"Once upon a Train"

[Papa Bear]

It was Hoppy's horse Topper, covered from head to hoof with a sticky reddish substance. "Well, Topper," Hoppy said smiling, "what kind of a jam have you gotten yourself into this time?"

"I think it's raspberry, sir. Martha Stewart brought a case of it with her," the porter said.

"Perhaps so," said Hoppy, "But since Martha isn't Martha, the question is, who canned these preserves? And how did Topper get topped with them? It's a totally different situation altogether."

"It's a totally different situation," everybody except Hoppy replied in unison.

"All right. It's time to get to the bottom of this," Hoppy declared. "I've got a plan. Let's...

 

[N Gauger]

tear through this pile of stuff and look for clues.....

They started looking for anything out of the ordinary, when "Lamont C" came into the car..

"What are you all doing"?

"We're looking for clues to figure out what the heck is going on here"

LC Hiked up his long coat and twisted his lips into a snicker.... He said......

"Who knows what evil lurks in a railroad train........... THE SHADOW KNOWS!!"

With that - he dissappeared.................or did he?...........

Hoppy & is posse started rummaging through the huge pile of postage, while the strawberry horse looked on.....

Then someone said.."Hey Hoppy - what are we looking for?".................

 

[ezdays]

...Hoppy replied, "beats me, but it's fun going through all this mail. Hey, here's one for Black Bart and another for a guy named Butch. It says here that they are to pick these letters up right here on the train post office."

"Stick em up!" came this voice from the back of the mail car.

"Uh, oh", said the group in unison. (It seems that they're doing that a lot lately.)

"OK, give me my mail, and while your at it, hand over the safe as well", said the masked stranger.

Well, the Stooges were never ones to refuse such a request and always so willing to help in their own way, so the picked up some letters and the safe and...

 

[N Gauger]

Ran towards the masked man with all this junk..

"here ya are mister - Don't Shoot!!!"

They... in stooge fasion.... dropped the safe "on" the masked mans foot. he cried out & pulled the trigger of the gun & shot...........

 

[ezdays]

....a shadow.... No, no, not THE Shadow, but his shadow.( that OK with you Mikey?) "Ouch!" exlamined the masked man, "that could have been me and not my shadow, that was too close. I'm giving up this train robbing business and dedicating the rest of my life to good."

Wow, what a conversion, but the shot did put a hole in the side of the car causing it to lose pressure. You see, back then, all rail cars had to be pressurized before they took that long hike up the Kazoo Pass, the highest peak in the state. Suddenly, everyone began to feel faint, the loss of pressure and the thin air was starting to get to them, then when it appeared that all hope was gone,....

 

[Papa Bear]

...the train hit a rough spot in the track causing the car to shake and a large trunk at the top of the great big pile of stuff to be dislodged. The trunk fell, grazed Larry's head, and broke open on the floor revealing a supply of oxygen tanks and masks. Hoppy and the masked man summoned what strength they had and put on oxygen masks, then helped the others put theirs on.

Soon everybody was breathing easier. Hoppy scraped up some of the jam to patch the hole and restored the cabin pressure. It was at that moment that they crested the summit of Kazoo Pass, so named because...

 

[ezdays]

.."once upon a time there was this propane gas tank car that was part of a consist. As it hit what is now known as "Kazoo Pass", the tank pressure was so great with all that thin air that it blew both ends of the tank out. Well, the results made the tank car look like a giant kazoo and hence the pass got a new name. And now you know the rest of the story," said the white-haired gentleman sitting in the parlor car.

"Aren't you Paul Harvey/" said the masked man. "THE Paul Harvey, of world-wide radio fame?

"Yep", said the white-haired guy. "I'm heading to San Francisco to a broadcaster's convention, and thought this train was heading that way."

"Uhh, Mr. Harvey, I gotta tell you the real rest of the story," said LC, "ya see boy, this here train, well, it's, uh, it's....

 

[Pitchwife]

...been going in circles ever since this story started. We will probably get to San Francisco, but when, is anybody's guess."
"What kind of way is that to run a railroad?" asked a voice from the other end of the car. "If I were in charge, all the trains would run on time!"
"And who might you be?" asked Paul.
"I'm Benito Moussolini," the man replied. "And I made sure the trains ran on time! Now what I would do is.....

 

[ezdays]

....before he had a chance to finish, Moe yelled, "get him boys!" As the three Stooges jumped, all they could grab at was air.

Nope, "that was just a spector" said Paul, " was it real, or was it because of the slightly underdone linguini and clam sauce we all had for dinner?".

Emeril heard that as was deeply offended. "hey, that was done al dente with just a hint of cellantro", he said.

Martha, who was really The Shadow, shouted, "WHERE DID YOU GET THE CELLANTRO, CREAP?" Now that really got Emeril's juices flowing as he picked up the pot of pasta and.....

Sidenote: Wait, folks, not another food fight, geeze, haven't we had enough of these on this train?

...to continue, Emeril picked up the pot of pasta and....

 

[N Gauger]

Flung it right toward martha - Martha dissappeared, proving that she was the real Lamont cranston..... But - where was the First Lamont Cranston... Where was the original Martha???

Where am I going with this?????

The real Martha, bounded through the car door, just as the pot o' pasta hit the car wall....

She screamed - "what a waste of food!!!"

Curly screamed - "Dont look at me when you say that!!!"

The train started picking up sped (It was heading down hill remember)

Everyone was pushed against the rear of the car & to their horror.. the pile of mail.........

 

[Papa Bear]

...suddenly began to float! The train was going so fast that the passengers were experiencing weightlessness. Curly took to the weightlessness like a fish takes to water. "Hey, I'm flyin'! Wheeeeeee!" he said. Martha said "I think I'm going to be sick!" but, mercifully, she wasn't. Finally, the weightlessness stopped and everyone came down with a great THUD.

"Well, at least the worst is behind us," said Emeril.

"I'm not so sure about that," replied Hoppy. "Look up ahead."

Everybody turned to look just in time to see...

 

[ezdays]

...Kazoo hill, not to be confused with Kazoo Pass. It's a well know fact that Kazoo Hill will turn the most seasoned engineer to quvering Jello. "Oh, jeeze, don't know if she'll take that 45% grade," said the seasoned engineer. "Seems like someone's protractor was out of calibration the day they laid those tracks."

"OK, buckle you seat belts folks," said the safety chief.

"Hey fella, you look familiar. How come you're here, how come there's seat belts on this train, and why did we pick this route that takes us down Kazoo Hill, and who in heven's name are you anyway?"

"Hey, hey, one question at a time, let's start with...", but before he could finish, the engine started to....

 

[N Gauger]

carreen around a curve - leading to the grade...... it shot down - ... uhh like a shot!!!

hit the hill full throttle - the brakeman applied the brakes - to try to slow them down, but - it wasnt helping much...

Everyone was pressed into their seats as the train went faster than it ever had before....

Then - the white haired man in his white coat stuck his head in the cab and said:

"Faster!!!!! We'll never make it unless we are going eighty eight Miles an HOUR!!!"

Well - we all know what happens next....

The engineer turned around to the "Doctor" and said.. "88 MILES AN HOUR?!?!?! -- this train cant go 88 mi.....

just then the lightening started ------- the special effects team was working OT on this one.....

The train - Hoppy - Harold hill - The man in black - Martha - Lamont - The Stooges - and the sherriffs - oh and Emeril - - all found themselves going through time - - only to wind up.........................................................................

 

[ezdays]

...in La La Land. "Los Angeles, Los Angeles, getting ready to stop in Los Angeles," says the conductor.

"Wait a minute," said the crowd in unison, "we were suppose to go back in time, not to another world, we want our money back."

"Refund, refund, REFUND?, we don't give out no stinkin' refunds," said John D., who was still aboard, but playing it cool for now. "We gotta find a way to reverse this time warp and get us back to where we were, but a few minutes before we were approaching Kazoo Hill. Anybody got any suggestions?"

"Well, I've got a few thoughts on this," said this kooky looking scientist with a rather large pocket pencil holder in his shirt pocket and huge, thick glasses. "You see, if we divide the speed of the train's kumbobulator fraction by the disenfranchised acceleration and multiply it by the square root of its hyperparabolic lattitudal function, it becomes very clear that....

 

[yellowlynn]

time

You're right. As Gomer Pyle would say "SHAZAM", and there they were. This time still going backward,but heading for Fools Curve that goes around Shootzkaboola Lake. Would they get slowed enough to make it, or get pasted onto Deaf Womans Bluff on the other side.
Only The Shadow knows, but nobody could find him (or her?) While everbody was spellbound, Lo and behold............

Lynn

 

[N Gauger]

....the train whipped around the curve - following the track - and all the spell bound passangers snapped out of it.... just in time to see......

 

[Pitchwife]

...another train heading straight for them (actually it was curving back and forth but was on the same track, anyway you get the idea). "That train looks mighty familiar." said Hoppy. "It sure does," said the conductor. "It should," said the scientest with the wild white hair, "It's US!" It seems that during all that traveling in time warps and other dimensions and whatnot, the train had split off another version of itself. "We can't let the two trains come together!" shouted the scientest. "The same matter cannot occupy the same space at the same time! If it does the whole universt could explode!" They could see themselves on the other train coming to the same conclusion, which was to be expected since they were the same people thinking the same things. As the two trains came closer together......

 

[ezdays]

...they all stuck their heads out the window to watch what was going on. All six of the Stooges got their heads together and came up with a plan, which we can assume that it was twice as bad as anything three Stooges could come up with. Their plan was simple, but effective, pull the emergency cord, the crazy-looking scientists will tell them exactly what time and what speed to do that. Both Docs quickly did some caculations and gave the figures to the scientists, 88 miles an hour would do the job once again, and yes, luckily there was a lightning storm just about where they were to pass each other.

"Are we ready?", said both scientists.

"You bet" said all the Stooges

"OK, on our counts of three, pull the cords, ONE....TWO....TWO and a half....TWO and three quarters.....THREE..E..E..E.....

 

[N Gauger]

All 6 stooges - pulled all 2 cords, at the count of both 3's....3's from the 2 scientists... and......

POP​

One of the trains dissappeared from the tracks... making everything right again.....

The train went merrily on it's way, steaming out of London England, in the early 1920's...... Heading toward Italy. As everyone quietly sat in their cars, enjoying the calming ride.....

Nothing's changed - Right???? Everything's normal.......

The train came to a sharp curve & Emiril cursed as his Lobster Flambe' scooted across the counter - he caught it just before...........................

 

[ezdays]

...he realized that he started out making Jumbalya with fresh shrimp, sausage, peppers and lots of hot sauce. "How can that be," he thought. "can we still be in a time warp? We were on our way to LA LA Land and now we're just pulling out of London. Hmm, Hoppy has been living in a time warp, maybe he knows."

As he made his way into the baggage car where Hoppy was still looking after his horse and sorting through the mail, he ran into the kooky-looking scientist. "Hey, you still look familiar, aren't you that Dr. guy on The Simpsons TV show?"

"Well, now that you asked, yes I am. But I can explain what happened. Someone pulled the cord out of sync with the modulated disreflected fignewton, resulting in a skew of the elightened fractascopic funtimental harmonic and hence, we slipped a few coggs in the old timing belt."

"Wow, thanks for the explaination, but can you explain that" as he pointed to....