“Ant farms?’

Arthur sat on the other side of his desk. His countenance was inscrutable. But that was what he’d said, wasn’t it?

“Yes. Clearly. Take it from me.”

“But everything?”

“Traditional investments are faltering. The bubble is going to burst. Real estate, energy, pork bellies. It’s all going to crash.”

“But not ant farms.”

“Did you ever hear of an ant farm crash?”

“No. But I’ve never heard of anyone who has invested in them either.”

“Exactly. Corner the market. Sell everything.”

Arthur had been my investment advisor for pretty much as long as I had been investing. But he’d obviously lost it. Maybe it was those pink pills he kept popping.

“Where would I even go to make such an investment.”

“I know a guy.”

“What’s his name? Peter Pismire?”

Arthur didn’t smile. He’d used to have a sense of humor.

“No, no. Gregory Glockenspiel.”

“Huh?’

“That’s his name.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“No, really. Mind like a steel trap. Known him since the University. The business faculty was in awe of him.”

“Glockenspiel? Spelled like glockenspiel?”

“Wonderful wife. Dorothy. Beautiful teeth. What a smile! No, maybe Ginger.”

“Ginger Glockenspiel?”

“That’s the ticket. Beautiful teeth. Interior designer. Big armoires of gleaning mahogany. Aspidistras. Not Glockenspiel though. She kept her name.”

“That’s understandable.”

“Manischewitz.”

“Like the wine. Like Sammy Davis Jr. saying, ‘Man, oh Manischewitz?'”

Arthur was scribbling on the back of one of his business cards.

“Here,” he said, poking it at me. It was the name and phone number of Glockenspiel. “Give him a call. Ant farms.”

“One hundred percent?”

“Absolutely.”

“I don’t know,” Glockenspiel said on the phone. “Ever since Arthur started taking those pills…”

His voice trailed off.

“So you don’t recommend that I sell everything and invest it all in ant farms/”

“Here’s the thing, Steve. It’s Steve, isn’t it.”

“Mike.”

“Here’s the thing, Mike. There’s been this buzz about the Department of Education is going to mandate that all elementary schools buy ant farms and use them as instructional aids. Teach diligence, social skills, that sort of thing. God knows we need something like that. But even if they do, whatever happened to a diversified portfolio?”

“My thoughts exactly.”

“Right, Steve. I advise you invest no more than half of your assets in ant farms. The other half should go into alligator lagoons in Florida.”

Holy shit, this guy was as crazy as Arthur.

“Do you know that there are 1.3 million alligators in Florida?” Glockenspiel was saying. “That’s about one alligator for every twenty people. This is an untapped asset, Steve. Wily entrepreneurs are beginning to take notice. It won’t just be purses and belts and shoes anymore. No, say sayonara to that New York strip steak. It will be alligator steaks everywhere. They’re already putting alligator meat in the turtle soup in New Orleans. Do you know how much it costs to raise a beef cow to maturity and slaughter it? How damaging the whole enterprise is to the environment? Alligator lagoons, Steve. That and ant farms should make your financial future secure.”

When he’d finally run down, I asked how Ginger was doing.

“Who?”

“Your wife.”

“Oh, you mean Bunny?

“Yeah, Bunny Maneschewitz.”

“Fine, fine. Her dental practice is thriving.”

That evening I poured myself a stiff Scotch and examined my last stock prospectus. It was grim. It was diversified. Multiple opportunities for failure. Then I looked at the Bible: the WSJ. Sebastian Smeedle, one of the most astute economic commentators in my humble opinion, had a piece. “There is a lot of talk about Ant Farms and Alligator Lagoons,” Smeedle wrote. “But beware of those who extoll their virtues. True, a huge economic collapse is on the horizon. But what you want to invest in is MET.”

I felt a bit out of it. Invest in the Metropolitan Museum of Art? The Metropolitan Opera? Surely not! What was MET? The gurus of the internet told me: “Monetary Electronic Tokens.”

Looking into it further, I found Smeedle noting: “What is money worth anyway? Nothing without belief. Faith. That’s what makes any economic currency valuable. Confederate money had a brief period of belief and value. Does anyone try to spend Greek drachmas today? Or beaver pelts? Get on the bandwagon with MET. That’s where the action is.”

I called Arthur.

“What do you think about MET?” I asked.

“Huh?” Arthur said, sounding groggy and sodden. I knew that he got into his cups after five or so but I was desperate.

“MET, Arthur. Monetary Electronic Tokens.”

“Is that you, Steve?”

“No, Mike.”

“MET is SHIT, Mike. You can take it to the bank.”

He hung up, leaving me uncertain as to why I would want to take shit to the bank. Wasn’t the whole point that I didn’t want to take shit to the bank?

Desperate, I called Gregory Glockenspiel at his home number, which Arthur had helpfully written on the back of his card.

“He’s in a ZOOM meeting,” said a female voice. “Absolutely can’t be interrupted.

“Is this Ginger?”

“No, Bunny.”

“Sorry. Bunny.”

“Yes.”

“I wanted to talk to him about MET?”

“Oh, I can tell you all about that. It’s great. Do you want an appointment? Call Amy in my office tomorrow. We just had a cancellation and can get you in.”

“MET, Bunny, MET.”

“Yes, yes, of course. Maxillary Electronic Titillation. It will make your gums sing like a tuning fork having an orgasm. I’ve seen it. I’ve heard it.”

What the hell did a tuning fork having an orgasm sound like anyway? I guess maybe I’d find out. While that was going on maybe I could figure out my finances. And whether ant farms would be in my portfolio.

————

Rick Kast is a lawyer who never quite got over being an English major and has written fiction and humor pieces since the late Pleistocene. He lives in Charlottesville, Virginia, with his wife and Nigel Tawny, a large orange cat. In addition to writing, his hobbies include cooking, gardening, listening to music, and engaging in snappy repartee with computerized phone calls. In addition to this fine publication, his works have appeared in several journals, some of which actually still exist. His novels Romance with Variations, Three-Part Invention, and his short story collection Hear His Cosmic Laugh, Mister Dog are available on Amazon and elsewhere where books are sold.