Rubella, Colic and Gonorrhea

When he turned eight the alms man got chicken pox and gonorrhea. When he was six it was Rubella and colic, at five he caught the mumps from the neighbor’s daughter and was twice diagnosed with measles. He contracted gonorrhea from the neighbor’s dog, a Heinz—57 named Peabody. Peabody came down with Rubella and colic and a nasty bit of redeye. The alms man’s Japanese fighting-fish caught the measles and refused to eat the dissected mealworms and chowder the alms man sprinkled on the top of the fishbowl every morning at 25 ½ minutes past seven. He called the Japanese Embassy to inquire about diseases common to the Japanese fighting-fish and was told to remove them from the fishbowl, boil the water, then return the fish to the bowl. When this didn’t work and the fish continued to whoop and turn colours, the alms man’s da suggested he flush the lot of ‘em down the john and get a dog like most normal kids his age. When the chicken pox finally left the alms man was diagnosed with scabs and head lice and his mama was instructed to boil one of his da’s hankies, soak it in Kalama and wrap it tightly around her son’s head. His da had a bout of shingles earlier that summer and had used the hankie as a sweat-liner in his cap and forgotten to put the hankie in the linen hamper for laundering. So the alms man came down with a nasty bout of shingles that only made the scabs and head lice worse.