Prozeugma

Prozeugma (pro-zoog’-ma): A series of clauses in which the verb employed in the first is elided (and thus implied) in the others.

I went to the grocery store. To the place she calls home. To where the meat, the vegetables, the fruit, the bread, the canned goods, the baked goods, the dog food darken the bins and fill the shelves and coolers. To the scene of her cheating ways.

I hid behind the nut display across from the butcher counter. I heard her say, “Can you slip me some salami between my buns?” My head nearly exploded—I could feel my brain bubbling. In fact, I could hear and feel it in my spine. Then the butcher said, “Sure Mrs. Wolf, I’ll slip it right between those two buns.”

When I heard that, my brain actually exploded. It was a small explosion. So small that I survived. I was taken by ambulance to the hospital for observation. My wife came to visit me. She told me she had something for me and pulled a sandwich out of the paper bag she was carrying. It was salami on a Kaiser roll, slathered with mustard.

I gasped. With my mildly exploded brain I couldn’t think clearly, but I knew she was trying to cover up her cheating ways. I decided to confront her at the grocery store when she was making another order from the butcher. I hid behind the nut display.

She said, “You’re probably the wrong person to say this to, but I think your nuts are rather small. Let’s have a look at them.” He said, “Okay, we’ll see.” He came from behind the counter and he and my wife walked toward the nut rack where I was hiding. It was a revelation—they weren’t talking about the butcher’s nuts. She wasn’t cheating!

I held tight and they didn’t see me behind the rack. They walked back the counter and the butcher went back behind it. I bought a big can of shelled pecans and made my wife a pecan pie. She called me to tell me she was standing in the grocery store parking lot with a Red Hot wiener in her hand. A wheel had fallen off her shopping cart and it tipped over and spilled everything on the parking lot. The package of wieners had torn open and she was picking the scattered wieners up and putting them in a shopping bag. That’s when I heard the butcher say laughing, “Look here!I’ve got a wiener that’s pink and smooth—no dirt.” Did he pick it up or whip it out?

I told her I loved her and that I had a big surprise for her. It wasn’t pecan pie.