Why I love The New Yorker Part LXXVII:

[Richardo]

[frazzled]

1. My favorite of all time

If you can't read it (it's old, from 1989, and this is a crappy jpg), it says:

1. Call Bank

2. Dry Cleaner

3. Forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race.

4. Call mom.

[A HERETIC I AM]

2. How many that might see your post will actually know what the "smithy" really means?

BTW, A very funny cartoon.

[nolabear]

3. I do! I do!

and both posts are great.

[frazzled]

4. I think anyone who grew up in Indiana and had to memorize

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's "The Village Blacksmith" (which was de rigueur (required) when I was a kid, and I've never forgotten it):

UNDER a spreading chestnut tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands. ...

Honestly, you think people have never heard of blacksmiths or a smithy (blacksmith's workshop; forge)?

[A HERETIC I AM]

6. "Honestly, you think people have never heard of blacksmiths or a smithy"

Actually, Yes I do think (many) people have never heard of blacksmiths or a smithy or rather, really have no idea what the context of the reference in the quote actually refers to.

Ask the next newly graduated high schooler you meet what two bodies of water the Suez Canal connects.

Ask them any number of simple questions that you and I might take for granted as common knowledge.

No, certainly most younger people have no clue whatsoever what a 'smithy' is. Nor do they have any idea of what it took to operate one, the products to come out of one and what kind of person did so.

[frazzled]

7. I think you underestimate our schools

It would be interesting to do a survey to see who knows what a blacksmith is.

[burrowowl]

5. New Yorker Toons

ARE GREAT!