Once upon a time there was a poor couple who lived in a small flat in an inner city suburb. Soon after she quit smoking, the wife fell pregnant, and experienced insatiable cravings for nicotine. She nagged her husband day and night, until he was forced to steal a packet of cigarettes from the corner shop just to shut her up. However, the shop manager caught him in the act, and was furious.
“Please,” begged the husband, “my wife is pregnant and she cannot live without these cigarettes.”
“You can keep the cigarettes,” said the manager in disgust, “but as soon as that child is born, you must hand it over to the child welfare department.”
The husband, thinking his wife would prefer cigarettes to a baby, hastily agreed. Nine months later the child was delivered into foster care and was named Nicotine.
Years passed and Nicotine became a beautiful and intelligent girl. She wanted to top English in the HSC, so she locked herself in her bedroom to study. Her foster parents begged her to reinvent her social life. They wailed,
“Nicotine, Nicotine, let down your hair!”
Nicotine would open her door and calmly explain that she wanted to top English in the HSC, before disappearing into her room.
One day, a boy from a local private school wandered past Nicotine’s house and heard her parents beg her,
“Nicotine, Nicotine, let down your hair!”
Nicotine replied that she wanted to top English in the HSC. The private school boy also wanted to top English in the HSC, so he began to plot ways to distract her from studying. He stood under her window and called out,
“Nicotine, Nicotine, let down your hair!”
Nicotine opened her window and suggested he do something anatomically improbable with himself. Before she knew it, the private school boy had shimmied up the drainpipe and into her room. He promised her raves, parties and acid trips. Nicotine thought he was pretty boring, so she ignored him and reread King Lear instead.
Every night, the private school boy would stand outside the window and call,
“Nicotine, Nicotine, let down your hair!”
Every night Nicotine would swear at him while he broke into her bedroom, until one day her conservative foster mother happened to open the door and spot a boy in her daughter’s room. In a rage, she threw Nicotine out of the house and advanced on the private school boy, who made a hasty esape through the window and broke his arm. For weeks he did nothing but worry about all the study Nicotine would be doing, until one day he ran into her at a bus stop. Relieved, he began to babble to her about marijuana, but Nicotine was fed up with him, so she hit him over the head with King Lear and stalked off. He never saw her again.
Nicotine ended up topping English in the HSC. The private school boy, consumed with worry, failed all his exams and ended up working at McDonalds.
Who’s smarter now?