“Hey Buckwheat!  Look, it came!” exclaimed Davy as he burst through the kitchen door.  

Joshua looked at the box that Davy held in his face.  “What?  What is it?”  

“Remember that ad for the hand-powered word processor I showed you in the back pages of Nude Volleyball Magazine?  I sent for one, and it's here!” 

“You actually ordered one of those?”  

“Ha!  And you thought it was just a scam,” laughed Davy.  

Joshua watched as Davy excitedly ripped into the box.  

“See, look!  It even came with an owner’s manual, he said, tossing the manual toward Joshua. 

Joshua thumbed through the manual while Davy continued to rummage through the packing material before he exclaimed, “Look!  See?  Here it is!”   

Joshua looked up from the manual at the object Davy was holding up.  “It's a pencil.” 

“It's not a pencil,” admonished Davy.  “It's a hand-powered word processor.  See? It even says so right on it.” 

Joshua read the engraving on the pencil.  “Crapco Hand Powered Word Processor.” 

“Isn't it great?” 

“How much did this thing cost?” 

“Seven ninety-five.” 

“You paid almost eight bucks for a pencil?” 

“I got a good deal because it came with free shipping and handling.” 

“Well,” said Joshua hesitantly, “at least it wasn't a total loss.” 

“And it came with this,” added Davy. 

Joshua looked at the object Davy was holding up.  “That's a pencil sharpener.” 

“No it's not,” retorted Davy as he continued to dig through the box.  “It's a Crapco Hand Powered Word Processor Recovery Device.” 

Joshua thumbed through the manual.  “Wow, sixty-four pages on how to use a pencil.  Someone has way too much time on their hands.” 

“Found it!” said Davy. 

Joshua looked up from the manual.  “What else did you get?” 

“It also came with this nifty Crapco Hand Powered Word Processor Editor.” 

“That's a rubber eraser,” quipped Joshua as he went back to perusing the manual. 

“Geez, you're such a Debbie Downer,” grumbled Davy. 

“I'm just being realistic,” replied Joshua as he thumbed through the manual.  “You could have bought a whole box of pencils, erasers and sharpeners for what you paid for that.” 

Davy shrugged.  “Yeah, I know, but at least it's for a good cause.” 

“What cause is that?” 

“Beats me,” replied Davy.  “They didn't say.” 

Joshua chuckled as he looked at the back of the manual.  “I think they had you in mind when they were identifying their target audience.” 

“What makes you say that?” asked Davy as he drummed the pencil on the table 

“Right here,” said Joshua, pointing to a sentence on the back cover of the manual. 

Davy read the sentence aloud: “Crapco.  If you buy this, you'll buy anything.”  Davy gave this a thoughtful pause before adding, “Oh well.  Maybe I can talk Dad into writing it off as a business expense so I can get some of my money back.”