The Man Inside the Tin Can: Launcelot

(This is a biography.)

Now, I must admit that Howard Pyle got it pretty close when he wrote that Launcelot was raised by the Lady of the Lake. But he left out some important details, which are as follows: Launcelot was raised by the Lady of the Lakeside Resort, and many people did call her the Lady of the Lake. Pyle, however, decided to ignore the historical evidence and wrote a very unrealistic book. (I can assure you that I will never ever write a book that isn’t one hundred percent realistic.)

Anyway, I should now get down to fully explaining the life of Launcelot. In the early years of Arthur, when he was merely a big business tycoon, there was this lesser king called Ban who lived somewhere up north (probably in Canada). Ban had a son named Jack, and Jack loved to play with little toy knights. He would hold tournament after tournament after tournament with all his little friends.

One day, one of these friends said, “I don’t want to play jousting anymore.”

“Why not?” asked Jack. “Look, here’s how things work around here: I say we play something, AND WE PLAY IT. And I say we play jousting.”

“Look ‘Mr. Lance-A-Lot’, we’ve been playing jousting for the past two years straight. Why can’t we play something else?”

I think you’ll like Jack’s method of getting his way. He threatened to kick his friend out the window.

“I’d like to see you try,” the friend said.

So, Jack grabbed his friend, squashed him up into the general size and shape of a football, and drop-kicked him through the window. After that, Jack’s friends all gladly played jousting with him, and Jack christened himself Launcelot in honor of his lost friend’s nickname for him. (And he did lance a lot with his toy knights.)

***

One day, a sophomore at the South England Villains’ College decided to do something really evil. So he rented a big army and camped out on the west side of King Ban’s castle, intent on taking the castle by siege.

Everyday life in the castle went on as normal, if for no other reason than that the gate was on the east side, and there was a big chasm in between the castle and the villain-wannabe.

After a few hours hours of besieging Ban’s castle, the villain-wannabe went bankrupt. “Why on earth did I agree to pay this stupid army by the hour!” he shouted at his empty wallet, but his wallet merely drifted off through the air, it was so light.

So he dismissed his army and devised an ingenious plan to take the castle. (He probably would have gotten extra credit if it had worked.) Here’s what he did: First, he used an old, rusty time machine to go a few hundred years into the future. Once there, he stole a printing press and returned to his own time.

Second, he arranged the type and splattered it with ink, put a piece of paper in it and pressed it down. When he pulled out the paper, instead of the nice letter he had expected, he found a mishmash of gibberish. The writing was backward.

After several years of learning how to put the type in backwards, he used the printing press to make several nice, clean letters. He sent a “You have won…” letter to each person in the castle inviting them to take a FREE vacation at the Lakeside Resort.

When everyone was gone, the villain-wannabe—who now thought he was a true villain—walked boldly into the castle.

“Why, look there,” he said to himself. “Someone has left a football just lying around.”

He kicked at the football. When his foot was an inch from the ball, a hand popped out and grabbed his shoe. “Help me,” the football cried in a pitiful, tiny voice.

Even if the man failed miserably at being a villain, he did at least set a new high jump record!

***

Meanwhile, at the Lakeside Resort, Launcelot was playing with the Lady of the Lake’s son, and King Ban was talking to the Lady. She was telling him how nice and quiet her son was.

“Yes, he’s always real quiet and you know, he’s never cried, not even when he was a little baby. He doesn’t whine or complain about anything. I’m worried about him.”

“Wow,” said Ban. “I wish my little boy was like that.”

“Yeah, but sometimes I wish I had a more adventuresome son,” said the Lady.

“Hmm,” said Ban, looking around cautiously. “I wonder if, maybe, you’d be willing to trade children. My son is always making lots of noise in my castle and climbing the walls—it’s very embarrassing when guests come.”

The Lady agreed, and Ban walked over to his son. “Hi, son. Say, I wonder if you know where the Lady of the Lake’s son is.”

“Yeah, but he didn’t want to play with me.”

“So where is he?”

Launcelot pointed at a football that was lying on the ground and then ran off to find someone else to play with. From then on, Launcelot lived with the Lady of the Lake as his stepmother.

***

When Launcelot was older, he didn’t have any friends, despite his big football collection that he was willing to share.

One day, he decided to become a knight. He asked his stepmother about becoming a knight, and she told him all about chivalry, nobility, and kindness.

“Maybe, I don’t want to be a knight after all. It sounds BORING,” he said.

“Well,” said his stepmother, “there’s also lots of jousting and feasting, winning prizes like teddy bears at tournaments, and risking your life for your country.”

“Hmm, cut off that last bit, and it don’t sound too bad. But I’ll need a suit of armor. I wonder…” Launcelot went down to the city dump and collected several tin cans. He pulled some green bean cans onto his right leg and chili cans on his left. A few tomato cans fit nicely on his arms, and a shiny trash can with the bottom busted out went around his middle. Finally, he poked some holes in a nacho cheese can and set it on his head.

“Do I look like a knight now?” he asked his stepmother.

“No,” she said, giggling, “but Kroger might hire you as a mascot!”

Launcelot couldn’t afford a horse, so he had to settle for an old bicycle. He got a length of PVC pipe to use as a lance and a trash can lid for a shield. He flat out refused to use a crummy little plastic sword, so he got a rubber one. The rubber sword was very light and worked remarkably well, just so long as it wasn’t used in a fight.

Decked out in his shiny armor (he had torn the paper labels off the cans), Launcelot mounted his, um, “steed” and peddled his way toward Camelot, ready for anything that the world might throw at him (except, maybe, for the semi truck that nearly creamed him on the highway).

(This one is to be continued, so be afraid, be very afraid.)