Travelling Bananas
Matt Seinberg

My friend Becky from work came in the other day, holding a brown banana in her hand. It looked worse for wear. I asked her what happened to the poor thing.

I should know better by now not to ask stupid questions, because long, stupid answers always follow. This time was no exception. Her story was amusing; I just had to share it.

It was as any other normal morning in Becky’s house, except one thing was missing, a banana to have with her lunch. She decided in the course of her day before going to work, one of her errands would be buying a banana.

Does she buy the banana before doing all her errands or after? Since she had to buy some food for the house, Becky wisely decided to buy not one, but two bananas. One would be for a snack while running around doing all the other errands, and the other would be for work.

All the bananas she found were quite yellow, so she picked the two best she could find, got the rest of the items she needed, and went on her merry way, eating one of these delicious yellow bananas.

Little did she realize that during the course of this day, the weather would be quite warm, even though it’s still winter. What happens to a yellow banana when you leave it in a warm car, the window isn’t cracked and the banana is sitting on the top of the grocery bag?

Becky’s banana started to turn colour. At first, it wasn’t bad, so Becky wasn’t concerned. As she went from errand to errand, including the dry cleaner, visiting her mother and brother, and having lunch with friends, Becky decided to take the banana with her instead of leaving it in the warm car.

You can only imagine the strange looks Becky got everywhere she went, carrying this slightly brown banana. People kept looking at her like she was some sort of bad banana mother, treating it like some sort of evil step banana, not the yellow child banana it used to be only hours before.

Can you picture this sad banana sitting on the table in the restaurant, stared at by all her friends, either wanting to eat it before it went completely brown or disgusted by the slightly brown color it now was? Becky was in a quandary.

Should she eat the banana now while in the restaurant or try to save it for later when she had dinner at work, and hope it was still edible by then? Becky wisely or not decided to try to save it for later. She even went so far as to ask for a plastic bag and some ice at the restaurant, and put the banana in that, hoping to slow down the browning process.

Alas, bananas aren’t supposed to travel around town like some sort of pet. They don’t like it, and start to turn brown just to show how annoyed they are, hoping the soon to be banana eater will notice and, slowly peel off the skin and gobble them up.

By the time Becky got to work, the poor banana wasn’t looking to well. She put it in the refrigerator with the rest of her lunch, and hoped for the best.

The poor bananas fate was sealed. It was sick and tired of her carrying it around all day. During the next four hours, it turned even browner. Ironically, Becky didn’t even have time to have dinner that night, and saved her meal for the next day.

By the time Becky ate dinner, a surprise awaited her. The banana by this time was black and inedible. When she peeled the skin off, the fruit was brown and mushy. She said a prayer for the banana and threw it away.

The moral of the story is that if you buy two bananas at the same time, intending to “have one for later,� you best eat them now, because bananas don’t like to travel very much and they will turn brown.

Addendum

I was talking to my friend, Mike, about bananas. Given the wild and crazy guy Mike is, the following thoughts came spewing forth. I had to share them.

Bananas are an interesting fruit, used, as they are, in many contexts that have nothing to do with the fruit itself. There is "Bananas,� as in going bananas," going a bit crazy. "Peel open the truth, as a banana" is to get to the core of the issue. "Going to make like a banana and split," is to get away fast.

Of course, I could Dole out a bunch of bananas, I find these lines about bananas apPEALing. Most are side SPLITting jokes but some of them might make you go BANANAS!

There’s the rather risqué "big banana," the context having to do with a man's private parts. Men sometimes name their privates. Odd though, no man I know of has ever named his privates, "Chiquita." It must be something to do with her fruit hat.