Another influential and potentially cranky area resident has decided ‘enough is enough’ and has thrown his considerable prestige, not to mention his quite impressive hand-to-hand combat skills, in with the growing chorus of people who now feel that Lamont has gone long enough without a device that most other real, normal, fully-functioning towns have had for well over 100 years, the obviously misunderstood yet humble 'flush toilet'. Mr. Toranaga, when he is not out crushing his enemies or throwing invading Mongol hoards back into the sea where they belong, lives at 1102 Garfield St in Lamont where he tends his rock garden, writes haiku poetry in some strange language that doesn’t even use real letters, and has friends over for some highly ritualized tea ceremony that no Westerner could ever really understand. (and that takes about 8 hours to complete, for Pete's sake!)“Well, this is bushido!” said the outwardly calm yet obviously agitated local warlord whose bloodline stretches back unbroken for over 200 generations – almost as long as the Emperor of Japan's himself. “It is bad enough that the area firefighters thought they could fight fires the way Japanese peasants fought them in the 16th Century – by carting water in buckets to the fire – and although the buckets these people chose to use were somewhat bigger, the concept was still the same – only the scale was different. So, just like using a fire hydrant is an idea whose time has come, it is also time for Lamont to break out of its shocking lethergy and put in a flush toilet. I mean, come on!” said Toranaga-sama in a calm, cool voice that lets everyone know that heads are about to roll, quite literally, if his sage advice is not heeded promptly. “Heck, in rural Japan in the 15th and 16th centuries, using your Western calendar, of course, even the most primitive of Eta or the lowliest shopkeeper could manage some kind of setup for the so-called ‘call of nature’. So, if these uneducated peasants could manage this feat over 500 years ago, can someone please tell me why Lamont has not been able to accomplish this after 100 years of being a town in the country that put a man on the moon? Sheesh! That is pretty sad" he said thoughtfully while shaking that big helmet-looking thing with those frightening although somewhat impractical horns back and forth or whatever.
(Editorial Note: The term ‘Bushido’ refers to the Samurai code of conduct, and should not be confused with a similar local word that somehow refers to one of several of those unfortunate ‘cow byproducts’ that make Lamont so famous. So before you church ninnies go getting all up in arms shouting from the rooftops “The Lamont Blog cussed, the Lamont Blog cussed!!”, might we suggest you do a little research, maybe in the soon to be open Lamont Library, and/or read the quite excellent book “Shogun” by James Clavell. I know reading a book will naturally lower your social standing within your relative social network, but opening up yourself to the world can only provide a level of comfort and understanding that is so obviously lacking in a life filled with watching cows graze, badmouthing the Town, shoveling manure (same thing as badmouthing the Town!!) and watching Gunsmoke reruns while eating pork rinds. Thank you!)
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