The Humor of Patrick F. McManus Quiz

Answer: A running battle ensued

Pat McManus has a wonderful way of sneaking up on the reader with his writing style. It had been years since I read "A Fine and Plesant Misery" and this line snuck up on me again. Probably because I have been in these 'running battles' many times.

Answer: Cigars, logging trucks and know-it-alls

In his classic story "Cigars, Logging Trucks and Know-It-Alls" Pat hilariously explains how cigars can create havoc when the driver of a car edging along a mountain road with a sheer drop at one side, thinking he is smoking a pipe, closes his hand around the lit end of a cigar.
The logging trucks appear at the end of a narrow five mile mountain road and the car load of fishermen are forced to back the five miles to the previous turnout just ahead of the truck.
Know-it-alls say things like: "Get on across. The ice is thick enough to hold you up if you walk fast enough. There now, didn't I tell you to walk fast?"

Answer: Astride a barstool in the nearest resort

A classic line from a classic humor writer. "The Rescue" is a story about strangers trying to help Pat even though he doesn't need it. In this case, he and Mort are rescued by an old couple who are hard of hearing. They grab the old couples' boat with their hands and are towed very rapidly through the large waves to shore. Standing on the dock after their rescue, Mort said, "Look at it this way. First we probably wouldn't have survived if they hadn't towed us to shore. Second, we're standing on the dock soaking our hands in the water and we don't have to bend down."

Answer: You're afraid of the dark

There's nothing like an older sibling to tell it like it is.

"The Mountain Man" tells of a young Pat spending endless days studying mountain men so that he could live off the land when he got older. His family, especially Gram, insisted there was no money in being a mountain man but, as a kid, Pat didn't care about money. As happens with most childhood dreams, Pat never did become a mountain man.

Answer: He laughed so hard he fell off the porch and injured his drinking arm

This is the hilarious prelude to the actual story, which involved Rancid Crabtree and an outhouse, spooks in a rotting cabin and golden trout. Rancid was the only person who knew how to get to 'No Whar Lake'. More than once, while giving them directions, he told the boys he was too old and feeble to get there.

After they were scared out of their wits in the cabin and returned, he was gone off in the woods. The story is told as a mystery and McManus leaves the reader to figure out for himself that Rancid was the 'spook' that scared them half to death.

Answer: If you'd been here sooner you would have seen us when we were still on fire

The deputy first asked if they knew anything about an explosion.
"What kind of an explosion?" Retch asked.
"A BIG explosion."
Later the deputy asked, "Don't reckon they'll ba another one, do you?"
"Nope" was their answer.

Answer: stop hangin' around with you

They find Murph in a bar fighting with the owner, Fat Edna. A man in a white suit, a stranger, wants to go along. Finding out he is a lingere salesman, Pat realizes the man is falling in with bad comapny.
Does the trip end in disaster?
Suffice it to say that Pat, Rancid, Fat Edna, and Murph are all piled in the cab of Pinto Jack's pickup tearing back down the narrow mountain road with a swarm of bees on their tail. The man in the white suit is clinging to the outside of the passenger door.
"Good thing you got a runnin' board out there," Rancid observes.
"Runnin' board?" Pinto Jack asks. "There ain't no runnin' board on that side!"
Then follows the classic line: "Better use yer brakes fer this hairpin turn up ahead, Pinto. They's a big dropoff on this side."
"Brakes?" Pinto asks.

Answer: The Full Bore Linear Panic

The Stationary Panic is a type of panic his wife, Bun, taught him once when she was about to step on a snake. She jumped up and down and repeated a high pitched chittering while flailing the air with her arms. Pat modified it by changing the chittering to an Austrian drinking song and varying the jumps to a folk dance. He recommends throwing in a few Russina squat kicks for style.
Using the MSP can get the panic of realizing you are lost out of your system without ending up in the next county.
Pat claims that after he once led a Full Bore Group Panic through a wild area of mountains the power company took advantage of the swath they made in the forest and strung electric lines along it.

Answer: Somewhere between damn cold and ice

According to Pat, they would have liked to have said that they remained in the liquid ice until the mushroom hunters passed, but that wouldn't have been the truth. To their advantage, however, they appeared to have been wearing blue leotards as they raced through the woods. And, fortunately, a very bad twelve letter word froze on Retch's lips and didn't thaw out for an hour.

Answer: A well done sirloin

Knowing a little about cows, I doubt they are smart enough to make the connection. But it sure makes for a funny story.
In "The Great Cow Plot" Pat remembers that in his youth a cow known as The Bull kept fishermen out of a very good stretch of fishing water. Word got around when The Bull had passed on and he was on his way to fish the creek at once. The Bull got the last laugh as it had died right by the best fishing hole, thereafter called Dead Cow Hole.