An Evening's Events at the Marshmallow Factory (standard:Psychological fiction, 1447 words)
Author: GXD	Added: Oct 23 2008	Views/Reads: 3814/2405	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
This tall tale reveals how rational thinking leads to an unexpected conclusion.

Click here to read the first 75 lines of the story

On one visit I  brought some sample pins I intended to show, but when I
put  a hand in my pocket, the big, burly security guard clamped his ham 
of a hand over mine.  The pins remained tightly clenched in my fist. 

Six people interviewed me (three purchasing agents, a production
supervisor, an engineer and the plant psychologist).  Each one  sat 
behind a heroic-sized desk in a bare room, leaving the little wooden 
bench for me. They found hundreds of excuses for turning down my offer 
of a better product for a lower price.  After the grilling, the 
security guard let me take my hand out of my pocket.  Encrusted in my 
palm were the half-dozen pins I was planning to show them when he 
grabbed it.  They didn't seem too fussy about my blood when they 
plucked them out and examined each one with a lens. In the end, they 
gave me samples of their pins and an order for twenty thousand. 

It was easier at the next auto factory.  They wanted thirty thousand.  I
drove right by the third manufacturer: the grapevine would get us 
together, eventually.  I needed time to move in and get cozy with the 
competition. 

When I got back, there were boxes and bins full of rivets and pins
stacked high along the walls on all sides.  Some aisles were blocked 
with stacks of boxes. 

"Stop, stop!" I shouted over the din of machinery, "we've made our
quota."  I grabbed a handful of pins from a box and compared them with 
the one in my bandaged hand.  They were identical.  After measuring it 
sixteen ways from Sunday and testing its hardness we were sure: they 
really were identical.  We shipped the whole fifty thousand.  A week 
later, orders began to flood in from all sides.  Since then, "The 
Marshmallow Factory" grew to become chief pinmaker to the Auto 
Industry. Years went by without incident. 

It was now ninety-five years since Marshmallow had built his factory. 
We were turning out two million pins a day and shipping them to the 
manufacturers of baby carriages, bicycles, golf carts, automobiles and 
trucks in 135 countries.  The freight forwarder kept a dozen people 
busy full time just shipping our pins.  Operations had become more and 
more automatic, so I still had only three workers -- one for each shift 
-- and I still paid them peanuts. 

During one two-week vacation, I hired this guy from the University of
Florida who showed up with a couple of chimpanzees.  In less than an 
hour he trained them to load the reels of metal and to stack the boxes 
against the wall.  It impressed me: those chimps certainly were strong 
for their size.  But in the end, when we worked it out, the cost of 
their food and lodging, medical attention and rental fee came to more 
than I was paying my people.  The poor fellow was crestfallen.  He went 
back to Florida with the chimps and my workers never found out about 
it. 

I suppose the business was a success: I certainly made a great deal of
money.  Only my lawyer and my accountant knew how much -- and where it 
was stashed.   I hadn't made a sales call for years and never wasted a 
penny on advertising.  When people wanted pins, they came to 
Marshmallow's.  Whenever the older buyers in the auto plants retired, 
they left little notes for the bright young boys and girls who replaced 
them to buy their pins at Marshmallow's.  Nobody ever questioned that 
edict.  If nothing else, Marshmallow pins were certainly consistent.  
Our pin No. 13350-A had precisely the same dimensions and tolerances it 
had sixty years ago.  It had the same hardness, the same color and the 
same surface finish -- even the same bevel on the end.  There is, after 
all, something to be said for stability and consistency in the face of 
change. 

However, I set out to tell another story.  It was midnight, but the
graveyard shift hadn't come in yet. . . . . 

Seattle, August 25, 2008 Gerald X. Diamond All rights reserved


Tweet