This is a “caco story” that Delbert just told me yesterday on the phone. I swear to you he rehearses these to commit them to memory so he can pull them out like trading cards in his social interactions. This one he heard from Bill, and I had forgotten all about it.
Every year on St. Patrick’s Day, Bill remembers Ned. First he buys a Statuette from a local Comic Book Shop that he thinks Ned would have liked, then he takes it to Ned’s parents, who put it in a special display cabinet they have exclusively for Ned’s things.
Then he goes to Ned’s Grave and remembers. Ned started smoking cigarettes before any of the rest of us, and he made it some weird rebellious centerpiece of his personality. So Bill sticks a cigarette up on the grave site and lights it, and smokes one as the cigarette burns down. I guess it’s kinda like pouring out a drink.
Anyway, apparently I was with Bill one time at the yearly remembrance, and he stuck a cigarette in the ground, as was his custom. I was still smoking at the time. The cigarette went out before it could burn down, so after I was done with mine, I picked the cigarette up out of the dirt, brushed it off, and smoked it anyway.
No way I’m letting a perfectly good cigarette butt go to waste!