Here is another story you can have for GetLost (it isn't exactly appropriate for my other publication venues). I posted it to Rec.Boats.Paddle this morning in response to Myron Buck's troll for "Shuttle tales From The Crypt".

Finishing up an off-season trip we elected to take a lay-over day is a small State Park in southern Pennsylvania, Caladonia SP.

Taking a mid-morning hike through the park Rob and I couldn't resist climbing a towering White Pine (the finest east coast climbing tree, with their "wagon wheel" array of branches). Eventually dismounting our lofty aerie we could find no trace of our ground-bound partners, Scott and Stu.

Rob and I searched about with no luck and, when a cold rain began to fall, we headed back to camp knowing that our missing comrades would soon appear in search of shelter and dry clothes.

Lunch came and went and still no Scott & Stu. Rob and I are now slightly concerned, but the missing dynamic duo are capable of taking care of themselves...they may be a bit eccentric - Scott is an anti-authoritarian birthright Quaker, Stu a divergent thinking atheist - but they are both experienced outdoorsmen... they're not gonna melt in a little rain.

Rob and I get a bonfire started to welcome back our cold, damp brothers upon their return and settle in under the tarp to wait. And wait. And wait some more. As afternoon stretches into evening and dusk begins to fall our slight concern edges closer to acute worry. They've been missing for nearly four hours, four hours in a cold rain...what the hell could have happen them?

I see Rob suddenly snap to attention, stare towards the park entrance and mutter "Oh shit!". I turn to follow his gaze and see, walking solemnly in our direction, a priest and a cop. This can't be good. My heart drops to my stomach as awful, ugly, final scenarios play through my mind...I'm so terror stricken that I don't even make an effort to hide our beers and other contraband from the approaching officer.

What could possibly have happened? What am I going to tell their folks? I'm already beginning to see their faces, haunting me. The stern faced cop, marching stride for stride with the priest, has the same penetrating gaze as my lifelong friend Scott...and the priest has a wild, unruly Stu-like beard...

....a wild, unruly beard on a priest??? Wait a minute - That IS Stu, solemnly approaching, hands clasped in prayerful repose, clad in full vestments. And Scott, stern faced, in blue uniform and Sam Browne belt.

Oh my god, I think, they've finally snapped and done something terrible...kidnaped their alter- egos and stolen their clothes...somewhere bound and gagged and shivering is a pissed off cop and a man of god thinking unchristian thoughts...

"What's up" asks Rob, as nonchalantly as he can.

"Come with me, my children" intones Stu, and motions for us to follow. We follow them out of the park to a large structure near the main road, where they push aside an unsecured door and escort us inside. They guide us through the darkened interior until we come to...

...a naked cop and priest???

...a portal into an alternate universe???

No. The costume room of the Totem Pole Playhouse, a vacant summer stock theater where Scott and Stu sought shelter from the rain. While Rob and I have spent the afternoon anxiously fretting for their safety, Scott and Stu have been merrily frolicking in costume, putting on two-man plays and penciling their names on the dressing room doors.

Overwhelmed with relief and comprehension, I never thought to ask why the ballerina outfits lay in disarray on the floor. Or maybe I just really didn't want to know...

Mike McCrae stalks the Fuller Brush Man with a small teasing comb when he's not on the river or writing about paddling. He previously wrote A Bridge Too Far for the September issue of Get Lost Magazine.