$1,000,000

That’s a lot of money. Oohh, Dan. Amazing revelation. You ought to write a book. Sharp as a disposable razor blade. How long did you go to school to figure that one out?

OK, I know. You have to be about as sharp as a bowl of Cream of Wheat to figure out that a million bones is a meaty chunk o‘ change.

Quick question: What would you do if you had a million bucks? (Please, no answers involving orphans, famine, or TV ministries.)

If I had a million bucks, I would have to do something completely crazy with it, something completely bizarre. Surprised? I didn’t think so.

If I had a million bucks, I would start my own town—Abstraction, Idaho. In this town, I’d run a water buffalo ranch and my water buffaloes would produce the best water for miles around. Water does come from water buffaloes, doesn’t it?

And my water buffalo ranch would have nothing but palm trees on it because you know how water buffaloes really love coconuts. Yeah, that’s the ticket. And I wouldn’t use dogs to herd my water buffaloes either. What would I use? Hmm. Aardvarks. Of course! I’d buy a pair of big, huge aardvarks—the biggest I could find—I’m talkin’ an aardvark that could bench press a Toyota. Yeah, and I’d make both of them wear those Gold’s Gym sweatshirts wherever they went. And I’d name them my two favorite names in the whole world—Cecil and Thor.

Yeah.

The only non-crazy part about it would be that I’d own a couple of Ferraris. I mean, I think just about everybody would snatch up a couple of those babies if they had a million bucks. Of course, one of my Ferraris would be purple with white polkadots and the other one would be painted camouflage (so everybody wouldn’t be staring when I drove it around, don’t you know), but when you get right down to it, a Ferrari is a Ferrari.

Then I’d sit on the porch of my water buffalo ranch on hot summer nights in a rocking chair flanked by my aardvarks, and sip a nice, tall, cool, foamy glass of imported milk. Somewhere in the background, I’d have a gigantic 20-foot-tall bug zapper doing its thing. Then I’d take a puff from my pipe and say to Cecil and Thor: “You know boys, some day all this will be yours.”

That’s a beautiful picture, isn’t it? Yeah, and that’s just my own personal, little fantasy. You’ve probably all got a few of your own little quirks that you’d satisfy if you had a million bucks.

Yes, sir. $1,000,000 sure does sound like a lot of cash. To most people that is. I mean, to some people, it’s probably like a drop in the bucket. Like that guy who just whipped Mike Tyson’s butt. What was his name now? James Buster Keaton, Doug James Dustbuster? Whatever. A million bucks was only a mere fraction of his latest paycheck.

Anyway, I’m one of the people who thinks a million bucks is the whole bucket, so if you ever hear that I made my first million and you need to borrow a couple of bucks, you know where to find me.