Previously : phatic met Beanie at the drugstore in downtown Regensburg, a stone's throw from the Police station. "You can drug us, you can use us," Beanie said. "But you have to answer to," phatic continued. "Oh-ooh, the Guns of Brixton," the concluded, simultaneously. All the while, somewhere else : "No, this isn't a time marked by prefiguration and fullfilment," I remarked to one of my young, handsome students who just had to -- or so he thought, this smart, but somewhat precocious little devil -- extract some details from yours truly to plug into his paper. "But you said it's nationalist time, mister, I mean Sir, Sir," the student said. "I did, but /that/ ain't no nationalist time." "So what is it then?" asked he. And I shan't bore you with the rest of this boring, long winded (langweilig, one of those more onomatopoetically sounding German phrases) "conversation" -- you ain't get something for... or other, as my grandma used to say. Anywhoo, let's return to phatic and his friend. They are still in downtown Regensburg. Beanie has a proposal, or even proposition, some say. "phatic, if you don't mind me addressing you in the lower case?" "Not at all," phatic responded gentlemanly. "I have a proposition to make." "You do?" "Yes. All swans are white." "Now, that's a grand proposition to make. Let me stop the story here so I can write down..." phatic made no haste but slowly stopped typi n g . . . After word : "This ain't no proper story," the dustbin operator declared. "I got no coherent narrative," continued the charlatan from Cameroon. "Yeah, and confusing dialogue, to boot," said the critic with lit.crit. "Is there any redeeming character to the tale?" Wordily, -tor Us low Noh-way