Cordarounds Adventurer Emeritus Wellington Stack has always been ready to take his Cordarounds to the limit, whenever and wherever duty calls.  Recently, we asked him to subject our trousers to a grueling test of gluttony – and report back in time for the Thanksgiving holiday.  The question at hand:  Could Cordarounds survive a stomach-expanding meal of Thanksgiving-like proportions, without its button rocketing forth from its stitching?  Mr. Stack’s dispatch follows.

BY WELLINGTON STACK

A crisp, October morning found me in a somnolent tavern in the meat-weaving district of Kathmandu, utterly exhausted, a flagon of rakshi in hand.  I had arrived from the Nepalese hinterland only days earlier after one of the most difficult Cordarounds field tests yet.  It had left me bloodied, concussed and in need of an appendectomy – to say nothing of my Cordarounds, which were dusty and redolent of soot and yak dung.  But that’s the price one pays for two days of nonstop breakdancing with angry Gurkhas to assess the durability of our zippers.  Now, I was recuperating with strong drink and an indomitable will to survive another day – and put another pair of Cordarounds through its paces.

Be careful what you wish for!  No sooner than had I taken off my boots and curled up for a nap that the satellite phone rang.  It was headquarters, instructing me to catch the next flight to Atlanta, Georgia, where, in advance of Thanksgiving, I would subject a fresh pair of Cordarounds to the rigors of a greasy, gluttonous meal.  If I failed, horizontal corduroy would have no place at the dinner table on Turkey Day!  And the ghost of Miles Standish would surely haunt me forever.  I quickly gathered my rucksack and souvenir “Kat Man Dude” tee-shirts, bade Chhongba a tearful farewell, and headed for the airport.

Two days and 8,000 miles later, my Olive Cordarounds and I arrived at venerable Mulligans Bar to take on the Ultimate Hamdog.  (Lindland scientists had concluded that with a side of tater tots and several cans of beer, the Ultimate Hamdog was the caloric, if not aesthetic, equivalent of a full Thanksgiving meal.)  Soon, the mélange of hot dog, hamburger, bacon, cheese, onions, chili and egg arrived at the bar in a formidable, steaming heap.  This would not be an easy task, certainly no less challenging than my last unicycle dash across the DMZ while eating a sack of kimchee.  I took a deep breath, and drew my first forkful.

Seemingly disinterested in my gustatory adventure were the precious few bar patrons – just a small group of very short men drinking Schnapps and throwing darts, and a gentleman in a waist coat and baggy breeches, who had introduced himself as an adult-diaper salesman.  This was lonely work indeed.  At times like these, my old friend Chhongba used to say that it is good to fight like the leopard, but it is also good to run like the hare, and, sometimes, it is wise to sit like a melancholy bull and say nothing.  I used this thoughtful but ultimately inappropriate piece of wisdom to distract me from a growing feeling of suffocation.  So much meat, and in so many forms!  I’ll admit that I thought about quitting.  But each time I felt my mouth filling beyond its natural limits with fat and oozing cheese, I thought about the Pilgrims.  I thought about America.  And I looked down at my lap and thought about my Cordarounds.  

So I pressed on.  After what seemed like an eternity, a gentle hand came to rest on my shoulder.  It was the adult-diaper salesman.  “A job most well-done, my friend,” he said, motioning toward my empty plate.  Empty!  As if emerging from a dream, I realized that I had somehow managed to eat the entire Ultimate Hamdog.  And my pants had weathered the strain without so much as a loose stitch!  Yes, Cordarounds had passed the gluttony test.  As I dialed headquarters to deliver the good news, I couldn’t help announcing to everyone in the bar that horizontal corduroy was now officially Thanksgiving-approved.

“What the hell does that mean?” one of the dart throwers barked.  The adult-diaper salesman slowly turned to me and winked.

“You’ll know soon enough,” he said, with a hearty laugh.  “You’ll know soon enough!”  And then, incredibly, we watched him don a black-buckled hat and vanish into thin air.

“My God!” the dart thrower yelped, spilling his Schnapps everywhere, “That was the ghost of Miles Standish!”

If you have any questions for Wellington Stack, pant adventurer,  don’t hesitate to leave them in the comments section of the Cordarounds Mailbag  (after Wellington’s story).   He’s certain to reply.