No one knew where Bob the Turtle got his name. He didn’t look anything like a turtle and he’d never had anything to do with turtles in his life. When he was a kid his best friend Josie had had a turtle but no one ever called her Josie the Turtle. (They called her Anna the Great Queen of Scotland, but that was a different story) Bob had once asked his mum why he was called Bob the Turtle, but she had just shrugged her shoulders and mumbled something about the Crimean War. And he was sure the Crimean War had nothing to do with turtles, or himself.
It’s not that Bob really minded being called Bob the Turtle, it was just that it was a bit of a mystery to him.
One day Bob the Turtle met Fred. He wasn’t Fred anything, just Fred. Bob the Turtle met him at a Pen salesmen’s conference (Bob the Turtle didn’t sell pens but he was having such a good time at the conference it didn’t seem to matter) Fred was giving a presentation on marketing techniques for felt tip pens in Asia. Few applauded when he was finished.
Bob the Turtle stayed back after the presentation and the two went out for a beer later that night. Bob the Turtle introduced himself as “Bob the Turtle” without a second thought, and Fred accepted the name, with out a second thought, as it had been with every introduction Bob the Turtle had ever made in his life.
After a few beers Fred asked Bob the Turtle if he’d buy a felt tip pen. Bob the Turtle didn’t need a felt tip pen, but then Bob the Turtle didn’t need fourteen copies of Ulysses and yet there they were in the trunk of his car. So Bob bought a fine looking felt tip pen off of Fred and the two parted company.
Later that week Bob the Turtle found the felt tip pen in his the bottom of his backpack that he’d been carrying at the bar that he’d gone to with Fred. The pen had leaked and his bag was ruined.
Bob the Turtle stared at the bottom of his ruined bag, now turned blue because of the ink from the pen. (The rest of the bag was beige)
Just my luck he cursed and he threw the bag into the garbage bin along with the pen.
Bob the Turtle forgot about the bag, the pen and Fred until two years later when he was holidaying in Thailand. Upon checking into a hotel for the night he reached for a pen to sign the cheque for the room and found he had none.
The man at the counter handed him a pen. It was the same type as Fred had given him two years earlier. After signing his cheque Bob the Turtle said to the concierge; “be careful those pens are known to leak”. The concierge thanked Bob the Turtle for his advice.
The next morning Bob the Turtle returned to the desk just in time to notice the concierge and his now ink stained shirt.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you”, said Bob the Turtle as he walked past the concierge.
“I wasn’t planning to” replied the concierge and at that moment Bob the Turtle realised why he was called Bob the Turtle.
Unfortunately he promptly forgot two minutes later when he tripped over a lamp and bumped his head.
Two years later he awoke in a Thai hospital with no recollection of who he was, an ink stain on his hospital gown and a vague hunger for turtle soup.