Of the plethora of Mr. Smith’s ideas, is there one that will save his business? Stephen Leacock, today on The Classic Tales Podcast. Welcome to The Classic Tales Podcast. Thank you for listening. Thank you so all of our listeners and supporters who really stepped it up last week. Our crisis is averted, and it looks like we’re going to be okay. I am overwhelmed with the response. We’ve sold our 5 lifetime access passes, but I’ll keep the one-year pass up for another week. Things got pretty real there, for a while. Thank you so very much for helping us to dodge that bullet. In case you haven’t already, feel free to take advantage of our free titles. I get so happy when I see someone has downloaded the free audiobook titles, especially new customers. I tried to have something for everyone, from several genres, and geared for all ages. Please click on over to our FREE section, and enjoy. You can find the free audiobooks here: https://tinyurl.com/wfrphaw App users can hear a sonnet from William Shakespeare in their special features this week. I failed to mention it in the brouhaha, but last week was a poem from Christopher Marlowe. Today’s story is from the Canadian humorist Stephen Leacock. It’s tricky with the pandemic still in our faces, it’s made it very tricky to choose what stories to do, and this one is a quirky little odd one. There are a few things that drew me to this story. First, I love Leacock’s description of the town of Mariposa. With so many of our local festivities cancelled this summer, I felt like hearing about life in a small town would do us good right now. Secondly, I like how Leacock’s protagonist, Mr. Smith, is not a perfect guy. He does some good things, and some kind of dumb things. And it seems like the environment of the town actually determines which of his scattered ideas make it all the way to fruition. It’s almost like Leacock has created this town as a kind of character with its own set of motivations, and we kind of watch and see how Mr. Smith fares inside. And now, The Hostelry of Mr. Smith, by Stephen Leacock Tap here to go to www.classictalesaudiobooks.com and become a financial supporter!   Tap here to become an Erudite Troglodyte - The Classic Tales Merchandise store!   Tap here to purchase Huckleberry Finn – the first Hybrid Audiobook