Isaac Asimov did make me smile hard.

 

https://archive.org/details/moretalesofblack00asim/mode/1up

I'm reading my second collection of Isaac Asimov's Black Widowers stories (More Tales of the Black Widowers) And enjoying it quite a bit. As a matter of fact, I'm spending a lot more time with it per day than is my wont, and thus am already halfway through the book after just a few days. (Normally it takes me several months to read an Asimov book because I only read a few pages per day. (Sotto voce: in the bathroom.)

The stories delineate the regular dinner meetings of this men's group, which is modeled after a real group Asimov belonged to. At these meetings, a guest is grilled, and some kind of mystery evolves out of the grilling. Invariably, the waiter, Henry, is the one to solve the mystery. It's very formulaic and you would think it would have gotten old after a few stories, but it actually has not and I'm anxious to read more. (There are quite a few more by the way. I'm glad that Internet Archive has them available, since some of the prices for these books are way out of my league.*) In the VIIth story in this volume, entitled "Season's Greetings," A character named  Gonzalo suggests that the Black Widowers should put together a book of limericks. He is immediately (and rudely) shot down for the suggestion, and then he surreptitiously begins to write, "There once was a group of dull bastards...." 

It didn't make me laugh...few books do...but it did make me smile. Smile hard. I think that's the first time this has happened whilst reading an Asimov book.

So there's that.

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