A wise old farmer had lived long enough to recognize a bad deal when he saw one, and yet even the deepest well of experience has limits when necessity presses its heel. He had spent decades coaxing stubborn soil into life, repairing machinery that groaned louder than the barn doors in winter, and negotiating with weather that never quite cared what a man or his crops might need. One morning, after counting every penny saved from harvests past and considering every possibility of borrowing another neighbor’s truck one more season, he decided it was time: he would buy a new pickup truck.
He had read the advertisement in the local paper countless times. It was simple, direct, and seemingly honest: a specific model, at a specific price, waiting for a buyer who knew a good deal when they saw it. The farmer trusted the words; after all, decades of dealing with seed catalogs, machinery salesmen, and local stores had taught him that the printed word could be taken at face value. And yet, he was cautious—experience whispered that advertisements sometimes said what you wanted to hear, not what you would pay for.
When he arrived at the dealership, the scene was familiar but always a little unnerving. Salespeople in pressed shirts hovered like hawks over their prey, bright smiles trained to disarm suspicion and coax signatures from careful hands. He walked directly to the truck he had come to buy. No idle questions about other models. No wandering through rows of polished vehicles. Just business. He tapped the truck’s side with a calloused hand, nodded to himself, and waited.
The salesman, a man with a practiced smile and eyes trained to detect eagerness, immediately approached. “That’s a fine choice,” he said, his voice smooth as the waxed hood of the truck. “Come inside, and we can get the paperwork sorted.” Pens were uncapped, forms shuffled, and everything seemed ordinary—routine. But when the farmer finally laid eyes on the final bill, the calm lines of his face betrayed a flicker of something deeper: doubt. He adjusted his glasses, squinted at the figures, and slid the paper back across the desk. “This isn’t the price I saw,” he said, steady and calm, the quietness of his voice masking a simmering clarity.
The salesman launched into a practiced explanation, his words tumbling out like a well-oiled machine. Power steering. Power brakes. Power windows. Heavy-duty tires. A package of extras the farmer had neither requested nor wanted, each feature tacked onto the price as if inevitability justified the sum. Each syllable nudged the cost higher, as if by repetition it could erase the discrepancy between advertisement and reality.
The farmer listened without a word, internalizing every detail. He needed that truck. His old one had died months earlier, leaving him reliant on neighbors’ vehicles for hauling feed, transporting equipment, and tending to chores that could not wait. He could not argue against reality. With a quiet sigh that seemed to carry the weight of years of pragmatism and patience, he signed the forms, paid the inflated price, and drove home in his shiny new pickup, saying little but remembering everything.
Months passed, the seasons cycled with merciless consistency, crops flourished unevenly across the fields, and life followed its predictable rhythm. Then one afternoon, the phone rang, a bright voice on the other end identifying itself as the same salesman. The conversation began casually, the tone cheerful, almost conspiratorial. His son, the salesman explained, had joined 4-H and needed a cow for his project. Could the farmer help?
The farmer paused, then replied simply, “Yes. I’ve got a few. Five hundred dollars a head. Come on out and take your pick.”
When the salesman and his son arrived, the farmer led them across the fields, pointing out each cow, explaining temperament, health, weight, and suitability for a 4-H project. They debated, laughed, and at last settled on one. The salesman reached for his checkbook and wrote a check for $500.
The farmer studied the check, shook his head, and said, “That’s not the final price.”
Confusion flashed across the salesman’s face. “But… you said five hundred,” he said.
“That’s the base price,” the farmer replied. “This cow comes with extras.”
He produced a neatly handwritten list, a ledger of absurdity:
Basic cow: $500
Two-tone exterior: $45
Extra stomach: $75
Product storage equipment: $60
Straw compartment: $120
Four spigots at $10 each: $40
Leather upholstery: $125
Dual horns: $45
Automatic fly swatter: $38
Fertilizer attachment: $185
Grand total: $1,233.
The salesman stared. At the cow. At the list. At the farmer. The lesson landed without a single raised voice, just as the salesman had once delivered his inflated pitch. The farmer smiled politely, and in that quiet smile was every ounce of memory, patience, and cunning that life on the land had taught him. Wisdom, after all, has a long memory.
Far from the fertile fields of crops and livestock, in a desert where heat bakes skin to leather and sand sneaks into every crevice, a modern-day old cowboy wandered, pushed to his limits. Days had passed without water. His lips cracked, his strength waned, and mirages mocked him at every turn. Convinced he was near death, he crawled across the sand, sweat stinging his eyes, when in the distance he saw something half-buried and gleaming faintly in the sun.
Summoning every last ounce of energy, he dragged himself forward and uncovered an old, battered briefcase. He opened it with trembling hands. Out popped a genie—not the whimsical, storybook kind, but a bureaucratic version, exhausted and stern, clad in a dull gray dress with an Australian Taxation Office badge pinned neatly to her chest. A calculator peeked from her purse, a pencil was tucked behind her ear, and her gaze bore the weight of decades of official scrutiny.
“Well,” she said, voice flat, “you know how this works. Three wishes.”
The cowboy squinted, wary. “A tax auditor genie? Seriously?”
She shrugged. “You’ve got no water, no transport, and about ten minutes left. You’ve got nothing to lose.”
Reluctantly, he nodded. His first wish: an oasis with cool water, shade, and abundant food. Instantly, palm trees appeared. Plump fruits, platters of roasted meats, wine and water surrounded him. Relief washed over him like the first rain after a long drought.
His second wish: wealth beyond imagining. Shazam. Treasure chests materialized, overflowing with gold coins, jewelry, and gems that gleamed like captured sunlight.
Finally, the genie reminded him of his last wish. He paused, considering. He wanted to be adored, to be irresistible, desired wherever he went. A logical wish, perhaps, for someone who had risked everything and now held everything he could desire.
Shazam. He was transformed—into a tampon.
The moral, merciless and clear, struck hard: deals from the government, no matter how sweet they seem, always have strings attached.