What in carnation...?

I've gotta hand it to people who actually take time to reflect upon the world and their existence and what it all means, since the alternative—which is far more common—generally involves blind acceptance of some imbecilic religious doctrine that they were unfortunate enough to be brought up with as kids.

But when this existential reflection leads to a conclusion that is equally obtuse as the fairytales of Christianity, Judaism, Islam or any other mainstream religion, it makes me wonder why they even bothered. I like to think that common sense and introspection would lead a mind away from such tommyrot, but alas, some folks just fall for folly.

And here is a tale of one such folk:

I was at the grocery store picking out some bananas. While perusing, I had the pleasure of overhearing a delightful conversation between two employees restocking fruit. One of these employees was, himself, clearly bananas.

His coworker, who had been honored with the role of receiving these insightful proclamations, just stood there. He began arranging his apples with a precision and focus I'd never before seen. Clearly he didn't know how to respond to his friend, who had just confessed a belief in reincarnated furniture.

I mean, how do you respond (respectfully) to such a statement? No favorable adjective, however insincere, deserves to be paired with such a declaration. Even the granddaddy of feigned interest—"That's nice"—would be too praiseful in such a situation. An appropriate response would perhaps be a smack to the head or a sudden burst of uncontrollable laughter, but hey, even the philosophically misguided produce boy has feelings (unless he's actually a reincarnated table, I suppose).

So the coworker simply smiled back and made a noise that sounded something like "hhheeeeenem." Well spoken, Apples. Well spoken.