Early one spring morning, two of Paul Bunyan's kitchen boys were
sitting on the dock waiting for Sourdough Sam to finish mixing his
famous flapjack batter. They were dangling their feet
over the dock into the water. That way, the slabs of
bacon strapped to their feet would keep cool until it was time to
grease the griddle (and that's how the expression "cooling their
heels" came about).
The two were talking about Paul's newest logging plans when they
heard a mournful hooting sound. There, next to the dock
was a plain gray and white duck. Now this duck was rather
strange looking--it had a long pointed bill and red eyes. They
asked the duck why he was so sad, crying in that mournful way. Well,
the duck explained that tonight was the spring debutante ball and
he had nothing to wear. This was the first time he was
old enough to attend the ball and he hoped to find his soul mate
there.
So it was very important that he be dressed his best. The boys
completely understood his predicament. One of the boys
was none other than Jens Threadbetter who was rather handy with
a needle and thread and, in addition to working in the kitchen,
sewed and repaired the men's flannel shirts. Jens told
the duck he thought he could find some scraps of flannel left over
from Paul's newest shirt. And so he did. He
sewed a lovely black and white flannel cape that fit perfectly over
the duck's neck and draped elegantly over the back.
Well, the duck was so excited he trilled and trilled "watch out
for me, I'm hot tonight." He was the hit of the ball
and immediately found his soul mate. The other ducks
all wanted outfits exactly the same so Jens was busy for many days
fitting and sewing black-and-white flannel capes. But
these capes only seemed to fit properly on the funny looking ducks
with the long pointed bills and red eyes. And, because
of all the flannel that Jens used in sewing the duck capes, he ran
out of black and white flannel for Paul and his men who then had
to have red and black plaid flannel shirts.
