JEROME, Ariz. — Jehovah’s Witness Leonard Standish and Tool fan Don Schmidt spent all night spreading the gospel of their faith and fandom, exhausted sources verified.
“So this weirdo shows up at my house, right as I’m writing this overdue community college assignment about Maynard James Keenan’s masterful use of metaphor in ‘The Pot,’” Schmidt explained. “The guy’s trying to get me to see the light, but let’s just say my light shone a little brighter. I decided to invite this Jehovah fella in and introduce him to the magic of Tool. Also because I haven’t spoken to another human being in weeks. I know most people hear Tool, but do they listen to Tool? After our four-hour conversation and several consecutive listens to ‘Stinkfist,’ I’m still not sure he understood the teachings of ‘Ænima.’”
Standish, for his part, was equally alienated by the man who recently spent half of his life savings on a ticket to the band’s upcoming “Tool In the Sand” festival.
“We never get people giving us the time of day, so this was a welcome change of pace,” Standish began. “But as soon as I presented a copy of ‘The Watchtower Announcing Jehovah’s Kingdom,’ he shoved a ‘Lateralus’ CD in my face. This seemed blasphemous! Yet Don was the only one in his zip code that didn’t slam the door in my face or point a shotgun at me before I could get a word out. Finally, I was able to tell someone about our sect, albeit in exchange for a 45-minute rant on something called ‘Schism.’”
Anthropologist Walter Whittier sees this moment as a dramatic breakthrough in his studies.
“In my experience, the Dead – that is, the Grateful Dead – were the only band to have a cultural currency as befitting ‘anthropology of religion,’ as opposed to mere ethnomusicology,” Whittier elaborated. “Now, it seems we have a new discovery: that the most devout Tool fans are as invasive as Jehovah’s Witnesses. An incredible revelation. That’s almost like the time a Scientologist and a Radiohead fan accidentally spent all day attempting to convert each other.”
At press time, Standish and Schmidt were witnessed politely leaving one another after the whole night, vowing never to dig into the other’s preachings again.