Here's a little quandary enmiring me: A few months back, my friend Tahmi developed a crush on her mailman, a very nice boy named Jesus (pronounced Hay-soos, although I enjoy to say it Jee-zus, as in Chuck E Jesus). The crush went on for some time, with him leaving her little notes and her bringing him bottles of cold water for his route. It was very sweet, but he was highly slow in actually asking her out.

To amuse her, I augmented a songbook I'd found at a thrift store--a garish 1970s publication entitled HERE COMES JESUS! and heavy on the day-glo inks. I chronicled the experience here, but in a nutshell, I improved the pages with references to Christ--"Here Comes Jesus (with my catalogues)," and other deeply stupid examples like that.

Then, I e-mailed Tahmi for her address, addressed the envelope, including a highly specious return address--Couriers for Christ, or something--and went to the post office to mail it, along with a thank-you card I owed her for an event she'd hosted.

A few days later, I received (along with several other people) this e-mail from Tahmi:

There is a manila envelope in my mail today from Couriers for Christ, Inc on JC Way in Houston. So I'm thinking that one of my clients (I do have many bible thumping clients) has sent me a little thank you gift.

Inside is the "Here Comes Jesus" youth hymnal. The outside is very 1970's- Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat-like---lots of colors, and it is also very JC Superstar-like in the writing.

So, I look inside to see if there is a note from who it is from. Nothing. So, I start looking inside the book and see that all the song titles have been changed. There is , "He Ain't Heavy...He's My Mailman", there is "I've Got It (and here's proof of delivery)", "He Is Lord (of my Route)", "Here Comes Jesus (with my catalogs)", and of course, "Put Your Hand In the Hand (of the nearest mailman)", "I Just Love My Jesus (when he brings me checks), and my all-time favorites, "My Mailbox is Filled with Jesus' Love" and "His Name Is Wonderful (but we call him Jesus)". (Kum Ba Yah was left untouched, with just a note saying you can't mess with Kum Ba Yah since it is so sacred.)

Still confused, because I'm kinda dense, I look at the postage and see that it was bought yesterday. And there is no way something made it here from Texas overnight with regular postage. So I've finally figured it out. I call Jesus, laughing, and he finally asks me out (dinner tonight).

Several of her friends responded to the message, mostly praising Jesus's excellent sense of humor and wishing her luck on her date.

So, I had a slight situation on my hands. Tell her before she went to dinner that I had sent the songbook, or not. I mean, what would a good friend do? A good friend who really cared that she finds true love, and who also sent her a thank-you card the same day in the same handwriting, which somehow went unnoticed?

Naturally, I didn't tell her.

A while later, she called to report on the date. She'd brought the songbook along, she said, and they'd looked through it at dinner. "What did he say?" I asked. "Not much," she said, they'd just looked through the book, with her pointing out comments she particularly enjoyed.

At no time did Jesus actually admit that he had no prior knowledge of this book. He is either very smart or very dense. Or, he thinks she's insane. He may just think she's insane.

I am not quite sure how to proceed, but I think I'll let sleeping mailmen lie, for the time being.

Star of the day. . .Barti