Eats, Shoots, and Leaves

A panda walks into a cafe. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air.

"Why?" asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes towards the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder.

"I'm a panda," he says at the door. "Look it up."

The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough, finds an explanation.

"Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves."

So, punctuation really does matter, even if it is only occasionally a matter of life and death.

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This is the story on the back of the book, Eats, Shoots and Leaves: the Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation, by Lynne Truss. I look forward to reading this when I get the chance. I was reminded of this book last night, when at church on the overhead screen, a line in a worship song stated, "its raining, its raining, its raining." And it admitedly distracted and disappointed me.