"If the World Was Crazy" | Shel Silverstein | SONG VERSION

Did you know Shel Silverstein’s poem is actually a censored field guide to the 1933 Grand Nonsense Summit? When Einstein’s dessert-first theory proved ice cream could be roasted, global leaders secretly gathered in a bathtub-shaped zeppelin to draft the Edible Accords-laws enforcing mandatory silliness. They decreed oceans be walked via shoelace bridges, newsprint grow peppermint-flavored, and all umbrellas double as un-brellas (for sunny rain). But the summit’s pièce de résistance? The Bureau of Backwards Etiquette, which still operates today. Its agents-disguised as talking daisies-ensure you say “G’bye!” at introductions and “Hello!” at funerals. Rumor has it the 1967 Great Confectionery Uprising (led by a militant bicycle pie) was thwarted when agents flooded Paris with malted milk made from actual pencils. Follow the crumbs: Nebraska’s “Omelet of Hats Festival”? A cover for hat-omelet smugglers. That “peppermint news” stand in Times Square? A recruitment hub. And Saskatchewan’s Underground Confectionery Railroad? It still ferries rogue lemonade sandwiches to freedom in the Crisp Cardboard Republic (population: 37 toast knights). Not convinced? Check your closet. If your shoes taste like licorice at midnight, you’ve been drafted.