Simultaneous

I agree with M1a, I think the spoken-word part at the beginning is about Maynard speaking with God. I give them credit, I never would have figured it out.

The only part I couldn't figure out is the "Peanuts parents and syrup" part. Maynard asked God what the matter was, and God said that. Then Maynard said "and then he looked at me like I wondered what that means".

I searched and found someone else who figured that part out. Peanuts does not refer to the nut, but to the comic strip by Charles Schulz with Charlie Brown, Snoopy, etc. The adults (e.g. parents) never speak, but only say "wah, wah...". Then the syrup is about how it makes things slower.

So Maynard asked God what the matter was, and God told him in effect "my Walkman sounds like the adults in the Peanuts cartoon speaking slowly". However, God noticed Maynard did not understand, so he simplified his comment to "do you have any batteries?"

So in order to understand God's comment, you'd have to know a lot of background information:

• what a Walkman is
• what a tape sounds like in a Walkman when the batteries are dying
• what the adults in the Peanuts cartoon sound like

So that is probably what talking to god would be like: God would talk to you, but you'd have no idea what he was saying since God is so much beyond you. In other words, "Every third inquiry was met with, you know, an eloquent but unusual response".

There is so much packed into this short story. So fun.