It's orange juice, my dear Watson, orange juice indeed

It's been a slow week at the Kitzmann household.

This lull in action means, of course, that I have nothing new to write about. Knowing that my column was soon due, I frantically searched my archives for something, anything, which I felt would pass for a column.

What I found was a story that I wrote when I was in 8th grade. It may be obvious to you that I was reading Sherlock Holmes at the time, and I beg you to realize that it was written in an analytical, yet half-serious manner.

However, I found this piece subtly humorous, and thought that it might be kind of fitting to this time of year, considering that a good portion of the population is sick and in need of a "panacea to many illnesses."

If nothing else, this piece should provide you with some very intriguing insight into the mind of an eighth-grader. Enjoy!

Today a rather peculiar thing happened: we made orange juice... but we used oranges. I learned today that you can learn something new every day. I could never in my mind make the connection between oranges and orange juice, but when I observed, as a skeptic, of course, the oranges being squeezed and the juice collecting in the bottom reservoir, I was quite amazed.

Naturally, I scrutinized every inch of this amazing machine and could find nothing that could possibly create this wonderful, mysterious concoction. I proceeded to interrogate the teacher for a long while as to how something so magnificent could be created from such a seemingly uninteresting fruit.

But to my amazement, when she told me that this concoction was from the orange fruit, she did not display the usual signs of someone who is attempting to hide something. Nevertheless, I seated myself in my small, comfortable office and pondered this peculiar, outlandish mystery.

Much to my amazement, I could draw no logical conclusion to this enigma, so, without resorting to the fact that I may be wrong (and thus humiliating myself and tainting my reputation), I simply left the mystery and subjected myself to a rather stupefying, but not impossible case involving a most fraudulent scheme.

But, as time passed, I could not ignore the forceful urge to investigate this case further. I continued to ponder this for a long while, and could simply find no evidence to suggest that I was correct in my original assumption.

I lived in a high state of denial for a time, and as the bitter truth slowly began to dawn upon me, I was greatly ashamed of myself, and would not leave my office. But I soon grew tired of the solitude (not to mention my rapidly declining social skills), and eventually had to relent and admit that I, the previously infallible Mr. E, had originally been wrong.

I found that this nutritious beverage is not a paranormal concoction at all, but rather, is much like apple juice (which I had accepted as coming from apples long ago) in the sense that it is nothing more than the product of a normal fruit. I began to drink it religiously and soon found that orange juice served as a panacea to many illnesses.

After solving this most astonishing case, I turned to other matters that demanded my attention, such three connected love triangles (a novelty indeed) and the usual fraudulent scheme. But I will never forget this particular mystery, one that riddled my mind, rattled my nerves, not to mention my ego, and ultimately witnessed to me an undeniable truth.

Elementary, my dear friend, elementary indeed.

Nathan Kitzmann is a freshman and is homeschooled.