Perhaps a Cat?

As speculation over Tom and Katie's wedding is breathlessly reported the world wide over (is it really that slow of a news month?) gossip columnist Jeanette Walls wonders if the vows to be exchanged will be from the traditional Scientologist canon. Helpfully, she provides the script for the sweet-nothings Mr. Cruise and his child bride might intone to one another:

If the wedding will be a Scientology ceremony — as has been reported — any feminists in attendance might be a tad miffed. The vows for Scientology’s wedding ceremony refer to the groom only as a “man” while the bride is sometimes called a “girl,” notes the Web site, Secrets of Scientology. And some of the notions of marriage seem a bit retro. Quoting from the book “The Background Ministry, Ceremonies & Sermons of the Scientology Religion,” the site reports that the minister asks the bride: “And do you take/His fortune/At its prime and ebb/And seek/With him best fortune/For us all?/Do you?” The minister then tells the groom: “Now, (groom's name),/girls need clothes/And food and/Tender happiness and frills/A pan, a comb,/perhaps a cat/All caprice if you will/But still/They need them./Do you then/Provide?/Do you?”

A pan? A comb? A cat? These are frills? Or, just maybe, L. Ron was looking out for the child brides, offering up a seemingly innocous list of sundries that, when given the MacGuyver treatment, could be combined to create a spectacular matrimonial arsensal.

Pan: cooking utensil...or blunt instrument of death when applied to head?

Cat: sweet companion...or slow death for husband who is allergic to kitties? Not to mention those claws...

Comb: grooming tool, musical instrument, or eye gouger?

We'll let Katie be the judge.Just knowing that she'll have these 3 deceptively bland wedding gifts gathered together in a burlap sack in a wing in her Telluride mansion makes me feel better.