Leaf at half-mast on the Gaffney Peach

After the second outbreak of serial killing in the little town of Gaffney, South Carolina, the leaf on the Gaffney Peach was once again lowered to half-mast, as a sign of "respect."

A lively debate among members of the Gaffney Town Council preceded this decision.

"It’s bad enough that thing looks like a giant butt," said Roland Meriwether, proprietor of Meriwether Peach Farms LTD…

"…but can we really afford to bring in a 100-foot crane from Atlanta to "lower the leaf" every time some serial killer runs amok in our little town?"

"Besides," Mr. Meriwether continued, "it don’t even look "half-mast" to me. It looks wilted! Is that the kind of message we want to send? "Serial killing wilts our peaches!" I won’t even be able to sell my peaches on a pig farm!"

At the time, Mr. Meriwether was laughed down by most of the residents of Gaffney as just another tax-dodging redneck Republican son-of-a-bitch, but within a few months Mr. Meriwether’s homely wisdom was confirmed by an influx of serial killers from all over the world, and the leaf on the Gaffney Peach went up and down as fast as…

"Copulating jack-rabbits," said Mr. Meriwether, and this time nobody was laughing.