He said that with a somewhat superior tone in his voice while tending to his sausage stuffing. "There are several kind of Czechs who live in town, you know," he philosophized.

"There is the angry one. He's called a Hot Czech."

"There is the one who suffers from low self-esteem. That's the Insufficient Czech."

"There is the single one. He's a Loan Czech."

"The married one is a Double Czech."

"If you are out of work you are a Welfare Czech."

"When you are born premature you are a Quick Czech."

"And what about when you die?" I asked.

"Canceled Czech," he smiled.

Then he told me the true story of two Bohemians who went dove hunting. They had double barrel 12 gauge shotguns and three shells between the two of them.

The one with both shells hid under a roost tree flat on his back and waited for dark. He fired both barrels into a flock of doves at close range and only succeeded in severely pruning the tree and breaking his collarbone.

The other one sat on a stump at the edge of a pond. He was waiting for dark too, but since he had been there since 6 a.m. he got a bit bored. To pass the time he picked some berries off a bush and started throwing them one by one into the pond. The berries started disappearing in a swirl of water. Then all of a sudden he saw this huge head, eyes and whiskers. A monster catfish was staring right at him, so he shot him with his only shell. The catfish weighed 80 pounds.

A Czech friend asked the Bohemians what they had doing. The one with his arm in a sling replied, "Dove hunting, shooting up in the air and killing catfish." Ah, yes, it's a Bohemian existence for some.