“Miracles just aren’t worth the effort most of the time,” I tell my friend at the hardware store while I y stretched out on the checkout counter. “I am only a lesser god, afterall. Even for a minor miracle I need to go through all kinds of paperwork before I can even attempt it, and I’m still exhausted from the one I performed weeks ago.”

  “So instead of answering their prayers you gave them directions to a magic parasite disguised as a witch’s hat?”

  “It got the job done, didn’t it?”

  “They couldn’t take it off because it had its teeth lodged in their skull!”

  “Eh, it seemed more like they were showing off than compining.”