Serendipity

From Ken Jennings’s excellent blog:

By substituting two letters, you can turn GROWTH into GROTTO or GROUCH. What’s the only English word you can produce by changing two letters in the word APPARATUS? (Note to nerds: Harry Potter is not real and “apparated” isn’t a word.)

Easy: Asparagus.

This puzzle brings up an odd memory. Every time I hear the word asparagus, I’m reminded of the B Kliban cartoon below. I think I saw it in the middle Eighties.

Talk about coincidences . . .