MASSAGER

— My grandmother worked her whole life as an accountant. (...) But later… (...) Well, no, of course we used it (her abacus –tr.) a lot for our household expenses. We weren't so well off, and we counted every kopeck. Granny would sometimes even calculate out the the family budget. So, it wasn't just lying around idly. But until recently it had settled down in the attic somewhere, with a load of old junk that we didn't need. We tried to toss it out a few times, but it seemed like a shame, since granny was so intimately attached to it, having worked with it for so many years. Let it sit there, and maybe someone will think of some use for it later. Then, eventually, its time came… First, granddad read an article in the magazine Health about the benefits of massage. Both he and granny suffer from radiculitis, or something, I'm not sure. Maybe it's their joints, or gout, or something like that. And we don't have enough money for fancy things made by some company…. But then granddad had a idea. He crawled into the attic, got out that abacus, and thought that he might make a massager out of it. So he went to the shops, had a look around, checked everything out, made some measurements, came back, and got down to work. And so he ended up with this thing. It looks like a real massager and, strictly speaking, it isn't really any different from one you could buy in a shop. It does the same thing. So both of them started to massage their backs with it and their spines started to straighten out. So you could say that this thing has had a third rebirth. So our abacus can still be put to some use.