The town fathers were looking for a way to increase attendance and participation at their regular meetings. One member suggested bringing in a hypnotist.
The officials agreed, a famous hypnotist was hired, a circular was publicly distributed telling all the townsfolk and they could see him at the town hall on Saturday night. Saturday night came and the hall was packed. The townspeople sat fascinated as the hypnotist withdrew his pocket watch. It was an ancient watch filled with gold and silver with diamonds for numbers. The hypnotist began chanting,"Watch the watch, watch the watch, watch the watch..."
The crowd became mesmerized as the watch swayed back and forth, light gleaming off of it's polished surface. Hundreds of pairs of eyes followed the swaying watch, until suddenly the watch slipped out of the hypnotist's fingers and fell to the floor breaking into many pieces.
"Crap," said the hypnotist.
It took three weeks to clean up the town hall.