Author: R.

Stacy the Liar

Politicians lie.
It’s what they do. It’s the job.
Stacy said one thing before she ran for for office.
Then she campaigned on the opposite.
Claimed she never said what she said in the first place.
After she won, she denied having said either.
Then admitted it, but said she’d learned more since taking office.
Evolving her position to suit the needs of the people.
Journalists printed her lies about her lies.
And fact checkers claimed it was all true.
When she ran again, she touted her experience.
But the only experience she had was with lying.
The perfect politician.

Standup

Rufus Washington was the greatest standup comedian without actually standing up.
He did his routines from a wheelchair, spinning tales from the ghetto on the other side of the tracks.
Drug dealers, hookers, pimps, corner stores instead of grocery stores.
Now, he traveled in a limo or a tour bus, with gorgeous assistants to help him into the chair… or bed… or the shower.
When the limo got in a wreck, Rufus woke up in the hospital, screaming that he couldn’t feel his legs.
Turned out, he’d been faking his paralysis just for a schtick.
Also, he’d faked being black.

Maintenance notice

Water maintenance today.
They’re redoing the mains so they don’t have to shut down the mains every time they need to work on a single building’s water pipes.
I’m sure that whatever maintenance and improvements they do, every future break or problem will be upstream from the work they did.
I’ve set aside some gallon jugs full of water for whatever… toilet flushing, tea, bathing a muddy cat.
Some neighbors are angry at the cut-off, despite an email and text alert going out.
It’s 2022, people.
If you’re wanting paper notices on your door, maybe they should be eviction notices?

Spumco

Spumco was the production company that produced Ren and Stimpy.
Spumco animators not only drew the characters, but they produced, filmed, and edited them.
You could say they were very hands-on with the production process.
Spumco’s founder, John Kricfalusi, was very hands on with young female artists.
He’d invite them to Spumco to learn the business.
More like monkey business.
Nickelodeon fired Kricfalusi and Spumco… because of the level of violence in the cartoons.
And Spumco was shuttered after lawsuits over royalties.
After an avalanche of sexual harassment complaints, Kricfalusi retired from animation.
Only because nobody would sponsor his projects.

Festivals

Every weekend, there’s a cultural festival in my city.
This week, it’s the Italian festival.
Italian dances, Italian food, Italian poetry.
Next week, it’s the German festival.
German dances, German food, German poetry.
The week after, it’s the Caribbean festival.
Caribbean dances, Caribbean food, Caribbean poetry.
And after that, it’s the Japan festival.
Japanese dances. Japanese food. Japanese poetry.
There’s no Palestinian festival.
They grab bullhorns and scream at the local Israeli consulate.
And synagogues. And community centers. And the Holocaust Museum.
That’s what they call culture?
What a bunch of pricks.
No wonder why they don’t have a state.

Jackie

Not only is Jackie the greatest hitter in the league, he’s also the league’s greatest pitcher.
He also leads the league in steals. He’s never been caught stealing.
On days he’s not pitching, he’s catching, and calling great pitches for the pitchers.
On the rare times someone makes it to first, he’ll gun them down when they steal second.
Someone injured? He’s got medic skills. He’ll get you back on your feet in no time.
He also manages the team, putting together lineups no team wants to face.
His parents are awfully proud of their sparkplug of a Little Leaguer.

Weekly challenge #1018 – PICK TWO It burns!, Fare, Value-added, Horse glue, Evolution

The next topic is Assistive technology

RICHARD

Unstuck
My son developed an interest in model-making and, like so many of his hobbies, I ended up funding the majority of it, but I reckoned it was educational and keeping him off the streets, so I never complained.
I’d be tasked with finding model kits, tools and supplies, paint – the standard fare for such activities.
Then, one day, he asked for horse glue.
It took me ages to find, and a very unpleasant trip to the local abattoir.
“What’s this?” He asked suspiciously.
“Glue made from horses, like you wanted.”
“No… Stuff for gluing horses. For my model farm!”

LISA

Him
As first dates go it was OK. We met. We ate. He invited me back to his. He made me pay my half of the cab fare. His flat was immaculate. Clinically clean. But, an overwhelming smell of what I can only describe as horse glue.
How many red flags did I ignore?
Reader, I married him. The first time I questioned his behaviour was in the dock years later, prompted by the barrister. You’d know him – his crimes had been front page news for so long he was a household name.
That smell? I could still almost taste it.

TURA

Horse glue; evolution
———
For violin-making, marquetry, and carpentry, there’s nothing like horse glue. But ever since petrol displaced horses it has been scarce and expensive. So we’ve bypassed evolution and genetically engineered the glue horse, Equus glutinosus. It produces so much glue that it accumulates in a reservoir under the skin of its belly. An implanted spigot allows it to be drained at regular intervals, a gallon at a time.

When the horse must be retired, the whole body can be rendered for glue. Scarcely anything will be left of it afterwards.

The flesh of Equus glutinosus is toxic and should be avoided.

LIZZIE

She waited for the bus. A bus drove by and she waited. Another bus drove by and she waited. Is the fare too much for you, dear, asked an old lady, trying to help. She shook her head. And waited. The bus stop had a small bench. She sat down, her legs so heavy. I’m so tired, she thought, so tired. Why are people screaming, their panic seeping through her haziness. Perhaps it was time, yes. But she had already done it. The bus stop was taken by the flames. It burns, it burns!, was the last thing she heard.

TOM

Skibidi Tree Friends

The evolution of American English has taken a shape right hand turn. Due to algo gatekeeping Gen Alpha has had to speed up creating terms to stay one step ahead of the media wasteland. It is no longer about value-added content for kids to claim their voices; it is life blood of their cultural center. As a boomer it would be easy to discount the humor of the Alpha-s as pure nonsense. But that’s the point, the powers that-be are quite mad, so truly why spend the time to sift out deeper meaning. I say skibidi this. 6 – 7

SERENDIPIDY

I take my job as senior product developer for the Spanish Inquisition very seriously.
It’s not only the evolution of new and novel methods of cruel and inhuman torture techniques, but I focus on the quality of the torture we dispense too.
So, I’ve set up a focus group of ‘customers’ to gain helpful feedback.
For example, it’s not enough to simply scream ‘It burns!” I want to know how badly? Is it a pain that lingers and grows worse over time? Can you give it a rating on a scale of one to ten?
Torture: Continuously improving since 1478.

NORVAL JOE

Patrick held up a phone with a Facetime video of the wave building up to crash down on the Five Sisters Coven. As it approached the shore it had grown to fifteen feet in height. “Thanks for your help, Billy,” Patrick said. “That’s some real value added to Sabrina’s power.”

“Don’t get too excited, Patty,” Billbert said with his hands still on Sabrina’s bare neck. “Sabrina is still the one in control.”

The tidal wave stopped, ten feet from shore, like a stationary water-wall. The women ran for higher ground.

“Looks like you failed,” Billbert said. “It burns, doesn’t it?”

PLANET Z

It’s an easy scam, really.
Get a bunch of rookies hooked on poker or blackjack or some other game.
Rig the games so they’re deep in debt.
To pay off the debt, they ease up on their game or fake an injury for a bit.
Maybe pass along things the public doesn’t know, like a teammate spending too much time in the training room.
What sport is this? What league?
All of them.
Because gladiators are stupid, and suddenly rich gladiators are stupider.
Don’t let that year or two in college fool you.
They didn’t learn a thing in there.

Making tigers disappear

Siegfried and Roy were stage musicians who used lasers, glitter, and white suits to amaze millions of fans who came to watch them on their Las Vegas stage.
They paraded their white tigers and exotic animals around, making them leap and disappear.
Roy was attacked by one of their white tigers and took years to recover before returning to the stage.
He died during the Coronavirus pandemic.
The next year, Siegfried died of cancer.
Magic? The truth is, anybody can make tigers disappear.
Well, more like everyone can, really.
When we destroy their habitats and drive the species to extinction.

Not worth a dime

President Roosevelt’s face is on the dime because of The March of Dimes.
Roosevelt had Polio, and The March of Dimes raised money for research to cure Polio.
George Washington owned quarter horses, so his head went on the quarter.
Abraham Lincoln said “A penny for your thoughts” to his wife before he was shot and killed, so his head is on the penny.
Thomas Jefferson’s life wasn’t worth a plugged nickel, said his angry neighbor who argued over a border fence between their farms, so his head is on the nickel.
Nobody uses all those other big, fancy coins.

Bob the butcher

Bob the Butcher was the best butcher around.
He had the best meats, the best knives, the cleanest store, the most generous scales, and the biggest smile.
Whatever you wanted, you could get.
And you could get it any way you wanted.
He could slice meat so thin, it only had one side.
The sausages were blended to perfection.
So fast with his knives, there never was a line, and the Take A Number dispenser still had the original 1 on it.
He even had a bone for every dog.
As he lured them into the back room for butchering.