They say that the grass is always greener on the other side.
The other side of what?
The other side of The Force?
Well, the good side of the force was in the Jedi Temple at Coruscant.
There wasn’t much grass on that planet.
Nor was there much grass on Mustafar, Darth Vader’s hideout.
What about The Far Side?
Gary Larsson drew it in black and white during the week, and only the Sunday editions were in color.
It turns out, they were talking about that movie The Blind Side.
Man, the grass at that rich private school was green.
Author: R.
The creepy dog
We have an awesome back yard and patio, but the neighbor’s dog stares through the chain link fence.
When it does this, it looks creepy and judgmental.
So, we replaced the chain link fence with a solid wooden fence.
The dog still finds a way to get up on the fence and stare at us.
And it looks even creepier.
No matter how high we build the fence, the dog still manages to get up there and stare at us.
We moved to another neighborhood.
No back yard. No patio. No fence.
And, thankfully, no creepy dog staring at us.
Radial design
There’s a difference between not liking a symbol and not liking the cause it represents.
I find the Isle of Man flag to be ugly, with its radial and rotational symmetry of freaky feet.
But as for the Isle of Man itself, I really don’t know much about it, nor do I care to learn.
Similarly, the Nazi flag also has rotational symmetry in the symbol.
It’s nasty. It’s sharp. And the people who use it are awful people.
I don’t care if it’s an inverted symbol for peace.
So, Clarence, these cookies are delicious, but I’m rejecting your design.
Peppermint Flatty
All the way back to the third grade, Miss Othmar’s class, you could see how Marcie would look at Peppermint Patty, calling her Sir.
Kids would talk, do horrible things.
You know how kids can be.
Patty may have been a tough tomboy in grade school, but when she got to high school, she started to blossom.
Marcie wasn’t cool with this.
Patty went on hormone blockers, had her breasts surgically removed.
She was scheduled for the bottom surgery when she found Marcie making out with Charlie Brown under the bleachers.
Patty killed them both with a field hockey stick.
The marketed moon
I’m a technical writer.
But every now and then, I get asked to write marketing copy.
I’m not a marketing writer. I’m a technical writer.
My mindset is explaining things and teaching, not selling and promoting things.
The marketing people say give it a try.
So, I do. And it’s awful.
But we work on it together, and it comes out not half bad.
We do this again and again, and I feel myself change.
I fall to the floor, my body contorting.
The marketers howl at the full moon.
And I, the newest member of the pack, howl along.
The day after
If The New Yorker weren’t horribly biased, I’d imagine a cartoon where a reporter is poking her head into an editor’s office and asking if President elect is one word, two words, or hyphenated, and you see through the glass that the editor has hung themselves.
But The New Yorker is nowhere near that self-aware or capable of self-deprecation humor.
Hubris is funny, until it happens to you and your narrow world-view.
Besides, I’m sure some cartoonist has already tried to submit a cartoon like this.
No idea if the editor hanged themselves, though. But would you really be surprised?
Weekly Challenge #968 – Blood Test
RICARD
— Bloods —
I swear that when you reach a certain age, it gives doctors a licence to prescribe a whole range of medicines they’ve been itching to give you for years.
So they ask you to pop in for a blood test.
A simple blood test. Nothing to worry about – just routine. Give us a call in a week and we’ll have your results.
Those results, once you reach that magic age, open the floodgates to a catalogue of woes – diabetes, heart problems, cholesterol, cancer… You name it, and you’ve probably got it.
Not me.
I switched my son’s samples for mine.
TANGENT
The world was due for cancer screening. A century prior, it had barely survived. From the fallout, symptoms were documented, and as the years of testing passed, the world was content that it would not return. Attention turned to its autoimmune disease. If left untreated, fever would come, and kill. A screening was missed while the autoimmune treatment plan was drafted, but the symptoms were minor, and the world was content.
The cancer, it turns out, had returned. Its presence accelerated the autoimmune disease, and the fever had started.
The world is dying, but it has survived worse. Have hope.
LISA
Six Months
It wasn’t the result anyone would have wanted. But there it was, unquestionable. She shunned all treatment feeling if it was her ‘time to go’ she should leave with grace. She contemplated speeding things up but didn’t want to leave anyone a mess.
She swapped a Netflix series for a brisk walk, a pint for a green smoothie, stopped smoking and started yoga.
So, sixth months turned to sixteen, turned to sixty.
She survived decades; then died as she crossed the road whilst engrossed in an article about a blood test mix up in her area, all those years ago.
SERENDIPIDY
To give them their due, they were very thorough.
They took swabs, they dusted for prints, they took hundreds of high resolution photographs.
And they found nothing.
Just the blood test to go.
I held my breath, and waited as they sprayed Luminol over every surface they could find.
They turned on the blacklights… And still found nothing.
Not a smear, not a spot, not even the slightest indication of blood anywhere.
I’d done my job well.
And, if they couldn’t find any sign of the murders, I was pretty certain there was no chance of them finding the bodies!
LIZZIE
She was in the tub. Went for a swim, someone joked. The blood test was inconclusive. Are you sure it was a person? He nodded. Melted in that tub, someone joked. It wasn’t funny. Where did he get the blood from then? The wall. Plenty of it. The acid took care of the rest. And now? Now, it was in their hands. That’s why you’re cops, he said, I’m just the coroner. Well, the blood wasn’t hers. It was his. That damn pocket knife he used to slit her throat first. Good thing no one noticed that he kept saying she.
NORVAL JOE
Linoliamanda, her mother and Billbert waited in the front lobby of the hospital while they admitted Mr. Withybottom. The nurse told them it would be an hour or more while he got his blood test, xrays, and possibly an MRI of his head, so they might as well get comfortable.
A group of teenage volunteers surrounded a small table, chatting, and waiting for their turn to push a patient or carry flowers to a room.
They were mostly girls and Billbert considered how some were very shapely, like Sabrina. While others had hardly any shape at all, more like Linolamanda.
TOM
Often discovery in less than amazing.
It was discovered in remote corner of Anatolia. Bronze Gears festooned with Lapis lazuli. After cursor inspection a sweeping claim was made, this was the world’s oldest safe. X-rays of the interior while clearly showing all the working part didn’t offer a clue how to open. In the heart of the safe was signal sheet of parchment. 10 years of exploring different methodologies the safe finally swung open. The Parchment took another 10 years to decipher. Seems the glyphs on the parchment were the combination to the safe. It ended up in a museum the parchment taped to the side.
968
There can only be one
Two go in, one walks out. Imagine the duel in Dune. Two form circling. Muscles coiled like steel springs. A fury of jabs failing to hit the mark. Glancing blows drawn no blood. Sweat rolling of arm. Finally, a countermove brings the point to the skin of the neck, but not quick enough. With a roll to the right and dropping to one knee she finds the tiniest of open. S jabs and press the plunger. Red fills the crystal chamber. The crowd screams. It is over, the blood test has been fulfilled. This one hell of a Nursing School.
PLANET Z
I order a lot of things online, and I get a lot of packages.
On recycling day, there’s a stack of cardboard boxes and padded envelopes on the corner.
Sometimes, I mail things out.
Warranty cards, returns.
Tests my doctor orders for this or that.
Most tests I take at the corner clinic, but some are tests I can smear some blood on a card and mail back to the lab.
Most bill my insurance, others take a credit card.
One lab requires that I write checks.
If they can’t process a credit card, how will they process my blood?
Delivery times
So, the US Postal Service can deliver hundreds of fliers, pamphlets, letters, campaign posters, and other junk mail from every candidate, PAC, voter’s organization, and special interest, but they can’t deliver my ballot on time?
They claim it’s because of systemic delivery delays.
But if there’s systemic delivery delays, why is every flier, pamphlet, letter, campaign poster, and other junk mail being delivered before Election Day?
If there’s delays, this crap would still be arriving after Election Day.
Because it’s been delayed.
Everybody lies on Election Day.
And the lies are the only things that get delivered with any certainty.
The lines at the parks
So, the pandemic closed all the theme parks and the movie theatres.
People got laid off across the board.
But mostly the hourly workers, the people who do their best to help you forget the world for a while.
Waiters and waitresses, hotel staff, entertainers, shopkeepers.
The executives, on the other hand, gave themselves raises and retention bonuses.
All while begging for government bailouts.
They put together their reports to give to the investors.
All while the laid-off workers lined up at food pantries and toy donation lines.
Were they longer than the lines at the gates to the parks?
Arlington’s toxic waste site
When the Union needed a place to bury all those dead soldiers during the Civil War, Lincoln had them commandeer Robert E. Lee’s house and estate so the enemy general could never go home.
Over the years, hundreds and thousands of soldiers and politicians and important people are buried there.
And then there’s the Kennedys.
Three alcoholic, drug-addicted date-rapists and the money-grubbing socialite that was already halfway out the door when the bullet splattered her husband’s brains across the limousine in Dallas.
An eternal flame burns at the site. The flames are much, much hotter where their eternal souls reside.