Author: R.

Big Art

Just as space travel opened up the asteroid belt for mining operations, faster-than-light travel opened up the galaxy.
Hundreds of billions of worlds out there, waiting.
The inhabitable ones became colonies.
The uninhabitable ones could be harvested for resources.
Or used for massive, bizarre art projects.
Release enough Von Neumann self-replicating robots, and you can make anything on a planetary scale.
Some purists call it cheating, because robots make the art, but others said they’re as much a tool as a paintbrush or a hammer and chisel.
Nothing’s worse than a critic who drops a meteor on your canvas.

Fun Quotas

The owner of the company told the executives that there needed to be more fun in the office.
“How much fun?” the executives asked.
“More,” said the owner.
So, the executives told the managers that there needed to be more fun.
They worked up a set of forms to track the fun, and metrics to measure whether individual and departmental fun goals were being met.
Every floor had a Fun Enforcement Officer, who went around shouting at staff to have more fun.
The staff responded by putting fun designs on their cardboard boxes as they packed their shit and left.

The Metric Family

The Metric System is evil.
Probably the work of The Devil, if you ask me.
In fact, we named our son Miles because we hate The Metric System.
The same reason why we named our next son Stone. Stone’s a measurement of weight.
Then came the triplets: Rod, Cord, and Peck. Look those up.
We loved to watch them play in the yard with their dogs Furlong, Fathom, and Fluid Ounce.
Because that’s what life’s about, right?
Enjoying your time with your family.
And when we’re not busy denouncing The Metric System, we, the Van Meters, are all about family.

Concrete Medal

The Olympics are supposed to be about good sportsmanship, fairness, and competition.
But the Russians dope up their athletes with performance-enhancing drugs.
And many Muslim athletes refuse to compete against Israeli Jews.
So, the Mossad came up with a new medal: The Big Concrete Block Medal.
They pick up the unsportsmanlike asshole or cheater, and they give them the medal.
Then they take them out on a boat, and drop them in the water.
And click a stopwatch.
They struggle, splash around, but eventually, they all go under.
And don’t come back up.
*click*
“A new record,” they say, laughing.

Mac and Cheese

You used to have to make cheese and macaroni with your own cheese and macaroni.
Then, Kraft came out with that blue box kit.
You know, the one with the orange powder.
Add your own milk and butter.
Now, if you don’t have your own milk and butter handy, you could use a Velveeta or Cracker Barrel kit.
Or one of those special Kraft kits.
Those have orange cheese goop in them.
Better yet, just get the Stouffer’s or other premade frozen macaroni and cheese.
Or go to a restaurant and order it.
That’s what kids menus are for, right?

Weekly Challenge #670- SHARP

How to properly cat

LIZZIE

Someone said “To destroy is always the first step in any creation.”
So, he grabbed his sketchbook and drew. Whatever he drew, he destroyed.
The smile on his sister’s face for each time she made him look stupid. The ice-cream business of his friend who bullied him as a kid. The records his cruel cousin stored alphabetically. And he went on and on.
Then, he drew New York. He didn’t know why. He had nothing against New York.
So, he drew himself a pair of thick glasses and he never touched the sketchbook again.
New York survived with minor damages.

RICHARD

Parenting

When it comes to parenting, I’m a firm believer in the ‘short, sharp shock’ method for dealing with bad behaviour.

When my kids were toddlers, I wired up the high chair to a car battery to dispense the necessary treatment; then, as Tasers and stun guns became more readily available, dishing out discipline became a lot simpler.

Of course, for the most serious tantrums, the only solution is alligator clips, connected to the mains’ supply – works every time.

So what if my kids now spend most of the time drooling and rocking back and forth… they’re always impeccably behaved.

SERENDIPIDY

You need a carefully selected, exceptionally sharp, knife: one capable of slicing through skin and flesh in a single, smooth motion. Then the follow up of the sharp, acid touch of freshly squeezed lemon juice – so intense!

Finally, a Liberal application of salt completes the ritual.

Then… Sit and drink. Best enjoyed with a companion.

The perfect tequila slammer.

And afterwards, when the bottle is empty, it’s time to turn the knife on your companion: Slice them up nicely, then rub copious quantities of leftover lemon and salt into their wounds.

It’s well worth the hangover in the morning!

TOM

Left To Ones Own devices

Jack was a sharp dress man, but not in the way you would think of a fashionable man about town. True he was dress to the nines in his New York suit. What made Jack sharp was the vast assortment of sharped things he hand incorporated into said suit, his favorite a straight razor. Everyone wanted Jack dead, and he was having none of it. Now the universe, a truly funny external agent of fate. Had other plan for Jack. Few have gangster have ever been done in by a self-inflected paper cut. Bleed out all over that sharp suit.

DUANE

Sharp

Music: Cheery Monday by Kevin MacLeod

I’m not the sharpest tool in the shed.  In boot camp I spent one week on chow hall duty.  My job was filling milk dispensers with boxes of fresh milk from the huge walk-in refrigerator behind the chow hall.

I walked out of the fridge one morning to a female petty officer blocking the door.

“Is that the meat locker?” she asked.

“Milk locker” I replied.

“Are you sure that’s not the meat locker?”

“Yes.”

“I was looking for some meat.”

“Nope.”  I was smiling and thinking how dumb she must be to not know where the meat locker was.

NORVAL JOE

When the three arrived at Linoliumanda’s house she ran inside and grabbed her butter beer mug. When she came out, it was clear something was wrong. “My parents are both gone. What do we do now?”
Roderick laughed. “Why don’t you fly?”
Billbert coughed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Roderick folded his arms. “You’re as sharp as a tack, aren’t you Billbert. I know you can fly. If you want to get to school on time, you’re going to have to do it.”
Billbert scowled at Roderick but went inside the house and used the phone to call his mother.
LAIEANNA
Finding a pink slip in my locker after hand to hand combat was a
devastating discovery.  It was my third year at spy school and I had
been in the top ten for every class since I enrolled.  Year three was
more advanced, but I was a dedicated student and still scored high
with the exception of Interrogations and Torture. It was the receiving
not giving kind of class.  Yes, I struggled, but I just needed more
time to adapt.  I have to be resigned to my fate and take the notice.
Ow, that’s sharp!  Now I have a papercut.

PLANET Z

Milton Sharp.
Oldest man in the world.
Died at the age of…
Well, nobody’s quite sure.
Birth certificates weren’t a thing when he was born.
Which was a very long time ago.
We think he might have been a hundred and twenty.
Maybe a hundred and twenty-one.
There’s no way to be certain.
It’s not like we can hook him up to a polygraph.
Or inject him with truth serum.
Well, we could, but neither would do much good.
Because he’s dead.
Does it really matter?
What is it going to change?
And we all die in the end., right?

Fishmonger

A fishmonger trades in fish.
A slaver trades in people.
So, who trades in mermaids? A fishmonger or a slaver?
They’re half-fish, half-people.
But then, are you trading in mermaids as a commodity, or are you representing them as an agent or employment facilitator?
The rates are nearly the same, but the results are somewhat different.
After all, you don’t drag your new VP of Sales out of her saline tank and eat her.
Unless, of course, your sales are down for the budget year.
Then, go ahead. Eat them.
Beats firing them and paying out a large severance package.

Go get the lemons

I never liked the idea that if Life hands you lemons, you should make lemonade.
You shouldn’t wait for Life to hand you lemons.
Nobody goes around handing out lemons.
Instead, you’ll probably get handed some handbill for a protest, or some guy dressed up like a hot dog will hand you coupons outside of the James Coney Island.
Or, if you’re in Vegas, a hooker’s kid will hand you an ad for his mother.
The sidewalk’s littered with those ads.
Me, I never wait for lemons. Life’s too short, man.
I go to the grocery store and shoplift them.

Thrown under the bus

Okay, so your team threw you under the bus.
At least they threw you under a bus.
I mean, that’s public transportation, right?
Was that bus running on clean-burning diesel or compressed natural gas, or some other lower-carbon footprint power source?
It would have been better for the environment if they had thrown you under an electric vehicle.
Or, I suppose, a human-powered vehicle, such as a bicycle.
Under a bunch of jogging humans would have worked, too.
Although if a bicycle or joggers had run you over, you might have gotten someone else hurt.
We couldn’t have that happening.

Boring at the booth

The problem with coming up with a cool schtick for a conference exhibit is that you end up having to do it a few hundred times.
Over. And over. And over.
Yeah, I know. It’s funny. For you.
For me, it was funny the first few times, when I was coming up with the routine, but now that I’ve done it a few hundred times, I’m sick to death of it.
So, here’s the bottle. Here’s a jelly bean in it. One jellybean. Because we don’t play guessing games with your business hosting.
Ha ha. Funny, right?
Now go away.