Category: My stories

Some people can’t see the big picture.
That’s because they’re standing on it
The picture is so big, they can’t see it… the whole big picture
They don’t have a viewpoint that allows them to see it.
So, they take the 10,000-foot view.
Only then can they see the big picture.
Oops. Lost a contact. And forgot a spare pair of eyeglasses.
Oh well. Use your smartphone to snap a photo, and then see the big picture when you get to the ground.
What? You dropped your smartphone?
Maybe you don’t need to see the big picture all that badly.

Fat Freddy was so fat, he couldn’t see the numbers on the scale.
So, he bought a talking scale.
No, the talking scale didn’t groan or say “Only one at a time!”
It just told him his weight.
In kilograms.
Which is a smaller number than pounds.
Freddy thought it was telling him his weight in pounds.
When he used his treadmill, it was set to use kilometers.
So he thought he was walking more miles than he actually walked.
He died of a massive heart attack.
His family paid for the funeral in dollars.
American dollars, not Canadian dollars.

Nobody at the dictionary company likes to work with Santos.
If you looked up the word “pedantic” in the dictionary, you wouldn’t just see a picture of Santos.
You’d see a picture of Santos arguing with Daniel Webster about the definition of pedantic.
Several editions of the dictionary missed publication dates because he wouldn’t stop arguing.
He was so obsessive about splitting hairs and tearing his hair out over the most minute detail, he ended up bald.
It left him without nits to pick, so he turned to nitpicking others.
The publisher gave Santos a final word to define: fired.

One wall.
One ball.
The handball championships.
The best of the best.
Playing in the finals.
They dive and swat and scream.
Scraping the ground, bloody knees and elbows.
Plastic goggle frames fly off their heads, cracking on the pavement.
Ragged leather gloves, torn surfer shorts, soles ripping off of their shoes.
Towels soaked in sweat, empty water bottles.
Pickle brine jars.
Anything for a win, anything.
Shouting at the referee, the crowd.
Kicking over chairs.
Game point.
Time out, time out.
One more serve to go.
Bounce it on the ground.
Slap it, and scream with everything you’ve got.

We named the bomb disposal robot “Scooby” after that dog in the cartoons.
Scooby was great for snipping wires and dragging bombs away from crowded areas.
Then we’d remotely detonate the bombs, either by setting off the explosives with a small charge or shooting the hell out of them until they exploded.
Sometimes, the locals would shoot somebody, put a grenade or bomb under them, and call for the medics.
Scooby was useful at scouting these human bombs, flipping them over to reveal the deadly trap.
And then, a bomb took out Scooby. Blew him to bits.
Scooby became Scrappy.

Long ago, I remember going to a hot dog place, and it was great.
It isn’t there anymore.
There was this really good pizza joint, too.
It’s also gone.
The rib joint in Columbus?
Long gone.
The bar and grill where I’d get margaritas and fish tacos and salads?
Gone. Gone. Gone.
They’re all gone.
Meanwhile, I drive past McDonalds and Burger King and Wendy’s and Jack In The Box and Subway and…
The mediocre chains stretch across the city… the state… the country… the world…
I park and go into the local barbecue pit sandwich restaurant.
Don’t ever change.

We keep seeds for thousands of species and varieties of plants in the Doomsday Vault.
Should disaster ever come, future generations can recover these plants.
I walk across the frozen tundra, enter the vault lobby, and open the hatch.
I close it behind me before I descend the stairs.
Another hatch, another set of stairs, and then… the vault.
I quickly find what I am looking for…
Brussels sprouts.
I grab all of those seeds and return to the surface.
And dump them in the lake.
It’s bad enough we will destroy the world.
Why make future generations suffer more?

The emergency room gave me a prescription without refills.
The drug worked so well, my doctor thinks I should stay on the medicine.
So, he gave me a follow-up prescription.
When I was down to three pills, I tried to get the new prescription filled.
My insurance company balked at the claim.
I called them, and had to explain the situation.
“What do you need it for?” asked the fool on the other end of the line.
“That’s a violation of my privacy and the HPAA laws,” I said.
The claim was approved, and I pick the pills up tonight.

All the pizza joints in town are on Maple Street.
Joey’s All You Can Eat is where you eat all the pizza you can for ten bucks.
Bobby’s All You Should Eat is where a dietitian calculates how much you should eat, and you pay ten bucks to eat it.
Stan’s All You Could Eat just displays the pizza that the dietician calculates you could eat.
Ollie’s All You’ll Ever Eat feeds you pizza until you burst.
Luigi’s All You Ate isn’t really a pizzeria. He just sticks his finger down your throat and holds your head over a bucket.