I remember this one house that used to hand out Jack Chick tracts for Halloween.
They’d say “You’re all going to burn in Hell!” every time someone rang the bell, and they opened the door.
Kids and parents out for Trick or Treat didn’t take them literally. They thought it was a performance thing, and laughed and thanked them.
Because Halloween is all about ghosts, goblins, and the spirits of Hell and all that.
It’s like saying “Merry Christmas!” or “Happy New Year!”
We’d read them and laugh, and throw them away.
And go back to fighting over Snickers bars.
Category: My stories
The Secret Ingredient
Don’t you hate it when the secret ingredient is love?
How many calories does love contain?
Are there any trans-fats in love?
Can you be allergic to love?
Ingesting it, of course, not experiencing it.
And I don’t mean the crude metaphor for oral sex, either.
And why is love a secret ingredient if you’re telling people it’s in there?
Doesn’t telling people defeat the purpose of a secret?
When I add secret ingredients, I don’t tell anyone.
I keep them a secret.
I mean, what if I were to say “The secret ingredient is poison?” when I poison people?
Scars of Memory
Every cut she makes, it reminds her of someone she’s lost.
The jagged scar along her shin for her grandmother.
The puckered hole on her arm for her mother.
The slashes on her hip for her father and brother.
The crisscrossed welts on her back from all of her boyfriends at the “wellness facility.”
And the fresh gash on her face for her therapist.
The blood on the letter-opener… some of it his, some of it hers.
She wipes it on the therapist’s sleeve, sits calmly in his chair, and waits for the orderlies to come to take her away.
Demons Out
When a priest exorcises a demon from someone, where does the demon go?
Does it go back to Hell? Or does it get released into the wild so it can possess someone else?
And if the demon goes back to Hell, what’s to stop it from finding its way back here to possess someone else?
Can daemons be destroyed? Because I’d think that would be a smarter option than just prying them loose and letting them go bother someone else.
Unless you’re in the business of exorcism, that is.
Can’t go threatening your customer base and revenue stream, I guess.
Marry the Dead
Traditional wedding vows state “Til death do we part.”
So when you die, you’re free.
However, some people prefer to remain married in the Hereafter.
That’s where I come in. I’m a Ghost Preacher, and I marry the dead.
Although they prefer to call it a renewal of their eternal vows.
Things get a little sticky when someone gets remarried after they lose their partner.
Not just because the spirits quibble and quarrel over who is more in love with each other.
But the fact that the ghosts tend to take it out on me, and that ectoplasm is disgusting.
Power Fail
Lightning struck the power line and knocked out electricity to half of the apartment complex.
My apartment is in the part without power, of course.
When the breakers were fixed, every building got power back.
Except for ours. The transformer was at the end of the chain, and it exploded.
So, everybody else has power while we wait for the crew to install a new one.
We can hear their televisions, video games, and air conditioners while we sweat in the dark.
And their screams when the showers go cold.
Because the water heater is in our building. Without power.
Yoga
Despite claims that yoga comes from an ancient medication routine, that story is a pack of lies.
Nor is it true that a meditation expert in Chicago concocted that bullshit story as a cover for their own meditation routine.
The truth is, it comes from the future. The far-distant future.
A time-traveler from the peak of human civilization came back to bring yoga techniques to the past.
He got fed up hearing all of his friends in the future reading the history books and wondering why we in the past didn’t just get a grip and chill the fuck out.
Dead End Job
Stan hated his dead end job.
He was paid by the city to hold up a DEAD END sign at the end of the street.
At least he got 2 weeks off a year, medical, dental, and a pension.
Ralph, who had the night shift, was non-union. He had medical, but with a big co-pay.
They had seniority, though. The weekend guy had to cover for Stan and Ralph when they were sick.
The contractor wanted to replace them with illegal aliens, who were cheaper, but the union fought it.
In the end, they were replaced by a metal post.
Tickle the ivories
I don’t understand why people say that a piano player is “tickling the ivories” when they play the piano.
I make pianos for a living, and I can report as fact that the white ivory keys are not ticklish.
Neither are the black ebony keys.
This is why you can dust a piano’s keys with a feather duster, and it won’t laugh.
In fact, none of the piano feels a damned thing.
The piano bench, on the other hand, is an oversensitive little prick.
That’s why we fill it with music books and sit on it to keep it shut.
metastory
I don’t like stories about how frustrating it is to write stories.
It’s a cop-out. It’s shying away from those holes in reality through which I look through to see the real world behind this one.
It’s whining and bitching about how hard it is to write.
How hard can it be? I’ve written for ten years, and I have yet to miss a day.
If I can do it, you can do it.
Except…. today has been so busy. And I’m totally worn out from all the bullshit I had to deal with.
Maybe just this one time’s okay.