I know that Jim Varney died of lung cancer a few years ago. He’s the guy who played Ernest in those movies and commercials. You know, the ones where the hillbilly pokes in the window and shouts HEY VERN!
If you think about it, we’re all Vern. Ernest is shouting all this stupid crap at us, over and over.
But if we were Vern, wouldn’t we lock our doors? Or latch the windows shut?
Sure, Ernest was an idiot, but letting him back in over and over, what does that say about us.
Maybe Vern left out packs of cigarettes?
Category: My stories
Glad Max
Glad Max guides his oxcart along the well-worn trails of Nepal, smiling and greeting his neighbors and countrymen.
Before the collapse of civilization, Nepal had been socially backward. Mostly subsistence farmers with poor access to technology, advanced medicine, and education.
There were a lot less annoying tourists and drugs and other crap that came with modernization. The old ways were back and here to stay. Nice and quiet.
Which made Max glad.
Every now and then, post-apocalyptic weirdos in leather BSDM gear drove up form Australia and caused headaches. And eventually drove off of cliffs.
Which made Max even gladder.
Zilla
Nobody knows why Godzilla keeps attacking Tokyo, but the insurance companies learned their lesson after the first time.
They tried to add “zilla” to the end of “Act of God” in their policies, but that didn’t quite work out with Kanji characters. So, they said that Godzilla had used his atomic fire breath on the building that warehoused all the records and paperwork.
When that scam didn’t work, the insurance company called the bankers and worked up a deal.
“Godzilla destroyed our vault and records,” the bankers said.
They pocketed the cash, fled to Singapore, and lived happily ever after.
The Gift Of Story
“A book can take you places,” my uncle said. “Wonderful places.”
You see a stack of fresh notepads and unused pens. I see stories that are waiting to be imagined and written.
So many places to discover and explore, then commit to the page. With each revision, the story becomes clearer, and the reader comes closer to actually being there.
I hold a notepad in my hand, pick up a pen, and remember my uncle trying to teach me to write.
But I couldn’t. I didn’t have the gift.
I close the rolltop desk and lock it.
Stories, lost forever.
The Complainer
Fred is a complainer. All he ever does is complain.
“How are you, Fred?” are the four most dangerous words in the English language. And, if Fred spoke any other language, they’d be just as dangerous in that, too. Instead, he complains about people who speak other languages.
“Why must people speak these other languages? Are they hiding something from us?”
Then he changes the subject to something like the weather, his job, his health, or whatever is bothering him.
Then, one day, when asked how he’s doing, he said “Eh, I can’t complain.”
We called the ambulance for him.
The Heat
I don’t know how people can stand the heat in Phoenix. Is there some secret underground tunnel system, because there aren’t enough skybridge tubes full of chilled mercy from one building to another.
Maybe they go around at night after the sun grants temporary reprieve from its searing wrath?
Centuries ago, my people wandered 40 years in the desert before they reached The Promised Land.
Me, I’d have given up after a day.
“Was Pharaoh really all that bad? I bet the labor market would be in our favor now.”
I step into a building.
Cool, refreshing air conditioning.
Amen.
The Cones
Usually, traffic cones are orange so you can see them at night. However, while I was walking back to the hotel, I saw a green traffic cone.
I picked it up and carried it back to the hotel, and I wore it as a hat for a selfie in the bathroom mirror.
I let it sleep on the other bed.
When I went down to the registration desk to check out, I left it in an elevator.
There are a lot of websites that sell traffic cones, but I don’t really want one now.
It’s just the moment, you know.
If the shoes fit…
Bob lost his right leg in a motorcycle accident. Bill had his left leg blown off after he stepped on a land mine in Iraq.
“Hey, you could buy a pair of shoes together,” said a girl at the bar. “Bob gets the left shoe and Bill gets the right.”
They heard that kind of patronizing crap one too many times, and they both snapped.
When they were both convicted for murder, they shared a prison cell. Sure enough, the warden did the “shoe joke.”
As they beat the fuck out of him, they shouted “We’re not the same size!”
Too Perfect
Trinity is a seven.
Sevens are better than humans, the ads say.
But they said that about sixes and fours.
Nobody said that about fives. Fives were… well… fives were fives.
Anybody who had a five could tell you that.
Anybody not in a wheelchair. Or with half their face ripped off.
So, the sixes had to be good. And the sevens even better.
Trinity is better than human.
She adjusts to everything I do. Everything I need. Or want.
And then, I caught her with Jake.
Another seven.
“I deserve better than human, too,” Trinity said.
Just too perfect.
The Stranger
The bride and groom asked me to deliver the toast.
I wasn’t the best man. I wasn’t the maid of honor.
I was just someone they once knew, that once knew them, or thought I knew them. Or myself.
Now, I wear robes and a hood.
Nobody has seen my face for years. Not even me.
I bathe in the dark, and I am shaved and groomed by a blind barber.
I don’t even remember the color of my eyes. My hair.
A stranger to myself and all.
I held the glass in the air.
And dropped it.
It shattered.