It all started when Smithers came in with a silver Cross pen.
“See how it shines!” chirped Smithers. “Magnificent, no?”
“It is the finest pen I have ever seen!” said Walter.
Until the next day, when Walter arrived with a golden Mont Blanc.
Smithers seethed with envy, but refused to be outdone.
His Cross pen was soon replaced with a dodo feather quill that he dipped into a diamond inkwell.
For the next week Smithers and Walter battled over fancier and rarer writing implements until they were both fired for charging all this extravagant nonsense to the office supplies budget.
Category: My stories
Warren
A frail and elderly imam was slowly helped through the White House, a guide at each elbow.
But every so often, he’d stop at a painting or work of art, inspect it for a while, and then continue his journey.
Then, he stopped at a painting of a former president, pointed, and said what the guides thought was “War and Jihad?”
The art curator was confused. “That’s not Bush, that’s Warren G. Hardi,” he said, then realized the mistake. “OOOOOOOH, I see. Right. Warren G. Harding.”
The imam smiled, and the guides helped him down the hall to the bathroom.
The Feast Of Saint Walter
Unlike other feasts for saints, The Feast For Saint Walter is unique in the fact it does not involve any elaborate preparations, but involves eating from a dumpster.
That’s right. A dumpster.
Walter was flat-ass broke when he was alive, bumming money from everybody.
I always said “It’s a miracle that people still give that dude money.”
Bob once told me “It’s a miracle his wife hasn’t thrown his broke ass out.”
He was rummaging through a dumpster and hit his head on the lid when the truck came.
Martyrdom through compaction.
Hey, is that an orange rind?
Walter provides!
Turn
I’m out in my workshop, tinkering with junk I’ve scavenged.
It took a while, but I think I have this old radio fixed.
I plug it in to the solar battery array, flip the switch, and the tubes begin to glow.
So beautiful.
I slowly turn the knob, and the empty frequencies swirl and crackle with the random almost-nonsense of static.
Something pops.
Wait. Was that a voice?
I turn the dial back.
Nothing.
I keep my eyes closed, listening… searching…
No voices. No music. No recorded messages.
I turn it off.
Am I the last man alive?
God forbid.
Take Your Rocket To Work Day
Today is Take Your Daughter To Work Day.
Jameson came in with a rocket launcher over his shoulder.
It seems he didn’t read his email and heard things wrong. Thought it was “Take Your Rocket To Work Day.”
Which seems weird, sure, but if you know Jameson, it’s not all that weird.
Rocket sounds an awful lot like daughter. Especially when you launch a lot of rockets over the weekend and have considerable hearing damage.
The one thing that has me worried is that Jameson may have misheard “Take” and think we said “Launch.”
I wish he’d read his email.
The Divorce of Figaro
Did you know that Mozart wrote a sequel to The Marriage Of Figaro?
It’s called The Divorce Of Figaro.
A year after the chaotic wedding day, Figaro is lamenting his crazy.
Seductions and singing.
Feasts and fancy.
Subterfuge and plots.
The Count and The Countess are on the rocks, too. The entire mansion is a wreck, every treasure having been smashed against walls in endless fighting.
The four take their fighting to the street, and they bump into each other.
They end up divorcing, The Count marries Figaro, and the curtain comes down.
A good story, but the music sucked.
Making The Grade
Years ago, back when I was in college, I was better at hauling kegs than carrying a courseload.
My GPA was horrifying.
However, I was making good cash running parties, so I figured I could buy my way out of the mess I’ve made.
I caught the professor at one of the parties, a Wheel Of Fortune-themed party, and I told him “I know I’m getting an F, but I’d like to buy a vowel, please.”
Five hundred bucks, it cost me.
That night, the professor shacked up with a Freshman and got fired. His TA turned in the F.
Which came first?
Which came first, the chicken or the egg?
Does it matter? Do we need to go over this again?
Fine. It was neither.
That’s right. Neither the chicken nor the egg came first.
It was the flying saucers.
They landed, aliens came out, and then looked around for a while.
The flying saucers took off, but they left a bunch of stuff, like crystal skulls, eggs, and chickens.
The crystal skulls mutated the eggs so they hatched all the different forms of life, like horses and monkeys and people.
There’s your answer.
Oh, and I’ll take my horse eggs scrambled.
The World Is My Gym
The world is my gym.
The sidewalk is my treadmill.
And the membership is free.
Sometimes, it’s raining.
Sometimes, it’s hot.
Sometimes, it’s cold.
Sometimes, it’s windy.
But, usually, it’s nice out.
The birds are singing.
I can’t hear them.
I have my headphones on.
A bird swoops past my head, flapping.
Defending its nest.
This happens every day.
I think about bringing a club.
Or a weighted sock.
To stun the aggressive avian.
What if I kill it?
Who would feed the baby birds?
I imagine myself, perched over featherless chicks.
Then vomiting into the nest
Where’s my ladder?
The Statue
We dug up the statue and cleaned it off.
It was a golden angel, and it was perfect in every way.
When was it made?
Who made it?
Why?
It didn’t weigh like it was solid gold. We thumped it and it sounded hollow, but filled with something.
Did we dare open it?
We had it shipped back to the university, and after careful examination, we found an unobtrusive spot to drill.
The hole grew deeper, deeper…
That’s when the poison gas leaked out, and as we choked, we realized it was the artist’s final statement:
Don’t fuck with perfection.