Curiosity killed the cat.
Then, Curiosity killed the dog.
Next came the goldfish. Curiosity put those in a blender and hit the big red button.
After that mess was flushed, Curiosity went outside with an air rifle and started shooting birds off the telephone wires.
She ran out of ammo right around the time we got home.
“Check on the babysitter,” I told my wife.
She went inside, found her tied up in a chair, and checked for a pulse.
“Weak, but it’s there,” she said.
Still alive?
Strange. Usually, Curiosity kills them.
I scolded her: “You’re getting sloppy, kid.”
Tag: cliche
Saving Throw
We’re having a fundraiser at work for the American Heart Association.
Make your own Ice Cream Sundaes.
Ice cream for heart research, right?
Makes as much sense as candy bars for Diabetes or strobe lights for Epilepsy.
I’m on a diet and can’t eat ice cream. But I love it so much.
So delicious.
So tempting.
NO! I cannot do this!
I must not give in! Stay strong!
I must make my saving throw against ice cream.
Work… work… work… do not think about the ice cream… work… work…
Then, I realize it’s time to go home.
Saving throw made.
Opulent
The bus station was opulent compared to this alley.
Yes, I use the word opulent to compare one hellhole to another.
Not the sort of word you expect from a common street bum?
I guess that means I’m no common street bum.
My journey from Saville Row to Skid Row is a sad tale, for certain, but pride and the length of that stop light prevent me from saying much more.
As a public service, I’ve scrubbed your windshield clean, and I ask nothing more than your thanks, but if your gratitude compels you, perhaps-
WELL FUCK YOU TOO, BUDDY!
The Dormant Clown
Dr. Potts released The Clown Virus last week.
Most people died mid-transformation, horrible grins on their pale faces.
But some survived, and now they roam the streets looking for the few remaining bottles of seltzer water, red rubber noses, and joy-buzzers.
A kind of social hierarchy has developed: The floppier and bigger the shoes, the more powerful the clown chieftain.
Then there’s the rare unexpressed carriers like me.
Potts had developed what he thought was an antidote foam, but it’s no cure. It just keeps the virus dormant.
I spray it into the pie-tin, and smack myself in the face.
Spotlight
Jim was the finest actor I ever saw.
Guy was brilliant. Could do any role at a moment’s notice.
If he didn’t already know the script by heart, you could hand it to him, he’d flip through the pages, and was ready.
The problem was, he didn’t like the spotlight.
No, I’m not talking about the attention and fame and all that stuff.
He literally didn’t like the spotlight.
He and the lighting director fought all the time about it, and it took a clever arrangement of houselights to light the stage.
He also wore a lot of white suits.
Cause Of Death
My cousin died the other day.
We’d just been talking on the phone, telling each other about everything like we always do.
She was found alone in her chair at home.
Everyone in the family worried that it had been suicide.
Because if it had been suicide, she’d not get a proper burial in the family plot.
So, I confessed… it was me… I murdered her.
I refused bail and sat in jail, thinking of her.
The guards came to tell me the autopsy showed it wasn’t suicide. She’d had a heart attack, that’s all.
And they set me loose.
Multiplying
Long ago, my Christian friends tried to teach me about Jesus.
So, I sat there and listened while they regurgitated everything they’d learned in Sunday School.
I agreed that the guy sounded like a really cool dude and did some amazing things, but I never understood the whole “multiplying the loaves and the fishes” miracle.
Sure, I was good at Math, but I never figured out how someone could multiply bread by a fish.
“What’s pumpernickel times trout?” I asked them. “Or whole wheat times salmon?”
In the end, they thought me a heretic.
Whatever. Their math is still fishy.
All the world’s a stage…
All the world’s a stage
But unlike those women and men
Who are merely players
With their exits and entrances
We are the guys who run the box office
Selling tickets to people
Who have nothing better to do
Than watch the same old shit
Happen over and over and over
Sure, some do it better than others
The ushers come in and tell us
“Hey, this one dude, he’s good!”
We take turns, close a window
Watch for a while, get bored
And come back to the box office
Reopen the window, and ask
“How many for the show?”
I can hear the television cameras
They say I am the Bobby Fischer of Tiddly Winks.
I say I am better than he was at… at…
Play chess?
Piss people off?
Hate Jews?
Whatever he did, I am better at Tiddly Winks than what he did.
He had his board, his pieces.
His outbursts.
I have my squidger, my winks, my mat, and my cup.
Blitz! Blitz! Blitz!
Pot them all fast!
One! Two! Three! Four! Five! Six!
Now I wait for my partner… and…
NO!
COME ON, YOU COULD HAVE MADE THAT SHOT!
Hurry up! Hurry up!
Hurry up, doctors…
Hurry up and clone me!
The Cake Of Damocles
The Tyrant of Syracuse, Dionysius, welcomed the rebel Damocles into his home, offering his throne to the visitor.
“It’s all yours,” he said. “Enjoy.”
“Thank you,” said Damocles, and he sat down.
It was then that he looked up and saw a red and white cake, suspended over the throne.
“What’s with the cake?”
“It represents the threat those in power must live under every day.”
“Threat of cake? But I like cake.”
“Then I guess you like danger.”
That’s when the cake fell, and the sword inside it impaled Damocles.
“Oh, did I forget to mention it’s strawberry swordcake?”