Tag: tragedy

Half Of What

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Master Kwan sat in front of the student, poured the pitcher into his glass, and stopped.
“Is the glass half-empty or half-full, Stinkbug?” asked the teacher.
The student scratched his recently-shaved scalp. “It is full, Master,” he said.
“With what?” asked the teacher.
“It is half-full with water,” said the student. “And half full of air. Half plus half is whole.”
“Drink,” commanded the teacher. “Fill the glass with air.”
The student drank. “Delicious,” he said, smiling.
“It is not water, Stinkbug,” said the teacher. “It is poison.”
“Then it is a delicious poison,” said the student, and he died.

Why he never went back

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Without language, nor lust. I guess you could still call it love.
They played backgammon at the café every evening. A bottle of wine between them – a smile, a wink. Nothing more than that.
One night, a madman shouted “GOD IS GREAT!” and exploded.
As if He needed reminding.
A week later, the man looked at the rebuilt café. He folded his tear-soaked paper, picked through the alleyway, and found a bloody chip.
Most people place stones on tombstones; he placed the chip.
Her husband showed him the way.
He never went back, except in his dreams.
And nightmares.

The Second Disaster

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As the shelters filled up, FEMA Director Michael Brown challenged his team to come up with alternative housing arrangements.
Strategic placement of hurricane survivors on television talk shows absorbed 2,000 of them. Green room sofas sure are comfy.
Golf courses became Brownville shanty towns. Nothing wrong with camping. People love to camp.
Best idea of all was shipping them out to zoos.
“It works for the Chinese and those damn pandas, right?” said Brown.
Two problems: hurricane survivors don’t live on bamboo like pandas, and they tend to fuck more often than pandas.
“Zoos can charge extra then,” said Brown.

Hiking With Grampa

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The sun went down, and night approached quickly.
Billy looked at the cheap Cracker Jack sticker and smirked.
“The toys they give out sure suck, right, Grampa?” he asked.
Grampa Fred slumped against a tree and said nothing.
“I guess I shouldn’t have let the GPS thingy batteries run down.”
Silence.
“If you still smoked, I’d have matches for a fire.”
Billy looked at the Quit Smoking gum. He rubbed two sticks of it together and tossed them away.
“If only you hadn’t run out of pills…”
Billy stopped. He looked around.
A pill! Another!
He followed the trail home.

Enjoy Your Stay

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The majestic Orbital Hilton, the “Jewel of the Sky,” also has the grim nickname of “The Suicide Space Suites.”
Individuals with incurable terminal diseases often purchase one-way tickets to the hotel, run up gigantic tabs, and then cycle out of the airlocks buck naked.
Or they will join a spacewalk hiking tour only to sever the safety tether.
Some take off their helmets, while others fire their thrusters at the earth so they burn up like shooting stars.
Because of this grim parade, hotel policy has been changed to require a substantial deposit for all guests, refundable upon return planetside.

Heavy Hangs The Ape-Crown

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Fatigued and wounded, King Kong clung to the building with his remaining strength. However, all he could muster was not enough, and his grip failed at the worst possible time.
As he fell, he realized that he should have carried the blonde in his mouth so his arms would share the strain of climbing the building.
He also decided that climbing the building was quite possibly a bad idea, too.
His nemesis told the gathered crowd that beauty killed the beast, but Kong’s final thought was that poor planning and a lack of ergonomic awareness was a major contributing factor.

Fostering Ill Will

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Xavier was the last of the Fosters of Foster, Iowa. He owned the local mill, railway, branch of the Iowa National Bank, and pretty much everything in town.
As editor and publisher of the local paper, he sang his praises daily. When that was not enough, he appointed himself grand marshal of a parade in his honor with an open air touring car lent from his dealership.
When he fell ill, the hospital that bore his name could not revive him, and Xavier was the final piece of the Foster jigsaw in the town’s cemetery.
“Good riddance,” sighed the town.

Twelve Other Labors

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Cocaretzi is a Greek dish of stuffed ox intestines
It is also the name of Heracles’ cousin. He was similrarly tasked with twelve labors.
Most of them involved solving petty disputes between neighbors. One was getting a bad wine stain out of a toga.
The final labor of Cocaretzi had to do with catering a picky Greek king’s picnic. He was tired of the usual fare, so he challenged Cocaretzi to come up with something new.
Yes, this is where the ox intestines come in.
Cocaretzi was executed for the vile dish, but at least it forever bears his name.

File Not Found

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Laurence grabbed the monitor and howled.
“My story is not gone, dammit!” he yelled. “Give it back, you motherfucking motherfucker!”
FILE NOT FOUND
“I worked for hours on that goddamned thing! I looked up tons of pages on Wikipedia and IMDB, for crying out loud!”
FILE NOT FOUND
“Auuuuuuuuuuuuuuugh!” screamed Laurence.
A cat ran out from behind the monitor.
“Did you break it, you furry little shit?” yelled Laurence at the cat.
The cat leapt off of the table and out the door.
FILE NOT FOUND
“Shit,” said Laurence. “oh well.”
He pulled out a pen and began to write.

The Tortoise and The Patsy

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“Is everyone ready?” said the Owl.
“Ready!” said the Hare.
“Ready!” said the Tortoise.
The Rat poked its nose from the undergrowth and winked at the Tortoise. “Ready,” it said.
The Owl shrieked “GO!” and the Hare was gone like a bolt of lightning.
The Tortoise watched and chuckled.

The Hare sped along the racecourse he’d let the Tortoise pick out, through meadows and fields and finally down towards the farmhouse…
*SNAP*
The Hare shrieked in agony as four traps grabbed his body and ripped open his skin to the bone.

The Rat calculated their winnings.
The Tortoise munched lettuce.