Twisted fairy tales for broken people.
636184
As I was growing up, I was always being told that I am what I eat.
So, I would tell all my food that they are what eats them.
There’s not much point to telling a salad that, nor is there a reason to announce this fact to a steak.
One time, I went out for seafood and I chose my own lobster from the tank.
I picked my lobster and then told it that I was going to eat it, I am what I eat, so it was about to be me.
It pinched my nose in its claw.
636184
There’s always that one person at a party, off in the corner, all by themselves.
Fred was holding the string to a red balloon, mumbling “All I need are ninety-eight more and I can start a nuclear war.”
So, we gathered up all the red balloons, but still came up short.
The party store was closed. We couldn’t buy more.
“Maybe if we paint the other ones red? I said.
But nobody had red paint, and the paint store was closed, too.
The next morning, I was drinking my coffee, when I heard the sirens.
Should have gotten a pinata.
9355513
This is an updated version of the Weekly Challenge that includes Elisson and Tom, which were borked by gmail.com issues. My apologies to everyone who’s voted so far… the polls have been reset.
Welcome to the seventy-six Weekly Challenge, where I post a topic and then challenge you to come up with a 100 word story based on that topic.
The topic this week was selected by Caleb Bullen of the Black Tie Martini Club.
And it’s Ramadan.
The excellent theme music is by Guy David
SOMETHING NEW
Due to popular demand, I am going to include stories that were sent to me, but without a recording. However, since the midget has left for sunny Coral Gables, Florida, those stories will just be posted in the show notes. You’re more than welcome to vote for them, but they will be ineligible for prizes or topic selection.
I feel that this is a fair balance between the podcast and blog natures of this content.
Feel free to share your thoughts on this decision in the comments, and we might possibly come up with an even better and more fair policy for handling these kinds of situations.
VOTING
Go ahead and listen to them by clicking on the grammophone thingy there in the left column and then vote for your favorites (multiple selections are allowed):
WE GOTS PRIZES:
I will be sending the winner a prize… it’s refrigerator magnets for the podcast. Massive amounts of fridge magnets were mailed out in the past week… watch your mail, and let me know if I’ve missed you.
It is your voting that determines who wins. So listen, vote, and tune in next week to find out who won!
MAD BARD Z
When Ramadan rolls around, my coworker Mohammed fasts during the day.
As the month drags on, he gets more and more irritated and angry.
I asked him why he puts himself through this. What is this all for?
He said that by denying the body nourishment, fasting is supposed to help focus the mind and the soul on spiritual needs.
“Oh,” I said. “I hope it’s working, because from my perspective, it just makes you cranky.”
Then he said “Aren’t you Jewish? Don’t you fast for your holy days?”
I thought for a moment. “Um… I’m supposed to fast? Oops.”
GOMEM
Ramadan, I dread ramadan, my car is always getting blocked in by
hoards of friggin’ taxis, as we have an office next the main city
mosque. I shout out “will you please move them friggin taxis”, all I
hear is “Allahu Akbar” in return. No I dont need a bloody taxi ride,
all I want is just to get my car out.
PAUL
In 2030 we program people. – memory inserts. Put knowledge, memories, the habits of greats onto a chip, and insert.
Normal becomes genius.
And better, people actually add knowledge, experience … great, ever towering brains built on silicon platforms.
What to do about Kreach Don?
Trained in Iraq, the old fashioned way.
Turned Serial killer — kids, mothers, girls, businessmen… even florists!
We don’t kill.. torture
What to do, what to do?
We build a special chip, a Read Only Chip. Fill it with all kinds of memories, very unpleasant, very punishing. Never changing, always fresh.
Then we ROM a Don.
HOUSTON KEYS
Muhammad Smith was famished. The fasting of Ramadan was a rough time for him.
He came across his buddies Muhammad Jones and Muhammad Lee. “Salaam Alekum Muhammad and Muhammad.”
“Alekum Salaam, Muhammad,” came the reply.
“Guys, I don’t know about you, but I am dying here, I would KILL for a pancake!”
“Hey Muhammad!” All three of them turned to see the newcomer, “Muhammad Muhammad al Muhammad racing across the street to meet them.
“Oh crap!” Muhammad said, “It’s Muhammad again.”
“I don’t know what is up with that guy,” was Muhammad’s reply. “He tries too hard, what an overachiever!”
GUY DAVID
– We learned about Red Man month today.
– The Red Man month?
– Well, Tati says that when the Red Men month comes, you can’t eat for the whole month and you pray to that man in pajamas that he let you eat, then he gives you an explosive belt and you can win 72 virgin, I don’t know what those are but I think they are also explosives and it’s fun, fun, fun.
– I think I’ll have a talk with Mrs. Tati. I don’t think she should be teaching you this staff.
– Daddy, can I have an explosive belt for Christmas?
CALEB
Ramadan Dan
He’s the Ramadan Man
He brings the joy of Ramadan
Wherever he can
He brings toys
To all the little boys
To the girls he’s mean
Because they’re unclean
He’s Ramadan Dan
The Ramadan Man
He brings the joy of Ramadan
Wherever he can
He knows you’re hungry
And you’re cranky
He’ll take pictures of your wife
And over them he’ll spank he’s
Ramadan Dan
The Ramadan Man
He brings the joy of Ramadan
Wherever he can
While you’re starving
Just for Allah
Won’t you give this
Man a Dollar?
Ramadan Dan
The Ramadan Man
“That’s not Funny!”
LAIEANNA
Fasting with purpose was Stan’s idea of impressing the health club
ladies. Most did it for health. He would have a religious
experience. After half-ass research into different belief systems,
Ramadan was picked because the month was coming up and no one he knew
was doing it. It still allowed eating at night, and he could
enlighten women to his cause during long hours at the gym. It was
decided till Bill informed him that intercourse from sunrise to
sundown (Stan’s peak action hours) was prohibited. He changed to
Buddhism. After all, the gym was only good for one thing.
TOM
Nurse Philps keep a watchful eye on Dr Actma. The intern was a double threat to Nurse Betty’s patients. The first concern was Doctor Ali’s 16 hours shifts. The second and more pressing was it was Ramadan. Nurse Philps trailed behind Dr. Actma as he made his rounds take note of any notation on a patient’s chart. If correction was needed she gently suggested it. As Ali moved across the floor he hear Betty laughing. “What now?” asked Ali. “Mrs. James is not scheduled for a prostate exam and most assuredly Mr. Juliet isn’t in need of a hysterectomy today.”
ELISSON
He stood on a promontory overlooking the Ross Ice Shelf, surveying the desolate ruins. His tears froze on contact with the cold air. Antarctic summer was very different from summer in the desert where he had grown up. An involuntary shiver seized him.
The training camp had been set up in a remote location so as to avoid the omnipresent Allied sweeps. It had worked – for a while. Who would think to seek al Qaeda here, of all places?
Ramadan had been their undoing.
A month-long daylight-hours fast was tough in the land of Midnight Sun. Only Ibrahim remained.
636187
When I was a kid, there was this girl. She liked to read Tarot cards for the other kids.
She couldn’t really read them, though. She just made things up.
Still, all her predictions came true.
When one kid caught the girl making things up, the girl told him he would die.
And he did. A dodgeball got him.
The teachers took her cards away, so she used dice. Although she called them bones.
Palmistry, phrenology, tealeaves – you name it. She thinned out her classmates quickly with her malicious, deadly predictions.
She works for the government now.
So, behave yourself.
2497266
As part of a top secret energy experiment, scientists tore a gateway into another dimension.
What came out wasn’t an unlimited, clean supply of energy but a horde of angry killer demons.
What we couldn’t kill, we were forced to contain in force-fields.
Some stupid lawyers from the ALCU demanded that these demons get their civil rights and day in court.
So, we put them in the containment cells with the demons.
Those that survived changed their minds about the demons.
One insisted on representing those terrorist assholes they’re keeping in Gitmo.
We put him back in with the demons.
636183
The first permanent moon base turned out to be a maximum security prison.
Well, if you don’t want prisoners escaping and putting the public at risk, where better to put them than on the moon, right?
If they revolted, well, we could stop sending supplies up there. The oxygen systems were designed to only work for so long before replacement.
The man in charge of scheduling supply runs lost a daughter and a wife to one of those murderers up there.
So it comes as no surprise that the past three shipments of oxygen systems turned out to be duds.
636184
She told me her number at a party, but I couldn’t remember the last number.
So, I dialed all of the numbers in the series.
One was a computer or a fax. So was two, five, seven, and eight.
Three and four were not in service.
Six could have been her. It was a generic pager number, so I gave it my number.
Nine was a kid’s personal line.
Zero was a hardware store. She said she was an art dealer, so that couldn’t have been her Must be the pager.
Unless, of course, she’s a robot with a modem.
636205
It’s been tough times. Came home from work with a cardboard box.
You know how it is.
I try not to let my daughter hear me worry, but kids are smart. Can’t fool them at all.
So she put the cardboard box on the floor and said it’s my Happy Ending Machine. Says so on the side in Magic Marker.
All spelled right, too.
“Put anything in it, and it will get better,” she said.
Bills? They got paid.
Papercuts? They got healed.
Sick puppies? They got better.
Homework? It got done.
Because that’s what happens in happy endings, right?
817215
And now, something from the master storyteller: Elisson
Marcel Marceau, the incomparable French mime, passed away September 22 at the age of
eighty-four.
Marceau (né Mangel), a French Jew who escaped the Nazis and fought with the Free French
during World War II, brought the art of mime to standing-room-only crowds, earning
worldwide acclaim. His waif-like character Bip, in part inspired by Chaplin’s Little
Tramp, was recognizable to millions.
In addition to founding the Colorado School of Mimes, Marceau was the model for Michael
Jackson’s “moonwalk,” based on Marceau’s “Walking in the Wind” sketch.
Today, to honor Marceau’s memory, fans everywhere will observe a moment of extreme noise.
636175
I was explaining the color red to a blind man when the hot ham sandwiches arrived.
The blind man laughed. “You have no idea what red is,” he said.
“I know what red is,” I said. “You’re the one who has no idea what red is. You’re blind.”
“But I know what red is.”
Then he began an hour-long, amazingly poetic, utterly riveting explanation of what red was.
When he was finished, he took a bite of his sandwich.
“It’s cold! Waitress!”
I may not know what red is, but I know when to eat my hot ham sandwich hot.