Stories
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The Blank Mural on Paducah’s Flood Wall
One time, the Kentucky government decided to encourage its cities to give lumps of coal, gift-wrapped in tobacco leaves, to designated sister cities of other countries. Sister cities were a big thing in the past. For example, Paducah sistered with a German town, Niederdorfelden, and would trade recipes, local art, and calligraphed goodwill documents, and the like.
The tobacco-wrapped coal program lasted for 2 years: 1902-1904. The abrupt ending of the “new tradition” was due to the fact that the people of Niederdorfelden took great offense at the coal. The previous year, St. Nik had given coal to the bad children at Christmas time. In fact, a sizable lot of children had received coal. Subsequently, Paducah received a bag of manure encased in a giant orange made of marzipan.
The confusion led to anger, guilt, anger again and then laughter. “No Hard Feelings” became the motto of the kinship and they stayed true to each other’s goodwill until about 1917. -
A Cradle Kid
Sonny has two things going for him. The first is his brilliant way of knowing what kind of dinner to order. Mine is always bad. And I sometimes order from the same places he does. He just seems to know which place is going to be good on the right day. Once, I got mashed potatoes from this place that Sonny always orders from and they were runny and box-tasting and had begun to swiss cheese on the sides. He got General Tso’s chicken from a place that usually gives me a headache. I swear they use MSG. But he said it was the best he’d had in a long time and I believed him. The other thing he has going for him is a cradle big enough to fit him and a lady.
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The Suppertime of Jules Verne’s 178th Birthday
Diary Entry: February 9 (as dictated to the secretary, Charles, who writes very slowly)
14 knocks on my door. I counted each one. Some were in cadences familiar to everyone. Five of those and then nine in a steady manner. I waited for the fifteenth one but it never came. When I got to the door and peeped through the hole, I saw a delivery guy holding a bag. It was my dinner. So, I opened the door and the guy held the bag up. It didn’t say Spice on the bag as it usually does. The guy moved his other hand from his waist to behind the bag. A moment to gasp and then he shot at me through the bag. If it weren’t for my copy of The Green Gable Show I would have passed away immediately, barely missing my 178th birthday dinner. The man had only one bullet and his eyes got big and full of tears as he fired. And he didn’t even have a true food delivery. It was an empty bag! I grabbed his gun. I smacked him across the cheek with my book. I handed him back his revolver. I offered him a second bullet to try again, always keeping one in my pocket like one would keep a lucky rabbit’s foot. He was too shaky (but not from anger as I was) to put it in and kept leaving the key chain on it, so I did it for him and handed it back. He shot me in the face this time and I got madder than hell. He hit my face! I went to my desk, bleeding all over the place (I’d just bought a white shag rug for $200 at a popular store to impress some girl who use to be special) and rummaged for another bullet, finding one more. I put it in the gun myself as I was walking back to the door with my face dripping blood. He was gone. I was angry. I tantrum-stomped and bled all over that stupid rug. Finally, my real dinner came and I fibbed to the real delivery guy and said “You must have the wrong address” because I’d lost my appetite from all the cheek blood that was bleeding inside my mouth. Then, I got hungry again. -
Two Dudes Helping Out
Fortune Dave confessed to making placating concessions to his doorman, Undisclosed Steve. Steve eats salads that Dave makes at home and in return Steve acknowledges that Dave has a place to live. Code Red Days are the days that Steve requests a Dagwood salad. Those days, Steve will stand by the door for the duration of the meal. The rest of the day is spent at Steve’s own place where he plays Worlds of Warcraft, all day, sometimes explaining to other warriors at the bar what a Dagwood is. Once, when all the warlocks were listening at a nearby table, they looked up from their ales at Fortune Dave, who then made his confession.
Then, there was Vampire Pokey, who was teeming with dead blood. Where and when he showed up depended on who was in need of a party favor and Pokey loved to give. Other vampires gave him the Dorian Gray look- you know, that vampiric looking down and closing eyes while turning back to the important party.
There was a gaggle- no wait- a murder of mummies who were never royalty but just experiments of a long gone indigenous group of people who had heart. Pokey gave them dead blood all the time.
And when Horse Day came-the day when parades provided tired Clydesdales for the chumley vampires- Pokey didn’t hang around for idle chit chat (“Oh, did you see the jockey that Chauntey killed? He said he was like the end of a milkshake.”) Pokey went to the mummies and gave them some dead blood from his wrists and then spent quality time with them, learning about berry picking and shell jewelry and sometimes just burning one of them in order to transfer the spirit to a wildcat. That kind of thing. -
Notes From a Scuffle with Foreshadowed Macular Degeneration
The shiner that David got was comparable to the shiner that Sean got that was comparable to the raccoon with nothing going for it except for Monday’s trash. David bought a pair of sunglasses for $5 and wore them all day. At night he felt foolish wearing them yet, he had no choice. Only the day before had he pulled a chain out of his truck to “whoop up on” Steve, who had pulled out a small club from his truck to “give David what for”. David’s chain got caught on Steve’s club and echoes from Lord of the Rings made the fight somewhat of a comfort to Sean. Steve punched David, giving him a shiner, and David sort of just sat down, holding his eye.
Steve said, “I gave you what for. Now you go home.”
And David said, “Man, you punched me in the eye.”
And Steve said, “I know. I’m not blind.”
And David said, “You oughta be.”
And Sean said, “I’m going home to get my mace with the spikes on it. Wait here.”
And thirty minutes later, Sean showed up with his mace. But it was too late. No one was around to see what he had that would make him the go-to guy for a medieval weapons cache. Two minutes later, Sean’s shiner would be self-inflicted from the mace and he wouldn’t have 5 dollars for sunglasses.
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The Relevancy of Time to the Time Clock at Work
Two guys walk into a showroom. One guy has construction helmet on, the other guy has a headpiece on just like Batman’s. The helmeted fellow is eating a twinkie and the batman has a 99c bag of Doritos. The showroom is full of office furniture and they both want a desk. The helmeted guy takes a rubber mallet and starts hammering on one desk. The batman guy takes a ball peen hammer and starts hammering on the other. After 20 seconds of doing so, a salesman walks briskly towards the helmeted guy and says “Stop. Please, sir. Stop.” He walks to the batman and says the same exact thing. The two guys look at each other and continue banging. The salesman walks back into the office and comes out with two other salesman who start yelling at the two bangers to stop. When this doesn’t work, one of the stockers holds a lighter to a fire sprinkler because he feels he has a reason to create disorder. The showroom becomes wet and three fire trucks pull into the parking lot and the stocker man with the lighter goes into the break room and grabs three boxes of pizza because it’s Pizza Friday and disappears into the back where he is picked up by batman and the helmeted guy and they go to the house where batman has a new Xbox, set up with 3 new games and they all eat pizza and laugh and drink Coca Cola. The end.
Epilogue: The batman fellow’s name is Pat and the construction helmet fellow’s name is Mason. The stocker’s name is Phil. They all agree that the new Batman is really good but love Michael Keaton. They also agree that Papa John’s is really good pizza but not as good as the J and J’s. Pat can take any topping he can think of to J and J’s and they will put it on his pizza. He once brought some necco wafers to be put on his pizza and was sure that it would be good but he was wrong. Phil dated a girl who liked anchovies and wanted some but the grocery store didn’t have any and neither did the pizza place so he bought some sardines and marinated them in salt and oil but she didn’t like it, so he stopped trying. It might mean he didn’t really love her and it’s a good thing that they broke up. Now, a month ago, Mason started playing Resident Evil 4 and was amazed at the amount of time that went by during play. He felt like everyone around him aged faster than he did because of how fast time seemed to pass during the game. He was almost right because of his own mass. Meanwhile, the salesman who didn’t know what had happened after the incident lives alone and watches Office Space once a week. Sometimes twice. His name is also Phil but goes by Philip. He doesn’t eat pizza much but enjoys cereal. He has a Reservoir Dogs poster behind his couch and that’s all he has that isn’t functional. He feels the monotony of his life is diverted by going to Walmart instead of Kroger for his groceries. He also lies on the floor for hours not doing anything. He can do 100 situps a day. He can do 100 pushups a day. But, what he doesn’t do is think up stupid ways to annoy other working people by dressing up like an idiot and pounding on office furniture in order to get free pizza. He will be at the apartment complex’s fitness center at 4:00 today in hopes of hooking up. His relation to time is relative to Mason’s.
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Not Stormy Enough
When the plot to overthrow the makings of a giant windstorm plan failed, Mitchell found a loophole that involved going back to the storeroom and getting the copperwire set aside for making penny yarn and weaving it in and out of the sheet metal thunder clapper. When the art director saw him and began his mother hen line of questioning, Mitchell replied that it was a union thing. Not being in the union, Mitchell knew that this would: a) uphold his denial of sabotage, b) allow him to give the union more overtime in taking the copper wire out at a later date and c) a thank you beer for the overtime.
On Sunday, the Senate gave audience to the presentation of the Windstorm Finale, designed to be a “Who? Not Us” weapon which was still in the planning stages. Subsequently, when the time came to show the rattling of the sheet metal in order to create fake thunder, the dull bangs of the copperwire were congruous with the dull satisfaction of the Senate. Later that day, Mitchell thought, “Haha. “Everyone is stupid but me,” as he drank his free Miller High Life alone.
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John Titor Fan Fiction: The Accidental Nap
John Titor’s machine was gravity based and would allow him to travel back to the time he needed to go. However, one day while “rewinding” (he was trying to watch someone type in a password into the IBM he was about to obtain 10 minutes into the future) a black hole shot an anti- ray right onto his machine (like a reverse disco ball) thus disabling the Gravity Sensor Unit and throwing him sideways onto another timestrip that was a phantom strip but one that kept going, like a fart that never leaves.
Anyhoo, he found himself in the year 1999 and was giggling over the y2k hype, not knowing he was on a phantom timestrip. “The sky will be falling from now on,” he thought and went to an internet café and tried to log onto his email account but kept failing.
Finally, he went to the administrator behind the counter.
“My computer isn’t working.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
“I can’t get any pages to come up.”
So, he walked over with John and asked for the page.
“It’s just yahoo.”
“Don’t know it,” and typed “iii.yahoo.go” and the yahoo page came up.
John then realized he was on the wrong time strip and asked, “What do you guys call the problem about the double-digit numbers turning over to 1900 instead of 2000?”
“What problem? We don’t have a-“
And then everything around him started disappearing like a fog clearing and he knew that the phantom time had finally dissipated. He’d never been in the absence of time and began to take a nap because a physicist had once written, “A true nap can only be perfect when there is no time to be wasted and none to worry.”
And he napped in no time. But it seemed like forever.
Meanwhile, in another time, a physicist had written the word “crap” and then accidentally typed “nap”.
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Dallas Fan Fiction: Working on My Belfast Accent at a Pub on Greenville Avenue at a Bring In The Weekend Party
This guy named Cliff? used to work at Taffy’s on Good Latimer? but then gave up on yelling every time he started the pulling machine? so he got fired? But then by mistake? he loaded the machine backwards? and it started brushing against the newspaper stand? so that it took the print off like a piece of silly putty would? but then would stay on? and somehow the print wouldn’t stretch? and so the pieces of taffy afterward had printing on them? and his boss started calling him Gutenberg? but with a Trenton, NJ accent? even though he was already fired? and he worked there for another year? even though he wasn’t supposed to? and then he moved to Waxahachie? but he couldn’t drive to work? so he got a job selling cookies at the Scarborough Fair? and he liked that better?
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The Man in the Vellum Pants
These guys were doing chores on a farm and the one guy had plastic pants to keep his other pants from getting dirty. The devil himself would see him and would shake his head saying, “At least I’m not that guy.” He wasn’t THE devil but a rockabilly guy who had a devil on his lighter. But the plastic panter was good at making piles. Really good at it. He numbered his piles and marked each one as if it were a garden of piles. He even kept a log of the piles with a vellum paper map attachment. The maps were transparent enough to see the history of the pile placement. Luckily, the owner of the farm enjoyed seeing such documentation and contacted a publisher of almanacs about his employee. The publisher laughed and hung up. It wasn’t until seven years later that the book was found that the pile documenter was properly recognized. During a time transport viewing, the farmer was heard saying, “Reading that logbook’s map was like peeling an onion. It-“ and as he paused the worker looked up from shoveling, smiled, and looked at the devil and said, “See, I told you.”
It was handmade. It could only be started by a lady with Betty Page bangs. -
Subway Fan Fiction
"I saw Blank Check last night."
"Yeah?"
"It was okay. Not what I thought."
"What you think it was?"
"I dunno. Just a different kind of movie than I thought. It’s over 10 years old now, that movie."
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah. Time flies. I’m gonna get an egg and cheese."
"Yeah."
"The kid from Family Ties was in it."
"Oh yeah?"
"He’s got some years on him now I guess."
"The kid from the movie?"
"Yeah. You’re hungry, too right?"
They got off at Union Square. The End. Two others get on.
"He’s got the shits. He is the shits."
"You see the new Star Wars? I got it on dvd. Joey has it."
"That guy’s gonna get it. He’s the shits."
"Joey?"
"No, but I wanna see that new Star Wars."
They get off at 6th Ave. The End. I get off, too. And then some addled fellow stopped a pretty girl.
"Excuse me does this go to 6th Ave?"
"This is 6th."
"I’m sorry I meant 7th."
Girl keeps walking. "Yes."
The fellow was made out of syrup. The End.
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Dan Castle
I met this fellow who built rocks out of sand with rubber and glue. He took a rock and made a mold from it. Then, he would go to his mixing bowl using sand, glue, and sometimes an egg to make a sort of dough, inserting it into the mold. Then, he would squirt an epoxy that he called, "The Going Backwards", and it would harden.
When he had enough rocks he built a castle. Well, he called it a castle but it was more like a house. With two turrets divided by a porcelein minaret and a slide for the back stairs it was definitely an odd house. There was one room blocked that was not unlike a caved-in mineshaft. He told me that pile was a door. I tried to open it, thinking it was one piece made to look like a pile of rocks but I was wrong. It took a good 45 minutes to open that "door".
Inside was a room with a horse/motorcycle he had not finished building.
"It’s gallops don’t propel the bike. They are not unlike Ramp Walkers. The gallops create energy that is stored in the motor. It’s propulsion primed, it will go for great lengths on recycled movement."
A Ramp Walker’s undersideFinishing my visit, a reporter with a 2:00 appointment met us outside and quipped, "So, this is the house made out of sand."
To which my new friend replied, "Call it what you like."
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How to Be Better Than You Already Are
A fine piece of literature was beholden at this dime store that had become a dollar store. It was a book on how to mold yourself into a better person so I thumbed through it for a grain of salt. The cashier saw me looking at the book, walked over, and grabbed it out of my hands. She thumbed through it like it was cash.
"Dammit."
"Huh?"
"I put a note in here from my tommorrow boyfriend so that my backup boyfriend wouldn’t see it and now it’s gone."
"What’s a tommor-"
"Nevermind. Dammit. FFFFFF-Why can’t people leave shit alone?"
And then she ran down the aisle of office supplies and thumbed through all the coloring books that were only a dollar. She was creating quite a pile while her register was building a good line of people.
One customer finally said, "Hellooo?"
"Hold on! dammit." She thumbed through a Noah’s Ark book, grabbed something, ran back showing me the note for assurance and then ran-walked to the register.
The customer thought she was pretty so he wasn’t mad anymore and asked, "Are these batteries any good? Cause they’re only a dollar."
"I don’t know. Do you want ’em?"
"I guess. They’re only a dollar."
Then, I saw two guys get out of different cars in the lot and sensed that one was tomorrow and one was backup and they didn’t look like dollar store buyers.
And then, I don’t know how, but the girl made herself look 80-years-old.
She was brilliant. And flighty. -
Dummy wins a comb over
Tommy had two gigs yesterday. One was at a daycare and the other was at an assisted living complex. The first one went fine. The toddlers usually scream with joy or fright when the dummy, Mark, begins talking. He did his usual knock-knocks because kids love the knock-knocks and then did a skit with the dummy on one knee and a five-month-old on the other. The four-year-olds love this because they aren’t babies any longer.
"Knock knock" (The infant starts the joke)
"Who’s there?" (dummy is good at looking at the kids)
"Lucifer." (Daycare teacher looks around uncomfortably)
"Lucifer who?"
"Lucifered different, we get a neeewww video to watch after cookies."
"Hurrah for the video and hurrah for the cookies!"
This is how he sold his video.
He took his fifty dollars plus his video money and drove to the old folks village. His act went best when a certain group of old thuggy ladies didn’t show up to gossip loudly at the middle table.
"She doesn’t know how to pee anymore" "She keeps talking about her husband" "She needs to close her mouth when she eats walnuts" "What do you call that guy?" "A ventriliquist. A ventriloquist. A fool!" "Hahahahaha!" "HaHa"
They showed up this time. He was ready this time because he had bought a video 2 days prior from a magic store ($120, if you’re serious) that showed him how to use his dummy as a ouija board.
The old ladies were back at it again. This time one of them had a walkie talkie cell phone and was talking to another old lady who was on the comode.
"Yeah, its that fool with the dummy again!" BEEP!
Tommy took Mark out of his case like a professional murderer and set him on his knee, pricked a drop of blood from his finger, wiped it inside Mark’s mouth, and dropped two pair of dice through a hole bore inside Mark’s back that had the names of the ladies’ deceased husbands. He had to shake him like a Boggle because the dice had to be one name face up. After five tries, they faced up on the name, Louis.
Mark began speaking in Louis’ voice and one old mean lady perked up and Louis said,
"Sally, you should shut up sometimes. And stop sitting with Hildy. She calls you Wingnut!"
Tommy had a great show and sold 2 videos.
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The Winking Wilzner
"Fridays are my diving boards and Sundays are my towels."
"That’s wonderful. Where are the teabags?"
"On the subject of my weekend, I will be rushing headlong into a journey of painting my bedroom to a color that matches the sepia-colored photos that I bought in college."
"I guess sepia was in then."
"Huh?"
"Where are the teabags?"
"Under the sink, next to the bag of brillos."
"They’re not there."
"Well, then. I have a sepia print of my favorite actor, Dilly Shan-"
Jeffrey went on a journey himself. He lied down on the carpet next to the mini fridge and took a much needed nap. He wasn’t tired. He just needed to escape the depression created by his officemates who appeared slightly higher than himself and this was his only weapon. He didn’t feign sleep, he went straight to the REM’s immediately.
What a wonderful tool! And he will keep his job due to its ambiguity.
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Supper Wind
When I’m a walkin’ I smell it
When I’m a talkin’ I don’t
but when I’m walkin’ I smell the cookin’s done
When I feel it gone a toucha my mouth
Like a smick smack I can’t go out
cause supper wind is blowing me back home. -
Go Dog Go!
Yesterday, I put it out there. I threw it to him gently.
“Just go slow.”
He swang his head back and forth like saying “no” and then dove his head to the paper. It wasn’t dinnertime. It was reading time and he tried so hard. Dr. Frankenstein probably cried a little trying to get his monster to talk and I was tearing up watching my dog struggle to read.
He lifted his head like he was going to throw up. Baring his fangs, he hacked up, “I can’t”.
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My Showdowns Diamond Paper
There was this guy named Diamond who wore a pair of pants that had spurs pointing inward at the side belt loops. When it was time to hustle he’d pat his hips and run from the pain.
SpursWhen he raced the legend, Carl Johnson, for pinks (in running that’s shoes) he prodded himself and beat the olympic runner in street racing, on a course that included a fake market made of balsa wood and sugar. When the runner bumps into a market stand, the sugar fruit creates a kind of oil slick for the opponent and the cardboard vendors’ "upset trigger" is released, making their cardboard arms fly up and down in a shaking motion via pendulum action.
A passerby gave Diamond a new name, Leggs Diamond, and was promptly sued. But a sometime girlfriend decided he should be called Diamond Showdowns in reference to his pre-run side patting of the spurs.
Diamond never made it to the pros because he "didn’t want that kind of glory." These times, he races unbroken ponies on Assateague Island and no one ever sees it happen because there are no fake markets to knock down in the moonlight.
Pony promotional pictureHe also fullback fishes. That’s catching a fish midair on the surf in the fashion of a touchdown. Sometimes you can catch him cooking his catch on an open fire while the ponies eat carrots and saltlicks with forks attached to their bridles.
Rudolf Schenker displaying funny use of bridle forks. Ponies laugh.In any event, you have to be cool to be around Showdowns Diamond. Otherwise, you have to leave.
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Trey’s Bum Leg
Trey loved the wet field. He walked with his pant legs rolled up. The bugs would jump from drinking dew, parting the way for Trey. One time, Trey’s leg slipped into a hole, making him thrust forward, losing control of his balance, breaking his leg. He knew it was broken because he heard the snap.
What he didn’t know was that his brother Billy was behind him the whole time.
“Boo!”
“Huh? Oh, thank goodness, Billy. I don’t know why you’re here but I’m so glad for this moment. Please go run for help. I can’t walk.”
“Sure, thing, Trey. Hey, can you write this paper about The Pony Express for me since you’re all invalid for the moment?”
“Anything, brother. Now run. Run like tomorrow is too late from yesterday!”
“Wha? Okay.”
And Trey sat and thought about some things he needed to change about his life. And then he picked up a pencil from Billy’s Trapper and began writing a brilliant essay about the Pony Express.
Trey started feeling hungry and reached inside Billy’s backpack for a candy bar or an apple. Nothing. He turned around more, not noticing that there was no pain to notice and saw eight broken stalks of celery.
His first thought was “Hey celery!”
His second thought was “I wish I had some peanut butter or cream cheese!”
His third thought was “DAMN YOU BILLY!” for his leg was not broken. Only the celery. And he was mad, yet grateful, and yet more mad than grateful.
And he walked home eating the broken celery very angry until he thought of how he didn’t like celery in soup. -
Damn My Half Ass Procedures For an Invention I Cannot Disclose Yet
A fool am I! I put down a 2 instead of a 4 and now I can’t finish what I started! In the vein of a sloppy Tesla, I was in the middle of showing off something brown and something fun. It’s not a diamond maker but its close! Oh fie on me!
You know how many filibusters I went through to get this one order in? It would be a filibuster to go through the first day’s list! Oh poop my eyes!
I was going to have the most wonderful unveiling meeting in conference room 10 at the Hyatt on the Riverwalk.
Stupendous mismash!
When I finally get the gumption to restart yesterday’s restarting point I will remember my mistakes and show you the most magnificent work since I don’t know what -Synthetic Tiger’s Milk? Dammit!