The Hilarious Misadventures of Gerald

            Once upon a time (or maybe it was twice), there was a cockroach named Gerald. He would appear randomly in the bedrooms of heroic protagonists who were at their wits’ end, and didn’t know how to solve the problems in their lives. With his experience, wisdom, and treasured counsel, he would show them that there was more to life than video games, potato chips, beautiful women, and bagels. There was more to life than ascending the corporate ladder and doing whatever it took to get to the top. Then, as he thought about it more and more, there actually really wasn’t anything more than beautiful women and bagels. Video games and potato chips, yes. But on the others, he changed his mind. “Changed his mind?” you say. “When did he change his mind?” Oh, just barely. Seconds ago actually.
              “You see, there’s this girl I like,” said Bruce Collins, a 17-year-old with hormones just absolutely out of control!
              “Say no more,” said Gerald. “You need to smooch her. ON THE MOUTH.”
              “Golly, that sounds awfully rushed,” responded Bruce.
              “DON’T QUESTION ME!” yelled Gerald. And his antennae danced. They always danced when he got angry.
              “All righty then,” said Bruce. “I’ll do it.”
              And then Gerald disappeared into the darkness of Bruce’s closet. His advice, though somewhat unorthodox, was always the answer.
              “Thanks Gerald!” Bruce called after him. But he was gone.
              A couple nights later, he was in the bedroom of one Steve Mutz. Steve was 36, married, had two kids, and was dissatisfied with his marriage.
              “I really love my wife, I do,” said Steve. “But it just drives me completely insane how bad she smells! All the time! And I don’t know how to break it to her.”
             “A good question,” said Gerald. “But a better answer. You need to smooch her. ON THE MOUTH.”                 
              “Ummm…”said Steve. “I can’t see how that’s going to help.”
              “WHO’S THE EXPERT HERE?!” Gerald yelled, furious, his antennae dancing every which way. “DON’T MAKE ME POOP IN YOUR SHOES!”
              “Yes sir,” said Steve. Just then, Steve’s wife burst through the door.
              “How could you Steve?!” she cried, upon seeing Gerald on the floor. “You’re always talking to that stupid cockroach! But you never talk to me!”
              “Now honey, you know that’s not true,” said Steve, doing his best to reassure her. But was it really his best?
              Gerald turned to flee, sensing danger, but he was too slow.
              A shoe, Steve’s actually, wielded by Steve’s wife, was coming down on top of him.
              “Uh oh,” said Gerald, seconds before he was smashed like a pancake, only a pancake filled with blood, brain tissue, internal organs, and covered by a chitonous exoskeleton that makes a satisfying crunch sound upon impact.
              Thus, Gerald’s reign of terror ended, by the very shoe he swore he would poop in.
              The relationship of Steve and his wife, however, did not end. In fact, it only grew stronger. Steve’s wife began wearing good-smelling perfume and deodorant, and she brushed her teeth after every meal. Their love strengthened, to the point that nothing could shake it. Not a thing.
              Bruce Collins, though a little socially awkward, got that kiss he wanted. And then he got slapped. But that’s okay. Bruce went on to play basketball in the NBA, where he led the Detroit Pistons to consecutive NBA titles. During one particular postgame interview, a question was asked, relating to what was going through his head during one of the game’s last plays, where he made a clutch shot. “I was measuring it the whole time, I knew I had to knock it down,” he said. And truer words were never spoken.
              Countless others, who had been blessed to be counseled by the great cockroach Gerald, also went on to have miraculous stories of success in their lives. It seemed as though Gerald’s spirit lived on in the lives of those he touched. 

The End

Questions for discussion as a loving family unit---

1) How can we apply Gerald's heroic example to our lives? 
2) Have you ever actually smashed a pancake? Explain.
3) Why is it important that we ascend the corporate ladder and do whatever it takes to get to the top? Even if it means...murder???
4) Is there a secret you're withholding from your own wife that could possibly mean the end of your marriage? Explain.

Strippers

Is there really skill involved in taking off your clothes? Like, skill that you can get paid for? How on earth? Is it possible that I could get paid for doing some sort of other basic human skill, like tying my shoes? Or zipping up my pants?

I've had this subject on my mind since Friday night, when I engaged in a raunchy bachelor party celebrating the marriage of Isaac Gish, which involved a girl who actually was not a stripper, but we all like to say that she was, since we're awesome like that. When I was 15, I went to a ward youth conference at some ranch in Hurricane, and we all saw a stripper. The story was, all the boys roomed in a recreation room that overlooked an indoor basketball court, and one night, as we were all lounging around and hanging out, somebody yelled, "Oh my gosh, it's a stripper!" And then we all ran to the window, and sure enough, down below, there was some bachelor party or something going on, and some lady dancing seductively around a guy seated in her chair, and she was removing her shirt. She didn't get very far in her stripping though, since she and all of the guys in the party looked up and saw us, and then they stopped. "Ok, everyone get away from the window!" one of our leaders told us, and we all scattered like sheep. Needless to say, we all had a great story to tell the females of our ward when we saw them again the next day. Boy were they impressed by our exploits.

THE END ALREADY.

Holden's American Childhood

When I was in kindergarten, it was the desire of every kid in the class to be able to play in the playhouse, a cramped little space about the size of a large cardboard box, but desirable indeed. Why this was, I wasn't sure. Maybe the thrill of having your own house (or pretending to) is just something common to everyone. Most of the time, I didn't finish my work fast enough to be able to be the first one in there. Most of the time, I would get to the playhouse, and Doug Schmutz and his various girlfriends would already be in there, playing house, or whatever stupid game kids like to play in playhouses.

On one particular day, I had trouble finishing a worksheet, and ran to the playhouse to find Doug and some hoochie in there. I began to cry. Tears of fury. And this is the part that may or may not be true. Only you can decide. In my fury, I went out and grabbed a jug of gasoline and some matches. Then I came back, doused the house in gasoline, and threw in a match. Then I barred the front door.

"HOLDEN, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" cried Mrs. Woods, my teacher, as Doug and his girlfriend screamed and cried inside the house, pounding on the door for someone to let them out. The flames spread quickly throughout the house.

"Something I should've done a long time ago," I replied. Man, I was evil. Such an evil kid.

Mrs. Woods attempted to open the door, but she couldn't. She was too weak. She had tyrannosaurus rex arms, so she couldn't really use her arms. The other kids just stood around and watched, helpless, as Doug and his girlfriend burned alive, screaming and crying.

The fire department arrived eventually, but it was too late. The playhouse was a pile of rubble. The charred corpses of Doug and his girlfriend lay in the middle of it. I didn't care. I had no conscience. In fact, I wasn't even watching anymore. I was coloring a worksheet about fish.

FISH!


Later that day, my girlfriend Jessica called me and asked if I wanted to play. "I can't, because I have piano lessons," I said. She was distraught, but she said we could play another time.

That's MY American childhood. Take that and shove it in your pipe, Annie Dillard!

Beet Root Powder Supplement

1) I dreamed the other night, intensely. I was three layers deep (thanks Inception for influencing my dream lingo) at one point. I had a brief moment of lucidity, in which I ran around yelling to everyone that I was dreaming, and that I could do anything I wanted, and then some angry fat guy started chasing me. Then at some point, I woke up into layer #2, and told Joe Hafen that I had just had a lucid dream, and then at some point, I woke up into layer #1, where I stumbled upon a railroad track in St. George, which led me to realize that I was again, indeed, dreaming, since I was aware that there are no railroads in St. George. And at some other point, I went shopping at the Red Cliffs Mall.

2) I've become interested in time lapse photography. Actually, I've always been relatively interested in it, but I've never understood it really. My video camera has a little time lapse recording function on it, so for the past 24 hours almost, I've had the camera, set up on a pile of books in our upstairs office, pointing out the window, time-lapse recording the view. It snaps a picture every 5 seconds, and will continue to do so until the 24 hours are up. At the end, it condenses all the pictures together, so it shows 24 hours of cloud movement (as well as the darkening and then brightening of the sky) in a 5-minute video. Pretty sweet, I must say. I do hope it looks neat. If this succeeds, I'll try it on other things, such as fruit rotting, mold growing on stuff, flowers opening up in the morning...etc.

The Johnny Chronicles: Episode V- The Great Race

Johnny must overcome his most fearsome adversary yet...himself.

Johnny was, well…Johnny.

“Come on Johnny, you can do it!” came the shout of his wife, Martha.

Johnny had been engaging in a race. Not just any race. This was the race to end all races. And by race, I mean, races of people. Johnny had become a white supremacist. But he was also actually racing, and he wielded a confederate flag, which he waved proudly and high in the air as he ran.

It had been an intense race. First, he had to swim three miles. Then he had to ride his bike for 112 miles. Then he had to run an entire marathon! Johnny grunted as he ran, because it is a well known fact that people who exercise that much are manly. And grunting is manly.

The sun beat down on Johnny as he ran. The cruel sun. Droplets of sweat dotted his face, his nose hairs, and his zygomatic arch.

“You can do it Johnny! Keep going!” cried Martha from the side of the road amidst a mob of humans. They actually were the Mob. Many of them donned bowler hats and were wielding tommy guns.

Johnny just ran and ran. The goal was just a couple miles ahead. Just a little further.

Many people wondered how somebody as old and constantly drunk as Johnny would have the ability to compete in the most grueling race in the world. But somehow, he did. And somehow, he was able to eat more gruel than anybody.

“You got this Johnny!” yelled Martha, who, strangely enough, was still standing in the exact same spot she was at the beginning of this story.

Grunt. Grunt.

Just a little bit further to go.

But then, an unthinkable tragedy occurred. A tragedy no one could’ve seen coming.

In the middle of a road lay a rotting banana peel. Johnny, completely focused on the race, was absolutely oblivious to it. And it lay right in his path.

“Johnny, no!” cried Martha, who was still in the exact same spot.

His feet went out from under him, and then everything was slow motion as he hung in the air. And then it wasn’t slow motion anymore, and he fell to the ground.

A stunned silence came over the crowd. But then, a miracle happened. An absolutely inspiring miracle. One that brought hope and inspiration to millions.

One of the other athletes, having seen Johnny taken down by the banana peel, stopped in his tracks. He looked ahead at the goal, which lay just 40 yards away. He looked back at Johnny, who lay dead on the ground. Or unconscious or something. He looked ahead at the goal again. It was right there. Glory. His for the taking.

He looked back at Johnny, pondering whether to help him up.

He stood there for about five minutes, just looking back and forth. It was all right, because he and Johnny were about 20 minutes ahead of everyone else.

He looked at Johnny again. He stared into that face, that old wrinkly weathered face. It looked back up at him. “Please,” muttered Johnny weakly, who apparently wasn’t unconscious. “Help…me…”

He looked back at the goal. It was so close, he could smell it. He could also smell the victory pancakes, which awaited him just beyond the goal.

“Sorry man,” he said to Johnny, and he took off towards the goal, leaving Johnny helpless on the ground.

The crowd booed, as the man sprinted towards the finish. But this race wasn’t over yet.

Johnny, who still held the confederate flag in his hands, raised himself up off the ground. Everything was fuzzy. He grunted. Then he saw him. Running. The man who had broken the “Inspiring Running Scene With The Obligatory Helping Up Of The Fallen Opponent” rule. How dare he, thought Johnny. How dare he.

With the flag in his hand, Johnny took aim, careful aim, and launched the flag high into the air. The colors of the Confederacy sailed proudly through the air towards the finish line, where the man was now just yards away.

The flag began to dip towards the ground. Somebody began to sing The Bonnie Blue Flag in the crowd.

Almost there. He was just feet away. Glory was in his reach. And pancakes were just a little further than that.

Johnny smirked, and nodded his head. “Sucker,” he said.

The man stuck his hands out, the goal within inches. Suddenly, a confederate flag, seemingly out of nowhere, impaled him through the heart. “Ouch,” he said, with that much emotion. And he tumbled to the ground. His hand, still outstretched, lay merely two inches from the goal. And it came to pass that he died.

The crowd erupted in cheering, hat-throwing, people losing their hats and looking around for their hats, and various things of the sort. It was epic, beyond all epic proportions.

“Go forth, Johnny,” said the race commissioner, Stan Judkins, as he motioned towards the finish line. “Claim your destiny.”

“I will!” said Johnny, and he stood up and ran to the finish.

A mob of people mobbingly mobbed him at the finish line. They picked him up and held him high in the air. He was the champion. He pumped his fists in the air. Then, amidst the crowd, he saw his wife, Martha. She was shedding tears. Tears of joy. She shook her head, but you know, that kind of head-shaking where somebody might say, “You little rascal, you.” Not the disappointed head-shaking.

“You little rascal, you,” she said. They laughed. Everyone laughed in unison.

“Hey, where are those pancakes?” asked Johnny. “I’m hungry!” And everyone laughed again, including those in the live studio audience. 

Beers On Me Tonight Guys

1) Just kidding, I don't drink beer. But if I did, I would say that, because it's such a manly thing to say. And everyone knows how manly I am.

2) The last 36 hours have been weird. Emily is gone up north for doggy shows with Frankie and Juno, and my parents have taken off somewhere as well. I'm completely and utterly alone, except for Emmett the dog. He and I talk often, and we can often be found reminiscing about the good ol days, when he was just a youngster, and I would run screaming around the house, causing him to bark and jump and bite people. Because, as everyone knows, running and screaming drive him INSANE.

3) I started learning how to drive Emily's stick-shift Miata yesterday. It's nervewracking, but I think I'm getting better at it. It actually forces me to concentrate on driving. Imagine that!

4) I really have nothing else to say. I miss the earth so much, I miss my wife. It's lonely out in space.

Bundy's Undies

It's Sunday morning.

10:30.

Sounds I hear: loud music coming from the apartment next door. Cars in the front parking lot starting up. I hear a clock ticking in my kitchen. The computer is whirring. Juno was barking like a crazy dog several minutes ago at something, but no longer. Oh, oh, I hear some sort of aircraft flying by overhead. I think it's a jet. That's about it. Oh wait, my digestive tract just made some sort of noise. I think that's all.

Did you know that when I was younger, I had this hobby of going to places near my home (the schoolyard, my backyard, the desert behind my house, etc.), taking a notebook, and just writing down the name of everything that I saw? Such a strange hobby.

Hey did anybody catch that royal wedding? Pretty royal, huh? I don't think I've ever seen anything so royal in my life. Kidding, obviously. Why in the heck would I want to watch that? The point of this paragraph is to state that the word "royal" would be a really good "cool" word, and I don't know why nobody has ever used it in such a context. Like, "Dude, that's so royal." Or, "Man, you are so royal." Heh!

What else is in the news...oh, tornadoes killed a lot of people in the south. But that doesn't matter. Did ANYBODY CATCH THAT WEDDING?! OMG IT WAS SO GOOD.

Hey, guess what, I'm all signed up for classes for fall semester. Human physiology, chemistry 2, trigonometry, and...CREATIVE WRITING. HOT DANG! It might actually be too many classes (with the labs), so I may end up dropping creative writing, but nothing wrong with signing up for it. Eat that. Clown.