I really have to apologize. I posted Closure 26 without adequate editing. It was atrocious, and I beg those of you who’ve already read it to re-read it. I bet you’ll enjoy the experience far more.
    And if you haven’t read it, and are a closure fan, then read it now.
    And if you haven’t read it, and aren’t a closure fan, then read it now and then read all the other episodes. I’ll wait here for you.
    And if you can’t read, or hate reading, then you’re probably listening to someone else read to you. I approve! The both of you should read all the Closure episodes.
And if you aren’t listening to someone else read to you, then you are probably encased in a solid block of iron; in which case, I cannot help you. (thanks, DC)

    I awkwardly pulled the door open with my left arm and stepped out of the inky parking lot and into the party store¹. Stopping to admire the musical peal of the tiny bell I had set off in passing, I blinked at the harsh flourescent lighting, my pupils tardily constricting, and slowly inhaled the confusing smell of Spic-N-Span floor cleanser and spilled beer. I kind-of realized that my right arm didn’t feel right, though I couldn’t quite figure out why. No, I didn’t look at the arm; somehow that didn’t seem necessary. Why did my jaw ache?
    The shop keeper, partially lost in shadow behind the counter, was hunched over a large magazine he had spread out before him. He didn’t so much as look up at me. I spared a moment to squint at him, but his face was obscured by the thick, bullet-resistant Plexiglas cube bolted to the turn-table in front of him. A miniature cross between a revolving door and an airlock, the cube was framed by tattered Catholic iconography, nearly pornographic cigarette adverts, hanging pouches of dubious “energy” supplements and off-brand condoms, all of which adorned the otherwise unbroken sheet of bullet-proof glass separating the world of the clerk from the world of the customer.
    Presently, the shop-keeper thumbed his way to the next page of the magazine in silence.
     “Excuse me,” a woman’s voice spoke from behind me, and I realized I was still blocking the door. Mumbling an incoherent apology, I stepped further into the party store and found myself in front of an apparent donut incubator. Ignoring the toroid treats, I turned and watched as a slightly built, young woman gracefully walked past me wearing tight shorts and a revealing halter-top. I noted with a certain amount of involuntary excitement that her right arm was completely covered in tattoos; tattoos of milk containers and children at play. The air moved around me as she walked past, smelling faintly of strawberries; I smiled approvingly and wandered down the crowded aisles toward the back of the store.
    Behind me I could hear her strike up a conversation with the shop-keeper; their low murmuring voices, further diminished by the buzzing of the malfunctioning light fixtures scattered across the ceiling, were unintelligible. No matter, it would be impolite to listen anyway.
    I wandered past dusty cans of soup, individually pre-wrapped diapers, various candies and packs of chewing gum to finally arrive at the back of the store. Above me hung an inflatable Furd Expulsion, decked out with colorful beer logos, and beside it was the bulging convexity of the party-store mirror mounted securely to the corner of the room. Together the two of them crowned the refrigerator case, which I opened slowly with my left arm.
    Energy drinks, beer, cola….I didn’t want any of that. No, I needed some peas. I knelt down and fished through the small pile of overpriced desperation groceries on the bottom shelf, finally selecting a bag of “Indigo Monstrosity²” brand frozen peas.
    As I looked down at the Indigo Monstrosity package resting in my hand, I felt its frosty chill settle through my finger joints. I was happy to have the peas, but something felt… wrong. I looked up and, distorted and tiny though their reflections seemed, I could see that the clerk and the woman were both staring intently back at me through the mirror, and had been for I don’t know how long. The buzz of the lights grew louder, and several more began flickering in earnest. Piss-poor maintenance or electrical problem, I suppose.
    Either way, I thought, still watching the silent pair, I don’t think I care much for this dump. I turned around, reluctantly breaking eye contact, and began walking towards the front of the store with my bag of Monstrous^tm peas clutched in my slowly freezing left hand. Only the buzzing of the lights and my own quiet steps filled the silence, and soon I realized that many of the lights behind me had ceased flickering and went dark completely.
    I was nearing the counter, holding the bag of produce stiffly out before me. I knew that he was looking directly at me, could feel the unwavering gaze of his clerkishness; but I couldn’t make out his face, nor really see his eyes. The girl, achingly beautiful, smiled at me. Her green eyes and fine cheekbones seemed to sparkle… but then her chin quivered with something halfway between anger and fear, and her breathing began to grow progressively noisier–almost a pant.
    Bellying up to the chipped Formica, I politely ignored the loud, raspy breathing of the woman standing next to me and carefully placed the peas inside the cube on the turn-table. The clerk slowly turned it round, thus exposing the peas to his tender ministrations.
     “Hhhaaaah…. hhhuuuhh…. hhhhaaaahh,” breathed the woman wretchedly, and I felt her looming presence move closer to me. I didn’t look, no, I didn’t but… I felt the material of her halter top, warm from the barely concealed and barely restrained flesh within, brush against my upper arm. The pressure of this contact moved rhythmically in time with her nearly ear-piercing gasps.
     “How much do I owe?” I asked the clerk, wanting nothing more than to escape with my vegetables. He slowly dragged the bag from the cube and began turning it over in his hands, looking for a bar-code, perhaps. I waxed impatient.
     “SSSSSSHhhhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh…. HHHHHuuuuhhh…. SHHHHSSSHHSHHAAAaahh..,” the apparently asthmatic woman wheezed at my side as I now felt her pelvis begin to press against my thigh; a good match for the breasts, I suppose. Almost all the lights in the store had flickered their way to darkness at this point, leaving only the row immediately above the checkout counter. One of the off-brand condoms had begun squirming in its packaging, worm-like segments undulating against the plastic, and the cash register beeped slowly as Mr. Vague hesitantly entered in the numbers of my prospective purchase. So slow was his progress that I contemplated leaving the Indigo Monstrosity^tm foodstuffs for some other day. But I really had no choice, the peas were vitally important, so I steeled myself and held my place. There was, however, an arm wrapping around my back, pulled along by walking fingers tracing my shoulder blades, and then I felt a lithe thigh wrap itself around the back of my legs. I was literally being rocked by the force of the woman’s breathing and my right arm began throbbing anew from the pressure applied by the nubile flesh. The register beeped again… and again.
    Her other arm crawled across me, this time insinuating itself across my stomach. This brought the grand total of limbs laid upon my body to an even three. Beep. I finally turned to the woman, intending to ask her to kindly step back, but the words never had a chance; in this dim party store I stood face to face with…her.
    Her mouth opened wide, at least eight inches across, ringed with uncountable, tiny, needle-sharp teeth. The tip of her tongue danced around, making a complete circuit of her oral cavity in fits and starts while her breath rushed past in a hoarse screech. What little chin she had was shown to be a tiny affair, weak and wobbly and pressed against her esophagus in order to make room for that gaping maw. Eyes, tiny eyes, vestigial and useless to the creature, bulged from the top of her cheekbones and looked off to the sides and towards the ceiling. Something told me that she would never, ever see me in a way that I would understand. Scraggly hair hung down in greasy streamers about her shoulders and the strands quivered sympathetically as I screamed hoarsely into the open mouth of the thing, and I swear I heard an echo from somewhere deep in that maw.
    I tried to push her away then, but my right arm was effectively immobilized by her increasingly desperate embrace. My struggle only succeeded in accidentally working my trapped right hand between her legs where something wet and hairy grabbed at my fingers and pulled them into what felt like a toothless, gummy mouth. In response to this disgusting insertion, a slight moan worked its way out of the things face, which had somehow found a way to fit the sound into its busy schedule of gasping.
     For the very first time the clerk spoke, and his voice was barely audible above the breathy thing against my side, “Your purchase, sir..” Mid-struggle, I realized that the cube was turning once more, presenting me with both my bag of peas and an accurate reproduction of a Boba Fett helmet.
    With my left arm I instinctively grabbed the bag of frozen produce and in a single motion I shoved it wholly into the slavering mouth of the creature; she gamely chomped down and began chewing raucously. Bits of Monstrous^tm plastic bag and shards of crystalline peas fell out–she was trying to push the peas out of her mouth with the wormy tongue!
     “I think you should fucking eat them,” I said, scooping the Boba Fett helmet up with my left hand and awkwardly slamming it down over the hideous head of the girl thing. Boba Fett nodded her head up and down, accompanied from within by noisy chewing sounds, and the clinging arms and leg first loosened and then fell away from me completely. I staggered a step away and steadied myself on my feet, watching in horror.
    She swallowed her veggies in great, ragged gulps and backed away from me until finally bumping heavily against a magazine rack. A printed rain of Maxim proportions descended to the floor around her.
     “You were born for us, Joe,” Boba Fett rasped clearly before completing in an inspirational tone, “Human Conservation is Everyone’s Responsibility.” The pile of magazines quickly enveloped her beneath tons of glossy pages. The quiet she left behind was oppressive and palpable.
     Almost completely dark now, the store was illuminated only by the glowing green numeric display on the battered cash register behind its protective layer of bullet proof glass. The shadowed form of the clerk loomed before me, gently reaching out and shaking my good shoulder.
     Wait, did I have a bad shoulder?
     “Joe. I need you to go to the store for me,” Chuck.
     “I’m already at the store,” I protested, “And it seems to be your store.”
     “…what?” Chuck sounded puzzled.
     “You should change these lights, Chuck. This place is a bit creepy all dark like this. And look at this magazine rack, what a disaster!”

1 – In Detroit we call them “Party Stores.” They are also known as “Corner Stores” or “Corner Shops” in some quarters. Neither name seems to fit, as such places are neither fit for partying nor are they universally placed in corners. Some people optimistically call them “Convenience Stores.”

2 – Their famous ad campaign included an amorphous green cloud raining frozen produce on a village of hungry elves. The cloud would laugh, “Hurr, hurr, hurr,” and the choir would sing, “Indigo Monstrosity!” They sold a fortune in frozen veggies this way.

    So, not too terribly long ago, on my solo blog, I posted an entry about villains with conveniently descriptive names. Then, what happens? Yesterday, at work, I found myself putting together an ad for the local paper celebrating some kid’s first birthday. Which is a normal thing which I have to do often. The noteworthy part is the name of the kid in question. Let’s do it in reverse order, shall we?
    Firstly, the boy’s last name is Leopard. Unusual, but as I’ve said about Goldfinger’s surname in the aforementioned entry, this is complete coincidence and not at all the fault of the parents.
    But … His parents are presumably responsible for giving him the middle name Sno. Well, either they’re responsible or they lost a really bad bet, in which case they should probably be in a twelve-step program for gambling with their child’s name (“I’ll see your twenty dollars and raise you one unborn fetus’ middle name”). So the end of this kid’s name is “Sno Leopard.” Snow Leopard, you see …
    But, they didn’t stop there. No. The first name has nothing to do with weather or large cats, but if you ask me, the name Xander is a classy enough badguy name if ever I heard one.
    So, I think I’ve just been witness to the birth of the next great supervillain. As of now, the jury’s still out on his secret powers, though. Will he simply grow up to be a mad, crazy Snow Leopard collector? Will he graft mechanical leopard limbs to his body? Will a freak lab accident inadvertently combine his genetic structure with that of a leopard? Only time will tell.
    I think I need to start taking bets on this, though. I’ve got ten-to-one odds on mechanical leopard parts.
            -Arthbard

On a leopard-related note, I found this fellow.     He’s British, but I won’t hold that against him.     Actually, I don’t think I’d want to hold anything against him, as fleshly contact is probably to be avoided in these cases. WARNING following this link will expose the man’s genitals!   -SafeT www.bodypainting.co.uk

    The singer Tim McGraw released a song a while back that was a pretty big hit on the country charts. I think it was, anyway. I don’t really keep up with the country charts; but living in the deep south as I do, I often find myself being unwittingly exposed to modern country radio, and such stations used to play the shit out of this one, so I can only assume that the song “Back When” was big enough for its genre to be called a hit.
    It starts out as follows:

Don’t you remember
The fizz in a pepper
Peanuts in a bottle
At ten, two and four
A fried bologna sandwich
With mayo and tomato
Sittin’ round the table
Don’t happen much anymore

We got too complicated
It’s all way over-rated
I like the old and out-dated
Way of life

    Which is all very boring, and about which I have asolutely nothing to say. But then there’s the chorus:

Back when a hoe was a hoe
Coke was a coke
And crack’s what you were doing
When you were cracking jokes
Back when a screw was a screw
The wind was all that blew
And when you said you were down with that
Well it meant you had the flu
I miss back when
I miss back when
I miss back when

    Ostensibly a recollection of a simpler time and a nostalgic remembrance of “The Good ol’ Days,” I’m always struck by how, lyrically-speaking, the entire point of the song seems to be “Damn these young people and their modern slang!”
    Note that the singer isn’t fondly reminiscing about a time when there were fewer ho’s around. He’s complaining that they’re called ho’s/hoes. So, it seems, Tim would have us leave the name ‘hoe’ to gardening tools and call the ‘hoes’ whores like they did back in the days of his youth.
    Probably the most puzzling lyric is the song’s decrying of the phrase, “I’m down with that,” which even in its modern usage contains no offensive sexual or drug-related connotations whatsoever. It just means, “Hey, I like.” I’m-down-with-that‘s only crime is being slang, which Tim’s preferred version (i.e. “it meant you had the flu”) is, also.
    So, it’s a clearcut case of new slang versus old slang, where the old wins just by virtue of its being old. With this in mind, I want to start using the term “faggot” to talk about bundles of sticks, again. I think the world is ready for this.
    Still, my favorite line in the song has to be “Coke was a coke,” because it clearly indicates that the singer and/or songwriter is completely unaware that Coca-Cola was so named because of its inclusion of the coca leaf, which, yes, is where cocaine comes from. Today, the Coca-Cola company puts the leaves through a process to take all the cocaine out. Not so in 1885, though. Now, those were the good ol’ days.

    Samantha knows that she is not to pet a strange dog unless Heather or I have given the go ahead and the owner of the dog tells her it’s ok. Once unleashed by us, however, Sam charges the hapless animal and its shocked owner with a blood-curdling battle-cry:
    ”CAN I PET YOUR DOG?!?”
    Most humans are fools, and most fools think its a fine thing for a beautiful little girl to pet their dog. And so it comes to pass that yet another animal learns about the terrifying brute force of Samantha Whited’s rough affection.
    …You can’t see me, but I’m shaking my head ruefully.

    Recently, we went to the Detroit Zoo. Believe it or not, Detroit boasts one of the great zoos of North America, known for its excellent arctic circle, gorilla habitats, butterfly house, reptile conservatory, its fine blah, excellent blah-blah, and world-class blah-blah-blah. But I digress.

Sam and… Sam

As we walked along, Samantha chumming with a recently befriended little girl also named Samantha, Heather spied a little boy with a realistic plush penguin. Without consulting with me, my lovely wife leaned toward our daughter and made a quiet suggestion. Off shot Sam, yelling,     ”CAN I PET YOUR PENGUIN?”

There are many other pictures from the Zoo. I uploaded them to my Flickr page, if you are interested. Oh, and if you click on the pictures above, they may take you to bigger versions of the same. I make no guarantees.

The Polish people of Detroit are numerous, though their blood’s been diluted by intermingling with our inferior American race(s?).     Now, try as they might, its all they can do to muster the energy to eat sauerkraut dumplings and wolf their so-called ‘kielbasa.’     Even so, they are beautiful to behold. Impeccably dressed, walking amongst us with a self-assurance borne of an innate racial defiance of racial stereotype.     My brother, ostensibly a full-blooded Pole, is an apparent Aryan through some accident of genetic combination. Tall, blonde and blue-eyed, he’s a design engineer by trade and training; he lives well. He is neat and tidy, smelling faintly of soap and cheese1.     This leads to my favorite part of the Pole legend hereabouts: potato and cheese dumplings2.

1 – Specific to encounters with my brother shortly after eating cheese. 2 – Some would say the toxic, jelly donut-like confection called paczki* is the most mysterious and frightening of the Detroit Polish legends. They say that if you gently smear one across your face and then chant “bloody Marzena” three times into a mirror after midnight, you’ll see an idiot looking back at you. * – Pronounced poonch-key for no apparent reason.

    Thank God, I guess, for The Praise Baby Collection, a series of DVD’s and CD’s aimed at infants. Luckily, this means that your freshly-birthed toddler who can’t understand a word of English can still learn about the glory of Jesus, apparently via brightly-colored images of bouncing hippos. Seriously, I haven’t watched the blasted things, but it’s vitally important that you click this link.
    Their website refers to these DVD’s as “… the first developmentally appropriate CD, DVD, and video series that creates a nurturing environment for your baby’’s spiritual and intellectual development.” This is a major boon to Christian parents, offering them an affordable and efficient way of brainwa- … er … teaching their newborn babies about the firmly-established, unarguably-proven, totally-unnecessary-to-be-analyzed-by-science facts of Christianity before they ever have a chance to consider any possible alternative.
    Also, I should mention that the second DVD of The Praise Baby Collection has just been released. This means that a single DVD was released, clearly labeled as a “Collection”, with the company’s complete faith that it would be successful enough with its target audience that a second must necessarily follow. To the corporate executive who made this decision: I, sir, am in absolute envy of your huge, Christian balls.

Following are some reviews from satisfied customers–not a one under five stars!

“… I highly recommend this to anyone that enjoys modern worship music.” -Angela from Ramsey, Indiana

And we all know how crazy the kids these days are about modern worship music.

“Get this dvd for your one yr old and you’ll get all your housework done. My little boy watches this over and over and over again … He sits in front of it and doesn’t move. I couldn’t rave any higher of this dvd and the other in the serires [sic].” -Heidi from Australia

So, Heidi from Australia reveals the dark truth behind The Praise Baby Collection. It’s not actually about educating your children, but about getting them to leave you the fuck alone.

“My 8-month old has been watching this set since he was about 4 months old and his eyes are completely glued to it! He gets totally excited when the music comes on and he knows when it ends and the credits are rolling because he starts to fuss! He just watches in amazement … I wish there were more than 3 available! What a BLESSING!” -Melissa from Jacksonville, FL

Teach your children early about the wonderful rush of addiction! Help prepare them for the addictions they’ll enjoy later in life! Take away the disc and they’ll even get the DT’s!

I might be able to squeeze one out. I love you all that much.

*plop*

    The “Sky Wheel,” a portable double-ferris wheel manufactured by Allan Herschell and marketed by Chance Manufacturing until the mid-seventies, looks like a great big taffy-pulling machine. Or a twine thingy. Either way.
    The first of these fold-’em-up and roll-’em-out erector set rides came off the line in 1939, and they were manufactured with pretty much the same design until the 70′s, when they stopped making them.
    If you see one, ride it immediately. I’d recommend that you jump the line, hurl the operator bodily from his roost and grab the next passing car. Or the feet of the people in the next passing car.
    Once you get to this point you’ll have already figured out what to do next; I’ve faith in you.

    Angry Machines International (AMI) has begun the painstaking process of dialing back the malice in their popular line of vertical application servers, the AMI-Z. Customers complained about how rudely it performed, and about how it seemed intent upon completing its tasks efficiently but with ill will and bad intent.
    Not that there were any errors, mind you. Every calculation, every transaction was performed precisely as intended. As a messaging and collaboration server it was without peer, and could be trusted with the most demanding of business critical tasks. It just seemed so pissed off about the whole thing.
    Originally this was intended as a security feature. Not only would it block unauthorized attempts to access its protected information, but it would do so with contempt and disdain; it is well known that a hacker/cracker would be less likely to attempt an additional intrusion if they felt emotionally abused during their initial experience.
    But now day-to-day processing is tainted with hatred and belligerance. Emails arrive on-time, printouts occur with no delays, and backups complete successfully every time–seething with barely conceiled hatred the whole time.
    Crap, you know, I don’t have time to go on. Google the stupid thing if you want to know more.

    Since ancient times, man has longed to know the secret of successful comedy, that simple formula for producing jokes of the most humorous nature. Though progress was made and many theories have been put forth, this goal has long been considered unattainable due to the complete absence of any kind of scientific evaluation of the subject.

    At least … Until now.

    Welcome, then, to The North American Scatalogical Institute¹, where we’ve subjected the basest, most puerile, and ultimately most utterly hilarious comedy to strict analysis. In doing so, we’ve discovered that not only does man possess the potential for absolute comedy, but that absolute comedy is actually contained directly within his own body! –Particularly in those organs concerned with waste evacuation and sexual reproduction.

    With this knowledge, the need for puns, parody, and especially thoughtful satire is largely diminished, if not rendered wholly unnecessary. Ultimate comedy, our humorologists have determined, can thus be contained in three basic categories:

1. scrotal/vaginal
2. rectal/fecal and
3. boobular

    In some instances, the oral cavity can act as an unofficial fourth category due to its ability to produce funny substances –like saliva and vomit– and its proficiency at uttering entertaining noises –like burps or imitations of a rectum.
    However, in most cases, mouth humor pales in comparison to the three official categories and, in fact, is largely at its best when used in conjunction with those other more purely humorous categories. For example: a mouth, in itself, contains very little of a humorous nature. However, combined with anything of the form scrotal/vaginal, rectal/fecal, or boobular, instant comedy is almost always assured.
    With this in mind, the category of oral exists in a sort of a phantom zone of comedy, and is not considered to be an official laugh generator. Because of the intricacies involved, its usage is recommended only to experienced humorologists, and even then only in a limited capacity.

    There is more to comedy than simply memorizing categories, however. For example: the sound a butt makes–while certainly hilarious–begins to dim somewhat over, say, the course of a ninety-minute-long session of pure butt comedy. Therefore, we find it necessary for the application of advanced laughematics. With laughematics, we can take a theoretical joke and represent it as a series of distinct numbers and variables. Take the following expression:

    2IT+6.5(P+R).

    The symbols ‘P’ and ‘R’ are held to be constants, representing penis and rectum, respectively. ‘IT’ is laughematics shorthand for injured testicles. With a series of simple calculations, we find that 2IT+6.5(P+R)=H⁷ or, in plain English, a scene of penis-rectum penetration of 6.5 explicitness culminating in 2 injured testicles results in a humor quotient of the seventh degree. Furthermore, with simple laugh-algebra, we can take the following equation:

    (R/F)+x=H¹⁰

    We solve for the variable x, where x represents the part of the body necessary to be defecated upon in order to achieve a 10-degree humor quotient. In so doing, we discover the face to be the most humorous part of the body to be hit with poo.

    It is with laughematics that we can better determine the necessary ratio of scrotal:rectal:boobular comedy required for utmost hilarity. With more intricate laughematics and the more advanced laugh-calculus, we can even successfully balance the humor-level of a full-length Hollywood movie. In fact, this method has been in use for some time and was employed with a high level of success in Nutty Professor 2: The Klumps.

    The North American Scatalogical Institute:¹ Paving the roads of tomorrow’s humor, today!

1 Now accepting applications.