Tunnel of MURDER Love

Christie and I went on our annual Minnesota State Fair trip yesterday. It’s the best thing that exists in Minnesota, or maybe the entire country, and we’ve even decided to go back again in a few days because we didn’t get to eat everything we wanted to. I mean, I only had one Pronto Pup. ONE. It’s like I didn’t even go. 

In my defense, however, I also had a thick slab of spicy bacon on a stick, three cups of chocolate milk, a bag of Tom Thumb Donuts, and Bacon Flavored Ice Cream.  And I registered to vote, had a blood sugar and BMI screening (I passed both with flying colors), took a vision test, sampled honey, learned about a revolutionary new hose nozzle, pet a baby goat, met my favorite radio announcer, and went down a big slide on a potato sack. 

After a few hours, our stomachs became too full to walk anymore so we decided it was time to go home. And then we saw Ye Old Mill. 

Apparently it’s been a ride at the State Fair for 98 years, and we’ve never even heard of it, so we decided that it was 100% necessary that we took it for a spin. We paid our $3 and then learned that The Old Mill is actually one of the last remaining Tunnels Of Love in the country. 

Now I’ve never been in a Tunnel of Love, but I understood that they're romantic boat rides that take young lovers through dimly-lit tunnels, accompanied by glowing pink and purple hearts. Most of the couples nervously look around, maybe hold hands, while some of the more confident ones make it to second base.  I may or many not have learned all of this from Hey Arnold. 

This is going to be cute! we thought, as we loaded our rickety red boat.

We entered the tunnel, and this is what we saw. 

COMPLETE. FREAKING. DARKNESS.

And we continued to see only that for a few minutes. We had no idea how fast we were moving, or whether we were moving at all - just complete darkness. And all of a sudden I realized Oh crap, maybe this is actually a trick Tunnel Of Love that is actually a haunted house. Something’s totally going to jump out at me, and I’m going to fall out of the boat and into the dirty State Fair water and drown. 

I was a little tense.

Soon enough, we saw light coming around the corner and I thought that maybe, thank God, the ride was over, but then I saw this. 

WHAT. THE. HELL. 

Yes. A dim forest filled with LSD-soaked leprechauns playing a silent “We're Going To Eat You”  tune on their pan-flutes. But as soon as they appeared, the current took us away from them and into complete darkness again. 

After a short sojourn of terrified darkness, we once again happened upon a forest. 

And this continued. 

By the end of the ride, I was thinking, My God, these demonic leprechauns are going to come alive and tear my eyeballs out and force my head under water, where I’ll drown and reanimate as one of them.  

So I tried not to think about it. 

ME: Haha, Christie. Let’s take a picture.

CHRISTIE: Okay! 

OH GOD, THEY ALREADY GOT CHRISTIE. SHE’S GONNA EAT ME.  

AND I ONLY HAD ONE PRONTO PUP THIS YEAR. 

Butt birth: it’s the new hot rage.

I can’t believe I’m about to post this dream. A few advance apologies are in order: If you’re a girl who once found me attractive but will never be able to get this image out of your head, I’m sorry in advance. If you’re the pastor or another one of my coworkers from church who I just added on Facebook and you thought you’d check out what my blog is all about, I’m sorry in advance. I would even recommend reading some of my older stories first; I usually write about much more wholesome things, like here or here or here. If you're one of my normal readers, or my one Canadian reader, no apologies. We're tight now; I can tell you anything. 

I’ve found that the weirdness of the dreams I have is directly correlated to the unhealthiness of the food I ate the day before. I once tested this with an evil concoction of Doritos and some spicy glop that resulted in a dream I never want to redream. 

For the following strange and semi-inappropriate beauty of a dream, I had eaten Big Mac Pizza (yes, pizza with all the fixings of a Big Mac), cheesy popcorn, and five or six fun size Twix bars. I don’t usually eat this way, and apparently not only my body but my mind freaked out about it. 

[At least my brain is watching out for me this time, as opposed to THAT OTHER TIME.]

The dream began with me laying on my side on a hospital bed. I wasn’t sure at the time why I was there, but the fact that a doctor and my best friend were in the room with me made me feel a bit better.

DOCTOR: How are you feeling, Brian?

ME: Oh, I’m doing fine. I kind of feel like I have to go to the bathroom tho–WHOAA!!

Suddenly something humongous shot out of my butt. It didn’t hurt, but I knew it was huge. What is going on? I wondered, still not sure why I was there in the first place. And then I heard it: a baby crying. Of course. I was the surrogate father of one of my best friend’s twins, and his girlfriend was in the other room going through excruciating normal birth with the other one. I was happy that birthing a baby through my butt didn’t hurt as much. 

DOCTOR: So, do you want to cut the cord?

ME: Oh...no, that’s too weird. I don’t even want to think about it.

DOCTOR: Are you sure? A lot of new fathers find it to be a special moment. 

ME: Gross. That’s just not going to happen. I’m not going to cut my butt cord.

DOCTOR: Really? It won’t hurt...

ME: Couldn’t you just do it? You’re the doctor, so you should be okay with this kind of thing.

DOCTOR: No, you should do it. It’s your butt.

ME: But I don’t want to. Seriously, the baby’s not even really mine. Just cut the butt cord so I can stop thinking about it existing down there. It makes me all twitchy.

DOCTOR: Trust me, I wish it didn’t exist either. Here’s the scissors. Cut your butt cord and we can all go home. 

ME: My GOD why do you have to be such a baby about this? You could get a better angle anyway. You’re getting paid to cut my butt cord; guess how much I’m getting paid to poop out a baby? NOTHING. I’m doing it out of the kindness of my butt heart. JUST CUT THE DAMN BUTT CORD SO I CAN PUT SOME PANTS ON. 

And so he did. I didn’t appreciate the grimace on his face or the way he only used two of his fingers to use the scissors, and stretched out the other fingers as if they themselves were avoiding the task as well. 

At this point the dream fast-forwarded a few months and I was carrying the baby in my arms, the one I had birthed, and it was talking to me in full sentences. It would only do this to me, because he and I had a special bond that can only come from a butt birth. 

And then I woke up. 

Now on to less disgusting things.

GREAT NEW IDEA: OKakes!

Have you ever wanted to make someone happy by surprising them with a sugary treat, and reply affirmatively to their question at the same time? THEN LOOK NO FURTHER.

As the inventor of SongBomb©™, PoemBomb©™, and RapAttack©™, I am proud to introduce new phenomenon which will be sweeping the nation in no time:

 

 

OKakes!

 

OKakes! are the perfect treat for answering questions in a fun and meaningful way! This is how they work:

1.) Someone asks you a question, for which your answer will ultimately be “Okay.”

2.) Instead of answering, drop whatever you’re doing and run away.

3.) Go and make a cake. It could be any kind of cake, really; a big cake, a little cake, cupcakes, petit fours…really, whatever you want.

4.) Decorate your cake with frosting, and squeeze “OK” onto it.

5.) Bring your newly made OKake to your friend who asked you the question.

6.) They will then reply to your tasty treat/answer with a smile, laughter, a hug, or tears of joy. They’ll LOVE it.

OKakes! are a most versatile concoction! Check out what these fine customers have used them for! 

. . .

 

. . .

See? They’re a perfect idea! Call now for an OKakes! Starters Pack, complete with OKakes! Guide to the Perfect Positive Response, including tips for making OKakes! in advance!*

*It is recommended, especially for the smaller OKakes!, that you keep the letter O and K on the same cake. If not, your friends may wonder why you have KKKakes! sitting around your house.

Submit your own stories and videos of your OKakes! experiences for a chance to win an individualized PoemBomb©™!

Dreambomb, or 50-Word Sagas, or I’m Doing Something I Really Shouldn’t Be Doing.

Another round of dreams I’ve had that are too small to devote a whole post to, so I lumped them together as short stories, written with no more or less than fifty words each. Just like the other 50-Word Dreams, these four share a theme. This time, it’s “I’m Doing Something I Really Shouldn’t be Doing.” I hope you enjoy your face off. 

Dream #1

            While sharing a pool with three women (it wasn’t a sexual dream, like the other blog), our conversation was repeatedly interrupted by one girl making a sound like a muffled car horn. My frustration increased to the point of consciousness, where I discovered the sound came from my snoring dog.

Dream #2

            Mom was sick, so I agreed to assist her in eating the potato chips held between her toes. When our new Romanian maid arrived, I let her take my place. (It’s a two-person job anyway.)

            “She’s doing it wrong!” my mom croaked immediately.

            “Be patient, Mom; it’s her first time.”

Dream #3

            Secretly lighting cigars to celebrate God knows what, my friends and I smoke (but oh dear Lord don’t inhale) happily at my roommate’s cabin, making sure to avoid the gaze of disapproving parents. Suddenly one approaches and all cigars are extinguished, save mine, which I shove wholly in my mouth.

Dream #4

            The tour of a WWII destroyed mansion was getting boring when, upon inspection, I discovered a Krisp Kringle hidden amongst the rubble.

            Oh boy! My favorite crunchy, chocolaty treat!

            Then I saw another.

            And another!

            They were everywhere! It was like a Krisp Kringle egg hunt!

            I stole them all.

The end. 

"Welcome to Chinese Restaurant. Please try your Nice Chinese Food with Chopsticks the traditional and typical of Chinese glorious history and cultural." *

An interesting little piece of realization came to me the other day while eating food from the Asian line at the Dining Center: Chopsticks are shockingly accurate instruments for gauging how high-strung a person is.

For example, people who can be described with words like chill, laid-back, or easy-going tend to have no problems whatsoever using chopsticks. Their wrists are calm, their fingers are unperturbed, and the chopsticks look like natural extensions of their body—like a Buddhist Wolverine. 

[He must do yoga.]

 

On the other hand, people who, say, are a little more stressed-out than others, maybe breathe a little too much from the chest, maybe bounce their legs up and down when sitting idly on a chair…(you know, people like me…) CanNOT work those damn chopsticks. 

People like us, who maybe idolize relaxation, go on trips just for that reason, or take time out of our day to sit in a hammock and relax even though all we can think of the whole time is what we’re going to blog about next (hellooooo), have some problems. We tend to go towards three techniques of chopstick usage:

1. Eat a third of our meal before giving up and searching for a fork, mumbling something like, “Errr…give up…I can’t…damn…FORK!” 

2. Go completely ape-sh** and use the chopsticks to stab at the chicken in our lo mein with bloodshot eyes and a strange sense of obsessive patriotism. 

[This is the second draft of this drawing. The first one is far too creepy, so I'm leaving it out. 

Oh, what the heck. Here it is...]

[I think this qualifies as "ape-sh**." 

And yes, those are American flag lightning bolts.]  

3. Buck up and pretend like everything’s normal, and hope that nobody sees the mangled mess of appendages and wood coming out of our wrist. 

So that settles it. Chopsticks usage has nothing to do with practice or culture. If you can’t use chopsticks, your character is to blame. The only probable solution is to quit your job, drink more wine, take up yoga, maybe some Ritalin, move to Asia and become a monk, ring more gongs, light more incense, probably smoke pot, stop watching Jersey Shore, and breathe from your freaking abdomen. This hasn’t been proven, but it has got to be more effective than practice.

*This title is quoting the wonderful, lost-in-translation inscription on most chopsticks packages. For those who are wondering if there's a point to this, or if I'm just making fun of the Chinese. The latter, people; the latter.

Eating Crap Causes Crappy Dreams.

My stomach is not what it used to be. In high school, one of my favorite snacks ever was to take the leftover taco fixings—excluding the vegetables—from  my family’s Taco Night, mix it all together, and microwave it.

Seasoned hamburger, taco sauce, cheese, and sometimes ranch dressing to really rake in the ol’ calories. A minute in the microwave later, and I would eat this brown slop with Nacho Cheesier Doritos.

It was my favorite.

Last evening my family had tacos. Around eleven o’clock, I found myself hungry for a little snack. I know! I thought, I should make my signature Taco Slop! 

So I did.

I was full and a little grossed out halfway through, but I still had so much left, so I forced it down.

Bad decision. A half-hour later, I felt like a jar of bacon grease.

I better at least get a good dream from this food, thought I. 

I didn’t, really. Nothing epic like Just a Flying Frog in Paris, or Groovin’ Vatican Style, anyway. The dream I had took place in Europe, where I was apparently traveling with my family.  I had pissed them all off by losing all of my train tickets that they had purchased ahead of time.

There was no way that we were going to buy new tickets, so I had to sneak on every train by lying to the conductors or creating some sort of zany diversion. One conductor, though, I couldn’t get past. This lady caught me red handed and wouldn’t let me on the train.

Me: But I bought a ticket! I just lost it.

Her: Thass juss too bad.

Me: But please, ma’am! My family’s going on without me!

Her: No way. No oness getting on the train wizzout a teekit.

Me: Can I work for it? Is there anything I can do?

Her: Vell, you could verk in the daycare car and tick care of the keeds.

Me: Okay. No problem. I can do that.

So the multi-accented conductor let me on a train and led me to a stinky, crowded train car full of little kids. I was just happy to be on the train.

But wait. There was something fishy going on here. And then it dawned on me. All the kids looked exactly the same! They were all identical, miniature versions of the actor that plays Seamus Finnigan in the Harry Potter movies! (He’s the ugliest character in the whole cast, even worse than the one who plays Mr. Filch. This is probably because he looks like one of my childhood friends who was always dirty and confessed that What if God Was One of Us? by Joan Osborne was his favorite song. I mean, who in their right minds would like that song? He probably grew up to like Nickleback too. Anyway...) Oh no!

[And yes, some of the kids were wearing earmuffs, okay?]

Then, simultaneously, every one of the Seamus Finnigans crapped themselves.

And then I woke up. It was obviously my stomach getting back at my brain for deciding to shovel that crap down my throat.

Dilemma. (Also: this post has very little point.)

I want a banana.

But as you can see, we have a bunch of green bananas and one that’s spotty and bruised. No middle ground. 

What am I going to do? I really want a banana. I’ve had problems with bananas in the past, but this is ridiculous.

I actually had a brainstorm that maybe I could open the old and a new banana, and then eat them both at the same time, somehow splitting the difference.

For some reason this yellow injustice brought two thoughts to my mind, which caused me great anger:

1. Jane Goodall probably never goes to the zoo.

2. I don’t understand how anyone can be comfortable blowing his or her nose with one hand.

And then I became really concerned about my brain, because these two things not only are not related to my banana dilemma, but are also not related to each other. 

WARNING: I AM GOING TO ELABORATE ON THIS. BEAR WITH ME.

Jane Goodall doesn’t have to go to the zoo because she lived in the jungle with chimpanzees for twenty years. She can just fly to her house in Tanzania and walk into her backyard and hang out with them. While the highlight for regular people at the zoo would be the chimps, she would be like, “Yeah, I’ve lived with them and made friends with them out in their natural habitat. I know many by name and I play with them and communicate via sign language with them. The relationship that you guys have with the chimps is merely a blip of nothingness compared to the one I have with a billion of them out in the wild. By the way, I’m pretty much against the fact that these guys are in a cage.”

I envy her.

And the second thought has always bothered me. When I see someone blowing his or her nose with a Kleenex in one hand, I can’t help but picture that person as a child with a snotty green nose, and his busy, overworked mother putting a Kleenex with one hand up to his face and saying, “Blow,” while she’s doing something with the other hand like making dinner or shopping or fencing. 

So when a grown-up person uses one hand to blow his nose, I just can’t handle it. Such a lack of control! I’m a two-handed nose-blower. My message to the one-handers:  Give your nose the proper attention. Two nostrils, two hands.

Okay.

There's still no connection. 

I walked away from the bananas in an embittered stupor, mumbling things under my breath about Kleenexes and chimpanzees. And still, after writing all of that, I don’t have a banana to eat...or any clue what's wrong with my brain.

The Fourth

Every year the beautiful and serene Riverside Park becomes trampled with trailers, portable stages, tents, tarps, food stands, bouncy castles, sticky cotton candy children, cigarettes, wagon pulls, and hundreds of people to commemorate the day the young, angsty, ragamuffin (5 points!) America signed a big piece of parchment that said “SCREW YOU, Great Britain! You’re not the boss of me!” and independence ensued.

(TJ = Thomas Jefferson. I think that’s what the other founding fathers probably called him.)

Now, 234 years later, we have Riverfest in La Crosse. Complete with patriotic garb that would make Stacy and Clinton from What Not To Wear actually explode.  My favorite was a man in a polyester button-down short-sleeved shirt with an American Flag background, and a flying bald eagle holding on to the handlebars of a motorcycle. It was too gruesome to take a picture of, but I went through the trouble of doing a Google search for "Harley," "Bald Eagle," and "American Flag" and made a collage that is frighteningly similar to the real thing, in case you needed a visual...

(American Flag + A simple motorcycle picture + a National Geographic picture of an eagle diving for a fish + a little layering = a level of kitsch one cannot experience without a gas mask.) 

I hit up The Fest (that’s what us regulars call it) rarely, and for the past couple years it’s been either beautiful or so freaking hot. This year, however, we had rain.  Not only did we have rain, but it was also sweltering. My protective NorthFace jacket was doing a bang-up job keeping the rain out, but the ideal of my personal dryness was just a ruse (5 points!), apparently, because despite the rain-resistance, I was sweating underneath like Mel Gibson at a Bar Mitzvah.  

(I’d like to apologize for that last joke. Not to Mel Gibson, but to Comedy herself. I was having trouble coming up with “Sweating Like A…” jokes, so I looked some up online. What is wrong with me?)

The patchwork of tarps placed hours before on the sublime grass of Riverside had puddles galore as far as the eye could see. Who knows if the owners would be able to enjoy their prime spots to view the fireworks later.

I had no plan to stay at the fireworks—nor The Fest, for that matter—for long.  Only one thing did I need. You say “Fest,” and the salivating starts for me. I cannot help but follow the intangible force that is the call of Tom Thumb Donuts.

(Mission accomplished.)