bizarreville

The recent announcement of yet another major airline deciding to pillage customers 25 dollars for a lousy piece of luggage has touched-off Upcharge wars in Bizarreville.  The 2 Bizarreville airlines are donning battle gear…let the war begin.

Leadbelly Airlines, the perennial last place holder in on-time arrival (or industry leader in off-time arrival if you prefer the positive perspective) has shot off the first volley.  Yesterday they announced that, yes, there would be charges for checked bags.  But they are taking it several steps further by announcing additional fee schedules for bringing crap on board:

Leadbelly says they are considering upcharges for tall people, fat people, and people wreaking of body odor in order to take even greater lead in the Upcharge race.  Obnoxiously fat people or stinky people will be charged for the whole row of seats.

Lame Duck Air, the leader and award-winner in marginally lousy customer service who coined the motto “Shut Up, Sit Down, and We’ll Getcha There” is taking a decidedly different tack in the Upcharge challenge.  They announced that they will immediately begin charging $2 to use the restroom, bringing back the classic Pay Toilet concept from the 1950’s for nostalgia buffs.  TP will be available from a restroom vending machine for a nominal extra charge, exact change only.  They have eliminated Flight Attendants per se, but will allow customers to buy Attendant service at one dollar per help item, or a booklet of 6 help coupons for $4.  They toyed with the idea of joining the baggage fee crowd, but are upping the ante…they have just eliminated all baggage on all flights, checked or otherwise.  “You want baggage, call UPS,” quoted a Lame Duck press release.

Leadbelly responds they will stay competitive in this war and may eliminate that darn “free baby” allowance scam that has been hampering airlines for decades.  “Bring your baby?  Full charge.  Don’t like it?  Get a friggin’ baby sitter.  Next?”  said the VP Customer Service.

Lame Duck Air (LDA) stock was up $0.13 on the news, while Leadbelly (LBA) was down $0.10.  Analysts with Dingbird and Doodle are still calling Lame Duck a BUY.   LDA quarterly earnings results are coming out next week…anticipated to be pathetic, but above expectations.

The President made a special trip last weekend to Massachusetts trying to pull all stops in order to avoid losing the critical Ted Kennedy seat in the special election today.  But his personal charm and charisma may not be enough, as Independent voters, exhausted from vomitting over the Reid/Pelosi commode, are switching allegiances by the droves, according to recent polls.

Many liberal pundits have lamented that losing the Kennedy seat will fly in the face of everything Senator Kennedy stood for…collosal bureaucracy, government control over all life functions, and irresponsible spending like drunken sailors out for a joy ride…right at the cusp of having all those dreams really coming true.  They have urged the President to do something, anything.

So the President has been busy trying to find new payola buckets that can be rolled out to the Massachusetts citizens quickly.  “It’s got to be more pragmatic than the Louisiana or Nebraska payoffs,” said an unnamed insider.  “It must be fast cash in the pockets, no fuss, no muss.” 

Insiders say the President, who just met with major bankers last week to shake them down for paying employees enormous bonuses, may have secretly launched a landmark deal.  In the deal, registered Independent voters will be emailed a special password today that will allow them to go to any Massachusetts ATM and withdraw up to $1000 free cash…today before 7pm only.   The four largest banks will foot the bill as a penance for just too much bonus greed, accounting tom-foolery, and general poor eating habits and farting at the table.

Sources say that the Independent Free Cash program will clearly demonstrate to voters that they, the Democrats, are the party of freebies, benny’s, and other good stuff on silver platters.  Privately, they acknowledge that many Independents will eventually understand the fallacy in all this.  But they are banking on the 1-day euphoria factor to get through the special election before they think it all the way through.  The nice new 46-inch flat screen TV on their credenza might help with their internal struggles, as well.

A Republican party spokesman was asked to comment on the proposed Free Cash program, and just shook his head and said, “Friggin’ idiots.”  A bank CEO who had been listening-in said, “I’ll second that.”

Disclaimer:  all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that sound real.

A special election is being held Tuesday in Massachusetts to fill Ted Kennedy’s old Senate seat.  Conventional thinking had been that this would be a slam-dunk win for Martha Coakley, the Democrat, who would take over for the temporary appointee Democrat Paul Kirk.  But with recent public outcry regarding the socialist agenda being rammed-through in Washington, the Republican challenger Scott Brown has closed the gap, particularly among the Common Sense fringe element in Massachusetts.

The Dems had been panicking, but in their desperation, they believe they have devised a foolproof plan to keep the seat.  To show that they are in tune with the public and even a bit hip, the campaign committee announced that they have changed their campaign theme song to “Pants on the Ground”.  The song, written by General Larry Platt and introduced to the world during the American Idol show last week, is almost certain to go platinum and win Grammies.  Dem strategists want to catch this wave early and use it to their immediate advantage.

The campaign musicologist tweaked some of the lyrics suggesting Republican Brown walks around with his pants on the ground, wears his hat sideways, and flashes his gold teeth.  Most voters know that none of it is true.  But the campaign is hoping for some sort of subliminal connection when the wavering voter is in the booth scratching his ass.

Dems plan to rent hundreds of large horn speakers that mount on top of cars, and will play their new theme continuously around towns and especially near polling places.  They have also asked all campaign workers to dress up in a Pants On The Ground costume theme on Election day, including inserting some fake gold teeth to complete the effect.

The Democratic campaign believes this will be enough to hold onto a thin victory on Tuesday, and avoid losing their fillibuster-proof majority that would undo Obamacare, for sure.

A Republican campaign spokesman was asked to comment, but he just shook his head and said, “Friggin’ idiots…”

Disclaimer:  all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that sound like they could be real.

Following a 15-year trend of increasing sports gimmickry, the silly sideshows have now eclipsed the games themselves in fan interest.  Exit polls done by the Jallop organization of fans leaving sports venues have shown diminishing interest and outright boredom of the high-priced arrogant prima donna parade out on the field.  More and more fans could not even remember who won the game, some even were not quite sure who was playing.  Only one in 10 even knew who Art Shmellman was.

But all remembered and were excited about the cheerleaders shooting air cannons of cheap T-shirts to the fans…which was voted the #1 fan interest activity in the latest poll.  Even though the T-shirts were often just goofy promotional crap from places like Bill’s TV and Appliance, fans would dive and crash into little kids just for the chance of snapping one up.  At a recent Bizarreville Skunkspray football game, little Tommy Derfberger received a broken nose when Elmer “the Whale” Flabbertime launched  himself over several rows to get a tie-dye.  Ironically, the shirt size was “Medium”, 5 sizes short of Elmer’s girth needs.

Other popular sideshows in order of popularity included the old grammaw trying to throw a football through an orifice 20 yards away, the scoreboard icon race, the little  s#*!t  bands that go through the stands playing obnoxious mini-songs, and the mock fighting between opposing team mascots with a crotch-busting at the goalpost finale. 

The Wave, which years ago was #1 in sideshow popularity did not make the latest Top Ten….although it continues to be exceedingly popular at some schools in Ohio, which apparently have not received the memo yet.

Team owners seem very happy with the trends.  For years, they were able to only cater to the hard-core, cigar-smoking ultra-fans who would laser focus on game play and keep score in their programs.  Unfortunately, this group rarely bought the 8-buck nacho chips, the 9-buck cotton candies, or the 10-buck vanilla cokes.  The new fans load up on all this overpriced garbage like there’s no tomorrow, as well as the chintzy hats, helmets, and literally anything with a team logo, creating a huge new revenue stream for the salivating owners.  “The experience has changed from just watching a meaningless game to a whole new social activity now,” one owner said.  “I don’t know…seems like the new fans just want to stuff their faces more.”

Owners are now contemplating how to better exploit the ultimate sideshow:  the tailgate party.  One innovative owner is trialling a bratwurst tax, with a team of weiner checkers to make counts in the lot.  If this is successful, you can bet that it won’t be long before all sports teams have weiner checkers on staff.

Congress just announced passage of a major new bill, creating a new 51st state which will be called the state of Confusion.  The name has Latin roots in meaning “a group pour”, which is very much how the new state will come into being.  Congress had originally wanted to persuade one of the existing states to donate land for this new state, but none would pop for it.  So they plan to construct the new state by filling in a small piece of the Atlantic Ocean with landfill garbage, wastewater treatment sludge, junk mail, plus all the returnable beer and soft drink containers from Michigan and other ‘enlightened’ states.  “It will be like Atlantis’ outhouse,” one senator said.

Congress announced that Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi will be co-presidents of Confusion, a departure from the convention of having the state’s chief executive being titled governor.  But it emphasizes how important Confusion will be in the new world order.  Both Harry and Nancy will have equal power to issue executive orders and statewide misdirection.  They will also have the power to collect tax  from any/all inhabitants, even the rodents, pigeons, and dodo birds.

Surprisingly, these Confusion appointees received overwhelming bi-partisan support.  Democrats pointed out that both leaders deserve this promotion opportunity as a reward for their brave, high-performing leadership in the past 12 months.  Republicans were enthusiastic about putting these two on a mound of  s#*!t  off our shores, in which they would be hard-pressed to find a way to turn it into a worse pile of  s#*!t.

The announcement did not indicate how to handle the difficulty of adding a 51st star to the flag, but sources say they will just put a small asterisk on one of the white stripes and call it even.

Truckloads and bargeloads of crap are already being diverted from city dumps and hazardous landfills around the country to the new Confusion-in-the-making.  Congress authorized $1 trillion for constructing the new state, but some fear it might overrun the budget.  Insiders say, “It doesn’t really matter.  After all what’s another trill or so when it comes to something this big?  A hundred years from now, who will know the difference when they’re enjoying the slip-n-slide rides at Confusion Disneyland?”

Disclaimer:  all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that sound real.

Bizarreville’s local NBC affiliate announced yesterday that it was totally fed-up with all the wankers running the network, is pulling the plug on these guys, and signing on to become some kind of PBS station.  They say that the latest nuttiness over who will host the Tonight Show has been the last shovelful of excrement in filling up the NBC manure wagon.

Bizarreville’s station plans to keep a late night talking format, but with an intriguing PBS twist.  They will employ PBS’ patented Pledge Drive babble for the full 55 minutes of the show without commercial interruption.  This format, according to the station manager, will be used to target the key market in that time slot:  folks who just want white noise to help them fall asleep in their beds.  Negotiations are underway with Joe “the Monotone” Barker to host the show by just drivelling nonsense continuously for 55 minutes, while old-fashioned telephones ring off-the-hook in the background manned by a panel of drones.  Joe has plenty of experience, and has hosted several interminable PBS pledge drives in the past 5 years with a droopy style that fits the new concept perfectly.

The station believes this talk format will be much more effective than the comedian format in terms of accomplishing the true goal:  doze-off.  They are confident that they can get a 90% konk-out performance within a 30-minute sleep timer.  The station has tested the concept with office staff people, and found most dozing off in 10-15 minutes listening to Joe, even during daylight hours with several pots of coffee at hand.  “We believe this will also make our viewers healthier by getting up to 30 minutes more sleep per night, and waking up more refreshed and energized,” the station manager said.

NBC is paying attention, has gotten the lowdown on the Bizarreville concept, and is rumored to be studying something similar…especially in light of Leno and O’Brien telling them to stick the Tonight Show up their ass.   NBC has a stable full of mellow-voice yawnable candidates for hosting such a show, who cut their teeth in their limpy News department and have been putting the public asleep for years.

Disclaimer:  all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that sound like they could be real.

A federal judge issued an order yesterday requiring both national political parties to change their names, as a matter of what he called “truth in advertising”.  The Democrats will be required to change their name to the Spendocrats, and the Republicans will be forced to change to the ReSpendicans prior to their 2010 political campaigns.  This was in response to a class-action lawsuit charging that both parties have been total imbeciles when it comes to spending discipline, with no apparent plans to rein it in…and seem oblivious to the problem as they dance through their field of daisies on Capitol hill.

Needless to say, both parties were outraged and have responded that there is no way in hell a judge has authority to make such an order.  Furthermore, they have both said that they are not spendaholics as some have charged, nor do they take hard drugs that would cause them to hallucinate that they are actually balancing annual budgets.  The Spendocrats and ReSpendicans have both stated unequivocally that it is 100% the fault of their predecessors who put them in this hole, and claim that it is only through enormously hard work and dedication that the fiscal situation isn’t in a bigger hole than it is now. 

The judge countered with an expletive, then cautioned that if they fail to comply, the parties will be in contempt of court and will suffer appropriate consequences, which may include selective disqualification from November contests.  He recommended making the change quickly, so that new logos can be designed and new flyers, brochures, posters, and other nonsensical paraphenalia can be printed prior to the primary races.  The judge even doodled some possible logo ideas with old-fashioned cash register themes during closing arguments of the case to keep from falling asleep… which he gave to party leaders, gratis.  “Emphasize your strength, boys,” he commented cynically just before he left the courtroom.

The judge had further ordered that all party leaders would have to either (a) resign, or (b) attend remedial arithmetic classes at nearby Shmeldmore Elementary School, under the tutelage of mean Miss Funkenheimer.  The 68-year old codgery math teacher has successfully taught over 1000 students in her career, some of whom were even dumber than these guys.  “She can teach total bozos how to do basic math, but may need to bust a lot of knuckles in the process,” the judge said.

When it was revealed that Harry Reid had uttered a racially-insensitive comment about then Candidate Obama during the 2008 campaign, he quickly got an audience with Obama to offer an apology.  The shrill/quacky apology was taped and broadcast nationwide…and, as it turned out, the audio was picked up by the executives of the Aflac insurance company.  Aflac had been looking for someone or something to replace their aging duck mascot, and associated worn-out advertising theme which had run its course into the ground.  But they wanted a transitional approach to avoid pissing-off their duck-lover customer base, which surprisingly makes up a large percentage of total sales.

The think they found their man.  Harry’s quack-barking apology excited the Aflac leaderships team, “He looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and…well, performs like a genuine quack to boot.  What more could you ask for in a duck surrogate?”

Aflac, which supplies supplemental employee benefit insurance to various companies, sees another benefit of courting Harry…possibly getting the inside track on some of the new Health Care provisions.  Aflac admitted that they had been nervous about their future in the upcoming Obamacare world.  But they think if they suck-up to ole Harry, he might make Aflac supplemental coverage part of their freebie package to everyone.

Aflac hopes they can ink the deal within the next couple weeks, before other firms discover his amazing quacking talent.  He was asked to quack “Aflac” a few times over the phone during the recent phone interview, and performed flawlessly.  “I thought I was talking to a real duck, honestly,” commented Aflac’s executive duck recruiter.  “He may be a jerkbag senator, but, my, what a duck talent!”

Disclaimer:  all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that sound like they could be real.

The Bizarreville International Cliche Association has voted “The Buck Stops Here” as the winner of the most ambiguous, wimpified cliche of 2010.  Association Chairman Max Mumpf admitted  that the President’s applying the cliche recently to the Christmas Underwear Bomber followup fiasco was the clincher.  The “Wimpy” trophy will be awarded at a special Rose Garden ceremony next week.

Last year’s winning cliche, as most will recall, was “Give it 110 percent”.  This cliche was hailed for the beauty in its ambiguity…concerning what numerical value constituted Full Effort by an employee.  It was beautiful to watch the judges debating, some thinking 110 percent was more than full effort, while some thought it was less than full effort.  It was also given a Special Award as the most de-motivating little phrase of the past 100 years. 

The Buck Stops Here is a famous cliche that goes back to the Truman administration, where it was used to denote that passing the buck (or blame for a bad decision) would end with Truman.  During those times, however, its context would have much too tough-minded, not nearly wet & wimpy enough to be a finalist for the Cliche Assn award.  The committee took into consideration that President Obama has personally redefined this formerly tough, historically-significant cliche and turned it into a milk toast of total ambiguity and confusion.  That made it a clear winner in the 2010 competition.

The judges noted that the President further ambiguated the cliche by making totally vague what the word “here” meant.  They were particularly impressed because normally the word Here is clear, straight-forward, and so difficult to make ambiguous.  Here is here, right here. “It takes a real silver-tongued devil to say Here, and mean ‘maybe here, maybe there, maybe Timbuktu, maybe nowhere’,” said the head judge.  “Most impressive bit of word-dodging since Clinton’s ‘depend on what the definition of is is’ fiasco.  Brilliant.  Bravo.”

Disclaimer:  all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the crazy ones that sound like they could be real.

Talk show host David Letterbrain has checked into Manhattan Nutcase Help Center in order to get psychological treatment for his strange fear of Sarah Palin.  Friends did an intervention with Dave after the 403rd time he tried to unsuccessfully craft a funny joke, a year after she had left the national scene.  Palin jokes that perhaps at one time were real side-splitters had more recently diminished to “courtesy chuckles” from studio audiences.  Friends tried and tried to tell Dave that his jokes were getting stupider and stupider and stupider by the day…and that his fans were complaining daily of his obsessive unfunniness.  After many months of denial, ole Dave finally had to admit he had a phobia bordering on psychosis of Sarah.

“She scares the crap out of me,” Dave said while visibly trembling.  “She could be our next President.  And you know, after all the insulting remarks I’ve made about her, she might just find a way to throw my ass in jail.  I just don’t want to be locked up in a little cell with Igor, the Thunder Yonker…ouch.”

Counselors have tried to calm him down, suggesting his anxieties had no merit, and he should just put that out of his mind….unless, of course he has been dodging income tax for the past 20 years and/or taking some questionable or inappropriate deductions that a team of 1000 IRS agents working full-time on the “Dave Audit Project” might find.  Or, in case he has had a housekeeper, hose-keeper, or servant boy that he has failed to properly claim.

Counselors have said that this type of sickness is not all that uncommon among comics, particularly elderly ones who have lost their edginess and have forgotten what is funny while they try to advance their goofy unfunny political agenda.  While he is there at the Center, the doctors will also be checking Dave for any lingering Cheney-phobia symptoms, and may just have him spend time with professional joke counselors.

Fans are hoping Dave comes out of the Nutcase Center flushed of his Palin-ophobia.  They look forward to new fresh topical jokes, with his wit directed at the vast array of real, true knuckleheads running the country now.  Certainly, the joke material is there, and fans hope he can connect with it.

Disclaimer:  all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that sound like they could be real.

Taking a page out of the Al Qaeda playbook, Democratic leaders were able to successfully convince several senators to suicide bomb their careers by voting Yes on the Health Care bill.  These were senators whose home state constituents were overwhelmingly opposed to the bill, and who initially indicated that they would vote against it.  But, by using proven Al Qaeda-type brainwashing techniques learned during interrogations at Gitmo, the Dem leadership persuaded them convert to their way of thinking, and got them to agree to be thrown under the bus, careerwise.

But it did not come without cost.  Each trans-voter was promised 19 virgins who will be at their beck and call in their senate afterlife.  At the senator’s choice, they can be male, female, or a mix of both.  The virgins will be commissioned to satisfy any of the senators’ wild fantasies, some of which are expected to be quite bizarre.   Requisions for pudding-like food substances, pogo sticks, cases of lard, and air horns are among the items that have surfaced thus far in the negotiating process.

Some other senators have raised objections to the virgin handouts scheme.  They have cited that they have been dependable/reliable voters, toeing the party line, but are not being given these kind of perqs.  In fact, they say they get very little supplemental recognition, complaining that leaders are taking them for granted, and their votes for granted, just because they have no independent thought.  Dem leaders have responded that there is no truth to the charge, and assures them that there will be ‘severe repercussions’ if they ever get out of line.  “I think that proves we don’t take them for granted.”

Leaders are, however, considering throwing a bone to the steady-eddie senators.  “Maybe we’ll give them each a virgin or two to shut ’em up.”

Meanwhile, the soon-to-be-ex-senators are starting to announce resignation plans before the 2010 election process commences.  Their new lame duck status will allow them to totally disengage from senate activities, be able to spend time designing and building their new virgin playrooms, and most importantly, load up on ED meds.

Disclaimer:  all stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that seem like they could be real.

With Democratic members of Congress nestled tightly behind locked doors debating/negotiating final language in the upcoming Health Care bill, the public has been left wondering what monstrosity-from-the-deep will emerge.  Pundits have questioned why the process has been so secretive, particularly when the President promised that the negotiations would be transparent, with cspan television coverage.  Some in Bizarreville are saying this is yet another broken campaign promise, and the latest in the 2010 Misrepresentation Olympics.

A White House spokesman met with reporters yesterday and said that, yes, the President misspoke when he said it would be transparent.  He meant to say “translucent”, an easy and forgivable mistake for someone to make who is not an optical scientist.  The President apparently always gets the two words confused.  He said that the meetings are indeed translucent in that people know there that there are some people moving, shuffling, and fumbling around in the room, but they just can’t see what their doing or saying.  But, he said, you can probably guess that it has something to do with adding layers of bureaucracy, and piling up costs to fix something that isn’t broke…duh.

Reporters questioned why the meetings weren’t being covered by cspan, as the President had promised.  The spokesman indicated that cspan had brought in cameras and put on special frosted-glass type lenses to get the translucent effect…even had a few Aides watch it and comment.  “The picture was very blurry and just did not seem to be very effective,” he said.  “Plus, not having any audio made the whole thing seem like you were just watching a TV test pattern.”  Congress people had considered taking off the frosty lenses in order to have a clearer picture.  But it showed just a little too much intimate detail… a lot of touching, scratching, and pants dropping, that might not be considered appropriate for their PG-level viewership.

The spokesman said that the President is committed to having high levels of translucency in all policy matters during his administration.  “You might not be able to see the details, but you’ll know something is happening.  And that is what change is all about.”

Disclaimer:  All stories in Bizarreville are fiction, even the ones that sound like they are real.