bizarreville

Don Smerfnerd of Smerfnerd Investments is urging all customers to load up on gold, and do it now.  He says he is personally jumping on the bandwagon, joining the new cast of Gold Fever who have been coming out of the woodwork, citing the recently released Shlunkmann Economic Study that, he says, predicts gold could go as high as $2000 per ounce.

But the truth is, the Shlunkmann study, if anyone took the time to read it, never predicted gold would go to 2000.  The study itself was about self-fulfilling prophesies, the Pygmalion effect.  But it used the example if enough nutcases started predicting that gold would double in price, and ginned-up enough fear in the marketplace, it could all set in motion events that would actually cause the price of gold to double.  So, then what’s the deal with Smerfnerd?  Many of his colleagues have been wondering the same thing…why is Smerfnerd, a conservative investor, doing this?  He has never been one to buy at the high end of the market and get shmucked.

Turns out, our intrepid investigative reporter discovered that Smerf and a couple of his ex-Amway buddies devised a Buy Gold pyramid scheme.  It goes like this:  You buy some gold, then go pitch/grab some buddies to buy gold, who go hawk even more people to buy it, who then shake down some of their friends/family…and so on.  Feed the fear factor of world economic collapse, and roll out some drivel likening our situation to the fall of the Roman Empire.  Get someone to do a story of a family storing canned goods in their 60’s -era fallout shelter.  Toss in a Nostradamus prediction or two.  Develop a network of gold sellers, and grab a little commission on every layer in the sales pyramid.  Pocket some serious dough.

At some point, like all good pyramid schemes, it will all come crashing down.  Smerf will eventually run out of nimrods to suck into his web, and some people will start doing a little bit of gold dumping….then the gold price will plummet.  But by then, Smerf will likely have bailed on all his stash, pocketed a tidy profit, raked in enough commissions, and will be laughing all the way to the Caymans.  Smerfnerd could not be reached for comment.

The Cox family, you know, the family that owns that big piece of land on the South end of Bizarreville…yeah, the family that has all those beat-up single-wides parked every which way in the clearings in the woods…Anyway, rumor is they’ve been buying Gold lately.  Not sure where they got the money for it…rumor is that Earl Cox, the one they call E-Cox, started up some kind of business renting-out farm animals.

His key financial advisor, who also happens to be his cousin Fred, the one they call F-Cox, said now is the time to load-up on Gold.  Said that in spite of the fact that it’s skyrocketed to $1000 lately, it could go as high as $10 thousand by this time next year, maybe higher.  “Just look at all these guys pitching gold in various advertisements, a veritable cavalcade of Gold hawkers.  They’re some of the most respected people on radio and TV…you gotta believe that gold will continue to rise…you gotta be able to trust them, right?”

Old Grampaw Cox, now irreverently referred to as G-Cox, was much more skeptical.  He remembered the last time gold shot up in price about 30 years ago.  G-Cox liquidated all his assets…which at the time was a rusted-out camper, 2 shotguns, and a paisley couch missing one leg… and bought Gold.  Soon after, the gold price plummeted, and he was broke…lived in a tent for about 5 years.  He still owns that tent…let’s the grandkids play in it when they visit.  But the kids say it smells pretty bad…say it smells like feet.

The Cox clan says that it’s different this time, versus 30 years ago.  But Grampaw thinks it’s deja vu, like some old rerun of “Father Knows Best”…it was bad then, even worse now.  He advises:  You want a good investment?  Buy good whiskey.  Of course, none of the Cox family drinks whiskey since their Conversion…….now it’s strictly tequilla.

E-Cox put aside his dream of upgrading to that shiny new double-wide, with the 2-sink restroom and the shag-carpetted kitchen.  He sold-off his closet full of ammo…well, not all of it, but a lot of it…and bought some kruggerands.   E-Cox stuck ’em in a mason jar, and buried his new stash behind a tall walnut tree out back.  Family members were worried that E would eventully forget where he buried the jar, so they insisted he write it down on a piece of paper.  He did that, but lost the paper…probably throwing it out when he was cleaning fish.

E-Cox is certain he will be rich when the impending financial collapse happens, and can then join the ranks of the hoi polloi, milling around at stuff-shirt parties, and eating pass-around hors d’oevres like barbeque buffalo meatballs on a toothpick and black fish stuff on Ritz crackers.  He said he might even buy a sport coat with one of those hankies in the pocket, “so much more convenient than having to root around for Kleenex when you really need to clean out the old sinuses.”