Author Archive for M. Toole

Trump Considered deportation of Elvis Musk over failure to buy elections in Texas

(Lake Ontario) White House insiders dancing in the East Ballroom today confirmed “anxiety within the top tier”, alluding faintly to the president’s disappointment with former weathercock schemer, Elvis Musk. It was clear that the financier/space ship builder, allegedly the world’s richest man, had fallen out of Orange favor, at least for now.

     Despite throwing half a billion dollars at the gubernatorial race and another chunk of change at the Senatorial vote nothing worked. The people of Texas (sadly not all) saw through the white boy GOP and thoroughly trounced  it at the ballot box.

     What the American voter wants now is some assurance that he might the right choice at the polls. Many voted against Trump more than for the Democrats which they see as flakes. The Dems should avoidon initial investigations of trump sycophants and assorted toadies until they successfully show the people of the United States (and what is left of our longtime allies) that the party has a program, a plan, security and low ego governing.

-Jack Spratt

“Because of you I close my eyes each time I yodel.”

– John Hartford (deceased) on “Aereoplane”

Rocky Relief staff qualifies for assisted living

(Denver) The 2026 Colorado Rockies relief pitching rank and file has patently approved for assisted living in 2027.

The operational status of the program which has morphed from the infield fly rule, clearly calls for players to inhabit barracks with one bathroom from February to October with no exceptions for body odor or tardiness.

The idea is for the staff to suffer collectively after blowing games. Emotional trauma spent , the alleged pitchers will then receive one on one counseling and low voltage shock treatments.

“Whether we will have the same work force next year is hard to say now but considering the past decade we are not overwhelmed with guesswork, said a former second base coach.

The exact location of the accommodation has remained a secret as a safety precaution and precedence will remain secure even during spring training.

-Gabby Haze

The Ant, the Grasshopper, and the Bar Fly

  So this guy comes into a bar…actually the two of them had been lounging for most of the afternoon flexing what was left of their pale muscles, pumping wisdom like a tired old well about to call it a lifetime. Both were heavy into self-absorbed. But swashbuckling tomcats like Don Juan were light on scrutiny preferring the other side of the looking glass to the mirror.

     These were very important men. Don Juan had an opinion on everything which he shared with the less fortunate like Candy, his shell-shocked drinking buddy who had eager ears but little as backup.

     “Yeah, I’ve damn well got her made,” started Don Juan. “Got my bank roll, my trailer house is paid for, and my pickup is runnin’ great.”

     He turned his neck ever so slightly and caught a glimpse of Candy who looked like he was trying to crawl into his cloudy pilsner glass.

     “For crying out loud, man, sit up straight,” he cuffed. “Look at your body language. It says everything about you. It tips your hand.”

     Candy looked at his body. He didn’t see or hear anything but he came to attention anyway following a pattern that had begun early on. Candy was there as a human reaction, to do as he was told. He was all but transparent because it had become easier that way.

     “Look at this,” said Don Juan, scanning the local gazette as he reached for his beer. “They sent a probe to Mars but it blew up when it got close. Idiots! I wonder how much that cost. I pay taxes and I’m damn sick and tired of the government shooting off space ships like they were butterflies.”

     Don Juan thought about what he had just said and smiled at his linguistic flair.

     “I don’t like bugs,” said Candy, “especially flying ones.”

     Don Juan continued to read the paper, his glasses fallen down around his cantaloupe nose. To him the expression on his face while reading was far more important than any information extracted from the experience. He wore a somber frown accentuated by hush puppies and a cap that read Cheyenne Frontier Days.

     “Winter’s comin’,” he soapboxed. “Look here. It snowed three feet in Duluth just yesterday. I’m glad I’m ready…got my wood all in and new mud and snows on the Power Wagon. How ’bout you?”

     Candy looked into the bar mirror. He had a propane heater in his small apartment that was paid for by the Veteran’s Administration because of the war. He didn’t drive and the last time he tried to can a batch of tomatoes, given to him by his sister over in Delta, he’d almost blown up the place. How could Candy prepare for winter? One season just plowed into another.

     “Oh, I’m fine,” he choked with a uncertain voice, all but drowned out by the television.

     “Fine, huh?” barked Don Juan. “Just like last year when you never got around to taping your windows and your pipes froze. Then you had to sleep on my couch for the whole month of January. Your like the man who had a forest of firewood at his fingertips but forgot to discover fire.”

     Don Juan was on a roll.

     “Security doesn’t just wander up into your yard,” he preached. “You gotta go get it. Whether it’s financial, social or romantic there’s a brawl going on and you just as well join in right away. Lead with your left, boy!”

     He slapped Candy hard on the back. The tiny toothless aperture just under his road map nose was not to be stopped now.

     “Take money, for instance,” he continued. “I worked for thirty-five years to get me a nest egg and now I’m gonna enjoy it. I got stocks and bonds, 40 acres up on the Plateau, a great retirement, CDs, credit cards, a fat bank account and even some of them annuities. Everything I got is paid for and I don’t have any kids to leave nothin’ to.”

     Candy stared into his empty glass. Don Juan ordered two more beers and companion shots. He had a captive audience and the four dollars was a well spent investment to keep it that way.

     “You might as well spend it all,” quipped Candy breaking into a smile.

     “Hell, we might just do that this afternoon,” smiled Don Juan who continued to peruse the paper. He was a man smart enough to do two things at once.

     “Yeah, you got to be ready for winter around these parts,” he said glancing in the direction of his doleful disciple who smelled like an empty case of Pabst. “You still got time and maybe I’ll even lend a hand but first let me tell you a story. I know you don’t like bugs but it’s called The Ants and the Grasshopper. It’s by some fella named Aesop. He was a Greek a long time ago.”

     Candy perked up. “That’s a funny sounding name,” he mumbled.

     Maybe you’ll get the connection here. You’ve got to have your affairs in order. You never know when your card will come up. What would you do in an emergency? What do you have to fall back on?”

     Don Juan went on to tell Candy the story of the industrious ants and the lazy grasshopper. Despite the fact that Candy did not like bugs he listened intently. Don Juan told him about the ants drying grain on a fine winter’s day. The grain had been collected over long, hard days throughout the summer months.

     “Then along comes this grasshopper, half starved, begging for a handout,” he explained. “One of the ants asked him why he had not stored up any food during the summer. He says he had not leisure time enough and that he had passed the days singing. The ants scorned him saying that if he had been foolish enough to sing away the summer then he must dance supperless to bed in the winter.”

     Don Juan waited for a response.

     “Mean little bastards,” said Candy.

     “You miss the point,” said Don Juan. “The ants worked at getting their ducks in a row while the grasshopper wasted his time. It’s just like you and me,” he added. “I’m the ant and you’re the grasshopper. My house in order while your roof is caving in.”

     Suddenly Don Juan clutched his chest, executing a poignant plunge from his prosaic perch at the bar. A swan dive in a dive. He hit the floor hard, his satellite brew crashing beside him. He was a goner.

     At the funeral a lot of people that Candy had never seen talked about what a great man Don Juan had been. They said he had grit. They said he had enjoyed a full life. They said he’d be missed. What they were really doing was a little preheat jockeying for position with regards to his assets, which ended up going to an uncle and aunt Don Juan had never liked.

     Meanwhile Candy wandered home and spent the rest of the day putting up visquine over the peewee windows of his ratty chamber. Were there no end to the chores? Don Juan’s old pickup sat propped in the driveway, a gift from the counterfeit relatives who didn’t want to haul the thing back to Salida. Now he would have to put gas in it. How would he ever get around to that.

– Kashmir Horseshoe

Elvis Musk and his Martian Dream

Ima goin’ to Mars

with Elvis Musk

You can fiddle, you can yearn

and be left in red dust.

Still he’s white as they come

and as dark as they go

The Apartheid Cowboy

the fool and his dough.

Halloween – A Celtic Thing

From the outside the newspaper business looks pretty basic, but it gets complicated fast. The publisher is in Brasil this week, engaged in beach frolic while the often responsible managing editor is out betting against the Broncos. That leaves me here with Freddy Kruegar, The Mummy and an assortment of zombies, vampires and skeletons on a slow news day no less, to do everything. Morbid decorations.

 Let’s see here…halitosis….hallelujah…ah yes, Halloween. It seems the perfect subject matter for late October.

While the observation of Halloween in this country carries an array of perceptions and conceptions, it is quite a different experience on the Celtic Isles of Scotland and Ireland where the Hallow E’en celebration or Oiche Samhain originated. To the Pre-Christian Celts, Halloween was a sacred pagan holy day where it was believed that the spirits of the dead could return to their former life and make contact with the spirits of the living. In that ancient society, dominated by the enlightened and mysterious Druids, Halloween was an end of the summer fire feast where the gods were thanked for a rich harvest.

The Manx called it Hoptu Naa and the Welsh called it Calan Gaeaf.  In the Gaeltacht of Western Ireland the people call the celebration Pooky Night, named after the mischievous Puka, a fairy of some regard. Either way it was all pretty much the same big carnival  at a time of the year when the crops were in and magic was said to be most potent. In addition, it represented the mid-point in the Celtic calendar and the entry into the dark phase of the year.

The tradition of costumes originates on these islands too. Where merrymakers would mimic or placate the dead with painted faces and ghoulish attire. They were short on super hero outfits, and pre-fab plastics with accessories, so they had to rely on the magic itself to pull off their disguise. In Ireland and Scotland today many people simply done the white face paint and black robes in an attempt to continue this tradition – the cycle of birth and death in line with the order and harmony of the universe…a far cry from our  commercial Halloween.

The practice of trick or treat (called mumming in Ireland) has been traced to the Celts too, as well as the Romans who invaded England. These conquerors sought to honor their Goddess Pomona, protector of the harvest, whose symbol was the apple, now an inherent part of Halloween celebrations. All of these feasts carried the unifying belief in the powerful symbolism of the moving dead, prayed for by the living

All was well until Pope Boniface IV decided that people were having too much fun. He turned the whole shooting match into a holy day of obligation where the faithful faced mandatory Mass attendance and an assortment of restrictions. The Pope could not accept the idea of a special day for all of the dead so he turned it into a day for just the blessed dead…All Saints Day. If you didn’t go along with the Pope on this one your crops would fail and your livestock would die mysteriously. Blasphemers, pontifically defined, would certainly spend eternity in the Netherworld

The Jack-O-Lantern also came from these isles but was carved from a large turnip since pumpkins were not indigenous to the Irish soil. The legend tells of a greedy gambler, Stingy Jack, who once tricked the devil and was condemned to eternally wander the earth at night. The lantern was placed outside to help him find his way and, possibly to keep him out of the flower beds, off the lawn and from peeking in the windows. The more bountiful pumpkin, used today to create the frightening, toothy faces on the jack-o-lantern, only came into play after early settlers brought it back to Europe (along with the potato) from the Americas.

Although the origins of our Halloween are clearly Celtic, Day of the Dead observances are popular in Mexico, Egypt, Guatemala, and the Caribbean. In Michoacan, Oaxaca, Chiapas and Merida children receive little chocolate sculls and families build altars piled high with food and the things the deceased loved one enjoyed in life. The altars are then decorated with marigolds to honor the dead. Pan de muertos (Bread of the dead) is baked to accentuate the feasting.

In Chichicastenango, Guatemala a massive procession begins at one end of town and strolls to the other. Along with the Jesus and Mary statues the alternative Creole deity, Rahsheeman, rides elevated through the streets. Sugar cane liquor is everywhere. Cannons are fired and bedlam is not far off. Up father north, at haunting Nebaj, the naturales engage in inebriated horse races (the horses are relatively sober until after 2) which are quite a sight to behold from the sidelines with a plate of Hilachas.

My female companion, freshly returned from the insanity of the plaza, had engaged earlier with a pushy local who thought she could intimidate, only to find that this gringa didn’t take any guff. She asked our hosts about all the goings on mentioning the mortar-like canons firing off and the conflicting bands playing Guatemalan favorites. He explained the cultural and religious aspects to which she retorted “and they really like noise.” He smiled and said “and they really like noise.”

In Cariacou, Grenada the party starts in the evening at the local boneyard where graves are turned into bars and everyone toasts dead relatives throughout the night. Fortune telling takes second fiddle to the consumption of under-de-counta (under the counter) a fortified (99% proof) rum from Trinidad fermented with spices and reputed aphrodisiacs. Now these folks really know how to throw a party. Chevere Boo, Babies !

DUDE NEWSPAPER SEASON BEST ON RECORD

(Ouray) The San Juan Horseshoe is reporting staggering profits after completion of its third Dude News Session held in July and August. The 2-week seminars give newspaper buffs the opportunity to get a little ink under their fingernails here in the computer age.

     Participants, who must apply for the minimal spots as early as April, undergo the pain and joy of real news men and women. Deadlines, logistical nightmares regarding circulation and subscription correspondence and layout are covered. Perhaps the most useful experience is in the dude ranch venue where students actually herd advertisers into a pen for branding.

     “That was my favorite,” said Bennie Ratshoe-Hummingway of Clovis, New Mexico. “How they got all those people in that small veal shoot is beyond me!”

     The regular staff enjoys a slight break from the tedious too. Many prefer to spend lazy afternoons sitting around the camp jug shouting encouragement to the tabloid rookies.

     “We just chill and let these overachievers overachieve,” said darkroom analyst, Earl MacAdoo. “Last week we ran a Bad Blood Drive in Crested Butte where residents mooned everyone and we took photographs. Before that we had a campfire feast where we charged our clients in a grand fashion and served them only humus and choice of Guinness Lite or tepid ditchwater. Staying on top of food cost is everything these days. Branding, or bovine tattoo handicraft as we like to call it, was optional.”

     The management of the paper feels that corporate America needs to find out how jerkwater operations like this paper are carried out. Survival techniques, social skills and alcohol control are a side-effect as is extensive vocabulary use.

     “And all of our delivery wagons run on methane gas, taking advantage of the hayseed culture that’s all around us,” said MacAdoo.

-Fred Zeppelin