All Entries in the "Lifestyles at Risk" Category
STALIN’S MUSTACHE TOUR RETURNS TO WESTERN SLOPE
The well received Joseph Stalin Mustache Tour will once again grace Western Colorado this summer with tentative stopovers in Mancos: July 26; Paradox: August 6; Cahone Whisker Days: August 12-13; Paradox: August 22; Glade Park: September 7; Sunbeam: September 16; Cowdrey: September 23; Dotsero: September 25: Bowie: September 30: Gladstone: October 4 and Spar City: October 29. Please be aware that Stalin’s mustache will be in the state for about four months with little to do during the day when it is not performing. Please treat our visitor with respect no matter what your politics may be.
WOODEN INDIANS APPREHENDED
(Ouray) Police here have concluded a roundup of local wooden Indians who may pose a threat to the peace and prosperity of the community. The often elusive culprits, including the defiant Cruton and his running mate Crow Feather, are in custody as of this morning.
The clever statues have for years been present each day on the street staring at tourists, loitering and otherwise promoting havoc, according to the authorities.
“Last month we received a report that one of the wooden Indians had spit on the street almost hitting the chamber jeep,” said an arresting officer. “Later that same day one of his cronies glared at city workers bust laying new water lines on Main Street. That was enough for a preliminary investigation.”
Meanwhile in upscale Ridgway, police officers remain parked outside of the local bar waiting for wooden Indians to emerge after a few drinks.
“It’s tough to determine who is in violation of the law,” said one officer since the state keeps lowering the legal limit as to percentage of alcohol in the blood. “These wooden Indian types just stare out of the windshield and say nothing. Why just Tuesday we nailed a suspected drunk who turned out to be dead sober although his blood/sap count was well over the line. – Melvin Toole
TOOLE SHOTS DAZZLING 19 ON DOS RIOS COURSE
(GUNNISON) Fairway wizard, Melvin Toole has shocked the golf world by recording a course record 19 over the weekend. Flaming his way through the first nine without a hitch, Toole’s drive on 17 just wouldn’t drop, rolling around the hole three times before stopping on the green.
Caddie Simone Simone told The Horseshoe that many in the gallery complained of neck injuries after watching the spiraling motion of the ball go round and around the on the lip of the cup.
“If it weren’t for that disastrous 17th he would have been perfect,” said the caddie. “Lots of golfers spend years just trying to break par. They take lessons, buy expensive equipment and get ulcers over such a silly game. Remember: It was invented by the Scots, who had been clearly exposed to yesterday’s haggis.”
This was only Toole’s second time on a golf corpse, having played the Montrose Course (recording a 22) Thursday. If he keeps up this fiery pace he will have to be considered the top contender in the Fairway Pines Bazooka Shoot slated for the Thirty-Fifth.
Appearing in what has become his trademark attire: a stunning red crepe blazer with matching whipped cream argyle suspenders, impressive asbestos chaps, your everyday competition flippers and a rigidly flumed stovepipe hat, Toole told reporters that his secret is to relax and hit the ball as hard as possible.
“Often I close my eyes right at the point of contact or aim for another golfer,” smiled the linkster. “The pro here says that as soon as I can get around to buying some irons my game should continue to improve.”
Toole said he took up golf because he likes to ride around in a the little carts drinking beer. He said the game reminded him a lot of croquet except that it wasn’t quite as painful being hit in the forehead with the golf ball. – Rocky Flats
Medical Notes: GENE LINKED TO STATESBORO BLUES
(Mao Clinic) Researchers here say they have isolated a never before detected gene that may have a lot to do with a medical condition known as Statesboro Blues. These particular blues, made famous by a host of black musicians in the 30s and 40s, is said to affect the central nervous system often causing in-grown toenails, scurvy, chronic pediculosis, the gout, and other maladies due to temporary geographic disorders.
The gene, at first almost undetectable, was discovered while scientists here were examining a crate of raw oysters under a microscope. The oysters were earmarked for a fundraiser.
“We thought maybe a piece of lint or some hair had forced its way onto one of the slides,” said a hospital source.
“We were about to eat lunch,” said Dr. Godfrey Daniels, a former physician at St Roscoe’s Memorial Carwash and Bad Food Bank in Bland Junction. “Someone noticed that our supplementary shipment of “angels on horseback” had been tampered with. We then stuck one of the edible bivalve mollusks under the microscope for further scrutiny and the Statesboro gene was quickly identified.”
Preliminary research indicates that there is a link between heredity and attitude, or, as one scientist proclaimed: “The inclusion of raw oysters in the diet may offer very positive options.”
“We were all certainly a lot happier after consuming the oysters and the vodka martinis didn’t hurt either,” she chuckled.
Called the “most important breakthrough in genetic research in over a decade” here at Mao, sources indicate more significant data may support these findings in the near future.
Isolation of genes is quite complicated and most people wouldn’t like all that horseradish,” said Daniels. “Now let’s go to lunch.” – G. Roscoe Lovinggood
BEARS EVICTED FROM YELLOWSTONE
(Idaho Falls) The last bears left in Yellowstone have been instructed to clean out their desks and look for other work according to sources with the Nashville Park Service in Washington DC. The official reason for the abrupt departures was listed as environmental in that grizzlies and black bears have been seen climbing trees and illegally harvesting trout from puny streams in the park.
“These bruins do irreparable damage to the pines and aspens,” said one park ranger from behind his 30-foot high super cell phone. “In addition, most of the bears refuse to buy even a one-day fishing license.”
The ranger, who would only give his game, bank and cereal number, denied allegations that people visiting the day-glo, geyser-plagued, extravaganza do far more damage than the animals who live there.
At present there are seven snack bars for every squirrel and one mile of blacktop for every raven within the park’s 3500 square miles. Over 4.8 billion tourists visit the park each season, which is just 17 times the population of Pakistan.
The bears, and any other wildlife that protest the arrangement, will be moved to temporary housing in Gillette.
Buffalo Phil Trampled
(Crested Butte) Legendary big game hunter, Buffalo Phil was killed Friday after being crushed by a Buffalo herd apparently on its way to a rock concert . Phil, who claims to have shot over 3000 buffaloes during his illustrious career back in the mid-1800s will be buried in several small caskets so as to appease fans on Lookout Mountain, Colorado; Cody, Wyoming; and Scott County, Iowa; Omaha, Nebraska; and Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, all of which claim that his stiff is already buried there.
The buffalo, or more correctly the bison, were not cited.
Discarded Telephone Books Clog Dumps
(Ridgway) Mounds of local telephone books, thrown away daily by postal recipients, have shut down the local landfill here. The books, which began flooding the market some ten years ago, now amount to 40% of the trash discarded by postal employees at the end of each working day.
The actual number of phone books published is estimated to be nearing 50 which computes to over 2500 sources of phone listings per capita. They come in all sorts of designs and colors, featuring combinations of communities who rarely call each other.
“Why can’t we just have one phone book?” asked a town councilperson here. “Wouldn’t that be enough?”
It is hoped that the landfill will be cleared and back open for dumping by the weekend. At present a line of semis, estimated to be 1/2 mile long, sits idle outside the Ridgway facility waiting to dispose of its pulp cargo. Persons attempting to dump other forms of debris have been turned away. The situation is no better in San Miguel and Montrose Counties where the books have once again out-muscled other trash for a place in the sun.
“Last winter people stopped buying firewood due to easy access to phone books,” said one postal employee. “They went out of here like box elder bugs in a lightening storm! Now the landfills are crammed full of chucked chain saws and scrapped log splitters.”
Publishers of the phone books defend their position saying that they had promised blanket circulation and did not want to short summer residents or visitors who might like to take home a souvenir. They say controls placed on press runs would jeopardize their right to make a living.
“Maybe we’ve reached a point of overkill,” said one account executive at Tele-Phoney Inc., appealing to the American sense of greed, “but there’s easy money in all that advertising.”
Consumer groups contend that the generic, specialized books are not large quite enough to benefit shorter Americans in bellying up the dinner table or to serve as a viable challenge to traditional side-show strongmen intent on tearing them up to exhibit their might.
None of the assorted producers cared comment when asked what happened to all the phone booths that used to grace the countryside. The booths, almost always void of phone books, have gradually disappeared in the face of the cell phone explosion of recent years.
“We’re responding to the needs of Americans who must talk on the phone all the time. It’s a security thing,” said the Tele-Phoney source. “What if their friends and relatives grow tired of chatting and they must turn to strangers for this anal form of communication. Who’ll pay the piper then, huh?” he puffed up.
Authorities all over the state have concluded that in the future the unwanted books should be discarded in hazardous waste dumps like the one in Uravan, which, despite the negative input of the local populace some years ago, operates there.
A federal study, completed last spring indicates that pulp used in the books actually neutralizes radioactive waste without the bother of having to bury it.
“Tailings and other atomic side effects are part of our culture,” said the Tele-Phoney man. “We’re just happy to be helping forge a cleaner environment. There can never be too much information for the common man.” – Melvin Toole
