All Entries in the "Lifestyles at Risk" Category
Macaques, Howlers and ED Capsules
A formula for disaster in our alpine canopy
Local authorities seek input as to the burgeoning ED treatment epidemic within the Japanese Macaque and Howler Monkey populations in the San Juans and Elk Mountains. As most of our enlightened readership is already well aware, the primates were secretly dropped into the Wiminuche Wilderness in 1985 followed by another introduction of a smaller group of immigrant macaques in 1991.
That was then. Now is now. The clash of monkeys and medicine. Catastrophe looms. Ape anarchy.
The availability and acceptability of erectile dysfunction products out there in the medicinal world has seen to that. They are plentiful on the black market. They have made their way into the forests. They are everywhere like jelly beans on Easter. The place has gone nuts. Primates that once blended well with other existing flora and fauna are no longer so docile. Monkeys who appeared content to sit in trees and yell are now out looking for a good time, every night of the week, so we’re told.
Police are perplexed as to how the primates are acquiring the drugs so easily and at such a volume.
“We are monitoring known dispensing spots for all sorts of legal pharmaceuticals,” said one officer in Colona. “We watch for suspicious behavior but not one monkey or ape has been spotted within city or town limits.”
County officials say the ED pills are being brought by tourists and discarded. They say the accessibility has grown over the past decade. But they agree that this is small potatoes compared to the incendiary house of cards shuffling in our woodlands.
“The alarming part is that the deteriorating relationship between wardens and primates has reached toxic levels so quickly despite the availability of counseling and free coffee at a series of open meetings that were poorly attended to be kind, and seen as irrelevant by other wildlife.
Humans are warned to stay out of the woods during the traditional morning, afternoon and evening mating times. Residents and visitors alike are reminded that the macaque and howlers are protected species. Harming one could land you in jail with big fines and a loss of hunting privileges for yourself and your off-spring.
“If it was me I’d just stay in the house or go to Arizona,” said one county commissar, who pleaded anonymity.
The clandestine experiment seemed to be going very smoothly as the troupes found everything they required to sustain and thrive as the first control group in North America. Although the forests were quite different than more tropical environs the animals quickly adapted substituting quakie for mango leaves and berries for bananas.
Division of Wildlife plans to relocate the species to Oklahoma during rifle season here have been abandoned due to the cost of diesel.
-Tommy Middlefinger
Many Regions Embrace Zucchini Standard
(Delta) A rising number of communities have weaned themselves off the dollar and taken to zucchini as legal tender as well as a negotiable measure of wealth and well- being.
Despite the strong US dollar, many mostly rural Americans feel that what they can see piling up is a better measure of prosperity than credit cards some measly paper money. Many say the paper money is good to start fires but they can’t get even dried zucchini squash to ignite.
“We got greenbacks and such with pictures of men in wigs or we got beautiful squash of yellow and green,” said one former Nitwit Coin enthusiast. “Which one looks the most secure?”
The source did not comment when asked about the winter months when zucchini and most fresh vegetables dry up around these parts. Already hunters and gatherers are hard at work canning and storing squash in apprehension of a “run on the bank” by city dwellers.
Rumors of an invasion by miles of rogue zucchini in the vicinity of Rangel, Colorado have been simultaneously downgraded to an official tropical disturbance and delegated as a federal disaster area. Federal mandates strictly limit plant migrations such as this that exceed 25 miles wide.
“That thirsty zucchini patch is easily twice that size,” continued our source who now identified himself as Hector Somebody, of Mack. He told us that hordes of zucchini militia, called Zucchini Rangers due to their laughable yellow and gold socks and well-oiled Squashkopf* Rifles, had surrounded the zucchini and dug trenches at the state line in preparation for a war of attrition.
Others hijacked a Bimbo Bread truck and drove it to safety in Wyoming moments before engulfed by the meandering squash. Nearby tractor trailers and a 4000-foot recreational vehicle were not so lucky. The Bimbo maneuver was reportedly linked to a wildly popular board game aply named Dump the Zuchini which claims over three million afficionados across the Rockies.
“They were here one minute and gone the next,” said Somebody, just like my sociable security check.”
*Carcano M 1938 carbine beretta – Fucile Armaguera to you flatlanders
-Gabby Haze
“Look for the ridiculous in everything and you will find it.”
– Jules Renard, 1890
Planets Set to Collide
(Substratum Observatory) Astronomers here predict that either Mars or Venus (or both) will collide with planet Earth, resulting in mass destruction and an end to life as we have known it. The frightening impact is expected somewhere between the next few days and the next 750 years, depending on negative energy flow, external phenomenon and the weather. Residents of the affected planets are urged
to stockpile food water and blankets so as to have the best chances of survival.
“We apologize for the inaccuracies contained in our report,” said one scientist, “and we would like to be more exact in our calculations but it’s tough to tell what is what and who is who in outer space. Trying to decide what time to have lunch is tough enough without trying to predict the arrival time of bedlam and pandemonium.”
Meanwhile an official gov’ment statement released this morning denies any knowledge of suspicious behavior on the part of Mars and Venus. In addition leaders in world capitals agree that all residents should continue their daily rituals and not worry about “silliness that they cannot control”.
“Like it or not the collisions could come at any time,” continued the astronomical source, “so we may as well enjoy life, although it might not hurt to get one’s cosmic ducks in a row.”
-Manuel Flushe
Soviets Withheld Hangover Cure from People
(Moscow) The KGB and other control factions in the former Soviet Union allegedly hid an effective cure for the common hangover from the Russian people for some 50 years. The cure, which reputedly involves a prescribed treatment of ripe Georgian peppercorns, liquid oxygen, generous portions of vitamin B, and dried Tabasco sauce lightly shaken with tepid vodka, was discovered by none other than Joseph Stalin while on vacation in Yalta in 1944. Sadly the paranoid dictator did not make his findings public, in fact did not share these remedial qualities with even his close friends and family, until his death in 1953.
The embarrassing disclosures were released as part of a continuing house cleaning in the Kremlin. It was not clear at press time if controversial Russian leader Vladimir Putin had knowledge of the proceedings.
Stalin’s sad legacy had survived until last year when rumors of a miraculous cure for advanced exposure to vile spirits was leaked to reporters by a Communist party girl during a weekend fling in Minsk. Since then the party girl has relocated to Finland and cannot be contacted for comment. The official recipe was never circulated within the hard-drinking population since it was destroyed by fire during the Yeltson Era.
According to statements attributed to the now deceased Yeltsin “It remains horribly barbaric and intensely cruel to those of us that enjoy a daily repast and often exceed our limits. Withholding information of this magnitude swerves as further proof that Stalin was not only mad but chronically stupid.”
For decades party officials had complained of lost workdays and low production, often attributing these social maladies to the liberal consumption of “barrio vodka”. Had Stalin shared his discoveries the Soviet System may have succeeded or at least shown better yields in factories and collective farms.
“The world might be a different place today had the Soviets applied this saving catalyst,” said one expert who often dresses as Stalin and still lives with his (not Stalin’s) mother.
The ancients seem to have possessed a remedy for alcohol poisoning as they called it. Researchers have doggedly pursued a cold trail in this vein since the Crusades. Prior to that time the personified factions of good and evil have coveted the panacea since the Sumerians first put cork to bottle, brewing beer in 3500 BC.
– Gregory Rasputin Jr.
SICK BLAMED FOR HEALTH CARE WOES
(Warshington) Opponents of the absent/diluted National Health Care program, proposed by the Obama Administration, say that sick people are the major stumbling block in creating an effective policy here. The culprits, they say, lay around in hospital beds doing virtually nothing all day.
Republicans, careful not to offend the right-wing Christian sector, added that these problem citizens should either get healthy or bow out gracefully so as to allow the rest of us to afford protection.
Saying that these “selfish malcontents are jeopardizing the standard of living for everyone”, a spokesperson for the Sturgeon General’s Office promised to look into the matter after the November elections.
“We’re all down with the flu this week,” whined the source,. If we had premier coverage like Congress we’d probably be able to make it to work and actually get something accomplished.”
In the interim, concerned parties on the left and right have called for a freeze on legal immigration so that “fevered clusters of humanity can be better curtailed”. These highly vocal groups have even gone so far as to demand clean bills of health from groups entering the county illegally and serve them up as some sort of example to the sleepy American voter.
“The last thing we need is a bunch of aliens getting sick and ruining it for everyone else,” said a T-Bag from somewhere south of reality. “If they insist on having babies here the least they could do is have the dignity to buy American-made diapers!”
When later informed that all “American” diapers (and American flags for that matter) are now made in China the enlightened source was at a loss for further misspelled words and bad grammar.
In a rare appearance at a suburban Virginia dog show President Obama told reporters that “blaming the infirm for health care woes was like blaming pets for leash laws”. It’s high time we identified the sandbaggers in the system and rooted them out one at a time,” said the Chief Executive. Following an enthusiastic response by those in attendance, the President promised to recognize no less than 16 new breeds of dog if elected for a second term. He did not mention cats.
Called cheap grandstanding by dwindling voices in the Republican camp, the action was seen by non-partisan forces as an attempt to placate the sick while securing the canine vote in the coming campaigns.
“Isn’t it about time the middle classes picked up the slack,” said one lobbyist for the American Medical Association. “If we wait for the rich or poor to cover our arses we could be six feet under before sunset. How can we realistically expect to find any answers with all the coughing and nose blowing taking precedence over common scents?”
– Tommy Middlefinger
Queen’s Coffin Located, Expedited
(London) For a harrowing 20 minutes nobody knew where the coffin had gone. Then in the nick of time a Jamaican Airlines ticketing agent stumbled across it while on her coffee break across from the domestic baggage sector.
“There it was. Bright as a prosperous colony, standing firm as sterling silver,” she said “I had seen it on telly when it left Edinburgh. It was the only unclaimed cargo on a red-eye flight in from Mumbai.
Within moments hundreds of anxious federal and local authorities swooped down on the lonely carousel, still going round and round. Forensic specialists and members of the royal clan were then spirited to the airport to make positive identification before announcing that the Queen Mother was in fact “in there all right” according to police.
“Her Majesty does not fly on commercial airlines,” said an aide. “The very idea that her private box had been tampered with is illogical since it only need pass through rudimentary customs in London.”
The aide blamed the Irish.
Meanwhile with the newly found Queen Elizabeth (no last name given) arrived at Westminster Abbey without further incident.
-Finn McCool
“If elected I will go to Mars” says Commissioner Candidate
(Lake City, CO) The Hinsdale County Commissioners race in 2022 is heating up with the incumbent promising star roving and the challenger urging voters to herald the town into the 21st century.
Resonating the words of then Presidential candidate Dwight D. Eisenhower regarding a visit to the war zone that was Korea 1951, Toole looked like he had just taken a bite out of someone.
“If elected I will go to Mars!” he exclaimed again just so everyone could hear him.
Paula Parvenu, a retired osteopath and competition for the coveted county position mocked Toole, saying that she would rather stay in county and help the residents here. Readers may recall Parvenu’s tearful concession speech following a painful one vote defeat in the County Coroner race in 2020.
“I realize I am a bit of a neophyte but I am quite sure that solar system treks and small town politics don’t mix well.”
“I’d say the Martian enthusiasm was split down the middle with half of the registered voters impressed with Toole’s courage and willingness to to strike out into the great beyond,” stressed one election monitor. “The other half simply want him to leave town for whatever reason he chooses in his jumbled consciousness.”
“Why Mars?”asked Toole defensively. “Less controversial than Israel or Taiwan. Closer than Neptune. “The moon is passé. Everyone is doing that.”
His own grapefruit powered spice module with a henway launcher was crafted in the Black Hills from old motorcycle parts and a discarded copper still.
“At first Toole threatened to ride his Gold Wing but aides calmed him down.,” said the former commissioner. “Then he volunteered to be shot from a canon duplicating countless success stories from his earlier circus days.”
The key here, according to the local prattle is that Toole says he is going someplace. Any place. The destination is secondary.
“The electorate hears the sound byte, stores it within the twisted wires and well-worn fears and generational opinions, spits out a poorly though out preamble and then forgets the matter entirely.”
-Slim Gulione
Parts of this report were extracted from the first draft of the popular String Bikinis on the Ganges, A Memoir
by Melvin Bedwetter Toole, Testosterone Brothers, Boston.
Take your libido to work day “abject disaster”
(Pea Green)) The first-ever exploratory, employee-sponsored Career Jamboree has reportedly failed in all projections and will be dropped in 2023.
“This was a social disaster peppered with inappropriate behavior and gossip, girl-boy shenanigans and the running of 30 mouths,” said Natty Redde who does cowgirl beadwork and was invited to the jamboree with her libido and well-behaved her dog, Sherker, who holds an advanced degree in canine tonsorial relations and likes to swim in rivers completely naked.
“In had a blast!” Redde said. “We didn’t bring Sherker’s libido because it had jumped the fence and tore up the neighbor’s laundry and bit the local policeman.”
The riling and vexatious event came together when leading office predators, including the Clown Administrator, were away on an illegal voting machine vacation in Grand Junction.
The Administrator, in keeping with her landmark statement, she did not elaborate further.
“I don’t play golf to get better. I play to keep from getting any worse.” – Babe Toole
