Opposites

What is the opposite of a shoe made of lobster? Nothing, apparently. According to a recent MIT report, if a person were to make a shoe made of lobster meat, it would have no opposite. This report comes at a time when opposites are being declared for nearly everything, from chicken salad (opposite: Katie Couric) to public nudity (opposite: retarded bacon). So far, lobster shoes are just one of three items declared to not have opposites, along with fighter planes constructed from lamb-flavored ice-cream and Jeremy Fuentes of Sioux City, Iowa. Asked to comment on the recent addition of lobster shoes to the list of things without opposites, Fuentes stated, “I guess it’s all good and dandy until you really dig down a bit and look at what’s really going on here. Those fascist, nazi, Zionist, libertarian, goat-herding monkey lovers up on Capitol hill are just saying that me and lamb-ice-cream-fighter-planes and lobster shoes have no opposites so they can keep putting everyday people down. It’s all just the man being the man, man.” No fighter planes made from lamb-flavored ice-cream or lobster meat shoes could be contacted for comment, though the author considered simply making her own shoes out of lobster meat. Costs were prohibitive however, so we can only dream of what the shoes might have said.

Mazoo

My uncle once told me about a man named Gordon Mazoo who lived under a bridge in northern Papua New Guinea. Mazoo was famous for his representational depictions of American Politicians that he would paint on the underside of the bridge, from Ernest Tankleton to Geroge W.H. Buhs. His most famous painting, of notorious Iowa senator Don Fretalas, was so lifelike that native passerby would often be frozen in their tracks when attempting to cross the bridge. On more than one occasion, people strolling over the bridge were stricken so violently by Mazoo’s paintings that they would collapse over the sides of the bridge and be horrendously mauled by the orphan children in the river below. When asked how these passerby even saw the paintings if they were on the underside of the bridge, my uncle stated, “What you need is a good chicken salad sandwich. That’ll clear everything up.”

Pasta

The most popular types of pasta worldwide are rarely those that are used most frequently for food purposes. Instead, pastas like rigatoni and penne are commonly used in medical procedures such as the fabled “pasta transfer” of the Italian countryside north of Florence. In this procedure, a small amount of cooked rigatoni is left out overnight to appease the demon lord Halavankali. The next morning, a small incision is made just below the navel, deep enough to reach the pasta recipient’s innards. The rigatoni is then slowly inserted, one by one, into the incision and the wound sealed. Weeks later, the pasta is extracted in the reverse process, called “transfer pasta”. The pasta will have congealed into a solid mass in the shape of a doughnut by this point. The pasta donut, called a “shabiglia” is then used for a traditional Italian bloodsport. The sport consists of one player throwing the shabiglia at an orphaned baby, while the second player attempts to kick the baby out of harms way. Once the baby has been kicked beyond a designated point (generally into a steep ravine or otherwise unsafe-for-babies environment) the two players must sprint at one another, each blindfolded by a shabiglia, whilst screaming “scutelepeggio mi formagio”, which roughly translates to “renounce the religion of your ancestors, villain, before I must salt your mother’s bread”.

Jeremy Leinsdorf

One thing that Copenhagen is not known for, however, is its large population of men who enjoy eating granola bars on top of their pasta. This makes sense, however, as Copenhagen is one of the largest granola bar manufacturers in the eastern hemisphere, and is far and away the largest consumer of pasta in Europe, with the one exception being the tiny country of Reginald-Biscuit 9, which has a population of one child, two dogs and a spoon. The child, Frankie Johnny Pestolovich IV, works in the country’s financial district, which consists entirely of a small shack in which he sells roadside garbage for exorbitant prices.

 

The dogs are not owned by Frankie. Instead, they usually hang around to gnaw on his legs when he gets sleepy or too exhausted to move. Frankie uses the only other resident of the country, a spoon, to beat away the dogs when he can muster enough energy. Reginald-Biscuit 9 is not, in fact, the smallest country on earth. The South Pacific nation of Jeremy Leinsdorf is actually significantly smaller, as its sole resident, Jeremy Leinsdorf, is an estimated 12 pounds lighter than his European counterpart.

 

As part of a recent international event, Leinsdorf and Pestolovich were pitted against each other in mortal combat at the behest of billionaire Richard Branson. Branson chose the weapons for the event, which included butcher’s cleavers and meat hooks, as well as medical instruments. The boys were let loose in a 10 square mile pen in the jungles of Borneo and told that they would be tortured and beaten mercilessly if they did not try their best to kill one another.

 

The boys did not come into contact with one another until the 6^th day of the event, after Leinsdorf had been tracking Pestolovich’s droppings for at least 3 days. Leinsdorf confronted Pestolovich in a small clearing, armed with a bonesaw and a Fijian war club. Pestolovich, sporting an ancient Chinese shield breaker and a gladius,  ensnared the youth in a previously set bear trap and ceremoniously “kneecapped” his adversary. Leinsdorf took advantage of Pestolovich’s need for honor, however, and clubbed in his skull. After decapitating his corpse and dragging himself to the edge of the pen, Leinsdorf was freed and dropped back on his island in the south pacific with little to no medical attention. It is presumed that he died some time later.

Unfortunate News

 Tran Lop Kwao, the former miss America pageant contestant (and the first male to enter that competition), was found dead in his Santa Monica apartment this morning. The cause of death was apparently from drug overdose. Toxicology reports indicate that Tran had been smoking dolphin meat in a large outdoor smoker last evening, which he later consumed in copious amounts. An autopsy revealed that Tran had eaten as much as 3.6 times the threshold dose of dolphin meat within a span of 30 minutes, and that he had also gone swimming within 15 minutes of eating the meat. 6 grams of cocaine were also extracted from the body, as well as a pound and a half of fiberglass shavings and an ounce of heroin, but none of these substances are thought to have caused Tran’s passing. Asked to comment, Tran’s mother, Sang Chur Bing Lung Phat Hey There Nelson stated, “Are you going to eat that, or do I have to fart on your sister?”

The Deep

I awoke the searing pain of incredulous movement flitting about the curves of my skull. It was raining so I moved to the window, catching a glimpse of you in the courtyard. I opened my mouth to let out the stale air in my lungs but the thoughts lingered. Awake, I drifted to the door, finding it sealed. How long it had been. Between you and I, one thousand kaleidoscope frames hung like sheets. The knob creaked. The floorboards moaned. I let out another breath at the top of the stairs. This time, the thoughts escaped, taking my essence with them. Desiccated, I cascaded down the steps, imploding into a dusty cloud. Evaporated and reformed, I collected myself and slid into the kitchen. Cracking joints resound off walls like snapped piano strings. I froze before the screen door, a hundred broken smiles and creeping tendrils held me in place. Collapsing through the glass and erupting onto the patio in a seizure of color, I found you sitting by the water. As you turned, I gasped and the world fell away. Six steps separated you and I. Six tiles of withered stone. With my first footfall the void beyond you flashed white and I was blind. Alone on the rock you found me. Your touch led me over each stone to the opposite side. My vision restored, I saw your hands for the first time. Digging into my flesh, my arms compacted like sponges and cracked. You released me into the abyss, floating. Your face, a mess of crimson feathers and obsidian grins, disappeared behind the veil.

 

The cool waters of the stream washed over me. I was alive.