Tag: Humor

And Now For Something Completely Different – A Weird Year In Review

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One of the fringe benefits of my job is, of course, the ability to travel around the country. If I’m lucky I get to see some weird and interesting people and things. Since I love oddities, superlatives, and miscellany I always keep my camera at the ready and I am seldom disappointed. Here are some things that brought a smile to my face in the last year. I took all these pictures of actual places and things I saw. Hopefully you might get a chuckle, too. God knows we could all use one right now.

by: Dustin Joy

Tourism

Every City wants to attract tourists, even if it doesn’t have all that much to brag about (I’m talking to you Fargo, North Dakota). Cities have tried this in different ways but the  common approaches are the “braggy” tourism guide from the Chamber of Commerce and the “do-it-yourself” tourist attraction.

The Braggy Guide

Fargo’s try – It is so flat and cold and boring in Fargo that their local tourism museum’s biggest attraction is the iconic wood-chipper which rearranges Steve Buscemi in the movie Fargo (most of which takes place in Minnesota)

 

Santa Fe is a little cooler but still has to qualify their claim a bit. Not Best Cheeseburger in the USA, but best Green Chile Cheeseburger. Still a good try.

 

Richmond not only runs their NASCAR races “at night,” WOW!, they also…

Have the 9th best Shopping Neighborhood in America. Go Richmond!

Noticed this ad for the Richmond Ballet (Yes, Richmond, Virginia has a Ballet.) What caught my eye, though, was the name of the Artistic Director. What kind of person, exactly, names his son Stoner?

 

Alamagordo, NM might have other exciting tourist attractions, but I put my money on PistachioLand U.S.A. After all, they do have the World’s Largest Pistachio. By the way, PistachioLand and “World’s Largest Pistachio” are trademarks so don’t go using them yourself.

Finally, there is Nemaha County, Nebraska which has a pretty nice tourist guide for a little place and a catchy motto, “All Roads Lead To Nemaha County.”

Unfortunately, two of the three roads depicted on their own map fail to lead to Nemaha County.

 

 

The D.I.Y. Attraction

The DIY is usually a representation of something or someone the city is famous for, sometimes life-size, sometimes absurdly big.

 

 

Louisville, KY has a couple. Here’s the blue horse.

And the giant baseball bat (A Louisville Slugger, of course)

 

Silver Bay, MN has Taconite Man who is, I guess, what a lump of iron ore would look like if you brought it to life.

 

Lubbock, TX, home of Buddy Holley, has, of course, giant nerdy glasses, just like Buddy.

Many cities opt for something made of bronze, Lubbock included.

Here’s Buddy himself.

 

Go on down to Corpus Christi, TX and you will find another hometown singer who died tragically young. Here’s Selena, immortalized in bronze. I hope if they immortalize me they at least put a shirt on me.

Here’s President Jimmy Carter. Oddly, though, this is not Plains, Georgia or even Atlanta. It’s Rapid City, SD. Don’t ask me.

Here’s a creepy bronze bust of rocket scientist and ex-nazi Werner vonBraun emerging from …a flowerpot, I guess, in Huntsville, AL. The green cast is not an optical illusion. The statue really is that color. Weird.

 

Finally, here’s a careless Ronald MacDonald in downtown Chicago.

 

 

The Local Paper

In addition to browsing the local tourism magazines I absolutely love small-town newspapers. They are usually good for a hilarious police blotter, a grammar-deficient news story, or a raving editorial about a monumentally unimportant subject. Here are a few tidbits I gleaned from local papers this year.

Rock Island is a tough place, after all.

 

I love the detail that it was a “three-legged” tiger.

Part two. She was intoxicated? You don’t say.

Part three. The final quote from the Omaha Police speaks for itself.

 

Leave it to Oklahoma.

 

I’m sorry to keep picking on North Dakota, but, you know.  So, let’s get this straight, you want to put a tax on windmills to offset the tax credit people get for building windmills. Brilliant! That’s the kind of forward thinking we expect from North Dakota.

 

This is the one and only picture here I didn’t take but you gotta admit it’s a good one. This is the headline the East Oregonian newspaper came up with for the Associated Press story about Oakland pitcher Pat Venditte – who is ambidextrous. Who knows, maybe he can pitch underwater, too.

 

Signs, Signs, Everywhere Signs

Traveling about I also get to see some pretty interesting signs from time to time. Here is a collection from this year.

 

At the Ottawa, Ontario airport.

 

Ottawa again.

 

Louisville, KY

 

Hayden, CO airport.

 

The Muscatine Environmental Center, Muscatine, IA.

 

The Lavatory of an EMB-145 jet. I wonder what part of the country you are in if the second notice doesn’t go without saying? Okay, I won’t say North Dakota. They’ve taken enough abuse.

 

I’m certainly too smart to comment on this.

 

Just outside security checkpoint at the Fargo, ND airport.

 

As you might have guessed – over the urinal. Restaurant/ Bar in Andalusia, IL.

 

Actual restaurant in the food court at the Maine Mall-  Portland, ME. You don’t want to know what’s in the ….well, anything.

Any children or my children?

Montreal, Quebec. So, no golfing and …what… no pooping goats? Or is it a sheep? Or is it a dog?

More damn rules. Okay, so no golf, no pooping sheep , and no hunting campers. I got it. State park in the arrowhead of Minnesota.

 

Deli in Iowa City, IA. Okay, maybe I’ll just go to McDonalds. The spatters of blood are a nice touch.

 

Hospital – Aledo, IL. I love glyphs! Where are his arms, by the way?

 

Carleton College – Northfield, MN. I love it that the Career Center is in Severance Hall.

 

Super 8 – Cloquet, MN. Are hard boiled eggs regional or rotational? Must be rotational, because they’re round. Get it? Get it?

 

Old Threshers Reunion – Mount Pleasant, IA. Sign needs to be…bigger, maybe?

 

Yes, we carry this sign with us everywhere we go.

 

Preston Hotel – Nashville, TN. No crappy little Gideon Bible is gonna cut it at the Preston (an awesome and quirky hotel, by the way.) In addition to the Spiritual Menu they ask you when you check in if you want a fish or a lamp. When you look puzzled they tell you that they will deliver to your room either a live Guppy in a fishbowl or a Lava Lamp for company or ambiance. Love that hotel!

 

A sign next to the history museum in Dickinson, ND. “German’s from Russia – They Came?” Well, good for them.

 

The Game Cleaning Room at Bemidji State University – Bemidji, MN. I bet Harvard doesn’t have that.

Some Questionable Grammar

Buckle Up. It’s more important then you think.

 

With rights comes responsibility, eh?

 

EL PASO, TX. Somebody has to sell tickets for Virgin Galactic.

 

Des Moines, IA. – Who says Iowans lack a sense of humor?

 

Beef Jerky Outlet – Huntsville, AL. Who says Alabamans lack a sense of humor?

 

And my final sign.

No comment.

 

 

Buy, Buy, Buy

Here are some actual products I saw, and you can buy.

Really?

 

For Deer hunting. God I hope it’s for deer hunting!

 

This slogan seems needlessly menacing, or is it me?

 

A real game but I should get some royalties from the manufacturer for infringing on my joke – What does a Yeti put on his spaghetti? Squatchsauce!!!! Get it? Get it?

 

This is not your Grandma’s hot sauce. Check out the attached label in the next picture.

With great hot sauce comes great responsibility!

 

I know this is an engraving art set but I just can’t stop thinking that this is a Jedi Kitten holding a light-saber. Use the Force Jedi Kitten!!!!

 

Yes, everyone will think you are cool if your wear these.

 

Try our recycled Kleenex, too.

 

Sorry, I thought that was a different product.

 

Do you want some of my Nut Goodies? What? What? They’re really good.

 

Halloween costume…er…costumes.

 

Don’t know why this makes me laugh but it does every single time.

 

At The Bookstore

I’m not sure what the Dewey Decimal code is for Hipster Baby but here’s the section.

 

Okaaaay?

 

Best Book Title Ever!

This should be shelved with the Vegan Stoner Cookbook, I guess.

 

Spoiler alert ……..

 

Yes. Yes we are.

 

I’m all for it.

 

A Millennial update of the old classic.

 

Cleanse is one term for it.

 

Etcetera

And, finally, other random stuff I saw this year that gave me pause…

Or Paws…

You can’t unsee it. I’m sorry.

 

Merry Christmas …. I guess. (I wonder what the Chinese kid thought when he was painting this.)

 

Santa Fe, NM – A VW Bug – I get it!

 

I thought there was a limit to what states would allow on a vanity plate. So did he get this one first?

Or this one?

 

Mmmmmm. Jesus Donuts. They are HOLY!  Holey, Get it? Get it?

 

Aquarium bar. The Galt House – Louisville, KY. It really freaks out the drunks.

 

It’s the Christmas Dragon …I guess. What’s the Christmas dragon again?

 

A perfect square knot spontaneously tied by my iPad charger and my iPod charger. Cool, huh? I wasn’t even a Boy Scout.

 

Walking Sticks making the beast with two backs (and twelve legs) on my shed. I’m sorry. This was just so weird and cool I had to include it.

 

Cool! A Lego version of Mark Twain’s House – Hartford, CT Airport.

 

Amish men watching the Saloon show at the Midwest Old Thresher’s Reunion – Mt. Pleasant, IA. I guess they didn’t want the elders seeing them inside.

 

A Tesla charging station in Amarillo, TX in the middle of Texas Oil country. Not even any graffiti.

 

The box the box my new shoes came in came in.

 

My son’s class did dioramas of the U.S. states. My son did Vermont. It was awesome. I do have to give honorable mention to the kid who did Tennessee, though.

 

Parked in Nashville next to the Rolling Stones tour plane and had to get a picture. My twenty-something FO looked puzzled. “The Rolling Stones, MAN!” I shouted by way of explanation. He turned back to me and said, in all seriousness, “That’s a kind of candy, right?”

 

Smithsonian Air and Space Museum – Chantilly, VA. Actual china found in the wreckage of the Hindenburg. And I can’t even get a cup of coffee to the table without spilling it all over myself.

 

Best bumper sticker of the year, bar none.

 

Photo caption – Smithsonian Magazine. Favorite phrase of all time – Raze the Ruins. Sounds like a great name for a band.

 

Have some almonds. But be careful if you are allergic to …almonds.

 

Dye used in our PTC fundraising Color Run! Maize starch I get. But what, exactly, are permissible colors?

 

Who puts this ornament on their tree? And what does it mean if you do? Peace on Earth, Goodwill to men?

 

Bass Pro Shop Store – St. Charles, MO. True Story. I was looking at the fish in the big aquarium in the middle of the store when I became aware of a middle-aged lady standing beside me also looking into the tank. She was a store clerk it turned out. After an uncomfortably long time she turned to me and said, very calmly and seriously “I hate that fish. He watches me all the time I’m stocking shelves over here. He just watches.” I smiled politely and backed away slowly.

 

Final cool thing I got to do this year in my travels. On Veteran’s Day in Ottawa, Ontario I got to meet the Prime-Minister of Canada and get his picture. He’s a smart, young, handsome Liberal who doesn’t seem to hate too many people…I’m not sure where I’m going with this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A True Story (with minor embellishment ) #3 – Sex Appeal vs. Bacon

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Ghandi said, “Confession of errors is like a broom which sweeps away the dirt and leaves the surface brighter and clearer.” Here is my most recent attempt. Perhaps a Dyson is more nearly in order for me than a mere broom.

Following is a shameful little exchange I had this morning with my stunning looking young flight attendant (you can be sure it’s nothing of a risqué nature.) I am happily married and have been for twenty-four years now to a brilliant and interesting woman who loves me dearly, as I do her, and who cares if I fall down and break a leg in the shower. But, however happily situated we all are in our relationship statuses (stati?) it seems most people would still like to think we are a commodity someone would be willing to buy. I have occasionally joked (not in earshot of my wife) that monogamy is easy when you have a physique like mine and a handsome nose to match. Still, one would not mind a temptation once in awhile just for the sake of ego.

Our hotel here in Richmond, VA offers flight crew members a coupon for a free breakfast. It’s a pretty good hotel and despite landing after midnight I dragged my tired carcass downstairs with minutes to spare before they stopped serving (free is free after all). And free being free I ordered the “hired-hand / farm-boy / lumberjack” special which was comprised of two eggs scrambled, three strips of bacon, wheat toast with butter and jelly, and American fries (Starbucks coffee, too.)

I was absolutely luxuriating in my bounty when my lovely slim flight attendant appeared and placed her order at the counter. She got her tiny container and a small glass of water and walked over to give me the minimum obligatory hello required by law of one flight crew member to another in such situations. Looking down at my loaded plate she smiled sweetly and said “my, what did you get?” It is amazing how much subtle meaning and judgement can be conveyed with the simple two-letter word “My.”

She might, if she wanted, make a good dental hygienist for she had chosen to begin this conversation just at the moment I had taken a large bite of toast (and okay, bacon and eggs and potatoes). I, stuck like a squirrel with a cheek full of acorns, sputtered and swallowed, and, at length emitted a veritable geyser of toast crumbs onto the table. Stammering, I finally got out, “the works, I guess, and you?” She giggled what I thought was a rather inappropriate giggle and said, “oh, I just got the egg whites and spinach.” She obligingly held out her clear plastic container holding what appeared to be one scrambled egg white (baked likely, if that is somehow possible) and one single leaf of raw spinach. I nodded and smiled and wished her well. My internal monolog ran somewhat differently.

Katlyn (not her real name) has, over the last two days been chatted-up and given the phone number / business card of more than six male passengers. She has been slavishly catered to and complimented by an equal number of gate agents and pilots. She is practiced in using her God-given attributes to their full advantage which is, after all, what we all aspire to do.

I have, on the other hand, received exactly no overtures from the opposite sex save the offer of a somewhat “pre-owned” lollypop from a four-year old girl who came on board with her mother. I respectfully declined. Life must be very different for a beautiful young woman. I’m not saying it’s better, mind you. We all have our crosses to bear I suppose. I’m just saying it must be different.

After our encounter in the restaurant this morning I sat and thought (okay, brooded) about our discrepant breakfasts. There is much to be said for being attractive to the opposite sex (or same sex. This is the 2010’s after all.) But I find that I am pretty happy with my beautiful wife and in lieu of flattery will settle for the occasional used lollypop – and bacon. Bacon is awfully good. The little girl on the plane did smile nicely after all, and those guys who gave Katlyn their numbers were probably jerks anyway.

So, Ghandi, confession may indeed be liberating, but apparently there is no contrition in mine. I will meditate on that.

The Embellishment – One would imagine that I have exaggerated the paucity of Katlyn’s breakfast. I must report, however, that that part of the story was entirely true, as was the enormous size of my breakfast. The misleading part of the story is an impression I may have given you about Katlyn’s personality. I have led you to believe that she is a vapid, self-absorbed, stuck-up girl. In yet another of God’s little injustices she is, in fact, kind, intelligent, friendly and really quite humble. It’s just not fair!

A True Story (with minor embellishment ) #2 – A Hero of a Sort

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I was in the restroom at Wal-Mart. I was washing my hands. I was luxuriating in the warm water. It was a Wednesday, I think, and it was a good day. I was home from a four-day trip. I was off work. I did not have to rush. I did not have to answer questions. I did not have to please bosses or passengers or co-workers. I did not have to please anyone. I was not required to demonstrate my acumen or diligence or stick-to-it-ivness or people skills. And it was Christmastime! I had listened to Bing sing about a White Christmas and Elvis sing about a Blue Christmas and the Bare Naked Ladies sing about a Green Christmas. But I was having a beautiful brown Christmas and I was with my lovely wife and my brilliant little boy in the Mecca of American capitalism and I was feeling warm and beloved. And then the door opened.

And in stepped – a woman. She was not an attractive woman. She was plain. She was perhaps a woman who had suffered sadness and disappointment in her life due to her genetic plainness. And I know a thing or two about genetic plainness. She was middle aged- as I am myself. She was thick around the middle – as I am myself. She had streaks of gray in her dull brown hair- as I do myself. She had a worn and unstylish old brown coat. Okay, mine is blue.

And she was perplexed and embarrassed. I saw her perplexication immediately and I felt a surge of compassion and kinship with her. I have made mistakes before. I have been on the wrong end of bad decisions. I have struggled myself through this hard and challenging world of obstacles. I have suffered “the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.”

I smiled. I smiled a wide winning smile as if to say that I would not contribute to her pain. I would not be one of those who had made fun of her in grade school or pushed her down in the playground. I would not mock her error or hold her up to ridicule. I smiled to say that I had forgiven her immediately. Her faux pas was a “no pas” in my book. She was off the hook. She needn’t have concerned herself even had I been standing at a urinal. Indeed I thought how much more delicious would have been my magnanimity had I been at a urinal. But she blushed. “I’m so sorry,” she stammered, puzzled and confused. And I, in my genuine magnanimity airily waved away her concern. “de nada,” I thought. “It was nothing,” I said, “I have done that many times,” which was a lie, but only a small one.

It felt so good to forgive her. This was perhaps the metaphorical cherry on the top of this already outstanding day. Not only was I warm and beloved and free from responsibility, I was a hero, of a sort. I was a good guy. I was a guy with enough confidence and savoir faire that I was above being an enforcer of social rules. This was her lucky day. She had barged into the right restroom at the best possible time. For, not only would she be alleviated of her embarrassment, she might gain, from my easy absolution, a new faith in her fellow man. And perhaps even a new faith in men, for I discerned, in a moment, that she had not always been treated well by the male of the species. “Your contrition is not wanted here, my lady,” I thought, but I could see she was contrite. She was used to cowering. She was used to wincing. She was used to masking her shame in nervous laughter and hidden tears.

“But not here,” I thought, “not in my restroom. Not today.” She affected a little bow and turned to leave much like a geisha backing out of a room. “Be not troubled,” I thought, “For all is well.” She looked relieved, or overwhelmed, or perhaps …nauseous? “No bigee,” I said, gesturing toward the door, “after you.”

I wadded my paper towel and launched it along a trajectory which intersected perfectly with the open garbage bin – nothing but air! And throwing my jacket over my outstretched arm and sucking in my gut just a little I pushed open the door and we walked out together- out of the ladies room.

The Embellishment: My coat was brown, too. And, okay, I missed the garbage can.

 

Postscript: This is one of my only pieces to ever be “published.” A shorter version of this got honorable mention in the River City Reader Short Fiction contest in 2013. I guess that somewhat diminishes its status as a True Story.

 

by: Dustin Joy

A True Story (with minor embellishment) – The Dude

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Caution: This story contains foul language, specifically the words “motherfucker” and “poop” and, for my vegan friends, gratuitous reference to bacon. If you object to such language I suggest you- oops, sorry.

 

I got onboard the hotel van this morning at 4:00 AM central time in Cincinnati. The van was filled with sober and sedate pilots and flight attendants sitting silently, nodding off or looking at their phones as flight crew tend to do at 4:00 am.

The other four passengers were a group of exuberant, perhaps “lit up,” twenty-somethings who were just a little past the point of tolerable for this time of the day. I believe they had not so much gotten up early to catch their flight, as stayed up late to do so. The runt of the litter who we might call “Tiny” weighed 300 if he weighed a pound. They were all wearing flip flops, baggy shorts, and t-shirts that looked like they had been slept in (or passed-out in).

About five minutes after our scheduled van departure time, the fifth member of their group (the leader?) finally hove into view from the hotel lobby, climbed aboard, and plopped down practically in the lap of a very stern-looking United Captain who had already been tapping his watch for the last five minutes. “The Dude,” as he shall hereafter be called, was wearing the requisite flip flops, a dirty “wife beater” with some samples of last night’s meal on it (I would suspect poutine if we had been in Canada. Gravy, at least, was involved), and a pair of droopy shorts with what looked very much like poop smeared across the bottom.

The United Captain scowled relentlessly but the Dude, totally oblivious to this, jumped up, ran to the front of the bus, and started an impromptu rap performance which went as follows. His mates joined in immediately with beatbox sound effects:

“Four o’clock in the morning,
Cookin’ bacon,
Motherfucker in the kitchen,
With a bulletproof
Apron”

This, I had to concede, was better than I could come up with at 4:05 AM. I know I never would have thought to rhyme bacon and apron or even how to work “motherfucker” in effectively. Even the United captain couldn’t help chuckling at this.

Having apparently exhausted his repertoire with that simple, excellent verse, or feeling perhaps that nothing more was deserved by his thankless and unresponsive audience, the Dude resumed his seat. The United Captain, hoping to avoid another game of musical chairs grimaced and shrank back against the wall leaving the Dude an ample landing strip.

Noticing, perhaps for the first time, that we were all in uniform the Dude suddenly waxed philosophical about aerodynamics. He pestered the good Captain all the way to the airport about the unlikeliness that them “big jets” could really get off the ground. As we bid the group goodbye at the terminal, the Dude asked each of us, in turn, whether we planned to “hit the liquor store” after the flight which always sounds good in front of fifty passengers waiting in line. The last I saw of the Dude and his crew was at the TSA security checkpoint where they were being diverted into the private screening area (usually a bad sign). Godspeed, Dude! I have to admire anyone with that much energy at 4:00 in the morning (even if it is chemically induced).

The Embellishment: You may have wondered what aspect of this story I made up or exaggerated. As Garrison Keillor would say, this is a “true” story. The only made-up thing in it is the United Captain’s sour demeanor. He was, in fact, enchanted with the Dude and chatted with him enthusiastically all the way to the airport. Surprised?

 

by: Dustin Joy