Various Fables and the Women Who Love Them

The Lab Mice and Their Divergent Beliefs

2010-12-21T08:50:00.005-05:00

Once, a colony of mice lived in the laboratory of a large, multi-national women's cosmetic company.The mice came in three different colors, white, grey, and brown, and, being alive, rather than noticing the commonalities that brought them together, they noticed differences that separated them, and they all started talking loudly about these differences, often at the same time.

One of the differences they noticed was that they all celebrated different things. The white mice celebrated Listmaus, the mouse day of lists, when mice made lists of various types and lengths and wrapped them around their Listmaus trees, hoping that someone would notice them and provide all the items listed there, or at least make a comment or two about them. The grey mice celebrated Chheesekkahh, which was a relatively minor holiday for the grey mice honoring the frying of blocks of cheese, even when there was not enough oil to properly fry the cheese, and how good the cheese tasted when fried. And, even though Chheesekkahh was a minor holiday for the grey mice, and even though no one, including the grey mice, knew how it was really spelled, a few marketing mice had picked up on the fact that it took place during the same time as Listmaus and they plugged the hell out of it, hoping to sell more T-shirts and trinkets. Finally, the brown mice celebrated Earadon, where they didn't eat any nuts, cheese, peanut butter, or even lick salt from sun-up to sundown, then binged like crazy until the sun came back up, all hoping that their loyalty would make their ears so much more prominent in comparison to their bulimic bodies.

The three colors of mice celebrated their respective holidays for a long time in relative peace, until one day, a particularly angry white mouse decided to stick the biggest Listmaus tree any mouse had ever seen right smack dab in the middle of the maze.

"What are you doing?" asked the brown mice, when they realized that they couldn't even get through the maze because the Listmaus tree was blocking all movement. They knew they had to get through before sun-up or else they couldn't eat the cheese that waited for them at the end.

"I'm putting up a Listmaus tree," said the angry white mouse. "Live with it."

"But we don't believe in Listmaus," said the brown mice, "And we can't get through the maze with that big thing there."

"Whatever," said the white mouse. "I have a right to celebrate how I want when I want, and you can't stop me."

"It is kinda huge," said the other white mice, "And it's blocking our way, too."

The angry white mouse turned on the other white mice. "What? I can't believe you! You are going to let these brown mice whine to the point that you give up your beliefs? You want them to destroy your Listmaus? You want them to chip away at it squeak by squeak?"

"No," said the other white mice, "In fact, we hate these crazy brown mice anyway." And, at that point, all the white mice began to join hands and start singing in front of the Listmaus tree about all of the stuff they hoped would be taken off their lists and rain down on them.

The grey mice listened to this and said, "What if you just move your tree out of the way, so that everyone can get through the maze?"

"What!" said the white mice. "This lab colony was founded on white mice values! And you just want to tear all of this down!"

"Here," said a mouse no one had noticed (because he wasn't actually a mouse, but a rat who worked for marketing disguised as a mouse in order to plant sales ideas virally), "Why don't we just put a piece of fried cheese down next to the Listmaus tree and celebrate Chheesekkahh over here in the dark corner, where you can also buy some Cchheesekkahhh cards and a few Chheeesekkah chocolates, all at a reasonable price, only in smaller quantities, because the total market is smaller."

The grey mice just rolled their eyes.

The brown mice, who were so hungry at this point that they ate the fried cheese, knowing that time was running out to get through the maze before sun-up, said, "That doesn't work. We don't want T-shirts and games. We just want to get through the maze before sun-up so we can celebrate Earadon."

The white mice answered, "And we just want to have the right to enjoy Listmaus wherever we want, in the way that is important to us."

"And the grey mice just want to have the right to celebrate Chhheesekkkahh as they traditionally have for thousands of years," said the marketing rat, "With flashing lights and wrapping paper."

"Actually, we have already celebrated it," said the grey mice, who, used to roadblocks, were looking for an alternate route through the maze that didn't involve pushing past the huge Listmaus tree. But nobody heard them.

"Listmaus!" said the white mice.

"Earadon!" said the brown mice.

"Chhheessekkkahhh!" said the marketing rat.

"LISTMAUS!" yelled the white mice as loud as they could, shaking the Listmaus tree until lists rained down over the entire maze.

"EARADON!" screamed the brown mice, tearing the lists to pieces and eating them in hunger.

"CCHHHHEEESSSEKKKKKAHHHH!" said the marketing rat, who, without his focus groups of hip and edgy grey mice, was not quite sure how to spell it, but sure that there was a market out there for Chheesekkahh cards if only he could get the narrative right.

"LISTMAUS!"

"EARADON!"

"CHHHEEESSEEEKKAHHAHHHAKKAHHAH!"

"LISTMAUS!"

"EARADON!"

"CCCCCHHHEEESEEEEKKKAAAAA-"

And, it was at that moment that a scientist in the lab flooded the entire mouse colony with gallons and gallons of boiling hairspray in order to determine the effects of super-heated hairspray on flesh, killing every mouse of every color in the most painful and gruesome way imaginable, no matter what holiday they celebrated.

Moral: Warning: product is flammable. If heated product come in contact with skin, rinse with cold water, use pressure to stop bleeding, apply ice to welts or swollen areas, and contact your physician immediately. In severe cases, contact local emergency services. Do not ingest heated product. The manufacturer does not recommend heating product and denies all responsibility if product is used in a manner not directed as labeled.

The Ducks and the Chickens Who Disagreed

2010-08-20T09:21:00.005-04:00

Once, there was a group of Chickens who needed a place to lay their eggs. The Chickens decided to build a new chicken coop, and they thought they found the perfect place, just around the corner from the duck pond. The Pond Zoning Commission decided everything was acceptable, there were no other issues from a legal standpoint and, once the endless study of whether or not that edge of the duck pond was protected wetland finally came to a conclusion (and, to keep everyone happy (or, perhaps, unhappy), it was decided that it was protected wetland, but also fell under a duck pond grandfather clause that allowed chicken coops to be built there, anyhow), then the Chickens proceeded to draw up plans for their new coop.

"Wait a quack quack quackin' minute, here," said the Ducks, when they realized that the Chickens were about to build a chicken coop on the edge of the duck pond. "Excuse me, Chickens, but we don't know who you think you are! This is a DUCK pond, not a CHICKEN pond! You can't build a chicken coop on the edge of a duck pond! This pond has a long and proud history of being a duck pond. In fact, it was founded by ducks, at least after we chased the herons out! This pond has duck values! The children come to the pond to throw bread because of the ducks! It is the ducks that have made this pond great! Now, suddenly, all it takes is for you guys to start waving your peckers around and you turn it into a CHICKEN pond?! Who's the real power behind this pond grab?"

The Chickens turned their heads quickly side to side and scraped their feet in their dirt. "Ain't no one here but us Chickens, Ducks. And we're coming home to roost! We're just trying to build a chicken coop, not take over your flappin' pond! You guys go south for the winter, anyhow, while we're stuck up here, unable to fly with our puny little wings. Don't we at least deserve somewhere to lay during the cold months? This chicken coop has been approved by the Pond Commission, and, unlike you Ducks, who always want to put everything on your bills, we're paying for the construction in cash, which isn't chicken scratch and will help the pond economy. You don't have to be so fowl- it's not like we declared it duck season! We just want to build a crowin' chicken coop, you bunch of silly geese! Don't get your feathers so ruffled!"

"GEESE!" gasped the Ducks. "The nerve of you dumb clucks! The only way you cocks should even be around our duck pond is extra crispy in a bucket! Well, you might have been approved by the Pond Commission, but we're not about to run around here like a chicken with its head cut off! We'll take our case to the residents of the pond, and then you'll see that building in duck territory is not everything it is quacked up to be!"

With that, the Ducks began to squawk on quack radio, spreading the word as to what an outrage it was to build a chicken coop on the edge of a duck pond, and how out of touch with pond values the Pond Zoning Commission was anyway (not to mention the fact that the stupid wetland study was a waste of taxpayer money). And, pretty soon, the issue of the chicken coop began to take up time from real news and get other pond residents upset. The Dragonflies were buzzing about it. The Frogs thought they'd croak before they ever saw a chicken coop built on a duck pond. The Beavers said, "Dam!" The Mosquito's blood began to boil. Even the Fish began to carp and throw barbs from their underwater perches as their anger bubbled to the surface.

The Chickens, not knowing what else to do, began to pray. "Dear Chicken God, please help us to cover these obnoxious Ducks in orange sauce and serve them up with a side of potatoes so that we may build our chicken coop. Are these ducks blind or have they just quacked up?"

The Ducks, who figured the Chickens were praying, also began to pray, but did it even louder. "Dear Duck God, please deliver these Chickens to the great Colonel Saunders so that he may bread and fry them and offer them up as Tuesday dinner special, or, even better, humiliate them by shoving bacon and cheese between their breasts. We would be egg-static if you would listen to our cries egg-hen!"

Knowing that the Ducks were praying, the Chickens tried to pray louder still, practically crowing at the top of their combs. "Dear Chicken God, please allow an oil company to begin to deep water drill in this duck pond, so that the pond becomes so polluted with oil spill that the Ducks have no choice but to change their names to "Foie gras" and "Pate". We have had to listen to their stupid Duck calls and know that they are really nothing but a bunch of loons!"

And the Ducks, who had had a lot of practice being shrill on quack radio, started to honk and quack so loud that even the bullfrogs decided to move to another pond to get away from it. "Dear Duck God, please, please knock the nuggets off of these Foghorn Leghorn wannabes so that they understand we are not just playing chicken here, but intend to duck and cover while using all of our resources, including the World Wide Webbed-feet, to fight this Chicken menace! We do not want to hear a single peep out of these pointy-beaked chicks!"

Finally, God, sick to death of all the clucking and quacking and crowing and squawking, not to mention the bad puns, sent a Crane down to the pond. Immediately, the Crane began to eat all of the crazy Chickens and angry Ducks, scooping them up in his bill and swallowing them whole, even without any dipping sauce.

"WAIT!" cried the Chickens, as they were gulped up by the Crane. "What is going on here? We didn't even know that a crane would eat other birds! All we wanted was for the Ducks to be gone from the pond, and now we're all being swallowed alive?"

"That's right!" screamed the Ducks, as they disappeared down the Crane's beak and into his swelling belly. "Cranes eat frogs, not Ducks and Chickens! This is ridiculous! Besides, we asked for help in getting rid of these Chickens, and, instead, this is what happens? Now we're up the creek without our paddle!"

But God just smiled and the Crane continued eating until every Duck and every Chicken was gone from the pond and the place returned to some sense of quiet and normalcy. (Well, except for the Crane, who had a terrible stomach ache after eating two entire populations and spent the next three days vomiting and having diarrhea.)

Moral: Don't complain about a zoning issue to a vengeful and mysterious God.

The Rabbit and the Cicadas

2010-08-08T12:08:00.000-04:00

Once, there was a young Rabbit who was just fine. She did a nice job in about everything she tried and was relatively peaceful and happy with her life. Of course, she had some nagging doubts just forming in the back of her head, even as a young Rabbit, but nothing that stopped her from learning and playing with friends and eating right. The Rabbit looked to be growing up healthy and happy. However, she had some disposable income (an annuity left to her by her grandfather before he was run over by a lawnmower).

This disposable income attracted some Cicadas who worked in advertising, and they began to buzz around her all the time. "Pssst, hey, Rabbit..." said the Cicadas, "Don't you realize that the toys you play with aren't as good as the toys the Rabbits over in the meadow play with? You have some, that's right, but they have the latest and greatest, the state-of-the-art, the "eliminate those nagging doubts about yourself that are already forming in the back of your head" kinda toys..."

"Really," said the Rabbit, who, because the Cicadas' buzzing was so constant, didn't even question it. The Rabbit looked around at her toys, then looked at the toys of the Rabbits in the meadow, and nodded her head (which was filling with even more doubts now). "You know, Cicadas, I think you are right. Those Rabbits in the meadow that you are showing me do have better toys and they sure do seem happier. What can I do about that?"

"Well, you see," said the Cicadas, "We're glad you asked that, because, over here, we can show you a store where you can BUY the toys that will make you feel better..."

So the just-fine Rabbit bought the toys that the Cicadas suggested and, for a few minutes, she really did feel better about herself. But, after a few of the toys broke, and a few more got lost, and the few that were left began to get boring (because, you see, the Rabbits in the meadows were playing with even newer toys that were even better at this point), the Rabbit suddenly didn't feel so good anymore. In fact, looking at her pile of accumulated, discarded, broken stuff, she actually felt worse.

"Ooooooh," the Cicadas sympathized, "Oooooooh, poor thing, poor thing. It is good that we know exactly what you need. You see, you are too old for toys now. That's why you're not happy. You really need a boyfriend, that's what you need. But, looking at your appearance, well...we don't want to say you are plain, but let's just say that you aren't going to attract the happiness-inducing boyfriend that you want looking like that."

The Rabbit furrowed her brow. "But I thought I always looked okay?"

The Cicadas shook their wings and buzzed and buzzed and buzzed. "Oh, yes, yes, yes. You do look okay. But okay isn't the way to attract that top-notch boyfriend who will really make you happy. No way, no way. You need to look STUNNING. Look at those Rabbits in the meadow. Look how thin they are, and how pretty...how perfect their make-up is and how well-groomed their ears are and how fluffy their tails are. You see, that is the way to attract a boyfriend."

The Rabbit still wasn't sure, but, looking at the Rabbits in the meadow, and seeing how happy they looked, she said, "Alright, how do I end up looking like those Rabbits in the meadow?"

"Funny you should ask us," said the Cicadas, "Because we know a store right over here that you can buy all the stuff you need to look beautiful and attract a top-shelf, front-of-the-line boyfriend..."

So the Rabbit bought all the stuff the Cicadas said and slopped it on her face and combed it into her ears and rubbed it all around her fur and even under her tail (because the famous Rabbit on the interview show, who was actually employed by the Cicadas, said that 'smelly under-tail' was the Number 1 turn-off for Rabbit boyfriends) and, when she was done, she felt kind of foolish and uncomfortable, but she then went out to the edges of the meadow to try and attract a boyfriend. And, night after night after night, which she used to spend reading and writing letters and enjoying the dusk, she now spent with other female Rabbits, lurking around at the edge of the meadow, waiting for that perfect boyfriend that the Cicadas had promised. And, ultimately, after a few false starts, she found a boyfriend, only he wasn't as perfect as the Cicadas had promised. He was lazy and he ate too many greens and didn't seem to have the social skills exhibited by the boyfriends of the meadow Rabbits. Ultimately, though, he was a boyfriend, so the Rabbit accepted him, even though he didn't really make her feel as good as the Cicadas had promised, especially compared to reading and writing letters and enjoying the dusk. But the meadow Rabbits did none of these things and they were truly happy, so neither did the just-fine Rabbit, anymore.

As time passed with the just-passable boyfriend, the Rabbit, now feeling pretty low, found herself expecting a litter and, under pressure from her Rabbit parents (who, like most Rabbits, were timid and conservative, always sniffing their noses in the air and preparing to run away from strange things while passing judgement on all those around them), the Rabbit married her boyfriend. And, after a long 31 days of feeling fat and being nauseated and not being able to find a comfortable place to lie, the Rabbit had her own bouncing baby 14 rabbits. Of course, between 14 babies, some postpartum depression, and a few dollars left in her grandfather's annuity, it was the perfect combination to attract the Cicadas.

"Hello, Friend Rabbit!" chirped the Cicadas. "You are looking...well."

The Rabbit, who was now filled with self-doubt and overwhelmed by the crying of 14 babies, especially since she only had 6 nipples, snapped at the Cicadas, "What does THAT mean?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing," said the Cicadas, who were smooth talkers if nothing else. "Nothing at all. We were just admiring how nice you look with all the beauty products that have attracted that top-shelf husband of yours."

"Well, he said the other day I was fat," said the Rabbit, "And I don't feel too beautiful. And now I have all these babies and I don't know what to do with them." She lifted her hopeful Rabbit eyes up to the Cicadas, "What would those beautiful Rabbits in the meadow do about all this?"

The Cicadas nodded their heads and buzzed and buzzed and buzzed (and the junior partner in the back shed his skin). "Are you sure you want to know?"

"Yes," answered the Rabbit.

"Sure?"

"Yes, yes!" pleaded the Rabbit.

"Well, in that case..." and the Cicadas got out their big guns, a laser-focused targeted marketing multi-media totally immersive sensory assault. They told the Rabbit about the perfect food for her babies ("Much better than that old fashioned breast milk YOU'RE using!"), about the perfect learning toys and books for her babies, about the cutest clothes that would make her babies the most attractive and get them into the best lepus colleges, if not get them modeling careers outright and make them rich without even raising a finger. They told her about various investment plans and insurance schemes and other places where she could hand over her money in order to ensure her babies the best life in perpetuity ("Didn't your own grandfather do that for YOU? Didn't he care enough to do that for YOU?"). But wait, said the Cicadas, don't forget yourself! Pamper yourself with this shampoo and that bubble bath and this facial mask and that whitening toothpaste. And make sure you are dressed in the latest Rabbit fashions ("You know, just because you are older and have 14 little ones, it doesn't mean you can't look your best") ("Or even hire one of our insured and certified professional Fox babysitters to watch your precious cargo while you make a trip to the edge of the meadow, for Girl's Night Out or for Old Time's Sake or for Just No Reason At All Other Than You Deserve It!"). And, of course, she would want her home to look the best it can, with all the best furniture, which happened to be on sale, and all the best appliances, which also happened to be on sale, and, when she was sick of the way her home looked, why, paint and rugs and wall treatments and lamps were also all on sale! In fact, maybe she should just ditch that stupid starter hole she was living in and live nearer the meadow in a brand-new, newly-dug hole, complete with 15 different bedrooms and carrots growing RIGHT THROUGH THE CEILING! And the Cicadas hadn't even begun to talk about vehicles, since the Rabbit needed something roomy enough for her brood yet stylish enough to show who she REALLY was ("In fact, maybe you should consider TWO vehicles--one for those soccer games and one for those visits to the edge of the meadow. Just because you're a mom now doesn't mean you have to sacrifice anything or give anything up for your kids! You DESERVE to be the beautiful Rabbit you really are. Plus, and we really didn't want to say anything, but do you think those glamorous Rabbits in the meadow really drive a minivan?...")

And, when all was said and done, Rabbit bought everything the Cicadas showed her, one thing after another, each one making her feel good for a second, but, then, after it wore off, leaving her with a still-empty feeling, which the Cicadas were more than happy to address by showing her yet-again something newer and more improved. And the Rabbit just continued to buy and buy and buy, because the Cicadas, in their buzzing, promised that this one would make her happier and that one would make her even happier and this one would make her so gosh-durn happy that her face would crack. And, meanwhile, her husband took up with one of the loose hares from the forest who would flash her tail to every Jack she saw, and the bank foreclosed on their edge-of-the-meadow, "Everyday Easter" model new-build hole, leaving the Rabbit family living under a log, which allowed hawks and badgers to pick off the babies one by one. Finally, in a desperate attempt to bring some kind of meaning to her life, the Rabbit followed the Cicadas' advice and hired the Fox Babysitting Service (motto: "We Make Sure Your Little Ones Are Warm and Well-Fed") to watch the remaining babies while she went to the edge of the meadow. Of course, no one paid attention to her at all, despite the new dress and the plastered on make-up, until the closing of the bars, when a particularly greasy weasel slid up to her side and offered to show her his weasel etchings. Because this is a family fable, we will not describe the degradation and humiliation that took place back at the weasel's lair, but, when the Rabbit, ashamed and miserable, returned to her under-log, she realized that all of her remaining babies, as well as the Fox Babysitting Service, were mysteriously gone. She couldn't call and report this to the authorities, because her phone had been disconnected weeks before, and, when she asked a government official for help, they said it would be at least 6 to 8 months before they could respond, since there were so many complaints against this particular Fox Babysitting Service involving missing Rabbit babies (and a few missing Chicken eggs, to boot).

As she lied under the log, crying, the Cicadas began to buzz again.

"Help me, Cicadas," said the Rabbit, who didn't even realize that, because of their previous help, she was now a long way from fine. All she heard was their constant buzzing and the pounding in her head. "Please help me to feel better, like I did back in the day before I met you."

"Oh, okay, we have just the thing," said the Cicadas. "It sure sounds like you need to ask your doctor about clinical depression, because that's what all the happy Rabbits in the meadow did and, now, look at them. Look at how happy they are and how often they go kayaking and eat cotton candy at the county fair and take walks on hillsides in the autumn. And, when you let your doctor know that we diagnosed you as clinically depressed, ask him about Carrotrol, a Shedding-Plow Laboratory product, the little orange pill that will make you happy with one swallow. Happiness is just a gulp away! Of course, let your doctor know if you experience any of these rare, oh so rare, rare, rare, rare side effects along with your unbridled joy, including incontinence, water retention, fur loss, ear droop, heart flutter, uncontrollable sobbing, thoughts of wolves, inability to lick paws, unexplained tastes of elderberries, increase in number of feces pellets, brain damage, growth of a penis followed by an erection that lasts long than three years, blood coming from the eyes, blood coming from the pores, blood coming from any other orifices not named, liver failure, kidney failure, fallen arches, neck pain, spinal column explosion, thoughts of owls, obsessive-compulsive disorder, compulsive-obsessive disorder, unexplained tooth growth, hyperactivity, lethargy, hyperactive-lethargy, chicken vocalization, leg cramps-"

"Fine, fine," said the Rabbit who used to be fine, "I'll take it. But I don't have any money left. The annuity is gone. Now that my kids have disappeared, my ex- doesn't pay child support. I felt too bad to fill out the paperwork for continued disability, and I never went to school and have no job-related skills. The money is completely gone."

The Cicadas all suddenly quit buzzing in unison. "What?"

"The money is all gone."

"But you have insurance, right?"

"No," answered the Rabbit. "But I really need that Carrotrol, a Shedding-Plow Laboratory Product, because, after all of this, I really need to be happy again."

"Mmmmm," said the Cicadas, "It looks like you may no longer be within our target demographic."

And, with that, the Cicadas flew away, leaving the Rabbit alone, under her shabby log.

Moral: Please help make the world a better place and click the sponsored links in the Sidebar! Thanks!

The Little Old Lady Who Loved Dolphins, Hummingbirds, Unicorns, and Bears

2010-08-07T12:33:00.004-04:00

Once, in case you haven't read the title, there was a little old lady who loved dolphins, hummingbirds, unicorns, and bears. "Oh, they are just sooooo wittle and soooo cute!" she would say to herself (while eating dog food so that she could afford prescription medicine and happy that her phone had been turned off so that she couldn't get the calls from the bank telling her her mortgage was three months past due), "Oh, I just wuv them so, so much!" In fact, the little old lady loved dolphins, hummingbirds, unicorns, and bears so much that she had pillows with them embroidered across the top and suncatchers of them in every window and framed pictures of ripped-out magazine pages containing pictures of dolphins, hummingbirds, unicorns, and bears. No matter what else went wrong in the world, the little old lady could sit happily and look at the beautiful images of dolphins, hummingbirds, unicorns, and bears that she had used to fill her otherwise drab and empty house. These animals made her happy.

One beautiful sunny day, the little old lady went out for a walk in the woods, enjoying the warm weather and fresh air, when she stumbled upon a quiet and sun-dappled glade. Coincidentally, this was the very same day and location that Dolphin, Hummingbird, Unicorn, and Bear gathered for their weekly poker game. The little old lady's heart began to flutter as she saw all of her favorite animals gathered together, focused intently on playing cards. "Oh," gasped the little old lady, "This is my magical dream! All the wittlest and cutest animals gathered together for a sunny and funny game of cards!"

The animals, however, were angry at this interruption of their very high-stakes and long-running poker game. They came out to the middle of the woods to get away from the squawking voices around them, not hear more. Angry, Dolphin took the cigarette out of his mouth and cocked his long snout over his shoulder. "Lady, can you keep it down, here? We're tryin' ta play cards!"

"Oh, Dolphin!" the little old lady squealed. "You are just the squeakiest-voiced picture of magic and peace! I am so happy to meet you!"

The Dolphin snorted polluted salt-water out of his blowhole (causing all the other animals at the poker game to cover their eyes and Unicorn to shoot him the finger). "Lady, you don't know a damn thing about dolphins, do you? We are highly intelligent, however we use this intelligence to torment each other and the animals around us. We kill porpoises for fun, then play with the mangled corpses for no reason other than to get our rocks off. We murder our own offspring with no regards to the propagation of species. Several of us males will gang up on a female, swim her to exhaustion while we engage in homosexual stimulation with each other, then rape her repeatedly, sometimes keeping her captive and repeating this horror show for weeks at a time. And we are so sexually aggressive that we will even attempt to rape humans that swim in our waters, sometimes even killing other humans we see as rivals. In short, we, as a species, are homicidal, psychopathic rapists. Nice talkin' atcha!"

"Oh," the little old lady said, fanning herself, her eyes wide. "Well, maybe I should throw away that "Mystical Dolphin" calendar I got last year. But, at least I still have the beauty and purity of you, Hummingbird!"

"You talkin' to me?" Hummingbird responded, fluttering his wings so fast that he scattered cards (including two he had been holding in his pocket) all over the forest floor. "I said, YOU TALKIN' TO ME, LADY! What is it that you find so amusing about me? Do I amuse you? Am I a clown to you? I mean, really--we hummingbirds are one of the most aggressive species on Earth. We have almost no social skills. We kill each other with our long and razor-tipped beaks as quick as you can say, "Nectar-ream!" and, if we were just a little bigger, we'd attack your ass, too. There is no use in the hummingbird world for other hummingbirds, unless, like our dolphin friends, it is in raping the female of our species. We are compulsively hyperactive and, because of our insane metabolism, we must eat constantly, and I mean CONSTANTLY, stealing food from any bird or bee that comes down the pike. And what goes in must come out, ya know, so we are almost constantly, and I mean CONSTANTLY, dripping urine and feces. That liquid splattering you as you watch us tear into our sources of sugar ain't the mist of happiness, toots, knowwhatamean?"

"Well," the little old lady gulped, a single tear running down her cheek five or six times out of each eye. "I, uh, don't know what to say, Hummingbird. I guess, at least, I still have the purity of the Unicorn to hold my faith in the animal kingdom and give me some comfort in the form of resin tchotchkes as I move through a dark and difficult life."

"Dat's MISTER Unicorn to you, Granny," said the Unicorn as he spit a glob of phlegm onto the forest carpet. "And, come on, really? You are going to put your faith, love, and ideas of peace on ME? A horse with a phallic symbol on its forehead? Yeah, let's just ignore the fact that I don't friggin' exist, okay? That there is no real animal that is actually pure and amazing enough, so I had to be invented? Let's ignore that. Instead, let's focus on the fact that, pre- my-hijacking-by-Christianity, I was a goat with a horn on my head and a crazy bushy tail. A friggin' goat, the animal symbol of sexual depravity. So then, lose the goat, turn me into a horse. All happiness and rainbows, now, right? Not so fast, dusty drawers. According to everyone from the Egyptians to the Greeks to the Bible, I'm the symbol of untamed strength and raw, human destroying power. And how can you tame me? Well, by sending a virgin into the woods to find me. Me, a horse (and check the motion of a woman riding a horse, see what that reminds you of), with an erection sticking out of my forehead, out in the woods all night with a virgin? Heh, heh, heh...might as well swim with the dolphins, babies. Which, of course, brings me around to the fact that, being a friggin' MADE-UP CREATURE, in order to get my magical healing horn, people had to lie and kill all kinds of other endangered species in my name, from the rhinoceros to the narwhal. Ouch, boys, too bad you were so horny! Seriously, though, thanks for the bony protrusion, and I'll be off spending time with your virgins."

"Oh dear," the little old lady moaned softy, "Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear..."

"HA!" laughed the Hummingbird, "Please! Don't even get me started on the habits of the deer in this forest..."

"But what about you, Mister Bear?" the old lady asked hopefully, "Surely you won't dash my animal kingdom, plastic knick-knack hopes and dreams? Surely you are as cute and kind and pure and noble as your marketed image suggests? Surely there is some benefit to ascribing cartoon-like human ideals on various wild animals?"

Bear looked around the table at Dolphin, who nodded, then Hummingbird, who may have also nodded, but it was difficult to tell because he was darting around so fast, then to Unicorn, who also nodded, causing everyone else to duck under the table until he was finished. Then, without saying a word, Bear laid down his cards (he actually was holding three Queens), and slowly, silently, pushed away from the table and rose to his full height of over nine feet. He sighed, shook his head enormous head, scratched the side of his face with his four-inch long claws, and looked across the sun-dappled glade. At the edge of the forest, he saw the little old lady quietly calculating how much unicorn placemats and hummingbird fan pulls and dolphin hand towels would go for on eBay. The bear did some quick estimation and, with surprising power, he pounced and bounded across the clearing. Within seconds, he began to rip the little old lady apart limb by limb and eat her alive, shaking her broken body in his locked jaws like a rag doll.

And the last thing she thought she heard before her temporal lobe was torn from her head and her sense of hearing ended was the deep, bear voice muttering something about being "one of the few animals who will attack and kill humans in the wild unprovoked".

After it was over and the shots of whiskey were refilled and the hand of cards resumed, all of the other animals at the table agreed that, for the little old lady's sake, it was a good thing Hippopotamus had a dentist appointment that morning and couldn't make it to the weekly poker game.

Moral: Someone should sell plastic tchotchkes of gnus.

The Nightingale Who Went to Rehab and Learned Her Lesson, According to Her Publicist

2010-08-06T10:10:00.005-04:00

Once, there was a Nightingale who was relatively talented, at least talented enough to be noticed, especially when she was put up for sale by her mother, who was a squid, and her father, who was part boar, part bacteria (there is very little regards to genetics in fables). The Nightingale was attractive in an underage, nightingale way, and she could sing, and she could act in varying degrees. So the Nightingale began steady work in the entertainment industry, taking appropriate roles in various youth-oriented productions and rapidly becoming one of the more popular animals in the animal kingdom.

However, the animal kingdom being full-up of animals, the success of this Nightingale began to attract hyenas from various dark corners of the entertainment industry. This was especially disturbing because, while most animals would have sensible and caring parents to look out after them, this Nightingale had a squid and a boar-bacteria hybrid as her parents, and they were more than willing to overlook the nefarious activities of the assorted hyenas in exchange for continued cash and consistent employment for their Nightingale daughter.

"Here..." purred the hyenas, "Try some of this good stuff. It will help you work longer and harder and louder and better..."

And the Nightingale, who had only a squid and a boar-bacteria hybrid for role models, and who had been working since she was just out of the egg, answered, "Okay."

"Here..." laughed the hyenas, "Stay out all night at these various hyena clubs, entertaining all of us hyenas with your hilarious misadventures and drunken antics."

And the Nightingale, with a suspicious line of white powder under her beak, answered, "It's hot in here," before she fell on her tail feathers, much to the delight of the hyenas, who laughed and laughed and laughed and laughed.

"Hey," laughed the hyenas, "Aren't you a wild and crazy lesbian?"

"I just want someone to love me..." the Nightingale cried, tears rolling down her face.

"HAHAHAHAHHAAHAHAHA!" laughed the hyenas, "YOU'RE THE BEST!"

"Blllgrfgrflrftzzzzz," answered the Nightingale, totally forgetting the wholesome family entertainment that had been paying her bills.

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" laughed the hyenas, "YOU ARE TOO FUNNY!"

Smelling the stink of career death (plus the fact that the Nightingale was pretty darn close enough to legal age at this point--at least close enough for the Internet), the Nightingale's antics began to attract vultures and, being vultures, of course they had cameras. Whenever the Nightingale tried to get in or out of a car, the vultures swooped in with their cameras, hoping to get pictures of the Nightingale flashing her tail, or, at least, pictures of the Nightingale falling down stairs. The Nightingale obliged by never wearing underwear (which, to be honest, most birds do not, outside of those little parakeets that old ladies have as pets and stone geese on the front porches of hillbillies) and falling down frequently.

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" her hyena friends laughed, "YOU ARE A SUPA-STAR!"

After all of these antics, the Nightingale began to feel invincible and actually believe the hyenas that surrounded her. "I am so funny," she would say (only it came out like, "Gaaaaaaaaaaaaahhurbldur"). "I am a supa-star!"

"YES" laughed the hyenas, even though both the Nightengale and this fable had long stopped being funny, "KEEP GOING! YOU ARE OUR FAV!" and, the whole time, the vultures continued to smoke cigarettes and snap pictures of the entire mess. And, of course, this was not a recipe for successful and healthy living. One evening (and it didn't really matter which evening for the Nightingale, since they were all the same at this point), the Nightengale tried to fly from a party to an after-party and, instead, flew into several cars, two walls, a parking meter, some trees, and a baby seal who was trying to cross the street and gain safe-haven in a seal orphanage. The Nightengale was promptly arrested and, thinking that the jail was the after-party, began to dance around and throw her hands in the air. The police, unimpressed, slapped a tiny little ankle bracelet around her bird-foot. "This will tell us if you have been drinking or taking drugs," said the police. "If you don't drink and do drugs, then you can continue to be free. If you do drink and do drugs, we will throw you into a birdcage."

"WOOT WOOT!" said the Nightengale.

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" laughed the hyenas.

And the vultures took pictures of the whole thing.

Of course, immediately upon her release, the Nightengale began to drink and do drugs, and, as promised, her ankle bracelet began to beep. The police showed up to arrest her.

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" laughed the hyenas.

And the vultures continued to take pictures.

The Nightengale was taken to court and given a chance to explain herself to the stork judge, but, of course, the Nightengale was in little condition to explain much of anything, and, unfortunately, she didn't look around to see that her hyena friends, being powerful afraid of both law enforcement and people who do things like have jobs, were nowhere to be found in the courtroom.

"Why do you continue to drink and take drugs?" asked the stork judge.

"PAAAAAAAAAR-TAY!" yelled the Nightengale. Only no one laughed and, instead, everyone in the courtroom and watching on TV clacked their beaks in disapproval.

"Why do you continue to put yourself and others at risk?" asked the stork judge.

"I'M A SUPA-STAR!" screamed the Nightengale. And, when, again, due to the overall lack of hyenas, no one laughed but, instead, clicked and clacked their beaks in disapproval, the Nightengale turned around and yelled, "F--- YOU!" to all the other birds in the courtroom (as well as those watching at home on TV).

In response to concern over their daughter's welfare (and, by "welfare", your humble author means "income), the Nightingale's parents suddenly showed back up (Remember them? Well, neither did the Nightengale). "Please have mercy on my baby!" sobbed the squid mother with big, blubbery calamari tears, "Please! Please, show compassion! I only have one more with any kind of earning potential! Take pity!"

"Yeah!" snarled the boar-bacteria hybrid father, who was too busy taking nude pictures of drugged women and playing bit parts in infomercials to actually show up in person and, therefore, came to court via a cell phone message, "INJUSTICE! INEQUITY! FREE THE NIGHTINGALE!"

(In a brief aside, it should also be noted that the peas and the corn from the classic fable, "The Peas, the Corn, the Fish Stick, the 2-Liter of delicious Coca-Cola, and the Invisible Hand of Free Market Industry" became aware of the antics taking place on the opposite side of the animal kingdom and, attempting to respond to their own mess of spilling yet delicious Coca-Cola, began to yell, "Hey! You! Look over there! Look at that! Don't look at us, but look over there! That's way cooler!" And, sadly, that's exactly what most of the animal kingdom did.)

The Nightengale, who was now laughing like a hyena herself, turned around and yelled to her parents, "F--- YOU, TOO!" Then, she shook her hips and yelled to the courtroom, "PARTY ON! WOOT WOOT!" Then, she laughed hysterically and, when finished, began to sob uncontrollably and pound her head on the table while her lawyers struggled to write a statement explaining how much she had learned from this difficult experience and how much charitable singing she was going to do to show true repentance.

The stork judge, sick to death of both this behavior and this fable, decided to put an end to the whole mess by ordering the Nightengale to be thrown into a cage. "It's okay," said the pig guards, patting her head as they led the Nightengale away (they were admirers of her various family films, which allowed them to keep their kids quietly entertained while they could stare at her boobs), "We'll hide you away from all the hideous riff-raff in the cage and, due to overcrowding in our cage by all the hideous riff-raff who don't contribute to society like you do, we'll let you out in five minutes anyhow."

"ROCK OUT LOUD!" the Nightengale shouted, pumping her fists, "QUAAAAAAAAAA!" And she fell over, waving her tail in the air.

And the vultures continued to take pictures of the whole thing.

Moral: Your high-school English teacher was right; stories where there are no protagonists suck.

The Monkeys and the Scientists

2010-08-04T12:18:00.000-04:00

Once, there was a Scientist who thought that she was cute, so she said, "If you have enough monkeys banging on typewriters for a long enough period of time, they will ultimately produce the complete works of William Shakespeare."

Well, the rest of the Scientists felt that the quotable Scientist thought she was just way too cute (although, actually, she was not only cute, but smokin' hot, and most of the rest of the ugly and friendless Scientists were just jealous, especially since they had all asked her out, but she had said no, since she was too busy making up cute quotes) and they set out to prove her wrong. They created the Internet where, rather than keep the monkeys typing in cages, the Scientists took the "Lion Country Safari" approach and allowed the monkeys to roam free while the Scientists stayed safely in cages. And, with that, the Scientists stepped back to allow the monkeys to start to type.

And they produced this.

And this.

And this.

And even this.

But, no matter how long and hard the Scientists looked, they could not find "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare" by anyone other than William Shakespeare. They found ads for free Viagra. They found time-wasting games where, instead of producing something for the benefit of humanity, people sat, sweating in desk chairs, pretending to be elves and wizards. They found illegal music downloads.They found nuts who were interested in selling gold and having dainty little tea parties. They found information on films of various interest, accuracy, and quality. And they found porn--lots and lots and lots of porn. And, for every piece of interesting and quality writing they found, they found even more of this, and this, and a whole lot of crap like this. Satisfied that they had proved the cute Scientist's hypothesis invalid, the other Scientists downloaded "California Girls" for free, posted some lies on the Wikipedia cold fusion page, updated their Facebook statuses to "Single" (primarily because they realized that, now that they had made her look stupid, their initial shreds of hope that the cute Scientist would date them were futile and should be abandoned), took one more quick glance at crazy Scientist bondage porn, and logged off to go talk to the cute Scientist.

"Cute Scientist," they began (because Scientists have secret machines that make sexual harassment invisible), "We have proved you wrong. We have been running the Internet for a few years now, allowing the Monkeys to bang away on their keyboards, and none have produced Shakespeare. We are afraid to tell you that, while you may be good at cute quotes, you are no good at science, and we have nullified your hypothesis."

But the cute Scientist just shrugged and said, "Hey, whatever. I'm dating a pro-hockey player anyway." And, with that, she quit being a Scientist and went and got married without a pre-nup. And the other Scientists cursed their breath and went back to killing orcs.

Moral: If you have enough monkeys banging on typewriters for a long enough period of time, they will not produce the works of William Shakespeare but will mainly throw poop and break the equipment.

The Peas, the Corn, the Fish Stick, the 2-Liter of delicious Coca-Cola, and the Invisible Hand of Free Market Industry

2010-08-03T17:57:00.002-04:00

Once, there was a delectable and somewhat nutritious dinner consisting of peas and corn, with a fish stick in the middle, and a tall, cold glass of delicious Coca-Cola*. The dinner would be all the better if the peas and the corn could stop arguing, but, of course, they couldn't, and, often, they would both turn to the fish stick for answers (for the rest of the dinner table had previously elected the fish stick as the leader, based primarily on the paper napkin demographic support.) But the fish stick, being a processed piece of food substance, usually said nothing and typically laid low.

One day, the corn noticed that the delicious glass of Coca-Cola was usually poured out of a towering 2-Liter bottle and, as corn will often do, it became very concerned, especially with the size of the 2-Liter in comparison to a tiny kernal of corn, and also the general sloppiness with which the delicious Coca-Cola was often poured from the bottle. The corn began to talk loudly and rapidly with varying degrees of sense.

"Peas!" the corn cried, "Don't you think we should pass some sort of regulation on that 2-Liter of Coca-Cola?"

"Nonsense!" coughed the peas. "Why, that 2-Liter is controlled by the Invisible Hand of Free Market Industry! There is no one to better be in control of that 2-Liter than the Invisible Hand of Free Market Industry!"

The corn was still confused and didn't quite understand what the peas were talking about, so they meekly answered, "Well, shouldn't we at least require that the Invisible Hand of Free Market Industry pour the Coca-Cola a little slower-"

"Socialists!" interrupted the peas.

"Well," the corn tried again, "What if we just make a limit on the number of 2-Liters that can be on the table at any one time-"

"Dinner-haters!" screamed the peas.

The corn huddled in its own cream and, after a few seconds of awkward silence, said, "Perhaps we could just ask nicely that the cap of the Coca-Cola be kept nearby in case-"

"Baby-carrot killers!" ranted the peas, holding their collective breath for so long that they began to look like radishes. At this point, both the peas and the corn decided to ask the fish stick what it thought. And, as previously described, the fish stick, he didn't say anything. The peas and the corn then decided that the silence of the fish stick was enough to give them plausible deniability and allow the status quo, so, with that, the peas went back to plotting for paper napkin vote suppression and the corn went back to whining ineffectively and everybody continued to enjoy a delicious, cold glass of Coca-Cola.

Then, one night, the Invisible Hand of Free Market Industry wasn't paying too much attention, and the 2-liter tipped over and began to flood the plate.

"AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" the corn screamed for a while. Then, as it began to drown in delicious Coca-Cola, the corn called out, "This is horrible! A tragedy! We need to begin to have meetings on what kind of hearings we should vote on having on this disaster!" And, with that, the corn retired to the edge of the plate where it could have closed-door meetings until the situation was fixed.

The peas, on the other hand, took another route and began to scream insanity at the fish stick. "Why don't you do something about this!" the peas yelled. "Why don't you fix this! How can you just lie there! You should have been monitoring this! How could you allow this to happen in the first place?! You are an incompetent and a socialist!" The corn heard this and, instead of pointing out that it was the peas who refused to allow anything to be done, saw an opportunity to blame the fish stick as well. This, the corn hoped, would convince the napkins to ignore the fact that it had also contributed to the sticky puddle of delicious Coca-Cola by doing absolutely nothing. So, as the peas raved, "Fish stick! You are a communistic fraud!", the corn chimed in, "Yeah!" then continued to have meetings at the edge of the plate, as far away from the rapidly spreading spill of delicious Coca-Cola as possible.

The fish stick, however, being a fish stick, didn't say anything and did absolutely nothing, and, ultimately, the 2-liter was emptied out and stopped pouring everywhere anyhow. None of it mattered, though, because the Invisible Hand of Free Market Industry just moved over to the other side of the table, away from the mess of delicious Coca-Cola, peas, corn, fish sticks, and sopping, falling apart paper napkins, and decided, from this day forward, to start eating dinner over there, where it wasn't as sticky and there weren't all those nasty vegetables.

Moral: Peas, corn, delicious Coca-Cola, and fish sticks- it doesn't matter. They're all going to come out the same in the end. However, no one bites the Invisible Hand of Free Market Industry that feeds them.

*While it would appear that delicious Coca-Cola is a villian in this fable, allow me to point out that the 2-liter of delicious Coca-Cola is actually a pawn and in no way responsible or at blame for the disaster depicted. Any Coca-Cola representatives reading this blog should note that, overall, the tone of the blog author is extraordinarily positive toward delicious and refreshing Coca-Cola, and, because of this, may wish to consider providing the blog author with assorted Coca-Cola product, particularly of the Vanilla Coke Zero variety--which, it may be pointed out, would not be sticky should it spill. As my grandma always says, "I'd like to teach the world to sing that they should have a Coke and a smile."**

**It is important to note that the author of this blog has not received any payment, in cash or product, from the Coca-Cola Company. Yet. But he can always hope.

The Stupid Birds Who Had a Product That Everyone Used But Still Ran Their Business Into the Ground (Sometimes Literally)

2010-04-22T21:17:00.003-04:00

Once there were a group of birds, who were neither Kitties nor Hawks, that realized they could charge all the other animals for the privilege of riding on their backs. "Hey," said the other animals, "That's a great idea!" Soon, all the animals who were hep began riding on the backs of the birds across the ocean and over the mountains and to Asia and everywhere else, getting there in a fraction of the time and now being able to commit various frauds, thefts, and aberration's of nature 24 hours a day in several time zones. The birds began to pass out little travel bags and offer movies while flying and serve drinks and force their various employees to wear little short skirts and silly pillbox hats.

But, as time went by, the birds were apparently stupid, and they began to lose massive amounts of money, despite the fact that they basically set prices between themselves, busted unions at will, and were used by every other animal in the universe when they needed to get to a fable quickly and conveniently.

"How can you lose massive amounts of money when everyone uses your service and you basically operate as a price-fixing monopoly?' asked all the animals of the animal kingdom.

"We're sorry, but you are going to have to pay for your headphones, and there will be no more dinner service on our flights," said the birds, as they raised ticket prices.

"How can you lose massive amounts of money," asked the other animals, "when you provide a useful service that is in demand by all consumers? Isn't that a violation of all known economic principles?"

"We're sorry," answered the birds, raising ticket prices again. "But you are now going to have to pay to bring items with you, pay for pillows and blankets, pay for paper tickets, pay for being too fat, and submit yourself to all kinds of humiliating and personally violating acts just to use our service. And, should you decide to cancel or change any part of your flight, May God Have Mercy On Your Soul. And we need a taxpayer bailout."

"How can you continue to raise prices while reducing services and still be used by a record number of people yet not make money?" asked the incredulous animals as they waited in line barefoot to be invasively cavity-searched by a minimum wage worker. "Isn't there, at some point, a time when you are going to make money? Is your entire organization run by incompetents who have never touched a dollar bill before? Seriously, we are not being mean, but we have no clue how you can operate as you do."

"Oooooh," answer the birds, "We're sorry. Volcano. We'll talk later."

Moral: You can't get there from here. At least not easily.

The Raven Who Didn't Believe in Socialism

2010-01-31T00:18:00.004-05:00

Once, there was a Raven who, having nothing better to do (since raven's are notoriously bad at sales and the health department frowns on having them work around food), spent her days stealing corn and cawing and then stealing more corn. The other birds of the forest looked at her and became concerned, knowing that she didn't have health insurance.

"Friend Raven!" the other birds shouted, as seen by the exclamation mark at the end of their dialogue. "We have decided to come together and form a health care collective that will allow us all to have access to affordable and quality health care. We would like you to join."

"What!" cawed the Raven, also in kind of a shout, "How dare you offend me with your socialist attitudes! Why would you think I would EVER want to be part of your anti-capitalist, leftist schemes! Why, I expect you would take my own beloved grandmother out to a field and kill her!"

The other birds, who were too kind to point out that Raven's grandmother had been dead for several years following a scarecrow induced heart attack, simply nodded their heads and went back to pecking the ground at random intervals in case there was food and picking fleas out from under their wings.

Later in the day, as Raven was stealing some corn, a farmer came out and shot at her. Now, the farmer, being nearsighted and a terrible shot anyway, didn't hit the crow, but, instead, sheared off the post that held up the farmer's scarecrow. The scarecrow tumbled forward, landing on Raven and crushing her hollow bird-bones in about eight-seven places. "Help!" cried the Raven, "I feel my bones have been broken in eight-seven places! Please, someone send a doctor!"

But, of course, Raven's insurance called "crushed by scarecrow" a pre-existing family-related illness and refused to pay anything toward it, despite the sky-high corn premiums Raven paid bimonthly. Because the insurance wouldn't pay, no doctor birds would touch her unless she paid in advance, and Raven, being a raven who had spent her days stealing corn and cawing and stealing more corn, had no money at all. (In fact, none of the birds had any money, since they were, after all, birds, and they were notoriously bad financial managers anyhow, but that we'll leave for another fable, such as "The Birds and the Sub-prime Loans".) And, because of this, Raven simply laid in the field and died a slow, painful death living in excruciating agony.

A few minutes before she died, a few other birds came by and said, "So now, friend Raven, how many more times would you caw and caw about government control and socialized medicine, having experienced our dysfunctional and classist health care system from the inside?"

And the Raven opened her mouth as if she was going to say something from night's Plutonian shore, but, instead, she died. And, while she died friendless and in hideously gut-wrenching pain, at least she didn't have socialized medicine.

Moral: Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore!"

The Rats and the Pieces of Cheese

2009-11-27T23:53:00.002-05:00

Once, in a time when rats, pieces of cheese, and blog readers all spoke the same language, a bunch of cheese slices really started to hate their lives. You see, every night, for many, many years, a group of rats would come into the kitchen in the night and eat the pieces of cheese. Well, for some (and those some were, typically, rats), this seemed perfectly natural. They would puff out their chests and say, "Well, well, isn't it the nature of competition and the way that the world is? I mean, rats eat cheese, always have, always will. Some have the good fortune to be rats and others? Well, their lot in life is to be the cheese. And, consequently and rightfully, they are to be eaten." And, in the end, everyone thought this was just fine, except for the cheese slices, who were sick and tired of being eaten.

"We need CHANGE" yelled the cheese slices to any market researchers who could hear them. "We are sick of being eaten by rats every night with no say in the matter! We need CHANGE!"

And the market researchers heard the pieces of cheese. So, being market researchers, they crafted a carefully constructed message of change- if the cheese pieces really want it, if the cheese pieces are serious about it, if the cheese pieces really listen, they could even VOTE for change. And, finally (at least according to the carefully constructed, well researched message that the marketing researchers sent the cheese), the cheese pieces would have a say, and the rats would HAVE TO, just HAVE TO stop eating them indiscriminately.

So the cheese pieces banded together and, together, they voted for change. "Now," said the cheese pieces, "No rats can come and eat us without fear of consequence." However, that very night, the rats showed up again and began to eat the cheese, laughing while they did it, causing them to spit little chunks of rat slobber covered cheese all over the counter. The scene was as horrible as before; perhaps, it was even more horrible, because the cheese pieces thought things were going to be different.

"Hey, rats!" screamed the cheese pieces, as they watched in horror as their brothers and sisters and cousins were torn to shreds by filthy rat incisors, "You can't do this! We voted for change!"

"Ha!" laughed the rats. "Just like a stupid piece of cheese, to believe a market researcher!"

And, with that, the rats continued to eat the cheese until their bellies were full and bloated and their intestines became blocked, which didn't really matter, because they were all rich enough to self-pay for their health care and not have to worry about whether their insurance called cheese-impacted colons pre-existing conditions for rats or not.

Moral: No matter how well-crafted a message, the cheese stands alone.

The Crafty Crane and the Frogs Who Were Concerned About Values

2008-06-01T01:10:00.006-04:00

Once, a group of frogs lived peaceful froggy lives on the edge of a lake, croaking and eating flies and passing laws that guaranteed as peaceful a life as a frog could have. The frogs were not pretentious and really didn't ask anything more than a fly in their belly and a pleasant summer night sky filled with stars to compliment their singing. The good lives of the frog citizens passed this way for many years.

One day, a crane and his crafty cronies descended from the sky, prepared to fill their own bellies with frogs. But, as they headed to the frog's corner of the lake, one of the frogs held up a flipper to stop them. "Wait," he ordered to the cranes, who froze, for they were not accustomed to being spoken to that way, especially by their dinner. "You cannot come here. Frog Law 50172.36 under the revised code forbids cranes from entering this corner of the lake. You'll have to move along."

Since most frogs fancied themselves lawyers, they all pretty much knew the revised code of Frog Law by heart.

The cranes were sorely angry, for they were being denied dinner by the rule of law. They gnashed their beaks and splashed their pointy feet and generally acted like fools, but there was nothing they could do against the rule of law, so they ultimately sulked away to a far corner of the lake, trying to find it satisfying to eat a few slimy fish.

But one crane, the main crane, was particularly crafty, and, knowing that frogs often held their elections in the late summer, returned to the frog corner of the lake the very next day. Immediately, he was greeted by another annoying frog quoting him the revised code, but this time, rather than gnashing his beak, he waved the poor fellows croaks off with one dismissive wing. "Okay, okay," said the crafty crane, "I'm well aware of your revised code. In fact, I've come not to cause trouble with my gnashing beak and my splashing feet, but rather to participate in your democracy. This is still a democracy, is it not?"

The frogs, offended that the crane would have the audacity to even question that, ribbitted in agreement.

"Well then, I have come to throw my hat into the ring as President of the Frogs." The crane bowed in an attempt to appear humble. "You see, I have long wished to serve the greater public, and, when I approached your corner of the pond, and I witnessed a group of frogs governed by such as powerful rule of law, I thought to myself, 'Self, this is a place where you can finally fulfill your destiny as a leader'."

"We have plenty of leaders!" croaked a cantankerous old bullfrog. "We have frog leaders, who represent frog interests and care about frogs. We don't need a crane as a leader!" Several other frogs let out belches of agreement.

"Mmmm, hmmmm..." the crane hummed, stroking this extremely long chin. "Well, if these leaders are so caring and have such an interest in frogs, why have they let your culture slide so far? Frogs leaving their families, frogs sitting around all day on lillypads with no ambition beyond looking good, frogs that, in an abomination to all that is natural, actually eat their own tadpoles. The current frog government is out of touch with the common frog. They are elitists who have no idea what is truly important. They don't care that those peacocks on the left coast of this lake pollute your frog air waves with filth and smut of every color and flavor. They don't care that butterflies are marrying other butterflies, then demanding benefits at the expense of taxpaying frogs. They don't care that your schools, your own frog schools, no longer allow a morning croak at the flagpole, or that the name of the Almighty Frog could be taken out of the Pledge of Frogligence. They see a choice, not a tadpole. So, I ask you, fellow frogs, who really represents what is important to you? Who really shares your ideals and knows your values? A bunch of dragonfly-latte drinking, college educated frogs with a superiority complex that work in cahoots with the liberal peacocks and butterflies? Or me, a hat wearing, gun toting, FrogSCAR loving crane."

When the crane finished his speech, the gathered frogs began to croak in loud agreement, splashing their legs in the water (except for the bullfrog, who had nodded off). And, the next day, with record voter turnout, the frogs elected the crane as their President, knowing that, despite the previous years of protection, equality, and prosperity the frogs had enjoyed, it was the crane who truly represented their interests in upholding froggy morals.

"My first act as President," the crane announced, "Is to strike from the revised code Frog Law 50172.36 and allow all cranes full access to this corner of the lake!" With the rule of law now changed in their favor, the other cranes immediately swooped in and began, following the lead of the frog president, to snatch the frogs in their beaks, gulping down the screaming frogs without even chewing.

"Mr. President, sir!" the frogs screamed as they watched their neighbors and relatives being eaten alive,"What are you doing? You promised to uphold values, to see that the butterflies and peacocks didn't spread their filth, and that no frogs would ever eat their own tadpoles again! You said you were just like us, and held beliefs that matched ours, that you'd bring change to our twisted culture! But here you are now, with your friends, devouring our whole society!"

The crane swallowed a gut-busting mass of squirming and struggling frogs, for even cranes would not talk with their mouths full, then said, "But I'm doing just what I promised. Your culture is obviously changing with every swallow of your loved ones. The peacocks and the butterflies never will bother you again, and there will be no tadpoles left to eat when my friends and I are done!" And, to illustrate that point, the crafty crane dipped his mouth in the lake water and slurped up a beak full of terrified tadpoles. And then his friends ate the frogs that questioned them in the first place.

Moral: Values are relative, but frog legs are tasty.

The Grasshoppers, The Gnats, and the Ever-Suffering Ants

2008-05-31T13:00:00.006-04:00

Once, there was a group of inventive grasshoppers who came up with an idea to manufacture grasshopper automobiles. Soon, they had planned and created a company, Grasshopper Motors, that had the potential to become one of the biggest corporations the insect world has ever known. But, as anyone who has ever read a fable can tell you, grasshoppers make better managers than workers, and they very quickly realized that they would need a source of labor if their venture was going to continue to flourish.

The grasshoppers headed to a colony of gnats who lived comfortably but simply on the surface of the pond down behind the old stone wall. The grasshoppers had a proposal: the gnats would work for the grasshoppers, building grasshoppermobiles, and, in return, the grasshoppers would always provide food and shelter for the gnats, even when they became so old their wings could barely buzz. The gnats, who were sick of being eaten by frogs anyhow, decided this was an alright plan, and they entered into a contract to work for the grasshoppers. Secretly, the grasshoppers knew that the lifespan of a gnat was only a few days anyhow, and they didn't expect that they'd have to put much out after the gnats were too old to work. The grasshoppers immediately began to skim food for themselves off the top of the storage supplies for the gnats, and, before long the top began to look more and more like the middle.

But, because the gnats quickly died after retirement, this arrangement worked for many, many years. The grasshopper managers of Grasshopper Motors got their grasshoppermobiles built and the gnats worked hard for most of their lives, then had a few hours of peaceful rest before being eaten by birds. But the beetle researchers were busy making medical discoveries under the big rock in the corner field and, over time, the lifespan of the gnats began to get longer through advances in medication and health care, first to four days, then to a week, and finally almost two weeks. The grasshoppers found themselves in the position of supporting more and more old gnats with less and less food.

Finally, when it came time to pay the increasing population of old gnats the food that had been promised them, the grasshoppers realized that there was nothing left; the little bit that had been saved had now been eaten by the grasshoppers themselves. "Whoops!" the grasshoppers said to the gnats, "Remember how we had promised we'd always take care of you? Well, now we can't!" And, with that, the grasshoppers packed up the Grasshopper Motors offices and moved the whole shebang to the southern part of the field, where the insects were so enslaved, impoverished, and broken that they didn't even ask for lifelong care, just a pitiful morsel of food to split between their starving families. This allowed the grasshoppers to eat even more themselves while saving absolutely nothing.

Meanwhile, the gnats were now angry, left with little to show for their long days of hard work building grasshoppermobiles outside of boarded up logs and out-of-business nests, plus increasing gnat on gnat crime. They complained and complained, even threatening to take the grasshoppers to the Butterfly Court in an attempt to get the care they had worked so many hours to receive. "Listen here," the grasshopper managers said, calling from their pool floats in the sunny, warm water puddle of the southern field, "We don't have to give you gnats anything, really. But, because we care, we're gonna set you up so that you won't starve."

The grasshoppers called the ants, who Grasshopper Motors had supplied with two or three crumbs a year for allowing them to sell grasshoppermobiles in their field, knowing that the ants had a system of public care for their aged population already set up. And, even though the ant's system was already swollen and about to collapse under its own weight, it was still better than the nothing the grasshoppers had left the gnats. "Listen here, ants," the grasshoppers said, drinking grasshopperitas and dancing all night in the grasshopper-only clubs at the southern field, "You're gonna take on these gnats in your public ant system or our whole Grasshopper Motors will go under and we'll quit sending back the couple crumbs we send once a year, and you'll be in even worse shape than you are now. And, we'll come back and eat all of you, too."

Now the ants saw little other choice, since they did indeed receive two or three crumbs a year from Grasshopper Motors, and they couldn't let the increasingly pitiful gnats starve out by the pond. So the ants welcomed the gnats into their public system of food distribution, which promptly collapsed and caused massive starvation anyhow. And, that year, when the grasshoppers brought their crumbs up from the southern field, the ant population was so decimated (and the gnats were wiped out entirely), that they couldn't even fight back when the grasshoppers ate those of them that were left.

Moral: Hope I die before I get old.

The Fox, The Farmer, and The Spector of Utility Deregulation

2008-05-31T01:26:00.000-04:00

Once there was a farmer who had a hen house. The farmer didn't ask much from his hens, only some eggs for breakfast on Sunday, a nice chicken dinner for Christmas Eve, and a few dollars profit for any extra sold at the farmer's market each weekend. Now, in the fields and woods around the farmer's land, there lived a wily old fox who occasionally, when someone forgot to close the gate, or maybe a tree damaged the barnyard fence, would get into the hen house and steal a chicken or two. But the fox could not get into the hen house that often, not as often as he would have liked, and it was difficult to get the chickens out of the barnyard, even with a damaged fence or an open door. He had to settle for lucky breaks when he could get them. The occasional raid on the hen house by the fox continued on for many years, but, in the end, the fox was little more than a nuisance to the farmer.

The fox, however, was powerful hungry and really didn't want to work that hard for a meal, so he came up with a plan. One day, when the farmer was tilling his fields, the fox called out to him. "Farmer!" the fox called, "I have a great idea for the both of us that will make your hens that much safer!"

Now the farmer was suspicious, both because he had never before heard a fox speak and because he doubted the fox would really want to make his hens safer. But the farmer was a polite man and he figured there would be no harm in entertaining the fox's suggestion, even though he expected it to be laughably horrible, so he nodded him on.

"Okay," said the fox, "As you and I both know, every once in a while, I happen to get into your hen house and steal a few of your chickens. This, no doubt, is irritating to you, as a farmer who has worked his whole life for his chickens, and I expect you would like it to stop. So I propose to you that, if you leave both the gate and the hen house door open, it will attract foxes from all over the county, rushing to your hen house to get your chickens. This mass of foxes will cause such a fox fight that, in the competition, none of us will ever get into the hen house to steal your chickens, and you will lose chickens no more. By opening up the access to your hen house, you will essentially prevent any chickens from ever being taken again."

Now the farmer laughed and laughed at this suggestion, expecting it to be even less stupid than it was, and he followed his laughter up by trying to run over the fox with his tiller. But the fox, as noted in the first paragraph, was wily, and he knew that the farmer's land was not actually owned by the farmer, but that the deed was held by a board of pig bankers in town. So the fox journeyed to town and made a presentation, using his limited but inventive fox knowledge of PowerPoint. He craftily explained to the pig bankers the benefits of leaving the hen house door open so that foxes would compete, which, in turn, would make the farmer's land all the more valuable.

The pig bankers paid very little attention to the fox as they were more interested in an upcoming acquisition of their bank by the corporate wolf bank that was working its way through the sham regulatory commissions for the sake of appearing like it was being regulated. So they snorted for a while, and rolled around on the floor, and generally acted like pigs, until one finally said to the fox, "So whatta you want us to do about it?"

"You own the deed to the land," said the fox, "Get the farmer to open up the door to his hen house and begin fox competition that will increase the value of the hens, therefore increasing the value of your land."

Now the pigs liked increased value so, with no further questions, one of the largest of the pigs, a big boar who had won the blue ribbon at the county fair two years running, headed out to the farm to advise the farmer to open his gate and his hen house door so that the foxes would compete with themselves and leave the chickens alone. And, if the farmer did not comply with these steps that the fox guaranteed would increase the value of the land, then the pig bank would be forced to call up the deed.

The farmer, seeing little choice, opened his gate, opened the hen house door, and went to bed.

Of course, the fox strolled right into the hen house and began to eat the hens in a bloodbath of fowl proportions. When he could no longer stand the squawking, he began to steal the hens, breaking their necks and carrying the whole bunch of them, in groups of three, back to his fox den. Finally, the fox ate as many eggs as he could. As morning approached, tired and stuffed and on the verge of diarrhea, the fox smashed whatever eggs were left on the floor of the hen house so the farmer and his family wouldn't even have those, and he crawled, belly dragging the ground, back to his den, where he promptly vomited and passed out in a gluttonous stupor.

When the farmer awoke the next morning, of course, he had no chickens and not one egg left, and, of course, with nothing left, no other foxes ever came for competition. Without the extra money from the chickens and eggs at the farmer's market, the farmer promptly missed two mortgage payments and the pig bank foreclosed on his farm, leaving the farmer and his family homeless. The pig bank did see the increased value of the farm by simply leasing it back to itself at 300 times the value, instantly increasing its leased income and driving up the price per share that the wolf bank had to pay for the acquisition.

The fox, meanwhile, ate the rest of the chickens over the next few days, abandoned his den, and moved on to another farmer's place down the road to extol the virtue of leaving the hen house door open to fox competition.

Moral: If a fox asks you to leave a hen house door open in the name of competition and you do it, you are stupid. If the State does it for you, you are experiencing the thrill of a free market economy.