Explorer: And right here are the Rocky Moun&mdash;no wait, just another barren wasteland.

Explorer: And right here are the Rocky Moun—no wait, just another barren wasteland.

Post-apocalyptic Expedition

Jazz flowed from the streets in the 50s. We swam naked in the churches. We prayed in the oceans. We stood around asking when Kerouac would finish that second novel.&nbsp;
People stole everything they owned and had everything they owned stolen from them. All anyone owned was a pair of lightly-threaded cutoffs that everyone refused to wear, so our swap-based economy became a public standoff. No one got anything and everyone was cold.&nbsp;
Sometimes Kerouac would publish an opening paragraph and redact it the next week.
Allen Ginsberg was blacklisted from the south side of Brooklyn for wearing a cardigan. John Lennon tried to strangle Neal Cassady for wearing cloth earrings. Elvis died. We knew there were underground literary salons happening we just didn&rsquo;t know why or when.
Jazz took over the culture in the 50s. While not everyone was named John Coltrane, those who were found immense success because of it. Everywhere you looked there was a famous person named John Coltrane. In hindsight, there may have only been one Coltrane, but he played like a half-dozen, and music will never forgive him for it.&nbsp;
Eventually the Beat Generation faded away. Jazz was displaced by the harpsichord and nudity was replaced by taping small rocks over people&rsquo;s pale parts and charging consumption tax on it. While present generations are nostalgic for the past, the Beat Generation was nostalgic for the present. For this, they&rsquo;ll always be remembered. That and the Korean War.

Jazz flowed from the streets in the 50s. We swam naked in the churches. We prayed in the oceans. We ...

The Beat Generation

No, dude. No no no no this is not happening right now. I&rsquo;ve lightly grazed the doorframe on my way out of the food serving area into the food eating area. I watch with horror one of my three cups of Diet Coke sliding mercilessly to the right in slow motion. Everything on my tray is for real gonna frickin fall. I look out to the dining hall. Oh my Jesus dang. Every single girl I have ever had a crush on is sitting here in Adams Dining Hall, picking at their Beef Saigon, staring at me. Half of these girls don&rsquo;t even go to Harvard, I think to myself. What the flip is happening?!&nbsp;
&ldquo;What?! Nobody makes time to have a conversation these days anymore?! You&rsquo;re all just gonna stare at me while my tray slowly flips out of my hands and lands on the floor?!&rdquo; I scream out at everyone, causing even more people to look up. Slowly but surely the Diet Coke glass makes it to the end of the tray and begins teetering back and forth on the edge. Will it fall? Will I be socially disgraced?&nbsp;
Think, Mike. Just think. What would my role model and namesake, Mr Tyson, do? I notice the lunch lady who swiped me in just to my left. It&rsquo;s a long shot, but sometimes you&rsquo;ve just gotta GO for it!
I&rsquo;ve dumped my entire tray on her head. Two bowls of oatmeal, nearly a liter of Diet Coke, 6 heaping plates of Morrocan carrot salad, enough ranger cookies to turn Usain Bolt into a diabetic, all over this poor woman&rsquo;s head.
Roll with it, Mike. Tyson wouldn&rsquo;t back now he would, hell he would bite an ear off for God&rsquo;s sake. He would uh&hellip;.
*SMACK* &ldquo;Looks like someone got up on the wrong side of the getting hit in the face with my tray this morning,&rdquo; I nervously quip to the entire dining hall after hitting the lunch lady with my tray across the face again and again.&nbsp;
Oh my god. Literally everyone is about to laugh at me. Why do I keep making this worse?
&ldquo;Excuse me, son.&rdquo; A man in a suit approaches me, gesturing at me to stop hitting the woman with my tray. &ldquo;I saw what you did back there with the throwing all your food on that person and then hitting them with your tray.&rdquo;
&ldquo;Oh, um, yeppo I guess I did that!&rdquo; Yeppo? What the frick is yeppo I don&rsquo;t say that.
&ldquo;We could use someone with your quick decision making skills. Have you heard of NASA?&rdquo;
&ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; I say, staring deeply into his eyes, &ldquo;No. Get out of my way.&rdquo;
I run back to my room in shame. Everyone saw me drop my dining hall tray today. I&rsquo;ll be a pariah for the rest of my life. I can&rsquo;t wait to get back to my room, turn on Mike Tyson talk show interview montages, and just forget about life for a while.

No, dude. No no no no this is not happening right now. I’ve lightly grazed the doorframe on my way o...

Dropping My D-Hall Tray

<div class="text">
I walk in every morning and the arcade carny asks me, &ldquo;what&rsquo;ll it be?&rdquo;
I reply, the memories of too many wasted tokens in my mind, &ldquo;brother, the usual.&rdquo;
The arcade carny hands me a big bag of tokens in exchange for my hundred-dollar note. That&rsquo;s the only good part of each day, when I&rsquo;m walking over to the whack-a-mole machine and the coins are jingling and it feels like I&rsquo;m worth something. I could pick any game, I think to myself. The basketball machine could be fun. Skee-ball never ruined anyone&rsquo;s life. But then I reach the whack-a-mole machine and proceed to spend every last coin I have in a frenzied orgy of mole destruction.
When I step away from the machine eight hours later, dazed and hyper-sensitive to bright lights and any sudden noises that resemble the squeals of the moles, I feel so dirty. I don&rsquo;t even collect my prizes anymore, I just throw the tickets in the trash. What would my wife say if they knew where all those dozens of lollipops and rubber bouncy balls came from? I feel sick and fall to the ground, throwing up on the ground near the motorcycle racing game where you actually ride the plastic motorcycle. The kid riding the motorcycle ignores me &ndash; even he knows I&rsquo;m scum.
Maybe if I were better at whack-a-mole, my life would be different. But when you miss the moles every single time, something in the human spirit just compels you to keep going. At the end of the day, it&rsquo;s not about the moles at all &ndash; it&rsquo;s about proving my worth to my only son. I&rsquo;m all out of tokens, though, so that&rsquo;ll have to wait for another time.
</div>


I walk in every morning and the arcade carny asks me, “what’ll it be?”
I reply, the memories of t...

Whack-A-Mole

Neil Klugman and Brenda Patimkin met days after Neil finished his time machine. At first, the exclusivity masked itself as novelty. “What should we do tonight?” Brenda would ask, knowing Neil wouldn’t wait to get to his second thought. He’d reply “Sal’s?” and Brenda would confirm, “2004.” Sal’s was much cheaper in 2004. 
 
Neil and Brenda indulged in the VIP wristband that stood before them and took up most of Neil’s bedroom. They got front row seats to the Hindenburg disaster. They figured out which religion’s version of God was the right one. They prevented the Holocaust. They watched The Butterfly Effect and undid their undoing of the Holocaust. 
 
“I want to bring you somewhere,” Neil confessed one night after a 2078 visit to Sal’s. 
 
“Where?” Brenda asked. 
 
“I want you to meet me as a kid. There’s something I think about a lot, and I think you’d understand me better if you saw it for yourself.” Neil spoke fluently, as if he’d meant to ask a thousand times already. “Can I show you?” 
 
Neil and Brenda climbed into the time machine, and he set it to 1995. A lot of people think time travel is instantaneous, but it literally takes six hours to take a plane from Boston to Los Angeles. You think traveling through time is faster than planes? Wrong. Time travel is no different: It takes three nanoseconds to go back to 1995 and six hours to travel from Boston to Los Angeles where Neil grew up. 
 
“I wish we could’ve Uber’d to your house,” Brenda joked as she got out of the 30-minute cab ride that cost $12. 
 
“Shh, don’t let them hear us,” Neil whispered, gesturing to little Neil who was facing four slightly taller boys. Between them was an injured bird. Boy #1 removed his monocle to taunt little Neil, “It’s better to put it out of its misery!” Boy #2 pounded his heel into the ground and shouted, “I want to see bird guts!” Boy #3 only let out a raspberry. And Boy #4 did not know how to bully. 
 
Little Neil mustered his courage and brought a hammer upon the bird. The boys’ callousness quickly turned to disgust, but their contempt stayed steadily aimed at Neil. 
 
Neil and Brenda hid behind a house so the boys wouldn’t see them. “You see?” Neil asked. “It’s funny, seeing it now as a thirty-four-year-old man, I can see that that bird wasn’t going to make it. It honestly looked kind of dead before I hit it with the hammer. What a relief. I’ve felt guilty about that forever.” 
 
“You should.” Brenda retorted. “That was majorly fucked up.” 
 
“W-what?” Neil stuttered. 
 
Just then, little Neil approached the couple and, through his tears, mumbled, “Excuse me. I don’t mean to bother you, but you both look sad. Do you need help?” 
 
“Murderer!” Brenda yelled. 
 
It was an awkward time travel back to Boston 2024. As soon as they got home, Brenda packed her things and left. Neil didn’t go on another date for ten years. He time traveled to 2034 to make the time go by faster. 
 
• • • 
 
In 2034, Neil met Florence, who was born in 2007 if you’re keeping track. A few weeks in, Neil posed the question: “Can I bring you somewhere?” Soon Neil and Florence stood in front of Neil’s childhood home in 1995. 
 
“What are those kids doing over there?” Florence asked. 
 
“Don’t mind them! Watch, she’s about to do it.” From behind a tree, Neil and Florence watched Brenda scold Neil. “She calls me a murderer and everything. I haven’t stopped thinking about it for ten years. Now you can finally understand this part of me.” 
 
“Wow. You’ve been thinking about another woman for ten years? By the way, what you did to that bird was seriously fucked up.” 
 
• • • 
 
After Florence left him, Neil gave up on love for ten days. He paused time so that he could grieve properly. 
 
Neil met Carry at a family reunion when Neil’s brother hired her catering company. Ugh, nepotism. 
 
“Why’d’ya wanna show me this?” Carry asked Neil. “That second bitch is right. Hell, if you brought me to 1995 just to watch another woman leave ya, you’d damn sure be sorry. While I have you for a sec—and I’m sorry to bring this up on vacation—I don’t think this is working.” 
 
• • • 
 
“You brought me here to watch someone leave you for bringing her here to watch someone leave you for bringing her here to watch someone leave you?” By this point, Neil had learned from his mistakes and changed the time travel mechanics such that one had to embrace their travel companion in order to make it back safely. Neil’s guest stayed in 1995. 
 
Neil planned one last trip. By now, Neil had Delta SkyMiles Diamond Medallion status, so he almost always got upgraded to Delta One. He never hesitated to book a flight or litter. Neil made it back to 1995, the day before everyone else. He took the bird from the drawer little Neil was keeping it in and hid it in a nearby forest. 
 
When Neil returned to 2024, he didn’t have any memory of killing the bird. Brenda had left him for some other reason, probably because he built a time machine and only uses it for dates. 
 
Free from the guilt of killing a bird, Neil was imperceptibly happier, and that bird suffered for much longer.

Neil Klugman and Brenda Patimkin met days after...

How To Get Delta SkyMiles Diamond Medallion Status

Typically, presidents near the end of their term are worried about how they’ll be remembered.I’m much more worried about finding my next job.
It’s my fault, really. I was dumb enough to take a position that had neither long-term security nor
opportunities for advancement, and why? To network? My entire cabinet will also be out of a job after inauguration day.
The scary part is that presidential success has little bearing on post-presidential job prospects. In fact, 100% of people who don’t get elected president go on to do something else. The same can’t be said for men like FDR and JFK, and they were some of the finest to occupy the White House. At this rate, I’ll be on the street, wishing I hadn’t cut unemployment benefits so severely.
Picture this. I’m applying for a sales role at Walmart, and all the manager sees on my résumé
is eight years in the highest office in the nation and zero retail experience. When she asks how I’d handle a difficult coworker, I recap the lessons from my
nuclear standoff with Russia. “Sorry,” she says. “The right answer is to go to HR.” See how stupid I’d look 
Reporters ask me when I’ll bring the troops home. I tell them never, it’s hard enough finding work without extra competition. Though Congress writes hundreds of bills, they won’t write me one letter of recommendation. I’vethought about going back to college, but I could never get in these days—I’m only the president of one organization.
Besides, in this recession I’m responsible for, it’ll be tough to be jobless when the aliens take over. Yes, you heard that correctly, the generals have told me that aliens are real and they’re coming, and when
they arrive, I’ll be lying to people at parties about being an “entrepreneur.” Hopefully our extraterrestrial overlords will keep me on as a lab rat.

Typically, presidents near the end of their term are worried about how they’ll be remembered.I’m much more worried about finding my next job...

Post-Presidency

Grandpa says that in America, the streets are paved with gold and the water is made of milk and honey. The trees bear cotton candy and the grass is sewn from satin and silk. Every house has a car in its garage and every car has an apple pie in its massive cupholders. The winters are survivable if you are not too old.
Cowboys roam the earth and baseball players slide about in the dust. Watch out&mdash;you just might run into a &ldquo;Hollywood star&rdquo; on your way to work! Work is eighteen hours a day, whistling at the old fishing hole.
Everyone knows your name and what you want for dinner today. Every couch is a fold-out bed. Every door is a fire escape. Every fire is a warm embrace. Every apartment is required to have a window facing the Statue of Liberty. The Statue of Liberty smiles all the time, except during national tragedies.
In America, the President writes you a letter every Sunday and you have to write him one back by the end of the week. He listens to everything you say, and if he doesn&rsquo;t understand something, he will call you to clarify. Toll-free.
The mailman always delivers, even when it rains, which it never does. The sun is closer and bigger than in the old country. Clothes dry in five minutes, tops. The chocolate chip cookies on the windowsill never cool.

Grandpa says that in America, the streets are paved with gold and the water is made of milk and hone...

Going to America

&ndash; (pickup) Hello?
&ndash; Doc?! Is that you? It&rsquo;s Billy.&nbsp;
&ndash; The Doctor is in! What&rsquo;s up?
&ndash; (angrily) What&rsquo;s up? The fuck do you mean &ldquo;what&rsquo;s up?&rdquo; Look, man I don&rsquo;t think it&rsquo;s cool that you decided to deliver the news that I have syphilis to my answering machine.
&ndash; What?
&ndash; I live with my mom, and&ndash;.
&ndash; Speak up, I can&rsquo;t hear you?&nbsp;
&ndash;&nbsp; (louder) Yeah, I live with my mom and she heard about the syphilis over the answering&ndash;
&ndash; (laughing) I&rsquo;m just kidding. I totally got you. This is just an automated message on my answering machine. Leave me a message and I&rsquo;ll be sure to get back to you.

– (pickup) Hello?
– Doc?! Is that you? It’s Billy. 
– The Doctor is in! What’s up?
– (angrily) Wh...

Answering Machine

We visited JGC’s grandfather (certified white boy) (pictured right circa 1953) and asked for some words of wisdom. Here is what we learned.

<ul>
 <li>“If you press on the baby’s head, he’ll finally start speaking Chinese.”</li>
 <li>“The sole use for the library computer is to look at pornography.”</li>
 <li>“Bitches ain’t shit if they don’t have their concealed handguns licenses.”</li>
 <li>“Cat’s got your nose. I’ve got the last four digits of your social security. Who do you think is in charge?”</li>
 <li>“If you get a mouse a cookie, I might just beat you to a pulp.”</li>
 <li>“There was a black president before Obama. They just don’t want you to know about it.”</li>
 <li>“Doctor needs me to take one pill in the morning, one at lunch, and one in the evening. Okay sure bozo.”</li>
 <li>“I got this ol AI to recreate a video of my deceased wife saying happy birthday and they done turned her to a Pacific Islander.”</li>
 <li>“You kids come back from college and start yapping about Israel. What the hell is even that.”</li>
 <li>“Throw a bottle of hoisin sauce in front of white people and they’ll assume it belongs on every dish at the table.”</li>
 <li>“I remember my first mole fight.”</li>
 <li>“Ima start screaming until you leave.”</li>
 <li>“Broke up with my bitch while she was playing fruit ninja. Whole lot of mmhms.”</li>
 <li>“Shower thoughts day 127: Fuck you I didn’t shower today.”</li>
 <li>“Mannnn. I should’ve ordered that.’ Brother. No one told you to order fried pickles as your entree.”</li>
 <li>“I swear to god my momma always be calling with a serious event that requires my full attention as soon as that bill come out.”</li>
 <li>“Please do not mention Vietnam in my vicinity.”</li>
 <li>“Dudes be stroking their scruff and saying ‘3 days and counting’ who gives a fuck.”</li>
 <li>“With enough hard work and dedication, I might just stop hating you.”</li>
 <li>“The government shut down? Damnit. I was planning on blowing the bitch up.”</li>
</ul>

White Boy Wisdoms

Ever since I earned my online economics nanodegree, I&rsquo;ve been controlling my fourth-grade class using precise marginal incentive structures. It&rsquo;s working a little too well. They just earned their sixth pizza party of the month, so it&rsquo;s our fifth time watching Happy Feet 2 because it&rsquo;s the only disc I have other than Happy Feet 1 and we watched that on the first pizza party.&nbsp;&nbsp;
It started simply enough. Kids do their homework, I start grading it during lunch, I realize they&rsquo;ve earned another pizza party, I realize pizza party points are inflationary and we are rapidly approaching a pizza party economic crisis, I don&rsquo;t have time to think about this, I don&rsquo;t even have a pizza for today&rsquo;s pizza party, I steal the lunch pizza out of the cafeteria warmer and bring it into the classroom before the bell rings, Mrs. Thatcher&rsquo;s kids are hungry but my kids are only temporarily hungry, we have a pizza party at the start of class, and everyone is happy except for Gluten Free Josh who is never happy.&nbsp;
Things turned sour when the kids started collective bargaining after I raised the price of a pizza party. You know that thought experiment where you consider how many fourth graders you could take in a fight, and you realize it&rsquo;s more than 1 but less than 20, but actually any fight with a fourth-grader is a Class A offense on your already shaky record? I began to beg. &ldquo;A small amount of inflation is actually good for an economy,&rdquo; I pleaded to unsympathetic ears. &ldquo;A small amount of pizza party is good for tomorrow,&rdquo; they said ominously, before all skipping out of the classroom in unison. &ldquo;Deal,&rdquo; I said to an empty room because it made me feel strong.&nbsp;
On our final pizza party of the year, negotiations between me and the students finally cooled down. Now that pizza is a symbol of the working class, the cool kids don&rsquo;t like it any more. They&rsquo;ll only eat Gluten Free Josh&rsquo;s special tofu with spicy dip because its low supply indicates higher value. The principal came by to congratulate the class on getting perfect scores on the state&rsquo;s standardized test. Little does he know my kids&rsquo; biggest secret &mdash; they only work hard because doing so benefits their long-term expected earning potential.

Ever since I earned my online economics nanodegree, I’ve been controlling my fourth-grade class usin...

Incentives

Kevin: Umm, I guess I would
have to say Amy.
Amy: It’s tails. What was it?
Kevin: Can’t say. Rules are rules.
Amy: Wow, I can’t believe you said I was “most likely to choke on a pair of octopus gonads and be a major cunt about it.” That’s so fucked up, Kevin.
Kevin: Wait, I didn’t say that. That wasn’t the category.
Vanessa: You called her a “cunt,” Kevin? Why would you say that?
Kevin: I would never say that. I have three moms. That wasn’t the category.
Amy: What kind of messed up person imagines one of their friends choking on octopus gonads?
Kevin: Can we please just move on to Tyler’s turn?
Amy: Oh, so you can ask him who’s “most likely to kill themselves by jerking off with a telephone pole in front of an orphanage”?
Vanessa: An orphanage, Kevin? Really?
Amy: Jesus, Kevin. You have a sick, sick mind.
Vanessa: I don’t think I can ever look you in the eyes again.
Kevin: The category was “who do you want to be better friends with.”

Kevin: Umm, I guess I would have to say Amy...

Paranoia

<div class="text">
Good evening passengers, this is your doctor speaking. Yeah, you heard that right. Everybody knows that the only thing harder than pilot school is doctor school. That&rsquo;s why I didn&rsquo;t go to either. At the end of the day it&rsquo;s just a bunch of buttons. And flying a plane? How hard can that be?
If you look out the window you&rsquo;ll notice that the ground is completely blank and devoid of any kind of state lines or city names that would help me figure out where we are. This is very much not what I expected. I guess that&rsquo;s the kind of stuff you learn in pilot school. At the very least I know we&rsquo;re not over the ocean because that is the one place I absolutely can not go.&nbsp;
Most of you are suffering from appendicitis, and the rest of you are here for weight-balancing purposes. I&rsquo;ll start the procedures once we get out of this turbulence and into some stronger turbulence, because I can tell you now this stuff is not nearly strong enough to cancel out the Parkinson&rsquo;s.
If you haven&rsquo;t gotten the complimentary nuts yet, they&rsquo;re probably not coming. This is a Turkish Airlines plane I stole in Baghdad so I highly doubt any of the attendants speak English. Come to think of it, you guys probably don&rsquo;t speak English either. Crazy how language works like that.
Anyway if you want any more anesthetic I&rsquo;ve got it all up here in the cockpit. Come party if you want. Or don&rsquo;t. It&rsquo;s your funeral.
</div>


Good evening passengers, this is your doctor speaking. Yeah, you heard that right. Everybody knows...

Cruising Altitude

The Lampoon's Spring 2026 parody of the Harvard Crimson

Spring ’26

Crimson Parody

Detective Town is the safest place in the county because no crime goes unsolved. Hell, no crime goes committed. Everyone is a detective, and not one’s gone rotten. The air is full of intrigue, which leads to higher-than-average rates of lung cancer. The lone traffic light in Detective Town has three settings: black, white, and ominous pause. But now there’s a stranger in Detective Town, and he’s got everyone more suspicious than usual.

The newcomer sticks out like a lit match in a blackout because he pokes around at the discarded red herrings rotting in the gutters. Plus, he’s the only one in town without a sidekick. Every detective in Detective Town has a suppressed homoerotic relationship with a sidekick, which remains unconfirmed but clear in subtext. No sidekicks live in Detective Town, but they make the commute.

Unlike the detectives, the stranger doesn’t narrate his internal monologue out loud, which makes it difficult for them to deduce his master plan. So, one by one, each of the 621 residents of Detective Town gift him a framed photo with a hidden camera inside. One by one, the stranger thanks them but declines the gift, saying he doesn’t know anyone in the picture. Awfully convenient. They’ll have to do this the old fashioned way.

After 30 seconds of intense interrogation, the stranger introduces himself as Carl Kowalsky, a 54-year-old plumber from Chicago. He claims he took a wrong turn while driving to visit his mother, which is just what a criminal mastermind who took a wrong turn while driving to visit his mother would say. Carl cunningly suggests they’ve made a mistake and that he’d really like to go home. Likely story.

That night, the detectives host a dinner party to see if Carl will slip up. But no one sits at the table with him; they’re all too busy searching other rooms for evidence. They suspect he poisoned the food anyway. Carl calls it a night and heads out around 8pm to catch the Cubs game. When the clock strikes midnight, all clues point to the butler. But there are no butlers in Detective Town. This isn’t Butler Town.

Eventually, the detectives feel they’ve gathered enough evidence to lock Carl up, but he walks free as a bird. They can’t try anyone in Detective Town; there are no judges, juries, or jailers. Carl makes a beeline for the highway, saying he thinks he’ll get better directions home in Gas Station Attendant Town. The detectives can’t hear him because they’re all monologuing about the ironies of justice with cherrywood pipes in their mouths.

Detective Town is the safest place in the county because no crime goes unsolved...

Detective Town

In Game 5 of the 1997 NBA Finals, Michael Jordan put on one of the most legendary performances 
in basketball history while suffering flu-like symptoms. He played so well, in fact, that he soon began to 
intentionally seek out other illnesses in hopes of improving his game.

Announcer: And there’s a classic taunt from Jordan, sticking his tongue out as he slams it home! 
Co-Announcer: He’s really letting his opponents have it. Wagging that tongue right at them! 
Announcer: Oh my. Is he trying to... lick them? 
Co-Announcer: They’re pushing him away—but he just goes for the floor. God. So vigorous. 
Announcer: Can we cut to commercial?

Agent: I’m sorry, Mike. There just aren’t any more Make-A-Wish kids who’ve asked to see you. You’ve visited 
them all. 
Michael Jordan: Then I’ll visit them again! Especially the contagious ones! 
Agent: That’s not how it works. You’re only allowed to visit them once. 
Michael Jordan: How about you? How are you feeling? Your voice sounds a little scratchy. 
Agent: C’mon, let’s talk about this later. Hey, you ever read that script for Space Jam: Baseball? 
Michael Jordan: Cough on me!

Interviewer: You possess a relentless drive to be the best. What’s your advice to all those out there who want 
to “be like Mike?” 
Michael Jordan: You gotta be willing to get your hands dirty. Put them in weird places. Toilets. Dirt. Never 
wash them, and touch your eyes often. 
Interviewer: I—I meant more in a work-ethic sense. 
Michael Jordan: Efficiency is also key. I eat all my meals at Chuck-E-Cheese. That 
kills two birds with one stone, since it maximizes your risk of both food poisoning and 
diabetes.

Wife: Alright, honeybun—where does my 5-time NBA champion want to go for 
vacation? 
Michael Jordan: The Democratic Republic of the Congo. 
Haut-Katanga province. 
Wife: That sounds, uh... lovely. They just opened a Sandals 
resort there, didn’t they? 
Michael Jordan: I would be surprised. It’s a 
hotbed for malaria. 
Wife: Oh. 
Michael Jordan: Even if the malaria doesn’t take, 
they have a pretty big cholera problem, too.

Michael Jordan: So! Magic... weird question— 
Magic Johnson: Don’t even think about it.

After the Flu Game

I was born with a poo gun in my hand. Doctors think it’s because my mother drank coffee during her pregnancy. But otherwise, I’m actually a pretty normal guy, like you or me.

Why don’t I just put a diaper on poo gun, you ask? Oh well I would love for you to share about that bulletproof diaper you’re clearly talking about. Idiot. Poos from poo gun are just as lethal as any bullet—if not more.

I was homeschooled my entire childhood. Every day I would sit at the attic window and watch kids from the neighboring school at play. Some days, a ball would bounce off my window, and the kids would look up in my direction. Those were the good days.

On the day of my 18th birthday I asked my mother if I could join a real school. She agreed after I held up my gun-hand and ominously said I had to go number two. I was so nervous my first day, I remember I got the runs and shot up the whole classroom, rendering everyone awash in poo. That was my last day of regular school. But my education was just beginning.

Mother enrolled me in gun school. I trained diligently until I became the top sharpshooter in the program. The NRA tried to recruit me as a kind of mascot but I damn near ate shit at a rally when I put poo gun to my heart during the pledge of allegiance. Then the FBI tried to hire me, but I had other plans. Quiet ones. I settled down and became the head of a town cotillion to teach nice manners to young girls and boys. That’s why it’s difficult for me to talk about such crass subjects like poo gun.

I won’t lie, life still isn’t easy. As I’ve gotten older, poo gun has only grown longer. To cover the rifle that is now my hand, nice dry sleeves won’t do it. I have to dip my sleeves in water before leaving the house so they can get more stretched out. My arms are always dripping with water. But at least they aren’t dripping with poo.

Poo Gun

<ul>
 <li>So how are my numbers looking?</li>
 <li>Not great. Voters aren’t taking well to the name “Leslie Lynch King.”</li>
 <li>What? People ain’t rolling with The Lynch King?</li>
 <li>We really think you should stick with “Gerald Ford”.</li>
 <li>But it’s my birth name! I’m Leslie Lynch King! Pow!</li>
 <li>Please let go of my neck.</li>
 <li>What’s wrong with Lynch King?</li>
 <li>Lynching is, er, how should I put this, starting to become a faux pas in America.</li>
 <li>That’s what makes it great! “Look out, I’m gonna lynch ya!” See? Kickass!</li>
 <li>It’s offputting to the American family.</li>
 <li>Aw, grow a spine. I got lynched ten times in the fourth grade.</li>
 <li>What exactly do you think lynching is?</li>
 <li>It’s the only hope America’s got against the wrath of Jimmy Carter.</li>
 <li>Right.</li>
 <li>It’s where they put your head in a toilet, right?</li>
 <li>That’s swirlies. Lynching is when you hang people in public.</li>
 <li>Oh.</li>
</ul>

Poll

Newly released records reveal that the Cuban Missile Crisis only happened because everybody involved was hungry.

CUBAN EXILES: [in Spanish] Okay, we’re at the bay now... where are the pigs?
CASTRO: [pointing towards booby trapped pile of roast pork and also speaking Spanish] Over there!
CUBAN EXILES: [in Spanish still] Ha. You think we’re falling for that? That’s pork, which is from chickens.
CASTRO: [also still in Spanish] Pork is from pigs. Chicken is from chickens.
CUBAN EXILES: [Spanish] I see. Things have changed around here. Let’s go!

The following conversation is in English except where noted

JFK: [on the phone] Robert? Can you hear me?
SECRETARY OF LUNCH: Mr. President? Tuna or turkey for lunch?
RFK: [on the phone] John, we’ve got to decide where we’re putting the nuclear missiles.
JFK: Hmmm...
RFK: How about Iran?
SECRETARY OF LUNCH: The tuna again?
JFK: No. Turkey will do nicely.
RFK: Very well. I will inform the Turks. [hangs up]
SECRETARY OF LUNCH: Very well. I will inform the chef.
JFK: What was that you were asking me, Robert? Hello? Can you hear me?
SECRETARY OF DINNER: Mr. President?
JFK: Get out of here, dolt. You’re four hours early.
SECRETARY OF BREAKFAST: Mr. President?
JFK: And you’re three hours late. What is with you people? Can’t get a damn thing done around here. What the hell was Robert asking me about?

KHRUSHCHEV: [in Russian] I would like to have a sandwich.
MIKOYAN: [in Russian] Sir, we have important business to take care of.
KHRUSHCHEV: [in Russian-accented English] Give me a sandwich.
MIKOYAN: [taking the cue, also in Russian-accented English] We must decide what level of aggression is appropriate here. If we station the missiles in Cuba and the Americans find out—

KHRUSHCHEV: [back to Russian] Will deciding to put the missiles there allow me to have a sandwich?
MIKOYAN: [taking the cue again, in Russian now] Well, I suppose that’s the only item on the—
KHRUSHCHEV: [still in Russian] Put the missiles there. And then arrange for a sandwich.

KHRUSHCHEV: [on the phone, in perfect English] Truce?
JFK: [in perfect English as well] Lunch?
Both laugh heartily. Laughter transcends borders and ideologies.

Newly released records reveal that the Cuban Missile Crisis only happened...

Cuban Missile Crisis

When it comes to performative feminism, I’m a veritable Fred Astaire. Before I stepped into the spotlight, performing feminism on the streets for coins was practically unheard of. You could find a common street urchin juggling bowling pins on any corner. When folks stopped by my pretty little slice of sidewalk, they knew they were in for a dazzling display of death-defying feminism.

I’d hula hoop atop a soapbox with RBG painted on it in period-blood red, while warning female passerby of a sneaky demon who goes by the name “Mansplaining.” My most popular act was painting my nails pink for the girls, while massaging my chest with breast cancer ribbons ’til I orgasmed on the first try, as all females do.

One remarkable evening, after my abortion act, I was beating the living personification of chivalry within an inch of his life, when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I twisted around and found myself face-to-face with David Hasselhoff. “My God!” he said. “You’ve got TALENT!” He slipped me a card with his contact information, and I read the three greatest words in the world (besides “free bathroom tampons”): America’s Got Talent.

David flew me out to Vegas for my big audition. I opened with my body hair act, in which my female assistant removed all of my body hair with wax strips. The crowd exploded with applause. She then used masking tape to reattach every single clump of hair. “All body hair is gorgeous, darling!” I shouted to the heavens. I wrapped up my audition with some silly impressions of white feminists, and dead serious impressions of the intersectional ones.

My career as a performative feminist was never the same after that performance. I won America’s Got Talent. Naturally, I bet my $1 million prize on the expansion of the wage gap and entered the 2010s as a multimillionaire. After decades in the industry, I even earned my star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, right next to comedy legend Bill Cosby.

When it comes to performative feminism...

A Performative Feminist

No, I’m not a flat earther—nothing of the sort. Rather, I believe the Earth is made out of pizza. I think the green grass is cheese, the oceans are oil and sauce, and that the Earth’s crust is also an extra part of the pizza loaded with more cheese than usual. I haven’t figured out what the pizza crust is, but I think it’s asteroids.

Pizza earthers and flat earthers are similar in the sense that we both think the Earth is flat—its just that they think the Earth is the Earth, and I think the Earth is pizza. Take Europe, for example. Flat earthers think it is a giant mass of land, whereas I think it is a giant mass of pizza. My house in the suburbs of Boston is also made out of pizza, and pepperoni slices for the roof.

Scientists might look around, and say, “this isn’t pizza, this is a pile of bricks,” every time you try to convince them that a pile of bricks is pizza. But at the end of the day, who gets to decide what a pile of bricks is? The guy who owns them, and guess what, you’re looking at him.

This doesn’t mean that I think people are pizza too. Only some people: Egyptians, Koreans, and Canadians. All other races/ethnicities are likely some combination of breadsticks, spaghetti, or garlic bread.

Now, this might all sound like nonsense to you, but let me explain how I figured it out. About a week ago, I decided to make my wife her favorite meal: homemade pizza. I left work a little early to buy the ingredients: bread, sauce, pepperonies, peppers, and of course, the cheese. When I got home, I began by dicing up the cheese and layering it over the bread—but something was wrong: a strange sound was coming from my room. I went upstairs to see what I could find, and when I opened the door, there it was: my wife having sex with another man. After that, I swallowed a bottle of pills, and when I woke up I believed in the pizza earth theory.

I can’t remember what my wife looks like.

No, I’m not a flat earther—nothing of the sort...

Pizza Earther

Time Traveler: People of Salem, stop this madness! These women are innocent. 
 Executioner: What? 
 Time Traveler: What you’re doing disproportionately discriminates against a subset of society on the basis of identity. 
 Executioner: (high-fives other Puritans) 
 Time Traveler: This woman committed no crime other than the crime of being strong and beautiful. 
 Executioner: The witch? Goodie Brenda? She burned down a school. 
 Time Traveler: Probably to protest the lack of schooling she received! 
 Executioner: Look man, when you’re stabbing other kids with pencils, the board pretty much has to consider an expulsion. 
 Time Traveler: I wish you could see the gender and sexuality office of my private New England liberal arts college. Your worldview is so small. 
 Witch: (pokes head out of rat-filled burlap sack) 
 Time Traveler: She’s alive! 
 Witch: To be honest, I’m like—I’m a pretty bad person. I kind of deserve this.

Salem Witch Trials

Man: Hey lady, let’s get out of here.
Woman: Not happening mister.
Man: Let’s go back to mine, we’ll take our brews to go.
Woman: I’m on a call, I’m married to my job.
Man: Why are you married to your jo—?

SENIOR BLIMP SPECIALIST: HEY BABE, IS THIS GUY BOTHERING YOU?

Man: What the fuck? A job?
Woman: As a matter of fact, he’s bothering me quite a bit.

SENIOR BLIMP SPECIALIST: ALRIGHT BUDDY, HOW ABOUT YOU AND ME TAKE A WALK. HOW’S THAT SOUND?

Man: What the hell is a senior blimp specialist.

SENIOR BLIMP SPECIALIST: NONE OF YOUR BEESWAX.

Man: Okay, I’m starting to put the pieces together here. You said you were ‘married to your job—’
Woman: Shut the hell up.
Man: —and here we are talking to a living breathing job. That’s clever.

SENIOR BLIMP SPECIALIST: SHUT THE HELL UP YOU JACKASS.

Man: That’s actually really clever the more I think about it.

SENIOR BLIMP SPECIALIST: I’LL KILL YOU, YOU SON OF A GUN

Man: That’s actually very cleve—*bullet tears through abdomen, killing the man instantly*

SENIOR BLIMP SPECIALIST: That’ll show him.
Woman: *Hugs job* I love you Darwin.

Married to my Job

One Thursday, Little Walter Chairfork was trudging home from school, mind filled with the events of the day. He had spilled milk all over his “Dad Jokes Are How Eye Roll” shirt at lunch, right in front of his crush, Nancy, and her boyfriend. J-Dog, everyone called him. It was the type of nickname you could shout while doing sports or having sex — two things Little Walter had yet to experience. Little Walter’s idea of sport was catching Pokemon on his Nintendo DS. His idea of an orgasm was basically the same thing but under his covers at night.

After spilling the milk, the day had gone from bad to worse. As Little Walter looked up at Nancy, he had tried to ease the tension with a gentle quip. “Some weather we’re having, huh Nancy? It’s raining milk and cookies!”

The room, which had previously erupted in laughter at his mishap, fell silent. “What does that even mean?” asked Nancy. “You’re not even eating cookies. I mean, the tone was fine, but the premise just fell flat.” Then J-Dog spit on him and gave the lunchlady his autograph.

After the great D-Hall Debacle, as Little Walter had termed it in his head, he had failed his Spanish test. You see, Little Walter wasn’t the kind of bullied nerd who could find solace in the fact that one day he would go to a great college and make more money than his peers. He was quite dumb. Next to a bag of potatoes, Little Walter looked like a bag of rocks, which was the sort of thing he would often say about himself in an attempt at self-deprecating humor, but everyone else would just find sort of sad due to its accuracy. Little Walter was also fat. Obviously.

And so, Little Walter was trudging home from school after his worst day of the last three. In all honesty, bad stuff happened to Little Walter all the time. Today he had failed the Spanish test and spilled the milk. Yesterday, his father had died in a brutal car accident. The day before, the ice cream truck had run out of Chunky Monkey (Walter’s favorite flavor). It was while attempting to capture a wild Charizard that Walter tripped, fell, rolled 4 feet, and found himself staring over the edge of the sidewalk into a gaping void of eternal darkness.

Jump, a voice echoed.

“Come back here, Chawizard!” said Little Walter, still engrossed in his videogame. Little Walter had a lisp, which came out in moments of stress.

What the — are you even listening, kid? A mysterious voice tells you to jump into a gaping hole in the middle of your neighborhood and you’re worried about a Charizard? Oh God – I can smell you from here.

“Chawizard?!” The hole had gotten Little Walter’s attention with the word. “Holy guacamole!” he exclaimed. The boy was prone to replacing his swear words with foods. His mother had always told him swearing was “a sign of the devil.” His father had always told him “shut up, go to your room, but get me another beer first.”

Uhh – yeah, yeah that’s right kid, the void said. There’s a Charizard down here, and if you want to catch it you have to jump.

Little Walter hesitated.

What are you waiting for?

“I guess...” he sputtered. “I guess I’m just worried that when I jump my shirt will ride up on my stomach like it does in gym class on rope climbing day, and that J-Dog or Coach Applebee will be nearby and say I’m a “tub of lard” or “trying my best” like they do at school.

Jesus Christ.

“But I can get over that,” Little Walter continued. “And plus, I jump every day when I’m trying to play hopscotch during recess. One day I’ll make it to the tenth square without tripping!”

Um. Okay. Well, yeah. I’ve got hopscotch down here, and ice cream, and all the Pokemon you could ever want. And... your dad just died, right? I feel like that was kind of glossed over, but he’s down here too. And he wants to see you! And there are no bullies or gym coaches. Nancy’s here, and you didn’t hear it from me but she’s wearing her good chapstick – the cherry-scented one, and she looks just about ready to kiss behind the bleachers. So tuck that shirt into those neon athletic shorts and get jumping!

“Wait... Nancy wants to kiss me? I gotta get down there.” Little Walter was confused but excited. Something was beginning to happen in his pants and he moved to cover it with his Nintendo DS, which was more than large enough to hide the problem.

I don’t know, she was saying something earlier about being in love with the unphukular kid and wanting to turn him into Prom Queen? And how she knows everyone else would see his inner beauty if she could just give him an 80s rom-com-style makeover?

Little Walter asked what song the makeover would be paired with, and the void said Take on Me or maybe The Power of Love, and Little Walter was sold. “Stop drilling, you’ve hit oil!” he chuckled.

What does that even – oh, okay yeah. Come on down.

“I’ll be down faster than you can say ‘my dog has cancer and I’m worried I won’t be able to emotionally deal with her death!’”

There was a pause.

“I mean hey, whatever’s down there it’s gotta be more spacious than the locker I spend half the day stuffed in. So is there a trampoline or something down there ready to catch my fall?”

Again, no reply.

“Hello? Are you there? You’re sounding almost as absent as my father!”

Look man, I think I’d just – I think I’d feel bad if I didn’t ask: is everything, like, okay at home? All this stuff you’re saying... it sounds like... really sad? Like pathetic even? And it’s just, this whole thing I’m doing... usually I have to tempt people into abandoning their lives with all of these false promises about what’s down here, and you just seem sort of immediately ready to go.

“You got snacks down there?”

Oh my –

“I like twizzlers. You got twizzlers?”

No, I don’t “have twizzlers,” said the voice, exasperated. Little Walter patted the rim of the hole comfortingly, worried he had offended it. “Aw, that’s okay,” he offered. “I also like Twix and Kit-Kats. Any candy, really.” He flashed a gap toothed smile. Little Walter’s penchant for sweets had landed him with 17 cavities before the age of 12.

I can’t believe I’m saying this but I... don’t have a lot of candy actually. Maybe you should ease off the sweets? Could help with the acne? And you might do a little better in gym class. Do your parents really not pay enough attention to you to care what you eat?

Walter felt something stir in his chest. He looked at the ground. Or rather, he looked down at his stomach, then leaned forward so he was able to properly see the ground. It was true – his parents were usually too busy arguing to remember to make him dinner, and he spent many a supper on the curb of 7/11, forlornly stuffing lukewarm taquitos into his mouth. Most nights, he would follow it up with a pack of four of twizzlers. Sometimes he would stare at the intersecting red strands, imagining them to be two people in love – not like Mom and Dad. Not like him and Nancy. Or maybe they formed a piece of DNA, he would think. A double helix of a gene that could make him a different person. An even marginally less pathetic person. It was his greatest wish in the entire world.

And though he was generally relentlessly optimistic, Little Walter felt sad.

Oh... look kid, I wasn’t trying to bum you out. You know, it’s just like, you gotta at least try to improve your life. You know, try deodorant or something. You can’t expect magic holes to appear all the time and start offering you everything you’ve ever wanted.

Little Walter considered this. He did not consider things often. and it hurt his little walnut-sized brain.

And most of the time those offers of paradise would probably be a trick anyway. Just a ruse to – taking purely hypothetically here – harvest your soul or something like that. I don’t know.

“So you’re saying I... shouldn’t jump in.”

Well, yeah. I guess you shouldn’t. It was the first time the void had ever said this.

“And I should wear deodorant? That would make people like me more?”

Yeah. Correct.

And so Little Walter continued on his way, circumventing the void by carefully maneuvering around the street and through his neighbor’s yard. He hummed Take My Breath Away to himself, thinking of one day when he would kiss Nancy. He would be like “Hey Nancy, you take my breath away” and she would be like “you’re so handsome” and they would totally smooch, maybe even with tongue if the moment was right.

As Little Walter trotted home, he felt nothing but appreciation for the advice the void had given him. He imagined doing his Spanish homework that night without his classic “reverse pomodoro method,” which included 25 minutes of Pokemon for every 5 minutes of studying. He pictured making eye contact with J-Dog the next day in school without cowering, speaking without spitting all over the place, and walking through the cafeteria without spilling his food. And yes, oh yes – he would even put on deodorant, he resolved.

And as the pit of despair and desperation into which he had almost stumbled shrunk in the distance behind him, he remarked to himself that maybe – just maybe – he would eat one fewer taquito that night.

“Only 11,” he whispered to himself defiantly. “Only 11 taquitos tonight.”

Little Walter eventually moved to Hollywood and became who we now know as Tom Cruise.

Screaming Into The Void

Ask For Words From the Audience 
But only accept words relating to the Dust Bowl or infamous American celebrity criminal trials because you’ve gotten really good at doing those sorts of scenes.

Reject Bad Ideas 
Say “No, actually” if someone starts the scene wrong or just scream “NOOOOO” if the scene has gotten really bad.

Take the Scene in New Directions 
If you make a really controversial statement about global affairs, then the scene literally has to incorporate that now. Because if they drop it then it’s like the improv troupe is endorsing that statement.

Have a Few Back Pocket Tropes 
The ones to pull out if you can’t come up with anything. Sexy fireman. Innocent schoolgirl. Dust Bowl era farmer. O.J. Simpson jury member.

Have a Few Back Pocket Phrases 
“Boy it sure is a dusty day out,” or “Look, the glove doesn’t even fit him!”

Your Favorite Guy in the Improv Troupe 
Man, this guy rocks! Make sure to pull him up for every scene and throw him off with a sexual opening line to see what he’ll do. If you end up making out on stage, it’s not a crime.

Your Least Favorite Guy in the Improv Troupe 
Man, this guy sucks. And he clearly has no grasp on the mechanics of the O.J. trial. Shut down all of his scenes by saying “You are blind and deaf and mute and totally paralyzed” so he literally can’t do anything.

Know When to End a Scene 
If both your characters shot each other and are now dead, you can end the scene.

Know When to Keep a Scene Going 
If both your characters have not yet shot each other, you have to keep going. Scenes only end when both characters have been shot.

Tips for Succeeding in Improv

Is it just me, or can you just not say anything these days? I mean, you can’t even massacre a neighboring village because they’re a different religion from you without someone getting offended, ya know? And don’t get me started on serfs. It’s not our fault if you’re too poor not to be indentured. Oh, but, ya know, I guess I can’t say that anymore, can I? God I hate this village.

Anyways. I was talkin’ to this chick the other day, completely riddled with the plague and I told her “Hey. Your organs may be eating themselves, but at least you lost a few pounds.” Last time I give a woman a compliment, am I right fellas? EVERYONE’S OUT TO GET ME BECAUSE I’M OUT HERE TELLIN FOLKS THE TRUTH.

Hey, Service Wench over there scrubbing the floors. Call me a Calvinist, because I’m predetermined to squeeze those sponges. CHECK PLEASE! Any couples in tonight? You sir, how long’s it been since you’ve fired the old cannon? Don’t worry, brother, I once fell in love with a woman with a chastity belt, too. Turned out that the entire jousting team had a spare key.

Hey now, settle down, I love women. IN MY CHAMBERS HEYO! Alright. I’m taking a seat. I’m taking a seat. We need to talk. Used to be, a jester could tell a few jokes about the king’s mistresses, maybe mock the size of his lance, and the worst that would happen is what? Public flogging? A little disembowelment? Now, you say one thing about the queen’s weight and suddenly you’re “problematic.” I’m like, yeah, I’m problematic. My problem is paying rent in this godforsaken castle. No one wants funny anymore.

“Oh, Geoff, can’t you do something wholesome? Maybe a little pun about the harvest?” No. I want to talk about the real issues. Like how I haven’t seen my jester pension in six moons. Also, I’ll say it, the King isn’t God.

Neck snaps in gallows.

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