Elf Perry's Magical Christmas Tree Rescue Service

Perry's 



- al Christmas Tree Rescue Service!

Like most of you, I am oft given to spending time trying to think up ideas for making my fortune, ideas which hopefully manage to bypass the careful planning, exhaustive attention to detail, and long years of hard and dedicated work that making one's fortune usually requires.

You know, the stuff you and I don't wanna do.

In this time of year when legions of discarded Christmas trees sadly litter the streets of our cities and towns like so many victims of a latter day Black Plague, I chanced to happen upon the following proposed humble idea for making craploads of cash. 

What do you think, folks?  Idea, or I-DUD?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Mommy, I'm so sad.  The Christmas tree's losing its needles and that always means we hafta put it out on the curb!"

"Not this year, Jimmy.  This year, Mommy called someone special!"

DING-DONG!

"I'll bet that's him right now.  Open the door, Jimmy."

"Why, you must be Jimmy!  I'm Elf Perry, of ...

 Elf Perry's 

Magical Christmas Tree Rescue Service!"

"Mommy, there's some old guy here in a ripped red sweatshirt and phony pointy elf ears."

"These aren't  phony elf ears, Jimmy!  They're just whimsical and glued badly!" 

"This is the someone special I was telling you about, Jimmy!  Right, Elf Perry?"

"Right, Jimmy's Mom!  Jimmy, I rescue used Christmas Trees and take 'em direct to Santa who breathes new life into them for next Christmas!"

"How do you get 'em to Santa?"

"My magical sleigh is out front.  Take a look, Jimmy!"

"It says U-Haul."

"That's Yule Haul, Jimmy!"

"Jimmy, please show Elf Perry where our Christmas tree is."  

"That would be wonderful, Jimmy, thank  ....  JESUS CHRIST!!! you didn't tell me you had a .... I mean GOLLY GEE WILLIKERS,  you didn't tell me you had  A California Redwood! for a Christmas tree." 

"You didn't ask, Elf Perry."

"Well, let me just come around back of the tree here and, oh, oh, oh my God!!"

CRASH!!!

"Sure hope you're insured, Elf Perry."

"I'm afraid my business plan isn't quite that far along yet." 

"Know what, Mommy?  I like Elf Perry, he's funny!" 

"Well, Elf Perry, looks like you've made a conquest."

"And how about Jimmy's Mom?  Y' know, you're not half bad and your son likes me, so maybe after I get done, we two could ..."

"Just pick up the damn tree, you pointy eared loser!  And watch out for the 

Chandeli-e-e-e ....

....e-e-e-e-r-r-r-r-r-r-R-R-R-R-R-R!!!!! 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So that's  Elf Perry's Magical Christmas Tree Rescue Service for you, folks.  What do you think?   

Idea, or I-DUD?

What do you mean,  I-DUNCE?!! 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

P.S. So who says you can't do slapstick in a blog post? 

First Contact!

All throughout the world, they watched and they waited.

But in Washington D.C. they watched and waited ever more intently than anywhere else on Earth, for it was over Washington, the seat of authority of the most powerful nation on the planet, that the silvery disc hovered.

Then, less than one hour before it had first come into view by the human eye, the craft gently lowered itself onto the White House lawn. As tens of thousands gaped in astonishment through the gates surrounding the home of the President of the United States, both the President and Vice-President  --- flanked by top level aides and legions of security personnel --- made their way to the mysterious vessel before them.

Then, they too watched and waited.  

An opening appeared in the silvery disc and through it walked two figures. They were humanoid, but like nothing ever seen before in our world,  like nothing ever seen before by mankind.

"Welcome to the planet Earth," said the President, slowly and deliberately. "I  am President Barack Obama."  

The aliens looked at one another but spoke nothing at all.

"This much older man with the bad hair transplant is Vice-President Joe Biden," added the President.

Silence.  Long agonizing silence ...

All around the globe,  people hoped and prayed.  

Finally the larger of the two aliens strode forward,  gestured with his tentacles towards the President and Vice-President, and began to speak: 

"Seen Les Miz yet?"

"Oh my yes!" gushed Vice-President Biden. "It's wonderful, and Anne Hathaway is a revelation!"

"I knew it, Bort!" shouted the alien.  "Knew it would be epic!"

"Can we see it right away, Klabu?" said the other alien.  Can we? CAN WE?"

"I don't understand!" said the President of the United States. "You've come all this way to see Les Miz?"

"Of course, everyone  loves Les Miz!  Why look at Bort, breaking into the show stopper!"

There was a time when men were kind,

When their voices were soft

 And their words inviting ...."

"Mr. Klabu,  please!  We must talk with you, learn from you!  You'll meet our leaders,  speak before our UN,  you'll ..."

"Mr. President? 

 "Yes?"

"No, thanks.  Gotta bolt right after the flick."

"But why?"

"Because we have dinner and a show on Alderon 7.  Heard their revival of  Cats is awesome!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Bort, stop butchering that song
and get us some popcorn!"

A Date with That Guy

A date with that guy?  Tonight even?

Eileen had recently met one Perry Block and since he seemed nice she said yes to his faltering invitation.  True, he was kind of old, kind of bald, and any looks he'd had must have been long in the rear view mirror, but why not?

He arrived at nine. Three or so hours later, her world was rocked!

Explosions!  Fireworks! Yes, the Earth damn near moved! 

Perry had gotten Eileen in the sack that night well before twelve o'clock! 

By dropping her off about 10:30 because of her "headache," so she could go to bed early.

It was New Year's Eve.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Picture prompt above, story below, 101 words . ... well, yeah, the story's kind of  a cheat and maybe a bit obvious,  but I couldn't resist.  Probably better than if I'd given you a story about The Honeymooners or Love American Style, which might have been a bit long ago and far away except for Boomers who remember such things.

For more about this weeks Fabulous Flyin' Fantasy Fictioneers' offerings,  please click on the page of our very explosive leader, one Rochelle Wisoff Fields. 

The Earth will move for you too. 

The Eye of the Be-Voter

You're traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of the imagination. There's the signpost up ahead --- Emergency Pull-Off, which has always struck me as kind of funny unless you're 16 years old and you're feeling ... 

No, no, wait!   I mean, there's the signpost up ahead, your next stop:

The Twilight Zone

Submitted for your approval, one candidate for the highly elusive office known as President of the United States.  A man who has everything the job seems to require --- a nimble mind, a grasp of the affairs of humankind, and a record of political contribution in one of the great states of the Union.  But this man also has a flaw, a dark forbidding flaw that casts doubt over all he's hoped and striven for.  This man has all the charisma of a room temperature bowl of Cream of Wheat!

One man, one tragic flaw, about to enter The Twilight Zone.

"What a tragedy, doctor!  All that ability, political service in the state of Massachusetts, burning desire for the job and yet ... all the personality of a casaba melon!"

"Even less, I'm afraid, nurse. Our cardiac surgeons have been asking him to give campaign speeches to their pre-operative patients in lieu of an anesthetic.  Seems to be working fine, with way fewer side effects than anything else!"

"Has our treatment worked, doctor?"

"It's too soon to tell.  Charisma transplants have been tried before but none have succeeded.  The last one I attempted was on a stultifyingly boring preppy woman named Martha something or other.  It failed dismally, but I heard she was able to find work on daytime television."

"Nurse!  Nurse, I need you!"

"Yes, sir, I'm here." 

"Nurse, I'm feeling a little stronger now.  I'd like to work on my inauguration speech.  I must know if the charisma transplant has worked!"

"Please, sir, don't try it yet!"

"Nurse, you just don't know what my life has been like! My earliest memory is of people yawning whenever I came near.  In school whenever I was speaking in class, teachers used to put a mirror up to my nose to see if I was breathing!" 

"Even now when I'm making love to my wife, she doodles on my back!  It's been a nightmare, do you understand, nurse?!   A nightmare!!  Nurse?!  Nurse?!!

"Zzzzzzz."

Commercial Message. 

"Now, sir, it's come time to remove the bandages and find out whether the procedure has succeeded. When the last bandage is removed, please begin reciting your proposed inauguration speech."

Round and round the bandages are unraveled. The first rays of light begin to appear to the patient's eyes through the continued unraveling of the layers of bandage, breaking through at last into his private world of darkness.

"Now, sir, begin!"

"Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country!"

"NO CHANGE!  NO CHANGE!  He's still boring as hell!"

"Doctor, he'll never be President now!" 

Submitted for your approval, one political candidate from Massachusetts named John Fitzgerald Kennedy.  Now the question may be asked "where is this time and place where somebody like Mitt Romney might be considered a cool guy?" The answer is "it doesn't really matter." 

For charisma truly is in the eye of the be-voter. 

Lesson to be learned in this thankfully non-Presidential election year of 2013 or any other, both on Earth and in  ... 

The Twilight Zone.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And you didn't think I was capable of a true Twilight Zone ending!

(And thank you to Rod Serling for The Eye of the Beholder, the great Twilight Zone episode on which this humble parody is based.)