Israeli Astronaut Hopes to Colonize Arabic Space Stations

istory in space exploration was made as the first Israeli astronaut was launched into space Thursday, aboard the U.S. space shuttle Columbia. The astronaut, Israel air force pilot Ilan Ramon, said that it was his country's hope to investigate colonizing outer space Arabic settlements.

"It has been a wonderful step forward for Israel, and for the future of space colonization as well," said Israeli Ambassador Malcolm Lentin. "Problems of overcrowding and dwindling resources may soon be a thing of the past. This mission is the first step toward colonizing Arabic settlements everywhere, including outer space, but also other distant Arabic states on Mars and elsewhere."

The launch took place under extremely high security, as have all shuttle launches since Sept. 11^th. The presence of Ramon, though, drew greater attention to possible terrorist attacks by Al-Qaeda and anti-Israeli groups. The launch took place without incident, not even a firecracker of any sort, which made it just as boring as all other launches in recent history.

As of press time, there was no evidence of Arabic settlements in outer space or anywhere outside of earth, but Israel said they would seek out any possible Arabic locales as part of their pre-colonization mission. Although the colonization of Arabic-controlled areas would be preferable, Israel said they would consider the colonization of areas dominated by other sects including Buddhists, Sikhs, Hindus, Christians, Scientologists, and Raellians. The possibility of uninhabited spots ripe for colonization hadn't been considered.

"Empty? Sure. We could do that," said Lentin. "I don't see where the challenge in that is, though."

Israeli scientists also did not rule out the possibility of Al-Qaeda terrorist camps existing in orbiting space stations, camps that could not be detected by regular sweeps of space areas.

"It's a slim possibility," said Pentagon terrorist expert Gen. J. Halftrack, "but I wouldn't put it past them. The technology is beyond their reach, by our estimates, but to tell you the truth those videos they produce have greater production value than we would have estimated. No telling what they're capable of that we don't know. And we haven't really looked for them in space."

Upon the completion of the sentence, the general dialed a direct line to the White House to propose War on Space Terror legislation, which the president presumably jumped on.

Ambassador Lentin, however, stressed that all Israel seeks through space conquests is peace.

"The Israeli people do not embrace violence," he said, sharing his fries with this reporter at a Burger King restaurant, but not his Dr. Pepper. "It is our desire to step into space with open hands, to greet any who live there and share with them. We will be happy to share our people, and their space stations or colonies. We can all get along, and I'm sure any Arabic astronauts we encounter will realize that."

For all the talk of sharing, this reporter never did get a sip of Lentin's Dr. Pepper, even when offering to use a second straw.

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Greetings, communistas! Apologies for the long gap in writing, things have been moving too fast and furious here at commune headquarters to allow much time for reflection. I just realized the other day that I’ve been wearing the same pair of socks for three days, and trust me, I have showered in that time. So hopefully that adequately reflects the level of hubbub going on around here lately.

No update from the last four months would be complete without mentioning the Gnarlap. Sometime around week 11 it became clear there was some kind of mythical beast living in the crawl space underneath my mother’s house. Not the basement, mind you, but the crawl space beneath the basement. Don’t ask me why we have a crawl space under our basement, faithful commune reader, I’m not a damned architect, and the police have already pursued that line of questioning to its fruitless conclusion. Just rest assured that it is there, and there is some kind of troll-like monster living in there and making a lot of noise and generating some kind of awful smell that Griswald Dreck is convinced is unmistakably the stench of a Gnarlap web. Raoul Dunkin was skeptical of this until the day he came home and found that the Gnarlap had eaten all of his Chicken in a Biskits, at which point he was convinced, and enraged.

As you might imagine, an exterminator was called, and as you might also imagine, if you’re particularly imaginative or an especial fan of the mid-1980’s series Amazing Stories, after the exterminator disappeared into the crawl space he was never heard from again. Ivan Nacutchacokov suggested that the exterminator just took my "imaginary creature removal" money and laughed his way to the bank, but I attribute that skepticism entirely to Ivan’s irrational hatred of the Vietnamese. It was obvious to everyone else that the poor man was eaten by the Gnarlap.

And if you thought running an internationally unknown news outlet out of your mother’s basement on a budget that’s not even enough to buy shoe strings was tough, just imagine trying to pull off that miracle while there’s some kind of horrible damned monster living under your house and eating people and snacks willy-nilly as it sees fit, not to mention stinking up the joint like Andre the Giant’s jock strap. It has been trying, to say the least. I’m tempted to apologize to our readership for the slow pace of recent updates, however none of that would be necessary if the Gnarlap hadn’t eaten two entire issues worth of content I had printed neatly inside the long-forgotten Hello Kitty notebook I found among my sister’s old things in the basement. If anyone already knew that Gnarlaps find spiral-bound representations of Japanime kittens delicious, they neglected to post this factoid on the internet.

I’m also inclined to beg the pardon of our long-suffering readership for the complete lack of Griswald Dreck output since Mr. Dreck rejoined our winning team, but somebody has to guard the crawlspace hole while the rest of us sleep, and we theorize that Dreck’s long stories about who invented cotton candy are the only thing lulling the Gnarlap into a non-commune-eating stupor.

But enough about that! On with the updates: As you’ve probably noticed, we have a new reporter on our staff, the aptly-named R.J. Handsomelots, who is indeed lots of handsome. In case you’re worried, don’t be, it’s not gay at all to say that. He really is that good looking. I met Mr. Handsomelots while buying gas at one of our insanely-overpriced local gas marts, and the fact that he knew how to write in cursive was all it took to convince me that he had what it takes to continue the fine commune tradition of excellence in journalism for no pay whatsoever.

I also figured out where the hell Red Bagel was getting those Book Revolt entries from, at long last. Turns out if you send a money order for $5 to a post office box in Bulgaria, Bulgarian wordsmiths will write you a book about whatever the hell you want in six days or less. God bless Bulgaria.

So, as you can see, we’re bravely plugging away here at the commune, bloodied but not humbled, afraid to go in the basement at night but not afraid to bring you the finest in American uber-journalism on a wildly unpredictable schedule. It will take more than a Gnarlap to stop us, commune readers. Unless the Gnarlap eats the entire staff while we sleep. Actually that would probably stop us pretty effectively.

Oh, shit, yeah, I also tracked down Rok Finger and Orson Welch. So there’s that.

Zincerely,
Emil Zender

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Believe it or not, the commune actually makes a tidy profit at the end of the week. Not this week, certainly not every week, but we can safely say the commune occasionally makes enough of a profit to keep the commune running. And here begins the problem.

As commune profits have grown, I began to hire staff members. Many of them you know through their columns, news articles, threatening letters to the commune or court dates. But there are unsung heroes as well, and I won't start to sing them here as my voice will crack. But one of these unsung heroes is Phil Lampost, the commune's Office Manager.

Or he was the commune's Office Manager.

Phil Lampost is the victim of what I call M.M.I.—Murder Most Implausible. Lampost was an exceptional person, skilled in both computer programming and office management. I found this out when I called him into my office, under the unfortunate premise of accusing him of embezzling $45 from the commune's Red Bagel fund, a fund designed for my future frivolous use. Phil then confided in me about the horrible truth.

In his spare hours, Phil had been designing a program called the Master Control Program, which would tighten security at the office, manage the commune's finances, assign writing and editorial duties without my help, and tuck me in at night. That last part is not a joke. This would be an amazing program, once Phil worked out the bugs as he promised me. I immediately apologized for accusing him of stealing money, but you know as well as I do it's hard to trust people these days. I wish I could say the story ended there.

Phil warned me cryptically that the program was growing out of control. Phil had made it as smart as an average person, he warned me, and that the thing would be ten times smarter than myself. Phil worried that the program was growing beyond its design, thinking for itself. Think about that! A computer thinking for itself without being told to do so. Think about it! It's beyond human, with all of our good points and none of our bad. And Phil warned me that if he could not be reached again, it would mean the Master Control Program had grown so bold as to kidnap Phil into the computer world.

I dread telling you what happened. Yes, Phil disappeared. My guess is that Phil discovered every penny of the commune's account was missing, no doubt stolen by the conniving Master Control Program, and when Phil tried to stop it he was abducted into the computer world. And for some reason, the MCP also abducted my new blonde secretary and bought two tickets to Jamaica.

But I shall not be thrown off the path from the real villain. The Master Control Program must be stopped. I don't know how, but I can and will do it.

I first set out to write a program to destroy the Master Control Program, but was thwarted early on by the fact that my computer was not already on. I will obviously have to enlist someone to write such a program for me, as well as turn my computer on.

Until such a time I will stop the Master Control Program the only way I know how: I have collected all the computers, calculators, and suspicious looking television sets into a big pile and started a bonfire out of them. I saw smokey demons escaping from the computers as they burned, maybe that's a good sign. I'll replace them, eventually, but I doubt they will be missed here at the commune offices. I've bought many foot stools to take their place, and that's usually what they were used for by commune employees.

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