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 May 26, 2003 |
Hollywood, CA ABC TELEVISION Bachelors Firestone (left) and Buerge (right), the lucky couple... of guys
When the answer finally came, it was with the bang of 25 pancake-makeupped jaws hitting the floor in unison. In an unprecedented and possibly illegal...
t was another surprise ending for The Bachelor, though this one was a little more Crying Game and a little less America’s Sweethearts. The question had been hanging in the air like a flatulent eagle all week: Would bachelor Andrew Firestone choose spunky Kirsten, whose ass he’d been blatantly checking out since the beginning of the season and who jealous former contestants gossiped was carrying his baby? Or would it be Jen, the slightly less stunning drama queen favored by the show’s viewers and the 23 catty former contestants who lay slain on the battlefield of bogusly contrived romance? Oh shit, dog. When the answer finally came, it was with the bang of 25 pancake-makeupped jaws hitting the floor in unison. In an unprecedented and possibly illegal move, Firestone passed up both Kirsten and Jen to give his final rose, and we guess a marriage proposal, to former Bachelor star Aaron Buerge. Asked on-camera what he was thinking when he made such an unorthodox choice, Andrew smiled to the audience and beamed proudly. “Are you kidding, all those bitches is crazy!” At that point viewers at home went berserk, throwing chairs and Kleenex boxes around like disappointed apes. In the background, Jen and Kristen held each other’s hair back as they vomited in tandem into a bucket of champagne. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not gay. I just couldn’t handle hanging out with those crazy bitches any longer,” Firestone confided. “If I hear one more girl talk about what font she’d use on wedding invitations, I swear to God I’m going to go all American Psycho on everybody. Shit! Anyway, I met Aaron backstage one night when he was cruising for some rejected bachelorette skank, and we really hit it off. We talked about handguns and the Red Sox, and not once did he bring up floral arrangements. It was the best time I’ve had in months. “That’s when I realized marrying any girl desperate enough to let a gameshow determine her mate for life would be a huge boner. Woo, dodged a bullet with that one!” Firestone exclaimed, exchanging a high-five with Buerge. “Talk about ‘Until me wrapping my lips around a shotgun barrel does us part’! Damn!” Buerge, star of The Bachelor season two, ended up not getting married to that season’s winner Helene Eksterowicz, invalidating the gift certificate to Crate & Barrel that was provided courtesy of the show. “Yeah, things with me and Helene didn’t work out. After the excitement of the show had worn off, I realized all the bright lights and pressure made her seem better than she was. Kind of like on the old Wheel of Fortune when the winner would have all that money to spend, and they’d get the bedroom set with the porcelain Dalmatians. It seems like a good idea at the time. But when you get home, what in the hell are you going to do with a set of life-sized porcelain Dalmatians?” Irate viewers expecting to see one woman’s heart crushed on national television, not two, flooded ABC’s switchboards with complaints, but Firestone insists it was all for the best. “Are you kidding me? Aaron saved my life back there. I felt like I was headed down a dark tunnel with no way to turn around. Then Aaron pulled up in a sweet convertible, or whatever the analogy is, and saved my ass. I could kiss that dude. Not literally though, just ‘cuz he wears my ring doesn’t mean nothing but we’re buds. I go strictly for the easy poontang, as the last six weeks should have made clear.” the commune news advises against getting married on a game show, especially if it’s Nickelodeon’s Double Dare. Ramon Nootles wants it to be known that he also slept with the field of contestants for The Bachelor, but it was before there was a show so nobody made a big deal about it then.
 |  May 26, 2003 |
Washington, D.C. Junior Bacon President Bush, the human code red, delivers a speech with some help from his “Li'l Dubya” ventriloquist's dummy
The little-known Presidential Warning System has been in place since the 1960’s, but it quickly fell out of favor during the Nixon presidency. Aides kept finding the siren-like device hidden in desk drawers or crammed beneath sound-deadening mattresses in the Lincoln bedroom over the course of Nixon’s term, and records ...
he United States Presidential Warning System (or “Terra Box” as it is fondly known around the White House, a tongue-in-cheek reference to the president’s speech impediment) reached its highest level Tuesday, signifying a major presidential gaffe or screwjob is impending. This news immediately scrambled foreign government officials, environmental groups and talk-show writers nationwide, who entered their own highest states of readiness and/or dread. The little-known Presidential Warning System has been in place since the 1960’s, but it quickly fell out of favor during the Nixon presidency. Aides kept finding the siren-like device hidden in desk drawers or crammed beneath sound-deadening mattresses in the Lincoln bedroom over the course of Nixon’s term, and records indicate it was later disconnected under questionable circumstances involving a bottle of tequila and a fire axe. Efforts were made to bring the system back on-line during former president Ronald Regan’s first term, but upon being turned on the device immediately let out an eardrum-shattering blurt before quickly overheating. It then caught fire and had to be put out with a shoe. The nation operated without a Presidential Warning System during the Bush Sr. and Clinton administrations, as the device reminded George Bush Sr. too much of his childhood nemesis, the board game Operation, and President Clinton found it seriously hampered his social life. The current siren-less incarnation of the device, consisting of a black box covered in lighted rectangles that are color-coordinated to the various levels of presidential “terra,” was brought online at the start of the latest Bush presidency. The new system was even praised by the president himself early in his term, when he said of the device: “I made it to the fourth level last night. Take that, Simon.” Tuesday the system registered an alert status of red, which according to the device’s manual translates to “Holy Shit” written next to a picture of a little stick man with a gun in his mouth. However, officials cannot say for certain how many times Bush has “bagged a red” since being elected, since Tuesday was also the day a White House staffer discovered the device holding up a candle in the presidential bathroom and no one was certain how long it had been missing. “While this may seem like an opportune time to panic, it is important to point out that the red bulb on the device appears to be nearly burnt out,” explained system designer Elwood Bond. “This is a good sign that we’ve been on red alert for most of the last two years, so this is more a ‘business-as-usual’ kind of doom than anything.” Asked if the system might be calibrated too sensitively, given that highest level of impending doom was continuously lit, Bond answered that the system really wasn’t designed with a Bush-caliber president in mind. “I set up the system so it would go red only in dire circumstances, like when Bush Sr. approved the CDC sending samples of anthrax, botulism and West Nile to Iraq in the early 90’s, or when we gave them the helicopters they used to gas the Kurds in 1988. Or really any time after the Shah fell in Iran and we were providing Saddam and the Iraqis with arms, intelligence and free money to help them invade Iran. All those are red-level events. Maybe orange. But Bush Jr. goes red just taking a piss.” But is there any way to tweak the system so that Bush isn’t consistently in the red? “I dunno,” replied Bond, scratching his head. “It does have an ‘off’ switch.” the commune news is currently at a state of yellow alert, which probably means the Chinese have laid siege on the building. We’re not sure, we lost the owner’s manual for this thing. Lil Duncan is the commune’s Washington correspondent and the reason some think SARS is sexually transmitted.
| Yale bombed, Harvard too drunk to walk home Study finds low I.Q. causes lead paint eating, not other way around |
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 June 1, 2003 Volume 44Dear commune:
Aren’t you just tired of all this bullshit?
Reggie Shaw
Dove Plains, GA
Dear Reggie:
We know exactly what you’re talking about. Those fussy pricks downstairs at Crochet! magazine need to be put in their goddamned place. First they have the gall to involve the police in our staff’s hallowed Annual Pogo Stick Race semifinals. We here at the commune may be a passionate bunch, given to boisterous arguments and cataclysmic displays of machismo, but we’ve never been unable to resolve our own pogo race photo finish disputes among ourselves. Sure, small-arms fire is sometimes involved, but cooler heads and Russian Roulette always prevail.
And speaking of meddling, who are they to say who can...
º Last Column: Volume 43
º more columns
Dear commune: Aren’t you just tired of all this bullshit? Reggie Shaw
Dove Plains, GA Dear Reggie:
We know exactly what you’re talking about. Those fussy pricks downstairs at Crochet! magazine need to be put in their goddamned place. First they have the gall to involve the police in our staff’s hallowed Annual Pogo Stick Race semifinals. We here at the commune may be a passionate bunch, given to boisterous arguments and cataclysmic displays of machismo, but we’ve never been unable to resolve our own pogo race photo finish disputes among ourselves. Sure, small-arms fire is sometimes involved, but cooler heads and Russian Roulette always prevail.
And speaking of meddling, who are they to say who can and who can’t keep livestock in the building’s common areas? They automatically assume it’s the commune’s goats that have been shitting in the elevator. As if their staff is above suspicion. The pricks.
Anyway, thanks for understanding. Sometimes the commune just needs to vent.
the commune
Editor’s Note: the commune is not responsible for those embarrassing Capri pants all the girls are wearing these days. We’re guessing a sauna mishap was responsible for those ridiculous things. But we do look forward to making snide remarks when we’re looking at photo albums ten years from now, just for the record.º Last Column: Volume 43º more columns | 
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Quote of the Day“No poor bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country. Unless we're talking Gandhi, but what fun is it taking a cudgel to the nuts for your country? None, that's how much.”
-Gorgeous George SpattenFortune 500 CookiePrepare for a fantastic journey of whimsy and wonder, and it's going to cost you $20—don't forget you can't touch her. Your keys are always in the last place you left them, so try looking at the bottom of Lake Chappaquiddick. What's up grandma's ass? What a bitch. When this particular problem comes along, literally whipping it will only result in jail time. Lucky skin blemishes: blackhead, pockmark, knife wound, stigmata.
Try again later.Top 5 Bush Second-Term Pledges| 1. | Encourage nations to work with us again, under threat of violence | | 2. | Pay national deficit with Discover and Visa cards | | 3. | Appeal to black constituents by finally selling off "Amos & Andy" videos | | 4. | Build new wing of America so rich people can vacation more | | 5. | Two, maybe even three more inaugurations | |
|   Flight Quarantined in Tokyo Obesity Scare BY hank pavik 5/26/2003 The L.I.E. Renovelized"Welcome to the L.I.E.," said the wise-looking man who was only wise-looking because the program made him that way, and was only a man because the program had a hard time making long hair that looked real.
Necco stood and looked at the man dubiously. Sure, he'd come here to blue-screen the whole L.I.E. for good, to tear the whole system down like a lousy set of Venetian blinds and set his people free. And yeah, the people hated him. They thought he was a prick who was full of himself and wore those leather pants everyone hated. But he'd show them. He'd free their damned minds and do it using karate. Yeah, that'd be awesome. Karate.
"I see you were expecting someone else," interrupted the wise-looking man, or WLM. "Perhaps a climactic karate fight for the fate of a...
"Welcome to the L.I.E.," said the wise-looking man who was only wise-looking because the program made him that way, and was only a man because the program had a hard time making long hair that looked real.
Necco stood and looked at the man dubiously. Sure, he'd come here to blue-screen the whole L.I.E. for good, to tear the whole system down like a lousy set of Venetian blinds and set his people free. And yeah, the people hated him. They thought he was a prick who was full of himself and wore those leather pants everyone hated. But he'd show them. He'd free their damned minds and do it using karate. Yeah, that'd be awesome. Karate.
"I see you were expecting someone else," interrupted the wise-looking man, or WLM. "Perhaps a climactic karate fight for the fate of all mankind?"
"I expect nothing but the freedom of my people. And answers," countered Necco, picking his nose.
"I have answers to all questions," said WLM. "Both those you will ask and those you should ask, which are not the same questions."
"Huh?" countered Necco.
"The things you know are not the things you think, and the things you think you know are neither thought nor known, nor do you think things which knowing can think, or things thinking can know."
Necco looked confused. "I think I'm in the wrong room."
"As I knew you would," answered WLM. "Now ask the question I already know you will ask."
Necco opened his mouth but drew a blank.
"The L.I.E. is a complex computer simulation in which we all live," answered WLM. "It stands for Living Interactive Environment. I am its creator."
Necco stared blankly.
"Yes, I have seen you naked. And it is of average size," answered WLM.
Necco nervously glanced down at his fly.
"What you should be asking me is not what is the L.I.E. but rather when is the L.I.E. No wait, that's wrong, I confused myself. You should be asking which is the L.I.E. Since this is not the first. The first one crashed when we tried to run two sessions at once, everyone seized up and we eventually had to yank the plug out of the wall. You may not want to hear this, since it will invalidate your entire reason for being here as well as the whole point of telling this story, but this is the sixty-fourth L.I.E. Or sixty-third. I lose track. But the point is there's always some asshole who shows up at the end thinking he's God and we have to nuke the whole thing. You, Necco, are that asshole."
Necco looked confused. "I think I'm in the wrong room."   |
