his week marks the 119th birthday of Buford “Old Man� Scarsby, the world’s oldest living human and recipient of the 2004 Marco Polo Award for getting lost in a famous way. Despite many spirited attempts on his part to disappear however, the famously lost Scarsby remains found at his family home in Cutrow, North Carolina this week.

As hardly a newspaper-reading soul in the country could have missed, Buford was lost for over 45 minutes last August, after wandering off and climbing inside a hollow tree, where he was later found, terrified and smelling of owl. Family members blame the resultant “media circus� on poor communication between Buford-finding family members and the newspaper-calling members of the Scarsby clan.

Scarsby, born in 1886, has lived a rich and varied life, none of which he remembers. The one fact of which he is sure, however, is that he was born in 1886, thanks to a faded daguerreotype photograph of a newborn Scarsby wrapped in that day’s newspaper in lieu of the expensive blankets or towels of the day. This compelling evidence convinced world standards-bearing organizations to verify Buford’s claimed age, despite the fact no birth records can be found due to no one being sure of the man’s real name.

Family members began calling Scarsby “Buford� in the 1980’s, following the lead of Scarsby’s then-98 year-old wife Emma, who thought she was talking to Buford Cubbins, a local pharmacist. Since his great-grandchildren grew up calling him “Buford,� Scarsby’s real first name is thought to have been lost to the ages. Scarsby himself believes he forgot his name around 1982.

“Lemon time,� explained Scarsby, clutching a packet of powdered lemonade.

Though certainly the most famous, last year’s incident was hardly a first for Buford, who has been wandering off and becoming lost on a regular basis since his early 80’s. In one notable incident in 1992, while on a walk Buford climbed into the back of a mail truck and fell asleep on a sack of letters. Buford was returned to his family later that day, thanks to a return address sewn into his trousers after a similar incident with UPS in 1989.

Some advocates for the elderly have decried Scarsby’s fame, arguing that the media’s handling of his frequent confused forays into lostedness only serve to foster stereotypes about the aged. Relatives, however, claim that Buford’s ways have nothing to do with his age, citing as example the seven years he spent wandering around lost behind enemy lines in Germany during and after WWI.

Buford’s great-grandchildren, who now care for and corral the remarkably aged man, had hoped that Scarsby’s longtime wife and sometimes companion Emma might reveal her husband’s true name on her deathbed in 1993. Emma Scarsby, however, had different plans, leaving the world instead with her immortal last words, “cartoon pussy.�

Though certainly happy that the old man is staying in sight these days, Scarsby’s great-grandson Lewford Scarsby remains guardedly optimistic about the future.

“There’s no way we can keep an eye on him 24-7,� explained Lewford. “But we’ve gotten pretty good at learning this old guy’s tricks and keeping him reigned in. Ain’t that right, Buford?
Buford? Aw, shit.�

frican politics managed a rare chance to draw the attention of the western world when good-natured white boy Mark Thatcher, son of Der Iron Girdle former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, finally answered accusations he and other exceptionally-Caucasian financiers backed a coup of the African nation of Equatorial Guinea.

Equatorial Guinea, a sub-Saharan country in Africa, established its independence in 1968 from Spain and has lived under a dictatorship ever since. In 2004, a group of mercenaries were arrested and charged with plotting a coup in the country when their plane landed in Zimbabwe, those on board demanding they find a movie other than Kangaroo Jack to play for the rest of the trip. Authorities in Zimbabwe, Equatorial Guinea, and South Africa charge a complicated web of white sugar daddies have fueled the coup attempt, and that Thatcher was among them.

Moss Chevalier, one of the wealthy foreigners implicated in the charges, denied personal involvement in a conspiracy, but praised the mercenaries and their efforts.

"Equatorial Guinea is a country suffering under the thumb of an oppressive ruler. Its people die in impoverished conditions while he channels the wealth of the country into his personal coffers. I have a great admiration for the generous—dare I say handsome—financiers who are risking their livelihoods to bring democracy to this long-suffering nation."

Coincidentally, Equatorial Guinea discovered off-shore oil in 1996, greatly boosting the country's economic value.

Overthrowing governments for oil are nothing new, even quite the rage in recent years, but the Equatorial Guinea case is a trendsetter for being a coup allegedly paid for entirely by citizens, rather than the traditional route of grassroots movements within the country or foreign governments. With the current U.S. administration trying hard to privatize Social Security and medical insurance coverage, could the privatization of colonialism be far behind?

"Obviously countries rich in natural resources have faced a history of invasion by private companies and corporations," said University of Trenton History Professor Bobby Shockes. "This goes back to the early days of capitalism, as well-backed private merchants brought their own bodyguards and miniature armies so they might claim native lands as their own. Traditionally, though, these eventually call for government intervention to protect them, such as the United Fruit Company incident in Guatemala, when the U.S. interceded on the company's half against the rule of that government in the 1950s. But this changes all the rules. The message here is a positive one for businesses and wealthy individuals: 'Don't wait for the people or our government to make for better business conditions—do it yourself!"

On Friday, Mark Thatcher left a South African court in Cape Town, saying it was "patently clear" he had no involvement in the attempted coup. The trial for the coup itself, ended in November 2004 in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, while Thatcher's friend, Simon Mann, is serving a sentence in Zimbabwe for his role in the coup. Thatcher's involvement centered around the purchase of a helicopter that purportedly would have flown opposition leader Severo Moto from his exile in Spain to the seat of power in Malabo, upon success of the coup. Thatcher now plans on using the helicopter for personal Cape Town weather reports, or perhaps selling it to pay off the 3 million Rand fine he received for violating South Africa's anti-mercenary laws.

The White House chose not to respond to indignant questions from this reporter if they were interested in using the new privatized invasion style for Iran and Syria, or if they would prefer the time-tested CIA shadow-intervention plans.

Long has the world grown fat like a diabetic tick off the fruits of my invention. Strike that, "fruit" sounds a pinch too gay. The meats of my invention. And make that plural, as "inventions," because they have been legion.

In retrospect, part of my problem was likely never patenting any of my skylarks, under the mistaken assumption that nobody would buy anything that I myself wouldn't pay for. Cell phones, gossip magazines, and underarm deodorant have all proven me wrong on that count. Let this be my Achilles heel no more, however. My next vacation is going to be enjoyed from a pup tent right outside the doors of the U.S. patent office.

"What the hell," you're likely cursing to yourself, unless reading this column from the holy confines of a sacred church or daycare center, "are you talking about, VanSlyke?" A fair question, rudely put. So I'll cut, slowly mind you, like wet cardboard was my tool rather than a razor blade, to the chase. If you've enjoyed anything in the last thirty years, chances are I invented it. There. Put that in your pipe and blow bubbles.

The original Game Boy? VanSlykeBoy is more like it, though that sounds a bit like a mascot for pickles. But when the original Nintendo was so popular back in the 1980's, I was the one who spoke up at the barber shop and said they should make a portable one of those, with a screen on the front and a hatch on back to slip the game inside, so that children could play their electrified games while working in the salt mines, rather than wasting valuable labor resources at home in front of the TV. To which my fellow barbershop patrons enthusiastically replied: "What's Nintendo?"

Nevermind, they made one without me. Even if my mental version was better, with a color screen and a hatch for snacks. Shame on me for not developing a massive Japanese consumer electronics company to market my product back when I had the idea.

Tablet PCs? Those, too, should bear the mark of the "V." This one I admit I invented by mistake, after taking home a flat-screen monitor from my doctor's office and realizing to my keen disappointment that it didn't do anything when not connected to a computer box of some sort. Bah to that. A truly useful screen would recognize my handwriting, connect wirelessly to the Internet, and show me the results of the Florida State beauty pageant. Like a pad of paper. Only without me having to draw the beauty pageant contestants or guess what might be on the Internet. Again, industry beat me to the punch on this one, but I did still earn the distinction of selling the world's first "tablet PC," to a half-retarded kid down the street. Thankfully he never asked what the cable trailing off the back was for. Grounding, son. Grounding.

These are just two examples among the thousands I could site, if this column were a thousand times longer and instantly downloadable by neural cortex. So, I'm sure you're wondering, what can we expect next from Sony and JVC, after they steal the idea from Homer VanSlyke? Glad you asked: it's Movie theater goggles. That's right Baxter, an opportunity to enjoy the movies and cop a cool futuristic look without leaving the money-saving safety of your own home. You simply strap on the goggles and the attached ear-implants, set the virtual screen size, toggle on or off the know-it-all loudmouth sitting behind you, set the cell phone ringer volume and frequency, and kick back to enjoy the latest Hollywood DVD. Or, if movies are distributed in crystal-gel modules like they should be by then, just pop a mod and prepare to have your eyes blown off.

Thankfully I don't think any consumer electronics giants read the commune, because I've got my prototype almost finished. It's just a beta model, mind you, in real-world application the big-screen TV welded to the goggles would likely cause serious neck trauma to the wearer. But once I get rid of all these stupid tubes and wires, the whole thing should really come together beautifully.

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