Your mother’s dead. Sorry, I didn’t mean to just blurt it out like that. Regardless, here are some tips for giving bad news so that next time her death won’t be such a buzz-kill.
Make it into a game._
Father: I hope you been having a good birthday son, I know you always wanted to be an actor, so I have a great surprise for you.
Timmy: Really? What is it?
Father: Our whole family is going to be in a film!
Timmy: We are!! Oh boy!
Father: The plot is as follows: your mother and I are going to get a divorce because you are a selfish little brat that has ruined our love life. The movie should take about twenty years to film or until you kill yourself, which ever comes first. It starts…now!
Timmy: [wide-eyed] Bu-but I don’t see any cameras.
Father: ACTION!
Talk about a related topic._
Fred: So I get to meet Magic Johnson after the game right?
Father: Oh yeah, for sure. I called Magic last night. It’s all worked out.
Fred: Yippy!! I’m going to shake his hand and get his autograph and…
Father: Your mother and I have AIDS.
Deliver the news when they feel sorry for you._
Jimmy: Dad…this bone marrow transplant procedure…I’m really nervous. You know I heard that it is kind of dangerous.
Father: You know son, you don’t have to do the transplant procedure for me anymore.
Jimmy: I don’t! [face brightens] You mean they found another donor?
Father: No son, you’re adopted.
Tell them they won something._
Dr. Stern: Congratulations Sarah, you have won 120,000 dollars to be paid over a period of four years.
Sarah: What?? Who is this? 120,000 dollars! How did I get that?
Dr. Stern: By not getting into Harvard Medical School.
Sarah: But wait, that means–
[Dr. Stern hangs up]
Give them hints of the bad news in the form of presents._
Father: Happy Birthday Lisa! Eight years old…wow! Come on and open your presents.
Lisa: Yippy!! [Tears open first present] Cool! It’s a ball of superman’s hair!
Father: No Lisa, that’s a wig. Open this one.
Lisa: [tears open next present] Wow, cool! A bunch of dishes filled with paint. I’m going to draw a dino-doggy!
Father: Actually, that’s some of your father’s platelets. You might want to put that somewhere cold.
Lisa: Oh…well, I’m going to open this one. [Tears open last present] A t-shirt! What does it say?
Father: Well…it says, “Leukemia: it will really grow on you.”
Lisa: What does that mean?
Father: It means you better grab a jacket because we’re going to go see Dr. Bernstein. He’s going to be injecting you with more birthday presents.
Observations. Day 10, Friday
From my outpost in the treehouse above Sandbox 4
The Swing Incident
Timmy claimed that he had counted to thirty, but Bobby knew otherwise. Timmy hadn’t separated his numbers according to the schoolyard’s established precedent. So it was that Timmy yelled “my turn!” while Bobby was only at ten bananas, and Bobby was sure as hell not ready to give up the swing with twenty bananas to go. “No!” yelled Bobby, “it’s still my turn.” Timmy, thinking quickly on his toes rebutted with “pig fucker!” sending the playground into silence.
There was some history between the boys. The two were close friends until an unfortunate accident during a game of TV tag left Timmy’s younger sister drowned in a pool of her own blood and legos. Bobby thought they were even after Timmy accepted his generous “two Kudos bars and a Lunchable for baggie of celery” deal, but Timmy wasn’t satisfied.
Now, with Bobby refusing to give up the swing, Timmy saw his opportunity for revenge and leveled the worst insult he could think of on the spot, “pig fucker.” This in itself would not have been that offensive, however only a week earlier Bobby had indeed fucked a pig.
Bobby, with his reputation hanging in the air above a gathering crowd, was in need of a comeback. Down, and not willing to take any risks, Bobby resorted to the tried and true “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me.”
Bobby was confident; never before had this defense been cracked. He remembered many times when he claimed to be rubber and his attacker glue, but that inevitably ended up with him being unable to receive the wealth of compliments bestowed upon him by the attacker’s quick change of heart.
He also knew that the formerly classic “I know you are, but what am I” response hadn’t worked since two years earlier when Jamie Vesterbule and Craig Saunders became deadlocked in loops of this technique for 85 hours straight before both finally succumbed to dehydration. Plus, Bobby really had fucked a pig.
“Words can never hurt me” seemed like the safest way to go…but Timmy had anticipated such a response. Without a second’s hesitation Timmy threw a dictionary squarely into Bobby’s face, sending the unsuspecting boy sprawling off of the swing-set and into a growing puddle of sand, blood and tears.
A hero was born.
Observations. Day 11, Saturday
Still can’t get out of this treehouse.
Hot4Tuna69: hi 😉
UndrTheSea: Hi! a/s/l?
Hot4Tuna69: 18/f/metropolis 😉 u?
UndrTheSea: Um, kind of complicated, but I’m a young guy in Metropolis too! Have a pic?
Hot4Tuna69: sure here u go 🙂
UndrTheSea: Holy moly! You’re a knockout!
Hot4Tuna69: oh thanks 😉 but i am all by myself tonight. 🙁
UndrTheSea: Really? So am I! Which is, uh, really rare for me. Wayyyy rare.
Hot4Tuna69:o no! well maybe u could come over
UndrTheSea: Seriously?? I mean, yeah, I could do that. Chicks ask me to all the time.
Hot4Tuna69: u could come over and make me a woman, how does that sound
UndrTheSea: Oh wow! Yeah! I’ll be right there!
Hot4Tuna69:: make me a hot mermaid woman
UndrTheSea: …mermaid?
Hot4Tuna69: my fin is so hot 4 u
UndrTheSea: …
Hot4Tuna69: i am covering myself in tartar sauce
UndrTheSea: …This is Superman, isn’t it?
Hot4Tuna69: HAHAHAHA! OWNED!!! KRYPTON RULZ!!!
CapdCrusdr: hey there
GothamUGrrl: o hi 🙂
CapdCrusdr: you go to the university huh
GothamUGrrl: yeah! i love it here, but i wish i was meeting more guys 🙁
CapdCrusdr: maybe sometime you and i could “meet” maybe in my cave. er, bedroom
GothamUGrrl: oooh rly? what would we do? 😀
CapdCrusdr: i’d start off by massaging your feet
GothamUGrrl: that’s hot, i luv that, what else
CapdCrusdr: then i’d slowly peel off your pretty green tights
GothamUGrrl: my what
CapdCrusdr: and stroke your long boyish legs with my fingertips
GothamUGrrl: wait go back a second
CapdCrusdr: i’d take off your utility belt, slowly, and try it on for you
GothamUGrrl: i don’t have a utility belt
CapdCrusdr: then i’d tear off your red shirt and lick all over your hairless chest
GothamUGrrl: ok this is more like it, sort of
CapdCrusdr: and then i’d flip you onto your stomach and spank your firm ass with your own utility belt
GothamUGrrl: ooh kinky!
CapdCrusdr: and shout “you’ve been a BAD sidekick, haven’t you?”
GothamUGrrl: um
CapdCrusdr: take off my cowl, i want you to look into my eyes when i batspunk on your handsome features
GothamUGrrl: god why is everyone in this town such a fucking weirdo
CapdCrusdr: nnnnngh oh fuck i’m cumming I AM THE NIGHT
FastrThanLight212 (7:07:32 PM): hey sexy
MetroChik4675 (7:07:47 PM): hi 🙂
FastrThanLight212 (7:07:48 PM): looking for some cyber?
MetroChik4675 (7:08:03 PM): oooh ok 😀 but i should tell you something first
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FastrThanLight212 (7:08:05 PM): i’m slowly taking off your blouse
FastrThanLight212 (7:08:06 PM): mmm yeah nice tits
FastrThanLight212 (7:08:07 PM): yeah you want this cock don’t you
FastrThanLight212 (7:08:08 PM): ohhhfuckkk cummmming
FastrThanLight212 (7:08:09 PM): shit want some more huh, you’re a dirty girl
FastrThanLight212 (7:08:10 PM): yeah you like that don’t you, you slut
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FastrThanLight212 (7:08:12 PM): god damn that was nice, i came so hard
MetroChik4675 (7:08:13 PM): wait
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Double Homicide, Kitchen
Sherlock Holmes: Yes, hmmm, yes.
[Holmes paces up and down the dingy room excitedly, pausing briefly every few minutes to examine a loose screw or the victims’ shoes.]
Detective Brass: His wife was a–
Holmes: Yes, a seamstress. I know.
Dr. Watson: Amazing! How…
Holmes: Notice the way his cuffs were perfectly re-sewn, and the small depression in this doorknob suggesting his wife favored her right ring-finger with an unusual proclivity, likely due to her right thumb and fore-finger’s exhaustion from long hours with a sewing needle.
Watson: By Jove!
Brass: No, she was a stockbroker, and the husband was–
Holmes: Yes, a steamboat captain, notice the distinctive way the left pant leg is tucked into his boot while the other is loose, a necessary precaution as the gears of a steamboat lie so close to an operator’s left foot.
Brass: No, he was a computer programmer.
Holmes: Hrumph! As If I’d take the word of someone with the over-sized left pinky of a haberdasherist. I mean really!
[Holmes injects himself with cocaine.]
CSI Warrick Brown: The grooves match. These two bullets were fired by the same gun, I just wish Sherlock Holmes wasn’t so late so I could make my report to him.
[An old woman enters the lab.]
CSI Brown: Oh god, not this again.
Old Woman: Hark! What say you about this Sherlock Holmes?
Dr. Watson: Excuse me, ma’am, but have you seen Mr. Holmes?
CSI Brown: For fuck’s sake Watson, do you have to fall for this every damned time!? It’s obviously Sherlock Holmes in a wig, just like it was the last 20 times before that.
Dr. Watson: Nonsense, sir! This woman walks with a limp.
Old Woman: What? I’m sorry, I’m a little hard of hearing.
Dr. Watson: I said–
[The old woman drops her cloak revealing she is actually Sherlock Holmes.]
Holmes: A-ha!
Dr. Watson: My word, Holmes, that’s simply astounding! Amazing! You never cease to amaze me with your brilliance!
CSI Brown: Sigh.
Homicide, Apartment Building
Detective Brass: Well what do you make of this?
Holmes: It was the landlady.
Dr. Watson: Why that’s astounding! How the devil do you know that?
Holmes: Quite simple, my dear Watson. You see the left shoe is scuffed in such a way that–
Lab Guy: We found some blood under his fingernails. The DNA matches the landlady’s.
Brass: Oh, well arrest her.
Holmes: Wait, don’t you want to hear how I knew the victim ate seafood?
Brass: No, not really.
Marg Helgenberger’s Character: Okay, so the body was cut in two BEFORE the murder took place. If we can find some saliva on the torso, we may have our murderer.
Dr. Watson: Indeed. Marvelous. Stupendous.
Marg: Right. Dr. Watson, would you please get a tissue sample from the lower abdomen.
Dr. Watson: The what?
Marg: The abdomen.
Dr. Watson: …
Marg: I thought you said you were a doctor.
Dr. Watson: Well I am. It’s an honorary degree you see. University of Tampa. In the field of surpriseability actually. But if you–
[Marg Helgenberger drops her cloak revealing she is actually Sherlock Holmes.]
Holmes: A-ha!
Dr. Watson: Yes! Good show! Marvelous!
