Sunday, November 23, 2003
Freak up your day, your week, your month, and even your year...
(Today's title brought to you by the brilliant and hilarious Anna)
Snow is reasonable. I can understand snow. Large portions of land covered with a thin layer of frozen water? Makes perfect sense, considering most of the earth's surface is water anyway. But mashed potatoes? There's no excuse for that. I don't know whose wiseguy idea it was to shoot down a plane carrying nothing but instant mashed potato flakes, but it certainly wasn't funny for a pilot and copilot hanging in the sky by parachutes, and the recently flooded farming community below wasn't laughing either. At first, as the deceptively serene white flakes floated out of an unassuming grey sky, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Little drifts even built themselves up in a holiday fashion, like the wind had been anticipating them all along. But something was horribly wrong, and it wasn't long before everyone knew it.
Can you imagine getting hit full in the face by a grapefruit-sized ball of mashed potatoes? How about putting on those new wool mittens and starting to make a snowman, only to find a sloppy mess of deconstructed tubers infiltrating your garments? And how would you explain to your mom the logistical laundrogical nightmare that you caused by making a mashed potato angel? This was just the beginning of the small town's woes.
The recent flooding left things ripe for disaster. Growing undercurrents churned the mixture of river water and instant potato flakes into fluffy white fields of mashed monstrosity. Farm equipment across the countryside choked on fourth and fifth helpings of homestyle goodness. Stores, restaurants, and small businesses were forced to close due to side dish overdose. Unlike snow, instant mashed potato doesn't melt away and evaporate. It stays around and rots, like so many square miles of pig intestine. Needless to say, this phenomenon is bad for civic morale and olfactory well-being. Something had to be done. But what?
(Cue audio: In the distance, the long low whistle of the gravy train.)
What could save this small rural community? A superhero? Government intervention? A candlelight vigil/buffet? No, the answer was far more simple. A certain disreputable fast food chain (for anonymity's sake, we'll call it McRoger's) made a few closed-doors agreements with city hall, and overnight, the mashed potatoes were gone from all the gravel roads, rich topsoil, and manure stockpiles, and there was a tasty new dish in town! Another victory for corporate symbiosis. Try some Farm Fries today!
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(Now, i don't usually do this sort of thing, but i got a cd the other day that merits breaking my usual blogging guidelines and telling you about it. If any of you don't own Starflyer 59's 'Everbody Makes Mistakes' album, go out and buy it now. You need it.)
(Today's title brought to you by the brilliant and hilarious Anna)
Snow is reasonable. I can understand snow. Large portions of land covered with a thin layer of frozen water? Makes perfect sense, considering most of the earth's surface is water anyway. But mashed potatoes? There's no excuse for that. I don't know whose wiseguy idea it was to shoot down a plane carrying nothing but instant mashed potato flakes, but it certainly wasn't funny for a pilot and copilot hanging in the sky by parachutes, and the recently flooded farming community below wasn't laughing either. At first, as the deceptively serene white flakes floated out of an unassuming grey sky, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Little drifts even built themselves up in a holiday fashion, like the wind had been anticipating them all along. But something was horribly wrong, and it wasn't long before everyone knew it.
Can you imagine getting hit full in the face by a grapefruit-sized ball of mashed potatoes? How about putting on those new wool mittens and starting to make a snowman, only to find a sloppy mess of deconstructed tubers infiltrating your garments? And how would you explain to your mom the logistical laundrogical nightmare that you caused by making a mashed potato angel? This was just the beginning of the small town's woes.
The recent flooding left things ripe for disaster. Growing undercurrents churned the mixture of river water and instant potato flakes into fluffy white fields of mashed monstrosity. Farm equipment across the countryside choked on fourth and fifth helpings of homestyle goodness. Stores, restaurants, and small businesses were forced to close due to side dish overdose. Unlike snow, instant mashed potato doesn't melt away and evaporate. It stays around and rots, like so many square miles of pig intestine. Needless to say, this phenomenon is bad for civic morale and olfactory well-being. Something had to be done. But what?
(Cue audio: In the distance, the long low whistle of the gravy train.)
What could save this small rural community? A superhero? Government intervention? A candlelight vigil/buffet? No, the answer was far more simple. A certain disreputable fast food chain (for anonymity's sake, we'll call it McRoger's) made a few closed-doors agreements with city hall, and overnight, the mashed potatoes were gone from all the gravel roads, rich topsoil, and manure stockpiles, and there was a tasty new dish in town! Another victory for corporate symbiosis. Try some Farm Fries today!
----
(Now, i don't usually do this sort of thing, but i got a cd the other day that merits breaking my usual blogging guidelines and telling you about it. If any of you don't own Starflyer 59's 'Everbody Makes Mistakes' album, go out and buy it now. You need it.)
