By Jim Morgan
Long ago in the pre-elephant days of San Pedro de Nada the gods of the world felt this peculiar need to get together and have a convention. ‘Tis very true that this was an odd thing for gods to do but for whatever obscure reason the gods made the decision to hold their conclave and at the behest and invitation of Le Mon Meringue, the Sanpedronesian god of lost beavers (who coincidentally looks like a duck, a mallard duck), they decided to hold their conference at San Pedro de Nada.
Of course San Pedro is but a tiny sandlot on the vast (even when you consider that this was in the days before mathematics so Boredom I was still actually there), so the gods actually had to hold their meeting above San Pedro instead of on San Pedro.
Anyway I digress… all the big name gods shewed up for this little omnipotent hoedown. JHVH was there smiting people for fun and amusement. KRSNA arrived on an exquisite entourage of purple elephants. Zeus arrived on a lightning bolt. Of course no one was sure if he was riding it or that his bolt-maker had gotten upset over his last paycheque and did unmentionable things to good ol’ Z boy. Jesus was there doing that annoying jump rope thing that he does with the rope through the holes in his hands. Eris shewed up wearing a skimpy nighty and looking sexy as hell. Of course everyone that hit on her was laughed at as she revealed to them that on that particular day she was sexless. However, she left with Loki when he decided to shew up and they departed from the scene and hid in her room during the rest of the convention eating un-bunned hot dogs, drinking Torpedoes, and making prank phone calls. What a weird pair! Anyway I reckon that all the rest of the gods were there too, Odin, Aphrodite, Elvis, Dionysus, Vishnu, Quetzacotal, Kali, Shiva, Princess Di and even the Reverend Billy Graham. Thor was there, but after a day or two of his hammer causing irreparable damage to the upholstery they asked him to leave.
I can not really report to you what happened during most of the convention, after all this story will be read by young and impressionable readers, but I can tell you that Aphrodite spent several days looking for her lost (and presumably stolen) merkin and that Dionysus’ feet are now flat.
After several days of doing only the gods know what, the gods decided that they needed to do something to justify the travel expenses to their accountants so they decided to create something. They set up committees and drew up many plans. Universal peace, hangover remedies, transportation via teleportation devices and self-vacuuming carpet all failed to arouse the support of all the gods. The only things on which they all could agree to were: 1) to create tongue depressors and 2) some new living critter and 3) that they really need to find Aphrodite’s merkin.
For all the power that the gods supposedly have the awesome simple majesty of the tongue depressor escaped their capabilities to create and after much forethought the very thought of finding the purloined merkin seemed distasteful to the gods. So they focused on drinking more of Dionysus’ joy juice and creating a new life form for little ol’ earth.
As a tribute to their benefactor they decided that the beast should have the tail of a beaver. That was the last sober decision the gods made regarding the new life form. The more they drank they got the more enlightenment they got. This animal was to be a mammal who lays eggs, has fur and flippers and the bill of a duck. All the power of the universe was to be vested in this little critter. Of course that was the first few hours of planning… after that the lights of enlightenment tend to dim a bit.
They decided eventually that the new critter would be a mammal, only that it wouldn’t realise that it was until it was too late to save itself from that curse. They decided to give the animal a limited but overly self-inflated intelligence so that it could grow on it’s own and they could go on without having to create all those nasty instincts. They made the beast bipedal, because let’s face it fins and flippers just look silly even to drunken gods. They gave the beast a voice, and believe me the gods will never live that one down. One good thing happened though, they eventually did decide that feathers would not be to good of an idea.
After they did whatever gods do to bring critters to life they needed a place to put the as yet unnamed critter. Of course none of the gods wanted to have this hideous monster residing in any of their realms. A great war amongst all the gods ensued (well exempting of course the Swiss gods who felt that their time would be better spent making cuckoo clocks and secret decoder rings). Each god zapped the other in fierce battles that very closely resembled a Marx Brothers’ food fight.
After several aeons of zapping each other the gods decided they had enough and the called a special plenary session of the United Deities Security Council, which is a lot like the UN Security Council only with smaller and more realistic goals, and asked the Council to decide the fate of the new hideous species. The Council agreed to arbitrate the affair as long as all the involved parties agreed to attend AA meetings that were held in Valhalla, Nirvana, Heaven, or a few hundred other locations including Ypsilanti, Michigan.
As the UDSC began to hear the case Le Mon Meringue, the Sanpedronesian god of lost beavers (who coincidentally looks like a duck, a mallard duck), stood before the council and saith thusly:
‘My fellow deities let this strife depart from amongst. We are the few, the proud, the gods. Let us fucking act that way! As this hideous species was created in the airs above San Pedro it seems fitting that San Pedro should house this hideous monster. But if we are to house this creature I feel we should be allowed to name this beast.’
The gods were understandably ambivalent towards this request as long as they didn’t have to house the critter. So they granted his request but asked what it would be and why.
He continued thusly: ‘During the days of our convention the RSPdNMP (you guessed it Royal San Pedro de Nada Mounted Police) were called in to investigate the theft of one merkin belonging to one Aphrodite. The RSPdNMP found a person with the merkin in question in his possession and they arrested this person. This person’s name was Hu Man. So as a gentle reminder of our misspent weekend we are going to name this beast Hu Man.’
And there was great rejoicing across the land and the gods thought they heard ‘La Isla Bonita’ being played in B-flat… nah it was just the hangover.
When Prince Boxxon came to San Pedro
By Dieter Hamm
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In the period of time that is know known as the age of
miracles San Pedro de Nada was ruled by a very lazy king,
Glorax III. During the hot afternoons when the archipelago
lay baking under a merciless sun he and his minions used
to sit for an extended dinner of several lodes, which they
washed down with a rather acetous home grown apple cider.
The apple cider was one of the unpleasant recommendations
of the king's kahuna, who of course seriously wished that
the king may have a long, long life thus his subjects
could sing and rejoyce for almost forever. But recently
Glorax III had begun to complain about an aching pain
somewhere beside his stomach, which in the peculiar speak
of the kahuna indicated a "swollen liver", possibly caused
by the kings habit of drinking so-called digestifs by
the barrel instead of eating a little bit less.
Furthermore the kahuna had found that his king was
assumedly suffering from the abovementioned pain because
he didn't take exercise often enough. So now that
todays dinner was over, Glorax III called for the porters
with his sedan to do something that he called taking
a walk. The kahuna silently groaned; the goodly hearted ruler
of all goodly hearted Sanpedronesians sometimes behaved like
a child. He wanted to rush by to tell his king that being
carried around in a sedan wasn't that kind of exercise
the he, the humble servant etcetera etcetera had been
thinking of.
In this very moment the horrible tone of ten elephants
tooting their trunks was heard, and the island began
to quake from a stampede of pachyderms. Men, women,
children, dogs, cats and mice shivered in panic, not
knowing what to make of all of this tooting and stomping
and the horrible voice of Prince Boxxon who, by the
always unleashed power of his will, had decided to
raid San Pedro de Nada. Riding his royal rhino he
stormed over the sandy plains, bravely following the
ten armoured elephants on which rode his invincible
warriors.
Ha! Did I say, that the mice of San Pedro shivered
once they heard the elephants toot? No, not the
mice. They gloated! Everyone knows that elephants
are afraid of mice, especially the elephants and the
mice themselves. Now this day would be the day of
the mice, not the day of the elephants, let alone the
day of Prince Boxxon. Ten seconds passed, twenty,
thirty, fourty, fifty... TOOT? Apparently the
first elephant had detected the reek of the scary little
critters. Indeed! Now there was a concert of desparate
trumpetting filling the air, all the elephants turned
around to flee in panic, and *crash*, the Prince's
rhino collided with one of the armoured giants.
King Glorax III and his men had no idea, what was
going on on their island, they just heard the spooky
rattling of dented metal and a departing caravan
of chaos. Now the evening breeze started to blow
gently and cool, and the monarch ordered his porters
to shoulder the handles of his sedan, thus he would
be on the beach at sundown.
How San Pedro discovered the Samba
By Rick Harwood
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In the olden days, before Sonic Youth, the people of San Pedro
had not a hell of a lot to do to pass the time. Days were spent lazing
in the shade dreaming of the teachings of Buddha and the hack writings
of Bernard Cromwell, all was dull in the tiny little isle... Boredom seemed
an apt name.
One day, the Word* came around that there was to be a concert on the island. (*The Word is the Independent Left-Wing and Right at the Traffic Lights publication of SPdN).
The Word advised the stoned and bored citizens of the tiny island chain that Madonna was touring in the region and would be performing on island of San Pedro Grande. That is Madonna Weevil-Smithington, the lesser of the Madonnas and famous for such hits as "Fabric Boy", "Pogue", "Mama Please Sermon" and her biggest hit to date - "La Isla Bogota", a number 1 smash in Peru, which was odd seeing as though Bogota is in Colombia. But that's beside the point now, isn't it?
The day of the big concert arrived, Ms. Weevil-Smithington (aka Wee-Lo) was ready to perform. She mounted the stage (she was later charged with indecent behaviour) and began performing all of her famous hits. However part-way through her hit "Sweet Home Witimka County" one of the island's resident squirrels, which had consumed a large quantity of crack cocaine whilst listening to the Butthole Surfers, began to lunge at Wee-Lo's throat. Wee-Lo had other ideas than being bitten by a squirrel on smack which was probably carrying scabies and so she began to dodge the squirrel's attacks. The dance caught on, and eventually Wee-Lo and the squirrel agreed to be partners, naming the dance "the samba" after the squirrel's latest one night stand.
The samba spread around the world and eventually several countries and cultures claimed to be the originators of this exotic dance... but we all know better.
And that's how San Pedro discovered the Samba.
The Statue Called Typhoon
By Jim Morgan
Way out on the Solitude Rock stands a representation of a typhoon etched in the finest of citrine stone. You know the place, it is right nigh to the giant turkey. Now *Typhoon* was not created to represent the Giant Typhoon of ought-nine as is often assumed but to commemorate and equally earth moving event in the history of SPdN.
In 19 and 20 the skies above Solitude Rock became filled with flying elephants! Now I know you are probably giving me the scornful looks of incredulity right about now, but I do speak the truth. Yes indeedee! The skies above Solitude Rock were filled with flying elephants.
Scientists for over 80 years have been trying to figure out how them elephants flew but they have yet to come up with a totally satisfactory answer. They closest they can come up with is that a massive cyclone developed over this herd of elephants thus making them lighter in weight. A sudden and very large gust of wind then blew and these factors combine with the obvious aerodynamic qualities of elephants hoisted out piloting pachyderms to heights ne'er before seen by any member of the elephant genus.
Now this is really about the silliest explanation ever concocted by them white-robed scientists. Sanpedronesians have their own explanations for the august events of that year and amazingly their explanation lacks the use of fancy terms like cyclone, aerodynamic and such and the like. The Sanpedronesians being a relatively simple and keenly enlightened bunch simply said that the elephants had heard another elephant playing La Isla Bonita and in B-Flat noless, and they had to fly to Solitude Rock to pummel this renegade elephant for violating the first and most cardinal law of pachyderm kind-- Elephants are only allowed to play La Isla Bonita in C-sharp.
So any way our pugilistic pachyderms flew the vast expanses to get to the place from which they had heard the awful sound. The made several flights around the beloved isles and then out of a sudden one of the elepahnts heards someone say '...but Daddy, elephants cant fly...' and then with a sudden jolt elephants began dropping out of the skies like bad orthography from a Vice-President.
I shant retell the horrors of what happened on the ground because children might read this story, but suffice it to say... the Sanpedronesian know why the Isle Boredom I is no more. And the rest is as they say, history.
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