The following stories were accompanied
by very tacky illustrations and given to my friends as Christmas gifts.
The Artist
Formally Known As The Frog Prince
Once upon a time, there was a wise King who had a most beautiful
daughter. For her sixteenth birthday, he gave her a most wondrous
golden ball, which she loved and cherised ever so much.
One day, while walking around the castle garden, she played a game
of tossing the ball high in the air, and then catching it. Alas, she
tossed it too high, lost it in the sun, and the most wondrous golden
ball fell down a deep, dark well.
She immediately set to crying over the lost ball, tucking her legs
underneath her in a coy and fetching manner. A big bull frog peeped out
of the top of the well, rubbing its head.
"Hey! You over there, crying in that coy and fetching manner! This
your ball?" and he lobbed it over to her. She caught it, one-handed,
and blinked in surprise. The Frog said, "It bonked me in the frigging
head".
"Oh!" she exclaimed. "How can I ever repay you?"
The Frog took an uncomfortable length of time to think of all the
ways in which she could repay him, and finally said, "Take me home with
you and be my companion. If you kiss me, my spell--"
"Ugh! No way," said the Princess, and she ran back to the castle.
"Hey! You promised!" The Frog watched her walk away. "Screwey dame,"
he muttered as he jumped back into the well.
The very next day, the princess took her most wondrous golden ball
back out into the garden and was delighting herself by throwing the
ball up into the air and catching it. Again.
"Oh, how the sun glints off of my most wondrous golden ball," she
purred. As she was watching the light show, she tripped over a rock and
fell to the ground. The golden ball fell, too, into the well.
"Ow! Son of a--" came the unmistakable voice of the Frog from deep
inside the well.
"Oh, Mr. Frog, if you will give my golden ball back to me, I will do
anything you ask."
"Get bent," said the Frog. The princess blinked in surprise. Again.
"Beg pardon?" she asked.
"Bite me," came the voice of the Frog. With that, the princess ran
back to the castle, sobbing her royal eyes out.
The Frog packed his bags and made his way to Hollywood, where he
cashed in the golden ball, purchased arm and leg extensions and blonde
hair implants, married a former Raiderette with her own line of skin
care products on QVC, and lived happily ever after in Malibu.
Rapunzel, or Take
Two Rampion and Call Me in Nine Months
Once upon a time there lived a man and a woman in a cottage in the
forest. The man and the woman loved each other very much, but they were
very sad and lonely for they had no children.
Unfortunately, they had bought into the extremely outdated and
stereotypical notion that a couple without children is a sad and lonely
couple indeed.
Anyway, they pined and they hoped and, at one such pining and hoping
moment, the woman happened to look out of her window and see great,
big, beautiful bunches of rampion growing in the garden next door. The
sight of the rampion made her so hungry that she immediately went to
her husband.
"Oh husband," she cried, "I shall positively die unless I can have
some of that rampion that grows in the garden at the back of our
house."
"Her house," the husband said.
"What?"
"You know very well that the rampion of which you speak grows in the
garden behind the house next door, owned by that elderly but capable
woman who practices Wicca."
"Yeah, whatever, just go get some for me." And with that, she turned
her back on him.
The husband, sensing the conversation was over, walked outside,
climbed the fence separating the two yards, and grabbed a big bunch of
the rampion. No sooner had he done that when he saw the witch standing
angrily before him.
"How dare you climb into my garden and steal my rampion!"
"Oh," answered he, "please be merciful! My wife happened to see this
beautiful rampion from her window and said that she would die were she
to go without." The witch seemed unimpressed, so he added, "Also, there
was a vague impression that I would be less than satisfied, sexually,
if you know what I mean...."
"If it is as you say," spake the witch, "you may take the rampion,
in exchange for your first-born child, who shall be given to me." The
man agreed and went back home.
"Oh, honey!" cried his wife. "You got it!"
"It was a bit pricey..." he mumbled, giving her the greens.
Nine months later, after the woman had given birth to a beautiful,
blonde, extremely long-haired girl named Rapunzel (whose name, I'm
sure, means rampion...somewhere...maybe...), the witch came-a-calling
to try to take the girl away.
The wife vowed never to let the child go, and shut the door.
So the witch took them to court.
At the end of the trial, the judge handed down his verdict, saying
to the witch: "While it is true that you and the defendant had an oral
contract for custody of the child, your child-rearing plans are very
inappropriate. Ideas such as locking this child in a high tower, and
climbing her hair for some quality time, are not in anyone's best
interest. My verdict, and this is in no way reflective of your
alternative religious lifestyle, is for the parents to retain custody
of the child. Court is adjourned."
And they all lived happily ever after, even the witch, who now runs
a homeopathic fertility clinic.
* * *
Hansel and
Gretel and the E.P.A.
Near a great forest there lived a poor woodcutter and his wife and
his two children; the boy, Hansel and the girl, Gretel. They were very
poor, and they had very little to bite or to sup.
You would think that a woodcutter living near a great forest would
be able to find work; however, it was old-growth woods, and Earth
First! had spiked a large number of the trees. There were protests
nearly every week. And there was that spotted owl deal.
Anyway, one evening, as the woodcutter lay awake thinking of his lot
in life, his wife whispered, "What will become of us? We cannot feed
ourselves, let alone two growing children."
The woodcutter was silent.
"I have an idea," she continued. "Tomorrow, we shall take the
children deep into the forest, where it is thickest, we shall give each
of them a piece of bread, and then we will leave them there and they
will never find their way home again."
"Why not give them the bread before we go into the woods?"
"If we do that, they'll leave a trail of crumbs and find their way
back. Jeez! Don't you read these stories?"
"But won't the birds eat the crumbs anyway?"
"Hmmmm...maybe, but it's best not to take any chances."
So, the next morning they took the two children deep into the
forest, then they gave them some bread, and said, "Stay here, sweet
children, while we work. In the evening we will come and fetch you
home." Hansel and Gretel did as they were told. When they got hungry in
the afternoon, they ate their bread. The forest grew darker and darker,
until it was night, and no one ever came for the poor children. Hansel
and Gretel slept soundly on the ground.
In the morning, Hansel and Gretel wandered aimlessly through the
forest in a vain attempt at finding their way home. By chance they
discovered a little house sitting all by itself in a clearing. As they
got closer, they saw that the house was made of bread and cake and
candy and sugar. Hansel and Gretel eagerly set to work, breaking off
pieces of the house and stuffing their faces.
The wicked witch, whose kid-trap/house it was, opened the door and
said in her sweetest voice, "Dear children, you must come indoors and
stay with me. I am lonely and am not a wicked witch."
Hansel and Gretel looked at the witch, who was salivating, then
shared a wink with each other and said, quite sarcastically, "Oh, sure,
we'd love to come inside." And they did.
Once inside, they shoved the witch into her own oven.
"I needed a little protein after all those sweets," said he.
"Tastes just like chicken," said she.
As the witch was basting, there was a knock at the door. Gretel
opened it to find a suited bureaucrat standing there.
"Hi, Stan Godwin, E.P.A. I couldn't help noticing that charred pork
smell, and so I am hereby notifying you that you are in direct
violation of federal regulations. A number of environmental impact
studies have to be done. The smoke and debris from one body alone can
ruin things for generations to come."
Gretel opened the door wider and smiled very sweetly. She sang out
to her brother, "Oh, Hansel. We have company."
Hansel and Gretel feasted very well that evening.