In Memory of...uh...Thomas… Johnston
So...yeah. Hi there, folks. As Thomas’s friend--that’s me Melissa--in youth, I prepared a little thingy about him being worm food. Anyway, so I know we’ve all been prepared for this day to come for what seems like an eternity, and it finally arrived. Thomas Johnston died on this year of 2081, December 24th--that must have sucked (pause for laughter)--due to the tragic accident that occurred. As you all know, the two pilots armed with the nuclear bomb assigned to be dropped on Turkey (the country), got into a fierce argument about the suckiness of banana flavored candy and accidentally released the bomb ahead of schedule and completely off-target. The bomb fell upon the cranium of the departed--but luckily did not detonate--as Thomas’s body successfully cushioned the impact. All around were relieved, but we, us here, lost…a person.
Mr. Johnston was a very successful bloke throughout his life; he brought about changes to the entire world. As we all know, he alone brought an end to AIDS research, and I think we can all agree it was a long time coming. It was he that said: “What is this AIDS? I’ll tell you what it is, it’s an excuse to be lazy!” Many of us admired him for that. He also was the man who warned the world about the dangers of giraffes. He wanted posterity to know about the giraffes’s innate ability to scalp human beings. And it was he who replaced the dangerous creatures completely with origami likenesses. Now, when we take our children on safaris we can know that as they try and feed the paper giraffes they’re safe. Or in his words: “What are these giraffes? I’ll tell you what they are, they’re evil monstrous beings, jealous of our full heads of hair--beware!” Yes, he was a bit repetitive, a bit useless, but it's what we came to know and tolerate.
So, you know being his best friend, I’m sure he wouldn’t have been satisfied if you all left not knowing about me. I as you know, am Melissa the Great; you could probably tell by the glowy light that surrounds my head. I took over the world a few years ago. I’m the reason cavities no longer exist and we all eat cake every morning. I just recently cured leprosy last month while simultaneously releasing my book In the Life of Me: What It Feels Like to be Awesome, which is a New York Times best seller--thank you. Soon I’ll be going on my book signing tour, so look out, I may be coming to your town soon!
Oh yeah, well I guess we should get back to this little thing here...Uh...Where were we? Oh yeah. I guess...so...he wanted, also, to make sure his final words were known to all; they were these: Visit our blog at freepoundcake.blogspot.com. They’re definitely lasting words that we will keep in mind for at least another minute or so; after all, he usually had that effect on people.
We all experienced a great loss with his parting: he was a great target for insults. I mean it was so easy to make fun of him, no kidding. It’ll really be hard to find someone else that fills that role like he did. Sometimes I would just laugh and laugh and laugh at his expense with complete strangers. I can attest that it really blows to have to find someone else now who is such a big dork. I don’t know if I ever will.
Anyway, none felt his loss more than his wonderful mother, who said only “Thank God we took out that insurance policy when we did.” I think we can all sympathize with that--especially since we know his will is bound to be really disappointing.
And of course we must appreciate that Thomas had some pretty stupid religious beliefs. It is at this point that we have to recognize them as if they were important. Thomas would have liked that. Anyway, so if you’ll all take your glasses of Koolaid and add the hemlock, you can drink it, and I’ll simply supervise. Thomas would have called this The Drinking of the Poison. We can all meditate on the possible meanings behind that as you all drink.
Thomas Johnston is a name we will never forget, at least, you know like for today. As his best friend, Melissa, I can attest that Thomas was a unique person. He may not have been athletic, or particularly skilled, or very pleasant--but he was definitely human. He couldn’t cook rice unless he was being supervised. He really made irritating conversation with all he came into contact ; I’m sure we all wanted to kill ourselves at some point. Still, Thomas was a person who did things and said stuff, but most importantly he lived life, he lived life until the day he died.
Oh and by the way, the event today is being catered. There are some lovely finger foods in the reception area, and don’t forget to get your parking validated. Oh, finally, if anyone else is here to get out of jury duty, remember to get a copy of the death certificate. So...let’s join together and totally get our grub on.
-Melissa
Monday, October 26, 2009
Melissa's Eulogy
Thomas:
I know that this form of introduction is only given at weddings, so you might think it’s a bit callous or insensitive of me to use it at a funeral like this, but I just wrote this eulogy like five minutes ago so I didn’t exactly have enough time to develop a smashing intro. Anyway:
Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to commemorate the death of Melissa Meyer. Well, actually we’re here to commemorate the life of Melissa, but since life is not possible without death I guess really it’s an either/or situation. Besides, Melissa was kind of a morbid person so she might like it; to be honest I don’t care—I mean we’re going to commemorate something here, right, and who’ll remember whether it was a life or death in fifteen minutes anyway (I mean I know that as soon as I start eating those deviled eggs I’m not going to be thinking about anything else in this funeral).
Ok, well, yeah: Melissa, she’s dead now. It’s sort of sad, I suppose; I mean it wasn’t too sad. I mean, I don’t understand what the hell this person in the second row is crying all about; I was her best friend and you don’t see me losing it. For God’s sake get a grip on yourself. I mean I was there when she passed into that coma; I saw that errant windshield wiper launched from a nearby sudden car accident almost fly right through her head; I mean how do you think I felt when she, after recovering from such a near freak accident, tripped on the sidewalk just minutes later and fell into a coma? Well, actually now that I think about it I kind of laughed; she was a klutz you know, and I was just about to start mocking her for tripping over nothing in particular when I noticed that she wasn’t exactly recovering from the fall. Regardless, I was sad later; I mean I didn’t visit her in the hospital (I hate those Goddamn places) or anything and I most certainly didn’t interfere when her mom cut the cord on her life-support after only two days (hell, I would have done the same thing; she was a bitch after all, and I know FOR A FACT that if I were in a coma Melissa would have been just itching to pull my plug; I know she had it out for me straight from day one…).
Ok, I guess I said a couple of words about her life or something; I made a list of some stuff; hmmmm, let’s see. Oh here’s one! She was bent on world domination. Did you know that? Yeah who’s the saint now? I mean I’m telling you she’s no Mother Teresa , just ask that random guy she enslaved, Greg I think his name was. Yeah did you hear about that? She just pulled him off the street, pointed him out and declared, “You, midget person, what’s your name? Oh it doesn’t matter, you’re my slave now so come here and put these shackles on.” And she really did have real shackles, I mean they were metal and everything and came with one of those really old fashioned keys with the curly-cue ends, you know? Anyway, so yeah, I mean she had her negative sides, let me tell you. Um. Ok here’s another thing: she started the Glo-Green Initiative, which was kind of cool. I can’t remember the theory precisely but it involved exposing our children to radioactive waste in the hopes that their genes would mutate and their offspring might have an extra mouth, or arm, or possibly cancer, or something. It was a good program; it showed promise to the human race, which Melissa really wasn’t much of a fan of anyway. I mean, she actually approved of abortions not because she believed that women had full political rights over their bodies, but because getting abortions would limit the number of incoming humans, which she thought was really a crummy species marked by pandemic stupidity. You can’t really blame her for that; I mean about 97 per cent of the people in this room alone probably shouldn’t reproduce; heaven forbid if you did, I mean let our future generations have SOMETHING to look forward to.
Ok, well that pretty much sums up her life for you; it wasn’t really all that exciting now was it? Hmmmm, I suppose most people’s aren’t; that’s kind of sad, isn’t it? Whatever. Anyway, she gave this to me a long time ago and demanded that I read it at her funeral. It’s a little slip paper. It says, “Your coworkers take pleasure in your great sense of creativity.” There’s some lucky numbers or something on the back; they’re twenty-two, eighteen, twenty-seven, thirty-three, forty-eight, and two. I think it’s just one of those things you get in a fortune cookie. How’s that for laziness for you? I mean she couldn’t even take the time to put together a proper last statement. Well that’s just how she was, I suppose.
Oh, I think her mom has an announcement to make; that’s nice isn’t it? Yeah, go ahead; take the podium.
Melissa’s Mother:
I just wanted to ask if anyone here had any Tylenol; my head is just killing me today. I think it’s all the potpourri this funeral parlor put out; if I had known they were going to include this shit, I’d have gone to the place down the street instead. But yeah, if anyone has any Tylenol, I’d really appreciate it if you lent me some. Thanks.
Thomas:
Yeah that potpourri really sucks; who the hell uses that stuff anyway?
Melissa’s Mother:
Yeah I know! I mean we have to contend with a dead person here; you’d think they would be a bit more considerate. It’s not bad enough that my daughter’s passed away; oh no, I have to put up with this fruity garbage as well.
Thomas:
Yeah; I think Margaret has some Tylenol for you over there.
Melissa’s Mother:
Oh thank God; coming Margaret.
Thomas:
Ok well I know everyone has stuff to do, so I guess I’ll wrap it up. Melissa. She was really great wasn’t she? Yeah. I’ll miss her, I guess. I mean she really helped me pass the time; I know I would have been SO bored had she not been present in my life. Yeah. Well that’s that I guess; there’s some cheesecake in the atrium, I think. I’m going to go get a slice. So…yeah…
-Thomas
I know that this form of introduction is only given at weddings, so you might think it’s a bit callous or insensitive of me to use it at a funeral like this, but I just wrote this eulogy like five minutes ago so I didn’t exactly have enough time to develop a smashing intro. Anyway:
Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today to commemorate the death of Melissa Meyer. Well, actually we’re here to commemorate the life of Melissa, but since life is not possible without death I guess really it’s an either/or situation. Besides, Melissa was kind of a morbid person so she might like it; to be honest I don’t care—I mean we’re going to commemorate something here, right, and who’ll remember whether it was a life or death in fifteen minutes anyway (I mean I know that as soon as I start eating those deviled eggs I’m not going to be thinking about anything else in this funeral).
Ok, well, yeah: Melissa, she’s dead now. It’s sort of sad, I suppose; I mean it wasn’t too sad. I mean, I don’t understand what the hell this person in the second row is crying all about; I was her best friend and you don’t see me losing it. For God’s sake get a grip on yourself. I mean I was there when she passed into that coma; I saw that errant windshield wiper launched from a nearby sudden car accident almost fly right through her head; I mean how do you think I felt when she, after recovering from such a near freak accident, tripped on the sidewalk just minutes later and fell into a coma? Well, actually now that I think about it I kind of laughed; she was a klutz you know, and I was just about to start mocking her for tripping over nothing in particular when I noticed that she wasn’t exactly recovering from the fall. Regardless, I was sad later; I mean I didn’t visit her in the hospital (I hate those Goddamn places) or anything and I most certainly didn’t interfere when her mom cut the cord on her life-support after only two days (hell, I would have done the same thing; she was a bitch after all, and I know FOR A FACT that if I were in a coma Melissa would have been just itching to pull my plug; I know she had it out for me straight from day one…).
Ok, I guess I said a couple of words about her life or something; I made a list of some stuff; hmmmm, let’s see. Oh here’s one! She was bent on world domination. Did you know that? Yeah who’s the saint now? I mean I’m telling you she’s no Mother Teresa , just ask that random guy she enslaved, Greg I think his name was. Yeah did you hear about that? She just pulled him off the street, pointed him out and declared, “You, midget person, what’s your name? Oh it doesn’t matter, you’re my slave now so come here and put these shackles on.” And she really did have real shackles, I mean they were metal and everything and came with one of those really old fashioned keys with the curly-cue ends, you know? Anyway, so yeah, I mean she had her negative sides, let me tell you. Um. Ok here’s another thing: she started the Glo-Green Initiative, which was kind of cool. I can’t remember the theory precisely but it involved exposing our children to radioactive waste in the hopes that their genes would mutate and their offspring might have an extra mouth, or arm, or possibly cancer, or something. It was a good program; it showed promise to the human race, which Melissa really wasn’t much of a fan of anyway. I mean, she actually approved of abortions not because she believed that women had full political rights over their bodies, but because getting abortions would limit the number of incoming humans, which she thought was really a crummy species marked by pandemic stupidity. You can’t really blame her for that; I mean about 97 per cent of the people in this room alone probably shouldn’t reproduce; heaven forbid if you did, I mean let our future generations have SOMETHING to look forward to.
Ok, well that pretty much sums up her life for you; it wasn’t really all that exciting now was it? Hmmmm, I suppose most people’s aren’t; that’s kind of sad, isn’t it? Whatever. Anyway, she gave this to me a long time ago and demanded that I read it at her funeral. It’s a little slip paper. It says, “Your coworkers take pleasure in your great sense of creativity.” There’s some lucky numbers or something on the back; they’re twenty-two, eighteen, twenty-seven, thirty-three, forty-eight, and two. I think it’s just one of those things you get in a fortune cookie. How’s that for laziness for you? I mean she couldn’t even take the time to put together a proper last statement. Well that’s just how she was, I suppose.
Oh, I think her mom has an announcement to make; that’s nice isn’t it? Yeah, go ahead; take the podium.
Melissa’s Mother:
I just wanted to ask if anyone here had any Tylenol; my head is just killing me today. I think it’s all the potpourri this funeral parlor put out; if I had known they were going to include this shit, I’d have gone to the place down the street instead. But yeah, if anyone has any Tylenol, I’d really appreciate it if you lent me some. Thanks.
Thomas:
Yeah that potpourri really sucks; who the hell uses that stuff anyway?
Melissa’s Mother:
Yeah I know! I mean we have to contend with a dead person here; you’d think they would be a bit more considerate. It’s not bad enough that my daughter’s passed away; oh no, I have to put up with this fruity garbage as well.
Thomas:
Yeah; I think Margaret has some Tylenol for you over there.
Melissa’s Mother:
Oh thank God; coming Margaret.
Thomas:
Ok well I know everyone has stuff to do, so I guess I’ll wrap it up. Melissa. She was really great wasn’t she? Yeah. I’ll miss her, I guess. I mean she really helped me pass the time; I know I would have been SO bored had she not been present in my life. Yeah. Well that’s that I guess; there’s some cheesecake in the atrium, I think. I’m going to go get a slice. So…yeah…
-Thomas
Thursday, October 22, 2009
THE BEGINNING…. Of the beginning.
By: Melissa The Great
In the beginning, before words… before Starbucks, iPods and Beef Jerky… there was a chicken.
Her name was Ms. Henrietta Big.
One day a fly named Gabe, came before her and told her that she was carrying inside her the coming of a divine being. She was with egg.
“Cluck?” She exclaimed.
“Yes, it’s true.” Gabe replied. “Soon you will hatch the future under your bottom.”
As the day drew near Ms. Big became very nervous and started to feel funny. Finally, as she began to lay her egg she suddenly… exploded. The explosion was so great everything around her simultaneously expanded. Feathers and crap flew everywhere, and in its wake, was an egg.
It was the most amazing egg ever.
Gabe, the Fly, knew he had to hatch it himself, as Eggie-Poo’s mother was now a conflagration of chicken poop and down feathers.
“Eggs need warmth.” Gabe concluded, and so, being too small to provide the great egg with sufficient heat, he created a large glowing ball of fire to keep it warm. This was called the Sun.
Well as the egg sat in front of the flaming ball it began to melt. Gabe started to panic.
“What shall I do!?!?!”
However, as Gabe began buzzing around and getting really annoying , the egg continued to melt until the wondrous ooze inside seeped out of its cracks.
Mmmm… so delicious--uh, so anyway Gabe barely noticed but from the ooze arose a grand, fabulous, ravishing…
Ian McKellen
I know what you’re thinking, Ian McKellen? But why? Well you see, if you rearrange Ian McKellen, and disregard a few of the letters and then add some, it clearly spells “Almighty.”
Ian McKellen = Almighty
For story-telling purposes, however, we’ll just refer to the Almighty as God.
And so Gabe the Fly set out to teach God how to be an all-powerful ruler. There were a few rules God had to learn first:
1. Be merciful.
2. Be just.
3. Do not disrupt free will.
4. Create something great.
It was easy for God to be merciful and just. The free will thing was simple enough, but the last rule really baffled God. What could an all-powerful ruler endeavor to create that would be fitting for a divine being?
God pondered.
And pondered.
And pondered.
Finally, God had the perfect idea, and he began working. Like a natural he created the earth and oceans, trees and flowers. He even created creatures that looked a lot like him. He called them humans. Humans looked like this:
The humans that God made were perhaps the most interesting of all his works. They created things themselves, like art, music and literature. He was delighted by his creations.
But you might be wondering why, why create the Earth and people?
The answer to this is: to make The One Divine Creation, The Ultimate Work of Brilliance:
By: Melissa The Great
In the beginning, before words… before Starbucks, iPods and Beef Jerky… there was a chicken.
Her name was Ms. Henrietta Big.
One day a fly named Gabe, came before her and told her that she was carrying inside her the coming of a divine being. She was with egg.
“Cluck?” She exclaimed.
“Yes, it’s true.” Gabe replied. “Soon you will hatch the future under your bottom.”
As the day drew near Ms. Big became very nervous and started to feel funny. Finally, as she began to lay her egg she suddenly… exploded. The explosion was so great everything around her simultaneously expanded. Feathers and crap flew everywhere, and in its wake, was an egg.
It was the most amazing egg ever.
Gabe, the Fly, knew he had to hatch it himself, as Eggie-Poo’s mother was now a conflagration of chicken poop and down feathers.
“Eggs need warmth.” Gabe concluded, and so, being too small to provide the great egg with sufficient heat, he created a large glowing ball of fire to keep it warm. This was called the Sun.
Well as the egg sat in front of the flaming ball it began to melt. Gabe started to panic.
“What shall I do!?!?!”
However, as Gabe began buzzing around and getting really annoying , the egg continued to melt until the wondrous ooze inside seeped out of its cracks.
Mmmm… so delicious--uh, so anyway Gabe barely noticed but from the ooze arose a grand, fabulous, ravishing…
Ian McKellen
I know what you’re thinking, Ian McKellen? But why? Well you see, if you rearrange Ian McKellen, and disregard a few of the letters and then add some, it clearly spells “Almighty.”
Ian McKellen = Almighty
For story-telling purposes, however, we’ll just refer to the Almighty as God.
And so Gabe the Fly set out to teach God how to be an all-powerful ruler. There were a few rules God had to learn first:
1. Be merciful.
2. Be just.
3. Do not disrupt free will.
4. Create something great.
It was easy for God to be merciful and just. The free will thing was simple enough, but the last rule really baffled God. What could an all-powerful ruler endeavor to create that would be fitting for a divine being?
God pondered.
And pondered.
And pondered.
Finally, God had the perfect idea, and he began working. Like a natural he created the earth and oceans, trees and flowers. He even created creatures that looked a lot like him. He called them humans. Humans looked like this:
The humans that God made were perhaps the most interesting of all his works. They created things themselves, like art, music and literature. He was delighted by his creations.
But you might be wondering why, why create the Earth and people?
The answer to this is: to make The One Divine Creation, The Ultimate Work of Brilliance:
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