The Emperor's New Clothes – Fact vs. Fiction (Installment 2 of "Fat Fairy Tales")

As the president of S.E.N.S.A. (The Society for Ethical Negation of Stupid Allegations) I feel it

incumbent upon me to right a tragic wrong that is long overdue.  The Emperor suffered a severe

blow to his reputation from which he was never able to recover.  As representatives of the

family, S.E.N.S.A. has undertaken an investigation that has spanned centuries.  We are happy to

report our findings, and finally clear the good name of this much maligned ruler, posthumously,

for the benefit of his family.

Myth 1:  The Emperor was extremely vain and overly conscience of his clothes and appearance.

Fact:  Although the Emperor did indeed dress in very fine attire, including fur trimmed robes

made from the finest purple cloth; this was not his personal wish.  It was more a matter of peer

pressure stemming from what the other monarchs of the time were wearing.  We believe the

spread of this falsehood could have also been the result of confusion on the part of his

biographer, H.C. Anderson.  Anderson published the emperor’s biography the same time as the

Little Mermaid’s.  Miss Mermaid herself was not able to wear anything other than green scales

on her lower extremities; abandoned mollusk shells to cover her top; and sea weed to adorn her

hair – resulting in an intense jealousy of the emperor’s finery.  It was likely she who started the

vicious rumors of the emperor’s conceit.

Purse Diving

My friends wonder how I get so much writing done while I’m at work. They think I must not have very much to do. Actually, while my body is busy completing the mundane tasks of an administrative drone, my brain actually has too much time on it’s… hands. Let me demonstrate:

As I was standing outside the office and digging around in my uber fashionable - but way too carnivorous (wait – I meant really, really, big – not meat-eating) purse this morning, searching for my access card, I happened upon my name tag. Normally, something this small would never come to hand without a stadium powered light and an hour long frisk that’d make any Man-in-Blue proud. Everything smaller than my trout sized wallet merely churns around my hand elusively with the rest of the flotsam (make up, eye drops, pens, mints, etc.) while I fish for bigger items. My access card is the exception though, due to the attached 2 foot long, red and blue (Go Wildcats!) lanyard. Reaching in elbow deep and groping around for a minute or so, I simply hook a finger into the lanyard and pull the whole thing out of the abyss with only a small shower of receipts, envelopes and gum wrappers cascading to the ground.

Shakespearean Insults as Marketing Slogans

For all you hard working, self starters out there with no imagination; it’s time you teamed up with a creative genius – Shakespeare – for some really great marketing slogans.

Not so much brain as earwax- How great would this be etched on the office door of an ENT or Brain Surgeon?

Foot Licker - Every place of business has one of these 16th century equivalents of the butt kisser. Hang this placard in their cubical one day when their out getting the boss’ dry cleaning.

The soul of this man is in his clothes – Sign displayed on Rodeo Drive – customers think it’s a compliment.

Light of brain – After binge eating all week, this is the only way my Weight Watcher leader could explain my 3 pound weight loss.

Birth Order Mongrel

As a self-help theory collector, I’m intrigued by the Birth Order theory. I adore Kevin Leman, but I’m too cheap to buy his book so I had to resort to googling my wrists into a carpal tunnel frenzy to find (probably inaccurate yet very entertaining) information. Here are the bits and pieces (many of them contradictory) I was able to glean.

The main categories are: Firstborn; Middle Child; Youngest Child; and Only Child (similar to first born).

Since my only sibling is an older brother, I must be the baby, right? Not so fast. A lot of the "youngest" traits didn’t fit me, and a quiz I took revealed that I was probably the third-born (middle) child. What's going on here? I don’t remember any unwanted younger sibling being put up for adoption.

Here’s where the tricky variations come in.

What They're Doing Now (Installment 1 of "Fat Fairy Tales")

A condensed verson of this story was published on HumorPress.com - the April/May 2011 edition.

The Daily Herald
News Flash!

How the West was Framed


Reporter: Sir, aren’t you the attorney who defended the Wicked Witch of the West?
Attorney: I handled her appeal, yes. Quite successfully, I might add.
Reporter: What's she doing now?
Attorney: I believe she’s on Broadway.

````
I read those words from a yellowed newspaper as my host Wanda set a cup of steaming, fresh brewed coffee in front of me.

Wanda sighed. “I can still remember reading that interview as if it was yesterday. For the first time in years I began to feel hope. If The Wicked Witch of the West’s conviction could be overturned after all these years, then maybe I could get justice too. That’s one of the reasons I called you.”

“But I’m not a lawyer.”

“Oh I know. West’s hot shot lawyer has offered to take me on as a client pro bono.”

“Pro bono? That’s surprising. Usually he only represents wealthy clients.”

“No kidding. West had to sell off most of her flying monkeys – she was heart broken. No, I called you because I read the biography you did for The Big Bad Wolf. I was mesmerized - couldn’t put it down. I had no idea he had such a traumatic childhood.”

“Thank you, I’m flattered. Did you know him well?”

“Only in his later years, when he was just a shell of a canine. By that time all his teeth had fallen out. Quite sad, really. Kind of hard to gum grandma to death, ya know?”

Yipee! Help Me Celebrate!

"The Slang Gods Have Spoken" was published on HumorPress.com. It received Honorable Mention in the Feb./March "America's Funniest Humor" Contest. Check it out at HumorPress.com, Contests, Honorable Mention, "The Slang Gods Have Spoken" by Virginia Jacobson (my real name :-)

Do You Know Where Your Lip Gloss Has Been?

Do You Know Where Your Lip Gloss Has Been?

My mother taught me, with the exception of my sister or best friend, not to use other people’s cosmetics. But who hasn’t stood at the mirror in the lady’s room on a Saturday night and swiped foreign lipstick across their mouth without thinking twice about it? But as a rule I’ve followed her advice pretty closely- until yesterday. Where do you draw the line of association? What if the lip gloss belongs to a co-worker? Harmless, right?

Wrong! In my defense, I have to say right now, that my spidey senses told me not to do it. It was just one of those things that you know intuitively. But I’m also the type of person who takes pains not to offend, and often end up being tactful to the point of abandoning good judgment. Ok, yes, a follower.

From this point on, the names have been changed to protect the innocent- and the bizarre.

Janine is a wonderfully friendly and exuberant woman I’ve worked with for about a month. She has an attractive face, long flowing dark hair, and an hour glass figure leaning a little toward Ruben-esk. She is exuberent, but seemingly innocent at the same time.

On my way to the break room one day, I joined another co-worker, Debra in a tête-à-tête at her desk. Janine was applying lip gloss from a container the size of a one pound Noxema jar. She offered some to each of us. We both declined. Then I got a whiff of a yummy strawberry scent. Hmmm, my lips WERE rather dry.

“Ok, I’ll try some.”