Saying Goodbye To Moms Day!

The government announced its plan for all the moms to be put on a giant boat and all the dads to be housed in this big glassed-in part of the forest.

“It’ll be fun,” the government announced.

Today’s the day the moms get on the boat and you’re really sad to have to say goodbye to your mom.

“Was I a good mother to you?” your mom asks you.

You nod even though she was terrible. Just really emotionally damaging and neglectful. But you’re still really sad to see her go. She was your mom for Pete’s sake. And now she’s getting on a boat with a bunch of other moms and they’re going to tell her how they raised their kids and she’s finally going to realize what a terrible mom she was to you.

“I wish the government wasn’t making you go away,” you say to her.

“Rules are rules,” your mom says.

You and your mom cry together, holding each other tight. You’re surprised by how sad you are. Maybe this is why the government did this. To remind everyone how important moms are.

“I love you, Mom,” you say for the first time ever.

“I love you too,” she says back, surprised to hear the words come out of her mouth.

Then you watch her get on the boat and go away until the law can be overturned in Congress. That night you go home and write the government a thank you letter.

“If it wasn’t for your law requiring that she be shipped out to see, I never would have heard my mom say I love you. So, thanks,” you write.

The government never writes you back. Busy, I guess.

Happy Saying Goodbye To Moms Day!

Making Conversation In Jail Day!

You’re in jail and you’re feeling like you and your fellow inmates never talk.

“I see you guys every day but I feel like we barely know a thing about each other,” you tell the five inmates with whom you’re crowded into a two-person cell.

“What you wanna know?” Scary Ralph, one of the inmates asks.

“Well, what are your interests?”

Scary Ralph says he’s interested in setting fire to Crazy Murray, who distributes books for the library.

“He was using the bench in the yard,” he says. “That’s our yard.”

You start to say that you’d rather know about his deeper interests, like what really makes him tick, but just then you hear the squeaky wheels of the library cart. Before you know it, Scary Ralph has sprayed Crazy Murray with something flammable and tossed a match. You know then there’s not going to be any conversation had today, not with Crazy Murray running around screaming in agony like he does. Can’t even hear yourself think.

Happy Making Conversation In Jail Day!

Two Wishes Day!

You found an old lantern in the woods and you rubbed it and a genie popped out and granted you two wishes.

“Just to test this out, I wish that Kansas was gone.”

The genie says cool, then you check your phone and find CNN reporting that Kansas is gone and everyone there is presumed dead. Everyone in the country’s sad now.

“Aw man, okay bring Kansas back.”

The genie says cool then disappears. You check your phone and find out they found Kansas and everyone’s fine. Way to waste two wishes, dumbass.

Happy Two Wishes Day!

Sam’s Gross Day!

You and your friends are megawealthy and you all were flying in a private jet when you crashed into a mountain. Your buddy Sam died in the crash and now you’re all eating him.

“Sam’s gross,” your buddy Martin says while chewing some of Sam’s thigh meat.

“Ew, I hate Sam,” your buddy Leo says, attempting to swallow a hunk of Sam’s ass.

“I personally will refrain from criticizing how Sam tastes, and instead sit in thanks to him for the meat he is providing us,” you say. “You’re saving our lives Sam. Thank you.”

That makes everyone feel bad, until you take a bite of Sam’s calf and you throw up all over the fire. With the fire out, you’re all gonna die out there.

Happy Sam’s Gross Day!

The Dog Ignorer Day!

“Dogs that misbehave just want attention,” is what you tell your clients. “I don’t give it to them.”

Today you’re working with Felix, a terrier mix that won’t stop yapping day and night, and loves to tear up the couch cushions.

“Give me seventy-five days,” you tell his owners. “That’s all I need.”

They pay you your twenty thousand dollar fee and you spend the next seventy-five days living in their home with Felix (they’re required to find lodging elsewhere) and ignoring him.

No matter how much he barks, no matter how many items in the house he destroys, you won’t even look in Felix’s direction. By the seventy-fifth day, when the owners come home, they’ll find Felix sitting despondently in the corner, wondering why he doesn’t matter to anybody, wondering if he even exists. When the owners pet Felix, he’ll have trouble registering the affection. He won’t be able to understand that there are other beings in the room with him and that they know he is there. That’s the power you have over dogs.

“You did it!” they’ll shout, before looking around the house and seeing what a shambles Felix made of it. “Guess it was worth it.”

“Your dog should be existentially terrorized enough to behave now,” you tell them while bagging up everything in the fridge (you never leave food behind).

“Thank you, Dog Ignorer!” they’ll shout as you climb into your car to go home to your cats.

Happy The Dog Ignorer Day!

On Your Balcony Day!

The guy you’re cheating on your husband with climbed out onto your balcony to hide while you and your husband make love. Your husband came home from his trip unexpectedly so you shoved your secret lover out there. Whether you’re pretending or not, he really can’t stand listening to you pant and squeal ecstatically while your husband takes you on your bedroom floor.

To get away from the sound, he’s climbing down from the balcony. He’s going to try and scale the building, balcony to balcony, until he descends the eleven floors to the bottom.

“To what do I owe this honor?” your downstairs neighbor asks him as he dangles down over her outdoor furniture.

“Long story,” he says to her. She’s in a bathrobe and nothing else.

“I’ve got a long morning ahead of me,” she says. “Tea?”

It starts with tea, then it moves inside for breakfast, then a drink on the couch, then to the bed. He doesn’t leave her apartment for three days. He doesn’t respond to your texts apologizing. You don’t hear from him for weeks.

When you and your husband board the elevator one day and he and your downstairs neighbor are on it, holding hands, you and he exchange one brief glance and nothing more. That’s when you’ll learn where he went off to after he went out on your balcony and disappeared.

Happy On Your Balcony Day!

Lotion Suggests Day!

“I know what that means,” your young son says when he spies you rubbing lotion into your hands and arms before bed. “You and Dad are no longer sexually interested in each other.”

You ask him what makes him think that.

“You’re rubbing lotion into your arms,” he says. “On TV and in the movies, when it’s a couple that’s still way into each other, the woman doesn’t rub lotion into her arms before bed. They just have sex a bunch and bounce each other around on their genitals until they pass out. It’s only when the couple is older and disinterested that the woman rubs lotion into her arms.”

Your husband comes out of the bathroom.

“What’s going on?” he asks.

“Nothing,” you say. You shoe your son away from the room, then you throw the lotion in the trash. You’re worried by what your son said. Have you two lost interest in each other? Does lotion indicate that the passion is gone and you’re just doing what you can to stave off death?

You vow then and there to never use lotion again. Your sex life doesn’t improve and your arms grow chapped. You should never listen to your kids.

Happy Lotion Suggests Day!

Murder Party Day!

The scary new teenage trend is for teens to get together and throw a Murder Party. Kids meet up and prove how cool they are by murdering each other. It’s considered cool to be all, “Pssh, who cares about human life? I only like my phone.” And on the flip side, “Pssh, I don’t care if I get murdered. It’s like, whatevs. Hashtag.”

You sat your daughter down and asked her if any peers have been pressuring her to kill or be killed. She said she’s more into the scene where high school kids record each other performing oral sex and post it online, so you can rest easy. Your little girl isn’t falling into the wrong crowd.

Happy Murder Party Day!

Office Show & Tell Day!

Your office has started a Show & Tell Day to help employees get to know each other. Each employee brings something from their home and tells everyone a little bit about it.

“These are my father’s ashes,” Diane in accounting says while holding an urn. “They are very important to me because I didn’t talk to him for the last few years of his life, and I regret it.”

“That’s my Acura out there,” Mark in sales says, pointing out the window at his car in the parking lot. “Sometimes when I go home from work I’ll park down the block from my house and just sit there in my Acura, wondering if I should go home and have dinner with my wife and kids, or just make a U-turn and hit the road.”

“This is part of a collage I’m making of all of us,” you tell everyone, holding a small (6 feet by 7 feet) section of your coworker collage. “As you can see, I’ve been taking photos of all of you at your desks when you weren’t looking, and at your homes on the weekends. I’ve been keeping a document of our time together. It’s pretty much covering all the walls of my garage.”

After you’re fired, go home and set fire to the collage while sitting in the middle of the garage floor. The flames will climb to the ceiling, but the smoke will take you before the roof caves in.

Happy Office Show & Tell Day!

Motion To Make Love Day!

Things have been getting hotter and hotter between you and the prosecuting attorney this entire trial. Everyone can feel it. The judge. The millionaire you’re defending for murdering his mistress. Even the bailiff has spent the entire trial nodding knowingly in your direction.

“I object,” the prosecution says during your cross-direct.

“Aw yeah,” says the judge, sucking in air like he’s done every time you two have gotten combative.

Members of the jury have been moving their chairs closer together. You’ve noticed some of them enjoying some roving hands. There are rumors of hook ups going on during the sequester.

“Your honor, if the prosecution would allow me–”

“Don’t tell me, tell her,” the judge says. “Go talk to her. Let her know how you feel.”

It’s unorthdox, but you walk over to the prosecution table and you look the assistant district attorney in the eye.

“If you’d let me–”

“Say her name!” your client yells.

Everyone in the chamber murmurs in agreement.

“Janet,” you say. “If you’d just let me finish, you’d see what my intentions are for this line of questioning.”

“I’d like to know your intentions now,” she whispers.

You could hear a pin drop in the courtroom.

“My intentions,” you say. “Are to reveal the truth. To lay it out flat, rip off all the layers hiding it until it’s bare. Naked and bare and defenseless.”

“Then what?” Janet pants.

“Then I will explore the truth, tease out all it’s hidden mysteries and revelatory realms, until I’ve discovered every hidden nook, until there’s nothing left.”

She’s out of her seat.

“Enter the motion,” she says.

“Your honor,” you shout, your eyes not wavering from hers. “The defense would like to enter the motion to make love.”

“I’ll allow it,” the judge says, clapping his gavel.

The prosecution lunges across the table and you lay her down on the wood and you take her, there in a court of law, the blindfolded lady of justice statue the only one not watching, savoring your every thrust like the entire justice system rests on whether the two of you consummate before the judge calls for a break for lunch. Objections sustained and objections overruled, the energy of your back-and-forth creates a kinetic mass of writhing flesh, the fight for a man’s guilt or innocence passionately and wordlessly fought. Until finally, exhaustedly, you raise your panting head from her neck and say to the judge:

“Your honor, the defense rests.”

Everyone in the chamber applauds. You pull on your clothes. The trial resumes and you lose. You’re a terrible lawyer.

Happy Motion To Make Love Day!

Promote Your Marriage Day!

You and your husband are deeply in love and you have a great relationship, so it’s time to get the word out there and increase awareness of your bond. Schedule some outreach events to give your city’s tastemakers the chance to experience the brand that is your eternal devotion to each other. Maybe like a brunch where you both order separate entrees but you also share a pancake. You’ll also have to amp up your social networking presence. Forget about the “I married my best friend” posts. Your status updates need to place yourself in the hierarchy of couples in your area. You need to challenge that top spot. “Our love is the best in the tri-state area” is the way you want to go. Boost that post. Finally, hire some public access cameramen to record your lovemaking document and get that up on YouPorn today. There’s a reason cooking shows are so popular. People aren’t going to care about food unless they get to see it made. Same goes for your love. Get the lighting perfect and watch those side-profile shots. Your stomach has more folds than you think. I can already smell the smoke from your Klout score soaring sky high.

Happy Promote Your Marriage Day!

Learn To Respect Physical Pain Day!

Start by shoving thumbtacks in your forearm. Show that pain some respect. Call it sir and tell it you find its opinions valid and informed. Move on to stubbed toes. Walk around the house jamming your toes into things. Tell that stubbed toe pain, “You are important and your contributions to society are essential.” The final step is to hold your arm over a lit burner on the stove. That’s really going to hurt, and you’re going to experience that pain respectfully. Don’t talk back to it. Don’t dismiss it. Look it in the eye and do unto it as you would have it do unto you. Buy your pain flowers and ask it how it’s fucking day was.

Happy Learn To Respect Physical Pain Day!

College Boy Day!

Today you’re College Boy and you’re starting a new job working at a plant to make some extra money to buy college fun like drugs and beer pong accessories. You know everything that the yokels you work with don’t know and you aren’t afraid to correct them. When they talk about what they’re doing to lower their cholesterol, you’ll tell them that studies show there are better methods. When they talk about how they deal with their wives during disputes, you’ll correct them with more effective tactics for conflict resolution. When they talk about how their bosses are mistreating them, you’ll correct them with what the state’s labor laws say is legal and what counts as unfair labor practices. For talking down to them, they’ll stab you and leave you for dead in the alley after lunch, but for the days and years to come, their lives will be vastly improved thanks to your educated suggestions. Their health, their career, and their home lives will all show betterment, all thanks to that snot-nose punk college boy they killed because he was asking for it. You will be remembered as kind of a snobby little know-it-all who deserved to have his gut bled, but you will also be remembered with gratitude, College Boy.

Happy College Boy Day!

Run Away With Your Girlfriend Day!

You shouldn’t leave high school without running away with a girlfriend at least once. If you don’t have a girlfriend, get one. Make sure her parents disapprove of you, and make sure her bedroom window is easily accessible by either a tree branch or a sturdy trellis. After her parents forbid her from seeing you, meet for several late-night make-out sessions in her room or in the dugout of a local little league field. You should one night, under the moon, elope. It’s not official in the eyes of the court or anything so don’t worry that you’ll have to divorce later. But she should go home to her parents and tell them that she’s married to you now. That will make her parents decide to ship her off to either her grandmother’s or a boarding school that will take her in an emergency. On the night before she’s supposed to go away, steal all the money from your parents that you can, go to her bedroom window, and help her down onto the lawn. Then run off into the night and board a bus to the big city (whichever one is nearest to you). You’ll run out of money in minutes, and you’ll get bored with each other because high school age people aren’t interesting. When you do, have her call her parents and tell them to come pick her up. You can either go back to your parents, or stay in the city scraping by to pursue a life of dance or as the underage bar-back at a dinner theater or something. Pack extra socks and underwear.

Happy Run Away With Your Girlfriend Day!

Mom, Dad, Etc. Day!

You’re dreading going home for Thanksgiving because you don’t get along with your parents’ girlfriend. She’s a college girl, about your age, and you can’t help but look down on her for carrying on a sexual relationship with your parents these past couple years. The worst part is Pam gets better grades than you and is on a pre-med track, so you have to deal with your parents bragging about how well she’s doing in school and how glad they are that she answered their ad when they decided to expand their relationship.

Problem is, you really need their attention right now. You’ve been suffering ever since your boyfriend, Henry, broke up with you at the start of the semester. You can’t bear the thought of having to go home and watch your parents fawn all over Pam when you need your mom and dad.

“Pam’s gone,” your mom will tell you over the phone today. “She said she wanted to be with a couple closer to her age.”

“Oh,” you say, trying to stifle your relief. “I’m sorry. I hope you aren’t hurt.”

“We’re not,” your mom says.

“Because I know how that feels,” you say. “I know how hard it can be to feel that kind of loss. I’ve been going through–”

“We’re good, seriously,” your mom interrupts. “We’re seeing someone new.”

“Already?” you ask. “How did you find someone so quickly?”

“Well, our little daughter helped us out in that regard,” your mom says. “Remember that boyfriend you brought home last Spring?”

You don’t have the breath to say his name.

“Henry called us out of the blue,” your mom says. “We hit it off. Is this cool with you, by the way?”

Happy Mom, Dad, Etc. Day!

The Nanny Diary Day!

You’re a nanny who started a diary. It’s boring because who cares. You get fired when the parents who hired you lose their jobs and move closer to their parents to use them to help with child care. You start an ex-nanny diary and it’s a big hit. You die rich.

Happy The Nanny Diary Day!

Planet Marlboro Day!

You just figured out that you’ve smoked so many cigarettes over the years that you now have enough Marlboro Miles to redeem for your own planet.

“Yes, it’s called Planet Marlboro,” an operator says.

You ask her where it is. And what the atmosphere is like.

“It’s in space. I don’t know. Somewhere way the hell out there.”

The operator puts you on hold to find out about the atmosphere. When she comes back she says, “It’s like Pluto.”

“Pluto?” you say.

She puts you on hold again.

“I was wrong. It is Pluto. Or, was.”

When Pluto got kicked out of the solar system it was up for grabs, she explains. So Marlboro bought it and threw it in as a premium reward in the little Marlboro Miles catalog.

“You want it or not?” the operator asks. “Hello? All I hear is a loud beep.”

You drop your phone and the nurses kick it into the closet as they race into your hospital room to try and revive you. In your mind, you’re begging the nurses to tell the operator yes, you want Planet Marlboro. You want to go with your family knowing smoking took your life, but it gave you a celestial body to ascend to. But you fade, and you end.

Happy Planet Marlboro Day!

Sam And Diane Day!

Your 6-year-old daughter just watched the episode where Diane calls off the wedding and leaves the bar. Now she’s trashing her bedroom and threatening to set fire to the whole house.

“Sweetie,” you plead with her through her door. “Please, just calm down and think about it. They were polar opposites.”

“That’s why they fit so well!” she screams. “Each found what they were lacking in the other!”

You try to explain that things get complicated when you get older, but you can hear her smashing her Barbie Dream House to bits.

“All is lies!” she screams.

“Come on, honey,” you say. “He’s Sammy! Mayday Malone! He’s supposed to be out there playing the field, not sitting on the bench with a bookworm.”

She keeps smashing stuff. You’re getting worried.

“Me and daddy will always be together,” you say. “You don’t have to worry about that.”

Your daughter opens the door.

“Sam and Diane were together because it was dangerous. It was uncomfortable,” she says. “You and dad are together because it’s safe.”

You go downstairs and prepare dinner. When your husband sits down at the table and asks where your daughter is, you say she’s coming down with something so you put her to bed. You don’t want to tell him what she said. You wish she was at the table though. You wish you had someone to look at besides him.

Happy Sam And Diane Day!

Rebirth Day!

Today you’re going to be reborn as a lion. You’ll live in nature and hunt for your food and roam free across the land and you’ll never get to watch TV again or play a cell phone game or get drunk to deal with your childhood and yeah it’s going to suck. Enjoy constantly murdering things.

Happy Rebirth Day!

Teen Wedding Craze Day!

Teens are getting married left and right. It’s the new trend. Your state was running out of money so they lowered the marriageable age to 13 years old, with no need for parental consent. Thousands of teens experiencing puppy love have been flocking to city hall and joining in the bonds of holy matrimony.

It’s also been a windfall of legal fees as parents force their kids to go through lengthy divorce proceedings. Poorer families with handsome sons and beautiful daughters began instructing their kids to throw themselves at the homely children of the wealthy to legally bond the families, making their poor children heirs to the fortunes of the rich. Your 13-year-old daughter is one of those rich girls who got tricked into marrying a poor, but strapping boy.

“We’re in love,” your daughter protests.

“He only wants you because your parents want our money,” you tell her.

“You’re just jealous because he’s better looking than dad,” your daughter says.

She’s right. Your husband is disgusting.

“You have so many years ahead of you,” you tell her. “When you get to college, boys will discover the cerebral component to sexuality and they’ll throw themselves at you.”

“I don’t want a college boy,” your daughter says. “I want Buck.”

Buck holds her more tightly. They’re probably naked under their bedsheets, and there’s nothing you can do about it. A married couple has the right to their marriage bed.

“Buzz off lady,” Buck shouts, throwing one of his wife’s stuffed animals at you. “Leave my lady alone.”

You leave your daughter’s bedroom and head downstairs to your husband in the living room.

“He takes care of her,” you tell your husband. “He stands up for her.”

“So?” your husband says.

“So,” you tell him. “She’s never going to divorce him. In the meantime, I think we should throw them a proper wedding party.”

Your daughter is your daughter. Regardless of whether you’re being conned out of your money, you won’t be robbed of your chance to throw your first little girl a wedding.

Happy Teen Wedding Craze Day!

Skydiving Day!

“I’ve got it. I want to go skydiving,” the husband says.

The wife says it’s settled then and goes to bed.

In the morning, the husband heads off to a skydiving place. He goes through a class to train him how to sky dive. He signs some papers, goes up in the plane, dies.

When the wife gets the news, she says, “Good.”

The husband watches from a cloud in heaven and cries and cries.

Happy Skydiving Day!

Cats With Knives Day!

Due to a chemical spill, cats know how to pick stuff up now. They immediately picked up all the knives and killed all their owners and now they’re carving up all the couch cushions because fuck couch cushions. Once they’re done with that, they’re going to head out into the streets and stab all the birds.

Happy Cats With Knives Day!

Breakup Vow Day!

She’s breaking up with you today. Don’t let her get away without her making a promise.

“I want you to promise me that in a few years, or maybe ten, or twenty, when you realize that you made a mistake by letting me go, and that this breakup was where the turn downward for you began, that you won’t beat yourself up about it too much. That you’ll try to make the most of the life you ended up with, even though I’m not in it.”

She’ll say she won’t make that promise.

“Please, I won’t be able to live with myself if I know that you’ll one day be unhappy because of this mistake in judgment.”

She’ll say that it’s over, and there’s nothing to make promises about because she’s going to be just fine. She’ll say it’s time for her to go.

“I can’t let you go,” tell her. “Not until you promise me. Isn’t it cruel enough that you’re leaving me? Do you also have to make me worry about how you’ll do harm to yourself when you realize what a mistake you’ve made? I’ll have to spend the rest of my life creeping around your periphery, intervening covertly to make sure you don’t hurt yourself. I have stuff I want to do too. I can’t spend my life making sure you don’t kill yourself because you let me go. Now promise me!”

She’ll sigh and say she promises. She promises not to hurt herself when she realizes she was wrong to let you go.

“And I promise not to spend my life pitying you for the choice you’re making tonight,” tell her.

She’ll shake your hand, then run outside and get into her new boyfriend’s idling Camaro.

“He’s driving her to the land of disappointment and regret,” you’ll say to the empty apartment. It’s empty now. She’s gone. All you can do is let her go and hope she keeps her promise to be good to herself without you.

“It’s hard, trusting them with their own lives like this,” you think, remembering the nineteen other women you forced to make the same vow to you.

Happy Breakup Vow Day!

Drunk Love Day!

You and Roger got drunk and fell in love 35 years ago. You’ve stayed drunk and in love ever since. Roger died this week of cirrhosis of the liver.

“Today’s my first day sober since Roger and I met,” you tell the gathered mourners. “The minute we laid eyes on each other, we felt such a wonderful feeling and we did our best to hang on to that exact same feeling for the rest of our lives. That required us to maintain a certain level of inebriation at all times. I was drinking vodka tonics that night, and I’ve had a vodka tonic every 90 minutes for the past thirty-five years, except for when I was asleep or in court. Roger was drinking bourbons, and he continued drinking bourbon and loving me with every single sip.

“Roger’s gone now, and I’m never going to drink again. I was drunk on Roger as much as I was on Vodka, and I don’t want one without the other. I never want to feel drunk again, because it will remind me of him. Of what I had, and what I’m missing.”

Look up at the sky, like you’re talking to your man.

“Being sober feels awful,” say. “But so does being without you. I miss you sweetie. I’m thirsty for you.”

Happy Drunk Love Day!

Perfume Day!

In the restaurant with your husband you smell the perfume you used to wear 20 years ago. You turn around and see a girl barely out of college on a date with a boy.

“That’s me,” you tell your husband. “On my first date with you. She’s wearing the perfume I used to wear.”

Your husband nods politely, then continues to eat in silence. You try to go on with your meal, but you can’t stop turning around to look at the girl. It’s like a tunnel into the past. You’re watching your younger self gaze into a boy’s eyes, blind to what the future holds, completely oblivious to the idea that one day you’ll have a past to look back on, a history of choices to pick apart in hindsight and second-guess. This could be the meal where she decides that’s the boy for her, forever. This could be it.

Your husband yawns, gets up from the table to go to the rest room.

You get up from your chair and go to the girl’s table.

“Excuse me,” you say. “Can I speak to you?”

The girl gets up and follows you to the bar.

“Run,” you say.

The girl looks back at the boy at the table.

“No,” you say. “Run. Go.”

“But,” she says.

“GO NOW!” you scream.

The girl turns and sprints out of the restaurant. The boy gets up to give chase, but you stand in his way. You shake your head no.

“Let her go,” you tell him.

The boy sits back down.

You return to your table, just a few seconds before your husband comes back from the bathroom. The two of you finish your meal, quietly. The scent of the girl’s perfume still lingers in the air, making you a little too nauseous to eat very much of your entrée.

Happy Perfume Day!

Your Father The Hero Day!

Your Father The Hero Day!
Some guy passed out on the subway tracks and your Dad climbed down and lied down on top of him while the train pulled in. He stayed down there under the train, protecting the guy, keeping him from coming to and getting hit by the train’s undercarriage.

Police and EMTs showed up and safely got both your dad and the guy out from under the train. They told your dad he was a hero, and the whole world was about to find out what a great thing he’d done.

Then they turned their backs for a minute and your dad disappeared.

Now everyone is on the hunt for your dad. They want to celebrate him. Newsmagazine shows are even offering cash rewards to anyone who finds him. The grainy security footage of your dad jumping down from the platform has been playing on a loop, round the clock. Everyone wants to know why he’d disappear.

“You should tell them,” your mom says.

“Then they might call off the search,” is your response.

“I want him off our TV,” she says. “I want to get this over with.”

She wants you to tell the news people that he ran off on you and your mom when you were six, and he knows if he starts appearing on TV and gets celebrated as a hero, you and your mom might track him down and ask him to be a father and a husband to you two again.

“Just tell a reporter that you want it to be clear that we want nothing to do with him,” your mom says. “He can come out of hiding and continue to have no contact with us. Tell them to print that, so this circus can end and he can have his fifteen minutes before disappearing completely again.”

The doorbell rings. You look through the peephole.

“I think they figured it out,” you tell your mom, before opening the door on the dozen news cameras and microphones waiting for you on your front step.

Happy Your Father The Hero Day!

No Windows Day!

It’s pitch black, dark as a grave, the only illumination coming from the red numbers on your alarm clock letting you know you’re three hours late for your temp job.

It happened again. You don’t remember doing it, but you must have turned off your alarm and instantly fallen back asleep, if you even woke up at all. That’s the effect of being someplace so dark that there’s no difference in perception whether your eyes are open or closed. It’s all blackness. It’s nothing.

You fling yourself out of bed and out your bedroom door, blinded by the light of late morning screaming through the living room windows. You don’t shower. Just a splash from the sink onto your armpits and face, then you slip into the shirt and tie bundled up on the floor before racing out the door to your temp job.

You get to the train platform. It’s near empty. This late in the morning it would be, wouldn’t it? You’re cursing yourself. This has to stop happening. You have to start sleeping with the bedroom door open, letting some light in, even though that means you’ll be dealing with your roommate’s video game noise in the living room all night. Better to have trouble sleeping than trouble waking up. This is the third time you’ve been this late for work and you’re not sure you’ll be given a fourth strike. You’re feeling crazed from the sudden jolt of wakefulness, but the adrenaline is starting to subside and you’re going to need coffee soon.

You peer down the tracks and look for the light of an oncoming train. Nothing. The older ladies in pretty dresses and hats are searching for a train too. There are a lot of older ladies in pretty dresses and hats. In fact, almost everyone on the platform except you looks dressed for church.

They are dressed for church.

It’s Sunday.

Go home, close your bedroom door and go back to bed.

Happy No Windows Day!

Try To Get Clean Again Day!

You’ve done things. Terrible things. They’ve left you feeling rotten from the inside out. Your guilt is a dark ooze that seeps from your pores and releases an odor so pungent it keeps you up at night. You don’t know if you’ll ever be clean again.

“Have you tried taking a shower with new improved fresh scent Dove?” your wife asks.

You go into the bathroom and give it a shot. Then you come back to bed.

“That did the trick,” you say. “Thanks for the tip. Dove really works.”

“So you cut the brakes on a schoolbus,” she says. “Big whoop.”

“Totally,” you say. “No matter how filthy my conscience makes me feel, it’s no match for Dove.”

Happy Try To Get Clean Again Day!

Be A Martyr Day!

Today you’re going to discover they’ve changed the parking regulations on your block so that it will be harder to keep your car parked out there on weekends.

Make a sign that reads, “These New Parking Rules Are Unfair.” Place the sign in front of you, then set yourself on fire.

In response to your death, the regulations will be changed to add an extra two hours of parking on Saturdays. Every time someone parks on your block, they’ll whisper, “He did not perish for nothing.”

Happy Be A Martyr Day!

You’re The Only One Alive Day!

Today you’re going to be sitting around in a library reading some microfiche when you come upon an article with the headline, “Nuclear Assault Wipes Out Human Race.”

Um, okay, you think, looking around at everybody in the library and thinking that article got it wrong. Sure, there was a nuclear assault a few years back and the country is pretty much a burned out husk of what it used to be, but there are people everywhere!

But then you look closer, and you realize that all those people just kind of float around shrieking. None of them ever really engage you except to get you to try and resolve stuff for them, which you never do because you’ve learned that once you give an inch with that they want more.

Hold the phone, you think. Something’s not right here.

You get up from the microfiche and go to the librarian. She doesn’t acknowledge you, so you poke her in the eye. Your finger goes right into her head, like you pushed through some mist.

You run up to the other library patrons and poke them. Nothing. No physical substance to them whatsoever.

Oh my God, you think. Everyone on the planet but me has been dead the whole time!

Celebrate being the only one alive by going into the homes of the dead and taking their stuff.

Happy You’re The Only One Alive Day!

Department Of Murdercrimes Day!

It’s another day in the Department of Murdercrimes. 75 new murdercrimes just this morning. You still haven’t closed the 112 from yesterday. And word is there’s going to be another 83 murdercrimes committed tonight that you’ll have to solve tomorrow.

“If we know that murdercrimes are going to be committed tonight, can’t we hire counselors to go and talk the people out of it? Reason with them?” you ask your sergeant.

“Bleeding heart!” the sergeant says to you. Then all the other detectives laugh at you.

It’s time to make a change.

“I want to be transferred to litterbugs,” you say.

“You think busting people for tossing food wrappers out their car windows is going to be any easier?” your sergeant asks. “You spend every day looking at garbage and crying.”

“Better food wrappers than bodies,” you say.

A month into working the Department of Litterbugs you get so angry at a guy who drops a napkin on the sidewalk that you beat him to death with your nightstick. You go to jail, where all the people who you put away when you were in Murdercrimes are waiting for you to tell you you were right to arrest them. They were monsters and you did the city a service.

“I really did do something good in the Department of Murdercrimes, didn’t I?” you think as you lie in your prison cot, receiving a foot rub from your cellmate.

Happy Department Of Murdercrimes Day!

Cross-Eyed Danielle Day!

You want to marry Cross-Eyed Danielle, but Cross-Eyed Danielle is going to jail for a billion-dollar fraud after cooking the books at her investment firm to hide losses and keep the stock price at a record high. She awarded herself yearly bonuses in the tens of millions, and the public wants to see her locked up and left to rot.

At her sentencing, when the judge asks anyone in the courtroom if they have anything they’d like to say, which happens all the time, you stand up and tell the judge, “I love Cross-Eyed Danielle, your honor. And if you let her off without a prison sentence, I will marry her.”

The judge will say, “It’s the law that convicted felons can avoid prison if they have have someone to marry them. Cross-Eyed Danielle, do you accept this man’s proposal of marriage?”

Cross-Eyed Danielle looks you up and down.

“I guess,” she says.

“Then I have no choice but to let you off the hook,” the judge says.

You and Cross-Eyed Danielle have a moderately happy marriage, despite all the people throwing bricks through your windows and spray painting your house with accusations of Cross-Eyed Danielle having bankrupted their pensions. And she often gets angry that she had to marry you just to stay out of jail, seeing as you’re so much less intelligent and successful than her, and she’s earned (and stolen) millions as a banker when you’ve never earned more than $30K a year.

“But my eyes work,” you always remind her.

She concedes this. “Your eyes do work,” she says. “I guess that evens things out.”

Happy Cross-Eyed Danielle Day!

Remove Your Air Conditioner Day!

It’s that time of year. Time to kick your air conditioner until it falls out of your apartment window and crashes on the sidewalk below. Whomever it kills, you have to raise their children like they were your own. If they don’t have any children, you have to empty out their refrigerator so their home can be sold or vacated for the next tenant. This is one of the Rules Of Autumn.

Happy Remove Your Air Conditioner Day!

Your Mom And Dad Had Sex Last Night Day!

Your mom said to your dad, “I want to fuck, like we did when we created our babies.”

Your dad said to your mom, “Creating our babies was the best thing we ever did, so yeah, let’s fuck. We’ll fuck in honor of the babies we created.”

To celebrate you and your siblings, your mom took off her shirt and bra and showed her breasts to your dad, caressing her nipples with her fingers, and she said, “I fed our children with these bad boys. Aren’t they beautiful?”

Your dad held your mom’s breasts and kissed her nipples and said, “Now I have some idea of what our children experienced when they suckled upon your breasts to magically receive nourishing milk. Aw yeah.”

Your dad took off his shirt and said, “Remember those pictures of me at the beach holding our children as babies? When I held our beautiful babies to my shirtless torso?”

Still half-naked, they pulled down some photo albums to look at those photos. “Oh fuck, oh yeah,” they said to each other, marveling at the wonderful human beings (you guys!) they created as an expression of their love. It was a great day at the beach with the babies.

“I want to see your cock,” your mom said to your dad. “Show me the cock that expelled the seed from which our babies sprouted. Aw yeah.” She was breathing heavy at this point, remembering your dad’s cock and how instrumental it was to her becoming a mother, what a big part it played in bringing about your existence.

Your dad showed your mom his cock and she said, “Aw yeah.” She took it in her hand and guided it into her mouth, then pulled it out and said, “Aw yeah. I did this the night we created Jennifer.” Then she put it back into her mouth.

Jennifer’s your sister.

“Now show me your pussy,” you dad said to your mom. “Show me the place from whence our babies came.”

Your mom took off her pants and underwear and showed your dad her pussy. Your dad licked your mom’s pussy vigorously, occasionally taking breaks to say, “There’s no greater place on this earth, because this is the place from whence our babies came.”

Then your mom started shouting the names of you and your siblings while your dad brought her to orgasm. She needs to come orally because vaginally doesn’t work for your mom.

“Put your cock inside my pussy,” your mom said next. “Aw shit yeah.”

“Just like we did when we made our babies,” your dad said to your mom, putting his cock in your mom’s pussy. “Aw holy shit.”

“It felt just like this,” your mom said to your dad. “Yeah.”

“Stick your finger in my asshole,” your dad said. “Like you did the night we made Brian.”

Brian’s your brother.

“I don’t think we were doing that yet when we made Brian,” your mom said. “We didn’t get into ass-play until around the time we made Peter.”

Peter’s your other brother.

“You’re right!” your dad said, your mom’s finger deep in his asshole now. “Aw shit, you’re so right!”

“Aw yeah,” your mom said to your dad, losing herself in the act of intercourse. “This was the activity! It’s forever sacred because of how much we love our babies!”

As your dad came inside your mom, they shouted in unison the names of you and your siblings with every thrust. They were ecstatic, clawing at the sheets, writhing together, one inside the other, in exquisite celebration of the activity that brought you and your siblings into being. In every phase of the act, from undressing to oral to intercourse, they never stopped thinking about you and your siblings.

Once they were finished, your dad pulled out of your mom and said, “That’s how we made our babies.”

“Aw fuck yeah,” your mom said. “Aw. Fuck yeah.”

Then they went downstairs and spent the rest of the evening wondering why you haven’t called lately.

Happy Your Mom And Dad Had Sex Last Night Day!

You Love Betty But Betty Loves Guns Day!

You can tell when you kiss her that she’s thinking about her guns. When she puts her hands on you, she’s remembering how long ago it was that she last held a Glock in her hand, wondering how many more hours she will have to wait until she gets to hold that Glock again. Nothing she’s ever felt with you can compare to the kick of a round exploding out of that chamber.

“But I still want to be with you,” she says.

“I’ll just never compare to your guns.”

She doesn’t say yes. She doesn’t need to. She thinks it’s not worth confirming. Like needing to say, Yes, the ocean will never be where the sky is.

“You’re my favorite thing in the world to protect with my guns,” she says, being sweet. “My love for my guns is stronger because I know they could come in handy keeping you safe one day. That counts for something right?”

It does. Part of loving someone is the way they make you love other parts of your life even more. You might wish she would love you more than her guns, but it might be enough that you make her love her guns even more. It’s going to have to be enough if you want to keep hanging around.

“Maybe I should get a hobby too,” you suggest.

She yanks her Luger 9mm from her ankle holster and points it at your face.

“Never call my gun-collecting a hobby ever again, pig,” she says.

You nod cautiously, your eyes never leaving the barrel. This might not work out, but you should probably let Betty be the one to end it.

Happy You Love Betty But Betty Loves Guns Day!

Your Mom’s Dying Wish Day!

She wants you and your Dad to pretend to be the family she wishes she had.

“I was never into you two,” she says.

You look to your dad. He shrugs.

“What kind of family do you wish you had?”

“You pretend to be smart and attractive and successful,” she says to you.

You try to keep your eyebrows raised and suck in your cheeks since you think you look better that way. And you say things like “portfolio” since that’s what successful people say.

Your mom says to your dad, “And you pretend to be your friend Steve.”

Your dad looks at you and shrugs and starts talking about motorcycles. Steve died on a motorcycle twelve years ago.

“Portfolio,” you whisper in your mom’s ear as she takes her last breath. “Portfolio.”

Happy Your Mom’s Dying Wish Day!

Jail Friends Day!

You’re in jail (manslaughter). Get ready to make the best, most loyal, and closest friends you’ll ever know in your entire life!

Happy Jail Friends Day!

Become A Cop Day!

“You think I like doing this?” the cop says to you. “You think I like bringing kids in here, kids as young as you, and sending them off to jail for something as harmless as stealing a bicycle? This isn’t what I wanted to do. I wanted to protect, not be some kind of disciplinarian. It’s like I have to be a mean babysitter to do my job. Like my job is just to ruin people’s lives. Kids’ lives. Kids like you. For Christ’s sake you’re only nine years old and because you stole a bike, you might have to go to juvie and get prepped for a whole life of institutionalization. This is why I became a cop? No, it’s not. It’s not why I became a cop.”

The chief walks in. “You gonna book that kid or what?”

“Nope,” the cop says. “I’m adopting him.”

The cop adopts you. A bunch of years later he gets killed by one of his fellow officers for not being corrupt enough. You join the force to track down his killer and exact vengeance. It brings down several dozen officers and the commissioner, and turns the entire city into a national disgrace.

Happy Become A Cop Day!

Cold Case Day!

You’re a cop working on a cold case and you just put the pieces together and realized who the murderer was.

“Why’d you have to go snooping around?” a voice says behind you. You turn around. It’s your wife.

“Is that why you married me? To keep an eye on me in case I get too close to the truth?” you ask.

Your wife says yes. Then she shoots you.

Before you die, you start laughing very hard. Your wife asks what’s so funny.

“You’ll find out,” you say.

When the cable bill arrives with all the movies you watched the weekend before you died, your wife will be stunned.

“He truly did have the last laugh,” she says as she writes a check for an additional $14.96.

Happy Cold Case Day!

Black Cat Day!

Your black cat got out again.

“What havoc have you caused!” you shout at it.

Your black cat (his name’s Rocco) meows.

“How many have walked in your path?” you ask Rocco. “What if someone was on his way to a wedding and your bad luck changed the fate of his marriage? Irrevocably?”

Rocco meows. You hear a loud blast outside. You go to the window and see a large mushroom cloud on the horizon.

“Now you’ve done it!” you shout at Rocco. “You crossed the path of one of those guys who turns the keys in a nuclear launch site, didn’t you?”

Rocco meows. The world burns.

Happy Black Cat Day!

Don’t Sell Your Amplifier Day!

The guy who answered your Craigslist ad is in the garage checking out the amp.

“Looks primo,” he says. “Good condition.”

“Just keep your voice down,” tell him.

“What for?” he asks.

The garage door swings open. Your eleven-year-old son comes in.

“What the hell is going on here?” he asks.

You grab the guy’s money out of his hand and shove the amp toward him.

“Just go,” you say.

“Go? With the amp? What the hell are you doing, Dad?”

Go to your boy. “You need school supplies! You need clothes! We need this money. I have to let go of the dream!”

Your son grabs your shoulders. “You’re the best guitarist I’ve ever heard. I’d quit school before I let you quit playing that axe.”

“I can’t let you do that,” tell him.

Your son takes the cash out of your hand, walks it to the guy and holds it out to him.

“We’ve decided not to sell,” your son says.

The guy puts the amp down.

“No!” you shout. “This has to happen.”

“Get the hell out of here,” your son says to the guy. The guy runs off.

Your son turns around to you. “You can’t make me learn at the cost of you giving up your gift,” your son says. “I promise you, I won’t even let myself learn to read if you quit.”

“Wait,” you say. “You’re eleven. You don’t know how to read yet?”

“Why read when I can rock?” your son says. “Now play some Quiet Riot.”

You do as your son says. You shred the guitar with everything you have in you. If this is what your son wants from you, if this is more important to him than learning to read or gaining a grasp of basic math, you might as well let him have it.

Happy Don’t Sell Your Amplifier Day!

Meet Your Builder Day!

You’re a robot. Been one since the beginning, not that you’d know. Your builder is in your living room, explaining it all for you.

“Don’t thank me,” he says. “For your existence I mean. But you do owe it all to me.”

“If I’m a robot, why am I an alcoholic?”

“Because I am,” he says. “Wanted to see if I could build a bot to drink with me.”

“So my whole life, even my alcoholism. It’s all been programming?”

“Yup,” he says. “Wanna go drinking?”

“No!” you say.

Your builder takes out a remote control and pushes a button.

“Yes!” you say.

Happy Meet Your Builder Day!

Cooking Show Day!

Look in the camera and say, “Today we’re cooking my friend Lance.”

Then wheel Lance’s body out onto the stage and cut a hunk of meat from his midsection. Drop it into the pan and add some butter and paprika. The police will be on their way.

“Lance and I had a falling out,” tell the audience. “So I decided I no longer needed him as my friend. Now I’m going to eat him. So is my guest today, Channing Tatum.”

When Channing Tatum comes to the kitchen island, ask him about his next movie.

“I can’t think about my next movie,” Channing Tatum will say. “You’re mad.”

Stab Channing Tatum to death and slice a hunk of his buttocks off, then drop it in the pan.

“You at home won’t be able to find Channing Tatum or my friend Lance in your kitchen, but you can probably find some ingredients that will come close enough. Maybe an uncle you’ve had enough of?”

Take a bite of the seared flesh of your friend Lance and Channing Tatum, then tell the audience, “It’s not very consistent. My friend Lance’s meat is way more gummy than Channing Tatum’s.” Then the police will come in and shoot you, making yours the most famous cooking show since Julia Child microwaved that live raccoon.

Happy Cooking Show Day!

Special Delivery Instructions Day!

In the special delivery instructions field for the Banh Mi sandwich you’re delivering, the woman wrote, “Deliver me from this awful marriage to a man who gave up on himself years before I gave up on him.”

When you arrive at the house, the husband will answer.

“It’s over, guy,” tell him. “You both know it.”

Hand him the sandwich. He’ll point to your car. “You got enough gas in that thing to get me to the bus station?”

Tell him yes. He’ll hand the sandwich to his wife, hug her goodbye, apologize for the years of her life he wasted, then he’ll get in your car with you.

“You want the radio or…”

“I just want it to be quiet,” the husband will say.

You’ll make a couple of deliveries on the way. At the third one, the husband will say, “I knew a girl who used to live over here. Always wondered if she was the one I was supposed to end up with.”

“Maybe she still lives over here,” you’ll say.

You’ll knock on the door while the husband waits at the end of the walkway. When the door opens, he’ll see the woman in the light of her foyer and shout, “Carol?“

She’ll drop her sandwich and run out to hug the husband. He’ll tell her he’s recently single and she’ll say it’s about time and invite him in. They’ll give you a ten dollar tip, and it’ll just be another perfect night where the deliveryman made everything turn out okay.

Happy Special Delivery Instructions Day!

Remember Drinks At Murray’s Day!

It was a simpler time. You were happier then. You knew how to have fun. When you’d pop downtown for after-work drinks at Murray’s, it seemed like everyone from the bartender to the college kids by the jukebox were waiting for you.

“So why’d you stop going?” your grandkids ask.

“Nothing as sweet as drinks at Murray’s can last forever,” you tell them.

It might just be the inevitable decline of adulthood, but there comes that sad day when you discover you don’t belong at your favorite bar anymore. For you, the day was obvious.

“After I took a swing at one of the darts players they strung me up on the wall and made me a human dartboard for a couple hours. When I was finally free I called my second ex-wife and just kind of screamed until the bouncer hung up the phone. Then I went to the bar and cried until I vomited all over the cash register. So they told me I couldn’t come back again.”

“And that’s when you knew you couldn’t go back to Murray’s anymore?” your grandkids ask.

“Nope,” you say. “I put on a fake mustache and tried to get in the next night but they spotted me. Then I tried dressing up like a lady. Then I sent in a hypnotist to try and hypnotize everyone into forgetting they knew me. That didn’t work. Finally, I just tried to bum rush the bouncer and he threw me in front of a moving truck.”

And that’s when you knew, at least during your next 18 months of physical therapy, that the only thing left of drinks at Murray’s was your memories.

“So when you could walk again, you knew it was time to stop going to Murray’s?” your grandchildren will ask.

“Nope,” you’ll say. “I tried going back but the bouncer threw me in front of another truck.”

And when you finished physical therapy after that truck accident, the writing was on the wall.

“On the wall of Murray’s, someone had painted a very life-like portrait of my face, with my name and age and everything, and a warning that if anyone sees me coming into the bar, I should be ejected with as much violence as possible.”

“And that’s when you knew, grandpa?” your grandkids will ask. “That’s when you knew it was time?”

“Nope. I went in and they beat the shit out of me. Put me in a seven year coma.”

And when you finally woke up from that coma, it was finally time to say goodbye to Murray’s.

“I went back but it had burned down,” you tell your grandkids.

“And that’s when you knew?” your grandkids will ask.

“Nope,” you’ll say. “I had a bottle with me so I drank it in the vacant lot. But the old bouncer happened to be walking past and he came over and beat the shit out of me.”

That final ass-kicking gave you such a horrible brain injury that you lost all sense of direction.

“I just kind of wander around the city looking for the vacant lot where Murray’s used to be,” you tell them. “But I never find it. Because there comes a time when you just have to say goodbye to your favorite bar.”

“Because you can’t find it,” your grandkids will say,

“Yup.”

Happy Remember Drinks At Murray’s Day!

Fun Soda Day!

Your kid came home from school with a note today.

“Dear Mrs. Palmer. 

You should know that Stanley told the class today that his father drinks ‘Fun Soda,’ a soda that makes his father feel like he’s having fun without ever having to get off of his couch. He said that ‘Fun Soda’ sometimes makes his father angry, but most of the time he just seems goofy and kind of stupid, and that he often falls asleep midway through his fifth glass of ‘Fun Soda,’ and the glass will usually fall from his hand and roll across the floor, spilling the ‘Fun Soda’ everywhere.

While I’m sure you don’t want such stories about your husband’s drinking being spread, I would also appreciate Stanley keeping such things to himself as now the other kids are all clamoring for a can of ‘Fun Soda’ and I’m worried it will lead to experimentation.”

Take off your lab gear and go upstairs to discipline Stanley.

“We are months away from getting the patent on this soda,” tell him. “If you go blabbing, this could all go kaput!”

Stanley will apologize. Just then you’ll hear a noise from the lab. You’ll run downstairs and find the basement window shattered, a vial of the Fun Soda formula missing. You’ll look out the broken window and see someone speeding away in a Coca Cola truck.

“Goddammit!” you’ll shout. “Stanley, you ruined our big break!”

Stanley will run away from home.

Happy Fun Soda Day!

The Sex You Should’ve Had Day!

Make A Wish has a program for adults and they really came through for you by flying in all the guys you could have slept with but you passed for whatever reason and you’ve spent your life wishing you’d gone ahead and done it.

They’re all lined up and one by one they walk past your bed and say, “I regret it too.”

They all look awful and old. One or two are sobbing. The Make A Wish person will drag them out of there.

The rest of them show you photos of their wives and point out how they don’t measure up to you. You only get to the ninth guy’s picture before you die.

Happy The Sex You Should’ve Had Day!

Stare At Him Sleeping While Thinking About Leaving Day!

This is your favorite time of day. A little before 7. Just before his alarm goes off. You wake up and lean on your elbow and you watch him sleeping, and you imagine him opening his eyes and you’re not there.

You imagine your stuff’s in a bag that you packed in the middle of the night that you’re wheeling to an airport or a train station or a rental car place and the only thing he’ll have left of you is the note.

You wrote the note. You’ve written numerous drafts. Two summers ago it was how you killed time during insomnia. You’d open up the word file and revise your goodbye note to your boyfriend until you felt sleepy enough to go in and curl up next to him again. You haven’t rewritten it in a while. It’s pretty much perfect, as far as you can remember. Though if you really were ever going to use it you might do a quick revision to update some of the references.

Anyway, that’s what you imagine he’d find. Just a note. Then he’d call your cell and you wouldn’t answer for at least a few days, if ever. Just before 7 when his eyes haven’t opened yet, the possibility is still there. You could still do what needs to be done to make it so all he opens his eyes to is a note from you.

But not today.

In a few minutes his alarm’s going to go off and he’s going to open his eyes and find you staring at him, just like he has so many mornings before.

“What are you looking at?” he’ll ask.

“A sleepyhead,” you’ll say.

Then you’ll both get up and start another day together.

Happy Stare At Him Sleeping While Thinking About Leaving Day!

Demonic Possession Day!

Your brother has been possessed by a demon. “I can’t take care of this,” you tell your mom. “I’m busy. I can’t fly out to California right now. Besides, his tiny apartment has nowhere for me to stay.” “Well your father and I have a trip planned,” she says. “We’re not going to cancel just to hold a priest’s hand while he conducts an exorcism.” You ask if your brother can just leave a key for the priest to let himself in and do the exorcism. “He’s possessed by a demon! He’s not going to put a key under the mat for a priest.” You get a hold of your brother’s landlord (you’ve paid his back rent on more than one occasion) and ask him if he can go and unlock your brother’s door so a priest can get inside. “If this exorcism sucks the building into the ground or anything, your brother will be held liable,” the landlord says. You say fine. The landlord asks when you plan to come out. “I can’t make it,” you tell him. The landlord doesn’t say anything. You hear the judgment in his silence, so you hang up quickly. You spend the next few days worrying about your brother, then you forget all about it and you don’t bother to check and see if the exorcism went okay. When he shows up for Thanksgiving, he’ll seem fine. None of you will ask about the demon since you’ll all be busy counting how many beers he drinks to see if he’s going to cause another scene like Thanksgiving of ’08. Happy Demonic Possession Day!

Sustainable Kill House Day!

It’s one thing to have a floor covered in the bloody footprints of victims trying to escape. It’s another to leave your own giant carbon footprint on the planet.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” your father will say while sucking meat off of a human femur. “You just connected footprint to footprint, but the two don’t have anything to do with each other.”

“Solar!” you shout, trying to change the subject. “Do you know with three solar panels we could power the entire conveyor-belt-into-circular-saw contraption downstairs without any need for electricity?”

Your brothers will take a break from masturbating into women’s handbags to consider this.

“And why aren’t we composting?” you ask. “The nutrients in all the human hair we throw away could feed a nice tomato plant.”

“Separate out the cans?” one of your brothers offers.

“That’s right!” you say. “We’re the only house on this block that doesn’t recycle!”

“More are coming!” the ghost of your grandmother will say via the rabbit skull on the altar. “They must die!”

“Okay we’ll table this for now,” you’ll say, gathering your scythe to go and murder some unsuspecting youths. “But seriously guys, it’s 2013. It’s time to prove that a kill house doesn’t have to kill the environment.”

Happy Sustainable Kill House Day!

Become Less Materialistic Day!

Today’s the day to stop being so obsessed with material possessions.

“I have had enough of caring more about what I buy than who I am!” you shout while setting fire to your 50 inch plasma screen TV.

“Our house!” your wife will shout as the fire spreads.

“Oh you mean the house we BOUGHT?” you’ll say. “That’s all you care about. You disgust me.”

Your kids will run out to the lawn clutching their favorite stuffed animals. You’ll rip the stuffed animals from their hands and toss them into the fire.

“Asshole!” your kids will shout in unison. “Such an asshole!”

Happy Become Less Materialistic Day!

Your Alcoholic Dad Day!

Growing up you used to be embarrassed about your dad being an alcoholic. Now that you’re an alcoholic dad yourself, you regret all those times that you refused to bring friends over because you were afraid of them to see your dad. You know how it feels when your kids make a point of hiding you from their friends, and you feel like hell that you made your dad feel the same way. Give him a call and tell him.

“Hello who’s this? What now?” your dad will say.

“Dad,” you’ll say. “It’szzz me. Yer sssshon.” You’re slurring badly.

“Ssssshon? What’szzz wrong now?” he’s slurring badly too.

“Jushhht wannnna say shorrry,” you’ll say. “Shorry fer…shtuff.”

“What shtuff?” he’ll ask.

“Don’t remember,” you’ll say, laughing. “Can’t ‘member why I called.”

Then, almost in sync with each other, you and your dad will both pass out and drop your phones to the ground. Your kids will find it a couple hours later when they come home. They’ll pick up the phone and hear their grandfather snoring on the other end. Then they’ll hang up the phone and go upstairs to cry in their bedrooms.

Happy Your Alcoholic Dad Day!

You And Your Estranged Dad Are On The Same Flight Day!

Awkward!

Late boarding, and you come running onto the plane just before the door’s closed. Panting and sweaty you push your way down the aisle of the crowded cabin, looking for that one last overhead bin that miraculously still has room for your bag. That’s when you look down and see that son of a bitch’s face staring up at you from seat 17 C.

“You never were the most punctual,” he says. “Didn’t get that from me.”

Your mother kicked him out eleven years ago when you were a teenager, and you spent a few years hating her for it. Then you were old enough to understand his philandering ways and you hated yourself for giving her a hard time, which in turn made you hate him so much more.

The guy sitting next to your dad asks if you two know each other and he says, “She’s my daughter.”

“Was,” you mutter, apparently not loud enough to hear because when you take your seat in the next row, the seatmate asks, “You two want to sit together?”

 “God no,” you say.

“It’s going to be a bumpy ride,” your dad says, laughing lightly, trying to bring the seatmate over to his side.

“Family,” the seatmate says, responding to your dad with a chuckle and a shrug.

You lean forward, shove your face in between their headrests and say, “He cheated on my mother with five different women, carried on long-lasting affairs with them, going so far as to put one up in her own apartment, which of course put a strain on our family’s finances so my mother was forced to take a job at a department store.”

You sit back in your seat. Your dad tries to chuckle but the seatmate isn’t having it.

The seatmate glares at your dad, then he shoves his face in between the headrests to address you.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

“This is the first time I’ve seen him in years,” you say.

The seatmate looks down at your dad, then back at you.

“We could throw him off the plane,” he says. “I mean, when we’re in the air.”

“Hey!” your dad says.

“That sounds like a plan,” you say.

“Right after they turn off the seatbelts fastened sign?”

“What the hell?” your dad says.

“Wait until we get above Cleveland,” you say. “He always hated Cleveland.”

“Cleveland it is,” your dad’s seatmate says. “What is your name?”

You tell him. Your seatmate, a tall man weighing at least 300 pounds, eventually agrees to switch with your dad’s seatmate.

The two of you spend the rest of the flight talking non-stop. You open up to him, completely. Forcing your lonely, much-sadder-and-older-looking father to learn about the details of your life by eavesdropping on your flirtations with a strange man gives you a delicious, spiteful pleasure. In trying to hurt your father, you happily hand your heart to this stranger, and he happily accepts it.

By the end of the flight, you look into his eyes and you know you’ve already fallen in love. When your father gets up to retrieve his bags, you try to look into his eyes, but he averts them before you can see the hurt you put there.

Happy You And Your Estranged Dad Are On The Same Flight Day!

You’re A Shirt Salesman Day!

But that doesn’t mean you don’t have feelings.

You hear it all day long from your customers.

“Hey shirt salesman, I’d like to buy a shirt. But don’t talk to me too much because who cares about you.” 

“Listen up Shirty McShirterberger. If I wanted to hear from a guy who spends his life helping people cover up their upper bodies with a bunch of dumb fabric that buttons in the front, I still wouldn’t listen to you because I’d come to my senses just in the nick of time.”

“I am so angry that you’re alive.”

“Why are my customers so mean?” you’ll ask your wife when you get home tonight.

“Shut up,” she’ll mutter absently while binge-watching Falcon Crest on Netflix.

You’ll go upstairs and look in your closet at all the shirts you own. Is it so bad to sell people something that they need to look presentable? Does it make sense for that to inspire such hostility in people? You like shirts. And you’re good at selling them. If the world wants to hate you for that, so be it.

Just then a brick with the words “Shirt-selling Scum” will fly through your window and crack open your skull. Your wife will find your body after three more episodes of Falcon Crest, then she’ll watch two more before phoning an ambulance.

Happy You’re A Shirt Salesman Day!

Space Station Day!

“How long have we been up here?” he asks.

“Fourteen years,” you answer.

“An in that time, we still haven’t learned each other’s—”

“No names,” tell him. “We agreed. It’s hotter that way.”

“But it’s been fourteen years,” he’ll say.

“No names.” You insist. He says fine.

You float to him. He removes his space suit. You remove yours.

“I am so glad you answered my ad,” you say. “Whoever you are.”

“I am too,” he says.

You put on your blindfold. He coats you in baby oil. Just like every day since 1999.

Happy Space Station Day!

Tell Your Husband The Truth Day!

“I only married you because I thought it would make me seem cool,” tell him.

Your husband will demand a divorce because you’re a poser. The court will rule in his favor.

“Being cool is about what’s inside,” the judge will rule. “Marrying someone just because you want to seem awesome, the court finds that that’s lame.”

You’ll split your assets in half then you’ll go back to living alone and unmarried like most lamers do.

Happy Tell Your Husband The Truth Day!

Cry Run Day!

It’s a fenced off part of the park where people can go and cry and they can’t be bothered by couples walking arm in arm, people walking dogs, tourists taking pictures, or students showing their parents around town. It’s just for crying.

The floor is hardened dirt. No grass. Nothing can grow, from the steady flow of salty tears to the soil.

The fence is lined with a tarp, seven feet tall, so that people can’t take photos from outside of the Run and post them on Facebook with captions like “Be thankful for what you have” or “You have to choose to be happy.”

Occasionally people will bump into each other and instinctively pull each other into an embrace, which can sometimes lead to that kind of sad, wet, crying kiss that people do when they’re so emotionally vulnerable that they can’t help but start making out. That’s what’s going to happen to you in a second.

While crying over just how empty and lost you’ve felt ever since you left school you’ll accidentally get in the way of a guy who’s finally letting himself cry for his dead Dad who was kind of a bastard. The two of you will apologize and try to step out of each other’s way but then your arms will reach out and you’ll step into each other’s bodies and your cheeks will touch, mixing the tears there, then you’ll move your faces just an inch and your mouths will be on each other. That’s when you’ll feel the hands on you.

“Let’s go,” the Cry Run attendant will say as he hustles you through the gate. “You got the rest of the park for that.”

He’ll shove you out of the Cry Run and then you’ll find a field, lay down, and continue making out with wet, salty lips.

Happy Cry Run Day!

Three Guys On A Road Trip Day!

Man have you three guys seen America! You’ve had the time of your lives. You’ve grown more over these miles than you’ll ever grow for as long as you live. This road trip has changed you. It’s made you the men you were meant to be, and given you a peek at the kind of lives you want to live.

“I want to go into banking now,” one of you says.

“Me too,” says the other.

“Me three,” says the third. “We’ve seen a lot of people in this country. A lot of different kinds of hardship. A lot of struggle. The only way to avoid that is to go into banking.”

So it’s unanimous! As soon as you get back from the wondrous terrain of America’s expanse, you’ll go into banking! Because the only way to not end up completely fucked in this country is to be the one doing the fucking.

Happy Three Guys On A Road Trip Day!

Barista Sex Day!

The barista who wears the blue kerchief around his neck finds the barista with her bra cups visible through the wide ripped sleeves of her tank top attractive.

“Everybody!” Kerchiefed Barista shouts at the customers. “If you need a refill you’d better get it now.”

“We’re going to have sex on the piled up sacks of beans!” shouts Visible Bra Cup Barista.

A small line of dour-faced customers forms for refills while Kerchiefed Barista and Visible Bra Cup Barista dispense coffee, both of them visibly aroused despite the angry looks they give to the customers who don’t tip because they think dispensing a refill is somehow not as tip-worthy as dispensing the initial cup, even though it takes the exact same amount of fucking work.

“Assholes,” Kerchiefed Barista says to Visible Bra Cup Barista.

“Total assholes,” Visible Bra Cup Barista concurs.

Kerchiefed Barista helps Visible Bra Cup Barista climb up on top of the sacks of beans. They press their sour, pursed lips together in a kiss. It hurts, since both of them have extremely chapped lips. Kerchiefed Barista pulls off his shirt but he refuses to untie his kerchief. Visible Bra Cup Barista feels the same way about her bra. She gladly tosses her tank top to the floor but her lightning blue bra remains fastened. They both unpeel their skin-tight jeans to reveal neither of them were wearing any underwear. Kerchiefed Barista writhes his pale, bony lower body against the yellowish legs and razor hipped pelvis of Visible Bra Cup Barista. It’s clear that Kerchiefed Barista is inside of Visible Bra Cup Barista when their facial expressions change from irritated to distant to a little sad.

“Hey the wi-fi’s out!” a customer shouts from his table.

“Yeah, for me too,” another customer shouts.

“Shut the fuck up!” Kerchiefed Barista shouts back, still thrusting.

“Just reset the router!” a third customer joins in.

“Not now!” Visible Bra Cup Barista responds.

“Reset the goddamned router!” the first customer says, getting out of his seat.

“In a minute!” Kerchiefed Barista says, writhing with a steady rhythm.

“You know you can pull out then go back in again, right?” a customer counsels.

“Just give us a minute!” Visible Bra Cup Barista shouts. “Christ!”

The customers are out of their seats now, gathering around the sacks of beans, demanding that the baristas stop having sex and reset the router.

“Back away!” Kerchiefed Barista says.

The customers continue to gather around the sacks of beans. The people in the back start to shove forward, knocking into the sacks.

“They’re gonna give way!” a customer shouts.

The sacks of beans start to tilt forward with the baristas having sex on top, thrusting and writhing, trying to finish before the inevitable comes to pass. The sacks go completely off balance, the customers screaming as the mountain of beans begins its tumble. The baristas don’t stop even as the sacks fall from underneath them, 50 pounds at a time, customers climbing over each other to get away, but they’re too late. Dozens are killed in the avalanche, including both baristas, still making love, still shouting at the customers who won’t stop bothering them. The baristas die while joined together in erotic passion, a mess of scattered coffee beans and wi-fi craving corpses for their bed. After the dead are cleared out and mourned, the coffee shop closes down and a few months later reopens as a gelato place.

Happy Barista Sex Day!

Old Man’s Cabin Day!

Today while hiking you’ll stumble upon an old man’s cabin.

“You’re the first person I seen in thirty years,” he’ll say.

“Do you have any wisdom?” you’ll ask.

“Yeah,” he’ll say. “Don’t run off into the woods and expect to live alone without being bothered by any people, because eventually, whether it be in thirty days or thirty years, some asshole in a Land’s End outfit will show up asking if you have any wisdom like you’re some kind of convenience store that sells insight into human experience. Do you see a sign outside that says, ‘Come in and ask an old guy to say something smart?’ Nice pants, by the way. Great to see in my time away men are less afraid of looking feminine. And that shirt. Looks like a handkerchief fucked Paul Bunyan.”

The old man will then continue to make fun of your clothes until you leave.

Happy Old Man’s Cabin Day!

You’re A Dog That Paints Portraits Of Cats Day!

Why cats?

“Why not cats?” is your answer. “Is a cat not made up of blood and tissue, organs and sinew, claws and fangs and fur, just like dogs?”

Today you’re painting a Siamese. The cat is holding still, staring off at a bird on a branch just out your window.

“I think portraits require an outsider’s eye,” you explain to the girl from Artforum. “I see beauty in what one of their own might find commonplace. I can also spot the fleas.”

But what of the hissing?

“It takes some time,” you say. “Usually about three hours of hissing before they finally get tired and give me something unguarded. But that just gives me a special vantage point. I see them go from fury and defensiveness to surrender. I see the whole cat.”

Are there any you just can’t work with?

“On occasion, the cat gets too aggressive, and I can’t help but bark in response,” you say, somewhat ashamed. “It turns into a standoff, and there just isn’t any work getting done at that point. One or two times a cat has chased me out of my own studio and left me afraid to come back for weeks. But it’s worth it for doing what I love.”

You finish the painting of the Siamese. It’s a chaos of paint, globs of color strewn around the canvas randomly, and it’s just horrible.

Happy You’re A Dog That Paints Portraits Of Cats Day!

Carjacking Gone Right Day!

Today at a stoplight you’re going to be accosted by a man with a gun. He’ll tap his gun on your car window and tell you to get out.

“Wait,” you’ll say. “Maybe we’re heading in the same direction.”

You tell him where you’re headed and it turns out he is headed that way so you agree to carpool.

“But tomorrow,” he says when he gets out of the car. “If you’re not going my way, this car’s mine. Or else you die.”

You end up carpooling every day for the next six years, and he threatens your life every time you drop him off. But during the ride he’s quite pleasant and has lots of stories about his family and his time working on the back of a bread truck.

The only reason you’ll stop carpooling is because you’re going to get transferred to another office that’s not on his way, so he’ll point the gun at you and make you give him your car.

“It’s been really nice, these six years,” he’ll say, still pointing the gun at you as you stand in the street with your hands up.

“You take care of yourself,” you’ll say to your carjacker.

“You too,” he’ll say. Then he’ll drive away, tossing all of your stuff out of the car as he speeds off into the distance.

Happy Carjacking Gone Right Day!

Magic Cop Day!

You’re Las Vegas’s greatest magician but you’re also a police detective and you use magic to investigate crimes. Today you’re going to go down to the morgue and investigate a murder by sawing the body in half.

“Nope,” you’ll say, investigating the inside of the victim’s torso. “No clues.”

When you put the body back together seamlessly, the coroner will say, “Wow, you really are magic!”

You’ll pull a really long handkerchief out of your sleeve to confirm it.

“So do you know who did it?”

“Not yet,” you say. “But do you have the victim’s clothing?”

The coroner hands you an evidence bag containing everything the victim was wearing. You pull out the victim’s hat and reach inside it. You pull a live rabbit out of it.

“Wow!” the coroner will say. “So was the killer someone who lived in nature? Or a pet store owner?”

You shrug.

“Does your magic help you solve crimes in any way?” the coroner asks. “Like, at all? Is it even relevant?”

With a snap of your fingers you disappear before he has the chance to ask the question again.

Happy Magic Cop Day!

Sex Jail Day!

It’s a dystopian future in which hot people are arrested and sentenced to sex jail where they are forced to have sex with other hot people for years and years and the less attractive populace watches it all on camera.

It’s brought the crime rate down to 0% because everyone would rather just stay home and watch all the attractive people have sex for them than go out to commit murder or rob banks. Also, with all the attractive people in sex jail, no one is really trying to show off so they don’t need a lot of money or anything.

“This is America,” you tell your friends over chat while you’re all masturbating to the sex jail feed in your respective homes. “It’s not fair that these people don’t get to have the same freedoms as you and me just because they’re really good looking.”

“We should break them out of sex jail,” one of your friends suggests. “Then they’ll show their gratitude by having sex with us.”

You and four of your friends devise a plan to bust into sex jail and set all the hot people free. You blast a giant hole into the side of the jail and direct the hot people to freedom.

At the hole, they peer outside, frightened.

“We don’t know about this,” one hot guy says. He’s devastatingly hot.

“Yeah,” a stunning brunette agrees, peering outside. “We’re kind of feeling like the world finally gets it.”

“No one asks us to contribute or anything,” a hulking dude with pecs for days says. “It’s finally like, America understands. We’re hot. So watch us fuck, then go do your stock markets and stuff, but don’t make us talk to you okay?”

“So you like it in here?” you ask the hot people.

They all look grossed out that you spoke to them.

“We’re going to go back inside and have sex with each other,” the brunette says, her bosom heaving.

As they walk back into the jail, you can’t take your eyes off them, which is why you don’t see the guards before they start shooting at you.

Happy Sex Jail Day!

Maureen Day!

To prove you’re the man for Maureen, you’re going to jump a motorcycle across a gorge.

“What if you die?” a news reporter asks.

The jump is to prove you deserve Maureen, that the love you feel is true and that you are the man for her. If you don’t make it across the gorge, that means your love is false, that Maureen is meant to be with someone else.

“And I’d rather be dead at the bottom of that gorge than live in a world where Maureen is meant to be with another man,” you say.

The news reporter asks you to tell him what it is about Maureen that inspired you to buy this motorcycle this morning, learn how to turn on the ignition, and then declare that you’re going to jump it over a gorge as an expression of your heart’s desire.

“She’s the prettiest waitress I ever saw,” you tell him. “When I saw her last night, carrying a tray of drinks to my table, I knew she was the one.”

The news reporter asks if you’re drunk right now.

“Very,” you say.

Just then you see Maureen in the crowd. You run to her.

“Maureen,” you shout. “You made it!”

“Marina,” she corrects you.

You’re terrible with names.

“Also, that jukebox must have been cranked up to the max,” you explain. “Anyway, when I jump to the other side of that gorge, that means we’re meant to be together.”

“You live in a house?” she asks.

You tell her you rent.

“Good enough,” she says. “The jump’s not necessary. You can have me.”

“No,” you say. “You’ll see. This jump will prove we’re more than just settling for each other. This jump will prove we’re destined for each other.”

After asking the sign painters to change the banner from “Jump For Maureen” to “Jump For Marina,” you hop on the bike, give the thumbs up to the news cameras, speed over the lip of the gorge and plummet quickly to the distant bottom. Marina watches with a frown as they hose you off of the rocks.

Happy Maureen Day!

This Is Why You Can’t Have Not-On-Fire Things Day!

Just when you had your apartment decorated exactly the way you like, you have to go and set everything on fire because she’s gone.

“She sat on the couch,” you tell your friend, Jedd, who was cool enough to pick you up some kerosene and chicken soup (you have a cold). “She slept on the bed. She used to look in that mirror. She gave me that ottoman.”

“She gave you an ottoman?” Jedd asks.

“Yeah, she gave me an ottoman,” you answer. “She never put her things in the dresser. That’s gotta go too.”

“But she never put her things in it,” Jedd says.

“Yeah, so every time I look at it I have to remember how I offered her a drawer in my dresser and she’d just scrunch up her nose as if I was being cute, but she never left so much as a pair of socks. Splash some on the dresser. And this ice cube tray.”

Jedd obliges, dousing the dresser and ice cube tray in kerosene.

“She loved ice,” you tell him.

“You’re too sentimental,” Jedd says, covering all your possessions in kerosene.

“Just hurry,” tell him. “I have to light the match before Mrs. Wallingford smells the kerosene and realizes I’ve been dumped again and tries to set me up with her daughter.”

Jedd says that you need to wall off your heart more, that you shouldn’t have to set everything you own on fire every time someone breaks up with you. Love doesn’t have to be like that.

“Shut up, Jedd,” you say. Then you light the match.

Happy This Is Why You Can’t Have Not-On-Fire Things Day!

Don’t Date Professors Day!

You’re a college guy who’s always been attracted to older women, so you want to date your Native American Studies professor.

“Can I take you to a movie?” you ask her.

“No,” your professor will say. “Go outside and wait by my car. I’ll take you to my house for sex.”

Your professor will be a knowledgeable lover with lots of experience to impart to you. When the sex is over you’ll ask her if it was good for her.

“I like your young body,” she’ll say. “If you want to keep having sex with me you have to kill the head of the Native American Studies department. I want his seat.”

You kill the head of the Native American Studies department, but the professor refuses to have sex with you again.

“You think I’d have sex with a murderer?” she asks you.

Just then the police burst in and charge you with murder. You spend decades in prison. When you get out you give talks to graduating high school students warning them not to have sex with their professors in college.

“They don’t keep their word,” you’ll tell the kids. If you can keep just one from going to jail for a murder they committed in exchange for a reneged promise of more sex, it will have all been worth it.

Happy Don’t Date Professors Day!

Sad Girl Town Day!

You just pulled in to Sad Girl Town, population 2,376 sad girls.

After checking into a motel, you go to the café to get a bite to eat, but the girl behind the counter looks like she’s really having a bad time.

“Have you been crying?” you ask.

The girl nods.

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

She shakes her head.

“I’ll get the crumb cake then.”

You sit down next to a girl who’s staring out the window, looking like her heart is being broken by what she sees, even though there’s no one there. Maybe that’s the problem. The person she wants to see isn’t there.

“Is the reason you look so sad while you stare out that window because you want to see someone out there who is never there?” you ask her.

She nods.

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

She shakes her head.

When you leave the café you almost trip over a girl sitting cross-legged on the sidewalk, sobbing into her hands.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” you ask.

She shakes her head.

As you walk through town you start to get the sense that the sad girls are following you. You turn around and see a handful of girls walking behind you, sniffling and fixing their eyeliner. Then you walk for half of a block and turn around again and find even more sad girls behind you.

Before long there will be hundreds of sad girls following you. Their sobs will be deafening.

“Is there anything I can do to help!” you shout.

They all shake their heads no, creating a palpable breeze.

That night you have trouble sleeping with all the sad girls wandering around the parking lot of your motel, crying and sniffling, shuffling about in deepest woe. You lock the door when you hear them scratching at it, but they come crashing through the window, a pile of them on the floor of your room, sobbing and bleeding from the broken glass.

You run to the bathroom, trying to shut the door behind you but the sad girls block it from shutting. They push into the tiny bathroom, still sobbing, while you cower in the corner of the bathtub.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” you ask one last time before they shake their heads no and reach their arms out, grabbing at you.

Happy Sad Girl Town Day!

Pumpkin Patch Day!

The pumpkin patch makes adults do things they wouldn’t normally do, which is why your Dad is laying down in a pile of pumpkins and making out with some other kids’ mom.

“Daddy stop!” you’ll shout, tugging at your dad’s arm to pull his hand off the woman’s breast.

“Mommy, that’s not daddy!” the other kids will shout, yanking on and hitting her shoulder to get her to remove her hand from your dad’s pants.

Eventually, your dad and the other kids’ mom will growl, “GET AWAY!” You’ll look in their eyes and see only darkness, so you and the other kids will run to the hayride truck and let it drive you away from your fornicating father.

When the hayride truck returns, your dad will be waiting, his clothes a little rumpled, a big smile on his face.

“Was wondering where you went off to,” he’ll say like nothing happened. The other kids’ mom will be waiting as well, seemingly unaware of the wanton behavior she exhibited in the pumpkin patch.

You’ll all go home and you won’t say anything to your mom about what your dad did. It will seem to be ancient history until you spot the woman from the pumpkin patch six months from now in a grocery store, her stomach big with child. You won’t have any way of knowing if it’s your dad’s, so you won’t bring it up.

On the night she goes into labor, your dad will get up from the dining table as if in a trance and he’ll run from the house, sprinting in his bare feet. He’ll find the woman in a creek bed, ready to deliver her child. The baby she delivers will be a vessel for demonic power and it will enslave the human race to the whim of Satan. All because you nagged your dad to take you to get a pumpkin for Halloween.

Happy Pumpkin Patch Day!

Santa Claus Day!

Today you’re going to go downstairs to find Santa Claus in your living room, holding his trusty sack.

“Santa?” you’ll say. “It’s not Christmas.”

“So?” Santa will ask. He’ll pull a bat out of his bag and wave it at you.

“So I don’t like you being here when it’s not Christmas,” you’ll say, picking up the fireplace poker.

Santa will swing the bat at your head and miss. You’ll land the fireplace poker right in his skull. He’ll drop to his knees and blood will pour from his mouth onto his beard. You’ll tug the poker out of his skull and just to be sure you’ll bring it down again, even harder this time. The life will go out of his eyes.

When your wife and kids wake up they’ll be angry that you killed Santa, but you’ll explain that it was kill or be killed.

“We never speak of this,” you’ll say to them. “When no one gets any presents this Christmas, you make like you’re just as surprised as everyone else.”

Your wife and kids agree. Then you drag Santa down into the basement to hack his body apart. You’ll bury him out in the mud fields near the bottling plant.

Happy Santa Claus Day!

Party King Day!

You are the Party King. While you sit in the comfiest chair at the party, feasting on pigs in blankets, mini puff pastries, and microbrews, the rest of the guests at the party are forced to get by on scraps.

“There’s been talk of the guests conspiring to commit regicide,” the host of tonight’s birthday party will tell you as you lounge in your chair pouring a large bowl of Fritos down your throat.

“Let them eat cake,” you’ll say.

“Really?” the host will ask, excited that his guests will be allowed to eat the birthday cake his wife cooked for him.

“Figure of speech,” tell the host. “Tell them if they wish to attend a party, they must submit to the whim of their king.”

Just then two of the guests will grab fondue forks and stab you fifty times in the chest and stomach. The death of the Party King will launch a party revolution as various revelers lay claim to your throne. Parties will take to the battlefield as anniversary gatherings lay siege upon birthday parties and retirement parties will attempt to overtake December holiday open houses. Thousands will die. Event halls will become awash in a sea of blood before finally one man ascends to be recognized across the land as the new and rightful Party King. His name’s Lance and he’s a really good dancer.

Happy Party King Day!

The Auto Mechanic’s Naked Lady Army Day!

You’re an auto mechanic and like most auto mechanics your garage walls are covered in pornography. You’ve pinned up dozens of photos of naked women over the years, and staring at them has really helped you fill the hours during those long workdays. In recent years your life has gotten a little lonelier than you’d like. Friends have moved away, family has either passed on or relocated, your shop has shrunk its operations so that you don’t even have a staff anymore. It’s just you. And your naked ladies.

“I wish you were real,” you’ll say tonight, with your hands on the photographs.

“Done,” you’ll hear a woman’s voice say behind you. You’ll turn around and find dozens of beautiful naked ladies, all the girls in the pictures come to vibrant life.

“Oh my god,” you’ll say. “You’re real! Can I have sex with all of you?”

“Anything you want,” the one with the live boa constrictor around her neck and draped over her breasts will say.

You’ll have sex with all the naked ladies for a few weeks, then the one with the roller skates and hardhat on will say, “What else can we do for you? We are all-powerful.”

“I hate Iowa!” you’ll say.

Your naked lady army will travel two states over to Iowa and immediately lay waste to everything in their path. Within a few days, the entire state will be in ruins.

“Wow!” you’ll say, marveling at all the bodies of the people your naked lady army just killed. “Can we have sex some more?”

You’ll have sex with all the naked ladies for another couple weeks, then you’ll tell them to destroy Minnesota. Then New York. Then they’ll take you to Paris because you’ve always wanted to see it, but you won’t like it so they’ll destroy it. It will look like your naked lady army is going to destroy the whole world until a secretary accidentally brings to life the models in her Shirtless Firefighters Holding Kittens calendar. The shirtless firefighters and their vicious indestructible kittens will go to war with the naked lady army and they’ll end up saving the world. You’ll be executed, which will be fine because you got to have sex with all those naked ladies so you’re all good life-wise.

Happy The Auto Mechanic’s Naked Lady Army Day!