It feels odd to be coming to the campground on a Wednesday, rather than a Saturday this week. The place has a different feel to it today. You’re not sure if that’s because of the change of day or because of the blank stage that’s in front of you. There is nothing on the stage except a very ornate mirror on the left side of the stage.
You don’t have long to wait to find out what the mirror is for.
While coffee and pastries are being served to the MUCH smaller patron area, Impish comes out from behind stage right and he is a sight to behold. Dressed in dragon sized Hawaiian styled Bermuda shorts, dark sunglasses perched on his forehead, a spot of white sunscreen on the bridge of his massive nose (enough sunscreen for the entire body of at least three bathing beauties) and a puka shell necklace with a little charm dangling from it that says “Gnarly, Dude”, he looks like a caricature of a 1970’s surfer bum.
“Oh good! I’m glad you’re all here. I need witnesses.” He begins to rub coconut oil all over his body. “Today you will witness a historical first…or is it an historical first? A historical…An historical…” He turns and bellows off stage, “Terrance, find out if it’s a or an.”
“A or An what?” The voice gets closer to the curtain.
“Anwar Sadat, what?” Impish starts back towards the same curtain.
“You have to fart?” Terrance is right on the other side of the curtain.
Impish pushes into the curtain as both of them at the same time say, “What the fuc—” and they slam into each other with the thin curtain between them. Now, it’s not very well known, but trolls have the thickest and hardest bones of almost any mythical creature, so although Impish, even in his current smaller form, may have out massed Terrance, he didn’t out density him and as they smacked into each other there was a mutual moving away from each other because, as Einstein postulated, for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. And this action was pretty severe, therefore, so was the reaction as a double “THUD” was not only heard, but felt.
Several miles away, two seismologists jumped as the needle on the seismograph they were studying suddenly jumped.
“That was a 3.1!” said seismologist #1.
“And that could have only been a precursor!” said seismologist #2 “Where was the epicenter?”
“Oh, never mind. I recognize those coordinates. That was probably that stupid dragon crash landing again. A little stronger than most other times, but not out of the area of statistical probability.”
The “stupid dragon” was shaking his head and coming back around, thanks mostly to the bucket of ice water dumped on his head and the Boston-Crème Donut waved under his snout. “Okay, so where was I?” he asked while swallowing said Boston-Cream Doughnut and making his way back to the center of the stage where his pot of coconut oil lay on the floor.
As he absentmindedly begins to smear even more oil on his already sopping scales, “Right, um… historical day and all that. Right.”
He begins to enthusiastically point to the front of the stage and almost shouts in his excitement, “There! Right there! We’ll put up another monument. ‘Here on this day, Impish Dragon pulled a fast one on Lethal Leprechaun.’ We’ll have to fancy up the wording some but…”
Impish stops and looks out at the audience as if seeing them for the first time, “And I’m so glad you are all here to witness my huge success!” Impish looks down at his oil soaked watch, “In just a couple of minutes now, Lethal Leprechaun will be stepping through that mirror returning from his extended vacation in Leprechaunia. He never DID allow me to come and visit so I’m going to slip through the portal while it is open and he is … I did tell you that the mirror is a portal, right? No? Well, okay, the mirror is a portal and it’s connected to Leprechaunia. Now, I can’t open it, believe me I tried. But it HAS to open when he returns and if I time it right, I’m going to slip in as he steps through. I’ve even oiled myself down so I can slide right in as he steps out. And I WILL get my vacation! Surf, Sun, and bathing beauties! I can hardly wait!”
As he finishes his explanation, the edges of the mirror begin to glow and a strange swirling transforms the glass into a foggy mist. Impish sets himself in a stance like he’s ready to run the 100 meter dash, or, in his case, the 100 meter waddle. “Wait for it…”
“Wait for it…”
Finally you see a green clad leg begin to step through the mirror and Impish takes off at a run across the stage and towards the mirror. You have to give him credit, he is almost moving at a good clip. Just as Lethal steps through the mirror, he has just enough time to step out of the way as Impish launches himself in the air while screaming, “KOWABUNGA!” Sadly, he doesn’t sail very far at all in the air, but instead belly flops a foot or two in front of the mirror, but with the oil slathered all over the place and with a maniacal laugh he screams, “I DID IT! I BEAT YOUUUUUUUUU…..” as he slides through the mirror and disappears.
There is a long silence in the campground as Lethal looks at the mirror until the swirling mist turns back into glass mirror, then he turns to you all and says, “Well, that certainly was exciting. I did think the Kowabunga was a nice touch, though.” and begins to walk off the stage, when he stops and looks back at you all. “I’m sure you all know that things aren’t going to go quite the way my buddy Impish thinks they will, right? Well, allow me to check back into the business office and I’ll come back and give you…,” in his best Paul Harvey voice, “…The REST of the Story.”
He waves his hand dismissively at Terrance as he comes from behind the curtains rubbing his head, “You folks go ahead and go through Dragon Laffs. I know he finished the issue because I didn’t let him know of my return until I was sure he finished up. We’ll catch up later.”
And with that he walks off the stage. And all that’s left for you to do is….
I felt sorry for the hypnotist I saw last night…
He hypnotized seven guys…
Then he dropped the mic on his foot and yelled…
FUCK ME…
What happened next will haunt me for the rest of my life.
It was a hell of a good Olympics!
Well, here it is…my final plead for donations. I have to pay the bill for the ezine very soon now and we really didn’t do well this year. Other than the vets, the disabled and the current service members, be they Law, Fire, EMT or Military (all of those who run TOWARDS the danger while the rest run AWAY) who have automatic Patron status, here are the New Patrons:
Steven H. Leah H. Henry S. Karl K. (K2) Virginia K. (Ginny)
Diamantina (Diaman) Henry C. Dan T. Jonathon J. Donald G. and James C.
Please, won’t you please consider one more time, a donation for our efforts for you each week?
Okay, that’s the pleas for this year. I will mention anyone else who donates, of course, but I’m done asking for money.
Here’s a GREAT essay on the redistribution of wealth! (aka taxes). It’s from:
It is commonly believed that a proper function of government is to “level the playing field” by ensuring that the rich pay their “fair share” of taxes, and that the poor and disadvantaged receive extra help from government in the form of subsidies, grants, and “welfare.” (Originally called the “dole,” welfare was given its current name in the 1930s, as a way to sell FDR’s “New Deal” program to the American public. The term was intended to confer constitutional legitimacy, since the preamble proclaims one of the purposes of government to be supporting the “general welfare.” But in reality, “welfare” is just a new name for the dole — the traditional term for using the government in order to rob Peter to pay Paul.) All such policies have as their stated aim creating greater equality. Originally scorned as “the leveling impulse,” wealth redistribution has come to pervade much of what the federal government does.
But is there anything wrong with government “leveling the playing field”? Consider what this practice entails in reality. Whenever government takes from one class of people in order to give to another, it is taking the property of some and giving it to others. The fact that some are wealthier than others is mere sophistry, an argument designed to distract from the real issue of government redistribution: It is theft, pure and simple.
Along with the right to life, the right to property ownership must be deemed among the most important God-given rights conferred upon fallen man. But whereas the people almost always raise an indignant hue and cry whenever government unjustly deprives men of their lives (as, for example, when an officer of the law kills a citizen without just cause, or when government dispatches its military forces to wage war for unjust purposes), the voice of the people tends to fall silent when government commits legal theft (or “legal plunder,” in the phraseology of French economist and statesman Frédéric Bastiat). One reason for this inconsistency is that a life, once taken, cannot be restored, and state-sanctioned murder thus becomes a crime that cannot be ignored. But stolen property can be given to someone else under the false color of social justice, a fact that dishonest politicians have ever taken advantage of to portray their depredations as a form of charity.
Read the rest of the essay here: http://www.thenewamerican.com/reviews/american-principles/item/23907-what-s-wrong-with-the-redistribution-of-wealth and don’t forget to read the comments. They got into some really good discussions on the topic.
Okay, so here is your warning:
It was horrible, right? It’s going to be going through your mind for the rest of the day, “untweetable”. Right? So why the heck do you think I gave you the WARNING!? So don’t blame me if you can’t get rid of “untweetable”.
“Good luck with that offering, pal. It sure doesn’t look virginal to me. What? Gold? Okay, we can discuss this.”
This one is from 2014, but it is so very true still today. You really gotta love this senator from South Carolina.
And I guess that video is a perfect lead in to:
Yeah, like CNN is anything other than the Controlling News Network.
That is the way of Obama
As I was getting in bed, she said, “You’re drunk.”
I said, “How do you know?”
She said, “You live next door.”
A bunch of people are out there looking for Pokemon, but won’t look for a job.
Go ahead, let that sink in.
Just a random shot of one of our team members’ kid.
I did learn something very interesting last weekend. Apparently RSVPing back to a wedding invitation, “Maybe Next Time” isn’t the correct answer.
Who knew?
Heck, I thought that was a good answer.
And that is the honest truth!
Well, apparently, you should have been more precise.
Okay, okay, I can feel the hate mail coming over this one right now. Let me just tell all you complainers one thing…IT’S A JOKE! Lighten up for crying out loud.
Yes, and the others of you who are outraged over this one…see the previous instruction.
This is just an example of Ninja Kitty School hazing gone horribly wrong.
And that, my friends, it what any other fellow officer would do.
Our old grouch friend Paul K9 writes in to us to tell us a story.
My brother took going to jail really badly. He refused all offers of food and drink, he spat and swore at anyone who came near him, and he smeared the walls with his own feces.
After that, we never played Monopoly again!
Okay, truth in advertising here…that’s all just bullshit! I LOVE MY KINDLE! I have almost 16,000 books in my electronic library (thanks in huge part to my best buddy Lethal Leprechaun) (****The following is a mandatory statement based on a legal mutual agreement between Mr. Leprechaun and Mr. Dragon****) (Yes Lethal, I am your book bitch) … ahem, as I was saying, I have almost 16k books in my electronic library, can anyone imagine how much paper that would take and how much room it would take if they were all real, live books.
If we assume that the average width of a book, paperback and hardback is half an inch, which I think is a little on the low side, 16,000 books X .5 inch = 8,000 inches or 667 running feet of shelf space. Now, assuming a normal book shelf (at least normal for me) is 6 feet tall, has five shelves that are 28 inches across. That means that each book shelf can hold about 11 running feet of books. So, my electronic library would need at least 61 book shelves.
Looking around my house, if I moved every single piece of furniture out, and used every single inch of wall space, and in the rooms that are large enough putting some of the shelves in the middle of the room and not even on the wall, I’d still be putting a handful of them in the backyard due to a lack of room. But, that would be okay, since that’s where all the furniture is, anyway.
It would be a really cool set up…until the first time it rained…or got cold…
Well, that little snippet got a little out of hand. I think it’s time to get back to …. um …. what ever it was we were doing before I started talking about books.
I think motivational posters are in order.
But, it’s Dairy Queen!
Yeah! Buddy!
Yeah, that’s pretty much been my experience as well.
Cow udder excretion.
Okay, another video. This one is just too good to pass by.
I want to take the opportunity to talk about something that pissed me off for the last week or so since I heard about it. And in some ways I feel like I’m beating a dead horse, but I have to get rid of this anger.
Colin Kaepernick sitting during the National Anthem in protest to the inequalities being perpetrated on different, selected minorities in our country.
Yes, there are some terrible things going on in our country right now. I would submit that they are happening to all classes and types of peoples, but be that as it may, we agree that there are horrible things going on.
And yes, the exact country he is protesting against, allows him the right and the freedom to express himself as he sees fit.
Having said all that, he has picked a truly horrible and insulting way to express his feelings.
Our National Anthem, our Flag, our Country has paid the price in the blood of the patriots who not only fought for our freedom, but continue to fight and protect the rest of us here at home.
Standing for the Anthem and the Flag is an acknowledgement of the sacrifices of greater people than ourselves who have given their all for us. Failing to stand politely is saying that what those others gave up means nothing to you.
And I submit to you, Mr. Kaepernick, if your parents haven’t taught you to be thankful for the freedoms that were given to you, if you can’t acknowledge a great sacrifice that was done FOR you, then sir, I suggest you find another country to call home and don’t let the door hit you in the ass on your way out!
I AM The Impish Dragon and I’ll hold the door for you as you leave!
Dragon Laffs 
my stars have always been on the top. today is no different.
kaepernik is the manifistation of all Pro Sports that allow semi-educated jocks to influence others.
He is the mainstay for all other clubs to totally vet draft choices. Craziness does not equal performance and as much as it effects the rest of the team, he is a deterrent at the least.
Regardless of his views, he has no right to influence or disrupt those around him.
Yes, it was odd reading Dragon Laffs on a Wednesday….but it sure was funny, informative, and sad to read that the annual donations are not coming in. I loved the video of DELETE IT, hard to believe she isn’t serviing time! It is a disgrace what the CLINTON family is getting away with….any one of us would be pounding out license plates. Now to Kapernick, the NFL should throw him the hell off the team. I don’t care what he believes…show respect to the country that includes the team signing his pay checks!
Oh my dear Impish…
You are my hitch for. far more things than just books!
You left out music, recipes and computer advice just for starters.
BTW should I mention that at last count I had roughly 4 times the number of books you do?
Granted yours are probably organized far nicer than mine however. With so little reading time available I try not to waste it on organizing them too much. I tend toward focusing on finding all the books in a series. So many books and so little time!
Maybe the low donations are a sign we should pack it in and devote our time effort and money to reading! Wadda ya think?
Lethal,
There certainly is a huge desire to spend every waking moment by reading. I agree… so many books, so little time.
If we were to take the amount of the donations and use that as a measuring stick to how much our efforts are appreciated, then maybe you’d be right. I tend to hope it’s more of a case of being that “it’s tough all over right now” and people just can’t afford to donate.
But, we’ve also asked many, many times for people to use the stars for rating us, which doesn’t cost anybody anything. Now that we’ve moved it to the end of the issue, they don’t even have to remember to scroll back to the top. If you finish the issue, it’s right in front of you.
So yeah, between the two, maybe we ought to retire and spend our time reading…or even collaborating on a novel.
We’ll see how it works out.
Cheers my buddy.
Three things Dragon Pal o’ mine_
I’d agree with the stars thing IF the damned star rating thing stayed up. It apparently keeps crashing as we’ve been aware for a while now.. WordPress wants a LOT of our money, but seems to be failing to deliver on a complete functional stable platform. They’re bloody well pissin me off and you KNOW thats NOT a good thing.
I’d another though about your words on your library and it occurs to me you left out something obvious, namely the amount of money you’ve saved. I was looking this morning and the average paperback book (lets face it you and I can rarely afford a hard cover edition of anything) is running between $10 & $11USD off Amazon for a newly released to paperback best seller. Other wise they seem to run mostly between $8 & $9 USD for well know established authors. That makes $9.50USD the mid point for averaging purposes. [($8 + $11)/2= $9.50]
So 16,000 (paperback) books times an average price of $9.50USD represents an investment of $152,000USD or basically the cost of your house.
As for possibly dumping the blog and collaborating on a book, I’m game. We’ve collaborated enough on the story lines in here that we might as well take a swing at something we’ll at least see a return on. We’ll need a good idea though, something that will really sell. Say maybe something like New Jersey being Ground Zero for the Zombie Apocalypse. Can you think of anything funnier than a Zombie Mafia?