Deliriously Happy (24 page)

The meeting was adjourned. Mr. McBoog was asked to stay behind.

Go to the bank and get all of your money. Accept only uncirculated singles. Come home. Lock doors and windows, unplug phones and appliances, and place electrical tape over sockets.

Draw the blinds. Put on latex gloves.

Place bills face down. With a Magic Marker, black out the Eye of Horus above the Masonic pyramid. Fill in the oval completely.

Secure your money, avoiding obvious spots such as under mattresses, behind paintings, up your or your spouse's anus, in cookie jars, etc. Suggested hiding places:

•  Spread out in a single layer behind the wallpaper

•  Colored with crayons and taped to refrigerator

•  Folded and frozen into ice cubes

•  Sewn inside dog

Spread your money across several different locations, keeping all of them in sight at all times. Stand with your feet eighteen inches apart, knees slightly bent, ready to spring in any direction.

Remain very still.

You picked a great day to visit. We have meat on Sundays.

Meat! Meat! Meat! Meat!…

Ignore those guys. They're nuts. C'mon, let me show you around. I think you're going to love it here.

If you don't mind, could I ask how you heard about us? It wasn't
Nightline
? That Cynthia McFadden, oh boy. She draws you into those dreamy green pools of hers, and next thing you know you're saying all sorts of bizarre crap. Creepy, how she does that.

Don't step in that bejeweled area. I spat there once and some consider it “sacred ground.” They'd kill you before I could stop them.

So you know, then: we are the Mighties of David, after the ragtag band of warriors the giant-slayer assembled to battle the Elders of Zion. I'm David, but not that David. It's just a happy coincidence.

Hey, Eleazar, Son of Dodai! One of my top Mighties, this fella, in charge of explosives and root vegetables. You can shake his hand, perfectly safe. We do all our own prosthetics here; our guy, Abishai the Extremity Maker, did the arm for the first
Terminator
. Those knuckles are fully articulated, by the way. Don't worry; it won't crush you.

Okay, broad strokes: We're a democracy up here. How we do that is we achieve a consensus through me, which I pronounce and it's written in stone, then tossed on the Pile of David. Bigger stone means bigger law. A few of the biggest: Tithing is 80 percent,
before agency commissions;
sexual activity is permitted, pending my availability on a first come first served basis; and, well, those are the two big ones.

Over in this area are the sleeping pits, and right next to that is the prayer/jerk circle—still a couple open spots if you're interested, right next to Benaiah the Grub Hunter or Jashobeam the Ant Piper, or you could squeeze in between Shammah the Sin Eater and Zalmon the Body Cleanser, sons of Anthony Quinn, the Zorba the Greek.

Well, maybe later then.

Okay, those tents, right to left: latrine, abattoir, showers, canteen. We've got to get some signs up. And down there, through those trees, you can see the lake where they shot the opening to the old
Andy Griffith Show
.

Ooh, sorry, didn't see you, Eliphelet! Of all of my Mighties, all of whom would give an arm or a leg, none have given as much or as generously as Eliphalet the Frequently Chosen.

You just sort of tug on his ear.

Our beliefs? You know, it's funny; most people don't even ask that. Pretty basic. We're fighting the Elders of Zion, who control the means of production through wickedness and vertical integration. That's why we're ideally situated up here in the hills; we can make sorties at will against Paramount to the south and Disney and Universal in the Valley; Fox and Sony are less than a day's march. Interesting note: this whole encampment was once owned by another king, King Vidor. And later by Sheila E. Frankie Muniz donated it when he joined. I'd introduce you, but he's in the Enlightenment Box right now, learning the meaning of
off the top
.

Now, I don't want you to get the impression that this is some sort of fantasy paradise. I mean, it's a great space and this is the swellest bunch of guys, and gal. But we're in an epic struggle here. This time it really is David versus Goliath. Thus, the pile of stones.

Meat … meat … meat…

They do love their meat. And they've earned it. Can you stay for dinner?

Wonderful. Listen, could you reach into this bladder and pull out a pebble?

It's a tradition.

No, you're our guest, you go first. Any pebble.

You got the red one! And on your first try.

Meat!… Meat!… Meat!… Meat!…

Welcome, Brother. Let's eat.

Due to numerous factors that retailers can't control, 2008 has been a challenging year and it seems this pattern will continue throughout the crucial holiday shopping season.

—Bill Martin, cofounder of ShopperTrak

Yes. Yes, there is. I go to the trouble of driving all the way across town, through three restricted zones, one of them Magenta, just to do my Christmas shopping at your mall, and you expect me to pay for parking?

So then the only space I can find is next to Macy's, which is still on fire, by the way, and a mile from any of the open stores. Do you know how aggravating it is running past all those cars in primo spots, abandoned and overrun with snakes?

Radio Shack is out of everything: generators, shortwaves, water-filtration units, Tasers, Kevorkians, D batteries… Dude says try the Hammacher Schlemmer, and then just starts laughing. They won't even let me in the Gap. You have to be a registered Christian to wear their clothes now, apparently. Girl explains it'll make it easier for Jesus at the Rapture. And Petco only has “humane” snake traps. Screw that.

Anyway, the main reason I'm here is to acquire a little Christmas cheer for the wife, and, while I'm at it, something to maybe perk up our love life, which took a major hit when we lost the bedroom furniture to marauders. Victoria's Secret is empty, on account of The Great Sloughing, I suppose. But I still can't get any service. The girl behind the counter, vacant, practically drooling, shows no interest in my wife's particular lingerie needs. Instead, she offers to take me into a dressing room and try on some outfits for me, at which point I realize, duh, she's a zombie, and I have to take her out. The manager yells at me for not using my silencer, and then says they don't accept American Express, or anything American.

Oh, and hey, that Santa of yours? A lot of kids going into his little house, not a lot coming out. Zombie. I'm just saying.

I decide to grab a bite from your food court before I go, because, you never know, right? And that's when I started screaming and shooting things until you came over here. Look at this Southwest Wrap.

What's wrong with it is you're not supposed to taste the snake.

No, you're not. Someone forgot to put on the Special Masking Sauce.

Well, if you're out of Special Masking Sauce you should put up a sign or something. And check out these Curly Fries.

They're not curly
. They're barely even twisted. Watch. When I hold one up, it goes completely limp. But you don't care.

You asked, Is there a problem here? There's your answer. That's the problem. When you stopped worrying about the curliness of your fries, when workers like you stopped worrying about the curliness, or creaminess, or deadliness of their respective fries, that's when this country got on the wrong track; that's when the bankers and CEOs all disappeared into that underground paradise they've been building since the eighties; that's when women's skin started falling off; that's when the Treasury Department, in a last-ditch effort to solve the financial crisis, certified all Monopoly and other board-game moneys; that's when the rivers ran red, and gelatinous, with what many thought was strawberry Jell-O but really, really was not; that's when the post office finally followed through on its threats to stop Saturday delivery; that's when dogs mated with cats, producing a pet that was unfriendly yet still slobbered all over you; that's when the president and the Congress went on a fact-finding mission to Subterrania and never came back; that's when baboons gained speech but only used it to make hurtful comments; that's when the dead rose and flooded the job market with cheap, disposable labor, and the serpents, seeing an opening, took dominion over this once great nation of ours.

You and your uncurled fries.

Oh, yeah, sure.
And
the asteroid. Let's all blame the asteroid.