How a Dead Tree Made My Thigh Twitch

Sometimes, my train of thought runs at breakneck speed and easily jumps onto a parallel track quicker than a cheetah with dysentery.

Case in point . . .

During a recent trek across South Dakota on I-90, Beloved was driving, and I was staring out the window at mile after mile of nothingness. Suddenly, just off the highway at an exit ramp, I saw a deathly-white tree, devoid of any leaves, and the train left the station.

That reminds me of the tree in "Legend of Sleepy Hollow." Man, Christopher Walken was super creepy in that. Who else was in  -  oh yeah, Johnny Depp. He was in "Sweeney Todd," too. Talk about super creepy. I can't believe high schools do that musical. At least "Little Shop of Horrors" has fun songs and a sense of humor. ActorBoy did great in that, but boy, when he jumped into the carnivorous plant/puppet at the end and stabbed his leg on an exposed bolt...eww.

Then Beloved asked me why I grabbed my inner thigh, and she got all confused when I said, "Did you see that dead tree back there?"

Almost the News XXXVI

 

Real Headlines. Fake News.

Man to Appear in Court After Fatal Hit-and-Run
This marks the first time a corpse will have been called as a witness.

Minneapolis City Council Denies Developer for George Floyd Square
"Actually, he's the coolest cat we've ever met. Not square at all."

Deputy Working at School in Georgia Accused of On-Duty Sexual Assault at Nearby Home
Sheriff Uttoh states: "What a person does on their own time is their own business, but when you're on the clock..."

U.S. Launches More Strikes in the Middle East
Accordingly, they are leading in the World Bowling Championships currently being held in Lebanon.

Large Police Presence in Inver Grove Heights Neighborhood
A local resident who wished to remain unidentified is quoted as saying, "There are three or four of 'em in my front yard, and they're each at least seven feet tall!"

New Report Shows Crime Trending Down in Minneapolis
Meanwhile, crime isn't a trendy thing at ALL up in Duluth.

Explosive Diarrhea-Causing Parasite Infects More than 1,000 People
The trick is to get the parasite to explode before it infects you.

Video Shows Tense Moments During South Minneapolis Standoff
"Let's take a break from this standoff and watch a clip of Indiana Jones outrunning a boulder."

Hack to the Future: Great Scott!

 

Admittedly, it doesn't take much to send my mind swirling down a rabbit hole of pop culture references and parallel universes. It should come as no surprise, then, to learn that's exactly what happened when I stumbled upon this AI-created mash-up of Taxi and Back to the Future:

Biff Reiger: Why don't you make like a tree and go to Central Park?

*  *  *

Bobby McFly: Calvin? Wh... Why do you keep calling me Calvin?

Lorraine Nardo: Well, that is your name, isn't it? Calvin Klein? It's written all over your hack license.

*  *  *

Latka McFly: I'm your density...ibbi da.

*  *  *

Bobby McFly: Wait a minute. Wait a minute, Doc. Ah... Are you telling me that you built a time machine... out of a taxi?

Dr. Rev. Jim Brown: The way I see it, if you're gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with an opportunity for extra income?

The Wonderful Wizard of Darth

 

Princess Leia returned from her learning pod only to find Almira Vader attempting to abscond with her favorite droid, R2-Toto2.

Almira Vader: I want to see you and your wife right away about Leia.
Uncle Owen: Leia? Well, what has Leia done?
Almira Vader: What's she done? I'm all but lame from the zap on my leg!
Uncle Owen: You mean she zapped you?
Almira Vader: No, her droid!
Uncle Owen: Oh, she zapped her droid, eh?

During Leia's attempt to run away from the whole situation, she was swept into a black hole, along with several chickens, wamp rats, and Miss Vader herself.

Upon gaining consciousness in a bright, Technicolor land of Ewoks and talking apple trees, Princess Leia soon made friends with a ragtag trio of misfits: Luke Scarecrowalker, Tin-3PO, and Chewbacca the Cowardly Wookie.

[Updated Update! Now The Truth Can Be Told: I started this post just so I could publish the picture of Miss Gulch on a Star Wars speeder, then I got interested in how A.I. would present the foursome. I like the Leia/C3PO/Chewie in the top pic, but prefer the bottom Luke/Scarecrow and simply HAD to show you the Emerald City with the Death Star and TIE fighters.]

Stuph That Has No Reason Being in My Head, Vol. IX

 

Clarence Odbody, the angel who saves George Bailey in It's a Wonderful Life, appears on screen for only 15 minutes.

It irritates me when people on medical shows say things like “You have to save my child! Please save my child!” As if the medical staff wasn’t going to do anything until the parent told them to.

The voice of Betty Rubble, Bea Benaderet, was also Kate Bradley, the owner of The Shady Rest, on Petticoat Junction.

Two spoons of Swiss Miss plus one spoon of Tang makes for a tasty, orangey mug of hot chocolate.

Ice is not slippery. The tiny bit of water (i.e., melted ice) between your boot and the ice is what's slippery.

The Twilight Zone's Rod Serling was only 5'4" tall...if tall is the right word to use in this instance.

I'd be terminal, too, if I had an arrow through my head.

The founder of Hormel Foods, maker of Spam® and other fine delicacies, was George A. Hormel, who pronounced his name HORmel, not HorMEL.

It's not the lavender flower that smells so good; it's the leaf.

Mary Tyler Moore was only 24 when she started playing Laura Petrie, wife of the 35‑year‑old Dick Van Dyke, on The Dick Van Dyke Show.

♫♪ Hey Pink Panther
We love Pink Panther Flakes
They’re pink and sweet and they’re new
We love your 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 different vitamins
Just as much as we love you
From Post!

Stuph That Has No Reason Being in My Head, Vol. VIII

 

Somebody, somewhere, needs to splice together every instance of Laura Petrie saying "Oh, Rob" into one big, beautiful supercut.

Only about a third of Gilligan’s Island episodes are about trying to get off the island.

Billy Joel wrote "We Didn't Start the Fire" as a response to a friend of Sean Lennon having said that Joel's life had been easy because he grew up in the 50s and everybody knows that nothing happened in the 50s.

The actor who was Alfalfa in the original Little Rascals/Spanky and Our Gang comedies, Carl Switzer, turned the key that opened the gym floor in It's a Wonderful Life and was the Haynes sisters' brother, "freckle-faced Haynes, the dog-faced boy," in White Christmas.

Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, on a sesame seed bun

Ray Charles shilling for Diet Pepsi:

https://youtu.be/J8RPtMBsM5M?si=wMGhSjZ6EWjVpUGM

I know it shouldn't bother me, but it does: My high school and college-aged co-workers at FastStop do not know who John Wayne is.

The square root of 6,561 is 81.

During the year that Tom Hanks was losing weight to film the 2nd half of Cast Away, Robert Zemeckis and the whole crew filmed the jeepy-creepy What Lies Beneath.

The term "gaslighting" (a form of psychological manipulation where someone makes another person doubt their own reality, memories, or sanity) sprang from the 1944 film, Gaslight, though that film was based on a 1938 play of the same name.

The Most Unexpected Cameo in Rock History (Hint: Barbed Wire Is Involved)

 

"Pride (In the Name of Love)," was U2's first Top 40 hit. It only reached 33 on the Billboard charts, but went all the way to Number 378 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

It's a fine stadium rock anthem with the numerously-repeated subtitle easily sung along with.

According to songfacts.com, the song was inspired by a visit to the 1983 Martin Luther King, Jr. exhibit at the Chicago Peace Museum and calls to mind singular men who lived their lives in a way they could be proud of...lives dedicated to love for all of humanity:

The words, "Early morning, April 4, shot rings out in the Memphis sky. Free at last, they took your life. They could not take your pride" allude to Martin Luther King, Jr. (even though he was actually shot around 6 PM. No matter, Bono has since apologized for the historical inaccuracy.)

When he sings "One man come in the name of love" and "One man betrayed with a kiss," we are meant to think of Jesus and how Judas identified him to the arresting officers.

And then there's "One man caught on a barbed wire fence," which obviously is a tribute to Captain Virgil "The Cooler King" Hilts; the character in The Great Escape played by Steve McQueen.

Well, maybe not.

Drawing on My Imagination...Well, CoPilot's

 

To get caught up, you may want to go to the earlier post, "My Graphic Rabbit Hole," to get the origin story of these flights of fancy, wherein Microsoft's A.I. engine, CoPilot, reimagines a portrait of me as...

a friend of Calvin & Hobbes

a member of the Family Circus

an anime character

drawn by Charles Schulz

or, best for last (as always), part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe!

#ReplaceMovieTitlesWithSynonyms

 

This is the kind of thing that could have been strung out over a multitude of #TuesdayTrivia entries on the Almost the Truth™ Publishing Facebook page, but (to almost quote Back to the Future's Doc Brown) then I figured, what the H-E-double-hockey-sticks?

• The Diety Male Parent
• The Lightless Templar
• A Dozen Furious Fellows
• The Nobleman of the Finger Circlets
• Lurid Unreal Narrative

• The Excellent, the Awful, and the Unattractive
• Altercation League
• One Swooped Above and Past the Fool's Structure of Twigs, Grass, and Mud
• It's a Marvelous Animate Existence
• The Noiselessness of the Young Sheep

Headlines to Hope for in 2026

 

Please, oh please, oh pretty pretty please!

Campaign Promises to Lower Prices Are Fulfilled

Hollywood Produces 10 Films People Actually Want to See

Minnesotans Give Up Their Juvenile Insistence on Calling "Duck, Duck, Goose" "Duck, Duck, Gray Duck"

Airlines Replace Tasteless So-Called Cookies with CornNuts

Ice Cream, Like Water, Declared Essential for Life and Free at All Restaurants

Art Garfunkel, James Taylor, and Paul Simon Release Cover of Satchmo's "What a Wonderful World"

Campaigning for Mid-term Elections Restricted to Publishing of Position Papers

Waste-of-ink comic strip, Fred Basset, finally shuts down. #FredBassetMustDie

#RuinAChristmasMovie

 

[Originally published December 22, 2017]

It's...

That...

Time of year, when the world watches the same movies for the umpteenth time.

But what if some unscrupulous modifier tweaked the titles of some of those over-watched classics?

It's a Wonderful Lice  -  It's a lousy Christmas when Zuzu comes home from school with someone else's hat.

Frankie the Snowman  -  Ol' Blue Eyes is back, but some miffed mobsters want to put him on ice for good.

Rudolph the Reed-Nosed Reindeer  -  Olive, the other reindeer, laughs at poor Rudolph because he sounds like a clarinet when he breathes.

A Christmas Stork  -  The protagonist wants to buy a Red Ryder BB gun, but is called away to deliver a baby to an obscure village in the Middle East.

Homely Alone  -  An eight-year-old boy is left behind from his family's Christmas trip because he's just so darn ugly.

Alf  -  A furry, alien life form travels from the North Pole to New York City in search of its biological father and a nice CLT...cat, lettuce, and tomato sandwich; where the cat is nice and lean and the tomatoes are ripe.

The Old Gray Mare Before Christmas  -  This sleigh ride just ain't what she used to be.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vaccination  -  An unfortunate reaction to an ill-timed flu shot spoils a family's holiday celebration.

White Supremacist Christmas  -  Some jokes just write themselves.

The Molar Express  -  A Rankin/Bass production that creates a myth based on the popular song, "All I Want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth".

The Santa Claws  -  Kris Kringle refuses to submit to his annual mani/pedi.

Pie Hard  -  NYPD Detective John McClane tries to reconcile with his estranged wife by bringing dessert to her employer's Christmas party, but the dessert is stale.

How the Grinch Smelled on Christmas  -  A special 4-D immersive experience. Not for the faint of nose.

Mildly Amusing Incident on 34th Street  -  A temporary Macy's employee claims to be Howie Mandel.

A Charlie Beige Christmas  -  The Peanuts gang goes to Phoenix for the holidays.

A Christmas Carrot  -  After a series of dreams, Ebeneezer Scrooge goes vegan.

For the video version of this post, CLICK HERE.

Welcome to My Graphic Rabbit Hole

 

With last week's mini-venture into A.I. image manipulation, I opened the door to something so fun it's dangerous. Or maybe so dangerous that it's fun, I don't know.

I gave CoPilot the following self-portrait...

...then asked it to make it look different in a number of ways. First, I wanted to look steampunk.

Then I asked to look as if Picasso painted me.

Then Van Gogh.

Salvador Dali

The good folks at Pixar

The only-slightly-different-looking Claymation

Then I thought, could CoPilot put me inside different entertainment franchises ... like The Simpsons?

Or Star Trek

Saving my personal favorite for last, look what happened when I asked to be put in a scene from Pirates of the Caribbean:

I was kind of hoping for something more like Jack Sparrow and less like Smee, but I look at this and can't help but think "Jolly Roger".

What Was So Special About August 31, 2023?

 

It's not always the best thing for my self-esteem for me to look at the readership statistics for Almost the Truth.

We're a happy little family here, you and I. But most of the time, the operative word in that sentence is little. Over the course of almost 18 years and 929 posts, this blog has averaged 304 views per post. But that represents a high of 771 ("Pictures Inappropriate for History Books!" 9/15/2017) and a low of 55 ("#PutAnAnimalInASeventiesSongTitle Two" 5/24.2024).

In terms of how many page views happen on any given day, the number bounces around between 200 and 500, with a few valleys and peaks on either side of that range.

But then, August 31, 2023 happened.

On that fateful day, there were 41,272 page views here at Almost the Truth.

What the farnsworth??!?

What happened on that day that drove so many people to find solace in the chuckles found in this space?

I consulted onthisday.com and found the following headlines for August 31, 2023:

• At least 76 people died in a fire in an office building housing migrants and vulnerable people in Johannesburg, South Africa. [This might have caused an uptick in readers looking for escape, but 41,000?]
• A new computer model study suggested humanity was almost wiped out 900,000 years ago with just 1,280 reproducing individuals remaining [I believe the number you're looking for is 8: Noah, his 3 sons, and their 4 wives.]
• Two leaders of right-wing group the Proud Boys received lengthy sentences for sedition for their assault on the US Capitol [We all know THAT didn't last long.]

Unconvinced any of these occurrences could have caused such a spike in readership, I looked through the years to see if there was a significant event's anniversary that sent people to the comfort of my comedy.

• 1888: The body of Jack the Ripper's first victim, Mary Ann Nichols, is found in Whitechapel in London's East End [Nah. That's way too long ago for people to care about.]
• 1895: First professional football game: QB John Brallier is paid $10 and his team wins 12-0 [And team owners have been buying wins ever since.]
• 1897: Thomas Edison patents the Kinetoscope, a device that produces moving pictures [Worth celebrating, but I think it would result in people going to the movies, not reading this blog.]
• 1946: Foghorn Leghorn, a Warner Bros. cartoon character, debuts in "Walky Talky Hawky" [Exactly what Edison had in mind, no doubt.]
• 1987: Michael Jackson's "Bad" video, directed by Martin Scorcese, premieres during TV special "Michael Jackson: The Magic Returns" on CBS [Hmmm...we may be getting warm here.]
• 2009: The Walt Disney Company announces it will acquire Marvel Entertainment for $4.24 billion

Back the truck up, stop the presses, and hoooooold on there! We have found the answer!

Stuph That Has No Reason Being in My Head, Vol. VII

 

The orange powder left on your hands after eating Cheetos is called "cheetle".

The two main male characters of The Big Bang Theory, Sheldon and Leonard, were named in honor of the actor who played Nick the Bartender in It's a Wonderful Life.

According to a producer I know, Miley Cyrus can't carry a tune...at all.

The stories that say Karen Carpenter was on a popcorn-only diet are unsubstantiated rumors.

James Taylor's first single, "Carolina in My Mind," was released on The Beatles' Apple Records.

♫♪ Dewey Dewey Bo-Bewey, Banana Fanna Fo-Fooey, Fee Fi Mo-Mooey...Dewey! ♪♫

Before he was Gilligan, Bob Denver co-starred as a beatnik on The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis.

On Sesame Street, Caroll Spinney was both Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch.

When extended, a frog's tongue is about a third as long as the frog  -  as if our own tongues reached our belly buttons!

Chihuahua's are the world's smallest breed of dog...even though they look like rats.

What If Spielberg Was in the Star Wars Universe?

 

When I saw this parody poster that injected Stephen Spielberg's original blockbuster Jaws into the entertainment behemoth known as Star Wars, and knowing that Mr. Spielberg and Star Wars creator George Lucas are personal friends, it set my mind to wandering and wondering: What if Spielberg made all his movies part of what took place a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away?

*  *  *  *  *  *  *

Droid Duel  -  A business commuter is pursued and terrorized by a malevolent artoo unit.

Stormtroopers of the Lost Ark  -  Archaeologist Indiana Jones is tasked by the Rebel Alliance to help locate a legendary ancient power, the Ark of the Coruscant, before the Galactic Empire gets it.

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial  -  Technically, this movie is already part of the Star Wars canon.

The Color Purple  -  A whole movie about Mace Windu's very special lightsaber

Empirassic Park  -  An industrialist invites some experts to visit his theme park of cloned tauntauns and banthas. After a power failure, the creatures run loose, putting everyone's lives in danger.

Saving Private Wicket-  Following the Battle for Endor, a group of rebel fighters go behind enemy lines to retrieve an ewok whose brothers have been killed in action.

#MakeAMovieUnderwhelming Deux

 

Ten years ago yesterday, I published a list on this topic. It may be high time for a second edition.

So hi, Time, and welcome to a world where Hollywood just isn't as exciting as it thinks it is.

• The Demi-God Father
• The Dark Serf
• 12 Slightly-Miffed Men
• The Good, the Bad, and the Nondescript
• Heated Argument Club
• One Stepped Over the Cuckoo's Nest
• 6ix
• It's an Okay Life
• The Green Furlong
• The Accordionist
• Sadiator
• The Stray Cat King
• Raiders of the Temporarily-Misplaced Suitcase

• Average Will Hunting
• Bravekidney
• Singin' in the 20% Chance of Showers
• Larry of Arcadia
• Full Plastic Jacket
• To Sicken a Mockingbird
• The Chihuahua of Wall Street
• A Fistful of Dimes
• Some Like It Lukewarm
• The Fifth Sense
• The Fourth Element
• Looking for Nemo
• Thousand Dollar Baby
• How to Train Your Dragonfly
• Mr. Smith Goes to Topeka
• Star Disagreements Episode Five: The HOA Retaliates

SNL, Disney, and My Cowbell Embarrassment

 

Apparently, I'm weird.

Well ... maybe unique is a better word.

Case in point:

Back in the days when Will Ferrel was a Saturday Night Live cast member, there was a particular sketch featuring Mr. Ferrel in a too-small-for-him shirt, playing cowbell as Blue Oyster Cult records their hit, "Don't Fear the Reaper." As the record producer, Christopher Walken repeatedly interrupts the recording to ask for ... and later, forcefully demand ... more cowbell.

It was pretty hilarious and even ended up being featured as a whole episode of the recent docuseries on SNL's 50 years of existence.

Okay ... now ...

Go back to the theatrical release of Disney's "live action" remake of The Jungle Book. I'm sitting in a packed movie theater. Mowgli is sitting in the orangutans' temple, which is strewn with found objects and treasures collected by the apes, about to meet their monarch, King Louie.

With the what-I-thought-was-common knowledge that Christopher Walken was the voice of King Louie, I saw Mowgli reach into the pile of stuph and pull out, with curiosity and confusion, a cowbell.

I laughed mightily.

I was the only one.

Apparently, I'm weird.

A Vegetarian's Lit Mom: Movie Title Anagrams

 

Twisting letters. Twisting plots.

• Twelve Angry Men = Warm Gent Evenly (A dozen chefs argue how best to cook a refined man.)
• Return of the King = Fuehrer Knotting (The final Lord of the Rings film is about Hitler's hobby during his final days.)
• Pulp Fiction = Clip Fop Unit (Drastic surgery on an effeminate man)
• The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly = A Tough Tho Lengthy Bad Deed (Yep, that covers it.)

This is what happens when you let AI create a graphic for "A Tough Tho Lengthy Bad Deed"

• Forrest Gump = Forgets Rump (And I thought MY memory was bad!)
• The Matrix = Max Tither (Neo gives more to his church than anyone else.)
• It's a Wonderful Life = A Definite Fowl Slur ("In the whole vast configuration of things, I'd say you were nothing but a scurvy little chicken!")
• Saving Private Ryan = Ivy Narrates Paving (A verbal creeping vine tells the tale of building a road.)
• Shawshank Redemption = A Sharpened Moth Winks (You only THOUGHT he dug his way out with a rock hammer.)
• The Godfather = The Hog Farted ("Leave the gun. Take the bacon.")

#MakeDisneySciFi

 

What if Walt Disney had been a science fiction fanboy?

*  *  *  *  *  *  *

Starship Willie  -  Mickey's first starring role as a swashbuckling intergalactic captain.

Snow White and the Seven Ferengi  -  ♫♪ "Whistle while you floss..." ♪♫

The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Spock  -  Audiences found this one "fascinating."

Alice in Alderaan  -  "Curiouser and curiouser. It's getting quite hot. In fact, I think this place is about to explo--"

Davey Crockett: King of the Final Frontier  -  Fess Parker stars as the famous frontiersman wearing a tribble as a hat.

Peter Pandora  -  ♫ "What makes the blue man blue?" ♪♫

Transporting Beauty  -  An evil fairy's curse renders Auroa unable to stay in one place for more than two minutes without being beamed to a different location.

The Lightsaber in the Stone  -  "Whoso pulleth out this lightsaber of this stone and anvil and can get the blame thing to turn on is rightwise king, born of Darth." 

The Mechanical Mermaid  -  Ariel the Android runs off with a silverware manufacturing unit.

Beauty and the Transformer  -  ♫♪ "Gosh, it disturbs me to see you, Megatron, with such a big dent in your rear. Every guy here wants to be you, Megatron, even when stuck in first gear." ♪♫

Final Book or Movie in the Series

 

On June 19, 2023, as a #MondayMirth feature on the Almost the Truth™ Publishing Facebook page, I published the following comic, stolen from John Atkinson:

On June 19, 2024, when said post showed up in the page's Memories feed, I thought, "Maybe I could turn that idea into a whole blog post."

And maybe I did.

And maybe there's no better time to post it than on a Friday the 13th.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *

Percy Jackson and the Morticians

Spider-man 13: Spidey Gets Raid-ed

The Hardy Boys: The Mystery of the Mixed-up Assisted Living Meds

Star Wars: The Flatulence of the Wookies

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Guillotine

Back to the Future 4 (in which, Marty travels in time to the exact moment he reaches 88 miles per hour and is caught in a chronological Mobius strip)

Malnourished Bird: Hunger's Not Just a Game Anymore

Harry Potter and the Potions Class Fiasco

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the Colon Cancer

Indiana Jones and the Myocardial Infarction