Seeing Satan in the smoke & the story of Daryl, the forgotten 13th Apostle

(724 words)

The tragic incineration of Notre Dame Cathedral had the faithful around the world peering through the smoke to see the faces of hope and redemption.

Not me.

I studied the smoke to see if I spy the face of  — brace yourself —

Satan!

It’s a habit I picked up through years of reading the Weekly World News. 

You can have “The Onion,” “Mad,” and other hipper sources of satire. To me, the funniest periodical ever printed was ‘the WWN. 

Sample headlines: “Scientists Reveal Saturn is a Giant UFO!” “Man’s 174-mph Sneeze Blows Wife’s Hair Off!” and “Sadam and Osama Adopt Shaved Baby Ape!”

They never skimped on the exclamation points. Never!!!

The News was the paper that provided some of the most comprehensive coverage of the life and death of Elvis Presley — in 2006. He was 71.

I started reading the WWN in college, never dreaming my “career” would lead to friendships with swashbuckling staffers. The Weekly World News was until it closed in 2007 a sister publication of National Enquirer. Their offices were separated by a simple partition.

So when I finished doing my wacky Enquirer stories during my visits, I’d stroll around the partition to revel in the preposterous. It was a storyteller’s paradise.

But it wasn’t all fun and games. When global tragedy struck, they were like other more sober news organizations in that they were ready to detail what happened and assign blame.

Unlike those prissy brethren they held nothing back when it found blame. And their quoted experts usually laid the blame at the hooved feet of …

Satan!!!

Yes, any calamity inevitably led to a front page picture of smoking ruins with a sinister headline: “Face of Satan Seen in Smoke …”

Of course, being fair and balanced before there was a fair and balanced, they devoted ample coverage to Team God.

That’s how I learned about the existence of Daryl the 13th Apostle. I recently found a copy of the story in box of old keepers. Headline: “Christ’s Forgotten 13th Apostle Was an Idiot!”

The story says a maverick researcher learned that the Apostle named Daryl was an “obnoxious jerk” and a constant embarrassment to the Savior. Church fathers believed dopey Daryl detracted from the solemnity of the Bible and edited him out of the Gospels.

British historian Dr. Chad Norton-Chestwell is quoted as saying, “Daryl was rather like a drunken party guest who clowns around thinking he’s funny when he’s really just annoying.”

He said Daryl showed up drunk at the Sermon on the Mount and actually heckled Jesus, shouting things like “Borr-ing!”

He demolished the dignity of the occasion of Jesus’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem by mooning the crowd and telling Jesus, “How’s that for turning the other cheek?” Jesus had to stop His followers from beating Daryl senseless.

The story about how Jesus turned water into wine when the wedding party ran out? Take a wild guess why they ran out.

He couldn’t even keep his yap shut during Jesus’s miracles. When He brought back Lazarus from the dead Daryl pinched his nose and declared, “The man still stinketh.”

No realm was too sacred for Daryl to satirize. One time a chair Matthew was sitting in collapsed and Daryl said, “My Lord, you may be the Son of God, but you’re one lousy carpenter.”

“At the Last Supper, he started a food fight. The other 12 apostles constantly urged Christ to give Daryl the heave-ho, but Jesus being who He was, he could only forgive the idiot.”

Yet, at the crucifixion, it was Daryl alone whom He called to be at His side, Norton-Chestwell said, adding, “Daryl stayed at the foot of the cross, making light of the situation with pratfalls and one-liners, to keep the Lord’s spirits up.”

Now, I suspect some — just some — of the WWN’s stories were made up (“Baby Born with Wooden Leg!”). 

But I hope the story of Daryl the Forgotten Apostle is factual.

I like the idea of a Savior with whom you could sit and enjoy Leslie Nielsen in “Airplane!” and “Naked Gun” movies. 

Because some probably did see the face of Satan in the smoke above Notre Dame.

But if you look closely enough, you just might see the Face of God every time you see someone you love smiling back at you.

Related …

Weekly World News & the baby born without a nose

Long live National Enquirer!

What’s the big idea? Read this

72 hours handcuffed to wife

Remembering Elvis, again

Election leftovers and other random thoughts

• When I read that Janet Reno, our first female attorney general, died Sunday at 78, I thought, man, I hope she was an early Clinton voter. I wonder, if you’ve voted already and subsequently croak, does your vote still count? If I had time, I’d look into it. I do not. In fact, the election is tomorrow and I have about five or six related stories I won’t be getting to. I thought that was as good a reason as any to dash off a scattergun random post today.

• A question I’m hearing from several wise friends is: Why would you even want your candidate to win? Why, indeed. No matter who wins, bad things are going to happen and this will be one of the great I-told-you-so elections of all-time. As “Art of War” author Sun Tzu points out, it’s much easier to attack than defend.

• Having said that, I like to point out if you know more Sun Tzu quotes than you do quotes by Fred Rogers you’re probably an asshole.

• I tweeted this last week and am chagrined I didn’t have time to write a whole blog post based on it: “I'm a traditionalist and never thought I'd enjoy early voting. Wrong! It was my most satisfying vote ever. I wrote in the Rodell/Rodell ticket for the 2048 election. And the girls are ahead!” Tweet was illustrated with a picture of my darling daughters, ages 16 and 10. 

• Pollsters are still pondering over the idea that there are Trump supporters too “shy” to be detected. In my experience, shy is one thing our nation’s Trump supporters most definitely are not. We’ll find out late tomorrow if they’re a majority, but they’re certainly not a silent one.

• Our local Trump tourist attraction — the red, white and blue Trump House decorated with a 15-foot one-dimensional Trump — had a huge rally Friday that altered the Tin Lizzy political demographics for my happy hour. I became momentary buddies with a great guy, a die-hard, pistol-packing, Hillary-hating Trumpster. We had a great time. He showed me his Glock. I showed him a trick I do with my fingers that makes it look like I’m removing a digit. We spent about two hours BSing. We agreed on nothing, but still departed as friends. I wish the rest of America could get along as well as me and Jeff did. Maybe America needs to drink more.

• For balance, here’s a Fred Rogers quote: “Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But for children play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.”

• It’s taken nearly 15 years, but I’m finally ashamed to have been associated with National Enquirer. When I worked there, The Enquirer was utterly pure in its pursuit of sleaze. It produced stellar scoopson  John Edwards, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Dole, Bill Clinton to name just a few. Now, one of the most scandal-rich candidates in history is getting a free pass from the Enquirer owner/Trump pal David Pecker, spawning a popular hashtag: #TrumpLovesPecker.

• The Enquirer’s ethical collapse means there’s only one real newspaper left. That’s the Weekly World News (sample headline: “Baby Born With Wooden Leg!” Above is the WWN’s 1996 “expose” of what the late Janet Reno looks like beneath her business duds (it drove Japanese businessmen mad with lust). The News, by the way, revealed just this week that an influential illegal alien is defying conventional wisdom and is endorsing Trump. Understand, this alien isn’t from Mexico. He’s from Kepler-22b, about 600 light years from Earth!

• I’m surprised we haven’t heard “Build that Wall!” chants from our Northern neighbors. With so many Americans threatening to move to Canada after the election, you’d think they’d demand some security.

• Sold 14 copies of “Last Baby Boomer” at my Saturday book signing at Greensburg Barnes & Noble! I am thrilled to hear so many people enjoying the book and hope you’ll consider getting in touch about gift copies for reader friends.

• I’m still feeling good about the Cubs victory, even though I was rooting for Cleveland. Maybe the reason is because the win meant all America is getting to bask in the joy that is seeing Bill Murray so happy in public. He was great on SNL. Coincidentally, we just that day had watched him in “St. Vincent” (2014). It’s fantastic and might be his greatest role.

• I hope you’ll check out the blog tomorrow when I intend to re-post my ’12 satire about the pretend 10 hours I spent in the voting booth as America’s last truly undecided voter.

• Be sure to vote tomorrow!

• Be sure, also, to smoke some weed, have some sex, enjoy a cocktail, splurge on a nice meal and do something to calm the hell down. I’ve never seen Americans acting more obnoxiously to one another — and I lived through the ’70’s! It’s better to live a life consumed by sloth and gluttony than hatred..

• Me, I’m going to try and do all five. All at once. It might not productive, but it’ll make Chris feel great again!

What's the big idea? Read this

(856 words)

I propose we today begin reversing the effects of global warming by everyone going straight to the nearest refrigerator and leaving the doors open for just 15 minutes.

I defy any scientist to refute the logic behind this idea.

I came up with this yesterday morning, posted it on social media and, of course, took the rest of the day off.

It wasn’t even 10 a.m. and I’d already achieved something that would save humanity and will doubtless one day earn me a Nobel Prize — and those babies come with $1.2 million in award dough.

The cool thing is that I come up with a really big idea like that at least once a week.

So, assured as I am of eventual riches, I rarely work most days, convinced as ever that my ship will soon come in and I’ll never again be troubled by the need to work. That means my daily life will differ little from what it’s like now except I’ll be able to afford to golf, go to baseball games and sit in the bar and daydream all day like I do now. 

The refrigerator thingie is inspired by the simple kind of genius I once read in a scholarly journal that foresaw a way to end air pollution. Experts said we could instantly purify the air around the globe by popping the tires of all the cars built in or before the 1950s.

I read this scholarly conclusion in the “Weekly World News,” unrelated sample headline: “Baby Born with Wooden Leg!”

I’ve been in the big idea business ever since.

I see a problem and I solve it.

It was that way when I read Olympic TV ratings were down. I enjoy the Olympics and how it brings people together.

Problem: We lack a spectacle grand enough to bring people together?

Solution: Let’s arrange a trans-Atlantic tug-of-war!

In fact, there used to be an international tug-of-war between America and Canada. It happened every year over the 1.3 mile-wide Detroit River between Motown and Windsor, Ontario.

I for years pitched in vain the story to various magazines because I thought it would be fun and might snag a nice buck. But the real reason I sought an assignment was because I was eager to satisfy my curiosity about what they did with the rope the other 364 days of the year.

I mean, you can’t just stow a coiled 1.5 mile long rope in some firehall garage.

I became so consumed with the idea I proposed the U.S. challenge Europe to a tug of war. Shipping would have to be halted for a week or so, but wouldn’t that be fun? 

We’d need some international referees to keep the crafty French from just tying their end to the Eiffel Tower and sipping coffee while we pulled with all our might.

Of course, most of my big ideas are meant to help humanity.

It was this way when I realized the bee population was dramatically declining while the bedbug population was skyrocketing.

We need bees to pollinate our plants and no one needs bedbugs. I said we need to find a way to turn bedbugs into bees.

I think the only thing holding this one back is a potentially nightmarish glitch.

Bedbees!

Then there’s the The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a floating junk monstrosity that’s twice the size of Texas. Less imaginative observers note its oceanic existence and are appalled.

I see the same eyesore and sense lucrative opportunity.

I say we colonize it!

Our 1 percenters are always eager for new experiences on ocean front property. The good thing about colonizing giant trash islands is they can be towed to different locations based on playboy boredom.

It’d be like a luxury cruise ship only instead of creating mountains of trash, it’d actually be one.

As an old newspaper guy, it saddens me that readership is declining. Even worse is knowing so many people go to bed hungry every night.

What to do?

Edible newspapers!

Gun violence is a vexing issue. Pro-gun people think they should be allowed to carry loaded guns anywhere they want. Anti-gun people say too many innocents are getting shot.

Solution: Everyone can carry a loaded gun anywhere they want. Schools, churches, sporting events — anywhere. But they only get one bullet.

Use or lose your bullet and in addition to any existing laws, you need to appear before a judge and explain what happened to their bullet before they get another bullet.

My friends call this the Barney Fife Amendment. 

I got millions of ‘em.

Because political divisions ensue even after mandate elections, I contend victors should be allowed to jail the vanquished — both candidates and supporters — until the term expires.

The post office is losing money while people are complaining that commercial flights are too uncomfortable and expensive.

Solution: Have the USPS ship humans!

I could go on all day. These things just come to me.

When will even one of these turn into a practical solutions leading to actual income for me?

Ironically, I have no idea.

Related . . .

SCOPEtics & the sunny side of global warming

The Great American Beer Fridge

How a tug of war can save Detroit

Industry-saving idea: edible newspapers!

Osama bin Bedbug

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Re-build Napa and boost America: Guzzle more wine!

Bob Costas & truly innovative gun violence solutions

For big profits, USPS needs to start shipping humans

Weekly World News & baby born without a nose

(691 words)

My first thought when I heard the newscaster say a baby had been born without a nose was that the Weekly World News had commandeered the airwaves.

Oh, how I wish that were true. The world right now could use more of the kind of heyday news the WWN published.

She was the black-’n’-white sister publication of the National Enquirer back when I was running around with those swashbucklers. The rogue organizations were housed in the same Lantana, Florida, building, separated by just a seven-foot partition.

And when the day was done, reporters and editors from both publications would converge on the same small bar and swap stories of what that day’s news gathering had reaped.

It was there I learned what to me is the absolute distillation of pure journalism. It was from a WWN editor who told me:

“If a woman calls and says her toaster is talking to her, I don’t refer her to mental health experts. I tell her to put the toaster on the phone.”

It was because of that sort of open-mindedness that the WWN became a bastion of lively news headlines like:

• “Cannibal food critic rates people he’s eaten based on their nationalities! (Mexicans and Chinese were “too spicy,” but Americans were highly rated for taste and texture.

• “Cruel surgeon re-attaches Siamese twins after they fail to pay their bill!”

• “Astronomer furious after NASA bosses rebuke him for ‘endlessly staring into space.’”

They broke the news that Dick Cheney was a robot; that Elvis Presley had died — in 1994; and that after stealing a race car that Big Foot would henceforth be known as “BigLEADfoot.”

But I most loved the often poignant stories of children born with unusual deformities.

There was the one about the baby who’d been born with a wooden leg; one about a baby born with false teeth, and the sweet story of the loving parents who were raising a child who’d been born without bones.

It had pictures of the Dad carrying the boy around in a bucket, the child’s smiling face floating up there on the top.

“Just because he ain’t got no bones don’t mean he’s not our son and that we won’t love him,” said Pops, who admitted the condition made hugging hard.

So you can see why I thought, “Baby born without nose!” was a story straight out of the old WWN.

Turns out it was not.

It’s straight out of Alabama.

“Eli’s doing great,” said mother, Brandi McGlathery. “He’s just like every other baby. He just doesn’t have a nose. Troy (the baby’s father) says all the time, ‘I think it gives him character.’ We think Eli is perfect the way he is.”

The condition is known as congenital arhinia. There are only 41 known cases in the entire world.

The pair said if the boy wants a nose, they’ll get him one, finances permitting.

Like lots of individuals, I’m a full organ donor. Heart, liver, lungs, eyes — come and get it.

Now I’m wondering if I could donate Eli my big ol’ booger barn. It would look really funny on him now, likely to cover his entire face. And the mustache would have to be thrown in as part of the deal. The nose and the mustache have been inseparable since 1986. 

If the kid’s savvy, he’ll use his parents’ gracious understanding as a bargaining chip.

“But I don’t want a stupid nose … I want a Corvette!”

And as the son of an optician, I wonder how he’ll ever get to wear sunglasses.

Every single pair of glasses requires at least a little stabilizing nose bone or the glasses will slide right off the face.

I guess he could use a right and a left monocle, but that would likely distort his orbital muscles into a permanent squint. 

But the kid’s going to need sunglasses.

Because you can, indeed, be cool and not need a nose. But you can’t be cool without a great pair of shades.

Of course, that’s just me, a guy with a real nose for news who’s always looking on the bright side of things.

Related . . . 

Fatherly fibber stirs skepticism

What happened when I spent 72 hours handcuffed to my honey

My National Enquirer greatest hits!

Men with tails making monkey out of me

Five li’l piggies when ouch!

Newt, the alien & me

Men with tails making monkey out of me

Shortly after losing to Alabama in the national title game Monday night, LSU Tiger coach Les Miles told reporters his boys “played their tails off.”

The remark caused me to sit up.

His players had tails?

This was extraordinary news.

It was confirmed later when I heard a distraught LSU player say “we got our tails kicked” in the 21-0 loss.

I hadn’t heard nor could tell by viewing that players from one of the nation’s best college football teams had tails. You’d think the uniforms would have needed obvious tailoring.

I’ve always been drawn to stories about human birth oddities. I think this curiosity stems from reading “Weekly World News,” which often features stories like, “Baby Born with Wooden Leg!”

The WWN at one time or another has published stories about babies born with tattoos, ear rings, halos and false teeth.

I remember reading one story about a baby born without bones. His parents used to carry him around in a bucket. There was a picture of this smiling little face cascading down the steps like a human waterfall.

I like to ask prospective fathers what they’ll do if their newborn is born with a tail.

I don’t pose this to mothers. They are often in a delicate emotional state and would be horrified at the thought their offspring might be different from any of the other neighborhood morons, as if goofball homogeny is some sort of genetic virtue.

Evolutionarily speaking, babies born with tails aren’t much of a stretch. Nearly all human embryos have tails that are one-sixth the size of the actual embryo.

In adult scale, that means a surviving tail would hang down just past the butt cheeks.

It’s a pity most of our human tails are eventually absorbed into the fetus because it’s hard to dislike any creature with a tail.

I can’t think of wagging tails without thinking of Casey, our beloved golden retriever who was with us from 1992 through 2007. His tail was like a big shaggy tennis racket.

It was forever clearing coffee tables of newspapers, wine glasses and microwave TV dinners.

The mess never bothered us because Casey was just such a big, lovable galoot.

Today I have a lot of friends who fit that description so I don’t miss Casey all that much.

If LSU players had tails, I’m surprised they didn’t play better.

A human tail in some cultures is believed to bestow God-like powers.

That’s the case with Chandre Oram, a West Bengal, Indian, tea smith. His 13-inch tail has made him an object of devotion to many who believe him to be the human incarnation of the Hindu monkey god Hanuman.

What I read in Wikipedia about Hanuman is too confusing to repeat here, but he must be a monkey god of great humility.

If anything about me led strangers to conclude I was worthy of adoration, you can bet I wouldn’t be schlepping tea to parched Indians.

Some of Oram’s devotees claim to have enjoyed miraculous healings after touching his tail.

So Oram is remarkable as much for his restraint as for his tail.

I know many, many men who would use the surplus appendage to convince women it had healing powers. They’d lure them into dark rooms for therapeutic petting. Only these men would be fraudulent about what they let the women pet.

One other factoid from the on-line en-pseudo-pedia: Oram says the tail makes him think he’s part monkey, just like Hanuman, because he likes to jump, climb and eat bananas.

I don’t see a correlation there. Most men enjoy those things.

Perhaps further study is needed.

We need to find for observation a sampling of monkeys who’ve lost tails in accidents or been born without them.

It would be interesting to see if they display urges to spend long hours in bars talking sports and spousal dissatisfactions.

Who knows? They might make dandy bloggers.

Even with the anatomical alterations, I’m sure a real monkey would still have a compelling tale or two.

Newt, the alien & me

I’m rooting for Newt Gingrich to overcome his myriad stumbles and do well in his run for the GOP nomination.

Gingrich and I share a natural affinity.

We both grew up in Pennsylvania. We both enjoy history. He loves zoos and I’m a party animal.

The Gingrich campaign is in the news today because a whole bunch of people I don’t know and certainly wouldn’t like have abandoned Newt.

Gingrich has vowed to press on. I hope he does.

The race for the GOP nomination promises to be one of the most odd, shrill and self-defeating political events any of us has ever witnessed and a bombastic gasbag like Gingrich only adds to the folly.

Really, in this race with no clear favorite, absolutely anything could happen.

An unknown might emerge. Strange alliances may be fostered. An alien endorsement could vault an underdog straight to the nomination.

And when I say alien, I’m not talking Sarah Palin.

Many people have forgotten the pivotal role a politically motivated extra-terrestrial named P’lod used to play in American politics.

That was back in the 1990s when the Weekly World News was still a supermarket staple setting brilliant new standards in news gathering.

“When a woman calls and tells me her toaster is talking to her, I don’t diagnose a mental health disorder. I tell her to put the toaster on the phone.”

To me, that may be the most succinct statement of journalistic purity ever uttered.

I heard it from an actual Weekly World News reporter in a tavern in Lantana, Florida, where both the Enquirer and the Weekly World News shared a building (it was the building that was poisoned in the surreal first anthrax attack in 2001).

I was an Enquirer correspondent from 1992-2000. It couldn’t have been more fun and every six months or so they’d fly me to Florida for two weeks. There may have been some practical reason for the junkets, but it wound up being purely social.

Each and every day reporters from all the various tabloids would gather at the same divey bar and try and outdo each other with stories from the world’s most raucous outlaw publications.

Hands down, the winners were always guys from the Weekly World News (sample headline: “Baby Born With Wooden Leg!”).

There was BatBoy, Bigfoot, and the alien P’lod and his uncanny ashtray-sized eye for picking presidential winners. For years, I had a WWN t-shirt featuring the 1992 cover of the one where P’lod correctly picked Bill Clinton who exalted, “I’m glad he saw through Bush and Perot!”

I always think of that wise alien anytime Gingrich’s name pops up.

It was 1995, just after Gingrich’s late mother Kathleen made headlines for whispering to Connie Chung that Newt thought Hillary Clinton was -- shhh! -- a “bitch.”

It ignited a huge controversy.

It was into this hornet’s nest I was thrust. The Enquirer had a tip that a family housekeeper was seducing Momma Gingrich with a wacky religion as a way to steal thousands of dollars.

It was one of the most hostile interview situations I’ve ever endured.

Not because of Kathleen, who was perfectly pleasant. No, it was because of Gingrich’s step-father, Robert, who’d become an impromptu media critic.

He kept glaring at me and asking insinuating questions about my background, my politics and who the utterly apolitical Enquirer’d endorsed the previous election.

I began to believe he’d never read a single newspaper when he asked if The Enquirer was the paper that had run the picture of Newt with an alien.

“No, sir,” I said. “That was The New York Times.”

The tip we had turned out to be untrue. We never wrote anything about the rumor.

Kathleen Gingrich died in 2007. I don’t know what happened to Robert, but Newt everyday does something to, well, alienate conservatives who for more than 25 years have been assuring us that Gingrich is a genius exemplar of the whole movement.

As for P’lod, who knows?

I hope he still has something to say. I hope he has guidance to offer. I hope there’s at least one journalist out there who’s not so cynical as to disregard the insights of a savvy old alien.

And I hope the talking toaster lets him get a word in edgewise.