How to Mess With Kids on St. Patrick’s Day

(Aside from watching the Leprechaun horror movies)
 

On St. Patrick’s Eve: “FYI, kids, remember they update the St. Patrick’s Day rules this year. Yeah, you remember from school: the Church of St. Patrick sets the rules, and they change every [10, 15, etc.] years. Usually they switch between easy and hard rules. So that old ‘wear green or you get pinched’—that’s obviously an easy one. I mean, we all have something kinda green, right? But this year—and I know you know this already—it’s wear something FOREST green or get your arms chopped off. Yeah, all that research and preparing we all did last month to get clothes with the exact right shade of forest green—that will really pay off. I’m glad you pay such close attention in school and heard about this from your teachers weeks ago. Oh yeah, don’t forget the day officially starts at midnight! Yay, it’s almost time.”

Easter Fools’ Day Pranks

For many of us, today marks the first EASTER FOOLS’ DAY in our lifetimes: the last time it happened was in 1956. Hope you’ve been busy brainstorming for the last 60 years… Let’s dive right in!

If you have swimming pool: find an Easter Bunny suit, or a large stuffed animal rabbit, tie weights to it, and sink it in the pool. Take several Easter baskets and eggs and fake grass and throw them in the water. On Easter morning, burst into the kids’ room and stammer tearfully, “Oh no oh no! There’s been a terrible accident!”

How to Mess With Kids: Halloween Edition

aka How to Seriously Traumatize Children For Life
aka Why I’m Never Allowed to Have Children, Ever
  ~ dedicated to the child upstairs who never stops running and jumping ~

Warning: scary photos below!

Wear an only moderately scary face mask. When you happen upon a child who seems scared of it, say “Don’t worry, don’t worry,” in soothing tones, “it’s just a mask. See?” Take it off and show them this underneath:

@_jessbel_ on Instagram

Damaging Books For Impressionable Children

Don’t look for these at your local bookstore… 

---

after Hauman & Hauman

The Little Engine That Could But Wouldn’t

“I carry the likes of you? Indeed not!”
 
How sad all the dolls and toys felt!
 
“I won’t pull the likes of you!”
 
And the dolls and toys were ready to cry.

The Two Fates of Optimus Prime / DeepDream

Before.

ONE

It turned out the matrix was alien technology all along: an electro-organic symbiote which bonded to its host. As such, its extended use had…consequences.

Super Cyborg Killing Transformer Shoe

~ Stories By 8-Year-Olds ~

In the spring of 1987, the grubby little fingers in Mrs. Thompson’s 1st grade class were hard at work scribbling out short fiction. Witches flew on broomsticks. Easter Bunnies delivered eggs, or didn’t. Ladybugs ate aphids. Life was grand.

However, as ABC Publishing Editor N. Hardwell was quick to point out (in his brutal rejection letter here), all of these short stories were remarkably formulaic. Every story in the anthology I Am the Easter Bunny, for example, started with:

I am the Easter Bunny. My name is _____¹. I am _____².

1. Floppy, Hoppy, Gilbert, Spotty, Fluffy, Swifty, Floppy, Easter, Fluffy, Heather, Easter, Gilbert, Smarty, Fluffy, and Rainbow Egg
2. Various combinations of: white, fat, fast, nice, happy

Given these cookie-cutter shapes, is it any surprise that the vast majority of children filled in the exact same cookies?

Now, don’t get me wrong: for Mrs. Thompson to have 1st graders write short fiction is AWESOME, and she was a GREAT teacher; I certainly loved her. Furthermore, some students must have benefitted from this kind of 1-2-3 guidance (here’s looking at you, Easter Bunny named ‘Easter’). But to be creative in this context, students had to be crafty—they had to include the mandatory sentences, but then branch out onto their own paths.

I live in Bunny Town. Do you like my eggs? I like Easter. Do you like Easter? I do like Easter. It is fun. Some of my eggs break.

I didn’t say they were good paths. But, BUT… then there was young Gordon. Little Gordon’s Easter Bunny (named ‘Rainbow Egg’) hops to the planet Jupiter and has difficulty understanding space monster language. His ladybug, who is melted by magic when trying to kill an evil witch, is rescued by a friend from the witch’s castle.

Clearly chomping at bit.

If there were any clearer evidence that young authors’ creativity was being stifled by these formulaic requirements at school, then it is this story, which I wrote less than two years after I Am a Ladybug, presumably NOT for a school assignment:

The (Robot) Love Doctor is ON

...In which 7-year-old Timmy seeks love advice from Artificially Intelligent Chatbots, including Jenny, Cleverbot, Santa Bot, Brain Bot, Cindy, Captain Kirk, Einstein, Dog Bot, Francois, Mitsuku, and Splotchy.

10 Ways to Mess With Kids on Christmas

When you dine next to little ones and are served any meat dish, jump back from the table and say "WHAT??! This is REINDEER meat!! How COULD you?? Santa won't be able to deliver presents now!"

Explain to kids that something terrible has happened to Santa, it's the same thing that happened to Grandpa before he died, he's gone crazy and he's not wearing his Santa suit anymore, and he's mad and yelling all the time, and there's something REALLY wrong with all the elves, they've turned evil and mean and they're fighting with everybody, it's just really, really bad. Then show them footage of Saruman and the orcs from Lord of the Rings.

World's Worst Gifts, Part 2

(continued from Exposé: Behind the World's Worst Gifts)

Don't Forget Your Kids!!

For your youngster lacking fine motor control of his hands, there's... THE DIPR™!!!

via the dipr

Says Founder and Inventor Robert Haleluk,

My favorite snack as a kid was Oreos and milk, but they would always break and fall into the milk if I dunked them for too long! As an adult, I still had the same problem so I set out to solve the issue and created the dipr. Now, all ages can enjoy the dunking experience without losing their cookies!

That's right, even if you're an ADULT who has this serious problem, the dipr™ is for you! Plus... best of all, you can eat right off of it*, so no more sticky fingers!

*Probably. Clinical trials show the probability of stabbing yourself in the mouth with the hook when eating right off it to be no more than 47%.

How to Mess With Kids on Turkey Day

Giving Thanks, Part I

"I mean - ha - you've heard of the Thansgiving Turkey, right kids? He was around when I was little, kind of like the Easter Bunny, but even better. He would bring baskets full of pumpkins and wonderful things to all the good little boys and girls Thanksgiving morning. But then, I don't remember quite when, he got lazy. He didn't do his chores at home. He didn't do his homework. He didn't listen to his parents and go to bed on time. He whined a lot. And finally, he lost his job as the Thanksgiving Turkey, and there hasn't been one ever since. Now every year on Thanksgiving we catch, slaughter, and eat his friends and children as revenge.
...Boy, it's a good thing you're not anything like the Thanksgiving Turkey, huh?"

"I'll tell you something. You know about recycling, right? Did you know that nowadays all our Halloween jack-o-lanterns are recycled to make all this pumpkin pie, and pumpkin pudding? It's pretty great. The only problem is, you know, those jack-o-lanterns stayed outside on the ground for a long time. A lot of bugs and worms and flies and maybe some BIG spiders probably crawled inside them. When we recycle those jack-o-lanterns we always forget to check inside - haha! We just grind everything up. Here - you want a piece?"

Socially Awkward Aardvark!

by Gordon & special guest contributor Ms. Kelsey

illustrations by Kelsey

...So we had this funny little idea. As an experiment, we decided to develop it independently at first, and see what our respective warped minds would birth. So here are two+ angles, a mere two surfaces of the multifaceted wonky gemstone that is Awkward Aardvark.

Our little friend may become the leading man in an ongoing series of a Much-Maligned Menagerie, so please do let us know if you think that should be the case.

Alright folks, enough chat... if awkward is the new sexy, get ready to change your underpants, cuz now it's time for... SOCIALLY... AWKWARD... AAAAARDVARK!!!

Gordonian Dialogues

PANTHER: Sup, Aard.
AARDVARK: ..Yo!
PANTHER: Aardvark, are you mocking me?
AARDVARK: No... my brother!
PANTHER: Stop.
AARDVARK: OK... dude. Roger... dog.
PANTHER: I will cut you.

Morph Man Reads 'Morph Man II'

aka Comics By 12-Year-Olds: Morph Man II: The Dawn of Omicron
(Read first: The Amazing Adventures of Morph Man!)

HOSTESS: Well, everyone, welcome to this very special panel reading of Morph Man II. For those of you following along at home, don't forget you can click on any page to see a larger, more legible version. So... we have with us today none other than... the green gooey crusader, that versatile variform victor himself, our fine feathered flatulent freedom fighter MORPH MAAAAN!!!!

Comics by 9-Year-Olds: Morph Man is Not Funny

by Gordon

The inaugural Comic by 9-Year-Olds, The Adventures of Robotron, could be called a work of a pure stage of childhood - untainted wonder, action, desperation, sci-fi grandeur, or at least the imitation of all that. Whereas The Amazing Adventure of Morph Man, which followed by perhaps only a year or two, seems to come from a wholly different place: the exceedingly awkward stage at which a child discovers humor, wields it clumsily, and thinks, almost exclusively mistakenly, that (s)he is hilarious. Cue mountains of poop jokes, fake burps, and armpit farts. In that spirit, I rather unproudly present:

Comics by 9-Year-Olds: Conversations with Robotron

Time for another treasure from the attic boxes... this time, the homemade comic book that started it all, yes: the legendary ROBOTRON #1, circa 1990. I think the Robotron series went up to #5 or 6, before giving way to the 'Morph Man' series and its spinoffs, and various superhero fan comics. Robotron had a companion / friend in a parallel galaxy named Robobot (penned by my best friend Doug), with whom he joins forces in the sequel.

Anyway, please enjoy....

AKA, Adventures in (Poor) Space(ing of Letters)

Rejected Stories By First-Graders

by Gordon

---

N. Hardwell
Editor, ABC Publishing

Mrs. Thompson
Dill Elementary School

July 1, 1987

Mrs. Thompson:

I recently received your submission "A Witch: a Collection of Creative Stories by Mrs. Thompson's First Grade Class" (facsimile below), along with the similarly-subtitled anthologies "I Am the Easter Bunny" and "Ladybugs." As I was between major editing projects, I was able to read through them rather quickly.

I should say start reading through them, because I was unable to make it all the way through any one submission. Frankly, your writers cannot be called 'First Grade' in any sense. Despite being somewhat inured to bad writing (thanks to decades in this cesspool of an industry), after reading "A Witch," I felt so nauseous I had to lay down to avoid vomiting. I had to restore my faith in human language by recalling Dr. Seuss rhymes and reading from a recipe book. I am now reconsidering my life.

The Amazing Adventures of Train Boy!

YOU KNOW WHO

MOTHER: Do you know who loves you, little boy?
BOY: Goo-goo ga-ga choo-choo.
MOTHER: Of course you do. Mommy loves you, and Daddy loves you! And who do you love, my little angel?
BOY: TRAINS!
MOTHER: ...
BOY: Chugga chugga.

TRAINING

BOY: Daddy goes here.
FATHER: OK. Now you're gonna... you're gonna sit on me? OK, time for a horsey ride!
BOY: No. Train ride!
FATHER: Oh. OK. Well here we go - vroom, vrooom, vrooom! -
BOY: No! Chugga chugga chugga chugga.
FATHER: Oh, right. OK. Chugga chugga toot toot!
BOY: Noo! Woo-wooooo!
FATHER: OK, OK, I got it already. Chugga chugga woo-hoo.
BOY: No! Woo-WOOOO!!
FATHER: Woo-woo, boo-hoo, what's the difference anyway -

Is 'Dopey' an Unfair Name? An Analysis of Dwarf-Naming Practices

On the auspicious occasion of the approaching 86th anniversary (it's a big one!) of Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, Disney's first feature-length animated film, I present a discourse on the appellation of dwarves.

How to Mess With Kids on Easter

The Easter Bunny's seen better days.

by Gordon (portions originally published 2012)

1) If you have a dog that destroys his toys: buy a stuffed animal white rabbit. Early Easter morning, bring your dog out to the back porch, give him the rabbit and allow him to rip it to shreds, scattering bits of fur and fluff far and wide. Maybe take a wicker basket and step on it and throw it nearby; break a few eggs on the ground. When the kids wake up, wonder aloud why there are no Easter baskets to be seen yet. Let the dog in and say, "Hey boy, what's that you got there? What's that piece of white fur in your mou - oh no. Oh NO. WHAT DID YOU DO???? WHAT DID YOU DO TO THE EASTER BUNNY??? Oh no, kids, whatever you do, do NOT LOOK IN THE BACKYARD!!!"

2) Corner some children at a small egg hunt: "OK, kids, make sure you find all 446 eggs!"
An hour later, say "Still not yet? Oh boy... it's gonna be a lot harder to find them once it gets dark. And it's gonna be so cold, and raining... Come on, hurry up!"