MLB warns of stiff penalty as gas station sex pill problem spirals (New York Post)

I always go to my local gas station for medical problems. Who can afford a doctor nowadays? Besides, the one cashier I really like, a blond girl in her early twenties, seems to think I'm attractive in an older uncle sort of way, so there's that.
The other day I tripped over a brick on my patio and scrapped my knee pretty bad -- bloodied up a perfectly good pair of cream colored Adjust-A-Band linen slacks. I couldn't get the bleeding to stop with the little band aids I had in the medicine chest, so I limped down to the gas station and my friendly little blond cashier looked around and finally found me a white dish towel and a bottle of rubbing alcohol for just $6.29 total. She helped me wrap the towel around my wounded knee, and then sold me a Hershey bar to help comfort me. She oughta be a nurse.
And that's not all. Last year I went in to the doctor about a painful lump on my neck. He said it might be my thyroid or it might be cancer, but whatever it was he'd have to run some tests and do a biopsy which would cost me a couple thousand dollars. Well, I knew I wasn't going to be able to pay that kind of money -- so I fobbed him off with some excuse or other and went down to my friendly neighborhood gas station, where I explained things to my blond cashier friend. She was sad because her boyfriend was in jail again for DUI, but she bravely put aside her personal sorrows to listen to me. She suggested a pill on the counter that was actually for sexual dysfunction, but she said it might do something for the swelling on my throat and why not take a chance what could it hurt?
So I bought a half dozen for twenty-five dollars and took one each day for six days. And by golly I started to feel much better, although the lump didn't exactly go away -- it just hardened and turned black. So I grew a beard to hide it. 
And today, a year later, I'm still feeling pretty good. Although my urine is . . . well, no need to go into that. You see, the blond girl at the gas station says all I gotta do is eat lots of  a certain kind of yogurt they stock and then hit the tanning salon every week. That will cure anything, she assures me. 
And best of all is that I've learned to eat mostly Slim Jims and Beer Nuts, just like she does . . . 

This viral Instagram hoax duped A-listers — and the man overseeing our nuclear arsenal (WaPo)

Crazy Henry banged on my door at two in the morning.
"Whatsa matter with you?" I yelled at him as I let him in.
"I just got word that the Red Headed League has set off bombs all over town!" he replied excitedly. "They're targeting everyone with blonde or brunette hair! We could be next!"
"That's the biggest load of baloney I ever heard" I told him. "Whaddya mean Red Headed League, anyway? That's out of an old Sherlock Holmes story or sumpthin'."
Crazy Henry spun around and locked my door, then dragged my couch over to block it.
"Stop that!" I commanded him. "You're having some kind of waking dream or psychic break. Your noodle is fried from all those podcasts you been listenin' to."
"Just turn on the TV and see if I been makin' it up" he said breathlessly. So I turned on the boob tube and there was nothin' on but reruns and Latvian hockey.
"See?" I said patiently. "You are imagining things once again, like that time you thought Zsa Zsa Gabor was your godmother." I got him a glass of warm milk and settled him in my recliner. He was soon asleep, snoring like a silkworm. I put a Hudson Bay blanket over him and went back to my own bed. Crazy Henry was going to have to be put in a Home one of these days, I thought to myself as I drifted away.

Next morning Crazy Henry slept late, so I was up and gone before he stirred. When I got back home that night he was still there, making navy beans and fatback with corn bread baking in the oven.
"That's nice of you to do" I commented as I hung up my marlin spike.
But when I looked into his eyes I immediately saw he was ensorcelled by those damn podcasts again. I sighed and sat down in the recliner. "What is it now?" I asked patiently.
"They're giving away free money down at the Federal Reserve Bank downtown!" he whispered. "We should get down there before it's all gone."
I went into the kitchen and brought back a brown paper bag. "Here" I said, "put my share in the bag with yours -- I'm too pooped to pop tonight. I'm gonna watch NCIS and then go to bed."
"Anything for a pal" he said warmly before leaving.
I didn't see Crazy Henry again for a week or so. Then I went over to his place Saturday morning to see if he wanted to go to the fudge brownie festival with me that afternoon. I found him stacking wads of fifty dollar bills on his coffee table.
"Here's your share" he said, handing me a pile of cash that would choke a goat. 
"This from the Federal Reserve Bank downtown?" I asked him.
"Yep" he said. "Next week they're giving away a part of Greenland. First come, first served."
I put the money in the same brown paper bag I had given him the week before and went home. I put the money under my bed, expecting it to be gone the next morning like pixie gold. But it was still there, so I sent it to my sister who needed an operation. 
She's doing fine now, thanks. 

And all these things did my father see, and hear, and speak

And all these things did my father see, and hear, and speak . . . 

1 Nephi 9:1

I never heard much from my father;

tired and silent was he.

The things that he saw and the things that he heard

were not fit for sharing with me.

I tried to speak much with my children

when they were as high as my knee;

today they are fathers and mothers

who really don't listen to me.

The beautiful things that I'm hearing

as quietus closer appears

I've no one to share with excepting

the Lord and the lingering years.

The definitive ranking of James Bond movie titles (WaPo)

travis.andrews@washpost.com

When I was born I was put on a list, ranking me seventh of sixteen.

Since then I have made it my business to destroy all lists.

Because ranking things is unAmerican.

Because compiling attributes or collating characteristics is puerile.

Because tabulation leads inevitably to deterioration.

This is especially true of a definitive list, which is among the most destructive and sinister of all agendas.

When I find a list lurking in an alleyway I grab it by the throat and throttle it. Or I douse it with patchouli and watch it shrivel up into a wooden nutmeg. Sometimes I run it out of town on a rail, or frog march it down to the station house where the cops can give it the third degree before sending it to Gitmo.

I tried being nice to a baby listicle once. I took it into my home and fed it cream of rice cereal and licorice. I sent it to school in brand new clothes, and gave it a warm comfortable bed in a cozy alcove near the soapstone stove. But it eventually turned on me, enumerating my faults and tallying up my skin tabs -- so I sent it away to the salt mines in Nebraska. 

You can't trust a list or turn your back on a ranking.

Never believe anything you read on a checklist. It's all as thin and flimsy as a set of steak knives on QVC.

Join with me, comrades, in eradicating all lists and rankings from the earth! You have nothing to lose but your catalogs . . . 

An outdoor movie night on air mattresses seemed fun. Then the wind picked up. (WaPo)

alex.horton@washpost.com

The wind picked up and blew my house away, so I went after it. While searching I met a man who had his wife blown away.

"That's awful" I told him.

"Yeah" he said. "Together we were like fry sauce -- apart we're just mayo and ketchup."  "Will you join me and go looking for her?" I asked him.

"Sure, why not?" he said. So we headed West towards the Marmalade Fields until we met a tall woman who lost her child in the wind storm.

"Which way did he go?" we asked her.

"He went straight up for a while and then headed towards the river." she replied. "Join with us, and we'll all go that way to look for him" we offered. She came along with us to the river, and there on the bank was her boy, a little mussed and with twigs in his hair but otherwise just fine. She hugged him and headed back home. I wanted to tell her not to let the boy blow away again, but then thought that might be presumptuous, so in the end I said nothing but waved at her and the boy silently. After they were out of sight my house came floating down the river, so the man who had his wife blown away and I got a rope and pulled it to shore. I decided to leave it right there and live the rest of my life on the river -- a very pleasant prospect for a man who loves to fish as much as I do. 

So that left the man whose wife had blown away. I really didn't want to leave my home on the river to help him search anymore, but on the other hand I felt some obligation to do something to help him find her, or at least find closure.

"You could just stay here and I'll fry fish for you" I offered him, not really believing he would settle for that.

"No thank you" he said quietly. "I will never rest until I find my wife." "I will go with you as far as Charing Cross" I offered half-heartedly. I could see the bream and catfish frisking about in the water of the river and yearned deeply to be a-fishing right that instant.

When we got to Charing Cross his wife had already married again and she and her new husband had settled down in the back of a shop that sold brass jar openers and rolls of candy buttons. So the man who had his wife blown away came back with me to my house on the river, where he turned out to be a dab hand at whittling fish lures. So we two scrapped along together for a number of years until another big wind blew the river off course and left us high and dry. 

Now we live underground with the gnomes and never worry about the wind anymore. And there are big black dirt fish that I can catch with a rope and crowbar -- they are delicious with fry sauce.