Author - Chris Weagel

God never made an ugly drum solo. Mitchell was an individual. His business card read “Couch Owner.” He told women little lies. He'd claim arm wrestling was behind him and that he'd lost the urge to stab pets. God decided strong winds should blow his car off a causeway near the alligator reserve. City workers found a half-finished voter registration form on his table and cases of loaf cakes filling the hallways of his apartment. There wasn't any traditional furniture. His living room had a canoe and two sealed garbage bags that were later found to contain stuffed animals, bent and shaped into low-slung chairs. The canoe was listed as his only next of kin. From all appearances, Mitchell had wasted his life. Yet buried in a silver notebook found in a pile of 2011...

Rosemarie drinks glasses of fire. She carries a shovel with her everywhere. Even state functions. She had a leather slipcase made for it. When sitting down across from bishops and commissioners, she lays the shovel out on the table before tearing up the paperwork and defaming her opponent's upbringing. She is lead agreement officer for a chain of high traffic meat tanning shops. She cares more about her Christmas lights than the mouth diseases people say they get from her company's products. Rosemarie knows they're all liars like the patrons of her previous job. She spent years inspecting people's feet at the public beach. (“How many toes? Five.” “Five?” “Yeah…” “I count 6.”) When a gang of astronomers rented the house...

The chairman of the county marching band council has just announced his resignation, effective immediately. Totally unexpected. No official reason given, but we’re all familiar with the rumors. Confetti cannons and duck costumes. Those will be the hashtags.
What this means, at least for now, is that until the formal election in January, I’m interim head of council…Careful what you wish for, right?
I don’t need the scrutiny right now. I’ve just burned out another credit card buying 4000lbs of play sand.
Headaches, headaches.

It made tremendous sense at the time. The purchase of the helicopter. We had just sold the family farm. We would never again spend another summer digging up premature beets to paint red so we could sell them for a higher price as strawberries. Nobody told Granddad about the farm. He still had a sharp mind but we kept him busy reviewing patent applications and memorizing ketchup recipes. He didn't even notice Grandma's transformation into an end table. Granddad would not have been happy about a helicopter. Being near or enclosed by processed metals made him anxious. He was convinced it was altering his molecules. He was born, lived and died in a hand dug cave under the driveway. He only ever learned 23 letters of the alphabet and spent his time judging others. The helicopter...

Time for the shovels to come out! We’re getting together a burying party! YAYYY! What does this mean for your family? We get in this here van – original color: mountain green – and we drive around looking for things to bury without warning. We’ll probably start with lawn ornaments – bury them right where they stand. Move up to bird feeders then fish-shaped mail boxes and finally novelty cement creatures that adorn all the boarded-up ice cream shoppes. And when we do it, we leave no marking. No headstone, no cross made of sticks, no drug store teddy bear as a memorial. We don’t even leave a dirt mound. If there’s extra dirt, we eat it. We keep our mouths shut. It’s as if the item just vanished! Gone! If we have enough people –...

The gum ball machine industry is ripe for disruption. You’ve read about this too, I know. It’s all over the tech sites. We’re talking the spherical, simple, usually-only-accepts-dimes-on-behalf-of-the-Lions-Club-type machine. The more elaborate machines – those with the curly ball slide and the LED lights and are shaped like a sea horse – no those are basically untouchable. Controlled by elves. But the simple glass globe kind are bleeding potential. The first thing I’d do is make them electric. Plug them in. Leave them on all night, as a threat deterrent. And then I’d add a wrist strap. Mobile is king. A whole other line would not dispense gum balls at all. Just fill it up with beef gravy and offer the whole thing for adoption. And whoever wins...

Underside Carpet Murals. Usually of fish. Vivid, robust images of sea creatures, bordering on bawdy. Some in the ashcan style. They're large and painted at night. The whole point is that you don't see them. They're face down under your feet. The artists are ashamed of how they earn their living. Sometimes they'll draw an extra arm on one of the fish or paint a group of tropical fish entirely in gray tones. Local tradition (and now county law) insist the artists' work be hidden. We want the artists to paint – to stay active – as it keeps them from stealing. And not just money: an artist will kidnap your children and smother your wife if given the chance. The children will be sold for coal dust and drugs. They'll cut off your woman's hair and glue it...