1. Set your alarm for 6:00 a.m. the night before. You want to be first in line for the perfect pumpkin. 2. When your alarm goes off, ask yourself what the hell you were thinking. It’s not like they’re going to run out of pumpkins. Snooze until ten. 3. Put on your newly purchased … | Continue reading

Can I still pay my union dues by sacrificing goats, bartering homemade macramé, or offering to house-sit while the high priestess is on vacation in Tulum? The Topeka Coven has long accepted sacrificial gifts to our dark lord, in-kind bartering, and occasional house-sitting as pay … | Continue reading

Our friends at 270 reasons.com are gathering a polyphonic orchestra of brilliant writers, teachers, doctors, filmmakers, artists, and citizens of all kinds to weigh in about their plans to vote this November. These opinion essays run the gamut from advocacy for basic human rights … | Continue reading

I hope you don’t mind, but my buddy texted me, and I told him he could stop by. I’ll warn you in advance, he can be a lot. But once you get to know him, he’s great. I know this is a “shoes off” house, but trust me, you will want him to keep his shoes on. Are you the type of perso … | Continue reading

Hello, I’m Carl, the custodian in charge of maintaining the litter box in your child’s public school classroom. Ask me anything. Are there actual litter boxes in my child’s classrooms for student use? Yes, we keep them there to support the needs of our youths who identify as a “f … | Continue reading

Good evening, and thank you all for attending this important town hall meeting. Due to budget cuts, we’re excited to announce our groundbreaking merger with Spirit Halloween. Yes, you heard correctly—Spirit Halloween, your go-to for spooky décor and flimsy costumes that disintegr … | Continue reading

“It’s a little crazy, by the way—especially for women that are like past 50. I’m thinking to myself: I don’t think that’s an issue for you.” — Bernie Moreno, Republican candidate for Senate in Ohio, speaking about women’s concern over abortion rights. - - - As a forty-nine-year-o … | Continue reading

Everyone knows it’s hard being the high school basketball team that lost to Air Bud. He’s a dog; it’s an embarrassing defeat. But people don’t realize it’s worse being the team that went out, played hard, and beat that beloved golden retriever by eighty-seven points. Famously, th … | Continue reading

As a New York transplant originally from the South, my body is hard-wired to welcome the fall season once the temperature hits 70. I’m not proud of it, but I have been known to dust off my sweaters and light a cider-scented candle during the final week of August. This year, as my … | Continue reading

1. Open the event with some pleasantries, perhaps a quick lighting of the holiday candles. Feel free to say a few blessings. A quick note: This will be the only time you should NOT bring up 1999’s soup-to-nuts, flawless film Blue Streak, starring Martin Lawrence at the absolute p … | Continue reading

“You see these guys walking out with air conditioners with refrigerators on their back, the craziest thing. And the police aren’t allowed to do their job… if you had one day, like one real rough, nasty day… if you had one really violent day…one rough hour, and I mean real rough. … | Continue reading

We are thrilled to announce that Google Translate has recently added “Deanspeak” to its suite of language-detection tools. In addition to offering translations from Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, and other languages, Google Translate can now render your college administrator’s opaque … | Continue reading

Listen, son, when I was your age, I thought I knew everything, and it looks like we have that in common. You think you know what this is all about? You think you understand what it means to be married to someone for over forty years? I’ve been married since 1977, and let me tell … | Continue reading

“Mayor Eric Adams of New York City, a former police captain who ran on a law-and-order platform but whose tenure has been consumed by accusations of corruption, spent years accepting free airline tickets, lavish overseas accommodations and illegal campaign donations from Turkey, … | Continue reading

Dear Applicant, Thank you for your embarrassingly eager interest in our job opening and for getting to know us over the course of twelve rounds of interviews. We regret to inform you that we have selected another, far more suitable candidate for the role—a starchy ten-pound sack … | Continue reading

It’s actually funny to me and not something that makes me mad that your office returned my business license application with the cartoonishly large word DENIED stamped right across the first page (in red ink) and several needlessly specific and not hurtful comments about why I am … | Continue reading

There are several common lines of inquiry when someone learns you’re vegan. These scripted responses will spare everyone a tedious conversation and might even make you less annoying at dinner parties (but probably won’t). Where do you get your protein? From peanut butter, seitan, … | Continue reading

Forty years ago this month, the great Tina Turner’s “What’s Love Got To Do With It?” was the number one song in the United States. - - - If I tend to look dazed, I’ve read it someplace that it’s been forty years since that song hit number one. Four decades! Hard to believe. We’re … | Continue reading

Dear Parent or Guardian, Despite our laughably small budget, the district insists we keep up with tech trends. As a result, you must manage a shit ton of cheap, hard-to-use apps and websites this year. Classroom Assist Students use this platform to chat with teachers and submit a … | Continue reading

THE STRAIGHTFORWARD TITLE: The Condiments Aisle 2 THE FOREBODING ROMAN TITLE: The Condiments Aisle, Part II THE PUNNY TITLE: The Secondiments Aisle THE PUNNY TITLE THAT’S OVERDOING IT: The Condiments Aisle 2: Come What Mayo THE REDUNDANT TITLE: The Condiments Aisle 2: The Next Ch … | Continue reading

Dear Patient, In our continual efforts to provide you with the confusing level of treatment you’ve come to expect, we’d like to introduce you to HellthChase, our new cumbersome and contactless check-in solution. HellthChase invites and obligates you to engage in the unpaid data e … | Continue reading

Look, this is not up for debate. We’re going to keep feeding the grizzly bear. Sure, he may not protect us in any tangible sense. In fact, sometimes he hurts us. But that’s just how the cookie crumbles. The thing is, the grizzly bear has always been there. We’ve always been feedi … | Continue reading

Though her family sometimes received food stamps and occasionally had their utilities cut off, Marcie Alvis Walker’s parents led her to believe that they were an average middle-class Black family. They encouraged her to pursue her dreams and told her that if she worked hard enoug … | Continue reading

Our parties have totally realigned. Democrats are conservative now. Kamala Harris made not one but several references to the American military in her DNC acceptance speech. That’s not what Democrats used to be about. According to pop culture, they used to be about soft, fuzzy thi … | Continue reading