A dog eating contest

When a headline makes me blink, I make a note of it. An alien would be forgiven for taking "a dog eating contest" literally.

There are parts of the world where dog meat is eaten. There is at least one video on you-tube that shows a small, sleeping puppy inside a hot dog bun. Competitive eating is popular enough to be televised occasionally.

Talking of which, have you seen the new TV reality series "I Survived A Japanese Game Show"? In one game, team members ran against the flow up a treadmill, with a seed tray strapped to their heads. In the seed tray was a mealy, sticky food item that the "Eater" had to grab without using hands, and consume completely. An umpire was responsible for looking in the Eater's mouth to be sure it was empty before the next runner was dispatched.

Would anyone like to contribute a headline that jarred them?

Newspapers and paper money don't make sense to one of my alien god-Princes of Tigron.



Excerpt from KNIGHT'S FORK

North London
Hampstead High Street

“Read all abaaaht it!” an evening boy of papers shouted, by a strange, half-tented cart from which passersby could exchange very small pieces of folded paper for very large, folded stacks of dirty paper, which they would then unfold and look at.

Prince Thor-quentin was fascinated. He loitered to observe the folly of mankind. His attention was captivated by more-efficiently folded papers. They were colored, and individually sealed in tight, clear wrappings to stop them flipping in the London street wind. Many of these colored papers showed bare-chested males, proudly displaying their favorite exercise equipment, or modest females in heat, bending over conveniently placed vehicles.

The boy of papers varied his cries of what was interesting. “Antipodean alarm!” he wailed. “Australian Air Force authorities allay anxiety over alleged alien…”

So many big A-words! Thor-quentin thought.

Then, he caught sight of the grainy, blurry, black-and-white photograph. The boy of papers might call the object diving into the sea a twisted, distorted weather balloon, but Prince Thor-quentin knew it for what it was. A Volnoth water-capable shuttle.

He’d practiced Djinncraft before on impressionable, sacrificial virgins. He’d never imagined that he’d use it to obtain something as worthless as a pile of dirty papers.

Approaching the boy of papers at a suitable lull in the passing trade, Thor-quentin murmured, “I will take. You will not cry out.”

The boy of papers promptly turned aside, folded from the midsection, and vomited into the slightly lower level of the trafficway.

Slack damn! Less force is required in this lesser gravity, Thor-quentin noted. He helped himself to a selection of the folded stacks of papers and passed a hand over the wad of small, purplish papers, as if he might be making a fair exchage like everyone else. In addition, since he could, he took one catalog of the local females in heat.


Best wishes,
Rowena Cherry