Your Alien Encounter Advisor
Starting to wonder whether those weird lights over the salt marsh aren’t swamp gas? Finding incisions in your body where you’ve never had surgery? You may need to talk to Your Alien Encounter Advisor. Dear […]
Author: Con Chapman
I'm a Boston-area writer, author of The Year of the Gerbil, a history of the 1978 Red Sox-Yankees pennant race, and 50 books of humor including "Scooter & Skipper Blow Things Up!" by HumorOutcasts Press. My work has appeared in The Atlantic, The Christian Science Monitor and The Boston Globe among print outlets. "Rabbit's Blues," my biography of Johnny Hodges, Duke Ellington's long-time alto sax player, was published by Oxford University Press in 2019, and was named Book of the Year by Hot Club de France. My young adult novel, "Kimiko Chou, Girl Samurai," was published by Atmosphere Press in 2021.
Coriolis Effect Has Things Topsy-Turvy Down Under
AUCKLAND, New Zealand. The morning skies are grey as our plane touches down at Auckland Airport, but that doesn’t dampen our spirits as my family and I peer out the windows for our first glance […]
Fantasy Football, Existentialist Style
At first, I had no idea I was in hell. I was lying in the same street I walk every day at noontime on my way to lunch. “What happened?” I asked the man who […]
As COVID Crushes Restaurants, Some Loyal Patrons Despair
BOSTON. It’s the day after Labor Day, and after working from home since mid-March Eloise Fricken was shocked by what she found as she walked from the Park Street subway station to her place of […]
Late-Summer Markdowns Trigger Preppy Doofus Stamped
NANTUCKET, Mass. A blue-ribbon panel appointed to investigate a late August stampede on this tony vacation island has concluded that drastic end-of-summer markdowns on madras shorts, whale-motif ties and other “preppy” clothing triggered a crush […]
Last Call for the Merit Badge Failures
It always returns at the end of summer–the feeling of failure. It has a dry, bitter taste that goes with it, as if it’s a wasting disease that afflicts your entire body and psyche and […]
As Summer Wanes Zucchini Avoidance Measures Kick In
WESTLAND, Mass. It’s a beautiful September day in this suburb west of Boston, with relatively cool temperatures and low humidity, but Todd and Mindy Boudin are sequestered inside their three-bedroom home with the curtains drawn. […]
Ask Mr. Furniture
Refinishing furniture can be a fun–and profitable!–hobby for those who have a creative side and enjoy inhaling toxic fumes. Mr. Furniture answers your questions and helps you turn “gunk” to “glow” and “crap” to “crapola.” […]
Aging Chanteuse Has Hit With Vocal Tribute to the Internet
QUESADILLA, Texas. Vikki Floria is an 84 year-old chanteuse who has sung for five vice presidents, but she hasn’t had a top-selling record in over three decades. She hopes to end that losing streak with […]
As School Year Looms, Penmanship Instructors Sound Alarm
WASHINGTON. Unemployed penmanship instructors marched on Congress yesterday, the last Sunday before most elementary school students return to school, demanding that the federal government commit $40 billion to improve America’s handwriting in order to avert a […]