100 Word Stories – Police Blotter – Animals!

And now, another 100 word story based on an item from the Police Blotter of my hometown of Burlingame, California.  As always, the actual blotter listing, with a link to the listing is presented below the story.  Enjoy!

Animals!
By Grant Baciocco

Charlotte screamed as the rhinoceros’ horn came splintering through the front door.  She leapt away from it and bounded up the hallway staircase.

At the door the rhino let out a bellow as he wrenched his horn free from the door and backed up for another charge.

Charlotte reached the top of the stairs as the door was hit again.  She turned into her bedroom and slammed the door shut, attempting to catch her breath as she heard the rhino enter the house.  She turned to find her room filled with gorillas eyeing the bag of peanuts she was carrying.

Burlingame, March 5. A woman told police she had been feeding wild animals and now felt in jeopardy while doing so.

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The story behind Unfriend.

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It’s out! Another, brand new, Throwing Toasters song! It’s called UNFRIEND and it is available on iTunes, Bandcamp, CDBaby, Amazon.com and just about everywhere else that singles are available.
This song was written a year or so ago, right around the time I was just getting completely frustrated with Facebook and being on it. I absolutely love how this song turned out and the magic Steve Goodie did with the instrumentation and the background vocals.  I think it is some of the most fun rock ‘n’ roll from Throwing Toasters in a long time.
When I wrote this song, I was pretty done with facebook. If you know me, or have looked for me on the social media site you know I don’t have an account. After several years, I began to realize that the social media service was just not my thing.  The examples given in this song are pretty close to reasons why I left.
While recording this, Steve made the comment that he thought it was funny that at the end I say it’s my mom, making the whole song about her.  That made the baby in the second verse me. Or a sibling. I thought this was pretty funny. I’d never thought of it that way. In my mind the song is about three separate people.
For the record, I was still friends with my mom when I left Facebook. The final verse is not about her. Honest.
So give UNFRIEND a listen. Rock out to it and let me know what you think. If you like it, consider requesting it on the Dr. Demento show by following the following link: http://www.drdemento.com/request/
And while you’re at it, be sure to Like me on….oh…never mind.
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100 Word Stories – Police Blotter – Pants

Here’s another 100 Word Story based on an item from the Police Blotter of my hometown of Burlingame, California.  Blotter listing and link to the listing on the web follow the story.  Enjoy.

Pants
By Grant Baciocco

“Four thousand dollars?” Samantha asked raising an eyebrow.

“Yes.” Roger replied.  “Four thousand dollars.”

“How is that even possible?”

“It’s all about the microfibers.”

“Microfibers?”

“Yes.” Roger replied, holding them up.  “These tiny microfibers are state of the art.  They promote sweating and, in turn, weight loss.”

“Couldn’t you just put on an extra pair of sweat pants?”

“That’s the point!” said Roger, slamming his fist down on the table.  “Because of these microfibers, you don’t have to!”

“But $4000?!” Samantha yelled.

“It’s all about the microfibers!” Roger screamed.  “Didn’t you hear me say they are state of the art!”

Burlingame Avenue, 2:11 p.m. Wednesday Men’s workout pants were stolen. Estimated loss was $4,000.

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The Dudley Disaster

I was in a CVS last week and, of course, being a week out, there was Easter merchandise everywhere.  Enough yellow, pink, green and blue to beat the band.  I started getting nostalgic for Easter celebrations gone by.

Usually, our Easters were spent in Klamath Falls, Oregon with my Mom’s side of the family.  We would dye Easter eggs with my cousins, the Palmers.  It was a tradition that was passed down from my cousin Brent to my brother Brandon to my cousin Brittany, that the egg dying wasn’t complete until the youngest had taken a big swig or easter egg dye, coloring their entire mouth.

Remembering these warm times, I remembered that, as a kid, we would get Easter Egg decorating kits and my favorite was Dudley brand because of the wacky characters they’d have on the box and decorating supplies.  To my supreme delight, this CVS had Dudley egg decorating kits!  To my absolute horror, this is what Dudley looks like in 2015…

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What?!  Part of what I remember so fondly about Dudley is that he and his friends always had a hand drawn look about them that was reminiscent of Jay Ward designs from Rocky & Bullwinkle.  I was so perturbed by this overly cute, seemingly computer generated, Dudley that I did what anyone who is seeing their childhood tarnished, I turned to the internet.  Within an hour I had purchased a classic Dudley Shake-an-Egg kit from eBay.

Friends, this is Dudley…

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And, because his appearance changed a little even within the package, this is also Dudley…

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My friends, either one of the two examples above are, to me, way more charming than…

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Right?

All the vintage packaging just has an air of being handmade.  As if Dudley and his pals created each box by hand.  Take a look…

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To me, that is a thing of beauty.  As a kid, I looked at, not only the box, but all the details of each of the contents.  I fondly remember each little character on each of the bags of dye!  Here’s what Dudley boxes look like today…

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Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Another thing I loved about these Dudley kits as a kid was Dudley’s wacky group of friends.  Clyde, Klara, Tedley and Elwood.  Who wouldn’t want to be friends with this group…

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I went by the Dudley website today at http://dudleyseaster.com and wanted to see if Dudley, at least, has the same group of crazy friends and what their designs looked like now.

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Aaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!  Who are these creatures?!

Meet Emmi, Oggy, Gus, Petals (the butterfly), Dudley and Phoebe.  The new Dudley gang.  They all have backstory now and relationships.  You can read them for yourself here http://dudleyseaster.com/about/?Dudley-Gang-2

Knowing nothing, this redesign seems to be an attempt at getting a TV show.  This section of the website reads like a pitch bible that you’d make if you were pitching an animated series.  I don’t know about you, but I’d rater watch this show…

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Happy Easter.

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