The Smart Alec Dictionary
Fighting Advice • I Feel Fine • Note To My Friend
One Minute Wit
Fighting Advice
For the soon-to-be fighter
If you ever plan on fighting someone,
for example, you become an action movie hero,
or you make lots of insulting comments about people’s loved ones,
or you play Jake Doyle on the Republic of Doyle TV show,
or you get sent back in time to the Wild West and become a poker player,
or you spend any time at all with Jackie Chan,
or you’re a hockey player,
make sure your opponent isn’t carrying an invisible, inter-dimensional, lightning-fast, automatic, honey-baked ham launching gun.
You won’t win.
50-Word Story based on Beatles Song Titles
I Feel Fine
A hard day’s night
Stuntman Joey jumped off a moving train.
“You alright, Joey?” the director asked.
“Yeah, I feel fine.”
Later he got hit in the knee with a baseball bat.
“You good, Joey?”
“Yeah, I feel fine.”
Joey went home.
His wife asked, “You alright, Joey?”
“I think I’m getting a cold.”
Kids
Note To My Friend
I like you.
You are not disgusting most of the time.
You rarely make me mad.
You don’t smell funny.
Your smile is good.
You don’t chew gum in my presence.
Your face is alright to look at.
You don’t throw mud at me.
It’s been a long time since you punched me.
You even seem to like me when I’m not being a jerk.
Thanks for being my friend.
Humor
The Smart Alec Dictionary
Not what Webster would do
I like to browse books on Amazon. It’s sort of a hobby. I look forward to seeing what is popular on the charts. I also enjoy looking at the cover art.
Of course, I never buy books online. Do I look like a chump? I learned all about libraries while in High School. They give out books for free! Why would I waste perfectly good Hot Tamales money on books when I can get them for free?
Plus, you can get books online for free now. Authors just give them away. Fools. I usually get some of those. Someday I plan on reading some of them.
But I still like to look at new books. Often, while I’m browsing, I start daydreaming of one day writing a book and having it available online. So someone else who likes browsing books, but not buying them, can see the cover of my book and admire it while wishing it was free.
So there I was, sitting on the couch with my laptop, innocently enjoying my book browsing hobby—while some TV show about a singer turned detective was playing on Netflix—when I saw a title that sparked my interest, The Smart Alec Dictionary.
Man, that title hit me like a still-wet tuna thrown by a burly fisherman who saw me sitting on the dock of the bay and remembered that I owed him money. The problem was, it was one of those 99 cent books.
Come on! Why do writers think they need to be paid for their books? They’re just full of words. I know a bunch of words too. I could put a bunch of words in a book. How hard can it be? Nope, books should be free. Like music. And photos.
Anyway, I decided to try the “Look inside” feature. When I clicked on it, a screen popped up that said, “You wish! Pony up the buck and buy it. Listen, I’ve seen your account photo. You could stand to skip a box or two of Hot Tamales. Buy the book instead.”
Man, I hate online tracking! I got so sick of seeing Hot Tamales ads every time I went online that I started buying my Hot Tamales exclusively at Costco. Is it my fault they only sell them in 50 packs?
Well, this book was not going to beat me. Or get my dollar. I hopped in my car and went to the library. I asked the librarian about the book. She said, they have one copy but there was a 789 person hold on it. I should be able to get it in about two years.
Next, I drove to Costco to see if they had a copy in the books-no-one-wanted-to-buy pile. I started frantically digging through the romance novels and cookbooks and celebrity biographies. No luck. Then next to a mountain of collector’s edition Lord Of The Rings books I saw a sign that said The Smart Alec Dictionary $.99.
Underneath the sign, there was nothing but an empty shelf and one Blu-ray copy of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Then I noticed a sheet of paper taped to the shelf that said, “You should have been here yesterday. I hope you have Amazon Prime.”
With fury worthy of a character in a western whose wife had just been murdered by a gang of outlaws, I picked up that copy of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and made it fly. I stormed out of the store. Right after purchasing another 50-pack of Hot Tamales. Hey, I was already there. Don’t judge.
I drove back home. Defeated, I logged onto Amazon, and using my wife’s Prime account and debit card I purchased a copy of The Smart Alec Dictionary.
I called in sick and spent the next two days of two-day shipping bingeing on Hot Tamales and watching The Streets Of San Francisco on YouTube while I waited.
Finally, the UPS guy jogged up and dropped a box big enough to hold a Volkswagen on my porch. I ran out and hugged him. It was awkward. Then I took the box inside and cut it open. Buried beneath approximately three acres of brown paper was my treasure. A shrink-wrapped copy of The Smart Alec Dictionary.
My hands were shaking a little when I went to cut the shrink-wrapped off, so I had my wife do it.
At long last, I opened the dictionary and began looking up some definitions. I felt like a five-year-old on Christmas morning. My heart was beating faster than Desi Arnaz playing Ricky Ricardo playing congas on the song Babalú on an episode of I Love Lucy.
I looked up the word dictionary and it said, “Duh.”
I looked up the word patience and it said, “Hold on a minute…”
I looked up the word handsome and it said, “The opposite of the face in your mirror.”
I looked up the word ignorance and it said, “I don’t know.”
I looked up the word apathy and it said, “I don’t care.”
I looked up the word perpetual and it said, “Will this never end?”
I looked up the word basic and it said, “Your grasp of English.”
I looked up the word crazy and it said, “Do you have that mirror handy?”
I looked up the word fiction and it said, “Alright, now you’re just making things up.”
I don’t want to give out too many spoilers, so I will just say, it was the best dollar my wife ever spent. I’ll be leaving a five-star rating!
Happy Monday.
Mark
"I Feel Fine" sounds about like the males in my life. "The Smart Alec Dictionary" was a fun read. At least the author got paid, even if not by the reader.
I too love to browse books online to check out what’s in the charts and perhaps why. I also love investigating the different book art & photography. But as an author it’s more like a spy job/research/learning experience. Just found your newsletter from your comment on the substack writers thread!