Excerpts From Nonexistent Books

“Okay, the category is Science, and the question is: Does Uranus have an aurora?”

“Hahahahaha! I don’t know, I’ve never checked! Bring me a mirror and give me a minute in the bathroom.”

“Fair enough. The answer is yes, but something tells me it’s mostly methane. Next card, History category: What did Dick Tuck do to Richard Nixon’s Chinatown train?”

“HAHAHAHAHA! Oh. My. GOD. Is that really someone’s name? How can you have a name like that and not change it? I have no idea what happened when he ran a train on Nixon, and I don’t WANT to know!”

“Card says that…he waved the train out of the station before Nixon was done. Ahem. Your turn. This one’s Arts Literature: At what time did Wee Willie Winkie run wild through the town?”

“This is starting to get a little spooky. Is it just me, or is this one SERIOUSLY perverted game of trivia?”

“Copyright 1984, but published in a factory built on an old Hustler Magazine burial ground.”

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The Taw, the last letter of the Hebrew alphabet, is used to describe a movable point in space, the size and hardness and luster of a pearl. It contains within it the exact mathematical opposite of every point in the known and living universe. Gazing into it is to invite madness. Sages have wasted away aeons tracking down the Taw wherever it has found itself and attempting to intuit truths about our world from viewing its opposite.

None of this, however, explains how the Taw appeared on eBay with an opening bid of 99¢ and a Buy It Now price of $19.99 (plus sales tax in California).

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Despite rumors to the contrary, ogres are a species apart and not simply very large goblins or orcs. Like orcs and goblins, ogres posess the ability to conduct photosynthesis through the green hue of their skin. Unlike them, though, ogres tend to be much larger: an adult ogre is usually 10 feet tall and in excess of 1000 lbs. They also have a decidedly simian build, with short and stocky legs to support their bulk but very long arms on which they can knuckle-walk to move faster.

The key differentiator between ogres and other sapients–though classifying ogres as sapients remains a matter of no small debate–is that ogres have never formed social groups larger that closely related bands. They understand and can speak a few words but have no language of their own so far as is known. This has led many to dismiss them as mere beasts, an evolutionary link between evolved sapients and their simian forebears.

This is in fact not the case. Ogre social organization is extremely complex, based around triumvirates of mature males that gather a band of mature females and immature males about them to live a mobile lifestyle of foraging and raiding. The males in the triumvirate routinely conspire against, challenge, and kill each other, an order that other sapients often use to take control of ogre bands. If someone is able to kill all three ogre band leaders, they are regarded by the others as the new leader.

Despite their limited language skills, ogres are masters of nonverbal communication and can converse in the Silent Tongue and sign language with a high degree of fluency. They are also extremely adaptable and excellent mimics: once exposed to the use and maintenence of metal weapons, for instance, they will practice those skills on their own. This is why most ogres encountered in latter days were well-armed and well-armored.

Unfortunately, the territory required for ogres to live in the wild was considerable, and as the nations of the world consolidated their borders, ogres found themselves squeezed out or in many cases deliberately killed. By the time of Uxbridge’s Anarchy in Pexate, for instance, ogres were extremely rare aside from a few captive bands belonging to powerful barons. The dawn of the modern age saw them all but extinct, confined to a few tracts of vast wilderness in Poccia and “sapient zoos” in Pexate and Layyia. Like the trolls of Ceres and the halflings of Daqin, ogres were simply unable to effectively adapt or oppose cultures in which organized warfare and professional soldiers were the norm.

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SENATOR ZEBULON T. MUDDLEFORD (D-FL): I like my hand. I’ll see you your “yes” vote on a highway appropriations bill and raise you one “yes” vote on a bridge to nowhere.

SENATOR RUTHERFORD L. CUBBS (R-NV): Page!

PAGE: Yes, Senator?

SENATOR RUTHERFORD L. CUBBS (R-NV): How many bridges in Senator Muddleford’s state equal the highway appropriation in the pot?

PAGE: 2.5, Senator.

SENATOR ZEBULON T. MUDDLEFORD (D-FL): Very well, “yes” votes on 2.5 bridges to nowhere.

SENATOR ALOSYIUS J. URSINE (W-IL): Is there even that much nowhere in you state?

SENATOR ZEBULON T. MUDDLEFORD (D-FL): We can always make some. Senator Ursine, are you going to ante up or fold?

SENATOR ALOSYIUS J. URSINE (W-IL): Getting too rich for my blood. Will you gentlemen accept an abstention on an ethics censure vote?

SENATOR RUTHERFORD L. CUBBS (R-NV): Throw in a “yes” vote on an authorization for the unconstitutional use of force and you’ve got a bet.

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“And so,” intoned Mwa the Mole gravely, “we take comfort in knowing that Mone the Mole died doing what he loved.”

Mone the Mole’s widow, Naabi the Mole, comforted her pups as Mwa the Mole continued his remarks.

“Digging tunnels and eating earthworms, those were Mone the Mole’s great passions. We all remember the stories about his tunnels, which seemed to get longer with each telling, and the fine earthworm sashimi he used to regurgitate from time to time.”

The pallmoles shuffled forward, bearing Mone the Mole’s mortal remains, still with bits of dirt from the cave-in and chunks of earthworm in his mouth. Mwa the Mola and Naabi the Mole were not sure if Mone the Mole had died from the cave-in or from choking, but either one counted as doing what he loved.

“And thus, we commend Mone the Mole to the air. Oxygen to oxygen, nitrogen to nitrogen.”

Gathering around the hole opened in the ceiling, the pallmoles reverently chucked Mone the Mole out of it.
moles “burying” their dead aboveground

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Sean saw it too late: his hiking partner had forgotten to douse the ashes of his campfire.

“Mike, wait!” he cried. But it was too late.

The high-caliber round put Mike down clean; he toppled face-first into the ashes, his blood quenching the embers that his fire bucket had not.

Half a mile away, atop a ranger watch tower, the bear regarded the scene through the lens of his 20x Leupold. His spotter nodded, and the bear ejected his 7.62mm brass into one outstretched paw. He then tucked it behind the band of his campaign hat.

“Only you,” he growled. “Only you.”

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“And if you stand here,” said the University of Northern Mississippi tour guide, “you can see the football stadium, the baseball field, and the student union all at the same time!”

She had led them onto a raised platform atop one of the four hills that made up the campus. While looking at the three visible landmarks simultaneously, an orienteer and soon-to-be freshman noticed a snaky pattern inlaid in brick below their feet. “What’s that?” she said, gesturing at the convoluted, folding-in-upon-itself design.

“Oh, that doesn’t mean anything that I’m aware of,” said the tour guide. “But the view is-”

She was interrupted by a loud harrumph from a nearby bench, where someone was sitting bundled up in a coat against the summer heat. “Doesn’t mean anything that you’re aware of?”

“I’m pretty sure it’s just a pretty symbol,” the tour guide said.

“I’ll have you know that is a labyrinth, designed after the famous Labyrinth of Chartres Cathedral, and one of the later expressions of a cultural shape that is innate throughout world history. From the Cretans to the Romans, to the prehistoric inhabitants of the Solovetsky Islands, the labyrinth–as distinct from the maze–has one of the richest cultural heritages of any symbol in history. This particular iteration is often thought to be used by pilgrims as a substitute for a costly and dangerous trip to the Holy Land!”

“Geez, it’s just a little squiggle,” the tour guide said. “Lighten up.” She led the group down the hill and away, with a sidelong look.

“Hmph.” The speaker took off their hat and jacket, shaking their snout and rubbing their horns. “Just a little squiggle to you, maybe. To a minotaur, it’s heritage. I bet you wouldn’t feel the same way if I said that Sigma Qoppa Nu was just a bunch of letters.”

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Q: Why was the triangular ratio unable to get a home loan?

A: Because it needed someone to cosine.

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Many people have wondered how the small town (pop. 137) of Butthole (pronounced “beaut-hoe-lay”) in Mississippi got its name. The road signs for Butthole (pronounced “beaut-hoe-lay”) were a constant source of amusement for out-of-towners and frequently stolen by pranksters until the town ordered them replaced with painted boulders to deter theft in the manner of Shitterton, Dorsetshire.

It has been suggestion, by analogy with the town of Bad Fücking in Saxony, that the name Butthole (pronounced “beaut-hoe-lay”) is simply another language that seems scatalogical to English speakers. After all, Bad Fücking simply means “the baths of Fuecke’s people” after a long-dead merchant named Johannes Fuecke.

However, none of the theories about the origin of the name Butthole (pronounced “beaut-hoe-lay”) have thus far held up to scrutiny. The oft-repeated tale that it has its roots in a Cajun place name, Beau d’Holey, neglects the fact that “Holey” is not a known word or place name in French. Another theory, that the town was named after a hole in a local butte, is belied by its location in board-flat Mississippi floodplain country. And despite the suggestion in a Saturday Night Live skit from 1987 that brought the town a burst of worldwide notice, there never was a “Cyrus Q. Butthole (pronounced “beaut-hoe-lay”), Esquire.”

Even the notion that the name was adopted with full knowledge of its actual meaning is troublesome, as the scatological term is unknown before 1859 (and then only in the West) while Butthole (pronounced “beaut-hoe-lay”) was founded in 1822. No source reflecting on the humor of the name can be found in any contemporary accounts, even from the Union troops who occupied the area in 1863 and who would have had good reason for a laugh at their adversaries’ expense.

In the midst of all of this, the town of Butthole (pronounced “beaut-hoe-lay”) is laughing all the way to the bank. Despite being overwhelmingly rural, conservative, and Republican, the town nevertheless makes a healthy profit selling t-shirts and souvenirs in person and online.

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At Pelusium, when the Persians and Greeks shattered his lines, did Nakhthorheb have any idea that three thousand years of an Egypt ruled by Egyptians was coming to an end? Or that his defeated kingdom was only to suffer ten years under the Persian yoke before being made part of the largest empire the world had ever seen?

The Egyptians had a story in which Nakhthorheb fled the country, fled to Macedonia, and sired Alexander the Great, his eventual successor in secret. I prefer to think he watched the Macedonians parade through the Siwa Oasis from beneath a cloak, and smiled.

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