Everything's a Scam?

Halloween Scare Tactics

“That will be six-hundred and sixty-six dollars,” said the cashier at the checkout counter.

“Charge it to the queen,” said Rokedo, perusing a magazine article celebrating the death of everything we hold dear.

“Excuse me?”

“The queen is paying for my groceries,” Rokedo responded, annoyed with the task of explaining the obvious.

The cashier called the manager to the checkout counter.

“What’s the problem?” asked the manager. He had been playing a video game inside the office and was eager to get back to his digital adventure.

“The queen is paying for my groceries because her lowlife son tried to sell me stolen flowers,” said Rokedo.

“The queen typically does her shopping elsewhere,” said the manager, a true master of diplomacy.

A line began to form behind Rokedo. Some of its inhabitants were becoming aggravated.

“If I have to stand here any longer, I’m going to start a war with an Arab nation justified by complete and utter lies,” said Doronto, a member of a local street gang.

“That would be rootin’-tootin’ awesome!” said Gauge, a man who pretended to be retarded for nefarious reasons. “There’s absolutely zero possibility that such an action would somehow contribute to the collapse of western civilization.”

“There’s no need for further war,” said the manager, traumatized to the point of disassociation by his years spent on the frontlines in various video game wars.

“Then I suggest you open up another register before things get genocidal up in these here parts,” said Gauge, placing a pile of chewing tobacco into his lower lip.

“We need all available associates to immediately report to a cash register,” the manager said over the loudspeaker, temporarily assuaging Gauge’s bureaucratic psychopathy.¹

“Is there some sort of problem?” asked Rokedo.

“The queen isn’t paying for your groceries,” said the manager. “You’re completely delusional.”

“But she said she would,” Rokedo countered.

“How much money do you have on your person?” asked the manager.

“I’m crippled by insurmountable debt. My net worth is less than zero.”

The manager wasn’t in the mood to play the role of financial consultant/social worker for some random nutjob. However, he did feel a pang of sympathy for Rokedo’s plight. Once again, he attempted to have a reasonable interaction with the queen’s unfortunate subject.

“How much money do you have in your pocket?” asked the manager.

“Twenty dollars.”

“For twenty dollars, I’ll give you the potatoes and a donut. That’s quite a deal.”

The potatoes became excited by the prospect of being consumed by a friend of royalty. On the precipice of being labeled “day-old,” many of them had given up on achieving any purpose in life, assuming it inevitable that their destiny was to collectivize into an undignified pile of slop on the floor of the grocery store’s dumpster.

“I love you,” said Scampy, a potato of Aryan origin.

“I don’t want stupid potatoes,” Rokedo whined, ignoring Scampy’s affection. “I want hot chocolate and whip cream!”

The manager became perturbed not only by Rokedo’s sense of entitlement, but his overall void of emotional intelligence. How could anyone ignore a golden potato?

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to leave,” said the manager.

“Can I take the wheel of steak?” asked Rokedo, assuming that the jig was up.

“You may not,” the manager replied. “I never want to see you in here again.”

“You should throw yourself off a bridge,” Scampy squeaked.

Rokedo became dejected by the one-hundred and eighty degree turn taken by his fortune. In an instant, he had been transformed from beneficiary of the queen herself to outcast from the best grocery store in town. Rokedo went home and cried himself to sleep.

“I’d like to purchase that bag of potatoes,” said a mad scientist named Spectre.

“Hooray!” said Scampy.

“I trust that you won’t be doing anything nefarious to the potatoes,” said the manager, the mad scientist’s physiognomy suggesting otherwise.

“I was planning on downloading the potato’s consciousness into my smart refrigerator inside a deep underground military base,” said Spectre.

“I don’t want to be stagnant,” Scampy cried. “I’m not a cut of veal.”

“You’ll be free to come and go as you please,” Spectre lied.

“Refrigerators don’t have legs,” the manager sleuthed. “You are going to do something nefarious to the potatoes!”

“You caught me,” said Spectre, stroking his somewhat rectangular moustache. “Ain’t I a stinker?”

“You are hereby banned from this store for eternity,” the manager declared.

“I’ll be back—bigger and better than ever before!”

Spectre lit a match, placed the flame near his behind, then farted, the combustion producing a cloud which the mad scientist used as vehicle to make his getaway. While flying toward the exit, Spectre shook his fist in menacing fashion.

NEXT WEEK: POSSIBLE BOOGERMAN RESURRECTION!

1. Unfortunately, Doronto was much less easy to placate. Immediately after completing his purchase of meatballs and menthol cigarettes, he did indeed start a war with an Arab nation, his justification for doing so an abominable hoax.