Disney World Opens New Ordeal Kingdom For Family Meltdowns

BAY LAKE, FL—Touting the new property’s wide variety of unique and imaginative attractions, representatives from the Walt Disney World Resort announced Monday the opening of Ordeal Kingdom, a new theme park specifically designed for full-scale family meltdowns.

Situated between Epcot and the Magic Kingdom, the 350-acre property reportedly incorporates many of the most aggravating elements of Disney’s other parks and expands them into a creative and fully immersive world of irritation, which is said to include the longest lines in the entire resort, a convoluted layout that is only depicted in indecipherable cartoon maps that are not to scale, and 150 percent higher prices. According to park director Jacob Bartlett, Ordeal Kingdom’s specialized combination of features will ensure a slowly building resentment among visiting families, eventually resulting in a dramatic public outburst followed by a silent walk back to the car.

“Whether it’s the sheer distance between rides or the unspecified bathroom locations, every aspect of the experience is guaranteed to ratchet up the tension until you and your family are screaming at each other and saying you should never have come in the first place.”

“We provide the rides, games, and entertainment, and you do the rest—Maybe your family will have that special Disney shouting match as soon as you enter the park, right after you shell out 75 bucks for your daughter’s ticket only to have her scream right in your face that she hates you.”

“We want your family to have a one-of-a-kind experience while you’re here, which is why Disney employees will be on hand throughout the park to wish you ‘a magical day,’” said Bartlett, referring to the greeting that will begin to sound more and more like a taunt as the afternoon wears on. “Plus, as one final treat, you’ll find the parking lots completely unmarked, providing one last special opportunity for family members to cry, yell, and pitch a hysterical fit—regardless of how young or old they are—when it takes more than an hour to find the car!”

Upper-Middle-Class Woman Worries There’s Better Coffee She Doesn’t Know About

DEERFIELD, IL—Upper-middle-class homemaker Irene Risser expressed fear Monday that there exists a gourmet coffee superior to the brands she currently buys. “I have Kona Coffee’s peaberry flavor, which is really terrific, and I also like to buy Sumatran Rainforest,” Risser said. “But I still worry that somewhere out there, someone has better, more expensive coffee than I do.” Risser then went on the Internet to search for $25-a-pound breakfast blends.

Exercise Briefly Considered

GERMANTOWN, TN—The notion of aerobic exercise fleetingly crossed the mind of Memphis-area office manager Theodore Sperling Monday. “There was half an hour to kill before Monday Night Football,” Sperling said, “and I thought for a few seconds that maybe I should go for a walk around the block.” After raising himself from the couch, however, Sperling instead walked to the kitchen for a leftover pork chop from that evening’s dinner and returned to the living room, where he briefly channel-surfed before settling on a Game Show Network rerun of wheel-of-fortune.

Fifth-Period Gym Class Under Investigation For Failure To Hustle

HOENIX—A fifth-period gym class at Derndell Middle School is under investigation by local authorities for failure to hustle during a basketball drill Monday.

The gym teacher, coach Irv Peeler, is cooperating with authorities and has not been charged.

“I did everything I could,” Peeler said in a press conference Monday. “I yelled, ‘Come on, people, let’s go, let’s move,’ and when that produced no effect, I yelled, ‘Let’s see some hustle out there.’ But even then I could discern no evidence of hustling.”

Peeler went on to say that the students displayed “very poor” effort.

Eyewitness testimony corroborates allegations that even during warm-up exercises, at least a dozen students failed to rotate fully during trunk twists, and that “a significant number” also failed to “adequately bend at the knees” during squat thrusts.

Among those named in the investigation were Brian Ericks, Dan Chester, Howie Goldberg, Tim Miraglia and Todd Pollack.

The report also indicated that of the 30 pupils in the class, six failed to come to class dressed in the proper gym gear. Those six were instructed by Peeler to sit on the mats along the far wall for the duration of the class. Their unpreparedness was also noted with a ‘U’ next to their names in Peeler’s gym log.

Despite the class’ poor performance during warm-up exercises, the main focus of the investigation is the basketball drill that followed. After counting off by fours in a somewhat lethargic fashion, the class then formed two teams of roughly equal abilities. However, upon commencing play it became obvious that none of the students, including some who are active in Derndell Middle School athletics programs, were in any way “hustling.”

According to early reports, some members of the class weren’t even up on the balls of their feet. Further, none of the students were observed going for the ball, showing good effort or otherwise “digging it out” in any way.

In addition to the lack of hustle, evidence indicates that there was a considerable amount of talking during attendance-taking, delaying the start of the physical-activity portion of class for nearly seven minutes.

“After blowing my whistle failed to achieve quiet, I made it clear to the class that if they did not settle down, they would sit for the entire period,” Coach Peeler told local authorities. “I also made it clear that I did not care if it came to that, as I had grading to do.”

“These students,” Peeler said, “are motor mouths.”

Only one class member, Randy Grabecki, was cleared from the investigation, as he has been excused from gym class all semester with a signed doctor’s note. “Randy has flat feet,” the boy’s mother, Helene Grabecki, told reporters.

Peeler said he sensed trouble early on in the period. “I had them run some easy laps around the gym to warm up before doing stretching exercises,” he said. “But when they went to stretch, well, they just sort of sat around on the mats. That should have been an indication to me right there that something wasn’t right.”

Eyewitnesses report that Peeler did seem to be trying to “fire up” the class by clapping his hands and yelling, “C’mon, people!”

If investigations do produce sufficient evidence to prove a lack of hustle, consequences for the fifth-period class could be fairly serious. Extra laps would likely be assigned, and revocation of “outside gym” privileges for when the weather becomes nice would be all but certain.

In addition, scoliosis checks—during which students must stand shirtless in the gym for upwards of 30 minutes while waiting to be examined by the school nurse—would be upped from once a year to twice a week.

Severe as that may seem, for two members of the class, the punishment could be even worse.

“This class includes Jeff Johnson and Tim Schutz, two of the most athletic boys in school,” said Bob Joravsky of the National Council on Physical Fitness. “For them not to hustle, well, we’d have no choice but to take away of Presidential Physical Fitness awards. It’s that bad.”

According to Joravsky, in a high-profile case such as this, President Clinton would likely come to Derndell Middle School and ceremonially remove the Presidential Physical Fitness patches from the boys’ denim jackets himself.

Monday’s incident is the most serious scandal to rock Derndell Middle School’s physical education department since 1991, when five students were permanently expelled from school for “failure to rotate” during a volleyball match.

Web Of Lies Surrounds Late Birthday Card

MISSOULA, MT—Only a thin tissue of lies screens area resident Jessica Jurgensen from the unpleasant reality that her friend Gina Tobler forgot her 34th birthday, which occurred four days ago.

“How did you like the card?” Tobler said in a carefully plotted phone call to Jurgensen Tuesday. “What?! I put it in the mail last week! I can’t believe you didn’t get it yet!”

The card, which currently sits inside a bowl of keys on Tobler’s kitchen counter, is ready to be mailed, awaiting only the purchase of a stamp.

In lieu of a timely card, Tobler presented Jurgensen with an intricate work of fiction in which she cast herself as sensitive and considerate, if somewhat hapless.

“I can’t wait until you see the card,” Tobler said. “I ordered it online weeks ago. I hardly ever order things online, but it was so perfect, no other card would do. I waited for it for so long, I was about to get another card, but then it finally did end up arriving on Wednesday, April 14. I remember the day, because I was so relieved I’d be able to send it out with plenty of time.”

By alternating statements of contrition and annoyance, Tobler created a smokescreen and bought herself the additional time required to devise a plan of action.

“I was going to mail the week before last, knowing how incredibly slow the post office can be,” Tobler told her friend. “I planned to drop it in the mailbox across the street from my optometrist’s office when I picked up my new glasses. See, I didn’t want those incompetents who collect the mail in my office to get a chance to lose it. But then I was in a rush to get my car’s oil changed, so I didn’t. But then my mechanic told me I needed to replace my brakes immediately, and that I’d better leave my car there. By the time I got home in the cab, I realized I’d forgotten your card in the glove compartment. I was so mad at myself!”

To back up her story that she mailed the card last week, Tobler considered rolling back the date on the postage meter at work, but was unsure if she’d be able to figure out how to do so. Instead, she created the following blueprint: She will place the birthday card into the mail with insufficient postage. When the birthday card is returned, she will smudge the original postage date—should there be one—or obscure it with an additional stamp.

In the meantime, she will maintain a steady stream of disinformation to baffle her friend.

“If you haven’t gotten your card yet, maybe I should just go to the store and buy another one,” Tobler told Jurgensen. “But I don’t want to get you some ugly one, just because the post office is inefficient. Well, it’ll come eventually. You’ll know it’s from me when it gets there. It has the cutest cat stamp on it. I know how you love cats.”

Tobler said she “immediately regretted mentioning that damn cat stamp,” which she still has to find.

Tobler’s meticulously constructed but delicate house of cards nearly collapsed when Jurgensen phoned Saturday. While attempting to cover her tracks, Tobler dragged her woefully ill-prepared husband Todd into the operation.

“I picked up the phone and it was Jessica,” Todd told reporters. “Suddenly, Gina started waving her arms and mouthing words to me about God knows what. I put the phone down and she whispered in my ear not to tell Jessica that the birthday card is still here. Luckily, it never came up. But then Gina scribbled this note to me that I should tell Jessica she’s going to love the card that I saw [Gina] get in a package in the mail at the same time as last week’s Sports Illustrated.'”

Todd’s subsequent confusion nearly blew Tobler’s cover and compromised the entire mission.

“I didn’t know what Gina was trying to tell me at all,” Todd said. “Finally, I just handed her the phone so she could talk to Jessica herself.”

Once the card is returned and re-mailed, Tobler plans to complete the maneuver with a confirmation call and close the book on her masterpiece of deception.

“I’ll be glad when this is all over,” Tobler told reporters. “I don’t think I can bear another week of fudging the truth. It’s exhausting keeping it all straight.”

Meanwhile, Jurgensen remains wholly ignorant of the fact that she’s being fed a diet of intrigue and deception.

“Gina and I are both a little scatterbrained,” Jurgensen said by phone from her Ronan residence. “I was surprised that she remembered my birthday at all. I totally forgot to call her last year until two days afterward. Luckily, I covered by telling her I was in the hospital for inhaling toxic fumes at work.”

Half-Fabricated Résumé Still Unimpressive

DALLAS–The résumé of aspiring tele-journalist Jonathan Krieger, liberally padded with exaggerations and flat-out lies, was deemed “unimpressive” Monday by Sandi Robertson, human-resources director of Dallas NBC affiliate KXAS. “This applicant has served as assistant news director at a number of medium-market stations,” Robertson said of Krieger, 25, who once spent a summer working at an El Paso public-access station. “But even so, his experience is just not at the level we’re looking for.” Robertson was similarly underwhelmed by Krieger’s alleged internship at theABC Family Channel and the “Reporter Of The Year” award he did not win at his college radio station.

Tortilla-Chip Supply Dwindling, Reports Man On Couch

WATKINS GLEN, NY—In an announcement with dire implications for future munching, couch-based snacker Randall Boles confirmed Monday that his personal tortilla-chip supply has fallen to “dangerously low” levels.

“I have already been forced to resort to drastic chip-rationing measures,” Boles told reporters. “If relief chips are not delivered within the next 30 to 40 minutes, my supply will be exhausted and a state of snack famine will exist.”

Boles’ supply, a 14 1/2-ounce bag of Tostitos-brand White Corn restaurant-style tortilla chips, was widely expected to last through the entirety of Boles’ Monday-night TV viewing, from Judge Joe Brown at 7 p.m. to Forgive Or Forget at 1:30 a.m. Tuesday. But severe chip mismanagement on Boles’ part caused the supply to become depleted far ahead of schedule, sometime around 9:40 p.m.

“Usually when Boles consumes snack chips for the purpose of enhancing audiovisual entertainment via orally administered gustatory stimuli, he judiciously conserves his supply, chewing and swallowing each chip before reaching for a second,” Dr. Morris Cruczek said. “But this time, he was recklessly filling his mouth with fistfuls of chips, putting in new pieces before previous ones had even been fully chewed. Exacerbating the problem was his inexplicable failure to supply himself with an ice-cold beverage, the consumption of which would have created periods of chip disuse and thereby extended the lifespan of his supply.”

According to Frito-Lay’s Roland Krall, a number of emergency options remain open to Boles, but none are pleasant.

“The use of bean or processed-cheese dip can be an effective chip-supply extension measure,” Krall said, “but in Boles’ case, all that remains are broken chip shards in the range of one-third to one-fourth of a whole chip. Dip-scooping with pieces that small would require exceptionally deft chipsmanship, and I’m honestly not certain Mr. Boles is up to the task. Plus, the amount of mental effort such an endeavor would require would likely exceed the amount of pleasure the snacking process is intended to provide in the first place.”

As a last-ditch option, Krall said Boles could shake the near-empty cellophane bag, collecting the smallest chip fragments and salt crystals into one corner, and then tilt the bag, pouring the resultant debris into his mouth.

“It would not be pretty by any stretch of the imagination,” Krall said, “but if so driven, Boles could thus extract one last burst of crunchy corn goodness from his dying Tostito supply.”

Regardless of what extreme measures Boles may be forced to take, the struggling snacker urged others to learn from his folly.

“I ignored the risks, and now it is too late to fix the problem painlessly,” said Boles, searching his fingernails for overlooked Tostito particles. “Conserve your chips. Do not end up like me.”

Donut Shop’s Mission Statement Awfully Ambitious

FREEHOLD, NJ—Patrons at Dotty’s Donuts on Cranston Avenue agree that the mission statement posted near the shop’s entrance seems overly ambitious. “It said, ‘At Dotty’s, our goal is to reinvent the morning,'” Dotty’s patron Ken Mentilli said. “‘Dotty’s Donuts are guaranteed to bring a smile to your face and a ray of light into your soul.’ That seems like a tall order for a donut shop.” Mentilli added that Dotty’s may not be able to deliver on its promise to “change the world, one fresh-baked bear claw at a time.”