Greta: “I’m so excited that we’re getting our picture taken!”
Hans: “Oh, please. I’m a year older than you, and let me assure you that this will get tiresome really fast.”
Greta: “You’re such a pessimist, Hans. You’re just mad because you’re wearing obscenely ridiculous shorts.”
Hans: “Like those idiotic bows in your hair are any less obscene?”
Greta: “Don’t be bitter. Mommy and Daddy like me better and they gave me these beautiful bows to show that I’m a princess.”
Hans: “Of course they like you better. You’re the newest model on the factory line. That’s how it works in this family.”
Greta: “Factory line? What on earth do you and your outdated bowtie mean?”
Hans: “It means that Mommy and Daddy are obsessed with being trendy, so they keep procreating in the hopes of always having the most current product. Once you’re thirty seconds past your expiration date, you’re history, just like our older brothers and sisters.”
Greta: “We have older brothers and sisters?”
Hans: “That’s exactly my point.”
Greta: “I still think you’re just jealous of my beauty.”
Hans: “Take a gander at our boots. They are the exactly the same. Do you know what this means?”
Greta: “That there’s only one cobbler in town?”
Hans: “That we have to fit a certain mold. And once you no longer fit that mold, your butt is sent out to pasture, no matter how many ribbons you’re wearing.”
Narrator: “And thus began the Hollywood tradition of valuing youth over talent…”
Suddenly, Cher and her hair walk into the room. “Girl, don’t listen to your nasty brother. Men are always a disappointment, even in the trial-size version.”
Greta: “Wow, you’re very pretty. I like the way your face looks so moist.”
Hans: “That’s because she just had it delivered this morning. That’s not an earring on her left side, that’s a price tag.”
Cher, ripping off said tag and handing it to a hovering assistant: “Look, sonny, I’m not going to argue with someone shorter than me who doesn’t know what they are talking about. I did too much of that in my first marriage, back before Columbus took credit for discovering a country that had already been discovered.”
Hans: “I don’t understand what your point might be.”
Cher: “Of course you don’t. Testosterone does that to a man, turning them into rutting animals who deny the rutting when they’re trying to get nominated to the Supreme Court. Anyway, I’ve got a concert in a few hours and I need to run. Sister Girl, you wanna come with so we can discuss how to surgically change everything about you and turn back time just to make us relevant in this disposable society?”
Greta: “It’s what I’ve always dreamed of, ever since, well, yesterday when I was born. Will I get to wear a thong and a feather boa just like you?”
Cher: “It’s covered under most insurance plans.”
The two joined hands and scampered away into the night. Well, one of them scampered. The other one had to ride a golf cart and hope that said cart didn’t hit a vicious pothole that would cause face-slippage.
Hans: “I think I missed a very important day of school at some point.”
Narrator: “It’s okay, Hans. None of us ever really know what is happening at Bonnywood.”
Previously published, modified minutely. For the record, I love me some Cher, so there’s really no need to send hate mail. (Unless you’re just bored out of your mind during the Covid lockdowns; I can respect that, from a mental-health standpoint.) Besides, Cher will outlast all of us…
Categories: Past Imperfect
Bonnywood Manor 
Gretel: Are you worried that we’ll be sent into the forest? Is that why we have to wear boots?
Hansel: Probably. If I remember correctly, that’s where our siblings were sent. They never came back because they were put in denotation, or detention, or something like that. I think there’s a Drudner* out there. We will need to prepare, because I heard that he looks like a kind old man.
Gretel: How do we prepare?
Hansel: Well, we have to shout at him at the top of our lungs that’s he’s a loser, loser, loser. That makes him come out of his house.
Gretel: Oh. Why do we want him to come out of his house?
Hansel: Because then the Good Witch will move in, and he will lose his power.
Gretel: Why didn’t anyone do that before?
Hansel: Don’t know. I think there might have been a spell.
Fin.
*Drudner: German. Evil male witch.
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Drudner. German. Male witch. Education don’t get much perfectly better than that. Thanks Lynette, for a new and wonderful name for him. Beats the hell out of ‘crazy deluded ego-driven man child.’
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Hahaha. 🙂 Happy to help. 🙂
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Lynette: Lovely allegory. Me thinks that if this tale had been told to more tykes in yesteryear, we wouldn’t have so many assholes today. Then again, the Bible didn’t seem to stick with a lot of people, either. So…
obbverse: Lynette is chock full of knowledge and she can teach you a lot of things. In a chaste way, of course…
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Reblogged this on Love and Love Alone.
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Thank you!
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👍👍👍
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‘G-strings, Vamps and Hair Weaves?’
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Every night all the men would come around, and lay their money down. Or so I’ve been told. I wasn’t actually there, despite the rumours…
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Oh, I Belieeeeeeeve, Brian, I believe you.
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You can always count on Cher and her hair.
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And she can always count on her royalties… 😉
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Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, dear friend. 🙂
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The same to you, kind sir!
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Cher will be tossing her mane long after nuclear winter has destroyed everything but the cockroaches and Keith Richards. ( this comment should be read while humming Strong Enough for full effect )
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Oh, you’re right, the comment reads even better if you’re humming. Now I can feel her spirit in me, truly can, overpowering my senses. And in case you were wondering, she doesn’t smell like teen spirit…
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Of course not. She smells like attitude, with a little derision mixed in.
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Cher, like Dolly Parton, Betty White and that guy from the Rolling Stones whose name escapes me right now (not Mick, the OTHER one)…have been pickled since Cleopatra ruled Egypt (or where-ever. Geography is not my best subject, nor history). They’re so artfully embalmed, or have drunk so much of that magic potion from that obscure movie starring Bruce Willis as a hen-pecked milquetoast ‘doctor’ married to Meryl Streep (EWWW, talk about nasty) and Goldie Hawn;( where in the two women were made immortal but were not careful about their carcasses and it was downright gruesome at the end) – the potion has permanently ‘saved’ those four (at least) for preservation in the annals of future history. Gawd I got off topic…ravel a thread… SQUIRREL. Back to your wonderful post featuring two winsome children.
Conversation:
Girl: They’ve got me on Prozac.
Boy: Mine is Valium or maybe it’s Xanax today. I get them mixed up.
Girl: One good thing about it – our faces will never wrinkle nor grow older. We’re frozen in time.
Boy: And dodged several nasty bullets from the future…there will be a thing called “Covid” and some very bad people (nationality uncertain, conspiracy probable, who knows) will destroy part of New York City by driving planes into some big buildings and early than that? Someone will shoot a nice man who only wanted to unite America (and chase women), and cause a ripple effect of badness that spreads until the Covid thing tries to wipe out what’s left of the country…. *gasps for breath..that was the MOTHER of all run on sentences!*
Girl: NURSE?? More Xanax/Valium please! He’s babbling…and seems really upset..
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Okay, it’s really time for you to put that Stephen King book down and start on something a little less… doom-filled.
Just kidding. If we don’t release our inner demons in some form or another (and writing is clearly the safest way to do so) then we will end up being walking bottles of rage that somehow get elected president and then proceed to rip the country apart with their ineptitude, cruelty, disregard for life, and general inability to not be an asshole.
See? I’m releasing demons as well.
But back to Stephen, or at least the concept of reading. What books are you planning to tackle next? Maybe we can do another joint read…
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I would suggest, because it’s just a damned good book, that you venture into “Where The Crawdads Sing”. I’ve read it (recently) and was enchanted. I’ve seen at least three other bloggers who have written of their admiration for it too. It’s a fictional murder mystery, but the setting and the idea behind the book will blow your mind I think. How’s about that one? Then we can compare notes on what we thought of it?
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I’m very intrigued by your suggestion. I’ve added it to my Kindle “wish list” for now, as the digital version is 15 bucks and I’m not touching that. Amazon will send me an alert if the price drops. In the mean time, I’ll stop by some of the “Half Price Books” locations around here. (Not sure if they have such up in your neck, but it’s a chain that generally offers used hardbacks for very decent prices…)
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That “other guy” is Keith Richards. That hit me, out of the blue, at 2:45 a.m. this morning. My brain just NEVER stops…
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I hear that. My brain will NOT shut off. I’m always snatching my phone off the nightstand in the wee hours and creating a reminder to follow up on my latest fevered-brain output…
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You have me wishing Cher had snatched me away when I was youngling — oh, what might I have become? Here’s a guess: my wardrobe would be way different and my face would be shinier.
Eh. Maybe it’s just as well.
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Yes, there would have been an upgrade with both the couture and the shininess, but we both know you loved your youngling days and your family. Some folks never get the joy of such, so let’s celebrate you home. (But it’s perfectly fine if you still want to awash yourself in body glitter every now and then…)
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