Anthea’s Hope story by Jim Duchene tech by Grok 1 The desert stretched endlessly before Thomas Jerome Newton. A cracked and desolate expanse that mirrored the fate of his home planet, Anthea. He stood atop a dune. His thin frame cloaked in a tailored suit that seemed out of place against the barren landscape. His eyes, hidden behind dark sunglasses, scanned the horizon. Not Earth’s, but a simulation he’d built in a Nevada warehouse. It was a desperate attempt to feel something of home. A planet dying of drought. Its inhabitants reduced to dust and memory. Newton had come to Earth decades ago with a mission. Amass wealth. Develop technology. Save Anthea by bringing water back. He’d succeeded in part. His patents had made him richer than King Solomon, but the planet’s bureaucracies, wars, and petty squabbles had delayed him. Now, time was running out. Anthea’s last transmissions had...
I can't tell you how happy I was that people got the joke. Even PETA, who's not known for its sense of humor, reached out a friendly hand via lawsuit, the only known way they communicate, to express their appreciation concerning my effort to satirize animal stereotypes. I rescued my pit bull from the local pound. He had been found abandoned in the desert. Thirsty. Hungry. Scared. Wearing a collar way too tight for him. No chip. Scars here and there. "Who's going to adopt this poor guy? I wondered. PT Barnum was famously quoted as saying, "There's a sucker born every minute," and, by adopting him, I proved I was born at the one minute mark. Now, I can either shake my fist at the sky about how pit bulls are misunderstood or I could write something showing how ridiculous those misunderstandings are. With Pit Bull Facts (8-8-25), I chose the later. ...
I got home from work the other night and saw my little girl watching the holiday classic Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer. This was two days before Thanksgiving! I grimaced. I'm not saying that particular Christmas special is bad (which it is), I'm just saying the only thing worse was listening to Miley Cyrus sing Nirvana's Smells Like Teen Spirit. And the only thing worse than that is watching her dance to it. Don't believe me? Check it out for yourself on YouTube. Anyway... I sat down and watched it with her. Why? Because that's what Dads who love their little girls do. As my mind wandered and my eyes glazed over, I was reminded of a time, not so long ago, I met a brave little pig. Traveling, I stopped at a farm because I had heard farmers tend to have attractive daughters with liberal ideas about hospitality, but, instead of a daughter, this farmer had a pig. The pig was missing three of its legs, one of its two eyes, both ears, its tail, and part o...
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