Factual Truth! Empty Town Opportunity!

In America, towns disappear all the time. But where do they go? It's the subject of a new Phlogiston Channel's "reality" series called "Waffle Station." Hosted by the star of the sitcom "Wombat," Clash Squeeze, the program examines communities & spends too much time napping in scenic graveyards. UFO Groups provide the commercial support.

Says Squeeze, "I never even met a woman who rollergirls or ultimate fights. There's just no way it's me dressed as a bimbo in those online galleries." Executive Enforcer Damon Mooser cites a 1997 clinical trial as inspiration for the series: "I have virtually no sense of spatial recognition & it has served me well."

American audiences can expect the show if they want, but previews in the former Soviet Russia as well as war-torn Canada have had little or no effect on the local economy. "If it's motor sports they want," critic Perl Gootbloot wrote in the San Salvadore Daily Hurrah, "it'll be like propaganda radio from World War Two all over again."

Already many small American villages have volunteered to abandon their townships in order for a chance to appear on the show. "We have even poisoned the soil with radioactive aluminum," said one resident of Dallas, Texas, before being carted away. "Waffle Station Fever" is a term no one has yet used.

Check your local listings.

News Item! Holiday Census Scandal!

Former mining executives have reportedly entered into a plea bargain with prosecutors in a case involving wild west-style saloons & bordellos. One lawyer for the flea circus, on condition of ambiguity, has issued a series of word balloons in an attempt to enliven the proceedings. Those still on the fence have been asked to get down.

Soon enough the government has felt the need to get involved. Former Census Taker & current Secretary Of The Interior Monologue, Herbert Umbrella, revealed previously unclassified, now redacted, documents which establish place, time & mise-en-scène but don't give away the plot in the manner of modern movie trailers.

"There are evil people in high places," asserts Umbrella, who holds a chain letter for no apparent reason. "Do you know how thin the air is in high places? No? Ask an Inca if you can find one. Or a llama if you're so inclined." Nearby a crowd of volcano divers passed out petitions for funding for a reality television series.

With Christmas this year grievously undermanned (but, tellingly, not underwomanned), officials unwilling to sit down & be still now charge representatives from rival parties with obstruction & conundrum. Experts warn now that the decision may end up at the Supreme Court, as if that's a bad thing, though non-experts can't say either way.