.....Of course little did Bush suspect, that Steve Irwin, the Croc Hunter, was actually calling form the Lincoln Bedroom within the Whitehouse on his cell phone. He was there on a covert mission to rid the world of those partisian trained attack pet goats, aid in the escape of Arlo and Levi, and perhaps take in a bit of the Smithsonian while he was in town. Steve had Martha, his pet croc and partner, with him for this mission. Martha was REAL good at popping holes in the tops of Foster's beer cans with her teeth, and also had tremendous fashion sense. And since her diet consisted almost entirely of pet goats and over-acheiving brain dead well conected frat boys selected to national office, Steve found her help priceless for this mission........

<center><FONT COLOR="#000080">--- Edited 2 times, lastly by Larry on Aug 07, 2004 ---</FONT></center>

Back in OZ Louise pondered, then had an Oprah Lightbulb Moment! "Help is at hand!! Steve and Terry Irwin only live 15 mins from me (Fairdinkum!) and Terry is a born and bred Oregonian like me. I'm sure she'll be happy to help rescue the Whitehouse!! I know Steve has a croc named Martha who loves eating evil pet goats like those poor things genetically engineered by Don. I'll give her a call!!"
"Terry!", cried Louise, "we need Martha's help to save the Whitehouse!! and the future of our Homeland!!" "Don't worry", cried Terry!," Steve and Martha have already begun a covert Operation in the Whitehouse! As we speak they are making secret plans to destroy the evil goats while pretending to help W.find you, Mike and Levi after your brave rescue and escape!! Unfortunatly it looks like they've located Arlo on account of he used toilet paper to make his escape, and that Psychedelic heliocopter was a bit of a give away! You should have used a black one and then they would have thought is was just Arnie dropping in!"
"O.K. guy's" said Louise "Looks like we might have to rescue Arlo Again!! He's probably holed up at Rising Son but I'm sure Jeb and his people will have the place surrounded in no time. Let's head back State-Side, but i just need to make a quick stop in Oregon to pick up my absentee ballot for November. I better get one for Terry too, every vote counts!" Louise and Levi got back in the chopper but noticed Mike looking very pale and hesitant. "Mike whats wrong?" said Louise, as she cranked up the chopper. "I just don't know if i can handle Florida at the moment with DisneyWorld,Goofy,Pluto,Jeb and all that trauma with Mirimax and the movie release." "It"s O.K. Mike", said Levi,"after Oregon we'll drop you off in Flint for some R.& R., and you do need to get your speech ready for the Republican Convention!" ......

Just as the Prez was about to take Steve Irwin's call, the special red phone on his desk starting ringing. It was his direct hotline to Jeb in Florida.

"Jebmeister!" said George.

"Georgie!" said Jeb. "My guys have the folksinger in custody. I'm on my way there now. I'll call you when I get there."

"Okie-dokie!"

Jeb arrived at the destination, a barren swamp land. It was dark but luckily he had brought a flashlight. He heard a voice.

"Over here, sir, to your right."

Through the darkness he could see 2 big, tough-looking guys, each holding a prisoner by an arm. The prisoner had a big cowboy hat on & didn't seem to be struggling to escape. In fact, he was telling a long story about a truck that his captors had trouble following. Jeb got closer & shined the flashlight in the captive's face.

"YOU IDIOTS!!!" cried Jeb. "That's not Arlo! That's Ramblin' Jack Elliott!!!"

"Howdy, Mr. Mailman! Have you a letter for me?", asked Annie to Roy the mailman as he looked to see. "No letter, just bills", replied Roy. Well, fudge!", commented Annie with a heavy sigh and a frown. "Say, was that your old man I saw on America's Most Wanted for littering a string of toilet paper halfway across the state of Florida?", asked Roy. "Probably just some wannabe looking for attention, Roy. Besides, ya can't believe everything you see or hear on tv these days", Annie replied. "Can't argue with that!", said Roy with a slight chuckle as he walked out the door.

Polyphonic ring tones of The Doors "Light My Fire" began to sound from Annie's cell phone.

"Hello?"

"Annie, it's me, so listen close because I only have 18 minutes and 20 seconds left on my prepaid account."

"Pop? Oh my gosh! Is that you? Where are you? Are you o.k.?"

"I'm O.K., honey. I'll explain everything later in detail, but right now I need you to do me a favor."

"Sure! What is it?"

"I need you to look in our address book and give me Pittsburgh Joe's address and phone number."

Annie fumbles around underneath a pile of old Rolling Blunder Review newsletters dating back to the early 90's laying on the desk.

"O.K., Pop, I found it! You ready to write?"

Arlo begins to copy down Joe's address and phone number when all of a sudden it dawns on him that he's got Levi's ink pen!

"Oh shit!"

"I'm, sorry, wa, what was that, Pop?"

"Nothin', just talkin' to myself."

"What happened to you the other day? I mean, I remember one minute I saw you sliding down a roll or two of toilet paper from that elevator booth suspended by the BlunderCopter and then the intense glare of the sun got in the way and I lost sight of you after that and I have no idea if or where you landed!"

I'll tell you all about my landing experience later, but on a real quick note, I recently learned from Oz intel that Pittsburgh Joe owns an authentic baseball authentically autographed by Babe Ruth, but what Joe doesn't know, yet, is that there are two micro-chips that's embedded in the center of that baseball. These micro-chips contain all the information we need to stop the onslaught of mass cloning of Bush's pet goats and give us medicinal information necessary to write serum formulas for prevention and cure against Bush's pet goat bites. So, if I don't get that baseball containing the micro-chips from Joe sometime within the next 48 hours and in the BlunderLab... well, I hate to speculate what could happen. Time is of the essence because some special force Bush thugs have already been assigned to intercept that baseball before I or anybody else gets to it so Joe could be in imminent danger. Don't worry, I'm going to do everything I can to make sure it doesn't get in the hands of errorists in the White House but I can't do it alone, I've got to regroup with my all my trusted associates quickly!"

"Pop, I'm scared now! I'm gonna have nightmares about these pet goats", said Annie as Arlo tried to calm her fears and reassure her everything was going to be o.k..

"I gotta go, sweetheart, but I need you to do two more things for me. Call mikey and have him saddle up four-legged Arlo for me and tell him I'll swing by this evening to get him. I've got a long ways to ride to get to Joe's house. I figure no one will ever suspect it's me traveling on horseback.
And then, call louise for me and have her meet me up in Pittsburgh tomorrow morning with the BlunderCopter.
Thanks!"

"Good luck, Pop!", said Annie.

The first thing that Annie did was to call Mikey to try to get four-legged Arlo saddled up.

"Hello, Mikey, is that you, this is Annie from the Story Board."

" Hi, Annie, I knew you'd call. I've been real busy down here trying to clean all this toilet paper up off my place that was strewn about by some idiot! "Look, I've got bad news about four-legged Arlo. I've kind of lost touch with him, and I fear he might be three-legged Arlo by now. Anyway, You'd better go ahead and make the rest of those phone calls. I can't help you unless you want me to saddle up my little miniature horse, Mickey."

"Well," said Annie, "can Mickey make it up to Pittsburgh?"

"Pittsburgh??" replied Mikey. "Why is Arlo going to Pittsburgh?"

"Uhhh...Just to visit a Blunderite named Joe. I hope it goes better than the last time we visited a Blunderite in Pittsburgh. He was this real boring guy who made stupid jokes and talked nonstop about baseball and some remaining piece of some outfield wall somewhere that nobody cares about."

"That woulda been Joe."

"Oh." Then after a long silence, "What about Mickey? Can he make it or not?"

"Hell, no. But Ramblin' Jack is down here now with a horse of his own. Just left the governor's mansion. Jack said that Arlo could borrow it."

Meanwhile back in Pittsburgh, Joe was still pondering the whole folk process thing. In fact, he hadn't left his chair for a few days. Soon he snapped out of it and was surprised to see his wife at the computer, perusing the Arlonet message boards.

"You finally snapped out of it!" she said. "I was starting to worry. Oh---You need to get milk."

"I didn't know that you read my posts on Arlonet," said Joe.

"I don't."

"Oh?"

"No, I like to read Levi, Louise, Larry, Arnie, Agnes, Mikey......some of the others. THEY make me laugh. All YOU ever write about is YOURSELF."

"Oh."

"Wait...There's a private message on here. Says Arlo is trying to call you on the phone."

"Probably needs my advice about his next set list."

Soon they were logged off the internet to free the phone line. Arlo's call came instantly. He quickly and precisely explained what was needed and it was agreed that Arlo would wear a baseball glove so that he could catch the Babe Ruth ball without dismounting and letting the Bush thugs catch up to him. Arlo asked, "Are you sure you can make a good throw from your porch? Can you hit me while the horse is still in stride?"

"I was only a fair ball player as a kid," said Joe, "but I can make a throw."

No sooner was Joe off the phone when it rang again. Joe answered. The voice on the other end was familiar and spoke before Joe could even say hello.

"We want that Babe Ruth ball."

"Marco???" said Joe. "You stupid bastard! What Babe Ruth ball?"

"Don't get cute. The Babe Ruth AUTOGRAPHED ball."

"If I owned a Babe Ruth autographed ball," said Joe, giving Marco his standard line whenever asked about the ball, "I wouldn't be just a member of Arlonet, I'd own the whole damned web site!"

"Don't kid me. We'll be in the same limo. You should remember it."

Thinking quickly, which he was never good at, Joe remembered the limo's sun roof and said, "You can't take a chance at stopping and being seen here. This thing is all over the news. Or at least it is whenever they're not showing those idiotic Mailmen for Bush. Just drive by and I'll be on the porch. Bring a baseball glove. Open the sun roof and stand up with the glove on. I'll throw it down to you."

"OK, but remember, no funny stuff," said Marco as he set a date and time and abruptly hung up.

One week later.

It was late at night and the limo was coming up Joe's street on schedule. Joe stood on his porch with his Sammy Khalifa autographed ball. Joe figured he could spare this one. Another failed number one draft choice, he mused. The ball was worth more before Khalifa signed it. When the limo was in front of the house, Joe fired the ball at Marco-----ten feet over his head, down the driveway of the house across the street, into the woods behind the house across the street. The driver slammed on the brakes, jerking Marco violently. Several men got out of the limo. It reminded Joe of a clown car in the circus; he just could not believe how many men could fit in that limo. The men, all in dark suits, ran down into the woods with flashlights. Marco shook his fist at Joe, rubbed the back of his neck, and joined the men in the woods. Nobody remained in the limo.

Just then Arlo came up the street on his horse. It reminded Joe of the cover of Son of the Wind. He thought, it's a good thing I live in the city. This kind of stuff would cause a commotion in the suburbs. Here in the city, nobody will blink an eye. Arlo was almost in front of the house when Joe threw the Babe Ruth ball right in the direction of Arlo's outstretched glove. Arlo watched it sail through the air toward him....

It was a perfect strike, and Arlo caught it right in the center of his mitt with his trusty steed not even breaking stride. As soon as Arlo knew he was safe from Marco and his gang, he slowed his mount down to a walk and peered at the shiny horsehide spheroid in his mitt. There was the signature, clear as a bell......Bill Mazeroski. "What did Joe do to me," shouted Arlo. "He must have given that Babe Ruth ball to Marco."

Levi,Louise and Mike had recieved the message from Arlo but they knew Arlo would take at least a week to get to Pittsburgh on account of he was riding Micky the mini horse, so they stayed with Mike in Flint while he finished his speech for outside the Republican convention.They said good-bye to Mike then headed to Pittsburgh.They arrived just in time to see Arlo catch the ball but then noticed him throw it down on the ground REALLY HARD. Then he threw his hat down too and started to jump up and down on it. "Jeez " ,said Levi, Arlo looks really upset. Louise pushed the control stick forward, swooped down and picked up Arlo, his hat, Mickey the mini horse and the baseball in one fell swoop. "Geez Louise!!!" Arlo gasped, you scared the (censored) outta me !!!! Joe went and threw me the wrong ball!!! So now we have the Mazeroski ball and Marco has the Babe Ruth ball!! WE gotta track down that limo and get that ball with the micro chips back before W. and Don clone more goats and take over the world!!!....

...Meanwhile, back in some yet to be explained but somewhat detected and discovered alternate reality, the sub-plots thickened...

There was more to this Bush and pet goat thing than most people knew, or would even want to know(Those in the Bush Whitehouse for reasons of plausable deniabilty for the most part).
The connection between Bush and the pet goats runs deep, and it's a strange tale.
When Bush was young, having parents that were busy with public life, society, and their other more gifted offspring, often meant that the young George W. was often left in the care of the families pet goats.
In fact, he was actually raised by them in large measure, much like Tarzan was raised by the Great Apes. Of course the Great Apes are much more skilled at langauge than goats, which is one reason that Tarzan is much more articulate that George W., but that's another story.
Being raised by goats does have some intresting dynamics of course, and these dynamics have manifested themselves clearly in the finished product that is now the president of the United States. (Although we also hold the view that George is really not so much a finished product, so much as he is a work in progress) As everyone knows, except perhaps George, goats will eat anything. These gastronomic goat habits have profoundly influenced the devolopment of "dubya" in any number of ways.There was never enough Purina Goat Chow on hand at the Bush estate, because Mom and Pop bush were always too busy to remember to keep up the supply. This goat chow shortage did not bode well for young dubya, as the hungry goats would nibble at the unused parts of dubya's brain, which of course turned out to be quite a great feast.After a time, the goats ate all there was to eat, except for the spoiled and rotten parts of dubya's brain which was too awful to ingest.......even by goat standards. This is why today, the spoiled and rotten parts of brain are all dubya has left to work with.(This mere fact alone could answer a great many questions that are pondered by a great many people.)
Of course the interaction and ingestion between dubya and the goats did cause the expected result of them sharing certain traits, either directly or morphed into some mutant form. For example: Goats will eat almost anything, dubya will believe almost anything.(thus morphing gluttony and gullibilty) Goats often have that goats in the headlights look, dubya ALWAYS has that deer in the headlights look.Goats butt heads with other goats, Bush butts heads with smart people.
Well, the list could go on for quite some time, and there is still secret research being done at Area 51. Be aware, be alert......the saga never ends.....until it's over.(thanks Yogi)

In an almost unrelated story:

George W. Bush has announced plans for his presidential library to be built after his de-selection.
After being a major leauge baseball team owner, and reading stories of autographed balls on the blunderland story board, George W. was inspired to make the following announcement.
" I have decided that my presidential library shall have a ball room, to display autographed balls. Since nobody's got a bigger set of balls than me, I have decided that only MY balls will be on public display in the ball room. I have arranged to autograph them and have them surgically removed shortly before the grand opening of the library".

----The Story Board Staff would like to thank the staff of "Confused Gnus and Views" and "Ingestigative" goat reporter Faux Irv for contributions to this report----

Film at 11:00........sound at 11:15.

<FONT size="1">(edited because I spell like Bush speaks)</FONT s>

<center><FONT COLOR="#000080">--- Edited 4 times, lastly by Larry on Aug 09, 2004 ---</FONT></center>

agnes had been out of town for a few days...way out. she had gone up the high mountain somewhere and now that she was back, was wondering if she might be under the influence of mushroom misidentification, but the longer she observed, the more she was convinced that it was just as she'd always remembered it to be, only more of it! "if that's the case," she mused, "maybe i should go out of town more often!"
anyways, in a desire to understand more about the connection between babe ruth baseballs, pet goats (and now, great apes as it turns out due to late posting), a renegade reporter, and being trapped like a croc' in a runaway elevator, agnes turned to fellow blunderite sue, who seemed to have detailed files on various things retrievable in an instant, all stashed away in the back of her mind somewhere. soon it would all be clear to agnes what her fellow adventurers were doing, and watched as sue turned to her and with a pointed straight face announced, "i have no idea what you're talking about."
agnes decided sue was holding out on her and wasn't budging.
just then, larry was heard to have said, "what's that sound?"
"what sound?" came the general response.
"that ticking sound, it's coming from over there!"
everyone's attention turned to over there.
"the ticking is coming from his ass!" larry purported.
agnes covered her eyes and shouted, "scotchy! can you disarm it?!"
scotchy responds, "it's not it's arms ya have ta warry about!"
"well then, can you dis-ass it?!"
just then...


edited to say: larry, thanks for covering some of the questions before i even had a chance to ask them!

<center><FONT COLOR="#000080">--- Edited 3 times, lastly by agnes on Aug 09, 2004 ---</FONT></center>

While Agnes & company dealt with the ticking croc, Joe pulled into his driveway after making another milk run. He got out of the van and noticed a baseball lying next to the curb.

It was a Bill Mazeroski autographed ball! It couldn't be mine, thought Joe, but he brought it into his house to add to his collection.

He got to his locking butler bookcase where his autographed baseballs are kept. The Maz ball was missing! It was Joe's all along!

He searched the bookcase and there he saw the Babe Ruth ball! He quickly figured out what had happened. How could I make such a mistake? he thought. Well, the same way Arlo could mount the midget horse Mickey instead of Ramblin' Jack's regular-sized horse. At least Maz and the Babe's autographs both started with "B." What was Arlo's excuse?

Then he realized his friends were probably chasing Marco and company just to retrieve a Sammy Khalifa autographed baseball. A prefectly worthless baseball. It had no power to save the world, and wouldn't even bring a quarter at a baseball card show.

To be continued....

...Or something like that...

Arlo, levi and Louise were still searchin' for the limo with little success. Louise was tired so she let Levi take control of the chopper. She was relaxing, tossing the base ball back and forth when Arlo turned to see a ALL HELL'S DONE BROKE LOOSE look on her face! "Arlo this is not even the Mazeroski ball!!! What in Heck is goin' on with you!!!
I guess the effects of reading "My Pet Goat" haven't worn off yet.

Levi flipped on the radio for some music to calm everyone down, and would you believe it!!!, Alice's Resturant was playin'!!!

Of coure everyone started hummin' along, then Louise noticed Arlo turning pale and clutching his belly. "Whats wrong Arlo, are you air sick??!!!" she cried!! "Turn it offff!!!" choked Arlo.
Levi switched it off.

Arlo recovered and explained.. "Remember how they taped that guy's eyes open in "A Clockwork Orange?"(L & L nodded their heads)"Well they did that to me at the Whitehouse except they made me watch Alices Resturant without sound and taped my ears open and played Alices over and over and over... now when I hear it I get violently ill!!!

Tears came to Louise's eyes, "This is a Disaster!!Next year is the 40th anniversary of Alice's and Arlo can't bear to hear it!!"

"Listen Arlo, we have to reverse the brainwashing! It'll be hard but I think if we put you into a dark room, tape yor ears open and make you listen to hours of Rush Limbaugh and Wayne Newton we might be able to reverse the effects!!

A frown came over Levi's face, "But I like Wayne" he said( Arlo and Louise just rolled their eyes ). But he redeemed himself when he yelled "I've got it!! W.has artificially raised the terror alert to try to pospone the election till the new year. Then when Arlo goes on the 40th tour and can't remember the words to Alice's his fans will be so upset they'll turn Republican and vote for W. instead of Kerry!!!!"

"Gosh you smart Levi!" yelled Arlo, " And I thought you were only good a finding great web sites!!!

Louise smiled knowingly " W. sure has a big surprise comin', we all know that none of Arlo's TRUE fans would ever turn on him just cos' he could never sing Alice's again!! (Except those couple of wankers who made Louise feel rrrreally embarrrresed at the Brisbane concert when they kept yellin' for Arlo to sing Alices. some people just don't get it !) ....

The ticking sound seemed more persistent now. Agnes and friends had grown panicky.

Agnes cried, "One of us is gonna hafta stick our hand up the crocodile's ass, or we're all gonna be goners!"

"Yeah," said Larry nervously, ".....one of us."

Just then, seemingly out of nowhere, a tall, gangly man burst onto the scene and threw his body on top of the crocodile, just in time for the explosion. The tall man was thrown high in the air, hit the branch of a tree with his back, and plummeted back down to earth, landing in the brush. The Blunderites, unharmed from the explosion, rushed to see who would sacrifice his life to save theirs.

They could see his leg twitch and hear his heavy breathing. He was still alive! Larry pulled him out of the brush for all to see. It was John Kerry!

"Mr. Kerry, sir, we---" began Agnes.

"It was nothing," said Kerry, breathing heavily into the light. "Just the type of heroic deed I performed all the time back in my days at Nam."

Meanwhile, back in lovely Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the Gateway to the Northeast, the Blundercopter stayed in a furious chase behind Marco's speeding limo. The driver struggled to stay with the oddly curving, narrow streets of the city, until finally he took one turn too sharp and plowed straight into a large mailbox. Marco and his thugs, who were not wearing seat belts, feeling they were just another intrusion by the liberals into their freedoms, were thrown from the
vehicle and landed hard on the people's front yards, bodies and mail scattered about as though a hurricane had hit. Ever the humanitarians, the Blundercopter slowed down long enough for Levi to climb down and verify that the men had somehow survived and were merely unconscious.

Levi grabbed the Sammy Khalifa ball and the copter sped away. A Pittsburgh policeman arrived on the scene, dutifully wrote each prone man a ticket for violating the state seat belt law, and thrust the tickets into their lapels before leaving. The accident made it to all of the major news stations on TV. Seeing it, Joe thought, that's a hell of a lot of trouble for a Sammy Khalifa ball! The media had identified Marco as a long-time Republican dirty tricks specialist, dating back to the Nixon administration. The viewing public was outraged to see that the Republicans, who were supposed to be "Friends of Postage," had been involved in the senseless destruction of a mailbox.

Joe stepped outside now with the Babe Ruth ball, hoping that his friends would realize that they had a Sammy Khalifa ball. After all, Levi certainly knew baseball well enough to know the difference. Sure enough, the Blundercopter was soon right above him. He tossed the ball high in the air where he saw Arlo glove it neatly. Joe waved as the copter flew away to the Blunderlab.

It was then that Joe noticed that the neighbors had been outside, watching. Joe simply said, "My work is done here" and headed toward his house.

To be continued....

...why not?

Shortly after the accident, Al Franken arrived on the scene to enlighten the onlookers as to what he had learned and to make a statement. " I have been on the trail of this croc bomb for some time now, and I have learned that George W. Bush himself installed that bomb in the croc's ass. I wonder what the republicans who made such a big deal about Clinton, a cigar and an intern would have to say about dubya, a bomb and a croc's ass?"