Authors' Note: Since the summary is a little vague, we will be a little more specific here. This story will be characterized as absurdist literature, very similar to that of the plays The American Dream and The Bald Soprano (hence our odd title). Absurdist literature was not our only inspiration; Link and Luigi's Naruto Primer gave us the idea to write this. Our story contains many short stories of the crazy things that ninja do in their free time, since their leisure time is not shown in the manga or the anime much. By the way, if you were confused as to why I have been writing "we" and "our," it is because I and writing this story with my twin sister. Anyway, I have probably bored you with my note, so go on and read the first chapter! Please review!

Chapter One: Konoha Raffle

"Geez, this raffle is so troublesome," droned Shikamaru in his usual complaining tone when he complains about troublesome things. Most of the Rookie 9 (who, of course, always hang out together, at least according to the Laws of Fanfiction) rolled their eyes and shook their heads in unison because they expected him to say something like that. Naruto folded his arms, closed his eyes, pouted his lips, nodded his head, and mumbled as he usually does to show his agreement or when he does not understand something and is pretending that he does. Naruto, on the other hand, was not upset about the raffle; he was irate that the Luncheon, where all of the Konoha denizens gathered before the raffle begins, did not have ramen. He was almost to the point of suing the whole world, that is until Sakura spoke up.

"Oh, I hope that I win some of the rare perfume, beauty products, or the secret big prize." said Sakura, interlocking her fingers and stretching her arms upward as if coming out of a daze. "I could only get eight tickets, though, because my mother only gave me eight ryou." Sakura rolled her emerald eyes as Inner Sakura screamed obscenities.

"Here!" Lee jumped out of nowhere quite explosively and offered her twelve of his. "If one of my tickets causes you to win, will you go on a date with me?" Lee instantaneously resumed the "nice guy pose" and ecstatically allowed his teeth to gleam so brightly that everyone within the mile radius instinctively put on sunglasses to protect their eyes. Shino observed his surroundings, oblivious to Lee's brilliant reflection of the sun since he is always wears sunglasses.

"Hmmm… it seems that I have become a trendsetter." He thought to himself, which is not redundant for Shino because he can "think" to his millions of bugs, not just himself. He sighed inwardly as his moment of glory ended when Lee ceased his dental glow and everyone removed their sunglasses. Sakura laughed, patted Lee on his shiny head, and told him about how funny he was.

"Anyway," said Ino, "I don't see why the council elders felt it was necessary to place a fifty ticket limit. Who would be so irresponsible as to buy even that many?"

"You forget that our Hokage is Tsunade-sama." began Sakura.

"I will never forget that!" butted in Tenten who was in love with Tsunade, along with other amazing ninja, but nobody paid any attention to her because she was so obscure.

"Well, she bought fifty, grudgingly, even though she was planning to buy more."

Meanwhile, Kakashi was standing by the raffle table waiting to purchase some tickets of his own. Another man, who was nowhere near as cool as Kakashi, approached the kiosk.

"I would like to buy ten-"

"NOOOOOOOO!" Kakashi tackled the poor, lame, un-ninja and pinned him painfully to the ground. "You will buy six because I need the seventh, and then you may purchase the remaining four." The Godaime sighed, as she put her head down on the table.

"Kakashi-kun, this is the third time that you've attacked somebody over raffle tickets. What are you thinking?" Kakashi straightened up, leaving the trembling man in a fetal position.

"Don't worry; this will be the last time today," explained Kakashi, trying to regain his composure as well as his dignity. "You see, I only need three specific tickets because I only wish to have three specific items: the large standard weapons set, the advanced weapon repair kit, and, uh, you know, that book." Kakashi nodded his head towards the newest installment of his favorite series. "I've done a survey of all of the people in Konohagakure to determine how many tickets will be sold and my odds of winning, and at the last raffle, using my Sharingan, I not only wasted my chakra, but I also memorized your ticket-shaking pattern. Then, I calculated and figured out the exact tickets I will need to win those prizes after discovering the order in which you will present them." Kakashi had an air of satisfaction after explaining his ingenious plan. After a moment of silence, Tsunade finally spoke up.

"You're off your rocker."

"Alright! We will now commence the Second Semi-Annual Konoha Raffle! As you all probably know, I started this tradition mainly because I wanted to win something and the closest thing this hidden city has to gambling is the arcade." She put on a feigned smile after being reminded that she had been deprived of her greatest love. "Oh, well, its other purpose is to raise money for the town, of course." The Godaime coughed three times, and the audience seemed to find this as a convenient moment to cough too. "So, let's begin!" She excitedly grabbed a bottle of sake, and rummaged through the glass bowl, hoping to grab one of her fifty tickets. "Dammit! I didn't get it! Arrghh, it goes to whoever has number 741." Lee jumped up ecstatically before realizing what the prize was.

"Oh no! I am not old enough to drink sake!"

"Lee, just take the bottle of sake." Sasuke said, rolling his eyes. Lee jogged up to the podium, accepted the prize he is not legally allowed to possess, and made his way back to his seat. Kakashi nodded his head knowingly, for he had predicted that ticket number 741 would get the sake. Tsunade held out the next prize: a coupon for a free meal at Ichiraku Ramen. Even though Naruto was the farthest from the podium and could not see what the Hokage was holding, his ramen senses tingled, and he just knew that the prize involved ramen. Yes, he thought, this prize is mine for sure!

"The winner of the free meal at Ichiraku Ramen is…" Tsunade elegantly dipped her hand into the raffle ticket bowl as Naruto (and other members of the crowd, I'm sure) waited with baited breath, "…hold on, let me check. No! Dammit! I didn't win again!" Tsunade snapped her fingers in frustration. There was a long pause were nobody said anything. Naruto almost suffocated from having his breath baited. Luckily for Naruto, Sakura noticed that his face was red from lack of oxygen, and she raised her hand.

"Hokage-sama! What was the ticket number?"

"Oh, right. The number is 589." Naruto quickly scrutinized his tickets, searching for 589. Crap! I only have up to 588! Who was behind me in line? The blond boy soon heard a loud "YAHOO!" and he instantly remembered. That's right, it was Kiba. The citizens of Konoha watched as Kiba ran up to the podium, with Akamaru running figure eights between his legs.

"Stop it, Akamaru. You know I always trip over you when you do that." Kiba scolded, but as if it was like magic, or it could have actually been Akamaru's fault, Kiba tripped. He got back to his feet quickly and accepted his prize. Before returning to his seat, however, Kiba slipped the Hokage fifteen ryou and softly told her "This is to make sure that I win the iPod, okay?" As he ran back to his seat, Tsunade smiled to herself. Heh, heh, this is a raffle. I can't guarantee something like that. Oh well, I am fifteen ryou richer.

"Yes! Some more sake!" exclaimed Tsunade as she eagerly grabbed the next bottle. Parents everywhere instantly covered their children's ears before she saw the number. "Shit! It's 356!" Lee jumped up excitedly again holding up a ticket that his beloved sensei had given him.

"Oh darn! It's more alcohol!" he exclaimed pitifully as he received his second bottle. Then Kakashi stood up and made his way towards Tsunade as she announced that the next prize was the large standard weapons set

"OH! I MUST HAVE THIS!" screamed Tenten quite loudly. Because it annoyed Neji, he gentle-fisted her to make her unconscious so that she'd shut up. It didn't matter, because she wasn't going to win anyway. After some more expletives, Tsunade announced the winning number. She looked to her side to find Kakashi already there and holding out his ticket, which bore the same number.

"Maybe I'm not quite off my rocker just yet." he told her smugly as he accepted the spoils. The Godaime finally spoke when the shock wore off.

"Why are you still up here?" She asked him. He handed her another ticket.

"It's because I have won the next prize as well." He said, pointing to the next Icha Icha book. The Hokage straightened up.

"Well, we shall see." She said after taking a look at his number and shaking up the bowl. She extracted a ticket, and her face fell. "It's yours." She said, handing the ninja genius his beloved book.
"I know, and don't worry; the shock will wear off soon." He reassured her. As he walked back to his seat, Maito Gai jumped out from underneath a rug.

"Congratulations, my eternal rival," exclaimed Gai in a loud and obnoxious manner, "but I will definitely get the big prize and ultimately defeat you!" Kakashi looked up from his new book.

"Huh? Did you say something?" said Kakashi automatically. Gai had a severe heart attack seconds later. Heh, works every time. Medic nins immediately came to his aid, and Gai gave them his will, which left his raffle tickets to Lee, but mentioned nothing else.

"Oh Gai-sensei!" sobbed Lee as waterfalls of tears gushed from his abnormally round eyes. Tsunade, on the other hand, ignored all of the aforementioned events, and continued on with the raffle. Iruka happened to win some coupons for the grocery store.

"Oh boy!" he shouted as he ran up to the stage. Unfortunately, he tripped and fell to his death before making it.

"Oh bother." said the Authors rather uninterestedly. "We'll just revive him later."

"Wow, we're doing well this year," Izumo informed his good friend Kotetsu, "including the luncheon, it's already been an hour and we've only had three casualties." Tsunade announced another number which, to her great disappointment, went to Ibiki. She gingerly picked up the next prize, which she recognized to be the third one that Kakashi predicted that he would win.

"The winner of the advanced weapon repair kit is…" Tsunade sighed as she hastily plunged her hand into the bowl. At the sound of the word "weapon," Tenten's unconscious state was reversed as she rose to her feet and shouted, "I MUST HAVE THIS PR-" Neji instantly clamped his hand on her mouth. Before Tsunade could read aloud the winning number, Kakashi was already at her side, his hand extended. The Hokage rolled her brown eyes and shoved the kit into Kakashi's chest. When Tenten saw this, she suffered a panic attack, and she almost became another casualty again, if she wasn't so easy to revive. Tsunade quickly went through the rest of the prizes so that she could get to the main prize, which is yet to be revealed. During this flurry of prize winning, Lee had won the two remaining bottles of sake ("But I am only thirteen, and I still get all of the sake?"), Ino won a coupon to Yamanaka flowers ("Do I honestly need this?"), Asuma won a pack of nicotine patches ("That almost seemed rigged, considering that I didn't buy any tickets"), Hinata won the iPod (even though Kiba "rigged" it), other random villagers got the remaining prizes, and Tsunade got none.

"Okay," she coxed herself silently, "all I have to do is make sure that the there are only my tickets left when I reach the big prize. Hm, what I could do is give away a bunch of meaningless crap until all other tickets are gone." The Godaime resumed speaking into the microphone. "Here we go! The next prize is…um…this napkin. Yes, this unused, clean napkin, and the winner is 588!"

"Are you kidding me!" said Naruto as he stood up. "I finally win something and it's a napkin!"

"Naruto, be grateful that you actually won something." Sakura rebuked him.

"Yeah," said Tenten, "I haven't won anything yet. I bet it's because I don't have a family name."

"I haven't won either," added Neji as Naruto won the following prize, a chair, "and I bet it's because I am part of the Hyuuga Branch House. You see that Hinata won an iPod, even though Kiba had tipped Tsunade. That is my reasoning." Tsunade then proceeded to search for another booby prize.

"Next we have a nice piece of lace. The winner is number 611!"

"OMIGOD!" shouted Neji, "I WON! TAKE THAT, DESTINY! Ooooo! And it matches my outfit too! I shall put it in my hair." Once Neji collected his destiny-shattering prize, Tsunade continued to dish out more worthless crap, ranging from toothpicks to used wineglasses, all of which were won by Naruto. Except for the used wineglass, Lee won that.

"And finally, we move on to the big, surprise gift! Kotetsu, Izumo, if you will please bring it out." Tsunade gestured to the two Chuunins, who appeared to be the slaves of the Hokage at several points in the series. As being such, they obliged, and they rolled out a huge, wooden horse. The crowd gasped.

"Yes, this is THE Trojan Horse. It came straight from Troy."

"Troy, isn't that located in the Wind Country?" mused one random person.

"Of course, and one person will be the lucky winner of this bad boy!" she exclaimed as she patted its wooden leg. Alright, she thought, there is little chance that I will lose this one. There are only fifty-two tickets, fifty of which are mine. What are the odds that I will lose? Tsunade gave the ticket bowl three good shakes, and she pulled out the winning ticket.

"Dammit! Are you kidding me? How could it possibly be number 834?"

"Oh, how troublesome, it seems that I have won, even though I only bought one ticket." said Shikamaru in his usual, lazy tone. "Ino, I don't want to have to walk up there. Can you carry me?"

"No!" Ino rebutted him rudely. I mean, was he really asking for that much? Shikamaru rolled his eyes.

"Aw, and I kinda wanted it too. Oh well." sighed Shikamaru, not moving an inch. Tsunade looked at the crowd of Konahaians (citizens of Konoha, of course), and she noticed that no one had moved forward to collect the prize. Hee hee, what luck! I get another chance to win! Now the chances are fifty to one, so I can't possibly lose this time! However, her optimistic mood dropped when she looked at the second ticket she selected.

"Im-impossible! Number 545 won?" Everyone looked around, trying to find the winner. Oddly enough, the winner was Shino, and he also purchased only one ticket.

"Wow," he said in his usual monotone, "how lucky am I." Shino slowly walked up to the podium, basking in the glory. He accepted the Trojan Horse from the extremely sulky Godaime, and he made his way back to his seat, with Kotetsu and Izumo pulling the horse behind him.

"Wow, it is so huge!" enthused Kiba. "Where are you going to put it, Shino?" Shino thought about it for a moment before replying almost happily (but not quite).

"I think I shall put it next to my bed, so I can wake up and see it every morning."