Lord of the Clings: the Tale of the Queen of Saran Wrap

By: Who Else but the Narrator

Once upon a time, in a beautiful land called the Mire in Bottom Earth, there lived a somewhat short person named Lindo Bakkins, who had a somewhat short grandmother, Milda Bakkins. Lindo owned a somewhat short dog that was strangely intelligent enough to converse, and yet extremely stupid. He mostly talked about bacon-flavored kibble. He was called Taffy.

Lindo lived in a similarly short hill, which she called Bake End. It had a square purple door and lots of chandeliers so taller people would frequently bang their heads on them.

It was going to be Milda's 90th birthday soon, so Lindo bought her a large bottle of scotch and wrapped it up in shiny purple paper.

Taffy came up to Lindo. "I wanna eat kibble."

"Good for you. Go away now; I need to think."

"About what?"

"Stuff."

Disgusted, Taffy trotted off.

Ding-dong. The doorbell's annoying ring rang.

Lindo went to answer it. "Yeah?"

A rather much taller person was swatting at grasshoppers that kept coming off the roof. "Go away! Leave me alone!" She squished one with her long staff.

Lindo, obeying the command, shut the door.

"No, not you," the visiting person shouted in desperation.

Lindo opened the door again. "Be more specific."

The person shrugged. "I was referring to the grasshoppers."

"Oh, well. C'mon in, Jandalf."

She ducked low to get into the door. "What's with you guys' decor?"

"To keep unwanted verticals out." Lindo and the other Bakkins referred to tall people as verticals.

"Wow, thanks."

"So, why'd you drop in?"

Jandalf shrugged. "Stuff."

"And?"

"Mission."

"About what?"

"We have to sit down first. And make death crispies of DOOM. Otherwise, I'm not talking."

"Fine by me. I've got some left from yesterday anyways."

"OK."

So the two friends sat, talked vaguely for a while, and ate chocolaty chocolaty death crispies of Otherwise, DOOM. Then, unfortunately, Jandalf had to get a bit serious. Well, kind of serious, anyway.

"Guess what, Lindo."

"What?"

"That's what."

"Shut up."

"OK."

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

"You know," said Lindo, "I didn't mean THAT way."

"Ah. You should have been-"

"More specific. Get on with it."

"OK. Where was I?"

"AHEM."

"Right. So, what I was going to say was, your grandmother has something in her possession that belongs to the dark lord Sore-on-my-head."

"What is it?"

"A Sony remote control."

"Huh? Why's this important?"

"Well, one day, Sore-on-my-head was flipping channels randomly when elves bombarded his home theatre, duct-taped him to the wall, and took his remote control because their cable had been cut off. What they hoped to accomplish by this, I'll never know." She sighed. "Minions of Xendor. But anyway, Sore-on-my-head was left taped to the wall, with the TV eternally stuck on WTN."

Lindo shuddered. "Poor guy."

"That's not the point. So, somehow the elves lost the remote and a Mexican mama found it in the Forest of Crazy Doom. Then, Milda, your grandma, ambushed the Mexican mama because she had run out of scotch while in the vicinity. Finding none, she took a bottle of Pepsi, four boxes of chocolates, and the remote, for the heck of it. So, she has no idea who it belongs to, or how important it is to Sore-on-my-head."

"So? What can Sore-on-my-head do? He's duct-taped to the wall."

"Well, they guy's got minions, you know."

"But I want minions."

"Yes, but that doesn't matter right now-"

"What has all this got to do with me?"

"Wait, okay?" Jandalf was getting quite ticked off. "By the minions of Xendor. Just shut up and listen."

"Fine. Yeesh."

"Quiche," Jandalf replied.

"Feesh," Lindo shot back.

"Meesh."

"Heesh," Lindo giggled.

"Why are we doing this?"

"Ehh-uhh."

Jandalf sighed. "So, the dude's got minions. They include some of the universe's most hated celebrity figures…"

"Martha Stewart," said Lindo suddenly.

"Yes, she's one of nine. The others are Michael Jackson, Big Bird, Cap'n Crunch, Don Cherry, Jar Jar Binks, Elvis Presley-"

"But he's dead."

"Not anymore."

"Uh-oh."

"The remaining two are the Olson twins."

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGHHHH!!!!!"

Jandalf nodded sympathetically. "My thoughts exactly."

"What do I have to do?"

"You've got to get the remote back to Sore-on-my-head before he decides he's had enough and orders his minions to kill everyone in Bottom Earth. You wouldn't want to be slaughtered by Martha Stewart, would you?"

"I'm going."

The next day was Milda's birthday party. All the people of the Mire had gotten together to bake an enormous gargantuan and very huge birthday cake to fit all 90 candles on.

While Milda attempted to blow out all the candles, Lindo sneaked away to look for the remote.

Milda's house wasn't extremely large, but it was quite messy. Lindo looked desperately around, then…

She saw the remote!

Unfortunately, as she got closer, she saw it was sitting in a half-full (or half-empty) glass of some kind of alcoholic mixture. Milda had been using the remote as a stir-stick for 42 years. The electronic object was encrusted with dried Pepsi.

"Oh, no," groaned Lindo, picturing how the Olson twins would destroy the Mire.

Suddenly she got an idea. "I'll just buy the guy another remote."

So she ran outside to get some cake, give Jandalf the scoop and make a rendezvous for batteries, rent a motorcycle, and go off to the nearest Radioshack as soon as she had given her grandmother the scotch.

When she got there, no one was to be seen in the store except for a lone clerk, sitting by the counter and watching a Star Wars DVD for the 152763rd time. The clerk even had the volume turned off, and was talking for the characters. And inanimate objects…

"Hyyyeeeeeeee. Stoopid hedds in mye hedd, givin' mee a mygrane."

Lindo walked up to the extremely bored employee, who saw Lindo, gasped, and jumped up, so her chair went flying across the room. "A CUSTOMER!!! I'M SAVED!!!!! WAHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! How may I help you?" she asked enthusiastically.

"Uhh…" Lindo scratched her head. "I need a programmable Sony remote."

The clerk grinned. "Oh, we've got lots and lots and lots and lots…"

"So, can I have one?"

"Sure!" The clerk piled hundreds on the counter.

Lindo picked one out of the pile and took out her card.

The clerk got the ringer-in-thingie ready. "I haven't seen a customer in sooooo long."

"I gathered that," Lindo commented, then went on to a subject completely off-topic. "Times just aren't what they used to be."

"You're telling me," the clerk agreed. "I used to be royalty. Ruled over the Land of the Crazy Doomed People. You know, where the Forest of Crazy Doom is. Then, some Mexican mama went on a rampage cuz her remote or something was missing, and ruined my castle. So I've gotta work here until I have enough money to rebuild my castle."

"How did one Mexican mama wreck a castle?"

"Well…we didn't have much of a budget…actually, it was cardboard."

"All of it?"

"Um, yeah. Oh, and some Styrofoam, and saran wrap for the windows."

"Uh-huh. I'd suggest something harder next time, like mud."

The clerk brightened up. "That's a great idea! But what if it rains?"

Lindo shrugged. "I didn't say it was foolproof."

"Yeah."

They stood in silence while the ringer-in-thingie connected.

"Okay," Lindo took the remote, "bye."

"Bye," said the clerk, rather mournfully.

Lindo had just gotten on her motorcycle outside when the clerk ran up. "Wait!!!!"

"What?"

"You forgot your receipt."

"Oh."

The clerk handed the receipt to Lindo, and began walking back in.

Lindo started up the motorcycle.

"Wait!!!!!!!!!!" the clerk yelled again, turning around.

"What?"

"Can I come with you?"

"Well…I guess."

"Yessss!!!!" she exclaimed, ripping off her nametag and hopping on behind Lindo, who was at the moment thinking, This is gonna be a long trip.

"So," said the clerk while they were on the highway, "what's your name?"

"Lindo Bakkins."

"I'm Chelsegorn."

"Uh-huh."

"I've never been on a motorcycle before," Chelsegorn said excitedly.

"Uh-huh."

"Hey, what's that over there?"

"Ehh-uhh," Lindo shrugged unenthusiastically.

"You sure are short."

This time, Lindo didn't even grunt, but kept on driving, trying to block out Chelsegorn's incessant questions.