Ludwig's Xmas Inventions
It was the 20th of December and Ludwig van Koopa was tightening the screws on his latest invention "These inventions are fantastic!" He said to himself, "With them, people won't have to worry about all the fusses of Christmas, so they'll just be able to enjoy the holidays!"
"Yeah right!" Came a loud voice from behind him, Ludwig span around quickly to see his older brother Roy holding an advent calendar.
"Roy! What have I told you about not coming in my room?" he snapped.
"I think the more important question is whether I CARE about what you've told me about not coming in your room, which I don't." Roy pointed about, making Ludwig glare at him, "Anyway, I bet none of those inventions can make these dumb advent calendars any less stupid. This Wednesday's one said it was Christmas Eve!" he said, showing Ludwig the calendar.
Ludwig took the calendar with interest, only to realise that Roy had been opening the doors from left to right in order of placement, instead of looking at the numbers. What Roy had thought was the 17th door was actually the 24th. He decided not to tell Roy this and instead said, "Well, I've actually been devising a computer program that will help you open the right door, regardless of the stupid placement. This is a draft copy I formed." He showed Roy a piece of paper.
ADVENT ALGORITHM
1: Query: Is date of December between the 1st and the 24th (inclusive)? If yes got to 2. If no tell user to end program.
2: Scan calendar for lowest numbered, unopened door.
3: Query: Is date of December Greater than or equal to number of lowest numbered unopened door? If yes go to 4. If no go to 5.
4: Tell user to open lowest numbered unopened door, then go to 2.
5: Query user: Have you eaten today's chocolate? If yes tell user to end program. If no tell user to seek out the last person with access to the calendar and beat them up. Then tell user to end program.
"Hey, what's this about beating up the last person who had the calendar?" Roy asked.
"Huh? Oh, well that's if you haven't eaten the chocolate for that day but it's miss…"
"Hey! I haven't eaten today's chocolate!" Roy realised, "And YOU were the last person who had the calendar!" he said, pointing at Ludwig.
Ludwig realised what Roy was thinking, "No… Wait! That's only if the chocolate… AHH!" He yelped as Roy thumped him in the stomach.
After thumping his brother a few more times, Roy stopped and said, "That'll teach you not to…wait, why WAS I beating you up?"
"The idea was that you only beat someone up if today's chocolate is MISSING! Not if you just haven't had time to open it!" Ludwig groaned from the floor.
"Oh! Now that makes much more sense!" Roy said, "Sorry 'bout that, I'll get out of your room now."
Ludwig growled as the idiot stomped apologetically out the door.
After a few minutes of lying on the floor and breathing heavily, Ludwig finally managed to get up.
"Ow… Stupid Roy!" He muttered, "Still, I can't let this stop me from trying out my new inventions… Now who can I find to test them with?"
Ludwig decided to walk around the castle to see if he could find anyone who could benefit from the use of his new inventions, and was quite pleased when he noticed Morton attempting to string up some lights outside his bedroom.
"You're doing your decorating rather late Morton." Ludwig commented.
"Urg! I HATE decorating my room, I can never get anything high enough because we don't have any decent ladders and if I put it lower down it looks really stupid and Roy and Larry come in and mess everything up like they always do. Have you noticed that? You spend ages and ages and ages doing something and then they like nothing better than messing it all up just to annoy you… Well I guess you HAVE noticed that, what with all the inventions you spend ages working that Larry and Roy smash up or break 'accidentally on purpose' and…"
"Speaking of inventions, I think I've made just the thing that you could use!" Ludwig said quickly, before Morton could REALLY start blabbering. "It's a robot that'll put up your Christmas decorations for you, I'll just go get it."
Morton watched with interest as Ludwig ran into his room, said something like "Follow me." And came back out, being followed by a large robot with very long and thin arms (Which it had four of) and legs. "It voice activated, so all you have to do is tell it what you want it to do. For instance: String those lights up just below the ceiling!" Ludwig commanded, pointing at the light's Morton had and the part of the wall he had been trying to work on.
The robot politely took the light from Morton and strung them up high above the door, as well as drilling hooks into the wall for them to rest on.
"That's cool!" Morton said, "Now could you come in here and help with this spray on snow… I wanted to spray it in patterns around on the window but they just looked messy… I'm not very artistic minded, Ludwig says it's probably because I'm right handed, so anyway I'll need you to clean up the mess I made earlier and then spray some decent patterns on the window…"
"Err… Morton, it's not very good at processing too many sentences in a short time… could you stop talking as much so you don't overload him, please?" Ludwig said worriedly, noticing that the robot was starting to made odd clicking noises.
But Morton didn't seem to hear him and carried on as he had before, "… maybe you could make some stencils or something of some cats or dogs in a stocking or something cute like that… then again Roy and Larry would probably make fun of me if I had cute stuff on the window so maybe you could make them killer cats or dogs, or maybe even tigers and wolves! That's be cool…"
"Err… MORTON! I really think it would be a good time to stop talking now…" Ludwig said, Smoke was now coming out of the robot's voice recognition modules, "If Morton doesn't shut up soon it's gonna explode!" Ludwig realised.
"Then again I've never like tigers, and they're not that Christmassy… maybe you could just do some snowflake or snowmen, OR you could make them look like snow Koopa Kids…"
"MORTON SHUT UP!!!" Ludwig screamed.
Morton gaped at him silently, and the robot looked as though it was making less smoke, "Thank goodness for that…" Ludwig thought, relieved.
"So, what's with you? Isn't a guy allowed to talk anymore, I mean here I am having a friendly conversation and you…"
BANG!
The robot exploded, sending parts flying all over the place and covering the two Koopa Kids with black soot.
"I was TRYING to stop THAT from happening." Ludwig said, glaring at his younger brother.
"Ooooh!" Morton said. "Oh well, I guess I can always ask the Koopa Bros to help me out, y'know Yellow's pretty good at art and they could probably reach up pretty high when they all climb on top of each other…"
Ludwig growled as he walked out and left Morton talking to himself. "Great! It's going to take AGES to re-make that! Still I can still try out my other inventions…" He thought.
Ludwig was walking about the castle, mostly to get away from Morton but partly because he was trying to find some more people to try his inventions out on, when the twins Iggy and Lemmy approached him.
"Hey Ludwig did you blow up something…" Iggy started,
"…without telling us you were gonna do it?" Finished Lemmy.
"It wasn't intentional, and anyway it was Morton's fault it blew up." Ludwig told them.
"That's a shame, watching it would have made…" Started Lemmy,
"…a nice break from wrapping Christmas presents!" Finished Iggy. At this statement Ludwig's eyes lit up.
"You two don't want to have to wrap your Christmas presents?" he queried.
"No, he keeps insisting that it's his turn to use the scissors and mine to use the tape." The twins both said, pointing at the other.
"How would you like not to have to wrap any of your presents at all?" Ludwig asked. "Because I happen to have made a machine that will do it for you."
"Really? That would…" Iggy started,
"…be really cool!" Lemmy finished.
"Then follow me!" Ludwig said, walking back to his lab.
"This is the automated Christmas present wrapper!" Ludwig said, showing them a large machine with a conveyer belt running through it.
"How does it work?" Iggy asked.
"Why don't you have a good look and see?" Lemmy answered quietly, before shoving his brother in the machine and turning it on.
"Well, first you put the present on the conveyer belt and switch it on." Ludwig started, oblivious to the fact that Lemmy had just done this. "Then the machine will scan it with laser beams to see what size it is."
"Ahh! My eyes!" Came the muffled voice of Iggy from inside the machine, "I'm blinded!"
"Then the machine will push and the fold the present into the smallest shape possible to save on wrapping paper." Ludwig continued, not noticing the sound of Iggy yelling about his spine, or the fact that Lemmy had gone quite pale.
"It will then give the present a negative electric charge…"
"AHH! My hair's all staticy!" Complained Iggy.
"…and then unleash the positively charged wrapping paper which will stick to the present."
"What the fmmhmph… Fm!" Iggy curses were muffled, probably by wrapping paper.
"And then the machine will tightly tie a bow around the present." Ludwig said, "Of course if you want to give somebody a pet as a present, you have to switch the machine to organic mode using the switch." He added.
Lemmy quickly pulled the switch from 'inorganic' to 'organic'. This caused the machine to make loud clunking noises and stop completely.
"Of course, you can't do that while the machine is running because it will cause the gears to become stuck and the whole thing will blow up." Ludwig said, just before the machine exploded and sent Ludwig and Lemmy hurtling into different corners of the lab.
"Umm… Like that, you mean?" Asked Lemmy innocently once he had recovered from the blast.
Ludwig pushed some debris from the explosion off of himself, it turned out to be a partially wrapped up Iggy. Annoyed, Ludwig ripped the charred wrapping paper off of his brother before picking both of the twins up and throwing them out of his lab.
Minutes later, while Ludwig was trying to clean up the mess and salvage any working parts of the machine from the wreckage somebody knocked on the door, and then entered before waiting for a reply.
It was Wendy, "Will you stop causing explosions? I can't concentrate with you blowing things up every five minutes!" She complained.
"What would you be doing that could possibly require concentration?" Ludwig snapped back, annoyed at the prospect of having to re-build two machines.
"I'm trying to decide what I should dress up as for Christmas." Wendy replied, failing to notice the sarcasm in Ludwig's voice, "I can't decide between a Christmas fairy or the snow queen."
"The snow queen suits your character more." Ludwig said, knowing that Wendy had never read the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe and that he would get away with this nasty comment.
"I don't want something that will suit my character, I want something that will enhance my natural beauty!" Wendy said, "If you're so smart why don't you make something that will help me decide!" She snickered.
"Actually I already have." Ludwig replied.
"Huh? Why?" Wendy asked, suspiciously.
"Because you asked me to make something like that when you couldn't decide what to wear for Halloween." Ludwig replied. "It's over here…" he walked towards the back of the lab and showed Wendy something that looked like a large phone booth. "It scans your face and body and then gives you a list of potential costume ideas that would suit your figure." He explained.
"Oh Goody!" Wendy exclaimed, before jumping into the cubicle, "Switch it on!" She demanded.
"OK." Ludwig said and pushed a few buttons. About half a minute later the machine produced a list:
Potential Costume Ideas:
Goblin
Evil Witch
Evil Gnome
Miniature Troll
Old Hag
"Um… The snow queen is closest to what's on this list." Said Ludwig, being economical with the truth.
"Well, can I have a look at the list then?" Wendy asked.
"Umm… No." Ludwig replied lamely, hiding the list behind his back.
"What? Oh come on! I wanna see the list!" Wendy snapped. "Why can't I see it?" She whined.
"Because the machine is faulty…" Ludwig lied, "It's come up with some really, REALLY stupid suggestions."
"Well, let me see them!" Wendy snapped, "It's not fair if you get to see them and I don't!"
"But they're nonsense!" Ludwig said, in vain.
"WAAAHHH! IT'S NOT FAIR I WANNA SEE THE LIST I WANNA SEE THE LIST I WANNA SEE THE LIIIIIIIISSSSSSTTTT!" Wendy screamed.
"Alright, you can read the flipping list!" Ludwig snapped, throwing at her, "Just remember that it's faulty!" he said.
Wendy read the list. She then read it again. "You think I look like a goblin?" She snapped at Ludwig.
"No! Like I said the machine faulty…" Ludwig lied.
"Quit lying! You think I'm ugly! I'm telling Dad!" Wendy snapped, "DAD DAAAD! LUDWIG CALLED ME UGLY!" She screamed as she ran out of the room.
"Oh great! Just what I need!" Ludwig thought sarcastically.
Inevitably… A few minutes later, King Bowser came stomping into the room. "Your sister's complaining about you, so if she's asks I'm punishing you by stopping you from inventing any more stuff for a week!" he said.
"Ok." Ludwig said, trying to repair the decorating robots voice recognisers, it was a common deal that Bowser made with his sons that they had to pretend that they'd been punished when they hadn't.
"Now I'm just gonna sit in here and have a look around so Wendy thinks I've been yelling at you."
"Be my guest, there's some biscuits in the tin next to you if you want one." Ludwig said.
Bowser looked in the tin, only to find that it was full of double chocolate chip cookies shaped like Christmas trees. He took one and tried it gingerly, only to find it was surprisingly good. "MMM… Since when did YOU make biscuits?" He asked.
"Oh, I didn't. I was testing out a new invention; it's a robotic peach that can cook Christmas dinners. I programmed it with all the cooking expertise of Jamie Oliver, Nigella Lawson and princess Peach.
"Why Peach?" Bowser asked.
"Well, she's the best baker we've ever used the mind probe on and Christmas cakes aren't exactly your speciality, if you know what I mean." Ludwig chuckled. The Koopa Kids often told each other horror stories about "Dad's Christmas cake." The scariest one had been Larry's insistence that Bowser used fruit grown in past nuclear dumping grounds and that eating too much would cause you too mutate into a normal person who liked plumbing.
"I don't know what you mean, actually." Bowser said tartly.
"Well, I mean they not very nice…" Ludwig explained.
"WHAT! WHAT DO YOU MEAN MY CHRISTMAS CAKES AREN'T NICE!?!" Bowser yelled.
"Well, I mean… Evil villains aren't usually that good at baking…" Ludwig tried to explain.
"Oh, so the fact that I'm an 'evil villain' means I can't be a good father?" Bowser snapped.
"Of course I don't mean that… I was just saying…" Ludwig said.
"Well, I think I'll just say that because of that you can have a double portion of my Christmas cake… RIGHT NOW!" Bowser snapped, before dragging Ludwig out of the room by the scruff of his neck. "And you really ARE banned from inventing any more things this week!" He added.
Later that evening, Larry found Ludwig vomiting into one of the castle toilets. "Gee little bro… You look TERRIBLE!" He commented. "Have a bad day today."
"Ugh… that's an understatement…" Ludwig said, "I got beaten up by Roy of no reason, two of my newest inventions were blown up, I sent Wendy into one of her temper tantrums and the Dad made me eat two slices of his Christmas cake and banned me from inventing stuff for a WEEK!" he moaned, "All because I tried to make some stuff that would make Christmas more convenient!" He added.
Larry gave him an odd look, "Why did you do that?" He asked.
"Well, so people wouldn't have to put up with all the fuss and bother of Christmas and they would just be able to enjoy the festivities…" Ludwig answered.
"Put 90% of the festivities of Christmas IS the fuss and bother!" Larry exclaimed, "Seeing everybody else get major stress if half the fun!"
"What about goodwill, cheer and peace?" Ludwig pointed out.
"Dude, you're not turning good on us our you?" Larry asked worriedly.
"Of course not!" Ludwig snapped.
"Then why should you care about goodwill and that other stuff? Hell I don't think many GOOD people care about that stuff that much." Larry said, "Christmas is about getting presents and seeing your family… preferably stressed out. It just adds to the fun!"
Ludwig though about this, "I suppose listening to Roy complain about his advent calendar every year is pretty funny." He said.
"See? If Christmas was really convenient then it wouldn't be any fun, because you'd know that no one was really that bothered about it. At least this way we know that Dad TRIES to make a nice cake for us, even if it does taste awful!"
"Your right!" Ludwig said. "Which is weird…"
"Very funny" Larry commented, "Anyway, I'll enjoy being right for once, and you have an Inconvenient Christmas!
"And an Inefficient New year!" Ludwig joked.
Author's Notes: These are NOT my whole views on Christmas; they're just the bits that I think the Koopa Kids would agree with. I'm also sorry if I offended anybody with the bit where Larry says he doesn't think many good people care about good will, again that is not my view, just what I think Larry would think.