Peter Parker, a teenage orphan living in Forest Hills, Queens with his Uncle Ben and Aunt May has been arrested by the NYPD after allegedly squirting a “viscous-like fluid all over the street.”

Dubbed “The Forest Hills Jacker” Mr. Parker was perp-walked through press to the station house for booking.

“Look, I don’t want to speculate as to what the substance might be” said the arresting officer, Detective Patrick O’Reilly.  “But he’s got to stop that.  It’s a nuisance. That stuff clogs the streets causing accidents.  Someone might get hit in the eyes and get an infection.  He’s……look, I know he’s a teenager.  But just stop it you know.”

Another officer on the scene was less charitable.

“He’s masturbating.  That’s the only explanation.  Either that or he’s been bitten by a radioactive spider.  But I think it’s masturbation.  The kid’s got to stop doing that.”

Parker was released into custody of his mortified Aunt.

“I’m so embarrassed.  They tell me it’s normal activity for a boy his age but still.” she said.  “Once I heard sounds from his room and knocked on it.  I was concerned that maybe he’d been bitten by a radioactive spider.  He said ‘Don’t come in.  I’m not masturbating!’ and I saw this sticky fluid leaking under the door.  What’s the bridge club going to think?”

After his release as he was getting into his aunt’s car Mr. Parker was asked if he had any comment for the press.

“Yes.  My name is Peter Parker and I am not masturbating!”

Parker’s Uncle Ben, when reached for comment was sympathetic.

“I’m an old man but I remember what it is like to be a teenager.  So he’s going to do that kind of activity.  Who can blame him?  I mean, have you seen our next door neighbor’s girl? Firm breasts.  Nice butt.  Hell, no wonder Peter’s masturbating.  He’s probably thinking of her.  I’ve been tempted too!”

If convicted of public lewdness Mr. Parker faces a $1000 fine and 30 days in jail.

In related news Peter Parker has changed his Facebook status to “I’m not masturbating!”

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Recently I was honored to sit down with living legend Tony Bennett.  Bennett has recently come under fire for his controversial comments about 9/11.  Naturally this was my first question.

MI:  Mr. Bennett, thank you for meeting with me.  I have been a fan of yours for years.

Tony Bennett:  Thank you.  We are terrorists.

MI:  I need to ask you about that.  You recently made some controversial comments –

Tony Bennett:  About Lady Gaga being the greatest artist of this generation?

MI:  No.  Not that.  It was about – 

Tony Bennett:  The time I strangled Peter Lawford to death on Frank Sinatra’s orders?

MI:  No.  It was – 

Tony Bennett:  Was it about the healing powers of my ball sack?

MI:  No.

Tony Bennett:  Well it’s true.  Go ahead.  Touch it.

MI:  I’ll pass.  What I wanted to ask you about were your controversial comments about 9/11.  You said and I quote, “They flew the plane in, but we caused it because we were bombing them and they told us to stop” and “Who are the terrorists?  Are we the terrorists or are they the terrorists?”

Tony Bennett:  I stand behind my comments.  Who are really the terrorists?

MI:  Well, I would say it’s the people who made your toupee.

Tony Bennett:  This isn’t a toupee.

MI:  Yeah right.

Tony Bennett:  No seriously.  I haven’t bathed in 35 years. It’s actually a couple thousand worms.  I’m a pacifist and I believe all life is sacred.  Even worms.

MI:  Oh.  Ewww.  Anyway back to your comments.  You also state that President Bush told you that he felt he made a mistake by invading Iraq.  

Tony Bennett:  Yes.  President Bush  told me that.  He also told me that he was the second gunman on the grassy knoll in Dallas.

MI:  Okay.  

Tony Bennett:  And he told me that Abraham Lincoln is kept alive in the White House basement.  Apparently they use feeding tubes and blood taken from a virgin during a full moon.

MI:  Right.  I’m going to end this interview now.

Tony Bennett:  Wait you can’t go before I sing for you…….I left my credibility/In San Francisco………

MI:  Mr. Bennett, you’ve built up quite a legacy over the last 60 years and I don’t want you to destroy it totally during this interview.  So I’m going to end it now.  I thank you for meeting with me.

Tony Bennett:  Last chance to touch my ball sack.

MI:  Goodbye.

And so I left Mr. Bennett.  It was a strange and disturbing interview.  I don’t believe anything he told me.  Well, except for Abe Lincoln being kept alive with the blood of virgins.  That makes sense.

(593)

Commander William Riker, second in command of Star Fleet’s flagship the Enterprise, and formerly thought to be a shoo-in for Admiral has failed a routine physical.  The news has placed his career in jeopardy and if Riker cannot pass a follow-up exam he will be forced out of the Fleet.

The news that he had failed the physical did not, sadly, surprise many of his colleagues.  Said Captain Picard:

I’ve been worried about No. 1 for years.  When he first arrived on board the Enterprise he was a thin, fit, energetic officer.  But something changed.  First he grew that damn awful beard which is nonregulation.  I probably should have told him to shave.  I blame myself for that.  But then he started to put on weight.  I mean, lots of weight.  I was concerned and checked his food replicator rations.  It seems he had used up all his and was borrowing rations from Commander Data which, as you know, is a punishable offense.  I went to his quarters to confront him and he was sitting on the floor eating cheesecake.  He wasn’t even using his hands, just eating it off the floor with his mouth.  I suspended him for a week but then he kept people up all night playing his damn trombone.  Or at least I think he was playing the trombone.  I snuck into his quarters when he wasn’t there to investigate (I love mysteries) and it turns out the trombone is where he hid his Devil Dogs and Ring Dings. I told him he had an addiction to food and that he was out of shape.  He responded by burping and finishing his philly cheese steak.  I think it’s high time I had a new No. 1.

A close friend, the android Commander Data tells of a curious incident:

I wanted to experience the human process of eating so I had the food replicator give me some chocolate frosted and sugar frosted donuts.  Commander Riker dropped by my quarters and noticed that I had some sugar on my fingertips.  He grabbed my hand and started sucking on my fingers while moaning.  My hand is detachable and he asked me if he could bring it back to his quarters.  I said yes.  When I asked for my hand back he told me he had covered it in ketchup and eaten it, titanium covering and all.  Most curious.

Lt. Geordi La Forge relates a disturbing incident:

I was in his quarters when my visor picked up a strange image  Will had placed hot dogs down his Star Fleet issued shorts.  I ask him why and he said sometimes he gets cravings for hot dogs and instead of carrying them around all day he just put them down his shorts and pulls them out when hungry.  It was after this that I stopped using my visor.  Some things are not meant to be sensed.

The first test in Riker’s physical was a one mile run.  The athletic director of the test said that

Riker had gone maybe 50 yards when he made a bee-line for the nearest vending machine.  He came back with several bags of potato chips – the green onion variety – a bag of peanut butter cups and a few cans of Pepsi.  He ate all them during the rest of the run and finished by complaining of cramps and vomiting on my shoes. I failed him then and there.

Commander Riker has acknowledged his addiction to food and blames it on his fragile emotional state caused by the break up with Counselor Troi.

Star Fleet has given Riker two months to get in condition for his make-up physical.  Riker for his part promises to surprise his detractors and pass the test with flying colors.

“I’m down to six bags of doritos and twelve donuts a day.  I can do this! Oh why doesn’t Deanna call?” he said.  “You can’t trust Greek women.  They’ll break your heart every time.  I know she says she’s Betazoid but I think she’s Greek.  Hey, is that a cheeseburger?”

(574)

Edith Keeler, respected social worker, visionary and babe

Edith Keeler, respected activist and social worker who runs the 21st Street mission here in New York has filed a restraining order against one of its occupants,  an unemployed man who goes by the name of James Kirk.  Mr. Kirk who broke into her basement one day with his “companion” a Mr. Spock (no first name given) has allegedly been harassing Miss Keeler, repeatedly telling  her of his undying love and asking her out on dates even after she had made her disinterest in him known.

“No offense” said Miss Keeler, “But I’m just too young to date a bald man.  I mean come on.  That wig is fooling no one.”

Miss Keeler also found Mr. Kirk’s racism offensive.

These are difficult times we live in.  That’s why I started this soup kitchen.  It’s open to all peoples of any race.  And here is this Kirk fellow telling me his companion, who has a tragic birth defect that left his ears pointed, was “Chinese” and that as a child he got his head caught in a mechanical rice picker.  I mean come on.  Such a blatantly offensive joke about peoples of color is shocking in today’s age.

But what most disturbed Miss Keeler was Mr. Spock’s premonitions of her death.

I overheard a conversation Kirk and Spock had.  Kirk was telling Spock that he loved me and Spock said, “Jim, Edith Keeler must die.”  It was then I knew I was in danger.  Who knows who these people are?  But for some reason they have targeted me for death.  I don’t blame Spock.  The birth defect that deformed his ears must have left him bitter but Kirk should know better than to threaten with death the person giving him room and board.  So I kicked them both out.

Miss Keeler thought that was the end of it.  But Kirk kept coming back, begging for a second chance.

“He said, ‘Edith you aren’t green but I still want you.’  Green?  What kind of psycho is this?” said Keeler.

I don’t need this.  I’m a social worker.  A social worker with a vision.  One day soon, man is going to be able to harness incredible energies, maybe even the atom….energies that could ultimately hurl us to other worlds in……in some sort of spaceship.  And the men that reach out into space will be able to find ways to feed the hungry millions.  They will be able to find a way to give each man hope.  Hope and change.  Socialism is the wave of the future.  It’s what I believe in.

In accordance with the restraining  order Mr. Kirk is prohibited from getting within 100 feet of Miss Keeler.

Under terms of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1880, Mr. Spock has been remanded into the custody of immigration agents who will deport him to China.

(722)

Pope Benedict XVI today excommunicated Linus Van Pelt, ratcheting up the theological controversy over the so-called “Great Pumpkin.”  With his excommunication Van Pelt is prohibited from publishing any of his writings or exercising any functions as a Catholic theologian.

Before his excommunication, Linus Van Pelt had been a daring and provocative theologian.  Van Pelt came to prominence when he posited the belief that a “Great Pumpkin” would rise out of a pumpkin patch deemed “most sincere” of all the pumpkin patches.  Van Pelt wrote that the Great Pumpkin is a modern version of the resurrection.  Like Jesus, the Great Pumpkin would rise or “ascend”, lifting up all his followers with his good works.

Pope Benedict has ordered that all of Linus’ writing be reviewed by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, The Vatican’s congregation in charge of safeguarding Catholic doctrine from all heresies and novelties.

Despite his excommunication, Van Pelt remains defiant and promises to continue publishing his works, even if he has to leave the Church to do it.

“There must be development of doctrine” Van Pelt stated in a press release reacting to his excommunication.  “Isn’t that what the spirit of Vatican II is all about?”

My doctrine of the Great Pumpkin has built upon the work of theologians of the past.  The Great Pumpkin himself shares much in common with the Holy Ghost.  If the Vatican wishes to silence me they cannot silence belief in the Great Pumpkin.  Long after I am gone the Great Pumpkin will continue.  The Church needs renewal.  Only through study of patristic resources can the Church remain relevant to society today.  It is time to open the window and let fresh air into theological inquiry.

Top level sources inside the Vatican believe that it is about time Van Pelt was silenced and that it should have been done last year.  Said a Cardinal:

If we had acted last year, when Linus was only nine years old we could have sent him to bed without supper.  But now that he’s ten we had to excommunicate him.  We should have nipped the Great Pumpkin in the bud but now we have a full blown crisis on our hands.

Many in Van Pelt’s home town are solidly behind the Vatican’s decision to silence him.

“He was a real pain in the ass” said a neighbor about Linus.  “He was always going door to door distributing literature on the Great Pumpkin.  He even called my family a brood of vipers when we wouldn’t take his brochure.  He’s worse than the Jehovah’s Witnesses if you ask me.”

Van Pelt’s best friend, Charlie Brown reacted to today’s events by saying that “While I respect and love Linus, we are obviously separated by denominational differences.  Has anyone noticed that I have no hair?  I mean, what’s up with that.  I’m ten years old for God’s sake.”

The Vatican has summoned Linus to Rome and he has six months to comply or face further penalties.

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