Thursday, October 15, 2009

For Rebecca

Millions of Americans Waste Entire Fucking Afternoon

Balloon Boy to America: Punk'd!

COLORADO (The Borowitz Report) - Moments after a little boy who was believed to be in his parents' homemade helium balloon was found safe and sound, millions of Americans came to the realization that they had flushed the entire fucking afternoon down the fucking toilet.

"I watched the entire drama unfold and then it turned out that no drama had unfolded," said Carol Foyler, 32, of Missoula, Montana. "I can't tell you how pissed I am at that fucking kid."

At their Colorado home, the parents of six-year-old Falcon Heene said that they were relieved that their son was all right and that they were pushing forward with their plans to build a giant child-operated flame-throwing robot


As reported on WA Today (starting several paragraphs into the article):

http://www.watoday.com.au/world/balloon-boy-found-hiding-in-cardboard-box-20091016-gzsp.html?autostart=1

Falcon was the son of Richard and Mayumi Heene, and the family appeared on ABC's Wife Swap. Richard Heene was described by friends as a sort of "mad scientist", 7News said.He was a storm chaser and had a website called The Psyience Detectives, which "investigates the mysteries of science and psychic phenomenon". A profile written for Wife Swap mentioned the Heene family's interest in experimental aircraft.

"When the Heene family aren't chasing storms, they devote their time to scientific experiments that include looking for extraterrestrials and building a research-gathering flying saucer to send into the eye of the storm," it said.

In a 2007 profile in the Denver Post, Mr Heene said he took his sons on storm chasing missions. "I think I have odd kids. They start screaming with excitement," he said.

On at least one occasion the family had a close call when they found themselves in the midst of a tornado in Buckeye, the Post said.

Viewers in the US were glued to TVs showing live footage of the runaway balloon, and posted their thoughts on Twitter.The story occupied most of the top 10 popular topic spots on Twitter, under various "hash tag" names including "Denver", "Colorado", "Balloon Boy" and "SaveBalloonBoy".

CNN said the aircraft was experimental and was built by the boy's parents.

I didn't get caught up in this. I was too busy wasting time in other ways. It sure is a funny story, though. I plan to get back to posting tomorrow . . . or the next day. . . or the one after that. First though, I'll catch up with the blogs of my on-line friends.

5 comments:

Kathy said...

My first thought when I found out he was ok was that most of the Moms were thinking that they were happy he was ok and then they would want to beat the snot out of him!

Rebecca said...

I really thought that kid was going to be found dead. A total waste of time yesterday afternoon. I even checked CNN at home before I went to bed to find out that he was found safely. A lot of publicity for the family and a huge waste of money spent searching for a kid that was in their house the entire time. I guess being on "Wife Swap" wasn't enough for them.

Lorraine said...

and thank God for that LOL you made me laught out loud, I'm so glad you're back lol or soon-to-be ;)

laughingwolf said...

so far the local sheriff's office sez they believe it was a genunine incident

Anonymous said...

Hilarious that story! Just bloody brilliant! (Did not get caught up in it either as I was on holidays and just read the gist of it when I came back today)