What's So Funny?
Russell Gayer, author speaker
Lonely Farts Club Band
April Fool’s Day is bearing down on us like a snow storm across the Sahara. If you’re like me, you know plenty of candidates who deserve a sound pranking. My all-time favorite prank dates back to the seventies. Kenny Young and I were eating sardines at lunch when a co-worker, Tim, started complaining about the odor. He went on and on about how nasty they were and chiding us about eating rotten fish.
After lunch, Kenny tucked the sardine tins under the front seat of Tim’s car. This was on a Friday afternoon in July. Tim drove home and parked the vehicle with the windows up all weekend. By Monday morning, the sardine remains had achieved a high state of putrefaction. Neither Tim, nor the car, was ever the same again. I’d love to hear the story of your favorite prank.
If you’re new to Friday Flash Fiction, the Duchess of Frivolity who coordinates the literary puppeteers is Kukla, Fran, & Ollie Wisoff-Fields. If you’d like to participate in this exercise of madness, head over to her blog for step-by-step instructions. To view the FFF Hollywood Squares Authors Block click here.
Dear Diary,
My audition with Col. Sparky’s Fife & Kazoo Band went poorly. Never have I witnessed a more dismal group of musicians.
The vocalist, a prudish woman in her fifties, appears to have been beaten at birth with an ugly stick. Her range can be defined as somewhere between a braying donkey and a cat in heat. She could not carry a tune if given a lorry for transportation.
The tuba player on my left insisted on elbowing my ribs with each toot of his oversized fart machine. My banjo could barely be heard above the din.
– Simon Cowell
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Here’s one of my favorite Far Side cartoons. Kudos to Gary Larsen. 
44 Comments on “Lonely Farts Club Band”
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What's So Funny? 
Russel, this had me laughing from Sparky’s Fife & Kazoo band onward. Truly a gem.
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Alicia,
I hear they have an opening for a Jew’s Harp player, if you’d like to join.
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Dear Russell,
I thank Bog that I was born with the innate knowledge that music would always be something I’d listen to, but never attempt. Your story was music to my ears. A mellifluous take on the poor band in the prompt photo and a nice poke at the jab master himself, Simon. Very well told.
April Fools coming? Hmmmm.
Aloha,
Doug
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Doug, I think you’d be quite good on kazoo.
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Perhaps, but they’d have to wash it off afterwards. I only play kazoo after eating Mexican food.
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Dear Simon,
Thank you for sharing this page of your diary. It gives us some insight into your hostile beginnings.
Favorite prank? A coworker of mine had a penchant for sneaking up on me. One night we both worked a later shift. On my way out to my car I took an icing bag and squirted royal blue icing under his car door handle. In the dark he had no idea what the slime was but it did give a nice blue design to his white dress shirt. The next day our store director had heard about my prank. Did I get in trouble? My boss, with a slow grin, said, “Good job.”
Shalom,
K, F & O
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Dear Kukla, Fran, and Ollie (displaying multiple personalities this week?),
Loved your prank story. That’s a new twist on being caught red-handed. I know a guy who pulled a similar prank, but used printing ink instead of icing. Needless to say, it doesn’t not wash off so well. Glad your boss had a sense of humor.
– Simon
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Royal blue food coloring doesn’t come out of a white shirt either. Believe me, this GM manager had it coming. I was the store hero of the week and he himself took it quite well.
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You’ll always be my hero. 🙂
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At least you had no gripe with playing under fluorescent lights, Simon. They do such wonders for the complexion … This isn’t a prank because I’m not a prankster. My sister was born on April Fool’s Day seven years before my arrival. We shared a room. When I was seven, and she fourteen, we got a wall calendar. On the April 1 square, I wrote, “The fool’s birthday.” That did not go over well. Fast forward to August, 1966. The Beatles are appearing in concert in Candlestick Park. I want to go badly, but I’m too young. I tell her that she should go. She tells me, “I’ll go next year.” I say, “How do you know they’re gonna be back next year?” She says, “They have concerts every year.” I announce, “You’re a fool, just like I wrote on our calendar! It’s so unfair that you get to be fourteen and I’m seven!” She insists that they’ll be back the next year and maybe our parents will let me go when I’m eight. I announce that I know I will never get to see the Beatles in concert. My sister calls me a crab. As anyone who knows their Beatle factoids, that concert on August 29, 1966, was the last one they played in the US. It wasn’t even sold out. About ten years ago, her daughter and my niece, Sweet Pea, gets into the Fab Four. While I’m visiting she asks her mother, “Mom, did you ever see the Beatles in concert?” My sister cringes, but to her credit she says, “No. I didn’t listen to your aunt. I’m a fool.”
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What a great story–especially the part where your sister admits that you–the crab–was right and that she was a fool. That was definitely a red-letter day on the calendar.
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Dear Russell, You were born clever and over the years have fine tuned it into brilliance! Good story! Besides that – you make Mike and I laugh! Nan
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Well, I’m glad I’m good for something.
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We’ll never know whether Simon’s banjo was any better than the folk drowning him out. Good piece.
p.s. Love the Larson cartoon.
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That’s the nice thing about the rest of the music being so loud—it hides your own mistakes, though I doubt he’d admit to any. Glad you enjoyed the cartoon. I’m a big Far Side fan. It must have been nice to retire at 35.
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Hilarious, Russell er…Simon. Also, loved the cartoon. My son had a book of those “Far Side” cartoons. I’d rather not think about that car’s smell. 😀 — Suzanne
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We had no idea he’d park the car in the hot sun for two days. I know another person who pulled a similar prank using a dirty diaper.
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Very funny! Way to channel Mr Cowell 🙂
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Thanks. I can just see him playing banjo.
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The Simon Cowell signature was to beat all! Or should I say strum all? Either way that was hilarious!
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He’s fun to pick on. 🙂
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LOL
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I can’t think of anyone more worthy to have the p*ss taken out of him thatn That Man. Funny as ever, friend.
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Yes, he is deserving of the honor.
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Lot of fun. Had a good laugh thanks.
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The band asked if you’d like to audition. How does Sunday afternoon look on your schedule?
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Honoured but I can’t give up dancing for band playing. Saturday?
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Russell, I roared through the whole story. Bravo!
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Roared like a river, or roared like a lion? Either way, I’ll take it. Thanks, Karen.
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Russell, I started smiling and at the end I was spitting out my vocal cords. So you’ve heard me sing, eh? 🙂
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No, but I think I’ll take a rain check. At least you didn’t get hit by the ugly stick.
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You’re nice! I think I’ll keep you. 🙂
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Ha.. I guess there is also a very good reason to drench the sound of the banjo.
My favorite prank.. Once we recorded hysterical laughter on a computer and programmed it to play at midnight on a professor’s computer at midnight, it took a couple of month until he was in his office that late.. But he was still a tad pale in the morning.
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That’s funny, Bjorn. Maniacal laughter I suppose. That would make your skin crawl.
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That’s a sad bunch of musicians, and that’s a very funny story.
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None as sad as Simon.
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What a hoot and a half! I loathe pranks and my husband did only one in our twenty years together. IN the middle of the night, when I went to the bathroom, he moved the bed. Having had that bed in that exact location for I know not how many years, I jumped … onto the floor…. he laughed in secret about it for years…
As for the rest, that was funny too!
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I bet there’s a good reason he only pulled one prank in 20 years–death threats. My wife would not see the humor in that prank.
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Let’s just say he didn’t get the reaction he had hoped for!
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Gary LarsOn, mate!
And you say he’s a favorite? 😉 ROFL
JK, typo, I know, Tay.
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Huh?
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I have three things to say:
1) My vocal range is much better than that!
2) Remind me never to let you get close to my car.
3) I don’t know how I missed last week’s entry, but it’s hysterical. You should steal from Perry more often. It’s a safe bet he’ll never notice; I just saw his memory riding off into oblivion without him.
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We’ve been scoping out your car and saving up dirty diapers for some time now.
Yes, Perry’s memory is such that he even steals from himself at times.
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Ha ha loved the title, obviously Sergeant’s been eating too many bell peppers. Favorite prank? Too many but there was one pretty spontaneous one in boarding school when we tricked a senior into eating detergent powder thinking it was Nesquik’s Banana flavored milk powder. He did foam at the mouth for a while.
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