Year-Ender Messages We Shall Never See

In reaction against the treacle-y Year Ender messages from friends and family around the world, I composed a small sampling of those we might like to see ... but WON'T:


OSAMA MESSAGE
Dear All --
Of course, we have had a wonderful year. Being True Believers, we ALWAYS have wonderful years, every year. The same is true of our entire Family -- which means all True Believers: a year of outstanding martyrdom and perfect joy. We are proud of every single one of you, both present and martyred. We expect the same of you next year and for all the years of glory ahead for all of us.

Isn't it wonderful to have no doubts, no fears, no tears? Glory! Glory! Forever! Forever! Your loving, O

LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD MESSAGE

Dear All,
It's been a great year. I went out and got eaten by a wolf -- who had previously eaten up old Gra'mum. Amazingly, we BOTH SURVIVED, because a woodsman came and cut open the wolf. Fortunately for G'mum and me, the wolf's digestive system was so very sluggish, we didn't suffer the SLIGHTEST acid burn. Even our clothes came through unscathed.

The wolf of course was TOTALLED. And the woodsman was hauled away by several animal rights agencies at once for having destroyed a unique specimen of wolf, that was both able to swallow two humans whole AND speak in English too! It's all very sad.

However, that was all some time ago. G'mum and I are entirely recovered. On the strength of my trauma, which is being seen as a specialized case of Child Abuse, I've got scholarships to Radcliffe, Brown and Yale. I plan to major in Survival Strategies for the Modern Girl Child.

G'mum has her own hugely popular reality show on TV called Surviving Grandchildren and Their Wolves -- of course I probably don't need to tell you any of this, since you're all probably glued to your sets every weeknight, waiting to see which grandparent gets swallowed next.

Mum and Dad are okay -- though of course I don't get to see them much, what with all the press attention following the attack. Sad thing about old parents, huh? They never entirely enjoy their kids' success. Can you believe -- they want me to STOP wearing my red riding hood! Huh! Considering that I've stopped wearing any OTHER clothes, taking off the cape might be a little ... ummm ... REVEALING, if you get my
point!

Well that's it from me. Wishing y'all a similarly successful
twelvemonth! Your beloved Red.

GAIA's MESSAGE

Another dreadful year *sigh* Dunno what to do about THEM. Yuck. How I hate the pests. Yes, yes -- floods, droughts, plagues -- I'm trying! THEY just keep on reproducing, of course. I thought rabbits were prolific, but these simians? Ohhh gollygollygolly. NOTHING STOPS 'em.

But I've still got a few tricks up my sleeve. My virus programmers are a really creative bunch, for instance. And I can always pull off a well-positioned quake or two -- though I HATE to do it. So many of my beloved rocks and plants and beasts die too, in the chaos. THEY never seem to understand that if only there were fewer of them, there'd be fewer catastrophes too ...

Oh well. This is all very bad-tempered of me. I'll end this now. There are ever more nasty dams to worry about, and nuclear facilities and malls and motorways ... aaaarggh!

Whatever. Have a good one! Your ever-loving, G