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Postcards from The Pug Bus

Lifting a satirical leg on popular culture

Persons in the Ether

Question of the Week

Salad dressing on the side or on the top?

Marlowe Brint, artisnal jewelry designer

Reportedly outside Santa Fe, NM

On the side, obviously. A salad should retain the illusion of free will until the very last moment. Once dressed, it has chosen a direction and can never go back.

Evelyn Voss, lobster fisher person

May once have lived in Bangor, ME

I prefer it on top, but only in a thin ceremonial line, as priests once applied oils to objects they feared and respected. A salad without dressing is just yard work in a bowl.

Clyde Ketter, attack dog trainer

Unverified, but emphatically from Akron, OH

Neither. The correct approach is to keep the dressing nearby in a separate vessel and let the salad absorb its presence psychologically. That is how my father did it, and his lettuce feared him.

Adverse Effects

The following lines may induce brief clarity, misplaced certainty, and the sense that something has already been decided without your approval ...

There is a moment, just before sleep,
when the mind loosens its tie
and admits what it spent all day denying.

Read It All

There is a moment, just before sleep,
when the mind loosens its tie
and admits what it spent all day denying.

You remember the thing you said—
not the words,
but the angle of them,
how they leaned slightly wrong
and stayed there.

A life is not ruined in grand gestures.
It goes soft at the edges first.
Corners round off. Standards blur.
You start calling things “fine”
that would have once kept you awake.

Which is the problem.

Because now you do sleep.

Beautifully. Efficiently.
Like someone who has made a series of
very small, very reasonable surrenders
and arranged them into a pillow.

Man watching neighbor’s wind chimes from his window while writing imaginary complaint during long-term feud.

Relations deteriorated shortly after the first breeze.

News

Most Americans Maintain a Long-Term Feud Known Only to Themselves

philmaggitti news 2 months

The Institute for Low-Stakes Conflict Resolution has determined that 72 percent of Americans are engaged in an active long-term feud that nobody else is aware… Read More

A satirical illustration of a couple sitting on a couch while distracted by digital devices, representing how a shared password for streaming services has become the primary bond in modern relationships.

The only thing joining these two is a shared password.

News

Scientists Confirm Most Couples Now Held Together by a Shared Password

philmaggitti news 2 months

A sobering new study conducted by the Institute for Romantic Fragility (IRF) has revealed that modern relationships are not sustained by love, children, common values,… Read More

A satirical image of the Nation’s Most Influential Thought Leader, an unkempt man in a baseball cap, filming a geopolitical rant from the driver’s seat of a Dodge Ram with an illuminated ring light.

Randall "The Ram" Jenkins: A Man of High Definition and Low Employment

News

Nation’s Most Influential Thought Leader Is a Guy With Podcast Mic in a Truck

philmaggitti news 2 months

Policy experts have been quietly rubbing their temples upon learning that the nation’s most influential thought leader is a unemployed dry wall installer delivering geopolitical… Read More

A satirical cartoon illustrating the risks of Florida English-Only Driving laws, featuring a bewildered man in a floral shirt attempting to feed a ham sandwich to a large alligator while standing next to a sign that reads "ALLIGATOR: DO NOT PET" and a red "STOP" sign, as a frustrated police officer looks on.

Local man discovers that 'Stop' and 'Lunch' are not synonyms.

News

Florida’s English-only Driving Exam

philmaggitti news 2 months

The Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles has determined that the ability to operate a multi-ton motorized vehicle rests entirely upon one’s mastery… Read More

An extreme close-up of a human face featuring a prominent third eye centered on the forehead. As if it is struggling to focus on a distant cosmic plane. The entire scene is bathed in a hazy, ethereal atmosphere with floating geometric light leaks and a soft, shimmering background.

I'll keep an eye out for you.

News

Does Your Third Eye Need Glasses?

philmaggitti news 2 months

The Third Eye is the most neglected organ in the human body, which is saying something given how badly most people treat the pancreas. According… Read More

Satirical illustration for Springsteen’s 'Streets of Minneapolis' Reviewed. A denim-clad Bruce Springsteen shrieks through a megaphone into a snowy Nicollet Avenue.' In the background, federal marauders on horseback patrol the ice near fallen protesters.

Noise pollution.

News

Springsteen’s “Streets of Minneapolis” Reviewed

T.J. Eckleburg news 2 months

Bruce Springsteen released “Streets of Minneapolis” on January 28 in response to recent events involving federal agents and aggressive anti-ICE demonstrators in that city. The… Read More

President threatens England illustration: standing behind a massive leather-bound dictionary in the Oval Office while pointing at the word MAGASTAR in gold leaf; shocked British scholars in wigs surround him as money and "Lexical Embargo" papers fly through the air next to a "Crumb Tariffs" jar.

"If you do not print the word, I will tax the tea until it tastes like the harbor."

News

President Threatens England with Economic Ruin over “Magastar”

philmaggitti news, trump 2 months

The delicate peace between the United States and the United Kingdom shattered this morning when the President issued a final, gold-embossed warning to the scholars… Read More

Abstract machine with an indifferent, human-like face symbolizing confrontational behavior and institutional response

News

Playing Chicken with the System, Confrontational Behavior and Institutional Response

As told to The Pug Bus news 3 months

The current political meltdown playing out in the streets of this country has followed a predictable script–a slam dance between confrontational behavior and institutional response.… Read More

The Pug Bus Instant Newsletter

The Pug Bus Instant Newsletter requires no email address, no mother's maiden name, no first pet's nickname, and no DNA sample. You simply mash the link below and read. The internet worked this way once, before someone realized your attention was worth more to them than it was to you.

Deliver It

⚡ The FDA has approved the first prescription-strength silence, available in 30-day supplies for patients whose doctors have determined they are talking too much. Side effects include clarity, improved listening, and a brief period of being liked.

⚡ A bipartisan congressional caucus has formed to study the feasibility of doing nothing faster. Early results suggest the group is ahead of schedule.

⚡ Netflix has announced a new content category called Shows You Will Start But Not Finish, to be featured prominently alongside Things You Have Already Seen Twice and Movies You Forgot You Watched. Subscribers describe the experience as having a lot of options.