Tuesday, 6/30

I guess my secret's out. I like a good barf joke as well as the next person.

Oh, the horror.

8-)

This all came about thanks to my TV piece last night, a piece that marked the end of the first half of 2026 by making predictions as to what might happen during the second half of this year. Since the first half of the year was one of the most surreal we've lived through, I felt license to let my freak flag fly in coming up with a few absurd ideas as to what ELSE we might experience between now and the end of December.

And trust me—my freak flag flies with a lot of gusto these days.

One of the thing I wanted to work in somehow was the UP State Fair, if only because I was trying to spread the absurdity around all of Upper Michigan for this particular epic. I tossed a couple of ideas out to my writing staff, and they (okay, me) quickly gravitated to one that involved a new ride at the Fair, which my writing staff (okay, me) quickly dubbed “The Barfinator”.It was an okay gag, and when you write one of these bits a week sometimes “okay” is okay. But then when I was in the shower Saturday morning a kicker to the gag came to me that elevated the gag beyond “okay” status and shot it into the realm of the absurd.

And that was the line I put AFTER dubbing the roller coaster "The Barfinator".

I also needed to put a graphic together for the gag, and I had one—a generic roller coaster with a sign that said “The Barfinator” on it. Once again, that was okay, but I felt that it needed a little more. Then, for some reason, the idea to move the “Barfinator” sign up & down, like it was designed to make you queasy, popped into my head, and at least to me it worked a lot better than the original graphic.

And all that was just for one 10 second gag in a two minute bit.

So now you know—I like a good vomit joke as much as anyone else. I hope you won't think any less of me, although if you do, I suppose we could always blame my writing staff (okay, me).

I just need to get better control over them, I guess.

The end result?

(jim@wmqt.com)