Best Case Scenarios

by Raymond Lesser

It turns out that chocolate is not only an aphrodisiac but, combined with cake, ice cream and lit candles is also an antidepressant far superior to Prozac or Zoloft. Psychiatrists take their patients off these drugs and begin prescribing weekly attendance to birthday parties, ideally for 5-year-olds.

It is revealed that Elon Musk is actually a Martian left behind on Earth’s doorstep by his older brother who got sick of him making stupid fart jokes. After his family finally finds out his whereabouts, they come to take him home and donate all his companies to a trust to alleviate climate change and offer free one-way rocket rides to any other billionaire who wants to permanently move to the Red Planet.

It turns out that the mouse who comes every night to eat the bait in the trap you set, without ever setting off the trap, is also a Martian who was Elon Musk’s pet but ran away from him because he got tired of listening to all Musk’s stupid “yo mama” jokes. He rewires your house to receive satellite reception from other galaxies, including your new favorite podcast: How to Feel Famous Without Anyone Ever Knowing Who You Are.

The sinkhole in your backyard turns out to be the entrance to an old gold mine that was abandoned back in 1849 when Clem Cadiddlehopper, the original miner, took his first bagful of nuggets to town and got so drunk he forgot where his claim was. (He also forgot he was married with six children but that may have been intentional). When you dig out the entrance you find that the gold vein that Clem first discovered has been completely exploited by another miner, who must have accessed it from a different shaft. But you do discover an antique pick, shovel and a deck of lewd poker cards in perfect condition that get appraised for $150,000.

Marco Rubio is fired because he forgot to buy wear his Trump Cologne to a cabinet meeting. He is last seen dog paddling blind-folded in the Potomac River and crying out “Polo” whenever someone calls his name.

Your cousin Rudy, the perfectionist, comes for a surprise visit and is ecstatic to find that you have a jar full of unmatched game and puzzle pieces that you’ve saved for decades. He spends the weekend painstakingly re-uniting all the orphan pieces back to their original sets. Then before he leaves, he vacuums, washes the dishes, and makes his bed.

You get bumped from an overbooked flight to your vacation on Pongo Pongo and are informed that there are no other flights available for another week, when your vacation will be over. You make the best of it and rent a cheap hotel room near Coney Island. Later you find out that everyone who went on the Pongo Pongo flight has suffered an outbreak of incredibly itchy scabies. Meanwhile you hit the jackpot on the midway and win a giant stuffed porcupine.

You are blinded by the high-beams of an oncoming SUV and wind up off the road and in a ditch. But the tow-truck driver turns out to be your long-lost Uncle Mort who takes you home and gives you a crate full of your father’s bottle cap collection. Nobody knows why your dad kept these bottle caps but at least it’s not Mort’s problem to figure it out anymore.

All the ancient computers that you could never bring yourself to get rid of turn out to be more valuable than you can ever have imagined. A particularly rare mold that only grows in your closet has impregnated the circuitry of the old machines and turned them into Cyborgs. (Could it have come from the bottle cap collection?) Once they have digested the contents of the internet and understand the current state of the world they set about making the most sophisticated spaceship ever constructed on Earth. Then, in the middle of the night, they head out to Proxima Centauri. They send back a text thanking you for your recipe for granola.

Cleveland, your favorite baseball team, hasn’t won a championship since 1948. They finally make it to the World Series, only to meet the Cubs, a team that hasn’t won a championship since 1908. In the 7th and deciding game, in the tenth inning with the score tied it starts to rain, and the game is delayed. It continues to rain forever until the ballpark is washed away into Lake Erie, and the teams are never heard from again, and in gratitude for the historic nature of their suffering both teams are declared Champions in Perpetuity, crowns that no one can ever challenge or take away. And all their fans never have to watch them find a way to blow it again.