Author: Harold Leeder

In Response To Jones’ ‘KS Bar’ Mitch McConnell To Open ‘Dave & Filibusters’

By: Harold Leeder

April 6, 2018

Matt Jones, the host of Lexington’s greatest television show of all time Hey Kentucky and also some sort of morning radio show, has decided to throw his visor into the ring of Lexington’s ever-growing list of restaurant owners.

While the impossible to pronounce KSBar and Grille has been in the planning stages for over a year, one thing Jones didn’t plan on was seeing some direct competition opening up right next door.

Yesterday Jones addressed a limited amount of local media members while insisting that other local media invites “may have gone into your spam folder.” Jones, a former lawyer, claimed he was very qualified to open the establishment saying, “Look, I passed the bar, now I own a bar.”

Regardless, a much larger portion of us attended a lavishly catered press event put on by Jones’ political rival and Lexington’s even newer restauranteur Mitch McConnell. A McConnell aide eluded to Jones by saying, “If he wants to open up a bar right next to ours, I’ll be glad to introduce him to the worst mistake he’s ever made.”

McConnell poked his head out from behind a curtain to announce that he, too, would be opening a bar he was told to say would be “fun.” The bar, Dave & Fillibusters, will be run by many of Washington’s elite and should open “the day before Matt’s place.”

Statements were brief by the Senator, but he did admit he’s already hired some of the staff for the bar. Dave & Filibusters management team will include former Show Me’s manager Jeff Hoover, and some friends of someone we weren’t as familiar with, Cole.

Dave & Fillibusters will feature a mix of potpourri, raw fava beans, and mildew to help recreate McConnell’s signature old white man smell. The bar plans to play old CSPAN soundbites over the speakers punctuated by the occasional basketball game buzzer sound effect.

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While menu items for Jones’ KS Bar were revealed by us on Twitter just over a month ago, McConnell is still trying to sort out his menu’s direction. “Leafy greens for sure, and whatever else I can find up here on this fencepost.”

Keeneland Dumps Road Salt On Race Track For Snow

By: Harold Leeder

April 5, 2018

Keeneland is abuzz preparing for the 2018 Blue Grass Stakes: the stables are filled with the finest hay, the concession stands are filled with the finest bourbon, and the racetrack is filled with the finest road salt. “It might snow this Saturday,” said Keeneland commentator Pierre van Button, who plans to buy a tiny ice scraper in case his four-inch thick glasses freeze over, “but the race must go on.”

A cart, on loan from Red Mile and pulled by one of their trotters, instead of a thoroughbred picked from one of Keeneland’s demigods of dash, wheels out barrels of artisinal road salt across the dirt track. Snow preparation is not limited to the track, however. Steps are being taken all across Keeneland and surrounding horse country.

The Blue Grass Stakes front-runner, Champion Good Magic, is getting his ice cleats hammered in by a farrier who was recently flown in from Minnesota, while other owners are preparing for Saturday’s pending snowpocalypse by simply not shaving their horses. The morning line 5-1 colt Free Drop Billy currently resembles a huge Pomeranian. Flameaway jockey Jose Lezcano hopes that the winter weight he, himself, put on will provide enough traction in the snow. “That, and the owner thought I should lay off the burgoo,” added Lezcano.

The threat of snow extends past the athletes. Keeneland concessions are stocking up on milk and bread while spectators are looking for pastel fur coats. “How are we gonna get through the cold with only this cocaine and bourbon,” asked one 43-year old man in a pink bowtie, nervously thumbing through his wallet, before correcting himself, “I mean bourbon and COKE.”

The Red Mile grounds crew explained that they’re happy to help Keeneland prepare for their opening weekend. However, if the snow hasn’t cleared in time for their own racing season they’ll just try a different approach. “We’ll just wrap the buggy wheels with chains.”

WKYT Doppler Radar Shows Heavy Clouds Over Magic Vapor Shop

By: Harold Leeder

April 4, 2018

They say, ‘If you don’t like the weather in Kentucky, just wait 5 minutes,’ and then whoever ‘they’ are laugh hysterically thinking this is clever. And while the weather may fluctuate wildly around much of the bluegrass, WKYT’s doppler radar has shown a small, unchanged portion on its map for the past several months. It appears a sick, wicked, fat cloud of puffy cotton has settled over Lexington’s Big Blue Magic Vapor Shop.

We looked into the anomaly further and found that while the cloud does seem to shift from puffy to hazy to occasionally giant-ring shaped, it never seems to leave the area directly above Big Blue Magic Vapor Shop.

Inside, sit two public enemies, brought together by weather. Chris Bailey puffs on an e-cig as thick white vapor pours out of him like he is a smokestack on the Titanic (pre-sinking). Next to Bailey sits his assumed foe Bill Meck, who blows some gnarly nimbus out his juice box.

“On the streets we are competitors, he calls for flurries, I call for light snow. He says partly cloudy, I say mostly sunny,” Bailey says. “But in here, in here in the world of vapes, it’s cloudy all day every day. This is where we bond.”

Meck takes a quick headcount of everyone in the room. “Tell Bodhi to order at least 5 large Za’s,” he shouts to an assistant.

Both meteorologists agree that the cloud will do no harm to the environment. The government agrees. An inspector from the EPA once visited, almost wrote the store up as a root source of global warming, but took a huge hit off a nattering nabob rig and remembered he was in Kentucky where warmth doesn’t exist, and left.

Live Reports From Frankfort Spring Break: Teachers Gone Wild

By: Harold Leeder

April 2, 2018

Kentucky legislators passed a bill last week eliminating pensions for public school teachers, but they made the mistake of voting to reform teachers’ pensions right before the teacher’s week off. And since most of the teachers don’t get paid enough to go anywhere on vacation they’ve all descended on the capitol to protest the bill. We’ve sent some reporters to the overly organized protest and will be live-updating Kentucky’s least fun Spring Break since UK spent theirs in Boise a few weeks ago. Check back periodically for up-to-the-minute details:

7:05 AM: Crowd gathers outside as no one can find their homeroom.

7:15 AM: Day Drinking begins with juice boxes and coffee.

8:00 AM: The protest starts with the 8 o’clock bell which is just a couple of band teachers playing the opening to Pink Floyd’s “Time” on their smartphones.

8:05 AM: Several teachers from Paducah are given pink slips for being tardy. “Report to the principal’s office,” they are told, and then they immediately start their six-hour drive home.

8:10 AM: A teacher with a bullhorn read the morning announcements and then started chanting Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It”:

We’re not gonna take it

We’re not gonna take it,

This paper is late,

Maybe we can find some extra credit assignment you could do instead,

Come back here and we’ll talk about it sometime after fooooooour.”

8:20 AM: Not everyone here is a teacher. This person seems to be against the wastewater part of the bill, we think, but we’re not sure though because, much like the legislators, we didn’t actually read it.

8:31 AM: Kentucky State Police Trooper Tobe Grant says he’s never seen such an orderly protest. “They even brought snacks,” he said as he sipped on a fruit punch drink and wiped peanut butter cracker crumbs off his uniform.

8:35 AM: Kindergarten teachers seen unfolding mats after snack time.

8:45 AM: Ironically, we’re seeing quite a few spelling errors on these protest signs.

8:50 AM: Art teachers to grade signs at 10.

9:02 AM: A delegation of math teachers are huddled in the corner crunching numbers on just how much money the pension reform is costing them. One of them is reprimanded for writing out 80085 on his TI-80 calculator.

9:14 AM: Kentucky Attorney General Andy Beshear promises the teachers that their absences will be excused for the day.

9:24 AM: A small group of counterprotesters show up but are teased for being Governor’s Pets.

9:29 AM: Hate to break it to this guy, but we’re gonna need to find more than a penny in the budget.

9:34 AM: Woodshop teachers are hard at work on a Trojan horse that they hope to wheel into the governor’s mansion.

9:44 AM: Everyone gathered around what we could only assume is some Confederate soldier guy.

9:57 AM: Frankfort food trucks are scrambling to make enough square pizza in time for lunch.

10:02 AM: Bam Carney arrives at protest with a bushel full of apples.

10:14 AM: No one’s in the vip section yet. I’ll come back later.

10:18 AM: Bottle service is pretty expensive but these teachers can afford it.

10:24 AM: Awkward: way more than 120 people have shown up to the #120strong protest.

10:31 AM: Just heard that Matt Bevin plans to spend his spring break at his other mansion.

10:42 AM: Substitute teachers are on standby to pick up the protest in case any of the full-time teachers have to call in sick.

10:55 AM: Teachers are always prepared for the unexpected, and it seems many weren’t sure what Frankfort cuisine might do to them.

11:03 AM: We sent our most steady-handed correspondent to take pictures.

11:27 AM: Aaaaand Lincoln can’t find his hat, someone give this guy some water.

11:44 AM: I’m pretty sure this guy in an anonymous mask is just here to hit on student teachers.

12:00 PM: The teachers take twenty minutes for lunch and a game of musical chairs beaks out as they all try to sit with the cool kids. “Man,” says one choral instructor, “I’m stuck with the band geeks.”

12:08 PM: The ALG’s coffee station will remain open until they can finish assembling the Monster Energy Stage. Future and Lil’ Uzi Vert to appear at 2.

12:20 PM: Recess quickly turned into angry nap time.

12:38 PM: We found at least one person ready for the after party.

1:02 PM: Police are on the lookout for a teacher with a red pen who’s accused of correcting poor grammar on signs.

1:19 PM: Jeff Hoover just showed up.

1:48 PM: A guidance counselor has set up a booth to help teachers find part-time second jobs. “Lowe’s is looking for seasonal workers,” she told a fifteen year veteran Spanish teacher.

2:07 PM: Someone thought they spotted Bevin earlier but turns out it was just Hank Azaria on someone’s iPad.

2:25 PM: This statue of Dr. Ephraim McDowell, the father of ovariotomy, was just voted Statue with Most Sassy Hips.

3:15 PM: The governor’s creepy doll collection.

3:36 PM: Randy Quaid, the face of a movement. Mr. Quaid made a statement of solidarity in the rotunda or at least the person holding this sign did.

Kentucky Legislators Pass Bill to Remove Themselves from Office

By: Harold Leeder

March 30, 2018

In a move suggesting the only term limits they need is their own stupidity, Kentucky legislators voted on a bill ending future pensions for teachers as well as their own political careers. The bill was hurried through the state house last night after suddenly being added in a subcommittee to a wastewater bill.

“You just don’t understand the kind of 3-dimensional chess we’re playing here,” said House Majority Leader Jonathan Shell, who helped present the bill in committee. “This is a power play. You’ve seen the kind of work we’re able to do while in office, just imagine what we’re capable of once we get some free time on our hands.” Shell then reached into his pocket, said, “A souvenir from the game of kings,” and handed us a peg from the boardgame Battleship.

“Well, I saw a waste bill,” says Rep. Bam Carney. “And thought, we’ve been kinda wasting everyone’s time this session so maybe we should just toss ourselves out with the water, too.”

Carney, who in an M. Night Shyamalan type twist is himself a teacher, was asked how this bill could make it through without anyone even reading it. Carney started humming the lyrics to the Schoolhouse Rock classic “I’m Just a Bill”.  When asked if he knew the lyrics to that song, Carney said, “Not really. I would put that on in class sometimes while I caught up on my Real Housewives.”

Meanwhile, teachers are planning on spending their upcoming Spring Break in Frankfort, the first time anyone has vacationed there. Eighth grade English teacher Laura Wilson seemed ready for anything. “Last week I was teaching my kids The Outsiders. And now it looks like the Socs actually wanna rumble.”

Carney ended his briefing by saying, “While we are sorry that teachers have to give up their pensions, we want to make sure we enjoy our retirement. I think history will show we did the right thing. Especially when no one’s around to teach it.”

Flat Earth Society Proposes New Circle Road Is A Straight Line

By: Harold Leeder

March 29, 2018

A new movement has arisen in Lexington recently as a small faction of flat earth believers have begun to assert that New Circle Road is not actually a circle but is instead a straight road.

In a frantically edited YouTube video, a self-proclaimed scientist named TruthFindingCarl69420 sitting in the front seat of his Honda Civic in the parking lot before his shift at Walmart explains, “Where’s the curve? I was just on it, stuck in traffic and looked up and saw a row of cars in front of me. There was no curve. We’ve been told the road is a circle but I’m not just going to trust what some government made map tells me.”

TruthFindingCarl69420 referred us to the president of the Not Circle Road Society, a different Youtuber named Carl, aka TruthFindingCarl696969, who sat down with us for an interview. He is planning on launching a bottle rocket across the road soon in hopes of proving once and for all that the road is straight (it remains unclear how his bottle rocket launch will prove this).

“A circle is a continuous loop,” TruthFindingCarl696969 said. “So, how would traffic back up on a continuous loop? How would I be stuck in a standstill constantly on a continuous loop?” At this point, this reporter started to understand where these people were coming from. “Sorry, there’s just no logic to support the claim that the street is round. You can’t just close off part of a circle and have it remain a circle. Huge sections are closed on it every day.”

The Not Circle Road Society isn’t disturbed by the fact that a driver can start at one end of New Circle Road and, staying on the road, wind up back where they started. “A line can imitate a circle if at each end of the line someone puts a Non-Pythagorean spatial bridge,” said TruthFindingCarl696969. We asked for a simpler explanation. “Portals.”

Things started to fall apart when TruthFindingCarl696969 began hypothesizing about how something could go from Exit 2 to Exit 19 in a matter of miles. He detailed how the lizard person parliament housed within CentrePointe was hiding secret strip malls from us in between those exits. After hearing that, this reporter lost all ability to be unbiased and bought a straight road/flat earth t-shirt and donned a tin foil hat to complete the transition.

When asked how many times a day he is on New Circle Road, TruthFindingCarl696969 said, “Oh I’ve never been on it. I live in Winchester.”

Kroger Opening New Location In Kroger Parking Lot

By: Harold Leeder

March 28, 2018

Good news for Kroger Rewards fans, a new Kroger will be opening soon! Kroger says a new Kroger will be opening in their current location’s parking lot.

Kroger officials say the new location will solve a lot of problems like crowded check out lines and wasted real estate. They hope to get ahead of any parking complaints by making all entrances and aisles in the new store-wide enough for any vehicle up to a luxury size SUV. “Your car is your cart.” is their new slogan.

“Customers will be able to use their fuel points in the store!” said an overly enthusiastic Kroger Supervisor, Ken. “Obviously this will also make things simpler for anyone who wants to purchase one of our patio furniture sets. Or Private Selection pajama bottoms.” This will also cut back on the delivery time of Pringle’s crumbs to your car floor.

Visitors will even be able to tune their radios to the store’s music station so you won’t miss any mid to late 90’s soft hit.

Each car is weighed upon entering and once finished shopping you are charged according to any weight gained. They hope this will stop anybody from trying to smuggle out organic bananas in their tires.

The construction has met some opposition. Like single working father Kyle Saylor. “I bring my kids to this parking lot all the time.” Behind him, his children are playing hide and seek. The youngest is laying underneath a Toyota Tacoma. “Just kinda sad to see it go.”

As of this writing, Kroger officials have decided that once the new location is open the former location will be demolished to provide additional parking.

New Program Retrains Coal Miners as Magicians

By: Harold Leeder

March 26, 2018

“Tada!” says former coal miner Richard Bachman, as he pulls a dead canary out of his top hat.

We are at the Mine-Freak Academy of Illusion and Stage Craft in Pineville. It’s the testing ground for a new program that would retrain former coal miners to be working magicians.

“We owe these people a debt that can only be filled with full employment,” says Representative John Minglewood, co-sponsor of the legislation behind the school. “They need opportunities. Computer Coding is fine but who knows how long that will stay in demand. You know what is consistent though?” he asks. “Birthday parties.” Then he fans a full deck of cards in front of his face.

The miners at the school do seem enthusiastic about their new careers. Some incorporate elements of their old work into their acts with bedazzled denim coveralls and big placards announcing the Mystic Secrets of the Appalachians.

“It’s not just the miners that benefit, but also the kids of this great state,” Minglewood said as a recent graduate walked out in front of a group of kids to begin pickaxing a woman in half. Another man made some amazing shadow puppets with his old headlamp.

Some are going with a more David Blaine-style daredevil approach, such as Daniel Heathcliffe who was preparing his act of escaping a straight jacket while being lowered into a coal slurry.

“I got a bit of a background in this type of stuff. My cousins go to a snake-handling church and my step mom’s kind of a Painted Lady.” He hands us a card for a beauty salon called “Polly’s Permanent Makeup.”

While enthusiasm has built for the program, the future of it remains unclear. This week in Las Vegas, David Copperfield unveiled his first robotic magician’s assistant.

East Coast & West Coast Kentucky Teachers Declare Truce At Summit

By: Harold Leeder

March 22, 2018

Education superstar Notorious P.T.A. of Paintsville and Paducah’s own administration tycoon TuChalk Shakur finally came together this morning in hopes of ending the East Coast-West Cost teaching rivalry that has plagued Kentucky education ever since Governor Matt Bevin first exposed teachers as thugs yesterday.

“All the kids around Kentucky are watching us on TV every day wondering what’s gonna happen next,” said famous lesson plan producer Sean ‘Pike Daddy’ Combs, “especially since they’ve had snow days all this week.”

While every county has been hoping this meeting would take place, it took the tweets of two brave educators, KRS-One-Twelve and Eazy-E-Town Principal, to get the meeting wheels in motion. Educators didn’t have to wait long as salt trucks made quick work of Fayette County roads. The Summit at Fritz Farm was chosen as neutral ground since neither coast has claimed it because despite Bevin’s statements to the contrary no teacher can afford to shop there.

The Governor suggested the two camps started their feud last year when Ms. Marion Goode-Knight, the gatekeeper of Owensboro’s Death Row Of Permanent Records, threatened to put teachers from the East Side of Kentucky “in Graves (County)” at the MTV Teacher Awards.

Emily F. Doom, a former Vice Principal from Covington, came down to help mediate the peace talks, although since she was from Northern Kentucky many weren’t receptive to her having a role in the process. “Em and them, don’t belong here. It’s about kids,” said retired Fayette County superintendent Dr. Andre Toothousand.

The Educators in attendance commented that they were relieved the peace talks finished so quickly this morning, as The Summit at Fritz Farm, like the Governor, has always had a strong anti-teacher policy.

Ringo Starr Receives Knighthood Bumping Up Sir Pizza To Second Worst Knight

By: Harold Leeder

March 21, 2018

Yesterday The Duke Of Cambridge (no relation to Analytica) bestowed the highest honor someone famous for not being a very good drummer can have as Ringo Starr was knighted at a ceremony at Buckingham Palace. Most of you probably know Ringo as the narrator of Thomas the Tank Engine, but few know that before that he was famous for being Yoko Ono’s drummer.

While the ceremony may have taken place in the other London, many Kentuckians still took note of the prestigious event as it officially moves Sir Pizza up from the bottom rung of least popular knights in the world. A scroll was delivered to the restaurant notifying Sir Pizza it had been promoted from the absolute bottom. “Hear ye, hear ye,” the printed-off email began, “The queen wishes to inform thee that you are no longer of the lowest order of knights, for another has been inducted beneath you. They shall be known from henceforth as Sir Ringo, The Applebee’s Of Beatles.”

South Broadway’s Sir Pizza manager Pete Best celebrated the pizza chain’s chivalrous ascension by letting his employees have an extra ten-minute break. “I know this means a lot to our hard working Sir Pizza family, It Don’t Come Easy.” Best added, “Put the lunches you packed away gang. That’s right, say Goodnight Vienna sausage, everyone on shift gets a large pizza with tiny pepperonis on the house.” Then he used what must have been a Speedy Rewards card to barely cut a circular pizza into small squares.