Tell me you watched the live coverage of Balloon Boy today. Don’t break my heart and just tell me you did. I sat at work, hunkered down in my office, my face only dimly lit by the bluish view from my computer screen rooting on the six year old inside the homemade space craft.
*Errrrreeeeek! *record comes to a SCREECHING halt.
Let me just bring you up to speed if you a) don’t have Twitter or b) were living under a rock.
Today the news stations were all flustered with a breaking story. A six year old boy! Runaway aircraft! Wait, wait, runaway homemade aircraft that looks like a giant flying saucer! 10,000 feet above the ground! He was losing control, cameras were following the little spaceship’s every move! People were flipping the eff out on Twitter. #Balloonboy became a trending topic on Twitter in like 32.4 seconds and everyone was like, “OMG! #Balloonboy is not a laughing matter! He could B dead!!!!” And I sort of giggled because I was just like, “Musin… Clev… There’s a kid in a BALLOON that looks like a SPACESHIP. Oh and it’s spiraling out of control over the Rockies.” And then we all had a good laugh.
But then the unthinkable (and by unthinkable I mean how did we NOT see this coming???) happened and they got the balloon down and no six year old boy popped out. None at all. In fact, I was a little nervous when the people were hacking away at the spaceship and I was all THE BOY! WHAT ABOUT THE BOY INSIDE?! Until I realized, oh hey, he’s not in there. He’s probably fallen out… SADFACE.
I was really sad. Mainly for the family because the death of a child, *shudder* is terrible but also because MAN, this story had so much potential for funny. I laughed allt he way up until there was a lack of boy in the balloon. In fact, I have several instances I’d like to point out.
1) Exactly what kind of family has a homemade, spare, functioning spaceship just lying around? I mean, are they in the habit of creating such vehicles? Is this a side hobby of the family? Are they in the Real Live Spaceship business? Spaceships ‘R Us: You dream it, we make it. (No, you shut up. If I had a spaceship making business that is totally what I would name it.)
2) How exactly did the conversation go when they realized the kid was missing? “Oh hey, anyone seen Falco-OH MY GOSH. He’s floating away in our homemade fully functioning astronaut farmer spacecraft!! CALL THE GUARD!!!!” That’s all there is to say about that.
3) The kid’s name is Falcon. As in the bird. That flies. Is anyone else seeing the irony here?
4) Let’s just take a minute to grab some lines from news anchors reporting this debacle… We all know Shep Smith has uttered my favorite line of all time. (Wait… Did we not know this? Short version: Guy runs up while Shep is reporting on Katrina, crazy, drunk guy running around without his shirt on, Shep says, “Sir! Sir! What are you still doing here?! Everyone is supposed to be out!” Crazy, drunk guy screams something about partying with Katrina or something and Shep looks back at the camera, deadly serious and says, “THAT guy’s probably gonna die.” The end.) But today an anchor actually looked at the camera and said, “This isn’t the kind of thing we see very often.”
I’m sorry.
What?
VERY OFTEN?! When have you ever seen a six year old float away in a homemade spaceship?! That would be NEVER, my friend. Never. Not once. Not last week. Not since Area 51 was the talk of the town. Never.
5) And finally, let’s just address the little fact of where Balloon Boy actually was… After his parents have called out the National Guard or whatever military service they were using. After CNN has had this kid as their breaking news headline for the majority of the day. After I have spent the last two hours of my workday glued to my computer screen do we find out… Little Falcon? He was IN THE ATTIC.
Yeah.
ATTIC.
Probably just hanging out. Playing army or pretending to be Anne Frank. I’m not real sure what six year old boys do when their in the attic alone while the rest of the nation worries that they might not be alive any longer. Wanna know why I’m not so sure? Because the rest of the entire nation and I were too busy watching the spiraling Jiffy Pop container over the Rockies! Wondering if the child has already plummeted to his death! Yeah, that’s what I was doing. What about you?
Long live AH! Deuces!
*drops mic….
9 Comments
lololol. What a waste of TV time. Well, not completely, I got a good laugh out of it.
.-= Chaunna´s last blog ..(Untitled) =-.
Damn damn damn, now I’ll have to find a new name for the Spaceship wholesale store I planned to open up here in NYC. I was certain it would “take off”…*insert TV audience chuckles.
I totally agree with you. As the parent of two boys, I watched the whole thing thing worried about the boy, wondered where his parents were when he climbed in and set the spaceship free, fretted about whether he might possibly fall out, worried that he must certainly be scared as that thing bobbed and spun….
And then discovered he wasn’t even in it when it landed! HAD he actually fallen out, plunging tragically, and quite messily to the ground from thousands of feet in the air?
Thousands of dollars of our search money later, he turns up in the family attic. A happy ending to a very, VERY strange and stressful story.
thanks for putting it into perspective.
Yeah, friend, I already have Spaceships ‘R Us copyrighted, trademarked and the most important of all: I called dibs first.
You know how when Peter fights that huge chicken on Family guy…right before the chicken attacks, Peter always goes “OH…..MY…….GAWD.” Well, that is exactly what the parents said when they realized their spare spaceship (I say spare because SURELY the kid isn’t allowed to play in the “Sunday-go-to-meeting spaceship…) was in the air and they had NO idea where FALCON was. In fact, here is a true and accurate transcript of the convo between Mama and Papa Falcon
M: Ted, where’s Falcon? (I made up the Ted part…but doesn’t it just fit so well?)
D: Uh….(scratches belly, sips his coors light ((this is OBVIOUSLY a coors light house)) I think I saw YOUR son outside by my extra spaceship (because there’s more than one, clearly)
M: Why do you call him MY son?
D: We both know your kid is weird Barb (I think Barb fits well also) and we both know there’s about 2 weeks of gray area as far as conception.
M: Screw you, Ted.
D: That’s the problem Barb…it wasn’t just me…Anyhoo, he’s outside.
M: I can’t believe you let him go outside by himself (walks to door) and play by himself with the spare spaceship (because there MUST be more than one in this family)…I mean Falcon is only six Ted (approaches back door) and you let him (looks at balloon passing the roof of garage)
TED!!!
D: Whadya want now?
M: TED!!! The spaceship is… (Ted races to door…)
TOGETHER: OH…….MY………GAWD (both look up to the spare spaceship)
AND…..SCENE!
Yep, that is exactly what happened. (Lie).
.-= M. Randy´s last blog ..Balloon Boy: A Ridiculously, Undeserved Nickname =-.
A. That kid will forever be the butt of jokes in school.
B. If he was mine, by the time that I was finished with him, Social Services would be scraping him off the floor…
C. I hope that they fine his idiot parents so much that even their Social Security checks will have to be used to pay off their debt. Stupidity is truly a criminal offence!
This story is just great, and will continue to get better!
When asked what happened, Falcon calmly told CNN “I played with my toys and took a nap.” This if course while the Colorado Air National Guard and Federal Aviation Administration scoured the area with a UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter. Yea, thanks-a-frickin-lot Heene family. Jackasses.
And the whole thing turned out to be a hoax… The family is going to be charged… Thanks a lot for raising my blood pressure for no reason…
http://www.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUSTRE59E5H720091019?feedType=nl&feedName=usmorningdigest
Great read, Ill come back