January 1, 2016

My Top Ten New Year’s Resolutions for 2016:

1. Draw moustaches on every ad I find featuring a Calvin Klein model. Because Calvin Klein discriminates against moustaches.
2. Work out twice, get massive gains, and then never leave my couch ever again.
3. Get Nobel Prize. (Note to self: come up with a plan for stealing a Nobel Prize. Preferably the Nobel Peace Prize.)
4. Publicly shame all people who park in two or more parking stalls at the same time by painting the words “Double Parker” on their doors in neon colours.
5. Every time I see two people (hopefully two people) engaged in unnecessary public displays of affection (ex. making out, fondling, unnecessary touching, or the like), I will point at them and shout at the top of my lungs, “It’s just like the monkeys at the zoo!”
6. Always wear my shoes on the correct feet (this will be the year that I get that one right).
7. Learn all the words to Macklemore’s song, “Downtown”, and buy myself a moped.
8. Master the ancient art of foosball.
9. Learn how to make an origami dragon and then make origami dragons for everyone I ever meet.
10. Read a new book and then scoff at everyone who has never read it before. The more obscure the book the better.

December 26, 2015

I’ve made a huge mistake. At least now I understand the lyrics of my least favourite Christmas song of all time: “Last Christmas, I gave you my heart/But the very next day, you gave it away”. Yes, my heart was broken on Christmas. And it is the fault of this Lola.

When I gave Lola the details of my devious plot to impersonate Santa Claus and sneak into people’s homes stealing their most prized possessions and thereby funding my plan for world domination, I thought that she would be impressed by my sheer genius (and not realize that I was copying the plot of a beloved Christmas tale). But alas and alack, her awe was feigned in order to steal my plans. Yes, Lola sabotaged my plan and tried to steal Christmas by herself.

I realized what was happening when I woke up Christmas Eve to find that all of the elves I had kidnapped had disappeared. Not only that, every bit of equipment I had gathered in preparation for my great heist was gone! The only thing that conniving temptress left me were the eight, fake reindeer from Walmart. Why couldn’t she at least have taken the reindeer?

I woke up Christmas morning to find that Lola was in the news. Not only had she stolen my plans and supplies, but she pulled it off beautifully! All the news networks are saying that the newest, evil mastermind in the world is Lola. It should have been me!

December 22, 2015

I went to Walmart (how I hate that place) and bought myself a set of plastic reindeer. They look about as realistic as Spongebob Squarepants, but if all goes according to plan, nobody will see them up close anyway. The key to success my friends is hoping nobody looks too close.

It is now time for some last minute preparations, and then I am ready for the greatest Christmas caper since the Grinch stole the last can of Who Hash.

Lola called again, very interested in my evil plot. She can’t resist the guileful mind of Linus Effluvium. I mean, who can? Maybe I can convince her to join me as my assistant. After all, she is just a lowly lab assistant working for a two-bit evil genius who barely qualifies as a mastermind of any sort.

But that is something for another day. For now, I must prepare myself for my greatest plot: taking over the world by pretending to be Santa Claus.

December 15, 2015

It turns out that hiring elves to work for Santa is harder than it might seem. So I went another route. Somehow, Santa himself has managed to hire elves to work for (I assume) the mere joy of providing presents to children. He must be either a master negotiator or he hired a human resources guru. Either way, I knew that there was only one way I would be able to compete with that: simply steal Santa’s elves!

I knew that stealing Santa’s elves from the North Pole was not an option. I was not all that interested in re-enacting the battle of Hoth to capture a few pint-sized creatures in strange hats and pointy shoes. Instead, I decided to kidnap the elves Santa brings with him to those photo shoots he does.

The mall where I took Lucifer was not going to let me anywhere near Santa or his elves ever again, so I decided to check out another mall. Sure enough, Santa was there too, along with all his elves and even a sleigh. I wonder how Santa can be at two places at once. I’ve got to learn that trick.

Once I got to the mall and scoped out Santa’s security detail (for the single largest distributor of children’s toys in the world, he has a surprisingly small budget for personal security; he must be getting naive in his old age), I put my plan into motion, a plan which I call Operation Hansel & Gretel. When the elves were looking the other way, I scattered a trail of candy canes on the ground, leading from Santa’s workshop to an unused sidedoor. This attracted a bunch of kids who tried to steal my perfectly baited trap, but I shooed them away with a decapitated teddy bear.

Eventually, one of the elves noticed the trail of candy canes and followed it to the side door. When he opened the door to search for more candy, I swooped in and threw him in a brown bag. I repeated the process until I had enough of those silly little elves.

The problem with a Prius is that they are not quite equipped for the storage and transport of multiple elves in brown bags. But, with a bit of creative maneuvering, seat adjusting, and a couple hard kicks to the shins, I forced my elves into the back seat of the Prius. Mission accomplished.

December 18, 2015

Lola called today! She wanted to know more about my plan for taking over the world via Christmas. I think I wowed her with my devilish charm and wit. There’s nothing like a well-timed knock-knock joke to woo a potential employee (who may or may not be the most attractive lab assistant I’ve ever met).

Lola seemed impressed, which is good enough for me. She asked lots of questions about my ingenious plan. I, of course, had only the most intellectual answers. Until, that is, she asked about the thrust-to-weight ratio of launching a fully-loaded sleigh with eight reindeer plus passengers off the roof of a single-family dwelling. I had the answer, of course – it’s the same basic principle as launching a fighter jet off of an aircraft carrier, except with no windscreen and no ground crew – but the problem was that I had overlooked one key factor: reindeer.

Everyone knows that Santa Claus needs his reindeer. My problem is that I never factored living reindeer into my calculations. I will need some fake ones instead. I saw a set of fake reindeer at Walmart, the kind that people put up on their lawn. I wonder if I could make those work…

December 11, 2015

Today I attended the League of Evil Genius Overlords job fair. Sadly, every time we hold such an event, we are inevitably crashed by a group of pre-pubescent teens and post-pubescent nerds living in their mothers’ basements who think that the LEGO job fair represents a beloved Danish toy company instead of the who’s who of criminal masterminds. Many a toy brick dream has been smashed by the heavy foot of LEGO (the evil version).

This time I attended as an employer. I had a sign made up and everything announcing my new job opening: “Elves needed. Entry-level only. Must like snow and reindeer.” I got a lot of long-haired hippies carrying fake bows and arrows come through before I realized that there was a Lord of the Rings event going on next door. When I realized that, I added, “Must swear fealty to the Dark Lord” on the sign. That stopped the lookie loos.

I had considered using robots as my elves, but after what happened at Halloween, I decided to avoid the use of robots until I figured out how to make them immune to fireworks. In the meantime, I had to satisfy myself with human labourers. How bourgeois.

A few people who stopped were actually serious about the opportunity. Most of them were henchman (henchperson?) interns with another LEGO member and were looking for advancement opportunities. None of them, however, really fit the role well. What I mean by that is that they were dumber than a worm with strep throat, denser than an especially dense rock, stupider than the grammar nazis who think that “stupider” isn’t a word. In short, they were perfect henchmen for a Spiderman comic strip, but not the quality that I would expect for up and coming LEGO participants.

And then came Lola. She’s young, brunette, and is a research assistant to some mad scientist who’s trying to harness volcanic energy to take over Iceland (he’s welcome to it; I mean, what kind of country doesn’t even have its own army!). I practically begged her to join my team. I’m not sure if I got through to her or not, but she took my business card. That’s what I call progress.

Other than Lola, today was a compete bust.

December 7, 2015

Well, it’s taken a few days, but I’ve finally gotten the cat fur out of the floor mats in my Prius. Little Lucifer sheds like a – well, like a cat.

After studying the movements of Santa Claus, I have come up with the following observations:

1. I need to buy a fat suit, because not even I could gain 100 pounds before Christmas
2. Even Santa Claus (if that is the real Santa Claus; I still have my doubts) has a fake beard. Therefore, it will be perfectly acceptable for me to buy a fake white beard. I think Walmart still has some Gandalf costumes left over from Halloween
3. I can see now why Santa has all those elves to help him: he’s too fat to tie his own shoelaces, let alone run an overnight delivery service to every house in the world. He needs all the help he can get
4. Santa reeks of cigarette smoke and has more gravel in his voice than coal mine. I either need to take up smoking or swallow about a gallon of acid. Either one would have the same effect on my health
5. I’m no medical doctor, but either Santa has had thirteen heart transplants or his body is immune to cholesterol. I’ve never seen a grown man eat so much bacon in a public place

I don’t know if these observations mean anything, but I will be keeping all of this in mind as I prepare for the next phase of my plan: hiring elves.

December 4, 2015

I went to go see Santa today. It was a fiendish plot to watch how the fat man acts, so that I can impersonate him. It turns out that there aren’t that many adult men who go to see Santa by themselves. In fact, one particularly nosy elf asked me to leave. I guess I was scaring some people.

I was about to change my plan entirely and just kidnap merry old Saint Nicholas when I found my break: you’re allowed to bring your animal to get a picture with Santa. Apparently, this is kind of a big deal for a lot of people. They just want Christmas cards with their pet on Santa’s lap and the caption “I’ve been a good boy/girl” emblazoned across the front. I can’t, for the life of me, figure out why this is a good idea, but apparently it’s a thing. And that was how I found my in.

Lucifer has never been a good traveller. I think he has ADHD, because he never has been able to sit still, and as soon as I put him in his kitty carrier, he turns into something out of an exorcism movie. But I managed to wrestle him into the car while losing only a moderate amount of blood, so I’ll take that as a win. Letting him out was just as much of an adventure. I had to put him on a leash just to keep him from jumping onto the roof of the Volkswagen van parked next to my Prius.

I’m not quite sure what’s stranger: getting your cat’s picture taken with Santa, or walking your cat on a leash. Either way, I did both of them. I got some stares. One insolent child dared to say to me, “Your baby is really ugly, mister.” I would have obliterated him if I didn’t happen to agree with him.

Santa was a bit of an enigma. You always hear about how jolly Santa is. Well, as soon as Lucifer sat on his lap, Santa turned into a bigger cry-baby than Ebenezer Scrooge on Christmas morning. It’s just a couple hundred scratches. Get over it, Kris Kringle.

Needless to say, I got kicked out of Santa’s workshop, and Lucifer’s mugshot is now hanging up in the mall’s security office. But I got to watch Santa up close and see how he operates. All in all, I’d say it was a successful day.

December 1, 2015

Christmas is my favourite time of year! You may ask yourself why this is the case. After all, why would an evil genius like myself appreciate a time of year that promotes peace and goodwill to all men? It’s because people let their guards down. The Grinch had it right: anyone will let a fat man dressed in a red suit into their house around Christmas. The Grinch’s only problem is that he didn’t have the gall to go through with his plan all the way to the end. I don’t have that problem; my gallbladder is working just fine, thank you very much.

It will take a lot of work to prepare for my own Christmas plot this year. But when the snow settles on Christmas morning, there will be a new ruler in town, and his name is Dr. Linus Effluvium!

November 28, 2015

I went to the Walmart today.  It is a miracle that the place is still standing.  If I had brought my rocket launcher with me, there would be nothing left but a smoking crater in the ground. (Note to self: next time I go to Walmart, bring the rocket launcher.)

When I first pulled in, I was amazed by the sheer volume of idiot parkers.  If you own a Ford pickup truck, that does not reserve you the right to take up two, three, or even four parking stalls.  Even if I didn’t bring a rocket launcher, I still keep my Prius well-stocked with tools of the trade (Yes, I drive a Prius).  So, if you were double parked at a Walmart today, don’t be surprised if you came back to your vehicle to find that you suddenly have a convertible.

Needless to say, the Walmart security showed up pretty quickly when I started up my acetylene blowtorch in the middle of the Walmart parking lot.  There was this one grandma with her two toddler grandkids who glared at me; I think she’s probably the one who ratted me out.

I had cut the top off of three double-parked vehicles by the time the security guards arrived.  There was a bit of a stand-off, with them accusing me of mass destruction of property and me accusing them of stifling artistic expression.  After a few minutes of philosophical repartee (and several threats of jailtime from both sides of the debate), I decided that a tactical retreat was in order.

All in all, I like to think of this day as my first excursion into enemy territory.  Needless to say, vengeance shall be mine.