Dr. STEIN FRANKEN AND HIS TURK/BEAR MONSTER

By Ted Colin
I caught up with Dr. Stein Franken in a back alley as he exited the sheriff’s headquarters in downtown Traverse City. I asked the good doctor if he would join me for a cup of coffee at a nearby café. At first he scoffed at the idea but then, he recognized me as the blog reporter who interviewed him and his family after they were attacked during a neighborhood backyard luau by the notorious Northern Michigan Lizard Monster. Evidently, Dr. Franken thought that I understood what he and his family went through when they were attacked by the lizard monster. Dr. Franken had appreciated the fact that I had not put too fine a point on the fact that he and his neighbors were nudists and that they were all buck naked when the lizard monster attacked. It seems my cover-up of the nudist propensities of this former University of Michigan research geneticist had earned me an interview.

Dr. Stein Franken and I drove over to the Flap Jack Shack for coffee and pancakes. They have terrific pancakes but, the coffee there is simply great and I figured an old lush like Dr. Franken could probably use a little coffee to make his story more coherent. Dr. Franken ravenously ate down a plate of pancakes and guzzled an entire coffee pot of caffeinated coffee. I was unable to finish my pancakes because Dr. Franken has a long grey beard and it was just full of pieces of pancake and sticky pancake syrup and he was sitting right across from me and he just made me sick. He had coffee drooling out the corner of his mouth and his bad breath made my eyes tear up.

Finally, I decided to start the interview. “So Dr. Franken, what have you done now?” I asked.

“It really is not my fault” replied Dr. Franken,” I have a real drinking problem and every time I overindulge I start thinking about how I can improve the world. I begin to think about how I could play God and make this a better place for all creatures great and small. I see all the creatures frolicking in the forest and I really believe that I can help evolution along in some way. Well, yesterday I was fishing and drinking cherry schnapps when this big black bear came out of the woods and he would not leave me alone until I gave to him my two rainbow trout I had caught that morning. While this thieving creature ate my trout I noticed a giant snapping turtle was crawling up the river bank. I decided that the bear might be more attractive with a turtle head, backside and, shell so I kicked the bear as hard as I could in the groin and did the same to the turtle. Both animals were in such pain that they passed out and did not come too until the operation was complete. I had spliced together the genes and body parts of a bear and turtle and created the world’s first bearturt.”

“So what happened with this bearturt?” I asked.

The old Doctor looked blankly at me as he was retrieving what turned out to be some horrifying memories of the bearturt. “Well,” began the doctor,” the bearturt was really quite a hideous creature and I told it so. It seemed to get perturbed but I’m not sure if it was mad because of what I had done to it or that I had told it that it was ugly. At any rate, it chased me out of the forest and onto a highway. The bearturt then flipped over several cars and flipped off several SUV drivers. SUV drivers always tailgate so I always preprogram all the creatures I create to flip SUV drivers off. At about this point the sheriff and his deputies showed up and starting shooting at the awful looking creature but it seems the turtle shell kept the bullets from penetrating any vital organs. The creature then fled into the woods to do whatever horrible a bear/turtle monster might do.”

Dr. Stein Franken was so high on coffee that I had to drive him home. After I dropped off the mad scientist I began to wonder how mankind could make such hideous destructive things like the turkbear but, we are unable to cure male pattern baldness. We are truly a messed up society and we do not have our priorities right.