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In This Issue

• Spec to Columnist: Blow Yourself
• Vote Phil "Shuttlecock" Steigman
• Magic Cards Not Key to Happy Sex Life
• Letters to the Editor
• FU Foundation Unveils New Logo Wear
• Lerner Elevators vs. ROLM phones - The Final Battle
• Regime Change at The Fed
• Whoah It's A Scary Roach!
• Nerd Wizard Levels Up on Girl at Bar
• A Pleasant Star Wars DVD Fantasy
• Imaginary Superhuman Boyfriend Tell-All!
• Marauding Interviewer: Will You Take These Pills?
• Make Your Own Flamethrower or AIDS Drugs From the Web
• Freshman Magical Mystery Tour of Columbia
• Erotic Mad Libs
• Adventures of Ice Bitch II
• Catch As Catch Can
• Stickman Theatre
• Lord of The Rings Party
• Dining at Columbia, Mob Style
• Crane Droppings
• THEY WATCH

Find this flamer at FutureHorizons. And also the thing that he's holding.

And I thought those kids with motorized scooters were cool....

There are two ways to make money by appealing to people's fantasies. First, one can simply present a fantasy in a fictional world for entertainment purposes. For instance, I may never need a self-retracting grappling hook to escape an exploding zeppelin, but it entertains me to see Batman do the same. Cartoonists present animals impervious to dynamite, screen writers let the Goonies find the pirates' treasure, and governments depict moon landings because we the public enjoy seeing amazing dreams vivified in an alternate world of exciting, albeit obvious, fiction.

Inventors, on the other hand, profit by bringing fantasies to real life. Inventions like indoor plumbing, penicillin, and fetish-based prostitution began as cockamamie dreams but, once realized, ended up benefiting the masses, as well as plumbers, doctors, and redheads with adorable feet.

Of course, some inventions simply manipulate the naive by presenting false manifestations of popular fantasies. The list of such ignominious shams includes key parties, democracy, and now, the business operations of Future Horizons, Inc. Based in Marquette, Michigan, Future Horizons produces useful tools like magnetic levitators, mind control helmets, and light sabers, and sends out construction plans for Marty McFly-style hoverboards, UFO detectors, and other assorted sci-fi junk. At www.futurehorizons.net, you can find out how big businesses and governments don't want you to have amazing products like the "Sonic Devestator (sic)" because they want to maintain control over the public and profit from suppressing the truth about time travel.

Thanks to Future Horizons, however, we can take back the power. Have you ever dreamed of a world without disease? Well, with a fully assembled, seven hundred dollar Rife Machine (invented in the 1940s by the inventively named Royal Raymond Rife, an amazing man whose work was suppressed by the American Medical Association) you can cure AIDS, multiple sclerosis, diabetes, and "hundreads" of other diseases for just seven hundred dollars plus shipping. Or, if you buy the construction plans for only thirty dollars, "a 21 day do it yourself cure for HIV is included that can easily be built from parts obtainable from Radio Shack." Once merely a destination for lonely women in need of large batteries, Radio Shack is now the place to equip yourself for sex with other people. Sorry, drug stores and teen clinics of America, we no longer need suffer the embarrassment of obtaining prophylactics, for the age of the bedside sexual health-bot has arrived.

If you're more interested in technology's potential for evil, pick up a fully assembled traffic light switcher for $390. Technology once available only to greedy government emergency paramedics can now be yours. Imagine zipping through intersections on your hoverboard, manipulating public traffic safety devices while telling the missus to start the pot roast early. Don't worry, you needn't fumble with a cell phone to make the call-you can use your two-way wrist radio like in Dick Tracy (the product description includes an actual Dick Tracy cartoon panel) for just twenty smackers made out to Future Horizons!

Now suppose that some back-alley toughs see all your flashy gadgetry and make a move to gank your high-tech dreck. Have no fear, just whip out your Ion "Phasor" ($49 for "construction

with parts from Radio Shack. Won't having a handheld flame-thrower be worth a mere twenty dollars in construction plans? After all, it's "great for torching those nasty plans") and incapacitate them with electrified fluid! Whew! Now that you've made it home safe and sound, it's time to help your kids finish assembling their flame-thrower beehive's (sic, again)."

Looking for a big-ticket item, I tried to find the best product available from Future Horizons. Since the jet pack prototype, which will run on unleaded gasoline, is currently being redesigned, I had to go with the plasma-powered light saber, a $990 value. From the ad: "The Plasma Saber looks amazingly similar to the real thing when activated. You won't realize how true this really is until you actually hold it in your hand." So if you're wondering how something can resemble a "real thing" which doesn't actually exist, remember that your doubt and confusion will really vanish once you actually buy the light saber. The product demonstration video ("not altered at all visually") is pretty convincing: a crooked air-lock door opens with a gasp, indicating the demonstration really took place on an actual space ship, and a guy in a robe approaches and really does light saber tricks. From the video I can tell that the saber's sound effects are "the most advanced ever created," and I agree that "when its (sic) swung aggressively [and how else would you swing a fake light saber you just bought for a thousand dollars?] the sound it produces is amazingly cool!"

Before you buy, let me answer a few questions you may have. Orders can not be canceled, and refunds will only be given if the product arrives broken (don't worry, the light saber comes in a padded black case). No applications for employment at Future Horizons will be accepted, and the office phone number is not made available because employees "do not have a lot of time to be answering the phones. When you are working with the equipment that we do, it is best if you go undisturbed." Construction plans come in the mail, while hoverboards are sent by freight. "We do not generally recommend you stopping by our office to pick something up," and no public or private tours of the Marquette facility are offered.

Indeed, we can all rest easy knowing the good people at Future Horizons will continue to devote themselves to solving life's problems with ray guns and mind-controlling Atlantean power rods, as long as we don't ask any pesky, skeptical questions. Fantasy can become reality; you just have to believe. That's going to be the motto on the chest plate of my nuclear-capable exoskeletal battlesuit. Construction plans: ten bucks.