All Our Base Are Not Belong To You
Finding comic relief amid tragedy
Written by Mike originally for Scorching.org on September 11, 2025

FOREWORD:
September 11, 2025 - A year ago today, a lot of websites were putting up these sappy messages of shock & anger, which is all fine & dandy. But that's now how I work. So instead I decided to break the overall crappy mood with as much comic relief as I deemed allowable. I managed to hang onto the writing, & now, one year later, I thought I'd re-post it, purely for those of you who visit here on a regular basis to see what I had to say about an actual global issue. And those of you who know me personally are well aware that it's a rare occasion when I actually do have something to say.

Part 1
Written September 11, 2025

Let me start by saying that I don't find the events that happened today to be funny at all. It's depressing & downright scary. But it's in my nature to relieve tension through comic relief. I have no intention to make jokes at the expense or misfortune of others. In fact, I tried pretty hard not to offend anyone, so please, for the love of God, don't take this page the wrong way. I'm just trying to bring myself & anyone else who needs it up when they're down.

New York City goes through a lot of crap like this in the movies. Meteor showers. Godzilla attacks. Shredder kidnapping Manhattan Island & leaving it suspended in the sky. Sure, it sounds silly, & that's because movies are supposed to be silly. Stuff like that's not supposed to happen in real life. But somewhere along the line, somebody decided otherwise. Somebody sitting in some secret evil control room, flushing a toilet, & saying "World Trade Center go down the hole."

In a word, or rather in an emoticon, :,-(

We didn't know what to say as we watched our televisions. We thought the first plane was just a tragic accident, until Crazy Battle Bot Plane #2 dives head first into the other tower. It wasn't apparent to us right away, though. It took a couple of hours to realize that the scene wasn't changing to Bruce Willis hitting golf balls off his oil rig in the Pacific any time soon. It was then that we knew that something was wrong.

Hang on, April!

When I was a kid, I believed in superheroes like Superman, Batman, & the Ninja Turtles. I put my confidence in them to save us in a time of crisis. While the deaths of many innocent people who don't believe in what the kids dancing in the streets in the Middle East eating candy think we all do cast a dark shadow upon the day, the fact that there weren't any of my favorite superheroes around to stop this from happening, to stop people from hurting, only added to the heavy dose of reality.

Luckily, there was a highly underrated group of superheroes that came to save the day dressed in fireman suits & paramedic uniforms. No, they can't fly or shoot lasers or stop the building from collapsing with one hand. What they did have was something that the indestructible Superman would have a hard time providing the suffering Earthling... bravery.

Then, shortly after that, in comes Crazy Battle Bot Plane #3 into the Pentagon. Now they've gotten evidence that the plane was originally heading for the White House, but this is even creepier. The PENTAGON!! Isn't that our nation's big central security headquarters? No, I'm really asking. I never learned a lot about the Pentagon. I had Telly Monster to teach me everything I could possibly want to know about triangles, & occasionally a circle & square lesson was thrown in, but anything more than 4 sides rarely showed its face.

I colored this all by myself.

Meanwhile, the government is working hard to find out what looneys are behind this. A few people have started pointing fingers at possible guilty parties behind this terrorist attack. I'm not going to get into that until more develops. For now, I'm just going to say this: Leave the Iron Sheik alone. He didn't have anything to do with it. Honest.

PASSER-BY: "It's him! It's the terrorist!" IRON SHIEK: "How dare you accuse me of causing that despicable crime! Just who do you think you are?!" KIDS ON THE BED: "That's Hulk Hooogan!"

So the twin towers are gone. Collapsed into a cloud of dust. Many who live to tell the tale have been evacuated here into New Jersey. And they'll still probably have to pay a toll to get out. The rest of us do. Whether you're going to Pennsylvania, New York, or out to sea, it costs money to leave New Jersey.

What's missing from this picture? (taken from the back of a Highlights magazine)

60 years from now, somebody's going to make a really bad movie about this day. And my grandkids are going to drag my 80 year old bum to go see it. And I'm going to be that senile old fart in the back going "I remember that! I remember that!" Yes, one day, that will be me. It'll probably be a lot of us.

"Now that is a noble cause!"

Part 2
Written September 15, 2025

From a religious point of view.
I don't talk much about religion because I don't like arguing about it. I think it's stupid... to argue about it, I mean. Not to believe in it. But the other day I read a ridiculous statement that terrorist attacks are caused partially by the existence of atheism & homosexuality. That's right, according to this guy, if you're gay or don't believe in God, you are responsible for making planes crash into stuff.

I think this guy really opened my eyes to the truth. That's right. I've finally figured out the secret of the deities! Gather round, children... this is an important discovery. Ready for this? There's more than one being named God. It's the only logical explanation, because there is no WAY that the God that I grew up hearing about is the same guy that Jerry Falwell (the guy who made the aforementioned statement) is talking about.

Let's call the god I was raised believing in God X. Now God X is a cool guy. He kinda just sits back & keeps nature in working order & gives us a proverbial smack upside the head every once in a while when we need it. Now let's call Falwell's god God Y. God Y hates gay people, or "fags" as they're known to his followers. God Y also hates Jews, even though his son was one, & he sent said son to tell people that him. And then there's God Z, the one that the terrorists believe in. God Z has a short temper, & is known to have said, "Hey, dudes, you know what, I don't like Americans, so go ahead & play Chicken with their airplanes or something," to an elite group that I like to call "Allah Witnesses." I should also note God Z is NOT the standard Muslim God. That one is closer to God X.

There. There's all the religion you're getting from me right now. Sucka.

Could it beeeeeee SATAN?!
A couple days after the attack, I was shown a picture of a cloud of smoke from the collision of the 2nd plane into the 2nd tower. Apparently if you look closely, you can see a silhouette of the devil.

"Hi, kids!"

Now I can see where these people are finding Satan in the cloud of smoke. And the best part is that it really does look more like the goofy naked Devil from Cow & Chicken than it does that evil Satan guy. But does that really say anything? People see stuff in clouds all the time. We used to make a game out of it as kids.

LINUS: "Jumping Jesus on a pogo stick! An airplane just crashed into the World Trade Center!"
LUCY: "Oh my God, look! I think I see Satan in that cloud of smoke!! What do you see, Charlie Brown?"
CHARLIE BROWN: "Well, I was going to say I saw a horsey & a duckie, but I changed my mind."

The truth is, you're not special for seeing the devil in a cloud of smoke that just so happened to be caused by explosion. It's not uncommon to see stuff in clouds & other objects in nature. People have seen Jesus' face in snow, trees, & even cereal boxes. One time I heard of a guy that collected Frosted Flakes that looked like famous historical figures. In fact, this morning I thought I saw Michael Jackson in my bowl of Life cereal. What do you think that means, dear scholar?

"It means you've been hit by a smooth criminal."

The friendly skies.
The other day I went outside & looked up to see two airplanes fly overhead. And I started at them in awe, like I've never seen an airplane before. Before the 11th, they'd zoom by in the sky & I'd barely even notice. It's like I took airplanes for granted.

If I can get philosophical on your heiny for a second, I find that I often do the same with my relationships with other people. On the bright side of things, I'm alive right now, & all of my friends are alive to read this as well. It's kind of sad that I rarely see the true value of what I have until it's gone, so here's to not making a habit of it.