Breakthrough research shows that the average human being has an attention span slightly longer than that of a fruit fly.

By tracking newspaper sales and snooping on your social media output, artificial intelligence specialists demonstrated that a typical human being grows bored of bashing people over the heads with "You're an inhuman monster and you're making us all unsafe" after 6 weeks.

At that point, the average human being wants to go back to "normalcy", which is a combination of normality and complacency, with a fair bit of complicity and consumerism thrown in for good measure.

This is Good for the Economy [tm], says researcher Zing Dweebat, who registered that tired expression as a trademark, patented the process of researching things, and sold the publicly-funded data to the Zitzengunsten military for an undisclosed amount of money.

Not everyone agrees with Ms. Dweebat's conclusion that short attention spans are Good for the Economy [tm].

A newspaper editor who asked to remain anonymous told us that "Boredom is bad for business. If people are sick of scabies, and want to go outside again, then make them fearful of something. Just do your god damned jobs or you'll all be laid off because we can't afford to pay your salaries!"

The anonymous newspaper editor went on to reminisce about the good old days of fearing brown towel-headed people, who at least had the decency to continue blowing things up long after white people got bored of fearing them and resumed their nomalcies, such as flying in planes and working in office towers.

"What we need," explained Claudette Monet-Grüber, the Reader in Economics at Fork in the Road Private Academy, "are continual spikes in the curve. We need to make sure the curve never flattens, so that people are always anxious and afraid and willing to consume newspapers. Basically when the economic lab rat doesn't perform the way we want it to, we must use electrodes to zap it into action.

Ahmooda Bahleefir, Science Teacher at Fork in the Road Private Academy, added: "Animal nature is to love and to work; to continue life along a straight line, trying to avoid sharp curves. But we are not animals. We are superior in every way. We must introduce sharp spikes in the curve in order to jolt us and make us hate each other and rage on the internet about the people who disagree with us. The human being wants normalcy, like an animal. But we must correct the human being, and find something new every few weeks to make us all fearful and willing to buy more newspapers."

"By the way," Ms. Bahleefir continued, "I taught Zing when she was at the Fork in the Road Private Academy. Wonderful girl. Not like her dad. Did you know that old coot has trained his ugly invisible little Tarski Monsters to shit on my lawn?"

Zing Dweebat's current research involves proving that the Big Pharma [tm] Flu Vaccine [tm], which has come under attack recently by armchair pharmacologists claiming it's just high-priced disinfectant and has, on average, no discernable effect on flu season, except perhaps to kill those who take it, is actually very effective, and anyone who disagrees based on articles published in medical journals or by government research is an anti-vaxer heretic and should be denounced vociferously and hounded from their job.

Mere minutes after Mayor S. Perkele announced Prohibition in Fork in the Road last Monday, out of work, disgruntled anarchists started breaking the rules and smuggling booze in from Zitzengunsten.

"Sure, why not?" said Senita Waddlebum. "This town hasn't exactly treated me well. I feel it's time to start undermining the system. A little bit at a time, planning each step carefully. The way I'd ski a marathon. I won't break any logical laws. Friendly far awayancing makes sense to me; I don't want my vagina to catch on fire. But Prohibition? That is pointless. It's time to shift a little of the quicksand produced by this bureaucratic control freak we call a democracy under the feet of the bureaucracy itself. Let it sink into the muck for a while as we anarchists bring some planning and sense back to this town."

Ms. Waddlebum is just bitter because she's not actually a woman, or even human.

Black-painted boats, with their running lights off and stocked with booze, were streaming into town each night this week, pulling up on gravelly beaches, with chairs set up by the smugglers so that desperately sober Fitrians could Sit the Blazes Down while buying their liquor.

Mayor Perkele said, "We'll overlook it for now. After all, people are consuming again, and it's crucial in these difficult times that we keep people consumptive. Besides, have you tasted the beer from Zitzengunsten?"

Ipsurd released a survey showing that 200 proof of Fork in the Road adults will drink even Zitzengunsten beer if they are left with no other options.

The towelheads are getting all bombastic again.

The tiny oiligarchy of Neverheardofistan was invaded Sunday by its neighbour, the petroleumarchy Didntweequiptheirarmyabad.

Prince Mohammed Smith, chief executive officer of Didntweequiptheirarmyabad, declared total victory and said, "Watch the profits roll in!"

Leonard Lump, Mayor of Zitzengunsten, said he had shares in Neverheardofistan and that he intended to sue, with Tomahawk missiles.

A German crypto-petroleum research lab has declared that the Irrefutable Tautology Engine, introduced by Erogan Stink to stop the environment and save the world and all that, is actually worse for the environment than filling up a steel drum with gasoline, lighting it on fire, and pouring lead and mercury into the concoction as it burns.

The study has not been made public, and in any case it's written in German, but even environmentalists have fallen for it, saying things like: "drilling through pools of water for lithium destroys the environment," and "if you were to hook up the Irrefutable Tautology Engine to a coal-powered electricity station, and use the generating station to produce at least 4 times more energy than is required to power the engine, then it would produce more emissions than the most efficient gas-powered car."

Clearly the Irrefutable Tautology Engine is a crock, and the internet has gone wild with support for this new german crypto-petroleum theory. A new Facebook group started up, calling for an immediate ban of all research into petroleum alternatives. Half of the members are card-carrying environmentalists who share the concerns of their big business sisters and brothers. After all, who cares about the environment when our mutual funds are suffering? We all need to retire with Porsches.

We tried to reach Erogan Stink for comment, but he was too stoned out of his mind, and releasing insider information on his Twitter account, to bother with us.

Mr. Stink's girlfriend, 14 year old Fork in the Road popstar Grim, said she was too stoned out of her mind to comment, too. She then released a song on FooToob called "The Chipmunks Sing a Song in Madarin About Rape and Stuff."

Mr Stink and his girlfriend were last seen dressed up as demons and lying flat on their backs in the Grand Canyon, staring up at the sky and moaning "Whooaaaaahhhh..."

The German crypto-petroleum company asked to remain anonymous, and offered me a $10 gift certificate to Donut Disturb down on Strip Mall Avenue to publish this article. Who could refuse that? We all have Porsches to retire to.

Donut Disturb has introduced a new donut, the Hope Donut, with the goal of raising money to support the orphaned children and middle aged son and daughter of those who died in the Bug Spray Tsunami.

"I might not be able to keep the Porsche and still retire by 55!" wept Dystrophic Meilleurvie, son of Pauvrella Meilleurvie, who died alone and chained to her long-term care bed by her loving family.

The Hope Donut was created to instill hope in the families of victims of the Bug Spray Tsunami.

"Our goal," reads the Donut Disturb website, where you can donate online, "Is to allocate 100% of proceeds. To the victims' families, we say: get up earlier, work harder and longer, and be hopeful!"

Disruption Man donated $5,000 of his multi-billion dollar fortune to the Hope Donut Foundation. "It's for a good cause," he said. "My whole life, I have always believed very strongly in supporting the, ummm... Ah... The, errrrrm... Look! Breast cancer! Aw, isn't that sweet."

You can donate to this worthy cause at:

www.donutdisturb.forkintheroad.ca/hopedonut

Nothing is as entertaining as watching another human being suffer.

Andy Stablusman, fresh from wasting hospital resources for his broken bones instead of saving the hospital bed for scabies patients who might have needed it, was seen in Fork in the Road Park on the weekend, reciting Hugh MacDiarmid poetry to the black-capped chickadees, the only creatures in this town daft enough to listen to his rabble-rousing nonsense..

"I think they were only listening to his bungling Scots dialect because he was feeding them crusty Swedish rye bread biscotti," said James Ladeeda, who was out searching his bushes for the mysterious poetry peepers who keep staring through basement apartment windows at poets working away at their craft in this town.

Nobody knows why all animals, including black-capped chickadees, love Swedish rye bread biscotti so much. Zing Dweebat, PhD. student at the University of Zitzengunsten, has published several articles on the phenomenon, including the contested theory that caraway seeds and hemp are all that's needed for any living organism to lead a good life and be stoned all the time and play frisbee and retire with a Porsche in the driveway. "Totally," said Ms. Dweebat when contacted for comment.

Andy Stablusman broke off relentlessly educating the animal world in the abstruse arts of obscure poets to come rant at us.

"Perpetual opposition!" he cried like a complete loon, before throwing a tasty bit of rye biscotti at the tape recorder then stomping back to his little fort made of stacked-up 30-packs of toilet paper and Gravol bottles in the middle of the park.

Mr. Stablusman can be seen every evening this week, or during matinee hour, at Fork in the Road Park. It is expected he will finish reciting the first MacDiarmid poem sometime in the next few weeks, so be sure to catch his performance soon. Or stay home and watch Zombies and Thrones, there's way more tits and violence in that, and it's not written in bloody esperanto or whatever the hell language it is Stablusman is supposedly reading.

It's back! Next week is the annual Brand Crucifixion Week, during which we publish photos of our readers posing with their favourite brands of products, in religious motifs.

Whether you're a Catholic who takes a selfie with a rosary of Mercedes [tm] hood ornaments, or a Hindu dressed up as Ganesha sucking Heinz [tm] ketchup out of a plastic bottle with its godlike trunk, or a Buddhist who poses with a plastic statue of Gautama wearing Nike [tm] shoes with overflowing handfuls of Bitcoins, send us your least creative, least imaginative, most "look what a great consumer and free advertiser I am" photo, for a chance to win a pair of Bluetooth Zippers [tm] jeans and a Draw a Line Through the Squiggly Thing [tm] T-shirt.

The election in Zitzengunsten for the new President of the Society of Demented Molestors is only 6 months away, and the campaigning starts now.

Oranj Bulbous, the reigning champion, weighing in at a whopping 45 I.Q., gave a speech on the steps of the Vomitorium of the Slightly Elliptical Arena:

As I get ready to don my orange spandex for another four beautiful years, I am reminded of the words of my father, who said to me as he beat me over the cranium with a beautiful aluminum baseball bat: "Son, pain is weakness leaving the body."

President Bulbous's chief rival in the ring will be Drew Launbiben, who defeated Anoyeen Bantsah earlier this year for the leadership of the Taupe tag team. Mr. Launbiben has not yet chosen a tag team running mate, because, his assistants tell me, he can't remember any of their names.

In a rousing speech in downtown Zitzengunsten, Mr. Launbiben pointed upward and said:

Hubdah!

His wife whispered in his ear and pulled him offstage.

Meanwhile, Oranj Bulbous descended on a rope hanging from the helicopter, slipped, fell 300 yards (that's 300 metres for you metric fascists), killing four spectators and castrating the justice system, got up, and said, "It's OK. I'm OK. Wasn't that beautiful? A beautiful entrance, in front of a beautiful crowd, on this beautiful day. Look at that beautiful wall!"

At this point, Drew Launbiben's wife rushed back on stage, whispered in the President's ear, then returned to the shadows.

"Beautiful invisible wall," President Bulbous continued. "It's so beautiful it's as if it wasn't even there."

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I caught up with contender Drew Launbiben after the crowd had dispersed and asked him if he might have been exposed to scabies.

"Yes," he replied. His wife whispered in his ear. "Oh, but I didn't exhale."

The match in six months' time promises to be a good one. It will be broadcast live on Pay-Per-Torrent.

Gunther Dimofo lives in, and reports from, a gated bunker community in Upper Zitzengunsten.

Bob and Belinda McIncltd have set up a new charitable initiative to provide much-needed help to the homeless living rough in Fork in the Road Park.

"Everyone has been really deeply affected by the Bug Spray Explosion and the Bug Spray Tsunami," said Belinda McIncltd. "Everyone wants to throw money at it, like the tragedy is a really inept pole dancer who will keep her clothes on if we just throw fives and tens at her until she takes her haul and runs off stage. So we figured: why not take advantage of it? We've got diapers to buy, after all."

"That's right," said Bob McIncltd. "Cherry Fanta is really carbonated and wet, so we have to buy the most plasticky plastic diapers there are."

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The goal is for 100% of the money to support the homeless.

Mrs. McIncltd drew a picture of how trickle-down economics works. "First, you pay rich people, and ease your bleeding little heart. Then, a complex process occurs here, you see this suiggly ball of confusion? That's right, that's what economists call the RAIRU - Reverse-Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment. It means that as long as we all remain cheerfully optimistic in spite of all the shit raining down on people's heads around us, then in a few weeks the jobless rate will be NEGATIVE! Can you imagine that? A negative jobless rate? Wow, that's impressive. I can't wait."

Mr. and Mrs. McIncltd also had to clear out all the crap stashed in their spare bedroom to turn it into a baby room. "I'm a preparationist," Mr. McIncltd explained. "But Belinda said, 'You get rid of all this god damned toilet paper, Gravol [tm] and kitty litter now, or I'll make sure my rich parents write you out of their will and you'll never retire with a Porsche like I will.' 'Yes, dear,' I said. Well, what could I do? I mean you never know when you're going to need 3,000 rolls of toilet paper. But I had to get rid of it."

The generous couple donated the stuff to the homeless guys living in Fork in the Road Park.

"So you can see, our charitable GoFundYourself project has already saved lives."

You can contribute to this worthy cause at:

www.gofundyourself.forkintheroad.ca/mcincltd

Real Fake Brains has opened up a shop on Strip Mall Avenue, selling vegan intelligence substitute to those who like the taste of intelligence but think it's cruel.

"Me and my pet rat eat there every Friday for supper," said Charlie Gordon. "Then I go home and write a Markov Chain poem, and my pet rat solves astrophysics problems."

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Mr. Gordon said that, as far as he knows, Real Fake Brains is like having the real thing. "It's nice and all. But I wouldn't want to behave rationally and logically all the time."

"And the hangover is terrible," he added, while his rat tried to dash its own skull open on the bars of its cage.