October 21, 2002

Midwest discomfort
by Michael Kelly

October 18, 2002

The dinosaur war
by Brent Kellogg

For weeks, if not months, Brad Carlton was slinking around with his head up his butt moaning and groaning with intense despair how he wanted to "bond" with his biological daughter.

When it was agreed that Colleen Carlton should stay with her granddaddy because living with her father would put too much stress on the Carlton's fragile marriage, Mr. Carlton completely forgot his urgency.

As time wore on Carlton found himself caught up with cheating on his wife with her best friend and the little things - like getting to know his daughter - fell by the wayside.

And thus the task of raising a 14-year-old girl fell into old man John 'Yawn' Abbott's hands.

Similarly, Yawn has been moaning for weeks, if not months, that his granddaughter has taken up with a boy far too old and he's done everything possible to prevent Colleen from doing something that she'll regret.

Upset that Colleen had summoned him from the airport the moment he returned from a business trip - during which he left her unsupervised - for no other reason than to lay her true confessions on the table, Abbott nearly had a coronary.

"What else have you been hiding from me?" the old dinosaur grumbled as if he had some right to know.

Should Colleen tell him when she has her period too? And what's the big deal about age difference? The old man didn't think age was an issue when he took up with Jill Abbott.

Because Colleen had admitted she went to a concert with the elderly J.T. Hellstrom the old guy took this as some sort of UN resolution violation.

By committing such an infraction Colleen had also thrown away what progress she had made since her dope smoking days and slap, slap, would have to start all over as retribution for disappointing her parents.

That Abbott uttered the word parents should have triggered something far back in his Alzheimer's like mind.

Colleen's parents don't give a rip about her. If they did she wouldn't be stashed with an old man in a stuffy house.

At fourteen, Colleen doesn't have much say in the matter. Kids don't have many rights. If she weren't, as Abbott claims, remorseful, Colleen could slap a sexual molestation charge on the old fart.

The fatuousness here is that Yawn is involved at all. Yes, he should be concerned that this boy his granddaughter is seeing will get her pregnant and that would be another fine mess this family has gotten itself in. But it's not up to the flatus to get all worked up over it.

That's what parents are for!

Abbott should waltz his ass over to the Carlton home and tell the kid's father what the kid is doing, to stop whoring around and pay attention to Colleen.

But no, Abbott continued the absurdity Friday by lashing out at his former wife, Jill Abbott.

"I can see I can’t trust you to help me with Colleen anymore," the old man honked at the poor woman who has been banished to a life of sleeping with men young enough to be her children.

Her sexual antics with employee Larry Warton in limbo, Jill has taken an interest in Romeo and Juliet types and told Yawn she didn't see anything wrong with the newly matured Hellstrom being just a friend to Colleen.

And why should she be concerned? Colleen is nothing to her.

Whiny imbecilic cultural caveman Yawn Abbott should get with the times. It isn't the plague that will ultimately do the human species in. It's teenage girls like his granddaughter having sex and adding to the population problem. Nothing he says or does can prevent Colleen from doing what she wants to do and she wants to have sex.

If Yawn finds this disturbing he should take his concerns to the parents. Just once it would be nice to see the parents of the out of control and spoiled kids in this city take responsibility for the shattered lives they've brought into this world.

September 23, 2002

Poetic justice
by Michael Kelly

September 10, 2002

Home owner dazed after blaze
by Brent Kellogg

But the conclusion was not an easy one to reach. Arriving at the scene the fire chief's main concern was with the electrical circuits even though Smoky the Bear knows electrical fires are obvious.

After some confusion both the chief and a police detective confirmed their arson suspicions based on the subsequent admission by the home owner's son that flammables were being stored inside the pool house.

Paramedics at the scene slapped a respirator on smoke inhalation victim and home squatter Diane Jenkins only to have the patient remove it in order to answer questions posed by the copper.

Shocked and dismayed that Jenkins was the focus of yet another problem, Jack Abbott stepped in and ordered the postponement of further medical treatment until the following morning, Then he ordered family members to prepare the house guest suite for her.

Meantime, the home owner was baffled by all the fuss.

"I'm tired" was John 'Yawn' Abbott's only concern as he surveyed the damage unable to comprehend why anyone would want to hurt Ms. Jenkins.

Living under the same roof with two war-crazed women, the old geezer has witnessed more than one disturbing event between Jenkins and his daughter-in-law, Phyllis Abbott.

That Jenkins was terrorized and his home could have been burned to the ground should have flung the old fart into action. Abbott should have instructed his son right there on the spot to get out. Pack your bags, your two women and get!

Abbott has long been suspected of carrying the Alhemizers virus, is clearly in denial and should be put away.

August 22, 2002

Overprotective grandpa
by Michael Kelly

Proving he has entirely too much time on his liver spotted hands, cosmetics tycoon John "Yawn" Abbott shuffled into his ex-wife's corporate cubicle here on Thursday to whine that his 15-year-old former dope smoking granddaughter was sharing a Java Hut table with Glowtique gigolo and future college man J.T. Hellstrom!

Earlier, Colleen Carlton informed the senile senior that she had no intention of introducing him to the "mystery boy" who would be dropping by the java joint for a study session.

As the decrepit dolt made the girl promise to share breakfast with him the following morning, Yawn ran into and briefly greeted Hellstrom as Abbott ambled out the door.

Peeping through the window, Yawn's jowls sagged with disapproval when he noticed the peroxide porcupine sitting with Carlton.

Dragging his haggard hide into his ex-wife's office, the cosmetics chieftain interrupted Jill Abbott's pity party over the abrupt departure of their acne plagued offspring, who was attempting to erect huts in a sweltering swamp.

Delicately changing the subject, Yawn regurgitated what he saw and questioned Hellstrom's "character."

Not really giving a rat's ass about the tepid teen trauma, Jill shrugged off the codger's concern about a potential love connection concerning Carlton and the spiky haired slacker.

Ms. Abbott, possibly hinting at a taboo attraction to the blonde bozo, blathered on in the belief that Hellstrom can have any woman he wants. Why would he want a wet behind the ears kid who doesn't know what the small bumps on her chest are?

Making a valid point, Jill wondered why the grousing geezer hired Hellstrom for the Glow Worm campaign if Yawn felt he were a teen wolf with fangs.

Typical of this fuddy duddy's fuzzy thinking, Abbott argued that J.T. wasn't hired because of his "integrity," but to "add a little edge to the mix."

Referring to the time their son Billy passed out drunk outside Hellstrom's hellish house party, and the host's feeble minded failure to dial 911, Jill jabbered melodramatically, "You can't forget the time he nearly cost us our son."

Things were even more mind numbing back at the Java Hut, when Carlton noticed J.T. acting dozier than usual as she started discussing F. Scott Fitzgerald's "depressing classic" The Great Gatsby.

Hoping to perk him up, Colleen insanely offered to "score some beer" for the illiterate idiot to imbibe!

Blowing his top, Hellstrom hissed that the suggestion was "stupid" for someone of such a tender age.

When her studly student tried to convince the delinquent he wasn't "angry" with her, Carlton stomped her foot and spat, "You sure do an amazing imitation," and the little snot started to storm out.

Before she took a peeved powder, J.T. explained that his adamant alcohol free stance has everything to do with Raul Guittierez lying bruised and bloody inside the Center 4 Disease after carelessly cavalier Brittany Hodges drove drunk.

Exhausted from an entire evening of sitting around the quack factory fretting about the diabetic he despises, Hellstrom gratefully endorsed Carlton's insipid idea that he saw some logs in the Glowtique before business hours. She'll gladly wake him up in time to hawk the Glow grease paint.

Vowing to "curl up somewhere" at the supposed place of business, Hellstrom hiccupped, "I wish I had more teachers like you!"

Before this saccharine scenario further resembles a sappy After school Special, the principle players need a piece of advice.

First, Hellstrom needs to learn how to read unassisted. It's not difficult. Most 5 year olds can manage the essential skill to some extent. Catching some shut-eye at work isn't wise either. Even in Genoa City, most employers frown on the practice. Haul your shiftless ass home to bed if you're too tired to punch a time clock.

As for Carlton, she'd better mind her p's and q's. This nonsense of "scoring beer" suds had better be a bad joke unless she wants her hovering grandfather breathing down her scrawny neck.

Speaking of Yawn, his granddaughter's checkered past doesn't entitle him to gas off every time she looks twice at a member of the opposite sex.

If Carlton should become too hot for the elder Abbott to handle, she has a father, mother, and step-father who can and should play bad cop.

Should Carlton sacrifice her virginity for a mattress ride with Hellstrom, old man Abbott has no one to blame but himself.

What kind of business bastard would hire someone he believed to be culpable in the near death of his son simply to sell a few cosmetics? Surely any young stud in Genoa City is qualified to flex his pecs, sulk, and pop zits by a swimming hole to unload tubes of lipstick.

Perhaps Grandfather Time doesn't dig the idea that the former pothead is now having her period and is no longer a little girl sporting pigtails and playing with Barbie dolls.

How horrifyingly easy it is too imagine the dentured dinosaur digging into his granddaughter's clothes hamper in a sick search for scanties stained with Hellstrom's semen. No doubt Yawn would suffer another coronary if he came to the cruel conclusion that Carlton's hymen is no longer intact.

Details are sketchy but Abbott has apparently received word that two of the notorious Glow Worms, his son Billy Abbott and girlfriend Mac Browning, are on the run from the police after an incident this week at the Chancellor mausoleum.

With talk show host Leanna Love on the prowl for the dirtiest of the Genoa City dirt, Abbott fears the bad publicity would have a negative effect on sales.

If old man Abbott doesn't waffle, the cancellation of the Glow Worm campaign will come as a welcomed relief. Another summer of zit infested teens tugging at their butt cracks and scratching their crotches was not looked forward too.

by Brent Kellogg

Reports drifting in from the home of John 'Yawn' Abbott indicate the Jabot Cosmetics founder is again displaying signs of Alzheimer's disease. The old geezer has been seen shuffling more often, opening doors when nobody is at the door, answering the phone when it doesn't ring and occasionally taking out the garbage. But what really tripped the wire is Abbott's feeble contention that Brad Carlton is responsible for his daughter's "condition."

The key word condition can only mean the breast cancer Ashley Carlton is dealing with and only recently told family members about. Naturally, a typical father would be upset to be the last to know about such a traumatic event. However, directing hostility at the husband makes no sense and is indicative of a serious medical problem.

Nobody in their right mind would blame anyone for cancer. Ah, take that back. God often takes the brunt of bitches and moans about uncontrollable human events. How could God let this happen or why is God doing this to me statements are common.

When old farts like Abbott place blame in places where blame doesn't fit the only conclusion that can be drawn is that dementia, or in Abbott's case, Alzheimer's has set in. And in a way that's a good thing.

With the percentage of people over 60 expected to double in the next 50 years this might be a good time for Abbott's festering memory difficulty to blossom. The older population is itself aging, and currently the oldest of the old — the group 80 or older — is the fastest growing.

Examining the physical and emotional problems that Alzheimer's sufferers and their families face would be a much needed diversion from women trapping men into marriage, troubled teens and squabbles over children.

Watching old man Abbott fighting to find doctors willing to provide aggressive treatment, his attempts to understand his loneliness and his fear would truly be the drama that has been missing from daytime for so long.

Four million Americans have the fatal disease that gradually erodes their mental abilities. Many let their early symptoms go untreated out of fear. As baby boomers age, the number of people diagnosed with Alzheimer's will continue to rise, as will the number of relatives who face the economic and emotional issues surrounding the disease.