The tension was excruciating. Curious passerby's and members of the Newman clan sat around on pins and needles wondering what it was all about. Mrs. Nikki Newman's great, and very reserved for blue-blooded family members only, family meeting.

Banned from the meeting because she's a Newman by marriage only, Sharon Collins Newman begged for permission to attend. Her own husband dared not overrule his mother's decision. "I'm Nick wife. I'm part of this family. I care deeply about what happens to it," she pleaded.

"This is a very personal matter," Nikki Newman buzzed, asserting her role as the Newman ranch Queen Bee and keeping the subject matter of the meeting so close to her bosom one might have thought she was protecting the exact location of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction.

At the eleventh hour, when it seemed Sharon Newman would have to get a court order to stop the meeting until a hearing could be held to determine whether she had a right to attend, her mother-in-law capitulated.

On Thursday the ambassadors representing family values gathered together at the Newman Ranch. Nick, Victoria, Victor, Nikki and yes, Sharon Newman were there huddled together in the same room. The suspense was so pungent a pin could have been heard dropping on the carpet.

As ten little beady eyes blinked on and off like strobes as if awaiting for a jury foreman to come forth from the darkness to read the verdict, Victor Newman finally spoke. This was the moment time had seemingly come to a standstill for.

"I recently learned my father is alive. Your mother wants me to go see him. I won't do that. It's as simple as that," the great man said.

Plop, plop. Fizz, fizz. Oh, what a relief it is. The build up - the drama - almost too much to bare - so intense it couldn't have been told to each member of the family in person, individually, by e-mail or on the phone and certainly so shocking Sharon Newman was to be prevented from hearing it in any form - is over.

Obsessed with looking like the ridiculously airbrushed cover models on "Mademoiselle" eating healthier and exercising and cutting out refined sugars or processed garbage foods or the four cups of coffee is not an option for the Newman women when it comes to members of their family.

Nikki and Sharon Newman showed this week they have no interest in getting an increasingly flabby world to stop eating so much fatty crap starting with their husbands and children.

That they intend to continue eating as pigs was made clear on Monday when the clan was seen shoveling bacon and eggs into their mouths while their growing children chewed on pancakes laced with chocolate chips.

"I eat the pancake part too," a gleeful Noah Newman wheezed before not suffering a massive diabetic cancerous coronary while trying to bend over and tie his Nikes.

Consciously poisoning the population with toxic foodstuffs far more full of synthetic goo and Agent Orange by-products and bioengineered rat dung than actual food from which the body can draw life and energy and satisfied burps, the Newmans are loved by the world's most toxic garbage-food purveyors, helping keep America obese and cancerous which delineates just how many reconstituted chemically blasted diseased cows go into the average piece of bacon.

"[The] bacon went kinda fast!" a beer-bellied Nick Newman spurted in between attempts to ask his piglets if they'd like another plate or maybe call in Jimmy Dean to personally shove entire sausages down their gullets.

October 6, 2003

Officials at Walnut Grove Academy have reportedly launched a new program to reduce absenteeism. WGA hopes that by cutting the school day to three hours it will encourage students in the habit of cutting class to attend at least part of the time and those who don't will be dealt with severely. To that end WGA may become the only Genoa City campus to send letters to parents informing them that their son or daughter will be cited for failing to attend class.

The letter, in part, would read, "Dear (loser parent name here), We are pleased and even giddy like a weasely slimeball narc to inform you that your simpering burgeoning-class-skipping dweeb of a space-wasting party girl/boy has been busted for missing class and probably using the three hours to hang out with Internet freaks who only want to get your girl/boy drunk on cheap wine and puke on the school mascot before wandering off and having really bad sex with his/her freaky Internet/stalker roommate/boyfriend/girlfriend, only to wake up six hours later praying no one got pregnant and stumbling off to snarf cold leftover chocolate chip pancakes and bacon from the fridge before skipping class again and calling you in a haze to ask for more money which they will undoubtedly spend on a bigger hard drive for the laptop and maybe some pot, much like you did back in college, which is probably why they're stuck at WGA and not a real school where class is actually held and the school day is longer than three hours."

News of the new three hour days at WGA did not come as a surprise as just about every school in America now finds itself faced with budget cuts, racial tension, a shortage of textbooks and a general school's out forever attitude. Considering how students at WGA have never actually been seen in a classroom, the reduced school day is seen as a plus for teachers because under the new plan hallways won't be crammed with students talking on their cellphones, making dates, threatening one another or chatting with strangers who are allowed to just waltz onto campus without a security check.

Local teens Colleen Carlton and double-thick Oreo-eating Sierra No Last Name were overly giddy that now they'll have more time to waste slurping down $3 lattes at the Newman Jitter Joint and flipping a coin in hopes that one day it'll turn up heads so that they can rat out their pal, Lily Winters.

Winters, the spoiled daughter of Newman Enterprises lackey Neil Winters and Jabot Cosmetics helmet-haired flunky Dru Winters, was busted Monday for lying to her pals about why she wasn't roaming the WGA halls. When Ms. Winters asked if Carlton and the Oreo eater would cover for her, like all loyal friends who have been shunned because they aren't friends at all and have begged repeatedly to be given another chance, Carlton pulled out a virtual knife and stabbed Winters with it.

As Carlton thrust the knife in again and again she wailed that Winters is using her. She only wants to be with that crazy stalker. Kevin Fisher snaps his fingers and Lily Winters goes running to him like a dog. Unlike Carlton, who is a whole year older than Winters but nevertheless a minor acting like an adult and can't get her college hunkmonkey to have sex with her, it is Winters who is ruining her future. Nay, it is so much better to while away the hours inside a musty coffee shop than to do something the least bit creative. Why, Carlton had a good mind to squeal to Winters' parents. Boy oh boy that would teach her what real friends are.

Winters, not the slightest bit smarter than Carlton, had the good sense to flip the bitch-in-training off before running straight to Fisher's dungeon. And Fisher was ready. He had already checked out the scantily clad deliciously assed supermodels displaying lingerie on the Sears website, had made a purchase and wondered if his emaciated sex slave was ever coming to model it for him.

"I didn't think you were coming," Fisher hissed when Winters finally blew in, his quite adeptly face revealing the epic scale of a human freak show.

Chained to his leg like a mangy underfed dog and whimpering, Winters said, "I'd never stand you up" as Fisher made her look at the rag she was expected to wear and Satan willing, would make him harder than the last time he raped the baby girl. But when Winters turned her nose up at the rag she felt Fisher's rage festering.

"Please don't get upset. I want to be with you," Winters begged, clearly implying that the first time she had sex with the sleaze it was bad but she'd do it again if only Fisher would say he likes her.

As Fisher toyed with his prey, Winters reminded him that she has a toothbrush to scrub away the stink so that her parents won't catch so much as a whiff of his odor on her and hinted she's ready to move into his pad since her parents are so busy they won't notice.

Pulling the ties that bind Winters to him Fisher said the time wasn't right and that a breakup would be most appropriate since the baby girl obviously hasn't learned obedience.

"I'm so sorry. I promise this will never happen again," Winters sobbed, causing Fisher to smile and think to himself, what a fool.

Residents shaken by manager's ineptness
September 18, 2003

Occupants of Genoa City's prestigious Sugar Shack Apartments were stunned to learn Thursday that just anyone can ask for the keys to their respective apartments and the building manager will happily turn them over.

"We were standing around here talking about how our mutual friend who is being stalked and probably having sex with a psycho freak can't be helped if she doesn't want help when the lady just walked in. She had a key!" said local hunkmonkey J.T. Hellstrom, whose abode he shares with a stripper and a raging diabetic was violated by a woman identified as Anita Hodges.

"I got a key from the building manager," said Mrs. Hodges, who seemed genuinely surprised that anyone would be concerned.

Indeed, the practice by building managers of allowing persons into tenant apartments has been a chronic problem for years. Most notably, on December 28, 2001, Lauren Fenmore gained access to the hotel room of Ms. Izzy Brana after sweet-talking the manager into letting her in. In May, 2002, Jack Abbott gained access to the hotel room of Diane Jenkins by bribing Jenkin's baby-sitter and way back when Tricia Dennison once stated she would have no trouble accessing the apartment of Ryan McNeil because she could get the manager to let her in.

August 26, 2003

It's drab and dingy and reeks of horse manure but that has never stopped members of the rich Newman family from eating, sleeping, working and having sex inside the Newman ranch tack house. Appropriately referred to as the tackyroom, Victor Newman disclosed this week his intention to have the place remodeled as a special gift to his adult daughter, Victoria who uses the room primarily as a place to have sex with whatever man she's fallen in love with after meeting once or twice.

Those who have made the one hour trip to the ranch and have seen the inside of this cesspool are usually appalled. Looking somewhat like the outhouse on Walton's Mountain complete with squeaky screen door, one step inside the tackyroom places the visitor smack dab in the middle of the bedroom and kitchen. A tiny table well worn by author Cole Howard's laptop sits just steps away from a hotplate which serves as a stove complete with coffee pot thought to have been owned by Dodge City's marshal Dillon.

Just off the main room is a small shower residents sometimes use after sex or whenever Newman himself is there working up a sweat from poking at the punching bag which hangs from the rafters. As abominable as the place is one thing always stands out. The overwhelming stink. If it's not the sweat or the horse manure it's the aroma of sex emitted from the bed sheets which often go unchanged.

While Newman is keeping details of the remodel a well guarded secret it is hoped he'll spend the bucks needed to turn the tackyroom into a respectable cottage where the bedroom is a room unto itself and not situated such that persons outside can peer through the window to see who's having sex.

And now here we are again, at a shimmeringly historic moment where we cannot help but note the delicious irony, the divine karmic genius of it all. The 4th of July and the slaves in Genoa City are forced to be at the beck and call of their masters while the slave owners enjoy the holiday by spewing hatred at their enemies.

Ain't life in Genoa City grand?

Miguel Rodriguez, always the faithful servant, was performing his duties Friday at the Newman ranch hauling trays loaded with red meat to be burnt to a crisp on the grill and baby-sitting the smart-mouthed Newman brat, Cassie. Although the little snot was simmering with hatred toward her mother and dying to get away from the ranch for just a day, Cassie did not go into town with her half-brother and grandpa to watch the parade.

For Rodriguez it was just another day watching from afar as the likes of Nikki Newman slapped the tragically shameless Sharon Newman right across her butt with a leather whip for stunning a good Christian like Nikki into disbelief and abject terror by wearing "The World's Smallest Bikini."

Sharon's mother, BoreUs Collins couldn't attend the gala but it was said she might roll her ass out to the ranch after attending the church picnic if the slave could be spared long enough to make the one-hour drive each way into town to fetch her.

And no pool party at the ranch would be complete without someone totally unexpected dropping by. Fortunately this year the Newman's didn't have to haul total strangers in off the street. They had Jitter Joint manager Cody Dixon, hot for just one-minute with Victoria Newman between his legs, stop by to ask about the troubled Newman marriage and say how he so hopes Nick and Sharon Newman can forget that she shoved her tongue down grandpa Newman's throat.

Perhaps most shocking of all this day was that Chancellor mausoleum slave Ether Valentine - apparently as a way to get back at her employer for having to spend the holiday sitting with an invalid - dressed stroke victim Katherine Sterling up in some godforsaken outfit donated by Lauren Fenmore and then tied a balloon shaped in the form of a star with an American flag emblazoned on it to the poor woman's wheelchair!

While no vehicles were seen in the parking lot undoubtedly these too would have flags stuck to the antennas and roof racks and nice little flag decals stuck all over the windows. For once in recent memory Jill Abbott had the good sense to tell Valentine to stop treating Mrs. Sterling like some patriotic circus act similar to Larry 'Wartman' Warton who showed up dressed as Uncle Sam.

Amidst insane deficits and more tax cuts for the rich and 150,000 U.S. troops still stuck in Iraq, amidst a warmongering ethic, there were those in Genoa City taking the joyous and the celebratory where they could find it never missing an opportunity to lash out.

At the RoadKill Cafe, Phyllis Abbott hurled hate balls at Dru Winters and vice-versa while Victor Newman introduced a terrorist-looking dude, his wife and kid, to Jack Abbott noting that the man - dressed in traditional garb - would be teaching this Summer at Genoa City University, a school nobody in this town attends anymore and especially during Summer and certainly not classes where Middle Eastern countries are part of the syllabus.

The professor from war-torn poor Jordan did hint that it's a good thing he's in Wisconsin and not Texas where Muslin looking people are kidnapped and tortured just for looking foreign and don't have shotguns in the rear windows of their pickup trucks. Still, the professor said his family intends to stay alert.

Like so many other Fourth of July's before it, this one ended with RoadKill Cafe owner Gina Roma singing what Victor Newman said was his favorite tune. America the Beautiful!

Glasses shattered and windows cracked as Roma wailed and patrons gorging themselves on crispy fried rat carcass joined in. Crown thy good with brotherhood while you can suckers because tomorrow it's back to full-scale hatred of thy fellow man.

February 18, 2003

We don't care!
Genoa City News staff report

Plethoric and growing like a heifer on BGH are the numbers no longer applauding Michael Baldwin's every love-drunk Paul 'Clueless' Williams-led move leading up to Baldwin's Bug-lovin' bubble burst and the reunification of Clueless and Christine Blair.

According to the general consensus, this ruddy, love-hate happy bunch apparently represents a very tiny segment of the Genoa City populace anyone care about. Seemingly years ago, although it was only months, Dizzy Izzy Brana Williams' father blew into town, dropped a few hints that Izzy is, well, nobody knows for sure. An undercover agent for the CIA? What? Besides her connection with Baldwin to breakup the Bug and Clueless, just what do the skeletons in Izzy's closet represent and why should we care?

Years ago we might have had cared but this meaningless story has painfully dawdled on for so long it's hard to find anyone who doesn't turn into a quivering mass of timid gelatin, shoulders slumped and looking at their shoes at the mere mention of the Bug-Baldwin-Izzy-Clueless saga.

Whimpering and fidgeting and apparently just as dumbly bored to tears, Izzy keeps running to Baldwin to vent her insecurities and toss around faux-threats that she'll squeal to Clueless what she knows about Baldwin but dares not speak out because telling Clueless would mean she'd have to confess her role in Baldwin's undermining and none of it matters anymore.

These jumpy, tremulous geeks keep prodding their flying monkeys to provoke more violence and hatred but each time must stop and ask themselves, wait wait wait, are we insane? What the hell are we doing? What is wrong with us?

This is the feeling. This is the overall sentiment. Monumental frustration battling it out with -- and ultimately giving way to -- overwhelming resignation and sadness at the shocking lack of substance. The Bug and Clueless are destined to get back together. You can almost see it and you don't care and it won't matter even if they attempt to have Izzy declared an unfit mother and get full custody of her child because this is the only hope that remains to make something out of nothing.

Even after the reconciliation you will be left with the frustrated and increasingly obvious notion that it's only a matter of time before Clueless and the Bug break up again as they are led further down the road of orchestrated self-destruction by a team of smirking demons of greed and lust. It feels like a cartoon. It seems like a joke. Except for the part about the rage and the blood and the children who we are continually told are the ones who suffer most.

And all you can do is bow your head and pray to your non-self-righteous deity, try to blaspheme the gods of love as vociferously as you possibly can, work to disallow the frantic screeching and oversimplified Good vs. Evil posturing from violating your better reason and molesting your honest intelligence and permanently soiling your soul. Maybe this is all you can do right now. You just close your eyes, and exhale, and hope the Bug and Clueless and Baldwin and Izzy and Yes-Boss Bassett and Mary Williams all go away.

February 13, 2003

Where's the drama?

by Brent Kellogg

I heard somewhere that February is "Sweeps Month." The month that the really "explosive" stuff happens in Genoa City. With half the month over I asked myself, "Where's the drama" and finding none thought, this would be a good time to review.

The month started with a bandaged head Karate Kid on drugs looking Victor Newman telling his daughter-in-law that spreading her legs each time something doesn't go her way would not get her the Mother of the Year nomination. This followed the "kiss" that would rock Nick Newman's world.

"Oh, no. My boy! Please tell me you didn't see. Tell me you didn't," a weepy-eyed Victor sobbed in severe rectal pain after realizing his son had seen the kiss.

Pleading for Nick forgiveness, Victor sobbed, "I wasn't myself" only to be called a "sick bastard" by Nick.

To prove he's a vile and barbarous pipsqueak and should have his little testicles stapled to a large log which is then shoved down a raging river, Nick committed a hate crime against his own father by punching Victor out.

Sharon Newman bawled all along that she had effectively thrown away everything she's ever cared about starting before she screwed the stable boy culminating with kissing her husband's father.

And because she's decided that Diego Guittierez is too much like the father she slapped across the face, Victoria Newman has crossed the drifter with no source of income off her list of potential husbands. This, while Diego begged Victor to grease the skids for him to no avail because everyone already knows there is no future for Diego and Victoria and only drags out the final good-bye of the hunkmonkey who screwed Victoria's sister-in-law.

Finally noticing that people had repeatedly said over and over there was something his wife should know about her health, Brad Carlton said he'd "try" to tell his wife but he was never told and didn't ask what it was he should tell.

After being stabbed in the back by Dru Winters, Ashley Carlton appeared to accept Dru's request to be pals again even though Dru demanded she tell Brad of her pregnancy. Ashley promptly ran - again - to the enemy camp to spill her guts and to tell Wes Carter she was still in love with Brad.

Olivia Winters told Wes she has deep feelings for Brad too. But because Brad is a married man she was suddenly having guilt pangs after eagerly sleeping with the white boy earlier.

The freakiest barometer of the human condition, Neil Winters could only wonder why Dru and Wes were using his sofa as a love nest. This after Wes returned from Paris just days after leaving Genoa City and not a single person thought it odd that Wes can afford to stay in a $400+ per day hotel without any source of income.

Liz Abbott blew into town, said there was something growing on her head, that Jill Abbott was in fact delivered by a stork named Bill Foster and that was pretty much it. Unlike Ashley Carlton's breast cancer, of which an endless amount of misleading medical information was spewed, no such information about Liz's tumor has been forthcoming except it blurs vision and smell.

Diane Jenkins gave up her baby in exchange for Jack and Phyllis' Abbott's promise not to tell the cops they have a piece of paper with her phone number written on it.

Convinced that the two men closest to her could not see straight through the god-awful disguise she was wearing or the thick Southern accent, Christine 'Bug' Blair pressed on with her dog and pony show which has no purpose or real meaning other than to drag out the eventual reunion of the Bug and her former husband.

With absolutely no life of his own, old man John Abbott continues to worry about his granddaughter, Colleen, whose father Brad said at least twice he would take responsibility for the love sick bubble-gummer but can't because he's too busy sleeping with a whore.

Is this the notoriously and infamously obnoxious quasi-drama and really sad sort of cult following not to mention much general rectal-cringing you tuned in for? Can it hold a candle to, say, the Sheila Carter saga from yesteryear?

Keep in mind while you watch this swill that at least one person stays up until midnight each night cranking it out. A Y&R writer!

February 11, 2003

Our family 'tis of thee