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Values
The debased coin of our times: solid silver replaced by a cheesy nickel-and-copper facsimile. |
Vampire
A pale and sinister stalker who gains sustenance by sucking the blood of the living , thereby transforming them into kindred souls who must spend the rest of eternity in search of fresh warm bodies. Vampirical analysis suggests that if one of the undead were to bite a different victim each night, by the end of a single month the entire population of China would be wearing capes. One may elude the fangs of these fiends by brandishing a crucifix or hiding in an Italian kitchen. |
Vasectomy
The unkindest cut; how a few brave men avoid having to face the local pharmacist on a Saturday night. |
VCR
An electronic device for capturing the flotsam of the airwaves and granting it an immortality denied to saints and sages. |
Vegetarian
A herbivorous individual with Buddhist tendencies. One who rejects the ghoulish concept of forking animal remains down the gullet, preferring to dine upon the corpses of plants and their detachable reproductive organs (popularly known as 'fruit'). Also: Vegan A vegetarian from another planet. |
Veneer
A thin, finely finished exterior that effectively conceals the underlying substance; e.g., a mortician's smile or the civility that prevails at a Hollywood party. |
Venereal Disease
Quaint generic term for sexually transmitted pestilences, dating to a time when the worst they could do was cause chancres and terminal insanity. |
Video Camera
An audiovisual recording device thrust into the hands of the public so that future social historians might develop migraines looking at our school plays, pet tricks, weddings and christenings. |
Video Game
An electronic form of opium, consumed by stony-eyed young addicts either at home or in dark communal dens, where their families occasionally must venture to retrieve them. |
Video Screen
A window without a view, gazed upon for hours on end by the most intelligent species ever to inhabit the earth. Successor to the printed page, the illuminated manuscript, the papyrus scroll, the hieroglyphic relief and the cave drawing as the primary source of second-hand information; doubtless to be replaced someday by three-dimensional images of men and women huddled around a fire, telling stories into the night. |
