A Flaky Holiday for the Fak Family.
Posted: Tuesday, March 25, 2008
by Mike Fak
http://mikefak.com
For Easter the Fak family made the yearly treks up from the south and down from the north to gather again at our home for our annual feast.
It is one of those times where we all try to get together although someone always misses as life continues to speed by for all of us.
It is different now than it was many years ago. All the kids have grown. They are too old for Easter egg hunts but too young to have their own offspring so the gathering is mostly a swap fest of Fak family stories. Many of these tales have moved into the realm of legend and myth as some in my family have a tendency to be storytellers.
You have all seen how two kids in Virginia sold a corn flake that looks like Illinois for $1,350 on E-Bay. The corn creation was bought by a flake who intends to include it in his traveling museum of Americana. It's good that the museum is traveling as I doubt travel agents will start printing brochures for Americans to drive great distances to see a corn flake. If you really look at it and then a map of Illinois without being drunk or stoned you will notice it looks no more like Illinois than I look like Mathew McConaughey and my wife assures me that is a great leap of imagination.
Still though the money is indisputable and that is where my creative money making juices kicked in. This past weekend, I had the entire family help me search for food items that looked like something else.
To start, we all went through the forty boxes of corn flakes I bought but we could find no flakes that resembled Illinois. We did find 32 states as well as all the European countries except Switzerland so that might make some money. There is a family dispute if a Fruity Pebbles looks like Ethiopia or not so I sent a picture to their consulate for an opinion.
The cheesy potato casserole came out of the oven looking just like the Mona Lisa but my nephew Jonathan tore into her right ear before anyone could stop him. I am having no luck finding an art restoration expert who has experience with potato casseroles so far but there is still hope.
I had my brother help me carry a load of plywood into the shed and there are some real money makers in that pile. If you have ever worked with wood, you have noticed the grain patterns often look like something. We were able to find a Monet, a Picasso and a Raphael in the sheets of plywood and that could bring serious cash. The only problem will be shipping as no one makes four foot by eight foot manila envelopes.
My wife's marvelous lasagna most certainly looked like a topographical map of some country and I had two nieces scanning the picture comparing it to Google Earth shots but they have had no luck so far.
By accident a spilled glass of wine on the area rug looks just like the painting of Hannibal crossing the Alps. The only problem is the picture looks like the troops are on zebras instead of elephants. I think for a cut of the action I can get an historian to come out and state that indeed Hannibal used zebras and that could help. Besides if an argument over the Hannibal story gets started the press stories on my rug will only catch more interest. The old adage bad news is better than no news will come into play.
The day unfortunately ended in a family squabble. Jackson the cat got into the remnants of the chocolate frosting bowl and an argument over whether she looked like Abe Lincoln or Tom Selleck turned the evening ugly. I imagine when I start dividing all the loot up from the sales everyone will be happy again. I can't wait for our Fourth of July gathering. The skinny on the internet says the real money is in bugs that look like people so the Fak family will all be entomologists this summer.
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Top-level comments on this article: (3 total)hi mike, this was your "shining" story, for me. it was so funny and crisp and interesting and very well written. i love this line, "Let me set the table for you on this story" so clever. the whole story was clever. really good job (in my humble opinion) i wish there was a 10, but i'll give you one:) thanks for making me smile, i needed the energy, best regards, sueThat you Sue. I am humbled by your kind words. All I am is Mike Fak and on some days I'm not even that. Mike
I live in Virginia and as clever as I believe my children are, I'm pretty upset it wasn't them selling the cornflake. Got to hand it to the young ladies, they even overcame the shut down by ebay for violating their food policy, idiots. Anyway, another clever story Mike. I believe we may have missed the train on this look alike thing, but I've got the kids working overtime to come up with the next "in thing" and since I like your stuff so much, if they come up with anything of interest, I'll drop you a line and let you in on it...for a small commisssion of course. lolThank you Myla. I think there might be a treasure trove in the marshmallows but I am so busy that I have started with foods alphabetically so it will be years before I get to the M's. Keep those kids looking for stuff. Thanks for cutting me in. Mike
Great story! Knowing just about everyone involved I could play the whole thing out in my mind. I am very happy to have found your column and look forward to reading the many past articles I missed. Godspeed to You, Sharon and Tim - Jerry N.
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