Review Time! - There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly or: This is what's wrong with America

Dad: "This is unacceptable."

Bill: "Calm down, pops. Don't have a coronary."

Dad: "I'll not be calm! I'll not be! I purchased this book in good faith assuming that the story would be the same as it always was. Instead it's some wussified nonsense."

Bill: "What's the big deal?"

Dad: "The big deal, Bill, is that this Lucille Colandro person took a beloved tale of a woman hoisted by her own petard due to her sheer stupidity and turned it into a buddy comedy."

Bill: "This is a professional review so back it up and tell the folks what is wrong."

Dad: "Alright. We all know the story of the old lady who swallows a harmless fly and then loses her shit eating every animal in sight faster than a fat man choking down steak at Golden Corral trying to get it out."

Bill: "It's all you can eat for a reasonable price. And they have surprisingly delicious steak. It's a no brainer."

Dad: "Damn right it's a no brainer, Bill. Golden Corral is amazing. But the point is that, through her overwhelming hubris, she assumes she can get this pesky fly out using increasingly large animals to chase eachother through her bowels and she just assumes it'll all work out."

Bill: "Well it is a kid's book. Usually everything works out in the end and everybody lives happily ever after."

Dad: "Not in the old days, Bill! In the old days we had the brothers Grimm and their books of sadistic child horrors. Of course even those were toned down by Disney. Heck even Shel Silverstein had a tale about a snail that lived up your nose that would bite your finger off if you put it in too far."

Bill: "That's messed up."

Dad: "Probably but it's necessary to keep kids from doing stupid things."

Bill: "So you don't pick your nose then?"

Dad: "Well I'm not a kid anymore so I can do as I please."

Bill: "Right. So anyway, back to the book at hand. What happens in this that set you off so much?"

Dad: "Well, Bill, there are several things. Firstly, in the original book, right after she eats the fly she eats a spider that wriggles and jiggles and tickles inside her. In this book that part is skipped."

Bill: "She doesn't eat a spider in this one?"

Dad: "Oh she eats the spider alright. It just doesn't wriggle and jiggle and tickle."

Bill: "Uh huh. Sounds crucial to the plot."

Dad: "It is! It adds some important alliteration to each verse that breaks up the monotony of reading 'she swallowed the cow to catch the goat she swallowed the goat to catch the dog she swallowed the dog to catch the cat' etc. over and over."

Bill: "Anything else?"

Dad: "And how! At the end of each verse instead of saying 'perhaps she'll die' she says 'she won't say why'. This is stupid both for the lack of foreshadowing to give the impression that perhaps it's not a good idea to eat hundreds of pounds of farm animals but also because the full text is 'I don't know why she swallowed that fly. She won't say why'. So they say 'why' like... twice in a row. Dumb."

Bill: "Yeah that does sound kinda iffy. So what happens after she eats all these things?"

Dad: "Oh this part is the delicious chocolate waterfall coating your Golden Corral cotton candy served on a slice of apple pie. Get this: At the end of the book she COUGHS and all the animals fly out and they're all just super best friends."

Bill: "Ok that's stupid. Why didn't she just cough out the fly to begin with if it was that easy?"

Dad: "I KNOW BILL! Not to mention the fact that these dumb animals were just eaten and pitted against eachother in some kind of gastronomical kumite and they're just totally fine with that."

Bill: "Well that sews it up. This book is garbage."

Dad: "It gets worse."

Bill: "No way!"

Dad: "Way! This isn't the only book. A cursory scan of Amazon also has 10+ separate books with titles like 'There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Frog!', 'There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Shell!', 'There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Desk!', and 'There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed Some Books!'."

Bill: "What the hell, dude. Do people buy those things?"

Dad: "They actually have 3.5-5 stars! It's madness!"

Bill: "That sounds like bad parenting."

Dad: "It's what's wrong with America, Bill. Too many stupid parents."

Bill: "So do you want to read the book?"

Dad: "Of course. I paid like 7 bucks for this thing. But in my version the old lady is gonna die. A lot."

Bill: "Excellent. You're the best dad."

Dad: "I know, son."