← back to Crazy News Channel
auto-data-snapshot: 2026-09-26T02:42:47 (3 data files) — cartoons/queue/2026-09-26.json cartoons/queue/20260926-rainbow-permit-office.meta.json cartoons/queue/20260926-statue-selfie-line.meta.json
688c4d18a63ed2f82bce55b6fe1b862030c324a9 · 2026-09-26 02:43:06 -0700 · auto-commit-fleet
Files touched
A cartoons/queue/2026-09-26.jsonA cartoons/queue/20260926-rainbow-permit-office.meta.jsonA cartoons/queue/20260926-statue-selfie-line.meta.json
Diff
commit 688c4d18a63ed2f82bce55b6fe1b862030c324a9
Author: auto-commit-fleet <steve@designerwallcoverings.com>
Date: Sat Sep 26 02:43:06 2026 -0700
auto-data-snapshot: 2026-09-26T02:42:47 (3 data files) — cartoons/queue/2026-09-26.json cartoons/queue/20260926-rainbow-permit-office.meta.json cartoons/queue/20260926-statue-selfie-line.meta.json
---
cartoons/queue/2026-09-26.json | 55 ++++++++++++++++++
.../queue/20260926-rainbow-permit-office.meta.json | 65 ++++++++++++++++++++++
.../queue/20260926-statue-selfie-line.meta.json | 63 +++++++++++++++++++++
3 files changed, 183 insertions(+)
diff --git a/cartoons/queue/2026-09-26.json b/cartoons/queue/2026-09-26.json
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..09efdda
--- /dev/null
+++ b/cartoons/queue/2026-09-26.json
@@ -0,0 +1,55 @@
+{
+ "date": "2026-09-26",
+ "generated_at": "2026-09-26T09:15:05.285Z",
+ "count": 6,
+ "briefs": [
+ {
+ "id": "statue-selfie-line",
+ "title": "The Line for the Statue for the Line",
+ "brief": "A single bold SVG illustration: an INVENTED roadside attraction statue where the queue to photograph it becomes so popular that a second, smaller statue is erected of the queue itself, drawing its own queue. Click to spawn the next mini-statue; caption updates the queue-of-queues count.",
+ "category": "entertainment",
+ "slug": "20260926-statue-selfie-line",
+ "status": "queued"
+ },
+ {
+ "id": "rainbow-permit-office",
+ "title": "The Rainbow That Needed a Permit",
+ "brief": "A single SVG metaphor: an INVENTED town's recurring rainbow is asked to file for a standing-display permit after appearing in the same spot too many afternoons in a row, with a little clipboard-wielding official measuring its arc. Click to advance the review stage.",
+ "category": "weather",
+ "slug": "20260926-rainbow-permit-office",
+ "status": "queued"
+ },
+ {
+ "id": "bleacher-superstition-tower",
+ "title": "The Lucky Seat",
+ "brief": "A single SVG metaphor: an INVENTED fan's 'lucky seat' ritual grows a new invented superstition item (rally cap, thunder-stick, borrowed jersey) stacked on the bleacher bench with every win, until the pile is taller than the fan. Click to add the next item.",
+ "category": "sports",
+ "slug": "20260926-bleacher-superstition-tower",
+ "status": "queued"
+ },
+ {
+ "id": "halftime-show-runaway",
+ "title": "The Halftime Show That Kept Adding Acts",
+ "brief": "A three-panel SVG strip: an INVENTED small-stadium halftime show keeps booking 'just one more' invented act between innings until the game itself is delayed by its own entertainment. Plot twist swaps the act (marching kazoo band, dog frisbee team, unicycle relay).",
+ "category": "sports",
+ "slug": "20260926-halftime-show-runaway",
+ "status": "queued"
+ },
+ {
+ "id": "festival-mascot-election",
+ "title": "The Mascot Who Ran Unopposed",
+ "brief": "A three-panel SVG strip: an INVENTED small-town festival's costumed mascot accidentally gets entered on a ballot for 'Grand Marshal' and wins unopposed, then has to be sworn in still wearing the felt head. Plot twist button swaps which invented critter mascot it is.",
+ "category": "entertainment",
+ "slug": "20260926-festival-mascot-election",
+ "status": "queued"
+ },
+ {
+ "id": "server-room-thermostat-war",
+ "title": "The Thermostat Standoff",
+ "brief": "A single bold SVG illustration: an INVENTED office's server room and its break room silently battle over one shared thermostat dial, each side's sticky-note demands stacking higher. Dragging the dial re-labels who's currently 'winning.'",
+ "category": "scitech",
+ "slug": "20260926-server-room-thermostat-war",
+ "status": "queued"
+ }
+ ]
+}
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/cartoons/queue/20260926-rainbow-permit-office.meta.json b/cartoons/queue/20260926-rainbow-permit-office.meta.json
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..bfad325
--- /dev/null
+++ b/cartoons/queue/20260926-rainbow-permit-office.meta.json
@@ -0,0 +1,65 @@
+{
+ "blurb": "A rainbow that keeps appearing over the same field every afternoon is asked to file for a standing-display permit, and a clerk arrives with a clipboard to measure its arc.",
+ "story_id": "pw-rainbow-permit",
+ "tags": [
+ "weather anomaly",
+ "bureaucracy",
+ "small town news",
+ "ordinance",
+ "editorial cartoon"
+ ],
+ "new_story": {
+ "id": "pw-rainbow-permit",
+ "category": "weather",
+ "categoryLabel": "Weather",
+ "location": "Pellow Bend, OR",
+ "byline": "Weather Correspondent Ines Barrow",
+ "image": "images/pw-rainbow-permit.jpg",
+ "intervalSec": 31,
+ "offsetSec": 7,
+ "stageIndex": 0,
+ "article": {
+ "dek": "A rainbow has appeared over the same hayfield at roughly 4:10 p.m. for twelve consecutive days, and the Pellow Bend permit office has opened a standing-display file on it.",
+ "photoCaption": "The recurring arc over the Ardmore hayfield east of Pellow Bend, photographed at 4:12 p.m. on the eleventh consecutive afternoon.",
+ "paragraphs": [
+ "PELLOW BEND, OR— A rainbow has formed over the same 40-acre hayfield east of this town at approximately 4:10 p.m. on twelve consecutive afternoons, according to residents and a log kept by the county road crew.",
+ "The arc rises from the eastern fence line and terminates near a grain silo, and has been photographed in the same position on each of the twelve days, said road foreman Dell Ardmore, who owns the field.",
+ "'It is not that a rainbow is unusual,' Ardmore said. 'It is that this one keeps its appointment.'",
+ "The consistency drew the attention of the Pellow Bend permit office, which regulates signage, banners, and what the municipal code calls 'standing displays visible from a county road.' Office supervisor Nelda Ordway said a file was opened on the eleventh day.",
+ "'A thing that occupies the same visual space at the same hour every day for two weeks meets the definition,' Ordway said. 'I did not write the definition.'",
+ "A clerk was sent to the field with a clipboard and an inclinometer and recorded the apex at 41 degrees, Ordway said. A Form W-7 standing-display application was opened on the rainbow's behalf, listing the applicant as unreachable and the $40 filing fee as unpaid.",
+ "Town attorney Bess Kimbrough said the office is on defensible ground procedurally but declined to speculate on enforcement. 'The code does not contemplate a respondent that cannot be served,' Kimbrough said.",
+ "Ardmore said he has no objection to the rainbow and would prefer the file be closed. 'Nobody complained about it,' he said. 'The complaint is that it was noticed.'"
+ ]
+ },
+ "stages": [
+ {
+ "headline": "Same Rainbow Appears Over Pellow Bend Hayfield 12 Days Running",
+ "detail": "An arc has formed over the same 40-acre field at roughly 4:10 p.m. for twelve consecutive afternoons, according to a log kept by the county road crew."
+ },
+ {
+ "headline": "Permit Office Opens Standing-Display File On The Rainbow",
+ "detail": "Supervisor Nelda Ordway said the arc meets the municipal code's definition of a standing display visible from a county road. 'I did not write the definition,' she said."
+ },
+ {
+ "headline": "Clerk Sent To Measure The Arc Records Apex At 41 Degrees",
+ "detail": "A Form W-7 application was opened on the rainbow's behalf, listing the applicant as unreachable and the $40 filing fee as unpaid."
+ },
+ {
+ "headline": "Town Attorney Says Code Cannot Serve A Respondent It Cannot Reach",
+ "detail": "Bess Kimbrough called the office procedurally sound but declined to speculate on enforcement against a phenomenon that cannot be notified."
+ },
+ {
+ "headline": "Permit Granted With Three Conditions The Rainbow Cannot Read",
+ "detail": "The approved display may not obstruct the water tower, must renew every 90 days in person, and may add no colors without review.",
+ "conclusion": "It appeared the following afternoon at 4:10, unchanged, and the file was marked compliant."
+ }
+ ],
+ "tags": [
+ "weather anomaly",
+ "bureaucracy",
+ "small town news",
+ "ordinance"
+ ]
+ }
+}
diff --git a/cartoons/queue/20260926-statue-selfie-line.meta.json b/cartoons/queue/20260926-statue-selfie-line.meta.json
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..59a9f04
--- /dev/null
+++ b/cartoons/queue/20260926-statue-selfie-line.meta.json
@@ -0,0 +1,63 @@
+{
+ "blurb": "The photo line outgrows the roadside statue, so the town erects a statue of the line — which promptly grows a line of its own.",
+ "story_id": "es-roadside-statue-photo-line",
+ "tags": [
+ "monuments",
+ "tourism",
+ "small town news",
+ "editorial cartoon"
+ ],
+ "new_story": {
+ "id": "es-roadside-statue-photo-line",
+ "category": "entertainment",
+ "categoryLabel": "Entertainment",
+ "location": "Vandalia, IL",
+ "byline": "Roadside Attractions Correspondent Marva Teasley",
+ "image": "images/es-roadside-statue-photo-line.jpg",
+ "intervalSec": 43,
+ "offsetSec": 10,
+ "stageIndex": 0,
+ "article": {
+ "dek": "The queue to photograph Vandalia's 22-foot fiberglass pinto bean has grown longer than the attraction is tall, and tourists have started photographing the queue instead.",
+ "photoCaption": "Visitors wait along the shoulder of Route 51 to photograph Vandalia's fiberglass pinto bean, with the line stretching past the far end of the gravel lot.",
+ "paragraphs": [
+ "VANDALIA, IL— The photo line at the Enormous Pinto Bean, a 22-foot fiberglass roadside attraction installed off Route 51 in 2019, now routinely runs 40 minutes on weekends, according to figures kept by the volunteers who staff the gravel lot.",
+ "Lot attendant Rosalind Kerbey said she began counting after Labor Day, when the queue reached the mailbox of the farm property next door. 'Forty-one minutes, that was the record,' Kerbey said. 'People were pretty good-natured about it.'",
+ "What organizers did not expect was that the line itself would become a subject. Kerbey said she now sees roughly a dozen visitors a day who never join the queue at all, photograph it from the shoulder, and drive off.",
+ "'They take a picture of everybody waiting and then they leave,' Kerbey said. 'I asked one fella why and he said the line was the more interesting part.'",
+ "The Vandalia tourism committee, which oversees the site on a $3,100 annual budget, voted 4-1 this month to commission a small companion sculpture depicting four people standing in line, to be installed near the entrance.",
+ "Committee member Dale Frenette cast the lone dissenting vote. 'I don't object to the bean,' Frenette said. 'I object to commemorating the inconvenience of visiting the bean.'",
+ "The companion piece was unveiled Saturday. By midafternoon, according to Kerbey's count, eleven people were queued up to photograph it.",
+ "The committee has scheduled a special session to consider what it is calling, in the meeting notice, 'the second line question.'"
+ ]
+ },
+ "stages": [
+ {
+ "headline": "Roadside Bean Statue Draws 40-Minute Photo Line",
+ "detail": "Weekend waits at Vandalia's 22-foot fiberglass pinto bean now run past 40 minutes, said lot attendant Rosalind Kerbey, with the queue reaching the neighboring farm's mailbox."
+ },
+ {
+ "headline": "Tourists Begin Photographing The Line Instead Of The Bean",
+ "detail": "About a dozen visitors a day now shoot the queue from the shoulder and drive off without joining it. 'The line was the more interesting part,' one told Kerbey."
+ },
+ {
+ "headline": "Tourism Committee Votes To Commission A Statue Of The Line",
+ "detail": "The committee approved a companion sculpture of four people waiting, 4-1. Dissenting member Dale Frenette objected to 'commemorating the inconvenience of visiting the bean.'"
+ },
+ {
+ "headline": "Statue Of The Line Draws Its Own Line Within A Day",
+ "detail": "Eleven people queued to photograph the new sculpture by midafternoon Saturday, prompting a special session on what the notice calls 'the second line question.'"
+ },
+ {
+ "headline": "Vandalia Now Maintains Four Statues Of Lines And Four Lines",
+ "detail": "Each new sculpture commemorates the people who waited for the one before it, and the committee has stopped numbering them in the minutes.",
+ "conclusion": "Nobody has photographed the original bean since August, though volunteers confirm it is still there."
+ }
+ ],
+ "tags": [
+ "monuments",
+ "tourism",
+ "small town news"
+ ]
+ }
+}
← 506aa9e index.html: correct stale comment — real-news stories can no
·
back to Crazy News Channel
·
auto-data-snapshot: 2026-09-26T03:13:13 (3 data files) — car b33a8cf →