Over the Rainbow, Over the Top

I have “Bedtime Story Duty” this week with my kids and I’m mostly winging it.  I thought I’d share tonight’s story.

Once upon a time in a kingdom far away called Toz. It was an amazing kingdom. Its leader was a very beautiful and very smart lady, I’ll call her Dorothy. 

Dorothy had only recently become leader of Toz. The people overwhelmingly wanted her to lead them rather than the evil and corrupt former government.

This former government was so bad that they caused a great flood in the kingdom of Toz, one of the worst floods in 50 years.   They did absolutely nothing to prepare for this flood that was building from earlier in the rainy season, squandering six months of preparation.  

Most of Toz was underwater and it was Dorothy’s responsibility to save the kingdom and rescue the people. Dorothy was very smart and very brave and, like all good leaders, she took her responsibility seriously.  But this was a tremendous task for her as she inherited a government whose bureaucracy was woefully lacking in competence and with an infrastructure incapable of dealing with such a disaster.

She also had to overcome the incompetence of three others.

First there was the Tin Man.  

If He Only Had a Heart.

The Tin Man had no heart.  He also always carried an axe. Some say it was because he needed one to grind all the time.  This may be true but he also used his axe in illegal logging ventures and to scare poor people.

Copters and Airplanes and Blimps! Oh My!

The Tin Man was also in charge of the Toz military, which meant he was pretty much all-powerful.  The Toz military operated with impunity, overriding any law that got in the way, except one… the Law of Gravity. Whether it be helicopters, F-16s, or even their blimp called the Sky Dragon, whatever the Royal Toz Air Force (RTAF)  put up, came down with a dreadful crash.

This concerned Dorothy because one time the Tin Man promised to have a military helicopter transport her back to the capital of Toz. Dorothy preferred using a boat to travel; after all, it was a flood.  However, there were no boats available because the Toz Navy was busy towing Rohingya out to sea.

A military helicopter was eventually made available but Dorothy wisely declined the ride saying that it did not have radar.  

“Nonsense,” huffed the Tin Man, “this helicopter has radar installed in it!”

Still, Dorothy was skeptical. She felt that a magical GT200 device duct taped to the cockpit’s console did not exactly qualify as an effective radar system.

Nevertheless, Dorothy eventually made it back to the capital city in Toz safely where she met with the Scarecrow. 

If He Only Had a Brain.

The Scarecrow was the governor of the capital city. He didn’t have a brain, which explains many things such as the fact that his statements during the crisis were mostly nonsense.

Another useless person at the capital city Dorothy had to deal with was the Lyin’ Man.

If He Only Had Courage and Told the Truth

The Lyin’ Man was a notorious coward.  No courage whatsoever.  In the past he was always running away, hiding in bunkers, having the Tin Man protect him. This time the floods scared him into fleeing all the way to the resort islands of the Maldives with his tail between his legs.

And there were many others, Dorothy managed to avoid.

There were those creepy Munchkin’s living on the “Yellow” brick road.

Don't Follow That "Yellow" Road, Dorothy

Dorothy knew that those fascists were no good.


There was also a very wicked witch.

She was the deputy spokeswoman for the very wicked Democrat Party in Toz who wanted to deny free speech to the good citizens of Toz by shutting down all social networking sites on the internet, including Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. There was also an ugly incident when she tried flying in reverse with her broom. 


Then there was the evil flying monkey prince.

In the end, Dorothy managed to single handedly keep the flood waters in check, saving countless lives and property despite having to put up with the incompetency of those other three.  

Dorothy was the hero to everyone in Toz. And everyone lived happily ever after.

The End

Disclaimer:

"Any resemblance to persons living or dead should be plainly apparent to them and those who know them, especially if the author has been kind enough to have provided detailed descriptions of their personality traits and, in some cases, their actual pictures. All events described actually happened, though on occasion the author has taken certain, very small, liberties, because that is his right as an American." 

Maybe tomorrow night I’ll give my rendition of Alice in Wonderland with the Mad Hatter and the Queen of Hearts to my kids.