Tag Archives: Dr. Crankenfuss

Freak Speak

An Incredibly Intense Passage

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Daniel Berenson here. If you’re looking for Dr. Crankenfuss, I’ve taken the liberty of moving him down the page today because it’s time for this week’s Sunday Snippet for Weekend Writing Warriors. Be sure to visit the Warrior site and look through all the contributions there. Some interesting stuff, to be sure.

The passage that follows is from FIREBUG, a published novel by Daniel Berenson of Freaky Dude Books.

Setting the scene: Eleven-year-old Curtis is playing with matches in his grandpa’s tool shed. He has just shot a lit match toward an open-mouthed jar. His aim is perfect. A direct hit.

The jar exploded into dust, and with it, the world.

The white blast enveloped Curtis, devouring him in pure, searing energy. Hot needles pierced his body and face and he went blind as he was blown backwards. He was somehow aware of electricity, light yellow dots slamming into him like Uncle Joe’s soldering iron, turning creamy liquid and soaking him in a rush of tweezers tearing at every pore in his skin. His body shrieked.

Time stretched thin and strong as spider silk, dragging him through black tunnels of razor wire slitting his every nerve. No thoughts… just pictures and pain, pain, pain without understanding… everywhere the feel of ground glass… power saws ripping through lips… electric piranhas… sparks of light piercing his eyes… there was something ahead of him… the house… the house was in front of him… now the ground… now the sky… his skin being ground between Indian arrowheads… the ground melting into his face… his nostrils filling with burnt meat… infinitely tiny bullets shooting into him everywhere… his hair… his hair?… HE WAS ON FIRE!
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Thank you and now it’s time for your usual host, Dr. Crankenfuss.
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News from the world’s Awesomest & Crankiest Curmudgeon’s Middle School and YA Blog –

Well, that was sure pleasant!
Thanks, Daniel. Now I’m really steamed! I’m trying to run a humor site for you and you post stuff like THAT? How can I top that? By jumping out the window? Hey, I could try that, seeing as how we’re on the first floor here. But it still wouldn’t be anywhere near as gross.

Man, after that intro, I think I’ll just fill all of you in on the news:
Daniel’s novel FIREBUG, the book where he got that piece at the top, is getting nice reviews at Amazon. There are only nine so far, but they’re almost all 4 or 5 stars. Daniel got a bit upset with the one 3 star review, but I helped him get over it by making him practice the karaoke number he’s doing tonight at a party. He’s singing, well, butchering Hard to Love by Lee Brice. After he saw and heard his performance on the computer, he felt a lot worse than he did after seeing that review. He’s trying to figure out how to create some kind of six-hour virus to get out of tonight.

Also he released LOVE THUG at Amazon last week and it already has a few reviews. Well, I exaggerate. Two, actually, but both of those guys bought the book at least. And both of them gave him 5 stars. I told him, “Daniel, books are like doctors. They take patience.” He tried to slap me for that one, but he got himself in the head instead. (Now that’s what you call an inside joke, people.)

Anyway, he’s still trying to give out a few review copies of both books in return for honest reviews. So if you know anyone who’s interested, after reading the sample of the book at Amazon, send him a message here and tell him how to get in contact with you.

Talk to you soon. But I hope it’s after a somewhat lighter piece of work than Daniel gave you today. I’m still a bit freaked out.

From Your Dude with the ‘Tude,
Dr. Crankenfuss

Freak Speak

Daniel’s Gettin’ a Bit Full of Himself with this LOVE THUG book

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Humor Post #105 from the world’s Awesomest & Crankiest Curmudgeon’s Middle School and YA Blog –

People out there know I don’t say much bad about Daniel, the guy who started Freaky Dude Books and me, but sometimes he just needs a little talkin’ to. He’s just released LOVE THUG at Amazon this past weekend, he’s gotten one whole 5 star review, and now he thinks he’s like the next Justin Bieber of the literary world. He’s gone and entered this contest at The Kindle Book Review where he thinks he has a decent chance of getting recognized in the Young Adult category. Well, the cover DOES look mighty nice. If they judge the book by its cover, he DOES have a chance. (No wonder. It’s by Maureen Dunlap, his girlfriend.)

LOVE THUG
A Romantic Comedy for Teenagers (or almost teenagers)

He was all excited so I thought I’d try to be funny. I told him he had a better chance of getting recognized in the “Face Like a Turkey” contest but he didn’t go for that too much. That was kinda mean, I admit, but hey, that’s one of my talents and Daniel says that one of the lessons of LOVE THUG is “Be yourself” and that’s what I’m doing here, isn’t it? Anyway, he had to pay $20 to enter so I guess he’s “puttin’ his money where his mouth is,” as they say.

Tell you what. To make it up to Daniel, I’ll write a little cheery rap for him right now just in case he doesn’t win this thing. After all — don’t tell him I said this — the odds aren’t that great, are they? There will probably be lots of entries and there are a lot of good writers out there. (Lucky I didn’t enter or he NEVER woulda stood a chance. But there wasn’t a category for rap, and I haven’t written a book yet.)
Anyway, here’s my “feel good” rap for Daniel:

Don’t get too down if you don’t win,
You can always get up and try again,
Rejection can feel like a kick in the shin
But your true talent will win in the end.

Good luck, Daniel, in that Kindle Book Review Contest. After all, you never really do know where lightning is going to strike, do you?

For the rest of you, take a look at their ad. Looks pretty professional to me.


From Your Dude with the ‘Tude,
Dr. Crankenfuss

Freak Speak

What’s ahead for Dr. Crankenfuss?

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Humor Post #104 from the world’s Awesomest & Crankiest Curmudgeon’s Middle School and YA Blog –

I been thinking about heads lately. Why? Cause someone at school called me a chowderhead. I couldn’t come up with anything clever to come back with so I went home and checked out all the -head insults. It’s a pretty pitiful selection from what I’ve been able to find. Here are some of the better known ones:
blockhead — bighead– bonehead — chucklehead — dumbhead — dunderhead — fathead — hardhead — knucklehead — lunkhead — pinhead — meathead — airhead — egghead

Then of course there are all the ones that have a body part in front of the word head. And I’m not talking about calling someone an armhead or a backhead. (Though there IS a forehead, isn’t there?) It’s usually an uglier or nastier body part than an arm or back. The only one I feel comfortable using here is butthead. I think you can come up with some others. But if you use them on your parents or teachers, don’t try to blame me!

But it seems to me like you can put just about anything in front of head, can’t you? Why was I able to find only a couple hundred “___head” words on official lists. I mean almost any animal will do as an insult. Try calling someone a platypus head and see if you don’t get a reaction. Or a penguin head. How about a woodpecker head (uh-oh, double meaning there). Even if you pick an animal most people like, put it in front of head and it doesn’t sound so nice, does it, poodlehead?

Anyway, someday I might have to compile The Book of Heads. I don’t think it’s been done yet. I could have zillions of cool insults and some very cool visuals, but also I could ask some questions that would really make people think.

For example,
*Why do we call someone a redhead when almost always their hair is kind of orange? But you never hear of an orangehead. Maybe that’s because when you spell it out, it looks like you’re saying that person looks like an orangutan.
**As long as we’re on redheads, why don’t you ever hear of a yellowhead or a brownhead or a blackhead? Well, that last one you do, but that’s not talking about hair, is it?
***Why is bonehead considered an insult? Would you prefer the alternative? Hey, gristlehead! Yeah, that sounds real nice. I mean, if you go into a crowded room and say, “Hey, bonehead,” shouldn’t everyone in the room say, “Yes?”
****And what about hardheaded? That means stubborn. But who wouldn’t want to be hardheaded? Would you rather be mooshyheaded?
*****If an egghead gets confused, does he become a scrambled egghead?
******Why isn’t beautifulhead a compliment?

Oh, this could be a very long book.

Well, I’m going to quit now. I’ve got so many ideas for The Book of Heads, my head is spinning. (There’s a totally new one — spinninghead.) Let me start getting a proposal together to submit to some publishers. I’m sure a couple of them will see the amazing possibilities here.

From Your Dude with the ‘Tude,
Dr. Crankenfuss

Freak Speak

Hey, I’m puttin’ my stuff on WeWriWa. How cool is that?

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Hey, Dr. Crankenfuss here. My last rap post was so awesome, I’m putting a bunch of it on WeWriWa (The Weekend Writing Warriors Website). They’re only giving me 150 words so here goes.
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ODE TO SPRING (ME OUTTA HERE!)

Learnin’ my math
And ABC’s
But nuthin much matters
No more to me
Feelin’ kind of blah
No dedication
But I think I know
The explanation.

I look outside
Blue skies, trees green
Sittin’ in class
Seems kinda obscene
This ain‘t no place
For a true freaky dude
Didn’t we outlaw
Involuntary servitude?

Feelin’ all tied up
And listless… yeah, true!
You heard of spring fever?
Well I got spring FLU!
As the Crank, I seek da truth
My questions never end
But now I’m only askin’,
“When is school gonna end?”

Ain’t seven months hard labor
Enough for any young soul?
Shouldn’t they be showin’ us Heaven
‘Stead of keepin’ us here in this hole?
Nature is tellin’ us somethin’
The worms go to the first birdie
Maybe we could fly like eagles
If you’d only stop school early
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Well, that’s it. 146 words total. Like I said, the limit was 150 words so I had to stop ’bout 2/3 through. But for the whole thing, you can go back to my last post. But the idea is you can comment on my knock-em-dead rap right here — well, in the comment box anyway — or you can go to WeWriWa and check out all the other 8-sentence or 150-word-poetry samples other people posted and see what you find. Pretty cool idea, if you ask me. And you can see how da Crank stacks up ‘gainst those other dudes.

AND THEN I GOT EVEN BIGGER NEWS FOR EVERYBODY. Daniel’s putting out a NEW BOOK next week! Actually it’s my favorite one so far and that means it totally crunk. It’s called LOVE THUG and it’s cool cause it’s short, hilarious, stupid, clever, with big illustrations, and short. Hey, did I mention it’s short? Guys usually like that. Like those Wimpy Kid books that pretend to be like 220 pages but if they were printed regular, they’d be like 80 pages max. Well, LOVE THUG is about that long. And pretty close to that good. So keep checking the OUR BOOKS page to see when it comes out and in the meantime, try out some of the samples of the books Daniel already has out there. I mean STORIES GUARANTEED TO MAKE YOU SICK? And two MOOSE JOKE BOOKS? What’s not to like?

Thanks to WeWriWa for the chance to share and I’ll be back soon.
From Your Dude with the ‘Tude,
Dr. Crankenfuss

Freak Speak

My newest classical rap: ODE TO SPRING (ME OUTTA HERE!)

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Humor Post #103 from the world’s Awesomest & Crankiest Curmudgeon’s Middle School and YA Blog –

ODE TO SPRING (ME OUTTA HERE!)

Learnin’ my math
And ABC’s
But nuthin much matters
No more to me
Feelin’ kind of blah
No dedication
But I think I know
The explanation.

I look outside
Blue skies, trees green
Sittin’ in class
Seems kinda obscene
This ain‘t no place
For a true freaky dude
Didn’t we outlaw
Involuntary servitude?

Feelin’ all tied up
And listless… yeah, true!
You heard of spring fever?
Well I got spring FLU!
As the Crank, I seek da truth
My doubting questions never end
But now I’m only askin’,
“When is school gonna end?”

Ain’t seven months of hard labor
Enough for any young soul?
Shouldn’t they be showin’ us Heaven
‘Stead of keepin’ us here in this hole?
Nature is tellin’ us somethin’
The worms go to the first birdie
Maybe we could fly like eagles
If you’d only stop school early

I ain’t got nuthin left
My energy’s worn to the bone
The second I walk in here
Is the instant I wanna go home
My brain is full to the max
You been crammin’ my head full of knowledge
I’m only finishin’ sixth grade
Feels like I’m ready to graduate college

So give a young man a break
Show him you really care
Announce, “We know it’s only April
But we’re lettin’ you outta here.”
You’ll be my hero, my idol,
My bestest forever friend
Just lissen to a student’s prayer
And let this school year end

     I promise to be a good boy
    Just let this school year end

    Don’t make me throw a hissy fit now
    Just let this school year end!

From Your Totally Worn Out, Wasted, and Washed Up Dude with the ‘Tude,
Dr. Crankenfuss