Irony Practice 2

As the holiday season ended, Bertha Berger struggled to put on her blue jeans. She stepped on the bathroom scale and received the bad news. She had never seen such a high number on the little scale, so she resolved to change. That day she threw out all the junk food in her fridge and went grocery shopping. Determined to lose weight, she bought low-fat versions of all her favorite foods. She had a low-sodium bacon sandwich with a diet soda for lunch. The sandwich contained over 1,200 calories but had very little salt. For dinner she ate two turkey burgers with reduced-fat cheese. Though she had consumed over 2,000 calories, Bertha felt like she deserved a reward. So for dessert she ate two low-calorie ice-cream sandwiches. And before bed she ate a bag of baked potato chips, which she thought were healthier than normal chips, even though they had roughly the same amount of calories. She dipped them in low-fat cream cheese. Bertha had consumed around 6,500 calories that day, but she felt skinny. When she woke up the next morning, she stepped on the scale. She couldn't wait to see how successful her diet had been.

As soon as Bobby heard that the math test was going to be worth 30% of his grade, he began studying. He studied in class. He studied on the bus ride home. He even tried to study while walking home from the bus but stopped after bumping into a lamppost. When he got home, he didn't watch any TV because he was studying so intensely. He completed the study guide that Mr. Morris gave him and then he completed one that he had made himself. Bobby refused to quit. He stayed awake all night finding and completing extra problems on the Internet. By the time the sun rose, Bobby had mastered the content. As he entered the classroom, he felt prepared. He sharpened his pencil, sat at his desk, put his head down, fell asleep, and failed his test.

I thought that my mother was going to flip when Perry came over to eat at our house. To my surprise she just ignored him, even though he wore his hat, put his elbows on the table, and rocked back in his chair. I thought that she would go crazy while we ate. Perry pulled bones out of his mouth and put them on his plate instead of spitting them into a napkin. To my astonishment Mom looked past this too. But when Perry slammed a glass of root beer and burped the ABCs, she could no longer restrain herself. "What a wonderful rendition of the alphabet, Perry, and how age appropriate? I'm impressed." Perry wore a confused look, unsure of what her reaction had meant.

While walking home from work, Lake Park Mall security guard Scott Thornton thought about his day. A shoplifter had outrun him, he had lost the keys to his golf cart, and a group of skateboarders had made fun of his weight. Things had not gone so well. Scott was so deep in thought that he did not even notice that he had stumbled on a movie set. Lost in thought, he passed by trailers, cameras, and stagehands, yet he was unaware of the scene around him. When he came out of his daze, he looked up and saw a ski mask wearing man waving a knife at an old lady. Figuring that the masked man was robbing the old woman, Scott bolted into action. His adrenaline was flowing. He didn't even notice the cameraman filming him as he jump kicked the actor wearing the ski mask.

When the first English settlers arrived at Jamestown, hygiene was not a priority. The settlers faced many challenges. Food was scarce and the land was unsuitable for farming. Worse still, relations with Native Americans were uneasy and violence loomed. Yet even in these conditions, some settlers found time to care for their teeth. They did this by brushing their teeth with rags and abrasive tooth powders. Archaeologists have examined the remains of these colonists. They discovered that many of the settlers were missing the enamel on their teeth. By using these tooth powders, the settlers had striped this protective layer from their teeth. This caused their teeth to decay and fall out prematurely.

Kathy had never considered herself to be good with animals until she got a goldfish. Taking care of fish is easy. You only have to feed them once a day. Kathy thought to herself. Then she put the bottle of goldfish food down by a bottle of rat poison. When Kathy woke up the next day, she went to grab the bottle of fish food when her phone rang. Wondering who could be calling, Kathy grabbed the bottle of rat poison instead of the fish food. She did not notice her mistake. The phone call was from her friend Mary. Kathy loved to talk with Mary. As Kathy was chit-chatting away, she unscrewed the top of the rat poison bottle. It was about the same size as the bottle of fish food. "Oh, Mary, that's outrageous," Kathy said as she shook the bottle of rat poison into the fish tank. "He did?" She asked, as she put the top back on the rat poison bottle and put it down next to the fish food. "How could she?" She asked before going on with her day.

As Harold carried his lunch tray passed Chuck, the school bully, Chuck stuck his foot into the aisle. He was trying to trip Harold. Harold expected such an obstruction, so he sidestepped around Chuck's leg. "Excuse me, Chuck, my fault entirely," Harold said as he continued back to his table. Chuck felt offended that Harold had not tripped, so he marched to Harold's table to put him in his place. Dipping his finger into Harold's school lunch, Chuck said, "What are you eating, puke?" Harold replied nervously, "Yes, well, I think that's what they serve here. Only the best for us students, right? Anyway, you're welcome to it." Chuck sneered and stuck his finger into Harold's chest, "I don't want any of your puke, puke. Next time, you fall when I trip you." He removed his finger from Harold's chest and grabbed Harold's cupcake from his lunch tray before leaving. "Good bye, Chuck. It's always a pleasure seeing you," said Harold. He then released a sigh and ate around the fingerprint that Chuck had left in his casserole.

"Whenever someone's in trouble, Captain Adventure comes on the double!" Shouted Captain Adventure from the rooftop, right before he dropped onto the purse-snatcher. The old woman recovered her purse and said appreciatively, "Thank you, Captain Adventure! You saved the day." Captain Adventure posed and offered to carry the woman's groceries upstairs. She politely accepted, and Captain Adventure handcuffed the purse-snatcher to a lamppost. Then he followed the old woman upstairs. As he put the grocery bags onto her counter, Captain Adventure saw something that made him jump onto the kitchen table. He started squealing in a high-pitched voice, "EWWWWW! Icky! Icky! A big bug." As he did this, he was pointing at an average sized ladybug that was on the floor about ten or fifteen feet from him. Seeing his terrified reaction to this small bug, the old lady scooped the insect onto her finger and guided it out the window. Captain Adventure was immediately relieved and said with genuine appreciation, "Thank you. I guess we're even now."

"Jones, they've got other offers on the table, bigger offers. We've got to move on this thing now while we've got our foot in the door." Pat Meier was working him over. Mr. Jones wasn't sure about buying the house, but he agreed. Later that night, Mr. Jones grew less and less certain. The phone rang. Mr. Jones politely answered it, "Hello. Jones' residence." At first there was no reply, and Mr. Jones heard someone laughing at a distance, "Ha-ha... The place has got mold in the attic and the basement!" Mr. Jones recognized the voice as belonging to Pat Meier. He continued listening, "The walls are an inch thin. Trains pass by every fifteen minutes! You wouldn't believe this garbage dump, Bernie." Mr. Jones figured that Pat must have called him from on accident. Just as he was about to hang up, he remembered that Pat was trying to get him to buy a place next to a train station. "I only let him look at the place for ten minutes at a time. I'm telling you, Bernie, this Jones idiot is going to pay twice what that dump is worth." Mr. Jones had heard enough. He ended the call. The next day Pat waited eagerly a long time for Mr. Jones to show up to the closing.

Bram hated his roommate Keith's dog. Bram resented how Keith didn't even ask him before he got the dog. Keith just came home one night with a dog. Now Bram shared his living space with a furry, poorly trained pest. The dog was not potty trained. It barked hours on end for no reason. It bothered Bram's guests by jumping and slobbering on them. Bram tolerated all this because he was a good roommate and Keith was his friend. Then Bram came home from work one day and found that Keith's dogs had chewed up Bram's limited edition shoes. Bram snapped. "Keith, do you know what your really awesome dog did? He tore up my favorite shoes. Thank you so much. I didn't want those anyway." Keith came from his room looking confused and upset. Bram continued, "Oh, I never said 'thank you,' by the way, for surprising me with this really well-behaved dog. I am so pleased to share my home with him!" Bram was shouting now. Keith grabbed his dog by the color and slowly backed him into his bedroom.