A declaration of war.

In what looked like another mundane UPS spot, the crafty whiteboard guy calmly waltzed onto the screen, took his place before his magical board, bowed before millions of Americans, unsheathed his mighty dry-erase marker, and slowly spelled out UPS like a young Matthew drafting his version of the gospel.

What happened next stunned the millions of American Idol viewers and marked one of mankind’s greatest acts of defiance.

With a steady hand and cool demeanor, the marker-wielding maestro wrote “Underpaid Servants” on the otherwise spotless board and quite possibly brought the tyrannical shipping powerhouse to its knees.

Long known for its third world wages and humiliating uniforms, UPS had seized power over the shipping world with little resistance. A brief war between FedEx and “Brown” had done nothing but leave the laughably expensive FedEx fishing for small time package deliveries and teetering on the verge of collapse.

You guys are badass. Seriously.

According to Franklin, he and his small band of hippie friends are planning to leave at the end of the month which will give them time to move out of their mutual home and amass some much needed money at family gatherings.

The trio, consisting of Franklin, “Moe” and “Little Tim”, have been diligently preparing for their trip by buying a map and stockpiling a modest store of marijuana with which they hope to enhance their experience.

The guys have also sprung for a twenty-five dollar oil change for Franklin’s 1993 Jeep Cherokee. Their destination, Colorado, has long been heralded as a sort of Mecca for the nation’s hippie population and is also the latest fad-state for post-graduate college students and women who are tired of shaving their armpits.

Franklin told Treebune.com about his reasons for the group’s hajj over the din of a String Cheese Incident bootleg, “It’s Colorado, dude. We’ve got some buddies out there, so we have a place to stay, and there’s like a ton of nature and stuff. It’ll probably be sweet. I hear it’s Frisbee season…and like…it’s Colorado, dude.”

Mama said there'd be days like this.

Over the summer, Conway worked out a list of possible new incarnations; the lovable, docile hippie, the brooding and quiet loner-type who likes French films and writes introspective poetry (high school girls love those guys in the movies), the tough guy with a heart of gold, or the cool hipster with the Swingers-esque clothes.

After weighing the pros and cons of each possible identity, taking into account all of his own strengths and weaknesses along with the anticipated reactions to each of the same, he settled on the gentle hippie persona…Snatchville high was running low on hippie types and he could be just the guy to fill the bill.

Wasting no time, Pete went into seclusion for the entire summer, growing his hair long enough to pull behind his ears and studying the lingo and high pitched falsetto delivery that defines the hippie lexicon.

Monopoly: OPEC Edition

The prospective action is said to be retaliation for U.S. efforts to corner the railroad industry by way of a shadowy trade with semi-ally France who gave the U.S. control of the Short Line Railroad in exchange for a “Get out of Jail Free” card, an effort by the French to be able to bail themselves out of trouble during any future invasion.

As news of the secretive transaction began to surface, OPEC was reportedly very angry as their dominance of the utility and transportation markets became threatened and their stranglehold on the world economy was somewhat loosened.

OPEC still currently still holds the deeds to both the Waterworks and the Electric Company, but now that America has gained control over three of the four existing railroads (Canada maintains control of the B & O Line) the United States' dependence on OPEC products is greatly diminished- a turn of events which has the members of the Middle Eastern oil producing gang grasping for ways to keep the rest of the world on its knees, begging for much needed fuel for both transportation and business concerns.