Todd Stadler's blog

Clever Bumper Sticker Theater

On my walk to work this morning, I passed by a car with several bumper stickers. One of them read, "God protect me from your followers!"

Well, a clever bumper sticker deserves a clever reply, my mom always said, so I walked up to the bumper stickler's house and knocked on the door.

After a few seconds, a man came to the door dressed in a robe. "Um, yeah?" he said.

"The jig is up! It didn't work!" I stated, matter-of-factly.

The man stared at me for a second. "What the ... ?"

"Your bumper sticker," I said. "It has failed. I am one of God's followers, and clearly, He has not protected you from me, because here I am. To destroy you. Or at least bother you very, very much.

"Wait," he said. "Are you talking about the whole 'God protect me ...'?"

"Yes, the same," I said, and I took my Bible out of my satchel. "Now please step outside."

"Wait, what? What are you doing?"

"This," I said, "is my Bible. I am going to thump you with it. Multiple times. On the head. That is why we are called Bible-thumpers. I thought that was obvious."

And then I stopped walking and noticed that I was now several blocks down the street from the car with the bumper stickers. It had all been a dream!

Notes for clods: this is not the right-wing religious-nut revenge fantasy you think it is. My reasons for writing this include the following:

• I detest Clever Bumper Stickers of all sorts, and this is a way of sublimating my rage.
• I chuckled to myself when I thought of referring to the one who applies a bumper sticker as a "bumper stickler".
• I was similarly amused at the (false) etymology of the term "Bible thumper", a term for which, frankly, I have never understood the true derivation.

I promise to never assault anyone whose car bears such a sticker. However, I may annoy you very, very much. Eye for an eye and all that.