Category Archives: Local

Rust Bucket Becomes FMO’s New Corporate Vehicle

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The FM Observer unveils its new armored vehicle.

Fargo, ND – Since the FM Observer recently went public with its IPO, we made another important executive decision: to purchase our official corporate vehicle.

Consider this post as the unveiling of our new FM Observer-mobile. It may look like a RustBucket to some, but believe us when we say it is a veritable fortress on wheels. We call it “The Tank”.

But don’t think we bought it for our own pleasure and aggrandizement. We bought it for YOU! So that we can better serve YOU, our faithful readers.

Yes, The Tank will certainly help us get from Point A to Point B, but Point B might just be your front door. Now, if there’s a hot story in your neck of the woods that you want us to cover, just give us a call and watch for The Tank to show up.

Now, if we’re under fire from certain questionable articles we’ve written, look for us to be hiding out In The Tank. And we’re not just doing it for our own personal protection. No, we’re doing it for YOU, so that we can survive, to live another day, in order to bring YOU more important articles about the issues that YOU believe in.

(But if as a bonus, The Tank turns out to be a majorly fun Party Barge, that would obviously be some sweet icing on the cake, and we would not have a problem with that.)

Fargo Group Making Serious Run At Perfect March Madness Bracket

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Bracket Central

Fargo, ND—Basketball fans have been guessing the March Madness tournament for decades. Every year, it seems, contestant stakes have been getting higher and higher. Cash prizes as well as bragging rights are among the available rewards for having the most accurate prediction.

The odds of you picking every single game correctly are roughly four trillion to one. Local March Madman Ryan Noisewater wants badly to destroy these odds. He’s crafted a master plan to win.

Hours before all the bracket challenges went live we spoke with Ryan to find out just what it takes to nail the perfect bracket.

“My hand-picked Bracket Posse spent the winter creating throw-away email accounts that can be used multiple times for any and every bracket challenge on the planet,” Ryan says. “We’re armed with two computers per guy–one ergonomic mouse for each arm and each machine has multiple monitors and replacement hardware on-site in case of computer malfunction. We run equipped with eighteen crates of Mountain Dew, prepaid masseuses, bedpans, and very limited basketball knowledge. We are ready.”

Ryan says he’s taken every factor into account during clinical trials he and his crew ran during the NCAA offseason. “We experimented with bracket completion possibility throughput via time-tested computer algorithms; how many left-clicks one hand can complete in a given second and how many seconds it takes to open an account and complete a bracket,” he explained. “This is how we’re cramming as many brackets as humanly possible into the system. I’ve also developed a simple equation in which you memorize a sequence of numbers (according to seed) and pick your teams in such a way that none of the brackets my team generates in the time allotted will be the same. One guy works with this set of numbers, the other guy works with that set of numbers. One of our brackets is bound to hit.”

By now, Ryan and his bracket posse should be hard at work clicking numbers and sucking down Dew in an effort to claim their trophy.

Blind Bowler Bowls Back-To-Back Perfect Games

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After he bowled a perfect 300 game, he went ahead and did it again!

Fargo, ND – You would have had to see it to believe it. Mr. Walter Lane of rural North Dakota bowled two perfect games in a row after entering a tournament on a dare.

His wife of fifty years, Edna Lane, dared him on a whim, to enter an upcoming bowling tournament “just for the heck of it”.

Of course neither Walter nor Edna expected much from it because Walter has been legally blind ever since Edna dared him to stare at the sun some years back. About that, Walter explains: “Well, I s’pose I shouldn’t have done it, but after she dared me, I went ahead and did it anyways. Wasn’t too smart, I guess.”

In spite of being blind, Walter somehow put together two perfect games of bowling. Bowling alley manager and retired bowling professsional Jim St. John recounts: “After throwing 12 straight strikes for the first 300 game, Walter proceeded to do the exact same thing again for his second perfect game. I could not believe my eyes!”

Asked what he plans on trying next, Walter responded: “I think we’ll give trap shooting a go, don’t cha know.”

FM Observer Goes Corporate With Initial Public Offering

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Buy FMO low, sell high. Then move to Hawaii.

Fargo, ND – The FM Observer is taking its paper to Wall Street. FM Observer (FMO) stock is slated to open at $3.141559265359/share next week. Here’s a Q&A the FM Observer did with Nick Hirchert about the upcoming IPO and how he plans to use it to get us all rich as hell.

FMO: Nick, can I call you Nick?
Nick: No, you may not.

FMO: Nick, is it true that FMO is going public?
Nick:  It is! We are taking the Observer to Wall street with our Initial Public Offering.

FMO: How exciting is this for you?
Nick:  On a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the most excited? We want to be rich like Doc Brown from Back to the Future so we can travel into the future & do a bunch of articles about stuff that hasn’t yet happened. Then we can retire forever.

FMO: Do you plan on donating all your profits to charity?
Nick:  We will assign one charity per future-article. Each article that gets future-posted will hopefully generate enough stock dividends to fulfill the financial needs of its respective charity until the end of time.

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FMO: Will you have a board of directors?
Nick:  Yes. I have appointed a board of directors.

FMO: Are any women or minorities possibly going to be on the board? Any midgets?
Nick:  The FMO Board of Directors is comprised of memes. Fictitious characters. Among them are: Douchebag Lumbergh, What if I Told You Morpheus and Conspiracy Keanu.

FMO: Where will your corporate headquarters be located?
Nick:  Corporate Headquarters is located in West Fargo, just off of I-94 near Sheyenne Street.

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FMO: How rich do you see yourself becoming?
Nick:  Wealthy enough to fly a Delorean into the year 2050 to compose 10,000 articles while aging in reverse as time counts backwards to 2014. You see, when you travel through time, you age substantially, directly proportional to the amount of years through which you travel. Ergo, concurrently, from the minute you arrive into your future year, you immediately begin de-aging as time simultaneously regresses into your initial host year. Vis-a-vis, concurrently, returning back from whence you came with the same eyeballs and hairline, but unfortunately, a completely different space time continuum.

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FMO: With all due respect, do you believe there’s enough pent-up demand for FMO stock to affect the earnings per share ratio?
Nick:  America is full of pent-up demand. Have you seen the comments sections of various other websites? Absolutely riddled with pent-up demand.

FMO: For stocks in general, do you agree that a double bottom’s pivot is usually the same price at the middle peak?
Nick:  Yes. If you turn on your pivot foot down low for a jump shot, release the ball at your jump’s peak.

FMO: No need to get snippy. Are you dog friendly?
Nick:  Quite.

FMO: Quite yes, or quite no?
Nick:  I happen to live with movie star Daniel Day-Lewis. He is currently in full character as a method actor for his next movie in which he plays a dog.

FMO: C’mon. Don’t bullshit me. Would you describe yourself as half empty or half full?
Nick:  My body is 75% water, 5% bonehead and 20% baloney.

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FMO: Where do you see yourself in 100 years?
Nick:  As time travel proliferates and the proportions of aging and de-aging become limitless, I truly have no earthly idea.

FMO: Thank you for granting us this frank interview. Any final thoughts that you’d like to share with us?
Nick:  Yes. In the year 2193, there is a great disruption in the 17th Matrix. One of you brings a fully-cooked Hot Pocket through an equilateral time vortex, causing an irreparable tear in the Matrix and a critical disruption in the space time continuum. So please, stop buying Hot Pockets for Pete’s sake.

Williston Overcrowding & Lack Of Housing Taking Its Toll

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For every person who finds an apartment, 199 others can not.

Williston, ND – With too many people looking for too little housing, folks in Williston, North Dakota are starting to reach their breaking point.

Because of the North Dakota oil boom, monthly rent in Williston is now the highest in the country.

Sadly, for every apartment, there are 200 people seeking a home where they can hang their hat.

Mayor Bob Cobb says: “It’s like trying to play ketchup but you never can quite catch up. It’s very frustrating as more and more people continue to roll into town.”

Professional psychologist René Magritte describes it this way: “The competition for housing is ferocious. For those that do get an apartment, not only is it extremely expensive, but you look out your window only to see all the people that wish they were you. It reminds me of the original Star Trek episode called The Mark Of Gideon in which a planet was so overcrowded that it was like Bombay on steroids.”

Help Fargo Police Investigate Convenience Store Robbery

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Whodunnit?

Fargo, ND – During a recent police investigation, Chief Inspector Ripley interviewed five possible suspects in the robbery of a local Kum & Go convenience store.

One fact that was known for certain: each suspect was telling exactly one lie.

From their statements below, can you use the power of deductive logical thinking to help the police investigators determine which suspect robbed the Kum & Go?

Here are the statements from the five suspects:

Angel said: It wasn’t Elizabeth. It was Brandi.
Brandi said: It wasn’t Cheri. It wasn’t Elizabeth.
Cheri said: It was Elizabeth. It wasn’t Angel.
Dolly said: It was Cheri. It was Brandi.
Elizabeth said: It was Dolly. It wasn’t Angel.

Anyone who submits the correct answer might be entered into a fairly random drawing to possibly win either a $5 gift certificate to Kum & Go, or win a frozen box of Philly Steak* Hot Pockets.

Good luck and thank you for assisting local crime-fighters in solving yet another in a long series of convenience store burglaries.

*Nestlé USA, the company that produces Hot Pockets, announced last week that it is voluntarily recalling an unspecified number of ”Philly Steak” and ”Croissant Crust Philly Steak and Cheese” Hot Pockets in certain sizes as part of a larger meat recall.

Hint to solving the crime: Only one of Brandi’s statements is true.

Local Trucker Inducted Into Guinness Book Of World Records For Saying “Bullshit” 312 Times In One Hour

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Truck Driver in Semi TruckWest Fargo, ND—Russell Hvordsenen of West Fargo, North Dakota has been inducted into the 2014 Guinness Book of World Records for mentioning the word “bullshit” 312 times in one hour. He nearly doubled the previous record held by a local truck driver Augvald Audgard from Dilworth, MN who has held this honor since 1981 with a remarkable 165.

When asking Mr. Hvordsenen how he felt about taking over the record from the previous record holder, it became quite apparent he is currently in training to beat his own record some time this year. Russell seemed upset at the fact that Guinness didn’t really give him anything besides some “bullshit piece of paper” when he was “really hoping to get some bullshit trip out of the deal or some bullshit like that at least. This is a bunch of bullshit.”

During that rant, he mentioned the word ‘bullshit’ an extraordinary 21 times in less than 45 seconds. Simply. Epic.

Wrapping up our conversation with Russell, we asked him what the motivation was this year to make such an impact on American Culture. After asking us if we were “some sort of bullshit communist or democrat” for driving a foreign car, he simply stated this:

“Well, the weather is bullshit, management is bullshit, the government is bullshit, the grocery store is bullshit with their bullshit. Did I mention mention management is bullshit? They don’t know nothin’ and in my opinion, that’s a bunch of horseshit.”

Horseshit? This could be real exciting. We will be watching Russell Hvordsenen in 2014 real close.

-via Mike Johnson, published with permission

FM-area convenience stores: “We are out of cash so please stop robbing us”

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Fargo, ND—A long string of recent armed attacks on gas stations in our town has left tills and registers completely tapped. After Fargo endured yet another pair of convenience store holdups yesterday, the Observer has learned local stop n shops are officially out of money.

Store clerks want the city’s armed hoodlums to know they don’t have any more cash to fork over after being robbed, like, fifty million times.

South Fargo Petro Serve clerk Zelda Holdsclaw:

“We’re out of cash so don’t bother robbing us anymore. You guys took it all. Holding us up again would be a complete waste of your time.”

It would appear that area convenience stores have become easy targets for a quick smash-and-grab. Thankfully, with this new announcement, all that is about to change.

North Fargo Stop-N-Go store manager Randy Noisewater:

“Robbers have finally taken us for all we’re worth. It might be time for criminals to step their game up, take off the training wheels and start robbing banks for Pete’s sake.”

North Dakotans Live In A State Of Happiness

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Hiberspace is the new happy.

Fargo, ND – Gallup’s recent release of its annual “Happiest State” poll results has left many Americans dumbfounded to see North Dakota sitting in 1st place for 2014.  It is being widely reported that collective “Whaaaaa?” sounds can be heard from Pittsburgh to Portland as people scratch their heads trying to figure out where North Dakota is and what’s so happy about it.

However incredulous, Gallup has spoken.  Toppling the reigning champ, Hawaii, North Dakota now ranks as the happiest state in the union.  While the FMO sends out a mittened “high five” to our state and its citizens, even we have to wonder:  How the heck did that happen?

In an effort to understand how North Dakota could have ever stolen the happy crown from Hawaii (Really??), the FMO decided to ask local psychiatrist and self-proclaimed happiness expert, Johann Kronnesvoldervandersbjorg to explain.

FMO:  So, Dr. K., why in the world are North Dakotans so darn happy?

JK:  I’m going to let you in on a little secret.  I’ve recently discovered a phenomenon that occurs in some humans who live in absurdly inhabitable conditions like we experience here in North Dakota.  After years of being exposed to mind-numbing cold, prolonged sunlight deprivation and high levels of casserole consumption, human beings begin to enter a state not unlike hibernation.  I call it Hiberspace.

FMO:  Can you repeat that?  I was half asleep.

JK:  Listen closely now.  Just as the internet exists in Cyberspace, North Dakotans exist in Hiberspace.  The inner consciousness becomes completely unaware of the outside world and instead operates in a sort of euphoric dream state.  Awash in endorphins and dopamine from the excessive casserole intake, the human mind drifts along blissfully for months in order to survive the harshness of reality.  It’s really quite extraordinary.

FMO:  So, you’re saying we’re essentially bears?  Big, lumbering, loopy, grinning bears?

JK:  Well, that’s one way to look at it.  The point is that Hiberspace is an incredibly exciting discovery.  Just imagine the possibilities!  If humans can evolve to the point where they can find happiness in such utterly ridiculous living conditions as the bleak, frozen tundra of North Dakota, then theoretically true Nirvana should be a snap for say, a Floridian.  It’s all about tapping into that magical sweet spot between hopelessness and denial.  Therein lies true happiness.

FMO:  And, apparently, a casserole.

JK:  Indeed.

FMO:  Indeed.

UFO Sighting In North Dakota Caught On Camera

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Sheriff Ben Dover says: This really happened! This here ain’t no hoax.

Perth, North Dakota – An amazing UFO sighting was caught on camera just outside Perth, in north central North Dakota.

Towner County Sheriff Ben Dover somehow captured this amazing image on his cell phone, while watching the UFO for about ten minutes, as he sipped an early morning cup of coffee.

Sheriff Dover said that he witnessed the UFO spacecraft use its tractor beam to pull up an old bi-plane that was sitting out in a farmer’s field.

Dr. Zak Neth of the National UFO Center: North Dakota has definitely been a hot-spot of UFO activity lately. However, the aliens who were sent to visit “Earth” might have mistakenly thought they were to visit “Perth”.