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Now available for preorder:
The San Francisco Panorama
.

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NEW BOWLING
ANIMATIONS.

BY SEAN ADAMS

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A bowling ball sits in a cubicle. His bowling-pin boss comes over, looks at his work, tears it up, and yells at him. Having finished for the day, the bowling ball goes to the parking garage, only to find that two bowling pins are trying to break into his car. They smash one of his taillights before running away. The bowling ball gets pulled over on his way home by a bowling-pin cop. The bowling ball says he was going the speed limit, but the bowling-pin cop says he didn't pull him over for speeding. He pulled him over for having a taillight out. The bowling-pin cop says that usually he just warns drivers with a taillight out, but since he doesn't like the bowling ball's attitude he's going to give him a ticket. When the bowling ball finally gets home, he finds his bowling-pin wife having sex with one of his bowling-pin co-workers. They're both dressed in leather. The bowling-pin wife stops for a minute to tell her husband that she doesn't love him anymore. Then she and the bowling-pin co-worker start back up again with the bowling ball still in the room. The bowling ball's eyes fill with tears. GUTTER BALL!

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A lifeboat of bowling pins floats on the Arctic Ocean. It's been three days since they lost their Navy ship and several comrades to the enemy bowling-ball captain. Starving to death, they draw straws to see who will be eaten so that the rest may survive. The short straw goes to a young private bowing pin. His eyes filling with tears, he wonders why God has forsaken him, why he had to follow in his father's footsteps and join the Navy. He wishes he could have been his own man and done what he wanted to do: culinary school. A sparkle in the distance interrupts his thoughts. The bowling pins shout and light flares to get the approaching vessel's attention. They realize their mistake too late. The bowling-ball captain plows through the lifeboat with his battleship. The bowling pins who are not drowned or torn apart by the ferocious engine freeze to death in under an hour. SPARE!

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A bowling-ball kid sits in a chair in an open room. To his right, his bowling-pin mother. To his left, his bowling-pin father. They each look at him with pleading faces. A bowling-pin lawyer hands the bowling-ball kid a clipboard with a piece of paper on it and then leaves the room. The paper reads: "Who I want to have custody of me. Check only one box." There is a box for Mom and a box for Dad. The bowling-ball kid looks at the paper for a long time. He begins to sweat. Then he has a panic attack. SPLIT!

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Two gangs of bowling pins are meeting in an abandoned warehouse. One gang has a briefcase full of money and the other gang has a briefcase full of heroin. They are about to make the trade when a maverick bowling-ball policeman crashes through one of the windows. The bowling-pin gangs scatter, shooting AK-47s at the bowling-ball policeman, but, with a quick spray from his pistol, he kills all but one of the bowling pins. The one he didn't kill escapes out the door. The bowling ball chases him outside. The warehouse turns out to be on top of a snowcapped mountain. The bowling pin grabs a snowboard and starts down. The bowling ball grabs his own snowboard and follows suit. They exchange fire on their way down. The bowling ball is closing in on the bowling pin when suddenly: an avalanche! All is a haze. The snow settles. Everything is still for a moment. Then the bowling ball and bowling pin rise from the snow and begin fistfighting. The bowling pin knocks down the bowling ball, takes out a gun, and shoots the bowling ball in the chest. The bowling pin begins to walk away, exhausted, when a gunshot rings out. The pin falls to the ground dead. The bowling ball sits up behind him holding a tiny revolver. He takes off his shirt and his bulletproof vest and, examining the bruise, walks off into the sunset. STRIKE!

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OTHER McSWEENEY'S FEATURES:

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New Bowling Animations By Sean Adams
Krazy Kris By Mike Sacks
Your Millions Never Came: The Good News Is That I'm Making a Comeback By Dan Kennedy
Worse Things Happen at Sea By Susan Schorn
The Press Release for My Attempt to Break the Guinness World Record for Holding Breath Underwater By Rick Stoeckel

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