Finnophobia

I have had much difficulty overcoming my acute and unnatural loathing for all things Finnish, and have long considered the glum mountain dwellers as abominations descended from miscreants. I have always found a special kind of abhorrence in fjords, and have woken up screaming from nightmares of Lapp children singing. 

For years I had attributed my irrational fear as a reaction to Finland’s high literacy rate and yet only later discovered that my lifelong phobia was a direct result of an artifact in my possession since childhood, an idol from a bear worshiping Sami cult.  

The unique hex conjured by a long dead shaman had caused the previous two owners - a Russian anthropologist and a Spanish museum curator - to go quite mad. The curse starts with mild Finnophobia, with the victim eventually succumbing to feverish dreams of reindeer herds and contemporary Finnish power metal.
 

After piecing together the intricate puzzle I successfully lifted the curse by returning the idol to its rightful owners in the Arctic Circle. 

I still find the throaty traditional joik singing style of the Lapps to be second only to the death rattle in terms of sheer audio horror, but I am now a Finnophobe in recovery. 

The Wives and Crimes of C. Alistair Borgia, Esq.

From a precocious age I had fancied the fantastic, financing my foreign forays of ageing whores and post-opium malaise by conning the needier, or paying Paul to rob Peter and other schemes in which the scheming was oh so seedier.

And yet the finer things in life such as duck flambé on a Bangkok holiday or naked serenades from the tribal women from the unexplored regions between Borneo and the Jakarta Bay have not tamed my lust for fortune and fame.

They Call Him Borgia

To this day the taste of gin reminds me of coerced pygmy hunting, a grotesque past-time I was obliged to attend after my mandatory wedding to the princess of a prominent sultanate. My disappearance resulted in a manhunt that only ended after I was able to acquire a white shrunken head bearing my likeness, a gruesome trinket that sufficed to satisfy the Belgian mercenaries that had tracked me into the darkest hells of the Congo.

Two juntas and a massage parlor later I telegraphed my thanks to my resident procurer, Sven Svensen of the Stockholm Natural History Museum, for obtaining the authentic shrunken head which likely had belonged to an unfortunate member of an Italian film production crew cannibalized in the Amazon.

Hot Night in the City

Crayola snatched harlots and their nights of sin wielding crimson stained bowling pins hinted at deceptions masked by the city's rouge deluge - that steady stream of cheap claret and suppressed regrets.

Microwave Goblins

In my travels and tribulations a recurring motif has given me some cause of alarm, namely the horror stories of the sound of phantom midgets harassing microwave buttons with sausagey digits.

The tiny gluttons will hide throughout the home - sinister gnomes leaving greasy finger stains from the spoiled fast food chain remains of meat chow mein.

If you find yourself stirred from sleep from their haunting tell-tale late night beeps the cessation of their infestation can be achieved through poisoned cheese - the only salvation from this rapidly growing disease.