the-grasshopper-and-the-ants
Original: the-grasshopper-and-the-ants on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Child (in bed): Grampa, can I have a story?
Panel 2:
Grampa (a bald, bearded man wearing glasses): This is the story of the grasshopper and the ants.
Panel 3:
Grampa: Once upon a time, there was a grasshopper and some ants. The grasshopper played his fiddle and danced all summer long, while the ants worked hard.
Panel 4:
Grampa: Come winter time, there was very little food. The grasshopper died so did the ants who did most of the work.
Panel 5:
Grampa: The ants who died spent their entire lives as a sexless slave race, devoted to a distant, all-powerful overlord who thought less of them than her own excreta.
Panel 6:
Grampa: The grasshopper experienced happiness, but died in sorrow. The ants experienced neither joy nor pain — only monotonous toil. From a naively utilitarian perspective, they came out equal.
Panel 7:
Grampa: Nearby, humans watched, and imagined themselves superior because their lifespans were one cosmic second longer.
Panel 8:
Grampa: The end.
Panel 9:
(The child has fallen asleep in bed.)
Panel 10:
Grampa: Would you like to hear the story of the big bad wolf who improved the gene pool?
Child: No, please.
Votey:
A chicken/rooster head with a speech bubble.
Chicken: I am the überwolf.
Child (in bed): Grampa, can I have a story?
Panel 2:
Grampa (a bald, bearded man wearing glasses): This is the story of the grasshopper and the ants.
Panel 3:
Grampa: Once upon a time, there was a grasshopper and some ants. The grasshopper played his fiddle and danced all summer long, while the ants worked hard.
Panel 4:
Grampa: Come winter time, there was very little food. The grasshopper died so did the ants who did most of the work.
Panel 5:
Grampa: The ants who died spent their entire lives as a sexless slave race, devoted to a distant, all-powerful overlord who thought less of them than her own excreta.
Panel 6:
Grampa: The grasshopper experienced happiness, but died in sorrow. The ants experienced neither joy nor pain — only monotonous toil. From a naively utilitarian perspective, they came out equal.
Panel 7:
Grampa: Nearby, humans watched, and imagined themselves superior because their lifespans were one cosmic second longer.
Panel 8:
Grampa: The end.
Panel 9:
(The child has fallen asleep in bed.)
Panel 10:
Grampa: Would you like to hear the story of the big bad wolf who improved the gene pool?
Child: No, please.
Votey:
A chicken/rooster head with a speech bubble.
Chicken: I am the überwolf.
Alt text
A ten-panel comic. A child in bed asks his bald, bearded, bespectacled grandfather for a story. Grampa tells "the grasshopper and the ants": the grasshopper fiddled and danced all summer while the ants worked hard; come winter there was little food, and the grasshopper died, as did the ants who did most of the work. Grampa adds increasingly bleak commentary — the dead ants spent their lives as a sexless slave race devoted to a distant all-powerful overlord who thought less of them than her own excreta; the grasshopper knew happiness but died in sorrow while the ants knew only monotonous toil, so from a naively utilitarian view they came out equal; and nearby humans imagined themselves superior merely because their lifespans were one cosmic second longer. "The end," Grampa says — but by now the child has fallen asleep. Grampa, leaning in, offers: "Would you like to hear the story of the big bad wolf who improved the gene pool?" The child replies, "No, please." Votey: a chicken/rooster head with a speech bubble declaring, "I am the überwolf."
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.