How to Suck as Much as Count Muskula
With help from our annual Halloween mask
By the News Team, Fri., Oct. 27, 2023
Every Halloween since 1982, the Chronicle has selected a person or entity of the most distinguished infamy and created a Halloween mask in their image. Accompanying assembly instructions help the wearer fully embody the creature. Elon Musk would have been an excellent choice in 2021 when he first moved here. But his offenses since – including his environmental impact and soiling Twitter – have made him the obvious choice for 2023. Count Muskula joins dishonorees Alex "Bozo" Jones; Texas' Hounds of Hades featuring Gov. Greg Abbott, Attorney General Ken Paxton, and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick; Donald Trump-kin; and Ted-dy Cruz-er.
There can be only one Count Muskula, which is why he must spread his seed far and wide to "help the underpopulation crisis." But though you may not be able to spring directly from the loins of our dark (edge)lord, you can become his techbro progeny by donning this mask. Channeling his seductive vampy energy, you too may suck all manner of things into your maw: bitcoin, antisemites, gallons of increasingly scarce water during a historic drought – you name it! Here's how to assemble your Chronicle™ Count Muskula mask:
1) Count Muskula's black-hole-ish magnetism makes this step easy, but as a mortal you will have to gather as many Chronicles as you can by hand – destroy all but one. Your job is to undermine public trust in the media.
2) With the one Chronicle that remains, gaze lovingly at your future visage. Tap into your inner Count Muskula and indulge an intense and uncontrollable desire to consume all matter. Surrender to the urge, using your pointy yet sucky little veneers – sorry, fangs – to suckle the pulpy paper around your new likeness, until there is nothing left but Musk. Yes. Yesssss. Count Muskula is all there is.
3) Now poke a hole for the mouth and grab a Swiss Army silly straw: You'll need this to gulp the sweet, sticky, life force from unwitting victims – or, variously, vacuum a few hundred million gallons of the Colorado River into your insatiable trembling lips.
4) Next, the eyes: This will help you spot your next acquisition – perhaps an unprofitable social media website, just to own the libs. Once you've secured it, go about breaking it bit by bit. Is it a free service? Find ways to charge for it. Is it a place for responsibly moderated free speech? Find ways to spread dangerous disinformation. Is it a place where people who feel like outsiders have found supportive communities? Enable bullies and bigots to make it unwelcoming to everyone but them. And it only cost you $45 billion!
5) Time to secure the Muskula Mask to your face with string. Billionaires don't maintain "junk drawers," so you'll need to send someone else to secure twine from the store – one of your Musk acolytes, or maybe a baby mama? While you're waiting, tweet your routing and bank account number and @ some food banks and poor countries.
6) Yesss. Yesssss. In the time it took you to solve world hunger, your minions have delivered the twine. But now you've lost money to the poor! Never fear – just convince Travis County Commissioners that your super-duper "Gigafactory" will be friendly to labor in exchange for millions in tax breaks, then work everyone to the brink of death (or beyond!). This will save a lot of money.
7) As you tie the string to the paper, relax and think silly, silly thoughts that are also oddly comforting. Your überintelligent brain has already figured out we live in a simulation, so just know whatever embarrassing actions you take – endorsing Kanye West for president, calling the cave diver who helped save that youth soccer team a "pedo," renaming a globally recognized brand to something a proto-incel tween would think is sick, avoiding all taxation – have no consequences.
8) Congratulations, your transformation is complete: Now you, too, may suck as much as Elon Musk!
DISCLAIMER: Backward cowboy hat sold separately.
