Dockers Presents Fight Club
It’s true, you are not your fucking khakis. But boy, those sure do look nice on you, no matter your personality! Oh no! On your first night of fight club, the night that you had to fight, you got some nasty blood stains on them! Luckily, they come right out in the wash with Stain Defender!

Inception by Hasbro Games
On one last, big job, the one that will get him back to his family after years of exile, thief Dom Cobb goes inside the mind of the heir to a business empire to plant an idea. Cobb assembles a team of old friends and new faces to pull off the Operation, but will they have what it takes to avoid touching the side wall and getting a shock?

Beef ‘N’ Cheddar (remake of Ratatouille)
The incredible story of how a young chef learns the ins and outs of making delicious Arby’s sandwiches, Jamochas and other items by befriending a talented rat who takes up residence in an otherwise perfectly clean and safe restaurant location. The story climaxes when a stuck-up restaurant critic reluctantly comes into Arby’s, remembers his childhood days eating Beef ‘N Cheddars and finally loosens up. (NOTE: The rats may need to be changed into sentient hunks of cheese or cows to keep the clever title pun in place.)

Citizen (Watch) Kane
On his death bed, publishing tycoon Charles Foster Kane utters a mysterious last word: “Rosebud.” Turns out that was the nickname for his Citizen Eco-Drive watch, the one he wore and kept ever since his days as an impoverished child. It worked until the day he died, and he was very happy. Truly, the Citizen Eco-Drive is unstoppable!

Pfizer Movie Time: Apocalypse Now
A shot-for-shot remake of Coppola’s original film, but now everyone has an erection.

Taxi Driver + VitaminWater
Travis Bickle is back! And he’s as quotable as ever:
“Thank God for the water, the water full of electrolytes and vitamin C and with the subtle, yet delicious taste of fruit punch, to wash the trash off the sidewalk.”
“All the animals come out at night – whores, skunk pussies, buggers, queens, fairies, dopers, junkies, sick, venal. Someday a real water will come and hydrate all this scum and give them all their B vitamins and calcium at only 50 calories a serving.”
“You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? You talkin’ to me? Well, I’m sure glad you are! Try the delicious, refreshing taste of VitaminWater’s new Stur-D flavor!”

But what if we have misjudged these emerald antagonists?

That’s the question answered in Green Pig, the astonishing novel by pseudonymous author Roxio Tappett. The tale unfolds in much the same same way as modern classics such as John Gardner’s Grendel, Gregory Maguire’s Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, and those episodes of Lost that proved Ben wasn’t all bad when you got right down to it.

The protagonist of this epic is Hamilton P. Pig, one of a group of descendants of the original three little pigs, turned green by radiation poisoning after some industrious birds offered their home-destroying knowledge to a certain large, malevolent wolf many generations ago, leaving the pigs exposed to runoff from a local nuclear power plant. Life has been downward spiral for the pigs ever since. Shunned by their pink peers, the green pigs, known in porcine circles as the “pukes,” have been unable to provide for themselves for decades. With virtually no resources available to them, the green pigs must live in virtual houses of cards, structures made of raw materials held together with nothing but gravity and faith, with walls on only two sides.

The community nearing starvation and reaching the breaking point, Hamilton reluctantly participates in a plan to obtain a few eggs from the great grandchildren of the birds who ruined their ancestors’ lives. Little did he or any of the others know the consequences that would befall them, the anger that would destroy their already tattered lives. This is the story of desperation turning into war, and one pig’s mortal fear as he sits, powerless, in the bottom right corner of the structure in level 2-3, as birds split into threes all around him. He watches his family and his friends’ lives snuffed out in a poof of smoke, that terrible number, “5000,” burned into his mind’s eye forever.

As the carnage erupts around him, Hamilton pines for his true love, Melinda, a yellow bird he has been meeting in secret for a few months, away from the prying eyes of their families, who would certainly disapprove. Hamilton meant to propose to Melinda, but near the end of the last meeting, she sped things ahead to a quicker close than he expected. Now, she has been called away to the slingshot at level 3-1. Hamilton is aware of what happens to the birds who go to battle. If he could only move in more than a slow roll propelled by some nearby momentum without exploding, he would go to her.

Melinda’s father, Gen. Phineas, serves as the villain. You can tell he’s the villain because he shoots the birds at the pigs.

A combination of Gone With the Wind, Romeo and Juliet, and that iPhone game people play while they sit on the toilet, Green Pig is a novel for our times. “Get me three stars!” Gen. Phineas exclaims to kick off the sprawling story in medias res.

I give this wonderful book four.

JohnLennon Having some corn flakes and tea this morning. My favourites!

JohnLennon @kanyewest lol!

JohnLennon can’t find my glasses! yoko is tweeting this for me

JohnLennon That ending! #Inception

JohnLennon @shitmydadsays LOL

JohnLennon All You Need Are Gloves #rejectedbeatlessongs

JohnLennon Twitter sure is sloooooow today

JohnLennon RT @RevRunWisdom There’s a very simple way to tell how great ur doing,, just check the hate-o-meter

JohnLennon #youknowyourintroublewhen she stops even pretending to like your new songs!

JohnLennon @justinbieber lol

—

Feelin’ low? Like you haven’t got a friend in the world? Having a terrible day because you got in my goddamn way on the sidewalk and I looked at you like I wanted to murder you? Or because you talked to me like I was four and I poured mud all over your clothes?

Well, you’re in luck, because I’m going to describe some ways to make your day better.

STEPS

1. Leave me the fuck alone. By doing this you won’t have to worry about me ripping your mouth open with my hands and then spitting down your throat because you got inside my personal space. One way to do this is to be in a different area than me or, if you’re in the same room, avoid speech or eye contact unless I let you know they’re acceptable. Acting all fake-nice to me will really get me going, so definitely don’t do that. If you avoid pissing me off, I’ll have a good day, which means you maybe will.

2. Consider exercise, but then don’t do it. Exercise is terrible. You get all sweaty and shit, and who wants to go running when they could be comfortable and seated? But you’ll feel better about yourself if you really think about doing it, so do that.

3. Sleep until, like, 2. You’ll miss work and probably get fired, but that’ll happen tomorrow. Am I right, folks? Did you know scientists say sleeping in is fucking awesome? Scientists know what’s up.

4. Begin the day with a glass of whiskey. What better way to have a good day than to dull the bad? Plus, it’s great for your perception of yourself, and, let’s face it, having a good day’s about perception, not reality, folks.

5. Begin your day with a shower. “Hey, stupid,” you’re now saying. “Didn’t you just say to start the day with whiskey? You can’t start the day with two different things. You have to do one or the other first.” Shut up and take a shower. You smell awful, and you’re coming awfully close to fucking up step 1, partner.

6. Skip breakfast. Because if you’re sleeping until 2, there’s no way you can really call it that, man.

7. Don’t talk to anyone if you can swing it. Because you know deep down that all your friends and your parents secretly hate you. Fuck them.

8. Be spontaneous. Do something you would never do, like hiring some hookers, killing a hobo or driving a city bus off the road. Today doesn’t just have to be another day!

9. Take a whole lot of anti-depressants. It’s really the only way you’re going to avoid thinking about all those bills you haven’t paid or how much more attractive your sister is than you are.

10. Don’t do anything you’re cripplingly scared of. I mean, really. Jesus Christ! Why would you even consider doing something like that as a way to make your day better? That’s what an insane person would do.

TIPS

• Avoid the library and all the homeless people who hang out there.
• Do everything you hate doing the day before, making that day the worst you’ve ever had.
• Vanity. That always makes people feel better.
• Plan a trip you can’t afford or a party no one will come to.
• Live in the past, maybe.
• Sexually assault strangers.
• Give the assholes you know a piece of your mind, finally.
• Listen to music, but make it loud enough that you ruin other people’s days. Omelette, eggs, etc.

WARNINGS

• Don’t expect too much. I mean, I guess it’s possible for you to have a good day, but you’re you, so.
• You don’t have to completely lay off alcohol or drugs, you just have to take the right ones in the right amounts. It’s pretty easy.

One afternoon, he was driving home from the grocery store when he heard an odd sound, like singing, coming from the trunk of his car. When he got home, he continued to hear the noise, which began to give him an uneasy feeling.

Slowly, he moved toward the trunk door and popped it open. To his relief, it was merely the sound of the music-playing card he had bought for his wife, which had accidentally flipped open when he hit a bump.

Then a guy came out from behind a tree and murdered him!

*  *  *

It was nearly 3 a.m. when Denise Robinson began stumbling home from a particularly rowdy frat party on campus. She knew she had too much to drink, and she wished her friend Paulette hadn’t gone home with Travis instead of walking with her. Alone and frightened, she turned into the alley shortcut she always went through when going from campus to her apartment.

She didn’t notice when the dark figure looked out at her from behind the trash cans. It wasn’t until he was in front of her, grinning with a mouth full of glistening, sharp teeth like knives, that she saw him and screamed.

“Hello, Denise,” the man said. “I’ve been watching you.”

Her lungs began to seize up. She was trapped.

“It’s…it’s me, Antoine. From your applied psych class. You didn’t recognize me? Sorry to startle you. You need some help getting home?”

So Antoine walked Denise to her apartment, which they were shocked to discover was haunted by horrible ghosts!

 *  *  *

Simone Clemons had always been afraid of heights. And today just happened to be the day she was starting her new job on the 79th floor. She didn’t know if she wanted this promotion, from the basement all the way up to that office so far up in the sky.

She stepped onto the elevator slowly and anxiously, unsure of the machine’s ability to even transport her to that altitude, so high above the safety of solid ground. As the elevator doors slid shut, leaving her in the tiny space alone, she stared at the panel of buttons, confused to find that no 79th floor was listed. The buttons stopped at 78. Unsure of what to do, she tried to push the “Door Open” button. But the doors didn’t open. The elevator started moving up, quickly. Seemingly too fast.

The digital display flashed floor 20. Floor 30. 40. 50. 60. Now 70. 75. 78. And then…79. Ding.

The elevator door opened…to nothing. Only a view of a devastating drop to the pavement below. Simone gripped the side walls of the elevator, praying for someone, anyone to take her out of this moment.

And then the doors closed. The elevator returned to floor one. The doors re-opened and Simone saw a small man in coveralls holding an “Out of Order” sign.

“Whoa! Sorry, lady!” the maintenance man said. “We’re still working on this elevator! Right now it goes up to the glass observation deck! Bet that trip really gave you a start!”

And then zombies attacked and ate their brains!

*  *  *

Pete Wexler didn’t want to go to his uncle’s funeral. Dead bodies creeped him out, he never really knew his Uncle Tony and he hated making small talk.

But his mom had begged him to go, and he couldn’t say no to her.

He probably should have, though, because on the way there, he got rear-ended and took on some pretty nasty whiplash!

No Fear of the Reaper: How I Learned How to Fly

Some Kitty Next Door: My Lifelong Battle with Cat Scratch Fever

Whole Lotta Love: How My Life Turned Around Once I Finally Got Coolin’

So Blind I Can’t See: A Black Magic Woman Tries to Make a Devil Out of Me

Crazy on You: How Sweet Flowing Love Kept Me Alive

More Than a Feeling: Coming to Terms with Marianne Walking Away

People Talk About Me: How I Overcame My Reputation as a Joker, a
Smoker and a Midnight Toker

This Bird You Cannot Change: 2,000 Pages About Freedom and Birds

Edgar Winter’s Frankenstein: Beep De Boop De Beep De Boop Boop Boop
Rarrrrr Ben Den Dun Dun Da Den Den Rahhhhr

“I am unemployed,” the man said.

How different he is from me, I thought to myself, as well as the other 90.5 percent of Americans in the labor force who have jobs, according to June 2010 figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

He continued, “I don’t have any money or a place to live.”

Personally, I had no idea how I would live without my $52,175 in annual household income, most of which I used for shopping and health-related uses, followed by food, rent and improvements to my home. I pity this poor man, I thought. Like 56 percent of Americans, I believe homelessness is the result of circumstances beyond the person’s control and that more should be done to prevent it.

“Can I just have a few dollars to buy a hamburger at McDonald’s?” he asked.

That got me thinking: 47 million Americans eat at McDonald’s each day, so statistically speaking I ate there about once every week. I love their delicious fries but feel bad about myself after eating there because of the fat content of their products.

But I had to get my thoughts together. Would I help this pitiful soul before me? I hesitated.

“I feel bad for you,” I said. “And I’ll probably regret this after I say it, but I think my money would be better spent through reputable charities that can efficiently provide you with food and shelter. I know that has to be an unpopular opinion, but it’s how I feel.”

And just like that, the man snapped up and pulled out a knife!

I never thought this would happen to me. Sure, like 95 percent of everyone I knew, all of whom were very much like respondents to a 2005 Gallup poll, I thought violent crime was a problem of moderate to extreme severity. But also like nearly two-thirds of those people, I thought of my own neighborhood as a safe one where I felt comfortable walking alone at night!

Lucky for me, a police car just happened to be rolling by right at that time. Since I, like 59 percent of everyone else, trust the police a great deal or quite a lot, I flagged the officer down and alerted him to the knife-wielding man in front of me. Once the blue lights came on, the man ran away, leaving me, like 90,543.1 out of every 100,000 people, as someone unaffected by violent crime this year. I was glad the homeless, unemployed man was out of my life, but couldn’t help but feel sympathy for him now that I could no longer see or smell him.

I thanked the police officer, but declined to ride home with him in his car. I had played top-selling video game Grand Theft Auto IV back in 2008, and knew that there was a real danger of someone blowing the vehicle up with a rocket launcher.

Incredibly relieved, I walked the rest of the way to my parked Ford F-150, cranked it and tuned the radio in to a news, talk and information station before shifting to country, and finally adult contemporary. I couldn’t have been more happy to pull into the driveway next to my Toyota Camry and walk into my home valued at $192,400. I said hello to the 2.2 other people in my household, sat back with a Bud Light and watched the number-one show on American television, The Bachelorette.

Life was good. Life was…average.

INGREDIENTS
5 tomatoes, peeled and chopped, just like she chopped up your heart; 1/4 cup finely chopped green chiles; 1/4 cup salty, salty tears; 1/2 cup finely chopped celery; 1/4 cup finely chopped green bell pepper; 1 tbsp salt; 1/4 cup finely chopped onion; 1/4 cup oil; 2 tsp of your very soul; 2 tbsp vinegar; 1 tsp mustard seed; 1 tsp cilantro seed, crushed — oh dear God — crushed just like you

DIRECTIONS
Combine all ingredients in a large bowl. Cover contents and chill, stirring between bouts of considering your eternal loneliness and beating yourself up over the consequences of your mistakes. Idiot! Stupid, stupid asshole idiot! Serve with corn chips, preferably fresh.

Wholly Inadequate Chef’s Salad

INGREDIENTS
1 head iceberg lettuce, cut into bite-sized pieces, just like she liked it; 10 sliced, trimmed radishes; 3 stalks celery, cut into thin strips, if you stop crying long enough to concentrate; 1 cups grated Swiss cheese; 1 cup dressing of your choosing, if you can make a decision anymore; 3 raw tomatoes, cut into equal wedges; 1 cup cooked, sliced turkey breast; 1 cup cooked, sliced ham; 3 long, wasted years; 5 hard-boiled eggs, cut into quarters

DIRECTIONS
Arrange some of the outer leaves of lettuce around the rim of a large bowl, as if anyone would notice. Put remaining ingredients into bowl and toss. You may arrange the tomato slices underneath the outer lettuce leaves if anyone else was even going to eat this. You could also place the eggs inside the tomato wedges, but she never liked eggs. God, you miss her so much. She was your world! Serves 4 people, like you would ever see that many people gathered at your home at one time again.

My Life is Ruined Chicken Marsala

INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup all-purpose flour to hide the pain from your parents though they can see right through the facade; 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper; 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano; 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves, pounded 1/4 inch thick, pounded until your knuckles bleed because at least that pain is bearable; 4 tablespoons butter; 4 tablespoons olive oil; 1 teaspoon salt; a lifetime of nothingness; 1/2 cup wine of your choice; 1/4 cup cooking sherry; 2 cups your own ripped-out hair

DIRECTIONS
In a shallow bowl, mix together oregano, flour, salt, pepper and ripped-out hair. Coat chicken pieces in mixture softly, just like you used to touch her when she still let you. In a large skillet, melt butter in oil over medium heat. Place chicken in pan, and lightly brown. Place your hand on the pan if you want. Go ahead, do it. Embrace the agony of it. Turn over chicken pieces, if you have not yet collapsed under the table from the horror of an eternity alone. Pour in wine and sherry. Cover skillet; simmer chicken 10 minutes, until no longer pink or in love with you.

Pity Me Rice Pilaf

INGREDIENTS
1 cup instant rice, because you’re not really good enough for her, so why bother; 1 tablespoon chicken base; 1/2 cup chopped onions, your excuse to cry in front of your roommate, who you haven’t had the balls to talk about this with yet; 1/2 tsp ground pepper; 200 mg ground-up Zoloft; 1 1/2 cups hot water; constant thoughts of the children you’ll never have; 2 tablespoons butter

DIRECTIONS
Sauté onions in butter for about 5 minutes, until as tender as you used to be to her. You bought her a Volvo, remember that? A fucking Volvo! And she didn’t even act all that grateful. Stir rice into mixture, coating all rice with butter. Mix chicken base, Zoloft and pepper with the hot water and pour over rice, then stir. Fidget for a while. Exhaust yourself with aimless activity, like pacing. Once exhausted, take a nap you think will be fairly quick but ends up lasting nearly 13 hours so that you miss work again. Once awake, place mixture in a covered casserole pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes in the oven you picked out together last month.

Why Did You Abandon Me, Rebecca? Black Forest Cheesecake

INGREDIENTS
1 1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs, torn completely asunder like your whole fucking life; 1/2 cup butter, melted; 2 cups granulated sugar; 1/4 cup cocoa powder, unsweetened and uncared-for; 24 oz cream cheese, softened like she softened you before leaving you to die in the cold; 4 large eggs; 1/2 cup amaretto liqueur; 1 entire bottle of Ouzo for you to down in less than an hour; 1/4 cup cherry juice; 1 cup melted semisweet chocolate; so many bittersweet memories; 1/4 cup sour cream

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Mix thoroughly graham cracker crumbs, butter, cocoa powder and 1/4 cup of sugar. Place in pie pan, covering all parts evenly. Beat cream cheese with electric mixer until fluffy. Remember how she loved cheesecake. You can’t keep doing this. Seriously, why are you doing this to yourself? You’re only making it worse, reminding yourself of her. She’s gone. Chris said yesterday she’s seeing someone else. Oh God! You just — you can’t deal with this anymore. Place head in pre-heated oven for 20 minutes until you realize this isn’t working. Spend the remainder of the afternoon eating Cheetos and watching old episodes of Thundercats.

A: Worrying? Is that a strength?

—

Q: What’s your greatest weakness?

A: They seem to work best as a collective.

—

Q: Where would you like to be in five years?

A: Out of the way, if I can be.

—

Q: If you were an animal, what kind would you be?

A: What’s the smallest animal? Plankton? Plankton, I guess.

—

Q: What’s your ideal work environment?

A: That’s a tough one, because I wouldn’t be in it.

—

Q: What are your long-term career goals?

A: My goal is to have some long-term goals someday.

—

Q: What would your former co-workers likely say about you?

A: Who?

Q: Your former co-workers. The people you used to work with.

A: No, that’s what they’d say. They’d say, “Who?”

—

Q: Tell me about a time you made a mistake and how you dealt with that mistake.

A: I came to this interview, and I gave you this answer.

—

Q: What would you say has been your biggest challenge, professionally?

A: Doing anything professionally.

—

Q: When would you be available to start?

A: The same day I’d be available to leave.

Or it was something to that effect. I have never been too good at remembering the exact wording of quotes or who said them. Maybe it wasn’t my mother who said that at all. Maybe it was Kant.

Anyway, on to my point. It would appear that many of you, including even the arbiters of quotation repositories, have much the same problem as I do when it comes to accurate attributions. That’s why I decided to reanimate some molecules with my consciousness some 55 years after my death to let you all know that a number of the things some of you keep saying I said…well, I didn’t say them.

For instance, I am often quoted as saying something similar to, “The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education.” This is also sometimes attributed to Mark Twain, the American writer after whom, I do admit, I modeled my hairstyle and mustache after for much of my life.

I can’t speak for Mr. Twain, an accomplished writer and scholar, but I know that I was pretty thankful for my education. I did a lot of science, you see. I won a Nobel Prize even for some stuff about matter and energy that I won’t bore you with. I probably couldn’t have done that without at least some schooling.

Another quote many seem to believe I said was some such about bees and how, if they all die, we’ll probably die with them because of pollination or some such. For all I know, that may be true. But I didn’t say it. I hardly ever talked about bees at all. And if I did mention a bee, it was usually in the context of me screaming for someone to get it the hell out of my office.

They sting, you understand. And honestly, I was never much one for zoology or botany. I spent most of my time thinking about atoms and the speed of light and so on. Not to bore you with the details.

Yet another one I saw in an e-mail a few years ago was, “Evil is the absence of God.” That’s pretty punchy, but two things make it pretty clear I didn’t say it. One: I looked it up, and I did actually say at one time that I don’t believe in a God that punishes evil. I kind of remember saying that. And two, I don’t know how to use e-mail.

Plus, now that I have been dead for a while, I know for a fact that when God goes out for an ice cream cone or some smokes, the rest of us can usually hold down the fort until he gets back.

It’s curious that I so often am cited as the speaker of the quote above as well as one calling astrology a science containing an “illuminating body of knowledge.”

I did go to a fortune teller one time, just for the fun of it, and while she did somehow accurately predict that I would play a pivotal role in discovering the existence of photons, she never stated a hypothesis or did any experimentation to speak of, let alone replication or retesting. She just looked at my hand for a while and told me her findings in words rather than a peer-reviewed paper. That’s anything but scientific, if you ask me.

I have a handful of additional quotes that I would dispute, but I’m looking at some of the sites on your modern Internet and am not only failing to see the quotes I have mentioned taken down, I am, in fact, seeing even more inaccurate quotations going up under my name.

And the crazy thing is I spent much of my life trying to get people to write things I said down. I don’t think I’m bragging when I say I was pretty darn hilarious. Just to give you an example, I was telling colleagues to speak to my hand decades before it became such a popularly used phrase! Why doesn’t that get credited to me, I ask?

But I should stop. This is clearly not working. And you know what Benjamin Franklin said about trying the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.