What kind of monster would put these onesies on their baby? How much would a monster like that be willing to pay for something like this? What if we included free shipping?

I don’t know who’s responsible, but I want to give everyone out there doing the Lord’s work of vandalizing billboards and other advertisements a little reminder. There is a right way and a wrong way to do your job. Let’s be a little more careful out there. Focus!

So last week, we got this email:

From: “Tracy Geller”
Date: July 26, 2006 3:28:55 PM PDT
To: Subject: I want to sell your comedy cds through our stores

I’ve spent a lot of time at your Van Gogh Goghs website and I think your comedy cds are perfect for our stores. I especially like your cd “Keepin’ It Real”. We work hand in hand with the largest stores in the country, plus thousands of small to medium sized specialty businesses stretched across the U.S.. If you want the opportunity to sell your products through major retailers like Target, Barnes & Noble, Virgin Records, Borders, QVC, HSN, etc … plus the other 16826 bookstores, 51005 gift stores, 10337 music stores, and over 24000 mail-order catalogs … check us out at http://www.VendorPro.com

Sincerely,
Tracy Geller
VendorPro.com

Okay. Seems like a usual mass-mailing kind of thing, but what seems odd about this one is that they referenced (and misspelled) a fake comedy album we had buried on the site, called “Keepin’ it Reel.” So you know what this album is that this company is eager to distribute, here’s the description:

Keepin’ It Reel

Label: No Cows Records
Catalog No. TMC-001
Produced by Jeremy Rankin
Recorded: Christmas 1993

T. Michael Childs had one great idea: a Christmas comedy album. This is that album. He also had three terrible ideas. First, the title, Keepin’ It Reel, did not convey the Christmas theme properly. Second, the album was released on Christmas Day, a day when no one wants to buy Christmas albums. Three, the material on the album deals neither with Christmas nor comedy, but rather is a psychotic rant about pancake batter. The only thing even remotely close to Christmas comedy is the track “Christmas Slug Bathhouses.” This track starts with Childs screaming, “Christmas slug bathhouses!”, then continued with his pancake batter diatribe. Sadly, T. Mike failed to keep it reel, or real. This album is no longer in print.

Sounds great to me! I think we’re going to do it! We can make the actual album in about two hours, and from there on, it’s pure profit.

Thanks, Tracy! Great A & R work! This one’s gonna be big!

More fake albums you may want to distribute can be found here.

So by now all of America and her collective cat have probably had a chuckle at Mel Gibson’s booze-fueled tirade about us Jews, and how we love warmongering and whatnot– and now he’s sobered up, and, like all drunks, is feeling a mite fragile. And he wants our help.

Granted, he seemed to be asking this of Jewish leaders, but in a crazy religion like ours without a clear hirearchy (we ain’t got no pope) I figure we all need to pitch in.

So, get ready to work some double shifts, Jews! I’ll be pointjew for the west coast; any volunteers for the east?

Grab your handpuppets, snacks, and massage rollers! We’ve got a job to do!

The ancient art of fecomancy can help you determine your personality type and how to live your life. Your fate is not ruled by the stars! The stars above are too far away and dim to exert any influence on you; common sense tells us that. No, your fate is ruled by something much closer, maybe even in your colon right now!

Use this handy chart to determine YOUR fecotype now! (click to download a nice, printable PDF)

So there’s been lots of miserable headlines in the news, but then I saw this one that made me realize that there’s lots of wonderful things going on as well.

This also clenches my decision to be an astronaut. I lost a spatula on at least two occasions this weekend, and I’m sure I can keep up with the best of them, spatula-misplacement wise. Zero-G’s just another challenge to my spatula-losing skills!

With Commentary

by T. Mike

The Dream:
I’m in a car with comedian/actor/writer/director Carl Reiner. It’s a young version of him, so young he actually has hair! The car is black and of older, if indeterminate vintage, late 1950s to early 1960s. Carl is drving, I’m in the front passenger seat. He’s started the car and we’re about to pull away from the curb, when I realize my cat is sitting on the hood close to the windshield, by the passenger seat. I quickly reach out the open window to grab her. Some combination of my inadequate grabbing, and the cat struggling cause me to lose my grip and the cat starts to fall to the ground. I manage to grab her tail. Now here’s where some weird dream effects kick in, and several things happen at once. I’m horrified of course, and quickly haul in the cat by her tail to the safety of the car. But for a horrifing second, the cat is on her back on the asphalt being dragged along almost behind the car. But, of course, cat tails just aren’t that long. Nor do cats survive that. The whole time I’m doing this I’m chanting “Stop the car! Stop the car! Stopthecar! Stoptthecar!” But not only does Reiner NOT stop the car, I swear, for the instant the cat is on the ground, the damn car SPEEDS UP!

So the cat is safely in my arms where I am hugging it tight to make sure it doesn’t freak out and get away from me and in any more trouble. Eventually Reiner pulls over and I’m like “Dude, did you NOT hear me saying ‘Stop the car’!? Or did you just not pay attention? When somebody starts saying stop the car OVER AND OVER again, you STOP THE CAR!” He doesn’t even have the decency to act sheepish. And then after I say something like “Dude, you OWE me! Big time!” Reiner starts talking about how when I tell this story about him and the cat, I should start it with this time he paid for a $21.95 dinner with 22 dollars, leaving a nickel tip. So not only does he not care about almost killing my cat, he’s trying to help me punch up the story of him almost killing my cat!

I would be more outraged, but then the dream turned into something about how I had decided to feed my old car to a couple of newer cars. But the newer cars just sort of nibbled on it, and then drove off playing with a giant ball, driving into it to “kick” it, and then chasing after it. And the cars were really bad at it ’cause they were cars.

Analysis:
I think this dream is about the incompatibility of compassion and comedy. I’ve always felt that it’s comedy’s job to be nasty and vicious, but in a smart and sharp way, like a knife, and not gratiuitous and disgusting way, like a handful of poo. Well, people get hurt either way, and um… that’s a bad thing. Not as bad as deliberately speeding up the car while trying to haul in a cat by the tail, mind you.

Reiner is telling me that tragedy can be mined for comedy, that everything is grist for the mill. But for God’s sake, punch it up a little! Make it interesting! But so complete is his heartlessness, he deliberately speeds up the car either as some kind of joke on me, or in an Andy Kaufman-esque move, speeds up the car so that my story of the event I will tell later will be better. Weirdo!

But as for me, I chose the cat. I guess I haven’t got the large cohones nor the icy heart needed to rip into everything and everyone.

The thing about the cars eating each other and “kicking” the ball around, I have NO freaking idea what that means. I haven’t even seen that Cars movie yet.

Conclusions:

1. Carl Reiner was handsome before he went bald.
2. Cats are more important than jokes.
3. If someone keeps saying “stop the car,” then STOP THE DAMN CAR ALREADY!

I thank you for your time.

Back to T. Mike’s other dreams

The business card of the holiest, Catholic-est taxi in Los Angeles!

Screw therapy, pills, drugs, and accomplishments, it’s a PROFESSIONALLY LAUNDERED shirts that are the true path to happiness!