SlapClap

Welp. New York Comic-Con was a success. I got a publisher for my self-made indie comic that I’ve been working on, on and off, for weeks now in the bathroom when I take “breaks.” Here is some preview art. Below is my pitch.

In 2007 the American Movie Classics channel, AMC for short, debuted a new pilot called Draper’s Little Secret. All of America watched two years later on DVD. It had breakout performances by little known actors Christina Hendricks, John Slattery, January Jones, and Vincent Karthees… Kartheims… Kartheisisizerdumm. Holding the show together was the charismatic lead actor who we see in the very first scene:

Opening scene: man in bar scribbles words on napkin. Is interrupted by Negro, as “Negro” is what they called them back then. That man’s name? Don Draper (not the Negros’). Don Draper as  played by … John Stamos?

SAY WHAT PROFESSOR!!!

How could this happen? How could an almost flawless show suffer such a self-inflicted wound? These entertainment media questions bubbled in the brains of two brave men who all of us look up to and admire: Batman and Hellboy.

And so Batman and Hellboy build a time machine that runs on aspartame traces found in the blood stream of Gulf War veterans to travel back in time and stop John Stamos from getting himself cast as Don Draper just because “he really livened up the sides.”

They also try to stop the Yitzhak Rabin assassination until they find out that changing history twice isn’t cool. So they have to re-travel back in time, shoot Yitzhak Rabin, blame it on Zionists, and then get Matthew Weiner to change the name of his show to Mad Men because of how mad they are. OF HOW MAD WE ALL ARE.

When I first started writing this I thought it was going to be a parable about racial unity.

Fashion Police: Freeze asswipe!

Perp: Excuse me?

Fashion Police: I SAID FREEZE!

Perp: Who are you?

Fashion Police: Not a clown. I know that. Not like you. Dressed up like some – some circus clown.

Perp: What? My khakis?

Fashion Police: Was that the plan today sir? Run around town like you’re in the circus?

Perp: I’m getting a bagel. I don’t-

Fashion Police: You look like Liza Minelli at a Chess King.

Perp: Hey seriously. I don’t appreciate that.

Fashion Police: I don’t appreciate your pants, sir. So we’re even. Is there a restraining order against them? Must stay 3 inches away from socks at all times. Or are you the real Ed Grimley? Hold on, are those socks blue? You’re wearing brown pants you maniac!

Perp: Stop waving your fingers at me like it’s a gun.

Fashion Police: …and my God, that shirt. Paging La Cage aux Folles.

Perp: What? What’s that?

Fashion Police: The Birdcage? Translated from the French– May, Nichols?

Perp: Sorry.

Fashion Police: Sheezus. Robin Williams plays a gay guy – I know. That’s like Mickey Rooney playing Chinese: you know what you’re getting before you get it. Maybe the other guy actually being gay made up for it. What’s his name? He did the voice of the warthog in Lion King?

Perp: The movie version?

Fashion Police: OF COURSE THE MOVIE VERSION!

Perp: Okay, okay. They made direct-to-video stuff too.

Fashion Police: I think he did all the ancillary media – “reprised the role” as they say. It’s Disney. I mean the royalties alone… That’s some serious “fuck you” money. Gah, why’d I say that? I hate those trendy colloquialisms. “Speak with thine own voice.” But seriously, what the crap is his name? I can picture the face …

Perp: Yeah.

Fashion Police: Yeah.

[Old lady with a walker goes by, stopping to feed a flock of pigeons]

Fashion Police & Perp (both): Sooo…

Fashion Police: These bagels … any good?

Perp: Best in New York.

Fashion Police: BEST in New York? I doubt it.

Perp: Just one way to find out …

Fashion Police: Are you – I’m invited? No ones ever – wow. WOW. That really means a lot. I get pretty lone– NATHAN LAAANE!!!

When Hollywood producer Aaron Spelling died tragically in that helicopter ski accident so did my dream of landing a TV pilot. Spelling and I had a tacit agreement in place that once my hour long multi-camera medical emergency drama Paramedic Paramour got out of development hell at B.E.T. (the black network) we would immediately agree to the 16-episode deal on the table from Lifetime television (the lady network).

But Mr. Spelling couldn’t hold on long enough to see that dream fulfilled, even after 16 hours of emergency hilltop surgery. And I am left but with a script – a damned fine one – about a super hot male paramedic who saves lives and takes names, but only if those names belong to beautiful ladies. Beautiful lady names: Ivanya, or whatever. You get it.

Tea Party Weekly Gazette Herald: Obama “Home” District At Risk

In a symbolic bit of political theater, there is a chance that the Hawaiian congressional seat that represents President Obama’s “birthplace” will be represented by a Republican.

Obama, of course, was “born” in the country’s 50th state before moving to Chicago and “not” joining the Black Panther party.

In Hawaii, Republican candidate Charles Djou is emerging ahead of two democrats as the likely winner of a special run-off election for the right to represent Hawaii’s 1st congressional “district,” the “birthplace” of the “President” of the United States, Hussein Obama.

Party of No Mas

Looking to win back wary votes, the Republican party is banking on a new big tent approach to win back the Latino vote. Operation: Big Tent is a three-fold plan to win back a once split electorate.

Step one: buy a big tent. That one is pretty self-explanatory.

Step two: invite Mexicans inside tent- harder step than it sounds. A lot of Hispanics don’t seem willing to trust Republicans, which is why a charm offensive is needed. Every tent needs a carnival barker- someone who can coax wary people [MEXICANS] who are outside of the tent to walk inside the tent. That means a person with the gift of persuasion. Obama for instance. Like a Republican Obama. Michael Steele? Bobby Jindal? Glenn Beck?

Step three: the Governor of a state with a fast growing Hispanic population passes a hyperbolic immigration law, likely unconstitutional, that makes deporting illegal immigrants into a Spanish dubbed version of Sophie’s Choice. Arizona, lets say.

On to step four. Oh… did I not mention there was a step four? Step four: Seal up the tent, position three to five Apache helicopters above the tent, secure tent roof with grappling hooks, lift tent gently into air, and fly tent 100-500 miles past the border into the part of Mexico college students don’t visit. Elect Lou Dobbs President. Do not pass go.

I hate it when people say “here’s a fun fact.” They’re never fun. It’s never “Here’s a fun fact: cows can only go upstairs.” Instead it’s “Here’s a fun fact: Sundays, I do laundry.”

Having said that – (oh, and I hate it when people say “having said that;” and people who bring up the “having said that” episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm; and people who call it Curb annoy me; and people who digress too much) – but having said that, here’s a fun fact: I’ve written 27 books!

The “To Bleed” series was a series of space crime novels I wrote in the late 90’s. The stories follow the adventures of astronaut Tex Sustential, “bleeding” heart quantum professor turned crime busting galaxy detective in a universe devoid of meaning.

The 27 books include “Hungry to Bleed,” “Dying to Bleed,” “To Sleep, Perchance to Bleed,” and breakout classic “Bleeding to Bleed: Blood In, Blood Out.”

Airport magazine called the series “high inventory,” and my books dominated the display windows of Times Square video retailers.

The key to my success? I do not talk down to the reader (you are the reader, by the way). My books are not pompous, like so many others authors. Your Dan Browns of the world; your Push by Sapphires. I write accessible stories that put readers inside the page. I write about the human experience in a way to which we can all relate. It’s a literary device I call “I Can Relate,” or I.C.R.. I.C.R.’s are small anecdotes dropped into a story to help the reader- you, remember? They help readers identify with the characters in my book, and the larger world.

From “Enough to Bleed“

“Officer Tex woke up screaming from his dream. The same dream. How could that be?And why was the toilet still running. Is that not the worst? Recurring dreams were for invalids and brain glitchers. Had he forgot to change blue fluid in his chamber simulator? Checking his T/S display it was already ten zeck-zecks past a quarter-flash. Tex popped a couple memory flarks before getting out of bed, and was struck by a terrible pain in his right leg- a goddamn muscle cramp. ‘Ouch, that hurts.’”

From “Early to Bleed“

“As Tex waited for the cable guy – you know how they’re always late – there was a quaking sound, like 20 Thurb-busters losing grav-torque all in a row. Tex grabbed his flube stinger and went to the window monitor. Outside were Lokseys, about a gill pack. They buzzed about like sentient chip seedlings in a moist patch of cyber-terra. Tex only had a moment to flip the neg switch on his flube stinger before they were on him. Then, like a wave of clenched pain, a goddamn cramp! ‘Ahhhh…‘ he seethed. ‘Goddammit!‘”

From “Bleeding to Bleed: Blood In, Blood Out“

“The captain of the astronaut police force briefed his men on doogon activity in the Orion nebula, but Tex had other things on his mind, and not just the shitty coffee in the break room. Why is coffee at work so horrible? And lets not get started on Starbucks.

Tex daydreamed about the green-skinned Patoot girl he had pulled over for doing eleven parsecs in a negative zone. Her ear-eyes lit up like hitting three soycumbers at a marsh casino slot. Jackpot! She would soon be his, dripping like Venusuvian waters in the finest traditions of the Parafet. He simu-fantisized about her arm-legs wrapped around him, and the strength of his leg legs balancing their entwined bodies at the edge of the bed… ‘CRAMP!‘ Goddamn crap!‘”

Happy Black History Month from Elton John, and the 1968 Men's Soccer Club of England. (pic via)

Till next year: testimonials from all of us to “you people.”

“OMB budget director Peter Orszag here, wishing you and yours a happy, and a safe, Black History month.”

“Hi. I’m convicted child molester Victor Salva. I also directed Powder. Happy Black History month you guys! Stay safe.”

“I’m 16th century French poet Pierre de Ronsard. I may be dead, but I’m not wack. Happy Black History month. Remember, safety in numbers.”

“Hey, I’m Jim. You may know me from the alleged triple homicide, alluded to on this blog. When I think of 28 Days Later I don’t think of zombies. I think of black people in February.”

I work off hunches, and I’ve got a hunch that people are getting sick of listening to the deep, melodious CNN tag line voiced by 79-year old acting legend James Earl Jones. It’s just a hunch. That’s where I step in.

Being the voice on a network “bump” is like hitting the lottery, and then suing the lottery for hitting you. We’re talking loads of cash. That’s why I’m throwing my hat in the ring early to be James Earl Jones replacement as the voice for CNN- a younger, hipper voice. Below is my reel.

CNN ID: Wolf Blitzer’s Situation Room

CNN ID: John King

CNN ID: Anderson Cooper 360

CNN ID: Rick Sanchez

CNN ID: Soledad O’Brien

CNN ID: Larry King Live

*pls. note: only makes sense when guest of show also starred in the movie Dune.

CNN ID: Roland Martin

CNN ID: Campbell Brown

CNN ID: Christiane Amanpour

Today I got CC’d by a family member in an email with the subject line “Madea’s Thanksgiving Rules!” Now normally I go ka-raaazy for funny chain emails. I think they should collect them all and put them in a book, and then burn that book inside the broken monitors of the computers they come from. You can read the original “Madea Thanksgiving Rules” here, but below are even more rules with help from a couple of Twitter friends:

1.  After polishing off seconds, it is acceptable to PARTIALLY unzip your fat suit to lie down. (via: @Caissie)

2. Vicki Lawrence’s career is one of the things we give thanks for.

3.  Please locate your character type card on dinner table before sitting down: philandering husband, unhappy career woman, etc… (via: @scratchbomb)

4.  If you don’t like football, good; if you do like football, tough. There’s a Meet the Browns marathon on.

5.  Inviting over Asian people is equally okay and uncomfortable.

6.  We laugh in the good times, we laugh at Good Times, but we do not laugh at The Office.

7.  Fart-off starts at 6 sharp.

8.  Adults, relegate physical abuse to the kid’s table.

9.  If you’re going to eat the food, REALLY eat the food. Don’t go half eating the food. Put down the knife and fork and EAT THE FOOD!

10.  Try to not get startled when sexually explicit references are followed by sexually explicit prayers.

11. You may notice hair in your food depending on how light-skinned uppity you are.

12.  Strokes happen in the kitchen, away from children.

13.  Dress code is mandatory: she insists upon formal Steve Harvey menswear.

14.  Yes Madea refers a lot to slitting people’s throats with a knife, and yes each year we help her bury her turkey cutting knife in the backyard, so what?

15.  No stepping on Madea’s line, and no writer’s strike on Madea’s set.

Jeff Fisher has been made to apologize. The most tenured head coach in the NFL told an insensitive joke. What was the joke, you ask? Did he tell a 15-minute version of “The Aristocrats” in a room full of kids in wheelchairs? Close. Fisher wore a Peyton Manning jersey to a charity event where he quipped, “I just wanted to feel like a winner,” a reference to his teams 0-6 start this season. The crowd politely howled in approval, but in reality we all know that there is nothing funny about football. Right Frank Caliendo?

If there were why would Jeff Fisher have to apologize for what might be the most self-deprecating joke not in a Woody Allen movie:

“This is a very worthwhile and needy benefit and I was honored to be there. …I’m sorry if I offended anybody, but if I had to do it again, I would do it again.”

And that’s about as good of an apology as you’re going to get from someone who shouldn’t have to apologize.

You remember how some kids never took showers after gym class, or if they did it was only after the locker room was cleared out and they had at least two towels? Not a lot of those kids became professional athletes save for one, Manny Ramirez.

How else could you explain why Manny decided to take a shower during the Phillies 9th inning rally to beat his Dodgers in Game 4 of the NLCS? He’s ashamed of his body, of course. What else could it be? Either that or he’s got some kind phobia about communal showers. You know, just Manny being Manny, way too anxious to get naked in front of other people.

(Roger Japupnik admires Padma's choice of fish)

Queens born toll booth operator Roger Japupnik just happened to be at the exact same locations as mentioned in last Sunday’s New York Times article “Sunday Routine,” a day in the life of Top Chef host Padma Lakshimi. It’s not creepy. It’s just a coincidence. He just happened to be going where she was going. For instance, the Lucille Roberts on 14th and 5th.

PADMA: When you’re in my line of work, you need every minute you can get on the treadmill. If I get to the gym at 9, it’s not busy, but if you get there at 10, it is. If it’s a light day, I stay 45 minutes. If it’s a leg day, it’s more like two hours. I do squats, I do lunges — I work every part of my body.

Roger Japupnik: “I’m a real gym rat there. I go… what’s a lot? Twice? I don’t know. Toll boof operating is taxing so I need to stay in shape. Lots of cardio there. You know, the treadmill. Leg work. I’d say about two hours just doing legs. I space it out though. Read a People magazine in between reps. Maybe watch other people doing there leg exercises there.”

“Whoa! Is that Ms. Padma? Look at that. At my gym!”

PADMA: Then I come home and I take a shower and I usually go to one or two markets. I go to either Kalustyan’s or I go to Dean & DeLuca or I’ll go down to Chinatown.

Roger Japupnik: “The thing about living in Queens there is, yeah melting pot and all that, but where am I gonna get my hands on spices? Like real ethnic spices? I got to go all the way down to Soho Dean & Deluca to buy a decent, authentic ethnic spice you know? By the way, you ever notice how many mirrors are in that place? You can spot people around any corner.”

“Wow, Padma Lakshimi again! I don’t know what to say? This must be psychic awareness or something. The web of human consciousness, and things like that.”

PADMA: If it’s in the summer, I usually just roll a blanket in my backpack and go to Central Park. When I was little, we lived in Elmhurst, and we would ride the subway in — that was our ritual. My mom would take me to the park, she’d get me a pretzel, she’d have my face painted and we’d listen to music. So it’s almost a very nostalgic pleasure for me.

Roger Japupnik: “Central Park. Wow. A very special place for me. Almost, nostalgia like. I can remember, you know… music and special things like that. People eating on blankets like that. Mommy’s buying pretzel snacks while they listen to the music and sit on the blankets there. Watching- watching the squirrels with my tiny binoculars.”

“Hey, oh my God it’s Ms. Padma again! She’s beaming like headlights in this cold air. She ought to put a sweater on.”

PADMA: I put on some crisp, clean pajamas, make my bed and get back in it. I have these Turnbull & Asser pajamas, they’re really very WASPy, tweedy kind of plaid men’s pajamas. I make a big pot of tea, in one of those big Chinese teapots I got in Chinatown, the white ones with the goldfish on it. I’ll make what’s called a bed picnic. I have a big California King bed.

Roger Japupnik: “I guess a lot of folks are getting that Lasik. The eye surgery thing there? I don’t trust doctors much, but it’s a problem. I lose my contacts sometimes. They just fall outta my eyes like if my allergies act up from say, ethnic spices, or the crisp feel of tweed pajamas in a hamper. Or from laying underneath a California King bed for several hours without moving.”

“Wait a sec… are those Ms. Padma’s feet? I mean they are brown and everything, and they look the same as the plastic molds of her feet I carry in my bag everywhere I go…”

Pete’s Boat

B.O.

Awkward Silence

(above: White House budget director Peter "motherf*cking" Orszag)

Hey stupid. Yeah, you. I’m here to talk about health care incentives; you’re here to get schooled on health care incentives. That is how this works. So here is what I want you to do, and don’t worry.. I’LL TALK SLOW.

First, take a good long look at this lighthouse I call my head – this f*cking thing sitting up on two shoulders staring at you so f*cking hard. It is the closest you will ever get to my brain. My brain, the most biggest brain since man stopped banging apes and got all lucky with fire and sh*t. My brain is fire. It’s fiyaaa.

Second, take a great look into my eyes. You doing it ain’t you? And what do it feel like? Feel like you at 90° degrees latitude and just fell off a cliff into the world’s loneliest lake. In other words, cold. Because my eyes are black like the bottoms of two wells. They freeze ice. They are opposite the sun. They blow warning to any among you who think they can f*ck with me. My name is Peter Orszag, and I will tea-bag you.

Third, lean forward and put your elbows on the desk, and then put those two sweat mops you call hands against your fat face, and then just listen. Listen and learn, like girls in the 50’s learned about sex from their mom’s diary and the Catholic Church.

Have I got your attention?

Good. Then what part of “health care must include a public option and be deficit neutral with hard scoreable offsets in savings scored by the Congressional Budget Office” DON’T you understand, you f*cking ass apes?

(above: Daniel Gilds, asshole?)

Dan Gilds finds a lot of things funny, but it was no laughing matter when he saw this picture of himself on the website huffingtonpost.com underneath the headline: Goldman Execs Sold $700M Of Stock While Taking Bailout Money.

The implication was immediate. “It’s not like I’m laughing at the thing the article’s talking about. I just happen to be laughing,” explained Mr. Gilds. “But I’ll laugh at anything. The other day I was watching that show Reba? On the floor!”

Mr. Gilds insists that he was not laughing at the bracing irony of investment bank Goldman Sachs enjoying a record quarter of profit-making based on selling off poor stocks while simultaneously taking tax-payer funded government bailout money.

“I don’t even work for Goldman, okay? I was just there on my break. Total coincidence. My buddy works there, and he was showing me pictures of his new baby.” When asked if he thought it was appropriate to be laughing at the dismal failure and greed of Wall St. while holding a picture of a baby, Mr. Gilds grew defensive. “I don’t understand- was that a real question? No, I’m serious. Are you sh*ting me?”

Mr. Gilds went on to assert his opinion that the collapse of the nation’s economy is no laughing matter, but then off the record bemoaned the critics of investment banks and deregulation. “I think they’re all a bunch of faggots and liberals. Hey, don’t print that.”

On the record, Mr. Gilds insisted that the happiness captured in the picture was merely a reaction to a good natured joke between friends. “I told my friend that his 2-month year old daughter already has a nicer ass than his wife’s. For that I get labeled asshole.”

A grant program out of New Mexico called The Lunar Legacy Project compiled a list of all the crap we’ve left on the moon. Among other things, 1 Pair of Tongs, Small and Large Urine Collection Assembly (eww), and Film Magazines. It’s not specified, but we’re assuming issues of Premiere.

The list is sufficient, but incomplete. What it did not include was redacted by the government, however one of the perks of Barack Obama as president is that every citizen – WHO HAPPENS TO BE BLACK – is given access to highly classified memorandums upon verbal request, excepting, obviously, the Jackson family and Ving Rhames. Here’s what they left out:

1. (1) Alabamian version of the bible.
2. (1) Floating chessboard, opening maneuver en passant: white takes black pawn, e5.
3. Alice Kramden.
4. (1) Vinyl copy of 1993 single “Over Now” from the album Coverdale & Page, autographed by David Coverdale. Not mint, having been dropped in a puddle of moon water (possibly, evidence of life).
5. (2) Makeshift shrines devoted to David Coverdale, surrounded by extinguished candles, and species droppings (unknown).
6. Marijuana cigarettes (several).
7. (1) Particle laser pointed at the sun.
8. (10) thousand lost television remote controls.
9. Neil Armstrong’s vibrator.

The complete offmanhattan interviews.

Watchmojo used a complicated formula, based on depression rates, suicides, divorce, unemployment, and weather to rank the most unhappy cities in America. Of course, they neglected to add the “it’s morning in America” x-factor bestowed on us by Presidents and their speech writers. In response, my defense:

#1 – Portland

(click pic)

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