I am, of course a Muppets fan.

Who isn’t? Al Qaeda. The Manson Family. Rick Santorum.

But everybody else — Muppets fan.

Having a Tiny Human in the house (now ten months old!), I’m slowly steeping him in the warm waters of approved pop culture goodness, which means it is time for a slow but ever-increasing dose of things like The Muppets. Yes to Kermit! No to Barney the Dinosaur. Stuff like that.

In the process, I’ve got a few mix CDs I play in the car with kid-friendly tunes (They Might Be Giants is particularly delightful in this regard). One such track: “The Rainbow Connection.” As sung by The Muppets.

And, as sung by me. Singing along in the car.

Thing is, as you start to sing songs to your kids, you start listening to the lyrics. I mean — Rockabye Baby? In the tree-tops? Wind blows, cradle rocks, baby falls out of tree? Why was the baby in the tree in the first place? Who puts a cradle up there? Ben Franklin? Nikola Tesla? And why are we singing songs about babies falling out of trees as a means to get babies to sleep? Is there a subtle threat in there? “You don’t fall asleep, I’m going to stick your bediapered ass in a tree and you better hope the wind doesn’t knock your chubby cheeks to the forest floor, kid. Now shut up and slumber.”

Anyway. So. Rainbow Connection.

I sing along and now I’m forced to ask:

What the hell is going on in this song?

Let us examine.

Why are there so many

Songs about rainbows

And what’s on the other side?

Right up front I’m forced to ask: are there that many songs about rainbows? I can think of… mmm, one other one. “Over the Rainbow.” Do we possess a secret canon of rainbow songs? More specifically, how many songs about rainbows do we have where the song ponders what’s on the other side of said rainbow? (We know what’s on the other side, by the way: goddamn leprechauns. A whole bloody cabal of ‘em. Wizard of Oz had Munchkins, a thinly-veiled metaphor for an unruly host of leprechauns hoarding gold in the form of a “yellow brick road.” Filthy little fair folk! Greedy little Rumpleforeskins.)

Rainbows are visions

Only illusions

And rainbows have nothing to hide

Except leprechauns. Rainbows are hiding the shit out of leprechauns.

So we’ve been told and some choose

To believe it

But I know they’re wrong wait and see

Wait. What? What’s happening? Rainbows aren’t just illusions? This is starting to sound like a crazy person’s conspiracy theory about rainbows. “Hey, man. HEY. BUDDY. Psst. All that shit you thought you know about rainbows? LIES TOLD BY BRAINWASHED SCIENTISTS. You think rainbows aren’t real but I’m here to tell you they’re real as you and me, man. It’s a ploy by Homeland Security. I’m stocking up on ammo and so should you. Because one day the rainbows are coming to come for us all. And then what happens, man? THEN WHAT HAPPENS.”

Ahem.

Okay, onto the chorus.

Someday we’ll find it

The Rainbow Connection

The lovers, the dreamers and me

Someday we’ll find “it.” Find what? What the fuck is a rainbow connection? What does it connect? Is it a bridge? A Delta flight? A drug connection? “Yo, you wanna get high, you gotta see my man Jimmy the Skeev down under the overpass. He’ll hook you up with the real rainbow connection, if you know what I mean. Right? Right? I mean drugs. He’s going to give you drugs for money. In case that wasn’t entirely clear.”

Also: saying, “The lovers, the dreamers, and me,” indicates that these are three distinct entities. Lovers cannot be dreamers and vice versa, and further, the singer identifies as neither of those things.

Now, given that the singer is generally a frog made of felt, I’m comfortable not imagining him as a lover. Because then he’s going to be (alert, incoming pun) porking Miss Piggy, and I don’t need to see that outside of an early Peter Jackson film. But Kermit isn’t a dreamer? Really? How sad for the gangly frog.

Who said that every wish

Would be heard and answered

When wished on the morning star

Okay, I don’t know that anybody ever said that. Is that a thing? “Sure. You want something, you gotta wish on the morning star. Someone will hear it. And that someone will answer it. No, I don’t know who the fuck it is. Could be a giant Space Manatee for all I know. Just shut up and get to wishing already.”

Though, now that I re-read it — “morning star?” Morningstar? Isn’t that a title of…

LUCIFER? Morningstar and Lightbringer? Is this song advocating Satanism? Or is it trying to teach us to turn away from the Devil’s wiles? “Oh, sure, Old Scratch will tell you that he’ll listen to and answer your every wish, but then he’ll stick a trident up your butt and remove your soul through your anus. That’s a true story. That’s in the Bible. It’s in… uhh, Mordecai 7:11. I dunno, shut up and just don’t worship the Devil.”

Somebody thought of that

And someone believed it

And look what it’s done so far

Who? Who thought of that? Who believed it? And what has it done?

I’m asking. Seriously, song. I’m asking. Because now it sounds like you’re just making shit up. Are we supposed to wish for things? Or not wish for things? Is this a war between the Morning Star and the Rainbow? Are we trying to get those two to connect? Come together, like the Beatles sang?

What’s so amazing

That keeps us stargazing

What do we think we might see

I’m getting a real mixed message here. Stargazing is cool? Stargazing is stupid? Wishing is for assholes? What’s so amazing that keeps us star-gazing…? Can’t it just be like, y’know, stars? Stars are cool.

Someday we’ll find it

That Rainbow Connection

The lovers the dreamers and me

Back to the chorus again. Still don’t know what we’re hoping to find. But, okay. I’m listening.

Have you been half-asleep?

And have you heard voices?

I’ve heard them calling my name

This sounds like a nightmare I had.

That’s some hypnagogic hallucination type of shit right there. “I was half asleep. Then… I heard voices. I heard them… calling my name.” That’s fucking creepy is what it is. Is it the rainbow? Is the rainbow calling you? Why? What does it want? Or maybe it’s the Devil? What’s happening? Am I high right now?

Are these the sweet sounds

That called the young sailors?

I think they’re one and the same

Whoa, whoa, whoa. Are we talking about the sirens? The freaky shipwrecking seductresses calling to sailors? This is getting terrifying. You’re saying that the voice I’m hearing while half-asleep, the voice that’s calling my name, is actually the same song that calls to sailors? To crash them against rocks? There’s a whole Christian analog here to when sirens were used to represent not a literal song toward deadly rocks but as a metaphorical representation toward worldly sins. And given earlier lyrics talking about dreaming and wishing and what might be a reference to the Devil…

What the hell is going on in this song?

I’ve heard it too many

Times to ignore it

There’s something that I’m supposed to be

If you’re hearing this with some frequency — these name-calling siren song voices — I’m maybe thinking you need to get jacked up on a Thorazine drip. Like, ASAFP.

And are the voices telling him what he’s supposed to be? Which is… what, exactly? Lover, dreamer, rainbow hunter, Satanist, non-Satanist, leprechaun felcher, what? What’s happening? Why my pants undone? How did I get here? Why am I surrounded by monster puppets in a swamp? Why does my anus hurt?

Someday we’ll find it

The Rainbow Connection

The lovers, the dreamers and me

THE RAINBOWS

THEY HAVE ME

THEY WANT ME TO KILL

TO DESTROY

SWEET SONG SINGING

THE FROG KNOWS THE FROG KNOWS

IA IA RAINBOW FTHAGN

I AM THE LEPRECHAUN KING, DREAM LORD, LOVER OF LUCIFER

AAAAGHAGHAGHA

*sob*

This weekend on Twitter, I said something about blah blah blah, religion isn’t funny enough, and if I had a critique of the Bible is that it needs more jokes. And then I went on to recommend a particularly funny book about religion — Lamb: The Gospel According To Biff, Christ’s Childhood Pal, by Christopher Moore.

Moore is, of course, a funny motherfucker. I’ve seen him speak a few times at book signings. He took the people at one signing out for drinks. Another signing I went to as a component of my bachelor party (not kidding). He’s great. Very engaging. He will at times talk about animal penises. It’s just how he rolls.

And all his books are off-the-charts funny, at least to me. I still remember reading Practical Demonkeeping in high school and thinking that he was the horror equivalent of Douglas Adams.

I read him, Bradley Denton, Tim Sandlin, and I think — “This stuff is rolling in raw hilarity.”

Thing is, you don’t read many funny novels.

I hear the prevailing wisdom is, “It’s hard to sell a funny novel.”

Though, I suspect what that really means is, “It’s hard to write a funny novel.”

So, two questions:

First, what funny novels have you read? Why were they funny? Were they more than just funny? Did they have good characters, good story, all the things you should have in a proper tale?

Second, what’s funny? How do you write funny?

That second one’s an open-ended and perhaps unanswerable question.

But worth asking, just the same.

Take a crack it it.

See you in the comments.

This week, the calendar pages come fluttering off the wall, and Baby B-Dub reaches nine months of age.

Which means he’s been out as long as he was in.

And it’s becoming increasingly clear that we’re screwed.

* * *

He never stops moving.

The boy was always a squirmy one. But he is rarely content to be held. Or to remain in one place for more than, ohhh, 34 seconds. This kid wants to go go go. He wants to crawl. He wants to stand. Give him half a chance, he’ll fling himself over the edge of the bed, the high-chair, the crib wall. He learned how to use the crib bumpers as ladders and climb up over the edge of the Baby Containment Unit. Just this morning I turned my head away from the high chair for two seconds to fetch a spoon and when I turned my head back, half his body was already out, his gooey food-slick face staring at the floor.

Gone are the days of the little lump baby.

Here are the days of Little Baby Daredevil.

* * *

We hear this saying a lot:

“Oh. He’s one of those babies.”

And then we get sympathetic head nods and shoulder pats.

* * *

Sweet Jesus, this kid can eat.

He’s like a wood-chipper.

It’s as if his stomach is a molten core, and any food poured into that fiery space is burned away to meager char and ash the moment it touches the walls of his gastrointestinal furnace. You know how some adult human beings can subsist on, say, a small yogurt and a banana for breakfast? Our nine-month son can eat more than that. Just yesterday we had to feed him four meals. You get through one container of pureed food and Baby Jabba over there is suddenly all BOSHUUDA NAY WANNA WONGA BLUEBERRY YOGURT which means it’s time to go seeking a new food source before he starts eating his high-chair.

And you think I’m kidding. He gnaws on his high-chair like a starving badger.

Sometimes I’m forced to wonder, did our son accidentally eat another baby? Is he somehow feasting for two? Ye gods, man, where the hell is all this food going?

OH THAT’S RIGHT.

It goes into the diapers. We went from one diaper every few days to one diaper every seventeen minutes. His diapers get so heavy, I just leave them outside in the wintry cold and let them freeze over. Then, should any of my neighbors grow uppity, I shall launch these frozen turd-bombs at their house with some jury-rigged trebuchet. If only they had the icy-chunk diaper-made cannonballs in the Middle Ages. Siege warfare would’ve been a whole different animal.

* * *

Diaper changes are different, now. He is not content to just lay there dreamily. He twists and turns and writhes and squirms. Trying to escape our clutches at the worst possible time — when we’re trying to wrestle a wet-nap from the box, when we’re trying to pop the stubborn tabs on the goddamn diaper, when we’ve got poop on our hands. Now diaper-changing time is a full-contact-sport.

And it frequently requires two people.

* * *

It’s like in all the war movies, eventually one side is forced to recognize: “We are overrun.”

* * *

Sometimes he stands up.

On his own. This just started happening — he gets his legs under him, reaches out as if he’s going to grab hold of something but then forgets that step and just — voooop — stands up.

He can make it for about three seconds.

Then he falls down. Whump, on his rump.

He’s learned how to fall so that he can learn how to stand.

There’s a lesson in there for all of us, I guess.

* * *

I pretend it’s a very early, very sluggish game of proto-catch between father and son. There B-Dub sits in his high-chair or in his crib and any toys he can find end up over the edge and onto the floor. Then I go and I pick up the toys and I put them back in and, within 30 seconds, they’re all back on the floor.

But I know the truth. It’s not a game of catch.

It’s a game of fetch.

And I am most assuredly the dog.

But I don’t admit that often. The illusion of reciprocity is key.

* * *

I know now, when you have a baby, it’s a game of buying your life back in five minute increments. Small things. “Oh, I’d like to go to the bathroom now. If I strap him in his high chair and give him a copy of the latest Field & Stream magazine, will that occupy him long enough for me to go and relieve myself? Will it? Will it?”

No, it won’t.

But you have to try.

* * *

He shouldn’t be faster than us.

That shouldn’t be possible. He’s tiny.

Oh, but he is. Plop him on the floor and play with him for a while, suddenly he’ll get it in his head to dart off to the farthest-flung and most dangerous corner of the room. Oh, and he’ll always go for the worst possible thing in the room, a thing that no matter how hard you baby-proofed still exists — “How did this Chinese throwing star end up under the couch?” Next thing you know you’re struggling to reach him before he wings the Chinese throwing star at the dog and you’re left dizzy with the notion that somehow this baby, this nine-month-old human who still poops his pants almost out-ran you.

And he can’t even walk yet.

* * *

He shouldn’t be stronger than us.

But if he gets hold of the spoon while feeding, I have to wrestle with him to get it back. And it’s hard. How is that possible? I’m a fully-grown man. I’ve got bulk. I’m not a weight-lifter or anything, but this kid has the muscle-tone of a bag of marshmallows. How is he beating me? How is this even a competition?

One day science will prove that babies somehow possess secret chimpanzee strength.

One day.

* * *

He’s very loud.

I’m sorry — maybe you couldn’t hear me –

HE’S VERY LOUD.

It’s not that he’s upset. He’s… talking. Except very, very loudly.

BAH BAH BAH BAH MAH MAH MAH DAD DAD DAD UGGY UGGY OOOOOOOO

* * *

Here’s one way he’s like his father:

Hates pants. Hates socks.

Gets rid of both at every opportunity.

Eat shit, pants. Go to hell, socks.

*fling*

* * *

He sleeps with us in our bed. And sometimes, in the middle of the night, you feel it. A presence. Staring you down. And, sure enough, there’s our little shadow-baby, sitting between us and just… watching.

Like a hawk watching a little bunny cross the road.

* * *

He’s trying to destroy us, physically. No matter how often you cut his nails he’s got talons like an owl. He’ll grab your lower lip and pull downward as if he’s trying to close a garage door. He’ll knock my glasses to the floor and then go for the soft melon-balls that are my eyes. He’ll headbutt. He’ll yank hair. He’ll bite — well, gum — your nose. He’s trying to wear us down. He’s trying to get control.

* * *

Who the hell am I kidding? He’s already got control.

He’s got it and he’s going to keep it not because he’s the tiny pink-cheeked dictator that rules this house but in spite of that — he is, instead, the pink-cheeked dictator that rules our hearts.

(Cue the audio: “Awwwww.”)

He’s learning how to give kisses. Kisses that don’t always come replete with a headbutt.

He’s learning how to high-five us.

He’s learning when to say Mama, or Daddy, or Doggy.

He’ll try to feed us.

He’s learning how to snuggle up and — almost — give hugs.

He smiles whenever we enter the room.

He laughs like they’re about to make laughing illegal so he better get it all in right now.

His feet are ticklish. He likes to rub noses with you. He’s still got the biggest bluest eyes and now, growing in upon his Charlie Brown head is a snowy white-blonde coat of wispy hair.

Sure, yeah, we’re overrun.

But that’s okay. We like it.

Happy nine months, kiddo.

fucking with hadge cuck

Hey, whoa, no. You don’t fuck with Hadge Cuck. You go stomping on his hill barrow and that big ass motherfucker will come out and beat your shitcan to death with his club, a club he made from ox bones and dragon cocks. Hadge Cuck bested Gilgamesh in a game of mighty kickball. Hadge Cuck breathes the breath of a thousand cigar-smoking ravens. What’s the old rhyme? “Hadge Cuck come, Hadge Cuck crush, Hadge Cuck punch your bones to mush!” Repeat after me: DO NOT FUCK WITH HADGE CUCK.

what is the no 1 things all writers need

A helper monkey. A little capuchin monkey that sits in a wastebasket near your desk and whenever you need something, you just ring that little ding-a-ling bell. “Monkey! Get me a cappucino! Monkey! Get me whiskey for my cappucino! Monkey! Deliver unto me my naughty magazines!”

don’t worry my dad has a beard

Well, thank god for that. I was worried there for a minute. I was all like, “Oh my god, the economy is really wobbly and houses are being foreclosed upon and our freedoms are being stripped away from us a little bit every day and Israel might attack Iran and someone’s inventing a weaponized bird-flu right now and for some reason that new TV show with Rob Schneider is really popular and that means the Mayans were right,” but then you come along and remind me that your dad has a beard. We’re all good here. Whew.

my beard makes me fat

No, that wreath of Krispy Kreme donuts you inhaled made you fat. Your beard just makes you awesome.

enema beard

Officially my new pirate name. “Yarrr, olde Cap’n Enemabeard hid his treasure of Tampax Pearl reward points somewhere here on this dirty New Jersey beach, yarrrr! Get to searchin’ ye scurvy helper monkeys!”

i’m on google at best buy lolololol

First up, you’re an idiot. Second up, you’re an idiot. Third up, who gives a shit? Fourth up, multiple LOL’s strung together is fucking stupid. What does it mean? “I’m laughing out loud out loud out loud out loud?” For the record, I think we’re all done with “LOL.” It’s over. You’re not really laughing out loud. You’re laughing on the Internet and, frankly, probably not even smiling. This goes double to all you yahoos who choose to insert “LOL” after every sentence whether or not it’s worthy of humor. “I installed a new ceiling fan today lol. I need to express my chihuahua’s anal glands lol. My mom has face cancer lol.” Stop it. Just stop it. Someone pry the “L” and “O” keys from your keyboard. Dingbat.

wendig slept with my religion

I did no such thing. Unless you mean that fling with Zoroastrianism? Yeah, we hooked up. We did some handsy stuff, some mouth stuff, but I wouldn’t call it “sleeping with.” Dang, are you Zoroastrian? Sorry.

where does chuck wendig live?

Well, that’s not a terrifying search term at all. Here, I’ll answer this for you: I live on the moon. Me and Newt Gingrich. He’s on the dark side. Me on the light. Every thousand years we battle. Now stop looking.

chuck wemdog

First time I’ve heard that one. I’ve seen Chuck Wending Winding Wedding — I’ve even seen Wangdang. Seriously. But never “Wemdog.” If you see my at a convention or something, run toward me with a high-five at the ready and then stick out your tongue and go, “WASSUUUUP WEMDOOOOOG!” And then as you get within the proper distance I will kick you in the kneecap and push you into a potted plant using your own momentum. Because I’m actually a ninja. Please don’t tell anybody. This blog isn’t public, right?

frisky dimplebuns

Hey! This was my nickname back at Kilimanjaro base camp. Those wacky sherpas. Chasing each other around and playing a funny game of grab-ass, shoving snow down everybody’s pants! Ha ha ha! What fun.

5 words you should use in every story

Here goes. Ready?

“Breeches.”

“Titmouse.”

“Byzantine.”

“Chapstick.”

And, “Rosewater.”

how to congratulate a published author

A gift basket. This gift basket should feature:

a) seven tiny bottles of whiskey

b) seven other tiny bottles of whiskey

c) chocolate of some ilk

d) an index card that reads: YOU’RE #1 IN THE AMAZON RANKING OF MY HEART

e) a bookmark shaped like a chihuahua

f) a fancy pen

g) a six-pack of five-hour-energy drink

h) an orange

i) an index card that reads: GET BACK TO WORK YOU FUCKING MONKEY

dolly parton baboons

She does have huge “baboons,” yes. I will now refer to a lady’s chesty bounty as “blouse baboons.” Men, you are not exempt. Your dangle-rods will now be called, “pants-dwelling proboscis monkeys.”

Please update all records.

i want to put meth in my butthole

I guess that’s one way to do it. Is the normal meth high not strong enough for you that you need to go shoving it up your no-no tunnel? You’re pretty hardcore. “Hey, man, you got any crystal?” “I SHOVED IT ALL UP MY POOPER HA HA HA HA HA” *vacuums the entire state of Ohio, then dies*

elk semen macaroni and cheese

Oh, hey, thanks, now I’m going to be scraping vomit out of my keyboard for a month. (Is that corn? Why is there always corn?) Maybe this is coming up on a future episode of Fear Factor. I read an interview with the woman who drank donkey semen on that episode that mysteriously fled the NBC schedule, and it was about as obvious an interview as you could get. “Uhh, it was really gross and I kept throwing up and it tasted kind of grassy and semeny and it was hot and flies kept landing on it between sips.” Yeah, uhhh, you just drank donkey semen. On television. For an episode that might not even air. And now you’re telling us all about it. What did you think it was going to taste like? A caramel macchiato?

This should be our Darwin test. We should administer this test to everybody. “I will give you one hundred dollars if you drink this cup of hot, fly-specked donkey semen.”

Anybody who reaches for the glass receives a crisp hundred-dollar-bill and then is dropped through a trap-door into a pit filled with starving grizzly bears who have been trained to use machetes.

“lord of the rings” “he ejaculated”

I kind of wish those were reversed. “He ejaculated Lord of the Rings.”

“Nnnggh, nnngh, nnnnnnnggggh.”

*squee*

“Hey, look, Boromir!”

I made this for you, Internet:

shotguns + robotics

Two great tastes that taste great together. Also, this is what the Mayans were talking about. At the end of their prophecies, all the pictographs end in a picture of a robot holding a shotgun.

aliens and carbohydrates

Two great tastes that — eh, maybe not so much. If you wanna lose weight, you need to cut out carbohydrates, but eat more aliens. Oh, these Alpha Centaurians? Delicious! They’re filled with pudding!

we both know you’re not in outer fucking space

I like to imagine that this is the voicemail left on a husband’s phone by his betrayed wife. “We both know you’re not in outer fucking space, Dave. That’s right. I found out you’re not a secret astronaut with the Newt Gingrich Take Back The Moon program. Guess what? Your mother told me. You’re just a plumber from Secaucus. I know you’re not in space — you’re over that slut Debbie’s house again, aren’t you? She smells like a mall perfume counter, Dave. I’m just… I’m just disgusted by you. You know what? You can go to the moon, you sonofabitch.” Click. Divorce. Done. MARRIAGE LOST.

evolution is obsolete piss like a monkey

Is this the tactic that the Creationists are taking now? I don’t think that makes much sense at all.

ask a shotgun

Do not ask for advice from a shotgun. He has the same answer to every question.

“What stocks should I buy?” BOOM.

“What qualities make for a good mate?” BANG!

“I just found out my husband Dave isn’t really an astronaut. What do I do?” KACHOOM.

what do fish have to do with anything?

Nothing, probably. Fuck ‘em. Just get rid of those assholes. Stinking up all our oceans with their fish poop.

piranha eats its own feces poops

See? Fish poop. Though I guess the piranha should be rewarded for eating his own mess. Maybe if we humans were so brave as the piranha we wouldn’t have to ruin the planet with our corrosive toilet industry. Did you know that for every toilet that we make, seven bald eagles explode? I read that.

good beginnings with dairy goats

MY FAVORITE PBS PROGRAM EVER.

i can see purple pulsating purple

I will take whatever toxic gourd juice you’re drinking, please. Two cups.

One for me, one for my imaginary pal, Mister Tinklepants.

rabbit stew gives me diarrhea

Where did you find this rabbit stew, exactly? “I was out walking around and I was just kicking up pieces of cardboard and knocking around a few old soup cans and next thing I know this hobo comes out of the sewer grate and hands me a bubbly frothy pot of rabbit stew! It was delicious, but gave me the trots something fierce.” You shouldn’t be wolfing down rabbit stew of dubious age and origin, dummy.

crotch crutch

Dang, if you need a crutch for your crotch, color me impressed. You must have a tremendous wang. Like, the size of a rifle case. And I can see how you’d break a dick that size. You probably get — no pun intended — cocky with a schwanz like that. You’re out there breaking boards to impress the ladies, or using it as a bat during slow-pitch softball. Eventually you’re going to bust that sucker in half and, sure enough, need a crutch. Good for you, huge-dicked dude. Way to swing for the fences.

does your ass feels offended

No, but my silky nipples do.

story boobs battle challenge crush milk

This is actually what they called “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” in Malaysia.

save a hundred lives and you’re a nurse

I thought it was harder — or maybe easier? — than that.

old photo of a pterodactyl

Taken by what? A caveman Polaroid?

ugh whiskey always ruins my night

Then you’re doing it wrong.

people with fruit for heads in a circle

I guess I need another cup of that toxic gourd juice, because I’m not seeing that, yet.

things you do not say aloud

Pick any part of this blog post and that’s a good place to start.

“Hey, y’all! Sorry, I didn’t realize that deep-fried butter-stuffed meatballs with a pina-colada-pork-cracklings-crunch exterior dipped in a whiskey-chocolate Dr. Pepper dipping sauce would or could ever give someone like me the diabetes! Oops, y’all! Sorry. Please enjoy my new Paula Deen whipped-cream flavored insulin poppers. And don’t forget to watch my new Food Network show: Paula Deen’s Savannah-Style Down-Home Diabetes Pancreas-Palooza. Starring my four sons, Bobby, Jamie, Baconface and Chondroid Lipoma.”

Dear Paula Deen,

You’re kind of an asshole.

Listen, it’s not that you get on your show and write your little cookbooks and tell people how to basically make like, Butter Salad or Cookie-Dough-Stuffed-Thanksgiving Turkeys or, I dunno, Sugar-Crammed Sugar-Balls (coincidentally my nickname when I attended the Culinary Institute of America, and by “attended” I mean “hung out by the dumpster eating hot gourmet garbage”). This is America. You’re free to eat and cook however you feel is most appropriate, and instruct your audience to do the same.

On the one hand, you maybe should’ve warned people — like with a pack of cigarettes, a casual, “Hi, y’all, if you go ahead and make my scrumptious French-Fried French Toast with Spackled Goose Grease your heart may explode in your chest” may have been welcome. On the other hand, you know what? We’re supposed to be a smart country. If you’re sitting there telling us how to roll up a pumpkin pie and then barbecue it before slathering it with foie gras and whipped marshmallow frosting, I think we’re all educated enough to know that maybe what you’re selling us is not exactly diet food.

We knew your food wasn’t health food.

You knew your food wasn’t health food.

And now you have diabetes.

Or, more to the point, you’ve had diabetes for three fucking years.

To clarify, that means for three years — over a thousand days — you have been shilling your Microwaved Pork Roll Munchiladas and your Bacon-Gorged Jabba Rolls and your Powdered Sugar South Carolina Soul Food Gummi-Bear Casserole and not once have you said, “Hey y’all, by the way, I totally have diabetes, which is a plague amongst Americans, a plague that for many could’ve been avoided if you chose to avoid making foods like my Lady’s Brunch Burger, a hamburger topped with fried eggs and bacon and shoved unmercifully between two pillowy glazed doughnut buttocks.”

That’s where you get me. That’s what chaps my rosebud, Paula. That you knew you had diabetes and refused to tell anyone. Not even because you didn’t feel like you wanted to out your own medical condition but because, let’s be honest, you didn’t want to lose any money associated with the way you suggest people eat. Not money from your shows, from your cookbooks, from your appearances or your ad revenue.

No, instead you waited to tell people until –

Wait for it.

Waaaait for it.

– until you replaced any potential lost income with a fucking Novo Nordisk pharmaceutical deal. Essentially saying, “Hey, my lifestyle actively causes diabetes, but I didn’t want to tell any of you that while you were still paying me to tell you to eat human infants rolled in Cocoa Puffs and sausage fat, and now by waiting three years and announcing a deal with Big Pharma I’m basically telling you that you can live how you want and eat what you want and by god it’s not going to impact the way any of us do anything because Thank the Baby Jesus for mah diabeedus medication!”

(Next up on her show: Deep-Fried Baby Jesus topped with Pork Jimmies!)

Like Anthony Bourdain said yesterday on Twitter:

“Thinking of getting into the leg-breaking business, so I can profitably sell crutches later.”

You know what Paula really said? Quote for quote?

“I don’t want to spend my life not having good food going into my pie hole. That hole was made for pies.” Now, I’m all for silly statements regarding pies and holes, because, c’mon. Fuck yeah, pie. But here she is, a three-year-diabetic, basically telling you, “Well, just because I have diabetes doesn’t mean I have to change the way I eat.” Yes! Yes it does! That’s the whole fucking point!

That’s the message you should be telling people! Gah! Fuck!

Further, on the subject of why she waited three years, she says: “I made the choice at the time to keep it close to me, to keep it close to my chest. I felt like I had nothing to offer anybody other than the announcement. I wasn’t armed with enough knowledge. I knew when it was time, it would be in God’s time.” Oh. Ohhh. Announcing the diabetes thing late is… God’s fault?

God didn’t give you permission until now? We’re on his time for this kind of shit, are we?

You didn’t wait because of God. Don’t blame this on him. I’m sure he’s up there sitting on his throne made of Dixie cups and human bones and he’s just shaking his head and making frowny-faces.

“BOO, PAULA, BOO,” he’s saying. “YOU HAVE DIABETES BECAUSE YOU FREEBASED HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP. YOU DIDN’T TELL THE HUMAN MOO-HERD BECAUSE YOU DIDN’T WANT TO LOSE ANY ENDORSEMENTS OR GET BOOTED OFF YOUR SHOW. DON’T BLAME ME FOR THIS ONE, YOU PLUMP SNOW-HAIRED SHE-DEVIL. BOOOOOO!”

Man, sometimes it’s fun to write in all caps.

Anyway, Paula Deen, you’re kind of an asshole.

I’m sorry about your diabetes, but, y’know, maybe you should’ve told people sooner.

I hope God takes some of your toes. Just a few of them. As penance.

Feel better!

Love,

Little Chucky Wendig, Age Eight-and-a-Half

P.S., please read this great piece by Andrew Zimmern.

P.P.S. Okay, fine, no, I don’t want God or any other invisible space being to remove her toes.

P.P.P.S. What about just a pinky toe?

P.P.P.P.S. OKAY FINE SORRY JEEZ

Now, IFC is weird in our house: Verizon makes it a subscription-only channel and we do not subscribe. And yet, somehow we can still see it? I don’t know. I blame techno-djinn. As should we all.

IFC has been very good with the making-funny, given that there is where I also discovered Whitest Kids U Know (streaming on Netflix, and the Dinosaur Rap is necessary viewing).

Anyway, point being, I’m a bit late to the game here, but Sweet Jeebus, Portlandia is some funny shit. I’m not particularly aware of Portland culture, but it matters little — the show walks this bizarre line where it first puts hipster culture on a pedestal and then pelts it with Pabst Blue Ribbon cans until it falls off and breaks. On Saturday Night Live, I generally can’t stand Fred Armisen — and yet, here, he’s allowed to, I dunno, become his comedy self and go Full Tilt Weird with it. And it works. By god, it fucking works. (Oh, and his comedic partner in crime is, somewhat mysteriously, Carrie Brownstein from totally rad grr-grrl band, Sleater-Kinney. So, there’s that.)

If you don’t have IFC, Portlandia still streams on Netflix.

In the meantime, I leave you with this:

Christmas came and Christmas went, and in the wake of Santa Jesus we found the flotsam and jetsam of a child’s joy –what I’m saying is, our living room exploded and gave birth to a metric ass-ton of baby toys.

And now, over a week later, I’m left rocking back and forth. In the corner. Covered in a shellacking of dried saliva and carpet fibers, my fingers burned with battery acid as they tried desperately — and failed with equal desperation — to pluck AA batteries from their plastic cradles. My vision flits in and out. My muscles twitch with myoclonic spasms. I… hear things.

I hear the heretical hymns and blasphemous songs of a thousand insane toys.

I hear them when I wake.

I hear them when I sleep.

I no longer can distinguish between day and night, between up and down.

I have gone mad.

* * *

As it was the child’s first Christmas, that meant that everyone felt inclined to Go Big Or Go Home in terms of providing the tiny human with gifted amusement. That includes us, of course — we, too, procured for him a bounty of entertainment even though he’s got the attention span of an epileptic cricket and frankly is capable of achieving maximum delight from Tupperware containers, paper towels, or his own wriggling feet.

That said, buying toys for a new child is everybody’s right, and I’d dare not rob anyone of that pleasure.

The bounty included such plastic idols of childish wonder as:

Blocks; balls; some kind of baby-sized faux-laptop; Elmo; a talking puppy; an electronic plastic “book;” a learning station that features such disparate items as a phone and a book and a piano and, I dunno, an autopsy station or something; a thing that might be best described as a “musical lawnmower;” another set of blocks; rings; wibbly-wobbly bean-shaped things; and so forth.

This is all wonderful and we are of course thankful to have these things.

It’s just…

You need to understand:

These things all make noise.

They all make noise.

THEY ALL MAKE NOISE.

The blocks squeak! The balls rattle! The puppy barks and talks about his ear and his feet and his paw and tells the baby he loves him! The book sings songs and barks and meows and baa’s and bleeps and blorps! Everything is a cacophony of saxophones and ABCs and 123s and and bings and dings and ringing phones and chimes and rhymes and timing tones and next thing you know your ears are bleeding and you’ve developed this tic and you smell the stink of burning flowers before you fugue out and stab the mailman.

* * *

The toys, they are impatient.

And they reward impatience, reveling in it.

B-Dub, he likes to crawl around and lay resplendent amongst his booty, flailing his limbs so that his hand punches one toy and his leg kicks another and then he’ll flop up and over like a breaching whale and crash his head into another toy.  Each punch-kick-headbutt elicits a brand new sound. But the sounds will gladly interrupt other sounds — just as one is beginning to dig into a chorus of the ABCs or Hey Diddle Diddle, the baby hits another button and then another sound or song begins. And trust me, these things are All Buttons. Every little widget and hinge and plastic nubbin does something — every tiny insubstantial movement or event sets off a chain reaction of musical bedlam. If the baby just breathes near one of them it’s suddenly lighting up like a fucking rocket booster and singing some song about a happy froggy.

It sings the song of madness. Our house sounds like this:

Hey diddle diddle the cat and the –

BAAAAA!

Bing!

A B C D E F –

Meow! Meow! Meow!

*guitar riff*

I Love You!

Mary had a little –

Ruff ruff!

Foot!

Hey diddle –

Yellow foot!

*saxophone smooth jazz*

It’s learning time!

It’s learning –

It’s learn –

Ruff ruff!

And meanwhile it’s all lights and vibrations and suddenly I’m starting to stroke out and wonder, “Sweet Christ on a Crumbly Cracker, is this why kids have ADD?” Then I wipe the nosebleed and pass out.

* * *

If you leave the toys alone long enough, they get… angry.

They’re like the toys from Toy Story: they demand to be played with. Each toy addicted to play, fun-junkies who just can’t get enough, man. The toy phone will ring, tell you it has a call. The book will beg to be opened, beg to be played with, hungry for storytime. The puppy wants the baby to know: I love you, baby who I just met yesterday, baby who’s name I don’t know, baby who punches me and bites me and who later ignores me, I love you so much I’d kill for you.

You turn the puppy off and he goes silent.

But even the slightest vibration returns him to life.

You sneeze two rooms away and the puppy’s back.

I love you, you hear.

The toy, talking to nobody.

It’s a trap, you think.

* * *

One rhyme:

“Ring around the rosie / The doggy chase the kitty / Husha, husha / We all fall down.”

What the fuck is that?

What happened to the pocket full of goddamn posies?

Rosie and Kitty don’t rhyme!

…or maybe they do.

Maybe I’ve just lost my mind.

*blubber whimper sob*

* * *

A B C D E F G H I

Meow

Ring around the rosie

Ding ding ding

Riiiiiing riiiiing

Open! Close!

Ruff Ruff

Ear! Blue ear!

Elmo sleepy.

Up! Down!

IA IA CTHULHU FTHNAGN

I AM THE SONG THE WORLD SINGS WHEN IT DIES

KALI MA KALI MA KALI MA SHAKTI DE

THE ANGELS WENT SCREAMING INTO MOLTEN PLASTIC AS THE DEVIL LAUGHED

AUM NAMAH SHIVAYA

It’s learning time!

Ruff ruff!

* * *

All the while, as the chorus of mirth and madness plays on, the baby is hyper-crawling his way toward anything that’s not actually a toy. For all the bounty that exists, he’s happy trying to eat a ball of lint or head-butt the couch. Or, best of all, track down the actual dog, a dog who he perhaps loves more than anything in this world. I’m sure as my wife and I slowly descend into the caverns of lunacy, the boy will discover our drool-slick bodies supine on the floor and he will find great amusement in playing with our twitching fingers, our slackened jaws, our tightly-curled toesy-woesies.

And the toys will sing an electronic dirge to mark our mind-death.

Let us begin.

invisible porn ambush

That’s the name of my new techno-mustache Harry Connick Jr. tribute band! Or something.

Okay, though, let’s — reluctantly – remove the word “ambush” from the equation for a minute. Invisible porn. Is that a thing? Can it even be a thing? Like, you have that saying — “if a tree falls in the forest and nobody’s around to see it, does it still turn into seven cats who determine the fate of the universe?” I think that’s the saying. Whatever. Point being, if the porn is invisible, does it remain pornographic?

If I cannot see the porn, how can it be porn?

Man, this really bakes my noodle. Invisible porn ambush.

It’s probably something Grant Morrison does to people.

is nathan fillion into bdsm

I don’t know, but I’m sure there’s a healthy contingent of fangirls and fanboys who pray to all the heretic gods that he is. Though, to be clear, Nathan Fillion has too strong a jaw to be concealed by a mere gimp mask. You’d probably need like, a welder’s helmet or something.

i am a monkey and you can be so awesome

NO, you-who-are-a-monkey, it’s you who’s awesome. High-five, monkey!

exposition about tigers getting effed

Tiger-effing? Can we all just be adult here and call it “tiger-fucking?”

The act of tiger-fucking is present and active — that’s not exposition. And, as such, I now feel that all popular novels should contain at least some portion — between 10 and 57% of the total manuscript — devoted to the very act of fucking tigers. Though, one supposes you could write exposition based on the act. Like, say, the history of tiger-fucking? Or a dull and listless explanation of the mechanics behind tiger-fucking? (“After you remove the tranquilizer dart from behind the tiger’s ear, lift up the big cat’s tail and…”) Ennh. See? This is why exposition sucks. It takes all the magic out of tiger-fucking.

do you want more eggs you greedy murderer

I just want to go up and yell this at people. “DO YOU WANT MORE EGGS, YOU GREEDY MURDERER?”

I’m sure I’ll discover in the days to come that this is some new tagline for a PETA ad campaign where they equate “People who eat chicken eggs” with serial killers like Ted Bundy. Because if ever there’s a bastion of people with a steady-handed grip on the handlebars of rationality, it’s PETA. Hey, sidenote, did you know that PETA kills dogs? Good times!

why don’t you go ahead and go die movie

Yeah, MOVIE. Why don’t you go ahead and die? With your dumb opening credits? And your stupid ending credits? And your producer! C’mon! PSHH PFFT. Why can’t you just be a book already? You better just suck it, movie. You better go and eat a bag of shit and take a big ol’ dirty dirt-nap. You goddamn movie. With your CGI robosaurs. Your sad devotion to that ancient three-act religion has — *glurk! choking!*

the latest way of fucking

The latest? Like, the really latest-latest? Okay, here it is — hot off the FAX machine. I haven’t tried this out yet, so I don’t know if it works, but hey — you asked for it, pal.

This should work for fuckers and fuckees of all sexual orientations.

The latest way of fucking is to take your sexual partner, right? You lay him or her down on a bed of warm fettuccine noodles. Butter them up with duck fat. Then you cast a magical spell over both of your hands until they become psychic hell-squid. Then you lay down upon your partner and let the squid’s psychic tentacles invade all orifices — this should hyper-charge all of your gnostic particles and trigger a universal synaptic orgasm in the both of you.

This sexual move is called “Tentacles Steal The Happy Gonads.”

Though, on the street I think they just call it “Squidfucking, With Fettuccine.”

hound riders of penney’s pubic hair

Uhhh. Wh… Wha…

See, every time I do a Search Term Bingo, I get one entry that just… leaves me flummoxed. I don’t have a joke. I don’t have a comment. I got nothing. I just look at it and it’s like a hungry abyss, it keeps pulling at me and pulling at me, daring me to try to understand why the fuck anyone would enter that into a search engine. I have to imagine some very intense hallucinogens were involved. Just an educated guess.

tacowhores

Count me among their number. And our number is legion.

TACOWHORES.

This Christmas, on ABC Family.

cures for lung butter

You need some lung toast. That’ll give the lung butter something to do.

Mmm. Delicious.

*crunch crunch crunch*

*cough cough cough*

*crunch crunch crunch*

lady gaga flashes her lady bits

I wanted to include this because this has been the #1 search term here at li’l ol’ terribleminds on and off for weeks. I for one am happy to live in a world where Lady Gaga can show off all her weird womanly portions.

ass sex ass

This is a palindrome.

That is, if the definition of a palindrome is the word “sex” sandwiched by “ass” and “ass.”

Which it’s probably not.

But it should be.

It should be.

slef published books are terrible

Yes, slef-published books are uniformly awful. But that’s to be expected. The Slef are a horrible race — sludgy, grotesque beings. All of them, made of boogers and dog hair. Now, self-publishing — well, okay, that has some hits and some misses, I’ll grant you. But Slef-publishing, ugh. Their books are made of ants. Their poems sung through throats filled with septic run-off. Horrible horrible beings, the Slef.

what wines do writers drink

Ones pressed from the grapes of shame.

blackbirds by chunk wendig

GODDAMN YOU CHUNK WENDIG. That fuckin’ guy is always beating me to the punch with books. Double Dead by — yep, you guessed it, CHUNK WENDIG. Confessions of a Freelance Penmonkey by — uh-huh, uh-huh, CHUNK WENDIG. 250 Things You Should Know About Masturbating On Public Transit by — oh, wait, that’s by some guy named Richard Wipe? Never mind. Point is, Chunk Wendig is always out there. Cock-blocking my every literary effort. He’s my otherworldly doppelganger. One day he and I shall do battle for dominance over the Wendig literary empire.

you look really good today

Aww, thanks! How sweet of you to say.

I’ve been working out. My skin has a healthy shine from the bacon grease applique I put on every morning. And my clothes have that mottled “a baby just vomited on them” look. All the rage in Prague!

motherfucking breakfast slush

New, from Nabisco! “Hey, man, what are you eating?” “MOTHERFUCKING BREAKFAST SLUSH, SON.”

Contains 11 nonessential toxic metals and 47 pieces of pulverized plastic packaging. Now comes in new autumn flavors: “Moldering fungi.” “Catshit In A Pumpkin.” And don’t forget, “MAPLE SADNESS.”

how do you know if your a writer

You know how to differentiate “your” from “you’re,” dipshit. That’s how.

virgin riding horse pony of orgasm

This needs to be a velvet black light panting hanging on my office wall. I don’t know what a “horse pony of orgasm” is, truthfully, and I don’t care. Whatever it is, it must be sublime.

Somebody out there? One of you artmonkeys? Draw this. Now. Please? Please.

Actually, I probably need an artist to illustrate a number of STB entries.

im a fucking unicorn no im a table

Well, make up your mind, shapeshifter. Shit or get off the pot. Unicorn? Or table? I mean, sheesh.

behave like a screenwriter

Pro-tip: it involves lots of crying, tons of whisky, and an inflatable narwhal.

Don’t ask about the narwhal.

If you join the Writer’s Guild, you’ll see.

They will make you see.

return of the vagina turtle scorpion

Ehh, this one was pretty good, but not as good as the first one. The original Vagina Turtle Scorpion, from 1974, was a fucking classic, man. A classic. None of that CGI shit. They made the Vagina Turtle Scorpion out of a scale model. Ben Burtt did the sound effects for the creature’s Doom Scream by throwing a bunch of hamsters into a garbage disposal. Controversial at the time. Do you remember the scene where the Vagina Turtle Scorpion — who by now you think is totally dead after his battle with the Screeching Dong Mongrel — rises up out of the desert sands and like, flies up and grapples that dirigible and punctures it with his hell-stinger? It was all, FLOOSH BOOM KAFOOZLE, and all the fiery shitty bits rained down on the ground. That was incredible. It affected a generation of nerds and cinephiles.

The new one just isn’t as good.

And the third one — The Vagina Turtle’s Lament In 3-D — totally sucks super-dick.

iam afraid of seeing someone on webcams

Like, anyone? Or someone in particular?

Maybe that little girl from THE RING. I’m scared to see her pretty much anywhere.

loosen your sfinkter

Holy crap-bunnies, that is the best spelling of “sphincter” I have ever seen. HERE COMES SFINKTER! *accompanied by wicked guitar lick* I want that to be a seriously non-rad late 1980′s hair-metal band.

strain all urine

All the urine? Human? Mammal? Avian? What are you hoping to achieve? The world’s largest collection of kidney stones? I guess that’s an admirable goal. Weirdo.

dingo with umlauts

Isn’t this the lead single by that new band, Sfinkter?

Elmo.

Fuuuuuckin’ Elmo.

By this point, the Baby Formerly And Still Actually Known As “B-Dub” is four months old. He’s a smiley, gurgly, farty beast. He grabs his feet. He shoves everything into his mouth. With his mouth he chews, he chews hard, his gums crushing my index finger daily. (Yes, he’s probably starting to teethe already.) He sleeps, but not much. He’s awake frequently. He’s very alert. He now laughs. That’s a delightful sound whose gravity is inescapable: we will do anything to make the baby laugh. Smack self in crotch with hammer? Drive car through a K-Mart? Kill so many nuns their bodies stack like firewood? Whatever you need, B-Dub. Just laugh for us. Just laugh.

I recognize already the danger of this path: a path many parents have gone down, a path where they work against good sense to keep their own children happy — no matter how little it helps them or the aforementioned children. There they walk, pandering to teenagers or adult children in order to win their friendship. Desperate and pleading and chasing the dragon just the same. Just love me, angry teenager. Just love me. And also, stop throwing food from the refrigerator at my head. Unless that makes you happy! Does that make you happy, angry teenager? What do you need? A sandwich? A dirt bike? A Taser? A hobo I purchased from the hobo black market? OH MY GOD I NEED YOUR APPROVAL

I can quit any time.

After all, our kid is a mere four months old and if I could bottle that laugh, you would buy it.

Here, listen:

Laughing Baby from Chuck Wendig on Vimeo.

See? You’d buy it. Right now.

Point being, we are happy to have an amused four-month-old rather than the occasionally epically cranky four-month-old. And one of the things that amuses Baby B-Dub is when we put on Sesame Street.

I grew up with Sesame Street. Loved it as a kid, and pretty much love it even still. This is Jim Henson we’re talking about. These are Muppets. Who doesn’t love Muppets? Al Qaeda. That’s who doesn’t love Muppets.

I understand the prevailing wisdom that says very young children shouldn’t watch television, and for the most part, Baby B-Dub faces us while we watch the Tube of the Boob. But we let him watch Sesame Street. I was pleased to turn it on and discover that it has not gone the way of other programming, which is to say, flashy ADD can’t-hold-an-image-for-more-than-a-few-picoseconds. Hell, watching some of Sesame Street I’m reminded of how ADD I’ve become. I watched one the other day that had Snuffleupagus suffering with a sneezing problem and by the end I was checking my watch. “Let’s wrap this shit up,” I’m saying.

B-Dub, though, he’s rapt. He’ll brighten when Big Bird comes on. He’ll talk to Abby the whatever-the-fuck-she-is. Fairy? She’s a fairy, right? Hell, soon as that new guy Murray shows up, B-Dub’s in. He’s invested.

And then, of course, Elmo shows.

It’s inevitable. It happens every episode. And the baby loves it. Elmo is a bright spot in a dark day, Elmo is a dollop of red whimsy, a giddy supernova, a blob of ketchup on a really great hamburger.

That is, it’s all those things for him. For the baby.

For me, Elmo is a fly inside my ear. He’s a broken fingernail, a bearded psychopath who won’t leave my TV.

Part of it is… part of it’s the laugh. This is like, a… a Joker-tormenting-the-Batman laugh. I tried to mimic the noise of Elmo’s laugh with my own mouth and I woke up two days later just outside of Carson City, Nevada, covered in scorpions and cradling some guy’s severed foot. Dead toes on my dry tongue.

Elmo’s mouth is the mouth of madness.

I try to get my head around Elmo and I feel woozy. I mean, okay, Elmo’s kind of like, a little kid, right? He represents the children watching. He’s playful and weird and frankly, a little bit stupid. (But that’s okay because he’s always learning. I guess. I dunno. Shut up.) So, why is it that Elmo lives alone? Who let Elmo have a house? Is he renting? Did he take advantage of a down market and buy a place? Are kids allowed to buy houses on Sesame Street? Jesus Christmas. No wonder we’re in the middle of an economic crisis. We let monster toddlers procure real estate. Great lesson, there. Someone call Tim Geithner.

Another great lesson: Elmo speaks in third person.

“Elmo this,” and “Elmo that.” Who does that? “Elmo’s fur is dyed with the blood of a hundred other Muppets!” Elmo cries. Then giggles as invisible hands tickle him.

Yes, please, Elmo, teach my son to refer to himself in the third person.

And why is Elmo asking a baby about anything? Every segment of Elmo’s World generally orbits a specific topic: doctors, bugs, cats, merkins, Lemon Pledge, torture porn, the methamphetamine epidemic, lasagna, whatever. Every part of the segment goes toward exploring the topic. Which is fine, in theory. Elmo sings a song, which is essentially Elmo just yammering the topic’s name over and over again, often set to a Christmas carol. Elmo talks to his fish, Dorothy, who often imagines Elmo in weird get-ups (Elmo is a caterpillar! Elmo is Rapunzel! Elmo is a cranky dominatrix!).

And then, inevitably, Elmo talks to a baby. He doesn’t refer to this baby by name. He just calls it “baby.”

“Hi, baby! What do you think about D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation, baby?”

In response, the baby gurgles and spits up and tries to eat Elmo’s proboscis.

And then Elmo laughs: “Ha ha ha, you’re so stupid, baby. Babies don’t know about early silent films that were also used as recruitment tools for the Klu Klux Klan! You’re just a baby! Ha ha ha!”

Why? Why? Why do you ask a baby, Elmo? That baby doesn’t know jack shit. That baby never knows jack shit. You’re not helping anybody. And frankly, you’re embarrassing that poor baby. You know what happens to the babies that end up on the Elmo’s World segment? They get put up for adoption. Or sometimes they get turned into cat food. That’s true! I read it somewhere. The parents are so ashamed of their stupid babies — stupidity exposed by that sinister fiend, Elmo — that they have little choice but to go on without them.

I think I read it in Newsweek.

Anyway.

None of that, none of it, worries me more than –

Yes, you guessed it.

Mister Noodle.

Or Mister Noodle’s brother, Mister Noodle.

Or any of the foul miscreants from the dread Noodle clan.

Here’s the thing.

I’m pretty sure Mister Noodle is a kid-toucher. I know he’s a weirdo. He’s definitely an idiot.

But I think he’s got a thing for kids.

And given the fact that Elmo appears to be a kid, this adds a whole creepy vibe to the Elmo-Mister Noodle relationship. Let’s break it down a little bit and you can see what I’m talking about.

Every segment, Elmo opens his window (which for some reason is a struggle and the window resists Elmo’s attempts — possibly because the window has Elmo’s best interests at heart, which is good, because Elmo is a three-year-old who lives on his own because his parents probably died in a house fire that Elmo himself set). When Elmo opens his window… there stands Mister Noodle.

Mister Noodle waits for Elmo to do this. He hangs out outside Elmo’s window. All the time!

Staring. Lingering. Waiting.

Just the other day I watched one where the window opened and, as always, Mister Noodle stood right outside the window. But here’s the kicker, and this is not a joke: he was touching his crotch. Seriously! Not kidding! His left hand was hovering over his crotch. As if he had been interrupted. As if, had Elmo waited only 30 seconds longer, we would’ve caught Mister Noodle with his, erm, “mister noodle” out.

This segment-within-a-segment always goes the same way. Elmo asks Mister Noodle to expound upon the current topic du jour, and Mister Noodle spectacularly botches any implementation of said topic. If the topic is about brushing your teeth, Mister Noodle will shove a toothbrush up into his brain (don’t worry, there’s not much going on up there). If the topic is about dogs, Mister Noodle will try to leash and walk a hot dog. If the topic is about molecular microbiology, Mister Noodle will concoct a devastating flu plague that eradicates the Muppet population (the “Fozzy Flu,” they call it).

Then, some disembodied child’s voice — not Elmo’s — castigates Mister Noodle for dicking it up again. “No, Mister Noodle, we don’t eat 9-volt batteries. Silly Mister Noodle.”

Finally, Mister Noodle comes closer and…

… well, he frequently touches Elmo.

Like, one episode was about doctors. And Mister Noodle was fucking around with a stethoscope. When he finally learned how to use it, he walked to the window and used it on Elmo. Fine in theory, but it’s the way he uses it. He lingers on Elmo’s chest. He slowly draws the stethoscope’s head down and circles it there like he’s trying to do more than just hear this Muppet’s dubious heartbeat.

But here’s the really creepy example.

One segment was about “skin.”

Yes. Skin.

A serial killer topic if ever there was one. I’m just glad Elmo eschewed singing the “skinning a hooker” song.

Anyway, so around rolls the Mister Noodle sketch and of course Mister Noodle has to lean inside Elmo’s window with his blank eyes and his creepy mustache. And then Elmo says, “Slip me some skin!” which already is a red flag, because here I think Mister Noodle is going to go all Buffalo Bill and open a suitcase filled with tanned human flesh, but what happens instead is worse. Mister Noodle slowly, tenderly drags his fingers up Elmo’s wormy puppet arms — seriously, it’s like, a sensual touch — before finally caressing Elmo’s hairy palms. Then — then! — it’s time for “back-scratches.” Which look like backrubs. Because there’s nothing like teaching your small children to give and receive backrubs from weird adult neighbors. And the backrubs are, again, sensual. These aren’t manly backrubs. They’re not silly. They’re blissful, erotic massages. Mister Noodle seriously actually embraces Elmo and pulls him close.

Eventually that segment ends with Elmo singing the “skin” song, which is Elmo saying SKIN SKIN SKIN over and over again set to the tune of “Jingle Bells,” and then a book floats nearby, a book that I am led to believe is bound in some kind of skin, and Mister Noodle dances outside, high on Muppet-touching.

My child is eventually going to go to school and there they will tell him about “Stranger Danger” and then he’ll come home and watch Elmo get caressed by this mutant who may not even be Elmo’s neighbor. For all I know, Mister Noodle just lives in the bushes, having escaped some kind of… facility. Does Elmo run? Does Elmo say no, then go, then tell? No. Instead Elmo lets Mister Noodle kiss his neck while Elmo munches away on M&Ms that smell like weird chemicals. Good job, Sesame Street. Nice work there.

So, that’s what I see as the “Elmo Problem.”

Anybody else? Just me?

I’m doomed, aren’t I?

I will now make love to your mouth.

Uhh.

Let’s try that again:

Let my meat make love to your mouth.

Hrm.

Okay, forget all that, what I’m trying to say is, I’m going to give you now three recipes, and these three recipes will comprise your dinner at some point this week. Trust me, you’ll do it. You’ll do it, and you’ll like it. You’ll like it so much, you will give me money. And a gift basket. A gift basket of hookers. Because that’s how good these recipes are. Are you ready to receive my culinary insight? My gastronomical penetrations?

My meat in your mouth?

Step One: Pulled Pork From Pork Butt

Contrary to its name, pork butt — or “Boston Butt” — is not actually the ass-end of the pig. It’s the shoulder. They called it that because they used to store and ship it in barrels called “butts.” Either that, or they thought it was funny. “HA HA HA you’re eating butt,” those randy old New Englanders would say. And then they’d say “pahk the cah in the gah-rage wicked smaht” and “go sox” before throwing tea into a harbor.

Anyway. You’re going to need a big round rumpy-pumpy of pork butt.

Select a pork butt that is around three or four pounds.

Take it. Coat it first with a lacquering of olive oil.

Then coat it with a liberal smattering of:

a) kosher salt

b) chili powder

If you’re so inclined, wrap it up in Saran Wrap. Which, for the record, I am incapable of using. Because seriously, fuck Saran Wrap. The way they package that stuff is for assholes. Foil? I love foil. The cutting teeth of the foil box work as designed. Pull foil, tear down, riiiiip, blammo. Piece of foil. But the cling wrap shit, the teeth are on the opposite side. So you have to tear upwards. And the boxes aren’t sturdy enough for this. They bend and warp and the teeth aren’t sharp enough and the wrap resists, it resists as if it has a mind of its own. By the time I’m done putting Saran Wrap over something so simple as a mixing bowl, I’ve pulled out half the supply of cling wrap and it’s all bunched up over the top and it’s lost any semblance of static cling. I might as well cover that mixing bowl with one of my son’s diapers.

Of course, my wife wields cling wrap like a ninja. She walks over — riiiiiiip — then places then cling film over the bowl like she received training in a Shaolin kitchen somewhere. Lesson: she’s either been training with Buddhist kung-fu cooks or I’m a total dipshit. I’m leaning toward the “kung-fu kitchen” theory.

What I’m saying is, give the pork butt time to absorb the salty chili-ey goodness.

Now go to your grill. Turn that bitch on, then prep for indirect heat. Make sure the grill hangs around 300 degrees. If you have the ability to utilize smoke, that’s your call — for this recipe, I did not. Oh, and if any charcoal purists come over here and try to tell me you can’t do this on a gas grill, I will have my Shaolin wife come karate chop you in your gonads. A good gas grill will serve you well. Like a hound. A hound made of propane and metal and melting fat who breathes fire and chars animal-flesh.

You could probably do this in the oven, by the way. Same deal — 300 degrees.

But seriously: the grill does this better. I’m not fucking around. Don’t think that I am.

Anyway.

Get your pork butt HA HA HA HA HA butt. Just shut up. Shut up and go get it. Take it. Put it on the grill — indirect! not over flame! — and then close that bad bitch up.

Come back in five hours.

Step Two: The Roasted Red Pepper Sauce

This is not a red pepper coulis, exactly, but fuck it, you can call it that and I won’t tell. I won’t sick the gourmand police on you. Foodies will not descend from helicopters to punch you in the mouth.

You’re going to need some things for this.

You’re going to need one sweet onion.

You’ll need one large or two smaller tomatoes.

Then you’re going to need a fuckload of sweet peppers. (A fuckload is equal to one pound.)

Red, yellow, orange, whatever. I like the little guys, but your mileage may vary.

Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. Chop coarsely. Curse while doing so. Call someone’s mother a “whore-biscuit” or “canker-nipples.” While disparaging someone’s mother, also be sure to remove the seeds from the tomato and the peppers because, ew. Who wants to eat a bunch of seeds? Squirrels, that’s who. And I assume you’re not a squirrel. If you are, and you’re all up in my blog chewing the wiring and depositing your foul little squirrel pellets in the programming, I will shoot you with my .410, which is my squirrel-killing gun. And it’s also my chicken-killing gun, just in case you’re one of those. Because chickens are dickheads.

Put all this stuff in a roasting pan over foil, get it good and lubed up with olive oil, and then liberally sprinkle with some salt and some Herbs de Provence. Yes, seriously. Hush up and do it, for Chrissakes.

Put in oven for one hour, or until you start to see the peppers darken around the edges.

While cooking, stand around, smelling that smell. Mmm. So good. Rub yourself. Just a little bit. Not to be gross or weird or anything. Gentle circles. Mmm. Yeah. So nice.

Ding. Hour’s up.

Veggies out of the oven, let ‘em cool, then pop ‘em in a mixing bowl.

Get your immersion blender, penetrate the sauce with your whirring doom-stick, and blend the shit out of those veggies. Metaphorically. The veggies should contain no actual shit. If it does, then you need to check yourself. You need to say, “What’s wrong with me? Why did I put feces in my food? Why did I sabotage myself again? I’m not a success. I’m my own worst enemy. This is why my wife left me.”

When you blend, you don’t need to blend it to a complete slurry. I like it with some pieces of pepper still floating around. Give it a little texture. Your call, though. You do what you like. It’s your sauce.

Now, add to this sauce two things:

a) 1/4 cup of creme fraiche (or sour cream if you’re, y’know, a hillbilly)

b) 1 TBsp of softened cream cheese.

Stir. No need to blend. Just stir. Not with your finger. Or your penis. Put that away. You should really see somebody about that. Always sticking your extremities into moist foods.

Cool in fridge until meat is meatified.

Step Three: Corn Done Two Ways

This is like a Choose Your Own Adventure game where every adventure ends in corn-a-licious delights rather than, say, getting eaten by Snarveling Moon Beasts or some nonsense like that.

Get four ears of corn.

Cook ‘em however makes you happy. Boil them for 8 minutes, grill them for 15 minutes, char them, whatever works for you. Just make a decision and cook the fucking corn already.

Then: de-corn the cob. Or un-cob the corn. I dunno. Cut the corn off the cob. Serrated knife FTW.

Option #1: CORN SALSA. Take the cut corn and put it in a mixing bowl and add in there: salt, pepper, one diced tomato, a de-seeded and chopped jalapeno, some melted butter, and the juice of one lime.

You could, quite seriously, add a splash of tequila in there. “Margarita Corn Salsa.” Awesome.

Option #2: CREAMED CORN. Chop up one small sweet onion or a handful of shallots and put ‘em in a skillet to soften them in butter — dice up a couple-few cloves of garlic in there, too. Throw the corn in there after about five or ten minutes (when onion is beyond translucent and nice and soft). Milk the cob, too. (Pork pulled from pig butt? Milk the cob? Meat in mouth? No wonder they call it food porn.) By milking the cob, I mean, scrape your knife down the cut cobs and get the rest of that “corn juice” out of there. Into this goes salt, pepper, and whatever herbs you have laying around. Oregano and parsley are nice here. But you could go with those Herbs de Provence, again, since you’re lazy and you already have them within reach of your greasy hands. Then mix in there two TBsps of creme fraiche again. Or sour cream. You pedestrian.

Sticking The Landing

Remove pork from grill. It will be crispy on the outside and unctuous on the inside. Pull it apart with your mind. Barring an unforeseen lack of psychic powers: tongs and fork.

Slap the pork on buns. (Butt? Buns? Goddamnit.)

Glob a dollop of that roasted red pepper sauce on there.

Put some Corn Your Own Adventure on the side.

EAT LIKE A FUCKING CHAMPION. Snarl and pound the table in delight.

Don’t forget to order me my gift basket.