Like me, I’m sure you’ve heard it over and over again: “The only way to become a great writer is to keep writing” or “there are no shortcuts in life” or “you can’t be a writer, you’re helplessly illiterate.” I assure you, these are nothing but ludicrous things parents tell their children before bed and after college.

You have access to a thesaurus and a checking account, there’s no reason your humor shouldn’t be published. I bet you have a whole list of ideas in your head but you just haven’t found the time to put them up on screen. It’s very important to not to beat yourself up about being unpublished; it’ll give you writer’s block and, if you’re an especially strong writer, a black eye. After all, you’re holding down a job and trying to get through your Netflix Instant Queue. Writing should be a hobby, nothing more.

How can I be so casual about becoming a successful author? Why, it’s because I’ve unlocked the secrets to getting your humor published for you! I unlocked them from my brain closet so I could present them to you in this easy to follow, step-by-step e-book.

Step 1: March into the bathroom, look in the mirror and say, “I’m funny. I’m funny and interesting and good looking enough to be a published author.”

Congratulations, you’ve just overcome the hardest part of the writing process: embracing both your brilliance and your lazy eye in one sentence.

Step 2: Dust off that laptop and get comfortable. You’re funny and it’s about time everyone knew it.

Step 3: Get a snack.

Step 4: Get comfy, again.

Step 4-7: Compose tweet about being a writer, look at your ex’s profile pictures on Facebook, inhale while thinking about how no one gets you, exhale.

Step 8: Time to start writing, sort of! The eighth most important step to getting published is choosing a subject. Spoiler Alert: I strongly encourage you to write about a semi-famous academic. The reason for this is because people love funny things that are only funny to a relatively small group of people, it’s known as “intimate humor.” (“Intimate humor” is a term I made up and a term you just told yourself that you knew prior to reading this book. Published Author-1, Unpublished Scoundral-0). If you find yourself drawing a blank, pull out your Lit 201 syllabus – yep, that one – and pick an author.

O’Connor? Too mainstream.

Joyce? Too drunk.

Kafka? Fucking Yahtzee™.

Step 8: I hate to break it to you, although it’s eighth in terms of importance, selecting a subject is one of the easiest parts of being a writer, second only to getting comfortable the second time. Now that you’ve selected a subject, Kafka, you must choose action.

Step 9: Not so fast! The powers that be aren’t going to accept your Joe Schmo, half-baked Kafka essay. This is where your uniquely hilarious perspective on the world comes in handy, so follow my instructions closely: Kafka must to be doing something that Kafka would’ve never done. That being said, I’m not talking about wig making or not being schizophrenic, I’m talking about things it would’ve been impossible for Kafka to do. Modern things. This is what the learned call “juxtaposition.”

Step 10: Put the dictionary down. The only thing you need to know about juxtapositions is that they’re infinite and will split many a-side.

Step 9 (cont.): Kafka is on MySpace, Kafka is riding a John Deer, Kafka is hosting the Emmy’s. The list goes on and on, one gut busting combination after another. The hilarious part being that HE WOULD’VE NEEDED A TIME MACHINE TO DO ANY OF THESE! It should be noted the crazier the juxtaposition, the better. Just below that note, it should also be noted that Kafka must still act like Kafka, regardless of action or time period. Trust me, even if it’s totally incoherent drivel, people will pretend to get it. Kafka is the spokesperson for Lipitor.

Step 12: Write! I’ve given you the tools, but only you can put fingers to the keyboard. And since you’re the only one who bought my e-book, all four of the ideas I’ve provided are up for grabs! Kafka plays the character “Franzie” on Happy Days. That’s five!

Step 11: Casually mention to everyone you know that you’re a writer. After all, why be a writer if no one else knows about it?

EDITOR’S NOTE: If you follow these eleven steps and your humor still isn’t published, don’t sweat it! No one gets published the first time, or even the hundredth time. Keep reading, keep writing and you’ll eventually find your voice through my e-book. Plus, you’ll be automatically registered to receive a free copy of my new e-book: How to Start a Blog.

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Dan Rozier lives/works/eats/sleeps and separates verbs with slashes in Cincinnati, Ohio. He tweets at @barf_city, which isn’t a city at all, but a Twitter handle.

When we left Pierce Noonan, he was experiencing a day of terror. His housekeeper interrupts him: “Excuse me, sir? Why are you screaming over the half-filled bathtub?” and he’s all: “HAHAHAHAHHAAHA! What?” and she replies with: “Oh gosh, shucks, being from Maine country, I need to finish cleaning up this tub right quick so I can get home and rest my stereotype.”

She then helpfully expositions about what “Dark Score Crazy” means, but Pierce Noonan wants specifics: do people go crazy with Dark Score Crazy? (This guy has a terrible imagination for a writer.) The housekeeper reveals that all these men have in fact, gone crazy and have killed little girls!

“Oh wow, that’s gross, “ Pierce Noonan’s face says, “but Ms. Housekeeper, was my wife banging dudes in this cabin?” Are you serious, Pierce? I think the housekeeper is also offended, because she leaves. Noonan decides to take matters into his own hands and goes online to Goog–I mean, Interweb Detective “Dark Score Crazy.” He comes up with nothing, not even 4Chan can help him. So he promptly goes up to his wife’s old work room attic and trashes the shit out of it. Then he sniffs the bedsheets.

This happened.

Suddenly he discovers an attic ABOVE the attic. A super-attic? The attic attic has a collection of creepy owls, a desk chair, some lye and a adorable raccoon that nearly kills our hero. So close, Mr. Raccoon! Better luck next season.

Noonan then finds a bunch of books about Dark Score! He flips through them, and seems sort of bored because there’s no reference to his wife cheating on him. What the hell, secret books?

He delves deeper into the mysteries of Sara Tidwell. He manages to pull up on his iPad a video recording of her performing in the 1930s. And yet he can’t seem to Google (sorry “Interweb Detective”) “Dark Score Crazy.” The mysteries of life!

Mattie shows up and bounces around and reveals that her sole custody of KyRA is pretty much a lock because Max has been paying off KyRA’s ad-litem or something. I don’t see how this means that Mattie is now safe and clear from the custody battle, but, whatever, bouncy bouncy bouncy!!

Then Mattie sees a familiar face in Noonan’s family photo. It’s the man she saw at the coffee shop with Noonan’s wife Jo! Noonan laughs gloriously. What relief! That’s his brother, his GAY brother. Hahahaha! Yay! Gay Brother Sid!

Then then, Mattie, like any 21-year-old bouncy bouncy gives the nearest 60-year-old man a big kiss on the lips. Yum!

You taste like my dad.

Noonan walks back inside his house to find it trashed by the ghost of Sara Tidwell, and proceeds to do her one better by breaking her records. That’s right bitch, Pierce will always break more shit than you! He returns to his magical fridge magnets, still trying to decipher the code “Sid Own Lft” secretly wondering if that’s the name of the Swedish man who boned his dead wife.

He calls his Gay Eunuch Brother Sid and Sid makes a joke about “knocking boots” and Pierce is like “HAHAHAHA. No, seriously, do you know anything about a lift? Maybe something you put in a shoe or an elevator in a factory where my wife was banging some dude? No? Okay.”

Pierce runs into his favorite Lady Tree and is hitting on the tree hard core (my mom wishes she were that tree), he puts his hand on the tree’s stomach and she zaps him and he pukes. That is an efficient deterrent for tree rape! He’ll think better next time.

Not to sound SAPPY, but you look GOOD, Lady Tree.

Suddenly, Pierce runs into Max, his motorized wheelchair and his assistant Rogette up on a rocky cliff. Max gives a long soliloquy about whores and rotting butterflies and Pierce sums up the audience’s thoughts by saying “what the hell are you talking about?”

Max wants to know if Pierce is sure he wants “to be the little girl’s hero.” And Pierce is like “Enough of ye!” and then Rogette punches him in the face and he falls off the cliff into the water and he shouts “ARE YOU CRAZY?!” and Rogette goes “AH-ha! HAHAHA!” and throws stones at him and continues to cackle like a Chico’s mannequin witch while Max yells out at him about responsibility.

Nothing to see here! Just taking a daily cliff walk wheelchair stroll.

So Pierce jogs back to his house in his soaking wet clothes (my mom wishes she were those clothes) and instead of calling the police and filing a report about being punched off a cliff he picks up a package at his door that is later revealed to be copies of his new book and then JASON PRIESTLEY: AGENT OF TEEN DREAMS leaves a voice-mail saying that the package has copies of Pierce’s new book. Phew, I’m glad I received verbal confirmation about the thing I just saw!

Instead of calling the phone company to report his lost phone or using his iPad to report his lost phone, Pierce pours himself a drink and decides to play a relaxing game of Words With The Dead. He gets a visit from the local deputy who passes on a message from Max that he wants Pierce to agree to “cease all legal maneuvers and let Mr. Devore rest in peace.” There’s no “catch” Pierce just needs to call Max and “agree to the terms.”

Pierce Mike Noonan has the same “whatthefuck?” look on his face as the audience, but he calls Max anyway—which is weird because why doesn’t he send a special convoy with a special message? Was his Gay Brother Sid busy?

But instead of simply calling and agreeing to Max’s nonsensical FORESHADOWING deal, Pierce Noonan says Rogette is an ugly bitch and promises to ring her scrawny turkey neck. You can’t just punch ex-James Bond off a cliff and expect to get away from it verbally unscathed, Rogette!

So after all that delightful banter, Noonan agrees to Max’s terms of 1) ceasing his legal maneuvers which was really only five minutes of his time applying basic logic to a custody battle taking place in what appeared to be in the “VHS Tapes” section of a public library and 2) let Mr. Devore rest in peace, implying perhaps a knowledge of Pierce Noonan’s ability to make out with dead people and maybe Mr. Devore is a bit frightened of this happening because he’s not scared of a man-on-man embrace, no, not that at all, in fact, he yearns for the touch of Pierce Noonan, for his strong manly arms and the chance to touch that furry, masculine chest as Pierce kisses him with a burly fiery passion of sensual Irish fierceness.

OR, Max simply wants a promise that Pierce won’t drink a pack of Nattie Lights and pee on his grave. Could just be that.

In the next scene Rogette gives Max a bath. I am hacking to cough up a hairball that doesn’t exist. She shoots him up with some drugs and puts a plastic bag over his head and kills him. Girl, if you were looking for a promotion, you are going at it the wrong way.

Romantic interlude.

Then! Pierce has a dream and is transported back to the County Fair of the Past and he runs away with KyRA from some menacing white dudes into a barn with hay bales and empty whistling jars. He tells KyRA to just squeeze his hand tighter if she gets scared and she replies that she isn’t holding his hand and he turns and AHHH, A LITTLE BLACK GIRL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Terrifying.

Sara appears and screams “CUSTODY HAS ITS RESPONSIBILITIES!” I don’t know if you should discuss responsibilities to a man who can’t even Interweb Detective a new phone.

Pierce wakes up because Mattie is calling! Max killed himself! Bouncy bouncy! They set a date for dinner and Pierce gets on his computer to find out it’s been THE SHINING-ED and it says “BAG OF BONES” everywhere!

WHAT DOES IT MEANNNNN?!?!

Whatever. Funeral! Pierce follows an old man wheelchair-ing away from the funeral to his conveniently located nursing home. The old man then reveals what really happened to Sara Tidwell. SURPRISE, SHE GOT GANG RAPED. So the menacing white guys at the county fair were all like, “aww, yeah! She’s hot and black, let’s all of us pull on our suspenders and run into her in the woods where she is smoking randomly and make racist comments and then gang rape her and OOPS THERE’S HER KID WITH A BASKET PICKING MOSS GOTTA DROWN HER.”

Before Max kills her, Sara curses the men, which means that all of their male descendants will drown their daughters. Here are some better curses:

1) Curse all the men who gang raped her to get gang raped and die.

2) Curse all the men who gang raped her to watch Bag of Bones 1 and 2 forever and ever. Until they die.

Pierce goes over to Mattie Bouncy Bouncy’s house and she licks her lips in the hallway and points to her apron that says “Kiss the Cook.” They suck face and her daughter appears: GIGGLE GIGGLE “READ ME MY BEDTIME STORY MR. MIKE I AM SO PRECOCIOUS, LOVE MEEEEE.”

Pierce reads KyRA a story and she reveals that she had a dream about Mr. Pierce, the SAME DREAM HE HAD. ZOMG. Instead of asking Pierce why he’s scared of black people, she refers to Sara as the “mad lady” and tells Pierce Sara’s daughter is her friend. The “mad lady” made her dad try to kill her. But whatever, finish story-time! She conks out by page two. No joke: all that giggling must have tuckered her out.

Mr. Pierce reveals the curse to Mattie Bouncy Bouncy. And Mattie in turn reveals that is why Jo never told Pierce she was pregnant because she feared he’d kill her daughter! Pierce is so relieved! “Thank you!” he says. Thank you? Thank you for telling me that I’m cursed and would have killed my child if it had the unlucky chance of being born a girl? (Also, please to note that in the novel, all the children are cursed to die, not just the girls. But who cares. This version will be a hit in China!)

They celebrate by making out and then Mattie gets SHOT IN THE FACE. SHOT. IN. THE. FACE. While making out. While swapping spit. You are wondering what sort of man would make out with some chick after talking about his glorious dead wife who passed away only a few months ago but then that chick gets SHOT IN THE FACE. WHILE MAKING OUT. Republicans, you have your new birth control.

I'm still very handsome.

Rather than yelling “are you kidding me?!” Mattie dies asks Pierce to take care of her baby and Pierce grabs a chicken tenderizer because that’s the best weapon you can find in a kitchen. Pierce hits the sniper in the head with the tenderizer a few times and finds KyRA awake and sobbing.

SOB SOB SOB. More evil bad guys to kill KyRA! It’s revealed that Max wanted custody of KyRA so he could kill KyRA but then when he realized that Pierce was around and his bloodline was also cursed, that he could kill himself because Pierce would end up killing KyRA anyways because she’s the last little girl of the bloodlines, even though she isn’t related to Pierce and Sara said the men would only kill their own daughters? Technicality I guess? That is some curse Sara.

CURSE NEGOTIATOR

But I guess the other dudes didn’t get Max’s memo that Pierce would be taking care of business because they shot KyRA’s mom and are now chasing Pierce down a rainy street. But luckily something even more logical happens when a sign is hit by lightening and falls onto the bad guys’ truck and kills them all!!

SOB SOB SOB. KyRA falls asleep again. She’s got the right idea. I want to fall asleep too. Pierce puts her to bed and walks downstairs where Sara’s ghost attacks him with a shitload of old records and the tub turns on, and Max’s ghost is taking a relaxing bath and referring to Pierce as Daddy and KyRA as whorelet. I’m only reporting the news, people.

Jo’s voice rises up, whispering “Lie Still Bag of Bones.” Pierce discovers that Jo is INSIDE HIS WRITING. And DOWN LFT SID means DOWN LEFT SIDE. “Owls Above Studio” is one paragraph and “Lie Still Bag of Bones” is “Lye will Still her Bag of Bones.” If Jo is in his computer, she has a virus.

Pierce runs to the sexy tree he’s been trying to sex and digs up Sara and her daughter and they are very well preserved, I must say. No bag of bones anywhere! Suddenly the tree starts to beat the shit out of Pierce with its branches and it’s hilarious. But then Jo appears and fights the evil demon Sara who was viciously raped and murdered and her child was killed before her very own eyes. Who cares, Sara! Lye all over their faces! GO TO REST, GHOSTS.

Jo tells Pierce she loves him and disappears. Pierce runs home and finds KyRA in the bathtub crying. Rogette is there and she is going to kill the little whorelet! Where is a tenderizer when you need it?! Pierce and Rogette fight over beard trimming scissors and KyRA cries and cries and cries but then Pierce stabs Rogette in the neck! Yay! Blood squirts all over! KyRA’s mother Mattie appears out of the water and says goodbye to her daughter. Get ready for therapy for the rest of your life, KyRA. I hope you get a good discount.

Wow, policemen are here! They haven’t been around for all the other unexplained murders, but it’s never too late. KyRA tells Pierce that her dead mom said that he’s going to be her dad now, and he’s ready to be a father! Finally, 150-something-year-old Pierce has grown up! Then they decide to go paddling on Dark Score Lake where little girls were drowned. (Also, don’t forget Kyra almost drowned. Twice.)

THE END.

Questions I have:

• Why?

———-

Eileen hopes you enjoyed her Bag of Bones review, you little whorelet.

———-

I’ve been slowly adding to Annie’s strange family dynamic ever since I blessed her with insanity way back when. Dinners like this can only happen in the winter, when Annie’s parents are around. She throws open all the windows, piles snow along the walls, and cooks a nice spaghetti dinner. Luckily, the cold also helps Robot Ben operate at maximum efficiency, and his conversations are a lot better than his usual repertoire of quotations from John C. Reilly movies and early episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

This comic was a nightmare. It has panels AND speech bubbles, both of which I tend to stay away from.

And that table really is pretty damn long. Adorable non sequitur. And I’m out!

———–

Andrew Kaye (known in some circles as AK) is the creator of Ben & Winslow and other questionable comics, many of which can be found in his deviantART gallery. He’s also the editor-in-chief of this magazine. Duh?

I haven’t felt this much raw excitement since last spring, when we got our weather radio. When the hubby brought that home, I said, “What! A radio that’s a hazard alert system AND the perfect bedside alarm clock? Bring that bad boy over here!” I was a little overwhelmed by the size of the frequency band. But then I programmed it for local area reception. And now whenever there’s a storm, I’m just like: “Oh, is there a super cell in our area? I didn’t even notice. That’s cuz I’m already down in the basement, getting my mind blown by our weather clock.”

You want to know what’s crazy? I didn’t even WANT a new mailbox at first. When my husband brought it up, I got defensive. I was like, “Oh—so you’re not into the mailbox anymore?” And he was like, “No, I’m just saying it could use some work.” And I was like, “How tight do you think it should look after all those years on the curb? Do you know how much action that thing has seen? And why do you even care—Is House and Garden coming by to lay it out in a big glossy spread?”

But that was before I rear ended it, trying to back out of the driveway while I was ordering pad thai for takeout. After that, the door was so loose it wouldn’t shut. The whole thing sat crooked on top of the rusted pole. For a while, I actually stopped checking it—even when I knew it was stuffed to obscenity with holiday catalogs! In all honesty, I was starting to feel like it was just a glorified letter hole.

Finally, I just said to myself: “Why shouldn’t a woman want to feel good about her box? That’s the first area people look at when they come to your house!” Well, some of you might think that sounds tacky. Or even superficial. But dig this, Judge Judies. If you took the time to examine your boxes more often, you might be surprised at how rundown they look. And when it’s gotten to the point where shit falls out of it several times a week—and gets lost in the snow until the next thaw—it is high time for an upgrade.

Obviously, there’s no suburban destination that is hotter than Home Depot. Especially if you need a big bucket of latex primer. Or a vinyl discharge hose. But a nice mailbox should be custom made. That’s why I’ve been snooping around to get some fresh ideas. Like, a woman in my office said she covered hers in rustic wood slats.  That box was hand crafted by the Amish! There’s a retired physician up the street who ordered one in the shape of a north woods vacation home. She was like, “Oh snap! Grab a fireside throw and some cinnamon scented pinecones and let’s cozy it up!” Around here, people love the outdoor scenes. I know of one box that’s decorated with a picture of a garden rabbit sitting next to a watering can. I said, “Is that bunny engraved, Mrs. Peterson? Oh no you didn’t!”

Then there are the really bold ones. We call those “statement pieces.” The other day, I saw one made entirely of stone. Seriously? I have never seen one that smooth. Call me old school. But what kind of person wants to come home from work every day and say hello to that hairless cat. Know what I mean? Contrast that to the model I saw at a silent auction. It was covered—literally, from top to bottom—with tufts of moss and grass. My first thought was, “Wow, THAT is a fuzzy piece.” The lady standing next to me bid on it, too. Not everyone could rock a mailbox with that much turf. But this is suburban Wisconsin.  Where people are just into that natural, organic vibe.

No matter what we end up with, I hope our postal carrier likes it. I thought our mail fell out because of the broken door. It’s also possible that the mailman threw it down there. I don’t think he’s a vindictive person. But I heard from the woman next door that he prefers his mailboxes to be BIG. According to her, he doesn’t like having to bend a package.  Or squeeze it into a standard-sized unit. And postal truck drivers don’t have time to walk stuff to your door anymore. They just want to drive up and stick it in.

So my neighbor went for an oversized one. She had to special order that hefty Rubbermaid too, because the local store didn’t carry a trunk with all that junk. I get that. We all want our mail carriers to be happy. Especially now that they might drop some service routes. As for the mailman, he can’t get enough. The day she put it out there, he wrote her a personal thank you note. Stuck it right in her new box. He told her it looked like a work of art.

I mean, talk about bringing sexy back! Am I right, ladies?

————

Erin Clune is a writer from Madison, Wisconsin. She has written for a variety of publications, but writes most regularly for public radio. Locally, she writes a food segment for WPR’s Wisconsin Life. Her essays have aired nationally on To the Best of Our Knowledge and All Things Considered. She also posts humorous essays on her blog, “Life After NY: Musings from the Third Coast,” which can be found on the internet. There she pokes fun at a variety of cultural trends, as well as some of the challenges involved in relocating back to her Midwestern hometown as an adult. But mostly, she laughs at herself. Because there’s just so much material!

I’m still pissed off I didn’t get an iPad for Christmas. What are some things you wanted for Christmas that your parents didn’t get you because they were bastards?

There were three things I consistently asked for Christmas when I was growing up: a good book, a pony and a cape. I got plenty of books, I even got a cape, but my dream of a pony has always eluded me.

Recently, I was issued a challenge while out for beers. That is, my friends were drinking beer and I was feeling brave and had Wild Turkey. That evening did not end well for me, and subsequently, I forgot the details of the challenge that I had been issued. All I knew was that I was hung over and had something to prove. And the challenge had to do with ponies and literature. Game on.

So below are the opening sections of some of my favorite novels, which have been mildly edited to include ponies. Yes, this is sacrilege. The real question is, was the challenge met successfully? Was this even the original challenge? Did it even have anything to do with ponies?!

Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser

When the pony boarded the afternoon train for Chicago, her total outfit consisted of a small trunk, a bridle, a small lunch in a paper box and a yellow leather snap purse, containing her ticket, a scrap of paper with her sister’s address in Van Buren Street, and a small pistol.

The pony, who happened to be clairvoyant, sat down next to the perturbed eighteen year old Caroline Meeber and looked directly into her eyes and said, “In a few moments, a frisky salesman named Charlie Drouet will introduce himself to you and thus will begin a series of events that will involve you becoming a kept woman by two separate men, years of internal emotional debate until you finally break free of their control and become a successful Broadway actress. I say cut to the chase! Take this pistol and rob him and thrive!”

Caroline Meeber nodded and prepared herself as Charlie Drouet waltzed onto the train.

Poor Things by Alasdair Gray

Like most farm workers in those days, my mother distrusted ponies. When death drew near she told me her life-savings were in a tin trunk under the bed and muttered, “Take it and count it.”

But it turned out that the ponies had a hand in my predicaments. I went to medical school only to find that the system was corrupt: practicing on the poor in order to aid the rich. Then, I befriended Godwin Baxter, a good but ugly man. He introduced me to his Frankenstein-esque creation, Bella, a drowned woman resurrected with the brain of her unborn child. I was intrigued, on the verge of love, and then discovered she was into pony play. That’s when things got pretty spicy.

Veronica by Mary Gaitskill

When I was a young girl, my mother read me a story about a wicked little pony. She did not believe in the power of friendship or rainbows. And while she was selfish and horded all of her delicious apples for herself, she grew into a sturdy mare and was then sent off to the glue factory. It made me and my sisters sad, but we were bratty anyway.

Now I’m a 50 year old ex-model turned cleaning lady with Hepatitis C. And my flamboyant friend, Veronica, is dead. But I feel better for having learned the lessons that terrible little pony taught me.

The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton

Lawrence Selden paused in surprise. In the early rush of the Grand Central Station his eyes had been refreshed by the sight of Miss Lily Barton. She was sitting aloft a magnificent golden pony, holding her parasol in a threatening manner. She did not look amused.

As he approached, his mind poured into a river of really deep thoughts – like how he loved and she loved him, but that the pressures of high society demanded she marry above her own station and how this would ultimately cause her scandal, degrade her and end with her suicide. While he considered this, Lily’s pony galloped forward and she struck him on the head with her parasol and Selden fell down dead.

“Let us ride, Princess Butterscotch,” Lily said, stroking the pony’s mane. “We are off to avenge my reputation before it is even sullied!”

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since. “Whenever you feel like criticizing any one,” he told me, “just remember that all the people in the world haven’t had the advantages you’ve had.”

Of course, I later realized that the Great Gatsby’s money had come from his network of pony servants who ran illegal bootlegs during Prohibition. The ponies had made him rich, and the ponies worked hard. And when the ponies worked hard, they got drunk. And when they got drunk, shit went down. It was only then I realized that social status was nothing but an equestrian metaphor!

Philosophy in the Boudoir by the Marquis de Sade

First Dialogue

Madame de Saint-Ange: Oh dear brother, let us discuss our scandalous bisexual affairs in such perverse manner that it will incite the French government to execute our author!

The Chevalier: Have you ever seen a horse’s cock?! It’s huge!!

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Got a question? Send it to jonathandefenestrates@gmail.com!

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We’ve had some bitter cold days here in the DC area (not as many as I would like, and certainly not enough snow, but whatever). What boggles my mind is all the professional women around here that wait for buses and subways in skirts. Short skirts. And not skirts with stockings or boots or anything else that would come between their skin and the weather. Just skirts, and bare skin from the thighs down. I don’t know how they do it. I don’t know why they do it. But it just seems like madness.

Unfortunately, Apsara’s suit is not an exaggeration.

———–

Andrew Kaye (known in some circles as AK) is the creator of Ben & Winslow and other questionable comics, many of which can be found in his deviantART gallery. He’s also the editor-in-chief of this magazine. Duh?

This same savoir vivre applies to music. Oh sure, the young slackjaw of thinks he or she has got hold of the Devil by his cojones. Picking the most salacious, or the most violent, the most non-sequitured or even the most depressing popular Tonkünstlers they can find, they think they have got to a place so vilely sacrosanct that no human has ever peeked into before. Silly, silly cods. What is Lady Gagoo? Hushler? Or even the debonair Maurice Chevalier? Do you think these playthings can teach you the innermost depths of human depravity and moral turpitude?

How often have I heard the wistful sigh of a barbaric young heart, knowing full well it will never be satisfied with Kleinigkeiten, wheezing, wishing they could but begin to plumb the depths of the Classical maestros? But where to start! It’s all so complicated, so overwhelming. Which composer? Which orchestra? Why is a fiddle called a violin all of a sudden? Fear not, young browbeater! Yes, I, head of the vanguard, have prepared for all the young marrow guzzlers out there a little slice of salvation. Though no mere player, I am an expert in my own amateurish and obsessive way. I have spent a lifetime collecting names, dates, and plagiarized impressions for just such an occasion. Swallow then, the following catalogue of idée reçues concerning the greatest composers, in full knowledge that the gulp you are about to take will launch you from dribbling barbarism to full-fledged bourgeois philistinism!

The Greats

Monteverdi, Claudio. Italian Renaissance man. In 1492, sailed with Columbus as cook. Accidentally discovered Opera, and consequently, all of modern western music, while trying to perfect the “rat-meatball”, a favourite aboard the Santa Maria. His music was polyphonic, that is, very, very funny.

Vivaldi, Antonio. A real sympatico character. Enjoyed his spaghetti in all weather. Worked in an all-girls atmosphere, which no doubt led to the stormy and dramatic allegro openings of his concerti; these tend to draw out in the middle with a limp largo, but happily finish off with another allegro, much to the chagrin of the ladies. You could say he was basso continuo himself. Spent the last 200 years of his life hiding in music libraries throughout Europe, until he was rediscovered in the 20th century by a gang of elite Fascist poets; has since become a favourite among Kindergarten teachers.

Bach, J.S. Famous German organ grinder. Had a monkey named “Fugue” which was his inspiration, and the love of his life. Dedicated all of his music to said monkey, including the unfinished documentary/bio-pic “The Art of Fugue”. Never wrote a bad piece of music. Is perfectly listenable today, provided you are equipped with an abacus and a six-pack of premium high-octane. Style was Baroque (pronounced BAR-OAK), which means composed in frills and powdered wigs. Also contrapunctal, which is a latinate term for “com-pli-muh-cated”.

Bach, C.P.E, and E.T.C.  The monstrous offspring of J.S. and his monkey. A clan of about a thousand sibling composers, all half-simian, scratching ticks, as well as notes, onto music sheets in the hopes of inventing the Classical style. Succeeded.

Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus. A genius. Also a Wunderkind, which is a type of German chocolate given out at Easter. The first composer to successfully die young and miserable in a ditch. Style was Classical (pronounced CLASS-ICK-AL), which means composed in frills, powdered wigs, and a smattering of rouge. Made masterful use of the Sonata-Allegro form, a simple sequential structure that consists merely of introduction, exposition, synthetic proposition, diachronic recapitulation, modulation, parabolic hyperbole, squash, functional analysis, and finally, the coda-cola.

Beethoven, Ludwig van. Another genius. His father was originally from the low-lands, and his mother was a bull-dog. Decided in his youth that he didn’t much care for music and went deaf to make the job easier. Famous for his elegant table manners. Once kicked Goethe in the shins. Style was the germ of the Romantic (pronounced BLARGH), which did away with frills, powdered wigs, and all such sartorial nonsense; made due instead with a beaver top-hat and chamberpot.

Schubert, Schumann, Shoeshine etc. A series of stand-up comedians who perfected the Kunst-Lieder, a kind of musical limerick. “There once was a chap from Gesundheit…”

Mussorgsky, Modeste. Russian composer whom the classicists allowed into the party only on the condition that he not touch the silverware. Part of the “Mighty Handful”, a Russian temperance movement that enforced alchohol and consumption. Composed Pictures at An Exhibition, a celebration of seedy pornographic cinemas, and A Night on Bald Mountain, a musical exposition on hair-tonic and vodka. Once kneed Dostoyevsky right in the samovar. His Opera, Boris Godunov, wasn’t.

Wagner, Richard. Contrary to popular belief, did not found the S.S., only occasionally sent them fawning love notes and locks of hair sprayed with the scent of Teutonic perfume (Sauerkraut). Believed in German Opera at a time when the world considered the Germans to be fatuous, long-winded, anti-semitic, violent, and bland. He sure showed them. His sixteen hour masterpiece, Der Ring des Nibelungen or How I Met Your Mother, has never been successfully staged with sock-puppets.

Mahler, Gustav. Composed while sitting in a tub of custard.

Bel Canto Italian Opera. Stereotypically presented as a gang of fat, bearded Italian clowns belching for hours with the backing of a tuba. In actuality, however, the costumes have a few variants.

Schoenberg, Webern, Berg, and Grover. The original cast of Sesame Street. Changed music forever by inventing Twelve-Tone Atonal composition, and the Sing-a-Long. Music has since reverted to being pleasant.

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Jason is a librarian from Ottawa, Ontario who has not yet figured out how to separate business from pleasure. He hopes to learn. He enjoys checking out the stacks and—once in a while—a book or two. (http://super-grammaticam.blogspot.com)

Naturally, first impressions are everything, and 3/5ths of the senses that matter are the ones you wish to appeal to.

Fellas, while you may not be aware of it, in this day and age, most women prefer that the man of their fancies at least smells like he attempts to bathe on a semi-regular basis. You may be asking yourself “Who the hell cares about my odor so long as I don’t smell like rancid monkey ass?” It’s a valid question–from the male perspective–in the dating world, while not having a significant BO problem is a plus, the faint smell of stale Doritos ain’t doing you any favors. You may think to yourself “well I wear deodorant.” Big whoop! You’re doing something we’ve all done to avoid being the smelly kid in class, it covers up your stink, it does not enhance.

Eau de...Ew

Firstly, you need to get over that unfounded fear that wearing cologne is going to turn you into a pretentious douchebag who is only able to communicate using a single two to three syllable word and also wears torn shirts and high-water hip huggers. Next thing to remember is finding a cologne that works with your natural musk. You can’t just buy any old thing and call it a day; you at least have to pretend you’re trying to be an adult. Visit your nearest Macy’s or preferred department store (that doesn’t end in –mart or -get) and ask around, they’ll be more than willing to help you find a selection as they’re looking to pawn off as much overpriced, scented toilet water as possible. Yes, it is expensive, but it’s an investment you’ll just have to make.

For all that is holy do not let the price tag dissuade you into traveling to the local Wal*Mart to pick up a two pack of Axe for eight bucks. Axe is good for two things and two things only: high school dances and impromptu flamethrowers. No, you don’t smell like sex, and no, women will not fall from the heavens with the desire to touch you where your bathing suit covers. You will be talked about, and the comments made behind your back will equate to: “Boy, I remember when I was a schumck.”

What’s important to remember is, much like everything else, you can, and more than likely will, overdo it. When that happens, you’ll know, as, whenever you enter and leave someone’s personal space, it will be followed by a not-so-subtle cough. Here’s a pretty good rule of thumb: if you can literally taste what you’re wearing before you walk out of the house, you need to disrobe, burn those clothes, and shower immediately before you offend everyone in the greater metropolitan area. You may think you smell amazing, but you will actually ruin a coworker’s day just enough to push them over the edge, causing them to pull that bottle of Jack from their office drawer, polish it off, and go on one of those rampages the news talks about every now and then.

And no, you cannot go the Pepe Le Pew route and accept your own stink; the man got the ladies due to a combination of charm and sophistication with just a hint of sexual predator.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEdBndu0YUM

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Chris hates anyone or anything which goes against how he feels a sentient being with more than three brain cells should act. He hopes to use his “Encyclopedia Douchebag…ica” as a springboard into becoming a full-fledged, tax exempt religion complete with holidays and greeting cards, mainly so he can steal from its coffers. His hopes are…not that high, knowing that those who needs his guidance most, are unable to read his words… what with the extra flesh from their sloped, ape-like foreheads blinding their eyes from the truth.

When not acting like a complete bastard (which is not very often), Chris writes about all things video game related on his blog iNOOBriated, and his Twitter. He also offers his services as a freelancer for Beckett’s Massive Online Gamer. Yep, he’s a neeeeeerd.

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I didn’t feel like writing a strip with actual dialogue for today. So instead of dialogue, I’ve inserted the basic idea of what the characters are saying. Feel free to imagine them talking about whatever the hell you want. It’s my Friday gift to you, gentle viewers.

After I finished this one, I realized that Winslow’s “Comparative analysis” in panel four might be read differently depending on how familiar you are with Ben and Winslow’s anatomy. When I do multi-paneled strips like this, I usually don’t draw the characters’ legs–but since the characters are so short, I’m really only leaving off their feet. Technically, Winslow is holding those cantaloupes (yes, those are cantaloupes) by his crotch. But he could just as easily be talking about that harbinger of old age, Melon Sag.

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Andrew Kaye (known in some circles as AK) is the creator of Ben & Winslow and other questionable comics, many of which can be found in his deviantART gallery. He’s also the editor-in-chief of this magazine. Duh?

But Bieber. My first Saturday here I’m sitting in a café, uploading pictures onto my computer, so I can upload them onto my Facebook page, so I can stare at them while I’m looking over my life according to online social networking wasteland.  I sit in the corner, desperate to look busy. A friend here told me that Korean baristas will feel sorry for you if you show up at a café alone. “They think you don’t have any friends. They’re genuinely sorry for you.”

I’m focusing, uploading pictures on my profile page, trying to look like someone who has a lot of friends when Justin Bieber’s song “Baby” comes on for the third time in one hour.  Normally, I wouldn’t care.  Or I would, because I imagined I’d be sipping green tea on a bamboo coffee table, sitting cross-legged on the floor and smoking ridiculously cheap Marlboros while listening to Korean hip-hop.  But no.  Here, it’s Bieber.  Nobody can escape the international, clean cut, high school-aged sensation.  Across the room from me, a Korean man mouths the lyrics and nods his head from side to side as if he’s half-heartedly trying to shake water out of his ear. I’m  not sure, but I think I’ve been tapping my foot since the song started, although I won’t admit it if you ever ask me in person, especially in front of other people.  “Bieber?  Don’t really know him.”

But I’m not so different from Bieber, I realize.  It may be a stretch, but his Wikipedia page says his mother’s name is Patricia. My name is Patrick, no? Just like Justin Beiber’s mom. What else?  Apparently as a youngster, Beebs was a percussionist.  I, too, am a percussionist, first playing piano and then beginning drum lessons after 8th graduation when I received my fist drum set, a CB700 beginner’s kit.  The cymbals looked like cardboard circles covered with tin foil and sounded about as good.  Nevertheless, it was mine and I loved it and beat the hell out of it until my parents got me “practice pads” and moved the drum set into the un-air conditioned garage in Phoenix.

Then I read this: “though a product of a middle-class suburban upbringing in Stratford, Ontario, Bieber’s manner of dress and speech (“Wassup man, how you doin’?” or “It’s like, you know, whateva’ “) suggest he’s mimicking his favorite rappers.”  Well, I too am a product of middle-class suburban upbringing.  In 8th grade, the year of my ascension at catholic grade school into campus wide superiority, I donned a starter brand Los Angeles Raiders jacket, via my obsession with Colors, an early Sean Penn movie about the Blood and Crips rivalry in the streets of LA.  In other words, I get what Bieber is saying.

And then I began another lie to myself – because I’m obviously American, or western, or a tallish Caucasian, I’m the minority, for the first time in my life.  And possibly, even stranger, I’m the only one sitting alone in the café.  But Bieber has come to my rescue.  While Korea is apparently obsessed with his music, I tell myself I have clout because I’m a real life American person.  And like in high school, as long as I was seen in the right scene, associated myself with the right people, I somehow had enough cred or “you know, whateva.”  Cred for what, I don’t know, probably nothing, but I told myself it was there and I had it, invisibly, while waiting for my photos to finish uploading.  Enough cred to get a job writing ESL children’s books for a language school because I speak English.  Enough cred to sell my own vocabulary just like Bieber sells his voice.  Mr. Stevens, a balding 27 year old who taught college algebra at my high school, coached the soccer team, and referred to me only as “Haas”, once said to our class, “Gentleman.  Potential means you haven’t done shit.”  Thanks, “Stevens.”  Maybe true back then, but now I roll with the likes of international pop stars.  Well, we don’t roll together, but we’re buds in a way because I get where he’s coming from and since he’s world famous and I work in an office in South Korea, our obvious western affiliations and masked teenage angst bind us spiritually.

There are over 70,000 hagwons, for-profit private language institutes, in Korea, and some are even popping up in the United States. And they seem to take any native English speaker with a college degree to drill vocabulary to classrooms of over-extended children. But it’s not my deal.  I’m new here. I’m just the writer.  I’m 32 going on 16, recently relocated to “the most colorful city in South Korea.”  I’ve seen carts of puppies stacked next to wire-meshed carts of chickens in the market downtown.  Massive pig hooves floating in bowls of water and piles of squid like soggy, deflated balloons.  Men and women my grandparents’ age squatting over vegetables and fruits, occasionally spitting onto sidewalks packed with sandaled pedestrians and, unbelievably, men on scooters weaving against the flow of pedestrian traffic.  The air smells like stagnant sewage, and then, almost suddenly, the sweet smoke of chestnuts roasting on sidewalk grills. Mountains surround Daegu, covered in pine trees, tipped off with clouds.  Crammed together like the dashes and zeroes of Hangeul words is a sense of mind numbing uniformity mixed with shocking particulars. Every new street is breathtaking, even if it’s the same as the one a block away.  Here, it’s Bieber, hour after hour, street after street, the same difference.

I turn my computer off when the song ends, drop my empty mug off at the café counter and step outside, trying to decide which way to go.  Both directions are equally anonymous.  I’m hungry, like usual.  What would Bieber do, I ask myself.  I swing my shoulder bag around my back, start walking into the cacophony of a side street, listening to the cacophony of a language I can’t yet understand. Then this:  an old man in a shiny, synthetic thread business suit stops me with a broad grin, says, “How are you fine.  A good day.”  And then he opens up his hands as if he meant, “What, do I have to spell it out for you?”

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Patrick Haas still lives in South Korea, writing children’s storybook for an ESL school and using his free time to work on his essays.