I don't like old white men. It's the old story about being born on third base and acting like you hit a triple. Back when they were young, life was easy for white dudes. Few women worked outside the home, so basically half their competition was gone. And it was the fledgling days of capitalism, when companies assumed they should act honorably, and pay a living wage.

Back in this prehistoric age, a mailman could support a family. A trash collector could buy a house. The cashier at the local supermarket -- one of the few jobs a woman could hold -- made $50,000 a year, which bought her a house and spared shoppers from hearing conversations like, "Hey Cristi, is this a beet or a carrot?" and "I swear to God, if you call me once more I will pull off your dick and hit you with it."

Their back-up plans were better than our career choices. "Well," they'd say, "if things don't work out as an architect, I could always be a flight attendant, fucking my way around the world and making $75,000 a year." Or "If by some horrible happenstance I don't make it as a doctor, Uncle Mike can get me a job as a fireman and I'll earn $70,000 a year for saving people, getting three meals a day, and showering with in-shape guys."

So it's a little surprising seeing how these dudes act like heroes today. They act like it was tough being employed before the word "productivity" was coined, when every office building was dark and empty at exactly 5:01 p.m. Now they're all offering endless streams of advice despite the fact they worked at their dad's factory for thirty years and called in drunk for half of them.

Life isn't working out? Just work hard and you'll get to the top, they say, blissfully unaware that an hour's work at minimum wage will buy you half an onion today. Want a promotion? Just ask your boss for more responsibilities, they say. Yeah, that'll work. Your net worth will skyrocket when you're suddenly in charge of french fries. Get there early and stay there late, they advise, clueless that getting any kind of employment these days means swearing that you love working unpaid overtime and giving white guys a foot massage.

Luckily, I don't see many overprivileged white dudes these days. I don't go to church. I don't read Time or Fortune. I ignore ads for brokerage firms that find life lessons on a golf course. So I was surprised to spot a few at the Budapest airport when I was catching the first of two flights home. You know you've messed up when you get somewhere even before the old people show up. They're supposed to be the early birds, allowing enough time for traffic, six trips to the bathroom, and snapping a hip or two.

As I sat there eating a Starbucks sandwich, an old couple in pastels -- let's call them Carter and Connie -- wheeled their luggage over and plopped down across from me. I winced: these were the kind of people you'd overhear telling waiters things like, "In America, restaurants have ketchup." I catalogued the differences between us: I was in 501s, not khakis, and a Fred Perry polo instead of Ralph Lauren. I wear contacts rather than glasses that come with a guarantee from Sears. Okay, I had some gray hair, but it was premature.

Carter whipped out something called Good Old Days magazine and started flipping through it. I Googled it on my tablet and was stunned speechless. It was an endless scroll of white folks ass-kissing dead relatives in heartwarming stories like these:

Dad's Dots and Dashes: "Morse code was his favorite language." I'm not sure how this'll turn heart-warming, since all I can picture is Dad screaming, "Until you kids shut your freakin' yaps, I'll be in the basement."

Grandma's Machines: "It was a good description for all those newfangled whatchamacallits." This little summary made my jaw drop. Really, in fifty years we've gone from admiring people who called blenders "whatchamacallits" to "Your tablet only has 32 gig of memory? Why the fuck do you get out of bed?"

A Day at Candlestick: "It was an unforgettable trip for a boy and his dad." Uh, let me guess: a bunch of white men watched another bunch of white men hit balls and run around bases, but somehow a boy learned something other than, "Life sure is good for us white folk!"

Home Remedies -- Feeling Rosy: "Roses -- they're not just for Valentine's Day anymore!" I'm honestly kind of curious if this startling expose will run toward "You can also buy them in October!" or "Did you know in a pinch you can use them as a breath spray?"

Sundaes Every Thursday: "Her mom's small gesture made a tremendous difference in her young life." Yes, believe it or not, a mom who makes ice cream sundaes for her kids every Thursday will be a better role model than those stupid bitches who work.

Sim's Lessons: "He couldn't read or write, but he taught his grandson a thing or two." Fingers crossed this is a "Work hard" or "Do your best" kind of lesson rather than "Mexicans stop picking strawberries if you don't give them water every four hours or so."

Carter and Connie sat there quietly for a few minutes until another elderly couple -- let's call them Dick and Debbie -- approached. "I checked this weather at home this morning," Debbie said to Carter and Connie. "Ninety degrees. [PAUSE] Of course, it's always ninety degrees at home. Ha!"

They all chortled as I rolled my eyes. It's her last afternoon in Budapest and she's checking the weather in Bag O' Pretzels, Wyoming? Weather that never changes? Besides, what difference did it make? If it was twelve degrees there, would she wear a parka and ski boots on the plane?

Connie started laughing. "Debbie was so funny this morning, Dick," she said. "We were standing on the deck, and she realized she'd lost you. She just started going up to people and saying, 'I'm looking for a man with silver hair.' Maybe the fourth person she approached said, "Sweetheart, EVERY MAN ON THE BOAT HAS SILVER HAIR.'"

You didn't have to be Sherlock Holmes to put it together. A couple of days earlier, a Viking Cruise Ship had moored in the Danube directly in front of my hotel. These folks must have been passengers. Judging from the commercials on PBS I'd always thought a Viking Cruise would be fun, so a close-up look at their passengers was a bucket of cold water in my face. As a seemingly endless stream of pastel-clad elderly wandered up and joined the four, I x-ed out the option with a Sharpie marker in my head.

When we finally boarded the plane, there had to be fifty of them. The men were all in Ralph Lauren and pleated khakis and the women in high-waisted pants, pastel blouses and gigantic jewelry made out of shiny rocks. They hoisted carry-ons into bins, settled into seats, exhaled hard and fell asleep.

After a couple hours I got sick of sitting and watching old sitcoms so I got up and went for a walk. I passed forty rows of sleeping seniors before I ran into the obligatory hunky flight attendant. I don't think I imagined our connection: flight attendants always do a lot of friendly touching but their hands don't usually linger on your chest. "You look like a whiskey drinker," he said, gesturing toward a crate of tiny bottles. "Help yourself."

Actually I hate whiskey, but I hate alienating handsome men even more. "Thanks," I said in a low but still possibly believable voice. There was a small age gap between us, but the more we talked the more the years melted away. We were both attractive and energetic. We were both handsome and fun and free. Conversation had ceded to serious flirting when Dick and Debbie barged in. "Can we get some water?" Debbie asked Mike. "Otherwise we're gonna be tough as beef jerky when we finally get to Houston."

Mike looked at me and smiled. "Houston, huh?" he said. "I get out to Houston occasionally."

It took a second for my mind to catch up, and I nearly laughed. It was crazy, his linking me with these old farts. It was silly. A minor distraction, a tiny error. Wasn't insulting at all.

I grabbed a handful of tiny bottles to take back to my seat and said, "I'm looking for a man with silver hair."

With A New, Diverse Menu, Domino's Pizza Rename Themselves Domino's Brown Food on Beige Paper

An American Guide to Murder

If you're the average American, you're confused by the way we treat our murderers. How come some people who kill other people get the electric chair while others get a plastic anklet and a book deal?

It's actually not as mysterious as it seems. At some point in our history, the court system divided killing into five distinct types. Though in every case the victim is equally dead, the perpetrator is randomly judged on what was going through his mind at the time.

It's definitely not a perfect system, but it's better than the alternatives, and I'm hopeful this strategy will spread to other crimes. Extortion, for example, could be subdivided onto a sliding scale of heinousness that ranges from "I gotta get something to feed the kids today" to "That BMW won't pay for itself." Arson might run the gamut from, "Ohmigod, Billy, you forgot to put the campfire out!" to "Build luxury condos on the mating ground of the Great Western Lizard? Not while I'm alive!"

Here are the various types of murder, in decreasing order of severity.

1. Premeditated Murder

Premeditated murder is the worst kind of killing because the killer put a lot of work into it. He sat around the house, possibly for months at a time, comparing and contrasting the various methods to off somebody. A gun? A knife? Twist ties and a Hi-C bottle? Judges take a particularly dim view of premeditated murder because the killer has a lot of time to see the light. There isn't much of a gray area: your life has clearly taken a wrong turn when you write notes to yourself saying stuff like, "Will Mentos dissolve in Visine? Might not kill but it'd definitely hurt!"

For this reason, premeditated murder is treated the harshest by the judicial system, with those found guilty either sentenced to life in prison or the death penalty. If you're a relative of the victim, you should be happy that the killer has been put away forever, because this dude is just plain nuts.

2. Spontaneous Murder

Spontaneous murder isn't as bad as premeditated murder, because it's the result of an idle whim. Something happened that got a dude mad, and he just happened to have a gun or a knife or a dry cleaning bag. This isn't treated quite as harshly as premeditated murder since rather than an inborn evil streak this is just some dude who's made one bad choice. Is it fair? I think so, but I've got eighteen vases full of twirly sticks in my apartment just because they were near the cash registers at Kmart.

Prison sentences generally run ten years and up. If you're a relative of the victim, there's a bit of consolation in knowing that right before the murder the criminal probably thought, "Do I really wanna kill this dude? Oh, what the heck!"

3. Felony Manslaughter

Manslaughter is when you don't intend to kill anybody but you do anyway. It's kind of the "Uh-oh!" of the crime world.

You didn't think a pudgy liquor store clerk would try to outrun somebody carrying fourteen bottles of Hpnotiq. You were just playing a joke, and were pretty sure trains stopped running on these tracks back in 2003. You thought pouring forty ounces of vodka into somebody's mouth was a good way to say, "Hey, we don't let just anybody join our frat!"

Luckily you won't be judged nearly as severely as murderers. It's almost like the judge is thinking, "Dude, it's a bummer that accident had to harshen your buzz."

There's plenty of consolation to survivors in acknowledging that for a minute or two the killer was suffused with regret, perhaps thinking to himself, "What, I killed somebody? Goddammit. Now I better forget about stealing those shoes."

4. Murder by Reason of Insanity

Murder by reason of insanity is totally different from premeditated murder. With premeditated murder, the killer has decided that if strangling an irritating record store clerk means he'll get the electric chair, well, that's the price you gotta pay. An insane person, on the other hand, isn't capable of this kind of rational decision-making.

Though this judgment is often controversial, the distinguishing characteristics really couldn't be clearer. Insane people hear voices in their head telling them to kill random strangers. Sane people would never dream of taking that kind of drastic action unless somebody criticized their dancing or said to their girlfriend, "Yo babe, what's up?"

There isn't much consolation for relatives of the victims, who are left thinking things like, "Well, maybe he isn't going to rot in jail, but he'll have to endure lots of psychotherapy and take drugs that won't let him crap."

5. Misdemeanor Manslaughter

Misdemeanor manslaughter is when you're not doing anything specifically illegal but somebody still winds up dead. This is the rap you want to get, the "Whoops!" of the killing world.

New Yorkers are familiar with misdemeanor manslaughter because this is the sentence municipal workers get when they crush somebody who gets in their way. Say you're driving one of those new articulated buses -- basically two buses attached by an accordion -- and your back half flattens an old lady who was in a crosswalk while the light was green. Dead bodies usually prompt animated harangues and finger-pointing but bus drivers are members of powerful unions and nobody wants to fuck with them. All of a sudden the powers-that-be agree it's okay to flatten people because WTF, buses are huge! Drivers can keep track what's happening around the front, but in the back it's every man for himself.

Or how about those trucks that are a whole bunch of wheeled buckets chained together? The driver's made a valiant attempt at safety: he's hung a metal sign on the tail saying, "You're in my blind spot! Who knows what the fuck I'm gonna do!" The courts agree that this absolves the driver of all responsibility. He didn't mean to hit you: he just couldn't see you, and it would have cost money to truly be safe. A truly wise judicial system realizes that people dying is the price you have to pay to keep condos at the low, low price of $1.3 million rather than, say, $1.4.

Relatives of the victims often find themselves on the horn of an ethical dilemma. On the one hand, it's sad; but on the other, those condos aren't going to build themselves.

Thanks, New York Times!

Catholic Church Stops Drenching Sleeping Homeless People Because It Wastes Water

Story.

Kraft Changes Mac And Cheese Slogan To, "Mmm, It's Magnetic!"

Story.

Kraft: We're Very Sorry There Are Chunks Of Metal In Your Mac And Cheese. Please Take It Back To The Supermarket And Get Your Sixty-Nine Cents Back.

Story.

My song is "You're Even Beautifuler And Your Friends Are Really Sad."

World Mourns Religious Leader

Cardinal Egan Dead Too

My Life In Magic

Magic featured prominently throughout my childhood. My dad used to disappear behind the couch. My uncle Bill used to pull quarters out of my ears. My sister could detach the top half of her thumb and slide it along her hand.

I used my very first words to demand a magic set for Christmas. I got maybe a third of the tricks to work, but even then they only fooled dogs and my sister. I couldn't believe that most of the tricks, like the Chinese linking rings, required hours if not weeks of practice. That would have really been a feat, considering my attention span didn't last through The Cosby Show.

Still, I kept going, gradually accumulating a box of simple tricks. The more I learned, though, the more daunting the hobby seemed. My friend Marty was just two years older, but somehow those years had imparted the world's wisdom to him, including how to grow chest hair at the age of ten. He told me about the superhuman efforts Harry Houdini put into his tricks. He could hold his breath for fifteen minutes. He could pick locks with his teeth. He could pull every one of his bones out of their sockets. My goal in life was to escape from a straitjacket inside a locked trunk, but Marty's first step was a stunner:

First hide a crochet hook in your ass.

This baffled me, coming completely out of the blue. I mean, I idolized Houdini, and would have given anything to be like him. Admired by men, loved by women, muscular and rich and amazing. But was this really what the job entailed? As far as I knew, this didn't happen to kids who had other hobbies. If you wanted to take up golf, the first step wasn't stuffing tees in your butt. If you wanted to try out for football, you didn't have a jam a goalpost up your ass. To a kid who was still four years away from initiating contact with anything downstairs, this was equivalent to saying, "Why don't you take up stamp collecting instead?"

Mere minutes later, though, David Copperfield hit it big. He was Houdini reincarnated. The whole world was riveted to their couches when he made the Statue of Liberty disappear, and the next morning I raced to Marty for details.

The solution seemed obvious as he related it, in between taking shots from his flask. Everybody was facing the Statue of Liberty, and then they weren't. Clearly that was the only way to do it, since thousand-foot-tall structures don't disappear. I remember standing there in shock: I mean, if that was the solution, it wasn't a real magic trick. Picture Houdini trying it:

HOUDINI: I am now going to make myself disappear!

AUDIENCE: [GASPS]

HOUDINI: Okay, everybody turn left!

AUDIENCE: [TURNS LEFT]

HOUDINI: Can you see me? No? Ta-dah!

Copperfield's next TV special took place on an airport runway. A bunch of people made a big circle around a 747, holding hands. A curtain closed in front of the whole thing, and when it opened, the people were still in a circle but the plane was gone.

I was baffled. Clearly something inexplicable had happened, but once again Marty knew:

"You really are a kid, aren't you?" he said, taking a puff on his Pall Mall. "You know all the people surrounding the plane? He paid them off. The second the curtain closed they backed away so the plane could get dragged off."

My mouth dropped open in disbelief and it didn't close for weeks. That was the solution: "Everybody was paid"? I went through all the stages of loss over the next few months. I was horrified, disenchanted, disgusted. After finally reaching accepetance, though, I realized something:

If magic just required paying off people, then it really was something I could do.

I quickly devised some simple tricks and spent more time posting signs around my neighborhood. "MAGIC SHOW," they read. "AMAZING SKILLS OF PRESTIDIGITATION BY MUSTARDO THE MAGICIAN! Admission $1." Probably the most amazing thing was that nine people actually showed up that day in my backyard, including adults who should have known better. I gave two dollars to my stooge in the audience, and the show was on.

I gazed out at the audience and pretended to randomly pick someone out, though most of these folks lived within a five-minute walk so they recognized my sister.

ME [HOLDING UP A DECK OF CARDS]: Miss, I'd like you to randomly name any card of any suit. Any card of any suit.

MY SISTER SUE: Okay. I pick the eight of hearts.

ME: Would you be so kind as to look in your purse?

SUE opens her Hello Kitty bag and pulls out a playing card.

SUE: Ohmigod! It's the eight of hearts!

THE AUDIENCE murmurs a bit of approval but foreheads furrow too.

ME: Now I will transport an ordinary piece of string across the room. [I PUT IT IN MY POCKET.] Miss, please look in your pocket.

SUE: What? Oh, this is a surprise.

As SUE fishes the string out there's still a paucity of oohs or aahs and more grumbles and harumphs. "Can you do a trick with somebody other than your sister?" somebody yells. It suddenly occurs to me that David Copperfield probably doesn't perform around people who live on his block.

ME: Is anybody thirsty? Now I will take a drink from the magic cup and transport the magic liquid to a random audience member.

SUE acts shocked and clutches at her throat, then she hocks a huge loogey on the ground.

SUE: YOU ARE FUCKIN' KIDDING ME!

AUDIENCE MEMBER: WHO DO WE TALK TO ABOUT GETTING A REFUND?

ME: Next let's try a stab at mentalism. [I PRETEND TO CONCENTRATE.] Is somebody thinking about a ... cat? Wearing a pink sweater?

SUE: HOLY JESUS! HOLY FUCKIN' GOD!!!

At this point a couple younger members of the audience leapt up and started chasing me. While I didn't exactly need a crochet hook up my ass, a little more practice probably would have helped. But the Amazing Mustardo wasn't particularly scared. He was a pretty quick runner back then, and the cape certainly didn't hurt.

And Now A Word From Our Sponsor

Sure to be this year's hottest action thriller is Run All Night, starring Liam Neeson and Ed Harris. Directed by Jaume Collet-Serra and penned by veteran screenwriter Brad Ingelsby, you're sure to be on the edge of your seat with hair-raising scenes like this:

LIAM NEESON [VOICEOVER]: A night finally came for me to pay for the things I'd done.

ED HARRIS: You killed my son.

LIAM NEESON: I pulled the trigger to protect my son.

ED HARRIS: I'm coming after your boy with everything I got.

LIAM NEESON: As long as you're coming after my boy, I'm coming after you.

ED HARRIS: My son was very important to me.

LIAM NEESON: Not as important as my son.

ED HARRIS: Everybody loved my son. He led U of Miss football to victory in three straight seasons.

LIAM NEESON: My son sold his internet startup for half a million and nearly banged a supermodel.

ED HARRIS: My son was a real handful. He racked up fifteen hundred dollars in speeding tickets after I bought him that Mustang.

LIAM NEESON: My son wouldn't spit on a Mustang after Farrah Fawcett drove one in Charlie's Angels.

WAITRESS: You guys ready to order?

LIAM NEESON: Yeah. I'll have the usual.

ED HARRIS: Me too.

WAITRESS: Okay. I'll be right back with those.

ED HARRIS: What were we talking about?

LIAM NEESON [CHUCKLING]: I forgot too. [PAUSE] Wait. I think we were talking about our sons.

ED HARRIS: That's right. You never should have gotten near my son.

LIAM NEESON: I'd resurrect your son and chop him into little pieces if he so much as touched a hair on my son.

ED HARRIS: My daughter -- eh.

LIAM NEESON: I know. Chicks are like that.

ED HARRIS: If you came after my daughter, I'd be angry. I might be furious. But I probably wouldn't come after you.

LIAM NEESON: I wouldn't come after your daughter. I'd send my wife after your daughter.

ED HARRIS: If your wife came after my daughter, I'd send my wife after your wife. But nobody's gonna make a movie out of that.

LIAM NEESON: I know, right?

WAITRESS: Here's your breakfast. Enjoy!

ED HARRIS AND LIAM NEESON: Thanks!

Vatican Considering Flipped Quarter for Sainthood Because it Answers Prayers About Half the Time

Hollywood Figures Out What To Do With A Really Talented Singer Who's 45

Picture this: you visit an online personals site. The posts are hit or miss, but you're optimistic. One seems like it might be interesting, but the picture is fuzzy. You click on it, and you find Mistress Hildy's profile:

Hi guys! Do you like amputees? Do you want mommy to put you over her knee and spank you? Did you soil your diapers like a naughty boy?

You close the page as soon as possible and literally five seconds later you get an email saying, "Hi! THIS IS MISTRESS HILDY! DID SOMEBODY POOP THEIR JEANS? DID SOMEBODY POOP THEIR JEANS?"

Oddly, this is how an increasing number of websites work these days. (1) They give you very little information; (2) you click to find out more; (3) as the photos fill in and details appear you're smacked with the horrifying realization that you were duped into looking at crap that isn't remotely close to what you want; and then (4) you get emails for the rest of your life with subject lines like, "HEY, ROMAN! MISTRESS HILDY IS STILL WAITING TO GIVE YOU THE ENEMA YOU DESERVE!"

My bath towels were looking a little threadbare so I used Google to see what my options were. Their top recommendation was Kmart, so I went there to investigate. They had a myriad of choices: polyester with embroidered butterflies, rayon with embroidered mushrooms, and dacron with gingham Holly Hobby silhouettes. I closed the window as quickly as possible but a few hours later I got an email from Kmart saying, "We saw you browsing our online aisles and thought you might be interested in these!"

And below are photographs of cardboard shoes, books about Jesus, and selections from Nicki Minaj's new clothing line for dogs.

It doesn't quite link up in my head. I mean, I didn't buy what I needed at Kmart, so they should probably have realized that I wasn't going to buy random shit. In fact, I was pretty much sitting there thinking, "Christ, what kind of desperate, douche-ass operation tries to flog all this bargain-basement crap?" It confirmed that if indeed there was a Kmart customer, it sure as hell wasn't me.

I got tickets for a talk on Eventbrite so naturally that signed me up for a news blast announcing every future event on the Eastern seaboard. The events weren't artistic. The locations weren't convenient. In fact, even EventBrite realized their suggestions had little in common with the event I chose. "YOU LIKE TO GO OUTSIDE," read the email's subject line. "HERE ARE OTHER EVENTS HAPPENING OUTSIDE YOUR HOUSE!"

I don't know what the fuck is up with LivingSocial. I'd heard they were a Groupon-style shopping portal that sent daily notifications about online deals, so I signed up. When their suggested deals weren't exactly my cup of tea, I followed their advice and customized my deal preferences. I spent literally hours filling out their six-hundred item "Personal Interests" checklist telling them things I barely admit to myself. Dogs don't like me, my gums are receding, I have a rather extensive collection of animated GIFs of Jon Hamm from the waist down.

And then every eight minutes for the next year I got email from them headlined, "CHOSEN ESPECIALLY FOR YOU!" that offered discounts at colon therapy and electrolysis salons. I'm not sure if the fault is accidental or intentional: though they ask yea or nay on Portuguese-Alaskan vegan-fusion restaurants, they neglect to inquire if you're unable to poop or are entirely covered in hair. I'm an atheist without a car, yet for some reason they think I'm itching to make a three-hour bus ride to New Brunswick, New Jersey, to see a play called, "Oy! Plotzing with a Yiddish Mama." Click on anything for additional info and they'll never let you forget it: a few hours later you'll see the email, "JUST BECAUSE YOU DIDN'T BUY IT DOESN'T MEAN YOU DON'T NEED A BRAZILIAN WAX!"

Even Change.Org -- the allegedly-altruistic petition site -- is full of shit. You sign one petition to protest bullying at a New Jersey preschool and literally seconds later the deluge begins. Now you get daily emails with headlines like, "Hey, Mr. Bleeding Heart, don't you give a fuck about the Boko Haram?"

I'm not sure what can be done about this irritating new trend. Businesses might pretend that those follow-up emails are a customer service, but when you get a hundred a day it seems more like punishment for visiting their website in the first place.

If you really want to sell me something, then, make a mouse that'll take back my last few clicks. "Excuse me," it'll broadcast to Change.Org, "I apologize for giving a shit." "Oops," it'll say to Kmart, "I'm not looking for fabrics made by DuPont." "Sorry," it'll tell Mistress Hildy, "I thought that was a mustache on your upper lip."

I'll read a book about "having it all" when it's written by an ugly dude.

I like this radio station. Ohmigod, was that a raccoon? I sure hope he didn't have a family. No, wait -- he's got a pouch, so they'd have been in his pouch. So I hope he did have family? No -- I hope he had family but they were on vacation. Though I'm not exactly sure where furry brown pouch-dwellers would be welcome. Maybe ... Greece? No, wait -- it wouldn't be good if they were on vacation. Think of it: you're sitting on a beach and you get a telegram saying your father is dead. Good luck finishing that Peach Mojito. Or would that have been their mother? Shoot, now I'm crying. And it wasn't even a raccoon, either. It was a homeless guy.

I really shouldn't be driving. What was it I took? I didn't think cocaine made people hallucinate. I really feel like some of these buildings could be Transformers and they could turn into robots at any time. Would that be a bad thing? It would if they had laser beams for eyes, but not if they were the "Danger, Will Robinson!" type. Why are robots always either good or evil? Those Transformers movies would be like six minutes long if all the other robots were normal. Like if they said, "Optimus, you know, I've got a lot on my plate today. Can't you enslave mankind by yourself?"

If there were people in a building and it transformed into a giant car, would they all end up in the seats or would they be crushed to death in the folded parts, just like that raccoon? There could be hundreds of people in a building, but only six or seven could fit in this Infiniti, so -- JESUS CHRIST! I guess I should at least look out for cheaper cars because who'd give a damn if they banged up a piece of shit?

These seats are so soft. I can't take my eyes off them. I know I should look at the road, but cement isn't exactly imported from Spain. Look, there's a small imperfection, almost like a zit. OHMIGOD WERE THESE LEATHER SEATS MADE OUT OF MY SKIN? No wait -- it's still there. I'm not sure about my back or my ass, though. Are my back and my ass still there? I think they must be, though I haven't seen them recently. OH HOLY FUCK!!! IT IS OPTIMUS PRIME! You bastard, you'll steal our civilization from my cold, dead hands! TAKE THAT! AND THAT! AMERICA'S NOT GOING DOWN WITHOUT A FIGHT!!!

Oops. Wow. Since when did we get mass transit in L.A.?

---

The Infiniti Q50. The car that pays attention so you don't have to.

---

[Fifty Shades of Grey] is a movie about submitting to erotic chastisement by a handsome man who plays Chopin on his grand piano and sips chardonnay from long-stemmed glassware. He is extremely rich. Because there’s nothing sexy about spanking if he’s skint.

Lecturer On Cosmology, Particle Physics And Quantum Mechanics Accidentally Links To Zazzle Ladybug Speakers

Or cool personalized speakers with a ladybug pattern!

Madonna Performs "Living For Love" At The 2015 Grammys

While the rest of the world remains blissfully clueless, music insiders are buzzing about what happened to Madonna during her performance at the Grammys last night. Her rehearsal earlier in the evening went perfectly and there was no reason to suspect anything would go wrong other than the fact that she is turning into Mae West as we speak. Analyzing frames from the broadcast performance, however, we can see where her act took such a dreadful turn.

The show starts off well. She sings a bit, then flings aside her cape to reveal her colorful matador costume underneath. This is the first time in forty years she's taken her clothes off by herself, though, and she finds the process has winded her.

She drops to the ground, injuring a knee. She discovers she can't get up.

Her backup dancers start to buzz about what's happening, because this is where she's supposed to mime being trapped in Tupperware to illustrate the crushing need for recycling. Instead she remains on the ground and reaches out for help.

At this point, no one in the audience suspects anything has happened. The pain isn't registering on Madonna's face, but there's probably a reason that might also explain why her eyes are now five feet apart. A dancer, however, realizes that until they answer the phone at MedAlert someone's going to have to help her through the act.

Other dancers catch on and lift her onto the smoking stage, where she is supposed to perch on a glittery rock and rap about how young women need to v-steam in the third world. Instead she seems to be struggling to remember where she is. Lights, glitter, men in lace masks and horns: oh, good -- she's in her bedroom.

More dancers join in and try to form a human walker around Madonna, but that just confuses her and makes her think she's headed to Sav-On. She starts groping around for a scarf and her Coupon Saver.

Smartly, Madonna has cast her dancers from the ranks of the West Hollywood Fire Department, and their training immediately shows. One of them hoists her into the air in a textbook Liza Minnelli Lift. He carries her to the side of the stage. This can't be easy for her, as she perhaps senses that this scene is just an Andrew McCarthy away from being Weekend at Bernie's.

Perhaps he feels his resolve weakening, as he's usually armed with a hose and a gas mask. He hands her off to a colleague. Madonna is really being a trooper here, though her dance rebuke against Boko Haram goes untapped. Anybody else would have left the stage, but instead you can almost hear her exhorting her helpers to never forget the jazz hands.

Finally the Medevac helicopter arrives and hoists her to safety, and the Grammy audience still doesn't suspect a thing. Madonna is said to be resting comfortably this morning. She is surrounded by concerned dancers, basking in their good wishes while reminding them that they really should come up and see her sometime.

The Second Greatest Discovery In The History Of Man

I've posted some landmark stuff here before but this is truly the landmarkiest. It's unbelievable, incredible, amazing. My hands are literally shaking as I type. I'm not overselling this, either: when you're done reading I think you'll agree I made one of the most stupendous discoveries in history.

It's been a million years since someone made a discovery as groundbreaking, when a caveman's odd, arbitrary actions changed history. Maybe he rubbed his nose with a rock and nothing happened. He scratched the ground with a stick and nothing happened. But then he smashed two rocks together, producing sparks that just happened to shoot into a bed of sticks. And suddenly there was fire.

He must have thought he was hallucinating. I mean, one minor, arbitrary action discovers a life-changing chemical process. A hither-to unknown substance -- with seemingly no weight or substance -- runs and leaps and sprints across the earth, leaving everything in its path black and burnt. It's like the opposite of air, all orange flames and destruction. It must have seemed like some horrific demon that consumed everything in its path, and when it finally ran out of food it died. Why is it orange? Why does it give off heat? It's all so bizarre and capricious it must have seemed like a dream.

My discovery was also arbitrary. My Maltese, Chutney, waddled up to me and started barking while I was making dinner. She was so cute I just had to pick her up. While I was giving her a hug, though, she bumped into a butternut squash, and then all hell broke loose. Seriously. It was unbelievable: yet another nondescript action somehow initiated an unstoppable, indescribable force.

The closest comparison I can come up with is fire, but instead of orange flames it burbled up in iridescent fuchsia bubbles. It spread really quickly, because like regular bubbles these arbitrarily took flight and landed on nearby surfaces, setting off further chain reactions. Instead of leaving things burnt and filling my apartment with smoke, though, it left a shiny trail, and its smell was reminiscent of popcorn.

I put Chutney down and grabbed a towel and chased it through the room, finally managing to smother every bit. I don't want to scare you too much: it wasn't hot and it didn't burn stuff so I wasn't in any danger. In fact, putting it out was something like shampooing a two-year-old: if it hadn't left me damp and out of breath I'd have said it was kind of fun.

When I regained my bearing I ran to Google. I typed in everything I'd observed -- fuchsia bubbles, popcorn, Maltese, butternut squash -- but for the first time ever it came up blank. And then it hit me.

I'd discovered an incredible new phenomena.

Like I say, I was trembling at this point. I immediately knew it wasn't quite as great as the discovery of fire: I mean, fire has all sorts of applied uses, from heating food to powering cars. I'm not sure what good fuchsia bubbles are, or who wants to smell like popcorn. But singlehandedly I'd opened up a whole new field to investigate, and unwittingly found myself on the forefront.

I grabbed my notebook and wrote down two definitions:

GRONK: [noun, guh-RONK] the fuchsia bubbles that appear when a dog touches squash

SPELCHING: [verb, SPELL-chung] the arbitrary encroachment of gronk throughout an area, turning everything shiny and smelling of popcorn

Now that I'd named my new world, I'd have to define it. What prompts it? What fuels it? What purposes could it serve? And naturally, as someone with nearly a degree from a major university, I'd need to re-enact the experiment in controlled conditions.

UPDATE 1: When neighborhood dogs touch a butternut squash, nothing happens. No gronk and definitely no spelching. Bad news, not to mention the rather insulting posters blaring BEWARE OF THIS MAN!!! that were recently taped up on my street.

UPDATE 2: When Chutney comes into contact with a pumpkin, nothing happens. Similarly acorn and spaghetti squash. I'm a bit embarrassed that what I tell friends will be the Entertainment Event of the Century actually turns into three rather boring side dishes touched by a dog.

UPDATE 3: I decide to start from scratch. I make Chutney touch a butternut squash again. To my horror there are no fuchsia bubbles, and it doesn't smell like popcorn.

UPDATE 4: I take another hit of LSD. Twelve hours later I realize this must have been the catalyst, since my notebook is mostly unintelligible except for the words RUNAWAY SCRELB and PLATCHING.

Anyway, I guess that's it. It appears the whole thing was an illusion. I hope you don't see this as a massive waste of time, because I certainly don't. I believe we made headway in describing how we encounter our world, though I should probably give a shout-out to my neighbor for pointing out that my beloved Maltese Chutney is actually a striped sweatsock.

Football Player Who Said We Should Investigate Domestic Abuse In Society, Not In Football, Arrested For Beating Up Society

Story.

BROOKLYN: Massive Fire On Yet Another Great Site For Luxury Condos

Story.

Fox News Anchor Doesn't Realize Key Card Controls The Electricity In His Hotel Room, Assumes Storm Knocked Out Power. Spends Night Sitting Alone In The Dark.

Story.

Scientists Invent A Way To "Un-Boil" A Hard-Boiled Egg

"Okay! Christ, I'll make you a cheese sandwich," said their moms.

Lindsay Lohan's Vagina Magically Draws Glassware To It

Somebody forwarded this picture to me the other day with the subject "Ohmifuckin' GOD, this is INCREDIBLE." After looking at it long and hard, I agreed. It seemed unbelievable, inhuman, a bizarre trick of nature. Could there be a rational explanation? Because taking this photo on face value, the conclusion seemed inescapable:

Lindsay Lohan's vagina magically draws glassware to it.

On the face of it it seems unlikely, but it's not without precedent. Lindsay has supposedly slept with Adam Levine, James Franco, and Justin Timberlake, so there's something going on downstairs that the laws of nature can't explain. I wrote up a list of possible explanations and judged the likeliness of each.

First I spoke to a friend who nearly has a degree. "These perfume bottles seem to be moving toward Lindsay's vagina," I said. "Is that totally impossible?"

His answer surprised me. "Definitely not," he said. "Einstein documented distortions in time and space caused by an observer standing at a fixed position and something moving really quickly."

I mused over this for a while before I discounted it. I mean, perfume bottles can't move really quickly. And judging from what my straight friends tell me, vaginas can barely be budged from the bed.

A second possibility is the "birds of a feather" argument. We all know how perfume bottles cluster together on dressing tables, as if they have an affinity for each other. Is it possible they're downwind of Lindsay's vagina, and they suspect that it's one of them? At the risk of personifying them, maybe it's like they're sniffing the air and thinking, "Hmm, I smell a brisk autumn breeze and sweet romance. Guys, I think we're supposed to be over there." This might explain why the closest bottles is the most eager to move while the third is like, "I haven't smelled nothing but toilet since 1985."

However, we reach the sole rational conclusion by offering a proven parallel. In the Caribbean, there are pearl divers who can hold their breath for upwards of ten minutes. They start slowly, and with practice they develop a skill that seems other-worldly. Rather than diving for pearls, though, Lindsay is taking selfies, brutally sucking in her stomach dozens of times a day. Over the years it's not a stretch to imagine she can now create a perfect vacuum inside her body: one that not only pulls in human flesh but also anything lurking nearby.

One hallmark of a good theory is that it's easily testable, and I hope to test this in the immediate future. I've already written up a simple script that calls only for Ms. Lohan and the line, "Ohmigod, I just can't hold onto this paperclip."

Still, we haven't answered all of the questions this selfie poses. Maybe tomorrow we'll think of reasons why Lindsay's bathroom mirror doesn't actually reflect people but instead only offers the image of three elongated clams.

Mansions These Days Have Ballrooms, Theaters, Recording Studios, Bowling Alleys, Cigar Rooms and Staff Quarters But Hairdressing Salons Make Them "Hard As Heck To Sell"

Story.

The Golden Globes Night of Mostly Underperforming Stars

Once again Tina Fey and Amy Poehler were smart, snappy hosts. The Guardian says their "sister act subverted the conversations that take place about celebrity women." Yes, the night was truly a feminist triumph, except for the part where a dude had to help them upstairs so they wouldn't trip on their gowns.

I don't think anybody could have predicted most of the winners, unless you knew which movies weren't particularly successful and had money left in their advertising budget. Patricia Arquette was a surprise winner for Boyhood. (The feminist triumph of Girlhood should hit theaters in 2027.) No sour grapes here: I mean, I'd give her a whole truckful of Golden Globes if she could play a mom who wasn't annoying.

Greer Grammer was a bright light in an occasionally dazzling evening. Clearly her assignment wasn't about connections or beauty: it was all about the work. And I know in the future she'll really be able to use that experience showing people how to find the exit of a theater.

Whenever I see Leonardo Dicaprio I think of Oscar Wilde. Not because of his wit or subversion but because in his attic I'll bet there's a painting of an attractive guy.

On the plus side, the night was lightweight, silly fun. Me, I loved hearing the screams of surprise when the winners were announced. I guess nobody knew if their checks had cleared or not.

Every morning I wake up with a headache, and I'm not sure if it's caused by gin or a cheap space heater I bought. A friend said to test it I should either turn off the heater or not drink for a night, so I guess I won't know until July.

HOW IT'S SUPPOSED TO GO

BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH AS ALAN TURING: One day computers will be so smart they will be virtually indistinguishable from people.

POLICEMAN: Really?

BCAAT: I've devised a test that I know one day will be met. You will type in messages on your keyboard, and you will see responses on your screen. You type in whatever questions you want: What's the weather like? Who is the president of China? Why am I so insecure? You won't be told who's on the other end. It could be a person replying to you or a computer. One day computers will have such limitless intelligence that you will have absolutely no idea it's a machine you're talking to. And that, my friend, is what I call "The Imitation Game."

HOW IT WENT IN THE MOVIE

BCAAT: Go ahead: ask me any question, and then tell me what I am.

Is broth the next juice? We visited Brodo in East Village to find out.

Chef Marco Canora opened Brodo out of a window of his popular East Village restaurant Hearth to serve bone broths in paper cups to street side patrons. This may sound like an unusual concept at first, but it looks like Marco may have tapped into NYC’s next big health trend.

You know what's not the new health trend? A professional chef tasting his broth and then using that spoon to stir it.

Movie Review: Into the Woods

Into the Woods is a Disney film of a Stephen Sondheim musical. It intertwines four fairy tales, which probably isn't a great idea. I mean, when you watch Disney's classic "Cinderella," do you sit there hoping Jack and his Beanstalk will show up? Did "Rapunzel" leave you thinking, "Well, that was fun, but it would really have been great if Red Riding Hood had turned up"? Consider your wish granted.

Rather than try to psychoanalyze the characters, the film pretty much just throws them together. We don't get motivations or hidden feelings or any sort of depth: it's pretty much shallow conversations between simple people who haven't previously met. Exchanges run something like this:

RAPUNZEL: Hello little boy! What are you doing in the woods with a cow?

BEANSTALK JACK: I'm taking it to the market to sell. Gosh, you sure have pretty hair.

RAPUNZEL: Thanks. See you!

BEANSTALK JACK: Adios!

Roughly 90% of these conversations are about the woods. They're so dangerous, stay on the path, or stay out! Despite the talk, we don't really get the reason, because the woods seem to be full of simple people wandering about idly, resembling more of a dirty Bed Bath & Beyond than an actual forest. If this movie had taken place at the Glendale Galleria, it would have been eight minutes long.

For the first half hour, Meryl Streep and fourteen semi-celebs sing the words "Into the woods!" repeatedly. They don't just etch into your consciousness like the theme from "It's a Small World," they actually replace every message sent in your brain, bloodstream and nervous system. At four a.m. this morning I didn't get woken up by my urge to go to the bathroom: no, it was my penis' turn to solo.

The intro eventually ends, and a hundred intermingled stories start. The mood changes with each: Red Riding Hood is sassy, Cinderella is sincere, Beanstalk Jack is a Joey Lawrence-style idiot complete with bowl haircut. An initial encounter with the latter isn't exactly spine-tingling: he climbs up the beanstalk, climbs back down, and then spends twelve minutes singing about it. I'm not sure why: I mean, whenever I've recounted the story to children they've never asked me to repeat the entire thing but this time with a tune.

This is probably why I don't like musicals: they do stuff that people do in regular films, but then they stop and sing about it afterward. Is that really necessary? I'm pretty sure James Bond films wouldn't be quite as popular if he stopped to recap everything in song.

I drove my Jaguar very fast
with Blofeld hot on my tracks.
I would have had sex with that Golden Girl
but I thought I'd get paint on my slacks.

Cinderella's subplot makes even less sense. The prince's ball now lasts three nights in a row -- so for three nights in a row, she captivates the prince, she runs away, and he chases after her. She loses her shoe on the third night and he takes it throughout the countryside to find out who it fits.

I'm not sure I'm conveying just how stupid this is, so let's make up some details and dialog that the movie leaves out.

[NIGHT ONE] PRINCE: You are so lovely, mysterious maiden. Please, tell me who you are!

CINDERELLA: I cannot! But I've had a wonderful evening, and I must go!

She runs off. The prince chases but a handsome, fit male is no match for a chick in stilettos.

[NIGHT TWO] PRINCE: Thank goodness! I've found you again. This time I will never let you go. Please, dance with me again.

CINDERELLA: Okay. [THEY DANCE] This is like a wonderful dream! [SHE SPRINTS OFF] See ya, buddy!

PRINCE [SHRUGGING]: Goddammit. Not again!

She runs off again. The prince chases, this time even more desperately, but again he can't catch her. He's bereft. True love escaped him once more!

[NIGHT THREE] PRINCE: This is fuckin' amazing. I thought I'd lost you forever, but here you are again! My beloved. Life has regained its meaning and birds will sing again.

CINDERELLA: Yup. Good to see you too. [THEY DANCE, THEN SHE BREAKS OFF AND RUNS] Gots to scoot again, beeyotch!

PRINCE [SMACKING HIS FOREHEAD]: Will I never learn?

The movie picks up during her third exit. The prince isn't quite as stupid as I've made him out, because he's covered half of the castle stairs with tar to slow Cinderella down. Sure, it would have been smarter to hire a guard, but these are troubling times in the kingdom, m'lord. Cinderella doesn't see the tar and her shoes get stuck. Oh, damn! Now he'll catch her for sure! She steps out of her shoes and then pulls them out. O...kay. She decides to leave one for the prince as a clue to her identity, and then she sprints off, running carefree through the tar.

Yes, the film definitely explores an alternative side of this fairy tale, because when you read the regular one you don't want to shout, "DOES SHE STICK TO THE FUCKIN' STAIRS OR WHAT?"

This time around we learn that a woman wearing one tar-coated stiletto is faster than our hunky prince. We almost wish the ball would go on for a fourth night, so the prince could lay nails across the exit and she'd step on them and her feet would get all bloody and we could all yell, "SEE IF YOU'RE FASTER THAN THE PRINCE NOW, ASSHOLE!"

Rapunzel is a shock on more of a visceral level. After fourteen people have sung about the glory of her hair, we see it looks like a bungee cord wrapped in a cheap weave. It's literally a matted yellow rope. If I fell into a tar pit and they threw me a lifeline of that shit, I'd be a really pissed-off fossil right now.

The baker is stupid and earnest, his wife is snarky. "This makes no sense!" she notices. "That's crazy!" she notes. She snidely remarks that somebody's wandered in from a different fairy tale. Suddenly we identify the movie's forefathers: we've got the style, though none of the charm, of Grumpy Cat's Worst Christmas Ever.

Towards the end you'll be delighted to notice that the observational songs -- classics like, "I Climbed A Beanstalk," "I Saw A Cow In The Woods," and "Man, That's A Really Big Wolf" -- give way to musical platitudes, and your heart races with hope that the end is near. Now all the songs are about hopes and dreams and you half expect a kitten dangling from a branch to sing a ditty called, "Hang In There!" I didn't get the closing song's words exactly but I'm pretty sure it went like this:

Dream a dream or wish a wish,
it is up to you.
But watch out for the dreams you wish;
Sometimes they come true.
If you dream upon a wish,
you get lost in thought.
Dreams and wishes get entwined
and that's one fuckin' knot.

STAGES OF MOVIE BADNESS:

1. You sit there and think, "Hmm. That scene wasn't great."

2. You sit there and think, "This scene was awful."

3. You sit there and think, "This entire movie is a massive piece of shit."

4. You sit there and think, "If I tell everybody Meryl Streep shoots Kim Jong Un in this, will they make it go away?"

5. Six days after you see the film you stop at a local store and buy cilantro. The clerk rings it up as parsley. You clutch your face, drop to your knees and scream, "OHMIGOD!!! IS THERE EVEN A FRAGMENT OF A BRAIN CELL LEFT IN THE WORLD???"

Into the Woods is the Bill Cosby of movies. Judging by the name you assume it'll be great, but even before you get comfortable you're overcome by some odd paralysis and all you can do it stare helplessly while a voice inside your head screams, "MOTHERFUCKER! MOTHERFUCKER!" You're left thinking of the trail this movie has blazed by shoving unrelated junk together. Instead of mashing together four fairy tales, how about one-liners? I mean, if they're funny individually, wouldn't they be hysterical en masse?

PRINCESS: I just flew in from New York.

GIANT: Really? I broke my leg in two places.

PRINCESS: My arms are so tired; is that your wife?

GIANT: Yes: feel free to take her! And maybe stay out of those places.

THE IMAGINED INVENTION OF "THE MENSCH ON THE BENCH" IN THE YEAR 2013

Davy and Debby Hoffman were furious. It was Thanksgiving and at the homes of all of their friends tiny elves were magically appearing on random shelves. Checking their own shelves, though, all they found were books and shit. They ran straight to their father Neal. "Why don't we have any elves sitting on shelves at our house?" they asked.

"'The Elf on the Shelf' is a Christian tradition," said Neal, "and we're Jewish. We don't believe in elves because we don't believe in Christmas because we don't believe in Jesus Christ."

"Oh," replied Davy and Debby. "That absolutely sucks."

Every day Davy and Debby whined a little more. They'd visit another friend's home and see a cute little elf on a book-free shelf, and then they'd go home and scream. "BUY US A GODDAMNED ELF ON THE SHELF!" they screamed in unison. "BUY US A GODDAMNED ELF!"

The last straw came when somebody told Davy and Debby that these little stuffed elves flew to the North Pole at night and talked to Santa about them. "We don't wanna be Jewish," they yelled at their father. "We don't want fuckin' books on our shelves. We want one of Santa's assistants to sit there and watch us!"

Their father shook his head. How could these children see that aside from being outside of their heritage this elf was basically a felt nannycam? Then one day a lightbulb blinked on above his head. "Why," he thought, "I'll make a Jewish version of that infernal toy! Who wouldn't love a little Jewish man hanging around their house keeping tabs on them?" Neal, a former toy company executive, stitched up a crude figure and kept his fingers crossed. Others might have called it a creepy copy of an semi-interesting toy but he dubbed it "The Mensch on the Bench."

"The Mensch on the Bench is even more fun than the Elf on the Shelf," Neal told Davy and Debby, "because he's a nice Jewish man who watches you. If you do good, he's happy. And if you do evil, he's unhappy."

"Every night the Elf on the Shelf flies to the North Pole," said Davy, "to tell Santa if we've been naughty or nice. Where does the Mensch on the Bench go?"

Hoffman wracked his brain. "The senior center," he finally said. "He tells everybody's grandparents about you."

"Oh, okay," said the kids. And a Chanukah tradition was born.

THE END

THE IMAGINED INVENTION OF CHRISTMAS IN THE YEAR 412

Marcus and Augusta Agrippa were furious. It was December 17, the first day of Saturnalia, and all of their friends were hanging ornaments on trees, stuffing themselves with food, getting drunk and screwing and exchanging presents afterward. They went home and complained to their father Flavius. "Why can't we overeat and get presents?" they asked.

"Only the pagans do that," said Flavius, "and we're Christians. We don't celebrate Saturnalia because we don't believe Saturn is the god of the harvest because we believe in one true God."

"Oh," replied the Marcus and Augusta. "That absolutely sucks."

Every day Marcus and Augusta whined a little more. They'd look outside and see drunk people urinating in the streets before going home and giving each other The Clapper. At their house, meanwhile, it was all wrestling lessons and chiseling Latin words into stone.

Finally they threw a hissy fit at the Caesar's Palace Mall when they saw pagan children drinking Jack and Coke out of little sippy cups. "We don't wanna be Christian," Marcus and Augusta yelled at their father. "We don't have any fun. We don't have human sacrifices. We don't get to smash shit up. AND WHAT ABOUT OVEREATING AND GETTING PRESENTS?"

After one last, futile attempt to explain to his kids that only an idiot would celebrate the growth of corn, Flavius got a brilliant idea. "Why," he thought, "I'll make a Christian version of that infernal holiday! Who wouldn't love a religious celebration where you stuff yourself and then get cool shit?" Flavius decorated a tree, wrapped gifts and made green bean casserole, then fashioned a diorama of baby Jesus in a manger and kept his fingers crossed. He knew it was lame but he had high hopes. Others might have called it a creepy copy of a semi-interesting celebration but he dubbed it "Christmas."

"Christmas is even more fun than Saturnalia," he told his kids as they tore at their presents, "because instead of celebrating some stupid harvest, you're commemorating a really nice guy. See, Jesus died because he loved you, then he came back to life and now he and his father watch you all the time. If you do good, he's happy. And if you do evil, he's unhappy."

"Oh, okay," said the kids in unison, and that was the year Christmas was born.

THE END

Once upon a time, a poor bookkeeper named P. X. Warbie had a dream. He loved children, and wanted nothing more than to entertain them. "Why, I'll write a book," he thought to himself. He toiled long and hard on this book, and three years later he had a finished manuscript about a boy named Sammy Spatula who never grows up, wears lots of green, and flies a lot between his home Sometimesland and earth.

P. X. was very proud of his work; now he just had to get it out into the world. He approached his neighbor, Mr. A. McNutley, who happened to be the Editor-in-Chief of the Grimsby Times. "I've got a great idea!" said Mr. McNutley after reading the manuscript. "Why don't we print your book in my newspaper? Say, five hundred words a day? I think it would be a big hit with my readers."

As Mr. McNutley prophesized, the column was a smash. People raced to the news stand every morning to find out what happened to the boy who never grew up. They'd never read anything like it! It was wholesome fun and suitable for the entire family.

By the fifth day, the newspaper's circulation had tripled, but dark clouds had appeared on the horizon. In the latest extract, the three children of Fred and Ethel Sweetie have been put to bed in a middle-class apartment in the Bayswater suburb of London. Just as they start to fall asleep, though, they notice a mysterious light on their balcony. They run to investigate and discover the slightly-undersized, androgynous lad who is Sammy Spatula.

"Hey, kids!" Sammy chirps. "How about flying off with me to Sometimesland?"

"That's silly," says the eldest, a flame-haired cutie named Barbara Ann. "We can't fly! Now go off and bother someone else."

"Sure you can!" protests Sammy. "Anybody can! You just need to try. Ready? Just close your eyes and leap!" The three children are hesitant but finally take the stranger's word for it. They fling themselves off the windowsill and find themselves being lofted up into the stars by gusts of wind, zipping and spinning miles above the city behind their brand new friend.

The night this column appeared in the paper, though, two hundred children threw themselves out of their bedroom windows and fell to their deaths.

"Maybe make it a little harder," said Mr. McNutley. "Like, they can only fly on a certain day of the year. Or they can only fly if their middle name is Humperdinck."

"I don't know," said P. X. "I'll have to think about this." He thought long and hard, and the next time Sammy Spatula flew, observant readers noticed one very small change.

"Do you all want to go with me to Sometimesland?" Sammy asked the Sweetie kids.

"YES!" they shouted in unison.

"Well, then, think happy thoughts and let's go!"

"That's not actually better," said Mr. McNutley after discovering that this latest episode had prompted six hundred kids to plummet to their deaths. #287 was little Billy Damron, whose last words were, "It's my own fault. I should have thought about puppies instead of my little brother."

"Shucks," said P. X. the next morning. "I was sure that would work."

"Were you?" snapped Mr. McNutley. "Did you actually picture kids standing by their windows thinking, 'Wow, I sure wish I could fly but the newspaper says I have to think happy thoughts and I'm coming up fuckin' blank'? I've got ninety angry parents in my foyer demanding some kind of explanation, and aside from the fact you're a complete nincompoop I don't have a clue what to say."

"Give me one more try," said P. X. "I'll come up with something to make all the parents happy."

As the clouds parted, a crisp white beam of moonlight shone on a tiny figure dressed all in green perched on their windowsill.

"SAMMY!" cried Barbara Ann. "Please let us go flying again! Every time you've shown up in the last two weeks you've just talked about alligators and showed us how to fold clothes. Please say we can go flying again."

"We can!" crowed Sammy to the childrens' cheers. "But this part is very important: flying is very dangerous, and shouldn't be attempted by just anyone. Before we go flying, you have to tell someone."

Little Barney sighed. "But you said we can't tell our parents about you," he said.

"I've got it!" perked up Barbara Ann. "We can tell each other!" She turns to her little brother. "Barney, I'm going flying tonight!"

A grin broke out on Barney's face. "Crystal, I'm going flying too!"

Crystal giggled. "Barbara Ann, I'm going to fly all the way to Somestimesland!"

Sammy looked perplexed, but eventually he nodded his head. "Okay," he said, "let's goooooo!"

"I don't know why the fuck you thought that would solve anything," said a furious Mr. McNutley to P. X. as he pasted obituaries into the first twenty pages of his newspaper. "They don't even take it seriously in the fuckin' story."

"I'm sorry, McNutley," said P. X. "I just didn't think."

"No, you didn't. You blew it again. It's a shame: my readership was up five thousand percent." Mr. McNutley gazed sadly at the crestfallen P. X. "Okay, okay, one more go, but this time I make the rules: Kids can only fly if they have something that no English kid will ever have. Ever. Ever!"

P. X. nodded eagerly. "Thank you, sir," he said. "I'll get right on it." He wrestled with possibilities throughout the whole night, and as everyone who's read this classic of children's literature knows, in a close race between pixie dust and clean, straight teeth, pixie dust won out.

THE END

Desperate Desire To Do Well On Jeopardy! Drives Straight-A Student To Listen To Iggy Azalea

Story.

This is truly a great day for movie lovers. I don't understand the whole story but apparently Seth Rogen made fun of Kim Jong-un and in retaliation North Korea hacked the computers at Sony Pictures. They downloaded every film Sony has ever made, and they've put them all online. Everything! I must have copied a hundred movies, and I only got out of bed eight minutes ago. My favorite so far has to be Big Hero 6. It was great! While I love all of the characters, my favorite has to be Baymax -- you know, the inflatable robot that looks like the Michelin man. I was laughing so hard I could barely take notes, but here are some of my favorite bits.

-------------

BAYMAX: Master Hiro, overwhelming evidence suggests that Professor Callaghan set the fire deliberately. Then he stole your army of bots and used them to escape.

HIRO: He couldn't have. That's nuts.

BAYMAX [confused]: No, it is not. My senso-detectors would have registered the presence of legumes.

-------------

BAYMAX: My calculations have determined that there is a 99.9465% probability that the test pilot was Professor Callaghan's daughter Abigail, and his subsequent actions have been in retaliation for her death.

HIRO: What? I don't believe it. That's sick!

BAYMAX [confused]: I must respectfully disagree, Master Hiro. According to my calculation its immune system has not been invaded by either bacteria or viruses.

-------------

TADASHI: Okay, Baymax, now wait just a minute. My brother Hiro gave you a polymantium exoskeleton, internal scanners and sensors, remote monitors, and jet engine feet. You have unbeatable skills in karate, tae kwon do, Western boxing, and Wing Chun. But you don't understand contemporary English? Jesus Christ, you are so freakin' lame.

BAYMAX: Thank you for your input, Master Tadashi. I will initiate a self-test of my lower limb interface.

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HIRO [weakly]: I must apologize, Tadashi. I believe it was my oversight that put us in this position.

TADASHI [in one last spurt of fury]: You think? Like if you'd just bought a Slang Recognition Chip for maybe six yen and put it in Baymax, he would have understood what we were talking about and not completely messed up our plan? And maybe that's why we're chained to a wall of Adamantium crystals and we're roughly six seconds away from having our insides boiled like miso ramen? These may be my last words so remember this forever: you may be my brother but you're also an idiot, and your superhero friend is totally fucked.

BAYMAX [shrugging]: Well, I'll give it a try. But don't blame me if it makes me deflate.

It's too bad my parents took me camping when I was a kid. Because after that, when all my friends wanted to be doctors or architects, I was just happy being indoors.

Coming Soon

Highlights from Musical Movies

Oh, this is the night,
it's a beautiful night
And we call it "Bella Notte."

Who can forget this immortal movie song from Lady and the Tramp? It's truly one of my all-time favorite movie tunes. It brightens a particularly romantic scene with its unforgettable melody, and the lyrics charm with their warm simplicity. If you don't speak Italian, here's a translation that doesn't lose any of the magic:

Oh, this is the night,
it's a beautiful night
And we call it "Nice Night."

I mean, what hard-hearted person could do anything but sigh when they hear that poetry? Of course we all know the songwriters, Frank Sandler and Jerry Wiebler, went on to pen a long string of hits after this. I'm sure every filmgoer can remember their Theme from Cabaret:

Oh, this is a man,
A really strange man
And we call him "Bizarro Muchacho."

Then there's their immortal Love Theme from Man of La Mancha:

Oh, that is a windmill,
A really big windmill
And we call it "Humungo Windmillo."

Sadly, the pair's popularity plummeted with the advent of rap music. They tried to join the trend in 2004 but most agree that even with Vanilla Ice performing it their swan song isn't their most popular work.

Oh, those are some buns,
Some fabulous buns
And we call them "Lotsa Buttockos."

Would you like to try my drink? [PAUSE] YOU BASTARD! SPIT IT OUT!

The Bad Manners cocktail at Nitecap, $14

[T]he semi-naked waiters returned with phallic branches of Brussels sprouts, sprouting from you-know-where. They handed you a knife, and you had to shear your own.... The possibility of accidentally slicing off a waiter’s private parts—was purposeful, felt [billionaire Russian oligargh Maria] Baibakova.

“Art is supposed to challenge us,” she said. “It’s not supposed to be comfortable.”

Hi. My name is Roman, and I'm the president of PWUTRASOUPANHCCBSHGAPOS ("People Who Used To Report All Sorts Of Inexplicable Phenomena And Now Have Cellphone Cameras But Still Haven't Gotten A Photo Of Shit"). Our group has gotten a lot of attention recently, and not in a positive light. If the angry mob would shut up for a second, I'd like to explain our side of the story.

Yes, it's true: in my lifetime I've seen some unnatural sights. In my lifetime, I've seen sixteen ghosts, eight UFOs, three werewolves, nine Yetis, and Jesus' face on four different types of toast (rye, whole wheat, challah, and raisin). Every one of these sightings has been publicized. "The Flying Cigars of Northern Vancouver" was actually made into a miniseries, "Space Alien Bar Mitzvah" was a special on Bravo TV, and #ChallahBreadJesus became a trending tweet. In my prime, I was averaging fourteen unexplained sightings a week, and that was before I started drinking Hpnotiq.

"Surely you've had a cellphone for the last ten or twelve years," you say. "So why haven't you gotten a photo of anything strange yet?" You roll your eyes and act like this odd lapse is conclusive proof that nothing paranormal exists, but I'm here to tell you that unlike the midget clown that hovered over me for most of 1972, there's a rational explanation for this.

First, you're probably aware of the biggest problem. A yeti runs out of the woods, I grab for my camera, and before I've even typed in half my password it's broken into my Fiero and then run off. It just isn't quick enough! My fingers shake and I'm typing, like, "1, 2, 3 -- " and before I see all the little app widgets he's gone back into the abandoned coal mine again.

"Roman," you say, "according to your eyewitness reports, every UFO you've ever seen either danced or hovered or hung in the air. Surely that would give you time to type in your passcode."

Well, in a perfect world, yes. But -- call me stupid -- I always make some kind of mistake. I actually did get video of Amelia Earhart's ghost eating nopales tacos at Machu Picchu, but just out of habit I turned my phone sideways to film it. It was crisp and perfect but I had to delete it. I knew that for every person who saw it and said "WOW! That's absolutely AMAZING!!!" I'd get a hundred going, "DON'T FILM IN PORTRAIT MODE, ASSHOLE!"

Sometimes I almost think there's an unnatural conspiracy to stop me from photographing this paranormal stuff. Like one afternoon a chupacabra ran by my window and I made a mad dash for my phone but at that very second it rang. I'm like "CALL BACK! I GOTTA GET A PHOTO!" and it's like, "ANSWER THIS CALL! FUCK THAT THING!"

Anyway, don't stop believing. Rest assured one day soon -- oh, shit. There's a crop circle in my back yard. Yes, a real crop circle, in my very own backyard. It's amazing, like an incredibly intricate fractal crossed with some fourth-dimensional M. C. Escher shit. Okay, I got it: type in password, don't use portrait mode, turn off flash --

Shit. Grass grows like fuck around here.