RPM’s was a diner that had radical neon and also Street Fighter

What is it you’re working on here, Peter?

I’m doing a little research on my reputation. There had to have been something to make everyone at school hate me.

Maybe it’s your combative and superior attitude.

Couldn’t be that.

You’re right, what was I thinking.

What were you thinking.

I plead temporary insanity. What else could it be.

Well…there was this local placemat competition when I was in like second grade.

Ah-ha. A placemat competition.

Exactly.

Now there you might have something. That’s much more plausible.

Just hear me out-we had to design these anti-smoking uh…placemats. Like to put your-

I know what a placemat is.

Okay but so you…don’t remember this.

Maybe it’s because I didn’t place.

You didn’t place. Ha!

Ha.

Right, well the thing is, see – I won. And my winning placemat design was made up of two things:

Mmhm.

There was a big “NO” where the capital O was like, with a line through it and a cigarette-

It’s called a prohibitory sign.

Terrific. But the thing I think that got me first prize was this little bee, like an insect bee, saying “Just beeeeeee yourself.”

That’s awful.

In a little word bubble, an-

Not only is that awful, it’s stolen from Aladdin. You are a ripoff artist.

I was eight years old. But you’re right, it is from Aladdin. I think that may have been an early foothold-

For the generalized hatred? I think it’s bad enough.

Yeah?

Sure, I mean I hate you now. Didn’t they like, put these placemats out somewhere? Like around town.

You bet your ass they did. Some diner on Main Street, and also….RPM’s.

RPM’s.

Fuckin’ RPM’s, man. They were eating off my placemats for a few months.

They weren’t “yours.” You had a scam running that got your terrible drawing on a few placemats around Mt. Horeb.

No, well I mean, you’re exactly right.

I’ll bet it was rough on the judges when they found out they excluded some budding young artist’s original work-

In favor of my blatant plagiarism, yeah.

Maxin’ with the kids one day, he or she pulls down Aladdin in its big soft white plastic Disney case and throws it on.

Those were the clamshell cases, yeah – for like so the kids could get them open easily.

Ah.

And they get to that part and are like “Wait, hold the phone, that placemat slogan we gave first prize to – Robin Williams said that shit in Aladdin.”

Right.

“We fucked up”

I’ve decided not to settle.

I’m searching for a summer job. I’m only doing this now, because I mostly do everything the wrong way.

The ridiculousness that’s about to begin will seem like it doesn’t pertain to the above, but it does!

Good tidings to all Ella’s customers. Wait – you there! Are you really enjoying eating off the kids’ menu at age TWENTY-TWO, ASSHOLE?

What you see above is the late Captain America riding a device that seems to be a combination of three things:

Old-fashioned monoplane -

Thank me for the guns.

Magical, mystical, alien-homeworld-bound rocketship:

*ahem*

Star-nosed mole

Anyway, the resulting monster patrols the ceiling, along with about a thousand other rainbow-hued paper-mache characters/badly-painted strange objects at the Madison restaurant everyone loves for distracting you from the food: Ella’s Deli!

I don’t want to work at the actual restaurant. You thought too soon. If you’d given the question any real consideration, you’d know that I of course want to design new novelty tables!

There are tiny trains inside the table.

Maybe a “famine” oriented table, with lots of harrowing starvation pictures under the glass. Challenging.

Or maybe uh. Exotic firearms. And little speakers in the table legs will play Guess Who’s “Guns Guns Guns.” For the kids.

NOT THAT FUNNY!

Ted Dancin’

Dad, I mean. I know you’ve got your own agenda.
Yeah.
I just think it’s stupid.

Scarlett Johansson

I have a natural knack for spelling difficult female celebrity names.

J-a-n-e-a-n-e G-a-r-o-f-a-l-o

She’s aged very well, hasn’t she? However self-righteous she might get on her radio show, she still has that wiseass charm. Not as cute as when she was on Space Ghost, but still.

Quick, Janeane – do some comedy!

There’s this other girl who hasn’t so much aged gracefully as lived gracefully through her youth and into young adulthood. She is one of those actresses whose delivery suggests she must be at least slightly cool when her lines aren’t written for her. And physically, well.

Even candid and unposed, in form she’s clearly the best selection for our generation’s Perfect Woman.

Unfortunately, she stands on the cusp of a brutal (and unnecessary) test of charisma and relevance: an album! Of sung songs! Sung by a singer. Which is um, her! Why? I don’t know, why did Zooey do it?

Why did Paris Hilton do it? Because she’s soul-dead. But surely this isn’t just a ploy fo’ dollas. Scarlett’s way too pretty to do anything less than honorable.

I’m wandering pretty far here. All this to get to the fact that she’s covering one of my first favorite songs, Tom Waits’ “Anywhere I Lay My Head”

Blah blah bad between-songs-joke blah blah awkward blah blah.

I’ll be damned if I’m going to go on trying to be funny. Instead I’ll give you the straight story:

This song is way too pure and glorious and brutal to be done justice by some hip young know-it-all wannabe chanteuse.

And it’s not just the song, it’s the title of her album! This kind of thing weighs on my mind.

I don’t need anybody
Because I’ve learned
I’ve learned to be alone

Scarlett, you haven’t learned shit about being alone. I can’t off the head come up with anyone who is LESS alone than you are. A song like this is all about pure, visceral, unadulterated sincerity. And poor Scarlett trying to sell a line like

“(S)he left in my sleep boys, I can feel it in my bones”

might be cute, but it couldn’t be sincere. And Tom Waits isn’t cute. Alright, when he tells stories and jokes during a set and comes off all insecure and nervous he’s pretty cute. Sigh.

God damn this rain.