Outside Yiddish Larry's Comfort Zone

Thursday evening was always a big night for Tito's Tittytown Tavern. The weekly Klingon language poetry slams were a big draw and the crowds were large, thirsty and rowdy as all get out. Stringbean had made sure that the kitchen was fully stocked with Sloppy Joe mix , cool whip and young coconut meat, the essential ingredients of Tittytown's Thursday night special: " Dr. Puckerbutt's Anal Ointment" (for your chapped anus). Tito was always a basket case on poetry slam nights and Stringbean had learned to simply keep his mouth shut and the vermin grinder well-oiled. Tonight Tittytown was aflutter with rumors that the morbidly-obese talent scout, Coco Van Winkle was on the prowl for fresh new faces. Coco sat in a dark corner of the tavern clad in his trademark lobster bib and pinwheel hat, bobbing his head to the music of the house band, Jiffy Pop Frankenstein and The Hershey Squirts. A collection of men and women dressed in Klingon uniforms and makeup of varying quality mulled around the tavern awaiting their moment in the limelight and paying very little attention to the music.

The band was on fire tonight, playing a dynamic collection of songs from their new album, "Fumigate the Odor of Your Love". They blasted out power ballad after power ballad: "Convalescent Home Smackdown", "Normal-shaped Baby", "Licorice G-String", "Monkey Shit Blowback" and "Flatulence Filibuster". Stringbean found the music pleasantly complimentary to practicing his pelvic thrusts as he observed the band from the kitchen. He'd been a big fan ever since purchasing their platinum-selling double album, "Werewolf Breath" at the Skanktown flea market. The double album featured some of their greatest hits: "Candy Cane Catheter", "Ovaltine Colon Cleanse", "Pickles Poops in the Pumpkin Patch", and the mega-hit, "Succulent Chocolate Booty". It was really something to have such a powerhouse rock ensemble play the likes of their small fishing village and Stringbean hoped he could meet the band members and possibly get an autograph or two when their set was finished.

Stringbean liked to believe that he too was gifted with a modicum of musical talent and he had even recently performed a mildly-successful fundraising concert to raise money for cement to fill in the Ducky Jurgens Memorial Sinkhole. In the past few months, several children had fallen (or were intentionally shoved) into the sinkhole and vanished while playing near the gaping menace. Stringbean had raised a total of $4.50. The contributor had given him the money with the stipulation that he stop repeatedly playing his song, "The Sexual Underwear Gang" and leave the area. Stringbean had used the money to purchase lamp oil and ping pong balls for a performance art piece he was putting together. It would be an interpretive dance performance based on the film, "Three on a Meat Hook". He was still working out the kinks in the act, but it was taking shape as something truly special. He would perform the piece as his alter ego: "Salsbury Steak Face Lift", and would involve audience members in an interactive scavenger hunt in which they would find certain items inside of his pants. Soon it would be Stringbean's turn to wow the crowd at Tittytown, but for now he would stick to manning the grill. There were burgers to flip and anus ointment to mix.

With Tito distracted and frantically tending bar for a freakish collection of beer-guzzling "trekkers", Stringbean was free to work on fine-tuning a somewhat problematic chapter of his autobiography, "Ladies, Please Attempt to Ignore the Flesh-Colored Boa Constrictor Packed Into My Cling Wrap Thong: The Stringbean McDougal Story". The chapter in question was the book's third, tentatively titled: "Count Drinkula and the Lovesexy Cherry Coke Enema". Stringbean unraveled a length of toilet paper that he'd been using to doodle his chapter notes on. On the wrinkled toilet paper, scrawled in his own blood, were the words: "Restraining order", "Buck Knife", "Loose Canon", "Pumpernickel" and "Denture Creme Diabolique". He read the list aloud and then quickly took a felt tip pen from his pocket and added: "Raw Bacon", "Dumplings", "Easter Basket" and "Gay Agenda". Suddenly his concentration was broken by a voice shouting loudly over the music. "Kral Rak! Mauk Lak! Krell Mauk, Earther!"

Stringbean looked up from his notes, meeting the piggishly beady eyes of a heavily-perspiring, pudgy-faced Klingon standing in the kitchen doorway with his hand out. Stringbean rolled his eyes and then passed the flabby pseudo-space warrior a mountainous plate of chili cheese fries and an extra large bucket of Mountain Dew. "Mauk Slak, Earther! Krell Mauk!" the plus-sized Klingon roared, afterward cramming a fistful of the sloppy fries into his mouth. Stringbean could only shake his head, mystified, as he watched the wannabe alien badass waddle away stuffing his fat face. He recognized the Klingon as Christopher Newcastle, an obnoxious know-it-all windbag he'd had in a high school multimedia class who spent most of his non-Klingon hours speaking loudly to no one in particular about something called "World of Warcraft". The gig as Tito's resident grill jockey wasn't bad but the fucking Klingons were a bunch of buttfucking asswipes. Captain James T. Kirk had probably said the exact same thing at one time or another.

The band finished up their final number to lackluster applause from the portly Kilngons. Stringbean attempted to make up for their rudeness with a few howls of approval and a couple of enthusiastic fist pumps in the air. The band members turned in Stringbean's direction and took a bow. lead singer Jiffy Pop Frankenstein tipped his purple top hat in appreciation. "I guess the ass-reaming little dickwad in the shithole of a kitchen liked us!" he said in a sarcastic drawl and then unzipped his pants and began to urinate on the stage. "Hey, shitface, when you're done choking your chicken in the kitchen you can drag your scrawny ass out here and wipe my piss up off the stage, you faggot!" Stringbean grinned and waved at the lead singer and then quietly took a double barrel shotgun from beneath the kitchen counter. "Come on Cinderella, get yer mop!" the singer said. Stringbean waved again and then shot the lead singer in the groin with the double barrel shot gun. Blood splattered stunned Kilngons and fellow band members as Jiffy Pop was blown backward, shrieking in agony. The crowd panicked and scattered as Stringbean began to randomly fire into the crowd. Tito's head exploded in a crimson shower of brain matter and skull fragments. A man in a gorilla costume ran out of the men's restroom with a plastic bucket and began lobbing handfuls of human feces at the frantic customers. Several men dressed as the Keystone Cops barged through the front door, battering customers with batons and throwing custard pies as a man in a straw boater hat sat down and began to play a cheery hony tonk tune on the tavern's upright piano. The tavern was in complete chaos. The glass of the skylight rained down upon the crowd as the flying horse, Pegasus descended from the sky above. Stringbean mounted the mythical creature and donned Jiffy Pop's discarded rubber Frankenstein's monster mask. "Merry Christmas to all! And to all a good fuck!" he shouted as Pegasus took flight. Stringbean dropped a live grenade through the skylight of the tavern as they soared into the glimmering night sky. The tavern's east wall exploded below and there were terrible screams.

This post has been a test of the emergency alert blog system, in the event of an actual blog posting please wipe the semen from your computer screen and attempt to put your pants on over the top of your head. Who stole Bobo's funny red clown shoes? Can I get an amen? How about some diarrhea medicine?

Author's Note: This nonsensical pile of feces was created with a large list of words and terms that I wrote down while thinking that they might be amusing when combined into a story. I was quite wrong. The list went as follows:

Poontang Beaversnatch

Pelvic thrust

Ginger snaps

Candy Cane

Jiffy Pop Dracula

Lovesexy Cherry Coke

Cling wrap

Mead

Instant mashed potatoes

Loose canon

Choose Life t-shirt

Off-script

"Slank"

Puke Bucket

Cracker Jack

Catheter

Normal-shaped baby

Fishing village

Werewolf breath

Dr. Hopstetter's gene splicing tape

Witchfinder

Soup Kitchen

Stage Coach

Flea Market

Pin wheel hat

Hershey squirts

Twinkie fucker

Easter basket

Johnson's sink hole

Restraining order

Harmonica lessons

Panty line

Raw bacon

Blowback

Monkey bars

Spray foam insulation diaphragm

Surgical tubing

Filibuster

Chapped anus

Mr. Microphone

Cocoa puffs

Direct deposit

Amin: The Rise and Fall

Phantom Tanning Booth

Ovaltine

Colon cleanse

Licorice g-string

Pumpernickel

Calling card

Pablo Picasso's Blue Fartknocker#4

The Succulent Booty

The Colonoscopy Challenge Game from Milton Bradley

Journeyman Proctologist

Fumigate the Odor of Your Love

Convalescent Home Smackdown

Klingon language poetry slam

A Mint Julep for Judas

Sexual orgasm of love

Mervin the Magical Misunderstood Morgue Midget

Claim Jumper

Hashish

Dr. Puckerbutt's anal ointments

Skullduggery

Sloppy Joe sandwich mix

Scavenger hunt

Tito's Tittytown Tavern

Pickles Poops in the Pumpkin Patch

Pimento Loaf

Grizzly

Dugan Portnoy

Coco Van Winkle

Ping Pong

Lobster bib

Scabies

Count Dracula

The Sexual Underwear Gang

Lamp oil

Pubic region

Vermin grinder

Morbidly obese

Talent scout

Three on a Meat Hook

Gay agenda

Jocular

Accordion

Facelift

Salsbury steak

String bean

Young coconut meat

Diabolical denture creme

Wicker athletic supporter

Cool Whip

Bugle

Slim Jim

Dumpling

Octogenarian Sex Addict

Neck brace

Drywall

Fort some reason, while I think the resulting story is godawful, I still think this list is very funny. I didn't even get around to using such comic gems as "Twinkie fucker" and "Poontang Beaversnatch". You win some, you lose some. I thought this would be a pretty funny tale but it's really just too forced, weird and idiotic. But, hey...I love that list. Most of all I love having this list in my coat pocket, scrawled on two crumpled sheets of paper with checkmarks on certain words and circles around others. This sort of thing always makes me feel slightly off balance, like a crazy person who has been taking dictation for an imaginary demon who lives inside of his head.

Gurgles, The Heavily-Medicated Chocolate Lovechild

The mad killer had left a trail of butchered bodies in his wake that brought to mind some kind of awful human chum line shoveled out for the police to follow like hungry sharks. His modus operandi was as unpleasant as his nickname, "The Maniacal Murderous Mutilating Madman of Midtown Manhattan". It was rather an excessively-long nickname, but we'd had a contest down at the 21st precinct where the winner who came up with the best nickname for the murderer won a free dinner at Happy Steak and it just so happened that that one was the most popular of the bunch. Personally I liked my own submission : "Kill-O-Tron X: Blood Hunter From The Future", but I was obviously in the minority on that one. In all honesty we could have just gone with "The Kiss Army Killer" which would have made sense given the murderer's habit of writing the police his taunting letters on Kiss Army stationary, but everyone had their own take on the killer's most suitable moniker...I'm just glad nobody actually voted for "Aquaman", because I'm pretty sure that one was meant as a joke.

The killer's latest victim had been found in the bathtub of her midtown apartment by a worried neighbor after she'd failed to show up for a ventriloquism lesson with her teacher, Jackie "Cap'n Patches" Paulsen.

"She never missed a lesson." the neighbor had explained.

"Ventriloquism was her whole life. That and 'Knife Collector's Showcase' on the QVC shopping channel. She tended to work blue, which I didn't particularly care for, but she was very good. Her comic timing was impeccable....God only knows what will become of Pappy Peanuts now that she's been butchered like that." The distraught woman went on to explain that Pappy Peanuts had been the victim's ventriloquist dummy; an overall-clad country bumpkin type of character with a taste for bawdy wordplay.

"Perhaps he can be donated to one of those creepy ventriloquist dummy museums I've heard about." I suggested.

"What kind of a maniac would do something like this?" She said, holding back sobs.

"A maniacal one." I said. "Yes sir, a real maniacal maniac is at work here. He murders and mutilates...he's a madman alright...who murders in the midtown Manhattan area. Yes siree, that's why we call him The Maniacal Murderous Mutilating Madman of Midtown Manhattan, miss... or as those on the inside call him, 'Mmmmmm'". I observed the mutilated body of the victim closely, making several mental notes...most of which were related to a discussion thread I'd chimed in on the previous night concerning World of Warcraft. My level 20 Paladin quest had given me an awesome new weapon and I wanted to share the news with my fellow dwellers of Azeroth.

"Did you happen to see anyone leaving this apartment carrying what appeared to be a human head?" I asked, pulling a pad and pen from my coat pocket. "Perhaps the man would have had something under his coat that might have made him look pregnant. Maybe in the last few days you've seen something strange like that and thought to yourself 'Hmmm, that man looks pregnant, just like Arnold Schwarzenegger in the delightful comedy, Junior. "

The woman thought for a moment. "Come to think of it, I did see a pregnant man carrying a human head, but I didn't really think anything of it until now" she said.

"Can you describe this man?" I asked.

"Well he looked pregnant...about nine months along I'd guess, and was carrying a human head." she said.

"Well seeing as how he couldn't possibly be nine-months pregnant in appearance and carrying a human head at the same time, this man is obviously an imaginary boogie man concocted by your no-doubt senile and traumatized mind, Mame...I'm sorry, but this looks like a dead end."

"But Pappy Peanuts is missing, Mr. Detectiveman. Wouldn't it be possible that the killer might have hidden the missing dummy in his coat, giving him the appearance of being pregnant?"

"Impossible...if he were nine months along as you claim he would have left behind a telltale trail of slimy ventriloquist dummy placenta...just like a giant murderous garden snail. It's always the afterbirth that nails them. At least that's how it goes with World of Warcraft. No, I think you've probably been reading too many Aquaman comic books, Mame, but for the sake of argument I'm going to have you draw a police sketch of this character that you believe you saw on this pad of paper." I said, passing her my pad and pen.

"But...I can't draw." she said.

"Nonsense. You'd be amazed what you can do when you put your mind to it. It doesn't have to be museum quality, Mame. I just need a little something to follow up on. Throw me a bone here for Christ's sake. I'm trying to apprehend a maniac before he strikes again....possibly in this very building...maybe coming back to cover his tracks by eliminating a potential witness who could put his crazy ass in the gas chamber. Follow me, Granny?"

The old woman gave the drawing her best effort, employing what limited artistic talent she possessed, and then passed the pad back, looking slightly embarrassed. I observed the drawing with a grimace of distaste.

"Well you're no Rembrandt, lady, that's for certain. Is that his eye? Looks like Paul Williams with downe syndrome. Is that an arm or a trombone? Shit, a three-year-old could draw a better murderer than this, but thanks for the effort. I'll make some copies and circulate them around...see if we get any nibbles." I tucked the drawing into my pocket. "Well, forensics will be here shortly to mop up this mess. If you see anymore murders you give me a call." I passed her my business card. "You might want to consider taking a few art classes. I believe seniors get some sort of discount at City College." I tipped my hat and turned to take my leave. "Now excuse me, Mame. I have to go shove an entire watermelon up my asshole." I said.

The elderly neighbor looked horrified by the idea. "I'm only funnin' ya, Granny." I said with a chuckle as I headed down the stairs.

Somewhere, out in the cold New York night, a kill-crazy maniac was running loose. I was just glad that I would be safely indoors playing World of Warcraft.