Hey guys

If any of you happen to be opening a copper wire supply company, I've got the best name.

Ready?

Coppertunities

Life

This isn't a joke, so I'm sorry...

Life is more a strip club than a bowling alley. If you're a fatso and an asshole, nobody cares if you threw a 265. Conversely, if it was all about the one with the biggest tits, then there wouldn't be any other girls in the joint. They wouldn't get tips so they wouldn't be dancing. Except for the ones who do it because they love it.

Which brings me to my next point. Even if you don't love it, act like you love it. What do you have to lose, except a shoulder for your pathetic self to cry on. And if you're crying on the inside, make the outside better. Not cosmetic surgery. The outside outside. There's more to this world than you you you.

Not in that Club

I don't understand all these "gentlemen's clubs" popping up all over town.

I mean... who really wants to see gentlemen?

And when are they going to give the scholars a nod?

I'm Very Open-minded

I'll give anyone the benefit of the doubt, whether they're black, white, brown, yellow, red, green, purple...

Actually, the purple folks are inconsiderate assholes. All of them. And, its genetic.

Stormin' Norman

It's too early in my non-career as a comedian to have a moment of genuine sentiment, so on the occasion of the passing of my idol - and true master of bull lettres - I'll tell a joke:

Suddenly with Norman Mailer gone, you can already sense a decrease in the overall testosterone level of the world. In fact, I've heard that the president is now considering diplomacy.

Strike!

So the TV Writers are striking. Oooh... Can we make it?

I mean...

...what's next, the meter maids??

Really? A Car??

I heard it on the radio: Donate your old car to help children in need.

How could my car help a needy child? It could run the kid over and end his miserable life.

My 25 Cents

Please, please...don't tell me any more about defective coins that are worth thousands of dollars. I heard a few years back about the Wisconsin quarter and how it was struck with a loose or defective die or whatever they call it that punches coins, and it left a different impression on a few of the quarters.

I realized yesterday at the laundromat that I have checked every fucking quarter that I've had ever since I found out that fact - which may or may not have been a conspiracy to get more people into coin collecting. (Coins are useless anyway.) That's me in line getting a bagel with one twenty, a dollar bill, and several quarters. I'm not breaking the twenty. But wait, I have to go through each of these quarters...Nebraska...Indiana...ok, we're solid.

I shell out about $6-8 in quarters at the laundromat. Checking the quarters is a bit of a way to pass the time in that context. But it really isn't because I'm searching in desperation. There's a part of my subconscious that is thoroughly horrified that I might get one of those Wisconsin quarters and pop it right into the dryer. I devote A LOT of unhealthy attention to this. I think they're worth about $5,000.

Oh, here's the link. Happy hunting!

I'm Confident

Since we have seen what a mess our invasion of Iraq and subsequent occupation of the joint has created, I am confident that the American people will not fall into supporting an attack on Iran.

But on the off chance that we do get tricked into supporting an attack on Iran too, leading us into a war with that country, I am absolutely certain that us Americans would never ever get tricked into supporting a full-scale attempt on other countries in the region.

I mean, how far could we really allow this to go?

But let's just say that we fell for it the first time, admitted that even presidents make mistakes, bought the whole Iran thing, and then the broader regional offensive...there's no way in hell the American people would support invading Europe. Even if there was pretty certain evidence that a member of the European Union had sold Syria the paper used for a check that a Syrian prince had sent to a relative of modest means in Pakistan, who used the check to buy nails to fix a wall, but whose nails were stolen on the way back from the hardware store by terrorist bombers and used as shrapnel against American troops.

I just don't see us falling for that.

If we did, though, the American people would definitely have learned something at this point. Guaranteed. And when an American president suggests, then, that we deplete our remaining resources by taking over the whole of the African continent and New Zealand...the voice of the people would say rather emphatically, "No thank you."

But if, as a nation, we were feeling particularly insecure or antagonistic on that day - we would remember how we felt that day and vow never again to let critical foreign policy decisions be decided at such vulnerable times. And when the president suggests nuking the U.N. and taking over the planet, we would laugh in his face.

But if, for some reason, the U.N. and the entire metro region went up in a cloud of smoke - and we attempted to control the planet from Sweden while losing an ongoing battle with The World - I am confident we would never get suckered into invading Deltroc, in the Zibjar System.

We would be stretching ourselves way too thin at that point.

Fantasy Football

My fantasy football team is doing really well so far this season.

Gandalf is throwing strong, while Frodo is rushing some serious yards. But the real surprise is Link, with three interceptions. I just hope Potter stays healthy.

They Got It Good??

Can we get to a point in our society where we can finally say what's on all our minds - that Milk-is-Chillin'** is not a classic.

I'm not even going to justify an honest assessment of its musical or literary merits. Suffice it to say, it's a cheap old school knock-off. And it's not even that old.

If you think that song's a hit, you might as well tell me that Larger Than Life should have won a freakin' Oscar.

So what if it's been often cited and referenced and repackaged...the song is a classic only in the way that caveman drawings are classics. It's got historical significance, but if anyone tried to pass that shit off today with a straight face, they'd be in for a serious beatdown. It's one of the most annoying songs on the planet. It doesn't even sound like a song, it sounds like a guy who refuses to shut up.

You know what? Today I have a hankerin' to get really annoyed for no reason at all. I know, I'll pop in Milk-is-Chillin'! Milk is Chillin', my pants are fillin', what more can I say...I like children...


**What I call Audio Two's 1987 opus "Top Billin.'"

The Most Humbling Occupation

So what do you think is the most humbling occupation on the planet?

I know, your knee-jerk response is something like Dunkin Donuts donut server. I say a much more humbling vocation is Novelist.

Think about it, it's relatively easy to climb to an extremely high position at Dunkin Donuts - or even go straight to the top. All you have to do is not ask five questions after I have already audibly ordered a black medium coffee no sugar: Medium? Black? Sugar? To go? Bag?

Cup? Styrofoam? Socialism? The meaning of life?

As Novelist, one might think that a job where hundreds or thousands spend ten or twenty hours reading or pretending to read your words or your editor's words would provide a moderately noticeable pimple of a bump to one's ego. But one would be wrong.

Humility is knowledge of the inconceivability of attaining greatness. And as a Novelist you don't have a glass of water's chance in a pretzel factory at getting to Top Dog. That is, so long as Harlan Coben is still writing. And his billions of books sold aren't all rounded up into the world's biggest incinerator. And incinerated.

Harlan Coben does to prose what Cheez Wiz does to cauliflower. He makes weaker authors weep with his heart-thumping pace and good-as-there settings. His characters are so real that you can smell their rank breath, or feel the gentle tug of lipstick stained teeth on your earlobe. He is, in one man, all things to all languages. The thin refraction of his almighty light in even the shoddiest of Divehi, Bhutan or Flemish translations can outshine the brightest of World Literature.

I can only imagine if Harlen Coben was around in the days of Shakespeare, what that lukewarm transcriber of history and myth would have done in the midst of suigeneris plot alchemists like Harlan Coben or his only peer in any age, Robin Cook. Oh, but please don't think that my mention of Robin Cook means that he can even touch the quill (if he was in Shakespeare's time) or preferred (according to Writer's Life Monthly) Compaq Presario notebook computer of the one, timeless Harlen Coben.

Why even type another wo...

Selfish Cancer

Cancer is rough. Cancer is devastating. Cancer is malignant. Cancer is a bad guest at dinner parties.

Cancer, also, brings absolutely nothing to the table.

Oh no, you say? It does a lot, right? It metastasizes and ruins vital organs. It robs people of their loved ones. All true. But consider this:

A new study suggests that those who eat grapefruit may face a higher risk of cancer, especially women. In other words, there's a decent shot that grapefruit causes cancer.

We already know that cigarettes cause cancer, certain diseases like human papillomavirus cause cancer, chemicals of all kinds cause cancer...even the sun, from 93 million miles away, causes cancer.

But what does cancer cause? Did you ever consider that?

For cancer, it's a one-way street. Take. Take. Take. Grapefruits, plastic bottles, heredity, Care Bears, clouds, the air - all contribute to cancer, it seems. And cancer just sits there and laps it up.

When are we going to demand that cancer give something back for a change?

The Following is Not a Joke

I just had an IM exchange with a good friend of mine about the genesis of this blog. Let's call him Donald.

ME: i came up with a great joke today: http://lastcomic.blogspot.com/
DON: the belmont?
ME: rain man. the belmont was yesterday
DON: ha. i didn't know you had your own page

[He's being very polite and conversational here.]

ME: i put it up yesterday. i realized that I always bog down conversations with half baked stand up routines, so I decided to just sweep it onto the site - then you guys can offer pointers on how to improve the jokes, or ignore them altogether.
DON: good call. i'll look at em all later. i'm groggy

[Also edging toward a polite resolution here.]

ME: you don't even have to bother - it's totally voluntary. the important thing is that I'm already 35% less annoying
DON: hahaha

...crispin?

[At a talk-back with actor/director Crispin Glover, I spouted a circuitous query that got me more insistent the farther I left the actor and others in attendance behind. It was about the prevalence of taboo in a consumer culture, but I kept saying "capitalism" instead. This discombobulation during public or celebrity events has become the standard for something called The Crispin Zone.]

...mailer?

[At author Norman Mailer's book signing at Union Square earlier this year, I told him that The Executioner's Song was "incredible," to which he answered with the octogenarian version of the Jordan Shrug.]

ME: well...topics like capitalism don't fit as well into this format - but I can put that on a more issues-oriented site

and then i'll be home free! voila, no more crispin zone!
DON: amazing...sorry i'm not responding with more than a word...i really am pretty groggy

It's obvious that he's very excited about this blog. I am too, because I have a lot of funny friends that I'm sure will whip me into shape in no time. I'm hoping to be on the SNL writing staff in 18 to 24 months.

Now, onto more jokes!

Drivers

The makers of the movie Rain Man must have really had it in for lousy drivers. They basically say that a guy who needs assisted living, reads phone books all day and can't distinguish between yes and no can still be a "very good driver."

(right?)

You can picture the producer at the top of the meeting:

"Well everybody, I guess we can finally get started, now that Jim and Steve are here. Glad to see they're in one piece." Nyuk yuk yuk.

Then Steve goes to Jim:

"We would have been here on time if we weren't stuck behind that schmo in the Pontiac with the ice cream sandwich. I bet ya even Raymond Babbit could have done a better job than that behind the wheel."

Am I Going Crazy?

So I was watching the Belmont Stakes the other day, and you know where that race is held? In Elmont, New York. The Belmont is in Elmont...

Does anybody else find this strange?

I mean...

The Iditarod isn't run in Ditarod, Alaska...

and the French Open isn't held in Rench Open, Arkansas...

Let yer man go!

The man who plotted to kidnap the young son of Late Show host David Letterman is on the loose. Last Friday, Kelly Frank, 45, fled with another inmate from a ranch operated by the Montana State Prison.

I mean...

who chooses stalker as a vocation and then settles for Letterman? That's a serious lack of motivation. Maybe he's working his way up the ranks. Next year Oprah, then Julia Roberts, then the world!

(do I have a good routine going here?)

If he gets laid off, he has to start from scratch with Brian Austin Green...