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One Fine Day In the Meeting Room of the Discount Breakfast Cereal Company!
“Awright you two, the boys in Research & Development have given us a great new sweetened multi-grained cereal – now it’s up to us to design the packaging!”
“Okay, boss – what’s the flavor?”
“Good question, Jones – it’s ‘honey oat.'”
“Well, I think we should really focus on the flavor and—-”
“—-Flavor, schmavor! Jones, you and your half-baked ideas of package design! What I want to know, boss, is what’s the cereal shaped like?”
“Let’s see, Wilson – they’re, eh, little rings.”
“That’s it! Perfunctory nod to the flavor (keep Jones happy) – but clearly we need to highlight the shape.”
“Sounds good to me! We’re done here! Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch, everyone?”
See, the word for the shape is bigger than the words describing the flavor, which is what most people would be concerned with.
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The Alien Invasion Has Begun!
NO NO NO! Not that alien invasion! That one began a long time ago and – from what I’m seeing around Southern California – is nearly complete! You presumed I meant the invasion of our streams and rivers by the New Zealand Mud Snail, right?
No, I’m talking about the other, sinister alien invasion! Like from outer space is what I mean!
You know – the one where they come down to our planet, and secretly infiltrate our civilization while they begin to learn our customs, our ways…and our weaknesses.
Perhaps using some sort of money-ray…
…Perhaps using some sort of money-ray – just like that [see above] – they manage to bankroll enough dough-re-mi to establish a manufacturing concern so that they might interact with us on various levels of society, from the lowliest, filthiest, never-graduated-from-art-school janitor on to the greediest, laziest union assembly-line workers all the way up to the loftiest, highest-minded and wealthiest investors with MBAs from only the finest business schools – to find out how to defeat us.
Now these aliens, they don’t want to call too much attention to their new company, see, so they need a sort of seemingly benign, innocuous, non-descript product.
How about…why, how about a plastic garbage pail! Sure, a waste basket! Perfect!
Now for a name! And this is where they made their fatal mistake. For you see, these invaders have such contempt for you and me – the dominant species on planet Earth – that they couldn’t resist naming their company something condescending and insulting – so confident were they of the imminent destruction of mankind.
I can almost hear the CEO himself, Zoroxx, probably, laughing during a board meeting as he named the company! “Ah ha ha! The stupid people of earth have no idea! I will crush them all and also crumple them up like discarded pieces of paper and toss them asunder, like so many crumpled pieces of paper. Ha ha ha! Simple humans! Ah ha ha ha – hey, wait, that’s great! Let’s use that! Also, Maryanne, sweetheart, get me a latte.”
Thus the company was named!
And it would have happened, too, if it weren’t for a plucky little fella name of Ted – me! – who happened to see this in the grocery store last night and uncover their devious plot.
(For the record, all I did was uncover their devious plot. Someone else still has to actually stop them.)
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Finally! Street-Legal Once Again!
And, geez, I only had to go to like eight freakin’ Pep Boys before I found it in stock!
I tell you, these fix-it tickets are a pain in the ass!
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Big Lots Presents Christmas in July!
SO I WAS AT my local Big Lots the other day, searching for recently expired “limited edition” holiday-themed breakfast cereal.
I wasn’t disappointed!
By the way, like you, I detest this current version of Cap’n Crunch. And I say this with a certain amount of trepidation, because there’s some graphic artist out there who drew this – and by the way can draw way better than I ever could – and he (or she!) is just doing his (or her!) job and probably is merely giving the Quaker people what they want.
Not literally the Quaker people – that is, not the religious sect – but “the Quaker people” meaning the people at Quaker Oats, itself a division of PepsiCo since 2001. But who’s to say the people at Quaker Oats / PepsiCo aren’t themselves of the Quaker faith? Who’s to say?
Also, did I ever tell you how I used to be a delivery boy for PepsiCo? It’s true! Well, not technically PepsiCo, but for a company that exclusively did graphics work for PepsiCo’s in-house art department. Oh, it was years ago.
There! Purchase, New York! I was a strapping young man, the summer after graduating high school and—-
Oh forget it.
Anyway, my point was that I hate how Cap’n Crunch looks now, and now, so do you.
His head and nose is the same size and shape of the hideous 70s-80s-90s version of Fred Flintstone. Why can’t they go back to the more stylized, original, 60s, Jay Ward Studio design? Of Cap’n Crunch, not Fred Flintstone! Nobody likes a smartass.
It’s not like there’s nobody around who could draw the Cap’n like that. I mean, Flickr is full of you people who delight in drawing vintage characters the way they’re supposed to be drawn and also better than me. So hop to it! Get those cocktail napkins and Prismacolors out! Get to work! Chop-chop!
And you guys at PepsiCo-slash-Quaker Oats! You keep doing your silly Pepsi “Throwback” vintage cans and your retro cereal boxes – well, for God’s sake, get your heads out of your asses and okay a non-limited edition redesign for the Cap’n Crunch box!
I can’t believe I have to be the one – yet again! – to state the obvious! My God, you PepsiCo people and you Flickr folks – you’re perfect for each other! Everyone sees it but you two! Everyone! The way you’re always teasing each other whenever we all go out. And you always manage to sit next to each other when we go to the movies. Jeez, it’s so obvious you’re into one another! What the hell is it going to take to get you two together?
Wait, wait. There was something else I was working towards here…
Oh, yes – went to Big Lots, found the expired cereal that’s been sitting there since last year, continued poking around, saw these things:
So just how lazy is your cat that you’re buying these?! Cats are the one self-cleaning pet that there is!
“Between Bath” wipes?! Who bathes a cat? If I was stupid enough to try to get Mr. Whiskers anywhere near the tub, it’d be off to the emergency room for stitches and tetanus shots for me, brother!
Hell, I can’t imagine even trying to wipe him down with what amounts to be a Wet-Nap without putting on my chain mail shirt, motocross helmet and black rubber welding gloves. (And with my luck, then Debbie walks in and wonders why I’m wearing the outfit when it’s not even Saturday night and the kids aren’t at her mother’s.)
And “great for pets on the go”…?! On the go where? Who brings a cat anywhere? Cats aren’t “on the go.” They’re the “stay-behind” pet! They’re the Official Stay-Behind Pet of the 2012 Summer Olympics! They’re everywhere they want to be, which is at home! “Pets on the go…!” Sheesh.
So, by abruptly switching gears and completely changing the subject halfway through, making obscure cartoon references that only a handful of people will get, constructing elaborate and abstract analogies that make sense to even fewer readers, and going on for way too long, that’s how I single-handedly blew out the transmission of a blog-post heading down the internet at 80 miles an hour at three in the morning and managed to lose most of my, what, six regular readers.
“Oh Commander, that’s amazing!”
Quite.
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What Did I Tell You!? What Did I Tell You?!
I told you! I knew it! I just knew it!
Remember how I wrote about Wendy’s precious new “baked sweet potato” some time ago? Remember?
Well, if you don’t remember, here’s my review for you to re-read and refresh your memory!
Anyway, remember, specifically, how I wrote – and I quote – how I wrote,
Remember how I wrote that? Yeah, well, today I went to Wendy’s and this was the only potato available!
What kind of potato is that? I’ll tell you what kind of potato is that! It’s a regular potato is what it is! There are no “sweet” potatoes at Wendy’s anymore! The so-called “sweet” potatoes are gone, pal! The whole place has been scrubbed of any reference, allusion, mention – any trace of them! Gone!
It’s like the whole thing never existed! But we know different, don’t we?
Also, their precious macaroni and cheese “Signature Side” has also been discontinued (industry term), probably at the same time, but I’d like to think that they gave the ol’ sweet potato the axe first, if only by a matter of seconds. Even if it was just mentioned first in the sentence when Wendy’s Vice-President in Charge of Discontinued Menu Items announced “Effective immediately, we’re discontinuing the baked sweet potato and the macaroni and cheese. That is all. Over.” Into an intercom on his desk, I’d like to think.
Into an intercom on his desk and it’s simultaneously broadcast through a sort of school p.a. system in every Wendy’s all at once. Man, can you imagine wielding that kind of power? To just push a button on your desk and speak into a little box and discontinue a menu item?! How cool is that!
The third of Wendy’s precious “Signature Sides” – the chili cheese fries? Still there. Exactly like I kind of predicted! Exactly!
Frankly, chili cheese fries at Wendy’s is a no-brainer and I’m surprised they didn’t come up with that years ago, on account of they sell fries and they sell chili there anyway. Considering all the times people eating from open jars of peanut butter used to bump into other people eating large chocolate bars, doesn’t it stand to reason that at some point over the last forty some-odd years in at least one of Wendy’s 6,600+ locations, someone carrying fries would accidentally slam into someone carrying chili?
But I guess it doesn’t matter how it happened, just that it did happen.
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So The Head of The Ted Parsnips Website Design Team Is Crying Poverty Again!
…and I almost authorized a raise! Almost!
Thankfully, that very afternoon I decided to take my post-lunch constitutional through the employee parking lot and saw him walking away from his car.
Mm.
Just so you know, folks…? If any of you ever apply for work here at Ted Parsnips, LLC…?
It’s bad form to have more chrome swans than your boss. And frankly, at eighteen, even I admit I’m pushing the envelope of good taste. But twenty-two! There’s just no excuse! The mudflap babes are, of course, completely acceptable.
Anyway, to teach the miscreant savante (French word!) a lesson, I plucked out one of his precious bulldog’s googly eyes – the right one. (His right! The bulldog’s right! Sheesh!) He’ll get it back when – and only when – I get that total website redesign I keep hearing promises about!
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An Exciting Little Caper!
HERE’S one that’ll have you saying “Hey, gotta hand it to ol’ Ted – he hit the nail on the head with this one, as he so often does!”
I was walking down the street the other day and there’s a pleasant little house on the block south of me. Oh, it’s a cute little cottage-type thing that you’d expect to see in a nice neighborhood, in a decent city; not in this rundown, trash-strewn, slum-ridden area of the filthy toilet that is Los Angeles.
And yet there it was.
I respect people’s privacy and private areas, so I won’t give you a shot of the whole place – but hell, I shot it from a public sidewalk, so my attorney can just shut his lawhole and relax, for God’s sake.
Looks nice, eh? Quaint, in a word, right?
You’d almost expect Rachel Arsewell herself to step right out on the porch and holler “Wot the ‘ell are you snappin’ bloody pictures o’ me ‘ouse for, wot? Get outter ‘ere before I pry a leg off’n me vintage 1920s naturally distressed white finish farmhouse gelding table and beat you within a centimeter of your bloomin’ life! Off with yeh, then, before I ring the constable!”
You’d almost expect something just like that, and you’d be right to.
But before we hurry on our way, let’s take a closer look at one of the little design elements to the exterior. You’re smart – you know exactly what I’m referring to.
There it is.
And here’s the thing: I guess maybe it’s a cute touch…but it makes no sense architecturally!
Accepting, for the moment, that despite your last name being neither Addams nor Munster but you still want to make your house look like it’s in worse repair than it actually is – accepting that, it still makes no sense.
Clearly the idea the idea behind this detail is here’s a darling little bungalow, sure – but even though it’s showing its age, any slight imperfections only make it that much more homey, appealing and cozy. I can buy the whole shoddy chic angle to this decorating flourish. That I can buy.
What I have trouble with is the fact that the charming “exposed bricks” are on top of the stucco.
Anyone with even an elementary knowledge of home construction knows that any brickwork would be under the stucco. The stucco is applied on top of the bricks, to cover it up and give it a uniform, flat surface. So this little added detail, which we all agree is just goddamn adorable, is entirely absurd.
I can’t imagine I’m the only one who notices this. Our street gets a lot of foot traffic – gang members, drug dealers, taggers, the chronically homeless – and no doubt every single one of them who passes this place is thinking the same thing – albeit in another language – and most of them are probably laughing about it.
I’m a good neighbor, however, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let the rest of the neighborhood make fun of the fine people living in one of the few nice houses around here.
So tonight, reeeal late, see, I’m going to sneak down the street and with hammer and chisel, knock off those stupid fake bricks once and for all and then pound the holy hell out of a few random areas on the exterior, knocking loose as much of the stucco and exposing the actual brick beneath before the lights start coming on.
And I need you at the curb with the car running.
Let’s do this.
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My Comic-Con Schedule!
IT’S that time again, gang! Comic-Con time!
Here’s my schedule of all the events I’m either a part of or that I plan to passive-aggressively horn my way into! If you see me, be sure to come up and say hello, unless I’m talking to someone more famous or who can do more for my career than you, in which case, don’t you dare interrupt. Don’t you dare.
As always, I’m happy to sign autographs – and still for my nominal fourteen dollar charge! (Exact change please.) Just let me know whose name you want me to sign and on what. My Will Eisner is all but indistinguishable from the real thing (especially now that I’m spelling it right) and my Bill Finger’s been getting some nice notices as well. Ask about my Siegel & Shuster “two-fer” discount!
Above: Some of my most requested autographs.
On with my schedule!
Thursday July 12
3:00-4:00 – Finding Last-Minute Lodgings in a Booked-Solid San Diego: A Candid Discussion
I plan to leave the cesspool that is Los Angeles at exactly five-thirty a.m. Thursday morning so I can get down to the Con when everything starts. But it’s three a.m. as I write this, and I’ll likely oversleep until 1:30 in the afternoon. I have no place to stay (yet!) but I’ll be damned if I spend three nights in my car again for the sixth year in a row. Head on over to Room 212 in the Bushmiller Pavilion if you have any suggestions. If you’re a vendor, maybe we can strike a deal and I can help you construct a fort out of your comic book boxes and sleep right there in your booth, making sure none of the notoriously sticky-fingered security guards roaming the convention at night start pawing through your stacks of vintage Little Lulus.4:30-5:30 – The Mystery of the Whitman Comics 3-Pack
Were Whitman comics ever sold individually in the 1970s? They were priced individually, yes – but is there an actual recorded instance of any issue sold singly, by itself, alone – and not in the little plastic bag where you got two decent funny animal ones and one piece of crap you never read like “Battle of the Planets” or, God forbid, “Star Trek” in the middle, which you couldn’t even see until you got home and ripped open the plastic? We’ll explore the evidence and talk to some guy who used to worked in a Rexall Drug Store back then. Room 218 (off of the Gottfredson Ballroom).
Friday July 13
11:00-12:00 – The “Stop Saying Zombie Apocalypse” Panel
A heartfelt plea to the general public and the media to stop using the phrase “the zombie apocalypse” immediately. Please note: People using the phrase “the zombie apocalypse” will not be admitted. Room 8.1:00-2:00 – Who Was Wealthier: Scrooge McDuck or Richie Rich? A Debate
Obsessed Swedish “Barks-ologist” Mågnild Ljüngbørg and completist Richie Rich collector Franklin Todd go head to head to finally settle the question which has baffled young children under the age of ten for decades: Who has more money – the edema-suffering “Poor Little Rich Boy” in the Eton collar or the greedy, globe-trotting waterfowl from Duckburg? You won’t want to miss this one, especially if you just bought a hot dog or a slice of pizza and need a place to sit down and eat it. Room 27-C.Midnight-1:30am – The Golden Age of Animation’s Most Hilariously Racist Cartoons
A Comic-Con Tradition! Join fellow animation enthusiasts as I screen clips from 37 vintage animated shorts from the 1920s through the late 1950s featuring the most patently offensive ethnic stereotypes you’ve ever seen! In the interest of time, I’ve edited them down to just the funny parts so they’re completely out of context. My promise: I will not waste time getting all Leonard Maltin on you by explaining these were “a product of their time.” The clip of the disgusting hairy Slovak peddler (“Toby the Pup in Prague,” Van Beuren Studios, 1930) is alone worth attending to see! Room 15.
Saturday July 14
1:00-2:30 – No, You’re Not The Next Mel Blanc: The “101 Bad Voices” and “101 Worse Voices” Panel
We’ll be screening a bunch of highly annoying, often infuriating YouTube videos of those jackasses who honestly believe they can get work as voiceover talent based on the dozens of very slightly different voices, none of them good and most of them based not on the original source – but on someone else’s impression of the original (usually an SNL cast member). Roll your eyes and grumble with the rest of us as we hear the requisite Stewie, Scooby-Doo and Cartman again and again and again, plus numerous other animated characters none of which are currently in need of a new actor to portray them. Also: We’ll be speaking with a panel of animation voice casting directors who’ll discuss why they don’t tend to hire new talent based on clips on the internet where someone is only able to perform a rudimentary vocal facsimile of an actor or character’s one most famous catchphrase. Room 12A.
4:00-6:00 – 60s Sitcom Powerhouses: Sheriff Taylor & Lt. McHale
What a treat! Set a spell and listen as I interview two of 1960s television’s biggest legends – Andy Griffith and Ernest Borgnine -as they describe what it was like to star in a hit comedy of the early 1960s. Paul Henning Amphitheatre. Canceled.3:00pm-4:30am – The People Versus Matt Groening
Join us as we hijack 20th Century Fox’s “Simpsons” panel – where they intended to discuss the upcoming season – and instead force Matt Groening, Al Jean, various writers, producers and show-runners to watch every single goddamn episode of the last season, “A Clockwork Orange“-style, and subsequently force them to defend each recycled plot, every single unfunny joke and awful line in a kangaroo court that hopefully will result in a formal apology and mutual agreement to finally pull the goddamn plug on the show once and for all.4:00-5:30 – The Annual Jack Kirby Anecdotal Circle Jerk
Come join friends and fans of the late, great Jack Kirby as we all attempt to outdo one another with a personal story or remembrance of the comic book legend, née God, who conveniently is no longer around to dispute any of what is said. The room fills up fast so be sure to get there early so you don’t miss a single one of the amazing stories you’ve heard ten times before! Room 23-BSunday July 15
10:30-12:00 – I’m Dickens, He’s Fenster: A 50th Anniversary Celebration
It was half a century ago this September 28th that a small portion of the nation first watched, with diminishing interest week by week, the probably pleasant and likely amusing adventures of Harry Dickens and Arch Fenster, until the last episode aired September 13th of the following year. I’ll be moderating neither John Astin (Dickens?) nor Marty Ingels (Fenster, I guess) but rather a panel of people not even tangentially involved in the television industry but who, like you, may have seen stills of the show or think the title at least sounds familiar. Also: What the next fifty years will bring, Dickens & Fenster-wise. Attendees are encouraged to come dressed as their favorite “I’m Dickens, He’s Fenster” character. Room 18, Adam West Wing.
5:00-6:00 – Nude-But-For-A-Mask Cosplay Parade at Black’s Beach
Our only offsite event, not officially sanctioned by the Con, but you know if Stan Lee can negotiate the treacherous cliff, he’ll be there! Please, no Furries or Gamorrean Guards! Torrey Pines, San Diego.
Okay, I think that’s it. See you there! Now to get some sleep, then hop in the car and head down the freeway before my attorney reads any of this.
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Now I’m Going To Be Hearing “I Told You To Write It Down!” For The Next Two Weeks!
SO LORI CALLS ME at work and asks me to pick up something for her on the way home. Fine; no big deal, right? Mm.
This is apparently what she wanted:
This is what I got:
But like I told her – they say you’re supposed to switch your deodorants every so often anyway, right? And I’m sure the big presentation she’s giving tomorrow that she’s been so stressed about will go fine.
Oh, believe me, folks – the copy I originally wrote for this one was worse.
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“For God So Loved The World…
…that He gave His only begotten son.”
He gave his only begotten son eight fingers is what he gave him!
Oh, sure, impose on Him to change water into wine for your party, no problem; see if He wouldn’t mind raising the dead for you, it’s done. But ask Him what size Isotoners he wears so you can get him a little something for Christmas, and suddenly things get awkward.
Look, I know it’s not unusual for cartoon characters to have only four fingers per hand, but when that cartoon character is based on a real-life celebrity, in this case the Christ, shouldn’t you go the extra mile and draw that fifth digit?
While I’m at it – since I’m going to hell anyway for mocking not only the Lord himself as well as the perfectly reasonable artwork by some anonymous artist out there who can draw better than me – while I’m at it, what’s up with this?
The open-palm bent-pinky gesture, that is! Why do so many cartoonists do this? Is it just a little artisterly pretension? A cartoonisterly affectation? Jesus’s other hand doesn’t look that way. Or is that the point – to mix things up a bit, you know – break the fingeral monotony so the two hands don’t look identical?
Or does Jesus suffer from early onset rheumatoid arthritis and it’s painful to unbend that pinky?
Now I’ll be the first to admit that I used to draw the open-palm bent-pinky gesture, or OPBPG, myself, but in my defense, I learned it by watching you!
And by “you,” I don’t mean you, but rather the output of pretty much everyone at Archie Comics, from Bob Goldschwartz to Stann Montecarlo as well as the entire stable of Harvey Comics artists, none of whom I know by name. (Don’t worry; neither do you.)
Look! Look!
They all used it! They all used the OPBPG! Why? Why?!
Who holds their hand this way?! It’s not easy! Try it! No, go ahead – try it!
If you’re like me you’re just going to end up with finger cramps and stigmata.
Ted Parsnips
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