And when you least expect it, they will come--they will come with their roll of duct tape and their vial of vile green pez. They will strap you into a chair and scotch tape your eyes open, shining a bright and annoying light into your eyes as they cram the pez down your throat.

Tommy Lee Jones clones. Hundreds of them. Out there with clip boards. Clip boards and bus schedules that are not REALLY bus schedules. (shh. Don't ask. Don't tell. It is safer that way.)

(*Yes, Melvin! Sharpen the pencils. Sharpen them all. I feel a stirring in the force. Evil is at hand.*)

Not G.

Tommy Lee Jones clones...

Please, don't get me all excited on a Sunday morning!! My little heart can't take it!!!

Gadzooks Leather Lad! We've been ratted out! Us fugitive pigeons had best wing it down to Paraguay post haste.

39 and counting.

I have not nor have I ever consumed a twinkie. I have no knowledge of any Joneses, Tommy Lee or otherwise.

Nope. No black birds or talking statues.

Where's that tin foil? Are you guys nuts?

(I understand Paraguay is beautiful this time of year. But the llama butter plays hell with the digestive system.)

...is a useful device. It wrecks havoc with tracking devices and if worn properly is even considered a moderately effective form of birth control. (*oops! Sorry Melvin. Here, use the tinsel instead. It works just as well, it is just harder to cover your whole body in it one strand at a time.*)

Things are lovely in Paraguay this time of year. Melvin and I are floating down the river on one of the finest tributaries of the River Denial. Our friends AC and the Red Army are having some sort of military maneuvers practice. I can't quite make it out, but they seem to be using some large pale object as a target. DANG! Bullseye! Good goin' Red Army!

Hee hee.

(*Oh, Melvin, that's adorable. Yes, do wrap another strand of the lights around yourself. I don't know if the arcade lights interfere with the tracking devices or not, but you look scrumptious in them! Come here. A strand of tinsel is slipping.*)

Not Galatea

...birth control. Re-watching "The Lamb" seems to do very well for us.

It was a brooding household the years we were forced to give up tinsel due to the dietary restrictions of the boys. (Flounder hee hee the haa haa brave hohoh oho has hooooohoooo them , oh god, I can't stop...).

Leather Lad is finding all sorts of amazing and strategic places to hang tinsel now. Such a bright boy. Very artistic and creative. You should see his finger-paintings.

Hummmm. Large white target..moon-shaped? Are there any twinkie wrappers floating in the river?

Try to stay away from the llama butter. You did say you hated getting your face licked. I assume those restrictions do not apply to Melvin. Face licking does have it's advantages depending on the identification of the licker and the lickee.

But I once went to a costume party dressed as a piece of candy, covered in colored cellophane...

Don't suppose that helps much.

I suggest you avoid being thus attired if Caspian is present.

You don't want to know.

...for the advice, but believe me, you only do that kind of thing once.

I had no idea how hard it was to remove yards of the stuff while being two sheets to the wind...it took forever...Good thing I had help!!

he he he

You lick off the pretty coating and discover something you don't like on the inside...

Those chocolate covered cherries---but only the insides. He pokes a tiny little whole in the bottom, sucks out the goopy cherry inside and returns the chocolate shell to the box which remains on the coffee table for other visitors. Waste not, want not.

*If you like we will dip some olives in chocolate. Just for you, my love.*

Galatea, looking for the fondue pot.

...he brings all his clone siblings and they start asking all kinds of ludicrous questions. And I hope you don't mind being duct taped to a chair for hours on end. Hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and hours and.....well, you get the idea.

Since Melvin came, I have been able to evade them and their evil plots much more easily--but I do notice a distinct increase in the number of large black vans with smoked windows parked outside of my house. Fortunately, Melvin and I have managed to dig a network of escape tunnels beneath the streets of my home town. It is a regular catacomb. I think there are four or five very hungry C.I.A. spooks wandering around down there right now. Heh heh. Melvin left them the olive "tongues" and the chocolate covered cherry shells.

That'll teach 'em.

Bwa ha.

*What a good idea, hon! The chicken skin and toast crusts will be much appreciated by the agents, I'm sure. Better set out a pan of water too. We don't want to run across their desiccated corpses in the tunnel networks.*

Not G.

(1) How many olive tongues would it take to fill your entire bathroom from wall to wall and floor to ceiling? (No olives, just the tongues)

(2) If two black helicopters collided above the forest and blew up, would any debris fall to the ground? Because according to our government, they don't really exist, you know. And you can't hear them. Would you hear them if they blew up?

(3) If you made dozens and dozens of Tommy Lee Jones clones and laid them end to end, how many would you have to make to go around the entire circumference of the earth along the equator?

(4) Same as #3 only along any longitude line crossing both polar areas?

(5) If human gas produces such a nice bright blue flame why don't they use it in fake fireplaces?

(6) Is it true that eating twinkies lowers your IQ 3 points per twinkie consumed?

(7) If you were born crossing the Atlantic Ocean in an airplane would you be able to claim citizenship rights as an alien? Since you came from the sky?

(8) Why does sour cream have an expiration date? Isn't that like an oxymoron?

(9) Why does the C.I.A. administer its brain gravy in green pez now? Isn't it rather insulting to the intelligence of the people they are interrogating to be force fed green pez from the bottom end of a thing with Popeye's head on the top?

(10) Is there any significance to Bill Clinton getting a dog? I mean, he already had a cat. What if this dog is like a Republican controlled robo-dog? Is this why Socks the Cat hates it so much? Could Socks actually be a highly sophisticated robo-detection cat?

I'm just wondering about these things. Uh...just a minute....

*No, I'm not on the internet, honey. I'm just looking for a .... uh ... a ... paper clip. Yeah. I'm in your desk looking for a paper clip. Did you buy olives at the store, huh? Didya?

1. 17,432,754. And a half.

2. You wouldn't hear them UNTIL they blew up.

3. 144. He's a big man, that Tommy Lee Jones.

4. See #3.

5. Because Taco Bell would go out of business.

6. Yes. I used to eat them all the time and now I don't know nothin'.

7. You would be a citizen of Atlantis and you would have webbed feet and be able to talk to sharks and stuff.

8. Have you seen sour cream that's a year old. Do you WANT to put that in your mouth?

9. They only use Gilligan dispensers. It's very calming, especially to terrorists.

10. Socks the Cat is, in fact, an unmarked black helicopter.

The Gathering and the Apocalypse just took place last week. I was in the bathtub--totally naked--but I didn't have any water in there. Just like 52 gallons of olives. And my sweetie was upset with me because 2 or 3 (dozen) went down the drain and she didn't want another bill from the plumber. Well, that's another story....but outside there was this horrific caterwauling and lightning and thunder and horse hoof beats and this little periscope came up from the drain and this loud voice thundered, "Now is the time of the Gathering." And another louder voice said, "Sorry buddy, this time has been reserved for the Apocalypse." Then there was this big argument about who was in charge of the master schedule and what dates had been spoken for when G's little basket of silk poinsettias turned from red to white to red to white to red, and little drops of Hershey's syrup began to drip from the petals and I held it up to show it to her and some of the chocolate syrup dripped on my chest and then.....well....we got distracted because G really loves chocolate syrup and she really, really loves me....and we lost track of what was going on until the next morning ...and by the time we finally got all the olives and chocolate syrup cleaned out of the tub and looked out the window the back yard was full of all this debris and some old guy in tattered clothing was wandering around listlessly and we yelled down and asked him whether the Gathering or the Apocalypse had taken place and he flipped us an obscene gesture and told us it was all over. So G went and got another can of Hershey's syrup out of the refrigerator---and some astrophysicist friend of hers sent her a bottle of Rediwhip and you know I haven't thought about that other stuff much since then. I guess I had other things on my mind. But I'm pretty sure they both were already. Sorry you missed it.