I'm tired of my pig room. I didn't even want it in the first place so to say that I can't stand it now (after 3 years) would be an understatement. It all started when my family won a chance to be on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition . They gave us a shot because my dad (Kirby) blew his arm off with a tractor beam while filming an audition for NASA (he didn't get it). With this in mind, they wanted to give us a house that was "one-arm" accessible. Which they did. And we're very appreciative of this. Especially my one-armed dad. Kirby.

Except, I never asked for a pig room. This adventure of decoration happened when Ty Pennington was assigned to follow me around for the day. We were toiling around in my backyard, shooting baskets on my Nerf hoop and playing jacks, when out of nowhere, in the distance, I saw a pig. Since, I don't normally see pigs anywhere near my backyard or throughout any avenue of my life ever, I shouted: "Whoa! Look! A pig!" I should have known I was in trouble when Ty immediately scribbled in his Extreme notebook. He must have taken this simple acknowledgement of a foreign object in my ordinary world as a sign that every ounce of my being is filled with an undying love/obsession of pigs.

Soon thereafter, they revealed my new and "improved" room. Pink walls filled with curly-cues and snouts, a bacon-maker next to my "pigpen" bed just down the hall from my bathroom, the main feature of which is a pig-slop bucket bidet. Did I mention I'm 28?

When I went to Ty to ask if I could have a "redo" he told me they were "kind of over budget." He then yelled, "Hey what's that over there?!" When I turned back around, he was gone, or more precisely, sprinting away.

Things have gotten so bad, I've taken to sleeping in my brother's "baseball" room. He doesn't like sports.

Thanks but no thanks, Quiznos guy. I'd rather not take the Free Meal Punch Card. It's too daunting. In fact, it's exhausting. All that work, punching away, week after week, just to get $5 off a meal *only when spending $5 or more. Is it worth all the trouble? I don't even go to Quiznos that often. By the time I get my 10 punches, the deal will probably have expired.

I can't take the responsibility of always having that in my wallet either. I don't like committing things to such a limited space if it isn't money or plastic. These paper Free Meal Punch Cards seem far too temporary and insignificant to justify a semi-permanent spot in my wallet. And you just know it's gonna fall out somehow. Just as I'm on 9. Then I'll really be shattered.

Not to mention the whole facing the cashier without the Free Meal Punch Card thing. God forbid that happens – then they'll give me a whole new Free Meal Punch Card and I'll have to start all over again. Oy, I can't even think of it.

You know what, I think I'll just skip the Quiznos experience altogether. I don't want to have to tell them that I'd rather not take the Free Meal Punch Card. Because then they'd ask why (they're very neurotic about these things). They just wouldn't understand. Yeah, I'm the crazy one. It's so crazy to stop frequenting a sandwich shop because you can't take the responsibility of a Free Meal Punch Card. At least I won't have a polluted wallet.

Who's the crazy one now?

How’s this for entrepreneuring.  I’m starting my own business.  This business is the model of efficiency and profits. 

This business is putting flyers underneath the windshield wipers of cars.

It’s “can’t miss” in that people are in their cars a lot.  And they can’t not see flyers underneath their windshield wipers when they’re in said cars.  So, I’ve already reached my target audience.  This is much preferable to the old guard and what I call “their old ways of doing things”, i.e., rubber-banding flyers around doorknobs.  Science has proved that this simply doesn’t work.  People just turn the knob and keep right on going.  It’s almost as if the flyer isn’t even there!  And, for those limited times in which they do acknowledge the rubber-banded flyer, it’s usually just to throw it on the ground.  Where it can get stepped on!  Is that any way to gain flyer visibility?  On the ground with muddy footprints on it?  I don’t think so.  You wouldn’t even be able to read it! 

When a flyer is underneath a windshield wiper, the person can always see it.  This is just simple acknowledgement that glass is see-through.  And as you see through, the flyers beckon.  “Take me out from underneath your windshield wiper so I can be read!” 

Which brings me to my most convincing point.  Let’s face it, there are red lights everywhere.   People need something to do at a red light.  That something is certainly going to be reading the flyers I place underneath your windshield wiper. 

I know what you’re thinking.  What if it rains?  Ah hah!  This just gives the driver more urgency to obtain the flyer before it gets wet and the pen ink stains their windshield!  It just means my idea works faster and therefore better. So, in a way, I’ll be praying for rain.  Not the normal type of praying wish, I know, but God has to listen regardless.  And maybe just this once he happens to hear my prayer for rain and think, “You know what, it hasn’t rained in a while, I suppose now’s as good a time as any.”  And I’ll be waiting.  Flyers in hands-clasped in prayer mode hands.  Near a car.  With a windshield. 

And windshield wipers.

As summertime revs up, people have been clamoring for Merchandise to finally take a break from entertaining the youth of America with cat puppet shows and step up to the streets, dance and then kindly recommend something to watch inside

It’s getting altogether too pleasant outside so Katy bar the door, close the blinds and fire up the ol’ VHS player.  It is time for… THE Trilogy. 

Yes, all three movies of the Problem Child franchise.

Problem Child
Problem Child 2
Problem Child 3: Junior in Love

It’s no coincidence that the first Problem Child came into our collective consciousness as the Cold War was ending.  The United States had a “problem child” of our own in the Soviet Union.

Many wondered after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 if the Cold War was really over.  As usual, it fell to the world of art to put a period at the end of the long paragraph that was the CCCP.  Duty called for the savants/creators of Problem Child to help us turn the page.  We were given meaning in the story of an adopted orphan that wreaks havoc wherever he goes.  We were supplicated by the saga of a “brow-beaten yuppie” and his search for spiritual completion, only to be saddled with a mean-spirited, incorrigible and literally redheaded stepchild.  It told our nation that we must “adopt” Boris Yeltsin and his cohorts, no matter how often they got into unbelievable situations.  In short, democracy could exhale.

And then the gift kept on giving with Problem Child 2.  Luckily, we only had to wait a year for this sequel in which a second inveterate child was given forth for the world to intellectually dismantle.  Alas, Problem Child 2 was only a mezzo-mezzo affair as it lacked the overall historical significance of the first.  This disappointment was grappled with for years as Americans were left to wonder aloud, “Where’s the beef Problem Child franchise makers?  Where’s the beef?” 

Luckily, the beef was found, savored and then quickly devoured in 1995.  Again, the bat of artistic expression met the ball of antiquity with Problem Child 3: Junior in Love.

If a movie is to be truly successful on all fronts, it must hold up a mirror to society at large.  Problem Child 3: Junior in Love accomplished this goal by functioning mainly as a disguised deconstruction of the Croatian battle against Serbian forces in Krajina (with, don’t forget, the full cooperation of ARBiH or Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovena).

Now, some in the Problem Child Franchise Fan Community (PCFFC) have disagreed with this assessment, calling it an “utterly elitist elucidation.”  They’d have you know that Problem Child 3: Junior in Love was really a simple love story based on the Julia Roberts, Lyle Lovett nuptials.  Well, “Phooey” to that simplistic underestimation.  If we are to use common sense, then Problem Child 3: Junior in Love is clearly and unequivocally a reflection of Croatia’s own “problem child”, Serbia (with the Serb capital of Banja Luka standing in for Dr. Peabody, played by Gilbert Gottfried).

NOTE:  Although Problem Child 3: Junior in Love is not considered canonical by the purists, it can be seen as a rightful continuation of the heady ambition of the original Problem Child, therefore rendering it canonical in the truest sense of the word.

So, go ahead, treat yourself with “The Tantrum Pack.”  Spend a summer day reliving art imitating life imitating art imitating… I’m not sure which one to end that on.  Which should tell you something about what you’re getting yourself into.  You’re getting yourself into greatness, my friends.  Greatness.

I'm sure you're just like me. Sick and tired of being sick and tired of illegal immigrants. Can't they all just be born here like everybody else? I mean, HELLO! Try being born in NEW Mexico next time. Dumbass.

Let me start over. I just got done reading/being inspired by this other dude's blog and he had some really insightful, intuitive things to say about the cure for illegals. This part blew my mind:

"Bush wants us to cut the amount of gas we use. The best way to stop using so much gas is to deport 11 million illegal immigrants! That would be 11 million less people using our gas. The price of gas would come down. ??Bring our troops home from Iraq to guard the border. When they catch an illegal immigrant crossing the border, hand him a canteen, rifle and some ammo and ship him to Iraq. Tell him if he wants to come to America then he must serve a tour in the military. Give him a soldier's pay while he's there and tax him on it."

How did we go so long without thinking of this? The answer was right under our nose all along!

This solution was so fantastic, it challenged me to do some long overdue thinking of my own. And now I've come up with an even better idea for combatting illegals:

Build a 10,000 foot wall around the entire border of the United States.

I know. You're slapping yourself on the forehead right now. It's almost too easy! And if we start today, the 10,000 foot wall will be completed by some time in 4012. I realize that 2,004 years is a long time but think of it this way; we'll be awfully glad in 4012 that we got started in 2008. Awfully glad and completely safe.

Sure, we'll never see the ocean again but it's a small price to pay for not having to watch another illegal float here on a raft from Cuba. The last thing we need is another expert paddler who can't speak English.

This way the terrorists can't get to us either. What are they gonna do? Fly planes into a 10,000 foot wall? GOOD LUCK WITH THAT! It's going to take a whole lotta planes to bring down a 10,000 foot wall! And let's say you do break it. What next? I'll tell you what next, nothing, cuz you're dead from the crash into the 10,000 foot wall. Idiot.

So you can thank your ol' pal Merch for heretofore unseen but obvious conclusions on how to fix our biggest problems.

I'm cooking up a doozy for global warming (teaser: it involves nuking the sun). Til then, grab a brick and help me build this wall dammit!

As most of you are probably aware by now, my new record, "Nuke the Nukes" has tanked.

There are myriad reasons for this. First off, the record company didn't understand my vision. I was looking for a John Mayer-ish warmth mixed with a Sepultura urgency, something they clearly didn't get. This has to be the reason they took the project out of my hands, only to bring in Phil Spector to produce an alternate version of my work.

Perhaps the worst sin of all was that they didn't put enough marketing muscle behind it. Excuuuuuuuse me, but one bum with a sandwich board does not a marketing campaign make. And they didn't even put him on a visible corner. I kept telling them there was not enough traffic in northwestern Nebraska to justify putting all our chips into that basket. But they assured me that "the Brask" was where the tweens were hanging out these days.

Regardless, we all know that the tweens are the wrong demo for my passionate take on using half the world's nuclear weapons to blow up the other half of the world's nuclear weapons. This message clearly sailed over their heads.

And having me guest star on the long-running Cinemax softcore porn series, "Lipstick Traces," was clearly not the best way to expose the record-buying public to my impassioned plea for stopping nuclear explosions with other nuclear explosions. As much as I respect the actress I had near-sex with, her eyes rolled back into her head every time I mentioned that Pakistan's nukes could only be stopped with India's nukes.

Doesn't anyone get me?

Now, my art won't even rust in peace in the "Used" bins because it hasn't been used at all in the first place.

What does this do for my career? I must say it's at the very least making me consider career suicide. I'm thisclose to telling my career as a musical genius to begin cutting itself as a cry for help.

If that doesn't work, I will counsel my career to begin looking for a) a running car and b) a closed garage.

Then at least my career can r.i.p. with an extended group of like-minded friends up to and including Garth Brooks as Chris Gaines, the Mondale/Ferraro ticket, Tommy Morrison the actor, Magic Johnson the talk show host, Christie Brinkley the artist, Michael Richards the bigot, Crystal Pepsi, the burger that stumbled upon a starving Orson Welles and the whiskey that thought it could sneak out while Pat Morita was vomiting.

But there's a lesson to be learned from these career deaths. And that is this: Never let your ambition exceed your grasp.

This is why I've decided to go back to comedy. My roots. My specialty. My "back to Africa."

In short, world, you're welcome in advance. You won't have me and my Mushroom Cloud Destroying Mushroom Cloud to kick around anymore.