Uncle Bing

November 25, 2002

"Growing up, Uncle Bing was like the uncle I never had. He was my father's estranged brother, who had been kicked out of the family for loving jazz. That's what he said, anyway, it didn't seem that bad to us.

Dad would secretly invite Uncle Bing to Thanksgiving dinner every year, and we'd pass him turkey and giblets through the doggy door. I was never sure who we were hiding Bing from, since mom always made sure to make extra portions for him. Maybe Stephanie had a problem with Uncle Bing I hadn't heard about.

When dad wasn't around, Bing liked to take my brother Goose and I under this wing, teaching us that money was for folks who didn't know how to pick a lock or sledgehammer a doorknob. For the bold, every neighborhood was like a department store and every kitchen a supermarket. Every garage was still a garage, but Uncle Bing had sent away for a correspondence course in hotwiring. So really every garage was like a used car lot, only not yet.

The neighborhood kids loved to make fun of Goose and I for our threadbare, out-of-season clothes, thanks to Dad's gambling and croquet habits. But only the really stupid ones were still laughing when we showed up wearing the clothes that had recently gone missing from their closets, thanks to Uncle Bing.

Goose and I looked up to Bing like he was our dad's brother, and we even baked him a giant oatmeal cookie the year he scammed the government into letting him stay at their big gray hotel for free."

Quote of the Day

“Don't run if you can walk. Don't walk if you can stand. Don't stand if you can sit. Don't sit if you can lie down. Don't like down if you can sleep. Don't sleep if you can be put into a medically induced coma. Don't be put into a medically induced coma if you can kick back in an iron lung and have machines shit for you. Don't do any of that if golf is on TV.”

-Lazy Larry Lisbaine

Fortune 500 Cookie

You're gonna die this week. Sorry we couldn't put a more clever spin on that. In the meantime, try pouring sugar on your cereal instead of milk. Fuck it, what's anybody gonna do about it now? If it's any consolation, almost everyone in the world doesn't know you're alive anyway. This week's lucky coffin models: Dirt Rocket III, Econo-Sarcophagus Jr, The Spruce Moose, Office Max Moving Box Model 223117, The Bobsled to Hell, Spring-Loaded Jokester's Delight, Seventh Generation Biodegradable Grandma Sack, foot locker in your ex-boyfriend's closet.

Try again later.

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