"The Truth" Goes Unrecognized at White House

ormer heavyweight champion Carl "The Truth" Williams visited the Bush White House recently, at the invitation of Secretary of State Colin Powell, and no one there seemed to have a clue as to who he actually was. "The Truth" got the grand tour, meeting with the president, the vice president and many members of their respective staffs, yet all expressed puzzlement as to who he might really be or why he was there.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said "The Truth" looked very much a like "a guy I once hired to put up some sheet rock in my basement, and a couple times we would go off into the little closet down there to smoke crack and give each other handjobs, but other than that, I can't place him."

The president himself was similarly disinclined to speculate on the identity of his guest. "How the hell should I know?" he asked. "All them fellas look alike to me. He's not the guy who delivers the pretzels, is he? Because if he is, I got a few words of ornerification for him."

Vice president Dick Cheney, when asked if he recognized "The Truth," responded by saying that it was possible that he did, but that it would endanger national security and the ability of future vice presidents to effectively do their job if he admitted it. He went on to say that if "The Truth" were to accompany him to an undisclosed location, perhaps they could discuss the matter further by the side of a warm fireplace full of shredded documents.

Mary Matalin, Cheney's spokesperson, came closest to recognizing "The Truth" when she admitted that, "after studying him closely, he does look very much like that guy that fisted me and my serpentine husband up the ass without Vaseline one afternoon last November, but I can't be positive without James here."

Mr. Williams said that, despite the lack of recognition, he very much enjoyed his tour of the First Residence. "Muthafuckahs be livin' large here, y'all!" he was quoted as saying when the Secret Service escorted him out by way of the South Lawn. "Word, dawg, place be almost as happenin' as George Foreman's crib. Sheee-it."

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Not leaving your house when it's really cold is an art form. Any yuhtz can sew a couple dozen dead geese together in the shape of a parka and head out to brave the elements. It takes a real man of character to exist for days, even weeks in the dead of winter without even putting on underwear. And Omar Bricks has character gushing out every orifice in his body.

As anyone who's ever survived a weekend blizzard knows, the first few days are easy. The fridge is stocked, the cable bill's paid for, and the dog doesn't mind holding it. Then around day four things start to get interesting. Suddenly you're out of Frito dip, and things to dip in it. That's when you have to start tapping into whatever store of canned goods you've wisely packed away for the long, cold winter. And if you're like me, that means you'd better be in the mood for six cans of cilantro and an eight-year-old tin of sardines that's bulged out on one side like a pregnant Gobot.

Before long even those well-thought-out provisions have been exhausted, however, and you have to start getting creative. Sure, there's always pizza delivery, but it takes a unique persuasive ability to convince the Dominoes guy to stop by Walgreens and pick you up some toilet paper on the way over.

Some Chinese places deliver, which is handy, but nobody's come up with the brilliant idea yet for a service that will run to the ATM and get some cash for you so you can pay for Chinese food, and so you end up having to barter housewares with some guy who learned English from watching Iron Chef.

After about a week the mailman stops trying to cram any more crap into your jam-packed mailbox, and you begin to run the risk of your lingerie catalogs getting ruined by the snow. What happened to the days when mailmen went door to door, dropping your mail right into your nice warm house through a slot? Now that was convenience! Not that I was alive back then. But now those lazy fuckers can't even be bothered to lean out of the truck a little to stack your mail in a neat little Jenga tower on top of the box. I think that says something about society but I'd rather not go into it right now.

So then you have to train some starving neighborhood dog to go fetch your mail from the box, because your own dog is too smart to fall for any of those tricks. And you've got to do it all without going outside or letting a possibly-insane dog into your house. That involves a lot of clever gestures from the window, and most importantly, a Supersoaker full of bacon grease.

By week two you find out what kind of survivalist you are, hunting for wild game from the upstairs bathroom window and heating your home by burning yesterday's fashions. Both go hand in hand more than you'd expect, since polyester fumes are a powerful appetite suppressant. That's what the Native Americans used to use before they had Dexatrim.

Of course all of this hasn't even scratched the surface of one of the biggest challenges of winter living: getting paid without going to work. Sick days eventually run out, even if you've managed, through a cornucopia of fake voices and accents, to weave a complexly plausible web of lies explaining why you haven't been to work in three weeks. Then it comes time to elevate your game to the next level, which involves convincing people that you're actually calling from work, but have been quarantined to your office and won't be coming out possibly until spring. If you can find a patsy to stencil-paint QUARANTINE on your office door without peeking inside, you're home free. Your mileage may vary in your own place of work, but personally I'd recommend working for the commune in that regard: this place is like a patsy farm.

Bricks out.

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There was a lot of talk this season about contraction in baseball. In other words, rounding up the teams that are too pathetic to wear the mantle of MLB and having them taken out back to be shot, much like my last three dogs who had the plague and my wife after she broke her leg power-walking. Some say this would be good for the sport: to thin out the ranks so that only the strong survive, and throwing the rest to the wolves of more popular sports, like football and croquet. Others argue that it's just a ploy by the owners, a bluff to get the players to agree to electroshock tracking collars at the next contract negotiation meetings. Everywhere, people are talking about it: from a WWII vet I met in a barbershop on Tuesday to a traveling salesman I met in another barbershop Saturday afternoon. The buzz in the air is palpable.

What do I think about the impeding contraction? Good riddance! The teams most often rumored to be under the axe are the Montreal Expos, the Florida Marlins, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays and the Minnesota Twins—not a half-dozen men between them. I mean that: the Devil Rays are actually a little-league team from Georgia who won some kind of Cheerios Sweepstakes to play in the big leagues. The last time they played the Yankees half the team went home with wedgies and pink-bellies. So they're an easy call.

How about the Montreal Expos? Frankly, I'm surprised a team named after an off-brand of panty hose has lasted this long. No need to worry about protests if we put them out of their misery, a gay pride parade in Nebraska draws more folks than an Expos game. I went to an Expos game one time on fan appreciation day, thinking I'd get a bobble-headed doll or something, right? Wrong. I went home with Vladimir Guerrero, it turns out every ticket-buying fan got a player for the weekend. He sealed my driveway and helped me dredge out the basement: a very nice young man. It was probably our folly in thinking that Canadians would be interested in American baseball anyway, since what they call "baseball" is a far different sport that involves whiskey and chainsaws.

What about the Florida Marlins? Their problem is exactly the opposite of the Devil Rays: the youngest guy on the team is 76, and he's the bat boy. I guess that's what you get for putting a team in a place where the state bird is Betty White. I saw a Marlins game once where the third baseman was killed three times during the game: twice by line drives and the third time he had a stroke during the seventh-inning stretch. They have more EMTs in their stadium than the Cardinals have hot-dog vendors, and their games take six hours because they're constantly having to revive the players (and some fans) with the electroshock paddles. And did I mention that they're slower than David Wells in a Jacuzzi full of glue? The entire team had one stolen base last year, and that only happened because the catcher for the Brewers, Snapper McGee (who had been traded from the Marlins only weeks earlier), died on the play and hence couldn't throw to second.

So the Marlins are out. That leaves the Minnesota Twins. Here's my question to you: has anyone actually seen the Twins in the last few seasons? I don't recall that I have and I'm starting to get worried that they might be buried in the snow up there or may have been eaten by Sasquatches. I recommend we send some St Bernards northward to confirm that the team is even still there before we talk about folding their franchise.

The thing I want to know, though, is why only four teams? Surely these aren't the only miserable excuses for a baseball team that we could rightfully give the ol' Kervorkian treatment to. Are we sure anyone in Anaheim got those flyers under their windshield wipers letting them know they have a team? The last time I was at an Angels game, the team didn't even show up, and I spent the afternoon playing pickle with their coach and a janitor. I heard the Kansas City Royals had to bus in hobos for their games this season, since the only fans that showed up were the players' moms, and they were driving the coaches crazy, loudly second-guessing all of their decisions.

I'm sure we could cut a lot more teams if we were serious about ridding this sport of losers and has-beens. Who would cry a tear for the Verno Beach Needledicks or the Fresno Filibusters? What about the Woody Creek Dirty Liars or the Mason City Menopause? Now that I think of it, I'm kind of tired of the Chula Vista Screaming Dandies, the Eugene Scat-Flinging Apes and the Apple Valley Dipshits, too. I say off with their heads, every last one.

Look, I've got nothing against any of these towns or their fans and I love an underdog just as much as the next guy. I'm just tired of being called on to pinch-hit every time I've sat down and just gotten comfortable with my beer and sausage-dog, that's all.

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