ock musician and poet Bob Dylan received the ultimate honor Friday night from an unknown fan believed to be under the influence of several chemical substances. For all his years of service in changing the face of modern music, Dylan was knighted in a brief ceremony behind the Homebrew bar and grill that took only a couple minutes.

Dylan, who was performing an unannounced set at the Homebrew promoting his new album, was extremely surprised and delighted by the honor.

"It was very cool," said Dylan. "You don’t get into this life with thought of major rewards like being knighted. You do it for the music, or maybe the money. This is quite a big moment for me and I’d like to thank the drug-influenced guy who bestowed this upon me, wherever he is."

Dylan was on his way to the parking lot of the club with friends when the unidentified high guy stopped him in the alley, proclaimed Dylan the man, and knighted him with a very quick tap on each of his shoulders with an empty Thunderbird bottle, pretending it was a sword. He then pissed his pants and stumbled back into the club. Surprised but happy with the honor, Dylan continued on to his car.

"I thought about trying to find the guy, but I didn’t want to insult him after he had just done this very great thing for me. I was also a bit shocked by it all. Even if you expect this sort of thing is going to happen, some alley behind a club is about the last place you’re ready for it."

Columbia Records, Dylan’s label, has jumped all over the high-press event. New releases of all Dylan’s previous albums are being issued with a royal seal on them under the artist heading of "Sir Bob Dylan."

"Everyone at Columbia has always known America has a special genius in Bob Dylan," said Columbia V.P. of Advertising John Bonlee, "and now people everywhere will know that. The dude on heroin or crack or whatever behind that club knew it, and recognized Dylan for his years of service to the music industry and world as a whole."

Sources report that if the blitzed night club rambler can be found, Columbia Records would like to have him knight Dylan again, just for the sake of press, on a two-hour TV special with friends and fellow musicians playing songs in Dylan’s honor. Dylan, who has written rock ’n’ roll and folk staples like "Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man," "Blowin’ in the Wind," and "Like A Rolling Stone," could not verify the possibility of a two-hour TV event, but said he would definitely not want to air opposite Friends and Survivor.

he major news media again claimed victory over the world itself by creating news from nothing. The so-called story this week revolved around a 25-year-dead white boy named Elvis Presley.

Presley, the king of rock and roll, died August 16, 1977, which is news thanks to the lack of real stories this week as fans and the media celebrate the 25th anniversary of his death. Born in Tupelo, Mississippi, Presley was the first attractive white person to bring rock and roll to the nation, and obtained the title "king of rock and roll" in some undisclosed media ceremony.

"Elvis touched everyone," said an unidentified modern rock star pretending to be in touch with music history. "He was the one and only. There will never be another like him."

Fans flocked in presumably record numbers to Graceland to see the place where Elvis lived in strange, hermit-like seclusion until his death on the toilet. Presley was extremely popular in his lifetime, though that popularity peaked and waned over the years, ultimately leaving him most popular after his death.

"This here's Elvis week," proclaimed a Los Angeles classic rock station disc jockey named Danger Bob. "Celebrating the king of rock and roll by playing 'Hound Dog' every hour on the hour. Elvis was one of a kind, he invented it all. There will never be another like him."

His legacy in rock and roll already firmly established, Presley added another accomplishment to his resume this week, as he helped provide filler for news programs, networks, and magazines all across the nation, despite being dead for a quarter of a century.

The face and name of Elvis Presley have graced the covers of magazines, news footage, and news websites, as if some new event had occurred to warrant his coverage. CNN has been airing specials covering the history and influence of the King, Time named Elvis their Person of the Week, and VH-1 has even been playing Elvis videos during the rare hours they play videos.

"The news media owes Elvis a ton of thanks. He's saved our hash from the fire once again," said CNN correspondent Muffy St. Clair. "The president's on vacation and unable to supply us with the usual amount of ignorant quotes. The War on Terror sure hasn't gotten any more interesting—nobody knows where Osama bin Laden is or if he's even alive. Hell, even the celebrities are boring this week. What's new? Anna Nicole Simpson? Puh-lease. A dead Elvis is more interesting than an alive her any day."

While the media has been working overtime to bring Elvis back to national attention, the public at large is invariably unchanged.

"Elvis?" said man on the street Carl Ginser. "Yeah, I like some of his stuff. That 'Suspicious Minds' song is kick-ass. I think the Fine Young Cannibals did a cover of that or something. Oh, and he would, like, raise his lip and snarl. And he always left the building and some guy would announce it, I think. I'm not sure why he's on the news so much lately, though. He's still dead, isn't he? Not a zombie or nothing?"

This reporter, for one, is thoroughly convinced he is. However, until Red Bagel agrees to spring for the plane ticket to Memphis and a shovel, we'll never know for sure. But whether he actually breathes or lies very quiet in his grave, thanks to all the needless media sensationalism, Elvis is still alive today in some way.

What kind of noise does your brain make when you think? A hum? A whir? I've come to believe that mine's more of a rattle and frankly, this week that's got me concerned.

What could be rattling around up there? Loose juices? Snot? Who can say? For all I know there could even be a little matchbox car up there from when I was a kid. I'm not saying I remember ever sticking one up there, but like most people of my generation, I took a lassaiez-faire attitude toward toddlerdom that I've since come to regret. Who kept records of that kind of thing back then? Shit, I could have a juice cup up there.

You ever get tired of arguing with someone who's already made their mind up about something? I do. Take my friend Dave, for example. Gay as a floral-patterned thong. Only he doesn't think so. Dude just doesn't want to listen to reason, while even Kansas housewives know that only gay guys part their hair like that. Some people just like to argue for the sake of being assholes, but you mark my words. One day he'll out-gay us all.

Another thing: as far as I'm concerned, we won the Revolutionary war. America. Hands down, forget about it. Some people may like to waste your time with their nit-picking and armchair quarterbacking of the situation, but tell 'em to go piss up their hipwaders. America 1, New England, 0. End of discussion.

You ever notice how, in a noisy environment, the number 406 sounds just like "oral sex"? In other news, I think the drive-up ATM is going to have to satisfy all of my banking needs for a while. At least until a certain prudish bank teller who never heard the story of "Judge Not, Lest Ye Be Open-Hand Slapped in Public" gets transferred to Siberia or wherever they send the girls who turn down the promotion-for-sex deals you're always hearing about in men's magazines.

Which is a bummer, since I've never been totally comfortable with the whole ATM concept. You just know there's some sick shmo out there running around in the middle of the night, wiping his ass on ATM keypads. There are just too many people out there for it not to be true. It may sound like something I'm just making up to fill column space, but it really is true, I actually shared a cab with the guy. Longest six blocks of my life, we had to keep stopping every time he saw an ATM or a pay phone.

I'm thinking of pitching NBC a sitcom idea I had based on a joke I heard in a bar one time. In the joke, this taxi cab driver picks up two naked guys and a naked girl at the airport. When they get to their destination, the cabbie turns around and, with a glance, realizes that obviously none of them could be carrying any money. The woman cups her breasts in her hands and arches her eyebrow, asking "Will these do?" The cabbie nods and she climbs in the front seat and they do the deed. The woman gets out of the cab, and then the cabbie turns to the two naked guys in the back seat and says the punchline, which I can never remember.

But I think it would be a funny show to have these three naked people traveling all over the world, doing funny things to get by without any money. There wouldn't be any explanation of why they were naked, of course, since that would probably get complicated and make it less funny.

º Last Column: Crapping Out Like a Vegas Fat Man
º more columns