fter weeks of suggesting that patients who had gone blind while using the company’s best-selling erectile dysfunction drug were pussies, the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer has assumed a new tack this week, as explained in the recent publication of the company’s informational packet entitled “Viagra Doesn’t Cause Blindness, Yanking Your Wank for Five Hours Causes Blindness.�

“Not only does Viagra work, sometimes it works all too well,� Pfizer spokesperson Dennis Baylor chuckled knowingly in explanation. “And sometimes it takes a little ‘self control’ to get that horse back in the corral, you know?�

Baylor continued to speak in baffling euphemisms for several minutes.

“Like if a business meeting’s about to start, or your wife’s pulling up in the driveway and you’ve still got your pants off and the Ken dolls and Candyland pieces strewn around the bedroom, well then it might be time to take matters into your own hands, if you know what I mean,� Baylor inferred, possibly speaking from personal experience.

“But too much of a good thing can be a bad thing,� Baylor continued. “And the old wives’ tales might be right about how being a little too friendly with your member might just lead to a little condition we like to call the blind man’s buff.�

Doctors like to call the condition non-arteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy (NAION), or in English, the sudden, permanent loss of vision due to swelling of the optic disc. Pfizer argues for a coincidental association, given that the NAION condition is most common in the sadly overweight and the diabetic, both prime markets for the company’s dick pills.

Pfizer’s Viagra has been for years the leader in the lucrative Erectile Dysfunction market, known as “ED� to everyone but guys named Ed. A serious health side-effect like blindness could torpedo the company’s profits, since being blind is nearly as much of an obstacle to scoring chicks as is not being able to get it up. Add the two together, and you’re in some serious deep shit.

Baylor was evasive when asked to clarify, in simple terms, what exactly the company was blaming for the incidents of blindness.

“What, are you daft?� Baylor balked. “Choking the chicken, slamming the ham, paying a visit to Peter O. Johnson, tree-hugging, the friendly fist!�

“Uh… spanking it, giving a slap-down to the little man, torquing your tuna, performing the holy handshake!� continued Baylor, growing frustrated and less nice by the minute. “You know, kid, dong massage!�

Unable to get a clear answer from Pfizer, this reporter turned to men’s men on the street for answers.

“Yeah, my mom always told me that would happen,� explained disco-ball installer Trent Yardbird. “Going blind because of, you know, taking your little buddy out for a skipper. Pulling the pud, slapping the salmon. The man’s crank handshake. You know what I’m talking about.�

This reporter’s further requests for clarification were all met with a withering “Man, you stupid.�

However, this reporter will not rest until he finds the truth, commune readers. At the suggestion of commune editor Red Bagel, I’ve scheduled an interview with my high school health teacher, Mr. Thorpe, as I continue my dig for the truth. Apparently Bagel believes he may have inside information relevant to this investigation.

ollywood mourned the loss of another great couple this week, when super-hottie Shannon Elizabeth filed for divorce from the incredibly fortunate guy she married years ago. Citing "irreconcilable differences," not the awful Shelley Long movie, but the standard divorce patter for the sex life went to shit, the couple ended their three-year marriage, leaving Elizabeth to go back on the market and husband something Reitman to sink further into anonymity.

Elizabeth, most famous for her beautiful face and gravity-defying breasts, has appeared in two of the otherwise-insufferable American Pie movies and Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, while husband Reitman, most famous for somehow bedding Playboy-quality ass despite having no real movie credits to his name, has appeared next to Elizabeth in a few photographs and not much else.

Some speculate trouble started on the set of Ashton Kutcher's M-TV show Punk'd, where trouble usually starts in Hollywood, when Reitman attempted to punk the brunette sexpot; but friends of the couple suggest the punking had been going on for months beforehand, and the couple spent more time by themselves than together, leading to the marriage's disintegration.

Elizabeth's pending divorce makes her available to enter the dating scene again, opening the door for relationships with attractive rock stars, hot Hollywood hunks, and even diminutive alternative news website reporters with charming vestigial wings.

The Shannon Elizabeth divorce from the formerly lucky fuck is only the latest in a string of super-hot celebrity babe news this week, including the deeper sinking of Katie Holmes into the world of science-fiction religion.

Fresher news also has Alias star Jennifer Garner wedding millionaire dope Ben Affleck in a secret Carribean wedding. Affleck, a renowned babe bagger with a track list including Gwyneth Paltrow and Jennifer Lopez, began dating Garner after his relationship with J-Lo flamed out, and he desperately wanted to find someone to fulfill the "nifer" part of his famed "Bennifer" moniker. The wedding comes as no surprise to hot chick watchers, as rumors have circulated for weeks that Garner may be pregnant with the seed of Affleck. Biologists, at least those of us who have a high school biology background, speculate the baby will either be a super-sexy spy or a really bad actor.

Also on the Ted Ted short list of fine asses to watch, Tomb Raider and sexual fantasy star Angelina Jolie was photographed with rich male hottie Brad Pitt, further fueling speculation the two were the source of friction that ended Pitt's marriage to Hollywood TV honey Jennifer Aniston.

On a sadder note, picky religious nutjobs found fault with sculpted super-beauty Jessica Simpson after the debut of Simpson's semen-inducing video for "These Boots Are Made for Walking," where Simpson is seen washing a car alá home video queen Paris Hilton's infamous Carl's Jr. commercial, in the guise of her Dukes of Hazzard role of Daisy Duke. The alarmed Baptists condemned the lovely jezebel as parading around all "slutty" and demanded she make a cleaner version of the video. Ted Ted, in response, demanded they burn in hell for ruining his good time.

In the meantime, Shannon Elizabeth asked for privacy during this very personal time, and could not be reached for response since this reporter did not have her number, no matter how desperately he keeps asking the publicist for it.

I have really done it now. And "it" is not a good thing in this case.

Exhibiting an unusual lack of foresight, I signed away the rights to my and Rascal's likenesses to television producers from way out west in Hollywood. Knowing Hollywood as I do, I expected some sort of daring and intellectual, if fictional, account of our conspiracy-cracking and maybe, just maybe, a few life lessons worked in between our hardline journalistic efforts. Well, needless to say, by my outraged introduction, I got nothing of the sort!

What I got, sir, was nothing but a moronic cartoon, called at this juncture, The Adventures of Red & Rascal. I was mortified. I had to look up what it meant just to be sure, and indeed I was.

Being a cartoon is bad enough, but you haven't heard the worst of it. Apparently in this show, if you can call it that, we are portrayed as quite the buffoons. Like a couple of ninnys, Rascal and I, the cartoon versions, traipse around wildly looking for Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster, carrying high-powered laser weapons made to subdue either of them, should we catch them. All of which is just plain ludicrous, since current laser technology is insufficient to detain Bigfoot, of course, and if you're going to try to kill him, you'd better have more than a net and a little laser gun, I'll tell you that. Not to mention the show grievously overlooks all the Loch Ness Monster's charity work and simply paints her as a heartless beast. But we're forgetting the larger point, which is this thing makes me look dumb.

I checked with my lawyer, Whistles Goldman, and found out I have absolutely no recourse, since I didn't verify in my contract I wanted complete control of the project. I figured, in my defense, that they knew I was Red Bagel and would want nothing less. But apparently "should've expected it" doesn't count for anything in contract law.

I've spent years building up my reputation and now it all has to end like this. What kind of fear am I going to instill in the puppetmasters who lurk in the shadows if every Saturday morning I'm seen falling hundreds of miles into a chasm and crashing in a puff of smoke? For one thing, they'll have unrealistic expectations on how to kill me, which might not work in my benefit like you'd think. The Red Bagel they all knew beforehand was a clever and cunning adversary, not some disproportionately fat and angular idiot who shouts "Fiddlesticks!" when he's confounded. I shout "Fuck!" and anyone who knows me can tell you that.

I did get a percentage of the merchandising rights in all this, which are worth an estimated $24 million, but what does that mean to me? I've already got so much money I give boxes of it to staff members in lieu of actual birthday gifts. If that doesn't tell you how meaningless it all is to me, I don't know what will. No, the money is nothing to me. My reputation—that's stainless steel, and before now, positively uncorruptible. Not to mention it's going to make Rascal look bad, too, and I will stand for that only slightly more than the damage done to me.

Rascal is a loyal and fearless manservant, always has been since whenever I hired him. Seems like years ago, but the pay stubs don't back that up. Rascal would follow me into the gates of Hell, me safely behind by at least 30 feet, and would only come out when I okayed it. That's how dedicated he is to my service. It breaks what you might call my heart to see him maligned in such a fashion.

Still, I have to admit, that Australian accent they gave him is both dead-on and hilarious. They really did their homework, these Hollywood slimeballs.

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