ith much of the South either bracing for or fucked up by hurricane damage, the president suffering from historically low approval ratings, and the daily civilian death toll from Iraq taking on Halo proportions, a bruised nation turned its hopes to Apple's latest portable music player this week.

"We fully expect he Nano to change the way we live our lives just as much as the original iPod did back in 1997," Apple founder Steve Jobs announced at a recent press conference, possibly referring to how additional profits for Apple could change his lifestyle for the better. Unfortunately, no one present had a microphone with which to argue or pose questions of semantics. "Besides, I know you've all got shit else going right in your lives right now, so fork over the cash already."

Disaffected Americans from across the iPod-affording spectrum licked their chops in anticipation of the Nano, which is just like the last iPod, except smaller and more expensive.

"This year has really been a shit biscuit," lamented Syracuse sophomore Sean Hannesy. "But I'm pretty confident that my spending $250 on an MP3 player is going to turn things around."

The release of the Nano comes not a moment too soon for a worn-out American public. With the Catholic Church in icky disarray, misogynistic gangsta rap topping the charts, and the recent news that California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger will seek re-election, many have been searching desperately for a money-spending distraction.

Hollywood has provided no solace, with a disappointing batch of summer movies—even by summer movie standards—leading to another terrible box office slump that has limited studio profits to the mere billions. Even sadder, American audiences have been robbed of one of their most time-honored means of avoiding awareness of the world around them.

"I like to call it The Summer of Gigli," explained Paramount executive Paul Walters. "I know that came out last year, but this summer really was that bad. It didn't even have a movie notable enough for use in a clever name."

Meanwhile, 500 Iraqi civilians were blown up by a different group of Iraqi civilians on Saturday, for reasons incomprehensible to white people.

Somehow even more depressing, some asshole in New York this week set the record for consecutive hours of TV-watching, only to have his record rescinded by Guinness when it was discovered he was just watching the first season of Lost on DVD.

"Thank God Apple came out with another iPod," sighed tech writer William Pepper. "Otherwise, this could have been a terrible year for everyone. Now it's just terrible for the poor, liberals, Southerners, Iraqis, movie buffs, music fans, Catholics, Sony, Californians, the Amish, steroid-abusing ballplayers, environmentalists, true conservatives, Cubs fans, animals of all kinds and children. I'm probably forgetting somebody. But it's been a bitchin' year for iPod fans, that's my point."

he so-called 'Axis of Evil,' which now has more points than a pinwheel, took on another member when the forgettable South American country of Venezuela added itself to the roster of anti-U.S. countries this week. The announcement was made in the most awkward fashion, when President Victor Chavez made allegations that the United States has made plans to invade Venezuela soon. How soon? Chavez didn't pinpoint a date, but said the invasion would happen imminently.

According to Chavez, the U.S. has been planning to invade his country for some time, and he has proof, although he didn't exactly present it to anybody. The most precise allegation made by Chavez cited "invasion training maneuvers" being made in his country by CIA operatives, who apparently weren't in Venezuela for one of their thousands of monthly beauty pageants.

"The U.S. wants our oil," said Chavez, not to be confused with the famed union leader beloved by Steinbeck fans and folksingers alike. "They are planning to invade Venezuela to get it. But they will not have it. And if they carry out their plan of invasion, they will be in for a hundred-year war they cannot win." Apparently there's a huge population of homegrown Navy SEALs in Venezuela that haven't been widely publicized.

Chavez appeared on Larry King, home of the mouth of the infidels, to warn the U.S. government not to fuck around with the big boys.

"We are as giants to the United States as you are but ants to normal people. Understand? Perhaps the translation is not so perfect… we are the giants, at giant size, while you are ant size. Get it? You are not normal human size. So we are, you can see, immensely bigger than you. Not in country size or population, resources or world renown. But fighting spirit! This is where we are huge."

The president (of our little shithole) responded Friday to Chavez's Larry King comments: "I will say Mr. Chavez does have immense balls. The rest of it remains to be determined."

While most of the administration shrugged and tried not to smirk at the angry Venezuelan's accusations, a certain White House insider called Vito, and whose real name is revealed on www.confidentialsourcesruined.com, attempted to shed some light on the U.S.-Venezuela position in the current administration.

"The president can't even say Venezuela," confided Vito. "I don't think he ever got past the 48 continental states in his geography classes. He occasionally points to the maps and says, 'What's with the other America? Who's copying us?' But this isn't just about insulting the president; it's about pointing out, once and for all, that when it comes to Venezuela, or for that matter any South American country, the White House position is to truly not give a shit."

While Chavez accused the Bush administration of seeking an invasion for Venezuela's rich oil reserves, our man Vito discounted that as unlikely horseshit.

"I'm not sure where Mr. Chavez gets his confidential information on U.S. foreign policy, but he should go back to the guy and beat the piss outta him. Does he seriously believe Venezuela is next on the list for U.S. invasion? Please! I mean… does he really have the list? Not even the top 10. We've got Korea, Syria, Iran, Pakistan… New Zealand, but that's a surprise, so don't tell anyone. Lord of the Rings raised their profile. But Venezuela? Please. All in good time, amigos. We've got bigger fish to fry first."

Omar Bricks has never believed in oil changes. I've always been one to say "Get it right the first time, jackass." Why waste time and money filling your car with shitty oil you're going to regret 3,000 miles down the road? Do the homework now and you won't have to pay some grease monkey rip-off wages to siphon out your shitty oil and spit it in a bucket a few months from now.

There's a whole industry that preys on this kind of short-sighted thinking. Lightning Lube, The Oil Slick, Carp. That last one has some letters missing from the sign, I'm not about to guess what the full name is supposed to be. Because if it turns out to be Carpenis or something great like that I'm going to be embarrassed that I've been calling it Carpals all along. And then there's The Change, which I thought was a clinic for pre-op transsexuals until I went in there to buy Ramrod Hurley a birthday present last year and they tried to lube my chassis.

But Omar Bricks isn't fooled, at least not by the oil-change places that aren't named like sexual reassignment chop shops. I'm not about to waste my hard-earned cash swapping out perfectly good oil, so I buy the good stuff up front. From Wal-Mart, I'm not sure what the brand is called. It's got a bunny on it.

And this all worked fine and good for years until last week, when I had to take the Bricksmobile IV into the shop because it was belching flames again and this was getting me written up for a ticket every time I'd drive past an elementary school and some kids would coincidentally catch on fire. The cops never had a shred of proof, of course, but if you're a lazy cop and you've got some dude driving an unpainted foreign car with a flamethrower for a tailpipe through the same neighborhood where you've got kids on fire, it doesn't take long to figure out who to pin the frame on.

So I took the Bricksmobile IV down to Ricky's, one of the only shops in town I trust, after the only other place I trust, Bill's, burnt to the ground in a freak accident while I was idling outside the day before. Quervo, the guy who owns Ricky's, dropped the bomb and told me I'd been putting Nestle's Qwik in my engine instead of oil, and as a result the whole thing was fucked, in a delicious-smelling kind of way. Turns out I'd never owned a car long enough for the disadvantages of using chocolate syrup to lubricate your engine parts to become evident; I'd always managed to blow the car up or drive it into a swimming pool before the chocolate folly caught up with me.

So, although it went against everything I believe in, I told him to go ahead and change the oil just this once. Put in the good stuff, you know, but don't break the bank. Anything with an animal on the bottle was cool.

At first I thought Quervo might give me some shit about asking him to work on some weird-ass Panamanian brand of car with license plates from an ATV, but he was cool about it. Or at least he seemed cool, he talked a lot but it's not like I speak Spanish. That reminds me, I really need to find an English-speaking auto shop some time soon. Preferably one built with a lot of asbestos.

Bricks out.

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