Same Old Story

Lost in Translation

Cosmic Comic Continuum

George Carlin at Retro Comic Spotlight

The Girls of Think-A-Holic Lounge

Unlikely Heroes Book One

Related Post

Picture Show

Closed For The Summer

Grifter Goes Viral

Author's Note 8-9-12: this video was changed from an uploaded Blogger video to a YouTube embedded video in order to enhance the viewing experience and for better playing performance on this blog.

If you've been following my barstool journal on a fairly regular basis, you know that Fred Fortune cancelled the contract that the Fred & Red comedy team signed last year with Think-A-Holic Lounge before they even did their first gig here. Fred nipped their Lounge opening in the bud because he found out that it was Angus McCloud (our big-ass head bartender and the 400-year-old ghost of a dead Scottish poet) who had reported Fred Fortune to the Pluto Police way back in Earth Year 2008.

When Red got a job as emcee at Retro Comic Spotlight earlier this year, Fred decided to go solo at The Red Room in underground Cydonia. Naturally, the left TV at Think-A-Holic Lounge (the one that normally broadcasts hacker podcasts) picked up Fred's Nightclub Debut and began broadcasting it every hour. Today, when I waltzed into the Lounge like I owned the place (something I really love to do), I saw that the entire lunch crowd was watching Fred's comedy routine. If a comedy act stinks to high heaven it always goes over really big at Think-A-Holic Lounge. Don't ask me why.

Hacker From Hell

This past Wednesday I waltzed into Think-A-Holic Lounge and bellied up to the bar like I owned the place. Our big-ass head bartender, Angus McCloud, always gets a kick out of the way I let on like I'm this big-time author from Earth and he usually sets me right up with a shot of think-a-hol and a cold, bubbly chaser. Today was no exception.

As soon as my butt hit my favorite barstool the left TV — the one that shows hacker videos instead of Mexican soaps and illegal sports — began airing this disturbing video. After it aired I asked ol' Angus to set me up with a double shot of Death-A-Hol instead and no bubbly chaser. Then I asked him to turn off the left TV and turn on the regular one.

After seeing an independent author reaching out to the entire universe from Hell, I preferred to watch Saturnites toss their senators around or watch nuns on Uranus bowl for dollars. Watching illegal sports is always a lot less disturbing than seeing your own fate played out before you in living color.

The Square Root of Infinity

...concluding this little story...

The little bubble-headed alien told me what his name was but I couldn't pronounce it. He told me that was because I had a tongue which was, in his estimations, the biggest barrier to speaking the language of outer space, in addition to speaking the truth. I let his snide remark slide as we began our descent.

"Where is this place?" he asked in utter amazement as we both stared out the front porthole of his little starship. "This isn't the same Earth that we used to visit and monkey around with ."

"Well," I said, not surprised by the sudden time shift and unpredictable turn of events, including this bubble-head's spontaneous confession, "it used to be."

And then we exited the roving wormhole and landed.

Close Encounters of the Square Root Kind

...continuing with this little story...

I started the weekend a little early last weekend. Last Wednesday night (it was actually wee-hours Thursday morning), I stumbled down the front steps of Think-A-Holic Lounge for the "umpteenth time squared" (actually, it was more like the square root of infinity) full of Death-A-Hol and pleasant thoughts about immortality when this flying saucer appeared out of nowhere and hovered above the nearly-empty parking lot. A green beam of light shot out of the bottom of the spacecraft and produced a little bubble-headed biped.

"Take me to your leader," said the creature in the green beam of light. His voice sounded bot-like and mechanical.

"Oh, really?" I said, with a flippant attitude that would have gotten most people ray-gunned into flaming skeletons. But not me. I felt invincible and stood my ground. "You mean you don't want to take me aboard your evil starship and open me up to see what makes me tick?"

"Been there and done that," replied the alien, in his own flip manner. "Besides, I already know what makes you tick. Now, are you going to take me to your leader or do I have to ask somebody else's alter ego to take me?"

"No problem, pal," I responded with more complacency than excitement. Bubble-headed aliens are a dime a dozen in this part of the space-time continuum, so this joker wasn't doing me any big favor. On the other hand, I was tired of just going home every night and listening to classic "soft rock" on old vinyl LPs— like Simon & Garfunkel and The Mamas and the Pappas — and sipping hot cocoa. So, I was up for just about anything.

"Do you have transportation?" it said to me in a serious tone that made me think twice about needing a little diversion.

"No," I replied, still flip as hell. I figured why not push the interactive envelope? I had nothing to gain and nothing to lose. "No, mine's still in the shop. We'll have to take yours." A big smile crossed the extraterrestrial's little mouth that seemed more like a leer than a smile, but I was still up for adventure and for even kicking some alien butt, if it came to that.

"OK, then," he said, stepping aside to let me into the green light.


"I don't know if you'll like our leader," I confessed, "but the crazy old son-of-a-bitch is all we have." I figured honesty was the best policy when you're dealing with aliens who can beam your ass off a tavern parking lot in the middle of the night without even blinking an eye.

And then we were beamed aboard.

this story to be continued...

Seeing is Believing

As most of you know, Wednesday afternoon is my favorite time at Think-A-Holic Lounge. The place is virtually empty then and the sun's usually shining outside and most of the world's at work. That's mainly why I mosey on down to the Lounge every Wednesday. Because, when most people are out running things or being run by things, I'm hiding out. And enjoying my favorite beverages while watching the ol' Boob Tube. A combination you just can't beat.

Today I asked Angus McCloud — our big-ass head bartender and the 400-year-old ghost of a dead Scottish poet — to turn on the new TV set. The one that shows "hacker videos" instead of the regular lineup of sports and game shows and beer commercials and those hot Mexican soaps that are so addictive.

We were in luck. A commercial for Angus McCloud's own invention — Death-A-Hol — had just begun airing. I asked ol' Angus who did the commercial and how he got it on TV in the first place.

"It don't matter," the ugly old spook chuckled, enjoying his recreational use of bad English, "if it's on TV, it's real, don't you know?" I knew he was hiding something but I didn't feel up to the pursuit.

"Oh, I believe it, all right," I replied with a loud sigh and then I tossed back a whole double shot of the less-popular think-a-hol, the elixir that makes you think and a product that's never been advertised on TV and probably never will be. I knew packaging rules the beverage industry, just like every other industry.

"Death-A-Hol is already a marketing success," Angus cooed, interrupting my thoughts and making me want to bounce the empty shot glass off the back of his homely head. But, I didn't. Instead, I ordered a single shot of Death-A-Hol, which is nothing but think-a-hol under a different label.

As I sipped the greenish liquid, I had to remind myself that it was only the original, amber-colored think-a-hol with blue food coloring added. But, at a premium price, mind you. Besides, I was drinking what I was seeing on TV. So, who cares? Suddenly, and in spite of my own better judgment, I felt less like Michael Casher's alter ego and more like the Real McCoy.

"Barkeep!" I shouted at the back of Angus McCloud's big-ass head. "More Death-A-Hol! And don't stop bringing it."

this story to be continued...

Transmission 6002020206

Related 6002020206 Links:

Little Green Man from Mars by Michael Casher

Little Green Man from Mars — the book video

25 Words or Less: 6002020206 

This week, nobody was watching the regular TV set at the Lounge. As a matter of fact, it was turned completely off because everybody was hovering around this new TV set, the one that shows hacker videos from outer space (as if the Lounge isn't already in outer space). Oh, well.

This video was the scariest one of all. Maybe it's because there are so many P.O.D. authors among our regular patrons. That means the astral bodies or the dreaming selves or the disenfranchised spirits of those authors. For us — the real outcasts in the publishing underworld — this video was even scarier than the movie The Exorcist. Why? Because when the devil does D.C. in real life, sooner or later he leaves.

Astral Feedback

Wow, the left TV set seems to be a hot item this week. But, hey, just when I felt like standing up and shouting to the TV screen, "You go, guy!" (or something to that effect) that screaming chipmunk voice kept me from even wanting to show my face around here.

But, you gotta give The Author From Another World some credit. Those Grays don't seem to scare him one damn bit. In fact, I think it might be the other way around.

...insertfeedhere...

Our regular Bar TV sits on a high shelf on the right side of the bar at Think-A-Holic Lounge and always has, as long as I've been imbibing think-a-hol here, with lots of bubbly chasers, of course. Now there's a new TV set on the left side of that high shelf. What do we get on that TV? Podcasts. Or something like podcasts. But more like video hackers having their say.

Don't laugh. This junk's a lot better than the tripe on the regular TV set. Except, of course, when they broadcast another one of those Senator-Tossing tournaments from Saturn or one of those extreme fighting events between male and female homonoids. Then the regular set is my favorite. Oh yeah, we still don't know what planet broadcasts that disturbing, but highly-addictive, stuff but the scuttlebutt around here is that these broadcasts come from Earth. Wow, that doesn't surprise me one bit.

Anyway, I tried not to be disturbed by this so-called "Wanted" broadcast by the Grays. But, when they go after Michael Casher, I can't help but feel a little threatened, too.

Head Game

Even at the edge of the space-time continuum, where places like Think-A-Holic Lounge can exist without taking up any physical space in the universe, people know that nothing sells a product like its packaging. Even Angus McCloud, our big-ass head bartender (and the 400-year-old ghost of a dead poet from Scotland) knows that you can sell gullible people shit by the bucketful if you make it look like gourmet food.

Ol' Angus even went one step further than that this past week when he got the big, bright idea that think-a-hol wasn't selling as well as it should, like the "joy juice" everybody thought it was. Well, hell, I can tell you why it's not selling very well anymore. Think-a-hol was invented to make people think and it's quite obvious that thinking isn't much of a pastime anymore for anyone. Except for me, of course, and a handful of faithful regulars at Think-A-Holic Lounge.

So, Angus came up with a little packaging gimmick this past week and, I've got to give the old spook credit, it seems to be a real winner. One of the local distillers of think-a-hol agreed to re-package his product in a black bottle with a brand-new new label on it (see pic).

It's the exact same think-a-hol elixir that all the distilleries on this side of the cosmos use, with a little something extra inside: blue food coloring, which makes the amber think-a-hol look like ghoulish, green "devil booze". None of us Lounge lizards can stomach the sight of the stuff or its dark-ass packaging but, ever since the repackaging deal, Death-A-Hol has become the number-one-selling elixir at Think-A-Holic Lounge. Go figure.

(I'd tell you why it's so popular and with whom, but I couldn't do that and keep a straight face.)

Welcome To Our Cosmic Watering Hole

The Illuminati Lives!

Today was a rare day at Think-A-Holic Lounge. Hardly anybody showed up and we can't figure out why. Black Friday is over and done with, so people aren't shopping their heads off down on Earth, and the rest of the universe must be at home with the wife and kiddies or at home with the hubby and kiddlies or at home watching TV. What else do people do?

Anyway, Angus McCloud, our big-ass head bartender and the 400-year-old ghost of a dead Scottish poet, found another rare video by SciFiFoFum so he and a handful of us regular lounge lizards watched it, over and over. We had to watch it over and over because we have no idea what it's really about. You know Earthlings. They'll do anything for the camera.

And, hey, before you get all bent out of shape about the title "The Illuminati Lives" because you're so damn sure that the word Illuminati is plural and should therefore require a verb that shows plurality, meaning "The Illuminati Live", let me enlighten you about another kind of plurality. In this case, the Illuminati is a group of people, not a bunch of Illuminatums. There are no such things as Illuminatums, to my knowledge.

But there is an Illuminati and it's not a word that any bestselling author invented. The Illuminati was here long before The New York Times Bestseller List and shlocky bestselling authors who are obsessed with antiquity and have a bug up their butts about the Roman Catholic Church.

So, pull your heads out of your butts or have a wee dram of think-a-hol, on me. Either one produces the same effect. Thinking. You can't beat it with a stick.

Because of the low volume in this "security video", headphones are recommended.