Tiny nugs

• I was drinking some coffee in the East Village t'other day when I noticed that the guy next to me looked like Vin Diesel. Nah, I thought. Then I figured, yeah, prolly, because Parker Posey and her little annoying white dog came and sat with him after hugs & air kisses. Do all celebrities know one another? Is Buzz Aldrin best buddies with Shia LeBouf?
• I guess I'm kind of like the Jet Li character in "Unleashed." Trained from birth to fly into a violent rage every time I see Robin Williams smiling smugly in bed with a curiously splotched Mandy Moore in the poster for "License to Wed." Except that my violent rages may be better described as impotent whining.
• I really don't understand Tony LaRussa.
• Owsley Stanley once said, "Everything in Cirque du Soleil is wet and French and gay and on fire." The LSD doesn't help, apparently. Or maybe it was Patton Oswalt; whatever.

Peanut shell buffalo

I was hungry, so I decided to eat. There is a good burger place a few blocks away from me called Five Guys. It is a small chain in the Washington - Baltimore area. They make really good burgers.

I walked outside and into the hot soupy evening. It was like walking through a nice split pea, or perhaps potato leek, soup. I did not want soup; I wanted a cheeseburger. I was kind of angry when I got to the restaurant.

I ate my cheeseburger and fries in the air-conditioned restaurant, and my mood improved. It was a really good burger. Then I walked to the door and noticed a sign: "DUE TO SEVERE PEANUT ALLERGIES IN SOME NEIGHBORHOOD CHILDREN, PLEASE DO NOT THROW OR CARRY PEANUTS OR PEANUT SHELLS OUTSIDE THIS RESTAURANT."

Five Guys gives you free peanuts as a snack while you're waiting for your burger. This is pretty nice of them. Peanuts cost money.

I was curious about these neighborhood children, so I tried an experiment. I took a peanut shell outside, and dropped it onto the sidewalk. Nothing happened for a little while. Then I heard a low rumble that grew into a tremendous thundering, like the sound of buffalo hooves in the ears of Lewis and Clark. Around every corner, through every bush, over every rooftop, out of every drainpipe cascaded hundreds of slavering children with peanut allergies. Their eyes were not human. They had only one thing on their minds: peanut. The Peanut Horde approached with the rapidity of an allergic jet plane. Spittle was getting in my eyes. I snatched the peanut shell up off the ground just in time. The children disappeared imperceptibly, disinterestedly, shuffling off to their dens.

3 products that I will not buy

• I was in a bookstore and saw a book called "Punk Marketing."
• I was listening to the radio and heard a commercial for RideAccidents.com, which is a website designed for people who are paranoid about dying on a roller coaster.
• I was in a drugstore and saw a medicine named "666 Cold Preparation."

CC&P answers rock stars' questions

Dear Mr. Jones,
I have considered this for a while, and the answer seems childishly simple in retrospect. If you are correct-- and I have no reason to doubt you-- then, by my calculations, going is half the trouble of staying. So I would say "go." Good luck to you!
Sincerely,
CC&P

Dear Mr. Morrissey,
I think it's best not to take things so literally here. When I say it's going to happen "now," I don't mean that it will happen in a moment that is asymptotically equivalent to the very instant my breath ceases to pronounce the word itself. I guess I sort of meant, "in a reasonably short period of time." I understand that you have waited a long time, and that you are even feeling a bit hopeless. For that, I do apologize. Please try to have a little faith, and in the meantime, take a nice bubble bath.
Sincerely,
CC&P

Dear Mr. Fogerty,
I have, and it was lovely.
Sincerely,
CC&P

Dear Mr. Malkmus,
Not really. I don't expect anyone else's attitudes toward me to change, for that matter. It's not like I'm that immature or deluded. But, you know, sometimes you just need to shake things up a bit. I think Ringo Starr once said something like, "Things got to a point where I had to either kill myself or shave my head. I chose the latter."
Sincerely,
CC&P

Dear Mr. Coyne,
Kind of. But I guess I never really thought of it that way. Thanks.
Sincerely,
CC&P

Dear Mr. McCartney,
Do you remember, about ten years ago, how a bunch of rural high school kids were getting killed by lying down in the middle of the road at night, just as the heroes had done in some dumb movie? I'm worried that might happen. Plus I like girls.
Sincerely,
CC&P

Shopping list

Felix Pie
Coco Crisp
Candy Maldonado
Cookie Lavagetto
Tim Salmon
Randy Bass
Steve Trout
Catfish Hunter
Mike Lamb
Rob Deer
Rabbit Maranville
Goose Gossage
Chili Davis
Billy Bean
Zack Wheat
Jim Rice
Peanuts Lowrey
Pepper Martin
Bobby Wine
Chet Lemon
Darryl Strawberry
Rocky Cherry
Dan Quisenberry

The Tokyo-Montana Express

Reggie Jackson once said, “'Articulate' is a word white people use to express their astonishment that black people can speak English.” (Note that this was about 25 years before the Biden-Obama thing. It’s true, I swear, even if The All-Seeing Eye of Google can’t back me up. This may have come from Maury Allen’s “Baseball’s 100,” a book that was my personal Bible when I was a kid. Willie Mays, #1, was my personal Jesus. I guess Napoleon Lajoie was my personal Seth, or something.)

Along those lines, it appears that “imaginative” is a word Westerners use to express their astonishment that Japanese authors are not bland, conformist salarymen whose only outlet for individualism is a creepy connoisseurship of schoolgirls’ underwear. This comes to mind because I’ve been reading a bit of Murakami recently, and every single back-cover-blurb follows an identical template: “East meets West in this imaginative romp joining American pop culture with Japanese spirituality. Careening from Bob Dylan to Gary Cooper to Zen koan, it’s as if contemporary Tokyo were placed in a blender and its intestines & pancreas were spattered all over the walls, creating a Japanese interpretation of Clifford Still etc. etc. etc.”

Well, OK, Murakami is imaginative. But I think we can all agree to ban “East Meets West” from ever appearing again, in any language (except ASL; come on, they’re deaf. Cut them some slack). East met West a long time ago; they became fairly well acquainted in the early 1900s, and despite a nasty spat during the early 1940s, they reconciled and began having casual sex during MacArthur’s occupation. East has a toothbrush & lots of clothes in West’s apartment. West has, like, a lot of its shit over at East’s place (it’s totally gonna want its Monks LP back in the event of a breakup; I’m just saying). Corn on Japanese pizza, made by Iranian immigrants = avocado in American sushi, made by Salvadoran immigrants. I’ve heard there are some feral Eurasian kids roaming free. Lock your doors.

Cognosce veritate; ecce libertas

Corn Chips & Pie has been in rehab for the past month. I'm feeling much better. I realize that I may have made many mistakes, and if anyone feels as if he were hurt by these hypothetical "mistakes," I apologize. Unreservedly.

I have never felt better. I have an odd gleam in my eye, and I don't smell the same way I used to. I kind of smell like arugula. It's not unpleasant; it's just a little strange. Why do I smell like arugula?

My soft, measured, articulate sentences seem rote. There is a hollowness in my gaze. My pre-rehab narcissism has been replaced by a post-rehab narcissism. Rehab helps one to redirect one's narcissism-- it's like a makeover for one's self-regard. The pig now wears Dolce & Gabbana. Whatever.

Oh, and how have you been?