She said umm...

In my last post I borrowed a joke written by my brother Dave that went something like:


I whipped out my tikka masala, and to her surprise
It was every bit as hot as her vindaloo


Like Superman and Batman, every joke has an origin story and this one was conceived in a canoe on a lake in Connecticut.


Dave and I were fishing as the sun began to set behind a million dollar lakeside home. As long time readers of this blog know, I only fish with a hula popper because if I was a fish I would be unable to resist a frog in a skirt. My brother was using a real lure and was actually catching fish.


When me and Dave are together, the jokes fly and loud, obnoxious laughter fills the air. It's like a writer's room. No boundaries, no shame, no joke too rancid. And like a good writer's room, we are both willing to let loose with 30 bombs in a row in the hope that the 31st is a winner. Dave must have killed because I laughed so hard that I tipped the canoe.


Me and Dave are city boys that swim worse than we fish so a rocking canoe is a precarious perch. So, I decided to give the canoe a good shake everytime the lucky bastard landed another fish. This gave me a great idea for a bit, or a youtube video or an actual porn site.

Hold on to your paddles, boys!!! Here comes the Bang Canoe. The premise? Two losers decide to create a website but all the good vehicles are taken. Bang Bus? Been done. Minivan Soccer Moms? Been there. Bang Boat? Cabin cruiser, Miami, scorching mamacitas, old in 1998. Car backseats? So boring that even I have done it.


So the two loser guys come up with Bang Canoe. A canoe has so many advantages, its novel, its cheap, its outdoors, its OUTRAGEOUS!!! Of course the two guys have never actually been in a canoe and soon find out that the required positions and rythmic pounding are really hard to achieve in a canoe. HILARIOUS! (If you agree, call my agent.)

That's when a woman in a beautiful sari walked out on to the deck of her house and looked out across the lake. It may have been the soft light of the fading sun. It may have been that she was close enough to see but not so close that you could really see. It may have been the look of longing in her deep, brown eyes. Or it may have been the beer, but she looked just like this:

It only lasted a moment but her gaze fell upon the two half jews in the canoe and she smiled. Then her husband came out to check on the grill with a kid right behind him. The woman sighed and disappeared into the bright yellow light of her house.

Talk of fish and canoes turned to talk of women -- exotic, unattainable women and then I open with the classic, although club-worn:

She wants me.

My brother starts riffing, and I riff back and he ends up at the old Blues Brothers song that I'm sure they stole from some poor, incredibly talented, incredibly old, black guy. If you're a serious student of comedy, you know it goes something like this:

I said woman, you going to walk a mile for a camel
Or are you going to make like Mr. Chesterfield and satisfy?
She said that all depends on what you're packing
Regular or kingsize?
Then she pulled out my Jim Beam, and to her surprise
It was every bit as hard as my Canadian Club
I said what now you got to say baby?
She said umm...

So Dave starts with:

I opened up her aloo ghobi, and to my surprise
It was every bit as creamy as her chicken korma

I countered lamely with:

I covered her face in my kheer, and to my surprise
It curried her pakora

He smirked and responded with:

She took all of my palak paneer, and to my surprise
She let me skewer her meen moli

Definitely a step back so I tried to take advantage:

I pulled out my chipatti, and to her surprise
It was every bit as hard as her saag panir

Hard and saag makes no sense, though when you think about it, Jim Beam and Canadian Club? Did John Belushi have two dicks?

Then my brother ironed out her creases and put her to bed with:

I whipped out my tikka masala, and to her surprise
It was every bit as hot as her vindaloo.

For some reason tikki masala sounds penisy and vindaloo sounds vaginary and hot is the right adjective.

So thanks to my brother, Dave Melonosky for the help. Here he is with a prize winning yellow perch.

36 Hours in Rajasthan, India. A Travel Guide*

*Not associated with the New York Times article that pissed me off.

Last week, when the editors at George Magazine pitched this assignment, I jumped at it. With the exception of Houston, Texas, there are not too many places in the world I won't visit as long as I'm paid well and get to expense everything. Normally, I would spend my 36 hours in Rajasthan, India at the airport trying to get a flight out but that wouldn't be much of an article so I put a clothespin on my nose and went looking for fun.


Friday 5 P.M.

After 23 hours of air travel and eight hours on a crowded train from New Dehli, you're starting to think that another weekend in Milan might have been a better way to spend $60,000, but one glance at the cannonball dents left in the wall of a fort will put a smile back on your face. Be careful not to step on a dusty beggar as you trod past Mehrangarh Fort in beautiful Jodphur. Named for those silly pants favored by British fairies, this city of sandalwood, dirt and open sewers puts the "in" back in India, as in, get inside a fancy hotel and stay in!

Friday 8 P.M.

Book yourself a room at the Umaid Bhawan Palace, a lavish Art-Deco masterpiece that proudly contains the longest sewer pipe in the eastern subcontinent, assuring that you won't be smelling yourself two hours later. Rooms start at 500,000 rupees, or $10,740 a night and for an additional 10,000 rupees Elizabeth Hurley will recreate her wedding night -- with you as the groom. After quenching your carnal apetite, dine at the hotel's restaurant. Order the Indian-influenced lamb curry (47 rupees) and a delightful bottle of Mumbai Merlot (114 rupees).

Friday 11 P.M.

Jodphur is a world famous exporter of polyester and opium. Skip the polyester but head over to The Devil's Bargain, a safe but touristy opium den on the darkside of town. Find a comfortable pillow and spoil yourself with some top shelf, pea-sized "pills" of the local Bollywood Brown (64 rupees a pill). Don't forget to pick up an artfully wrapped tin (160 rupees) of raw opium paste for the folks back home.

Saturday 11 A.M.

Forget where you are and how you got there? Go back and read the entry for Friday 11 P.M. then hire one of the colorful elephant cabs for the short ride to Bikaner. Remember to ride side saddle or you may lose an hour recovering from a elephant-induced episiotomy.


Bikaner is one of the few places in the country where the cow is treated like a cow and the rat is treated like a cow in India. Enjoy a 100% beef 114 Grammer with Cheese (12 rupees) with a traditional Cherry Slurpee (6 rupees) at the clean and well lit Burger and Lassi before standing in the long lines at the Karni Mata Temple.


Saturday 1 P.M.


The locals call it the Rat Temple but don't let the teaming swarms of rats discourage you from visiting. The 14th century architecture is splendid, the historical mumbo jumbo relayed to you by a guide with poor english and few teeth about how Ms. Mati asked the god of death to reincarnate the son of a grieving story teller and ended up with a temple and 30,000 rats makes you feel good about being a Christian, and the smell of rat feces is a refreshing break from the smell of human feces.



Much like a Japanese Restaurant, no shoes are allowed in the temple, and if a rat scurries over your foot, legend has it that you will have seven years of good luck -- and goosebumps for three hours. If you see an albino white rat, you win a date with Padma Lakshmi. If you are truly blessed and a rat shits in your coffee mug, this auspicious occurence will result in you being reincarnated as a guy married to one of those buxom multi-arm goddesses that are hotter than a five story walk up in old Bombay.



Saturday 6 P.M.


After a four hour bus ride to the pink city of Jaiper, visit the snack bar at the bus depot and order a chai (6 rupees) and a sweet fan biscuit (4 rupees). Watch as the weird herby stuff is steeped in exotic steamed milk, just like at the Starbucks back home where a chai (6 rupees) is almost as good and the maple oat nut scone (9 rupees) is actually better than anything you can get in India.

Get back in the bus and leave because Jaiper has way too many Indians and the curry is subpar.



Saturday 10 P.M.


Sitting on the edge of an endless desert where the sand in the wind painlessly removes the enamel from your front teeth, Udaipur is considered the most romantic city in India, --the Reno, Nevada of the subcontinent. It also has really good curry. At the Royal Sitar eschew the tempting chicken fingers and fries (15 rupees) and order the mutton curry (29 rupees). It's a hearty stew-like dish flavored with curry and the freshly killed parents of lambs, and it will provide you with the fuel you'll need for the frantic festivities to come.



Saturday 12 A.M.


At the upscale Bengali Ranch, choose from the well thought out selection of local varietals. In a small but elegant room (200 rupees an hour), she'll remove her shimmering sari then you'll whip out your tikki masala, and to her surpise it will be every bit as hot as her vindaloo.



Sunday 12 P.M.

Just like it's sister city of sin, Udaipur is full of one arm bandits. It is also home to an alarming number of two armed bandits, one legged bandits and one armed one legged bandits so watch your pocket book as you stroll to Lake Pichola. Take a boat (24 rupees) or wade (0 rupees) to the island in the middle of the lake and have lunch at the Isleoflosttoys Palace. Built in 1373, it's menu hasn't changed since 1397, and for good reason, everything is delicious. Order the curry (62 rupees).


Sunday 4 P.M.

As you begin your 31 hours of travel back home, with an ice pack strategically placed on your inflamed sphincter, squeezed in a train that is stuffed like a samosa with less than savory ingredients, think back on the last 36 hours and be thankful that you didn't go to Milan or Miami for the weekend because then you'd be forced to go back to work on Monday instead of Wednesday. (You don't get sentences like that at the New York Times!)

I did this better before:
36 Hours in Zagreb, Croatia

Attack of the Zombie Salmon from Hell

Thanks to Steve, the guy in the cubicle next to mine, for this bit. He came back from his fishing weekend with no fish but a bunch of cool photos. Less revolting photos taken by Steve can be found at HudsonvalleyXXXposed.com.

Dragonflies hovered and darted above the riffles like NASCAR drivers anxiously awaiting the green flag after an overlong yellow. The light of dawn made reading the water a challenge - but a challenge was just what Steve was looking for after 40 hours of sitting on his fat ass staring at a damn computer monitor. Little did Steve know that sun glare would be the least of his worries -- not when stinking, putrid death was lurking inches from his ankles!

Dr. Merv Rettenmund, an Ear, Nose and Throat man at Putnam Hospital, noticed the smell first. "Jesus, it smells like rotting fish!" he exclaimed between puffs on his Newport Menthol.

Gravity sees to it that all watery things merge into one, and a river runs under it. It was an old train trestle bridge that never seemed to get used by a train. The river was the 18 Mile Creek, cut by a glacier 47 billion years ago from the igneous spawn of long forgotten volcanos. The steady flow of the mighty river was the timeless result of countless rainfalls, culverts that kept the highways passable, the outfall from the Town of Olcott sewage treatment plant and hundreds of failing septic systems located throughout the valley.

After he buttoned his supple, calfskin glove he would hold his rod straight out in front of him, where it trembled with the beating of the blood in his veins. Although it was 8.5" long, it only weighed four and half ounces. It was wrapped with red and blue silk thread and, the wrappings were carefully spaced to make the delicate rod powerful but not so stiff it could not tremble.

But that was earlier, back in the bathroom of Room 7 of the Lighthouse Motel, and Steve was now thigh deep in the middle of a cold river in western New York State. Still, Steve remembered the good old days when he could get off with nothing but spit, his bare hand and the lingering memory of Katie Couric.

The stink of fish flesh brought him back to the river. The river often smelled like a mixture of ripe cheese and warm piss in a pair of worn corduroys, but this stench was nose bleed awful. Steve was a Catholic and a bait fisherman. His first cast of the day sank a sack of brown trout eggs right in front of a Steelhead Trout. The big fish swam like a bat out of hell that was being chased by a legion of the Devil's own zombie assassins. Steve chuckled. "That fish will be in Lake Ontario by noon," Steve thought to himself, "Next time I cast I'll have to place it a little further away."

There was a muffled cry from behind the railroad trestle that was a good thousand yards away.

Dr. Rettenmund cursed, "Damn amateurs." He fired his butt into a fast moving current and lit up another one.

Dr. Rettenmund saw the first zombie fish. It was alone and swimming slowly and methodically right at him. "Damn, unusual for a salmon," he muttered. Dr. Rettenmund was a Presbyterian and a fly fisherman. His rod rocked back and forth to an unheard four count and the Royal Coachman landed at the strange salmon's nose. That was the last cast Dr. Rettenmund would ever make but thankfully, it was a beauty.

There was a gurgle and the good doctor was gone.

Steve looked up in disbelief. "Zombie salmon from hell!" he shouted. An overpowering stench rose up out of his chest waders. It was not the foul smell of zombie fish or a fart ignited from last night's Hommel Chili with Beans. Tough guy Steve had crapped his pants.

He started to the nearest shore but the zombie fish had him cut off.

A big ugly mother came right at him. Steve stumbled on a rock and twisted his ankle. "Ouch," he thought and fell into the water.

An eye drawn way into its socket looked at him vacantly as 100 sharp little zombie teeth bit into his face.

Buddy was sitting in the warmth and comfort of his dad's Honda Pilot listening to Linkin Park as he explored the contents of the glove compartment. The high pitched scream of a woman rose up from the river.

"That's Dad!" yelled Buddy. "And he's in trouble."

Buddy burst from the SUV and headed down the steep embankment. At the shoreline he saw Steve, no more that 50 feet away, struggling in the water. Buddy raised his Crosman 1280 Break Barrel pellet gun up to his shoulder. He sighted down the blue steel and let out a long breath. If he was less than an inch off, he would take out his dad's eye and that meant no trip to Wal Mart and no Pokeman cards. Buddy pulled the trigger. There was a sudden cloud of pink salmon flesh. Buddy pulled the trigger again, and again, and again, and again.

This was the best fishing trip ever! After a return visit to the Pilot for more ammo, Buddy finally cleared the nearby water of zombies. He struggled into his chest waders because his mom would kill him if he got his new basketball shoes muddy, then he waded to his dad.

"Dad looks terrible," thought Buddy. "I mean he always looks terrible but now he really looks terrible." Buddy found the inner strength to drag the massive bulk of his overweight dad onto the shore.

"Don't die, Dad!" Buddy was about to cry but if his dad wasn't dead and saw him crying? No trip to Wal Mart.

Steve opened his one good eye and watched a single tear travel down the flushed cheek of his only son. "What are you a pussy!?!" Steve yelled, but he wasn't really mad. It was a joke.

That night there was a trip to Wal Mart and dinner at Outback. Steve finished a third beer as Buddy finished a second sundae. "Hurry up son, I have to go to work in the morning."

The mind-numbing monotony of work would never be so good.

My Baseball Card Collection

Over the weekend, while I was throwing out useless stuff, I found my old baseball card collection. I used to buy hundreds of packs of cards every spring -- the good ones I kept in a shoebox, the Carmen Fanzones and Horace Clarkes ended up on the floor of my closet where my mom would scoop them up and throw them out.

Here are the best of the best. I know these cards are worth a small fortune and as soon as Antiques Roadshow comes to New York I'm going to find out if I'm getting myself a Wii for Christmas or a BMW!

All the Greatest New York Mets Collection

I was a Met fan growing up and until Daniel Murphy showed up this year there was only one Met worth idolizing, George Thomas Seaver. Tom Seaver cards were so coveted that I used to glue and tape them to the cover of the shoebox so that I didn't accidently flip them or stick them in the spokes of my bike.


I've left the old yellowing tape on because I know that collectors of fine antiquities really go for the warm glow of a well-aged patina.

"Mr. Seaver? Please take of your warm up jacket for this action photograph."

"FU. I 'm afraid I'll get a chill."

Tom was a former marine and was against the Vietnam war. He also had a smoking hot wife. He was like a Kennedy at our house.

I saved the best for last. The official Tom Seaver rookie card. Back in the day they didn't waste real cards on rookies so Tom had to share his card. I didn't want any of the guys to think I was in love with Bill Denehy so I made sure everyone knew that I was a Tom Seaver fan.

My Hall of Fame Collection

Johnny Bench was like the white Roy Campanella. He hit like Joe Mauer and fielded like whichever Molina brother is really good at fielding. Catcher cards were always great for drawing little piles of poop.

I didn't know that Reggie Jackson would someday become Mr. October for the hated Yankees but how could I resist that pose? Just 11 years old and I already knew that drawing a penis was funny. It would be a few more years before I realized that drawing an erect penis was REALLY funny.

Damn that evil Nolan Ryan for getting himself traded to the Angels for Jim Fregosi.

Even I knew that Hank Aaron was going to be an all time great but my little brother didn't give a damn.

Mickey Mantle was the most hated player of the most hated Yankees. Here he is after an imaginary fight with Felix Millian. This card in near mint condition recently sold at Christies for $500,000,000,000,000,000. Yo! - I'm free friday night - hit me at facebook - no ugly chicks, rly!

Even More Wall Street Journal Humor - Dog Day Afternoon

Another Post Courtesy of the Wall Street Journal - I kid Rupert Murdoch a lot when we see each other at the Friar's Club but his rag does supply an endless assortment of crap for my blog.

The Wall Street Journal has a daily cartoon called Pepper and Salt that I really, really don't like. Apparently, rich Wall Street scumbags have their own unique form of humor that is not funny. Here's today's cartoon.

Woof! Let's see what witty, neo-conservative growling these two mutts are up to. Maybe not. When you first read these cartoons you think, oh no, they're just like the cartoons in the New Yorker, I'm just too stupid to understand them. But after weeks of analysis, I've come to the conclusion that we're smart enough, they just suck, and they almost never have anything to do with business, or the right wing agenda of the Wall Street Journal.

Even us poorly paid liberals know that dogs like a good belly rub so what is causing this reduction in services? Why is this funny? I texted Rupert Murdoch but he hasn't gotten back to me. Also, it looks like the guy drew the whole thing is a minute and a half. Does the Wall Street Journal pay its cartoonist so little that the guy can't take 10 minutes to draw two dogs? Seriously, I could draw a better dog on a napkin and I ain't Picasso.

This is the part of the post where I attempt to write funnier captions. Remember this is a "business" comic for Wall Street Journal readers that is officially housed in the collections of the Harvard Business School Library assuring that future generations of MBA assholes will have no sense of humor. If you are the president of a major university and want to house a collection of my work, e-mail me.

And today's winner so far:
As always, I will continue to add captions to this post all day until I think of something funny. You are invited to help but you won't because leaving a comment is too much damn effort, bitch.

Note: There are a bunch of these comic rips so just scroll on down.

Pop Culture Significance, Sesame Street's 40 Years vs. 50 Years of Playboy

Remember when Google ran that special Playboy 50th anniversary logo a couple of years back?

Jerry Falwell got so upset he almost popped a boner.

Sesame Street has been around 40 years! You didn't know? What are you as dead as Jerry Falwell? I haven't seen this much media coverage of a pop culture anniversary since Playboy turned 50.

Now, I can appreciate the Children's Television Workshop's significant efforts to

1. teach the abc's;
2. bring Palestinian and Israeli children together with only foam rubber and fake fur;
3. and make the inner city a little less frightening to white people everywhere...

but enough already. If you all don't stop I'm gonna have to get off my lazy ass, wake up my lazy brother and do a bit.

Which leads me to a shameless plug of my Playboy 50th anniversary bit. This bit was so good it actually caused UncleMelon.com to crash for two days.

We got farked and received 70,000 hits in three hours. By noon, the log files on the cheap server that hosted UncleMelon.com were full and the site went down. The always unresponsive but incredibly inexpensive web host took their sweet time and the rest is history.

My site had been farked maybe a dozen times before, resulting in huge increases in traffic -- but nothing like that day that has become known at wikipedia as Pink Tuesday. The difference? The boobies tag.

A Fark boobies tag = outrageous, server crushing traffic.

The bit was a decade by decade review of select centerfolds that stands up pretty well. It's sort of Basic Humor 101 making jokes about cultural changes in hair styles, clothing styles, boob styles, and pubic hair styles.

Everything is still good fun until you get to May 1992, Anna Nicole Smith, ouch. Uncomfortable, yeah a bit, so just skip over it if you're a pussy.

The usual warnings apply, the bit is not suitable for children, pregnant women or discerning readers.

Wait just a second, some of you expected a dissertation on the significance of 40 years of Sesame Street versus Playboy's 50 years. Wouldn't you rather go and admire some mighty fine boobage? It's seriously sweet stuff, just try not to think about what those boobs are doing today. You know, pointing straight to the epicenter of the planet, accidently dusting off the radiator in the bathroom, and scaring the cat.

You still rather read an analysis? Here's one graciously provided by my guest blogger and brother, Dave Melonosky.

---

Sesame Street vs. Playboy

Firstly, they both:

1. led to excessive masturbation
2. made many of us question our sexual mores
3. showed alternative lifestyles in a positive light
4. featured fantasy characters that do not exist in the real world
5. went from furrier to less furrier over the years

Now for Playboy's advantages:

1. allowed masturbation in greater privacy
2. was glossier and had funnier jokes
3. more tits, less boobs
4. more pussy, fewer cats and dogs
5. let us count all the way to 13, if you count playmate of the year

Now, Sesame Street:

1. had Kermit,the first openly gay television host
2. had a mixed-species, same gender couple in Snuffy and Big Bird
3. less white, way more colors
4. provided masturbatory simuli but we were often caught by our moms playing on the living room rug

and the winner is.... Playboy! For being less gritty, less gay and more naked.

Editor's Suggestion for CTW: In the future, more Maria, less clothes, way less Elmo.

Enough Already! Google and Sesame Street and Kim Kardashian, the Unholy Trinity

I get it. Sesame Street has been around a long time. Enough with the fricking Google logos.

Last night I am in Defcon 1. Halftime is almost over and I need to get back to the game, pronto. I punch out of xhamster and head over to the always reliable Google. I start typing kardashian bj with my right hand while my left hand is busy goo-goo-googling and who is looking down at me? Fricking Elmo! I really don't need a 5 year old puppet watching me while I go about my business.

The other night it was the cookie monster, Saturday it was the purple, metrosexual vampire guy. Google, throw me a bone and after 11 PM, logo me up some vintage Maria from circa 1979!!!

I stole these photos of Maria from FranklinMintBlog -- google, please feel free to steal them from me.

A-Rod the Centaur Part 2

I just found this photo of A-Rod the Centaur at AccessHollywood.com. They are claiming that this photo was taken in August of this year as Alex Rodriguez was taking his two children for a ride in Central Park. It appears that years of steroid abuse and frequent injections of Human Growth Hormone (HGH) have resulted in man boobs and the torso of a horse.

Alex Rodriguez the Centaur

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

An ex-girlfriend of New York Yankee third baseman Alex Rodriguez revealed that the former drug abuser commissioned Sandro Bonticelli to paint a family portrait that hangs over the bed in the master bedroom of his 407-room apartment in Manhattan. Mr. Rodriguez is portrayed as a forlorn centaur while Kate Hudson is painted as a happy chick with a +3 halberd.