GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #737: A RELIABLE PEN

 Ever see the movie Four Rooms? Half of it is good, and I'm talking about the segments directed by Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino. In Tarantino's, there's this bet. It's inspired by an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, but it's based on a very good short story by Roald Dahl. I recommend reading it if you can find it.

Anyway, the bet is, this guy's got a reliable lighter. He's betting that he can light it the first time he tries. If he succeeds, he gets his friend's awesome car. If he loses, the bellboy is going to cut off his pinky finger.

(It should be mentioned that everyone involved is drunk on Cristal. Because "it's fucking good, Ted." And "everything else is piss.")

You can watch it here to see how it all turns out, but I won't spoil it for you. The conclusion is very fast and very funny.

I expect peak performance from my pens, and I very rarely get it. If I have a gel pen, it will always work the first time I use it unless it's at the end of its life, but everything else? It could happen, but more often than not I have to scratch it on paper a little bit first before it starts writing.

At work we have shitty pens. Sometimes I have to really scratch at them to get them going, and it irritates me because if I'm physically writing something down, as opposed to typing it, time is of the essence. Not too long ago our 401(k) company visited us and left us with a bunch of gimcracks, including a bunch of pens. I took a few because it's always good to have a decent supply of pens.

I didn't expect much. I figured it would be good for a month, tops, and then it'll be done. Much to my glee and pleasure, it wrote perfectly the first time I used it. And it has written perfectly each and every time since.

I'm always after big things to make me happy, but more often than not it's the little things. Like a reliable pen at work.

GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #136: WHAT I REALLY WANT TO SEE

Do you know what I really want to see? Maybe I should first ask if any of you have read Roald Dahl's MY UNCLE OSWALD. Well, if you have, you know it's about a sex fiend by the name of Oswald, who has spent most of his life writing his memoirs so everyone will know about the sexual depravity he's gotten up to over the course of his life. This volume of his journal is about him teaming up with a beautiful young woman to steal the sperm of famous, prolific men in order to sell it to women who want to bear the children of geniuses.


Yes, you read that right. This is a novel from the mind of the same guy who came up with CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY and JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH.


Do you know what I really want to see? I want to see a movie based on this novel, but we need an a-list cast. I want this thing to get the THIS IS THE END treatment. I'm sure Rogen and Franco would be all over this, but I'm thinking bigger.


What if . . . dare I think it?! What if we could get the Clooney and Pitt cast of OCEAN'S ELEVEN to do this? How awesome would that be? They certainly have enough of a sense of humor to take the piss out of themselves.


We need this to happen.