"RAPID-FIRE RAKER" IS GETTING RETIRED -- (Or Fired)

It had to happen. Blog-owner WCC, unlike Jim Bowie or Davy Crockett, is coming back (alive) from San Antonio tomorrow. I guess he saw the high prices of those Gila Monster-skin cowboy boots and can't wait to get back into his holey tennis shoes. Or perhaps those ten-gallon Stetson hats didn't fit. He only has a five-gallon head, y'know.

More likely WCC thought I wasn't able to match his wit and funniness. But he's hard to follow for anyone who is still partly SANE. So I'll try to cram in as many of my very own custom-created jokes for you so I'll leave you laughing. Does that mean you or I will be laughing to leave? We shall see. But this 'big ending' will let me jump into a role I created but never got to try: that of "Rapid-Fire Raker -- World's only standup comic who sits in a rocking chair." The jokes only SOUND old. I 'm the real thing. Try to imagine this, from a packed comedy club ...

After sweeping the stage I shuck the broom and drag out my wooden rocking chair. As I sit down, cries of "He's off his rocker" begin to die out. I begin...

"Hi folks! Anyone from Wisconsin? Well how about a guy from there that watches old Andy Hardy movies during lunch. I'd call that "Mickey Rooney and Cheese." (Drums: 'Kaboom, crash!') Thanks, drummer. Now pick up that cymbal before the waiter grabs it and starts serving drinks. (Silence) See, the cymbal is big and round sorta like a tray, and -- Hey, I need some laughs! Just cuz you're still sober you don't have to act it! What are you,an audience or one of those posters Hitler hung? Aw, that's OK cuz I don't need this job. Or any job. That's why I never vote for any of those presidents who wanna put everyone back to work. You call it a promise -- I call it a threat!

"Besides, I've been sick. Of all places I hadda eat HERE! But drink up if you did cuz the alcohol will kill anything. You too? Sure, but it'll get rid of those little tiny germs first. Oops! My shoes are worn out and the soles are flapping. If I walk real fast it sounds like clapping. So I keep these. Saves money plus the sound effects make me feel like a big success. I need the applause cuz I don't get as much respect as that Dangerfield guy. It's true. I bought one of those Memory Foam mattresses and it forgot who I was. For some reason it thought I was the wrong guy when I crawled in. Oh well, I can always oin this audience and sleep here." (Runs out -- of jokes and courage both.)

Just kidding. Thanks. You've been a great audience as I tried to fill in for my pal, WCC. At least I think you were a great audience. (In a blog you can think anything you want...until you read the comments - so I just won't read them.)

I hope our real blogger will be glad to be back. But it will be one of those bittersweet homecomings, like many parents will have as their kids go back to college. And each year they return less like kids than when they left. Takes awhile to realize that 'growing up' was your and their goal both all along. So cheer up!

Now it's time for me to say "I'll keep a song in my heart for all of you." Because nobody wants to hear my chest rattle! Now...

"Howdy WCC, and 'Bye Y'all." (I'm speaking Texan.) -- Raker

BUTTERED PARSECS -- Slipping into Astronomy

Hi. This is Raker again, not WCC, the STAR of this blog. He’s still a few light years, or heavy-footed miles away on his trip to Texas. But enough about Earth. Let’s talk about something even bigger than Texas: The rest of the Universe, whether Texans admit it or not.

Several years ago one summer my son and I signed up for an astronomy class at a nearby college. He did it for the high school credits that he could get. I did because I “just thought the stars were pretty.” I wonder how many others who figured on some easy credits of relaxing star-gazing got hit with wall-to-wall MATH instead! So that’s how “Parsecs” got into the title today. It’s an astronomy measurement, one of the few I remember, which is 3.2 light years. That’s 19.2 trillion miles, for you who tend to check the National Debt Clock on this page.(Don’t worry, because we are still in the lower trillion dollars of debt.)Things are still just fine, especially for whoever keeps selling printing presses to Washington, D.C.

Back to the class. I hadn’t had algebra for years, and avoided using or thinking about it, preferring to let those mechanical calculators do that for me. But I didn’t drop out like some of the disillusioned stargazer wimps. I plunged into the homework, partly as a good example for my son. He still had years (I hoped) of study ahead, and “Wise Responsible Dad” would show him what it took to succeed in a difficult subject. In fact I began to OVERdose on homework. Facts and figures regarding parsecs, astronomical units, kelvins, doppler effects, red shifts, temps of stars, dying, exploding and newborn from cosmic dust began to fill my world, and our home. Scribbly notes and numbers covered our desks, tables, bedsheets and any flat surface I could find with half-done and crossed-out graphs and problems. Anything ‘blank’ was in danger of getting a ‘number tattoo,' White and light-skinned people began to fear to visit, Fine, because I had no time to entertain anyone who preferred to talk about their babies or work instead of astrophysics. My marriage was in danger too. When I caught my wife trying to throw away a pile of my wrinkled paperwork and yelled “Drop that pitchfork!" it almost caused a supernova explosion.

Now for the happy ending. And any ending to that class would have been happy. I got a final grade of “A.” Wow! I must have had more math stowing away inside that UFO, which my mind had become than I thought! This proof of my Einsteinian brilliance had to be shared! I approached my son, lazing like a Basking Shark in our swimming pool. When you want to make a statement last longer and sound more important, you start with lots of prefaces: ”Ahem. Well, son, I notice you spent a lot of time out here this summer. And your astronomy book isn’t wet so I know you didn’t study. In fact, that bookmark is on the same page I saw it the first week of class!" (No reaction behind the sunglasses.) “But, in contrast, I worked like a dog myself and got an ‘A’ as my reward. But I won’t be angry as long as you learned your lesson about the worth of genuine study. Now what kind of grade did you end up with?"

He took another suck at his lemonade, somehow floating beside his rubber mattress. “Me? Aw, I just scanned that (slurp) book. Kinda lame. A lot the same as my old physics course. So I (slurp) only got a B plus.”

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Today’s tip for a cleaner home:
When you tell someone to “Think outside the Box,” make sure your CAT isn’t listening. - RAKER

SECRETS RE BLOG WRITER UNREVEALED IN SCANDAL MAGS

-- I mean those 'Ragazines' we scan while wating in line to pay at Walmart. Why die waiting until he's a Movie Star?

By now perhaps you know WCC's Monoblog has a guest host. That being yours truly, 'Raker.'

Hello again to those who are back for my second attempt at being Ghost Guestwriter, or whatever. I realize I don't do this as well as WCC, "The World's Weirdest Wordsmith." That's a title I gave him. He's far too modest to brag about his weirdness and prefers to let others do it. In fact, he used to be classed as a "Functional Illiterate". That is, until he stopped functioning.

But maybe you wonder how and why I was chosen out of the million or two who applied. (That's partly true -- TWO did apply.) I proudly came out as his top choice, being the one who wasn't jailed and agreed to work for nothing. How lucky I was that, for this blog, writing skills were not critical. Look how far he got without them! Just kidding, of course, because he confesses having to repeat so many English classes taught him a great deal. Though mostly about aeronautics. On the rare days he attended class he devoted his time to folding and testing many revolutionary types of paper airplanes. When the teacher would retrieve one sticking in her hair or cleavage, her scowl would soften as she'd find actual attempts at writing essays scrawled among the gum and doodles on the paper. WCC credits her, more than anyone, for truly PRAYING him to pass.

But, since today's issue seems to focus on inside stories about our once-again-truant blogger, and since he's not here to stop me,let me add something more. I remember visiting him in his newly-remodeled home in St. Louis. You know how all that newness makes you want to extend it to accessories, right? And that means sets of fluffy new towels in all the bathrooms. I was impressed that all of his and his wife's were monogrammed. Pretty classy, I thought.Then I noticed every towel had a scripted letter "H" on it. Nobody's name in that small family even has an "h" in any of their names! So when I asked about it, WCC told me that the H's were for "HIS" and "HERS." That led to the obvious question of how, since both initials are the same, how She and He can tell which is which. He stared at me like I was the only idiot standing there. "Easy," he said. "Her "H's" are on HER towels, and my "H's" are on MINE. How silly would it be the other way around?" I left soon after that, and washed up in a service station on the way out. I don't know whose paper towels I used, but I almost skipped drying my hands because I couldn't find any "H" on them. Now Adios from Raker. I'm doing the same as you faithful readers are: Counting the minutes 'til the landlord of this blog comes home riding a steer, (or maybe a steer horn,) back from Texas. Yee Haw, Y'all!