Fox Whores Itself For Cookies (or I AM NOT DAN O'BRIEN)
So after three straight weeks of tooling on CNN, Hate By Numbers has come home to Fox News where apparently they are totally OK with running informercials for diet products under the guise of medical reports. It should be mentioned that due to my new computer, loaded with the as bad as you've heard Windows Vista, HBN almost didn't happen this week. But MJ-89 stepped forward with her IT know how and plucky Australian determination. Thanks MJ! But of course, the real story this week is the inability of certain Cracked readers to tell DOB and me apart. Read all about it after the vid.
Last week, Dan O'Brien poked a little fun at me in his Roseanne article by dropping my Facebook link and beseeching the Cracked readers to befriend me. I chuckled and got ready to receive a handful of friend requests. Surprisingly, there were over a hundred. Even more surprising, about 20 of them were from people trying to befriend Dan O'Brien. I was incredulous. How could anyone mix up Dan O'Brien and me? We are nothing alike. I was mad. Indignant. Insulted. And I knew exactly what to do. I stormed into Editor in Chief Jack O'Brien's office and demanded an explanation:
"This business about the readers mixing up me and DOB has got to stop!" I asserted.
But Jack wasn't paying attention. He was proofing Ross's new article about The 7 Craziest Advice Tips For Ebay Shoppers
.
"Check it out," he said without looking up. "Really first rate. If it weren't for the fact that Ross occasionally murders people in accordance with the phases of the moon, he'd be my favorite Cracked blogger."
But I wasn't interested in hearing about Ross. "Are you listening to me, Premature E-Jack-U-Lation?" I inquired. "We have a problem here."
"What is it NOW, Dan," Jack said, looking up from the piece. "Oh, Gladstone . . . I thought . . ."
"Thought what, Banana Jackeries?"
"Thought you were someone else. Never mind.... And stop calling me that."
I knew Jack was a reasonable man at heart. A man who unlike DOB and me, had never been held in Disney jail for asking Minnie Mouse (repeatedly) if she were "fucking Goofy," during a character breakfast. (That shit just does NOT get old.) I tried to appeal to his inner businessmen.
"Listen to me, Three-Jack-A-Day-Smoking-Habit. Cracked has got to do a better job differentiating between DOB and me. Don't you want the readers to have TWO reasons to come visit Jacked.com
?"
Jack tightened up his eyes in an inexplicable display of pain. I assumed the lashes from his recent dominatrix visit were flaring up. (I'd read that all powerful men have their own dominas.)
"First of all," he said. "You're doing it wrong. You're just supposed to do variations on my name -- not insert "Jack" into any word that happens to rhyme with it. Second, are you seriously complaining about this?"
"Of course not, Tic-Jack-Toe" I said, trying to think how I could complain without appearing to be complaining. I came up empty so I just tried affecting a more pleasing English accent. "It's just, I've worked hard to carve out my own identity, and when 19 year old Facebookers get confused by a link, it just ruins it for me. I mean, seriously, how could anyone mix up Dan O'Brien and me?"
"Why are you talking like that?"
"Do you like it, Ex-Jack Change Lane?"
"No. I hate it. And was that suppose to rhyme with Exact Change
?"
"Right-o, Guv'ner! Jolly good."
Jack got up from his desk with a deeply pained growl. I could only imagine that his demanding mistress had been experimenting with new forms of CBT.
"Gladstone, this is not a problem. Buckholz punching my Grandma right in the face was a problem. But a handful of readers confusing you and DOB is not a problem."
"First of all, Polly-Wants-A-Jacker, your Grandma totally had it coming. But second, can you just explain to me how it's possible? How could someone confuse DOB with me?"
Jack shifted his weight uncomfortably -- no doubt due to the chaffing from the leather assless chaps I assumed he wore beneath his clothing. (At this point, it was just my running guess that his predilection for sado-masochism was the only real problem in our relationship). "Why would they mix you up? Gee, Gladstone. I don't know. Let's see:
You both write for Cracked.com;
You're both from the Northeast;
You're both the youngest of three brothers;
Neither of you is what a strapping man like me would call "tall;"
At least once, you both have expressed the desire to become, or have claimed that you actually are, Spider-Man;
You have both written multiple articles about Hannah Montana/Miiey Cyrus;
Neither of you kill people in a ritualistic and Zodiac-based fashion like Ross Wolinsky;
You both played in bands in college;
Both of you have engaged in a public slander campaign for the affections of Cracked readers who may or may not look like their avatars and who would never have sex with you in real life;
You both fought crime in Rhode Island in the 90's as masked vigilantes with secret identities starting with "M;"
And lastly, you are the only two guys I know who are still sporting sideburns. Seriously, what is wrong with you?"
I was undeterred by Jack's list. "Yeah, but I'm Gladstone. The name is synonymous with humor and class. 'O'Brien' is synonymous with functional alcoholism and chlamydia."
"You know that my last name is also 'O'Brien,' right Gladstone?"
"Yes. What's your point? We're talking about me and DOB now. Try to stay focused Killing-Me-Softly-With-His-Song-Was-Sung-By-Roberta-FLACK."
"Gladstone, I hate you so much, I no longer feel bad about writing all those nasty things about you on Digg.com."
Just then DOB walked in, and for a moment it was like I was a staring at a mirror -- if mirrors could make you less hot and rob you of your comedic abilities. I tried to think of a cutting insult. Something to let Dan know he meant nothing to me. I could tell Dan was hard at work too, crafting the perfect comedic diss to put me in my place. We stared at each other for close to thirty seconds, our well lubed comedic minds working overtime, pursuing a the pinnacle of sophisticated and incisive humor. And then, in the glow of comedic inspiration, we delivered the logical fruition of our industry:
"Cockgoblin!" we screamed in unison.
It seems Highlander was wrong. There can be more than only one.
Check out some more of Gladstone's stuff HERE. And while you may already be his Facebook friend, have you joined the club that all the kids are talking about? And lastly, if you MUST be DOB's FB friend, then ...
