Next week's "All Over...," uh, I mean, "One Headlight."

My, um, good friend, T. Blanston, Jr., takes over my column space in this week's Arkansas Weekly. Here's the latest "One Headlight" by Mr. Blanston.


Due to his recent hospitalization after being viciously attacked by his daughter’s new pet monkey, Rob Grace was unable to write his column this week. Instead, award-winning journalist, adventurer, and handsome international playboy, T. Blanston, Jr. -- Rob’s good friend and comrade in print as well as life -- has graciously offered to contribute a column in his friend’s absence.

It is with a heavy heart that I write my trademark salutation: Greetings from Rancho Paradiso on the shores of the beautiful Loch Greers Ferry.

I have been at the hospital bedside of my dear friend, Rob Grace, for the past few hours. As you may have noted last week in the picture below Rob’s column, he finally relented and purchased a monkey for his daughter.

The monkey, named Wizzy, initially seemed to take a liking to Rob, but the other night as Rob watched a re-run of What Not to Wear, Wizzy sprang onto Rob’s face and proceeded to claw his eyes and bite his nose.

“It was horrible,” Rob’s daughter, Hannah, told me later. “Clinton Kelly had just made a cutting remark about a blouse a lady was wearing on the show. Dad chuckled, and said something like, ‘That Clinton is so sassy,’ and then, before you knew it, Wizzy was all over Dad’s face like white on rice.”

"Sassy" Clinton Kelly, co-host of What Not to Wear

I paused while Hannah held back her tears.

“I’ve never heard Dad scream like that,” she continued. “It was like a little girl except more shrill and high-pitched.”

I placed my hand on her shoulder.

“He’s gonna make it,” I said. “Your dad’s strong. By the way, did they ever find the rest of his tongue?”

“Yeah,” she said softly. “It was under the recliner.”

It took ten minutes for authorities to arrive and pry Wizzy off of my friend. By then, the damage had been done. Paramedics found various parts of Rob’s face around the living room, and Wizzy was wearing my friend’s treasured hairpiece. Unfortunately, Wizzy escaped and was last seen driving a white 1973-model Chevrolet El Camino toward Tunica. Witnesses said that Wizzy had two female companions in the vehicle with him, that the trio was consuming large amounts of Colt 45, and that Wizzy was still wearing Rob’s toupee.

Needless to say it was quite a shock to see my friend in the hospital earlier tonight. His head was covered in bandages and his body immobile, but his fists were tightly clenched.

“I thhnew I thouldn’t have boughthh tthhat monkey,” he said. “I tthhnew it!”

Trying not to laugh at my friend’s new speech problem, I simply placed my hand on his wrist and turned my head away.

“Hey,” he asked me, “thid they thind the threst of my thounge?”

By then, I could not hold it anymore. Laughter spurted out between my tightly closed lips. He really sounded “thilly.”

His eyes widened beneath the bandages.

“Thwat?” he asked. “Thwy are you latthhing at me?”

The attending nurse in the room also failed to keep a somber attitude, and she busted out laughing with me.

“I’m sorry,” I said to her as I gasped for air between laughs. “But he sounds hilarious, doesn’t he?”

“Thess!” she said as we now laughed even harder.

“Thwat?” Rob asked again. “Thwat? Thwat?!? Tthhop latthhing at me!”

Fortunately, doctors say the rest of Rob’s tongue will be reattached. A quick-thinking paramedic put the severed section in a cherry Icee Hannah was drinking that evening. Surgeons also say they’ll be able to fix Rob’s facial injuries, ensuring he’ll be as handsome as ever (though one doctor says Rob’s nose might have to be relocated to his chin while his left eye might have to be placed below his right ear which, by the way, will have to be moved to his left cheek).

As for me, I have to catch a jet to Cancun where I’ll be hanging with Kanye West on the beach. Besides Rob, I’ve never met a more polite and thoughtful man than Kanye. I’m really looking forward to the trip.

Who knows, maybe we’ll run into Wizzy and his two new girlfriends at some upscale nightclub.

So, Rob, get well, and remember you’re in our thoughts and prayers.

Oh, and thay thello to thannah for me.

This week's "All Over the Map"

Here's my "All Over the Map" from this week's Arkansas Weekly.

The riots began around 12:15 p.m. on Tuesday, September 8, 2009.

The first reported uprising occurred at the Woodrow Wilson Elementary School in Staunton, Virginia. According to police records, a band of enraged second graders barricaded themselves in the cafeteria.

“I knew this would happen,” said Mary Anne Archer, the mother of one of the students. “When you expose children to the rantings of a mad socialist dictator, you’re going to have mass brainwashing and violent anarchy!”

Archer was outside the school a few days after what is now known as the WWES XBOX Party. Wearing a t-shirt that read “End Socialism Now,” Archer paced the sidewalk with flushed cheeks and arms tightly folded.

“I mean, he actually told second graders to concentrate on homework instead of playing video games,” she said in a voice trembling with anger. “What kind of communist monster would even suggest such a thing to a child!”

“Damn straight,” said Tommy Archer, Mary Anne’s husband. His hand was on her shoulder in a futile effort to calm her emotions. “Communist. Socialist. That’s what Sean Hannity says he is.”

“Don’t forget ‘dictator,’ sweetie,” said Mary Anne as she slightly turned her head to him.

“Yeah,” he said. “Dictator.”

The emotional wounds are still fresh for many because of the hundreds of XBOX Parties – or, XBOX Riots, as some parents are now calling them – that were held at elementary schools across the country after President Barack Obama delivered his now infamous school address.

The scenes played out the same at most schools: After the Presidential address ended, students usually banded together, forced teachers out of classrooms and cafeterias, and then barricaded themselves inside sections of the school.

Their demand? That parents bring their XBOXs, Wiis, PlayStation 3s and other video game consoles from their homes to the school. And, in a show of solidarity for the President’s suggestion that they actually take school and homework seriously, the students would then start a bonfire of the consoles.

Political opponents of the administration immediately took to the airwaves to demand Obama apologize for the incendiary remarks and order the National Guard to the schools where all of this was unfolding.

“Ya see, I told ya this was-a gonna happen,” former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin told reporters outside a Juneau Chili’s where she was enjoying lunch on that now fateful day. “Ya get a radical thinkin’ socialist in the ole White House there, and he’s gonna a-start spoutin’ about radical agendas and scarin’ little American children, and you know? I just think now is the time we just need to come together in a unity that, uh, just surrounds all our beautiful American, fields of a-grain fed souls and a-bodies and combat this radical socialist agenda, and you know? I don’t know about you, but if you don’t tie your shoe laces, well doggone it, you’re probably gonna trip. That’s what America stands for.”

After being met with silence and confused stares from the reporters, Palin then offered to share some delicious halibut recipes.

On Fox News, Glenn Beck offered his insight.

“I told you, America, I told you this would happen,” he said as he fought back tears. “Now, across this great country, plumes of black smoke rise to God’s heaven as these video game consoles burn in a radical act of socialist rebellion the likes of which this world has never seen and committed by these innocent young American children who are now Obama Youth – their minds wiped clean of rational freedom-loving thought and infected with the desire to learn and actually form their…own opinions!”

Beck suddenly sprang from his seat with clenched fists and wide eyes.

“This is the Apocalypse!” he screamed in a high-pitched voice. “Wake up, America! This is the Apocalypse! And it was brought on by the socialist that resides at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in our great nation’s capitol! Please – right now -- lock your doors! Load your guns because they’re coming! They’re coming! The storm troopers are approaching!”

And with that, Beck’s head literally exploded.

BEFORE: Beck, seconds before his head explodes in a bloody mass of bone and brain tissue.

AFTER: KA-BLOOEY!

Of course, as the day wore on, the riots subsided and all of the students were coaxed back home after Miley Cyrus pleaded for calm and peace in a nationally televised address.

Yet, anger and confusion still linger in the minds of many Americans over the XBOX Parties of 2009.

“I really don’t know what’s gonna happen,” said Mary Anne Archer. “Our little Tommy, Jr. just stays in his room and reads. He reads! Books!”

Tommy, Sr. stood and ruefully shook his head.

“And after the money we spent on the XBOX. Pitiful.”

This week's "All Over the Map"

Hannah loves monkeys -- too bad she couldn't take this one home from the Little Rock Zoo this past Sunday.

Here be my column from this week's Arkansas Weekly. More monkey news.



Odds and ends this week…

Last week’s column about my daughter’s mission of having her parents buy her a pet monkey prompted a few comments. While I was shocked to learn that my uncle and my great aunt each owned a pet monkey at one time, most agreed with my point of view: that monkeys can be mean little critters that throw poop as well as attack people or inanimate objects.

However, one reader related a highly disturbing story that actually made me feel sorry for a pet monkey. This reader, who most definitely shall remain nameless, told me that he once bought pet monkey for his daughter, and all the nightmare pet monkey stories came true. The pet monkey had to wear diapers. The pet monkey ran wild throughout the house. And, the pet monkey was mean. So mean, in fact, that one day while the daughter was in school, the pet monkey bit the father.

And that, dear readers, was the final straw for the father. The father grabbed the monkey, stuffed it into a pillowcase, crammed the pillowcase in a box, threw the box in a freshly dug hole, and covered the box with dirt.

Burying your daughter’s pet monkey alive is borderline psychotic. There was absolutely no reason for the monkey to go through such a long and excruciating death. I wouldn’t be that cruel no matter how insane the monkey had been.

In fact, had it been me, I would have just slammed the stuffed pillowcase against a brick wall a few times.

It’s a much more humane and quick form of killing a pet monkey should one have the opportunity.

Plus, you’re spared the work of digging a hole, and you save a box!

(I kid…I kid.)

***

And wouldn’t you know it? As soon as I complain about local gas prices being stuck around $2.55 per gallon, they drop to around $2.34 per gallon the day last week’s column hit the streets.

Which is great.

But with my luck, they’ll probably be back up to $2.55 per gallon when this column hits the streets.

***

Shoji!!!!

We receive some nutty press releases here at Arkansas Weekly. One recent press release came from the Shoji Tabuchi Theatre in Branson proclaiming that it had been awarded the prize of America’s Best Restroom for 2009. Holy toilet plunger! (Click here to read the exciting press release!)

I’ve never been to the Shoji Tabuchi Theatre. My musical tastes sadly exclude Japanese fiddle players with Mr. Spock haircuts and sequined costumes -- though I must admit I’m up for any restroom that features a hand-carved mahogany billiard table.

I mean, there’s nothing like a good billiards game after going to the toilet. But then, I’m not sure a billiard game in a public restroom would be very hygienic or nasally enticing.

Another interesting press release arrived in my e-mail box this morning (I’m writing this on Friday, Sept. 4) from author David Conn.

I must say I’m not familiar with David Conn, but his press release notes he an “astute expert on cult mentalities,” a former Defense Department liaison, and a former lead analyst with Chevron’s environmental laboratory.

The release also says that when Conn is “…not uncovering some new cult, David enjoys singing and dancing and has had lead roles in several musicals, including having played the part of Captain Von Trapp in Contra Costa Civic Theater’s Sound of Music.” (Click here to read the ominous press release from Mr. Conn.)

Cool. A cult expert with roots in our Defense Department and musical theatre!

Anyway, Conn’s recent press release says he’s available for interviews to warn America that President Barack Obama has all of the makings of a cult leader. In fact, Conn says Obama is more dangerous than the infamous Rev. Jim Jones, the cult kook who led 900 of his followers to commit mass suicide in Guyana.

Conn cites Obama’s “eerily Big Brother-type broadcast to students across the country on Sept. 8.”

Conn will “look inside the mind that would dream such a stunt as giving a national address to the youth of this nation, which to some sounds Hitleresque.”

Interesting. So, a speech televised to American school kids by the president of the United States reminds Conn of the mental machinations of Hitler and a cult leader who engineered the suicide of his followers.

I wonder if Conn and others of his ilk thought that way when President George H.W. Bush did the exact same thing in 1991. Of course, back then, ultra liberals were in an uproar when Bush’s speech was televised to students. Now the shoe is on the other foot, and ultra-conservatives have their panties in a wad…so to speak.

You’d think the mentalities of these political factions were stuck in fifth grade.

Still, to quote one Lee Greenwood, I’m proud to be an American. Any country where a Japanese fiddler with a Mr. Spock haircut can have a hand-carved mahogany billiard table in his bathroom and where cult experts can also experience exciting careers in musical theatre is my kind of place.

Official: Zach G. is now a celebrity

Whether you like it or not, when you make TMZ.com, you've officially arrived in the realm of celebrity.

Another sign you've officially arrived in the celebrity realm is when you can wear whatever the hell you want on a city sidewalk.

Of course, I personally saw Zach Galifianakis running down a Little Rock sidewalk dressed as Little Orphan Annie, so the dude's been walking to the beat of his own stylish drum for a while now.

My heroes return (sort of NSFW)