This is the beginning of Hero:
I was on the train, going to work; it was early; I was considering how obviously the blue of my slacks clashed with the black of my shirt now that I was here, in the light of the morning, instead of in the dark of my apartment, and then I looked up and I saw Jake.

I was suddenly eighteen years old again, frustrated, angry, on the verge of crying. He made his way towards me while I told myself that I'm thirty-three, dammit, I'm supposed to be a fucking adult now. But, still.

READ THE REST ON TOASTED CHEESE HERE.

1. Your head will look off-balance if there aren't eyeballs in it
2. You need your eyeballs in order to see
3. You need your eyeballs in order to wear mascara
4. You should probably wear mascara more often
5. Even if you're a boy
6. It makes your eyes pop
7. "Pop" as in, "fabulous, dahling, smile for the camera, you saucy minx," not "pop" as in, "explode, leaving a clear pus-like goo all over your face"
8. Although, makeup is highly overrated
9. But, let's face it, very helpful to some of us
10. Unintentional puns are cause for reconsidering the whole don't-poke-your-eyes-outta-your-head-just-because-you're-bored thing

Alternatives to poking your eyes out of your head can be found here.

MAJOR DEVELOPMENT!!
The Things With Knobs show at Red Kiva this Wednesday has been postponed in order to bring you world famous rock band of love: FULL ON WORLD DOMINATION.

This is not a joke. Do not miss this show. Who knows when these sultans of sound will reappear. LIFE AS YOU KNOW IT WILL END IF YOU ARE NOT THERE AND THAT WOULD SUCK SOME MAJOR ASS!!

Red Kiva
1108 W Randolph
7pm
$10

1. We won't eat your children
2. We will eat your leftover pizza
3. Drink specials
4. Prince will be there
5. Sure he will
6. Drink specials
7. We are not weapons of mass destruction
8. Still, we will blow your brains out of your head
9. You don't need your brains anyway
10. Drink specials

Perhaps you are spending your Friday afternoon cocooned inside the walls of a cubicle. Perhaps you are okay with that since it's 45 degrees outside. Perhaps you are completely flummoxed by the 45-degree weather, especially since it was 80 degrees just a few days ago. Perhaps your brain has frazzled because of this sudden change in temperature and perhaps this is why you keep running into the broadside of that mile-long file cabinet.

If you follow this list of 8 things to do on a Friday afternoon, you will end up rich and famous and you'll have clear skin for the rest of your life.

1. Organize an air guitar contest
2. Make sure you include "Freebird" in your air guitar contest
3. Only tell your friends about your air guitar contest
4. The voices in your head count as friends
5. Stage the air guitar contest on the conference room table
6. During the CEO's meeting, the one you weren't invited to
7. Make rock-god faces of the kind that could be easily misinterpreted as the immediate and unwieldy effects of severe constipation
8. Prepare for greatness

1. There's jello wrestling
2. There's naked jello wrestling
3. You can make a model of your head in papier-mache
4. You can get drunk, do an interpretive dance, and people won't laugh at you
5. Except me, I will totally laugh at you
6. But I'd laugh at you anyway
7. There is a seriously high propensity for talking to someone who rarely says anything that's actually true
8. I rarely say anything that's actually true
9. Except for that part about laughing at you, that's totally true
10. Papier-mache, though oddly spelled, is cool and I have 12 of my own heads sitting next to me right now

We are walking down the sidewalk, the lion, the tiger, and me, the lion tamer. We are an intimidating trio. The lion is six feet and some inches, eight, I think; and the tiger is six feet and some inches, six, I think. I am not tall, but I am wearing a top hat and tails and very high, very pointy black boots. I have a whip. We are all--the lion, the tiger, the tamer, the boots, the whip--very intimidating.

The lion and the tiger growl occassionally. They frequently say, "I want meat." Then they giggle. I am not quite sure they mean "meat" as in food. I flick my whip occassionally. I am quite adept at working with it. With the mere flick of the wrist, from across the room, I can pick up a piece of cheese, place it on a cracker, and place the entire concoction in my mouth gently. My whip is very handy.

As we are walking down the sidewalk, plotting the victory that will surely be ours in the midnight costume talent show, we hear a rustling in the shrubbery. We are walking by homes that have shrubbery. My whip stands at attention. The lion growls intimidatingly. The tiger does too. We are all very intimidating.

The rustling slows. Then stops. Then suddenly, there is a beast that flies out of the shrubbery. From afar, it looks like a rat. But as it charges at us, it grows bigger and bigger until it is as huge as a house, with teeth as big as doors. It is growling so loud it drowns out the growling of the lion and the tiger. I flick my whip but it does no good, the beast is more monster than animal, more devil than anything else I have ever seen in my lion tamer life.

I see the lion and the tiger fight valiantly against the beast, by which I mean, jump a mile into the air. And then, I remember every safety course I have ever taken. I scream. A blood curdling scream. Not because I am scared--I have a whip and high heeled pointy boots, after all, there is no need to be scared with these accessories--but because I know that a blood curdling scream will scare the beast.

It does. The beast goes scrambling for cover under the shrubbery, dwindling in size as it runs away from us--disintegrating from a mammoth beast to what looks like a dog to what looks like a rat. We have escaped what could've very obviously been a fight on the scale of a third world war. We are all safe and unharmed.

I am a very good lion tamer. I always save my animals. I am also very intimidating. I have a whip.