Tales to Astonish!

For two full days now I’ve been wracking my brains trying to think of something to post that could possibly come close to the quality and grandeur of the previous post. In truth, I haven’t done anything as obviously awesome as tearing open a candy wrapper straight across in almost forty-eight hours. I guess I came pretty near when I dropped a plastic cup onto a tiled floor and almost perfectly replicated the big drum part from “In the Air Tonight,” but without an audio file there’s no proof. And without proof, it’ll go down as another one of my ‘hoax’ stories, like the time Michael Jackson’s sister came to my house to use the bathroom.

Sure, there were candidates for stories, but all of them were minor and I felt a little like William Randolph Hearst for trying to blow them up into full, exciting posts. I don’t want to turn into some sort of “yellow journalist,” doing stuff like talking about my inane daily life and trying to make it sound thrilling — astonishing, even. I mean, if I started doing that in order to increase my blog traffic, then it’d probably catch on and before you could say “circulation war” the entire blogosphere would be adrift in a sea of hyperbolic posts about people’s day jobs, dating lives, and child-rearing! Who the hell wants to read about that stuff?

Last night I decided that I needed a big break — a big story, a Woodward-and-Bernstein-type expose on something Important. Something giant, touching, and vibrant, other than my penis. I wanted to post something to rattle cages, perhaps even change things, and affect people’s lives. So here it is:

THERE MAY BE A VICIOUS KILLER LIVING IN YOUR HOUSE!
TAKE STEPS TO SAVE YOUR FAMILY!

In my lifetime, I’ve been accused many times of having problems with self-esteem. SOME PEOPLE have recently said that if there’s one thing that’s true about me, it’s that I’m self-deprecating. But to that, I say…

…NO MORE!

Because today and from now on, I AM AWESOME.

And I’m not just saying this facetiously. This isn’t a one-post pony. This is grade-A, here-for-the-duration, staying-the-course awesomeness. It hit me like a bolt of lightning this morning: a sign — a sign that I am clearly destined for great things. I would like to share this with you. If you have a weak heart or low blood sugar or are afraid of pure unadulterated kickassity, I recommend you avert your gaze immediately. Are you ready?

In a feat that can only be performed naturally (sans special effects trickery) perhaps one in a million times, by perhaps one in a million awesome people, I completed the ultimate, incomparable deed:

TEARING A SNICKERS WRAPPER
JUST LIKE IN THE COMMERCIALS

Before today, I thought that the only way to tear a Snickers wrapper glamourously straight across was to involve scissors or something outside the laws of physics, like time warps. Usually candy bar wrappers are completely destroyed as they’re torn open haphazardly, the plastic tearing along mysterious and random lines in an uncontrollable manner. As far as my un-awesome self was concerned, the Perfect Tear was a thing, like supermodel orgies, that only occurred on TV or in George Clooney’s house. I WAS WRONG. All it took was the epiphany that I, much like Mr. Clooney, am awesome.

In case this hasn’t sunk in yet, here’s a publicity shot from the Snickers people:

Now here’s mine again:

The only real difference is that they tore it open at the very tip (or were using a special, super-long wrapper) so that they could still keep the whole name of the product in full view. That’s not impossible to do with your bare hands, but it’s pretty impractical for someone that’s actually going to eat the chocolate bar inside. If I tore the wrapper that high up, I’d still have to shake or pull the Snickers bar out of the wrapper. What I am saying is this: MY WAY IS MORE AWESOME.

Seriously, if this is not proof enough that I am ranking in the single digits of the Most-Awesome list, I simply don’t know what else I could do to convince you. Phooey on the non-believers, I say. I am awesome, and I am here to stay.

Also, my penis is huge.

I know this is already a coupla days old, but it wasn’t until this read-through that I realized exactly how absurd it was.

Now, With Double the Entendre!

Every caption on the first page is wonderful.

Sleestak, I do not know where you find these.

Straighten up indeed.

I just realized that I haven’t written anything all week. I’ve been all sorts of distracted and — some would say — discombobulated. I like people that say that. Not because of their opinion of me, but because they have a good vocabulary.

Anyway, I’ll be better next week. SCOUT’S HONOR! In the meantime…

EDIT: This guy needs some double-sided tape for his shirt.

I’ve been pretty lucky in life, romantically-speaking. I’ve dated my share, had a lot of fun, and am fortunate to have been very much in love — not once, but twice. Both times with real, living girls! That puts me ahead of almost 98% of comic readers. Maybe 99%. Perhaps all of them.

In this regard, I’ve had a lot of chances to do all sorts of romantic things. I’ve written some stellar poetry (some of it rhyming), painted some pictures (some of them pretty), and made an awful lot of very creative cards in the signature Retropolitan style (weird and dumb). I vaguely remember pulling apart roses for the petals this one time; true love does not mean photographic memory. I love being in love, and I like to express that as creatively as I can.

But…

…there is one thing that I will never do for someone, no matter how much I love them. Even if I marry one day, and my then-wife turns to me and asks this of me, I’d rather divorce her. Yours truly, The Retropolitan, lover of all things strange, connoisseur of horror and the macabre, deep romantic…

…will never bite off your fingertip for love.*

No matter how much you beg, no matter how much sex you promise, even if you told me that you’d buy me the Batmobile, I will not do it. And then I’d be mad at you for involving the Batmobile in this gruesome affair. Like, really mad.

Seriously, there are better ways to cement our love. We could hold hands, buy matching t-shirts, or carve our initials into a tree. Maybe gift certificates or something.

Please, just let me keep a full set of digits. I (and one day probably the police) will be immensely grateful.

*Somewhat disturbing imagery.