Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing Johnny Tremain’s hand.

Johnny Tremain is the main character of the eponymously titled book set in 1700s Boston. Like most people, he had two hands. Unlike most people, he ruined one in a silversmithing mishap. The hand was burned and disfigured and no one wanted to look at it. That’s how gross it was.

But what if his hand had managed to transform into the shape of a bunny rabbit or a race car instead of a melted blob? Johnny’s life could have been so much more. His hand would have intrigued people. Passersby would comment, “Your hand looks so futuristic!” (If it were the race car shape.) He could use clever euphemisms for masturbation such as “I’m going to feed the bunny a carrot.” (If it were the bunny shape.) But instead of making the most of a bad situation, Johnny became a paperboy – an obvious cry for help. Everyone knows paperboys are depressed loners. (Every time I see my paperboy he’s got ink all over his hands and is begging for money.)

I can’t know exactly how Johnny was feeling – in part because he was fictional – but I know how I felt after one of the worst haircuts of my life. I was only twelve and it was the day before my first day of middle school. I think my barber had been drinking and the result made me regret turning away that wig salesman only hours earlier. I had to wear a shower cap (we couldn’t afford a hat) for several weeks until my hair grew out. I figure Johnny Tremain felt the same mix of despair and embarrassment, but multiplied several times over because his hand was never going to grow out of its grossness.

It’s a shame he couldn’t use the circumstances to his advantage. For instance, a hand-puppet version of the Elephant Man would have been a brilliant career move. It may sound tasteless, but it’s all in the portrayal. And Johnny would have occupied a very niche corner of theater. One obstacle is that Joseph Merrick didn’t exist yet, but that’s what imagination is for.

By the end of the book some doctor “fixes” Johnny’s hand, but the psychological damage can’t be undone so easily. Even though his hand may look and function like a regular person’s hand, in Johnny’s mind he probably still hates it. It wouldn’t surprise me if he doesn’t put a glove on it in the winter, or purposely shakes hands with people he knows have really strong, almost painful handshakes just to get back at it.

There was a lot of missed opportunity with that hand. Reading Johnny Tremain I kept turning the page, expecting Johnny to come to his senses. But his hand was just too much for him.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing Johnny Tremain’s other hand.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing Oculto Pantalones Nudist Colony.

While getting lost on my way to Caldor (it turns out they’re out of business, so don’t bother looking for the store yourself) to pick up a new toaster, I ended up in the woods. I parked my car and began hiking through thick brush to the top of a mountain thinking that would be a great vantage point from which to locate the Caldor. I never made it to the top because I discovered a secret nudist colony.

It was populated exclusively by three grown men in their mid fifties, Paul, Nigel and Derrick. All they had was a tent, a few belongings, and the fruits of the land. I asked what they wear in the winter and Derrick told me they cuddle for warmth near the fire. I asked if they get lonely and Nigel told me to shut up.

They said they’d been there for six years and were loving it. No one bothered them or told them to wear clothes. Fashion trends didn’t concern them and they laughed at the notion of pockets. In keeping with their culture I disrobed as well. It was amazing. If I were a younger man I would consider joining them. The thrill of playing a game of Scrabble naked was exhilarating.

Although they get along now, there was a time of discord. Nigel and Derrick are brothers and this often made Paul feel out of place. So Paul abandoned the camp and formed his own nudist colony about 300 feet away. But when Nigel and Derrick ran out of food, and Paul managed to tackle a wounded deer, they worked things out. (The sign, ‘Paul’s Better Nudist Colony’ still remains, perhaps as a threatening reminder.)

Oculto Pantalones is actively seeking new members, enough so that they hid my car keys and pants to try and make me stay. But it’s not only old men who are allowed to join. In particular, Paul said, “We really need some women. Any women as long as they’re naked. Actually, fuck that, I’d settle for a woman with clothes.” “Sometimes I’ll send up smoke signals in Morse code,” Nigel added. “They say ‘we are here and we are naked.’” So far no one has responded.

They are three passionate men, communing with nature and unafraid of being true to themselves. It’s an inspiring site and one worth your time. If you’d like to join them, I recommend it. Unfortunately it was the middle of the night when I left, and I could barely see anything. So other than saying they’re in Western Massachusetts, I can’t offer any more details. Maybe try driving to Caldor and you might stumble upon their little utopia like I did.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing Mercurochrome.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing nonprofits.

If you ever decide to start your own nonprofit – don’t. They may sound like fun, but the truth is they’re very difficult to run. For starters, if you want to be taken seriously, you’ll need an office. Even if you don’t know what to do with it and even if you can’t afford it. Then, because that office will feel so empty and lonely and also because whenever the mailman walks in you feel suspicious for being in an empty office all alone just watching TV, you’ll need to hire some employees.

Lots of people want jobs these days, so finding prospective employees is easy and a great way to meet new people. (New people who act like they like you even if they don’t.) It’s lots of fun until the interviewee asks you a question like, “What does this job entail?” And when you don’t know how to answer because you don’t even want to hire he or she in the first place, you’re likely to stumble over your words and accidentally blurt out, “none of your business.” That’s when you thank he or she for coming in and cross your fingers the next one won’t be so inquisitive. Because the position is undefined you just hire the ones who smile a lot and seem friendly.

At this point you’ve got an actual office full of real people, and keeping them busy is so hard. There’s a limit to the number of times you can tell someone to file away something which you promptly pull back out and ask to be filed away again. Especially when it’s the only file you have. Definitely get extra files if you start a nonprofit.

Another hurdle is that you’re a nonprofit. This means you don’t make money, so paying salaries is basically impossible. Fortunately, that problem kind of works itself out when everyone quits because you never paid them.

Not paying your other bills is where the real difficulties arise. You’ll get evicted and Rent-2-Own will show up to take back all your furniture. The next thing you know your dreams of having a nonprofit have been crushed.

I say, if you’re going to start anything, make it something profit oriented. Popular things that sell very well include: gasoline, jewels, iPhone apps, and sexual entertainment. Open a place that sells one or all of those.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing the back of David Byrne’s head.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

I understand contemporary children’s entertainment won’t be the Lassie or Family Circus I enjoyed in my youth and I’m completely open to the disturbing trends of today, like that little Caillou child who has progeria. If heart-wrenching cartoons of sickly children are what the kids like, okay. But there’s one cartoon I find particularly disturbing: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

I discovered them last week when they appeared on the toothpaste I bought at the dollar store. They’re apparently quite popular and can be found on a number of products. Generally speaking, I find popularity to be a good measure of quality. Take, for instance, the career of Faith Hill. She’s famous because of her inimitable talent. But in the case of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the popularity disturbs me.

According to their movie (also available at the dollar store), these turtles began as regular turtles who were exposed to some type of transformative material which made them teenagers and ninjas all at once. This is completely impossible and terribly misleading.

One of my favorite childhood shows was the Howdy Doody Show, a show in which the star was a small puppet. But as a child I couldn’t understand the concept of a puppet and believed Howdy Doody to be a new, slightly terrifying species of man. It caused a lot of complications for me. Children simply don’t have the capacity to differentiate reality from fiction, and it’s utterly wreckless to suggest the possibility of talking turtle-men.

At the very least we’re setting our children up for embarrassment with the dollar store clerk who makes fun of them for believing the movie is a documentary. At most we’re raising a generation of children who will be microwaving themselves and pouring chemicals on their friends with the expectation of super powers. Most of them will survive, but they will be horribly disfigured and this will greatly impede their chances for reproducing. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are a direct threat to mankind’s survival.

To combat this threat, I’ve started a non-profit called Future Procreations Against Turtles. Spread the word and donate if you can. The unborn children of the future are counting on you. (I do give the Teenage Mutuant Ninja Turtles one star, because they like pizza and so do I!)

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing flop sweat.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing Public Service Announcements.

There are a lot of things I don’t always know I should be doing, and public service announcements (or PSAs) help to inform me. While listening to the radio the other day, I heard a PSA from a man, Patrick Dempsey (fortunately, because I’m always more attentive to the words of celebrities than I am ordinary people), warning me of the dangers of plastic bags. He informed me not to place them over the heads of small children, thus preventing suffocation. This is good to know because I don’t like it when children die. I only wish I had heard this PSA before my nephew’s birthday party last April. He lived a short 27 years.

Sometimes, when I’m watching TV, I find myself annoyed by the show and wish it would hurry up so I can learn something new from a PSA. On occasion a PSA will be about something I already know, but that makes it no less enjoyable. It reminds me that other people may be unaware, so I’ll make an extra effort to work the subject into conversation. I’ll tell my barber, “Please give me a trim and if you’re suffering from an eating disorder you should seek help.” Or I’ll pull up next to a motorist at a traffic light and ask, “Where are you off to today? I’m going exactly where my turn signal indicates.” Then I’ll point to the turn signal which is blinking in the direction I’m traveling.

There’s nothing I can think of that’s more helpful than a PSA. Nothing. It’s a fantastic use of time and resources from which everyone can benefit. Some might argue the thousands of dollars it takes to create one could be better used if donated to any number of charities. And when I think of an argument for that I’ll update this post. For now I have to go with my gut on this.

There is one PSA I’ve never seen and I hope somebody makes it. It would indicate to people the importance of not swallowing unmarked pills one finds in an abandoned car. I’ve seen too many people get stomach aches from that.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing the year 2008.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing that picture frame model.

All my picture frames are purchased at Walgreens and they always come with the same guy in them. I hate this guy. He’s always smiling no matter what mood I’m in. And god is he handsome. Never in my life was I that handsome and I’m fairly certain I’ve peaked. If I ever had his looks I wouldn’t have smiled so much. It’s like he’s rubbing it in. I would have been way more considerate and tried to look sad in front of ordinary people, but not in a way that suggested I was sad because they were ordinary.

I’d like his wife to die and then right when he finds out I would be there to snap a picture. Then I’d put that in a frame. Actually, if his wife died he probably wouldn’t be too sad, because he seems to have a lot of wives. In some pictures he’s by himself, frolicking about, but in many others he appears with any number of women and children. And they’re all so damned perfect. He makes me feel guilty for removing his picture and putting in one of someone less attractive and happy. Like I’m ruining the frame.

For a while I was so angry I wanted to drive to this guy’s house and have a word with him. But I didn’t know who or where he was, so I took a photo of him and mailed it to Google. They never wrote back. And when I searched the internet for “attractive asshole” I get a lot of results that make the librarians yell at me.

I tried going to Stop & Shop to buy my frames instead, but he was in those, too. Eventually I found a frame he wasn’t in, but it was enormous, almost three feet tall. I took it home and inserted a picture of myself, but the picture being regular size made me look sad and lonely in the giant frame. This was intended to be a Christmas gift for my lawyer and I didn’t want him to suspect I was as lonely as this pairing of frame and photo implied. So I had the picture of myself blown up to fit the frame and I gave him that.

If I ever meet that picture frame model I’m going to tell him exactly why he makes a simple thing like buying a picture frame so difficult and emotionally taxing. If he doesn’t apologize, I don’t know what will happen.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing the Apple Newton.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing Avatar.

Avatar, the new cinema experience by director James Cameron, is phenomenal. A lot of people aren’t sure what to expect, so here’s a run-down. To begin, the film is so phenomenal that when you arrive at the theater, no seats will be available because a group of teenagers will have bought tickets to a film that wasn’t sold out (Old Dogs) so they can sneak into Avatar. Their enthusiasm for the film’s awesomeness won’t be to blame, the awesomeness will be.

Because of this, you’ll be forced to stand in the back of the theater with four other displaced patrons (one of whom will stand way too close to you), all trying to enjoy the movie while keeping an eye the crowd for anyone careless enough to leave their seat unattended while they head for the restroom or concessions stand. It will be difficult to concentrate on watching the crowd because of the visual spectacle that is Avatar. It’s got it all: fights, space ships, laser beams, wheelchairs, planets, Giovanni Ribisi, trees. Everything!

When that unsuspecting viewer does get up, be prepared to race for that seat, probably knocking over one of your opponents. (If she grabs your ankle, just kick her off and keep moving.) You’ll be rewarded with a warm seat and whatever remains of the beverage the previous occupant had been consuming, in my case a fantastically enormous container of soda. But don’t drink too much, because when you crash from the sugar high, you’re likely to pass out. And if the timing is as unfortunate as mine, it will be just when the blue cartoon cat-lady is about to die.

When you regain consciousness, the storyline will have taken unexpected turns, abandoning all the characters and changing from the future to present day. Instead of dragons and explosions, there will be a lot of nurses and neon lights. But my goodness, the 3D effects are so real! You will feel as though you are actually right there, in the hospital. The ending is kind of anticlimactic and involves nothing more than signing some paperwork and a bus ride home. (Which is exactly how Iron Man ended.)

Plot problems aside, it was like no movie I’d seen before. Except Delgo. James Cameron has really out done himself!

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing grapesauce.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing powdered wigs.

The powdered wig offers an air of sophistication other wigs simply can’t. Yet for some reason, almost no one wears them. It’s baffling. Occasionally an actor or member of British Parliament will don one, but never a gardener or waitress. If the common man wishes to be taken more seriously, the powdered wig seems an obvious choice.

Every time I look at a quarter, I’m reminded of the world we could be living in. There’s George Washington proudly displaying his powdered wig. Did George ever suspect there would be a day when people wouldn’t want to wear them? Not likely. Ben Franklin probably knew, though. That guy was smart.

A lot of people would call me a hypocrite for wanting to bring back powdered wigs but not wearing one myself. To be honest, I do wear one around the house when I’m alone, but senior citizens are rarely trendsetters. It’s the young people who need to take the lead on this, which is why I’ve been mailing powdered wigs to people like the Jonas Brothers, Hannah Montana, the cast of The Hills, and all the people who play vampires.

With each powdered wig I include a form letter which reads, “Here’s a wig for you to wear. If it wasn’t for your ancestors who wore these wigs, you wouldn’t be alive today. Do what you know is right.” I got a subscription to Teen Beat, hoping when someone wears one of my wigs it will show up there. So far all that magazine has been good for is making me wish I still had the body for skinny jeans.

Once, I tried handing out free powdered wigs at a playground, but people are scared of change. Especially parents. If you’re a young person and would like to begin wearing powdered wigs, try throwing a wig-wearing party. It’s a great way to socialize and show your peers that you’re willing to be noticed. Plus, with a wig, you’ll never need a comb again.

Anyone who isn’t still convinced about the benefits of powdered wigs, consider this: When was the last time you saw a dead person in a powdered wig? Never. Now I’m not saying wearing a powdered wig can prevent death, but it makes you wonder.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing a cantaloupe I saw in the road.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing Ponzani Bros. Appliance Repair.

It was my anniversary and so I needed to get my toaster fixed. I placed all its pieces into a plastic bag and headed down the street to Ponzani Bros. Appliance Repair, a place that advertises itself as being able to “repair anything or your money back.” What the ad doesn’t say is that they can’t actually repair anything and they’ll make you wait in their office wasting quarters on their gumball machine while they look at your toaster.

When I arrived I was greeted by Barabara (not Barbara). On the phone she sounded like anybody else, but in person it was difficult to look at her. This was the beginning of what would be an uncomfortable 24 minutes.

A guy wearing a shirt with the name “Alphonse” on it said nothing to me as he appeared from a back room, took my toaster parts and disappeared again.

Worried about the future of my toaster, I nervously bought gumball after gumball. When I ran out of space in my mouth I started putting them in my pockets. When I ran out of quarters I approached Barabara to exchange some dollars for more and as she obliged our hands accidentally touched.

The clock on their wall has a background image of a beach and sunset, I guess to remind you of the things you’re not seeing while you’re stuck waiting in this tiny office with Barabara, listening to her gum her pen.

Finally Alphonse appeared, carrying my plastic bag. It didn’t appear to have regained the shape of a toaster. He shook his head, snorted, handed the bag to Barabara, and disappeared again. “Sorry,” she said as she pushed the bag across the counter towards me.

Ponzani Bros. Appliance Repair clearly doesn’t care about repairing appliances and I doubt they’re even brothers. They also don’t care about customers who weep openly in their office. And the gumballs they sell? Don’t expect a refund. I will give them one star because I found a copy of the Cocoon soundtrack in front of their building.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing the lower intestine.

Hello, and welcome to my week-by-week review of everything in the world. Today I am reviewing faking an illness for sympathy.

As much fun as it sounds, I’ve had to steer clear of such a ruse because of my very malleable mind. If I believe something to be, it will likely manifest itself within me. As a child my mother suggested my dad might have been a werewolf. (Her exact words were, “Your father’s back was hairier than I would have liked.”) That was all it took for me to attack a chicken in our coop. Or take the unfortunate period when I believed my deceased wife’s spirit had inhabited the toaster because I saw a photograph of her reflected in its chromey exterior. I spent a good couple of months taking Toaster Wife to the movies and restaurants. Then she got hit by a bus and that put an end to that. Faking an illness is just too slippery of a slope for me.

For those of you more daring, consider the benefits. The most obvious is that people will take care of you and make you feel loved. It’s also a good solution to getting things done if you’re lazy. People love to help the incapable. And if getting attention is your thing, this will do that too.

But there are drawbacks. You may find that no one will notice or care. It can be a sobering indicator of what your friends and family truly think of you. Or that they don’t really think of you at all.

It’s best to fake something that requires no visual aids and is therefore hard to disprove. Think tapeworm (act hungry), cancer (act tired) or amnesia (act forgetful). On the other end of the spectrum diseases to stay away from are those which require a great deal of physical stamina or make-up, such as St. Vitus’s Dance, Progeria or Down Syndrome.

Faking an illness can turn a dull or trying life around. But get caught and times could turn even worse. It’s a risky endeavor, but a potentially rewarding one.

Please join me next week when I’ll be reviewing The Matrix.