I was about to drive to the store to buy cat food and pork rinds (the former for Jay, and the latter for Mister Meme). When I opened the door of my car, it was nearly taken off when a purple Corvette squealed around the corner onto my street and screeched to a stop right in the middle of the road.

Out hopped Citizen Jim, struggling to hold two Bull Mastiffs on the leashes in each of his hands. The dogs barked and snapped and growled as Jim sprinted toward me in a neon green silk track suit.

"Hey, Babe!" he said, smiling. "How's it hanging?"

Just then, Mister Meme leapt from the second story living room window of my apartment. The Mastiffs broke free of Jim's grip and Meme began chasing them down the street, their deep-throated growls and barks sounding more like the yipping and yapping of Chihuahuas within seconds.

"Well, SHIT!" Jim screamed. "If that cat hurts my dogs—"

"What're you doing in the neighborhood?" I asked him. "I was just about to go to the store and—"

"Bullshit! You're not going anywhere until I tell you the good news, if you haven't already heard about it on that E! channel," he said.

I closed the driver side door and leaned against the fender of my car. "I hope this doesn't have anything to do with Erika Eleniak," I said. "You need to wash that girl out of what's left of your hair."

"Pah! Erika Eleniak! Hell, she was a good girl, but you know I was only using her to pass the time," Jim said, waving my concern away like some sort of unhygienic stink.

I rolled my eyes and sighed. "Okay, then. What's the news? You know I only get channel five."

"Well, I'm sure you remember that brilliant review I wrote last December?"

I smiled. "Which one? All your reviews have been brilliant," I said. "Even with all the dashes and the arbitrary capitalization of what you consider key words."

He doubled up his fist. "Look, at least I'm published somewhere other than MY OWN GODDAMN WEB SITE!" he yelled. "Dashes never did—anything to hurt—Miss Priss Dickinson's career—did they?"

"You're right," I said. "Even though she'd be rolling in her grave right now if she knew anyone had seen any of those awful poems she wrote."

"WhatEVER. Anyway, I'm talking about the review I wrote of the Hawthorne biography that came out last year. It was in the Mobile Register?"

"Ah, yes. I do remember that one," I said, nodding gravely and scratching a spot on my chin to appear thoughtful.

"I know you don't care! Gah! Where are my goddamn dogs! I'm leaving!" he said, looking around for signs of Mister Meme and his Mastiffs.

Two yards away, I saw the dogs on top of a small metal shed, barking loudly at Mister Meme, who was crouched on the ground below. Even at such a distance, I could see his tail was bushed out to three times its size and swishing menacingly.

"Jim, just finish your story. You know you're my hero. You're the only one of the two of us who's a real writer," I said.

"That's better," he said. "Too bad you're always forgetting that important fact. Anyway, my pals at Random House decided to include a blurb from my Mobile Register review with the the paperback edition of the book!"

"Oh, Precious Lamb! That's wonderful!" I said, moving toward him with my arms open.

"Enough with the love! That's only the first part of some double-whammy-bammy good news!" he said excitedly.

"What could be better than that?" I asked.

"Well, I guess Quentin Tarantino was looking for some inspiration for the next Kill Bill movie. So now he's paid me a bag full of money for the rights to my blurb!"

I screwed up my face. "What on Earth did that blurb say?" I wondered aloud.

Jim struck a Napoleanic pose, hand thrust into the front of his track suit, and looked at the sky. "Infuses historical fact with lively details... capture[s] a contemporary Hawthorne in all his conflicted glory, rendering him tenderly human...Wineapple does for Hawthorne what David McCullough did for John Adams, freeing him from history that he may walk among us again."

He looked back at me, waiting for my reaction.

"That's real good, honey," I nodded. "But how is Quentin Tarantino ever going to use that?"

"He's making a period piece, set in 19th century New England. It's gonna have everyone I love in it, Stimpy! Hawthorne, Thoreau, Emerson, Washington Irving!"

"Is this going to be an action movie?" I asked.

Hawthorne: A Life Brenda Wineapple

"Hell yeah! Listen, contrary to what everyone thinks, David Carradine didn't invent that kung fu bullshit, you know. Apparently, a lot of those Transcendentalists got into some serious martial arts back in the day. In fact, the original ending of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow actually included a lavish, thrill-packed jujitsu fight instead of—"

"Oh, for God's sake! That's the craziest thing I've ever—"

"You SHUT UP!" Jim shouted. "Quentin explained the whole thing to me—he even showed me the comic books he has that tell all about this secret history of the Transcendental movement."

I scratched my head, then shrugged. "Well, okay. I'm real proud of you."

"I don't believe you," he sulked. "But I DON'T CARE! I don't need you to validate my success as a blurb writer!"

He was then knocked over when one of his Mastiffs ran by with Mister Meme on his back and biting ferociously at his massive head. The other came toward us half-limping and half-staggering, fur torn in a hundred places, one ear missing and bleeding freely from gashes in his neck.

"Well, I guess I'll hafta get these hounds to the vet," Jim said, still on the ground. "But I'll be sending YOU the BILL!"