Once upon a time—now, isn’t that a silly way to start a story? If something happened, it happened in time, or it didn’t happen at all. If I have to tell you it happened in time, don’t I have to tell you it happened in space, too? I should have been one of those people who tell you how the universe works—what do they call that? A cosmetologist. That’s what I should have been. I’ll bet they make more than the couple of dimes I get for one of these videos, not to mention the last one got demonetized for “encouraging dangerous behavior in children,” even though I explicitly said that you should get your parents’ permission before you tie a sheet into a parachute and jump off the balcony. But anyway, at a certain time, and some place in the universe and definitely not outside it, there was this jackrabbit, and his name was John. But, as you probably guessed, everybody called him Johnny. And Johnny Rabbit loved to eat celery. It was like an obsession for him. His therapist tried to put a Freudian interpretation on it, but I don’t want to get demonetized again, so we’ll just leave that alone. Now, I know a lot of you kids don’t like to eat celery. Who does? Well, rabbits do, because rabbits are weird. Aren’t you glad you’re not a rabbit? Anyway, one day Johnny went to his local Metro Mart to pick up some celery, and the greeter told him—this Metro Mart had greeters, who were mostly retired squirrels who worked there because Social Security wasn’t enough for them—and this greeter said, “You might want to check out aisle eighteen, because we’re having a big sale on microwaves.”

And Johnny Rabbit said, “Why would I want an oven? I’m a rabbit. We eat vegetables raw. It’s like our creed.”

And the greeter said, “Oh, we’re not selling microwave ovens. Just the microwaves themselves.”

“Well, that’s even sillier,” said Johnny. “What would I do with a pile of bare microwaves?”

“Lots of things you can do with microwaves,” said the greeter. “They have numerous applications in wireless data communications, for example.”

“Really? I didn’t know that,” said Johnny.

“Honest and truly,” said the greeter. “You can look it up in Wikipedia.”

So Johnny Rabbit got out his phone and looked up “Microwave” in Wikipedia, and he was amazed to discover how useful microwaves really are. So he got a cart and ran over to aisle eighteen and bought all the microwaves in the store. And then he went to another Metro Mart and did the same thing, and then another, and another, and eventually Johnny Rabbit had cornered the market on microwaves, and no one could use a cell phone or open a garage door or operate a particle accelerator without buying their microwaves from him, and he got filthy stinking rich and could buy all the celery he wanted, and he ate so much celery that he got really sick and his doctor told him to go on a high-protein diet, and he ended up becoming the world’s first carnivorous rabbit, and maybe I’ll tell you that story some time if it doesn’t get me demonetized again. So that’s the story of Johnny Rabbit, and it teaches us to watch out for opportunities, because they might make you really sick. There’s your lesson for today, kids. Next time we’ll hear the story of Wally the Wannabe Wallaby, about a kangaroo who thought his life would be perfect if he could just get in with the in crowd. Till then, this is your old pal Mrs. Cheswick saying eat your vegetables, but not too many vegetables.

Hello there once again, kiddies! This is your old Auntie Social here again, and I’m back with more etiquette advice to make you shining stars in the social galaxy. Yes, we were off the air for a while, on account of that little kerfuffle—can you say “kerfuffle”?—over the advice I gave you about meeting new people. Who ever would have thought Turkmenistani immigrants would be so sensitive? And who would have thought there were so many of them? It’s a funny world. But I’m back now, because one of my nephews is a personal-injury lawyer whose ads are all that keep the network afloat in this godforsaken time slot, and today we have a special treat for all of you. It’s time to talk about weddings!

Yes, I know most of you aren’t old enough to be getting married yet, unless you’re in West Virginia, and oh dear I can smell another kerfuffle on the way already. But many of you will have big brothers or sisters getting married, or cousins, or maybe your dad is finally going to marry your mom and make an honest woman of her. About time, isn’t it? So you’re probably going to be invited to a wedding sometime, and you’ll want to know what to do.

The first thing you want to do is get a wedding gift. These days there are things called registries, where the bride and groom can make up a list of the things they could really use to start their new life. So what you should do is look up and down the list very carefully and see what gifts are still not taken, and then you should get a blender. It’s not really a proper wedding unless there are piles and piles of blenders all prettily wrapped on the back table at the reception. And by the way, if you’re a bride, check out Auntie Social’s Swag Shop, where you can get whole boxes of thank-you cards pre-printed with “Thank you for the blender” in nice copperplate cursive. They have pictures of historic blenders on the fronts of the cards, too. Even the original 1937 Waring Blendor, which I got from some Russian photo site.

So once you’ve picked out a blender and paid for it with your mom’s credit card, you’ll need to think about what you’re going to wear. A lot of you are going to have parents who want to dress you up like a paper doll for the wedding, so you’re just going to have to sit still for that, because there’s nothing that can stop parents once they get it into their heads that their children will look cute dressed up like miniature Mafiosi. The best thing you can do is find a mud puddle just before the wedding, and then your parents will have to let you wear what you want. So if it’s up to you, here’s the golden rule for wedding clothes: jeans without holes and a T-shirt without a slogan.

Okay, so now you’re at the wedding, and you probably think it’s just going to be I do, I do, done. But no, there’s always an officiant, which is somebody who thinks he’s important because he’s licensed to do weddings by Underwriters Laboratories or whoever certifies these people. And this is like his one time to talk in front of an audience, and he thinks he’s got something so special to say, so he’s just going to keep rattling on for three hours. So this is why you should always remember to bring one of those little portable game consoles to a wedding.

Now, when the bride and groom are finally married and they’re leaving the church, it’s traditional to throw rice at them. It’s a tradition passed down from generation to generation. I don’t know why. I think it’s because older generations were stupid. But these days there are people who say you shouldn’t throw rice, because it gives our little birdie friends indigestion, although after what they did to my windshield this afternoon I say our little birdie friends can have all the indigestion they want. But rice is boring anyway, so I say find something more fun to throw at the bride and groom. I’m thinking firecrackers.

Then comes the reception, and this is where you have to be at your most polite, because most brides these days hire a disk jockey, and most disk jockeys make you want to punch them. But your old Auntie Social can tell you from personal experience that punching them doesn’t do any good. So I just say—

Oh, dear, there goes that phone. And I see by the caller ID that it’s a network vice president, so it looks like kerfuffle time again. And I’m out of time anyway, so we’ll wrap this up right now, and your old Auntie Social will be back with more etiquette advice next time. We’re going to talk about gender-reveal parties. Won’t that be a lark?

Once upon a time there was a little goat whose name was William Grosvenor Bennington Carey McAllister Avery Goat. But that was kind of a cumbersome name for a goat, so, as you probably guessed already, everyone just called him Willie. And Willie Goat liked to eat, as goats usually do. They’re famous for it. If you’ve ever known a goat, you know they like to eat. Of course, other animals like to eat, too. I knew a raccoon that could eat fettucine Alfredo like you wouldn’t believe. My Aunt Wilma used to eat fettucine Alfredo, too, but she had to have it with Tabasco sauce. If it didn’t have Tabasco sauce on it, she threw it out the window. And that was how the raccoon got it. My Aunt Wilma was odd that way. She used to give everybody a bottle of Tabasco sauce for Christmas. I still have all those bottles, because I hate Tabasco sauce. But Aunt Wilma didn’t eat nearly as much as Willie Goat did. He would eat anything. He would eat hay and bushes and tin cans and croissants and piles and piles of Swiss cheese. He liked the holes especially. So one day he had just finished eating a Studebaker Commander when his neighbor Pepito the Alpaca came up and said, “I’ll bet you half a dollar you can’t eat what I’ve got in my hand.” Pepito had hands. I guess he was kind of a strange alpaca. But anyway, Willie Goat said, “There’s nothing I can’t eat. You’re on. Show me what’s in your hand.” And Pepito opened up his hand, and there was nothing in it. “Ha ha!” said Pepito. “You can’t eat nothing! It’s a philosophical whatchamacallit!” But Willie said, “Sure I can. For the next five minutes, I won’t eat anything at all, and that’s eating nothing.” “No it’s not,” said Pepito. “Yes it is,” said Willie. And they argued and argued, and eventually it went all the way to the Supreme Court, which refused a writ of certiorari, so they never did come to a conclusion, and the last I heard they were still arguing about it. This teaches us not to eat Studebakers, because they make us cranky and argumentative. So that’s the story of Willie Goat, and I hope we all learned our lesson from it. Next week I’ll tell you the story of the cute little salamander who learned that some of the medieval legends about salamanders weren’t true at all. Till then this is your old friend Mrs. Cheswick saying, Don’t eat Studebakers. I got a state grant for this channel, so I have to teach you something useful.

Q. How many dog breeds are there?

A. Ruff-ly three hundred!

Q. How did the Witches’ Supply Company, Inc., get eye of newt into tins?

A. With a fiendish in-can-tation!

Q. Why did the organic gardener forget to turn his compost heap?

A. Because he was non compost mentis!

Q. What did the boxer’s ex-wife get him for his birthday?

A. A pair of socks!

Q. Who writes this stuff, anyway?

A. [redacted]

Announcer. And now Malt-O-Cod, the delicious malt food drink flavored with real cod-liver oil, presents…

(Music: Fanfare played on a portable reed organ.)

Announcer. The Adventures of Superego!

(Music: March theme on organ, under for…)

Announcer. Yes, it’s Superego, the hero your parents want you to admire. Dressed respectably in a dark grey suit with deep maroon necktie, Superego fights an unending battle against the forces of chaos and wanton doyourownthingism.

(Music: In full, then fade.)

Announcer. As you recall, in our last episode, Superego had finally come face to face with Sir Edward Iddington, a diabolical villain who insists that he has the right to do what he wants because he’s a big boy now.

Superego. You’re wearing one mauve sock and one red sock with a green Christmas tree on it. What would your mother say?

Sir Edward. Irrelevant! I can do what I want! I’m a big boy now!

Superego. Yes, but what will people think when they see your mismatched socks?

Sir Edward. They will think that I have ankles! And they will be perfectly correct!

Superego. Well, I came here to negotiate with you about the articles of capitulation you sent to the Secretary General of the United Nations, but I’m not sure I can get past the socks thing. Do you really think that the Security Council will agree to turn over control of all their armed forces to a man who can’t match his socks? And I haven’t even brought up the plaid jacket with striped pants. You look like a used-car salesman. Supervillains who get ahead in the world are the ones who dress respectably. I mean, look at Vladimir Putin. Except when he’s posing for pinup calendars, he’s always in a suit and tie. And his socks match.

Sir Edward. Ha! That is because Putin is a supervillain without imagination! He is hardly super at all! His puny proletarian mind can imagine nothing beyond conquest and world domination—the poor, circumscribed dreams of an idle schoolboy!

Superego. But you just demanded the entire United Nations submit to your unlimited authority. How are your dreams any less circumscribed?

Sir Edward. A mere stepping-stone! An intermediate stage! A way-station on the route to my ultimate victory! A Howard Johnson’s on the turnpike to my ideal world!

Superego. And what will you do with the world once you have it under your control?

Sir Edward. I will give it liberty!

Superego. Liberty? But we already have liberty. We have a republican form of government, under which the people elect representatives to make the laws by which they are governed. This is the only sure foundation of personal freedom.

Sir Edward. Incorrect! You have negated your argument by your own words! The people make laws! Where there are laws, there is no freedom!

Superego. Then how would you govern the world?

Sir Edward. I would give the people liberty! They will want to eat ice cream for dinner, and I will say, Yes! You may! They will want to leap off the porch roof to see if they can fly, and I will say, Yes! You may! They will want to lynch their immigrant neighbors for speaking Spanish at home, and I will say, Yes! You may! They will want to blow up public buildings just to watch them go boom, and I will say, Yes! You may!

Superego. But that’s complete chaos. The human race couldn’t survive that kind of anarchy. We’d be extinct in a year.

Sir Edward. Precisely! I will give the people rope enough to hang themselves, and I will say, Yes! You may! And then there will be no one left to tell me what to do! Ha! Ha ha, ha ha ha! Ha, ha ha ha, ha ha ha ha ha!

Announcer. Is this the end of civilization as we know it? Don’t miss next week’s philosophy-packed episode of the Adventures of Superego!

(Music: March theme, in full and under for…)

Announcer. Of course, girls and boys, when you talk about liberty, there’s only one freedom that really matters. That’s the freedom to drink Malt-O-Cod morning, noon, and evening, and any time you get a craving for the rich, satisfying flavor of malt from contented barley and oil from the cream of the North Atlantic cod fisheries. Tell your parents you’ll stage a revolution if you don’t get your Malt-O-Cod every day. And, in honor of America’s upcoming 250th, look for the red, white, and blue powder in specially marked packages. It’s the malt food drink that’s brain food—Malt-O-Cod!

(Music: In full, then out.)

No. 348.—The Speke’s Pectinator.

Once upon a time there was a Speke’s Pectinator who lived near the town of Holhol in Djibouti. Now, you’ve probably heard all kinds of stories about Speke’s Pectinators before, because you’re just the kind of boys and girls who like to trip up a poor old lady who’s just trying to make a few extra bucks on the Internet by telling educational stories, and you’re going to write in the comments about all the things I got wrong about Speke’s Pectinators, but I don’t think so, not this time, because I looked them up in Wikipedia. So this Speke’s Pectinator was wandering through the shrubby shrublands of Djibouti when he met a Pelzeln’s Gazelle. And the Pelzeln’s Gazelle said to him, “Oh, please, could you pectinate for me? Because I’ve never seen anybody pectinate before, and it would just about make my day.” But the Speke’s Pectinator said, “No can do, because I don’t pectinate for just anybody, you know.” And the Speke’s Pectinator continued on his way, and he met a Grevy’s Zebra. And the Grevy’s Zebra said to him, “Say, would you pectinate for me? I’ve heard a lot about it, but I’ve never actually witnessed a live performance, so to speak, and it’s my birthday next week.” But the Speke’s Pectinator said, “Not this time, buster, because I don’t pectinate for just anybody.” And the Speke’s Pectinator kept walking, and he came to a Ferruginous Duck. And the Ferruginous Duck said, “Hey, you must be a Speke’s Pectinator, and I could use some pectin for my guava jelly. Would you pectinate for me?” But the Speke’s Pectinator said, “Amscray, bird, I’m tired of everybody asking me that.” And I could go on like this, but I think you all get the point, and it turns out the Speke’s Pectinator never did pectinate at all. Now, isn’t that a shame? But it just goes to show you. This story teaches us a good lesson, which is that you can’t make assumptions based on people’s appearance. Like everybody thought my uncle Stu looked like a fireman, but the one time our house caught fire Uncle Stu was the first one out and he didn’t come back until Aunt Emma went down to Krzrnski’s Cafe and dragged him off the barstool and made him call the insurance company. And that’s the lesson we learn. Next time we’ll hear the story of the Patagonian Mara who lived in Duluth, and I’ll bet I get comments about that one. Till then this is your old friend Mrs. Cheswick saying clean up your room, and that should make people stop saying I’m a bad influence on kids, shouldn’t it?

No. 61.—The Chipmunk.

Once upon a time there was a chipmunk. Now, you’re probably thinking you know all about him already. You probably think he was Chipper, and he ate Chipped Ham, and his name was something alliterative like Chester or Cholmondeley, or even something like my name, which is Cheswick, except that’s my last name, and we’re talking about his first name, which wasn’t alliterative with “Chipmunk” at all, and you might think it was but you’re wrong. His name was Ralph. But he hated the name Ralph, so he went by the name Abernathy. However, no one he knew could remember the name “Abernathy,” so they all called him Phil. So one day Phil the Chipmunk was out gathering nuts in the woods. He gathered some chestnuts, and he gathered some walnuts, and he gathered some butternuts, and he gathered some peanuts, and then he said, “Wait a minute, peanuts don’t grow in the woods. I must be in a field in Virginia or Georgia.” But he wasn’t in a field, and someone had put the peanuts there just to fool him. I don’t know why they wanted to fool a chipmunk into thinking he was in a field in Virginia. Some people are just like that, I guess. So while Phil was gathering all these nuts, along came a red squirrel, and she said, “What’s your name?” And he said, “My name is Abernathy.” And she said, “Really? What a coincidence! My name is Phil, too!” And they lived happily ever after except for the mortgage crisis in 2007, when they lost a lot of the nuts they had invested. This shows you that you shouldn’t use nuts to speculate in dubious loans, but you should bury them in the woods instead, and then they’ll grow into big nut trees, and you won’t have the nuts, but someone fifty years later long after you’re dead will be able to eat nuts from those trees, or maybe bury them and make more trees, and eventually we’ll have nothing but nut trees as far as we can see. I hope we all learned our lesson from that. Next week I’ll tell you the story of the itsy bitsy spider who had a lemonade stand in Nuuk, which didn’t work out very well for her, but I don’t want to spoil it for you. Till then, this is your old friend Mrs. Cheswick saying eat your granola or something, cause I want to have a good effect on you kids.