In this blog’s grand tradition of ceaselessly providing essential public services, here is a detailed invoice of the estimated property damage inflicted in the 1989 hit film National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (in 2009 dollars):

-Windows shattered by the unveiling of oversized Christmas tree: 2 windows at $700 each
-Superflouous destruction from tree: $100
-Yuppie neighbors’ high end stereo destroyed and window shattered by huge icicle: $780
-Clark’s flannel shirt ripped when stapling lights to the house: $20
-Hole in ceiling created when Clark is in attic: $988
-Yuppie neighbors’ dishes smashed and carpet stained with wine when the Griswold’s house lights up: $50
-Santa and reindeer lawn display kicked in by Clark: $99
-Saucer sled ripped to shreds when lubricated with a non-nutrative cereal varnish and ridden down a mountain and across a Wal-Mart parking lot: $15
-Damage to warming shed Clark sleds through: $350
-Light bulbs smashed by Cousin Eddie’s bag of dog food: $2
-Strand of Christmas lights chewed up by cat: $9
-Living room chair destroyed by flaming cat: $400
-Cat: $14
-Uncle Lewis’ suit burned in tree fire: $100
-Drapes burned in tree fire: $50
-Ornaments destroyed in tree fire: $75
-Superfluous damage and destroyed walls in tree fire: $1500
-Door knocker ripped off by delivery man: $65
-Yuppie neighbors’ dining room window smashed when Clark fells tree: $700
-Banister post chainsawed off by Clark: $60
-Door destroyed when Snots the dog smashes through it in squirrel chase: $148
-Fine china smashed by Snots and squirrel: $90
-Yuppie neighbor’s dress ripped apart by squirrel: $110
-Windows shattered by SWAT team: 4 at $700 each
-Yuppie neighbor’s door kicked in by SWAT team: $575
-Uncle Lewis’ toupee singed in gas explosion: $325

-Final successful endeavor in Chevy Chase’s career: Priceless

That comes out to a grand total of some $10,825, not counting the inevitable city fines coming for starting a massive chemical explosion. The lesson learned by America? When in doubt, allow Chevy Chase set something on fire and let the good times roll!

This blog has become an albatross.

I lay prostrate before you, gentle readers, to yet again apologize for the lack of new content on the John Larroquette Project. The horribly oppressive millstones of fatherhood and professional employment remain such that it’s difficult to find spare moments to devote to blogging. However, the flame of my blogging passion still burns, albeit tenuously amidst the gusting gales of responsibility and re-heated lasagna.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve had many worthwhile ideas for blog entries flit fleetingly past my consciousness. I’d like to take a moment to share some of those concepts with you. You the reader can then harken back on 5+ years of JLP entries to imagine the predictably perverse paths of grotesque alienation and obscure historical references that I would undoubtedly trod down once again…

-The gaunt Northern European male models that infest the pages of the Baby Bjorn instruction pamphlet. How exactly are these photographs supposed to make me feel?

-Musings on what it’s like to hold a wide-awake baby at 4 in the morning while you’re watching rodeo bloopers that are being broadcast on television for some reason.

-The magic of menthol-lyptus

-Something overly descriptive about breastpumps

As you can plainly see, I’ve still got it.

Can Mussolini save Christmas?

Little Benito got caught with his fingers in Santa’s enchanted pickle jar, and now it’s up to him to save Christmas!

Santa can’t help! He is chained down to Satan’s Throne of Skulls until Mussolini can make the orphans of the world believe in the joy of Christmas!

Can Mussolini pull it off? Can he magically slaughter 400,000 Ethiopians one last time? Can his secret police silence domestic opposition with a campaign of beatings and ruthless suppression? Can Il Duce save Christmas?

Little children around the world lay awake at tonight with their hopes in Benito Mussolini, wishing that their klutzy hero is able to pull off an unlikely miracle finish, like when his fascist blackshirts consolidated power in Italy during the 1920s! Without little Benito’s help, their stockings will be swallowed whole by the Rattlesnakes of Torment! Don’t let the children down, Benito Mussolini!

Christmas is wonderful!

Join with me as I carve a runestone that my name might last to eternity!

I have obtained this half-ton stone of the finest obsidian – it shall serve as a permanent testament to my strength and valor. My name will be written on the halls of the aeons! In cursive!

Come, my feral swine. Carve for me!

On this, the 11th day of the 11th month of the 9th year after the Culver’s was established on Silver Lake Road in New Brighton, MN bringing with it frozen custard of the finest varieties, I, Peter Welle erected this stone to commemmorate my own existence. I am a lone, towering man staring into an uncertain future. My face has been windburned by woe and the gusting gales of grief. My inner thighs are pockmarked with pudency. Yet I remain, a stalwart, elemental force against the iniquity of the world.

Lo, to all you who read these words, be warned: somewhere, in some eternal, ethereal form, I am watching you as you go to the bathroom…

Come! Trudge dead-eyed into the courtyard for another forced viewing of a new Rock TV!

This was a fun little idea for a Hallween video that we wrote and produced alongside our If You’re Not Getting, Get Going! video. Unfortunately, a bit of bad administrative work by me (exacerbated by the fact that apparantly I’m busy now) meant that the video got bumped from the Rock’s service the night before Halloween to make time for some silly little thing where two new pastors were officially recognized by the church.

Regardless of the scheduling snafus, here are some of my thoughts on the newest Rock TV:

-While I find the finished video to be a bit choppy and unclear at points, there are certainly elements to it that I love. As usual, Todd’s trailer trash testimonial performance demonstrated his uniquely talented abilities to deliver a laugh. His “my cats just love my new leg nub” is by far my favorite line in the video.

-The dark tone in the second half of the video is something I liked. Some members of the ministry worried that it was getting too dark and grim for church-laughs, and so we leavened it a bit with some lighter music at points. That probably helped, but I wonder if it might have been more fun to go “all in” on the violence and death (not that it would have been any more popular).

-The production of this video was a personal challenge for me because I was making a very conscious effort to step back and allow others to take the lead in writing, production, and editing. I’m usually a notorious control freak in this ministry, but that doesn’t really bode well for the future of Rock TV as my free time gets more and more eaten up with family endeavors. This video represented a worthwhile opportunity for others to edit and make the sorts of decisions that I usually manage. It was hard, but very good for me. Kudos to everybody that put in work on this one.

-When we were in production with this one, I summarized it to my wife as “an infomercial for an excercise product that’s really just a psychopath with a chainsaw who chases you into shape”. After she watched it, her only comment was, “You never actually show him chasing anyone”. Leave it to her to point out the massive, gaping hole in the video that nobody in the ministry seemed to notice. Thanks, honey.

First of all, I apologize about my absence from blogging. Life has been a whirlwind of repeated hospitalizations for my wife, catching up at work, and absentminded child-rearing.

Here are a few inerrant notes on fatherhood:

-They aren’t kidding when they say that having a baby keeps you busy. Don’t get me wrong – being a dad is great, and it makes being home with my family so much more fun and meaningful, but I don’t have time for ANYTHING anymore. Between everything going on, I somehow managed to forget to shower for almost 4 days. Probably 75% of my daily caloric intake comes in the form of breakfast cereal. My conversations with co-workers have grown terse and clipped as my energy levels have fallen below Stojko Vrankovic levels.

-Various friends from our church have been bringing us meals to help us manage the craziness. This is the greatest thing ever since Kirby Puckett straddled my childhood dreams like a plump collosus. Our refrigerator stands at the ready with disposable tupperware containers containing all varieties of foods, from Mexican to Italian to slightly different Mexican. All I have to do is serve myself up an oversized portion, pop it in the microwave, and the world is my Mexican oyster.

-Thankfully, there has been no drama between Oliver and our two lazy, obtuse cats. Their ears perk up whenever he cries, and if the crying goes on long enough they will each retire to their basement crapboxes for some peace and quiet. Curiously, Ben Franklin has shown some interest in the bottle nipples – several times we have caught him nibbling at them as they hang on the drying rack in the sink. For this, he has been thrashed mercilessly.

-From what we can gather thus far, Oliver is a communicative person who likes to be held, enjoys music, and whose poop looks like butternut squash soup with seeds in it. In other words, he’s a classic Libra!