aoul Dunkin, insert your own slanderous insult here, reporting for the commune from Paris, France. Somehow my job is to cover a war in the Middle East, though your guess is as good as mine on how to do so from Paris.

The best explanation for how I landed this assignment is that dullest tool in the drawer Ramrod Hurley, Acting-Editor and possible Bachman-Turner Overdrive member, thought anti-American sentiment runs so high here I'd be ripped apart upon stepping off the plane. Having already sent danger magnet Ivan Nacutcha-whatever to the front lines, this probably seemed like the best option for getting me rubbed out, as I have no doubt the lunatic thinks I'm bucking for his job.

Fortunately for this commune whipping boy, I speak fluent French and my own anti-American sentiment runs so high I fit in pretty well with the locals. I've joined in a few local protests at the local McDonald's, but mostly I've been spending my time drinking the world's best wine, smoking thin cigarettes, and living the high life on Ramrod's expense account. Did you know you can actually buy some of the paintings at the Louvre? Surprised me, too.

Anyway, by the time Bagel gets back and has a look at all the damage Hurley's done I wouldn't be surprised if he finds himself the new public enemy number one. Fine by me. I've had enough shit from those yokels to last Bagel's lifetime. Oh, by the way, if you should ever get to France and they don't ridicule you back to the stone age for being American, you should try some of the cuisine. The women are exceedingly naughty, too. Hot mamas.

I suppose I should report on the war at any rate. Not much to say, to tell the truth. I'm looking out a window facing the western sky right now and I can see no sign of impending missile attacks or bombing raids of any sort. I thought I heard an air raid siren sounding an hour ago but it turned out to be a couple of cats getting familiar with each other. I threw a block of cheese at them (or fromage) and they ran off. No reports of any cat casualties or anything.

I asked the concierge and some other folks about the possibility of chemical weapons, and while there is some notable body funk in the air, I don't think there's too great a risk of attack. I'm still going to go down and buy a canary tomorrow. If there is a chance of a biological weapon attack, it will be an early warning sign, but mostly I just want to some company.

Yesterday I thought I saw a small group of Iraqis surrendering in front of the hotel, but they were actually just selling souvenirs. I bought a T-shirt with the Eiffel tower on it and they retreated into Baghdad. Baghdad Café, that is, a little coffee place up the street. Nice guys, very fair.

As you can see, it hasn't been extremely eventful in this area. But I promise to stay with this story until news breaks, or until my plane ticket demands I return home. For the commune, this Raoul Dunkin, snickering his ass off.

he Pentagon announced today that, in the wake of the success of the huge 21,000 pound MOAB (Mother Of All Bombs), it was beginning work today on an even bigger model, officially dubbed as the Motherfucking Cocksucking Sonofabitch King Hell Bastard Shit Oh Dear Of All Bombs, Like, Ever, or MCSKHBSODOABLE. The bomb will be approximately the size of one-fifth of the Earth's moon, will have a payload the equivalent of 946 Hiroshimas, and will, in the words of one unnamed Pentagon official, "Blow the fucking shit out of every living creature within about a five thousand mile radius -- even cockroaches. Ha! Even cockroaches! Maybe we should call it the Orkin Exterminator!"

To begin construction of the new super-sized weapon, the United States has annexed the entire nation of Canada and sent eviction notices to every Canadian citizen, asking that they please vacate the premises within one month. Official spokesman Colonel Jack "Rabbit" Tallysmall-Rand commented on that eviction notice, saying "Those Canucks better get going fast, because we need to start building this baby pronto. Any of them back-bacon lovers that's still there in a month's time will find the doors locked and their stuff all piled into a Hefty bag on the sidewalk, toot sweet."

Asked about the bomb itself, Col. Tallysmall-Rand agreed that "Super-sized is about right. We want it our way, get it? The MCSKHBSODOABLE will be the mightiest weapon the world has ever seen, the monster truck of all bombs, and that ought to show all them bastards that don't want to get with the program that we mean business."

The Colonel added that the bomb will be delivered by a pair of space shuttles flying in tandem, with the payload tethered to a huge glider-like platform between them. Once in range, the cables will be released and the bomb will then waft gently to the Earth, where it will unleash seven or eight different kinds of hell once it reaches treetop level.

"This baby gonna make the MOAB seem like a little old ladyfinger when it pops, whee doggies! It could bomb the stink off a shit pile!" Col. Tallysmall-Rand went on to say, while exchanging double high fives, down low, too slow with his aide, one Major Custis Sprinkle.

"He ain't lying!" interjected Major Sprinkle, drawing a grin and an elbow in the ribs from his superior officer.

Asked who came up with the name for the bomb, Col. Tallysmall-Rand just beamed and replied, "Who do you think?" while Major Sprinkle, exaggeratedly winking and nodding his head, gestured with a pointing finger held behind his palm towards the colonel. "Mr. Rumsfeld wanted us to call it the 'Democracy-Maker,' but we thought that was too pussy. We wanted a name that would put the fear of God into our enemies."

Asked by another reporter why they didn't just build a bomb the size of the entire Earth and cut an America-sized hole in it, Col. Tallysmall-Rand's eyes grew wide, and he remained silent for a long moment. He then declared the press conference over, and immediately huddled with Major Sprinkle and a number of other officers near the dais, while Military Police cleared the room by wildly swinging their batons in all directions.

Last issue's tome on the metric system inspired more reader mail than any column since the My Friend Polio where Omar Bricks offered to sell naked pictures of my sister to the highest bidder. This time, however, readers weren't asking if I could beat Omar's price. They wanted to know how in the hell we came up with our current non-metric system of weights and measures in the first place. Good question.

Imperial weights and measures (known in modest England as "English weights and measures") range from the feet, gallons and pounds we're all familiar with to hundreds of freakish and forgotten variations that sound like whimsy straight out of Lord of the Rings. The next time somebody asks you for a chalder of coal or wants to know if you can spare a groat, you'll know you've either time-tripped into some medieval hell or else you're at the Renaissance Fair. Either way you're screwed. Likewise if someone offers you a minim of soy sauce or four roods of swampland. And if some wiseacre tells you you're twelve scruples overweight or uglier than a perch of limestone, punch him in the face first and ask questions about his outdated terminology later.

The system of Imperial weights and measures is not one defined by cold logic or mathematical nonsense, rather it's an innately human system based on how one innate human, King Edward I of England, thought things should be measured. Having grown up poor, Edward was the kind of insecure nuevo-rich king that insisted everything be named after him and that potatoes should only be grown in his likeness.

In England, length was originally measured by a unit known as the dork, which corresponded to the king's, uh… royal tackle. Later, more prurient factions within the country pushed to have the measure changed to the more family-friendly foot. Edward relented after being convinced that everybody knew what it really meant, and that nobody thought he had big feet.

The yard was developed as a unit of measurement based on the distance from the door to the backyard fence in the king's boyhood home, which indicated a home run if cleared on the fly by a batted ball. Anyone who pointed out that Edward grew up with a damned small back yard was immediately beheaded and taken off the king's Christmas card list without benefit of legal council.

An acre was originally defined as the area an ox could crap up in one morning, though over time oxen fell into disuse due to the scarcity of uncrapped land in England. In time the acre was known as the smallest area of land you could leave to your heirs without them coming to ox-drop on your grave after you'd passed.

Edward was also obsessed with barley, which at the time was known as "edwardly." The king spent much of his spare time counting grains of the stuff, and was keen on showing off his barley-counting prowess by having the standard measure of weight in England be equal to 7,000 grains. This unit was nicknamed the "pound" because that amount of barley was usually sufficient for bribing the dogcatcher to return your wayward pooch. As is still true today, the English of Edward's times were unusually fond of their dogs, though back then they didn't eat them.

The mile was defined as the longest distance Edward had ever walked without being carried, when as a boy his manservant died suddenly of a heart attack while carrying Edward to the beach and the king-to-be had to walk very far to find some ice cream. Similarly, the hour corresponded with the longest time Edward had ever had to wait in line, from the time when he was at the king store and there was a run on poofy velvet capes.

Naturally, the Imperial system was refined in the years after Edward's passing, the most notable addition coming when London blacksmith Mike Inch's ex-girlfriend Lydia immortalized his unimpressive tackle by lobbying that its length would be a perfect way to divide the foot into twelve segments. Lydia was so unflagging in her badmouthing crusade over the years that the inch eventually became a national standard of measurement, providing a powerful example that hell hath no embarrassment like a woman dumped for a slutty bar maid.

If the history of weights and measures teaches one lesson, it is that terminology and unit sizes will come and go over time, but human pettiness is an undying standard that will always remain universal.

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