Pickles, corn dogs, and Kennedys
a SUIT column by Chris Jungle

Sometimes the stuff I digest still leaves a funky taste in the mind. This weekend I watched the second half of the Connecticut-North Carolina eating two food substances available in abundance at my humble abode--pickles and corn dogs. Hopefully, no one is contemplating all of the phallic connotations that sprout up from the admission of my weekend diet--and it probably should be considered a coincidence except that I went to see Boogie Nights at the cheap seats the same night. But something had obviously triggered a phallic reaction. I couldn't really put my finger on why long, thin substances kept coming up in my day, and then I remembered the obvious: The Kennedys had been in the news all week.

Not only did I get the news of Joe Kennedy's decision to leave politics earlier in the week, but by the end, many stories cropped up about the less than popular JFK antiquities auction. Someone please solve this riddle for me--what is the purpose of massive news coverage to report an event is unpopular? By the very definition of being unpopular, I should never get wind of it. Is it because the auction was surprisingly unpopular that stories about it appear in newspapers and popular magazines? Actually, I know the answer to those questions, and it happens to be the same answer I give when people ask me why I blather on about the subjects I do--you have to talk about something.

So now I'm talking about the Kennedys and their strange power to make me regress to the phallic stage of my youth. Okay, it's not just a stage of my youth, but any more graphic terms and explanations, and I officially lose my TV-14 rating.

When I talk about the Kennedys, there are really only two Kennedys worth mentioning--JFK and RFK. I'll let people talk about old Joe Kennedy and his bootlegging business, but it was his sons who really made the name holy. Now, there's just too many Kennedys to care about. RFK may have died way too young, but he sure did make sure his seed was planted enough times to carry on the name. That's what pops into my head every time I hear the word Kennedy. Sex, sex, sex.

My subconscious reaction to the word Kennedy has made some of the most intense moments in our government's history seem like plots from torrid, lustful mini-series. My version of the Cuban Missile Crisis now includes some supporting characters by the name of Bambi and Sindy whose job it is to ease the tension. I know it's not nice to think of the Kennedy men as stereotypical sex crazed, power hungry beasts, but I suffer because of my shallow thinking. Anyone who has experienced corn dog/pickle belches knows what I'm talking about.

Even with all of my education on historical events of the Kennedys, somewhere along the way I built up a psychological reinforcement to think about sex, and every time the newspapers, TV shows, magazines, pamphlets, and newsletters decide to write stories about the Nation's First Family, I feel a need to roam the streets with a take charge attitude and look for vulnerable, giggly women. In fact, I bet one of the reasons I watched MTV so much in college was because a lady named Kennedy was telling me what music I should watch. Music I should watch? I never thought I'd write that phrase.

The purpose of this column (yes, there is a purpose) is to cry out, beg, plead, and grovel to the major news sources in this country to stop telling me about meaningless Kennedy stories. If there's a scandal, a death, or a marriage, that's fine. I'll get through it best I can, but don't tell me about auctions and how John John's magazine is still being published because every mention of the word Kennedy makes me lose a few brain cells in exchange for a stronger libido.

In fact, writing this column is not doing me any good. I'm starting to feed my own addiction. I can feel myself getting more and more sexual by the second. I'm starting to see Marilyn Monroe, Jackie (in her younger years), tall women, short women, Russ Meyer type women. Help me, please. It's all happening for the wrong reasons. I can't go through this every time something happens to a Kennedy--alive or dead. Select your Kennedy stories carefully because it's having an unpleasant reaction on the populous. Please, I'm running out of corn dogs.

Chris Jungle is currently spending his time in a sound proof room where he watches basketball and reads pre-screened news articles.

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