Catholicism was on board for awhile, but he had some kind of emergency death in the family or something and bailed on me. I was in talks with Global Warming's agent, but he wanted a bunch of money and some old refrigerator units, and that's not happening. My Tax Return won't return my phone calls... no idea where he could be, and even my Vacuum Cleaner has been avoiding me lately. But the other members of SKP have been riding my ass for the last three weeks, and have even threatened to rename my feature, “Erik's Crappy Corner,” if I don't get one of these things out. So, I looked high and low and I finally found this Regular Old White Lighter lying in the middle of the sidewalk down on Ludlow and Houston. It has agreed to answer some questions for us, on the condition that I bring it home and stick it on a shelf in my room, cover it with junk mail, and then completely forget that it's there. So let's get this thing going. The sooner we start the sooner it will be over.

Erik: Hey Regular Old White Lighter. How's life?

Regular Old White Lighter: Oh, not bad. Glad to be in off the street. The stuff I saw out there... man, have I got a story for you. You won't even believe this.

E: Yeah... right... whatever. God, I wish I had landed that Goat piece before Stu stole it out from under me.

ROWL: A few months ago I get stolen from a deli by this really seedy guy who ended up pocketing me and taking me down to this crack den near Chinatown. Well, no sooner did we get there, then people start yelling and I hear bangs. Now at first I think it's a car backfiring, right; but it's not. Turns out somebody is shooting the place up...

E: Blah, blah... What does a guy have to do to get Daylight Savings Time on the phone? A couple months ago it was all I could do to screen his calls. Now, all of sudden, it's his busy season and I'm just another jerk. Damn it!

ROWL: Well I don't remember too much after that, except that I get thrown out of a four story window and actually fall into the window of a moving car. Now this is where it gets really interesting. See, there is this girl driving who couldn't have been any older than 19, and there is a guy in the passenger seat filming her. He's telling her to do things like lick the steering wheel and stick her seatbelt places...

E: Okay Erik, snap out of it. There's no sense in wallowing in this. Got to make the best of this situation. You are a professional here. So you didn't get your interview with Subway's New Toasted Subs... you tried them, they weren't even that good. Quiznos Toasted Subs would make for a far better and more interesting interview.

ROWL: Okay, so for this next part, you probably need to have a little background on me. See I haven't always just been white like this. I used to have this tie-died wrap on me that changed color depending on whether it was hot or cold out. Well, it just so happens that this guy filming is not only perverted but he's also color blind. Now, when I flew in the window and landed on the guy's lap, I was blue and green... you know, because it was pretty cold outside and also because I'm zooming out of the sky at a pretty good clip. So this guy sees me, and picks me up and asks the girl what color I am, but he wants her to answer all sexy for the camera. So she turns, and whispers “blue and green...”

E: Oh, who am I kidding; Quizno's Toasted Subs is old news. That interview would have been interesting 8 years ago... when you failed at landing it the first time. Maybe I'm going about this all wrong.

ROWL: Okay, so a little time passes and this guy has been holding me in his hot sweaty palm. So, now I've turned orange and red, but he doesn't know that because all he can see is gray. Well the guy is really getting into this filming thing now and he's got this girl reading all the traffic signs and telling him what color they are, in this really seductive voice, and I can tell he's getting excited. Then, all of a sudden he holds me up again and asks her what color I am. So she turns to the camera and whispers all sexy, “orange and red.” This guy loses his mind! He thinks she is trying to mess with him and is making fun of his vision problems. Well he starts jumping up and down in his seat and shouting all kinds of craziness at the girl... something about color discrimination and something about Stephen Speilberg and little girls in red cloaks with red roses... Anyway, in the middle of this crazy color tirade, he suddenly just rips off my outer wrapping and just shoves it in his mouth and swallows it. Meanwhile, the girl is scared out of her mind, and rightly so. She has stopped paying attention to the road, and is so completely preoccupied with this psycho who is eating lighters, that she slams right into a row of parked cars! BAM!

E: Where did it all go wrong? I feel like I was really on a roll there for awhile. I even almost had that Guinness Book of World Records Giant Zucchini interview six months ago... how did it go so down hill from there?

ROWL: So everything is a blur. Turns out the girl is wearing her seatbelt... because she's been rubbing against it for the movie... but Mr. Color Blind is not wearing his, so he and I go flying through the windshield and hit the sidewalk. This guy is dead on impact and I'm just lying there, looking up at the sky, trying to comprehend what's just gone down. Next I hear sirens, the cops come, question the girl, take her to the hospital, and cart this dead pervert away. But nobody, in the whole process picks me up or even glances at me. A Regular Old White Lighter just isn't respected these days. So I just end up lying there for a day or so, until you come walking along with that puss on.

E: Wait, what did you just say?

ROWL: I was telling you how I got to the place where you found me, and I was telling you how I just laid there until you came along with that big puss on your face.

E: You just said I had a big puss! On my face! That's hilarious! I mean who talks like that? What are you from the 1930's or something? Oh man, you gotta be careful who you say that around these days, Regular Old White Lighter. Puss has some other connotations... and a puss on a face, oh that is priceless. Wooooo. I'm dying here. Ha! Boy, I guess this interview wasn't a complete waste after all... Wait till people read that sentence. Good stuff... ahhhhh. Well, I feel A LOT better after that. I guess laughter really is the best medicine. Let's get back to interview. So have you always been white, or did you maybe have like some plastic on you before with an American flag or some fighter jets or something? I once had one with both.

ROWL: Right... this interview is over, can you put me on the shelf now?