The Dopple Gang: Smart Humor By Dumb People

Exciting Investment Opportunities In Johnny McNulty

Dear Sir or Madam,

My name is Johnny McNulty and I am the sovereign ruler of myself, titled renter of my apartment and heir to occasional influxes of cash from my mother. You have been selected through a rigorous name generator to be informed of exciting investment opportunities in myself and my personal industry. I am very industrious. With an influx of capital, perhaps from a Sovereign Wealth Fund (if anyone from Abu Dhabi is reading! Or Norway - Johnny can provide complete proof that he does not use child labor or produce land mines, nuclear weapons, or cluster munitions), hedge fund, or private investor, who knows what rates of personal growth can be achieved?  My industries of expertise include:

1.) Technology - Johnny (me) has a long history of being on the internet, and is aware of the latest memes and animal-picture trends. He has run several small sites dedicated to serving his core constituency of friends and family for over two years, and whenever he asks, people say they read it almost every time he emails them. In addition, Johnny has considerable acumen in video-games, focusing on more conservative, less risky strategy games which produce an admirable record of finishing 89% of single-player campaigns.

2.) History, Political Science - Johnny majored in History in college, and double-majored in Political Science until he dropped it because it wanted him to take courses all the time. As we all know, in today's society capital can move across borders with unprecedented ease, providing almost unlimited access to the markets of almost all the nations of the world. But how often has that capital arrived, only to find integration awkward due to a lack of knowledge of the inner politics of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere during the 1930's and 1940's, or an intricate understanding of Hapsburg diplomatic protocol? All too often, is the answer. But no more, now that for a small fee you can call Johnny at home and ask him for trivia, or the geographical location of South American nations.

3.) Hospitality - Johnny is a great cook, an adept conversationalist, and his couch folds out into a very comfortable full bed. Could Johnny's apartment be a successful bed and breakfast? Do you have $20,000? Then yes!

4.) Administrative Services - Johnny has interned for some of the finest organizations in the world, from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, Saturday Night Live, The Onion, Late Night With Conan O'Brien, The Aspen Institute, and The Institute for State Effectiveness. Johnny has all the filing, researching, tech-support, coffee-producing, minutes-taking capabilities of a Delhi-based Indian Institute of Technology grad, with none of the political baggage. The only requirement is that I not leave my apartment and work three hours a day. Is that cool?

5.) Finance - I set up a $300 E*Trade account in January, which currently is $297 but I will report got as high as $335 in February before I took the advice of my stupid roommate, who works at Bear Stearns. Although not for long, the jerk.

6.) Email Advertisement - Do you need to send emails advertising your investment opportunities to millions of unsuspecting Americans with the hope of striking gold on one or two senior citizens? Look no further! I will shamelessly plug any and all new product launches, investments, or pleas for money from exiled royalty with the pestering ruthlessness by which I remind my friends and acquaintances to come to my improv shows every weekend.

So if you have excess cash you're unable to figure out how to spend on yourself, come deposit it in me! Interested investors should contact the white kid losing his money playing chess in Union Square. And they should hurry, because Manny has a deal where I can play 3 games for $10 until 6 p.m.

What Happens When I Sit Down To Write Without Any Ideas

As a rule, The Dopple Gang is not a blog. So as a rule, I am bound to break that rule. Someone asked me today why I hadn't written anything recently, and my honest answer was that I had no ideas at the moment. Sad, but true. But, they responded, so what?

Yeah, I thought, so what? I'll just start writing! Well. This happened. It started off with the following brainstorming session:

"Ok...how will we be entertained in the future...hmmm...howbout everything gives you blowjobs. Like it was a really easy machine to make, and once they invented it, they just slapped it on to everything, like the way they do with iPods now."

Yep. And that thought took me to this:

More about THE FUTURE!!!!!!!!!!

Video Games Will Give You Blowjobs
       The late 2000's gave a taste of the divergent paths video-games would go down in the future. On the one hand, expensive, technology-intensive platforms aimed at hardcore gamers will continue to come closer and closer to reality, finally achieving decades of speculation about virtual reality, immersing the user in a total-feedback suit which will provide the tactile experience (minus the pain) depicted in the game. Imagine the experience, and technical skill required, to actually steer your avatar through modern-day military operations in the Middle East, fighting off insurgents, feeling the shockwaves of ordinance after calling in airstrikes, or being fellated by an extremely grateful Baghdad widow. Of course, for the inner otaku in all of us, Final Fantasy XX provides the rich story lines, amazing art, and cinematic blowjob cutscenes the fans have come to expect.
       On the other hand, more casual gamers will be attracted to the colorful graphics, simpler gameplay, and easy-to-use pleasure wand of the Nintendo company. Games like the cel-shaded Paper Mario 3: Escape From Blowjob Island, or games with fun brainteasers like "Blowjob Party Game," appeal to old and young alike who want all the fun of a blowjob without all the button mashing.

Cars Will Steer Themselves
      Although many people have predicted this invention, the will to actually develop it was not present until Toyota began offering drivers-side blowjob machines as an option, with other manufacturers of course rushing to follow suit. The resulting spike in traffic fatalities from thousands of ecstasy-addled motorists crashing into each other made development of self-steering cars a literal necessity. Now fatal traffic accidents are a rare exception, belonging only to the past and the American South, with families free to travel across the country without worrying about a pleasure-induced twitch plunging them all to their death.

And then I ran out of ideas for things that could be improved by blowjobs. Can you believe it? I mean, golf, maybe. But who wants to write about golf?

So, in conclusion, I will write when I have an idea. Because when I don't have one, I can't even think of things that would go well with a nice blowjob on the side, which is a list that extends to pretty much fucking everything.

I apologize to any relatives who may have read this.

Love,
Johnny

John Mayer's Blog: A Translator

by Johnny McNulty

The following is a blow-by-blow parsing and translation of John Mayer's blog entry "From The Heart," a missive against self-obsession and the impact on modern media on our collective psyche. Also, it is about John Mayer being a very boring man who dislikes everyone who thinks they're better than him. All the quotes are in the order the appear in the blog entry, which can be found here.

FROM THE HEART

                    I need to write this. Translation: I want to write this.

I've been traveling alone in Japan for the better part of three weeks now, and It's been so remarkable an experience for me that I can't book a ticket home yet. I haven't spoken very much out loud these days, but I've been thinking to myself in what feels like surround sound. I can see so many things clearly, and feel so connected to myself and the world around me that I need to share the perspective with you. Translation: Study abroad is fucking awesome, dude. Other countries are so spiritual, y'know?

I'm already aware that when I sing, say or write anything, 50 percent of the response will be in support of it and the other 50 will want to discount it. Translation: My manager does not let me read reviews of my albums.

This blog, though, is directed to 100 percent of people reading it. Translation: Yep.

If my blog truly does have any cultural effect, then it should be used for more than just pictures of sneakers and funny youtube videos. Translation: I do not like blogs about sneakers. Why are you writing a blog about sneakers? I don't like sneakers. I mean, I like sneakers, but not enough to write a blog about them. I'm a celebrity. My blog will help the world.

(If you don't think my blog has any effect, than you can't by definition be reading this right now and therefore don't have to respond to it in any way. Isn't that tidy?) Translation: I am a fucking genius.

What I'm about to write isn't about fame or success or celebrity or the media. That's my business. Translation: I'm gonna write this because I'm famous and successful in the media.

This is about us all. Translation: This is about me.

This is about a level of self consciousness so high in my generation, that it's actually toxic. Translation: I think I'm 17.

This is about the girl in her bedroom who poses in front of the camera she's awkwardly holding in her outstretched hand. She'll take a hundred photos until coming up with one she's happy with, which inevitably looks nothing like her, and after she's done poring over images of herself, will post one on her myspace page and then write something like " I don't give a f*ck what you think about me." Translation: Melanie, answer my wall posts.

This is about the person trying out for American Idol, who while going off about how confident they are that they were born ready to sing in front of the world, are trembling so badly they can hardly breathe. Translation: Stage fright is for pussies. I'm John Fucking Mayer, bitches.

This is about me, the guy who walks through a throng of photographers into a restaurant like he's Paul Newman, but who leaves a "reject" pile of clothes in his closet so high that his cleaning lady can't figure out how one man can step into so many pairs of pants in a week. Translation: 1.) I told you this was about me. 2.) I'm Paul Newman. 3.) Then I fired her for talking to me.

This is about a young guy who maintains a celebrity blog that subsists on tearing other people down but who has wrestled with a lifelong battle for acceptance as a gay man. Translation: Should I add the word fat? 'as a fat gay man.' No, no. 'as a gay fat man.' That's better. I don't know. I mean Perez Hilton is definitely a big fat gay man, but should I call him that? No, I'll take the high road by slyly referencing him without using his name so I can always deny it later.

This is about us all. Translation: This is about me.
Every one of us. Translation: Specifically me.

Who all seem to know deep down that it's incredibly hard to be alive and interact with the world around us but will try and cover it up at any cost. For as badass and unaffected as we try to come off, we're all just one sentence away from being brought to the edge of tears, if only it was worded right. Translation: That sentence is: "When it comes to boring music, I prefer Jack Johnson."

And I don't want to act immune to that anymore. I took the biggest detour from myself over the past year, since I decided that I wasn't going to care about what people thought about me. I got to the point where I had so much padding on that, sure, I couldn't feel the negativity, but that's because I couldn't feel much of anything. Translation: It was so bad, I was smoking pot every week.

And I think I'm done with that. Translation: People stopped paying attention to me.

I'm not the first person to admit we're all self conscious, Kanye was. Translation: Kanye West was the first person to come up with the concept of being aware of other's perceptions of you. I want Kanye to read this blog. I want to be friends with Kanye.

But what I want to do is to shed a little light on why we're all in the same boat, no matter the shape of the life we lead: because every one of us were told since birth that we were special. Translation: But many of you are still trying to pretend you are as special as me, John Mayer.

We were spoken to by name through a television. Translation: My house was haunted.

We were promised we could be anything that we wanted to be, if only we believed it and then, faster than we saw coming, we were set loose into the world to shake hands with the millions of other people who were told the exact same thing. Translation: Stop making albums on the internet. I have a record deal. Remember "Room For Squares"? That was a breath of fresh air, right? We didn't need Pitchfork to tell you it was good, or bad, or sucked, or that some Weekend Vampires were way better. I GOT HERE FIRST, DAMMIT! NO ONE MAKE NEW MUSIC UNTIL I'M DONE!

And really? Really? It turns out we're just not all that special, when you break it down. Beautifully unspectacular, actually. Translation: I'm NORMAL. Do you hear me?! NORMAL! Normal people are CRUSHED! BY SELF DOUBT!!...RIGHT?!

And that truth is going to catch up with us whether we want to run from it or not. The paparazzo following me to the gym ain't gonna be Herb Ritts and the guy he's following (ME) ain't gonna be Bob Dylan. Translation: Jack Johnson.

It's just a matter of how old you are once you embrace that fact. And for me (ME), 30 sounds about right. Translation: The rest of you should realize right now.

What now, then? I can only really say for myself (ME): Enjoy who I am, the talents and the liabilities. Stop acting careless. In fact, care more. Translation: Get it? Careless...Care Less...Care MORE!

Be vulnerable but stay away from where it hurts. Translation: Album reviews.
Read. Translation: But not album reviews.
See more shows. Translation: Mine.
Of any kind. Translation: Mine.
Rock shows, Translation: Mine.
art shows, Translation: Did you know I also macrame?
boat shows. Translation: I have a boat I need to sell.
Create more art. Translation: But not music. Enough people do that.
Wear hoodies to dinner. Translation: Badass!
Carry a notebook and hand it to people when they passionately recommend something and ask them to write it down for me. Translation: YOU carry around a book in which to collect recommendations for ME.

Root for others. Translation: For the rest of you, this means me.

Give more and expect the same in return, but over time. Translation: I write blog entries, you buy my albums. Over time.

Act nervous when I'm nervous, puzzled when I don't know what the hell to do, and smile when it all goes my way. And never in any other order than that. Translation: I have no fucking clue.

And when it's all over, whether at the end of this fabulous career or of this life, which I hope takes place at the same time, I should look back and say that I had it good and I made the most of it while I was able. And so should you. Translation: As a quiet, unfamous citizen who won't date Jessica Simpson.

I'm going quiet now. Translation: Sincerely,

John (ME)