Hard times.

Where the hell is that banjo? What.... Marvin (my personal robot assistant) is using it again? Jesus... how's a brother supposed to sing the blues around here?

Have to resort to non-banjo alternatives, I guess. That's the way things go here at the Cheney Hammer Mill. You got complaints? Stand in line for the pluck string instrument. You may call it annoying mountain music. We call it aural psychotherapy. (Of course, when Marvin's doing it, I don't know quite what to call it. ) Be that as it may, you need some kind of relief in these troubled times, when money is as rare as .... well ... rare earths. We've got lots of common earths. My point is... we're freaking broke again. Join the select club of 90% of Americans, eh? Busted!

Well, if we have a middle name, it's innovation. Big Innovation Green, that's us. (People often associate another middle name with us... I believe it begins with an "f"). We're constantly thinking of ways to float the overloaded boat of our miserable lives and careers. Sometimes that thinking involves a lot of bad ideas, it's true. The vegetable stand never worked out, for instance. Not enough profit in selling discarded carrots and onions that fell off the back of the turnip truck. (Not to mention the offense that enterprise gave to our companion, the man-sized tuber.)

Speaking of bad ideas, Marvin had one. The gears were spinning hard inside that brass noggin of his. Next thing we knew, he was wheeling off to the local constabulary, resume in claw, looking for a personnel officer. You see, he'd run across an article in the local paper about how the police we're saving up for one of those bomb-fetching robots you see on T.V. once in a while. It occurred to Marvin that he should, perhaps, apply for the position - that the amount of money they would spend on a robot could constitute a salary of sorts. That's the story we got from Anti-Lincoln, anyway. My guess is that he sold Marvin to the cops and invented that cock and bull story to cover his own sorry ass.

I'll tell you something, Anti-Lincoln.... you're going to need something larger than that pathetic little lie. Thanks to you, Marvin is sniffing out explosives. Shame, Abe, shame.