Brain Wreck

Hi, I’m Wilbur. You all remember me from my starring role in the immortal TV series, ‘Mr. Ed’, and also from my work at the Peoria Playhouse, my numerous starring roles with the Akron Little Theatre, and my long-running commercial for ConstiPoodle, the laxative for doggies on the go. Of course, my most famous role was working with Mr. Ed, the ultra-famous big, big, big-time talking horse TV megastar! Mr. Ed and I are still on cable in El Segundo, parts of Costa Rica, Belize, Kenya, and Kentucky, and all of Fayetteville, Arkansas.

As you all know, there was a huge public outcry when we got canceled. CBS told us that they received over two dozen phone calls on the day after the announcement. What the hell. Ed had just gotten too old to be on TV. They wanted young, fresh faces, like Grizzly Adams and The Beaver and all that crowd. Ed was pretty depressed. The job market for talking horses was pretty slim. I was planning to fall back on my early ambition to become a bachelorette party cop, but, as it turns out, I was also considered to be a little long in the tooth, and deficient in other parts, for the job. I also became pretty depressed.

Well, what was I supposed to do? Talking to a damn horse was the only decent gig I ever had. Anyway, we had to press on. Ed and I talked it over, and then we moved into a studio apartment in El Segundo, where we are still on cable TV. We wound up living there for several years. Try living with a stink like that and then you come and judge me, buddy!

It wasn’t like we didn’t try. I auditioned for anything that came along. I almost had Julia Roberts’ role in ‘Steel Magnolias’ until I accidentally got too close to the klieg lights and one of my breasts caught on fire. In the meantime, Ed tried his hand at being a writer, but he didn’t actually have any hands, so typing or holding a pen was quite a challenge. Also, every story wound up in a stall with a brood mare in estrus. It seems that there is a very limited market for horse porn. Gee, who could have ever imagined that.

After a while, Ed began to drink heavily. He said it improved his writing and moved him up in a class with Hemingway and Faulkner and Fitzgerald and other alcoholic writers of note. I noted that none of them ever wrote horse porn. He argued that his subject matter put him above all those guys, because they could never understand the profound depths of his creations.

For as long as I had known him, Ed had also been a very heavy smoker. When we were living in El Segundo, he was knocking back three or four packs of Camel cigarettes every day. So, of course, the inevitable happened. One day while Ed was watching a video of ‘My Friend Flicka’ for the umpteenth time, he fell off the couch with a massive heart attack. The downstairs neighbors thought it was an earthquake, and they all ran outside as fast as possible. Typical Californians.

I immediately called the French Embassy, and they sent over a crew within half an hour. For all you die-hard Mr. Ed fans, he is now available in the canned goods department of all the leading French grocery stores, or, if you wish to save yourself the airfare to Paris, just send $19.95 cash, check, money order credit or debit card, to me, Wilbur, at 6345789 Crash Test Blvd., Apt. 8675309, El Segundo, California, 999999. In exchange, I will send you a genuine can of Mr. Ed, complete with autograph and bio, and, for a limited time, I will throw in, absolutely free of charge to the first thousand customers, our CD, ‘Mr. Ed and Wilbur Sing the Greatest Hits of Bob Denver’. This wonderful musical tribute includes ‘Theme from Gilligan’s Island’, ‘The Rich Taste Better When They’re Boiled’, ‘Touch Me Gingerly’, Mary Ann’s Theme ‘ Sweet and Innocent Costs You More’, and, of course, the Disney inspired closing theme to ‘Gilligan’s Island’, ‘I Hope, I Hope, You Find Someone to Grope’. In addition, I will also include Bob’s great top forty hit, ‘Too Rude to Live, Too Hairy to Die’, which features the immortal lyric known to all. ‘With a song in my heart that turned out to be gas…I played that melody and blew up my ass’.

Better hurry folks! This offer won’t last long. If you call in the next thirty minutes, I will also include the complete collection of Mr. Ed’s short stories. It’s the perfect gift for your husband, wife, sweetheart, or casual sex acquaintance.