ASK JOHN EATS.™

It's Friday, and all three to seven of my readers know what that means: time for another installment of my new advice column, ASK JOHN EATS! Each week I'll be answering another actual letter sent to johneats[a]gmail.com, so if you've got a question for me, please send it in! I'm here to do the work you'd rather not do, much like your own personal (and free of charge) Shabbas Goy! But I can't do it without your questions, so what are you waiting for? Get off your ass and send me something -- that means YOU, Ivan!

Enough small talk. Let's solve some problems!

Dear John Eats,

Some say marry money, but my brother says big brains matter more. Which is right?

(signed)

Cranial Nerve

Dear Cranial Nerve,

Short and to the point, that's what I like to see! And our first question regarding affairs of the heart -- a subject upon which I'm quite well-versed, since I've had so many successes in my dealings with the fair sex. And if there's one thing I've learned about women, it's that they can be extremely difficult to kill when cornered in their secret lair. Wait, didn't I ever tell you about the dream I had like fifteen years ago where I was ordered by the government to kill Whitney Houston? Oh, this is awesome!


I was an assassin for hire, and obviously I'd been reading a lot of X-Men comics or something because I had retractable adamantium claws in my hands. My contact at the government briefed me and told me that Whitney Houston had spent the last few years with a band of underground outlaw mutant teenagers. She'd become their "queen" (much like when Storm became queen of the Morlocks after a knife fight with the dreaded Callisto in Uncanny X-Men #170 - words by Chris Claremont, pencils by Paul Smith - some would say one of the 25 Greatest Moments in X-Men History) and was now drunk with power, ready to send her evil mutant hoards to terrorize the so-called "normal" people of America. I accepted the job and now here I was, pulling my camouflaged jeep to a stop at a safe vantage point overlooking the dirty old gymnasium/hotel (I said it was a dream, didn't I?) that Whitney was holed up in. Using the cover of darkness and my heightened senses, I easily infiltrated her lair.

The place was empty and quiet -- almost too quiet -- and looked suspiciously like the set of the video for Tonight, Tonight, Tonight by Genesis. There were holes in the roof which sent narrow shafts of dim starlight streaming out onto the floor, cutting through the inky darkness. I tried to avoid the light so I wouldn't be detected, but eventually the place's lights went up and I heard a horrendous, crack-addled cackle. Whitney stood before me in a suit of chainmail, challenging me to do my worst.


Like a female Colonel Kurtz dressed in Tina Turner's outfit from Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, she was obviously totally insane.

We slowly circled each other. Gradually, hundreds of teenage mutants emerged from the shadows and formed a circle around us. This wasn't going to be easy.

I popped my claws early, just to make her sweat. One of her teenage mutant cronies tossed her a long pike. She took a few swings, nothing fancy, toying with me. But I wasn't there for games.

This was gonna get nasty.

I drew first blood, slicing her abdomen before she could parry with the pike, sending bits of chainmail, flesh and blood spraying into the dusty air. Her little mutant brood howled their dissatisfaction, but I couldn't hear them; I could only feel the blood pounding in my ears, my berserker rage rising in intensity as her pike found its mark: the small of my back. If it was a fist it would have been a sucker punch. Instead, it took a decent-sized chunk out of my back, a wound that would have been fatal for any normal man. But I wasn't normal.


I stood my ground. She stood hers. No quarter was asked for, and none was given. She was a tough cookie, good in a scrape.

But I was better.

It didn't take long before I had her on the run. The teenage mutants were chanting, spitting at me, throwing garbage at me. Suddenly my claws found their mark: square in the center of her breast bone, taking out her heart. Her lifeless body slid to the floor.

Whitney Houston was dead.

Before I realized what was happening, I was being raised up on the shoulders of the evil underground teenage mutants. I'd bested their leader in single combat, so instead of trying to kill me they made me their new king. I didn't even think twice; I became their leader, turned my back on the government. I couldn't work for those paper pushers anymore. I belong here, with them. There's no going back.

I'm the best at what I do.

And what I do isn't very nice.

Signed,

John Eats.

Do you have a question, no one else can help, and you can't find The A-Team? Mail your question to:

johneats[at]gmail.com

Please only send these questions via email. John Eats does not like to be asked questions in person or over the phone, that's during his "Me Time" and he doesn't want to be bothered.