Graham Chapman

Jim Yoakum

The definitive collection of writings by Python Graham Chapman. Funny, innovative and surreal as any Python sketch.

Sketches, Letters, Essays & Gondolas

Calcium Made Interesting

The slightly ridiculous tragicomic odyssey of one Joe Perk, a young man alone: inarticulate, simple-hearted and naive; a humble coffee-jerk with a unique talent, as he travels from small town Oklahoma to New York City in order to realize his dream: to become a world champion coffee barista. Along the way he stumbles in and out of the lives of Cliff, his cruel half-brother who delights in stealing Joe's girls; Miguel, a farmhand with a secret bean; Cappuccino, the lovely coffee shop owner in love and in trouble; a crazed homeless man who drives an office chair, quotes movie dialogue and wants to kill Joe; Lou, the diner-owner with dyslexia; Graydon Froth, a coffee mogul with a serious inferiority complex; Macchiato, reigning barista champ and prize chump; and Shakes, the mysterious man who imparts to Joe a secret knowledge that will possibly make him a star.

Joe Perk

Franz Kafka

One night, in a London pub in the 1990's, I ran into a man who claimed to be the actor Michael Caine. The man said (in a thick Cockney accent): "'ere mate, if yer buy me a beer I will recite the bloomin' 'oole of Franz Kafka's classic tale of alienation, 'Metamorphosis, ' also known as 'Die Verwandlung.' If, however, yer chose not ter ffen I shall kick yer in the bleedin' balls." As I valued my balls very much I agreed... And so here is Kafka's 'Metamorphosis, ' as retold by a man in a pub who looked like, and who said that he was, Michael Caine. He may have been Michael Caine, I don't know, it was hard to tell. The pub was really dark and well, I'd had a few pints.

Jim Yoakum

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