This past week pretty much blew chunks.

I quit smoking and haven’t had a cigarette in more than eight days. But that has nothing to do with how shitty I think everything is.

It’s sort of just the icing on the cake. Whatever the root cause, it’s been an unpleasant distraction.

Look at this picture, for example. It’s of a Beach Road business that offers a very special service.

I haven’t a single god damned clue what ageaing is, but I’m totally against it.

You should always be suspicious of and hostile to words that sound funny. And then act violently toward it.

And it’s stupid things like that window which have filled my brain this past week. Also, for example

The only people who would find this picture fascinating, and not always for different reasons, are mental patients and the unemployed.

I’m covered, in any event.

But why is this happening to me right now? I’ll tell you my theory. I’m in the doldrums. I’m unemployed, middle-aged, and I spend most of my waking hours having one way conversations with a cat. And despite all these advantages, I still feel like there’s something wrong.

Episodes of Tina? Finished. Advertising scripts? Done. There was nothing needed finishing. This post has been in draft since Tuesday. There was no wind in my sails.

Like all sailors before the steam ship, I literally was stuck in the Intertropical Convergence Zone, so to speak. (The fact that I also suffer from rickets is immaterial).

But that still doesn’t answer how one gets stuck in the doldrums. In this day and age, with our modern satellites and mood stabilizing drugs.

The answer is you have to be put there. Something has to set you off.

What did it for me. What really pushed me over the edge into a brown study.

What really set me thinking that I’d hit rock bottom, and froze my career and my life in its tracks.

Was the fact that I was bumped from an open mic for standup comedians.

Never in my entire three-and-a-half week standup comedy career have I been subjected to such contemptible treatment.

I didn’t even think it was possible to get bumped from an open mic. I thought the whole idea of an open mic was to give people a chance. Not to dash their dreams of one day co-starring in a movie with Rob Schneider.

And what about my free speech rights, and my rights as an American citizen to get anything I want, whenever I want it?

Snatch needs to understand they didn’t just prevent an aspiring funny person from getting some microphone time. By denying me my rights, they are letting the terrorists win.

And we were doing so well until now.

Anyway, I think I have a solution that could benefit us all with a lot of free publicity. A frivolous lawsuit.

This is how it’s going to work. I’m going to tell the world that Snatch Bar bumped me from open mic because I’m Jewish. Voila. Instant publicity for everyone.

Our names will be in the news, but sadly, not as much as if I were a holocaust survivor, or even 100 percent Jewish for that matter. I’m sorry to report that my mother is gentile.

So when I hold my first press conference, I will explain that I am accusing you of semi-antisemitism. Or anti-semi-semitism. (I may use both.)

I think this fiasco would get Snatch a lot more than if someone, say, referred to Anne Frank as a slut.

Which I wouldn’t recommend.

So, let’s make this work, suing each other out of the doldrums.