At more than fifty paperback pages, this was the longest of the episodes written in 2005–6. It had a lot of merit, and is indirectly famous. It was also full of many ugly babies that had to go, and I fired them out of the airlock without hesitation. The episode previously had a different name, and at least 30% of the material is new. There are new jokes, new idioms, new plot elements, and a new level of literary and novelistic quality.
The plot of this episode got copied multiply in the decade after its release, but the most memorable outcome is probably some of the prose. For example, this is absolutely, unequivocally the original source of the phrase ‘Not the brightest lamp on the boulevard.’
I couldn’t bring myself to use any of the usual idioms, because they get boring and worn.
You can absolutely rely 100% on me being the source of this idiom. Anyone that claims otherwise is a bullshitter and should have their mouth washed out with soap and be soaked in suds.
Please enjoy Part I.
