40-05-29 Nicer the Goader

STARRING: ART VAN HARVEY, BERNARDINE FLYNN AND BILL IDELSON 

Rush and his enemy Nicer Scott are going at it again. The fight occurs over the fact that Nicer makes ridiculous claims and Rush is tired of it.

MIS' CROWE SAYS:
Prelude to the afternoon of a paste upside the snoot.

I can’t help but feel a weird tinge of pride that thorn-in-Rush’s-side Nicer Scott comes from Burlington, Iowa, which is just a stone’s throw away from my hometown, though I feel the need to clarify that he in no way represents all Southeast Iowans.

Sometimes Nicer Scott makes me think of this story that ran on This American Life, “The Super Always Rings Twice.” It concerns a blustering braggart of a New York building superintendent, who tells all kinds of stories about his lethal power and prestige back in his home country of Brazil, stories which absolutely no one in the building believes. And then it turns out — spoiler alert — that they were all completely 100% true. What if Nicer Scott’s stories are all true, too? Well, the ones that are not factually impossible, anyway. What if he has got 87 pairs of pants in cold storage back in Burlington, Iowa? 

It always strikes me that Rush never actually gets punished in this episode. He gets a good talking-to, but he is actually given a lot of opportunity to talk and to defend his actions to his parents. Although they claim not to sympathize with him, I can’t help but think that by the end of the story, they do!  They can’t seem to think of anything else to tell him besides “You’re a pretty good boy” and “Try not to do it again.” While I would never advocate violence…some people really do just need a paste upside the snoot. Not that it seems to be a deterrent for Nicer.

SEE THE SCRIPT (transcribed by Lydia Crowe)

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This episode has amazing similarities with 39-11-07 Smelly Makes a Speech.

That being said, the ridiculous claims made by Nicer and Paul Rhymer's art of the preposterous saves the day.

Trivia:

A Mohawk Indian in a cage!

+ In days prior, Mildred Tisdel had teased Rush and made him mad.

+ Leroy Snow has a girlfriend.

+ We find out that Heinie Call lives across the street from the Gooks.

+ Claims made by Nicer that were revealed in this episode:

• claimed to have various blood in him: Cuban (3 gallons), Eskimo (quart and a half), French (pint) and Greek (2 teacups.) 
• claimed to have never looked at himself in the "looking glass"/mirror.
• claimed to have 87 pairs of pants in a cold-storage vault in Burlington, Iowa.
• claimed he can chin himself 35 times.
• claimed to have owned a live Mohawk Indian and kept him in a cage.
• claimed to have slept 26 hours at a stretch.
• claimed that in Burlington, Iowa he could stick out his tongue and touch his ear with it.

+ In the episode 39-04-03 Rush Draws List of Acquaintances, Nicer mentioned relatives and acquaintances to Rush in several parts of the country, but none of them were in Burlington, Iowa (which is mentioned twice in this episode as to where he came from).

+ Rush says the Brick Mush man is nearly bald.

Another point of contention: The number of hairs on Nicer's head... {{{HEAR}}}

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