One-two-three, one-two-three, JUMP-two-three, one-two-three… Good, good – you’ve got it! Now try it again, from the top. And a-one-two-three…

Greetings from the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill, a combination squat house, launch pad, recording studio, interstellar refugee center, and – now – dance studio! You heard me right. Sure, sure – no one in Big Green can dance his way out of a paper bag; this much is true. But needs dictate actions in this corner of the universe as well as in yours, and damn it, we need money to get this tour off the ground. So….. dance lessons. Administered by Marvin (my personal robot assistant), as it happens.

Oh, sure, laugh. You may laugh, but actually… he’s not as bad a dancer as you might imagine. In fact, he’s far worse than that. To observe that he is mechanical is less than surprising, I suppose. Actually, he’s kind of mechanical even for a robot. (He doesn’t do that robot dance any justice.) Fortunately, we live in an area where no one can dance, apparently (precious little reason to do so, as well), so Marvin can, simply by dint of his willingness to claim expertise, seem like an expert. Oh, the lengths money will drive a man (or an automaton) to. Sad.

Why are we so short on cash? Please! Aren’t we always? Think of the expenses we need to bear. Just keeping ourselves in Cheesits and crepe paper is enough to bankrupt any tycoon. And then there’s Anti-Lincoln’s odious absinthe habit. (Now I know why he spent so much time at the theater.) We’re just pouring money down the rat hole every day of our lives. And those rats are living pretty large, my friend, pretty large. Of course, now they have to share with our tour manager, Admiral Gonutz (ret.), who needs cash (and lots of it) to provision our ramshackle interstellar space craft.

So… I don’t care how poorly Marvin teaches the waltz. So long as his students pay their bills, we’re bleeping golden. ‘Nuff said.