Some More of the Dharma

Let's say you are kidnapped, hogtied and dragged from your office or the deep fryer where you work and taken hostage by Venezuelan nationals bent on avenging some slight or another.

For days you remain tied up in Caracas, subsisting on leftovers from a Subway located in the hotel where your captors have set up a command post to further their cause of prolonging the Bolivarian Revolution.  At length you are untied and paraded through the streets as fiery locals call you unkind names and toss burros at you as they ride their colorful burritos.  Or the other way around.

You are brought before the Queen of the Revolution, Her Majesty, the leader of the Puppet Government, Mary Annette.

"Silence, Insect!" she commands, as you cower and beg for mercy.

Mimi Kennedy

"At the stroke of 11 this morning, you shall be defenestrated if you cannot answer the following question:  Which cast member of 'Dharma and Greg' suggested a song topic to Jim Steinman, which led to Steinman writing Meat Loaf's biggest hit ever, based on an Elvis Presley song?"

That's when you say, "Mary Annette, stop pulling my string. The answer is Mimi Kennedy, who played Dharma's mom Abby, who was in a musical with Steinman. Steinman was complaining that he couldn't make progress as a songwriter, and she told him that his songs were too complicated, and advised him to write something a little easier to comprehend. And while she was saying that, someone had an oldies station on the radio, and 'I Want You, I Need You, I Love You' was playing, and Steinman started to sing along but then put his own twist on the song.  In his take, the guy wants and needs the girl, but there ain't no way he's ever gonna love her...but two out of three ain't bad, right?"

Steinman finished the song, Meat Loaf cut it for his first album in 1977, "Bat Out Of Hell," and now you can tell Queen Mary Annette that you do not a) want her, b) need her or c) love her.

She will understand. You might as well go back to work tomorrow.