Q: What is your least favorite duty being a bank manager?

A: Making small talk with inept bank robbers with poor escape plans who end up taking me hostage. By far. Not even a close second. Foreclosing on a widow leads to weeks of depression where I walk around the city  wondering what my purpose is on this Earth, wondering what kind of God would create a world where people, good people, would have to earn their money forcing gentle kind old women from houses they've owned for decades, but foreclosing on widows - and this is something that makes me cry and gives me hives - foreclosing on widows is a cherish childhood memory compared to making small talk with bank robbers.

Despite what years of motion pictures may have lead you to believe, bank robbers are not suave professionals  possessed of quick wit, fighting against corporate greed on behalf of the little man. They are lazy, vile, stupid people who lack the basic social skills required to hold even the most menial of jobs. Carrying on a conversation with such people takes the kind of patience reserved for saints and mystics.  If you replaced every word from a bank robber's mouth with the phrase, "I'm don't understand how life works so I punch things," you would be no worse off and have a better understanding of who they are as people, and would save yourself the trouble of having to spend time deciphering the tremors, eye-rolls, grunts, lewd gestures and asinine observations they consider parts of speech.

Sooner or later the conversation turns to bank managing, and what it's like, and how it must be an awful, soul-crushing job to serve as the penny-filled sock of capitalism, knocking the common man out and taking his money. They refuse to accept that bank managing is a job like any other, it has good days and bad days, It keeps me around people and it gives me something to do.

Now that I've answered your question, will you start releasing hostages? Or are you going to wait until all those red dots on your chest reach your forehead?

Q: Was sand a living thing?

A: Sand is made up of very small rocks, worn down by eons of pressure from the winds and the rains and the hand of man, and has no life of its own.

Sand has no heart no beat, no lungs to breath, no blood to spill, no soul to take. Don't worry, son, you can't hurt sand. When you poured out that can gasoline into the sand pit and dropped in the book of matches, you didn't kill any sand. Sand can't be killed.

People, however, can be killed. People who, for whatever reason, might have been bound and gagged at the bottom of a sandpit, hidden under a tarp. That's what you heard scream.

In your school, have they ever taught you about the word "alibi"?

Great. Let's work on one together.

Q: What kind of pain medication do they use for knee problems?

A: Typically something like Ibuprofen, Naproxen or Celecoxib. If you have a good-sized tolerance for meds, they might give you something stronger, like Tramadal or Hydrocodone. If you're real lucky, or you know somebody, you might be able to score some Morphine.

None of those options will work for you.

To suffer knee pain, you need to have a knee. You don't have a knee. Not anymore. What you're feeling is what they call "phantom pain." It's not real. It could go away in a minute, could last you rest of your life, hard to say.

That guy tore your leg right off. We all heard the snap from the sideline and assumed it was bad. We never expected it to be this bad. You, here, on the ground. Your leg, over there in the linebacker's hand. Our scouts were right. That guy is a beast. I've never seen such animal ferocity on a football field. I hate to say this, but in your condition there's little chance you'll remember, but I kind of admire that guy. It's like he doesn't even care that he's crippled a man for life. What dedication.

And now he's eating your leg. They should probably test that guy for drugs.

I'm sure you're in a lot of pain now, but as I said most of it is phantom pain. The pain will go away, the scars will heal, someday you might even walk again - I hear today's prosthetics are incredible - but no matter what happens, you'll always have the memory of scoring a touchdown in the Rose Bowl.

Damn it, I just saw the flag.

All right, enough with the speeches. I can't think of much else to say and you probably can't hear me, judging by the blood coming out of your ears. We need to get you off the field and to the hospital, and fast; the halftime show is about to start.

Q: What is so great about the Nobel Prizes?

A: For over a century, the Nobel Foundation in Stockholm, Sweden has awarded Nobel prizes in the fields physics, chemistry, medicine, literature and peace. Winning a Nobel Prize signifies that you have reached the pinnacle of your chosen field, and stand among the giants of human thought. In addition to a medal, and a place in history, Nobel winners receive a cash prize of over a million dollars.

Past winners of the Nobel prize include Marie Curie, Ernest Hemingway, Albert Einstein, Erwin Rudolph Joseph Alexander Schroedinger, William Faulkner, Martin Luther King, and Teddy Roosevelt.

Frankly, winning a Nobel Prize is akin to winning Super Bowl MVP, an Oscar and a Congressional Medal of Honor all at the same time. It's the greatest award a human being could possibly win.

And I have one.

So, please, Dad, can I sit at the grown up's table on Thanksgiving?

Q: How good are titan pistols?

A: When it comes to protecting your loved ones from the potential dangers of the modern world - home invaders, the Chinese army, socialists, ninjas, zombies, thrill seeking, drugged addicted veterans scarred by the horrors of war - there's no better weapon than a Titan Pistol. 

Titan Pistols kill where they point. That's Titan Promise #1. 

Most companies are afraid to tell you this, but the majority of weapons bought for home protection are used on  family members, either intentionally, to end drunken arguments, or accidentally, when you mistake your son sneaking back in the house after curfew for a burglar trying to rob you over your collection of vintage smut.  At Titan Pistols, however, we are proud of the fact that our guns kill more family members than Smith and Wesson, GLOCK, and Remington combined. 

When you bring home a Titan Pistol, someone's going to die. That's Titan Promise #2.

Unlike other manufacturers, our pistols don't misfire, or jam or cost you valuable seconds of shooting time with a complicated safety lock. Titan Pistols don't have a safety, or a trigger, or a cartridge. The moment you pick up a Titan Pistol, it will fire. If you look at a Titan Pistol, it will fire. If the air around a Titan Pistol reaches a temperature higher than 73 degrees Fahrenheit, it will fire.

You have to work hard NOT to kill someone with a Titan Pistol. That's Titan Promise #3.

Thanks to our three promises - Our guns kill where they point. Once you bring one of our guns home, someone will die. Our guns require constant diligence not to kill - we guarantee that Titan Pistols are the best gun on the market. 

How many would you like to buy to protect your family?

Oh. I see. 

I probably should have warned you to keep your family back before I began my presentation. As I said, Titan Pistols are sensitive killing machines, and as you witnessed, your wife and daughter do not have bullet proof heads.  Don't bother to get up, I'm comfortable cleaning up. This isn't my first presentation.