[FCN], as they don't say in China.

Warning: The following post contains explicit, insensitive racist material. Please don't read if you qualify for affirmative action.

A fan of FCN who recently moved to China has bemoaned a fact which leaves her in a rut and us patting ourselves on the back in congratulations. The fact is this: FCN is censored. The People's Republic of China has decided that Funny Class Notes is not beneficial to the ideological health of the nation. Well, all right!

Of course, we're not ones to celebrate lying down. Nope. We've got to get the bottom of things. We got to meet the people responsible and shake them warmly by the hand. That's why, last weekend, we took the bus to China.

We arrived in Beijing late Saturday afternoon. The sun was shining and the beatings were only just getting started. We could tell this was going to be a great weekend. Then we tried to catch a taxi to the Ministry of Information, and our mood rapidly went sour. The irreverent driver pretended not to speak English! Of course we didn't fall for this, and told him with increasingly threatening tones of voice that we were American cowboys and we would whup his succulent T-Bone if he didn't take us to the Ministry of Information. A half hour passed, with him yelling rapid-fire Chinese and the three of us tag teaming so our throats could get a rest. Finally, he relented.

"Okay, I'll take you," He said, with a charming trace of an accent. "Get in the car."

We arrived at the Ministry just at dusk. There were armed guards standing outside, and when we told them who we were, they dragged Dan back behind the building and started beating the tar out of him. We were unfazed. In fact, our spirits were still pretty high. As a group, that is; Dan looked kinda fazed.

We got into another shouting match with the guards. This time, we lost, and were forced to beat a hasty retreat to other side of the street. It was clear to us that reason didn't work with these people. After all, this was an oppressed country. One couldn't just walk up the ministry and ask for an appointment with the bureaucrat who nixed the only website linking to your T-Shirt gallery. It was time to stop doing things the Chinese way. It was time to unleash a little good ol' Americana on these unsuspecting orientals.

But first we had to wait for Dan. That took awhile. While we waited, we skimmed the headlines of a newspaper on a nearby bench, which had headlines like: PARTY SOLVES ANOTHER PROBLEM and EVERYTHING IS FINE STILL.

Eventually Dan returned from his beating. We quietly made our way to the parking lot and found a spot marked (not counting the Chinese): MINSTER OF INFORMATION. Using skills we learned playing Grand Theft Auto back in kindergarten, we broke into the vehicle and hid ourselves in the back seat. We also acquired weapons.

After several minutes, the door to the car opened and a man plopped into the driver's seat. As soon as the car was fairly moving, Dan put him in a deadlock (rather passionately, I thought), and told him to stay calm. The man foolishly decided not to follow Dan's sage advice. He yelled and screamed until the tightening arm cut off his wind pipe.

"Now, you listen to me," Dan growled. "We came to tell you something, and by gum, we're going to get it told if we have to strangle half the Imperial Guard to do it. We're the FCN team. We saw you censored our blog, and we're pretty happy about it. We wanted to come over and say thank you."

The man's face was red and his eyes were bugging out, apparently indicating some sort of Chinese acknowledgment. In China, they don't just say "You're welcome," or "Don't mention it." They bug their eyes out and make guttural noises. It's a strange culture. Unless you've studied the subtleties like us, you really can't hope to interact with the Chinese.

Anyway, we bailed out of the car and caught the next bus ride back home. Then we checked our email. We had a message from the Minister. It read:

"Sirs - I heard reports earlier of your attack on my driver and say that this behavior must not be allowed to jeopardize the relationship between China and US which is already very dangerous."

We love you, too, Minister.