There are many book distributors out there who can offer you tips about how to sell Srila Prabhupada’s books to the fallen, conditioned souls. Some focus on techniques like getting the book into their hands. Some use a sliding scale for prices. And some even resort to wearing karmi clothes.

But I’ve got a tip for you that is guaranteed to always get results: Look like John Stamos.

It’s easy to distribute books when you look like John Stamos.

You know, the famous Uncle Jesse from the hit 80’s sitcom, Full House. The character of Uncle Jesse was beloved by all! The girls thought he was a hunk and the guys all wanted to be like him. Believe me, I know what that’s like and thanks to John Stamos, I’m raking in the laxmi points on sankirtana!

Now, I hear what you’re saying, “but Janastotram prabhu, I don’t look like John Stamos!” And I can see how you’d think that’s a problem. I’ve got a secret, I didn’t look like John Stamos either until I grew the iconic Stamos mullet. I was shaved up for years until one day when I was applying Tilaka and caught a glimpse of John Stamos in the mirror.

A year later the mullet was fully installed – even had a special puja for it. And after a small out-patient procedure, I was John Stamos. My book scores doubled!

Another tip I can give you, and this is pretty important, adopt a catch phrase. I’ve taken nicely to the Elvis-inspired Uncle Jesse quote, “Have Mercy!.” On Full House, whenever Uncle Jesse would see a fine young lady, he would curl his lip like The King, wiggle his hips and say “Have Merr-saaaay!”

And since Srila Prabhupada’s message is 100% pure mercy, I can casually saunter up to a karmi, place a Gita in their hands, curl my upper lip and say it: Have Mercy! The girls all melt and the guys wish they were devotees who looked like me. It’s great!

But maybe you look too much unlike John Stamos to really be a convincing John Stamos. Might I suggest another cultural figure from other 80’s sitcoms? Take Joey Lawrence, for example. Do you look anything like Joey Lawrence? He’s no John Stamos, but I bet you could sling a few Gitas after throwing around a couple of “WHOA”’s. Or how about Kirk Cameron from TV’s Growing Pains? Ever thought about Scott Baio from Charles in Charge? Get yourself a Willie Ames and watch your Laxmi points soar!

Oh, and for the matajis, may I suggest Jo or Blair from The Facts of Life? Get two other girls to be Natalie and Tuti, dress up the ashrama leader as Mrs Garret and you’ve got yourself the best themed sankirtana party ever! And men, don’t completely rule out an A-Team sankirtana party! “I pity the fool who don’t take Prabhupada’s Gita!”

But there are, of course, some caveats. Personally, I would forget the instinct to attain Happy Days’s Arthur “Fonzie” Fonzarelli. Sure he’s iconic, but everyone wants to be The Fonz. Seriously, if I see another devotee with slicked back hair, motorcycle jacket and tshirt holding “Perfect Questions, Perfect Answers” with one hand and giving a “thumbs up” with the other, I’m going to scream. And come on, what kind of catch phrase is, “Aaaaay!”? May I please beg to submit “Who’s the Boss” lead, Tony Micelli (played by the lovable Tony Danza) as a suitable alternative.

Oh, a word of caution: stay away from Balki Bartokomous of TV’s Perfect Strangers. Trust me, folks – not pretty.

So when you’re sitting by yourself in the ashrama at night, thinking of your sankirtana look, may I humbly suggest the 80’s situation comedies as a source of inspiration. John Stamos has served me (and Srila Prabhupada!) very well over the years. If you’ve been contemplating a Michael J Fox, Erik Estrada or even a Bill Cosby, I say go for it! Make the power of the 80’s sitcom work for you (and Krishna)!

A Kaupin is a loin-cloth traditionally worn by celibates to reduce the production of semen. The girding assists to raise energy from that area up the spine to nourish the brain, notably along with drinking hot milk while reading Krishna Book in the evening.

“My mother made me floss my teeth before and after every meal which amounted to childhood trauma”, Goswami, born Adam Garney, said. Although this was the main incentive to leave home and join the Hare Krishna’s, “every time I offer obeisances I am reminded of this flossing, rather than of guru and Krishna”, he confessed, after greeting the deities this morning.

Reflecting, “The Govindam prayer brings back memories of momma saying, ‘go floss ‘em, Adam!’” Purportedly, such bad karma would stop like the slowing down of a fan after being switched off.

When Goswami reported his difficulty to the temple authority and requested laksmi for two sets of boxer briefs from his sankirtan collection, he was returned with, “Maya. You are transcendental to phobia and need to wear kaupins so that your senses are controlled.” His authority then remarked that the temple funds were for Krishna’s service and not for “material problems”.

Goswami’s fellow brahmacaris reminded him of the story of a yogi who wanted two sets of kaupins, gradually accumulating “material things”, ending up with a house and a wife, the “death of a brahmacari.”

“This is a personal issue, not a product flaw,” said Susan Mistlefield, an Oral-B spokes persons. “Our dental floss is used by millions dentists worldwide and they are certainly not joining the Hare Krishnas.”

Due to his flossing phobia, Goswami often fails to offer obeisances before exiting the temple room. “If I could simply have a couple of pairs of Fruit of the Loom or maybe some Joe Boxers, I’d offer one thousand dandavats to the vaisnavas daily, outside the temple president’s office while praying to Raghunatha das Goswami, no problem.”

To possibly remedy the situation, temple authorities sent Goswami on a two week pilgrimage to holy Vrindavan. “A good dandavat parikrama of Govardhana should fix him right up,” said sankirtana leader, Apana das.

Shortly after parikrama, Goswami disappeared, leaving everything, including his kaupins, behind. He has since been seen along the banks of the Ganges River with the Naga Babas.

“It is fact,” said two-year adherent, bhakta Randal, “she is nicely following Vedic culture by getting the hell out of my way, otherwise, she is simply prostitute.” Adding, “Could you let her know that I think it’s really nice, that she gets the hell out of my way? Could you tell her that for me?”

Abhava devi dasi sustained slight abrasions and a bruise on her knee as she got the hell out of the way for His Holiness Matsarya das Goswami as they passed each other in the downstairs hallway near the lobby.

“She is so chaste,” reports Sri Danda das brahmacari, “just see how completely her head is covered. And how her eyes never quite make contact with yours.”

Another brahmacari questioned, “I wonder what color they are.”

One such event was witnessed by a family visiting the temple for the first time. “What was that about?” Asked Ron Browning, the father of the family of four, after seeing Abhava devi dasi trip over her own feet to get the hell out of the way near the washroom as several Hare Krishna monks wandered by. “That just doesn’t seem right.”

When questioned about his temple’s unspoken policy about brahmacarinis, Kamarupam Swami, temple commander and bhakta leader, disagreed that it was sexist.

“The idea that women are mistreated in the temple is completely bogus.” He continued, “outside the temple, they are practically trained to casually walk past so many men. Is that not abuse?”

Temple visitors are not the only ones talking about Abhava devi dasi’s behavior. Talk in the men’s ashrama has turned to discussing her actions as well.

“I really appreciate her dedication to Srila Prabhupada,” says Pradhana das, during the brahmacari ashrama’s Tuesday night Bhagavad-gita study group, “she gets the hell out of my way better than any mataji I’ve ever seen.”

“It’s true,” added life-long brahmacari, Devakanya das, “Have you ever noticed that even though Abhava’s long, brown hair sways back and forth, it never comes undone as she glides across the floor to the wall?”

“And how, when she casts herself to the wall as we move past, her sari nearly exposes her slender waist giving way to the soft curve of her hips,” said Menaka das, closing his eyes. “Even as she gets the hell out of my way, she remains such a nice, chaste mataji.”

Abhava devi dasi’s conduct has not gone unnoticed. “Most women do not understand how to act in front of men,” Kamarupam Swami said after a thoughtful pause. “Most women will casually stroll by, hardly noticing me at all. But when Abhava devi dasi gets the hell out of my way, I can fell her sincere concern for my spiritual life.”

Typically, this waiting period is 2-3 business days, the time it takes for temple treasurer Nandakumar Gupta to prepare the papers for the IRS and accountant, Larry Spigman.

“Usually we are very quick,” says Gupta from behind a stack of W-4 forms. “But now Larry is busy with so many things. We are very quickly searching for new accountant.”

The arrival of new devotees was at an all-time low, until the temple board decided to hire full time sankirtana workers. These full time employees, many who were out-of-work TV commercial actors, work 40 hours a week chanting, dancing and distributing books on the corner of Maple and High Streets. The results of their labor are obvious.

“Normally, we’d get one or two new bhaktas a month, but now we get four or five a week,” said bhakta leader Balanga das, adding, “It’s really hard to keep up with all the paperwork.”

In the past month, the temple has taken on over 20 new bhaktas. Nearly all of these bhaktas are awaiting the processing of their work papers.

“I just want to mop a floor or clean some pots,” says new convert, Bhakta Todd, “I can’t wait to get in there and do some real seva.”

Bhakta Joe, who joined up with Bhakta Todd, agreed, “I don’t get it, why can’t we clean the temple or a bathroom or two?”

Some congregational members suggested that the temple pay the new bhaktas “under the table.” But, according to temple authorities, working “under the table” (the practice of paying a worker without reporting it to the IRS) is something that the temple would never do. “It is simply wrong,” say Gupta, “for a bhakta to earn wages and not report, it is robbery, he is criminal.”

Another problem addressed at an emergency temple board meeting is that if the rate of new bhaktas does not soon decrease, the temple will be unable to pay the new adherents, even after the paperwork is sorted out.

“We are given only so much laxmi for payroll,” say Gupta, “we are now having to turn new devotees away, we have no more positions to fill.”

The temple board has also placed a hiring freeze on new bhaktas. The sankirtan workers can still go out to collect laxmi, but for now they are not allowed to bring back any new recruits.

“I just don’t know what to do,” said a visibly upset Jason Marsh, who has been studying Srila Prabhupada’s books, classes and conversations for over a year, “I wanted to join the temple, be in the association of devotees, to do some service.”

When Marsh was told about the hiring freeze, he asked the sankirtana manager, “Hiring freeze? Didn’t Srila Prabhupada say that temple devotees shouldn’t get salaries? I just want to do service, I don’t want to get paid, I just want to do it for free.”

The sankirtana manager replied by saying, “Prabhu, you can quote Srila Prabhupada all you want, but to work at the temple, you have to be on payroll. Anything else just isn’t practical.”

Back at the temple, the new bhaktas have been told to read from Srila Prabhupada’s books until the paperwork can be processed, however, even that practice has been called into question.

“Srila Prabhupada says that even reading his books is devotional service,” says temple board member Ravi Patel, “how can a devotee perform devotional service when not on the temple payroll?” Adding, “you are asking for big, big lawsuit.”

Police said around 400 celibate monks, including several high-ranking sannyasis and vanaprastas had taken to the streets.

The protests, sparked by a reprinting of the classic Brahmacarya in Krishna Consciousness, are the largest toilet paper factory protests since Fortunate Souls; The Bhakta Program Manual hit the bookshelves in 1996.

“Toilet paper is maya,” said protest organizer Vitananda das brahmacari, “and Charmin, the largest toilet paper manufacturer in the world, must cease this nonsense at once.”

The pakka brabhmacaris chanted and danced as others held signs reading “Water Not Wiping!” and “Lotas or DIE!” A large banner reading “Shower After Passing Stool!” was held up behind the protesters as several devotees burned an effigy of Mr. Whipple.

Shouts of “tonight you will wipe in hell” were heard over the clamor of dissent.

“This is the best place to kick off our operation,” said Malavata das Goswami, editor of Clean Bottoms, Clean Minds Magazine. “More than any other company, Charmin Toilet Paper Company is responsible for the unclean gates and unclean, stool-like minds of America.”

Part way through the protest, an aggressive cell from within the brahmacari community muscled through a police line and made their way to Vice President and CFO Clayton Daley’s office. There, they barricaded the doors and symbolically fired Daley on crimes of “launching a two-ply smear-campaign against humanity.”

Visibly shaken, Daley responded to the protesters’ calls for his dismissal, “who are you people and what the hell are you talking about?”

Several devotees under the influence of military-grade mace were seen being dragged from his office by police.

“We may lose a few to arrests,” said Vitananda, “but our numbers will continue to grow.”

But analysts said it would be difficult to get more devotes to join in the protests after Charmin announced that it would be donating several thousand cases of bathroom tissue to ISKCON temples across the United States.

ISKCON Governing Body Commission spokesperson, Mutrayoh das, in an attempt to quell the turmoil caused by the protesting factions, flew in from Mayapura to accept the offer, saying, “They are so nicely beginning their devotional service. Srila Prabhupada built a house in which the whole world, wipers and lota-ists, could live.”

The emotionally-charged rally organizer, Vitananda disagreed, “I must humbly beg to submit that you are mistaken, prabhu. This is an affront to Vedic civilization and you are diluting the true meaning of Krishna consciousness.”

Protests at Quilted Northern, Angel Soft and Scott Tissue are in the planning stages.

“We may not have had a victory in this battle today,” spoke Vitananda as the protest was finally broken up by the Cincinnati Police Department’s riot control squad, “but in the end, we will be victorious as more and more as devotees realize that this mleccha wiping culture naturally causes a person to become an inhuman monster and go to hell.”

When asked why he chose this particular quote Kamadeva replied, “It’s something that I think about a lot. Though I don’t normally come in contact with women, on the occasions that I do I can generally feel their lust towards me.” Adding, ” It must be a very hellish situation for the spirit souls trapped inside of them.”

Kamadeva was chanting japa in a pasture one day when he came across a cow who looked at him with a lust similar to what he had seen before in the eyes of a woman.

“Though I could feel lust emanating from the cow, it was not nearly to the degree that I had felt lust for me emanating from the woman I was preaching to the night before.” Kamadeva added, “I once again remembered this quote and now understood that there was some truth to it.”

The equipment that he used to conduct his experiment primarily consists of “an iron rod mounted with a button and attached to a box.”

“While I use this instrument I make sure to clear my mind and chant very purely,” Kamadeva explains. “The maha-mantra purifies my body of any subtle degrees of lust so that I can accurately get a measurement of the lust of things around me.”

The brahmacari then aims the rod at a person or object, presses the button and the meter shows how many cows worth of lust are present.

“It was not surprising to find women coming in at ten cows,” Kamadeva spoke of his research. “But there were some unsuspected results as well.”

Kamadeva’s experiment has found that inanimate objects also contain a greater degree of lust then first thought.

“Computers for example also have a very high rating of eight cows, probably because there are so many pictures of the sex-life inside them,” said Kamadeva.

Other objects with high lust counts include hot showers (seven cows) and grains cooked by karmis (eight cows). Kamadeva added, “these are definitely things I plan to research more thoroughly in the future.”

In conclusion Kamadeva explains, “As you can see, it is true that women are ten times lustier than cows, though karmi men, at four cows, are also very lusty. The good news is that even a new Bhakta shows evidence of lust decreasing, and with the advancement of becoming brahmacari, the lust is scaled down to practically nothing.”

Though Kamadeva’s research has not led him to the sastric origin of this particular saying, he asserts that hearing it from the mouth of an elevated soul during a Srimad Bhagavatam class indeed makes it bona fide.

“There just weren’t a lot of fallen souls on 25th that day,” recounts Steve, “I got bored with preaching to the bugs in the ground, and that’s when it happened.”

Steve was distributing copies of Science of Self Realization, On the Way to Krsna, as well as Beyond Birth and Death when he dropped one of the books onto the ground. While picking it up to touch it to his forehead, his thumb accidentally opened up the book and his eye caught the passage: “One of the differences between Krsna and an ordinary being is that an ordinary entity can be in only one place at a time, but Krsna can be everywhere in the universe and yet also in His own abode, simultaneously.”

“That’s good stuff, prabhu,” Steve explained, “That’s just really deep.” Adding, “After reading that, I figured there was probably more stuff like that in it.”

Vijaya Kumar das, Bhakta Steve’s sankirtana partner, was astounded that he had time to pick up the book, even if accidentally. “Sure, I can understand how his thumb could inadvertently open up one of the smalls, but how could he have time to actually read the thing?” Vijaya added, “I just don’t get it, he was such a fired up book distributor.”

However, Steve insists that it was only a few pages. “I didn’t mean to get all caught up in it or anything,” Steve argued, “But, I mean, have they read this? It’s really good!”

Dayananda das, the bhakta leader and Steve’s temple authority, concluded recently that Steve “must be in such maya if he is having so much time to be reading so many books like that.” Adding, “He is such a nonsense.”

When asked if he has ever personally read Srila Prabhupada’s books, Dayananda admitted that he has looked through them once or twice. “I have been meaning to get to them eventually,” he said. “We are warriors in Lord Caitanya’s Sankirtana Army, studying sastra is for brahmans.”

Accused of playing politics and stirring up drama, Bhakta Steve was at the center of a recent temple board meeting.

“I apologize for getting political, I have been out of line,” spoke Steve during the meeting, “I should have been distributing the mercy, not have been wasting so much of Krishna’s time.”

He added, “But seriously, have you read this? There’s some really good stuff in here!”

Area temple president, Arvin Patel, conceded, “while it is very nice to see this young bhatka so fired up about reading Srila Prabhupada’s books, he must remember that he is distributing so nicely to collect laxmi for Sri Sri Radha-Krsna. It is few pages now, but if unchecked he will be one hour every day reading, like that.”

Bhakta Steve has now promised to keep fully engaged in his service as book distributor, leaving the reading of Srila Prabhupada’s books to the fallen, conditioned souls he meets on book distribution.