Jack Box's nearly dead? Buy his shoe on eBay!

Jack in the Box once famously blew up its mascot. Now it's merely putting him on a death watch and selling his clothes on eBay.

The West Coast burger chain has been waging an online marketing campaign that pivots on a tragic accident suffered by its mascot and purported CEO, Jack Box, the orb-headed character whose visage adorns a gazillion car antennas in California. As regular readers will remember, Jack was supposedly hit by a bus last Monday. His head was fractured, prompting some delicate work with a glue gun. His executive duties are being shouldered by the mysterious and bumbling Phil, who was caught on video ordering from a hot dog cart, and Jack's assistant, Barbara, who's chronicling the situation via Twitter. She's also added some sauciness by citing tensions between herself and Jack's wife. "Jack’s wife Cricket is a lovely woman who I have nothing against at all, no matter what anyone says," writes Barbara.

Now the chain is pushing the campaign a step further by reporting that a shoe Jack was wearing at the time of the accident has turned up on eBay, with bidders already offering in excess of $500 for the macabre souvenir.

Meanwhile, well-wishers are being invited by the chain to send their regards to Jack via a website tracking his hospital stay, which apparently isn't doing well. A nurse explains that a doctor's pass at a nurse triggered a dead silence in the ward. "You could hear a pin drop," she recounts. "I heard Jack flat-lining."