More monkey shines from the publishers, editors, and authors of That Long Newspaper Spoon, Hubris, GmbH, Even Paranoiacs Can Have Enemies, and The (NIU) Public Address System.
In short, it's Jackass, crazy limey special forces style:
"Here Aye yam, alone [except for the camera crew], on a glass-eeyer in Alasker, and Aye'm going to die if I cahn't find food and shelter soon ... Uh oh, here comes a polar bear ... I had better pee on me own head ... it's an old British commando technique ... cor, yeah, that's a right solid stream, eh? ...
"In 1922, a hiker in these parts named Brad Fidgepoddilaparbadoobadoo peed on his own head and froze to death in a solid block of yellow ice. So Aye've got to keep moving.
"Ay've surveyed me position, and eaten some raw disgusting animals alive, and peed on me head again, and given the wally a right shake for good measure, so I will survive the night in me improvised shelter made of me own eyelashes and blocks of frozen pee chiseled off me forehead with me own feces, honed razor sharp by repeatedly scraping against me own frozen sphincter.
"Tomorrow, I must find civilization, or die. One thing I know from my training is to follow the KFC signs, which from my vantage on top of this vedddy dangerous but picturesque iceberg -- and which I am totally alone upon despite the fact that I am now being photographed from 300 feet in the air by a circling helicopter full of paramedics and tea -- are only a day's hike away. For two fings invariably go togevver, civilization, and KFC. And now a word from our sponsor ..."
Shoot me ... it's a food blog post. This is what I made for dinner tonight. Baked "bubble and squeak" -- a savory cake-like mixture of mashed potatoes and hashed brussels sprouts with sauteed onions and carrots, garlic, ham, and swiss cheese given the treatment for 25 minutes at 375 degrees. Half of it is now in my tummy.
Recommended wine: Black cherry Fresca, 2007.
Musical accompaniment: Loudon Wainwright III, "Living Alone":
You sit at a desk and you squirm in a chair You stretch out on a couch, you could fall asleep there But you lie in your bed and you try not to think You put on your bathrobe and you stand at the sink And then you look into the mirror and you unplug the phone You re-read the letter, you're living alone.
You clear out a closet and you listen to a clock You wipe off a table and you pick up a sock And then you put up your feet and you stand on your head You hate what you did and you regret what you said And then you gaze at a spapshot and wait for the tone You talk to yourself, yeah, you're living alone.
You were always alone, but you just didn't know it You tried living with someone but then you had to blow it And if there's one thing you learned after living with her Is that you're not the man now that you never were.
So you turn up the heat and you fight off a cold You thumb through the Bible as you sit there on hold But you're your own boss you can do as you please Open a window and let in a breeze You sit down to dinner, yeah, you cooked your own You light a candle, you're living alone.
You think about her and how did it end Your cleaning lady has become your very best friend You're back in your hometown, you're living in fear They wonder where has he been and why is he here You're watching the reruns of the Twilight Zone Your life in a nutshell, you're living alone.
You were always alone, but you just didn't see it You tried to be someone different but you just couldn't be it And if there's one thing you learned after all of it Is that you're usually fired before you can quit.
What you need is a dog, some goldfish or a cat A boa constrictor and a laboratory rat The end is at hand now and you have the means A roll of toilet paper and the right magazines Your parents are dead now and your kids are full grown You're 53 now, you're 53 now, you're 53 now You're living alone.
Here's the first in an intended series of posts related to the upcoming MLB season, and specifically Chicago's two teams. I'm not going to clutter things up with the same old speculative crap about Marks Prior and Buehrle, Derrek Lee, Kerry Wood, Jermaine Dye, or even Ozzie Guillen, because every other one of the 80 million baseball blogs out there are doing a damn good regurgatative job of that. I'm going to try to come up with some unusual stuff and see if I can get any long-tail hits out of it. Or not.
Anyway, the first one is, in a roundabout way, about the Cubs. Here it is.
In my last post, I referenced Jim Bouton's book, Ball Four, and my own post inspired my own self to start reading it again. Early in the book is a passage that relates niftily to the upcoming '07 season, about new Cubs manager Lou Piniella.
The book begins just before the start of the 1969 season, with Bouton at age 30 and in decline as a sore-armed former fire-thrower about to join the short-lived Seattle Pilots (who became the Milwaukee Brewers in 1970) in an attempt to revive his flagging career. Also joining the Pilots that Spring -- a young Lou Piniella.
In chapter 2, Bouton describes reporting for training camp on February 26, six days late, due to a brief players' strike. He talks about how, when the strike was called, he had intended to live up to his contract and report on time, because his position on the team was insecure, but then:
What made me change my mind was a phone call I made to Lou Piniella, a twenty-six-year-old rookie who'd been in the Baltimore and Cleveland organizations.
Since the Pilots were not a team yet we had no player representative, so the three or four Pilots at the meeting at the Biltmore [in New York, with players' representative Marvin Miller, where the strike was called] were asked to call four or five teammates each to tell them what happened. I reached Lou in Florida and he said that his impulse was to report, that he was scared it would count against him if he didn't, that he was just a rookie looking to make the big leagues and didn't want anybody to get angry at him. But also that he'd thought it over carefully and decided he should support the other players and the strike. So he was not reporting.
That impressed the hell out of me. Here's a kid with a lot more at stake than I, a kid risking a once-in-a-lifetime shot. And suddenly I felt a moral obligation to the players. I decided not to go down.
Eventually I'll put this link into the seldom-utilized sidebar, when I update the "National Pastime" section for the long-awaited (by me) resumption of MLB action, but for now, here's a regular-type post. Check-outable is this:
To spread the charms and values of vintage base ball, and accelerate the formation of vintage clubs and leagues around the world, by codifying the rules and equipment of the game's 19th century roots, and organizing competitions that include an annual, six-team Vintage Base Ball World Series tournament.
The Vintage Base Ball Federation was co-founded by one of my favorite dudes, Jim Bouton. Jim Bouton, for those of you who don't know, is the author of the best baseball book possible in the known universe, Ball Four, which, I have it on good authority, is a fun read even for non-baseball fans. He has been a vigorous advocate for several years for good, old-fashioned baseball and the yards in which it is played. Plus, he's extremely funny.
Now what I am I going to use as an excuse to continue refusing to donate money to my alma mater (juris doctorally speaking)? I guess I still have a couple fallbacks, such as the fact that I pay taxes, dammit, and I'll be paying for law school for another 20 friggin years.
Let's see. That's three years of law school, one summer ruined by studying for the bar exam, nine months of practicing law, and twelve and a half years of being a writer/editor. And a 30 year payment plan. Sure, deciding to go law school instead of grad school to study southeast Asian politics worked out great. Actually, that course of action probably would have had more than its share of disasters, as well. Although I would have studied southeast Asian politics at NIU, whose mascot is a huskie dog named Victor E. Oh well, road not taken, etc. etc., and so forth.
In meta news of the blog, in one week, we'll reach the one-year anniversary of the commencement of Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss as an honored symbol of pointless blog nonsense. (Not a mascot! Honored symbol! Honored symbol! Honored symbol!) In other words, CBRAT turns one year old. Maybe I'll update the template in celebration of that occasion. Or not. Probably not.
POSTSCRIPT: I haven't seen the new "Casino Royale" flick yet, but I'm 100 percent sure that this version will remain my favorite, no matter what. Does the new one have Peter Sellers? No? Forget it, then.
It's time to introduce a long-running character to this blog ... a long-running character, I mean, in such print blogs as That Long Newspaper Spoon and such failed (-to-be-finished-being-written) novels as Cole Stoma. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, now presenting his first contribution of his non-semi-famous way of doing whatever it is he does, ladies and gentlemen, here is Cole Stoma:
My life is completely fucking stupid. In my life, in this phase of it, my idea of a good time is to cook some really good scalloped potatoes, with good cheddar and some cayenne pepper sprinkled over the top, and then to eat it in front of the TV with a nice bottle of beer and watch a Jacques Pepin cooking show. That is what passes for a good time in my stupid life. It’s like I’m some kind of old maid, but I’m a dude.
Thank you, Cole Stoma. We look forward to your future submissions of abject failure, you straw man of fictional loserdom. Or not.
Waiting in the wings: John Kitchener, Helen Hiwatter, Don Fazool, and Parsley Garnish.
Refused entry to the theater, but in a facetious manner: Noam Crosby, Feng Shui, and The Swami, Davis, Jr.
I wonder why there aren't any "first drafts" extant by classical bigwigs, like Plato. Like, how many dialogues did Plato write where he painted himself into a corner and the antagonist voice in the dialogue ended up beating Plato in the argument? It had to happen sometimes ... I mean, haven't you ever thought you were onto something and then thought about it for a while and realized you were wrong? Unless Plato just switched up the characters based on the roll of the dice, he must have tossed out some dialogues.
(excerpt from my upcoming book, "Standup Comedy for University of Chicago Students, as told by Dr. Milton Rosenberg, Ph.D.")
CDs currently on my CD changer (literally on it, as in sitting on top of it): Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Charles Mingus, Eric Dolphy, John Coltrane, Sun Ra. When did I become a goddamn jazzbo?
Today Slate has an article about various meaningless interjection words, which I didn't actually read, except for what it has to say about the word "meh."
What it doesn't say about "meh" -- and what I'm going to get into the record right now -- is that I honestly believe the term was, if not coined outright, at least firstly or nearly firstly popularized by my good friend, Mr. Insert Namehere, aka, Foojang, who started using "meh" as a stand-in for pretty much any situation calling for a resigned expression of mild "je ne sais quois"-nitude, at least as early as the early-to-mid mid-1980s -- much, much earlier than the episode of The Simpsons that is credited with meh-ing the term to Internet meh-pularity. Take note, linquists. Uh, I mean, linguists. Linquists sounds like a family of Swedes. So take note, linguists. Or not.
I almost missed this "stuff falling off of other stuff" item from the other day, but thanks to Steve Rhodes's must-read "The [Day of the Week] Papers" column at my favorite Chicago-oriented website, The Beachwood Reporter, I didn't miss this David Roeder columnar item in the Sun-Times ... although, as the source text itself questions, is it really a "stuff falling off of other stuff" item or something a bit more Chicagoly shady?
Scaffolding popped up last week around the Farwell Building, 664 N. Michigan. It is there to keep pedestrians from being hit by falling facade pieces, said Dave Bayless, spokesman for the owner, the Terra Museum of American Art.
You might remember the Farwell, a 1927 building that got an unexpected reprieve last month when the city landmarks commission said developers couldn't hollow it out to make it part of a condo project. The decision threw the project by Prism Development Co. into confusion. Without the Farwell part, Prism would have to drastically alter its plans next door for condos it is marketing under the Ritz-Carlton name.
If you know the way the game is played in Chicago, you might side with Michael Moran, vice president of the group Preservation Chicago, and call this a "scaffolding scam." Moran wrote: "This is a typical ploy to get a building demolished. 'See, it's decrepit,' owners claim. 'I even had to put scaffolding around it. Now don't you see why I have to demolish it?' "
By the way, why don't they just change the name of this town to Chicondo? Before much longer, this town will be nothing but. Although I suppose I should save my "Chicago has been ruined" colicky posting for some other time. But, long story short, Chicago has been ruined. It sucks. I mean, it has always sucked in many ways (it's 1 fucking degree Fahrenheit outside, and it has been that way for about 18 thousand days in a row -- just to name one sucky characteristic of this location), but in the last several years, the good things about Chicago have gotten scarcer and scarcer. Unless, that is, you like extreme blandness, cheaply constructed overpriced housing, and cutesy post-post-PoMo "urban tchotchke" shops ... lots of "urban tchotchke" shops (because everyone needs a sculpture of a labradoodle made out of baling wire and rusty antique 7-Up bottle caps, not to mention a six-piece set of hand-blown cocktail glasses in various colors to match every type of adulterated pukishly-flavored "martini" you love to drink so much ... green for apple, black for chocolate, orange for St. Joseph's Children's Aspirin, etc.) -- in which case you probably love it. And you are probably a 23-year-old investment banker from rural Wisiowindiasotachigoura who thinks Wrigley Field is a kickass place to score (i.e., drunkenly scream at) chicks (female version: you think a martini is permitted to contain any liquor other than gin or vodka and vermouth -- which is such a misguided viewpoint that I would need a whole separate blog to address it) and, dude, you got soooooo drunk at Barleycorn last weekend, dude, and you think Simon's Tavern is a "dive bar" and .... well, I wish you well, if by "well," you mean, "would go away forever." If you're not a person like that, and you're thinking about moving here, don't bother. It's over. Seriously. Chicago is over. It's not a "pretty soon" or "in the near future" thing -- it's past tense. History. The end has taken place. If the suburbs didn't suck harder than all that has ever sucked, simultaneously and in unison, with the fervor of the universe's champion sucking enthusiast ... gahhh ... again, let's post on that topic some other time, when I feel like working myself up into a frusternated pissed-offness. Which I prefer not to do now (editor's note: too late), cuz we gots a three-day weekend coming up -- woo! Preznit's Day off this year! Bartender! Rambling digressions all around, on me!
I'm not much for pro wrestling these days, other than the occasional relapse into reminding myself of why it's no longer entertaining, but I enjoyed it a lot back in the 1970s when, way up in the northern boonies, I would jiggle the fine-tuner to bring in fuzzy black and white UHF broadcasts of whoever the current behemothal fake-fighting apes were at the time, and laugh my pre-adolescent head off.
And, of course, I, Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss, got my start in the world as a fake wrestling manager, so my heart will always be a little bit in the grappling game ... or, whatever you call it.
I don't think I've ever heard the name Bob Luce before reading his obit today (thanks to One O. Brawl for the tip), but I think his passing deserves a mention. I don't recall being aware of him as a personality, but I dug his work.
He brought noted grapplers such as Andre the Giant, Dick the Bruiser, Buddy Rogers, Gorgeous George and Verne Gagne to Chicago, showcased them in appearances, including his weekly local TV show leading up to his events, and introduced them with elaborate music as they entered the arena.
I'm also reminded by the obituary of how cool the old International Amphitheater used to be. Mang, Chicago was Chicago then. Along with the old Stadium, the Amphitheater was about as City of Big Ugly Acne-Crusted Hair-Capped Shoulders as you could get. Here is what Luce said about his preferred venue:
"If wrestling has an odor, as some suggest, it is not readily detectable in this arena that also caters to livestock shows and political conventions."
I don't think the Cubs or the White Sox are going to get anywhere near post-season play this year, but I do think it's going to be a season that's fun to watch. For me, the interesting contest will be between Cubs GM Jim "Never Saw a Buffet He Didn't Like" Williams and Sox GM Ken "I Brought You a World Champsionship, Isn't It Time to Stop Calling Me Kenny?" Williams, and their divergent spending philosophies.
To sum it up very briefly, Williams has gone the cheap route for '07, whereas Hendry has been spending like a neocon at an imperialism party. I would like to come up with a better metaphor than that, but in the meantime, that's what's going in the draft version.
Anyway, I think it's kind of ironic that the Cubs have been so free-spending lately, because perhaps more than any other team in Major League Baseball, they can count on putting 3 million asses in seats (or their fully paid no-show ghosts, at least -- since attendance is measured these days by ticket sales, and not, you know, attendance) regardless of which clump of bums they put out on the field. I mean, I'd be willing to play second base for them this year, for the league minimum of $327,000 (hell, I'd even give them an under-the-table cut rate deal for, say, $100 grand), and I do not think it would affect their bottom line one bit. And I'm a really bad second baseman. I mean, I'm pushing 40, and way past my peak ... which was, I think, when I was 8. And I wasn't very good then, even though I was close to leading the little league at drawing walks from 3rd grade pitching.
But I digress.
The specific reason for today's "nobody cares" baseball post is that I have to believe that Ken Williams is laughing his fine ass off right now. The sports sections in Chicago's daily papers (OK, their websites) today were plastered with the news that Cubs ace starting pitcher Carlos Zambrano has decided he wants him some of that moolah the Trib Co. has been showering on the likes of Alfonso Soriano like ... uh ... a urolagnia specialist at a FloMax convention ($126 million over 7 years). The Tribune quoted Zambo as saying he wants a contract extension inked before opening day, and he wants a big one:
"I'm ready to sign, and I would do my job anyway with the Cubs this year," Zambrano said. "Whatever happens, I don't want to know [anything] about a contract during the season. I want to sign with the Cubs before the season starts. If they don't sign me, sorry, but I must go. That's what Carlos Zambrano thinks."
...
"[Cubs general manager] Jim [Hendry] spent a lot of money. I hope he has more for 'Big Z.'"
Gotta love the self-referential third-person usage there.
"I'm worried about the industry, and the industry affects everything that the White Sox will be able to do," said Williams in a recent interview. "You simply, if you are practicing any fiscal sanity whatsoever ... I'm just disgusted."
So whose approach is going to work out better, Hendry's or Williams's? Or will they both fail? And how will we know? The Cubs are likely to draw a ton of fans no matter what, but it remains to be seen whether the Sox can continue the box office success they enjoyed last year in the aftermath of the '05 championship season.
Anyway, I'm not an economist, Captain, just a humble baseball fan, so it beats the hell outta me. The White Sox might do better than the Cubs in terms of wins and losses this year, or they might be getting themselves on track for another World Series run by '10.
And the Cubs -- hey, with this bold strategy, they could win it all. Who knows? New field manager Lou Piniella sez it's time.
Yes, in the words of Larry Sanders, "It's fleezing! It's fleezing!" but we all know that it's a transient condition. A few weeks from now, we'll barely remember. Plus, a few weeks from now ... yeah, here's the part where I pimp the White Sox yet again, for no profit and virtually no reward of any kind.
Sure, there's not really much to do in regard to baseball right now, even if you're a geek. The big trades and free agent signings are pretty much over. The Cubs and Sox both raised the prices of their tickets, which soon will go on sale and sell out to mysterious, shadowy, and evil ticket brokerages (at least one of which, in the case of the Cubs, is owned by the team's parent corp. itself) in short order, and once again, I'll be lucky to go to two or three games this year. So, aside from whining about how the local teams are going to finish somewhere between third place and the basement yet again (sorry, Kenny, I'm not buying this revamped bullpen just yet), but you still can't attend many games (especially the Cubs, who I now hate, largely because I live three L stops from Wrigley Field and I work at home on Fridays, and I cannot spend Friday afternoons getting drunk in the bleachers due to the goddamn contradictions of capitalism) ... well, it's a bit of a lull at the moment.
Was a lull, that is. Because now there's this: Carl Skanberg's Palehose 7, a comical strip in the vein of last year's excellent Palehose 6. Already, three installments are up. Go, go go! Obscure cartoon humor awaits you!
Nobody watches the YouTube videos here, but I thought this one was semi-noteworthy anyway. It's a fairly predictable mashup of 24 and Aqua Teen Hunger Force, a little satire on the Boston Mooninite Lite-Brite scandal from last week. What I thought was semi-noteworthy was that it's allegedly produced by National Lampoon ... which I wasn't sure even existed anymore, despite the generally awful website. I still remember when they used to be funny. It's still just a memory, alas.
Anna Nicole Smith's untimely death (just 27 days younger than STDPM) is knocking crazy astronette Lisa Marie Nowak out of the headlines. Nobody wins from this double tragedy. Except maybe Bobby Trendy.
Sorry, but the heating is just inadequate in this joint, and it's very drafty in the computer vicinity. This weather is driving me the rest of the short distance to crazy. Got a batch of cheesy scalloped potatoes in the oven now (be careful with the scalloped potatoes -- they call them scalloped, but they're really potatoes) and after I eat them, I'm hunkering under a big blanket and camping out in front of the warm glow of the television for the "Naked Trucker and T-Bones" show. Until May.
We were so naive in 2001, weren't we? We could still be surprised then. We weren't yet jaded and callused by the death of western culture.
Yeah, OK, I don't know about any of that, but the best song that came out in 2001 was a fairly rudimentary mashup, by today's standards, of The Strokes and Christina Aguilera by Freelance Hellraiser. Yeah, you got yer RIAAs and yer Kleptones and yer Danger Meeces in more recent times, but "A Stroke of Genius" still hits on all cylinders.
I can sense the end of winter approaching. White Sox pitchers and catchers report for Spring Training in two weeks. Position players show up five days later. Approximately one minute hence, Ozzie Guillen offends the media for the first time in '07.* Let's play ball!
Yeah, yeah, I know ... Chicago has its collective head up its ample ass right now over the trademark-protected "Big Game" allegedly taking place this weekend, and the upcoming obscene yet ponderous spectacle is all anyone is talking -- or, more accurately, being talked at -- about. So, in the spirit of ... uh, that ... here's my prediction: The score of the aforementioned "Juego Grande" will be 27 to 12.
* Not counting his mangled pronunciation in an interview the other day of "Urlacher," which was just freakin' hilarious.
Long ago, in a time before broadband, I used to lounge on the couch a lot at night with these obsolete analog things we called "notebooks" and write stuff down in a really inefficient and painful process we called "longhand." Then, after I filled up a bunch of pages with mostly crossed-out chicken scratches, I would select out 300 to 1000 words or so that didn't make me want to puke, and make a "zine" out of it ... which is sort of an antique kind of blog thing, in a way, only printed on paper and reproduced on the work photocopier at lunchtime. (Some of the titles of those defunct samizdat publications are in the banner up top.)
I recently stumbled on a pile of these notebooks in my disused "dining room" (scare quotes employed because I have never eaten a meal in there; it's pretty much a storage room, aka, place to throw junk when I don't want to look at it so much anymore), and the first impression I got while flipping through them was, "Wow, I used to smoke some really good weed in the '90s."
Maybe too good. Toward the end, chronologically, of these notebooks, I was clearly spending a lot less time fleshing anything out, because they devolve from full pages of text to pages filled mostly with goofy little cartoon faces and vague, jotted notes that I apparently intended to make into a story someday, which day never came. For no particular reason at all, here are a few, vintage 1999 or thereabouts:
~~~~ cupola --- stoned artist -- 3 white housewives ---- "I'm fucking him" -- fucking him now? or future? -- both
Steve Allen confronted by a talking cat ~~~~~ hypnosis, telepathy, pickled herring, Bergman movies
Take me to your desires.
Onion-assed man -slammed in door -makes dogs cry
I was not long thereafter consulted in my capacities as a solicitor by an aggrieved man with an ass for an onion. "My soup is ruined," he wailed. "A total loss!"
OK, I'm fed up with Blogger and I'm looking for a new place to engage in this pointless toy bloggery, or else I'm just calling it quits entirely. The new setup is garbage ... error this, error that, glitches, constant difficulties in posting, can't view the blog, blah blah blah. If there's anything I don't need, it's more headaches for no good reason.
This is today's thing, and the reason why I can't look at anyone's blogger blog at the moment (so this post comes to you courtesy of Rene Descartes, I guess):
We're sorry, but we were unable to complete your request.
When reporting this error to Blogger Support or on the Blogger Help Group, please:
* Describe what you were doing when you got this error. * Provide the following error code and additional information.
bX-vjhbsj
Sure, put the code on the "Blogger Help Group," if it makes you feel better. I've never seen anyone from the assholes in Mountain View (i.e., anyone from Google) provide any answers or even make any appearance at all in that forum. So it's more of a "Helpless Blogger Emotional Support Group" than anything else, where you can go to say "Me too -- same problem here" while you waste yet more time fretting over your point-free nerd activity.
I need a better hobby. I'd take up knitting, but apparently it's obligatory to blog about it, so never mind that.
UPDATE: Service interruption downgraded to "empty threat watch," which means that conditions are right for empty threats to develop. If you see an empty threat on this blog, please take refuge in the nearest comments section.
I've done several blog posts about Chicago radio personalities getting fired, retiring, and/or passing away, but none have attracted the blogterest (i.e., several hundred Google referrals and other types of SiteMeter hit stats over the last 5 days) as Wendy Snyder's unceremonious dismissal from the Steve Dahl show (scroll downward or site-search for original post and follow-ups) on WCKG FM 105.9. (Sorry, Bobby Skafish ... the masses have spoken with their relative silence in your regard.)
So, in honor of that, here's this. I would have posted the Descendents version instead, but it's not on YouTube, sadly.
The Beach Boys - Wendy (Live on Ed Sullivan 1964)
Meanwhile, in other radio news, I saw today in Feder's column or some other column that still-unemployed Garry Meier has apparently lost the jury trial brought by his former manager for alleged non-payment of fees. As a fake manager, myself, I consider this a win for the good guys.
In a little restaurant in Amersfoort, Holland, Roland Kirk was recorded with the Swiss trio of pianist George Gruntz in 1959 [sic?] by the KRO broadcasting company
Today's thaw (it got up into the mid low upper high low mid 40s today, with variable variables, barometric hydrometers, and isobars with big brandy snifters used as tip jars) seems to be causing that perennial winter phenomenon: the midwestern urban avalanche.
Mayor Daley was reported as saying, "That's just silly! Silly silly silly! OUCH!!!" before suggesting to the U.S. Olympic Committee that ice dodging would make a fine new sport for the 2016 games.
Later, Alderman Joe Moore's office released a statement expressing relief that no chunks of ice fell on any fattened geese. Skinny geese are on their own.
In meta-news of the blog, Google has forced me to migrate to the new Blogger setup, which pisses me off. The appearance has changed somewhat, and I hate it. It looks like ass. Feh. Welp, I guess you get what you pay for blah blah blah (I fucking hate that expression, but I said it myself before some other asswipe sez it to me). Bah. I guess this fucker needs a re-design anyway, especially now that so many Wendy Snyder fans have come onto the scene this week. Makes me feel like I should fluff up the throw pillows ... if I had any ... and uhh ... dust something. However that's done. By the way, on the topic of "Snyde," who knew she had fans in Iceland? Well, she does, according to my SiteMeter stats. Ice fucking land! The land of Ice! And Bjork! Also fans in D.C., California, and various other non-Chicago locales. My traffic for the last few days has more than tripled over the usual trickle of Latin palindrome curious, meeces to pieces haters, and seekers of teh urethra pr0n. Which kinda makes me wish Wendy Snyder could get fired every week.
Promising news from the Orient. Maybe this boy can kill upstairs neighbors' parrots too. (Although the creature has been quiet today. As has the pet bird. Get it? Hah!)
Anyway, in connection with methodology here, I believe that the dog that scared the boy was scared by a cat, which was scared by a mouse, which was scared by an old lady who scared a spider, which wriggled and jiggled and squiggled inside her. Perhaps she'll die, as well.
Boy's screaming kills chickens
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Hundreds of chickens have been found dead in eastern China—and a court has ruled that the cause of death was the screaming of a four-year-old boy who in turn had been scared by a barking dog.
According to a local newspaper, the bizarre sequence events began when the boy arrived at a village home in the eastern province of Jiangsu in the summer with his father who was delivering bottles of gas.
A villager was quoted as saying the little boy bent over the hen house window, screaming for a long time, after being scared by the dog.
"One neighbour told police that he had heard the boy's crying that afternoon and another villager confirmed the boy screaming by the hen house window," the newspaper said.
A court ruled the boy's screaming was "the only unexpected abnormal sound" and that the 443 chickens trampled each other to death in fear.
The boy's father was ordered to pay around £117 in compensation to the owner of the chickens.
Look, peoples, let's get this crystal clear. The line "I hate meeces to pieces!" was uttered by -- in fact, was the catchphrase of -- the cartoon cat Mr. Jinks, from the Hanna-Barbera show, "Pixie and Dixie." He's the one who hated meeces to pieces, and often said so. Many, many times those scampy meeces, er, mices, er, mice, Pixie and his gay lover, Dixie, would thwart the hapless and hungry cat, Mr. Jinks, who was not so much evil as, just as nature made him, a cat, yes, a predator, with a natural predilection toward attacking with the aim of eating mice, which, when such efforts were met with monotonous and wacky sound-effected failure, would anger said Mr. Jinks to a quite comical degree, indeed. Although he was magically gifted with humanoid speech, you see, his command of irregular plurals was, to say the least, deficient, and, in fact, was clearly below even that of a small child, who would presumably be more inclined to make the very logical mistake of referring to more than one mouse as "mouses." Not Mr. Jinks, though. No. For some twisted reason -- perhaps malnutrition, perhaps confusion at finding himself thrust into the cruel world in a semi-anthropomorphic condition -- Mr. Jinks pluralized "mouse" as "meeces." Hence, on those occasions when Pixie and Dixie -- that is, those rare occasions when Pixie and Dixie were not fellating each other in their fruity little hidey hole behind the sheetrock of some unseen human person's house -- so enraged Mr. Jinks to a degree causing him to lose his ordinary catly composure and aloofitude that he would roar his displeasure to the nonexistent and uncaring gods, Mr. Jinks would grieve the grievance of the feline damned, via the repeated oath:
"I hate meeces to pieces!!!"
Now, in a world less warped and chaotic, perhaps he would have instead expressed himself with something more like "I hate mice like slipping on ice!" or, granting the cartoon scribes a modicum of comic license, "I hate mouses, those louses!" But would that compel such a torrent of Googlishly curious? I think not.
Nonetheless. The persistent misguidedness of seekers of "I hate meeces to pieces" knowledge perplexes me. I mean, I regard myself as a teacher, and repetition of lessons to the dull and dim is part of my lot, which I accept. But for Christ's sake. See, there's this thing called Wikipedia, and it has a lot of info. You'd be amazed. It even has info on who said I hate meeces to pieces, by gum.
Wow. I barely insult Opie and Anthony -- the best things going in talk radio, dammit, and there's plenty o' gay porn to prove it! -- and all of blogger goes down for the evening. Yep, there's your cause, fellow blog-nerds. It had nothing to do with excessive traffic consisting of irate reaction to the alleged State of teh Union Address (which, I'm told, happened tonight, not that I'd know -- I was watching yet another documentary on Discovery about idiots dying, literally, to climb K2, as yet another means of making myself feel smart by staying in my 60-degree-fahrenheit apartment and drinking beer). Nope, blogger went down because I pissed off the massive legion of O&A fans. My mistake. I'll never do it again. However, the collective punishment assessed against all of humanity is that comments to this "shit opinion" repository are now moderated. Damn, it's an uncivilized world we live in.
According to Robert Feder's column today in the Sun-Times, sidekick Wendy Snyder has finally been fired from the Steve Dahl afternoon drive-time-a-ganza on WCKG, after having been seemingly on thin ice for the last year or two. Frankly, I think Dahl was just tired of having someone in the studio with (albeit only slightly) bigger breasts than his. Although WCKG's cashflow problems could account for it as well. Its only advertisers seem to be mortgage refinance schemers and scary-sounding child control courses. Or else they're just freeing up cash for Garry Meier to take over the morning slot from Opie & Anthony, who, I'll venture to proclaim, will never succeed in Chicago. There, I just started a rumor.
POSTSCRIPT: Good gravy, I had no idea Wendy Snyder was so popular. The Google referrals for "Wendy searches" are outstripping "O&A searches" by a large margin -- and it's a good thing, too, because I'd much rather see Wendy strip than O&A. But seriously, I've always liked Wendy Snyder as a radio personage and hope she gets re-employed soon. And not back at the Brookfield Zoo.
esta indecision me molesta si no me quieres, dejame digame que tengo ser ¿sabes que ropas me queda? me lo tienes que decir ¿me debo ir o quedarme?
¿me entra frio por los ojos? ¿me entra frio por los ojos? si me voy va a haber peligro si me quedo es doble me tienes que decir me entra frio por los ojos
¿me entra frio por los ojos? si me voy va a haber peligro si me quedo es doble me tienes que decir
Ian Dury & The Blockheads - Sweet Gene Vincent ( Live 1978 )
blue gene baby
skinny white sailor, the chances were slender the beauties were brief shall I mourn your decline with some thunderbird wine and a black handkerchief? I miss your sad Virginia whisper I miss the voice that called my heart
sweet gene vincent young and old and gone sweet gene vincent
who, who, who slapped john?
white face, black shirt white socks, black shoes black hair, white strat bled white, died black
sweet gene vincent let the blue cats roll tonight at the sock hop ball in the union hall where the bop is their delight
here come duck-tailed Danny dragging Uncanny Annie she's the one with the flying feet you can break the peace daddy sickle grease the beat is reet complete and you jump back honey in the dungerees tight sweater and a pony tail will you guess her age when she comes back stage? the hoodlums bite their nails
black gloves, white frost black crepe, white lead white sheet, black knight jet black, dead white
sweet gene vincent there's one in every town and the devil drives 'till the hearse arrives and you lay that pistol down
sweet gene vincent there's nowhere left to hide with lazy skin and ash-tray eyes a perforated pride
so farewell mademoiselle, knicker-bocker hotel farewell to money owed but when your leg still hurts and you need more shirts you got to get back on the road
I don't want to come right out and say who I think will be in the Super Bowl, but I will go ahead and predict that both teams will come from places that begin with the word "New."
To save Mr. Insert Namehere a couple seconds: "Yeah, good thing you didn't come right out and predict that."
By the way, have you ever noticed that most prognosticators have names with the letter "K" in them? Kreskin. Skilling. Warwick. Hm.
My upstairs neighbor is a lunatic and I hate her. She is constantly vacuuming up there, probably to clean up her goddamn gigantic pet macaw's shit, because I think it roams around loose. Squawking and screaming. I don't think it can talk, but it seems to be able to do a pretty damn good impression of Yoko Ono.
I don't remember hearing so much hubbub upstairs with other people, but with her, I can hear her talking baby talk to that thing all the time, and yapping on the phone, and listening to frickin WXRT. And I won't get into the ceiling-fan-shaking sound effects that resulted the last time a "special friend" visited.
But, as people like to tell me, That's Urban Life, Buddy! That's The Big City For You!
Welp, starting in March I can get revenge, because the Spring Training baseball games will start up on the radio, and I can play them real loud while I am washing dishes, so I can hear the radio over the noise of the faucet, like I do almost every day from April through October -- which I have to imagine might be pretty annoying to an upstairs neighbor, maybe.
Anyway, I know that it's NFL playoff season and the Bears are the belle of the ball right now, but we're almost midway through January, so it's only a little over a month until pitchers report for spring training. The Bears are going to be finished by next Sunday anyway. After that, it's all baseball, baby. Total monopoly on futility and pointlessness for the next six months. Until the Bears begin training camp in Bourbonnais in late July. Those are the sports nerd solstices: "Pitchers Report" and ... uhh ... I forget who shows up first for football training camp. Anyway, that's presumably an important date for some people, the beginning of football training camp. I wouldn't really know.
I'm not sure if this is technically a "stuff falls off of other stuff" item, but it's close enough. The Tribaroony reports today:
A piece of metal believed to have fallen from an airplane either taking off or landing at Midway Airport crashed through the roof of a nearby Southwest Side home early this morning, a city official said.
Well, there goes another piece of my nerdish childhood -- co-author of whacked-out drug-fueled cartoon-sex-infused "fairy tale for paranoids" The Illuminatus! Trilogy (and a lot of other stuff), Robert Anton Wilson has died after a lengthy illness. (According to a post on RAW's blog.)
Welp, Kerry Thornley's been dead for a while. Greg Hill's been dead for a while. Robert Shea's been dead for a while. Timothy Leary's been dead (and outside looking in) for a while. Not many people left from that crazy crowd anymore. Paul Krassner, take care of yourself. You might win the tontine yet.
(spoken) Morning Reg, meat and two veg? He done him with a ten-pound sledge, he done himself a favour Crash!
Forty-year old housewife Mrs Elizabeth Walk of Lambeth Walk Had a husband who was jubblified with only half a stalk So she had a Milk of Magnesia and curry powder sandwich, half a pound of uncut pork Took an overdose of Omo, this made the neighbours talk
(spoken) Could have been watching Frankie Vaughn on the telly and giving herself a scratch
(Chorus) This is what we find (x 4) A sense of humour is required, amongst the bacon rind
(spoken) Hello Brian, wash and iron? Try it on, it's only nylon
Single batchelor with little dog Tony Green of Turnham Green Said 'who's a clever boy then girl, now you know whom I mean' For the mongrel laid a cable in the sandpit of the playground of the park where they had been And with a bit of tissue, he wiped its bumhole clean
(spoken) A bit of claggy on the waggy
(Chorus) This is what we find (x4) They must have had a funny time, on the Golden Hind
(spoken, reverb) O vanitas vanitatum, which of us is happy in his life Which of us has our desire, or having it, is gratified
(spoken) Hello Mrs Wood, this boy looks familiar, they used to call him Robin Hood. Now he's Robin fucking shit cunt
Home improvement expert Harold Hill of Harold Hill Of Do-It-Yourself dexterity, and double glazing skill Came home to find another gentleman's kippers in the grill So he sanded off his winkle with his Black and Decker drill
(Chorus) This is what we find (x4) The hope that springs eternal, springs right up your behind! This is what we find (repeat to fade)
Ian Dury and The Blockheads - This Is What We Find (Live 1978)
It's pottery because it's true. And timeless, seemingly.
In other news, over the past few days, all previous Google-referral records for this blog have been smashed into greazy little quivering blobs by the string "we enter the circle at night and are consumed by fire," and variants thereof. Apparently some serious students of Latin palindromy have let themselves loose on the WWW (pronounced "wuh wuh wuh"). Although they ain't so serious as to be capable of finding actual information on the subject, apparently. Which is just as well, I guess. If people knew how to go to Wikipedia first for their trivial bullshit, my hit count would go from dismal to crestfallen.
By the way, the title of the They Might Be Giants song "I Palindrome I" is, of course, not a palindrome at all, although that is probably among the least of that band's offenses against society. I swear on a stack of Thomas Jefferson's religious books (and George Jefferson's dry cleaning receipts) that if I have to endure that goddamn Dunkin Donuts commercial with the obnoxious TMBG "Perhaps FrItalian" song in it one more fucking time, I'm going to kick both Johns right square in the nuts. Especially Linnell. No, wait, especially Flansburgh. No, wait ... ESPECIALLY both of em.
Also, it's been well-noted elsewhere on the web, but I think it merits reiteration: John Krueger Menstrualcramp must go straight to hell right now and begin serving his eternal fiery penance for that excrutiating Chevy truck commercial they play during every single break during every single football game.
Another person who should go to hell is me, for failing to get a TiVo® yet, already. Dammit.
For those of youse who use RSS reader thingamajonks and would prefer to add this site to the excitement rather than try to remember not to forget to visit manually, the url for the CBRAT site feed is as follows: http://colicky.blogspot.com/atom.xml
The feed capability been operative for a while, but I guess I never publicized it. Now I have. It also strikes me that the sidebar needs updating. However, I ate half a pound of whole wheat spaghetti carbonara last night in a gluttonous frenzy, so ... I have no idea what the connection is between these things.
Hey hey hey, it's a telecommuting day! I'm in my sweatpants and slippers, drinking coffee, and I luvv it!
The Sun-Times "Web Connect" page has cracked the case on rock and rolling lawyers (or law and yering rockers) in this not-really-lurid expose, in which it was apparent that most guitar-slinging attornies in Chicago are yer "disorder preserving," thin blue line worshipping, lock 'em up and throw away the key prosecutor types.
Except for friend of the blog Dan K., that is:
"Playing live for people is like winning a jury trial. It's just the best feeling," said Dan Kiss, a Cook County assistant public defender and bass player for Soft Targets. "There's a lot less pressure, too. No one goes to prison if you play a bad show."
Oh, sometimes they do, Dan, if you play it right. (Just ask blog mascot, Dez "Pogo Papillon" Dez Monde, aka Number 314159.)
Dan goes on to say:
"The people in my office who don't get it think the proper way to express yourself for a mass audience is to write a blog. And they don't understand why you'd want to be around smoke and alcohol," he said.
Mm. I have to admit that I don't quite understand what these way uncool office people are going on about, because the smoke 'n' booze factor around this blog's headquarters (not to mention hindquarters) tends to be pretty hefty most of the time. So there seems to be an inherent contradiction there. But if by "mass audience" they mean "roughly 12 to 20 people a day, about a quarter of whom were looking for the answer to the musical question 'what cartoon character said i hate meeces to pieces?' " ... OK. This is definitely the best way to express yourself in that manner.
POSTSCRIPT: The Soft Targets website is over hyah. Keen.
But seriously folks. They had to wait for Ford to croak first before executing Saddam cuz the fool woulda pardoned him. Something about a long sartorial nightmare being over. Those blazers with too heavily padded shoulders ... weapons of fashion dysfunction.
This has been a confused mixture of a stereotypical neocon blogger character crossed with Mr. Blackwell's reaction to the execution of Saddam Hussein. Back to your regularly scheduled loud playing of bootleg mp3s and drinking of overpriced beer from the inaptly named "Buy/Low Liquors."
This is a post that should go in the "Celebrity Dreams" blog that Mr. Foojang started a few years ago, but since that never got off the ground, I'll put it here instead.
A few nights ago I dreamed that I was at a big picnic in a forested area in the summertime. It was warm, so I was wearing the standard-issue aging-hipsterino David Cross® cargo shorts and XL t-shirt, but later on in the evening there was going to be a sit-down dinner indoors, for some reason, so I was carrying around a pair of black houndstooth gabardine trousers.
Suddenly I felt a humanoid claw on my shoulder and heard a shrill southern voice exclaim, "Oh no! Those won't do a-tall!"
I spun around, and confronting me was a very perturbed Laura Bush. She snatched the pants from my hands and began scrutinizing them with the rigor of a Texas librarian.
"My word! Just look at these! Tsk! The cuffs are frayed, the hip pocket has a tear in it, and I can see right through both knees! Oh no no no, these pants are NOT acceptable!"
While visiting Chicago, IL, this past August, I managed to hunt down the apartment and office buildings that were used as establishing shots on "The Bob Newhart Show" during the 1970s. Also found the statue that TV Land dedicated to Bob in 2004. A fun little excursion for this diehard fan. Shot on August 21, 2006.
No, that's not the cover from an old pulp novel -- that's a foto taken earlier today from out my "sun room" window. This is Chicago in December. Actually, this is Chicago between November and April, pretty much. Giant mushrooms sprout from the sidewalks, battered by ice floes bearing hapless Artic adventure-tourists falling from the cornices ... Doc Savage mounting surveillance cameras on every flat surface. Yeah, it's gonna be a long winter.
Season's Affective Disorder Greetings to all my regular readers (how do you stay so regular at this time of year? bran fruitcake?) and random stumblers (special holiday shout-out to all "I Hate Meeces to Pieces" Googlers). I expect this will be the last post until xmas is over, and probably won't get any hits until then anyway, so, mazel tov, and I hope the Baby Jesus doesn't let you down again this year.
As was pointed out to me via email earlier today, I have been "a little off my game" lately. It's true. Even the old familiar sight on the teevy of the SWAT team in action in my home town hasn't perked me up as it should. Although I did enjoy it.
Yeah, I'm talking about Bears defensive thug Tank Johnson's arrest last week in Gurnee on gun charges (six gats, zero FOID). Growing up in Gurnee, I got pretty used to living near various Bears (as well as certain mustachioed ex-head-coaches from certain Super Bowl Dos Equises) so nothing about that incident surprised me particularly much. But it was a nice touch to see helicopter shots of the subdivision across Rte. 132 from my old neighborhood, even if they mostly focused on Mr. Tank's (as Ma Moss is calling him) outsized McMansion wedged into a block mostly full of smallish aging ranch houses and split-levels, most of which did not feature several pit bulls living in the backyard. Although there were some nasty Dobermans around there that I occasionally ran across in the old days.
I said "familiar sight of the SWAT team" back up in the first graf. That's because Gurnee was a little bit more of a lively place in the early to mid 1980s than you might expect from a town of a few thousand brackish Northern Illinois–Southern Wisconsin-type persons. Village Hall called it "The Rural Community of the Future," which apparently was code for "Mayhem Central of Lake County of the Present (if you don't count Waukegan, North Chicago, and Zion ... or Round Lake on a bad Friday in July, any July)."
Just to list a couple of the noteworthy examples, in 1984, one of my classmates burned the high school down in a fit of rage, and a year or two before that, a motorcycle gang leader deliberately blew up his house with himself and his old lady inside, after setting a shotgun booby trap at the front gate (which, luckily for the GFD first responders, didn't work). Another classmate was stabbed to death by a Reagan-discharged mental patient at McDonalds (OK, that happened in Waukegan, so maybe that doesn't count).
Best of all was what happened during my sophomore year in high school. Briefly, what happened was that some nutjob living across the street snapped and robbed a drugstore at gunpoint and holed up at home with some weapons and stolen drugs and started telling the cops he was going to do some shooting at the school. So we got to go on the 1982 version of "crisis lockdown" ... which consisted, for me, of sitting around in German class all afternoon, looking out the window, watching the SWAT team assemble in the teachers' parking lot. Which was, I gotta say, as hella cool as it sounds. Long story short, they stormed the house (which I didn't get to see cuz it was around the corner from that classroom), and it turned out the nut had already offed himself. The end.
That's not the only "cops with big guns and body armor" story I have from my high school years, but I think I'll save the other one for some other post, if it ever becomes topically relevant (aka, tangentially related to a current news event).
The moral of the story, though, if there is one: Quit acting so righteously and indignantly shocked, Gurneeians. You can't spell "Gurnee" without GUN, after all.
OK ... the experiment of not hating Christmas is officially over, due to the existence of this. Non-hatred of life itself is now at serious risk, in fact.
!!!WARNING!!! Sheer evil follows. DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT under any circumstances watch this video as far as the point where Santa appears to be going into labor in his sleigh. Mother Mary and Joseph. If this blog had a "safe word," I would call it right now.
Like I said the other day, stuff falls off of stuff a lot in Chicago. For example, today's Sun-Times contains an account of the following:
Seven pedestrians were injured Wednesday afternoon in the Loop when wet concrete fell from the 24th floor of a construction site to the street, according to police and firefighters.
Firefighters? Wow, flaming wet concrete! Get Ronny Howard on the horn -- it's time for a sequel to "Backdraft." Not sure what to call it, though.
Man, I am an uptight person. I'm always obsessing over the food inventory in my freezer, refrigerator, cupboards, etc. If there's too much, then I worry about using it up. Then when I start to use it up, I worry that it's running too low. If I have a bunch of leftovers, I worry about eating them before they go bad. If there aren't any leftovers, I worry about not having any. It's like a George Jetson machine, the crazy thing of not stopping.
I just spent several minutes thinking about something I could cook "ahead" for dinner tomorrow or the next day, just so my refrigerator is fuller, because there's almost nothing on the bottom shelf and it was making me nervous. Finally I just put some bottled water on the top shelf and displaced some stuff from up there to the lower shelves, to thereby provide for the illusion of population.
I'm not even kidding. I'm completely insane. This is just one of many ways that insanity exhibits itself when I'm trying to quit smoking for about the 6th time in the last 60 days. When I'm smoking, I just squint my eyes and say "fffffffuuuuck yyyeeewwwwww" to the kitchen, in between coughing fits.
INSIDE BLOGBALL: By the way, as if I needed a further excuse for the paltry recent posts on this left-headed step-monkey of a blog, I spent several hours last weekend cleaning evil malware from my computer, which I apparently came into on MySpace or YouTube or both. Due to lingering skittishness (as well as plain sickness of staring at the flickering screen, expecting it to break down again), I'm still using this machine at a reduced level of obsessiveness from usual, so the various Previously Promised Multi-Part Posts are getting delayed even more. Plus, how can I write when my parmagiano-reggiano cheese supply is down to zero, and I'm almost out of sliced chicken and multi-grain bread? Not to mention when I got half a head of romaine lettuce that ain't getting any younger, and four mixed-berry yogurts I gotta eat between now and next Monday or they'll turn into pumpkins? Kitchen management for one is a full goddamn time job, muthfuck. I apologize to no one.
No energy or inspiration for a real post, so here's these.
•Adhesive solution for NASA. You know how Space Shuttle tiles are always falling off? I think I have a solution. Egg Beaters. Because that fake shit has to be the stickiest substance ever created by mad scientists. Even if you use canola oil in a teflon-coated pan, you can't get it clean, even if you soak it in the sink half the fucking evening. I think it's made of horse hooves, space-age polymers, and boogers from teh planet Krypton. It only serves you right for eating fake eggs. Life's too short to eat fake eggs. Hell, life's too short, period, so I guess if eating fake eggs makes it feel longer, it might be worth it. And if you could eat Egg Beaters during a four-hour delay at Newark Airport, you would feel goddamned immortal.
•The eighties. There's eighties nostalgia, and then there's eighties nostalgia. Eighties nostalgia for me is this video of Bongwater with Screaming Jay Hawkins. Maybe this was actually in 1990 or even 1991. Anyway, close enough. Screaming Jay Hawkins at Biddy Mulligan's in Chicago was probably the best show I have ever attended. Unbe-goobledy-leevable. Lynda Barry was there. You could ask her if you don't believe me. And here he is prefacing Bongwater covering a Roky Erickson tune.
•More Screaming Jay, dammit. From the same TV show.
•Injustice. Nobody gives enough credit to the damn Sherpas, and it pisses me off. These rich asswipe "adventure tourists" are paying $50,000 a pop to be guided to the summit of Everest, and, meanwhile, the Sherpas are bounding up and down the goddamn mountain, pounding in fixed ropes and hanging ladders for these "North Face" catalog models, and they don't even get to take a cell phone video up there. It's like, "Hey, they have a genetic advantage and their bodies create more red blood cells and they like carrying backpacks full of bottled oxygen," like they're an alien species, so it doesn't count. Tenzing Norgay, bitch! OK, maybe I have been misapplying my college-educated "critical thinking" skills to this Discovery TV series. Or maybe not.
•Kramer in Nepal. "You're all a buncha Sherpas! That's what you are! Fifty years ago, Sir Edmund Hillary woulda had you upside down, with a cerebral edema shoved up your ass! You Sherpas! Oh, does that word scare you? SHERPAS! SHERPAS! SHERPAS!"
•Andy Dick in Nepal. "Well, I think you're justa bag of pooey old gay Sherpas, too! My nose itches. No, inside."
•Gravity City. Moving over to the flattest part of the world, I have an idea for a new running feature for this blog: Gravity City. Because it's pretty obvious that the force of gravity is greater in Chicago than anywhere else. Maybe that's why it's so flat. You can tell the gravity is stronger here because things are always falling off the buildings. I started paying attention to this phenomenon several years ago, and I think it's time to start documenting them in blog form. That should give me a lot of posts, because winter is the "heads up" season in Chicago. Every time the temperature gets up to around freezing, thousands of citizens are buried for weeks under mounds of ice and snow cascading off of skyscrapers like the Grim Reaper's Slushee machine. But it's not just a winter thing -- windows, scaffolding, terracotta tiles, folding chairs, sock monkeys, lame rock star poop, Batman, corrugated cardboard, wooden decks, department store mannequins, foie gras, bound and annotated volumes of Tom Dreesen jokes, bound and gagged Orca whales, counterfeit DVDs, smelt, and circus peanuts are just a few of the things that fall from Chicago buildings on a daily basis. So stay browsed.
So, yeah, it definitely looks like Christmastime today in Chicago. Due to the snow, I mean. And here at CBRAT Central, I've been trying to get a little bit into the Christmas spirit this year, for a change.
I used to like Christmas a lot. I was into the lights, the decorations, all of it. Even the music. But then I got somewhat soured on the whole holiday that one time, when during the first act of the annual ritual viewing of my favorite TV special of all time (and perhaps my favorite thing in any category entirely), the Charlie Brown Christmas Special, my wife kinda dumped me. If turning toward me while sitting on her end of the couch and announcing that she wanted a divorce could be construed as "dumping."
But, shit, that was 10 fucking years ago. (That's 1996, for you math-impaired people out there.) I'm pretty sick and tired of being grouchy and stuff at Christmas.
When I got rendered single and moved to Chicago in 1997, I complained to my friend John R. that I was having a hard time "getting over it." He said to me, "Shit, STDPM, it's going to take you 10 years to get over that." Now John is gone, before the 10 years is even up.
Wow, that's kind of a bummer turn this post has taken. But my point remains. Ten years of being the Charlie Browniest guy I know has been more than enough. So that's my modest goal for this December -- to stop hating Christmas.
Hah! Good luck to me.
Anyway, I'm off to a pretty good start, breaking out the Vince Guaraldi "A Charlie Brown Christmas" record and thinking about how all the dust in my pigpen of an apartment might have been dirt that was once trod upon by Nebuchadnezzar. Sort of makes you want to treat me with a little more respect, doesn't it?
Now you say, "You're an absolute mess!"
Then I say, "On the contrary, I didn't think I looked that good!"
And that's what Christmas is all about.
This post has been brought to you by Dolly Madison. Bartender! Cupcakes and Zingers, all around!
El media gossip jefe Roberto Feder (from Fort Lee, New Jersey) writes:
Veteran sportscaster Les Grobstein joins Len Ackerman and "Packer" Dave Rusch as hosts of "Pro Football Showdown" at noon Sunday on NextMedia Group north suburban news/talk WKRS-AM (1220).
The three-hour show, formerly called "Bears-Packers Showdown," is syndicated by SRN Broadcasting & Marketing, based in north suburban Lake Bluff.
So, the Grobber (best loved for recording former Cubs manager Lee Elia's 1983 profanity-marbled rantcapade for posteriority) has finally been hired. Albeit, by a Waukegan AM station that my mother used to call "Doubleyou Kiss R Ass" ... but work is work, right? Although you probably don't get fringe benefits for three hours a week.
Good move on the name change of the show, however. Especially considering that the former name would only make sense for two weeks a year. But ... are they sure they really want to conduct a radio talk show about pro football ... during the precise time-slot the Bears games are usually scheduled?
Ah, who gives a crap about football anyway? Only three months till Spring Training!
You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop."
Yes, I come from the portion of the country where they pronounce things correctly. Well ... except that many of us say "ruff" for "roof," which kind of bugs me for some reason. And I absolutely refuse to pronounce "Chicago" as "ShuhCAWgo" -- because there simply is no fucking way you can get that vowel sound out of a mere "a," and I don't give a shit who disagrees.
Also -- hey, quiz-making asshole or assholes, I gotta quesshun fer you (or youse). Why the fuck would I be annoyed to be asked whether I come from Wisconsin or Chicago? You gotta prahblim wit eeder a doze fine playsiz? Whyncha come over by here and say dat?
I AM from Chicago, ya knockwad! And I grew up 5 miles from da Wiscahhhnsin border! Ya jerk.
There, I feel better. A little unwarranted hostility is pleasant during periods of writer's blecch (see immediately previous post).
I would do a post about having writer's block, because I currently have a pretty severe case of it, but I think that's kind of technically impossible.
Plus, one is wrapped up in "building" a new "product" for one's real job, and that's consuming most of one's word-manipulation capacities at this time.
In the meanwhile, Chicago sports fans, enjoy a new-ish web comic strip by the creator of "Palehose Six," Carl Skanberg:
Your dad made reservations for Julmiddag, and I sent the money today. Don't forget -- Dec. 10 - 3 p.m. at Chevy Chase. (o: Probably won't have any lutefisk, though. A lot of the old Swedes were complaining about that last year. Also -- gasp! -- no glogg! Speaking of which, your dad says there's a whole bottle in the gun safe. Between that and the pear wine, we can get snockered tomorrow!
After nearly ten years of promising that the album "Chinese Democracy" is just about to be released, Axl Rose has become the preeminent master of making a career out of not getting stuff done. And after the recent cancellation of a Guns 'N' Roses show due to safety officials' concern about the proximity of stage pyrotechnics to the band's firewater, Axl has begun plowing new fertile ground in the rich earth of celebrity inactivity.
Now, hot on the heels of much media hype for O.J. Simpson's new book, "If I Did It, Here's How I Did It (Psst, I Totally Did It)," offered here as a CBRAT exclusive are some excerpts from the ultimate "Where's Chinese Democracy?" story, "If I Didn't Do It (And I Didn't) Here's How I Didn't Do It," by Axl Rose as not told to Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss, soon not to be published by anyone.
Chapter One
The fire marshals have taken away my booze. This interview is over.
Chapter Two through Chapter Seventeen
Ibid.
Chapter Eighteen
Another day in the studio. Be a good man and pass the heroin.
Chapter Nineteen
Duhhh.
Chapter Twenty
Wore out my tenth vinyl copy of Ethel Merman's Greatest Hits looking for vocal inspiration.
Chapter Twenty-One
The dry cleaners lost my favorite bandana. Chinese Dumbasscracy.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Totally stuck. Should there be three "whoa whoa whoa"'s or four in the chorus?
Chapter Twenty-Three
Passed a KFC on the way to the studio. Reminded me of Buckethead. Called off the session.
Chapter Twenty-Four
"Do you know where the fuck you are?!" Long story short, I didn't.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Mind totally blown by realization that my name is an anagram of "Oral Sex."
Chapter Twenty-Six through Chapter Thirty-Three
Ibid.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Slash came over to tell me Billie Joe Armstrong still wets the bed.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Spent the day in the batting cage with Mike Piazza. Failed to learn to lay off the high heat.
Chapter Thirty-Six
"Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa." No, that's too many. Back to the drawing board.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The fire marshals have taken away my drawing board. Fuck it. I give up.
Accomplished mail and stamp artist, painter, zine publisher, and friend of mine for over 16 years, John Rininger, died a few days ago at the age of 45.
We collaborated on numerous projects over the years, including the notorious magazine, Even Paranoiacs Can Have Enemies. He taught me most of what I know about zine publishing and introduced me to a lot of interesting people. He also fed me a lot of books that have had a huge impact on me, including the works of Max Stirner, Emil Cioran, and Eric Gill. He could be a very challenging and exasperating guy to deal with, but he was a big part of my life, and I'm going to miss him.
Goodbye, John R.
(The headline of this post is a translation of a Latin palindrome used in one of John's last zines, Catalyst Komics 807, published just a couple months ago.)
Pardon the lack of new material for the last couple of weeks. I'm gonna make up for that soon. But probably not until after this week is over, because I'm still recovering from my vacation and my brain is extremely tired. By the middle of the weekend, I should have the initial installment(s) of a new multi-part post in the classic "We Had Some Ultimately Non-Fatal Misadventures on the Way to Better Understanding of Oneself Blah Blah Blah, and Here's a Humorous Telling of the Tale" genre. Subject: Super Karaoke Fun Time Band road trip from Jersey City to Philadelphia, Saturday, November 11, 2006.
But that won't be until Friday afternoon, at the earliest. For now, here's a brand spanking new video for the song "Fire Needs Oxygen," co-starring members of the Jersey City Bridge and Pummel women's roller derby league and One O. Ball and a new set of Chains. It's kind of a preview of the upcoming motion picture of the same name, in a not all that really sort of way.
Otis Ball and the New Chains - Fire Needs Oxygen
POSTSCRIPT: Heh heh. I said spanking. Google perverts, strap it on and cinch it up, here! We need to macaca the Sitemeter stats on this thing.
Just got home from Jersey, after sitting thru a four-hour delay at the Newark Airport for a mystery reason. United Airlines, consider yourself disliked by one very powerful blogger.
Just a semi-random sprinkling of itemery here, to get some blogging in before I leave on the Great November Jersey City Road Trip, '06 version, this weekend.
• Dick Biondi jobful again.Robert Feder of "The Bright One" reports that oldies station doubleyou whatever it is (94.7 FM) has rescued legendary deejay Dick Biondi from Dante's first circle of aging radio talent Gehenna (aka, unemployment) to host a nightime show. Along with their recent hire of John Records "Yeah, I've made a career for 40 years based on pointing out that my real middle name is in fact 'Records'" Landecker, that makes three actual local human beings on that station. The third? Oh come on, it's Scott McKay. You didn't know that? I have more things to say about Scott McKay than Dick Biondi (whose appeal, frankly, I still don't get), so this bullet point is now about him. McKay kind of lost me when he admitted on-air during one of his first shifts for the station that he didn't really know much about, you know, rock music made between roughly 1954 and 1976 ... as in, "oldies" music ... but gee whiz, he was sure game for a college try! It also galled me when he'd say idiotic stuff like, in reference to the Kinks' "Victoria," for example, he said, "Wow, that came out in 1969? I always thought that was much more recent, like 1980 or something." But I guess he's OK. He plays what Scott "I'm the industry genius in New York who tapes and syndicates all the rest of the shifts" Shannon tells him to. At least they have a relatively large playlist, perhaps in an attempt to answer the plea of Carl from The Simpsons: "How 'bout some new oldies, geniuses?"
• KISS-tastrophe. I dropped a deuce when I heard this one. Our correspondent in New Jersey reports that his local Best Buy has sold out of the new KISS "Kissology - Volume 1 (1974-1977)" DVD box set, which was released on (skeddy, keeds!) Halloween. Allegedly, they sold 160 copies in two days.
• Maybe this one will be on volume two. In this YouTube embedded veddeo from 1979, enjoy Peter Criss and his buddy Johnny Walker Black having some trouble with the words (and, apparently, general theme, tenor, mood, and implications thereof, from, and within) to token chick ballad, "Beth."
• Paging Dr. Frood. I dreamed last night that I was at a big party in some kind of barn on a sprawling estate someplace, and I had an embarrassing moment with Keith Richards. Yes, Keith was at the party, and so was Mick. Jagger. There was a pizza on a table, and Keith and I both kept trying to grab the same slice. I'd go for one, and he'd reach at the same time, and then we'd mumble "sorry" and move to another one and the same thing would happen. It was like the pizza equivalent of the awkward hallway dance when you're trying to pass somebody coming from the other direction.
• No sir. One time about 10 years ago I was sitting in a crummy apartment next to the projects in Champaign watching a bunch of black gang bangers play Dungeons and Dragons (I shit you not) while I waited for my "friend" to get back with "some used books" I was buying from him. Somebody asked me what I did for a living and I mentioned something about how I used to be a lawyer but I got fed up with the lying bastards. One guy turned to face me and said, "My lawyer got me off of two counts of Murder One. I don't think he was lying to me." I wasn't sure what that meant, but I shut up real fast.
• Back in the New York groove. Friend of the Blog "Mr. Jacobson" (or is it "-sen"?; I can never remember) relates that his downstairs neighbor where he used to live in Northwest Edgewater or Southwest Rogers Park or wherever the hell it's called there, used to suffer under the delusion that she was the lover and soulmate of Ace Frehley. That's all there is to this story. Anyway, under the makeup, Ace looks like a Ramone in this veddeo.
• They really really hate them. The numero uno Google referral phrase for this blog for the past several weeks has been "I hate meeces to pieces." I wish I had more to say on the subject that I didn't have to look up on Wikipedia to come up with. The subject of Mr. Jinks the cat hating Pixie and Dixie the mice, that is. In their eponymous(e) Hanna-Barbera cartoon, that is. Which was produced from 1958 to 1962 but lived on for decades more in reruns. Featured one of my favorite cartoon voice artists of all time, Daws Butler. (Of course, Mel Blanc was the king, and June Foray and Stan Freberg did great work as well, but I digress. If you don't already know about those people you probably do not care. The Daws Butler wiki-bio is actually worth reading, though. Because I say so.) And then there was also Don Messick, the Baba Looey to Butler's Quick Draw McGraw. And come on, he did Scooby Doo. I mean, not in the Rick Santorum way. OK, maybe I'll just wrap this bullet point up.
• By the way. I hate it when people give me or anyone else shit about split infinitives. Everyone except the nuns that taught English to the baby boom generation -- and the people taught by them -- has joined the consensus that they're "unobjectionable." I like what Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary says: "There has never been a rational basis for objecting to the split infinitive." Which is probably why every person I've heard object to them proclaims that they are objectionable because Sister Inguinal Hernia said so.
Just a few of the celebrated people born on this date --
Larry Flynt Anthony Kiedis Lyle Lovett Kinky Friedman Bo Bice (!) Bobby "The Brain" Heenan (!!!) Marcia "Simpsons; Bob Newhart Show" Wallace Rick "one-armed drummer from Def Leppard" Allen Barbara "Hill Street Blues" Bosson Jenny "naked blonde chick" McCarthy Lynne "CNN Headline News" Russell
and
Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss.
Yep, we here at CBRAT have begun our 40th year on earth, and you can bet we're really pumped. Great. Yeah. Getting closer to death is great, and the time just keeps moving faster and faster. Fantastic.
