Into the Valley of Death rode the 25-man playoff roster ...

Is it looking good?

No.

Are we crying about it?

No!

Screw disappointment and frustration. Let's rock.



Stiff Little Fingers - Alternative Ulster



Minutemen - Little Man With a Gun in His Hand


Tar - Goethe



Red Aunts - Roller Derby Queen



Sensational Alex Harvey Band - Runaway



Naked City - Victims of Torture



TheWrathofZod - Ka Mate (Haka)

That will teach them to get born with dirty parts

So I dropped off the kitty kats, Piper and Mingus, over by the animal hospital this morning for their wiggly-bit fix-jobs and New World Order homeland security chip implants. While they're Out of the Office, I'm going to take advantage of the lack of tornadic feline maelstromity to straighten up a few things ... so that they can dismantle them again when they come home tomorrow.

In that connection, here, in no particular order and for no particular reason, is a list of paperback books Pipey and Mingey have knocked off of my cheap orange metal bookcase over the last few weeks, and that I haven't bothered to pick up until now:

• Nineteen Eighty-Four - George Orwell
• Our Gang - Philip Roth
• Radical Lawyers - Jonathan Black, editor
• My Secret Life - Anonymous
• Inside the Third Reich - Albert Speer
• Teenage Runaway - John Benton
• The Way of the Bull - Leo Buscaglia
• The Social Contract - Jean Jacques Rousseau
• Sincerely, Ronald Reagan - Helene von Damm, editor
• Babbitt - Sinclair Lewis
• Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego - Sigmund Freud
• War and Peace (abridged version) - Leo Tolstoy
• The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge - Carlos Castaneda
• Masters of Deceit - J. Edgar Hoover
• Myra Breckenridge - Gore Vidal
• Beyond Cloak and Dagger - Inside the CIA - Miles Copeland
  

Ooh, here it comes ... Wait, no, no, that's not what we ordered!

To all my fellow lefties who are rubbing your palms together like greedy monkeys and limbering up your eyeballs for viewing the drubbing of the century delivered to Sarah Palin in the VP debate ... be careful. Learn something from the hapless Cubs fans.

You're setting yourselves up for a terrible shock. Joe Biden is Ryan Dempster. Hell, at times, Joe Biden is Neal Cotts. (I won't go so far as to say he's Bobby Howry. Hyperbole is hyperbole, but that would just be ridiculous.)

At any rate, be prepared for the possibility that you will wake up tomorrow extremely depressed and dejected.

Game 163 Coming Up

Oy gevalt! I can hardly wait. That exclamation is in honor of Steve Stone, who had to leave the radio booth around the midpoint of yesterday's game against the Tigers due to the sounding of the shofar. So, presumably, Chris Rongey will be subbing for him tonight, which is suboptimal, but it will still be better than listening to the audio on TBS ... ugh.

I hope the Sox win, of course, just because -- but also because I hope I haven't heard the last of Stone and Farmer on AM 670. They made a great team this season. Stone will do fine alongside Hawk on TV, and DJ or whoever else replaces Stone on the radio will be all right, I'm sure, but it won't be the same great combo as The Pony and Farmio.

OK. About an hour to go. Get yer black threads on and let's win it.

UPDATE: 6:30 pm: My bad. I guess it's past sundown, so the holiday obligations are over. Anyway, Stoney is on the air. Which starts things off right, from my perspective.

UPDATE: 9:00 pm: That was an awesome catch by Brian Anderson. Wowie wow wow. Onward to Tampa.

Meanwhile, Elsewhere in the Blargasso Sea

Hey, here's some unexpected news that is quite decent, I must say. Back-in-the-day ("day" in this case meaning late '90s) acquaintance of the blogger Michael "Professor of Dangeral Studies" Bérubé has resumed blogging at his blog. And he's as blabby as ever.

No word on a potential Nastybake reunion, although I gather that the non-Bérubé members of that band are scattered at various arctic research stations. But we can dream.

Also Off Topic: Curtain Closing, Too, as You No Doubt Have Heard, on The House That Stein Wrecked

And my nominee for "Number One Yankee Stadium Moment" is the following, which is only better for being fictional.

It's the Great Smoke-Off immortalized by Shel Silverstein (born in Chicago, September 25, 1930 ... and I'm remedying things by noting that anniversary almost two days late, yes) between Pearley Sweetcake (D-California) and The Calistoga Kid (D-New York).

Here's a verbal taste. Then the video embedation.

See the dealers and their ladies
Wearing turquoise lace and leather
See the narcos and the closet smokers
Puffin all together
From the teenies who smoke legal
To the ones who've done some time
To the old man who smoked reefer
Back before it was a crime

And the grand old house that Ruth built
Is filled with the smoke and cries
Of fifty thousand screaming heads
All stoned out of their minds
And they play the national anthem
And the crowd lets out a roar
As the spotlight hits The Kid and Pearl
Ready for their smokin' war

Shel Silverstein - The Great Smoke Off

Off Topic: Curtain Soon to Close on Shea Stadium; Nobody Cares

OK, I can't help but razz this a little bit -- I just read over on the Mets' website that fans have voted Bill Buckner's error in the 1986 World Series as the "Number One Shea Stadium Moment," or words to that effect. I can't argue against that being a huge baseball event, and very memorable ... but isn't it kind of weird that the biggest thing to happen for Mets fans at their home park was an error by an opposing player? Wouldn't you rather have it be something great that, like, a Met did there?

Apparently I was a little bit too level-headed and kind last night

OK, now I gotta say that the White Sox don't just need a new bullpen.

They also need new starters.

Kansas City is beating Minnesota at this moment, which means the agony could be prolonged for another day.

But I'm going to just go ahead and declare this season ovuh.

I'd like to say I'm happy the Sox did better than I expected them to do this season.

But I'd be lying.*

Watch for a new "Cubs" look for this blog soon. As in, blue background, and new song lyrics in the sidebar, along the lines of

We love our favorite team
They're the Chicago Cubbies
We love teddily bearses
And cuddly things
And pissing on lawns again and again
Like drunken Teletubbies
And centuries devoid
Of World Series rings

It's a work in progress.

---

* Do you dig my use of the Rick Telander "paragraph break after every short declarative sentence" technique?

I think I've mastered it.

Don't you?

Suspension of the State of Non-Hiatus

OK, you know what? Someone send me a note when the White Sox get a fucking bullpen. Until then, they're dead to me.

POSTSCRIPT: One O. Ball sez the following -- a slightly bitter and alcohol-influenced email from me to him late last night -- would have made a much better post. And I think he's right.

Washington Mutual fails tonight. Which, although it was pretty much expected for a while, is the biggest bank failure in U fucking S his fucking tory.

So what does the Trib website have up for its top story? Yep, of course. White Sox swept by Twins and blow first place. Almost certainly to miss the playoffs.

I have two responses. Fuck you Tribune. And fuck you to hell White Sox. Fuck you with the fuck power of a thousand fuck suns.

They desperately needed to improve the relief pitching. So what did they do? Sure. Sign Ken Griffey Jr. An aging, way way over the hill power hitter who can't hardly hit a ball out of the infield anymore at his advanced age of approximately 974 (ok, 38, which is the same thing, in baseball years).

The White Sox relief pitching staff has blown more games this year than Andy Dick has blown dicks. Which isn't even possible, because Andy Dick has blown even more dicks than the number of people who have been born since the dawn of time ... but somehow it is true anyway.

Therefore, they can gnaw upon that which pees in my toilet. Gnaw and ruminate, you cow-like retarded fuckers. I take shits into the mouths of your unborn children. And you don't even want to know what I do to your already born ones.

Bah. Everyone can eat shit and get cancer. I'm going to bed.

Don't stop now -- this joke has only started getting funny, and it has infinite potential

Bloomberg say:

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson's $700 billion plan to buy devalued assets from financial companies is "a joke" because it doesn't go far enough to calm markets, said Kenichi Ohmae, president of Business Breakthrough Inc.

Ohmae, nicknamed "Mr. Strategy" during his 23 years as a McKinsey & Co. partner, called for a $5 trillion "international facility" to be made available to financial institutions.

These finance boys ... they need to stop thinking small. As Burnham said, "Little boondoggles lack the monkeys to make barrels fun again and thus suck boneless chicken dicks." Or ... something like that.

Anyway ... Why not eleventy trillion? Twelvety ann-jillian? Blurve-blivvity squabunderglassinabalsamicreductionillion? These numbers are completely meaningless anyway. Why not just say we'll need $Universe?

Infinity money! Plus one!

In the parlance of our times

I am suspending this blog until Congress gives me $700 billion.

The banks! The banks! The banks are on fire!

We don't need no water!

Let the motherfuckers burn!

A brief reflection on late-season baseball in Chicago 2008

So the Cubs have clinched the NL Central Division, and the Sox are still 2.5 games up in first place in the AL Central, so there's a good chance that both clubs will be in the playoffs, which hasn't happened since, I think, 1906, which was the year they faced off in the World Series (Sox won). Not that I think that will happen this year, but it's a lot of fun to have this much "meaningful" baseball this late in the year.

Especially during late September, baseball starts to feel like hanging onto summer for dear life ... fingernails ... toenails ... teeth. The longer baseball lasts, the longer summer lasts.

Which is why I'm always glad when either team makes the playoffs (in my lifetime, that's 1983, 1984, 1989, 1993, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2007, and 2008), but, both ... that's like double reprieve. That's like, summer hasn't ended at all. Both teams in town are still playing.

Feels almost like June.

In the future, far awayWe will live in outer spaceThere will be a cure for cancerThere will be one race

And the North Siders come one step closer to the unthinkable.



The Cleaning Ladys - When the Cubs Win the World Series: Punk Gospel Rendition

Friday Nite Veddeos: Not Dedicated to Ike the Hurricane Edition

No baseball no damn where tonight.

Man, did Roger Bossard look pissed off earlier tonight or what? And Ozzie in his stupid kelly green "Halfway to St. Pat's Day" or whatever hat. That's a hella snazzy red tarp they got now, though. I gotta admit.

And, as the Cubs fans out there know, Houston is soon to be inundated by some form of cyclonic vicissitude, and I'm tempted to dig for a good YouTube version of Jimmy Webb's "Galveston" and post it up, but it seems too obvious.

So, instead, here's some veddeos that aren't intrinsically related to anything, with parentheticals describing the disparate categories they fall into.



Slade - Look Wot You Dun (category: favorite Slade song of the moment)



M.I.A. - Paper Planes (category: favorite college radio hit of 2008)



Gugug - Outdoor Miner (Wire cover) (category: Gugug)



Harry Nilsson - One (category: Nilsson: the best)



Blondie - Union City Blue (category: States: New Jersey)



Bongwater - Nick Cave Dolls (category: nostalgia for the year 1990, which was a pretty good year)



Big Black - The Power of Independent Trucking (category: '80s)

Driving and Rocking: Report from the Commute

Yesterday morning on the Edens, on the way to work up above the Arctic Circle, I heard the following one-two combo on the college radio, in the following order, over by dere. I'm still enjoying it. I love to listen to Brian Eno rock songs when I'm driving fast. And Bauhaus kicks ass here, too.



Bauhaus - Third Uncle (Eno cover)



Brian Eno - King's Lead Hat

Bill Meléndez, RIP

Somehow I missed it until today, but Peanuts animator José Cuauhtemoc "Bill" Meléndez died last Tuesday at the age of 91. The Peanuts specials often get slagged for being low-rez, jumpy pieces of work, but I think Melendez did a great job of interpreting the comic strip. It certainly would have been incongruous -- if not downright jarring -- if they had been lush, 3D, "uncanny valley"-transgressing Disneystraganzas. Also, TV was TV. Budgets were budgets. The classic Peanuts specials were great, and I won't tolerate contentions to the contrary!

OK, so maybe the Saturday morning cartoon shows weren't quite as good, but it's still hilarious in Portuguese:



"ISN'T THERE ANYONE WHO KNOWS WHAT CARNIVAL IS ALL ABOUT?!"

*sigh*

So long, Bill. Thanks for everything.

Because Exene Cervenka is the antidote to Sarah Palin ...

Because she is.



X - Under The Big Black Sun



X - Devil Doll



X - We're Desperate (Get Used To It)

What's this noise I hear about some kind of "foot" ... "ball"? Is that some kind of Republican stunt?

Fall is a mixed bag for me. For the most part, I love it. But it has a couple of drawbacks. For one thing, the leaves fall off the trees (coincidence? I think not!), which is a drag. For another thing -- the one-two punch of college and professional football seasons starting.

My one-word assessment of football: Ecch.

OK, that's only recognized as a word by Mad magazine's editorial style manual. And I watch more than my share of football every fall and winter. Actually, one game -- one play, even -- is too much, but I watch a lot more than that. I get bored after baseball season ends, and Sunday afternoons in the winters here are very conducive to ingesting a few alcohols and being bored to death by a game that should be called "Pause Ball." People say baseball is slow and dull -- people who are WRONG, that is -- but watching football is like watching C-SPAN. Minus the action.

The average football play consists of 11 gigantic armored freaks of nature running about one-and-a-half feet into 11 other gigantic armored freaks and then falling down. Then they all get up and gather together in New Agey discussion circles and talk about it for approximately two days. Then they line up and collide into each other again. Sometimes the ball gets thrown, and once in a while, somebody catches it. But then some guy dressed like a convict sticks his head in a contraption that looks like one of Matthew Brady's original Civil War cameras and they have a Constitutional Convention to decide whether the receiver's foot touched a line or didn't touch a line, or whether his socks match, or don't match, or whether the marching band's drummer was off-beat, or just too hip for the room ... etc.

And every year they change the fucking rules. Although the rules that get changed usually are rules I didn't know existed anyway -- because there appear to be about 700 million rules in football, especially pro football. The NFL rule book must be thicker than the Internal Revenue Code and all the tax regulations put together. So when they enact a new one that says something like,

"A tackler who tackles the quarterback on his mother's birthday must send the quarterback's mother a nice birthday card -- and not one of those 'funny' ones. It must be one of those mushy ones that will make the quarterback's mother cry with happiness, so as to forget the fact that her Number One Son has just been pummeled into the turf with the force of the Tunguska Explosion,"

you can't hardly notice the difference, I guess.

So ... anyway ... I'm told that we have our own professional football team in Chicago. OK, I guess I knew that, since my hometown was (and is) totally riddled with players from that team, temporarily living there, for some damn reason. Pro football players can't afford to live in Lake Forest? Or Highland Park? Or even Libertyville, or some other decent Lake County village? Maybe some of them do, but Tank Johnson used to live in my old neighborhood, and Fridge Perry used to live in a crummy aluminum-sided cookie-cutter box in a very mundane subdivision in Mundelein, so ...

But I digress. The fact is that I'm not much of a Bears fan. When I used to like football -- in the late '70s -- I was a Steelers fan. The Bears were bad. I'd watch them because they were local, but they sucked. Then they were good for a short while, but managed to be completely irritating the whole time -- what with the Super Bowl Shuffle, that imbecile Coach Ditka, etc. -- and then they sucked again. Somehow they ended up in the Super Bowl a few seasons ago, but that was just the kind of fluke that makes me hate football even more.

So I'm no Bears fan. But if you're interested in the semi-comedic rantings of someone who kind of is a Bears fan -- check out this new tour de farce by puppet-master Des and his cast of incomprehensible characters -- Captain Silas Redbeard's Bears Preview. You won't get it, per se, but it might weird out your brain in a manner that you can do something positive with, karmically. That's up to you.

And, in the general jugular vein of football comedy, here's a timeless classic that everyone knows, but that is worth a re-listen:



Andy Griffith - What It Was, Was Football

Blogpourri: Some bad news, some more bad news, and some videos

First of all, let me be the latest (but far from the first) to opine that Firefox 3 stinks like Charles Bukowski's abscessed taint. Slow fucking crash-prone resource-gobbling swirly loaf of soft-serv corn-studded fecal matter of a browser. OK, that's a little overboard. It has some nice features, but it is a slow memory-chomper. Granted, I'm using XP on an old machine, but fuck that. Fuck that excuse. Fuck it. Fuck it till it chafes and politely asks you to stop, then freezes up and mutherfucking dies.

Can you tell that I'm trying to quit smoking again? Yeah, I'm up to 72 hours now. Not quite past the hair-trigger rage phase as of yet.

Second -- god damn it. Just when I was allowing myself to feel good for a second about Our Favorite Ball Club, Carlos Quentin Tarantino-Crisp apparently injures himself via spazmattack tantrum, seemingly taking himself out of the season. He might still win MVP, only this "MVP" will stand for "Most Velvety Pussy." Oh man, that was totally uncalled for. I'm sorry. Especially since as of right now, the White Sox are beating the Angels 5 7 to nothing. Woulda been nice if they coulda done that at the only game I managed to get to this season -- at which the Angels beat them 3 to zero -- but, hey, you can't have everything. Or, in my case, anything.

Second and a half -- in slightly hilarious news, the Cubs are getting their panties raided and handed back to them in knots by the mighty Cincinnati Reds tonight. Not to exhibit ill-will toward my fellow Chicagoans, but -- HAH!!!!

And now, the veedeos. For no reason at all, I'm in the mood for some loud testosteronated semi-obscure '70s guitar rock crap. So here's a few of those. Rock till you can't stand it (or those nearby can't stand you, whichever comes first).



Captain Beyond - Dancing Madly Backwards (On a Sea of Air)




Bloodrock - Gotta Find a Way



Flower Travellin' Band - 8mm footage


OK, that should do it for now.

Putting aside the fact that Palin kind of looks like Stacy Peterson, if she had been allowed to exist for another 20 or so years ...

... McCain's choice for sidekick certainly gets beaucoup Novelty Points. Not that "things" were boring, veez ah veeeee this election campaign (emphasis on the "pain"), but they could get much more interesting soon. And by "interesting," I mean "slapstickutacular."

I predict that at the veep debate, Joe Biden bites his palm like Lenny and Squiggy when Sarah Palin takes the podium. OK, maybe that won't happen, but it's a sure bet that some dude, on either or both sides of the contest, is going to say something inappropriate about her purported hotness. If it's a Republican, he'll recover with the Nigel Tufnel retort, "What's wrong with being sexy?" If it's a Democrat, he'll throw himself under a bus -- literally.

I bet some GOP attack ads get aired with Obama saying "Sweetie" a thousand times in some kind of Negativland-esque tape-loop ("Sweetie. SweetieSweetSweetie. SwSwSwSwSweetie. SweeSweetSweetie. SweetieSweetieSweetieSweeSweeSweeSwee- SweeSweeSweeSweeSweeSwee. Christianity is stupid! Communism is Sweetie!"). If that hasn't happened already.

There's about a 20% chance that McCain will call Palin "a fine piece of tail," which will be good for a laugh -- but I bet he'd get away with it, and Palin will get credit from the press for being a "good sport," unlike those sourpussed feminazis in the Donkey Party. I also predict that by Nov. 4, the term "hockey mom" is going to induce projectile vomiting in me. Actually, we can revise that date to Sept. 4.

Regardless of what happens, it's sure going to be strange to have an election without any Southerner on either ticket. When's the last time that happened? And Alaska is about as far from Dixie as you can get without actually leaving the atmosphere.

Which raises the question -- if Cokie Roberts so insistently and persistently believes that Hawaii is an "exotic" locale, what about Alaska? Sure, it's technically on the same continent as America, but it's closer to Russia (i.e., zero miles, if you count the maritime border) than the contiguous United States. RUSSIA!!! They even have Orthodox churches in Alaska, with onion domes and everything. Hell, Alaska used to be Russia. There are still Russian-language documents in state legal archives. So, I wonder, what's Comrade Palin's viewpoint on South Ossetia?

ILL-ADVISED POSTSCRIPT: I've been tempted to make a "Dead Parrot Sketch" joke, by the way, but I'm not sure I'd want to do that in a public forum. I don't need to dork myself up even further, and Monty Python is way, way up there in terms of sheer dork quotient. (Although I guess I just did. Actually, the truth is, I couldn't think of a good one.)

So, in lieu of that, how about this?

Ohhh, she's a lumberjack, and she's OK!
She sleeps all night and gives birth all day!

Cuz ... see ... she's got so many kids. So ... many ... kids. OK ... maybe not.

POST-POSTSCRIPT: Allegedly, Palin returned to work the day after giving birth to her daughter, Piper. Well, there's some traditional Waltons family values for you. But I don't mention it because of that. I mention it to dispel any notions that I am biased in favor of Palin because I have a kittie cat named Piper. Any and all resemblances between Piper Palin and Piper Moss are purely coincidental. Although I didn't take any time off work when I acquired her, either. But then I didn't extrude her from the base of my torso ... so ... again, not comparable, I guess.

Mariotti Quits, Swisher Searches in Vain for Unaltered Hair to Wacky-Up in Celebration

I know it's been a while since I've written anything about the White Sox (or anything about anything, but in my defense, summer has never been a productive season for me, creatively), but I'm trying to be teh funnay hyah, and it's hard for me to write jokes smartass remarks when things are going well. I mean, Nick "Swishy Knickers" Swisher has suddenly become some kind of home-run hitting guy, Paulie seems to be shaping up, Crede is back (his back got better about a week back, thanks very much, try the veal), and Carlos Quentin and Alexei Ramirez continue to be ... awesomely awesome. The hosers are a game and a half up in first place, as of this writing, and ... until a few seconds ago, the Mariners had a two-run lead over the Twins. Damn, you, Twins! Identical upper-Midwest flies in my baseball ointment! But still, it's kind of hard to mock the White Sox right now. Even Juan Uribe.

And now Ozzie Guillen gets a nice Chreestmoose present in August: Jay Mariotti is leaving the Sun-Times "to pursue other opportunities." Yeah, I'll leave it unspeculated at this time what those "opportunities" could be.

Obama '08: Making the Politics of Failure Work Again (in a Changed Yet Believable Manner)

I don't think the Democrats know how to fight anymore. Apparently that twisted mutant Carville was the only guy who could. Anyway, today they're hammering McCain on the "I don't remember how many houses I own" thing, and I'm not sure what they're going to get out of that. What's the message, that McCain is filthy rich? That's not a negative -- people in this country fucking LOVE rich people and identify the hell with them. If they didn't, they'd never watch football or baseball.

If they're trying to play the "elitist" card, they're failing. Being rich doesn't make you "elitist," in the parlance of the conventional punditry -- eating arugula does. Being able to read and spell at a 9th grade level does. Knowing that Pakistan does not share a border with Iraq does.

I think that when Biff Nascar and Britney Hatesgays hear that McCain has so many houses that he's lost track of them, they're just going to react by saying, "Hot damn, that guy's good! I wish I could get me some a them there houses! And a new couch for every front porch! And I will, too -- soon as I win the lot'ry! Pick Four! Easy Money! Superball! Yee hah! I love Nascar! I hate gays! McCain's got more houses than a Monopoly game! I love being a Republican!"

Staycation, all I ever wanted ... staycation, had to not get away ...

Long time no post, but I've been on staycation this past week, and staycationing just did not include blogging, until now.

Some people seem to enjoy taking on extra jobs during their time off regular work, whether for the money or the fun of it. I used to work with a guy who likes to go pretend he's a trolley conductor during his time off work. But I won't comment further on that.

I'm not interested in taking on a temp job for money, but sometimes I think it'd be fun to find a little fantasy gig to get away to from time to time -- and then to get away from after a very finite span.

In fact, every summer I find myself wishing, every so often, I could spend a day at the old golf course again, cutting grass, changing holes, chasing gophers -- you know, greenskeeping. I know if I tried to do that job again I'd probably croak -- I'm old, I'm way out of shape, I have bad feet, I'm lazy as fuck, and nowadays I'm fat and can't handle the hot weather very well -- but it's fun to pretend.

So here's my idea (patent pending): Fantasy greenskeeper camp. You show up, some sunburned jerk wearing Frye boots and camo pants yells at you for being late, throws a rake at you, and then you go have a bloody mary at the 19th Hole. If you feel like it, you can rake some sand, too. Or drive some gnarly equipment around for a while, maybe a front-end loader or one of those smooth greens mowers with the zero turning radius and hydraulic everythings. Or you can just hide behind the bushes along the Number Five fairway and smoke a jay, no big deal.

Now, I know there are a few problems with the idea. Commercial viability of the enterprise, business-wise, might be one of them. And most of your demand may well come from "Caddyshack" fans who have a real skewed idea of the greenskeeping discipline. Bill Murray's character, Carl Spackler, is probably the image most people have of greenskeepers. Which is a shame. I mean, we all love to laugh about "killing the golfers" and "total consciousness," but greenskeeping is not all featherbed bent and Cinderella story.

Which is why I'd like to introduce my candidate for Head Greenskeeper of the Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss Fantasy Greenskeeper Camp (tentatively opening 2009) -- Greenskeeper Don. If you will indulge me by watching this short clip, I think you'll see why fantasy greenskeeping is going to be the craze of the Late Zeroes, and I think you'll all be lining up with your checkbooks to invest.



OK, that one is not entirely fair. Here's Greenskeeper Don in a more triumphant moment.



Kick ass, GD, that's some fine turfgrass!

And to really seal the deal, here's just one more, in case you thought the life of a greenskeeper lacked drama. Lemme tell you, when those cute little buggers grow up, they could bite your leg clean off. (Bonus greenskeeper porn: Check out the tantalizing glimpse of that greens mower ... looks like an old Toro. Anyway, charp chariot, ese.)

White Sox Fail to Acquire Kathy Griffin ...

[insert Photoshopped image of Kathy Griffin wearing Sox uniform and blaming string of GIDPs on Jerry Seinfeld here*]

... Settle for Ken Griffey instead. Junior.

Yeah, I know that was last week's news. But you might have missed the total evisceration of the Trib's Mike Downey by Fire Joe Morgan's Ken "Some Call Me Mose" Tremendous. Which is also from last week (Friday), but ... we move slow in humid weather here at CBRAT World HQ. Although I'm not sure if complete static refusal to budge is "movement," technically. Too hot to argue. Throw me the idol, I throw you the whip. Anyway, maybe it's just because I'd have been more excited if Ken Williams somehow had managed to pull a star relief pitcher out of David Blaine's pruny, perennially submerged tuchus [insert Photoshopped image of the reincarnation of LaMarr Hoyt emerging from David Blaine's magical butt here] than an ancient, crippled bat-diva [insert Photoshopped image of KG Jr. dressed as Adam West sending back a meal here], but I found it funny.

POSTSCRIPT: Damn that's a lot of "Kens" for one tiny little blog item. Three, in fact. Ken, Ken, Ken. Ken't hold onto a goddamn lead -- that's what the White Sox ken't do lately! [insert apology for terrible, albeit true, joke here]

_____

FOOTNOTE:

*[suggestion: dip into library of Paul Konerko photos for source material -- is the resemblance not uncanny?]

Who are you?

I am Bat Cat!!!

Climbing the everythings of Gotham Apartment in a never-ending quest to rid its streets and sidewalks (I mean -- catwalks) of my most despiséd nemesis -- the house fly -- and to eat their tiny crunchy bodies, I am Bat Cat.

Armed with nothing but a soul-warping desire to cleanse Gotham Apartment of buzzy mobile bug-objects and my super-powers of: reckless extreme climbing ability ... dogged monomaniacal persistence ... and the kind of amoral willingess to mix comic-book metaphors with a sheer disregard for logic possessable only by a mutant fly-fighting feline -- as I've already said twice before (but with slightly different emphasis), I am Bat Cat.

OK, OK, you're Bat Cat. Sheesh. I'll tell you -- never bring a kitten to an Imax show. They have no sense of perspective.

Weds Nite No Reason at All Post

One or two or more of the people at large and in the roster of occasional blog visitees know that I am one of the larger Mike Nesmith fans, and not just by volume or carat weight. Here's a YT thang I am especially taken with because during the part where Mike is trying to remember what key it's in, I shouted "G!" and then right on cue he said "No, it's definitely not G."

Anyway, sweet song.


Mike Nesmith - Wax Minute

But it ain't my favorite Nez song. This one is. This is the song I fell for after checking out the "Live at the Palais" LP from the Gurnee public library sometime in the early 1980s. And this version contains a story -- the story of the song, even.



Mike Nesmith - Grand Ennui

Actually, though, this is my favorite Mike Nesmith tune. He did it with the Monkees. It's also my favorite Monkees song. I could listen to this one over and over, and sometimes I do.



The Monkees - You Just May Be The One

Words lack the power ...

I'm going to lift the following (short) news item from ChicagoTribune.com wholesale because it contains so much ... so ... much that mere reference is insufficient. Just a few of the CBRATian elements (would-be tags if I had the energy to set up a whole tagging scheme): Cubs, Sox, Gurnee, drunken suburban violence, unspellable names, and inaccessibility by phone.

For some reason this story reminds me of a bit of spam I received last week, which had the best spam email subject heading I think I've ever gotten. It said:

Nazi toddlers ruined my birthday

It was all I could do not to open it. Anyway, I guess this is more like "Nazis ruin toddler's birthday," but that's pretty damn close. Close enough to spur a little "thematic connection" synapse in my brain.

Maybe I'll expound more on this tomorrow, with more prose and whatnot, but for now here it is, the most Stronger Than Dirt Pete Mossiest news item of 2008, so far:

Cubs fans accused of beating White Sox fan

The Associated Press
8:31 PM CDT, July 28, 2008

HUNTLEY, Ill. - McHenry County authorities say three Chicago Cubs fans face felony battery charges after allegedly beating a Chicago White Sox fan so badly he lost his right eye.

The men are accused of beating 32-year-old Robert Steele of Gurnee during a 2-year-old girl's Sesame Street-themed birthday party.

Police said Monday the men were drinking alcohol at the July 19th party and taunting Steele.

They say Steele was kicked in the head and his nose was broken. He stayed several days at an Elgin hospital.

Thirty-one-year-old Jaroslaw Czapla, 37-year-old Boguslaw Czapla and 33-year-old Maciej Trojnar face mob action and aggravated battery charges.

Jaroslaw Czapla's number is unlisted. There were no listings for Boguslaw Czapla or Trojnar.

Ich bin ein Old Man

Oy. Apparently I cannot rrrock like I vaguely recall being able to do. Caught a show at the Empty Bottle last nite, and boy are my everythings tired. I only had two beers, but my body is no longer equipped to stand upright for that many hours in a row. Anyway, another fine performance by Scott Hiram Biram, supported by the outlandish Bob Log III and Fort Wayniacs Left Lane Cruiser. If you weren't there, sorry to have missed you.

This blog is undergoing serious summertime neglect, for which I apologize to my dozen or so readers. With any luck, and some rest, I'll get back to it pretty soon, maybe tonight. For now, here's a YouTubed-up sampling of the stuff that's making me drag ass like McCain's older brother today.



Left Lane Cruiser - Wash It



Bob Log III - I Want Your Shit on My Leg



Scott H. Biram - Fixing to Die

Krazy Kitten Korner: Piper and Mingus Glad to Be Back in Chi, Wrecking Stuff

City baby cats say, "Oi, oi! What shall we destroy next?"



Charged GBH - City Baby Attacked By Rats/City Baby's Revenge

Sat Nite YT Vid Post: I Wonder What the Hell Ever Happened to My Goddamn Ween Tape Edition

Sometime in 1992 I lost a goddamn Ween tape, specifically the cassette version of their 1991 album "The Pod," and I never found the mutherfucker. I was in law school at the time, living in a somewhat crappy apartment in Urbana, Illinois, in between Green Street and Main Street, on Elm. Just in case you want to get in a time machine and past-stalk me. I have no idea what happened to that fucking Ween tape. It's bugged me ever since. Where did you go, Ween tape? A nation turns its lonely eyes to you. Woo woo woo.

Roughly around that same time (as in, roughly around some set of dates within the confines of the three year period I lived in that apartment) there was a homeless dude squatting in the utility closet in the hallway. Not literally squatting -- actually, he would sort of lie in there on his back with his rancid legs sticking out the makeshift wood-panel door (sans padlock). And, naturally, he would cough, snort, hack, spit, and rant and rave all night long, snarling curses at Jesus H. Christ and whatever other motherfucking cocksucking shit shit shit fuck demons that were getting his Irish up. That utility closet was separated from my living room by a metal grating that I didn't feel incredibly confident about, vis a vis its physical integrity, so after about four days I got the landlord to put a lock on the closet door. But ... maybe during those four days, that dude used telekinetic powers to unscrew the screws to that metal grate, crawled into my living room, and TOOK MY GODDAMN WEEN TAPE. Then he crawled back into the closet, re-telekinetically-screwed the screws back into place, and left the entire scene as he found it, with no apparent evidence of tampering. OTHER THAN THE ABSENCE OF MY WEEN TAPE.

Or else maybe something else happened to it. Beats me. Anyway, I used to like this "Pork Roll Egg and Cheese" tune from that tape a lot, and now of course there's YouTube (until Sumner Redstone and his evil fucking minions of fuck ruin it), so I don't even need that futhermucking goddamn missing shit tape shit shit shit Jesus fuck your mother fuck your brother bleaaaggghhhh grmble gbah ghrahrr blegghghhhh! Hack! Ptui! Wheeze!

Dream of the Sam Adams and Drambuie Fiend (don't ask)

Last night I dreamed that I was making out with Jenna Fischer, and then we were interrupted by Stephen Colbert, who wanted me to look over a little John McCain skit he'd written for his show, you know, to see what I thought about it. It was pretty funny and surreal, something about a plane crash that McCain averted with his superhero-like physical strength. Then Jenna Fischer and I started making out again, while Colbert and his entire crew watched. Then I woke up. God damn it. Where's a persistent vegetative state when you need one?

Politics and History Corner: Profiles in Scrotal Courage: Like Riding a Wire Fence: The LBJ's Slacks Years

People often, in my imagination, ask me, "Hey Colicky, hey Mr. Obama's Not Good Enough, has there ever been a President you've liked? Do you have a favorite?"

Well, pretend questioner person, that one's easy. Yes! My favorite President of the USA is the one who was (purely coincidentally) occupying the White House when I was born -- and that would be Mr. Lyndon Baines Johnson, of Texas.

Yeah, I know. Nobody but history profs looking for something contrary to say in a bid to get attention defend LBJ's presidency. LBJ escalated the Vietnam War, was a lifelong racist, and probably ordered the hit on JFK, but he made some really excellent tapes of his own private phone conversations. Much better than the Nixon tapes, even.

Everyone knows all about the wacky LBJ tapes already -- at least they do if they've listened to about five seconds of NPR in the last 10 or 11 years. But that fact doesn't diminish their total brilliancy and sublime geniosity.

Below is embedded a YouTube rendering of my favorite LBJ tape. Nope, it's not the "goat glands" tape, although that one kicks zany ass, too. And it's not the really creepy one where he hits on Jackie Kennedy. My favorite LBJ tape -- I've summoned recollection of bits of it often for more than 10 years now; as such, it's been an invaluable source of inspiration and wisdom: you might say it's my bright shining beacon in a dark and stormy world -- is the tape of the phone call he made to the Haggar people, ordering six pairs of lightweight pants for casual summer wear.

Among the things we learn from this recording is that LBJ carried his own money -- and a pocket knife. Imagine that -- I don't think John McCain has even set eyes on cash money in at least 25 years, let alone toted his own supply. The Secret Service would probably never allow any President or candidate to carry around a knife. The current Preznit might have allegedly prodigious brush-clearing skills, but I suspect that if he'd ever been permitted the possession of his very own keen Victorinox Swiss Army model, he wouldn't have choked on a pretzel a few years ago -- he would have gouged out his hard palate with the sewing awl. If LBJ were still alive, he'd probably be brandishing a Leatherman Juice Xe6 multi-tool -- or two -- Secret Service be damned.

We also learn at right around two minutes into the excerpt that when LBJ gained a little weight, he suffered from ... a specific variety of physical discomfort. As a guy who's made the mistake of over-hasty and over-thrifty trouser selections, I gotta admit, I can sympathize. If I could get Haggar on the horn and make them throw in an inch here and two inches there, I would.

He does seem very pleased with himself when the gentleman at Haggar asks where he wants them sent, and LBJ replies, "White House," but wouldn't you? Sure, we're all humble and lovable shoe-shine boys and girls in our humdrum lives here, but I defy any one of you to become leader of the Western world without revealing a little pride when you give your address to catalog retailers. Although I like to believe I'd temper it a little bit -- "Yeah, send them to the White House -- basement apartment." Besides, I wouldn't really need to impress anyone -- I'd just be happy that my balls finally felt really good.

So, please enjoy. There's also a Real Media version and a real nice transcript hyah.

Ess Ayy Tee YouTube Arr Dee Ayy Why Nite Video Post: You Can't Spell "Gurnee" Without "Gun" Edition

I hope everybody had a nice Jesus Christ's Favorite Country's Birthday yesterday. I'm still up hyah in the wilds of northeastern Lake County, on the edge of nothing, at the tangential point between zero and the square root of negative one. Near the skeevy crotch formed by the Lake Mitchikan coast and the shockingly non-fortifried border with Winksconskin.

I last lived full-time in this region (in this house, even) in that decade I like to call "The Eighties." During the last half of that decade, I was pretty heavily into hardcore punk -- especially Midwest-style (you know, that Naked Raygun-type "Whoa oh" variety) -- an example of which being frontman Tesco Vee's Michigan/D.C. combo, The Meatmen.

Here's a fine Meatmen number that, for me, at the time, in the place, under the conditions prevailing, summed up the local Zeitgeist fairly close to 100 percent accurately. With references to Harleys, snowmobiling, monster trucks, Pabst, Montgomery Ward, and bowling, you've got just about every ingredient of this still-rural, brackish zone between IL and WI in the Reagan '80s. Not to mention the misogyny and general violent fuckheadery. I'm not sure if this Upper Midwest brand of redneck cretinism still dominates hereabouts, or if things have ch-ch-ch-changed, but I have a feeling you don't have to search with a fine-toothed comb to find plenty of dudes like the character in this tune.

Not that I have much latitude to mock. For a while in high school my own uniform involved a mullet and a flannel shirt, and my best friend drove an El Camino. And just yesterday I grilled up some brats, ja hey, and smoked some beers, so ... yeah, I guess I might be an Upper Midwest Redneck, too.

Who's for another beer? Hell, ja! You fuckin' betcha!



The Meatmen - True Grit

My wife laments -- I drink! I’m crass!
Plug her little sister in the ass
Please do not of house chores, dearest, speak
Cuz the truck pull derby is this week

I’m a scumbag -- I know what I like
Plodding loony on my Harley D. bike
Bowling league and a dozen beer runs
Snowmobiling over bunnies is fun

My four-wheeler is 60 feet high
Jack and Cokes in the morning, spouse cries
Poaching wildlife for personal gain
Gunaholic commie-hatin’ insane!

When I get all hostile, in a snit
I’m true blue dirtbag -- I am true grit!
When I shine my piece it gets real stiff
I’m a nasty, ass-kickin' prick when I get miffed!

Shooting pool at "White Trash Magnet Lanes"
Flirt with boozy, sleazy, bleachy dames
I was weaned on my dad’s sphincter ring
Ten years old before I said a thing

I’m a redneck -- I know what I like
Death for fudge-packin’ homos and dykes
Equal rights for the wenches? No way!
Mother, guts, God and Ronnie’s OK

Got a case of Pabst soaked in me gourd
Got my "Action Slacks" from Montgomery Wards
Poaching wildlife for personal gain
Gunaholic commie-hatin’ insane!

When I get all hostile, in a snit
I’m true blue dirtbag -- I am true grit!
When I shine my piece it gets real stiff
I’m a nasty, ass-kickin' prick when I get miffed!

Summertime, and the blogger is lazy

Some people say there are two kinds of Republican voter: millionaires and suckers. OK. I'll buy that. But there's only one kind of Democratic voter: suckers. (There are millionaires who vote Democratic, to be sure, but they're subsumed within the "sucker" category.)

Why I Drink: Stinking in the Suburbs Edition

Yeah, so, I'm up in Lake friggin County (land of not quite enough flooding, unfortunately), house and cat sitting for my parents while they're back east on their annual visit to see my dad's side of the family. The kittens are pestering their old cat, eating his food, playing with his toys. He's not too happy about it. I'd prefer to be elsewhere, myself. This is my least favorite part of the summer. I can't stand the suburbs. I did some grocery shopping at a "Super Wal-Mart" in Waukegan this afternoon and I wanted to break into one of the shotgun cases and Hemingway (Cobain?) myself. Hellish. Nothing's within walking distance, all the cars are gigantic, and everyone drives 900 miles an hour -- badly. The people are all super-sized, too, as if someone injected them with a huge syringe full of brine, like a cheap ham. Not just fat -- big. Necks bigger around than my waist -- and I have a pretty fat waist. Calves like beer barrels. Goddamn military crewcuts on their leathery, huge heads. And the men are even worse!

Feline Engineering Disasters

Episode 1: Fresca Box Tunnel breached by pesky sister.

Argh: In which a rant about FISA devolves into a strange sports metaphor and then ends ... simply ends

Two things I can't sit through without the word "bullshit" playing in my mind over and over for the duration are: a church service (any church service) and a House floor debate on C-SPAN.

After watching Nancy Pelosi this morning, I may be unable to eat for the rest of the day. My appetite has seceded from the Union. My entire digestive system is now calling itself The Free Alimentary Canal Zone of Occupied North America.

I wonder how my old crim law prof, Wayne LaFave, feels these days. LaFave is the country's leading expert on Fourth Amendment law, and his treatise on search & seizure is recognized as the leading work on the subject. I don't want to ascribe any particular political leanings to him -- because I, frankly, don't know for sure what his political opinions are -- but I have to imagine that it must be weird for him that the entire span of meaningful Fourth Amendment protection has fit within his entire professional career.

LaFave's writing was, it can be argued, instrumental in the development of search & seizure law as we knew it. One thing they don't teach the heck out of in high school civics and history classes is that the Bill of Rights didn't have a lot of practical value for ordinary citizens until relatively recently. Depending on which right you're talking about, none of the "rights" in the Constitution really existed until some point in the 20th Century. The Fourth Amendment was not applied to state governments until 1961 -- before that, it had no effect on most criminal prosecutions. The "reasonable expectation of privacy" test for search and seizure -- which has become at least somewhat familiar to most reasonably well-educated Americans -- didn't exist until 1967. Even the exclusionary rule -- without which, the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures was essentially meaningless -- wasn't established until 1914.

After the Warren Court expanded search and seizure protections into something approaching practical reality, the Burger and Rehnquist Courts began taking a whittling knife to the Fourth Amendment. Exception after exception was adopted throughout the Reagan-Bush-Clinton years. The Bush Two administration has made tool upgrades to an axe, a chain saw, and an Acme®-brand Wile E. Coyote-style TNT demolition device. The Roberts Court seems likely to accelerate the process.

The NSA approached telecoms with its plan for comprehensive citizen surveillance six months prior to that Big Boom-Boom Day that's used to justify all subsequent legal erosions to our civil liberties. Everything from FISA to Daley's lust for CCTV cameras convinces me that "privacy rights" existed only as long as it was too technologically unfeasible or expensive to spy on everyone. Now that the technology is capable and cheap, all bets are off. Total exposure to government monitoring now seems inevitable. Why? Because they can.

For a brief time -- well shorter than the average span of a human life -- the Constitution rose slightly above mere "piece of paper" status. It is now, to borrow a phrase from the baseball stat nerds, "reverting to the mean." The Constitution is like a pitcher who had several lousy seasons in his early career, then broke out and won 20 games for a couple of seasons and a Cy Young Award, and then blew his arm out.

Yeah, that's right, I just implied that the Constitution is like Steve Stone. Which indicates to me that this rant has run its course. In closing, as Lenny Bruce would say, "Emmis."

ON A LIGHTER NOTE: But, hey, it's Crosstown Classic weekend! I predict the Sox will take two out of three at Wrigley, and sweep next weekend at The Cell. This could be good news for Friend of CBRAT, Mr. "Pat" Jacobson, who vowed a few weeks ago that he would give up his left nut in exchange for a Sox sweep of the whole kaboodle.

So, if you find yourself walking around in the Uptown/Andersonville Terrace area this weekend, and you hear a voice coming from a window somewhere -- yelling "Pat's left nut! Pat's left nut!" -- don't be alarmed. That will just be me.

UPDATE: PAT'S LEFT NUT LIVES: Well, we can put away the Burdizzo. Cubs win, 4-3. The Sox will not be sweeping the Crosstown Classic in 2008.

This update was brought to you by "Pat's Left Nuts on Clark," serving the Wrigleyville Community for nearly 30 snacktastic years.

Wednesday Night Blog Meeting: Cats Named, Sox Good Again

After much deliberation and trial and error, I laid names on my crazy new furry buddies. I'm calling the boy Mingus, after Charles, my favorite jazz genius. Mingus the cat has some of Mingus the man's audacity. And Charles Mingus was tuned in enough with felines that he was able to teach his cat Nightlife to use the toilet.

I'm calling the girl Piper, not so much after notable girl Pipers Piper Laurie, Piper Perabo, or even Buzz Kilman's daughter Piper, as Rowdy Roddy. My favorite pro grappler. I know Roddy is a dude, but if you saw Piper the kitten wrestle, you'd get where I'm coming from. Piper is here to do two things: kill toy mice, and kick your ass. And all the toy mice are lost under the couch.

In other good news, the Sox pummeled the Pittsburgh Butt Pirates again tonight. I call them the Butt Pirates because they are butt pirates. Actually, I still have some nostalgia for the Pirates, because I attended game four of the 1979 World Series, at Three Rivers Stadium ... which they lost, but they came back to win the series. Steve Stone pitched in relief for the Orioles at that game, and now he's doing excellent radio work with Ed Farmer on AM 670, so it all comes back to the White Sox in the final analysis. I'm believing in them again. Don't let me down, you (pale) hosers.

And now for some YouTubes, cuz at least a few people seem to enjoy them. First up is a short biography of Charles Mingus, followed by a little "Hot Rod" Piper.

Personnel Announcement

I'm pleased to announce that today we added two new staffers to the CBRAT®-brand blogging family. Please join me in welcoming ... uh ... they don't have names yet.

On the left: unnamed girl kitten. On the right: unnamed boy kitten. Their interests include attacking my sneakers, falling asleep on my sneakers, and attacking my sneakers some more.

Don't you know / The Lord above / Created you / Just for me to love

At the risk of overloading this here CBRAT with Gugug (impossible!), I'm embedding up this YouTube video just 16 hours old, offered in tribute to Bo Diddley. This is a number I first heard on a collection I bought on cassette shortly after being blown all the way to the end of creation and back by Bo's set at the Chicago Blues Fest in June 1986. I still haven't stopped yammering about that performance. Changed my damn life.

Peter Meehan Is a Blithering Idiot

The NY Times "Travel" section today has an interactive map of ballparks, allegedly describing the best and worst food choices available at them.

What does dimwitted, water-headed, shit-for-a-palate "food writer" Peter "Wouldn't Know My Ass From a Hole in the Ground Except That My Ass Is What I Pull My Prose Out Of" Meehan have to say about U.S. Cellular Field?



I have a feeling that Meehan has never actually visited Sox Park. As long as I've been going to baseball games in Chicago -- which is over 30 years -- Sox Park has had far superior food to the ivy-covered urinal on the North Side. (At Wrigley, he recommended the Italian sausage and advised skipping the hot dogs, with which I can't argue. Except that I'd advise skipping the Italian sausage and the entire trip, as well. Nothing is good at Wrigley, unless you enjoy comparing your tackle with other mens' while pissing in a trough.)

Paper of record? To quote Lee Elia, "My ass."

POSTSCRIPT: For a more sensible review of U.S. Cellular Field's food, see this Sports Illustrated fan survey, in which Sox Park ranked 2nd best for eats, with 58.8% rating it as "excellent." (Wrigley Field -- 22nd best, with 14% excellence.)

So long, Bo

Ha'ina 'ia mai ana ka puana: Friday Evening Ukulele Post

I promised, and I'm delivering. Enjoy for your pleasure some items of ukulelal interest, please.

Friend of the blogger from back-in-the-day days The Viper has a blog. OK, he has had it for a while, but I didn't stumble upon it until this week. And I'm glad I did. Do everyone a favor and go read it thoroughly. We won't go anywhere in the meantime.

Scotland's YouTube frickin' genius sensation(s) Gugug has more of what Gugug does up on the thing. Here's a small selection. Watch it and see if you fail to smile, you soulless bastid.



Gugug (feat. Duglas) - Georgy Girl

William H. Macy plays the ukulele and dishes dirt about co-stars, simultaneously!



William H. Macy does what I said, on Oprah ... well, not literally on Oprah ... that'd be a real scoop, though ... damn

From the fine programme, Later with Jools Holland:



Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain - Smells Like Teen Spirit

The Undertones get coverage (this one is dedicated to John Peel, RIP):



Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain - Teenage Kicks

I can't stand to leave out this cover of one of my favorite Bowie numbers (which also relates to my reference to the Mars lander in the last post -- not included, audio of me singing along to this in falsetto in my apartment ... sorry):



Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain - Life on Mars

"Ha'ina 'ia mai ana ka puana" means, "Begin again at the refrain," or "Tell the story in the refrain," depending on the translator.



Warren Zevon - Hula Hula Boys

I've spent a few weeks on the Big Island, but I've not been to this place. It's on the agenda for next visit.



Keonepax - Pu'u Anahulu

Please excuse the politics, I'll try to keep it brief

I generally don't blog about politics here (or anywhere) because this is Colicky Baby Records and Tapes, not Enraged and Disgusted Quasi-Marxist Post-Situationist Records and Tapes (yet), but the Pfather Pfleger pflap ricocheting around the pipes today like a particularly evil unit of Quick Draw McGraw ammo has my guts in a roil, and it's got to come out. (Another reason I don't blog about politics is that they inspire the worst in mixed metaphors by me. One more alert: The following rant is unrehearsed, hastily written, sloppy, and unedited, for the most part, so you all may wanna skip it entirely and wait for some more wacky smartass baseball posts and/or obscure YouTube rock, jazz, and ukulele videos, which will follow fairly soon, I'm sure.)

Conventional punditry has it that Obama faces big difficulties from racism among rural, poor, uneducated white people. Frankly, I think he's got enough to worry about from (a more subtle but just as virulent type of) racism among the urban (and suburban and exurban), relatively affluent, nominally educated ones. The reaction to Pfleger's sermon proves to me once again that even "liberals" are not ready to discuss race in a way that makes whitey uncomfortable. To fail to suck liberal white ass just isn't cricket; it just isn't, as they say in Blighty, done. Tut tut. Pfleger didn't get the memo, I guess, the memo that clearly indicates that all oratory on racial issues must be prefaced, during-faced, and post-faced with repeated assurances that almost all white people are A-OK, except for a few of those bad, uneducated ruffians, mostly from the distant past. Any suggestions that such a thing as white privilege exists are just not cool, bro. Those suggestions, are, in fact, "black racism," because "making some sensitive pale-faced suburbanites feel bad by saying some nasty, nasty words in loud, loud voices" is totally on a par with "creating a permanent underclass via the 'badges and indicia' of slavery, continued institutionalized bias, systematic police harassment and torture, disproportionately harsh treatment by the criminal justice system, coverage in the media that vacillates between 'benign' neglect and unconcealed disdain, etc. etc., and so forth."

I didn't read all of Pfleger's sermon, and I don't really feel like watching the video, so I don't know about the assertions on Pandagon.net that he dove into the realm of misogyny -- to which, if true, I say, shame on the Pfather. I'm not among Pfleger's pfans, by any means. I'll be ticked off at him pforever for getting all the head shops shut down, and he's demonstrated a large degree of unthinking ass-headedness several times over the years ... but I'm sticking with what I said in the previous graf. Maybe ostensibly progressive white people are so easily bruised in the emotionality because of a huge case of subconscious guilt -- or fear. That'd make some sense. It's still irritating as all get-out. OK, that's enough from me on that. Challenges and/or practically anything at all in the comments are welcome.

One last parting shot -- in somewhat ironic honor of the new Mars mission (which I hasten to disclose, I consider to be hella cool), here's this (followed by more Gil, just because if it's good to you it must be good for you):



Gil Scott-Heron - Whitey on the Moon



Gil Scott-Heron - Black History



Gil Scott-Heron - No Knock



Gil Scott-Heron - Whitey on the Moon (another version) & Hold On

Notes from Section 529: And it was at that point that I said to my Sherpa, "Gunga galunga ... gunga, gunga-galunga"

I went to the Sox game yesterday, and Steve Nick Swisher played in a Sox game yesterday. But I think we were at totally different Sox games.

[Laboratory-made testosterone aficionado Gary] Matthews [Jr.] threw out Nick [Pom Poms for Brains] Swisher at second base in the fifth. Swisher lined a single toward the right-field corner and Matthews slid on one knee to cut off the ball and -- all with fluidity -- popped up to make a perfect throw on the fly from deep right.

"Unbelievable play," Swisher said.

I believe a certain Mr. Jacobson and a certain Squeaky Z will attest to the fact that, as soon as the outfielder picked up the ball and started to throw, a certain Dirt Moss said, out loud, audibly, "He's out." And he was out. In other words, I found the play to be totally believable. And predictable. And that was from the very top row behind home plate, which is at an altitude of approximately 18,750 feet above sea level.

I will edit Swishy's statement for him.

"Unbelievably stupid baserunning by me," Swisher should have said. "Might have cost us the game. But at least I have swagger! I'm a great cheerleader! I can't hit or run or catch or throw all that well, but I have ENTHUSIASM! Everyone LOVES me cuz I'm so damn HILARIOUS! Check it out, I can fit an entire GLASS in my mouth! Hey, lay-deee!!!"

Ready for some baseball

Going to the Sox game this afternoon. New winning streak starts today at some point in the indeterminate future.

No Mas Equis, Por Favor

To the elderly bearded "Stay thirsty, my friend" guy in the Dos Equis commercials airing endlessly every commercial break during major league baseball games this season: Hey, I think your obituary is "beefed up" enough. I'm ready to read it. In the morning paper.

In other embedded thoughts regarding last night's Sox telecast: During the pre-game ceremony for Carlton Fisk (which was, of course, rife with typical sports-TV male soap opera weepiness, including hideous rock ballads, to which I supplied my own impromptu lyrics, including, "I'm not gay, but I'd love to suck your joint" and the less subtle "I want to wake up with your burly he-man pubes stuck between my teeth and the stink of your musk on my sheets" -- I guess you had to be there) did Carlton Fisk's bike have training wheels? Ron Kittle didn't use no training wheels. And Bo Jackson's hips, ankles, elbows, and kneecaps were fashioned by surgical Druids from Welsh bluestone, and he didn't need no training wheels. I guess Pudge left his "Pole" at Fenway. There's a wicked obscure attempt at some Red Sox humah for yah.

I was also trying to come up with a "Lute Fisk" joke but I gave up. I think he is of Swedish extraction, though. I guess we'll take him.

Motivational blogging puts Sox back in first place

Also, an interleague series with the totally weak San Francisco Giants helped, too.

OK, that's all for now. More posting if and when I get over the stomach bug that hit me over the weekend. You don't wanna know about it.

If I write the one-millionth "Down with OBP" joke headline in blogging history, will balloons and confetti fall from my ceiling?

I've been living in some considerable dread that I will be challenged about an anomalous development in the pages of this Blogger®-brand web-based publication. That challenge -- which would come from an imaginary critic that I'll imagine with the voice of my old pal, Kirby the Beekeeper, who can issue a loud challenge, to be sure -- would consist of something like, "Hey, Colicky! Hey, Mr. White Sox fan! How come all's you write about on this blog anymore is the Cubs?"

Well, I'll tell you. First, check the name of the blog. If you're aiming to create some kind of semi-fictional (OK, quarter-fictional) Colicky Baby characterization for yourself, you can't beat the Chicago National League Ball Club for material. Plus, I live on the North Side (granted, in Uptown, which is sort of the North Side's least favorite body part, aside from maybe East Rogers Park -- although East Rogers at least has the advantage of being a couple miles farther away from Wrigleyville), and the constant turnover of doe-eyed (or is that wall-eyed?) Iowa and Michigan temporary transplants serving out their three-to-five-year post-collegiate "urban adventure" (heavy on the public drunkenness and urination) and wearing various faux-vintage machine-antiqued Cubs gear in all the liquor stores and taverns (my places, damn it -- I've earned title to them through 10 years of hard Uptown living) before spawning little replicants clad in spittle-stained Cubs onesies and then moving to godforsaken places like Schaumburg and Naperville after driving up rents in "The City" -- well, sorry for the run-on, but those transients are a constant source of inspiration -- colicky-wise.

Short version: It's too much fun to pick on the Cubs to resist doing so.

Second, the White Sox. Have you been watching them lately? If so, I'm sorry. In particular, I'm sorry for predicting, a few months ago, that Nick Swisher would "get on base a lot." Oops. Nick's OBP is currently a few points higher than the team's OBP, but the team's OBP is sadder than a Kazuo Ishiguro novel. Yes, the Sox are like an old English butler whose time has passed and who gave up the chance for true love to live out a dying ideal, when it comes to on-base percentage right now. Or something like that. Anyway, maybe I should go back and quietly edit that post by adding the phrase "in April." As in, "Nick Swisher will get on base a lot in April, before turning into a strikeout machine with grotesque facial hair."

Although predicting that Nick Swisher would "get on base a lot" might be less embarrassing than accidentally referring to him, as I've done about a dozen times in meat-space, as "Steve Swisher" ... but then that probably just means I'm getting old.

And I don't get much pleasure, personally, from making fun of the Sox at this time. I could slag Konerko, but why? I guess I actually did make fun of Juan Uribe the other day, but that's allowed.

Have the Cubs signed Jim "Hollywood" Edmonds yet? That should go at least as well as the Nomar signing.

See what I mean?

Brennaman Was Right

Cubs fans are the biggest assholes in the Solar System. Until Voyager or SETI or some other gizmo turns up evidence of superior extraterrestrial assholery orbiting distant stars, Cubs fans are the ranking assholes in the entire universe.

The latest rectal display: booing former Eastern Illinois University quarterback Tony Romo at yesterday's game. Sure, I'm no Dallas Cowboys fan, and Jessica Simpson's boyfriend is a pretty tempting target, but the whole booing bullshit has been way out of hand at Wrigley Field for a long time. I hate that 7th inning stretch "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" guest singer nonsense and wish they'd drop it, but Cubs fans, you are dicks. By all accounts, Romo can't sing and he murdered the wretched song, but it's supposed to be a stupid little bit of fun. Are you telling me Harry Caray could sing?

Also, it's a goddamned game. Responding to everything you don't appreciate by making an ass of yourself -- booing, throwing garbage onto the field, etc. -- is pathetic. And Cubs fans have demonstrated themselves to be the schmuckiest of schmucks in that regard. Booing opposing players is jerky enough, but Cubs fans constantly boo their own home team. When the cheap seats cost upward of $40, and you show up to boo and throw shit onto the field ... you are a cock. A chancrous, leaking, tiny cock.

Plus, it was Mother's Day. Romo's mom was probably in attendance. Booing some guy for trying to entertain you for a minute or two, in front of his mom, on Mother's Day ... well, fuck you, Cubs fans. Fuck you to hell. To paraphrase Bill Shatner, you sicken me.

Cubs fans are like every irritating fuckhead on my dorm floor in college. Every dimwitted drunken blowhard who thought it was cute to act like Bluto from Delta House at all times. Luckily for me, most of those anuses flunked out after one semester, but Cubs fans never ... go ... away. In fact, they seem to multiply like a virus.

And word has gotten around. To wit, see embedded below, an instant classic from a few weeks ago -- crotchety old Reds announcer Marty Brennaman pointing out the obvious. When a noted chumfucker like Brennaman can't abide your dickery, your dickery is considerable in magnitude. Brennaman may be an unlovable bag of hostile dementia, but he's right.

Happy Mother's Day

Just got off the phone with Ma Moss. Among other things, we talked some politics. Like me, she's dissatisfied with all of the major party candidates.

"If they keep it up," she said, "I'm going to vote for Nader again."

Yep. That's my Ma.

And now for all you mothers and muthaz, here's some Mothers. (I'm Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss, the Swede of the group.)



Mother People



Motherly Love



Son of Suzy Creamcheese



My Guitar Wants to Kill Your Mama