Hey, whaddaya know, it’s Dec. 12, which means … something. I dunno what. I got nothin’ here.
Oh, yeah — this was the day back in 2000 that the Supremes pulled the plug on Al Gore’s campaign, which had been on life support for the better part of quite some time.
Well, as “Odd Bodkins” cartoonist Dan O’Neill was fond of saying, “Reality is a 5-4 decision in the Supreme Court.”
We now return you to the reality-based community, which is already in progress.
Mad Blog Media 
Dear Mr. Dog,
I first learned your name following Charles Pelkey, aka LUG. Your own postings have charm. Thanks for a great Carlin rant. Lately, you’ve started my day with Zappa – nothing like a bit of “Old Brown Eyes” with breakfast! Methinks you share my sense of irony. Today, you even (slightly mis-) quoted Dan O’Neill. [Sun: “What’s this ‘absolute truth’ thing?” Moon: “It’s a five-to-four..”] You might agree that reality and absolute truth are not identical. You’re the first person in decades who has mentioned Dan O’Neill. The Explainer can tell you what Disney did to Dan & friends at Hell Comics for degrading Mickey, whose copyright survives any post-diluvian human. I’m keen on DO’N’s attitude, which we share with Carlin & Zappa. If you cannot laugh at the big stuff: 1) you’re in the wrong country; 2) you have a problem; 3) you’re numb; or 4) you weep. In his Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton places two philosophers, Democritius of Abdera and Hercleitus, atop a cliff observing humans; H wept at the folly of man, but our boy D could not stop cackling. As O’Neill puts it:
“DO NOT SEEK TO REMOVE HIS HAND FROM HIS THROAT BECAUSE HE IS ABOUT TO CHOKE ON HIS OWN RICH LAUGHTER, BECAUSE THEN YOU WILL HAVE TO GUARD YOUR OWN.” Good advice to all censors.
Marc (M.Div, J.D.)
I was reading O’Neill back in the Seventies and remember well the Air Pirates tilting against Disney’s legal windmills (don’t tell anyone, but I myself had been known to scarf a magic cookie on Tuesday after lunch).
My comics collection, which has long been out of control, includes “Hear the Sound of my Feet Walking … Drown the Sound of My Voice Talking,” “The Collective Unconscience of Odd Bodkins,” “Buy This Book of Odd Bodkins” … you get the idea.
Your note provoked me to dig out a couple of the Hell Comics editions of “Dan O’Neill’s Comics and Stories” with the “South of the Slot” strips featuring Cub Calloway, ace reporter. Being an old rim rat and a Jack London reader, I liked the double gag.
I knew I shouldn’t have quoted O’Neill from memory, which is a fickle bitch. All I had to do was rotate the office chair 180 degrees, snatch the book out of the shelf and do what any marginally competent editor does — check the facts.
But noooo. …
At the time, before the plug got pulled, I believed that living with the uncertainty of who would be President was a hell of a lot better than knowing Shrub would be President. Didn’t need 8 years to validate that belief either.
Ben, that was a slo-mo train wreck indeed. Gore was thinking coronation and W’s handlers were thinking circumcision. The bigger dick won.
Got the big red K1100RS home as snow was falling in BombTown. Any later would have been trouble any day in my book. But snow sure beats wildfire.
K, glad to hear you made it home with the shiny side up. You should forward us a photo of you astraddle The Beast, if you can get Meena to pull the trigger … on a camera, that is.
So now you dose the gas up with Stabil, put the battery on a charger and wait for spring? Growing up in SoCal I never understood putting things away for the winter until we moved to Iowa.
The nice thing about Northern New Mexico is the sun remains intense. Even after a good snow, three days later the sun burns off the roads and one gets back on two wheels. So I doubt the bike(s) will spend much time immobilized.
Black ice can occasionally be a bitch, though.
Well, Patrick, the way Meena is mumbling about that motorcycle, I better not bring up the idea of pulling triggers.
Geez, I remember when W was awarded the presidency. I said, “he’ll be a one-term wonder like his daddy, how much can he screw up in four years?” How wrong can a guy be? The next guy in that chair could be a corporate raider who talks out of both sides of his mouth or a half-assed “historian/lobbyist” who cheated on everyone and everything he’s been associated with. Maybe we’ll just stay here in Italy, things might get better now that ol’ Sil’s in the background instead of front and center talking about how full the ristoranti are in Milan as example of how great things were economically. The only guy more unconnected from reality might be Pat McQuaid of the UCI!
Khal, Reminds me of the time I borrowed a friend’s Yamaha FZR1000 and took Heather for a ride up in the SoCal canyons above Malibu. This was long after my racing days were over. She thought riding on the back was just OK…if she was going to ride on a moto, SHE wanted to be controlling the thing! When anyone asks why we don’t ride on a tandem bicycle I recount this story. We have much more fun each riding our own…and the moto X 2 thing would get VERY expensive very quickly!
My other half takes seriously that comment about motorcycle riders being “organ donors”. Especially in this age of texting, yacking, and otherwise witless drivers. Can’t say she doesn’t have a point, but I’m not sure why that same thinking doesn’t carry over to bicycling, which she is more than happy to engage in.
Be glad it doesn’t! In my book when your number’s up, it’s up whether you’re heading for the corkscrew at Laguna, enjoying a fun descent on your bicycle or sitting at home watching the tube. I try to follow the Stoic philosophy though I don’t do very well at it. Marcus Aurelius I’m not!
I’ve been closer to the Grim Reaper in a car and while on a bicycle. My brother in law from my first marriage almost pulled a Greg LeMond on me once when we were deer hunting–he blew a hole in the tree I was standing next to, at about head level.
Interestingly, I’ve never gotten close to the Hereafter on a motorcycle. Maybe that is next….save the best till last?
I assume you are talking about this, Larry?
Well, back in my day it was more like this
though the ancient bikes shown here were 1000 cc. When I raced in this category in the early 80’s they’d switched down to 750 cc machines. No streamlining, no electronic traction controls, twitchy overstressed mild-steel frames with rudimentary reiniforcing, it was pretty wild and wooly compared to the modern stuff.
Wish Los Alamos wasn’t so far from Laguna Seca…would be a nice place for a Motorcycle Safety Foundation course.