There’s enough bullshit in the media for Texas to open a branch office. And you’d still have enough left over to start two law firms and a Christian bookstore. — George Carlin, “40 Years of Comedy.”
Read and rave, or ride and run?
I think you know the answer to that one.
Marco Arment, whose technical advice I took regularly when Radio Free Dogpatch still roamed the Great Audio Wasteland, wondered the other day whether we might have been better off “before we knew everyone’s hot takes on everything.” (h/t John Gruber at Daring Fireball.)
George Carlin’s advice I have been taking for much, much longer.
I caught Carlin’s act early on, when he gigged on “The Tonight Show” with Jack Paar and later Johnny Carson. But he really got my attention with the 1972 album “FM & AM.” His treatise on bullshit didn’t arrive until 1997, during his live HBO special “40 Years of Comedy,” but as usual he was (a) right on target, and (2) prescient as hell.
What would he have to say today? Plenty, I expect. Carlin was a master alchemist who could transform bullshit into gold.
Me? Strictly an amateur. JV. In it for the yuks, which have proven elusive lately. Can’t quite spot the diamonds in the dung.
So instead of blogging I’ve been riding and running, feeding the birds, watching some standup (Kyle Kinane, Rory Scovel, Leanne Morgan), taking Miss Mia Sopaipilla to the spa for a wash and brush-up, contemplating various household projects long deferred, and reading fiction — no, not the news, actual for-reals fiction.
And I’m definitely not trying to round up enough pennies for the rumored foldable iPhone Duo. $2K and up for something you can leave on top of your car at the gas station or drop in a toilet?
I mean, talk about bullshit. …
Good choices!
2k for a phone so I can be better connected to bullshit? Shit, I won’t even pay 2k for a gun I don’t need. Maybe for a bicycle. At least I use those two wheeled things for the betterment of my mental and physical health. And on that note, off I go.
Oh, the places you’ll go! When you’re on safari instead of on Safari.
Yes, the latest annoyance, the Achilles tendon injury, seems to have healed and it is back to Les Minor Hill Rides. Fuck the stupid phone technology.
My sports medicine doc thinks, as I do, that a lot of these other recent and weird leg injuries are the result of over-compensation of other muscle groups for the loss of specific muscle group mass and coordination due to last year’s spinal injury blowout. Thank goodness for surgeons.
So plodding onward we go. At least, unlike last September, I don’t need crutches and teeth clenching to get from the bed to the bathroom to take a piss. Just more conservative adjustments in my riding to climb those Hors Old Fart Catégorie climbs up here. The human body is amazing in its ability to adapt and heal. Thank the Creator for that.
The body parts have a strong organized union alright. When one member gets cranky it starts a series of protests up and down the line. And then age sets in with shortening of the fibers, tendons (not to mention memory) and there you have it…..shoulders, knees and low back parts all in solidarity inflammation. My right knee is giving me shit fits almost daily because the big fellows (quads, hamstrings) aren’t getting their share of either hydration or massage. I’ve done so many stretches over the years it’s a wonder I don’t look like Gumby.
Yes, it is weird. I noticed I have been getting hamstring cramps but only in the left leg, which was damaged by the disc collapse. None in the right leg. So that’s one more reason I blame a lot of this stuff on fucking up my back last summer.
Aging is like being in a tag-team match, but with no one on your side.
The lower back starts things off, then hands off to the knees, which ring in the ankles, and then the upper body steps in — shoulders, neck, both ears and everything in between — followed by the fingers and toes.
Finally, the ass starts kicking itself and the ref steps in. “And the winnah is … Father Time!”
The iPad Mini is the worst selling device in the Apple line-up. So natch, let’s make their first $2k item something basically the same size. How many MBAs did it take to come up with that?
Yeah, I’m not sure I get it. The Duo was said to be a Tim Cook thing, which, fine. But foldables haven’t exactly crushed the market, and I suppose you could argue that this was because Apple hadn’t jumped in.
But still.
Over at Six Colors Dan Moren remembers back to when the iPad was dismissed as “just a big iPhone.” The Duo may be something else altogether, he says:
Ohhhhkay. What it looks like to me is a much more complex beastie than either iPhone or iPad with multiple possible failure points.
Sheeyit. I quit using my iPad years ago and don’t even like my iPhone all that much. I’ll be a tough sell. But then when am I not?
I have an iPad Mini. The main reason I bought it is to replace the 7gen iPod Touch when the battery finally croaks. It’s still going strong by the way. Now there are rumors the iPod Touch might get resurrected. Streaming music is losing its appeal. Rick Beato has an interesting take on this. I suspect he is related to Patrick!
Haw! Another crank like me. Like us!
I still have floppy disks and drives, Zip disks and drives, stacks of blank CD-R disks and drives to burn ’em, two Macs capable of booting into “Classic” mode (OS 9), CD/DVD players, a couple-three old iPods, and two boxes of old vinyl. Alas, no turntable to play ’em. There may be a cassette player/recorder around here somewhere.
Also, notepads and pens and one monstrous old 10-ton Underwood manual typewriter that could use a little work.
Bring on the Apocalypse!
You can get a Taylor mahogany GS Mini for a lot less than $2K. You could get one with a pickup and Boss Acoustic Singer Pro amplifier, you already have a SM-58 and stand, all for less than $2 large. We could go gigging at retirement communities. Those folks love filling up tip jars. Plus you could hawk a bunch of Mad Dog Media T shirts. Make lunch money!
I had a friend that used to play at the RV campground where he worked. It sounded like a cool gig but then I realized he had to play a lot of Jimmy Buffet.
I can listen to Jimmy. Not a lot. But he hung out with Thomas McGuane, Jim Harrison, and that crowd, and split at least one songwriting credit with Jerry Jeff Walker, so I keep a few of his tunes around for old times’ sake.
I mean, you gotta love an album called “A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean.” Playing with Jimmy on the sucka were Steve Goodman and Vassar Clements, among others.
Margaritaville is actually a really good song, just way overplayed. I think Jimmy would’ve been a cool guy to hang with if I had been into that scene but it was before my time and I probably would’ve died.
That would’ve been a rough crew to run with, for sure. McGuane in his “Captain Berserko” period. Harrison taking guns away from Hunter S. Thompson and insisting on no cocaine before dinner. That sort of thing.
Anyone Steve Goodman didn’t play with? Now THAT’S the life. Rocking with hall of famers for your salaried gig, but can still go to the grocery store and parent teacher conferences without being recognized.
We may have to find some way to augment the ol’ Socialist Insecurity, yeah? Busking beats burglary.
I told my financial planner that I planned on busking for my retirement. He didn’t think it was a good idea and he’s never heard me sing.
I had been planning to expire rather than retire, skipping the whole freegan/cat-food period and getting on with higher/lower rebirth. But then I got married and she insisted that I stick around, if only to empty the litter box.
“freegan/cat-food period” Ha! Another bulls-eye! Kudo!
Carl, I never thought I could do more than strum a few basic open chords. I don’t do much more than that now, but I played and sang for an audience seven times and mastered that pesky F chord open and barred. The last four times were for over 50 people. Yea, it was for free in the neighborhood rec center. But, for me it was a bucket list thing. If I had to do it for a living, I would be getting next to Mia at the food bowl.
I tried learning trumpet a few years ago. My wife banished me to the garage and said to watch out for the New Mexico Conservation Officers showing up, telling me that I sounded like a mortally wounded elk.
I gave up. I guess when all my mom’s brothers, my mom, and many of my cousins got the musical gene, that emptied out God’s musical gene drawer when they got to me.
I tore Margaritaville out of my song book a while ago.
Yeah, that one’s gotta go, for sure. Ptui ptui ptui. …
Perhaps I should mention “Cheeseburger in Paradise”. I bet that has you searching for the Listerine – the old Listerine.
But I like Jimmy enough to overlook the frivolous songs and realize it was about appreciating life and maybe sometimes, sitting down with friends and strumming the F cord on the 5-string.
Isn’t it great to not have children and to not worry about the future? Or maybe really, folks who were smart enough to have children worry about it less because they have faith / knowledge that their children can handle the future. Perhaps those of us aging quickly into compost without offsprings (pluralism intended) need to immerse ourselves around younger people to realize that they will work it out. We need to stop worrying about it and simply hope that a bolt of lightening thunders out of the heavens over Florida at a time when some loser chosen by the electoral college duffer raises his 4-iron in ire at a biffed shot.
As for spending money on a phone, Wow! The smartphone tech gurus sure figured out how to make a proverbial “stay in touch with the world” tit out of something that was developed for basic communication. I’d say “Thanks”, but I don’t see a benefit to selling the addicted masses something that they really won’t be more productive with.
I hope the cat is relaxing very well after the bath. They usually don’t like the start but appreciate it when it’s all over.
Regarding bicycles, how many scallywags out there have run across a seized stem bolt? I encountered my first recently in an alloy stem on a bike that I’m rehoming, and after the gamut of normal removal procedures, the bolt head finally sheared off when trying an extractor and I suddenly generated a few more ounces of scrap metal. But it was a relatively inexpensive stem and I had another on hand as a replacement. But it does make me wonder how many bike assemblers out there take the time to add a dab of lithium grease in their threading processes.
As I finish this wanderlust of words up that I know will appeal only to the beautiful ones of you out there, please take a moment today to simply enjoy some tasty coffee, or maybe later a libation (or a non-liberating libation), have a great walk, run, or ride, and maybe strum some strings or sing quietly along with a tune that you enjoy. Whatever the hell you may be doing, remember that happiness is better then worrying about the mess that we may think is ending the world as we know it. What we think is simply fodder added to the 117 billion home-sapiens that have retired before us.
Word. “Enjoy every sandwich.”
I am changes in latitudes, The captain and the Kid , God’s own drunk kind of guy, I hope Anita Bryant never does one of my songs (Manana) but I was listening to Buffett in 74 before the midwest idjits got into him. saw him in at Cesear’s in 81. Great show and lots of fun with the right weed. after seeing the places in the Carribean he sang about from, the deck of a three masted barqentine in I was really happy, But five years later the big cruisr ships and pursuit of almighty dollar ruined the place. Coors light no Red Stripe beer and Cane Garden say was the last relic but the hurricae got that. So only memories remain. But music takes me back. Now we are the people are parents warned us about. Groans all around. LOL
Quaffing Red Stripe beer (alas, now brewed by Heineken in Amsterdam), singing Tin Cup Chalice while strumming a ukulele, accompanied by a one string wash tub bass, on my (very) small town Main Street in Oklahoma – appealing to passersby to donate any amount to the local historical society, (or for $25, we will stop) – Jimmy Buffet still resonates!
One of my all-time JB faves is “Death of an Unpopular Poet,” said to have been inspired in part by real-life poets Kenneth Patchen and Richard Fariña, whose “Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me” sparked a Doors’ tune.
Another is “He Went to Paris.” Not your typical Parrothead “Why Don’t We Get Drunk and Screw?” fare (though I love that one too).
Ah me ah my…..Spent most of a glorious Saturday morning battling with Verizon over a sneaky bill increase. And while I was at it, bitched about internet gateway connection speeds dropping lower than a legislators morals. Ended up with a little lower bill but their “fix” for the internet gateway actually knocked it cold. No matter what shennanigans their tech tried. New gateway on the way but after 25 years, I do believe I’ll be leaving the Verizon camp. I used to get incredible, real person CS help in short order. Now bots and dolts and ever increasing costs. Sigh…not a lot of options for internet where I live that aren’t companies (ATT, Comcast, etc) that already porked me in the past. And although fiber optic is everywhere around town, it ain’t on my patch of earth yet. On the brighter side, using the iphone as hot spot seems to work one hell of a lot better than wifi did!
It’s funny that all these modern conveniences require us to spend an entire day (or more) fixing them about once a year
Yeah, the swine at CenturyStink yanked our drawers down again a few weeks back, adding another $10 per month or so to their already-extortionary rate for shite service.
That being said, I’m still not exactly warming up to the idea of fiber optic. I mean, who’s in a rush to have the trickle of A.I. bullshit turn into a raging torrent?
Freedom comes at a cost
Yeah that open road looks good now … if you ain’t lost
And when daytime turns to night
Well you’re sitting there wondering if the choices you made were right
Baseball, by the Michigan Rattlers
Woke up to temps in the 50s, so I did the only thing I could think of: made a pot of pork green chili that we’ll eat three different ways to start the week. As a gravy on top of breakfast burritos, a soup garnished with avocado a warm tortillas on the side, and then Day 3 gets the stew treatment with some added potatoes, pozole, or beans.
I got 99 problems, but the Santa Fe School of Cooking letting me down ain’t one of them.
Well chosen, sir. I’ve been thinking about a pot of SFSoC green chile stew myself, being slightly bored with Pierre Franey’s turkey chili (which is excellent) and my own simple posole recipe.
Had a pork loin roast that made it down from Montana. Defrosted it and made Green chilm stew form Rancho de Chimayo cookbook and a big pot of posole paired with Posas green chile and chicken tamales. The cooling weather makes it fun to cook and eat., Went2 to Santa Fe farmers market on Saturday lots of great fresh stuff. Melons sand peaches.. Plus the people watching was most primo, quite the slice of humanity on display. Plus La Chosa for lunch. Pretty good day day
Any leftovers? Yum!
Your riff on Carlin’s “40 Years of Comedy” hit the spot. I love how you pulled the 1972 album “FM & AM” into the mix, reminding us that his bull‑shit radar was already calibrated decades ago. The line about “enough bullshit in the media for Texas to open a branch office” feels oddly prophetic in today’s noise‑filled feeds. It’s funny how Marco Arment’s nostalgia for “before we knew everyone’s hot takes” mirrors Carlin’s own disdain for the endless commentary. Your blend of comedy history and media critique feels both sharp and oddly comforting.