Porking the zeitgeist
About the time I began Shatter, I read this old piece by Bruce Sterling, wherein he explains why his blogging days were numbered:
To my mind, blogging is like stand-up comedy — it’s a performance art. In that line of biz, you should always do your best to scamper off the boards while they still want more.
No, I’m not thinking of calling it quits. I’m merely reflecting how very weird this business is, and how Sterling’s assessment is right on the money. We’re all a bunch of stand-up comics. Some of you folks are channeling Steve Martin, while the rest of us are getting booed out of Open Mike Night at the Y.
What makes a humor blog outrageously successful? Tapping into the zeitgeist, that’s the conventional wisdom. Not only does the blogger offer his audience something they can’t find elsewhere, but also, they believe they want this ‘something’ desperately. Whether they really need it or not is beside the point. Did anyone really need Wonkette’s below-the-Beltway gossip? No. But it felt so good.
Yeah, it’s about entertainment, and there are as many ways to entertain people as there are people. Nevertheless, it seems to me that the humor which really sizzles is the stuff that not only taps the zeitgeist but gives it a thorough all-night porking. Take this remixed movie trailer to The Shining (which I plugged a few days ago, but y’all were sleeping): it works because it riffs off the rigidly formulaic style which seems to possess all movie trailers these days. Unless you’ve never been to a theater or watched trailers on television, you’ll recognize the satire. And if you’re familiar with The Shining, the joke is complete.
Maybe this is a tough gig for me because I don’t watch network TV, nor do I watch the videos on MTV (do they even show videos, still?) or listen to pop music on the radio. Between rentals and going to the theater, we probably see less than twelve movies a year. And so I’d love to be porking the zeitgeist, but hey, the zeitgeist and me, we don’t have much to talk about these days.
That’s why I need to win the lottery: so I can quit my day job and do nothing but go to the movies, watch TV, read People, scratch my ass, and write the funny stuff.
Oh . . . and, by the way? Just thought you ought to know that I’m Bikini Bettie.
You’re Bikini Bettie, you love being warm and
cheery. Hanging out with your friends is great
because your so fun to be around!
Which Bettie Page Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla
D.
Future History: A Wikipedia Article From The 22nd Century
The Decline of the American Republic
The decline of the United States was due to several factors which are obvious from the perspective of the 22nd century. However, even at the time, the weaknesses were well known; political and financial leaders chose to ignore the warning signs.
America rose to economic, political, and military superiority at the end of World War II. European and Asian countries had been devastated by the damage to their cities and industrial base while the U.S., due to its relative geographic isolation, had suffered little harm. This, coupled with an educated populace, allowed their economy to achieve substantial growth, far outstripping its rivals.
At least you girls have Fabio
I’m feeling a bit wiped out from my editing work, so I decided to hand today’s blog off to Bare Rump. In case you don’t know her, Bare Rump is a ten-foot-long, eight-legged research scientist from the Tromatopelman planet M833-G1a. Like the rest of her kind, she has a rather odd take on romance which I’m sure you will appreciate. Actually, Bare Rump is an atypical Tromatopelman female; she’s had her share of lovers, but presently enjoys a long term relationship with a Grith Lyssome intelligence officer whom she calls Lord Valor.
As for why Bare Rump is here on Earth, you can read more about that here.
Oof. That’s it for me. Be nice to my favorite girl.
Bare Rump here, y’all. (Ooh, my Texas time is showing!) Doug wanted to take a bit of time off from the blog, and since I have been ever so negligent updating mine, I volunteered. Lord Valor offered, but what could he write about? Poop and software, that’s all my lover knows. Well, he also understands how to show a girl a good time. Dear me yes. If only you could see the way he rolls me onto my dorsum and sets me a-quiver with that magical proboscis of his — but, heck! This isn’t the Epigynum Monologues, for gosh sakes.
Doug has left it up to me to introduce you to my planet’s top-selling Romance novelist, Bronwyn Webweaver. A bit of background: Bronwyn was born the only daughter in an egg sac of eight. She excelled at her schoolwork and rapidly grew big and strong. As an only daughter, she had to skip college and take work as a legal secretary. “I could type fast but couldn’t spell. I was the worst legal secretary ever,” she says now.
She took a mate who survived their first encounter only to get too zealous on the second. Now fat and pregnant, Bronwyn took a job as a botanist’s assistant at the University of South Underland. Her work forced her aboveground on a daily basis, collecting moss and lichen samples for her bosses. The now famous mugwasp storm of 4079 forced her to stick to her tunnels, and out of boredom, she took up a pencil and notepad and wrote out the rough draft for her first novel, Silk Bondage (4080).
Silk Bondage suffers from first novel syndrome, sadly. Way too much angst and not enough sex. For my money, Web of Desire (4081) was her first true hit.
I love this book, but Miss Webweaver, puh-lease, what is up with your cover artist? Start with those silk sheets. Girl, it looks like your red-kneed hobag of a heroine has just worked her way through the entire South Underland Males’ Varsity Yabbaball Team on those very sheets. My advice? Find a good dry cleaner.
And those little black balls. Are those . . . no, please don’t tell me those are thought bubbles. Your heroine apparently fantasizes about beady-eyed males with Fu Manchu pedipalps. And where are the rest of his legs? Good God, girl, have you been snacking?
I have only one word to say about the male on the cover of Bronwyn’s next book:
HAWT.
Take me, take me now, you great savage wonderful hairy bastard you. Burn me with those Palps of Fire. I promise I won’t even snark on that weird-ass floral arrangement you have on the left margin — what is that, Baby’s Breath? — okay, I said I wouldn’t snark. But gaaawd look at those stout glorious pedipalps. You know they don’t make pedipalps that big in nature, so what is this, some sort of cruel photoshopping stunt? Cover artists are mean bitches, I tell ya.
Only one problem. He’s a little too perfect. He’s like, “Look at me, God’s gift to females. You’d be lucky to come within a mile of my sperm web,” and I’d be like, “Dude, if you don’t get over yourself, I’m going to fix those two buttonholes on your thorax,” and he’ll be all, “I don’t have two buttonholes,” and then WHAM! I’d be all, “You do now, dude.”
Um, Doug? Don’t let Lord Valor read those last two paragraphs. He can be awfully possessive.
And now, on to my favorite Bronwyn Webweaver novel:
“I salivated for days!” says Emma Longfang of the Silken Times. Yeah, you would, Emma. You haven’t tasted male-meat in decades, you desiccated skank hobag. (That’ll teach you to snark on my abdominal hair condition on network TV, bitch.)
Damn, she pisses me off. Such a perfect cover, and Emma “Drool Problem” Longass has to ruin it with her stupid witticisms — not. Grrrr.
Okay. Take a deep breath, clear head, concentrate on Sex at Seven, Dinner at Eight. Aaah.
Everything about this book is perfect. Start with the title: why not treat copulatory arachnicide with honesty and a sense of fun? Girls, be honest: who among you hasn’t sucked dry your share of males? The one who says no, she’s an anorexic. You humans aren’t so different than us.
Then there’s that dude on the table. Man, they don’t get more dashing than that. Yeah, he looks like he’s about ready to dash clean off the table before I get my chance to pounce. And the way he’s holding his forelegs, he almost looks intelligent, don’t ya think? Sure, it’s not realistic, since most of our males can’t be trusted to dig a tunnel without burying themselves alive. But a girl can dream.
He sure is one handsome bad-ass brute. Only thing I don’t like about it is the wine glass. If I have to listen to one more “I don’t drink . . . wine” joke, I’m going to barf. And you wouldn’t like me when I barf.
As for the story, here’s the deal. Bawb is a handsome young home-spinner who gets drunk one night with his buddies. One of them, Dood, bets Bawb that he can’t survive six matings in a row with the ladies from the Girls Who Don’t Suck dating service. Bawb takes the bet, figuring he won’t mind too much if he loses since he’ll be dead. Little does he know that Dood has lined up his sister Scythee as Bawb’s last date. Scythee is legendary in their community; no male has ever survived her embrace. Will she be his last date, literally?
WARNING! SPOILERS!
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Bawb’s sister warns Bawb of Dood’s trickery and tells him to tell Scythee that he (Bawb) has a rare blood disease, making him unpalatable. The first five girls learn about Bawb’s supposed blood disease and they are righteously pissed that he didn’t warn them. Comical hijinks follow. Meanwhile, Scythee has little else to do but admire Bawb’s good looks, and, lo and behold, she falls in love with him. She saves Bawb from the other girls’ attacks.
Bawb desperately wants to inseminate Scythee, but Scythee is leery of the blood disease. Bawb gets his sister to explain everything. Scythee falls in love with Bawb’s sister. Together, they eat Bawb and then take a long vacation in the Crystal Caverns.
Various and sundry
We’re watching a Xena: Warrior Princess marathon on Logo, a network dedicated to gay viewers. I always knew there was something special about those Gabriele-Xena bath scenes. Hey, I was just looking for the soap.
Maureen is hosting a 72-er at Writer’s BBS. Kinda like the NFG 69-er, but with three more words. Click on over if you want to read; if you want to play, you’ll need to join Writer’s BBS, but hey, it’s free.
I finished my first read-through-and-edit on my novel, The Brakan Correspondent. It took a while — 651 single-spaced pages, and I can only get some decent editing time in on weekends. Now for the last step (I hope): I need to fix all the problems I’ve found on the first read-through. I’ll be losing scenes, adding others, patching plot holes, axing evil wases, and replacing as many lame speaker attributions as I can with action tags.
At the risk of sounding arrogant (of course, when has that ever bothered me?), I think this story is something special. I’m feeling confident an agent will pick this up and get it published. Will it make it into Paperback Writer’s 2% that sell more than 5000 copies? Hey, right now I’m high enough on it that I can see it pushing LaHaye’s Left Behind schlockfest off the shelves.
Ya gotta dream big.
D.
Groucho snarks proto-muffin: myth or reality?
From snopes.com, the urban legend clearinghouse:
The most infamous remark of Groucho’s You Bet Your Life years supposedly occurred when he was interviewing a Mrs. Story, a contestant with twenty-two children (reputedly the largest family in America at the time):
GROUCHO: “Why do you have so many children? That’s a big responsibility and a big burden.”MRS. STORY: “Well, because I love my children and I think that’s our purpose here on Earth, and I love my husband.”GROUCHO: “I love my cigar, too, but I take it out of my mouth once in a while.
True or false? Read the whole story here.
D.
The Technorati Grand Slam
I knew a Maureen Dowd in high school. Not the Maureen Dowd of New York Times fame, but a fairly sharp cookie nonetheless. While other girls’ only goal in life was to sing Bali Hai for the school musical, South Pacific, our Maureen Dowd had higher aspirations. She applied herself, got good grades, and went to college.
But enough about the Maureen Dowd I knew. What I really want to tell you about is the serenity I experience when I search for pictures of the Doodlebops. I don’t even know what Doodlebops are, although I gather they are possessed versions of the Teletubbies, which is good enough for me. Hell, it’s not like I write for TV Squad, after all. From a quick perusal of Technorati, I gather Doodlebops are the love children of Scooter Libby and Judith Miller. ‘Nuff said.
By the way, if your name is John Tierney, please get lost — along with Karl Rove, George Bush, and Dick Cheney.
I am such a Technorati whore.
D.
Six degrees of me
Remember the Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game?
1. Kevin Bacon sucked in Footloose with Sarah Jessica Parker,
2. Sarah Jessica Parker sucked in Sex and the City with Kim Catrall, who sucked more often, and
3. Kim Catrall didn’t get to suck Kurt Russell in Big Trouble in Little China.
Thus, Kurt Russell’s “Bacon Number” is 3. The University of Virginia’s Bacon Oracle can connect Kurt to Kevin in 2 steps, but I think my links are more fun. You ought to get points for fun.
After much consideration, I’ve decided I’m a full six degrees away from Kevin. Here’s the connection:
1. Kevin Bacon played with Benjamin Bratt in The Woodman (2004).
2. Benjamin Bratt played with Michael Keaton in One Good Cop (1991).
3. Michael Keaton played “Himself” on three episodes of Fred Rogers’ “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” (1975).
4. Fred Rogers hosted a special episode of “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood in which he costarred with Koko, the sign language-facile gorilla (1998). Here they are in a loving pose even Bam couldn’t snark:
5. Koko once attended a halloween party at the house of molecular biologist Larry Kedes.
6. Larry Kedes was my PhD thesis advisor.
By this reckoning, my Bacon Number is 6. Are you surprised I had to go through an ape to get to Kevin? Even if she is a very, very intelligent ape.
This isn’t my lowest Bacon Number, but it is the most entertaining connection I could find. If my Bacon Number translated into something practical, such as income, status with literary agents and publishers, or ease of accumulating female groupies, then my Bacon Number would be 2.
What, you don’t believe me?
1. Kevin Bacon played in The Big Picture with Eddie Albert (1989).
2. Eddie Albert costarred* with Yours Truly in Green Acres (1970).
You realize what this means, don’t you? All of you are, at a bare minimum, only three degrees of separation away from Kevin Bacon.
We can all die happy.
True Koko story:
Larry Kedes knew Koko by way of a post-doc in his lab. This post-doc was, at the time, Penny Patterson’s photographer and significant other. Penny is Koko’s teacher and bestest friend.
Anyway, Larry thought it would be a hoot to have Koko over for Halloween. She could answer the door and hand out candy, and the neighborhood kids would all figure Koko was a human in a gorilla suit. Since Penny always treated Koko as if she were a human in a gorilla suit, it all made sense, sort of.
Think about it: if you wanted to invite a gorilla over to your house, wouldn’t your first question be, “Where will she crap?” Brilliant ape that she is, Koko is toilet trained. Larry thought he had all his bases covered.
In his plans, he unfortunately neglected one detail. Koko had never before seen a bidet.
I wonder who cleaned up the mess?
Koko, if you’re reading this, here’s how to use a bidet.
D.
*I’ll admit my choice of verbs stretches credulity.
THIS JUST IN
Oh, man, this is just too good not to share. Thanks to Ishbadiddle for this link to a remixed trailer for The Shining. This is fluffing brilliant.
I wish I could say this was an American idea
But it’s not. The company is Australian.
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Caring for your pads
I’ll let you folks peruse those links at your leisure. When you’re bored of that, the Wikipedia entry on toilet paper was a hoot.
D.
“Are you spiritual?”
Um. Helloooo, Blogger? Is there a good reason why this post was up for several hours, and then disappeared, only to reappear as an older (AND INCOMPLETE!) draft version on my dashboard?
Or is this post being yanked by an even Higher Authority?
Cue Twilight Zone music.
Damn. I hate telling jokes twice.
At a Christmas party a few years ago, one of the local wives asked Karen, apropos of nothing, “Are you spiritual?”
Here was my wife, a firm atheist, being questioned on faith by someone who could only be described as a true believer. I watched, dumbstruck. I expected blood. But I had underestimated Karen yet again. As an attentive student of Miss Manners, she handled the question with ease.
“What an interesting question,” she said. “And such a good question, too. Isn’t it odd how infrequently folks talk about spirituality with people they hardly know? I wonder why that is?” And so forth. She kept at it until the topic had strayed a safe distance from the hot button of spirituality. The other woman never knew what hit her.
I was relieved — not so much because Karen had handled the question so deftly, but because no one had bothered to ask me.
That might explain how I came up with the Hannukah Lobster.
After that bit of humiliation, I brow-beat my parents into signing me up for Hebrew School. There, Israeli women who pronounced my name Dog taught me to read Hebrew, and later, a tyrannical cantor taught me my cantillation marks so I could belt out Torah lines with the best of ’em. Religious instruction consisted of disjointed Bible stories taught as historical fact with nary a word of moral or ethical analysis. As for Talmud — Talwhat?
Our rabbi fancied himself a comedian, a Jackie Mason in tefillin. What a dick. His whole pre-ceremony interaction with me consisted of a twenty minute interview, during which he badgered me about how baseball was a sport for intellectuals. He got me to cough up some dirt on my family, which he used during my bar mitvah as ‘humorous’ snark. Yeah, that’s right — in front of my friends, family, and the whole congregation.
That ended my schtick with Judaism, at least for a while.
See, it’s this last bit that Blogger keeps eating. Not the whole post, just this last bit. Grrr.
A few days ago, I mentioned Borges’ story, “Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote”, wherein a little known, marginally successful author sets out to rewrite Don Quixote word for word. I’m beginning to feel like Menard, only it’s not Cervantes I’m struggling to channel. It’s me.
Well, here goes. One more time. This time I’m saving the HTML in a separate text file.
Over the years, my spiritual pendulum has swung from Judaism through Agnosticism to Zen Buddhism. I’m what you call a Jew-Boo (if you’re trying to be nasty, that is) or a Juddhist (my preferred designation). Those of you familiar with Buddhism know that its precepts are compatible with other religions. Zen, especially, is more a philosophy than a network of faith-based beliefs. So it’s not all that weird, despite what some of my tribe might think — the ones who sling the Jew-Boo label, that is.
Now that I’m an adult, I can take charge of my education. I have a halfway decent library on both Zen and Judaism, and I’ve read a fair fraction of it. I’m not an ignoramus. For that matter, I suspect I’ve read more of the New Testament than the average American Christian.
Nevertheless, when it comes to practice, I’m as piss-poor a Buddhist as I am a Jew.
The pendulum tends to take a sharp turn back towards Judaism whenever I’m faced with a pediatric airway emergency. Times like those, the last thing I want to believe is that I’m the one whose solely responsible for the life of this child. Those situations are frightening enough without that kind of load on my shoulders. Yup, that’s when the big time bargaining comes in.
Me: Hey, God? You remember me, the guy who recites his Shema every few years or so and hopes like crazy he’s catching You in a good mood. Well, hey, look. It’s like this. I have this kid here, she’s eighteen months old, and I would really appreciate it if you would help me look after her.
Him: (silence)
Me: Okay. Be that way. How about this: if things work out okay, I’ll start working on my son again. I mean, he’s nine years old. How entrenched could his atheism be? I’ll do my best, Lord, I really really will.
And so forth.
When you get down to it, I want to believe, particularly at times like those. Security, that’s what it’s all about. I don’t believe in an afterlife and I’m not particularly afraid of my own death. I am concerned about the safety and health of my family and my patients, and so I want to think Someone is up there watching over us.
At the same time, I realize no one makes it out of here alive.
That’s why questions like “Are you spiritual?”, “Do you believe in God?”, or even “Have you been saved?” distress me. The answer to all three is the same: It’s complicated.
You know something? For the folks who ask those kinds of questions, “It’s complicated” is the last answer they want to hear.
It’s complicated because I’m not the perfect Vulcan my wife is. It’s complicated because, while I hate blind faith, I’m too attached to my memes to let them go. It’s complicated because, like any true Agnostic, I really don’t know the answers.
I’d like to think my confusion is the hallmark of an intelligent mind, but I know it is nothing more than what it is: confusion.
And it doesn’t help that every time I come within a hair’s breadth of something approaching an epiphany of self-understanding, Blogger eats my column.
Okay. Here goes. Save HTML file. Hit publish button.
D.
Cool link and quick snark
If you haven’t done so already, hop on over to Stephanie Feagan’s blog, where she has a fun link to a Kinky Friedman political cartoon. Go Kinkster!
No more Muffinry, folks. I’ve had it up to here. It occurred to me, however, that some of you might still need your morning Muffin. If so, check out the Lydia of Purple website (get a load of that URL!), and while you’re there, don’t miss reading about Joshua’s overpriced birdhouses. Josh needs to make a living, too.
“Bless this Ozark Lad with a new pair of pants without holes in the knees.”
D.