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Domestic Terrorism

This entry explores some of the same themes as Jesse's wonderful "Lawnmower Lines" entry but is different - and perhaps improved - because I am in it.  And there is implied violence.  One may be a consequence of the other, I'll leave that for you to judge - if you must.

I have written before about the recurring semi-guilty pleasure I derive from borrowing Ron's mower, driving it the intervening mile between our houses, and then mowing my lawn from the perch of the completely unnecessary spring-loaded seat atop the Cub Cadet while enjoying my crappy cigars.  My neighbor, Don, has made it clear that the noise of the mower, followed by the twin smells of stogie smoke and cut grass, create a clear signal for him now, and he anticipates it's happening, once every two weeks or so.  Often, it's the signal to mow his own lawn, so the levels will match.

Thursday night, I rushed home, got the mower, made it to my house, and began to mow my lawn.  At the end of my now 10-hour days, I have less daylight than I used to, but in the July of a Florida Summer, this is still considerable.  From the mower, I waved at several of my neighbors, and then saw one guy walking his small dog around the perimeter, near the row of crepe myrtles, a tree I only know the name of because of my wife.  He waved to me, and then let his dog piss on a tree.  Whatever.  Then, the dog pissed the mailbox.  Hmmm.  Then, he was allowing his dog to shit right on my lawn, and he was not equipped - as so many in my neighborhood are - with any kind of scoop or bag.  So I yelled, "HEY!" over the mower noise, gesturing toward the dog.  He turned and looked, kind of shrugging, as if to say, "Hey, he's crapping.  What do you want me to do?"

I have bad reactions to indifference.  I gunned the mower at him and his dog.

The Cub Cadet does not go that fast.  I get lapped by kids on bikes all the time.  This guy apparently did not know that, and did the cartoony "move in all directions at once" thing, speed walked away, came back for his leashed dog, scooped him up, and kind of skip-ran down the sidewalk and around the corner of Joshua.  I know, because I followed his ass on the mower down the sidewalk, waving my cigar and yelling, "You bringing back a scoop for that, or what?"  I came back and finished my lawn.

Afterwards, I went for the hammer to whack some loose nails in the fence and couldn't find it.  I came out of my car-hole with a small hatchet (handle, flat on one end, heavy - this will work) and ran into a another neighbor coming up the driveway.  His initial reaction was just, "Whoa."  Turns out, he wanted to talk shop about the mower, and bitch about the guy who lets his dog crap on other people's lawns.  He thought it was funny that I "mowed him onto the sidewalk."  My neighbor's phrasing is funnier than the whole event taken together, I thought.

More Fortune Cookie "Wisdom"

As you know, I am obsessed with fortune cookies.  I wait throughout Chinese meals to get them, and I have, on two seperate occasions, invested in them in bulk amounts - and to no avail.  There is still a part of me hung up on what random manufacturers elect to put inside of baked goods.  I vacillate wildly between straight reads, adding "in bed" at the end, or beginning with "Confucious say."  Today, we went out for Chinese, since Jones is briefly back in town to ship furniture, sell vehicles, and make final preps to expatriate.  We got our fortune cookies at the end of the meal, and this is how today's fortunes rounded out:

Jones: "You will be advanced socially, without any special effort."  Just the normal, backbreaking, soul crushing effort you're used to.  Nothing special, though.  At least this would actually seem to be a fortune, as opposed to an aphorism, something ripped out of the I Ching, or advice.  We actually took this to mean that since Jones has decided to move to Panama instead of Costa Rica, he will, in short order, become a drug lord.

Max: "A good time to start something new."  WHEN?!?  Not only is this not a fortune, it's not even a complete sentence, you lazy motherfuckers over at the fortune cookie company.  Not only did you pick a trite thing to say, but you fucked it all up in the execution.  Way to go, fortune assholes.

C: "It is better to have a hen tomorrow than an egg today."  Again, not a fortune.  Debatable, too.  Maybe I'm hungry for eggs now.  Not tomorrow - now.  Maybe this is more about how eggs should be treated than anything.  If I have an egg today - and say, a heat lamp - maybe I'll have a hen tomorrow, metaphorically.  In any light - heat lamp or otherwise - this is a highly suspect sentiment to be reading in a Chinese restaurant after a meal that, in all likelihood, included chickens and their products.

Me: "Every man is a volume if you know how to read him."  Not a fortune.  I know how to read those, and this isn't one.  You know what else?  Not true.  Some people are, at best, pamphlets.  Some people are tracts, issues, articles, maybe a folio.  Not everyone is a volume, and most can only aspire to be codices.  This would have been funnier as "Every man is a weapon if you hold him right," and it would have made about as much sense as this one did.  The guy who wrote this is not a volume - hell, he's not even a Chinese fucking fortune.

One of you wants to get me a grant to start my own fortune cookie company.  I'm bockwursting every third person 'til I get my damn grant.

Looks Like We Got Ourselves a Reader

So, today Max read us a book.  Hot Rods, published in 1981, is the moving story of a race between Gas Hog and Tin Fox.  Much to the chagrin of the ecologically-minded among you, Gas Hog triumphs at the end of the race, due mostly to fancy driving by his boss, Tom.  Max has read other beginner's books, but rarely with as little prompting and assistance as this.  We all hung out in his room and listened, helping him a little here and there, but mostly being impressed with his abilities.  He knows many words on sight now, and can sound the rest out.  His imagination distracts him occasionally, but that just seems like gravy to me - eventually, he'll be able to tell better stories than he reads.  He needs to work on his concentration and perfect his skills, and he seems to have the beginnings of a genuine love of reading.  We recently got a number of new books (Thanks, Mary Sue) and while he was a little resentful of us rearranging his (and Abby's, eventually) bookshelves while he slept, his secondary reaction was, "How cool is that?"  Hopefully, between the pride he felt as his own accomplishment and the revitalization of his little library he'll wade into the practice he needs to be a solid reader.

So yeah, that's me, bursting with pride.

It Takes Many Men to Make a Darth

(With apologies on the title to Stephen Sondheim)

Darth Vader is not one man,
(if he is a man, at all)
he’s an amalgam of several guys,
some are great and some are small.

His voice is serious James Earl Jones,
and in helmet, always is,
but when he’s not on the job as Darth,
he’s announcing  on CNN.

David Prowse was the big, big man,
with red saber and Dark Side flaw,
‘til the third film, when at last he dies,
then it’s actor Sebastian Shaw.

Who used to be Anakin in the end vision,
with Obi-Wan and Yoda,
until Phantom Menace: Episode One,
where Jake Lloyd takes it over.

Then the Clones Attacked, and
we got Hayden Christensen.
He’s to be our transition Darth,
and I suppose the last one, then.

And this doesn’t count the folks who run
the puppets and special effects,
like when he gets his limbs cut off,
or he’s cracking various necks.

Yes, it takes many men to make a Darth,
at their effort we're not sneezing,
it's hard work, what with duels and all,
the Force choking and the wheezing.

Elmoliciousness

(I did this back in 2004, and lost it when the first blog went tits up.  I am now inspired to re-print it.  Enjoy, if you are a very specific kind of person.)

"Elmo's name is Elmo. Seven months ago Elmo was recruited from Sesame Street by a secret branch of the CIA called SD-6. Elmo was sworn to secrecy, but Elmo couldn't keep it from Elmo's goldfish, Dorothy. When the head of SD-6 found out, he had Dorothy killed. That's when Elmo found out the truth. SD-6 is not part of the CIA. Elmo was working for the very people Elmo thought Elmo was working against. So Elmo went to the only place that could help Elmo bring them down. Now, Elmo is a double agent for the CIA, where Elmo's handler is a very nice man named Michael Vaughn. Only one other person knows the truth about what Elmo does, another double agent inside SD-6, someone Elmo hardly knows - Elmo's daddy, Jack Bristow."

I was inspired to re-post this, of course, because of this bit of brilliance over on P-Loaf.  It's far better than the Elmoness I did, is not dated like mine, and has the virtue of being totally original.  Props to Megs, ya'll.

Dildo-Named Band Feels Defamed

I have to start this with a personal (weird) anecdote.  I wouldn't give two-fifths of a damn about Steely Dan (or, indeed, own their Aja album) if not for the Christmas season of 1993.  During the month of December, I got my good friend Jon Guy a job with my then-family's jewelry wholesale company over the holidays, working nights.  We would go in at 7pm, pull orders all night, and then leave at 7 in the morning, go home and try to sleep.  We did this job, night after night, with a couple of really nice guys named Gary Duncan and Tiger, who was an ex-cop.  The only thing that got us through some nights was the only radio station we could all agree on, which played songs from the 70s and 80s between ads for something called Splash Casino.  One night, Jon became obsessed with the Steely Dan song "Deacon Blues" and called and had the late-night guy play it four times.  Hence, my passing interest in Steely Dan.

And they are named after a sexual aid of the dildo variety, though admittedly not a real one.

This letter, then, is not surprising, from a band known for it's dark sarcasm and lyrical wordplay.  The guys in the group have always had a sense of humor, and their approach to this seems to reflect that.  And I'm sure it's a shit film - of course it is.  It has Matt Dillon in it, and he has been able to lower the tone of everything he's been in in the last ten years except for Crash.  What is a little surprising is that this has become news (even entertainment news) and that they would bring up an issue like a little infringement, since they've famously had some incidents like this of their own, albeit from the other side of things.

I'm sure Condi Rice will be flying into to negotiate peace without a cease fire between the two parties before the end of the week.

Soundtrack for My Monday

Because my Mondays are not like your Mondays. My Mondays are Tuesdays. My actual Mondays are more like an extended Sunday. I work four ten-hour days now, so I get three day weekends. This is making it even harder for me to gear myself up to go back into work on the Mon/Tuesday morning when I must return. Well - that, and other extenuating circumstances. This one sucked especially, because ESP & DLF had to leave this morning after a wonderful low-key fun weekend, and because the kids were all snuggly this morning. So yeah, work: This is what I used to distract my brains today.

Alice in Chains - Dirt (prompted an argument between me and a 20-year-old co-worker about whether it was Jerry Cantrell or Layne Staley who had died. He lost. Dude - Staind even released a song about it.)

Peter Gabriel - Shaking the Tree (same co-worker gave me shit about this album...apparently, Pete is "gay," in the pejorative, rather than the sexual sense...sometimes I just fucking hate everybody)

Julia MacConahay - Strings Change (fuckin' cool music from our very own J-Mac, it compelled me to try and keep up whilst I was working on stuff. Julia's voice - specifically on "Carry On," which is what I hope the title is - is mesmerizing, and the re-make of "Ain't No Sunshine" is fantastic.)

Michael Franti & Spearhead - Everyone Deserves Music (we could all do a lot worse than to listen to this record once a day, and for some people, it should be mandatory - site)

Eddie Izzard - Circle (because he's really fucking funny)

The World and All Things Considered from NPR on WUWF.org.  This last is where I decide, having damped down my head noises all day, I will now feed them and encourage them to congregate, letting them begin to mutter again, before they build up into the cacophony that produces, among other things, blog entries.

Blog entries better than this one.

FEMA & the First

After reading this story about FEMA restricting the rights of the disenfranchised, displaced, homeless and hopeless leftover people from Ivan, Dennis, Katrina and Rita and Wilma who are in FEMA "villages" (described by an NPR commentator last year as "socio-economic timebombs") from all over the Gulf Coast (from New Orleans to Northwest Florida) I thought it would be a keen idea to see if we could get in to get an interview with someone.  First, I thought getting Diane ('cause she's here visiting) in with her press credentials would be something to try, but then, I also thought we would be able to just drive right in like I used to do when they first erected these things, so I also thought using Diane's clout would be an unnecessary step.  I took the above photo late last year by just driving right in and looking around with my camera, so I thought I could probably still do that.  Because, apparently, I am hopelessly naive. 

Now, they have two overweight and older security guards of the sort that couldn't stop me if I really wanted to push the issue, and an awkward series of orange plastic barriers keeping people from going right in.  They stopped us and told us, essentially, that if we didn't have someone specific to see there, then we had no business there.  "This is a FEMA facility," was the response given when I asked when the restriction had begun.  So - firsthand experience with FEMA's new gated communities, where your rights are severely restricted in return for housing.  No one can get in to see you without a reason and an appointment and apparently, a chaperon who will throw you out when things get a little bit controversial.

I don't think I've let go of this one yet.

One Juror Left

Jack Warden (pictured at extreme left), a character actor who won Emmys for his performances, and the guy who played the fedora-wearing marmalade salesman with the baseball tickets burning a hole in his pocket in 12 Angry Men, has died.  Warden was a gifted comedic actor, who I guess I've only seen in maybe three or four other things.

This means that Jack Klugman is the only guy left out of the fellows who served in that jury room.  Fonda and many of the cast died in the 80's, and McArdle didn't even make it to the 70's - but then, he was old in '57.  Martin Balsam, the last thing I saw him in was the re-make of Cape Fear, the DeNiro one, and E.G. Marshall was in Absolute Power and Nixon right before he died.  Juror #2 - the guy with the cough drops - was also the voice of Piglet, and he died last year or the year before.  So, just as in the film, they are slowly dropping away until there is only one left, and soon they can all leave the jury room.

I don't know if I wrote this for all you 12 Angry Men fans out there, or just to scare the living shit out of Jack Klugman.

(Not pictured - Lee J. Cobb)

(Also, the Squidbag from a year ago today.)

Antiquities

Not 'antiques.'  I watch the Roadshow for that.

I'm currently reading The Lost Gospel, about the journey into the public eye that the recently discovered (1978) gnostic Gospel of Judas made.  It's an interesting book, and written in a way that makes it feel like an extended National Geographic article - and indeed, that is who published the book - jumping around and providing background in an efficient way while telling a richly-detailed story that never drags.  Anyway, this is not a book review, except inasmuch as it is.

The author of the book addresses the many different (and in some cases, such as the Getty, very public) cases of major museums which hold items from other countries in their collections and which are negotiating with the countries of origin of those items for their "return."  (Alas - already, my bias is evident.)  Not to crap all over anyone's cultural heritage (which would be a reasonable expectation from my readers at this point) but I can't help but wonder when something belongs to everyone versus when it should be returned to a point of origin, and also when an item is 'stolen' versus being discovered.

We all know that Indiana Jones and Lara Croft are the good guys because they find ancient shit and put it in museums, or they discover for the sake of discovery - or at least for ends which are purer than those of their opponents.  So it's a conceit that Hollywood can take for granted we stipulate as viewers.  But what about a guy who finds something and sells it to support his family?  Is he less of a person because he wants/needs to get paid for his efforts?  What about because he sells to Farouk the middleman in Cairo vs. contacting the most reputable buyer?  Many of these guys who dig stuff up - Nag Hammadi, Rosetta, scrolls and gospels - are illiterate farmers, so they're going to go to the guys in the city that they know.

Then it becomes a question - I think - of the age and importance of the thing, which can be completely subjective.  I mean, if I smuggle a headpiece (of course, to the Staff of Ra) someone made last week out of Alexandria - who cares?  But if it was made 1800 years ago?  Well, that's clearly stolen.  And should everything go back to its point of origin?  Swag stolen by the Third Reich?  Yes.  King Tut?  I don't know.  The Gospel of Judas?  Almost certainly not.  It's too important.  Here is a book which could (but likely will not) alter some of the thinking of the acolytes of one of the globe's dominant and most inescapable faiths - it belongs to everyone, I think.  I just can't come up with a clear defining point between theft of antiquities and getting something into the hands of people who will preserve it, between excavation and grave robbery, between culling history from the sands of time and the rape of history.

Opinions?