Monthly Archives: April 2009

The Funny

You May Now Resume Dipping Your Balls in It

I am having a supremely crappy day. I won’t go into details, because the details will not be compelling to anyone, I assure you. But this crappy day comes on the heels of several crappy days recently, so it feels a lot worse than an out-of-nowhere crappy day would. If that makes any sense.

But news like this alleviates the general crappiness just a little bit.

To be honest, I saw no more than 5 episodes of The State when it aired, because it was on MTV and I didn’t have cable. (Well, I had limited cable access via grandparents who lived next door, but I saved most of that precious access for MST3K and 120 Minutes.) But I saw it enough times to know it was pretty awesome. Any show whose theme song samples Nation of Ulysses doesn’t have to do much else to woo me.

It was always a show I wanted to explore further, because clearly it deserved exploring. Unfortunately, no one saw fit to make it explorable. The fact that it hadn’t been released on DVD for all these years is criminal.

But I guess the perpetrators of this offense have been tried, convicted, and executed, because The State will finally get a proper DVD set of its own. That is fantastic news for fans of The Funny.

Now, if the Mets could remember how to catch balls and run the fuckin bases, I’d really be in business.

Boob Tubery, Parental Guidance

Kids Mock the Darnedest Things!

Whilst catching up on a DVRed epsiode of Best Week Ever, The Baby had a mild-but-loud freakout. We paused the show at this precise moment so we wouldn’t miss any of the hilarity:

0419091916.jpgBut as we tried to calm The Baby down, she saw this screen and immediately erupted into hysterics. She squealed, “Daddy! Monster!” and made the claw motion sort-of displayed by Paul F. Tompkins.

We couldn’t restart the show because she thought this screen-freeze was so funny. Every time she saw it, she would laugh with childish fervor and say some variation of “Daddy, funny!” And when she would turn to see the TV screen once more, she’d break into insane laughter, as loud as the first time.

So thank you, Paul F. Tompkins, for making us laugh about weirdly paused screenshots. Again.

Decrees for My All Encompassing Dictatorship

Decrees for My All Encompassing Dictatorship: No Harmonicas

On my way to work this morning, my iPod shuffled its way to a live version of “Mirror Man” by Captain Beefheart. Great, I thought, I like this song and I haven’t heard it in a while. Then, about a minute in, the good captain busted out a harmonica solo, whereupon I hit the skip button. It was too damn early for me to hear a harmonica solo.

Harmonica is so bad it ruins songs I like.

Harmonica shall be banned because it is the harbinger of the worst music in the world: the blues. I don’t mean the blues as it was played 50, 60, 70 years ago, when it was an vibrant musical genre that reflected an actual living culture. And I don’t mean something that has bluesy influences, or bluesy overtones, because that would cut out pretty much all rock music.

I’m talking about the bone-chilling, teeth-rattling sight of someone playing four-bar blues in sunglasses and a fedora. That should have been banned by the Geneva Convention. How can we let that go on in the 21st century?! I fear for my children.

Harmonica shall be banned because of this natural human reaction: when you see somebody pull out a harmonica and start playing it onstage, 99% of the time you want to punch that person in the face.

Harmonica shall be banned because of this:

bluesbros.jpgAnyone who knows how to play harmonica when my Benevolent Dictatorship begins shall be grandfathered in and permitted to continue to play. However, they must register with the local Harmonica Office and inform their local Harmonica Officer if they plan on traveling within 500 feet of a live microphone.

Continuing education programs will be instituted to make John Popper employable. However, there is probably no hope for Bruce Willis. Nor should there be.

I have spoken.