We Are All McLovin

I got out pretty easy today. Only one co-worker wished me an appyhay irthdaybay, and that was at the end of the day. He said he hoped I had something fun planned. I said I did.

I said, I’m going to see “Superbad” again.

Oh yes, he said. I’ve heard of that movie. I may have to go see it. You said you’ve seen it already once? Yes. I am going to see it again. Previously, I saw it with my Lady Friend. Tonight, I will be going to see it with my Uncle Jay, who is moving back to Kansas next week. Oh, he said. So is that movie anything at all like “Napoleon Dynamite?” I heard some people compared it to that movie.

No, I said. In fact, let me explain this to you.

People just pretended that “Napoleon Dyanmite” was a funny movie. It actually wasn’t. Nor was it interesting or even soulful or anything. You see, what actually happened was that these five guys got together in Topeka Kansas the night it opened, and they smoked a lot of marijuana, and they went to see “Napoleon Dyanmite,” and they laughed their asses off, and then they went back home and told their little brothers about it. And the little brothers went and saw it, and they pretended it was funny so their older brothers wouldn’t think they were retards. But you see, these fellas didn’t have any weed. So it really wasn’t funny. But they had to pretend that it was. So they paid it forward, peer pressuring five of their friends into going to see the damned thing and into thinking it was funny. And they peer pressured five of their friends. And so on. And so on. And so on. Until finally you saw it, too, and you pointed at the screen and laughed and weren’t even sure why.*

Vote for Pedro. Ha-ha.

As opposed to “Superbad,” which is funny. Genuinely. This film will force you to cackle, to slam your foot to the gooey theater floor, to the point where you need to gulp for air. It is funny, foolish, raucous, gross, and flat-out hillarious, and then it goes and knocks the wind out of you by being real and good. No. “Superbad” is nothing at all like “Napoleon Dynamite.” “Superbad” is well worth your $10 and your two hours. Comparatively, “Napoleon Dynamite” probably should not have been made.

So. If you haven’t already, see “Superbad.” And, please, don’t get up the minute the credits start to roll. Sit through the credits. Really.

*Some portions of this exchange have been embellished by the writer.

Cheryl Spector

I didn’t know Cheryl Spector very well, though I knew her for years. I knew her primarily through my uncle and his crew and secondarily because she worked at one time for the same outfit which currently keeps me out of trouble. I would meet up with Cheryl Spector about once a year or so, and she would always inundate me with questions about said outfit. It seemed to work for both of us. It gave me something to talk about when I was feeling out of my element a feeling that is generally reserved for days ending in ‘y’ but which can be especially pronounced in a crowd full of outgoing gay and/or transgendered people and, I think it gave her something new to discuss, or maybe gave her a chance to vent old stuff.

Anyways, Cheryl Spector died last week. Leukemia. That’s just odd.

This Things I Believe

I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because some people out there in our nation don’t have maps, and I believe that our education like such as in South Africa and as Iraq everywhere like such as and, I believe that they should our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S., er, er, should help South Africa and should help the Iraq and the Asian countries so we will be able to build up our future. (For our children.)

Seriously. This run-on sentence was actually uttered in public. In front of other people.

Top Jimmy Jumps

As far as I’m concerned, Van Halen’s 1984 only has three songs.

I added it this week to an amazon dot com order, realizing that I did not have the disc on hand and feeling nostalgic following the weird reunion news of this week. I debated internally for several moments before I decided that I am too old and balding to attend a Van Halen performance and that the risk of purchasing tickets is simply too great. I am certain that before they reach the D.A.R., Eddie will be so sick of Dave’s fits over brown M&Ms that he’ll be swilling soco and screaming “Bah bammit bave, you a fucking aahho. You fiah. Fucker.”

I won’t even get into the now hackneyed argument that it just isn’t Van Halen without Mike. If I hear one more guy say “the vocals just won’t sound right without Mike,” I swear, I’ll just bo-zee-bo-zee-bop. Not that it isn’t true. It’s just, geez. Find a new tack already. He’s a bass player who sings like a girl really good. He’ll be missed on the tour. Thumbs up.

There’s a fall day in seventh grade I’ll never forget. I rode my bike across town to visit my buddy. I’d been listening to Diver Down for a really long time at that point. I know it wasn’t my introduction to Van Halen, that my first actual introduction to them was several years earlier, the first time I heard “Dance the Night Away” on the radio. But I hadn’t yet made the connection. As far as I knew, that red, white-striped cover was the first time I’d ever plugged in. I had recorded the album to tape and had popped it into my little mono boom box, which I had stuffed into a backpack and had it blasting behind me as I rode the 20 minutes or so from Holden Land to Longcoy World. It was fucking awesome. Without a doubt, to me, Diver Down, not 1984, is the most incredible Van Halen recording, with Women and Children First and Fair Warning following.

So, listening to 1984 now, I understand that it really only has three songs on it, “Panama,” “Top Jimmy,” and the heavenly, sloppy wet “Drop Dead Legs.” The rest, I think, ought to have served as harbingers, should have warned of the weird yet to come. I admit that I enjoyed 5150 and also that I actually went to see Van Hagar live, but I am generally a VH purist. Wolfgang could play “Flight of the Bumblebee” on that bass with his dong and his left pinkie and the lineup would not impress me.

All I know is that you, me, and every teenage boy at that age at that time was convinced he was Top Jimmy, or at least always wanted to be.

He’s the king.

Fast Wiki

I’ve been in a bit of a nostalgia spin lately, due partially to listening again to Colin Hay’s Man @ Work and realizing that it does not actually suck like I thought it did. I saw Hay perform at the Iota a few years back and bought his Going Somewhere, which is nothing short of masterful. So anyways, I started wondering whatever happened to the other fellows in the band, you know, Greg Ham and those other ones. So I looked up his Wiki, which was painfully short, so I decided to add a bit. I wrote:

“Greg Ham is a supernatural being who can “read and persuade dull minds, who can fly, and who can balance upon one fingertip and hum Girl From Ipanema with his buttocks. He is a vegan, but only for the irony.”

My entry wasn’t up for two minutes before it was yanked. Those Wiki guys sure are on top of it. And I betcha I’m never allowed to post again, least not from this compyooter.

Worth it.

Toast Posties

Blogging is a weird avocation, one I’ve been at for a very very very very very long time. Seven years I think. Something like that. And I can tell you that bloggers get restless. Because half the fun of creating a blog is CREATING it. Setting up the WordPress account or tweaking the Greymatter or making the odd punishing decision to do the whole thing in Notepad, archives be darned. Despite the fact that most bloggy software is meant to create a stable way to create and archive content, many bloggers get downright restless now and again, either threatening not to post evar again or snapping up new domain names and shopping for new themes.

A few years ago I bought jstreet.net, and I’ve been wondering what to do with it ever since. I keep thinking it should be turned into a cool D.C. blog. And I keep trying. But I’m not a cool D.C. guy. I’m kind of a nerdly homebody who just doesn’t think there’s anything wrong with that. So I keep trying to do the JStreet thing but end up back at the good ol’ tongue-in-cheek home sweet home.

So for the two of you who read this. Keep reading, I reckon. Here I am. Until next time I get a wild hair to do something else.

The Radio Is Broken

I’m okay. Really. Thanks for asking. But I have managed somehow to survive the great XM Blackout of 2007. I got to sleep last night like the kid in “The New Adventures of Old Christine.” “Easy…easy…easy…” since there was no Audio Visions 77 to lull me to sleep. I missed recording Deep Tracks last evening and missed recording This American Life as well.

But don’t worry about me none. I’ll be fine once the shakes stop and the hives go away.

Battlestacked Galactica and Other Crap

I am a man of much media mirth. Ask my little lady Jesscita. Unfortunately for her, I am a Fan of the Show, and so therefore, many of our conversations begin with me saying something along the lines of “So on the Howard Stern show yesterday…” She acts a little disgusted by the whole thing, but usually, when I have it on when she’s around, she takes an interest. The last time, it was Howard reviewing the whole “shut up, sit down” litany. Myself, I’d heard it a gazillion times before, though I could listen to Ben Stern talk for hours and likewise with listening to him review the old tapes and bitch about them. For her, hearing it for the first time, well, it tickled her. I’d warn her, honey, that’s how you become a FOTS. But I won’t belabor the point wit’ her.

My other media obsession is with the Sci-Fi network television program known only to me as “Battlestacked Galactica.” I call it this mainly because I think it’s funny, but also, admittedly, due to the otherworldly nature of Tricia Helfer’s presence on the screen. Gaius Baltar, you lucky bastard. I did not watch during the seasons’ runs and am getting caught up via DVD, which is great because it means you can watch like five of them in a row and then go look at your self in the mirror and see your eyes bloodshot and that tomato sauce stain on your white T shirt. I kept trying to watch it before, but to be honest, it requires some heavy lifting in the beginning before you’re in. For me, it was the last season’s finale, and the song, and how they used the song, and then Starbuck looking, as she might say, gods-like. Interesting as hell that they’re pagans railing against a monotheistic superpower. The show is one of the finest I’ve ever seen on the television machine. I cannot wait for the first disc of season 2.5 to get back to me.

I can never tell if it takes a very lot to entertain me or actually very little.