Fortunately, it’s not this hard!
Billy, an Alt-Left voter, is trying to decide who to vote for in the upcoming Presidential Election.
1974 Karmann Ghia…best car I ever owned.
Improbable Moments in an Unbelievable NFC Championship Game:
First Half:
Wilson is one for eight for 14 yards, three interceptions and a 0.0 quarterback rating.
3rd Quarter, 7:00 to go.
3rd & 19
29 yards to Baldwin for a first down.
Sea 0 GB 16
3rd Quarter, 4:48 to go.
4th & 10
Fake Field Goal for a TD
Sea 7 GB 16
4th Quarter, 5:04 to go
Wilson to Kearse, tipped ball, interception
Sea 7 GB 19
Here’s where I doubted: I text a friend who is a GB fan, saying “Nice Game GB. I’ll root for them in the SB :)” He told me to shut up, that the game wasn’t over, that I might jinx it. I doubted.
4th Quater, 3:52 to go
Seattle gets ball back on the Seattle 31.
1 timeout left
Sea 7 GB 19
4th Quarter, 2:09 to go
Wilson runs for a TD.
Sea 14 GB 19
4th Quarter, 2:09 to go
Onside kick recovered
Sea 14 GB 19
4th Quarter, 1:37 to go
Lynch 24 yd td run
Sea 20 GB 19
4th Quarter, 1:25 to go
Wilson scrambles & throws a desperation lob caught by Luke Wilson for 2 pt. conversion
Sea 22 GB 19
4th Quarter, :19 to go
Greenbay kicks 48 yard field goal to tie
Sea 22 GB 22
Overtime
Overtime
GB calls tails, coin toss is heads
Seattle gets the ball first
Overtime, 14:51 to go
Seattle starts on their 13
Must go 87 yards to win the game.
Overtime
Seattle goes 87 yards in 6 plays
2 pass plays, both 35 yards, back to back. 35 yards was the longest play for either team the entire game, and Seattle put two of them back to back.
Sea 28 GB 22
As an overly romantic kid, I spent a good portion of my youth wearing bulbous headphones, analyzing the lyrical content of pop music. I once passed an entire family vacation listening to “Bennie and the Jets,” trying desperately to both memorize the lyrics and comprehend their meaning. The weird and the wonderful.
Religious leaders were scaring kids with stories of Satan-controlled rock stars and a nefarious tool called backmasking. Ironically, this made me certain the prophets of pop had access to deeper understanding. All I had to do was decode the hidden messages!
The influence of my sweet satan seemingly made me vulnerable to overwrought orchestrations of infatuation. Songs were my education in love. Imagine my joy when dad drove home in a new Chevy van! The things I imagined.
Over time, I began to develop a bullshit meter. For example, was there really a Mandy in Mr. Manilow’s life. I had my doubts.
Ambrosia is the fabled food of Gods, famously used by Athena to affix beer-goggles on the suitors of Penelope. I knew nothing of Homer as a pre-teen. For me, Ambrosia was simply a band who understood true love and heartbreak, just like me. I bought all their singles.
Years later, I happened upon those 45’s, inserted the required yellow adapter (a satanic symbol for man on man on man love action) and began anew to analyze the lyrical content of their hit “How Much I Feel.” It’s widely counted as a beautiful blue-eyed soul love song. Even Casey Kasem thought so. But, is it?
Less than thirty-seconds in, the bullshit meter lurched full red. I grabbed the needle so quickly it sounded like tires screeching round Dead Man’s Curve. How Much I Feel? This guy was a lying, cheating bastard. Let’s break it down.
[Note: each lyrical section of the song is presented in a short audio clip. Click on the triangle next to the title to play it.]
I don’t know how this whole business started
Of you thinkin’ that I had been untrue
So, his girlfriend (wife?) suspects infidelity and confronts him. His response is classic misdirection: turn the accusation back on the accuser. The question is shifted from whether he cheated to why she doesn’t trust him. See how that works?
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While researching Mitt Romney’s family history for a future post, I happened upon this most interesting thing today. According to Mitt’s listing at the Ancestry.com, Willard Mitt Romney died about 2005!
So, consider me a “Deather!” Mitt, I demand to see your death certificate!
Now, in line with a good conspiracy, I expect this information to be scrubbed of all evidence quickly. But, I’ve got the proof! It’s right there in my screen capture. Mitt Romney is dead!
Update! @ 9:50 am
In attempting to verify this, I went to the Mormon church owned familysearch.org. There’s no record of Willard Mitt Romney there at all! It’s all been scrubbed! So, while I’m not naive enough to present the conspiracy that Mr. Romney NEVER existed, I do wonder WHAT the LDS Church is hiding!
Mr. Romney, just produce your death certificate!
Dedicated, with Appreciation, to Paul Denman, Helen Folasade Adu, Andrew Hale & Stuart Mattheman
click arrow to play…listen to each song as you read each section
October 1984 | 2:30 am | Provo, Utah
Lying across a sturdy sofa, empty lobby of a dormitory, Brigham Young University.
Eyes smudged with eyeliner, highlighted hair tousled, bleached white 501s.
I’d been at The Star Palace, a refuge from the adjustment of moving out of Seattle and into Pleasantville. “Don’t drink, don’t smoke, what do you do?” I danced. Hard.
My best friend back home was black. We frequented black clubs, listened to black music. There’s no “black” in Provo. I adapted; rather than rock steady to the Whispers, I swayed to Swing Out Sister.
In a malaise of misfit and dried sweat, I was watching Night Tracks, a late night music video show.
He’s laughing with another girl,
playing with another heart.
Placing high stakes making hearts ache.
He’s loved in seven languages.
Jewel Box life, diamond nights and ruby lights,
high in the sky.
Sight: red lips, black hair, freckled brown skin.
Sound: delicate piano, driving bass, salvific sax; creating structure to protect, wings to carry a voice soft and soaring, mysterious and familiar.
Heaven help him, when he falls.
And fall I did. No help from Heaven.
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I’m leaning against a bar, swirling Johnnie Walker Black on the rocks and reading Somerset Maugham’s “Of Human Bondage” when a woman approaches with a scowl and purpose. “Empty that bag and prove to me that you need to carry everything in it” she demands, handbag slung defiantly over her shoulder, arms crossed. “You should not be carrying a bag; men don’t wear purses.”
One might expect such a confrontation would catch me off-guard, but this interrogation is common. For the past 15 years, I’ve carried what is derisively referred to as a man bag.
More frequently than it should, this accessory elicits stares, comments, scorn and on rare occasion, compliments. In the seeming view of many, my bag further erodes the lost beacon of masculinity, the fall of the Western World.
For me? It’s just a bag. I’ve come to see it as a Rorschach Test that reveals more about others than me.
With deliberate movement, I take another swallow of scotch, set the tumbler down slowly, and ceremoniously two-hand lift my black Ferragamo onto the counter, exhibit A in this darkened courtroom drama.
If I’m ever a fugitive from justice, and if I ever use the alias of being an Amway Salesman, I better be ready to play the part. To wit…
In the recent bold escape from prison and life-on-the-lam orchestrated by married couple Jennifer Forsyth Hyatte and George Hyatte, their eventual capture was due a tip given by a cab driver in Columbus, Ohio, who, when asked what tipped him off, stated the following:
Wagers, 33, said he didn’t realize he had picked up the fugitives until he was alerted to TV reports later that evening.
He said his suspicions weren’t aroused by anything the couple said, except that they didn’t try to aggressively recruit him after telling him they were Amway salespeople.
“You know, Amway people are all about Amway, and when they didn’t — when they didn’t try any conversation further about it, that’s when I pretty much thought, well, they’re not with Amway,” Wagers said. — Source: CNN
In my list of “Job’s I’d hate to have” I’ll now add “Public Relations Executive” for Amway. 🙂
da Vinci transcended the normal constraints of the human experience. The ability to talk art, politics, science, religion, sexuality…and all the while, doing it with style. If I could give him a gift, it would be an Apple iPod. Quote: “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”
He was asking all the right questions at a time when most others were looking in entirely different directions regarding life, humanity and nature. The ability to ask the right questions is what makes for interesting conversation, and I think he’d provide that in buckets. Quote: “Circumstances rule men; men do not rule circumstances.”
This man has so affected my life and shares such a compatible vision of technology and how we interact with it. Mostly, I’d spend much of my time trying to convince him to bring back the Apple Newton. Quote: “Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugared water or do you want a chance to change the world?”
I can’t explain it. But, I’d want her band to be involved as well. I envision a weekend in Monte Carlo, or in Spain. Good food, great music, passion, tears, and heartbreak. Oh, and we’d have to ride horses as well. Quote: “I know the end before the story’s been told, it’s not that complicated, but you’re gonna need a bullet proof soul.” [NOTE: I got to meet Sade. I write about it here: My Life With Sade]
Of Human Bondage is one of my favorite books. I so identify with Phillip Carey, the lead character, that I think I would likely connect with Somerset Maugham as well. There is a kinship there that I’d like to explore and better understand. And then, I’d like to explore the ideas of human bondage that he wrote about. Quote: “It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it; but the young know they are wretched, for they are full of the truthless ideals which have been instilled into them, and each time they come in contact with the real they are bruised and wounded.”
Other candidates: Carl Sagan, Aristotle, Joseph Smith, Frida Kahlo, Anne Rice, Joseph Campbell, D. Michael Quinn, Kurt Cobain, Jeff Buckley, Karl Popper, Low
