Writer, Essayist, Zinester

There are times in my head, for whatever reasons, that my mind goes too many ways and then as a result I need to focus on less things in order to be effective in my creative process.

So this weblog is on indefinite hiatus. My zine and podcast will continue.

Thanks for reading.

Some of Us Do Not Find Every Weathly Person You Can Scrap Up That Interesting
(or)
This Is News?

My least favorite part of the Strib re-design? The need to give us a page-and-three-quarters on some 25-year old rich kid who really hasn't done much.

Sports Sports Sports

What a terrific sports weekend. The teams I love won. In football North Dakota beat Minnesota-Duluth to stay unbeaten, remain on top in the NCC, and hold onto their national #1 ranking. In hockey, the Sioux swept Northeastern at home.

But it's as much fun in sports to cheer against teams. And I am blessed in that department also. The Vikings lost a game on the road, to no one's surprise. Les Steckel, please report to Winter Park.

The Gopher football team choked away a game at home against Wisconsin ... oh no, they didn't get Paul Bunyan's Axe!! Good thing they got that Brown Jug! Maybe they can also get the Pig Trophy! They play for such cute nothings in the average football conference that is the Big Ten Little Eleven.

The Gopher hockey team gutted out a split on the road against a tough, tough nonconference opponent. Oh wait, they lost and tied at home againt Alaska-Fairbanks. (The total for the weekend was three points for Gopher freshmen, fourteen for Sioux freshmen.)

And Notre Dame lost at home to Southern Cal. This one might be the best, because Notre Dame has the hoariest cliches (outside of Little Eleven trophies) that you can imagine: wake up the echoes, ghosts present at the field, touchdown Jesus, etc. On Saturday, they broke out another hoary cliche and wore their green jerseys. Big deal! It takes a lot more than a different color scheme to beat the Trojans. My new hero Matt Leinart led a game-winning drive late in the fourth, including a perfect clutch pass on a fourth-and-nine. After the game, Leinart dared suggest that USC is truly the team with the supernatural on its side: "They were looking down from up above and we got in."

They Used the Mann Act on Chuck Berry, Why Not the Purple?

The Vikings sex cruise story gets weirder and weirder every day.

The Strib recently released the names of the players who were allegedly on the cruise and I am proud to say that none of these bums play on my fantasy football team, The Moe Greens. Then again, there are no good fantasy players on the Purple so far this season.

There are also allegations that some of the ladies (of the night?) who attended the party were flown in from out-of-state. I wonder if the players know about the 1099s they will have to send come tax time.

I'm Eagerly Anticipating This Movie, Think Ann Coulter Will Be My Date?

Good Night and Good Luck opens this Friday. Journalism Legend Edward R. Murrow vs. Slimeball Senator Joseph McCarthy.

Please Please Plug In, Bob

This morning I watched the first hour of the Bob Dylan: No Direction Home DVD and all I keep thinking was: folkies give me the creeps. For every authentic dude like Woody Guthrie, you get a dozen yahoos playing dressup and trying to act all "authentic."

In all the late-fifties/early-sixties footage, easily the most exciting guy I saw was Gene Vincent - who we see kicking rock 'n' roll ass with the Blue Caps while they tear through Little Richard's "Rip It Up." Plus it sounded a ton more authentic than anything happening in the Village.

But Grand Forks Has One University, Fargo-Moorhead Has Three Colleges

While reading up on The Deaths, I found out that Grand Forks is considered a coke town - at least to Fargo people:

"Fargo is a drinking town. Grand Forks is more of a coke town. There's a saying: It always snows in Grand Forks."

You're Next, Galileo

Last year the Dover, Pennsylvania school district board ordered that students be taught about intelligent design. There is currently a trial underway to rule on that decision. If there was any doubt remaining that intelligent design is a pseudo-scientific front scheme for Christian wackjobs, check out this quote from a school board member in Dover:

"Nearly 2,000 years ago someone died on a cross for us," said board member William Buckingham, who urged his colleagues to include intelligent design in ninth-grade science classes. "Shouldn't we have the courage to stand up for him?"

There ya go - if you dare teach real science in the classroom, you'll make Baby Jesus cry.

"Sorry About That, Chief"

RIP, Don Adams, who not only was Maxwell Smart in "Get Smart," but was the voice of childhood fave Tennessee Tuxedo. (My viewing of Tennessee's show in the afternoon was too many times pre-empted by Watergate hearings - thank YOU, Tricky Dick!)

It's been years since I have seen an episode of "Get Smart," plus I've only seen about fifteen minutes of one Austin Powers movie. Needless to say - in the secret-agent-parody genre, "Get Smart" was about (insert number between twenty and forty) times funnier.

Using Such Comparisions Rocks Him Like a Hurricane

Strib sports columnist Jim Souhan is a big fan of using Hurricane Katrina analogies:

Wrting about the Vikings coach:

Tice is displaying the leadership skills that made New Orleans the tourist attraction it is today.

Writing about the Gophers offense:

When your running game covers more ground than the average Category 4 hurricane, the quarterback is asked to not mess up.

Witty stuff, Jimmy. Here's a reference in case you need to spark the muse.

Hello Hooray

Hot on the heels of my finding out about "The White Shadow" DVD, Migwire lets us know that Alice Cooper's Good to See You Again is also coming out on DVD ... the SAME DAY as "Shadow"! This movie occasionally would pop up as "long wait" and rarely as "short wait" in my Netflix queue, only to drop back down to the Saved section as "unknown." Must have been some quasi-official limited release. Hopefully this new release will correct that.

I love the original Alice Cooper band. (And have no doubt, they were a BAND with the former Vincent Furnier as the frontman.) ("She asked me why the singer's name was Alice / I said 'Listen, baby, you really wouldn't understand.'") Their Greatest Hits album is easily one of my all-time faves.

I'll be playing some Alice Cooper on my next podcast, which I hope to record this weekend.

Couldn't Think of Witty Dylan Lyric To Insert Here

I've been looking forward to seeing "Bob Dylan: No Direction Home" for quite a while and was planning on watching it on PBS next week. But then I remembered that the only time I have ever seen any cool rock 'n' roll show (Austin City Limits aside) on PBS is during a pledge drive. During all other times of the year, that network is rock-free - only breaking out the riffage when they want to hit us up for some money.

So I put the Dylan documentary at the top of my Netflix queue - it's already available for rental. Even if PBS is playing this one straight, I'll have the pause and rewind options available.

The Babs Bush Drunk Gene Lives On!

I'm guessing that Dubya and his kin get their drunk genes from his mom, the fugly former first lady. Pappy Bush ran the CIA and I don't think you can do that job while drunk, if only because you should be sober when negotiating with the Mafia to do your dirty work.

The Babs Bush Drunk Gene Roll Call:

Son and Momma's Boy, George W.

Granddaughter, Noelle Bush (Jeb's daughter)

Grandson, John Ellis Bush (Jeb's son) (Look - he's biting his tongue trying not to say: "Don't you know who I am??")

Granddaughter, Jenna Bush (Dubya's daughter)

Granddaughters, Jenna and Barbara Bush (Dubya's daughters)

And when while at the Astrodome visiting Katrina evacuees, Babs may have been drunk when she said: "Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this, this is working very well for them."

But I suspect that she is just plain mean.

Heaven

"The White Shadow" is coming out on DVD. Awesome. Amazon.com is saying the release date is November 8th, but Netflix is saying that it is October 18th. Let's hope for October.

What's the starting lineup those first two seasons, before Jackson was tragically killed in that liquor store holdup? (Sadly ironic: Jackson had beat his drinking problem early in season one.)

My guess:

C - Coolidge
G - Thorpe
G - Hayward
F - Jackson
F - Reese

Or was Jackson a guard and Hayward a forward? I don't remember well enough, nor do I know basketball well enough. I just know that "Cool" was the center and that Thorpe ran the offense.

"This Is Show Business, Baby. No Business, No Show."

I finally watched The Harder They Come last night. I didn't think it was possible, but now the soundtrack sounds even better. As Greil Marcus once wrote: "The Rolling Stones would have killed to make this album."