(GETTIN' READY TO GO TO HUNKER) NOTES FROM A FRIDAY AFTERNOON
tipping the cows of my mind.
For your consideration: another curious collection
of thoughts, reactions, and observations that didn't make it into a full-length
post this week. So they're sort of like all those aisles and aisles of
miscellaneous crap just waiting to be bought at Home Depot. But without all
that damned dust...
• It's been a while since I updated these totals, but with the passing of yet another Mission Accomplished anniversary, it seems like a good time to do so. If you count the 24 persons still officially listed as missing, the September 11th American death toll was 2,998. The Iraq War American death toll currently stands at 4,065. Which means that George W. Bush leads Osama bin Laden by 1,067 innocent American lives. And counting.
• If Hillary were trailing Obama by that many delegates, she'd have already dropped out. And rightly so. If bin Laden doesn't hurry up and close the gap, the Superterrorists are all gonna throw their support behind Bush, and the race for biggest American-butchering jackass in the world will be officially wrapped up.
• It's obvious by now that when Bush said Bring 'em on, he didn't mean that he wanted to fight 'em; it meant he wanted to beat 'em at their own game.
• Well, then... Mission Accomplished indeed.
• Speaking, as I was a few moments ago, of Barack and Hillary, I'll stand down on those subjects this week and turn the commentary over to another rip-snorting piece, post-Pennsylvania-primary, from Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi. It's all worth reading and considering, but here, for my ear, is the money passage: With all his verbose deflections of Hillary's attacks and unconcealed annoyance over silly nonissues like his failure to wear a flag lapel pin, Obama inadvertently painted himself into a corner as a know-it-all, a pointy-head who would rather yammer in polysyllables and talk to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than wear the fucking American flag on his chest — as Hillary, meanwhile, was promising to "obliterate" Iran and in the process roping in hordes of nondescript suburbanites who'll crawl through the mud for "Madam President" while marching to classic rock tunes like the "Horst Wessel Song." Clinton's genius was in seeing that it was possible to play the liberal/intellectual-baiting game not only with Republicans but with Democrats — and that by forcing her opponent to take the high road, she could scour the fish-rich waters of the low road. The result has been an epic clash, a war of cultural types that has nothing whatsoever to do with issues and everything to do with self-image. It's become a pitched fight between the fucked-over suburban little guy and the vilified intellectual, two groups that for years have felt put upon and dispossessed, for different reasons. The fact that their respective champions are identical superstar U.S. senators/multimillionaires makes the bitter hatred this schism is inspiring absurd, but it doesn't make it any less real. Or likely to end anytime soon.
• As a quick follow-up to last week's Home Depot vs. Giant Eagle Self-Checkout Note: I bought three items at Giant Eagle earlier this week, and it took me almost four minutes to complete the transaction. I bought a three-foot fluorescent light bulb at Home Depot this afternoon, used my check card, got cash back, and was on my way in under 45 seconds. The difference between the two makes me nuts. It also makes me want to forgo eating and just make lots of home improvements instead.
• TWM Strange But True Tip of the Week: if you like chocolate-covered almonds, try the CVS -- yes, the pharmacy chain -- brand. They're shockingly good and incredibly addictive; at that price, and even at considerably higher prices -- I'm talking to you, Trader Joe's -- you won't find any better.
• TWM Music Tip of the Week: if you like Tom Petty, Ryan Adams, Gram Parsons, The Byrds, Flying Burrito Brothers, or any other great, country-tinged roots-rock, check out the over-thirty-years-in-the-making debut album from Mudcrutch, Petty's pre-Heartbreakers band. All those glowing reviews are true: it's not a self-indulgence, and it's not a novelty project; it's a CD as good as anything he's done since Full Moon Fever, and evidence -- as if we needed any more -- that the guy has talent and inspiration to burn.
• Orphan of the Storm, my favorite track so far, may be the greatest Gram Parsons song Gram Parsons never wrote. And it's surely the most gorgeous song I've heard all year.
• Thank God viewers sent Brooke White packing on American Idol this week. I was really starting to fear for her health, if not her sanity; that look on her face during the first few bars of I'm a Believer Tuesday night was virtually indistinguishable from the look on Shelley Duvall's face in the last half hour of The Shining. If she'd have had to sing even one more week, I'm afraid she would have died of fright right there on the stage.
• I can almost picture it now. Paula Abdul would turn into that crazy, flesh-rotting woman in the bathtub in room 237, Ryan Seacrest would be running around that stage wagging his finger and shouting This... is American Redrum!, and that cranky brit would, after seven seasons trapped as the only responsible caretaker of the Idol Hotel, would grab a microphone stand, leap up on stage, and beat David Archuleta senseless while screaming Heeeeeere's Simon! at the top of his crazy lungs.
• The Pens played last night like a team that, after seven straight wins, just couldn't summon the urgency or concentration to compete. Sure, they had some good chances, Marc-Andre Fleury was strong in goal, and Jordan Staal and Tyler Kennedy worked and forechecked like madmen, but the rest of the team was sloppy, turnover prone, and seemed, until those last few minutes, to be mailing it in and waiting for another sweep. Credit the Rangers with having other ideas. And expect the boys in black and gold, delivered an extra dose of adrenaline by an amped-up Mellon Arena crowd, to have no such problems come Sunday afternoon.
• I heard a few minutes of local sports talk radio this morning, and it sounded like more than a few people were already starting to panic. I even heard two different discussions about whether the Pens would lose the series. Now. I'm not saying it's not possible. But the Pens lose one game after starting the playoffs with seven straight victories, and people have to be talked down from the ledge? What kind of lunatics are you? Did you expect them to win the Stanley Cup without losing a game? (This sort of bipolar sanity -- from unrealistic optimism one day to irrational pessimism the next -- only confirms my suspicion that the Pens' bandwagon is filled with bored, half-drunken, half-witted Steelers fans. But more on that in another post...) If you'd told me at the start of the week that they'd split in New York, or if you told me at the start of the series that they'd be coming home for Game 5 up three games to one, I'd have been doing backflips. Now, suddenly, that scenario seems so dire that people are threatening to do backflips off the Liberty Bridge.
• Hang up the phone, have another beer, and hang on 'til Sunday, okay?
• Okay.
• It's been a while since I updated these totals, but with the passing of yet another Mission Accomplished anniversary, it seems like a good time to do so. If you count the 24 persons still officially listed as missing, the September 11th American death toll was 2,998. The Iraq War American death toll currently stands at 4,065. Which means that George W. Bush leads Osama bin Laden by 1,067 innocent American lives. And counting.
• If Hillary were trailing Obama by that many delegates, she'd have already dropped out. And rightly so. If bin Laden doesn't hurry up and close the gap, the Superterrorists are all gonna throw their support behind Bush, and the race for biggest American-butchering jackass in the world will be officially wrapped up.
• It's obvious by now that when Bush said Bring 'em on, he didn't mean that he wanted to fight 'em; it meant he wanted to beat 'em at their own game.
• Well, then... Mission Accomplished indeed.
• Speaking, as I was a few moments ago, of Barack and Hillary, I'll stand down on those subjects this week and turn the commentary over to another rip-snorting piece, post-Pennsylvania-primary, from Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi. It's all worth reading and considering, but here, for my ear, is the money passage: With all his verbose deflections of Hillary's attacks and unconcealed annoyance over silly nonissues like his failure to wear a flag lapel pin, Obama inadvertently painted himself into a corner as a know-it-all, a pointy-head who would rather yammer in polysyllables and talk to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad than wear the fucking American flag on his chest — as Hillary, meanwhile, was promising to "obliterate" Iran and in the process roping in hordes of nondescript suburbanites who'll crawl through the mud for "Madam President" while marching to classic rock tunes like the "Horst Wessel Song." Clinton's genius was in seeing that it was possible to play the liberal/intellectual-baiting game not only with Republicans but with Democrats — and that by forcing her opponent to take the high road, she could scour the fish-rich waters of the low road. The result has been an epic clash, a war of cultural types that has nothing whatsoever to do with issues and everything to do with self-image. It's become a pitched fight between the fucked-over suburban little guy and the vilified intellectual, two groups that for years have felt put upon and dispossessed, for different reasons. The fact that their respective champions are identical superstar U.S. senators/multimillionaires makes the bitter hatred this schism is inspiring absurd, but it doesn't make it any less real. Or likely to end anytime soon.
• As a quick follow-up to last week's Home Depot vs. Giant Eagle Self-Checkout Note: I bought three items at Giant Eagle earlier this week, and it took me almost four minutes to complete the transaction. I bought a three-foot fluorescent light bulb at Home Depot this afternoon, used my check card, got cash back, and was on my way in under 45 seconds. The difference between the two makes me nuts. It also makes me want to forgo eating and just make lots of home improvements instead.
• TWM Strange But True Tip of the Week: if you like chocolate-covered almonds, try the CVS -- yes, the pharmacy chain -- brand. They're shockingly good and incredibly addictive; at that price, and even at considerably higher prices -- I'm talking to you, Trader Joe's -- you won't find any better.
• TWM Music Tip of the Week: if you like Tom Petty, Ryan Adams, Gram Parsons, The Byrds, Flying Burrito Brothers, or any other great, country-tinged roots-rock, check out the over-thirty-years-in-the-making debut album from Mudcrutch, Petty's pre-Heartbreakers band. All those glowing reviews are true: it's not a self-indulgence, and it's not a novelty project; it's a CD as good as anything he's done since Full Moon Fever, and evidence -- as if we needed any more -- that the guy has talent and inspiration to burn.
• Orphan of the Storm, my favorite track so far, may be the greatest Gram Parsons song Gram Parsons never wrote. And it's surely the most gorgeous song I've heard all year.
• Thank God viewers sent Brooke White packing on American Idol this week. I was really starting to fear for her health, if not her sanity; that look on her face during the first few bars of I'm a Believer Tuesday night was virtually indistinguishable from the look on Shelley Duvall's face in the last half hour of The Shining. If she'd have had to sing even one more week, I'm afraid she would have died of fright right there on the stage.
• I can almost picture it now. Paula Abdul would turn into that crazy, flesh-rotting woman in the bathtub in room 237, Ryan Seacrest would be running around that stage wagging his finger and shouting This... is American Redrum!, and that cranky brit would, after seven seasons trapped as the only responsible caretaker of the Idol Hotel, would grab a microphone stand, leap up on stage, and beat David Archuleta senseless while screaming Heeeeeere's Simon! at the top of his crazy lungs.
• The Pens played last night like a team that, after seven straight wins, just couldn't summon the urgency or concentration to compete. Sure, they had some good chances, Marc-Andre Fleury was strong in goal, and Jordan Staal and Tyler Kennedy worked and forechecked like madmen, but the rest of the team was sloppy, turnover prone, and seemed, until those last few minutes, to be mailing it in and waiting for another sweep. Credit the Rangers with having other ideas. And expect the boys in black and gold, delivered an extra dose of adrenaline by an amped-up Mellon Arena crowd, to have no such problems come Sunday afternoon.
• I heard a few minutes of local sports talk radio this morning, and it sounded like more than a few people were already starting to panic. I even heard two different discussions about whether the Pens would lose the series. Now. I'm not saying it's not possible. But the Pens lose one game after starting the playoffs with seven straight victories, and people have to be talked down from the ledge? What kind of lunatics are you? Did you expect them to win the Stanley Cup without losing a game? (This sort of bipolar sanity -- from unrealistic optimism one day to irrational pessimism the next -- only confirms my suspicion that the Pens' bandwagon is filled with bored, half-drunken, half-witted Steelers fans. But more on that in another post...) If you'd told me at the start of the week that they'd split in New York, or if you told me at the start of the series that they'd be coming home for Game 5 up three games to one, I'd have been doing backflips. Now, suddenly, that scenario seems so dire that people are threatening to do backflips off the Liberty Bridge.
• Hang up the phone, have another beer, and hang on 'til Sunday, okay?
• Okay.
Posted: Fri - May 2, 2008 at 03:41 PM
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Published On: May 02, 2008 03:41 PM
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Published On: May 02, 2008 03:41 PM