Sinfest: Still my favorite Webcomic

And not just because they're quoting Thomas Dolby on the website.



(click to enlarge)

This is bizarre.

Okay. There's a woman named Jessica, she co-writes the blog Feministing. I've linked to it a couple of dozen times, both at this blog and my old one, usually finding it a source of both good humor and good ideas.

Jessica was invited, along with several other bloggers, to meet with Bill Clinton recently. As one would, they posed for a group photo with the former President. Right-wing bloggers are, apparently, in a state of agitation about this.

What has them so stirred up? Well, apparently, it's because Jessica, besides being a funny and smart writer, has these...things. On her chest. These round protruberances, the outlines of which show even when she's wearing a sweater. My god, how distasteful.

Sadly, I am not even making this up. The often-inspirational Amanda from Pandagon had this to say about a couple of Jessica's critics, Ann Althouse and someone called Dr. Helen.

Ann, unable to muster up anything to actually say about the luncheon, decided to invite her male readers to make gross comments about Jessica’s body. Naturally, the word “intern” was thrown around, because about 95% of wingnuts think “interns” are concubines for politicians. When Jessica linked back and told her, far more nicely than I would, to cram it up her tight ass, she decided to write an entire post on Jessica’s boobs. Ann is a Boob Woman, apparently. Dr. Helen, never one not to vie for a chance to bash on women in hopes of earning an honorary penis (for some reason, they haven’t awarded it yet, making her the most optimistic moron ever to walk the face of the planet—the Dr. doesn’t know she can buy a strap-on for a couple hundred bucks, I guess) has written a post inviting her male readers to abuse Jessica for the audacity of being a pretty young woman and also a writer who gets invited to lunch with a former President. Dr. Helen’s excuse is we feminists are opposed to men groping women in bars. This means we are supposed to avoid men who have consensual sex with women. Dr. Helen’s unwillingness to understand the concept of consent still boggles my mind.

(Quick sidebar: A strap-on costs a couple of hundred bucks? Man. I am out of the loop.)

Jill from Feministe, whose responses to previous fun-with-feminism moments I've also linked to in the past, goes into it here.

let's go human racing...Let's go racing now.

Your Famous Last Words Will Be:

"I can pass this guy."

What Will Your Famous Last Words Be?

Suspicion of tradition so new wave

You Are Lightning

Beautiful yet dangerous People will stop and watch you when you appear Even though you're capable of random violence You are best known for: your power Your dominant state: performing

What Type of Weather Are You?

Something going wrong around...

Tom tagged me with a t'do list: name five songs that make me cry.

As is my wont, I've added one or two videos where appropriate and availible. This is, as they say, in no particular order...

Joe Jackson - Is She Really Going Out With Him? (live version from the Beat Crazy Tour of 1980): With "Sentimental Thing" from Blaze Of Glory a very close runner-up. What moves me so much about this performance of one of JJ's best-known hits is not so much the lyrical content (though god knows I've identified with that in my time) as the emotion of the performance.

It was recorded at the last gig Joe would play with his original lineup until the reunion Volume 4 album of 2003. As he repeats the last line of the chorus-"Something going wrong around here"-it builds into a final emotional screech, a yelp-"Something going wrong AROUND...."

...before the band takes off into a final vamp that becomes chaotic when Jackson climbs "over the drum kit and accidentally pulling a few wires out of their sockets in the process," according to his liner notes to the Live 1980/86 album.

Level 42 - Something About You: Specifically, an unfortunately uncredited remix that I have on one of my '80s new wave compilations. I like the single version, which is featured in the video below, but I love the remix. Whoever did it actually took some parts out of the song and I've never missed them, in fact the opposite.

There is a moment in this song where I can absolutely see my characters Annabel and Keitha dancing together. I won't tell you just what it is because, again, that moment's not really connected to the lyric of the song and it doesn't matter.

But it gets me almost every time-even just now thinking about it. It represents every hope and dream I have of where I want to take them-which sometimes seems so far away...



For the record, it has nothing to do with the fact that a scene in the video features a painter, which another of my characters, Colley, is. I only just discovered that myself.

Tears for Fears - Year Of The Knife: This album track from The Seeds of Love is for my All That Jazz moment, if you remember the big musical number before Joe Gideon dies.

They say his famous final words
Came from the heart of the man
I made my bed on love denied
Now I ain't gonna sleep tonight

Too late for the young gun
To lead a simple life

(The sun and the moon, the wind and the rain...)

Fixx - Secret Separation: This is the second-best single the Fixx ever recorded (it'd be the best if not for that instantly-dated drum sound) and their most emotionally and lyrically coherent.

Like all their records it benefits immeasurably from production by Rupert Hine, who knew how to do vocal and instrumental arrangements and overdubs that showed the band to their best possible effect. Herein the simple strummed guitar that leads to the last lines of the song.

This consists in part of the first line of the first verse and the last line of the chourus, repeated over and over in different voices:

I'll bear one precious scar that only you will know
Passengers in time
Free me...

Eurythmics - Shame: First things first: The person who posted the video for this to YouTube doesn't want it embedded, but if you go here you can see it. I would suggest you do, not only to hear the song but to see, IMO, the best video the two ever made (I believe Dave was the director).

As for the song, it's a beautiful rebuke to the idea of "the glamourous life." Now, normally I get prickly about the notion that it's always multi-billionaire rock stars like Sting and John Lennon who are telling us to "live here and be happy with less" or "Imagine no possessions."

So why do Dave and Annie get away with saying

Shame

In the dancehalls and the cinema
On the TV and the media

-for promoting a lifestyle which, they say, "don't exist?" Well, maybe it's because they don't leave the bromides and bands upon which they were raised out of their finger-pointing.

Shame
And they said all need is love...
With the Beatles and the Rolling Stones

I confess my first reaction to this information was...

...is this a joke?

Cross-dressing British comedian Eddie Izzard will be joining the cast of the George W. Bush-loving series 24 in the sixth season. How fair and balanced.

Also joining the cast will be actor James Cromwell, in the role of Jack Bauer's father.

Probably a good choice. Can you think of anyone better qualified to play Kiefer Sutherland's father? I can't.

Let's ask this guy. Sir, can you think of anyone better...



Okay sir, we'll catch you later...

The TV producers of Hollywood aren't listening to a wide enough selection of music

The West Wing episode "Posse Comitatus" features a montage set to the late Jeff Buckley's cover of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" near its conclusion. The song also featured on the second season premiere of House, "Acceptance."

At the end of the Huff episode "Is She Dead?" the song "Delicate" by Damien Rice plays...which it also does in the background of the third second season episode of House, "Humpty Dumpty." To make this even slightly weirder, the refrain of "Delicate" is

why'd you say hallelujah, if it means nothing to ya?

Now these are both artful, great performances and songs...but there are millions of others. You'd think someone would have noticed.

Random Confessions Of The '80s Man

On the commentary track for the new Special Edition DVD of Some Kind Of Wonderful, director Howie Deutch misidentifies Propaganda's "Dr. Mabuse," which plays under the opening credits, as "Do Anything" by Pete Shelley.

How to annoy the '80s man.

BTW, I know one or two of my vast reading audience are also Mystery Science Theater 3000 fans. This is the video for "Dr. Mabuse."



Tell me that's not a much, much, much, much cooler version of Manos, the Hands of Fate.

Further to yesterday's post

Blowoff.

But on the bright (?) side, I'm publishing reviews again

Punk Goes '80s.

Seriously-Lindsay Lohan owns no underwear

(click to make pic bigger)

However, I admit that I like the fact she's standing under a sign with my old nickname when I was a kid on it. I'm a simple man in many ways.

A song and a few thoughts

Five years ago, after September 11, 2001, the first time I left the house, this is the song I put in my tape deck. Of course, the lyric can't give you the full effect. Especially as it's missing the recitation of "The Lord's Prayer" that runs throughought the song, ending with the haunting repitition of "God deliver us from evil."

But this gives you a rough idea.

I stand alone and watch the clock
I only wait for it to stop
And in the room locked up inside me
The cutout magazines remind me
I sit and wait alone in my room

And in my room against the wall
There is a picture very small
A photograph I took some years ago
It shows a picture of the room I know
I sit and wait alone in my room

The walls are white and in the night
The room is lit by electric light

I stand alone and watch the clock
I only wait for it to stop
The doors are shut and all the windows lock
The only sound is from the clock
I sit and wait alone in my room

The walls are white and in the night
The room is lit by electric light

--Yaz, "In My Room"

The more I am reminded of the pain of that day, the more I resent the folks who've tried to manipulate its memory. No event in my lifetime (I'm 54) brought Americans together the way our shared suffering brought us together that day. It is appalling not only that this unity has been lost but that the emotions of 9/11 have been reconfigured to demonize one another. The worst kind of partisans have claimed 9/11 as a club to use against the other side. The same thing has happened with the Iraq War: If you don't see things my way and vote for my side, you must be objectively pro-terrorist, plus you hate America and pray for our troops to be killed.

--Mark Evanier.

Roughly 3,000 people died on September 11 for no good, human reason. Countless others were injured and/or had their lives forever harmed in a myriad of ways...physically, emotionally, financially, etc. (I think there's an unfortunate tendency to talk about the number of dead as if that's the sole measure of damage that occurred.) I don't think we should look back at it all in a way that just makes us afraid it'll happen again. We usually do the wrong thing when we operate out of fear. But there's got to be a more constructive thing we can do with that memory than exploit it for short-term benefits.

--Mark Evanier (again)

Frankly, I don't see how 9/11 can be venerated in any legitimate collective way as long as George Bush is leading that process. Above all, BushCo's manipulation of the survivors and victims on the anniversary of this abhorrent tragedy shows the blasphemy of someone whose actions consistently demonstrate duplicity and a pure political motive.

--BAGnewsnotes.

There's a feeling by some bloggers today that it would "creepy" to blog about other, non-9/11 topics. Right or wrong, I do not share this feeling. Obviously I wanted to acknowledge the day, but I do not see how there is anything constructive in adopting a hushed, faux-reverent tone to my writings here.

As if showing that I have not "forgotten" the events of that day made one damn bit of difference. The quote from BAGnews above is quite correct: As long as George W. Bush remains in office, we-none of us-are doing anything to actually bring those responsible to justice.

And in a way it seems just as disrespectful a spit in the face of those who were lost, and their loved ones, to pretend otherwise.

They're on to me.

Your 'Do You Want the Terrorists to Win' Score: 91%

You are a terrorist-loving, Bush-bashing, "blame America first"-crowd traitor. You are in league with evil-doers who hate our freedoms. By all counts you are a liberal, and as such cleary desire the terrorists to succeed and impose their harsh theocratic restrictions on us all. You are fit to be hung for treason! Luckily George Bush is tapping your internet connection and is now aware of your thought-crime. Have a nice day.... in Guantanamo!

Do You Want the Terrorists to Win?
Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Could I have any higher regard for "Studio 60" before it even airs?

You wouldn't think so, given its cast and crew. But apparently, I can, because I just read in the selfsame EW that the writing staff includes Mark McKinney of The Kids In The Hall, who was hired to help out with the sketch writing for the show-within-the-show.

Come on, September 18!

Oh boy, "Girls."

So I'm flipping through the Entertainment Weekly TV Fall Preview issue. In the writeup on the new, Sherman-Palladinoless season of Gilmore Girls, they describe Lauren Graham deleting lines and generally being more "collaborative" and "a more active participant in the process" than was apparently the norm in the past.

Well, great. Graham is a talented, commanding, sexy and funny actress...but I have yet to read a single interview with her that suggests she should be getting anywhere near that creative process.

But then, most actors shouldn't. Occasionally you find one who's capable of looking at "the big picture," but they're rare as un-plastic surgery-ed faces in Hollywood. For the most part, actors creative decisions are based on who they like (I want to make out with him, not him!) or what they think will make people like them (this won't make me look unsympathetic, will it?)

Cruelty, thy name is theatre

Sideways was one of the movies I loved most in the past couple of years; I was pleased when it was nominated for and/or won all those awards. One of the things it gets absolutely dead-on is the soul-shriveling experience of the struggling writer walking downstairs to check his mailbox every day and finding...nothing.

(I've been known to joke that Sideways could have been made for me. I'm a struggling writer and I've had a crush on Virginia Madsen since 1985.)

So anyway, this evening, I go downstairs to check my mailbox. In it, I find an envelope with the return address of a theatre to which I submitted a couple of my plays a while back. Now, I don't mind so much these days, having one of my plays rejected.

Though obviously I'd be delighted if one of those messages in bottles I sent out so long ago suddenly brought me a production. But my ego isn't invested in my plays at the moment, not the way it is in my novel.

So I have no big problem with the fact that in the envelope was not a letter telling me they wished to produce one of my plays and send me some thousands of dollars. I do, however, think it was a bit chintzy of them to be sending me a fundraising letter.

I need Virginia Madsen to come and teach me about wine...

Oh, Mr. Varkentine...come now!

I've been noticed by the web page for The Jack Benny 39 cent stamp campaign. I share space on the page with (among others) a couple of non-entities named Neil Gaiman and Mark Evanier. I'm sure they're proud to be associated with me, even in this meager way.

As I've mentioned before, Benny is one of my all-time favorites from the golden age of radio. Actually, he's one of everyone's favorites from the golden age of radio, and...holy cow. I just found out that YouTube has a couple of short clips of a filmed recording of The Jack Benny Program in 1942.

This is the second part:



I want to make a sidenote here to say a few words abour Rochester, a little "let the clicker beware" if you will. His routine with Benny in the above clip makes use of some racist stereotypes, something his portrayal was sadly not free of up through about the second world war. I'm posting it because I believe the routine is still funny, due largely to Eddie Anderson and Benny's gifts as comic actors.

In his book Prime Time Blues, Donald Bogle makes the case that Benny & Anderson were the originators of the black/white comedy team we've seen so many variants on since, and I agree. First in performance and then in writing, as the staff got more "hip" to the realities of the black experience of living in America in the first half of the 20th century, Anderson's Rochester always transcended stereotype.

Benny was the acknowledged master of comedy timing, but Anderson was nearly his equal at the skill. That is why, in my view, such troubling material as they performed still holds up...which is more than I can say for Amos and Andy.

That team was just as popular in their day if not more so, but nowadays it's just not funny anymore, at least not to me (and for reasons that have nothing to do with the racial content). Anderson's characterization can still be appreciated today, both if understood as in the context of its time and because, again, it's just so funny.

That's what I think, anyway. Your mileage, as they say, may vary.

"I don’t want to be the person I will be if I stay here.”

Harry Anderson is leaving New Orleans.

Harry Anderson, the illusionist, comic and former star of sitcoms like “Night Court” and “Dave’s World,” has lived in New Orleans since 2000, when he left Hollywood with his wife, the former Elizabeth Morgan. They rode out Hurricane Katrina in the French Quarter, in the building that houses Oswald’s Speakeasy, Mr. Anderson’s nightclub. Their home, whose ground floor was given over to Sideshow, their magic and curiosity shop, was in another building in the Quarter.

In the weeks after the storm, even before the power was back, Mr. Anderson opened his club for what he called French Quarter Town Hall meetings. The weekly gatherings, which at first offered little more than camaraderie by candlelight and warm beer, evolved into a de facto government for a part of New Orleans that had experienced little flooding but could not begin cleanup and rebuilding because of the city’s overall paralysis.

So it is especially poignant that the Andersons have now decided to leave. But their story is not unique: many in this city are suffering the same continuing loss and strain that led these two to their decision. So their departure raises the question of whether others who can afford to leave, those who have not sunk every penny into a now-moldy house or a devastated store, will also move on.

One reason they were leaving, they said, was that the tourists were few and even fewer were coming to see “Wise Guy,” Mr. Anderson’s engaging one-man show at Oswald’s. “I had more people in my car last night,” he said to his piano player during a performance in May.

Mr. Anderson said friends and relatives from out of town are happy to hear that they are moving. “It’s been a universal response from people who aren’t here,” he said.

Their New Orleans friends, too, have been supportive, Ms. Anderson said, and no one has expressed hostility. “I feel a little bit better now because I feel something is going to happen,” Ms. Anderson said. “I’m glad we tried to stay, but I don’t want to be the person I will be if I stay here.”

Okay...I freely admit this is a cheap shot...but come on...

Via A Socialite's Life:

Justin Timberlake...who will be voicing King Arthur in animated feature "Shrek The Third,"

You know...a lot of great actors have played King Arthur. Joss Ackland...Mel Blanc...Pierce Brosnan...Graham Chapman...Sean Connery...Peter Cook...Tim Curry...John Gielgud...Richard Harris...Harry Shearer...Martin Sheen...Dave Thomas...

...to name just a few, in alphabetical order (thank you, IMDB). Now, Justin Timberlake. Good work, guys. We just got the English to forgive us for the whole Dick Van Dyke's Cockney accent in Mary Poppins thing.

I suppose we can't really blame young Justin. The poor boy ain't that bright:

[Timberlake] finds himself dizzy when he tries to read books and scripts aloud - unless the text is always in the centre of the page.

He says, "I think I need to get my eyes checked. I don't have a problem reading scripts because all the text is in the middle of the page and you just scan down. "But there's something about going left to right, left to right that makes me dizzy."

A choice of replies.

One: He can't read left to right? Well, maybe there's a solution to that. Oh, Rabbi...

Two: Do all of you reading this know from just what state in our union Mr. Timberlake happens to hail, or would you like me to refresh your memory?

Now that, my friends, is comedy

Guerrilla artist Banksy hijacked a shipment of Paris Hilton cds and replaced the cd with a disc of his own music ... he also replaced the inner artwork with his own manipulated artwork. Here are a few photos of the jacked up artwork and the cd:

Banksy has replaced Hilton's CD with his own remixes and given them titles such as Why am I Famous?, What Have I Done? and What Am I For? He has also changed pictures of her on the CD sleeve to show the US socialite topless and with a dog's head. A spokeswoman for Banksy said he had doctored 500 copies of her debut album Paris in 48 record shops across the UK. She told the BBC News website: "He switched the CDs in store, so he took the old ones out and put his version in" ... But he left the original barcode so people could buy the CD without realising it had been interfered with. Banksy is notorious for his secretive and subversive stunts such as sneaking doctored versions of classic paintings into major art galleries. His spokeswoman said he had tampered with the CDs in branches of HMV and Virgin as well as independent record stores ... No customers had complained or returned a doctored version, he said.

Via Pink Is The New Blog.