List.

The List, as stolen from The Zombie.

What would best describe your personality?

Super Mario Bros. Theme – NESkimos
Okay, off to an interesting start…I’m a little Italian guy who stomps mushrooms and turtles.

What do you like in a guy/girl?

I Must be in Love – The Rutles
Yeah, ok. I enjoy being head over heels.

How do you feel today?

Country – Keith Jarrett
Ahhh! So that’s how I feel!

What is your life’s purpose?

Smoky Joe’s Café – The Coasters
It would appear my destiny is to eat beans and get menaced by near homicidal short-order cooks.

What is your motto?

9^th Symphony, First Movement – Dvorak
Not sure what the motto is, but it’s damned dramatic.

What do your friends think of you?

You Can’t Always Get What You Want – The Rolling Stones
Perhaps I need a new set of friends. I mean if I am THAT much of a disappointment…

What do you think of your parents?

Cold as Ice – Foreigner

Jeezus, this is just fucking spooky! Further commentary would be superfluous.

What do you think about very often?

Please Don’t Talk About Me When I’m Gone – Leon Redbone
Makes me sound pretty insecure, huh? I’m getting a bit unnerved.

What do you think of your best friend?

Tai Shan – Rush
My best friend, my mentor, my mystic guide. “…and China sang to me.”

What do you think of your crush?

Little Darlin’ – The Diamonds
Okay…

What is your life story?

What Is and What Shall Never Be – Led Zepplin
Damn, the Tarot has NOTHING on this meme.

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Waiting in the Car – Duck’s Breath Mystery Theater
This is the least “grown up” song I can imagine. Hmmm, is there a message here?

What do you think when you see your crush?

Aneurysm – Nirvana YES! That’s the feeling EXACTLY!

What do your parents think of you?
Peace Not Greed – Kottonmouth Kings
If they think of me at all, this would be about right.

What do strangers think of you?

Oops! I Did It Again – Richard Thompson

Um, what did I do, exactly? Why aren’t the strangers telling me?

How’s your love life?

Can’t Get There From Here – REM
Oh, very funny.

What will they play at your funeral?

Blue Moon – The Platters
Why? Why would they play this at my funeral? Does this have anything to do with what strangers think of me?

What will you dance to at your wedding?

British Highway Code – Master Singers
What?

What is your hobby/interest?

Soviet National Anthem – The Red Army Choir

Workers of the world unite! Collect the whole set!

What’s your biggest secret?

The Elements – Tom Lehrer
My biggest secret is that I am a total geek? C’mon, that’s no secret! (I have just been informed that this is more nerdy than geeky. Damn.)

What do you think of your friends?

Wings for Marie (Part 1) – Tool
Whoa.

What song do you listen to when you are sad?

Koalas – Mitch Hedberg
Yes. Mitch Hedberg cheers me up greatly. And I, too, like toast.

In love?

Dangerous – Doug and the Slugs
Imagine that, a song about obsession.

What song do you air guitar to?

Piano Concerto No. 20 – Mozart
I am a mean Air Cellist.

What should be your signature karaoke song?

Bad Case of Loving You – Robert Palmer
I don’t karaoke, but I am sooo guilty of singing this song loudly in the car when alone.

What is your greatest desire?

Linus and Lucy – Vince Guaraldi Trio Does this mean that I am seeking the innocence and purity of youth as exemplified by the Peanuts gang? Or am I seeking the peace and harmony one associates with the Christmas season? Or am I over-thinking this one? Yes.

What does next year have in store for you?

Istanbul [Not Constantinople] – They Might Be Giants
Great, this next year’s gonna be a Turkey…

What’s your outlook on life?

Mull of Kintyre – Paul McCartney
’Cuz life is like a sappy nationalistic dirge…

How will you die?

About a Girl – Nirvana
I will die of a broken heart?

Do people secretly lust after you?

Ying Tong Song – The Goons
I’ll take that as a “no”.

The best advice you will ever get?

Summertime Blues – Guitar Wolf
Typical. The best advice I will ever receive and I can’t understand a damned syllable.

Now that I think about it, “chickener-shit” may not be a word…

I knew this guy once, George. This is not a post about George…that will probably come later. Nope, this is a post that would piss George off in a very big way because George is a hard-line, cold-war, nuke-‘em-‘til-they-glow conservative. Not that I begrudge him for his political beliefs, quite the contrary. But, as I said, this is not a post about George.

This is about two things that George said. The first was what he described as an “Ancient Chinese Curse”. I cannot vouch for the veracity of this statement, but I have heard it repeated since. The phrase:

“May you live in interesting times.”

Frankly, I think we’re there. I look around now and I am shocked there is not a national freak out going on. We are at war against a concept. We cannot win the War on Terror any more than we could win a War on Fear. What is being said here? We will fight you until we feel safer? This is, frankly, absurd. I am embarrassed by the lies and deceit perpetrated by the government of my country in the name of commerce. This is an unprovoked war…greed dressed in patriotism is still greed, just with hypocrisy.

Watch closely, the United States is sinking in a mire of our own making. We are witnessing the degeneration of the country. Our economy is sinking. The dollar has drifted south on all major indicators. A Chinese government economist has advised that China no longer invest in the Dollar as it is no longer stable. China. I would have laughed in 1999.  Then again, Clinton was in office and there was a budgetary surplus. That was only eight years ago.

US corporations are being bought up at an alarming rate by multinationals.

Our civil liberties are gone. The First Amendment has been rendered irrelevant by the chicken-shit press and chickener-shit courts. Search warrants are issued without documentation to corporations (ARE YOU LISTENING, AT&T? ARE YOU GETTING THIS, NSA?) who violate our privacy, read our mail, and listen to our conversations. (The enemy is everywhere, right? Right?) Imminent Domain is being applied in ways that surely must make even Trump blush at the audacity.

Unless actions are taken soon the US will drift to 2^nd nation status. We may already be there.

The second quote from George was a joke of sorts. He vowed that someday he would become America’s, “…last President and first Emperor…” while running on a platform of, “Justice for Just Us.”

Um, George? If you’re reading this, another George seems to have beat you to it.

Now, Where Was I?

“They want to see my nipples; I wish that they were dead.”  - Gary Muller – “My Name Is Not Merv Griffin

I just turned on my mp3 player…kinda thought that I would write a little something tonight.  I don’t think I’d even put too much thought into what I would write about, but that’s pretty much how I start off any project.  So, I turn on my music, hoping to hear something inspirational and I am pummeled with the lovely little couplet above.  The time has come where I must confess something that you may find shocking.

I have exceptionally dreadful taste in music.   In case you are not familiar with the song…it is horrific and contains the worst trumpet solo in the history of recorded music.  It is deliberately, unabashedly, and perfectly bad…and nothing this perfect happens on accident.  I know nothing of Mr. Muller or why he would choose to write and record this tune.  I think he did it on purpose… if one were to set out to create the worst song imaginable, it would be hard to imagine anyone conjure anything this bizarre…or wretched.  In my humble opinion this makes Gary Muller a fucking genius…and dear goddess, I love the song.  It is hysterical.

I’m sick that way.

:::::

Everyday at lunch I go into the breezeway on the plaza level of the office complex across the street and have a smoke.  It is all but illegal to even think about smoking in Seattle, much less light up, so little clots of smokers pop up here and there in safe zones…and, as you might expect, I see many of the same folks two or three times a week.  One of these people is a little-person, diminutive, vertically challenged…a midget, in short.  I never talk to anyone, but every time I see her I want to rush up to her in a scolding manner and tell her that smoking will stunt her growth.

The only thing that keeps me from doing this is the fact that she could probably kick my ass.  She looks mean…

:::::

My boss is currently in Taipei presenting a paper to the some international collection of public librarians.  While she is gone, one of my co-workers decided to clean out her office for her.  This means, of course, got me delegated to “help”.  Don’t get me wrong, I really didn’t mind lifting boxes and shredding paperwork.  I amused myself by pretending that I was an Enron employee and kept looking over my shoulder and acting all shifty and shit whenever a fellow staff member walked past the shredding room.  Good lord, I’m pathetic.

While plowing through the mountains of paperwork I found a journal targeted to library managers from 1991.  As I threw it onto the ever-growing pile of future landfill material, I started thinking about all the things that happened in my life and in the lives of those who matter to me.  Good things, mostly.  Then it hit me…the magazine was 16 years old.  My daughters would consider this positively ancient, yet here I was recalling cherished memories from before they were born so vividly, it was as if they had just happened yesterday.

For a second I felt old – and it wasn’t a bad feeling at all.

:::::

Hope you are all well; I’m going to go have a bite of chocolate.

GOB

Eh….

It’s customary…if not a damned cliché…to begin a blog with a “Hello World” thing full of optimism and liberal use of the words “hopefully” and “random” – both used incorrectly. This would be followed immediately by some saccharine, hackneyed bullshit about blogging being a noble and wonderful journey and maybe…just maybe we’ll all learn that were not so gosh darned different after all. Not really interested in going down that road. Besides, given that anyone stopping by will likely already know me, such a post would be redundant and disingenuous.

Nope, it’s better I start out where I left off.

I enjoyed blogging…for a while. Then I didn’t. Then I stopped. Cause to this effect would be best ascribed to ennui and declining interest. Much of this was triggered by a singular event. I happened across the writings of a certain blogger. The style of writing was similar to my own – as were many of the topics. I am not so full of myself that I think my “style” is THAT unique…that is, I don’t think this was literary larceny, but the similarities were obvious and I was forced to evaluate my own writing. I recognized in my own posts trivialities and cute expressions and cloying snarkiness. I was trying to write clever. But I wasn’t writing about anything.

…and I got really self-conscious.

So…I’ve started again. I’d like to keep this site to a few people. So if you’re here and reading this, I likely think you’re pretty cool.* I respect your opinion and would appreciate any feedback, commentary, personal observations…hell, post a limerick.

A word of warning or preparation here. My head is not on right and never has been, but I am approaching a place that is feeling more real to me. I have (and this is no exaggeration) somnambulated my way through much of my life. I have been a less than an active participant, reluctant to face issues both painful and emotional. I have taken the path of least resistance. I fear I have been a bit of an asshole, too. It’s time to grow up and I’m making changes. I’m going to have to get a little personal. I trust you not to judge…just the same, let me know if I am being an asshole. Again.

I’ve made changes before, of course, but my efforts, while sincere, have not been long-lasting. I hope to chronicle my progress and continue my growth without backsliding, as has so often been the case in my past.

I will continue to be curmudgeonly, critical, and cynical. These are some of my better points.

More soon. Peace.

GOB

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* Unless, of course you have stumbled onto this post while looking for Grumpy Old Bastard Porn (GOBP). That would be disgusting. Moreover, it would appeal to a very narrow demographic and you should seek help immediately.

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