Almost the News XXXVIII

 

Real Headlines. Fake News.

A Single Juror May Prevent a Verdict as Deliberations Resume
As of yet, it is unclear what the juror's marital status has to do with it.

Officials Identify 3 Found Dead Inside Townhome
Police spokesperson, Kermit T. Frog, announced, "Hi-ho! It's most definitely a three, you see, because if it was an eight, the left side wouldn't be open like that."

Doctors Prepare to Strike Monday as Contract Talks Continue
"Hold that calendar still! I'm going to give it SUCH a smack!"

New Law Strengthens Requirement to Stop for School Bus Stop-Arms
The vote was unanimous in favor of adding the words "We really MEAN it, you guys!"

North St. Paul Woman's Yard Is a Magnet for Monarchs
"Just this morning, I saw King Charles, Duke Wayne, and Queen Latifah."

Two Engaged in Voter Fraud During MN's Primary Election
The wedding ceremony is expected to take place early next year.

Eden Prairie Teen Appears in Court
The teen is quoted as saying, "Ta-daa!"

#TurnASeventiesSongIntoAHalloweenHit

 

I've never been a huge fan of Halloween and I may have just figured out why. It just doesn't have any good songs!

Sure there's "Monster Mash" by Bobby "Boris" Pickett, and Michael Jackson's "Thriller," but if we're being honest, the only really good marginally-Halloween-themed song doesn't even have any words: "Frankenstein" by the Edgar Winter Group.

Momma always said not to complain unless you had an idea on how to fix the problem, so here we go...tweaking some of the best songs from the best decade of music to turn them into holiday hits on the macabre side.

Suspended Over Troubled Water  -  Simon & Garfunkel sing about a classic dungeon scene

Guillotine Keeps Choppin' Off My Head  -  ♫♪ And just like that, the guy makes sure that I am dead ♪♫

Spirit in the Guy  -  Norman Greenbaum's salute to demonic possession

The Long and Winding Rope  -  ♫♪ That wraps 'round your neck ♪♫

One Bad Apple  -  This time, the Osmonds are telling the tale of how Snow White's evil stepmother put her to sleep

How Can You Reanimate a Stolen Heart  -  ♫♪ How can you stop the blood pressure from going down ♪♫

You've Got a Fiend  -  James Taylor's dark side

Gypsys, Tramps & Werewolves  -  ♫♪ They chase you through the woods and make you howl at midnight ♪♫

The First Time Ever I Sawed Your Face  -  Roberta Flack takes her number one hit to a Texas massacre

American Die  -  ♫♪ Drove my Chevy to the levee where I buried this guy ♪♫

A Ghost With No Name  -  A song about going through the desert with an anonymous spook

Tie a String of Garlic Round the Old Oak Tree  -  ♫♪ Make those vampires flee far away from me ♪♫

Killing Me Softly With His Saw  -  Roberta Flack's follow-up hit

Bennie and the Banshees  -  ♫♪ She's got lethal nails and a voice that wails ♪♫

50 Ways to Cleave Your Lover  -  Paul Simon gives several new meanings to the word "hacker"

What Is the Vertical Magnitude of the Sentimentally Charged Interpersonal Attachment You Experience?: The 366th Greatest Song

 

I have a theory that says the only reason people liked "How Deep Is Your Love" so much is that it was juxtaposed next to all the disco on the Bee Gees' album Saturday Night Fever. You know, like how in high school I only hung out with guys uglier than me...so I would look good in comparison. (Of course, there were only two guys in the whole school who met that qualification.)

Another possible point of interest in the song might be this #FunFact divulged by Rolling Stone:

The Bee Gees' work for Saturday Night Fever was recorded during a famed two-and-a-half-week-long session at a chateau in northern France, where, according to Barry Gibb, "six classic lesbian porno scenes [were] filmed."

 

For the Record:

1. I'm fairly certain the porno scenes were not filmed at the same time the Bee Gees were recording.

2. Now that I'm aware of this connection, I'm wondering which movie they meant "How Deep Is Your Love" to be part of.

I know your eyes in the mornin' sun

I feel you touch me in the pourin' rain

And the moment that you wander far from me

I wanna feel you in my arms again

And you come to me on a summer breeze

Keep me warm in your love, then you softly leave

And it's me you need to show

How deep is your love?

I'm just sayin'!

Observed Absurdities™ 74 - Is It Just Me?

 

Beloved and I were taking a short vacation in the Hoosier state to celebrate her high school class reunion last month.

We were staying with some of our very best friends, who I have yet to make up any Almost nicknames for.

We were being treated to dinner in an upscale steakhouse in beautiful downtown Fort Wayne.

I was personally unprepared for what I immediately saw when I walked into the men's room at said steakhouse.

Behold . . .

Is it just me, or would anyone else be slightly confused? I'm not kidding; I backed up and double-checked the sign on the door.

Of course, when I realized it was just an image on the wall, I didn't know whether to be relieved or disappointed.

Arguable Advice from the Fab Four

 

With 213 songs to their credit, the Beatles were bound to stumble upon a few wise words here and there. "Let it be" and "Money can't buy me love" come easily to mind.

But let's remember that the Mop Tops were only human. Not everything that sprang from the grooves of their records can be considered "speaking words of wisdom." I offer, therefore, the following list of Beatlesque advice that might make you think twice.

• Your loving give me a thrill, but your loving don't pay my bills. Now give me money. That's what I want.
• Gather round, all you clowns. Let me hear you say, "Hey you've got to hide your love away."
• Leave it all till somebody else lends you a hand.
• Baby, you can drive my car, and maybe I'll love you.

• If the sun don't come, you get a tan from standing in the English rain.
• Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see.
• Happiness is a warm gun.
• Let this be a sermon. I mean everything I've said. Baby, I'm determined, and I'd rather see you dead. You better run for your life if you can, little girl. Hide your head in the sand, little girl. Catch you with another man, that's the end, ah, little girl.
• Lay down all thoughts, surrender to the void. It is shining, it is shining.
• Picture yourself in a boat on a river with tangerine trees and marmalade skies.
• And it really doesn't matter. If I'm wrong, I'm right.
• Roll up for the magical mystery tour! Step right this way!
• Why don't we do it in the road?

This One Will Sneak up On You: The 367th Greatest Song

  

Cream's Top Ten hit, "White Room," was birthed by a period of drug and alcohol excess. We should have realized that the minute we heard the lyrics.

Let's allow CoPilot to visually interpret the first verse:

In a white room, with black curtains, near the station...

Black roof country, no gold pavements, tired starlings...

Silver horses, ran down moonbeams, in your dark eyes...

Dawn light smiles, on you leaving, my contentment...

All of which sounds and looks reasonably normal (moonbeam-running horses notwithstanding) until we hit the chorus:

I'll wait in this place where the sun never shines
Wait in this place where the shadows run from themselves...

Eeek!

Happy Dolly Parton Day!

 

Warping  9 to 5, what a way to cross the cosmos

Two levels down, they're holding a princess in a jail cell

Searchers for some droids
That is what we are
So we ambled in
This cantina/bar

Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jolene...

I'm begging of you, please don't take my Death Star plan

Almost the News XXXVII

 

Real Headlines. Fake News.

Rally Held in Minneapolis for Man Fatally Shot by Police in Madison
Rally spokesperson: "We were legally holding a rally for this man. The Madison PD had no right to fatally shoot us."

2 Teens Arrested After Attempted Carjacking in Minneapolis
"The fact that they couldn't successfully lift the car to change its tire is just a crime!"

Police Warn of Urban Exploring After Death
"There be ghosts wandrin' round these alleyways..."

St. Paul Could See Property Tax Hikes
A news release from forensic ancient literature expert, Along Tymago, states that the Apostle Paul predicted rising property tax rates as long ago as the first century AD.

Wolves to Retire Kevin Garnett's Jersey on Feb. 28
Starting March 1st, Garnett will be playing shirtless.

Testimony to Resume after Lindsay Clancy Jury Sent Home Early
"Okay, now that the bothersome jury is gone, let's get down to business..."

Attention: Airport Pick-ups/Drop-offs Could Be Cumbersome Next Few Days
This announcement from airport officials, of course, represents absolutely no change whatsoever from the normal state of affairs.

Bench Dedicated to Boy Killed in Minneapolis School Shooting Nearly 1 Year Ago
Why we're telling you about it now is a mystery.

Residents Weigh In on New Police Chief
...even though it would be much easier to use a bathroom scale

Desperate Search for Nepal Flood Survivors Enters Critical Phase
Search coordinator, Luke N. Finedem: "In this phase, everybody starts whining, complaining, and talking about how they would run things differently."

Three Minutes of Tuneful Self-Importance: The 368th Greatest Song

 

Depeche Mode started out orthodox enough:

Reach out and touch faith

Your own personal Jesus

Someone to hear your prayers

Someone who cares

Your own personal Jesus

Someone to hear your prayers

Someone who's there

But it soon becomes clear the singer is encouraging the listener to consider the singer to be the listener's supernatural confidant:

Feeling unknown and you're all alone

Flesh and bone by the telephone

Lift up the receiver, I'll make you a believer

Take second best, put me to the test

Things on your chest you need to confess

I will deliver, you know I'm a forgiver

I was going to continue with more lyrical analysis, but I just realized that I have already given you all the words in the song. Everything else is repeating what's already been sung.

So...

Not only is the singer manifesting a textbook case of Messiah Complex, but he is also making it clear his songwriting ability lacks...shall we say...depth.

Certainly length.

Stuph That Has No Reason Being in My Head, Vol. XI

  

I've always known that Donny Osmond and Michael Jackson were about the same age, but it boggles me that Prince (born June 7, 1958) was actually over two months older than MJ.

You know when someone sneezes and you say "Bless you"? THAT sounds like a sneeze, too.

Even though they were originally voiced by two separate people, since the late 1990s, Winnie the Pooh and Tigger have been voiced by the one and only Jim Cummings.

Snap, Crackle, and Pop were the first breakfast cereal mascots.

If you replace W with T in the words what, where, and when, you get the answer to each of them.

Julie Andrews was not cast to recreate her Broadway role of Eliza Doolittle in the film version of My Fair Lady, making her free to star in Mary Poppins instead . . . for which she won an Oscar.

The canine television sensation, Lassie, was always played by a male dog.

Speaking of dogs, we all know what a female dog is called, but I had to ask the WorldWideWackfest what the term for a male dog is. I learned that dogs used to be called hounds and that dog was the term for a male hound until it started being used for the whole species.  So now there is no specific term for "a male dog."

Whenever I write or type the word "Wednesday," I say three syllables to myself: wed - nes - day.

♫♪ The Mate was a mighty sailing man

The Skipper, brave and sure

Five passengers set sail that day

On a three-hour tour

A three

Hour

Tour ♪♫

How a Dead Tree Made My Thigh Twitch

Sometimes, my train of thought runs at breakneck speed and easily jumps onto a parallel track quicker than a cheetah with dysentery.

Case in point . . .

During a recent trek across South Dakota on I-90, Beloved was driving, and I was staring out the window at mile after mile of nothingness. Suddenly, just off the highway at an exit ramp, I saw a deathly-white tree, devoid of any leaves, and the train left the station.

That reminds me of the tree in "Legend of Sleepy Hollow." Man, Christopher Walken was super creepy in that. Who else was in  -  oh yeah, Johnny Depp. He was in "Sweeney Todd," too. Talk about super creepy. I can't believe high schools do that musical. At least "Little Shop of Horrors" has fun songs and a sense of humor. ActorBoy did great in that, but boy, when he jumped into the carnivorous plant/puppet at the end and stabbed his leg on an exposed bolt...eww.

Then Beloved asked me why I grabbed my inner thigh, and she got all confused when I said, "Did you see that dead tree back there?"

Repetition, Thy Name Is Bo: The 369th Greatest Song

 

According to the magazine Rolling Stone:

The B side of Diddley's first-ever single was built around a four-note guitar stomp that was a trademark of mid- Fifties Chicago blues. Songwriter Willie Dixon, who supervised the 1955 session, said it was Diddley's sense of rhythm that set him apart from everyone else at Chess [Records]: "The drums are speaking, and he'll tell you what the drums are saying."

Hmmm...

If Bo Diddley's "I'm a Man" is telling me what the drums are saying, I cannot help but be reminded of a Far Side comic wherein Larson translates the barking of dogs into English: We see a dog chasing a car and another dog excited about a person walking down the street and still another dog squaring off with something up a tree  . . . and in each instance, the dog is saying "Hey! Hey! Hey hey!"

In other words, the song is that four-note guitar riff (Da-DAA da-dah), endlessly repeated.

Over and over.

And over.

With Bo's two-note melody expressing lyrics that may not even be worthy of that many notes:

Now when I was a little boy (Da-DAA da-dah)

At the age of five (Da-DAA da-dah)

I had somethin' in my pocket (Da-DAA da-dah)

Keep a lot of folks alive (Da-DAA da-dah)

Now I'm a man (Da-DAA da-dah)

Made twenty-one (Da-DAA da-dah)

You know baby (Da-DAA da-dah)

We can have a lot of fun (Da-DAA da-dah)

I'm a man (Da-DAA da-dah)

I spell M (Da-DAA da-dah)

A (Da-DAA da-dah)

N (Da-DAA da-dah)

Man

I seriously (Da-DAA da-dah) cannot imagine (Da-DAA da-dah) picking this song (Da-DAA da-dah) over Chicago's totally different song with the same title...which didn't even make Rolling Stone's list.

Da-DAA da-dumb!

Pizza Delivery & the DJ

 

It was a dark Sunday night in late November.

I was co-starring in a strange little play titled Winterthing in a strange little midwestern town called Fort Wayne.

One of the co-stars I was sharing the stage with was an eight-year-old wonder named Melanie. Her part required her to be a whiny little snot that inspired everyone to want to slap her. The good news was that even though she did the appropriate face-slapping inspiration on stage, in truth, she was a sweet gal with dark, shoulder-length hair, black, round-rimmed glasses, and a smile that could melt the hardest heart.

On the Sunday night in question, Beloved and I had been enlisted to take Melanie home with us for a sleepover while her parents were out of town. All three of us were looking forward to it, partly because it would involve Beloved and Melanie going with me to a strange little radio station while I did my once-a-week shift on the air, playing whatever songs I felt like. (Oh...those were the days!)

Part of the fun was ordering a pizza from the strange little shop across the street. (Are you old enough to remember when getting a pizza delivered was a smile-inducing, unique event?)

Melanie was oh so happy as she practically skipped into the studio carrying the pizza and gleefully placed it on the turntable that was playing the song currently going out to the tens of people listening live.

I screamed. Melanie screamed. We all screamed.

The pizza survived. The song did not. Melanie’s sense of confidence and well-being may have sustained a deadly blow.

Almost the News XXXVI

 

Real Headlines. Fake News.

Man to Appear in Court After Fatal Hit-and-Run
This marks the first time a corpse will have been called as a witness.

Minneapolis City Council Denies Developer for George Floyd Square
"Actually, he's the coolest cat we've ever met. Not square at all."

Deputy Working at School in Georgia Accused of On-Duty Sexual Assault at Nearby Home
Sheriff Uttoh states: "What a person does on their own time is their own business, but when you're on the clock..."

U.S. Launches More Strikes in the Middle East
Accordingly, they are leading in the World Bowling Championships currently being held in Lebanon.

Large Police Presence in Inver Grove Heights Neighborhood
A local resident who wished to remain unidentified is quoted as saying, "There are three or four of 'em in my front yard, and they're each at least seven feet tall!"

New Report Shows Crime Trending Down in Minneapolis
Meanwhile, crime isn't a trendy thing at ALL up in Duluth.

Explosive Diarrhea-Causing Parasite Infects More than 1,000 People
The trick is to get the parasite to explode before it infects you.

Video Shows Tense Moments During South Minneapolis Standoff
"Let's take a break from this standoff and watch a clip of Indiana Jones outrunning a boulder."

And the Wind Cries "Squirrel!": The 370th Greatest Song

 

It's not often that Jimi Hendrix wrote a ballad.

Then again, it probably wasn't all that often that he and his girlfriend had a dish-smashing argument.

All I know is, "The Wind Cries Mary" is fairly depressing:

After all the jacks are in their boxes

And the clowns have all gone to bed

You can hear happiness staggering on down the street

Footprints dressed in red

And the wind whispers, "Mary."

And it goes on from there with talk of a crying queen and wifeless king and blue traffic lights and a tiny island that sags downstream and the wind with a bad memory and a crutch and what were we talking about anyway?

Hack to the Future: Great Scott!

 

Admittedly, it doesn't take much to send my mind swirling down a rabbit hole of pop culture references and parallel universes. It should come as no surprise, then, to learn that's exactly what happened when I stumbled upon this AI-created mash-up of Taxi and Back to the Future:

Biff Reiger: Why don't you make like a tree and go to Central Park?

*  *  *

Bobby McFly: Calvin? Wh... Why do you keep calling me Calvin?

Lorraine Nardo: Well, that is your name, isn't it? Calvin Klein? It's written all over your hack license.

*  *  *

Latka McFly: I'm your density...ibbi da.

*  *  *

Bobby McFly: Wait a minute. Wait a minute, Doc. Ah... Are you telling me that you built a time machine... out of a taxi?

Dr. Rev. Jim Brown: The way I see it, if you're gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with an opportunity for extra income?

All This, and Yet I Am Not a Scrabble Champion

 

While playing a well-known crossword-creation game online, I was amused, and perhaps slightly nauseated, when I looked at my available letters and saw "LINTPIE".

Although the thought of consuming such a concoction certainly killed my appetite, it brought to life a string of thoughts, so I LEPT IN and called a TIP LINE.

I had just stabbed my mouth with my fork, so I was suffering from TINE LIP and couldn't really carry on a conversation. Instead, I fastened a TILE PIN to my shirt and tried to start a campfire...but I couldn't get the PINE LIT.

I was going to burn my mortgage, but since I couldn't get the fire going, I just stood there and stared at a LIEN PIT.

Trying to redeem my time, I cleared my hair of louse eggs until I had a nice little NIT PILE.

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy: The 371st Greatest Song

The Who's very first single spent a mere two weeks on the March 1965 charts and only made it to Number 93.

Musically, it feels suspiciously like "You Really Got Me" by The Kinks (maybe because both songs were produced by the same guy). So much so, Dave Davies of The Kinks says that when he heard "I Can't Explain," he thought those "cheeky buggers" from The Who were copying them.

According to Songfacts.com: The Who guitarist Pete Townshend wrote this song when he was 18 years old. He described it as being about a guy who "can't tell his girlfriend he loves her because he's taken too many Dexedrine tablets."

And yet, Rolling Stone considers it the 371st greatest song of all time.

I can't explain why.

And the Clean Plate Award Goes To...

 

Beloved and I were spending a day with LittleMan and Goober (our two youngest grandchildren) and thought it would be a treat for the 2-year-old LittleMan to have a Happy Meal for lunch.

He was very excited to get his McNuggets, fries, and apple juice. Several fries and all the juice were quickly consumed, but the chicken nuggets seemed to hold no interest for him. Soon, he was just sitting there staring.

I asked, "Are you going to eat your chicken nuggets?"

He grabbed the remaining fries from his plate and set them on the table. Then, one by one, each McNugget was placed there, too.

LittleMan proudly proclaimed, "I all done!"

*  *  *  *  *  *  *

Honestly, I admire the confidence. Maybe I should try this as a diet plan.

Observed Absurdities™ 73 - Are You Coming or Going?

 

Beloved and I had just enjoyed a south-of-the-border repast, paid our bill, and were caught up short when attempting to actually...you know...LEAVE the establishment.

Being unsure whether to trust American Express or Pepsi, this post has been uploaded from a small Mexican restaurant in Lakeville, Minnesota.