More Things That Keep Me Up At Night

      If a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, shouldn't I be investing heavily in hand-birds?

      I am God's gift to women. If they don't like me in this color or the size is wrong, they're still gonna need a receipt to return me. Right?

      Did Marco Polo really invent echo-location at sea, or is that game just apocryphal?

      Is it possible to overdose on cottage cheese? Cause man, I ate about half a tub of that stuff right before I lay down, and now my toes are numb.

Before there were more things that keep me up at night, there were of course simply things that keep me up at night.

Uriah Q. Muttonchop, Humble Chronicler of the Affairs of the Celebrated

      Dear Reader, as the Entertainment Correspondent for this fine periodical, The Picayune-Tattler, it is my great pleasure and privilege to wind my meandering course throughout this fair land’s many theatres, writing salons, and town square gazebos, rubbing elbows with the most talented Thespians, Singers, Orators and Writers our vibrant young country has to offer. Some of the more generous of them will graciously stand a drink or two for an Impecunious Scribbler, while a few even of the richest insist on The Dutchman's Treat. You know who you are, Mr. Van D--.
      But with great opportunity comes the equally great burden—nay, sacred duty—of the would-be chronicler of this land’s rich tapestry of entertainment: penning the Obituaries of the Celebrated—those dolorous dispatches that remind us yes, even for kings He comes, though one may be the very King of Popular Music.
      It was but a month ago that I first informed you, dear reader, of the passing of the beloved and internationally renowned Negro entertainer, Mr. Michael Jackson. I will never forget the sense of awe and child-like wonder invoked in me the first time I saw Mr. Jackson’s minstrel show on stage—the elaborate sets, the dozens of ballet-artists, and of course, his signature flourish, the Moon Walk. How my mind boggled at the feat! “Great Caesar’s Ghost!” I heard myself ejaculate. “To all outward appearances, he seems to be walking in a perfectly straightforward manner. And yet, see how he nevertheless is progressing not forward as one would naturally expect, but widdershins! What a Strange and Wondrous place the Moon must be if indeed its denizens perambulate in such a manner!”
      Perhaps some of us tutted at the troubled man-child’s Foibles and Eccentricities—the single gauntlet, the tinted spectacles he wore even at night, the pederasty. And even Mr. Jackson’s staunchest supporters in the Negro community bemoan the ill-advised Whiteface Routine he had incorporated into his performances in recent years. Mr. Jackson himself was so taken with the look that on more than one occasion this humble correspondent espied him about town in full costume and whiteface, as if he were perpetually performing on stage, no matter whither he went. Yet who among us cannot whistle at least one of his Famous Ditties, and who of us who witnessed his Opulent Funeral was not moved when that great golden sarcophagus was lowered into the mouldy earth, followed by his beloved pet elephant Jumbo, still mournfully trumpeting a lament for its Fallen Master as the tomb's lid sealed them together 'til that other, Final Trumpet does blast?
      Now yet again I put pen to paper with Heavy Heart, for I have the onerous task of informing you that during the very same month two more of our beloved idols have shuffled off this Mortal Coil, never again in this world to thrill us with their prodigious gifts or their derring-do.
      I dab now at the tears in my eyes as I write of the death of beloved charlatan William Mays. What housewife’s heart did not thrill to the noise of his shrill tenor as he arrived on her street in his horse and buggy, hollering his wares? How he eased the daily drudgery of her Domestic Rounds with his improbably Miraculous Nostrums! And if his snake oil could not always remove the blood and vomit from Father’s going-out shirts as efficaciously as promised, what lonely homemaker would begrudge the odd fib or two, if only it were shouted to her by one so Manly in Form and so Lush of Beard? Farewell, sweet Billy, and may flights of angels bellow thee to thy rest.
      My final charge in this litany of woe, dear reader, is to report that Mr. Stephen McNair, who once bestrode the football gridiron like Colossus, was brutally gunned down by his mistress in a Love Nest in the city. The Wicked Vixen—who it should be noted was of Foreign Extraction—gave vent to all the fury of her sex when scorned, before turning the Hellish Engine of Destruction upon her own tender breast. Though tragic, perhaps Mr. McNair’s fate might serve as a Lesson for Gentlemen to steer clear of the doxies, or at the very least to make certain said ladies remain ignorant of the Art of Shooting, a discipline which this Sad Affair makes clear should remain the exclusive Province of Men.

Top Ten Imaginary Reasons for Hypothetical Palin Divorce*

      Over the weekend, a rumor spread quickly across the internet that Sarah and Todd Palin were on the verge of getting divorced. The rumor was started by the Alaska-based blog "The Immoral Minority," but has since been vehemently denied by both Sarah Palin's lawyer and her spokesperson, and few major news outlets have touched the story with anything less than a ten-foot pole. But the boring truth has never hindered The Broken Stove from makin' stuff up before, and we couldn't help wondering: if Sarah and Todd Palin were to get a divorce, what might be the top ten reasons for them going their separate ways?

10) Stress caused by the media's insistence on quoting Sarah's actual words, as opposed to that much better thing she thought of as soon as she got home.
9) Staying together would simply be "marriage as usual," something Sarah swore she'd never do.
8) Sarah doesn't want kids to be saddled with lame duck mother.
7) "Once you 'go McCain,' there's no goin' back to plain."
6) Gay marriages in the sinful states have eroded fabric of once-sacred institution to the point where straight Palin marriage never had a chance.
5) Todd & Sarah just can't keep it in or out of their pants, respectively.
4) Let's face it; Todd just not First Man material.
3) Sarah sick of Todd constantly bugging her for sex act he calls "Shoot Me from the Helicopter."
2) Sarah is not quitting the marriage, she's simply repositioning herself to serve the marriage in other arenas.
...and the number one hypothetical reason why the Palins would hypothetically get a divorce:
1) It would be the Mavericky thing to do!

*Not actionable. Really. Don't even try it.

Henry Louis Gates, Jr. Plays the Dozens

      Last week Harvard prof Henry Louis Gates, Jr. was arrested after breaking into his own home. The arresting officer's report indicates that when he told Gates he would speak to him outside, the famous scholar allegedly replied, "ya, I’ll speak with your mama outside." What happened when they both hit the street was the most vicious dozens beatdown that a Harvard professor of literary criticism has ever laid on a Cambridge police officer.

• "Yo mama's girth is so prodigious, I was compelled to compensate my limo driver with overtime remuneration because of the time required to navigate to her good side."
• "Yo mama's intelligence is so feeble, she mistook football's "quarterback" position w/ a refund of 25¢, when in fact it has nothing to do with currency at all."
• "Yo mama's so advanced in years, a screening of the motion picture 'Jurassic Park' evoked in her a keen nostalgia for the days of her youth."
• "Yo mama's girth is so prodigious that, presuming you reside in a building with multiple floors, the safety notification posted by the responsible authority in your building's elevator reads MAXIMUM OCCUPANCY: 12 Passengers or Yo Mama."
• "Yo mama's physical appearance is so repulsive, that John Merrick, better known by his sobriquet 'The Elephant Man', because the combination of terrible deformities inflicted upon his body by a congenital disorder gave him what some witnesses perceived to be an elephantine appearance...of course his name was not really John at all, but Joseph; due to an unfortunate error of recall made in the memoirs of his one-time physician and guardian Frederick Treves, the mistaken name 'John' was perpetuated, and then reinforced in the contemporary public's mind by the Oscar-winning film 'The Elephant Man,' a fictionalized account of Merrick's life directed by avant-garde filmmaker David Lynch, who used Treves's memoir as source material. But none of this is really pertinent to my central thesis, to wit: yo mama's so ugly, the Elephant Man paid to see her."
• "Yo mama's intelligence is so feeble, she raised you, a high-handed authoritarian who believes that his position as an officer of the law empowers him to punish disrespect with imprisonment, even when the disrespect has been earned, and comes at the hands of an innocent man who has been humiliated in his own very expensive home, and who has committed no crime other than being in the wrong skin at the wrong time."

"H" Is for the Hurt Behind the Humor

      As I continue strolling through the songs on my iPod, I've made it up to the letter "H". I'm surprised to find that 230 or so songs on my iPod right now begin with "H", but not so many of them are among my most favorite. Oh, there's plenty of good stuff, but it feels like A-G had more songs that I return to again and again. So picking an "H" theme proved more difficult than some of the previous letters...until I noticed how many of my "H" songs were either silly, or sad, or a little bit of both. Which got me thinking about the idea that a lot of humor has its basis in sorrow or pain. Slapstick is the most obvious example, of course, where the humor lies almost entirely in observing another's painful discomfiture and being glad it's not you. A lot of what makes us laugh is the same thing that would make us curl up in a corner and sob like a baby if we couldn't figure out how to hang a comic face on it. In that spirit I offer up my "H" songs, most of which have humor with at least a little hurt behind it.
      The Rainmakers were a great Missouri band who played an odd mix of hilarious rave-ups and more serious social satire, but everything they did came wrapped in a tight, catchy rock and roll bow. Lead singer and songwriter Bob Walkenhorst has not only a unique voice but also a biting wit and a great sense of musical humor ("Big Fat Blonde" still ranks for me as one of the great silly party songs of all time). "Hoo Dee Hoo" mixes their trademark upbeat guitar rock with a nonsense chorus and a surprisingly touching lyric of nostalgia and regret.

      "Hank" is a bluesy story-song by the Boston bar band Treat Her Right (some of its members, including the late Mark Sandman, later spun off to form Morphine). The song's narrator imagines a cry-in-your-beer story to explain the message found written on a dollar bill: "She lost. You won. I love her. Hank."

      I've been laser-burning new pits in my copy of Wilco's "Sky Blue Sky" with repeated listenings ever since it came out. Maybe I'm just getting old, but it seems harder and harder to find bands that are rock-solid musically and also produce songs with thoughtful lyrics about experiences from after college. Right now Wilco is my favorite band for grown-ups. "Hate it Here" is easily summarized by adding the line that immediately follows the title in the chorus, "since you're gone."

      And then there are the songs that just skip the humor altogether and go straight to the hurt. Sometimes the marriage of singer and song is so perfect that you just can't imagine the music and words in anyone else's voice. These final two "H" songs, "Has He Got a Friend for Me" performed by Maria McKee, and "Hurt" performed by Johnny Cash, are like that, though neither of these talented songwriters wrote the songs themselves (they were written by Richard Thompson and Trent Reznor, respectively). If someone had told me that Johnny Cash was going to cover Nine Inch Nails, and proceed to make the song his own, I probably would have thought it was some kind of joke. But watch the video. That one's Johnny's now.

CNN Helps Madonna Laugh in the Face of Death

      I know that online news--especially at the big organizations like CNN--can happen pretty quickly, and there's great pressure to get a breaking story online before the other guy does. But when you're one of the biggest news outlets in the world, you should probably have systems in place that would prevent the kind of thing that happened on Thursday.
      As I was casually browsing CNN's home page, I clicked a link for a story on an accidental death during the construction of a Madonna concert in France. It was a straightforward account of a sad accident, obviously based on early, sketchy reports. Fine. But the story was accompanied with a file picture of Madonna in concert. Here's the story as it originally appeared (this is an unaltered screen capture from my browser; click the photo for closer look):

      Yes, a story about a horrible accident that led to several injuries and one death is accompanied by a picture of Madonna giving the two-fisted finger to the world. "Yeah someone died," says Madonna in this version of the story, "but he was French, so who cares? That's just rock 'n' roll mother-f***ers!"
      Obviously, someone said, "Get me a picture of Madonna in concert to go with this story of an accident involving her stage set." But did no one actually look at this picture before uploading it to one of the biggest news sites in the world? Was someone playing a joke--someone who was hopefully shown the door that very hour? Yes, they replaced the photo within about fifteen minutes or so, but how did it ever get attached to that story? They should thank their lucky stars that printed news is dead; otherwise this one would be haunting them for years to come.

The Ancient Cat Toy Burial Ground

      I was putzing around in the kitchen earlier today when my foot struck one of the little flat bowls we use to feed the BHOC, and ZIPPO it slid under the oven like an air hockey puck. Sure, I was now up 1-0, but I knew for a fact that Donna had done exactly the same thing less than a week ago. And LEFT IT THERE. But I digress.
      Since I knew the cats had occasionally lost toys under there, and the stove hadn't been pulled out for cleaning in months, I girded up my loins and dragged it from its cubby. Let's just take a little...WHOA NELLIE BOZO! I'm thinking of calling the National Geographic, because I have discovered the fabled Ancient Cat Toy Burial Ground.
      That's Porter investigating the grisly remains, perhaps reconnecting with long-lost friends he thought were gone forever. You might have thought the other picture was of some child's box of cherished collectibles, a hoard of doodads whose pedigree and significance are known only to the little kid who lovingly squirreled them away and invested them with the mysterious power of keepsakes. But no, that's just all the crap I hauled out from under my stove, every single item an accidental goal in our cats' neverending game of kitchen air hockey. The cats have already dug around in the box and pulled out a couple of blasts from the past to play with, but here's a partial inventory of the rest:

• 10 actual cat toys--some whiffle golf balls, plastic jacks, tiny stuffed mice, and a couple of spiky plastic rolly thingies that look like undersea mines.
• Numerous homemade cat toys, like an empty thread spool, some wadded up bits of paper, bottlecaps (twist and flip), and a plastic milk cap ring.
• And many completely cat-improvised toys, including a grievously maimed origami kangaroo, two tiny Christmas ornaments, a walnut and an acorn, a pen, a clothespin, and an empty tube of Airborne® cold medicine.

      Now I've got to find some place to keep all this junk, so it once again can be doled out piece by piece to thrill and exercise the kitties. At least for the ten minutes it takes them to maneuver back into the kitchen and light the red light. GOOAAALLLLLLLLLL!