SATURDAY MORNING CARTOONS

Which I guess have a common theme, and the theme is sex, or, to be more precise, the clichés of sex, which, right at the moment, and to be wholly frank, I view with an ambiguity that is close to visible. As my emotional life grinds on, like some grim panzer retreat from a metaphoric Moscow – only with mercifully better weather – the inevitable culmination of the sexual cliché has become a matter of such utter predictability, that, all too frequently, it’s instigation takes on an inert pointlessness. Alcohol has much the same effect. I would like to be protractedly drunk, but the hangover would kill me. Slowly and with pain.

We could look at it another way, however. Perhaps here in the Shaolin Temple of Rock & Roll – among the Cirque du Dreamseekers* – we search for the original cliché with the wholly unexpected twist. (Between walking on Zigzag rice paper, perceiving Elvis in a potato chip, and snatching the pebble from my hand, grasshopper.) Now wouldn’t that be something? A blow for the oxy-morons!

* more later.

An opium den, wistfully published without comment.

THIS BLOG IS STILL PROTECTED BY...

A NEWTON REMINDER

Newton would like to remind yet again you that The Animal Rescue Site hasn’t gone away and still needs daily clicks to meet their quota of the free food donated to abused and neglected animals, by their corporate sponsors/advertisers. These donations are calculated by the number of hits on the site. So use this link, to go to the purple button that you press to register your hit. It costs you nothing and the animals eat. Okay?

The secret word is Foodbowl

DYSFUNCTIONAL MUTATIONS

THE SECOND COMING
By William Butler Yeats

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight; somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

And why, you ask am I reproducing Yeat’s The Second Coming, this Friday morn. Well, neighbors, apart from being one of my favorite poems, I have been reading up on all the speculation on how the last episode of The Sopranos will turn out on Sunday. I have the hard job, you see. On Sunday, I get to watch the last episode and the sit up all night writing the post-game summation for LA CityBeat. Please read it when it’s published Thursday.
Yeah, you say, but what the fuck does this have to do with Yeats? Well nothing, except one writer in The San Francisco Chronicle cited the poem as a metaphor for big Tony. I didn’t really agree with the thesis, but I was glad to see the poem, except, watching the news of the day – the Turks moving on Iraq, Paris fucking Hilton, Bush in a pissing contest with Putin and a new Cold War – would that I could identify the slouching beast now born and growing, but how can I can I spot it, and know which one it is, in this vast crowd of dysfunctional mutations.

Statutory Bob Dylan quote – “In Jersey’s everything’s legal, as long as you don’t get caught.”

The secret world is Stable

BRIGHTON LUNACY

The following tale comes from UK Steve…

LONDON (AFP) - A police force is to put more officers on the streets during full moons because they believe the lunar cycle may be linked to violent behaviour, a spokeswoman said Tuesday. Sussex Police have found that drinkers in the seaside city of Brighton and Hove are particularly aggressive during full moons, despite mixed findings from researchers who have examined the issue previously. "I compared a graph of full moons and a graph of last year's violent crimes and there is a trend," Inspector Andy Parr told the Brighton Argus newspaper. "People tend to be more aggressive generally. I would be interested in approaching the universities and seeing if any of their post-graduates would be interested in looking into it further. This could be helpful to us."

This crime-at-full-moon has been an urban law-enforcement legend for as long as I can remember – kinda like the one that claims domestic violence peaks at 89F – but I never heard it officially acted upon before. Also I grew up in Brighton, during the Mods and Rockers wars, when – forget the moon – a careless discussion of the relative and contrasting merits of Jerry Lee Lewis and The Who could trigger a bloody battle with rocks, bottles, and lengths of primary chain.

DOC'S PAPERBACK CLASSIC'S #15

There’s porno-kitsch, and there’s inept porno-kitsch, and then there’s this creation (stolen from the site RetroRaunch). If nothing else it really deflates the naïve ideas I used to entertain that to cultivate an outré sexual inclination required a certain modicum of intelligence and imagination to, at the very least, make some kind of choice in the matter. Seemingly all you actually needed was the sum of 2.95. (Which probably bought you a three-course meal at the time.) I love the sock garters on the male victim, however. He should have kept his tie on.

The secret word is Curiosa

IMPEACH CHENEY

Want to impeach the hideous Dick Cheney? One way to start the balls of retribution rolling is to click here. (Think Cheney wears sock garters?)

MORPH MAGNIFICENT

Well, I’m no longer busy, but, damn, am I tired. Indeed, if there was anything worthwhile on 400 channels of television, I would probably be too tired to watch it. And if fucking Bush gave Scooter Libby a pardon tonight, I would probably be too tired to hurl a boot at the TV and scream into the night. I fact, I think I’m really too tired to be doing this, but my ego will not allow Doc40 to lapse and thus, I can only offer…

500 Years of Women In Western Art

Which is an amazing piece of work (sent by one of our favorite Southern Belles) and I totally recommend that you watch if only for the incredible morphing. And talking of morphing, word is now out that breathtaking picture of sunset at the North Pole I posted Tuesday of last week was, in fact, created on a computer.

The secret word is Lips

Maybe (turn out the light)

OVERWORKED

Busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, busy, but tomorrow I hope we’ll be back to normal. Is the guy third from the right holding a broom or a mike stand? (Elvis or the janitor?)

The secret word is Deadline