Smiley Sam, Ross Noble, And Twitter

I find myself taking full advantage of Twitter as a place to put down all those wacky random thoughts I have as the day goes on. Some of them have had many occasions to be repeated over the years, and I'm finally having a place to put them. Having an iPhone with me at all times makes it easier to save these little "gems", and I use that word wrongly, for posterity. No longer will these nuggets of insanity be blurted out and instantly lost in the ether, now they can be saved so historians can analyze them to see just how insane I really was. Por ejemplo, one of my favorites over the years has been, "Why do they call it common sense when it's so UNcommon?" Working for the Post Office, I usually have several occasions on a daily basis to utter this, either aloud or internally. Now, thru the magic of the iPhone and Twitter, I just posted it the other day. Wasn't long after that an artist whose work I've enjoyed over the years, Jill Thompson, retweeted my post, as she must have found it amusing. Always nice to have that sort of validation from someone whose talents you admire. Seeing as how she has illustrated works from the likes of Neil Gaiman (Sandman) and Grant Morrison (The Invisibles), as well as dozens of others over the years, yeah, it made my New Year's Eve pretty nice. Thanks Jill!

Fast not-too-far-forward to New Year's Day, and comedian Ross Noble, who I had mostly known for years from Just A Minute until recently, was encouraging people to make interesting pictures with his Smiley Sam The Smiling Ham (the explanation would take too long...read about it on his Twitter page http://twitter.com/realrossnoble --I'd give you an actual link, but for some reason I can't seem to do that on Blogger, and I've been trying for the last 10 minutes to figure it out; it just won't let me do it, despite following their instructions). So I printed out a pic of Sam, cut out the face, and taped it to the head of a really cool hand made clown my Mom had given me for X-Mas. She makes these herself, and they get sold in the gift shop of the local hospital she volunteers at. For some reason, the orange one hadn't moved (all the others come and go pretty quick), so I had mentioned to her she should send it to me for X-Mas (she still lives in New York, while I'm coming up on 10 years out here in Las Vegas). The funny thing is, even though she makes these herself, she's a little creeped out by them. I think it's terrific, and it sits proudly on an entertainment center/bookshelf here in my home office. She knew I really liked it based on the fact that it sits next to a picture I took of deceased race car driver Greg Moore and his still alive father Ric, that both had signed for me many years ago. I even presented both with their own copies of the photo, just because I thought it was a nice shot of the close pair.

After taping Smiley Sam's ham-face to the clown's head, I snapped a picture of it (again, using the iPhone; damn thing does everything...), and sent it to Ross via Twitter. This is another thing I enjoy about Twitter. People I admire that I normally would have no other means of ever having any contact with are suddenly reasonably accessible. Ross lives in the UK, but spends a large amount of time travelling the Eastern Hemishpere, be it the rest of Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and so on. He's got various travel programs available, as well as tour documentaries on his stand-up comedy DVD's (of which I have a few now, thanks to Steve!).

Maybe an hour after tweeting the picture, I see a post from Ross that says, "This Is no question the most scary thing I have ever seen." That was followed by a link, which I clicked, seeing as how I was curious as to what could have a mind as brillantly unstable as his running scared. The link caught me completely by surprise, as it led to this;





http://img129.yfrog.com/i/rxs.jpg/


Needless to say, seeing that it was my own picture that had scared him made me laugh quite hard. I was quite pleased that I'd apparently made an impression on him. Not really sure how my Mom is going to react when she reads this, though...

When Ross does shows, at the intermission, people often leave objects on the stage, so that when he comes back on, he just starts commenting on whatever interests him. His shows are filled more with off the cuff stream of consciousness than actual material, which is his true genius. The man is just funny, with nothing prepared. He HAS very funny material, it just gets relegated behind the tangents he goes off on, which are also extremely funny, and that's why he's so good on Just A Minute. So, if he ever does any shows in the United States (and I'm not sure if scaring him like this will help...), I'm bringing the clown with me to leave on stage in the interval. Not sure if I should re-tape Smiley Sam's face on or not...

Thanks Ross, and thanks/sorry Mom! (BTW, as of this writing, Ross' posting of my pic has had nearly 4,000 hits, in less than 24 hours...lotta weirdos out there...)

Update; it's now about 5:45 AM on Sun the 3rd of Jan, and it seems Ross is still enjoying Smiley Sam The Clown Ham. A comedian friend of his, Jason Manford, was apparently distressed about gaining some weight. Ross, in an effort to make him feel better, started tweeting him pics of Smiley Sam, including mine...

twitter.com/realrossnoble @Jason_Manford how about this http://yfrog.com/3gbd3cj

Twitter is so much fun...


Blog Post Soundtrack; Allman Brothers, The New York Dolls, The Doors, The Smiths, Fear Factory, Faith No More, Fu Manchu, Orange 9MM, Pantera, Black Sabbath, Son House, Corrosion Of Conformity, Prong, a track from Mel Brooks' 1968 movie The Producers, Les Claypool Frog Brigade, Clutch, Public Image Ltd.

Action-Figureophobia

The movie Arachnophobia was on some channel the other nite, stopped and watched a couple minutes between periods of some hockey game I was watching. While not anything I'm ever going to own on DVD, I do remember liking it. I had gone to see it in the theaters with some friends, which reminded me of the following story.

There was quite the marketing push for this film in the summer of 1990. A quick check of IMDB reveals it came out almost exactly on my 19th birthday. For weeks we kept seeing commercials for this 'comedy' film about a bunch of spiders and the people who were freaked out by them. Seeing as how it starred Jeff Daniels, who I like as an actor (except for Dumb & Dumber; how could he stoop so low?), it seemed like something good to go see.

Either late the nite before the official opening, or one-nite-only a week before the actual opening weekend, there was a sneak preview showing of the film. This is important only from the standpoint of up until the actual release weekend of the film, it was constantly being billed as a comedy. The commercials were edited in a way as to make this look alomst like a goofy 50's horror flick, with that edge of silliness to it that would make the horror aspect seem quaint.

Upon actually seeing the film, in a very dark theater, turns out the comedy aspect was extremely minimal compared to the creepy-crawly horror aspect. I'm not afraid of spiders, but I don't particularly enjoy them either. My friend who had driven us to the movie that nite, however, apparently had an extreme dislike of the creepy little guys, so much so that he was a little tense upon exiting the theater.

We had all enjoyed the movie, we just felt that we might have enjoyed it more had it been properly billed as the horror-first film that it really was. As we get into the car, with me in the seat directly behind the driver, I happen to look down and see a little G.I. Joe type action figure on the floor, and the brain spots an opportunity for comedy. Well, comedy for me, anyway...

While conversation continues about the film as we prepare to drive off, I carefully position the arms and legs of the figure so as to be as outstretched as possible, roughly resembling the size of the angry oversized spiders of the film we'd just seen. Just as my friend is about to start the car, I subtly placed the figure on his shoulder right at the nape of his neck, so that some of it was actually touching his skin. As for his reaction, let's just say it's a good thing I didn't do this while we were moving along on the road. Upon further reflection, it's possible the car might have jerked LESS violently had we actually been moving...

Oddly enough, immediately after the official Friday opening nite, the marketing campaign was switched to emphasize the fact that this was more of a straight-up horror flick. I like to think my little escapde in the parking lot had something to do with this.


Blog Post Soundtrack; The White Stripes, Metallica, Brant Bjork, Prong, Faith No More, Deftones, Rage Against The Machine (love that they got the X-Mas #1 in the UK, BTW)

More Death At The Post Office

So for a number of years out here, my job was to fill in for five specific carriers on their rotating days off. Each carrier had one day off a week (in addition to Sunday), so I would wind up doing a different route every day, within that group of five. One of the carriers, at the time I was doing this, was pushing 70, but we've always joked about him being a million years old. We frequently ask him about his days in the Pony Express, and he shoots back that when he started, they rode dinosaurs! Every once in a while during the mornings in the office, if he happens to stroll down the aisle where my case is, I'll shout "Dead Man Walking", or yell out "Lazarus!". Gotta have some fun.

This man is very popular on his route, so much so that when I would be out there, old ladies would come up to me and ask, "What happened to that nice old man who used to do this route?" Remember, the carriers are only off one day a week other than Sunday. These ladies had just seen the guy yesterday. "Used to do this route?" I finally got so sick of this ridiculous query, that one day, without picking my head up from the box I was putting mail in, I told a woman who had asked me that, "Oh, I'm sorry ma'am, he died". As I continued to casually put mail into the box, I could see out of the corner of my eye the look of shock take over her face, and her jaw drop down to about her waistline. I honestly can't remember if I let her off the hook and told her it was just his day off, or if I let her just think the worst, knowing full well she'd see him again the next day.

So the carrier came back the following day, and did his route as usual. When I saw him the next morning, he yells, "You been tellin' people on my route I'm dead?!?" "Yup". "Oh, okay".

These same women would also tell me, because I wasn't getting there at the times they were used to from him, "You must be new". An attitude of you-don't-know-what-you're-doing was dripping off every word. I'd been doing this job for 6 or 7 years at the time, so it kind of offended me, so when they would tell me I was new, I'd tell them, "No, I'm 31 years old!". They seemed to stop with the smarmy comments after that...

The funny thing is, every fall, he would take 6 weeks off to go back to the Illinois area on vacation. I never had to say a word to anyone on his route after the first week. They just started taking up a collection for his next of kin.

As I write this, the man is about two months from his 76th birthday, still carrying his route five times a week. We make fun of him because we all can only hope to be half as spry and full of energy as him. His sense of humor is also bigger than the fire that would be started were we to give him a birthday cake with the number of candles that we claim his age is.


Blog Post Soundtrack; The latter portion of The Roots Come Alive!

Brant Bjork

Got my color vinyl copy of the 10th Anniversary re-issue of Brant Bjork's first solo effort, Jalamanta, in the mail today. Quick history lesson, Brant was the drummer for most of the all-too-brief career of the amazingly stunning stoner rock band, Kyuss. He, along with Josh Homme, was also the main songwriter of Kyuss. Josh went on to found Queens Of The Stone Age after the amicable demise of Kyuss, and went on to huge success in the music industry. Brant has been a little more low profile, but has put out better music, IMHO. I do love the first 2 or 3 QOTSA albums, especially the self-titled debut, but they've drifted kinda aimlessly into some weird experimental thing that I'm not so crazy about with the more recent albums.

Brant, on the other hand, has continued to put out albums, either on his own, or in collaboration with other bands and friends, that have been consistently fantastic. He drummed for Fu Manchu when they were putting out the best music of their still ongoing (and great) career, he was drumming with Nick Oliveri (another former Kyuss member) in his amazing Mondo Generator project, and has managed to put out over a half-dozen solo albums. And, while all of it has been terrific stuff, Jalamanta is the one album by Brant that is truly stunning in it's musical achievements. The places it takes the listener are third-eye opening, as Bill Hicks would say. I've never smoked, but listening to much of the stoner rock genre, along with the comedy/preachings/teachings of George Carlin and Bill Hicks, I'm pretty sure I've picked up a great deal of what I would've gotten out of that anyway.



Blog Post Soundtrack; Brant Bjork's Jalamanta album

In Appreciation

It's amazing the number of artists and writers and musicians and comedians whose work has enhanced my life. I have to have something playing at all times around me, often when there ARE other people around. The only time I don't have some sort of music or DVD going is when I'm reading, or talking with someone, either on the phone or with someone in the same room. I spend a lot of time during my work day by myself, so my iPhone gets a healthy workout. When I'm home and I'm at the computer (which happens often when I'm home), my iTunes library gets used frequently. Hence the Blog Post Soundtrack listings at the end of these little ditties. Whenever I drive anywhere, be it the 10 minutes to work, or the multi-day driving vacations involving upwards of 1500 miles in a scant few days, some form of entertainment is always playing (probably a little too loudly) to occupy my brain.

My point is, there are hundreds, probably thousands, of people who have helped make my life a richer experience. Listening to, watching, reading, sometimes just studying (some pieces of art I have can be stared at for hours and still not have all their details and meanings revealed) the work of a large number of creative human beings has made the life of a fairly ordinary, regular Joe, working stiff a lot more interesting. There is an unspeakable amount of gratitude that I try to express whenever I have the chance to meet any of these people in person, or via their own websites, or things like Twitter. It is also one of the things that makes me fairly certain there is something more to existence than this mere mortal coil.

The perfect next plane of existence for me would involve the equivalent of an interactive DVR of the universe, in which any moment in the history of time could be accessed, and entered if so desired. Or any soul that has ever existed could be accessed for a discussion, and it wouldn't be tedious or boring for them, and there wouldn't be a long line to wait on, or their soul wouldn't already be checked out of the library. And language barriers wouldn't be an issue either (just thought I'd better throw that in, as I'm an arrogant American, where we feel one language is more than enough to get by. I really wish I could speak several languages, as most Europeans seem to be able to do with no problems whatsoever. The only languages I've got any sort of command of are English, New Yorkese, Canadian, and a few accents here and there).

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of "ordinary citizens", whose lives have somehow affected mine as well, starting with the parental units, and going right on up thru the current crop of co-workers and people I see on my route nearly every day, who have also managed to entertain me in one way or another. Some of them are funnier than they think, and some just make me think.

But sitting here at my computer desk in my home office, I can look around and see artwork by Michael Golden, Rick Leonardi, Brian Bolland, Frank Miller, Mike Mignola, Steve Rude, Mike Zeck, Bernie Wrightson, Barry Windsor-Smith, Dave McKean, Paul Chadwick, Bill Sienkiewicz, pictures of Bill Hicks, Greg Moore, Graig Nettles, Jacques Villeneuve, art representing Kyuss, Metallica, Megadeth, The Misfits, and that's just from sitting in this chair. I could spend the rest of my life thanking people who have helped enhance the time I've already spent here. But I think I'll go back to enjoying some more of their work now.


Blog Post Soundtrack; Eric Clapton, Bill Hicks, Band Of Horses, ZZ Top, The Police, The White Stripes, Rollins Band, The Buzzcocks, Clutch, Ross Noble, Public Enemy, Son House, Queens Of The Stone Age, Django Reinhardt

Happy Thanksgiving

Much like Christmas, the spirit of Thanksgiving isn't something that should be boiled down to just one day. However, I will take the opportunity this day to say that I try to be appreciative on a daily basis of all the good things in life. Things as simple as the sun being out in a clear blue sky, enjoying the colors of trees and flowers, listening to music, reading books, admiring artwork, these are things that I'm thankful for. My parents, my friends (some at my job, some on my route, some in New York, some spread around the country, and online ones around the world), and many people whom I've never met but who have produced some sort of art or entertainment that I enjoy are more things to be thankful for. And the fact that I'm still here to enjoy all of this stuff, and seemingly have the mental and physical wherewithal to fully do so, doesn't go unnoticed either.


Blog Post Soundtrack; Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade

Rise And Shine

I love getting up at the same time on my days off as I do when I'm supposed to go to work. It's nice being up that early and knowing that I don't have to go out, that all of that time that I normally have to be at work is now completely mine, free to do whatever chores or things have to be done, at a nice relaxing pace. Obviously things that are fun are mixed in too (there will be some NHL 10 on the XBox 360 played today!). I prefer this to sleeping in, waking up and realizing that half of the day off is already gone. I've always been a morning person, I tend to get more done earlier anyway. Usually, if I haven't accomplished something by noon, it's probably not gonna happen until tomorrow. Remember those old US Army commercials, with the tagline, "We get more done by 9AM than most people do all day"? For lots of reasons, I'm very proud of the fact that I'm not most people.


Blog Post Soundtrack; Judas Priest, Beastie Boys, The Doors, Voivod