Kid Charlemagne

This feels like the right tune to start this week:

Apologies...

...for the complete lack of posts this week. It's been a loooong and very busy week so blogging was put on the back burner. I hope to get back to it in earnest this weekend.

In the meantime I offer a compilation of the schlocky music I grew up with, and for some reason still love.



Many thanks to those still checking in here.

More Creationism Schtick.

Ricky Gervais shares his take on creationism.

Blackadder Stands Trial

Here's some fun from the classic BBC series Blackadder.

Fans of House might recognize counsel for the defense.



I hate to sound like an old man, but they just don't make TV shows as good as they use to.

Storm

I came across this Tim Minchin gem a few weeks ago on another site. Thus far I've resisted the urge to repost it here, but my resistance has worn down.

Enjoy.



(Via)

Back In Black

Lewis Black shares his thoughts on creationism in that special sensitive way only he can.

If You Really Loved Me

Tim Minchin has a crystal clear understanding of exactly what real love looks like.

If you don't think this is funny, there's something wrong with you. Seek help immediately.

More Easter Happiness!!

Besides Cadbury Eggs, Peeps are the best part of Easter. Here's a new and different look at the world of Peeps. (Not one for the kids)

Happy Easter!

Marketing Truth

This seems like the perfect way to wrap up this week.

I give you Bill Hicks on marketing.



Plus the ultimate Coke ad.

Where The Wild Things Are

Oh Man! I can't wait to see this!



Where The Wild Things Are was one of my favorite books as a kid. It seemed like most children's books were about happiness and light, but Sendak's slightly darker vision of childhood appealed to me a little more. Of course I was happy that in the end Max got to come home to a warm supper.

Here's a reading of the Sendak book if you're interested.



For what it's worth I know where at least four of the Wild Things are. They live with me.

(Via)

The Inquisition.

This one's for my kid.

Nobody expects The Spanish Inquisition!

Ham of Truth!

Every time we have ham my poor wife has to listen to me recreate this bit. Now I can subject the world to it!

"It's a Universal Truth - That's F-ing Good Ham!"

It's Hard To Be A Liberal

Sometimes you have to take a hard look at your own side of the debate and admit how absurd you can look.

Dammit it IS hard to be a liberal.

Can You Tell Me How to Get....

Ricky Gervais gives us some new insights in to Elmo.

Worlds Apart!

Sometimes you just need a shot by shot remake of Journey's Separate Ways video!

Enjoy.

Gonzo

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas has moved on to my cable movie comfort list. It's become one of those films I can pick up at any point, watch for a while, and enjoy as much as the last time I saw it.

Hunter Thompson has long been one of my favorite writers, and I have read Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas a number of times. It's a great book - although in my opinion his best was Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 - but the movie took a while to grow on me. It was jarring to see the excesses of the book shown on screen.

A few nights ago I came across the film again and stumbled right in to the "wave speech." This short part of the book is rumored to have been Thompson's favorite piece of his own writing. Seeing Johnny Depp deliver it again reminded me of what a gifted writer Thompson was.

Here is the text:

"Strange memories on this nervous night in Las Vegas. Five years later? Six? It seems like a lifetime, or at least a Main Era — the kind of peak that never comes again. San Francisco in the middle sixties was a very special time and place to be a part of. Maybe it meant something. Maybe not, in the long run . . . but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time and the world. Whatever it meant. . . .

History is hard to know, because of all the hired bullshit, but even without being sure of “history” it seems entirely reasonable to think that every now and then the energy of a whole generation comes to a head in a long fine flash, for reasons that nobody really understands at the time — and which never explain, in retrospect, what actually happened.

My central memory of that time seems to hang on one or five or maybe forty nights — or very early mornings — when I left the Fillmore half-crazy and, instead of going home, aimed the big 650 Lightning across the Bay Bridge at a hundred miles an hour wearing L. L. Bean shorts and a Butte sheepherder's jacket . . . booming through the Treasure Island tunnel at the lights of Oakland and Berkeley and Richmond, not quite sure which turn-off to take when I got to the other end (always stalling at the toll-gate, too twisted to find neutral while I fumbled for change) . . . but being absolutely certain that no matter which way I went I would come to a place where people were just as high and wild as I was: No doubt at all about that. . . .

There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda. . . . You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. . . .

And that, I think, was the handle—that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting — on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. . . .

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark — that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back."

Here's Depp delivering it brilliantly:



The passage so perfectly captures his feelings of loss about the 60's, and shows the sense of hope and destiny that Baby Boomers once had. As a Gen Xer I've long raged against the failings of the Boomers - and there is a lot to rage over - but I admire that they have the 60's to look back on.

Gen X doesn't have anything similar. I can't longingly look back at the 80's and say "we were winning." I hope we get more things right in middle age than the Boomers did, but it's hard to deny that they did "young" exceptionally well.

Hunter - we miss you.

Lego Your Doubt!

This is awesome! The fairly recent trend of converting stories and movies in to Legos is tremendous, but a Lego Bible is just fantastic. Take a few minutes and kick around in here. The above depiction of Job is just one of the highly entertaining things you will find.

Shout out to Unreasonable Faith for tipping me off to this one

Woody on Life.

It's late, I'm tired, and sometimes life feels like you're stuck on a movie line in front of a boorish intellectual. Take it away Woody:



"If only life were like this..."

Cake or Death!

It's late on Friday, and it's been a long week. So instead of something boringly serious I give you Eddie Izzard.



Plus a few interpretations of his work.