Video Killed The Radio Star. This is a song from the 80's by The Buggles. It is the first song to launch MTV. The channel no longer plays music videos and now features a sorry selection of reality shows. Finding new music is a real adventure nowadays. I've been listening to WFUV F.M. which is a public radio station ( no commercials!). They recently started a feature at noon on weekdays called, " MIXTAPE" which boils down to an all request hour. In the '70s, 80's and 90's I made mixtapes for anybody I thought might listen to them. I enjoy a little attention from time to time, but as a "disposable person" a term one of my girlfriends tagged me with, I've learned that when I'm out of sight, I am truly out of mind. Hence my craving for recognition. I had the whole D.J set-up, so I made some tapes that I considered brilliant, and others that were ho-hum. This new feature on the radio is a bitter disappointment. There are rarely any surprises heard on the alleged all-request mish mosh. I find it repugnant that people ask for the same stuff they play day in and day out anyway. It goes back to my college radio teacher telling the class, " You'll never go broke underestimating the intelligence of your audience". He was right, the retardos who listen to this station either have no imagination or the disc jockeys aren't allowed to play variations from the regular slop they feed us. I am not sure where the blame lies, I feel it's a 50/50 split. I'm sure if I requested a song by the dreaded Phoenix it would get played because they're one of the hostesses favorite acts. If I requested any tune by Ten Years After, it would shuffle by unnoticed. The audience seems to love it, so I suppose it makes no sense to cater to an overopinionated wannabe like myself. Give the people what they want, even if it sucks!

Nice TWERK If You Can Get It!

For once I'm not naming this mental fart after a Rock And Roll song. Mainly because I don't know any tunes with TWERK in the title. There probably are lots of tunes out there with TWERK in the title, I'm just unaware of them since I don't listen to top forty music.I suppose I could've substituted the word WORK and used it as a humorous twist, like "Twerking In A Coal Mine", " We Can Twerk It Out" or " Twerking For A Living", but those are stretches I'm not prepared to make. For those who are totally in a vacuum, Twerking is the act of dancing in a sexually provoative manner, mainly consisting of pelvic thrusts. Lets face it, dancing is a way for people to try and get laid, it's been that way all through the ages. If you disagree, you're a complete doofus. Sure dancing can be enjoyable, but men sure wouldn't bother doing it if there was no chance of it leading to some serious humping. It's been in the news because child star Mylie Cyrus*, a.k.a Hanna Montana put on a show at the Video Music Awards ceremony where she twerked and did an incredibly bad job of it. Twerking isn't something that takes a great deal of skill, but like anything else, some people do it better than others. Some folks can do it naturally, and others have to work at it. It sure looks better watching girls do it than men, I'm sure nobody will argue that point with me. I think the fact that people made such a big to-do over Miley's performance made it get blown way out of proportion. I certainly wouldn't have gone to YOUTUBE to watch it if there hadn't been dozens of news stories about it. I didn't find Ms. Cyrus's act at all offensive, I was more distubed by her constantly sticking her tongue out, Gene Simmons beware. It made her look like a retard, ( I know that's politically incorrect, I just can't think of another way to say it! so shoot me). If anyone recalls The Rocky Horror Picture Show, the dance " The Time Warp" has some serious twerking in it, and that's about as offensive as a child's coloring book of zoo animals. When Elvis Presley first appeared on television, his pelvic shifting was considered obscene, and many programs only showed him from the waist up, to keep teenage minds off of carnal thoughts. I've got news for people who believe that, teenage minds are on carnal thoughts no matter what, it's human nature. Always has been, always will be. There's nothing that will change that! So people have to stop getting their glands in an uproar over what teenagers do, because their bodies are like the Indy 500 of hormones racing around their systems, and trying to put a lid on biology is like trying to fasten a cover on a pot of boiling water. No matter how tightly you manage to secure it, eventually it's gonna blow! * I am unsure of the correct spelling of Ms. Cyrus's name so I tried it the two most obvious ways, and I'll leave it at that.

Mixtape

I swiped this title from a song by Tift Merritt. Tift is an artist I know very little about. I've heard her name often, but virtually none of her songs are etched in my memory. I'm a social retard, I know that's a politically incorrect way of phrasing things, but I cannot think or any other way to put it. When I like a girl, making mix tapes was a perfect way for me to display my affection. From the late nineteen seventies up to the early two thousands, I crammed my thoughts and music onto cassettes and CDs amd presented them to the object of my desire. Naturally, none of those women ended up with me. Today, August twelfth, twenty thirteen, the radio station that I listen to, initiated a new feature. At noon, they play Mix tapes. No, not actual cassettes, but music compilations of listeners song suggestions. Apparently I'm not the only geek out there, who resorted to this medium to try and win over the hearts of members of the opposite sex in this manner. Go figure! Even weirder, I'd probably still do it, if I had access to my hifi system, and there were any women that I thought I had any iota of a chance of dating. The thing that is the biggest question mark in my mind is: I wonder what happened to all those tapes? Are they sitting in a shoebox in a closet somewhere, or were they all disposed of? Tossed out like yesterdays newspapers. I really considered many of them to be truly brilliant. I'm pretty sure that the recipients had a less of noteworthy opinion of them. I'm equally certain that none of those women read this drivel, so I'll never find out the answer, but if anyone does read this, I'd appreciate a comment describing what you did with mix tapes that a suitor bestowed upon you. Somebody put a certain amount of thought and effort into that plastic case full of music and sentiment. I'd like to know if it has lasting value, or it was just a footnote in time?

Blue Jean

This is the title of a David Bowie song. I am not a huge Bowie fan, but I do like his innovative attitude towards music, and this song fits the bill. I've always been slim, thin, svelt, slender, skinny or whatever else you may want to call it. When I was a teen and preteen, fitting in was all a part of the process of aging that I was at odds with my parents about. The "Cool" kids in school wore Levis jeans. So of course I wanted to wear them as well. The ever popular quote, " If everyone was jumping off the Brooklyn Bridge, would you do that too?" always ended that argument for me. When I began buying my own clothes the Levis slim-fit jeans were the thing for me. The 517, 519 and the very first cargo pants The Bush Jeans were the style that I liked and the fit was perfect. These pants are no longer in production. I still have a 28 inch waist but I cannot find Levis that fit me suitably anymore. When I used to hear Levis ads on the radio, they used to end them with the tag line, " Quality Never Goes Out Of Style". That may be so, but who's going to buy it if the style goes out of quality? Recently they introduced the Levis Skinny Jeans. I foolishly bought a pair over the internet. They fit like they were cut for a woman. They have an extremely low rise waist, and they're tight in the crotch. This is perfect for anyone who doesn't have genitals, so Barbie and Ken can wear them but nobody else in the real world, other than the youth who like to sport their waist somewhere around their ankles can make this work. That's a look that I'm amazed has lasted so long, it sure as hell doesn't look comfortable! I like to carry my wallet, comb and a pen in my back pocket, but this mode of wearing jeans makes that a dangerous undertaking. The main thing is...how do they get their pants to stay mid-thigh? Do they Krazy Glue them on? Is there velcro on their knees? I am truly baffled by this. I've been told that this look was perpetuated by the notion that prisoners aren't allowed to have belts, so they walk around with their pants drooping all over the place. Who in their right mind says, " I want to look like I've been in prison"? I realize that fashion trends tend to go against what our predecessors wore, and that will always be so. But if something is uncomfortable, I don't care how hip it is, I ain't wearing it! I think I've got an incurable case of the Blue Jean Blues!

The Secret Agent

This is a title I bogued from the late Rory Gallagher. I had several options of titles for this rant, but Rory is one of my favorite guitarists so I chose his tune to intro my unwanted opinion. I could have used The Spy by The Doors, but that is almost as obscure as the title I chose. I also could have used Johnny Rivers's Secret Agent Man from the TV series that starred Patrick McGoohan, but that's not obscure enough for my tastes. Enough of that, let's get down to what I'm up in arms about today. More than a week ago, a contractor for the NSA revealed that they have access to our cell phone and e-mail records. That's got a lot of people up in arms. The whole conspircay theory, Big Brother mind-set is worried about our privacy. That's a legitimate gripe. It is no secret that cell phone signals are transmitted through the air like radio, and it isn't too difficult to intercept those signals, so if you have anything personal to discuss with your other party, DON'T do it over the phone! It's that easy. After the September 11th 2001 terrorist attacks, the U.S was wondering where our security agencies were when all this was being planned. We are very anxious to point the finger when the ball is dropped, but when steps are taken to prevent such actions we are quick to point the finger and moan about our rights being violated. I have no objection to anyone checking my phone records, if it'll keep me from being blown up, that's just a part of the price we pay for our freedom. On the other hand, I can see why this high school drop-out Snowden, felt that he had to blow the whistle on the NSA, it is something that we should be aware of when we use social media, but the dammage he's done cannot be reversed. The bad guys now know that they have to find another way to interact with each other,so now& they will resort to whatever is necessary to accomplish their evil deeds, making it more difficult for us to stay one step ahead of them. First of all the NSA is not able to monitor every idiot who makes a cell phone call or sends an e-mail, it is completely impossible. Secondly, if they did eavesdrop on all of our calls, they'd have to replace their staff on a daily basis, because they'd be bored to death at an alarming rate. When I used to commute to work by bus, I often heard one side of some loudmouth's conversation who was yapping incessantly while riding, and the inane stories that I heard half of were astoundingly stupid! Try to image hundreds of thousands of these idiotic tirades that occur every hour of every day worldwide, and then picture yourself having to put your ear in and follow along. You'd be nuts in less than an hour, I can almost guarantee that. So if the NSA wants to monitor me while I tell my friends that the Amy Mann concert I just saw was terrific, that's fine with me. I seriously doubt that Amy's got a nuclear device in her guitar case.

Watching The Detectives

I went wayyy back to the late 1970's to steal this title from an Elvis Costello tune. I must say that it holds up well over the years, but that's not what I'm wasting words on today...it's TV. I just finished rewatching the final episode in this season's best new television drama, "Elementary".. I've never read any of the Sherlock Holmes novels, never saw the movie in it's entirety, but I havce to say that the cast and writing of this show are top notch. I've also been watching a nother relatively new drama on ABC which is less than stellar, " Body Of Proof". It stars Dana Delaney as a washed up surgeon who becomes a medical examiner. It's a shallow effort to cash in on the success of the CSI series. I like dana Delaney from her days on "China Beach" but the writing is lame and the plots stick closely to a specific formula, so that you can practically fill in the rest of the show once you've seen the first fifteen minutes. The characters are irritiating, and every week I ask myself why I watch the show, but I do, so shoot me. "Elementary is filmed in New York, at least it looks as if it is, so that  gains extra points on my criteria list. The characters are riveting, and not in the least bit hokey unlike many television dramas.  It features Lucy Liu, who I first saw on the Fox dramedy " Ally McBeal" and she plays the part of Watson as good as TV can allow. Sherlock Holmes has moved to New York after his heroin habit gets out of hand and his father  hires Dr. Watson, a failed surgeon to be his rehabilitation "mentor" for lack of a better word, to oversee his return to health.  He works as a consultant for the NYPD. There is sexual tension between them, but they haven't become lovers and this is a perfect formula for keeping the show going. Romantic interest would leave a limited number of plot exits, and good writers know that. Both Holmes and Watson have their quirks, but they both are appealing in their own annoying ways. The plots have twists that you don't see coming and they are inventive and entertaining. I know that it has been renewed for the 2013/14 season and I can't wait to see what happens next. " Body of Proof" has also been re-upped, and I can pretty much figure out what is going to happen next, and I don't particularly care. 

Nerd Love

I've heard numerous songs with this title, but the one that I found most pleasing was by a band called Dude Offline. It harkens back to The Ramones style of no bullshit rock and roll. The thing is, I'm not a music critic, I'm just like a sad imitiation of Jerry Seinfeld, making what I consider to be humerous comments on typical subjects. I like Dude Offline's tune but what I really want to talk about is...NERDS. When I was in high school,  nerds were the people who were NOT cool. That's it! It had nothing to do with IQ. I knew lots of smart people who were cool and lots of dumb ones who weren't.  In the mid 1980's there was a movie called " Revenge Of The Nerds". It was a pretty successful film ( I have no idea why), so much so, that it sparked a bunch of sequels. But in this first travesty, the nerds who were groupled into packs, unlike the nerds of my day ( I even spelled it differently, NURDS was the version I learned. It was Theodore Geisel a.k.a Dr Seuss who coined the term and spelled it the less offensive way)  who seemed to be loners or groups of two or three at the most. In this tale, the head nerd who is in a college fraternity of other nerds ( Yeah, like that's really gonna happen!) calls the group together and makes a speech where he says,
 " People don't like us because we're smart..."  Luckily I was watching this on HBO and it didn't cause head-turning when I yelled back, " No! People don't like you because you're NERDS!". Nerds are people who are unpopular, at least they used to be, but some goofball discovered that there's money in Nerdiness, and now there are hordes of people who actually think that there are people like the cast of
" The Big Bang Theory" who hang out and act like retards together. One of the cable channels is having a reality show to find out who is the Top Nerd.  Why is it so hard to understand that Nerds are people who are disliked simply because they are social outcasts. It is like having an honor to find the person with the worst B.O.  Nerds are people who are NOT popular! That is it. I'm betting that there was some geek who had writing ability who after graduating college, got a gig writing in Hollywood and he dreamed up the whole cute cudly nerd scenario and sucessfully pitched it and now there's  nerd mania sweeping the country.  There's no accounting for taste, and seeing the nerds on TV is not my cup of tea. I see tons of them in daily life, along with candidates for the worst B.O. as well!