Six Pack Of PBQ
As 2014 winds down, the playbuzz quiz is off the chain. Almost every day another facebook denizen announces What Kind Of Demon Are You? or Which Magical Creature Should You Adopt? Today’s waste of bandwidth will explore these dimensions. Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
The is an accounting procedure called LIFO. It means last in, first out. The last PBQ on FB was Which Magical Creature Should You Adopt? “If you could pick one of these superpowers, which one would you choose?” “Where would you rather live?” The first four questions offer a non choice, like “something else”, or “somewhere else.” The research oriented PG chose these placebo options.
The first result was GREMLIN. “You are a generous, yet rebellious individual and you and your pet gremlin will have loads of fun getting into trouble together! Just remember, don’t feed him or her after midnight!” Hopefully, an AMC automobile is not involved.
What Kind Of Demon Are You? DJINN “Like human beings, the jinn can be good, evil, or neutrally benevolent and hence have free will.” Some cleansing cream product called Puffs advertised in this segment. Magic Dragons are pleased.
What Crime Did You Commit in Your Past Life? This does have a fun question. “Pick a celebrity mug shot.” The options are Kholoe Kardashian, Lil Wayne, Lindsay Lohan, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, and Nick Nolte. Lindsay Lohan has the best hair.
There is a bit of ironic presentation. The meme-headline says “Am I the only one around here that gives a shit about the rules!?” A mean looking actor holds a pistol, and screams. The question is: Finish this sentence: Rules are meant to be ______ . The answers are Bent, Broken, Followed. To the right of the question is an ad for Ricoh Healthcare Technology & Document Management.
The last question was “Pick a weapon.” An option is a knife, and handgun, with the universal no pasted on. The criminal result: PRACTICING WITCHCRAFT. “After the rumors began spreading, a wave of hysteria washed over the community and you were thrown in jail.” That sounds like the last two weeks in “post racial” Amerika.
When you work on the internet, there is temptation and distractions. There is always *something* on twitter. @paul_lander FOX News had on Mark Fuhrman talking race relations. Let’s face it, if he were alive, they’d give a cooking show to Jeffrey Dahmer. Just try the mashed potatoes.
Which leads us to the next PBQ, Which Mythical Creature is Hidden Inside You? FAIRY A hair care product called Pantene is advertised.
The last two PBQ are about allegedly real people. It is a fine line between history and myth, especially when you are promoting a war. What Iconic Figure In American History Are You Most Like? probably will overlook this sordid reality.
“Which of these periods in American History would you most like to live in?” The options are “Now – The Information Age” (picture of aluminum skyscrapers”,) “The Founding Days” (painting of George Washington looking cool,) “The Roaring 20s” (picture of women in short skirts dancing,) “The Influential 60s” (picture of post pubescent Joan Baez and Bob Dylan.)
“Which of these influential figures of Western History do you hold in highest regard?” Winston Churchill, Salvador Dali, Albert Einstein, Bill Gates, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln. Six white men, with the hispanic Dali posing with a cat. This PBQ is politically incorrect. Maybe PG should not worry about being compared to slaveowner GEORGE WASHINGTON.
The last PBQ is Which Famous Genius Do You Think Like? ALBERT EINSTEIN PG might trim the mustache back a bit. The rumored affair with Marilyn Monroe can stay. Being misquoted on the internet, sixty years after you die, is good, clean fun.
Gremlin, Djinn, Fairy, Practicing witchcraft, George Washington, Albert Einstein. Life is good. Political correctness is greatly overrated.
#UnwieldyInsults
@llamaranch Your intelligence is so low it makes some question if you are afflicted with a mental disability #FizzleOff #UnwieldyInsults
@llamaranch You are the male offspring of a female canine
@HoorayBacon You look like what would happen if a wookie mated with one of the guys from Duck Dynasty #UnwieldyInsults #YeahNotFunny
@JohnParrish56 There is an odor emitting from your torso that is most egregious. I do say you should stop living. #UnwieldyInsults #YeahNotFunny
@KebabManiac With your wit, you’d make a wonderful dinner guest for Jeffrey Dahmer
@rockskimmer Lawrence Welk wants his Tupperware back, you bubble-hating, enemy of the accordion! #WeCantBreathe #UnwieldyInsults #newsnight #ISIS
@papermonkeynz A preponderance of recessive genetic traits has made you unattractive in a society that values symmetry in facial structure
@KebabManiac I don’t care what the others say – you wear that hunch well
@facebookie You, sir, are lower than Eubalaena japonica ordure at the nadir of the Mariana
@MXTracy66 You are like an Adam Sandler movie with an all Nickelback soundtrack.
@shelikesitloud I bet if you tried to spell pterodactyl, your brain would break.
@laurieallee Your mythology is archetypally incongruous.
@rockskimmer In the HeeHaw auditions of life, you would be laughed from the room and not allowed any of the craft services cornbread. #UnwieldyInsults #newsnight #ISIS #WeCantBreathe
@KebabManiac You Have The Grace Of A Pygmi Hippo With ‘The Shits’ And The Dancing Prowess Of The Great Proffesor Stephen Hawking
@DaiseyDoesIt Your pompous presence reveals your inherent nature as one best illustrated by a phallically formed cranium
@zolaris64 Your mother wears Bates 30501 Durashock desert foot protection.
@laurieallee Your voice has tonal anomalies that would make Schoenberg abandon dodecaphony & long for traditional harmonics.
@laurieallee If Anton Van Leeuwenhoek had seen the inner machinations of your aberrant deviations he’d have smashed his microscope.
@rockskimmer You have the spelling skills of an umbrella stand and the wry wit of a Bass Pro Shops fish finder. #UnwieldyInsults @TheHashtagGame
@TheBrandonHolly You are a maladroitly uncoordinated ape who is unable to take notice of his own bemusing presence & horrendous malfeasance.
@MullingHagel In the theater of the absurd you were asked to stop acting.
@Bat_Guano_1 Your bad taste is exceeded only by your bad breath.
@lowdudgeon Your judgement is so lacking you would not be out of place on certain American Grand Juries I could name.
@Pacific231 The woman who gave birth to you some number of years ago wears specialized footwear designed specifically for times of war!
@MHanson62 “Hey, Excrement for Intelligence…”
@MullingHagel Your personality is comparable to a poorly written novel about vampire teenager and your face is cubic in design.
@steverand616 Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries
@FateJacketX I would rather read Hawthorne to a bovine in heat than suffer your malodorous company at the debutant ball!
@KennyBrendan You’re an objectivist Marxist who fails to appreciate the potential for revolutionary subjectivity. #WeCantBreathe #UnwieldyInsults #newsnight #ISIS
@thecoolnoodle Your vapid, feckless attempts at blatant obfuscation r tedious and leave me disheartened by your woeful lack of intellect.
@llamaranch This meal tastes like the regurgitated bile of a pregnant hippopotamus who suffers from leprosy. #UnwieldyInsults @TheHashtagGame #ladygaga
@tlcninjarx Your only value is the plethora of calumnious epithets you have reminded me are in my arsenal of verbal eviscerators
@MHanson62 While I appreciate your Mother’s military service, her combat footwear is inappropriate and unflattering.
@jpostman You’re about as effective as the 1992 Maastricht Agreement was at unifying EU monetary policy #UnwieldyInsults #YeahNotFunny
#UnwieldyInsults are from twitter. They might be talking about you. Pictures are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
The Rudolph Story
The story below is a repost. Pictures are from The Library of Congress. There is an appearance by Gerald Rudolph Ford, and his women. Betty was a merry soul.
Someone posted a bit of revisionism about a holiday classic. As he sees it, “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” is about racism.
In a bit of yuletime synchronicity, the urban mythbusters at Snopes posted a piece about Rudolph the same day. It seems as though the Rudolph story was originally written for the Montgomery Ward Stores. The idea was to print a Christmas booklet to give to customers. A staff writer named Robert L. May was picked for the job.
Originally, there were concerns about the red nose, and the connection to heavy drinking. At the time, the original meaning of “merry christmas” had been forgotten. Merry meant intoxicated, and a merry christmas was a drunken one. The booklet was released. It was a big hit with shoppers.
Mr. May had a brother in law named Johnny Marks, who was musically gifted. Mr. Marks wrote the song, and somehow or another Gene Autry came to sing it. A story (which PG heard once, but cannot find a source for) had Mr. Autry doing a recording session. The session went very smoothly, and the sides scheduled to be recorded were finished early. There was a half hour of studio time paid for. Someone produced copies of “Rudolph”, gave them to the musicians, and the recording was knocked out. It became a very big hit.
Gene Autry had a radio show, “Gene Autry’s Melody Ranch”. He created the “cowboy code”. Number five gets our attention today. Under this code, the cowboy must:
1. never shoot first, hit a smaller man, or take unfair advantage.
2. never go back on his word, or a trust confided in him.
3. always tell the truth.
4. be gentle with children, the elderly and animals.
5. not advocate or possess racially or religiously intolerant ideas.
6. help people in distress.
7. be a good worker.
8. keep himself clean in thought, speech, action and personal habits.
9. respect women, parents and his nation’s laws.
10. be a patriot.
“Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer” has become a beloved standard, without the troubling religious implications of many holiday songs. It is the second biggest selling record of all time. The only song to sell more is “White Christmas”. You just can’t get away from race.
Too Many Opinions
Eighteen words appeared on facebook. “Nothing is more conductive to peace of mind than not having any opinions at all.” ~ Georg Christoph Lichtenberg. The FBF is known to have opinions.
In the google age, or le goog, you are only a right click away from too much information. In cases of facebook education, the first impulse is to ask the question, did the person really say that? In the case of Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, the probable answer is yes.
“Nothing…” is from The Waste Books (New York Review Books Classics) “German scientist and man of letters Georg Christoph Lichtenberg was an 18th-century polymath: an experimental physicist, an astronomer, a mathematician, a practicing critic both of art and literature. He is most celebrated, however, for the casual notes and aphorisms that he collected in what he called his Waste Books.”
The Sudelbücher, or scrapbooks, were written in German. They are essentially a collection of random thoughts. If twitter had existed then, these thoughts would have gone to 140 character purgatory, never to be seen again. History would not have been affected.
The first thing you learn when you investigate this quote is a translation controversy. Conducive is possibly more appropriate than conductive. German speakers might have thoughts about which word best describes the thoughts of GCL. This would constitute having an opinion.
The cited aphorism does have the aroma of truth. You are not required to have an opinion about everything that goes on. Those rhetoric warriors often do not have your best interests at heart. Sometimes the best thing to do is to realize that the hot trending hashtag is #noneofmybusiness.
While stumbling through google city, searching, like a digital Diogenes, for one honest man, a lovely essay appeared. How to Waste a Notebook: The Waste Books of Lichtenberg. The author might have actually read the Sudelbücher, instead of the Brainy Quotes highlights.
“Last month, however, I chanced upon The Waste Books by 18th century German polymath Georg Christoph Lichtenberg. (Polly Math would be a good stage name.) Containing thousands of aphoristic notes, Lichtenberg’s books read like clippings from newspaper horoscopes, fortune cookie fortunes and one-liners commingling with trenchant observations about the human condition and the existential peccadilloes with which it’s fraught. So, why call these gems The Waste Books?”
Fairyland: A Memoir Of My Father
Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father was published last year. It got some attention in Atlanta, where the story started. A few weeks ago, a copy appeared at the Chamblee library. It was time.
Steve Abbott and Barbara Binder were grad students at Emory. They met, fell in love, and got married. On December 6, 1970, Alysia Rebecca Abbott was born.
As might be predicted for a couple that met at an SDS meeting, the Abbotts had an unconventional relationship. They lived for a while in a decaying mansion on Clifton Road, with a few dozen commune neighbors. Truth be told, the Abbotts might have wound up with a divorce. Instead, on August 28, 1973, Barbara was killed in an automobile accident.
Steve had always been bisexual. If you have any doubts, see this cover he drew for The Great Speckled Bird. After Barbara died, he took his daughter to San Francisco. After a couple of stops, they wound up at 545 Asbury Street. Steve wrote poetry. Alysia grew into a young lady.
When it was time, Alysia went to college in New York. Barbara Binder Abbott was from a “comfortable” family, and the Binders stayed in touch with their granddaughter. Meanwhile, Steve turned up HIV+. Eventually, his condition required Alysia to move home. On December 2, 1992, he took his last breath.
Alysia Abbott can tell a story. Fairyland is an entertaining read, even when the story is tough to take. Hopefully, there will be more reading product from the lady.
This is the dedication: “for my mother and my father, and for Annabel, so she may some time know where her mother “was at.”” Annabel has a brother, Finn. He is profoundly autistic. When the NPR book promotion interview was given, Finn could not talk.
A few months ago, PG heard Annabelle, a song by Gillian Welch. The chorus rhymes Jesus with please us. PG found this to be upsetting. He wondered if he was going to go the rest of his life being triggered by Jesus. And now, the author of this deeply moving book has a daughter, with a very similar name. Annabel will have an autistic younger brother to grow up with.
The second part of this feature is a repost. It is the story of a World Aids Day rally, December 1, 1992. The next day Steve Abbott died. Pictures today are from “The Special Collections and Archives, Georgia State University Library”.
1992 was a year for PG. His father died in February. In July, PG went to Europe. It was a bad, bad year for friends with aids. Several were recruited by the grim reaper.
By the time December 1 came around, PG was ready for another year. In those days, PG was working in an architect office downtown, and had lots of free time. There was a rally for World Aids Day at the state capitol, and PG saw a chance for free entertainment. A podium was set up in the rotunda, and a series of speakers declaimed. One man said to use a condom every time you FUCK. He seemed to enjoy screaming the F word in the state capitol.
A man named Doug Teper spoke. He was the only state legislator to speak, and he criticized the organizers for not inviting him. Later, PG … who lived in Mr. Teper’s district … asked him for a business card. Mr. Teper forgot to bring his business cards. (PG was standing next to Mr. Teper when a speaker demanded health care for everyone. PG leaned over and said, how are we going to pay for this? Mr. Teper shrugged. Twenty two years later, we still don’t know.)
In July, a close friend had died. Jim lived in Loganville, in Walton County. PG stood behind a statue of George Walton during the rally.
PG saw a person named Gene Holloway at the rally, and went to talk to him. Years earlier, when Betty Ford was the first lady, PG was taken to his eighteenth birthday party. A couple of years after the rally, PG saw an obituary for Gene Holloway.
Names
Alan Burnett~Bill Medlock~Bill Meneely
Blaze Mills~Buddy Conine~Calvin Bunn
Danny Fields~David Chewning~David Hadden
Charlie Hall~Dwight Dunaway~Freeman Waldrop
Gary Hunton~Gene Haynes~Gene Holloway
Gibson Higgins~Glenn Krause~Greg Scott
Harold King~Hawk~Jerry Pyschka
Jim Anderson~Jim Woodward~Joe Kenney
Joe Vickery~John Harllee~Jon Gordon
King Thackston~Larry Jackson~Layton Gregory
Lee Mullis~Les Friessen~Mac Wilson
Manfred Ibis~Mark Keenum~Mark Rosen
Martin Isganitus~Michael Dollins~Micheal Mason
Moon Moore~O’Gene Donohue~Purl Sudds
Ron Davis~Sam Mitchell~Skeeter Smith
Steve Bedworth~Stuart Davis
Ti Barfield~Tom Aderhold~Tom Selman
Tom Williams~Trion~Winston Morriss
Chamblee54 
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