Author Archive

Early London Tube Routes No Longer in Use

1. The Vacuum Tube – Antiquated route. Replaced by the Transistor Tube and eventually the Digital Highway
2. The Fallopian Tube – AKA “The Tunnel of Love.” Getting there was half the fun and once there people didn’t want to leave
3. The Test Tube – Never got beyond beta. They were always experimenting with this Tube.
4. The Boob Tube – Fail. Riders watched it instead of riding it
5. Like Totally Tubular Man – The fact that it was located in San Fernando Valley and not England had more to do with its demise than anything else

 

Notable Tube Stops

1. Mattress Springs
2. Gobsmack Wickets
3. Poopchute Commons
4. Hospital Corners
5. Isle of View (AKA – I Love You)
6. Sure Would Forest
7. Minster
8. West Minster
9. Upper Minster
10. Lower Minster
11. Minster-upon-Minster
12. Minster Minster Minster – Marcia Brady lived here briefly
13. Minsterpool
14. Minstershire
15. Minsterham
16. Shrinkage Flats
17. Upper Lip
18. Stiff Upper Lip
19. Lifesasham
20. Eden
21. East of Eden
22. Titwhistle Sound
23. Spit-by-the-Sea
24. Mucous Greens
25. Paltrow Goop
26. Cabbie Abbey
27. UBER Abbey
28. Abbey Road
29. Bedlam
30. Mayhem
31. Bedham
32. Maylem
33. Maybe Bedlam, Maybe Mayhem
34. Bridge-over-Troubled Waters
35. Fancy That Guvnah
36. East Fancy That Guvnah
37. Cameltoe Arches
38. Blossom Farts Hollow
39. Stratford-upon-Avon – Home to Shakespeare
40. Nose-upon-Face
41. White-on-Rice
42. Once-upon-Atime – Home to Fairytales
43. Picklesworth
44. East Picklesworth
45. Slightly East, But More to the Northeast Without Actually Being In East Picklesworth Proper
46. Nowhere Near Picklesworth, more Devonshire than Picklesworth
47. Will You Forget Picklesworth Already This is Cavendish Forks
48. Gherkinville
49. 55 Miles Due East of Picklesworth
50. Stink-on-Shite
51. Paper Docks
52. Shallowpool
53. Humbug Station
54. Scrooge Rectory
55. Jesus, Will You Let It Go, You’re Not in Picklesworth Anymore and We’re Not Even Going to Picklesworth
56. East Jesus, Will You Let It Go, You’re Not in Picklesworth Anymore and We’re Not Even Going to Picklesworth
57. The Heights of Impropriety 
    
58. Pissinboot Falls
59. Prominent Flats
60. Plain Commons
61. Extraordinary Commons
62. Dingleberry Farms
63. Papist Trappings
64. Texarkana – Who knew they’d have one too?
65. Sticky Wicket Thickets

1. Green Eggs and Hamlet – A charming farce about breakfast during the Renaissance
   

   1564-1616. Numbers don’t do him justice. But words do. Much ado.

2. The Book of Norman – The Norman Conquest as seen through the eyes of a zealous young missionary, Prince Brigham
3. Romeo & Romeo – Set in a Roman bath house, this steamy play about gladiator hygiene introduces the recurring character of Bette Midler
4. The Merry Wives of Vlad the Impaler – The bard takes a lighter look at Vlad’s happier domestic life. This is not the one-dimensional “head on a pike” Vlad that can be so dreary.
5. MEGA – Make England Great Again. This play later morphed into The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
6. Do You Know the Muffin Man. Well, Do Ya Punk? – This play begat the character of Dirty Harry
7. Taming of the Jew – A headstrong Semite is mellowed after his desired behaviors are rewarded with bagels
8. A Midsummer’s Night Protest March for Redress of Grievances Against the King – The peasants revolt against the King’s knights use of excessive force – especially when a simple, “Will you kindly give us your first born,” would do. Uprising eventually leads to King John relinquishing some power by signing the Magna Carta.
9. Two Gentleman from the Tenderloin – Rosencrantz and Guildenstern visit Stonewall and wind up in chains – though by choice
   

   While visiting his home in Stratford-upon-Avon, I paid homage at his burial site in Holy Trinity Church.

10. Juliet and Juliet – 2 chefs battle to the death in a final cook-off to see who will become Queen Elizabeth’s court chef. Neither want to lose their head over this, but one will. It’s like a medieval version of the Food Network’s show Chopped. Also, Juliet and Juliet, may have been the basis for the 2009 foodie movie Julie & Julia.
11. How Now Brown Cow – Falstaff develops unaccountable feelings for his cow Bessie, in a love that dare not speak its name. Audiences found it very mooving.
12. Thou Wench Doth Spaketh Poorly – A grammar snob decries the lack of the King’s English spoken by a Cockney street urchin. Play later became My Fair Lady
13. A Pursuit Most Trivial – Professor Maximillian of Cambridge keeps pestering the faculty with pointless quiz questions on a variety of topics. Eventually it becomes a board game craze and he makes a million. Which influenced play #14
14. Maximillian Makes a Million – A stunningly unorthodox play where the protagonist (Professor Maximilian) confesses that it wasn’t the first million, but rather the second million that was actually the hardest to make. No one was exhibiting meta-humor in 1590, except for Shakespeare. This “lost” play never made it out of previews in Greenwich. Its charred script was discovered near his Globe Theater in 2007 after getting singed in London’s Great Fire of 1666.
15. Sir Thinxalot – This brilliant Knight of the Eggheads defeats opponents with wit and cunning. In Act II he marries Lady Mensa.
16. The Gouger of Venice – A greedy Venice merchant overcharges its citizens for gondola rides until the Doge gently persuades him to “play nice” or have his disemboweled entrails strewn all over St. Mark’s Square
17. Bangers and Mash – An Olde English version of Starsky and Hutch
18. East Side Story – A musical version of Romeo and Juliet. Who would ever dream a musical like that would work – unless you transferred it to the West Side.
19. Ojello – This first draft involving rendering horses into edible byproducts somehow transformed into Othello
20. The “Ado” Plays

• • Much Ado About Nothing
  • Some Ado About Some Thing
  • A Little Ado About a Few Things
  • No Ado About Anything
  • Much Adieu About French Good Byes

 

Shakespeare was celebrated in his day because he wrote popular and relatable plays for the masses and aristocracy alike. This was before Johan Gutenberg’s printing press made books/novels/stories generally available. There wasn’t much entertainment competition. Shakespeare had the field pretty much to himself. Theater going was one of the few ways your average Lancelot entertained himself. Will S. actually became more popular after his death (just like I will). Back then the play really was the thing.

This is by no means a condemnation of the outsized talents of Shakespeare, just a perspective on our most worthiest of playwrights

Still, I wonder why playwright isn’t spelled playwrite. Makes no sense. Oh well – a little ado about everything.

The Topic is Dark, But in an Upbeat, Dark Chocolate Kinda Way

Reasons Why People Choose to be Euthanized

1. They now find that when one door closes, another 2 doors also close
2. Try as they might, whenever life gives them lemons, all they can make is urine
3. Nut milks not delivering on their promise
4. HHDS (Hogan’s Heroes Derangement Syndrome). Ever since Hogan’s Heroes was summarily cancelled (without explanation) in 1971, hundreds of post-adolescent men have suffered from this late onset syndrome. I know I do.

Reset: Reasons People Choose to be Euthanized

5. One of their personalities gets a Restraining Order on the other
6. Their self-driving car goes out on rides without them
7. They’re convinced those cyber bitches Alexa and Siri are scheming against them
8. No one is impressed any more by your “State Quarter” collection. And then you discover they weren’t impressed by it in the first place.
9. Toaster doesn’t care where you set the Darkness dial. It pops up after it thinks it’s done
10. You just spotted your so-called Psychiatrist washing dishes at the Waffle House
11. Every time you get to the front of the line, everyone turns 180° around and says, “Sorry Charlie, you’re at the back now?”
12. You can no longer find Rita Moreno’s 1980 Pepsodent commercial on YouTube
13. The endless frustration of being unable to turn raisins back into grapes
14. Did you know that Euthanasia outnumber youth in Europe?
15. Your self-deprecating humor now hitting too close to home
16. Your shadow is now acting independently of your movements
17. That Aha video “Take On Me” no longer brings you the joy it once did. In fact it’s scary as hell now.
18. Some people euthanize preemptively because they think they’ve learned all they can from this incarnation and just want to get on with the next one

I’ll always carry a torch for catalytic converters – an acetylene torch. I had to in my business. How else was I going to cut them out of the exhaust system?

Hello law-abiding citizens, my name is Eugene Clark and I was once a catalytic converter thief. My street name was Acetylene Gene and due to my dastardly deeds I had a carbon footprint the size of a crop circle. And while catalytic converters save the environment from ghastly gasses, they saved me from financial ruin. That is until I got caught platinum-handed by the Alameda County Sheriff while practicing my craft in a dark and unmonitored Costco employee parking lot. I had just harvested my 3^rd converter of the night when Officer Malloy collared me. I knew I should’ve stopped at 1, but you know how it is when you’re at Costco – you always end up getting more than you planned on.

 

Since that eventful evening I’ve gone straight. I mean I’ve always been straight, it’s just that I no longer steal for a living (unless you count not paying rent at my girlfriend Stacy’s trailer). The Alameda County Probation Dept. sentenced me to house arrest and outfitted me with a hi-tech GPS tracking ankle bracelet. That didn’t last. I kept torching it off and selling the bracelet for its precious metals and valuable circuitry (old habits die hard). The Probation Dept. finally clamped on an unforgiving manacle of worthless iron and I got the message. I’m housebound once again (trailer-bound really) which is no different than my life during COVID. As part of my plea bargaining sentence I’m duty bound to enlighten the public on the nefarious ways catalytic converter thieves operate and how citizens can protect themselves against such rank thievery.

 

To the School Children of America

Kids, as the theme song for the TV series Baretta advised, “Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time.” Of course Robert Blake, the star of Baretta, is in jail for murder so I don’t know how valid this line of reasoning is. Let me come at you another way. I believe it really hurts your grades to spend too much time trying to picture your teacher naked. It’s a short term benefit that’s not helpful in the long run. But if I could say something more instructive and useful to the school children (and the court does order me to do so) it would be this: Kids, don’t meddle with precious metals. Rare earth materials belong either in the earth or under a car in the exhaust-scrubbing catacombs of a catalytic convertor. A life of larceny will eventually catch up with you so you might as well get on the straight and narrow so you can avoid living in a tin can with manacled ankles.

 

What do catalytic converters do? Yeah, what do day do?

Catalytic converters are like the automobile’s liver. They filter out (convert) harmful and poisonous exhaust gases into relatively harmless compounds. More specifically they transform carbon dioxide, nitric oxide, nitrogen dioxide and hydrocarbons into more environmentally friendly carbon dioxides and water vapor by means of chemical reactions. As the polluting hot exhaust gases pass through honeycombed chambers coated with precious metals at temperatures of 400°, chemical reactions occur that essentially neuter the malevolent gases and convert them into less noxious vapors.

 

Catalytic convertors have a salutary effect on the environment depending on if you know the meaning of the word salutary. Some regard catalytic converters as solid state chimney sweeps. It’s worth noting that despite the ubiquity of catalytic converters, the average vehicle still produces roughly 8 tons of GHG (Greenhouse Gases) annually, mostly in the form of carbon dioxide. Now multiply that by 1.4 billion cars on earth and that’s a ton of CO₂. Actually it’s 11.2 billion tons – almost as heavy as Homer’s The Odyssey.

 

That’s what’s different about today’s global warming. It’s not some endogenous cyclical process. It’s a gross imbalance of 11.2 billion tons of CO₂ injected into the air annually. It’s not part of some organic long term cycle of heating and cooling that the Earth can naturally manage. The earth has never faced this level of unmitigated ecological imbalance since that asteroid impacted the Yucatan Peninsula 65 million years ago, wiping out the dinosaurs and injuring Barbara Walters. Barbara has since recovered, but the earth may not be able to recover from this avalanche of CO₂ as greenhouse gases slowly trap evermore heat. I’m not a doom and gloomer, I’m just stating it as a distinct possibility. It could be catastrophic. The only thing left would be Mt. Rushmore. Read the rest of this entry »

1. I stand with all paraplegics
2. Freedom is not dom, it just sounds that way
3. Beavers Lives Matter #JerryMathersMatters
4. I deeply care about things in an abstract, non-participatory sense
5. I’m passionate about slacktivism and clicktivism
6. If I knew what disingenuous meant, I guess I’d be angry
7. I donate money to many causes anonymously. Here’s a list.
8. I have high moral values…in public
9. I’m just a humble narcissist expressing his false modesty

1. I’m just a humble narcissist suffering from false modesty
2. Most appropriate song in the Ukraine: Crimea River
3. Warning to Anna Phylactic: The enclosed Ideas were written on equipment used in processing tree nuts
4. Henceforth all cities are forbidden to change their names. Listening Peking, Bombay, Kiev? Nobody needed to learn Beijing, Mumbai or Kyiv. Heck, I still call New York City, New Amsterdam. Sometimes I even refer to North America as Terra Incognita or simply the New World, but I’m an old soul. And you too P Diddy or whatever is the latest iteration of your name. You will always be Sean Combs. It’s bad enough your first name doesn’t have an “h” in it.
   

   I love my kitty. This picture has nothing to do with this list. I just love my kitty and I don’t care who knows.

5. You’d think the UCS (Union of Concerned Scientists) would have greater interest in this list. They don’t. These so called “Concerned Scientists” could care less. Hypocritical bastards.
6. If you don’t like this list, don’t humor me with that, “It’s not you, it’s the font” malarkey
7. My dog thinks these ideas are too clever by arf.
8. If when reading this list you experience dangerous waves of laughter, stop reading and dial 911…and please listen carefully because some of their menu options have changed
9. #9 removed by the Union of Concerned Scientist because they were concerned it was “too funny” and would lead to #8. Oh sure, I’m at my funniest and suddenly they’re all concerned.
10. #10 removed by the humanitarian organization Doctors Without Bladders. Well they can piss off.
11. My yogurt has had its acidophilus and bulgaricus culture removed by woke vegans. Just another example of cancel culture.
12. The Cyrillic Alphabet is hard enough, but the symbols ¥ĭŋŧŧƌƣǣȝȾɏɖɖ will lead you to Rune
13. What makes us human? Well we’re the only species to look at our Q-Tips or Kleenex after we’ve used them
14. I’m more aware of your pancreas than you think
15. When is it appropriate to donate something to Goodwill? For example, I have things hanging in my closet I haven’t worn in over a year: a really ugly vest and a couple of raccoons I found guilty of treason. Do I just give them away?

 

Note to Readers: David Hardiman is a multi-adaptive platform, replete with a suite of tools designed to create user-friendly content. He now refers to himself as the symbol “Ɵ.”

Hello again everyone. I am Ɵ (the multi-adaptive platform, replete with a suite of tools designed to create user-friendly content formerly known as David Hardiman). Glad to of made your acquaintance. No. That should have read: Glad to have made your acquaintance. Maybe it is the font after all.

 

Peace and Love,

Ringo

Top 10 (or so) Least Popular “White Noise” Ambient Sounds

1. Rain falling on a corpse
2. An endless loop of “Please listen carefully as some of our menu options have changed”
3. Waves crashing on a Land Rover parked too close to the shore
4. Nail guns operated by the Marine Drum & Bugle Corps
5. Wind blowing through an orphanage
6. An endless loop of “If this is a medical emergency, please hang up and dial 911”
7. Morgan Freeman slowly enunciating, “Here kitty, kitty, kitty. Heeeeere kitty.”
8. A batter repeatedly hit on the ankle by a 95 mph fastball
9. A continuous sound of rubber being punctured by one of those “Caution: Severe Tire Damage” spikes.
10. The Gettysburg Address solemnly spoken in Pig Latin
11. A quartet of Leaf Blowers playing “When the Saints Go Marching In”
12. The sound of no hands clapping. AKA the Sound of Silence.
    

    Whatever get’s ya thru the night…It’s alright. It’s alright.

13. Christopher Walken reciting “Rock-a-Bye Baby”
14. The whoosh of toilets flushing
15. A 15-round recording of Rock’em Sock’em robots boxing
16. A veterinarian brushing Grover’s teeth. Grover is his assistant.
17. The zipping sounds of aestheticians administering a bikini wax

And if this list doesn’t put you to sleep, nothing will.

In 1975 at the tender and horny age of 14 I spied with my little eyes a glimpse of 2 glorious female breasts. At the time they were heaving provocatively and bathed in the pink smoky light of the Palace-a-Go-Go Lounge on James Street in my hometown of Syracuse, NY. These breasts possessed my ideal demographic – human, female, and naked. Through the eyes of a lovelorn 14 year-old, these priceless ornaments were like 2 Crown Jewels perched regally on the chest of a royal subject. I took one breathless glance at those twin charms and sighed “God Save the Queen.”

 

You may wonder what circumstances gave birth to a callow 14 year-old finding himself in a position to ogle a stripper gyrating onstage at midnight? Well the real story behind this wormhole into a forbidden dimension begins at the intersection of lust and wanderlust. Actually it began at the intersection of Wolf Street and 7^th North Street where my sister Gail had an apartment.

 

And that’s where our story truly begins. But before we pick up things at the Danforth Arms Apartments, some background is needed so you may understand my journey from being a student with plenty of homework and chores to do on a quiet Sunday evening at home, to an outlaw truant drinking in a salacious eyeful of Gypsy Rose Lee strutting her fleshy stuff across a smoky stage. I don’t want to tell the story too quickly or you won’t appreciate the journey. Now that I’m 60 I know how to pace myself in elucidating a story so you’ll better appreciate it. No longer am I an excitable 14 year-old prone to premature elucidation. Read the rest of this entry »

And I’m neither referring to NASA landing and operating 5 rovers on Mars (not to mention a helicopter), nor am I referring to the fact that an Airbus 350 weighing 620,000 lbs. at takeoff can stay airborne for 19 hours and fly 9700 miles. While I marvel at these stellar (and interstellar) achievements, what I am referring to specifically is something even more miraculous and decidedly earthbound. It’s probably the most miraculous feat of forever and for all-time. What I’m referring to is free soloist Alex Honnold becoming the first human to summit the 3200′ sheer granite face of El Capitan. And he improbably accomplished this without benefit of any mountaineering equipment except for a pair of really good rubbery shoes and a keen sense of which way is up.

.

I use the term “the first human” advisedly because even though I’ve witnessed Mr. Honnold ascend El Capitan in the movie Free Solo, I still don’t believe it’s humanly possible to do what he did. Clearly his status as “human” is in question. Even hybrid human Jeff Goldblum in “The Fly” would have had difficulty traversing this unforgiving eminence. And Honnold made his ascent in only 3 hours and 56 minutes – or about as fast as it takes Elon Musk to manufacture 150 Teslas. So perhaps you can understand why, when I consider Mr. Honnold’s feat, I say, “Wait, did that really happen?”

.

Yes, it really did happen and there is much to say about this superhuman achievement. But words will only conjure a mental dimension of this experience and that’s why I’ve provided some video: Free Solo. It is a worthy exploration to comment on and marvel at this spectacle of indescribable derring-do. And as I share my sense of unalloyed awe at Alex’s outrageous feat and his courageous feet, I realize this endeavor is just business as usual for our uniquely wired Alex. He is not doing this with feigned swagger and false bravado. To Alex, this anti-acrophobic act is not some kind of flashy derring-do. It’s just…do. Read the rest of this entry »