Category: neck deep in the zeitgeist

I just looked at three or four of the blogs I used to read on a regular basis, and all but one is either completely kaput or almost as sadly neglected as my own. “I actually had someone email me about a year ago to see if I had died. I had not.” I barely even remembered how to get here to post, and a lot has changed. This seems to contradict the general trend I read about everywhere that social media is the new black. Why is it then that all the blogs I first read are dead?

I know the reason I stopped blogging; I didn’t have any damn time. If you read the last post, you will see that I was about to start a job in the music bidness. I did that, and now I’m out again. Let’s just say it wasn’t as much fun as it should have been. And once I’d had dinner with Billy Bragg and met Chuck D, Robyn Hitchcock and John Doe, I figured I’d had enough to hold me for a while.

I’m now back on the corporate teat, doing PR for a big software company. Those of you who used to read this blog back when it had a pulse, or who know me from the real world, know that this is not an unusual move. It’s odd to be back in corporate America, but the nice things about it are pretty nice so far.

One thing that’s changed about PR in the six or seven years since I was doing it on a regular basis: blogs. Everything I read about the industry tells me that I’m a chump to be paying attention to The Wall Street Journal. I should be pitching to bloggers. Also I need to be on Facebook and Twitter and probably a bunch of stuff I’ve never heard of. Looks like I have some catching up to do.

I don’t have my blogging voice back yet. I’ll have to figure out what that is. I know that I probably won’t be writing the relatively long and thought-out posts I used to write back when I was unemployed. But I’m going to try to do something, even if it’s just posting the odd juxtapositions that come up on my mobile phone web browser’s news headlines. “I could give you a for instance, but that would squander another potential post, and I can’t afford that.”

There’s a gag I’ve always wanted to try that requires you to be in a group situation where nobody knows you. A party would be ideal. First, attach yourself to a group of people telling jokes. When someone finishes telling a joke, you say, “That reminds me of one” Then you tell the exact same joke the first person told, word for word. You have to tell it, of course, as though you aren’t aware you’re doing anything unusual. I’ve always wondered how people would react. Anytime I’ve been in a situation where it might work, I’ve forgotten until later. And frankly, I might just chicken out. It’s probably like getting into an elevator and facing the opposite way everyone else is facing: much, much harder than it sounds. I managed it for about five seconds once.

The reason I’m thinking about all of this is because I start a new job on Monday, working in the indie rock music biz. “I don’t know why I’m being cagey about the name of the company, except that that’s what everybody always does in blogs. I suppose I should call it Local Indie Label.” I could try the retold joke bit at my new job, but I’ve been thinking about some gags that would be a bit more complex and have some longevity.

The L. Ron:

Strategically place a dog-eared copy of Dianetics on my desk. Frequently say things like, “We need to get clear of what’s holding us back in order to reach new levels” Exhibit a great deal of interest in the impending marriage of Tom and Katie, and vigorously defend him should the situation arise.

Potential drawbacks: as it is in the entertainment industry, company may already be rife with Scientologists

The Poser:

Show up on day one in an obviously new t-shirt promoting some radio-friendly rock band “say, Candlebox” preferably still showing creases from being folded. Wear a similar t-shirt every day: Limp Bizkit, Blink 182, etc. Surreptitiously “yet visibly” change shirts at the end of the day, removing the t-shirt and putting on a Polo. In meetings, whenever I agree with someone, make the devil horns gesture and stick my tongue out. Always spell rock as “RAWK!!!! Make frequent drug references.

Potential drawbacks: termination or injury before the end of my first day, forced to ingest narcotics

The Easy Listener:

Starched oxford shirt and pressed khakis. Bring in a small transistor radio and listen to Sunny 99 all day. Hang motivational posters in office. Ask co-workers listening to company product to “turn that down a bit please, some of us are trying to work”

Potential drawbacks: too close to home, could validate co-workers current suspicions; no obvious “ta:dah! I was just kidding! moment. Possibly irreversible.

Kind of hard to find a tasteful image for this post.

So as you may have heard, Wal-Mart heir John Walton died yesterday when his ultralight aircraft crashed in Grand Teton National Park. I don’t think I ever met the man, but I’m sure his friends and family miss him terribly, and if you’re one of them you should probably stop reading.

I understand that the Associated Press needs to respond quickly when things like this happen and they may not have time to edit for much more than spelling and grammar — but still, don’t you think they should have caught this:

Wal-Mart heir John T. Walton, who died in the crash of his experimental, ultralight aircraft, was remembered as a down-to-earth man…

Oh, dear.

The article goes on to quote a spokeswoman for Grand Teton National Park:

She said Walton, "well-known and much-loved in this valley, died doing something that he loved to do."

I think I might have rephrased that, too, unless Walton was known for his love of plummeting.

So, where were we?

Anyway, me and the Mrs. recently returned from our honeymoon in Curaçao, famous for producing an eponymous blue liqueur drunk only by teenagers in the dark, and Aruba, famous for causing people to start singing that Beach Boys song. On both islands they speak Papiamento, which is a patois of Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, English, French and Edward James Olmos’ lines from “Blade Runner”

Seriously though, it’s a beautiful language and we did pick up a few phrases. “Bon dia means good day, “bon bini means welcome and “masha danki” I seem to recall, means, “Thank you very much” although Jean says it means, “Faster, donkey!"

By the time we left we had picked up enough to be able to read the sign above, which I’m pretty sure means, "Johnny Walker – the world’s bendiest whisky."

When we landed in Aruba we immediately heard some airport employees speaking Papiamento, and it sounded like this: “Papiamento papiamento papiamento. After we had been in the islands a bit longer, our ears became more attuned and we were able to hear more of the subtleties of the language, and it sounded more like, “Badda bing badda bing badda bing“

As we all know, the Internet is a strange and terrifying place. If you ever need to have that confirmed, go to Google, turn off the "SafeSearch" feature, and then do an image search for, well, anything. Pretty much the first hundred hits are going to be porn.

I first learned about SafeSearch when, for reasons too mundane to catalog, I had a legitimate business reason to search for a picture that could be used to illustrate the concept of hairiness. I did a Google image search for "hairy," then saw the SafeSearch button. I turned it off. I’m sure you can imagine the kinds of images the new search returned. Well, the same thing happened when I searched for that picture of a goat. Let’s just say I’d heard that kind of stuff went on, but I didn’t need to see it. My two new New Year’s resolutions:

1. Never turn off SafeSearch.

2. Never leave the house again.

Anyhoo, the goat thing:

I went into our local Wholefoods-which-used-to-be-Wellspring on Wednesday to buy some cheese for a party. My friend Jon was working in the cheese section “which used to have a sign that read "What a friend we have in cheeses"” and I asked him what he thought of a particular goat gouda that caught my eye. Jon said, "It’s mild, but it still has that goaty tang." I said, "I’m going to buy it just because you said goaty tang."

Yeah, that’s it. Welcome to Fistful of Plooble 2005, now featuring nothing but infrequent random slightly amusing things.

Happy New Year!

Still, you have to admit that’s one handsome goat.

Continue reading “Happy New Goat”