Old-Chinese-Lady-Robics

For the past ten years, I’ve been working in and around a tiny park in San Francisco called Sydney Walton Square. It’s more a lawn than a park, with an ugly fountain and an alarming psychotropic bust of Georgia O’Keefe . I suspect it has something to do with the massive apartment complex nearby, some land-use law. People eat lunch there on sunny days, but for the most of the day it stands empty. Even winos manage to overlook it.

But the AM, the joint is hopping with old Chinese ladies, doing their OLD-CHINESE-LADY-ROBICS.

“But Greg, I’ve tried cardio-roller skating, I’ve tried Jazzerilates, I’ve even tried Supine Lymphatic Kneading from Sweden. What is it about Old-Chinese-Lady-robics that makes it such an appealing addition to Physical Culture?”

An excellent and well timed question, Senor Rhetorical Conceit! The attractions to this ancient technique are many, but the surface features that my feeble imagination is able craft for this crappy little feature are thus:

The Gear
Simple. Lumpy. Comfortable. Obscure.

-- Off-brand lumpy black restaurant worker tennies

-- brown elastic band tube-trousers with cavernous middle seam. Should have that magic sheen that can only mean one thing: spun polyester (Eerie thought: as oil supplies dry up, will the price of these inexpensive pants sky-rocket? Is the Chinese Old Lady Community concerned? I must prepare Cantonese-language flyers immediately!)

-- Men’s dress socks, poly blend, grey

-- Quilted, shapeless cotton house coat with floral accents

Or, alternatively:

-- Poly sport coat, in hallucinogenic black and yellow hounds-tooth pattern over a cotton poly blend navy sweatshirt.

Optional:

-- Fishing hat

-- one of those special clearly store bought cotton bonnets that only Old Chinese Ladies seem to wear. Where do they buy these? I suspect there are special supplier that only furnish the Old Chinese Lady population, sort of like a mail order house for Masons.

Chinese Old Ladies also buy the mysterious off-brand sweatpants and rugby shirts they clothe their grandkids in.

So you got the gear. So stop dicking around and get down to the work-out, already.

General principals:

You’re not here to sweat. If you perspire, you’re probably going to start producing too much yellow bile and your liver will cramp. Or some fucking thing. All I know is, Old Chinese Ladies take it mellow and that’s okay by me, a fat white man.

Also, the exercises listed below are merely the primary colors in a vast palate of pointless motion. Don’t be afraid to combine moves.

The Exercises:

Head roll: Roll your head with your eye closed and your mouth gaping like a trout. Slowly, always slowly. Old Chinese Ladies are not there to show off.

Windmills: Rotate your arms. Imagine you’re a 2nd grader waiting for the bus. Look bored, like “this is nothing. I don’t even FEEL this, yo.”

Foot Stomping: One! Two! One! Two! It’s a Long March to health, only you’re not going anywhere. Swing your arms, too, if you can manage it.

Arm swing: Holding fast with one arm to a small cherry tree, swing the other arm gracefully. Smoke.

Walking backwards: Walking backwards exposes your back to all the benefits your front enjoys when you walk forward. Probably good for bile production and proper spleen sanitation. And if you’re not shuffling, you’re basically wasting everybody’s time.

Wiggling: Roll your hips like it’s your wedding night. Arms must be akimbo. Akimbo, goddamn it!

Now, Old Chinese Ladies are an insular group. They even have their own language, called Chinese. So don’t just jump in there and start doing the do. Get the principal moves down as listed above, work out your routine at home in the mirror.

And attitude is a HUGE part of Old-Chinese-Lady-Robics. You need to hit the right insouciant demeanor. You’ve seen it all, you’ve done it all, and while you could never be called a cynic, you do have a certain phenomenological ennui. The world is just you, your quilted jacket, and your swinging arm.

So once you got all that down, start at a distance from your target dojo. Let them see you, get used to you. Stick to the basics, then after a few weeks start with a few combos. Not flashy, just technically competent.

After a year or so, if one of the ladies offers you a piece of produce, you’ve cracked it, you’re in. You are now a full-fledged practitioner of Old-Chinese-Lady-Robics.

The URL where you can buy your quilted coat will be forwarded presently.

Saturn getting all jiggy with it.

Super Space Probe Cassini!!! has been peeping Saturn's radio emissions, and it sounds funky fresh. Red Nova lets you listen in here.

It's good. Sounds like the soundtrack to Forbidden Planet.

(Nerd note: Forbidden Planet (with Leslie Neilsen!) was the first mainstream movie to feature an all electronic soundtrack. A wife/husband basically ran a homemade analog synthesizer into the suface of the Sun (figuratively). What you hear is basically the death screams of crude transistors as they short out into oblivion, leaving only the acrid smell of burnt ozone. Most people would have difficulty identifying it as music. What the hell is wrong with everybody? Anyway, it turned out to be they were right about what space sounds like: all fucked up.)

INSANE DRUG WARRIORS!!!!! HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!!!!

My god, my god, my god, my god.

Over at The Agitator, we get a glimpse into a dank little chatroom where some fractured bat-shit insane rent-a-cop DEA agents let it all hang out from underneath their KEVLAR vests.

Choice quote: "Inexpensive science has the potential of achieving what billions of dollars spent on LE has failed to accomplish for decades. The next "Drug War" may be the war we fight to preserve our paychecks. That is why we need to get behind President Bush's goal of outlawing all, repeat all, forms and reasons for abortion. With abortion, birth control (bc) pills and emergency bc outlawed a new, underground illegal drug industry will spring up overnight."

Gubmint work. Good if ye can get it.

Shane MacGowan addendum

From the Wikipedia article on Shane MacGowan, under the section entitled "Teeth":

"Shane MacGowan is somewhat famous for his teeth, or lack of them. Many of his teeth are missing; the remainder are rotten, crooked and resemble cigarette butts.

For this reason, MacGowan's teeth are generally considered to be in bad condition."

Shane McGowan

 
I recently tried to watch "The Shane McGowan Story" on pay-per-view (in the free movie section!) and for the life of me I couldn't understand what the fuck he was going on about. He sure hasn't aged well.
What was also alarming about the documentary was various loved ones going on and on about his genius -- father, mother, girlfriend, all clear-eyed and lucid-- yet not one of them then said: AND WHEN HE NODS YOU CAN HEAR SLOSHING. Shane himself looked like a bullfrog who had recently aquired arms and was celebrating with many, many pints and a fag. The sound that emitted from the liver colored hole in front the beast's head had the rhythm of human speech, but it was mostly long vowels sounds puncuated with "y'know wud I mean?".

In my early twenties, I had a hopeless beavis and butthead-like crush on Shane McGowan. He has fangs! I wanted to Irish in the worst way. I bought a Chieftains CD. I wore dark sport coats. I tried to read "At-Swim-Two-Birds". And his lyrics were all about illegal horse races and alcohol induced hallucinations! Sweet! Bauhaus was for fags! This was the real shit.

It went so far as spending a quarter of an hour negotiating with a bartender at Spec's, trying to get him to do a boilermaker with Creme d'Menthe and Guinness. Shane loved this drink! He claimed in an interview that's what rotted his teeth! Sign me the fuck up!

Finally: "I'll give you the shot. I'll give the pint. What you do with them is your business." Smart, wise man.

It didn't even matter that when I first read some Brendan Behan and saw that Shane had been doing a lot of lifting. He's a drunk! (Behan was a drunk and pervert, which is cooler.)

I sort of drifted away from all that fake Irish crap after a few years, maybe going back to the Pogues every so often for cheap nostalgia when I washed dishes.

Imagine my horror to learn my old hero is actually legally retarded.

The idiocy I do for money.

Do you watch late night cable? Ever see those Mike's Hard Lemonade ads? The ones with the talking bottle? Funny, yes? Well, guess who gets to be the voice of the bottle on his very blog? ME! Why? Because I'm an jackass and that happens to fit perfectly for the mileau.

(No, I am not sitting on a shitload of voice-over royalties. I'm only the written voice of the bottle.)

It's an interesting bastardization, putting a brand character out there in the cruel harsh world. Would the Pillsbury Dough Boy blog? Kudos for the folks at Mike's Hard Lemonade for putting their character out there to risk the slings and arrows. Most companies are extremely leery of the public. Strange, but true.

Right now we're still nailing just what the hell we're doing. The URL is mikeshard.blogspot.com. The official site can be found here: Mikeshard.com.

Ruby and Owen fiending.  

Nude Fat Man Eating Cookie Dough: Astride Destiny!!!!

Please, please, please don’t tell my mother, but....I think I have found a way to finally FLOURISH and INFLUENCE.

Explanation, thusly: I was in a muddle. The cats had been gassy and off their vat harvested meat product, and the cookie dough took on a taint due, I think, to the ambient moisture emanating from the barca-lounger. What a day, what a day, all day.

When I am blue, I resist “Are You Being Served?” as I feel I owe it to the ensemble players to be sharp and receptive. The tulle fog of funk that hung low near the shag clouded my joy receptors. Whoa.

The constant Stuka-like wail of Mater’s vacuuming could only further tinge the afternoon. If only I could look at a map at that moment, and retrace my steps to find were I had strayed from the sure path of glory.

So, I flicked and surfed the TV, desperate for respite from existence. And then, my god, my god, god, god...I found the solution. A documentary on the public television about something called the MACARTHUR FELLOWSHIP. They give millions of dollars to geniuses. Like me!

Internet...blah, blah....application, to whit, filled out, as it were:

**
Information regarding who will carry out the work:
Me

Name of your organization (and acronym if commonly used):
Foundation for the Realization of the Perfection of Hominids by Way of A Dome-ed City (FFTROTROHBWOADC)

Name of parent organization, if any:
Am affliated with Olympic Video Rentals (member #4445)

Name of chief executive officer or person holding similar position :
Mr. Alex Trebek (Pending acceptance)

Organization’s address (and courier address if different)
PO Box 323
San Guano, CA

Organization’s phone number, fax number, and e-mail address, if any
Can be contact via nudefatman@crackpotpress.com

Web address, if any:
nudefatman.blogspot.com

Name or topic of the proposed project or work to be done:
The Dome-ed City: Hominid Evolutionary Acceleration P.R.O.J.E.C.T.

A brief statement (two or three sentences) of the purpose and nature of the proposed work
To create and maintain a protected citadel where geniuses can spend their days reflecting and strategizing for a better tomorrow. Free sodas!

The significance of the issue addressed by the project and how it relates to a stated MacArthur program strategy:
Geniuses are held back by stupid idiots. This preserve would allow geniuses to be able to sit down and think for once, and also enjoy refering to maps and globes with their peer in a suitable stately environment. This is right up MacArthur’s alley!!!!

How the work will address the issue:
It is a large DOME-ED citadel. I can’t imagine you’d need more explanation than that. Perhaps one of your Fellows, possible one with a background in Science, maybe able to explain it to you.

How the issue relates to your organization, and why your organization is qualified to undertake the project:
The issue relates because I am genius and I am constantly held back by certain people that aren’t really all that bright. I am qualified because I am a genius. I’m confounded by the idiocy of the question, frankly.

Geographic area or country where the work will take place:
Am seeking a suitable extinct volcanic caldera.

Time period for which funding is requested:
Now until at least 2075, or until the current Monetary System is replaced, which ever come last.

Information about those who will be helped by and interested in the work and how you will communicate with them:
Geniuses will be helped by this project as well as any women we deem essential. I will communicate to them by decree.

Amount of funding requested from MacArthur and total cost (estimates are acceptable):
$700,000,000? $800,000,000?
I will leave the procurement issues to one of the accepted denizens of the Dome-ed, one with good money sense. Can credit be arranged? Do successful applicants get satin jackets?

**
So, easy-peasy. I should be out from under my mother’s petticoats by Labor Day! Today I mark that start of YEAR ZERO. I have to find some stamps.

Mmmmmmm!

Delicious vat harvested meat products!

Imagine the possibilities! "Honey, to show you how much I want to be a part of you, I have grilled you this special loin de Greg, grown from cells harvested from this, my own body.
Soon, I'll be in you and my nutrients will be nourishing your life force. Would you like some Dijonnaise? And if you'd allow me to scrape a specimen off your inner cheek, after the 3 month incubation period, I will be able to ingest you as well. I LOVE YOU!!!"

The bummer would be if after all that, you got diarrhea.

Mash up: White House Press Briefing vs. The Nag Hammadi Scrolls

(Taken from transcripts of the 7/11/05 Morning Press Briefing and The Thunder, Perfect Mind a 4th century Christian gnostic poem, part of the trove of ancient codices found at Nag Hammadi, Egypt in 1945. Enjoy!)

QUESTION: Scott, can I ask you this: Did Karl Rove commit a crime?

MCCLELLAN: I was sent forth from the power,
and I have come to those who reflect upon me,
and I have been found among those who seek after me.
Look upon me, you who reflect upon me,
and you hearers, hear me.

You who are waiting for me, take me to yourselves.
And do not banish me from your sight.
And do not make your voice hate me, nor your hearing.
Do not be ignorant of me anywhere or any time. Be on your guard!
Do not be ignorant of me.

QUESTION: Do you stand by your statement from the fall of 2003, when you were asked specifically about Karl and Elliot Abrams and Scooter Libby, and you said, “I’ve gone to each of those gentlemen, and they have told me they are not involved in this”? Do you stand by that statement?

MCCLELLAN:
Why, you who hate me, do you love me,
and hate those who love me?
You who deny me, confess me,
and you who confess me, deny me.
You who tell the truth about me, lie about me,
and you who have lied about me, tell the truth about me.
You who know me, be ignorant of me,
and those who have not known me, let them know me.

QUESTION: Scott, this is ridiculous. The notion that you’re going to stand before us, after having commented with that level of detail, and tell people watching this that somehow you’ve decided not to talk.
You’ve got a public record out there. Do you stand by your remarks from that podium or not?

MCCLELLAN: Be on your guard!
Do not hate my obedience
and do not love my self-control.
In my weakness, do not forsake me,
and do not be afraid of my power.
For why do you despise my fear
and curse my pride?
But I am she who exists in all fears
and strength in trembling.
I am she who is weak,
and I am well in a pleasant place.
I am senseless and I am wise.

QUESTION: (inaudible) when it’s appropriate and when it’s inappropriate?

MCCLELLAN:

Take me [... understanding] from grief.
and take me to yourselves from understanding and grief.
And take me to yourselves from places that are ugly and in ruin,
and rob from those which are good even though in ugliness.
Out of shame, take me to yourselves shamelessly;
and out of shamelessness and shame,
upbraid my members in yourselves.
And come forward to me, you who know me
and you who know my members,
and establish the great ones among the small first creatures.
Come forward to childhood,
and do not despise it because it is small and it is little.
And do not turn away greatnesses in some parts from the smallnesses,
for the smallnesses are known from the greatnesses.

QUESTION: You’re not saying anything

Code: Orange

Today, we're code orange.

Why orange?

I'm guessing because it's the color of the vests worn by the pair of ancient shambling stooped wrecks that inspected my train this morning.

It is touching to see them, their little shrunken apple heads poking out of the furry collars of their oversized nightwatchmen jackets, clutching their walkie talkie with their leathery talons. They take their little jobs so seriously! It's nice we can extend a sense of contribution to our seniors in their golden years.

Nude Fat Man Eating Cookie Dough: My Enemies

Scott McNeely (CEO, Sun Microsystems)

I wrote several times to McNeely, faxes, letters, emails, asking for advice on attracting computer geniuses to my DOME-ED CITY project. Obviously, MASSIVE SUPERCOMPUTERS would be needed to run the CRITICAL FUNCTIONS of the Dome-ed city.

He never responded. So he is my enemy.

If, in the future, Sun Microsystems announces plans for a DOME-ED city, you know where the idea come from. FROM ME.


Jonathan Swartz (Lead Scientist, Sun Microsystems)

Interestingly, I wrote to Jonathan Swartz as well, visionary to visionary. He did send along a JAVA mouse pad, which is more than the bucktoothed vole McNeely had ever done.

However, in my thank-you note, I pointed out to Professor Schwartz that McNeely is an enemy of progress and perhaps that he, Schwartz, should break off any professional association with the fraud McNeely and join me. (I also tasked him with finding me a suitable office suite, which I don’t think I was out of line in expecting my #2 to procure.)

Imagine my rage when on a web feed, I saw Schwartz standing next to that shit-eating chimp MCNEELY.

I can no longer take Schwartz’s mind seriously. He is clearly an idiot. He is dead to me.


“Di-Di” (“Customer Service Person” Wendy’s)

There is a newish Wendy’s up the way and the Park’N’Shop. As I had some angry business to attend to with the dim Corey at the Hobby Shop, I thought I could stop before hand at the Wendy’s and load up on protein (to power-up my wits for the verbal duel).

To save time, I called up ahead of time and this Di-Di answered. In a decent businesslike manner I asked for her to describe each menu item to me, so I might have an idea of what I wanted upon arriving. She was marble-mouthed and extreme perfunctory in her descriptions. When I tried to coax more data out of her, she turned on me and called me a “dumbass” and hung up!

Come the rise of the DOME-ED City, Di-Di, when you are brought before my DREAD JUDGMENT SEAT, you will weep and I will laugh. And you will be a junior trooper on the cat urea detail until the end of your days.


COREY (The boob behind the counter at the Hobby Shop)

Oh, Corey. Oh, special precious Corey. With your scaly little hands and grim little mouth. Your “knowledge” of D&D lead figures is so incorrect as it is actually SATANIC. It is an unholy inversion of the truth. It is RONNIE JAMES DIO made flesh. Again, and again, and again until all times for ever more, Corey...Fantasy Orc Systems DID have a limited edition Wererat Knight!!!!! How do I know? I own it! Quod to the erat to the demonstrandum, Corey.

Pasha The Cat

Enemy is not the right word here. But between the poles of my affection, Pasha is trending South at a clip that is troubling.

Naughty Pasha has kicked up his hairball production into Wah-Wah pedal-like effiency.
Hhhhherrrr. Hhhhhheerrrrrr. Hhhhherrrrrr. That of course, is not a crime. But this accompanying this audio component is a rhythmic jet of effluvia emanating from where his nethers would be if they were still available (mother insisted. Although revolted by her lackadaisical attitude toward the poor chaps danglies, I chose not to press my authority over the cats at this juncture, as mother had hid my “Are You Being Served?” Christmas Pageant Spectacle VHS Tape. While not conventionally intelligent, Mother possesses an almost bovine cunning.)

Again, I can only have sympathy with the vagaries of the body. Despite my commitment to the sensual, after long periods of rest I occasionally enter a disassociate state with my buttocks and nethers. (An Ironic cruelty: the lifestyle of a man whose creed is Beauty Truth and the Body produces numbness in the loins.)

No, effluvia I can deal with. It’s all part of the game I call Truth, Beauty and The Body.

The wedge between Pasha and myself is the PURRING. The cuss purrs like a fiend after his breakdowns, because he knows....he knows that is the one thing that buckles me (me, as steadfast and monolithic and stately as they come.) It is the MANIPULATION I cannot abide. And Pasha knows that. He knows. I see it is his eyes.

NEXT: Astride Destiny!!!