Also:
“I was just thinking… How do airplanes work?”
“I sometimes wonder what’s going on in Australia. Or, maybe Japan. Life must be a lot different over there.”
“Do a lot of people get music and movies for free off the internet? I just found out this was a popular thing to do.”
“I recently went on some roller coasters. I do not like the ones where you hang upsidedown. I do like the ones where you go down FAST.”
The Meaning of Life According to Kurt Vonnegut
‘Kilgore Trout relinquished himself to the stained and burnt remnants of the brown EZ Boy that acted as his writing chair. He flicked the last inch of his cigarette into the nearby oil drum that was his trash can and scrutinized the current page in his battered typewriter to determine where he had gotten up to on Gorogo Radio Two, a story set in a world with a similar society as our own, but with inhabitants that more closely resembled snowplows than humans.
The story followed one such snowplow who had recently found himself in possession of omniscience and had decided to exploit this ability by hosting a daytime radio call-in show.
Trout had previously paused his writing after having an angst-filled teenaged snowplow call in to ask the omniscient snowplow host what the purpose of living was. In returning to the story and determined to not dwell on the unanswerable for too long, Trout conceded to writing the first thing that came to him. This is what he wrote:
There’s nothing better to do, kid.
Trout read what he had just written and found the sentence to cause him considerable consternation. He wasn’t completely sure, but he suspected he had struck upon something.
In his disgust, Trout pulled the page out of the typewriter, arranged it with the other pages of the story, lifted it above his head, and as a message to the Creator of the Universe, flung the entire thing in the nearby oil drum. While Trout had every intention of eventually calming down and retrieving the manuscript, the Creator of the Universe responded to Trout’s aggression by consuming the manuscript in the fire that had been quietly developing in the oil drum since being ignited by an errant cigarette butt.’
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
It’s Becky’s birthday, so I did a cover of Satellite of Love for her.
There are two types of people in the world: Die Antwoord and everybody else
I’ve made a concerted effort to ignore any signs that Die Antwoord’s fifteen minutes could possibly be waning. This is due to my genuine appreciation for what they’re doing, and I hope to see them overcome the somewhat confused reaction they initially elicited from people like me. That confusion is clearly part of their appeal, though. I originally believed them to be pawns of a larger marketing ploy or clever young director guiding their absurdity, but I now see them as harbingers of a new era in culture and art.
Their claims about being “next level” is a double bluff. I’ve heard them called a South African Ali G, but listening to their album clearly dispels such characterizations. They’re taking parody to the next level by blurring the lines between and around art, satire, and genuineness. Make no mistake, it is an act, as evidenced by their earlier work as MaxNormal.tv, but such distinctions are only useful in comprehending how audiences will react to them. I was talking to a relatively smart kid the other day who applauded The Colbert Report for balancing out the liberal bias of shows like the Daily Show. Reality doesn’t really matter to us, and Die Antwoord is proving this by giving themselves into their characters. Now that hipsterdom has been condensed into its shadows of twee music, vapid interests and memes plastered throughout social networking sites, and a fashion ideal adopted by middle schoolers and rappers, it’s time to consider what modern culture has to offer us. Die Antwoord’s mixture of absurdity, sincerity, and mockery is the only possible progression culture can make after the pomposity, materialism, and nihilism of what it once meant to be a hipster.
Unless you’re into Ke$ha or something.
Go Ninja, go!
Assorted Amazon reviews by Donald E. Nielsen
“Very simple instrument with very limited note capability.” (Harmonica)
“Vendor shipped promptly. Video was as expected, however after receiving it I learned similar instructions can be viewed for free on ‘Fit TV’.”
“A third grader could have written this book and if you have a third greader who wants a dog book, then maybe this one if for you.. It offers noting related to training your dog.” (Product description: “Beginning readers can learn 100 different words in this story about a remarkable dog.”)
“Pace indicator great for maintaining your pace while running. A bit noisy and irritating to other runners.”
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]
Real Love cover by me. Originally by John Lennon.
Since it’s Valentine’s Day already in England, I thought I’d share what I made for Becca.
About half-way through learning the song, I realized not only was I not very good at piano, but my voice can’t really reach any of the notes. C’est la vie.
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