In my continuing, failing effort to bring a sense of perspective to America, I present the historical events that shaped our country, all of which took place today, January 15th.
1- New Connecticut (Vermont) declares independence, 1777 Yup, how’d that work out for ya? Didn’t keep that “New Connecticut” name long, huh? That name needed a serious rethink. But I think it ended up OK. When I think of Vermont, I think of Maple syrup and the Green Mountain Boys. When I think of Connecticut I think of traffic around Hartford.
3-Molasses floods Boston streets, 1919 This is true and it is one of my favorite historical events. A gigantic vat of molasses collapsed and (slowly) flooded the town in sticky goo. Buildings were knocked down, people got trapped and drowned, and the smell lingered for ages. This really happened.
2- Ford Foundation is born, 1936 And in 1952, she changed her name to Anna Smithson. Seriously, would you like to go through life named after a philanthropic organization? Poor girl was mercilessly teased in high school, with all the teenage guys trying to give her a “donation.”
4– First appearance of the Democratic donkey, 1870 That was the first, but definitely not the last, jackass the Democrats have run for election.
My contributions to the blog have been sporadic at best over the past month, and as a penalty, Mr. B gave me an ultimatum: He can dock my pay, or I can take some stupid brain twister challenge. Because my bookie the power company gets testy when they don’t get paid, I decided to take the challenge.
Mr. B gave me five words that I HAD to work into this week’s blog, or else. So here’s my response. Answers below, but see if you can dope them out for yourself!
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I’ve always been a student of history and politics. In my life, there have been two political events that have been my favorites most of all:
First, Al Haig’s famous (and epic fail) “I’m in control here” speech after Reagan was shot:
Which prompted this nationwide response:
It wasn’t even constitutionally correct at the time – a few more old white men would’ve had to have been capped for that to happen.
The other one was Nikita freaking Kruchev banging the podium at the UN (fake but awesome photoshop below):
I mean, damn, he used a shoe! How awesome is that!! That’s some kind of world-class ball breaker right there.
So I’ve always loved politics and the like. But life growing up in my area of Brooklyn always felt like I was being trapped in concrete, just sort of stuck in a slow-motion boring load of muck. So when I had a chance to move to Astoria, I jumped at it faster than you could say “Monkey Loves Milk”
Unfortunately, that was a stupid mistake because….well, because it was Astoria, and that was even more boring than my old section of Brooklyn. Minus the pizza but more souvlaki. That’s a pretty poor trade overall, sort of like an old school British swell trading drams for pennyweights (or like taking pennies on the dollar to you uncouth Yanks) So I upped stakes again and schlepped back to Brooklyn, tail tucked between my legs.
So here I sit in Brooklyn again, still stuck in boring-land, still following politics from afar, still shoving meat-lover’s pizza down my gullet as fast as I can to fill the hole inside stomach. Still, it’s not all bad. Today’s awful political class provides me plenty of remote entertainment what with Spitzer and Wiener and the laughable afro on Mayoral Candidate Bill DiBlasio’s kid:
I mean c’mon! Am I the only one who sees this picture and has to fight the urge to say “Hey hey hey!”
Remember when the gang tried to bootleg the Doobie Brothers concert and that huge Wollensack recorder fell out of Rerun’s coat? TV GOLD my friends. (The gold moment happens around 4:15.)
“My name is Raj Thomas. Which Doobie You be? CLASSIC.
Hey, Am I the only one who thought Shirley Hemphill was kinda hot???
Mr. Blog's Tepid Ride 
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