Tag Archives: Mr. Blog’s Tepid Ride

Dark Shadows

14 Dec

December 13th, 2009

I’ve had some free time on my hands lately. You know, since they’ve taken all the coal from the ground, and they’re closing all the factories down. Out in Bethlehem they’re killing time, filling out forms, standing in line, whatever else Billy Joel wrote about in Allentown. Not that I live in Allentown, but the point is that I have enough time on hands to write blogs quoting from Billy Joel songs for no good reason.

So I’ve been looking for something to do and crack is just too expensive so I settled on watching old episodes of Dark Shadows on DVD. It is cheaper than crack, less addictive, and some of the old black and white episodes are so boring I can fall asleep on the couch, which is a real boon to a guy like me who can’t seem to sleep when he is supposed to, i.e.: at night, and not while driving to Best Buy to pick up a set of Dark Shadows DVDs.

There were 1229 episodes made and so far I have seen the first four. Only 1225 more to go! Truthfully though, this isn’t the first time I have watched this show. Several years back, in the 1990’s, I watched almost a whole season of this show on the Sci-Fi channel. That was when it was actually a good place to find science fiction TV shows and movies, as opposed to what it is now, a good place to see films like Mega-Croco-Shark vs. Prehistoric Alligator IV: Revenge of the Fish.

The problem then was that the show got my interest. Why is that a problem? Here’s why. When I tuned in a girl named Victoria Winters (how do I know she was named Victoria Winters? Because every episode started with a voiceover beginning with “My name is Victoria Winters.” Damn egotistical if you ask me.) had been transported via séance into the past to become part of the Collinswood household of the 19th century. I got to know all the characters, like Angelique the witch from the West Indies who was much hotter than Jossette Du Pre, and that caused a big problem for Barnabas because while he was schtupping Angelique behind Jossette’s back in the Indies, back home in Maine he was supposed to be marrying Josette. Which is why Angelique killed him and turned him into a vampire. Simple.

I got to know the rest of the cast, from Rev. Trask to Willie to Jeremiah Collins, etc, and eventually all good things came to an end and “My name is” Victoria Winters was pulled back to the 20th century where not a single character (save Barnabas)  was on the show. Oh sure, the actors were all the same, but they were all playing different characters! I had no idea who anyone was. Why was Jossette called Maggie Evens and working in a diner? Why was Jeremiah now called Roger? Who was this woman cleaning the chimney?

And even worse, they picked up as if nothing happened! As if the whole past season didn’t happen. “As I was saying, that is why the cows didn’t give milk this year,” said Roger. WTF?

So I stopped watching.

Now though I’m determined to get through it. I’ve gotten the first set (of 36 freakin’ sets!) and I’m almost entirely through the first disc (out of 6.) So that is 6 discs per set, for 36 sets, that makes about 4,500 discs to get through. Or 216, whichever one is mathematically accurate.

At this rate I can expect to be finished with Dark Shadows by the time I am 65, just in time to retire. Then I am sure to have some more time on my hands. Having already seen Dark Shadows, maybe I’ll move on to something shorter, like rare kinescopes of Al Jolson singing Mammy. Or maybe I’ll just do crack.

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No Toilet No Bride

13 Dec

December 13th, 2009

Who doesn’t trust The Washington Post? For journalistic integrity they are right at the top of the list. Are they? I don’t know, I never read that paper. I prefer to peruse the British press where I can catch a glimpse of a Page Three girl. But this article comes from one of my favorite American News Sources, News of the Weird (Their motto: “For journalistic integrity we are second only to the Washington Post, we think.”).

It is from the November 22nd edition, and credited to the Washington Post of November 12th. So if this was first reported in the Washington Post and then picked up by the News of the Weird, you can be sure this will be high on the agenda at the next session of the UN General Council.

An unprecedented toilet-building spree has taken hold in India over the last two years, spurred by a government campaign embraced by young women: “No Toilet, No Bride”

Now I am nothing if not a credible journalist, so I did a bit of research and found this bit of info on CNN.com, squeezed between a picture of Tucker Carlson’s bow tie and a sidebar about how highly polished Obama’s Nobel Prize is:

“No toilet, no bride,” has become a rallying cry for women raising a stink about the lack of a basic amenity. (Ha ha! Who says the news industry can’t be funny?)

They see it as a human rights issue, especially in villages where plumbing can be nonexistent.

It was that way in Sunariyan Kalan in the northern state of Haryana. Sumitra Rathi said village women had no choice but to relieve themselves without privacy. They would go before sunrise or hold it in until darkness fell once again to avoid being seen. Or they would walk out to the fields and endure embarrassment. They don’t want their daughters to face the same indignity.

“Many of them do make serious inquiries from the families of grooms about latrines,” she said.

Personally, Mr. Blog stands with his sisters on this one. “Places of poop” (as a friend once called them) are vital to the general well-being of every man woman and child. At least in my neighborhood. But I’m not sure everyone agrees with me. About five years ago, I was parked in the local Toys “R” Us parking lot waiting for someone to come out when I saw a woman and her son, who was no more than four, exit the store. I was parked very close to the exit, as it was quiet and I didn’t have to steal a handicapped spot, so I saw the whole sordid scene. The woman held the boy by the hand and marched him to the nearest lamppost where she pulled his pants and underwear down around his ankles, pointed to the pole, and yelled “pee!”

Yes this is true and yes I watched it and no I am not a pedophile.

The kid, without batting an eye, peed, and in quite an arc I must say.

I was appalled. The store they just exited had a bathroom!

So now the kid finished peeing and is standing there, full frontal nudity, in a puddle, in full view of all the perverted trash in the parking lot, and me, when the mother, who had turned her back on this, turned around and asked the kid if he was finished. He said he was. So she reached around, grabbed the kid’s gear, and gave it a few vigorous shakes to get the last drops out. Yes, she gave the kid a reach around in the parking lot.

This kid has a great future as a foster child ahead of him.

She pulled up the kid’s pants and they walked back into the store.

Did I mention there was a bathroom in the store? In fact, two. The kid could have gone himself into the men’s room or, he’s still young enough, with his mother in the ladies room.

So I wonder if that woman came from a non-toilet country, like India? Perhaps she was not yet acclimated to all the wonderful plumbing our great culture has to offer? It could be that, as yet, she was not yet used to the American way of defecation? From youth, I have been privileged to live in houses, and have relatives who live in houses, and shop in stores that have, and work in buildings with, TOILETS. They may not have always been clean or had toilet paper, and they may have looked like an elk was eviscerated in them, but they were good old American toilets and I was proud to pee in them, even in winter when, quoting my friend once again, “heated toilet seats are like a gift from the gods. I really wish that they were the norm in all places of poop.” (She is quite the philosopher. I only hope she’ll speak to me again.)

“No Toilet No Bride.” I can only hope that this wonderful slogan takes root in America.

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