February 8, 2010

QOTD:

If American workers had been rewarded for 100 percent of their increases in labor productivity between 1980 and 2008—as they were during the middle part of the 20th century —average wages in 2008 would have been $28.53 per hour—42.7 percent higher than the average real wage in 2008.
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

You Can’t Sit Down

Hound Dog Taylor and the HouseRockers

Natural Boogie

February 7, 2010
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Just a Closer Walk with Thee

Ella Fitzgerald

Brighten the Corner

February 6, 2010
  • Motorist: (sound of honking and squealing brakes)
  • Girl 1: ...and so, uh, Abby was, is that her name? Yeh, Abby was there and that made me really mad...
  • Motorist: Are you girls blind?
  • Girl 2: What's her problem?
  • Girl 1: Abby, she's just stuck up.
  • Girl 2: No, I mean hers. Geez.
  • Motorist: Get out of the road!
  • Girl 3: Wait, which Abby? The blonde? I hate those scarves she wears.
  • Motorist: (honks)
  • Girl 1: Really, what is her problem?
  • Me: You're crossing against the light!
  • Girl 3: What?
  • Me: You're walking in the middle of traffic.
  • Girl 1: What?
  • Girl 2: Omigod! Who is that guy? What is his problem?

one two three

This is a test, my friends. An experiment.  I am reminded that not so many years ago a Polish mathematician thought that there was a chance that an experiment he had helped to devise would set the atmosphere of the earth on fire, ending human life.  I suppose this is why the United States government — it was under their authority that the test was performed — picked a humid equatorial locale, a place where the dank air would surely smother any fire, leaving America’s postwar inheritance secure.  The location of a test is sometimes important, is my point.  But I don’t mention this to say that the location of this particular test is important.  That is not my meaning at all! Not. At. All.  It’s just that I know that you might have had that thought, and so I wanted to take a brief moment to inoculate.  This is only a test, and the location — by which I mean the internet — was not chosen for any particular reason. Nor is there any reason to suppose that the test was conducted under the authority of the U. S. government.  No reason at all. None.

[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Drivin’ Nails in my Coffin

Ernest Tubb and his Texas Troubadours

On Tour

(recorded live at the world famous Cain’s Ballroom in Tulsa, Oklahoma)

February 5, 2010
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Taj Mahal - Blind Boy Rag

Track 2, Side B

De Ole Folks at Home

July 13, 2009

Heh, indeed.

July 2, 2009

Heh, indeed.

June 28, 2009

QOTD:

Amid the tropical heat of a Philippine prison, convicted murderers, rapists and drug dealers on Saturday paid tribute to Michael Jackson with a reprise of their YouTube dance hit, “Thriller.
June 25, 2009

QOTD:

Michael Jackson will need to be supremely fit to perform a series of 50 shows in London starting next month. The dates are fast approaching. Who better to get the so-called King of Pop into royal shape than bodybuilder and actor Lou Ferrigno, who was known for having fast-growing muscles playing The Incredible Hulk on television in decades past.
June 23, 2009

QOTD:

I am not so interested in dictating to others how they should remember their past. Let the Lost Cause find itself, our search lies within. And when it’s over, we will put Ida Wells up against Nathan Forrest, on any day of the week, and leave the generations to judge. Sooner or later, in the words of Nas, we’ll all see who the prophet is.
June 16, 2009

QOTD:

USSR’s first orbital toilets were custom-made. Gherman Titov, Andriyan Nikolayev, Pavel Popovich, Valery Bykovsky and Aleksey Leonov had to have their buttocks measured for their personal toilets. A research institute in Moscow still has the bronze toilet bowl, which first woman in space Valentina Tereshkova used.

QOTD:

The menu of US astronauts is nutritious as well, but it looks more like a diet ration and presumably consists of exotic fruit, vegetables, sea food and low-fat meat. That is why, their waste is much softer. Engineers took account of these peculiarities when designing the sewage system for the ISS. It just so happens that the solid Russian waste ruined the US toilets in space.

QOTD:

“There are at least six nude versions which are very close to da Vinci’s hand. All are attributed to the da Vinci school. The most likely scenario is that his followers got inspired by a now-lost original,” Vezzosi said.

According to Vezzosi, the original naked Mona might have been part of a series of erotic portraits by da Vinci and his pupils, which were never really shown because they were considered inappropriate.