NOSTALGIA

Early Roxy Music, before their later dreaded MOR phase, with Brian Eno on tambourine and crazy synth freak out.

Editions of You is one of the few tunes I liked when I was 16 that I still love as much today.

APOCALYPSE OPRAH

In one of those "hell freezes over" moments, Oprah names Cormac McCarthy's ultra-bleak post apocalyptic novel The Road as her new book club selection. I can't wait 'til the people that bought into the new age blather of her previous pick get ahold of this one.

No power of positive thinking here, folks. Just dark intense violence and cannibalism.

(A copy of The Road sits on my shelf and awaits, but a Pynchonian airship still commands my attention).

I'M NOT A CYNIC

Because of my acerbic opinions I'm often accused of being a cynic. I reply that I'm not a cynic, I'm a skeptic.

It turns out one of my comedic heroes, Harry Shearer, who I'm going to see perform this Friday, often gets the same question (this time from Bob, the local entertainment columnist). He makes the same distinction I do too. I'm glad there's at least a few skeptical brethren in the mass media like Shearer who still have a fully functioning bullshit detector.

Bob:

Being someone who reads the newspaper and absorbs all this information about what’s going on in the world, do you think that ultimately makes you cynical?

Harry:

No. It makes you highly skeptical. The people I make fun of are the cynics. They’re the people, whether they are in broadcasting or the government, who think that people are saps, that people have an attention span of four seconds, that people won’t know if they’re telling the truth or not. Those are the true cynics. The skeptic’s job is to expose the cynic.

You can read more about how Shearer started out with Jack Benny and his influence on his comedy style at Bob's Humblog.

Many of us know about the voices Shearer does for The Simpsons, his role in Spinal Tap and other Christopher Guest films, and his radio show, but did you know Shearer played Eddie Haskell in the original pilot for Leave it to Beaver?