Like millions of other boys across America, my life was permanently changed on February 9, 1964, watching the Beatles on Ed Sullivan show with my parents. Wearing pajamas as this would be the last show before bedtime for a six year old, my eyes and ears could not comprehend what was coming out of the black and white TV set. A cosmic broadcast signal from CBS New York was coming in through the rabbit-ears antenna perched atop the set. Suddenly our little living room, in a little apartment where my mom and dad were superintendents in a little apartment complex, became even smaller. Smaller because my excitement was bursting right out of that brick apartment building, out through the windows, and into the New Jersey night air. I couldn’t contain myself from that moment on.

A day later, I convinced my parents to buy me the nine-volt transistor radio, acquired from Two Guys department store in Hackensack. It came equipped with a low-tech single earpiece. It was enough to listen with one ear and interact with my friends with the other. Dungarees had large, deep front pockets then. The earpiece wire could travel up the body, under my t-shirt. While waiting to catch the next Beatles tune, I had to sit through other genres, like Motown. At first I didn’t like it, but eventually I gave in to James Brown and the Supremes. In 1964, it was the Beatles with twelve songs in rotation. Getting past “I Wanna Hold Your Hand”, the real gem of the year was “I Feel Fine”. The Beach Boys were holding down the US front with the tough-sounding “I Get Around”, and The Dave Clark Five with “Glad All Over” in the British invasion. There was a US vs. UK battle of the airwaves, and it was all good-we were all winners. It was Motown soul, fast cars and surfing, and British hair and clothing. A whirlwind of pop music and young adult culture was emerging. We were catching this on mono speakers, portable turntables, and black and white TV. And we were blown away.

Crossing the great chasm from kindergarten to first grade-going into 1965, the first of many cultural music nuclear explosions emerged. Bob Dylan slams us all in the head with the release of Like A Rolling Stone. It came out of that little one-inch transistor radio speaker like a symphony. You could hear everything in the production, guitars, keyboards-everything. That was insanely more difficult than bringing up the mix on computers today. Guitar sounds were what attracted me at that time, and so the British artists continued to blow us away with loud, clangy tones. The Kinks with “All Day And All Of The Night”, the Stones with “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction”, and The Yardbirds with “For Your Love”. The Byrds, in parallel, electrified 12-string guitars on “Turn, Turn, Turn”. The Beatles were not too shabby, with five tunes on the charts, spanning from “Yesterday” to “Ticket To Ride”.

Even though sound technology was considered primitive by today’s standards, it was to be delivered in no other way, in no other era. The needle on the vinyl, the single crappy speaker, the analogue 4 and 8 track studios of the time, did nothing to diminish the end result. It enhanced it. It was actually high art, creating music with the tools available. The artists worked very hard in the studio in those times compared to present-day. And I think there was a better appreciation from the general public as well.

Today, as I see families and young people choose their musical entertainment (or is it chosen for them?), I can’t help but feel somewhat sad. Powerful smart phones and iPads are handed to kids that are way too young to be handling them. They’re not listening to music, they’re playing games. I can’t tell you how many parents I know that have had their little prince or princess drop/break these expensive gadgets, only to hand them right back after the repair or replacement. Maybe with a stern warning to not do it again. How does a kid go from an expensive, internet connected device to sitting down with an acoustic guitar? Or write a story? Or paint a picture? Unless a parent or teacher tries to shove it down their throats, young kids with handheld high tech entertainment devices are being done a disservice. I know I would have jumped all over the technology had it been available to me, and I am so thankful to have lived in the time when things were still amazing.

Another time waster is “Can I ask you a question?”. It should be “ Can I ask you another question after this one?” Why ask a question about asking a question? Ask the question for fuck’s sake! Another peach is assaulting the person you are conversing with the verbal diarrhea news blast stating that you just said something: “Having said that”, after saying something, is completely useless. It’s just another way of saying you are going to blather on some more. It’s just filler to connect verbal sausages links of hot air. Another gem is the king of all setup lines, “To tell you the truth”. This indicates that all of the above was and probably is a boatload o’ bullshit, and that everything you just spoke about was an assload of lies. Whenever my ears pickup this line, my mind hears “I usually spend all of my waking hours talking to people about the grand delusions constantly running in my head, and I choose to take this microsecond to speak the truth”.  It is usually delivered  with the person leaning in towards you a little, in a hushed tone. As if someone else within earshot hears it, they will call them out on it because it is indeed some more bullshit!

Wouldn’t it be great if just once, while you were on the receiving end of this tripe, the caped crusader Captain Bullshit jumped in out of seemingly nowhere. He would swoop in, grab the swill spewing verbal assailant by the shoulder and spin them around, face to face and scream: “Let me tell you something, can I ask you a question? Why do you waste the time of tax-paying citizens with your vocal vomit? Having said that, you will now be escorted to The Land Of Mindless Chatter. There, you will be in the company of other simpletons, where you can yammer till the end of time”. He would then grab this person by the waist (pending girth) and fly them away.

Pig Light Show Experience: Interview with Marc Rubinstein

JS: So Marc, what was the origin of the Pig Light Show?

MR: John, first and foremost I was a musician and fan when Rock and Roll was going through its most prolific and creative period from about 1965 to the turn of the seventies. Working as a musician and trying to get one up on some of the others, I started adding stage lighting to my bands set up. Very few if any bands were doing this back then. We were among the first around my area of Long Island, New York. The others noticed, and soon I was getting much more work doing lights for them, as opposed to playing with my own band. Around the Fall of ’67 I saw a concert at the Anderson Theatre in NYC, which happened to be across the street from where the Fillmore East would eventually be. The opening act was Moby Grape, second bill was Procol Harum, and top bill was Buffalo Springfield. They all had one thing in common behind them onstage-Joshua Light Show. As great as that concert was (and it WAS great!), for me seeing Joshua’s work was a revelation. I did light, I was a musician, light AS music! That WAS me!

The next day I started figuring out how to do the effects, as well as continue with my stage lighting. You see, being a musician on Long Island at the time meant you were in competition with The Hassels (Billy Joel), The Vagrants (Leslie West), Vanilla Fudge, The Young Rascals, and tons of other really talented and hungry people. My choice was to be a pioneer in one thing or an also-ran in another. I liked the idea of pioneering. Within a few months I was doing it. Getting work at parties, in clubs (even though I was under age), everywhere I could. And I was making a name for myself. Slowly the stage lighting part disappeared and I was doing real light shows and getting paid well and becoming well known. It didn’t suck!

JS: How did you learn to do these shows?

MR: I saw the effects, and had more than average interest in lighting AS art. I worked it out. Then Joshua White went from someone I had to meet to mentor, he studiously would never tell me HOW to do things. Once I figured it out he would guide me toward where I could get the materials easier, cheaper, and in greater variety. At the Fillmore East 40th reunion I asked him about why he’d tell others but never me. His answer? “So, where are THEY now”?

JS: Who manufactured the various tools of the trade and equipment needed to put on a light show?

MR: We got stuff from everywhere, but none that you’d imagine. WE were the creators, the companies were the ones copying us. Usually our clock crystals were GE, color media from Rosco, motors from Bodine, dyes from Bacheimer, slide projectors from Kodak, overheads from Buhl, Keystone and others (and eventually we custom built our own), and the list goes on. It was like being a guitarist but having to find each part of your guitar, cables and amp separately and construct what no one had ever seen before.

All those projectors with oil wheels and funny lenses and all the digital effects you can find today…they allow you to do a light show, not perform one. There is little immediate or enticing about them. They are just THERE. No one is expressing anything to anyone else. It’s like a person who knows all the right notes but has only one rhythm, only one sense of style, only one anything. Midi versus live. Joe Shmo fresh out of his first guitar lesson versus B. B. King or Clapton.

JS: Was your setup a semi-permanent fixture in the back of the Fillmore? Were you located anywhere near the sound board and engineers?

MR: We did rear projection from a platform hanging off the back wall backstage. The platform was permanent but we were in and out often.

JS: How much would you interact with the sound crew? I imagine there would need to be some tight coordination for all of it to sync smoothly.

MR: We were given a monitor so we could hear the bands and a little closed circuit, black and white video feed so we could see where our projections were in reference to the artists on stage. That was it.

JS: All before widescreen, flat panel displays and laptops! We are spoiled!

MR: Indeed we are! If I had had the technology then that we have today-ah, but 20/20 hindsight isn’t useful at all.

JS: What artist or band was your first solo show?

MR: I’m asked that a lot, but I don’t remember. There were so many back then and life was a very heady whirlwind of youthful activity.

JS: After how many shows would you say your confidence was just brimming with creative abandon, where you knew you were onto something that was being appreciated?

MR: Friends (even those who were in the light show with me), said they thought I never noticed anything around me during shows. I was intensely focused all the time. The creation process was such an intimately personal experience for me, even while collaborating with others and with the musicians. It was never a matter of confidence. It was what I did. I either did it well or did it poorly, but once the music started I never noticed anything but it and me. Under all that I was still an introverted kid with all that goes along with that. I will say that very often today the guys I work with will almost always stop at some point in the show and call the audience’s attention to the light show and give me an intro as if I was a valued member of the band. And that is very gratifying, because that’s is how I most often feel, whether they know it or not.

JS: Very cool! What did the performers tell you? Did some dictate what they wanted? Did any let you do whatever you wanted?

MR: I have almost never in my life had anyone tell me what to do or what not to do. I do what I do and they do what they do. Usually they either trusted me or they didn’t, but I never had any of the artists I have worked with complain. I have had many sing my praises. When you are a fan of theirs, that’s strangely embarrassing, and humbling.

JS: How did the light show sync with the beats-was it automated or were you playing right along?

MR: I never used anything but my hands and eyes. I dislike things that try to follow a beat or frequencies or any of that.

JS: Almost organic in nature.

MR: Literally, not just figuratively. But that is what gives the work I do today such a different quality. Nothing can really mimic or replace the action, flow and feel of the liquids or the hand-held reflectives or many of the other human-controlled things. That is why I maintain a studio with the very same overhead, slide and other projectors, liquids and reflectives I used way back. I perform on the screen to various types of music, video record it, chop it into managable chunks and then do my shows from that content.

JS: They will go in the rock time capsule! Did you learn the song set list in advance of the shows? Must have been hard in the pre-digital days of vinyl and analogue tapes.

MR: Never. We worked totally impromptu. Of course, so many of the musicians were well known to us, so we often knew their music quite well. Sometimes we knew nothing and flew by the seats of our pants.

JS: did you ever travel with any of the artists?

MR: No. In those days tours were nothing like they are today. They came to the venues and got what were there-lights, sound, and light shows.

JS: Who were your favorite artists to work with?

MR: There were actually quite a lot, some because of their personalities and some because of their music. God, the list is long. Once I stop I always think of more.

JS: Of course the evil twin question, who was the worst?

MR: Hard to answer that without getting in trouble. The worst experiences were not with bands, but rather with individuals. Sometimes it was road management, and never the bands themselves.

JS: Any “Spinal Tap” prima donnas with strange demands?

MR: Not really. There were prima donnas, though far fewer than you might imagine. Most people hardly understood what we did. There was one concert we did with Black Sabbath where the promoter didn’t bother to hire any stage lighting other than two follow spots, and the road manager kept running back behind the screen yelling “ bright yellow, bright yellow, the group can’t see what the fuck they’re doing-BRIGHT YELLOW!” He figured Black Sabbath in silhouette was better than an invisible one!

JS: Hilarious! Did you get to hang with the bands at all?

MR: Yes, we could and sometimes did. At the Fillmore we had our own dressing rooms but a lot of socializing would occur back there. At other venues there might be a room for food and drink-a hospitality room, where we could go when they weren’t onstage or between shows. We usually worked through the band changes with short films, funny slides and stuff, but before and between shows we got to meet a lot. We were all working, we weren’t hanging out with “stars”. We were hanging out with our peers – when we weren’t working – and it was a much different scene versus the legends associated with them. For THAT kind of thing you’d have to be touring with Zeppelin a few years later.

JS: Were you just simply blown away by some of the amazing artists of the time when you actually met them? Were some of the superstars down to earth?

MR: Most everyone we worked with were great. They all worked very hard to get where they were, and most often the most famous were the most down to Earth. I never was too worked up about it, the stardom and all. I was working, they were working, and we all understood that. But I have to say meeting John Lennon and Paul McCartney was a trip. Just wish I could have worked with them.

JS: I am envious! How did you meet them? What went on?

MR: They came to see The Mothers of Invention the weekend their Live At The Fillmore East album – THEIR “White” album – was being recorded. Paul came to the Friday early show. John and Yoko at the late show, and they came back to the Saturday late show and jammed with The Mothers. I think it was Saturday between shows Graham had Chinese take-out backstage for everyone.

JS: Amazing! How did your gig at the Fillmore migrate to the Capitol Theater in NJ?

MR: John Scher and Al Hayward were doing concerts around New Jersey when they learned the Fillmore was closing. That was when they thought the time would be perfect to open their own theatre and stop booking other places to do their shows. They called me and scooped us up early, and hired a lot of the Fillmore staff to run their concerts at the Capitol.

JS: What do you think brought on the demise of shows and venues of that era? I sometimes think it was disco, then MTV-that encouraged people to stay home glued to the tube.

MR: Lasers. People get all goosed up by technology even when they don’t know what the hell it is. Laser shows, like Lasarium, became so cool to the public. Ignore that fact that they were little squiggles and such like a Spirograph toy, they were LASERS! Then there was the birth of the large scale tours. Groups could fill arenas, make a lot of money at one show, while wanted control of everything. Music became so much less intimate. People got used to being charged a fortune and getting little or nothing for their money. For a while Joshua Television became popular, blowing the performers up on a big screen. If they didn’t, most of the audience saw them as ants on a stage very far away. With those huge concerts someone finally got a clue about using laser lights in a show. I think it was with The Who, shooting into smoke over the band and audience. That was the scale and environment where lasers looked great. That was also where moving lights first were introduced, developed by ShowCo.

JS: As recorded music transformed from the analogue to digital age, how did you adapt?

MR: I was out of the business for a long while-teaching stage lighting and playing music. I was also doing Macintosh computer consulting and playing with tons of cool software. It’s not so much different in some ways. The record companies never understood what digital was, what it would change and how, and they were taken unaware. Live shows got so big and expensive on one hand, and “so cut-to-the-bone” and unprofitable for the bands on the other. Digital made it so the clubs that once paid good money (which encouraged local bands to excel and compete) were now being replaced by DJs and bands that were begging for any work they could get. It is a different world now, and audiences have no idea what they are asking for when they want great music without cost. A musician spends thousands of hours just practicing to get where they are, and then no one wants to pay for their music.

JS: Are your ears able to tell the difference? Some say they can.

MR: If you listen carefully and know what to listen for, but that’s when I’m being Marc the musician. When I’m doing light shows, I don’t care.

JS: It’s amazing how in those days album production and costs were astronomical, and paid against future earnings for the top performers. So many legendary studios closed down since today the same result can be obtained on a computer.

MR: Yes and no. Many went to digital and evolved, but nothing beats a good engineer and producer. A musician without them is like a writer with no editor or proofreader, and they suffer because of it.There is a lot of artistic masturbation today. And with so much available in the digital world any shmo with a computer can make believe they are The Beatles or George Martin. And very, very, VERY few are even in the same state, much less ball park.

JS: I’m always reminded of real talent when I hear just the vocals from Because on the Beatles Abbey Road (Anthology 3). That still sends shivers. Today, singers can just blurt it out and auto-tune will fix it.

MR: Then they have to sing live at the Grammys or somewhere THEIR engineer isn’t and, ha! For me it’s CSN&Y doing Find The Cost Of Freedom, going into the repeat when they switch from unison to harmony. Killer!

JS: So tell us about your new project, The Pig Light Show Experience.

MR: It’s me. I go with videos and stories and music and info and more music, and more videos! I engage in a one-on-one with many, but it feels like just one. We talk, I perform and share, and we have a great time!

JS: I’m guessing you have some killer stories to share.

MR: Oh, more than a few!

JS: Will you be going back to some of the performers that are still around today for their recollections of your light shows?

MR: I may. I also thought about getting a few of them to go one their camera-phones and send me a little quip or two. Maybe that would be a cool addition.

JS: Are you expecting that a new generation of young people will be able to understand how light shows came to be?

MR: Well, I speak with many new light show artists all the time. They are there, and the number is growing. Maybe by doing the Experience I can show them, live, some of what they don’t get by watching YouTube videos of just the west coast light shows. Get them beyond just squishing the liquids with bands to actually PERFORMING.

JS: What type of reaction do you get today when a young person sees your work for the first time?

MR: Usually stunned silence for a moment. They have seen canned effects and what VJs do, which is nothing like a light show. All of my content is self-created.

JS: Marc, I’m going to suggest for those that want to know more about the Pig Light Show Experience check in and make a donation. It’s like buying a piece of rock history, and surely will be an entertaining and interesting experience. Thanks for your time!

MR: Thank you! That’s a great idea. And check out www.piglightshow.com or on YouTube at TheRealPigLightShow.

The Pig Light Show Experience

We were watching it on pay-per-view via cable TV, so that means it can be paused and save for viewing later, as long its within a 24-hour time period. I shut it off around 20 minutes in, after noticing my snoozing wife (I recall mentioning that in the first paragraph). This provided ample opportunity to retrieve the clothes from the dryer, and move the recently washed from the washer to said dryer. By this time my wife was half awake and moved to get in our bed, where I was folding clothes on my side of it.  I finished up there, as she entered dreamland. Turned off the lights and went back out to the kitchen, cleaning up the post-dinner mess. Cleaned and loaded the coffee machine, all ready for tomorrow morning-just flick the switch and we’ll be swimming in hot java, one less thing to concern myself with.

Oh yeah, Total Recall 2012. My first  thought was: WHY? How many movies really need to be remade? OK Hollywood WE GET IT, the technology kicks-ass now, and we can see shit we could never fathom in the original version of any remake made today. Outstanding, you can make the computer images explode right in our faces, as we sit in awe and amazement. Wowzers all around. I don’t want to live in the future, since all humankind will be comprised of two groups residing in the UK and Australia. There will still be Geico insurance commercials on TV, though.

Meanwhile, I’m thinking about everything I didn’t accomplish this week. I didn’t paint the den, which has been waiting patiently for 4 years. I promise to do it this year. Really den, I mean it. My parents are both alive, thankfully, but I feel guilty for not calling my mother in close to five days now. And Renny, he’s been holding it in for awhile, sorry buddy let’s got for that walk now. On second thought, it’s January and cold out, so I’ll just hold the retractable leash out the back door in the yard, hang my arm out as far as it can go, and let you shit in the flower bed. Sorry bud, I’ll assign crap cleanup detail to one of the boys, maybe extract some value out of the twenty bucks I dropped on them earlier.

What lessons did I teach my boys today? Go ahead, I’ll wait. Didn’t need much time did you? That’s because they LEARNED NOTHING from me today.  I just handed them twenty bucks each to go out with their buds and eat dinner, simply because I was too lazy and tired. I rationalized that at least I was providing them with dinner, so they wouldn’t feel bad. I actually felt bad about making them feel bad. Meanwhile, they are thrilled to get the freebee twenty bucks, and will probably find a box of Easy Mac in the pantry and just pocket the dough anyway. What more display of insanity does one need? Their cell phones are covered, the car insurance for the car we bought for them is covered, gas too. We prod them to find part time jobs to help cover these expenses, but somehow feel bad since they are going to school, knowing it’s top priority. Never mind that a college degree guarantees absolutely nothing future-wise in today’s economy. Unless they are working in or around food (since everyone needs to eat), which employed people will continue to buy, they will most likely wind up coming right back to the house once school is over.

We watched our parents scrimp, save, and work endlessly to provide us a with house and roof over our heads, food, clothing. For our newer generation kids, we want more, and to provide them with the best tools possible so they can go out and support themselves. We want them to be good human beings. We want them to be compassionate and caring to others. All this great human interaction is going on while they receive texts and emails on their phones. All while we receive texts and emails on our phones. All until I can close my eyes at night, with a roof over our heads, in a nice comfy bed. Tomorrow, I’ll come up with a life lesson that will really prove memorable for my kids.

I started out Friday night watching this movie, Total Recall 2012.

But the music was killer. Top 40 AM and FM was bursting with great music. Such a bizarre variety. It was the definition of eclectic. Where to start? In the Billboard Top 100, David Bowie’s Space Oddity came in at 97, ahead of Albert Hammonds (who?) It Never Rains In Southern California at 98, and behind Edgar Winter’s Free Ride at 96. Pink Floyd was at 92 with Money, while the Stones sat higher at 85 with Angie. Wedged in at 90 was Deodato’s Also Sprach Zarathustra (2001). Remember? On the way up to the Allman Brother’s Ramblin’ Man at 79 you had to step over the Spinners at 82 with One Of A Kind (Love Affair). We didn’t like some of these songs at the time but against today’s autotuned vocals they are a blast of cool air. Kodachrome by Paul Simon rested at 74, just under Bette Midler’s Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy at 71 (ok that one that still sucks). Number 69 was owned by Focus, with Hocus Pocus, just under Steely Dan’s Reelin’ In The Years at 68. Hard to believe these were in the bottom half of the top 100, no?

Still not cracking midpoint, we have the uber funk of Curtis Mayfield’s Superfly at 65. Stevie Wonder’s Higher Ground came in at 62, with Wings’ Live And Let Die at 56 (yes that was ’73 I was scratching my head as well). Remember War’s The Cisco Kid? That came in at 55 just under Chicago’s superb Feelin’ Stronger Every Day at 54. Loggins and Messina was only one higher at 53 with Your Mama Don’t Dance. Halfway up from the bottom at number 50 we have Deep Purple’s Smoke On The Water. Tough, tough competition back in the day, all competing for our $4 to buy the 12” vinyl that housed these hits. The Spinners crack the top half with Could It Be I’m Falling In Love at 47, under George Harrison’s Give Me Love at 42. Georgie comes in just under the Doobies with Long Train Running at 42, which is yet under Seals and Crofts’ Diamond Girl at 40. Smooth sailing from here out! Not really, because at number 38 we have Monster Mash by Bobby “Boris” Pickett and The Crypt Kickers. Time to break out the wine and turn the lights down low as you and your mate chill to the sounds of Barry White’s I’m Gonna Love You Just A Little More at 33. At this point you may have a decaf coffee and jump on the O’Jays Love Train at 32 and keep the lovin’ going some more.

Shall I keep going? Ok, I shall. We’ll step over Three Dog Night’s Shambala at 31 to get to Stealers Wheel Stuck In The Middle With You at a cool 30. John Denver was Rocky Mountain High at 29, while Paul Simon Loves Me (better you) Like A Rock at 27. Stevie Wonder again at 26 with Superstition, as we climb higher with Dr. John’s great Right Place, Wrong Time at 24. Grand Funk claims to be an America Band at 23, which came under Cher’s Half Breed at 20. Stevie Wonder once more with You Are The Sunshine Of My Life at 19, eclipsed by Sweet’s Little Willy at 18 (sorry Sweet). Dobie Gray’s Drift Away at 17 is just under 16, owned by Edgar Winter Group again with Frankenstein. Instrumentals were all the rage that year, weren’t they? I even left out Dueling Banjos by Eric Weissberg and Steve Mandel way back at 61 because I thought it would take too long to type their names.

Billy Paul had a thing going on at 15 with Me And Mrs. Jones, Mrs. Jones, Mrs. Jones. Strangeness ensues in the top tier, with Carol Burnett TV show actress Vicky Lawrence taking 11 with The Night The Lights Went Out In Georgia. Do you know that Cher turned down this song?  Diana Ross instructed us to Touch Her In The Morning at 10 (number 10, not 10:00 AM). You’re So Vain, however if you really believe that, since Carly Simon owns that at 9. Billy Preston takes 8 with Will It Go Round In Circles, just under Crocodile Rock by Elton John at 7.  Wings takes number 5 with My Love (I don’t get it either), Marvin Gaye owns 4 with the amazing Let’s Get It On. Roberta Flack thought this might be Killing Her Softly With His Song at 3. Jim Croce has a nearly posthumous hit with Bad Bad Leroy Brown at 2, with number 1 owned by (trumpets ‘pease) Tie A Yellow Ribbon ‘Round The Ole Oak Tree by Tony Orlando and Dawn.

We are still tying yellow ribbons around trees for soldiers returning home from war in the middle east, with no M*A*S*H sitcom warzone humor to take the edge off. Morons parodied on TV in the 70’s are now shameless millionaire reality show stars that make Archie Bunker look like a Rhodes scholar. Pop music is created in computer rooms on flatscreens, with so called singers that only have to splorp out a base vocal that can be cleaned up in the mix. Our tax dollars are doled out to foreign countries to help them manufacture products that used to be made in America.

And the music sucks!

As I watched the presidential debates, I was awash in a sensory overload acid trip. The words coming out the candidates’ mouths made no sense, sounding like chicken clucks or dog barks. It smelled like pig manure (the nose knows truth). The suites, ties, and makeup looked swell though. Maybe the soundtrack from a show on Animal Planet got mixed into the debates accidentally. It was nowhere near as fun as watching the Wizard Of Oz with Pink Floyd’s Dark Sid Of The Moon album as a backing soundtrack, however.

Maybe I missed it, but did either of the two pre-selected marionettes talk about the profits the Too Big To Fail Banks are celebrating, care of you and me? Or the post 9/11 U.S  cost of war: 225, 000 lives, $4 trillion dollars?¹ That may have just sounded like a gorilla burp onscreen, maybe we missed it. How about the current price of gas at the pumps? Just because we don’t have a U.S. troop presence or a formal chain of command, does not mean that the war is over in Iraq. U.S. mercenary contractors like Triple Canopy are there and in Israel now protecting U.S. diplomats.² The Bush administration called it the “global war on terrorism” and the Obama administration use phrases like “contingency operations”. Call it whatever you want, it’s all in the money. A simple plan: 1) install U.S. diplomat in oil-producing country of choice, and 2) hire contractors to protect them. And don’t forget to throw Israel in the mix for good measure.

Today when I tell people I’m not voting for either puppet, I still hear the same mind-numbing response. “You’re not doing your part!” Or “there are important issues at stake!” Ron Paul was robbed, and Gary Johnson has no chance. So I’m choosing not to go with “the lesser of two evils” (an idiotic cliché). The election process is delusional theater at best. The electoral college is an outdated artifact of history. We are the only country that does not allow (trust) the citizens to elect a president of their choice via popular vote. So why bother? Voters won’t actually elect either Barack Obama or Mitt Romney; rather, they will elect a slate of electors pledged (but not required) to cast electoral votes for either Obama or Romney. Get it? No? Neither does a large portion of the population.

I’ve got my nose hair trimmers, tweezers, and clippers ready for action. I have my own “war on follicles” to deal with.

¹http://news.brown.edu/pressreleases/2011/06/warcosts

²http://www.salon.com/2011/12/17/no_the_u_s_is_not_leaving_iraq/

Every day I wake up and expect the material world we live in to be a better place.

“I made up my mind when I entered public life that I would not make it possible for anyone ever to say that I had sought public office for the money there was in it. I therefore kept the money that came to me as salary in a separate account and distributed it where I thought it would do the most good. Part of it went to supplement the salaries of men who worked under me and whom the government paid less than I thought they were worth. Part of it went to charities.” (source: hoover.archives.gov).

Hoover was given the boot in the next election, as economic prosperity didn’t come fast enough for voters. The general populace voted for the “New Deal”, promised by Franklin D. Roosevelt. President Obama’s “Change” seemed Zen-like and simple enough for the masses, even though in 1984 Walter Mondale’s “America Needs A Change” had zero impact as voters put Ronald Reagan back in office for a second term. Reagan’s slogan, “Are You Better Off Than You Were Four Years Ago?” struck a major chord with voters. I remember my dad, an immigrant house painter at the time, agreeing as he drove his shiny new Ford Econoline van with ladders on roof racks to one of the new housing developments that were popping up all over Long Island at the time.

Today, our society is like Bill Murray’s character Phil Connors in the 1993 film Groundhog Day, stuck in a time loop repeating the same day over and over. He finally gets out of the loop after the long journey to self-enlightenment. This modern society is like the pre-redemptive Phil, easily distracted and utterly self-absorbed. The difference is Phil was smart enough to wake up. He made the necessary changes himself. He finally advanced to the next day. Our society does not want to wake up; it wants to be lead and fed.

Until the current election year presidential candidates loaded up their campaign slogans with acidic piles of bile in the form of entitlements. This year, they’re playing it safe with no such promises. Obama’s 2012 slogan is “Forward”. Not a lot of people know that. I didn’t, I had to look it up to write this.  Back in May while speaking to a group of high-dollar donors at a Ritz-Carlton hotel, Mitt Romney poked fun at President Obama’s then newly unveiled campaign slogan, remarking, “Forward, what, over the cliff?”  Anyone care to guess what Romney’s slogan is? It’s “Believe In America”. Both slogans don’t make promises that can’t be kept. Obama’s 2008 dual-slogans “Hope” and “Change” keep coming back to bite him in the ass.

We, the unwashed masses, are on a stage, with a background that rolls by depicting a different landscape when the shadow power structure wants to move it. Those not on the stage, the unemployed, are doomed to view the show in the theater with no exit doors. Both groups are in the same theater, except those on the stage are unaware the exit doors are painted on brick walls. Although the current national unemployment rate is listed 8.3%, we all know it is closer to roughly 23% actual as reported in “alternate” news.  This figure  represents all of those unemployed no matter how long, the forced under employed (part time), and those who have given up looking, due to a dried up job market. I guess there are no slogans for these people.

Meanwhile, the rotating landscape keeps moving. We see people waiting on long lines ready to buy up the latest iPhone. We see commercials on TV depicting utopia, and we can get there by using credit cards. They usually feature background music delivered by a sing-songy female that sounds like Jewel. You can even check your balance (and make payments) on your smart phone (thank you so much banksters). Athletes are worshipped and paid unreal rates to play games. Quarterback Peyton Manning gets $1.2 million per game. People are paying money to see him play, at the same time bombarded with advertisements to buy more stuff. And they like it. The Twin Towers come down and we are urged to accept the official story and move on. A handful of Arabs outwitted the FBI, CIA, NSA, 16 US intelligence agencies, along with Israel’s MOSSAD. The complete and total failure  of US National Security in the worst terrorist attack in the history of the world, and no one was held accountable, no demands from the media. President Bush appoints an expert-free commission. We get a sanitized report. Just like the one we got from the Warren Commission on JFK’s assassination. Just move along now, nothing anyone can do about it. Get some hot wings for the game this Sunday. On widescreen.

Maybe the current generation of people, and those born into a world where the internet is as ubiquitous as the land line phone was in my generation, are just overloaded with information. So much to sift through, millions of internet pages, tweets and texts, human interaction has become secondary to typing. We have gone back to the Teletype of the 1940’s, and put it in our pockets. Data transmission has magically escaped from the confines of wires and walls, and now we have instantaneous, personal news readers. We are numb to it all, can’t read another word about yet another psychopath killing people, our soldiers killed in the Middle East, or humans killed anywhere. Where does one focus with all these distractions urging us to do something else, buy something we don’t need, eat something that will make us sick, or sit in a chair and watch millionaires play games or run for president? Just move Forward, and Believe In America. Both slogans don’t mean a thing. Both presidential candidates want to bomb Iran, which we will be able to witness on a hand-held AppleDroid, in between sporting events and ads for banks.

I see organically-raised chickens in every pot, a Prius Hybrid in every backyard.

The games continued to be played every four years for nearly 1200 years. In 393 CE, the Roman emperor Theodosius I, a Christian, abolished the Games because of their pagan influences. They stayed dark for 1500 years until a French aristocrat, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, resuscitated them. He had a head full of well-meaning idealism that aristocratic (out of touch) men had back then, with notions of international brotherhoods obtained through noble competitions like the pentathlon, which nobody wants to watch.

I’m sure Zeus chuckled a bit from the heavens when viewing the opening ceremony in London this year. Coming in at an astounding $42 million dollars, it showed the world that Queen Elizabeth II can have some jolly good fun in a cameo appearance with Daniel Craig in James Bond double-oh-seven fashion. Rowan Atkinson in Mr. Bean guise, hammering away at a single synthesizer note while dreaming of his own athletic glory, provided the global viewing audience with additional madcap entertainment. Speaking of queens and Daniels, Elton John was nowhere to be found.

I wonder how some of the current competitions would have fared in ancient times. Women score the ultimate touché with synchronized swimming, galvanizing audiences into speechless amazement. These competitions even have value as potential wartime skill training. Synchronized diving would have been quite handy as the enemy forced you and your battle mate off a cliff, hopefully into waters deep enough to avoid paralysis. Once afloat in the sea below, divers convert Transformers-like into speed swimmers. I think a competition that would pay homage to the ancient gods would be to put sharks in the pool for the swimming competitions. Maybe the 400 meter Freestyle, for both the men and the women. Imagine the viewer ratings. Winners live, losers feed the sharks. Greasing up the body with olive oil, however, might not be a good idea in this scenario.

Getting back to that $42 million dollars. The sharks are already there, and they control the whole show. The Olympics are meant to be a celebration of human endeavour. The ‘people’s games’ in London are subject to the whims of global corporations and financial institutions who seek to ‘legally’ avoid tax, saturate sport with their own marketing, and sanitize their reputation. Forget how they get away with financial murder in these times of austerity for right now. Olympic game attendees ‘lucky’ enough to witness the glory, will continue to wave their little flags Kumbaya-style  in support of their little countries. Even the VIPs.

I see a little silhouetto of a man
Scaramouch, rhymes with douche, will you do the Fandango?

You have a kid that plays lacrosse? How wonderful he or she must feel now that you have immortalized them in action on the playing field in a lovely shade of chrome. Maybe it’s a running position, lacrosse stick raised, ready to make the next college-level shot. I heard that in order for your child to even be considered for a college scholarship, you must plaster images of all potential future stick-handlers on your twelve mile-per-gallon troll sled. This is in addition to kissing the influential lacrosse coach’s ass (to put it mildly). Bonus points if you add My Child Is An Honor Role Student At [insert your favorite wonderful school here]” bumper sticker below the trail of demon spawn silhouettes tracking across the tailgate.

My cheap bastard husband won’t get me an iPhone

To the parents/chauffeurs of these social-status tanks, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU THINKING? Do you really think anyone gives a shit about how many times you procreated? Unless you adopted these kids and saved them from Madonna or Angelina Jolie, it only proves one thing: you have no life worth mentioning. You blather on about the accomplishments of your little clones like someone other than yourself cares to know. If they don’t want to listen, you force us to VIEW THEIR REPRESENTATIVE BODY OUTLINES on the tailgate of your spawn bus. You’ll even put the dog on there, like a little period at the end of a sentence we wish you weren’t uttering.

I had plenty of time to examine the nuances and minutiae of every stick-on child action figure on your trunk lid. Not because I stopped to look, but rather because you took an insanely long time to turn the wheel of your vanity-bus with one hand, in an eternity that seemed like slower than slow motion.  The other hand was clutching a cell phone and pushing it against the side of your face. But you don’t want to get a ticket for doing that, so you made believe it was a walkie-talkie. You cannot do this without looking right at it. Apparently this is very taxing on your multi-tasking skills, since you were oblivious to all other drivers attempting to occupy the space available in your bloatmobile’s wake.

Such proud parents you must be. May you continue to display your little achievers, right there in your Facebook profile picture.