On my X Blog, the first three installments of “Vignettes From Gay Life” (actually, from the fantasy world of Gayland): XXX-rated comic homoerotic collages. Vignettes 1-4 here, 5-8 here, and 25-28 here.
Archive for January, 2012
Vignettes from gay life
January 12, 2012More Zippy bop
January 11, 2012In today’s Zippy, Dingburgers continue to pursue their beatnik ways:
oo-bop-de-bootie!! Or maybe Oo-Bop-Sh’Bam!
Implicit attention
January 10, 2012When I awoke on Sunday, a random fact (probably a dream remnant) claimed front seat in my thoughts:
Zez Confrey is the composer of “Kitten on the Keys”.
Remarkable that I should have known this in the first place — though I do have one spirited performance of the piece on my iTunes (by Alan Feinberg on his album Fascinatin’ Rhythm) — and even more remarkable that I retrieved the memory. Why?
Well, Zez is about as Z-heavy a name as you can get (and even more compact than Zardoz). Fact is, I notice words with a Z in them, especially names, and they get lodged in my memory.
Actually, I notice them even when I’m not reading text, and attending to it, but merely noticing the text in passing, at a glance. I don’t think I’m looking for names with Zs, but even when my attention is focused on something else, my mind takes me there. I’m implicitly attending to the letter Z.
“or words to that effect”
January 10, 2012From the annals of taboo avoidance in the NYT, in Charles McGrath’s “How Many Stephen Colberts Are There?” (NYT Magazine, January 8th), p. 22:
“It’s bizarre,” remarked an admiring Jon Stewart, whose own program, “The Daily Show,” immediately precedes “The Colbert Report” on Comedy Central and is where the Colbert character got his start. “Here is this fictional character who is suddenly interacting in the real world [via a super PAC created by Colbert]. It’s so far up its own rear end,” he said, or words to that effect, “that you don’t know what to do except get high and sit in a room with a black light and a poster.”
Stewart and Colbert are free with taboo vocabulary on their shows, knowing that it will all be bleeped out by Comedy Central (presumably to protect the children; after all, a lot of kids get their news from “The Daily Show” — and maybe they perfect their swearing there as well).
The Times isn’t averse to ass ‘buttocks’ (as in the title of the Andy Warhol movie “Taylor Mead’s Ass”) or non-anatomical ass (as in its blog title “Cheap Ass Food”), but it seems to draw the line at ass ‘anus’ (as in the idiom up someone’s ass, above). So unlike its avoidance of fuck in any of its senses or uses, its avoidance of ass is more nuanced and contextual.
Zippy bops
January 9, 2012Today’s Zippy:has the denizens of Dingburg’s Beatnik District bopping on the bongos:
Shades of Mr. Zopittybop-Bop-Bop (here)!
More play on nonsense syllables — bebop, rebop, plain bop, oobity, doo-wop, etc. — from various musical genres: R&B in Lionel Hampton’s “Hey! Ba-Ba-Re-Bop” (1946), “Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo” from Walt Disney’s Cinderella (1950), rockabilly in Gene Vincent’s “Be-Bop-A-Lula” (1956), the Beatles’ “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” (1968), Afro-beat/punk/rock in Who Shot Jonson’s “Oobity Bap” (2009). And more, much more.
Separated spellings
January 9, 2012Names of the year
January 8, 2012Noted by Victor Steinbok on ADS-L, this news of the weird from Huffington Post:
Beezow Doo-Doo Zopittybop-Bop-Bop, 30, was arrested Thursday afternoon on charges of carrying a concealed weapon, possession of drug paraphernalia, possession of marijuana and a violation of probation in Madison, Wisc.
Zopittybop-Bop-Bop was born Jeffrey Drew Wilschke, according to court records unearthed by the Capital Times. He legally changed his name to Beezow Doo-Doo Zoopittybop-Bop-Bop in October.
The story has been picked up by a great many papers and blogs. No, I have no idea who put the bop in the Zopittybop-Bop-Bop.
From the urinal desk at AZBlog
January 8, 2012(Not about language. Art and entertainment.)
From Chris Ambidge, who’s visiting family in Preston, England, some postcards yesterday from the Barton Grange Garden Centre in Brock (near Preston) with illustrations of the extraordinary urinals in the place. Which turn out to be the work of San Francisco artist Clark Sorenson. Flowers and shells. (more…)
gastropub
January 7, 2012From today’s (S.F. peninsula) Daily News, a story by staffer Bonnie Eslinger (“State pulls liquor license of ‘gastropub’: Move comes after police contacted alcohol bureau over series of alleged crimes at British Bankers Club”) about the (probably temporary) closing of the British Bankers Club in Menlo Park CA:
Housed inside a 90-year-old building that stands prominently at the intersection of Santa Cruz Avenue and El Camino Real, the British Bankers Club billed itself as a “gastropub,” offering a menu that included such items as ahi tartare and a foie gras burger. Only fresh, organic ingredients were used in its cocktails, according to information posted on the club’s website.
Some information about BBC, then about gastropub (and brewpub).