Wow. Jimmy Kimmel gets a halo today

By Pablo Fanque,
All This Is That National Affairs Editor


I'll admit, I hardly watch TV, and especially not the late night talk shows (after all, late night is for art and sinning). But Jimmy Kimmel--whom I've never especially appreciated--took it to the next level yesterday. I've really only seen him back in the early Conan days, and a couple of times on The Man Show. Jimmy K either has a death wish, or he is channeling Jerry McGuire and Senator Jay Bullington Bulworth.


Jimmy K


Yesterday, Jimmy Kimmel let it all hang out in NYC, at something called The Up Fronts. You read about this every year--this is the big shindig, where TV networks butter up advertisers and sell them their upcoming slate of shows. A bunch of TV "stars" come in and try to convince the ad people that their show will truly be a cash cow, centering right in on their beloved demographic. As the New York Times reported: Jimmy had "A Jerry Maguire Moment." I tend to think of it as more of a Bulworth moment. Here are some quotes from his talk. Unfortunately no one seems to have recorded it. At least it's not on YouTube or any of the other usual suspect sites. He even seems to have taken a few direct shots at sacred cows like Jay Leno.

"Let's get real here. Let's get Dr. Phil-real here. These new fall shows? We're going to cancel about 90 percent of them. Maybe more."

"Every year we lie to you and every year you come back for more. You don't need an upfront. You need therapy. We completely lie to you, and then you pass those lies onto your clients."

"Next year on ‘Grey's Anatomy,' your product could kill Dr. Izzie. It just depends on how much you want to pay."

"I think all our shows are going to work this year. I really do. I don't, really."

"The important thing to remember is: who cares?, it's not your money."

Wow. Despite this, he still appears to be working. At least today. He was either very very high, or he has some kind of iron-clad no-cut contract. Or both. In either case, Excelsior! Jimmy.
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Choreography! A wedding dance goes off the hook.

A father-daughter dance at a wedding becomes a choreographed dance routine. Sweet!


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digital art: Jack Evolved

click to enlarge
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All This Is That Reheated: President Bush drunk at Camp David

Photograph: unknown source. If it's yours, let us know!

From All This Is That December 29, 2005

President Bush's Christmas retreat at Camp David devolved into a troubled, drunken "bender," according to sources close to The White House. Unsubstantiated rumors have circulated throughout the year that The President has begun drinking again. These rumors seem to be corroborated by this video hosted by http://www.wimp.com..

Rumors of Presidential tippling died down in December, following the Scooter Libby indictment and The Administration's double digit bump in the polls. However, revelations of massive domestic spying and renewed talk of special prosecutors and impeachment have let the cork out of the bottle, so to speak.

Sources report that the President is drinking frequently as he struggles to map a strategy to survive his next three years in office, as well as attempting to secure a place in the history books, possibly without his close advisors Andrew Card, Rumsfeld and Cheney, as well as a faltering majority in The Senate.

On Christmas morning, the Secret Service unexpectedly cancelled a photo-op and cleared the press from Camp David, allowing only a small pool of reporters and photographers in a cabin half a mile from the presidential compound.

Numerous White House staffers willing to talk off the record, painted a picture of an administration under siege, led by a man who declares his decisions to be "God's will" and tells aides to "f**k over" anyone opposing the administration's nebulous goals.


Hammered, or a little shaky on his feet?

Earlier in the week after sharing bourbon and eggnog[1] with his inner circle, The President reportedly broke down in tears, complaining that Vice-President Cheney "is supposed to have my back, he's supposed to be the brains of the f***in' outfit!. He was supposed to be the grandpa everyone loved. . .and all he's done in the last year is bring a s***storm down on us! Even our f***in' friends are racing for the exits!"

Later the same evening, The President allegedly urged his team to kneel and "pray for the deaths of prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, Rep. John P. Murtha, John McCain, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Arlen Specter, Howard Dean, and one more f***in' Supreme Court Justice. . .to fix those pinko bastards and ACLU treehuggers. . .once and for all!"

[1] The Camp David bartenders used the potent recipe for eggnog created by the northwesterner Dean Ericksen, a former bartender, and ironically, a prominent environmental activist.
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Ballard Bear Update

The black arrow shows the location of my house.

From the Seattle Times: "Urban Phantom is the name given by state wildlife agents to a 2-year-old black bear who was first seen in Magnolia late Saturday, and so far has eluded capture as he has been sighted also in Ballard and Shoreline."

The 'bar was tromping around my neighborhood, after possibly swimming from Magnolia to the beach at Golden Gardens, and then climbing the heavily-treed hill. He was spotted near the graveyard up the hill, just a couple of blocks from my brother and sister-in-law, Dean and Mary's house near Blue Ridge. Later yesterday, he made good time, and ended up in a park in Shoreline. I know bears can run fast, but this bear made serious tracks. And so far, no one seems able to find him. At Twin Ponds Park, where he is possibly located now, he will run into a serious roadblock. Interstate 5 probably blocks his path (if he moving to the east, where forests and bear habitat exists).

From The Seattlest: Damn Bear Almost to Jack's House
The black bear we mentioned this morning seems to have somewhere pressing in mind. So far it's cruised from Magnolia, through Ballard, and "made a stop in Twin Ponds Park in Shoreline," says MyBallard, who have created a bear-tracker map. The Department of Fish and Wildlife has put its hunt on hold because there are too many people running around, but that doesn't bother Seattlest Jack: "I am gleeful over the fact that even in a major city, in the 21st century, one might still encounter a bear, or giant bear-like raccoons."

Also from The Seattlest: "Fish & Wildlife officials, meanwhile, have discontinued the search because they don’t believe the small bear is dangerous. The bear had quite a day, swimming across the Ship Canal from Magnolia into Ballard late Sunday night, criss-crossing its way through the neighborhood with police and wildlife officials in close pursuit with tranquilizer guns and tracking dogs. The bear disappeared for several morning hours — wildlife officials believe it was taking a nap — before heading sharply north into Shoreline. There, the media joined the chase, with TV crews on the ground and choppers swirling overhead. "
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The Policemen - a children's book. . .

--click to enlarge--

A wonderful, and creepy parody of a children's book. I don't know who wrote it. It seems to be selected pages of a children's book on cops, slightly re-written.




http://www.blameitonthevoices.com/2008/06/childrens-books-policeman.html
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Soul Sacrifice by Santana at Woodstock

According to a video interview I saw with Carlos Santana (in an exhibit at the Music Experience Museum in Seattle), Carlos was on acid during his performance at Woodstock. He'd apparently mis-timed the LSD and ended up baked on stage. He said he felt snakes growing out of the guitar. But somehow he pulls it off--and makes some awesomely classic guitar faces while he's doing it.

Note that Michael Shrieve, the drummer, was only 19 years old at Woodstock...



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A bear in Ballard!

"Police officers and wildlife agents spent hours looking for a bear that wandered through the Ballard neighborhood of Seattle..." (In the Crown Hill section of Ballard--our neighborhood!). If we was in Magnolia/Discovery Park, that means he either walked right up 15th Avenue (and over the Ballard Bridge), over the Ballard Locks walkways, or he jumped in Puget Sound and swam to the beach in Ballard, just below our house...

The Associated Press story appears here: http://mynorthwest.com/?nid=11&sid=168819
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All This Is That Reheated: Square Dance At Kent Elementary

Valley Elementary held two or three square dances a year and they were the coolest thing in town, but the Lettuce Festival, Puyallup Fair (for which we got half a day off school), Kris Kringle Days, and Hydroplane Races were all right up there.

A semi-pro called the steps over a record player or Wollensak tape recorder. Kent was a natural for square dancing; the town was still full of Okies, Clodhoppers, Tarheels, Hayseeds, Rednecks, Yokels, and Hillbillies: my people.

One of the vocals sounded like Tommy Duncan singing. I haven't heard the tune in 40 years. Its lyrics are seared into my brain:

Now you all join hands as you circle the ring
Stop where you are, give your partner a swing.

Now swing that girl behind you.
Swing your own, if you have time to.

Allemande left with the sweet corner maid.
Do-si-do your own.

They we'll all promenade with the sweet corner maid
Singing Oh Johnny Oh Johnny Oh.

Girls wore floofy dresses and boys wore button down shirts with cords or jeans. The adults wore bolo ties and gingham dresses. A couple bales of hay and some other countrified accoutrements were scattered around the gym, along with "refreshments" of soda pop, doughnuts and maple bars.

You got to dance with girls without the potential psychic trauma of actually asking one to dance. They arranged us in a group of partners that changed frequently. However, even those chaste touches and do si dos scrambled our brains with thoughts of girls! The fleeting moments allemanding left, whirling skirts, and whiffs of dime-store perfume all fueled our overheated pre- and mid-pubescent psyches.

I remember square dancing in 3rd and 4th grades, but not so much the 5th and 6th. I do remember seeing The Beatles that year on The Ed Sullivan Show show. I don't know if The Beatles killed square dancing, but after their arrival, square dancing was never quite the same.
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All This Is That Reheated: How I became Jack

How I became Jack Brummet

I was working for a magazine in Seattle called Construction Data. On my first day on the job, my boss, McGoo, walked up to me and said "I have your new business cards."

He handed me a box of the cards.

“Jack Brummet. Circulation marketing and feature article writer? Jack?," I asked.

“I like that, yeah. Jack. Face it. . .John is a pussy name. Jack’s the name of a man's man. These are constuction guys named Bill and Biff and Sven. Do you want to sell magazines, or be be some marketing fop named John?”

I became Jack. And I still am.
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All This Is That reheated:

Due to the exigencies of work (I'm slammed!), for the next few days, we'll be posting some of the best of All This Is That. Unless Pablo Fanque actually comes through with some new material to fill the breech. I suspect he will.

From All This Is That, December 4th, 2004:


Poem: The Absence of Footprints

1.
We're not trilliums or daffodils
That spring back up
After a nap in the dirt.

2.
You told me you wanted
To make the crossing
Over to Cold Island
And I could never believe you.

It wasn't the karmic stain
That bothered me,
But the unfathomable fact
You didn't want to be here;
That all this wasn't enough.

All this is that.
And it wasn't enough.

3.
You stare into the ditch
You spent years unloading.

You are afraid to climb in
And stop,

To take something
That isn't working,
and make it not work forever.

4.
It's
so
quiet
you
hear
dust
motes
six
feet
up
bump
in
shafts
of
sunlight.
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Video: I'm going home by Alvin Lee/Ten Years After @ Woodstock '69

I always liked Alvin Lee's over the top, showboat performance at Woodstock, although I have never actually purchased an album by him/them.



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