lucius septimius 1/5/2020 7:40:00 AM

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Kosh's Shadow 1/5/2020 8:26:50 AM

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Reply to lucius septimius in 1:
Baked beans are off. You can have spam instead

video

JCM 1/5/2020 9:32:07 AM

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Apparently the flu shot this year was for "strain b" one kiddo and I have "strain A"

Spent most of yesterday sleeping.

JCM 1/5/2020 9:32:07 AM

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Apparently the flu shot this year was for "strain b" one kiddo and I have "strain A"

Spent most of yesterday sleeping.

buzzsawmonkey 1/5/2020 9:34:54 AM

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Reply to JCM in 4:

I got a flu shot this year, but my own belief is that the whole "flu shot" thing is a long-running scam.

JCM 1/5/2020 9:49:38 AM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 5:

Flu shot is a crap shoot. The essentially take a guess at what strains will be prevalent the upcoming season. Some years they do better than others. 

Occasional Reader 1/5/2020 10:03:15 AM

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Occasional Reader 1/5/2020 10:04:23 AM

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Alice in Dairyland 1/5/2020 10:24:59 AM

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In #2 Kosh's Shadow said: Baked beans are off. You can have spam instead

Now don't go making fun of spam.  It's the perfect breakfast meat to bring camping.  It doesn't need to be kept in the cooler/refrigerator.  Of course you have to fry it to death (beyond recognition) and dice it up before you can add it to the eggs.  Then you have to cover it up with cheese; but after that, it's quite tasty.  I think that's the only way it can be consumed unless you are in the situation of actually starving to death.

In #3 JCM said: Spent most of yesterday sleeping.

Hope you feel better soon.

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 10:32:01 AM

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In #8 Occasional Reader said: So, any of y’all gotten your draft notice yet?

No -- I already died from nuclear bombs.

Alice in Dairyland 1/5/2020 10:38:35 AM

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In #10 lucius septimius said: No -- I already died from nuclear bombs.

If that's the case, I hope you feel better soon also!

Occasional Reader 1/5/2020 10:39:00 AM

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Reply to lucius septimius in 10:

Lucky you.  Me, I have to report to Fort Yuuuge a week from Monday for Basic.

Kosh's Shadow 1/5/2020 10:41:15 AM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 5:

I heard some people saying that they got very sore after this flu shot. One said (iirc) someone ended up in the hospital after the "high dose" shot, too.

BTW, they found the best way to prevent flu spreading is to inoculate schoolchildren - that prevents spreading to their grandparents better than inoculating the grandparents.

Kosh's Shadow 1/5/2020 10:44:16 AM

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Reply to Alice in Dairyland in 9:

I linked to the Monty Python Spam sketch (actually right before the waitress says "Baked beans are off")

During WWII, in England, Spam was more available than other meats (which were very hard to get unless you were in the military), and I read that a lot of Brits got to like it, because it was the only meat they got. I think that is part of the basis for the sketch.
It was invented for troops in WWI

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 11:25:06 AM

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Reply to Kosh's Shadow in 14:

It is also considered a delicacy in Hawaii.

Occasional Reader 1/5/2020 11:58:56 AM

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Occasional Reader 1/5/2020 11:59:20 AM

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Alice in Dairyland 1/5/2020 12:03:03 PM

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Reply to Kosh's Shadow in 14:   I watched the video, too funny.  The web lists two sources of the name; "spiced ham" and Special Processed American Meat.  Like I said, the only other reason to eat this would be the threat of starvation.  It just looks so unappealing.  At least fried crispy and mixed into something else helps hide that.

In #15 lucius septimius said: It is also considered a delicacy in Hawaii.

So was Obama!

buzzsawmonkey 1/5/2020 12:16:09 PM

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In #8 Occasional Reader said: So, any of y’all gotten your draft notice yet?

I still have to put up the plastic over my windows to keep out the winter chill, if that's what you mean.

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 12:50:48 PM

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Reply to Alice in Dairyland in 18:

What I always heard was Spam = "shoulder, pork, and ham" because of the ingredients.

Alice in Dairyland 1/5/2020 1:23:27 PM

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Reply to lucius septimius in 20:   Spam - truly America's and Great Britain's Mystery Meat!

buzzsawmonkey 1/5/2020 2:07:58 PM

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What America has lost by the death of its common---or largely common---musical culture.  Back in the era of jazz/swing/dance bands, everyone knew the same songs---one might play a song "sweet," another "hot," but the songs themselves cut across social and ethnic lines, whether they originated in Tin Pan Alley, on the Broadway stage, or even in traditional pickin' and  singin'.  

Practically every cartoon from the beginning of the sound era up through the early Sixties used "Chicken Reel" or "Turkey in the Straw" as the background music for a barnyard scene; dog scenes often had something like "Oh Where, Oh Where, Has My Little Dog Gone?"  There were lots of other songs used as background music/comment on the action, of course; one of my favorites is in the Edward G. Robinson film "Five Star Final," where a newspaper's revelations of a woman's past drives her to suicide, and when her husband, grief-stricken, follows suit by taking his own life, the radio in the room is playing an instrumental version of "One More Time."

This common musical accompaniment even carried over into comic strips; Al Capp was a master at it.  When the Shmoo makes its debut in his "Li'l Abner" strip, the puns and allusions fly fast and furious.  Not only is the Shmoo's name a pun/joke---the Dogpatchers keep saying that "Shmoos [i.e., schmooze] does everything"---when Li'l Abner first hears "the call of the Shmoo" he is stopped by a "large gal" who is "there to see that the Shmoon don't come over the mountain," an allusion to "large gal" Kate Smith and her signature song.  When the Shmoos start spreading across the US, worried industrialists note their spread "from Natchez to Mobile, from Memphis to St. Joe---wherever the four winds blow!", a clear reference to the then-popular song "Blues Shmoos in the Night."  In another "Li'l Abner" strip, the Yokums' socially-pretentious cousin holds a big party to introduce the debutant "Caramee Back---from Old Virginny."

The last several decades have seen a social Balkanization not only in styles of music, but in the content and commonality of the lyrics and substance of the music itself.  Both early rock 'n' roll and early disco tapped into pop and folk standards, for a while, at least---but it appears those days are largely gone, and with them both a measure of social cohesion and a knowledge and appreciation of the richness of America's musical past.

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 3:41:03 PM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 22:

While I've been at the home place, I've been perusing my old copies of Mad.  The song parodies would, in large part, not work today because the current generation doesn't know the Great America Songbook or the classic Broadway musicals.  I'm doing my best to educate my kids in that regards, though only my daughter really seems to be taking to it.

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 3:41:51 PM

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Reply to lucius septimius in 23:

I should add that my father constantly came up with off the cuff song parodies for particular moments at home; I've followed in the tradition.

buzzsawmonkey 1/5/2020 3:44:51 PM

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In #23 lucius septimius said: The song parodies would, in large part, not work today because the current generation doesn't know the Great America Songbook or the classic Broadway musicals.

Indeed.  They also don't know the classic poems that MAD routinely parodied, such as "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere," "Under the Spreading Chestnut Tree," "Ozymandias," etc., etc.

buzzsawmonkey 1/5/2020 3:45:36 PM

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In #24 lucius septimius said: I should add that my father constantly came up with off the cuff song parodies for particular moments at home

I suspect that on that basis, at least, we'd have gotten along well.

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 3:53:06 PM

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buzzsawmonkey 1/5/2020 3:59:04 PM

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Reply to lucius septimius in 27:

Even worse, the "transgenders" are being rounded up and shipped to Camp Squattupee.

Kosh's Shadow 1/5/2020 4:08:12 PM

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Reply to lucius septimius in 23:

My mother never let me buy Mad.

I read it in the supermarket magazine section while they shopped.

I did buy a DVD of 54 years of Mad, but the box keeps disappearing. I think my mother's ghost comes and hides it.

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 4:11:56 PM

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Reply to Kosh's Shadow in 29:

My older cousin had a stash hidden in his room -- he gave me all his copies at one point.  I have pretty much the entire run from 1966 to 1972.

Kosh's Shadow 1/5/2020 4:20:23 PM

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Mad did as parody of West Side Story, called East Side Story, about the UN, and it tore apart all the communist countries and dictatorships. I can't imagine them taking that side today.

I won't subject you to the popup-laden site that mentions it, but it does give the following excerpt:

Sample lyrics for "When You're A Red" are as follows:

"When you're a Red,
You're a Red all the way
From your first party purge
To your last power play"

buzzsawmonkey 1/5/2020 4:34:34 PM

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Reply to Kosh's Shadow in 31:

They did a gangster version of "South Pacific" called "South Chicago," too.

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 4:44:05 PM

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Reply to buzzsawmonkey in 32:

One of my favorite was a series of yet-to-be made musicals, with the cartoon characters signalling the casting.  They included:

"Where's Moby?" (Moby Dick, starring Gregory Peck, with a cameo of William Holden).

"Call Me Julius" (Julius Caesar)

"Lose your Head" (Tale of two cities, starring Frankie and Dino)

"Ape over You" (Tarzen, staring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor)

lucius septimius 1/5/2020 4:46:19 PM

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Reply to lucius septimius in 33:

Take me out to the courtyard,

Take me out with the crowd.

We'll have the best revolution yet,

We'll kill the king and Marie Antoinette

So let's root, root, root for the head man

He has the job that is hard.

Cuz it's off!  Off!  Off with their heads

In the old courtyard.

Kosh's Shadow 1/5/2020 4:48:36 PM

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Reply to lucius septimius in 34:

Are we supposed to have cake with that?

Occasional Reader 1/5/2020 5:34:06 PM

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In #31 Kosh's Shadow said: Mad did as parody of West Side Story, called East Side Story,

Which, of course, was actually the original title of the first draft of the script.