Things You’ll Find in Shuteye Town

40 Subway Stations running 9 trains on 6 different lines
30 Stores to shop in, located in two different malls
21+ Restrooms
20++ Television Shows, including ads (galore)
19+ Passenger Lounges
15+ Nightclubs & Strip Joints
11 Hospitals/Clinics
11 Prisons
10 Concert Venues
10 Television Networks
10 Movie Theaters
4 Professional Sports Teams
2 Newspapers
2 Centrally Located Police Stations
1 University/High School Complex
1 Library (Closed)
1 Airport
1 Amusement Park
1 Sports/Events Arena

Plus:

125+ Multi-Story Buildings (commercial, government, industrial)
50,000(?) Private Homes & apartments
Assorted interactive vending machines, ATMs, surveillance cameras (000s),
& The UnderNet

All red, all gold. Aren’t they cute?

We were trying to watch Thursday Night Football. But hey. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers were wearing red from top to bottom and the St. Louis Rams were wearing gold from bottom to top. My wife was inclined to overlook it. Not me. When life gets completely silly, you have to call it out. How many Rams can you put in a row?

Not all gold. Times when they’re actually football players, not gold diggers.

The best possible NFL owner these days would be Busby Berkeley. If he’d had Technicolor, he’d have been a trillionaire.

See what I mean?

I know women like to see butts. But men like to see legs more than women like to see anything.

Sigh.

And this is where it all started to go wrong. I began thinking about rows of things, which is no way to go. You can be benign at first.

Still time to make it all okay.

And you can think about rows of beauty.

Lots more handsome than Rams.

But then it turns out you’re just a guy, and you have all these thoughts that go from bad to worse.

They’re all perfect when you put them in a row.

And you’ve got this search capability that lets you look for rows.

Athletes are cool. Heard they got in trouble for these outfits. Can’t think why. But then I’m a guy.

That’s about the point where everything goes all to hell. Because we’re guys and we want to see stuff.

And we want it to be exotic and beautiful. Because we’re just completely awful.

We want them to be exotic and ineffable. We’re idiots.

Sorry. As I said, how a good idea goes wrong.

Two productions almost 30 years apart. But each time a ray of light. Why I’m happy. Back in 1987 Raising Arizona was a delight. The only fatality was a horrifying bounty hunter. This year, the second season of Fargo was, against all odds, a tribute to life despite dozens of bodies shot down in a Byzantine plot.

I don’t usually do superlatives. I’m going to now. Kirsten Dunst.

Best acting I’ve ever seen her do. Gorgeous work.

Amazing performance. Jean Smart. Same. Nick Offerman. Same. Bokeem Woodbine. Same. Ted Danson, exceptional. Meaning same.

The single best miniseries I’ve ever seen. The writing was glorious, the acting was way beyond expectations, and the content was ultimately inspiring. I liked the state trooper. He was brave and his wife will live.

And then we watched Raising Arizona on demand. My wife laughed so hard we had to give her a sticky bun to keep her from seizing. Kidding. It was oatmeal raisin cookies. But she’s fine now.

Where was it going? You knew? Did you? I did.

Fifteen years ago I dreamed of the UnderNet. Where you could do anything your heart desired.

Here’s your entry point. My wife says it’s demonic. I say you just have to be smart and patient and then you will find the infinity of the UnderNet.

I grant it’s not easy, this underground offshoot of Shuteye Town at Hackerz Station. Even I have to puzzle my way through. But it can be done. It can be done. Here’s one of the signs you’ve made some headway.

Find her.

One of the icons of the UnderNet. Can you find the center?

Merkel hoists her burkha to show us what’s up there. Not much.

So she’s changing up her mind, even if it leaves her ass hanging out a little.

“German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s refugee policy has attracted praise from all over the world. Time magazine and the Financial Times newspaper recently named her Person of the Year, and delegates applauded her for so long at her party’s convention on Monday that she had to stop them.

“The speech that followed, however, may have surprised supporters of her policies: “Multiculturalism leads to parallel societies and therefore remains a ‘life lie,’ ” or a sham, she said, before adding that Germany may be reaching its limits in terms of accepting more refugees. “The challenge is immense,” she said. “We want and we will reduce the number of refugees noticeably.”

“Although those remarks may seem uncharacteristic of Merkel, she probably would insist that she was not contradicting herself. In fact, she was only repeating a sentiment she first voiced several years ago when she said multiculturalism in Germany had “utterly failed.”

Uh, we knew that already. Another laurel for female politicians. Hasn’t been one since Thatcher and, before her, Meir.

Okay. So who really has the worse hair?

That huge question aside, how did CNN do? Pretty well. Nicely done apart from the early assault on Trump, which was inevitable. Bush was a chump. Cruz was good. Rubio didn’t mess himself in the boy’s room. Rand Paul was there, wasn’t he?

Christie could have been president if he hadn’t hugged Obama.

Was anybody else there?

Well, I wasn’t there. I’d’ve fucking killed them all.

Challenged my wife to name the best five songs of the eighties. She nailed it with her third choice. My own are great but not in the running with this, which sticks up for Jersey in the rockingest way possible.

So then I thought I’d just top her completely.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ITf2Tj7ovqg

Life is too short for fooling around.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JSUIQgEVDM4

First heard the death knell in 1967. Now the bell tolls for thee and me. Never thought they’d beat me. Now, nearly forty years later, I’m not so sure.

Stones tried to warn me too, more gently.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BF0MbYgYrCQ

But I didn’t listen. My greatest fault. I don’t listen to the darkness. Why I continue to laugh, unless it’s more of a sneer. Take your pick.

One guy thought something was wrong when everyone else agreed otherwise. He was right. Hmmmm.

Of course the planet is happy they had a global warming conference in Paris. The planet is always cheering us on, unless they’re just laughing up their gigantic sleeve about how important we think we are.

Earth very concerned and frightened about human bullshit.

Anyhoo, the fat boys of the western nations got theirselves a agreement. Like you know. What everybody can sign onto after a thousand bottles of champagne and enough gooseliver to make every old man bloat up to Zeppelin size.

Geez. $200 million and 200 pounds plus. Way to slim down for salvation of the earth. And there are still starved little coeds who think he’s a hero. Why Tipper is still seeing her analyst every day of the week.

One touchdown already.

He enlisted in the army in 1827. He’s been red-shirted as a football player for 88 years.

The Telltale Heart. All we have on our side.

Enough of the nearly napping BS. Okay?

I’m not trying to be cute here. I’m attempting a kind of exorcism. You know how a song gets stuck in your head? Usually it’s accidental, unbidden. This one I did to myself. It occurred to me while I was wool gathering a week or so back that the name of my cat, Elliott, rhymed with Camelot. Gave me a grin. Until I woke up every morning hearing Camelot in my head. So now I’m trying to offload it onto all of you. Sorry.

*******

It’s true! It’s true! The cat has made it clear.
The climate here is perfect all the year.

A law was made four years ago here:
July and August will not be too hot.
And there’s a legal limit to the snow here
For Elliott.
The winter is forbidden till December
And exits March the second on the dot.
By order, summer lingers through September
For Elliott!
Elliott! Elliott!
I know it sounds a bit bizarre,
But with Elliott
That’s how conditions are.
The rain may never fall till after sundown.
By eight, the morning fog must disappear.
In short, there’s simply not
A more congenial spot
For hunting-snoozing-fighting-eating
By Elliott.

The King.

Elliott! Elliott!
I know it gives a person pause,
But For Elliott
Those are the legal laws.
The snow may never slush upon the hillside.
By nine p.m. the moonlight must appear.
In short, there’s simply not
A more congenial spot
For happily-ever-aftering than here
For Elliott.

*******

In case you need a palate cleanser, here’s what I regard as the definitive version of the real thing.

There. I feel better now. How about you?

The Concrete Charlie Honor.

Life works in a big wide circle. So this year, finally, another Philadelphian wins the Chuck Bednarik Award. His name is Tyler Matakevich. He’s beloved in the City of Brotherly Love. And he will go in the first round of the NFL draft. He’s a Temple Owl. The alpha of a parliament of owls. And he also seems to have the wisdom that is supposed to coincide with parliaments. His teammates look up to him. He is charming and funny and humble. He lights up local TV when he consents to an interview. It’s never about him. Always about his team and his family. An anachronism.

But make no mistake. He is a fearsome defensive player. He was named the best defensive player in the country. He won the Bronco Nagurski Award. Now the Bednarik. Also the Walter Camp Award and the AAC player of the year. He had 481 career tackles and is ninth all time on the NCAA career list. He is the seventh player all time to have four seasons over one hundred tackles.

What in the new lingo of our city is called Temple Tough. How this beleaguered team finally surmounted dozens of years of tragic history and thumped the hell out of the thugs of Penn State. (Don’t cavil. I was there just before the Paterno implosion when Penn Staters at the Link were screaming “nigger” at Temple players in their annual game.) Tyler is a Catholic boy. He said nothing about the Nittany bigots. He just did them in this fall. Thoroughly.

Chuck would be proud. We are too.

Doctor Dream looks down with telephoto eyes…

It all begins and ends with Doctor Dream. He starts with the first punk screed, called Deus Ex:

Come with me
I know the way
Through these chrome and yellow corridors
That end in cul de sackcloth and ashes
Of the blueprints you plagiarized
Disfigured with fatal slashes
Then letter bombed to bits.

That’s his first stanza. The Lounge Conversations are part of the sum.

Published, appropriately, on this Seventh of December, which is both Pearl Harbor Day and the birthday of my namesake grandfather.

WE ARE PLEASED TO ANNOUNCE PUBLICATION OF “THE LOUNGE CONVERSATIONS” BY ROBERT LAIRD.

A print book you can buy at Amazon right now. For the hideously expensive price of $6.99. You all know that in my years of blogging I have never ceased to beg, piteously, at almost half decade intervals, for tips in my jar. Now I’m doing it yet again. Erick Erickson thinks I’m an extortionist. Oh well. Buy the damn thing. I’m the real thing. Wait till you see the next book. That’ll be more.

A short book, about a guy careering through the subway system of a place very much like hell, or where we have somehow gotten to today. That’s why we’re publishing it. It’s almost exactly a quarter century old, and the conversations the infamous Daniel Pangloss has with bartenders and drinkers in the subway lounges of Shuteye Town seem as if they could have happened just this afternoon.

You can find it here at Amazon.com. For just under $7.00. But if you ever thought no one could have anticipated the America of Obama in 2015, you are very much mistaken. This is a path we’ve been jogging — or skateboarding — along for a very long time. And this slender volume proves it.

Not all doom and gloom. Daniel Pangloss is actually funny, in the way that only optimistic pessimists can be. Oxymorons are contradictions, which is the simplest definition of comedy.

But. As Daniel Pangloss says, “All is for the best in the best of all possible worlds.”

The acknowledgment is to Voltaire. His real name? Francois Marie Arouet. Anagram. There’s a select club of the mean ones. They cross borders. Voltaire. Bierce. And me. I’ve experienced the Interdict twice. Crossed Candide and redone the Devil’s Dictionary. Destined to die like most of them, unknown, unrecognized and unloved. And, as Max Smart would say…

American Glossary.

To hell or to Hadleyburg. Know where I’m going.

http://youtu.be/zzCftBiesq0

My iPad isn’t working today. So what. I cannot be silenced. Hackers. Can’t make an argument on their own. Just screw with people over code. Mechanics with no real intellect. Want to show your brilliance? Contend with the ones you disagree with. Use no obscenities. Use logic, learning, love of debate.

Losers. Shut me down here and I will publish more print books than your limited minds can read.

Captain Leon W. Miesse.

He was on the western front in World War I. In the Rainbow Division. When he retired as a plant engineer, he made himself a woodworking shop in the cellar and produced works of art. His wife was as old as he was and couldn’t make it into the basement. Why I learned what naked women looked like from my grandfather rather than stolen Playboys. Secret? Esquire Magazine. Back when it had something to do with men rather than metrosexuals.

He had more tools than this. But you get the idea.

I worked with him in his basement workshop. My mother didn’t care about the pictures plastered over all the walls of the workshop. She knew I was a boy.

Naked women. My mother thought it was just funny.

Doesn’t matter how young you are. Naked women are just terrific. What better gift can a grandfather give to his grandson? Oh. Yeah. He taught me how to use all the tools too.

Obviously we have to wait for the administration to tell the media what the narrative is. I’m thinking a love quadrangle among right wing survivalists that went wrong and resulted in workplace violence.

No way I would write a whole play for one pic.

A One Act Icelandic Play called “Arnika”

[Arnika and Ligisnurd sitting on a dock of the bay, whittling whalebone.]

Arnika
Do you hear that foghorn?

Ligisnurd
No.

Arnika
What are you? Deaf?

Ligisnurd
Now I hear it.

Arnika
What happened between us? You don’t love me anymore.

Ligisnurd
I do. I was just distracted by the foghorn.

Arnika
Which you didn’t hear.

Ligisnurd
You always bring this up. I never loved her.

Arnika
Right.

[A bunch of people enter carrying foul smelling fish carcasses in a net.]

Ligisnurd
You probably think I was after your sister, but I wasn’t.

Arnika
Just because this whole place stinks of foul fish.

Ligisnurd
Stinks? I like the smell.

Arnika
I knew it.

Ligisnurd
Knew what?

Arnika
You always liked her best.

Ligisnurd
We have to talk. We have to talk about so many things.

[Men enter to chop the heads off the fish..]

Arnika
Talk about what? My uncle sexually abused me and you saw and went to scandinavian playwright school instead. My mother became a prostitute in Paris and sent home flowers. My father had three hundred mistresses and never smiled once in his life. How do these things happen? You’re my brother Ligisnurd. Explain it to me.

Ligisnurd
I guess we have to have sex to fix everything. This is Iceland, after all.

Arnika
You got that right, bro.

[Fishermen sweep the offal off into the sea.]

Arnika and Ligisnurd embrace and have lots of sex. Close curtain.

The bay. Where they would have lived happily ever after except for being doomed Scandinavians.

Yeah. Sitting on the dock of the bay. we all do it.