All posts by Dale Connelly

Uncategorized

Worst Tagline Ever

63 Comments

I know this latest wave of food-borne listeria is a tragic development that has taken lives and broken hearts. The situation is made slightly more awkward by the fact that primary agent of despair in this case is the cantaloupe, one of our funniest fruits.

You can get a debate on this, but in my view The Banana is (and always will be) the funniest fruit of all due to its prankish peel. The Kumquat comes in second on the strength of its unusual sound and spelling. And The Cantaloupe is third, partly because of that unexpected “u”, but also because it is firmly in the melon family, and all melons are comical.

They just are. If I have to explain it to you, you’ll never get it anyway, so what’s the use? Let’s just say that melons make people smile.

But one of the unfolding tragedies in this tale is the fate of the single melon producer responsible for the tainted fruit. Among other things, this story has given that company the worst possible advertising tagline, printed exactly this way in the Los Angeles Times:

“If it’s not Jensen Farms, it’s OK to eat,”
said Thomas R. Frieden, director of the CDC.

What a charming little jingle this would make.  Imagine being the marketing person who has to plan a comeback for Jensen Farms once this blows over. I recommend a re-branding that doesn’t include the name Jensen or the word cantaloupe. I would go for something that speaks to our greatest hopes and aspirations. Something optimistic and uplifting. How about “Stable Economy Melon Orchards”? Maybe not. At any rate, good luck to every Jensen family involved in agriculture, anywhere in the world.

When have you said ‘I think it’s something I ate’?

Uncategorized

Alien Crime Family Goes Free

60 Comments

I am appalled. Simply appalled!

Washington based apologists for a well-known group of galactic killers have managed to get the charges dropped in a case that might be the greatest unsolved massacre in history. Involved are two high-profile families of troublemakers, both of them familiar to anyone who loves popular entertainment.

The facts:

The Culprit

65 million years ago, an enormous explosion wiped out everybody in the famously lizard-like Dinosauria family. These were nasty characters whose offenses against plants, animals and each other, but especially against scientists, have been well documented in prehistoric-themed movies, with particular honors going to Jurassic Park.

For the past few years it has been suspected that this explosion and the ensuing global calamity was the work of one or more members of the Baptistina family, a rogue cluster of asteroids once described “aimless chunks of useless metal” known for their propensity to fall violently on unsuspecting planets and their moons.

According to the oft-repeated story, friction, infighting and outright collisions within the Baptistina family led to a violent split, sending certain members of the tightly knit clan into a headlong exile outside the comfortable orbit that had marked their brutal existence for so many years.

One of the renegade Baptistinas is said to have flown so far off course in its blind rage that it crashed into the only home the Dinosaurias had ever known, causing a huge dust cloud that fouled the atmosphere and choked off sunlight for eons, and leading to the death of every Dinosauria in the place, which was a lot.

But now the asteroid-loving excuse-makers at NASA say the Baptistina break-up happened 80 million years ago, too late to allow for one 6 to 9 mile wide disgruntled ex-Baptistina to go on a Dinosauria killing rampage as soon as 65 million years ago.

“The demise of the dinosaurs remains in the cold case files,” said Lindley Johnson, program executive for the Near Earth Object (NEO) Observation Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “The original calculations with visible light estimated the size and reflectivity of the Baptistina family members, leading to estimates of their age, but we now know those estimates were off.”

I have no idea what Lindley Johnson is talking about, but I think at least one of the Baptistinas had the means (they’re huge and suicidal) and the motive (dinosaurs are incredibly ugly). But did they have the time? As for sequencing, I think it’s easy to under-guess how far an annoyed asteroid can go in 15 billion years.

But apparently no one is going to prosecute any Baptistinas from here on out.

“We are working on creating an asteroid family tree of sorts,” said Joseph Masiero, the lead author of the study. “We are starting to refine our picture of how the asteroids in the main belt smashed together and mixed up.”

Yes, asteroids getting smashed together is definitely the problem. All sorts of reckless things begin to sound like a good idea when you are an asteroid who has had one too many bumps. Don’t close the book on this, NASA! They’re hiding something!

The most annoying miscarriage of justice you can recall?

Uncategorized

If a Xylophone Falls in the Forest …

56 Comments

A friend sent this video. I find it fascinating that people will go to such lengths to create something unique. I admit I’m impressed by the patience and craftsmanship on display here. But the question that kept coming back to me while I watched was “why?” Think of skill required and the time invested. The music has been performed more beautifully by others – this is a glorified player piano in the woods, admittedly inspired and visually delightful, but there has to be another reason.

And there is. You’ll see it at the end.

So all this careful planning and detailed effort was really about creating a trap to capture your attention. And the ultimate goal was to get you to feel an irresistible urge to own a cellphone that looks like a big wooden kidney bean. The marketing strategy was to amaze people so they would start sharing the video online, and it worked! At least I passed it along to you, and you may share it with someone else, so I guess we fell for it completely. But I’m unashamed. Really, whether the purpose is creating great art or simply moving the product, I admire the work that went into turning this wild idea into something real.

Here’s another video showing some of the behind-the-scenes activity.

Are you an idea person, or the one who brings that idea to life?
Or is it possible to be both?

Uncategorized

Happy Hensonday!

63 Comments

Today is Jim Henson’s birthday, which should be a national holiday where we get out our heavy old socks, decorate them with fringe, buttons and felt, stick our hands inside and start acting out stories.

I love it that he was drawn into puppeteering as a way to get into television, discovered the possibilities in textiles as part of a college class and wound up graduating from the University of Maryland with a degree that was not in communications or theater, but home economics. I wonder if his parents ever asked “what are you going to do with THAT?”

Henson was born in Mississippi in 1936. He would have been 75 today.
Google is observing the date by giving you a chance to animate their famous logo.

Here’s a look at some of Jim Henson’s work, as if you aren’t already familiar with it. The clip does point out something amazing about Henson’s fabric creations and the comic sensibility that brings time to life – namely how lasting these creations are. Is there any question that Kermit the Frog will outlast everyone alive today?

Henson argued that the frog was a lot more interesting than the guy with the beard, but we know that’s simply not true. Still, it is quite remarkable how easily we can look past the human with his arm up the back of a character.

There is something fascinating about an assemblage of talking felt.

Your favorite Muppet?

Poems

Ready, Set, Go!

77 Comments

The news from the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), Large Hadron Collider near Geneva and the Gran Sasso National Laboratory in Italy that they have measured particles traveling faster than the speed of light is certainly exciting, puzzling news. We’re not sure exactly what position Einstein is in right now, but he might be turned on his head. The thought that something, anything, could travel faster than light, opens up a new frontier, which somehow got me thinking about one of my favorite sing-song poets, a bard of the vast unexplored spaces, Robert W. Service.

I looked over The Cremation of Sam McGee and The Shooting of Dan McGraw to get that rhythm in my head, and wondered what Service might do with the latest scientific scuttlebutt.

In the Gran Sasso, below rock and snow
that’s where scientists discern
measurements of speed as they keep a bead
on the stuff that’s launched from CERN.

The monotony generates ennui
in the physics racing game.
When the flag goes down they bestow their crown
on one candidate. The same.

It is always light that takes home the bright
shiny trophy they bestow.
Light is faster than any beast or man.
Light to win, to place, to show.

That’s the racing line set by Al Einstein,
who gauged E and MC’s burst
The result, said he, with great certainty
is that light MUST finish first.

Still the races ran with nary a fan
for each time just like the last
When results were shown, ‘twas already known
‘twas the light, by far, most fast.

Then one darkling day down along the way
came a stranger small but game
As he whizzed around it was quickly found
That Neutrino was his name

When he challenged light to a race that night
oh, the merriment was thick.
But when all was said the speed meters read
‘twas Neutrino, by a tic.

Oh, the hew and cry. The Italian sky
was vibrating with the din.
For no one could say what it meant the day
when light raced, but did not win.

In what area are you unbeatable?

Uncategorized

Ask Dr. Babooner

40 Comments

Dear Dr. Babooner,

My husband is totally wigged out by the irrational fear that he might die under a piece of the falling UARS (Upper Air Research Satellite) later this week. I told him the odds that the satellite would break up and come crashing down to earth on exactly the right trajectory to hit him in the forehead with a killing shot are, frankly, astronomical. He said the satellite was designed to be an astronomical object, so beating those odds would come naturally to it.

I didn’t think he really understood what I was saying, so I pointed out that his personal chance of being struck by a piece of debris is about one in several trillion. He pointed out that the satellite is a government object, and several trillion is like nothing to the government.

I told him there was no record of anyone ever being injured by a piece of falling satellite, and he said the government would have to make sure that any record of such a thing would certainly be erased. The fact that no record exists is, he says, sure proof that many injuries have already occurred.

Why doesn’t he worry about bad things that actually could happen, like snow blowing in under the broken front door that he said he would fix this summer, but didn’t?

Sincerely,
Possible UARS Widow

I told PUW that her husband, like most people, worries as a form of entertainment. Risk is a stimulant, and so is rage. As a government-hater, the remote but enticing possibility that this tax supported object will harm him provides your husband with an irresistible high. His body is producing waves of adrenaline every time he thinks about it. That problem with the front door, however, is a terrible downer, and any attempt he makes to fix it could end in failure. Thinking about Big Brother trying to kill him with a satellite is win-win. If it actually does take him out, it proves he was right all along. And if it misses him, it means he dodged a school bus sized bullet.

But that’s just one opinion. What do you think, Dr. Babooner?

Uncategorized

Classy Warfare

48 Comments

My favorite off-the-map Member of Congress, Loomis Beechly, is apparently dipping his toe in the presidential pool. Which only makes sense, since he represents all of Minnesota’s water surface area. He sent out this provocative e-mail late last night:

Greetings to all my 9th district constituents, and congratulations on once again making it to that time of year when all the visitors go home and we have the beautiful waters of Minnesota to ourselves!

It is encouraging to see the success that one member of my state’s congressional delegation, Michele Bachmann, is having on the national political stage. True, a lot of the pundits are saying she’s a bit careless with the facts and the scuttlebutt is that her campaign is on the decline, but the truth of the matter is this: they’re still talking about her! As long as you’ve got that, you’ve got a chance.

But the main thing you have to do when you’re running for the top office is show people you have serious, common-sense, popular ideas for fixing all the things that are wrong with our country! Bachmann is great on presence and passion, but she’s lacking a plan.

Congressman Beechly reaches out to floaters in his district

I don’t have her fiery attitude and camera-ready hair, but I do have a great strategy to get us past the horrible, agonizing “tax the rich” vs. “no new taxes” show down we went through in Minnesota this past summer and are about to re-live on a national, (some would say nuclear) scale.

My idea?

Tax happy people.

That’s it. That’s my whole plan.

Happy people should pay through the nose to get us out of this mess. This works much better than “tax the rich” because wealthy people fight back and they have the means to win every time. Happy people, by contrast, come from all points along the economic spectrum and while some of them might have the resources to mount a counter-attack against a new tax burden, why would they waste their time? Clearly they’ve got something special going on in their lives – something that makes them happy. Better to concentrate on that than to ruin your day by thinking about stuff the government is doing!

Some will say this idea doesn’t have a chance because Tea Party Republicans will oppose any tax of any kind on anyone. Possibly. But what I see developing is an endless confrontation where the two sides try to shift most of our financial burden onto the strongest supporters of the other side. Democrats want the bill to be picked up by well-to-do Republican donors. Republicans want loyal Democrats in organized labor and education to shoulder the burden. Tea Party Republicans? I don’t know what they want, but I’m pretty sure that none of them are happy. So if they could be convinced to support any form of new revenue, the “Happy Tax” has the best chance with them.

Who are the happy? I think we all know. And really, let’s face it. Nobody who is paying attention to the state of the world today cares very much for happy people. Their buoyant spirits just make us angry, so let’s tax them to the hilt! Chances are, they’ll keep on smiling.

I’m not saying this great idea qualifies me to be president. But you may say it if you wish, even though it most definitely will not make me happy.

Sincerely,

Loomis Beechly
Your Congressman

Great plan, but how could we measure taxable happiness?

Uncategorized

Buddy Photo

44 Comments

Yesterday was the anniversary of the taking of this photo, snapped from the Voyager spacecraft in 1977. It shows Earth and its moon – the first photograph ever taken with both in the same frame.

Imagine, these two celestial bodies, linked forever in a gravitational embrace, but never photographed side-by-side.

That is, unless you count that time they went clowning around in the photo booth at Dayton’s Arcade in downtown Minneapolis.

It was a spur-of-the-moment thing. They’d been orbiting Block “E” for much of the day, feeling tired and a little goofy, when some people came out of the booth laughing. Earth happened to have a couple of quarters in her pocket, and she thought, ‘why not’?

There’s something about that photo booth environment that makes the pictures taken there more memorable than most of those high-buck, carefully posed portraits.

Maybe it’s the built-in incentive to mug for the camera. After all, you gave up your pocket change for this and the shutter is going to click whether you’re ready or not, so you might as well do something to make it look like you’re having fun!

The Voyager photo cost more – lots more. Bazillions. And it is an amazing, historic image. But there is an icy distance to it that simply couldn’t exist in the close confines of the photo booth. If it’s a buddy picture you want, something full of warmth and fun, the photo booth is where you want to be.

Describe a favorite photo of you with a friend or a relative – where was it taken and how did it come about?

Uncategorized

Lovesick Blues

102 Comments

Today is the birthday of Hank Williams in 1923. He only recorded 66 songs under his own name in the short time between his emergence at age 25 and his death at 29. Thirty seven of those recordings became hits. That’s 56% – a hit-to-miss radio that I suppose will never be equalled. It amazes me that I can sit here in 2011 and at my leisure call up Hank Williams to perform one song on video while he is heard singing another. I doubt that Hank could have imagined such a result when he stood in the studio and looked into the glassy eye of that TV camera.

The Hank story is one of the saddest among the endless volumes of tragedy that fill music’s dark library of biographies. Near the end he was drugged, in pain and unreliable – missing show dates and losing his gig with the Grand Ol’ Opry, singing in beer halls in Texas and Louisiana.

Hank Williams had a great talent. He made the Lovesick Blues famous, though it’s one of the few songs he did that he didn’t write. If he had managed to hold things together, he could have had a much longer career but probably not the same legendary profile.

It’s odd how well we remember the ones who crash and burn.

Live long and stay obscure. Die young and be remembered. Your choice?

Uncategorized

City of Democrats

65 Comments

Today’s guest post is by Barb in Blackhoof.

I have fond memories of listening to TLGMS In the barn. While milking, I would sing (and sometimes dance) along to many of the songs. “City of Democrats” la, la, la. Wow. How strange that there’s actually a city of democrats. Pretty cool, huh? Hmmm.

How many times have you been singing a song for years, with lyrics that you figured were correct, only to find out that you had mistaken? For example, Dale and Mike were playing “City of Immigrants” (by Steve Earle) not city of democrats. Drat. I had already made plans to move the herd.

There are a lot of songs for which I have my own lyrics, I guess. I don’t hear so well. But it wasn’t until John Prine (at a concert in Duluth) spoke of “mondegreens” in an intro to one of his songs, that I learned there was a term for these mis-heard lyrics. John said a fan requested a song that was her favorite – “It’s a happy enchilada and you think you’re gonna drown. That’s the way that the world goes ’round.” The actual lyrics go: “It’s a half an inch of water, and you think you’re gonna drown.” This is a very common phenomenon – and not a terribly new one.

Sylvia Wright coined the term “mondegreen” in a 1954 Atlantic article. As a child, young Sylvia had listened to a folk song that included the lines “They had slain the Earl of Moray/And Lady Mondegreen.” As is customary with misheard lyrics, she didn’t realize her mistake for years. The song was not about the tragic fate of Lady Mondegreen, but rather, the continuing plight of the good earl: “They had slain the Earl of Moray/and laid him on the green.” (this paragraph from Mondegreens: A Short Guide by Gavin Edwards.)

And if you really want a good chuckle, look at the columns by Jon Carroll – an example: “Cleaned a lot of plates in Memphis, pumped a lot of Tang down in New Orleans?”

And here are some of mine….. can you guess the correct words and artist?
Oh, a Tree in Motion (from my teen-age, little teeny transistor radio)
Solid Citizen (this one is way off and very embarrassing)
Salivate, Salivate, Dance to the Music (this one is pretty easy)

Have you got a favorite mondegreen?