Friday, October 31, 2008

FREE PHIL SPECTOR'S WIG!* CA vs Phil Spector - GUILTY of 2nd Degree Murder! Don't punish a guiltless hairpiece!




Phil Spector's Wig began life in the jungles of west Africa - a lone surviving pup - after poachers illegally and cruelly killed its mother and litter-mates. Orphaned, cold and desperately thin, Phil Spector's Wig was found by a kindly National Park Ranger and given a home. Hand fed 4 times a day with bottles of goat's milk, Phil Spector's Wig was raised as human hair for three years before it became too large to continue to live in the tiny forest quarters of the Ranger. Trading the caged hair for the equivalent of $40 American, Phil Spector's Wig was seperated from a loving environment for the second time in its short life.



The next five years were a blur of animal traders, zoos and carnival side shows - a parade of cages and handlers that seemed to reawaken the wild yearnings of the seemingly tamed beast . At long last Phil Spector's Wig came to rest in a habitat at the L.A. Zoo, sharing the space with Burt Reynold's 1970s Fill-In-The-Blank, an Eva Gabor Fall and three of Shatner's Early Rugs.

It was at this time that Phil Spector's Wig was seen by the legendary music producer's stylist. Ageing, dry and in need of an all-over blunt trim, Phil Spector's Wig was bought for an undisclosed sum and quietly removed from the Zoo's collection. After six months of aggressive moisturizing and rumored electro-shock treatments, Phil Spector's Wig initially appeared on his head shortly before Mr. Spector was put on trial for the murder of Lana Clarkson replacing the hairpiece that had been a potential witness to her mysterious death.



In early court appearances, Phil Spector's Wig displayed the aggression of a beast long tamed against its will - it threatened to take over the trial and tip the scales of Justice against its Master. For this reason, it had to be beaten mercilessly into an obedient blonde Page-Boy where it sat for the four-plus months of the trial.



On Monday, April 13th, Phil Spector was found Guilty of the Second Degree Murder of Lana Clarkson. Should his Wig have been put on the stand in his defence? Just what did the hair see? We may never know. 

Free Phil Spector's Wig! I believe that slow exposure to the wild would make it possible to someday release Phil Spector's Wig to the jungle from which it was taken. Phil Spector's Wig could live the life that Nature intended, wild and free - no longer beaten down by relentless brushing and cruel triple-processing. Phil Spector's Wig could once again take its place among the jungle's apex predators.

Please join me in this moral quest. Make your voice heard with mine! Free Phil Spector's Wig!

*This message brought to you by epistleoftimothy & The Campaign to Free Phil Spector's Wig which are solely resposible for its content. Funding from the World Wildlife Foundation and the United Hairdressers of America Philanthropic Fund.

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

EVEN MORE FEAR!





In 1818 Mary Shelley unleashed FRANKENSTEIN, THE MODERN PROMETHEUS on the literary world. This Gothic cautionary tale warned of an Industrial Revolution spinning out of control. Man, mad with arrogance, dared to enter the realm of God - the creation of human life! Victor von Frankenstein cobbled together pieces and parts ("... now pieces is pieces, but parts is parts...") of discarded human remains to construct his monster. I've always thought he was particularly lucky to have found body parts of similarly sized men. Had he used Shaquille O'Neal's left leg and Nathan Lane's right leg the poor monster would have just spun counter-clockwise when it tried to move forward.

But I digress, my point was that Ms. Shelley warned of the horror of patchwork living creatures at a time when harvesting the DEAD to save the LIVING was a dread thought. Today, we can participate in a process thought noble and compassionate by simply indicating our willingness to be "harvested" on the back of our Drivers' License. In the last 60 years, medicine has saved countless lives by attaching pieces and parts from the dead (soooo pig! sometimes even from the dead of other species) to the sick and dying. Medical ethicists, philosophers and theologians struggled with early transplants - thinking them "a step too far" and evidence of Man's arrogant attempt to usurp God's power. Luckily, those arguments abated and settled themselves as the lives saved bore evidence of God's will for Medicine.

They have resurfaced, however, as we have begun to master the Human Genome and all of the potential industries that might flow from the application of our new Knowledge. Stem cells and genes are just smaller pieces and parts, really. We are only just glimpsing the "blueprint" of human life - yet already the ethicists, philosophers and theologians have begun their emotional,  moral hand-wringing. Have we, at last, gone "too far?" Will God smite us for our prideful folly? Is there no end to Man's Curiosity and the lengths to which he will go to apply cutting-edge Knowledge to improve all of our lives?

I for one, hope not.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

A RANT ABOUT FEAR.


FEAR! The GODZILLA franchise of films (god bless you TOHO Studios) symbolized, for the last half of the 20th Century, Man's struggle with the horror of nuclear war.


The monster mutant - created by the remorseless H-bomb experimentation of the world's superpowers - grew out of Japanese cultural consciousness as a dark-lampoon excorcising their shared terror as the only NUCLEAR GROUND ZEROES ever. I ought to know, I wrote a paper about it in college.



Of course, I also wrote a paper about the odd homo-erotic relationships between Superheroes and their same-sex sidekicks (Q: Boy Wonder, how do you separate the men from the boys in tights? A: Holy with a crowbar, Caped Crusader!) but that topic hardly ever surfaces in conversation.

FEAR! however, is inescapable for us humans. It is the PRIME first tier emotional response. In college Psych courses I learned how FEAR! grips our lizard-brain and massages out a whole host of hormones for the classic FIGHT or FLIGHT response of all animals. As I've aged and pondered the nature of human fear (I've had some painfully dull decades) it occurred to me that for our sick twist of a species, the response is really FIGHT, FLIGHT or LIE LIKE A RUG!



Were Adam and Eve kicked out of Paradise for eating the fruit of the forbidden TREE OF KNOWLEDGE or for lying about how they were set up and tricked into doing it? Free-will made them God-like and the second they exercised it they started back-pedalling, denying that their choice was entirely their own. I bet it went down like this...

GOD: Adam? The apple? Huh?

ADAM: Eve made me do it! (Sorry guys, I don't see MEN diverting from the established Creation Myth.)

GOD: Oh, for the love of Mike..., Eve? Do tell?

EVE: Well, there was this serpent...and oh Hell, you made me curious gave me Free-will and told me there was only ONE THING I couldn't do here in all of Paradise? What's up with that? I'm pretty sure I was set up!

GOD: Excellent, Eve! You passed the test and may remain with me in Paradise for All Eternity. Adam, you are cast from the Garden and must till the soil, slaughter the animals you named and painfully squeeze out your offspring and die unforgiven. Oh, note to ME! Don't make Homosexuality an Abomination. It's Boy's Night Out on Earth Forever!




Okay, maybe not.


Ironically part of that which makes us God-like and separates us from fish and fowl is the ability to LIE when AFRAID. Try it! Catch a Toddler in the cookie jar or your Golden Retriever in the garbage can and only one of them will make up a story (either way you might need a towel for the floor.)

Monday, October 13, 2008

October Surprise - From An Anonymous Source Within The McCain Campaign



Barack Obama - soon to be King Of Earth - has agreed to meet WITHOUT PRE-CONDITIONS with MASTER CYLINDER-King Of The Moon!




These unprecedented talks are aimed at ending the centuries old conflict between the MOON MEN and America's Favorite Feline Defender FELIX THE CAT!



The talks center around control of the MAGIC BAG OF TRICKS that Felix uses to thwart the MOON MEN.




This technology was recently leaked to MASTER CYLINDER by the bags inventor THE PROFESSOR and his henchman ROCK-BOTTOM.


The leak was revealed by THE PROFESSOR's nephew POINDEXTER after hours of interrogation by CIA and Army Intelligence.


Rumors of "water-boarding" have been vigorously denied by spokesmen for the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the current Administration.

Sunday, October 5, 2008

HOLY BATM-ANIME, BATMAN!?

Or Someone say ZAP! or ZOWIE! please! 

from the PRESS RELEASE:

Batman: Gotham Knight was headed by an impressive list of directors who have brought their distinctly different anime styles to the classic Batman character. The production was divided among three renowned studios – Studio 4C, Production I.G and Madhouse – and included the truly inimitable visions of directors Shojiro Nishimi, Futoshi Higashide, Hiroshi Morioka, Yasuhiro Aoki and Toshiyuki Kubooka.

With stories written by several of the most talented writers of film, comic books, and animation, including Academy Award-nominated screenwriter Josh Olson (A History of Violence), David S. Goyer (Batman Begins), Emmy-winner Alan Burnett (Batman: The Animated Series), Jordan Goldberg (Associate Producer, The Dark Knight), and award-winning comics writers Greg Rucka and Brian Azzarello, Batman: Gotham Knight presents thrilling new adventures of Batman that spotlight several of Gotham City’s most dangerous villains, including the fearsome Scarecrow, the freakish Killer Croc and the unnerving marksman known as Deadshot.


For the record, I am not an anime hater. More specifically I think the anime classic AKIRA (Katsuhiro Otomo 1988) is one of the finest films I have ever viewed. In fact, I'm terrified that it will be live-actioned into mediocrity - the impact of the hand drawn animation is SO compelling.

But I come not to praise AKIRA, but to bury BATMAN:GOTHAM KNIGHT. 

First and most annoying-ly - who the hell is this moppy-haired prissy-mouthed twink below? Certainly not Bruce Wayne, billionaire industrialist man about town? Not even young Bruce in my universe. How would he ever get all of that beach bum hair into a cowl?



Oh, I see. You give his cape and cowl a cowl-neck. Like the sweaters Judith Light wore on Who's The Boss? In fact the rendering below also features shoulder pads ala Designing Women from the same sad era of television fashion. If he had a Cliff Huxtable sweater he'd be wearing the 80s trifecta.



Thankfully, some of the animation teams chose the traditional black and gray. No armor, no wings, no rubber suits with nipples (sorry George Clooney) - oy!



On balance, however, I found more anime conventions than Caped Crusader. Why even bother wearing a utility-belt if - instead of reaching for it - things can just suddenly appear in your hand? Your trunks will hold your tights up, Bat-dude! If it doesn't DO anything it's an accessory-belt. 



I'm certain the attempt was for an edgier, younger, darker Dark Knight but it fails in the opinion of this long-time Bat-maniac. And the claim that this somehow bridged the space between Begins and Dark Knight is silly. One of the stories was a re-imaging of an Alan Burnett script from BATMAN:The Animated Series where the differing POVs of some urban tweens result in "Batmen" who fly, wear armor, drink blood, eat quiche, blah blah blah. I liked it better the first time. The others feature a cast of characters that I have enjoyed more in the Saturday Morning animated versions. And uh... JOKER?  



I'm glad I waited to watch this on Cartoon Network instead of buying my own copy. Do yourself a favor. Skip this 'toon and buy a copy of AKIRA if you want animation with edge, pathos and well, the ubiquitous tousled-haired twinks.

Friday, October 3, 2008

Dear Mr. T. Boone Pickens,


Boone Pickens 75 years ago


I think your idea for alternative fuels for America and an end to foreign oil dependence ROCKS! Never would I have dreamed that I would see eye to eye with an 80 year old Texas Oil Billionaire but the Universe is huge and Irony rules.