Ronnie James Dio and James Hetfield, I'm sorry.

I’ve been revisiting Metallica and Ronnie James Dio era Black Sabbath lately.  It’s like discovering them for the first time.  What the hell have I been missing?  It’s been great.  I’m just kind of embarrassed I didn’t like them at the time.  I never appreciated Ronnie James Dio and James Hetfield like I should have.  I was blinded to Ronnie’s genius by my loyalty to Ozzy era Black Sabbath.  And Slayer always cast a shadow over James Hetfield and Metallica.  But this stuff is great.  James Hetfield is as much a riff lord as anyone, and Ronnie is a better singer than Ozzy. 

While my like or dislike of them doesn’t make any difference to them, I just wanted to publish this open letter type blog post to say I’m sorry, and that I never should have doubted you guys.  

Manhattan Bike Lanes

My thoughts on bike lanes in Manhattan are pretty simple.  I think bike lanes slow you down and they funnel you into danger zones.  It’s a lot safer learning how to ride a bike in traffic than riding in those things. 

On the other hand, I can’t stand it when someone blocks the bike lane or uses it incorrectly.  Bike riders have so little space already that it infuriates me when what little space we have is abused. 

I’m assuming this is the same for the other bores, but I never go there.  

Podcast Horror -- Milgram Experiment Edition

I was listening to a podcast and the guest at one point confused the Stanford Prison Experiment with the Milgram experiment. 

“Wait! Something’s wrong!  He mixed up the experiments!” I said.

But it was a podcast.  It was recorded.  They couldn’t hear me.

What the hell was I going to do?

Thank god, the responsible host made the correction.  What a relief!  I wonder how long I would have agonized over that.

The guest knew the difference.  He just said the wrong name.  

Anyway, this could have turned out way worse.

The First Time a Woman Ever Spoke to Me at The Gym

    At my chain gym there’s a hack squat machine next to a leg press machine.  I was going for the hack squat machine.  I was intercepted by a weird Russian lady who hopped on to the hack squat machine.  

Okay.

She then asked me how it worked.

So I explained it to her.

And that was the first time in all the years that I’ve been going to the gym that a woman spoke to me.

More Moms and Scooters

    Please see my previous post.  https://hesjustoneguy.blogspot.com/2021/10/moms-and-scooters-and-kids-oh-my.html?zx=2c1d9b565ec9fedb

I saw that stupid bitch again!

At approximately the same time as the last time,  as I approached the  intersection of 41^st and 6^th,  I saw hordes of CitiBike riders hurtling toward the intersection, and a truck about to make that turn across their path.  Then along comes that same fucked up irresponsible bitch and her poor child, heading straight into death.  

Again, everyone survived, but damn it makes me nervous to see all of these folks forced to ride in a bike path funneling them to the death zone.  

Moms and Scooters and Kids -- Oh my!

It wasn’t the first time I saw a mother riding an electric scooter with a child stashed between herself and the handlebars.  This time they were heading up the 6^th avenue bike lane, which is on on the left side of the street.  I’m walking perpendicular to them on 41^st street, which goes east west, so I’m approaching from their left.   

Wouldn’t you know a box truck was rolling past them to make the left turn, which cuts right across the bike lane?  That truck looked like it wanted to suck the hapless riders under its wheels.

I started  to panic.  

“No, no, no, no, no,” I uttered. 

I thanked the gods that the woman slowed down and the truck had plenty of time to pass them and make the turn, and she and the kid were able to make it through the intersection.  

“What the fuck is wrong with that cunt?”  Was my first question.  

“Is this legal?” Was my second question.  And something must be pretty bad if I’m asking if something’s legal.  

I guess men aren’t the only ones capable of reckless stupidity.  

I will now go find out if there are any laws against this and if there is anything I can do about it — which is, again, completely unlike me.

Sophie

 I was walking past a little daycare center housed in a typical Hoboken brownstone. Children were sitting around a picnic table in the front yard “engaged in an activity.” That is I couldn’t tell what they were doing.

I overheard a gentle giant of a man — you know the type — like why is this gigantic long haired medieval looking guy caring for children? — telling Sophie, pretty sure that was her name, that there’s “No need to get that upset.”

Immediately I thought, “Sophie, there is a very good god damn real reason to be that upset.”  I’m sure the gentle giant’s soothing entreaties were only making her more irate.  

I don’t know what was making her upset.  But what made me upset was someone telling her to not be upset.  I know I don’t like being told how to feel.  Ultimately, we all suffer alone.  It’s better if those around us just keep their mouths shut.  

So, Sophie, you get as upset as you want.

Defeat

I guess I don’t know how to ride a bike anymore.

I was struggling up the Bayonne side of the Bayonne bridge. I mean just pedal, pedal, pedal; then stop and try to breathe and repeat. During one of the at least four breaks I took, an old woman, curly grey hair and all, rolls along side me and says, “Don’t stop on the bridge!” She was practically laughing at me. As she pulls away, I see the GoPro strapped to her helmet. Just great, this moment will also be captured on film, or whatever we call it now, forever.

I guess I need to learn how to ride a bike . . . .

Made in Britain

Made in Britain is a made for TV movie, directed by Alan Clarke, who also directed Scum. It stars Tim Roth in his first role as skinhead Trevor. It was released in 1982 in the heart of the whole skinhead revival thing. Or maybe the end.

Unlike other Made for TV movies, Made in Britain does not contain your normal morality arc. The movie opens with Trevor and his social worker being marched down various Brutalist hallways in some creepy court/administrative building in England. At the end of this long march, he is sentenced to a kind of home or boarding school to be observed until a final court date. You would imagine that in the following scenes, after some insincere attempts, and then missteps, he would come around and give up the criminal life. Nope. In the final scene, after getting hit on the knee by a real cop, instead of a friendly social worker, he just sits there in his cell smiling a psychotic smile after indicating he does not mind going to prison.

I liked Trevor’s support staff. Unlike my imagined, soulless civil servant, the staff charged with Trevor’s care, who were all men, were sincerely trying to to help him. One of them even took him to a demolition derby and allowed him to drive one of the cars. I felt more sympathy for them than for Trevor. Maybe that was the idea. I don’t even know if one is supposed to feel sympathy for Trevor.

If you want a slice of life, which this movie is touted as, of 1980s England juvenile justice system, you’ll get it here. Also if you like The Exploited, that is also here.

Vid Shot

My fiancé and I took an Uber to the Meadowlands Racetrack in New Jersey to get our first Covid vaccine shot.

When we got there I knew we had walked into a dystopian movie. I think any time a sports facility is repurposed you’re in a dystopian movie. When there’s army men. When you don’t know what anyone looks like and nobody knows what you look like. When you have tinnitus and everyone is wearing a mask and you can’t hear what anyone is saying. And there’s slogans everywhere. We have walked into a dystopian movie.

I decided to watch as they injected my fiance. I’m glad I went first. The needle is about an inch long. They shove that whole thing in. After two open heart surgeries, I did not know that the whole metal part was shoved in your arm. It’s not like an IV that travels parallel to your skin’s surface. It goes straight in. Perpendicular.

By evening my shoulder was sore as hell. I was not able to avoid the side effects, and now, once I get the second shot, I am sure I will be all feverish and weak, as others have described. Inescapable reality.

After the shot we went to the 15 minute self monitoring area. We couldn’t find seats next to each other. They were playing “People are Strange,” on the radio. I thought “Strange days.” They really are.

“Dancing Days” came on next. Are they here again?
The only upside to this mess is that the Mask (Uppercase Mask) interferes with government facial recognition. But we probably have that chip in us now. It’s hard to feel good about any of this. I read a report that somebody got

Covid the day after getting the vax. Everything about this situation seems mixed up and confused. There’s pro government people screaming, “Wear a fucking mask,” and “Stay the fuck home!” There’s anti government people, who I tend to agree with, who still seem suspect. Again, it’s hard to feel good about anything these days.

Your Onanism

 

So I get an email from this guy Rodel Needham. (Please see picture.) I don’t know who he is. His email address is kiliplacadab1985yahoo.com. Cool.

He proceeds to tell me that my device has been infected with his “Badware.” What? Malware? I guess that’s what he was going for.

Then there’s this gobbledygook about going through his message to the incontrovertible after-effects. Not too sure what this means even now. More gobbledygook about my domestic hobby, and some kind of vague threat that I will need my valuable time.

Now we get to the heart of the matter. He has recored my onanism using my camera. Okay. Who uses the word onanism, other than David Foster Wallace, who’s dead? So he recorded me jerking off? What camera did he use? My Instax? My Minolta? My Polaroid? The webcam on my computer? I would have noticed the green light.

He says he has blackmail material, exciting blackmail material. See his file below. Nope. Didn’t open the file.

I blocked this clown.

That was the end of that.

And so what if he shows my parents a video of me jerking off? I’m pretty

sure that ten or 20 years ago I accidentally sent a porno clip to my father called Asian Bra Busters. He never said anything about it. I’m sure that’s how we would deal with any other unpleasant material going forward.

Fuck you Rodel!

Desolation Angels

This year I wanted to read lesser known books by authors who seem to be famous for mainly one book. For example, Jack Kerouac is known primarily for On The Road. The decision to read Desolations Angels, came to me when I was riding my bike in a desolate industrial zone in New Jersey, (maybe all of New Jersey is a desolate industrial zone . . . . ) and the I kept thinking, “Man, this is desolate.” And then the title, Desolation Angels, popped into my head.

Desolation Angels has a different feel than on the road. It covers the the time around the publication of On The Road, but it was written later in Kerouac’s life and close to the time of his death. It is a book by an older Keroak, looking back on his life with some regret and a lot of melancholy.

The first “Desolation” chapters about Kerouac’s stay on Desolation Peak were impressionistic and maybe difficult to follow. How do you write about being by yourself for weeks on end? The book takes on a more standard narrative as it progresses through America and beyond. There are a lot of locations and many of the usual characters. If you can get through the first chapters, it gets easier.

I read On The Road in my late teens. While I didn’t hop in a car and go for a cross country drive, I did think it was cool. Now having read Desolation Angels, I am middle aged, older than Kerouac was when he died, and find myself also looking back, wondering what the hell it all means.

Metal Squares

  I may be just writing this to test out the compile function

of Scrivener.

     I have been stuck on my review of Desolation Angels for

weeks, so here is something.

    There are many sub genres of Metal Music; Death, Black, Heavy, Speed . . . the list goes on. In order to simply things, I have determined, based on my lengthy observations, that there are different kinds of Metal music which can be visualized by the Metal Square. A Metal Square has four squares inside it.  So like a box with a cross in it.

The first kind of metal is Understandable Metal. A great example is Iron Maiden. You can understand everything the singer, Bruce Dickinson or Paul Di'Anno, is saying. This square is in the upper left hand corner.

In the upper right hand corner, is Not Understandable Metal. Early Eyehategod is a good example. You know Mike Williams is singing, but you don't know what he is singing. The next two squares deal with the bass guitar. On the

lower left hand corner is Metal in which the bass guitar is discernible. For a fantastic example, we once again look to Iron Maiden. Every note Steve Harris plays is completely clear.

On the lower left, we have Bass Guitar that we would notice if it was removed from the mix, but you can't really hear it as a separate and distinct instrument. Listen to Slayer for this one. There are minor exceptions, but for the most part when the band is going full on, you can't make out separate and distinct bass notes.

In conclusion, All metal bands inhabit two of the Metal Squares. Iron Maiden would be Understandable Metal, and Articulated Bass Metal. Slayer would be Understandable Metal, Unarticulated Bass Metal. The next time listen to a Metal song, see for yourself, which of the Metal Squares it inhabits.

As an additional note, Scrivner may not be the preferred tool for this sort of writing.

The White Album

I’m pretty sure I’ve already stated on Twitter or maybe Facebook that London Calling is better than The White album, by the Beatles.  Wanted to say fuck you to the baby boomers.  But is the Clash and original punk any less boomer than the White Album?

So I got to thinking, “What is Gen X’s White Album?”

And then I got to thinking, “What is my White Album?”  I mean my personal white album?  And does everyone have a White Album? Especially since the death of the album in popular music?

That’s as far as I’ve gotten on this.

More to come, maybe.  

Wade In The Water

Great little movie I found on Amazon.  

It's about a loner who winds up on the vengeance path and then the path to redemption, and how childhood abuse hurts everyone.  

Not at all smarmy.  Just a compelling story with no fluff.  Check it out.  

Plastic Bags and Good Coworkers

Cat owners and clumping litter.  If you’re one, you probably know about the other.  You probably know about using plastic shopping bags from the grocery store, and other stores, to put the clumps of urine and desiccated feces in before placing in your garbage can.  If you’re from H***** you know that these same bags have been unconstitutionally outlawed.  And how everyone was gleefully jerking each other off when this happened.  What the shit are we cat owners supposed to do now?  

After hearing me complain about my treatment by the tyrannical H**** government, they have begun to bring me their plastic bags.  I save them in a drawer till I have a lot and then I bring them home.  Where I fill them with clumps of urine and desiccated feces.  And then I add them to the H***** garbage system.  

If we work together we can fight unjust systems.  And in this case win.  Soon they’ll ban plastic shopping bags in New York.  But we’ll get smarter, and we’ll fight harder, making sure this plastic bag arms race ends in either mutual destruction or the birth of a more just society.  

Changed By Tom Cantor

When you received an unsolicited book in the mail you read it.  One of my sort of rules in life is to occasionally read a completely random book, a found book.  So you have to actually find a book.  Maybe you see one on the discount table and just like the title, and knowing nothing about it or the author, you just buy it for $2.50 and read it.  Maybe it comes to you in the mail.  In this instance the book was Changed, by Tom Cantor, mailed to me for no reason.  I read it.  

This book was pure crap printed on glossy paper.  The author was a typically rebellious kid and screwed around some as a young man.  That and the rape of his wife, who he though would make him a cleansed man, his terminology, made him feel bad about himself.  So even though he was Jewish, he turned to Jesus.  Completely idiotic.  There, I’ve saved you from having to read this shit.

Also he mentions a person who was in the Gestapo and the SS.  Seems unlikely.

So despite the bad review, if you get this slick dog shit in the mail, read it.

Run Over By A Paralyzed Dog

I saw this in my notes, and said, “Whatever this is, I’m gonna finish it.”

Then I had to remember why I made this note.

It came to me.

I was walking down the street and a dog who was paralyzed and in one of those paralyzed dog contraptions, ran over my foot.

I think it was a pug.

The owner was apologetic.  

I said I didn’t mind.

How often do you get run over by a paralyzed dog?  

The Children of Times Square

 “An alienated teenage boy runs away from home and ventures to New York City where he falls in with a gang of juvenile delinquents working as drug dealers and pickpockets for a shady crime boss.”  Quoted from IMDb — https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090829/

That’s it.  That’s what the movie is all about.  Except they aren’t pickpockets.  

Some observations.  

There is great footage of New York in the 80’s.

Our hero, Eric Roberts, not to be confused with the actor, lives the TV perfect life in Pennsylvania.  He wants to go see his favorite band, The Raybops, (If you’re looking for a band name, please take note.)  His step father insists he stay home to babysit his toddler stepbrother.  Of course Eric sneaks out to see the concert.  At the concert the band is announced, all the kids jump up and scream . . . Cut.  We never get to hear the band. I really wanted to hear The Raybops.  

There is another young man, who’s house burns down, forcing him and his family to stay in a welfare hotel.  He also joins the gang of juvenile delinquents.  During one of his scenes, he comes home after a successful day of delivering cocaine packets around 1980’s New York.  As he’s getting into bed, a giant roach, American Cockroach, is seen descending the wall behind his bed.  That is realism.  Did the director plan that and place the roach on the wall, or was that a happy accident?

One of the juvenile delinquent kids wears a belt around his head.

It is Courtney Gains’ first role, confirmed by my extensive Wikipedia research.  He was in it for not more than thirty seconds, and his face was barely visible.  I jumped up and said, “Wait!  It’s that guy!  In all the movies!”  

It is a made for TV movie.  I didn’t know that, until I began my research for this article.  

Final analysis: amazingly entertaining bad movie.