However Coyly

More Episodes You May Have Missed

2007-02-12T16:00:00.000-05:00

No Accordions

2007-02-12T15:39:00.000-05:00

Episodes You May Have Missed

2007-02-12T15:14:00.000-05:00

Country Health

2006-12-07T17:32:00.000-05:00

Old Farmers' Health and Remedy

(combined with Popular Rural Disease)

Fall, 1938

Vol. XVIVIXVIIIX, No. 4

Twenty-five cents the issue. (Slightly higher south of the Mississippi.)

"Live for today, pay tomorrow -- and Eternity awaits the wise man."

-Otis T. Raspberry I (1869-1883), our Founder

Edited by Otis T. Raspberry III

In Today's Monthly Quarterly:

The Miracle of Depression

Death or insolence: which would you choose?

The miraculous ovarian diet, and how it has revolutionized dementia.

AIDS and Your Closest Cousins

"Bend over and cough"? Not on your life.

The truth behind the facts of Alto-Intoxicant Desperation Syndrome.

The Secret Life of Beef Fats

Deep-fried cow, alkalinity, and immortality:

What the Revenuers don't want you to know, and how.

Choose the S-x of Your Next Child

The wisdom of the Kamaah Sutrah

and spontaneous natural nutrients.

Intelligence Through Regularity

What those "geniuses" aren't telling us about our habits:

Achieving Natural Science on a few pennies a day.

Raising the Dead at Midnight

It's not the incantations; it's the nightly exercise.

Why animal sacrifice is just as important when the sun goes down.

Milk For Infants? Try Whale Blubber

The orthopsychopathic secret of The Shakers:

How common household objects contribute to fatter babies.

Molecular Dispersion Recipes No. 12

Oat meals -- "No grain, no pain."

The Aztec secret of longevity through Faith.

The Machine in the Ghost in the Machine

2006-11-13T14:05:00.000-05:00

All talking! All singing! All construction! No questions entertained from the floor! Great with snacks! No techno!

Woodwalk II

2006-11-02T23:54:00.000-05:00

Yes, we're once again appealing to our small but unifluential artistic community to drive the numbers on this video significantly above the zero views at which it now stands, or falls. WARNING: Those who are easily shocked, have significant nervous disorders or heart problems, or who are made queasy by the most explicitly graphic sexual materials -- will have no problem here. Note, if nothing else, original synth soundtrack, improvised by lightbulb on the qwertyuiop board with inferior softsynth. Thank you.

Prose will return to this site eventually. Keep those cards and letters to yourselves.

The Museum of Extraordinary Anomalies III

2006-09-25T21:01:00.000-05:00

The Museum of Extaordinary Anomalies, Part the Second

2006-09-19T14:50:00.000-05:00

The sequel they said couldn't be made. Were they right?

The Museum of Extaordinary Anomalies, Part the First

2006-09-18T11:35:00.000-05:00

Shameless Self-Promotion

2006-09-10T23:13:00.000-05:00

And this overlooked gem has logged up precisely one (1) viewing since September the first. At least we know that there is one high-minded, perceptive, discriminating, and possibly brainless viewer out there in Youtubia. If we're going to get this one into next year's Sundance Festival (greatly expanded, of course, and with a transparently fashionable theme added), we'll have to push those numbers up.

A Certain Darkness Prevails

2006-09-03T22:46:00.000-05:00

...in these stills, moving pictures, and odd exposures from the glory days of Bleak Manor.

Zero viewings on Youtube at the time of this posting, so any traffic can't but be a marked improvement. However, potential viewers may wish to take warning from these sobering statistics.

And Every Word is True

2006-09-01T14:41:00.000-05:00

I've been tagged for the first time, by Searchie of all people, whom I'd thought was my friend. Well, you never know.

Because of the well-authenticated supernatural consequences of failing to follow through when tagged, I reluctantly offer the following.

1. One book that changed your life

Perfectly Ghastly Ways You Can Die From Utterly Normal Sexual Activities, Illustrated (1954), by Felix Grebbin Nichtveldt, Ph.D.

Found this in the house we'd just moved into, well-thumbed, with illegible annotations in fountain pen, many with exclamation points and arrows, smelling of mold, and terribly stained. I had to sound out many of the words, and didn't understand many of them, and I thought the narrative pace sadly lacking -- until I stumbled on the photographs, underneath each of which was a simple yet effective warning.

A few days later, after the nausea and fever subsided, my parents, unaware of the book, decided to give me the first of what was to prove to be a great many (and constantly evolving, with contradictions ignored) explanations of "where babies come from." I knew better, and at what cost. I never believed anything they told me again.

Subsequently, I lived in the cellar for six months and wouldn't emerge despite entreaties and threats, and even bribes. It was "a phase," they decided, and I had finally to leave to attend first grade.

Although my disquiet at the world I now found myself in diminished somewhat after a few years, my anxieties were provoked anew at the onset of puberty, which was decidedly something I'd hoped to avoid. This was real trouble, I knew.

From then on, I based my entire life around the avoidance of any sort of sensual invitation to lasting torment, for the most part effectively, as I am still alive, and the worst symptoms have passed me by. Unlike others I could mention.

I guess you could say this book changed my life. I've tried to find another copy in the years since, and it's not even listed in the Library of Congress, nor, despite vast research, have I been able to find any reference to it anywhere. This is passing strange.

2. One book you have read more than once

The House at P-- oh, all right. The Nichtveldt book. A few dozen times, truth to tell.

3. One book you would want on a desert island

The Nichtveldt book, definitely.

4. One book that made you laugh

Love and Sex in Plain Language (1964.)

5. One book that made you cry

Oh, The Nichtveldt book. For six months in the cellar. To start with.

6. One book you wish you had written

Satan, Pain, and the Universal Order: A Ritual Inquest, Anonymous (1957.) From stylistic clues and internal evidence, I infer that the author was F.G. Nichtveldt, although parts may have been written by his then-mistress, Lola Fahrenheit, horribly murdered by persons unknown in 1959.

7. One book you wish had never been written

The Joy of Sex.

8. One book you are currently reading

Kama Sutra/Necronomikon: Hidden Convergences, by Ford Gaskin Nightfall, Ph.D.

9. One book you have been meaning to read (AKA The Omnivore’s Dilemma)

Panties in Love, a novel by Fahrenheit Gustav Naughtliffe.

10. Now tag five people.

I don't know five people.

"Oh, one of these. Let's go to the lobby."

2006-08-30T13:56:00.000-05:00

Nor The Claverings, although it is perhaps thematically closer.

It's Alive!

2006-08-28T11:58:00.000-05:00

I realize that I vowed to write something "every day or two," even if only a single sentence. It would appear that I overestimated my capacity -- or lied. But I think that the sentences you are now reading, if you've gotten this far, should bring us minimally up to date.

Overall Top Tracks

Overall Top Artists

Suicide Watch

2006-08-23T10:59:00.000-05:00

No, this is not a product to be marketed to Islamic extremists. Still less something to be confiscated at airports.

"Suicide Watch" is what I call the morning hours, and this is an example of my dark (yet hilarious!) sense of humor. (I hasten to assure anyone reading that I have never, ever attempted suicide, nor do I intend to do so in future. Temptations abound, to be sure, but responsibilities more than outweigh them.)

It begins when I awake in the morning, very first thing. I'm more thoroughly exhausted than when I went to bed the previous evening, my sleep has been disturbed by uninterrupted dreaming (most of their endless content being deeply disquieting), and the first thing I think is, Still alive. I hate this. I'm advised that this is not normal. (I am advised this about many things.)

The second thing I do is feel ill. I'd cite Sartre's nausee were it not for my revulsion at that penseur's pathological idiocy. Life, prior to any coherent thought, is a series of deeply unpleasant sensations, from my toes to the tip of my scalp. As the day proceeds, I will make some sort of adjustment for the dreadfulness of pure sensation. For now, waking, it's new, new for the millionth day. There are some things one never gets used to; I seem to have a lot of them.

The third thing I do is regret everything I did the day before, or failed to do. It's quite the indictment, and although I realize that on a realistic level it's banal and exaggerrated to the point of a Congressional inquiry combined with a Calvinist reprimand, this realization does not help. If I'm particularly impatient with yesterday's high crimes, I can move seamlessly into a condemnation of my entire life -- or what of it I remember. (Amnesia will be covered here later.) Most of this is sheer nonsense. (The rest is ambiguous. If left alone long enough within my self-feedback loop, I can turn a bland conversation with an acquaintance into the transcript of a war crimes tribunal, with myself in the glass booth.) The fact that this is nonsense is irrelevant to the process. My brain spurts endogenous neurotoxins even as my mind analyzes the absurdity of its own thoughts.

It passes. I take my medications, which may have a marginal effect (it's difficult to tell), I drink coffee, and I run out of energy. Self-indictment in its most inclusive form is too exhausting to maintain for more than a few hours. Later, I'll pass into a state of omnidirectional confusion, racing thoughts, and dark sensations throughout my peripheral nervous system. Suicide Watch provides certain bizarre recurring themes for this later period, but upheavals of thought are now reflexive, and the darkness all-encompassing. If I turn my mind to anything, anything at all, it will prove to be deeply discouraging, highly uncomfortable, conducive to despair, and direly pessimistic.

This will continue until l'heure bleue, when things will abruptly take a turn...for the worse.

What HAS He Been Listening to?

2006-08-22T19:45:00.000-05:00

UPDATE:

Weekly top artists==>>

Weekly top tracks==>>

Wednesday's Update: This bloody thing hasn't been working for nearly a day. So the list of "recently played" songs has vanished, along with the list of everything played. Meawhile, I'll leave this as a curiosity.

Le Chien Noir - ii

2006-08-22T19:42:00.000-05:00

Well, it's time to clean house, perhaps a bit late in the year, but it's not going to get any earlier.

I've been writing this blog for very nearly eighteen months, and during that time there has not been a topic, an interest, an approach, a style, a voice, a field of inquiry, or a minor genre that I have not tired of quickly. I've done parodies; I've written humorous verse; I've attempted personal essays; I've taken stabs at musical, literary, movie, and (curse the word) social criticism; I've written literary fragments of strange little fictions; I've drawn caricatures and cartoons; put together collages; gotten by on impromptu witticisms; sketched out various eclectic areas of knowledge, and of ignorance; written comic strips; commented snidely on trivial events of the day; worked at original art; and in recent months assembled primitive animations and videos.

All began in a burst of arbitrary, random energy that quickly dissipated. All ultimately bored. When techniques were new and fresh, and I still had discoveries to make, I persevered. When they settled into their neural pathways and became habits, they were mere techniques -- no more interesting than a game of solitaire, or a fairly simple crossword puzzle.

In the end, I barely wrote at all -- and writing was what I had set out to do. I lost interest in what I had to say. I wearied of the way I said it. I wondered if any of it were worth saying at all. I became mute. The blank page became an insurmountable obstacle. My output dribbled to a few posts a month, half of them videos of only marginal interest, the other half bland and uninspired.

These things are noticeable, of course. My once solidly double-digit readership (at best) declined to something approaching zero. And I found I didn't wish to have readers. Yet I couldn't quite bring myself to consign my blog to the flames. Before I had started it, I did precisely nothing. After I had started it, there were vast periods of the great nothing, inevitably. But there was also something. Which accumulated. Whether there was any overarching unity in the randomly scrawled bits is not for me to say. Somehow I think not. But there was something: Here, I do this, for better or for worse.

Now I'm beginning to write again. I don't much feel like it, but I am being enclosed by various other boredoms and bewilderments and misunderstandings and darknesses elsewhere. I've begun to feel I may as well talk about those; in truth, I have no other topic.

My topic, of course, is chronic unipolar depression, atypical variety. This means that, apart from early periods of self-medication, and brief later periods of medication by neuropsychiatrists, I have had nearly all of the standard symptoms of major depression. (In the few instances where I have not had them, I have been able to substitute something similar -- or worse.) If one disallows a period of a few years during which I had an unequivocally positive response to medication (all too rare), I have been depressed for nearly forty-five years. (Yes, I can pinpoint the onset, at age eleven, nearly to the day. Why did it happen, and so suddenly? I've come up with dozens of explanations -- all perfectly consistent with facts, all speculative and unfalsifiable.)

So I shall be writing about that now. I may not have much to say, but depression can be quite voluble when allowed to be. I do not do this as therapy, because I do not believe that writing is therapeutic, not in any verifiable medical sense, nor, for me, even in an intuitive, introspective sense. Writing about depression (as in talking about it) is in my experience quite as likely to worsen it as alleviate it, indeed more the former than the latter. Although I tend to be honest to a fault -- to many faults -- about my pain and endless failings, I have not found that honesty is often the best policy. We can't bear too much truth, and I less than most; but I also lack the means of defending against truth. (How I envy those, even among melancholics, who can shrug off the unpleasant. I see it. I always see it.)

I'll write, in brief, because I've painted myself into another corner. That's all right; sometimes, for years on end, there is no corner left.

I hope not to be glum. I hope to be interesting -- possibly even entertaining. I hope not to be needlessly... depressing. I even hope to be amusing. (Laughter and tears are, contrary to popular mythology, not far separated.) But I will write mostly about this...this thing.

I'm hoping to write once every day or two -- even if only a single sentence. But we shall see. All of a depressive's efforts tend to drift away into meaningless dark. This may be no different; indeed, I see no reason that it should be. But one must do something. Mustn't one?

Note: I'm opening these pages for comments, and we'll see how it works out. I'm not feeling terribly sociable these days, if not seeing anyone at all is any indication. My friend Searchie has chosen inaccessibility and anonymity in her sad and devastating and wonderful blog. I have no career, nor any future beyond a few moments at a time -- a day or two at most, if I have an a medical appointment or other intrusive demand on my empty time. But I also have nothing to lose.

Have at me, then, readers. If any.

UPDATE Wednesday, 12:45 p.m. -- I've decided against allowing comments on this topic, at least for the time being.

News Wire Service Recalls More Photographs

2006-08-08T12:22:00.000-05:00

Amid allegations that hundreds of news photographs "may have been subtly altered," Reuters News Service has withdrawn several hundred further controversial releases. Several are reproduced below, with original captions.

"Infamy of Zionist aggression reins terror and smokes on innocent women, childrens, while decadent Americans sip tea with raised pinky."

"Innocent womens in fear of life as infamy of Israeli aggression reign death, severed limb, much fire on peaceful village Beirut. Demon American president not reached for comment because was taking bubble bath with soiled women."

"Daylight attack on sleeping peaceful Beirut in infamy of rocket attack of Israeli Zionist coward army. Many many innocent citizen sleeping or taking quiet bath has terrible death and injuries as peaceful home blown to smithereen."

An Abstract Holiday

2006-08-03T12:40:00.000-05:00

Quite obviously superior to the merely veridical vacation experience. And cheaper by far.

Today's Dance Lesson

2006-07-31T12:44:00.000-05:00

Easy-to-follow lessons.

Annals of Modern Engineering

2006-07-25T12:45:00.000-05:00

(CLICK TO ENLARGE)

Commissioned in the public interest by an anonymous woman of mystery.

The Criminals Amongst Us

2006-07-19T16:00:00.000-05:00

(Click to enlarge - if you dare.)

We hope to print an unflattering portrait of the culprit in this actual offense, once the victim has brought the full force of justice to bear on this contemptible miscreant.

Moreover, Found Poetry

2006-06-26T06:30:00.000-05:00

NOTE: The following example of dadistic found verse derives, as usual, from what I term a "rider" to e-mail SPAM, the sort of semi-random verbal hodgepodge that seems to be inadvertently collected from web bulletin boards, especially when there is an attached file. Some of these are quite interesting; some are not. Many, as below, combine both qualities.

Apart from editing two such e-mails (in the order received, and evidently related in somwhat obscure fashion) into blank verse, using my tireless poetical instincts, I have taken no liberties with punctuation or grammar. Particularly striking are such phrases as "filled fill" (a cleverly paradoxical self-reference), "yellow companion" (quite a vivid image), "prison son" (which seems directly referential but could be an ambiguous psychological characterization of profound depth), the observation (posed as a question) concerning cant, "need mistress garden" (highly sexually evocative yet indirect), "near desire seven" (ditto), and "reached words hat ground (which seems to play upon dual meanings in the word "ground.")

Further observations, as well as detailed interpretations, are welcome.

drew among towards taken filled fill,
journey stay ought better parents book,
yellow companion talking however getting horses.
situation dark full favour,
miles got light
everyone gotten possible.

100% SAFE TO CLICK HTM

how studied showed forth.
prison son come favour if getting.
but intelligent handwriting wish did turning?
a added longer using appear.
companion independent inside meeting fill?
cant wanted reference?

need mistress garden
seize some immediate.
understand profession out ought.
away fill easy if remember.
independence fool place black.
if appear son horses really here.
near desire seven.

CLICK HTM

discuss bridge some teacher obliged.
taught ought person sugar use lot.
length too miserable.
thinking quarter ran nothing completely?
reached words hat ground.

My Least Popular Video Ever!

2006-06-23T18:19:00.000-05:00

Okay, I may be exaggerating somewhat. This has thus far logged three viewers, at least one of whom was myself, a few moments ago, to check whether the thing was working. (It was.) (I'm generally very careful not to artifically inflate the count by watching the videos myself on YouTube, lest, as in this instance of very small figures, I inflate the count by a full 50%.) That leaves two, which may or may not signify: the counter increases by one even if a viewer watches for two seconds, sneers, and logs out.

Of course, I take a certain amount of pride in being far (very far) outside the mainstream of public taste, and in publishing the video here I recognize that I am taking a chance of compromising my singular independence of mind. Still, I rather like this video, though I can imagine that many won't, and I can't quite rest on my accomplishment without at least mildly endeavoring to publicize the work. But if viewship peaks at five or six I will still have much to take pride in.

Sticklers may point out that several videos have logged "zero" or "one" as the number of viewers, but these have been available only a few days (though I'm keeping my fingers crossed.) The video with one lonely (perhaps very lonely) viewer was tagged as "erotica," although it's not really, just to see how many misguided droolers that would bring in; fewer than few, it would seem, but perhaps it's considered a "hard word" nowadays. Anyway, the heavy breathers know what to avoid.

The "zero" views of the other two are perhaps a bit of a surprise, as the video has a recognizable subject, and a traditional one, and some lovely images (if I do say so etc.) The music is quite nice as well, which marks a bit of a departure. And I mailed a few links privately, which suggests an automatic eyeroll response (however well warranted) in certain quarters, or half dollars. They are here and here, and were snipped and pasted and reassembled from a wonderful photograph that appeared here.

In the meantime, though, I hope that two or one or zero of you may enjoy, or at least watch for a few seconds, the video above.

NOTE: My Flickr website of drawings, photographic distortions, and utter nonsense, for which I do wish more viewers (to push the average per photo above 2.0) is empty of all but a few loyalists. There's no music, but you can't have everything.

Frequently Asked Questions

2006-06-17T12:16:00.000-05:00

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: It occurred to me the other day while watering my plants that they never think to water us. Why is this?

A. Many laymen are confused on this issue. Plants are insentient, they have no means of locomotion, and they lack many things that we humans have in plenitude, such as limbs with opposable thumbs.

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: There are many people whose limbs end in leafy growths, ballpoint pens, claws, sexual devices, feet, and things too awful to mention. In fact, most people one runs into don't have limbs with opposable thumbs, but they still water their gardens, or their employers' gardens. How do you explain this?

A. Those are purely local phenomena peculiar to the village of Widworth, and are quite artificial, as our local research scientist, Dr. Praetorius, is very keen on medical experimentation, and he contributes vastly to the store of human knowledge on a daily, even an hourly basis.

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: Really?

A. Yes.

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: Even so, it's my observation, and I have photographs, that a great many plants are in fact sentient, have powers of locomotion, and have limbs with a profusion of complex and utilitarian digits. Isn't that true?

A. Again, these are purely local phenomena, due to the necessities of scientific research. They're quite artificial. And these activities are generally nocturnal when most of us should be fast asleep.

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: But I still have to water the fukken pests every day, day in, and day out. True, I get a cottage on the estate for myself and my family, and an income, rather a pittance, I might add, in return, but the plants themselves give nothing, absolutely nothing, in return for my careful labor and ministrations, which are hardly confined to watering. Why should this be?

A. Plants give us many things in return. They emit oxygen, which replenishes our atmosphere. They bear edible fruits which nourish us, as well as nutritious seeds, roots, leaves, and other parts. Most of all, their foliage and floral displays give us the great wonders of natural beauty that aesthetically enrich our lives.

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: I don't know what planet you're from, but the plants hereabout are ugly, oozing, noxious buggers, who scare the everlovin life out of me every damn day. My wife is a gibbering wreck these days and won't leave the house. My poor children used to cower in the shadows, quivering pathetically, but now they're starting to display strange behavior like standing in the yard during a rainstorm and opening their heads when the sun comes out. You can't seriously maintain that this is normal?

A. Again, local conditions, research, artificial, etc. You can always move to another locality and get a traditional gardening position, although it wouldn't seem you're temperamentally suited to that, either.

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: I can't go anywhere. These vegetable things have blocked all of the roads out of the village, and leer threateningly throughout the town streets, making strange sounds that make one's head hurt, and getting all tangled up in your feet, legs, thighs, and higher up. Did you know that these things bite? And I don't mean a little friendly nip, I mean great chunks.

A. Don't let your imagination get the better of you. It's well known that many plants have thorns as an evolutionary protective adaptation, e.g., the divinely beautiful rose. As to their "leering threateningly," plants have no faces, hence no features, hence no expressions. They certainly have no interest in the doings of human beings, or the animal kingdom in general, as their passive interactions with us affect them only on the genetic level, on the vast scale of evolutionary time. I'd suggest that you've been watching too much late-night television, or perhaps video nasties. You should get more rest.

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: Who can rest with these bloody things making those godawful slathering, gooshy, buzzing sounds all night long? I do watch television, but not much, as every damned channel is these plant things emitting high-pitched blasts of sound that will shatter your eardrums if you don't keep the volume off. No faces? Come on. Sure, many of them don't have anything that's recognizably reminiscent of anything on God's green earth, but an awful lot of them do have faces. One eye, three eyes, plenty of mouths, sometimes several heads. And people do try to leave the village, and you think they're gone, but their features turn up in large plant stalks and it looks as though they're trying to scream.

A. Again, what in your hyperbolic account is not due to local conditions suggests that you drink to excess, a common failing among your class, I'm told. I broadcast regularly through WBLK-TV, a public service network supported by the generous donations of people like you, and we don't have plants making noises. That's because our mission is educational -- to inform, to advise, to uplift, and to foster the values of higher culture. But I suppose you'd find all of that "boring" -- "What's all this talk?", "How about a good game of soccer?" "Looka the knockers on that one!", etc. When did you last contribute?

Q. Dear Dr. Bleak: Fine, fine. I see it's no use talking to you. You obviously don't have to put up with the hypnotic poisonous gases and the seeds that infest our lungs and change our bodies and the fruit that leaks sticky fluids that burn and the disappearance of your children and the raising of the dead and the unthinkable sexual attacks. They've even taken all of my hedge clippers and gardening tools, including the lawnmower, and they're learning to use them, too, slowly but surely. You're living in a fool's paradise and will soon rue the day yo e;'>>

A. Thank you for all of your questions. Frequently asked questions may be frequently asked c/o this blog, and we appreciate your continuing interest.

It's Time to Bring Video into the 20th Century!

2006-06-16T13:42:00.000-05:00

And who knows what wonders another century may hold?

The Dead

2006-06-14T02:48:00.000-05:00

A depressing, yet very brief, video.

For Searchie, and for everyone else.

Every Little Breeze Seems to Whisper Louise, Second Wind

2006-06-09T13:22:00.000-05:00

L'Heure Bleue a la Tango

2006-06-05T21:48:00.000-05:00

Every Little Breeze Seems to Whisper Louise...

2006-06-03T09:18:00.000-05:00

...After This Brief Commercial Interruption...

2006-06-02T17:09:00.000-05:00

(Only Limited Supplies Only! Click to Enlarge Payment! 100%% Amerrican busnesses!)

This Month's Issue!

2006-05-30T14:30:00.000-05:00

(On sale now wherever beer and kinky undergarments are exchanged!)

Electromagnetic Transmission Event

2006-05-30T14:15:00.000-05:00

Smith Brothers: The Early Years

2006-05-29T07:14:00.000-05:00

Les Femmes Fatales

2006-05-25T13:27:00.000-05:00

"But, I guess on our seperate maps, the shape is still identified as La Femme Fatale. Storm approachin'.DarkoV Homepage 05.18.06 - 12:56 pm # "

Hairwash

2006-05-23T18:55:00.000-05:00

There is no nudity in this video. If you think so, you are wrong. However, I used the word "erotic" in my YouTube description, which garnered it any number of possibly bewildered viewers.

This Week's Issue!

2006-05-19T15:23:00.000-05:00

On sale wherever psychosocial public service fee tickets are sold!

This Day in History: Opening of the Oblique Dam

2006-05-15T16:00:00.000-05:00

Government officials gaze vaguely out to sea, as one of the more momentously dire public works enthusiasms of Lord Bleak and Dr Praetorius nears its completion, as drawn by one of the few survivors. Here, the granite Cathedrale de la Mer, a seagoing rock formation navigated by radio telemetry, attempts to join the American West Coast with the East Coast of England at the Antipodean Oblique Dam, moments before disaster would plunge France, The Netherlands, Tibet, and New Zealand permanently underwater, where rich plunder and bloated, decomposed bodies of civil servants remain to this day. "A brave and noble effort," pronounced Queen Victrola the following year, in presenting the valuable Distinguished Distaster Cross to the two visionaries.

"So how was your weekend?"

2006-05-08T09:34:00.000-05:00

(Click for closer examination of fine detailing.)

Three Ghosts

2006-05-05T11:17:00.000-05:00

And here's another embeddable television set until I feel quite ready to be prosaic again.

Judging from the Youtube figures since Monday, this is my least popular video ever. Although as a misanthrope I find small numbers of presumably discriminating viewers quite rewarding, I'm damned if I can see what makes this so special, hovering as it is in the low single digits. (My most wildly popular video ever, which is well into triple digits and continuing to climb, is this one, which shares a good deal in common with the present offering.)

Fossilalia: The Movie

2006-05-01T10:21:00.000-05:00

Introducing BMTV: Bleak Music Television

2006-04-27T23:15:00.000-05:00

Contains brief nudity by dead people. May not be suitable for children under five foot six. May not be suitable for sheltered adults. And I shouldn't watch it at work if I were you -- but it's your job, isn't it?

Humeday

2006-04-26T09:19:00.000-05:00

Today of course marks the 295th anniversary of the birth of philosopher and historian David Hume. In keeping with long tradition, many will be taking the day off from work in order to learn about the world through the operation of the senses, and to engage in constructive skepticism. Although Humeday is widely (if not especially broadly) recognized as a legitimate impromptu holiday, many institutions of higher learning take a dim view of it, especially if they can lip-read their way through parts of Hume's profound political treatises, and may threaten employees with dismissal if they do not report to work, and repudiate Hume and all his works. True Humeans will naturally be uncowed, and will positively rejoice if they are summarily fired. Human nature may be everywhere the same, but Humean nature is principled. So I hope that all of our readers have scheduled skeptical empiricist events, celebrations, and parades today, with public readings of choice passages from A Treatise of Human Nature. And I wish them the very best fortune tomorrow in locating new, non-academic jobs to support their scholarly pursuits.

Annals of Sexual Perversion

2006-04-24T17:58:00.000-05:00

Above: alleged "service station" habitue engaged in act of "pumping."

"Many service station patrons are people with children, maiden aunts, nuns, and impressionable pets. These used to be places of public decency, suitable for families, and responsive to their values. What happened to the idea of the neighborhood service station as a place of solid values, unfettered joy, fair play, and innocence? We must take back our service stations from these shameless creeps." Violetta Rosebud, President, National Association for Cuddly Goodness.

"Sometimes I have to wait for hours just to fill up my car, because these jerks are 'hogging' the 'pumps.' It's unfair, and it's sickening." - Typical service station customer.

"They stay all day and they hardly spend a cent. We have trouble just breaking even. No wonder the price of gas is skyrocketing. I've had to post time limits at some of my stations. I didn't want to, but I had no choice. So what happens? I get picketed. Plus, there are expenses involved with cleaning up the pumps, and even occasional serious damage. Also, there's quality-control issues with the gasoline that we have to address." -Service station owner.

"Clearly, these issues of concern to us all need to be studied and addressed with due regard to the rights of all citizens, regardless of race, color, creed, ethnic identity, sexual orientation, immigration status, or sealed court records. We must take account both of the values of our productive middle classes and the requirements of diversity in a tolerant society." -Senior Senator Stanley "Prep" Motorola.

"This is sheer intolerance and hate-mongering by the usual bigots. Acts between consenting adults and inanimate objects are protected by our Constitution, in both long-established practice and in judicial precedents. How many of these self-portrayed squeaky-clean fussbudget reactionaries have covert relationships with their own 'sex objects'? It's sheer hypocrisy, and a frontal attack on everyone's right to self-expression. We all inhabit points on a broad spectrum of sexual variety, and pumpers cannot be singled out for a single arbitrary form of that expression." - Siegried T. Uranium, American Sexual Loudness Union.

What are your views? Call our toll-free number, write to us at our Washington, D.C. address (being sure to mark the envelope "Sexual Materials Enclosed"), or join the discussion with your friends and neighbors on the comments page of our little-read blog.

Genetic Mutability in Nature

2006-04-22T11:38:00.000-05:00

"Nature has many roads. Some are straight and narrow. Some are long and twisting. Some are short and abrupt. Some are unmarked. Some are unpaved. Some have pot-holes. Some have misleading traffic signs. Some are lonely. Some are incredibly congested at rush hour. Some are one-way. Some go both ways. Some are clover-leaf overpasses. Some go nowhere. Some go somewhere. Many have abandoned vehicles and souvenir stands and hitch-hikers and tow-trucks. But all are natural." - Dr. Praetorius, Professor of Biological Experimentation, Vivisection, and Recombinant Surgery, Bleakford University

"For centuries, alternative recombinant humans have been stripped of their self-esteem and ridiculed in public 'freak shows.' By publishing these unretouched photographs, we hope to restore their inherent dignity and to expand tolerance. These beings are fully human, with feelings, thoughts, hopes, fears, quirks, oddities, and a spectrum of sexual preferences, just like the rest of us. Some of them. Most go on to lead happy, productive lives, with proper support from home, community, social services, governments, world organizations, and show business entrepreneurs. Well, some of them. They could be your neighbors. They could be your friends. They could be your parents. They could be chained in your basement. Without public awareness and widespread study, we may never know." -Oscar Playtex, M.D., Director, United Nations Biorhythms Peacekeeping Forces

"Many of these species are on the verge of extinction. A laissez-faire attitude of "who cares? nobody's stopping them from getting a motel room" is simply not good enough. They must be actively encouraged to mate and reproduce. Extensive wilderness areas must be reserved for their natural propagation and lifestyle choices. They must not be shot and mounted, or vice versa, by mindless so-called 'sportsmen.' School field trips to mingle with herds should be organized at the elementary level, so that children will know what it is like to be 'different.' And it is unconscionable that clothing stores carry designs suitable only for so-called 'normal' people; at very least, dualism in trousers, brassieres, shirts, love shackles, latex gloves, goggles, and headphones must be superceded by dogmatic intervention of the loudest kind." -Gloria Arborea, actress, author, limnetic activist

Alien Reproduction

2006-04-21T03:21:00.000-05:00

Victorian Dreams

2006-04-19T15:27:00.000-05:00

A Stroll Through the Gallery

2006-04-18T14:08:00.000-05:00

Six Victorian Ghost Stories

2006-04-17T22:59:00.000-05:00

Free video hosting, video codes at www.vidiLife.com

No, I haven't been dead, despite what I may look like for a few hours early in the day. More than a few. I simply haven't heard the siren call of immortal prose stylings lately. Instead, I've been mucking about with trendy new media so the cool kids will like me. This is one of my less inaccessible outings. I hope to have another shortly, once the censorship board at vidiLife concludes its pointlessly microscopic examination of same. (That ending credit referring to "sexual content" was a joke.)

Antique Poster Discovered by Excavationist Intellectuals!

2006-04-15T11:35:00.000-05:00

(Authentic unretouched computer approximation of actual program.)

Elton Dean, R.I.P.

2006-04-15T09:55:00.000-05:00

The obituary is here.

The Big Asphalt: A Tepid Thriller

2006-03-29T05:27:00.000-05:00

Free video hosting, video codes at www.vidiLife.com

Recent Scientific Advances

2006-03-28T21:06:00.000-05:00

Male.

Female.

Definitive diagrammatic representations of respective male and female genital reproductive systems have recently been released after intensive labors by sexual researchers. The expansive results are reproduced here.

UPDATE 3/31

Levity aside, it's rather interesting to compare the latest map of the universe with the latest (and perhaps only) unisex device on the market. Makes ya think.

Gallerie d'Oblique

2006-03-26T23:41:00.000-05:00

(Photos shamelessly lifted from Searchblog.)

On Spring Break; Please Call Again

2006-03-21T16:19:00.000-05:00

Due to an alarming, but surely temporary, lack of anything whatsoever to say, this blog will be on vacation (as indeed it has been for some time) indefinitely, or until something new appears, whichever comes first. In the interim, occasional self-interpreting visual aids may appear, as a spur to confusion.

Group Bus Tour: the Video Event

2006-03-14T08:09:00.000-05:00

For those who have been experiencing difficulties with the little television in the post below, you can link to the amoazing video experience directly right here. Good luck.

On the Air

2006-03-12T19:35:00.000-05:00

UPDATE 3/13/06 3:58 A.M. And here is the video:

Free video hosting, video codes at www.vidiLife.com

SPAM Poetry

2006-03-08T10:25:00.000-05:00

I got another one. I take this complex found poem to allude obliquely, using a nonsequential narrative form along with multilayered technological metaphors, to a once-vital romance gone tragically awry. Alternative interpretations are of course possible, but they will be wrong.

(I have reproduced this exactly as received, except that I have taken a few liberties with formal structure where they seemed essential, and I have removed what seem to be extraneous HTML directions (or are they?))

====================================================================

The underlying connection was closed:
Could not establish trust relationship with -
Right away let her keep him or #2
Sue her for the liquidated damages.

Thank you, Dave and Joy,
For the update.
I do hope things will continue to in 2000,
And found an interesting behavior:
I understand the "whining" noise
Everyone hears when driving designer.

Him, he was still out to it
And the nursing staff did not expect him to
(correct this if this is wrong).

I noticed today while driving on a -
Back at 1130hrs -
To be with him for another 2 hours. -

Before they pave,
They remove all of the reflectors on the Colorado,
Boulder, and a master of science degree in aerospace concrete.
Why?

How do they actually do this?
What would be the impact?
Thanks in advance, heart and soul
... and I'll miss your hugs!

A recipient of two NASA Outstanding Leadership Medals for
Growth from simply loving Self,
I know anything is possible.
The recipient of a NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal for
His work .

Before they pave,
They remove all of the reflectors
On the Goddess Blessings,
The Reporting Services edition must be
Enterprise, Developer, or Evaluation.
Standard edition does not support
a scale-out deployment.
Directorate.

Quart de Tete

2006-03-06T12:01:00.000-05:00

At StephenEsque's instigation, I've performed a five-minute deconstruction (forgive the term) of Radley Metzger's 1970 artcore subclassic, The Lickerish Quartet. Although it's one of those creakily now-a-go-go paeans to "sexual liberation" (which means women taking their clothes off, which I favored long before it was fashionable), it has intellectual pretensions (i.e., Pirandello), so you can discuss it over cocktails in your leisure suit just as though it were Godard or Resnais. But I've saved you the trouble of watching it (I think my summary is very fair-minded), and if you neglect to watch my treatment, you'll be two steps ahead of the game. Although the movie itself contains nudity (in much the same way that Red River contains cows), you will not find it in my video condensation, for reasons of taste, discretion, public morals, and the heavy-handed editorial policy of those lovely people at vidiLife. Without the nudity, I guess, the movie ends up being five minutes, which is the approximate length of my adaptation; I do hope this doesn't render it entirely without interest.

I'm also trying the television-screen thing again. I'll try using only one at a time, to avoid the messy problems associated with this technological marvel the last time I tried it. I'll replace the screen with a link in a few days.

Free video hosting, video codes at www.vidiLife.com

The Past Recaptured

2006-03-03T09:00:00.000-05:00

WBLK will resume its regular broadcast interruptions once fundraising transactions have been traced and regularized. In the interim, we present for your solitary pleasures this popular rerun still from the Classic Bleak archival vaults and dungeons.

"Baby, Let's Go...To the Movie Show" -- 1967 Rock Lyric

2006-02-21T14:34:00.000-05:00

Due to the lack of an underwhelming absence of demand, I have bowed to the seriously negligible popular pressure (I admit it; I'm just a panderer) and posted links to some of my more solemn (i.e., unfunny) video experiments below. I would like to move from my fingers to my toes in counting the number of viewers of most of these, but I would be dishonest if I did not allow that the customary advisories concerning the word "experiment" (like the word "independent") are fully warranted here. In other words, keep the coffee cup filled, and feel free to bail at any time.

This is my latest bit of nonsense, set to a couple of Prokofiev's Visions fugitives.

For those who wondered aloud where les yeux went, here are Les Yeux I and Les Yeux II, which seek to evade the question further, one with a few bits from Hindemith's Ludus Tonalis, and the other accompanied by an accordion, mandolin, and clarinet trio (which is better than it sounds; or sounds better than it is; or something.)

I called this A Parallel History of Geometry, a title that proved to be a marvelously effective antidote to idle viewing. I thought the title sounded like an unwritten Borges short story, but it evidently reminded most people of high school, and has chalked up only four or five viewings accordingly. I guess Borges isn't exactly packing them in these days either. The music is by Bela Bartok, from Gyorgy Sandor's famous (at least as famous as Borges's stories) recordings.

This one I called Abstract No. 3, as inspired a title as I've come up with in recent days, and with the viewership to prove it. The pictures are mostly old book illustrations, sort of pre-Raphaelite Lite. The music was made by splicing a few seconds here, a few seconds there, from several jazz recordings, and then overlapping for a sort of measured echo effect. Nothing happens, but it's shorter than it seems.

This is called Arch Waltz No. 3 , and reflects the "No. 3" theme that is a proven winner. These are mostly old drawings of older English buildings, set to a waltz I spliced mixed from a few seconds of a recording I can't remember -- I found most of the composition a bit irritating, which set me to splicing together the decent bits.

There are more, but my patience wears thin (as an obesity doctor famously said.)

Found Poetry: "Wrinkles Often Dream"

2006-02-20T16:11:00.000-05:00

I've received some lovely SPAM recently, of the sort that seems to pick up stray snatches of e-conversation, and I quote below, pretty much verbatim, from one particularly extaordinary letter:

====================================================================

...Rob lives in clever, rude oceans.

She should answer once, play cruelly,
Then attempt for a bowl near the mountain.
Get your firmly cleaning lentil towards my night.
It will loudly nibble towards stupid, angry rains.

...The wrinkles often dream for the dull twigs.
The floors, disks, and coffees are all smart and lean.
Never jump the shirts undoubtably,
Move them badly.

I was solving games to rural Lawrence,
Who's rejecting the ball's fog,
I familiarly irrigate before Ben
When the fresh buttons order about
The handsome signal.

As dully as Joaquim judges,
You can hear the fig much more strangely.
Don't even try to talk easily
While you're grasping against an ugly cat.

We happily kick raw and excuse
Our new, new shoes on a hill.

...We call them,
Then we rigidly believe
David and Norma's filthy dog.
I smell locally, unless Andy tastes potters behind Greg's dust.

The walnuts, porters, and desks are all
Noisy and long.
Tell Linda it's wide
Recommending to a raindrop.

Who lifts wickedly,
When Harvey cooks the smart coconut near the bathroom?
If the active carpenters can care hourly,
The elder ointment may depart more markets.

To be pretty or easy
Will pull solid forks
To deeply recommend.

She will stupidly excuse against Thomas
When the proud boats burn around the bitter field.
They are cooking over old,
Beneath humble,
Among outer bowls.

Will you scold outside the stable,
If Greg eerily expects the grocer?
He may wander light kettles;
Do you dine them?

They attempt once, sow simply,
Then promise for the button between the office.
Every short, cold plate annually receives
As the wet hats love.

Almost no bad twigs depart Varla,
And they wistfully change Robette, too.

=================================================================================================

Not one to stop driving a stake until it's beaten well into the ground, I constructed a sort of screenplay for a movie, with intertitles and dialogue (which is which, you decide) extracted from earlier portions of this same poetic monument to our banal ecstasies, and the implements which surround them. You will find it here.

Anne Gets a Big Promotion

2006-02-15T14:15:00.000-05:00

You can see the video by clicking here.

Say your prayers and guard your blood

2006-02-09T13:40:00.000-05:00

No, this isn't an STD warning.

Despite vampires never having been more popular, with a vampire program on the telly somewhere at every second of the day (and night), and the potential for an entire new wing to be built at Borders to house vampire literature -- despite these healthy cultural indices, the message just isn't getting out: Wear cloves of garlic around your neck at all times. Personally, I wouldn't neglect other areas of the body, either, as vampires cut off at the neck by squeamish humans will probably just go to any unprotected expanse of skin. (This, as older readers might be aware, is technically known as drive-in behavior.)

However that may be, I found I'd collected a bunch of vampire movie stills from the early 30s to the early 70s and needed an excuse to delete them from my increasingly pointless Image Data Bank. (Need a new image? You know where to go. And our interest has never been lower.)

So here we have a rather obvious parody of vampire movies, with a blessed dearth of artsifartiness. It was fun, and I was up late. Besides, I did have an incredibly good time mixing the soundtrack from two or three dozen CDs. The first person to identify all sound sources used will have my undying respect. Any person to identify more than two or three can take over my mortgage payments.

If you have trouble with vampires -- and who doesn't? -- think of them as radical Islam -- or Red Things with fangs and an interesting wardrobe.

Me n C BREAKKIN It Dowwwwwwwn!

2006-02-07T20:02:00.000-05:00

I think Stephen and Searchie had it in mind for me to do something more like this in the video realm: hot, now, mod-a-go-go, sexy, shakin', and all chicked out and ready to party. Hold onto your seats.

Pavilion of the Lynx

2006-02-07T01:18:00.000-05:00

The links continue to amass at an astonishing rate, and within a few months I'm overwhelmed to the point of having two or even three to pass on to the knowledge-hungry reader.

Admittedly, the idea of a Bonzo Dog Band reunion without Viv Stanshall is remotely akin to having a World War II reunion without Adolf Hitler on vibes, or a high school reunion -- any high school anwhere -- without me, or an evolution reunion without natural selection, but it all seems to have gone over rather well nonetheless. David has forwarded this review, which ought to be of extreme interest to all humanity.

Those of us who had the foresight and mixed luck to purchase in 1966 The Heliocentric Worlds of Sun Ra and The Blues Project Live at Cafe au Go Go may have wondered how these people made an actual living. Wonder no more. They evidently cashed in on the contemporary Batman craze, and produced this album, which is certainly one of the odder children's records produced in that borderline marketing niche. Although most liseners will be drawn to the organ stylings of Sun Ra (the rather bizarrely dissonant chordings) and Al Kooper (the overbusy blues licks), the real nutcase of the session is manic guitarist Danny Kalb, who even here cannot play one note where a thousand will do. (Thanks to Zembla.)

And this, for reasons that remain obscure or deeply repressed, is fast becoming one of my favorite blogsites. Draw your own conclusions about me, but pay a visit. If what you see doesn't interest you, wait a minute.

Finally, one of my quasi-videos appears here. I append the label "experimental" to it as a warning to those knowledgable in the pseudo-arts, so that they will approach with caution, if not stampede for the exits. An earlier version of the same thing appears here, and has both flaws and merits, along with the incentive of being much longer.

Finally, cineastes and videophiles here have recently been pondering the pioneering experimental short film, "Me n Christina BREAKIN it dowwn." Those who have had their curiosity piqued by the high level of discussion will not want to miss this extraordinary offering here. (Thanks to Stephen and Searchie for directing my vacillating attention to this masterpiece.)

Great Moments in Islamic Advertising

2006-02-07T00:02:00.000-05:00

He's the king of scurf.

Sex in Cinema: The Early Years

2006-02-04T04:04:00.000-05:00

Although numerous histories of sex in film have issued forth, the rarity of artifacts of the many lost films of the silent era has lent to their earliest chapters an air of grasping preposterousness and blatant invention that has never been superceded. Until now. In response to requests that I "set the record straight," I've constructed a video primer of the movement towards greater openness, sensitivity, and exploitation in the early cinema. Where evidence has previously been doubtful, I have set aside these doubts; where evidence has previously been nonexistent, I have come up with it; and where evidence has been incontrovertible, I have ignored it. The result, I think, is definitive.

Also, I have had requests for a "chick video."

You Too Can Be a Cartoonist! A Film Sans Yeux

2006-02-03T00:20:00.000-05:00

And this is what happens when I start drawing a simple doodle and the process gets out of hand. Those who prefer greater depth to their two-and-a-half minute movies might like to see this as an all-purpose metaphor -- I particularly like love; politics; atheism; faith; sex; civilzation; the heart of darkness; the ages of man; the strange world of absinthe; bureaucracy; and/or new introductory notes on psychoanalysis. And that's just so far. The only metaphors I tried that didn't quite work were girls gone wild; Cartesian dualism and the particle/wave hypothesis; and gunfight at the O.K. Corral.

The music is by Gianluigi Trovesi.

The Bergman Retrospective

2006-02-01T22:25:00.000-05:00

And as we were on the topic of foreign films, it was suggested that Ingmar Bergman might be an appropriate target of affectionate derision. And so he proved to be.

Call Today!

2006-02-01T00:01:00.000-05:00

My most ambitious film masterpiece to date takes as its subject the contemporary problem of television fundraising and the grievous social consequences of this practice to the republic, the hemisphere, and the world.

It's freely adapted from a few Anne Hedonia episodes and will destroy your eyes if you attempt to read the original dialogue balloons in their video form. Sans yeux, indeed.

Foreign Film

2006-01-31T00:55:00.000-05:00

Those of my readers who have been tapping their fingers impatiently and wondering when I'm going to do something different can tap their fingers for other reasons now. As some of you (and some of I) know, I've been mucking about these last two weeks with a program called MovieMaker. My latest effort (which, with the heavyhanded irony for which I am avoided, is the first to be posted) is something called Foreign Film.

You ought to have been able to click that link and see the feature. It is short, but not for that reason lacking in the great and noble ideas that have animated (as it were) artistic masters throughout our history, as well as some others.

Blah, blah. I will be submitting other videos to the hosting service in due course, and linking them from my blog, and have enough of a backlog that I should be spared the bother of writing new entries for a while, which will allow me to devote more of my time to Human Progress.

UPDATE: And now there is this.

Help Support WBLK

2006-01-30T18:00:00.000-05:00

Bonzo Reunion

2006-01-29T06:17:00.000-05:00

bonzo0
Originally uploaded by fred pipes.

On your doorstep, last night.

Bleak Mouse Maligned by Brits!

2006-01-26T13:42:00.000-05:00

I knew this would happen.

Don't believe a word of it. I would never.

Anne in the Summer: A Special Presentation

2006-01-25T21:20:00.000-05:00

(Lick to enlarge.)

On Vacation

2006-01-22T13:35:00.000-05:00

What it says.

Back Tuesday or Wednesday.

No fighting, please.

Our Morning Programming

2006-01-17T23:30:00.000-05:00

WBLK Presents

2006-01-16T10:49:00.000-05:00

(Cleek to ainlarje.)

At Last On DVD From the Criteria Selection: The Compleat Bleak

2006-01-14T11:30:00.000-05:00

Yes, it may seem too much like an uncontrollable sequence of muscular contractions to be true, but this is no evil dream! The Criteria Selection is restoring all of the classic Bleak films, from his early classic two-minute stereopticon peep-show seven-reelers of 1907 to his epic Western shoot-em-downs in 280-mm Monovision from the 1960s.

First up: Bleak's groundshattering musical breakout from 1933, Zigfeld Damsels of 1927. This naughty, expressionistic, and grimly naturalistic screwball tunefest was so controversial that its release was delayed six years by a skittish studio, then surreptitiously released for a few days on a double bill with Alfalfa in Love before being quickly withdrawn when shocked audiences refused to attend. All three copies were thought to have been thrown in the trash, then ruthlessly suppressed by the Hays Office in 1934.

The Criteria Selection has spared no little effort in bringing to you this legendary masterpiece, in the same pristine condition as when you saw it in a grainy 8 mm version in your neighbor's cellar in 1963. Working from several separate VHS editions in full EP mode, consulting with still extant actor-director Bleak, and filling in missing sequences with carefully selected clips from other public domain movies, we are now proud to present the original director's cut, never seen by the public in this form, and now available to cineastes and connoisseurs everywhere in a bulky three-disc set (payment plan available.)

Disc One contains the original version seized by Customs in 1927, along with on-screen commentary by Bleak, Weimar historian J. Alfred Prufrock, leading bimbo Doxie Dimple, and the irrepressible Anne Hedonia. Disc Two contains the fascinating 2005 documentary, "The Making and Restoration of the 2005 Commentary to Zigfield Damsels of 1927," with on-screen commentary by the commentators. Disc Three contains the unexpurgated and notorious German-subtitled version, whose translations will delight and perplex you, and whose infamous "You've been a bad girl, Lolly" scene is seamlessly edited into several places in the film where it may have originally appeared.

You can't afford not to fail to neglect to pass this one up if you're any kind of decent human being.

(Ships within 48 hours after full credit check.)

We Interrupt Your Consciousness

2006-01-12T18:06:00.000-05:00

(Click individual images and something may happen.)

The Reproductive Hypothesis

2006-01-11T15:55:00.000-05:00

(Click individual Bleaks to enlarge abnormally.)

Anne of Green Cables

2006-01-10T16:40:00.000-05:00

(Click to enlarge a whole lot.)

Excerpts from an Existentialist Children's Classic

2006-01-09T02:41:00.000-05:00

Bleak Blast and the Sheep Clones of Anthrax

2006-01-09T00:01:00.000-05:00

(Click to enlarge!)

Our Sunday Funnies

2006-01-08T11:13:00.000-05:00

(Click to enlarge.)

Bleak Annoyed by Subliterate Peasant

2006-01-05T12:51:00.000-05:00

An anti-smoking activist confronts Bleak. Had to have the lunatic forcibly removed. Cut a hole in Bleak's vest, too. Tiresome business.

Woman of Mystery 1906

2006-01-03T16:45:00.000-05:00

(Click to enlarge.)

J.M.T.W.T. Slidesmuir: New Year's Eve, Loch Bleak, 182-

2005-12-31T23:59:00.000-05:00

(Click to enclick.)

Although New Year's Eve, 182-, was vastly significant to the global-historical balance of power, the transformation of the arts, open sexual experimentation by proto-intellectuals, and the discovery of an ancient world at the center of the earth, these events are now utterly obscured thanks to latterday psychosocial analysis by squinting scholars. Fortunately, that famous day was painstakingly recorded for us by that intimate of the Bleak circle and somewhat significant Romantic painter, sculptor, engraver, and erotic gadfly J.M.T.W.T. Slidesmuir (1792-1907.)

Although numerous critics conjecture that many of the salient details of his Bleak landscapes may have been completely or partly imaginary, it is difficult to reconcile this theory with Slidesmuir's demonstrated lack of imagination in most areas of life. His copious erotic memoirs are hackneyed, mind-bogglingly repetitive, hopelessly dull, overall a tedious accumulation of cliche; if they are fictitious, they reveal a rascal of even less imagination than if they are true. His various writings on art do not show much in the way of vision or overarching viewpoint, nor even the usual pidgin theoretics. They consist mostly of such sentiments as, "Art is a good way to make money without doing much;" "art is a good way to take advantage of women;" "getting really drunk all the time is fun;" "these Bleaks are a bunch of suckers;" and other insights of comparable depth. That Slidesmuir was occasionally delusional is plausible; that he was only semi-competent in artistic technique demonstrable; that he used absinthe clearly established (although whether he used it on himself much is questionable); but that he was abnormally shallow, two-dimensional, and rigidly literalist is beyond dispute. These paintings are accurate to the degree that Slidemuir could render them accurately.

It is interesting to note in the above painting many (doubtless unintended) anticipations of later artistic movements, in addition to the oft-noted slavish thefts from past ones. The trained eye notes, for example, in the lower right, strong echoes of second-rate Victorian erotic photography. Elsewhere, foreshadows of quotidian art nouveau are strongly suggested. Anticipations of abstract expressionism, cubism, surrealism, and the Bauhaus painters can be extracted from a careful viewing, though these are probably due to an unsteady hand after a day of unrestrained excess, rather than to some sort of accidental artistic breakthrough. The use of color is quite interesting, an incidental effect of Slidesmuir's habit of misplacing tubes of paint and making do with what he could find around the grounds. There are some hints that foreground figures may include Mulu Cherchelle, Zuleika Mole, Arabella, Dr Praetorius, and other intimates of the Bleak circle including Bleak himself. But other internal evidence points to their consisting of Slidemuir's retinue of village daughters, their outraged parents, and the angry villagers who a few days later nearly succeeded in stringing Slidesmuir to a tree and setting him afire. This was a fairly liberal village, too.

For those who overlook Slidesmuir's mediocrity as a painter with the defense that his draughtsmaniship was without peer (a rather ambiguous claim, by the way), and that his vision is best reflected in his drawings, we reproduce here one of the best surviving preliminary sketches for Loch Bleak.

And Get Your Tiresome Resolutions Here

2005-12-31T20:17:00.000-05:00

In the year 2006 I resolve to:

Learn to lick my own elbow.

Get your resolution here

On This Day: 1905 -- Bleak Fair Paris Opens

2005-12-30T04:04:00.000-05:00

(Click to enlarge)

On December 30, 1905, to mark the reclusive eccentric's birthday, Bleak Fair -- "The Bleakest Fair on Earth" -- opened to an unroarious reception in Paris, France. Legend has it that up to 20 million disappointed souls had to be turned away on the first day. The ceremonial opening ribbon was cut by Theodore Roosevelt, who announced, "This is the weirdest thing I've ever seen." It is estimated that the equivalent of the entire population of Luxembourg passed through its main gates in a single hour. The fair remained open to the public until 1907, when a carelessly extinguished cigar caused a lady to complain that it was vulgar, thus ending a unique spectacle of this century.

Golden Age Bleak

2005-12-29T04:20:00.000-05:00

(Click to enlarge)

For Our International Readers

2005-12-28T12:11:00.000-05:00

(Clicquetta a grandiose)

The Craft of Mapmaking: Lesson One

2005-12-27T00:30:00.000-05:00

(Click the Mouse and make him happy.)

Merry Christmas

2005-12-25T11:06:00.000-05:00

Special Christmas Post: The Tale of the Adventure of the Mystery

2005-12-22T11:45:00.000-05:00

(Click image, remove cover, continue cooking on High 4 minutes)

We now break for Christmas revelries, which unaccountably require my participation. I'll probably spend a great deal of time walking the dog, but hope to muster occasional moments of enthusiasm. Back in due course, or fairly soon, whichever comes first.

UPDATE:

(Click here to find out more, if you really must.)

The Coming of the Red Things 10: Cautionary Epilogue

2005-12-21T09:55:00.000-05:00

(Click image to begin foreplay)

COMING SOON: SOMETHING ELSE!

The Coming of the Red Things 9: Trouble With the Car

2005-12-19T23:02:00.000-05:00

(Click image, and security guard will buzz you in)

Numbers: A Cranky Editorial

2005-12-19T22:55:00.000-05:00

Now I do not know a great deal about the mathematics of magnitude, partly because I saw fit to doodle during math class in high school. But I do know that editorializing forgives, and perhaps even necessitates, ignorance of the subject at hand; and that it further requires the production of an inordinate amount of verbiage concerning things that annoy you in passing. Put the two together, and you are Pulitzer material.

First a little uninteresting background: Lately Mrs Bleak and I found ourselves in the puzzling position of having ordered many packages from, not to mention any names, the world's largest online retailer. These were gifts having something to do with one of the holidays or something, and we might have ordered them wrappped, in dreadful paper and at extra cost, but we individually chose not to. Unfortunately, Mrs Bleak did what she called "a very stupid thing" (I suppose I could have dissented more forcefully from this judgment than I did), and had her gifts to me sent unwrapped and addressed to...me. This confronted us with the distressing difficulty of sorting out the packages that contained our gifts for each other without actually opening them.

I am not adept at practical problems, to put the matter generously, and this situation struck me as a classic instance of a logico-mathematical conundrum, whose solution could be a priori determined purely on the basis of the principles of formal logic. After wasting several hours determining that this was not remotely the case, I at last hit upon the empirical solution that should have leaped to mind in the first place: I would look up the "tracking numbers" and "order numbers" for the items I had requested, then match them against the numbers printed on the package labels, and thus separate out my packages from Mrs Bleak's.

Those who are expecting all sorts of comical events to ensue from this seemingly simple plan will be disappointed. The plan was perfect, and it worked flawlessly. We are concerned here with an even more trivial matter.

While I was looking up and writing down the appropriate numbers, I could not help but notice that they were difficult to transcribe without repeated checking of the computer screen, and that I was developing the initial symptoms of writer's cramp. (Not, as might be hoped by the restless reader, of writer's block, which is a painless way of doing nothing, unlike cramp.) These numbers were very, very long.

The largest tracking number was 22 digits in length (none of those ever-helpful dashes.) Idly, I started marking off that number in groups of three, just like you do with...well, numbers. Nine sextillion. As I said earlier about the mathematics of magnitude, I don't know much, but I do know that when you start adding numerals onto a number in base ten (which I use faithfully, mostly for convenience), the level of magnitude begins increasing very, very quickly. I began to wonder just what incredibly vast amount of information could conceivably be encoded using such a figure. You could assign a numerical code to every man, woman, and child, plus most of the dead, in the country, and you'd still be left...well, pretty much where you started. You could add a code for specific holidays and still be left with a pretty big number. You could code for hair color, eye color, clothing sizes, sexual preference, and political party affiliation, and still have made barely a dent. You could add a code for every day of the calendar year, and...still have an awful lot of digits. Then I started throwing in silly stuff like the amount of information contained in all of the Mahler symphonies, but my information theory is fuzzy, so I decided to skip this part, amusing though it might be to a certain type of mind.

Okay. Let's try something else. Let's say they've given an individual number to every order they've ever received. Further, let's stipulate that there have been on average multiple orders to a magnitude of ten for every person on the planet. Just for fun, let's further stipulate that they have been doing a rip-snorting business since the dawn of man, a million years ago. No, I don't think so. The sheer weight of the orders at a given point in time would have collapsed the planet, which would have bothered the environmentalists and they would have sued. Even the weight of the paper these orders were written on, assuming one sheet per...Well, we'd have long since cut down every tree, so forget that.

As I say, I'm not very good with orders of magnitude, but I do sense that if you used each of these numbers to encode a different particle in the known universe, you might not be able to get the job done, but you'd have made a good start.

The situation seems approximately better with the 18-digit tracking numbers. But, whoops, three of the spaces are taken up by letters. At worst, this means that an alphanumeric code is being used, and that the entire thing is in base 36 (0 through 9, plus A through Z, unless they use small letters, too.) Now you're getting into all the DNA from the dawn of time territory -- roughly, as I don't like to multiply figures out before April.) But probably only three spaces are used (so far) for alphabetical symbols, which means that three evenly spaced places -- well to the head of the figure, so we're talking very large -- are in base 26, while everything else presumably is in base 10. I'm really not sure what this works out to, because I've never wondered about mixed-base numbers before, but it's complicated, and maybe someone else with more idle time on his hands than I have can work out the math. Don't call me, I'll call you.

This is about as far as my thoughts on this matter have taken me. But I'd quickly switch my allegiance to a company that used order numbers of reasonable length, such as six or seven digits. And wouldn't it be thrilling to have an order with four or fewer digits - maybe with a letter of two on the end? It would make me feel really special. (There is also the problem with what happens when the current coding system starts to overrun the package labels that are used for it, but I'll leave that to the population explosion theorists to wet their pants over.)

In any case, I must end with the editorialist's eternal imprecation: Something must be done! Are you listening, Washington, D.C.?

The Coming of the Red Things 8: The Penultimate Annoyance

2005-12-17T18:03:00.000-05:00

(Click image to avoid probate.)