Strange Little People, Eating Their Own Cheese

The regular folks at the Urban Dictionary are usually of great help when I need to round out a show. But not this week! Because a "tide" (which the show will be about tomorrow) is a thing about which there is not a lot of confusion, & the idioms that you find with the word ("turning of the tide," "time nor tide waits for no one," even uses like "eventide") have to do with the regularly of the physical process. But how do they define it at the Urban Dictionary?

TIDE, n.
1. What most white Caucasian people smell like. Comes from the brand of laundry detergent they all use, Tide.
Ex. Yo this cracka smell like tide!
2. Good looking person (used chiefly in Scotland)
Ex. That fellow is well tide!"
3. a. To prepare a pile of cut marijuana for use in a blunt, or other smoking preference involving the tuck method or tucking; often done with a credit card.
b. To create a pile of cut weed with a credit card, often preceding a tuck.
(The act of "tiding" was given its name by the resemblence of an ocean tide going back and forth, this is the motion one uses (back and forth) when tiding.)

Okay, the last one is related to "tides." The first one too, though indirectly. Check this one out:

"Tides low, crabs on the rocks"
1) Associated with the verb "to leave." Used primarily when people want to leave a dull party.
Ex. Person A: This party sucks!
Person B: Yeah, tide's low, crabs are on the rocks!
2) An expression alerting others that the person's testicles are itchy & he's about to scratch them, generally used in public.

Just like there are a lot of songs about tidal waves, there are some modern idioms in the Urban Dictionary:

tidal wave, n. 1. A feeling of intense hunger that rushes over you.
Ex. Dude, I just got tidal waved, want to go to an Indian food buffet?
2. A woman's thong visible over the back of her pants.
3. The fat roll that goes up the back of a woman during sexual intercourse from behind.

I have no idea what meaning # 3 means.

But remember! Self Help Radio is new tomorrow afternoon! Visit us at selfhelpradio.net!

The Self Help Radio Email Archive Project: Submission Five

Still trying to charm the girls, I see. I miss writing these kinds of emails. I wrote this for a curly-headed blonde of German descent back in the summer of 1998. It did not end well. It was called:

YOU MAY ALREADY HAVE WON!!

Are you a CURLY-HEADED BLONDE of GERMAN descent? Do you often wish that PORNOGRAPHY were more ARTISTICAL? Do you LOOK BOTH WAYS before crossing your EYES & dotting your TEAS? Say, how much WOOD could a WOODCHUCK chuck at a guaranteed low wage & meager benefits?

If your answer is YES to all these questions (& 47 to the last one), then HAVE WE GOT A PRODUCT FOR YOU!!

First, put down that CHECKBOOK. Put away that ABACUS. Say goodbye to that shareware copy of TETRIS PLUS. Find some other place to store that IMMANUEL KANT reader. Clear your desk of those FISHER FAT-FREE GOLDEN ROAST LIGHTLY SALTED PEANUTS. Wash your hands of that LEFT-HANDED SCISSORS & GLUESTICK combination. Because your WILDEST DREAMS (as seen on TV) are about to come rushing out of your HEAD & into CYBERSPACE!!

Yes, DICKENBOCK INDUSTRIES, the same people who brought you the GLIB REMARK, the ASSHOLISH STARE & the INSOLENT INANE IDEALOGUE, is back with a PRODUCT so shiny it'll put a dent in your EYEBALL; a PRODUCT so tasty it'll make you wish you hadn't had BARBECUED RIBS for breakfast this morning; a PRODUCT so expensive that all three BUSH SONS would have to rob the UNITED STATES of a few billion more to put a DOWN PAYMENT on it; a PRODUCT so delightful it makes sitting in the BACKYARD with a HOSE & a KIDDIE POOL seem like a walk in COMPTON in the NUDE; a PRODUCT so passive-aggressive you'll feel like MOM & DAD never left the farm.

& YOU, , have automatically qualified to be in the ELIMINATION ROUND of the SEMIFINALS of the FIRST QUARTER TEST TRIALS. Send no money now. Or, hell, why not, send money now. You are almost certainly promised a place in the running. Certain restrictions apply. Offer not available to former video store clerks. Please see your lawyer for more details; if you cannot afford a lawyer, the court will appoint one for you.

BUT THERE'S MORE!

Your allowance will double! You'll be able to eat candy without rotting your teeth! You'll play piano like Liberace! You'll slim down to 3 pounds! You'll smell like a gerbil (a relatively clean gerbil, not one kept in a dirty cage utterly neglected by the three under-ten kids in the house). You'll learn more swear words than a Franciscan monk! You'll have enough money for the bus! AND MUCH MUCH MUCH MORE.

Send us your name, address, phone number, times when you & other members of your household are not at home, your measurements, an embarrassing photo, a bit of skin off the back of your neck (for DNA purposes), a sample of your handwriting (writing out "Cosy lummox gives smart squid who asks for job pen" a few times is fine; also, sign your name as you would on a check), your SAT score & your favorite recipe for oatmeal cookies (mm-mmm) to the address below, & wait for your package in the mail!

Oh, , this is indeed YOUR LUCKY DAY!

Whither Tides?

Oh crap! I didn't have time to write in my blog today! I can't explain why I'm doing a show about tides! No time! No time!

Gotta distract you somehow! I know! Watch this video about smelling vibrations!

& I'll see you tomorrow.

Preface To Tides: Spring Or Neap?

Today on the Self Help Radio blog (that's this place): a poem by little Georgie Snark, aged 7, sort of about tides:

There is no tide at the continental divide
Said the man to his bride
She thought he lied so she goodbyed
Though his eyes eventually dried he could not hide
His pride as he sighed
& looked on the bright side
With his future open wide
But his car did collide
With a tour guide in his stride
Though he could have made the auto slide
He took to long to decide
The victim was cast aside
& his safety was denied
The police asked the man why'd
He run the guide over & he replied
"I am like Jekyll & Hyde"
But the excuse he supplied was denied
& at the court where judges preside
It was implied that he would be tried
Where justice would be applied
But as if to deride
The criminal justice system's bona fides
He died.

As awful as that is, here's how I began this post before Georgie sent in his poem:

In conversation with a conservationist, I happened to overhear an overbearing person complaining about plain communication.

You dodged a bullet!

Now More Than Ever Before!

If you can believe it, Self Help Radio has entered the twentieth century - er, I mean, the twenty-first century - with guns blazing & shirtsleeves uprolled. Wait. Is it the twenty-first century yet? I couldn't throw away my 1987 Garfield calendar. That cat is fun-nee!

In any event, Self Help Radio has begun communicating on a more modern level. That's right! We've incorporated the latest improvements in telepathic slang & nanotechnological gesticulation to make every movement & utterance more meaningful than previously thought possible. Skeptical? Cynical? Cyclical? Have you not been paying attention? YOU'RE UNDERSTANDING ME NOW!

In the immortal words of Carol Burnett &/or Freddy Nietzsche, "The last thing at the end of the day is to say you're really fucking sorry about the first thing at the beginning of the next day." Actually, that's not either of them. I think I heard it on Smallville. Or maybe Californication. But that makes the point: we're hip to the happening network & pay cable shows! We are high def & low culture & there'll be no middle ground anymore - we come at you like geese at a cracker. No two ways about it. Idiomatic & hydrostatic. Problematic & slightly grammatical. Tables out, chairs in. No more puzzles - just problems!

We welcome you therefore on the journey that, if we had a lifetime, would have begun earlier. Since we needed time to get our bearings, learn to read, lose our virginity (we wish!), wait for the appropriate technology to be invented, buy a computer, find a radio station that wouldn't make us play crappy music, & stop being so afraid all the time (we wish!), we have a fraction of a lifetime. But it starts now! But what about last week's show? What about all the shows we've done in the last year? Well, visit them if you must, but don't get hung up. That was then, this is tomorrow. Now. Tomorrow now! Today!

Todaymorrow! Right now! & also later. It's a continual process. Morrowday! Something like that. We're working on it.

A Week Day Day Dreaming

What a week. I know, I haven't spent much time talking about Self Help Radio, but then, you haven't spent much time talking about Barack Obama. Or the election. Or people committing suicide by jumping off spaghetti bowls & then leaving notes for the president-elect. So I suppose we're even. Not! You owe me! You owe me big time!

I can talk about tomorrow's show today, however, & that sounds a little like a bumper or whatever you call those things that people play to hype something coming up. A teaser? A French tickler? A Barack Obama? Who knows. Anyway, I will - I promise! - finish the Indiepop Cs tomorrow. You have my word on it. Will I get to the Ds? No. Will I include bands that will make indiepop purists be all like, "Aw, man, the Cranes [or insert any other band name] ain't indiepop!" I will! Will I get a weird email from a person who's not really in a band & who in fact has only made recordings for his myspace page under a band's name complaining that I didn't include his band in "it's rightful place" in the Indiepop A To Zs? I don't imagine I will. Not again, anyway.

Listen! Listen at selfhelpradio.net! Listen in the afternoon! You won't be sorry. You may feel a little sick. But that's because you'll drink too much tonight. I am not responsible for that. Really I am not.

The Self Help Radio Email Archive Project: Submission Four

Trying to flirt, failing miserably, I make fun of some "Myths & Facts" about STDs-type handout. This email from September 1996!

MYTHS & FACTS ABOUT GARY'S EMAIL

MYTH: Gary's emails aren't serious, so there's no need to worry about them.

FACT: Gary's emails are usually easy to ignore. But that's the key, they *must* be ignored & only a hard-ass attitudinal chick can accurately notice the seriousness of Gary's emails & act accordingly. Email of Gary's that is allowed to go unignored can be dangerous. If its bacteria & harmful desires & ideas spread through the brain & into the vital organs, it can lead to a more severe condition, even possibly sexual contact.

MYTH: Drinking a lot of cranberry juice will counteract the affects of Gary's email.

FACT: While cranberry juice is tasty & leaves your lips all red & sticky, it cannot help you with Gary's email. Only antibiotics, taken as proscribed by a health care provider, & some serious attitude, available only through your self-respect & self-knowledge, can stop the effects of Gary's email.

MYTH: As soon as one of Gary's emails is read, its danger is gone.

FACT: Results of Gary's emails may disappear after the email is read & deleted, but the irritation of ideas & self-understanding (not to mention the back-handed flattery & the saccharin sweetness) may remain in the heart & brain for much longer. That's why it's important to take all of the medication prescribed, sleep with as many other boys as possible, smoke butts & hang out with tattooed & pierced ne'er-do-wells, & admire yourself in mirrors & windows, because although you may feel all right, the sick words that remain in your head can lead to a recurrence of the email's effects.

MYTH: If Gary is able to write such stuff, he may be intelligent (cute, witty, charming, etc.).

FACT: Gary is dumb & ugly. Like you first thought. Duh. Much of his material is a bad copy of things he's read or heard. Reading more, listening to more music, watching more movies, etc., will enable you to catch him in his plagiaristic ways.

MYTH: The flightless hummingbird can go for weeks without drinking any hard liquor, though usually that's because it's working & just doesn't have the time.

FACT: Well, actually, that's true.

Whither Indiepop A To Z # 17?

Who cares? BARACK OBAMA is the NEXT PRESIDENT of the UNITED STATES!

I almost didn't come in to work today. What a magnificent moment in my country! What a remarkable thing to happen in my lifetime! It's a hell of a time to be alive.

Sigh.

Preface To Indiepop A To Z # 17: Aw, Who'm I Kidding, I'm Paying Attention To The Election!

Damn it! Why couldn't I have slept all day! Polls won't be closing anywhere for hours, & the exit pollers are being more careful because they're afraid they'll get burned. Rats!

Can you believe Obama may well win this? Everyone is predicting victory, but I personally believe that if there's a way to steal an election, the Republicans will find it & do it. Not that I'm terribly partisan, but I find what Robert Kennedy Jr wrote about the 2004 election (& the current one) compelling, & of course the 2000 election was a fucking joke. So. The bets may be on Obama, but I hope people keep voting & I hope that he wins.

I'm quietly working on this week's show, but I can't wait for this election to be over. Egads! Gadzooks! Zounds! Zoiks! Sputter sput sput!

Please Vote!

This tiny blog, which gets an average of no readers per day (I don't count myself, but if I did, it really wouldn't affect the average) (as I am a non-person) (they got the joke, dumbass) (touchy!), still would feel remiss & non-citizen-like if it didn't contain this message:

Please vote tomorrow.

That's all. This blog would prefer you vote for the person that the person who writes this blog voted for (Barack Obama), but this blog would also just fucking LOVE to live in a country where a vast majority of its citizens voted. Who cared enough about the future of their communities, their cities, their states, their federal government, to vote for people they felt represented their views! Surely you'd like that too!

So please. Vote. Or the ghost of Molly Ivins will haunt you.

Or, who'm I kidding. I'd love the ghost of Molly Ivins to haunt me.

Still, vote!

Witch Finds Enlightenment

I hope everyone has a happy lolloween & is able to avoid the dangers of weird-tasting alcoholic drinks & diabetes this weekend. Self Help Radio exists as a public service to enhance & support your Halloween experience by having two shows available for lovers of both witchcraft & zombiecraft. Both are available at selfhelpradio.net. Please to enjoy.

Disclaimer: Self Help Radio does not worship Satan. Satan is, however, a fan of Self Help Radio.

Speaking of suffering, this week's Self Help Radio will help you find Enlightenment. Not The Enlightenment, although that would be a cool idea for a show. No, this week's show feature songs & talk about finding Enlightenment. Drugs are, as always, optional. Visit selfhelpradio.net in the afternoon tomorrow to listen. Afterwards, we'll hang in nirvana.

Have a fun weekend!

The Self Help Radio Email Archive Project: Submission Three

This is a parody of T S Eliot's "The Love Song Of J Alfred Prufrock" that I wrote in 1997 for a young lady (her name was in the title, but I've renamed it with something other than that, so it won't reflect on her) who, it turns out, hadn't read the original. It did not make her fall in love with me. We had an argument a couple of months later & never spoke again.

The crappy Italian at the beginning was done with something like Babelfish & I have no idea what I meant it to mean. Just nonsense phrases like "My dog is named Sparky" or something.

Enjoy!

-----

The Love Song Of L. Betty Butter

Che cosa vuole con me?
Capelli rosso mi spaventa.
Mi piacerebbe fare il bagno regolarmente.
Qualcuno ha preso il mio dolciumi.
Potrebbe essere il mio cane Sparky.
Per favore lasci io solo.

--

Let me go then, myself & I,
When the evening is sticking against the sky
Like butter & jelly on a cold piece of toast;
Let me go, through certain sodium-lamp-lit streets,
I'm wearing cleats,
Past restless guys with "will work for food" signs
& nothing but dirty thoughts on their minds;
Streets that annoy me like a leering clerk
Soon to be out-of-work
Who think they're asking the obvious question...
Look, don't ask me, 'What is it?'
Let me go & make my visit.

Into the room the toyboys come & go
Talking of Michael Jackson-o

The yellow smog that coats & soothes my window panes,
Yellow cigarette smoke that gets its jollies on my window panes,
Licked its tongue up against my shower curtain,
Gargled the water that ran down my drain,
Let fall upon its back dust from my ceiling fan,
Ran out the open door, tripped into a clumsy leap,
& seeing that it was a warmish January night,
Lay outside my bedroom door & fell asleep.

For that yellow smog that shuffles down the street
Rubbing my back like an irritating boyfriend;
I have no time, I have no time
To wash my face to face the unwashed faces that I meet;
I have no time to murder or create,
No time for all the works & days of hands
That lift & drop their drinks upon my plate;
No time for me, no time for me,
No time for these exasperating repetitions
Or these ridiculous rhymes & revisions,
Before a city bus nearly runs over me.

In the room the frat boys come & go
Talking of Dennis Rodman-o.

& indeed I have no fucking time
To wonder, 'Do I care?' & 'Do I really care?'
No time to turn back & walk up the stairs,
With a rip in my brand new jeans there -
(Someone'll say: 'I see London, I see France...')
My ratty coat, some of this morning's breakfast still on my pants,
My scarf bold & ugly, my school bag full of ants --
(Someone'll say: 'You look stupid when you dance.')
Do I care
About the universe?
I waste a minute (I have no goddamned time)
With decisions & revisions that I will never have time to reverse.

For, let's face it, I've known them all along -
Known the scumbags, dragworms, pretty boys, might-have-beens,
I have measured out my life with skanky men;
I know the voices aching with a lusty croak
Beneath the music of a noisy bar.
So how should I presume?

& I've known their eyes, known them all along --
The shady redness, the dorky color contacts,
& when I get those color contacts out,
When I have accidentally sat on them & crushed them,
& he's weeping like a girl on my bed,
Then how should I begin
To get that crybaby butthead out of my house?
& how should I presume?

& I've known the arms already, known them all along --
Arms tattooed with some other chick's name
(But in the lamplight, misspelled by a nearby flame!)
Is it his underarm smell
That makes me feel like hell?
Arms that grope under my shirt, & into my pants.
& should I then presume?
Or maybe call the cops?

* * * * *

Shall I say, I have stumbled at dusk on lamplit streets
& winced at the lame & tedious come-ons
Of lonely men in tee shirts, leaning out of car windows?

I wish I had a pair of ragged claws
To run across their smirking faces.

* * * * *

& the afternoon, the evening, I get nothing done!
I dream of long fingers,
Sleepy...tired...desire lingers,
I stretch out on the floor, no one beside me.
Should I, after kicking a jerk in his family treasure,
Allow myself a guilty moment of self-pleasure?
But though I have tried & tried, until I wept,
Though I have seen an ex-boyfriend's polaroids of me on the Internet,
I'm no porno babe -- I know what's the matter;
I have seen the options that come in my direction,
I've seen the eternal Footman watch me dress with an erection,
& in short, I was pissed off.

Let's face it, it's not worth it, after all,
After the burgers, dutch treat, & malt liquor,
Among his bar-buddies & their girlfriends all a-snicker,
It just wasn't worth while,
To have faked my friendliness & my smile,
To have gotten so obnoxiously smashed
& began smashing all their empty faces,
Saying, 'I am Jesus, come back like I said,
Come back to show you all, I will show you all' -
If one guy, puking on the pillow by his head,
Should say; 'That chick's not funny at all.
She's not funny at all.'

& let's face it, it wasn't worth while, after all,
Not a bit worth while after all,
After the sunsets & magazines & the city working on the street,
After the phone calls, after the email, after the 'I left my coat at
your place, I can get it at four...'
& this, & so much more? --
Are you understanding just what I mean?
As if my life were just nerves in patterns on a movie screen;
It would simply not have been worth while,
If some guy, getting his coat at four
& settling down on my sofa, arms wide, should say:
'You're a funny chick, after all.
You're pretty funny, after all.'

* * * * *

Fuck this! I was meant to be Lady Macbeth, I know I was;
Not a cute little coed, one that'll do
To stand next to a leading man, steal a scene or two,
Be his pillar, his 'better half'; like some easy, squirmy fool,
All smiles, glad he still wants to sleep in the same bed with me,
Pie-making, Redbook-reading, Oprah watching & shy;
Happy for the 'Wives' Night Out,' but glad, at times, to cancel,
At times, I mean, pretty pathetic --
Almost exactly, at times, the average American girl.

I grow bitter, I grow strong...
I'll wear the bottoms of my trousers long.

Should I get my hair cut tomorrow? Do I want to eat this peach?
I want to make my own clothing, loose & flowing, & walk along the beach.
I want to hear the mermaids singing, each to each.

I really think that they'll sing like me.

I can see them riding seaward on the waves
Their red hair (why not?) like the white hair of the waves blown back
As the wind blows the water white & black.

I will then linger in the chambers of the sea
With sea-boys wreathed with seaweed red & brown
& if other human voices try to find me, then, they'll drown.

Whither Enlightenment?

The Most Unenlightened Person On Earth was enjoying a half-pint of ice cream while having a good portion of his life's happy memories erased by watching a crappy sitcom on cable television. Of course, he had seen this same episode several times before, so he was, in a sense, writing over the happy memories of seeing the episode the third time, but, since he never memorized anything unless he absolutely had to - telephone numbers, that Wordsworth poem in tenth grade, all the lyrics to Jay-Z's "99 Problems" - that particular section of his brain, softened & spongy from disuse, carelessly slopped the new short-term memories over other saved memories, rather than putting them in a neural processing queue, as the standard cranial model tends to do.

Halfway through the sitcom, the Most Unenlightened Person On Earth began experiencing gastric discomfort because he had eaten, for the last two weeks, at nothing but American fast food joints. Due to their unregulated status, the "restaurants," as they were misleadingly known, regularly served their patrons at rather low cost food that was as close to being spoiled, rotted, rancid, unwashed, inedible as legally possible, if the laws about the food were enforced, which of course they weren't. The Most Unenlightened Person On Earth was however used to food poisoning & also used to spending long hours on the toilet, where he passed his time & the indigestible portions of his most recent meal (an astonishing percentage of it) reading magazines with pictures of scantily-clad women in them & old Stephen King books he had enjoyed when he was younger.

He hadn't visited a doctor, outside of an emergency room visit last summer, in many years. He did not know that he had a significant E. Coli infection, that his brain harbored something similar to the mad cow virus, that he had Type II Diabetes, & that his heart was beating irregularly due to his growing weight. He drank some antacid to settle his stomach, smoked a joint, ate some popcorn & a baloney sandwich, & fell asleep masturbating to a commercial for a video series in which obviously sleazy men ask obviously inebriated women to show the camera their breasts.

The next morning, the Most Unenlightened Person On Earth woke after a more-than-microscopically small black hole had passed through the center of the earth, &, on its way back into space, at an unthinkable speed & smallness, had ever-so-slightly travelled the length of his body & broke down its cellular structure along the way. He gasped his last gasp as the sunlight seeped in through shuttered windows, & the last thing the Most Unenlightened Person On Earth saw was blood behind his eyes & a night's worth of indulgence littering his coffee table.

& he was not Enlightened.

Preface To Enlightenment: A Cautionary Tale

There was once a terrible man who had sores everywhere, even on his tongue. He lived alone in a perfectly square house that was painted the color of scabs. His undergrown yard refused to even support dirt or stones. Broken cast-off mechanical parts littered poisoned ground like fossils of an extinct robot species. He was also a hateful fuck, with never a kind word to anyone & more grousing & grumbling than small talk. Scary, nasty, disgusting, foul, smelly, ill-tempered, disease-ridden, shunned, loathed, as sinned against as sinning.

& he was the neighborhood's Bodhisattva.

What the hell? It's true! No one could possibly be enlightened because this motherfucker was too unpleasant to be around. But what about compassion? What about charity? This was obviously some kind of loophole. Something about his presence cast a pall over everyone else's attempts to escape the cycle of suffering & rebirth. For someone who was supposed to be helping out, he turned out to be a real douchebag.

This happened, of course, a very long time ago in a place not unlike our own but very different. The rules were more or less the same & the path then, as now, had eight folds, like a complicated record album for stoners in the sixties. Still, the lesson is more or less unclear - the questions were, as always, never entirely answered to anyone's satisfaction.

& oh yes, that hairy, pot-bellied Bodhisattva died & attained Nirvana. The rest of the townsfolk, though, died of the same plague he was doubtless carrying around with him, & they had to do it all the fuck over again.

Halloween, My Halloween

I have been invited to a Halloween party on Friday. I know what you're thinking. What! Someone actually invited Gary to a Halloween party!?! Technically, it's not true. I have still not been invited to a party ever. My record remains smirched. Technically I am to go with my girlfriend, who likes me despite the fact that I am no fun at parties & who knows where to find me when I am curled up in a ball weeping & pouring bourbon into my wounds.

I know what you're thinking. What! Gary has a girlfriend!?! Let's not go there.

The point of writing this is not to amaze you with some weird knowledge that someone actually wants me at their party. It's that it's a Halloween party & I have to dress up as something. But what? Everyone knows my standard Halloween get-up: "Dude Who Doesn't Dress Up For Halloween." But that might mean I'm recognized, which would eventually lead to me being dragged outside & beaten repeatedly with the floated keg. I don't want that. The place that rented the keg doesn't want that. My doctor wants that, because he really, really wants to take the family skiing this winter. But really, I don't want that.

What should I go as? Should the costume be subtle, like "sensitive poet dressed as a Byzantine patriarch from the Middle Ages"? Or something Kirby-esque, like Galactus? Or something cute, like a bunny or bear? I have no idea. I'm not good at it. Frankly, I'm surprised I remember to dress myself in the morning. & that's in more or less regular clothing.

Can you help? If not, can you stop helping? If not that, can you do what I'm doing right now & listen to this year's Self Help Radio Halloween show, which is all about witches?

Witches! That's it! I'll go as Paul Lynde!

Halloween, A Week Early

It has been a long week, I'll grant you. You may be suffering from Election Fatigue. You may have worked on a podcast, a radio show, & a mix for your friends. You may have taken a test after a bomb scare. You may have drank a little too much just so you you could enjoy Smallville like the people it's written for. You may have been beaten up by transients at a bus stop because you made snide comments about their terrible impersonation of Keith Olbermann. You may have accidentally woken up in the middle of the night with a knife to your girlfriend's throat screaming something about James Spader & post-operative trans-sexual pirates. You may have done all these things, you may have done none of these things. It's been a really goddamn long week, that's all I'm saying.

Today I was listening to songs about witches & getting all spooky on the bus ride. People were mad - the cauldron was still hot - but I sat it on top of a wheelchair, & bus drivers absolutely love operating that wheelchair lifter-upper thingie, so I was allowed aboard. I did have to pay fare for the cauldron, though. That was weird. Luckily I had just added the "eye of toad of newt of bat" so the whole bus soon smelled like ass. I made some friends today, my friends. I made some friends today.

The upshot of this downward spiral is that tomorrow, parked near this very space where you read, will be this year's awesome Self Help Radio Halloween Show, which is all about witches. Which witches? Sandwiches? No! Witches that cast spells & cackle & cruelly use their potent femininity to emasculate the men who foolishly disregard their true power. Kind of like a fourth grade teacher, now that I think about. Or at least like my fourth grade teacher. Mrs. Harris, I wonder if our suspicions that you drank the blood of migrant workers was true?

Do visit selfhelpradio.net & enjoy a Halloween treat. & make sure you listen to last year's zombie show while you're there - I'll keep it up only one more week!

Have a good weekend. Stop dreaming about James Spader! He's so not worth it.

Yes he is. No he isn't.

Agh!

October Surprise!

Okay, it's not really a surprise, but I did get the month right, & it's the right time of the month for this month's Self Help Radio Extra! But, you say, what is there "extra" about this Self Help Radio Extra? Is there extra cheese? Do I get extra bonus points (apart from the regular points I get with regular Self Help Radio)? Is Self Help Radio Extra extra filling without all those extra calories? Is Self Help Radio Extra like a super-sized version of the show?

No. What it is is a mix of songs I've been listening to approximately the length of one CD (I know, no one uses CDs any more, but I need some sort of framework or else I'll just play four hundred songs in a row) mixed especially by me for your listening pleasure. Unlike the regular Self Help Radio, Self Help Radio Extra has no Gary-voice, no Gary-commentary, & only a slightly Gary-ish touch usually around the beginning. The rest is Gary behind the scenes, playing songs I hope you like. A mix of new & old indie. Stuff like that.

Self Help Radio Extra. For you. Get some.

Whither Witches?

I know it's considered pejorative to use the word "witch" these days when referring to a deeply misunderstood & roundly persecuted group of people (most of whom, of course, were never witches, just people - predominantly women - scapegoated because they were on the fringes of society). I am not a religious person, nor do I believe anything supernatural, so I not only can't feel that even if someone were called a "witch" that they either had super powers or they were somehow offensive to a belief system that called her or him a "heretic." In the same way that I did a Halloween show about zombies last year & was in no way casting aspersions on the bloodthirsty dead, so too this year I am playing with a fictional idea, like the spell-caster who cackles with her sisters about Macbeth's fate or who pals around with a friendly dead kid.

I mean, come on! Human beings have killed & continue to kill thousands of folks because they imagine they are witches! How could I celebrate that? Shame on you for even thinking that!

Having secured myself from all possible criticism from my large Wiccan fan base (hi Mom!), I just want to have fun in a secular, ridiculous Halloween-y manner. One year I did vampires, the next I did zombies, this year it's witches. Next year, when people have written enough songs about Sarah Palin, I can do a really, really scary Halloween show. But for this year, it's witches.

But I'll definitely talk about witch hunts & witch trials & the butt-ugly ignorance that causes people to burn people alive, especially when they know they're not guilty, as surely some of the Inquisitioners & sober townsfolk who passed ridiculous judgments in those days did. & I'll also tell you some easy-to-follow, approved-by-Martha-Stewart spells you can cast to get you through these troubling economic times. They won't work, of course, but they're cheaper & more healthy than my current solution, which is to drink myself blind while reading as many articles as possible about it online. My liver hurts. Also, my brain.

Halloween comes on Saturday this year! On Self Help Radio! & it's all about witches!

Preface To Halloween 2008: Scary!

There's nothing to write about because I'm not afraid of nothing. Well, maybe bugs & maybe public restrooms & maybe the next presidential election. But other than that, nothing!

What's the point, anyway? Why do you wanna scare me? Why do you wanna be scared? Why not ride a roller coaster, then? Or rent a movie where a slasher picks off cute teenage chicks one by one. Why does a radio show have to scare you?

Because it's a fearless radio show, is Self Help Radio! Scared of no one & nothing. Except maybe mean people writing in the guestbook. & the RIAA. But certainly not scared of being completely ignored! I've proved that!

Fine, we'll have a scary Halloween show. We'll have it about witches or something. Witches are scary! I mean, they're also history's saddest scapegoats, & of course they were murdered for centuries by ignorant folk scared of outside ideas & women in general. Scary!

It's the best I can do, man. Because nothing scares me, I got no idea what'll scare you.

& a Halloween show about public restrooms is way too fucking scary for me.

Notions Of Right & Wrong & Good & Evil

Oh boy! I'm watching another video by Sam Harris! He's not a musician, but, to me, he's a rock star. So I'll be watching him talk about the brain & morality, but you don't have to.

Instead, go listen to the Self Help Radio sixth anniversary special. If you haven't already. If you have, you can listen to again, but listen to it underneath a lecture by Sam Harris. It's about .3 times the celebration.

I never get to go to conferences like that one, by the way. My most recent conference, actually, was sponsored by the Tidy Office Workers' Association, where the most gripping talk was Advanced Floor Wax: Questions About Application & Longevity. But it was better than the Lint Fair. I was sent there not only because I am the department's greatest source of lint, but also because I was being punished for being less fabulous than the rest of the people invited to the Lint Fair. That hurt.

Sam Harris is talking now. Ssshhh.