I'll just entertain myself

I was so happy to have a long term job that I pushed myself to the limit. Now when we walk in the park I spend as much time on the grass as I can.

I let a few things bother me enough to leave here. But it turns out I no longer give a crap about it and so I came back. Thanks for the video. I have been lamenting the lack of that video since I got back. Look around. There is less funny stuff online now than ever before. My humor and oddities thread languishes because I am not funny enough to take up the slack. What does a guy have to do to have some fun around here? Watch Roseanne Barr videos? Geez, I'm dying here.

Celebrate the fact you at least have a sense of humour Ed unlike some of the two dimensional characters who take up way too much space on A2K.

Always enjoy reading your ramblings Ed.

It also helps to have really supportive shoes with a decent arch. If you wear them, most sandals have no arch (except Ecco brand) and will contribute to back, hip and knee problems.

Yep. As Woody Guthrie wrote,
"It takes a ten dollar shoe to fit my feet -
Your two dollar shoe hurts my feet -"

You should try these Rags. People would look up to you wearing these. (no choice)

They Pump you UP! (Hans and Frank)

You could fall off and be killed.

The Flash. Why do we need someone who can move really fast? Wouldn't there be less destruction if we built bullet trains? In fact, there are quite a few comic book heroes that I would cull. I would start with the boy wonder. Batman's dark and mysterious. The boy ruins it by being loud and gaudy. Captain America looks like an idiot with that shield and dumb costume. Green Arrow????? What's with all the comic book women looking like a misogynist's dream? Except for Peter Parker's aunt. Why can't she be sexy and flaunt her body in every panel? Don't get me started with Swamp Thing.

I'm an equal opportunity trash your icons monger. Read here long enough and I will get to many things you possibly love. I don't mind that you love what I possibly don't, but I am likely to trash it anyway.

For better or worse, here is something Gene Autry wrote:

The Cowboy Code By Gene Autry

1. The cowboy must never shoot first, hit a smaller man, or take unfair advantage.

2. He must never go back on his word, or a trust confided in him.

3. He must always tell the truth.

4. He must be gentle with children, the elderly, and animals.

5. He must not advocate or possess racially or religiously intolerant ideas.

6. He must help people in distress.

7. He must be a good worker.

8. He must keep himself clean in thought, speech, action, and personal habits.

9. He must respect women, parents, and his nation's laws.

10. The Cowboy is a patriot.

I copied this in the Your Daily Quote thread. When somebody attacked it, Merry Andrew defended Gene, pointing out that Gene had been a rancher on his father's ranch and served in WWII in the Army Air Corps among other good points. This was his ideal code for cowboys. The reality was not always the same, but for old time westerns it works.

https://gizmodo.com/frozen-in-siberian-permafrost-for-24-000-years-microsc-1847045211
Frozen in Siberian Permafrost for 24,000 Years, Microscopic Animal Comes Back to Life

Everybody likely has movie favorites that speak to their own lives in ways significant and unique. I know I do. For beginners, there is The Grapes of Wrath. It tells the lives of persons just like my mother's family. The big difference being that when her family reached California the authorities were at the border, turning moneyless families away. Thousands per day had kept flowing in. They resumed a life of cotton picking in Texas. There were actually other crops besides cotton. Mom liked picking strawberries the best. It was not until after she married and had three children the opportunity to be in California came up again. She left her husband and went with her parents to San Diego. Her parents didn't even like California. They returned to Texas, but Mom married again and stayed behind. When I was small, many of the kids I knew in California had very heavy southern accents. I recall being ridiculed for calling aigs eggs. The Grapes of Wrath always conjures the early days and remains my favorite all-time movie because of that.

Adjusting the theme from my last post, books have the same effect on our lives, of course. It was not that many years after I learned how to read that I discovered Oliver Twist. It spoke to the life I had under the poverty and oppression of a demented stepfather.

At age nineteen the works of Philip Wylie helped to form me politically and opened my eyes to the foibles of society. It is an experience that keeps giving to this day. One example, he wrote about how easy it would be for a coup to succeed in this country. Of course it takes somebody more organized and intelligent than a goober like D. Trump to have a chance at succeeding. That's where the Koch brothers and their ilk come in to do it by stealth.

Other movies and books that are a part of me in important ways are Catch 22, The Americanization of Emily, Elliot Gould in Getting Straight, The Tortilla Curtain, works characterized as "beat," Midnight Cowboy, Born on the Fourth of July, the autobiography of Malcolm X, some essays and speeches by Martin Luther King, Jr. and some by Jesse Jackson - almost everything is pre-21ST Century.

Music - The release felt with the discovery of Rock and Roll - I was in the ninth grade when it entered my world. Music was already my greatest refuge. With the coming of folk singers such as Harry Belafonte and Peter, Paul and Mary, the music became even more personal. Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie, Huddie Ledbetter, Phil Ochs, Joan Baez, Leonard Cohen dozens more -

Last but not least the writers and filmmakers pushing dystopian themes.

I forgot to mention Henry Miller among the authors. Also neglected cartoonists, such as Walt Kelly (Pogo), R Cobb, and Robert Crumb.

Speaking of R. Crumb, there was an amazing short documentary Crumb (1995). He really was not of this earth. H s still alive, aged 77. Fo those that aren’t familiar he was a cartoonist and creator of Mr. Natural, Keep On Truckin’ and Fritz, the Cat.

I preferred Gilbert Shelton, creator of The Freak Brothers and Fat Freddy’s Cat.

Very similar to Crumb.

I don’t dislike Crumb, I quite like him, but Sheldon just noses it in my book.

He’s from Texas ‘n all.