I post a weekly diary of historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I often feature in "Cheers & Jeers".
OK, you've been warned - here is this week's tomfoolery material that I posted.
CHEERS to Bill and Michael in PWM, our Wyoming-based friend Irish Patti and ...... well, each of you at Cheers and Jeers. Have a fabulous Mother's Day, and the rest-of-the-week.
ART NOTES - 300 works in an exhibition entitled Ireland: Crossroads of Art and Design, 1690–1840 are at the Art Institute of Chicago through June 7th.
HAIL and FAREWELL to the former Democratic speaker of the House, Jim Wright - quite possibly the last living elected government official who was in the 1963 JFK motorcade in Dallas - who has died at the age of 92.... and to Oscar Carl Holderer - the last known surviving member of the German engineering team that came to the United States after World War II and designed the rocket that took astronauts to the moon - who has died at the age of 95.
DESPITE ITS PROGRESSIVE CONSTITUTION the nation of South Africa offers very high stipends to its eleven kings and queens - including the leader of the Zulus, who receives $4.8 million for his seven palaces, six wives and twenty-eight children.
MOTHERS DAY's CHILD is Mikey the Cat - a Texas female kitteh (despite the name) who was grieving over the death of her three premature kittens - then, when offered the chance to 'adopt' three newborns ...... began nursing them as if they were her own.
IN FUTURE ELECTIONS in Great Britain: if the Labour Party manages to recover and win a coalition majority in Parliament, it will likely be due to its growing strength in Greater London - a change from the 1980's - with a heterodox coalition of women, ethnic minorities, immigrants and the liberal middle classes.
BRAIN TEASER - due to BiPM's goldbricking day off this past Friday, the Quiz of the Week's News appears here for the first time this week.
FRIDAY's CHILDREN are Mushi and Cheesy the Cats - who rode on a specially-equipped bicycle (ridden by Thomas Vles) from the Netherlands to England, to mark the grand opening of his "Poopy Cat" cat-product firm's London shop ... captured on video from start to finish.
THE OTHER NIGHT yours truly hosted the Top Comments diary with a look at The Road Not Taken - as Rebecca Skloot and Joshua Redman were on their way to careers in veterinary medicine and law, respectively ..... until fate intervened, leading them to careers as a best-selling author and a star of the music world.
YUK for today - last evening, there was a wonderful skit on Saturday Night Live - a multi-candidate "Southern Republican Leadership Conference" with the declared candidates all emphasizing their "coolness".
SEPARATED at BIRTH - Academy award-winning director Kathryn Bigelow and the Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton.
...... and finally, for a song of the week ....................... after profiling several distinguished artists in this space such as Gabriel Fauré, Duke Ellington and Chet Atkins, as well as songwriters such as Ervin Drake and Dorothy Fields ..... well, it's time for a little psychobilly, everyone!
At least in the form of Mojo Nixon who 'retired' a few years ago from performing ... except when he makes comebacks. He combines rockabilly, punk and manic satire with - as the All-Music Guide puts it, "all the subtlety of a sledgehammer" and is certifiable enough to merit inclusion in a Dr. Demento compilation .... which has gotta count for something.
Born Neill McMillan in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, he earned a political science degree from Miami of Ohio and went to England in 1979, hoping to break into the punk movement as a guitarist there. Unsuccessful, he relocated to Denver the following year and after joining a punk band named Zebra 123 laid down his first marker of outrage: promoting a gig called the Assassination Ball with posters depicting the exploding heads of Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter (garnering some Secret Service attention). He later moved to San Diego and met future partner Country Dick Montana and developed his stage name as a "combination of voodoo and bad politics".
He began performing with harmonica/percussion player Richard Banke (who took the name "Skid Roper") and eventually won a deal from Enigma Records in 1985. Their debut album became a college radio station hit due to "Jesus at McDonald's". Their next disc made them even more popular, containing such eminently dignified tunes as "Stuffin' Martha's Muffin" - an ode to Martha Quinn who was one of the original MTV veejays - plus "I Hate Banks" as well as "I Ain't Gonna Piss in No Jar" (dang, how timely are they?) and a subsequent single Burn Down the Malls which garnered the duo their first MTV airplay. Mojo Nixon also appeared in the 1990 biopic Great Balls of Fire as the drummer of Jerry Lee Lewis.
The duo went on to record a few more albums, with their only two charting hits: "Debbie Gibson Is Pregnant with My Two-Headed Love Child" and 1990's Don Henley Must Die - which had an interesting coda. Two years later, Don Henley (reported to be upset at first with the song) - jumped up on-stage at an Austin, Texas gig to sing it along with Mojo and Roper.
Around this time, Skid Roper left to pursue a studio career, and Mojo Nixon became a 'solo artist' (of sorts). But he first had to endure the bankruptcy of his record company, which left him rudderless for a bit (not-for-nothing did his song "Destroy All Lawyers" come about). In the Nineties, he appeared in two films, Super Mario Brothers and Car 54, Where Are You? - both of which were major flops.
He re-emerged with recordings with the Dead Kennedys lead singer Jello Biafra (Prairie Home Invasion in 1994) as well as Dave Alvin of The Blasters - and on Mojo Nixon's 1995 solo album he sang with Country Dick Montana in what proved to be the last recording before Montana's death. However, the company would not release his song "Bring Me the Head of David Geffen" (although it came out later on a compilation album).
As you can see, Mojo Nixon has never played it safe - and over the years released more such songs, and was named honorary captain of the US luge team at the 1998 Winter Olympics. He took a job as an afternoon talk show host in Cincinnati but was shifted to a morning slot when his political views (libertarian-left) grated on nerves in the area. In fact, Mojo Nixon once debated Pat Buchanan on CNN(!) over the emerging record label censorship in the 1990's.
He formally left music with a final 2004 performance in Austin, and has spent several years on a Loon in the Afternoon show on Sirius satellite radio. But you can't keep a good man down ... or even a crazy one. When a friend sought high office in Texas, Nixon was quoted as saying "If supporting Kinky Friedman for Governor is what it takes to drag my ass out of retirement .... consider my ass dragged".
In 2009 he released Whisky Rebellion - for which he offered free MP3 downloads of his entire catalog for three weeks declaring he was not an "a-hole like Metallica". And in recent years, he has lampooned the Westboro Baptist Church as well as Tim Tebow.
They'll find a cure for him yet - until then, Mojo Nixon will turn age 58 this August, and made a guest appearance at the South by Southwest conference in Austin this past spring.
His most famous recording - and which encapsulates his .... well, mojo - is his 1987 song simply titled Elvis Is Everywhere - and below you can listen to it.
When I look out into your eyes out there
When I look out into your faces
You know what I see?
I see a little bit of Elvis
In each and every one of you out there
Lemme tell ya...
Weeeeeeeeeellllllll...
Elvis is everywhere
Elvis is everything
Elvis is everybody
Elvis is still the king
He's in everybody
He's in the young, the old
the fat, the skinny
the white the black
the brown and the blue people got Elvis in 'em, too
Who built the pyramids?
ELVIS!
Who built Stonehenge?
ELVIS!
Elvis is everywhere
Elvis is everything
Elvis is everybody
Elvis is still the king