Jack Handey – genius, as usual..

If you go through a lot of hammers each month, I don’t think it necessarily means you’re a hard worker. It may just mean that you have a lot to learn about proper hammer maintenance…”

by Jack Handey

Barakamaki?..

Sushi we need..

Truth in advertising..

‘Randy from Dover, Delaware’ tells it like it is on the QVC home shopping channel..

The creative process – pt1..

A rare fly-on-the-wall opportunity to see Fathers Ted and Dougal at work on the composition of the seminal ‘My Lovely Horse’..

“..just play the f—ing note!…” Been there a few times myself, I’m afraid..

The Minefield of Caddishness..

The splendid Harry Enfield, with important advice for all you impressionable young things. Let’s be careful out there..

Hamlet as Facebook news feed..

If you don’t do the Facebook thing I’d imagine that this item would make little sense to you. If you do, then I think you’d have to concur with me that this is a work of no small genius. Click the pic below for the full size version..

Look at us – the last stronghold of gracious living in a world gone mad.. mad!

Been musing, this unfine morning, about trains and rivers, and destinies and obligations and life-stories and desires and tennis and, of course, Terry Thomas.. A quick trawl through Youtube reveals that both my favourite Terry moments are now on there..

Can’t for the life of me imagine how, in all my yaddering on here about music and composers generally, and film soundtrack composers specifically, I’ve signally failed to mention the great Neal Hefti, the unchallenged master of that hyper-elegant Manhattan sound. The Odd Couple is, I suppose, his signature work but this one is my favourite. That moment when Terry bends to pick up the mail at the front door, and those velvet horns come sweeping in.. that’s the sound of a New York I was desperate to experience. Of course it had already disappeared long before I finally managed to get myself there, if it had ever actually existed in the first place..

…and, inevitably, the greatest tennis match in the history of the game. From School for Scoundrels, Terry dispatches Ian Carmichael in fine style. How can so much laughter be generated in me just by one man repeatedly uttering the phrase “Hard Cheese!”? Sublime..

It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood..

.. A beautiful day for a neighbor.
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?…

(God, I’ve been watching this for a couple of minutes now and I think I may need counselling..)

If there is a path it is someone else’s path and you are not on the adventure.

.. Just been reading Joseph Campbell on the Arthurian Grail Tradition, and stumbled on a passage that nicely explains something that had puzzled me. I’d often wondered why all the knights wandered around individually on their quest, rather than joining forces. Campbell writes this..

“… They thought it would be a disgrace to go forth in a group. Each entered the forest at a point he himself had chosen, where it was darkest and there was no path…“

Nice, huh? I liked it anyway..

..and of course no discussion of Arthurian legends would be complete without a reference to the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch..

“… Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count. Neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three…”

Time to relocate, perhaps..

For those who don’t follow the beautiful game, Turkey play Germany tomorrow evening in the semi-finals of the European Championship..

(thanks to Monica for the photo)

Grauniad in inadvertent nail-on-head shocker..

From an otherwise unremarkable puff piece in today’s edition..

.. Oh well, at least he likes his grandmother..

Father Jack..

I was obliged at the weekend, against my better judgement, to attend the First Holy Communion of the daughter of close friends. It was, of course, a mistake – big old church, big old priest.. and all I could think of, as he continued to pontificate, were the words of the immortal Jack Handey, which, as it happens, were some of the first I quoted on this blog, a while ago now..

“If a kid asks where rain comes from, I think a cute thing to tell him is “God is crying.” And if he asks why God is crying, another cute thing to tell him is “Probably because of something you did.”

..and while we’re on the subject of Catholic Guilt, and sinners in general, no-one nailed it better than Mrs. Doyle..

2001, A Space Atrocity..

.. This just in, from Mr. Paul Staveley O’Duffy..

“A good mate of mine (Karl Phillips) is a techy for Robanna’s Studios in Brum and one day recently he was asked to set up and operate a PA at a school concert..”

(Only click the link if you’re not drinking liquid of any kind.)

Jack’s back!..

”As the light changed from red to green to yellow and back to red again, I sat there thinking about life. Was it nothing more than a bunch of honking and yelling? Sometimes it seemed that way.”

Jack Handey

We’re off to see the wizard..

.. the wonderful wizard of cheech!

Because, because, because, because , because…

Jaco has an off day..

.. found this late last night, on a routine youtube-trawl. 30 seconds in, I already had beer coming out my nostrils, and may have done a little wee..

(Tim, our guitar player, is a big fan of these ’shreds’ and keeps exhorting me to watch the Clapton one, but it never seemed that funny an idea as I never thought him much of a player anyway. This Jaco one, on the other hand, is, for me at least, a perfectly executed work of twisted comedic genius..)

 

I am big. It’s the pictures that got small..

Just got this. I think somebody’s algorithm needs a bit of serious tweaking…

Going back to my roots..

Somebody just drew my attention to this..

The Roots – Live, Toronto – March 30, 2008

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Tickled me, anyway – gotta love the Roots..

Cruise control..

And beauty surrounds ye..

Now this did raise a wry chuckle. From a few years ago, Mr. O’Duffy and myself moonlighting under pseudonyms to produce and arrange this oft-overlooked contemporary classic for loveable English eccentric and all-round good bloke, Mr. Vic Reeves. Actually, it charted higher than Breakout in the UK. Sound quality on the video is not great, but I still find it somehow oddly moving, and I’d quite forgotten about all the Strawberry Letter 23 references – not entirely sure any more as to why we did that…