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Weak XV

9 April 2023

No. 6,235 (cartoon)

Lo! The Egyptians feared not the celibate knives.

Now just what in the hell does that mean?

I don’t know, but it sounded quite plausible when the rabbi said it.

10 April 2023

Dr. Suess’s Air of Vomitrociousiosity

“I’ve warned my publishers that if they later on so much as change a single comma in one of my books, they will never see another word from me. Never! Ever!”

Roald Dahl put some teeth into that threat, adding, “When I am gone, if that happens, then I’ll wish mighty Thor knocks very hard on their heads with his Mjolnir. Or I will send along the ‘enormous crocodile’ to gobble them up.”

Now that the author’s been dead for thirty-some years, his publishers gulped a few handfuls of stupid pills and rewrote his work to make it more appealing to “sensitive readers.” The words “fat” and “ugly” no longer appear in the new editions, lest some delicate soul might be upset at the suggestion that anything in the world might possibly be fat or ugly.

(Why is there never an enormous crocodile around when you need one?)

I agreed with my fellow cartoonist Dan Piraro when he rolled his eyes—using only ASCII characters—after reading that Theodore Geisel dba Dr. Seuss was being lambasted for “racially insensitive images or stereotypes” in his work.

That’s when Lance Ito wrote to Piraro to make it clear that Geisel was a remorseless racist.

At the beginning of the Second World War, his was a leading voice advocating the wrongful incarceration of the entire Japanese American population along the West Coast of the United States. He falsely accused our community of treason, sabotage, and worse … Please note Geisel personally profited from this action. ... In the decades that followed Geisel never acknowledged the wrongfulness of his actions, apologized to any of the communities he denigrated, nor did he make any effort whatsoever to ameliorate any of the harm he profited from causing.

I’ve always liked Dr. Seuss’s quote, “You know you’re in love when you can’t fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.” Correction: I always liked it until I learned those were the thoughts of an unrepentant racist; a conceptual patina that leaves every word he wrote with a whiff of vomitrociousiosity about it.

11 April 2023

Be the Crazy One

Duane and Amanda invited me to their thirtieth-anniversary party. I would have happily joined them for such an auspicious occasion even had they not promised a mountain of food and an ocean of wine.

“What does it take to stay married for thirty years?” I asked.

“In any relationship, it’s important that you be the crazy one,” Duane replied with a smile.

Amanda nodded her head and smiled too.

I extrapolated from that that they both considered themselves to be the crazy one; perfect! I concluded that you don’t have to be crazy to be married that long, but it helps.

12 April 2023

Do Suicide Pills Expire?

It seems like almost everyone I know has suicide pills. They’re certainly not for recreational use, but you never know when you might need to take the one-way trip through the final exit.

Theresa is a bit perplexed about what to do with hers. According to the manufacturer, the medication has expired. After scratching our noggins over a few drinks, neither of us could figure out whether that made them less effective or more.

Since suicide pills are neither today’s problem nor today’s solution, we went on to puzzle how so much wine could apparently evaporate from so few open bottles ...

13 April 2023

Strict Inequalities For The n-Crossing Number

A friend showed me a paper his grandson wrote, Strict Inequalities For The n-Crossing Number. Neither of us could make heads or tails of the treatise on knot theory, and not just because knots don’t have heads or tails.

The author is only sixteen or so, so that’s obviously an impressive accomplishment. I don’t think he’s particularly precocious, though, since he may only have a dozen years or so to explore beyond the known boundaries of mathematics. For reasons I haven’t even tried to understand, the consensus among my learned friends is that almost no one has ever made a significant math discovery after her or his thirtieth birthday.

That’s one of the reasons I’m so pleased that I chose to be an alleged artist and writer instead of a dancer or an athlete. I imagine that I’ll be able to press a shutter release or type this shonky frogtwaddle until I pop my clogs.

14 April 2023

Obituary Ghostwriter

I ran across something I’ve never seen in Edward Koren’s New York Times obituary, and now you can run across it too.

“My trajectory was a comedy of manners,” Mr. Koren said in an interview for this obituary in 2018.

I’ve never heard of anyone being interviewed for an obituary before; I wonder how often that happens. I’m curious about how many one-liners like the one above Koren prepared for his terminal conversation with Robert McFadden. I’ll conclude with the question of the day: given the arrangement, who’s the ghostwriter, Koren or McFadden?

15 April 2023

What Was Satchmo Thinking?

Last night I listened to Joey Ramone’s version of What a Wonderful World followed by Louis Armstrong’s recording of the same song. After that, I let my pseudo-jukebox computer play more of the hundred Armstrong tracks I copied to my hard disk years ago and then ignored. I was enjoying the background music until I heard a couple of lines I was sure I couldn’t have heard.

I’m white inside, but that don’t help my case ...
My only sin is in my skin

Satchmo, what were you thinking?! (Might it have anything to do with the time he spent in detention at the Colored Waifs Home when he was nine after being arrested for being “a dangerous and suspicious character?”)

I don’t know much about such histories, but I can see why James Brown’s Say It Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud was so welcome in 1968 when it stayed on the scene, not unlike a sex machine.

Meanwhile, back in the land of repression and suppression, here are the lyrics to (What Did I Do To Be So) Black and Blue, written by Andy Razaf née Andriamanantena Paul Razafinkarefo. (Allegedly, the work was “commissioned” with a loaded gun by Dutch Schultz, the infamous New York gangster.)

Out in the street, shufflin’ feet
Couples passin’ two by two
While here am I, left high and dry
Black, and ’cause I’m black I’m blue

Browns and yellers, all have fellers
Gentlemen prefer them light
Wish I could fade, can’t make the grade
Nothing but dark days in sight

[Armstrong omitted those opening lines and began his recording here ...]

Cold empty bed, springs hard as lead
Feel like old Ned, wished I was dead
What did I do to be so black and blue?
Even the mouse ran from my house
They laugh at you, and scorn you too
What did I do to be so black and blue?

’Cause I can’t hide what is in my face
How would it end? Ain’t got a friend

What did I do to be so black and blue?

How would it end? Ain’t got a friend
My only sin is in my skin
What did I do to be so black and blue?

Coming next weak: more of the same.

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©2023 David Glenn Rinehart