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I tried to get the photographer to pay me $20 to take my picture. "I have a copyrighted image to protect," I told him. But he wouldn't pony up the $20, so I'm stealing my image back. They can stick their copyright.
Anyhow, here's proof indeed that I went to a Reds game last night... My first in I don't know how long, but only my third or so since the 1991 strike....
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You can see it, can't you? I'm not just imagining it.
If you could feel it, and you're welcome to anytime if you want, it would feel like a frozen pea attached to my spine just under the skin.
It started out bigger. When it was first discovered, it felt like a frozen grape attached to my spine just under my skin. Or so I've been told. The truth is that it's been strategerically* placed in a spot where I can't reach it no matter how I contort myself. At least Dick Cheney was clever enough to know that I would surely remove it if I could reach it, even though his attempts and mind manipulation have failed miserably. |
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I'm onto you, Dick Cheney. You can't control my mind, you Czar of Darkness.
At first I thought it was an Alien Implant. For all I know it could be an Alien Implant. It may very well be that Dick Cheney is in league not only with the Forces of Evil in the United States of America and the rest of the Planet Earth, but he could be in League with the Forces of Evil of the Entire Universe. Or it may be that it's really an Alien Implant pretending to be a Dick Cheney Implant, but that doesn't ring true to me. I have no evidence, but I figure that if it's an Alien Implant, then it would be of an Intelligence far greater than that on the Planet Earth and would therefore know that to assume the voice of a Dick Cheney Implant would be counter-productive.
I mean, anyone who knows me would know that the first time the Dick Cheney Implant told me to run a redlight for the sanctity of the Republic or to tell the cashier how much I enjoyed her cleavage because it would be good for the economy, that I would tell the Dick Cheney Implant to Kiss My Progressive Ass. I'm not unfamiliar with voices in my head, and I can separate the real ones from the imaginary ones. So anything the Dick Cheney Implant tells me to do, I do the opposite. An Alien with an Intelligence far greater than our own would know that and would present itself to me as a, say, Salma Hayek Implant, or a Jodie Foster Implant. Or even a Teri Hatcher implant because, you know, I'm easy that way. Or it could have said that it was a Jack Bauer Implant and then I sure as hell would have done everything it said because Jack Bauer is a bad-ass and I don't want to be at the wrong end of his prodigious head-butt. Or spine-butt as the case may be. I digress. It's hard to concentrate with Dick Cheney yelling into your spine, and he's really pissed that I'm going public with this. In fact, this is my third attempt to blog this because "somehow" my Internet Tubes are being clogged with dangerous materials like yellowcake uranium and germanchocolatecake plutonium and belgiumwaffle indigium, so every once in a while I have to turn my computer upside down and shake it really hard, and sometimes the words I've written get all jumbled up and I have to start over. |
I'm not unfamiliar with voices in my head, and I can separate the real ones from the imaginary ones. |
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So even with Dick Cheney riding shotgun, I'm not dangerous, just ineffective. |
But I digress. I was saying that I know it really is a Bona Fide Dick Cheney Implant is because only Dick Cheney would have the ego to want to take the credit for being clever enough to get an implant on my spine without my knowing it. That's Dick Cheney for you.
But you don't have to worry about me. He's tried the reverse psychology thing. He tried to get me to stand up in the middle of the Tuesday staff meeting and try and get everyone to sing along with "You Are My Sunshine" by telling me NOT to do it. So in that case, I did exactly what he said. So now everytime the Dick Cheney implant tells me to do something, I think to myself "What Would Walt Whitman Do?" and so I usually get too confused to do anything at all. So even with Dick Cheney riding shotgun, I'm not dangerous, just ineffective. And I was ineffective in just about everything I do before the Dick Cheney Implant, so nothing's really different except for the constant nagging and occasional screaming. I don't mind that so much, but when he turns on the Civil Defense Sirens, I get a headache and have to lay down for a while. And I did that a lot before the Dick Cheney Implant, too.
But I'm not here to complain, but just to share my story in case someone else out there has an implant that tries to manipulate his or her thought processes, for whom I offer this advice: "Ignore the Voices in Your Head." Chances are, they're up to no good. And if you do have an implant, please e-mail me at dickcheneyimplant@richardojones.com. I'd love to hear your story.
But if you have voices yelling at you but no implant, you're just crazy and should leave me the hell alone.
* Irony. |
Shortly after posting an entry about The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks, I found this one last Saturday on my way home from a gig at Monkeyland*. I just upgraded my flickr account because I was reaching my limit, so my Bad Signs can be seen in a slideshow there now.
PS: *There wasn't a monkey to be seen.
Although Mindy Smith spent some time in Cincinnati — and joined her first band while there — one gets a sense that it was not exactly a memorable part of the native Long Islander’s life. For one thing, she was recovering from the death of her mother, her musical idol and inspiration.
“She had the most beautiful voice I’ve ever heard,” said Smith, who was 19 when her mother died of cancer. “She had the ability to touch people, to move mountains with her voice. If I learned anything from her, it’s to put all of your emotion into your performance.”
So she found herself enrolled at Cincinnati Bible College.
“I went there because I had some friends who went there,” she said. “I was a lousy student, but I needed to get out of New York. I tried to do a band-thing, but that only lasted about two months. It was fun, but...”
After dropping out, she re joined her father, who had relocated to Nashville, and that’s where she found her voice and her instrument.
“That was my version of college,” she said, “learning how to write. I started out singing them a capella, but realized I needed to learn how to play guitar to accompany myself. But I felt like that’s what I was meant to do: Write original songs.”
Smith got to work on her career, going to songwriters showcases and open mics nearly every night. Winning the Tin Pan South writer’s contest in 2000 led to a staff position at Yellow Dog Music. The company allowed her to earn a living writing songs for others while she made demos and generated a buzz that earned her an appearance with Lee Ann Womack at South By Southwest and as the only unsigned artist on the Dolly Parton tribute CD, “Just Because I’m a Woman.” She was singled out by Parton herself for that project.
She’s still on the road for her 2007 album “Long Island Shores,” her second, playing solo acoustic sets.
“That’s really the way I like to do things,” she said. “That’s how I started out, so I’m quite comfortable out there alone.”
So this is a new approach... presuming it's a scam. But the ALL CAPS TEXT, the broken lines, the fractured English and the fact that I've never heard of this guy all make this e-mail smell like fish...
MY NAME IS ALLEN TAYLOR, I AM ON A CHRISTIAN MISSION OUT OF THE COUNTRY
AND I CAME ALONG WITH MY FEMALE YORKIE TERRIER PUPPY. AFTER A WHILE I
NOTICE
THAT THE WEATHER HERE IS NOT GOOD FOR THE PUPPY AND I HAVE NOT BEEN
ABLE TO TAKE
GOOD CARE OF HER THE WAY I ALWAYS DO BECAUSE OF MY JOB. SHE IS AKC &
CKC. -
TEACUP. HOME RAISED, VACCINES & HEALTH GUARANTEE.I NEED A SOMEONE TO
ADOPT
HER AND TAKE CARE OF HER THE WAY I ALWAYS DO.IF YOU CAN TAKE GOOD CARE
OF HER DO
SEND A REPLY AND I WILL EMAIL YOU HER PICTURES.
P.S EMAIL ME BACK AT: revallentaylor@gmail.com
I HOPE TO READ FROM YOU.
REV ALLEN TAYLOR
GOD BLESS YOU
So let's play it cool and see where it leads...
Where is the dog now?
Recorded live at the Third Street Tap & Grill, Hamilton, Ohio, and on location in Okeana, Ohio. Thanks to Barb Didrichsen for the additional camera work, and to Ernie Mills of Okeanas for showing me around his country home...
HAMILTON — “Musicianaries” Gary and Julie Tussey have both been making music since they were children.
She’s a little bit pop and rock with three self-released solo CDs to her credit. He’s a little bit country and blues. Together they’ve hit upon a sound that has landed them a national distribution deal for their next record, “Dance!”
The Tusseys have been together as a couple for 13 years, but it wasn’t until about two years ago that they joined forces in their music ministry to perform as a duo, inspired by an enigmatic encounter after a gig.
“He always played piano with the floating left-hand technique like Jerry Lee Lewis,” Julie said.
“Then about two years ago, I was playing in a church, a guy came up to me after and said, ‘The Lord is using the guitar now,’” Gary said. “I think he meant it like a smart aleck, but I took it as a challenge,” and he retired to his studio to study.
For the next six months, even his wife didn’t really know what he was up to except that she’d hear him playing endless scales.
Then one day, he came to her with a riff he had written, and she immediately started writing lyrics to it, and they kept writing until they had their first duo disc in the can, a self-produced and self-marketed project they called “Hillbilly Praise.”
When they started on the second set, the music became more “rhythm ’n’ blues meets gospel,” they said, or what they decided to call “Christian blues.”
“‘Hillbilly Praise’ was more praise-and-worship, but for the next CD we tried to tell more life stories,” Gary said.
While there are still details to be worked out in regard to post-production on the music, the Tusseys hope that “Dance!” will be released in time for the Christmas season.
Contact this reporter at (513) 820-2188 or rjones@coxohio.com.
