Chocolate Thunder: Eat the Boom

Florida is a magical place, filled with costumes and puppetry and astronauts. And astronauts are the world's greatest diaper wearers, excluding incontinent bears. I say that because of an experience I had with Mark N. Brown, the astronaut responsible for the deployment of the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite in 1991 on STS-48. I was having trouble writing my critically acclaimed novel Infinite Jest!: The Longest Joke Ever Told and decided to take a walk to the Okeechobee County Jail. I never got there because I met Mark when we both stopped by Hattie's Burger Fountain for a bacon cheeseburger smoothie and started talking about inspiration. I'm a grind-it-out kind of guy, and told Mark inspiration is for the lazy and unemployed. What's the point of waiting around for a flash of insight when you can be working towards the light instead? At that point he beat me unconscious with his mind and put $25 in my pocket.

Here was his point: never call an astronaut a bag of elk piss because they have powers you cannot fathom. Anyway, here's the podcast. I had a boatload of trouble thinking of anything interesting to say, so you can just fastforward through the parts in which I speak.

1. Vicki Anderson - I'm Too Tough for Mr. Big Stuff
2. Shuggie Otis - Hurricane
3. Eddie Kendricks - Let's Go Back to Day One
4. Marie Queenie Lyons - Your Thing Ain't No Good Without My Thing
5. Willie West - Fairchild
6. The Chi-Lites - I Found Sunshine
7. Kim Weston - Brothers and Sisters (Get Together)
8. Ann Peebles - Somebody's on Your Case
9. Little Milton - More & More
10. Curtis Knight - The Devil Made Me Do It
11. Edwin Starr - Soul City
12. David Ruffin - My Whole World Ended (The Moment You Left Me)
13. Jean Knight - Do Me
14. Archie Bell and the Drells - Tighten Up
15. Howlin' Wolf - Evil

Resistance Is Futile: Bring Me the Sonic Screwdriver!

Here we are again, fresh off of Thanksgiving and the joy of spending time with family and friends and food. God I just want to eat the food so much. Get away from me! Where's the gravy? What's in my pants? AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH please help me I can't stop weeping and my tears are made of turkey skin.

So, the holidays are the best time to be laid off, or so Paul Krugman says. I mean, it's not like they give the Nobel Prize to just anyone predicting the second coming of the Great Depression. Oh no no no no. Oh hell no. Luckily my main bro Krugger has offered me a position at his noted economics and manufacturing firm, Great-Depressiony Widgets, Eclairs and Really Exceptional Fellows Under Captain Krugman's Elegant Dominion. What a stupid name for a company but don't tell him that because he will FLIP HIS LID.

So here's the new podcast. I decided to stop doing music podcasts and just read excerpts from The Economist and the Wall Street Journal and whatever other publication helps me visualize the length of the bread lines that are in our near future. Except what the future calls bread is actually a euthanization shot. But at least I got to hedge the shit out of some funds while the going was good. Also I put my voice through a synthesizer that makes me sound like Larry Summers. It's fun because it randomly throws in phrases like "Women in science? Ha ha I just pissed myself!" and "Science? Women? Barfsauce!"

Resistance is Futile: Bring Me the Sonic Screwdriver!
1. Any Trouble - Playing Bogart
2. The Lambrettas - Cortina Mk 2
3. The Undertones - My Perfect Cousin
4. The Nerves - One Way Ticket
5. Elbow - Mexican Standoff
6. The Pernice Brothers - Working Girls (Sunlight Shines)
7. The dB's - Amplifier
8. Big Dipper - Ron Klaus Wrecked His House
9. Weezer - In the Garage
10. He's Dead Jim - The Klingon Stomp
11. The Buzzcocks - Orgasm Addict
12. Orange Juice - Consolation Prize
13. The Modern Lovers - I'm Straight
14. The Wedding Present - Dalliance
15. Thin Lizzy - Fighting My Way Back

Out With Gout '84: Best of 2008

So here it is. Years of hard work and sweat and blood and maybe a little pee have led to this moment. Well, not exactly this moment. Listen, I don't want to get into this argument about the time relativity and fifth dimensions, okay? I did enough of that at cool dude camp.*

So, I present to you the first podcast. Some things to consider before/as you listen:

1. The intro song will change. When I made it I had forgotten I had another opening in mind that is way more awesome and will probably melt your soul when you hear it.
2. The microphone I used sucks. When I try to speak loudly, the sound gets all blown out and I want to cry a little. So the mix isn't especially good. I apologize if you have to turn it way up to hear me and then get a face full of music right after I finish speaking. In the future I hope to get better equipment and master the mixing program so this won't happen again.
   
3. I will get better. When you listen, you may think Trigonometry Palin wrote and performed the podcast interludes. NOT A FACT. It is a baseless rumor and I will release the medical records** to prove it. Don't give up on me yet.
   

I have also decided to post the tracklist of the podcast. I do this because my enunciation is bad and my "radio" voice is 37% slurrier than my normal voice, which is awesome. Also, I forgot to mention the artist/title of the last song. Totally a Trig thing to do.

Out With Gout '86
1. The Constantines - Our Age
2. Mercy Arms - Half Right
3. Pete & the Pirates - Ill Love
4. School of Language - Rockist, Pt. 4
5. Threatmantics - Sali Mali
6. Sigur Ros - Gobbledigook
7. Annie - Sweet
8. The Raveonettes - Dead Sound
9. Ray LaMontagne - I Still Care For You
10. The Fleet Foxes - Oliver James
11. The Walkmen - In the New Year
12. Glasvegas - Geraldine
13. Stars - A Thread Cut With a Carving Knife
14. Fucked Up - Crooked Head


*Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics doctoral program
**Medical record #1: Go cram it with walnuts