It seems that some of the Blown-Eyeds, are posting videos of 70’s Rockers. It also seems that the developing tune theme has to do with “Mountain”. Having actually been a 70’s Rocker, Ms. Brooklyn Smartass, (“Hairboy,“ indeed!), I figure I’ll play along.

With that, I give you Mountain’s Mississippi Queen, recorded in 1970.

I think it was about fifteen years ago I was at a concert at the Meadowlands Arena in New Jersey (I think it was a Clapton concert), and I was happy to learn that Leslie West and Mountain would be the opening act. Frankly, I was surprised to learn that ol’ Leslie West had managed to survive all the booze and pharmaceuticals.

Anyway, out they came, and, I surmise to remind everyone in the audience who they were, they opened with “Mississippi Queen”. The song began with the familiar power chords, and we all waited for Leslie to play the screaming lick that would signal the real beginning of the song.

When the audience was brought to an appropriate level of excitement, it was time for Leslie to play the lick he had probably played thousands of times before. Here it comes! ………….. ACK! WTF? His guitar was out of tune! Leslie West was on stage playing a guitar that was out of tune. The song was damned near half over by the time he realized the little problemo and fixed it, proving, I suppose, that maybe he only half survived the booze and pharmaceuticals.

As the video below demonstrates (it was shot in 2006 in Lakewood, New Jersey – not exactly the Meadowlands), Leslie West is still, well, … ambulatory.

You remember our former governor, Jim McGreevey?

Sure you do.

No?

Aw hell, I know he’s been gone for a while, but you must remember him.

He’s the guy who threw a lavish family reunion in Ireland at taxpayers’ expense.

He’s the guy who accepted a speaking engagement vacation in Puerto Rico, which was paid for by the Longshoremen’s Association, an outfit with ties to organized crime.

He’s the guy who surrounded himself with crooks and who may himself been directly involved in a “Machiavellian” scheme.

He’s the guy who put his profoundly unqualified, non-American boyfriend in charge of the safety of the citizens of New Jersey by naming him the Head of the Department of Homeland Security.

He’s the guy who, likely on the verge of being indicted, decided to resign, on the stated grounds that he is a “Gay American”.

He’s the guy who submitted his written resignation to take effect sufficiently in the future so as to prevent the citizens of New Jersey from voting for a replacement in a special election

He is the guy who made New Jersey the laughing stock of the country.

Remember him now?

I thought you might.

Now, it seems that this very same Jim McGreevey has accepted a teaching post at Kean University, a state university, where he will be teaching … hang on to your chair … ethics, law and leadership. In addition to his taxpayer-funded salary (modest thought it may be), he will also be earning credits towards his taxpayer-funded state pension.

I had hoped I was finished writing about this creep, and I damned sure hoped I was done paying for this creep, but this is New Jersey, and the creeps are in charge.

Frankly, I’m fresh out of outrage.

I continue to wish Governor Corzine a full and speedy recovery from the injuries he suffered when the SUV in which he was riding was involved in an accident on the Garden State Parkway.

Once he’s back on his feet, I hope he explains to the citizens of New Jersey why seatbelt laws and speed limits apply to us but not to him.

After the accident, the explanation offered by the police was that a reckless driver caused the accident by veering onto the Parkway from the shoulder, causing a second car to swerve into the path of the Governor’s SUV. The police then revealed that, at the time of the accident, the Governor was not wearing a seatbelt, which constitutes a violation of New Jersey law.

Now, the police have added significant new details to the description of the accident. It seems that the Governor’s car, part of a two-car motorcade, was blasting down the Garden State Parkway at 91 miles per hour, with flashing emergency lights and a blaring siren, so that other motorists would get out of the way.

It now seems fair to conclude that the accident happened because the other two vehicles were trying to get out of the way of the Governor’s speeding SUV. Simply put, but for the Governor’s car traveling 91 miles per hour (26 miles per hour over the posted speed limit), with flashing emergency lights and screaming siren, the accident would not have happened.

Was the Governor responding to a genuine emergency, which would have justified the speeding and the use of flashing lights and siren? No, he was in a hurry to get to the meeting between Don Imus and the Rutgers women’s basketball team, which on that day was the hottest news story in the United States and a world-class photo-op.

If there is any good news in all of this, it is that no law abiding motorists were injured.

ScrappleFace. Priceless. Go read.

RightWingRocker was quite possibly drunk kind enough to identify my ravings, which are anything but scholarly, as stuff that makes him “think”. As such, I am to identify five blogs that make me “think”. RWR’s naming this blog as one that provokes thought proves, as I urge below, that “thinking” covers a good deal of ground.

I “think” I should note that I construe the term “think” very broadly. “Thought,” when boiled down to its essence, is a series of electrochemical events that takes place in our crullers, and there are all sorts of thinking one might do. For example, there is deep introspective thought, problem solving thought, fantasy thought, analytical thought, humorous thought and free-ranging thought (i.e. creativity), just to name a few. Given the breadth of the definition, any blog worth reading ought to provoke thought of one kind or another.

With that said, here are the five blogs that came to mind, understanding that any and all of those in my blogroll qualify as blogs that make me think, otherwise they wouldn’t be there.

Straight White Guy. Eric’s writing very often takes me to familiar places, but casts familiar things in a light that I had previously not seen. Eric can write about something as pedestrian as sitting on his deck with a cup of coffee, but he and observes, really observes, his immediate surroundings in a most compelling way, which is not only entertaining, but also often serves to remind me to look at the world around me more carefully, lest I miss something amazing.

Elisson and Erica. The two “E’s” (one of whom I have met a couple times and the other I will be meeting shortly) have taught me more about things Jewish than I had previously learned in my entire life, and they managed to do it in a most entertaining way — those wacky Jooos. Now that might not be such an achievement if I lived in a place where one never bumps into someone of the Jewish persuasion, but I live in the Northeast, where just about every town has a synagogue, so I didn’t exactly come to the table with a tabula rasa. Still, there is absolutely no way that I would ever eat gefilte fish.

Sgt. Hook. Our favorite Command Sergeant Major regularly reminds me of the quality of the people who serve in our armed forces and their steadfast dedication to their country, their comrades, their mission and to you and me. Sgt. Hook is a class act.

Two Nervous Dogs. Dogette, who is a gifted writer with a deadly wit and savage sense of humor, regularly manages to make me laugh. Perhaps more importantly, at least for purposes of this post, reading her stuff can light up a spark of creativity in me when my creativity meter is stuck on zero. I don’t understand exactly how or why that works, but it often does. So, that damned sure qualifies in the Making-Me-Think Department. (NOTE: If you are unable to see Dogette’s site, it’s because she has deployed multiple bot shields with enough Macht to send a ten-ton asteroid careening into space. If you are denied entry, let me know in the comments, and I’ll see what I can do, but you may have to chip in for cookies.)

Here are da Rules, which were lifted directly from RWR’s site.

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think,
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme,
3. Optional: Proudly display the ‘Thinking Blogger Award’ with a link to the post that you wrote.

This exercise required entirely too much thought.

I’d like to dedicate this to my buddy, V-Man, seeing as how he has entered his fifth decade and isn’t dealing with it all that well.

Keep rockin’, Sonny Boy.

Via The Ultimate Insult

In a recent segment of “Katie’s Notebook,” (distributed to various radio stations and posted on CBS’s website) Katie Couric described her experience of obtaining her first library card. Her remembrance opened with, “I still remember when I got my first library card, browsing through the stacks for my favorite books.”

Howard Kurtz points out in a Washington Post article that Katie Couric did not write the piece describing her experience for her “Notebook,” but rather it was written by a network producer. Well, that’s not exactly true either. It turns out that the network producer lifted much of the piece from an article written in the Wall Street Journal by Jeffrey Zaslow.

CBS explained that it was “very common” for staffers to write first person commentaries for Ms. Couric. The network apologized to the Wall Street Journal and fired the producer.

Maybe Katie Couric will actually write something all by herself for her “Notebook” about this little oooopsie.

via Coyote Blog and Instapundit

Dear Diary,

Hey, I just flew in from Syria, and boy are my arms tired! ROFLMAO!

OMG, this is the first chance I have had to catch up on my diary, because I was on a very important, most excellent dimploatic trip (Maybe you read something about it. LOL!!), where as the SPEAKER in the House I got to do lots of speaking with people who are almost as smart and as important me.

The plane ride was a riot. At first, Waxman was pretty stiff, but after a bottle or two of Cristal he started to loosen up. I fired up my Peter, Paul and Mary discs and convinced him to try some primo herb. It was a hoot when he started trying to sing “Puff the Magic Dragon,” and he’d get all confused and shit. Then he started snorting and pounding the chair laughing and saying stuff like, “Yeah, yeah. ‘Little Jackie Paper’ … Imagine if he had a brother named ‘Toilet’ or News’?” Then he tried to grab my ass. I can’t say I blame him.

Truth is, some people probably shouldn’t do herb. LOL!!

We spent a couple days in Israel, where I got to speak a lot to a lot of very important people, and were they ever glad I came, because they have some serious problems, and I solved one of their biggest problems in a jiffy.

I gave each of these seriously important people a crystal and we held hands in a circle until we all felt the right vibes. They obviously knew I was an expert at this, because they were all staring at me and saying nothing.

I am totally certain that they have serious denial issues, because do you believe that I had to explain to them that their biggest problem is that they just cannot seem to get along with their neighbors? I told them that you catch more vinegar with flies than honey … no, wait you catch more flies with vinegar than … no, wait! Oh, you know what I mean. I said, “Look, if your neighbors jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge or ran around with scissors, does that mean you have to do it too? And, a rolling stone gathers no moss.” They obviously got it, because they were all shaking their heads. This dimplomacy stuff is a snap.

Oh, then they took me for a ride around Jerusalem and we stopped by this wall. It was awesome. There was a bunch of people there, mostly dressed in black – sort of Gothic, who were head banging. I figured they were all wearing iPods, because I couldn’t hear any music. I forgot my iPod, so I had my driver pull the car near the wall and turn the volume way, way up on my Green Day disc. I hopped out of the car and joined in with the head bangers. They freakin’ loved it! They all stopped head banging, gathered in a group (like a moish pit) and watched me rock. It was awesome.

I know they hated to see me leave Israel, because everywhere I went people were saying “MESHUGENA!!” which they told me means “We’ll miss you!” Still, it was time to leave, because I had to go straighten out our shit with the Syrians.

I totally loved Syria. The day before I was going to meet the president, they asked me if I wanted to see “John the Baptist”. I figured it would be cool to meet an American who has a church in Syria. But, when we got there, the only thing left of John was his head! WTF? What a hoot! Those Syrians are a pisser.

OK, OK. I know. What about the scarf-on-my-head thing? Truth is, at the time, I was so wrecked ‘shrooms I don’t even remember putting the goddamned thing on. After a while, I got to liking it, and, in fact, I am going to introduce a resolution in the House of Congress that will require everyone to wear a headscarf every Thursday as a show of solidarity with our Syrian friends. Yeah, I will expect the men to wear them too – sort of like the ones “Little Steven” wears. OMG, I am going to sooooo miss the Sopranos.

Anyway, the next day I got to meet with the president of Syria. I knew the meeting would be totally great, because he totally never took his eyes off my tits. Well, that’s not exactly true, because he tried to look up my dress as I crossed my legs. I made sure he got a peek. Try that kind of dimplomacy, ChimpyMcHitlerburton!

I told him about my serious talks with the very important people in Israel and how the people there really want to be friends, and I explained to him what the world needs now is love, sweet love – No, not just for some, but for everyone. Then I let him grab my tits.

Obviously, it worked! He told me that he was a big fan of Larry David.

This dimplomacy stuff is a total no-brainer.

I’m glad to be back in the U.S.A., because I ran out of Cristal and decent weed over there. I ended up having to settle for some shit that I got from our interpreter. It tasted like ass and barely gave me a buzz.

Besides, I had to get back because my friend Barbra Streisand is throwing a huge party for me at her house (We made up, but psssssst Don’t mention the “saggy tits” thing, OK?). People are going to pay to come. How totally awesome is that? For $150,000, they can actually sit with me. I’m thinking of offering special pricing: an ass fondle for $175,000 and a bare tit grab for $250,000.

God, how I love being the SPEAKER in the House.

Vol 1
Vol 2
Vol 3
Vol 4
Vol 5
Vol 6
Vol. 7
Vol. 8

Governor Corzine is in intensive care as a result of injuries suffered in a traffic accident on the Garden State Parkway.

A spokesman for the governor, Anthony Coley, said Corzine suffered 12 broken ribs and fractures to his collarbone, sternum, left leg and a vertebra in his lower back. He said the injuries were “not life-threatening” and there did not appear to be any brain or spinal cord damage.

In the meantime, Senate President Richard Codey has assumed the duties of acting governor.

Developing.

Update: More here.