Is there anything worse than trying to watch the big game at your local sports bar, and you can’t even hear the TV because some idiot is blasting Vivaldi on the juke box? “Hey everybody, listen to how the violins go dee-dee-do-dee and the trumpets go brawk-brawk-brpppt!”

Arggghh it makes me so angry! The next person who says “harpsichord” is gonna get a fist sandwich in their eye.

My friend and I were watching the Final Four at Bill’s Sports Oasis last year, and we couldn’t follow the game because it was “Gustav Mahler Night” (sponsored by Corona), so they were blasting this angry, intense symphony bullshit at ear-splitting volume! “We get it, Gustav: you couldn’t get laid. Boo-hoo.”

I wish I had thought to bring my (NEAR-MINT) CLASSICAL MUSIC DISRUPTOR/ELIMINATOR! Then, with the mere switch of a button, I could have shut down all classical music (live OR recorded) within 5 miles!

If you hate classical music, you can’t afford to live without this device. Note: This is one of the original, coal-powered models, so make sure you have lots of coal handy, or you won’t be disrupting shit.

Does anyone know anything about this magazine? Is it good? Worth subscribing to? College hoops will start up soon and I wanna be “in the know.”

You all know how much I love ol’ Matt Taibbi.

I just read one of his all-time great paragraphs — he’s talking about the MSNBC lady who dropped a 10-ton bomb of dumb the other day. Have you seen the video? Here’s the video:

“If Medicare’s so great, why don’t you use it, you 45-year-old man who won’t qualify for another 20 years?” LOL, health policy debate highlight.

Anyway, Taibbi brought the ruckus with this one:

Fuck a fancy boutique drug like Erbitux — I have a very expensive private plan and I can’t even go to a doctor, not even to ask a simple question, unless it’s an emergency. I can’t get a routine checkup, can’t find out what that weird lump in my left foot is, can’t have the pleasure of a routine proctological exam unless I want to pay cash for it, and, well, forget about getting a filling replaced or seeing a therapist to deal with my incipient nervous collapse/burgeoning mid-life crisis. Hell, forget about paying for Erbitux, if I wanted to get a colonoscopy to find out if I needed Erbitux, I wouldn’t be able to — I’d probably have to wait until I was a fully symptomatic cancer patient before I could even have that conversation on my insurer’s dime. And I’m one of the lucky ones, I actually have money to pay for care out of pocket, if I had to. No country in the world rations care more than the U.S. There are whole generations of Americans (20-40 year-olds in particular) who don’t know what it is to be able to go to a doctor for preventive care or routine checkups. Erbitux, for Christ’s sake! Give me a break.

LOL, I love the guy. Hope that lump in your foot goes away, Matt! Lemme know if you want me to organize a prayer vigil for it …

Blog reader, internet entrepreneur, and almanac enthusiast JK sends along a video he found. Please wrap your face in aluminum foil before watching, or else when your face melts it’ll drip all over your keyboard and you won’t be able to type without getting melted face on your fingertips, and then people will call you “Mr. Finger-Face,” and when they take your fingerprints they’ll see your melted eyes staring up at them.

Holy shit, does he kill it very hard re: 2008 Almanac? (1:08) “I got it after it came out … about a day after it came out.”

JK notes: “My collection destroys this guy’s, BTW.”

Oh yeah? PROVE IT. Post a video of your collection or STFU. Big dogs only. Poor Richard’s, represent.

Can you feel the storm gathering? No, not the storm about gay people marrying … the other storm … the one about statistics and data … the one about “Where was the biggest pumpkin grown last year,” or “What’s the second-longest river in Tallahassee …”

I’m talking about the coming ALMANAC WARS.

The Almanac Wars continue … reader JK finally stepped up and filmed his collection, sideways-style.

Very impressive … no audio commentary required … just a cold, hard look at one man’s collection of almanacs.

Can anybody out there top this collection? Bring it.

To avoid a quarrel is a setback for sin, for it is a hot temper that kindles quarrels.
A sinner sows trouble between friends and spreads scandal where before there was peace.
A fire is kept hot by stoking and a quarrel by persistence.
A man’s rage is in proportion to his strength, and his anger in proportion to his wealth.
A hasty argument kindles a fire, and a hasty quarrel leads to bloodshed.

Blow on a spark to make it glow, or spit on it to put it out.
Both results come from the one mouth.

–Ecclesiasticus 28:8-12

Last night I tuned into the hit series MAD MEN to see what the buzz was about.

Oh my goodness, could this show be more boring? Seriously, this is what everyone’s going ga-ga over? Some lady going to the hospital to have a baby while her husband sits in the waiting room and talks to some random guy? Hello?

Meanwhile, some skinny advertising dude is talking about “White people watch TV like this, but black people watch TV like this.”

Please, this show was more boring than licking a piece of notebook paper while listening to a dial tone.

Oh, wait, I forgot about one scene that was really exciting: Some lady was like, “I want a raise,” and the main guy was like, “I can’t do it, they’re counting paper clips” (seriously!).

FINAL VERDICT: Thumbs down. Please let us never speak of this television program again.

By the way, I’m working in the wine shop today … expect many updates … come on by and buy a bottle … fine wine is a great accompaniment to your evening meal … I have both red and white wines available today …

Okay, so I’m sitting here working at the wine shop … wines flying every which way … even wines with bubbles in them … and then I notice that the “Wine of the Week” is the 2005 Vincent Saincrit Bordeaux, which is a MERLOT. Booyah. Regular readers of this blog know how hard I go to the mat for Merlot, the greatest kind of wine, the wine that crushes all other wines (even champagne) … and now, I’ve got this case of this bad-ass Merlot sitting here, and it’s 10% off this week only. Let’s make this happen!!!

I’m gonna try this wine myself, tonight. Can’t wait! The label is really nice; you’d think this wine costs $50 a bottle. But it’s quite a bit less … come on into the wine shop and let me blow your mind with what a great bargain this bottle is …

In case you think I made up that story about the incredible Merlot/Bordeaux wine of the week, read what the wine shop owners say about this wine:

Here is a wine that will make the transition to Fall beautifully. The 2005 vintage in Bordeaux is considered the best in a century, certainly the best in our lifetime. The benefit is not only for the top end châteaux, but also for everyday wines such as this bottle. The fruit is that much riper and complex, thus making for a wine that drinks like a more expensive one. This pure Merlot is harvested mainly from the Premières Côtes de Blaye area of the right bank of the Gironde. It is aged in oak barrels, imparting depth and perfume.

“Best in our lifetime?” Are you kidding me? You people better come in here and buy some of this motherfuckin’ wine, or you’re gonna regret it for the rest of your life. I’m opening one of these bottles tonight.

Reader KL concurs with my analysis of Mad Men:

Oddly enough, it was MY first time watching Mad Men last night, too….pretty boring, you betcha….

I should’ve gone with the old Sunday night standby, Law and Order Criminal Intent rerun instead.

Hmm, I don’t know if I’d go that far … good ol’ Law & Order … finally a realistic cop show for grown-ups … definitely holds up well against The Wire, LOL. Let’s watch Vincent D’onofrio have a conniption fit for 45 minutes, and then the suspect will totally confess to everything while their attorney sits there not doing anything to shut ‘em up … we all know how often that happens in real life.

“Yes, yes, okay, I admit: I murdered socialite Doris Hilton. She wouldn’t dine in my restaurant so I stabbed her in the neck with a mustard bottle. Then I dumped her body in the hottest Williamsburg nightclub where all those lousy teenagers go to snort cocaine. Also, rap music is scary. And I would have gotten away with it, too, if it wasn’t for you meddling kids. Whoa, hey, are you Eric Bogosian? What are you doing here? Anyway, yeah, lock me up forever, I don’t care. By the way, I’m so glad my rich parents paid so much money for this hard-as-nails defense attorney, because he’s obviously doing a great job preventing me from putting my foot in my mouth and confessing to everything. Thanks a lot, Mr. Attorney. Okay, so, umm, do I just put the handcuffs on myself, or what? Hello? I’ve been talking for 5 minutes straight with ominous Yahama DX-7 synthesizer music going crazy, what happens next? Oh, you’re rolling credits? Okay. Dick Wolf, much respect.”

I don’t know, guys. It might just be that Sunday night is read-a-book night.

That reminds me: I finished The Plague. There was a twist ending re: who the narrator was. I had forgotten that the narrator turned out to be one of the infected rats. He had taught himself to read and write while all the other rats were dying of plague.

Just sold a bottle of white wine to a gentleman who paid with a ONE HUNDRED DOLLAR BILL.

“Playas only, drink that wine.”

Don’t worry, no need to call the Beacon Fire Deparment, it’s not literally on fire.

But I just had three back-to-back transactions. Let me catch my breath and tell you about them …

First, a man bought so many bottles, he qualified for a discount. I put all his bottles in a big box and then he went on his merry way!

No sooner had he left then two women approached the counter with their bottles! You know how it goes: “No rest for the wicked,” and all that, so instead of resting on my laurels, I immediately swung into action and provided superior customer service by scanning their bottles and telling them the price and then selling the bottles to them and processing their credit cards with a flick of the wrist!

And now, if you’ll forgive me, I’m going to rest for a minute … gotta prepare for the evening rush …

Guys, I’m working at the wine store every Monday. It’s really nice in here, and I get to listen to internet radio and work on all my projects while surrounded by the finest wines …

So my question is: Should I make this a regular weekly feature? “Wine Store Mondays,” how does that strike you? You can kick off your work week by following all my adventures in the wine store. You’ll find out what it’s like to sell wine and answer people’s questions about wine and tell them about Merlot and Cabernet and the two other kinds of wine I’ve heard of.

Email me with your opinions. On my blog, the readers come first.

Breaking … per my previous post, readers are overwhelmingly in favor of a regular “Wine Store Monday” feature … votes are currently 2 in favor, 0 opposed …

From reader JR:

If the blog was nothing but Wine Store Mondays, I would read it. And I don’t even drink. It’s like live-reporting from the front lines of capitalism.

LOL, me and Ayn Rand, chillin’ with a bottle of 2004 Di Bruno Sangiovese … you know how we roll … going Galt all over this Malbec, you can’t stop us …

Polls are still open! Let me know how you feel about regular Monday updates from the front lines of wine-apitalism.

“Change has come to America.”

In an absolute rout that would make Nate Silver’s head explode like a gourd filled with Merlot, WINE STORE MONDAYS has crushed the competition!

The final tally? 15 in favor, 1 opposed.

From reader MR:

I definitely think “Wine Monday” should be a regular weekly feature. I hold this opinion for the following three very good reasons:

1. You always sound weirdly euphoric when you write about the wine shop, which makes for a “good read;”

2. It would provide a nice counterweight to Friday Face-Offs, thus giving the week some structure for those of us who don’t have normal jobs;

3. There are definitely not enough people spreading the word about how great wine is on the internet.

From BTS:

The original Wine Week was my favorite series since www.mnftiu.cc went into Blog Mode®.

Wine Store Mondays: giving Friday Face-Offs a run for its money since 9/09!

Reader JM understands how incredible Mondays will be from now on:

Writing to vote YES for Wine Store Mondays… LOL, is anyone voting ‘no’? (Jamba Juice moles –ed.) The chance to vicariously experience the excitement, intrigue, and prestige of working in a wine shop– “no thanks, I am currently skydiving while wrestling an alligator, my life has enough stimulation!”

Long-time reader FB smells a movie …

Just wanted to add another Yay! to the tally for Wine Store Mondays.  I already can smell the next Julie & Julia in the air …

P.S. The only people who hate Merlot are upper middle class jerkweeds who think “Sideways” was a documentary about their life. (Reader JKK, please note! –ed.)

P.P.S. Jamba Juice still sucks

Okay guys, I have my mandate. Wine Store Mondays is a go. But in order for this to really succeed, where I get a book deal and then Meryl Streep plays me in a movie, I will need all of your help in cross-blog-posting and linking and facebooking and twittering and what not.

Are we gonna do this? Am I actually gonna become America’s new wine authority on all things wine and wine-related?

Answer: YES.

Know hope.

I’m gonna try to see if these guys will do a comedy gig at the wine store.

In the midst of all my Wine Store Monday triumphalism, I should note that a few voices of dissent have cried out for more yoga-blogging. It’s true, I kinda fell off the yoga wagon/train/horse in recent weeks.

So, because I love all my readers and I believe in “Namaste” and “Vinyasa,” I will attend a yoga class TONIGHT and then blog about it tomorrow morning!

So all you yoga-headz, get ready! I’m about to pop off some downward dogs and maybe even reverse my warrior like a fuckin’ champ.

Whoa, didn’t see this coming. Reader JM chimes in regarding the 2009 Almanac Wars (basically saying, “Almanacs are for punks, go straight to the Statistical Abstract of the United States“) and sends along this video (already one of my top 10 vids):

Damn, that’s a pretty serious collection! The guy has like 20 volumes just on the “Pearl Harbor Attack,” whatever that was. Almanac-heads might need to up their game …

So I went to yoga class last night. Gulp. “Hoo boy.” (Say in Tom Scharpling voice.) This was the worst yoga experience of my life. I swear we spent like 20 minutes face-down on a wooden floor trying to lift our legs up in the air. That felt good … NOT!!!

Then she had us go into some kind of discombobulated pigeon pose that made no kind of sense. I almost had a leg spasm, trying to reach around and grab my ankle which was like a quarter-mile away (I’m tall).

And … no warrior pose? Are you kidding me? Jeez, lemme bust out a warrior pose! Warrior 1, Warrior 2, I don’t care … just let me feel like a bad-ass for a minute. No, instead she had us doing lunges — my least favorite yoga poses — hips getting all diagonal and legs trembling and trying to lean forward and getting all sweaty and wobbly. Blecch.

At the end of the class, when the teacher said “Namaste,” I yelled out “I DON’T THINK SO.”

(Just kidding … had to get in some classic yoga humor, there. You know me and my pixie-ish whimsy.)

Anyway, it was good to have a bad yoga experience, I suppose. Usually I feel good after yoga and I think “Man, I’m glad I went to yoga.” But last night, I was like “Goddamn you’d think after 3,000 years they’d figure out how to make this not totally suck.” But they can’t break me! You’ll see me back on the mat before too long. You can’t keep me down; I’ll pop off a fat tree pose in 2 seconds flat, don’t tempt me …

I made a pledge to myself to watch a lot of TV this week. So on Monday I tuned into VH1 for “Flight 666,” a documentary about Iron Maiden’s tour of Central and South America.

Guys, is it possible that in 20 years or so, we’ll all realize that Iron Maiden is the best rock band in the world? Because I’m pretty close to believing that. Because, umm, did you know that Bruce Dickinson, the singer of Iron Maiden, has a pilot’s license, and that when the band tours, he flies them around in, like, a 747 jet that has Iron Maiden painted on it and even has a picture of Eddie (Iron Maiden monster) painted on the tail? Did you know that?

And did you know that Iron Maiden is still rocking so hard? My friend went to OzzFest a couple years ago and said Iron Maiden blew every other band off the stage. Still holding it down.

Seriously, if I learn more than one Iron Maiden song, I might just become a super-fan.

The one thing that bothers me about Iron Maiden, though: Not enough nicknames for people in their liner notes. LOL, I think they should add some nicknames for their road crew.

Hmm … I feel like there might be lots to write about Iron Maiden. We might just have to explore the idea of an MNFTIU IRON MAIDEN WEEK.

(This is a video of Iron Maiden live in Rio … with one person singing along.)

Reader and almanac-collector JK was not impressed with JM’s contribution to the Almanac Wars:

Slow clap for the sanctimonious JM and his video about the Government Documents Department.  Unless and until JM can show a video of his OWN collection of ALMANACS (this is an Almanac War?) then color me unimpressed. 

Besides, anyone can grab a camcorder and go to the frickin library. Bravo JM!  Next time, why don’t you just show us a video of you typing in ‘www.google.com’ into your web browser.

Ouch! JM, are you gonna stand for this? This guy JK is calling you out! I don’t have to tell regular readers what this reminds me of …

By the way, JK shot new footage of his almanac collection … I think you’ll agree this is a game-changer … I’m commissioning Rand Corp. to analyze what this means for future almanac wars, because: WHOA.

If you’re in the almanac-war business, this is the grimmest 19 seconds of your life!!!

People are already chiming in about the MNFTIU Iron Maiden Week rumors …

Reader JT imagines a full-on investigative project:

I would like to go on record fully supporting further journalistic investigation of the type that only you are capable of into all things Iron Maiden.

I think we can all agree that I would bring home about 50 journalism awards if I went into all-out investigative mode re: Iron Maiden.

Reader DS accidentally gets his mind blown:

So I read mnftiu via Google Reader rss feed along with other such notable blogs as the “Roger Ebert’s Journal,” wherein Roger Ebert is presently holding it down at the Toronto Film Festival, and while reading your Iron Maiden post I became momentarily disoriented and wound up believing that I was reading a Roger Ebert post about how much Iron Maiden is still rocking hard and how much of a Maiden superfan Roger Ebert is about to become.

LOL DID MNFTIU MAIDEN WEEK JUST BLOW MY MIND VERY MUCH BEFORE EVEN OFFICIALLY SETTING IT OFF????

Thank you, DS, for inspiring my latest fantasy New Yorker Festival panel: David Rees in conversation with Roger Ebert: “What We Talk About When We Talk About Iron Maiden.” Let’s make it happen.

My promise to you: I am going to win the first Iron-Maiden-related Pulitzer Prize.

Breaking my own embargo … get ready for a big week on Monday … up the irons …

Guys, this is one of the most incredible emails I’ve ever received. I simply must share it with you. Old friend and sometimes reader MH graced my inbox with his presence … chastising me for once again being late to the Iron Maiden party …

dude this is your best friend calling. Via internet. I was reading your blog for once, (love it! –ed.) and–have I NOT BEEN TRYING TO TELL YOU SINCE 8TH FREAKIN GRADE that Iron Maiden is the best band ever?? I’m coming up there to that wine store on Monday so you can live-twitterwineblog about me telling you yet again, two decades later, that Iron Maiden is the best band ever and I, and I alone, along with VH1, deserve the credit for you knowing this.

Monday is shaping up to be a true red-letter off-the-hook banger. Iron Maiden + Wine Store + best friend who’s been trying to get me into Iron Maiden since 1986? Are you kidding? They might have to slow down the earth’s rotation just so we have enough time to process everything that’s about to get set off on Monday.

I just hope MH remembers to bring that “Live After Death” cassette he’s been rocking since the Reagan administration …

Monday can’t come soon enough!!!

I am inside the shop … I turned on all the lights and opened the register … I’m ready to sell you some wine. Burgundy, Merlot, or Pinot Gris, all are sitting here waiting for you …

WELCOME TO WINE STORE MONDAY.

Okay guys, let’s get into it. Here’s the Wikipedia entry on Iron Maiden. We’ll crowd-source the analysis; let me know if you find anything interesting.

WE LEARN TOGETHER SO THAT WE MAY ROCK TOGETHER.

“Up The Irons” is a phrase I saw a lot during my 30 seconds of Iron Maiden research last week. What does it mean? I thought it had something to do with the heavy-metal devil-horn thing people do with their hands. Turns out it has to do with SOCCER, of course:

Iron Maiden frequently use the slogan “Up the Irons” in their disc liner notes, and the phrase can also be seen on several t-shirts officially licensed by the band. “The Irons” has been used to refer to the London football club, West Ham United, of which founder Steve Harris is a fan. Fans of Iron Maiden have been known to use the phrase as a greeting or sign-off to other Iron Maiden fans.

Why are British people so crazy, with their soccer and pints of beer and chanting and whatnot? This is how I knew not to be honestly scared of Iron Maiden when I was a kid, in spite of their scary album art: Because if they really were devil-worshipping sadists, would they really mention lager and soccer in their liner notes, and give everyone fifty nicknames?

By the way, all is quiet on the wine store front right now. Listening to some Nick Drake over the store’s stereo system. Later I’ll unpack some cases and organize the new bottles. Getting psyched for that …

Maybe I’ll bake some bread later this afternoon, in anticipation of Iron Maiden fan MH’s visit, where he tries to get me to admit that he’s been right about Iron Maiden for 20 years, ever since he had that “Live After Death” cassette that he used to listen to all the time while I was listening to Schoolly D.

Anyway, I’ve got over 100 bottles of wine for sale … come and get ‘em … I think there’s even some wine here from 2001. (In wine, though, that’s okay, because sometimes wine takes a while to reach its full potential … just like all of us! Wine metaphors, better recognize!)

Classic Iron Maiden riffage. (Seriously, I think I’m getting into Iron Maiden for real: “You take my life but I’ll take yours too”? How does that even work?)

I could see pairing this song with a nice, full-bodied Malbec … maybe Gozzo’s 2007 organic vintage ($14.99). From the wine-store owner’s description: “(This wine) will go with just about anything hearty, from braised sauteed pork chops to braised beef …” to a classic Iron Maiden jam called The Trooper!!!

Come on by the wine store, let’s make this happen.

Oh boy, check this out. “Me want.”

QUESTION: What wine would you pair this with? My initial thought was to pair it with a Pinot Blanc(?), one of those see-through white wines, since the record is see-through.

But on the other hand, dropping the needle on this LP is gonna be a heavy, exciting experience. A special occasion. So maybe I’d go with a lush, medium-bodied bottle, like maybe Domaine Henri Boillot’s Clos du Roi 2005, a 90-point Pinot Noir ($94.99). Sure it’s almost a hundred bucks, but in this scenario I’ve just spent $1,000 on a record, so I’m like “Run up that Visa bill, it’s party time.”

Besides, this bottle “generous and balanced,” according to some metalhead named Allen Meadows, so it’s gonna be worth the money …

Anyway, I would really appreciate it if one of my readers would buy this $1,000 Iron Maiden record and then invite me over to listen to it with them on a high-end stereo system. Thanks.

Oh man, I almost got so busted! The UPS guy just showed up with a package while I was blasting “The Evil That Men Do” (famous Iron Maiden song) on my laptop. Fortunately this MacBook (bought with donor funds, thank you once again I love you all) features a MUTE button, which I was able to hit just in time …

Wine Store Mondays, you don’t stop …

BREAKING … a customer just bought a bottle of the Gozzo 2007 Malbec, the very wine I suggested pairing with “The Trooper” by Iron Maiden!!!

I played it cool, of course … the consummate professional … but part of me wanted to yell “UP THE IRONS!!!” as she left the store.

Wine-Store Monday & Iron Maiden Week, it doesn’t get any hotter than this.

Okay, we have a contender for “Iron Maiden Wikipedia Paragraph of the Day.” It’s about Eddie, Iron Maiden’s monster mascot:

The 80s Maiden covers Piece of Mind through Seventh Son of a Seventh Son seemed to have a continuity of their own. Most noticeably traces of his lobotomy from Piece are featured in every cover from this period. Eddie’s cyborg eye (from the Powerslave-era single 2 Minutes to Midnight) also appeared on the covers of Somewhere in Time, Raising Hell and Seventh Son. Some of his cybernetic parts from Somewhere in Time remain on Seventh Son but obviously Eddie’s somewhat odd decomposition makes this link less clear. This continuity ceased for unknown reasons after No Prayer for the Dying (though Eddie’s non-zombie appearance on Fear of the Dark may have been a reason for the change) and has since been largely abandoned. Regardless, traces of the lobotomy still appeared in some artwork associated with the album. Indeed, the cover for The X Factor and associated artwork is about the operation that caused this change to Eddie.

Let’s get lost in this image …

Iron Maiden has their own wine. And yes, yes, yes … it’s a Merlot.

You can have Piece of Mind that this fine Chilean Merlot tastes great on it’s own or with a very very rare steak! Comes in a wooden presentation box ‘IRON MAIDEN Eddie’s Evil Brew’ printed on top sliding lid which would make a great gift. Exclusive to the Official Iron Maiden Shop. NOTE: This item is very fragile and heavy and incurs additional shipping costs to keep it safe.

Alas, I think the wine has been discontinued. It’s no longer available at the official Iron Maiden Online Shop.

A woman just came in. She bought three bottles of wine! I was stoked. I thought everything was going great … I started to put the bottles in a big bag, and then: CHAOS. “Can you put this one bottle in a separate bag? It’s a gift.”

Of course my initial reaction was to panic and “run to the hills,” but I kept my cool and asked if she wanted a gift bag, which the store stocks, and which I am authorized to sell to people. But she just wanted a separate regular bag.

No worries … I took a deep breath and fulfilled her bag-related-requests like a champion. I guess you could say I gave her “piece of mind.”

Iron Maiden and wine … we’re doing this. All day, all night. “Two minutes to midnight.” “666, the number of the beast.” What else can I say?

I know, I know, it’s a psychological and oenological injustice that Iron Maiden’s merlot is no longer available. HOWEVER if you come to the wine shop tonight, I will draw the Iron Maiden logo on any bottle of wine you buy.

Okay, it’s not an Iron Maiden song, and it’s not even really Iron Maiden’s style, but it pairs nicely with most tannin-heavy reds …

NOTE: I usually hate these kinds of videos/this kind of guitar playing, but something about this dude just makes me laugh, especially the psychotic style he drops at 2:10. Also check out his thumb (which is obviously addicted to crystal meth) at around 2:55.

This video made me realize something fundamental about my relationship to guitar solos: You know most guitarists (especially metal guitarists), when they’re taking a solo, they make a bunch of dumb-ass goofy faces? Big sloppy grins with the their tongue hanging out every which way? It’s like the size of their mouth has an inverse relationship to the actual artistic merit of the solo. Bigger mouth = dumb-assier solo.

But check out my man’s mouth in this solo. Because it’s pretty big … LOL. Look at his mouth at 3:18. They don’t even make mouths that small anymore. That’s how you know this dude is for real.

I’m gonna get back into performing live. Why? Because I miss sharing my insights and feelings with people.

Two gigs next week! Please tell your friends who live in the appropriate geographical areas!

Thu, 1 October 2009
Variety Shac
UCB Theatre
New York, NY
9:00 PM

Sat, 3 October 2009
Open Space Gallery
Beacon, NY
8:00 PM
NOTE: I will deliver my infamous “Lottery Lecture;” opening act is Sam Anderson! (Reading selections from the Lost Symbol, we hope!) Anyway, this is a HOMETOWN THROWDOWN!!!

Due to an amazing set of circumstances, I’ll be working in the wine store tomorrow afternoon. Yes, that’s right, you people get *TWO* WINE STORE DAYS this week …

God is good … know hope.

Ten thousand thank-yous to reader TR, who sends along this version of “The Trooper.”

Watch. Learn. Love. Know hope.

Reader AF fully supports my Iron Maiden awakening … the loss of my Iron-Maiden Maidenhead, so to speak:

Just writing to wish you well on your journey to Iron Maiden Superfandom.  I am a recent convert as well.  It is way more metal to get into metal now; starting in 1986 would have been taking the easy way out.  I don’t think they even knew how to use the word “metal” as an adjective back then.

That’s right! I only wish I had been metal enough to hold out until I was 70 … but no, the siren call of the Maiden was to tempting … I couldn’t resist … she called out to me, her breath sweet with the taste of iron … Iron Maiden, I am here now … I am here …

Back in the store for a special Thursday edition of “Wine Store Mondays.”

From what I’ve heard, Thursdays are busy for buyers-of-wine-who-come-to-the-store.

It will take all my concentration and focus to serve these customers with the professionalism they have come to expect.

No worries, though … as I always say: “You take my life but I’ll take yours too.”

Let’s do it, people. Let’s buy an insane amount of wine.

In this photograph, I have paired a 1984 Iron Maiden Powerslave ($1.00) with a 2005 Morey-Saint-Denis Burgundy ($84.99).

Come and get a taste if you’re man enough …

Reader YB chimes in re: my brief mention of the “Somewhere in Time” cover:

your blog post wherein you contemplate the cover of Somewhere In Time is cool, but I think you’re missing out on the fine detail and trivia stuff in that cover — here’s the cover … and here’s the scoop on trivia …

Hmm … looking at the trivia page (“To the right of the clock is a neon sign that reads ‘Ancient Mariner Seafood Restaurant,’ a reference to the song ‘Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ from the Powerslave album”), I just have to wonder … do you think any teenagers ever got stoned on marijuana and spent hours looking at the “Somewhere in Time” album cover? LOL, hmm, I wonder if that ever happened … no, no, it’s just too crazy, that could never happen. What was I thinking with that incredible flight of fancy I just imagined? What teenager in 1986 would ever run home with his brand-new copy of “Somewhere in Time” and then go into his bedroom and put the record on and then roll the fattest joint ever and then open up the album cover and start looking for all the hidden symbols and references? Nobody would ever do that in a million years, because that would definitely not be very fun at all.

Things are getting hectic at the wine store … two sales within a minute … you know what they say when I’m working the register: “Gone in sixty seconds — OF WINE.”

Come and get it … “666, the number of the beast.” Merlot for life.

Check out 0:44 … very interesting … you don’t even have to spin the record backwards to hear it … LOL, I love the specificity of “red wine,” obviously Bruce Dickinson knows his stuff …

Speaking of which, have I shared this nugget from Wikipedia’s entry on Bruce Dickinson? It goes on about how Dickinson is not only the singer for Iron Maiden, but also a fencing enthusiast and a pilot and all this other stuff, where you’re like, “Damn, this dude is the toughest man of all time,” and then you get this:

“The most recent television programme (Dickinson) has presented was a show on spontaneous human combustion for Sky One called Inside Spontaneous Human Combustion with Bruce Dickinson, in which he investigates the phenomenon of this occurrence by enlisting the help of several experts and performing various experiments to determine its possible cause.”

GAME OVER. Bruce Dickinson WINS. Everyone who is not Bruce Dickinson LOSES.

We’ve got some excitement for you next week …

I haven’t been doing much political blogging recently, and I never blog at night, but I’ll make an exception because of how stupid John McCain is. Look at his dumb-ass twitter page.

“just finished taping an interview with Hannity re: Afghanistan - watch tonight at 9pm.”

SHUT UP. Whatever, gramps.

(Actually, I shouldn’t dog McCain too hard; he’s the core demographic for our latest project… more next week …)

Hoo boy, what a week! We were seduced by the Iron Maiden … we worked in the wine store … we laughed and loved … and now it’s all over. :–( Nothing but entropy and despair until the cold embrace of the grave.

Oh well! At least we still have FRIDAY FACE-OFFS!

Welcome to the 18th installment of an internet legend.

This week’s FFO is “Run to the Hills” by Iron Maiden.

Man oh man, listen to all those people singing along. That’s amazing. Being in Iron Maiden must be fucking awesome.

Don’t blink … first contestant is coming up next … this is Friday Face-Offs!!!

“Run to the Hills” opens with one of the most famous licks in heavy metal. I guess it’s supposed to sound Native American? Anyway, it’s only appropriate that we kick of this week’s FFO with a tribute to that lick. Let the happy horns of heraldry play!

Hmm. Okay, maybe it would be cool if he played the lick correctly.

Never mind! Let the happy keyboard of heraldry play:

Yeah! Now play both clips at the same time to really set it off right. Friday Face-Offs!!!

Hmm … a little Swedish style-mix-up, here. (You know how the Swedes like to mess with our minds.) But does it work? On the one hand, it brings out the plaintiveness of the chorus. On the other hand, I can’t imagine 500,000 Brazilians singing along to this at a stadium show …

Even before I got into Iron Maiden, I always liked “Run to the Hills,” because the chorus is so emotionally complicated. (I assume it’s being sung from the perspective of the Cree, right?) It’s also the first piece of pop culture I heard that framed the whole “Cowboys and Indians” thing as an injustice/genocide (to the Indians, that is).

“Murder for freedom a stab in the back /
Women and children and cowards attack”

So in a way, maybe I owe my entire humorless, politically-correct, Oberlin-incubated worldview to … IRON MAIDEN!!!

\m/ Up the irons! Free Mumia! \m/

UPDATE: Ah, someone beat me to it.

What does this remind me of? Oh, yeah.

Does this guy own many guitars, though? Hmm, does he spend much time at the Guitar Center? If I worked at the Guitar Center, I would murder 20 co-workers in order to become this guy’s exclusive sales-helper.

Comment from one of his viewers: “… ignore all the idiots that say negative things about your singing, they don’t understand what fun is.”

I can agree with that sentiment — no doubt I like to have fun and be silly — but really, you should get the chorus right: It’s not “run through the hills.” It’s not a song about picking wildflowers, for God’s sake.

Game on.

I have literally never seen anyone dance like this. What is that move? (0:01 - 0:08) So many new kinds of dance moves for me to try at the club; I can’t wait! First I just need to buy my special dancing outfit. Let’s see, I’ll need a green party hat, a plastic mask, sunglasses, a Revolutionary War jacket, and a vinyl cape made out of a placemat(?). No worries, I think I can buy it at L.L. Bean.

Okay, is 0:17 tough enough for you, when he throws 400 years of Western imperialism to the floor? This kid should get tenure at Berkeley just for that.

Very strong showing. Friday Face-Offs! RUN TO THE HILLS.

Have you ever heard of the Iron Maidens? They are the world’s premiere all-female Iron Maiden tribute band. (I gotta say, the singer’s abs are looking tight. Forget yoga, maybe I should join an all-female Iron Maiden tribute band.)

The person who posted this video apologizes for the sound quality, but I think it fits the song, because the song is about killing Native Americans, and this sounds like a blanket that’s been infected with smallpox.

Tower of power.

You’ve tried the rest, now try the best!!!

Guitar tone of the year. Holy guacamole. Jimi Hendrix sippin’ on syrup. That’s the kind of tone suckers pay Butch Vig big bucks to bring out. Also, was this filmed by an undercover PETA operative or something? It looks like one of those secret slaughterhouse videos where you see people kicking chickens across the floor. Actually, the opening lick would work well in a PETA video, because it’s sort of queasy-making: “We snuck inside this Tyson Foods plant and shot this SHOCKING video of a man setting CHICKEN FEET on fire and throwing CHICKEN HEADS into a hot-grease-grinder and he was LAUGHING THE WHOLE TIME … run to the hills!”

I love how someone’s mom starts working the lights at 2:39.

Friday Face-Offs! Run for your lives! Winning video is next!!!

ALERT … ALERT … history in the making … Drudge Report sirens blasting every which way … WE HAVE A TIE FOR FIRST PLACE!!!

I will be answering questions about this historic moment LIVE on CNN at 5:30 this evening … Cokie Roberts wanted an exclusive, but I couldn’t get with that … FFO breakthrough …

First-place tie, first-place tie … “They said it couldn’t be done…” Run to the hills, 666 the number of the beast, Iron Maiden … the devil, Eddie, Powerslave, merlot, all that stuff, up the irons, you know how we do … Inside Spontaneous Human Combustion with Bruce Dickinson …

FIRST PLACE WINNER #1:

Check this out (but first earn a PhD in semiotics so your mind doesn’t implode):

1:35 - 1:43, ouch. Who drew this, Cormac McCarthy? From the user’s description: “Weird pictures are showing you, what’s that song about. Try to feel it!” All I know is, if I owned a clothing store on the Lower East Side, I would be slapping all these images on t-shirts and selling them to trust-fund dopeheads for $80 a pop and I would be getting paid.

FIRST PLACE WINNER #2:

(Please, please watch this.)

Not much I can say about this, other than I hope you had a nice life, because I’m sorry but you have officially just been murdered by these kids.

FRIDAY FACE-OFFS! That’s it for Iron Maiden week. Have a great weekend. \m/

Metamucil + Bifocals = Gold
Senior citizens + Twitter = Gold

HOWEVER …

Senior citizens + Traditional URL shorteners = Not Gold!
(”Honey, what’s a bit.ly?”)

More soon …

Forgot to mention that since it’s Monday, I’m in the wine store. But it’s Yom Kippur, so I expect traffic to be a bit light.

(That’s the kind of statistical analysis that keeps people coming back!)

My CTO and I are tweaking the homepage design of our new product that we’re rolling out this week (it’s a multi-staged stagger-beta-launch, culminating in an ice-cream party at my house).

Anyway, since this is a service for senior-citizen internet users I’ve been thinking a lot about usability issues. Does anyone know if the internet offers a large-print edition for the elderly, where all the sites are printed in bigger type?

By the way, beta-testers can check out the power of our service here:

http://urlshorteningservicefortwitter.com/n7drq

Thank you for being a friend …

Guys, I just sold my first-ever bottle of Sake (special candy wine grown only in Japan? I think).

Could this be connected to Yom Kippur somehow? It wouldn’t surprise me … the world is a mysterious place.

PS: This is an outrage.

If you’d like to stay up-to-date with all the latest news re: urlshorteningservicefortwitter.com (the hottest new URL shortening service for twitter), you can follow us here.

We’re at 40 followers and going strong! Thanks to all beta-testers and senior citizens!

www.urlshorteningservicefortwitter.com … change is coming to the internet …

Let’s get short!

Change is coming to the internet … at long last … urlshorteningservicefortwitter.com’s twitter page is now at 75 members! I might hold an emergency ice cream party to mark the occasion!

If we can get 100 followers by the end of the week, I think we can all agree that it would have been the most dramatic surge in twitter followers in any twitter account in history. (I think the grammar got a little tangled back there, but I’m excited– I don’t have time to bust out Skrunk & White and make sure I’m typing words correctly…)

Ice cream party!

Please tell your grandparents to follow us! Please spread the word to all the members of your local Matlock Fan Club (LOL, Matlock jokes never get old … just like Matlock fans [because they're already as old as possible].)

It’s called urlshorteningservicefortwitter.com, and it’s changing the way people link to stuff on twitter!

The movement has started … I have received more than five four emails from readers who are excited about my latest venture! (And again, many thanks to webmaster and professional computer programmer Paul Charles Leddy for all his help … Paul, you are truly the king of URL shorteners.)

Anyway, reader AA hits all the hot-button references for this new age of URL shortening:

holy shit it’s about time you expanded your empire from being the hottest blogger around to being the hottest url shortening device for the twitter machine around. finally we’ll all have time to finish our metamucil before murder she wrote ends so we can go look for our bifocals and finish reading that letter to the editor we wrote about how we don’t want the government messing with our medicare!

Reader MC sings our praises:

I am ultra-excited about URL Shorteners LLC … amidst the explosion of lookalike “me-too” URL-shortening services, I am refreshed to see a newcomer that stands out from the crowd.

Exactly! He gets it.

Think about it: Most URL shorteners are just too short and plain’ ol’ BORING to be memorable:

http://bit.ly
http://tr.im
http://is.gd

Yawn … half those those things aren’t even real words… “is.gd?” hello, that sounds like Aztec gobbledygook … but what’s this? … a new kid on the scene … turning heads …

http://urlshorteningservicefortwitter.com

Finally, a URL-shortening-service URL you can pronounce! Made of real words everyone can pronounce!

Feel the change … it’s coming … time for me to eat some ice cream …

This SeniorJournal.com article from January says senior citizens don’t like social networking sites:

Just 7 out of every 100 senior citizens – Americans age 65 or older – have a profile on an online social network - well below the 35 percent of all adult internet users …

No surprise there: Why would senior citizens sign up for twitter, if they’re going to be barraged by intimidating bit.ly links? (If there are other social networking sites, I’m not aware of them. I don’t have time to poke around the internet all day; I’m trying to solve problems.)

Anyway, it’ll be interesting to watch the percentage of seniors using twitter rise over the next few months as more seniors learn of urlshorteningservicefortwitter.com.

Have you told your grandmother about us?

A poignant email from VM:

I only wish my parents would have lived to see it.

Don’t worry, VM … they’re using it. In heaven.

http://urlshorteningservicefortwitter.com/79rmf