Category: Retro & Vintage

Hello. I am Mr. Google.

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You might get me confused with Mr. Yahoo. He’s in a cubicle next floor down. I am Mr. Google, but unlike he, I run this entire penthouse suite by myself.

I am everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I am also a verb, and a very good one. Have you ever heard someone ask a question, and heard the response, “Go Yahoo it?” I didn’t think so.

I am Mr. Google, and I am a household word. If your child sneezes, do you instruct him to go “Kleenex” it? Of course not. But if little Tommy or Suzy wants to know whose grandmother once advised being obsequious, purple and clairvoyant, do you say, “Go Dictionary it?” or “Go Encyclopedia it?” No you don’t. You tell them to Google it, because you understand that I know everything and everyone that you don’t, and you avoid the embarrassment of displaying your own intellectual shortcomings to your young gullible prodigies.

Then you whine, “But Mr. Google, I can say, ‘I’m going to Xerox this report,’ right?” Oh how quaint. You might as well say, “I’m going to make a carbon copy of my typing errors.”

Because I am Mr. Google, I have complete control over your offspring. My half-brother, Mr. YouTube, assists me with this easy task. When your little darlings are busy with internet research for their report on eukaryotic organisms due on Tuesday, Mr. YouTube assists them with the latest “OKGO” video as soon as you leave the room.

My sister, Wikipedia, helps out as well. She lies.

Do not trifle with me; I am Mr. Google.

[Image from here.]

Saturday Matinee: I Want A Gnu

Great song, great ukelele… Unfortunately, the music’s in him, and it’s just screamin’ to get out of the room without waking up his parents. (‘Sokay, bro, I can’t sing and play at the same time either.)

“Have You Ever Seen Lorraine?” Here she is, twitchin’ and bitchin’ to the Ramones’ version.

But THIS is the link that set me off. The Original Creedence Clearwater Survival version, found at Casual Slack.

The .Gif Friday Post No. 24 – Weirdos & Cursor

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Was this an inspiration for the late great Ed “Big Daddy” Roth‘s “Weirdos?” We may never know. So here’s a bonus:

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This was done by the same guy that did this one, here. As always, we like to credit original sources when we can. If anyone has a link to the original image or .gif creator, we’ll give ’em the thumbs up theirs and post the linkoids in technicolor.

Fish Tanks Wash Mediterranean of Insurgents

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Malta (Strutts News Services) – According to reliable sources, Allied operations in the Mediterranean Sea have been suspended indefinitely due in large part to the success of the “surge” of armed forces swamping the region. Reports from the depths of the fighting confirm that although insurgent forces resurfaced a few months ago, a flood of countermeasures have restored the area to pre-war conditions.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, M1A1 Armor Crewman Lannie Foosers commented that the surge has been a success. “Basically we broke the supply lines from Latakia to Marseille and flushed out the insurgents’ movements.”

Although asked/baited several times by other media sourCes preseNt, to his iNtegrity, Foosers declined to make a lame pun about donating mobile artillery vehicles in trade for personal recollections in reference to a Bob Hope recording.

Babe Magnet: All Terrain Barracuda

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“Don’t hassle me, man, I’m here to replace your toner cartridge. I mean it. Back off already. Look, all the roads are closed, but I got here, okay? So just back off. You gotta buck for gas?”

This is a prime example of the best of the rural Babe Magnet genre, and one of the last of the breed that uses a speedometer as a gas gauge. The owner’s name just has to be “Danny,” but his friends call him “Bo.” Bo added glasspacks, airshocks and oversized rims to this classic muscle car, and jacked it up so he wouldn’t get stuck in three-foot high mud drifts along the levee. Pure efficient genius.

The Babe Magnetage factor is subdued, but if you look closer, it’s there in all its glory. The sub-bumper floodlights, the purple window tinting, the flat black “Smokey’s radar ain’t never gonna reflect this” paint job spells it all out for the Johnson twins, Velveeta and Vivarina.

The double V’s beg for rides to the Reddy-Mart for Slush Puppies and Moon Pies while Bo feigns disinterest. He slaps in an 8-track of Uriah Heep’s Greatest Hits, pops open a warm YooHoo with his thumb, and leaves a rooster tail of crushed rock on his way to his job restocking fan belts at the Sunoco station.

[Image from here.]

I Don’t Know What It Means Either.

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[Received via email, don’t know the source. Tip ‘o the Tarboosh to Carla B.]

Saturday Matinee: Catfish Noodlin’, Chairman, The Commitments, Wilson Pickett & the Big O

Noodlin’ is catchin’ de fishes widdout dem bait in tackle. Feel ‘roun’ fo de ho in de mud, reach innan grab ‘im what dere. Justin Wilson be done do dat, too. Noah fence.

There are professional noodlers, and the good ones are missing fingers because snapping turtles nest the same way. (Once they got you, turtles won’t let go.)

Then there’s this. It’s cool, too, except for that giggle at the end.

[Aussie friend Phil phound the catfish catch. Chair kick found at Arbroath.]

Lookee here folks… this particular post has no theme, so it makes complete sense to post a coupla completely unrelated videos here.

“The Commitments” was a very underrated movie about a bunch of Irish misfits that came together with a love for 1960’s American R&B and pulled it off before self-destructing. Put it on your “must rent” list if you’ve not seen it.

Here’s the real deal that’s too hot to handle and too cold to hold: The Wicked Wilson Pickett’s “Land of 1000 Dances.”

Otis Redding followed in Wilson’s footsteps. Here’s “Try A Little Tenderness.” Look for Steve Cropper, Duck Dunn, Al Jackson and Booker T. Jones (Booker T. & the M.G.’s) backing him up.

J. V. Lafferty’s Contribution to the World

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If you lived here, you wouldn’t need to keep your old trunk in the attic. From Wikipedia:

James Vincent de Paul Lafferty, Jr. (1856-1898) was an Irish-American inventor, most famous for his construction of Lucy the Elephant. Born to Irish parents in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he received Patent Number 268503, on December 5, 1882 to protect his original invention, as well as any animal-shaped building. Broke by 1887, he was forced to sell her and in 1898, he died, and is buried in the cemetery of St. Augustine’s Catholic Church in Philadelphia.

This architectural gem was built, still stands, and is protected as an historical something or other. [You can see Lucy in all her glory in this previous post.]

Babe Magnet: Duct Tape

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It’s a difficult call as to whether or not this magnificent piece of machinery truly qualifies as a genuine Babe Magnet. The role of the duct tape would give it automatic induction into the realm of the BM, but this relic seems to be sitting a a few too many parking lots downstream of the Stop-N-Go store in uptown Tomball.

In other words, it just isn’t advertising itself… except for one, actually two details.

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Yep. Rubber doorstops for the broken window regulator grant this monster machine a solid thumbs up as a genuine Babe Magnet. Pure efficient genius.

[Images from here.]

UPDATE 12 March 2008: I’m embarrassed to admit that I missed one other important detail. The seven little white things on the dashboard are either (a) Sun-bleached Easter peeps from last year; (b) Partially consumed rice balls; (c) A used Kleenex collection; or (d) Little tiny ghosts.

There may be other solutions to the mystery of the little white things. I know that some of y’all have more expertise identifying LWT’s through the windshield of a Babe Magnet than I, and I’d appreciate any suggestions so that we can put this Bunk stumper to rest.

R2D2 Beta Version ca. 1871

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Some images are just too cool to caption, but so what.

R2D2 [steam powered beta version] was a mechanical dork even back then. “Tweep Pleeeert REEEP,” means only one thing in droidland, and it’s not nice.

[Image from GadgetConcierge. Related posts here and here.]