I am glad to have had the discussion of Lowery's closing here yesterday. Already having the Zora Neale refernce, I dug a further today to find the original source: "Big Bill" Broonzy's classic "Black, Brown and White Blues (Get Back)."
And original being probably loose, since the phrasing was probably a chant and part of an oral tradition of protest song/chant before the 50s when Broonzy recorded the song.
Anyway that is more time than google challenged right-wing co-workers deserve, but I am happy to have the knowledge.
W.: Did you know I was a war president?
Is it wrong that I'm hearing this in Ralph Wiggum's voice?
Is it wrong that I'm hearing this in Ralph Wiggum's voice?
This would have made the last 8 years slightly more tolerable instead of the faux good-ole-boy voice W. really uses. But I don't think Ralph Wiggum mutilates the English language enough.
On The Daily Show they showed a clip where Cheney was turned dramatically out of frame at the top of the stairs. All I could think was "Dalek".
In the second video on dailyshow.com you can see it at about 3:50
Need your cats to get a paying job?
[link]
At the Nekorobi cat cafe in Tokyo, customers pay $10 an hour to watch pillows being shredded and pummeled. Most patrons are 20- to 30somethings seeking healing by cats or those who cannot afford to have pets full time.
Not for nothing, and I do loathe W, but that is how he talks - there's not much faux there. Growing up in Midland and Houston, not an uncommon accent for people not trying to maintain an less-accented speech.
As an example, my parents both grew up in New Mexico with all their siblings. NM is kind of the land of no accent. They all moved as adults to various parts of Texas and raised their children in TX. One of my aunts has a very strong, almost ridiculous west TX accent now (think an older Mrs. Taylor on FNL - "HIiii Y'all. How are ya doin'?" with upswing drawl at the end of each sentence if not word.) despite not even growing up there. My mom, less so with the accent, and the rest of my aunts and uncles, basically nothing. My brother and I actively worked to lessen our accents, but all my cousins have varying degrees of TX accents based on the regions they lived in.
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that, yes, Obama is a pro-woman, pro-reproductive-rights President: [link] So, there's that.
This is the first day in 8 years that I didn't think the government wanted to send troops to patrol my uterus.
(Not to mention, closing Gitmo.)
I feel like I woke up in a parallel universe.
But he grew up in Maine.
And his siblings don't do it.
I'm sure he works it. It's like that YouTube of Sarah Palin politicing before her national campaign -- strangely bereft of "gonnas" and "you betchas".
[link]
