David'Z RantZ: "It's All Good?" (Reprinted from 3/7/2009)

"It's all good."

What?

What's "all good?"

Says who?

What the hell does that even mean?

It is not "all good!"

Stop saying that!!!

Thanks for your time.

Kind of a "Hang-Up!"

Oh, goody! I actually get to write a post that's not about someone I admire who just died!

I just encountered a two-day-old article about a relatively recent phenomenon called "ringless voice mail" (or "direct-to-voicemail"), and if you care to read the very same article in its entirety, click here.

If you're unfamiliar with this, here's a brief explanation as to what it is: Thanks to an irritating technological advance, messages from telemarketers or debt collectors are sent directly to your voice mail. Your phone itself never rings, so you can't do anything to block them.

Advocates for this procedure are contending that these -- What the hell would you call them? "Un-calls?" -- should remain unaffected by any and all consumer protection laws because technically, they're not "calls" at all.

Those opposed to this technological "advancement" claim that "voice mail boxes would be clogged with automated messages... making it challenging to unearth important calls, whether they are from an elderly mother’s nursing home or a child’s school." Just think of your voice mail being stuffed with scores of messages from a single debt collector, or worse, several of the bastards.

But, you may wonder, what if you're on the "Do Not Call" list? Hate to break it to you, but in that case, sucks to be you, fellow babies, because if these messages are not considered "calls," there's no protection from said list!

Furthermore, the Republican National Committee is claiming that prohibiting these messages would constrain free speech. (Check it out here.) Hm. The RNC protecting money-hungry business owners' rights over those of private citizens? Who'da thunk it?

What can you/we do about this while the matter is still up in the air, as it were? (And believe me, we should certainly do something!) Well, the FCC is soliciting public comments on this issue, which can be left here. That's a damned good start.

Again, to read the entire article on this subject, which I strongly advise, please click here.

And thanks for your time.

Gregg Allman, 1947-2017, R.I.P.

Keyboardist, singer, and songwriter Gregg Allman of the Allman Brothers Band died a few days ago, from complications from liver cancer. He was sixty-nine.

Gregg and his older brother Duane had played in a handful of bands before forming their first successful band, the Allman Joys, in the mid-1960s. They were renamed the Hour Glass, then became the Allman Brothers Band, and their debut album appeared in 1969. Duane died in a motorcycle crash in 1971, but Gregg and the rest of the band decided to keep the band together.

Gregg was involved in several marriages and relationships in his life -- one of his wives was Cher, to whom he was married from 1975-1978 -- and had five children by five different women.

Gregg was plagued with drug and alcohol problems throughout much of his life. In 1995, when being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Gregg was drunk when he delivered his acceptance speech. Reportedly, upon seeing his speech on a later television broadcast, Gregg was so disgusted with himself that he was inspired to his final, successful attempt to swear off drugs and alcohol.

Thanks for your time.

Roger Moore, 1927-2017, R.I.P.

Once again, I seem to have the kiss of death. Only three days ago, I was thinking that I hadn't heard anything from Sir Roger Moore lately (Not personally, of course! I mean in the news, in publicity releases, etc.). I thought, "...and he's got to be getting 'up there' in terms of age..."

Well, just yesterday (Tuesday) I read that he had died after a short bout with cancer, at age eighty-nine. Moore had quite a lengthy career, and was best known for playing James Bond in seven films in the series featuring Ian Fleming's 007. Also in Moore's resume were roles on Maverick, and as Simon Templar on the show The Saint. And if you wanna get technical, he also (very briefly) played Inspector Clouseau in the film Curse of the Pink Panther! Moore was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2003!

Thanks for your time.

Powers Boothe, 1948-2017, R.I.P.

I just found out on Saturday that Emmy-winning actor Powers Boothe died at the age of sixty-eight on May 14th. Damned shame. I remember him best from his roles as Senator Roark in Sin City and its sequel, Sin City: A Dame to Kill For, a spectacular performance as Curly Bill Brocius in Tombstone, and his fairly recent appearance on the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. television series. There were, of course, many other roles he'd played in his long career with which I was regrettably unfamiliar... but I'd seen enough of his acting to have been greatly impressed by the man. As I so often say in these tributes, he'll be missed.

 Sin City

Sin City: A Dame to Kill For

 Tombstone

 

 Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Thanks for your time.

"Idol Eyes" (Reprinted from March 22nd, 2012)

I have been looking through this warehouse I call an apartment for weeks, trying to find the following poem. "Idol Eyes" is certainly not the best thing I ever wrote, but I only did it as kind of a novelty piece anyway. It may make some tenuous kind of sense to you when you read it here, fellow babies, but if you read it aloud, I guarantee it won't make any sense at all to whomever hears it!

Which was the point.

Thanks for your time.

IDOL EYES

You idolize,

You idealize,

But whatcha gonna do when your idol lies?

Your idol lies

To your idle eyes,

So you'll never see the truth in his idol eyes.

You lionize

His lyin' eyes.

(But you'll never see the truth in his idol eyes.)

You idolize

But your idol lies,

And when his day is done? Well, he idle lies.

He idle lies,

Closin' idol eyes,

And when your day is done you idealize.

Just a Filler

Howdy, fellow babies!

I haven't posted in almost three weeks because I've been lazy busy.

Lazy Busy, and largely uninspired! 

So this afternoon, I spent over an hour going through unfinished drafts on my posts list for this blog. I deleted a few that I know I'll never do anything with, but I still have almost one hundred and fifty!

And out of all those drafts, I didn't find anything that I want to finish. Not right now, anyway.

I'm just telling you this so you can't say I haven't posted anything lately. Ha.

Thanks for your time.