If you're a "regular" at this here blog, you know that things are simply not operating smoothly. Or, to say it better, my life is chaos. My blogging has been erratic and my blog reading worse. Between a week of vacation and "life," blogging was shoved out of the backseat and into the trunk. Not having the time to read your posts has put a serious dent in my HERE'S TO YOU posts. How can I dedicate anyone anything if I'm not up to speed????
Despite this, life has gone on. You've continued posting, and I've been semi-aware of it. In point of fact, one of my favorite blogs, FERRET-FACED FASCIST FRIENDS (which is totally a pun, btw) closed its doors. Stephen T. McCarthy posted the last blog bit over a week ago. It wasn't until today that I even made it back there to give him a solid comment. Ugghh.
I took a look in my "favorites" to see what I'd saved since my last HERE'S TO YOU post. There was ONE video there for A Beer For The Shower. Frankly, I think that's an excellent summation of just how sorry my blogging has been. So, what to do????
I've decided to post that one video for the Beer Boys, a video for everyone, and a whole bunch of videos for my friend Stephen T. McCarthy to honor the closing of his blog FERRET-FACED FASCIST FRIENDS. You'll notice the plethora (one of my all-time favorite words!) of Joan of Arcadia videos. Anyone who knows me knows that I adore that show. Just love it. And miss it sorely. If you, too, are/were busy and unaware that F-FFF just breathed its last, don't worry. Stephen T. McCarthy will still be posting twice a month at STMcC presents Battle of the Bands. Next battle on 12/15/14. I hope to see you there.
Now, let's get down to it!
This one is for everyone:
This one is for The Beer Boys at A Beer For the Shower:
These are for Stephen T. McCarthy at FERRET-FACED FASCIST FRIENDS:
Since this post really should have been titled 'Here's to You STMC', and the fact I refuse to comment on the last F-FFF post; let me add a few;
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=warren+zevon+heartache
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=warren+zevon+mutineer
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=warren+zevon+my+ride%27s+here
There was one more, but even the title is definitely 'adult content' and I didn't want to post that at a blog other than my own.
These are all Warren Zevon with his somewhat caustic sense of 'everything' but I'm sure STMc will get it.
I know this comment is not directed towards me in any way, but as a huge Zevon fan, I'm crashing.
DeleteI always figured that by the time he released "MY Ride's Here, WZ knew he had cancer.
It would have been so cool to save that song for the last track on his swan song, The Wind
The Wind was started and completed after Warren announced he was on borrowed time, and some of the songs are touching-I dare you to listen to "Keep Me In Your Heart" without getting misty-eyed-but WZ maintains his caustic sense of humor (check out "Disorder In The House")
I can assure you that STMc will "get" the Zevon references.
The finale for FFFF has been a long time coming-Stephen and I have not worked together since 2011, and he was talking about it back then.
But the two of you should cheer up. You've seen the length of the comments he leaves! He'll still be posting-it will just be as footnotes to your blogs!
LC
LC
DeleteI couldn't agree with you more on WZ timing with respect to 'MRH'.
Also, did not intend this to be some sort of Requiem on my part. I too have been hearing about the eminent demise of F-FFF for quite some time now, and there's still BOTGG. Ha, ha, ha!
FAE ~
DeleteI do believe I understood the intention of your choices. No, StMc isn't gone, but F-FFF is. That is sad. It's okay to be sad about it. As for me, I hope that one day he changes his mind and returns to it. Heck, I started reading the Stuffs blog, since it was before my time (back when I had some extra time), and feel sad that it was defunct before I ever found it. StMc tells the best stories, and life has provided him excellent fodder. The fact that he doesn't want to tell them any longer... well, you can't make someone share their Stuffs or their take on the world. BUT, you can be sad for it. (And cross your fingers and hope that the winds of change come in like a breath of fresh air and revitalize him. I hope that's what this move accomplishes. A restoration of the soul.
LC, Since you "know" him in a way the rest of us do not (I'm talking about in person... get your mind out of the gutter everyone!), you know better than the rest of us how necessary the physical move is. Sometimes a change of scenery changes everything else. Of course, I hope the move will resurrect his old blogs, but more important, I hope it resurrects his relationship with Jesus. That is the single most important relationship of our lives... so, I wish him well. Of course.
FAE. BOTGG... I think my brain isn't working, but I don't get it.... Battle of the GoGos. Battle of the Greek Gods. Battle of the Green Giants. Battle of the Gas Guzzlers. Battle of the... I'm out of ideas.
DeleteBummer he's closing his blog!
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry you've been having a tough time and have struggled to keep up with your blog/blogging. I hope things pick up for you in the New Year. Btw I loved the show Joan of Arcadia. :)
ReplyDeleteI miss Joan of Arcadia.
ReplyDeleteTake care of your life. We'll still be here. Well, most of us anyway.
Life has a way of messing up the best plans, but it is what it is and we have to roll with it. Sad to know he closed down his blog. How sad :(
ReplyDeleteThis is such a great tribute to Stephen! I'm also sad to hear that FFFF is closing its doors, but happy that he'll continue with Battle of the Bands. It's hard to get through What I Did For Love without falling apart. I know Stephen will love it!
ReplyDeleteOh, and the scene from Cougar Town was perfect for Bryan and Brandon's post last week! Very funny!
Hope things are going better for you now, Robin. I really appreciate all that you do!
Julie
Love, love the UPS video - there's nothing like a child to make you smile. Seems they both have a treasure in friendship!
ReplyDeleteBeer for the Shower is right on the money, baby!! Humor is so healing.
STMcC - other than swapping a couple of jokey BOTB comments, I haven't had the pleasure of reading much of the blog that's closed. I'm sure you will miss having that side of him in the blog-fest of life.
Robin, you never cease to amaze me. I enjoy whatever and whenever your time permits you tapping on the keys(smile). I think your photo of the dog stuck between the trees says it all for me. (Ain't it the truth!?) Be well, be you, know you're loved.
Alex ~ He's closing one of his blogs (which he's been talking about doing for a while now), but Battle of the Bands remains alive and well.
ReplyDeleteChrys ~ I think many people are struggling. I've read several posts indicating this is a wide-spread problem. Yeah... Joan of Arcadia...
LD ~ JOA was a great show.... I appreciate my blog friends!
Elizabeth ~ Life is all about beginnings and endings. They should be commemorated.
Julie ~ Yes, everyone who reads that blog is saddened by the closing of the doors. And everyone who participates in BOTB is glad it exists. Thank you FAE for kicking it off!
Dixie ~ My mom turned me on to the UPS video. It is so cute. I actually had several coffee videos to choose from for ABFTS... ha! You would enjoy F-FFF, Dixie. He's not taking the posts down, so you can go back and read at your leisure. I am glad I amaze someone. I look in the mirror and don't see "amazing." I see someone who is struggling to get a handle on anything! Yes, I feel very much like the dog in the photo. Thank you for the encouragement!!!
Hope your life gets in order soon. Love that UPS vid. I haven't seen Joan of Arcadia on your blog for a while.
ReplyDeleteGood video choices, all the way around.
ReplyDeleteI just read NOW Stephen's last two-part post, if that makes you feel any better. See? I'm even farther behind than you are! Personally, I think it was one of his best posts.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteokay, you got me with the UPS video. That kid is way too cute.
ReplyDeleteAww, that UPS video is sweet. What a cute little boy, and that truck they gave him was seriously cute!!
ReplyDeleteGreat post and homage to Stephen but glad he is still doing the battle of the bands
ReplyDeleteGreat homage to Stephen. As long as he's still around the blogosphere (and e-mail) that's all that matters. Plus, I absolutely love what he's done with his BOTB blog.
ReplyDeleteAnd of course, thank you for the mention! That coffee video is fantastic. I don't know what an iced DAMN or a fart muffin is, but I'm sure it's still somehow better than what they serve at Starbucks.
I totally feel you on the life is chaos end. Lots of fun videos and homages! Way to be fun AND supportive! Love it!
ReplyDeleteROBIN, the GIRL WONDER ~
ReplyDeleteThis was a fantabulous send-off for me. Thanks so much. It's hard for me to believe that anyone really cares this much.
I watched all the videos all the way through. In a couple of the longer ones I'm not sure if I always caught what it was you were relating to me, but I probably got most of 'em, anyway.
Here are a few quick thoughts pertaining to some of them:
I literally (yes, "literally", 6-B, as in "really") laughed out loud at the line, "The craziness is over. I'm done."
"We both solve puzzles in a universe where there is no certainty, only probability and possibility"... AND PISSABILITY! The so-called "scientist" left out "Pissability".
I loved when the little 6-year-old girl, Iris (really God), said, "I'll walk you home". No one was ever more safe walking home at night than Joan was with that 6-year-old girl. Ha!
I really liked the way they played that one girl's unexamined life by tying it into the desserts. She was just staring at them for 5 minutes because she didn't even know herself well enough to know which dessert she liked. (Of course, you know that's hardly me. You could line up 100-bottles-of-beer-on-the-wall, and I could go right to the one I wanted at that moment.)
The scene with Treat Williams was... GREAT!
That guy, when he's right for the character (as in this scene, and in 'Hair') he is just magnetic, dynamic - he practically leaps off the screen. But when he's wrong for the part (bucking the commonly accepted view: 'Prince Of The City'), he's just downright bad.
I wasn't familiar with that song from 'A Chorus Line', but it had the appropriately melancholy undertone. I've listened to it about 6 times now.
And I liked FAE's song choices, too. Of course, anyone who knows me knows I'm a Warren Zevon "Dark Humor" kind o' guy. AHHH-WOOO!
Hey, Robin, M'Dear, if you ever get out Los Angeles way, you'll need to check out Arcadia. You probably won't see Joan there but you will find a pretty little horse track called Santa Anita Park (I did fairly well there)...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Anita_Park
...and nearby is a North Woods Inn restaurant. Mmmm... good stuffs, Maynard!
http://clearmansrestaurants.com/northwoods/
Thanks again for this wonderful send-off. No blog ever died more humbly and appreciative.
~ D-FensDogg
'Loyal American Underground'
Okay, here's the takeaway from all of the JOA video. I think you got the Everwood scene with Treat Williams and the song.
Delete1) Addresses Crisis of Faith and Left-Right decisions. Joan was experiencing her own crisis of faith. God asked her to do something that felt wrong (find a way to get Adam's art out of the Art Show). She failed. He won the Art Show. So, she is questioning God's motives (the crisis) because Adam's winning seems like a good thing. Then he quits school (because he won) and she totally forgets what God just said, "It's all about what you do next." And she smashes his sculpture. Everything she'd done prior to that were left-right choices. When she smashed his art... right-wrong. It reeks terrible damage, as all wrong decisions do/will.
2) The teacher was quitting due to the indifference of his students. As he says, "Making someone care--that's the point."
3) You referenced the ripples that a life sends out (at least I think you did) and it made me think of this clip. Adam didn't open the last letter from his mom because he was afraid (the primary motivator if ever there was one), but the ripples were good. May we all be so lucky...
4) This one is about finding your voice and even disagreeing. (I'd say you've gotten good at both of those on F-FFF...;) But God says, "Grace is the touch of truth and lets you see the world in a new way. It's a gift that can only be felt when you're open enough to accept it."
5) God says, "Everyone has a part of themselves they don't like, Joan. You carry it around like a weight. The lucky ones realize that when it becomes too heavy, you can choose to set it down. That's when you see things the way they really are." Well... that is one of my all-time favorite episodes and God Quotes. Your blog helped me to set down my own weight and see things as they really are.
5) God says, "You did what you're supposed to do... Real connections can't be broken by time or space... Sometimes it's enough to plant the seed, walk away, and let the flower grow on its own."
6) It's just about being yourself... and that being enough. For Joan. For the girl who doesn't know what she likes (but is on the journey of discovery). For you. For me.
I think I said in my original comment that the first season of Everwood (in which that scene with Treat Williams happened)... just fantastic. The other three didn't live up to it, but the first one OUTSTANDING. When he says, "I've got nothing left" is when I lose it every single time.
For the record, I can't believe you'd never heard this song before... What I Did For Love, I mean. As I was searching JOA clips on YouTube the lyrics, "Kiss the day good-bye" were running circles in my head. Sometimes I can almost a hear a song, but not quite. It took me a while to pull it together in my brain. When I did... well, it seemed an appropriate send-off.
Part 1 Of 2:
DeleteGIRL WONDER ~
Before I forget, did you see that I replied to your comment at the "CONVERSATING' blog bit? I also gave YOU a couple videos to check out there.
>>... Everything she'd done prior to that were left-right choices. When she smashed his art... right-wrong.
Ahh, see how smart you are?!
Some very basic explanations BEFORE I viewed the videos probably would have helped. At least I'd have known what I was looking for. I'm not as smart as you seem to think I is. Nevertheless, I did pick up on a few of the things.
>>... 2) The teacher was quitting due to the indifference of his students. As he says, "Making someone care--that's the point."
Ahh2 (no, I didn't just sneeze), got it! It was really good the way you were able to zero in on some of my blogging issues and were able to think up very appropriate scenes from JOA to illustrate them.
>>... Adam didn't open the last letter from his mom because he was afraid.
I really liked this one and I played the contents of the letter part (where Joan's Mom was reading it) twice, because that part about him being her joy is something I know my Ma would have said to me also. She loved me so much.
>>... 4) This one is about finding your voice and even disagreeing. (I'd say you've gotten good at both of those on F-FFF...;)
Oh, no, not me! I always go along with the crowd because I fear having to stand alone. Ha!
Actually, the opposite is true. I agree with what Mark Twain said (paraphrasing)... Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to reconsider.
Continued Below...
Part 2 Of 2:
Delete>>... Your blog helped me to set down my own weight and see things as they really are.
Thanks, so much! Different people have different purposes for blogging. Mine, as you know, was always (even if sometimes secretly) about passing along some distressing truths and some great Truths that I had learned along the way. Mostly, I just wanted people to turn toward God because, no matter how often and loudly the pseudo-atheists shout the opposite, God and His Son, the Christ, DO exist and have our welfare in Heart and Mind at all times.
>>... Sometimes it's enough to plant the seed, walk away, and let the flower grow on its own.
Yep, I got that one.
>>... When he says, "I've got nothing left" is when I lose it every single time.
He played that scene BEAUTIFULLY! And I liked everything he said in it, the stuffs about fairness and all, and especially when he said that he had never thought that God owed him anything.
If I had heard 'What I Did For Love' before, I had forgotten it.
At one time I was under the impression that I did not care much for musicals. Then I started thinking of the ones I did like and came to realize that I like way too many musicals to be able to say "I DON'T LIKE MUSICALS".
However, there are certain types of musicals I don't like. For one thing, a musical MUST have a good storyline to hold my attention and/or it must star some actor or actress I really enjoy watching. If one of my favorite performers is not in it and if it's obvious that the story is just a thin excuse to put on a singing and dancing show, then I won't go.
I've never seen 'A Chorus Line', nor 'Cats', nor a lotta others that were popular, primarily because I suspected right away these were musicals more for the ladies.
I used to joke that I was too manly to like musicals, but as you can see by that (partial) list on the blog bit I linked you to above, I do like a number of musicals ('West Side Story' is decidedly NOT one of them!), which means either A) it's OK for manly men to like musicals after all, or B) I'm not the manly man I pretend to portray myself as. (Frankly, I believe the real answer is C) All of the above).
Thanks again, Robin. It was a great tribute to a now defunct blog, but one which served its purpose, so it seems.
~ D-FensDogg
'Loyal American Underground'
GIRL WONDER ~
ReplyDeleteTwo Things:
First, a wish for a happy new year filled with peace and contentment.
And, I watched Season 1, Disc 1 of 'JOAN OF ARCADIA'. It included the pilot episode and 3 or 4 regular episodes. Hokey-Smoke! That was really, really good! I was genuinely surprised because it was far better than I had expected. I thought I would rate it as "OK" or "Fairly Good", but those episodes exhibited some damn fine writing, and even some good acting. (I especially like the girl who plays Joan and the guy who plays her brother in the wheelchair.)
It's great the way the episodes move along, where God is asking her to do things and you really can't figure out why until the end where the fruit of her actions is suddenly revealed and you see how far ahead God was thinking.
The shows were so good that I had my Brother watch them too, and he really liked them also. So, then I had him go back and watch the pilot episode, which he had not seen, and I watched that one for a second time.
The pilot ended with a woman singing the song 'I BELIEVE IN YOU', which is track #3 on Bob Dylan's first Christian album, 'SLOW TRAIN COMING', which I think is amongst his Top 5 or maybe even Top 3 albums ever. I got to thinking that might be a good BOTB if you could find out who the woman was that sang the cover on 'Joan Of Arcadia' and put it up against the Dylan original. (I would predict that the cover would beat the original in a BOTB contest.) I'm not going to do that BOTB, so feel free to present it someday, if you'd like to. That's my New Year's Eve gift to you... should you decide to accept it.
I now have NetFlix sending me Season 1, Disc 2, and will be watching it next Mon., Tues., and/or Wednesday.
I read a bunch of reviews of the show at Amazon and it seems many people feel the show was degenerating after the first Season. One guy even wrote a pretty articulate review in which he argued that the show began losing its touch beginning with the 9th episode of Season 1. And I was wondering how you feel about this.
Based on things I read, it sounded like those who believed the show was going in a wrong direction with the end of Season 1 / beginning of Season 2 had some strong arguments. But having not gotten to that point, I can only go by what they wrote was happening.
Also, to be truthful, it seems to me that as good as the beginning of this series was - and to be sure it was really quite good (except for that positive remark about the Quran in the pilot) - the concept itself seems to have a limited "shelf life" span. I mean, no matter how good the writing was, and no matter how well the episodes were constructed, there was naturally only just so far you could go with that concept before it began to stretch too far or become too repetitive.
In other words, I think the very nature of the concept almost dictated that the show could not maintain that high quality and the unexpected outcomes of each episode for very long before it was bound to get old or go too far in an attempt to keep it fresh. The idea was great, and the execution of the idea was great, but I think it was a show destined to end early.
Anyway, thanks for keeping at me about this until I checked it out. I really didn't think I'd care for it much; I thought it would seem hokey or just a superficial shot at pseudo-Spiritual lessons. But in fact, what I've seen so far was really excellent, and I look forward to seeing the next 4 episodes, at least.
~ D-FensDogg
'Loyal American Underground'