Let’s see what happens when your host (me) has nothing to say, and instead it’s open mike night. Step right up, speak your mind, tell a story, sing a song, whatever.
once weekly, usually on Saturdays
5/24/2025
Anything goes #29
29 responses to “Anything goes #29”
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I assume your crack tech team is working on this little problem. It really wouldn’t have to be crack: some southern import weed would do the trick.
jtb
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I am (more) confused (than usual). What’s the one little problem?
Comments were off-line yesterday for an hour or so, sorry if that was it. It was intentional; I’m working on an improvement that’s almost ready…
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¿Su programa solo habla español? Viva Zapata.
Juan
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Sign language works better for me.
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Dear “I’m forever blowing bubbles”,
I don’t think these comments are getting through. Give my best to Bubbles.
jtb
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OK. You were offline for another two hours today. You just came back. I’m not complaining. Just letting you know. I thought I’d try Spanish in case it was a language problem. Maybe that fixed the problem. Maybe not.
I also tried a couple times during my insomnia night. No messages posted.
Just trying to help debug, but if you don’t think you have a bug the help is sort of wasted. It’s possible I am the bug.
jtb
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. . . and now messages are not getting through again. I’ll stop bugging you while you analyze. Maybe the problem is on my end.
jtb
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Anyone else having problems?
Eel complained a few days ago that his first posting of his latest dirty story hadn’t shown up. unlike the Google/Blogger era, though, there’s simply no censorship in the software here, and I certainly don’t delete comments unless they’re spam.
Keep me posted… if that’s possible!
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My recent comments either take days to show up (I figured you had to approve them?) or not at all (which is probably best for everyone, in my case.)
I don’t sign in to post, but there is autofill for my name.
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How long has this been happening for you? I’m trying to piece together cause and effect and a timeline.
I love and welcome any comments that aren’t spam,there’s no filter or approval process, and whether anyone’s logged in or logged out should make no difference.
I’ve opened a ticket with our crack IT team.
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A week, maybe? I notice if I post a comment, it may not show up until you also make a new post on the blog, but again, I figured that was an approval thing. Instead, it might be a whole site update thing – meaning that the “held” comments only show up when you hit “publish” on your own entries.
I’m no tech guy – if I were, I’d be invoicing you for $250/hr right now, heh – so I could be talking nonsense.
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See, now that one showed up instantly. Go figure.
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…aaaand that one didn’t appear until your new “Climate” post also appeared.
WEIRD, man!
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Weird, and I’m also no tech guy. but the accumulating evidence suggests you’re right, it’s “a whole site update thing.” That’s not the way it’s supposed to work though. Should all be instantaneous and automatic.
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I am 92% sure all problems with commenting are now solved.
Comments posted should appear pretty dang close to instantly, and if ever they don’t, please smack me upside the head again.
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Let the beheadings begin, and never end until all that remains is the working class
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I dunno. Dems are capitalists, of course they’re capitalists. That’s the box they can’t think out of, and the system we’re all shackled to. Guillotines, by all means, and why even talk to Nancy Pelosi? She’s the wrinkled face of corporate capitalism.
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Is it possible Eel fucked up your software by posting his dirty stories? Is it equally possible that I’m the culprit because my stories are too damn clean? It sure seems like problems popped up when you went to the slightly altered format for submitting content, but your assertion that there are no problems would shoot that theory right in the ear (the right ear). In any case, I appreciate that you’re keeping an open mind about the posting problems and a closed mind about the rabid dog Oklahoma and Texas helped elect President. If you want to run a test, or a series of tests, I’m generally available except for Sundays and Thursdays. Give me a script and I’ll overact.
John
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“There are no problems” may have been a tad too optimistic.
Seems I can see everyone’s posts instantly, but nobody else can see squat until I bang on the side of the box. An IT ticket has been opened. Anyone, everyone, now and forever, if a comment doesn’t show up within one minute of being posted, and refreshing the page doesn’t help, plz let me know.
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I am Doug’s test post. Not logged in. Firefox.
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This isn’t a complaint that requires action. I commented a couple of songs during the Great Outage of Last Week that never showed up. Shall I recomment and see whether I have better luck this week? Also, I don’t think recomment should be underlined, because I think the minidash between “re” and “comment” is optional. Come to think of it, I also think the minidash between “mini” and “dash” is optional. I think it was a Cowboy Junkies song. I am unaware of any mini-dashes in any Cowboy Junkies songs, although “Margo Timmins”, lead singer for the group, contains no dashes at all.
John
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> This isn’t a complaint that requires action.
Well, that’s good. Action is not usually in my bailiwick.
Please, Cowboy Junkie me!
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This is one of my favorite Cowboy Junkies songs — Blue Moon Revisited (Song for Elvis) — as it appeared on the remake of their Trinity album.
https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1SC4y157aT/?uid=425631534334793135376154
jtb
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I don’t believe that woman’s a cowboy OR a junkie. False advertising!
Gotta believe in the song, though.
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Comments continue to be hung up in limbo. There’s a workaround I can do to force comments to be published, and I’m doing it every few hours, if I’m home.
The latest comments do appear *instantly* on the Comments page, but can be delayed before appearing on the page where they were posted.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled but delayed programming.
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My high school pre-calc teacher had a poem of the week on Fridays. He said, among other wise things, “arithmetic is prose — calculus is poetry”. I wouldn’t know: I never made it to calculus. There wasn’t room for both calculus and philosophy, and both teachers were outstanding rebels. I chose philosophy. I have wondered if anything would have been different had I made the other decision.
However, I drift like an early-60s Oldsmobile with insufficient tire inflation. I’d like to share three of Carl Moore’s favorite poems with you. He was right about arithmetic and calculus. He was right about everything.
All three poems are by Wallace Stevens. I think I’ve shared one before, but I don’t care very much.
The Emperor of Ice Cream
by Wallace StevensCall the roller of big cigars,
The muscular one, and bid him whip
In kitchen cups concupiscent curds.
Let the wenches dawdle in such dress
As they are used to wear, and let the boys
Bring flowers in last month’s newspapers.
Let be be finale of seem.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.Take from the dresser of deal,
Lacking the three glass knobs, that sheet
On which she embroidered fantails once
And spread it so as to cover her face.
If her horny feet protrude, they come
To show how cold she is, and dumb.
Let the lamp affix its beam.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird
by Wallace StevensI
Among twenty snowy mountains,
The only moving thing
Was the eye of the blackbird.II
I was of three minds,
Like a tree
In which there are three blackbirds.III
The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.
It was a small part of the pantomime.IV
A man and a woman
Are one.
A man and a woman and a blackbird
Are one.V
I do not know which to prefer,
The beauty of inflections
Or the beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after.VI
Icicles filled the long window
With barbaric glass.
The shadow of the blackbird
Crossed it, to and fro.
The mood
Traced in the shadow
An indecipherable cause.VII
O thin men of Haddam,
Why do you imagine golden birds?
Do you not see how the blackbird
Walks around the feet
Of the women about you?VIII
I know noble accents
And lucid, inescapable rhythms;
But I know, too,
That the blackbird is involved
In what I know.IX
When the blackbird flew out of sight,
It marked the edge
Of one of many circles.X
At the sight of blackbirds
Flying in a green light,
Even the bawds of euphony
Would cry out sharply.XI
He rode over Connecticut
In a glass coach.
Once, a fear pierced him,
In that he mistook
The shadow of his equipage
For blackbirds.XII
The river is moving.
The blackbird must be flying.XIII
It was evening all afternoon.
It was snowing
And it was going to snow.
The blackbird sat
In the cedar-limbs.Of Mere Being
by Wallace StevensThe palm at the end of the mind,
Beyond the last thought, rises
In the bronze decor,A gold-feathered bird
Sings in the palm, without human meaning,
Without human feeling, a foreign song.You know then that it is not the reason
That makes us happy or unhappy.
The bird sings. Its feathers shine.The palm stands on the edge of space.
The wind moves slowly in the branches.
The bird’s fire-fangled feathers dangle down.for Carl: jtb
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Poetry is some weird shit, man. It’s a whole ‘nother way of reading and thinking, gotta slow everything down and kick all other thoughts out of the way. I don’t do that very often, but this shit’s worth slowing down for. Thanks, John.
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I fell in love with The Emperor of Ice Cream when I was 16, just about 60 years ago. This guy buys an old three-wheel putt-putt that plays tinkly music and has a cold box and starts selling frozen treats at a little over market, calling his business The Emperor of Ice Cream. His minister tells him about the wonders that god performs, and our ice cream salesman says, “Nope. The only Emperor is the emperor of ice cream. That’s another way of telling the story.
jtb
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Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one with ice cream, real ice cream
You took the trail with poetry about ice cream
And that has made all the difference.It’s why you’re skinny and I’m not.
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