perfidy

Heh.

Queerly, just as I was riding up the elevator after a refreshing nicotine break, thinking that despite a full time job, the endless labor of preparing my new house for moving into, and my old house for moving out of, and writing the great american novel in my spare time, and a wife preparing to give birth to our first offspring in two months, "now would be the right time to start a blog;" I got an email from my dear friend Johno, inviting me to join his blog. 

He therefore has my eternal gratitude for saving me the effort of creating one myself. He is my hero. At least until someone else does something nice for me. 

Like Johno, I am from Ohio. However, I am rather further to the right, politically speaking. Also, I am sans college degrees, though many people have called me the smartest "C" student they ever met. (In my defense, I did once get a 3.85 average one semester. It would have been a 4.0 if someone had warned me that the only way to get an A in Hale Chatfield's English classes was to write term papers on the topic of sex or death or both. I got a B+ on the mid term, recovered for the final, but the fat jerk still gave me a B+ for the class. But enough complaining.) I like long walks in the park, playing with puppies, and am a Gemini. I also think that astrology is horseshit. 

I fully agree with Johno on the politics, culture and stupid shit manifesto, though I should like to add "things that explode" to the list. 

[wik] While DJ B-head's first post did use the bold type that was to become characteristic of the blog's unique style and verve, note that he was so banal as to give his first post the excruciatingly bad title, "Howdy." Thankfully, he soon progressed to more innovative (and dare we say, cool) titles such as, "A quote from Ralph Peters," "Buckethead on France," and "The French." In almost no time at all, he became the stylish and clumsy commentator that we all love so much. 

This message from the Minister of Minor Perfidy: Thank you for your cooperation!
 

Just mostly. It's also very much about "Do You Know The Difference Between Big Wood And Brush: The American Song Poem Anthology". As a very astute review in the Observer noted, this 28-song collection is like a phantom radio transmission from what Greil Marcus called the "old, weird America." I've been trying to explain this to people, and I just can't. I end up reduced to gestures, incapable of explaining exactly what's so great-- just that it is. Go out and pick this up, support the good people at Bar/None records, and let your mind unwind to such gems as "Jimmy Carter Says 'Yes'," "Blind Man's Penis," and "Maker of Smooth Music." 
 

Want to tell me about it, for all the good it will do ya? I may be reached at toastdog-at-juno-dot-com. 

What the hell was I thinking? 

Because my compadre Buckethead and I have been having some fascinating (to us) discussions via email that we felt would better fit the format of a weblog. Also, in case we ever wish to run for public office, we want to have a clearinghouse for our enemies who wish to use our own words against us. We believe in convenience. Finally, because I sort of miss being in graduate school and participating in mindless theoretical discussions about senseless minutiae. 

This weblog is about three things: politics, culture, and stupid sh*t, though not necessarily in that order. I am fanatical in my devotion to the majesty of rock and the mystery of roll, the genius of Jackie Chan, and the ability of the American polity, through sheer mass and insensibility, to withstand even the most vigorous assaults from within and without. 

Just who the hell do I think I am? I was born in Ohio on the eve of Nixon's resignation. After this inauspicious beginning, and an excruciating career in Ohio's public school system, I decamped for a slightly different part of Ohio, and college. Seven years later, I woke up with a hangover, a tattoo, and a graduate degree in US History. A recent veteran of the entertainment industry, which I found neither glamorous nor entertaining, I now work at one of the more august institutes of higher learning around. Not telling which one. I think I'm so damn smart. 

I am a centrist. Being brought up in post-industrial Ohio tends to imbue one with a certain innate sense of pragmatism that not even the fiercest postmodern assaults have been able to shake free. But, I'm also an intellectual chauvinist, an optimist, and kind of an asshole. I have seen the worst that both the Left and Right have to offer, and I have thoroughly enjoyed mocking them both. Hence, this forum. Goody for me. 

Missy Elliott is the funk queen of the Universe. For shizzo. 
 

The PM of Serbia has been assassinated in Belgrade. Let's hope this time is different from the last time, mmkay?

First post! w00t! 

[wik] Note from the Ministry. Note that at this early stage, MC P-Saurus had not yet learned to use bold type to distinguish the post title from the body. Note also the pathetic reference to 733t h4x0rz. Happily, his skills developed rapidly, though he had to abandon the two cents moniker from shame. This message from the Minister of Minor Perfidy: Thank you for your cooperation

[alsø wik] this first post was on the earliest incarnation of the blog, founded by Johno and given the moderately clever name, "Johnny Two-Cents." In a few months, there came another first post when the whole operation was aggressively re-branded as The Ministry of Minor Perfidy. 

[alsø alsø wik] At this early stage, neophyte blogger Johno referred to himself as Pythagosaurus.