Meet The Beatles, Mr. Zuckerberg

The new Kindle's on sale, mates, it's off to Target! 

Ever wonder what would have happened if the word's greatest ever band had come face to face with today's social media? What if John, Paul, George, and Ringo suddenly sprang to life as 20-somethings in their heydey in the age of smart phones, hashtags, and "you've got male?" 

Ever pause to ponder that?

No, of course you haven't.    But never you mind, because ... 

Just role up for the Mystery Tour,  step right this way!

Text Man

(to the tune of Taxman)

One, two, three, four
One, two….

Let me tell you how it will be.
I’m texting you, you’re texting me.

Cause you’re the Text Man.
Yeah, the Text Man!

Should money spent appear too small. 
Get going, you can text them all!

Cause you’re the Text Man.
Yeah, yeah, the Text Man!

If you hit a bar, text the barkeep,
If you take a trip, text Uncle Pete,
If you’re Michael Phelps, text swimming meet,
If you take a walk, yeah, text your feet!

Text Man!

Cause you’re the Text Man.
Yeah, the Text Man!

You like texting by the score. (Ah hah, get your bill soon.)
Keep texting, you could still pay more. (Ah hah, texting’s sweet!)

Cause you’re the Text Man.
Yeeeah, the Text Man!

Now my advice for those who die.
Text Man!
Just keep on texting from the sky.
Text Man!

Cause you’re the Text Man.
Yeah, The Text Man!

And you’re working for nothing but texting!
Text Man!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Blackberry Ringing

(to the tune of Blackbird) 

Blackberry ringing in the dead of night.
Take these smokin’ things, watch e-mails fly!

All your life.
You are always waiting for an e-mail to arrive.

Blackberry ringing in the dead of night.
Not hard to theorize, it’s plain to see.

All your life.
Forever you’ll be waiting for a moment to be free.

Blackberry fine! Blackberry mine!
Ringing all night through the dark black night.

Blackberry fine! Blackberry mine!
Ringing all night ‘til the broad daylight.

Blackberry ringing in the dead of night.
Take these smokin’ things and e-mails fly!

All your life.
You are only sated when an e-mail does arrive.
With this gadget you are mated in an e-mail paradise. 

You are always waiting for an e-mail to arrive.

~~~~~~~~~~~

You Won't Friend Me

(to the tune of You Won't See Me)

When I call you up,

Your line's engaged.

I have had enough,

So I hit your Facebook page!

I send you a request,

You act like I’m Pete Best.

And I just cannot rest,

If you won't friend me,

You won't friend me.

You won't friend me,

You won't friend me!

I don't know ..... why you 

Should only want to share

Some profile info with everyone,

Even your likes aren’t posted there!

I've so much to post,

Don’t make me give up the ghost!

I won’t go psycho like Glen Close.

And you won't friend me,

You won't friend me.

You won't friend me,
You won't friend me!

Time after time,

You leave my friend request unspoken.
I wouldn't mind

If I knew what I weren’t pokin'.

Though my Facebook friends are few,
They're filled with tears.

My friend request to you

Been's gathering dust for years!

Yes, I tell you, sister,

I’m getting all kinds of bitter,

And I’ll just hop on over to Twitter,

If you won't friend me,

You won't friend me!

You won't friend me,

You won't friend me!

Oooohhhh!  La, la, la!
Oooohhhh!  La, la, la!

Oooohhhh!  La, la, la!
Oooohhhh!  La, la, la!  (and fade out ...)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hope you enjoyed this lazed-out excursion into the realm of unmitigated blog filler.

And I’d like to say thank you on behalf of the group and myself, and I hope we passed the audition ...

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The Stylish Blogger Award

Mine, mine, all mine!

Marni Mann is a talented author and terrific twitterer (@MarniMann) and blogger (Marni Mann: The Memoir of a Writer)  who happens to be named after a movie made by Alfred Hitchcock.

 Frankly it’s one of the lousier movies made by Alfred Hitchcock.

Marnie, (1964) features a tepid performance by Tippi Hedrin, an odd miscasting of the young Sean Connery, and “a surprise ending” even M. Night Shyamalan would have rejected. However, if you have to be named after an Alfred Hitchcock movie, it beats going through life with everyone calling you Psycho!

Recently Marni was kind enough to bestow upon me the highly coveted Stylish Blogger Award. To be honest, I’m referred to as "stylish" about as often as Anthony Weiner is referred to as "photogenic."  So, such as to properly reflect the image of this outstanding award, I got myself a haircut and bought some nice new clothes.

Do I look okay, Marni? And where would you like me to send these bills?

In accepting the Stylish Blogger Award, I can only say I am truly honored and that I plan to place it on my fireplace mantle right next to the Versatile Blogger Award presented to me last year by none other than Ms. Meryl Streep! (Note: Not only is that complete bullshit, I don’t even have a mantle, let alone a fireplace!)

The Stylish Blogger Award comes with the stipulation that each recipient share seven random facts about himself or herself. Among the hundreds of thousands of fascinating things about me, I have elected to share with you the following:

1) I am terrified of sharp knives. I have spent the better part of the last twenty years attempting to develop food with zippers.

2) This is my favorite joke:

I used to play baseball for Caesar’s baseball team back in the glory days of Rome. One Sunday afternoon we were playing a game dedicated to the revered Gods on Olympus when I was called out on strikes on a third strike pitch I’m sure was low and inside.

I turned to the umpire and said, “You, sir, are neither holy nor Roman nor an umpire!”

If you don’t get that one, I don’t hold out much hope you’ll like my second favorite joke, “St. Thomas Aquinas, Gertrude Stein, and Moses Maimonides walk into a bar….”

3) I have no math sense whatsoever. Keep this is mind if we’re ever in a restaurant together and you ask me to figure out the check!

4) The most famous person I’ve ever had sex with is Jane Goldfarb. Yep, you heard right! Jane Goldfarb!!!

5) I once met Moe Howard of the Three Stooges when I was ten years old. Yes, he did gouge my eyes out. Yes, he did pull me along by my hair. But to my everlasting regret and shame, he did not hit me over the head with a crow bar.

6) I am terrified of heights. My entire life is like the dream sequence in Vertigo in which Jimmy Stewart envisions himself falling in terror from tremendous heights, only not as well directed.           

7) I have personally proposed to Tom Cruise that he make a series of Gay Scientologist movies.

8) Bonus Fact: I am a big fan of the Philadelphia Phillies, although they root against me just about any chance they get!

Now comes the part where I get to play James Franco and Anne Hathaway whose combined ages depressingly equal just one year older than I am, as I pass the Stylish Blogger Award along to three deserving blogging buddies. It’s supposed to be five, but I’m the award winner and I fully reserve my right to be both iconoclastic and ornery! 

 The envelopes please ….

Think book bloggers are boring? Yeah, you probably do, considering you follow me and therefore think great writing comes inside the stale tasteless cookie you crack open each and every Saturday night around 2:05 A.M. following your stoned Chinese take-out and Shelley and Joyce are those two Jewish girls your buddy fixed you up with in college that you both miserably struck out with.

Well, unlettered yokel mine, not this book blogger!

Tim Lowe aka @Book_Dude is an insatiable reader and writer who shares his literary and life perceptions in a lively, informative, and often intensely personal manner. In his blog Bookspin, Tim offers thoughts on books as diverse as Hitch 22: A Memoir by Christopher Hitchens to Inside the World of ESPN while managing to employ words and phrases like “capacious” and “ contradictions that contain their own multitudes” in a manner that makes us actually wish we knew what the hell they mean.

 @Book_Dude gives you everything you’d ever need or want to know about the latest hot-off-the-fiction-or-non-fiction bookshelf regardless of whether you actually want to read what he purveys or, like you, just want to know which books to leave around half-open to impress random babes and other dignitaries who may be stopping by. You should be stopping by Bookspin.

One of the most eclectic blogs I’ve ever read is the work of mystery writer K.B. Owen (@kbowenwriter) who’s also a former college professor with a doctorate in 19th Century literature. With regular features entitled Mystery Mondays, Wise Word Wednesdays, and Fashion Fridays, Dr. Owen offers compelling courses on each of her obviously beloved subjects at K. B. Owen, Mystery Writer.

When it comes to mysteries, Kathy provides a thorough investigation of whichever mystery genre, writer, or hard-boiled detective she has under the microscope at the time, be it Hitchcock, Charlie Chan, or Encylopedia Brown. Fashion Friday shifts gears to provide a comprehensive look at 19th Century fashion, accompanied by a fully-painted portrait of the era replete with original period photos and artwork. And Wise Word Wednesdays represents Kathy’s musings on famous and not so famous words, phrases, and quotations. Hmmm .... maybe Kathy can help us figure out what the devil “capacious” and “contradictions that contain their own multitudes” mean. 

If you’re the kind of person who’s fascinated by the fact that Charlie Chan was played only by white guys and never by an Asian or enjoy discovering a 19th Century rendering of the innards of a woman constricted by the wearing of an  au courant corset of the time, then K. B. Owen, Mystery Writer is the blog for you. It’s certainly one for me.

There almost as much going on in Heaven and Earth as well as in your philosophy, Horatio, in  Fantasies, Mysteries, Comedies, Recipes, as the expansive title of Marian Allen’s (@MarianAllen) blog suggests. For one, there are Hot Flashes, short short SHORT stories that express fully realized events, thoughts and feelings in less time than it takes me to say “Duh, which way did he go, George?”

Here’s but a sampling of two:

First Allison had a cold, then Louise, then Johnny, then Spike and Lady Margaret. Sometimes, multiple personality disorder was no damn fun.

 The days and nights are equal lengths tonight and I’ll start being good. By mid-summer, I’ll be a paragon. Then the nights get longer.

Go ahead, dude, you do one as good, I dare ya!

Marian's blog also contains longer stories, links to other published works, poetry, interviews, reviews, and recipes. Though recipe blogs aren’t my thing, Marian even includes a recipe for latkes, which I make only with a Manischewitz mix. So non-Jewish Marian's versatile blog even manages to prove that she’s a better Jew than I am! 

But you don’t have to be Jewish ---- or anything else --- to enjoy Fantasies, Mysteries, Comedies et al.

Those are the awards, folks; I’ll see all the winners at the after party. Drinks are on me, but since I’m not telling anyone where the after party happens to be and since in fact there really isn’t any after party, I’m not all that concerned that Tim, Kathy, and Marian are going to ring up much of a bill on me.

And once again, Marni Mann, thank you very much for the Stylish Blogger Award!

But picking me?

What are you?

Psycho?

~~~~~~~~~~~