Our Top Ten Comic Strips from Today's Mother's Day Sunday Roanoke Times: Oh, Look, It's a Kangaroo

Greetings to our blog readers in Iran (perhaps), Japan and Costa Rica.........

Our top ten comic strips from today's "Roanoke Times," a daily newspaper in Roanoke, Va., which David Letterman calls the greatest city in the world (we're just kidding, he sez that for New York City), include a "Speed Bump" strip in which there is a surprise:
http://www.gocomics.com/speedbump

"Non-Sequitur"  features a man who sees surprise messages in the night sky which his wife is oblivious to: http://www.gocomics.com/nonsequitur

Third place goes to "Get Fuzzy" which features a kitchen argument: http://www.gocomics.com/getfuzzy

We also enjoyed today's "Mutts" which features a quote from the late '60s era stand-up comic Lenny
Bruce (pict. bottom) who once said he hated to visit small towns because once you see the canon in the park there is nothing else to do: http://www.gocommics.com/mutts

Here is our top ten: http://www.roanoke.com/comics

1. Speed Bump

2. Non-Sequitur

3. Get Fuzzy

4. Pearls Before Swine

5. Zits
 
6. Agnes http://www.gocmics.com/agnes

7. Dilbert http://www.dilbert.com

8. Doonesbury http://www.doonesbury.com

9. Jump Start

10. Mutts

For our survey of the comic strips from today's Washington Post, go to http://www.nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

http://www.denverpost.com/comics

Quote of the Week- Lenny Bruce

Today, our quote of the day comes from the late, great comic genius Lenny Bruce (1925-1966), whom I have recently outlived (he died just a few months away from what would have been his 41st birthday).

Bruce was using the term 'yada, yada, yada,' some 30 years before it became a pop culture standard thanks to the term's frequent use on "Seinfeld."

This quote seems quite prophetic considering the recent telecommunication mergers:

"Communism is like one big phone company."

SIDEBAR: We had assumed that Cong. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) was the nuttiest, fringe Republican candidate for president, but it appears this dubious dishonor should go to Gov. Rick Perry (R-Tex).

According to an NPR report last week, Perry, who is a born again evangelical who likes executions (hmmm....yeah, he does seem too much like GWB) stated in Portsmouth, NH, that public schools in texas teach evolution and creationsim. Perry added that there were 'some gaps in evolution.' The day before Perry essentially said that global warming was just 'a lot of hype.'

This lead another Republican candidate, former Utah governor Jon Huntsman, who must feel like the only sane man in the asylum, to tweet that he did believe in evolution.

Of course, saying something intellectually sound while trying to become a Republican presidential candidate could cause a person to lose Sioux City!

Special Quote of the Day- George Bernard Shaw

We continue our quotes from famous people from Ireland with a quip from author/playwright George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) who penned "Pygmalion" which became the basis for the Broadway musical and film "My Fair Lady."

While we our quoting famous people from Ireland, we are listening to Mardi Gras music, including a great tune from Tom Waits, to commemorate today's festivities in New Orleans from WXDU (88.7 FM-Durham, NC), which is the student-run radio station from Duke University, from the net.

Washboard Dave is the DJ at the moment, and according to the station's web site DJ Andy B., who has a program from 10:00 p.m-midnight on Thursdays is the DJ of the Month. Of course, this has nothing to do with Ireland!

Here is our quote from Shaw:

"A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing."

I wonder what he would make of blogging? Perhaps, it would have prevented him from writing "Mrs. Warren's Profession" (1893), another one of his classic plays.

SIDEBAR: At 9:05 p.m., my friend Les Blank's landmark documentary film about a film "Burden of Dream" airs on Flix, a subsidiary of Showtime. You will either come away sincerely admiring filmmaker Werner Herzog or questioning his sanity for shooting a full-scale epic in the Amazon River jungles of Peru.

SIDEBAR 2: Have a morbid side that wonders just when and how someone like acting legend Erroll Flynn died? (I actually never got around to looking that up, but there are better things to do in life and for that matter- even online). Well, you can check out (deadoraliveinfo.com) where I learned that I have now outlived another icon stand-up comedian Lenny Bruce who died around the time when I was born by 75 days.

Quote from The Composers- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Yes, we decided to use an image of the late '80s Austrian pop singer Falco (1957-1998), who alas like John Lennon and Lenny Bruce died when he was 40 (which is yikes my age!). Of course, all of us who grew up in the '80s or saw the movie "Adventureland" know that Falco (who was actually more like a two-hit wonder) was best known for the 1986 smash hit single "Rock Me Amadeus," which I think all of us got sick and tired of. But, today, much like the Swedish pop group Abba, it has grown on us like kudzu!

(If memory serves me right, Falco died in a car accident on some island near Jamaica. We need our Honduran intern Javier to verify that once he gets back from Chucky Cheese!).

As for the Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791), who also died quite young, he is of course known as 'the genius of Salzburg' as he composed many musical classics, including the operas "The Magic Flute," "The Marriage of Figaro" and "The Shephard King"- to name a few.

And, more importantly, he was the subject of Milos Forman's 1985 Oscar-winning film "Amadeus" which is based on a play of the same name by Peter Shaffer.

Here is our quote from Mozart, which is one I sincerely agree with:

"I pay no attention to anybody's praise or blame. I simply follow my own feelings."

For classical music lovers in Roanoke, Va., the Roanoke Symphony will be giving a performance called "Movie Masterworks" on Jan. 24. More details are available at their web site (rso.com).

I Made My Standup Comedy Debut

The place was The Idiot Box, a comedy club in downtown Greensboro, NC. It was this past Friday night, and it was Amatuer Night. I was reluctant. I was hesitant. But, hey I had performed karaoke to Talking Heads songs, so why should stand-up comedy be any different?

Of course, five minutes on stage felt like the length of "Ben Hur," but I did manage to pull though it. I made jokes about Warren Beatty's love-life, being a Turkish-American in small-town North Carolina, my agnosticism--which always causes me problems and religious fundamentalism.

I made the Woody Allenesque observation that if heaven and hell existed as the world's fundamentalists think they do, then I could see myself in a line where a serial killer who had just raped and murdered 40 women would get into heaven because he accepted Jesus Christ right before his lethal injection. But, I would get sent to hell for once going to a strip club in Bluefield, WVa., when I was 23 years old.

And, the kicker was that the receptionist at the Pearly Gate would tell me: "Hey life isn't fair, so why should the after-life be any different?"

I was not exactly Lenny Bruce (pictured- yikes, I just found out he died when he was my age---40!, in 1966), but I was bit funnier than a "Gomer Pyle" rerun (I hope!).

SIDEBAR: I just found out that not only is the long-forgotten 1980 comedy film "Soggy Bottom USA" with Don Johnson and P.J. Soles, which has been hard to find for years, is not only available on DVD, you can download it for free on Netflix! I've wanted to see the film ever since I missed it at the Buchanan Theatre in Buchanan, Va., (which reopened in 2003 after being closed for close to 20 years) but I have heard it's a bit of an awful film.

The Rialto Theatre in Raleigh, NC, is also showing another film from that era as they will present Walter Hill's film "Southern Comfort" (1981) in 35-mm at 8:00 p.m. on Wednesday. Tickets are five dollars.

Quote of the Week- Lenny Bruce

Before there was Howard Stern or Sarah Silverman, there was Lenny Bruce.

It was hard to find a quote from the late comedian which would not have offended. Frankly, this one may upset my friends in Princeton, WV, or Eden, NC, but it so true:

"I hate small towns because once you've seen the cannon in the park, there's nothing else to do."