What’s the matter with me? I thought I put that thing away about an hour ago. My mind is becoming unhinged. (Did it have a hinge to begin with? And if so, what was it hinge-ing upon?)
Weighty questions indeed. That’s what you get here at the hammer mill… the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill, that is… where you can find the answer to any question but one – how the hell can we stand living here? Now, don’t get me wrong. It isn’t because the place isn’t well appointed (in fact, you might even say that it’s dis-appointed) – this is part of its rustic charm. As someone who has spent much of his life in the lap (or some other anatomical area) of luxury, living in a squat house can be a refreshing change. (Especially on days when you’ve got running water.) No, no… I’m referring to the recent change in ownership, to wit, the unfortunate turn of events that resulted in our corporate label, Loathsome Prick 
Records, acquiring the title to this old wreck. And before I go on, let me just ‘splain you about something – they don’t see this as an investment property, okay? They see this as leverage.
Leverage towards what? Good question. Seems like ever since the man-sized tuber was a baby carrot, these fuckers have been pushing us to release some product for them to push. Now, if you know Big Green at all, you know our credo… the quality goes in before the music goes out, or something like that. Sure, we’ve been working for years on this project, but damnit, we haven’t gotten to that quality part yet. Damned frustrating thing. We tried to insert the quality right off the bat, but it was just too big. Then Mitch Macaphee came up with a formula that would convert quality into a semi-viscous fluid, which we could then pour into our recordings. But that just managed to gum up the works, and we lost precious time… six months, I believe. (Just try to get semi-viscous fluid out of reel-to-reel tape spools. If you’ve ever seen The Reluctant Astronaut with Don Knotts, you know what I’m talking about.)
Who’s to blame? I think you know the answer to that question. (Oh, yes you do… don’t try to hide in the back, 
there – I see you!!) It is most assuredly Marvin (my personal robot assistant) who is responsible for the monumental cock-up that has befallen us of late. Now, I know what you’re going to say…. the same thing posi-Lincoln (the good one) has been saying all week: Marvin can’t help himself; Marvin has lost his tiny little nut; Marvin is addlebrained and cracked in the crown. Poor little Marvin, right? Well, goddamn it…. I’m sick and tired of this robot-coddling. If he’s got the poor judgment to go bonkers all over the place, the least he can do is avoid any kind of real estate transactions. I mean, it’s not like he’s a professional realtor or anything. Think of the issues they have to contend with! And I’m supposed to feel sorry for him? It’s unsupportable, damnit, unsupportable!
Phew. Well, I’ve gotten a little overheated here, my friends. And I apologize. I should let Matt take over the keyboard for a couple of weeks. Or maybe Big Zamboola. (Nah… he types with his ass.)
reason for the shoot-down was the fear that its fuel supply would survive re-entry, land in a populated area, and possibly expose people to lethal chemicals. Once the deed was done, however, that rationale started breaking down, at least judging by what I heard of the coverage (from NPR’s Pentagon reporters, who are pretty close to being official spokespersons). The next day the military was suggesting, though its press surrogates, that the fuel wasn’t all that dangerous and that, in any case, chances of its falling near civilization were around 3 out of 100. (Good thing, too, since as of Thursday morning they couldn’t be certain they had destroyed the fuel tank.) Of greater concern to them at that juncture was the possibility that components of the satellite’s surveillance technology would fall into the “wrong hands”, such as those of the Russians and the Chinese. (You heard right – the Russians and the Chinese. Apparently it’s 1960 again.) 
Anyway… no reason to be surprised that they’re more concerned with caring for their satellites than for the human race. By Friday of this past week, the newspapers were running stories about how this shoot-down was a crucial test of our “missile defense” capability. Missile defense is, as you likely know, that amazing system we’ve been spending tens of billions of dollars developing and deploying that, while not so good at shooting down incoming missiles, provides excellent protection for favored military contractors like Lockheed Martin and Raytheon. The satellite story morphed into basically a P.R. bonanza for Raytheon, inventor of the famously ineffective Patriot missile (much touted during the Gulf war as a tremendous success, the Patriot was later shown to have failed consistently and even to have erroneously targeted one of our own planes). Assuming the Pentagon is telling us the truth when they say the missile struck its target (i.e. assuming a lot), the system may be marginally useful if our adversaries start lobbing broken-down spy satellites at us with more than a week’s notice.
Hmmmm. Play that one back again. Yep, yep. Yep. Uh…. nope. Can’t hear it. Try it again. Try tweaking up the fenstenmacher towards the end, there. Okay, okay…
in a drafty old mill like this, flanked by a needy man-sized tuber, a couple of cranky Lincolns, a wayward planetoid without a solar system, and a lunatic robot. Yes, Marvin (my personal robot assistant) still has his issues, but we’ve pretty much decided to give him his space. (No more banjos in the blender, though. It makes the smoothies taste weird.) After all, this old barn of a place is plenty big enough for a person (or a robot) to go as mad as he/she likes, just so long as he/she doesn’t hurt anybody, or him/herself. Got that, kids? And remember – be free. Okay, everybody got a paddle ball? Good. Start paddling on three… one … two … THREE! Good, Jimmy! That’s the ticket. VERY good!
tin head to sign over our squatting rights (such as they are) to the kind and generous folks at our current corporate label, Loathsome Prick Records. As Matt was quick to point out (with a flaming poker, no less), this transaction may tend to give our paymasters a little more leverage over us than some might consider either fair or appropriate. Not that they would necessarily press their advantage, but… necessity has very little to do with it. And just yesterday, in the middle of a mastering session, the playback was drowned out by the sound of a band saw. No, it wasn’t a last-minute avant garde solo thrown into the middle of Do It (Every Time). It was a bunch of workmen hired by Loathsome Prick to rip a new entrance in the courtyard wall. Which just happens to be one of the walls enclosing our makeshift studio. Which just happens to be where I’m standing right now.