Tag Archives: Cowboy Scat

Usual Rubbish

Ison the prize.

Okay, well, THAT didn’t go so well, did it? Right. Don’t panic. One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three … arrrrrgghhh.

Is Smith frying yet?It’s been a couple of weeks, so I don’t know if you recall our harebrained plan to get to the various extraterrestrial venues in our interstellar tour to support Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick (selling quite briskly on Aldebaran, I hear). Right, well… we have that rent-a-wreck rocket (or “wreck-it”) that will get us part of the way to Aldebaran and points west-southwest, but it doesn’t quite have the horsepower to escape our solar system. If we tried, at this time of year, we would get caught in the gravitational pull of the sun. Then the only pleasure we’d get out of this trip would be to watch Smith fry…

Okay, I’ve wandered a bit. Fact is, the only solution we could think up in the absence of our mad science advisor Mitch Macaphee is to launch ourselves into extended orbit around the Earth and hitch a ride on the comet ISON when it emerged from its close encounter with the sun. We would, I don’t know, throw a grappling hook onto it as it passed and it would pull us clear of the solar system, at which time the low-rent engines in the rent-a-wreck-it could handle getting us to the next star system. Simple, right?

Big GreenNot so right. Only trouble with this plan was … it could never work. Aside from that, it was sound. So we took off last week, using the Cheney Hammer Mill courtyard as a makeshift launch pad, and spent a good bit of fuel climbing up into extended orbit around the Earth ( or the “Oyt”, if you’re from East Chootica ), Marvin (my personal robot assistant) at the controls. Steady hand, indeed.

Now, 3 out of 5 astrophysicists supposed that ISON would make it around the sun in one piece. Wouldn’t you know that the other two had it right? So we’re hovering at the rendezvous point, and around the left side of the sun comes this charred looking ice chunk, tumbling along, no bigger than the average medicine ball. Try getting a grappling hook into THAT sucker.

Okay, so… NOW what do we do? Any astrophysicists out there? Methods for counteracting the sun’s gravity? Email them to us ASAP. Like, I don’t know, yesterday, perhaps.

Usual Rubbish

That’s strange.

I think that’s the last of it. Packed tight, top to bottom. Nice job, lads. Okay … pop the nose cone back on. Time to light this candle!

Nothing to see here, right, Marvin?Oh, howdy. Yup, we’re getting ready to embark on our upcoming interstellar tour in support of our album, Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick, which as been a absolute drug on the market down here on earth, but is selling much more briskly in outer spaaaaaaaaaace. Seems like extraterrestrials are totally ready for satirical country-western, mock-pop, found sound records like ours. Who knew?

Now if they only adopted some kind of currency that is convertible into our own. Right now they’re paying us in photons. No, really. Every month, we get a box full of light in lieu of a royalty check. Try taking that to Chase Bank. I can’t even get mortgage backed securities in exchange for that stuff. Still, it’s worth something on Aldebaran, and that’s all that counts … if you live on Aldebaran. (We usually resort to doing all our shopping out there, as it happens.)

Big GreenSome of you are probably wondering whether it’s safe for us to venture beyond the protective atmosphere of mother earth in such a ramshackle looking spacecraft. I totally get that. The thing is, we have assurances from Marvin (my personal robot assistant) that if anything goes badly wrong in the icy vacuum of space, he will be responsible for the consequences. Knowing how risk-averse Marvin has always been, that fills me with confidence. My bandmates look a little nervous, sure, particularly after hearing about the comet ISON, which is in the process of rounding the sun as we speak.

Will we escape ISON’s enormous coma of deadly gasses? Are they indeed deadly as I just claimed just a few key strokes ago? Answers to these and other questions await our liftoff in FIVE …. FOUR … THREE … TWO … days.

Usual Rubbish

Podcast rundown: November

Just getting a few things packed away in my cozy little cabin, in the makeshift rent-a-spacecraft we’ve hired for our interstellar tour in support of Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick (our latest album). A few sticks of chewing gum, some duct tape, an x-ray of a tooth (not mine, as it happens – just some random tooth) … all stuff I wouldn’t want to be without for the stretch of weeks we’ll spend in the icy void of space. Brrrrr!

Big GreenAnyhow, before I do another hand’s turn of real work, I wanted to post my usual visitor’s guide to our most recent podcast. I know, I know – podcasts should explain themselves, right? Well, in a perfect world they would, but this world is far from perfect. Just ask Dr. Pangloss. (Wait … he’s probably exactly the person you shouldn‘t ask. Try Candide instead.)

November’s THIS IS BIG GREEN included some very useful tidbits, such as:

Ned Trek XIV: The Wrath of Carl – Amazing to hear myself say this, but this fourteenth episode of our epic Star Trek parody, starring Captain Willard Mittilius Romney, his first officer / dressage horse Mr. Ned, and a crew of neocons and misfits, pits our cast against the most terrifying enemy they’ve ever faced: a real astrophysicist (Carl Sagan), armed with actual facts about the universe (most of which we made up, but you’ll get the idea). Carl can wreck the Free Enterprise merely by commenting on it. What will Willard and Ned do? Download it and find out.

Song: Volcano Man – A selection from our album International House. We’ve played this number on the podcast before, so … here it is again. (The rapture’s comin’!)

Put The Phone Down: Matt and I talk about a wide range of issues, touching on health care, hunting, blah, and blah-blah. Some rare moments of insight. (Did I say insight? I meant instep.)

Song: Little Pig Flies – A selection from the 4-track cassette production archives, previously unreleased (of course). This number has echoes of Richard Kimball, running from Inspector Gerard. Toiling at many jobs. You get the idea.

Song: Good Old Boys Roundup (Demo Version) – The demo of a song that was intended for International House but never made it to the final version. We may have played this on the podcast before, I don’t know. Anywho, here it is … again-ish.

Back to packing. Hasta la vista.