Tag Archives: Cowboy Scat

Usual Rubbish

What to bring?

I don’t know. Do we really need a hibachi? We’re all vegetarians, except for Marvin, who only eats electricity and petroleum distillates. Well… okay, then.

Big GreenHi, friend of Big Green. What are they doing now? It’s called getting ready for an interstellar tour, as yet unnamed, to support extraterrestrial sales of our most recent album, Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick. It took us long enough, but we did secure adequate transport for the seemingly impossible journey ahead of us. (Carl Sagan would say it is simply impossible, but he is not available to comment. Ergo … it’s possible.) Some over-the-road hauler dragged the missile here from the Moon, where its (asshole) owner left it for our retrieval. Jesus H. Christ, the company brought the craft all the way from Neptune, but apparently thought the moon was close enough.

The accommodations on board, mind you, are a tad spare. Spartan, you might say. Ever read a book by one of the original NASA astronauts? Yeah, it’s kind of like that. A bit like a t.v. submarine, only with rocket engines instead of propellers and no periscope. I’m no Wilt Chamberlain, and I have to duck down low to get under the rafters. And the cockpit is full of retro-looking levers and switches. One of the toggles is marked, “Kill” – not sure Wait, it does have a periscope!what that does. I wonder … if you switch it back and forth, does something, somewhere, cease to exist and then come back to life again? Important question.

On a rack in the control room is about a dozen pressure suits that look like something out of a 1960s sci-fi movie. You know – the ones with accordion-like joints and white crash helmets with visors. I’m guessing that means there is no artificial atmosphere in this beast, but I’m counting on someone with some technical knowledge to determine that for us. Marvin (my personal robot assistant) has been serving as a surrogate mad scientist while Mitch Macaphee continues to enjoy his hammock in Madagascar (if that is where he truly is, the bounder!).

We need all the help we can get. Now, where did I pack my packing list? Hmmmmm….

Usual Rubbish

Down for the count.

Okay, I think we have this thing settled. Everyone in agreement? No? Good. We value diversity of perspective here at Big Green. Especially when LIVES HANG IN THE BALANCE….

Big GreenSorry, friends. I hate to raise my voice, but sometimes you just have to. With sketchy-looking promoters breathing down our necks (and judging by the aroma, they had limburger hoagies for lunch), we are still hashing out the details of our means of transport on our rapidly approaching interstellar tour in support of Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick, our latest album. We have, in fact, identified a rent-a-wreck spacecraft that is within our budget. It’s being offered by a subsidiary of our corporate label, Hegemonic Records and Worm Farm, Inc., operating on the planet Neptune. Fortunately, they deliver. (But only as far as the moon. I guess that extra 239,000 miles is a bridge too far for these goons.)

Okay, my thought was this. We program Marvin (my personal assistant) with the ability to fly the craft from the moon back to Earth. Then we, well, get him to the moon somehow. Matt suggested one of those really big rubber bands, stretched between the legs of the St. Louis Arch – just aim and shoot! Sure, that sounds good, dear brother, but how the hell are we going to get to St. Lookin' good, Marvin. Louis? We can’t even get to the moon, for chrissake. Then there’s always the option of telemetry – just flying the ship here by remote control. But with Mitch Macaphee, our mad science advisor, in a hammock in Madagascar for the fourth consecutive month, we haven’t the means of contriving such a device.

Damn … if that hammock were only here instead of Madagascar, we could maybe use that instead of the rubber band. Hmmmmm…

Anyhow, I saw a picture of the ship, and it looks pretty tight. Kind of like a 1979 Oldsmobile diesel station wagon, only a little less buff. (Matt doesn’t see what I’m seeing. He thinks it’s a death trap. I see only goodness and niceness.) If I can share it with you, damn it, I will.

Well … while we’re waiting for the countdown to begin, we’ve got a podcast to finish. So, down to the basement, man the mics! Stop making sense!

Usual Rubbish

Geek to me.

Connect blue wire (A) to terminal (3). Check. Connect yellow wire (F) to terminal (48c). Check. Hit boot switch, but first, insert index fingers (K) and (M) into ears (7) and (8). Hmmm…. okay.

Big GreenOh, hi. Caught me in the middle of something, as usual. Always some task to perform here at the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill, our adopted squat-house in lovely upstate New York. As you may recall from previous posts (or not), we are preparing for an upcoming interstellar tour to support extraterrestrial sales of our new album, Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick. Fact is, we make most of our money on units sold outside the bounds of the known solar system. (The rest we make on Neptune and some of the smaller, rockier moons of Saturn.)

Anyhow, as you might suspect, we will be needing some means of transportation for ourselves, our hangers-on, our instruments and gear, our provisions, etc. We have an old 1954 GMC City Coach (or we at least have access to it in the junk yard across the street), but it’s seen better days and probably isn’t up to a journey of 1,000 light years across the trackless void of space. (The windows haven’t been caulked in a couple of decades, so I doubt it’s space-worthy.) We used to simply “rent” spacecraft from other fictional narratives, like Lost in Space or Here Come The Brides, but that option is walled off by lack of funds. Our mad science adviser Mitch Macaphee is still in Madagascar, enjoying the sun, so we’re left to our own devices.

The one on the leftRight, so … using Mitch’s credit card, I ordered a do-it-yourself space ship from Heathkit. (Yes, I know … they no longer exist. I had to go through Mitch’s time portal to place the order.) So here I am, perhaps the most technically challenged member of Big Green, a man without a smart phone (I still use that brick phone my dad lent me in 1989), assembling a deluxe interstellar space cruiser stick by stick, armed only with a soldering gun and a pair of superannuated pliers.

No need to back away. I haven’t gotten to the volatile rare earths part yet. Stay tuned.