Tag Archives: hammer mill

Usual Rubbish

Pod dunk.

Other alternatives, anyone? What would you do, Mitch? Well…. what the hell else is there to do? When faced with adversity, start a podcast.

Yeah, you heard me right. In the midst of preparing for Big Green’s [INSERT NAME HERE] Interstellar Tour 2011 and of being ejected from our home of nearly ten years (the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill), we’ve elected to launch a podcast. I know this sounds crazy, but … hear me out. The world is full of blowhards and know-nothings. Fact is, a lot of blowhards are know-nothings. So the harder we blow, the less we know – follow me? And if we don’t know we have problems, like impending eviction, for instance, well that’s almost like not having any problems at all. An elegant solution, and it costs next to nothing… or at least a good deal less than our legal counsel was planning on charging us. (Anti-Lincoln has some rapacious per diem rates, I’m here to tell you. Just watch your ass.)

Why do we spend so much energy on pointless pursuits such as this? Because they are there, that’s why. Would Sir Edmond Hillary climb that enormous hill-ary if it hadn’t been there? Certainly not. We create the podcast … and the other thing … not because they are easy, but because they are hard. What do I mean – not sure. But it may make its way into my first inaugural, or into Anti-Lincoln’s third inaugural (once removed). He’s always looking for new material. Not sure why he’s looking here, but… I digress.

Fact is, no, the podcast is not all we’ve been up to. Fact is, we’re recording songs again, filling the hours between forays into the outer reaches of the galaxy in search of lucrative performance opportunities. We’re patching together new takes of older songs in the Big Green catalog – songs from beyond time, as it were. Lots of ’em. My method is simple. I have Matt pull out his various guitars and play them into a microphone. I press one button when he starts and another when he’s finished. That’s what we call “collaboration”. Try it sometime, Monty.

All right, actually, I am doing parts as well, and Marvin (my personal robot assistant) is putting down some scratch rhythm tracks. (They sound very scratchy, actually. I think he needs a little oil.) Still, while we’re doing that, go and check out our podcast. Be sure to block your eyes – it’s an audio podcast.

Usual Rubbish

Out of mind.

Okay, so let me get this straight. We go to court and plead our case. The judge motions to the guy in the hood, and they take us away in chains. Got it. Any other options?

Oh, hi. Yeah, we’re working with our legal advisor – a mouthpiece named Anti-Lincoln, esq. And as you can see, he’s helping us out with our recent eviction notice. Not the first time, you understand, that we’ve been asked to vacate the premises. More than once the folks down at city hall have reminded us that this building is SUPPOSED to be vacant. Seems a waste to us, but what do we know? The abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill is abandoned for a reason, even if we don’t know what that reason is. Freaks! They didn’t even sweeten the deal with a grace period; just “Out, already!”

I know what you’re probably saying right now. You’re saying, “That Big Green,” says you, “they are totally out of their tiny minds.” And that’s where you make the big mistake: referring to our tiny minds as more than one thing. In actuality, together our brains make up one mind. That’s why we know what the other person is going to do wrong before he goes and does it wrong. We are the collective mind of Big Green. Or at least that’s what I tell the tax assessor when she comes a-knocking. Try it sometime – it totally freaks them out.

Trouble is, we are also a collective wallet. And if I were to choose with whom to share a wallet, it would not be this troop of losers and miscreants. God knows, every time I get my hands on some legal tender it evaporates into thin air, snatched up by the claw of a Marvin (my personal robot assistant) or the twig of a man-sized tuber or the spotted hand of a man named Lincoln. It’s a kleptocracy here at the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill, or at least effectively so. No one subscribes to the notion of private property. I’m surrounded by collectivists! What’s mine is mine, what’s yours is mine – that’s their motto. And me, a mere anarcho-syndicalist. What defense hath the likes of I?

Okay, well…. I’ve run off at the mouth a bit, not even getting around to mention Big Green’s upcoming [INSERT NAME HERE] Interstellar Tour 2011. Some publicist I turned out to be. Got to stop typing so I can motion to my counsel.

Usual Rubbish

Heave ho.

Hey. Did any of you guys nail a proclamation to the door? Lincoln, is this your dagger? Anyone good with a quill pen (other than Lincoln)? Hmmmm…. could be legitimate.

Okay, there’s this parchment scroll tacked to our door with a dime-store knife. And it’s got some rubbish scribbled across it about how we need to vacate the premises of our adopted home, the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill, by the end of July… “or else”. No signature. But a very distinctive style of penmanship, I must say. South paw. (You can tell by the smudging of the India ink. ) Can just barely read the thing, frankly. (Or even dishonestly.) Clearest thing is the illustration of a shaking fist – kind of threatening.

I handed this to anti-Lincoln, since he tends to understand this kind of thing (ultimatums, mad grudges, and what-not). He read it upside down, looked at the back of the paper, then rolled it into a tube and tried to make trumpet sounds with it. I should know better, I admit. Though we could use a horn section. (Two Lincolns, two proclamations rolled up like a trombone – that could sound! That’s now, brother, that’s real now!) You know, I’m tired of being the adult in the room. I want to be like Marvin (my personal robot assistant) and just sit in a corner with a plastic cup of pudding watching cartoons all day. It’s raining, besides, so riding the swings is out of the question.

All right, I know. This is kind of serious. Though we’ve been evicted before. The Town Board hates us, and the mayor has it in for us for some reason. Maybe it’s because Mitch Macaphee crashed his birthday party last year. Or maybe it was the yards of that novelty $100 bill toilet paper we sent them along with our payment in lieu of taxes bill. (That was on anti-Lincoln’s advice. So much for legal counsel. I’m going to have to ask for my $100 back.)

Okay, well… I guess we’ll have to take some time out of our tireless preparations for Big Green’s [INSERT NAME HERE] Interstellar Tour 2011 and ask anti-Lincoln to look this document over a bit more closely. With his eyes, this time.