Remember Vioxx?

ADVERTISING and COMPETITION in the FREE MARKET

Remember Vioxx? The pain medication for arthritis that was taken off the market because it significantly increased the risk of heart attacks? It's back! The FDA seems to think it's all fine and dandy. It voted in a'resoundingly' approval with a 17 to 15 decision in favour of the drug.

Why should this drug even exist? this decision shows capitalism at its frenzied and irrational best. The board voted 31-1 in favour of approving Celebrex for the same purposes. This means, there's already a drug that does the SAME THING, but DOESN'T KILL YOU. Any sensible, state-run economy would choose the one that doesn't kill you and stock the shelves, but capitalism seems to uphold competition as a good in itself. Companies need a fair chance to convince you with million dollar ad campaigns and free samples for your doctor to buy their amazing, fantastic, life-changing product [might cause headaches, sniffles, irritated eyes (ok I think they stopped paying attention) death, diarhea or upset stomache].

Don't get me wrong. I don't want to see a state-run economy, or, god-forbid a classless society. I understand what the benefits of competition are, however, I would like to observe that paid advertising virtually eliminates these benefits from the capitalist system. It's true that in a free market the best product would win out and the consumers would benefit from competition. Unfortunately the invisible hand of the market has been arm-wrestled into submission by the distracting, scantily-clad, neon-green, monster hand of advertising.

Competition between products no longer occurs based on their relative merits, it is conducted almost entirely in terms of advertising. If drug companies weren't allowed to promote their products to doctors, or advertise to consumers, no one would buy the product that kills you, Celebrex would be rewarded for producing a safe and effective product and, yes, the consumer would benefit from competition.

Unfortunately in the real world, this isn't how capitalism works anymore. People are going to see ads for Vioxx on tv, they're going to remember it because it's the pretty purple pill or something and they're going to ask for it. Their doctor is going to give it to them because he has to see eight more patients before lunch and he doesn't have time to argue with them.

the FDA and the BIG PHARM

I hear my quick-witted readers thinking, "Von Mustard, you make a good point; but is this really a sign of the apocalypse?"

Don't worry, it gets worse.

Ordinarily, I am not one to get caught up in conspiracy theories. This might be surprising -- after all I am more than one hundred years old, I drink constantly and I'm an eccentric occultist -- who keeps the conspiracy theorists in business if it's not me? Admittedly, I know things about various esoteric sects and the subtleties of divine influence that might sound like conspiracy theories to some; but I don't believe in any of the mundane theories that are pushed around by so many leftists. I don't believe the last US election was rigged. I don't believe C.E.O.s are secretly evil. And I don't believe either the World Bank or the I.M.F. have any hidden intentions.

The only over-the-counter, garden-variety conspiracy I believe in is the monetary lubrication of scientists and government officials in the United States by the big drug companies. The Vioxx case is a perfect example.

I read in the New York Times that ten of the members of the panel had previously received funding from the pharmaceutical companies whose drugs were being reviewed. The members of the board who had never received funding from, or had close ties with, any of the companies under review voted 14-8 AGAINST VIOXX and those who had received funding voted 9-1 IN FAVOUR OF VIOXX.

The result is that a drug, which has a less-lethal competitor, is being put on the market in the name of competition, even though 14 of 22 scientists who haven't been paid by the manufacturer think it is too dangerous to be worth taking.

Keep in mind that this is the same FDA that won't approve the importing of generic drugs from Canada "because of safety concerns."

___ _ ____ _ ____ _ ____ _ ____ _ ____
Oh, wait, this just in, perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps Vioxx serves some terrorist-fighting purpose that I am unaware of. The following is a REAL quotation from a related article in the New York Times about the same drugs.

"Dr. Christopher Grubb, a captain in the Army Medical Corps, said soldiers in the 82nd Airborne were required to carry a cox-2 [such as Vioxx] drug in the event of a battlefield injury. Dr . Grubb said the drugs had allowed many soldiers who otherwise would have been sidelined by pain to be deployed overseas.

The drugs, he said, ''are essential for our global war on terrorism.'' The comment prompted loud laughter in the meeting."

An Open Letter to Justin Davenport III

It seems my former-colleague Justin Davenport III has completely lost his marbles. Literally! Oh, what a fine collection of marbles he once had. This posting is a reply to his critique of my opinions about patronage and art.

Dear Sir,

Ah Professor Doctor Davenport III, my arch-nemesis, if you don't get your act together and at least get some sort of a laboratory again, I may have to demote you to ordinary-nemesis and neither.

In response to your whimsical, vagabond's philosophy I say this:

You may be right to believe that in your deprivation art appears to you viscerally and with great vigor -- as common folk often say, 'absence makes the heart grow fonder.'

HOWEVER, while you may now experience more beauty, this effect takes place only within your subjective experience of the art and the art itself remains unchanged. While you greedily fortify your personal experience of art, you are setting your treasures at great risk, leaving them in the hands of some unscrupulous Barnum or money-hungry Bailey. I own and catalogue art not for such selfish ends as my own personal pleasure, but because I firmly believe great art to be an end in itself.

Does your heart not sing out with regret, now that you consider how your art, once protected in your vast, fire-proof warehouses, might at any moment be consumed in some sort of conflagration?

What's more, without men like myself and your former self how is the world to distinguish between high-art and the vulgar pantomimes of commoners? It's true that you enjoy art now more than you did previously, but in your desperation can you still differentiate between a Man Ray and an Ann Geddes? Have not the lower classes already plagued our culture with professional wrestling, country music and hip hop? Those poor uneducated, unfortunates seem to actually appreciate this chicanery.

Oh, Justin Davenport III, please, I beseech thee, pull yourself up by your bootstraps, kick your dirty addiction to experiencing pure art, untainted by financial interests, and return to your previous position as an arch-nemesis worthy of mention.

Sincerely,
Col. Matteus Von Mustard
Director of the Matteus Foundation for Buying A lot of Art and Locking it Away

Weekly Updates

I have struck upon an idea; perhaps this site would better serve my readers if I were to update it at regular intervals. People would know when to come and check for the latest catatostrophe forecast.

I have selected the stroke of midnight on Sunday nights, for it is quite clear to me that the Apocalypse will come on a Monday morning; probably in February. People will get up and find that it has snowed while they were sleeping. "Oh that's just typical. Fucking Mondays," will be the resounding cry. Everyone will shovel the snow off their cars and then go get stuck in traffic. And so the chorus shall echo, "Oh that's just typical. Fucking Mondays." Then the city will be torn apart by gigantic, stone-skinned demons. "Now that's atypical," the people will say, "Fucking Mondays." And then they will all be roasted alive inside their vehicles, wishing fervently that just this once they had slept in instead of going to work.

So, let it be known that each and every Sunday evening I shall release upon the world another Sign of the Apocalypse.

Matthew has begged to be allowed to type something with his clumsy ape-fingers. I have decided to humour him, but I presume that it's not worth reading, so please, go about your business.

[Ed. note -- Look, no need to insult me, I just wanted to say that the timing was good, because people will be able to go and check their sbemail to cheer themselves up after all the doom and gloom.]

Taking Action #1: Telemarketing

I have slowly come to realize, through the type of glacial thought process by which all wisdom is created, that criticism and alarmism is not necessarily the way forward. Simply pointing out devils and demons shall not save us unless we can find a way to take action.

Accordingly, I shall begin a series of posts which mention a sign of the apocalypse and suggest a method by which my readers can remedy the situation in question.

The first sign of the apocalypse against which I suggest we take action is the dread and baleful rise of TELEMARKETING.

Telemarketing works because it is a cost-efficient way of reaching a large number of people, and this is true because telemarketers can speak to a great number of people per hour. Those of you who instantly hang-up on telemarketers are actually helping their cause, by increasing the number of people they can speak to in one hour.

Some months ago, a counter-script was drawn to my attention, which brilliantly turned the table on the telemarketer. However, this counter-script is impractical because it is cumbersome and irritating to enact. In it's place I have developed a much simpler method of combatting telemarketing.

Although I never actually answer the phone (this is one of Alphonso's duties), I will provide you with a hypothetical conversation between myself and a telemarketer.

Myself: "Hello?"
Telemarketer: "Hello, Is this Col. Matteus Von Mustard?"
M: "No. Would you like to speak with him?"
T: "Yes please, could you get him for me?"
M: "It would be my pleasure; who can I tell him is calling?"
T: "It's Michelberg Banking."
M: "Oh yes, he will be delighted to speak with you, just this morning the Colonel remarked to me that he was looking for somewhere to invest his obscenely immense fortune. Just a second please..."

At this point, I place the phone down gently upon my mahogany desk and retire to the drawing room to enjoy a Cohiba Siglo IV, one of the most flavorful, longest-lasting cigars in the world.

Baba Yaga Blogs!

Of late I have been having Matthew "surf the web" and regale me with tales of the astounding websites that he encounters. This was intended to be recreational and while I was startled to discover that all your base are belong to us, it is not particularily relevant to my work on this site.

Alas, Matthew, unaware of the implications of what he was saying, laughingly told me that Baba Yaga has a website! The uneducated ditherhead had never heard of Russia's most terrifying witch. I lept to my feet!

"By Thor's Hammer, I have been tracking Baba Yaga for as long as I can remember, but her trail went cold in a small hamlet near St. Petersburgh in 1978 and she hasn't resurfaced yet."
"Who's Baba Yaga?" asked Matthew, as a drop of drool coalesced upon his chin.
"Who is Baba Yaga?" I increduled, "Baba Yaga, is the insatiable arch-fiend of the Russian forest. Baba Yaga is an emaciated hag with iron teeth and a crushing grip. Baba Yaga lives in a tiny cottage which runs about on gigantic chicken legs!"

But it seems that Baba Yaga is up to her old tricks. She is feigning some sort of a satirical, onion-style reporting targeted at liberals and progressives. In fact the flash-animated retellings of old fairy tells (1,2) are really quite good, particularily the second one. What she really intends is beyond my capacities.

I've been struggling with her website's motto for hours now, but it is resisting all the traditional methods of esoteric decryption.

"Tales of Gnostic Turpitude"? What is that crone up to?

I intend to try Kaballah next. I have a hunch that I will get somewhere, by taking the scrabble values of each letter and comparing them to the balance equation for Binah and Chokmah.

1,1,1,1,1 1,4 3,1,1,1,1,1,4 1,1,1,3,1,1,1,2,1

Ah ha! I can't believe I didn't see it before. I shan't have to explain that even to Matthew.

Sidebar Changes

My official, but occasional, editor Matthew Lie - Paehlke has finally added my links to the "sidebar." However, that meat-headed imbecile [ed. note -- I am not meat-headed] has once again succumbed to homonymitis and mispelled 'links' as 'lynx.'

Get out there and PATRONIZE!

The Joy of Conducting

This morning, Matthew asked me a question that was both pert and impertinent!

That little scalawag had gone to the symphony last Thursday and, to my surprise, he had had the mental capacity to appreciate it. He actually had the audacity to ask if I had ever been to the symphony!

I rumbled and fumed like a semi-dormant volcano; sometimes that boy is overwhelmingly minx!

Oh, but don't worry, I caught him upside the conversational head with a one-two combination of retort and rejoinder!

"Have I been to the symphony?" I rhetorically asked, "Actually, I conducted a number of operas in Hannover between 1958 and 1966 under the name of August Wenzinger!"

For a moment, I drifted away upon the sonic swell of a full stage of surging strings. My pipe crackled, dried Egyptian tobacco catching flame and combusting, its flavour reminscent of monuments and heiroglyphs. I wistfully recalled the incomparable sensation of conducting a symphony orchestra. One of life's greatest delights, conducting is a dance performed in a mirror-world of inverted causality, where new notes are born in response to a man's motion.

The slightest trembling of the fingers provokes a magnificent vibrato, a swift swing of the arm is met by the thunderous report of the tympanis. When I conduct, each one of my noble exertions receives the type of instantaneous adulation which it so deeply deserves.

I drew at the pipe and then released a thin wisp of smoke into the air. I believe Matthew was speaking, but how could I be expected to attend to such trivialities at a moment like that.

I recalled my friendship with the real August Wenzinger. He was a gifted cellist (oh the evenings we spent together in Basel -- he playing and I crooning ever so gently. We would laud the moon long into the night, treading softly over the inextinguishable protests of our landlady Frau Drachenfutter), as I was saying, he was a gifted cellist, but he simply did not have the mettle necessary to lead an entire orchestra.

Accordingly, when he received an invitation to conduct in Hannover, he proposed that I take the stint in his place. We worked together to devise a wax facsimile of his head, which I had Alphonso hollow out so that I could wear it while conducting. To this day I associate Baroque operas with the smell of a sweaty waxen mask.

Alas, that is enough reminiscing, there is a sign of the apocalypse to be had herein.

The Deplorable Financial Decline of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra

At this point, that smarmy little upstart Matthew had been thoroughly rejoinded and our conversation was able to continue. He gushed and squealed about the various primitive delights which he experienced and through his rambling it came to my attention that an acquaintance of his had obtained two tickets for ten dollars!

"Good god!" I protested, "But how then, shall they keep the commoners out?"

Apparently, the Toronto Symphony Orchestra is actively courting the likes of Matthew by offering severely reduced ticket prices to the young and uncultured. I was shocked and appalled! What a degradation; an entire symphony reduced to getting on its knees and begging for the attention of a worthless dunderhead such as Matthew Lie - Paehlke.

Matthew informed me that the TSO had an operating deficit of 2.28 million dollars last year. Up until now, I had been focussing my philantropic efforts on the Wiener Symphoniker, because, let's be honest, they're much better than the rag-tag bunch we have here in Toronto, but I hadn't realized the local situation was this dire.

Immediately, I rang for Alphonso and had him cut them a check to cover the gap for this year and last on the condition that they instantly cancel this TSOundcheck nonsense and return the symphony to those who are rich enough to actually deserve it.

Dismissing Matthew with the stern warning that he should not attend the symphony again until he learned to appreciate it and handing my pipe to Alphonso to be cleaned, I tried to imagine how this deplorable state of affairs could have come about.

The Gentleman's Art of Martyrly Investing

And then it struck me! Within the machinations of our crass culture, with its lowbrow notions of monetary return on investments, we have lost both the fine art of patronage and the patronage of fine art!

The rich today have no pride and no shame. They do not seek to acquire that which is fragile but laudable, instead they purchase that which is ugly but profitable. The pathetic cowards that pass for wealthy these days are always looking for safe investments and good returns.

Ha! I say, risk is its own reward! A real man invests headlong down the steepest slopes! That is bravery! That is investing!

Pick a company you believe in and take a stand! Heroes are men like Davey Crockett, fighting to the bitter end at the Alamo. To make financial decisions based on monetary loss and reward is the absolute height of ham-fisted provincialism.

At the Granite Club, where I go for racquetball, I recently spoke with a "gentleman" who told me with some sort of deluded pride that he had invested in Walmart. He seemed to think that it was some sort of achievement to shame both himself and his wealth with this kind of esurient clutching for more and more money. I, for one, was raised to believe that true wealth was demonstrated by a total disregard for petty things like budgeting.

Of the many, many, many things which I own, there are only a handful of which I am proud enough to boast, and even then I do so only when the spirits move me. Since I am feeling quite spirited right now, I shall detail these things for you; my world-class collection of ivory miniatures, my zepellin fleet, my first edition of the Bible (autographed by the author) and the preserved body of Salvador Dali.

But hear me now!

This post is a call to arms for those who fancy themselves wealthy. Stop throwing away your money on profitable but artless ventures and step up to the patronage plate. A man should be able to list the things that he owns with pride. To start the ball rolling, I am pledging to purchase Brazil and kick everyone out in order to preserve the rainforest for future generations!

The gloves are off, who amongst my readers shall respond to this challenge?

I pray to all that is wealthy, that someone will rise to the occassion; the current state of things is positively mortifying. Things have gotten so bad, that I wouldn't be surprised to overhear a man at a table next to me at Scaramouche bragging that he was dining there because he had somehow obtained a coupon.

Oh, what an ugly word that is. Perhaps I shall repeat it in order to shame my readers into putting their wealth to good use.

"Coupon!"
"Coupon!"

The fact that I should ever use that word thrice in one day is sign enough of our impending doom.

The Death of the News

Oh Lords!

An upstanding gentleman who's name appears to be Brad Blog, is reporting that CNN.com has been using the SAME PHOTO in articles about Iranian AND North Korean Nuclear facilities! Read the stunning revelations here.

It has long been known that people watching television are far more deeply affected by images than oral information. This was demonstrated as far back as Reagan, when it was found that people watching reports which featured images of Reagan smiling and waving and shaking hands accompanied by a critical voice-over ended up with a higher approval rating for the president.

What happened here was presumably that CNN wanted to run an article on Nuclear facilities in North Korea, but did not have a picture to accompany the article, so someone had the bright idea to just use the photo from the Iran article they ran twenty minutes ago.

"No one will notice," they thought, "They're all idiots anyway."

While I don't see this as being part of an intentional conspiracy to deceive, what is particularily scary is that CNN does not believe that an article asserting that a rogue nation, which is headed by a maniac, is in possession of nuclear weapons, is not important enough to run, unwess there are pwetty pictures for the people to wook at.

The Apocalyptic Sign here is the complete degeneration of our media into info-tainment and the utter collapse of any semblance of an attempt to inform the public of anything in an objective and useful way. The unassailable quest for ratings and advertising dollars has completely destroyed the commercial media.

Ah, but I'm just getting warmed up, this post is a one-two punch. The New York Times is also reporting today that there's an increasing chance that they might pull the plug on PBS -- THE ONLY NEWS OUTLET WHICH IS NOT A SLAVE TO RATINGS AND ADVERTISERS!!!

"I'm concerned that PBS is so desperate for funding and support from the Republican-dominated Congress that they're willing to sell their legacy," Mr. Chester said. "They could forgo their historic mandate to do cutting-edge programming and replace it with Bush-administration-friendly educational content."

From "Conservatives and Rivals Press a Struggling PBS." John Tierney and Jacques Steinberg, New York Times, February 17th 2005.


_________________________________________________
To give credit, where credit is due:
My excessively lengthy, sign-sniffing nose tracked the CNN story through a series of quality links: Blondesense and All-Spin ZOne.

My First Post!

Hi Everybody,

It's me, Matthew. The Editor of Matteus Von Mustard's Apocalypse Watch. I'm the won responsible for the spelling and grammar hear, I also take care of getting things posted, since the Professor Doktor isn't two good with computers.

I'm really excited write now, because I finally saw my first sign of the apocalypse while I was digging through the statistics at NBA.com.

I found the sign hidden amongst the win/loss ratios of two teams: The Toronto Raptors and the New Jersey Nets. These two times traded around Christmas. Toronto traded away it's superstar Vince Carter in exchange for Alonzo Mourning who is effectively hospitalized. So the only factor at play here is the presence or absence of Vince Carter.

Look at these numbers! They don't make any scents! Reality has stopped adding up!

Toronto Raptors:
Percentage .350 with Vince.
Percentage .419 without Vince.
7 wins and 13 losses before trade. 13 wins and 18 losses after trade.


New Jersey Nets:
Percentage .480 with Vince.
Percentage .360 without Vince.
9 wins and 16 losses before trade. 12 wins and 13 losses after trade.

Vince Carter's presence reduced the Raptor's win percentage by nearly seven per cent, while the presence of the very same player increased the Net's win percentage by eight percent!

The once invincible Reason, has clearly bean vinced!

The End of Art

I shall give you fair warning that this post is for advanced occultists only. The conceptual convolutions performed within may destroy the minds of lesser individuals.


PooH's HEFFALUMP MOVIE and The END of ART

Disney has had a doom-bringer of a film locked and loaded for several weeks now and today is the day that they shall fire it upon our children through a thousand multi-plex cannons. It is called "Pooh's Heffalump Movie" and it is a clear sign of the apocalypse. The great unknown of the Hundred Acre Woods has been hunted, captured and repackaged as a little cute purple thing with a British accent.

For those who can't clearly recall the literary masterwork "Winnie the Pooh," here is a short excerpt.
___________________________________________________

ONE DAY, when Christopher Robin and Winnie-the-Pooh and Piglet were all talking together, Christopher Robin finished the mouthful he was eating and said carelessly: "I saw a Heffalump to-day Piglet."
"What was it doing?" asked Piglet
"Just lumping along," said Christopher Robin. "I don't think it saw me."
"I saw one once," said Piglet. "At least, I think I did," he said. "Only perhaps it wasn't."
"So did I," said Pooh, wondering what a Heffalump was like.
"You don't often see them," said Christopher Robin carelessly.
"Not now," said Piglet.
"Not at this time of year," said Pooh.
Then they talked about something else, until it was time for Pooh and Piglet to go home together.

__________________________________________________


While there are many tales dedicated to the Heffalump, this is the closest a Heffalump comes to actually appearing anywhere in the works of A.A. Milne. The Heffalump is something we have all seen, but we can't remember exactly when. The Heffalump is that dark, shadowy lump, lumping along, just out of sight; always either almost about to appear or just having left.

Pooh and Piglet hunt the Heffalump, they discuss it with great earnestness and conviction, they imagine conversations with the beast. Nonetheless, the Heffalump remains nothing but hints and half-memories, footprints in the leaves, an awesome rumbling in the distance.

Jacques Lacan, who is, aside from Xenophanes, the smartest man who ever lived, believed that the Real was that which necessarily fell just outside the grasp of language.

Lacan's psychoanalytic techniques also revolved around the notion of the Symbolic order. The Symbolic order consists of all the qualities we have marked off in our experience, of every type of predication we may wish to perform and of every thing to which we can attach a predicate. The Symbolic order was, for Lacan, the entirety of our experience and, in a very real way, where we actually lived our lives. Lacan felt that only things which were part of the Symbolic order could exist. For Lacan the Real was not to be equated with existent things; existent things have, so to speak, the backing of the Real.

Lacan believes that the Symbolic order necessarily breaks down around any incursion of the Real. Instead of being directly accessible, the Real is designated by the 'gap' that it leaves in the Symbolic order. The 'gap' is a space, a lack, an emptiness, but that does not mean that it is simply an absence of being. Rather, Lacan tells us that "when speaking of this gap one is dealing with an ontological function." The Real does not have any being and it is utterly unknowable, but it is always ready to invest its force, always ready to impose its presence on the Symbolic order. It is in this investing of presence, this shaping of conscious experience, that the Real has meaning for the human subject.

Likewise, the Heffalump is an absence in the text, a dark shifting absence, which leaves space for all those massive shadows that lurk in the forest of literature. The Heffalump is a vast giant moving through utter darkness, apparent only indirectly, veiled in its own absence, granted form only by a triangulation upon tell-tale traces. Like the lowly electron, we can never simultaneously hold two pieces of information about the Heffalump, we can know where it has been, but never where it is. The more precisely we try to describe this mercurial beast, the more certain we become that we are actually talking about something else. The Heffalump is clearly an analogue of the Real, the most difficult metaphysical concept imaginable, and yet A.A. Milne has rendered it in terms that a child can appreciate, if not understand.

A.A. Milne's Heffalump was the single greatest metaphor in all of art. It left the door open to reality, to the unconscious and to all those things which are beyond the grasp of language, and now Disney Co. has plugged that door with a little, droopy purple elephant. And so ends the long and glorious life of Man as Artist.

The more often we repeat old films in watered down forms, the more doors we slam in the hallway of art, the deeper we descend into Baudrillard's hyper-reality. Pooh's Heffalump Movie clearly demonstrates that art is dead, that men and women will never again be moved to action by the creative act. Never again will art point to real life and demand action of us. Instead it will own repeat mind-numbing formulas and make clever references to brand-name products, tying us tighter and tighter in the bonds of post-freedom consumer culture.

The Apocalypse -- Coming Soon to a Theatre Near You!

Suggested Reading

First, allow me to introduce myself; I am the Right Honourable Col. Matteus Von Mustard Esquire and I am pleased to make your acquaintance. In keeping with the unspoken rules of social decorum, it would not be amiss if you were to leave your own name in the comments.

It has come to my attention that new readers are bravely venturing upon the rocky shores of my internet island. In accordance with the preceding analogy and the traditions of nautical sportsmanship, I shall recommend a few sandy coves where they may tether their schooners should they so choose.

While I'm more than certain that you will eventually want to read each and every word that I have written, I will recommend a few tidbits with which to begin.

Thusly:
MATTEUS VoN MUSTARD'S FAVOURITE PREVIOUS POSTS:

MATTEUS VON MUSTARD's APOCALYPSE WATCH June 15th 2004

IT's GETTING HOT IN HERE October 19th 2004

The NAME of OUR DOOM is FRIDGE-O-VISION November 7th 2004

Dear COUNTESS, My DEEPEST APOLOGIES... November 25th 2004

TRAVEL ADVISORY for THOSE READERS Travelling with OTTOMAN EMPIRE Passports December 6th 2004

GET OUT THERE and PATRONIZE! February 21st 2005

TALKING to TELEMARKETERS February 24th 2005

ZOMBIE TERRORISTS! March 6th 2005

The Unbearable Absence of PORK MOSS! April 18th 2005

Why French Bread is for FAERIES! May 15th 2005

The So-Called Power Stripe July 16th 2005

Best Speech Ever! February 08th 2006

Can Bush Possibly Gitmo Hypocritical? March 06th 2006

Links of Interest

While, on occasion, the deathly serious business of apocalypse watching makes my unique and exciting hobbies seem trivial even to myself, I feel that they remain an important part of my character and thus are presumably of great interest to all men everywhere.

For this reason, while I will be sure to keep this blog dedicated to apocalyptic matters, I have decided to offer you a series of links which will allow my devoted readers to see the web through my eyes and explore those topics which interest me.

I would put them in my sidebar, but Alphonso is attending to some business for me in Mainland China and Matthew appears to be a useless idiot. He continuously whines and winges about templates and font sizes or some nonsense.

PERSONAL LINKS:

My Alma Mater
My Hobby
My Self-Defense Manual
My Portfolio from My Brief Career into Advertising

MY TWO FAVOURITE THINKERS:

Xenophanes
Italo Calvino


SHOPPING LINKS:

A Convenient and Inexpensive Source of Quality Wines
The Finest in Custom Zeppelins
A Great Site for Online Shopping
A Refined Alternative to Amazon.com
My E-commerce Venture

The First World War, The Invention of Jazz, the First Publicized Transatlantic Flight and the Story of Matteus Von Mustard's Startling Teeth

THE PROPHECY:

It has been prophecied that a new type of demon shall arise among us in the last days and they will be known by their “gleaming fangs” and “lascivious grin.” To hear the name of these new demons sends a chill down my spine. I will not repeat the dark tongue in which it is written -- but know that it translates as ‘souless smirkers.’ Only recently, did I realize how literally the prophets spoke when they said these things would arise among us.

THE PROCESS:

Our airwaves are awash with advertisements for alabasterizing agents! Men and women alike flock to the drugstores to purchase whitening pastes, whitening gums, whitening strips and whitening ray-guns. What's more, people pay thousands of dollars for special dentistry procedures to polish their pearlies to a perfect gleam! It will happen to you if you're not careful. You'll pay your money, you'll sit and suffer in that reclining chair but only afterwards will you come to realize the horrible price that you are about to pay. After the procedure the dental surgeon, leans over you and looks down into your eyes. He removes his small, paper mask and says:

"Your teeth look great now, we've whitened them a couple of shades, but it's going to take a bit of work to keep them this way. You'll have to make sure to floss and brush three times a day."

Fair enough, you think.

"Oh, also you're going to have to give up smoking."

You think to yourself, "Well, that's going to be tough, but it'll be good for me in the long run."

"Oh, and coffee. You'll have to give that up too."

Your heart begins to beat faster, something is horribly wrong. What sort of a twisted contract have you signed?

"Oh, and by the way. No red wine."

You're hyper-ventilating, you're choking, your vision is blurring. If you're lucky, you manage to end it all with that tiny drill while the dentist's back is turned.

And so you now see, how the deceiver Dybbuk offers us the gift of white-white teeth, but then exacts a promise from us to maintain his gift and in-so-doing steals from us the three greatest pleasures in life. Where would we be without cigars, coffee and red wine?

I understand that the temptation to dazzle the fairer sex with a fleeting flash of perfectly polished bicuspids, but the cost is too high.

Let me tell you how I avoided a similar fate, fifty years before this current spate of advertising.


THe TaLE OF MaTTEUS VoN MuSTARD'S STaRTLING TeeTH

After decades as an avid smoker, java enthusiast and oenophile, by 1914, my teeth were in appalling state. I was beginning to see that in time, this might make me slightly less than 110% attractive to women. But unfortunately, before I was able to launch my publicity campaign to affirm the attractiveness of slightly-blackened teeth, I was distracted by some ominous events in Bosnia-Herzegovenia.

In June of that year, I received a most shocking telegram that my dear friend Franz had been shot dead by members of the Black Hand. Like so many other emcees before him, Ferdinand rolled deep and so began World War I.

During the war, I did my best to serve the stipulations of my contract to the fullest, but I was constantly plagued by the distractions of my colleague Professor Doktor Heironymous Colgate, who burdened me with hourly ballyhoo endorsing his patented Tooth Bleach. By the end of the War To End All Wars, he nearly had me convinced that my slightly-blackened -- to be forthright, I prefer the phrase 'Cajun-style' -- teeth were somehow unhealthy or unattractive.

Luckily, I had distinguished myself through my various inventions during the war years and I was able to end my military service to enjoy the Peace To End All Peaces as a civilian. I knew that I would have to distract myself from the graphic images contained in Professor Doktor Colgate's various flyers, placards, circulars and bulletins, so I decided I might go and see what this "new" world was all about.

I had Alphonso take me to Ireland by motorcar, from there I snuck into a military base, by disguising myself as one Cpl. John Alcock and requisitioned myself an experimental aircraft -- it was a modified Vickers Vimy bomber if I remember correctly. So I flew that little bird, from Ireland straight through to Newfoundland. It was quite cold and a few times Alphonso had to climb out onto the wings to chop the ice off so it didn't weigh us down. We landed early in the morning of June 15th 1919.

Just after dawn, I removed my goggles and found myself staring into the eyes of the real Cpl. John Alcock. Apparently, he had been expecting the plane to be brought to him by sea, so that he could use it to complete the first transatlantic crossing later in the month. I explained what had happened and we had a good laugh. I gave him my goggles and my jacket and I said to him;

"Well old boy, I've got her warmed up for you, you might as well take off right now."

And so he did, with this little fellow named Arthur Whitten-Brown as his navigator, and the next day they landed back in Ireland, ahead of schedule, and won the 10 000 pound prize from the Daily Telegraph.

From "New"foundland, I took a train to "New" York, but it wasn't at all to my liking, so Alphonso and I hitchhiked to "New" Orleans, because I had heard they knew how to throw a good party in that town. I had a delightful time there, painting the town red with these wonderfully talented black-skinned fellows. They used to play a sort of an upbeat marching music that I was crazy for at the time. All of them except for this one dreary, cheerless chap by the name of Jelly Roll Morton. Oddly enough his real first name was Franz's last name: Ferdinand. But anyway, this man was quite a musician, but lord he was moody, so one day I said to him, and I remember this distinctly, I said:

"Jelly Roll Sir, I have had it up to hear with your melancholy melodies, why don't you jazz it up a bit."

What I said must have struck a chord in the young man's mind, because the next day he had his band blasting out the most rollicking tunes you ever heard! Next thing I knew he was the most popular man in town and we were out dancing in the bars until dawn every night.

I remember one particular evening, and this is what this digression is driving at so pay attention, this one evening, I was looking at this dirty tramp off in one corner and I noticed he had a mouth full of wooden teeth. I saw those and thought,

"Maybe this vagabond is on to something; certainly wood is too base a substance for one so noble as myself, but an entire set of Platinum teeth, now that would be just the ticket!"

The next morning I telegraphed my jeweller in London post-haste and had him fabricate a set of platinum dentures from a cast of my teeth which, for reasons I won't get into at the moment, is kept in a safe in Manchester. Two weeks later, the package arrived and I had Alphonso install them immediately. I was pleasant as a pheasant with my shiny new masticators; oh how the ladies did swoon that evening! I remember it now, me laughing uproariously, my platinum grill gleaming in the smoke-blue air of one New Orleans bar room after another. Oh how I did shine! No one had ever seen anything like it. Night after night, every man in the bar would ask me how he could get teeth like the wonderful Matteus.

The real beauty is in platinum's resilience, I haven't brushed my teeth once since October of 1919, and despite endless cigars, cappucinos and Cabernet Sauvignons my teeth are as shiny as the day I had them installed.

Shortly after that, Jelly Roll and his band began touring, -- I think they eventually found some popular acclaim up in Chicago and, from what I hear, over time, they had a not inconsiderable influence on American music -- once they left town, I lost interest in that particular scene and moved back to Europe. Over the decades my name has been forgotten and nothing remains to testify to my presence in New Orleans in the summer of 1919 except for the unquenchable desire of young African-Americans from the Southern United States to replace all their teeth with platinum.

Just in case you think I didn't get mine though, peep my website!

CONCLUDING REMARKS:

Dental hygiene zealots awake! The pearly gates lie not between thine lips. Within thine mouths lie mortal, earthbound teeth, meant for chewing, chomping and munching. Life is messy, dirty and delightful. Do not be seduced by the pristine permanence of your teeth, for it is, in truth, the pristine permanence of death that you are embracing. Do not join those lost souls who have already had their teeth whitened! As these people lie eternally banished from the brilliant radiance of the infinite heavens -- which is several shades purer and more sparkling than could be captured on any tooth chart -- they will wail and gnash their perfectly cultivated incisors until they chip and cleave apart.

Those of you intent on enduring supernatural tooth whitening processes, I urge you to reconsider.

Mind you, if you gotsta look flizzy for the hunniez, I fully overstand... still. Please visit my sales establishment on the world wide web and come away with the most mad-iced-out grill.