THE BEST OF PROVDOG?

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Last February, through my friend The Flying Aardvark, I learned of a website with the unusual name of I CAN HAS CHEEZBURGER (ICHC). At Cheezburger, one is able to add their own captions to photographs, and these captioned photos are called LOLZ. It can be a lot of fun. Even too much fun. Using the pseudonym ProvDog, I overdosed on the site until I wore it out. Having created 323 Lolz of my own (as of this date), I'm now semi-retired from the site. In other words, "I'm burned out."
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ICHC has some sort of voting system in place allowing visitors to select their favorite Lolz, and the most popular of them are displayed on the site's "Home Page." This is like having a Top 40 radio hit. One can also "Favorite" the Lolz they personally like best. "Favorited" Lolz are collected in a file so that the person can easily locate them again for viewing and re-viewing. In my 7 months of playing at ICHC, I favorited 181 Lolz created by other folks.
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It's a difficult site to figure out because, as near as I can tell, it is overrun with Crazy Cat Ladies and other Weirdos. (I fall into the latter category, not the former.) It's impossible to get a handle on which Lolz are going to be popular and which are going to go largely ignored. In my time there, I wound up creating one Lol that was voted onto the Home Page. My big hit was "FLUFFY'S DRIVING SCHOOL", a Lol that I myself don't feel is even one of my 30 best. In fact, it became a bit frustrating to me seeing FLUFFY get Favorited over and over and over again, while other Lolz I had created, which I thought were much better, went unnoticed.
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It got to a point where everytime I saw that some visitor had Favorited Fluffy I'd think to myself: F##k Fluffy! Eventually I created a Lol which featured the singer Van Morrison saying, "ProvDog hates FLUFFY'S DRIVING SCHOOL the way I hate BROWN EYED GIRL." This satisfied me for awhile, but eventually I got irritated again and decided one day that I'd rather be a No-Hit Loser than a One-Hit Wonder, so I deleted Fluffy from the website. (Sorry, folks, but you ain't gonna Favorite Fluffy ever again!) I'm probably the only bloke in that website's history to remove his biggest hit. 712 people had Favorited Fluffy over the period of a couple months.
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One day I created a Lol meant to amuse my friend The Flying Aardvark. It was an inside joke, and to anyone else the Lol would have been utterly nonsensical. And yet two strangers actually Favorited it. Now, how does one explain this? A completely meaningless Lol gets favorited not once but twice by individuals I do not know, and yet so many of my other Lolz which I thought were at least mildly amusing, get Favorited zippo times. As I said, the collective mind-set at this site is difficult to understand.
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Since I rarely create new Lolz anymore, I figured I'd post here what I feel are the cream of the crop from my own collection. I suppose it's only proper that I start with my most popular Lol - Friggin' Fluffy:
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Now on to some Lolz that I like much better.
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THE CAT COLLECTION:
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This next one was never Favorited by a single person, and yet I think it's one of my funniest. Go figure! All I know is that it actually made ME laugh when I created it:
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Another one never Favorited by anyone:
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This next one actually got a favorable response and was probably my second most popular Lol even though it didn't receive enough votes to be included on the ICHC Home Page:
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PROVDOG'S DOGS:
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This first one actually received one vote - a NEGATIVE vote! Poor Petey:
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Well, isn't this TRUE? . . .

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I thought I'd try converting a dog photo into a record album cover. Few people cared for it:

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DRUNKEN ANIMALS! Or, A Kangaroo Hops Into A Bar And The Bartender Says . . .

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I think Hank was Favorited by one person:

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This next one got Favorited even less than Hank did, but I can't really complain; I've always known that my sense of humor is a bit "out there" and I think a lot of people just don't "get me":

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POLITICS AND OTHER SH-- "STUFFS":

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This was the very first Lol I ever created at I Can Has Cheezburger. You'd think that at least a few Democrats would have Favorited it, but you'd think wrong. A little Monty Python wink here:

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I thought this next one was kind of clever. I was alone:

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This next one actually did receive a fairly favorable response:

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CRAZY ABOUT WOMEN! Or, Just Crazy Women:

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ProvDog does film noir . . .

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JUS' GENERAL STUFFS:

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It truly surprised me when my version of Treasure Of Sierra Madre wasn't Favorited even once. I guess I just don't "get" ICHC any more than ICHC "gets" me:

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Fun With Words:

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This is one of my best, sez I. After this one went nowhere, I took my Captionator and went home:

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I do recall that my friend The Flyin' Aard liked this one:

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This last one was the biggest disappointment. I thought at the time I created it that it was my best Lol and I still feel that way. Maybe it was too wordy or too convoluted, but just as Ed Wood hoped he would be remembered for his movie Plan 9 From Outer Space, I hope to be remembered for my Nathan K. Greenberg (the K stands for Kosher). I was playing at ICHC strictly for personal joy, and so it really doesn't matter that Nathan went down with the ship - I like him jus' the same:

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I have three other favorite LOLZ which I previously posted on my Blogs here, so I didn't include them in this group, but otherwise I would have. They are:

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"NONCONFORMISTS"

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To The BAThroom

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Cars 'N' Cats

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My nearly 300 other Lolz can be found HERE, if anyone's interested enough to look.

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And I suggest you visit the Lolz that other folks created which I have saved in MY FAVORITES. These are all good ones, most of which are better than my own (that's why I Favorited them!) Check 'em out.

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Well, I hope some of this Stuffs was at least good for a chuckle or a snicker or two.

Yak Later, All.

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~ Stephen T. McCarthy (a.k.a. ProvDog)

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FLOATIE, WE HARDLY KNEW YE

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According to my Ma (may she rest in peace) on November 22, 1963, the day President John Kennedy was killed, I cuddled up to her as she was sitting in front of the TV set and crying, and I said, “It’s a sad day.” She answered, “Yes. It is.” Then I asked her, “And will it be a sad day tomorrow? And the next day? And the next day?” I was only 4 years old and had no idea what was going on but I guess when a little boy sees his mother crying he can pretty well figure out that it’s a sad day. Now I’m 50 years old and I still have no idea what is going on, but I recognize that this too is a sad day.

Ladies and gentlemen and everything in between, it is with a heavy heart that I inform you FLOATIE the frog has croaked. In other words, he’s gone to that Great Lily Pad In The Sky. He’s dead, doggone it, DEAD! (“Don’t be obtuse; I hate it when you’re obtuse!”)

Surely y’all recall my 2008 ‘Margarita Day’ Blog installment titled “Floatie For Vice President In 2008” in which I told y’all about Floatie attempting to make it into the Guinness Book Of World Records as the longest living water frog? Kathy has told me that, unfortunately, her son’s frog, Floatie, came up a small jump short: he departed this world at 19 and a half years old. The record was 20 years. So close and yet 6 months away. Personally, I think Floatie should have cheated by using steroids and FGH (Frog Growth Hormone). I mean, when in Rome... Better to enter the record book with an asterisk than not to enter the record book at all. It's the new American way!

Oh well, can’t win ‘em all (just ask Kurt Warner and the Airheadzona Kurtinals), but Floatie had a good long life and he will be remembered fondly everytime I have a frog in my throat. Right now it's just a lump.

A service for Floatie is being planned for 10:00 A.M. this Saturday at the Arizona Amphibian Aquatic Center. In lieu of flowers, Floatie’s family has suggested people make donations to the Flies On Wheels program.

R.I.P., FLOATIE.

IF only Floatie could have held on for another 6 months he’d have been famous.

IF only Lee Harvey Oswald hadn’t gotten an assist from someone on the grassy knoll, Lyndon Johnson WOULDN’T have been famous.

IF a picture paints a thousand words,
then why can't I paint you?

IF Who’s on first, What’s on second?

IF you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you, you’re the bloke operating the guillotine.

IF your aunt was a man she’d be your uncle.

IF Floatie had been an alligator
we’d all have new shoes and handbags.

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

Link:
Floatie For Vice President in 2008
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AW-WOOO! WEREWOLVES OF MISSISSIPPI

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LISTEN, BABY, HAVE YOU EVER BEEN LOVED BY A MAN THEY CALL "THE WOLF"?
~ HOWLIN' WOLF (from 'I Ain't Superstitious')

The first Blues albums I ever bought were Volumes 1 & 2 of ‘King Of The Delta Blues Singers’ by Robert Johnson. This was probably in 1978. But I had heard a little Blues prior to that as my Ma purchased B.B. King’s ‘Completely Well’ album when it was released in 1969. We both loved his hit The Thrill Is Gone, and I still think it’s perhaps the best electric guitar Blues solo ever; simple lines that build to a tension-filled climax. Yeah, you know what I’m sayin’.

But I didn’t really start to develop a serious interest in Blues music until the early 1980s, and by ’86 I really had the Blues, and I had a Big Boy’s Blues collection to match.

I still have a cassette tape I titled “Official New Orleans Blues” which consists of various really old down-home Country Blues that my buddy Eric and I taped off a radio station on October 4, 1983 from our Motel 6 room in Slidell, Louisiana while on our “Jack Daniel’s Cross-Country Tour.” It was really thrilling to be hearing stuffs like that being played on the radio because we didn’t have any programming like it in Los Angeles.

I think it was probably 1987 when I went to my first Watts Music Festival. Watts is located in South Central Los Angeles, and it's most famous for its folk art classic Watts Towers and its big 1965 riot. I’d heard that another White boy attended the ’87 Blues Festival in Watts but I didn’t see him there.

A couple of weeks ago, far into the evening, I happened upon a TV station that was broadcasting a program called ‘The Howlin’ Wolf Story.’ Well, I was already late for bed, but bed is for wimps when da Wolf be howlin’! I stayed up and watched the program one and a half times and then bought my own DVD of it online first thing the next morning.

Of all the Bluesmen (and women) WOLF was always my favorite. Muddy Waters? Love him! Robert Johnson? Love him! Albert King? Love him! Little Walter? Love him! John Lee Hooker? Love him! Willie Dixon? Classic, man, classic! But there ain’t no Bluesman I loves mo’ than da Wolf, man! I can still remember blasting Wolf in the UCLA parking kiosks when I worked on that campus in the mid-‘80s and all my coworkers saying, “What the #$%! is that?!”

Anyway, I thought ‘The Howlin’ Wolf Story’, a 90-minute documentary, was fabulous! I’d never seen any live footage of Wolf before, and he was just tearing it up. The story is rollicking, tender, and heartbreaking - that stuffs about Wolf being rejected by his mother nearly ripped the heart out of me. Howlin’ Wolf (Chester Burnett) was a huge man, and he was as interesting as he was big. Wolf was a massive-voiced singer who went back to school while in his fifties to learn how to read and write; he paid unemployment insurance out of his own pocket to his musicians; and he was a devoted family man who worked his way from Dirt Poor, Mississippi to Innovative, Blues Giant. ‘The Howlin’ Wolf Story’ includes some very insightful interviews with various people who were close to the Wolf, including the great Hubert Sumlin, without a doubt one of the finest Blues guitarists who ever lived. In other words, see the documentary, Friends; you’ll dig it - that's a promise from me to you! I made Brother Nappy watch it and he dug it even though he ain’t no kind of Blues fan.

OK, the commercial’s over. Here’s the lesser stuffs:

Circa 1990, a day of drinking at the Townhouse bar (a dive that I hear has gone downhill) in Venice Beach, combined with my love of Blues and Jazz music, inspired me to write my first and only screenplay. It was called ‘Billy & Billie’, about a nerdy White would-be writer who idolizes Stephen King and is trying to write a screenplay about vampires in Las Vegas, and it's about a sassy, smart Black girl who idolizes Billie Holiday and sings for tips on Venice Beach. Can two so dissimilar people fall in love and find lasting happiness? Only I know. The story didn't make me a penny, but here’s one scene that I still like:

INT. BILLY WITHERS’ APARTMENT – DAY

BILLIE CLAYTON stands in the middle of the room with a record in her arms. She hums the melody of “How Long Has This Been Going On?” while she sways gently, her eyes closed. There is suddenly the SOUND of a loud ZIP, which causes her to take notice.

BILLY WITHERS, who has just angrily snatched a sheet of paper from his typewriter, crumples it up, tossing it on the bed, where many more crumpled pages are scattered across CLAYTON’S records. As he puts in a new sheet, BILLIE picks up his manuscript and thumbs through it.

CLAYTON
What’s wrong?

WITHERS
The usual: I’m stumped again. I’ve got the protagonist surrounded by vampires and slot machines and I can’t figure out how to save him.

CLAYTON
Well, maybe he doesn’t get saved. Maybe they kill him and it has a sad ending.

WITHERS
I’m only on page fifty-six; it can’t end yet. This whole thing is terrible – worse than that: it’s a stench.

CLAYTON
How about if he leaps across the slot machines and gets away?

WITHERS
Nah, he’s just a normal guy. He’s not supposed to be especially athletic.

CLAYTON
Well, how about he pulls the handle off a one-armed bandit and sticks it in a vampire’s chest like a stake?

WITHERS
You can’t pull a handle off one of those things.

CLAYTON
Oh. I’ve never actually seen one in person. Well, what have you thought of?

WITHERS
Nothing worthwhile. He’s just trapped, trapped, trapped. Damn, I’m a lousy writer.

He picks up a couple of her records and reads them.

WITHERS
Howlin’ Wolf, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Big Bill Broonzy? They sound like they’re from the World Wrestling Federation.

CLAYTON
They’re all great Bluesmen. You know, if it wasn’t for whiskey, the devil, and big-legged women, there wouldn’t be any Blues records at all.
(Suddenly excited)
Hey, I know what you need; you just need to take a little break from writing, that’s all. You need to find a nice, peaceful spot that will settle your mind – and I know just the place. Get your coat, come on.

She rushes to the closet to get his sportcoat.

WITHERS
Where are we going?

CLAYTON
You’ll see. It’s a place I go whenever I’m depressed and need some tranquility. Come on, you’ll like it.

She tosses him his coat and goes to the door, holding it open for him.

CLAYTON
Alright, let’s get on it.

Where did they go, you ask? Guess you’ll just have to wait until the movie comes out to learn that. But it’s not coming to a theatre near you in this lifetime.

“ALRIGHT, LET'S GET ON IT."
~ HOWLIN' WOLF to Eric Clapton after teaching the Englishman the guitar chords to ‘The Red Rooster.’

~ Stephen T. “Lonesome Dogg Blues” McCarthy

Postscript:
I found this really cool story about Taj Mahal playing at the Watts Music Festival. Click HERE.
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PRESCOTT "AS IN BISCUIT"

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In the last Blog Bit here at “STUFFS” I told y’all some stories about when I was living in Prescott, Airheadzona. While I was there, I did manage to make my presence known by writing a couple of letters which were acknowledged by the local newspaper. Below is a copy of my first letter which I wrote to Budge Ruffner, a regular newspaper columnist whose family had been in Prescott since the pioneer era.

What you need to know in advance is that one of the things that irritated me about Prescott was how the citizens were constantly bitching ‘bout the Californians who’d moved there and “ruined it.” One couldn’t go a week without encountering yet another reference to how the town had been Californicated. Never mind the fact that the majority of the population was also from elsewhere. There’d be some joker from Illinois complaining about the Californians who’d moved to Prescott.

I figured turnabout was fair play, seeing as how beginning right after World War II, the influx of Easterners and Midwesterners into California had ruined The Golden State for the natives like my Pa. Now there was an Eastward migration out of California because it was too crowded and people on the other side of the Colorado River were unhappy. Well, they weren’t getting any sympathy from THIS #$@%&! Californian.

On to my letter and Budge Ruffner’s reply:

Dear Mr. Ruffner,

With your varied endeavors and a newspaper column that needs tending, you are undoubtedly a busy man. Still, I’m hoping you will take a few minutes to solve my puzzlement.

I have been in Prescott for little over a year. (Dare I admit this? If I do’d it I get a whippin’… I do’d it) I am one of those #$@%&! who came from You-Know-Where. There are some things for which this town can be justly proud: an environment more conducive to the raising of a mentally healthy, well-adjusted child could not likely be found in this country. Sadly, however, in the category of HOSPITALITY TOWARD “OTHERS”, a Best Of Prescott certificate cannot be awarded.

My question is this: Where am I? Do I live in Prescott (“as in biscuit”) or Prescott? Upon my arrival, I took to calling it as the natives do, but have since reverted. It seems to me that unless there exists very old written or verbal documentation stating that Mr. William Hickling Prescott pronounced his name other than how it is spelled, there is no earthly reason one should assume it was prononced otherwise.

Mr. Ruffner, I am a seeker of truth, and I desire to know the true name of the community in which I live. Unless someone can provide proof that the unorthodox pronunciation is correct, the motive for the natives’ decision to call it Preskitt would unfortuantely seem to be one or both of the following: Pretentiousness (a la Beverly Hills’ “Ro-DAY-O Drive” as opposed to Rodeo Drive) or a means to differentiate “Us” from “Them” (of which I will be forever labeled unless the prevailing winds change direction).

Figuring the definitive answer to this riddle could be obtained at The Sharlot Hall Museum, I inquired there and got a decisive “I have no idea” in response.

Knowing that the Ruffners have played a significant role in Preskitt’s/scott’s development, I turn to you for help. Truly, I do not want to appear pretentious by mispronouncing my town “as in biscuit”, but likewise, I’d hate to draw attention to myself as a #$@%&! from You-Know-Where if in fact it really should be said “as in biscuit.” Please take me seriously, and please take a couple minutes to rid me of my dilemma. I will accept your answer as conclusive. I thank you in advance for your reply. Until I hear from you, I remain . . .

Somewhere In Arizona,
Stephen T. McCarthy

P.S. – You may want to print your answer in a future column; it would be doing a great service to all the #$@%&! from You-Know-Where, now living in… well, here… and in the same quandary I find myself.

Within a week, I received a note in the mail from Mr. Ruffner. Printed across the top of the note it said “Screw the golden years” and below that he had typed this:

Dear Stephen…

Your letter was just what I needed. I was desperate for a column topic. Your letter was a real gem. Gracias! Friend: Budge.

He also told me the date in which the column would appear in the local newspaper. And true to his word, the following humorous article was printed on the date he specified:

Last week I received a well-written letter from Stephen T. McCarthy. McCarthy has resided in Prescott several months and hinted, but never admitted, he had entered Arizona by crossing the Colorado River. This indicated to me that McCarthy’s former home had been LaLaLand. Beyond this burden of personal history, McCarthy may be a native of the scorched and shaky earth, riot capital, home of the dismal Dodgers and Charles Manson look-alikes state.

In any event, McCarthy is not yet acculturated to the local protocols and practices. While some disenchantment with local attitudes toward transplants was expressed, the principal complaint of McCarthy was how to pronounce the name… Prescott.

Why McCarthy directed his inquiry to me, I know not. The various “correct” pronunciations that had been offered by editors, historians, linguists, curators, archivists, the mayor and eight bartenders, all conflicted and confused the issue. As yet, the mayor can’t even spell it.

Now, the answeer is not a simple one. The truth is, there are several pronunciations of Prescott, depending on various factors. Backtrackers to Prescott, by that, I mean those new arrivals from the Pacific coast, seem to prefer the pronunciation, Presskit. This anomaly may be a result of the California school system or a chronic throat condition due to constant exposure to smog.

The affluent, old money, Ivy League types, have a slow, almost erotic pronunication, best duplicated as Press-Scott. While I do not find this offensive, it seems somehow pretentious.

Those hardy souls who have pulled their U-Hauls in from their former homes in the Bible Belt of our great nation have all settled on the pronunciation… Pre-scit. It is a short and pinched version of the name. I suspect it is rooted in an unedited, mimeographed church bulletin which they had been exposed to since childhood.

Now we should touch on the native pronunciation. First however, in Prescott, anyone who has been here long enough to pay off his new pickup, is considered a native.

Having had that defined, a native, unless borracho, normally says Presscuit, as in biscuit. This, however, has been challenged over the years by academic types. The result of this controversy has been an anti-intellectual environment nourished by local radio.

Often the problems of the present can be answerd by the past. Certainly this is true in the case of this one. When the name of this new city was being considered, several were suggested. Perhaps we had better ask the city adminstration to reconsider what has proven a bad decision. The town was almost named Granite City. Certainly an honest and descriptive name, easy to pronounce. A native of Venice suggested Venezia and when this was rejected he named his claim in the Bradshaws for his native Venice.

The citizens of Prescott Junction avoided ill feelings and bad pronunciation by changing the name of their town to Seligman.

When the meeting to name the town was held May 30, 1864, Richard McCormick, secretary of the territory, offered the name Prescott after Willam Hickling Prescott, the historian. McCormick was always a troublemaker. Goodwin City was an offering to honor the governor, when in fact he had done nothing but show up. My preference was the name Gimletville, offered by an old miner. There is a gimlet cocktail and a gimlet tool.

Within days now, petitions will be in the banks and bars, demanding that the mayor and city council change the name from Prescott to Gimletville, as it should have been in the first place. If you can’t pronounce Gimletville maybe you had better move back to Cucamonga.

(Budge Ruffner is a native Prescottonian, a historian and the author of three books.)

For those of you who do not know, Rancho Cucamonga is located in California, approximately 40 miles east of downtown Los Angeles.

~ Stephen T. McCarthy . . .
is a native Californian raised in Dogtown; he’s a liar, a drunk, and the author of two seldom read Blogs.
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