"I Think, Therefore I Ant."
July 8
Tom Cruise Insanity Watch
Today: Guarded
(Check Back For Daily Updates)
Tom
Cruise Continues Quest
To Be World’s Biggest Punch Line
Tom Cruise's former sham-wife Nicole Kidman
will not attend his wedding despite reports that Hollywood’s leading freak
had assured his ex that instead of being a human sacrifice (as originally
planned) she would be a guest of honour.
Cruise, in an impromptu press conference
screamed, “Not only is Nicole a vile back-stabbing Judas but I also happen
to know that she is a witch. A recent documentary film about her confirms this
very fact. I command you all to find her and bring her to me so she can be
burned at the stake.”
When informed that the documentary was, in
fact, Kidman’s latest film, Bewitched, Cruise shook his head in
disbelief and replied, “You know nothing. You’re ignorant and glib. I’ve
studied witchcraft. I’ve traveled back in time and met witches. And let me
tell you, when the aliens make me their silver-headed Gamma Ray God, then
you’ll see. Oh yeah, oh man, oh baby. Now go! This press conference is over.
Yah! Yah! Yah!”
Dead Football
Guy
James Henry Smith is getting attention in
death for doing something that in life deserves no attention whatsoever:
Sitting on his fat ass in his recliner chair, guzzling beer, smoking
cigarettes, occasionally grunting and watching football on TV.
Smith, 55, of Pittsburgh, died of illnesses
related to sitting on his fat ass, guzzling beer, smoking cigarettes and
watching TV. Because his death came as absolutely no surprise to anyone, his
family was able to plan for the unusual viewing that celebrated his life of
inertia, sloth and waste.
The Samuel E. Coston Funeral Home erected a
small stage in a viewing room, and arranged furniture on it much as it was in
Smith’s home on game day Sundays.
Smith’s body was on the recliner, his
feet crossed, a remote in his hand and a cardboard cutout of the words “Shut
the fuck up, I’m watching the game!” was taped to his cold, dead lips. He
wore black and gold silk pajamas, slippers and a robe. A pack of cigarettes
and a beer were at his side, while a high-definition TV played a continuous
loop of Steelers highlights and a CD played a loop of Smith belching and
shouting, “Yeah! Go! Shit! I said shut up! Yah! Run! Hit him! Oh fuck! Get
me a beer! Kill him!”
“I couldn’t stop crying after looking
at the Steeler blanket in his lap,” said his sister, MaryAnn Nails, 58.
“He stole that blanket from me and when I asked for it back he told me to
‘shut up.’ He was a helluva jerk and a fat bastard.”
“He hated everybody but he loved
football,” she said while sipping on a bottle from a brown paper bag.
“Well, actually he hated football when the Steelers lost. That’s when he
was scary and violent. Fortunately he was a total lard ass and so he was
unable to chase you.”
Longtime enemy Marty Jones called the
viewing “a celebration, but more importantly – a bad joke.”
“He owed me 100 bucks,” he said. “I guess
now I’ll never see it.”
Your
Horoscope:
Aries: You make three
important discoveries today: Feeding the dog cat food will not turn it into a
dat (or a cog); mayonnaise is not the perfect cologne, and jokes about your
inflamed genitals do not get big laughs at church.
Taurus: The
planets are trying to tell you something and it’s that you are blessed not
to be Tom Cruise. FYI: The Tom Cruise cycle of your chart is now over.
Gemini: You may not think that you are good enough to compete with
those who are above you in the corporate pecking order and for once you’ve
finally got something right. Get back to your cubicle.
Cancer: If at first you don’t succeed go to a bar and drink.
Leo: See above.
Virgo: Your dreams of being the world’s first jazz bagpiper still remain
unfulfilled. What a surprise.
Libra: You’re on a roll. 17 days in a row with a hangover! Keep
drinking, sport.
Scorpio: Your confident manner is, in fact, pure arrogance.
Sagittarius: You need to patch up a relationship, but applying stucco to
your partner isn’t how to do it.
Capricorn: According to those gossipy planets, you are worrying for no
good reason. We advise that you find a good one.
Aquarius: Neptune in your birth sign is energized. You however, remain a
couch potato.
Pisces: You have two options but only one choice. So what’s it going to
be? The Beer Store or a crack house?
The Lingering
Disinterest
of Mrs. Wallham
Several
of Mrs. Ellen Wallham’s closest friends had recommended Dr. Bell as their
psychoanalyst of choice, should she decide to pursue her recent interest in
finding the root of her lingering disinterest.
Mrs.
Wallham was initially reluctant to enter therapy.
Her
anxiety regarding the field of psychoanalysis stemmed back to when her
daughter Alexa, at the tender age of seven, began referring to her as “mommy
shit box head.”
An
amused Mr. Wallham and his rather furious wife sent their only child to see a
prominent child psychologist and Mrs. Wallham had been quite dissatisfied with
the results. Alexa had grown into a monumental disappointment and Mrs. Wallham
remained convinced that Alexa’s six months in 1979 with Dr. Tamal Shakamanth,
were squarely to blame.
Nevertheless,
Mrs. Wallham was bored, Alexa was in rehab, her husband was simply that and
her recent interest in finding the root of her lingering disinterest was,
well, taking root. She decided
that she had nothing to lose and called Dr. Bell’s office to book an
appointment.
Mrs.
Wallham was immediately impressed by Dr. Bell. She was greatly relieved to see
that unlike Dr. Tamal Shakamanth, the good doctor did not wear flared
trousers, gold chains and was refreshingly white. There were no lava lamps,
beanbag chairs and hookah pipes. Mrs.
Wallham was soothed by Dr. Bell’s conservative suit and by the charming
opulence of his office. As well,
Dr. Bell’s manner was pleasing. He
spoke warmly, clearly and slowly in a low, forgiving and hushed tone designed
to lull his listener into a tranquilized sense of calm.
Mrs. Wallham admired the doctor’s sensibility and saw a little of her
own father in him. She thoroughly
approved.
During
their first session Mrs. Wallham told Dr. Bell about her interest in finding
the root of her lingering disinterest and more. Mrs. Wallham was so very
relaxed lying on his couch and found herself opening up to the doctor and
began telling him things that surprised even herself.
Not because of their content of nature, but only because she had never
allowed herself to consciously feel, let alone verbalize everything that she
had stored away for the past sixty-some years.
At the end of her first session, Mrs. Wallham shook Dr. Bell firmly by
the hand, offered up her heartiest of congratulations and arranged for 10 more
sessions.
The
following 10 sessions flew by in what seemed like a week, which was not
entirely surprising since it was in fact, only 2.
Mrs. Wallham was aware that she was perhaps going a bit overboard, but
frankly didn’t care. It was
bliss to talk of nothing but yourself for 45 minutes everyday and have a man
as cultured and intelligent as Dr. Bell hang on her every word. It was
expensive yes, but she trusted the doctor implicitly and was convinced that
his examination of her lingering disinterest and other disorders was going to
pay massive dividends to her, her family, and quite possibly the field of
mental health. After all, if Anna O could do it, why couldn’t she?
And Mrs. Wallham, or Mrs. W., as she sometimes imagined herself named
in the medical journals, was a complex woman, convinced her lingering
disinterest was much more than what it appeared.
For
the next five months Mrs. Wallham unleashed her dreams and demons within the
walls of the good doctor’s office. She spoke at length not only of her
lingering disinterest, but also of her husband’s many shortcomings, the
crude manners of young shop girls and the health benefits of orange peppers.
She bitched, moaned, confessed and never felt better.
Not cured, but better...
Mrs.
Wallham arrived at her Tuesday afternoon appointment and was somewhat
surprised when she entered Dr. Bell’s office and found it occupied by both
the doctor and a boy approximately 10 years of age.
Mrs. Wallham was embarrassed initially; in her 5 months of treatment,
she had never walked into a session in progress. She then remembered that
Livia Seezer, Dr. Bell’s competent secretary had told her the doctor was
ready to see her. She looked at
the two in confusion, Dr. Bell asked her to have a seat and explained.
“Mrs.
Wallham,” he began, “I realize that this is a tad unusual, but I would
like to introduce you to my son Hamish.”
Hamish rose from the small ottoman he was perched on, walked over to
Mrs. Wallham, politely shook her hand and said hello.
Mrs. Wallham smiled graciously, complimented the boy on his choice of
socks and was surprised when, subsequent to their exchange -- he failed to
leave the room. Rather, he returned to the ottoman and fished a pad of paper
and pencil from his knapsack.
“Mrs.
Wallham, I hope you won’t mind me saying that I feel we’ve developed a
very synchronistic, positive therapist/patient relationship.”
Mrs. Wallham was listening to Dr. Bell but was still watching Hamish as
he scribbled some notes on the paper. Dr. Bell meanwhile seemed to be awaiting
her reply.
“Uh...no.
Of course not doctor,” she finally managed. “In fact, I’m
quite...should he be here?”
Dr.
Bell clasped his hands together and sat back in his chair. Hamish peered up from his notes, put his pencil away and
clasped his hands together as well. Dr.
Bell spoke very carefully, placing weight on each individual word.
“Mrs. Bell, I have a favor to ask of you.
A serious favor and I will understand if you choose to say no.
Please do not worry that some sort of...judgment, or change in our
relationship will result in a negative answer.”
Mrs.
Wallham shifted uneasily in her seat, it suddenly felt rather uncomfortable.
“Oh my!” was her only response.
“Precisely!”
agreed Dr. Bell. “Now my son Hamish, is in grade 4 and has been asked
to hand in an assignment about the person he admires most.
Naturally, that person is me.” Dr.
Bell tilted his head slightly, allowing the light from the window behind him
to frame his sensibly thoughtful face. “I
discussed the thesis with Hamish and we both agreed that if he was truly going
to get to the essence of me and write an appropriate homage, he must be
allowed to see me at work, helping people.
What I would like from you, is signed approval to allow Hamish to
observe today’s session. I know
it’s a breech of ethics, but I have a hard time saying no to my son.”
For the first time in her 5 months with him, Dr. Bell laughed.
“Of course that’s my problem, not yours.”
Mrs.
Wallham seriously doubted his last statement and for the first time in the
doctor’s office felt herself at a loss for words.
She certainly didn’t want some ten year old child observing her
therapy, but at the same point she was afraid of hurting Dr. Bell’s feelings
and flattered that he had chosen her for Hamish to observe.
Dr. Bell smashed that last illusion quickly.
“Hamish himself asked to observe you. I allowed him to review the
case histories of all my patients and he was most intrigued by your fear of
dust and need for restrictive undergarments.
Isn’t that right, son?” Hamish
nodded and smiled. Dr. Bell
continued. “So...what do you
think?”
Mrs.
Wallham hated herself for doing it but she somehow felt she had no choice.
She figured it was worth it to indulge the good doctor for one
session...besides, she didn’t plan on saying much.
Mrs. Wallham had been getting quite explicit in her last couple of
sessions and had been planning on pulling back a little anyway. She decided
that this was as good a time as any to refocus her attentions on her lingering
disinterest. She lay back on the
couch and started quietly. “I was very disinterested this week. Nothing seems to...” Dr.
Bell cut her off immediately. He
was out for bigger game this session. With
Hamish at hand taking notes, Dr. Bell was not going to settle for vague
notions of lingering disinterest. He
wanted to blow the kid’s socks off.
“That’s
very interesting, but I would like to return to last week’s session in which
we discussed your fear of manual masturbation.”
Mrs.
Wallham thought she was going to be ill, but couldn’t be sure if was out of
embarrassment or emotional recall. Hamish giggled slightly. “Hamish!” said
the doctor in a stern voice. “You
must never laugh...no matter how funny the patient is. Mrs. Wallham’s fear of masturbation is not to be tittered
at. It is to be understood.
You have to ask yourself -- why fear?
Is it a mask for desire? Does
this phobia extend to other areas? Is this symptom merely an underlying cause
of far greater emotional problems? You
have to think, Hamish. Not
judge.”
Desire?
Did he say desire? This was too much for Mrs. Wallham to bear.
She sat upright and crossed her arms over her shoulders. “Dr. Bell I
must protest.” Dr. Bell looked
over at Hamish eagerly. “Did
you hear that son? The vehement
protest? Not to mention her body
language. What does that mean to
you?”
The
room fell quiet for a moment as Hamish looked Mrs. Wallham over closely.
“That she’s upset?”
Dr.
Bell sighed, looked at Mrs. Wallham and shrugged.
“No Hamish...I think it might mean more than that... Mrs. Wallham, I
think this might progress more smoothly if I filled Hamish in on some more of
your personal background. You
don’t mind...?”
Mrs.
Wallham felt faint. She lay down
and closed her eyes and tried to block out the sound of Dr. Bell filling young
Hamish in on all the lurid details. She
had never realized that he was so calculating, that he was so clinical in his
analysis of her thoughts, she had only mentioned her distaste regarding
masturbation in passing. When he
was finished, Dr. Bell had the boy leaning toward the theory that Mrs. Wallham
was, among other things, an obsessive compulsive, passive aggressive and a
victim of social stratification -- systematically taught to fear touching
herself and at the same time longing for what she was supposed to keep her
hands off of. The whole theory
was nonsense; Mrs. Wallham felt herself getting angry but did not act. The 45
minutes would be over soon enough and she was in no mood to encourage further
debate on the subject.
Dr.
Bell, on the other hand, had an entirely different point of view. “I would
like to probe this issue in more depth,” he calmly stated, “I would like
to hear of your first understanding of masturbation as a concept. When did you first become aware of it?”
That
was it. Mrs. Wallham had heard
enough. In all her life she had
uttered the “M” word four times and heard it from others perhaps another
ten. And now, here, it was being
bandied about like a maid’s first name.
She decided to put an end to it. “Dr.
Bell, I no longer feel comfortable discussing this.
To be honest, I considered it a trivial matter to begin with and think
it would be more productive if we were to move on to my lingering
disinterest.”
There
was a long pause as Dr. Bell furiously scribbled a note down on his pad.
He sat forward, scratched his chin, looked at Mrs. Wallham, looked to
Hamish and then spoke. “Hamish, this is what we in the profession call
resistance...and this is important. There is something lurking behind this
resistance, something significant. We
are close now, son. We are
turning the key, and I want you to be the one to open the door.”
Dr.
Bell rose, picked up Hamish and sat him down in his seat. He handed Hamish his notes and pen and took a seat on the
ottoman. “Mrs. Bell, I would
like Hamish to conduct the rest of the session.
We are very close to some kind of a breakthrough and I think it would
be beneficial for Hamish to really get his feet wet, so to speak.
Hamish? Do you think you
can handle this? Remember when I
let you prescribe for your mother? Well,
it’s no more difficult than that. Just
listen...just listen.”
Hamish
appeared confused, but it was obvious that he didn’t want to, or was afraid
to, let his father down. He bravely picked up the pad and looked at Mrs.
Wallham. For her part, Mrs. Wallham was mentally reorganizing her schedule in
light of her newly available hour every weekday afternoon. She had been swindled, bamboozled. This man was a sham, not a shaman. A con, not father-confessor.
It was Dr. Tamal Shakamanth all over again. She felt her face go flush with shame. She was a sucker, all right.
She was about to get up, slap Dr. Bell in the face and storm out when
Hamish spoke.
“I
think it might be valuable to get back to your lingering disinterest.”
She
paused. There was something about
his voice.
This Week’s Featured
Album:
Gee, Dad
Organ Music by Ed Scofield with son Tim
Liner Notes.
All songs by Ed Scofield unless noted.
Side One:
1. My Big Organ and My Son’s Small Kit
2. I Wish I Was Sterile
3. Stop Calling Me “Dad”
4. When Big Brains and Good Looks Skip A Generation (The Ballad Of Tim)
5. You Were An Accident
6. Keep Your Eyes Off Mom – I Saw Her First
7. Where Did You Hide My Gun, Tim?
8. You’re 16, You’re A Man, You’re Out Of The House
Side Two:
1. Tim (You’re An Enormous
Disappointment)
2. Dad Gets The Groupies
3. Making My Boy Cry (Makes Me A Big Man)
4. Shut Up and Shine My Shoes
5. Surfing Bird California Wipe Out Girl (by Tim Scofield)
6. Dumb As A Chimp and Twice As Smelly (An Ode To My Son)
7. The Useless Progeny Two-Step
8. I Think Tim’s A Homo
Writing and performing
“Gee, Dad” was a long, difficult, acrimonious and, yes, explosively
violent experience. Originally intended to be an artistic collaboration of
folk organ ballads written by a loving dad and his “devoted son” it ended
up being a financial setback and an ugly discovery of the shortcomings and
many failings of my hapless drummer boy, Tim. We walked into the studio with
one objective: to write catchy songs about the seasons (mainly Fall). We
walked out of the studio with a newer objective: to never speak to each other
again. I’m pleased to say that we still haven’t exchanged a single word.
These 16 songs represent what I went through in that studio and are the
essence of everything that I discovered about my son as well as my feelings of
absolute disgust for them: From my concerns about his obsession with his
mother to my thorough belief that he is a vile and deviant homosexual. And
I’ll say this much, my feelings of loathing really come through in all the
songs (with the exception of Tim’s derivatively putrid “single,” Surfing
Bird California Wipe Out Girl) and I still enjoy playing them when
family comes by for a visit. We had everyone over last Xmas and I fired up the
Hammond and played a rather “rocking” version of I
Think Tim’s A Homo. It didn’t go over all that well with everyone,
but I was so drunk I couldn’t have cared less. Ha, ha, ha.
Ed
Scofield (revised liner notes 1972)
My therapist says I should
try and talk about that summer dad and I recorded these 16 tracks. So I’ll
try... “Gee, Dad, you ruined my life and I hate you.”
Tim
Scofield (Belleview Mental Asylum 1972)
Cover
photo: Mrs. Scofield. © 1967 Oedipus Records
(to the top)
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