THIS IS NOT A TEST isn’t as pretty as it used to be, but who is? If I can find a workable theme it will be pretty again. MTINATPA (MAKE THIS IS NOT A TEST PRETTY AGAIN!) hats are on the way.

In this episode I call your parenting into question, try to be dignified, compare myself to famous explorers, scratch my head over kids who wear costumes for no reason, call you into question for letting the kids wear costumes for no reason, change diapers, witness a spoiled prick playing Minecraft, call home schooling into question,…

Good is great, perfect is not, also, having the Zika virus, taking a vacation, having a stroke at work, Mat Gleason’s “Modern Art Blitz” and Internet TV shows in general, Jay Leno, join the professionals, McDonald’s mozzarella sticks, striving, astral planes, Internet millionaires and other numbskulls, rules, prog-rock creeps, hurdy gurdys, confetti, swing, NASCAR, injection…

Bukowski, Bukowski, Bukowski! And let us not forget civil servant weirdos, resisting the draft, spending all day in a bar, paying child support, living on a park bench, having a different kind of brain, fear of public speaking, skin magazines, TMZ, art generated by companies, critical mass, shaking your bush, the foolhardy and ultimately fruitless…

Wondering about David Bowie, hair, catastrophes, cheese blintzes, Powerball, being struck by lightning, little house on the prairie dresses, sand in your shorts, Bob Dylan in a cowboy hat, Iggy Stooge, using to mirrors to see yourself from behind, pale meat, fermentation, wigs, psychologists, nostrils, living in basements, reinventing yourself, how to look a man…

Blabbing about CBGB, Lemmy from Motorhead, making up new words, 20/20 hindsight, attitude and inspiration, being in the right place at the right time, chess, flophouses, saloons, sewage, little black boxes full of people, bass guitar strings and their durability in the face of continued abuse, the Longhorn in Minneapolis, moping (not mopping), lying around…

It’s the most wonderful time of the year, right? So let’s talk about Christmas, the fine family of Unilever companies, year-end lists, crying kids and sweaty dads, nostalgia, shoveling brains, the disco 70s, the characters on Mad Men, the old man sitting in the corner, prisons, carnies, dead Blue Whales, paying an extra dime to…

Let’s talk about when it’s time to give up. And while we’re at it we may as well talk about professional hand models, deep tissue massage, the counterculture, Oprah, the rising tide that raises all boats, how lazy poets are, sure fire money-making schemes, a better way to store sweaters, Sumi-e painting, Japanese hammers, bible…

Including thrilling tales of riding bikes up the side of mountains, financing the Napoleonic Wars, “monetizing” every human, sending the nanny to CVS in a chauffeur-driven Bentley, Mork from Ork, the last can of beans in Pasadena, mental illness, speaking to the unborn, sashaying in the halls of Congress, marking the passage of time, Pizza…

An apple a day keeps the doctor away. Okay, but what do I need to eat to keep the insurance company away? Also, maps, taking a shower, Richie Havens, rabbit holes, incompetent doctors, the condition known as “Heisenblatt shoulder,” living on the high side of normal, treadmills, torturing people and measuring how their bodies react,…

Art vs. commerce – as Bukowski wrote in Barfly, “Ah, the eternal question! The eternal answer? I don’t know.” But not knowing the answer to a question has never prevented me from doing this before. I’ll talk about a lot of other things I don’t have any answers for too, like terrorism in Paris, forcing…

We’ve all done it, bought a song – or an entire album – that we already have. Do you blame technology or marketing? While we ponder that we’ll also ponder getting your arm chopped off in big piece of farm equipment, chance, luck, chaos, the Pope, opinions, monkey meat, The Beatles, The Monkees, Victrolas, 8-tracks,…

Self-publishing – what is it? Why should you care? Well I don’t know, why should you care about anything? But if it doesn’t interest you, we also have renovations, elevators and what people write in them, pissing, the possibility of executing certain types of people (not you), housewives and uneducated dandies, being deemed worthy, Thomas…

Rock and roll, who’s game is it? I can tell you. And what about Halloween? What’s up with that? Plus a love letter to Sonny Vincent, hate mail to prog rock, the joys of mindlessness, paternity suits, being the captain of your own pirate ship, walking a cat on a leash, interesting hats, true believers,…

The title is a quote from Homer Simpson, but don’t we find our truth in our comedy? While we talk about work we’ll also gossip about commuting, the skyway system in St. Paul, Bob Marley, counting songs, Greek philosophers, Martin Luther, farming, disease and death, Indians, craftsmen, the rise of the machines, factories, labor unions,…

On tap today: collecting things, completism, Catcher in the Rye, TV Guide magazine, bottle caps, cat-eye sunglasses, Circus, CREEM and Rock Scene magazines, box rattlers, sealing things in hard plastic, View-Master, King Tut, silver dollars, binding sniffers, Mantle rookie cards, Electro Harmonix pedals, The Wormwood Review, The Wailers, Elvis tie racks, being no-nonsense and domesticating…

Do you believe rumors? Of course you do. Where do they come from? Word has it we’ll also talk about kinescopes, spinning plates, being an eternal optimist, seeing ghosts, your Facebook feed, P.T. Barnum, Internet arguing, the liberal media, briefly trying to be good Lutherans, Rastafarians, being a feminist, a dictator’s stock in trade, pollen…

An oral history of my Teeth. Yes, teeth! Just one of life’s wonders and horrors that we all share. And you can’t talk about teeth without talking about Thunderdome, science and technology, surviving on 2 liter bottles of Coke and bowls full of jellybeans, stumps and crowns, implants (dental, not breast), royal decree, things you…

An admittedly biased one-man oral history of the Guerilla Poetics Project, including tricky vampire doctors, sharks, unknown poets, databases, voting blind, Ginsu knives, explaining Netflix to a monkey, swag, pawn shops, mysterious collectives, going viral, human nature, ending strong, the extinction of retail book stores (maybe), vinyl LPs, The Beatles fan club and minor miracles.…

This Facebook thing, think it’ll catch on? Also, gay marriage in Kentucky, cats are henchmen for the dark overlord, knock-off Prada bags, Soviet apartments, geocities, pictures of car wrecks, chosing convenience over quality, hedge funds, the Holstee Manifesto, five thousand dollar bicycles, mystery meat, snake oil, those Victorian-era bikes with the giant wheels, taxidermied deer feet, 80 year old hammers, wiping your ass with a corncob and Ben Franklin. Links mentioned…

Okay, let’s talk about The MTV Video Music Awards, Chrissie Hynde’s book interview and the Internet’s reaction to it, and The Pageant of The Masters, which is something you’ve probably never heard of, but you’ve got to hear about it. And yes, I will also say a thing or two about the Oscars, the Wu-Tang…

Trevy Felix of Boom Shaka and his companion Nelly Stharre were found dead on August 19th in the burned remains of the house where they lived in the hills of Dominica. Trevy was a friend for almost 30 years, so here’s a little remembrance. [subscribe] Transcript

Listen while I extol the wonders of aging and sing the praises of getting up and doing the same thing every day, running naked through the streets, retirement, pensions, GOD testing Job, people who “don’t see color,” being in your 50s, filling up the Internet, the best place to sit or stand at a concert, going…

Let me tell you about First Aid Kit, and what it was like when I saw them perform the other night. Let me also tell you about the Inland Empire, cult-speak, living in a Walmart parking lot, plowing the same fields over and over, sibling vocal harmony as competition, authenticity, suffering for your god, the…

What happens when I’m part of the audience at a live Big Brother TV show. Not to mention, blown tires, wobbly CV joints, drifting, soggy in New York, Ed Sullivan, The Beatles, punk cred, the L.A. river, Julie’s boudoir, the angriest white man in America, amping up the excitement level, lemonade, grade school pictures, how…

Misadventures in trying to give things away on the Internet. Also: dicking around, vacations, text messaging, ridiculously humid days, lying about your name, setting fires in your front yard, people at the post office, bubble wrap, the customer is usually wrong, the Recycler, that TV show about guys up in Maine buying and selling and…

Let’s talk about clothes. We all wear them, we all love them. You do love them, don’t you? Along the way let’s also mention humidity, the people who really run shit, guacamole, Chinese boots, caves and castles, going topless, Victorian era women, flappers, frozen steaks, Comic-Con, Captain America, mouth-breathers, subcultures, fishermen, black jeans and Babylon. [subscribe] Transcript

It’s time to get to the bottom of Charles Bukowski’s “10 year drunk” and many other Bukowski myths. Also, taking it easy in Greece, Pearl Harbor, meditation, BMWs, expensive wine and a veritable slew of new Bukowski books due out later this year. Links mentioned in the episode: The senseless, tragic rape of Charles Bukowski’s ghost…

It’s the 4th of July, what better day to talk about independence. We’ll wave the flag and maybe talk about some other things, like the President, Marc Maron, Rolling Stone and the Rolling Stones, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Joan Jett and the Runaways, the Sex Pistols and Green Day, blowing shit up, refusing to kiss the king’s ring, weasels, politicians, tough…

TED, changing the world one robot at a time. Also, Big Brother, camping, Comic-Con, the Rolling Stones, the south pole, smallpox, selfies, throwing shade, and ice cream on my nose. Links mentioned in the episode: Google spreadsheet listing every TED talk [subscribe] Transcript

I love autobiographies and I love rock and roll in all its many hairy permutations, so what could be better than reviewing a stack of autobiographies written by musicians? That’s a rhetorical question, I’m going to do it anyway. By chance I may also speak of Rachel Dolezal (again), Compton’s Most Wanted, White Indians, survivalist cults, Saturday Night Live, jumping…

Thrill to the new sound of me talking about Rachel Dolezal, dreadlocks, our old friend the Internet, Bob Marley and the Wailers, the Vocoder, the tinny clang of the 80s, electric guitars, triggers, metal kids, mistakes, Gramophones, fuzzy noisemakers, the Mellotron, Guitar Center, Louis Armstrong, transcendence, cocked wahs, bagpipes, and momentum. [subscribe] Transcript

Well, I have a little chest congestion, so forgive the slight wheezing as I talk about President Obama, the Los Angeles Clippers, fast forwarding, neighbors, construction, This Old House as porn, people who are good at what they do, working on Sunday, the history of sticking windows into walls, the ceiling of the Sistine chapel, chatty Cathy, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, corrugated fiberglass, Styrofoam heads, evidence of a…