An almost daily update on my journey into trying just about anything that ever interested me. Tap dancing? Photography? Video making? Coaching an NFL football team?
Just so you know, Dan and George are working on Budding Ventriloquist Presents Gridiron Gurus: The Musical.
Scared? You should be.
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Are Dan and George picking the Browns because they like the color brown? Could be. Brown has a very
under-appreciated quality to inspire, don't you think? Well, it does. One-two-three, no changes.
Remember, last year they had a fixation on turquoise. Still do, but the Panthers aren't exactly helping this year, even with Fig Newton at QB.
Gaudy, you say? Yes, but ... when you got it, flaunt it.
George and Dan are on a roll.
Just the other day they the talk was:
Dan
"Sure, we're the best doggone pro football prognosticators in the entire ventriloquist universe."
George
"Like that was hard. Consider the competition."
Dan
(Reaching out to knuckle punch George)
"Hey... What it is. What is was. What it shall be."
George
"What the hell? Haven you gotten over the Mod Squad getting cancelled? Quit talking like a cretin."
The talking always goes like that. The gibberish makes it to the Budding Ventriloquist Presents Gridiron Gurus script is actually the least nonsensical conversations the guys have. You see them trying to pick out something at 31 Flavors, much less agreeing on picks.
But, they did know there had to be more. There was more than just being great ventriloquist prognosticators. And now it appears that they can drop the "ventriloquist" part.*
This is the line of pick records of vaunted "Experts" of ESPN. People who have inside knowledge. People who have met Tom Brady in person. People who actually know what in tarnation Tampa-two defense is.
Now just look at where the record of 37-11 puts your favorite Gridiron Gurus.
And, regarding anyone who jumps on the bandwagon of Bob Golic,** former NFL star, who has the closest thing to a Guru quality record (GQR) at 35-13...
Just look at the still from his acting*** days on Saved by the Bell. You see it? In the "then" picture?
Yes, that's a mullet. It doesn't matter that it was years ago when it was in style.
It never, ever was in style.
So when it comes to who's the best and the name Bob Golic comes up, can you say "disqualified"?
Dan can.
In fact, he can make George say it too.
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* - There are some who think that Dan should take that sentence literally. But these days, Dan is listening to George more and more.
** - Bob Golic could tear off all of Dan's limbs. But, Dan has the courage it takes to tell the truth and is unafraid. Mostly. There is something about a mullet that says a guy can take a joke, right?
*** - In this case, the word "acting" is used generously. You probably don't need to see if Netflix streams the show. Check out the Magnum, PI reruns instead. Or The Rockford Files.
It's been suggested that they quit while they are ahead. But suppose a team was 14-0 and decided not to try to try and win every game and go 16-0? Wait, that's what the Colts did that a few years ago. Bad example.
Just how good is 13-3 in picking Week 2? And being 24-8 for the season after two weeks?
If you look at ESPN's 10 NFL "expert" prognoistcators (http://espn.go.com/nfl/picks), which includes some person named "Accuscore" and a dude (or dude-ess) named "Pigskin Pick'em"*, your Gridiron Gugus are as good as the best. Only Bob Golic and Adam Schefter are even equal, and those two rub elbows with the real deals all the time.
Former Eagles quarterback turned color commentator Ron Jaworski didn't make a pick for one of the games, so he actually has one less wrong pick. But he's disqualified for taking a bye.
And I have one word for you, Mr. Jaworski: Cheater! Coward! (Oops. Two words.)
I think letting my lips move is bringing us luck. Then again, George is doing all the picking, and he says there's no "luck" about it.
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* - I don't think that's the person's baptismal name. And, to be frank, if I was changing my name, "Pigskin Pick'em" wouldn't have come to mind.
So, after opening last week's season premiere of Budding Ventriloquist Presents Gridiron Gurus with George in the buff, the network phones were ringing off the hook. Well, "off their charger stands" might be a better description.*
It was such a roar I half-expected a stern letter from Commissioner Pete Rozelle.
Of course, George won't stop complaining about it, either.
(If it doesn't play here, click on http://youtu.be/9MiuJWTFJuI. It's about 4 minutes that will make you feel better than Pilates.)
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* - Modern technology requires a whole new set of cliche phrases. Maybe George and I should do a whole series on that. Bet the History Channel would pick it up if it was a series if we did it while driving on ice.
Last year, in Week One of 2010 (in the very first Budding Ventriloquist Presents Gridiron Gurus), I was 7 right and 9 wrong picks. And my lips moved a lot.
This year, I’m 11 and 5 in Week One. And my lips moved a lot.
You have to take any improvement you can, don’t you think?
Or
don’t you?
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It really should have been 12 and 4, but I picked the Kansas
City Chiefs over the Buffalo Bills. Not that
I thought the Chiefs would win. Heck, I
was hoping for QB Ryan Fitzpatrick to have a huge day, seeing he’s leading up
my fantasy football team at work,
So why did I pick the Chiefs?
Try saying Buffalo or Bills, much less Buffalo Bills,
without having your lips move.
‘Nough said?
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You’re still trying, aren’t you.
I knew you would.
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I'm psyched about the new logo. The crew in the logo lab said we do more to go green.
This is the BV version of an "after school special." You know, something educational for the kids. You never know where next John Muir will get his inspiration. To think it could be by watching Gridiron Gurus.
Kind'a awesome, huh?
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That is one sweet new logo, isn't it? Kudos to the boys in the logo lab. Go get yourself some Twizzlers, on me. My treat.
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* Webwaves - my very own invented word for the medium of internet programs. Besides correctly picking the Packers for the Super Bowl, it is my proudest contribution to a society that needs so much.
As the Budding Ventriloquist Creative Staff (BVCS) toiled to come up with the perfect* Ultimate Master Plan of Mirth (UMPOM), the was a hell-of-a-lot of television watching. Or, as the kids say these days, there was a shucks-ton of it.**
So, potential programs for The Vent Channel were hot topics. I’d know something was up when a staff member pulled an all-night er in the logo lab. There would always be a trail of crushed chips and empty salsa jars going from the fridge to the lockdown door. (The lockdown door was installed to quarantine the lab in case of a bio-hazard accident in there. You know, like on the show Bones. When is the season premiere for that?)
Not that it was always a gem of an idea. For example:
The BVCS was so wrapped up in the History Channel. They just couldn't turn it off, even as it replayed the shows over and over. It seemed an endless source of inspiration. After considering having George and I join the Knights Templar or visit the landing sites of “Ancient Astronauts” or Area 51, they hunkered down on the most illogical of history programs, Ice Road Truckers.
While some on staff saw the historical value, others ranted endlessly on how this represents the dumbing-down of America. Not that the show isn’t cool. It just has a nebulous relationship with anything a history teacher would recognize has historical.
But neither George or I had a Commercial Drivers License (or CDL, as they say in the trucking biz), so the big rigs were out of the question. However, the drama of sliding my 2001 Honda Civic down I-94 to Baldwin, Wisconsin in a sleet storm seemed a jolly good substitute.
To the staff, at least.
But being the one who would pilot El Civic-o down the road in a blizzard with a full camera crew watching me try to do ventriloquism and drive at the same time...
You get the picture.
I'm now contacting the Guinness Book people to see if I now hold the world record for putting a kibosh squarely on top of an idea.
They were right about one thing: George and I do look spiffy in winter clothes, if not down right dashing.
That said, we moved on.
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* - Perfect is perfect. And at Budding Ventrilquist, there's no promising perfect unless it's going to be perfect. And I know perfect. I hope that's perfectly clear, as Dick Nixon used to say.
Yes, I quote Nixon. Agnew, too.
** - This is an instance where substituting the word “shucks” for that most ubiquitous vulgarity “sh*t” doesn’t exactly work. (The "*" in the word to the left is for the protection of my growingly ubiquitous youth audience. I wouldn't want to be the first to expose them to that word. Nope. Not me. )
*** - I used to use three asterisks (***) for a section break/transition. But given my penchant for footnoting with asterisks as well, I am changing to three hashmarks (###). Please, don't panic. It will grow on you.
It's all for you, my dear readers. Give it some love.
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Just testing you on the new transition markers again. See? That didn't hurt, did it?
The coalescing of thought. The co-mingling of ideas. The conjugating of everything and anything conjugateable.*
The Budding Ventriloquist Creative Staff (BVCS) spent the summer kicking around ideas. They also kicked each other, but we'll talk more about that later.
Out of it came the Ultimate Master Plan Of Mirth (the UMPOM as we say in the biz) for Season Three. And what an UMPOM it is.
The staff is putting the finishing touches on it right now, including coming up with a better acronym than UMPOM. Last I checked, that effort has digressed into some sort of drinking game having to do with hearing the name "Bob." I'm not complaining, though. It seems to be working. At least that's what the staff keeps insisting in between shots.
This long-awaited progress was not, however, without its detours and dead ends. The gang had more than one catastrophically bad idea.
But if Budding Ventriloquist stands for anything, it's that the only bad idea is one that goes wasted. Ask anyone, they'll tell you just that about BV.**
Oh, and superbly thought-out pretense and conceptual underpinnings, too. Like this finely honed piece of logic:
The TV networks are all pitching their new fall season shows; AND
This is a fall ritual every man, woman, and child in this great country looks forward to with unfettered hope, EVEN THOUGH
We know from history that not only are most of them going to fail, most of them are going to fail because they are crap, LIKE
The bad ideas the BVCS wasted time with, SO
I should put the bad ideas on display here on the blog BECAUSE
it's damn American!
One must do what one can for the country that makes publishing a blog like Budding Ventriloquist not a crime, but a right.
Libyans, this is your future!
Therefore and forthwith, hang on to your socks. I give you the first in a series of rejected ideas:
After kicking around the concept that ventriloquism is either a hobby or a calling, or both, the team proffered:
“An odd vocation it is, like decoupage.”
And then, there was dead silence.
Can you sense the dramatic pause? The creative tension? Perhaps an air of fear and loathing that the Craft of Kings*** was being simultaneously besmirched and heralded as the natural successor to the Art of Kings****?
Yes, it all made sense. I know about as much about decoupage as I did about ventriloquism back in August 2009 when this whole wonderful adventure started. And, dare I say, decoupage is as under-appreciated as an art and form of expression as ventriloquism is
Mod Podge: God's sticky gift.
Still, I had to let the staff know that:
·Scissors are not my strong suit. In fact, they aren’t even in my deck.
·What can get messy WILL get very, very messy when I’m involved.
·Sticky is a challenge. I am the only person who can turn a half-used roll of duct tape into a hostage situation. (I carry a Medical Alert alarm with me at all times for just this reason.)
The debate continued and ultimately broke down on the sticky point of whether decoupage is performed by a decoupagist (my vote), decoupager (a popular, edgy choice among the young'uns), or decoupagee (pronounced de-koo-paa-zhay by the Indie rock crowd). Food was thrown. That's where I draw the line.
We moved on.
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*Conjugateable: something that is capable of participating in conjugation (joining, forming a single piece). This is highlighted because as a derivative form of the word conjugate, it doesn't actually exist in the English language
'Til now, that is. Do you feel awestruck that you got to see the birth of a word? Right here?
I even got to decide how to spell it. How cool is that?
** To be honest, I'm not sure what "they" say or would tell you about BV, though I have a feeling a New York Times poll would show I could win the Republican nomination if I announced at the right time.
***Decoupage is really and truly the Craft of Kings. I looked it up.
**** Ventriloquism is the Art of Kings. Looked that up too. Same place. But I already told you that.
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See? I kept my promise. Here it is September 1 and, back at the beginning of June, I told you:
Season One: Budding Ventriloquist tells stories and has fun writing silly stuff in its inaugural season. Season Two:Budding Ventriloquist Presents Gridiron Gurus ushers in actual live ventriloquism as the adventure continues.
Season Three: Budding Ventriloquist ski jumps over a shark tank while wearing an iconic leather biker jacket...
NO!
Not going to happen!
Not to my blog it's not!
The entire creative staff of Budding Ventriloquist is going to take the rest of this summer... not "off," but incredibly "on." The staff is going to roll up its sleeves, get out the sharpies and the flip charts and the white boards and the markers (the ones that are fruit-scented, no less!) and get "on" task to come up with the next incarnation of this blog.
There's no jumping the shark* with this blog. No sir'ee. Nada. Nix. Negits. Nope.
So, to the exaltation** of regular readers and viewers***....
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No worries. BV will return, bigger than ever. After about 22 months, it's time to regroup.
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* "Jumping the Shark" refers to an episode of Happy Days where Fonzie saves the day by, well, jumping over a shark. The episode was a milestone in the show that signaled a downhill slide in the show's creative quality because the story had run its course. I was thinking of making a Joanie Loves Chachi reference, too.
Same diff.
** An Exaltation is a group of Larks. The birds, not the cigarettes.
*** I am still amazed that I have "viewers." How can I not keep doing this when it allows me to say, "my viewers..." It's still just such a wow.
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Dear friends, I really appreciate you reading this and the rest of my posts. Humorist and cartoonist Kin Hubbard once said:
"The only way to entertain some folks is to listen to them."
