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• The Delivery Presents – Tunes and Terror and Not a Hint of Politics (with @RealityBlurs and @mark_scudder)
• R.I.P. Michael Clarke Duncan — An Actor Who Made Small Roles Big
• Clearing the Browser Tabs – Lying Liars and their Cozy Campaign Coverage

The Delivery Presents – Tunes and Terror and Not a Hint of Politics (with @RealityBlurs and @mark_scudder) Posted: 04 Sep 2012 06:54 AM PDT I believe Episode 162 is the first show in which I didn’t hit on politics at all, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. Quite honestly, I’ve had my fill of politics for a while (not a good sign since we’re still two months from Election Day). Never fear, though, faithful listeners, for I had a couple of the guests on the show you’ll truly enjoy, even if we didn’t talk about conventions and polls and attack ads and Paul Ryan’s pecs. Mark Scudder is a musician who has done something exceptional — recorded an entire album online in full view of anyone who wanted to watch and give their input. The result, “The Solution is the Problem” is pretty darned good. If you’re tired of auto-tuned pop-tarts, dancers who only occasionally remember to sing, and overproduced sample-fests, Mark’s music will hit the spot. In the second half, I was delighted to have game designer, author, and new friend Sean Preston of Reality Blurs on the show. We talked about his new role-playing game tremulus, what it’s like to launch a Kickstarter, what makes a game fun for people who have never played an RPG before in their lives, and why we love scary stories so very much. Dig in and enjoy! And if you have a few bucks to spare over the next couple or few weeks, pick up what Mark’s album and pledge for Sean’s game. The Delivery - Episode 162

R.I.P. Michael Clarke Duncan — An Actor Who Made Small Roles Big Posted: 03 Sep 2012 06:21 PM PDT AP reported earlier this evening that actor Michael Clarke Duncan is dead at the age of 54. He was rushed to the hospital last month after he suffered a heart attack and spent a couple of weeks in the ICU before doctors moved him to a regular room. He was a huge man — almost 6 1/2 feet tall and about 300 pounds — who had converted to a vegetarian lifestyle a couple or three years ago. I’ve not seen any information about whether his size or weight contributed to his heart attack or whether it was one of those unfortunate events that happen to we frail human beings. I’m genuinely sad to read of Duncan’s death. There are few actors who make the movies they are in better and Duncan was one of them, though he never stole a flick again the way he did as John Coffey in The Green Mile. He was the bright spot in such forgettable movies as Armageddon, The Scorpion King, The Whole Nine Yards, Sin City, Talledega Nights, and Planet of the Apes. He lent his voice to a number of animated movies like Brother Bear and Kung-Fu Panda, and made a host of guest appearances on over a dozen television shows as well. What I liked most, though, is that he seemed like a man who thoroughly enjoyed his life without resorting to the sort of arrogant crapweaselry we see all too often from successful actors. He was a celebrity who I never saw flaunt his fame and I admired that. Perhaps that humility came from his life before acting. He quit college and took work digging ditches and bouncing at bars to care for his sick mother. The bar experience led to bodyguard gigs in Los Angeles, which paid his bills while he looked for acting jobs. AFter the death of Notorious B.I.G., Duncan decided to go all-out as an actor and got a few roles as — what else? — a bouncer. Eventually, though, he got his big chance in The Green Mile and turned that performance into a career of which any actor would be proud. My condolences to his family, his fiancee, and those who knew him and held him dear.

Clearing the Browser Tabs – Lying Liars and their Cozy Campaign Coverage Posted: 03 Sep 2012 05:06 PM PDT Because I am by nature a cynical man I am not often surprised when I read about the underhanded tactics our Dear Lightbringer and his lapdogs in the media have used to against Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan. I have said before that I believe Mitt Romney is a weak candidate, the latest in a long string of squishy “moderates” whose basic political philosophies are “make things slightly less bad” and “don’t scare the Republican power-brokers”. On the other hand, neither of them are inveterate liars nor are they rank political opportunists who will say anything to anyone for a vote or two. What we’ve seen from the Obama campaign recently has been a textbook case of political projection. The President has tried to slap his most glaring faults — the inability to keep a promise, the penchant for rhetoric that soars so high is actually leaves the real world, and an unshakeable belief in a failed ideology — on Romney and Ryan. His media lapdogs have certainly done their part to help the President along and the strain, apparently, is taking its toll and it may not be long before the lapdogs turn on their master. Oh, they won’t turn on him as a pack before Election Day, but if he loses? Bet on it. And now, links! I don’t know how I missed this when it happened, but the guys at Q and O celebrated their 9th anniversary a few days ago. Congratulations to Bruce, Dale, and Jon for building one of the best blogs I’ve ever read. As you know, Q and O was one of the few blogs I read before I started The Sundries Shack and the guys there taught me a lot in my newbie days. If you are the member of a newspaper editorial board, and your first flinch after a convention wraps is to use phrases like “charted a course of denial and obstruction” and “narrow partisan agenda”, then perhaps you should re-evaluate your standing as a neutral and objective source of information. Of course they won’t, because they are so steeped in a particular worldview that the very notion another one exists that isn’t held by zealots and lunatics is beyond their ability to comprehend. While I’m on the subject, let’s just say that, at this point, any journalist who slaps on a “fact-checker” badge should be laughed to scorn. On the other hand, there’s new media, led by Stacy McCain, who went to the RNC on prayers and the generous donations of dozens of regular working Americans and churned out a dizzying amount of work. I’ve said it many times before and I’ll say it here again. You will have to look a long time before you find a journalist, in old media or new, who works as hard as Stacy. His co-blogger Smitty is no slouch as a writer either. Outsourcing: the culprit isn’t who you think. It never is, though, is it The Democrats do love themselves some Catholics, don’t they? Well, they don’t love them until they have to love them, but the whole abortion issue is still a problem. Or at least it should be. Neal Armstrong is dead; long live Barack Obama. The numbers in this point about how Barack Obama’s fiscal geniuses have brutalized the elderly ought to show up in a couple campaign ads, especially ones run in Florida. Am I the only one who thinks it sad that the British Government believes it needs to teach children how to play outside? I don’t mean the usual nanny-state garbage of “wear big doofy helmets while on your bike and more pads than an NFL linebacker when roller-skating” but the far more basic “get out there and run, jump, and climb trees”.

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