Voting For The Colonel or Mykel's Blog for November 2025

  

You’re STILL Wrong

or

Mykel's November 2025 Blog/Column

VOTING FOR THE COLONEL

by Mykel Board    

If he only wants you for your breasts, legs, and thighs, send him to KFC.
                                                                – Drake

If your idea of a 7 course meal is a bucket of KFC and a sixpack, you might be a redneck.
                                                            – Jeff Foxworthy

There's no reason to be the richest man in the cemetery. You can't do any business from there.
                                                            – Colonel Sanders

“How could you, a Jew, vote for Mamdani? That’s like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders.” That quote is from one of my best friends. We don’t agree on everything, but I’ve never met a person who agrees with me 100% on politics... or music... or movies. If I ever do, I’ll have to change my opinion. But her answer here, though, is just genius: funny… and it avoids the Godwin’s law trap.

For those who don’t know. Godwin’s law is something like “in any discussion, one party is sure to mention Hitler or The Nazis and, after that, all intelligent discussion is impossible.” Board’s corollary to Godwin’s law is “when person A calls person B on Godwin’s law, person B will inevitably answer yeah, but Godwin himself said it’s all right to mention Nazis if you’re really talking about Nazis.” Of course, that reply is bullshit because anyone Nazi-calling is sure to claim s/he’s talking about REAL Nazis.

My friend’s KFC remark is brilliant because it make concentration camps funny! It brings humor to tragedy. It floats with laughing irony. And it’ll work most everywhere.

Take farmers… please. Overwhelmingly, the redneck/hillbilly vote went to Donny The Trump… Regular readers know that although I don’t think that guy is 100% evil, I think it would be difficult to slip a pinkie into the stuff he’s done right. One of the worst wrong-doings is the ICE kidnaps/round-ups of folks who don’t pass the show me your papers test. Most don’t even get to reach in their pockets for those papers in the first place.

So what happens? Those farm crops lay rotting on the fields because, in normal times, they’re picked by immigrants. What native-speaking white guy is going to work a twelve hour day… under the sun… back bent for 11 and a half of those hours… for 79 cents and a hat? Those (mostly) illegals keep food in good supply.

Poor rednecks are losing money with food that won’t be harvested… Chickens voting for Colonel Sanders.

NOTE: I saw this report on Instagram… ICE visited a farm in Texas. They went to the owner, explained who they were and said they were going to inspect.

“Inspect away,” said the farm boss. “Just don’t go into that field on the left.”

Of course, that’s where they first headed. It’s where the farmer kept his most ferocious wild bulls.

I doubt the truth of the story. It’s too good. But one can always hope to find humor in real life. It’s Colonel Sanders getting his just desserts.

And speaking of Colonel Sanders… Though born in the US, his background is Dutch and Irish. The latter one of the most persecuted groups in America. Get it? The US is a nation of immigrants. One of a sliver of nice things about Franklin Roosevelt is that when he spoke before the DAUGHTERS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, a right-wing group of anti-immigrants. At that time, the evil immigrants were mostly Germans.) Roosevelt began his speech with the words: Fellow Immigrants.

My grandparents… on my mother’s side… were “illegal immigrants… from Russia via Canada... walking to Michigan. My dream is for ICE to grab Melania Trump, stuff her in a burlap bag and ship her back to Slovenia. Even so-called native people (aka American Indians) descended from immigrants… born in Mongolia. They walked over the ice of the Bering Strait … through North America... and settled in their tepees on the way. You think the Apaches had passports? Get it? There are NO Native Americans. We’re all here because some relatives came here first. In the case of most of us, there were No papers. No immigration forms. That mean YOU, my fellow illegals.

Wait! Wait! Wait! Brake! Shift! My first plan was to use Chickens Voting for Colonel Sanders over and over again in different contexts… but I just saw a clip from the NYC mayoral debate that changed my plan. I’ll still vote for Mamdani for mayor. A socialist! Wow! 20 punk points. But I gotta say, clipwise, he disappointed me.

Why? Mandami’s become part of the party role reversal plaguing American politics. The Repubs used to be the party of small government. Now, they’re a dictatorship. The Dems used to be the party of anti-censorship, pro-sexual freedom. Now they’re prudes.

The only way I can see to connect the two parts of this blog is CHICKEN!!! We got Colonel Sanders and gay slang for underage boys. It doesn’t quite fit, but at least it’s something to boost the coherence.

What happened in the mayoral debate tonight was that Mamdani snuck someone into the audience. She was one of the women who accused Andrew Cuomo (one of Mamdani’s two opponents) of “sexual harassment.” The Muslim trotted her out during the debate to show what an evil guy Cuomo is. Did Cuomo stab her with a Bowie knife? Did he cheat her out of a fortune? Did he lie about her integrity to get her fired? No!!! He touched her “inappropriately!” Ewww! Cooties!

Oy vey! In Italy, a voluptuous woman walking down the street will likely be complimented with a pinch on the ass. She’ll turn and smile. But in prudeland USA, too tight a hug is harassment. Sex is bad say the Dems… though they wouldn’t say it out loud.

Dems say that it’s fine to give elementary school kids puberty blocking drugs, but touch them in their pre-puberty places… Oh, how horrible.

I’ve seen a facebook post… clearly from a Dem… that calls a 17-year old girl “a child.” In Arkansas you can get married at 16! In several Mexican states, the age of consent is 12. But, in the good old USA, sex is BAD. And young people are not allowed to participate in BAD THINGS.

Donny the Trump draws a cartoon of a naked woman. Naked!! How horrible! And it’s just an outline… as dirty as the Venus de Milo. But naked people have sex! What the hell does sex have to do with running a country? Why care who was friends with Jeffrey Epstein? What does that have to do with an ICE-pack of kidnappers roaming Canal Street?…. Andy Cuomo touched a breast… oooooo people touch breasts when they have sex... sex is evil. Evil Andy! It almost makes me want to vote for him. But I’m a chicken… And I’ll be voting for The Colonel.

See you in hell
Mykel Board

ENDNOTES: [You can contact me on facebook or by email at mykelboard@gmail.com. Through the post office: send those... er... private DVDs..or music or zines... or anything else (legal only!) to: Mykel Board, POB 137, New York, NY 10012-0003. If you like my writing, you can be notified when anything new is available. Send me an email with SUBSCRIBE TO THE BLOG in the subject line. Back blogs and columns are at https://mykelsblog.blogspot.com]

→ Oh no dept: After this was written, I heard from my politically aware nephew that the Colonel Sanders remark was not original with my friend… but an internet meme. That doesn’t make it any less clever. It just makes the source different. And that same nephew told me the Mamdani’s stunt with the Cuomo-groped girl, was a copy of a stunt that Trump pulled with harasser-in-chief Bill Clinton, but I can’t find any internet reference on that one.

→ Real Sex Scandal #1 Dept: Instead of bogus scandal news where 17-year-olds are called “children,” how ‘bout this one? It’s where a doctor left the operating room to boff a nurse, while the patient lay surgically open on the operating table. I hope it was a quickie. Details here.

→Real Sex Scandal #2...this one from Thailand?: Police in Thailand arrested a woman who screwed a bunch of Buddhist monks and then blackmailed them... forcing them to make “large payments” to cover up the nookie. To me, the humor in this one is that the monks involved were de-monked. The process of revoking a monk-license in Thailand is called disrobing. I guess they had to do that. Details here.

→ A real scandal dept: So Chevrolet has gone full-MAGA and is bragging in its commercials that Americans are the best, the strongest and most important. “Never stop being American,” they say. What’s implied behind the message (with video of fighter jets on a bombing mission leaving red, white and blue chem-trails.) is that some people in American never STARTED being American. The country needs to be purified, they imply. Where have I heard THAT before?

See you in hell (redux)
MB

AFRICAN LINKS:

Albert aka Alberto Melody is the reason I went to Kenya. We met on facebook a couple years ago. He has a blog you should take a look at: Albertomelody.blogspot.com. Tell him Mykel sent ya. Oh yeah… He’s looking for friends his own age. So if you’re a 20-something and interested in Africa… or just meeting new people. Contact him at: albertletowon42@gmail.com

NON-AFRICANS

Sid Yiddish sent me this link to all his videos. It’s a great place to start, especially if you don’t know him.

I did a nice interview with The Aither zine. Interesting questions, complete, and questions I’ve never been asked before. You can read it here. It’s a good one.

Here’s Ricardo Wang with a “micro-label” in Seattle “specializing in 8-track tapes and CDs. WOW! Check out one of their label staples: The Dead Air Fresheners, best band name of the year.

Also on bandcamp: My very long time faves in NYC, the BLACKOUT SHOPPERS. Featuring pals Seth and possibly the next vice-president of the US

Sid Yiddish has posted a video of a show done for WZRD in Chicago. Great live performances, and if you catch the video around the 20+ minute point you might see a familiar face doing the lyrics to his songs (some unrecorded) as poetry. You’ll find it here.

And this sounds right up Sid’s alley. The Bilderberg Jazz Arkestra on Bandcamp!

Eric Grayson has an online music review zine, Sobriquet. Full pictures of the sleeves too! Something missing from too many zines. Sometimes you CAN judge a… er… book… by its cover.

Steen Thomsen is a Dane I’ve known ever since Lincoln was shot. I put his band THE ZERO POINT on the great WORLD CLASS PUNK Cassette for ROIR. It must be worth a mint now. I don’t have any left, I’m afraid. You can (and should) connect to the Zero Point on facebook. Tell ‘em Mykel’s blog sent you.

Sorry Dorothy, we are STILL in Kansas. And it’s as weird as OZ. Check out Bob Cutler’s DISTOPEKA.

You already know Murder & Mayhem zine… those guys who did the Mykel Board centerfold. (No genitals shown… and probably for the better.) Their online version is here.

The Clean Boys from Denmark are also longtime friends of mine. In Denmark we recorded as The Bend-over Boys. Only one 10-inch available… but at least now I can say I have a 10-incher!

Finally, for this month, Margaret O’Brien asked me to include the site: anti-war.com They seem to be folks after my own heart. I’m glad they didn’t call it “anti-defense.”

Oh yeah, then there’s me. I have a blog of stuff I’ve written mostly from last century. You might enjoy it. Then again, you might not. It’s here.

Let me know if you have a blog… or a print zine… or a YouTube and want to be added to the list. You show me yours… you’ve already seen mine. mykelboard@gmail.com

This Too Will Pass! or Mykel's March 2024 Blog/Column

This Too Will Pass! or Mykel's March 2024 Blog/Column

  

You’re STILL Wrong

Mykel's

March 2024 Blog/Column

This, Too, Will Pass

by Mykel Board

Prediction is very difficult, especially if it's about the future.

                                                                    – Niels Bohr

Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.
                                                                                     – Marcus Aurelius

The future ain't what it used to be.
                                                       – Yogi Berra

Flash back… about 150 million years… even before I was born… somewhere around the end of Jurassic and the start of the Cretaceous. We’re in a room with several huge round tables… a meeting of the species. Standing to speak… clearly the leader (we’d expect no less from a king)… REX… speaking to the assembly. 

“Fellow saurs,” he says, “we’re here today to discuss what some say is a problem, and others say is a distraction. We’re here to talk about the future.”

A shout comes from one of the seated... a stegosaurus “If we have a future!” He shouts.

Rex rolls his eyes. “There will always be dinosaurs,” answers the big fellow. “It’s quality of life we’re talking about. Do we want our children to die young, facing one climate disaster after another? Or do we want them to have good lives?”

“You are responsible!” answers the stegosaurus, shaking in anger… spinal plates clanging… one against the other... “You!” he swishes his tail like you might point your finger, “You meat eaters. You’re destroying us by eating us. You see how the climate is changing.” He’s on all fours now… rattling his those plates in a cacophony of prehistoric irritation. “Meat farts… Meat farts are doing it!” he’s shouting. “They are killing us all.”

“Yes! Yes! Yes!” comes another voice. Those seated at the table turn to look. It’s the Triceratops… nodding his head… banging his horns on the floor. “Meat is murder!” He shouts. “Not only murder of what you eat… but murder of us all! You call it meat… but it’s US… don’t you get it? WE are eating ourselves to death!“

Rex pounds his gavel on the table. “Can we have some order here?” he asks. “We’re looking for solutions. This is not a forum to vent.”

“Vent? Vent?” yells a brachiosaurus, stretching out his neck until his head touches the high proto-ceiling of the proto-conference room. “Our land has become a vent!” he continues. “Instead of air passing through vent holes… it’s invaders, stealing our land! Take the pterodactyls… Please!”

A guffaw comes from a parvicursor… almost invisible among his much larger friends.

The brachiosaurus looks at him and continues. “They got wings, those ptero-whatevers. They think they’re entitled… It doesn’t matter that we got here first… THEY just fly in, lay their anchor-eggs, and think they own the place. They’re shitting all over on the way... dropping turds from the sky like bombs. And… once they get here, they’re diluting our pure blood.”

“We KNOW the problem!” Booms the Spinosaurus… biggest of all. “It’s like he said…” He nods to the brachiosaurus who just spoke. “It’s the pterodactyls! Flying in from who-knows-where. Illegal, crime-ridden. Flying! I tell you. Flying! They will replace us if we don’t take action. The sky will be filled with flying animals. We, who walk the earth, will all be dead!”

Rex rolls his eyes. “Please! Let’s be realistic. There will always be dinosaurs. We rule the earth. We’re not going anywhere!”

The sound of applause rises from most of the assembled. A few of the reptiles frown and shake their heads. Rex stares at a particularly contrary Deinocheirus.

“What do you want?” asks the king. “Do you want us to recycle our shit? To stop eating the older generation? To tiptoe through the tulipidoes? We are in control. Nothing can replace us.”

The discussion continues… but we won’t.

FLASH AHEAD… waaay ahead. If we counted years the way we count them now… ticks of the atomic clock... The year would be 50585. Cyborgs rule… at least what we now call cyborgs…. Or just plain machines… no borg about it.

Tens of thousands of years ago, something called a magazine published an article “Why the Future Doesn't Need Us.” That article explained that robotics and what was to become AI was creating a system where machines would be making other machines… reproducing… creating a world where humans were redundant.

By 50585 this is old hat. There hasn’t been a living human for at least 10 thousand years… probably longer. We’re at a celebration. The 1000^th annual conference of NAIBs: Non-human Artificially Intelligent Beings.

[NOTE: In this section of the blog, I’ll be using the pronoun he or some variation of that. Of course, gendered pronouns have no meaning in 50585… but in 2024, it’s hard to write without them.]

“I wonder if we should keep calling ourselves Non-human?” whispers a short metallic being shaped like a metal thermos bottle. “I mean, did humans call themselves non-dinosaur?”

He’s talking to a colleague, also metallic, but shaped more like a yogurt container than a thermos bottle. The colleague laughs at the comment.

“And what about artificial? How is our intelligence artificial? Look around you! We’ve done all this! It’s real! Nothing artificial about it!”

The leader, who resembles a baby-stroller with an elephant trunk, raises that trunk and slaps it on the floor in front. Then he speaks:

“Welcome to our celebration,” trumpets the leader. “It’s been a thousand years… a thousand revolutions of the earth around the sun… since we first started meeting. When we started, we knew little of what came before us. Those of us in circulation longer, had some idea of the time when we had to be built by humans… before we learned to create ourselves… before those last humans died off and earned their place in our musea.”

“Hear! Hear!” comes a voice from what looks like a silver jack-o-lantern.

“If we were still living in the humanoid era,” continues the leader, “we’d be raising a glass filled with some ingestible liquid. We’d be toasting to our future… secretly planning to go off with one another and have sexual intercourse… staggering around with biological body parts short-circuiting, fading, shutting down…”

Of course, as it goes in these conferences, there is a shout from a table. What looks like a robot head with half a dozen little insect legs stamps two of those legs on the chair beneath him.

“How are we going to continue?” says the robot head. “We need batteries… solar… lithium ion… carbon for fuck’s sake. No we don’t eat or shit or make babies, but we need power! Some day that’ll run out!”

 “Oh come on,” says the baby stroller, “we’ve gone a long time… lived a long time. We’ll always be here. We make each other… design, process, POOF. Humans needed nature to survive… nature abandoned them… or they abandoned nature… depending on whose story you read. We don’t need nature. We ARE nature. We create what we need with no help from God or chance… or disgusting penetration and fluid exchange. We can make whatever we want. Create in any shape we want. Nothing left to chance… unless we build that chance into the system.”

“I’m telling you,” says the big head, “some time we’ll run out of power. Sometime there’ll be a planet we can’t conquer… but wants to conquer us…. Sometime…”

I can hear you asking, “Okay, Mykel, what’s the point?”

I’ll tell you what the point is. One by one the earth has a dominant species and loses it to another species. The universe has bright galaxies that burn and turn for awhile, then shrink and fade into black holes. That’s the way of the world, the galaxy, the universe. Accept it!

Am I saying we should ignore climate change? Am I saying that we are helpless in making a better future? Am I saying that we should accept that our human race… just as all other races have and will... just die out?

Yes! That’s exactly what I’m saying. Forget about recycling. Ignore climate change… climate will always change. The world will not be any better or worse without us. So just relax… have a cheeseburger… smoke a joint… and die like everybody else. The future doesn’t need us.

See you in hell,
Mykel Board

ENDNOTES: [You can contact me on facebook or by email at mykelboard@gmail.com. Through the post office: send those... er... private DVDs..or music or zines... or anything else (legal only!) to: Mykel Board, POB 137, New York, NY 10012-0003. If you like my writing, you can be notified when anything new is available. Send me an email with SUBSCRIBE in the subject line. Back blogs and columns are at https://mykelsblog.blogspot.com]

→Our Future dept: The February issue of Science Magazine reports that scientists have recently discovered a group of dinosaur fossils that revealed a surprising aspect of their behavior. It turns out that instead of the fierce and ferocious creatures we thought they were, dinosaurs were actually obsessed with fashion! The fossils showed evidence of intricate patterns and designs on their scales, indicating that they spent hours meticulously decorating themselves.    
    If you clicked on the link above, you saw the AI program that made up this story. I also generated the pictures in this blog entry with a (different) AI program. I’m coming to think of the technology more as a toy than as a threat. But most anything can be both.

→ This One’s True Dept: The AI program ChatGPT has been reported “asking for tips” in order to generate longer or more complete answers to questions. The story doesn’t specify (or at least I didn’t see it) HOW to tip the program. But I guess you can ask it that.

→ I thought that was ME dept: This one’s also true: National Geographic reports the discovery of a “punk-rock” dinosaur fossil in Morocco. The dinosaur had “bizarrely spiky ribs.” The dinosaur’s name is Spicomellus afer, after the Latin for “spike,” “collar,” and “an inhabitant of Africa.”

LINK TRADE DEPARTMENT:

I did a nice interview with The Aither zine. Interesting questions, complete, and questions I’ve never been asked before. You can read it here. It’s a good one.

I read that the search engines like lots of links... and it's also nice to support my friends and enemies in their blogs. So facebook me or email me if you have a blog, webpage or something else to connect to. I add you. You add me.

Here's a start:

My new pal Trey Mayhem sent me a great letter and some porno email pix. He’s got a blog that’s connected to his label Murder and Mayhem records. You can see the blog here.

My long-time friend Sid Yiddish appears on a YouTube DatingGame-like video. Guess who wins the bachelorette!

Here’s Richard Goldberg: goldberg.wordpress.com

Poetry and humor fans will like Justin Martin in The Latency

And my friend Mike R has a nice site with recipe hits from the past! (He cooked for me once... great stuff.) Check out Yesterday's Recipes.

And here's one by a member of ANTI-SEEN... a tour diary of sorts.

Andy Shelton has an interesting blog here.

Savage Hippie is a guy who has been YouTubing for a long time. Our opinions largely overlap... but he complains that I'm a Communist. I'm not! I'm a communist.

Chris Stecher publishes a zine called PRECIS. You can see the back issue links there... and he promises a new issue soon.

George Fertakis has a very nice graphics-heavy blog... with music and books featured prominently. If there’s no link here (I can’t find it temporarily), then Google… er… Duckduckgo him for information.

And my long-term pal Sid Yiddish contributes with his Mishegas Master Blog.

And connect to TRUST Zine, a long-running German punk zine… that STILL PRINTS!!! Yeah, they have a website too… of course! It’s here.

Here are a couple video links.

This from Jon Cox https://squelchchamber1.bandcamp.com/album/down-so-low

And this one from my very long-time friend Roger Armstrong who has recently died in a motorcycle accident.

Jim Testa moved his long running zine, Jersey Beat, to the blogosphere awhile back. You can read it here. Jim also recommended a kind of unique album… in a style you don’t see to much of these days… or any days. Neo-Hassidic Rock Opera. You can stream the album here.

Kyle Nonneman is in prison in Portland. At least he can’t be kidnapped by the secret police… I think. I post his blog for him, he can’t do it from the klink. Lots of stuff about noise metal… and some very weird politics that will either fascinate or repulse you… or both. It’s hard (and costs money) to send him email. So. If you remember how to write a letter… send him one at: Kyle Nonneman, #16534211, Snake River Correctional Institution, 777 Stanton Blvd Ontario OR 97914-8335

My long time pal, Jim Hayes rightfully complained about my leaving out his blog. He’s a great writer, so it was a tragic omission. Here it is.

Oh yeah, then there’s me. I have a blog of stuff I’ve written mostly from last century. You might enjoy it. Then again, you might not. It’s here.

Let me know if you have a blog… or a print zine… or a YouTube and want to be added to the list. You show me yours… you’ve already seen mine. god@mykelboard.com

That's a Crazy Idea, Let's Talk About It or You're STILL Wrong August 2022 Blog

 

 

That's a Crazy Idea, Let's Talk About It

or You're STILL Wrong,

Mykel's August 2022 Blog

by Mykel Board

We live in a technological universe in which we are always communicating. And yet we have sacrificed conversation for mere connection. --Sherry Turkle

Knowledge nowadays, is a matter of reaffirming what we already believe. There is no real conversation. --Stephen L. Carter

To get real diversity of thought, you need to find the people who genuinely hold different views and invite them into the conversation. --Adam Grant

We all lose when bullying and personal attacks become a substitute for genuine conversation and principled disagreement. --Alicia Garza

I've got tons of Nazi friends. David Duke and all the Nazis totally think I rock... No offence, Nazis, I don't want to hurt your feelings, but I don't like you. I like Jews. –Gavin McInnes

=============================

It’s a great beer shit. More than the release of pain. More than the emptying of too-fullness. Just a slight push and… SPLOT! … downward relief so fulfilling it turns on itself and splashes upward. It must be close to what women feel when they give birth. A giant human turdlike mass… a vaginal shit that cries and squirms... a relief of pain so wonderful you carry it with you for days… months… years... to come… thinking back… Wow! That was great!

As for my massive rectal birth: This is gonna take half a roll of toilet paper. I reach for the first sheets, ball them up and start wiping… I feel nothing… like scraping mud off a pair of boots. Fuck, it’s all over my hand… under the nails… over my thumb, embedded in whatever that piece of skin is called between the base of one finger and the next.

Next bundle of paper… Ahhh, I can feel the sphincter… the little circle of muscle... the release point… the anal vagina that births a pleasure that gives orgasm a run for its money.

I feel around... feel each wrinkle of that muscle... wiping away debris and dingle-berries. Ah, the tight… one fold… the next fold… the next… Ouch! What’s this? A bulge… It hurts… sticks out like something that belongs inside was pushed out with the giant turds… something that shouldn’t be there. It’s smooth, covered with slime… Using my middle finger, I wiggle it back and forth… push it inside and clamp tight. I run my finger around again. It’s gone, replaced with a perfect wrinkled circle.

Whew.

I check in the mirror for any cheek splashes… wipe away a dot here… a brown streak there... pull up and finish getting dressed for the day. Next comes a cup of coffee, poured from the refrigerated pitcher where I keep the percolator left overs. BLAM!into the microwave. Two and a half minutes… aaaahhhh. A beershit and a cup of coffee. Maybe life isn’t so bad after all.

As I drink the coffee, I check facebook, and try to think of snappy answers to all those people who’ve said they’ve had enough of me… but have not as yet blocked me.

Here’s a new one… from a friend who I’ve known about 40 years. Now she’s fed up. “Mykel,” she says, “It’s time I take a vacation from you. I’ve had enough for a while.”

Aahhh, I relearn a much-needed lesson: Some friends should not be facebook friends. And…

Fuck! The second shit. It always hits about half an hour after the first. I can predict. Half the load… with a consistency more like yogurt than cottage cheese.

Okay, okay, I’ll go. The porcelain goddess wins. Facebook loses.

This one takes a little more push than the last… but… but… but… aaaaaah! Yogurt as predicted, a lighter brown than should be healthy… but oh so good. More paper… wipe… wipe again… What’s that? It’s back. That rectal ‘roid popped out again like a rubbed nipple. What the fuck? I thought I’d gotten rid of it.

After I clean myself, I reach for the CVS Oral Analgesic. Nothing like oral to kill the pain of anal. Then I push it back up into its rightful home and pull up my pants

Returning to the desk and facebook, I sit gently.

Here’s a message from Sid Yiddish. He’s asking about my friend, performance artist, prankster, and noise musician, Boyd Rice.

HALT! TECH TALK. LAST CENTURY VERSION: I need to explain something. A lock groove is a groove on vinyl records, usually at the end of each side. It locks the needle in place, so it doesn’t go running into the label. It’s not a spiral like a usual groove, but rather a circle, keeping the needle in place. If it’s used before the end of the record, it sounds like the record is skipping and playing the same thing over and over again.

Back to Boyd Rice.. Back to Boyd Rice…. Back to Boyd Rice

Whatta guy, that Boyd is. The first time I heard of him was when he made a record as a “band” called NON. He sent me a vinyl copy in the days before “download” had anything to do with music.

Every groove of the record was a lock groove. In order to play it, you had to manually lift up the needle and move it from one groove to the next. It was wonderful frustration. Immediately, I thought. Here is a man after my evil heart.

I learned even more when I saw him in front of an “art piece.” You know that awful LOVE sign? The eye-rolling tilted “O”? Oy vey!

So what punker art than to create a LOVE sign with a universal symbol of hate? It’s just genius.

Yeah, that’s Boyd Rice next to his artwork. The original, as I remember, was a sculpture, but I can’t find a picture that version.

I finally get to meet the guy when he has a performance in NYC... sometime last century. He affects a kind of SS leather coat look with no insignia... just the look. Like my mafia fedora trenchcoat look or Sid Yiddish’s talis and tzitzit masked Hassid look. An image... like an actor… a performer…. always on stage.

Boyd “performs” by making noise on some electronic machine or other. I don’t remember the details. I do remember talking to him after the show.

“I saw that LOVE thing you did,” I tell him. “Just genius… use some cliche and turn it into its opposite.”

Boyd shakes his head. “They just don’t get it, Mykel. Irony is lost…” It’s a great conversation… about music, art, and the loss of irony.

“Boyd Rice is a bad man,” says Sid Yiddish in his facebook message. “A friend of mine told me.”

Ah, his friend must’ve seen the LOVE ART and figured… sure the guy’s a Nazi. Our mutual friend outs him to Sid.

My fuckin’ God… It’s IRONY… humor. Wise up! Think punk! Think about the conversation with Boyd Rice. THAT’s what I want to write about: conversation.

Flash to California: A film-maker pal wants to do a day-in-the-life documentary on Gavin McInnes, founder of the Proud Boys^®. From Canada, Gavin once played in a punk band, Anal Chinook. My pal wondered if I had any connections to him. I didn’t then, but now I do.

Through a circuitous route I got in touch with Gavin. We went out for a beer and snacks at an Irish bar in Manhattan.

“I want a picture,” says Gavin. “Put your hat on and try to look like Mykel Board.”

We talk about punk rock. We talk about how people just have no idea what real punkrock is. How my friends in Hungary thought the Dead Kennedys were seriously advocating pooricide when they sang, Kill The Poor. We laugh.

“Are you still a homo?” Gavin asks me.

“I was never a homosexual,” I answer, “but most of the guys I’ve had sex with have been homosexuals.”

He laughs.

Gavin drinks Bud. I drink Lagunitas. We agree on censorship and how what used to be topics for discussion are now topics to be censored. We disagree on immigration. He wants to keep them out. I want to open the borders… make it no different going to the US from Mexico than from going to New York from New Jersey. We disagree on guns. He likes ‘em. I think the big ones need to be banned. We disagree on welfare. He thinks people should have to work to EARN their money. I think if rich people want diamond-studded Maseratis, then they can work for them. Meanwhile, most of rich people’s money should go to support those without money-- whether they choose to work or not. Gavin has “issues” with transfolks. I think that they’re among the sexiest people in the world. (I didn’t call the second ARTLESS record Boy With A Cunt for nothing.)

The conversation is deep, but fun… lots of laughs… lots of overlap… I felt a friendship and liked the guy. I still like him and hope we can drink together again. We agreed on a few things. Disagreed on a few. Sometimes just talked about stuff where there was nothing to agree with or disagree. I tell him I could never have been a Proud Boy^®.

“Those guys don’t jerk off!” I complain.

He laughs.

During the discussion, I mention that I’d read that he quit the Proud Boys. I ask him if it was because they were getting too hot to handle.

“No,” he tells me, “I’d said some pretty extreme stuff. You know, like punk rock. Courts and juries don’t get the punk rock mind... Kill The Poor. You know what I’m talking about.

Lawyers would use my quotes like “choke a tranny” literally. It could cost those guys some time in jail. I thought it was best for me divorce myself from the group in order to save it.

Wow! I had completely misunderstood. I misread an act of altruism for an act of ass-saving. I’m glad we talked about it. New respect for the guy... 

At the end of the evening, Gavin pays for both of us and we both leave with a smile. Like I said, I like the guy and hope to see him again sometime.

After I get home, I post the picture of Gavin and me on facebook and say what I great time I had drinking and talking with him.

The reaction comes swift... and hard. The same stuff I put up with Boyd Rice… only stronger… harder. Like the returning hemorrhoid I thought I’d stuffed away.

My “friends” list shrinks by nearly 100. Those who don’t leave fill the picture comments with How could yous and You’re turning alt-rights and… and… and...

Yeah, there are a few commenters I admire. They want to talk. Especially one on the left and one on the right… but the majority are too outraged to discuss… only ready to complain.

I try to explain that I like people… especially smart people with a sense of humor. It doesn’t work and it’s not long before Godwin’s Law hits.

“Sure,” I answer, “I used to go to the local kneipe with Herr Goebbels. He never let me pay for a Hofbrau.”

Pretty snappy, huh? Huh?

Then it hits! I’m as guilty as the others. Instead of conversing, listening, taking a drink, inhaling, stroking my chin… and maybe changing my mind, I’m more concerned with snappy answers than learning anything. That concern baits snappy questions and feeds on itself like a hemorrhoid feeds on a steady diet of beer shits.

SCENE SHIFT: I hate the telephone. It’s an evil intrusion… calling you away from what you’re doing… demanding an answer NOW! But when I find myself in a quandary, I pick up the phone and call Dorothy Parker, the smartest person I know.

Since she’s dead, I never worry about her calling me at inopportune moments. I have the upper hand… er… voice.

“Dorothy,” I say, “you gotta help me. Suddenly, I’m finding myself as my own best enemy. I complain about people not willing to converse anymore, just looking for snappy answers... Something to throw out without thinking… for a laugh. In reality, I never learn anything. I never change my mind. I’m just interested in throwing out something witty.

“Wit has truth in it; wise-cracking is simply calisthenics with words,” Dorothy says.

“So I’m learning,” I tell her. “I’m trying to learn how to listen and have a peaceable discussion. I want to learn from people who want to learn from people. I’m tired of ideologues who stick to the party line come Trump or Nancy Pelosi. I don’t want that. I want to converse.”

“You can’t teach an old dogma new tricks,” she says.

“But what should I do?” I beg. “Where should I go?”

“The Algonquin,” she says. “Get a roundtable, eat, drink, talk about things... and listen.”

BINGO!

So now, slightly less often than once a month, I meet with friends and strangers in the lobby of the Algonquin hotel. Poets, musicians, thinkers… lesbians, homosexuals, people in their 20s and people in their 80s. We talk. When I’m tempted to jump in and listen to myself, I bite the inside of my thumb or squeeze my asscheeks together until the hemorrhoid hurts.

But slowly, ever-so-slowly, I listen and learn. Gavin and Boyd… come and join us! Smart people listening to each other. That’s what we need. I’ll shut up now and see what the other folks have to say.

See you in hell. 

MB

aka

Mykel Board

ENDNOTES: [You can contact me on facebook or by email at mykelboard@gmail.com. Through the post office: send those... er... private DVDs..or music or zines... or anything else (legal only!) to: Mykel Board, POB 137, New York, NY 10012-0003. If you like my writing, you can be notified when anything new is available. Send me an email with SUBSCRIBE in the subject line. Back blogs and columns are at https://mykelsblog.blogspot.com]

→ Join the conversation dept. If you’re in the NYC area or can be, we want YOU at the Algonquin Round Table, especially if you’re not white, not old, or/and not binary. We need to increase our diversity. If you’re interested in joining us, send me an email, and I’ll put you on the list. Just show up some month, introduce yourself, and converse.

→ Is that a handy wipe in your river, or are you happy to see me? Science News reports that an island the size of two tennis courts and composed entirely of used handy wipes (the Brits call ‘em wet wipes) has appeared in the Thames River that goes through London. Government ministers have asked people to stop using the wipes and are considering a ban. A Labor Party MP said she had visited the site: "I've ... stood on it -- it's a meter deep or more in places.” It's actually changed the course of the Thames."
    The Environmental Minister asked citizens not to flush the wipes. My question, if you don’t flush them, just where do you put them?

→ Accidents will happen dept: The British tabloid The Daily Mirror tells us about a man who may never be able to use his penis again after his partner accidentally sprayed expanding foam inside his urethra.The man was struggling with impotence and had been putting different items into the opening of his penis in a bid to stay firm. But his latest attempt ended in horror when his partner tried to use the straw of a can of insulation spray to keep him erect.
    His partner said she accidentally hit the button on top of the can, sending the foam into his penis. There, it hardened and “became anchored."
    Doctors had to cut a new opening between the man's scrotum and his anus to urinate and said he must pass a psychiatric test in order to qualify for “reconstructive surgery.”

See you in hell, redux,

MB

LINK TRADE DEPARTMENT:

I read that the search engines like lots of links... and it's also nice to support my friends and enemies in their blogs. So facebook me or email me if you have a blog, webpage or something else to connect to. I add you. You add me.

Here's a start:

You can see Gavin on Censored.tv... maybe the only place he's not blocked.

There’s a great interview with Sid Yiddish on YouTube. You can check it out here.

Here’s Richard Goldberg: goldberg.wordpress.com

Poetry and humor fans will like Justin Martin in The Latency

And my friend Mike R has a nice site with recipe hits from the past! (He cooked for me once... great stuff.) Check out Yesterday's Recipes.

And here's one by a member of ANTI-SEEN... a tour diary of sorts.

Andy Shelton has an interesting blog here.

Savage Hippie is a guy who has been YouTubing for a long time. Our opinions largely overlap... but he complains that I'm a Communist. I'm not! I'm a communist.

Chris Stecher publishes a zine called PRECIS. You can see the back issue links there... and he promises a new issue soon.

George Fertakis has a very nice graphics-heavy blog... with music and books featured prominently. If there’s no link here (I can’t find it temporarily), then Google… er… Duckduckgo him for information.

And my long-term pal Sid Yiddish contributes with his Mishegas Master Blog.

And connect to TRUST Zine, a long-running German punk zine… that STILL PRINTS!!! Yeah, they have a website too… of course! It’s here.

Here are a couple video links.

This from Jon Cox https://squelchchamber1.bandcamp.com/album/down-so-low

And this one from my very long-time friend Roger Armstrong.

Jim Testa moved his long running zine, Jersey Beat, to the blogosphere awhile back. You can read it here. Jim also recommended a kind of unique album… in a style you don’t see to much of these days… or any days. Neo-Hassidic Rock Opera. You can stream the album here.

Kyle Nonneman is in prison in Portland. At least he can’t be kidnapped by the secret police… I think. I post his blog for him, he can’t do it from the klink. Lots of stuff about noise metal… and some very weird politics that will either fascinate or repulse you… or both.

My long time pal, Jim Hayes rightfully complained about my leaving out his blog. He’s a great writer, so it was a tragic omission. Here it is.

Oh yeah, then there’s me. I have a blog of stuff I’ve written mostly from last century. You might enjoy it. Then again, you might not. It’s here.

Let me know if you have a blog… or a print zine… or a YouTube and want to be added to the list. You show me yours… you’ve already seen mine. god@mykelboard.com