NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH? Mykel's October 2024 Blog

Tuesday, October 1, 2024

The Truth! or Mykel's October 2024 Blog: YOU'RE STILL WRONG

You’re STILL Wrong
Mykel's

October 2024 Blog/Column

THE WHOLE TRUTH

If you tell the truth you do not need a good memory!

--Mark Twain

The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and must therefore be treated with great caution.

– J. K. Rowling

Gossip needn't be false to be evil - there's a lot of truth that shouldn't be passed around.

– Frank A. Clark

Somewhere in the south of France an invasion has come from somewhere in the north of Africa. A row of tanks… just left the warship… works its way from Marsailles toward Paris. Somewhere in the middle of that row… not the exact middle… maybe a place best described as forward middle… is a tank with a driver and two gunners.

The line of tanks stops … somewhere in an open field… maybe a farm. It’s quiet here in the late afternoon. The driver stands to open the hatch at the top of the tank. He’s a young soldier… mid-twenties at the latest. He reaches up to push the hatch open. As the young man stands... his right arm above his head holding the hatch open… a whistling comes across the sky. Then... an explosion… several. One of the little missiles hits the open hatch… explodes… blowing the man into the air… separating the man from the arm that opened the hatch. Carrying the man up and away from the tank… into the field. A pool of blood next to him makes a Rorschach pattern destined never to be interpreted. The next little missile hits the tank dead on… blowing the gunners inside into little pieces.

The now one-armed tank driver awakens on a cot in a field hospital. He barely notices his transfer from there to a truck… filled with portabeds… several of those lying on the beds moan loudly. A few scream out in pain. Others are dead still.

FLASH TO Emma Silverberg now looking into her mirror. She sees how her neck wrinkles where it meets her chest. There’s a little hollow in that spot… shaped like a sideways eye. She reaches behind her neck with her right hand… grabbing the skin of her neck… pinching it between her palm and fingers… watching the ugly little pocket disappear as the skin pulls tight.

“Maybe if I taped it,” she thinks. “Duct tape would hold… it holds everything.”

I’m imagining this as I sit in her living room waiting for her to meet me for dinner at Arby’s. I’ve been visiting her for almost ten months now. It’s part of a program called VISITING NEIGHBORS where lonely people who want company meet and go out to eat… or see a movie. Sometimes they need help getting around. Usually, they just need company.

Emma is slightly older than I am… just past eighty. It’s easy to see that she used to be a beauty. Her eyes remain bright blue and though the lids wrinkle on them, those eyes show an intensity that clearly melted the hearts of dozens of young men… and maybe women.

She did not grow fat in her old age, but I can tell that her weight shifted. Her breasts drooped. Her muscles turned soft and flabby. She still dresses like I imagine her dressing 50+ years ago. Tight black sweaters, short slinky skirts, shoes with heels so high and thin that, more than once, I’ve had to catch her in a stumble. It’s time for a change. I know that. And this evening I’m going to tell her.

She’s coming down the steps now. Gripping the banister tightly to keep her balance. She’s dressed like she always does, except tonight, she wears dark stockings with a single seam up the back… from ankle to that small area I’m unable to see.

“How do I look?” she asks me.

I take a deep breath. “I’m sorry Emma,” I say. “But someone has to tell you… You’re older than I am but you dress like a teenager. People laugh behind your back. They’re annoyed when you stumble in front of them in your too-high heels...” and I go on.

FLASH TO CALVIN, SITTING ON HIS MILK CRATE ON BLEECKER AND LAGUARDIA “Yo Calvin!” I say to him, “You been waitin’ for me?”

He laughs. “I’m always waitin’ for you,” he says, “or somebody else who’ll give me a dollar.”

I fish in my watch-pocket were I keep my homeless single dollar bills. I pull one out and hand it to Calvin.

I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn to face a very stern-looking woman, about 40. She frowns… pulling her eyebrows closer together… wrinkling her forehead.

“Why do you give him money?” she asks. “He could be working. You’re keeping him on the street. Let him get a job…. Do something.”

She walks away in a huff... like I’ve insulted her. I hope I have.

HANG ON: That story about the tank commander is true. That man was my father. The story was right from my one-arm dad’s mouth… I wasn’t there, but I believe every word of it. The story of Emma and my comments to her was a lie… made up on a bus on its way to from New York to Boston. (We’re almost in Danbury as I write this).

The third story, about Calvin, I’m not sure of. I remember somebody somewhere complaining about my giving money to street people, but the details are lost on me. File that one under I Don’t Know.

That’s what I want to write about this time: TRUTH… during this last political month… charges of truth and lies hurl back and forth like missiles in a battlefield. I’m here to tell you IT DOESN’T MATTER.

ASIDE: I’ve often written about my friend Dawn. We’ve known each other for around 40 years. Our opinions overlap: she’s a Democrat. I’m a social-libertarian. She’s a feminist. I’m a social-libertarian. She’s interested in the possible. I want the impossible. In any case, I respect her as a deep thinker… and one area we agree on is TRUTH. We both think the made-up Mykel mistreated the made-up Emma. Her feelings, her pride, her self-esteem are more important that THE TRUTH. My father’s dead now. The truth won’t hurt him.

AN EXAMPLE OF TRUTH AT IT'S WORST

=====================
This blog will be posted a month and a few days before the presidential election. I predict a Trump victory. Most of my readers will be happy to know my predictions are usually wrong. I, of course, will be voting for SID YIDDISH, as I have in most every presidential election since Harry Truman.

As I write this, the election has turned into a bunch of LIAR LIAR PANTS ON FIRE charges and counter charges. An army of fact-checkers calls out each side when one side says it advocated SHIT, where in TRUTH they advocated FUCK.

“I built a wall to keep out migrants,” says Donny the Trump.

“I helped draft legislation to make it hard for illegals to stay here,” answers Kamala the African-Indian.

“I helped draft legislation to make it hard for illegals to stay here,” answers Kamala the African-Indian.

No one says, “Let’s open up. Let’s let people go where they want to… live where they want to.” Oh no. That’s not realistic. (Code for able to be true.) Fuck realism. I want the impossible.

I don’t care if George Santos is really a gay son of holocaust survivors. I love the way he urged fellow-Republicans to come out of the closet. I love his creativity in making up an entire life: schools, jobs, personal history. These… er… trump any notion of TRUTH. His falsehoods are better than the truth can ever be.

FICTION is/can be more accurate than TRUTH… and it can reveal a greater truth than the truth itself.

“I stopped American jobs from going to China!” shouts Don in his brag about saving factory work.

“Together with President Biden,” counters the former and possibly future Prosecutor in Chief, “we have created more jobs than any president in the history of America.”

“No one should ever work.” is the opening sentence in a book by Bob Black called The Abolition of Work. Bob Black gets it. He tells both sides to fold the truth… the realistic…. the possible... into a long thin tube… and shove it up their collective asses. He does not talk about what’s real… likely... not even what can be achievable… but he’s right!

I don’t care if the Civil War was about slavery… as modern historians say… or only about not losing territory… as Abraham Lincoln said. It doesn’t matter which is true. Slavery had to go.

TRUTH is sometimes important… it’s how we learn and how we transfer knowledge… but it’s not the MOST important.

Like in my fictional account with Emma Silverberg, compassion is usually (always?) more important than truth. During that awful presidential debate there were “fact checkers” galore looking to catch a lie here or there. Who checks the fact checkers?

After the debate, factcheck.org wrote: Trump repeated his false claim that everyone — liberals and conservatives — wanted to end Roe v. Wade’s right to abortion.

That’s not true. Trump’s claim was that liberals and conservatives wanted THE STATES to decide about abortion rights. This may or may not be true, but the “fact” reported by factcheck is false.

Factcheck also said: The vice president claimed Trump’s economic policies led to “one of the highest” trade deficits in American history. But the annual trade deficits during the Biden administration have exceeded those under Trump.

Even by Factcheck’s own account, Harris said ONE of the highest trade deficits… not THE highest. It is likely BOTH had one of the highest. The fact-checker lied.

We could go on... but why? Why have a fact check at all? Why not just assume from the get-go that both sides are lying, and that there are things more important than the truth… especially compassion, vision, and goals… even if those goals are impossible... what people would call lies... they’re still more important than THE TRUTH.

Where are the compassion-checkers. Where are the source-checkers… what the source says may be fact or conjecture. Isn’t it more important to know if the source wants the same things you want? Where are the language manipulation checkers? The ones who value meaning over truth. The ones who catch the trick in I never shot John Smith… but you did stab him to death.

DONALD TRUMP: These are the people that she and Biden let into our country. And they're destroying our country. They're dangerous. They're at the highest level of criminality. And we have to get them out. We have to get them out fast.

KAMALA HARRIS: And let me say that the United States Congress, including some of the most conservative members of the United States Senate, came up with a border security bill which I supported.

COMPASSION CHECK: Bing: Lack of compassion-- BOTH candidates: People come to our country because conditions in their own country… often caused by US policies… are so bad they need someplace better. They are Emma Lazarus’s Retched refuse from foreign shores. Kicking them out is like kicking away a dog huddled under a roof to get out of the rain. It is pure cruelty… true or not.

KAMALA HARRIS: What Goldman Sachs has said is that Donald Trump's plan would make the economy worse. Mine would strengthen the economy

SOURCE CHECK: It is likely TRUE that Goldman Sachs said that. But do you want a country run by Goldman Sachs? Do you want Wall Street making the decisions on what’s a good economy and what’s a bad economy? Do you want a view of a “strengthened economy” where the stock market is up and the streets are ever more crowded with homeless people?

KAMALA HARRIS: And now in over 20 states there are Trump abortion bans which make it criminal for a doctor or nurse to provide health care

LANGUAGE CHECK: Is abortion “healthcare?” Nowhere in the world is it criminal for a doctor or nurse to provide healthcare. There are different definitions, however, on what healthcare is. Sometimes, abortion is clearly healthcare… where a birth can lead to the death of a mother, for example. Trump said he supports abortions in that case. In other cases, abortion may be provided by a healthcare worker, but it is not healthcare… except maybe mental healthcare, I’ll give it that.

Don’t get me wrong. I support abortion. Just walk down the street. You’ll see dozens of reasons to support abortion. There clearly should have been more of them… so many missed opportunities… But don’t call it healthcare just because a doctor does it. Is a facelift healthcare?

Get it? In national politics like in everyday interaction, there are things more important than the truth. I don’t care if Donald Trump improved the economy more than Joe Biden did. I care about what each consider an economic improvement. The truth is secondary (tertiary?). I don’t care if Kamala Harris came from a middle-class background and loved her nanny. How will a woman, who, for most of her life, worked to put people in cages, think of me if I end up on the street… needing to steal bread to eat for a day?

Catch words: extremism/ist leftwing, rightwing, fascist, authoritarian, communism/ist, air strikes… these are all ways to manipulate the language... truth or not.

Sometimes the truth is important, but, more often, there are things that matter more.

See you in hell,
MB

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]

→ MAYBE IT’S THE FUGU DEPT: In Japan, the number of people aged 100 or older has hit a new record – 95,119. Most of the centenarians are women, The world's oldest person, Tomiko Itooka of western Japan, is 116. Japan's oldest man, Kiyotaka Mizuno, 110, told local media that he has "no idea at all about what's the secret to my long life.”

→ BEFORE YOU WERE BORN DEPT: In the 1950s and 60s, nuclear weapons were considered insurance of peace through the theory of M.A.D. Mutually Assured Destruction. If you destroy me, I’ll destroy you, so we’d better not start anything.
    I haven’t heard that term in ages. But I did hear of a new “Global Strategy Company” a national full-service political consulting firm with expertise in government affairs, public relations, and electoral politics. You probably guessed right. The name of the company is just perfect for politics 2024:

More at: https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?pli=1#sent/KtbxLwgsxqWWLGLgRcRcqFZqjlxngZhkHL

→ BETWEEN THE LEGS DEPT: The NY Post reports that men with small dicks, on average, earn about triple what men with large ones earn. Since, elderly rich men get more nookie than elderly poor men… I hope the rumor spreads… just like her legs. Truth or not, for someone pushing 80, it’s certainly a better hook than my bank account.

→ SPEAKING OF SHORT DEPT: Our (unwarranted) obsession with truth is best exemplified by a website that says (among other things): Napoleon wasn’t short, Marie Antoinette didn’t say “let them eat cake,” and no witches were burned during the Salem witch hunts. That’s another problem with “the truth,” it keeps changing.

See you in hell, redux,
Mykel Board

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:

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.

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

Here’s an update on the current URL for Sid Yiddish’s Dating Game (type) entry.

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.

And for a quiet smile and a much needed break for you and the dog, try G.C. Adams’ YouTube entry.

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.

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

DAR! or Mykel's September Blog/Column

 

You’re STILL Wrong

Mykel's

September 2024 Blog/Column

DAR!

"It's kind of like some sort of… gay radar. I call it… the homometer."
                                            — Ed Helms on The Daily Show

Canadian psychologist Nicholas Rule studies social intuitions—the snap judgments we make about people we’ve just met. In a series of experiments, he and his colleagues tested people’s abilities to judge others’ sexual orientation, and came to the conclusion that gaydar is real. -- Psychology Today

Your vibe attracts your tribe.”
                                    – Unknown

Vibe high and the magic around you will unfold.
                                – Akilnathan Logeswaran

Sitting at the bar downstairs at the Peculier pub. I’m showing New York to Paula, one of a ton of my lesbo pals, just in from California. There are only a few of us here… it’s still early… clock would be striking 6 if the clock actually struck. For the moment no one else sits at the bar. A couple couples are at the well graffitied table around the main floor. Mac is the waitress. As is the custom here, the waitresses always show navel. (For some reason, all are innies… maybe that’s also a requirement.) Andrew, a former waiter who never showed navel is now behind the bar pouring beer and mixing drinks. Paula drinks a PBR. I drink an Ithaca Flower Power.”

We click our glasses and say “Baka yaroo!” Which I tell my English-speaking friends means “cheers” in Japanese… but actually means something like “you fuckin’ idiot”

“How’s the girlfriend?” I ask.

“Don’t ask…. That bitch!” answers Paula.

“Ouch!” I say, then laugh.

Right then… like a movie where the director cues the Enter The Mysterious Stranger^®, a girl walks in and up to the bar. Wow! I use my palms to push my eyes back into my head. Talk about MY TYPE. Concentration camp thin… a flawless face with just a touch of the oriental… one-hand cupable breasts… a built in pout. She stands next to me… leans over the bar to order an Imperial Stout from Andrew.

“You have good taste,” I say to her. “And tolerance up the wazoo for an imperial stout at 6 in the evening.”

She smiles.

I feel myself beginning to harden. Paula leans over and whispers something in my ear. It sounds like “Eyekul, Caesar Tyke,,, whore ket tit.”

I know my hearing is bad so I answer, “We’ll talk later, when there’s less noise” I say and return to my banal beer conversation with Mysterious Stranger^® As we talk, the bar fills up slightly. Among the new folks entering is a young woman wearing a short summer dress. Dark hair and skin with a touch of Indian (red dot, not feather) in it. The new entrancée looks around, spots Mysterious Stranger^® with us at the bar. She smiles walks over to us… to Mysterious Stranger^® actually… and kisses her hello. I don’t mean a peck on the cheek kiss, I mean a tongue deep passionate guess-where-my-tongue-will-be-next kiss.

“So long,” says Mysterious Stranger^® as she and the femmy girl walk to the back of the bar, and out of sight.

“Mykel,” Paula says to me, “did you hear what I said to you?”

I shake my head.

“I said, ‘Mykel, she’s a dyke.’ Didn’t you get the vibe?”

This brings me to the point of this blog-post. I’m notorious for not getting vibes. I have absolutely no GAYDAR. My friends who have the skill can smell one a mile away. To me, that girl just looks like an office lady. That guy looks like a CVS delivery boy. I just can’t tell. Two guys could be futt-bucking in a restroom stall and I wouldn’t know.

Of course it’s a liability…. Especially since my personal tastes go to butch girls and femmy guys… but I NEVER KNOW... unless I end up with some late night skin-to-skin. That skin-to-skin could be night-time nookie, or a fist to my jaw!

One of my friends: female… bisexual. (Not that I believe in that stuff… but that’s another post) says she’s got LAYDAR. This is a vibe detector that buzzes when the object is hot to trot. It works with any gender. What a great ability! I often wonder how many ready-to-goes I missed because I couldn’t tell… or the reverse… how many hours I wasted chasing after someone who’d get not further than “Let’s just be friends.” (Is there an uglier phrase in the English language?)

But GAYDAR and LAYDAR are not the only DARs I lack. There’s also GENDAR. It’s controversial with XY and XX and all that Olympics shit. But that’s not what I’m talking about. I mean just every day people, dressed in everyday non-gendered clothing. Sure, a beard is a dead giveaway. Balding helps too. But with a neutral haircut, neutral clothes: sneakers, jeans and a loose t-shirt… I can’t tell! Yeah, I love the middle look… “can’t tell” is sexy… but I also can’t bring myself to defile English and refer to one person as THEY. I know some girls like to hide their biology under a crewcut or even using Rogain on their face. That’s okay with me. But if you have a Santa Claus beard or the kind of face you’d want to lick the make-up from… LET ME KNOW WHAT’S UNDERNEATH DOWN BELOW! I can’t tell.

Then there’s JOKEDAR. People who know me know that I lie casually. I think lies are funny. When I’m out with my multinational friends, I pretend to show off by telling people CHEERS in Spanish is Besa mi culo… In German it’s Leck mich am Arsch. Actually, both phrases mean Kiss My Ass. I already explained how I hand the Japanese.In Tagalog, the main language of the Philippines, CHEERS is Putan ina mo! Oh yeah, that means Your mother is a whore. It’s one of my many playful habits, and I’m often at a restaurant or bar with friends, turning heads at other tables, making strangers laugh. But there’s always at least one… sometimes more… who come back with that’s not funny. Well, what is?

Lately, the only things people seem to find funny are jokes about politicians they don’t like. Are you one of those Stephen Colbert types who just says Donald Trump over and over, getting a laugh every time? Or worse are you part of the OFFENSE squad… like half of facebook and maybe all of Reddit who think nothing about politics, gender, race, or most anything else is funny… unless they agree with you? One of my “friends” on facebook banned me because I said Kamala Harris doesn’t look black. That wasn’t fully in jest… but it certainly lacks humor to take offense at it. If someone says I don’t look Jewish do I take offense? Of course not! I just unzip and pull out my ID. I’m not sure I even know what OFFENSE is! Sure I get angry at stuff. And sometimes people say things (mostly things about me) that make me sad… is that OFFENSE? I don’t know! I have no OFFENSEDAR!

Speaking of looking Jewish, another DAR I lack is JEWDAR. A story I often repeat is my visit to Kafka’s (yes, he was one too) grave in Prague. It was during Communist times, so I was an unusual American. As I stood looking at the tombstone, an older woman, who was removing branches and other debris from the grave spoke to me in English.

“Are you Israeli?” she asked.

“No,” I told her. “I’m from New York.”

“But you are Jewish…” she said with some authority.

How did she know? What was there? Of course the answer is that she had the Jewdar that I lack.

Last century, I wrote a song called Jews With Tattoos (which an Israeli pal of mine told me was a HIT in Israel!). In the beginning of that song, I wrote the cliched view of Jews: Glasses and a Hitchcock lip, big belly balding too. Lots of pimples, way too smart… Actually, I can’t tell. Does Ron Jeremy, the most famous male porn star in the world, look Jewish? Does Scarlett Johansson look Jewish? Sammy Davis Jr? David Diggs from the musical Hamilton?


I can’t tell, but the internet says he is one of us!

Okay, this next guy “looks Jewish.”

I'd say “Shalom” to him on the street. Otherwise I wish I were like those Chabad guys who come up to everyone passing and ask “Are you Jewish?” (Someday I’ll write about Chabad… I love those guys). Oh yeah, once in a record store I was looking at an LP and mentioned to the store owner that I know the guy on the cover… a fellow Jew.

“In New York, how do you know if someone is Jewish?” he asked me… clearly the tone of a joke in his voice.

“I wish I knew,” I answered.

“He’ll tell you,” he replied.

I walk down Bleecker Street, heading from Sixth Avenue toward the Peculier. A thin young man somewhat taller than me... long hair… the kind of face you’d want between your legs. He wears extremely baggy jeans and a t-shirt that says RANDOM across the chest. He stares into the cellphone in his right hand… poking at it as if angry. I figure he’s having trouble finding some place… learning –as we all do eventually– that among tall buildings, Google maps are wrong.

“Are you lost?” I ask him… as I often ask strangers poking at their cellphones.

He turns to me… wide-eyed and whispers. “We’re ALL lost.”

He raises one arm above his head and points to the sky. “We’re stray sheep,” he continues, his voice getting louder. “My phone is possessed. It’s been taken over by SATAN!” By now he’s screaming at me. “AND YOU ARE HIS AGENT! DON’T THINK I DON’T KNOW!”

Fuck! I have no NUTDAR! I can’t tell a looney until he’s right on top of me. I don’t care how good-looking he is… I don’t want this guy on top of me… I run.

FLASH RETURN TO THE PECULIER PUB: It’s Drink Club. I sit outside with my fellow imbibers, lying about how to say cheers in various languages. You know about that from JOKEDAR. We’re in one of those makeshift sheds that popped up during the plague. One of the many reasons I like eating and drinking outside is people watching. Bleecker Street is a human zoo sometimes.

We’re sitting outside as usual and this big guy passes us. As he does so, he looks directly at me.

“Wow! It’s great to see you!” he says, and then comes over to me and sits next to me. “Don’t you remember me?” he continues. “It was a couple weeks ago. You dropped your cellphone on the sidewalk and I picked it up and ran to you. My name’s Jim. You thanked me and said I owe you twenty bucks for that. You didn’t have it then, but that’s okay.”

“I’m Mykel,” I tell him, “in case you forgot.”

I have no memory of that incident… but I have no memory of most things. I call Mac over to the table. “Bring this guy a beer,” I say to her. She smiles and goes to fetch one. I pull out my wallet, take a twenty and give it to Jim.

“Sorry to take so long,” I say to him.

Mac brings Jim his beer. He drinks it in a fell swoop.

“Thanks, Mykel” he says. “Great to see you again.”

He gets up and leaves, heading toward Sixth Avenue and the subway. It’s only then that I realize it was fake and I lost $20 due to my lack of SCAMDAR. One of the few things I pride myself on is my ability to recognize fakes… but even that I can’t do with the accuracy I’d like. I got taken!! A sincere face... a good story... a friendly hug saying we’ve known each other for a long time. POW, I’m as much of a sucker as the tourists who fall for the pea-shuffles under the shells.

What exactly are these DARS I don’t have. Most people I’ve asked describe it as a VIBE. A feeling that transfers automatically from one person to the next,,, like the smell of unwashed armpits. Sometimes I get the impression of other people. If they’re happy… or angry… or sad. But that comes from a smile, a frown, a fist pounding on a table. Maybe a tear on the cheek. But that’s not a vibe.

A vibe is something mysterious. Something that transfers silently through the air. Happiness without a smile. Anger without a clenched fist. Lust without a pants bulge. I’m aware these vibes exist. Many of my friends have all kinds of them. Some even divide the world into people sending good ones and bad ones. These friends try to explain vibes to me, but I don’t get it. I’m like a person born blind that friends are describing BLUE to. It’s useless. I just can’t understand.

So, for future reference. If you’re an attractive tough girl… at least if you’re a girl who can beat me up… you’ll have to tell me you want me. If you’re a young femmy guy… like to start at the bottom… you’ll have to rest your hand between my legs before I’ll be aware of how you feel.

I am vibeless.

See you in hell,
MB

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]

-→Test Yourself Dept: Here’s a test I found on the internet. Just from visual vibes, you have to guess who is straight and who is gay. Let me know how you do. (I got 47% correct… worse than chance) Part of the problem could be that they showed a side-by-side pictures and asked to choose right or left. I couldn’t guess if they meant MY right/left or the people in the picture’s right/left. My 47% was based on the former assumption.

→ Movies about Everything Dept: In researching this blog I discovered there’s a movie called “Under The Gaydar.” (See the reviews in IMDB) And RON JEREMY is in it! I can’t find it for free on-line, so maybe one of you can tell me how to do that. The plot, by the way, is the story of a guy whose parents fear is gay. So they hire a girl to seduce him and turn him straight. The guy is actually straight, and gets to screw some beautiful girls, paid for by his parents.

→YOU’RE INVITED dept: If you’re in New York on a Thursday, come and join us at Drink Club. Just look for the Drink Club sign or ask the bouncer at the door.

RETURN TO THE NATION DEPT:

I found a stack of old issues of THE NATION and want to recommend some great pieces there. First there’s an article by Aida Chavez that says Biden is using the same order that the Trump administration used to expel migrants at the border without a hearing. I’m guessing we can expect Biden’s VP to do the same if she gets the chance.

There’s also another fascinating piece about “Foundation Colonialism.” That is those charities (like the Bill & Melinda Gates one). It seems that while they give away a lot of money, MOST of it is to organizations based in Western Countries. Their “help” is usually spreading Western medicine (big Pharma), farming (GMOs, heavy fertilizer use), etc. to countries who can and should use the more native-- and cleaner, though less profitable for big industry-- methods.

LINK TRADE DEPARTMENT:

I did a nice interview with The Aither zine. Interesting questions many I’d 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:

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.

Also on bandcamp: My very long time faves in NYC, the BLACKOUT SHOPPERS. Featuring pals Seth, superstar comic writer, Justin Melkmann and possibly the next vice-president of the US, Charles Bukkake.

Here’s an update on the current URL for Sid Yiddish’s Dating Game (type) entry.

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.

And for a quiet smile and a much needed break for you and the dog, try G.C. Adams’ YouTube entry.

You already know Murder & Mayhem zine… those guys who did the Mykel Board centerfold. (No genitals shown… and probably for the better.) Their on-line 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!

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.

Longtime writer, Randall Fleming, has a new book out about the reversal of flag desecration. In his view, the right And more generally it’s about political violence in the 21^st century.

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.

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

The Anecdote To Your Problems or Mykel's August 2024 Blog: YOU'RE STILL WRONG

You’re STILL Wrong
Mykel's

August 2024 Blog/Column

The Anecdote To Your Problems

If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it.

                    -- Margaret Fuller

Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.
                    -- Douglas Adams

Honey to heal a wound. Cherries for gout. Cod-liver oil— blech!—to keep your eyes healthy. Your grandmother and her doctors probably swore by these fixes, and now science is catching up with them.
                    -- Jen McCaffery and Tina Donvito

Anecdotal fallacy is when someone uses a personal story or a few individual cases to make a broad claim. Just because it happened to one person doesn't mean it's a universal truth. The bigger picture often involves research and data that can offer a more accurate view.
                    --Practicalpie.com

Practicalpie...You’re wrong!

                    -- Mykel Board

I’m more frustrated than a chimp with his fist stuck in a jellybean jar. My left testicle itches… not the whole thing… just one spot.. about an inch down from where the skin joins the leg. It’s a narrow piercing itch, like I’ve been stabbed by a knitting needle and instead of pain, the reaction is… ITCH. As intolerable as pain… as severe as pain… only not pain… itch. I’m at a table in the library… a great old building... used to be a church, I think. A winding staircase connects the floors. The table, nice wood, about 5 feet wide by 15 feet long. Seven other people sit at the table… about two feet between us. I feel like I have to grab myself… between the legs… and scratch, rub… or insert my hand under my belt and rake my nails over the offending part. I’m too shy to do any of that… Yeah, there’s the bathroom under an arch on the other side of the reading room. Must be all-gendered because a line of people… boys and girls… waits to get in. I can’t wait.

I move my left hand under the table… pretend I’m scratching my knee. Slowly, I raise the hand up scratching my thigh. I realize my upper arm, pressing against the table shakes the furniture. People look at me, squinting in anger. I stop scratching. Now I squeeze my thighs together, rubbing them… one against the other. No… no… this won’t work. I can’t take it. I stand… the itch gets vaguely lighter. I walk out of the library…. Run home… grab a bottle of rubbing alcohol from the rack on the bathroom door… drop trou… bathe the affected part in 90%… ow… ow… ow… aaaaah. Relief.

FLASH TO ABSTRACTION: Strangely, I find people who are non-religious… even atheist... talk about their advantages as being blessed. They talk about being grateful for their good hearing or their ability to write books. I don’t get it. If you are BLESSED with something… who (what) did the blessing? You can’t be blessed unless someone blesses you. On Passover, I bless the matzoh. I do the blessing. The matzoh is blessed. It is not part of the ritual for the matzo to bless me. I don’t know how it could.

Jordan licks the tip after giving me the best blowjob I’ve had in years. I’m GRATEFUL. I received the gift from Jordan. I’m grateful TO Jordan for the gift. You cannot be grateful for something unless you’re grateful TO someone.

FLASH TO REALITY: I am grateful to my friends who disagree with me. There are a lot of people in the world who disagree with me. Most I’ve never met. Some stopped being my friends because they don’t like my politics, my attitude, my brown skin tags. But I also have friends who I’m grateful to for continuing the discussion. For contradicting me, but remaining friends. For sitting and talking and disagreeing… for pointing me in a new direction… for teaching me how other people think… for putting up with my scratching under the table. My friends tell me about the way they look at the world. Sometimes they think things, maybe repeat what they’ve heard elsewhere, try to discuss with logic. Even when they get to the eye-rolling stage, they don’t give up on me... at least they don’t give up being my friend. I’m grateful to them for their friendship… for their willingness to explain… for their presence. I’m not blessed to have such friends. No one gave them to me. But I am grateful TO them.

“Okay Mykel,” says literary device, “can you put the pieces together? What does being blessed, being grateful, and having cool friends have to do with an itchy testicle? Can you connect the dots… er… scrota?”

Ah, literary device. I’m lucky she’s there whenever I need her. I’m grateful to myself for inventing her. The gist of this blog came from a lunchtime conversation I had with Jim and Dawn. They are two of my friends who often disagree with me, but despite that disagreement, remain my friends. I’m grateful TO them for that. We’re talking about the American healthcare industry. I say that I’ve been to 71 countries, and among the ones called First World, the US system is the worst… even beating some Second and Third worlders. It’s the only country you have to PAY for an ambulance to take you to the hospital. And I’m talkin’ hundreds of dollars.

[NOTE: Since I posted this, a European friend has told me that they charge 71 euros in Belgium for an ambulance. That's still less than half of what they charge in New York, See how important anecdotes are?]

I tell them about my pal Marilyn, who when in England suddenly developed a stomach something or other. She was staying in a cheapish hotel, and crawled to the concierge to ask how much a doctor would cost and where she could find one.

“If you’re sick you go to the doctor… or a hospital. It doesn’t cost. You just go,” comes the answer. “Want me to call you an ambulance?”

“How m.. m… m…?” starts Marilyn.

“Pay for an ambulance? That’s crazy.” says the hotel lady. “That sounds like something from a Sci Fi movie. You know: dystopia.”

“Anyway, I don’t need one.” answers Marilyn. “Could you just get me the address of a doctor? I’ll take a taxi.”

I don’t know the diagnosis. A rotten crumpet maybe. But she saw a doctor, got diagnosed, maybe a prescription… and it was over. She paid the cab fare… that’s all.

“That’s anecdotal,” says Dawn when I relate the story. “You can’t go by what a person says. You need the science… the statistics.”

“Okay,” I say. “How ‘bout my London pal Alestair?” He had the same kind of prostate cancer I had. Went for the radiation. 20 treatments… one every two weeks. He just finished up… 7 months after diagnosis.

“Still anecdotal,” says Jim. “I’ll look it up. The cellphone comes out pop-doodle-pop.

“Google lists long wait times as one of the worst things about the British system. See? You can’t go by anecdotes.”

“You trust Google more than you trust my friends?”

“It’s science,” answers Dawn. “An anecdote is only what some people say happened to them. It could mean anything.”

SPEAKING OF THE INTERNET: Wikipedia tells me: Lies, damned lies, and statistics" is a phrase describing the persuasive power of statistics to bolster weak arguments. It’s one of the best, and best-known critiques of applied statistics. It is also sometimes colloquially used to doubt statistics used to prove an opponent's point. The phrase was popularized in the United States by Mark Twain (among others), who attributed it to the British prime minister Benjamin Disraeli.

FLASH TO MY BALLS: I don’t need Google-verified statistics. Rubbing alcohol works for me, so I use it. If you have the same problem, try it. If it doesn’t work for you, try something recommended by someone else. I posted a question on facebook asking people what they used in a way NOT recommended by the manufacturer or a white-coated salesman in doctor drag. Here are a few of the answers:

• I use Claritin over the Rx for my vertigo.

• Antiperspirant on feet. If I use it in the armpits, my lymph nodes swell up, so I have to use antiperspirant-free deodorant.

• Flonase for vertigo and mosquito bites

• I’ve heard that mouthwash is effective against an itchy scalp.

• I use yeast infection creme (Monestat) behind my ears

• I use the heartburn med Tagamet (which is a histamine blocker) and sucks for heartburn as an antihistamine to treat hives and allergies.

• Skin so Soft by Avon of all people repels deer ticks and mosquitoes

All this information is ANECDOTAL… yet I’d try any one of these tricks in a minute, over a scientifically proven (and advertised) cure. Anecdotes are REAL PEOPLE. They are not statistics. They are not victims of control groups, placebos, or tests the results of which will reverse themselves in 2 months. Anecdotes are my balls and Marilyn’s British stomach virus. Google statistics don’t mean a damn thing.

This is a religious-like worship of an absolute GOD of science with Google as its bible. It claims a truth as demanding as the belief that Jesus walked on water. It is a belief that rejects PEOPLE It rejects experience and replaces it with numbers.

I once got a mailing from some atheist group. It came with a sticker that said I BELIEVE IN GOOD… adding an O to the religious mantra. Well, I believe in GOODMAN… Frank Goodman who lives next door. And I believe in Abdula, Owasu, Tetsuya, Bob… and all the humans out there who have tried it out and passed it on. I believe in bodies more than test tubes... experience more than statistics… health reports more than dissection.

I WANT anecdotal evidence. If science tests 100 people and 76 of them get hair regrowth after drinking piss… I want to know what’s up with the other 24. Are they more like me? Do they have something special that keeps the baldness?

One of the most important people in my life is Sid Yiddish. I’ve voted for him for President in every election this millennium-- except when I voted for Obama. (What a mistake THAT was.) Sid will not eat food or take medicine if he doesn’t like the taste. He doesn’t eat fish, drink anything cola-flavored, hates mint and licorice. If he tells me something “is bad,” I know enough to ask, “Is it because of the taste or because it doesn’t work?” He is a real person and his opinions and recommendations can be narrowed down and explained. Those 24 people who had no success with piss drinking… Did they even try? What makes them different than the others? How could I ever know?

Get it? In my anti-science rampage, I’m running my jeep through the crowd of science supporters… flinging them… bloody... from the grill… left and right… ahead too so I can run them over. The story of their demise? ANECDOTAL of course. It’s not science until we have a test case… a crowd of Christians perhaps… crossing the street. Slammed into with a Tesla... the scientific method. Does the same thing happen both times? Is it reported in a respectable journal? Were the subjects strictly controlled? Does Google know about it?

Jen McCaffery and Tina Donvito (see quote at the beginning of this blog): You’re Right! Anecdotes are the Olympian runners. Science can only catch up.

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]

→ MISSED IT BY THAT MUCH Dept.: Right after the Donny Trump ear attack, my pal Ed. opined, “It’s a fake! It sounded like a pop gun” He was met with a pooh pooh chorus. But I just read about how Teddy Roosevelt’s “attempted assassination” guaranteed him the presidency for a second term. And the more I think about it, the more it seems logical. What are the odds of such a close call? Some innocent shlub takes a bullet “to show the attack was real.” Who compared the deadly bullet with the one in the ear? No one! Isn’t it convenient that the shooter was killed before he could be questioned? Holy Lee Harvey Oswald batman! Next blog: CONSPIRACY?

→ COVID-24 DEPT: And speaking of conspiracies. Isn’t it a bit odd that the weak candidate, Joe Biden, should come down with Covid just in the middle of his campaign? After the bigwigs call on him to cut his losses and run, POW! Isolate in Delaware. In national policy, the guy wasn’t so bad. If he weren’t such a war-lover, I’d almost vote for him. Looks like the Dems are gonna lose everything this year. (I almost wrote “this ear”). LATE NEWS: Joe pulls out of the race. Turns it over to Kamala. Frankly, I think Sid has a better chance this year than he’s ever had before. He’s got my vote… again.

→ TOLD YOU SO DEPT: BBC News reports that one of the recent winners of the Nobel Prize for medicine discovered a breakthrough drug after poring over 2,000 ancient herbal recipes. Dr Tu Youyou's discovery, the anti-malarial artemisinin, derived from wormwood, is credited with saving millions of lives. From opium in poppies, to quinine derived from the cinchona tree, to digoxin from foxgloves, there are many gems unearthed from the past that have true testable medical benefits. All this was pre-science… just anecdotal… hundreds of years of anecdotes. Science is just catching up.

→COULD SEE THAT COMING DEPT: USA Today reports that Dustin Ebey, 35, a math teacher from north Texas, has changed his legal name to Literally Anybody Else and is running a write-in campaign for president of the United States. ABC13-TV reported that Else has revealed his running mate, Neal David Sutz, a New Yorker who is currently living in Switzerland. Else said Americans deserve better than the divisive, partisan electoral system we currently have. "This name gives everybody something to point to, to channel, that belonging to one movement, to one message that could hopefully have a meaningful impact," Else said.

See you in hell redux, 
MB

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:

Mike Diana often censored great Boiled Angel comic artist invites you to check out his material. Take a look at it at: http://mikedianacomix.com/boiled-angel 

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.

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

Here’s an update on the current URL for Sid Yiddish’s Dating Game (type) entry.

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.

And for a quiet smile and a much needed break for you and the dog, try G.C. Adams’ YouTube entry.

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’Brian asked me to include the site: anti-war.com They seem to be folks after my own heart.

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