• Random Access Memories

    Symptomatic Nerve Gas Is Dead

    My current struggles with air quality at my work have reminded me of something from nearly 20 years ago – the “Symptomatic Nerve Gas” guy. This was a street character that I used to see out and about when I was still living in Eugene. I moved from there in 1985, but still remember running into the guy when my friend Jean and I would go to clubs for live music and dancing. We’d spot him and start chanting “symptomatic nerve gas” to each other, because that’s all we ever heard him say. I was astounded just now after Googling…

  • Hot Off The Presses

    WHIG Bombshell:

    Don’t let the bright colors and screaming banner ads put you off, this is going to turn out to be important in the tale of how the WHIG party orchestrated the war in Iraq. First, you form a sekrit club and have meetings about stuff you want to get done, like knock off countries you don’t like because they’re not American enough and have a lot of oil that you might like to have. Then you give a journalist a really, really juicy scoop that paints that country as teh evil. Then you use that published story to justify why…