Comedy

Dispatch From The Cactus Patch….April 26, 2024

/ Phil Strawn / 14 Comments

Elon Loves Me Two Times….

I must be doing something right: Twitter has banned me twice in the last month. Calling out a violent Hamas-loving terrorist protester for assaulting a minister will get you banned, but not loading videos of murder, rape, and assault that is deemed acceptable. I will wear my banishment like a new suit. Also, WordPress AI took over my first post and made crazy alterations, so I deleted part of it. This is the newer version.

I love Cows: what’s not to love about them? I once had a herd of Bovines and Horses, Goats, Mules, and Chickens. I never saw the Cows interact with the Chickens except to kick them out of their way. Now we have the Chicken Flu in Cows milk. How did this happen? I fear the DEI movement has taken hold of American dairy farms. Cows are now forced to intermingle with the lowly Chickens, all in the name of equality and diversity, and thus, we have the Cows infected with the Chicken Flu, which Faucci says is ten times more deadly than the Covid thing. I’m not buying it and will continue to drink my hot milk and Ovaltine. Chicken Flu be damned.

WordBook Has Arrived…

I knew it was going to happen: WordPress is morphing into FaceBook. The current climate of protest and hate on our expensive kindergartens known as universities is spilling over into WordPress blogs and comments sections, something that has crippled FaceBook in recent years. Is it only me, or have any of you noticed that the hardcore educated liberals waste no time in going after folks who don’t agree with their ideology? I guess that a teaching degree, a social science degree, or a master’s degree in Taylor Swift’s Music theory gives them the fortitude to admonish others who live in the real world. Now, the old Sniffer wants to ruin the stock market with a 45-50 percent capital gains tax, which will decimate retirees’ stock accounts and destroy American capitalism in one swipe of his Nancy Pelosi Model fountain pen. Let us hope there is enough brain power in Congress to stop this socialist madman.

Grifter Swifter

/ Phil Strawn / 12 Comments

The original Tortured Poet

After reading all the glowing, foot-kissing reviews of Swifter’s new album, “The Tortured Poet’s Department,” I take back a few of the skews I gave her, but only a few. I had no idea the poor dear had lived such a sad life. I doubt her feet touched the ground until she was five years old, and every spoon in the house was pure silver. A downtrodden, entitled little rich girl confined to her Barbie bedroom writing little kid songs on her half-size Martin guitar. She never played in a bar, a club, or anywhere for that matter, except for her doll babies. Pop’s paid millions to get her into that Nashville brotherhood, which shows us how far that once holy ground has slipped. Did the poor waif have ever have a decent relationship with a male, not counting her current knuckle dragger? Doubt it, so the tortured poet title might fit her, even though what she writes is far from good poetry.

There have been many before her who qualified for the title: Harry Nillson, John Lennon, Bobbie Gentry, James Taylor, and Willie Nelson are a few. The original Homeric tortured poet, Bob Dylan, still holds the title: Swifter is no more than a grifter.

Say It Ain’t So Billy Joe…An Ode To Teenage Love

/ Phil Strawn / 20 Comments

After a few months of rehearsals and gigs with our new members, Danny and Marshall, Alice, our manager, announced that she had arranged an audition for a female singer for the band. No consulting the boys on this one; it was full ahead. Alice had good ideas, so we rolled with them. She thought some femaliaty would add depth and make us more audience-friendly, since we were a bunch of surly young men with longish hair and the attitude to accompany our looks.

She knew someone who had a neighbor who knew another neighbor of a family who lived next door to a lady who attended church with a woman who had a daughter who sang in the choir at school and did solos at church, so Alice, one step ahead of us, escorted her into the practice room and announced, ” Boys, this is Miss Janelle.”

In walks, this teenage girl with a full-grown woman’s head of long hair piled up in a big bump on top and then down past her shoulders. She was a dead-ringer for Bobbie Gentry. But could she sing?

A TV dinner tray sat by Marshall’s organ, used for drinks and lyric sheets, so the auditioning singer pulled from a Coppertone beach bag a few record albums, a book of lyrics, a TAB cola, and a framed 8×10 autographed photo of Bobbie Gentry. Now we knew why she looked so much like Bobbie Gentry…she dug the gal.

Danny asked Miss Janelle what songs she knew. ”

Do ya’ll know any Dusty Springfield, Petula Clark, Diana Ross, LuLu, Sonny and Cher, Marianne Faithful, April and Nino, Dione Warwick, Lesli Gore, Ronnie Spector?” she asked.

Danny said, “Nope” we are a rock band, not the Ed Sullivan Show.

That kind of busted her bubble a little bit. “Well,” she says, ” How bout some Bobbie Gentry? I just love her and she is my favorite singer in my whole life.” We had already figured that out from the picture and the hair-du.

Our inquisitive drummer, Barry, interrupted her, ” Isn’t that the song where she and the boyfriend throw a baby child off a bridge into the muddy river?”

Miss Janelle whirled around and yelled, ” No, moron, she didn’t throw no itty-bitty-baby off a bridge; it was a bouquet of Mississippi wildflowers to solidify her big love for her man Billy Joe Macallister, but then he got caught dating his aunties pet sheep, causing him to jump off the old bridge into the muddy Tallachee river. Bobbie sent me a letter, along with this picture, explaining the whole song, but I promised to keep it a secret. We’re friends, you know.”

She thinks hard for a minute, then says, ” The only Rock-N-Roll song I know is Gracie Slick’s Somebody To Love. Ya’ll know that one?” We sort of knew it, so we gave it a go.

The lass let loose and was jumping around like Tina Turner, hair flying everywhere, strutting and shimmying, doing the Bug-a-loo, the Monkey, The Watusi, and a few others while singing. When we ended the tune, Marshall, our organ player, was staring her down with those big pansy-boy watery Puss-N-Boots eyes. He clearly had a severe case of the “Hubba Hubba’s” for this gal. Danny told us that this happens about once a week and he will be alright once he gets home and eats his mama’s hot supper. Alice announces she is marvelous and is now part of the band. Okey-dokey.

The next rehearsal, Miss Janelle comes in with red eyes and mascara trails down her cheeks. All sniffily and weepy, she says, ” My boyfriend said I can’t sing with a bunch of degenerate rock musicians. We are in love, big-time, and I must quit the band now.” Still in the grip of the Hubba-Hubba’s, Marshall puts a consoling arm around her shoulders and tells her, “it can’t be all that bad.”

She barks at him, ” Shut up, Moon Doggy….It’s my party, and I’ll cry if I want to.”

And with that, she packed her Coppertone beach bag with her albums, lyrics book, TAB cola, and the autographed picture of Bobbie Gentry and left, leaving the air heavy with teenage perfume, hair spray, and juicy fruit gum. Then…..More to come in my series.

Dispatches From The Cactus Patch: April 19th, 2024

/ Phil Strawn / 18 Comments

Doing my best Joe Walsh impression

It’s been a taxing week in The Cactus Patch. I’ve discovered that the television news makes my face break out. During my teenage years, I had but a few dozen pimples, while my buddies’ tortured faces resembled a Fire Ant attack. Now at almost 75, my facial skin is red, rashy, bumpy, and pissed off. I fear it may be the newscast that causes stress and anxiety, which leads to the facial condition. I plan a visit to a Dermatologist to assess the damage.

Headlines That Will Make Your Head Explode And Require You To Wrap Yourself In Cottenelle Toilet Paper and Duct Tape To Stop The Splatter On Your Wife’s Newley Painted Walls…

Couldn’t find Cottonelle, so I used the Happy Bear’s Butt paper.

The attack on Israel from 12th-century Iran, a land full of self-flagellating fanatics with modern weapons and TikTok, has America in a tizzy, and it’s likely the cause of my skin condition. If the Shah and his Missus, two well-dressed cafeteria Muslims, were still alive and in charge, there would be large air-conditioned shopping malls, Starbucks, and Ikea stores, giving the citizens something more to do than mill around in the street and shout, “Death to Isreal, Death to the great Satan, America.” I would think this behavior would get as stale as last week’s bagels after forty years. I read that Israel counter-attacked the Mullahs overnight. A well-planned strategic Puma-pounce, carried out by young pilots, both men and women who are wide-eyed and prickly aware of the unfolding biblical implications. Mainstream media, meaning all the morning propaganda shows disguised as “drink your coffee with us while you shoot up with your Ozempic,” programming says “Israel is to blame” for the attack on Iran. Well, no kidding. The Israelis were reluctant to contact the White Nursing Home for fear that Old Sniffer would rat them out to the Mullahs, which it appears is what Blinken may have done. The word BLAME in their statements should tell us all we need to know about their true feelings.

Coming To America…not the Eddie Murphy movie

Job? I Don’t Need No Stinking Job!

NPR Field reporter Maya Sharona was at the Texas/Mexico border on Thursday morning, interviewing ” future citizens” as they wiggled under the razor wire.

An invader dressed in a new jogging suit and Nike sneakers agreed to speak to her.

Maya Sharona: Sir, welcome to our country, could I have your name and your destination?

Invader: “Oh, Hi there, you scurrilous bitch of a white woman; my name is Juan Valdez from Venezuela, and I am headed to New York City to join up with my compadres in MS-13, you know, the gang boys. I’m real excited about my prospects in your weak stupid country.”

Maya Sharona: “Sir, do you plan to find a job once you reach the Big Apple?”

Invader: ” Job? I don’t need no stinking job. Papa Joe is giving me a 10 thousand-dollar debit card, free housing in a five-star hotel, a new iPhone, a Social Security Card, A voting card, Welfare, free food, a new car of my choice, and all the white girls I can assault all your daughters and wives..where are the white girls? A job would get in the way. Say, you are a nice looking chica, how about we step behind that large steel wall, and by the way, how do you like my new 9MM Glock? gimme your purse.”

Snack Time In New Guinea

/ Phil Strawn / 13 Comments

” Yum Yum eatum up”

The old Chief Sniffer should have been a dime novel author.

“My uncle was eaten by cannibals on the island of New Guinea” is his latest contribution to his resume of fantastical yarns. That could have certainly happened; the tribes in New Guinea are renowned for their culinary skills. Now, come to find out, it’s a whopper of a lie. He was fact-checked in-depth and has told this one before. His poor uncle perished in a plane crash near New Guinea in WW2: And why would Sniffer tell a group of United Steel Workers this story? The fun begins when this guy goes off script or loses a notecard; that’s when he fancies himself to be good old Will Rogers from Scranton, PA.

Behavior like this is quite normal for folks with Dementia or drunk authors. I should know: my two late uncles were masterful spinners of incredible yarns and a few lies here and there. My cousins tell me I am afflicted with the same virus.

Hemmingway never wrote a line without the accompaniment of liquor, and Edger Poe didn’t draw a sober breath for decades: a serious conversation with a Raven made him famous.

President Sniffer is no Hemmingway or Poe, just a mentally ill old man that folks feel sorry for while he destroys our Republic. Maybe Jill should publish his yarns? You know it would be a New York Times bestseller.

A Tiny Late-Night Rant from The Cactus Patch….

/ Phil Strawn / 8 Comments

It’s already started in a mere 24 hours. Poor OJ Simpson, the maligned ex-football player who couldn’t keep a large knife out of his hands, is being turned into a 20 over-par saint. He only wanted to ” have some fun,” as Sheryl Crow warbled. Considering the crime he committed and the families he destroyed, it’s a surprise he lasted this long without some do-gooder taking his sorry butt out. If there is payback from God, I hope he is getting a double dose of it now. Of course, all the high school and elementary kids who jumped and cheered when he was found innocent are now middle-aged adults or older, so I wonder if they still idolize a murderer? It might be interesting to hear from a few of them. My late father was dying from brain cancer during the OJ show trial. He told me that OJ would get off on the race card, and sure as hell, he was right. The trial gave my pop something to watch and focus on, so I thank the Hollywood judge and the defense lawyers for that much.

Breaking News: Iran is going to attack Israel within two days as retaliation for killing one of their top terrorist thugs. Those turbine-wearing imbeciles don’t get it. The people of Isreal are God’s chosen people, and anyone who comes against them will suffer God’s wrath. Did it ever occur for the Ayatolla to read a Bible? Best of luck to Iran if they think they can pull this one off without a major butt-kicking. Iran will likely wait until Saturday to move; that way, our Sniffer in Chief will be on vacation and whacked out on heavy meds. We should be worried that “Not A Doctor” Jill might have the keys to the red button while her mixed green salad for brains hubby is sleeping.

Poor Congress: still putting on their fake push and shove to convince us that both sides are working for the peons, which would be us’ins. The speaker will cave, as he always does. Neither side wants to give up their insider trading: ” What am I supposed to live on when I leave…Social Security? Can’t you hear them squealing right now? It’s a good ole boy’s private club, and we are not invited.

One final note: Momo is going, by bus, with a large contingent of women from our church and hundreds, if not millions of other churches in Texas, to our state capitol in Austin on Saturday. The planned peaceful protest is to let Gov. Abbott know that the schools, the woke teachers’ union, and DEI cannot have our children’s souls without a fight. Besides getting to stomp and yell for a few hours, the bus is stopping at Bucee’s for a potty break and lunch. I can see it now; An Ozsarka bottled water and a bathroom break will cost me $ 50.00. She hasn’t said if signs, pitchforks, or torches will be involved, but knowing her, there may be. Those green-haired fishing tackle-faced, Birkenstock-wearing, Mao-worshiping, booger-eating, pimple-faced, Starbucks-drinking students at UT haven’t had the pleasure of getting their skinny jeaned-wearing rears kicked by a bunch of senior citizen women wearing heavy orthopedic shoes with steel toes. I have a large stash of cash in case I need to drive to Austin to post bail. My apologies to Coach Darrell Royal; may he rest in peace. God Bless Texas and Davy Crockett.

Easter Evening From The Cactus Patch

/ Phil Strawn / 11 Comments

It was a rather quiet Sunday here in the Cactus Patch. The church service was pretty good, the band on stage was stellar, and the Pastor gave a rousing benediction using Acts as his vehicle. We left a little early to make a late lunch engagement with Momo’s daughter’s family in Fort Worth. We were both worn out from attending the Liverpool Legends concert on Saturday night at the Granbury Opera House. Dancing in the aisles, old folks holding up their lit phones since they banned Bic lighters, and most folks don’t smoke anymore. An ambulance was waiting at the curbside in case any of the audience suffered the Rock n Roll vapors. Good time. Then…

“Are You A Boy..Or Are You A Girl?”

A catchy tune from 1965 by the band “The Barbarians,” a tongue-in-cheek poke at long-haired hippie dudes with beautiful Breck Shampoo flowing hair. Being well into my 70s, it takes a lot to surprise or tick me off, especially if it comes from Washington, D.C. Now, I find out that today, Easter Sunday, the holiest of days in our Christian faith, has been officially recognized by the white house as “Transgender Visibility Day.” Who in the Hell made this decision? I would say our president, but then he is supposedly a cafeteria Catholic and doesn’t at this time have the mental capacity to recognize what a slap in the face to Christian Americans he has delivered. Of course, the blowback is off the charts. Stay tuned for masses of pilgrims marching on Washington with torches and pitchforks.

If a teenage boy wants to dress like a teenage girl; go ahead. Same for the girls that want to wear a pair of Levis, Tocava boots, and a lumberjack shirt, do it, but shut up about it. You don’t need a special calendar day for the rest of America to see you are a nut job. At ten years old, I wanted to be Mark Twain, but I didn’t prematurely age myself and wear a white suit and wig. Thank the Lord the world didn’t have social media back then. TikTok, Facebook, and all the rest should take a huge chunk of the blame for this madness; radical teachers and Hollywood take the rest. No matter how dangerous and sick, the newest trends become the life our children grasp to follow. And now, no matter how small, the movement has its special day on the world calendar. Did someone in DC not check for conflicting dates? Was this intentional? I believe it was and it pokes a sharp stick in the eye of Christian Americans. I’ve seen it all and can stop worrying about future surprises. There, I feel better.

“So You Want To Be A Rock N’ Roll Star”

A few other great bloggers I follow, Dave of “A Sound Day,” Max of “Power Pop,” and Cincinnati Babyhead, have previously suggested that I chronicle my times in the Rock music world back in the 1960s. I have decided to give it a healthy shot; although I am timid about blowing my little tin horn, I will attempt to make it as humble and accurate as possible.

Put Those Dark Glasses On…It’s The End Of The World

Yep, I’m ready. Momo and I got our cardboard-certified Eclipse glasses and are ready for the world-changing event on April 8th. Our town, Granbury, Texas, expects an additional 100 thousand folks starting next Friday through Sunday. I may rent my extra wooded lot for camping since many pilgrims will not have accommodations. We are stocking up on canned foods, water, hootch, and ammo in case everything goes sideways.

X ( Twitter) Banned The Cactus Patch!

/ Phil Strawn / 27 Comments

Do I Look Upset?

It finally happened; X formally suspended my account on their platform either for a week or until death, whichever comes first.

Why? Because I commented on a video from a conservative site. It showed a large, rather violent black woman assaulting an old white man in a jogging suit who clearly had trouble ambulating. Punching, kicking, and knocking the poor guy down, then kicking him like a football, and everyone around, instead of helping stop the attack, had their phones out, filming it. That’s what we do now; we think our little video might get us a thousand likes or a Pulitzer Prize. Lord help us if we should get involved, “Not my problem, man.” But, it is our problem if we allow this type of behavior. People on the street are out of control. Normal behavior no longer exists in our society. We have been replaced with violent Pod People.

My comment was neither rude nor profane like so many I’ve read. Just an honest comment about how Karma comes around and her’s will in time. Well, maybe it was a little snarky, but not too.

I’m not upset or mad but rather proud that the little green-haired, Birkenstock-wearing, pierced-face, hairy-legged, bottom-dwelling, Red Bull-drinking, tofu-eating, vegan, half-starved, woke-assed, pimple-popping, ass-picking, safe room-hiding, breast-nursing, skinny jean-wearing, gimlet-assed little morons at X think I am a danger to free speech.

I may be, since my blog and I make fun of everyone, including all politicians and sometimes folks like the Popester.

Growing Up In The 1950s. Threats Used By Parents To Keep Kids In Line

/ Phil Strawn / 15 Comments

Pictured is the infamous “Dope Farm” in Fort Worth, Texas. A facility built to house drug addicts and high-profile bad guys. If you grew up in Fort Worth in the 1950s, chances are good that your parents used this place as a threat to keep you in line.

My neighborhood buddies and I were a bit on the bad side; nothing severe, just minor kid things like blowing up mailboxes with cherry bombs, setting garages on fire, raiding the milkman’s truck while he was taking the bottles of milk to a doorstep, dropping firecrackers down rooftop vents, fun little things like that.

These minor infractions usually ended with one or all of us getting a butt whooping with a belt, flyswatter, Mimosa tree switch, a tennis shoe, or a Tupperware cake pan. The Tupperware hurt more than any of the other weapons our mothers could find. When our hijinx got to be too much, our mothers would pull out the dreaded threat of “Okay, that’s it, either straighten up or I’m sending you to the Dope Farm.” That’s all it took to turn us into practicing angels for a few days. All the kids knew about this place. The narcotics users, gangsters, and local children who misbehaved went there. None of us actually knew anyone who had been incarcerated within those walls, but the thought of going there scared the liver out of us.

In the late 1950s, a cousin of mine turned into a genuine hoodlum, robbing a grocery store dressed up like Mr. Greenjeans from the Captain Kangaroo show. Greased back hair, black work boots, dirty Levis, and a white tee-shirt with a pack of Camels rolled into the sleeve, and he rode a junked-out motorcycle. When my mother spoke of him, she crossed herself. My poor cousin was added to the ever-present threat because he spent a year of his teenage life at The Dope Farm, living in a small cell, eating Wonder Bread and Bologna samwithches, and watching the old movie “Boys Town” every Saturday night. There wasn’t a Father Flannigan on the premises, only guards with guns and a Baptist preacher.

I was pretty good for a year while my cousin was locked up. We received a Christmas card with a picture of him dressed in his striped pajamas, slicked-back hair, and a Camel dangling from his snarly mouth. All this while perched on Santa’s knee. It was a nice little card, similar to the ones we made in school from construction paper and paste. Some bad words and threats were written below the photo, but my mother wouldn’t let me read them. She cut the bad word part off and taped the card on the ice-box, so every time I opened it, the threat was there, and it worked.

The only kid, other than my hoodlum cousin, who was dragged off to the place was our baseball team center fielder, Billy Roy. Billy started hanging out with our nemesis across the track, The Hard Guys, and became a regular James Cagney by the fourth grade, robbing a local convenience store with a Mattel Fanner 50 cap pistol. You guessed it, he went to the Dope Farm for six months. He learned some good stuff there because when he came out, he went directly into a lucrative life of hoodlummanity and crime. Last I heard, he was in Sing Sing.

Dispatches From The Cactus Patch March 14th 2024. Remembering The 1960s

/ Phil Strawn / 8 Comments

A shot of the crowd at Texas International Pop Festival, August 1969. The promoter, Angus Wynn, thought it would be a great idea to have a Yogi or a Swami to lead the crowd of zonked-out teenagers in an hour of Transcendental Meditation since it was the most recent in-crowd thing to do thanks to the Beatles and the Beach Boys who hung out in India with the famous Maharishi Mahesh Yogi Jr. He got a discount on a guy out of Deli, India, who was working in a sub sandwich shop in Brisbane, Australia, but was once a revered holy man in his home country. After a crazy hot night of music that lasted until after midnight, the Maharishi O Mah-ha-Ah-ha took the stage with a sitar player and three nude women beating on tablas and tambourines, all sitting crossed-legged on a rented Persian rug from AAA Furniture Rentals. The crowd, still suffering from the after-effects of too much pot and the brown acid that Wavey Gravy warned them about, eventually got into the groove. After an hour of chanting mantras, swooning and swaying, and all that middle eastern crap, the Maharishi passed hand-woven Indian baskets through the crowd asking for donations. What the good Ah-ha didn’t realize was that even though the young folks were long-haired, dope-smoking teens, they were Texans, and most of them owned shotguns and rifles and drove pickup trucks. Tithing was meant for Sunday church only, not some dude in a robe with a red dot on his forehead. The poor Maharishi was last seen tied to the front fender of a GMC pickup loaded with long-haired hippy Texans shooting their shotguns into the air while speeding down I-35. Best not to “Mess With Texas,” which is where that famous saying was born.

My late cousin, Velveteen, and her late husband, Zig Zag, came up with this idea for a hippy-only tea bag while living in a commune in the mountains of New Mexico. Since they enjoyed sitting around all day doing nothing, they figured why not let the rest of the regular folks enjoy their lifestyle, too. The tea, with its mystery ingredients, was a hot seller for a while until Lipton caught wind of it and sued them into the next galaxy.

My late cousin, Alice, was the only waitress at Woodstock in 1969. She and Wavey Gravy came up with the idea to serve all the attendees breakfast in bed, but she was the only member of the Hog Farm lucid enough to work. When asked how the gig went, she said, ” I didn’t make a cent in tips, damn Hippies don’t have no money anyway.” She met Arlo Guthrie backstage and married him the next day during a Joe Cocker set. They later opened a famous restaurant in upstate New York, where you could get anything you wanted at Alice’s restaurant.