Surprising lies: who buys them?

 
























Surprising Reading Facts (Infographic)

by Robb Brewer, pastor, Gateway Churh

UPDATE:

An infographic I posted a several months ago has produced much interest. Several websites used the graphic on their own pages which has caused large numbers of people to blow up my email wondering about my statistical sources.

First, I created the graphic because I’m a book lover and wanted to express my passion for reading through a different method. While I’m well-versed in research methodologies, my goal wasn’t–and still isn’t–to produce a quantitative, peer-reviewed product. I simply wanted to illustrate reading importance.
Second, I was curious to know if I could create an interesting graphic. I’ll just assume I found the answer to that one.

                                                                     

  Rev. Robb Brewer

Here’s what I’ve discovered about the source on the original graphic:

According to a Jenkins Group Facebook post in 2011, the reading statistics are incorrectly attributed to the Jenkins Group. Apparently Jerrold Jenkins, owner and founder of the Jenkins Group, presented the observations to a group of small publishers using data from the Book Industry Study Group, American Book Sellers Institute, and US News and World

Report. https://www.facebook.com/jenkinsgroup/posts/10151053968015564
A New York fundraiser who hosts a reading blog contacted the Jenkins Group to ask about their study. She discovered the company distances itself from the statistics; while they admit their owner, Jerrold Jenkins, presented the material, they never actually published the report. http://www.libereading.com/2012/04/in-which-i-execute-some-hard-hitting.html

I think it’s safe to say the stats from the original graphic are questionable, and I am therefore recanting any and all connection to them.

At the same time, I still believe in the absolute viability of reading and it’s ability to radically impact a person’s life. In an age where our smartphones will read aloud to us, we risk watering down this life-changing skill. So here’s a new graphic. The stats aren’t as juicy, but it still supports my original point: reading is important.




   Rev. Robb Brewer's new, "less juicy" graphic


By the way, I'm not changing the last box from the original graphic. I like Earl Nightingale's thought. It's not research-based, but it makes me feel good--just like reading.

                         
                         Elmer Gantry, con-man, seducer, and salesman for the Lord



http://www.robertbrewer.org/disciple/surprising-book-facts-infographic/


Read this carefully, and you'll discover how total crap can be presented - nay, ACCEPTED - as fact.

I've seen and heard people quote these "statistics" (from the original, non-backpedalling/shit-eating version) many times, and not one person questioned their veracity. Mostly they seem to feel outrage, blaming internet culture and the school system. But could there be more to this thing? How could there NOT be, when the so-called stats are so ridiculous?

Then I noticed the tiny lettering at the bottom of the graphic:  Robert Brewer, a name that immediately made me wonder: who is this guy, and could these unbelievable statistics be true?

The answer is no.

In a blog post (see link, above), Pastor Brewer admits that he "created" this graphic to impress people about the problem of illiteracy. He admits he did not concern himself with accuracy: "While I’m well-versed in research methodologies, my goal wasn’t–and still isn’t–to produce a quantitative, peer-reviewed product. I simply wanted to illustrate reading importance." But not only are the stats completely bogus, and not only did he KNOW they were bogus, he would not admit to being the source, nor would he take responsibility for passing on known distortions and lies. In fact, he quickly passes the blame to someone else. 

Perhaps feeling the heat from a few nitpicking killjoys, Brewer begins to buck-pass to a mysterious association called the Jenkins Group, who also quickly deny they knew anything about the "statistics". It all started with one guy, apparently, and they sure aren't going to support HIM any more (even though his name is Jenkins and he owns the group). It finally ends with this astonishing statement: "I think it’s safe to say the stats from the original graphic are questionable, and I am therefore recanting any and all connection to them."  Like Pontius Pilate, when the heat is on, Reverend Brewer very hastily washes his hands. 

                              

Meanwhile, his Surprising Book Facts (a. k. a. Surprising Reading Facts - how come they changed the title, anyway?) is now world-famous, still widely quoted in schools, and discussed over coffee in offices everywhere, often with gasps and groans: "oh, look at THIS," "I can't believe this," "what has our school system come to?" etc. etc., while not ONE person takes the time to see if any of it is valid. The final conclusion about "becoming an international expert in seven years" is an especial favorite, a real crowd-pleaser with its inspirational message of hope. ("Gee, do you think it's really true?" "Well, I guess it MUST be.")

Why are people buying this? Why is ANYBODY buying it? It's written down, that's why. It's on the internet. It's in a neat-looking graphic with nice colors, eye-catching. In some cases people are actually quite offended if you try to debunk it, maybe out of pride: they can't or won't acknowledge they fell for this swill. What's the matter with you, are you cynical about everything now? Don't be so negative!

Brewer seems to think it's all to the good, justifying his deception by claiming it gets the discussion going about the general illiteracy of our culture. My favorite line is the little kicker at the end: "By the way, I'm not changing the last box from the original graphic. I like Earl Nightingale's thought. It's not research-based, but it makes me feel good--just like reading." Note how it's suddenly "Earl Nightingale's thought", not his. Brewer must have gone to the Jim Bakker School of Evasive Whitewashing, like all these assholes do.  But is making yourself feel good sufficient grounds for pushing fabricated "statistics" on an absurdly gullible public?

You decide.

A few late-blooming thoughts:

I just saw another blog where a young woman claimed to have "cracked" this complex mystery with some "hard-hitting investigative journalism". I'm not sure what she meant by that, because this thing is so transparent that all you have to do is read the guy's name at the bottom of the original infographic and google it. The info I needed came up in seconds. Not so hard-hitting, not so investigative, unless that's what passes for investigation now. By the way, Rev. Brewer's name was never mentioned in her post. She had, at best, a very superficial knowledge of the Jenkins Group and their association with the "infographic". She also claimed that, while the statistics may have been valid ten years ago when the graphic was originally designed, it was probably somewhat out of date now. What can I say - she's too nice to investigate anything.

Kicker to the kicker: spot the sloppy writing!:

"At the same time, I still believe in the absolute viability of reading and it’s ability to radically impact a person’s life."

This is all about literacy, is it not? Is it not about taking care with language and learning to write with a modicum of proficiency, especially when (literally) PREACHING to us all about literacy, presuming you are here to straighten us all out? This is making me so angry I have to get away from it before I kill someone. To the world, I want to say, WISE UP. IT AIN'T THAT HARD.

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Stravinsky: Pulcinella (complete)

Pulcinella is a ballet by Igor Stravinsky based on an 18th-century play—Pulcinella is a character originating from Commedia dell'arte. The ballet premiered at the Paris Opera on 15 May 1920 under the baton of Ernest Ansermet. The dancer Léonide Massine created both the libretto and choreography, and Pablo Picasso designed the original costumes and sets. It was commissioned by Sergei Diaghilev.

OK, enough Wikipedia (and I only use it because I'm too lazy to put it in my own words). This video is hardly the ideal Pulcinella, but the ideal Pulcinella may exist only in my own mind. It was one of the recordings I grew up with, and we played the spots off it, mainly because my father was on a Stravinsky kick and wanted to hear everything he ever wrote. I remember the music vividly, but not the conductor, the orchestra or the record label (else I might be able to track down a reissue).

As a kid, I suppose I knew a little bit about the ballet, something about clowns jumping around in those white outfits they wear in Europe, but of course I had never seen it. I still haven't seen it. I've never even heard a live performance of the whole work, only the ubiquitous suite. But always I had an echo in my brain of that first recording. I own five Pulcinellas now, and I don't listen to any of them because that first one spoiled me for anything else.

Why? The voices. The three singers, tenor, baritone and mezzo-soprano, are the spirit of the piece, and all too often they sound wooden, as if they just don't get it and are only singing the notes. The piece has to be conducted with a certain irony and even satire, a sour edge contrasting with lamb-gambolling sweetness. The music is often at odds with the odd-sounding words, which in fact have nothing to do with Pulcinella and the commedia dell'arte. The words are more like medieval sonnets about thwarted love. And yet they are splashed against this odd rococo backdrop, this motley set painted by Picasso.

There were a few Pulcinellas on YouTube, and a while ago I tried to find a good one. There is a rare performance of the ballet, but it's chopped up into 10-minute pieces. A more complete one exists, but someone has recorded it with atrocious sound distortion, as if they didn't even notice the music. What is the matter with people today??? I doubt if I will ever find the perfect combination, and besides, all those clowns jumping around is distracting when I would rather concentrate on the melancholy sweetness of the music.

Anyway, it took a hell of a long time to find a translation of the Italian words, and it wasn't on the internet either, but on a set of CD liner notes, with type so small you had to take a magnifiying glass to it. It had the Italian on one side and the English on the other, like a menu.(I once bought Coles notes for a Chaucer class, and it was the same deal) I had to transcribe the words line by line, and it took a while. I thought I posted something about it already, after all that work, but I can't find it. If this is repetitious, please forgive me.

Since I decided against the ballet version, which in fact was pretty silly, I had to make a few (gulp) gifs to fill the gap. I was trying to get something across which, as usual, I didn't quite. When you look up pulcinella, you get punchinello, a nasty little creature in a Milky the Clown-style puffy white suit, a conical hat and a nasty bird-beak. He's menacing, is what he is. He'd scare little children. But wasn't the commedia the thing that brought us Punch and Judy? Maybe they called it something else back then.

Pulcinella  

by Igor Stravinsky

(Tenor)

While on the grass

the lamb grazes

alone, alone

the shepherdess

amid the green leaves

through the forest

goes singing.

(Soprano)

Content perhaps to live

In my torment I might be

If I ever could believe

That, still far away, you were

Faithful to my love,

Faithful to this heart.

(Bass)

With these little words

So sweet

You rend my heart

To the depths.

Fair one, stay here,

Since if you say more

I must die.

With such sweet

Little words

You rend my heart

I shall die, I shall die.

(Soprano, tenor, bass)

I hear say there is no peace

I hear say there is no heart,

For you, ah, no, never,

There is no peace for you.

(Tenor)

Whoever says that a woman

Is more cunning than the Devil

Tells the truth.

(Soprano, tenor)

There are some women

Who care for none

And keep a hundred on a leash,

A shabby trick,

And have so many wiles

That none can count them.

One pretends to be innocent

And is cunning,

Another seems all modesty

Yet seeks a husband.

One clings to a man

And has so many wiles

That none can count them,

None can number them.

(Tenor)

One pretends to be innocent

And is, and is cunning

Another seems all modesty

Yet seeks a husband,

There are some

Who care, listen, for none.

Who cling to a man

And who flirt with another

And have a hundred on a leash

A shabby trick,

And have so many wiles

That none can count them.

(Soprano)

If you love me, if you sigh

For me alone, gentle shepherd,

I have pain in your suffering,

I have pleasure in your love,

But if you think that you alone

I should love in return,

Shepherd, you are easily

To be deceived.

A fair red rose

Today Silvia picks,

But pleading its thorn

Tomorrow she spurns it.

But the plans of men

I will not follow.

Because the lily pleases me,

I will not spurn other flowers.

(Soprano, tenor, bass)

Sweet eyes, bright with love,

For you my heart languishes.

Oh death oh death

Tonight I watched a movie called Songcatcher for the third time. Saw it originally in the theatre - can't believe it was 14 years ago. Those years are as dust now. I loved it, wept through it that first time.  It's about a woman professor, circa maybe 1910, who turns her back on the ungrateful world of academe in search of authentic folk music. This compels her to go crashing through the backwoods of the Appalachians with notation paper and a gramophone.

Any story that has ancient recording devices in it automatically fascinates me. But Lily's personal evolution from prim academic to fire-breathing zealot is also crucial. The second time I watched it, I was a bit bogged down in  Hollywoodisms, the Deliverance-style backwoods "types", the two guys with the still and the shotgun, Granny on the porch, etc. And those do occur. But what also does occur is music that makes the spine freeze and the hair stand up on your arms, if not your whole body. It has that plaintive, almost howling quality, with the little uptick at the end of a phrase. Harmonies that are close and tight and somehow must go back a long way, because they're very much like the harmonies in the hymns sung by the Mennonites, Hutterites and Amish. 

The film glosses over the existence of the Child Ballads of the 1850s, a massive collection of folk songs from the British Isles which were also known to exist in remote areas of the United States. Lily's discovery is presented as not only completely original, but brazenly ignored by academics. The Child Ballads, so-named after the collector of the lyrics, cover some heavy ground:

Child Ballads are generally heavier and darker than is usual for ballads. Some of the topics and other features characteristic enough of Child Ballads to be considered Child Ballad motifs are these: romance, enchantment, devotion, determination, obsession, jealousy, forbidden love, insanity, hallucination, uncertainty of one's sanity, the ease with which the truth can be suppressed temporarily, supernatural experiences, supernatural deeds, half-human creatures, teenagers, family strife, the boldness of outlaws, abuse of authority, betting, lust, death, karma, punishment, sin, morality, vanity, folly, dignity, nobility, honor, loyalty, dishonor, riddles, historical events, omens, fate, trust, shock, deception, disguise, treachery, disappointment, revenge, violence, murder, cruelty, combat, courage, escape, exile, rescue, forgiveness, being tested, human weaknesses, and folk heroes.

That just about does it. Thank you, Wikipedia.

I looked at a number of clips before choosing this one. It takes place after a primal, almost primitive gathering of the community, and after all the jug-hoisting and boisterous stomping dies down, things go very quiet. Then a darker and more horrible story is told in song, passed from person to person, while Lily stares transfixed.

From what I gather, the makers of this film strove for as much accuracy as possible in the presentation of the songs. If they initially stuck to more familiar numbers like Barbry Allen, it was probably so the audience had something to grab hold of: "Oh, I know that song!" But as the story wears on, ballads stubbornly passed forward for centuries grab us with their macabre tales. The voices sound rough-edged and authentic, and by the sound of them, It's possible these songs are still being handed down.

I like this clip because it's technically not very good, captured right off a TV screen, and thus is surreal in quality, glowing and soft-edged. It traces the air like a flame. The scene where Lily becomes panicked by the screeching of a mountain lion in the woods, following a mountain survival strategy by tearing her clothes off to placate the beast, carries on the rawness and sense of exposure created by the songs. There is no corset that will keep you safe from the devil. If the scene smacks of "let's throw a little sex into the mix", it still works, because to this point Lily has been a simmering volcano, not so prim as she may outwardly appear.

I have a question. When DID these songs start? A song can't come out of nothing. It's not there, and then it's there. I know a bit about the "there" of the creative process, and what happens is that a tiny light comes on. A flash. A little white explosion. Then there is an idea born. From there it must be developed, of course, given its life. But as much as we may think a song like Oh Death has "always" been there, it has not. Someone had to start it, just like someone had to start the Bible. Start language. And in the same freight-train of thought, what was the first word? I know it's a nonsensical question because language developed in so many different parts of the world, in different ways and at different times. We now know there were a vast number of different proto-human creatures living on earth at the same time, borning and dying, evolving, overlapping each other before being absorbed or going extinct.

But let me go back to my  original question. What were the first things humanity felt compelled to name? Did they name themselves and each other first? Did language have to do with the hunt, as testiculo-centric anthropologists have always claimed? So how is it women evolved to sit around yakking about their kids in Starbuck's? Was it just a bunch of grunts and gestures at first, or - no, it had to be more.

I think it was Noam Chomsky, or Chumleigh the Walrus from Tennessee Tuxedo (could have been either one) who said there is really only one language. There are core rules, structure that prevents it all from becoming just strings of words, or gibberish. Underneath it all, ideas, needs are being expressed, things we all experience as humans. No one sat down and "made" language, any language, and yet we have all somehow contributed, if only with our own boring and unremarkable way of using it.

So there wasn't language, then there was. There were no songs - maybe chants around the fire with no words, but at some point there was an immense thunderclap and the two were married forever.

I love the starkness of this song about death, its terror of everlasting judgement and eternal hell. Cheers me up, in a way. I love how Lily's face shimmers and burns, how her enormous eyes stare in a kind of awful rapture. I have a horrible urge to make gifs - stop me, someone! But I can't make a silent movie out of this.

(Should I try to find a clip of what happens AFTER the wildcat-fleeing scene?)

Going over Jordan

"Poor Wayfaring Stranger"

I am a poor wayfaring stranger
Travelling through this world of woe
But there's no sickness, toil or danger
In that bright land to which I go 

Well I'm going there
To meet my mother
Said she'd meet me when I come
I'm only going over Jordan
I'm only going over home 

I know dark clouds
Will gather 'round me 
I know my way
Will be rough and steep
But beautiful fields lie just before me
Where God's redeemed
Their vigils keep 

Well I'm going there
To meet my loved ones
Gone on before me, one by one
I'm only going over Jordan
I'm only going over home 

I'll soon be free of earthy trials
My body rest in the old church yard
I'll drop this cross of self-denial
And I'll go singing home to God 

Well I'm going there
To meet my Savior
Dwell with Him and never roam
I'm only going over Jordan
I'm only going over home

I had some News. I can't say much about it now except that it scared the hell out of me. I don't know what's coming next. Maybe nothing. But I've known too many people who've fallen. Some make it out. Maybe it's nothing. Probably it's nothing. Maybe not though, and my mind pinballs back and forth. I wrote an email to someone I care about and signed myself "Wayfaring Stranger", then realized, hmmmm, that's a song. 

I went through more than a dozen versions on YouTube and didn't like any of them. Most were full of sobbing violins and plunky banjos and tried to sound folksy and just ended up sounding maudlin. Even the great Johnny Cash didn't quite pull it off, and Joan Baez was, well, Joan Baez. Too much herself. Her signature was all over it.

I don't know who these singers are, but I love them, love the care with which they sing this, their utter musicality, pitch, tone, balance, the lean accompaniment, the brilliant a cappella section. All of it. In a very toned-down way it sounds like mountain music, which I am sure it is. Those aching harmonies, simple. These singers do not get in the way of the song.

Poor wayfaring stranger. I wonder if I subconsciously remembered any of the lyrics. I have been chasing my health issues around and around and around for a couple of years now, coming up empty, and this is not a turn for the better. I wonder, like everyone does, what happens to us, if anything, after we die, if we don't just turn to soil, not such a bad thing really. 

When poor Jasper died, I showed Erica and Lauren his little grave in the back yard. Erica blew it off, but Lauren stood there with eyes like saucers. She couldn't quite believe that he was down there, that he belonged there now. I tried to explain to her how we had given him back to nature, that he was at peace now, just like he was sleeping. 

A while later, still saucer-eyed, she said to me, "Maybe you should plant a tomato plant where he is." 

"Why?" 

"Then a tomato will grow up, and Jasper will be alive again."

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Hey, meet the Swinger

Hey, meet the swinger

A '60s kind of girl

Walks like a panther

Smiles like a princess

On the blazing white beach

Her body etched in silver nitrate

Her camera dangling like heavy jewels

shoved in the face of the viewers

This new thing was cool

BAM. And with her mouth open,

Beach girl, girl of the raging sands, the girl we can't reach

Snaps the shot, the snapshot 

with her Love Story hair wisping in ocean breeze

her counterculture eyebrows melting hearts

she snaps   to show us how easy

how almost alive

though you know she's snapping at nothing at all

And now comes the Archieparty

The beach blanket bingo we've all been waiting for

those wholesome young people

splashing each other and doing the boogaloo

but we know what's under those blinding smiles that delirious laughter

There's a reason they call it The Swinger

In nervous clicks

the straight-browed girl is squeezing the button again and again

though taking a picture of air

Her day has not come 

but it will

then as swiftly depart

she's a '60s girl bare feet and long hair and straight black brow

not beautiful but has the Look 

her moment on the beach

Again and again she tosses her tresses

in that stoned and blurry way

and for the first time we see

her dangling earrings gypsylike

her careless carelessness

her throwaway look so carefully composed

and Chaplinlike, our lovers proceed into the ocean

a march a brisk step and when seen over and over, how it becomes so clear

they have nothing to do with each other

and how would they ever know it would fade so quickly

yet last forever

broken into bits on a woman's computer

played with like a toy

a sliver of memory seen over and over

"hey, I want to get one of those"

even though "nineteen dollars

and ninety-five" was way beyond my reach

what I wanted was those eyebrows

those thighs

the windswept hair, the earrings, the boy friend

and all that comes between ourselves and time.

More weird shit, late at night

Before the mutoscope, which is one of those things you hand-crank with a lot of pictures on a rotary thing - you know what I mean, you put a nickel in first - well, before THAT even, was this thing, the filoscope. Though you can't see it here, it's just a flip-book mounted on a gizmo so you didn't have to use your finger. The action was pretty limited, but no worse than those goddamned Edison pictures of trains and stuff.

This looks more like an early film than a mutoscope, but maybe it has been cleaned up technically in some way. These less-than-one-minute dramas were thought to be somewhat risque, and a few even showed nudity, or at least titties. They could only be seen by one person at a time, which leant an atmosphere of intimacy. In fact, going to view these supposedly-naughty nickel entertainments is the origin of the term "peep show". Thus they were denounced from the pulpit as pornography, and enjoyed by all.

This lady does a sort of shimmy-dance for 10 seconds or so, then plays around with a chair. She seems to hail from a circus, or perhaps the vaudeville stage. Strong teeth.

This is, well, uh, er, I don't know what this is (or why). Definitely a filoscope, though it isn't clear how the mechanism works.

This one has obviously deteriorated more than the others. The pages seem to have rotted and turned brown. Some of them are missing, so skips and blanks are ubiquitous. I wonder if men snatched individual cards out of these things while no one was looking.

I like this one because you can actually see the thumb. There appears to be blood on it for some reason. The story is the usual sleazy thing.

All cranked up.

Enrico Caruso: "Over There" by George M. Cohan

Pretty strange stuff! I woke up with a song from the '70s Broadway musical George M! in my head. It was called All Our Friends, and so far I haven't been able to find lyrics or a performance other than a hideous rendition by an amateur group that can barely stand up, let alone do an awkward kick-line and sing wildly off-key. But I do remember some of it: "Half a ton of them, every one of them, all our wonderful friends. . . the line of them never quite ends!" This of course reminded me of the definition of "friend" on Facebook. In most cases you have never met or spoken to, nor will you ever meet or speak to, these people. I encountered a gushing new page by someone who had "omigosh, already exceeded the total on my page (5000 friends, all close, personal and intimate, of course), and have to start a new one just for fans of my writing." Already it was up to 1500. I don't know how this happens. Most of these friend-laden people aren't famous, and you cannot tell me (and no one will even talk to me about this - everyone goes silent) that they really do have thousands and thousands of "wonderful friends. . . The line of them never quite ends!" So instead, here is Enrico Caruso singing George M. Cohan's patriotic World War I anthem, Over There, perhaps in French towards the end (? French?) The line of them never quite ends!

(Oops, just found a fantastic version, probably sung by Joel Grey - even with a repeat, it lasts only one minute, so it took me several tries to transcribe the words. They are pretty much as I remember them. The link below may or may not work - I hope so, because it's a kick-ass performance.

http://grooveshark.com/#!/search/song?q=George+M.+Cohan+All+Our+Friends

All Our Friends

George M. Cohan

All our friends, every one of them, they’re
All our friends, wonderful friends

Dozens and dozens, a regular throng

Simply besiege us and follow along

Because they’re all our friends

Half a ton of them, the line of them never quite ends!

They come in groups and troops, invited or not

Uptown, downtown, right on the spot

I must confess I guess I worship the lot –

Yes every mother’s son of them

Every one of them

All our wonderful friends!

(Da-da, da-da-da, da – LIKE!)

Bonus Joel Grey. I can never get enough of Joel Grey.

The only one who could keep up with Cagney. Who was the only one who could keep up with George M. Cohan.

GEORGE M!

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Weird shit in the lab!

The first time I saw this one, I thought, duhh-y, duhh-y, duhh-y, like Bugs Bunny in the cartoons. Now it's the twentieth time, and I'm still saying it. I realize, yes, that it's some sort of science experiment, that it's probably perfectly safe, but why does it take place on a cookie sheet? Is it meant to be edible? Some new form of calamari, perhaps?

This one is even more volatile and mysterious. It just puts out these - things. I don't understand science, don't understand how anything can even "be", and then something like this comes along! Satanic, if you ask me. Black magic. The Republicans would be against it, for sure.

This one goes on for about half a minute. Not sure how that can be, because gifs have an outside limit of fifteen seconds, but maybe in the Land of Kraken, the usual rules are suspended. All I know is, my blog is having a hard time playing these things and I've already had to re-gif and substitute several times.  My blog is trying to spit them out!  Just a coincidence? I. . . DON'T. . . THINK. . . SO!

This is a truly horrible experiment by that Mad Russian guy, whoever he is, KGB Guy or whatever, the one who made the floating candle floating in kerosene. It looks as if the yard is about to explode. Don't try this at home. Don't try this, EVER.

A mere science experiment, or a new life form in the microwave?  You decide.

(Mad Scientist's Note. I had to cut about half of these because they stopped playing. So if the rest of them won't play, it's the Mysterious Ghost of Pharaoh's Snake or the Kraken Kreature, or whatever, or else the gifs are too long (which makes no sense because the longest one plays fine). Sometimes I just have trouble with these things, other times not. It's kind of like my lumbar region. Hope these are sufficient to gross you out.)

Why did the chicken beat up the dog?