The Glass Character

Thursday, October 16, 2014

Plastic Jesus

ARTIST: Trad and Anon
TITLE: Plastic Jesus


Well, I don't care if it rains or freezes,
Long as I have my plastic Jesus
Riding on the dashboard of my car
Through all trials and tribulations,
We will travel every nation,
With my plastic Jesus I'll go far.

{Refrain}
Plastic Jesus, plastic Jesus
Riding on the dashboard of my car
Through all trials and tribulations,
We will travel every nation,
With my plastic Jesus I'll go far.



I don't care if it rains or freezes
As long as I've got my Plastic Jesus
Glued to the dashboard of my car,
You can buy Him phosphorescent
Glows in the dark, He's Pink and Pleasant,
Take Him with you when you're travelling far

{Refrain}

I don't care if it's dark or scary
Long as I have magnetic Mary
Ridin' on the dashboard of my car
I feel I'm protected amply
I've got the whole damn Holy Family
Riding on the dashboard of my car

{Refrain}

You can buy a Sweet Madonna
Dressed in rhinestones sitting on a
Pedestal of abalone shell
Goin' ninety, I'm not wary
'Cause I've got my Virgin Mary
Guaranteeing I won't go to Hell

{Refrain}

I don't care if it bumps or jostles
Long as I got the Twelve Apostles
Bolted to the dashboard of my car
Don't I have a pious mess
Such a crowd of holiness
Strung across the dashboard of my car

{Refrain}

No, I don't care if it rains or freezes
Long as I have my plastic Jesus
Riding on the dashboard of my car
But I think he'll have to go
His magnet ruins my radio
And if we have a wreck he'll leave a scar

{Refrain}

Riding through the thoroughfare
With his nose up in the air
A wreck may be ahead, but he don't mind
Trouble coming, he don't see
He just keeps his eyes on me
And any other thing that lies behind

Plastic Jesus, Plastic Jesus
Riding on the dashboard of my car
Though the sun shines on his back
Makes him peel, chip, and crack
A little patching keeps him up to par



When pedestrians try to cross
I let them know who's boss
I never blow my horn or give them warning
I ride all over town
Trying to run them down
And it's seldom that they live to see the morning

Plastic Jesus, Plastic Jesus
Riding on the dashboard of my car
His halo fits just right
And I use it as a sight
And they'll scatter or they'll splatter near and far

When I'm in a traffic jam
He don't care if I say Damn
I can let all sorts of curses roll
Plastic Jesus doesn't hear
For he has a plastic ear
The man who invented plastic saved my soul



Plastic Jesus, Plastic Jesus
Riding on the dashboard of my car
Once his robe was snowy white
Now it isn't quite so bright
Stained by the smoke of my cigar

God made Christ a Holy Jew
God made Him a Christian too
Paradoxes populate my car
Joseph beams with a feigned elan
From the shaggy dash of my furlined van
Famous cuckold in the master plan



Naughty Mary, smug and smiling
Jesus dainty and beguiling
Knee-deep in the piling of my van
His message clear by night or day
My phosphorescent plastic Gay
Simpering from the dashboard of my van

When I'm goin' fornicatin
I got my ceramic Satan
Sinnin' on the dashboard of my Winnebago Motor Home
The women know I'm on the level
Thanks to the wild-eyed stoneware devil
Ridin' on the dashboard of my Winnebago Motor Home
Sneerin' from the dashboard of my Winnebago Motor Home
Leering from the dashboard of my van



If I weave around at night
And the police think I'm tight
They'll never find my bottle, though they ask
Plastic Jesus shelters me
For His head comes off, you see
He's hollow, and I use Him for a flask

Plastic Jesus, plastic Jesus
Riding on the dashboard of my car
Ride with me and have a dram
Of the blood of the Lamb
Plastic Jesus is a holy bar

I did not write any part of this song. I remembered Paul Newman singing it in Cool Hand Luke, and wondered if I could find a video anywhere (which I could), then looked up the lyrics. Most versions had one or two verses, but this one went on forever, apparently written by that celebrated lyricist, Arthur Unknown (sometimes known by his pen name, Anon).

It's a strange thing, obviously a sour parody of What a Friend We Have in Jesus. The thing is, it was not so very long ago that I was a churchgoing Christian and even a lay minister, a preacher. Seems like a lifetime ago. So I can't quite join in wholeheartedly. But when I saw what was happening to "my" church, its slickness and desperate attempts at hipness to attract a "younger" crowd (i. e. people under 80 with more disposable income), I felt sickened. All of it was done in the name of finance. In all the time I was with that church, the main thing I heard about was not the gospels, but a desperate lack of money and the need to give, give, give.

This wasn't about hungry people overseas or Christian education, but (mostly) paying a mortgage

which always seemed to be shockingly in arrears. If we as individuals had conducted our finances that way, the bank would have put us in foreclosure. As it was, the larger church carried us as perpetual deadbeats.

Guilt trips abounded if you didn't or couldn't raise the amount of your offerings annually, because after all, the church's expenses kept going up, and it was up to us to take up the shortfall. Don't you want to support your church? Tell us, then, just what are your priorities? Didn't we hear you went on a vacation last year? (WHAT, you went to Vegas?) Once a year, incredibly, someone came to each person's house to ask them how much they were giving, and gently but firmly pressured them into giving more. I hated this and felt it was a violation of privacy and completely unfair, but I never said anything because you just didn't say anything. I knew if I did, I would likely be gently pressured back into the beliefs and policies of the fold (with a vague but palpable ostracism as the penalty
if I didn't), or perhaps genteelly labelled "mentally ill" (well, dear, she can't help it, you know).

As a symptom of a structure that had been rotten for years , leadership finally caved in, and no one had the first idea why it happened, or how. It's like my "do husbands fall from the sky?" post. Jobs don't fall from the sky. Husbands don't, friends don't. WE PICK THEM. We vote our leaders in, then bitch about them endlessly, even demonize them. We were snowjobbed by a shallow huckster, fell for him hook, line and sinker, then turned him into some sort of Satanic figure who had destroyed our innocent little lamb of a church.

Bullshit!

So I walked away, even tried a few other churches and was suffocated and frankly bored. The wheezy hymns, the lack of life, the lacklustre attempts to inject some enthusiasm and relevance into the services, all of it fell flat for me. More than once, when I tried to sit down, someone put their hand out to cover the spot on the pew and said, "My family sits here." No hello, not even a "sorry", just a "go away".

It left a hole, because for some fifteen years I was deeply involved, but the last several years were just hell for me, because there was absolutely NO ONE I could talk to about it all. It would be seen as "disloyal".

But I could no longer adhere to a church with such shallow values, a church which would not or could not or just didn't want to take responsibility for all its bad decisions.

Plastic Jesus, indeed.

(CODA. As usual , while I work on these things, or after I post them, more comes to me. In this case, it startles me that I wrote the words I just wrote. I had no idea I was going to. Not that I've never written about church disillusionment before. I have, and I will again. But in this case, I merely came across a YouTube clip from Cool Hand Luke, then thought of the song, then Googled the lyrics. Funny stuff, and strange, too. And that, I thought to myself, would be that. But in the world of exploration through writing, "that" is NEVER "that" - and I thank whatever God I still have for the process.)

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Wednesday, October 15, 2014

MOOG: The Electric Eclectics Of Dick Hyman (1969)

The Story of Skippy

One summer day in the city, a day when nothing out of the ordinary was happening, a puppy was born.

The puppy's family named her Skippy, for no particular reason. She was a creamy-golden cocker spaniel, very sweet-natured and beautiful. The children doted on her, the adults tolerated her, and for a while, everything was good.

But things change. The biggest people in the household, the Mom and Dad, weren't getting along very well. Skippy could hear them screaming at each other, and she crouched down on her belly in dread. One night there was an awful crashing and booming upstairs, and Skippy didn't sleep.

The next day, they told the children they had decided it would be better if Mom and Dad lived in two separate houses. The children knew it was their fault. Skippy wondered if it was her fault. Soon it became apparent that it was.

Neither of them really wanted Skippy. They didn't like dogs, she smelled, her fur had mats, and the vet bills! They argued and argued about who would take Skippy. The children kept their mouths shut in fear that Skippy would be taken away from them.

She was.

First the Mom and Dad thought about giving her to a shelter where she might find a "forever home", but then a friend of theirs, a man with many dogs, asked to take her, and they told themselves it was a good thing.

The children said goodbye to her tearfully. Mom, busy throwing all of Dad's things out on the sidewalk, said they should stop being such babies and keep quiet, so they did.

The man had many dogs. But he had no use for the new dog that cowered in the corner, her tiny stump of a tail wagging in a blur to placate him. Sometimes she peed on the floor, and he slapped her muzzle so hard she could not help but let out a shriek of pain.

Then he'd tie her outside for a long time.

Something happened while she was outside, and it became apparent that Skippy was going to have puppies. The man looked at her like he wanted to murder her. Skippy went under the bed to protect her unborn puppies. They were all she had.

The man had the decency not to harm her during her pregnancy, but when the puppies were born, they didn't look right, as if their father had been a Doberman or Rottweiller. Too bitter mixed with too sweet.

Very early one morning, Skippy noticed her puppies were gone. She never found out where they went. She mourned, whimpering, until one day the man threw something hard at her head.

She stopped whimpering.

But there was something gnawing at her, thousands of centuries of needing human beings to love and pay attention to her. One day she rolled over on her back to expose her belly, and the man kicked her hard. The sound she made cannot be described.

Though it was not like her to abandon her people, one day Skippy took a chance and ran away. She became a dog of the streets. Her survival instincts were sharpened, and when a person approached her she crouched down and let out a low growl.

She became more and more matty, and thinner from eating scraps. It looked bad for Skippy, and some days she just wanted to run in front of a car.

Then something happened. A girl was walking along the street, and saw two enormous liquid-brown eyes peeking out from behind a bush.

She crouched down and said, "Come on, girl. Come on."

It took quite a while for Skippy to come out of the bushes. She didn't know what to expect. But she knew, in a certain doggish way, that children shouldn't be harmed. No matter what the girl did to her, she would find a way to tolerate it.

There was a rope digging deep into Skippy's neck, so she hooked her finger in it and dragged her home. The pads on her feet were hot and sore from planting her legs.

Her mother said, Cindy, I don't know. We can't take in another dog. I think we should take her to the shelter right now. It's the best thing for her. Cindy cried, but did as she was told, knowing that it was her fault.

Skippy knew that it was her fault.

Things were bad at the shelter, all bleach and bars. There were a hundred other dogs there, either barking aggressively or cowering in corners. People came and went, poking and prodding, looking for something that would soon be their property.

Skippy knew that some dogs ended up in wonderful homes, and wondered how to act. She knew she shouldn't hope too much, but hope was the only thing that kept her going.

Then one afternoon, an old woman came into the shelter. Her eyes met Skippy's.

It was love.

It was love, and despite the fact that the old woman didn't have enough money to feed a dog, she took Skippy home, naming her Lady after the dog in the cartoon movie.

This was a home such as Skippy had never known. She truly was treated like a princess. She even wondered if the old lady could get her puppies back.

But then one morning, everything fell still. The old woman didn't get up.

Then came the argument all over again: who will take the dog? No one seemed to want her very badly. She was a burden no one could afford.

Then someone spoke up. A man who had many dogs. The family brushed her carefully, making her look her best. He took her home, put a rope around her neck and tied her to a post in the yard.

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Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Forbidden Zone in Color: 'Alphabet Song'

"Swinging the Alphabet" is a novelty song sung by The Three Stooges in their 1938 film, Violent Is the Word for Curly. It is the only full-length song performed by the Stooges in their short films, and the only time they mimed to their own pre-recorded soundtrack.

In 2005, film historian Richard Finegan identified the composer of the song as Septimus Winner (1827-1902), who had originally published it in 1875 as "The Spelling Bee".

[hide]

Lyrics[edit]

Colorized screen shot of the Three Stoogesmiming their own pre-recorded soundtrack ofSwinging the Alphabet.

B-A-bay, B-E-bee, B-I-bicky-bi, B-O bo, bicky-bi bo, B-U bu, bicky bi bo bu.

C-A-cay, C-E-cee, C-I-cicky-ci, C-O co, cicky-ci co, C-U cu, cicky ci co cu.

D-A-day, D-E-dee, D-I-dicky-di, D-O do, dicky-di do, D-U du, dicky di do du.

F-A-fay, F-E-fee, F-I-ficky-fi, F-O fo, Ficky-fi fo, F-U fu, ficky fi fo fu.

G-A-gay, G-E-gee, G-I-gicky-gi, G-O go, Gicky-gi go, G-U gu, gicky gi go gu.

(Dah-Dah-dah-dah )

H-A-hay, H-E-hee, H-I-hicky-hi, H-O ho, hicky-hi ho, H-U hu, hicky hi ho hu.

J-A-jay, J-E-jee, J-I-jicky-ji, J-O jo, Jicky-ji jo, J-U ju, jicky ji jo ju

K-A-kay, K-E-kee, K-I-kicky-ki, K-O ko, Kicky-ki ko, K-U ku, kicky ki ko ku.

L-A-lay, L-E-lee, L-I-licky-li, L-O lo, Licky-li lo, L-U lu, licky li lo lu. (Curly's a dope)

M-A-may, M-E-mee, M-I-micky-mi, M-O mo, Micky-mi mo, M-U mu, micky mi mo mu.

In the 1959 re-recording of the The Alphabet Song/Swinging The Alphabet With Moe, Larry and Curly Joe the letters "G", "J", "M" and the lyrics "Curly's a dope" were omitted and seven new lyrics featuring the letters "N" (N-A-nay, N-E-nee, N-I-nicky-ni, N-O-no, Nicky-ni no, N-U-nu, Nicky ni no nu), "P" (P-A-pay, P-E-pee, P-I-picky-pi, P-O-po, Picky-pi po, P-U-pu, picky pi po pu) "R" (R-A-ray, R-E-ree, R-I-ricky-ri, R-O-ro, Ricky-ri-ro, R-U-ru, ricky ri ro ru), "S" (S-A-say, S-E-see, S-I-sicky-si, S-O-so, Sicky-si-so, S-U-su, sicky si so su), "T" (T-A-tay T-E-tee, T-I-ticky-ti, T-O-to, Ticky-ti-to, T-U-tu, ticky ti to tu), "V" (V-A-vay, V-E-vee, V-I-vicky-vi, V-O-vo, Vicky-vi-vo, V-U-vu, vicky vi vo vu), and "Z" (Z-A-zay, Z-E-zee, Z-I-zicky-zi, Z-O-zo, Zicky-zi-zo, Z-U-zu, zicky zi zo zu) were added to the song.