"Okie from Muskogee" must rank alongside "Born in the USA", "Every Breath You Take", and REM's "The One I Love" as one of the most misunderstood songs of all time.

Merle Haggard wrote it as a satire of his Okie father's bewildered point of view on the cultural upheaval of the late '60s. Much like Springsteen in 1984, he was forced to distance himself from the GOP's misappropriation of the song in the 1972 election campaign, including refusing an invitation from Richard Nixon to play at the White House.

(For further research I highly recommend Drive-By Truckers' Southern Rock Opera album, an ambitious deconstruction of "Sweet Home Alabama", Th' Skynyrd Band, George Wallace, and the duality of The Southern Thing.)

When I was in grad school I DJed at the college radio station, and one of my duties was training new student DJs, usually freshmen.

While these people generally had some concept of what vinyl records were (e.g. a DJ moves them back and forth with his hands; they go wikki-wikki-wikki), some of them just couldn't get their heads around the fact that you put the needle *directly on the record*.

"And if you want to hear a different track, you just pick up the needle and move it? Really?"

Hopefully I put some of them on the righteous path, but some were terrified of the concept and wouldn't even venture into the station's vinyl room (a miraculous cave of many wonders).

Why do people keep landlines? To add to Bilby's comments:

6) If you have a home security system that calls cops/FD/ambulance for you, you need a landline to connect the system to. I suppose there are ways to connect the system to a cellular line or VOIP, but they would negate the 911-calling advantages as mentioned above.

7) I'm not one who has had cause to worry about such things, but aren't landlines more "secure" in terms of ease of listening-in? I could be utterly wrong about this, but the perception does exist.

8) I know how to fix a landline phone, plus I've already got several handsets laying around. Why buy more stuff? (Yes, I know buying new electronic stuff is this page's raison d'etre.)

9) Per Uncle Ike, a body perseveres in its state of being at rest except insofar as it is compelled to change its state by force impressed.

"Discarded somewhere in the desert near Bishop, California, photographer Richard Harrington..."

Why would someone throw away a perfectly good photographer? Seems a waste.

Russian air force spokesman Arturs Carlsonski was heard to add, "As God is my witness...I swear I thought cement could fly."

Don't be fooled--this isn't about camping, it's about *tailgating*.

Coleman will sell a couple million of these in SEC country alone. Fruity blender drinks + dopey sorority girls stopping by your tailgate = win.

"Mellow Down Easy" is an old Willie Dixon jump blues tune, recorded most famously by Little Walter but also (less-famously) by Iggy & the Stooges. Kenny G got nuthin' to do with it.

I also don't get how the original reporter could look at the linked playlists and get "jazz DJ" out of that--there is a Les McCann track but it appears to be the exception rather than the rule.

Not trying to bust up the entertaining "smoove-jazz-lover-does-something-decidedly-unmellow" narrative...

I'd love to wear a rainbow every day,
And tell the world that everything's OK,
But I'll try to carry off a little darkness on my back,
'Till things are brighter, I'm the Man In Vertically Aligned Low-Density Carbon Nanotubes.

Or, if you prefer,

I wear vertically aligned low-density carbon nanotubes on the outside/because vertically aligned low-density carbon nanotubes is how I feel on the inside

"Clone" is probably the wrong word for what this guy is trying to do. It was reported in the local French press that he would be constructing a development that *resembled* Lyon, rather than duplicating specific buildings--probably a good idea since the city's most distinctive landmark is a Catholic cathedral.

What makes this project interesting, and what differentiates it from any number of Las Vegas resorts (think New York New York or The Venetian), is the attempt to import cultural institutions. Besides Olympique Lyonnais and a Bocuse restaurant as mentioned in the linked article, these would include the Institut Lumiere (film studies), a satellite campus of the University of Lyon, and a branch of the Musee des Tissus (which is much more interesting than it sounds).

I believe Paul Bocuse already has a restaurant at one of the Disney parks, so this shouldn't be too different...though I wonder if pork, an absolute essential in Lyonnaise cuisine, will be on the menu.

Also, for the true Lyon experience, there should be no place to park, and everything should smell faintly of pee.