Across Difficult Country

The Khaleej Times reports the drummer of the Scorpions is being held captive in Dubai . If this were the 80’s I would scour the dive bars, pool halls, and fast food restaurant parking lots to assemble a crack team of metalheads and hard rockers, and we would go give the Mussulmen what for. But this is the 21st Century. I don’t even know where those guys are these days. Some got fat, some are dead, some drink white wine and listen to Mumford & Sons. What the rest are doing, I don’t want to find out.

Sad news from Nigeria, the Tide reports reggae artists there are “now in limbo”, thanks to the surging popularity of other musical forms, many of which are even worse than reggae.  Also sad is how the Tide, once a great newspaper with a commitment to truth , has gotten rid of all of its interesting columnists and is now little more than an African version of Vox media, minus Vox’s smug pretensions and tedious liberal bias. Sad news from Driffield: the Driffield bus depot closes May 31st , annihilating my plans to finally take that bus trip to Driffield. I think there is a carpe diem type  lesson here, either that or try harder to come up with holiday ideas that aren't total shit. Sad news from Harare , where tobacco farmer Brighton Magutakuona had “his privates burnt” by a goblin . The saddest part is the goblin was his own, one he inherited from his grandparents.

A violent career criminal and overrated boxer, Rubin “Hurricane” Carter (no relation) was beloved by sleazy journalists , Hollywood hacks, mush-brained liberal judges  and croaky folk singers because he murdered three white people.

His books, a gooey mix of ghosts, rotten bananas, magic, bean farts and jungle sweat, are beloved by prize committees, middlebrow politicians, left-wing psueds and college girls who wear army boots.