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R a N d O m A c C e S s H u M o R RAH! RAH!
Volume 0 Number B August 1993
A rag-tag collection of fugitive humor, some of which
is vaguely related to the BBS/Online System world.
Editor: Dave Bealer
Member of the Digital Publishing Association
Copyright 1993 Dave Bealer, All Rights Reserved
Random Access Humor is an irregular production of:
VaporWare Communications
32768 Infinite Loop
Sillycon Valley, CA. 80486-DX2
USA, Earth, Sol System, Milky Way
WARNING! WARNING! WARNING! WARNING! WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!
The "look and feel" of Random Access Humor has been specifically
earmarked, spindled and polygraphed. Anyone who attempts to copy
this look and feel without express written consent of the publisher
will be fed to rabid radioactive hamsters by our Security Director,
Vinnie "The Knife" Calamari.
TABLE OF INCONTINENCE:
About Vaporware Communications.....................................01
Editorial - The Joke's On Me.......................................01
Lettuce to the Editor..............................................02
Memories of a DP Major.............................................02
System Design 101..................................................04
Product Liability Suit.............................................06
The Twit Filter: The Star Gazer....................................10
Reality Check......................................................10
RAH Humor Review: Robin Hood: Men in Tights........................11
Announcements......................................................12
Taglines Seen Around the Nets......................................13
Masthead - Submission Information.................................A-1
RAH Distribution System...........................................A-2
Random Access Humor Page 1 August 1993
About Vaporware Communications
VaporWare Communications is an operating division of VaporWare
Corporation, a public corporation. Stock Ticker Symbol: SUKR
VaporWare Corporate Officers:
Luther Lecks
President, Chief Egomaniac Officer
Dorian Debacle, M.B.A. Gabriel Escargot
V.P., Operations V.P., Customer Service
Pav Bhaji, M.Tax.(Avoidance) Carlos Goebbels
V.P., Finance V.P., Political Correctness
Kung Pao Har Hoo, M.D., Ph.D., D.Sc. F.A.C.S, C.P.A., S.P.C.A.,
Y.M.C.A., L.E.D., Q.E.D., op. cit., et al.
V.P., Research & Development
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Editorial - The Joke's On Me
by Dave Bealer
Back in June I wrote a little piece about how constant CRT use can
ruin your eyes. I even ended the piece with a crack about "my
rapidly failing eyesight." Although I knew that my eyesight really
is getting worse (it goes along with being human), I never realized
how close it actually was to succumbing to my near-constant computer
use.
For more than ten years I've been working with mainframe computers,
first in college and then for a living. Since 1986 I've added to
the strain by fooling with personal computers at home almost every
night. For the last year, the at-home use has been really intense as
I bang out an issue of RAH each month. Something had to give sooner
or later...it turned out to be sooner. During the week of July 12th
I began to experience sore eyes and headaches near the end of my
shift at work. An eye exam that Saturday (my first since the 1970s)
showed only mild astigmatism.
Astigmatism is really nothing to worry about, it merely means that my
eyes are misshapen. Instead of their normal spherical shape, my eyes
now look like a pair of pears. Red pears at that, probably Bartlett.
The only good news was that my distance vision is still reasonably
good. The exam resulted in a prescription for reading glasses. Oh,
joy!
So here I am, one of the clumsiest human beings ever to stumble
around the planet, wearing a very expensive and fragile collection of
wire and finely ground, UV coated, scratch resistant plastic. This
will last. Sure. I hear they've started a pool at work to guess how
long it will be until I sit-on, lose, or otherwise destroy these
silly things. Nobody took a date more than a month away. {RAH}
Random Access Humor Page 2 August 1993
Lettuce to the Editor
Dear Techno-Imperialist Pig,
Your ineffective government is a disgrace before all other nations.
It will be destroyed from within, a victim of its own corruption.
The American people are weak and their government is their greatest
shame.
S.H. (adolf2%behind.the.third.bomb.crater@baghdad.iraq)
- - - - - - - - -
Dear S,
I'm not sure about the rest of your little tirade, but our government
is definitely NOT our greatest shame. That honor is currently held
by newly crowned Wimbledon Champion Pete Sampras. Has anyone else
noticed that Pete looks like a dog lolling his tongue and panting
after every point in every match he plays? No wonder people around
the world think Americans are rude. We can only hope he's house
broken. - DB {RAH}
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Memories of a DP Major
by Dave Bealer
Many of the senior people in the data processing field today do not
have a Computer Science/Data Processing degree. There is a perfectly
good explanation for this, of course. When they were in college
there was *no such thing* as a DP degree. Not that this is
necessarily a bad thing, mind you. One of the most talented systems
programmers I've ever known has a bachelors degree in music
performance (piano) and a masters degree in education. She taught
music in public school before going into computers. This is quite
believable, since she still brings the same stentorian presence to
any room she enters. I do feel sorry for the folks who didn't major
in DP; they missed out on some interesting times.
I received a Bachelor of Business Administration degree in 1985 from
a large public university in the eastern United States. Said school
shall remain nameless since I'm not done paying for the degree and I
don't want them trying to repossess my education. Anyway, the major
was called Computer Applications, but was promptly changed to the
sensible name of Management Information Systems right after they
printed my degree.
The original plan was to major in computer science, but my allergic
reaction to calculus quickly torpedoed that notion. Mathematicians
love to throw around strange Greek letters and call them scientific.
There are two problems here. One, the mathematicians don't REALLY
know what all those Greek letters mean either. Two, only those
programmers/analysts working on actual scientific/engineering
projects actually need all that math. The rest of us are better
served by knowing how to do basic arithmetic in hexadecimal. Folks
who can't even handle that often become doctors, the morally bankrupt
ones become lawyers, and the totally illiterate ones usually become
PC software documentation writers.
Random Access Humor Page 3 August 1993
My degree program, being business oriented, required two semesters of
COBOL programming for graduation. Now I was raised on structured
programming techniques, with Pascal as my first computer language.
Trying to learn COBOL effected my brain much like shifting into
reverse at 220 miles per hour on the back straight at Indianapolis
effects the car. I remain convinced to this day that COBOL is really
a long term terrorist plot to undermine the efficiency of programming
teams everywhere.
More than half of our DP/CS professors were from countries other than
the United States. This was culturally enlightening, but many of
these folks had evidently failed their "English as a Second Language"
courses. The really strange thing about the non-native instructors
was the inverse relationship between their English speaking ability
and their technical ability/attitude towards the students. The profs
with good English skills often seemed as lazy and incompetent as the
worst of their American colleagues. The instructors with a limited
mastery of English were mostly eager and knowledgeable, which made
their impaired ability to get the information across doubly
frustrating, both for them and the students.
A great example of this phenomenon was a pair of professors from the
same country in the Middle East. We'll call them Prof. A and Prof. B
for the purposes of this study. Prof. A had an excellent command of
the English language, as well as several others. He also had a lousy
attitude towards the students. He wasn't very helpful to students
who desperately needed help. He was too busy promoting himself to
anyone who could conceivably do his career some good. Students
didn't fall into that category, so they were mostly ignored. This
man was almost always three to five minutes late for classes, which
were an interruption of his self-promotional activities. The really
galling thing was the fact that this character had the nerve to state
in a local newspaper interview that American students were, "lazy and
always late for class." It's a good thing I wasn't in the same room
with him when I read that interview, or I'd be writing this article
in prison. BTW, I'm convinced that the fact that Professor A was my
instructor for both semesters of torture, er, COBOL has absolutely
nothing to do with my low opinion of him.
Professor B had a great deal of trouble with English. This didn't
stop him from teaching such topics as IBM 370 Assembler Language. He
simply kept coming up with new ways of trying to get the concept
across until at least a few of us figured it out. Anyone who has
studied assembler can verify that not everyone gets through such a
class no matter how good the instructor is, or how many times he goes
over the material.
I now work in a monster mainframe installation where the disk storage
is measured by the terabyte and folks have been known to get lost for
weeks in the DASD farm. Today my average dataset takes two cylinders
of 3390 cache subsystem. And we're talking source code and JCL, not
data. In college we only had 10 tracks of 3350 storage for each
computer course we were taking. Some desperate students tried to
make paper tape storage out of old pizza boxes. In one course we
were even forced to keypunch our programs on cards. Yuck!
Random Access Humor Page 4 August 1993
Well, I'm almost recovered from my experiences at "Old State". I
still wake up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night sometimes,
wondering how I can possibly complete the thirty major papers,
programs and miscellaneous assignments due before the term ends next
week. Of course once the realization hits home that it was only a
dream, that I only have to get up and go to work tomorrow, the relief
is overwhelming. {RAH}
--------------
Dave Bealer is a thirty-something mainframe systems programmer who
works with CICS, MVS and all manner of nasty acronyms at one of the
largest heavy metal shops on the East Coast. He shares a waterfront
townhome in Pasadena, MD. with two cats who annoy him endlessly as he
writes and electronically publishes RAH. FidoNet> 1:261/1129
Internet: dbealer@access.digex.net
---------------------------------------------------------------------
System Design 101
by Greg Borek
If automobiles were manufactured the same way programs are...
Team Leader (TL): OK, what have we got?
Programmer (P): Well, we drove the new release out of the factory and
it didn't catch fire, ...well, within the first 3 miles anyway. I
think we may be onto a winner here.
TL: Excellent! Does the car perform the way the customer wants?
P: Sort of. The customer asked for a car that can cruise at highway
speeds, and our new release can attain speeds of nearly 75 mph,
...um, under certain conditions.
TL: What conditions do you mean, besides obvious ones like going down
a steep hill?
P: As long as there is not too much fuel in the tank and no one is
actually in the car at the time, we can attain some really good
speeds. Passengers particularly tend to degrade the performance.
TL: Not allowing passengers in a car may inconvenience the user. How
much is the performance degraded by a passenger?
P: One passenger chopped the speed down to 8 mph. I'm sure the
customer can adapt his highway driving to accommodate this slight
restriction. I'm absolutely sure he won't mind when he gets a load
of all of the fancy features included in this new release.
TL: You did remember to adequately document these alleged features in
the owner's manual, I hope? It was sort of embarrassing the number
of support calls we got about people not knowing they had to start
the car by putting the key in the trunk lock.
Random Access Humor Page 5 August 1993
P: All of the features are very clearly and simply explained. That
guy we hired that used to write tax booklets for the IRS can sure
churn out manuals. Especially the twelve chapters devoted to the air
conditioner. We felt that it was necessary to go into some detail
about the air conditioner.
TL: Why so many chapters about the air conditioner?
P: The user wanted a really powerful air conditioner, and, well, the
boys down in the design department got a little carried away. The
car doesn't so much have an air conditioner as a refrigeration unit.
TL: Doesn't that degrade the engine performance?
P: We were worried about that too until one of the brainboxes came up
with the idea of "overlaying" the engine. For the mere cost of half
of the passenger compartment we swap the pieces of the engine between
the engine and passenger compartments. Only the pieces of the engine
that are currently in use are under the hood. We really feel this
was the most clever way to provide all of the required features while
reducing the overall size of the vehicle.
TL: Even so the thing is a bit large. I seem to remember the target
size of the vehicle being about that of a 2 seater, wasn't it? To
the casual observer, our vehicle looks kind of like an Essex-class
aircraft carrier.
P: I know, and down in the design department we are kind of
embarrassed. We really wanted to make sure we included all of the
neat features we had been working on.
TL: Did the user ask for all of these features?
P: Well, not all of them, but they are all really neat... and he
probably will once he sees what we've included. I mean, the rocket
launchers alone may prove invaluable during his commute to work.
TL: That's true, but what about the gas milage?
P: We came close to what the user asked for, provided he's not too
finicky and does not know basic math. If you look off the stern you
can see the tractor semi-trailer tanker truck that must be connected
to the car at all times. We are going to recommend prepositioning
the tanker trucks at every exit on the interstate.
TL: You know, all in all we made it a pretty lousy sports car. At
least we can take solace in the fact we met the government standards
for a sports car. Good job. {RAH}
--------------
Greg Borek is a C programmer with a "Highway Helper" (OK, "Beltway
Bandit" - but don't tell his boss we told you) in Falls Church, VA.
He has previously been mistaken for a vampire. Netmail to: Greg
Borek at 1:261/1129. Internet: greg.borek@f1129.n261.z1.fidonet.org
Random Access Humor Page 6 August 1993
Product Liability Suit
author unknown
{Ed. note: This little ditty has been floating around the
humor conferences lately. It's a real scream for Looney
Tunes fans. The copy obtained had gaps in the text, which
have been filled in by the editor, who is *not* a lawyer. }
In The United States District Court,
Southwestern District, Tempe, Arizona
Case No. B19293, Judge Joan Kujava, Presiding
Wile E. Coyote, Plaintiff
-v.-
Acme Company, Defendant
Opening statement of Mr. Harold Schoff, attorney for Mr. Coyote:
My client, Mr. Wile E. Coyote, a resident of Arizona and contiguous
states, does hearby bring suit for damages against the Acme Company,
manufacturer and retail distributor of assorted merchandise,
incorporated in Delaware and doing business in every state, district,
and territory. Mr. Coyote seeks compensation for personal injuries,
loss of business income, and mental suffering caused as a direct
result of the actions and/or gross negligence of said company, under
Title 15 of the United States Code Chapter 47, section 2072,
subsection (a), relating to product liability.
Mr. Coyote states that on eighty-five separate occasions he has
purchased of the Acme Company (hereinafter, "Defendant"), through
that company's mail-order department, certain products which did
cause him bodily injury due to defects in manufacture or improper
cautionary labelling. Sales slips made out to Mr. Coyote as proof of
purchase are at present in the possession of the Court, marked
Exhibit A. Such injuries sustained by Mr. Coyote have temporarily
restricted his ability to make a living in the profession of
predator. Mr. Coyote is self-employed and thus not eligible for
Workmen's Compensation.
Mr. Coyote states that on December 13th he received of Defendant via
parcel post one Acme Rocket Sled. The intention of Mr. Coyote was to
use the Rocket sled to aid him in pursuit of his prey. Upon receipt
of the Rocket Sled Mr. Coyote removed it from its wooden shipping
crate and sighting his prey in the distance, activated the ignition.
As Mr. Coyote gripped the handlebars, the Rocket Sled accelerated
with such sudden and precipitate force as to stretch Mr. Coyote's
forelimbs to a length of fifteen feet. Subsequently, the rest of Mr.
Coyote's body shot forward with a violent jolt, causing severe strain
to his back and neck and placing him unexpectedly astride the Rocket
Sled. Disappearing over the horizon at such speed as to leave a
diminishing jet trail along its path, the Rocket Sled soon brought
Mr. Coyote abreast of his prey. At that moment the animal he was
Random Access Humor Page 7 August 1993
pursuing veered sharply to the right. Mr. Coyote vigorously
attempted to follow this maneuver but was unable to, due to poor
design and engineering on the Rocket Sled and a faulty or nonexistent
steering system. Shortly thereafter, the unchecked progress of the
Rocket Sled led it and Mr. Coyote into collision with the side of a
mesa.
Paragraph One of the Report of Attending Physician (Exhibit B),
prepared by Dr. Ernst Grosscup, M.D., D.O., details the multiple
fractures, contusions, and tissue damage suffered by Mr. Coyote as a
result of this collision. Repair of the injuries required a full
bandage around the head (excluding the ears), a neck brace, and full
or partial casts on all four legs. Hampered by these injuries, Mr.
Coyote was nevertheless obliged to support himself. With this in
mind, he purchased of Defendant as an aid to mobility one pair of
Acme Rocket Skates. When he attempted to use this product, however,
he became involved in an accident remarkably similar to that which
occurred with the Rocket Sled. Again, Defendant sold over the
counter, without caveat, a product which attached powerful jet
engines (in this case, two) to inadequate vehicles, with little or no
provision for passenger safety.
Encumbered by his heavy casts, Mr. Coyote lost control of the Rocket
Skates soon after strapping them on, and collided with a roadside
billboard so violently as to leave a hole in the shape of his full
silhouette.
Mr. Coyote states that on occasions too numerous to list in this
document he has suffered mishaps with explosives purchased of
Defendant: the Acme "Little Giant" Firecracker, the Acme Self-Guided
Aerial Bomb, etc. (For a full listing, see the Acme Mail Order
Explosives Catalog and attached deposition, entered in evidence as
Exhibit C.) Indeed, it is safe to say that not once has an explosive
purchased of Defendant by Mr. Coyote performed in an expected manner.
To cite just one example: At the expense of much time and personal
effort, Mr. Coyote constructed around the outer rim of a butte a
wooden trough beginning at the top of the butte and spiralling
downward around it to some few feet above a black X painted on the
desert floor. The trough was designed in such a way that a spherical
explosive of the type sold by Defendant would roll easily and swiftly
down to the point of detonation indicated by the X. Mr. Coyote
placed a generous pile of birdseed directly on the X, and then,
carrying the spherical Acme Bomb (Catalog #78 climbed to the top of
the butte. Mr. Coyote's prey, seeing the birdseed, approached, and
Mr. Coyote proceeded to light the fuse. In an instant the fuse
burned down to the stem, causing the bomb to detonate.
In addition to reducing all Mr. Coyote's careful preparations to
naught, the premature detonation of Defendant's product resulted in
the following disfigurements to Mr. Coyote:
Random Access Humor Page 8 August 1993
1. Severe singeing of the hair on the head, neck, and muzzle.
2. Sooty discoloration. 3. Fracture of the left ear at the stem,
causing the ear to dangle in the aftershock with a creaking noise.
4. Full or partial combustion of whiskers, producing kinking,
frazzling, and ashy disintegration. 5. Radical widening of the eyes,
due to brow and lid charring.
We come now to the Acme Spring-Powered Shoes. The remains of a pair
of these purchased by Mr. Coyote on June 23rd are Plaintiff's Exhibit
D. Selected fragments have been shipped to the metallurgical
laboratories of the University of California at Santa Barbara for
analysis, but to date, no explanation has been found for this
product`s sudden and extreme malfunction.
As advertised by Defendant, this product is simplicity itself: two
wood-and-metal sandals, each attached to milled-steel springs of high
tensile strength and compressed in a tightly coiled position by a
cocking device with a lanyard release. Mr. Coyote believed that this
product would enable him to pounce upon his prey in the initial
moments of the chase, when swift reflexes are at a premium.
To increase the shoes' thrusting power still further, Mr. Coyote
affixed them by their bottoms to the side of a large boulder.
Adjacent to the boulder was a path which Mr. Coyote's prey was known
to frequent. Mr. Coyote put his hind feet in the wood-and-metal
sandals and crouched in readiness, his right forepaw holding firmly
to the lanyard release. Within a short time Mr. Coyote`s prey did
indeed appear on the path coming toward him. Unsuspecting, the prey
stopped near Mr. Coyote, well within range of the springs at full
extension. Mr. Coyote gauged the distance with care and proceeded to
pull the lanyard release.
At this point, Defendant's product should have thrust Mr. Coyote
forward and away from the boulder. Instead, for reasons yet unknown,
the Acme Spring-Powered Shoes thrust the boulder away from Mr.
Coyote. As the intended prey looked on unharmed, Mr. Coyote hung
suspended in the air. Then the twin springs recoiled, bringing Mr.
Coyote to a violent feet-first collision with the boulder, the full
weight of his head and forequarters falling upon his lower
extremities.
The force of this impact then caused the springs to rebound,
whereupon Mr. Coyote was thrust skyward. A second recoil and
collision followed. The boulder, meanwhile, which was roughly ovoid
in shape, had begun to bounce down a hillside, the coiling and
recoiling of the springs adding to its velocity. At each bounce, Mr.
Coyote came into contact with the boulder, or the boulder came into
contact with Mr. Coyote, or both came into contact with the ground.
As the grade was a long one, this process continued for some time.
Random Access Humor Page 9 August 1993
The sequence of collisions resulted in systemic physical damage to
Mr. Coyote, viz, flattening of the cranium, sideways displacement of
the tongue, reduction of length of legs and upper body, and
compression of vertebrae from base of tail to head. Repetition of
blows along a vertical axis produced a series of regular horizontal
folds in Mr. Coyote's body tissues-- a rare and painful condition
which caused Mr. Coyote to expand upward and contract downward
alternately as he walked, and to emit an off-key, accordionlike
wheezing with every step. The distracting and embarrassing nature of
this symptom has been a major impediment to Mr. Coyote's pursuit of a
normal social life.
As the court is no doubt aware, Defendant has a virtual monopoly of
manufacture and sale of goods required by Mr. Coyote's work. It is
our contention that Defendant has used its market advantage to the
detriment of the consumer of such specialized products as itching
powder, giant kites, Burmese tiger traps, anvils, and two-hundred-
foot-long rubber bands. Much as he has come to mistrust Defendant's
products, Mr. Coyote has no other domestic source of supply to which
to turn. One can only wonder what our trading partners in Western
Europe and Japan would make of such a situation, where a giant
company is allowed to victimize the consumer in the most reckless and
wrongful manner over and over again.
Mr. Coyote respectfully requests that the Court regard these larger
economic implications and assess punitive damages in the amount of
seventeen million dollars. In addition, Mr. Coyote seeks actual
damages (missed meals, medical expenses, days lost from professional
occupation) of one million dollars; general damages (mental
suffering, injury to reputation) of twenty million dollars; and
attorney's fees of seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. By
awarding Mr. Coyote the full amount, this Court will censure
Defendant, its directors, officers, shareholders, successors, and
assigns, in the only language they understand, and reaffirm the right
of the individual predator to equal protection under the law. {RAH}
---------------------------------------------------------------------
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Random Access Humor Page 10 August 1993
The Twit Filter: The Star Gazer
by Dave Bealer
One of the main functions of online conferences is passing on
information - teaching and learning, if you will. Most large
regional, national or international conferences have people resources
capable of answering almost any technical question, no matter how
basic or advanced. The problem is that some folks will spend an
inordinate amount of time inspecting the dental work of any horse,
even a gift one.
Star Gazers are a particular species of twit who will accept
information and advice only from acceptable sources, such sources
being world renown in the field in question. These are the kind of
folks who would only accept beginning guitar lessons from Eric
Clapton or Pete Townshend. They can't accept the fact that only
people like can Pete Townshend can get guitar lessons from people
like Eric Clapton.
Whether it's horror writing lessons from Steven King or cannibalism
tips from Jeffrey Dahmer, star gazers will accept only the very best.
Never mind that dude down the street who has been feeding his family
by teaching the art/craft/science professionally for twenty years.
His advice is obviously no good since he never had a number one
bestseller or a chart-topping single. Given this attitude, it's no
wonder that star gazers almost never achieve the stardom they so
desperately seek.
Don't concern yourself too much with star gazers, they will soon
become disenchanted with the non-achievers in your conference and go
their less-than-merry way. If you tire of their bombastic behavior
before they tire of your group, simply place the star gazers in your
twit filter. {RAH}
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Reality Check
by Raymond Koziel
The following survey was published in the June 7th edition of
Computerworld. 1,977 people were asked what items were considered
necessities. The following is the breakdown of the replies:
Automobiles............85%
Clothes washer.........82%
Television.............74%
Home air-conditioning..47%
Microwave oven.........44%
Car air-conditioning...42%
*Office computer........36%
Second automobile......27%
Dish washer............24%
Office fax machine.....23%
VCR....................18%
*Home computer..........11%
Cellular phone..........5%
Random Access Humor Page 11 August 1993
Only 36% felt the office computer is a necessity and only 11% felt a
home computer is a necessity! Well at least the office computer
ranked above the dish washer and fax machine. {RAH}
--------------
Ray Koziel is a systems programmer (C++ and Pascal) for Blue Cross
Blue Shield of IL's EMC-Net, a private bulletin board used for
electronic submission of insurance claims. Living in Chicago with a
wife, a new baby boy and two dogs, Ray has found RAH helpful in
keeping his insanity. FidoNet: 1:115/542 (The Loonatic Fringe BBS)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
RAH Humor Review: Robin Hood: Men in Tights
by Dave Bealer
Scene 1: (Whitehall, Pennsylvania - Summer 1974)
A pair of high school chess nerds go to the West End Drive-In Theater
to see _The Thief Who Came to Dinner_, which was supposed to have
chess woven into the plot. A powerful thunder storm keeps them from
seeing that film. Their disappointment was considerably reduced by
the fact that they had thoroughly enjoyed the second feature, which
was shown first as per the custom of the time. That second feature
was _Blazing Saddles_, the hilarious sendup of Western movies by the
incomparable Mel Brooks.
Scene 2: (Kansas City, Missouri - Summer 1987)
One of those chess nerds grew up to be a computer nerd and would-be
humorist. Thirteen years later I have yet to see the entire movie,
_The Thief Who Came to Dinner_, although I have seen the last few
minutes of it on television. Conversely, I have seen _Blazing
Saddles_ dozens of times and enjoyed it immensely each time. The
good news is that I only suffered from an oxygen-deprivation headache
from laughing too hard that first time I saw it.
Oddly, Mel Brooks hit his peak in 1974, the year both his best films
(_Blazing Saddles_ and _Young Frankenstein_) were released. Although
his films since then are well worth seeing (especially _History of
the World - Part I_), he never again achieved the inspired lunacy of
his two masterworks. Hope springs eternal, of course, especially
among the fans of great artists. We may know that our hero is past
his prime, but we keep supporting his new stuff anyway in the hope
that he may yet find a way to reach new heights.
So one hot Friday afternoon I ventured into the Crown Center Mall and
caught a matinee of _Spaceballs_. Why not? I can never sleep in the
afternoon before an overnight software install, especially while on
the road. _Spaceballs_ was definitely not a new height. In fact I
was quite disappointed with that movie after that first screening.
The movie has since grown on me (like a tumor) despite the presence
of Rick Moranis, one of my least favorite comedy actors.
Random Access Humor Page 12 August 1993
Scene 3: (Pasadena, Maryland - Summer 1993)
The would-be humorist is now a practicing amateur humorist with an
international (and completely demented) following. He decides it
would be interesting to provide a review of a comedy movie before the
movie closes in first-run theaters. Selecting the latest work by
his hero, Mel Brooks, our hero ventures into Marley Station Mall to
catch a matinee of _Robin Hood: Men in Tights_.
This movie is a parody of the Robin Hood movies, which are sort of a
genre all to themselves. The principal target is Kevin Costner's
recent rendition, which desperately wanted lampooning in any case.
The opening is great, and will be especially appreciated by anyone
who ever wanted to hear the phrase "Hey Nonny, Nonny" in a rap song.
Cary Elwes does a creditable job as Robin Hood, but his performance
is just a pale reflection of his work in _The Princess Bride_. He
seems to do better with subtle humor, which is not a likely part of
a Mel Brooks movie.
Richard Lewis portrays a neurotic Prince John, typecasting if ever
there was such a thing. My first impression is that this guy does
not have a big future as an actor.
Mel Brooks is a scream as Rabbi Tuckman, purveyor of sacramental wine
and circumcisions. Dom DeLuise has a riotous cameo as Don Giovani,
the godfather associate of the Sheriff of Rottingham. Of the
newcomers in the cast, the most energetic is Dave Chappelle as
Ahchoo, Robin's Moorish companion and martial arts partner. Mark
Blankfield has a hilarious turn as Blinkin, Robin's blind servant.
If you want to know the identity of the world famous English actor
who takes the de rigueur cameo as King Richard, you'll just have to
go see the movie.
_Blazing Saddles_ it isn't, but it sure beats _Spaceballs_. {RAH}
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Random Access Humor Page 13 August 1993