Humor is subjective and perishable. Once these lyrics convulsed a nation; now we scratch our heads and say "well, maybe they had on funny costumes."
Now when he was a young man / He never thought he'd see (King Tut) / People stand in line to see the boy king. (King Tut) / How'd you get so funky? (Funky Tut) / Did you do the monkey? / Born in Arizona, Moved to Babylonia
It's "King Tut," by Steve Martin, and it was a Craze for a while. Like a lot of Martin's early comedy, it seems a bit thin today. Yes, I know, blasphemy. I like Steve Martin, especially in different roles like "Pennies from Heaven" - a misfire, but he's good - and "The Spanish Prisoner." But having listened recently to some old bits before audiences that had a collective fit of hysteria upon hearing him simply say "I am a wild and crazy guy" AND NO MORE, it's apparent that there was something in the air at the time - besides reefer - that combined with his diffident mocking of a particular type of sleazy performer to form a style of comedy that didn't age well. It was funny because Steve was doing it. That was enough.
The wikipedia page for the song says: "The song is the subject of in-depth analysis in Melani McAlister's Epic Encounters: Culture, Media, and U.S. Interests in the Middle East, 1945–2000." How? Good Lord, how many PhDs do you have to have to assert that the Arizona-Babylonia reference is a symptom of Western cultural ignorance over ancient Mesopotamian culture and history?
Anyway, there's Tut-related news today. From National Geographic:
Undisturbed, at that. Intact, with all its jars and totems. And who might be buried there? Nefertiti.
So:
Yeah.
WORK Amazon is going the Uber route, more or less: you can sign up to deliver packages when you feel like driving around and making money.
Is this bad? Of course this is bad. Again, we rely on the Guardian to set us straight:
It's going to be a dark day when the helicopters come down and drop the nets to gather the new serfs and force them to delivery packages.
A UPS driver makes about $30 an hour, before taxes, and they can't set their own hours. The benefits are better but there's no "oh, I'll just do it for four hours today" option. Something for everyone, then. Isn't that good?
No, of course not.
MISC Of all the questions I never thought I'd ask, let alone care a whit about the answer, there's this contender for #1: Did PETA sue on behalf of the proper selfie-taking macaque?
VotD X-Files trailer is out.
Could they explain whatever happened to that alien invasion, and the bees, and the black oil, and the super-soliders, or is it too much to ask? The tired, predictable response is "The Truth is Out there!" or "I Want to Believe." Choose whichever you like.
