Gentlemen (and ladies if there is one left beside my wife):
Aside from the requisite screaming argument with Wayne Morrison - which seems to be the inevitable cul-de-sac where opinionated sots end up on this board anymore - I've been absent. Thus, I cannot comment intelligently (beyond the occasional lurking wannabe) as to the propriety or correct use of all those annoying, sophomoric and vaguely homosexual emoticons.
Where the word "emoticon" claims its Genesis (capitalized in deference to Peter Gabriel et al.) is beyond me; the *point* I am trying to get across is these useless pieces of superfluous code have become little more than a literary crutch by which the lower orders may now express their puny thoughts without the necessity of being forced to compose clear, cogent prose.
I'll admit to using the occasional putrid smiley-face, but only when hopelessly over-served; inevitably while trying to placate one of our schoolmarm twats with nothing better to do than spend days trying to disprove the unassailable fact that C.B. Macdonald is the *real* genius behind Merion - and certainly not Hugh Wilson or Wayne Morrison's great-uncle Rastus who, though related to John Shippen by lineage, was actually the inventor of the sand wedge - not Eugene Saraceni who incidentally changed his name as the Wicker Basket Society has a policy against Italian Catholics.
But I digress . . . . . yet not too far.
You see, the last time I checked in on this site, Tommy had promised to send me a copy of "Supper's Ready" off "Foxtrot" but was evidently too damned busy upholding the honor of Merion - or drinking vino on the beach with his new chick - to remember his promise to the long lost Armenian.
So, as you guys are still leaning on
this kind of stuff instead of using our accumulated insight - for instance - towards speculative insights as to where Raynor's "2nd Fishers Island" could be built, I see no hope for any of your lot.
Except Uncle Bob, who remains my hero.
For the rest of you: It is one thing to engage in 'group literary masturbation,' but quite another to allow it to degenerate to such a hollow level that even the lowliest newbie is not the slightest bit intimidated to chime in his half-baked drivel.
For shame.
I've no other salient pontifications. There is nowhere to go but up. With so many newborn plebeians vomiting entrails from their 'Philosophy-of-Aesthetics' class, I can hardly follow the music on these threads.
Beethoven to Punk Rock, all in less than 10 years. Such are the pitfalls of egalitarianism.
At least that idiot Johnny Thunders was amusing in his invective.
Selah.