Last Ten Songs We Listened To on 106.1-SteveFM in Roanoke, Va.: For God's Sake, Why Play Whitesnake?

Greetings to our esteemed blog readers in Finland, Uruguay and Australia..........

Yes, we can't understand why oldies radio station that play 'our music' from the 1980s play hair metal bands like Whitesnake, Twisted Sister and Cinderella either. We are the 'I Want My MTV" Generation X'ers who purchased records and tapes from these bands, and we did see them perform in concert (True confession: I saw Whitesnake in concert, but they were opening for Heart), but now we aren't that interested in these bands (oh, I forgot to mention Ratt and Poison too), but young folks seem to be. So, we will be tortured by these songs we made famous until we are old enough to play shuffleboard at a nursing home in Pensacola, Florida. Perhaps, this is what we deserve for the mistakes of our youth.............

Now that we've had our little rant, here are the last ten songs we listened to 106.1-SteveFM in Roanoke, Va.:

1) Best Day of My Life. American Authors. 2013

2) Let's Go All the Way. Sly Fox. 1985.

3) Don't Go Breaking My Heart." Elton John (pict. bottom) and Kiki Dee. 1976.

4) 'Livin' on a Prayer.' Bon Jovi (pict. center). 1986

5) I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles). The Proclaimers. 1988/93 (song was made famous by Johnny Depp film "Benny and Joon")

6) "West End Girls." Pet Shop Boys. 1984/2001

7) "Old Time Rock and Roll." Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band. 1979. (song was a hit when released, but became popular again in 1983 thanks to the early Tom Cruise film "Risky Business")

8) "Holiday." Madonna (pict. top) 1983

9) "Demons" Imagine Dragons. 2013.

10) "Here I Go Again." Whitesnake. 1982/87.

http://www.1061stevefm.com

http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com

http://www.madonna.com
 
http://www.bonjovi.com

http://www.eltonjohn.com

http://www.whitesanke.com

Top Ten Comics from Sunday, Jan. 25th Roanoke Times: Get Fuzzy Finally Comes in First

Greetings to our blog readers in Estonia, Wales and India.

The images above are of 1) Jeb Bush (for "Doonesbury) ; 2) Danny DeVito (the boss) and the late Andy Kaufman on the '70s sitcom "Taxi" (for "Pearls Before Swine) and 3) Warren Beatty as "Dick Tracy" (for "Funky Winkerbean").

Kudos to Stephan Pastis of "Pearls Before Swine" for having the guts and gumption to make fun of his boss comics syndicator John Glynn!

"Get Fuzzy" usually takes places second place in our comics survey, but today, it finally made it to the top slot.

Here is our top ten from the latest Sunday edition of "The Roanoke Times:"

1) Get Fuzzy

2) Doonesbury (made fun of Jeb Bush)

3) Pearls Before Swine (made fun of Big Boss Man)

4) Speed Bump

5) Dilbert

6) Funky Winkerbean (featured 'Dick Tracy')

7) Agnes

8) Garfield

9) Jump Start

10) Red and Rover (featured Snoopy from "Peanuts"!)

http://comicskingdom.com/

http://www.gocomics.com/explore/comics


1)

Last Ten Movies We'Ve Seen: Catching Up with 2014

Greetings to our faithful blog readers in Afghanistan (well, maybe), The Bahamas and Poland.

Here are the last ten films we've seen (well, actually as of last week). We are still trying to catch up on the best films of 2014, some of which are listed in the IMDB as 2013 films.....yes, we are confused as well!

1) Night Moves (top image, film is about eco-terrorism.) 2013. Dir: Kelly Reichhardt

2) Palo Alto (center image, Palo Alto is where Stanford U is located). 2013. Gia Coppola.

3) Inherent Vice. 2014. Paul Thomas Anderson.

4) Post Mortem. Chile. 2010. Pablo Lorrain

5) Tabu. Portugal. 2012. Miguel Gomes

6) Drug War. Hong Kong. Johnnie To.

7) And, Now a Word from Our Sponsor. (bottom image, Ipana, originally an American toothpaste now only found in Turkey!)* 2013. Zack Bernbaum. (w/Parker Posey)

8) Museum Hours. 2012. Austria. Jem Cohen.

9) Lfe of Pi. 2012. Ang Lee.

10) Under the Skin. 2013. Jonathan Glazer (w/ Scarlett Johansson)

#- We learned that from Bill Griffith's comic strip "Zippy the Pinhead"


http://www.imdb.com

http://www.netflix.com

Last Ten Songs We've Heard on Simon-FM: Disco and the Hair Bands

Greetings to all of our fans in Norway, Slovenia, Moldova and Iraq and Iran.:).....I guess now thanks to modern technology you can listen to 98.7 (Simon-FM, Greensboro, NC) in those parts of the world just as well as you can from High Point, NC!

From the noon hour on Friday, we jotted down the ten songs they were playing; the stations features an eclectic mix of songs from the '60s, '70s, '80s and '90s, but while they proclaim to 'play everything' we have yet to hear them play a song from Turkish pop star Tarkan (I guess one can call their hotline and asked for his popular song "Dudu" if they so choose, it can't hurt........well, I suppose!)......


Here are the ten songs they played during that hour in reverse order:

1) You Dropped a Bomb on Me. Gap Band. 1982.

2) Black Water. The Doobie Brothers. 1974.

3) Your Love. Outfield. 1986.

4) What It's Like. Everlast. 1998.

5) Good Vibrations. Marky Mark and the Funky Buns. 1991.

6)  Rock and Roll All Nite. Kiss. 1975 (pict. bottom)

7) Sister Christian. Night Ranger. 1984 (pict. center)

8) I'm Your Boogie Man. KC and the Sunshine Band. 1977.

9) We're Not Gonna Take It. Twisted Sister. 1984 (pict. top)

10) Na Na Hey Hey (Kiss Him Goodbye). Steam. 1969.

Whew! We almost typed 1069 for that last song's release year. Now, we can't get the imagine of Vikings singing "Na Na Hey Hey" out of our skull!

http://www.987simon.com

http://www.visitgreensboronc.com

http://www.visitwinstonsalem.com

http://www.twistedsister.com

http://www.nightranger.com

http://www.tarkan.com

Noon Rush Hour Tweets: No More Garden Yeti Statues

Greetings to our blog readers in Canada, Kuwait and Japan........

We took down some tweets from the noon hour on the east coast, which was three hours ago, but perhaps those of you joining us from San Jose, Calif., have time to read this on your lunch break. Did you get Chinese take-out? Just wondering.

Congrats to Ghana for its 1-0 win over Algeria at the Africa Cup of Nations in Guinea, the winning goal came from Asamoah Gyan in the 91st minute. Our favorite Turkish team (well, we like Galatasaray too) Bursaspor also won 3-2 at the last minute, as Brazilian international Fernando kicked in the game-winning goal over Konyaspor in the 92nd minute.

The images above are of 1) Big Ben Clock in London, which actually has a Twitter account; 2) A Garden Yehti statue; and 3) Hillary Clinton, who is the current favorite to win the Democratic Party presidential nomination in 2016.

Here are the tweets:

1) Big Ben: BONG BONG BONG BONG BONG

2) WDBJ Weather (tv station in Roanoke, Va.): Snow now falling across the Roanoke Valley and Salem area. We'll see a mix with sleet this afternoon.

3) NPR News: Goodbye, Garden Yeti....in-flight catalog SkyMall files for bankruptcy

4) Karia Pacheo: Legitimately more upset about SkyMall than any celebrity death I've about on Twitter.

5) Sean Lemon (Guitarist for Room 94):........... (hashtag MakeSexAwkwardin5Works): Can my friends watch please?

6) Chris Cillizza (aka The Fix, a Washington Post political columnist): I am taking August off! DNC says Dem convention will be held week of July 25, 2016, back-to-back with GOP convention (Yea, this is the reason why we have an image of Hillary)

7)  What the F*** Facts: None of the menu items on the McDonald's menu are certified vegan or vegetarian. Even French Fries, which use natural beef flavors.

8) The Guardian (UK newspaper): Laura Deas takes World Cup skeleton bronze in St. Moritz (Switzerland).

9) Felix Salmon: I wanted to cover a protest event, but, it's scheduled to last 3.5 hours. No one has that kind of time in Davos (Switzerland).

10) Nona WillisAronowitz (contributor to The Nation): Sorry, old white Republican dudes; tweeting like a teen won't make us vote for you. (Perhaps, she has Cong. Bob Goodlatte in mind........we always make fun of him on this blog)

11) DCist: Maryland once again tops list of most millionaires per capita.

http://www.washingtonpost.com

http://www.visitlondon.com

http://www.dcist.com

http://www.thenation.com

Our Favorite Comics from Sunday Jan. 18th Washington Post: Maybe Michelle and the Kids Like Foxtrot Too

Greetings to our blog readers in Iceland, Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Finland.....

In the Outlook section of the Sunday, Jan. 18th edition of "The Washington Post," journalist Michael Booth made the bold proclamation that Scandinavia was over-rated. This made me rethink my foreign country travel bucket list in which Iceland and Norway are ranked second and third respectively after Liberia..........(perhaps, stand-up comic Gilbert Gottfried applauds us for making fun of Ebla, he might be the only one!).............

The images above are of: 1) Charlie Brown, but "Peanuts" is not our top-ranked comic strip, in fact, since the strip is in permanent rerun status, we disqualify the strip from our surveys, but Charlie Brown was the butt of a great gag in "The Argyle Sweater;" 2) A snowball fight in reference to "Foxtrot," which perhaps First Lady Michelle Obama and her daughters found amusing; and 3) the old Flash Gordon serials with the late Buster Crabbe which is actually being used for "Brewster Rockit: Space Guy" (there is also a "Flash Gordon" weekly comic strip still in circulation)....

Here is our top ten, which also includes "WUMO," a Danish import that this week illustrated what it would be life if children said inappropriate things about fat people who eat too much fast food (Gottfried probably loves "WUMO" too):

1) The Argyle Sweater

2) Foxtrot

3) Brewster Rockit: Space Guy

4) WUMO

5) Lio

6) Speed Bump

7) Sherman's Lagoon

8) Knight Life

9) Prickly City

10) Pearls Before Swine

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

Our Favorite Sunday Comics from the Jan. 18th Roanoke Times: Sorry, No Hi and Lois

Greetings to our blog readers in Germany, Thailand and Ghana..........and to those of you who reside in Cong. Tim Huelskamp's (R-Kansas) congressional district, which is most of Kansas (not an endorsement)..................

Here are our ten favorite comic strips from the most recent Sunday edition of "The Roanoke Times," the daily newspaper for Roanoke, Va. As usual, "Hi and Lois" didn't make the cut, but some comic strips that we usually rank very low actually made the top ten!

The images are of 1) an octopus for "Speed Bump," this week Dave Coverly's single-panel strip focused on octopi flirting; 2) Dr. Seuss' "The Cat in the Hat" for "Zits," which got a surprisingly high third place from us, in this week's strip the teenage title character is wearing something akin to a Dr. Seuss Hat and 3) Rain, which correlates with Stephan Pasits' "Pearls Before Swine" comic strip where (SPOILER ALERT) it starts to rain as Rat is showing Pig how accurate iPhones are; we imagine if the late Steve Jobs were alive, he may have liked this strip.

Here is our top ten, as has been the case for many weeks in a row, "Get Fuzzy" finishes second:

1) Speed Bump

2) Get Fuzzy

3) Zits (highest ranking so far)

4) Pearls Before Swine

5) Agnes (highest ranking so far)

6) Mutts (highest ranking so far)

7) Garfield

8) Dilbert

9) For Better or For Worse (it made the top ten)

10) The Family Circus (it made the top ten too!)

http://www.aqua.org/

http://www.georgiaaquarium.org/

http://www.tnaqua.org/

http://www.travelks.com/

SOTU Tweets: Right, Left and the Fog Machine

Greetings to our blog readers in Canada, Scotland, Luxembourg and the city of Yozgat, Turkey, where it will be 4:00 a.m. when President Barack Obama delivers his State of the Union address; you Canadians are perhaps just as aware that the Edmonton Oilers will be across town in America's capital where they will play the Washington Capitals.

There are reasons why we have images of Cong. Bob Latta (R-Ohio, his district is around Toledo), Donny Osmond and Vice President Joe Biden, but let's go ahead and present some tweets from the early evening hours here in les etats unis:

1) Cong. Latta: I applaud RepFredUpton and SenJohnThune for developing a proposal to establist clear, reasonable rules for the Internet.

2) Mormon Democrats (yeah, they are the reason we chose Osmond though he is a Republican): The GOP forgets that GW Bush's resolve didn't stop Putin from invading another country, nor did it prevent North Korea from obtaining nukes.

3) The Onion (a satirical journal): Biden Arrives Early to Set Up State of the Union Fog Machine.

4) Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont): The typical middle class American family made less last year than it did 25 years ago.

5) Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Virginia): Not only did Lisa drive from Botetourt County to be my SOTU guest, she brought cookies form Mrs. Rowe's in Staunton! (I actually went to high school with Sen. Kaine's guest Lisa Shutters Barnett; Botetourt County is four hours south of Washington, DC)

6) Ken Rudin (NPR political analyst): "It's 4 p.m. on the day of the SOTU and that only means one thing: Rep. Eliot Engel (D-NY) is already sitting in the House chamber."

7) The Baltimore Sun: SOTU preview: Obama calls for increasing taxes on the wealthy, free community college and expanding paid leave."

8) Joy Ulfelder (political scientist): Save an hour of your life and read the SOTU instead of watching it tonight. Most boring theater ever.

9) Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Missouri): "RT if you agree every American deserves a chance to succeed.  Our top priority should be working together to create good paying jobs."

10) Martha MacCallum (Fox News host): "I will be hosting On the Record tonight_ see you soon!"

11) David Corn (liberal reporter): "Mitt Romney shifts his position on Climate Change_ Again!"

http://www.theonion.com

http://www.thehill.com

http://www.baltimoresun.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com

http://www.c-span.org

http://www.rollcall.com

Our Favorite Strips from Sunday, Jan. 18th "Herald-Journal" (Spartanburg, SC)

Greetings to our blog readers in Moldova*, South Africa and Egypt.....

Normally, we list our favorite comic strips from  the Sunday editions of "The Washington Post" and "The Roanoke Times," the weekly newspaper in Roanoke, Va. But, today, we adding "The Herald-Journal," which is the local daily newspaper serving Spartanburg, SC, a city that is one and a half hours south of Charlotte, NC, and known for its BMW factory and race track.

Our top ten favorite comic strips from this Sunday's edition of that paper include "Bizarro," a single-panel comic strip in which a woman calls her neighbor to ask if the giant outside her home has gotten or if her house has gotten smaller. There is now a small house movement in many parts of the United States and perhaps in other countries as well (see top image).

It is sort of a running joke here on the blog that "Get Fuzzy" always finishes second, and that is the case today, with a strip poking fun of how lucky one can get playing a scratch lottery ticket (center image).

And, in third place, the single-panel comic strip "Close to Home" pokes fun of the process in which scientists name the latest medications, in this case, it is from taking the first three letters of their dogs' first names. (Prozac, an anti-depressant, is our bottom image).

Here is our top ten from "The Herald-Journal"

1) Bizarro

2) Get Fuzzy

3) Close to Home

4) Gasoline Alley

5) Snuffy Smith

6) Dustin

7) The Family Circus

8) Dilbert

9) Doonesbury

10) The Phantom

NOTE: This is the rare week when "The Family Circus" was funnier than "Doonesbury" or "Dilbert," that may not happen again until Haley's Comet returns to earth.

*- Yes, we have actually been getting hits from the former Soviet republic of Moldova lately!

http://www.goupstate.com

http://www.visitspartanburg.com/

http://www.sceducationlottery.com/ (not an endorsement)

http://smallhousesociety.net/

http://www.gocomics.com

http://bizarro.com/

Sunday Jan. 11th Washington Post Comics Survey: The Usual Suspects

Greetings to our blog readers in the former Yugoslav republic of Slovakia............hmm, we've been watching too much Fox News lately (just kidding, we know Slovenia is the country that was once part of Slovakia, and who has time for Fox News when there are "Green Acres" on reruns on TVLand).....

The images above are from 1) "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century," a kitschy science fiction tv show that aired on NBC circa 1980 (we are using as our image for 'Brewster Rockit'), 2) The Village People, which were at the center of the gag used in "The Argyle Sweater," and 3) A sea turtle for "Sherman's Lagoon," this week Sherman the shark had a visit with Fillmore the sea turtle where they discussed the weather, the government and the season premiere of "American Idol" (we are kidding, they actually talked about E-bay).

Here is our top ten:

1) Pearls Before Swine #

2) Brewster Rockit: Space Guy #

3) The Argyle Sweater #

4) Speed Bump #

5) WUMO #

6) Garfield (highest ranking ever in our WP survey) #

7. Prickly City #

8. Baldo (first-time entry in our survey) #

9. Sherman's Lagoon *

10. Knight Life #

#-Gocomics strips

*-Comics Kingdom strips

http://www.gocomics.com/

http://comicskingdom.com/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

The Last Ten CDs We've Listened To: Nothing Goes Together Like Rush and The Go-Gos

For those of you in France, the land of Lucky Luke (who is called Red Kit in Turkish) and Asterix, we want to take a moment to remember the 17 people who senselessly lost their lives this week in various terrorist attacks across Paris, including the ten who were killed at Charlie Hebdo headquarters. Je Suis Charlie. Je Suis Ahmed. Of course, we are now realizing that using an image of a Volkswagen Beetle, a German car, instead of an image for a Fiat is perhaps a bad idea.

The images are of 1) the Canadian rock band Rush, 2) a postcard from Ocean City, Maryland, for the Go-Gos' album "Vacation," and 3) the VW bug for the band The Cars.

Here are the last ten cds we've listened to:

1. Interpol. Antics. 2004.

2. Rush. Signals. 1982.

3. The Go-Gos. Vacation. 1982.

4. Talking Heads. Remain in Light. 1980.

5. The Pretenders. Learning to Crawl. 1982.

6. The Cars. Candy-O. 1979.

7. The Rolling Stones. Let It Bleed. 1969.

8. Peter Gabriel. Us. 1992.

9. Frank Zappa. Waka/Jawaka. 1972.

10. Blur. 13. 1999.

http://www.gogos.com/

http://www.talking-heads.nl/

http://petergabriel.com/latest/

Last Ten Songs We Heard on Steve-FM in Roanoke, Va. (on Jan.9th from 2:00-3:00 p.m.)

Here are the last ten songs we heard on 1061. Steve-FM (Roanoke, Va.) on Friday, Jan. 9th from 2:00-3:00 p.m.

The images are of 1) Billy Idol 2) an Australian kangaroo (for "Down Under") and Jack Nicholson from "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" (for "Let's Go Crazy)..........

1. Bang, Bang by Jessie J. 2014

2. Eyes without a Face. Billy Idol. 1984/1999*

3. Breakdown. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. 1976,

4. Down Under. Men at Work. 1981.

5. What a Girl Wants. Christina Aguilera. 1999.

6. If You Leave. OMD. 1986.

7. Rockin' Me. Steve Miller Band. 1976.

8. You Make My Dreams. Hall and Oates. 1981.

9. Home. Daughtry. 2007.

10. Let's Go Crazy. Prince and the Revolution. 1984

*-Digitally remastered in that year

http://www.1061stevefm.com

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.roanokedoesntsuck.com

http://www.billyidol.net

Sunday Comics Survey for Jan.4th Roanoke Times: Get Fuzzy Comes in Second Yet Again

Greetings to our blog readers in South Korea, Ireland and Russia........

Our favorite Sunday comic strip of the week was "Doonesbury." In today's strip, a patriotic man approaches a War in Iraq veteran and thanks for him for his service, but the former solider expresses misgivings about his years of combat, which provides for an awwwkward moment. Yes, this is also the reason why we have an image of Saddam Hussein at the top of our page.

Second place went to "Get Fuzzy" for the third or fourth week in a row; the strip is usually runner up to "Pearls Before Swine," which featured a pun about John Lennon (pictured bottom) songs, which finished fourth today in our survey.

Third place went to Dave Coverly's single panel jam, which was one of many strips today that had prison jokes......yeah, what's up with that?

Amazingly enough, "Family Circus" made our top ten for the third or fourth week in a row, and "For Better or For Worse," actually made our top ten for the first time since like 2003.......

Here is our top ten:

1. Doonesbury

2. Get Fuzzy

3. Speed Bump

4. Pearls Before Swine

5. Agnes

6. Dilbert

7. Non Sequitur

8. Jump Start

9. Family Circus

10. For Better or For Worse

http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com (for this week's "Washington Post" comics survey)

http://www.roanoke.com

http://www.roanokedoesntsuck.com

http://www.comicskingdom.com

http://www.gocomics.com

Last Ten Songs We Heard on 98.7 Simon-FM in Greensboro, NC (from earlier in the week)

On Tuesday night (December 30th, 2014), we heard the following ten songs from 98.7 Simon-FM in Greensboro, NC, from the hour of 8:00-8:59 p.m. We are pressed for time, so let's get right to the list:



1) What's Going On. Marvin Gaye (pict. bottom) 1971

2) Money Talks. AC/DC. (pict. middle) 1990

3) Straight from the Heart. Bryan Adams. 1983.

4) Feel Like Making Love. Bad Company. 1973.

5) Tiger Suit. K.T. Tunstall. 2010.

6) All Right Now. Free. 1970.

7) Don't Dream (It's Over). Crowded House. 1986.

8) Cherry Pie. Warrant. 1990

9) Could You Be Loved. Bob Marley (pict. top). 1980.

10) Don't Know What You Got ('Till It's Gone). Cinderella. 1988

www.987simon.com

www.yesweekly.com

www.visitgreensboronc.com 

Top Ten Comic Strips from Sunday Dec. 28th Washington Post

Greetings to our blog readers in Singapore, Nepal and Taiwan..........

This week, we look at our top ten favorite Sunday comic strips from "The Washington Post;" once again, Stephan Pastis did brilliant work for "Pearls Before Swine," a comic strip which only ran in a few newspapers when it first started and is now even in "The News and Advance" in Lynchburg, Va. (we love making fun of Lynchburg here at 'The Daily Vampire').....In the latest Sunday strip, Pastis has Goat telling his mutual frenemy Rat that he can in his house as his house if getting painted. SPOILER ALERT: But, Goat has so many attached conditions that Rat just decides to check into a hotel anyway, hence the reason we have an image of an old motel postcard from Joplin, Missouri (top image). "Pearls" wins this week's comics survey for this amazing strip.

In a close second, we have "Lio" where the little boy who is the title character attempts to return a dragon in a long line for Christmas returns at some Sears or Target or Wal-Mart or Best Buy (you get the joke, I hope)......btw, a dragon from Wales is featured here in our middle image...

In third place, Scott Hilburn's "The Argyle Sweater" ponders what would happen if a fisherman working for Red Lobster found one of Spongebob Squarepants' friends (bottom image)....

Here is our top ten, that we are typing up as we listen to Peter Gabriel's great 1992 album "Us" which would listen to more of instead of vegging out to Billy Idol (forgive the Gen X humor)....

1. Pearls Before Swine

2. Lio

3. The Argyle Sweater

4. Foxtrot

5. WUMO

6. Dustin

7. Brewster Rockit: Space Guy

8. Reply All

9. Sherman's Lagoon

10. Prickly City

For this week's "Roanoke Times" comic strips survey, go to our sister blog's link here: http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/comics/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/comic-riffs/

http://www.gocomics.com/

http://comicskingdom.com/

http://www.visitmo.com/