"Do you have a thing for pandas? I have a problem in my head that is called PANDAS; it stands for something."

The above quote is without question the single most entertaining comment I've ever read on the Internet. The first tidbit today, however, is not about pandas but peacocks, known in some parts of the world as "what a panda would look like if it were a bird and had no resemblance to a panda whatsoever" (and now you see why most people just stick with "peacock").

According to this story in the Staten Island Advance -- forwarded to me as "Man Beats Peacock to Death, Presuming It's a Vampire" -- a 35 year-old man ended a weekend of life-affirming adventures (including waving a shovel at his father and announcing that he intended to "smash [his] face" before jumping into Raritan Bay with the suspect shovel) by killing a peacock:

"The peacock had wandered into the parking lot of the Burger King at Page Avenue and Amboy Road in Tottenville Thursday morning, and jumped onto the hood of a car.
That's when the 5-foot-6-inch, 135-pound Potts showed up, cops say.
According to witnesses, he grabbed the helpless bird by its neck, threw it to the ground, and stomped and kicked it repeatedly. He yelled, "I'm killing a vampire!" and ripped off his shirt during the attack, witnesses said. The mortally injured peacock had to be put down."

This of course maintains order and balance in the cosmos by adhering to Newton's "equal and opposite reaction" Third Law, in this case making up for all the people who have allowed the dreaded Peacock Vampire to live in blood-sucking peace. Now I'm a huge advocate for animal rights, but this gets mixed reactions from me. For one, why is there a peacock wandering around Staten Island? Two, if this attack occurred in a Burger King parking lot, where was the King? Also, I'm not a big fan of flashy public displays. Killing a peacock on the hood of a car is one thing, but ripping your shirt off? Uncouth, sir. Uncouth.

The bottom line is this: you can't take chances with would-be vampires. If I had a dollar for every time I let an urbanite exotic animal go about its urbanite exotic animal business, only to hear on the news the next day that a green, gaseous vapor had crept through someone's radiator, materialized as a spotted snow leopard and proceeded to vampirize the bejeezus out of them, I'd have enough money to pay someone to write this and make it legitimately funny.

I've been to a lot of shows lately; the aforementioned Wood Brothers; Langhorne Slim (who nearly spit on me before the show and then asserted that speaker buzz was actually the sound of love); Hoots & Hellmouth at the same show, who were fantastic live and produced an okay record that really fails to capture the flailing, rolling thunder exuberance of that on-stage persona; and I also met the marvel-voiced and surprisingly diminutive Allison Polans at that show, whose forthcoming record with her band Papertrees will hopefully be featured on here soon. Good times, noodle salad.

All of these artists I recognize as being talented and vital without the aid of celebrity sound bites. I've bought two magazines lately where an ad for some new record has a plug from -- wait for it -- Stephen King. Yes, the master of whatever has endorsed Ryan Adam's new "Easy Tiger" and something else absurd. Brad Pitt's endorsement of the new Nick Drake family album album is even more insulting, especially given the fact that it makes no reference to that particularly disappointing album. I don't even think I'm put off by records needing celebrity sponsors...I just wish they'd pick better ones. Stephen King compared Ryan Adam's to Neil Young; if Neil Young had said anything kind about Adams himself, that might be worthwhile.

Speaking of Nick Drake, everyone reading this should purchase Joe Boyd's White Bicycles: Making Music In the Sixties. Boyd discovered Drake and produced his first two albums. He was one of the architects of the era's blues revival, introduced Mike Bloomfield to Paul Butterfield, put together The Lovin' Spoonful, The Incredible String Band, Fairport Convention, owned and operated London's UFO Club, produced Pink Floyd's first single and -- in his spare time -- was the stage manager when Dylan went electric at Newport. I'm exhausted and humbled even listing half of that, and what makes him that much more intimidating is that the book itself is incredibly self-aware and clear-voiced, making it a great read apart from the subject matter.

Within the next 3 days I'm finally making a decision as far as where to host the audio files on here, and how to format this whole thing for future consumption. That may include adding other writers, but it certainly includes gaining a larger audience before I waste any musician's time on something with no readership. To keep the tradition of wonderful imagery alive, however, I've included some recent favorites from the Classic Comics thread on SomethingAwful.com:

(And yes, some days I feel like the last pic is what I do five days a week).

Next time, something to download. For serious for keeps.