The Way I Talk [brought to you by pop culture]

Catchphrases have been a part of mass popular culture for as long as there has been mass pop culture. It goes back at least as far as the golden age of radio, with things like "'Tain't funny, McGee" (from Fibber McGee And Molly), "Coming, Mother!," (from Henry Aldrich), and the whole litany--"Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive! Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound! Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane...!"--heralding a new adventure of Superman. Hell, it probably goes back farther than that. The thread continues uninterrupted through "Bang, ZOOM!," "You bet your sweet bippie!,""Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Willis?," and about nine dozen lines from Seinfeld, plus whatever more recent iteration I'm too curmudgeonly to notice. The devil made me do it.



I was thinking of what lines from pop culture regularly find their way into my own speech patterns. Some are more obscure than others, I guess, because my personality tends to be more obscure than others. I think the two phrases that pop into my daily discourse most often are "I'm comin', Beanie boy!" (from TV's Beanie And Cecil cartoon) and "HERE! In the SHADOWS!" (from the radio adventures of The Shadow). The former is better-known than the latter, and either is more widely recognized than my three runners-up: "I can't pronounce Baccaruda" (from a Plymouth Barracuda commercial, reprised on record by the British group The Barracudas), the seemingly non sequitur "Now CRAYON I can say!" (from an episode of The Monkees), and "I own a hundred pairs of stretch socks" (from Marvel Comics's 1960s humor title Not Brand Echh).



(I have also been known to recite the opening bits from the TV shows The Adventures Of Superman and The Green Hornet in their entirety with no discernible provocation. I also sometimes blurt out made-up intros to shows that never existed, starring comic book characters The Challengers Of The Unknown or the original Captain Marvel. I am most certainly me.)



I live inside my pop obsessions. A number of slightly-used lines from TV, movies, comics, songs, and other effervescent sources could find their own random way into my patter at any given moment. "Hey, that's O-NED-ers!," "You gotta be quick!," and "Chad? Who's Chad...?" from my favorite movie, That Thing You Do! "Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb!" from the 1966 Batman film, a line I once spoke directly to actor Adam West when one of us was in full Batman costume (I won't say which one of us that was). "Your bullets cannot harm me; my wings are like a shield of steel!" from the Batfink cartoon. "No brag, just fact" from TV's The Guns Of Will Sonnett, generally delivered in my best approximation of a Walter Brennan impression. Quotes from John F. Kennedy's speeches ("We choose to go to the moon and those other things...!") and quotes from JFK impersonator Vaughn Meader's hit comedy LP The First Family ("I should like to point out that I am standing here in my shorts dripping wet," and "The rubber swan is mine"), each spoken with my attempt at the right voice as the torch is passed to a new generation. With vigor.



The beat goes on. Lines from Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon, The Dark Knight, The Grapes Of Wrath, The Marx Brothers, audience response lines from The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and the deep tone of James Earl Jones, all jumbled together in a quotation gumbo: This could be the start of a beautiful friendship, the stuff dreams are made of. Why so serious? I'll be there. Members of the faculty, faculty members, students of Huxley and Huxley students--well, I guess that covers everything. From the freezer to your table. This is CNN.



As I recite all of these lines in my ongoing role as whatever it is I'm supposed to be, it doesn't necessarily matter whether or not folks pick up on the specific reference. It's not a trivia challenge, a round of Name That Catchphrase! From "To the Batpoles!" to speculation of what's behind the curtain Carol Merrill is standing next to, it's just the way I talk. An early clue to the new direction. Sorry about that, Chief.



I do think it's time to bring "You bet your sweet bippie!" back into the general lexicon. Save the Texas prairie chicken. I am Spartacus. Live long and prosper. And let's be careful out there.

TIP THE BLOGGER: CC's Tip Jar!

You can support this blog by becoming a patron on Patreon: Fund me, baby! 

Fans of pop music will want to check out Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, a new pop compilation benefiting SPARK! Syracuse, the home of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl. TIR'N'RR Allstars--Steve Stoeckel, Bruce Gordon, Joel Tinnel, Stacy Carson, Eytan Mirsky, Teresa Cowles, Dan Pavelich, Irene Peña, Keith Klingensmith, and Rich Firestone--offer a fantastic new version of The Kinks' classic "Waterloo Sunset." That's supplemented by eleven more tracks (plus a hidden bonus track), including previously-unreleased gems from The Click Beetles, Eytan Mirsky, Pop Co-Op, Irene Peña, Michael Slawter (covering The Posies), and The Anderson Council (covering XTC), a new remix of "Infinite Soul" by The Grip Weeds, and familiar TIRnRR Fave Raves by Vegas With Randolph, Gretchen's Wheel, The Armoires, and Pacific Soul Ltd. Oh, and that mystery bonus track? It's exquisite. You need this. You're buying it from Futureman.

(And you can still get our 2017 compilation This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4, on CD from Kool Kat Musik and as a download from Futureman Records.)

Get MORE Carl! Check out the fourth and latest issue of the mighty Big Stir magazine at bigstirrecords.com/magazine

Hey, Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 100 essays (and then some) about 100 tracks, plus two bonus instrumentals, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).