OT, but in desperate need of comedic treatment: Cheney fucked up his back carrying boxes out of his lair, and will be in a wheelchair for the inauguration. Actually, that doesn’t need treatment, does it? Ready to go.

Word to the wise, if you’re 99 years old and have had 14 heart attacks, don’t try to carry your own man-sized safe.

And, to be fully pedantic, Jack Elam died in 2003 at the age of 84, so Burt Prelutsky really can’t get anything right (I know, surprise, surprise, surprise..). Of course, in comment, Prelutsky makes clear that he’s just recycling old material for the bumpkins at Big Hollywood:

CONTRIBUTOR: Burt Prelutsky – January 19th, 2009 at 9:45 am
I just wanted to stop by to confirm that Jack did start out as an accountant before devoting his professional life to playing no-accounts. I originally wrote this piece back in October, 2003, when Jack passed away at the age of 84. But I brought it back for Big Hollywood, where, as I expected, the readers are finally giving him the send-off he deserved.
Regards, Burt

Of course, Big Hollywood isn’t just a place for recycled tributes to long-dead actors. No, it’s a place for washed-up has beens (never was) to bitch and moan about remakes of old shows that are vastly superior to the original. I’m sure in a few years, Dirk will be bitching about some A-team remake, too.

I read that and I thought Elam died sometime over the Christmas break. Didn’t know ol’ Jack died 6 years ago.
But it was a good story anyway about Jack’s poker playin’ skills. Didn’t know Elam was good at poker and I don’t know why it was important to tell that tale.
Sadly, this was one of the better offerings thus far from Breitbart’s new venture.

The best righty stuff often is recycled, and sometimes it’s recycled lefty stuff. The best thing about the Minnesota right-wing blog Nihilist in Golf Pants is its name, which was taken from a wonderfully incendiary Garrison Keillor riff.

Something about a wingnut’s attachment to a character actor best known for playing crusty old coots (and he did it very well, truly) makes me think that Stephen Colbert, with his late-night phone calls from Wilford Brimley, has had these people tagged for a very long time.

The story reeks of bullshit to this old poker dealer.

If newbie wins and then leaves early — yeah, that lacks class.

But if a kid comes in and can’t win a hand and bails early — so what? He wasn’t a regular anyway, so any real poker player wouldn’t think twice about it.

And the only truly “short-handed” home game I’m aware of is when there’s only one player left. If Elam had been such a good player he’d know this much: the fewer the players, the better his chances. An excellent player understands the power of the last position, an average player may not.

Shee-it. I’d play Burt Prelutsky heads-up any day…

I know I speak for my whole generation when I say that we all–every one of us–remember exactly what we were doing on October 20, 2003, when we heard that Jack Elam died. The hushed, shocked silence. The crowds in the streets, with strangers asking each other in sad and quiet tones if they had heard the news. The anger that this man had been cut down in his prime, leaving this world at the age of only 84, with so much promise ahead for him. Ever since then, I have tried to do my best to honor his memory by spending a little time, just a little every day, doing my best to be a walleyed old coot. And I’m a better man for it.

Jack, we hardly knew ye.

Except I’m pretty sure no one would describe this as “the best righty stuff”. Although in that case, the bar is set awfully low..

Next up: Burt mourns the untimely passing of Zachariah Chandler, Ulysses S. Grant’s third Secretary of the Interior, at the age of 65 in 1879.

Charlton Heston is dead?!!??

Wait, and I”m not joking, I thought Burt Prelutsky himself was dead. I thought he died during the campaign? Wow. Must have been a dream.

aimai