Friday Shuffle - Shut Yer Pie Hole Edition

I'm not even sure I'm going to be able to express correctly what's on my mind but you're intelligent people. Maybe you'll be able to pick out my meaning from the mishmash rattling around in my head.

It boils down to this. I want people to simply shut up. Stop talking. Stop rambling, yammering, yapping, yakking, babbling, blathering, whatever - just stop.

I don't mean for everyone to go through life in dead silence. I love good conversation. I like to watch a good interview or to hear someone tell an interesting story. But lately I feel as though I'm being overwhelmed by just too much talking. Remember the part in Amadeus when the emperor tells Mozart that his opera has too many notes? "Just cut a few and it will be perfect!". That's how I feel about people and their talking.

This afternoon I took a break from my busy day to sit on the sofa for twenty minutes. I just wanted to close my eyes and rest. Not sleep. Not doze. Just rest. The TV was on to one of the afternoon news/talk/guest/feature story/all mixed together programs that populate the government owned regional TV stations. People were calling in with questions for a guest and these people could not get to the bloody point of their question to save their souls. And it's not because they're not professional TV people. The moderator couldn't make her point about anything either without using twenty thousand words first. It got to the point where I wanted to get into the car, drive to Leipzig and punch that woman in the face to get her to shut the hell up.

Needless to say I came out of my twenty minute rest period feeling worse than when I went into it.

The constant talking without a point is maddening. People are so in love with the sound of their own voices and they're not going to be happy until everyone else is just as in love with it. People are so bent on talking, talking, talking and it seems as though no one is playing the part of listener. And if they're not talking it doesn't mean they're listening. It often only means that they're simply waiting to talk. I sometimes am grateful for living in Europe if for no other reason than I am unable to ever watch The View. An hour or half hour or whatever it is of constant talking with some of the most grating voices known to man. I've seen that show while I've been in America and it left me wanting to find an ice pick with which I could puncture my eardrums if it would only make the voices stop.

It's an election year in the US next year and that means the pointless talking is just going to get worse. No one will be able to make their point succinctly. Voices will get louder and shriller and I'm half convinced that winners and losers will be decided by who can shout down the other more effectively. It's all rhetoric and empty phrases and I pray we can have a candidate who can speak, get to the point and not cover it with crap and fluff.

I think what's kick all this off with me is the constant coverage in the Anna Nicole Smith and Britney Spears stories. No one actually knows anything new and so they flog the old parts of the story over and over and then when there is some actual news, volumes of words are used to speculate over the tiniest detail. And it's all speculation. No one knows shit but they'll analyze their non-knowledge until the very universe itself must be begging for relief. Whatever happened to report new developments and then shutting up until the next new development?

Perhaps what I really need is to get away from the sources of the constant yammering. That would mean that I need to watch a whole lot less TV and stay completely away from Aunt Annoying. She's a master at talking without a break and afterwards no one knows what in the world she was talking about.

Bixente the iPod, shuffle for me.

1. Bungle In The Jungle - Jethro Tull
2. Late Night Grande Hotel - Nanci Griffith
3. I Don't Wanna Play House - Tammy Wynette
4. Boy From New York City - Manhattan Transfer
5. Dog Eat Dog - Adam Ant
6. Whiskey In The Jar - Thin Lizzy
7. Cadence To Arms - Dropkick Murphys
8. Relax - Frankie Goes To Hollywood
9. You're My Best Friend - Queen
10. Window In The Skies - U2

Bixente Say Relax. Point taken.

Have an excellent weekend. May you only hear what tickles your ear.