The Latest Generation

A look at Midnight Cowboy and how an off-the-cuff assessment brought up similarities to Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas .   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_Cowboy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midnight_Cowboy_(novel) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Leo_Herlihy Born 1927 - Silent generation (which starts in 1926) Midnight Cowboy at IMDB https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear_and_Loathing_in_L...

Last week was the anniversary of September 11, which inspired this episode's 9/11 theme.    Prompt the First; The Rising https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rising_(album) Released July 2002 - not quite a year after the attacks   Prompt the Second: Humor and 9/11 I have a note to myself from soon after the attacks:"Steven Spielberg, around September 12, said that there should be no art about Septemb...

Re-reduxing this one, because it is again the time of year for football games and field shows, and post-game parties, and (back in the day, anyway) rewatches of Highlander and The Lost Boys. And because The Lost Boys showed up, all unbidden, in a separate project I was working on today, and immediately started pulling my mind down memory lane.  And a little bit because Highlander showed up last mo...

There's reasons for why this one makes sense to look at again, but mostly I thought it was pretty good....Plus No Hard Feelings is going the rounds on streaming (currently on Netflix, as it has been for a little while.) ========================================= A look at perceptions of modern parenting, specifically how Generation X is seen to be parenting the Homeland generation and young Millenn...

This was one of the first episodes I put out here, and I'm a little surprised I haven't redone it yet.  The Star Trek (Original Series) episode  The Way to Eden is REALLY the one with the space hippies. It's one of the most generally disliked episodes, because of how over-the-top it goes in an attempt to be up-to-date and hip and with-it.  But on reviewing from a generational perspective ( and abo...

Our first tale from interesting times could've happened in other times - there's nothing specific about that time it happened, except that everyone there was Generation X, and it was just at a point where the mystic allure of the Awakening was giving way to the freedom of the Unraveling. But don't want to spoil it for you, so just listen. Not referenced or mentioned or anything here, but there's a...

Introduction to a new series on this podcast - one I've been intending to do for a while.  It's called Reactivities: Tales from Interesting Times.  Strauss & Howe originally called the cohort born between 1961 and 1981 the Thirteenth Generation, but the Coupland's " Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture " soon made it the preferred moniker. In Strauss & Howe's cyclical view, every fourth...

Re-duxing to honor Bob Newhart on the occasion of his recent passing. I had forgotten that some of this - from 6 years ago - inadvertently sounded like Newhart had already passed.  This is done in the style of one of his routines, which were almost always as one side of a conversation - often as if he was on a phone call, sometimes with other gimmicks (a submarine captain's announcement to his men...

  Prompt the First: Trump Shooting The Dead Zone - 1983 movie , 1979 book eventually a 2002 TV Series Bob Roberts - 1992, written and directed by Tim Robbins Here's the third one - I didn't bring it up because it's impossible to do so in this context without sounding completely silly. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sideshow_Bob_Roberts - Simpsons episode 1994   Prompt the Second: Economic Structure...

1. Jaws Post on Facebook on June 29th mentioned the Quint speech from Jaws, which, for all it's wonderful, has the wrong date "So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945. Anyway, we delivered the bomb." https://www.history.navy.mil/.../after-action-report-of... BUT...the date is completely wrong. It was July 30, 1945 - just after mid...

Prompt the First: Another Brick in the Wall Part 2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Another_Brick_in_the_Wall   Prompt the Second: Disney Cycles The Spectacular Failure of the Star Wars Hotel, Jenny Nicholson's magnum opus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T0CpOYZZZW4 On that pylon thing - this suggests that the original idea was to have a central performance viewable by everyone at every table. https:...

  For a quickly done episode, this turned out pretty well.  Prompt the first: The First Turning in Set Direction   The article on Variety: https://variety.com/2021/artisans/news/loki-production-design-blade-runner-1235019744/ The Loki series playlist on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLxaFrzRPFngWR4Odhwc8BXfJUNjDCPSVf A Boy and His Dog - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0072730/ Hello T...

I'm trying to replace the Lucas Portrait file with one that isn't twice as long as it needs to be. That may result in this episode getting re-published, in which case, enjoy an episode that will be redone in a month again, but at least will be four minutes long instead of eight.... --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Been on my mind for a bit, for two...

Going deep into the archives for a not-previously-reduxed discussion with my wife on a matter important to any generation: What's funny, what's not, and why?  We are Gen X-ers who think Quick Change is brilliant and funny. My mother-in-law thought Where's Poppa was brilliant and funny. You'll have to make up your own mind on which of us was right.   As mentioned, it's one of the first recordings I...

  Prompt the First: The   Crazy World of 2nd Turning Music https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thompson_Twins - doesn't mention the shaved eyebrow thing,  SNL: Devo, B-52s, David Bowie It wasn't uncontrollable urge; it was Satisfaction and then Jocko Homo And it was between their first two albums - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duty_Now_for_the_Future came out in 1979 And during Jocko Homo, they strippe...

  Prompt the First - Guadalcanal But also: The Pacific (2010)-   last time did Band of Brothers,   Taylor Swift — 1:12:50 in Long Pond sessions - association between Guadalcanal fighting and pandemic trauma. — Epiphany Available on Disney+ And it was in fact released IN 2020 - before vaccines were available, while effectively lockdown was still ongoing. And also - just barely related the Ahwanee w...

This is a bit of stretch for relevance but: It's Tax Day, and sometimes that's too busy a day to get anything else done. While composing Fanfare for the Common Man, Aaron Copland thought Tax Day was the most common sort of day for modern man, and that it would make a good day for a premiere.  Which this isn't, but it's a decent look at the music that opens this podcast. ---------------------------...

  Prompt the First - Band of Brothers September 9, 2001 - Sunday ~ nearly 23 years ago ~ 55-60 years after the events portrayed WIth regards to people being comforted by the familiarity of battle movies, I was particularly thinking of the use of the Awahanee Hotel in Yosemite Valley as a treatment for shellshock, as PTSD was called at the time. It didn't work very well, because it was TOO quiet an...

The Ten Commandments was on, which is set completely in the 19th dynasty, but because it's soon after the 18th it seems relevant enough. There are a number of candidates for the Pharoah of the Exodus. As the 1956 movie The Ten Commandments shows, one is Ramses II, the third pharaoh of the 19th dynasty. The 18th Dynasty has at least one or two as well, and that Akhenaten attempted to institute mono...

Thoughts on the film Eternals, a Marvel Cinematic Universe film from 2021   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternals_(film) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9032400/ - on IMDB   Here's the Bluesky thread with my initial thoughts, most of which are in here. https://bsky.app/profile/generationalize.bsky.social/post/3koba7n5kd526   As one of the Story Aside episodes, it begins from the Stories model: http:...

Prompt the First: Four years later. In the time of Covid.   It's four years since COVID lockdowns. That seems significant to me, in a way that the four year anniversary of 9/11 didn't. But the 1 year anniversary of 9/11 was important, and 4 years wasn't. What's the difference? Prompt the Second: Saving the MCU with Generational Analysis A previous look at one small part: http://stories.generationa...

Re-upping this one, because I've let it go for a bit and coming back to it now.  Consider this one a reminder of things to come. ============================================ The atomic bomb test on July 16, 1945 - also known as Trinity - occurred only 3 weeks before the bombing of Hiroshima and only 7 weeks before the end of the war. Looking at it as the midpoint of that summer, it was only one of...

A final episode for the initial Mapping History consolidation, asking the questions "What's Left" and "What Next?"

In Third Turnings we can expect to see Less powerful societal structures More freedom for individuals to do what they consider worthwhile Exciting (if bubbly) economies as individuals explore new opportunities Names we still recognize as some individuals make themselves known 1543 - Nicolaus Copernicus publishes "On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres" As we draw the final side of our map - th...

  Prompt the First: Put on Your Sunday Clothes Hello Dolly: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064418/ Wall*E: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0910970/   Prompt the Second: The Young Adult Suicide Chart Here's the tweet with the initial chart https://x.com/armanddoma/status/1758375001030627750?s=46&t=h3SDrddBzjyl2UOHr9Q3xA Shows increase and peak to 1994, sharp drop through 2003, then mostly show increase...