National Joe Day.

(via Joemygod)

We here at Spatagram are committed to the publicizing of silly holidays. In fact Melonball Thursday is right around the

corner. It's just before the Resurrection if you track the days on a calendar sold by the your local Church. In the vain of Melonball Thursday and International Talk Like a Pirate Day

comes National Joe Day. Evidently today has nothing to do with a penchant for coffee. Today has to do with shaking off your old name for whatever reason and go by the nam

e Joe.

Wake up on March 27 and introduce yourself to everyone as Joe. If you are a girl, Joe is short for your old name. If you are a boy, Joe is short for your old name as well. You are a new person. You are no longer strapped down to

that name you have been carrying around all these years. Throw off the old name and become Joe for a day. Make a journal entry talking about your feelings about your own name. People always attach meaning to certain names and when you don't fit those meanings, it leaves you wanting something else. Here is your day to

express who you think you are. Record it in a journal.

Now doesn't that sound intriguing. I once told an entire playground that my name was Paul, using my middle name to see how it made me feel. I also studied how it sounded in the air. And whether or not I could remember it when my name was called. I grew a new experiment on the heels of the Facebook surge of users changing their middle name to 'Hussein' to desensitize the word. I

added 'Rocco' as a middle name for Rocco DiSpirito, whom I have a very embarassing crush on. It was post election and people were done making statements and filling spaces for rent with Silliness. I don't shy away from the Silly, I walk hand in fin in it. I throw it a fish whenever do-able. I now get mail to Tony Rocco. It's changed my Life. Paul still exists but only for those that really know me. But in that vein today I unleash my Joe on the planet. Just Joeing ya here. I'm making dinner reservations under the name Joe.

National Hot Dog Day!

It's no secret I'm a fan of wieners. Big fan. Big wieners. To me they say, 'summer' and 'americana'. Remember the old slogan, baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet (even though that sounds french) The Hot dog industry has named July as National Hot Dog month and July 23nd as National Hot Dog Day. I also adore obscure holidays; International Talk like a Pirate Day, Melonball Thursday and am so happy to have found my new fave. The Dog Days of Summer, indeed.

The month begins with the Annual Coney Island Hot Dog Eating contest brought to you by Nathans Famous. My dear friend Joey Chestnut pulled another victory out of his solo cup by eating an astounding 54 HDB's in ten minutes. (hot dog and buns eaten) I know this because, I was there. Well, not physically, but spiritually. I was at friends holiday (July 4th) BBQ in Panorama City getting ready to have my third dog of the day. I was chatting up a very nice lady with tons of BoSox paraphernalia adorning her. I assumed my new besty was gay as she was checking her iPhone for sports feed. Straight, not narrow. She stumbled onto the results of this years competition and I implored her to give me more. When hearing of Kobayashi being arrested at the event I swooned. Kobabyashi is Chestnuts #1 competitor. Long and the short of it (pun intended) is K wasn't registered with the Federation that governs the sport and rushed the stage. High Drama among buns and lemonade. Arrested, hanging on to a rail like a child. Swoon.

See, I have an affinity for this event rising. I look forward to the Fourth Of July just for this very contest. Independence is nice, but wieners don't care who you marry. I remember my first seeing the televised event on ESPN when I was at work one night. My colleagues amazed I could actually be silenced by something on ESPN for that long a time. I was mesmerized by the depravity of my favortie activity and bastardizing it as a competition. I love to eat. I live to eat. I workout like a demon so I can eat more. Sometimes I awaken in the night to eat if I know that there's something special calling to me. Like a mermaid the sushi sings, Pavaroti draws me to the container of pasta leaving past roommates sighing knowing their leftovers when put into the fridge, "will never see the light of day." It's a sport governed by it's own Federation with by laws and dues. I cringe/cheer every time I get to hear one of the competitors resume. You don't know someone until you know how many crab cakes someone can put down. Or pounds of pasta. Or oysters. Would I want to have them for dinner? Probably not. Would I watch them on TV with the earnest love of a six-year old? Abso-freaking-lutely. Competitive Eating? Get out of here....

So get out there and grab yourselves a sausage with relish and succour. In La La Land, there are plenty of choices from Dodger Dogs to my personal fave Pinks. I encourage you to get out there and try it, it's a wonderful holiday and I think you'll enjoy it. National Hot Dog Day, not for the weak of heart, and a sport in some towns. If you are what you eat.....I am a hot dog.

Happy Birthday Albert Einstein!

Happy Birthday Albert Einstein!!!! More than a noun, an adjective.

Here's a man who knew how to party. If it wasn't for him wearing the same exact thing every day (a time save) he is best remembered as the picturesque braniac of the twentieth century.

I'm partial to the picture of him sticking out his tongue until I found this one recently online.

E=MC 2........................................Thank you.

14 March 1879–18 April 1955

PS.....Other holidays of note. Melonball Thursday approaches. ......

Casaba Cantina!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy Melonball Thursday!!!! The best holiday of them all this year coincides with Passover the trendy Jewish holiday marking the exodus of the Jews from 400 years of slavery! From this they wandered the desert for forty years following Moses. (allegedly they were walking off the meal, nyuk nyuk) If they had only had GPS...........

I'm telling you this to tell you a SILLY little story, yes involving a passover of sorts. Imagine if you will, the Thrilling Resort Of Ill Repute sloping the hillside towards the Long Island Sound on the CT Shoreline. We call it Yankee Key West in this strip of the CT shoreline as many wild birds mixed with drunken cockatoo's, sometimes three or four. The Resort was a breeding ground for bad behavior and timeshares, the two go together like hot dogs and doughnuts. The staff there was a fantastic team of characters. It was like Hogwarts with liquor and name tags. The Prancing Polish Prince and I worked the slave shifts being the low men on the totem pole. This included bfast buffets with mutants like QTip, Elena and Disco Bob working side by side with us. More stories there, but another time. Sometimes the hangovers were so bad one of would sleep under the buffet while the other ran the floor and room service. I digress.

The Resort was a three tiered nightmare of stairs that developed my calves to the fierce models of art they are today. When we would work brunch, I was usually furthest away from the kitchen with a long way to schlepp plates. Down three flights to the hellhole kitchen I would carry my heavy trays and pass the coffee station along the way. There were swinging western doors to the station that had to be watched out before the next left, entrance to the kitchen. It was my joy to smack said door en route to knock my colleague filling a coffee pitcher so that it would spill (hopefully on them and burn a tad). This particular day I had hit the Prince a number of times and it wasn't helping his H/over. On the last trip down I smacked the door, shouting "Door" as was customary, into the Prince in full on coffee mode. He didn't care for this, followed me into kitchen with a scrounged piece of cheesecake off a nearby dirty plate laden tray. He stalked me to the dish station and as I unexpectedly dropped tray on slop station my ears were filled with, "Cheesecake!!!!" I turned to see the Prince in full demonic glee with dirty cheesecakd fingers. I turn to his unintentional target, the salad pantry and the weasel QTip that was shocked by the pastryassault that splattered on the facade of pantry. A pantry raid if you will. This was a Passover that I will remember for a long time. I wouldn't have worn the tyranny of the sweet very well and the acts of retribution would have been ugly. Happy Passover it was.

Isn't that Silly?????? I thought so.

HAPPY MELONBALL THURSDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Melonball Rising!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Long and hard we toil. Hours numerous and remunerations scant, we work. We work to provide for a better life and in doing so we find humor along the way. Humor is deliverance from the banality and agony of day in day out labors. Humor is a multilingual mistress who can provoke her recipient in many tongues. What's one man's trash is another man's treasure which explains the enormous success of Larry The Cable Guy.

Git 'er done.

It's silly, I know but so are so many other things in life. Why are tops necessary at the beach, why do we have to follow the flow of the escalators and what was Tropicana thinking with their new packaging?? Silliness abounds and we all see it differently. The common thread is that we are transformed in a moment by just that little twist that appeals to our senses. Schadenfreude, scatology, wit, knock knock jokes, practical jokes even Howie Mandel with a surgical glove can make someone stop and smile. In that moment you are free to feel, and even to dream a bit. I would love to be able to share in this happy feeling that we all share when something 'tickles our funnybone' and am once again inviting all to celebrating



Melonball Thursday; The unofficial holiday celebrating Silliness usually marked by toasting a shared silly act from the past with a melonball of the celebrant's personal choice. Historically the thursday before Easter.


This holiday took it's roots in a kegger back in the Eighties. It was originally marked as an homage a man who's ego directly influenced a generation of some very funny people. Melonball was his nickname but it became the bouncing ball that made me want to keep singing funny lyrics. The holiday was bastardized or re-engineered to bring in a larger group of people who deserve to feel good about themselves and their lives in the Nineties. From NYC to NH, from Newport to NJ the word was spread of a holiday that was the organized moment to have a laugh, a memory and a melonball. The word was spread from tavern to tavern, from career-ending youth theatre tours to career-ending youth theatre tours. Just like those beacons were lit in the end of "The Lord Of The Rings" the news has been spread. Alright maybe that was just silly, but we're still trying.

Everyone has a right to be silly at sometime or another (and hopefully even get paid for it) so this coming thursday, give yourself a break and crack a smile, have a melonball and tell a story or two. You'll make your bartender, local farmer and yourself a bit happier. And from the way the world is today, don't you think you deserve it????

Send your pictures of this Melonball Thursday to my email monoxvii@adelphia.net I look forward to seeing them and you and hearing your stories!

The Sheena Metal Experience Redux

Hello sweet monkeys of fun, denizens of silly how are we today??? I'm currently entertaining my dear Suzie Q on the Left Coast here and showing her the highs and lows of fun in LA. Yesterday we did a taping of the Chelsea Lately show on E! It's a hyper-ballic slam of current events and tabloid titillation. Yesterday she touched on Gisele, John Mayer and Vince, the 'ShamWow" guy. There was some funny material and decent improv. She's a riot, if not a little rough around the edges. Her roundtable featured dear sweet Diablo Cody of 'Juno' fame and her special guest was Camille Guaty from 'Cupid' a strange show with an uncertain future. The crowd warmer was an amazingly hyper fella who scared you all into clapping, stomping and cheering. Chelsea was nice enough to sign some autographs. I didn't have a copy of her book was hoping to get her to sign a pack of Marlboro Lights. Oh well.

Today we're off to have bfast at the Fountain Coffee Shoppe at the Beverly Hills Hotel and then a hot dog at Pinks. Peaks and Valleys my friends, peaks and valleys. And a little shop in between.

What could round out her experience but a trip to The Sheena Metal Experience broadcast on LA Talk Radio!!!! Suzie and I will be in the studio, me as a guest, S as a patient observer. We had a fantastic show on ST Pat's, why not give us a listen 5-7pm today PST and get yourself Experienced! Listen here.

Melonball Thursday approaches!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Darwin's BDay!!!!

Grab your Scopes and swing from the vine, it's time to honor the uncle of all Monkeys: Chuck Darwin!!!! On this bicentennial bday, that's 200 for the simp chimp, I extend an invitation to one and doll, eat a banana and think of Havana. Do something silly so that you can talk about it on the up coming Melonball Thursday. Remember Chuck was the original free thinker who told us where we came from; Apes not Eden. Evolution is still very much the revolution so have a bananadaquirini and read some Bananaland, It's Darwin Day.

Monkey Monkey.

Here's a little fun toy at the bottom of my cereal box of nonsense.

Darwin yourself.

Melonball Thursday.

Hope everyone had a blessed and happy Melonball Thursday!!!!!!!!!! And Easter, too.

Melonball Pictures

Beware the Ides of March........

The fifteenth has historic significance for March being the Shakespearean suggestion of imperial assassination. I like to think of it as a warm-up for Melonball thursday.

Historically MBT is the unofficial holiday celebrating silliness. It began in the middle eighties with some overly creative highschoolers and has spread to an imagined phenomena. The rites of MBT include gathering with friends or strangers, ingesting a melonbal cocktail, shooter or actual fruit and remembering silly times.

For this MBT I plan to post my collected photos from the Ministers of Silly. Beware.

September 19th, Talk Like A Pirate Day.

Anyone who knows me or has read all of my posts while sitting under power lines, knows that I celebrate the mundane and cherish the banal. I fancy holidays that I've created in my own mind and work diligently on spreading their good name. Well now, I 've had the rug pulled out from under my (peg) leg.











Today is International Talk Like A Pirate Day. The day when all are encouraged to talk like a pirate. It's been in existence for a short period of time, in comparison to Melonball Thursday's inception. It gained national exposure with the aid of syndicated columnist Dave Barry. The originator, Mark Summers (Cap'n Slappy, pictured right) and buddy John Baur (Ol' Chumbucket, left), created the day mostly to remember Summer's wifes Birthday. Here are some brilliant sound bytes to work in to your dialogue today, from Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson;









Bring me one noggin of rum, now, won't you, matey."









"Avast, there!"









"Dead men don't bite."









"Shiver my timbers!" (often pronounced as "Shiver me timbers!")









"Fifteen men on the dead man's chest -- Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!" (see Dead Man's Chest)









"There! That's what I think of ye. Before an hour's out, I'll stove in your old block house like a rum puncheon. Laugh, by thunder, laugh! Before an hour's out, ye'll laugh upon the other side. Them that die'll be the lucky ones."









I myself have often been considered a pirate of sorts. And thoroughly welcome this holiday as my own. AAAaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrhhhhhhhhh.

Booty.

(Pictured; Cap'n Pinkertony, the Scourge of Barneys)

grrrrrr.