Amusitorial – We are not amused

musitorial n mashing music, musings and editorials, music and song that evokes thought and commentary.

“We are not amused”

Today’s musitorial is really more of an amusitorial, for the recording shared is not music, but a skit by Cheech and Chong on their album Big Bambừ (Ode Records/Warner Bros., 1972).

My new term amusitorial got me thinking too. If ‘amoral’ is ‘without morals’ and ‘ahistoric’ is ‘without history,’ perhaps ‘amusing’ is truly defined as ‘without thought.’

We often find jokes, stories or situations the funniest when they are really not so funny, like when they are at someone else’s expense, when they are without humour. As I age I sometimes reflect on my younger days (or is that younger daze) when I might laugh uproariouly at a joke or an insult that someone else found funny (usually the teller) whether or not I really got the joke or before I considered its implications. There I go, taking the fun out of making fun of someone else.

But that’s just my musing spurred by an amusing recording, one that I hope you will enjoy too. It came to mind yesterday when I saw President Trump’s after-the-fact missive about the lecture he got from Episcopalian Bishop Mariann Budde who is under attack by nasty and unthinking critics for her very Christian plea to President Trump to be more charitable, more Christian, in his dealings with so-called illegal immigrants in the United States.

Readers will know that my mind wanders (wonders?) at such moments, and this time it wandered to a recording by the aforementioned 1960s comedy duo, Cheech and Chong (American Cheech Marin and Canadian Tommy Chong). In those days before YouTube, comedy routines were often committed to vinyl for wide distribution. On Cheech and Chong’s album Big Bambừ is a brief skit called, "Streets of New York or Los Angeles or San Francisco or....” Enjoy!

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Link to YouTube recording of “Streets...”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TduZlJOMu6c

Link to Wikipedia article on the album: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Bambu

Link to Wikipedia article on Cheech and Chong: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheech_%26_Chong