Notes From the Whirlpool

Hey there! Sit down, have a drink. We should get acquainted…
Me? I’m JAMES GATES. What’s that? Well, that’s a tricky question…You might call me a Wichita…what? Character? Fixture? Gargoyle? I don’t know for sure… I’ve lived in the Wichita area almost 79% of my life. Most of the time I haunt Delano and the Old Town district like they were my own personal Whitechapel—you may only catch glimpses of me, floating in the background at a bar, a show or an art opening, but there are traces of me everywhere. (Wow, that didn’t sound creepy at all, did it?) I’ve been around long enough to have met some people… And let’s face it, I’m recognizable. I’m six and a half feet tall, rail-thin with blond hair, goatee and yellow-tinted glasses—I look like the three-way love child of Andy Dick, Shaggy, and Lurch from The Addams Family.
If there’s one thing I’ve been known for over the years, it’s random, bizarre, goofy shit. Tales are still told of the time I staged a re-enactment of the Oswald assassination in front of the Bohemian Bean Co., or when I held an impromptu white-slavery raffle to pay my rent… After awhile, it just seemed a natural to go semi-pro, which I did in 2006 with the sketch comedy group PANIC BUTTONS. I’ve been performing on stages and microphones throughout the Wichita area ever since, pursuing the goal of building a live, local comedy scene. In March 2007 I started doing THE JAMES GATES SHOW, a live comedy experience based around A) the late-night talk show format, and B) a whole bunch of me. And the rest is, well, the stuff of much confusion…
Anyway, this is my log. I get to write about anything I want, anytime. I like that. Hope you do too.
Fri Aug 21

08/21/09 - A Couple of Lists, #1

A Couple of Lists, #1

Random List #3944 – SHOWS ON “ZOMBIE TV”

More and more, I find myself using Twitter and Facebook as a place to test/”sneak preview” certain material… case in point:  I started leaking some of this list yesterday, with a bit of commentary on each.  It started innocently enough, without even a title…

·      “Now, folks around Hazzard County have known for some time, them Duke boys’ll eat your brains right out your head…” (cue banjo)

·      ZOMBIE CROCODILE HUNTER- Steve Irwin returns from the grave to molest a new set of unsuspecting animals for our viewing pleasure!

·      BEVERLY ZOM-BILLIES- “Brains, that is- Skull Gold, Cranium Tea…” (cue banjo; strange how often zombies & banjos fit together…)

·      LIVE W\ REGIS & ZOMBIE- I know, you’d think it’s the other way around, but take a closer look— NO WAY is that bitch normal…

·      THE BITE OF THE CONCHORDS— Infection is still one of the best ways to start a cult following…

·      DECOMPOSING HOUSEWIVES- oh, come on— they were already halfway there when the show started 5 years ago…

·      UNDEAD BETTY- Is homosexuality a metaphor for zombies, or are zombies a metaphor for homosexuality? These are the questions…

·      ZOMBIE & THE BEAST— can still star Linda Hamilton & Ron Perlman in the title roles!

·      ZOMBIE KNIGHT RIDER- question is, who’s dead- Hasslehoff, KITT, or both? (Or maybe there’s no KITT, and he’s just riding a zombie)

·      THEY’RE ALWAYS HUNGRY IN PHILADELPHIA— Oh, like Danny DeVito was ever that funny while he was still alive…

·      LAW & ORDER: SZU- “In the zombie justice system, human brains are considered particularly tasty…” CHUK-CHUK!

·      EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND’S BRAINS— Pretty obvious…one cast member played Frankenstein, and another actually IS Frankenstein…

·      WITCH DOCTOR WHO— Q: What’s the one thing that could actually make time travel MORE complicated? A: Zombies, of course…

·      ZOMBIE FLIPPER— Greatest idea in the history of civilization. Michael Bay must film this NOW. Related: Zombie Lassie, Mr. Unde-ED

…and it just ballooned from there…

·      Zombie Idol

·      CSI: Raccoon City

·      Top Chef: Zombie

·      2 and a Half-Man

·      Grey’s Post-Anatomy

·      Undeadwood

·      Stargate SZ-1

·      The Undead Zone

·      Zombie’s Creek

·      One Tree Silent Hill

·      The Gilmore Zombies

·      Port-Au-Prince 90210

·      Hannah Zomb-tana

·      Zomb-tourage

·      Charlie’s Zombies (or Zombie’s Angels)

·      The 6 Million Dollar Zombie

·      Bionic Zombie

·      Extreme Makeover: Zombie Edition

·      How I Ate Your Mother

·      Zombiewood Squares

·      Tic Tac Zombie

·      21 Zombie Street

·      Zombie and the Fatman

·      Spongebob Zombiepants

·      Leave It To Zombie

·      Dead of the Class

·      Zombie Bloopers and Practical Jokes

·      WKRZ in Cincinnati

·      He-Man and the Zombies of the Universe

·      Mary Zombie Moore Show

·      The Brain-Eat Bunch

·      ZR

·      Undead Like Me

·      Murder, She Ate

·      Zombie Matlock (oh wait—that’s what Matlock was in the first place…)

·      Laverne & Zombie

·      B.J. & the Zombie

·      Touched By a Zombie

·      Dr. Quinn, Zombie Woman

·      Zombie Acres

·      The Z Word

·      Saved By the Bell: the Zombie Years

·      Zombie Meets World

·      That’s So Zombie!

·      All My Zombies

·      Days of Our Deaths

·      One Life to Eat

·      The Z-Team

·      Zombie Airwolf

·      My Favorite Zombie

·      The Greatest American Zombie

·      Quantum Zombie

·      The Facts of Death

·      227 (28 Days Later)                                   

·      VH1 Pop-Up Zombie

·      Zombie Vice

·      I Dream of Zombie

And shows already on the air featuring zombies:

·      According To Jim

·      Dancing With the Stars

·      Last Call with Carson Daly

Interesting note:  I was never able to come up with a zombie version of 24… it just wouldn’t work.  You can’t have zombies in a show that requires people dying to advance the storyline…

Random List #2861 – “THE 12 LABORS OF UHURA”

I’d like to conclude with a list I call “The Twelve Labors of Uhura”, in honor of probably the only “Uhura” you know (and definitely the only one I know), Lt. Uhura, the communications officer for the Starship Enterprise, from the classic original STAR TREK series and recent theatrical release of the same name.

 I do this because I feel that Lt. Uhura has NEVER gotten the level of recognition that she has deserved.  You may be aware that she took part in the first interracial kiss shown on television—with Captain Kirk, of course—but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.  I mean, seriously… she was a black woman in space in the 1960s.  Let’s go over that again:  she was a BLACK WOMAN, in SPACE, in THE 1960s.   The bitch broke down barriers in her sleep.  I mean, when you’re a black woman in space in the 1960s, pretty much anything you do sets a precedent… 

So with that in mind, I’d like to take a moment, if I may, to share some of Lt. Uhura’s many accomplishments with you.  Think of it as sort of a tribute to Black Future Month….

Lt. Uhura was:

  • 1st black woman to kiss a white man on television, in space (and that works both ways—she was also the 1st to kiss a white man in space, on television…)
  • 2nd black woman to use a water fountain in space
  • 3rd black woman on the Enterprise to be on the Enterprise
  • 4th woman to urinate in the Alpha Quadrant
  • 5th black woman to eat yogurt in space
  • 6th black person to play racquetball in space
  • 7th woman to have a “heavy flow” at Warp 5 or higher
  • 8th woman in Starfleet trained in the “Distracting Feather Dance”
  • 9th person in the Federation to get the Roluman Herpes
  • 10th person/extraterrestrial to get an  “emergency gynecological exam” from Dr. McCoy
  • 11th person/extraterrestrial to file suit against Dr. McCoy in Federation court (pending the completion of their five-year mission)
  • 12th black woman to tell Kirk “Now HELL no!!”

Me love lists,

JG