Friday, February 29, 2008

This Just In: BSNYC Interviewed; "Save The Messengers" Campaign Abandoned

Firstly, I'm proud to report that the excellent Belgium Knee Warmers blog has posted an interview with me today. Frankly, I think featuring me on a classy blog like that is like spoiling a nice steel frame with a carbon rear triangle, but unlike many bike companies those guys seem to know what they're doing so I'm not going to worry about it. Many thanks to BKW.

Secondly, I'm sorry to report that the "Save The Messengers" campaign has officially Jumped The Shark. A loyal reader informs me that three celebrities have recently climbed on board:











It hardly warrants mentioning that when the preachy triumverate of Baldwin, Begley, and Anderson adopts a cause it's no longer cool. It's like when your favorite band licenses a song to a car company. And I don't know about you, but I flat out refuse to support something that's not cool. Consequently, I'm afraid the "Save The Messengers" campaign must now join Buddhism, Kabbalism, and animal rights in Ned's Atomic Dustbin of Unfashionable Causes.

But don't despair. No matter what the fate of the messenger, their aesthetic at least will be forever preserved in amber by those who emulate them. A reader recently forwarded me this video, which manages to simultaneously disgrace cycling, the city of San Francisco, and the rotting corpse of punk in less than two and a half minutes.



(Taking a final drag before swinging a leg over the fashion express.)



(Gig cancelled?!? Oh, the irony!)

And if you really want to experience the thrill of making deliveries by bicycle in a hostile environment, just get your hands on the 1984 video game classic, "Paperboy."



Indeed, after watching this video (also forwarded to me by a reader), it appears that the future of cycling is in 80s video games.

106 comments:

  1. That's how I felt when I heard the Ramones on an AT&T commercial.

    Baldwin, Begley, ANDERSON!?!?

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  2. It's the Film Actors Guild Society!

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  3. FAGS save the world.

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  4. I'm just going to end it all.

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  5. OK, I'm pretty much with you, except on the "Close that gap" thing. As you have noted in the past, road racing is all about getting some other sucker to do all the work. Well, that is what "GO GO GO" and "Close that gap!" are all about. Now "Hold yer line" douchebags can all suck it.

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  6. snob

    FUCK YOU! for posting that video
    you are DEAD TO ME!

    ReplyDelete
  7. I'm sorry Mr. Bike Snob but I love San Francisco so much that the video only served to reminded me and I dissolved into homesick tears before the end. Quintessential San Francisco alright.

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  8. Oh Jesus, why didn't somebody tell me that we were abandoning the cause. I just frigin' finished filming a public service announcement with Sean frigin' Penn.

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  9. Wait Matt, where? The Aurora bridge? Brakeless down the Counterbalance? Do you want it on YouTube? Background music? Should I call The Crisis Clinique?

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  10. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  11. Man i LOVED paperboy! Way to dig out the classics!

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  12. That video has scenes of blatant littering, unprohibited smoking, and brakeless fixies, those guys are BAD ASS.

    This may be my old fahrt perspective, but I was tired of that shit when I was in my 20s, can't 20-somethings think of anything else? Who the hell keeps printing Dead Kennedy's and misfits T-shirts? Those guys are all on medicare.

    Kids today, ...GET OFF MY LAWN.

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  13. I actually played paperboy on tuesday. I made it to thursday. tgif.

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  14. wow, Im cracking up, but now that we have abandoned the cause what am I going to do with all theses bracelets I just ordered?

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  15. Erik K --

    Weave them into top tube pads

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  16. OK. I just watched the Tron video...I guess some things don't translate from Eastern Europe, but thank god they were wearing full leathers and motorcycle helmets, because at those breakneck speeds...

    Tron was Al Gore's favorite movie. I don't know how I know that.

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  17. The one good thing about this music video is that it accurately depicts the entire fan-base of the band Dead To Me-- three fashion whoring idiots living in San Francisco riding fixies because it's, "Like, totally a Zen thing." These people probably say "Namaste" instead of "Goodbye".

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  18. Paperboy RULED! I always like the breakdancer spinning on his head on a piece of cardboard. So un-PC by today's standards

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  19. It's like when your favorite band licenses a song to a car company.

    Please tell me you've heard Hum shilling for Cadillac.

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  20. I was going to complain about the vintage of that Baldwin photo, but then I realized that given his current girth, you probably had to go that far back to find a picture of him without his shirt on. Namaste...

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  21. People!

    join the BSnob fan club in Facebook:

    http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10694887315&ref=share

    The only of a kind!

    ReplyDelete
  22. AH-

    I am with you on that AT&T commercial.

    BSNY - a great post. Have a good weekend....

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  23. Of the first nine to join the bikesnob fan club on facebook three appear to have Saami heritage.

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  24. Hey, Dead to Me:
    Pull my finger.

    More wanking going on there than George Michael in a public bog.

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  25. i'm almost ashamed to say that these guys stayed at my friend's apartment when they were touring through our town :/

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  26. Anonymous said...

    More wanking going on there than George Michael in a public bog.


    Needs translation.
    For those of you on this side of the pond, south of the Great lakes:

    More wanking going on there than Larry Craig in a Minnesota restroom.

    North of the lakes:

    More wanking going on there than Brian Mulroney prosecutors in Ottawa shit closets.

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  27. Yes! Ned's Atomic Dustbin!

    I still love "Kill Your Television".

    I'm old.

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  28. Snob,

    I'm getting married tomorrow and going on a two-week honeymoon starting Sunday. It's totally inappropriate but I keep thinking about how I'm not going to be able to read this blog for two whole weeks.

    ReplyDelete
  29. Holy shit, a Ned's reference, Paperboy, AND a set-up leading to Pam Anderson. A fitting Friday post!

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  30. m. weed:

    It's good to see your priorities are straight!

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  31. M. Weed,

    Congratulations! I'm glad I will be with you in the form of a gnawing sense of withdrawal.

    --BSNYC

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  32. Namaste? Saami? It takes a PhD. just to read the comments section.

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  33. That Ned's Atomic Dustbin video was a flashback I didn't need. I still listened to the whole song, to my eternal shame.

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  34. Sorry to disappoint, I only go brakeless on the track. I'm too old to try and impress some hipster with my brakeless pike position dismount. I guess I'll just have to continue getting off my bike one leg at a time like I have been for a decade.

    Maybe I'll trackstand my touring bike at Westlake Beach, some stalls on those blocks. I do this sweet trick where I actuate my barend shifters while lighting a cigarette.

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  35. EWH! that video sucks so bad. Punk rock should be left in the 90's where it belongs and track bikes should be left on the track or between the legs of messengers, and passionate bike enthusiasts. but who am i to say this...

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  36. m.weed- as a lawfully wedded spouse, let me give you this advice: come clean to your spouse now, before the ceremony, about your Snob tendencies.

    I'm sure Snobby could tell you of the thousands of emails he's received pleading for some sort of Snob Sanctioned Support System for those whom BSNYC in private.

    No one needs to read about another instance in the gossip section of a newly married couple is calling it quits because a spouse discovered the "laptop in the bathroom is for checking real-time stock quotes", turns out to be for a deep seeded Snob addiction.

    Show your partner (aren't I being nice and PC?) who you really are, and what you really enjoy. If she still loves you, your marriage will surely endure. If she cannot accept BSNYC, it wasn't meant to be.

    Wasn't it Shakespeare who said in Sonnet 116:
    Let me not to the marriage of true minds
    Admit impediments. Love is not love
    Which alters when [BSNYC it] finds,
    Or bends with the remover to remove:
    O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
    That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
    It is the star to every wandering bark,
    Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
    Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
    Within his bending sickle's compass come;
    Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
    But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
    If this be error and upon me proved,
    [BSNYC] never writ, nor no man ever loved.


    Best of luck and let us know how you coming out goes.

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  37. BSNYC --

    Buddhism and Kabbalism unfashionable causes, OK. But animal rights? Yikes! Keep animal rights and let Pamela go.

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  38. openyoureyes,

    The soon-to-be-wife reads the Snob regularly as well. She just doesn't comment. All's well!

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  39. Anonymous 1:37pm,

    Sorry, but animal rights are out. Right now it's all about Africa. I don't decide this stuff--that's just the way it is.

    --BSNYC

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  40. xRideVeganx said...

    EWH! that video sucks so bad. Punk rock should be left in the 90's where it belongs...


    LOL..Never Mind the Bollocks was released in 1977.

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  41. Dear BSNYC --

    Thanks for clarifying that. We'd better add humility to your list of cardinal virtues.

    Anon 1:37 PM

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  42. dear BSNYC,

    the last time i saw this kid he was very rude to me. Its a cool trick and i have no where near the amount of time or care to learn it, but what is the point? please justify this for me. He made me feel dumb for not knowing trcks, and i am still kind bitter.

    ----> http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=27278817

    and yes, i just like 90s and some 80s punkrock.

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  43. kinda***
    and i dont know how to type...

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  44. Hey, that's not Alec Baldwin. I saw Alec Baldwin live on TV the other day, and while I'll entertain the possibility that Alec Baldwin may have eaten the guy in the picture, I will not accept that the guy in the picture is Alec Baldwin.

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  45. OMG! I LOVE PAPERBOY! i forgot it existed.
    j

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  46. I've seen Dead to Me a few times, and I really try to like them. But they're not that great. They're certainly not making it any better with this video.

    They just should go back to being One Man Army and not hipster/vegan/fixiphile/straightedge hobags.

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  47. Afternoon, lower classes.

    Good move, there is no saving bicycle messengers. I was leaving the Sports Club yesterday and saw one almost get hit by a delivery truck while racing across 2 lanes of traffic. I'm sure they will end up serving me coffee or packing my wine into my 'Rati eventually.

    The firm used to hire a few here and there, but an email is just so much more efficient.

    Going to Dad's place in MV for the weekend, taking the Citation. Should be right on the money, the ladies love a man with his own jet.

    As I always say, Thanks for being you, and working for me. Posters, feel free to correct my spelling, you guys are as efficient as my secretary!!!

    - Upperclass, out!!

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  48. One thing missing from the video--people on real bicycles passing the behoodies set...

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  49. Style on a road bike


    Somebody needs to put "La Course en Tete" on VideoGoogle.

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  50. Dear UpperClass: Please see the comments regarding Marios Mother posted yesterday. Impersonating Thurston Howell III is only slightly less funny than impersonating an elderly Italian Mother. Give it a rest.

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  51. Great scenes in "La Course" of Eddy feeding a young baby Axel in a high chair some dark Belgian beer.
    Europe...it's the little things.

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  52. upperclass.. I think the idea of the blog comments is to carry forward the humor, not kill it with incomprehensible drivel.

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  53. Save the messengers campaign over?

    Oh dear.

    Now what am I supposed to do with all the donated glaucoma medication that nice young messenger asked me to hold?

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  54. The Bike Messenger....A possible remake of the Kevin Costner movie The Postman???

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  55. Holy crap...I just watched the Light cycles/Rebel yell mashup.

    Your post made me YouTube Stone Roses & the Charletans UK.

    Excuse me while I cycle off into maudlin nostalgia.

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  56. Upperclass post check
    Marios Mom post check
    30 posts by Leroy check
    'Vote For' posts check
    Outagiously long posts check

    All we need is a creepy bikegonewild post for a grand slam.

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  57. you fucking suck dick snob

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  58. Oh, I must have been slightly inebriated when I posted about Hillary. Sorry everyone.

    Spamming on BSNYC about politics, what was I thinking?

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  59. you forgot to add a woogie woogie for the grand slam

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  60. Anonymous 4:37pm,

    Wait, I'm confused. Are you saying I "suck dick," or are you just saying I suck, and then calling me "Dick Snob?" I'm not offended, just confused.

    --BSNYC

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  61. nice tact snob!!! keep it up it gives me something to look forward as I press forth in the coalfields.

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  62. Dear Anon 4:23 PM --

    Did that nice young messenger leave a brick of glaucoma medicine with you?

    I only ask because your math seems a little off.

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  63. ...anon 4:23pm...

    ...from the moment i saw your post, i was convulsed w/ laughter...i may even read it later...

    ...just sayin'...

    ReplyDelete
  64. i went on a bike ride, im over it. thanks so much for the advice!!! :D

    yours truly,
    - little transparent girl

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  65. O.K., I waited all day to see if somebody else asked this for fear of the shitstorm which will inevitably follow if I get this wrong, but Baldwin? Isn't that Richard Gere from An Officer and a Gentleman?

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  66. Good post Snob.

    commiecanuck, Mulroney, too funny. And you are suppose to say The Right Honourable. Bag of money? now where did that come from I wonder? You're the only guy I know that sits on the border. Must be a dual citizen.

    -theothercanuck-

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  67. Nice post - BKW is my other favorite blog, what a nice surprise. Paperboy and Ned' Atomic Dustbin (whom I saw open for Jesus Jones a long time ago)...mind blowing that you'd find these references. I thought I was the only one...

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  68. Wow. Your shit is huge in Finland.

    http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=10694887315

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  69. Consequently, I'm afraid the "Save The Messengers" campaign must now join Buddhism, Kabbalism, and animal rights in Ned's Atomic Dustbin of Unfashionable Causes.

    applause ~!

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  70. ...bikesnob nyc meets belgium knee warmers...

    ...jeez, it's like a big kozmic ksyerium es of karmic PRO cycling perfection...

    ...that is some seriously balanced out shit...

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  71. Band of Horses on some car commercial....


    I was just playing Paperboy a few weeks ago. Neat.

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  72. Ned's Atomic Dustbin, Tron, and Paperboy...triple flashback whammy. I love you, man.

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  73. First Bicycling, now Belgium Knee Warmers. "Grand Tour style vs. classics style vs. crit style." But what about "PRO" style?

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  74. Anon 5:56- You dead on. I saw the Baldwin references and kept going back to check and I (not that it really matters) side with you. That also makes the Buddhism link clear.

    xrideveganx- Not to be insultive, but you're cute; '90s? Some of the best stuff was late '70s early '80s, Pistols (thanks Sid), Ramones, etc. Some of the best shows I've ever seen and some excellent fragments of memory.

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  75. Hey Dead to Me:

    Eat Shit.

    Just kidding!

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  76. To think I could have lived a full long life without ever hearing "dead to me." I like the term as Vorenus referring to his dead wife in Rome. Sounds better than the band does. Pamela A.'s face looks like a first base mitt turned inside out.

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  77. You're the only guy I know that sits on the border. Must be a dual citizen.

    -theothercanuck-


    Canada is the only country I know where the Prime Minister can take a $300,000 cash bribe and get away with it because he declared it on his income taxes. But even that is excusable, ...spawning Ben Mulroney is not.

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  78. commiecanuck,

    how true.

    -theothercanuck-

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  79. wow! watching this weekends' comments section is like watching two battered and bloodied fighters too tired to even raise their arms to lash out.

    dare i say that we have been overcome with a form of battle fatigue? i'm not sure such a thing has ever been observed on the net. simply astounding!

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  80. i mean with close to 100 coments per day and over 200 on the "cone of smug" Haulin Ass alone, who knows what kind of injuries may have developed? Overuse injuries such as carpal tunnel syndrome, sinus infections from dairy products being pushed through the nose, and the mental fatigue of maintaining a false indentity (i'm looking at you "upperclass" living in your parents' basement).

    doctors of course are standing by. i do think that it is our amerhkun right to file a class action suit against eachother.

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  81. It cracks me up that some of you guys are letting 'upperclass' get to you. Just ignore posters like that and he will go away.

    That bikesgonewild guy went away after those wierd posts he made.

    Just give it time and things will work it out.

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  82. bgw wasn't ignored, he had his identity hijcked and was beaten into the ground. what blog are you following?

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  83. how can you 'hack' a blogger account? that doesn't sound right - this is a pretty secure website.

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  84. Some people have WAY too much time on their hands...

    Yeh seriously, who the hell is still printing these Dead Kennedys and Misfits shirts.

    http://phatbenetar.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  85. Wait, I'm confused. Are you saying I "suck dick," or are you just saying I suck, and then calling me "Dick Snob?" I'm not offended, just confused.

    I wonder what magazines will interview Dick Snob NYC.

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  86. see commiecanuck, kroe, and upperclass above. too cheap to purchase a free gmail account but still wanting to stand out from the masses. I'll admit I don't know how how.

    anyway, you use those "handles" to duplicate the original. or if really industious get a gmail acount using the first same name "bgw" smith. then begin your maliscious posting. quite easy.

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  87. ...i'm a big boy & don't mind taking a direct shot, but it's quite true that someone had re-registered my 'handle' w/ google blogger & was posting bullcrap to try & discredit me by 'trying' to make me look like an idiot...

    ...a shame really, cuz i'm quite capable of making myself look like an idiot all on my own, but i do have my own methods & standards...

    ...the best suggestion i had & this came from a lawyer friend, was to simply pay some kid who knows his shit to really hack in, find out who wants to mess around & let 'em know just how far things "could" go...sound advice...

    ...accept no substitutes, this was posted by moi, the real bgw...

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  88. An apology on my part BGW, I hadn't realized someone used your name. Sorry about that.

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  89. ...anon 1:46pm...no problem...

    ...& as stated, i reserve the right to appear as an idiot, but only by my own devices...

    ReplyDelete
  90. Honestly I don't like the sex pistols or the ramones. I'm into 7seconds, descendents, gorilla biscuts, h20, and punkrock like that.

    ReplyDelete
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