THE ASK DR. HAL SHOW!!!

VIRACOCHA, ASSOCIATED ARTISTS & THE CHURCH OF THE SUBGENIUS(TM)
BRING YOU
ASK DR. HAL!
(FOUNDED 1998 by CHICKEN JOHN)
You'll Pay to Know -- What You Really Think
VIRACOCHA @ 998 Valencia Street
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIF.
(CORNER OF VALENCIA ST. & 21ST)
Admission $10.00
Doors Open 8:00 PM - Show begins 8:30 PM
(Please Note Early Start Time)
AN EVENING WITH DR. HAL & FRIENDS
AN... [read more]

VIRACOCHA, ASSOCIATED ARTISTS & THE CHURCH OF THE SUBGENIUS(TM)
BRING YOU
ASK DR. HAL!
(FOUNDED 1998 by CHICKEN JOHN)
You'll Pay to Know -- What You Really Think
VIRACOCHA @ 998 Valencia Street
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIF.
(CORNER OF VALENCIA ST. & 21ST)
Admission $10.00
Doors Open 8:00 PM - Show begins 8:30 PM
(Please Note Early Start Time)
AN EVENING WITH DR. HAL & FRIENDS
AN UNMATCHED LINE-UP OF ARTISTES & STARS JOINS THE SHOW FOR A NIGHT OF UNPARALLELLED ENTERTAINMENT. COME ONE, COME ALL.

With Special Guest Opening Act:
SOPHIA, THE SINGING HARP LADY!
Also featuring:
ZERO BOY-- MANHATTAN'S BEATBOX MIRACLE!
WHITMAN MCGOWAN -- POET OF PUISSANCE
THE DEVIL-ETTES -- A POUNDING, PULSATING PHALANX OF PULCHRITUDE-- À GOGO!
...AND (BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT) THE ONE & ONLY
"CONNIE" DOBBS -- CONSORT OF THE EPOPT!
===================================
The Dr. Hal Report
Vol. XVI No. 2

"Exuberance is Beauty."
-- Blake.
"The Road of Excess leads to the Palace of Wisdom."
--Also Blake.

ASK DR.HAL BARRELS ON WITH 2ND BOLD BACCHANAL
NEW SPACE TURNS OUT TO BE "THE PLACE"
by Byron Harris

San Francisco-- This Friday will bring this month's iteration of the all-new Ask Dr. Hal! show. But we must stress, once again, that this run of Ask Dr. Hal! is not now being presented at its former habitation, the famous Chez Poulet Galerie-Cabaret. Instead, for the time being, we now offer our End-of-March Show at Viracocha, a cozy, tucked-away performance space at 998 Valencia Street, the corner of 21st & Valencia.

" You Can't Keep a Good Show Down-- Unless You Mean the One
You're Keeping Down in the Basement."
-- Obscure Saw

Heh, heh! We believe Viracocha is a good fit for our show, and that our regular & expanding audience will enjoy its comfortable atmosphere and amenities. Yes, it's in the basement. Not just figuratively, but literally Underground. And it's really nice down there.

Also, for this & future shows we're once again reviving our older tradition of pre-shows & opening acts. Those who have been paying attention will remember that Our Founder, Chicken John, actually got rid of all our opening acts, some years ago. He hated to be responsible for their level of professionalism. He hated the amount of time they added to the show. And he really hated-- you guessed it --to pay them. But--

"We're Bringin' 'em Back!"

Our recent ventures have shown that these shows --with ancillary acts-- can still be profitable, even enough to pay off guest performers. But note well that such a Utopian scheme greatly depends on a decent-sized audience. Please attend, then, & cause this theoretical concept to be born again, into reality. It's all about filling seats, to put it baldly. As for Chicken John himself, he is taking a sabbatical from the show during the current season. Also conspicuously absent will beYo-yo Champion & Internet Proxy surfer David Capurro, who wants to spend more time with his family.

On March 30th, the rôle of Chicken John will be played by Mr. John Hell, Chief Inspector, Grand Pandjandrum & Factotum of free-form radio sensation, Radio Valencia. The part of David Capurro will be interpreted by Sean Kelly, of old Spanganga fame.

A LINE-UP THAT WON'T LIE DOWN! -- FIRST...
KrOB'S KR-R-R-A-A-AZY KARTOON!

Just before each performance begins, at precisely 8:30 PM, we screen a great animated cartoon-- each one seven minutes of the best theatrical shorts ever committed to film -- "REASON," THE PROTO-DEMOCRAT, & "EMOTION," THE PROTO-REPUBLICAN
This week KrOB proudly presents a marvelous selection, one of the Walt Disney Studio's rarely seen wartime propaganda cartoons, Reason and Emotion (1943), directed for Disney by Bill Roberts. In this interesting film, we're taken inside the human head, male and female, to see the "operator,"the little guy inside (literally) at the controls of the human personality. Haven't you seen this set-up before? As we recall, the old Bell Science Series of educational classroom films used it, too, the one with Dr. Frank Baxter. We're talking about how inside the human head, see, there's actually a harassed little guy sitting behind an enormous, over-complicated control panel, operating the complex human body. (It goes without saying that this begs the question of whether there's an even smaller gremlin inside that guy's head, operating him). And, not too recently, you may recall, in one of his movies Eddie Murphy played the rôle of a microscopic Eddie Murphy... strange concept ...inside the head of the full-sized version, operating the same kind of keyboard. Murphy also, of course, doubled in brass to play that large version of himself. [OK, completists, that movie is called Meet Dave (2008).] Anyway, according to our featured cartoon, everybody's head contains two of these little characters, each vying for the driver's seat.

WITH A FAMILIAR 1940'S ANIMATED CARTOON CHARACTER

We'll say no more here anent the Inner Man concept. But by the way, it seems that once again we'll encounter the star of several of our earlier cartoons, the late German Reichschancellor & Dictator, Adolf Hitler. Boy, that guy really gets around, doesn't he? You're watching a cartoon, and, all of a sudden-- huh? There's Hitler! Though Reason and Emotion has frequently been shown only as excerpts in surveys about propaganda films (when it has been shown at all) we plan to give you the whole thing complete and uncut. So join us on this last Friday night of the month, in time to catch up with yet another treasure of your Nation's vanished popular culture. See how good hand-drawn animated cartoons once used to be. Remember, our show will start right up at the very moment that the cartoon ends. Hitler would want you to be late, wouldn't he? So be on time!

"The "edited version" is almost worse than nothing at all... It should be seen in its entirety. The editing doesn't do a marvelous short [any] justice. Well worth the trouble to find. Most highly recommended."
--Robert Reynolds

THEN -- OPENING ACT: SOPHIA, THE SINGING HARP LADY!

We are fortunate to book this act. Sophia plays the harp, yes, & she performs her own songs as well as traditional ones. Her voice has an emotionally compelling sweetness & clarity-- reportedly, her music has caused the eyes of the crustiest old hippies to well up with tears in response... As a way of honoring the lyric impulse, we're beginning our show on a tranquil note of beauty & melody. A sample? -- Here she is: http://youtu.be/AEUonTQkwcY

& -- PETE GOLDIE SETS THE PACE-- THROUGH SPACE!

Astronomer & Boffo Boffin Pete Goldie each week brings us new discoveries in Space Science & the cosmos. A quondam NASA consultant, Dr. Goldie is particularly interested in the Cassini Space Probe & often reports its findings. Indeed, above our stage hangs the eternally present scale model of this voyager into far realms of
alienage & distance. He'll likely give a run-down, perhaps, on how images from Cassini's cameras have revealed something that hasn't been seen so well before: vertical ring structures that are attributed to the gravitational effects of a 5-mile-wide (8-kilometer-
wide) moon -- RINGS AROUND SATURN!!!
Over most of their area, Saturn's main rings are only about 30 feet (10 meters) thick, but the ring particles, thought to be mostly water ice, can be perturbed along their edges by gravitational interactions with moons that circle in gaps within the rings. The latest imagery focuses on a tiny moon called Daphnis, which pushes the ring material into structures that tower as high as a mile (1.5 kilometers). These so-called "shepherd moons" of the giant gas planet are thought to be responsible for every gap in the rings -- even for the rings themselves. (Though some gaps don't seem to have an associated moon & Pete will (probably) explain that they really do-- but these "moonlets" just haven't been discovered yet.) With Cassini on the job, however, their discovery may come any day-- inwhich case Pete will no doubt let us in on it before the official NASA release. That's right -- privileged information.

SOLAR SYSTEMS GONE HAYWIRE
In young solar systems around just-fledged baby stars, some orbits are more popular than others, resulting in "planet deserts" or even "planet pile-ups." Yes, recent findings indicate that gas giant planets in other star systems are crashing & careening into each other, smashing everything else nearby right out of its orbit. For a phenomenon you should ask Pete about is one that has deeply puzzled various dedicated deep-space astronomers: rather than occupying orbits at regular distances from a star, giant gas planets similar to our own system's Jupiter and Saturn appear to prefer to occupy certain regions in mature solar systems, while staying clear of others. It seems that high-energy radiation from baby sun-like stars is the likely force that carves gaps in protoplanetary disks, the clouds of gas & dust that swirl around young stars, swirling... & swirling... providing the raw materials for planets. The gaps then act as barricades, corralling planets into certain orbits. The exact locations of those gaps depend on the mass of these planets, but they generally occur in an area between one & two astronomical units from the star (One astronomical unit, or AU, marks the average distance from the Earth to the Sun; 93 million miles). Pete will explain this-- that's what he does -- and he does it all with sardonic humor, dry wit & rhetorical flair. Some people's favorite part of the show (though -- not many). He ends by showing the very latest picture-- of his daughter, Daria.

& WHITMAN MCGOWAN A.K.A. TRUNGPA BUMBLECHE,
WITH MARGERY SNYDER!

WHITMAN McGOWAN started his spoken word career reading poems at a back-alley coffeehouse, The Espresso Bar in Pasadena, California, where he put poems for a dollar each on the menu. After moving North to San Francisco (where his UC Santa Barbara teacher Kenneth Rexroth previously held a famous salon) he became best known for crafting a Pagan anthem, “White Folks Was Wild Once, Too,” performed to great acclaim at last September's Ask Dr. Hal! Show in Point Arena, California. Whitman earned his stripes (visible in good light) in performance poetry touring Europe a number of times around the turn of the Millennium, twice with rock n' roll revue Le Cirque Electrique, collaborating with excellent musicians of all types. Along the wayhe garnered the title of nightclub wrestling champion of Dresden, Germany (memo to rowdies: Don't heckle this guy) & acquired on that same tour an alter ego, Trungpa Bumbleché. He’s been published in Salon, PUBLIC HOUSE, The Edinburgh Castle Pub anthology and countless other places. His spoken word & music recordings combine storytelling, chant, comedy & "talksinging." Zeitgeist Press of Berkeley is coming out later this year with a collection of his greatest performance hits, illustrated by Firesign Theater art director Bruce Litz. For us, the S.F. poet adds to the bubbling, seething A.D.H. gumbo with a new special ingredient: a performance of his recitation “Every 8 Seconds” from his forthcoming, soon-to-be-released CD “Look What The Cat Dragged In Again,” a number which features melodious Margery Snyder playing some spooky Debussy on flute. Just this alone is worth the admission price.

& THE DEVIL-ETTES !

They wear pink miniskirts, white vinyl go-go boots & petite devil horns. And, frankly, they're adorable. Sassy, sultry, yet utterly All-American, The Devil-Ettes provide good, clean fun for kids of all ages! (Especially male kids.) These go-go goddesses have gained notoriety for "settin' the fringe a flyin'" at their wacky, wickedly wild high-energy shows. Keeping the lost art of go-go alive, these gals are living interpretive masters of the most vivacious dances from the vortex of the heyday of 1960's Go-Go, including the Hully Gully, the Jamaican Ska, the Frug, the Watusi and oh, so many more great dance steps! In addition to numerous performances in their hometown of San Francisco, the girls' fancy footwork has taken them to Las Vegas, New Orleans, Los Angeles and beyond! Moreover, we are pleased to report that these beauties were featured in Atomic magazine, GQ-Spain, The UTNE Reader, The Spectator, Dance Magazine, Hustler, British scene magazine The Face & a huge 6-page spread in Deutsches Glamour (that's Glamour Magazine's German edition to you). Local publications often feature them too, including the cover of the San Francisco Independent, another recent cover feature in the 96 Hours section of hometown newspaper The San Francisco Chronicle. They've gotten a gratifying amount of ink in The SF Bay Guardian, The SF Weekly (where they were voted Best Garage Rock Dance Troupe), The San Francisco Examiner and more, many more... We emphasize-- they're NOT Burlesque performers, they're NOT strippers, NOT pole dancers-- they're honest-to-goodness GO-GO DANCERS! Right there before your very eyes. You'll think you've died and gone to Go-go Heaven. Indeed, when the time comes, such an assessment may be, in all probability, fairly accurate.

& ZERO BOY!!!

The performance dynamo known as Zero Boy has appeared with Dr. Hal before, at, for example, Manhattan's Theater For The New City in the East Village, & just last year as separate attractions in Voluption, in Brooklyn, N.Y. And he has just guested in last month's Ask Dr. Hal! show, not to mention any number of our shows from earlier years. Attentive listeners to Dr. Hal's current radio program on Radio Valencia.FM, also called the Ask Dr. Hal! Show, have heard him & Dr. Hal together, manically improvising for hours on end. Now you can see him-- live! Folks, he isn't going to be in this neck of the woods forever. Catch his act when you can. (This Friday would be a good time.)

" You can't believe those sounds came out of a human mouth."
--Kimmie Joan

& CONNIE DOBBS -- HERSELF! -- (PRIMARY WIFE OF J.R. "BOB" DOBBS)

That's correct, Pilgrim-- incredibly, we will feature the ravishing Connie Dobbs, chief wife & consort of assassinated Church of the SubGenius leader and Epopt, or "Anointed One," J.R. "Bob" Dobbs --& head of the Connieite Order within the controversial Church. Expect fireworks from this tempestuous temptress, more than any ordinary man can handle--& live! Connie Dobbs make a freight train jump de track, Connie Dobbs, she make a preacher ball de jack--
I say, dat Connie Dobbs, she make a Saint lay down his Slack.
--Traditional

& WOVEN SEAMLESSLY THOUGHOUT

Q & A with YOU & the good doctor -- that's right! Your most pressing concerns & worrisome conundrums SOLVED in a matter of mere seconds (or mintes -- depending on the honoriarium). A true breakthrough in "pay to play" technology where detailed information you so vitally seek is dispensed generously & w/o rancour. Dr. Hal knows everything & unlike so many other of the world's great smartypants -- he's willing to share -- PROVIDING YOU ARE!!!

Also on our programme:

KrOB's Kompelling Klip: When Chasmosaurs Attack!

Monster Movie Moment-- The Attack of a Berserk Chasmosaurine Dinosaur! A creation revived by KrOB. Thought to have been permanently misplaced, this chestnut was recently raked from the entropic fires of destruction, separated from the chaosium & established as an element in the world of harmony. Once again, frantic, anachronistic cavemen thrash it out with a bellicose behemoth of the Mesozoic. Not a toothy, temperamental carnivore, either, this time, but a sanguine Ceratopsian plant-eater. However, "placid" this plant-eater is not. Like the Cape Buffalo of the present day, the particular Ceratopsian in question may be characterized as bad-tempered, formidable &, frankly, ferocious. It may be ill, which would explain its ire. Sick animals often withdraw to attempt to heal in solitude. And this dinosaur is weirdly hanging out alone in a dark cave, not what its naturally gregarious species is thought to have done. Our hapless troglodytes should have known not to intrude, not once but twice-- & the infuriated saurian comes stomping out both times, ripping, bellowing, rampaging, and goring... Ceratopsians are split into two subfamilies by taxonomists; those with short frills (centrosaurines) such as Centrosaurus, & those with long frills (chasmosaurines) like the eponymous Chasmosaurus. In addition to the larger frill, these long-frilled beasts typically had longer faces & jaws as well-- & it is suggested by some paleontologists that they were most likely a bit more selective about the plants they ate. Remember, long frills were a relatively late development in dinosaur evolution, since even Chasmosaurus dates from the Late Cretaceous Period, 76 to 70 million years before Ask Dr. Hal! The frill of Chasmosaurus has been described as "heart-shaped," since its bone structure consists of two large 'loops' from a central bone. The name refers to the two "chasmae," or holes, in that squamosoparietal frill; most ceratopsians had openings like this to lighten the weight of that characteristic bony structure (although Triceratops, the most familiar ceratopsian of all, known by name by all children, uniquely has a solid frill with no holes. Actually, the holes may even have developed very late in the life of individuals of that species, but there's no time to get into that here). Some finds include a number of smaller ossifications (called epoccipitals), which grew clustered on the outer edge of the frill, all part of this dinosaur's showy ornamentation to draw the attention of critical females as part of his mating display. However, we will not call this frill a "shield." Not in our write-up. It was so large, & yet so flimsy (since it was mainly skin stretched between the bones) that it could not, we think, have provided much in the way of functional defence. It was simply used to appear imposing. Let's go further out on this limb & posit a possible secondary function: a heat-exchanger for purposes of thermoregulation. Why not? It's our show, after all, an opportunity to contribute to Science. Now, like many ceratopsians, chasmosaurs had three main facial horns-- one on the nose & two on the brow. Different fossil finds have produced inconclusive results - one species of Chasmosaurus, named C. kaiseni, bore long brow horns, while C. belli had only short ones. Although these were initially named as different species, it now seems possible that sexual dimorphism was at work, so that the long horns belonged to males & the shorter horns to females. Could be, could be... Interestingly, paleontologists have recently recovered some actual fossilized chasmosaur skin. This skin appears to have had many bony knobs (osteoderms), with five or six sides each. These knobs, or tubercles, were a standard feature of dinosaur skin. And you will get a good look at the creature's skin during its more than one exaggeratedly violent rampages. You'll see its epoccipitals, too, as it bashes and mangles its shrieking caveman victims. Yes, cavemen are variously trampled, impaled, gored & bitten, before the trumpeting, bellowing Chasm-osaurus meets an equally spectacular demise, from falling from a great height to its death -- into... a chasm, of course. Get it? Ker-splat! --ugghhh... It's scientific! Educational! This is stop-motion animation by the late David Allen & the great Jim Danforth, along with many other evolutionary ingredients popped into the pot by KrOB to brew up one of the more popular KrOB Dinosaur Monster Movie Edits. It's been shown at the Odeon Bar, & was also exhibited a few years back as part of the I Hate Cartoons Animation Festival, curated by our old pal Attaboy & narrated then, as it will be the night of Friday, March 30th at Viracocha, 998 Valencia Street, by Dr. Howland Owll.

If you missed it before, catch it this time! Or -- better still -- come in for a "booster shot."

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