Digital Recorder, Steve Martin, Robin Williams, and Sumo
3/24/1

I have a little digital recorder that I sometimes carry in the pocket of my pocket T-shirt. I have it because I think things and can�t remember them later. Most of the things that I record are simple, like �Milk� or �Tell Aisai about [whatever]�. The time it is best is when I get a thought or desire that I may forget. Then later, I will hear it, and my intellectual curiosity or desire will be stirred again. Then I delete it and forget it.

I�m not really using it nowadays. But I did hop upstairs after watching a documentary on Steve Martin because I really wanted to put this thought down:

Steve Martin was very good at not turning into Robin Williams.

Robin Williams was also a wacky comedian from the 1970s. Or perhaps it was the early 1980s. I have decade blurring issues. But Robin didn�t know when to change. He may be more commercially viable than Steve, but Steve kept his respect.

Produces don�t call Steve Martin and say �Can you do your Steve Martin thing as a genie for me?� Or �Can you do your thing as a robot?�, �Can you do your thing as a doctor of the terminally ill?� or �Can you do your thing as a dead guy obsessed with his wife in a surreal afterlife?� If they do call Steve, he doesn�t bite. And also, there is no distinct Steve Martin Brand Schick.

Robin Williams is one joke, and I�ve heard if before. Mork, Doubtfire, Bicentennial Man (or BM for those in the medical community), Aladdin�s genie, and all other entities he has inhabited through the miracle of the silver screen have been mere doppelgangers of each other. All of them minor sub-demons rooted in the Robin Williams pit of evil.

Or something like that.

One thing about the digital recorder that I sometimes carry is that the clich� of the person with a recorder in TV is false. Not quite as false as the clich� of the sumo wrestler, though.

There is currently a commercial on the air where they�ve got some professional looking rasta dude waking in Chinatown with some heads-up displayer clamped on his head and he says �Note to self�� Trust me, no one says that. Adding three words which have no meaning at the beginning of a note, especially one which is time based, is absurd.

Perhaps I should get a stack of post-it notes with �Note to self� at the top of them, because, you know, I write that at the top of every note I make to myself.

About those sumo wrestlers�and my favorite is Takanahana, though I should be more loyal to Akebono�they must have the worst stereotype on American TV going. When someone wants to make a Krystal�s commercial with a sumo wrestler featured, they get the fattest Asian they can and put him in a diaper-like garment.

It is true that sumo wrestlers are large, but they are also very well muscled. They basically look like linebackers in the NFL. However, they don�t have to be any specific weight. Last year, the heaviest sumo was 660 lbs. He did retire due to persistent infections in the muscles of his calves. He was an American, from Detroit if memory serves. Akebono is a pensive looking Hawaiian who weights 500 lbs. The lightest sumo is only 220 lbs.

There are no weight classes in Sumo. Every wrestler who shows up at a basho (tournament) competes against every other one. The main rule is to make your opponent fall or step outside the ring. The other rule is you can�t punch or kick. It is a pure and excellent sport.

Perhaps someday I should pine on about Rally racing also. FIA WRC stuff�not that cheese we have here in the US.