Out of control.

I think we need more compression on the mids. No, more than that - I can still hear my voice. What do you mean I'm paranoid? Does everybody think that??

Whoops - didn't think anyone was listening. (See... I'm not paranoid!) That's right, I'm here at my lonely console, cloth-eared, putting the finishing touches on Big Green's new album. (Not so new anymore, actually, but.... don't say that to the vultures at our corporate label.) Just twiddling a knob here and there, virtually speaking. Pressing the "good" button, as it were. Then it's just a question of running order, album art, and.... oh yeah, a name. What the hell should we call the freaking thing, anyway? That's usually the easy part. I mean, Matt can think of album names all day long. (I just follow him around with a bucket.) Trouble is, around this place, you can't even hear yourself think.

Vas is loss? The place sounds like a bloody machine shop, that's vas... I mean, what. No, I'm not talking about the album. That sounds more like a bottling plant. The machine shop-type sound is coming from that nasty piece of work I call Marvin (my personal robot assistant). Oh, yes... he has taken his paranoia up to a whole new level. I told you about his obsession with the Canadian space robot "Dextre", currently being deployed from the international space station. Well, it's getting worse. It started out with some off-hand comments, a derisive "squx" here and there, that sort of thing. Then it got uglier. How ugly? Well.... he found himself some second-hand sheet iron, not sure where. (Check your backyards... or forget that, check your cars.) He then built himself a full-sized replica of Dextre. (Pretty good one, too. Almost proud.)

Yeah, well... I do feel a kind of pride about Marvin. He is, after all, the only personal robot assistant I've ever worked with, and if I do say so myself, I've brought him along rather well. Except for the "being insane" part. And hey, that's a sickness - just ask my doctor. The upshot is, he can't help it. So when he does something like build a replica of a space robot, then starts whamming away at it with a sledgehammer, then steals a welder's torch from the auto repair shop up the road and blasts big molten holes through its frame... it's.... not.... my .... fault.... (Don't know how else to say it.) Matt says I should just "pull his power pack" for a week or two, but that's the easy way out. What would anyone learn from that experience, right? The man-sized tuber, the two Lincolns, and Big Zamboola all agree... this is potentially a teachable moment. We could all come out of this having grown. (Though if Zamboola grows any bigger, he's going to have to go back in orbit.)

Anyway, what I was trying to convey over the last three paragraphs is that, yes, we are working on the album, albeit slowly. Distractions, distractions... when will they ever cease? Wait a minute.... excuse me... Marvin! Marvin! PUT THAT FLAMETHROWER BACK WHERE IT BELONGS!!