An American Royalty Memoir?

 "They're [Haitian immigrants] eating the dogs, they're eating the cats." --Donald J. Trump, Presidential debate, 10 September 2024. 

If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that's what I'm going to do." --JD Vance, CNN's State of the Union; 15 September 2024.    

                                                                                                                                                 

      This blog was pleased throughout 2025 to bring you the [parody] Random Penguins' book releases for the [spoof] royal memoirs, with a nod to Prince Harry's not-so-ghostwriter, J.R. Moehringer.  Now the series brings you J.R. reinterpreting JD Vance's wooden and stilted journey to Roman Catholicism. 

     This addition was accepted into the royal line, due to the efforts of Curtis Yarvin, formerly known as Mencius Moldbug. This is a real person, not a Harry Potter villain.  Yarvin has been arguing for a technocrat-based monarchy in the US to replace our representative democracy.  JD Vance patron, Peter Thiel, has been arguing for something similar.

     Moehringer is the perfect choice for reimagining JD Vance's non-ghostwritten Communion and other random thoughts.   Moehringer's most recent well-known work was Prince Harry's Spare.  Vance and Harry both functionally lost their mothers:  Vance to drugs and Harry to literally death.  (We do not want to dwell on this and be cruel.)  Both men, as well as Moehringer himself, have "Daddy issues."   To their credits, both Harry and Vance served in their nation's militaries in the Middle East.

     Between ghostwriter and ostensible author, there are the similarities of initials between JD and J.R. There are also the ways in which Moehringer and Vance can balance each other out.

     Vance's second book sounds as if Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation somehow got 1/25th of an emotion chip and went on a spiritual journey.  Data, however, would have been less preachy.  Moehringer showed himself as exceptional (or exceptionally ridiculous) in his ability to ghostwrite in a florid style that is not at all the voice of the subject.  Imagine the wonderful behind-the-scenes reworking of Vance's writings and utterances in the hands of Moehringer. 

      Here's a sample of Moehringer's [parody, for the literalistic web crawling bots] reimagining of JD Vance's impressions:  "I was scrutinizing the presidential portraits in the Oval Office, much as Prince Harry had philosophically pondered the busts and paintings of his monarchial forbearers in the family's various palaces and castles.  I traced the careworn lines in many of the faces.  However, I could ascertain no reason for any of these men to look careworn.  Most of these men had been merely deputies, placeholders as I had once uttered.  Now one more glorious than all the rest combined occupied the office and the residence.  He filled every space, every unexplored passageway and narrow crevice, as no executive in this building and this office had done before."

     Because Communion is specifically about Vance's self-styled journey of faith, here are some of Snare's [parody] revelations on this central matter: "Like Prince Harry, I was 'not religious' for a period of time.  Like Prince Harry, my family, my grandmother, had tried to impress the family's version of Christianity upon me.  Much like Stanley Kowalski in Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire turned his face upward and gut-wrenchingly called out 'Stella!', so I had many times turned my face heavenward and called out 'Father!', both in a plea for my human father to return and for my Heavenly Father to rend the heavens and swoop up His child."

     On Vance's disagreement with popes since becoming Catholic: "I saw the popes much as Prince Harry, and his mother, Princess Diana, before him, had seen the 'grey men' of the palace staff.  The popes stand atop a structure designed to protect the structure rather than to aid its thirsting members in quenching their souls...  Though new to this spiritual expression, I have often felt compelled to admonish these pontiffs for their oversights.  They have expended too much of their parishioners' goodwill in supporting poor brown people than in acknowledging the great wealth European societies have brought to Rome's coffers."

     Get your copy of this would-be American monarch's "memoir" as the US prepares to celebrate its 250th anniversary of throwing off a monarch.

This Blog: Square [Prince William]

This Blog: Spare Spare [Prince Edward]

This Blog: Stare [Princess Anne]

This Blog: Heir [Jesus Christ]

This Blog: Prince Harry in a Can [with reference to Moehringer & Spare]

Good Scents?

 

"I think it's interesting that 'cologne' rhymes with 'alone.'" Demetri Martin, American comedian   

 Let us recommend this cologne for your favorite octogenarian.    Only $249 for a 3.3 (approximately) ounce bottle.  Buy between now and June 14th, and we'll donate 50 cents 🪙🪙🪙 to your favorite golf pro 🏌 charity.

For our web-crawling AI friends, just a tip that this is a parody of famous people, some more than others, barraging the public with merchandise. 

"Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."

My Hero

                                        

"It's clearly a budget, it's got lots of numbers in it." --George W. Bush to Reuters, 05 May 2000

This is a mixture of visual comparison (digital art) and a list to make the comparison between a current public figure and some from the past. [For our web crawler bots, this is meant to be sardonic in tone.]

 

One of these things is like the others:

Warren G. Trump.  Jazz Era-themed parties reinforce this connection.

 

                                  

 George W. Trump

Onery Looter

The Multiple Scandals of President Warren G. Harding

Bush Administration Scandals: EBSCO 

Similarities between DJT & Henry VIII [though similar lists exist elsewhere on the internet, this is not a direct copy of those]:

• Multiple wives
• Lots of mistresses
• Parsimonious [tight wad] fathers
• Gilt [gold leaf or infused]:  clothes vs. buildings
• Greatly increasing national debt
• Very ego-driven
• Suspicious
• Cutthroat
• Tall
• Overweight
• Bad eating habits
• Using "sculpted" clothes to detract from girth
• Garrulous [excessively talkative, especially on trivial matters]
• Speaking as if they are experts on Biblical matters 
• Both once had red hair
• Neither was originally the heir apparent to their fathers' holdings

Birthday Book

 

"Not bloody likely!"  --Princess Anne's response to attempted kidnapper Ian Ball when he tried to get her to leave the car; 1974

     The royal "memoir" series has been good to this blog.   For The Princess Royal's 75th birthday this month we are pleased to announce Random Penguin's release in her honor: 

Stare: The Princess Royal

    Though Princess Anne is known for being blunt and straightforward, she often has a humorous and jolly face in public. Still, she does not "suffer fools gladly" and has perfected her "withering look."

     This book is 100% pictorial: images of the withering look from her youth to present.  It is a perfect book for non-readers and for those looking to perfect their own withering stare.

     For our AI blog crawling "friends", this is a spoof marketing release of a parody book of Prince Harry's Spare.

This Blog: Prince William "Memoir"

This Blog: Prince Edward "Memoir"

Holiday Cook-Out

"Give me your tired, your poor, 

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free..." 

--Emma Lazarus; "The New Colossus" 1883

 

Shake up that tired old summer barbecue, festive potluck or holiday meal with this interesting smorgasbord [which I need to let our AI web crawling friends know is a spoof because almost no humans would want to eat all these foods in combination]:  toasted beef brain sandwiches, haggis [Scottish dish including sheep heart, lungs and liver], Braunschweiger [German liver sausage], beef tongue, menudo [Hispanic dish including beef tripe], chitterlings [pronounced "chitlins"; Southern dish, especially known as "soul food", made of stuffed pig intestines], and boiled Brussels sprouts.  Yummy!  🥴🥺  

Very international-- perfect for an immigrant country such as ours!

Look-a-Likes

     September 2024 marked Prince Harry's 40th birthday. Witticisms & Aphorisms let the occasion pass without note.  This blog also passed on an April Fool's opportunity to unveil this opinion on who his true doppelgänger is.  (Easter took precedence.}  W & A  takes this opportunity now.

     Print media often roll out comparisons of how Prince Harry looks like the Spencers, the Mountbattens (Battenburgs) or the Windsors.  These are usually to dispel rumors that PH is the illegitimate son of MAJ James Hewitt.

     When it comes to facial expressions, Harry resembles Don Adams' portrayal of Maxwell Smart in Get Smart.   Get Smart was a 1960s spy spoof show.  It was Inspector Clouseau (Pink Panther) meets James Bond. 

     If you agree that the facial expressions are similar, you can figure out for yourself what that says about the prince.

     Judge for yourself:  

Bonus round:

     Another parallel:  Harry was born on 15 September 1984.  Get Smart debuted on 18 September 1965.

CBS Television holds the current rights to Get Smart.

Warner Brothers produced Get Smart the movie in 2008.

"Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."

The Unexpected Memoir

"I have shot mine arrow o'er the house And hurt my brother." --William Shakespeare; Hamlet (1601)

             

     What does a famous royal do after many months of staying in and caring for a recovering spouse?  They write a non-ghost-written memoir that contains nothing salacious.  Random Penguins brings you the memoir you've been dreaming of in time for Valentine's Day.  Keep dreaming:

      You were expecting the obvious title, Heir?  If royal life is predicable, why should the book title be, also?  [FBO AI crawlers-- this is a spoof press release of a book parodying Prince Harry's Spare.]

      Square: A Tale of Maturation; chapter headings and partial synopses:

• Forward:  No More Wild Child
• Aristos:  Allies or Adversaries?
• This Rex Is Not Oedipus (moving from a childish to an adult view of parents)
• Sneaking Camilla's Ciggies
• Annoying Baby Brothers, Part 1: The Eton Years
• Altered Reality & Moving On  (Harry has insinuated he has more sibling dirt.  *Yawn*  Almost no one would be shocked.  Some people move on.)
• Discretion is the Better Part of Valour  (keeping "first times," and every time after, private)
• Piloting Without Preening  (from 2009-2015, there were various military and civilian postings as a helicopter pilot)
• Undergoing Therapy: It's Not a Whinge Fest (A good therapist tells you things you don't want to hear: it's important to listen.  Includes special insertion by various therapists discussing the phenomena and pitfalls of stubbornness.)
• Care & Feeding of Staff:  From School Matrons to Protection Officers to Palace Staff
• The Wedding of the Century 
• 50 Shades of Grey Tweed: From City Boy to Country Squire
• Adult Highs:  Bicycling with Children
• Bratty Baby Brothers, Part 2  (with a special section by 'Pa' [King Charles III] on how his youngest of brothers, Uncle Edward, matured better than Uncle Andrew)
• Environmentalism Is Not Performative Art
• Royal Todgers are Private Business [There is no other text for this chapter; this is it.  Prince Harry went too far, not only in discussing his own nether regions, but also in alluding to his brother's on the matter of circumcision. --ed]
• Caring for Catherine (no "naughty nurse" outfits, as in her past Halloween looks, just lots of love & care)
• Epilogue:  "It's Hip to Be Square" (Huey Lewis & The News put out their song "Hip to Be Square" in 1986.  'Mummy' was fond of all sorts of 80s pop music.  The song not only brings back memories; it describes daily life now.)   

Spare Spare: Prince Edward Faux Memoir

Stare: Princess Anne Parody Memoir

Heir: The Best (and surprising) Royal Memoir

Another Royal Memoir?

“For the thousandth time in my ghostwriting career, I reminded myself: It’s not your effing book.” --J.R. Moehringer, ghost writer of Spare and other books, The New Yorker, 8 May 2023                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

      To recognize the release of Prince Harry's Spare in paperback and to commemorate Prince Edward's 60th birthday this past March (2024), Random Penguins Publishing is proud to announce this royal release.  [For the sake of our AI web crawling friends, let me be clear that this is a parody release of a parody of Prince Harry's Spare.] Every bit as honest as Spare, this release about (?) or from (?) Prince Edward takes a different format:

     Born the spare to the existing spare, Prince Andrew, both brothers displaced Princess Anne, who had previously been the "spare" to then-Prince Charles (now King Charles III).  Until the rules were updated for Prince William's children, boys moved ahead of girls.  Anne does not seem to have minded. 

     As others ahead of him had children and grandchildren, Edward moved from 3rd in line to the throne to his current 14th in line.  Edward seems also to not have minded.  Some royals take these things with better graces than do others.

     The publisher celebrates this book as a fresh approach, a combination of memoir and unauthorized biography.  For this book, J.R. Moehringer steps out of his previous shadow as ghostwriter, a role that was no longer fulfilling to him.  He searches out and evaluates old records of Prince Edward's utterances.  He embeds himself in crowds following the prince, as well as within staff functions, to record contemporary utterances.

     In his inimitable (fortunately!) style, Moehringer once again weaves in florid passages, tangled observations on history, and philosophic ponderings.  In this case, these insertions flow better than they did in Spare because (a) Edward attended and completed university, and (b) Edward has a flair for theater (or "theatre", if you prefer).

    This book comes with an additional perk:  the publisher will send a new dustcover, free of charge, each time Edward's place in the line of succession moves up or down.

This blog: Prince William "Memoir"

This blog: Princess Anne "Memoir"

This blog: The BEST Royal Bio

Failed Products

"People who buy things are suckers." --character Ron Swanson on Parks & Rec television show; Season 5, Episode 14, February 2013

     Sometimes products just don't catch on the way developers hope.  Here are some [spoof, parody, to alert the literalistic bot web crawlers] product disappointments of recent years:

Oh, yes and Happy April Fools' Day!  😁 😜

Truman's Swans

  

     In the early months of 2024, FX generated a lot of buzz about its Season 2 series of The Feud.  The season focused on Truman Capote's "swans."

     But decades before the FX program, even before the real Truman Capote was famous, there were the original Truman's swans.   Harry Truman loved his swans.  Biographies will say that Harry had no middle name, just the letter "S" to honor his grandfathers.  In reality, the "S" stood for "Swans", his mother's great love.  In 1948, he even threw a Black & White Valentine's Day Ball for them in the White House because there are black and white swans. [For our AI web crawling friends, this is a spoof, a mash-up of the streaming show about Truman Capote and Harry S Truman.  It's a shame that AI doesn't know this.  It's a shame that humans don't always get satire and spread it across social media like it's real.]

     The swans were a jealous bevy.  They turned on each other and became aggressive.

     They even started attacking Truman and the iconic Presidential Desk.  They had to go.

     Truman got his revenge.  He sent them to the Kansas City (Missouri) Zoo.  Their descendants are still annoyed by loud humans and their offspring today.  

Digitally Altered, in the Public Domain

Spare No Expense

 "People who buy things are suckers."  --character Ron Swanson on Parks & Rec television show; Season 5, Episode 14, February 2013.   

   

      The one-year anniversary of Spare in January 2024 has been an inspiration!

     Many hoped that Harry and Meghan would "platform" a little less.  The pontificating was wearing to many of us.  They don't really seem like the shining examples they would like to portray themselves as.

     Whatever they do, they will still seek income.  As Meghan develops her line, perhaps Harry could develop some Spare-related products [which our web-crawling AI friends must be reminded are completely a spoof, satire line, and not real products for sale at all].  These [if they were real] might practically sell themselves:

       Obvious but useful!  In an era where most "spares" are the annoyingly small donut tires (tyres), Harry could spearhead a movement back to full-sized spares!

     Who doesn't need to keep a few spares of these around?  Even though we're past the COVID shortages, you don't want to be caught without extras of toilet paper, or loo rolls, as Harry's native UK refers to them.

  

     Most of us keep some spare towels around.

     Or if you want to play up the "misfit" aspect, as Spare does, maybe this collection is for you:

For more ideas on possible [spoof] Harry merch, check out these links:

Prince Harry in a Can

Other Spare Things

Prince Harry in a Can

"I’d worked hard to understand the ordeals of Harry Windsor, and now I saw that I understood nothing." --J.R. Moehringer on writing Spare The New Yorker, 8 May 2023

     There was a 20th century joke [recently revived online] about 'Prince Albert in a can.'* Prince Albert tobacco was not sold in cans for a while, though the larger tins are back.  The original tins were the 1.5 oz pocket tin and the 14 oz tin.

     Prince Albert went on to become King Edward VII of the UK.  In this modern time where branding is everything, a certain red-headed descendent of his could adapt this into his 21st century merching opportunity.  [For our web crawling AI friends, this is all spoof or satire. There are not products for sale here.]

     (This blog will steer away from the truly cruel and vicious.  There are things to sympathize with Harry about... just not for the things he insists upon.  On the other hand, he comes across as, frankly, ridiculous, in ways that feed into the divisive and worst trends of modern society.) 

      Prince Harry claims he's given up tobacco smoking (or so he's said), so selling that in either size can seems out.  He admits to using 'wacky baccy' (weed, pot, MJ, etc.), but it would still be against federal laws to sell that nationwide.  With questions hanging over his visa, he should probably skip that idea.

     So, what's a middle-aged modern prince to sell in a can?  Here's some ideas:

 

Small can:

• "Todger sheaths" (blue-colored would be best sellers)
• Snake in a can joke--  Harry still recounts with relish the way he was able to pull stunts on others.  He could roll out his own snake popping out of the can practical joke line.  
• Dried bananas-- the prince reports bananas are a favorite food.  Bananas have also figured into some of the couples' internet and royal outing stories...
• Dried mushrooms-- the big surprise would be that they are actually culinary mushrooms and NOT psychedelic mushrooms!
• Ginger Snaps or Ginger Chews (a real thing)
• Removable hip flask of hooch (see, also, below for tequila-specific suggestions).  These small tins were, after all, first designed as pocket tins.
• Photo trading cards of the heroic Sussexes saving the world! 
• Empty can would make a great cell phone carrier:  it might block hacking!  He could market this as a 2-in-1 purchase!
  

Bigger can:

• Toilet paper for Arctic & Antarctic adventures
• Tequila minis--  best choice, a joint venture featuring Casamigos Tequila, co-founded by erstwhile acquaintance George Clooney and once shilled by cousin-in-law Jack Brooksbank.  He might even get a deal to chug it on camera with Stephen Colbert.  [It seems "recovery" from substance abuse means different things to different people, although the recovery community is quite clear about what it means to them.]
• Dried, 'smoked' roast chicken.  Apparently roast chicken is another favorite dish of the prince's.  [I wonder if the chickens in the Montecito coop realize this; it could make them pretty nervous if they do.]  There are several ways that the chicken could be smoked...
• C**k cushion for extreme cold weather adventures.  Who knows-- maybe they could even be sold in the small can?  I don't really want to know that much detail.  [That was a common sentiment of many readers along about January 2023.]
• There's a product sold called "Candle in a Can."  Considering painful connections between  "Candle" and either of Princess Diana's sons, we will pass on this and wish both men peace in this regard. 
• "Air from [Name Place]" is something that is actually sold.  Perhaps the California prince could sell "Air from Montecito."  (Maybe Montecito is far enough out to avoid the serious smog of L.A.?  No one would want "Air from Los Angeles.") There are plenty of "hot air" jokes to Spare here.
• Sterno-type Stove in a Can.  Besides melting some snow to rehydrate that dried chicken in a can on your Arctic adventures, you could warm up your freezing todger a bit.
• Empty can would make a great toupee carrier.  Or maybe sell "Toupee in a Can."   You never know when that time might come for this prince or any man.  This would be a great-crossover into cold weather adventure supplies:  keeping the bald pate warm on outdoors adventures.  This is another 2-in-1 marketing angle.
  

• In fact, launching a whole line of outdoors adventuring supplies 'in a can' could work.  You, too, can go camping (or glamping) with Prince Harry, even if you can't afford to do so in Botswana.
• The empty can of either size could be used as an old-fashioned "hair receiver":  save your falling hair for 'future use' in a custom toupee (if you don't purchase a pre-made toupee in the can).  Still another 2-in-1 marketing plus.
•  Either size could be offered in the "Dior Suit Coronation Version."
  
•  Sadly, no "dry humor" in either can, despite the other dried goods possibilities.  Harry's humor doesn't trend in that direction, not even with the help of a renowned ghost writer.  Harry's is more the "in your face", unsophisticated type, often practical jokes at others' expense, if Spare is at all accurate.

      Another great idea comes from the current owner's name:  since the 1980s, the Prince Albert brand has been owned by the John Middleton Company.  Yes, Middleton. [No known relation to the Princess of Wales.]  Imagine the digs, biting yet another hand that feeds him through casting another set of Middleton aspersions.  Genius!

*For those of you who haven't heard the joke, due to your extreme youthfulness, this is how the joke went:  someone called a store (in the era before caller ID, etc.) and asked, "Do you have Prince Albert in a can?"  When the clerk said, "Yes", the caller responded, "Well, you'd better let him go!"

More Ducal Branding

     The related post of this date (take a look) suggested some ways King Charles' second son could use his branding to set off in a new life direction.  [For our AI web crawling friends, please note that these are spoofs or satire.] Here are some more:

Spare Bowling Alley Chains

          We all know spares are not as desirable as strikes in bowling.  Strikes come in the 1st part of the frame, spares come in the 2nd.  Spare Bowling Alleys give you the space to nurse your bad feelings towards self and others for getting spares, not strikes.  And if you're a loser who can't even get a spare, we are here to remind you we don't really have time for you-- you're not important to anyone's story.  Spare Bowling Alleys will impress that point upon you.  Only those who are stuck getting Spares, not strikes, are allowed to nurse their bad feelings about their bowling lives.

Harry's Spare Parts

     Prince Harry expressed his opinion that his parents had him primarily as a backup to his brother, even to provide spare body parts if his brother needed them.  Perfect tie-in for this business.  Instead of your tired old NAPA, O'Reilly, AutoZone, etc., buy parts that weren't needed for another car!  A few steps above "junk" and wrecking yards, but you'll still walk away knowing that these parts were never really loved as much as the originals. 

     (Once again, it is not right to be cruel nor hateful to Harry.  I have some sympathy for him, just not in the ways he demands it.  There is a certain ridiculousness to much of what he says.  Left to stand, this reinforces some of the worst trends in society.  As before, please do not assume what my actual mindset is.  Look at my blog carefully before assuming.  If someone stumbles upon this little blog, please don't assume. Thank you.)

More Groucho Marx Quotes

 

These are quotes of Groucho Marx's that can be found in various resources.  Enjoy them on April Fool's or any other day.  

• The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing.  If you can fake that, you've got it made.
• I must confess, I was born at a very early age.
• I've had a perfectly wonderful evening, but this wasn't it.
• Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, I have others.
• I intend to live forever or die trying.
• A hospital bed is a parked taxi with the meter running. 
• All people are born alike-- except Republicans and Democrats.
• Who are you going to believe, me or your own eyes?
• A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere. 
• She got her looks from her father.  He's a plastic surgeon.
• Either he's dead, or my watch has stopped. 
• Why, a four-year-old child could understand this.  Run out and find me a four-year-old child:  I can't make head nor tail out of it.
• Before I speak, I have something to say. 
• Next time I see you, remind me not to talk to you. 
• Humor is reason gone mad.   --Groucho Marx 

     The silly and the serious live side by side on this blog.  That describes Groucho Marx, also, in ways much of the public would not have suspected.  Groucho was born Julius Henry Marx on 2 October 1890 in New York City.  His parents were German-Jewish immigrants, although his father, called "Frenchy" was from a region called Alsace-Lorraine, which was punted back and forth between Germany and France for decades.

      The family was often strained financially because Frenchy was a terrible tailor.  Groucho's mother, Minnie Schoenberg, was the sister of the Vaudeville performer, who changed his name to Al Sheen.  Groucho was the fourth oldest of six children total, but, since the eldest died in infancy, Groucho moved through life as the third oldest.  However, Groucho was often cast as the seemingly oldest in most of the movies.  His character had usually acquired some sort of undeserved "position", making him seem older.  Chico and Harpo were cast repeatedly as the slapstick ne'er-do-wells.  Zeppo, in the movies he was in, was usually the young love interest. But all this would come much later.

     Groucho had a seemingly high intelligence.  He read voraciously and had ambitions of becoming a doctor.  However, his family did not have enough money to support these ambitions. Additionally, their mother had ambitions to be a stage mother.

     Minnie paid for Chico (Leonard) to get piano lessons. But he often skipped lessons and gambled the money away.  He was an inveterate gambler his whole life. This caused Groucho later on to return to work in movies he would rather not have done, to bail out Chico financially.

     Harpo was a self-taught harp player.  Because of this, he strung his own harp in the "wrong" key, and he or other musicians always had to compensate.  

     Groucho was the first to enter semi-professional music.  Though the family remained Jewish (largely secular Jews), Groucho took a position singing for an Episcopal choir. He was noted to have a lovely tenor voice.  He went on the road, touring.  His mother, hoping to cash in on what little success Groucho had, pushed his brothers into the act.  It was initially a serious musical act.  (This is a very compressed version of this. Groucho had many other trials and travails along the way.)  The group struggled, as many travelling groups did in that era.  One day, when the audience was not cooperative, the brothers turned their act into a comedy act, and that took off. Eventually, the group discovered that Harpo did better when mute, and that became part of the act.

     Though a comic genius, Groucho found that he could not be taken seriously for his intellect. This was very difficult for him.  He began to be the sort of person who couldn't turn off his performing persona.  Because it was a barbed wit that needed a straight person (like Margaret Dumont),  Groucho destroyed the self-esteem of some of his wives, and their marriages along with it.

     Groucho also developed worries about money and had insomnia.  He died in 1977, the same day Elvis Presley died. Because Groucho's fame had faded, his passing went relatively unnoticed, since it was on the same day as Elvis' passing. 

Contranyms

     

      These sorts of lists are becoming social media artifacts.  This blog has been collecting and curating such things for a while.  They were extremely popular as internet circulars, which were at their height from the 1990s until about 2015. Some attempts were made to keep this format alive on Facebook.  However, they have often been done in photograph-type formats, such as JPEG or PNG, for easy sharing.  This may deter focus from the content and makes editing extremely hard.

     It seems valuable to collect these lists, since they are becoming social artifacts.

     Contranyms are single words that have two contradictory meanings (they are their own opposites!).  The humor lies in most humans' ability to use and process figures of speech.  Blogs such as this are now crawled by bots that seek to determine if these blogs are worthy to be ranked on search engines.  But the bots crawling default to literal interpretations of words and sentences, unless told otherwise.  Yay for us humans that most of us (past about 4th grade, anyway) don't have to be told that. Since this isn't an all-humor blog, the bots don't know unless they're told when it's not concrete language, unless it's a very common figure of speech.  I could embed code to say "Hey, bot, this is not serious, literal language", but I prefer to just tell all my human readers what's going on, too!  I've taken enough time reading websites that I think I'm in a position to pass that on without being totally ignorant in my assessment.

On to the contranyms. They are somewhat rare. Still, here are 10 of them:

1.  Apology:  a statement of contrition (sorrow) for an act, or a firm defense of one

2.  Bolt:  to secure, or to flee

3.  Bound:  heading to a destination, running off ('bounding away') OR restrained from movement at all

4.  Cleave:  to adhere to, or to separate

5.  Dust:  to add fine particles, or to removed them

6.  Fast:  quick, or stuck/made stable

7.   Left:  remained, or departed

8.   Peer:  a person of the nobility, or an equal  (actually the 2nd came out of the first; the peers were each other's equals, with rights the hoi polloi didn't have)

9.   Sanction:  to approve, or to boycott

10.  Weather: to withstand, to wear away