Responsibly Wild Blog

Our Band Could Be Your Life is in my top three favorite reads of all time. When I was at the zenith of musical self-righteousness, I discovered OBCBYL and devoured it. I was in my junior year of college and funny enough, I was taking a history of rock n roll class at the same time. So for 3 hours a week I was learning about the 12 bar blues in class and then falling deep down a rabbit hole of seminal punk, noise rock, and hardcore in my personal time. If you dig deep enough on this site you'll discover my initial reaction to reading it. I was the stereotypical "only willing to learn the things I'm into" kid until just after discovering this tome, but at the time this book was like the Bible. A sacred text that drew a line in the musical sand saying "If you want it, this is the bar you need to pull yourself over." Turns out I didn't want it that badly. But of course, life lessons and stories of dedication don't just apply to one avenue of life. ...

So if you aren't up on the hottest series finding daylight after Game of Thrones' massive shadow has started to dissipate, it is Fleabag. Title not withstanding -apparently a half-cute, half-insulting nickname for writer-actor-director Phoebe Waller-Bridge- this show is everything you want from top shelf HBO minus the dragons and gratuitous nudity, except it is British and on Amazon. Now before you fire up your streaming gadgets, know this show is chock full of X-rated content but doesn't stoop to visualizing all naughty bits just too reel in the Bros. I mean the first scene in the show involves painful sodomy and strong cursing about said sodomy. The only reason I'm not describing it in further detail is I'm certain my pre-adolescent children will one day discover this website and I don't want them to learn the vulgarities and explicit details of intercourse from their parent's digital ghost. (Hi kids! I promise I'll stop using the word sodomy.)...

Unless you've been living under a rock, you know this past weekend we were hit by two cultural mega bombs; Avengers: Endgame and Game of Thrones: S8e3 "The Long Night." There's plenty to be said about Endgame, but I'll leave my thoughts for that over on my podcast; Filmcast Without a Cause . But as for Game of Thrones, I've got several thoughts and nearly all of them have flipped from where they were right after the credits rolled on Sunday night. HEY! SPOILERS GOING FORWARD Yes, I have waxed on with woeful rage at the series devolution of HBO's powerhouse program, but at the penultimate moment of the series, it seems fitting to revisit what is one of the largest culture achievements of all time. Without beating around the bush right away my general thesis is GOT's showrunners do not understand their property and have not only dumbed it down, but have spit in the face of their own reduced work. Famously Game of Thrones is adapted from George ...

I have never been much of a reader. For a brief period in college I fell head-over-heels for Chuck Palahniuk, but after a half dozen books and starting to feel like I was reading behind the typewriter with each new release, I kind of quit cold turkey. Sprinkled between the Palhniuk releases I read some of my favorite biographies, retrospectives, and cultural critiques, but once I was in the working world I lost the appetite to spend my free timing reading. Since college I have read... But very sparsely. Some Vonnegut, some Dick, but just as before Palahniuk; if something didn't grab me within a few pages, I dropped it. It's always been something I wished I could embrace but I have never been able to sit still long enough and give myself over to trickling narratives and writing styles that didn't grab me right out the gate. That is until I recently got sick of podcasts. I have been a podcast fiend since discovering Filmspotting in early 2007 and wanted something to listen ...

Nine years ago I wrote a post called " 15 Albums ." Basically a popular Facebook post at the time that I pushed to this blog as a means to expound on my choices. Also, posting here means I can more easily return to my ramblings years later when the feeling grab me. Well this past weekend I read that old post and thought; I should write a sequel to this! ...then I realized that the concept of an album (songs written, recorded, and released together as a collected work of musical art) lost a great deal of importance right around the time of that 2009 post. So instead of a sequel, how about a spinoff? So... Here are 15 films and a music video that had a profound effect on my life . The initial post waxed poetic on albums that changed your life, soul, gut punch, etc. Some of these films had that effect, but films don't really effect people in the same manner as music. Throwing on headphones and listening to music is so personal the very act is designed to shock your syst...

Funny how some important events can swing your life and make you completely forget about old past times. Not only have I forgotten to post on blog for the last 20 months, I completely forgot it exists! Hilarious. Why did I forget? Oh nothing too huge... just that my first born made the scene almost exactly one-year ago. (If you don't follow me anywhere else) Meet my beautiful little lady, Emmalyn Rogue Boberg. I have tried really hard not to over share my daughter with the world. First off, she has not consented to us sharing videos and photos of her on YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. But it's mostly because I don't like seeing five-times-a-day posts of other peoples kids, so I shouldn't commit the same sin. If you would like a digital window into her life, check my Instagram story . I figure that forum is best because posts disappear within 24 hours and viewers have to actively participate to view. But 20 months... dang. People always tell you ha...

Three-year-old Pat repping the Cubs (and some awesome war wounds from my attempts to ride my tricycle through a brick wall). For the entirety of my 34-years on this Earth I have been a Cubs fan. Born in Chicago, descended from at least one die-hard Cubs fan, my Grandmother Constance Catanzaro (and one White Sox fan, Joseph Catanzaro), I have always loved the Chicago Cubs. One of my oldest Chicago memories is going to Wrigley Field with my Grandma, my Mom, and at least one of my aunts (maybe others) and sitting in the stands enjoying one of those frozen chocolate malts you eat with a wooden stick. Now there is a picture of a five year-old Pat wearing his Grandpa's Chicago White Sox cap, and I did root for them in 2005, but such is to be expected in a divided family tree. I'll be the first to admit I'm not a baseball obsessed sports fan. Basketball is my number one (Hard not to be with MJ and the Bulls dominating your youth), But the Cubs have always been my baseball...