Well apparently I need not worry about the Red Menace and their
Republican allies sneaking up on the freehold on a dark and moonless
night. Beagles has already invited them in, well the Russkies, the
Republicans, ever docile in the face of a conquering power, are standing
outside holding their hats, not wanting to get in the way in the crowded kitchen where Beagles bustles about distributing steaming cups of coffee and fresh doughnuts, threading his way through the Kalashnikovs leaned casually against the kitchen chairs. "So," he inquires brightly, "I understand you guys aren't commies anymore, just gangster totalitarians, welcome to the freehold. Would you like some of this marmalade? How about meddling with our elections? That whole thing about democracy, about voting, it's not that big a deal. Our Republican buddies are even now working to knock Americans who are likely to vote against them off the polls. Do take whatever doughnuts you don't finish back out to them. They will eat right out of your hand."
Sometimes I think that whatever radio or tv Beagles gets the news over is maybe being blocked by the Russkies the way they used to block The Voice of America, not that Beagles would mind since they aren't commies anymore, and that Putin guy seems a lot like a thinner, more manly (longer fingers one supposes), less hairy, Trump. And even though Beagles turns up his nose (don't beagles have a great sense of smell?) at Trump, he likes most everything Trump is doing, which ok, is not a hell of a lot outside of undoing Obama's executive orders, so he is kind of a little caboose trailing behind the Trump train and glad for the ride.
All the experts, all the dems, all the independents, most of the republican party, most of Trump's cabinet, pretty much everybody except for that inner circle of Trumpsters, the Bannons and that Conway woman (typing this I wish I had a less acute sense of smell) and Trump believe the Russians are meddling in out elections. I guess now we can admit Beagles into that elite circle of those who don't..
And I guess Beagles hasn't heard that this is all being taken to court. There's cagey Mueller, the house and senate committees, sundry other committees, and I am sure there are lawsuits and whatnot. Is Beagles aware that Trump obstructed the investigations by firing Comey, and sending that clown Nunes on a keystone kops errand? It's like five days into a trial and no verdict yet, we might as well let the guy go and shut up about it because nothing is proved yet.
And shut up about it? Is that the American Way? Why listen to the news when you can watch the same stuff you watched forty years over and over again through the magic of dvds?
Tuesday, July 11, 2017
Monday, July 10, 2017
Let 'Em Come!
I still don't understand why everybody is making such a big deal about the Russians these days. They gave up Communism a long time ago, and they never were as much of a threat as we were led to believe even when they had Communism. Are they still fooling around with the Ukraine? We haven't heard much about that lately, but that doesn't mean it's not still going on. Then there's that thing in Syria, which is such a mess anyway that I don't see how the Russians can make it any worse. If I was in charge, I'd just let them have Syria as well as the rest of the Mideast, except for Israel. That whole region was better off when it was being ruled by outsiders, but I doubt that the British or even the Turks want it back now, so give it to the Russians. I'm getting really tired of hearing about their alleged interference in our elections too, just like I did with that ruckus about Hillary's emails. If anybody has any actual proof that a crime was committed, they should take it to court. If not, they should just shut up about it already.
I found the old "Meeting of Minds" show on You Tube, and I watched one episode the other night. I intended to just check it out, not watch the whole thing but, once I got into it, it held me spellbound for the entire 58 minutes. This wasn't the first episode because they made reference to a previous episode. I also seem to remember that, in the first episode, Steve Allen explained the format, and he didn't do that in this one. I understand that they only made a total of six episodes and spaced them out over several years. It must have been re-runs that we saw because they ran one episode a week, leading us to believe it was a regular show, but then it was replaced by something else. The more I think about it, it must have been after 1980 that we saw them because my hypothetical wife seems to remember that we were living in our house on Townline Road at the time. I tend to agree with her because we had better reception there than we did at our previous house in Indian River. Our PBS channel was a weak signal anyway wherever we lived, and sometimes we couldn't pick it up at all in Indian River. The reception at Beaglesonia was the worst of all and, after a couple years of that, we got our satellite dish.
Like I said, we don't watch as much TV as some people, and we won't watch something that we don't like. There are maybe a dozen shows over they years that we have really liked, and we have most of them on DVD. If we could find "Meeting of Minds" on DVD, our collection would be complete, except for "The Big Bang Theory". We have all nine seasons, and will pick up the tenth when it becomes available this fall. I heard somewhere that they have been promised at least two more seasons, and I'm sure that we'll buy them as well.
I found the old "Meeting of Minds" show on You Tube, and I watched one episode the other night. I intended to just check it out, not watch the whole thing but, once I got into it, it held me spellbound for the entire 58 minutes. This wasn't the first episode because they made reference to a previous episode. I also seem to remember that, in the first episode, Steve Allen explained the format, and he didn't do that in this one. I understand that they only made a total of six episodes and spaced them out over several years. It must have been re-runs that we saw because they ran one episode a week, leading us to believe it was a regular show, but then it was replaced by something else. The more I think about it, it must have been after 1980 that we saw them because my hypothetical wife seems to remember that we were living in our house on Townline Road at the time. I tend to agree with her because we had better reception there than we did at our previous house in Indian River. Our PBS channel was a weak signal anyway wherever we lived, and sometimes we couldn't pick it up at all in Indian River. The reception at Beaglesonia was the worst of all and, after a couple years of that, we got our satellite dish.
Like I said, we don't watch as much TV as some people, and we won't watch something that we don't like. There are maybe a dozen shows over they years that we have really liked, and we have most of them on DVD. If we could find "Meeting of Minds" on DVD, our collection would be complete, except for "The Big Bang Theory". We have all nine seasons, and will pick up the tenth when it becomes available this fall. I heard somewhere that they have been promised at least two more seasons, and I'm sure that we'll buy them as well.
The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming
Oh I don't know, just something very square about tv, well about all those families sitting home and feeding their faces from their tv trays when they should have been doing something, I don't know what. Anybody remember Married with Children? I remember Peggy once nagging Al about how they never go out and do anything anymore, "Why don't we have a social calendar?" she implored, "Don't need one we have this," Al replied, showing her a copy of TV Guide.
I seem to remember those more elaborate standalone ashtrays. I think they had a like a handle, something protruding from the top where you could bang your pipe to knock out the ashes. Pipes, a big pain in the ass with their whole rigmarole of devices, although some people dig that crap. As soon as it became apparent that my pipe filled with cherry blend, jutting from my jaw Hef-style wasn't going to get me any chicks I discarded it. It took longer for me to realize that my English Leather wasn't doing the trick either. I reckon I reeked.
We still talk about something being bigger than a breadbox, or I think we do, I'll have to check next time I am around people who aren't old. Sometimes a young person strolls into the Ten Cat. Sometimes even a hot young babe, over at the geezer's corner Old Dog and I may elbow each other as we pick our eyeballs up off the bar. Could this be the pickup line we have been waiting all our lives for? We shall see, we shall see?
Meanwhile The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming. That was a movie from 1966, kind of a gentle movie it appears. Can there be a handsome Soviet submariner and a winsome little New England farm girl? More likely an exotic Russian sub girl and a chiseled jawed New England cop or something. We would just be happier, even in a friendly affair, if we got one of their women rather than they got one of ours. Later we got the Red Dawns and the Wolverines.
And now we have Donald Trump. Why prepare an invading armada when all you really have to do is flatter a fat man? Of course the Trumpsters are all like, no problem here, what a pal is that Putin. The ever thinning crust of republican Never Trumps bleat, but the wish washies between the Trumpists and the Nevers are alarmingly willing to go along for a ride on the Trump train to Moscow.
Late at night in the freehold Beagles may hear a creak and grab Old Betsy and note a movement in the bushes and blam. Was that a Red or a Republican? Ah, what's the difference?
Sunday, July 9, 2017
TV Trays
My hypothetical wife and I still eat supper off of TV trays. We got a sturdy solid wooden set of them at Walmart when we moved to this house in 2000. Before that we had those flimsy metal ones, and these are a big improvement. There isn't much on TV that we like anymore except "The Big Bang Theory", so we mostly watch DVDs of old shows and the occasional movie. It usually takes us at least two suppers to complete a movie because we only watch it while we're eating. Other than that, I watch a little news and weather, and that's about it.
I said that I didn't watch much TV as a kid but, the more I think about it, I probably watched as much as anybody when I was in elementary school. It wasn't until high school that I got too busy to sit around in the evenings with my family and watch TV. We didn't get TV reception where I was in Alaska, or radio either, because the surrounding mountains blocked the signal. They had towers on some of the mountain tops, but that was only for telephone service. Cell phones hadn't been invented yet, but the Alaskans used to to run their land lines up the mountain and broadcast to other towers all over the state. All calls within Alaska were billed as local calls, and they had one small telephone book for the state. There were only 200,000 people in Alaska at the time, and 10% of them lived in Anchorage. Last I heard, Anchorage now has more people in it than the whole state did when I was there.
We had a TV set in our day room when I was in the army, but I don't remember ever seeing it turned on. The guys told me that was because all the shows were in German. We had an American radio station, The Armed Forces Network, but no American TV station in Berlin. So, from about 1959 to 1967, I got out of the habit of watching TV, and I never missed it. I did not own a TV set until 1975, when my daughter started school and people kept telling me that she would be a social outcast if she couldn't discuss her favorite shows with her little friends. My daughter is now 47 years old, still doesn't own a TV, and is far from being a social outcast. Of course she has a computer and one of those magic telephones, and they give her all the screen time she wants or needs.
I said that I didn't watch much TV as a kid but, the more I think about it, I probably watched as much as anybody when I was in elementary school. It wasn't until high school that I got too busy to sit around in the evenings with my family and watch TV. We didn't get TV reception where I was in Alaska, or radio either, because the surrounding mountains blocked the signal. They had towers on some of the mountain tops, but that was only for telephone service. Cell phones hadn't been invented yet, but the Alaskans used to to run their land lines up the mountain and broadcast to other towers all over the state. All calls within Alaska were billed as local calls, and they had one small telephone book for the state. There were only 200,000 people in Alaska at the time, and 10% of them lived in Anchorage. Last I heard, Anchorage now has more people in it than the whole state did when I was there.
We had a TV set in our day room when I was in the army, but I don't remember ever seeing it turned on. The guys told me that was because all the shows were in German. We had an American radio station, The Armed Forces Network, but no American TV station in Berlin. So, from about 1959 to 1967, I got out of the habit of watching TV, and I never missed it. I did not own a TV set until 1975, when my daughter started school and people kept telling me that she would be a social outcast if she couldn't discuss her favorite shows with her little friends. My daughter is now 47 years old, still doesn't own a TV, and is far from being a social outcast. Of course she has a computer and one of those magic telephones, and they give her all the screen time she wants or needs.
Something for Sunday
I can't believe that you guys are nostalgic about that crap.
It might be crap today, as viewed through the lens of a life well lived, but it wasn't crap then. Nostalgia is almost the right word, but not quite. I don't detect any yearning for the "good old days," more like a reflection on how things have changed, slowly, without our noticing it. It amuses me to see Uncle Ken rhapsodize about his days as a hippy, even as he gazes across the realm from the lofty heights of his not quite ivory, more like cast concrete, tower.
-----
One trick I use with YouTube is to download the content and view it at my leisure. Well, not view it, exactly, but listen to it. Most documentaries are like that, the narrative is the main thing and the images are usually superfluous. There's a funny word for you: superfluous. I wonder if there is a regular fluous, as opposed to Super Fluous; something I should find more about. Looks like Latin, but we've had enough of that.
Anyhow, after I'm done with the content I delete it; those hundreds of megabytes add up, don'cha know. One thing I've learned, more useless information, is that one of the rules of the Inquisition was that blood must not shed. You could apply red-hot irons, crush their limbs, but don't you dare shed a drop of blood. Maybe it worked better in theory than in practice and a trip to the Vatican Library would sort out the details. The Church has been historically very big on rules but enforcement varied, as in many large bureaucracies. They rigidly adhere to the rules they want to and ignore the rest.
-----
Some local hoopla in Wittenberg, Germany this year as they observe the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther's bit with the church door. I was listening to a clip about what a vulgar dog ol' Luther was, big on scatalogical terms. Telling someone to "lick my ass" was a popular form of expression back in the day, at least in that part of Europe. Mozart was another potty mouth, enthusiastic with anal references. Maybe the German language lends itself well to that sort of thing, combining words to make new ones. Any scholars present?
-----
TV trays, huh? I was surprised that they are still being made; a big selection on Amazon, but the new ones look a lot sturdier. They were always flimsy as I recall, and never seemed to be right size for the plates and glasses that we had at home. But they were fine for snacks.
Ashtrays are another throwback item still being made. The height of fashion (in my memory) was the pedestal type that stood next to Dad's easy chair. My uncle had one with a fancy built-in lighter. Very swank. In the not so distant future when you describe something as being the size of a pack of cigarettes people won't know what you are talking about. You don't see people smoking on TV anymore although they do in real life. More fake media.
It might be crap today, as viewed through the lens of a life well lived, but it wasn't crap then. Nostalgia is almost the right word, but not quite. I don't detect any yearning for the "good old days," more like a reflection on how things have changed, slowly, without our noticing it. It amuses me to see Uncle Ken rhapsodize about his days as a hippy, even as he gazes across the realm from the lofty heights of his not quite ivory, more like cast concrete, tower.
-----
One trick I use with YouTube is to download the content and view it at my leisure. Well, not view it, exactly, but listen to it. Most documentaries are like that, the narrative is the main thing and the images are usually superfluous. There's a funny word for you: superfluous. I wonder if there is a regular fluous, as opposed to Super Fluous; something I should find more about. Looks like Latin, but we've had enough of that.
Anyhow, after I'm done with the content I delete it; those hundreds of megabytes add up, don'cha know. One thing I've learned, more useless information, is that one of the rules of the Inquisition was that blood must not shed. You could apply red-hot irons, crush their limbs, but don't you dare shed a drop of blood. Maybe it worked better in theory than in practice and a trip to the Vatican Library would sort out the details. The Church has been historically very big on rules but enforcement varied, as in many large bureaucracies. They rigidly adhere to the rules they want to and ignore the rest.
-----
Some local hoopla in Wittenberg, Germany this year as they observe the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther's bit with the church door. I was listening to a clip about what a vulgar dog ol' Luther was, big on scatalogical terms. Telling someone to "lick my ass" was a popular form of expression back in the day, at least in that part of Europe. Mozart was another potty mouth, enthusiastic with anal references. Maybe the German language lends itself well to that sort of thing, combining words to make new ones. Any scholars present?
-----
TV trays, huh? I was surprised that they are still being made; a big selection on Amazon, but the new ones look a lot sturdier. They were always flimsy as I recall, and never seemed to be right size for the plates and glasses that we had at home. But they were fine for snacks.
Ashtrays are another throwback item still being made. The height of fashion (in my memory) was the pedestal type that stood next to Dad's easy chair. My uncle had one with a fancy built-in lighter. Very swank. In the not so distant future when you describe something as being the size of a pack of cigarettes people won't know what you are talking about. You don't see people smoking on TV anymore although they do in real life. More fake media.
Friday, July 7, 2017
when tv was king
When I was doing my Ed Sullivan research I came across a pic of the Rolling Stones at the time and there they were poised like the early Beatles in a little square or pentagram with each of them maybe ten feet from the other standing alone in front of a microphone wearing some kind of sports jacket, standing straight, not slouching.
Still for all that the blokes were edgy, they openly smoked cigs and just had kind of an attitude that no American pop star had. Maybe Elvis had an attitude while he sang with the hips and the sneer and all but afterwards he was all Yes Ma'am and No Sir.
And Ed Sullivan was such a fucking square. Maynard G Krebbs would have called him a cube. /I can't believe that you guys are nostalgic about that crap. We became hippies to get away from that crap. Our stuff may have been crappy too, but we were stoned while we were enjoying it.
I do wonder about Doby Gillis though. It was kind of a breakthrough comedy in its day, I think because Doby's dad threatened to knock his block off instead of delivering some hokey message at the end of the show. Still probably would not hold up.
There was a whole tv culture though wasn't there, with the whole family assembled in the living room after supper, each in their assigned spot as the knob was turned and the tv fired up (as I recall it wasn't a blink like we have now but it was a circle in the center that expanded, something like that, something mystic) and then they were bathed in pale blue light like pod people or something. The family was all together but nobody spoke.
And then there were TV Dinners and that little rickety tray you could put in front of them to eat your dinner while you were glued to the tubes. We never ate them at my house, they seemed too decadent. What kind of Mom doesn't have time to make her family dinner? Later on as a hippy I ate them (while not watching square tv), because they were cheap, and even to this day I indulge sometimes. A couple tamales from the guy who comes through Ten Cat at 9 PM over a Santa Fe rice and beans is a south of the border treat that cannot be beat.+
There have been mishaps in the super phone, at one point it turned its ringer off and for awhile my keyboard only printed out Asian Indian letters. Stuff happens chaotically, it updates itself, it moves stuff around, it tells you the weather with kind of a good boy beam like what a clever lad it is, when you never asked and don't care. When I was riding the grey dog down to Champaign and was on the wrong side of the bus and couldn't read the green signs Google Maps told me where I was, but then it was constantly asking me if I wanted to take a photo of wherever I was.
I first got it when I was to meet my sister for lunch and I went to Pizzeria Uno while she went to Due, and we eventually ate and went home alone wondering where the other one was. A phone call would have remedied that situation. I only take it with me when I am traveling or meeting someone where wires could get crossed.
I do love the camera though. It takes great photos. It won't let you name them or organize them, but if I connect it to the computer with a cable I can deal with its photos the way I can with the computer.
Still for all that the blokes were edgy, they openly smoked cigs and just had kind of an attitude that no American pop star had. Maybe Elvis had an attitude while he sang with the hips and the sneer and all but afterwards he was all Yes Ma'am and No Sir.
And Ed Sullivan was such a fucking square. Maynard G Krebbs would have called him a cube. /I can't believe that you guys are nostalgic about that crap. We became hippies to get away from that crap. Our stuff may have been crappy too, but we were stoned while we were enjoying it.
I do wonder about Doby Gillis though. It was kind of a breakthrough comedy in its day, I think because Doby's dad threatened to knock his block off instead of delivering some hokey message at the end of the show. Still probably would not hold up.
There was a whole tv culture though wasn't there, with the whole family assembled in the living room after supper, each in their assigned spot as the knob was turned and the tv fired up (as I recall it wasn't a blink like we have now but it was a circle in the center that expanded, something like that, something mystic) and then they were bathed in pale blue light like pod people or something. The family was all together but nobody spoke.
And then there were TV Dinners and that little rickety tray you could put in front of them to eat your dinner while you were glued to the tubes. We never ate them at my house, they seemed too decadent. What kind of Mom doesn't have time to make her family dinner? Later on as a hippy I ate them (while not watching square tv), because they were cheap, and even to this day I indulge sometimes. A couple tamales from the guy who comes through Ten Cat at 9 PM over a Santa Fe rice and beans is a south of the border treat that cannot be beat.+
There have been mishaps in the super phone, at one point it turned its ringer off and for awhile my keyboard only printed out Asian Indian letters. Stuff happens chaotically, it updates itself, it moves stuff around, it tells you the weather with kind of a good boy beam like what a clever lad it is, when you never asked and don't care. When I was riding the grey dog down to Champaign and was on the wrong side of the bus and couldn't read the green signs Google Maps told me where I was, but then it was constantly asking me if I wanted to take a photo of wherever I was.
I first got it when I was to meet my sister for lunch and I went to Pizzeria Uno while she went to Due, and we eventually ate and went home alone wondering where the other one was. A phone call would have remedied that situation. I only take it with me when I am traveling or meeting someone where wires could get crossed.
I do love the camera though. It takes great photos. It won't let you name them or organize them, but if I connect it to the computer with a cable I can deal with its photos the way I can with the computer.
Thursday, July 6, 2017
Long Live You Tube!
I had no idea that all that old stuff was on You Tube, I though it was just amateur videos posted by ordinary people. Well, I did find some old Bo Derek movies on there once, but the quality was poor and I figured that somebody had posted their pirated copies. According to Wikipedia, they have rules about posting copyrighted material, nudity, and explicit sex, but they are seldom enforced. The You Tube people do not monitor or screen the postings but, if somebody complains about a particular video, they will take a look at it and take it down if it doesn't meet their standards. If the actual copyright owner registers the complaint, they will offer to either take it down or share the advertising revenue with them.
When Old Dog mentioned that they have some clips of the Ed Sullivan Show, it made me remember Senor Wences. You know, the Spanish guy with the puppets who did, among other things, "Difficult For You, Easy For Me". I typed his name in the search box and, sure enough, he was there. Looking at those clips after all those years caused me to see them in a different light. As a kid, I just thought it was a cute puppet show. Now it dawns on me that this guy had to do all those voices, including his own, and operate the puppets, sometimes while spinning a plate on a stick or juggling several balls. In one scene, his hand puppet, Yanni, is supposed to be sick, so Wences tells him to stick out his tongue. Yanni opens his mouth, which is Wences' thumb, and out comes another finger on the same hand. He made it look easy, but I tried it myself, and I couldn't do it.
Like I said, I didn't watch a lot of TV when I was young, or a lot of movies either. One of my friends talked me into seeing "Moby Dick" with him, the good version with Gregory Peck. He had already seen it, but he wanted to see it again, which puzzled me. Why would anybody want to see the same movie twice? Okay, fast forward about 30 years: VCRs had been out awhile, but we didn't have one yet. One of our local stores had the machines for rent, so we decided to try that to see if we even liked it. As luck would have it, "Moby Dick", the good version with Gregory Peck, was on display and caught my eye, so we rented it. Shortly after that, we bought our own VCR machine, and "Moby Dick" was one of the first films we bought. All I remembered from my earlier viewing were the action scenes, most of the dialog went right over my head. This time, however, I must have paid more attention because the whole movie kept me spellbound from start to finish. I guess there is something to be said for the wisdom of age.
When Old Dog mentioned that they have some clips of the Ed Sullivan Show, it made me remember Senor Wences. You know, the Spanish guy with the puppets who did, among other things, "Difficult For You, Easy For Me". I typed his name in the search box and, sure enough, he was there. Looking at those clips after all those years caused me to see them in a different light. As a kid, I just thought it was a cute puppet show. Now it dawns on me that this guy had to do all those voices, including his own, and operate the puppets, sometimes while spinning a plate on a stick or juggling several balls. In one scene, his hand puppet, Yanni, is supposed to be sick, so Wences tells him to stick out his tongue. Yanni opens his mouth, which is Wences' thumb, and out comes another finger on the same hand. He made it look easy, but I tried it myself, and I couldn't do it.
Like I said, I didn't watch a lot of TV when I was young, or a lot of movies either. One of my friends talked me into seeing "Moby Dick" with him, the good version with Gregory Peck. He had already seen it, but he wanted to see it again, which puzzled me. Why would anybody want to see the same movie twice? Okay, fast forward about 30 years: VCRs had been out awhile, but we didn't have one yet. One of our local stores had the machines for rent, so we decided to try that to see if we even liked it. As luck would have it, "Moby Dick", the good version with Gregory Peck, was on display and caught my eye, so we rented it. Shortly after that, we bought our own VCR machine, and "Moby Dick" was one of the first films we bought. All I remembered from my earlier viewing were the action scenes, most of the dialog went right over my head. This time, however, I must have paid more attention because the whole movie kept me spellbound from start to finish. I guess there is something to be said for the wisdom of age.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)