Sunday Rerun: Philadelphia Story

 The man's name was Bob Marcucci and he did things that people don't do these days.  He died recently in Los Angeles, but his story begins in his native Philadelphia, where he was working as a waiter in an Italian restaurant in 1957.  That's when he borrowed $10,000 from his father and started a record label known as Chancellor Records (there's a Chancellor Street in Philly.)

Frankie

Those being the nascent days of rock 'n' roll, three years later, the small label grossed $2 million. The first big seller for Marcucci was a kid who showed some musical talent.  Born Francis Thomas Avallone, he was a teen trumpeter and he thought he could also sing a little, but would prefer to keep tooting the horn. Marcucci said, "Give me a year and I'll make you a star."  The first two records they released on the young man failed to hit the Top 40, or the Top 4,000 for that matter.  But then, Marcucci wrote a little ditty called "De De Dinah."  The young man with a horn put the trumpet down, stepped up the mic and sang the song while holding his nose to create a distinctive vocal sound, and went on the road, now known as Frankie Avalon.  He's still known that way and he is still out on the oldies revue circuit, still singing "De De Dinah" and other hits.  Regular viewers of cable tv know him as Teen Angel, singing "Beauty School Dropout" in the movie "Grease."

"He was my mentor, he was my creator, and he really put all of his time and efforts into creating a star," Avalon told the Los Angeles Times. "He had so much zest for life. And with his enthusiasm for show business and the people that he believed in, he just wouldn't stop."

Well, a guy with some musical talent is one thing to make into a star, but here's the real kicker.  Frankie's sister went to school with a 15-year-old kid named Fabiano Forte.  As the legend goes, Marcucci was in the South Philly neighborhood where the Avallones lived when he saw an ambulance in front of a house and an upset looking kid on the porch.  The kid was Fabiano Forte, who was pondering the family's fate.  His father, the breadwinner for the family, was a Philly cop, and in those days, a cop who went sick was a cop who went without a paycheck, so naturally, Fabiano was worried when his father suffered a heart attack.

Marcucci asked the lad if he could sing or if he were interested in being a singer.  Answer to both: "No."

But you don't get to be a millionaire show biz mogul by taking any amount of "nos" for answers.  He kept at it, and of course pointed out that the Forte family fortunes could be vastly improved by the proceeds from a couple of hit records.  Bob gave the singer a new name ("Fabian") and a new wardrobe. He beat the drum, hanging posters that read “Who Is Fabian?,” “What Is a Fabian?” and “Fabian Is Coming!” This was sort of the Facebook of the 50's - hiring kids to go around tacking posters on street corners and telephone poles. In June 1958, Fabian showed up on Dick Clark’s “American Bandstand” tv show, sporting a sweater, tight pants and white bucks.

“The little girls at the hop went wild,” Clark told The Washington Post. “They started screaming and yelling for this guy who didn’t do a thing but stand there. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Before buying his way out of his contract several years later, Fabian had hit records with “I’m a Man,” “Tiger,” “Turn Me Loose” and “Hound Dog Man.”

Fabian 

As is the way with teen idols, his popularity waned, and he wound up making a couple of movies before hopping on the oldies revue bus with Frankie Avalon.

And Bob Marcucci's Midas touch went away too. The last Top 10 hit for the Chancellor label was Claudine Clark’s “Party Lights,” in 1962, and by 1965 the label was out of business.

He moved to Los Angeles, as do so many, and he found work on the edges of show business.

And now, at long last, I can quit sitting around on our front porch wearing my plaintive, despondent face.  Bob Marcucci has passed on, and I guess I'll never be discovered.  Which is good, because I'm a terrible singer.

But there was a time when that didn't matter!

The Saturday Picture Show, April 29, 2023

 

We all understand that Mr Bezos worked hard to set up an online bookstore, and the business he founded has mushroomed into a behemoth that means I rarely have to go to a real store anymore; I just go to the front porch where Jeff has sent me kitty litter and AA batteries and aftershave and vitamins and photo prints and nasal spray and oh yes, books, and lots of them! And now he gets to hang around Coachella with his new wife and Kris Jenner and a shirt with butterflies all over it and I wonder if he got that from Amazon.

The legend of MC Hammer began when young Stanley Kirk Burrell was hanging around the Oakland Coliseum so often that the Oakland A's offered him a job as batboy and general clubhouse factotum. The players all loved him, and noticed that he had a strong resemblance to "Hammerin' " Hank Aaron, legend of the game, so they called Stanley "Hammer." He went into entertainment and did well for himself. In 1996, he came to see the A's play in Baltimore and found himself standing right next to me in the crowd. I'm sure he would remember me as the guy who shook his hand and said, "How's it goin', Hammer?"

It looks a lot different when it's cooked and served in a bowl, but these are oats in their natural habitat.

I like this picture a lot, the tones, the images, the sundown.

This is the breed of dog known as a Komondor, a Hungarian watch dog. They would be handy to have around in case your floor is wet, too.

Here's a family of owls that made themselves a nice little house for themselves in a cactus. I hope they aren't getting needled.

Here's the answer for what to do with that old broken guitar: knick-knack shelf!

The Northern Lights are on bright display this year. This sighting is from South Dakota.

For whatever reason, this man wrote out the complete script to the movie "Jurassic Park" and made art of it.

People on their way to see the ballgame at Oriole Park at Camden Yards pass by this water vendor, who will sell you an ice-cold H20 for two dollars, or maybe a tenth of what it would cost inside the stadium. 

Don't Misunderestimate Yourself

It was the comedian Norm Crosby who became known as the "master of the malaprop" for saying things like, “Wilt Chamberlain is an insulation to young people all over the world. Wherever he appears, after every game the kids give him a standing ovulation.” and his classic, "Are you staying over, or are you communicating?"

But those were intentional mistakes. He wrote them to get laughs, and laugh we did! 

It's always funny when someone unintentionally slips on his or her tongue and says, "I just might fade into Bolivian" (Mike Tyson) or "Pls refudiate" (Sarah Palin). Boxer Tyson may or may not have know that he meant to say "oblivion," and I'm not about to ask him to point out Bolivia on a world map, anyway. Perpetually confused politician Palin went on to say "English is a living language. Shakespeare liked to coin new words too." By putting herself in the linguistic class of the Bard of Avon, Sarah reminds us that she might be better off selling Avon door-to-door than selling neologisms.

But! I just stumbled over a fun fact! There's a word  - "lethologica" -that describes the frustration of not remembering the word or name you want to use. 

I say this all the time: It's easy being a guy, because a) we get out of the shower, run a towel over our heads, throw on a shirt and pants, and we're ready for the day   and b) if we can't think of another guy's name - even a guy we've known since God was in junior high school - we can just punch him in the shoulder and say, "Whaddya say, buddy boy?" Also, "Ace," "Pal," and "Big Man!" are acceptable.

If the object we can't properly name is an inanimate object, we just say, "Hand me that thing, you know what I mean, the thing!" or "that whatchamacallit" or "the whatzit."

One warning, though: if you're even having surgery and your sedative wears off to the point where you hear the doctor say, "Gimme Dat Ding!" you should run and come back later for your pants.

 

Pass Le Farm De Boone, s'il vous plaît

News From Around The World! Dateline Belgium, where their customs enforcement squad has destroyed a shipment of American beer because they are very touchy about the word "Champagne" over there, and Miller High Life calling itself  “The Champagne of Beers” is just unacceptable.

So, claiming that the beer cans improperly claimed to be full of Champagne, Belgians crushed the plans of 2,352 of them (98 cases, I did the math!) to bring happiness to consumers.

Oh, the humanity.

The trade association for the Champagne industry is whining that the "C" word can only be on bottles of bubbly sparkling wine, and only on fizzy grape juice made by a traditional method in Champagne, France.

If you want to call your pétillant wine "Champagne," you have to make it out of  Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, and Pinot Meunier grapes.

And so, the Comité Champagne, the Champagne trade association, requested that the Belgian government destroy perfectly good beer (well, Miller, but still...) because calling any beer “The Champagne of Beers” is a doggone infringement on their band name.

Miller High Life has been calling themselves by that moniker since 1969. Before that, they called their product "The Champagne Of Bottled Beer" from 1906 on. 

The Belgian authorities were quick to point out that the beer, which was confiscated at the port of Antwerp in February, was smashed “with the greatest respect for environmental concerns by ensuring that the entire batch, content and container, is recycled in an eco-responsible way.”

If you are daft enough to think that beer is champagne, you would probably also think that paintings of dogs playing cards is great art, the novels of John Grisham are great literature, and a Filet-O-Fish is fine seafood dining.

But at least, the Belgians are not waffling on this.
 

What Shell he do

It's the NBC TV network that runs those little 10-second Public Service Announcements about being fair and nice and respecting others and how everyone deserves fair play on and off the job. 

Well, the more you know about the NBC network, the more you need to hear that NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell is leaving the company. Has left it already, it would seem. He came in over the weekend to clean out his desk and he is out on his asterisk. There was a complaint about his behavior being inappropriate, and I guess it says a lot about his behavior to read this:

“Today is my last day as CEO of NBCUniversal. I had an inappropriate relationship with a woman in the company, which I deeply regret,” Shell said. “I’m truly sorry I let my Comcast and NBCUniversal colleagues down, they are the most talented people in the business and the opportunity to work with them the last 19 years has been a privilege.”

A Shell of a man

The company had brought in an outside law firm to run the investigation, and Shell's departure was "mutually agreed upon," the company said. That is corporate-speak for "quit before we fire you."

Comcast owns this whole ball of confusion, and Comcast chairman and CEO Brian Roberts and Comcast President Mike Cavanagh wrote a memo to all employees which stated that they were “disappointed to share this news.”

“We built this company on a culture of integrity. Nothing is more important than how we treat each other. You should count on your leaders to create a safe and respectful workplace,” Roberts and Cavanagh stated. “When our principles are violated, we will always move quickly to take appropriate action, as we have done here.”

They went on to point out that that NBCUniversal “is performing extremely well operationally and financially,” which is corporate-speak for "We got rid of him before the news got out and ruined our bottom line, which is buttressed by revenue from stalwart programs such as 'Lopez vs. Lopez' and 'Young Rock'."

Shell came up through the ranks, if you will, at NBC, creating the streaming service Peacock, where discriminating viewers can choose among the 27 "Real Housewives" series streaming. He also oversaw NBC's film studio and theme parks, where the most daring of us can see TV shows being filmed. 

For an extra twenty dollars, I'd bet they will allow you to co-star in an episode of "Night Court"!

This is not the first time an NBC bigshot has been caught with his pants down, if you will. Shell was around in 2020 when Ron Meyer, longtime vice chairman, walked the plank after the admitted to paying a women to hush up about their affair. Shell said, as he pushed Meyer out the door, that Meyer “acted in a manner which we believe is not consistent with our company policies or values.”

And of course, back to the earliest days of the Me Too movement, dimwitted Today host Matt Lauer had a can tied to him for his dastardly treatment of females, including having a button on his desk that locked his office door. 

So, yeah, The More You Know about NBC, the more you realize the top brass up there needs a lot more polish.

My question is, and always has been, can these men just not?

Determination

This is a story about having the perseverance to reach a goal, despite an obstacle that most people would find daunting.

And it's a story about life at home during World War II. You have to remember, most every able-bodied man and woman were involved in the war effort between 1941 and 1945. Men were soldiers, sailors, Marines...women worked in defense plants, building bombers and other sad but necessary tools of waging war.

When the war began, there was serious consideration to shutting down professional baseball, but President Franklin Roosevelt issued a proclamation stating that “I honestly feel that it would be best for the country to keep baseball going. There will be fewer people unemployed and everybody will work longer hours and harder than ever before."

“And that means that they ought to have a chance for recreation and for taking their minds off their work even more than before." 

So with the green light from the president, baseball looked to continue for the duration of the war. Just one problem: who would play?

The rosters of the major league teams for the war years included a 15-year-old pitcher for the Reds, Joe Nuxhall, dozens of men ineligible for service for various reasons, some men who had already served...and one man who had one arm.

His name was Peter Wyshner at birth, but he changed it to Gray to avoid the prejudice that some of Eastern European extraction dealt with in the Depression era.  “I can’t remember when I haven’t had an ambition to be a ballplayer,” he said in 1945. "Being a big-leaguer is just something I dreamed of.”

He had lost his right arm at 6 years of age, when he fell off a grocery truck and it was crushed beneath a wheel. Teaching himself to hit and throw lefthanded, he got his start in baseball as a mascot for an amateur team in Pennsylvania and worked his way into a starting slot with that squad before signing with Three Rivers of the Canadian-American League. 

From there, he played with semi-pro and minor league teams until he got the spot with the St. Louis Browns in 1945, where he played in 77 games and batted .218. And that was the year the war ended, so with hundreds of men coming back to baseball, Gray's big-league days ended. He played again in minor league ball and stayed out of the spotlight until passing in 2002.

And when asked how good a player he might have been had he not lost that arm, he replied, “Who knows? Maybe I wouldn’t have done as well. I probably wouldn’t have been as determined.”

But - here is the thing few people report when telling his life story. In 1941, after the Pearl Harbor attack, Pete Gray attempted to enlist in the US Army, but was turned down because of his physical status. He said, “If I could teach myself how to play baseball with one arm, I sure as hell could handle a rifle.”

An interesting aspect to an interesting life. Never a star, but still, an inspiring figure, Pete Gray.

 

Things work out

We moved into this house in 1999 and we have loved every minute here ever since. That's one of the main reasons we don't go out much, just to dinner on Fridays and that's about it. We're happy here, and what we don't have, and need, Amazon can bring to us, so....

When we were moving in, my sister kindly surprised us with two of those great rocking chairs from Cracker Barrel. Peggy sits outside every morning on the porch, drinking her coffee and enjoying the out of doors, and she rocks on her chair contentedly. I sit inside, enjoying not being out of doors, perched on a stool, sliding Taylor Ham down my neck.

The other night, we went to Cracker Barrel for dinner and when Peggy saw the rockers on their front porch, she mentioned that it might be time to replace ours, as 24 years of heat and cold and rain and snow have taken their toll on the chairs. And speaking of the front porch, I mentioned that our posts have gotten a bit shabby down at the bases, and we might want to think about replacing them, as well.

It wasn't even 24 hours later that we had a brief, but very intense, thunderstorm roll through. There was a period of wind and spattered rain, and then whew! came a really strong wind, ushering in some rather heavy rain. That wind just sounded a little more fierce than the usual gusts we get.

Sure enough, Peggy went to check on the porch, and found that the wind had totally removed one of the posts - ripped it right off the house -  a pillar in the back of the porch roof, and tossed it onto the driveway like a discarded toothpick. Next to it we found one of the rockers, with a leg broken off. They both landed mere feet from Peggy's car without damaging anything.

Nature speaks to us, and all we have to do is listen. On Saturday, the wind cried, "Go back to the Barrel and get a new chair, and call someone about replacing these posts!"

And so I will. It's not wise to ignore such obvious commands.

Sunday Rerun: Wrap It Up

You do know why the kids love fast food, right? Just talking about the food here, not the toys or the playrooms or the cartoon characters. There's a little something in the food...

And they don't take these things lightly in Ireland. The Supreme Court over there in the Emerald Isle made an important ruling the other day.

No, it wasn't about abortion rights or health insurance or states' rights or anything like that. The Irish Supremes ruled that the bread on Subway subs has more in common with a Dunkin' Donut.

In a judgment published on Tuesday, the court ruled that the bread served at Subway, the sandwich chain that started here in the US and has now snaked its way around the world, could not in fact be defined as "bread" because of its high sugar content.

"I'll have a Deluxe BMT on Angelfood, please."

I love these.

I have no idea if the bread in foreign subs is of the same recipe as we get here. This whole thing started when Bookfinders Ltd, the people who hold the Subway franchise in Ireland, appealed a ruling, asking that their food be considered a staple.

"And for dessert, children, how about a Footlong Chicken & Bacon Ranch Melt?"

Over in Britain, they have something called a VAT - Value Added Tax - which draws a clear line between staples such as bread, tea, coffee, cocoa, milk and “preparations or extracts of meat or eggs” – and what they call “more discretionary indulgences”  -  ice-cream, chocolate, pastries, snack chips, popcorn and roasted nuts.

And the fine print of the law says the amount of sugar in bread “shall not exceed 2% of the weight of flour included in the dough”.

The Supreme Court ordered up a bunch of subs, one supposes, and analyzed the roll on the average Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki or Meatball Marinara. Those rolls had 5 times the permissible amount of sugar, or, as the court put it, “In this case, there is no dispute that the bread supplied by Subway in its heated sandwiches has a sugar content of 10% of the weight of the flour included in the dough.”

I tell you, my sandwich-loving friends, only a Supreme Court can get this serious about a Footlong Italian BMT:

“The argument depends on the acceptance of the prior contention that the Subway heated sandwich contains ‘bread’ as defined, and therefore can be said to be food for the purposes of the second schedule rather than confectionery,” Justice O'Donnell ruled. “Since that argument has been rejected, this subsidiary argument must fail.”

Subway replied to a query from the Guardian newspaper with this terse statement: “Subway’s bread is, of course, bread.”

You might also recall the commotion raised when some sharpie with a ruler found out that the footlong subs are 11" at most, or the 2014 imbroglio when Subway responded to a petition drive by removing a flour whitener known as azodicarbonamide from its baked goods. People didn't seem to worry about getting their adult minimum daily requirement of azodicarbonamide until they found out it was also used in yoga mats and carpet underlays.

So. Where do you wanna go for lunch?

The Saturday Picture Show, April 22, 2023

 

I don't know if they still use this as a first-grade textbook. I remember being disappointed in the thin plots and sketchy character development.

Remember the old tale they told kids about the stork bringing them in the world? Well, friends, this is a shoebill stork, and from the nutty look in his eyes, he has seen a lot of things, and will share them over a nice bowl of porridge.

This is popcorn, and I'll betcha it would look great popped up with salt and butter on it. It's called "Glass Gem" corn, and this was grown by a Cherokee farmer. The corn is a mix of ancient Pawnee, Osage and Cherokee varieties.

This is the town of Centurion in Sicily, Italy. I have to believe there are lots of stories about people wandering around there!

We've all seen video of new ships being launched and the vessel flops in the water and rocks back and forth before settling in at anchor. Random thought: How cool would it be to be inside the ship hanging on a like a madman as all that happens?

"Are you close to being at the end of your rope?" "I am a frayed knot." 

And when King Kat arrived, the people bowed down to him in humble supplication, begging for his favor. And they brought him fresh fish, and tureens filled with kibble, and sparkling water direct from Lake Como, and like the true king he is, he ate two bites and fell asleep until dinner.

I have for years favored the spelling "Catsup" over "Ketchup" because I am just impossible, but now, this old Libby's ad gives me the option of asking for "Catchup" and I believe I will.

What could be sweeter for 100-year-old Oriole fan Regina Moyer than to come down to the field before a game and get the grip-and-grin from manager Brandon Hyde? Happy Birthday, Ms Moyer!

This is the "American Food" section of an English supermarket. How about that! They have Old Bay seasoning and Jiffy muffin mix. Baltimore is all over the world!

Book him!

You can't even open your Facebook or listen to the news without hearing from someone who's all worked up over someone else's gender identity. 

But let me tell you about a man who took it upon himself to strike back in the stupidest possible way. His name is Jeremy Hanson, and he sent threatening messages ...to Merriam Webster! Because of this....

 

You see, Jeremy does not care for gender-inclusive definitions, and when he opened the new Merriam-Webster dictionary and saw new definitions for "girl," "woman," and "female," he did what any red-blooded American maniac would do, and fired off hostile emails to the publisher.

“It is absolutely sickening that Merriam-Webster now tells blatant lies and promotes anti-science propaganda,” Hanson, of California, wrote in the 2021 messages. "There is no such thing as ‘gender identity.’ The imbecile who wrote this entry should be hunted down and shot.”

Bein's as Jeremy has a busy schedule back home in Sunny Cali, scanning dictionaries for words he doesn't like, he was tried remotely for a federal court trial in Massachusetts.

The trial in federal court was help in Federal Court in Massachusetts, where the company is based, remotely, and for his efforts, Jeremy was awarded one year and one day in prison, plus 30 days of home confinement, three years of probation, and he was ordered to undergo mental health treatment.

He told M-W through their website and said he was “going to shoot up and bomb” its offices, forcing the publisher’s Massachusetts and New York City locations to close for five days.

Here comes the part I always enjoy: His defense attorney, Marissa Elkins, says he has a history of anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder and claims that spending time in the Ironbar Hilton could have a deleterious affect on his mental health. A good way to prevent prison-related anxiety has always been the avoidance of illegal acts.

Mr Hanson, you are now a "convicted felon" and an "inmate." Look that up in your Merriam-Webster!

 

 

Steven Seagal, come on down!

Let's do one of those "Whatever happened to...?" columns, and let's find out whatever happened to oddball "martial artist" and "actor," Steven Seagal, so popular in the 80s with a string of movie that had three words in the titles..."Above The Law", "Hard To Kill", "Marked For Death", "On Deadly Ground", "Bored To Tears." 

OK, you caught me making up that last one. But as soon as moviegoers figured out that he was always going to beat up entire gangs as long as they only came at him one at a time, his movie career went kaput. Then he made his great comeback film, "Out Of Work." 

No, you caught me again. What he did was to become some sort of volunteer deputy sheriff someplace and try to make a reality show of that, but someone called the "COPS" and he was on the bench again.

So now, Seagal,  American-born but a naturalized citizen of Russia, has started the All-Russian Aikido Centre in Moscow to prepare young Russians for army service.

Putin really envies Steven's toupee. 

Recently Seagal, who is the head instructor of the Russian Aikido Federation, was present for the ribbon cutting.

“I am very glad to be able to present this centre today and that aikido will develop here,” he said during the inauguration. “These arts can make this world a better place.”

Tass, the official state-affiliated media outlet of Russia, says that the main objectives of this Aikido center are to “increase the applied nature of aikido, develop various styles and directions of traditional and modern aikido, increase the general motivation of those involved - the opportunity to become a champion, receive a sports category, title, as well as prepare young people for service in the Russian Armed Forces.”

I think that sentence sounds like something Seagal would have said: both self-aggrandizing, and senseless, all at once.

Not so long ago, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree to award the American "actor" the state Order of Friendship. The decree cited Seagal’s “great contribution to the development of international cultural and humanitarian cooperation.”

Truly, when we think of Steven Seagal, we think of international culture and humanitarian cooperation. Why, he is even the Russian Foreign Ministry's "special representative" to the United States,  a honor of which former president Barack Obama could only say it left him "flabbergasted." Especially since SS does things like visiting Russian prison camps and talking up the Kremlin way of doing things.

Steven is 70 now, and maybe he's just playing around with all this Russian-loving stuff.  Who knows? Maybe this all some big reality stunt movie he's secretly making!

Call it "Putin You On."

 

Going Old School

Today I am doing one of my favorite things of the entire year - it's the day for Junior Class Interviews at my old school, Towson High School in Towson, Maryland.

The idea came to the faculty a few years ago that students will be leaving the school in a year, and will be going to college, entering the workforce, or possibly joining the military. Whatever is next, chances are, they will be interviewed, and that's the plan for this exercise: to give the juniors the experience of someone in authority sitting across a desk from them, asking questions and expecting to engage in a meaningful dialogue.

I was involved in this for the pre-pandemic years, and then it was not held in 2020 or 2021 for social distancing reasons, and last year, when it was restarted, I went and pulled my lumbar region all out of whack, so I had to bow out. Or stand aside, more clearly. Bowing was out of the question.

I look forward to it because it always always always restores my faith in young people. Frankly speaking, I think they are great, in their unjaded, hopeful, looking-to-the future way. I will meet with several dozen of the students, one on one, at a table in the same library where once I sat, unjaded and hopeful and looking ahead. 

To be honest, every year I will meet with one or two who have been sold a load of turnips, if you will. These few think they will ascend to the top of the computer graphics industry, or play in the NFL, or achieve fame and fortune without putting in much work. When they speak dismissively of the advice they receive from teachers and parents and other...older...people, I always give them the old Mark Twain quote about how, when he was 16, his father was the stupidest man alive, and when he turned 21, he was amazed to see how much the old man had learned in just five short years.

But those show-biz kids are few and far between. I love doing this, and I love telling them, "I was graduated from here in 1969," and then to save time and all that mental arithmetic, I tell them, that was 54 years ago. 

They look like they can't wait to go tell someone they met a Cro-Magnon Man! 

Tag Sale

Here in the US of A, many people are willing to plop down extra money for the thrill of having a special vanity license tag on their car. Selling these tags to people who have money burning holes in their pockets has brought in tons of moolah for the states that participate, and at least the money goes for good causes such as education, wildlife conservation, and bridges and highways.

Now,  my dream has always been to have a vanity tag reading "VNITY TAG" because I am such a literalist, but if you really want to look rich, just get the tag "P7" on your dusty old Duster, because one like that, sold to someone in Dubai, is now the most expensive license tag in the world.

That white license plate sold at auction for 55 million dirhams - 15 million American clams. The identity of the lucky purchaser has not been revealed, probably because people would be lining up to sell him a light saber, a time machine, Chicago Cubs World Series tickets, or other things that will probably never exist. 

In 2008, someone from the United Arab Emirates shelled out 52 million dirhams ($14 million) for the number "1" tag. That buyer was businessman Saeed Abdul Ghafour Khouri, and if anyone out there has his phone number, I would like to call him and ask how he came to have so many dirhams.

Dubai, a city with lots of oil money and no income tax, has lots of people with oil money to burn, so to speak. Lisa Fleisher and Low De Wei write in  Bloomberg News that dropping large sums of money on vanity plates is a way for the “ultra-rich to show off their status and wealth.”

The most money any American was willing to pay for a tag is like $400,000 for someone in Delaware, and no, I checked, it does not read I M BIDEN. 

And the good part of this shindig in Dubai was, it raised $27 million for the One Billion Meals Endowment, an initiative that fights food insecurity across the globe.

 

 

The Lure of Local Lore

We like to drive up Philadelphia Rd (which will eventually take you to Philadelphia if you let it) to the Cracker Barrel up in Abingdon, Harford County, and along the way, we pass this sign every time. In fact, I had Peggy take this picture of the sign from our moving car just to prove I'm not making it all up.

The Ha Ha Branch is just a little stream, a tributary of the Bush River, on land once owned by the descendants of John Hall of Cranberry, who owned 1500 riverside acres as of 1673.

The local legend has it that a headless horseman (not the same one written of in Washington Irving's "Legend Of Sleepy Hollow") (we hope) would appear when horseback riders would attempt to ford the stream we're speaking of...and the ghostly headless horseman would "issue blood-curdling taunts of "Ha Ha!" according to the local history book "Our Harford Heritage" by C. Milton Wright.

C. Milton Wright has a high school named after him, so he must have known a lot. He had no idea, of course, that a man named Ha'Sean Treshon "Ha Ha" Clinton-Dix would leave his native Orlando to play for the Crimson Tide of Alabama and then seven years in the National Football League as a safety, but there is no apparent connection between the athlete and the stream. 

Another interesting fact I just made up is that the headless horseman had a daughter, a modest young lady who was very popular in the community. In fact, all the horsemen knew her.

Please say that last part out loud again.

 

Sunday Rerun: Holding Back The Truth

 There is a local angle to this story, but the focus of it should be worldwide.

Henrietta Pleasant Lacks was an African American woman from Virginia who moved to Turner Station, an African American section in southeast Baltimore County, in 1941. She came up here with her husband, who relocated after finding work at the Bethlehem Steel plant in Sparrows Point. Ten years later, she died at Johns Hopkins Hospital after fighting cervical cancer for many months.

While she was undergoing radiation treatments, doctors removed cell samples from her cervix - from the healthy part and from the cancerous section. I don't even pretend to know how this worked, but these cells became the "HeLa (named for her) immortal cell line," and were used in biomedical research - research that medicine used to develop the polio vaccine, in vitro fertilization, HIV/AIDs research, and other major scientific breakthroughs. Here is an article to help clarify what the cells were used for; suffice it to say they have been amazingly helpful in many ways for many years.

However, and this is a BIG however, the cells were taken from Mrs Lacks without her knowledge and consent, and it was not until just a few years ago that her family became aware of all that, and they are now being given some say in the matter of who gets to use the cells' DNA code, and for what. They also now receive acknowledgement in research papers.

Ms Sims

The latest wrinkle is that Jackie Sims, a mother in Knoxville, TN, whose 15-year old son was assigned to read the book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks feels that the book is pornographic.

That's right. She went there. Ms Sims says that the sections in the book that describe the gynecological problems that led Mrs Lacks to seek medical attention are pornography.

"I consider the book pornographic," she told WBIR-Knoxville. "There's so many ways to say things without being graphic in nature, and that's the problem I have with the book."

The book is scientific in nature, written by a science writer named Rebecca Skloot, and is not on the level of the average Danielle Steel potboiler.  But Sims feels that the story should be told in a "different way."

Ms Skloot took to Facebook to say, "Just in time for ‪#‎BannedBooksWeek‬, a parent in Tennessee has confused gynecology with pornography and is trying to get my book banned from the Knoxville high school system...I hope the students of Knoxville will be able to continue to learn about Henrietta and the important lessons her story can teach them. Because my book is many things: It's a story of race and medicine, bioethics, science illiteracy, the importance of education and equality and science and so much more. But it is not anything resembling pornography."

Just so we're clear, here, pornography is generally defined as the portrayal of sexual subject matter for the purpose of sexual arousal.  The simple mention of one's nether regions is not pornography.

Ms Sims is entitled to feel the way she does, although she is probably considered foolish by those who understand a) education and b) the normal reading and viewing material of 15-year-old boys.

But it seems wryly sad to me that the Lacks family was treated so shabbily by the doctors and researchers in the days before biomedical ethics and racial discrimination became more than passing thoughts to most in the majority, and now, here is a woman trying to hold back the truth all over again.

The Saturday Picture Show, April 15, 2023

 

I guess not many of us have seen this view - it's the underside of a swimming duck!

Here's a perfect example of allowing nature to blend with our habitat. I can't figure if the tree was there first, or the house.

This is an abandoned mining town in California. I thought this was an interesting vanity tag (DO NOT CLIMB ON) but then I realized it's a warning to one and all that this battered old Ford will likely crumble into a rusty pile if one more person jumps on it.

Summer is coming, and with it will come the traveling carnivals and more funnel cakes than we can even dream of.

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Quoting from "Rapper's Delight" here..."Have you ever went over a friend's house to eat,  And the food just ain't no good? I mean the macaroni's soggy, the peas are mushed,  And the chicken tastes like wood..." How about if the chicken tastes like cardboard?

At least the thought was good.

More song lyrics! This one from "You're From Texas": "You've got a smile like an acre of sunflowers, and your eyes are a bluebonnet blue..." That's a pretty shade of blue!

I lost before I even started.

Baltimore is home to many people who mistake the gas pedal for the brake, leading to signs like this, and huge profits for door and window glass firms.

One thing I will never miss about work is that dreadful command, "Could you work something up for us on Excel?" I will always miss Lotus 1-2-3!

Military Madness

Here's a scene you've seen a thousand times: Someone is sleeping soundly when suddenly, the door bursts open and a dozen beefy cops or soldiers burst in and there is a mass clicking sound as rifles are readied for action and the object of the sudden interrogation appears from beneath the sheets....

And in the movies, they always have the right guy and he is taken into custody and charged with violations of Title15 U.S. Code § 1825.

But sometimes in real life, which is different from the movies because no one really looks like Ben Affleck or Jennifer Lopez out here, sometimes, they get the wrong guy.

This is what happened in Boston last week: the FBI and the U.S. Army Special Operations Command were doing a training exercise at a hotel. In their play-acting scenario, soldiers and agents were supposed to bust into a room at 10 PM one night to take someone into custody for interrogation. A volunteer was in place in a room, all set to play the part of The Suspect.

As far as I know, that volunteer is still sitting in room 1425, watching The View and enjoying the view. Because, the Army people and the FBI people barged through the wrong door, taking the wrong person into custody, and subjecting that wrong person to 45 minutes of relentless questioning before finally deciding to check out his claim that he was a pilot for Delta Airlines.

Whoops!

At least no one was injured in the incident, except for the pride of the Army and the FBI. The pilot is lucky they didn't waterboard him, one supposes. 

"First and foremost, we'd like to extend our deepest apologies to the individual who was affected by the training exercise," said Lt. Col. Mike Burns, spokesperson for U.S. Army Special Operations Command, who went on to mansplain that this was "essential military training" that was "meant to enhance soldiers' skills to operate in realistic and unfamiliar environments.The training team, unfortunately, entered the wrong room and detained an individual unaffiliated with the exercise."

The FBI-Boston Division said personnel were "mistakenly sent" to the wrong room "based on inaccurate information" and that the pilot who was the guest of honor at this pajama party was "not the intended role player." I guess not; he was sound asleep in a room at the Revere Hotel at the time while these other guys were playing army.

Burns described the incident as "serious," adding that "The safety of civilians in [the] vicinity of our training is always our number one concern."

Yes sir!

 

"It will take forever to move on"

There was a marvelous episode ("The Judge", season 6, episode 9) of the police comedy "Barney Miller" a few years ago in which Sgt. Dietrich investigates a complaint made by a lonely befuddled woman about abductions, murders, and other crimes she is seeing through her window.

It turned out that the "window" through which she was seeing this crime spree was her television screen, and all the things she was "seeing" were crimes committed on the soap operas that she was watching instead of actually interacting with real people and events in her life.

To tell you the truth, in a day when one can't so much as go to the mall without running the risk of getting shot by a member of some non-well-regulated militia, maybe she had a better idea, just staying home.

But that episode came to mind the other morning while I was watching "Good Morning America," which had a report about Taylor Swift breaking up with some guy she had been going around with for six years. I'm sorry for the both of them; I like it when people find a match and always hope it works out,

BUT...(and you know there is one!)...Janai Norman, telling the story, showed some tweets and other social media messages posted by Swift fans in response. One of those tweets really caught my eye, from a person who said, "I have officially accepted this news..."

Huh? How is it up to us to accept or not accept the news of any other person's relationship foundering? It would be one thing if that writer happened to be a friend of Ms Swift or her erstwhile love interest, whose name I don't know because I don't keep up with show biz gossip. Yes, if you are her friend, you are personally invested in her happiness or sudden lack thereof, and so you would have something to say to her.

But, assuming this fan is not in the entertainer's inner circle, what is it about celebrity in 2023 that endows upon us in the audience a feeling that we should or could "officially accept" bad news about them?

There was a time when the stars had publicity agents and press relations people to groom their public images through staged photographs, arranged dates, and orchestrated goodwill campaigns. Today, as soon as a person gains the slightest bit of traction in the race for public attention, he or she sets up an Instagram account and immediately posts pictures of their every mundane activity all day long.

"Here I am looking sweaty - just left the gym - see you soon St Louis!" 

"I had no idea that it would be so hard to find real fresh-squeezed orange juice in Tampa - better try Whole Foods next..."

And of course, "Kid" "Rock" and Travis Trite have to come on and slam a beer company for acknowledging the LGBTQ+ community, in an effort to seem like"real guys." 

I don't blame the famous for wanting to remain famous. They are adroit users of social media, sharing their lives. That's fine.

Where we make a mistake is in thinking that we are a part of those lives. 

Now, let's get back to paying attention to matters of real importance, such as whether or not Prince George will behave at his grandfather's coronation. 

Mind Me Platypus Duck, Bill

Attention Samuel L. Jackson! Someone re-did your beloved thriller "Snakes on a Plane", but it means trouble for an Australian man who cleverly decided to take a platypus on a train.

He's 26 and has kept his name out of the papers so far, wise move for someone who swaddled a wild platypus in a towel and got on a train, accompanied by a woman.

The authorities are taking him to court, alleging animal protection offenses. For reasons best known to himself, the man stands accused of taking the creature from his natural home (a waterway in northern Queensland) and taking it by train to a shopping center.

 "It will be further alleged the pair were observed showing the animal to members of the public at the shopping centre," Queensland police said in a statement.

It was the railway police who put the grab on the guy. The police also talked to the woman who was with him, and have not said what happened to the little animal.

"Police were advised the animal was released into the Caboolture River and has not yet been located by authorities," police said. "Its condition is unknown."

Camera footage shows the man wearing flip-flops carrying the kitten-sized platypus along a train platform, and wrapping it up in a towel. Then they proudly displayed their new friend to other passengers.

But, this is illegal under Queensland's conservation laws. The maximum fine could be Aus$430,000 (US$288,000).

"Taking a platypus from the wild is not only illegal, but it can be dangerous for both the displaced animal and the person involved if the platypus is male, as they have venomous spurs," police said.

The police add, in words that I would think hardly need be said: "If you are lucky enough to see a platypus in the wild, keep your distance."

The first British scientists who saw these critters, with their stubby beaver-like tails and duck-like bills, thought they were some sort of 18th Century hoax.

 

I'll tell you what else the platypuses (the plural is not "platypi," because it's not a Latin word.  The word derives from the Greek words platys, which means flat, and pous, which means foot) have going for them: they are part of the very rare group of mammals, called monotremes, that lay eggs.

And now you have something to talk about over dinner!