Castles Made of Sand

I refudiate you, madam

2012-02-17T05:00:00.000-05:00

As far as I'm concerned, anyone can vote any way he or she wishes to, but it starts to amuse me when Sarah Palin speaks about how conservative people are and how conservative they ought to be.

To be quite frank about this, anything that Sarah Palin says amuses me, because, as a fan of speaking voices, I get a boot out of her Midwestern adenoidal twang. It makes everything she says sound sort of strident and, well, a bit unpleasant. Here are words she said about Mitt Romney the other night to a group of people so conservative that they felt the need to spend a weekend in DC with other people equally so:

"I trust that his idea of conservatism is evolving and I base this on a pretty moderate past he has had, even in some cases a liberal past," Palin told Fox News Sunday. "He agreed with mandating on a state level what his constituents needed to be provided, needed to purchase in the way of health care and Romneycare, which of course was the precursor to Obamneycare."

This is why she seems snarky...she "accidentally" creates neologisms, the better to damn Romney by linking him to the president, a guy she seems to dislike quite a bit. This is considered "cute" by the crowd that likes to pun on people's names. Like they call our Governor O'Malley "Owe"Malley! That's funny. The man has to raise taxes because his predecessor spent money we didn't have, and now the bills are coming due, so blame the guy who's trying to settle the check at the restaurant after everyone has enjoyed their feast.

And how is it that people think it's so doggone cute when she calls reporters "the lamestream media"? "Lame" is an offensive term for people facing mobility challenges.

And the same people who use that sort of term like to mock the president because his mother and father gave him a middle name that they consider repulsive. Like he had something to do with what name they gave him.

Jimmy Carl Black, born James Inkanish, Jr.

It seems to me that when one has to go around trumpeting how conservative they are, they might be wondering about it themselves. It was funny when the former drummer of the Mothers of Invention, Jimmy Carl Black, would blurt out,"Hi, boys and girls, I'm Jimmy Carl Black, and I'm the Indian of the group!" because his Cherokee heritage, while a source of justifiable pride to him, wasn't really germane to the issues the band was singing about. It's not as funny when Ms Palin goes, "Hi, I was once the governor of Alaska for a whole half of a term and now I go about, not really havin' the nerve to run for anything, but just commentin' on everything and everyone, don'cha knooooow."

Don'cha knoooooow that she doesn't know much about Paul Revere, either? "He who warned, uh, the British that they weren't gonna be takin' away our arms, uh, by ringing those bells, and um, makin' sure as he's riding his horse through town to send those warning shots and bells that we were going to be sure and we were going to be free, and we were going to be armed."

She has no idea how much she amuses me. She ought to have her own show. Oh wait. She did.

Our Lazy Crooks

2012-02-16T05:00:00.000-05:00

Kathleen Turner, movie star

The local police blotter is never full of the sort of things that make the local Chamber of Commerce blush with joy, but you have to admit there's a certain panache about some criminals, despicable though they are. In town after town all across the nation, other people get to swell with pride as a young man is charged with multiple counts of whatever, and during his trial, has to be chained, shackled and cuffed to prevent him from bursting out with, "I did it all for you, Loretta! They can't keep us apart! They can't stop you from loving me! Let me not to marriage of true minds admit impediments!"

The magnificent Towson High

Nothing but nothing is better for a town's morale than a Lifetime Movie Of The Week being filmed there, right in the courthouse. We had our cine-moment almost twenty years ago, when John Waters made "Serial Mom" in Towson, and we got to see true movie magic at work. It was the dead of summer when they filmed it, but some prop guy had to find autumn leaves to strew about, because they had to work in the gag about it being improper to wear white after Labor Day.

But whereas Kathleen Turner, in that movie, killed someone with her car right there in the back parking lot of my alma mater Towson High, lately the crime scene in our village is down to just where the perpetrators can't even stay awake. Here is something from the local Patch:

Ridge Avenue, 200 block. 10:55 a.m. Feb. 12. Someone used a key left in a home's front door and laid down in a bed. The person refused to leave until police arrived. Police arrested (a young man named Adam), 20, also of the 200 block of Ridge Ave. He was charged with fourth-degree burglary and trespassing and released Feb. 13 on $10,000 bail.

Knollwood Road, 7900 block. 1:49 a.m. Feb. 12. Someone kicked an apartment door open and laid down. Police arrested (another young man named Adam), 22, of the 200 block of Donnybrook Lane. He was charged with fourth-degree burglary and destruction of property. No further information is available.

And that's the way it is in 2011. Somehow, I can hear these young crooks, whom I don't know from Adam, being interrogated by the gendarmerie. "Yeah, see, so you slept at the Petersons', see? And that wasn't enough, oh no. Then you had to sleep at the Willises' and the Harpers' and the O'Hoolahans'! And then you woke up one day, and sleeping in someone's house wasn't enough, so you started asking them to leave out some warm milk and cookies, and you slipped into their Snuggie® and used their white noise machine, and then you started recording Republican debates on their DVRs and you were up to five Santorum rants about how the left wing is trying to destroy the very fabric of America per day and still it wasn't enough, and then you started snorting Ovaltine - first the Classic Malt flavor and then the Dark Chocolate..."

Could someone just do something normal for once? Like get arrested for jaywalking?

How's your Vade Mecum doin'?

2012-02-15T05:00:00.000-05:00

Not to get too personal, but you do have a vade mecum, and to some people it's vital to have it around.

I had never heard the term before seeing it the other morning in my daily Merriam-Webster Word of the Day feed. Here's how they define "vade mecum:"

"Vade mecum" is Latin for "go with me" (it derives from the Latin verb "vadere," meaning "to go"). In English, "vade mecum" has been used (since at least 1629) of manuals or guidebooks sufficiently compact to be carried in a deep pocket. But from the beginning, it has also been used for such constant companions as gold, medications, and memorized gems of wisdom.

It's probable that not so many people carry around any sort of pocket manual any more. Even doctors no longer tote their 85-lb volume of the Physician's Desk Reference, which lists vital information for physicians: medications, their recommended dosages and possible interactions, and tee times at leading golf clubs. All this information is now an app; just buy it at the App Store and download it on your phone. Very handy. Same thing for other handbooks and manuals. Even the Bible is available to download.

In its other meaning, we all have Vade Mecum in the sense of stuff we Don't Leave Home Without. Wallet, keys, pocket change, pocket knife, bandanna, cell phone: that's mine, everyone has their own, and here's a big shout out to the person who invented pockets! Because we don't have but two hands!

A frosty reception

2012-02-14T05:00:00.000-05:00

So how many times have you wanted to describe what could lengthily be described as "a grayish-white crystalline deposit of frozen water vapor formed in clear still weather on vegetation, fences, etc" ? Just think of the countless times people have come in late to work because they were busy scraping a grayish-white crystalline deposit of frozen water vapor formed in clear still weather off their windshields. (This excuse not valid in August in Maryland, although some will try it out.)

I bring this up because on TV not long ago, a weather person used the correct meteorological term to describe this grayish-white etc to the news person and the news person about flipped out. Because, that frozen stuff is known to dictionary readers as "hoarfrost."

I'll tell you another perfectly good English word that just does not get used because it would make people giggle if it did, and that's "hoary." Dickens used that word a lot, and it was only a couple of centuries old when he did. It started in the 1510's, according to the Oxford English Dictionary (best not to argue with that) and it descends from the Old English word "har" meaning "gray, venerable, old" and so we came to use "hoary" for something old and "hoarfrost" for that frozen junk on the windshield of the Biscayne that is grey, like the beard or hair of an old man. Still, middle schoolers, I cannot recommend that you point out to your elders that they certainly do "look hoary" today. I can tell you from sad experience, people won't get it.

There's a certain Bart Simpson-ish delight we all get from being asked what we talked about in Sunday School ("Hell! Hell! We talked about Hell!") and from looking forward to days of having a sore throat because it enabled (me) to ask for another horehound cough drop. Turns out, horehound is an Old World bitter perennial mint (Marrubium vulgare) used for making cough drops and me chortle.

So now, we're finished with the snickering over words, as long as I don't have to go to a doctor and be told there's something wrong with my coccyx.

EW!

2012-02-13T05:00:00.000-05:00

By now you have seen this commercial, unless all you watch is PBS or the Home Shopping Club Sandwich Channel. Seems like a good idea, to have three straight-out curt girls follow you around and criticize everything you do. If it makes you want to put that big gooey sandwich, or stack o' waffles aside, so much the better for the diet.

But outside of the dietary realm, wouldn't it be helpful to have three little helpers with us at other times? Such as when we're tempted to be texting while racing through an intersection, trying to make it while the light is stale yellow, and trying to steer around the pedestrians and baby strollers in the walkway. How great then it would be to have three beefy traffic cops in the Studebaker with you, growling "Dude, you could kill someone." "NOT smart!" "What are you, drunk, or crazy?"

Reaching into the toaster with a metal knife to retrieve that scorched-and-smoking slice of pumpernickel, it would be a nice reminder to have two electricians and the ghost of Benjamin Franklin: " 120 volts!" "You could get a shock!" "You could short out the toaster!"

Or when someone tries to warn you not to hold your cell over the stern of the boat while you try to get one more shot of Cousin Ingemar water skiing...when someone says "Be careful!" when you're sharpening a knife...when you go darting down the sidewalk to get the newspaper and you're certain that it's not icy...that's when you need advice.

Kids in middle school know everything. It would pay us all to listen.

Sunday Rerun: We'll Cross that Bridget When we come to it

2012-02-12T05:00:00.000-05:00

Her father was Peter Fonda, who made Easy Rider. Her grandfather was Henry Fonda, who made dozens of great movies. Her aunt was Jane Fonda, who made a lot of great movies and also dabbled in politics, made a ton of weight-loss exercise videos, and exercised her free speech rights a time or two. She's married to Danny Elfman, musical composer for everything from The Simpsons to Pee Wee's Big Adventure to Good Will Hunting, and whose nephew is married to Jenna Elfman.

Dag if you didn't guess it right! Say hi to one of my favorite actresses, Bridget Fonda. Bridget gave us starring roles in "It Could Happen to You" and "Point of No Return." ICHTY was the one where she played a down-on-her-luck waitress who accepts the tip of 50% share of a lottery ticket from henpecked NYPD cop Nicolas Cage, who guffaws his way through another whole movie. Her luck sure changes!

PONR was the one where she was a street thug in DC, known as Scooter Libby. No, seriously, she played Maggie. And when she was arrested, a secret government entity took her away, teaching her everything from martial arts to etiquette (taught by good ole' Mrs Robinson herself, Anne Bancroft.) Trained to kill in 17 different ways, she was sent out into the world to do the bidding of this mysterious organization, and then a lot of people's luck changed, mostly for the worst. Diving down a laundry chute to avoid a rifle-launched surface-to-air missile, killing a bad guy with his own breakfast, and taking care of the real-life father of the guy who played Mike Damone in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High," Bridget was everywhere in this movie.

And then she made a few more movies and she retired in 2002, and has not made a movie since. I'd like to see that change next year. Not gonna happen, but I'd like to see it! She left the movies about the same time Peggy and I did: she because she had tendered enough money to be able to retire from making talkie movies for theaters, and we because we were tired of people eating chicken tenders while talking during a movie in a theater.

And did you know that the real-life guy upon whom the nerdy Mark "Rat" Ratner was based in that FTARH movie was a real-life computer geek named Mark Rathbone, who later wrote "Windows for Dummies" and made a fortune?

Bridget Fonda already had a fortune, I guess, so she doesn't need to make any more movies. I wish she would. Then I could get all worked up and say, "Oh boy I can't wait til that new Bridget Fonda movie comes out... on pay-per-view so we can enjoy it in peace and quiet without cell phones ringing, people conversing, people chewing chicken tenders in my ear, and all the rest of those things that drove us out of the theater in 2002!"

It could happen to me!

Saturday rerun - Nickel and Dimed

2012-02-11T05:00:00.000-05:00

Barbara Ehrenreich wrote a book entitled "Nickel and Dimed," which is all about the current economy. She showed how hard it is to get by on the minimum wage by going out there in the workplace and doing it! It wasn't always successful, but she wanted to see if she could at least pay for a place to live, transportation, and food, off a low-paying job such as serving food, cleaning hotel rooms, being a dietary aide and residential housekeeping.

I don't think I would like to replicate her efforts; being comfortably ensconced as I am in my happy life means I don't think I'd do well living out of a rented room in Podunk and earning 6 bucks at MegaMart. But reading this book got me to thinking about three jobs I could do and three jobs I WISH I could do.

F'rinstance, I would love to be a sub shop guy. There will be those who have been sub shop guys or gals who will say, "Oh nuh-uh you wouldn't!" but maybe for a short period it would be fun to make cold and hot subs and pizzas. Unless people got really picky and started telling me just how much mayonnaise they wanted, or to hold the fried onions on the cheese steak. I guess I'm saying I would like to have a sub shop to make subs for me and Peggy, but maybe that's impractical.

Waiter or server, yeah, I could try that. I believe that someone tried to float the word "waitron" as a unisex word for all who schlep food out of a restaurant kitchen and over to a table, but it seems that most people are sticking with "server." I do love to talk to people who do this. They all have several hundred stories about good and bad customers, and if they have a second, they are only too glad to share the stories. You have to know when to ask, though.

Cab driver is something else I could try, as long as we can rule out armed robberies, drunk passengers, passengers who hop out of the cab without paying and run like thieves, and drunks who would rob me and then run like thieves. Not good. But, take away the unpleasant aspects of any job, and it looks like a bowl of berries. I just think that pushing a hack around would give me the chance to meet some interesting pedestrians and show them my extensive collection of shortcuts and ways to get around our county. I don't think I'd take any fares into the city, at least its more crime-ridden areas. But I could tell people why they should stay out here in the boonies, and we'd both be better off!

Any list of three jobs I could never land but think they would be fun to get would start with major league baseball first-base coach because this non-stressor mainly involves greeting members of my team who have successfully reached first base, reminding them not to leave for second until I say so, and picking up foul balls to toss to happy kids in the stands. And to think, people get paid to do this!

Being president of the United States of America would be a gas too, if only for the apoplectic state it would induce in my many critics who claim I am too liberal for words. Imagine their faces when I start my term with promotions such as "Turn-In-Your-Gun Tuesday" and "Vice-President For a Day"!

There is no doubt at all that the coolest and easiest job of the high-paying jobs is movie director and what fun that must be, huh! You get to stand in a room full of glamorous people who have their lines all memorized, and the sound effects person is ready, and the camera people and everyone else, and then you go "Action!" and everyone acts and then later you show up at the premiere wearing a beret and a tuxedo jacket over blue overalls and talk about your "craft" and the difficulties of being an authentic "auteur." Occasionally, a new or nervous actor will ask you what is their motivation in some scene. You just tell them their motivation is to say all their words in a reasonably convincing manner and not fall over the ottoman in the living room scene. And then you start thinking about what to have for dinner at some swanky H'wood bistro later.

Nice to dream, ain't it?

I never would have guest it

2012-02-10T05:00:00.000-05:00

Here's a tricky etiquette question:

You receive a wedding shower invitation and a "hold-the-date" for a wedding..from a woman whom you have never met, who briefly worked with your husband several years ago. Unless her husband saved this woman's life through a well-timed Heimlich Maneuver or CPR, why are you getting an invite to the nuptials?

Ahhh...cast a wide gift net. So many people just get invitations, say, "Meh," and send some Corningware® or a Keurig coffee machine, those little K-cup deals that work so well for two months and then just make gagging, grinding noises when all you want is an honest cup of mocha java.

BUT there is an alternative! Here's how it works. You buy the gift and send it along via ME! I'm looking for a steady source of retirement income, and surely a well-paying job as Wedding Guest Stand-In would do me well. I have a nice pinstripe suit, some shirts and ties, and I'll even find a pair of dark socks to wear in place of my customary crimson footwear.

In return, I will take along ZipLoc bags so I can bring you some Lobster Newburg. I will shout out "Nice pull!" when the groom toasts the bride. And I will lift up the centerpiece, look underneath and claim that it has my seat number written on a little label, thereby entitling me to take it home.

I don't enter this profession without a background. I love weddings, I love love, I love the church part even when everyone oooohs and aaaaaahs, and then I love piling back into the Biscayne and driving over to the conception. What better way to wile away a Saturday than to hear the DJ croon,"And now...making their first appearance as husband and wife...will you please give it up for Dickie and Dixie Normus!!!!!!!!!!!"

And while all this is going on, I'm sizing up the fruit table or the giant lasagna, as it sits bubbling away.

And I can Chicken Dance like nobody's business. Snap snap snap snap!

I had that buddy Johnny years ago who made a Saturday habit of putting on his sports jacket and tie and showing up at receptions, blending in after everyone was seated for the main meal, showing up in time to scarf up chow and guzzle free suds. If anyone asked who he was, he would just reply that he was an old friend of the bride. Or groom. His great gift was his ability to look nondescript. He just blended right on in. I think a lot of that was owing to his sport jacket being the exact color of Lobster Newburg.

Wedding season is coming up; please contact me soon and arrange to stay home while people whom you don't even know, and/or like very much, get married. Let Mr Guest be there for you!

One Million, Give or Take

2012-02-09T05:00:00.000-05:00

Attention, One Million Moms: How come there are only 40,000 of you on your Facebook page? How is that a million?

These goofballs who called themselves One Million Moms, a part of the bizarre American Family Association, are urging people to make nuisances of themselves. You go on the website of this AFA, and they're busy asking you to call Home Depot stores and ask for the manager and annoy him or her by engaging them in bickering about how horrible it is that the Home Depot supports the right of people to love whom they wish.

That makes me want to stop off at the Depot on the way home and buy some 2x4s, maybe even some 4x8s.

I took this right off the AFA website:

Last week we reported that Home Depot appeared to be pulling back its support to homosexual activists. We spoke too soon. Immediately after we released our findings, Home Depot said it will continue to support homosexual activities.

And I find this to be true. I needed to run by the Depot last week for some hinges, and right there in the aisles, homosexual activity abounded. I was shocked. Shocked! I lumbered on over to where they keep the lumber, trying to buy some shelving, but the aisle was blocked off because some clerks and customers had formed an impromptu chorus line, doing a tribute to the Liberace Era.

Homosexual Activities. How silly a term. I mean, when I go to the lumber yard or the Dollar Tree for my shower supplies, no one calls that a "heterosexual activity." When Peggy and I sidle into "our" booth at the fabulous Double-T Diner, I don't think of that as a "heterosexual activity." And even when we have heterosexual activity, I don't think of it as "heterosexual activity."

So, if you're gay and you work at the Home Depot, selling me paint or drill bits is a homosexual activity, and my painting the kitchen window frame or drilling a pilot hole to hang a picture is a heterosexual activity. What's the diff?

Now, the self-righteous have turned on Ellen DeGeneres, and they're asking that we call our local JC Penney and heckle the manager and threaten to boycott the store and say any number of bad things about their towels and sheets and t-shirts. The Many Moms said that J.C. Penney was trying to gain a new target market by "jumping on the pro-gay bandwagon" by hiring Ellen to promote their merchandise.

"They wanted to get me fired and I am proud and happy to say that J.C. Penney stuck by their decision to make me their spokesperson," Ellen said.

This is what you look like when you let others do your thinking for you.

I am proud to report that I have been walking this earth for 60 years, and during all that time, not one person who ever drove by me on their "pro-gay bandwagon" tried to force me to jump aboard with them and ride around town. Each and every gay person I have ever met left me alone with my preference, and I have tried to reciprocate by letting them do as they like as well.

See you at Penneys and Home Depot!

I don't need Sri Lankans flipping me off

2012-02-08T05:00:00.000-05:00

During the Super Bowl broadcast the other night, as the clock wound down toward halftime, Al Michaels mentioned that Patriots coach Bill "Ratty Hoody" Belichick was so meticulous, so detailed in preparing his squad for the big game, that he even lengthened the time of their break during practice in the last few days. During the regular season and the playoffs, halftime runs for 12 minutes, plenty of time for showing beer, pickup truck and erection assistance commercials along with some insightful analysis from Terry Bradshaw.

But in the Super Bowl, home of memorable ads and winners donning celebratory t-shirts and caps within seconds of the final gun, the halftime break is thirty minutes. So Belichick halted practices last week and made his charges sit around the locker room for half an hour to acclimate them to the length of the break on Sunday.

The drawback was, all those men had to try to sit for a longer period of time in the same room as Tom Brady's ego, a massive, turgid, swollen ego that expands and contracts like the fortunes of the supermodels he beds.

The good news is, during the game, which the Patriots, to Brady's astonishment, lost, neither team had to watch the halftime show. This year, featured artist Madonna, a singer popular in the 80's, lip-synched songs that very few people knew while even fewer paid attention, being more deeply involved in the bacon-horseradish dip and crockpot chili simmering on the card table near the kitchen. Madonna was assisted by Cee Lo Green, Nicky Minaj, M.I.A, LMFAO, and ROTFLWTF in singing a seemingly interminable medley. M.I.A, a British performer of Sri Lankan descent born Mathangi Arulpragasam, is 36 years of age, and virtually unknown, so she thought she would indicate, by holding up a finger, how many people cared about what she had to say about anything (see photo). It always strikes my funny bone that this boring halftime show is sponsored by Bridgestone, a tire manufacturing company. It's funny because I am tired of the whole spectacle.

Back in the days when the University of Maryland was turning out more All-American football players than doctoral candidates, the joke was that they needed to improve the college so it could be a school that the football team could be proud of. Now we have this Super Bowl, and the last few games have been very good football games. Here's a vote for a quicker halftime show, with no need to trot out people who have not been on the cultural radar since the days of Howdy Doody.

He's not really a good man

2012-02-07T05:00:00.000-05:00

I love pics of rich guys being hauled into court

Apparently, there are at least two John Goodmans (John Goodmen?) in this world. Sure, there's the one from the "Roseanne" show, the actor who went on to play Linda Tripp on Saturday Night Live's satires about Bill Clinton. I feel your pain.

Then, there is this other John Goodman, down in Florida. Hmmm. What do we know about this dude?

Papa. Don't preach.

He founded the Polo Club Palm Beach, where rich people cluster to watch people playing polo. In Palm Beach. Sounds delightful, am I wrong? Next year, if they're still open, let's get down there in January and watch them play for the Herbie Pennell Cup. Oh well now, I mean, really.
He's worth around 300 million dollars.
He ALLEGEDLY drove drunk, piloting his Bentley into the path of a Hyundai car driven by a 23-year old named Scott Wilson. As Wilson drowned in a canal, Goodman ALLEGEDLY ran off on foot (the only way to run, really) and later blew a blood-alochol test that was off the Lohan scale.
Anticipating financial setbacks from settlements with the Wilson family, he set up trust funds for his children to hide the money from the Wilsons, who probably are as repulsed as his own kids at the fact that he
adopted his girlfriend as his daughter. He's 48. She's 42. Funny what love can do.

With his trial due to start on March 6, and with charges that could send a person whose father was not an HVAC billionaire to the Ironbar Hilton for 30 years, Mr Goodman is making his plans, putting his affairs in order, getting his ducks in a row. Under Florida law, where this bizarre adoption took place, anyone can be elected by hanging their chad out, and there is no law against having sex with an adopted child as long as there is no "lineal consanguinity" - meaning there is no close blood tie, such as aunt, uncle, niece, or nephew.

With my retirement coming up in a matter of weeks, I get a lot of questions. "How is Peggy going to put up with you now?" is one of them. The other is, "Are you going to move?" I get this one a lot from neighbors.

But "Have you ever considered getting a girlfriend to adopt as a daughter?" never came up. And I don't think I want anything to do with people who live like that.

Until recently, I had considered moving to Alaska. But I found out, wacky stuff goes on there, too.

But I am understanding now that corporations are people, my friend. Therefore, Mr Goodman ought to adopt Apple. That sounds like the name of a Palin offspring anyway.

Eeny Meenie Emo

2012-02-06T05:00:00.000-05:00

It's important to look different

Because I like to keep in touch with all aspects of our national culture, I became aware of the "emo" movement in music and said, what is this, now? It would appear that to listen to this sort of music, defined by Wikipedia as "a style of rock music influenced by punk rock and featuring introspective and emotionally fraught lyrics," one needs to develop an elaborate hairdid featuring all the shades of the emo rainbow (pitch black, dark black, jet black, shiny black, purple, pink and blond) and really trowel on the mascara and eyeliner in the same shades, except blond. And then, from what I can observe seeing youths sauntering around the mall or handing me food at Panera, it's key to maintain a stony silence, as if building a wall of no sound to keep the world at bay.

So, listen. I can relate to the angst, the sturm and drang, of the Emo youth. I was for years an honorary member of the Bratwurst pack. It's tough, finding yourself at the crossroads of boy and man, girl and woman, and you find yourself in high school, a microcosm of life at large if ever there was one, and it can be sad. I filled my high school years with trips to the principal's office and off-campus jaunts to historical sites such as the Gayety Burlesk and the Glass Slipper Show Bar, and of course my after-school activities in the Detention Club filled many an afternoon with healthful exercise of placing chairs atop desks and washing blackboards. But beside the worry about grades and part time jobs and parental disapproval of piercings and opprobrium from friends, high school is that time for many of the first real stirrings of love and love's bastard cousin from Milwaukee, heartache.

There is nothing quite like the feeling of getting thrown over during a five-minute break between classes. I saw this happen to people! You're sitting in Algebra, and for all you know you have a steady sigoth* and then the bell rings in more ways than one. Class ends, and she sidles up to you on the way to US History, and banishes you to Dumpville USA, and then you sit down in Miss O'Hoolahan's class and she asks you for six reasons that led up to the Spanish-American War. And you answer, "X=5.25" because your heart and mind are still in Algebra**. And as the class hoots and hollers with scorn, that's when you really start thinking about wearing six more chains on your black jeans. And you go home and listen to your Emo bands, such as Weezer (named after the bandleader's bout with childhood asthma) and Death Cab For Cutie (named after a song done by the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band that came out when I was suffering through a bout of algebra myself).

But wait! There's more! I understand that music hath charms to sooth a savage breast, which was a line written by Wm. Congreve in 1697. In 1698, music teachers stopped quoting it to high-school students for the same reason that English teachers never say "There is no frigate like a book" out loud. Music is helpful when you're down and out, got the blues, feelin' lonesome. Sad songs by people wearing studded clothing seem to help.

Such as Little Jimmy Dickens! That's the stage name of Grand Ole Opry legend James Cecil Dickens, who, at 4'11" towers over no man, and yet, he towers over them all when it comes to singing from the heart. I urge you to listen to him sing "Twice The Fool" or "The Whole World Seems Different" and make this simple comparison: if these songs, recorded in the turbulent 1960's, don't help you to understand that we've all had heartache at one time, so no one is all alone in that valley, then please go back and listen again. Little Jimmy is that good.

*significant other

** something you will never, ever, use again in your life.

There's Something About Marry

2012-02-05T05:00:00.000-05:00

I happen to be a big fan of marriage, the vow to have and to hold, forever and ever, amen. I'll admit that a certain amount of my fondness had to do with how lucky I have been in marriage. As it happens, I married the most wonderful woman in the world, and we've had a lot of good times. Even the bad times have tended to work out for the best, because as tough as it is to deal with sad news, it's a lot easier to handle when someone sweet is holding your other hand.

We know another couple; they've been married for years and they have a nice life going for them, too. They have helped out a relative in the most meaningful way possible, by taking her into their home, and they have worked on their respective careers while still bringing the important stuff - their togetherness - home every night. Like all happy couples, they find the greatest joy in each other.

And here's the part where I tell you, that other couple - Michele and Lee - are both women! Imagine! Two people in love, in happiness with the world and with each other, and just because they happen to be of the same gender, there are people willing to spend their evenings parading around the state capitol with protest signs protesting signs of same-sex marriage becoming legal here in the "Free" State.

Delegate Don Dwyer from Anne Arundel County is quoted in the papers as saying that he and his like-minded fellows are out to stop the bill from advancing in the Maryland House of Delegates by not letting it "out of committee," which means "don't let people vote on it." He believes that he can stop the bill from coming to a vote among the citizens of Maryland. Why he wouldn't want the people to be able to vote on it might be linked to a recent poll indicating that 49 percent of Marylanders would be okay with same-sex marriage. I'm not going to mention what party Dwyer represents, but it's the same group of people who brought you Hoover, Nixon, Bush, Cheney, Bush, Gingrich and Reagan. Open-mindedness is not a common trait there.

Notice how her eyes just mesmerize you

Another Republican in the state, Frederick County State Senator David Brinkley, says that Marylanders are uncomfortable with same sex marriage. Well, cheer up. I have good news and glad tidings from a land called Reality.

Only people who want to marry a person of the same gender have to be concerned with this! You see, no one is going to force anyone to get married to anyone. You don't need to be comfortable or uncomfortable or any which way about someone else's living arrangements, sleeping arrangements, or who does what to whom while wearing what. Every night when I lay my little head down to sleep, I say a little prayer for Peggy and the rest of the people I love, that they will be happy and healthy and fortunate, with God's great mercies. And then I fall asleep for six hours, during which time I could not care less what's going on between two other human beings on our block, in our zip code and in the entire universe. I mean, I was so glad when Bristol Palin found true love, because she married that nice fella and now look how happy they are! And Newton L. Gingrich, who is a living example of the value of good ol' fashioned marital stability.

I always ask the same question every time that people go on about how great it it has been that we have spent 140 trillion dollars, or whatever, on NASA so we could get some moon rocks. What's it to me what goes on at the moon?

A guy I used to know always defended the space program, saying that without it, we never would have had Corning Ware®, Tang®, and digital watches.

Shut me right up.

Now here comes the question I pop out every time the talk goes to why it's anyone else's business who marries whom:

What's it to you?

I'll be right over here, sipping Tang out of Corning Ware, checking a digital watch to see how long it takes to get an answer.

And this is my beloved

2012-02-04T05:00:00.000-05:00

Time today to write my annual birthday tribute to my splendid Peggy, who was kind enough to marry me in 1973 and remain so ever since. One thing that I really like about our relationship is that even people who have never met her have heard so much from me about her that they tend to speak of her as if they were old friends. This happens at work all the time, and then if people from the work group happen actually to meet Peggy at a mall, retirement party or supermarket opening (three places where you're likely to find me) they always act like they are meeting someone from folklore, like Joan of Arc or Joan Van Ark or Pamela Ewing or something.

I talk about Peggy all the time just because she is such a good person. I mean that in every sense of the word. Her kindness just flows over all who come in contact with her. More than most people, she is guided by the Golden Rule and frequently comments after yet another kind gesture to someone, "Well, that's how everyone should be treated."

She likes the simple things in life (pause for joke about her choice of husband) and is totally thrilled to have a chance to have dinner at Friendly Farm, or a walk at Loch Raven, or a quiet evening at home, reading, or watching something good on TV like that Downton Abbey show she's so fond of.

She doesn't need the best and the brightest; just having things with love pleases her. Over the years many women, especially younger women, who come into her life have sought her advice on topics ranging from setting up a new file at work to setting up an entire new household. These women tend to look at her in a special light, as if she were wearing a halo. In fact, she is.

We live in a world of flash and dash and Kardashians, people who regard marriage so lightly as to use it as a plot device in a dumb TV show. People like Peggy, who get out of bed and go to work and work hard all day and then drive home to do more and more and more for everyone else don't get the attention, and that's how she likes it, anyway. She is all about the getting-things-done and not at all about the spotlight, but if there were a spotlight for just a minute to show the world what goodness and purity of heart and spirit look like, I'd like for it to shine just for a minute on the woman who still makes my heart skip a beat every time I see her.

We have a quote from Ring Lardner on our refrigerator: "They gave each other a smile with a future in it." I love that thought. I knew from the first time ever I saw her face that I would marry her. Peggy, I'm glad to say, felt the same way.

Happy Birthday, Peggy. Thanks for letting me be around your goodness. I love you like the rivers love the rain.

Drumming up trouble, celebrity division

2012-02-03T05:00:00.000-05:00

So you think your life is tough? How about the horrible sad woes inflicted on our wealthy entertainers? Check this out! (from the New York Post)

Al Roker nearly “pulled an Alec Baldwin” on an American Airlines flight when he refused to give up his aisle seat for rocker Alex Van Halen and his wife, Stine Schyberg, and remained glued to his phone after the gate closed to tune out the pushy couple’s protests.

After hosting the Rose Bowl in LA, the campy “Today” meteorologist avoided a fiery confrontation on AA flight No. 4 to New York when his first-class companions, the Van Halen co-founder and his wife, bitterly complained to the gate agent that Roker was sitting between them as the plane sat on the ground.

Witnesses said Alex was seated by the right- side window, his wife in the center of the cabin, with Roker in the aisle seat between them. Alex’s brother and Van Halen co-founder Eddie and his wife, Janie Liszewski, were seated in the row behind them.

“Alex complained, ‘We’re not together, Mr. Roker’s seat is between ours,” a spy said. “Al was looking at his phone, desperately trying to ignore the whole situation.”

When the agent asked Roker to move to the aisle seat in the first-row center, he stated that he’s “allergic to dogs,” a source tells us. A passenger with a little dog in a crate was in the row behind Roker, and moving to the aisle would have put him three seats away, rather than four.

To sit together, Alex and Stine then swapped with passengers in business class, our spy said, adding that a relieved Al “said ‘Hello’ to the new people when they sat down, after hiding from the Van Halens by texting.”

Roker, who then turned his phone off, seemed to have better etiquette than “30 Rock” star Baldwin, who was bounced from a flight last month for unleashing his rage on a flight attendant who asked him to put his phone away.

While the situation was uncomfortable, “There was literally not an ounce of rock star bullbleep,” a spy said of Alex, “But his wife was making a big deal complaining about it.”

A rep for Van Halen told us the band “couldn’t be reached.” NBC declined to comment.

Now, as we were saying last week, I don't fly, and here is why. If I thought there was the slightest chance that I would have to witness Al Roker - the man whose costars obsequiously call him "Mr Roker" - having a snitfit with Alex Van Halen and his wife over who was sitting where on a jet flying coast to coast I might have had to say this:

"Hey weather guy, would it kill you to move over one and let this man and his wife sit together? And drum guy and wife, did you think of asking nicely, or was this a big 'Do you know who I am?' thing?"

He sticks with it!

I use a little scale for gauging dumb celebrity spats like this one. If I brought Alex Van Halen before a group of people of all ages and backgrounds, how many could ID the flamboyant drummer? They might know his brother, Eddie, who was married to Valerie Bertinelli, but Alex? And conversely, how many people would recognize Al Roker without his weather paraphernalia all around him?

Maybe it's crazy, but maybe our pampered celebrities just possibly could start getting along with each other. Picture Al Roker, sitting there faking like he's reading messages on his cell while Alex Van Halen's third wife crabs about who's sitting where.

It almost sounds like an oil painting, ready to be made into a tapestry to decorate the homes of people who read the tabloids.

And hominy grits? Oh, about 40 or 50!

2012-02-02T05:00:00.000-05:00

"Disgust is one of the six basic emotions—along with joy, surprise, anger, sadness and fear—but it is the only one that has to be learned, which suggests something about its complexity."

That's a quote right out of a Wall Street Journal article by Rachel Herz, an article entitled "You Eat That?" It describes some, well, disgusting food items that are consumed, apparently with relish (or other condiments) by our fellow citizens of Starship Earth. I won't make you toss by telling you the details, and I would not advise reading the article if you're just about to unzip your ZipLoc baggie and have lunch. Let's just say, there are some good Italian cheeses, and then there's Casu Marzu, a big rotten favorite over in Sardinia.

I'm not going to go on about foods other people like because Heaven knows, some Sardinian might find my hominy (dried corn soaked in lye, dried again, and then cooked up with sausage. Ummm UMMMMM!) to be repugnant, and my stewed rhubarb to be out-of-bounds. What I am thinking about is those six basic emotions.

The REAL Mario Lanza

Think of a baby, and think how he or she just shows exactly how she or he is feeling. They'll let you know right away, all right. If they feel joy because a mobile is circulating above them or some adult is making goo-goo eyes at them, their little faces light up and they burble with joy and happiness. If all of a sudden, from behind that adult another person leaps at the baby and begins singing "The Loveliest Night of the Year," the baby will register surprise, for this might be the first Mario Lanza impersonator in his or her young life (but surely not the last.) Anger comes along when there's no meal served along with the song, and a baby shares anger by demonstrating lung power and turning on the old water works.

Sadness is demonstrated when the baby gets a little bit older and finds out that life doesn't always go the way we want. I can't count the number of times that I or someone I love went all-out for something, only to have it not work out...and then, that not working out turns out to be for the best. "When one door closes, try to see if there's an open window you can climb into somewhere," goes an old saying, and for good reason. Or take the community-wide sadness of the weekend before last, when the Ravens lost that playoff game. It was late on a Sunday, and most of Bmore went to bed sad, but a funny thing happened overnight. The earth continued to spin, and when we got up and pulled on our sox, we found that the sun had come out as it always has.

People who study such things say that humans developed fear out of a well-founded sense of wariness when they found themselves living near saber-toothed tigers. No kidding. That was a fairly smart thing to do, as tigers are known to be carnivores and would regard most people as a fine dinner. Fear the tiger!

Most fears like that make sense. We also have irrational fears that should be examined thoroughly...fear of Friday the 13th, fear of loud noises, fear of falling, and worst of all, fear of making a loud noise while falling on Friday the 13th.

But...disgust has to be learned? Not so fast, social scientists and anthropologists! Let's go back to our baby example. Let's give that baby a name. How about, we name him Jimbo? Let's make Jimbo happy, first. So put him in a warm room, wrapped up snugly, free of diaper rash, and all powdered up like a fine donut. Then let's put on some sweet, tender, vivid music...Brahms is good. Jimbo, all fed and happy, is ready for an afternoon nap.

Then, break the news to him that his full name is Jimbo Kardashian, and there on his little pink face you will see instant disgust.

Pencils Down!

2012-02-01T05:00:00.000-05:00

This fellow Mr Fifty Cent (I knew him when he didn't have two nickels to rub together) had a song called "21 Questions" and it made me think of 21 of my own.

How come in the movie "Arthur" with Dudley Moore, no one asked how come a rich New York playboy spoke with an English accent?
Who would play the part of "you" in a Lifetime TV Movie of the Week?
How long are you willing to wait in a restaurant for a table?
ref #3...Would you stick around even if I told the hostess my last name is Donner so that she would later call out,"Donner..Party of 6!"
How do you think it felt to be the first person who ever ate a raw oyster? Remember - they probably didn't have cocktail sauce then!
How is it that people will spend thousands of dollars to go to HotAsHell Florida to visit an amusement park based on the adventures of a mouse, yet they freak out if they see a mouse darting around in their yard?
Why do we sing "Rock a bye baby" to put a baby to sleep when the song is about putting your baby in a tree and letting the wind crash the cradle on the ground? How restful is that for a baby?
Do you agree with Michael Kelso's statement that "Canadians don't have time to generalize about people because they're too busy drinking beer, playing hockey and putting maple syrup on their pancakes"?
Do you notice how much different things were over a ten-year period than they are lately? As in, look at how people dressed and what kind of music was popular in 1952, and compare that with 1962. But people still dress the same in 2012 as they did in 2002. Wha' happen'?
If you were a celebrity, would you sign autographs for everyone who mobbed you at dinner?
Did you ever go on a date with someone you were sure was going to be dull as dishwater, only to find them scintillating?
Did you ever go on a date with someone you were sure was going to be scintillating, only to find them dull as dishwater?
Do you hate it when a person makes up questions and simply reverses the thesis of one to create another?
Do you like it when when a person makes up questions and simply reverses the thesis of one to create another?
Are you in touch with your inner child?
Can you remember to pick up a bottle of milk on the way home, or do you need to write a note?
What is it about some people, anyway?
Would you swap 10 years of your life to be really rich or really famous or really good-looking?
Have you ever felt like you were having deja vu for the second time?
If you could know your exact day of death, would you want to find out?
Who has ever seen a ball of wax? Why do we refer to "the whole ball of wax"? Who wants a ball of wax to begin with?

Please send your answers before tomorrow night.

Signs of the times

2012-01-31T05:00:00.000-05:00

Junk has been piling up in the basement, and it seems certain that the kids are no longer going to be able to wear any of the clothes they wore to third grade, now that they're in seventh. The old VCR is not getting much use, the one Rock 'em Sock 'em Robots robot lost his head in heated combat in 1967, and the rolled-up Bay City Rollers posters haven't seen the light of day for many an S-A-T-U-R DAY!

So it's time for a Yard Sale. They are great and an excellent way to find amazing bargains at low-low prices. Had it not been for a yard sale I chanced upon down near the mall one long-ago Saturday, I would not today be the proud second owner of a copy of a "Bing Sings While Bregman Swings" phonograph album, and then I wouldn't have known the glory of hearing der Bingle boo-boo-boo his way through "Jeeper Creepers," "Nice Work If You Can Get It" and "They All Laughed." Not to mention the amazing "Mountain Greenery."

I just mentioned it, didn't I?

I got that album for a dollar. But that happened because I just happened to drive up on the yard sale that sunny Saturday. And boy were they mad that I drove up on it, preferring that I park on the sidewalk.

But if they wanted to draw a bigger crowd, they would have needed to advertise. Not by buying spots in the Super Bowl, or even on local tv or radio. Most yard sales are advertised on homemade signs that are stapled to telephone poles. The thing is, people letter them with Magic Markers on tagboard, and they look great at the kitchen table, but when folks are whizzing by in their driving machines, the skinny writing might not show up all that well.

And yard sales are one thing, but lately I see homemade signs that say things like LEROY BUYS HOUSES 443 555 3827.

Really? You would call the number on a sign you saw that someone made in their kitchen and then tacked up on the pole down by the intersection and allow Leroy to purchase your house, thereby relieving you of that pesky underwater mortgage and giving you ready bucks to spend on who knows what-all?

My advice, for what it's worth ($0.00): remember to use a thick magic marker for making your own signs, and if you read homemade signs from Leroy, you might want to forget what you read!

Me, a name I call myself

2012-01-30T05:00:00.000-05:00

Nephew Jay and Niece Jamie were recently blessed with the arrival of their third child, a cute little tacker named Zachary. So I got to thinking about how names become popular, since there was not a single Zachary in my schooldays.

The good people over at babynames.com were kind enough to provide a list of popular names for kids, and the list shows names as they increase (#2, Noah, and #1, Charlotte) and decrease (#3, Aiden and #5, Ava). Names making their first appearance ever, or a return appearance, are also pointed out (#86 Ezra is on the list for the first time since shoes required buttonhooks, and how long has it been since you met a little girl named Hazel - #99?)

Coming in at #50, Zachary joins his brother Alexander (#9) and sister Isabella #17.

Over in the other side of the family, our nephew Drew and wife Laura have three kids: the twins Preslee and Mason and little sister Finley, none of whose names are on the list yet, but you wait - they'll be there soon. And I have to wonder why there are so few Elvises among the young of today. May I ask what all you young parents are waiting for? "Elvis" is currently #858 on the US charts of baby names, having peaked at #312 in 1957. It is ahead of "Newt," though (#958). "Mitt" is not on the list, nor should it be.

My own name? Well, little-known fact, I was christened "Marky Mark" by the Funky Bunch, but I just go by Mark, and I'm at #154 and planning to move up again really soon. Newborn Marks can take their names from Wahlberg the actor, Twain the writer, McGwire the steroid-assisted slugger, Ruffalo the actor and Foley, the congressman who loved reading so much that he just couldn't stop turning over pages.

Two Sad Outcomes

2012-01-29T05:00:00.000-05:00

Last Sunday afternoon, Beverly Moore, 68, who lived on Bourbon Court not too far from us in the Seven Courts development, was still with us in this vale. But on Sunday evening, not long after the Ravens finished their game in New England, Mrs Moore, a widow, was crossing Seven Courts Drive, having left the Weis Supermarket with some groceries. A driver stopped to allow her to cross the busy street. Another driver, as yet unidentified, swerved around that other car and struck Mrs Moore, who died on the scene. According to the Perry Hall Patch, the vehicle that hit her was a light colored four-door Ford 500 sedan, with damage to the right front bumper, the right headlight and possibly the hood and right front panel.

Of course, the first thing you think is, it was right after the football game ended, and maybe this person had a few pops and should not have been driving anyway. But who knows that for sure? The only thing we know with certainty is that someone hit this poor lady and then did not stop, or turn themselves in since.

And I wonder, how do you live with that on your mind? On one level, do you stay at home behind drawn curtains, flinching every time a car drives up your street? Do you recoil in fear when you see a police car or a plain Ford sedan? Does your heart flip when the phone rings? Have you awakened every morning since Monday saying, today could be the day? You know the cops will be coming for you. It's not if, but when.

Or could it be that a person who would drive off from such a thing has no conscience to bother him or her?

And Mrs Moore was but the first person killed in traffic this week in Baltimore County, but the circumstances of the second fatality were far different. On Tuesday, a man reported that two burglars had run out of his house in the north County. Police spotted them and were following along. At Jarrettsville Pike and Merrymans Mill Rd, the driver stopped to let his passenger (and presumed fellow burglar) Jenard Toliver out of the car.

(Can you imagine that conversation, as they rocketed through the streets of Jacksonville? "You can just let me out here, dude....yeah...this is fine...just slow down to 60 and I'll just roll right out...see ya...")

Remains of stolen Honda

Without his passenger, the driver, later identified as Aaron Nathaniel McCoy, Jr, careered down the Pike in a stolen Honda, and stayed on the same road as it became Dulaney Valley Rd. (We do that a lot with our streets here for the convenience of felons: stay on the same road and it changes names as you proceed.) McCoy's life ended at 20 as he evaded police, clipped a Jeep Cherokee near Ivy Church Rd and hit a pole straight on. There was also a large pickup truck involved in the pileup, but fortunately no one was seriously injured. McCoy, whose criminal career began at 16 and included escapades with firearms and armed robberies, died on the scene.

Two dead in Baltimore County traffic accidents. Both preventable, both memorable, both sad.

To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men

2012-01-28T05:00:00.000-05:00

I’m not here to ruffle any feathers or upset apple carts,but then again, I’m not here to remain silent on an issue that bothers mequite a lot. In fact, it’s peopleremaining silent about issues that should have bothered them quite a lot thatreally has me going.

Sandusky and Paterno

It’s about Joe Paterno and his legacy, the image of his lifethat is being discussed so much these days. You know the deal. He had an assistant coach who allegedly wasbuggering, fondling, showering and engaging in horseplay with young boys in thePenn State football building. A youngassistant coach saw a young man being raped in the shower one night, the storygoes, and reported it to Coach Paterno.

Coach Paterno did something about it, all right. He immediately went to his higher-ups (as ifhe had any) and suggested that they might want to be aware of this ineffableenormity going on in the football building. But hey, guys, let’s not make a big thing of this, what with the roadtrip to play Wisconsin this weekend, and of course, we don’t want to mess upour chance to get invited to the Chili Bowl in January. Team comes first, right?

I am always reminded of something I did in high school. At our school bus stop, there was a housewith a garage, and the neighbors allowed us to hang out in the garage on rainydays to keep us and our cigarettes dry for school. One time we were in that garage on a snowy morning and the buscame along. The bus didn’t see us atthe stop so the driver slowed down and looked. To our collective shame, we just sort of looked around and whispered,“Wait! Stop!” so that we could go home and claim that the bus left us behind -even though we said “Wait! Stop!” That’s how much emphasis old Paterno apparently put into going to thebig wigs at Penn State, when he knew this awfulness was going on.

So the awfulness continued to go on for years. We always hear that sins will be foundout. While Paterno and his footballteam won game after game, young man after young man was forced to submit to theSatanic iniquities of coach Sandusky. And not until just after Paterno set the record for most wins by a coachat a major college last fall did the terrible truth come out. He stood there on the sidelines, or sat there in the press box as he wound up doing in his final games, coaching the team, knowing full well that he had had a violent predator on his staff, and he did nothing but smile and pretend nothing was wrong.

After all that went on in that damned building came tolight, the school did the only thing they could do about a man who saw evil andplayed it off lightly. They fired him,which enraged that segment of the student body and the team’s fans that couldnot differentiate between right and wrong and how to report the latter. A mature individual with a functioning moralcompass sees a young man being raped by a football coach, and hollers loud andlong until someone makes it stop. For Paterno to report it in such a desultorymanner and then continue to walk onfield every week and coach a team in thename of Penn State was to ignore the tragedy that occurred in his domain – atragedy that he could have stopped.

A week before his death, Paterno gave an interview to theWashington Post in which he tried to clear up his image by playing ‘dumb oldman.’ To the Post, he claimed that he had never seen anything like this before:“And then I called my superiors and I said: ‘Hey, we got a problem, I think.Would you guys look into it?’ Cause I didn’t know, you know. We never had,until that point, 58 years I think, I had never had to deal with something likethat. And I didn’t feel adequate.”

Hey, we got a problem, I think.

“And to be frank with you I don’t know that it would havedone any good, because I never heard of, of, rape and a man. So I just did whatI thought was best.”

Joe Paterno, known as “JoePa,” presented that paternal imagethat people found so adorable. He hadthree sons and a daughter. Do you kindof think that maybe if he had seen one of his kids being violated in a showerthat he might have, you know, known what to do or how to feel? Did he really think that doing nothing wasacceptable?

Anyway, that’s his story, and I wouldn’t even still betalking about him except for this. People were talking about him on the news the other night as theygathered for his funeral, and one former player said how old JoePa cared moreabout what kind of men his players were than what kind of players his men were.

And yet his actions would not seem to bear that out. It seemed that winning football games meantmore to him than the physical and mental wellbeing of Sandusky’s victims.

One final thing: the night that Paterno was given a messageto call the vice-chairman of trustees for Penn State and when he did so, he gotthe news that in the best interests of the university, he had been fired.

And then his wife picked up the phone, called thatvice-chairman herself, and said, “After 61 years, he deserved better.”

So did those young men. So did those young men. Joeshould have done better by them. He had one final chance in that Post interview to say that, but he stuck with his "I don't know, you know?" stance til the end.

Seal test

2012-01-27T05:00:00.000-05:00

There's something I don't understand concerning our national adoration of celebrities, however minor. We just can't get enough of their glamorous lives in our lives, and that seems to make us feel like part of their lives.

The most recent example that comes to mind is the widespread disbelief about the breakup of the marriage of Heidi Klum and Seal. When I say minor celebrity, that definition fits these two perfectly, because I am certain that either of them could walk through most malls without drawing a huge crowd. I mean, look at them: a couple of handsome people, but we've all seen people who look just like them, have we not?

This is Brad

This is I

Brad Pitt was on Fresh Air the other day and so I decided to give him a good listening-to, what with people always saying that I look so much like him and all. One point he made is that he and Angelina Jolie cannot just hop into the Studebaker and run down to Dairy Queen and JC Penney's for a root beer float and a new suit. He said they have to plan ahead when they leave their house and have security arrangements in place before they open the front door. And you have to figure, he can't go out and get the paper in the morning clad only in boxer shorts and a torn t-shirt. He also said that he accepts these limitations on his freedom as being part of the life he chose, that of a celebrity. He's a very famous guy, very recognizable in public, even though he can't just stroll along with the rest of us.

But anyway, when Heidi Klum and Seal announced they were getting a divorce, they made with the usual Hollywood nonsense about how they still loved each other so very very deeply and planned to remain friends and involved in each other's lives forever. That must be one of the advantages of being famous, because most divorced couples that I know are not exactly going off to Branson for a weekend at Mel Tillis's country music showcase or anything. What they are doing is wondering when the ex-husband will be back with the kids, or why his mother has to butt into everything all the time.

Here's what really puzzles me, is all the people on tv and at the Buy-Sum-Mor standing around talking about what a shock this is that these two people have decided that eight years together is more enjoyment than they can stand. "They seemed so great together!" say people who have never been within a hundred miles of them together. "He really loves her!" say people who can't accurately make that assessment. "She really loves him!" say their cousins.

I understand that we "know" famous people and love the idea of having them in our lives, however distantly, but I can't figure out how we come to feel that we know them well enough to say how they feel about things. Maybe I should call someone famous and see what they know about me!

"Hello, Newt?"

Flying off the handle

2012-01-26T05:00:00.000-05:00

Dad of Rand

Now, I'm trying to be very objective about this, but I don't fly on airplanes very often. In fact, if you define "not very often" as "not since 1982," then it's true. I don't fly in an airplane, and not so much because I fear falling out of the sky and landing in a cornfield in Iowa. I fear being at the airport and being in line behind a jackanapes like this Rand Paul, son of prospector Ron Paul.

It was all over the paper the other night, how Rand was in line at the airport to go to Washington to speak at a pro-life rally (and he's a libertarian, of sorts) when he was pulled out of the line because the airport screener said there was some sort of anomaly when he went through the scanner.

Hats off to the screener for not recognizing Paul, who clearly likes to be recognized.

Annoying

Anyway, instead of following the lawful directions of the airport security people, who are in place to prevent more 9/11-style hijackings, Rand Paul threw a little hissy fit and refused to be patted down.

He refused to follow the law.

What's interesting is that he is one of the 100 people who are proud to call themselves US Senators, a group of people who fly to Washington DC and write laws.

Now, again, this is why I don't fly, because I don't want to be involved with this fool, who said that if he had been a senator in 1964 he would have had problems with Title II of the Civil Rights Act. He thinks that if you own a bar or restaurant or oil-change drive-through, you ought to be allowed to refuse to serve people of races you find objectionable.

These Are Your Tea Party Members, folks.

But back in the day when people protested the Viet Nam war, all the "old people" over 30 took the protestors aside and wisely advised them to "change the laws first, don't break the laws!"

Now this ophthalmologist/senator/Wallace throwback advocates breaking the laws. And he's one of the ones we sent to DC to write them.

Poe-try

2012-01-25T05:00:00.000-05:00

The moon is about love & Werewolves, also Poe

Poe is about looking at the moon from the sun

or else the graveyard

Allan Ginsberg, from "Is About" (1996)

The story here in Baltimore is that the Poe Toaster did not show up again this year, apparently putting to rest the tradition of saluting Edgar Allan Poe on his birthday in January. For years, someone showed up at his grave in downtown Baltimore every January 19 and left a bottle of cognac and three roses, but the last time this happened was 2009, the two-hundredth anniversary of the poet's birth.

But, as long as there is eighth-grade English being taught, there will be students all across the nation reading "The Raven":

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more."

So, that part of the tradition will live on. There is another section of Baltimore called Fells Point, a waterfront area where saloons prosper. Go figure! Fells Point is named for William Fell, a Quaker from England who began a shipbuilding business in that area in the 1700s. If you remember the tv show "Homicide," which showed the seamier side of Bmore for several years, then you'll recall the building where the detectives worked...that's the Fells Point Recreation Pier, which dates back almost a century. And there is a saloon called The Horse You Came In On right there, which is rumored to be the last place in which Poe tipped a bottle before dying in the streets of some combination of (per Wikepedia) "alcohol, brain congestion, cholera, drugs, heart disease, rabies, suicide, tuberculosis, and other agents."

His was not a happy life; his were not happy poems and stories. The Baltimore Ravens football team salutes him: their three mascots in giant black bird outfits are named Edgar, Allan and Poe.

And they're not so happy these days either. But life goes on!

James's Bond

2012-01-24T05:00:00.000-05:00

I just finished reading the book "Destiny Of The Republic" by Candice Millard; the New Yorker and NPR liked it so I gave it a shot and I'm glad I did. James A. Garfield, the subject of the book, was the 20th president of the United States, and, chiefly because his term was only of 200 days' duration, he is today not one of the presidents whose name is on the lips of the electorate. I mean, he really didn't have chance to do very much in that short a time.

We talked about him another time because of the circumstances of his assassination at the hands of "disappointed office seeker Charles Guiteau." Guiteau might be better known today than Garfield, come to think of it: there have been far fewer assassins than presidents, thank Heaven. But Garfield was an interesting guy, once you read more about him. He didn't even want to be president, and went to the Republican convention in 1880 to make the nominating speech in support of General Sherman, who had such a hot time in Atlanta. Next thing you know, it was Sherman's turn to be all burned up, because Garfield made such a great speech about Sherman, the crowd went nuts and nominated Garfield instead.

That is sort of like being Cyrano for a friend and going to ask a girl to marry that friend and then she says, "No, but you'll do!"

So, long story short, Garfield gets elected and then Guiteau does his dastardly deed, and Garfield might have lived anyway but the doctors refused to practice antiseptic treatment in those days and so they infected him with fatal sepsis while trying to remove the bullet that Guiteau put in him.

What I really found interesting about the man was that he was a self-made man. His father died when JAG was but a tad, and he had to make it on his own. He was self-educated, and spoke very formally, like this:

Territory is but the body of a nation. The people who inhabit its hills and valleys are its soul, its spirit, its life.

A pound of pluck is worth a ton of luck.

If wrinkles must be written on our brows, let them not be written upon the heart. The spirit should never grow old.

James A. Garfield

So, clearly he was an introspective, thoughtful man, old Garfield. Ms Millard brings out the fact that when he married his wife, Lucretia, he wasn't that into her for many years, and the marriage was hardly the stuff of romance novels. Then he had an affair with a woman who was a news reporter in Washington, and when Lucretia found out, he not only begged her forgiveness, but fell deeply in love with his wife because she was so cool about it all. According to the book, here is what he said to his wife:

"I here record the most deliberate conviction of my soul. Were every tie that binds me to the men and women of the world severed, and I free to choose out of all the world the sharer of my heart and home and life, I would fly to you and ask you to be mine as you are."

This is all the more remarkable when we consider that he said it fifty years before the Wright Brothers' first flight, so history cannot account for how exactly he planned to "fly" to his wife. Perhaps he had reservations on Air Tran.

I also feel deeply that the average philanderer of today would never be able to speak in such a flowery manner to his aggrieved wife. The best that today's Newts could come up with would be, "Hey, it was only once or twice, and she tricked me into it anyway, ya know whattamean?"

Note to 21st-Century guys who think this might be a nice way to have a little somethin'-somethin' and get away with it: this only worked in 1863. After all, he didn't have to worry about YouTube and TMZ. Neither will you, if you just bring it on home!

You gotta know how to Pony like Bony Maronie

2012-01-23T05:00:00.000-05:00

Photo from the Aegis

I'm writing this on Saturday morning, so by the time you are seeing this (and thank you for doing so!) the ballgame between the Ravens and the Patriots will be in the history books. I really think that for a lot of folks around here, the buildup to big Ravens games is almost as exciting as the game itself. Everyone is wearing purple in some form, it seems, and jerseys of favorites replace dress shirts for me and dresses for women. Gorgeous cheerleaders are all over town stirring support, and the Ravens band is playing stirring music. I heard them on TV playing "Land of 1000 Dances."

Now, you might say, what song is that? And then I might say, you might know that song as "Na Na Na Na NAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" because the phrase "Land of 1000 Dances" is not mentioned in the lyrics. And there are but 16 dances mentioned, according to Wikipedia: the Pony, the Chicken, the Mashed Potato, the Alligator, the Watusi, the Twist, the Fly, the Jerk, the Tango, the Yo-Yo, the Sweet Pea, the Hand jive, the Slop, the Bop, the Fish, and the Popeye.

The dance formerly known as "The Italian Cruise Liner Captain" is now known as "The Jerk."

C & the H's

"Land of 1000 Dances" was first done in 1962 by Chris Kenner, who is also remembered for his other hits "I Like It Like That" and "Something You Got." Kenner wrote it, along with Antoine "Fats" Domino. But when Cannibal And The Headhunters recorded it in 1965, lead singer Frankie "Cannibal" Garcia forgot a couple of lines, substituting "Na na na na naaaaaaa" and vaulting into history in the process. No one talks about the Chris Kenner version so much, but the Cannibal version and the Wilson "Wicked" Pickett version from '66 were staples at every teen center and swimming pool dance in the 60s.

So the Ravens Marching Band is doing that song and that's why the Ravens won the Battle of the Bands..and more...

"It says here..."

2012-01-22T06:35:00.000-05:00

I thought it was sort of odd that a number of websites were posting the news of Joe Paterno's death last night. Odd, in that it hasn't happened. I guess we can expect it soon; an 84-year-old with lung cancer, dispirited from recent events, probably does not have a long time ahead. But how does it happen that someone decides to post information that is not 100% accurate? If a reporter hears secondhand that a nurse came out of the coach's hospital room claiming that Paterno had passed, is that enough to go on and put out a bulletin?

Obviously not.

And the other day I got one of those web essays that are always going around. This one was called "Bill Cosby Is Tired" and it listed some of things that purportedly are vexatious to the comic. When you read it, it seems perfectly real, and written in that Cosby manner - slightly preachy, slightly funny - but when you go to Cosby's website, you see his denial of the whole thing. You can't blame people for passing it along, but you have to wonder. Deep at the heart of all this, someone is sitting somewhere at a keyboard, and they say, "Hmmm. OK. Let's see..we did Bill Gates's 'Advice To The Graduates' and George Carlin's '10 Ways that Soccer and Lacrosse Are Different' and Andy Rooney's 'Did You Ever Notice That Everything Tastes Better With Gravy On It?' " So what can I make up today?

I'm guessing there's an element of sadness in the creation of something falsely attributed to someone more famous...or an element of envy. To the persons who create this fiction, I say, why not put it out under your own name and let it stand on its own merits?

Saturday rerun: I Still Have my Nametag

2012-01-21T05:00:00.000-05:00

Everyone drove Mustangs to the A & P

In the spring of my senior year, just before my graduation from the exclusive Towson High School (admission by zip code only!) I went to work for The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company, also known as the "A & P," and that's pronounced "Ann P" around these parts. I had hoped to start out as District Manager or Vice-President of Sales, Grocery Division, but it seemed that the only openings they had were for "clerk," so I took that, figuring on biding my time for the inevitable promotions that never came.

Rat Fink t-shirt decal

Some interesting facts about that job: we had to wear a white shirt and tie and pants that could be any color but could not be jeans of any fabric. We got around the shirt thing by wearing t-shirts underneath with various slogans and depictions of cartoon characters.

My starting salary was a whopping $2.15 per hour, not bad when my classmates worked at Gino's or McDonald's for fifty cents. In fact, top pay on the clerk scale was $3, and there were full time guys there, working 40 hours, grossing $120/wk, and raising families and buying houses, cars and cheap beer on that pay. We wore red aprons and name tags. The store sold all the national brands, of course, but we had our own - in fact, the tea bags were called "Our Own" tea bags - brands, such as Jane Parker baked goods and Ann Page canned foods. I used to wonder about the people who worked in the packaging end. Working the early shift, I would be stocking the bread aisle and found it endlessly humorous that Jane Parker's Old-Fashioned Home-Style Bread carried the description "A hearty, firm-type loaf." And one of my best buddies on the crew, Charlie (known as "Cholly" in BalMoreEse) had a younger brother whose detestation of cole slaw was so thickly ingrained in his diet that he carried the sobriquet "Slaws-A-Balls."

Please don't try to understand that nickname unless you are 18 and male. That's the only way it's funny.

Tool of the trade

We would set this to 2/69¢!

I didn't usually work a cash register, so it was not to be my fate to have experiences like John Updike wrote about in his short story "A&P," but I would never have acted like the guy in that story anyway. We had our share of pretty girls parading through the store in various states of deshabille and decolletage, and there was lots of ogling going on in the time-honored manner of adolescent males. I spent a lot of time unloading freight trucks and placing items on the shelves for sale, so I always had one of those box-cutter knives and a Garvey price kerchunker ready for business.

Sometimes in the evenings, taking the trash out, or having a smoke break, we would see two cars pull up and park, and then a woman would get into a car driven by a man, and they would drive away, casting furtive looks as they left. Of course, as major-league suburban sophisticates, we knew something was up. We just didn't know what, to tell you the truth. And in the apartments behind the store - now torn down and replaced with apartments - I don't know why either - there lived a woman who was quite uninhibited in her manner of dressing, which is to say that she paraded around naked and stood in the bathroom window, providing endless amusement for the easily amused. We don't know where she got her groceries, because she did not come into our store. We did know that she got her clothes at the same place The Emperor did!

So that part of my career lasted through my college days and then I took a cut in pay to go into radio, but I am writing today because the A&P chain is done in Baltimore as of today. All the stores are closed; some will reopen as Shoppers' Food Warehouses, and some as Shop-Rites, and some will remain empty, corpses of a company that shot itself in the foot time and again changing its name from A&P to WEO ("Where Economy Originates" - snappy, huh?) and then SuperFresh, where they tried to be all things to all people. Gourmet foods? Sure! Cheapie no-name brands? Aisle 5, I think! Sit awhile and have some pizza and a soda? Steam that shrimp for you? Power tools, aisle 16!

Back in the day, we addressed customers as 'Sir' and 'Ma'am' and we thanked them for shopping with us and the acceptable answer to any question about where an item was shelved was never, "Gee, I don't know!" But I heard that a lot lately in SuperFresh, and while I am sad to see them go, I can tell you this about Baltimore: we like to eat food, and you have to be pretty lousy at running a food store to drive people away like this chain did.

Shame, too. They did have tasty cheese rolls.

Science Project

2012-01-20T05:00:00.000-05:00

Well, my new hero is young Samantha Garvey, who was all over the papers, blogs and tv shows last week. She's the Long Island high school senior whose work in marine biology over the past several years has made her a finalist in the Intel Science Talent Search. She has done a thorough study of what happens to ribbed mussels in the presence of predators.

Her project is titled, "The Effects of Physical Environment and Predators on Phenotypic Plasticity in Geukensia demissa." As that clearly states, it's all about how ribbed mussels -- which is what non-scientists call Geukensia demissa -- adjust their characteristics, or phenotypes, when predators and the whole world at large come crashing all around them.

When I was her age, the only study I did concerning the field of marine biology took place along the banks of Loch Raven Reservoir, where my scientific colleagues Joe, Mike and Steve investigated what would happen when four minors drank Boone's Farm and fished for trout. The predators in our study were the game wardens, and the mosquitoes. It's my recollection that none of us changed our phenotypes, but I might be wrong. We were more than happy to change our jeans, I do remember that.

Here is what makes young Samantha so special: when the news of her hard work came along, she and her family were living in a homeless shelter - and not for the first time. Her parents have had their troubles, and now some help has come along and a rent-subsidized home has been found.

Samantha is the president of her local National Honor Society. I'm proud to say that I, too, knew people who were in the National Honor Society, although I was a stranger to their selection committee. She has a 3.9 GPA, and I did about 3.9 % of my homework. She, unlike me, wants to attend Brown or Yale, because as you'll see in the video, she wants better for herself and her family in the future, and she realizes that if she works for it, she can achieve it.

I love the way she is such a good young lady, hard-working and doing her best while being respectful to her family and to others. I feel that she is one of those people who will beat the odds and find success. I wish her well.

Now where did I leave my fishing rod...

What I Learned in Grade Three

2012-01-19T05:00:00.001-05:00

Because I don't really care for most of the comics in the newspaper today - I refuse to start my day thinking about something called "Zits" - I get classic comics delivered to my email every day.

Oh, that Marmaduke.

But it was actually the "Peanuts" cartoon from the other day that led me to a memory...

I've mentioned before how lucky I feel to have been with the same core group of other kids from first grade through twelfth. Sure, people came and went, but there were dozens of guys 'n' gals decked out in maroon and white on graduation night that I could remember in those early days at Hampton Elementary (which began in the Lutherville school building for the 1st 1/2 of 1st grade).

Our teacher in third grade, one Margaret van Breeman, was not typical, as third-grade teachers go. For one thing, she was not softhearted and kind. For another, she taught us all sort of ridiculous notions ("people from down South talk like that because it's so hot down there and they are tired all the time") and even had us singing songs that today are not permitted within ten miles of an eight-year-old ("Mammy's little baby loves short-nin' bread"). I can see her in that classroom, explaining why certain words were to be sung in certain ways, as in "Put on da skillet, put on da lead" being the way to say "put on the skillet, put on the lid" when one was really tired from the heat.

All right, I suppose that a lot of odd, eccentric, racist notions were expounded upon in a lot of 1950s classrooms. That's just the most memorable part of Miss Van Breeman.

The other thing I can't forget about her was her temper! Man, did she have a temper! Hardly a day went by that she didn't start SCREAMING about something. Even a simple request to use the lavatory could result in a tirade that rivalled some of the best set-tos between Reggie Jackson and Billy Martin.

And these contretemps were not only about things that happened in her classroom. We were down on the lower floor of that lovely school on Charmuth Road, and woe betide any kids from any other classes who dared to make noise in that hallway. She was out there hollering in a jiffy, bellowing about their hooliganism.

This was in our quiet, little Dulaney Valley town, and there was not a lot of hollering to be heard on our winding streets and byways. But Lord, how she jarred that quiet. Every day, something else to shriek of.

All I can remember about her is that she said she came from a farm in Upper Marlboro, MD, and that she recognized the patriotic deeds of Reuben, who was a custodian at the school who had been a paratrooper in the Army. Beyond that, we knew nothing that I can recall.

In fourth grade, our teacher was Mrs Rennie, who was more the grandmotherly type. Strict, but fair, and encouraging to those of us who had a little trouble with our timeses and guzinthas.

One day, she made an English composition exercise out of writing letters to Miss Van Breeman, who was conspicuously absent from the faculty that next year. We thought it was a nice idea and we wrote the letters, which Mrs Rennie said she would have mailed to our former teacher.

It wasn't until many years later that a couple of us started to wonder just what happened to Miss VB, and if she had been...you know...fired? hospitalized? promoted to chief of disciplinary services?

We shall never know, on this earth. But one day I fully expect to be walking through those fabled pearly gates and hear, "Mark! Get back there and pick up that cafeteria tray! This isn't the Plaza Hotel, you know!" being barked out in a familiar Southern MD accent. Then I'll know I'm right where I need to be.

Haley's Comet

2012-01-18T05:00:00.000-05:00

When the outgoing governor of Mississippi, the honorable Republican Haley Barbour, was leaving the office the other day, he apparently packed up all personal belongings, all that stuff that collects in a desk over the years, and failed to check the new calendar on the wall.

He just totally LOOKS like the governor of Mississippi!

In the apparent belief that this is the year 1812, Mr Barbour let loose upon this land some 200 of the finest that his famed penitentiaries have to offer. Murderers, thieves, probably a rapist or two, who knows? "But nobody on death row!" he proudly proclaimed.

Here's the part that makes me wonder what year it is in Mississippi:

"The pardons were intended to allow them to find gainful employment or acquire professional licenses as well as hunt and vote," Barbour said.

So, setting aside our wondering about what sort of "professional" organizations will grant licenses to convicted felons, are we just to understand that food is so hard to come by in the greater Hattiesburg area that, rather than just send them to the Buy-So-Lo, we give rifles to murderers in hopes they will come back with the pickup full of venison?

Among those getting early outs from the Walled Off Astoria was the brother of former Packer/Falcon/Jet/Viking quarterback and Southern Miss college star Brett Favre. Earnest Scott Favre had his record cleared in the 1996 death of his best friend, Mark Haverty. Favre had driven in front of a train in Pass Christian while drunk, pleaded guilty in 1997, and was sentenced to a year of house arrest followed by two years' probation. All this happened 15 years ago, and he was still in the Big House? Just for spelling his first name wrong?

Karen Irby also packed up her troubles in her old kit bag and headed home, presumably to Jackson, where she was a socialite before a DUI crash killed two doctors.

In 1996, South African Azikiwe Kambule was sent up as a teen in the carjacking and murder of a Jackson woman. Today, it's like that never even happened. He's headed home.

I did mention Mr Barbour's party affiliation, did I not? Lest anyone think he's one of those liberals, soft on crime, and willing to spring forth a veritable phalanx of Willie Hortons on an unprotected populace...

Come Fry With Me

2012-01-17T05:00:00.000-05:00

In my ongoing effort to provide up-to-the-minute cultural information for today's with-it generation, all of whom I outrank in seniority by several scores, I now bring to your attention what some are calling the "vocal fry." I call it the "spoken sizzle," and it's that way some people have of letting the end of their sentence trail off in a guttural sound like this.

I think it was the late 90s when the uptalk phenomenon swept the country, much like the current fascination for following the lunatic pronouncements of Newton Leroy Gingrich (who said, "A mere 40 years ago, beach volleyball was just beginning. No bureaucrat would have invented it, and that's what freedom is all about” in 1996) and all those crazy rumors about Fonzie being killed in a car wreck. People started talking like THIS. The end of every sentence ended on an UP NOTE. And simple declarative sentences sounded like QUESTIONS? I'm sure you REMEMBER!

And then there was that trend, mercifully relegated to the past now, of people who dealt with children talking in a sing-song even when they weren't talking to children. I can understand that, in order to cajole little Eggington to stop sticking the tines of his fork into the electric socket, it was effective to say, "Now, EGGY, you know that UPSETS Mommy when you BLOW OUT all the CIRCUITS in the house with your FORK so please knock it the hell OFF already." But then that person would stop at the deli on her way home and say, "I need a QUARTER pound of HORMEL spiced ham sliced THIN please and a LARGE tub o' SLAW." That sort of SPEECH cadence can be absolutely RIVETING, can it not?

But. The sizzle, the fry. A lot of singers trail off with it (remember Britney Spears, the way she growled "Oh Babbbbbbbbbby Babbbbbbbbbbby"?), and of course it's a staple when you hear the likes of Paris Hilton soliloquizing. It's almost as if Paris and her friends, when you hear them chattering in a cluster, run out of energy as each sentence trails off. That's why their conversations sound like this:

"I like wanted to get that dress in like five different colors because I don't know what color boutonniere Chad will be WEARinggggggggggggggggggggg"

"Like Oh my Godddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd"

So please be on the lookout for this trend in your home, and do you all can to nip it in the buddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd. See you tomorrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrow.

Picture Show

2012-01-16T05:00:00.001-05:00

You'd have had to know my grandfather, that's all I can say. The man was amazing in his interests and abilities. When I make a movie about my life, his part will be played by Edward G Robinson, see?

He was always coming up with some sort of gag gift or other, and one time he gave me a hat that said "Don't Go Away Mad - Just Go Away" and I wish I still had that hat. Not that I feel that way about most people, but it cracks me up, and every time I hear that Mötley Crüe song of the same name, it makes me smile to think of my grandfather and Tommy Lee << in the same context.

I think about that hat and the hundreds of other little gifts I got from my grandfather, many of which came in the form of jokes I still use (Pep Boys matches, Land O'Lakes butter cartons) when I think about my childhood, which took place during the years in which Dwight "Ike" Eisenhower wore baggy pants to play golf with Dick "Dick" Nixon. I often wish that I were a kid again and know what I know now, but then again, who hasn't made that wish?

Ike 'n' Dick

During my 911 days, I was fortunate enough to make friends with a nice co-worker named Hazel, who had a little baby named Ashlee. Ashlee had a baby four months ago, a wonderful little angel named Cole, and yesterday in the mail, here came an envelope addressed to me and Peggy bearing a card that said "Love" and a picture of the baby inside.

Just a photo of a lovely little baby boy, sweet and pure, and it brings so much joy to Peggy and me to see him smiling and happy in that picture, which took a place of honor on our refrigerator near the Ring Lardner quote ("They gave each other a smile with a future in it") and photos of other people we love. I wish him sunny days and happy nights and lots of love and laughs. When he gets to be my age (the year will be 2061!) he will know that you need to have plenty of both, and I have a feeling he does.

Thank you Ashlee. We love the picture, and we love all of you!

Sunday rerun: Bad to the Bone

2012-01-15T05:00:00.000-05:00


Quite humerus

Some nights, when I go to type my blog entry, I can hardly wait to sit down at the old keyboard. I have something on my mind to write about and it's just a matter of how quickly I can type. And then there are times like this, when there is no specific topic on my mind, nothing that really strikes my fancy. And where is my fancy, by the way? I imagine it is located somewhere near the funny bone. That's what we say when something amuses us, right? It "tickled my funny bone." I decided to look into this, since nothing else was on my mind. I called the medical examiner's office and the anatomy department at the School of Medicine, but both places said that recent budget cuts had left them short-handed. In other words, they were working with a skeleton crew.

Well, look at old skinny here, and there is the old soupbone, the upper part of the arm. It's really called the "humerus," so it would appear that some wag lost in the history of anatomy was the first to call it the funny bone, since it was so humorous.

So what would happen if the anatomy texts taught tomorrow's doctors to use the common colloquial terms that we use for body parts? If you were being treated for a scalp laceration, wouldn't you feel better about a doctor who said, "Let's have a look at the old melon here..."? The podiatrist would tell you, "No matter your dogs are barking so loudly!" and the optometrist would really say, "Jeepers creepers! Where'd you get those peepers?"

I enjoy skeletons, and plan to do so, right up until the day I become one myself. I'm here to tell you, I'm bad to the bone.

D-I-S-R-E-S-P-E-C-T

2012-01-14T05:00:00.000-05:00

I can understand the feeling that this fellow Morris out in Arizona gets, having lost his wife, because there would be no "me" without my beloved Peggy.

But Morris lost his wife in the Gabby Giffords slaughter down there in the Cactus State and, as much as I sympathize and empathize with his losing a wife, I am repulsed by the stupid things he is saying. You can click on the link and read them right out of the Arizona Republic; I won't give them the light of day.

A few facts: This nation was built upon the free exchange of ideas. Former Marine Morris and his wife had every right to go to that Safeway that Saturday and meet their congresswoman, whose love of public service led her to schedule the open forum for all. (As opposed to the congressman in the next district over from us, who schedules his "open meetings" by sending texts to his loyal supporters just before the meeting, thereby keeping pesky reporters and Democrats at bay.) Yes, they went to the meeting, and of course, this maniac Loughner killed and injured people who were only trying to exchange ideas. Which is why Morris was there. He wanted to tell Rep. Giffords that she is too liberal for his tastes, but he didn't get the chance to say this before the bullets ruined so much.

We are responsible for our actions, which is why Loughner now awaits both sanity and a trial. Morris is blaming Rep. Giffords's husband for not providing security for her, although he fails to point the same finger at himself for not doing the same for his spouse. Perhaps he feels guilt because he survived and his wife did not. That is understandable, but why express it with such venom toward another victim?

Morris refused a visit from the president when Mr Obama flew down to AZ to meet the survivors and mourn the lost. That's called disrespect to the commander in chief, which is something that no good Marine would ever display. He shows disrespect again by calling Gifford's's husband, Mark Kelly, "our dear captain astronaut." The whole Marine ethos is built on unflinching, automatic adherence to rules and policies. There's no room in their rulebook for someone who expresses his negative regard toward persons of higher rank. Feel it all you want! Think it, let it settle in the old brainpan and stay for good, but keep it to yourself!

Morris says that his wife worried that he would offend people with his talk of liberal politicians leading the country down the tubes when all along, a man who really cares about his wife's feelings would not embarrass her in social situations with his rants about how the liberals are taking the country down the tubes. There are ways to disagree politely, ways to let your feelings be known without getting the askance looks from your neighbors, but Mr Morris does not seem to be a man who would seek that middle ground.

Writing on a blog called Jezebel, Margaret Hartmann says this whole thing is just "tremendously sad." Morris is "challenging anyone who says the lesson from the attack is that there needs to be more civility in politics," she writes. "Either he's focusing his anger over his wife's murder on Giffords or he's truly so partisan that he can't look past the fact that he disagrees with her politically—or perhaps it's a mix of both."

It's a sad day in America when people can't meet in civil congress, as it were, on a shopping center parking lot in Arizona to discuss our various approaches to what's best for America. What really annoys me about this man - and again, I ascribe most of his uncalled-for remarks to the awful tragedy he survived - is that he is of that generation and social stripe - retired, conservative, ex-military - that would normally eschew such behavior. Morris calls himself an ultraconservative. Tell me, what is so conservative about being so obstreperously disrespectful to high government officials? If a left-leaning liberal were in his shoes, and a guy like Bush were back in the White House, the O'Limbaughs would be in barely-controlled snits of rage. "How DARE he ignore the POTUS? And a former Marine, to boot! What is this world coming to, that he would display such contempt?"

What is this world coming to, indeed.

Wherefore Art thou, Art?

2012-01-13T05:00:00.000-05:00

Was it not the great legal scholar Oliver Wendell Douglas who sagely advised that your right to swing your arm ends where my nose begins? I think so.

What's the first rule we learn when we commence attending school, or dating? Keep your hands to yourself!

Learning to respect the rights of others seems a quaint, old-fashioned notion in these hurly-burly times, when people are dashing around faster than Mrs Gingrich at a buy -one-get one FREE hairspray sale.

Now, I'm all for artistic expression! Heaven knows, I'm the first to salute anyone who hangs a velvet Elvis or wide-eyed kid painting in their family room. Under my sobriquet "Phil S. Styne," I donate such art to the needy families of Newport, Rhode Island, Malibu, California, and Palm Beach, Florida.

But help me to understand why people are defending kids who go around with their spray paint and their b.a. Sharpies and leave their graffiti on cars, houses, buildings and slow-moving pedestrians.

Here's what I'm talking about, specifically. According to the Perry Hall PATCH, one of our local Vincent vandal Goghs was caught at 0250 hours the other morning spray-painting the building at Pete's Cycle shop on Belair Rd. We assume that this redecoration was not done under the auspices, supervision or permission of the proprietors of Pete's, but the post-pubescent Picasso, while under interrogation down at the station house, gave it up, naming two other places that had come under his decorative touch.

OK, let's stop right there. You got a kid, 18, caught vandalizing the property of another person. There's hardly a need for a trial, since he was caught in the act in the middle of the night. So does he:

a) admit his act, say he was "just foolin' around and all," and await his chance to do useful Community Service hours, removing the handiwork of others?

b) clam up, tell the cops, "You ain't got nothing on me, see, copper?" and refuse to talk anymore "without my mouthpiece, see?"

c) claim that this is his "way of expressing (his) artistic side"?

You've taken quizzes like this before, so you know we stack the right answer on the bottom. Yes, the youth said that. His "tag" is "Toe" or "Toenail," so we know there is trouble afoot when he kneels and says, "Let us spray."

So, we know he needs some more education, which we can hope will be meted out to him by a wise and wonderful judge.

But as usual, that's not the worst part of the story.

The article in the PATCH engendered a lively debate, and when you read down to the bottom of the page, you are treated to the views of fellow adults who say things such as,"No, he did not commit a "white collar crime", (which are usually worse by the way...) but somebody giving away their art for free."

I'm not even going to comment on the syntactic struggles of that sentence. This is a woman, trying to tell us that spray-painted graffiti on SOMEONE ELSE'S PROPERTY should not be considered a crime, but a gift of art. And she goes on with a whole new theory: "...the pre-frontal cortex (risk assessment, decision making) is not developed until around 25yo. He can go to war, but not drink... so, not totally an adult in terms of the law."

Attention attorneys everywhere! A brand-new defense has just been offered by a woman who goes on to say "maybe I've been involved in education too long." In her view, no one under the age of 25 really knows how to assess risk or make a good decision, so we can't hold their actions against them.

To you 18-year-olds who work full or part time, go to school, have a car and a social life and no time for damaging the property of others at ten minutes til three in the morning, I am sorry, but this woman feels that your brain stems have not borne ripe fruit just yet, and so she discounts everything you say, do, touch or feel.

She has no respect for your accomplishments, though they are many and varied, as she is too busy defending the misguided actions of a guy who is most assuredly representative of but a tiny fraction of your number.

And now you know the worst part of the story.

Dated comments

2012-01-12T05:00:00.000-05:00

I'm a bit of a dumpster diver, I'll admit it. And I'm always on the lookout for boxes to use for recycling, so I snag 'em from the recycling area at work to take home and fill up with used newspapers and beer cans.

So today I was over there in Papertown and I saw a 2001 calendar that someone had gotten rid of. It was striking, to see that. It reminded me of when you see a rusted, junky hulk of an old car on the side of the road, steam spewing out of its snout like a Gingrich tantrum, and you think of the day some happy family got that Delta 88 when it was brand new, and how they all piled into that Oldsmobile for a ride over to Cousin Al's and then a stop at Scoops, the ice cream parlor. For the first few weeks, until Dad spilled egg foo young all over the front seat, no one was allowed to eat in the car. Ah, the memories!

When this calendar was printed up in late 2000, the world had been through its Y2K crisis and everything seemed to be OK, but a few hanging chads later, things changed. Still, there was nothing about Tuesday, September 11, 2001 that seemed to augur anything evil. Just by looking at the calendar, it was going to be another Tuesday, that was all.

I have framed in our garage a work schedule that my father made up for the last three months of 1941. I keep it around because it is an early example of the perfect calligraphy that he used every time he wrote anything. From a formally done wedding commemoration, to the face on the grandfather clock he made us, to a note to an adolescent me reminding me to change the oil in the Plymouth, cut the grass and sweep out the workshop, everything he wrote was a work of art. So I figure it was during the summer of 1941 that he laid out the calendar for the final quarter, and you can look at this chart and see who was working at the Baltimore Gas and Electric Company in his department on that Sunday morning, December 7, "a day which will live in infamy."

They're all just dates on a calendar, 365 per year, except this year when we will have 366. Until something happens that makes a day of memorable happiness or one of memorable enormity, we never know.

2012: The Year in Weird

2012-01-11T05:00:00.000-05:00

So here we are in the year 2012 and that means it's an election year (you might have heard some commotion in Iowa and New Hampshire of late) and it's time for another Olympics. This is the one for which Baltimore actually put in a rather strong bid a few years ago, and had we been awarded the Summer Games, you may be sure that I would have spent my Summer some other place. Like I need tourists clogging up the roadway early in the morning, trying to get to the water polo venue when I need to get motorvatin' over the hill. Plus, it would have been a financial pleasure to rent out the house to a family of Latvians, in town for the Games.

That'll be $20,000 there, Ludvigs. Thank you. Enjoy the games.

I've never been much for the Olympics anyway. Track and field events leave me shaking my head. I mean, if you dig the broad jump and the pole vault and the discus throw and that crazy stuff where you ride a bike 50 miles, swim 50 miles, and shoot a mechanical duck, go for it! Just leave me to baseball and football, and I'm fine.

It goes without saying that you can't have an Olympics without a really weird mascot. Baseball has the Oriole Bird, the San Diego Chicken, the Phillie Phanatic, and Yogi Berra - all wholesome and fun symbols of the great game. The Olympics seem bent on causing nightmares in children and impressionable adults with Wenlock and Mandeville here:

I mean, you decide if these monocular puzzle pieces are anything you want your children to dress as this Halloween.

It's never too late to persuade them to go as the King!

I don't like dreamin'

2012-01-10T06:12:00.002-05:00

Sunday morning at 2:38 AM (but who's counting?) I was awakened from a hitherto wonderful sleep by a nightmare.

Forces beyond my control force-fed to my thumpin' and mumpin' brain images of deer, wolves and other wild four-leggers, injured, wounded and charging at me with hooves flying and manes tossing and growling and howling going on. The scene of this nightmare was my grandparents' house, not too far from where I work now, but a house I have not visited for over thirty years, what with my grandparents both being gone. Somehow I drove a car into their back yard, having been sent there to check on the animals, and this dreadful scene unreeled before my sleeping eyes.

Now, I'm not much of a dreamer, and hardly a night has ever gone by that found me involved in a nightmare, unless you'd apply the term to that dream in which Sarah Palin shoots me with a deer rifle, drags me to her shed and spreads an unpleasant ointment on my forearms. I guess I dream, like everyone else, but I don't seem to remember any of them when I wake up, and as I have told Peggy a thousand times, nothing I say between 11 PM and 5 AM is to be taken as anything but the ramblings of a sleepyhead.

I used to follow a blog called Pepperoni Dreams but it disappeared, and now that name has been taken over by a guy who chronicles his hegira across Charlotte, NC, looking for that town's best slice o' pizza. The old blog by that name was written by a group of people who would deliberately gulp down spicy pizza right before bed or nap and then wake up to write about the disturbing images that danced across their somnolent brainpan. Some PRETTY weird stuff went on there, I tell you.

And by the way, the dinner before the crazy animal dream was stuffed shrimp and salmon, and the only spice on that was lemon, so who knows? And I had eaten seven hours before hitting the old sackaroo.

Peggy is fond of dream interpretation. I think that ranks up there with horoscopes as an example of science gone horribly awry. My problem with astrology centers around my sharing a birthday with boxer Mike Tyson, jazz bassist Stanley Clarke, tv hostess Nancy Dussault and swimmer Michael Phelps. How can my fate be tied to any of theirs just because we share a birthday? And we are all Cancer the Crabs - moonchildren - supposedly crusty outside and warm and soft inside. Uh, yeah.

Peggy has dozens of books and pamphlets that interpret dreams while you wait. So she'll come down and say, "I dreamed I was driving a Pontiac" and look it up in the book, to be told that "driving" means you want to go somewhere and "Pontiac" means you are so desperate to go that you will drive a Pontiac to get there.

I don't understand.

Maybe I should look that up!

Wonderful weekend

2012-01-09T05:00:00.000-05:00

It was a good weekend! Friday like a dolt I forgot something at the office, so Peggy went back with me and we ran into a friend who was leaving for the day.

Not only that, but she was also leaving for good. She transferred in to our office a couple of years ago, and she was very professional and kind at all times. I mean, here it was, the last day of her time on our job, and it's almost 6 pm and she was still there, packing her stuff and moving along. Very conscientious, very dedicated to the job.

How many people would do that? She was the only person in the building, as far as I could tell. No one was there, yet the way this person is, she was there, and that's all that mattered. I know that she knows how true it is, that old expression "Character is doing the right thing even when no one is watching."

Then on Saturday I did the grocery shopping and had yet another occasion to be in the store aisle when a smallish lady needed help. Pickled beets are just the sort of thing that always winds up on the back of the top shelf. There I was, making my way down the veggie aisle intent on picking up a bag of Bob's Red Mill Organic Corn Grits Also Known As Polenta, as the complicated bag likes to say. Anyhow, 1/2way down the aisle, I saw that shy smile that all of us tall men have come to know. "Excuse me, sir, I need your height..." she smiled.

Now, if you know me, and even if you don't, you know that I tend to ham it up. (Really!) So forgive me for sweeping that jar of beets off the back of that shelf and plopping it into her cart the way that Cal Jr used to pick up a grounder and feed it to the second baseman to start off a double play. Went home with the eats, put 'em away and then it was time for a treat! We had a wonderful dinner at the diner, and came home in time to watch the end of a playoff game and watch some old Dragnet shows I bought at WalMart (22 episodes, 5 bucks.)

Sunday we did some chores around the house and settled down to some serious football watching. Dinner turned out fine and we just enjoyed the day. This Tim Tebow story with the Broncos is really something to see, and we were happy to see him win the game in heroic fashion, 11 seconds into overtime.

By Sunday evening, Peggy was watching her Masterpiece Classics on PBS, and I of course got on the computer looking for pictures of Ben Roethlisberger with that look on his face. There are thousands of them.

We don't jet to France for the weekends, and to be quite frank about it, I am sorry for those who do. A couple of days off with the person you love, dinner at the diner, and the American spectacle of football and pork roasts are things I couldn't live without.

In Heaven there is no beer bread

2012-01-08T05:00:00.000-05:00

Not so long ago I got involved in one of those modern versions of a chain letter: an email recipe exchange. So far, I have gotten quite a few recipes back, and one was for something I used to make all the time, but haven't of late, and I pass it on to you today.

It's that rarest of recipes that does two things well: first, it makes a delicious loaf of bread, and second, you can forget about lighting all those Yankee Candles® on the day you make this recipe. Your entire house will have that yeasty smell so common in bakeries.

It's Beer Bread. And it's about as simple to make as it can be. Three simple ingredients:

3 cups self rising flour
3/4 cup of sugar
1 can or bottle of beer - it can't be light beer and it needs to be at room temperature

Mix in loaf pan (spray sides and bottom with Pam) and let sit 1/2 hr
Bake 40 mins @ 350

And there you have it. Let that loaf cool a while, slather with olive oil or butter or some cheddar spread and go to town, all the while enjoying the sweet smell of Kwik 'n' E-Z home baking!

Happy Sunday!

I'll Flip You For It

2012-01-07T05:00:00.000-05:00

from NPR -this story about how the government is about to save $50 million:

The federal government will stop minting unwanted $1 coins, the White House said Tuesday. The move will save an estimated $50 million a year.

The Baltimore Bins/ NPR photo

Earlier this year, we reported on the mountain of $1 coins sitting unused in government vaults. The pile-up — an estimated 1.4 billion coins — was caused by a 2005 law that ordered the minting of coins honoring each U.S. president.

We calculated that the unwanted coins had cost taxpayers some $300 million dollars to make. There were so many coins piling up that the Federal Reserve was redesigning a vault in Texas to help hold them all.

We got to see a vault in Baltimore. It was the size of a soccer field, filled with bags of dollar coins.

You can see the presidents' faces on the coins. Andrew Jackson, John Adams, James Buchanan. The mint is only about half way through the presidents.

And the pile of coins has been growing. The mint makes enough of each new coin to meet initial demand. But about 40% of those coins get returned to the Fed, where they sit unused.

"As will shock you all, the call for Chester A. Arthur coins is not there," Vice President Biden joked on Tuesday, as he announced the new policy. "I don't mean to comment on his presidency, but it just is not very high."

The mint will continue to make a small number of the presidential coins, for collectors.

The Treasury department estimates it will take about 10 years for the economy to absorb the 1.4 billion $1 coins now in storage.

Now, here is my question.

Exactly where in Baltimore is this soccer-field sized warehouse full of Chester Arthur dollars? I really really really want to see it.

Festivus Maximus

2012-01-06T05:00:00.000-05:00

There's a happy kind of feeling in the air around Bmore these days. The Baltimore Ravens of the National Football League once again - for the fourth year in a row, and they are the only team who can make that claim! - are in the playoffs, which is sort of like the Iowa Caucuses, only without the Gingriches and the Santorums and the hilarious Bachmanns.

All around the town, people are wearing purple, buying bumperstickers and swizzle sticks with the Ravens logo, and wearing their Ravens jerseys to work. These days, you can get a mani/pedi from a nail tech wearing a #20 Ed Reed jersey, an oil change from a Jiffy Lube guy wearing a #52 Ray Lewis, or an indictment from a judge with a #27 Ray Rice jersey under his robes.

The lawn in front of Federal Hill, where a Union encampment kept watch on our fair city during the Civil War to ensure that the locals didn't go Rebel, and the lawn in front of City Hall are being painted up with the official Ravens logo. You need a huge stencil to do this, although a couple of kids with Krylon spray paint and huge Sharpies could probably spruce up your front lawn for you if you asked nicely. Tell them you want it to look like this:

And that is the cannon that the Union army kept pointed at the downtown area all during the War Between The States, following the Baltimore Riot of 1861, which is re-enacted almost every week by young volunteer history buffs.

Next to the cannon are three heavily-guarded Ravens cheerleaders.

But there is a certain feeling in the air that is only being felt in twelve towns around our nation - towns ranging in size from Green Bay WI to New York NY. The playoffs are here. Happy Festivus!

What's next?

2012-01-05T05:00:00.000-05:00

When "they" ask how it is that Peggy and I have stayed married for all these 38 years, with no end in sight, we usually chorus back with the same answer"

"I just don't know what it's gonna be next with him/her"

We rarely agree on a thing. There you go. I am a lifelong liberal loonbug yellow-dog Democrat who wouldn't pull a Republican lever in a voting booth for anyone. Never have, and never will, because you can't come to me and tell me you're from the Cheney party and ask for my vote.

Peggy generally votes for the right party, although she did say, "Well, Reagan hasn't done all THAT bad a job" in 1984 and I still agitate her on that one.

Peggy likes Oprah. Enough said there.

And now she likes watching "The Talk" more than I do because they replaced the wonderful Leah Remini with Cheryl Underwood, and Aisha Tyler is keeping Holly Robinson Peete's chair warm. Aisha's ok, she adds to a conversation, but Cheryl seems to come in every day with a page full of gags and zany responses that she adds whenever she can...even if it's not germane to the issue.

It's like this: They'll be talking about, say, how old a teenager should be before he or she goes on car dates, and everyone will make some good points and Sarah Gilbert will pipe up with statistics about how many people get killed in car wrecks every single day and it will all be meaningful. And then! Cheryl will mug for the audience and say "I can't find anyone of any age to take me out in a car!"

And there will be peals of laughter, both in the audience and in my house, as Peggy dabs her eyes from the overwhelming mirthiness of it all and Julie Chen bows her head in embarrassment. I tell you this: the average Talk viewer thinks that Cheryl Underwood is funnier than a dozen joke books.

And I just sit there, feeling mystified, and a little left out. I don't get what's so funny.

Mr Osbourne

And then there are those who find wisdom and sagacity in the words of Sharon Osbourne. First of all, you have to listen hard to figure out just what she's saying in the first place. Most of her sentences begin with the word "Ozzy," so there's your clue. As in:

"Awzay 'n' Aye wet out to ditah lohst noight 'n' 'e wuz so tie-uhd, 'e pahssed oat in 'is seeoop" which means "Ozzy and I went out to dinner last night, and he was so tired, he passed out in his soup."

Someday I will figure out why someone would seek, let alone listen to, advice doled out by a woman who would marry John Michael "Ozzy" Osbourne, the apparently addled performer/lyricist of such lovely ballads as "Crazy Train" ("Mental wounds still screaming Driving me insane I'm going off the rails on a crazy train"). Peggy thinks he's great, loves his music, finds his reminiscences enchanting, and I'm sitting there going "Huh?"

Mr Nelson

However, there is an Ozzie song that I really like. Click here to hear Ozzie Nelson and his Band do "Gee, But It's Great To Meet a Friend."

Now, that's something to Talk about!

Mad man

2012-01-04T05:00:00.000-05:00

Oh man, I was peeved. Vexed. Miffed. And most certainly irked. Without going into details, let's just say that someone from somewhere called me, said that they had done something that we aren't supposed to do, and told me what I was going to do to make things whole again.

You say what, now?

Oh yes, and I was going to do it by some deadline, too. And there was to be no dithering, and my suggestions for 127 different ways to handle the situation were just scraps of crepe paper, tossed to the wind of the other person's demands.

Well, I went and told someone, because I didn't want any of us getting splashed with beach when the ship hit the sand, and he said, "Why did ____ get this way?"

I said, "I don't know; ____ just got all whoopsy on me!"

He didn't know what "whoopsy" meant, and to be frank, until I said it, I didn't either, because the word did not exist in English, as far as I know, before I coined it just then.

And I'm not saying it's a brilliant word (such as 'sesquipedalian') or particularly euphonious ('symphony'), or even so self-evident that you know what it means without running to the Funk & Wagnalls ('rainbow-colored') but 'whoopsy,' which can also be spelled 'oopsie' for all the people I work with care, came to be defined by the brilliant thinker and wordsmith Stephen Roblin, who said it means

"Indignant without just cause"

And I say bravo to that. When someone goes to court hollering that they were ONLY going 45 in a 30-mph zone and "lots of other people were going even faster," they are being whoopsy. When someone gets a free dessert in a restaurant because their reservation got messed up and they had to sit for a few minutes out by the wicker baskets with the duck sauce packets, fortune cookies and chopsticks for the carryout trade, and then complain that if they're getting a free dessert, they'd prefer tira misu, that's whoopsy.

And certainly, in that old story when a grandmom takes her grandson to the beach and he is bobbing around in the surf on his inflatable serpent and the tide suddenly rips and carries him out to sea and the brave lifeguard swims against the current, brings him back to the beach and performs CPR to bring him back to life, and the grandmom says to the lifeguard (as dozens cheer his heroism), "Well, he HAD a hat!" that is major league whoopsy.

The word spilled out and I'm waiting for it take hold in the local vernacular. But then again, I'm waiting for "vernacular" to take its place in the vernacular, so anyway...

Movie review, 70 years later

2012-01-03T05:00:00.000-05:00

We watched a movie the other night - it was "For Me and My Gal," starring Judy Garland, Gene Kelly and George Murphy. 1942, the nation at war, and here came a movie about World War I.

Spoiler Alert: I'm going to tell you every detail about the plot, so if you haven't seen this musical but figure you might want to catch it on TCM, you might want to switch to this blog for a while and come back here later.

I wish I had been around in those great days of vaudeville, when, for one small admission price, one was treated to an evening of song and dance and comedy and skits and more songs and more dances. That was entertainment in the early part of the 20th Century. There was no tv, no radio, no cable reality series, so people had to make their own reality, and entertainers entertained them with entertainment that was entertaining, not "Teen Mom" or "Prom Mom" or "~~Pawn Stars~~." We must not have enough trouble of our own these days, to have to spend time importing the miserable lives of others into our own, via cable that we pay for.

The movie intertwines the vaudeville act along with showing the striving and reaching for the top that always accompanies professional pursuits. In the picture, Judy Garland is a really great singer/dancer, you see, and she is teamed up with George Murphy, who is....not so great. But he's a really nice guy! So she gets a chance to work with Gene Kelly, and they are on their way to the top, and then he gets a chance to be part of an act with a female singer who is all mysterious and sexy (we know that right away because she speaks with a European accent) so he dumps old Judy right off the bill. Then her brother is lost in World War I, a brother who held such promise as a budding doctor, and old Gene here is so avid about getting to the top of show business that he self-inflicts a hand injury so he won't get drafted. But it all works out in the end, because he becomes an ambulance driver and saves the battalion by driving a car through a hail of gunfire to warn an oncoming convoy that there's a hail of gunfire just ahead.

And of course, the big finale...he shows up at her solo concert - she's a BIG Star now - and she spots him in the audience and all of a sudden she runs to him and they duet off to the big rousing finale.

In real life, Judy Garland suffered through emotional and physical pain that was to end her life way too early. Gene Kelly was a man of many contradictions. On the one hand, he was a lifelong Democrat and supported progressive thinking. On the other hand, he was a Steelers fan. He made "Singin' In The Rain" and other great musicals, and he was in the the first movie that ever put me to sleep in a theater - the abysmal "Xanadu." George Murphy retired from the movies and became a Republican senator from California, setting into motion the tendency of that state to elect washed-up show biz figures to high office, because something seems to make the residents of the Golden State think that Arnold Schwarzenegger could do good things for them when he's not busy impregnating the help.   Other notable Californians who have made great contributions to our national weal include Sonny Bono, Helen Gahagan Douglas and the "great" Ronald Reagan.   He must have been great; everyone says so!

George Murphy, as a Republican senator and leader of the Nixon re-election campaign, was quoted as saying that because people of Mexican descent are "built low to the ground" they are "perfect for doing farm labor."

He seemed like such a nice guy...in the movie. What a great actor he was!

Rock Starr

2012-01-02T05:00:00.000-05:00

When people talk of their favorite Beatle, and these conversations take place every day, most say they toss it up between John Lennon and Paul McCartney.

But I go right for the biggest Starr of them all: Ringo Starr, the lovable happy drummer born Richard Starkey. All the experts said he was not a great drummer, not a great singer, not a great-looking man: the same unfair criticisms that poor old Ron Paul has to bear on the campaign trail, except that no one can knock Ron's drumming. He manages to drum up support, against all reasoning.

But back to Ringo: I always liked the guy. He never seems to take himself too seriously, which is always nice to see in a multi-millionaire, and he liked American country music and rockabilly well enough to record Buck Owens and Carl Perkins. In fact, look at this list of Beatle songs:

1. "Boys"
2. "I Wanna Be Your Man"
3. "Matchbox"
4. "Honey Don't"
5. "Act Naturally"
6. "What Goes On"
7. "Yellow Submarine"
8. "With a Little Help From My Friends"
9. "Don't Pass Me By" and "Good Night"
10. "Octopus' Garden"

and what do they have in common, beside being mainly up-tempo happy kinds of songs? The lead singer on each is Mr. Starr!

He's the oldest of the Beatles, born in July, 1940 (which makes him 71, for crying out loud!) He played around his native Liverpool in bands such as Rory Storm and the Hurricanes before getting the chance to replace Pete Best with the Beatles in 1962. No, he wasn't the prolific songwriter that Lennon and McCartney were, or even George Harrison, but Ringo's sense of humor lent a lot to the charm of the Beatles. It was his turns of phrase, like "It's been a hard day's night" and "Tomorrow never knows" that found their way into songs written by the others, and remember how the "plot" of their first movie "A Hard Day's Night" revolved around getting their wandering drummer back to the studio for a live tv show? Who better to play the Beatle gone missing?

It's a shame that Ringo is the only Beatle not to be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for his solo work, but perhaps someday, the people who vote on such things will hear his curious adenoidal voice sing "In the town where I was born, lived a man who sailed to sea..." and give him his due.

A poem for New Year's Day, by Robert W. Service

2012-01-01T05:00:00.000-05:00

The Passing of the Year - Robert W. Service

My glass is filled, my pipe is lit,
     My den is all a cosy glow;
And snug before the fire I sit,
     And wait to feel the old year go.
I dedicate to solemn thought
     Amid my too-unthinking days,
This sober moment, sadly fraught
     With much of blame, with little praise.

Old Year! upon the Stage of Time
     You stand to bow your last adieu;
A moment, and the prompter's chime
     Will ring the curtain down on you.
Your mien is sad, your step is slow;
     You falter as a Sage in pain;
Yet turn, Old Year, before you go,
     And face your audience again.

That sphinx-like face, remote, austere,
     Let us all read, whate'er the cost:
O Maiden! why that bitter tear?
     Is it for dear one you have lost?
Is it for fond illusion gone?
     For trusted lover proved untrue?
O sweet girl-face, so sad, so wan
     What hath the Old Year meant to you?

And you, O neighbour on my right
     So sleek, so prosperously clad!
What see you in that aged wight
     That makes your smile so gay and glad?
What opportunity unmissed?
     What golden gain, what pride of place?
What splendid hope?  O Optimist!
     What read you in that withered face?

And You, deep shrinking in the gloom,
     What find you in that filmy gaze?
What menace of a tragic doom?
     What dark, condemning yesterdays?
What urge to crime, what evil done?
     What cold, confronting shape of fear?
O haggard, haunted, hidden One
     What see you in the dying year?

And so from face to face I flit,
     The countless eyes that stare and stare;
Some are with approbation lit,
     And some are shadowed with despair.
Some show a smile and some a frown;
     Some joy and hope, some pain and woe:
Enough!  Oh, ring the curtain down!
     Old weary year! it's time to go.

My pipe is out, my glass is dry;
     My fire is almost ashes too;
But once again, before you go,
     And I prepare to meet the New:
Old Year! a parting word that's true,
     For we've been comrades, you and I --
I thank God for each day of you;
     There! bless you now!  Old Year, good-bye!

A Poem for New Year's Eve, by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

2011-12-31T05:00:00.000-05:00

In Memoriam    by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
   The flying cloud, the frosty light:
   The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
   Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
   The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind
   For those that here we see no more;
   Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
   And ancient forms of party strife;
   Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
   The faithless coldness of the times;
   Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
   The civic slander and the spite;
   Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
   Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
   Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
   The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
   Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

Wake me up in case it snow-snows

2011-12-30T05:00:00.000-05:00

Well, we just got one step closer to being like the Jetsons or something around here. As 2012 approaches, those of us who live in Snowville can now hit the sack at night without having to worry about what will happen if it snows, or gets frosty, overnight.

Why, you ask? Because now there is an app, available for iPhone or Android, that will wake you up five minutes early in case of frost - or twenty minutes early in case of snow, giving you time to clear off the Biscayne and get on the road.

Here's the link to the Winter Wake-up app:
http://www.boondoggle.eu/#/case/55

I didn't click on it, so I can't even tell you if it's a free app or not. I don't think it works on the phones of teachers or students, who are likely to have snow days off anyway. They don't need this! They can actually hear the first flakes hitting the street at 3 in the morning.

The Traipse of Roth

2011-12-29T05:00:00.000-05:00

Roth and Rat

You know what I really feel sad about? It's the saddening fact that we are all bound for that same sorrowful destination, that place where our hopes and dreams all wind up, heaven's waiting room....the court system.
Everything winds up as a big fight in front of a judge or mediator these days. The most recent example that came to my mind was the fact that Ed "Big Daddy" Roth had to go to court before he died to settle down all the hue and cry ("Hugh and cry" as I saw it in a magazine not long ago) over the rights to his beloved artwork.

Ed "Big Daddy" Roth? you ask yourself. Is he a Dadaist, a Cubist, a Neo-Impressionist, a Primitive, a pre-Raphaelite? Well, he is certainly a pre-Rafaelite, in that he was famous before Rafael Palmeiro was, but we remember Ed for his hot rods and his beloved "Rat Fink" character which came to be seen like a rodent version of Dino Flintstone, gigantic head sticking out of a car, holding a 6-foot long stick shift and roaring off in a supercharged car. There were Rat Fink decals on almost every notebook in my junior high school, and plenty t-shirts too, being proudly worn by the same guys who toted those notebooks.

I re-read Tom Wolfe's "The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby" at least once every year, amazed that a book of essays from the early 1960's is still relevant today. (One of the pieces, "The First Tycoon of Teen," is about Phil Spector, and we were just talking about his Christmas music and Darlene Love last week.) The title essay in the book centers on the "Kustom Kulture" of highly-stylized cars created by guys like Roth and George Barris in Southern California, and how the car culture was so predominant in those waning days of the American 1950's (which ended on November 22, 1963.) Wolfe refers to Roth as the Salvador Dali of the hot rod world, and that implies a timelessness to his art (although without a drippy melting clock to tell the time.)

Dali's "The Persistence of Memory"

But, according to the Los Angeles Times, all this happiness and mirth came crashing down with the sound of legal briefs being filed and decisions being handed down. To think of a jury sitting around deciding who would get the rights to "Sick But Happy" t-shirts or "Grim Reaper" decals is cause for a head shake.

My will will be a simple will, and I will will my few belongings to those who I feel will care for them well. One of you will come into possession of several thousand 45-rpm records and as many LPs. If I'm up on my cloud somewhere playing a harp and I hear that people are down here in a courtroom arguing over ownership of Jerry Lee Lewis's classic album "The Greatest Live Show on Earth" I will smite you mightily, so don't be a rat fink!

Fiddler on the Route

2011-12-28T05:00:00.000-05:00

We had our good friends Ray, Michele and Maria over for dinner the other night. Good times! I made my patented lasagna and then threatened to demonstrate my patented pull-out-the-tablecloth-while-everything-stays-on-the-table bit, but at the last minute, I was overcome by an attack of good sense and settled for merely yanking out the napkin, leaving my knife and spoon right where they belonged.

That's the kind of thing that only works on TV, anyway, that tablecloth trick. In real life, you try that and the gravy goes splattering all over a guest's bodice, and the tumblers filled with water go tumbling all over. Maybe that's why they call them "tumblers."

But nature has a way of making things even. So what, if you can't count on that working. Here's something I can guarantee will work every time: Bet your buddy that within six months, a story just like this will appear in his local fishwrap: (from the Canadian National Post:)

Lost $170,000 violin returned to Boston music student after being left on bus

By Eric Johnson

Christmas came early for a Boston music student who was reunited with the $170,000 violin she forgot in the overhead compartment of a regional commuter bus she rode last week, police said.

Muchen Hsieh, a student at the New England Conservatory in Boston, had traveled to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, arriving at roughly 11 p.m. on Tuesday.

Christine O’Brien, a spokeswoman for the Philadelphia police, who helped Hsieh track down the missing instrument, said then came a moment of sheer panic for the student.

O’Brien said Hsieh realized she had forgotten the instrument after she was picked up from the bus station. She blamed her absent-mindedness on travel fatigue.

Hsieh called the bus company, Megabus, roughly 30 minutes after she arrived but the bus had already left the Philadelphia station, O’Brien said. Hsieh also notified police, making a plea for the instrument’s recovery, O’Brien said.

The 176-year-old instrument, on loan to Hsieh from a Taiwanese cultural foundation, was found by bus cleaners in the same compartment in which Hsieh left it. They put it in storage, and police returned it to Hsieh on Friday.

Hsieh joins the ranks of esteemed musicians who have mislaid or forgotten their valuable and sometimes priceless instruments. World renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma once left his in a cab.

One German string player required medical attention from the stress caused when he left his violin, worth roughly US$1.4-million, on a commuter train in 2010.

It is not unusual for students at Hsieh’s school to have such valuable instruments, Ellen Pfeifer, spokeswoman for the New England Conservatory, told the Boston Globe.

The violin, which is in pristine condition, was made in 1835 by Vincenzo Jorio in Naples.
__________________________________________
Somewhere, the ghost of Vincenzo Jorio is hollering "Che stupida!" and ordering Neapolitan ice cream. I see these Megabus disgorging their passengers down by the mall and most of them have had a nice ride for a dollar. How many of them left their fiddles in the overhead compartment, up there rolling around by last Friday's New York POST and an couple of empty Snapple bottles and Bachman's Old Style Dutch Pretzel boxes?

We have an epidemic of forgetful musicians, and I feel a lot of symphony for them...perhaps we could orchestrate some sort of fund-raiser...

Albert and his father

2011-12-27T05:00:00.000-05:00

Albert Brooks is a funny guy - so funny, in fact, that he has to sit back and be less famous than other "funny" guys such as Tim Allen and Louie Anderson. But he can stand it. As he explained the other day on "CBS Sunday Morning," he did not get into show business as an all-or-nothing deal, and if he hadn't made it there, he would "gone and sold shoes or something."

But make it he did, and we've liked him in movies such as "Lost In America" and "Modern Love." His real story, though, is almost as interesting as some movie plots.

To begin with, he was born with the name of Albert Einstein. This little joke was played on him by his father, who was a radio comedian born Harry Einstein, who went by the name "Parkyakarkus." As in, sit down right here. He did funny dialect bits on radio and in movies, and by the time television took over as America's choice of entertainment, he was wealthy from California real estate investments, so it didn't matter that his form of humor didn't work too well on the small screen.

He was still considered one of the funniest comics around, and so it was that on the 23rd of November, 1958, he was topping the bill at a roast for Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz at the Friars' Club in LA when stricken by a massive heart attack.

The odd thing was that he collapsed, just after leaving the audience gasping for breath after a hilarious monologue, into the arms of Milton Berle. Trust me, the last person you want to be saying something serious on your behalf would have been Uncle Miltie, but that's the way it worked out for "Parky." Berle stood there hollering, "Is there a doctor in the house?" and the crowd thought it was a gag of some sort.

Parkyakarkus

No joke, but really, even though some doctors actually were in the audience, their efforts to bring him back were for naught, and Parkyakarkus passed away that night.

Albert Brooks had one half-brother, the late Charles Einstein, who was a well-known baseball historian and writer, and two brothers: Bob "Super Dave" Einstein, a stunt comedian, and Clifford Einstein, who was in the advertising business.

One of Parkyakarkus's friends was Frank Nelson! Which means that young Albert had the thrill of answering the doorbell and hearing this famous "Yesssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss?"

Interesting lives, all.

Face value

2011-12-26T05:00:00.000-05:00

One of our local blogs has a running comments section. Major news stories are analyzed by hoi polloi, and there's a lot more polloi in there than you might think. To say that everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion is quite true, although the judicious among us choose wisely which opinions to lend credence to.

We are all entitled to just one identity, though. Now, you might want to remain anonymous or pseudonymous on one of these websites. After all, if you happen to be a high school principal, say, you wouldn't want to chip in with your low estimation of today's young people. And it would not be wise for a guy who runs a pit beef stand to proclaim publicly that meat is murder. So, we all have the right either to sign our names to our words, or use a nom de blog such as "Big Shirtless Ron" or "Hometown Honey."

But I found this interesting: one of the frequent participants on this local chat box, a woman who talks of "loony lefties" and their "liberal indoctrination," always posts with her name, or what seems to be her name, and her photograph, or what seems to be her photograph. She frequently points out that she is so brave as to use her real name and photo when responding. It's a picture of a very pretty woman, to be sure.

The other day, people who also chime in on the blog started calling her out, posting a link to a photo website. If you click on the link, you see a much larger version of the picture of the woman - and the startling news that the photo is that of a mammose Playboy magazine model.

So, either a curvy Playmate® has moved to our town or, more likely, this local conservative has been using someone else's photo as her own. I can't say for sure which one it is.

But how sad it would be, were the latter to be true. Not all of us are born beautiful, with bodies like gods and goddesses and faces that cause stunned breathtaking stares from swooning passersby. I know I wasn't, but on the other hand, I am happy enough with who I am to be that person all the time. Love me or not, but please join me in wishing we could all just be proud of what the Lord gave us, and not need to wear the mask of another's face.

Merry Christmas from Baltimore, hon!

2011-12-25T05:00:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas to you and yours!

2011-12-24T07:00:00.000-05:00

Andy Williams gets it right when he says, "It's the most wonderful time of the year!" I'm sorry for those who don't agree, but there is enough glee (and "Glee"!) for everyone to share from mid-November to the bleak days that start on January 10, the day after the BCS Bowl Championship is decided, and continue until opening day of the baseball season.

I love Christmas and all that it brings. It's more than the gifts, more than the ham and turkey and pie, more than the carols, more than the snow we still might see ONE of these days. It's that settled feeling that you can't really feel in August, a feeling that means there is hope for renewed goodness and spirit, hope for peace and joy and love. Because, why not?

I notice we don't send or receive nearly as many Christmas cards as we used to, and at first that seems sad, but then you realize, this e-world we're living in means we are all connected more or less all of the time. Time was, you'd get a Christmas card from your second cousin once removed and it was the first time you had heard from her since the time Uncle Walt fell down the well. Now, she's on your Facebook, you get texts from her asking what size scarf you wear, and she publishes a regular email newsletter updating one and all on the activities of her children, including Eddie, the oldest boy for whom no one held out much hope in the early days, but who expects to be graduated from chiropractic school in the spring semester.

Mr Gates and Mr Jobs did a lot more for keeping the world's families and friends close than a power outage in Buffalo in January. I don't know how you feel, but I love that feeling of being in touch with the people I love and who love me right back!

This is my (typically) long way of wishing you and yours the happiest of Holidays. Whatever you celebrate, however you celebrate, may the best of everything be yours, and may your heart be merry and bright!

Crime takes no holiday

2011-12-23T05:00:00.000-05:00

Clearing off the local crime blotter: It seems that crooks in Baltimore can't get enough copper!

So, the coppers can't arrest them fast enough!

I don't know what kind of price people are getting for copper these days, but it must be a pretty copper penny, because thieves are going to the tonier neighborhoods, where people have copper rain gutters, and literally ripping them off in broad daylight, hauling the metal down to the recycle yards for some extra holiday money.

Or they go into abandoned houses, which are as numerous in the city as former Kardashian sex partners, and yank pipes out of long-abandoned plumbing fixtures.

Or they go to the Baltimore Gas and Electric substations and cut through the fence for access so they can steal spools of copper wire, failing to have any sort of lookout in place, so when a county police comes along and sees the hole in the fence, he can just radio for a helicopter to help spot the hapless crooks...

as they attempt to hide from a helicopter spotlight by lying facedown on a big pile of dirt.

Brilliant play, Shakespeare!


d'OH!

Or, check out this story about a dude in Miami Gardens, FL, whose plan to Spiderman himself into a copper pot of gold went slightly awry...

We always heard that the masterminds behind criminal enterprises are so brilliant that, were they to turn their brains to honest endeavors, they could find success in any legitimate pursuit. Why, any drug kingpin - even those who moonlight as a wide receiver for the Chicago Bears - is well-versed in supply chain regulation, promotion, security, customer relations, and inventory control.

Maybe that used to be the case. Are our schools letting us down? Do we need to worry that even our criminals are being graduated from high school while still stupid?

10,000 hours

2011-12-22T05:00:00.000-05:00

10,000 hours might seem like a long time. It's a year and 51 days, if you start on it right now. An easy way to measure it is this: although it only takes an hour and 45 minutes out of your precious life to watch the movie "Sleepless in Seattle," it seems to take 10,000 hours.

Here's an article that I saw, read, and found less than fascinating, since I am in the middle of the eighth inning of my working career. I'm pretty certain that spending 10,000 of my remaining hours learning how to be a surveyor or washing machine repairman or Republican will not avail me of happy prospects. But this fellow Wilson quotes from the book "Outliers" by Malcolm Gladwell and mentions the 10,000 hours that it takes to learn the motor skills needed to, say, play the piano.

Suddenly, I see this 10,000 hour figure everywhere I look. Brad Paisley, country singer and guitar slinger, writes about it in his book "Diary of a Player: How My Musical Heroes Made a Guitar Man Out of Me." In writing advice for people who wish to become famous guitarist/singers, he sagely counsels aspiring stars to stay home and learn to play a guitar and sing. He recommends 10,000 hours of practice at doing what you want to do, pointing out that an odd trend in America now has people becoming famous without even learning to do anything first. This makes me think of Sarah Palin or several Kardashians. Brad, kinder, does not name names.

He doesn't paint a glamorous picture of it, though. To learn to play a guitar at his level of skill takes both innate talent and development of skill. You have to have both. Brad got his first guitar from his grandpa at age 8, and worked on it every day all through his childhood, eventually landing a place in a band with much older guys by middle school, and continuing to flourish as a musician through adolescence and college.

And he is too modest to make this point, but I'll say it: part of the problem is that the great ones make it look easy. You don't see Paisley staring at his guitar, brow knitted, trying to remember how to play that certain note in his song "Waitin' On a Woman." Same as you don't see your surgeon leafing through Reader's Digest magazine as he prepares to trepan your medulla oblongata, you don't see your dentist marveling "Well, lookie there!" as he stares in amazement at your throbbin' molar. Or at least, you don't want to see that!

So, there is no shortcut to knowing what you're doing, and the only way to know what you're doing is to do it over and over and over until it becomes 2nd nature.

Yet, oddly enough, it's hard to find a person who is truly excellent at doing something and is good at teaching others how to do it just as well. The best managers and coaches in professional sports don't tend to be former stars. They might not relate well to those of lesser innate skill, while the guy who hung on the fringes of the the big leagues got there by dint of talent and a lot of hard work.

On the other hand, there is an old horse I see hanging around a meadow near our house, and you could spend the next 10,000 hours of both your lives riding around the oval at Pimlico, and I'm still fairly certain he won't be winning the Preakness.

But all that trying will still be better than not making the effort!

Put Another Nickel In

2011-12-21T05:00:00.000-05:00

"If I didn't have a dime, if I didn't take the time to play the jukebox..." was the opening line to a song by Gene Pitney way back when. Jukeboxes, if you can find one, cost more than a dime to operate these days, I am certain. They probably have jukeboxes that take your credit card.

I once had a sales clerk take my credit card. Wouldn't give it back, either.

But seriously, folks. It's called "jukeboxing," in radio parlance, when a station is changing format or just going on the air. They don't have commercials to run, so they play music 24 - 7 for a couple of weeks.

Which this year means that people in the Baltimore area get Christmas music nonstop from 99.1 FM in DC. That station used to be El Zol, the Latino station, but El Zol is now on 107.9, which used to a religious station that moved to 860 on the AM dial to make room for El Zol, which stepped aside to make room for a new all-news-all-the-time station on 99.1

I hope that clears all that up.

But let's face it; Christmastime is no time to be coming on the air with a new all-news station, with nothing but Boehner's intransigence, Kim Il Sung's death and Beyonce's parents' divorce to tell us about.

So they are saving the news til after the New Year and spinning Christmas music all day and all night, without commercials or anything else to stand between us and hearing "Do You Hear What I Hear?" 7 times a day.

I never tire of that song, nor of "Feliz Navidad", nor of the Chipmunk's Christmas songs. So far this hear, I have not heard The Singing Dogs, and some skillful dial-punching at the last minute the other day saved me from exposure to the dreadful "Christmas Shoes" song.

I'll make a deal: you don't play "The Christmas Shoes" and I won't play Jimi Hendrix's Christmas medley of "Silent Night," " The Little Drummer Boy," " and "Auld Lang Syne."

Sounds good to me!

DVR alert!

2011-12-20T05:00:00.000-05:00

I rarely make television advisories, or recommendations, because what I consider funny, most people think is serious, and vice versa. In fact, I still wonder why there is no canned laughter accompanying the "Today" show, but I supply my own chuckles, chortles and guffaws whenever "Face The Nation" or "Teen Mom" loom on the screen.

But - if you love a good laugh and a pop classic Christmas song, you have to make sure to see David Letterman this Friday (12/23). This is something he does every year on the final show before Christmas: the guests are Jay Thomas and Darlene Love, and Jay tells his Lone Ranger story and throws a football at a Christmas tree, trying to dislodge a meatball where the star at the top ought to be, and Darlene sings "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)."

Jay Thomas is one of those guys that, when he comes on, you go "Oh, I know him from..." and the answers are many. He's a DJ on Sirius, he's an actor on TV shows, movies and the stage, and he does voiceovers for a lot of shows. It takes talent to tell the same story over and over for years and years and still make it work. George Bush tried to do that and failed, but Jay will have you bustin' a gut with his Lone Ranger story, it says here.

Darlene Love is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for her work with Phil Spector (l). That's her voice on hits such as "Today I Met The Boy I'm Gonna Marry" and "He's a Rebel," although Spector, who added his own peculiarity to everything he did, labeled the records as being by "The Crystals," even though Darlene did the singing, accompanied by her backup group, the Blossoms.

It's Friday night, 11:30 Eastern time on CBS, and I am pretty sure you'll like it!

All Wound Up About It

2011-12-19T05:00:00.000-05:00

The other day I mentioned the grandfather's clock that my father made for Peggy and me. It's still ticking along just fine, at 26 years of age, but I mentioned that it stopped running on the day that he passed away.

This is the clock he wrote about!

Not everyone knows that they used to call these big tall clocks with long cases "longcases," but they started calling them "grandfather clocks" way back early in the 1800's, and later in that century a fellow with the cheery name of Henry Clay Work found himself at the George Hotel, a hostelry in Piercebridge, England, where there stood a longcase clock that had slowed down when one of the proprietors stopped ticking and stopped ticking itself when his brother did. Mr Work heard the story and came home to Connecticut to write "My Grandfather's Clock," which is still being sung today. You can hear Burl Ives singing it, you can hear Lawrence Welk's Champagne Music Makers Featuring Larry Hooper singing it, and you can hear Johnny Cash "singing" it too.

Henry Clay Work - not to be confused with Andrew Dice Clay - also wrote a cheery little number called "Come Home, Father" about a family's efforts to get their dad out of the saloon. And he wrote "Dad's a Millionaire," "Agnes by the River," "Take Them Away! They'll Drive Me Crazy," "Used-Up Joe," "When You Get Home, Remember Me" and of course, his last hit, 1884's "Drop the Pink Curtains."

They just don't write songs like that anymore. But when you get home, remember to drop the pink curtains. I'm sure there's a message there for us all.

Sunday rerun: Book Report

2011-12-18T05:00:00.000-05:00

Somehow I will have to make sure that Peggy does not pick up the book I am reading these days and start reading it.


Just the right thickness for a wobbly chair leg

It's the autobiography of the noted actor, raconteur, Hollywood swinger and tanmaster George Hamilton. "Don't Mind If I Do" tells the tale of the life of a man chiefly famous for being famous...sort of the male version of the Gabor sisters, without all that acting talent. I picked this book up at Barnes & Noble on their reduced rack for $5.98, because I was interested in reading about just how it is that he became an actor, and also because the book looked so lonesome, sitting there atop a gigantic stack of other copies of itself.

And I'm not even that far into it, to tell you the truth. I've read up the part where his mother, having left his father, supports herself by striking up friendships with Hollywood notables such as Hoagy Carmichael.

I am telling you, there is a world out there in which people do such things. Then again, there is a world out there in which people used to be able to spend their vacation at Twitty City, the Hendersonville TN home of country music legend Conway

Conway Twitty (1933 - 1993)

Twitty. And after paying the admission charge, fans were able to roam the grounds and visit the mansion wherein dwelt the man born Harold Lloyd Jenkins. Fans could even enter his house and walk around in there. Sure, there were velvet ropes set up to keep people from entering the bathroom while the great man loofahed his back, but they say that one could actually stand right outside the dining area and watch Conway spooning Shredded Wheat down his neck in the morning.

And people planned their vacations to be in Twitty City for this.

George Hamilton IV

You ask how in the world does Conway Twitty have anything to do with George Hamilton, and you might think I am confusing Hamilton with George
Hamilton IV, the country singer from North Carolina who had such a big hit with "A Rose and a Baby Ruth" in 1956. But no. Here's the angle:
Hamilton had an older brother Bill who was interested in decorating and had a real flair for design. His mother let Bill decorate their apartment in New York, and Bill got the idea to put one of those velvet ropes in front of the door to a rarely-used closet. People walking by were to get the impression that the door led to another whole area of the apartment, but it was currently closed for renovation: hence the velvet rope.

I'm not kidding you. There are people who actually think like that, deceiving people into thinking there is more to them than the eye can see at first glance. And the velvet rope is all that stands between them and reality. Then there are people who will cluster on the east side of a velvet rope while Conway Twitty goes about his life on the west side.

I just don't think that Conway would have fronted in any way. He seemed like a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of guy. Hamilton comes from that there-must-be-more-to-see-than-just-this school of thought.

I think I prefer the Conway.

Saturday rerun: Hey there, Geordie Girl!

2011-12-17T05:58:00.001-05:00

Hey There Geordie Girl!

If you don't know who Cheryl Cole is, don't feel too bad. She is the darling of olde England. Pretty and talented, she rose from poverty in the city of Newcastle Upon Tyne (I guess if we named our towns like that, we could say that people hailed from Glen Burnie Upon Linthicum or Lutherville Upon Timonium, but we don't seem to have time to do that sort of thing here) to become a winner on a show where people become singing stars. Her name before she married English football player Ashley Cole was Cheryl Tweedy. I checked, but her father's first name was not Conway.

Yes, Simon Cowell is involved in that show she won, under his real name of Simon Upon Cowell. And Simon brought her to America this past March, after she recovered from the malaria that almost took her life last year (I tell you, this woman is a walking Lifetime movie) so she could be in the American version of his show The X Factor.

And now all of a sudden she is an Ex Member of the judging panel of that show, for unspecified reasons. You can read this article in the English newspaper, but no need to take a jet over to Merrie Olde. Just click 'ere and you got it, guv'nuh! And as you see from this picture, she is as pretty as a picture, and is bound to have plenty of success in whatever nation she resides. I wish her well, and I thank her for getting me to read up on something I consider fascinating.

When I was reading all this about her struggles with America and being homesick, I kept seeing that her fellow British kept calling her their favorite "Geordie." Well, I knew that Brian Johnson - the one from AC/DC, not the one from The Breakfast Club - was once in a band called Geordie before he got the call to replace tiny terror Bon Scott. I didn't know what a Geordie was, but it turns out that people from this Newcastle Upon Tyne are all called Geordies! Here's this from Wikipedia:

"Geordieland" is a term usually referring to the entire region surrounding Tyneside including Northumberland and County Durham, but excluding Wearside where locals are referred to as Mackems.

And the article goes on to say that George is a popular name in that town, so maybe that's why they call the natives Geordie, or maybe it was because they have a lot of coal mines there, and the miners used to wear a "Geordie" brand headlamp.

Again, I am fascinated by England, for reasons of my birthline and because as a child, I spent many a happy hour in the dentist's waiting room reading all those "There Will Always Be An England Dept" spacefillers in The New Yorker. But there is an entire dialect in this town, this Northumberland region. They speak English, to be technical about it, but they sort of have their own words for a lot of things, such as "bairn" for children, "ahent" for behind, and "lowy" for money.

It must be fascinating to live in a city with a lexicon all its own. Attention Newcastle Upon Tyne residents! We do the same here in Baltimore Upon Highlandtown, where a police nightstick is an "espantoon," a guy driving a horse rig around to sell produce is an "A-rabber," and lightning bugs are called "fireflies.

I love words. Here are five more: Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Don't take that tone with me

2011-12-16T05:00:00.000-05:00

In a public setting, people are often startled to hear my cell tone ringing. I think they are surprised that I have friends, or at least friends with unrestricted access to a phone.

They take their bands seriously down South

Or maybe it's my ring tone. It's "Yea Alabama," the fight song of the University of Alabama, a school with which I have no affiliation besides this obsession with their football team. I can't explain where that came from, but I love the ring tone.

Like the bumperstickers hanging off the back of the Fairlane, and the t-shirts we sport, our ring tones say a lot about us. A lot of people go for the various free ones that come with the phone, and that's cool, but then they are limited to what they can use.

I was in a police supply store and a City officer came in, apparently on his way home from a ceremonial function. I mean, this guy was decked out in his finery, with the leather belts and badges and pins. And he was looking at a new sidearm when someone from somewhere decided to call him on his cell.

And the cell said: "I like big butts and I cannot lie; You other brothers can't deny..."

And there was snickering all around.

Another entire category of ring tones would be Songs That Are Currently Popular But I Never Heard Of Them. Ofttimes, I'll turn to Peggy when someone's tone comes crashing into our silence to find out what song that was, and she'll say, "Oh, that's 'For the Sweet Love of God, Will You Stop Breaking My Heart' by 3 Random Wurdz."

Oh.

Funny sound effects, or sunny found effects, are both good to hear on the phone. Just get one of those sound effects CDs and soon, your every call will ring with the merriment of "Cross-Cut Saw," "Crowd Noise," or "Fire Engine and Ambulance Sirens."

Of course, if you really want to stir things up, most phones have a tone option called something like "Old Fashioned Phone Bell." Use that one, and watch the heads spin - people don't even know what it is.

Astonishing, yet true

2011-12-15T05:00:00.000-05:00

I've talked here before about my father, how he sends messages from beyond to let us know he's still cool up in Heaven. There was the time I was post-operative at Sinai and they couldn't find a room and somehow at the last minute, a room became available - a room that just happened to have the same number as the final four digits in my parents' phone number. Or how, on the day he died, the grandfather's clock he made for us stopped running. And only after Peggy's importunings to him in the beyond did it start to work again, and it ticked away merrily until we moved, and he didn't seem to like where we placed it in the new house, so it stopped again until we moved it.

Oh, there have been many such things over the years, and here is the latest. Dad passed away on December 14, 1997, and as I write this on December 14, 2011, I have to tell you, he sent a message on a device that had not even been dreamed of when he departed this vale. During his last weeks, all he wanted was a little peace and quiet, and to hear a books-on-tape version of Robt. Louis Stevenson's "Treasure Island." Apparently, this was a favorite of his from boyhood.

Peggy and I got Motorola Xooms so we can keep up with the important aspects of society at all times. Xooms are like iPads; they are little tablets that have internet, email, cameras, and I don't know what-all else. A Xoom is the Android version of the iPad, and as I understand it, Mr Steve Jobs went to his fate cursing Android technology. But we like it. I mean, what if a Kardashian got married or divorced or pregnant and we were out of e-touch? I'm looking forward to using mine as a book reader and jumbo camera. And it came loaded with a few things free for nothin'.

Such as my all-time favorite song, from my all-time favorite album: Cheap Trick doing "Surrender" live at Budokan. (Bonus for CT fans: here's "Ain't That A Shame" from the same concert.

And, as one of the three free pre-loaded books: Robt. Louis Stevenson's "Treasure Island."

Go figure.

Bruise Clues

2011-12-14T05:00:00.000-05:00

A few years ago, there was a goofy mugger in New York City who begged the judge at his trial to put him in the Ironbar Hilton for a long long time. Since there is almost always something else behind such a request, the judge found out that the mugger had mugged the wrong mug's mother. He knocked down a lady and stole her purse - and that lady was the mother of a made man in the Mob.

Oooops. And no chance to say "ooooooops I did it again."

Now we meet Anthony Miranda (above). Young Anthony, until last week, earned his keep in Chicago by committing strong-arm robberies. I guess it's always a risk, when you walk up to people in cars and wave your ~~phallic substitute~~ gun in their face and demand their money and their dignity and their sense of well-being in a world that is set up to keep the bad people away from the good.

Anthony, it turns out, is a convicted felon! And yet, he was let out of jail before he had learned all the lessons that his penologists should have taught him. One of those lessons should have been: Get a job, you dreg of society, and work to earn a living. Any form of gainful employment is more honorable than your current procedure.

And for his part, Anthony, as he sits and waits for his face to mend, can tell us that he has learned this valuable lesson as well:

Always make sure that the guy you are attempting to rob is not a 6'2", 250-lb. Romanian mixed martial arts champion.

That's what he tried to do last week, Friday night in Chi., and he picked the wrong guy. He walked up to the man in his parked car and asked for a light off his car lighter, and then pulled out the gun and told the guy to get out of the car and hand over his wallet and valuables.

With about as much effort as it takes the rest of us to brush away a gnat, the Romanian, who works as a bodyguard and hostage rescuer, disarmed young Anthony and decorated his face for Christmas, all red and green.

Anthony shot himself in the ankle during all this.

The good guy told (laughing Chicago) police that bad guy Anthony was begging for mercy, saying that he had a baby.

If the baby is over six wks. of age, he already knows what kind of guy his Daddy is.

Hold the phone

2011-12-13T05:00:00.000-05:00

I don't know anyone involved in this story, as far as I know, but a look at the local crime blotter for my town includes a story about a man who called the police because he was ripped off to the tune of $250.

I can't sing that tune. I can hardly hum it.

But this fellow thought he'd finish his Christmas shopping a little early, I guess, so he saw an ad on Craigslist and followed up on it. Someone was offering to sell an iPhone for $250, so he thought what he'd do, he'd make an appt. to meet that guy at the parking lot of the fire house, which happens to adjoin the police station, to make the deal.

Anyone thinking that proximity to a police station is a deterrent to crime need only ask the proprietor of the 7-11 ("Sem-Elem" in Baltimorese) across the street in the other direction. As police cars whizzed by last week, the place was held up by a man brandishing a handgun.

Poor "brandish." It's a word that means to shake or wave in a menacing fashion or to display ostentatiously. So, you could just as easily say, "Snooki brandished her cheesy clothing, makeup and personality" but no one uses "brandish" in that sense. It always winds up in the small print in the police blotter, part of a crime story.

Anyway, this bright citizen meets the guy at the fire house parking lot, forks over 250 semolians, and calls Verizon to activate "his" new iPhone, only to be told that he is holding a stolen phone.

He should have used his iBrain.

It's like when people drop everything and run to the car dealership that ran a TV commercial swearing that they sell cars "below factory invoice!" That's right; they will sell you a Biscayne for less than they paid to buy it themselves! Don't be fooled! Sign right here!

A few years back. we were getting calls from honest citizens who met with upstanding entrepreneurs who were selling Sony TVs right out of their van behind the A&P. For your $300, you got a Sony TV...carton. Sealed up nice and tight with a cinder block inside.

Folks, take it from someone who reads the papers: do your shopping at a real store with real merchandise. People who agree to meet you at the firehouse parking lot are not generally members of the Chamber of Commerce. And they don't accept coupons!

Jailhouse Lawyer

2011-12-12T05:00:00.000-05:00

The name of the young man pictured at left is JesseDimmick. You have to wonder what hisprison nickname might be, given the myriad possibilities.

You and I might consider this to be the idea of a dimwit,but old Jesse here filed papers on a couple residing in his native Topeka,Kansas. He needs some satisfaction, andas all American citizens have to the right to do, he has gone to the courts toget some. His beef, out there in thegrain belt, is that Jared and Lindsay Rowley broke an oral contract into whichthey had entered with him.

Jesse is hoping that the judge will hear him out, and upholdhis rights, because there is nothing more sacrosanct than a solemn promise madeamong adults, and anyone who would back out of an oral contract is just nodoggone good.

The Rowleys’ side of all this includes the facts that Jessetook them hostage in their own home in 2009. He was, at the time, on the run from authorities who wanted to questionhim in the beating death of a Colorado man. They would want you to know that they entered into an agreement to hidehim out shortly after he entered into their home; for an “unspecified” amountof money, they said they’d help him make his move. But instead, they fed himsnacks and watched movies with him until he fell asleep. I’m guessing they made him watch a JuliaRoberts picture, any of which have soporific effects. The original version of “Desperate Hours” would not have beensuch a great choice.

So, he nods off, the Rowleys run out, the cops are called inand poor Jesse gets shot. "I, the defendant, asked the Rowleys to hide mebecause I feared for my life. I offered the Rowleys an unspecified amount of moneywhich they agreed upon, therefore forging a legally binding oralcontract," Dimmick said in his hand-written court documents. So he figureshe’ll be made whole if they hand him $235,000. He just feels awful about the bullet-wound-treatment hospital bills he left behind when he wasconvicted of four felonies in Kansas and then shipped off to Colorado, wherethey are still going to run him before a jury on that murder charge.

Samuel Goldwyn, the master of malaprops who was a moviebigshot (he’s the ‘G’ in M-G-M) used to say, “A verbal agreement isn’t worththe paper it’s printed on.”

Veteran court-watchers agree, the phrase “hand-writtencourt documents” always means the case will not go much further. And that will give old Jesse a chance to suehis current jailers for not providing him with a nice new PC and a decentprinter so he can make his stupid suit look all nice and prim.

Oh no! Now he’sgoing to sue me for calling his suit “stupid.” Well, get in line, buddy boy!

Oh no! Now he's going to sue me for calling him my "buddy."

I can't win.

Watch out!

2011-12-11T05:00:00.000-05:00

This is an email that I got from our friends Rick and Bonnie - I love these "rest of the story" stories! I hope you do, too!...

If you were in the market for a watch in 1880, would you know where to get one? You would go to a store, right? Well, of course you could do that, but if you wanted one that was cheaper and a bit better than most of the store watches, you went to the train station! Sound a bit funny? Well, for about 500 towns across the northern United States , that's where the best watches were found.

Why were the best watches found at the train station? The railroad company wasn't selling the watches, not at all. The telegraph operator was. Most of the time the telegraph operator was located in the railroad station because the telegraph lines followed the railroad tracks from town to town. It was usually the shortest distance and the right-of-ways had already been secured for the rail line.

Most of the station agents were also skilled telegraph operators and that was the primary way that they communicated with the railroad. They would know when trains left the previous station and when they were due at their next station. And it was the telegraph operator who had the watches. As a matter of fact they sold more of them than almost all the stores combined for a period of about 9 years.

This was all arranged by "Richard", who was a telegraph operator himself. He was on duty in the North Redwood, Minnesota train station one day when a load of watches arrived from the East. It was a huge crate of pocket watches. No one ever came to claim them.

So Richard sent a telegram to the manufacturer and asked them what they wanted to do with the watches. The manufacturer didn't want to pay the freight back, so they wired Richard to see if he could sell them. So Richard did. He sent a wire to every agent in the system asking them if they wanted a cheap, but good, pocket watch. He sold the entire case in less than two days and at a handsome profit.

That started it all. He ordered more watches from the watch company and encouraged the telegraph operators to set up a display case in the station offering high quality watches for a cheap price to all the travelers. It worked! It didn't take long for the word to spread and, before long, people other than travelers came to the train station to buy watches.

Richard became so busy that he had to hire a professional watch maker to help him with the orders. That was Alvah. And the rest is history as they say.

The business took off and soon expanded to many other lines of dry goods.

Richard and Alvah left the train station and moved their company to Chicago -- and it's still there.

YES, IT'S A LITTLE KNOWN FACT that for a while in the 1880s, the biggest watch retailer in the country was at the train station. It all started with a telegraph operator: Richard Sears and his partner Alvah Roebuck!

Most kids today never heard of Roebuck...only Sears.

And now you know the rest of the story!!!

Saturday Rerun: One For the Books

2011-12-10T05:00:00.000-05:00

We got married on his birthday

It gets a little tricky following my reading habits; I prefer biographies and autobiographies and it's not uncommon to be reading two or three of them at once. That's the present case; at home I have "Life" by Keith Richards going on as well as "Deconstructing Sammy," which is an account of the nightmarish accounting and legal problems involved in settling the last will and testament of the great Sammy Davis, Jr. Incidentally, Sammy wrote two autobiographies along with collaborators Jane and Burt Boyar, "Yes I Can," and "Why Me." If you're pressed for time, the Boyars condensed the two into the posthumous "Sammy, " and I also have a book of writings about SDJr called "The Sammy Davis Reader."

Sammy was many things to many people, but boring, he was not. And if you ever want to sum up in one sentence the ego that drives talent to the top, how about this quote from Mr Davis: "It got to the point where there were only three important people in my life: Sammy, Davis, and Junior."

And I also read during my lunch hour at work, when I turn around and shove a sandwich down my neck and enjoy a book. Right now lunchtime reading is "Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke," and I am learning a great deal about the life and sad death of the singing legend, who came up through the gospel tradition and was the lead singer of The Soul Stirrers before stepping out on his own pop music path.

JT - 1937 (?) - 2000

His replacement in The Soul Stirrers was Johnnie Taylor, chiefly remembered for his disco hit "Disco Lady," but please do yourself a favor and click here to be taken to the magical You Tube so you can hear Johnnie do "I Believe in You (You Believe in Me"), the 1973 hit that was playing the summer that Peggy and I met, and you know the rest. All summer long I heard that song and every time I heard it, I knew she would believe in me forever.

If I were ever to write an autobiography, all that would be a great chapter. Not that anyone would believe that two people could meet on a Thursday and be engaged on Monday, but it happens! It's my true story.

Used to be close to the fans, now it's closed to the fans

2011-12-09T05:00:00.000-05:00

Even back to when I was a kid (see "My Civil War Memories") the pro football team from Baltimore had their summer training camp in bucolic Westminster, MD, a town in Carroll County known for that camp, and for being almost universally called "West MINIster" around here.

The name of the pro football team has changed from Colts to Ravens, and the name of the college where the estival practices are held went from Western Maryland College to McDaniel, but still, every summer, the crowds go out there, packing local bars and restaurants and outlining the fields, watching both established stars and rookies who are soon to be on their way back home sweating through calisthenics and scrimmages in the unrelenting August heat. Then, after practice, the players would sign autographs for the kids. It was good family fun, and good public relations for the team, and everyone benefited.

So, naturally, it's never going to happen again.

This past summer, with the NFL player strike or lockout, whichever it was, there was no time for the traditional summer camps, so the Ravens had their workouts at their palatial practice facility at Owings Mills, here in Baltimore County. Owings Mills is a town chiefly noted for being almost universally referred to as "Owings MILL." The Ravens have offices, fields, gymnasia and other facilities there. It sort of looks like Versailles did before it got so run down over there.

And they found out that it worked out just fine to have camp there, where no fans are allowed, so they told Westminster and McDaniel College "thanks a lot, fellas" and bade them goodbye. They said they will arrange to have a scrimmage or two open to the public at the football stadium downtown, but something about that felt a lot like when someone you work with gets a great new job and they promise to come back "all the time" and "write and call every day" and you never hear from them again. It's a shame, and people who used to plan a week of summer vacation around a "ride up to Westminister hon" are going to have to think about a few days at Twitty City instead.

Fans are, as you might expect, vexed and miffed, possibly even irked, over this. But, also a predictable outcome: they took their vexation to the wrong forum.

Ravens Running back Ray Rice (from Rutgers) (r)has established himself, in three years, as a star in the league, a fan favorite around here, and a popular member of the community as well. He grew up in tight circumstances, and it's particularly nice of him to be as generous as he is with his time and effort and resources. He maintains a Facebook page, shares thoughts and opinions with his fans, and also uses the page to arrange charity drives around back-to-school time and Christmas time. In exchange for autographed photos of #27, people can donate gifts to these causes, which wind up in the hands of the deserving, so it's all good.

But this past weekend, Ray had to step in on his page and ask people to stop hollering at him because of this move by the team. "I don't make these decisions; I just run the ball!" he had to tell those who upbraided him for the choice made by management.

Again, it's like when people howl at the server because they don't like the way their Chateaubriand tastes, or because someone was Palin too much sauce on their baked Alaska. The owner of the team is a man named Steve Bisciotti (r) who started a temporary-employment agency in his basement, and now is the 655th richest person in the world, with 1.5 billion semolians in his mattress. He would be the man who signs Ray Rice's paycheck, so if you have comments on his football operation, I'm sure he'd want to hear from you. His home phone number is oops out of space, sorry.

12/8/73 - 12/8/11

2011-12-08T05:00:00.000-05:00

Magic
It must be magic
The way I hold you and the night just seems to fly

Easy
For you to take me to a star
Heaven is that moment when I look into your eyes

Those are words from the song "I Just Fall In Love Again," written by Steve Dorff, Larry Herbstritt, Gloria Sklerov and Harry Lloyd and performed, with varying levels of sophistication, by Anne Murray, Dusty Springfield, The Carpenters, and Artie Lange.

The song describes very well how I feel about my wonderful wife of 38 years, (as of today): the marvelous Peggy. The term "varying levels of sophistication" is, of course, also a reference to me, a man once described as a Tony Danza sort of guy with a Martha Stewart sort of wife.

Unlike Martha, Peggy never served a bid in the federal slam (unless she did it in her early teens) but she is classy, proper, elegant, appropriate and, well, just so great about everything all the time. She works hard at work and then comes home and works hard at home, never with a complaint. She manages our finances with the wizardry of a CPA, she deals me with with the wisdom of a wise adviser, and in recent years she has taken on the somewhat confusing task of being my mother's bookkeeper, juggling those payments and checks perfectly.

Here's the thing about Peggy: we don't agree on very much, but we do agree on love. She likes those books where self-appointed gurus tell people how to control their fate by meditation, and I like books in which people go to diners a lot. She likes Enya and Yanni music. I like everything from Shep Fields and His Rippling Rhythm to Ke$ha, with the exception of Yanni and Enya. She likes to watch Self-Aggrandizing Old Oprah, I like to watch Grand Ole Opry. And don't even ASK if she wants to watch Jackass in any of its iterations. She does not.

We wouldn't seem to be a match except for one thing: I love her totally, unconditionally, and constantly. I can honestly say that there has not been a nanosecond in these 38 years that I wished for my situation to be any different. She is the first thing I think of in the morning, and the last at night. People kid us at parties and supermarket openings because we stick together. That would be because I am never "tired" of her, I've never heard everything she has to say, and I can't wait to hear what's next anyway.

38 years! I could tell you how much the world has changed in that time, but in many ways, it hasn't. People are still getting up and going to work in cars, buses and trucks: the modes of transport predicted on The Jetsons have not come to pass. People still come home from work and watch situation comedies or Monday Night Football. And we still love to be loved, and to love in return. I don't see that changing, no matter how many more decades come and go. You can have a lot or have a little, but if you have love, you're lucky, because that means a lot.

Yep, we'll be going up to Friendly Farm to celebrate our anniversary, after our great-nephew's birthday party. We'll giggle and guffaw just like on our honeymoon, and the only difference is, in 1973 we were looking only forward to spending our lives as one. And thirty-eight years later, we get to look forward and backward.

Happy anniversary to my wonderful Peggy! I love you!

Back when she was Young

2011-12-07T05:00:00.000-05:00

It always amuses me to hear people wistfully going on about the "good old days" when "people were honest and did the right thing" and were "good Americans, especially them actors and all, 'cause up til this Jane Fonda, they were people you could look up to."

Until you knew the truth, and then you'd find out that people have always been pretty much the way they are. Ever heard of Judy Lewis?

Judy Lewis passed away last week, but she was born in 1935 to actress Loretta Young, just back from spending eight months ~~hiding out in~~ touring Europe. No one was to know that Loretta Young had given birth, you see. For one thing, she was a VERY Religious Young Lady and for another thing, her baby daddy was jug-eared hambone actor Clark Gable, who was a VERY married man at the time. They fell in love while making a movie called "The Call Of The Wild" (indeed!) and they acted like two telegraph keys: they just didit, didit, didit. And all this without a condom or at least some sort of rhythm!

So what they did was, Loretta had the baby, put her in the bullpen of foster care, and then - because she felt the same maternal urges that so many single women with burgeoning careers have - she told everyone she adopted the little jug-eared baby who looked more like Clark Gable than Gable himself.

They operated on the child's ears at the age of 7, for the love of Pete, to pull them a little closer to her head.

We don't know why Clark Gable, once free of his marriage, didn't marry Loretta. Maybe he found her a little too deceptive. Or maybe he was busy banging 1/2 of Hollywood. But Loretta married a guy named Tom Lewis, and they had two children, while continuing to claim that Judy was "adopted."

Gee, you wouldn't think that would mess up a person's head, would you, to find out from the guy you are about to marry at age 23 that your father is a bad actor in movies and the woman you had always been told had adopted you as an infant was your birth mother? “It was very difficult for me as a little girl not to be accepted or acknowledged by my mother, who, to this day, will not publicly acknowledge that I am her biological child,” she said in an interview in 1994, when her inevitable tell-all book came out.

For heaven's sake, COVER THOSE EARS!

Her mother, saint that she was, responded by not speaking to Judy for three years. By that time, Judy had given up her career as a soap opera actress and had become a licensed family and child counselor, a job to which she must have brought a great deal of empathy. Perhaps she could understand her mother. I don't. Loretta never came clean about all this when she was alive, which she stopped being in 2000, and then her tell-all posthumous autobiography told it all.

Here's what the old girl told her daughter when she finally admitted what she did: “And why shouldn’t I be unhappy? Wouldn’t you be if you were a movie star and the father of your child was a movie star and you couldn’t have an abortion because it was a mortal sin?”

Loretta Lynn, noted country singer, was named for Loretta Young. A picture of Ms Young hung on the wall of the Webb family home in Butcher Holler KY, and her mother liked the name. I just thought I'd end this on a happier note. Loretta Lynn has brought pleasure to millions. Loretta Young couldn't be honest with one.

Republican Party Like It’s 1979

2011-12-06T05:00:00.000-05:00

Outin Iowa, where they’re known for being stubborn, Michele Bachmann also seems to hope they’reforgetful. The other day, after peoplein Iran stormed the British Embassy in Tehran to protest London's support ofrecently upgraded Western sanctions on Tehran over its disputed nuclearprogram, reliable old Michele told a group of Hawkeyes that if she werepresident, she would close the American Embassy in Tehran.

Cuethe memory of Sgt Hulka in “Stripes” saying, “Son, there ain’t no draft nomore.”

Earthto Michele: there is no American Embassy in Tehran, Iran. You see, back in 1980, there was a littlebit of commotion over there, and forces loyal to Ayatollah Khomeini overthrewthe Bazargan regime. These people didnot like the US one little bit and they held 52 of our people hostage for 444days. We thought you had heard aboutthat. It was in all the papers. We have not had… diplomatic relations…withthat country…since 1980.

Wewatch Brian Williams every night, a man so cool that he can keep it togetherfor a live 30-minute news wrap-up and not be bothered by a little thing like afire alarm klaxon sounding in his studio. He didn’t even bother to mention this latest gaffe by Ms Bachmann. I think it’s like when your goofy cousinfrom Peanut Prairie shows up at a funeral wearing cutoffs and drinking a DrPepper. Best just not to say anythingabout it.

Backto live action, don’t you love it when foreign students run around burning upcars and burning flags just to demonstrate their outrage? What cheesed the Iranians off against theBritish is that the Brits are shying away from the Iranians since it appearsthat Khomeiniville is working on a nuclear program.

Wescoff at these students. Over here, we reserve our rage for when an overagefootball coach gets a can tied to him because he knew that children were beingraped in his building but he said nothing. It would have been nice had those goobers at Penn State gotten mad over JoePal’sfailure to act in any honorable way, but no. They were worried about the future of their football team.

I’mliving in a country where some people think Michele Bachmann knows enough to beour leader. That’s why I worry aboutour future.

Tooling around

2011-12-05T05:00:00.000-05:00

(Orange) Juice S2

My nephew wants a Leatherman for Christmas, and I couldn't agree more. A Leatherman is the ne plus ultra - the finest kind - of pocket tools. I myself proudly tote a 2001 Juice S2 - orange in color - and it has literally gotten me out of any number of situations.

Let's face it, ladies and gentlemen, when it's time to pass out the Christmas presents, the family always turns to the one person among them who carries a Leatherman (there are fake-y brands, but wouldn't you really rather have the real thing?) so he or she can slit tape, snip wire, remove staples, and open up battery compartments for toys.

Have you ever tried to remove a doll from its wrappings on Christmas morning while eager hands try to pry it from yours? It's glued and bolted onto a piece of cardboard suitable for patching holes in an airplane chassis, and then they wrap a mile or two of baling wire around it all. If more police secured their prisoners the way Fisher-Price packages Tackle Me Elmo for delivery, there would be far fewer escapees sauntering around, I'll tell you that right now.

My Dad used to know an old guy who ran a hardware store, and when he and his friends got together, if one asked the other to show his pocket knife and the guy had no pocket knife on him, he had to pay a dollar. I have always remembered that, and so I have been able to hold on to many of my dollar bills, because I always have my mini-Swiss Army knife on my keychain, my regular Swiss Army in my pocket and the Juice in my manpurse, where it is ready to go on active duty for holidays and gatherings.

I once found myself trapped by a faulty trap door leading to my parents' attic. The door was jammed, the latch would not open, and the only way out was to remove the hinges. I was prepared, and here I am today to tell the story. If not for the pocket took kit that I lug around, I might still be in that attic, wearing an old fur coat, watching old home movies...

Leathermen (Leathermans?) are not cheap, but you can get a decent one for around 35 bucks. You can go all the way up to a hundred or so, but then you have to stop and think, how often will you need an electrical crimper or an awl? But I remember fondly how my Dad would look over his tool collection, pick out a long wooden-handled device with a steel spike on the other end, and say, "Son, someday, this awl will be yours."

Science Marches On

2011-12-04T05:00:00.000-05:00

You can now rig up your cell phone and your child's cell phone (or your spouse's, should you feel the need) and set a little GPS bug to let you know where he or she is at any given time.

Ford has a car that allows you to set a governor on the speed so little Egbert or Juanita can't go doing 110 mph in the Focus.

If you order from Domino's, you can log the progress of your pizza, from cold lump of dough to hot stuff in your hands, right on the pc. Their "Pizza Tracker" will even tell you who is making your pizza pie, and then it will tell you the name of the high school guy or former Chief Financial Officer of a major mortgage firm who is loading it into his car for the ride to your hacienda.

If you're waiting on a package from FedEx, no need to call the warehouse and ask Carl, the night watchman, to go down and see if your package from Whoville is sitting there waiting to be delivered, or what. Just go online and check to see exactly where your "Jim Nabors: Mayberry Memories" DVD box set is currently.

Modern Technology! It's wonderful! Bill Gates and Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak and all the others involved in computers foresaw this brave new world, and their vision and intelligence made it come true for us.

So now that these pressing needs have been met, how about letting today's (or tomorrow's, no rush) big brains get to work on some other things this old world needs, such as:

a new kind of top for those little lunch-sized fruit cups that are so darned handy, yet unleash a stream of apricot or pineapple juice when opened. And then all afternoon as I parade around the office, I hear people asking who is wearing Del-Monte cologne.
a phone answering device that automatically makes flippant remarks when one of those Salespeople Who Assure You They Are Selling Nothing calls to sell you something. If I'm busy, or eating, or busily eating, it's not always convenient for me to pick up the phone and make my own flippant remarks.
Some method - there must be one! - of making Peggy enjoy Zooey Deschanel a little tiny bit.
A way to talk the good people at Mrs Paul's seafood into making their Seafood Platter frozen dinner again. They stopped making it, I don't know, 20 years ago, but what a meal it was! A couple of frozen shrimp, a scallop or two, a fish filet and a mystery fishcake, and a hearty helpin' of Tater Tots®, and that was supper, Mister! And the box had a picture of the meal all cooked up and sitting on a plate with a thin slice of lemon, but the fine print quickly reminded you that this was a "Serving Suggestion," so in other words, don't be looking for a frozen lemon slice in the box. You will only know disappointment if you do.
An opposite-alarm clock. Stick with me a second. You know how you have the alarm clock set to go off in the morning to tell you it's time to get up for work? What's the first thing you say every morning? OK, what's the second thing you say? "I shoulda gone to bed earlier! Oh Lord, I am so tired!" Right? So, my device would start ringing like crazy, seven hours before it's set to go off in the morning, so if you get up at 6, this clock will sound off at 11 PM, reminding you to get yourself in the sack. Otherwise, you'll sit around until 1:30, quarter to 2, watching "CSI" reruns and missing out on valuable snoozulation. No wonder you're so tired all the time!

Same names, different people

2011-12-03T05:00:00.000-05:00

As someone with the same name as someone famous, I know a little of how it feels to be Gerry "With a 'G' " Sandusky, the fine sportscaster on channel 11 here. Just a little. After all, the people with the same name as I were a World War II General, a major league pitcher, and a member of the Black Panthers gunned down in his sleep by Chicago police. Gerry Sandusky has to deal with the homophonic Jerry Sandusky, that (allegedly) disgusting shtick dreck from Happy Valley PA.

By the way, did you know that several years ago when one of beloved, paternal coach JoePa's stars was caught driving drunk, the superannuated coach's response was, "He didn't hurt anybody, did he?" Clearly, a leader of men for our troubled times.

But I'm not writing today about what happened at a former agricultural college in the middle of nowhere that went crazy mad over a game. Today, it's about having the same name as someone famous. As Gerry With a G pointed out when the Baltimore SUN wrote about this confusion of names:

“What I have discovered is that there is this parallel universe of people who have the same name but no relationship to people who have committed or been alleged of committing heinous crimes. Somewhere there is a plumber named Bernie Madoff. Somewhere there is a salesman named Ken Lay. And somewhere there is a truck driver named Charles Manson. And they’ve had to live with this.

Good guy Gerry
“The part that’s really irritating: My dad was a great man. He coached in the NFL for five decades. He was a great family guy who was a terrific father and a great husband. And when he died, I took great pride that he left me a good name. And every Sandusky I’m related to and every Sandusky that I know, they’re good people and we take pride in our name. And to see this happen is just beyond bizarre.”

I remember a mailbox out by the road not far from us. It proudly bore the family name: "The Simpsons." Back before Bart and his family came to life on TV, no one thought twice about that name. There have to be people named Bart Simpson in this world who were born before the sitcartoon came along. They have to deal with this now.

It's not likely that there are many other people named Newt Gingrich parading around the nation. But if there are, they probably get asked all the time how it feels to have the same name as a known philanderer. And I wouldn't bet the bank on there being a lot of Barack H. Obamas, but how cool would that be. Imagine calling for a table at a restaurant! And imagine, you're sitting there when the hostess says, "Welcome to Carrabba's! Obama, party of five!"

I have always wanted to give the name "Donner" to a restaurant host, just to hear "Donner, Party of 2!"

Sometimes, a person is given a famous name at birth, and they live up to it as they live their life. Take my friend Don, who was born to a family that just loved the opera. He has grown to do the same, and actually owns his own tuxedo and top hat for opening night galas. You know him, for sure, by his whole name:

Don G. O'Vanni.

Scent from above

2011-12-02T05:00:00.000-05:00

Human brain (actual size)

I don't have a really good sense of smell about me, and a lot of people are going to remove "of smell" from that phrase, but I am no bloodhound. I mean, if you're baking olive-garlic-parmesan bread within ten feet of me, I can pick up that scent, and don't even try to tell me there are more than two fragrances for men. There is English Leather, worn by me since the first time I dragged a razor across this old mug, and then there is Drakkar Noir Musk McGraw, which outsells my brand by a hundred to one, but what do I know? Apparently, I enjoy smelling like a belt.

At this time of the year, I enjoy shopping for Peggy, and I love to see the various perfumes being sold by actors, actresses and singers. Britney Spears! Paris Hilton! Shakira! Alan Cumming! Faith Hill! Avril Lavigne! Bruce Willis!

Oh well now, I mean, really. Bruce Willis cologne? Is this where the mad merry-go-round of life has spun to a stop, an area in which people say, "I want to smell like Bruce Willis!"? Yippee cay-ay-ay!

If you have a bottle or an atomizer or a 55-gallon drum of this fluid, could you please take a small piece of paper, douse it with the cologne , and then not mail it to me?

Actually, they might have had a better product to sell if they gave it a name. Britney has Fantasy Midnight, Hidden Fantasy, Curious, and Curious in Control among the many scents available in her name. Bruce should have labeled his mansmell "Smirk by Bruce Willis."

But, even though I'm not great at picking up scents in the air, when I DO smell something, it often brings up memories. The most recent example of this is that the custodians at work must have gotten a new cleaning fluid to use in the men's rooms. All of a sudden, it smells like the lavatories at my dear old elementary school in there! Kind of a bleach-y, piney fragrance.

The scent of the floor wax in the long long corridor of justice where I went to work at my first county job is still the same after all these years, and even though it's not even an emergency services location nowadays, I still feel like a rookie when I walk down that hall.

Having a McCormick Spice plant up the road a piece is interesting, because if you're downwind of it early in the morning before the carbon monoxide washes it out, you can tell what's going on up there in Spicetown: garlic, oregano, basil, the dreaded anise, or Old Bay. Can't smell the first three without thinking of pizzas. Anise is like when someone fooled you by claiming that licorice is candy, which is like yeah, if liver is meat. And Old Bay - King of Spices in Crabtown - will take you back to any time you took the mallet to a dozen hardshell beauties.

And really, who can smell beer spilled all over someone's upholstery or t-shirt, and not think of high school days?

I ain't been nowhere

2011-12-01T05:00:00.000-05:00

What a treat for fans of the late Hank Snow to find that Amazon is selling an excellent compilation of his later works on a double CD entitled "I'm Still Moving On: Singles 1961 - 1979." Great stuff on both discs, from his novelty hits ("Ninety Miles an Hour Down a Dead End Street") to his ballad side ("I Just Wanted to Know How the Wind Was Blowing") and the under-appreciated "Rome Wasn't Built in a Day," which demonstrated the guitar skills of the man from Canada born Clarence Eugene Snow. In fact, he was such a fine picker that Chet Atkins recorded several instrumental albums with him, which is sort of like being asked to help Dale Earnhardt Jr drive a car.

Geoff Mack wrote the song "I've Been Everywhere" and Hank had the big hit on it, and sang it on the Grand Ole Opry for years. For some reason, someone used Johnny Cash's version of this song for a tv commercial a couple of years ago. Cash never had a hit with it, but there is a certain cachet to using Cash, I guess. I'd have to check...

Anyhow, I, who once spent an entire recuperative afternoon teaching myself and my knee replacement how to say Nahasapeemapetilon (as in Apu, the owner of the Kwik-E-Mart in Springfield) have once again undertaken to learn all the cities and locales that Hank so effortlessly spins in the song. Lyrics:

I was totin' my pack
Along the dusty Winnemucca road
When along came a semi
With a high and canvas covered load
"If you're going to Winnemucca, Mack
With me you can ride."
So I climbed into the cab
And then I settled down inside
He asked me if I'd seen a road
With so much dust and sand
And I said,
"Listen, Bud I've traveled
Every road in this here land."

I've been everywhere, man
I've been everywhere, man
'Cross the deserts bare, man
I've breathed the mountain air, man
Of travel, I've had my share, man
I've been everywhere.

Been to Reno, Chicago, Fargo, Minnesota,
Buffalo, Toronto, Winslow, Sarasota,
Wichita, Tulsa, Ottawa, Oklahoma,
Tampa, Panama, Mattawa, La Paloma,
Bangor, Baltimore, Salvador, Amarillo,
Tocopilla, Barranquilla, and Padilla, I'm a killer.
I've been everywhere, man
I've been everywhere, man
'Cross the deserts bare, man
I've breathed the mountain air, man
Of travel, I've had my share, man
I've been everywhere.

Boston, Charleston, Dayton, Louisiana,
Washington, Houston, Kingston, Texarkana,
Monterey, Ferriday, Santa Fe, Tallapoosa
Glen Rock, Black Rock, Little Rock, Oskaloosa,
Tennessee, Hennessey, Chicopee, Spirit Lake,
Grand Lake, Devil's Lake, Crater Lake, for Pete's sake;

I've been everywhere, man
I've been everywhere, man
'Cross the deserts bare, man
I've breathed the mountain air, man
Of travel, I've had my share, man
I've been everywhere.

Louisville, Nashville, Knoxville, Ombabika,
Shefferville, Jacksonville, Waterville, Costa Rica,
Pittsfield, Springfield, Bakersfield, Shreveport,
Hackensack, Cadillac, Fond du Lac, Davenport,
Idaho, Jellicoe, Argentina, Diamontina,
Pasadena, Catalina, see what I mean, sir;

I've been everywhere, man
I've been everywhere, man
'Cross the deserts bare, man
I've breathed the mountain air, man
Of travel, I've had my share, man
I've been everywhere.

Pittsburgh, Parkersburg, Gravellburg, Colorado,
Ellensburg, Rexburg, Vicksburg, Eldorado,
Larrimore, Atmore, Haverstraw, Chattanika,
Chaska, Nebraska, Alaska, Opelika,
Baraboo, Waterloo, Kalamazoo, Kansas City,
Sioux City, Cedar City, Dodge City, what a pity;

I've been everywhere, man
I've been everywhere, man
'Cross the deserts bare, man
I've breathed the mountain air, man
Of travel, I've had my share, man
"I know some place you haven't been."
I've been everywhere.

Now, how many of those places can you say YOU have been to? I have been to Baltimore, obviously, and Jacksonville, if you count the one in Baltimore County. And Pasadena, if you count the one in Anne Arundel County, and Glen Rock, in York County, PA. Never been close to any of the other places.

I would love to say I have been to Kalamazoo, but the Baltimore Zoo is as close as I'll likely get. If you go, please send me a postcard.

Police Navidad

2011-11-30T05:00:00.000-05:00

Attention, Christians! I bear glad tidings! Yes, this is the time when many start to worry about all these Politically Correct people who want to BAN Christmas.

Stop worrying, please.

We see this 47 times a day; people make it their status update to mention how they respond to a retail clerk saying, "Thank you and Happy Holiday!" by loudly, proudly trumpeting, "Merry Christmas!"

OK. Please understand, I am a Christian, and I rate myself very highly on the list of People Who Really Love Christmas. I myself say "Merry Christmas" all the time, especially in December.

But please, don't take it so personally if someone says the more generic "Happy Holidays" to you. They have what we call a "job" and they have to follow what their boss calls "the rules."

Sure, Christianity is the world's most popular faith, but consider these numbers: Christianity claims 2.1 billion followers. Islam, 1.5 billion. Hinduism, 900 million. Sikhism, 23 million. Judaism, 14 million. Bahaism, 7 million.

Which means, there are people of other faiths in the same nation, state, county, zip code and mall that we currently populate. They don't necessarily share our faith. Growing up in the WASPiest enclave of Baltimore County, I still recall the day a new boy showed up in our fourth-grade class, and how stunned everyone was when the teacher, before his arrival, prepped us for him by saying that he was Jewish and that his parents were divorced. This being the era of Ozzie and Harriet America, both of these statuses were unprecedented in our circle. When the kid finally walked into the classroom, he might as well have had two heads and a tail, so closely did we stare.

And we couldn't make head nor tail out of one thing: he was just like us.

I hear people hollering all the time about how schools can't have "Christmas concerts" anymore. "They have to be POLITICALLY CORRECT and say 'Holiday Concert,' " they moan. Maybe little Akbar in 3rd grade or Levi in 7th or Akashleena in her junior year are not dreaming of sugarplums or Santas. Why make them feel lesser by promoting one religion over another? No one is trying to take Christmas away from us.

I know I am treading on parlous ground here; after all, people have been fighting wars in the name of religion since the first Easter. But this is not worth fighting over. I humbly ask those who get so upset about an innocuous greeting to remember that others might not feel the way they do about spirituality, and that's all right too.

And, Merry Christmas to you all! Happy Holidays!