Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love

I was in that used book stall I like today. I saw a book called GREAT PHILOSOPHERS WHO FAILED AT LOVE. Ha ha ha! I don't know why that made me laugh. And then I saw a book called THE HEAVENLY CITY OF THE 18TH-CENTURY PHILOSOPHERS but at first I thought it said THE HEAVYSET 18TH-CENTURY PHILOSOPHERS. Whew! Anyway, that was some day I had.

A Vial of Deadly Germs

"The series failed, but at least the plot for this episode is so tried and true you have to wonder why," writes McNeil. He encloses an eight-second video clip ("click" here) but I know you won't "click," you are too lazy to even "click" on an eight-second video clip, jerk, so now I have to spoil it for everybody by revealing that it says, "A vial of deadly germs imperils an entire city on MY FRIEND TONY, tonight." But now you will never know how funny it is because of the professional cigarette voice of the announcer and the little, almost comic lift he gives to the title of the show, incongruously (but somehow inevitably), considering what has gone before, or maybe I'm just imagining that, but I guess you'll never know. "And here are some of the worst opening credits I've seen. Not THE worst, but the hands to the face at the end....whew," McNeil concludes, but hell, you won't "click" on that either, will you? How I hate you. As consolation, I turn to my copy of THE COMPLETE DIRECTORY TO PRIME TIME NETWORK TV SHOWS 1946-PRESENT by Tim Brooks and Earle Marsh, which is almost without exception totally useless in our modern world. Yet now I may with glee type up the entire entry on MY FRIEND TONY: "When he was in Italy shortly after the end of World War II, John Woodruff almost had his wallet stolen by a street urchin named Tony. Years later, a fully grown Tony arrived in America to join John as half of a private-investigation team. Professor Woodruff, whose academic career in criminology had given him the ability to analyze the most obscure clues..." ugh, never mind, I can't type anymore, okay, I'll type this one phrase that comes toward the end, "Tony's carefree romanticism," anyway, ha ha ha, "street urchin."

Men Like Me

"Carson wanted a dog to kick, and every time he looked at me he saw a Milk-Bone in my mouth." Ha ha, so terrible it's good. I am reading a book called JOHNNY CARSON, written by Johnny Carson's lawyer. It is filled with tough-guy sentences of a comfortingly cornball variety. The lawyer is helped out of the particular crisis alluded to in the above dog metaphor by a couple of men, one named Charles Wick: "men like me," he writes, "men who were highly accomplished at what they did." By the way, Wick has been introduced to us as "the man behind SNOW WHITE AND THE THREE STOOGES" - ha ha, whew! What a gas. First I read THE RICHARD BURTON DIARIES and now this, or as I call them, PEOPLE GETTING DRUNK ON YACHTS, VOLS. I and II. That's not fair. I can't recall whether anyone gets drunk on the yachts in JOHNNY CARSON, though they get good and drunk elsewhere. The lawyer remarks of the year 1970, "One was accustomed in those days to seeing drunk patrons in bars and tipsy diners in restaurants, far more so than today." Wow! I want to invite him to Oxford, Mississippi. He'll be so surprised all the time!

Three Ear Holes and Flies Silent

"It's pure built to hunt. Got three ear holes and flies silent. It can open and close each pupil separate from the other one. They ain't a better hunter." So says a character about an owl in Chris Offutt's story "Barred Owl" from his book OUT OF THE WOODS. "Well, reckon you know your owls," the narrator replies. Chris sent me the story because he knows how much I like books with owls in them. This one did not disappoint! A real beaut. But be forewarned there is some gruesome owl business involved! What Chris's character said about owls made me remember something I read once, and I thought I had told you about it before, but I can't seem to find the "post," so I'll tell you again. In her book ON RARE BIRDS, Anita Albus writes of the barn owl, "The sound of bells doesn't faze it if its nest is in a church tower. It's got nothing to do with the bird, and the thundering noise is much too conspicuous for its fine-tuned hearing... It has the best ear of any bird in the world... When it strikes, its eyes are closed." Between the ellipses there's a long discussion of the barn owl's "three-dimensional hearing" but my typing fingers are getting tired. And I could have sworn there was a part about an owl snatching a mouse from deep in a snow bank but I guess that was some other book. Don't worry, I only spent a few hours looking for it. Chris Offutt and Melissa Ginsburg gave a reading the other night in the neighboring village of Water Valley. Dr. Theresa and I went out there to see them. Melissa read some new poems about Freud! Chris read a story from a forthcoming collection and I was getting mighty worried there wouldn't be an owl in it but then WHAMMO BLAMMO just before the ending he slipped in an owl! Whew. Many thanks to Montgomery Clift for portraying Freud in this "post."

New Hope For Movie Cats

Asked Dr. Theresa what she was doing. She said, "Watching this incredibly long movie that I was enjoying until something bad happened to a cat." Isn't that always the way, though, friends? For example, I'm sure you recall Drew Barrymore's film DOPPELGANGER, in which they go so long without anything happening to the cat that you think, "Whew! That cat is going to be okay." Then BANG! Something bad happens to the cat. Friends, I'm here to tell you that it doesn't have to be that way. In my book YOUR CAT CAN BE A MOVIE STAR! you will learned the surefire methods to get your cat into a positive movie where positive things happen to cats, such as SHAMUS, which was not a good movie, but at least nothing bad happened to the cat, though nothing good happened to the cat either, really nothing happened to that cat.

Fish Update

The fish is okay, folks! Whew. Bill Boyle has it. We're going to arrange a handoff. More fish updates as they occur. Keep it tuned to the "blog"!

Vic's Mystical Daggers

And here's Vic talking to his date as they drive home from a party: "And when love starts twisting its ecstatic daggers inside you, you soar up to the peaks, the mood of elation is on you... And then it may be inevitable that after such peaks you must descend into the valleys, through the mood of depression." That's dialogue! In a book! On the next page, Kay says, "It's just as you said, you were blessing me with your body." And Vic replies, "Now I know what mystics are." Ha ha ha! Whew. Oh brother! Boy oh boy!

Lugubrious Volleyball Accompaniment

Hogan's description of the TV movie SOMEONE I TOUCHED sent me racing to the streaming video. "Forget the others I've touched, others I've touched," advises Cloris Leachman, singing the theme song to SOMEONE I TOUCHED, which involves the phrase "someone I touched" A LOT. Foreground shots seem to indicate that the theme song to SOMEONE I TOUCHED is coming out of a transistor radio during a volleyball game at the beach! Pretty lugubrious accompaniment to a volleyball game, I would say. "Yes, everything dies..." sings Cloris Leachman lugubriously. What a downer! There's a long pause before she adds, "but this feeling gentle and warm." Whew! What a relief. For a second I thought that everything dies. "You'll always be someone I touched," Cloris Leachman reassures us at the end of the song. Then, just as Hogan said, a man with a moustache comes up to Glynnis O'Connor (pictured) and tells her she has syphilis. She shrugs it off: "That's no big deal these days is it?" And the guy replies, "No, no big deal." I don't want to tell you how to start your 1975 TV movie about syphilis, but that is a terrible way to start it! We know we have like an hour and a half to go, so we want it to be a big deal!

Whew

Whew! Better Jerry news already. From Mark Childress comes a bulletin about the following event: "The King of Comedy: Jerry Lewis in Conversation with Peter Bogdanovich - Saturday, November 22, 7:00 p.m. - At The Times Center, 242 West 41 Street, Manhattan." Not only does this prove the Peter/Jerry connection long speculated upon by the "blog"... it also represents Jerry's chance to redeem himself! Weirdly, I can't find any information about this event on the "internet." And almost everything is on the "internet"! But maybe I am not "googling" correctly. In any event, Mark will be out of town, so we will not be receiving any firsthand accounts.

My Days Are Full

Hey, if you "click" on that recent reference to Soupy Sales (and why would you?) and then you "click" again (again, why?), you may be taken to an old "post" about monkeys controlling a robot arm with their thoughts. But if you "click" yet again (don't you have something better to do?) you will find what seems to be a factual error on the "blog." A factual error on a "blog"! This will not stand. But you see, it's a design flaw, not a factual error. The recent "post" should have included a "link" to another "post" in which the seeming discrepancy was explained. Whew! I'm glad that's settled. This is what I do now. What do YOU do? Something important? Well la-di-da. Don't let me keep you!

McNeil Expresses Engulfment Concerns

I won't lie to you: McNeil is still concerned about that machine in Switzerland, the one they're going to crank up in a couple of days. The one that, some say, might make a black hole and engulf the earth or whatever. McNeil sends along an article in which a German scientist says that we might not even know for four years! Like, we might be all, "Whew! Nothing happened." Then four years later these little black holes start popping up and that's all she wrote. Thanks for nothing, German scientist! You've just ruined the next four years for everybody. P.S. A surprising number of people act like I'm crazy when I lay the news on them about the black hole machine. So here is a "link" for any disbelievers.

Dr. "M.'s" Yak

Ha ha! Dr. "M." does not really own a yak! But wouldn't that be something? No, "Yak" stands for "Young Adult Korner," in keeping with our hilarious practice of spelling "corner" with a "K." Ah, Dr. "M."! Our TV critic, food expert, and palimpsest aficionado! It seems she has taken up reading "Young Adult" novels, adding a new layer of authority to her "blog" presence. Now, you know I have a problem with "YA novels," stemming from the fact that I have been perversely and incorrectly designated a "YA writer" by Publishers Weekly for no reason whatsoever and they don't even care no matter how many times I email them through a blur of tears. So my dander rises when I hear the term "Young Adult"! There is also the fact that being an old adult, I hardly have time for my old adult activities, much less any side trips into whatever it is that young adults do to pass the time. The idea does not appeal to me much, I confess! I blanched at the thought of reading Harry Potter, and resisted that whole phenomenon quite easily, though I knew many trusted and intelligent non-young adults who read and enjoyed those books. The thought of it still puzzles me! Then again, I watched the Gilmore Girls every Tuesday without fail so I have no room to talk. And then there are my Jimmy Olsen comic books. I'm getting around to the point, which is that Dr. "M." recommends a "YA novel" called TWILIGHT. She says: "I read Twilight over the last couple of days, and I think I felt flush throughout most of it. Whew! While I doubt Twilight is as good as Faulkner's vampire story," she continues, "it does make for an indulgent diversion!" I had never heard of the book before Dr. "M.'s" email, so I did some "Googling" and found out something surprising. According to the New York Times, the author wrote the book "in a flash after she had a dream about the characters, who then inhabited her mind and dictated the novels to her." See, I want some of that! Why can't things come to me in a dream, like they do for everybody else? All I ever dream about is Leonard Maltin. About the "YA" TWILIGHT, all I can say is, if I ever were to read a "YA novel" it would be because Dr. "M." recommended it. She is trustworthy and true blue! In the meantime, I CAN personally recommend TWILIGHT, the old adult novel by William Gay, if you like gothic, necrotic literary thrillers about mad undertakers who are a little too "into" their work. William Gay's TWILIGHT does feature two young or young adult protagonists beset by terrible grisliness but you would be crazy to let your young adult read it. Finally I will remark that the Dalai Lama eats yak meat. I base this on his autobiography, which I read a long time ago. But according to my recollection, the Dalai Lama is not a vegetarian! He tried for a spell, after seeing something bad happen to a chicken, but he got sick while on his all-vegetable diet and had to start eating meat again. Growing up in Tibet, vegetarianism is not an option. There are hardly any vegetables! Yak is a staple! I should really do some research before making such assertions, but this is a "blog" and nothing matters. Well, hold on, let me grab the book. I'm throwing around guff about the Dalai Lama, after all. Okay. Here's what the Dalai Lama says: "I was instructed by my doctors that not only must I take less greasy food, cut out nuts and reduce my consumption of milk, but also I must start eating meat again... so reluctantly I returned to being non-vegetarian. Today I eat meat except on special occasions required by my spiritual practice." This sort of ties in with the "YA novel" TWILIGHT, which is, as I understand it, about vampires who have given up human blood. Anyway, I bet you thought the Dalai Lama was a vegetarian! That'll teach you to question the "blog."

Victuals

Two emails on the subject of food came through last night. The first, it should come as no surprise, was from Dr. "M.," who, as you very well know, is the "blog's" resident expert on food ("click" here for the most recent corroborative "post"). Dr. "M." writes on the subject of our recent "cabbage vs. collards" dilemma: "My mom fixed hoppin' john and cabbage tonight. But she commented at the dinner table that we should really be having collard greens. But the cabbage was divine. Also, you are supposed to hide a dime in the hoppin' john, but she was too tired to do that, she said. Actually, she said she was too tired to clean the dime so that she could hide it in the peas-n-rice. I am glad to know that all of those years of finding dimes in my peas (often once they were in my mouth!) that the money was clean and sterile. Whew!" The cabbage, we would like to note, was grown by Dr. "M.'s" husband the Farmer. Dr. "M." and the Farmer just returned from a trip to Chicago, and Dr. "M." also provided, in a postscript, a long list of restaurants they enjoyed while there, and which we reproduce here for your pleasure and edification: Cafe Spiaggia * The Green Zebra * Orange * Milk and Honey Cafe * Lovely Bakeshop * Hot Chocolate * Hopleaf Bar/Restaurant * Eleventh City Diner * Intelligentsia Coffeeshop. The second food email came from James Whorton, Jr., commenting on our recent lauding of Lobel's hot dogs. A student of Whorton's, it turns out, is the "webmaster" for the Lobel's "web" site! In a non-food-related coincidence, Whorton reports that as the new year begins, he is reading LITTLE BIG MAN by Thomas Berger, "originally published in 1964" (Whorton's note). On 12/31/07, I finished up THE FAR SIDE OF THE DOLLAR, which was ALSO ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN 1964! Astonishing!

Scrabble on the "Internet": The Ultimate Evil?

Remember when I used to fulminate against the evils of the "myspace"? Ha ha! Whew! Those were the days. Now I am Rupert Murdoch's willing lackey. It just feels so pleasant and satisfying to be brainwashed. Noting my fantastical degree of suggestibility, two of my "internet" chums - Lynn Shelton and Kent Osborne (also an actual flesh-and-blood chum in real actual life) - are waging a campaign to get me to join "facebook" so that we can "play Scrabble on the 'internet.'" THIS IS WHERE I DRAW THE LINE! There will be no "facebook" "internet" Scrabble. NOT ON MY WATCH! Very occasionally, I should write something. As things stand, I spend half my time "blogging" about why these modern kids these days don't watch STAR TREK and the other half checking to see if BEST IN SHOW's Jennifer Coolidge has agreed to be my "myspace" friend. (P.S. She has!)