Another Day In Redlands CA

Avoiding The Void.

2010-05-20T19:49:00.000-07:00

I've had lots of story ideas for "Another Day" lately, but I think I'll just use my time in more productive pursuits, such as sleeping and watching TV. After two years, a couple of hundred blog entries, and hours at the computer, I've created no audience for my cyber-ramblings.

Writing this blog is a bit like the wanna-be artist in the family who paints bad portraits of sea scapes and mountain vistas, and then foists them off on friends and relatives. Said relatives are then forever obliged to pull them from the closet and hang them in the living room whenever the "artist" plans a visit. Such is stuff of bad TV sitcoms.

I'm not going to do that to you anymore. See ya later.

Welcome, Natalie.

2010-05-08T18:00:00.000-07:00

Daughter Samantha had her baby this morning. Natalie Rose weighed 7 pounds, 8 ounces, and is 20 inches long. Mother and daughter are doing fine.

Four Dead In Ohio...

2010-05-03T17:52:00.000-07:00

Forty years ago, tomorrow, four students at Kent State University were shot and killed by National Guardsmen during an anti-war protest. I don't have any pithy remarks to make, and I won't dwell on how quickly the years have passed. It all seems fresh in my mind.

Unemployed? You Are Not Alone.

2010-05-01T17:32:00.000-07:00

I love little search engines like this one, provided by the newspaper in Long Beach. Just plug in your favorite community and see just how many people are out of work. The media tends to report gross figures for the counties, but here you can really see the numbers by city.

Click on the blog post headline, or go here:

http://www.presstelegram.com/ci_12651877

Lemme give you a hint here. Check out the numbers for Berdoo County perennial losers Muscoy, Adelanto, and San Bernarghetto; you'll be shocked. None of them match Cabazon in Riverside County, thank God, where over 35 percent are unemployed.

Why Is It...

2010-05-01T17:01:00.000-07:00

...that Caltrans (meaning the taxpayers) went to the expense of widening I-1o through town, only to then block off massive strips of the right hand lane to provide unneeded accel/decel lanes at the offramps?

...that Redlands is spending money for a revamp of the bricks and park on State Street, when the city is in a serious monetary crisis?

...that the Redlands cops allowed transients to illegally occupy a house on Alabama (clearly visible from the street) for months, until one of the tramps decided to burn it down?

...that the city has taken no action to prevent Edison and its contractors from killing city trees, especially since the city has no money to remove said trees once they die? And does this open the city to lawsuits should one or more of these trees fall over and kill somebody?

...that the Facts can be so blatant in its support of the local Tea Party folks and the proposed Super Walmart, while never writing an editorial on any subject in months?

...that the local cops, who continually cry poverty, are allowed to drive their patrol vehicles home, and leave them there, for days at a time?

...that Redlands continues to lean on its citrus and philanthropic heritage, while doing nothing to add to the city's long-term viability as a pleasing place to live?

...that nobody ever questions if the public wants the dozens of police cameras placed all over town to monitor us?

Just thought I'd ask.

The Mother Of All Press Releases.

2010-05-01T13:45:00.000-07:00

Look what I just found on the AP wire!

5/1/10 8:57:10 AM EDT

WHITE HOUSE

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF STATE

ADVANCE COPY

TEXT OF THE PRESIDENT'S STATEMENT

DO NOT RELEASE TO PUBLIC UNTIL FOLLOWING PRESS CONFERENCE

Press conference scheduled Monday, 5/3/2010, 9 AM, White House press room.

Attending: POTUS, VPOTUS, President of Mexico Felipe Calderon,

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Credentials: White House, State Department press credentials ONLY

unless prior clear by Homeland Security / Secret Service and press office.

Contact SS media relations at 202.406.2000.

Media load-in 7:45 to 8:15 AM East gate. NO EARLY ARRIVALS.

-----------------------------------------------------

COPY AS FOLLOWS:

-----------------------------------------------------

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

The United States has always welcomed immigrants from around the world. My father, an immigrant from Kenya, came to this country seeking a better life, and chances are that some member of your own family arrived here seeking the same.

Unfortunately, millions have recently come to this country without permission, most crossing our southern border with Mexico. This has caused many communities, particularly in the southwest, increasing hardship, as they pay for increased law enforcement and health care for these undocumented families -- families who want nothing more than a better life than their native country can offer.

Therefore, seven months ago, our State Department began private negotiations with the government of Mexico to stem the tide of illegal immigration, and at the same time improve the economic conditions of our Mexican neighbors.

Today, I am proud to announce a new treaty between The United States and Mexico, that, once ratified by our Congress will address these issues. The scope and ramifications of this treaty are immense, but I want to share with you now a brief summary of what our two countries have agreed to.

Effective January 1, 2015, portions of San Bernardino, San Diego, Riverside, and Imperial counties in the state of California will become part of Baja California, Mexico. This will provide the nation of Mexico with billions of dollars of infrastructure -- cities, highways, electric generating plants, factories -- all in place to create an economic boon to Mexican citizens in the decades ahead.

Prior to this date, all undocumented Mexicans now in the US will be urged to move permanently to this region. After January 1, 2015, any Mexican citizen residing illegally within the boundaries of the United States will receive significant jail time, and their property and possessions seized before their repatriation to their home country.

In addition, as of the January 1, 2015 date, no child born of undocumented Mexican parents in the US will receive automatic United States citizenship.

In return for the approximately 250,000 square miles of territory, Mexico will convey to the United States 49 percent of their ownership in the state-held Permex gas and oil company, and allow unlimited off-shore oil drilling along their border with the Pacific ocean and the Gulf of Mexico. Revenues of these wells will be shared on an equal basis between both countries.

As for the United States citizens residing in the affected region of California, they can stay, retain ownership of their property, and hold citizenship of both the United States and Mexico; or, move out of the area and receive a one million dollar annuity from the United States government, paid out over the fifteen years after the treaty is ratified.

President Felipe Calderon of Mexico is with us today, and wishes to share a statement with the American people. Following President Calderon's message, the Secretary of State will be taking questions.

Thank you, and God Bless America.

-------------------------

END OF TEXT.

-------------------------

Nah, just kidding...

Lane Bryant Says ABC, Fox Censored Commercial

2010-04-26T17:41:00.000-07:00

I can think of about a hundred commercials that ought to be yanked before this one. Read the story here -- all of it.

Lane Bryant Says ABC, Fox Censored Plus-Size Lingerie Commercial

The Ad The Networks Refused (At First) To Air

2010-04-26T17:37:00.000-07:00

All It Takes Is A Bic Pen, And Huge Talent... Meet Mylne.

2010-04-26T17:10:00.000-07:00

8 Year Old Rally Car Driver - This kid has a future!

2010-04-17T21:15:00.000-07:00

A Pair Of Jacks.

2010-04-15T19:51:00.000-07:00

Two of the most familiar voices you're likely to hear on any given day are named Jack, and you've probably never seen either of them.

Our first Jack is really named Dick Sittig, of Secret Weapon Marketing, who created fast-food CEO Jack (in the) Box in 1994 and continues to voice Jack in their commercials to this day.

Sittig is a virtual recluse compared to our other Jack, the Jack of Jack FM. Few listeners here realize that they're sharing the sarcastic vocal talents of one Howard Cogan with 60 other markets airing the Jack FM format.

Paste this link into your browser to see how Dick Sittig saved Jack-in-the-Box's bacon 16 years ago:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_(mascot)

...and here's a great interview with Howard Cogan, of special interest to those of you (and you know who you are) intimate with the world of radio:

http://aircheckerradioindustry.blogspot.com/2010/01/how-cogan-is-jack-fm.html

New Social Networks.

2010-04-14T18:07:00.000-07:00

Twitter, Twitter, Twitter. That's all I hear about any more. Somebody's making millions, and it ain't me. Maybe I'll just have to invent some new so-called social networking sites and see if I can rake in some cash.

Let me know if you'd like to throw away I mean invest some money in the following ideas:

Angry? Depressed? Dispossessed? You're needed at...wait for it... BITTER.
Elly Mae Clampett will host an animal support group at.... CRITTER.
So involved in the Internet you're texting on the john? Join....SHITTER.
Writing blogs that nobody reads? Waste more time at...DITHER.
From the South? Like fried food? Tell us all about it at FRITTER.
Violent major league home-run kings on steroids are welcome at HITTER.
Into archery? Join QUIVER.
Country-western fans can join those from sit-com "3's Company" at...yes... RITTER.

I think I'll stop now and wait for my medication to kick in. I now return you to your regularly scheduled blog...

40 Years Ago...

2010-04-13T19:15:00.000-07:00

....the crew of Apollo 13 safely returned to Earth.

Back then, America could not only send men to the moon, we could figure out how to get them home when catastrophe struck. Damn, but we were good back then.

America always needs heros, even when things go wrong. We seem to be out of the hero-making business these days, unless you're a politician (Barack Obama and Sarah Palin come to mind) , or the winner of American Idol.

So it goes.

Miracles Do Happen.

2010-04-13T18:29:00.000-07:00

Not long ago, a friend sent along a chain letter that, among other things, asked if I'd ever seen a miracle. I wrote back saying that I had not.

I spoke too soon. At the time I got that chain letter, I hadn't listened to Susan Boyle's debut CD. I have now, and if Boyle isn't a miracle personified, I don't know what one could be.

You must be familiar with Susan Boyle by now; it's been almost exactly a year since she appeared on the UK's Britain's Got Talent TV show. Boyle, 48, frumpy and totally without any apparent style, walked on stage and blew the audience away with her rendition of I Dreamed A Dream.

I don't care that her subsequent album was number one in sales worldwide, or that millions watched her initial performance on YouTube. If nobody else but her neighbors ever heard Susan Boyle sing, she would still be a miracle in my book.

Listen to her voice, damn it. You'd swear she was turning 30, not nearing 50. She can sing high, low, up down, sideways -- any way, any range she wants. Listen to her version of Cry Me A River and you'd think you were listening to one of the great vocalists of the 1950's.... just add in some tape hiss or pops and snaps from a vinyl record, and it would be perfect. Amazing Grace? Boyle knocks it out of the park. She even puts a new spin on the Boyce & Hart pop trifle, Daydream Believer.

Listen to her voice. Pray her new found success doesn't hurt her; that people will not take advantage of a simple woman with an amazing gift. After all, miracles don't happen every day.

Steve Jobs: How to live before you die | Video on TED.com

2010-04-12T14:49:00.000-07:00

Apple's Steve Jobs gives a commencement address at Stanford. A truly great speech.

Steve Jobs: How to live before you die | Video on TED.com

Adam Savage's obsessions | Video on TED.com

2010-04-12T14:41:00.000-07:00

Here's Adam Savage from Mythbusters like you've never seen him. The video is rather long, but worth the time. I really, really, want some of the drugs he takes.

Adam Savage's obsessions | Video on TED.com

Fun With Numbers... Census Participation

2010-04-12T13:32:00.000-07:00

Ever wonder just who did, or did not, participate in the 2010 census? Here's a link that will show you, by state, county, or city, the percentage of the homes that returned the census form. (Click on the blog entry headline, or cut and paste the following into your browser.)

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/census/census-participation.htm

The link will also show participation in the last census, a decade ago.

I was surprised at how low the numbers are. Redlands is about average for California at 66 percent. Using the lists/search tools, I found, not unexpectedly, that low-income areas do poorly, as do cities that have a high percentage of vacation homes, such as Mammoth Mountain.

For some really scary numbers, go to the southern states of Mississippi and Alabama, where you'll find towns where less than a quarter of the residents returned census forms. Smaller towns seem to do worse than larger communities, for some reason. Surprisingly, most Kentucky towns have a higher participation rate than most in California.

Recovery? Good Luck With That.

2010-04-11T18:10:00.000-07:00

Back in the days of the last big recession to his this area, I sold advertising to car dealers. Long about 1992, my territory generated around $2 million in revenue from the following stores:

Center Chevrolet-Geo

Holiday Olds-Mazda

Royal Chrysler-Plymouth

Kennedy Cadillac

San Bernardino Lincoln-Mercury

Somebody's Pontiac Jeep-Eagle

Somebody's Acura

Somebody's Hyundai

Somebody's Mitsubishi

Fairview Ford

Moss Bros. Dodge

Chuck Obershaw Toyota

Metro Nissan

I watched a lot of sales managers desk a lot of deals back in those days. San Bernardino was never a rich community. Lousy customer credit was always a problem, but the dealers, at least most of them, seemed to do OK.

Never did I think I'd see times like these. First, Uncle Sam closed Norton AFB, taking with it thousands of steady paychecks, both direct and indirect, that fueled car sales. The region grew, and with that growth came more competition in Ontario, Fontana, and Moreno Valley.

I, too, left for supposedly greener pastures for a few years.

Take a look at that list. Nine are gone. Only the last four still exist in one form or another. The manufacturers don't build Oldsmobiles or Pontiacs or Geos or Plymouths or Eagles any more, and Chevy, Ford, and Chrysler have a fraction of the market share they once did.

One thing for certain: while certain banks may be "too big to fail", that phrase doesn't apply to cities. Just look at San Bernardino. Or Detroit.

Thank God I don't sell advertising anymore, either.

Hey, Boomers, Wrap Your Head Around These Stats:

2010-04-06T19:31:00.000-07:00

John, Paul, George, and Pete Best formed The Beatles fifty years ago.

It's been forty years since The Beatles broke up.

John Lennon has been dead thirty years as of this coming December.

George Harrison has been dead nine years.

Paul McCartney is 67 years old.

Ringo Starr will be 70 in July.

Yoko Ono is 77 years old.

Sean Lennon is 34 years old.

Julian Lennon is 47 years old.

Manager Brian Epstein, often referred to as "the fifth Beatle" would be 75 now.

Producer George Martin is now 86 years old.

Banished Words.

2010-04-05T22:13:00.001-07:00

Some suffer from overuse. Some are just insufferable. Check the list. Copy the link below, or click on the blog entry headline. Enjoy.

A Death In The Family.

2010-04-05T20:49:00.000-07:00

I lost a beloved friend today. Shadow was "just" a cat, but one of the best friends I ever had. I've written about Shadow before in my blog -- how smart he was, how human he seemed, but words can't describe how much he meant to me.

Some animals are always ready to please their owners; others quietly co-exist, preferring to just be in the background. Shadow's temperament was as varied as the weather; one day aloof, and another silly and playful, racing about the house in what we called his "Seabiscuit" routine.

One time he let it be known he was ready for his dinner. When my wife set a plate of a new flavor of cat food down in front of him, we both swear that he sniffed it, turned around, and said, and I quote, "What the fuck..." clear as a bell, and marched off, disgusted.

He knew our routine. He knew to wake me at 3:45 in the morning for work, and when it was time to go to bed. We'd laugh that he hadn't gotten the memo when the time change came, and he'd get me up an hour early.

Every night at bedtime, he'd crawl up on my chest, and rhythmically pad my chest, his claws digging through my shirt and into my skin. If I for some reason had pulled the blanket up, he would be visibly dejected, deprived of his game.

Lately, since the cancer came, he could hardly stand as he tried to do his little two-step dance. He'd get off one or two cycles, slowly, before the effort became too much.

Towards the end, his weight loss was dramatic. Shadow was literally skin and bones, yet he was more eager than ever to go outside, attempting to roll on the concrete despite the pain, and enjoy the sunshine. He gave up worrying that our other two cats, who he hated, might be out there with him. Shadow even managed to catch, and eat, one final lizard in his last week.

Through all the pain the cancer brought, the loss of blood, the loss of energy, Shadow kept his dignity. He never looked at me seeking pity. Shadow was too strong for that.

A lot of humans could have learned a great deal about life from Shadow. I know I did, and I will miss him very very much.

Hate Your Neighbors? You Need One Of These.

2010-04-05T19:00:00.000-07:00

I'm waiting for one of these...

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/04/01/the_little_nukes_that_got_away

to show up on eBay, myself. Hey, if, as the article says, they no longer have any value in today's arsenals, I don't see why they don't sell them surplus... Oh, wait, I forgot about the Taliban. Darn. It would have looked soooo cool on the front lawn, too.

Flags Of Our Future Fathers.

2010-04-02T17:55:00.000-07:00

Not long ago, I ran across an old 48-star flag at work. It's been fifty years since Alaska and Hawaii became states, bumping the U.S. flag to an even fifty in count. I got to thinking about what would happen to our flag should Puerto Rico ever decide on statehood, and, not surprisingly, there is already a 51-star flag designed for just such a contingency.

Even more surprising is that the U.S. Army has designed flags to accommodate up to 56 states.

Where would we get 56 states, you ask? Google and Wikipedia, as always, to the rescue....

As it turns out, we could end up with even more than that, if everybody who wanted their own state got their way. Think about these changes to our U.S. map -- lots of them make sense to me.

Eastern Washington joins with Idaho's panhandle: Eastern Washington has absolutely nothing in common with the western part of the state -- not weather, not lifestyle, jobs, politics -- nada.

Divide California in half: This idea actually passed the California senate just a few decades ago. Differences may not be as extreme as in Washington state, but many exist; plus the state is just too damn huge to manage. Personally, I'd give everything east of the Sierra Nevada's "spine" to Nevada, with which it has more in common.

Speaking of Nevada, Los Vegas is a city-state all to itself, again having nothing in common with the vast desert and agricultural territory that makes up the "real" Nevada. Those stupid Las Vegas types don't even pronounce the state's name correctly... it's Nee-VAAAA-duh, for gosh sake.

Which leads us to the biggest city-state of them all, New York City. Make it a state, and leave Upstate New York alone. While you're at it, break off Long Island and make it a state, too.

There have been revolts over water in Georgia, taxes in Virginia, and arguments in Texas dating back to its admission into the Union.

Then there's all those islands out in the Pacific we mainlanders never think about except when watching documentaries on WWII or atomic bomb tests. The Marshall Islands, the Northern Marianas, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and American Samoa all are under our government's thumb. Shouldn't they receive recognition, too?

Think beyond, for a minute, what this would do our flag, and think about the repercussions in American politics. How would, say, twenty extra Senators change the present balance of power? Would it swing the USA left or right? I'll let you ponder that. Get back to me with your thoughts.

Maybe Gerrard's Will Sell It?

2010-03-31T18:09:00.000-07:00

Those crafty Germans have come up with a beer I think will be a big hit:

Click on the blog entry headline, or paste this into your web browser:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2010/0401/1224267477657.html

Time's Up, Jenny.

2010-03-28T19:57:00.000-07:00

To: Jennifer Dobbs, Editor, Redlands Daily Facts

From: Dave, official thorn-in-your-side

Re: Subscription

YES! My one-year subscription to the Facts is up, and I'm not renewing. You can begin celebrating any time you like. No more will you receive Nasty-grams from yours truly complaining about the layout, composition, and most of all, writing in our once-revered daily newspaper.

I'm done. Finished. Stick-a-fork-in-it Over. Even if your circulation department offered me another ten-buck a year deal, it's just not worth the stress every evening. No more will I groan as I watch you and your band of idiots pretend to be journalists. No more will I read yet another Sunday column about your freakin' grand baby. No more will I feel my stomach churn as you give yards of free advertising to local hairdressers. No more vomit-inspiring "Questions of the Week", nor the printing of every single press release that crosses your collective desks. No more buried leads. No more moire-patterned photographs.

Free at last, free at last -- thank God almighty, I'm free at last.

Carpe Latin, Anyone?

2010-03-26T17:45:00.000-07:00

Latin, which used to be taught in our schools back when Americans spoke English and not Ebonics, still has a place in our society. It's used extensively in law and scholarly work, and shows up nightly on cop shows -- as in, "I've got an alibi..."

Have some fun with Wikipedia's list of Latin phrases:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin_phrases:_A

Maybe you can come up with a motto to go with that family coat of arms you've been doodling on restaurant napkins. Here are a few of my favorites:

Barba tenus sapientes, directly translated as "Wise as far as the beard" meaning "In appearance wise, but not necessarily so." I kinda resemble that remark.

Cacoethes scribendi, an insatiable urge to write,

caveat lector, or let the reader beware!

o tempora, o mores! -- Oh, the times! Oh, the morals!

Here's one for all us bloggers out there who think highly of our own work:

Quae non prosunt singula multa iuvant , or, "what alone is not useful helps when accumulated..."

Hey, we can even work Buzz Lightyear into this: Ad infinitum ad extra! - which roughly means "To infinity and beyond!"

and a final comment on our present government:

corruptissima re publica plurimae leges,

which means "When the government is at its most corrupt, the laws are the most numerous."

Best Picture? The Hurt Locker? WTF.

2010-03-26T08:50:00.000-07:00

OK, so I waited until after the Academy Awards to see The Hurt Locker. I was ambivalent about seeing this film, or any film about Iraq for some reason, and judging by the box office of every movie made about the conflict, I guess I'm not alone.

But -- Damn! Best Picture, huh? OK, I'll plop down a couple of bucks at the video store and see what the fuss is all about.

What I got was a pretty average war movie. Pretty average war movies rarely depict war accurately, sacrificing veracity for drama, and Hurt Locker is no exception. This is too bad, because the basic premise that war can be a drug is valid, though nothing new to either books or cinema. (Find a copy of The War Lover, either in print or on film with Steve McQueen to see what I mean.)

But the continual inaccuracies detract so much from the film that it knocks what otherwise could be a pretty suspenseful movie into the "WTF" category over and over and over again.

Much has been made of the central trio of protagonists going it alone -- modern warfare just doesn't work that way. What, no radios? Statements like "Hey, let's split up" -- ??? Come on.

Where they really lost me is when the team is somehow are out in the middle of the desert in their Humvee (alone) and come across what turn out to be either coalition special forces for some sort of rent-a-warrior team herding a group of captured bag guys. They all get in a firefight with a bunch of militants 850 meters away in a concrete block building. One of the good guys hops up on the Humvee and starts plastering the building with .50 caliber machine gun fire. You have any idea what a .50 caliber bullet does to a concrete block? A sledge hammer has nothing on a .50 hitting a block -- it will shatter in a dozen pieces. The inside of that building would be a serious cluster fuck of flying concrete and steel.

But, no, apparently our good guy can't hit squat, because he's promptly taken down by a single round from an AK-47 from the building. Nice shot, dude -- how did you manage to zero your crap rifle and calmly squeeze off a round, and hit a target 850 meters away while that block building is exploding all around you?

One of the team gets all squeamish about getting ammo out of a dead man's pouch. He retrieves just one magazine. You'd think that A) he'd grab everything he could find, and B) he wouldn't be all upset by the blood, having been tripping over blown up people for the past ten months. Guess it's just more artistic license.

Then, our hero, firing a big, heavy, Barrett .50 caliber rifle, can't seem to hit a motionless target, until he pulls off a one-in-a-million shot, hitting a running insurgent at 850 meters. Uh-huh.

Oh, there's lots more to make people groan, like when our hero goes rogue and searches for a bad guy alone, at night, in the city, (!?!) and then nearly gets shot as he tries to reenter his base.

Oh, and in another scene, why would Mr. Bad Guy put the wires to hook up his bomb only about ten feet from the bomb itself, when he could have run the wires to a safe location? It must be so he can let our hero watch him drop his 9-volt battery in defeat. Please...

I suppose director Kathryn Bigelow figured that if filmmakers got away with such nonsense in all the Vietnam movies we were raised on (think Apocalypse Now) well, why not? Well, Vietnam, being a fucked up mess from every one's perspective, and it being the 1960's (say no more) lended itself to such broad-brush film making. America has changed; the face of war has changed; cinema has changed, but apparently neither Bigelow or the Academy notices or cares.

Why I hated Fess Parker.

2010-03-18T20:16:00.000-07:00

Fess Parker has passed away. Nobody, ever, hated Fess Parker, the TV actor who brought us Daniel Boone, and earlier, a certain character that "killed a bar when he was only three" and whose last name was Crockett. And I don't mean the one from Miami Vice.

But, thanks to Parker's role as Crockett, everybody in America learned to sing the opening strains of the theme from his TV show, which was a mammoth hit only months after I was born.

As a result, for about the first 15 years of my life, anybody who learned my name was David spontaneously burst into song...

"DAVEEEEE, DAVY CROCKETT! KING OF THE WILD FRONTIER," they would blurt, usually with a big shit-eating grin on their face.

I got sick of that really fast.

Every time I think that damn song has at last been forgotten, someone will pipe up on hearing my name and start singing. Even now, fifty years after it was on the air.

My reaction hasn't changed much. I groan and growl something to the effect that "boy, that was certainly original". Then I flee as soon as possible.

I never slugged anyone for singing, but there's always a first time. You've been warned.

The Greatest Bond Film, Period.

2010-03-14T18:57:00.000-07:00

Today's beautiful weather was largely ignored as the best of the 22 James Bond films showed up on the tube -- the one, the only, the singularly wonderful "Goldfinger".

Of course, I have a predisposition to liking this film, as it was the first Bond flick I saw as a young lad of ten, and it's impact was enormous. Like the rest of the world, I was captivated by the scope of the movie, the terrific music, and of course, the greatest movie car of all time, Bond's Aston-Martin DB-5.

None of the later movies with the exception of Thunderball seemed to have any possible connection with the real world. Somehow, the ten year old in me then, as well as the 55 year old in me now, feels that, yes, there could be a nutcase like Oric Goldfinger mad enough to attempt the destruction of America's gold depository. A guy like Goldfinger could have a Korean bodyguard with a steel hat, or a flying circus composed of beautiful women. And, a guy like Goldfinger could get an A-bomb from the Chinese (at least in 1965), and the money for the whole scheme from The Mob.

Sure, why not?

It seems all the later films are just to preposterous for me. Pick any of the Roger Moore Bond films, and tell me just, for example, how James Bond is going to find himself floating around in space with Barbara Bach? Gimme Pussy Galore flying a Piper Cherokee (one of only two Bond girls older than Bond himself!) any day.

What later film has anything to compare to my beloved DB-5? That Aston that supposedly turns into a submarine? Yeah, right. (OK, so they really did build an Aston Martin submarine, but they had to wear SCUBA gear to run it. Not Bond enough in my book.) We won't even discuss Bond's BMW era.

Watching the end of the film, I'm reminded that, thanks to the Mythbusters, I now know that shooting out the window of an airplane won't cause you to be sucked out, nor cause the plane to go into a death spiral. Bummer. Some things you just shouldn't know about. I will continue to fight disbelief so to think that yes, someday, I might unzip my wetsuit, and reveal my white dinner jacket. (Not that I own either.) Now that would be cool. Seriously Cool. Bond, James Bond Cool.

Dave's list of the Greatest Bond Films Ever.

1) Goldfinger

2) From Russia With Love

3) Thunderball

4) Dr. No

5) On Her Majesty's Secret Service

6) Casino Royale (the remake.)

7 through 22 -- who cares?

After doing my list, I once again consulted the web for similar lists. Apparently, I'm not alone in liking the Connery films best, but happily there are many who enjoyed the much-maligned On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the film that featured the only appearance of George Lazenby as Bond. Remember this -- the lovely Diana Rigg (now 71 years old!) was in that film.

More Great Female Rock Singers.

2010-03-13T18:46:00.000-08:00

I got to thinking -- just who did I leave out of my list of golden-era rock singers?

Google to the rescue. It seems lots of other people have tried to list the best of the best, though most do not try to limit the time period. Here are a couple that deserve mention, though I think I'll stay with my original "top 5".

Cher. Yeah, Cher, as in "Sonny-And...". Think about this for a minute. A very distinctive voice that improved with age; a style all her own; great stage presence. Probably should be classified as more of a pop singer than rock, but.... what the hell.

Stevie Nicks. Great, unique vocalist, even though I can't make out her lyrics half the time. A great contributor to one of rock's greatest bands.

Pat Benatar. Pat could probably sing anything well, but she chose rock. Clear voice; lots of inflection, terrific power. Frequently dismissed as a flash in the pan, Pat can, to this day, kick most female singer's butts. Lady Gaga should be happy Pat Benatar isn't 21 years old.

Joan Jett. A pioneer with her band, the Runaways. Strong cult following? Get this, they're making a movie about this group.

Tina Turner. Surprisingly, she is missing from most rock lists, perhaps because she's more commonly classified as a blues/pop singer, which I think is wrong.

Anybody else I missed? Please don't suggest Blondie; I attribute all that band's success to its producer and engineer. Patti Smith? Probably, but amazingly, I don't know her stuff... she didn't get airplay on the stations I listened to in my misspent youth.

Burn, Baby, Burn.

2010-03-13T09:32:00.000-08:00

In a previous post, I bemoaned the fate of my old DVD player. Now, the laser works just great, and I was thinking to myself, "self, what could I do with that laser?". Turns out there's lots of laser projects clogging up the tubes on the Internet...

But: did you know that DVD laser is 50 times more powerful than a laser pointer? There's a site that will teach you how to convert your little Mini-Mag flashlight into a laser pointer hot enough to light a match or pop a balloon. Needless to say, a laser this powerful will damage your eyesight... so unless you want to try DIY Lasic on your corneas, you might want to stay away from projects like this one.

The Greatest Female Rock Singers.

2010-03-13T08:08:00.000-08:00

I spend a great deal of time in my car listening to classic rock on the radio. Who was the best female rock singer of the "golden age" (roughly 1965 to 1985)? Here's my take on the subject; I'm sure to have left out some obviously brilliant people that have slipped my mind, but then, you're free to write your own list.

First, here's who I left out, and why.

Folk singers are not rock singers, even if they occasionally sang a rock song. Same goes for "country-rock" pop, "contemporary" and all the Mo-Town greats. Sorry, I'm only interested in rock singers for the purposes of this list. That cuts out a lot of people who are, or were, immensely talented, and some of my favorite all-round singers as well -- people like Linda Ronstadt, Joni Mitchell, Carole King, and Carly Simon.

So, here's my list:

Number 5: Grace Slick. Here's a woman who's vocals could send a shiver down your spine in the first bar of a song. She could sing low, sing high, and sing hard.

Number 4: Chrissie Hynde. Nobody better exemplifies the rock spirit in my book. For years and years, and right up until today, Hynde leads her band in the making of great rock and roll. The fact that she leads is a big plus, too -- rock is all about strength and power, and she's got both. Maybe she doesn't have the vocal range of others, her attitude makes up for it and then some.

Number 3: I stretched my time period for the golden age of rock into the 1980's just so I could cheat and include Melissa Etheridge. Listen to her early work feel the passion, the lust behind her songs. Talk about range -- low and deep, or screaming at the person in the last seat in the last row of an arena, Melissa can do it. She'd be number 2 if she hadn't followed...

Number 2, Janis Joplin. What can I say? Maybe better people have come after her, but nobody sang like Janis, with that tortured, blues-inspired voice. You felt she put every ounce of herself into every song, with nothing held back.

Number 1: I know I'm going to catch flack for this, but the best female rock singer ever is Ann Wilson of Heart. Song after song after song, her crystal-clear, highly musical vocals define great singing. She's not as edgy as Chrissie Hynde, nor as tortured as Janis, nor a scary as Grace Slick, but she does everything well -- she writes, she leads, she plays, she has great vocal range. If this were baseball, she'd be voted MVP.

Leftover Laser Beams.

2010-03-13T07:50:00.000-08:00

It's an amazing, reoccurring story of American life: the unique and novel becomes commonplace, and then waste for the landfill. Good examples of this include the automobile, the television, the transistor radio, VCRs, and now, the DVD player.

Who would have thunk that someday we'd all be trying to find out where to throw away a machine that, at its heart, generates laser beams? I mean, really: laser beams, the stuff of science fiction and of James Bond movies.

But, there it sits on my back porch, dumped in a box along with the remains of last night's pizza.

Amazing...

OK, This Has Gotta Stop.

2010-02-18T10:57:00.000-08:00

Four days, 63 earthquakes. This is especially disturbing when you're sick in bed with the flu, as I am. There's only one thing happening more frequently -- the San Bernardino Sun's telephone subscription drive, which has a boiler room full of people calling the house constantly. Both events must stop. Now.

Redlands Does Have Its Faults.

2010-02-15T14:32:00.000-08:00

According to the USGS, we've had a total of twenty-one earthquakes here in Redlands in the past couple of days. Most of these are too small to be felt, or are ignored, or taken for trucks hauling more shit to Walmart or the stores in the Doughnut Hole.

This is not good.

That is, the quakes are not good. Our ignorance and the trucks, we brought upon ourselves.

Still, there is one place in California that's surpassing us -- someplace called "The Geysers," which by name alone ought to tell you something about it's geological instability.

Check out our faults by clicking the blog entry headline.

Driving By Wire.

2010-02-12T14:01:00.000-08:00

Ah, yes. Technology. Can't live with it; can't live without it.

Poor Toyota. Their decades-old reputation as a maker of safe, durable, unexciting cars hit a speed bump a few months back. Reports started circulating of their vehicles going hell-bent-for-leather despite their owner's protestations. First the floor mats were blamed, now they say it's the gas pedal's fault.

It seems these days a growing number of cars have accelerator pedals that aren't connected to the engine. How can this be, you ask? Well, back in the last century, gas pedals pulled a rod that opened a blade in the carburetor. Then cars got fuel-injection, replacing the carb... so the rod was replaced by a cable to open the throttle body. Add computers to the fuel injection system, so that the system knows the throttle body position, and... to hell with it, the engineers said, we'll just make a pedal that talks to the computer, and the computer can tell the engine what to do.

If I recall correctly, the first car to have this system was the V-12 BMW, back around 1990. My 2002 Mini Cooper had it, and I wasn't thrilled when I found out, because I remembered this. (Paste into your web browser, or search You Tube for "Airbus Airshow Crash")

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EM0hDchVlY

The aircraft shown was one of the first to use "fly-by-wire" technology; in other words, the pilot had to go through a computer to maneuver the plane. The factory wrote the aircraft's software so that if the computer saw that the gear was down, it was xxx feet off the ground, etc. the computer was to go ahead and land the plane.

One small problem: this Airbus was at an airshow, an event the software geeks had never anticipated. The pilot wanted to just fly past the runway at low speed, and then climb out. The computer wouldn't let him do it. The flight data recorder from the wreckage told the ugly truth: Try as he might, the plane wouldn't respond to the pilot's commands. The pilot would pull up on the yolk; the computer would push it right back! The pilot firewalled the throttles. The computer said, "No way." and refused to cooperate.

To borrow a line from HAL the computer in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: "I'm sorry, Dave, I'm afraid I can't let you do that."

Oops.

Back to Toyota: I'm sure their cars worked just fine in testing, too. Nobody ever thought that owners might track in dirt, rocks, trash, hair, etc. that might foul the pedal mechanism, especially since the problem only occurs on one of two pedals from different suppliers. In their defense, it could/can/will happen to other makes as well; Toyota just happens to be a huge company at the leading edge of technology, just like Airbus was.

Toyota's solution for the future? Starting next year, their cars will go to idle if the throttle and brake are simultaneously applied. That will please parents of American 17-year-old boys who want to attempt "power brake" starts from the stoplight, where Junior revs the engine against the brake of their dad's new Camry automatic. But...

Nobody, at least nobody I've heard from, has talked about the other, more serious consequence of this software fix.

Suppose you own a 2011 Toyota with a manual tranny. Not many are sold here, but lots of them are, in lots of other places. Now, imagine you're on a mountain road. You've crested a hill, and coming up on a sharp downhill right-hander. You need to slow down, and change gears. No problem, you say. Grab the stick, and while tapping the brake with your right heel you attempt to blip the throttle with your toe as you engage the clutch and downshift.

Uh-oh. Rather than a clean, RPM-matched shift, the car bucks and jerks like a drunken sailor, because the computer is saying "I'm sorry, Dave..." Your clutch and transmission have just taken a pounding, and, if, heaven forbid, you're in a wet, icy, or gravel-covered corner while all this crap is happening, you could quite possibly lose traction, and therefore control of the car.

Oh, and, you will be sharing the same "Oh shit" sentiment as that Airbus pilot felt as he flew into the trees.

Ain't technology a peach? As my son would say: Good luck with that.

Anyone for yet another recall?

Passings.

2010-02-12T10:05:00.000-08:00

Walter Fredrick Morrison has died. He was 90 years old. If that name doesn't ring a bell, perhaps the toy he invented will. You see, Morrison invented the Frisbee.

Mr. Morrison didn't call it the Frisbee, though. He named it the "Pluto Platter" and dressed up in a home-made space suit to promote his creation. In 1957, he sold the rights to Wham-o, which renamed Morrison's creation the "Frisbee".

Over 200 million Frisbees have been sold. I think that number is low; every kid I've known in the last 50 years has owned one, and they are sold around the world.

Oh, yeah. One more thing. J.D. Salinger died a couple of weeks ago. Catcher In The Rye is one of the most overrated books ever written. If you ask me (and you didn't) I'd say Fred Morrison made a bigger contribution to the American experience than Salinger. So there.

Enterprise RAC Follow-up.

2010-02-10T21:41:00.000-08:00

As promised, here's the response to my complaint from Enterprise Rent-A-Car.

Mr. Woods,
I wanted to apologize about the HHR that we put you in when you had a reservation for a Full size car, therefore I am going to refund your credit card $25.00 to compensate you for the difference. I hope this resolves your concern and this is a fair resolution. Thank you for your business.

Thanks, Mr. Larson, whoever you are. I love how they never address the issue that their agent in Asheville flat-out lied by claiming that an HHR was a full-size car. Best, they phrased my complaint as a "concern". Yeah, I'm concerned that thousands of other people may be getting screwed the same way I did. But, nevertheless, thanks for my 25 bucks back. Now, let's discuss compensation for pain and suffering...

12 Banned Super Bowl Ads.

2010-02-05T22:07:00.001-08:00

An almost-nude model caresses a pumpkin. Two dudes find love over potato chips. Mickey Rooney does the unthinkable. Watch these and other ads that never made it to game day.

Posted using ShareThis

Secrets of the Rent-A-Car World.

2010-02-05T21:11:00.000-08:00

Searching for similar issues I had on my recent dealings with Enterprise Rent-A-Car, I found this:

http://consumerist.com/2007/03/9-confessions-from-a-former-enterprise-rental-salesman.html

..or just click the headline of this blog entry; it should take you right to the site.

It's basically everything you ever needed to know to get a great rate on a rental car. Who knew that the rates for each class of car are meaningless? They can charge anything they want! Do some more searching, and you'll find whole web sites devoted to how messed up Enterprise is. It makes me happy I only got ripped off a little bit. By the way, ERAC now owns National and Alamo, too. Good luck.

CHAIRMAN MAO’S Underground City.

2010-02-05T18:17:00.000-08:00

Another great photo series from the folks at Crack Two, whoever they are. Enjoy.

CHAIRMAN MAO’S Underground City | Crack Two

Rare Photos of Famous People.

2010-02-05T18:14:00.000-08:00

Now for something completely different:

Rare Photos of Famous People (125 pics) | Crack Two

Goin' South, Part V.

2010-02-05T18:13:00.000-08:00

Our little adventure was at it's end. We said goodbye to 19th century luxury and busied ourselves with packing up and returning the HHR. Clearing security and boarding the plane took 15 minutes, tops.

I turned my attention to the Sky Mall magazine and the whine of the jet turbines as our lone flight attendant reviewed the multiple ways to escape death in a doomed airplane, should we find ourselves in such a rare situation.

My fancy new Swatch watch's chronometer recorded a precise, 30 second take-off roll between brake release and rotation, and Asheville fell beneath us. I glimpsed both The Biltmore and the Grove Park Inn from the window in the evening dusk, and wished them both well.

Atlanta's airport is the LAX of the south. It's so big (how big is it?) that subway cars shuttle passengers from one terminal to another, deep beneath the runways.

Maura and I wedged ourselves into seats 38 D and E. Passenger 38F showed up momentarily, a young girl on her way to Pomona to be interviewed for veterinary school. Groans were heard as a woman toting two young children dropped into the seats two rows ahead. Kids + cramped quarters + time + cabin pressurization = crying. Lots of crying.

Then things got really bad. The woman in 37F, right in front of us, hunched over and started to sob. The sobbing grew into crying. The crying grew into a wail. Ping! Ping! PING! Passengers started pushing the flight attendant call buttons. The vet student gave me one of those "Oh great, we're screwed now" looks. I gave her one back.

As we later learned, Miss 37F was on her way to rehab in Palm Springs, but not before she mixed up a stimulant and wine cocktail in the airport bar. Our stewardess took off her "enjoy the flight" face and put on her "So help me God, sit up and maintain control, because I've got three officers on the jetway ready to haul your ass off of this plane" demeanor for the benefit of Miss 37F. Wow, I didn't know that flight attendants that in them, unless Captain Skully says the plane's landing in the Hudson.

Thank God for the nice lady in 37D. I don't know who she was, but she spent the entire four hour flight engaging Miss 37F in conversation and keeping her from doing something stupid, like opening a cabin door at 36,000 feet.

At least it took my mind off the width of the seat.

Goin' South, Part IV.

2010-02-05T17:40:00.000-08:00

Having said goodbye to kith and kin in Atlanta (having consumed a great deal of leftovers from the party) we headed north once again to Asheville. Having never seen the Smokey mountains, we chose a new route back, and I'm glad we did.

Lovely country you have there, mountain folk. I bet come summer time, the road is filled with people coming up out of the heat and humidity of Atlanta to enjoy the cool air. The road is a Harley Davidson owner's dream, with long, smooth curves that would invigorate the rider.

Still not having overcome my movie-goer's paranoia of southern cops ("I sees ya'll from Califurnia. Ya'll hippies? Step outta dat car, son." I again set the cruise control for "slow" and let the HHR do its own thing, while I admired the scenery.

While we were in Atlanta, we'd missed the snow storm that had blanketed the area with six inches of the white stuff. The roads by this time were clear and dry; the bright sun keeping the temperature warm enough to prevent dreaded ice in the shady corners of the road. It looked like some Christmas of my distant past.

Asheville popped into view more quickly than expected. We returned to the first motel we had stayed at, not wanting to be adventurous with our still suffering backs, feet, knees, etc. and chose to visit the restaurant we'd had such a great meal at the first night in town. If you read part one of this travelblog, you'll know what happened next. Plastic, anyone?

The next day we visited The Biltmore. Maura, mind you, has effectively no cartilage on one knee, but she climbed up and down staircase after staircase after staircase in America's largest home. The Vanderbilts must have been in great shape having to cope with those stairs... and pity their servants. Maura was in agony.

The following morning we searched out antique stores and checked out some of Asheville's art galleries.
Nothing I've seen compares with the work on display there. We both agreed that in just one store we saw more terrific stuff than in all of the art colonies in Santa Fe, New Mexico, or Carmel and Monterey on our own California coast.

We'd saved the best for last on our trip. Our last night was to be spent in the hotel that brought us to the attention of Asheville in the first place -- The Grove Park Inn,

GPI is a Mecca for lovers of the Arts and Crafts Movement, and one of the half-dozen or so great historic resorts in the USA, along side those in Yosemite, Yellowstone, and a few others. This huge resort, located on a mountainside a few miles from central Asheville, looks out over the valley and the distant Smokeys, and has been a destination for tourists since 1895. It is a rugged looking building, it's walls a great collection of natural stone, making it appear as though somehow the sands of time had eroded away the earth, revealing the hotel beneath the mountain.

The main entrance opens to a great hall, flanked at each end by massive, and I do mean massive, stone fireplaces that dwarf the guests who stand in awe before them. A row of rocking chairs face the fire, and guests gaze into the flames for hours on end, silent in thought.

It has been a long time since I looked into the mysterious energy a fire possesses. I was captivated, as thousands have been over the decades. It drained away my aches and put my mind at ease. Looking into a stack of burning logs calls up emotions that date back to man's earliest existance. A fire meant warmth for the night, then as now; safety from predators; an opportunity to cook a meal; provide time to reflect before sleep closed in.

Today, we travel far and pay large amounts of money to sit before a majestic fire such as this. And it is worth every nickel.

Maura negotiated a great rate on a room that ordinarily would cost me the pay of two days hard work. Some ongoing exterior renovation work obscured the view, so the price was halved. So, only one day's wages... (cough.)

But what a room! A corner room, at that, with windows on two walls -- it's twin across the hall was once occupied by President Franklin Roosevelt, back in 1936... and ours had the better view. (Fear of snipers, perhaps?)

Original Craftsman furniture! Heavy tongue-and-groove paneled doors; tile work to die for; the deep, deep original bathtub. I guess you had to be there, but it was very indicative of what wealth would have brought you back in the days when traveling to, and then staying at such a resort, might have encompassed two months, rather than a single night.

We prowled the halls for hours, examining hundred-year-old furniture, listening to the trio playing in the bar, and of course, watching the fire. The hotel was perhaps at best 30 percent occupied, it being the dead of winter. As lovely and warm a place as it is, the staff as pleasant and cooperative as you could ask for, I still had to crack a joke about The Shining, Steven King's horror story about a great hotel like this in winter. Maura was not amused. Redrum, redrum...

Next: Back to reality.

Goin' South, Part III.

2010-02-05T15:47:00.000-08:00

The city of Atlanta is justifiably proud of having hosted the Olympics 14 years ago. It has a lot to show for the $1.8 billion it spent, most notably the Centennial Park downtown. It is probably the biggest and best urban park built in the US since Fredrick Law Olmstead's Central Park in New York City.

Centennial Park these days is dominated by what is touted as the nation's largest aquarium, and the Coca-Cola Bottling Company's tribute to itself, the "Coke Experience'. I'm bigger on history than I am on fish, so I guided Maura towards the Coke building; its glass and steel design reminded me of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, a place Maura and I visited on our first trip together.

It costs a surprisingly lot of money to have Coke tell you its story; $20 a ticket, plus another ten-spot to park. Remember though, the payoff of the tour is at the end -- the ability to sample Coke products from around the world. ("64 different flavors!" we were reminded again and again.)

First stop on the tour are display cases and walls of Coke advertising from the past 100-plus years,followed by a small bottle line and then, their piece de' resistance, a "4-D" movie complete with shaking chairs and spitting seat backs. It's all very, very Disneyland -- so much so I'd bet money they farmed out the work to Disney's "Imagineers". Nice, but unnecessary. We chose the non-shaking row, our backs still tender from the Delta flight.

Finally, you get to the fabled 64 flavors from around the world. Having tasted a bunch of them, it's a good thing they thought up Coca-Cola first. Here's a dirty little secret: only standard American (read high fructose corn syrup) Coke is available. If you come looking for the genuine original -- Coke made with (yum!) sugar -- you won't find it here. I suppose if they did, nobody would want to buy the stuff we get now. Visit your local specialty store and look for the good stuff from the independent Coke bottler in Dublin, Texas, or, even easier and cheaper to find, Coke from Mexico. Now that's "the real thing"...

Atlanta is as beautiful as any American city can be. Striking new buildings jut up to the sky; the highways make a Californian envious of their silky pavement, and the city fathers have done a good job of preserving the best of the past, too, both big (the historic Fox Theater) and the small (Gone With The Wind author Margaret Mitchell's house).

North of the city center, there are beautiful apartments and condos that, still farther out, give way to private homes that would be a joy to own anywhere in the country. Atlanta is a city that's done good by itself.

Goin' South, Part II.

2010-02-05T14:52:00.000-08:00

So, south to Atlanta in our gay little Chevy HHR... Having seen one or two or five too many movies featuring retarded southern sheriffs terrorizing tourists with speed traps and radar guns, I pegged the cruise control at exactly the speed limit and watched the miles and miles of those ram-rod straight trees roll past my windshield.

North Carolina gave way to South Carolina, and then Georgia. I suppose I was mesmerized by the trees, as they are so few and far between here in California, a place where even the few we have are hunted down and lobotomized by the electric company if they come within ten feet of their power poles.

Growing near the Atlanta suburbs, the highway widened and things began looking more familiar to a Californian as national chain big box stores and fast food joints grew numerous at every exit. Our destination found, we popped in to visit Maura's brother, a high-powered attorney of national note, and two of her sisters, Ruthie and Lizzie (the expectant one) who work with him.

Brother Johnny's office, with it's neo-Federal design and halls lined with Presidential portraits, suggested that he'd picked up part of the set from TV's West Wing at some Hollywood yard sale, or at least hired their designer. Very impressive.

Tired from the drive and the remnants of jet lag (how can it be three hours earlier, yet feel it's three hours later?) we made it to our nice, warm, generic hotel and crashed for the night.

The baby shower/family reunion/meet the latest set of spouses/boyfriends/girlfriends party took the better part of the next day. Ruthie held the bash at her beautiful house, which she shares with her boyfriend Keith, a stocky gent with a big passion for anything having to do with Michigan football.

Now, my timidity when faced with interacting with huge crowds of enthusiastic, if not slightly inebriated in-laws is well known, so Ruthie made it clear there were many places to "hide" in the massive Ruthie/Keith mansion. No fear; I primed myself with several bottles of Corona and dealt with my social inadequacies head on. Or, at least, in the 'head'. (Keith, bless 'em, has an amazing variety of reading material in the bathroom. I now know a great deal about high-dollar power boats. Thanks, Keith.)

Lizzie looks radiant in her final weeks of pregnancy, and her husband Bill prepared enough food to feed Delta's entire staff of starving Riwandans, plus several Haitian counties thrown in for good measure. It was (burp) very good.

Bill's parents were up from their home in Florida. They look like they'd been sent over from Central Casting to play the perfect senior couple, which they are. Bill's mom could easily get work in Hollywood in one of those "I may be over 60, but I can look and act 45" commercials that pay Sally Field so much money.

Speaking of Hollywood, I feel sorry for dear Ruth, wasting all that time and money in law school when she should have been perfecting her stand-up comedy work. She is devastatingly funny. Seriously, this is a woman who could have stolen roles from Lauren Graham, Jenna Elfman, Tina Fey, and half a dozen other big time comics. Oh well. Saturday Night Live's loss is disability law's gain.

I'd regale you with further observations of the event, but, well, you just had to be there. And a word to Keith... let me know if you find a Grand Banks 42' in bristol condition with low hours on the Cats. I'm a player.

Next: Heading downtown for a Coke.

Goin' South.

2010-02-04T23:26:00.000-08:00

My wife's youngest sister's baby being due shortly, we hustled down Atlanta way for a family get together and short vacation. What I found shook my preconceived notions of The South, as well as creating a great deal of fodder for Another Day.

Item 1: Delta Airlines has lost its grip on reality. A plane flight to Atlanta is roughly $545, but going to Asheville NC via Atlanta is only $278. Asheville is a place we've always wanted to visit. We chose Asheville as our arrival and departure destination. Delta's pricing schedule isn't their only problem, however. While all the airlines try to cram as many discount fare passengers into the rear of their planes (also known as "steerage" in the old days of, say, the Titanic) our Boeing 757 had seats that no adult, short of a starving Riwandan refugee, could find comfortable.

Lacking a tape measure (not that the TSA would have let bring one onboard) I estimate the width of the so-called seats at a meager twelve inches wide, thirteen tops. I'd like to cram a few Delta execs into those seats for four hours and get their opinion. Then again, perhaps Delta is being run these days by Riwandan refugees, which would explain a number of things.

Item 2: Flying to Asheville, rather than Atlanta required us to rent a car, which we would have had to do anyway. Here's a laugh. Enterprise Rent-A-Car describes their full-size cars on their website as "Chevrolet Impalas or similar". Note the italics, folks. Our "similar" car, there being not an Impala to be found, was a Chevy HHR, one of those retro-styled wagons that GM introduced to steal sales away from Chrysler's popular PT Cruiser. The HHR is based on the Cobalt, a compact by anyone's standard. Well, bullshit, I say; a tricked-out Cobalt is still a Cobalt, not an Impala. I fired off a Nastygram to Enterprise on my arrival home. I'll let you know the outcome.

Item 3: Forget any preconceived notion that North Carolina in general, and Asheville in particular is some backwater film set for Deliverance or Smokey and the Bandit. I learned this the minute I pulled out of the parking lot and got passed by a Lotus Elise (!), as I, in turn passed by a sizable and well-stocked BMW dealership.

As it turns out, Asheville is one very hip place to be, with art galleries in abundance, a cranking music scene, and money being made and spent quite well, thank you. If there's a backwater, perhaps it's here in SoCal's Inland Empire, though a Fontucky/San Bernarghetto rap-and-ranchera version of Dueling Banjos is beyond even my imagination.

In short, the Smokey Mountains are, well, smokin'. Beautiful houses of all vintages abound, all set on generously sized lots, surrounded by thick groves of soldier-straight trees that seem to be uniformly set four feet apart and sixty feet tall. House prices seem cheap; perhaps it's the abundance of lumber, I don't know.

Item 4: There's a chain of restaurants out there that serves delicious, gut-busting barbecue. I won't mention the name, however, because they tried to kill my wife. Just be warned of this if you ever encounter a roadhouse with the Lone Star state in its name. In due fairness, the Asheville outlet is supposedly their training center, so, as the old commercials say, your mileage my vary. In any event, it's a great tasting way to die. And, they will comp your meal if you complain. Note to the trainees: do not, repeat, do not melt plastic bags into the pulled pork. Bad idea. Very bad idea....

Item 5: If you have the slightest interest in architecture, or what it was like to be a railroad baron back in the 19th century, you owe yourself a visit to Asheville's own Biltmore mansion, home of the Vanderbilts. This was, and still is, the largest private home in America. You could, I suppose, try to wrap your head around the square footage (125,000), but try this: there's four and a half ACRES under one roof.

Guess what? It works. It's a beautifully designed home in the French chateau style; opulent, yes, but not garish in the way you might envision how some modern, super-rich guy might blow hundreds of millions on his crib. Vanderbilt wanted the best, so he bought the best, starting with his architect and landscaper. The architect? The guy who designed the base for the Statue of Liberty. The landscape designer? The guy who created New York's Central Park. Can you say "heavy hitters"?

Vanderbilt pumped so much money into his project that roughly one out of nine people in Asheville were employed at one time in creating Biltmore. Vanderbilt paid well, too. He attracted artisans to the area, and that reverberates on in the Asheville art scene to this day. It was such a huge undertaking to build, and now operate and maintain the house (still owned by Vanderbilt's descendants) that, even now, 1,800 people work at the Biltmore during peak tourist season.

It's almost (but not quite) a pity to know that Bill Gates prefers curing disease and poverty with his billions, rather than build a 21st century competitor to the Biltmore. Gate's pad would probably look like the Biltmore, too... except it would be a) reinterpreted by I.M. Pei or Frank Gehry, and b) located in a geosyncronous orbit 22,000 miles over Redmond, Washington. I'm not sure who he'd get for the landscaping; James Cameron, perhaps.

Coming next: Dave's march on Atlanta...

Oy Vey, Who Knew?

2010-01-24T21:03:00.000-08:00

...Headline from the little news feed at the bottom of the blog, this time from the L.A. Times...

"San Bernardino Loses Its Jewish Community"

I don't know if there's a "lost and found" for an entire community, but they'd better check. It just doesn't seem Kosher....

Passings.

2010-01-24T20:52:00.000-08:00

Our lives are marked by major events. Births, graduations, marriages, illness, death.

I'm cheered this month by the news in my family of both an impending birth and an impending marriage, but I'm sad to report the loss of two others who, while not relatives, are people I've known for decades.

My friend David lost his dad last month. Dave's dad was a tough career military man who flew B-17's in WWII and fought endless battles with his son when Dave was young. Still, he could be a charismatic, entertaining guy as I found out when he substitute-taught a class I had in high school.

My friend Bob lost his mother last Friday. I knew Bob's mom better than Dave's dad. I think it took her years to trust Bob's group of high school friends not to get her Bobby in trouble, but eventually we won her over... I think. Bob's dad died when he was three, so he and his mom were very close, and I know the loss Bob feels is great.

Now It Can Be Told.

2010-01-24T20:33:00.000-08:00

My "little girl" Katherine Rose is to be married.

The future Katherine Heavrin received her proposal in San Francisco today on the Golden Gate Bridge.

I hope somebody passing by honked their car's horn.

I've known this was coming for a couple of weeks. Her boyfriend, Marine Lance Corporal Phil Heavrin, is a class act, having come to my house, ring in hand, to ask in advance for my blessing.

Phil is a quiet man with a bone-crushing handshake as he looks at you straight in the eye. I like him.

They are both young, but in some ways they both seem to be throwbacks to my parent's generation, when men went to war, the women waited, and then made solid marriages when the battle was won.

Alas, the USA is not the same as it was in 1945. But the world is what you make it. Both Phil and Katie vow to go to college and make something of themselves. I believe they have the determination to do just that.

My little girl.... my little girl. Where has the time gone?

I Think They Ought To Move Closer...

2010-01-16T17:14:00.000-08:00

... now that property prices have fallen....

Headline in our own wonderful San Bernardino Sun, from the RSS feed on our blog....

Haiti quake hits home for Redlands Symphony

Wow. How do they pay the airfare?

Have I Got A Deal For You...

2010-01-16T17:07:00.000-08:00

From the folks who liked General Motors so much they bought the company, we have a great deal on some used but well maintained genuine American iron:

Seats seven; faster than any Ferrari ever made; big trunk; high miles; no warranty. Only $28 million dollars -- was asking $42 million. White in color. Two available. Email: NASA.gov.

Yep, folks, right here at Uncle Sam Motors, we've got just two remaining NASA space shuttles available to you, yes, you at the end of the year.

Be the envy of your block. Billions spent in development and upkeep; now you can own one (or two!) at bargain-basement prices. Cash only; no Pay Pal or Western Union money-grams. Can deliver....

So That's My Problem...

2010-01-12T20:45:00.000-08:00

...from the "Art Quote of The Day"entry at the bottom of today's blog, a word of enlightenment that needs to be saved for future reference, or at least to be used as an excuse once in a while.

"An artist never really finishes his work, he merely abandons it." Paul Valery

My son must be an artist, too....

Super Duper Double-Dippler Doppler Radar.

2010-01-12T20:31:00.000-08:00

My wife, Maura, is, among other things, a self-confessed weather nut. I think the favorite gauge on her car is the outside thermometer. The Weather Channel is of constant interest. Her Ipod touch has links to weather in half a dozen cities. (She has lots of relatives in lots of places.) Favorite TV? Those guys who chase tornadoes on the Discovery channel. She grouses about the inaccuracies of Los Angeles centered weather forcasts on local TV.

So I got her a weather station.

We joke about it being her "super duper double dippler doppler radar" but in fact radar is about the only activity she can't monitor now from the comfort of her easy chair.

The station itself is on a ten-foot pole mounted to the side of the garage. It looks for all the world like a high-tech weathervane with a plastic cat-food bowl on top. The station runs on solar power with a battery backup, and sends data via a low-power radio transmitter to the receiver in the house.

The receiver constantly spits out barometric pressure readings, wind velocity and direction, inside and outside temperature and humidity, precipitation, and can graph the results over days, weeks, or months, all at the touch of a button. Or two. Or sixteen, to be exact. Now, she can create her own weather forcasts. It's accurate enough that Maura can send reports to NOAA as a volunteer weather observer.

To which I say, "Up yours, Johnny Mountain."

As for me, I can turn the display's light on. I feel so empowered.

It's About Time.

2010-01-12T20:01:00.000-08:00

Up until New Year's Eve, I've never, ever, purchased a watch.

I've had a couple as gifts. The best one was stolen from my gym locker back in college. The replacement, another gift, was a perfectly serviceable Bulova that I always disliked.

I recently found a watch at work. I turned it in to my boss. It was a huge, clunky model that looked like it had been ripped from the dashboard of a jet plane. It's from a company called Bell and Ross, though it was later revealed to be a fake. I looked it up online, and the real ones are very expensive. I found myself engrossed in Bell and Ross's corporate story of aircraft pilots/engineers looking to build the ultimate watch.

I read on. And on. And on. I spent most of the New Year's holiday weekend learning the intracities (pun intended) of the watch industry.

Remember when quartz watches became all the rage? Super-accurate, and cheap to make. It about killed the Swiss, who for centuries built mechanical clocks, and later watches, with elaborate movements of gears, balance wheels, and a hundred other parts all carefully crafted to, well, run like a Swiss watch.

The fallout of this was that many of the companies that built watches and the parts that go inside either closed, or merged with one another. Eventually, to make the story short, the Swiss watch mechanical movement business ended up with two eight hundred pound gorrillas, and not much else.

One gorilla is, of course, Rolex. Everybody in every corner of the planet knows the name Rolex. The other, well, we'll get to that in a minute. Rolex doesn't sell its parts to anyone else. They build all their stuff in-house, (except for their Tudor brand, so I understand) and the rest of Switzerland, be damned.

That's not to say there are not watches for sale every bit as good as Rolex, and a lot more creative, styling-wise, if you ask me. The irony is that since almost all the other watch manufacturers must buy from Gorilla Number 2, there's a lot of similarity inside.

It's possible that you could buy an expensive Swiss watch for $10,000 (or more!), and a lesser watch for under a thousand, and find out they both have essentially the same guts. The manufacturers freely admit that. They differ, they say, in the assembly of the parts, the dynamisism of the design, the exclusivity of the brand. OK. I guess. Maybe the $10,000 watch is assembled by Vogue super models in lab coats, while the cheapo is put together by former actors, laid off when Ricola (REEE-COAL-AAAA!) cut back their ad budget. Somehow, though, I doubt that.

Now, back to the story of Gorilla Number 2. This watchmaker has systematically bought up the designs of many famous movements, cornering the market so well that it came to the attention of the Swiss government. They've been forced, beginning two years ago, to reduce their domination of the movement market in order for others to compete. Watch manufacturers like Breitling are investing millions so that they won't be short of parts from the gorilla.

So who is Gorilla Number 2? Supplier of 90% of Swiss watch parts to nearly every luxury brand that still uses traditional mechanical movements?

It's Swatch.

Yeah, that Swatch. I shit you not.

And the watch I bought? It's a Swatch.....

"I've Got Pictures."

2010-01-12T18:32:00.000-08:00

It's been a couple of days now, but I'm still trying to deal with the news that my first daughter is...

Well, let me tell you how it started.

Saturday afternoon, I was comfortably asleep during my now de rigor afternoon nap, when my wife Maura wakes me and says, "Samantha is here, and she has some photos to show you."

"Huh? Wha..?" was my very intelligent reply. I stumble to the back door.

Sammy is there, along with my other daughter Katie, and my ex-wife, of all people.

"I've got pictures." Samantha says. She is holding a small pile of black-and-white... OH MY GOD THOSE ARE SONOGRAMS.

I'm frozen. I feel the floor drop out from under me. All I can do is stare at her over the top of my glasses.

"I knew he'd give you that look," the Ex says, laughing.

She's got a whole pile of sonograms, she explains, rather than the usual one or two, because, being a nurse in a hospital, she can shoot new ones whenever she gets bored.

It's a girl. 24 weeks along. And she's already kicking, Sammy says.

I'm going to be a real grandpa. I suddenly feel as old as a grandpa is supposed to feel, too.

I think back and think what most new grandpas must think when their daughters say they're going to have a baby -- wasn't that daughter born only a couple of years ago? Why, it seems just like yesterday I was taking Lamaze class. Or changing diapers. Or celebrating a first birthday. How could it be so long ago?

Daughter Number Two has already bought baby clothes. Maura is clipping coupons for Pampers. Sunday, we hit three stores looking for the touchstone item that will bring it all home, at least for me.

When Samantha was in her first year, it seemed she lived in a bright footy jumper that we dubbed "the pink seal suit". It just somehow felt that I urgently try and locate one for Natalie, for that is what (as of now) they'll name her.

Maura, God bless her, found the perfect jumper online and available for pickup at a local store. So the torch (or pink seal suit) will be passed to a new generation.

Natalie will be coming in May. In the interim, should I refer to her as Prenatal-ie?

Maura, I suspect is getting tired of me singing "The Circle of Life" from Disney's Lion King. Perhaps I'll switch to "Sunrise, Sunset" from Fiddler on the Roof.

Damn, I feel old.

An FYI on BYD, Soon To Be A BMOC.

2010-01-12T17:26:00.000-08:00

On top of my post introducing you to the Chinese-made Geely brand, here's another contender for your auto-buying dollars in the decades ahead -- BYD. They've adopted the same approach that Geely has, which is to closely examine the best Japanese vehicles and take them as their role models.

Speaking of models, BYD makes a complete line of cars, from Yaris-style sub-sub compacts to SUV's to a dead ringer for the last-generation Mercedes SL sport coupe.

What makes BYD stand out, however, is their corporate background. BYD is an electronics maker, first and foremost. They build cell phones, for Godssakes. Think about how important electronics are to cars these days, and it makes as much sense as a certain Mr. Honda did some sixty years ago, when he decided his company would focus on engines for any use, not just building small motorcycles.

BYD already has a fully electric car in production. Check their website:

http://www.byd.com/showroom.php?car=f8

They're gonna have to change their name, though. I read "BYD" and I think either "BVD,""DVD," or "BYOB". OK?

New Year's Resolutions...again.

2010-01-02T09:46:00.000-08:00

A new year, a new decade, a new set of resolutions.

1.) Take better care of myself. I've been letting myself go, and I know it.

2.) Stop being so pissed off at so many things. It's not my job. Repeating, It's not my job...

3.) Get off the couch. Turn off the TV. Step away from the computer. (Does that count as three?)

4.) Read more books. I said that two years ago, and haven't. Try again, Dave.

Obamacare At Last.

2009-12-25T10:57:00.000-08:00

If ever there was an example of the weakness, greed, corruption, and just plain stupidity in our government, the lengthly debate over health care reform was certainly it. I say "was" because the Senate finally, finally, came to agreement (at least the Democratic majority) to pass a bill, but of course this will now go to the next step, which is getting both the House and Senate to agree on the final terms.

The fact that nobody is pleased with the result is, unfortunately, to be expected with the bunch of selfish crooks we have running our country. But, and this is the most important part, is that, in the words of Diane Feinstein, healthcare has gone from a privilege to a right. That's huge. Huge.

That one idea, now accepted and soon to be signed into law, will change how our children will live, and their children, and all the children for the rest of American history. Thank God.

Merry Christmas. Now What?

2009-12-25T09:55:00.000-08:00

So another year grinds to a close. Thank God. This hasn't been a good year for Redlands or our country, but we're still here, keeping on.

Let's see what happened this year around Redlands.

Gottshalks went bankrupt in January and closed their store in the mall.

The owner of the mall went bankrupt, too, and there's still no talk of what's to become of it. Back when it was built, a local engineer friend of ours had said there was no way it would ever make money, and it appears he was right.

The furniture store across the street from the mall folded their tent after many decades, and the plan to redevelop the property into a drive-thru pharmacy were nixed by the city council. The building remains vacant.

The car wash across from WalMart went bankrupt, too.

The Redlands Daily Facts totters on, supported in part by volumes of legal advertising required when property is repossessed by the banks.

Speaking of banks, Washington Mutual was taken over by the FDIC and sold to Chase.

On the plus side, business out in the "donut hole" where Target, JC Penney, and other mega stores reside is booming. Unfortunately, Redlands doesn't get tax dollars from them.

Redlands' patron saints used to be the Smiley brothers. These days, Jack Dangermond fits the role. His company, ESRI, is singlehandedly redeveloping the town, block by block. Their new glass-enclosed building opened this year, and is lushly landscaped. Jack apparently never met a tree he didn't like.

The city has found itself a couple of million dollars short, and has cut back services to help stem the bleeding. They're eating into the city reserve fund, which will run dry in about a year by my guess.

The schools are in a real mess. I believe they're underfunded by something like $11 million, with no clear path out of that jam, thanks to the state being billions upon billions short on revenue.

Our cops even had to face budget cuts, but thanks to grants, they're placing surveilance cameras on damn near every street corner. Don't you feel so much safer now? Be sure to try and "maintain" when you stagger out of one of State Street's trendy bars... the cops are watching you.

At least none of the half-dozen earthquakes that rolled through town this year did any damage.

So: on to the second decade of the 21st Century. Good luck with that.

Geely: No, Not That Bad Movie...

2009-12-24T12:41:00.000-08:00

If my old Mustang represents the past of American motoring, perhaps it's time to look to the future: enter Geely.

What's Geely? What it is not is more important. It is not some hi-tech niche market company trying to sell electric cars that look a lot like a Lotus Elise. (That would be somebody else.) It's not innovative, nor cutting edge, and certainly not top-of-mind. Scratch all that off your list.

What is is, is Chinese. Geely makes very boring sedans that look a helluva lot like somebody entered the dimensions of the Toyota Corolla, Honda Civic, Ford Focus, Mazda 3, and a bunch of other cars and spit them out for the Chinese middle class to gobble up. Which, it seems, they are. They build the same type of cars that most of the world, including us, buy by the boatload while we dream at night of owning a Porsche.

So why do I say this is our automotive future?

Twenty years ago, a Korean company called Hyundai started selling cars in the USA. They were gawd-awful. Just mentioning that somebody was driving a Hyundai was cause for giggles and the rolling of eyes.

And then we had Daihatsu, and Kia. Innocent people were buying small Fords, only to find out they were really Korean. Daihatsu disappeared after a couple of years. I had a dealer tell me they were glad to give up the franchise, because they couldn't make any money in the service department on them. They didn't break, unlike their other brand, Dodge...

Kia went bankrupt, and Hyundai bought them up. Today, they sell well. And guess what? People don't roll their eyes when somebody buys a Hyundai, because they have a killer warranty and last a long time.
The cognoscienti will tell you that Ford uses Hyundai as a quality standard to measure their car interiors against.

My, have times changed.

Korea is a small country. Geely's is going to dominate the world soon. And we owe China billions and billions and billions of dollars. Think we'll keep them out of our market? Not likely. (Crap, I'll bet WalMart will sell them.) Look for a Geely in your neighbor's garage in the next few years.

Oh, they'll have to change a few things. Like, perhaps, product names? People would split their pants laughing if you said you just bought a new Geely KINGKONG.

Oh, and did I mention Geely just purchased Volvo? That gives them an instant dealership network in North America and Europe....

The '65 Is 45.

2009-12-23T21:23:00.000-08:00

Forty-five years ago, today, my dad and I picked up the 1965 Mustang he'd had on order from the Towne Ford in Redwood City. I was ten years old, but I remember it like it was yesterday.

My first sight of what was to be the seminal car in my automotive history was not a pretty one. The hood was up, the dashboard was a maze of wiring, and a mechanic in overalls was upside down on the floor, cursing.

"Who the hell would order a car without a radio, and then decide to have one put in!" he groaned.

My dad, that's who. He'd had nothing but trouble with the radio in the old Chevy, so he'd decided to do without... only to decide later that the radio, being literally the centerpiece of the dash in the Mustang, would have looked awkward had it been missing... so he asked that it be put in when it arrived.

This was only the latest in a series of problems that had plagued the purchase. Dad had ordered it in plenty of time for it to arrive before our planned trip to celebrate Christmas with relatives. Unfortunately, the United Auto Workers had other plans that year, and went out on strike. Fortunately, Ford and the UAW came to terms in short order, but demand for new Mustangs being huge, the already long waiting time grew by several weeks. Dad grew increasingly anxious, but finally the call came only two days before Christmas.

The Mustang was to have had a saddle tan interior to complement the dark metallic green exterior, but arrived with light green seats instead. Somewhere in the middle of the model changeover and the strike, tan was discontinued and nobody bothered to tell either the dealer or my dad. My mother had made a tan pillow (alpaca fur!) which no longer matched, but it stayed in the car for many years.

Sitting in the back seat for the first time, I remember thinking that as cool as the new Mustang was, nobody was ever going to be able to restore these things, like people restored Model A's and other old cars. All that plastic! What I didn't know was that all that plastic was easier to reproduce than the stuff Model A's were built out of. Here we are, 45 years on, and that car will probably outlive me.

No time for a gentle break-in -- we left almost immediately for SoCal, at night, in a steady rain. The fresh plastic and vinyl dashboard offgassed enough goo onto the inside of the windshield to nesessitate repeated cleanings on the way. I didn't care; we had the coolest car on the highway.

A few years later, the car was mine. I drove it in high school and college, street raced it, drove it on my first job far away from home, took it on dates with many a girl, rebuilt the engine myself, and drove it with my first daughter in the back seat.

I also drove it to my dad's funeral. I sold it not long after.

Today, the car rests not far from here in the good care of an old friend. I see it occasionally and know without hesitation how every switch and knob and doorlatch should feel, how the windows sound as they are wound up; the ka-lunk of the hood and thump of the trunk as they are shut.

I know it's VIN, (5R07C166312) it's old license plate, (MKW454) that it takes a Fram PH8A oil filter, and that you set the point gap at 30 thousanths. It took Autolite BF 45 plugs. (BF 35's when racing.) I could not tell you any of those things for any car I've owned since. (Especially since "points" are a thing of the past. Electronic ignitions, you know.)

To tell you the truth, I never want to be that emotionally invested in a car again. But like an old friend you don't see any more, history is history. They don't make Mustangs the way they used to, and life has grown more complicated, too. I'll celebrate this little bit of nostalgia at a respectful distance.

Don't Thank Sam Walton.

2009-12-20T11:24:00.000-08:00

Most of America probably gives the founder of Walmart, Sam Walton, credit for the invention of the membership-only super center, where one can buy everything from toothpaste to tires.

The fact, as long-time Californians know, is that the credit rightfully goes to Sol Price, who died this week at age 93. Yes, Price created Price Club, which later merged with Costco. But even before that, back in 1954, he created the original super store in San Diego -- FedMart.

According to his obituary in the New York Times, Mr. Price opened his first store near Lindberg Field, limiting membership to federal employees. The first year, he lost $750,000. After offering membership to the public, the company took off and made Mr. Price a very wealthy man.

Those of us who grew up in Redlands remember FedMart very well. It was located in a former A&P supermarket on Orange Street, the site now occupied by Starbuck's Coffee and several other fast food chains.

I remember being taken there by my grandfather to buy salmon eggs before a fishing trip in the mountains. I bought model cars, spray paint (49 cents!), and a ton of other stuff there for the better part of ten years.

I miss FedMart. Thanks, Sol.

The Big Two Hundred.

2009-12-20T11:05:00.000-08:00

I've reached a milestone of sorts with Another Day in Redlands CA. -- my Blogger homepage tells me that this will be my 200th entry. To quote those great sages of long ago, Bartells and James: Thank you for your support.

No News Is Bad News

2009-12-13T19:43:00.000-08:00

Thursdays's announcement that newspaper trade publication Editor and Publisher will shut down immediately comes as quite a blow to all the ink-stained wretches out there who toil(ed) in the trade.

What better indicator that the newspaper industry is suffering serious wounds? To think that E&P is dead is just inconceivable to me. A long, long time ago, when I was working in my first serious job out of college, living on a diet consisting largely of Swanson's TV dinners, I still found the money to buy a subscription to Editor and Publisher. It kept me in touch with the rest of the business; made me feel that though I was in a crappy job, in a crappy company, in a crappy town, in a crappy state, I was part of something bigger and more important.

I suppose that there are other forums now for people in the business; back then there was no Internet, and all that personal technology has brought us -- the same technology which is killing print as we speak. But, just as there is something to be said for the tangibility of the newspaper, there is something very good indeed about a magazine that makes one feel like a professional in a world that very much wants you to be just another worker bee.

Worst Use Of A Rock Song In A Commercial...

2009-12-13T17:17:00.000-08:00

We boomers have endured years of classic rock music rehashed as themes for TV commercials. Even the Beatles and Led Zep turn up in ads these days; probably the most creative use of Rock as Advertising was Zeppelin's "Rock and Roll " to reposition Cadillac in the marketplace.

What I don't understand is Pachanga Casino's use of "More Than A Feeling" by one of my favorite bands of all time, Boston. Yeah, I know, I know... baby boomers (supposedly) have money to burn at the gaming tables. Some genius says, "let's use a classic rock song nobody else has used to lure them in" and voila, we're hearing Brad Delp (RIP) implying that playing slots owned by the Indians is some sort of transcendental experience.

Right.

No, it's not right. It's wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. It's jarring. The images don't fit the soundtrack. There's no audio or video subtext to explain the use of the music. Gag.

Boston should have held out for the 2011 Mustang, or some energy drink, or something else that takes the spirit of their music and uses it to better effect.

Oh well, I hope they got a good paycheck.

Add This To Your Bookmarks, America

2009-12-09T20:21:00.000-08:00

Think of all the crap the late, belated Weekly World News wanted you to believe was true. Now think of a web site that had real, serious stuff that the world would prefer you not know. Let me introduce you to Wikileaks. Nothing frivolous here -- just stuff that's out there, floating under the radar that you won't find Katie Couric purring about on the CBS Evening News.

Linky:

http://www.wikileaks.org/wiki/Wikileaks

Speaking of Hanukkah...

2009-12-09T19:55:00.000-08:00

In my last post, I wondered about why no Christians write Hanukkah songs, as so many Jews write (very good) music about Christmas.

As it turns out, someone has.

It's quite a catchy tune. What makes it really interesting is the source.

Would you believe the song's author is the senior Senator from Utah, Orrin Hatch? I kid you not. And Hatch is a Mormon. Go figure.

I can't figure out how to create a link to the song, but you'll find it at NPR's web site. Enjoy.

Random Thoughts; Not Well Thought Through.

2009-12-04T22:14:00.000-08:00

Don't, as I found myself in a dream last night, find yourself in a circa 1970 Vietnamese village with only five rounds remaining in your M16 rifle. Especially if the village looks like Redlands. (Warning: the VC are forming up at the donut shop on the boulevard.)

Meredith Baxter is a lesbian? Damn! I've had a crush on her for 35 years. I couldn't be more surprised if Rosie O'Donnell came out and said she was straight.

Turkey isn't just for Thanksgiving anymore. Turkey purchased at a cut-rate price after Thanksgiving tastes even better, and the leftovers can stretch on for nearly a week. Yummy.

If so many Jews have had huge success recording Christmas albums (Neil Diamond? OMG...) why isn't there a market for Christians singing songs for Hanukkah? Is there a message there someplace? And, by the way, when is Michael Jackson's lost Kuanzaa album due out?

I've obviously lived a sheltered life. Apparently everybody but me knows that Ambien is a sexual stimulant. This has come to light thanks to Tiger Woods' short drive into a tree. Maybe they ought to rebrand it as "Escalade" in honor of Tiger's damaged Cadillac. Seems like a great name for a product of that nature.

Sophia Loren is 75. Seventy-five years old? No freaking way.

Bond. James Bond.

2009-11-30T10:33:00.000-08:00

In my book, there's only one Bond. Sean Connery. He was the first James Bond I ever saw, and the best. Mr. Connery has been in poor health lately and hasn't been on film in several years, but it is good to know he's doing voice work for an animated short, the second in a series, which takes place in his beloved Scotland.

Connery's Bond defeated a lot of bad guys over the years, and it's interesting to note that he's outlasted all the actors who played the bad guys as well.

Last month, Julius Wiseman, who played Dr. No, passed away. Donald Pleasence (Blofeld in You Only Live Twice) died in 1995, Gert Frobe (Goldfinger) in 1988, and Adolfo Celi, Largo in Thunderball, back in 1986. I'll ignore the unofficial Never Say Never Again that Connery appeared in -- Max Von Sydow (Blofeld) is still quite alive.

Connery has also outlived all of the guys who played his CIA counterpart, Felix Leiter. Cec Linder (Goldfinger) passed in 1992, Rik Van Nutter of Thunderball in 2005, and, most recognizable of the American spooks, Jack Lord, who died in 1998.

Time has also not been kind to Bond's MI6 brethren. Bernard Lee (M) died in 1981, Desmond LLewelyn (Q) in 1999, and sadly, the lovely Lois Maxwell, Miss Moneypenny, in 2007.

Bond girls may not have great screen careers following their appearance in the series, though the fabulous Pussy Galore of Goldfinger, Honor Blackman, continues to work at the age of 82. As far as I can tell, all the other lesser Bond girls are still alive and kicking.

So let's all raise our glasses (shaken, not stirred) to Connery Bond, and the fun we had at the movies.

Short Description = Short Attention Span.

2009-11-29T21:25:00.000-08:00

Somewhere, in some cubicle, in Hollywood, or New York, or Cleveland, or Bombay, for all I know, there's some guy tasked with boiling down the plot lines of movies into fifteen word summaries. These little summaries end up as the TV listings on my cable guide.

They suck.

Just the first few words turn me off. They tell me "Forget it, Dave, you're going to hate it. This movie is crap. It's trite. It's tasteless. It's a waste of time."

Those words have exactly the opposite effect that the networks want to create -- they drive me away from watching the movies. Most of the time, I don't get through the description before I've moved on to the next listing, only to find myself again reading no further than the first few words and moving on, yet again.

Let me give you some examples. I won't tell you the names of the movies that the description is meant to illustrate. Just read, and decide if you would continue to read the rest of the synopsis, much less watch the flick. Perhaps you will agree with me. Perhaps not. After all, somebody bought tickets to these gems.

A simple Missouri farmer...

A liberal adaptation of the life of Jesus...

In medieval Korea...

In ancient Rome...

After causing St. Nick to have a fatal accident...

A career-minded architect...

Rebel forces gather...

A martial arts teacher...

A small town is brought together...

A single mom becomes pregnant...

When a man is mugged...

A tyrannical Roman leader...

A brilliant scientist is horribly disfigured...

A reporter awakens...

In the 1980's, a former rock star...

A family gets a police dog...

A soldier is released from prison...

After serving in WWII...

An enthusiastic computer programmer and his girlfriend...

Two brothers find a downed spacecraft...

An updated telling of the classic tale...

An IRS agent with a mysterious secret...

Two weed-smoking friends...

A former US soldier...

An aging transsexual...

NASA discovers an enormous asteroid

Two brash fighter pilots...

Two brothers with a history of conflict...

A martial arts expert enters a tournament...

A model and a car dealer team up...

Scientists train genetically altered sharks...

A reclusive and awkward man...

A famous rapper is denied membership...

An unemployed single mother resorts to...

A disgraced former FBI agent working as...

A cantankerous female FBI agent...

A struggling young artist receives inspiration...

After a detective's wife is murdered...

A girl returns from a mental hospital...

When a submarine goes missing...

A young pregnant woman discovers...

A depressed man is urged to enroll...

Psychotic killer returns...

A high school student dreams...

Un mercenario que transporta mercanicia ilegal
(just thought I'd throw that one in...)

Maybe some night I'll drink a lot of beer and combine all of these into the ultimate bad movie.

It will be about tyrannical, depressed, weed-smoking pregnant Roman soldiers who find a craft from outer space after being released from prison while psychotic aging transexual Korean rebel forces gather to train genetically engineered sharks that once worked for the FBI. All will die however when the asteroid hits in a liberal interpretation of the life of Jesus.

I'm summarizing here to save the guy in the cubicle some work.

It will probably make millions.

Let's Get Animated For A Minute...

2009-11-29T20:25:00.000-08:00

Knowing that lots of people will be stuck around the house on the long Thanksgiving weekend, the TV networks pulled out some of their grade "A" stuff to watch. (Not enough, but enough.)

Having just rented Disney's Up the other day, and remembering how terrific it was to see a genuinely creative story told, I was delighted to see three other animated films on TV. The Incredibles remains one of the best movies released in the past decade, and loses nothing in multiple viewings. Cars, another one of Pixar's hits, is sheer genius, especially to anyone who has loved anything automotive or who has traveled Route 66 / Interstate 40 multiple times, as I have. Finally, I got to see a recent release that didn't get as much attention as the others, but none the less is a fine film in its own right -- Bolt.

All of these films combine outstanding animation with (pardon the pun) three dimensional characters, a well thought out story, and great voice acting from some of the best people in Hollywood... and I just don't mean the "stars" whose names we all recognize. There are some incredibly talented people roaming around Hollywood whose faces you will never see, but who's voices you have heard perhaps hundreds of times on film and television. To them, I tip my hat.

Lately, all we seem to get on the big screen are cheap comedies and big CGI films lifting characters from comic books. Maybe the studios ought to turn the creators of the above films loose on live action movies. Then again, maybe not. I want to see more great animated films in the future.

Happy Thanksgiving.

2009-11-26T09:35:00.000-08:00

Today is the day we should all remember our ancestors who shared their blessings with the natives.

As such, the wife and I will be dining at home on Fajitas and drinking Mexican Coca-Cola.

It was either that, or going to the Indian casino and playing the slots.

I'd Laugh, But It Ain't Funny.

2009-11-24T16:50:00.000-08:00

The New York Times reported today that many newspapers around the country, including the San Bernardino Sun and the Riverside Press Enterprise, will boost the price of their Thanksgiving (or in case of the PE, day after) newspapers to the Sunday rate.

Traditionally, the Thanksgiving day newspaper is physically one of the largest, if not the largest issues of the year due to the enormous amount of Christmas advertising. Street sales of the paper from vending machines also spike as people want to know what's going to be on sale the following day.

How sad it is that newspapers can't draw readers based on their news content any longer, and at last are admitting that people are buying the paper just for the ads. That being said, ad revenue continues to decline because of the generally piss-poor economy and more so because newspapers fail to provide reasons for people to subscribe. Typical of the brain-dead publishers and owners who run these businesses, they're taking the tactic of punishing their buyers (both readers and advertisers) on the one day they want the paper most.

Imagine if retailers operated this way... Walmart, Target, Best Buy, Sears, et al all raised their prices the day after Thanksgiving,.. ridiculous, huh? You'd tell them to shove it, and find somebody else to buy from. Maybe somebody online. Maybe somebody who mailed you a catalog.... Gee, let me think, who are newspapers competing with these days? Online news compilers (and their ads) and direct mail.

Idiots. Idiots. Idiots.

Oh, and in other news, the Washington Post is closing all its US bureaus. Goodbye New York, Chicago,and Los Angeles Post writers.

When The Dead Refuse To Die.

2009-11-21T20:44:00.000-08:00

Go figure.....

Item 1) New Moon, the sequel to Twilight, has set a record for an opening day box office -- $72.7 million. While I haven't seen it, longtime movie critic Roger Ebert, whom I trust, reports the movie seriously sucks. Apparently people don't care that it sucks, as even here in Redlands, people camped out days before the movie opened to insure they'd be the first to see a sucky sequel to a sucky pop-culture phenomenon. Lines stretched all the way from the theater to Redlands Blvd. and on down the block.

Item 2) Going Rogue, Sarah Palin's autobiography, has sold 300,000 copies on its day of release, and the initial print order of 1.5 million copies has been upped by an additional million. The one-day sale exceeds Hillary Clinton's book by fifty percent.

Is there something I'm not getting here? A vampire drama swamps the theaters -- and the vampire is a vegetarian? That Sarah Palin is still in the news, despite often looking like an idiot during her vice-presidential run, and subsequently quitting the governorship of Alaska?

Is it that a vampire and a folksy politician are both too cute to lay down and die, metaphorically? One movie, and one election, are one too many for both.

An Apple A Day...

2009-11-21T20:09:00.000-08:00

...sends the dentist my way.

Friday, a nice crisp apple separated one of my front teeth from its home of half a century.

Shit...

I've never liked my teeth. My teeth have never liked me. I'd rather go into battle in Afghanistan, armed with nothing more than a BB gun, than visit a dentist. The only way I'll go is if a) the dentist hands over a double dose of Ativan, a tiny little pill which knocks me cleanly on my ass for 18 hours, and b) provides me a heavy mixture of Nitrous, which I will huff like a twelve year old trying to get high on airplane glue.

Once sedated, I will resist the temptation to kick and scream like a little girl, and instead surrender to the mind-expanding power of the chemicals swirling about in my brain. Hours pass quickly, and I will find myself outside trying to remember the brilliant insights I'd had under the spell of the drugs. I do suspect, however, the last dentist I visited has not yet been able to remove the claw marks from the arms of his chair while I waited for the good stuff to kick in.

Once home, I will sleep like the dead for a solid 12 hours, and remember nothing at all from the experience, or the entire previous day, for that matter. This can be something of a problem at work if you're required to, say, know what you did before you headed for the exam.

Perhaps I'll just look for work in Hollywood as a character actor. It is, after all, about time for a remake of Deliverance, and what with my missing tooth, I can play hillbilly #3. Cue the banjos, please....

Dave vs. Dobbs -- My Ongoing War With The Redlands Daily Facts

2009-11-16T20:37:00.000-08:00

My wife cringes when I sit down each evening to read The Facts, our little community newspaper here in Redlands.

She cringes because she knows that on any given night, I will find something that will turn me into a raging, vein-popping, bug-eyed, up-close-and-personal local version of Lewis Black.

It's not that there's no news in The Facts. I'm accustomed to that; I resigned myself to the new realities of community journalism a long time ago. What stirs me up like a turbocharged Oster blender set on warp drive are the typos, pagination errors, style absurdities, and just plain amateurism I find on a routine basis.

When it really gets to me, I grab the paper and head for the computer. My wife will go "uh-oh" and ask to see what I write to Facts editor Jennifer Dobbs. I suspect she wants to know if she should be dialing the phone for a defense attorney.

I felt compelled to fire off one of my famous Nastygrams again just a few hours ago. It seems that they have hired a reporter who, I suspect, never finished middle school, much less journalism school. I have never seen an article printed in any newspaper (even The Facts!) with such poor sentence structure, misspelled words, or bad grammar. I'd give you examples, but I'm trying hard to keep my blood pressure below flash point.

I practically demanded that editor Dobbs email a reply, and she did. Here's what it said:

I looked at the piece after receiving your e-mail and agree it should not have run and it wasn't scheduled to run. I need to talk to staff and find out why that happened.

Thank you for bringing it to my attention.

I'm glad that the article should not have run, but it begs the question: Why was Ms. Dobbs not aware of the story until I alerted her to it?

I just don't have it in me to ask.

Small steps, David. Small steps...

Now I Know Where The Term "Finish Line" Comes From

2009-11-16T16:21:00.000-08:00

This is amazing video. These Finns make anybody, in any American motorsport, look like a bunch of pansies. And did I mention the spectators? I can almost see them holding scorecards, ala Dancing With The Stars, each time a car crashes in a ditch, flips three times, mows down a telephone pole and half a dozen pine trees: "8!" "9!" "8!" Golf claps all around, please.

Now, mind you, these cars all look like stockers with roll bars added. Look at the bottoms of the cars, and you'll see no shiny race bits, just stock exhausts with mufflers and skinny tires. So, in all probability, these cars have seen a decade's worth of road use (and road salt, this being Finland) so they're probably rusty as all get out. Perfect for bending around Aspens.

While this is a compilation of lots of races, there's at least one sequence where not two, not three or four, but at least 10 cars crash at the same spot in the same race. Remind me never to get in a bar fight with a Finnish rally driver -- these guys are tough.

Click the link!

Crazy Finns Crashing - with pure crashing sounds

If you think that's fun, check 'em out in the snow...

Rally crash compilation special snow rally

There's dozens more rally videos on You Tube from all over Europe, but I think the Finns have the market cornered on Crazy. Enjoy!

Obama and the Afghanistan Decision.

2009-11-16T15:47:00.000-08:00

The President has been taking a lot of time making up his mind about what to do about the level of troop deployment in Afghanistan. His leading general tells him he needs 40,000 more people to make progress, and by progress he means securing the villages from attack, not wiping out the opposition. Others close to the President, so the leaks/rumors have it, are telling him to send 20,000 guys and just blow the hell out of anything that moves.

The recent elections were a farce and it revealed the true face of the current Afghan leadership, which is to say their isn't any, at least in the democratic sense. Karzai looks like he tried to steal the election, and it's been well publicized that Karzai's own brother is a crook, and apparently on the take from the CIA as well. Not a really good endorsement of our efforts so far, wouldn't you say?

So, here's my two bits on the topic. I think Obama is stalling because he wants to see if Karzai can get his shit together. If he can't, Obama is going to pull the plug on the whole mess and walk away, saying "we did what we could", to the extent that the coalition will let him/us get away with it. I think that would just be fine, though Hillary would cough up a hairball.

Not a bad solution, since Al Qaeda and Bin Laden are well holed up in Pakistan, not Afghanistan anymore, and the Pakis have their own problems that ultimately are more far reaching than their own region -- I'm talking about their stockpile of nukes, which a whole bunch of terrorists would love to get their hands on.

I hope the CIA has done their homework on that one. Oh, and did I mention the mess in Iran?

Figuring Out Flickr

2009-10-31T12:43:00.000-07:00

I've recently discovered Flickr, the photo hosting site. I've known about it for a long time but I never gave it a full look-through.

A few years ago, I seem to remember Life magazine doing a special edition where photographers documented a single day of the entire world. With Flickr, you can click on an icon showing you a sample of the five to six thousand photos uploaded every minute to their site. It's worth looking at to see just what people find interesting enough in their lives to a) document with a camera, and b) upload for the whole world to see.

It's an odd mix. I was surprised to find fewer wedding and travel photos, or even ones of new babies,than I expected, though they do appear in large numbers. Then there's the photos by "serious" photographers who have not only spent a great deal of time on composition and exposure, but on tweaking the image in Photoshop or some other image-altering program to create brilliant, if slightly unreal, if not surreal, pictures.

Party photos, particularly right now at Halloween, are big, though they usually consist of overexposed, slightly out of focus shots taken at odd angles -- probably representative of the physical and mental condition of both the photographer and subjects. I think Flickr censors out some photos to keep the "girls gone wild" element to a minimum.

Then there's the fashionistas/wannabe models, who shoot hundreds of pictures of themselves, taken at every conceivable angle, wearing their latest outfits, hairstyles, and makeup. These women scare the hell out of me for some reason.

Remember when little girls played with dolls? Now big girls play with dolls and document their designer efforts on Flickr. This phenomenon seems to be an Asian thing, not too far removed from Anime. I don't get it. But then, I don't really get Anime, either.

On very rare occasion, you'll find photos that were taken decades ago. The best stream I've found so far were several dozen photos taken on the streets of DC during the 1972 Presidential inauguration parade. If you think the world is fucked up now, look at these: Midwestern marching bands and floats right out of the 1950's; Nixon with his famous phony smile waving to the crowd; a large and haggard bunch of radical college students protesting the war. All images I've never seen, and worthy of a national archive.

U2 Much.

2009-10-25T12:32:00.000-07:00

There was a day not long ago when a major music performer would show up for a concert in his car, pull his guitar out of the back seat, and hit the stage and spotlight.

Things change.

It's not enough to be an accomplished musician or talented band anymore; no, it's as much about the presentation as it is to sing, and dance, and play for the crowd. For evidence, I offer you this little fact:

Rolling Stone magazine reports that it takes one hundred twenty trucks to move U2's current show from venue to venue. Think about that. Ever sit at a train crossing and count the cars go by? Minute after minute, 60, 70, 80? Now think about one hundred and twenty 48-foot semi's rolling past, all for one freaking rock and roll show.

I've never been much of a concert goer, but doesn't all that engineering get in the way of the music? Or, are people saying, "Well, their music is OK, but I hear the stage is really cool."

Sure, I'm an old fart, but I don't recall anybody going to Woodstock to admire the truss setup.

No wonder tickets cost so damn much these days.

Redlands' Biggest Rock Hero...

2009-10-18T17:21:00.000-07:00

...is Kim Fowley. Look at this guy's resume by clicking on this post's headline; I bet he could tell some tales. Rock, punk, folk, strange, from Zappa to Helen freakin' Reddy, the lad has done it all. He even worked on American Graffiti! Check his wiki listing, too... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Fowley

...where there's some interesting comments from former members of The Runaways. And you always thought Redlands' biggest musical connection was folkie Joan Baez...

The Walmart War

2009-10-12T19:55:00.000-07:00

There's been an ongoing war over the proposed construction of a "Super Walmart" here in little 'ol Redlands. Those opposed point to Walmart's lousy employee pay and anti competitive pricing, and the proponents shout the glories of Walmart's low prices.

Here's my take.

I've always hated Walmart. The company has a particular blandness only a company founded and managed from Arkansas could create. Yes, its prices are cheap, because the products are cheap. Remember when Walmart touted its products as American made? Not any more. Years ago, Walmart destroyed many a middle American town by undercutting locally owned businesses who couldn't compete on price. So how goes it now?

What will a Super Walmart mean for Redlands? Other than a very large vacant box where the current store is located, not much. Here's why.

If Wallyworld disappeared from the planet in some sort of retail rapture, where would people turn for the things they used to buy there?

Foodstuffs -- big grocery chains like Albertsons and Vons

Electronics -- big electronic chain stores like Best Buy

Auto Parts and Repair -- big auto parts stores like Pep Boys and Auto Zone

Sporting Goods -- big sporting goods chains like Big 5 and Sport Chalet

Clothing -- big clothing chains, Target, Kmart, and Penney's

Health and Beauty -- big pharmacy chains, like CVS and Walgreens

Garden -- big box home improvement stores like Lowes and Home Depot

So... the common denominator here is the word "big"... Walmart competes in this market with other big chains, because there is no small business Walmart wants or needs to compete with any more. They're all long dead and gone.

Yes, we have our boutique stores serving select segments of the overall market in most (but not all) of these categories. But the real dollars these days go to the big nationwide shops. And of the list, only a few of them (grocery stores) pay a living wage, thanks by and large to unionization.

The war is over. Walmart and all the other big boxes have won. Independent business was wiped out years ago. The end.

Going To The Hospital...

2009-10-04T15:33:00.000-07:00

Today I visited the mother of an old friend at Redlands Community Hospital. (She's doing fine.)

I was struck, though, about how visiting a hospital is good for us. It reminds us that life is a fragile thing; that we should cherish our good health. I walked out of there with a fresh appreciation of the cool fall weather, the distant mountain vistas, and the music on the radio.

Even if we're in not-s0-good shape, not being in the hospital should give us joy, for that means we are free to be out and about, and not trapped in a bed surrounded by machines and charts and bedpans.

Don't shirk your duty visiting the infirm; it's good for you.

Raiders of the Lost Film Trailer

2009-10-03T14:38:00.000-07:00

Dear Steven and George:

I'm shocked, shocked to see that Raiders of the Lost Ark was, in fact, a remake of an earlier Charlton Heston film. Despite your heretofore successful efforts to suppress its existence, a diligent film historian has rescued one of the last remaining copies of the film's trailer that you hadn't had destroyed. See for yourself -- here's the link:

YouTube - Raiders of the Lost Ark (1951) Trailer

I think you owe the movie going public an apology....

oh, and by the way, this is all a lie. But it's damn good editing on somebody's part.

Things I'll Never Need In Ireland.

2009-09-22T15:47:00.000-07:00

Sun screen.

Shorts.

A mister system.

High fructose corn syrup. (Everything is real sugar, there.)

Air conditioning.

A 4 speed, dual quad, posi-traction 409.

Ebonics-to-English translation book.

Another Good Reason To Not Watch TV

2009-09-20T20:55:00.000-07:00

This year's Emmy awards show was supposed to have showcased the best television has to offer. Maybe it did, but I turned it off after the first hour because it certainly wasn't offering up anything I wanted to watch.

I don't want to know who was responsible for writing garbage like this, but their names ought to be passed around Hollywood as people who have no comedic sense whatsoever. I've never seen so many jokes fall flat in the name of "edgy" humor.

Get a clue, guys. There's better jokes in a three year old copy of Reader's Digest. I'm sure you all think Jay Leno is out of style -- but at least he can make people laugh. Neil Patrick Harris may be funny on his sitcom, but he's the poster boy for award show hosts who are so full of themselves. And, as Wifey pointed out, he's no Hugh Jackman when it comes to song and dance, either.

I guess it's back to the Discovery Channel for me...

What If...?

2009-09-20T16:23:00.000-07:00

Funny stuff for your enjoyment.

YouTube - "What If the Beatles Were Irish?" by Roy Zimmerman

I Want It. I Want It Bad.

2009-09-19T21:48:00.000-07:00

Follow the link below to the cottage of my dreams. Nine minutes of heaven.

YouTube - mossfort cottage

So You Thought Insider Trading Was Illegal? Guess Again.

2009-09-19T21:20:00.000-07:00

This little bit of news pissed me off.

If you work on Wall Street, and use information not available to the public for your own profit, you can go to jail. It's a serious crime. But guess who can use insider information freely, make all the money they want, and do it perfectly legally?

Your Congressman.

That's right, folks. The people who regulate Wall Street and write the laws that determine how your tax dollars are spent, are free to use information that the public doesn't yet know about to make money for themselves.

And use it they do. A recent study shows that our reps are making about 12 percent annually on their investments, in good markets and bad. Bernie Madoff should have had it so good.

There ought to be a law. Yeah, like they're going to pass a law like that.

Great Hollywood Mistakes.

2009-09-19T20:07:00.000-07:00

We're not going to dwell on so-called movie "bloopers" as there's a ton of websites out there that can point out even the smallest continuity screw up. No, I'm talking mistakes that have derailed, even ruined the careers.

Image, for example, is everything. Letting the whole world know you're an irresponsible drunk not only drives away your audience, it drives away investors who might finance your next film.

Look no further than Mickey Rourke, who only last year was able to crawl out of his self-created black hole and find a role that was able to capitalize on the actor's past. What comes next is up to him.

It's worse if you're a woman in Hollywood. All but a few have a relatively short shelf life in film, and this isn't the forum to argue about the cruelty of that fact. Add irratic behavior and the public perception swings from "oh, isn't she cute" to "look at that crazy bitch". Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Lindsay Lohan...

Lohan didn't help herself by becoming attracted to a lesbian disc jockey and proclaiming she was gay to everyone who would listen. While Hollywood is certainly one of the most gay-friendly industries around, a certain amount of modesty in the matter makes a great deal of difference to the ticket-buying public. Good job: Jodie Foster. Bad job: Anne Heche.

Dis-figure this: Actors have long relied on cosmetic surgery to prolong their careers, but sometimes the change can make them unrecognizable. The recent death of Patrick Swayze reminded me of his co-star in two movies, Jennifer Grey. Her nose job was probably the most costly in history, though she continues to get work, according to IMDB.

Which brings us to tonight's winner. Once so huggable you'd believe she could both shit kittens and piss glitter, Meg Ryan suffered not one but two tumultuous marriages to Miami Vice star Don Johnson (where'd he go, by the way?) and the fatal blow of getting her lips injected with collagen. She went from looking like America's sweetheart (see Sleepless in Seattle) to just another sultry looking woman in a cosmetics ad. We've got plenty of sultry women in Hollywood, but not enough sweethearts. Sorry, Meg.

Mary Travers, Dead at 72

2009-09-16T20:06:00.000-07:00

Somehow, even when you know someone has been sick for years, passes away, it comes as a shock. Mary Travers, of Peter, Paul, and Mary fame, has died of Leukemia, and I feel so sad to hear the news.

Maybe it's a 60's thing, but I always thought that Mary Travers left a trail of good Karma where ever she went. If you believe in auras, Mary's was always radiating a swirling kaleidoscope of bright greens and blues and yellows, sort of a translucent version of a tie-dyed T-shirt.

What a voice; powerful yet lyric. Was there any song that wasn't improved by the addition of her vocal touch?

And so it goes.

WWWD? What Would Walt Do? The Disney/Marvel Deal.

2009-08-31T12:57:00.000-07:00

If you really, really care about all things Disney, then the announcement that Disney is going to acquire Marvel Comics for $4 billion is cause for concern.

Disney is more than a company; it's a 70-plus year old belief system that every kid worldwide seems to adopt at an early age. For some people, the fairy dust dissipates at puberty; for others, it is as ingrained in their personal psyches as much at age 50 as at age 5.

How that feeling can linger much longer, I don't know. Buying up Marvel can't help. We've seen the original Disney characters pushed aside in the past at Disneyland (Toontown, or California Adventure, for example) but I can't bear to see the X Men take over Tomorrowland, or see Spiderman swinging down Main Street USA. I'm sure thousands of people would, but not me. I'm sure it's just not what Walt would have wanted.

Uncle Walt's been dead now (can you believe it?) 43 years, and the stewardship of the Magic Kingdom has strayed from Walt Disney's visage considerably during that time. I like to blame Michael Eisner, the long-time head of the company, but Eisner's been gone now for several years, so who's to say?

Perhaps it's the people that Eisner hired, and still work there; perhaps it's the people who concern themselves with watching the money and the stock price, rather than pretending they work alongside the seven dwarfs or Cinderella.

No matter. I personally now see Disney as just another entertainment empire. Perhaps it was always so, but I think Walt truly wanted us to believe that there was a safe, interesting world of history, science, and nature, and a bright future for all. Bringing Marvel into the Disney fold adds nothing to that vision.

Tom Dowd and the Language of Music

2009-08-31T11:33:00.000-07:00

Last night I watched an absolutely fascinating documentary on Tom Dowd. I'd never heard of him before, yet he did so much in his lifetime that I'm familiar with. It's one of those stories that, if somebody made it up, one would say "that's preposterous -- nobody did that" and yet Tom Dowd really did.

Imagine a 16 year old Physics whiz, studying at Columbia University. It's 1941. At night, he haunts the jazz clubs, meeting legendary acts that we still revere today. Through a twist of fate, he ends up engineering recordings. This is back in the day of direct-to-acetate discs, mind you.

Soon, he's drafted into the Army, where he's sent right back to Columbia to work on something called the "Manhattan Project". Yeah, that Manhattan project -- the kid is helping design the first atomic bomb.

His night job is getting him lots of attention, though, in the music world. The war ends, and he's sent off to Bikini Island to study A-bomb tests. Mind you, he still hasn't completed school!

After the tests, he returns to Columbia to find they want him to study 1939-era Physics, when the Physics world has totally been changed by the advent of the Bomb -- which he helped create. Dowd drops out to concentrate on his music career.

And what a career. Dowd engineered recordings for the likes of John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, Cream, Lynyrd Skinner, the Allman Brothers, and many many more.

Oh, and while he's doing all this, he pretty much invents the use of multiple track recording techniques and the equipment to make it possible. Just freakin' amazing.

Toward the end of the show, Dowd sits at a console and demonstrates just how he mixed "Layla" for Eric Clapton's Derek and the Dominoes. I was totally blown away.

If you're the least bit interested in music, history, or even Physics (!) you've got to see this film.

Practice Your Portuguese While Peeing In The Shower. Really.

2009-08-19T18:54:00.000-07:00

Looks as though I'm on the cutting edge of something...

First I open my Redlands Daily Facts tonight, and I find a lengthy column on the benefits of taking a leak in the shower. Apparently, you can not only save a gallon of water, but it's good for what ails your feet.

Not an hour later, I run across this You tube video from Portugal. It's a for-real public service announcement, and it's pretty damn funny for a PSA. I hope you enjoy it.

It Slices, It Dices -- the New "Bushomatic".

2009-08-19T18:27:00.000-07:00

You've got to try this! I won't spoil the surprise by describing the "Bushomatic" but it can be a hell of a lot of fun. I thank movie critic and all-round great guy Roger Ebert for the link. Just click the headline of this entry, or enter the following:

http://www.idyacy.com/cgi-bin/bushomatic.cgi

Justice Scalia and the Letter of the Law.

2009-08-19T17:35:00.000-07:00

Common sense is the basis for common law. Common sense, however, seems to get lost in today's legal system. Here's a prime example this week from Justice Scalia:

"(The Supreme Court) has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a court that he is 'actually' innocent."

In other words, if a man sitting on death row, about to be executed, is somehow found to be innocent, but has received a fair trial finding him guilty, there's nothing a federal court, even the Supreme Court, can do to intervene.

Why? It's because the Supreme Court hasn't ever ruled on the topic. So... sorry dude -- you're gonna fry or get gassed or injected because of the arcane nature of our legal system. The best the Supreme Court can do right now is send flowers to the funeral.

Maybe it's true, but it sure is freaking scary, isn't it? Common sense would lead you to believe that the highest court in the land could stop an innocent man from being executed. But --- nooooo!

Watch Your Mouth.

2009-08-19T11:34:00.001-07:00

From today's Irish Independent: A Vogue cover model has won a court case against Google, seeking the identity of a blogger who called her a "skank". She sought the identity of the anonymous poster so she can sue for defamation. Apparently, the courts, at least in New York, don't view blogs as a legitimate method of free speech.

I am so screwed.

Look who's going to kick my ass, should anyone ever discover "Another Day": General Motors; Shell Oil; Jamie Lynn Spears; Southern California Edison; the Michael Jackson estate; The Redlands Facts, and about a hundred others.

I hereby apologise to everyone I have so egregiously offended. Shame, shame on me for having an opinion. Really.

The "New" GM Lies, Just Like The Old GM

2009-08-13T13:33:00.000-07:00

What's the old joke -- statistics don't lie, only liars with statistics?

Earlier this week, every media outlet I can think of ran with General Motors' announcement that the new Chevy Volt will get 230 MPG. Some went on to clarify that GM meant the hybrid will get that kind of mileage in the city. Only a very small number of people bothered to look at the actual numbers to see how the new GM is already bullshitting us.

First, yes, the Volt can get 230 MPG. On one very big condition. You drive no more, no less than 51 miles to calculate your MPG! We're talking big time misleading here, folks. I suppose they could also claim that if you drove the car less than 40 miles on the electric motor every day, forever, and used but one gallon of gas during the life of the car, it would have received 200,000 miles per gallon, but the public might actually question a number like that.

My Honda gets at least 150 MPG going downhill but I don't claim that as my actual average. I suppose if I peel off the Honda nameplate and glue on a Chevy "bowtie" I can do so with impunity.

This Week In History...

2009-08-09T12:54:00.000-07:00

40 years ago this week...

The Woodstock music festival in Bethel, New York became both a focal point for the nation, and an everlasting symbol of a generation. Damn, I wish I'd been there. I once met a woman who'd been there. She hadn't even intended on going, and ended up there for four days. Some people have all the luck.

Also 40 years ago this week...

The Beatles didn't make it to Woodstock, because they were busy crossing a street in London. That street was Abby Road, and the resulting photograph/album cover became one of the Woodstock generation's iconic images. (Paul, it is noted, is still alive, despite being shown barefoot.) If you don't understand that comment, ask your parents.

Plus, 40 years ago this week...

Charlie Manson sent his followers on a murderous rampage, something we'd like to forget, but can't.

35 years ago this week...

Richard Nixon quit the Presidency. Despite what he said at the time, he was a crook. And, as someone who was on Nixon's enemies list notes, nobody has trusted a President since.