Ultimate restful sound - flute and harp

Each by itself is wonderful, but together they are like gently rippling stream. Here is a LINK to some beautiful Japanese music for flute and harp.



More HERE on the harp.

Floyd the Bomber

On the episode of Peter Gunn entitled "A Slight Touch of Homicide," Howard McNear (Floyd the Barber on the Andy Griffith Show) plays a grand jury member who takes it upon himself to kill with bombs gangsters who were not convicted. It is a little hard to picture Floyd as a bad guy, but in this show he was.



More HERE on Howard McNear.

The sheik's tragedy

He was the sixth in the family line to assume the shiekdom, and thus he was the Sixth Sheik. He owned a flock of prize sheep, all of registered stock. They were numbered in order of their births. The sixth to be born was his particular favorite, and thus was known by the Royal Shepherds as the Sixth Shiek's sixth sheep. Sadly, this beloved animal took ill, and a messenger was sent to the Royal Veterinarian. Said messenger dashed to the doc's office and blurted out, "The Sixth Shiek's sixth sheep's sick." He blurted it out - can you?

Alexander Nevsky - that is my opinion, too

According to Wikipedia:
Valery Gergiev, the principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, has stated his opinion that Prokofiev's music for this film is "the best ever composed for the cinema".

A very good assessment. I agree with him.

The Lone Ranger and the Count of Monte Cristo

In the movie, The Son of Monte Cristo (1940), Clayton Moore plays the part of a young lieutenant helping the good guys. Children of my generation knew him as the Lone Ranger in the TV series. Since we never saw him without his mask on TV, I did not know exactly what he looked like. However, his voice gave him away.



Moore with Louis Hayward as Monte Cristo

Judgement, or sympathy

          "Do not judge a man until you have walked in his shoes." We perhaps have heard that saying many times; and while there is an element of truth in it, on the whole it is simply wrong.
          The element of truth is that if there are extenuating circumstances in a man's life, you will not be able fully to know them without firsthand knowledge of his circumstances. I cannot sympathize with him without walking in his shoes.
          The error in the statement is that I do not need to have intimate knowledge of everyone's circumstances in order to know that wrong is wrong. Sin (misconduct) is wrong because it is contrary to God, his nature and his word. Put another way, sin is wrong because God said it is wrong. If a man has done something that God has pronounced wrong, I do not need to know the man's circumstances in order to judge that what he did is wrong.

Peter Gunn's "office"

He worked out of Mother's, a wharfside jazz club, always filled with cigarette smoke. The cool jazz that was played on the program was actually really good.

British Sterling

Like most things colognes are matters of fashion. When I was in high school, English Leather and Brut were very popular for every day use. However, British Sterling was the "Cadillac" cologne - the one you used if you really wanted to impress the girls. I have no idea if any of those are used much any more.

Balm for the ears

I arose this morning, as usual these days, in considerable discomfort because if my neck issues, at 6:00 to take my Ibuprophen fix. On normal days my wife has me get her up at 7:00 to walk with a friend. However, it sounded like it might be raining, so I went out on the carport stoop to see. It was, very gently, so I sat down to listen for a few minutes on the theory that if my body cannot be comfortable, I at least ought to let my soul enjoy it. It was right at that moment when the birds had decided it was daylight enough to start singing, but one stalwart cricket was holding out that it was still night enough to chirp. It was a balm to the ears. 

More HERE about crickets.

Moira Lister - another actress who married a blueblood

In 1951, Moira Lister married Jacques de Gachassin-Lafite Vicomte d’Orthez, a French officer of the Spahis, owner of a champagne vineyard and hero of the Rif .

In the 1940s, she was a friend of sadistic murderer, Neville Heath, however she didn't know his real name. She was invited out to dinner by him a week after he had brutally murdered another woman. He walked her home, kissing her goodnight. Weeks later he murdered another woman. He was eventually caught and hung in England in 1946. Lister believed her blond hair saved her life as both of Heath's victims were dark-haired.

Clever exchange from the movie "The Inner Circle"

Policeman: "What's the matter; are you hard of hearing?"

Old man: "No, I'm slow of thinking. By asking you to repeat it gives me a chance to catch up."

Medicine is not a profession any more

It is a racket. It was a profession when its great concern was healing people. Now its great concern is raking in huge sums of money - along with the insurance companies - along with the lawyers. And do not blame this one on Obamacare, because it was this way a good while before Obamacare came along.

Famous people have long been trashy

Just read the lives of the rich and famous down through history. But today their trash gets sensationalized, and thus glamorized. Who cares about them, anyway?

Old Walmart buildings - blots on the landscape

We are in the process of getting our third Walmart building in the small town where I live. So what happens to old Walmarts? Well, sometimes the find new tenants, but almost always they take on a shabby, seedy appearance and become local eyesores. Just one more reason not to like that company.

The nature of love

There are many aspects of love found woven all through God's word, but one of the chief of them is unselfishness. By that I mean not only the opposite of greed, but also the selflessness - being focused on others and their needs.

The quietness after the storm

This phrase has been used poetically many times, but it describes a very real phenomenon. I am sitting at the table in our kitchen this morning, looking out at the aftermath of the thunderstorm that just passed through. The violence is gone and there is a complete stillness over the landscape. What a blessing that our kind heavenly Father gives us periods of stillness after the stresses and tumults of our life so that we can heal and reflect.

Major Hochstetter and Kitty on Peter Gunn

In the Peter Gunn episode entitled "The Briefcase," two of the guest stars are Howard Caine (Major Hochstetter on Hogan's Heroes) and Barbara Stuart (Kitty on Gomer Pyle).


Caine


Stuart

One of the best criminal faces ever

Robert Carricart. What roles are you going to get with a face like this other than bad guy roles?

Stirps

A game our family has enjoyed is one in which a player picks an unusual word, and then the other players make up a definition  and everyone tries to pick the right one. (There is a commercial version available, but we did it on our own with slips of paper.)

At one session of this game, someone chose the word stirps, which has as one definition in legal usage, "a person from whom a family is descended." From that time our clan has titled my father (currently 90 years old) "The Stirps."

Maggie, Arkansas

Along State Highway 10 in southeastern Logan County, Arkansas, running from west to east, the last two incorporated towns are Magazine and Blue Mountain; and east of Blue Mountain  in Yell County is the unincorporated community of Waveland. In one of the examination rooms at a clinic in Fort Smith, I recently saw a map of the railroads in Arkansas from about the year 1900. It was quite interesting. I noticed that along the stretch of the Rock Island railroad corresponding to the area described above along the highway were Magazine. Maggie, and Waveland - but no Blue Mountain.

I had never heard of Maggie, so I asked a couple of local residents who are well-informed on South Logan County history if they knew anything about it. Yes, it happened that they did. Maggie was a small community located just west of Blue Mountain where the highway and railroad cleared the top of the uphill grade coming from the east. The pull was a long one, and evidently Maggie was the logical place to put a railroad stop, instead of at Blue Mountain. There are still a few houses near where Maggie must have been, but the Highway Department has placed no community name sign there, as they frequently do at other unincorporated "wide spots in the road," and so Maggie has pretty much passed from the public's notice.

One wonders who the lady was for whom the community was named.

Religious debate

Until we began allowing television to destroy our minds and habits, public debating was a common feature of American life. Frequently such large crowds would gather that the debates had to be held outdoors to accommodate them. It took a sharp mind to follow the arguments from each side, let alone to decide which was correct. They were a FAR cry from the glorified press conferences that are called political debates today. Whatever one may think of the propriety of such exercises, there can be no doubt that such public displays of rhetoric (at least the better ones) were wonderful tests of the public's mental ability and were profitable to the development of it.

Why actors never stop acting

You could never tell who might come into the Restaurant Maillaux, or what might be the effect of her charm, her youth, her piquancy, on some guest who was looking for just that, who had almost, perhaps, decided not to produce that delightful little play because nowhere, in no casting office, had he found just the girl, with just the charm, the piquancy, for the leading part. And here, where he would least expect it, he would come upon the girl, drudging with hats and coats as Cinderella drudged at whatever menial tasks Cinderella drudged at. (Cecily was not very precise on this.)

(from Murder Is Served, by Richard and Frances Lockridge)

The murder blackmail fallacy

Occasionally in old radio shows or old movies you will encounter a woman who is blackmailing someone who has committed murder. That is a very puzzling and illogical plot twist, since a person who has murdered is not likely to shy from doing it again - and that is usually what happens. I guess there were stupid people in fiction as well as in real life.

Peter Gunn's cool cars

Gunn was a cool detective who drove cool cars. They were cool in my childhood, and they are cool now. However, as is the case with all cars, they went through a period when they were not cool. The cars of your grandfather's era are cool; the cars of your father's are not.

The downward progression

What was scandalous to one generation becomes "not that bad" to the next simply because it is not as bad as what is going on currently. The downward progression is as old as mankind. One help that we have today, due to the printing press, is that we can document the decline over the generations and see that men 100 years ago were lamenting it just as we are today, but the things they were lamenting have become widely accepted - even among church folks. This ought to alarm us and cause us to reform, but that never seems to happen - and so the decline continues. A knowledge of history has many advantages, but they are seldom used.

Ignoring pain

I am no expert, and the pain with which I am dealing is not at an excruciating level, but I do sense that the mind has, at least to some degree, the ability to ignore pain, especially when it is otherwise occupied.

"Steal you blind"

That is an interesting expression. I suppose it means that a man is such an incorrigible thief that he would take even your sight if he could. How strangely we express ourselves in the English language sometimes!

Our effect upon others

Since no man is an island, as has been said, anything we do has a ripple effect. Each man has a duty to live correctly so that his life will not have a negative impact upon others. That puts an added weight upon our decisions and self-discipline, does it not?

Communication

A surplus of anything cheapens its value in the market. So it is with communication today. Much is being said, but little of it is of any worth.

An ill-tempered mount?

The first was a grulla, a mouse-colored mustang who, judging by disposition, was sired out of a Missouri mule by a mountain lion with a sore tooth.  That grulla was the most irritating, cantankerous bit of horseflesh I ever saw, and he could buck like a sidewinder on a red-ant hill.

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis Lamour)

Underrated Presidents?

I absolutely am no Presidential scholar, and I am going on little more than a gut feel based on what I have read over the years and observed in my own lifetime. However, I think it is likely that among our Presidents are a few whom history has underrated. Here are three.

John Adams. Anyone who was sandwiched between George Washington and Thomas Jefferson is naturally going to be overlooked somewhat. Adams was one of the great statesmen in the formation of our country, and it can be assumed he brought that ability to the table as President, even if he did not bring a winning personality.

James Monroe. Many of the "great" presidents are considered so because they served in times of stress, and therefore had a crisis to which they could rise and make their mark. Monroe had no such crisis, but the national scene was so smooth during his two terms that it is called the Era of Good Feelings. The credit may not all have been his, but we must assume he deserved some of it.

Theodore Roosevelt. He had the gumption to take on not only the powerful industrialists of his time, but the pro-business wing of his own party which had held largely a political monopoly since the War Between the States. Whatever else he had, he had courage.

What we are doing to our memories

"Cap knew that country, knew every creek and every fork. There were no maps except what a man had in his skull, and nobody of whom to ask directions, so a body remembered what he saw. Cap knew a thousand miles of country like a man might know his kitchen, to home."

This quote is from the Louis Lamour novel, The Daybreakers. It illustrates the active, vigorous memories men had in those days because they had to have them. Their very lives depended upon their memories. Now we have machines to remember for us, and we are allowing our brains to atrophy. That cannot be a good thing.

A poetic view of Kansas

Have you seen those Kansas plains? Have you seen the grass stretch away from you to the horizon? Grass and nothing but grass except for flowers here and there and maybe the white of buffalo bones, but grass moving gentle under the long wind, moving like a restless sea with the hand of God upon it.

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis Lamour)

Rita Hayworth - perhaps the most famous Hollywood royalty wife

She was married for a while to Ali Salman Shah, Prince Aga Khan. He was the son of Sultan Mohamed Shah, Aga Khan III. Being one of Hollywood's most glamorous stars at the time, it got a lot of press, needless to say. Prior to Hayworth, Khan had been married to the daughter of John Reginald Lopes Yarde-Buller, 3rd Baron Churston of Churston Ferrers and Lupton, whose lineage went far back into the bluebloods of England.

Pain hinders concentration

It has been my experience that it is very difficult to concentrate when I am uncomfortable. The mind finds it difficult to rise above the matter. This is true regardless of the nature of the pain, whether it be physical discomfort or mental anxiety. Our nature is such that our attention goes to the factor that in our mind demands it most stridently. I suppose it is one of the features of a truly disciplined person to be able to focus his mind in the midst of such things.

Write it down

Perhaps I am not the norm, but I have found that my memory works better when I write things down - the old-fashioned way, on a piece of paper. The tangibleness of the act seems to help me remember.

A little joke from Peter Gunn

She's had her face lifted so many times, when her neck itches she scratches her nose.

One way to make friends

"I'm looking for the boss of the B Bar B."

"What might you want with him?"

"Business talk. I'm friendly.

The chuckle was dry. "Ever see a man covered by two Spencers who wasn't friendly?"

(from Silver Canyon, by Louis Lamour)

Useless

No doubt it is good for us to go through periods in our life when we are unable to do those things that we normally do to contribute to our family and community. It is then that we feel useless. And although that is never true in a relative sense, in the absolute sense, in ourselves, we were worse than useless. So far from having merit, we had only the infinite demerit of sin, and it is good that we be reminded of that occasionally.

Never bargain with God

How could you? What assets do you have with which you could bargain. All your righteousnesses are as filthy rags. In Him we live and move and have our being. No, we cannot bargain with God, but we can get Him for his tender mercies.

Pain causes contortions

I am finding very quickly that physical pain causes the body to twist and contort its normal  structure to get away from the positions that cause the pain. Short-term that is not a problem, but if it goes on for very long it can lead to deformity.

So it is with emotional pain. The mind can twist away from pain just as much as the body does, and if that develops into a pattern, the result is some sort of emotional or mental deformity that can scar us for life, if not corrected.

Functioning with pain

The ability to concentrate and function somewhat normally with pain is a rare quality. I have seen some that have it, but I must confess I do not. And I have found that dealing with pain is very exhausting, even if you are not doing much physically.

Private Secretary TV show: "What Every Secretary Wants To Know"

This is a cute comedy program starring Ann Sothern as the private secretary of Don Porter, a talent agent. Porter is trying to get two of his proteges placed with Charles Evans in his production of Samson and Delilah. Evans' secretary has resigned, and his wife, Madge Blake, is trying to fill the job temporarily. Sothern maneuvers to get Porter appointed chairman of the opera dinner, so he can be close to Evans, She manages to wrangle the deal, of course.

Sothern was a clever comedienne and fit this role wonderfully well, even if she had the irritating habit of not completely closing her mouth.




Blake

Quite an insult!

You're the sort of dumb Isaac that couldn't find a bass drum in a telephone booth.

(from Leave It To Psmith, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Quite a compliment!

Liz, I've said it before, and I'll say it again. When it comes to the smooth stuff, old girl, you're the oyster's eye-tooth!"

(from Leave It To Psmith, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Dish-faced gazooni

This is an interesting insult hurled by Miss Peavy at the love of her life, Mr. Edward Cootes, in the P. G. Wodehouse novel, Leave It To Psmith. It makes one wonder what she might have called him if she had not loved him.

Don't ask names

There is something oddly furtive and shamedfaced in one's attitude toward people's names. It is as if we shrank from probing some hideous secret. We say to ourselves, "This pleasant stranger may be a Snooks or a Buggins. Better not inquire."

(from Leave It To Psmith, by Sir P. G. Wodehouse)

Unspoiled by success

"I think you are terribly conceited."

"Not at all," said Psmith. "Conceited? No, no. Success has not spoiled me."

"Have you had any success?"

"None whatever."

(from Leave It To Psmith, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Herbert the Turbot?

          "I was once offered a princely sum," went on Psmith, now floating happily along on the tide of his native exuberance, "to write a ballad for the Fishmonger's Gazette entitled, 'Herbert the Turbot,' But I was firm. I declined.
          "Indeed?" said Lord Emsworth.
          "One has one's self-respect," said Psmith.
          "Oh, decidedly," said Lord Emsworth.

(from Leave It To Psmith, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Oops,wrong flower!

          "I asked you to wear a pink chrysanthemum. So I could recognize you, you know."
          "I am wearing a pink chrysanthemum. I should have imagined that that was a fact that the most casual could hardly have overlooked."
          ""That thing?" The other gazed disparagingly at the flora decoration. "I thought it was some kind of cabbage. I meant one of those little what-d'you-may-call-its that people do wear in their buttonholes."
          "Carnation, possibly?"
          "Carnation! That's right!"
          Psmith removed the chrysanthemum and dropped it behind his chair. He looked at his companion reproachfully.
          "If you had studied botany at school, comrade," he said, "much misery might have been averted. I cannot begin to tell you the spiritual agony I suffered, trailing through the metropolis behind that shrub."

(from Leave It To Psmith, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Thanks, but no fish

I had to rise and partake of a simple breakfast at about four in the morning, after which I would make my way to Billingsgate Market and stand for some hours knee-deep in dead fish of every description. A jolly life for a cat, no doubt, but a bit too thick for a Shropshire Psmith. Mine, Miss Clarkson, is a refined and poetic nature. I like to be surrounded by joy and life, and I know nothing more joyless and deader than a dead fish. Multiply that dead fish by a million, and you have an environment which only a Dante could contemplate with equanimity. My uncle used to tell me that the way to ascertain whether a fish was fresh was to peer into its eyes. Could I spend the springtime of life staring into the eyes of a dead fish? No!

(from Leave It To Psmith, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Pacific Blackout (1941)

This is a spy movie set against the background of the Civilian Defense program during World War II. Robert Preston has been falsely accused of murder by Eva Gabor, a nightclub singer, and sentenced to death. During a practice blackout, he escapes from the authorities and begins to search for the real killer. While he is trying to get out of his handcuffs during the blackout, he is found by Martha O'Driscoll. For whatever reason, she believes his story and takes to him immediately. They manage to cut his handcuffs into so that he can move his hands. He tries to get her to leave so she does not share in his problems, but she is not to be denied, and sticks to him. They dodge capture in a series of close scrapes through the night. And they fall in love, naturally.

O'Driscoll goes to confront Gabor, but she will not tell her anything, because she is being threatened by a German agent that her mother and daughter in France would be harmed if she does not cooperate. O'Driscoll leaves to find Preston, and when they return, the girl is dead. They find themselves right in the middle of a spy plot to use real bombs in the fake air raid.

This is a pretty good spy thriller for a low-budget movie. Well worth the watching.




Preston


O'Driscoll

A name for suffering

          "The last I heard about you was an announcement in the Morning Post that you were engaged to - I've forgotten the name, but I'm certain it wasn't Jackson."
          "Rollo Mountford."
          "Was it? Well, what has become of Rollo? You seem to have mislaid him. Did you break off the engagement?"
          "Well, it - sort of broke itself off. I mean, you see, I went and married Mike."
          "Eloped with him, do you mean?"
          "Yes."
          "Good heavens!"
          "I'm awfully ashamed about that, Eve. I supposed I treated Rollo awfully badly."
          "Never mind. A man with a name like that was made for suffering."

(from Leave It To Psmith, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Wisdom about marriage from Louis Lamour

Long ago she had decided that marriage was not worth the trouble if one was married to any but the right man, and she was content to wait.

(from Taggart)

One of history's more eloquent proposals

Aline's was not a deep nature. She had never pretended to herself that she loved the Hon. Freddie in the sense in which the word is used in books. She liked him, and she liked the idea of being connected with the Peerage, and her father liked the idea, and she liked her father, and the combination of these likings had caused her to reply "Yes" when, last Autumn, Freddie, swelling himself out like an embarrassed frog and gulping, had uttered that memorable speech, beginning, "I say, you know, it's like this, don't you know," and ending, "What I mean is, will you marry me, what?"

(from Something Fresh, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Evidently not one of the family beauties

The first shot broke a window and whistled out into the night. The second shot hit the dinner-gong and made a perfectly extrordinary noise like the Last trump. The third, fourth and fifth shots embedded themselves in the wall. The sixth and final shot hit a life-size picture of his lordship's maternal grandmother in the face and improved it out of all knowledge. One thinks no worse of Lord Emsworth's maternal grandmother because she looked like George Robey, and had allowed herself to be painted, after the heavy Classical manner of some of the portraits of a hundred years ago, in the character of Venus (suitably draped, of course) rising from the sea; but it was beyond the possibility of denial that her grandson's bullet permanently removed one of Blandings Castle's most prominent eyesores.

(from Something Fresh, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

How much sleep we need - I think

"One of the Georges - I forget which - once said that a certain number of hours' sleep each night - I cannot recall at the moment how many - made a man something, which for the time being has slipped my memory."

(from Something Fresh, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Now there is a priceless bit of information.

The bluebloods have their good points

We may say what we will against the aristocracy of England; we may wear red ties and attend Socialist meetings; but we cannot deny that in certain crises blood will tell. An English peer of the right sort can be bored nearer to the point where mortification sets in, without showing it, than anyone else in the world.

(from Something Fresh, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Another detective for our list: Gridley Quayle, Investigator

This character was the creation of Ashe Marson in the P. G. Wodehouse novel, Something Fresh. He was constantly doing great feats and evidently pretty constantly had someone covered by his revolver.

Just plain P. G. will do

If you ask me to tell you frankly if I like the names Pelham Grenville, I must confess that I do not. I have my dark moods when they seem to me about as low as you can get. At the font I remember protesting vigorously when the clergyman uttered them, but he stuck to his point. "Be that as it may," he said firmly," having waited for a lull, "I name thee Pelham Grenville."

(from the introduction to Something Fresh, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Frugal - or stingy?

I fear that Stingy gets credit for much in the name of frugality, but there is a difference between Stingy and Frugal. The frugal person makes prudent use of the assets that God has given him. His joy is not in having, but in doing, for himself and for others. He is not so in love with his things that he deprives himself of the lawful enjoyment of them, but he is careful with money so that he has what he needs when he needs it. "There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour. This also I saw, that it was from the hand of God." He also takes great joy is dispensing his assets to the benefit of others. "Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth."

The stingy man's enjoyment is in the having of things, and therefore he does not enjoy letting go of those things. He is willing to deprive his loved ones of lawful natural enjoyment that he could provide for them because it pains him so much to let go of his money.

Sinful extravagance and wastefulness are to be avoided; but God has graciously given us a certain amount of natural funds for our use in this life (because we certainly cannot use them in the next). We are to enjoy our money, but not to waste it; but we are to enjoy it. The spendthrift wastes; the frugal man enjoys; the stingy man hoards.

Then and when, but never now

They were upon their great theme: "When I get to be a man!" Being human, though boys, they considered their present estate too commonplace to be dwelt upon. So, when the old men gather, they say: "When I was a boy!' It really is the land of nowadays that we never discover.

(from Penrod, by Booth Tarkington)

Does modern technology give us more time?

I see so many people occupying huge amounts of their day in pointless communication in social media, it appears to me that technology may be a time-stealer, not a time-maker. That, of course, reflects on our lack of personal discipline and our lack of priorities.

Peace and quiet

They are soothing and healthful. We all need them from time to time. They are necessary for our minds to regroup and our bodies to relax.

The most cast-iron stomach

One thought troubled him a little because it gave him a sense of inferiority to a rival. He believed, against his will, that Maurice Levy could have successfully eaten chocolate creams, licorice sticks, lemon drops, jaw-breakers, peanuts, waffles, lobster croquettes, sardines, cinnamon drops, watermelon, pickles, popcorn ice cream, and sausage with raspberry lemonade and cider. Penrod had admitted to himself that Maurice could do it and afterward attend to business, or pleasure, without the slightest discomfort; and this was probably no more than a fair estimate of one of the great constitutions of all time. As a digester, Maurice Levy would have disappointed a Borgia.

(from Penrod, by Booth Tarkington)

The lush summer of 2014 in Arkansas

It is August 14, 2014 in west central Arkansas. The grass is lush and green and deep. Cattle are fat as ticks and their owners’ only problem getting hay has been getting the pastures dry enough to cut it. I have never seen a summer like this normally by this time the grass is dry and crunchy and we are in the midst of a series of 100 degree days that feel like a blast furnace. We have not had a single 100 degree day this summer, and on many of the days the highs have not even reached 90. If I were not experiencing it, I would not believe it. It is easily the mildest summer in my memory.

Joan Davis, funny girl

Joan Davis was a contemporary of Lucille Ball. She had her own TV show and starred in a number of movies. Davis was not quite as funny as Lucy, but then neither was she as irritating.

An irritating figure

He is about 25 years old, drives a pick-up truck and wears a ballcap. He stayed up way too late last night (again), could barely drag himself out of bed this morning, rushed to get ready, and now he is late for work. So he drives like a maniac in the midst of rush-hour traffic, passing in dangerous situations where he gains virtually nothing for his recklessness. I am very glad that his insurance rates are outrageously high, because he deserves it. The problem is that other young men's rates are affected by his negligence.

Law of the Barbary Coast (1949)

Crusading District Attorney Robert Shayne is trying to clean up the Barbary Coast area of San Fransisco. (Shayne made a career out of playing second-best to various leading men.) He is trying to get the kingpin back of all the crime (Stefan Schnabel) named so he can indict him, but his main witness is shot on the witness stand. Gloria Henry's brother is shanghaied and killed, so she goes to Shayne for help. She enlists with him in his fight against the crime. On her own initiative, she goes "under cover" as an entertainer in one of the dance halls. Stephen Dunne (of Sam Spade radio fame) is Schnabel's assistant, and also  falls for Henry, but he dies heroically capturing Schnabel.




Shayne


Henry

Judge Hooker's exalted lodge position

On The Great Gildersleeve radio show, His Honor held the post of Grand Screech in the Summerfield Nest of the International Order of Hoot Owls.

Fluffums Wuffums?

This was the term of endearment for the Great Gildersleeve from his romantic interest at one point in the program, Miss Amelia Hooker (the judge's sister).

Rats!

It is just like it was when I was growing up. I walk to the refrigerator, open the door, and there is nothing in it except things that are good for you.

"Justice must be blind to friendship."

Charlie Chan, from The Sky Dragon

Peter Lorre and Adolph Hitler

According to Backstage.com

Lorre was wooed by none other than Adolph Hitler—who appreciated the actor's depiction of murderers—to return to Germany in 1936 and take part in the burgeoning film industry there. Lorre wrote back: "Thank you, but I think Germany has room for only one mass murderer of my ability and yours." Apparently, the Führer never forgave the slight. During the war, when a Nazi saboteur was captured by the FBI, Lorre's name was third on his list of 100 people to be exterminated.

Whether or not this story is fact or a legend, I do not know, but it makes a good story.

Another case where a stage name made lots of sense

Actress Kaaren Verne was born  Ingeborg Greta Katerina Marie-Rose Klinckerfuss. Somehow I just do not think "Ingeborg Klinkerfuss" would have knocked them dead on the movie posters.

Everyone always wants to know "why."

One of the hardest conditions of boyhood is the almost continuous strain put upon the powers of invention by the constant and harassing necessity for explanations of every natural act.

(from Penrod, by Booth Tarkington)

Some sorts of help you do not need

          "Odd," said Gally, as the door closed, "that a single visit should have left him so prejudiced against that shed. You wouldn't think to look at him that he was the neurotic type. But you often find these fellows with tough exteriors strangely sensitive. It was the same with Plug Basham that time Puffy Benger and I put the pig in his bedroom."
          "Why did you do that, if you don't mind me asking?"
          "To cheer the poor chap up. For several days he had been brooding on something, I forget what, and Puffy and I talked it over and decided that something must be done to take him out of himself. He needs fresh interests, I said to Puffy. So we coated a pig liberally with phosphorus and left it at his bedside at about two in the morning. We then beat the gong. The results were excellent. It roused him from his despondency in a flash and gave him all the fresh interests he could do with. But the point I'm making is that it was years after that before he could see a pig without a shudder. He took the same jaundiced view of them that Sam has taken of potting sheds."

(from Galahad at Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

What radio did for the public

Consider that before radio, the only way you could hear a live performance of anything was to attend that performance. True, records of live performances in a rudimentary form may have been available, but  those were recordings of performances, not the performances themselves. With radio, listeners could hear politicians make speeches, symphonies perform, comedians play to live audiences, etc. It allowed the common folks in out-of-the-way places to hear first-class entertainment live.



More HERE about old radio broadcasts.

Mother Potter's Chili Bowl

Many citizens of our great land may have missed the opportunity of dining at this establishment. However, according to the Lum and Abner radio show, this was a restaurant in Fort Smith, Arkansas, during the 1940's (Whether it was real or fictitious we have not been able to determine.) We suspect, however, that it was somewhat of a greasy spoon. It was the place where Lum was sent by Diogenes Smith, con man and counterfeiter, to deliver some "pamphlets" to a confederate of his, Lum being the unwitting delivery boy for the package.

More HERE about Lum and Abner.

Man At Large (1941)

George Reeves is an FBI agent posing as a newspaper reporter. Marjorie Weaver is an aspiring reporter who is waiting to her big chance. A man comes into the city room of the paper to give them a story on fifth columnists and is shot while waiting. Weaver thinks Reeves did it. Richard Derr, a British agent posing as a German aviator, has escaped from a Canadian prisoner, and the editor sends Weaver to cover the story to get her out of the way so that she will not talk about the case, in answer to a request from the FBI. She jumps right into the middle of a spy story at a small motel near the Canadian border.

Weaver finds a story at the motel that tells about the escape - in advance. She seeks out the author - a blind man with a German accent. She still thinks Reeves and Derr are German agents, and they are still trying to uncover the Nazi organization. She finally is convinced that Reeves is on the level, and they launch into the typical hair-raising finale.




Derr


Weaver

More HERE about Marjorie Weaver.

My brief career in art history

My ability in the graphic arts is negligible, but it was one of the requirements for my degree when I was at Westark Community College (now UAFS). So, I loaded up on 18 hours and took out. The first thing we did was to get a large folder of paintings that we were to study at the library and be able to identify. Much to my dismay, it seemed that every early artist felt compelled to paint a Madonna Enthroned, and I absolutely could not tell one from the other. They all looked alike. I spent one long, despairing evening at the library trying to make sense of the project - and the next day dropped the class. I could make it up with an equivalent course later on.



More HERE about my college days.

An ideally suited pair

          "I think I accomplished my objective, don't you?'        
          "As far as Tippy is concerned, yes. But what happens when he gets her on the phone and she says she doesn't love him?"
          "She won't. I cannot picture any niece of mine not loving someone as rich as he is."        
          "You don't think it's only his money that's the attraction, do you?"
          "Certainly not. They're soul mates. She has about as much brain as a retarded billiards ball, and he approximately the same. It's the ideal union and I am gratified that I have been able to do my little bit to push it along."

(from Galahad at Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

More HERE about dumb blondes.

He wanted a girl who was not too smart

          "Do you remember Clarice Burbank?"

          "Was she the Russian ballet one?"

          "No, that was Marcia Ferris. Clarice was the one who made me read Kafka. And the reason I bring her up is that Vee would never dream of doing a thing like that."

          "She probably thinks Kafka's a brand of instant coffee with ninety-seven per cent of the caffeine extracted"

          "Exactly. She's just a sweet, simple English girl with about as much brain as would make a jay bird fly crooked, and that's the way I want her."

(from Galahad at Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Charlie Chan on delicacy

"It is difficult to pick up needle with boxing glove."
(from Charlie Chan's Chance)

She had trouble getting her point across

Lady Hermione had often heard of secret societies where plotters plotted plots together, but she wondered if any plotter in any secret society had ever had so much difficulty as she was having in driving into the head of another plotter what he, the first plotter, was trying to plot.

(from Galahad at Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Those cars just do not look antique

Have you noticed that when you see cars from even early in your adult life, you do not register them as "antique"? You mind still wants to think of them as current. Antiques are from you parents' generation aren't they? Aren't they?

World War I - 100th anniversary

For the next five years we will be observing anniversaries of some of the most significant events in the history of the world - but events that are probably completely unknown to today's school children. This will be a wonderful opportunity for teachers if they will take advantage of it.

Augustus Whipple - "On the Care of the Pig"

One constant factor in all of the Blandings Castle novels of P. G. Wodehouse is Lord Emsworth's devotion to the study of that monumental tome, On the Care of the Pig, by Augustus Whipple. One wonders why this singularly scholarly volume is not more famous today. (The fact that it is entirely fictitious might have something to do with that, of course.) Whenever the constant bossiness of his sisters grew too great for the Earl to bear, he would retire to his study to refresh himself by perusing Whipple.

Musical hog-calling at Blandings Castle

When it came to communicating with pigs, Lord Emsworth had resources denied to other men. It so happened that there had come to Blandings Castle a year or so ago a young fellow anxious to marry one of his nieces, a young fellow who on leaving England under something of a cloud had found employment on a farm in Nebraska. He had forgotten his name, but he had never forgotten his teachings. In however deep a reverie a pig might be plunged, this young fellow had said, passing on the lore he had learned on the Nebraska farm, it could always be jerked out of it by what he described as the Master Call, and this he had taught to Lord Emsworth. It consisted of the word "Pig-hoo-ey," the "Hoo" to start in a low minor of two quarter notes in four-four time, building gradually from this to a higher note until at last the voice soared in full crescendo, reaching F-sharp on the natural scale and dwelling for two retarded half-notes, then breaking into a shower of accidental grace-notes.

(from Galahad at Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Poor Sgt. Otis!

One character on old radio shows who has my complete sympathy is Sgt. Otis Loveloon, the slow-witted assistant of Lt. Walter Levinson on the Richard Diamond radio show. Diamond is always taking cuts at him, and Otis is rarely able to make a snappy comeback. Otis was played by actor Wilms Herbert, who was also the Francis, the butler of Diamond's girlfriend.


Herbert

Philip Marlowe on the Cheyenne TV show

In the episode Rendezvous at Red Rock on the Cheyenne television series, Gerald Mohr guest stars as Pat Keogh. Mohr, of course, was the star of the Philip Marlowe radio series. He rescues Cheyenne from a murder charge, but turns to be a kidnapper and thief. In the show, he (supposedly) plays the piano and sings. The singing may have been legit (it sounded like him), but he was not really playing the piano.

How to bust up a wedding (Blandings style)

He felt that he id not need to look into a crystal ball to foresee what would happen when Tipton read that letter. His first move, one presumed, would be to ask Veronica for an explanation, and one could readily guess what explanation Veronica, the dumbest blonde in Shropshire and its adjoining counties, would give. "But I thought you had lost all your money, Tip-pee," she would say, rolling her lovely eyes, and it would be all over except for returning the presents, countermanding the bridesmaids, telling the caterer his services would not be required and breaking it to the bishop and assistant clergy that they would have to look for employment elsewhere.

(from Galahad at Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

More HERE about weddings.

Beauty (or not) is in the eye of the beholder

Left alone with Monica Simmons and scanning her with a critical eye, Tipton found a difficulty in detecting those glamorous qualities in her which appeared to make so strong an appeal to Wilfred Allsop. He willingly conceded that if attacked by a mad bull or a gang of youths with switch knives and brass knuckles he would be happy to have her at his side, for the muscles of her brawny arms were obviously strong as iron bands, if not stronger, but as an arouser of the softer emotions he could not see her with a spyglass. He was thinking, indeed, as so many men have thought on meeting their friends' loved ones, that given the choice between linking his lot with hers and going over Niagara Falls in a barrel he would greatly prefer the latter form of unpleasantness.

(from Galahad at Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

More HERE about beauty.

A face that does not improve with contemplation

         "Oh, by the way, Lord Emsworth," she said, "I nearly forgot to ask you. Who would that boy be? A small boy with a face like a prune run over by a motor bus."
          Lord Emsworth was baffled. He had no solution to offer. It was left to Gally to supply the information. The description, he said, fitted Dame Daphne Winkworth's son Huxley like the paper on the wall and could scarcely have been improved upon by the most meticulous stylist.

(from Galahad at Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Ronald Howard (Sherlock Holmes), son of Leslie Howard (Scarlet Pimpernel)

My wife and I are big fans of the old British TV series, Sherlock Holmes, which starred Ronald Howard in the title role. Tonight she commented, "He looks a lot like Leslie Howard." I had not thought about it, but he did. Leslie Howard, of course, was a big name actor who was nominated for two Oscars and had a prominent role in Gone With the Wind. I looked it up and, sure enough, Ronald was the son of Leslie. (No, American actor Ron Howard was of no close relationship to them.)


Leslie


Ronald

More HERE about Ronald Howard.

Sam Spade on the Jack Carson radio show

When I listened to the Carson program, I noticed at once how much he sounded like Howard Duff from the Sam Spade show. And lo and behold, in this episode, Carson hires Spade to help him with threatening letters he has been receiving. Judge for yourself how much their voices resemble.

HERE is the link.


Duff

Why this contestant never got married

"I could never see giving away half my food to get the other half cooked."
(from You Bet Your Life radio show)

Mary Carr on You Bet Your Life

On the 26 May 1954 episode of the radio show. It turns out that Mary Carr was one of the contestants. It turns out that she was a movie actor with a long list of credits. Though 80 years old, she was an excellent contestant, answering questions quickly.

HERE is a list of her credits.



More HERE about You Bet Your Life.

Collectives for Washington, D.C.

I saw this years ago, and cannot remember where. I would give credit if I could, but at this late date I cannot.
You know all the different collectives that are in the animal world, e.g., a gaggle of geese, a pride of lions, etc. Some wag came up with his own list, which included a senility of Senators and an incompetence of Congressmen.

Charlie says notice the small things

Insignificant molehill sometime more important than conspicuous mountain.

(from Charlie Chan in Egypt)