While I was doing something else...

So. While I was working away at busying myself with something of little or no importance what-so-ever, I had the tv on as my distraction du jour. And I noticed that "Stage Door" was coming on. I can't even pretend to remember when I first saw it, or how many times I've seen it. In the early days of tv, an RKO package in 16mm was very popular on independent stations (on UHF!) and late at night. "Stage Door" seemed to be on constant top 10 rotation. Every time you turned on the tv (at least in the Philadelphia market) there it was.  Again.  And every time I'd get hooked, mesmerized, and zombietized. It's been years since I've seen it. The script was clunky claptrap when it was new.

The screenplay was adapted from a stage play by Edna Ferber and George S. Kaufman. It's set in a boarding house for wanna be actresses (on West 58th!!). Ginger Rogers, Katherine Hepburn, Adolphe Menjou, Eve Arden, a very young Ann Miller, and Lucille Ball (Happy 100th Lucy!). With more character actors than you could shake a script at.  It was made in 1937, but there's something about it which feels like 1931. Maybe it's the one room set  piece 3rd walled  static no electricy thing. Whatever.  But it caught me again and  I was soon  engrossed... Maybe it's because Hepburn's character is supposed to be brash, annoying, spoiled, and with a superior attitude, etc.  - and she is.  She's aggrivating, but it's her character. I think. Therefore Decartes is. Well, I don't want to get into Hepburn bashing or anything, so I'll stop now. I just wanted to note that I had a great time watching it tonight. And now I remember why I watched it so many times back when...

I so want to do this....

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Ushers in Terrazzo

I've been wandering around in the ol' file folders again...

I'll have to try to get this stereoptican slide blown up to actual size.
Here we have Persident Teddy Roosevelt giving a speech in Brattleboro, VT. c1902.

I've always had a thing for neon...

I also like the artwork on (alleged) pulp fiction

Of course there has to be a classic movie moment...

How can anyone resist picking this one up?

... ushers in terrazzo (ohhhh, I like that for a title).

From the floor of the Adelphi Theatre, Rogers Park, Chicago.

Progress (I think)

Well, gee willikers! Turned out that all I had to do to get the right column stuff  the way I wanted was to scroll down in the options box. It's almost there.

Today is the Birthday of the great Louis Armstrong. He used to tell everybody that he was born on the Fourth of July. Nobody was really sure - he picked the date. Since his passing, old documents were found with his actual birth date.

Live - onstage in Copenhagen


..with the under appreciated Velma Middleton and Luis Russel featured...


Oh, joy! I like this new size!

work in progress

After much thought, I've finally decided to go ahead and use the newer Blogger "templates".
This adjustment allows more space for pictures and video. The old version of this page had settings which did not transfer over. I've changed everything I can find, but it looks like I still have some work to do, particularly in the right hand column. Oh, all the older posts will now have images wildly placed, etc. I'm not going to go back and edit them, although I did fix the last two.

And so it goes...

Just now I'm watching the US Senate debate the House bill which is intended to save this country from default. There's debate before a vote at noon. Some things in the bill are beginning to come out. The new debt limit will not get the country past the 2012 elections - unless an as yet to be appointed committee finds $ 1.2  trillion in cuts by November. If that figure is not reached, defense, and payments to medicare will immediately stop.  It gets better -  by September 30th, Congress will have to draw up the next year's budget. People (Republicans) are openly saying that this is the time to get rid of Medicare. And...  if that agreement on budget cuts by November doesn't happen, the cuts for Defense and Medicare will be voted on 2 days before Christmas.  Geez, do they really think that is creative? Hell, I did that one years ago, when Sony/Columbia/Tristar put me out of close to a decade's work for them the week before Christmas. This vote has been sold on the idea that the country runs out of money today, August 2nd. But, as Orin Hatch (R) noted, "Really?" He then said that he'd never been shown the figures by the Dept. of Money - and he's on the Finance Committee. Uh-huh.

  

...and fight like hell for the living

Jesus. It's already August. And it's time to bake that first lamas wheat bread. Unless you have Coeliac disease. And its the birthday today of Mary Harris "Mother" Jones.  It's her real birthday. She used to say she was born on May 1st, which is International Worker's Day.