Monday today, all day.

If you work in retail, you rarely get weekends.

But one still hates Mondays.

...and that's the kind of day it is shaping up to be.

Found on the web today

Sleepily, from the vaults

There seems to be a change underway. I start nodding off around 8 to 8:30pm these days, waking up once or thrice until I finally go to bed. If I'm not falling asleep, I alternate between feeling overly warm on the verge of sweating (or sweating slightly) and occasional chills. I've put weight on. It's winter and I suppose I'm really seeking to hibernate. There's lots of rational reasons for all of this, from starting work at 6:45am one day, and working afternoon and evening until 8pm or later the next, having to keep the thermometer set high so that my neighbor on the same heating circuit gets enough heat, aging, etc. I now wake up and get up around the time I used to go to bed - well, after a rather successful night anyway. I find it all fairly annoying.

As I go looking for various files whose names I no longer remember (if indeed I ever knew them) I find some things that I'd saved and forgotten. Like the text of the poem, "When I Am Old I Shall Wear Purple". Like the following. It's been on my computer since last May. I just found it again. And maybe it's because I'm starting to yawn and beginning to nod off, but I find myself laughing a little bit as I read it. Maybe Laura sent it to me (but I don't see anything like it in her emails from last May), or maybe I just picked it up somewhere. Whatever.

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


TEXTING for the Older crowd


Since more and more over 50's are texting and tweeting there
appears to be a need for a STC (Senior Texting Code). If you
qualify for Senior Discounts this is the code for you.
 
 
ATD: At The Doctor's
 
BFF: Best Friend Fainted
 
BTW: Bring The Wheelchair

BYOT: Bring Your Own Teeth
 
CBM: Covered By Medicare
 
CGU: Can't get up
 
CUATSC: See You At The Senior Center
 
DWI: Driving While Incontinent
 
FWB: Friend With Beta Blockers
 
FWIW: Forgot Where I Was

FYI: Found Your Insulin
 
GGPBL: Gotta Go, Pacemaker Battery Low!
 
GHA: Got Heartburn Again
 
HGBM: Had Good Bowel Movement
 
IMHO: Is My Hearing-Aid On?
 
LMDO: Laughing My Dentures Out
 
LOL: Living On Lipitor
 
LWO: Lawrence Welk's On
 
OMMR: On My Massage Recliner
 
OMSG: Oh My! Sorry, Gas.
 
ROFL... CGU: Rolling On The Floor Laughing... And Can't Get Up
 
TTYL: Talk To You Louder
 
WAITT: Who Am I Talking To?

WTFA: Wet The Furniture Again
 
WTP: Where's The Prunes?
 
WWNO: Walker Wheels Need Oil
 
GGLKI: (Gotta Go, Laxative Kicking In)
 
SDO: sorry, dosed off….zzzzz

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

Over at Austanspace, Laura has written a nice little piece about recent unfortunate trends in horror stories,   films, and characters. The following is for her. Hey, I find it scary....

fin

The flood this time - continued

All in all, I spent over 6 hours yesterday dealing with cleanup from the mini flood in the building's basement. The box of DVDs that was sitting on the floor absorbed enough moisture that the box itself had to be thrown out. But the contents were, by and large, dry. The DVD box for The Chronicles of Narnia pt1 suffered some damage. I'm not sure how that disc even got into my collection - it must have snuck in with some of the review copy DVDs I got when I was running the video store. I've never seen the movie(s). And I guess I should confess that I've never read the books. It's just as well, if I had them, they'd probably have been lost in the flood, too.

Which is my way of noting that I have had several storage places over the years. All of the Vermont ones (with the singular exception of a friend's barn which amusingly enough has holes in the roof) have had water damage to my stuff -damage to the privately printed complete Richard Burton translation of the Arabian Nights was the real heartbreaker. I had my copy since my days running a very big bookstore in New York City, the Bookmasters store across 33rd Street from Madison Square Garden, and across 7th Avenue from the Statler-Hilton Hotel.

The last time I saw that set of books for sale was in Boston in the late 1980s or early 1990s. (I'd get lost in time if I tied to come up with the right year...) and it went for $1,000.00 I think my copy is currently in storage in my friend's barn. I don't remember what all I sold when I first went flat out broke a few years ago. Sigh. Sold all the Edward Gorey books, a lot of the Roman and Greek classics I never got around to reading, the resource materials I had for all that "in a timeline as written" reading that I never got around to (ancient maps, books of architecture and costume, etc.) Ah, well. Semi-retirement's coming.

Oh. That Bookmasters store.

Yes, that's me somewhere around November 1977.
The books and promo materials were delivered in an ambulance.
I have a picture of it around here somewhere. I'll look.

Madison Square Garden was built on the former site of the Pennsylvania Station, NYC's great transit terminal. By my day, the station had been torn down, moved underground and had the Garden built over it. The loss of the old building used to be regarded as one of the great architectural tragedys of the modern world. I never got to see it. I do remember the old Whatchi ma hootziz over on Lexington there, you know , ah ---- Grand Central Station. So, I can sort of suss out from the photos how Penn Station looked and must have felt. Sorta.

These pics from the wonderful Shorpy site give a good idea of the sheer size of the place...

These give a good idea of the atmospherics:

So, that's what used to be across the street from the store. Across the street on he 7th Avenue side was, as I mentioned, the Stater-Hilton Hotel. Which had previously been The Pennsylvania Hotel. Which just celebrated its 93rd Birthday 4 days ago. Inside the Main Entrance, to the left of the lobby, walled off and unused, is a huge old dining room/supper club. The room has two raised wings for a total space of 58 feet by 142 feet. The ceiling is 22 feet high. It used to be the Cafe Rouge. Although its had several uses over the years, including an ignominious turn as a souvenir shop (with the old dance floor showing underneath the worn linoleum), I've read that it's all still there, the fountain and everything.

It was the premier night club in New York City in the late 1930's and early 1940's. Artie Shaw played there. During his engagement in November of 1939, he quit the business there. Benny Goodman played there. Duke Ellington played there. Basie played there. Most of the big bands did. And for about three years at the beginning of the 1940's, it was home base for Glenn Miller and his Orchestra. Miller hired a couple of the unemployed Shaw musicians, including Shaw's main arranger, Jerry Gray. While with Miller, Gray came up with "Pennsylvania 6, 5000", which became a huge Miller hit. It's the hotel's telephone number, said to be the oldest number in continuous use.

There were broadcasts from the Cafe several nights a week, and on weekends there were even broadcasts in the late afternoons - it was also the site of many of Miller's "Sunset Serenades" USO shows. There were also broadcasts from the hotel's cellar club., around the corner and slightly down the side street, the Madhattan Room. For a couple of seasons it was the home base of Benny Goodman from the days when Harry James and Ziggy Elman were in the trumpet section, and  Gene Krupa was the drummer, when Swing was was becoming king.

Over the years, the Hotel fell on hard times, and its once great reputation nearly destroyed. The current owner bought it in 1997 with the intention of demolishing it for a new high rise. A group formed to save it, but their attempts to get landmark status for the building and for the Cafe failed. Last December the owners suddenly changed their minds and say they now intend to renovate it. 

       Fin.

The flood this time

So. I went downstairs to do my laundry. I couldn't help notice that there was water all over the floor in various places. I wasn't going to look, but I had to. Yes, it had hit my storage unit, And it looked like it hit various spots I had previously deemed safe. Even with my back out, I spent a good 45 minutes or so digging to the back. I did, after all, have 16mm film prints sitting on the floor. Thankfully, I had put the prints in metal canisters on the bottom. The lowest can was the final 40 mins of David Copperfield (the one with W.C. Fields as Micawber). The can was soaked. It was so wet, I was surprised that slugs weren't living on it. It took a minute to get the can open. And, praise be, the reel of film itself was absolutely dry. So, I've lost a few empty boxes in which electronic things came, a blanket, the electric mattress pad, the gift wrap bag and all the pretty ribbons, the box of Christmas Cards whose design was a Metropolitan Opera snow scene poster from La Boehme (ouch), and I found a few things I'd been looking for, especially the little plastic box of push pins - yes, I've been too cheap (and broke) to buy more because I knew they were there somewhere. I'm worried about the 16mm projector, it looks like the bottom may have gotten wet. My big 32" tv (in storage only because there isn't enough room for it -and - the Hi Def one that I was given in my room) seems like it's okay - I didn't move it yet, but it doesn't feel wet around its floor space.

Of course, now I want to bring up the electronics, bring up and use the 16mm projector, check the VHS machine once more, maybe I can get it working, etc.

Bringing up and setting up the old amplifier, speakers, and tape deck was a wonderful thing, Now I want to do more, bring up and re-connect the turntable, too. I want to listen to my music again. I want to see my old films again. Basically, I'm delving into stuff I haven't been able to play with for a good number of years. They're from a different, earlier me, part of the detritus we leave behind. And I like the person I'm discovering. He definitely had good taste, at least.

I must get back to it, I left stuff all over the place down there.
And the bottom box of the DVD's looks very wet... (ominous music).

To be continued...
   

The Convergence

And so it begins...

In an Associated Press story on the net this morning, writer Jim Coyle notes:

"Over the next few months, YouTube, Netflix and Hulu will roll out their most ambitious original programming yet - a digital push into a traditional television business that has money, a bevy of stars and a bold attitude of reinvention. The long-predicted collision between Internet video and broadcast television is finally under way."

full article (for as long as the link lasts)

Well, sort of, anyway. Just as Hollywood mogul Adolph Zukor refused to panic during the 1950's audience switch from movies to television (he saw it as the same business and moved the studio into tv production), someone is going to realize that Internet TV is simply another piece of the same money making system. This isn't really a delivery systems battle, which is how it is being cast at the moment. It's the beginning of the long time coming convergence of television and the internet, computers and home electronics, performing arts and libraries, information and entertainment, government and you and me . 

Why do you think  Hollywood pressured its Washington DC funding recipients to create bills like the Stop Online Piracy Act, and the Protect Intellectual Property Act? Those two bills may have been sidelined for now (expect to see them again), but S978, the Commercial Felony Streaming Act is still out there. 

CFSA would make streaming of unauthorized material (read: copyright violations) a felony instead of the current misdemeanor. Meaning all those kids on YouTube singing Motown and other classic songs? Illegal. Jail time. No more getting famous by postings yourself singing, Justin Beiber. Unless of course, you get copyright clearance and pay the royalty. I don't want to exaggerate here for simplicity's sake, you do get to have 9 uploads of streaming video that won't get you into trouble. It's the 10th upload that does it. By that time, you're a proven serial copyright abuser. A Felony.

There are also troublesome re-writes (they use the word "upates") to copyright laws underway. (The rebuttal period for some proposed changes just ended, hearings begin this Spring.)

It's about the money, and it's about the control.

You definitely should click on this one to enlarge it. Just click in the area outside the picture to get back here.

On the money front, once upon a time, Hollywood and the music industry really didn't give a hoot about their older product. Oh, sure, the Hollywood studios would license packages of movies for showing on tv. They chose the movies for each "package", and small tv stations had to accept all the bad titles to get the good ones. When the film distribution companies used this idea for movies in theaters, it was called "block booking" and outlawed as a monopolistic practice by the U.S. Justice Department. It's the technique cable companies use today in their approved monopolies. The film distribution companies (Movie Theatre Chains) were forced by the Dept. of Justice to sell off their Movie Studios which produced the product they distributed. All of this changed again during the Reagan years, thanks to a process which became known as "vertical integration", but that is another story. The point is, Hollywood didn't care about its older product very much.

I know this is true because I got involved in film collecting in the early 1960's, just as I was entering my teen years. (Collecting was the only way to even see most silent movies then.) The films themselves were on a flammable 'nitrate' stock which could also disintegrate, or just deteriorate and give off an odorless poisonous gas. Film Collectors, seeing the losses piling up, banded together to do something about it.  The studios didn't much listen. Finally, an act of Congress created the American Film Institute, whose original mission was preservation of American films, both Hollywood and non (newsreel libraries were being very heavily hit by losses too!, etc).

And still Hollywood wasn't much interested, even in preserving its own classics which they could re-release. My first time seeing Gone With the Wind was in a release which was reformatted for cinemascope. I did not like the movie, and failed to understand what all the fuss was about. (Until I saw it years later at the Elgin Theatre in NYC in a real IB Technicolor print, in its proper frame ratio and I realized what an immense accomplishment it really was. And it played better as a movie, too. Well, at least the first half. ) If it wasn't for the work of film restorers, and the miracles made possible by computers, Gone With the Wind might not exist today in its original form.

And then there was BetaMax. And lo, the Hollywood Business Community was shakeneth to its core. People videotaping movies over the air and watching them for free? Oh, no. No, no. Several of the studios, dollar signs forming on their eyes like characters in 1950's cartoons, brought forth a lawsuit.

While the lawsuit was progressing through the court system, something happened. People started buying video cassettes of movies on both Beta and VHS. Much of what was available were titles in the public domain. Cut to the chase - there was money to be had. Maybe not Big Big Money, but Good money.

Since that time, the studios have been positioning themselves for greater control over everything they own. And what they own now, after the deregulation of the Reagan and Bush years is - a lot. Want to see Casablanca again? Okay. You just have to pay.

Same thing goes for the printed word. Save paper, go digital. (Problem one, digital can be manipulated and changed). Made available for your tablet - for a small fee.

The music industry got in on the act, too. Big time. Depending on where you live, there are laws which make it illegal to play recorded music (any format) as background in a cafe or restaurant. Unless you pay royalties, of course. It was the recording industry that went ape shit bonkers over downloading music from the internet. Remember people going to jail for downloading music?

Of course, if the song, book, movie or tv show you want to watch, read, or listen to is available all is well. But, there are lots of titles that aren't available. It doesn't  matter that the item in question was created as something which would either be sold to, or exhibited to, the public.

Case in point. At the beginning of the AIDS crisis in New York City, an all night movie special was held as a fundraiser at the 8th Street Playhouse. Everything was donated. Every cent would go to the cause. There was one problem. The ad mentioned the movies to be shown, one of which was "This Is the Army", one of those big patriotic flag wavers from WWII which was based on Irving Berlin shows. The film is in the public domain. You can make copies of it, you can sell it, you can watch it anytime you damn well please. What you can't do is show it in public - Irving Berlin owns all of the music, and he (or his lawyers at the time) didn't want the film seen. Berlin didn't care if he got paid. He didn't want the film exhibited publicly. Period. Needless to say,  it was withdrawn from the benefit.

So, imagine how much of our culture, how much literature, movies, and music can and will go missing when all of the delivery systems have merged into one business. That's where this is all headed. When you're born, you'll get your internet user ID along with your social security number and birth certificate. Probably all on a chip. Maybe implanted. Your phone is your tv is your computer or internet access portal. You pay for everything, pretty much the way you do now, except everything is digital. Access goes to those who have money and can pay. Even then, if, say, Justin Beiber were to grow up, own all his own music and decide he didn't want any of it heard or seen in videos ever again, well, you'd be out of luck. Yes, I know that's a bad example. I used it on purpose. 20 years from now, you want to examine his effect in and on the music industry and the public consciousness. Too bad, not allowed.

How long that control might last is currently set at the life of the creator, plus 70 years. Or plus 120 years if it's a corporate authorship.

And it will once again be up to the underground collectors to preserve our cultural heritage.
And possibly knowledge. A few days from now (February) is Library lovers month.
It's not too far fetched to think of a world where libraries are held by rouge collectors.
Stand up for them now, while we still have them.

Quote

Just now, ABC News (this coming political season, I think they're going to push Obama - they're owned by Disney and he'll make a great audio-animatronic) just had an off the cuff interview question to Newt Gingrich, who is supposed to be talking about Mitt Romney:

"How can somebody run a campagin this dishonest and think he's going to have any credibility running for president?"

Pot, Kettle.

A few from The Vaults

While making file folders and organizing various graphics, I felt like it was time to share again...

Here's an old fave from the exploitation movie poster files. (Did I ever mentioned that I worked for Sam Lake back in the late 1970's or so? God, and I'd finally managed to forget that one, too. Shipping porno trailers to states in the American South labelled as "machine parts"! Really, I'm not making this up.) Okay, be here now, from 1961, a.k.a. "V.D."... the story of a high school track star, his girlfriend and the new girl in town...

of course, there was a little something else that became a plot point. Here, from my WPA art files:

(The Works Progress Administration, a Federally funded program which hired artists during the Depression)

Arrruuugggghhh. I can't believe I forgot to post this one on the appropriate date:

and, from the Early Disneyland (and other Amusement Parks and Arcades and that sort of stuff) files, Tomorrowland in 1957!

and finally for today, a reminder that February is Library Lover's Month:

Before going off to work

Another before I go off to work note: Found on the web this morning:

The following would have been posted yesterday, but I just couldn't post it considering the story I was telling. This has got to be one of my favorite headlines of all time. I didn't purchase a copy of the paper back when because I thought the headline pandered to the worst in all of us, and was too far over the top. Now I wish I had it (I still cherish my copy of the New York Times'  "Nixon Resigns" - I kept the whole paper. I used to have the Kennedy assassination, but it went missing over the years, I think my father threw it out.) Anyway, this bizarre story is back in the news because the murderer involved was seeking parole (Charles Dingle's parole was, thankfully, denied.).

Silly observation of the day: doesn't the woman who heads the IMF (International Monetary Fund) look a lot like actress Tilda Swinton (a stevil fave)?

and last, but not least, one of the reasons this country has gotten so fucked up that it actually entertains the notion of Newt Gingrich emerging from his hidey hole and running for president, this from NYC:

Bingham Ray

This morning I became unstuck in time again.

Work today doesn't start until 3:15pm, so I was enjoying a leisurely click through fest of the news , my recent eye problems making it difficult at times to read, when I clicked my way right into the news that Bingham Ray had died.

Bingham was just a few years younger than I am. He was out in Utah where he had just attended a conference and was about to attend the Sundance Film Festival. I called my old friend and something of a mentor in the film business, George Mansour right away. Bingham had had a little stroke and Richie Abramowitz drove him to the hospital. Everything was fine. Until the next day.

These are names from my past, years ago in film distribution in New York City. Bingham managed the Bleecker Street Cinema (after John Pierson, I think...). He became a booker for Walter Reade for awhile, and if I remember correctly, it was Bingham who was responsible for saving a little art deco cinema called the Metro, which was way uptown on Manhattan's West Side (99th Street). It had originally been the Midtown, and was one of those little jewels of the movie theatre biz.

At the time, revival and repertory were all the rage. People had discovered the joys of seeing old movies on big screens again after years of late night showings on television. I've often mentioned that my opinion of John Ford as a director changed completely after seeing his movies on a big screen as opposed to tv.  The movies of that era were thought out in terms of 20+ foot high screens. It would take too long to explain what I mean, so here's a quick, not very good example, a scene from the 1939 "Stagecoach", in the wrong frame ratio to boot.

Kind of impressive looking, eh? Ford liked to film in Monument Valley. Well, click on the image and blow it up until it fills your screen. It's not the same image anymore, is it? Ignore the soft focus, I didn't have time to find a good hi res still. Even the point at which your eyes naturally focus shifts.  Big screen. The Metro had a decent sized screen. It was a joy to see old movies there. They felt at home. It wasn't as big as a screen as at the Regency, the leading revival & repertory house, but I liked the theater a bit better. Bingham and I used to trade potential double bill titles. He was kind enough to run several of them. One (at least, in memory it was my suggestion - after all these years, I wouldn't swear it wasn't his) was my favorite, a pairing of two film noirs, The Big Sleep and In a Lonely Place - now forever known as "Gloria in excelsis" for Gloria Grahame who appeared in each. (I also once ran a theatre bookstore that used to sell her her scripts and sound effects for year yearly summer tour in The Glass Menagerie. We had just gotten one year's materials in when she died.)

Ms. Grahame and Bogart "In a Lonely Place" a story of a washed up Hollywood screenwriter and his neighbor.

His management of the theater was so successful, in an out of the way neighborhood, that it was twinned and turned in to a first run house. It seems to me that he booked the Film Forum for a little while before he moved on into film distribution, but my memory of those years is getting a little fuzzy and takes a while to sort some things out. The Metro was bought and sold, and closed shortly after the nearby Olympia kept a date with a wrecker's ball. It was slated to become a supermarket, but that deal fell through after the exterior was awarded landmark preservation status. Then it was going to be a trendy clothing shop. Then an apartment house. Last I heard, it was still there, sitting idle, most of the interior gone.I believe it is now slated to become a performing arts school. I hope it has survived.

Details from the interior like the following, however, are long gone:

Bingham made quite a name for himself in the world of independent movies, and was co-founder of October Films (still around after being bought and sold several times, now under the name Focus Features). Bingham is one of the people who built the market for, and took the chances on financing, serious art films in this country. For a couple of years, he even headed United Artists, when it was a specialty division of MGM. Some of the movies he championed include Bowling for Columbine. Life is Sweet. Secrets and Lies. Breaking the Waves. The Last Seduction. There are many, many more.

And I'd go on and on if I could, remembering when there were so many theatres where one could go and see art films and old movies and third and fourth runs, the St. Marks (what a pit! One never wanted to put one's feet on the floor in that place), Theatre 80 St. Marks where Howard Otway used to show 16mm movies in rear projection, The Cinema Village, the Paris, the Walter Reade, the 57th Street something or other where the Chaplin movies played, I'd go on, but I must leave for work.

Take care, Bingham Ray.
As my friend Austanspace would say, Ya did good.

Dream

Image find of the morning while dreading the necessity to get ready to go to work.

  

Perfect for a Sunday morning

As I head off for the 45 minute walk to work, and see that it is -4 (F) out there, this just warms my heart. Thank You, whomever is responsible. Please do Newt and Mitts next, then we'll talk about people in my everyday life...

Harrumph.

Is it wrong of me to want to have a smoke detector that doesn't go off every time I boil water? All I have to do is turn on the exhaust fan, but even at the slow speed the noise is overwhelmingly obnoxious. It's bad enough where I work - buzzers buzzing, bells ringing, beeps beeping, kids screaming, bad 80's music playing on the celestial sound system where "Shiny Happy People" seems to play every 20 minutes as though it will somehow turn either the staff or the customers into happy face moronic shoppers... oh, wait...no, they just don't have happy faces. Everywhere, it seems, there is noise, noise, noise. I feel positively grinchy.

I do not like the way this year has started

It's only January the 20th, for Christ'sake. Already we've had IowaNewHampshire free time for uncontested Republican ideology, SOPA, PIPA, the Costa Concordia tragedy advertisement for the upcoming 3D re-release of the movie Titanic, a severed head rolling around the Hollywood sign, the bankruptcy reorganization last ditch attempt to save Eastman Kodak from extinction, a Russian intended destination Mars aircraft that fell to earth no one quite knows where, locally horrible news of the accident related death of a well known woman, a teenager killed by a train, a ruling from Federal level Judge Murtha that the local falling apart nuclear plant run by cost-cutting seeming we don't care about the consequences as long as we rake in the dollars sociopaths who have lied to the state and it's agencies can stay open for another 20 years, a friend losing her job due to the closing of a store which benefited our local hospice, the forced cancellation of a mediation session between the town approved but yet to be built skate board park and the intractable well off bastards who live across from it and are horrified by the thought of such commonness near them (although hidden in save the park stay green sloganeering),  the nearly complete destruction of our once wonderful local daily paper, and now the announcement of the passing of both Etta James and Johnny Otis, who wrote her first big hit and made her a star.

It's all a bit much.

Sophie Tucker's Birthday

Well, I now see that my credentials are no longer recognized by the rotating globe as being from "Freeport, Maine". Now, the ID thingy lists me as being from Winchester, New Hampshire. Don't tell anyone, though. That area's a haven for ritzy money types, they'll freak out at having to associate with me. All in all, I'd rather Comcast stop playing around at whatever it is they are doing and get my IP address to show up again as Brattleboro, where I live and attempt to pay my bills.

Today is Sophie Tucker's birthday. I've been aware of her since I was a kid and heard her quips, "I've been rich and I've been poor, and believe me, rich is better", and my favorite, "Money may not buy happiness, but it sure does help ease the pain". She was known at the time as "The Last of the Red Hot Mamas". Born in the Ukraine, her family emigrated to to the US and settled in Hartford, CT when she was an infant. She started her performing career as a "coon shouter" in blackface - vaudeville managers thought she was too fat and ugly to be accepted by audiences as herself. She performed songs like,  "Nobody Loves a Fat Girl, But Oh How a Fat Girl Can Love". She hired African American singers to giver her lessons, and African American composers to write material for her. She was such a hit in the Ziegeld Follies in 1909 that problems arose with other female performers. Then William Morris booked her at his new theater on the corner of 42nd Street and Broadway. At one point, on tour in Boston, someone stole the luggage that contained her makeup kit, and she went on without the blackface. She went over so much better that, at the behest of Mr. Morris, she never wore it again.

In 1911, she introduced a song that not only became a huge hit, it became her theme song (and the title of her autobiography). Over the years she recorded it many times. The following clip is from my own library of stuff. It is the first clip I've digitized, as well as the first clip I've posted to YouTube (private link).
This was accomplished using the device I bought myself for Christmas that I mentioned in yesterday's post.. It plays great on my computer, but as uploaded to YouTube gets a bit out of sync. I've no idea why, but I'll try to figure it out later.

So here you go, an old school entertainer doing exactly what she knows how to do.
Happy Birthday Ms. Tucker.




Here's a nice little bio if you'd like to read more:
http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/tucker-sophie

Curses, or the Pirate's Bounty

Sometimes I think that I must be the victim of a curse. I have no idea who would have placed it, but to be honest, I think it was probably one of those "and on your child" kinds of things. It would certainly explain a lot. The now perpetual motion machine of itching scratching skin condition which doesn't give much room for peace would finally have a reason for existing.

Part of the problems with the depressions in which I live when not medicated is that I quickly become convinced that I am not "allowed" to have nice things or to enjoy a few simple pleasures. These thoughts aren't just wild fantasies, they are tried and true repeatedly observed realities of the way my life works and has always worked. Trying not to have that filter in place is very very difficult. I've really begun to question whether or not the years and years of anti-depressants that allowed me to trudge on were really an acceptable answer. I sure spent a lot of money on them. And all along, I only needed to understand that it was just a curse somebody put on me for some unknown reason. Someone I knew back in my NYC days once had a vision and told me that in a previous life I controlled patronage money in a medieval court and frustrated the lives and dreams of many artists (how could one not in such a situation?) and that I was working out the karma.

When preparing for the holidays, I decided to hook up my old stereo equipment so I could listen to a few tapes of my old radio shows. Of course, at first that the right hand channel no longer worked.. After a number of experiments and switching of wires, I finally got things going. But of course, it goes out every now and again. Last night, the tapes played fine. This morning, day off, lovely snowfall out the door windows, coffee made, old fashioned steel cut Irish oats with maple syrup all prepared, I turn on the music and - no right hand channel. After playing with wires and trying the old fashioned fist bang on the top of the amplifier, sound was restored. But the peaceful, satisfying moment was gone, robbed, stolen, cursed. It also turned out that the box of my tapes turned out to be DJ Princess Wendy's old shows. And the other box turned out to be Henry's old shows. Mine? Aside from a few I found, in storage in a barn several miles from here. I'd also been planning on re-connecting the turntable so I could play the records I have with me (most are in that barn). I'm no longer sure I want to attempt that.

Of course, I'm behind in the bills again, which is beginning to obsess me. I spent a bit of money at the holidays I shouldn't have. I bought myself a little something for $40.00. It's the piece I need to put my 8mm video, VHS, BETA, Laser-discs into a digital format on my computer - which means I could burn them to DVDs. Several years ago, I put my father's 8mm movies into video. Did it myself, using one of those home rear projection screens and some really basic circuitry to narrate a date or two into the images. The transfer is on an 8mm video cassette. I made several VHS copies for the family, and kept one for me. If I could see it. My VHS player conked out in a move, and I've got one or two of Laura's old ones, but they don't work for me. Something from the same move gave the heebie jeebies to the Beta machine. So the other day I got out the 8mm video. Something sticky was on the outside top of the camera. Not the way I leave things, and nothing, I mean nothing in that tote to have produced it. And it doesn't want to come off with a simple careful washing or cleaner-ing. After an hour or so delay for that project, I got things to an acceptable level and went back to hooking things up. And - it no longer works. If I were in better touch with my feelings and let myself, I would be devastated. I loved the 8mm video camera. If I was hiking and found a mountain stream, I'd find it a place to sit and let it record 5 or 10 minutes of a stream flowing. The cam records in HiFi stereo, so natural sounds applied. Or maybe the scene would be the ocean from the days when I could afford those 4 day off season vacations to Provincetown on Cape Cod. Or a pond with peepers peeping. Hikes on Wantastiquet in heavy snow - I think I was recording the time that I got there before there were any other footprints in the snow. Etc. All this has been closed off in storage for so many years, and I have it with me now. But it seems I shall have to wait a while longer. I looked up a couple of sales sites to see what used 8mm camcorders that could play hifi stereo were out there. And the answer is: not much. A lot of Hi8, a later technology. But just 8mm video? A few. The best part was the price. If I can't tinker the damn thing into working, it's gonna be a long time before I get to see those again.

Unless I can lift the curse.

I can't go to Broadway with you.
Why Not, dainty June?
Because I'm staying here with my favorite cow, Caroline!
(Applause and cheers)

I have one of my old mix tapes playing as audio backdrop desktop. I used to love making mix tapes for myself and friends. Swing bands, show tunes, etc. Over the years mix tapes were so reviled in cheap joke land that they just fell away without commentary or memorializing. I'd forgotten how much fun they could/can be.  Is this what all those ipods are really about, making a kind of for me only mix tape?

I really should get started making the applesauce. It's something else I used to love to do. I had another of those damn the cost moments. Bought several different varieties of apples. (This area is blest with a large inventory of old fashioned varieties you don't get just anywhere.) A little apple cider to cover the apples in the pot. (Gawd, cider got expensive over the last several years. It used to be about as cheap as soda.)

So, before I go, I think I'll mention one or tow things. 

First up, a little story on the newswires and HuffPost this morning. A very, very rich man named John Castle (I'm not making this up - he runs a partly eponymous  "leading private equity investment firm distinguished by its disciplined focus on investing in control positions in middle market private ..." translation- focuses on buyouts...) Where was I? Oh, yeah, this Mr. John Castle was not pleased. A waiter had brought the check, as per Mr. Castle's wife's request. Calling the waiter a Yiddish word for a male private part, he grabbed the waiters hand and broke one of the waiter's fingers. 

 Click here if ya think I'm making this up, 

or Here for the story on the Huffington Post.

The other thing I wanted to mention is that today is the birthday of United States Founding Father John Hancock. He's the guy who was president of the Continental Congreass when the Declaration of Independence was forged in endless meetings. He was the fist signer of the official copy of the document, and famously signed his name in large letters so that King George was would have a male member in his eye. Hamilton was something of legend for being the first to stand up to the Brit storm-troopers. He was a child of wealth and privilege, but he did have some morals, dammit. After all, he restrained himself enough to keep only  the one slave.  

(Just looked at the clock. It's 11:11) Remember the Brits marching on Concord? They were after the Colonist's armaments, officially. They were also after John Adams and John Hancock who were at one of those pesky uprising meetings. (After the incident at Concord Bridge, and getting the army back to Boston, all participants were given a blanket pardon - except for Adams and Hancock.

At the time, Hancock also seems to have been running some kind of smuggling operation. The Brits had tried to investigate one of his boats. He got there lickety split and refused to let them go below deck (see above "first to stand up to" note). There was a court case, and the charges were dropped.

There followed another incident over his ship  the Liberty (I'm not making this up). Seems a good part of the ships contents were unloaded in the middle of the night avoiding scrutiny and taxes. After about a month, a Brit ship hit port called - The Romney (I'm not making this up) with someone who swore he was forced to unload the Liberty in the middle of the night thus escaping scrutiny and taxes. The authorities seized the Liberty. There were riots, and the colonists eventually managed to burn and destroy the ship of Liberty to save it from the Romney... oh, never mind.

As a man of wealth, Hancock managed to get away with a lot. He was one of the main forces behind the Boston Tea Party, although he did not take part. And took great care not to comment on the destruction of property.

After the war was over, he was elected the first (and 3rd!) Governor of Massachusetts. As such, it was his decision to put down the Shays Rebellion. Seems there were been many unpaid Revolutionary soldiers whose homes were being seized by Boston banks to pay off the debts of Boston's wealthy elite to British purveyors of goods and finery. Hancock let loose the storm-troopers. After they finished firing into a crowd of protester/occupiers of a county courthouse, 5 lay dead. At least that's the figure now used. It used to be much higher. These things have a way of changing over the years.

The John Hancock Insurance and financial services corporation has absolutely nothing to do with John Hancock, his family, or his businesses. As befits the operation of an Insurance Company, they simply stole his name to make themselves look better. Guess they didn't realize that he was an elitist crook who skirted the law as often as possible, especially in paying of taxes, and only seems to have seen everyday people as an income stream which needed to be kept in line when they protested the outright thievery of their lives. Or maybe it was their little joke.

Oh, by the by, he was also a Mason.

Do the Masons put curses on people?

Friggin' SOB Bastards

Just got back from a quick run downtown. I stopped at the Post Office to get any new mail. I shouldn't have. There was new mail, from Prudential. It was Prudential that had the enough money to bury me insurance policy that was taken out in the 1960s that I cashed in to save my financial ass last spring. There had been a loan on the policy, and interest charges on it had eaten away at the funds which were supposed to be providing interest on the principal. After cashing it in , all I got was $2,666.94, which was less than the figure I had been told (they found fees to charge & etc.). So what do I get in the mail today? An income-tax declaration - showing no  income tax withheld (they were supposed to), for "Gross distribution" of $6398.30.

I had been counting on my income tax refund to help catch up with my bills, and maybe get new sheets, new shoes, etc. But that's not going to happen now. Thing is, I sure didn't get $6,000+ out of them. What do they do, just make things up? Make me pay the taxes on the money they made off of the policy over a 40+ year period?

In my life I only had one dealing with an insurance company (Aetna, back in the mid 1970's) which seemed appropriate and above board. Every other dealing I had ever had with an insurance company has left me feeling cheated, screwed, and abused. I'd come up with even more descriptive terminology except I'm so mad and frustrated that I can't think properly.

I always said, even in my early 20's, that I would never sink so low as to take a job selling insurance.
Now I remember why.

Harrumph.

Slowly, inexorably, I am being driven insane. Here's a perfect example. A second ago, without knowing what I did, I somehow hit the right combination of keys that turned text into italics. Easy enough to fix. A few seconds. If only the aggravation it caused would go away as quickly. This information is not an epiphany. That was yesterday, which means the Christmas decorations come down today - it's my day off. I start to organize the laundry, decide getting the tree down is more important. I'm hungry. What I really want for breakfast is oatmeal. I have a can of steel cut oats in the cupboard. But nothing to mix-in, my preference being maple syrup. At the store where I work, we sell the grade of syrup I want (grade "B") but I can never find it. It isn't with the rest of the syrups. It isn't with the display for tourists. I thought we'd stopped carrying it until a customer brought "cooking syrup" to the register. They couldn't tell me where in the store they found it. Today, I decide that it is time to get my little syrup container, and go make a bulk purchase at the Co-op. I can control the amount, I don't have to spend tons of money. I already had my coffee - probably the last I will be able to afford for awhile. Coffee beans went up $2.00 a pound Thursday morning. I am having trouble typing, I move closer to the keyboard. My knee knocks into the tape deck. It still lives.

I look all over, the little syrup thingy is not to be found. I only have two or three of them collected over the years. I decide to go to the basement storage, I'm trying not to be foolhardy and buy another container I don't need. I have no clothes left that fit my current size. Smaller, yes. Larger, yes. I have one belt, on it's last legs. It's the type that is comprised of woven stands of leather. I can only keep it in a position tight enough to hold up my pants by using twine tied in a knot. The knot slips. I try to move it. The belt breaks. I have no other belts. I check online to see what time the second hand shop which benefits the hospice opens - 10am. I have an hour. I use twine intended to wrap up the tree to hold up my pants. The bow instantly slips into a knot. I can not reach it to untie it. I head to the basement.

Every time I wade into the storage unit, I run into one of the very syrup containers I'm looking for. Just not today. 8 boxes of stuff later, I have turned up the second pair of scissors - hurrah! They'd only been missing for about 6 years. I find the bulb forcing glass - not knowing where it was I didn't buy that pre-chilled ready for forcing hyacinth bulb on sale that would have cheered me up. Maybe it will still be there when I go back to work, except the sale price will be probably gone and I won't allow myself to afford it.  I find my "pre-show" tape. It is bits of music and dialogue I used to play when company arrived for a movie. I miss showing my 16mm collection - even to myself. I find it hard to sit through a movie on tv. Not so on a screen. I look longingly at the projector. I've no place to put it in my room, though. Just not big enough. All the movement has made the twine holding up my pants stretch.They start falling down. I finally find the syrup container. Happiness abounds. It takes about 20 minutes to get the boxes back into the storage unit.

My hair is a mess. I've been trying to come up with $20.00 to get a haircut. There are only two actual barber trained barbers left in town. One is almost never there. One keeps regular hours - her place is near where I work. She's the one that will cost me twenty by the time I throw in the tip, provided her prices haven't gone up. I figure if I'm going to walk to the co-op and the hospice thrift shop, I might as well walk the 5 minutes more and go to the $10.00 haircut place. It used to be Harold & Son. Harold is long gone. His son has always given me a great haircut. But he mostly drives truck these days. The women who run the shop are hairdresser trained not barber trained. They have almost never given me a cut that I've liked. Maybe I shall bit the bullet and just go.

I accidentally step on something placed out of the way so I won't step on it. It's okay, it's the stapler I didn't have room for on my desk area. Now there will be a little folded over staple waiting to snag my foot flesh the moment I take my socks off.

I can't get to the knot to retie the twine. That's solved easily enough - I just let the pants drop. Fixed! It's nearing 11am. I wonder if I have the time to go and do everything.... what? Where did the time go? If I don't get started there won't be enough light left to take the tree down and pack up properly. I'm still hungry though. 45 minutes to make that oatmeal. Maybe I should check and see if there is even enough left. Hopefully when I stand up my pants will stay up. If not, the screaming you hear will just be me. Nothing unusual. Someday I may actually accomplish something.

Doing things I used to do

After so many of them, one Christmas tends to blend into another. Even the Christmas tree's I've done over the years tend to a sameness. That's all right, though, I guess I find it comforting, wrapping me up into the warm folds of a nostalgia blanket.

There's the ornaments from the 1940's given to me when I lived in that entrance on the alley apartment in Ocean City, NJ back around 1970. Jeez. That's when the local cops thought I was a drug dealer and was having me watched by the FBI. (Or maybe they were doing the watching but their observations were, I was secretly told, going into such a file. I've never cared enough to find out if it existed or not.) It was worse than they imagined; I was training to be a draft counselor. I also harbored, on occasion, a lost soul who did have legal problems for having been caught using drugs. When he 'went away' for several months, I inherited his dog, Happy. A truly wonderful spirit, that Labrador. He was the one who figured out how to put his mouth on and turn the doorknob to let himself out. He never figured out closing the door, though - which could be a mite disturbing at 4am in the middle of winter when winds would knock out the heater's pilot light. As it turned out, the lost soul was the scion of a wealthy Philadelphia area family whose fortune derived from a common household invention. It was one of his stories I never believed. Except that one Christmas, the one with the 1940's decorations given for the tree by friends when I lived in the apartment that opened into an alley, when I got back from a quick Christmas stay at my Dad's, there were a couple of presents under the tree. Donna had moved out to marry what's his name, so they couldn't have been put there by her. Lost Soul didn't have a key to the place and was away visiting another friend for the holiday. When locked up, that place was locked up tight. I found out the hard way when I left my key behind once. I had to wait for one of my roommates at the time to arrive.  The presents turned out to be for the lost soul, and one box for me. They were labelled. My gift was a crystal brandy snifter and glasses set. It was of a lovely quality. And it was nothing any of my circle could afford. It was from the Lost Soul's parents. It was a lovely thing to do. And little creepy in the way it was done.

That was my second Christmas living on my own. The previous year, I remember I was living way out from the center of town (on 33rd Street, right on the beach! Downtown was the 9th street area).  I was so broke. I managed to get a tree, but didn't have the money to get a stand. As the apartment was on the beach, I found a bucket and filled it with sand. Worked great. I think that was my favorite tree stand to this day. I had been able to afford a string of lights and two boxes of balls, one all blue, at Stainton's, the local downtown department store. They had an annex around the corner and down a bit where they put such stuff. During the summer, the annex would be filled with tables with penny and ten cent merchandise, a major stop every year when I was a kid on vacation staying at Great Great Great Uncle Harry's for two weeks.  Even though time has taken its toll and the boxes are no longer full, the remaining balls are still in use on this year's tree. As are the ones from the 1940s.

This year did see a few casualties, though. It will be remembered as the second year I gave up entirely on the seven dwarfs, of which I only managed to get five. Purchased at that 5 and 10 cent store that used to be on 6th Avenue south of 8th Street in NYC about where Cornelia Street came in but on the other side, they have officially been retired due to deteriorating conditions. (But the box of glass balls from there is still in use - the box fell apart, though.) And this year, I didn't use the little birds that used to attach to the tree limbs with little wires at their feet (they were a present with the balls from the 1940's). The little wires were pretty much gone, as were many of their feathers and a number of beady eyes. But every year I had them on the tree (and I still have a few to put back some year) I put two of them, beak nuzzling beak, the way Jerry Campbell put them once. Tradition. For Absent friends. The two glass balls with a red ribbon hanging inside, which have written on them "miracles happen" are still in use. For absent friends. I purchased one. The other was given to me by my step sister in law. As I opened it she said she didn't know if it was appropriate. It was, I assured her, it was. For absent friends.

Today is the birthday of Marianne Faithfull. She's 65 today. And Good God, but somehow she managed to survive all that. And end up as a great chant-hussy. You can sometimes hear the days, every one of them, in her voice. Happy Birthday, Ms. Faithfull. Happy Birthday.


 
 

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From my Aunt Lorraine who estimates 1954 or 1955.

My father labelled this one.