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The Day the Music Died Plus Fifty

My sister can officially call herself old.  (Not that I’m that much of a spring chicken myself….)

It’s been fifty years today since a small airplane crashed in a cornfield in Clear Lake, Iowa, killing the pilot and his passengers:  rock ‘n roll musicians Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J. P. Richardson, the Big Bopper.  The event became an iconic watershed for some, including an acoustic-rock singer named Don McLean; he looked at the legacy of his hero Holly, and where the music Holly helped popularize had headed, and he wrote a song about the years since “the day the music died.”

I’m hesitant to rehash the facts here; they are quite available already, from a Wikipedia article to goleor other sites, and it would just be reinventing the wheel.  Many of those facts have acquired the patina of legend:  the winter tour, the coin flip, the jocular “cursing” of each other by Holly and Waylon Jennings….  I will simply add here something that was noted on today’s Morning Edition:  that Buddy would be just in his seventies if he had lived, and perhaps rocking to this day, as the people he inspired (such as the surviving Beatles and the Rolling Stones) do in their sixties.  As for the art he practiced…well, some say that it died the death some time back as well, or has mutated beyond all recognition; but there are still young practitioners of true rock out there, such as Atlanta’s Tim Brantley.  Maybe Holly, Valens and the Big Bopper would still see hope for their beloved music.

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Peace be to you.

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Does Anyone Find This Moderately Disturbing?

From Moderately Confused by Jeff Stahler:

Moderately Confused by Jeff Stahler

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Peace be to you.

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The Ultimate Action Figure!

Now that Barack Obama is safely installed in office, we can start making fun of him!  From one of my contacts across the limitless desert of the Internet comes a link to a new action figure….

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Peace be to you.

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R.I.P. Ricardo Montalban and Patrick McGoohan

When I returned home from work tonight, I found two sad pieces of news, though not unexpected in a way.  Both actors we lost today were quite old, full of honor and work, and survived by families that will remember them better than we mere fans.

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Ricardo Montalbán (IMDb, Wikipedia) was 88 when he passed away.  Depending on how old you are, or how well-versed in Trek-lore you are, you may best remember him as the semi-mysterious Roarke, the law and prophets of Fantasy Island, or as a peddler of cars upholstered with “fine Corinthian leather,” or as the power-thirsty Khan Noonien Singh of Star Trek TOS’s “Space Seed.”  For the oldest of us, though, we will know him as an actor in movie and television roles long before this, stretching back to forgotten pieces from the 1940s.

Montalbán was an actor who always tried to challenge himself.  If he took on a role, he wanted to find facets that nobody else might have seen before.  This was one reason why he chose to reprise the role of Khan for the second Star Trek film, The Wrath of Khan; he felt that there were more facets to this character — often cited as one of the best villains ever put on celluloid — that needed to be explored.  From the Wikipedia article on the character:

Montalbán said in promotional interviews for the movie he realized early on in his career that a good villain does not see himself as villainous. The villain may do villainous things, but he feels that he is doing them for righteous reasons. Montalbán further stated he always tried to find a flaw in the character because no one is completely good or completely evil; while Khan had a rather distorted view of reality and therefore performs acts of evil, he still feels that his vengeance is a noble cause because of the death of his wife. Khan quotes the character of Ahab from Moby Dick throughout the film, driving home his lust to make Kirk pay for the wrongs he has inflicted upon him.

Not many casual fans might have known that Montalbán suffered from a spinal condition that had been aggravated by being thrown from horses in some of his Western roles, and which deteriorated as he grew older.  Operations only worsened the condition, and his last roles were often played from chairs or wheelchairs.  Despite this, he remained active and in work up through last year, often doing voices in cartoons ranging from Kim Possible and Freakazoid to Family Guy.  He can be seen on camera in a wheelchair in the first Spy Kids movie (and also making appearances in the more lamentable second and third movies of the series).  He even did work on an episode of Dora the Explorer, as an animated puzzle character named El Encantador (the Wizard or Enchanter).

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I enjoyed watching and listening to Ricardo Montalbán, but my greater admiration was saved for Patrick McGoohan (IMDb, Wikipedia).  Aged 88 at his death, McGoohan acted since 1954, when he played in an episode of You Are There, and alternated roles in both movies and television for years.  His best movie role was perhaps in Ice Station Zebra opposite Rock Hudson, and he also played the voice of Billy Bones in Disney’s Treasure Planet.

But in America, he will be best known for three television series:  his recurring appearances as various murderers in episodes of Columbo; British spy John Drake in Secret Agent (also known as Danger Man); and, of course, as the man known only as Number Six in The Prisoner.  This series, a follow-up to Secret Agent and a definite brainchild of the discontented 1960s, explored the pressures placed on Man to conform to societal norms and expectations, shrouded in the allegory of a spy who suddenly and without explanation resigns from MI.6, and then finds himself kidnapped and spirited away to “The Village,” a place filled with people known only by numbers.  Not knowing which side, if any side runs the place, the Prisoner fights to escape, to retain his identity and sense of self, and most of all to discover — who is Number One? The debate, discussion and uproar over this milestone piece of television has continued to this day, and fans still flock to the Welsh resort of Portmeirion to see the exteriors and discuss the deeper implications of McGoohan’s vision.

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Peace be to you.

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Today’s Message from the Illuminati

I’ve put up a few “Messages from the Illuminati” in the past, but I think this one may just take the prize for obscurity — if not plain wierdness.

Karl Rove kills the vampiric tuba and the atomic plant.

If you follow the link above, I assure you won’t get the same message.  Each cell of the Cabal (fnord) gets its own message, and that message will vary from load to load.  Just click on the eye of the Pyramid at the top of the page if you need a clarification.

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Peace be to you.

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David Bowie and Bing Crosby — “Little Drummer Boy/Peace on Earth”

The tradition of the Mews continues, with this wish for the planet and for children of all countries and creeds everywhere:

May the true wishes and hope of this Christmas season be with all!

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Peace be to you.

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STOP PRESSES: Bush Kisses Streisand!

Last night, in one of the last ceremonial duties of his presidency, George W. Bush presented the Kennedy Center Honors to this year’s class of performing and associated artists: Roger Daltrey, Morgan Freeman, Pete Townshend, George Jones, Twyla Tharp — and Barbra Streisand. And, at the end of the East Room ceremony of placing the Rainbow Ribbon around their necks, the staunchly conservative president — I’ve seen this on the videotape this morning on Today — leaned in and kissed the fearlessly liberal Streisand on the cheek, which she returned with equal courtesy.

One does wonder just how much internal conflict passed through President Bush’s mind at that moment.  Barbra Streisand has been a most vocal gadfly of Mr. Bush’s policies for some time, and the arch-conservative sections of the press and the Blogosphere have made her the poster child for everything Left, Liberal and Vulgar in the country — aside from Bill and Hillary Clinton, of course.  Graciousness triumphed, though, and, as Ms. Streisand said herself, “Art trumps politics tonight.”

This is not the first time politics cast a (distant) shadow over the Honors, according to the Washington Post.  George W. Bush also presented the Honors to Warren Beatty and Robert Redford; and Bill Clinton, during his tenure as President, hung the Rainbow Ribbons about the neck of Charlton Heston, of National Rifle Association fame as well as The Ten Commandments and Soylent Green.  In the end, though, the important things seems to be the honor done to performers worthy of the term “honor,” and that is what has happened here.

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Peace be to you.

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Is Miracle Whip a Midwestern Thing?

In this family, when it comes to hamburgers, I am considered a heretic.  Everybody else prefers cheddar or pseudo-cheddar (Velveeta) on the burger — sometimes the extra-thick slices that have more resemblance (for me) to thick sheets of congealed mucilage.  Heart attacks by the sheet.  I want cheese on my burgers, but when I’m cooking them myself, I prefer something a touch different:  something along the line of a good aged Swiss.  I have yet to get a few pounds of ground meat and some of that really good Swiss from the Whole Foods Market to cook hamburgers with; but, maybe for some family cookout.  (Hmmm; I could do a Who’s the Boss? and have a winter cookout sometime with the grill….)

Where the difference really shows up, though, is what other things I use to dress the burger.  The Younger Child is a purist; cheese and nothing else, usually.  Older Child has started using mustard, as well as occasional lettuce, and mayo.  Kitt also goes for mayo, along with lettuce and tomato, and maybe a good slice of onion.  Me, I like the cheese and the onion, sometimes the lettuce and the onion, but usually no other dressings if the burger’s good and juicy…except for those times when I hark back to my childhood and slather the bun with a blast of — Miracle Whip.

“I sense a disturbance in the Force….” Miracle Whip???

Yes, the stuff of Lutheran cold-dish-supper salads and classic commercials that you can find on YouTube.  (Remember the ones about the private eye who was always willing to break a case for a turkey on soft potato bread and Miracle Whip above the lettuce and tomato?)  It wasn’t a frequent thing; but that slightly tangy-sweet taste worked for me at times.  It seemed to go great with ketchup, too, which I used on my burgers back when I wasn’t making them myself.

Kitt tends to Look at me when I invoke Miracle Whip; so does Older Child, in the same way she Looked at me when I told her how some Canadians use vinegar on their fries.  (Younger Child finds the concept of variety in food alien.)  What can I say?  I don’t know if it’s a Midwestern thing, but I do know that I’m not the only one that likes Miracle Whip on the occasional hamburger.  (It really shines on a turkey sandwich, but hamburgers work as well.)  Mayonnaise — at least the stuff that comes off a grocery-store shelf, some of which is, ironically, prepared by the same company that makes Miracle Whip — is a tasteless, pasty substance with only slightly more redeeming quality to it than guacamole in that it is tasteless.  (If I ever sat down to make Alton Brown’s Good Eats mayonnaise, I may change my mind.)

How about readers out there?  Is this just a bizarre personal thing, is it a Midwesternism, or is the enjoyment of Miracle Whip on hamburgers more widespread than I imagine?

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Peace be to you.

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Unused London Underground Tunnels For Sale

I just ran into a note in some of my mail (thanks to Paul Chapman at Steve Jackson Games).

You may recall that, during the Battle of Britain in World War II, many residents of London took shelter in the Underground — their subway system — to escape the Blitz. Some tunnels were built especially for this purpose in the Kingsway district of the city, though, and were employed for other purposes following the war:  communications center, public records library, even a recreation room.  The tunnels are reached from unmarked doors in High Holborn Street.

The current owner (British Telecom, I believe) now plans to sell the tunnels off — 77,000 square of space.  They’re hoping for a bid of £5 million pounds.

You can see six pictures of the complex at the BBC article.

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Peace be to you.

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Fantastic Knitting Sites

Bruce has always seen this as a personal site as much as a news site, and he lets me post what I want, so I’m going to recommend a few knitting sites here.

  • Let’s Knit2gether — This is an incredible site with a regular podcast by CAT on all things knitting.  It’s not just a how-to (though there are excellent segments on that), but a place where you can travel with her and her husband Eric, the producer, to knitting shows, the Knit ‘n Pitch at the Mets’ Shea Stadium, and other places.  CAT interviews, she teaches, and she inspires.  Who woulda thunk that you could knit wire?  I’m getting ideas for jewelry for our church’s next auction in 2009.
  • Ravelry – Ravelry is best described in their own words:  “Ravelry is a place for knitters, crocheters, designers, spinners, and dyers to keep track of their yarn, tools, and pattern information, and look to others for ideas and inspiration. The content here is all user- driven; we as a community make the site what it is.”  Go and check it out; if you knit, this is the place to be!

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