May 30
May 30, of each year, National Hole in My Bucket Day is observed. This wacky holiday is in honor of the fun children’s song; There’s a Hole in My Bucket.
The song which has origins in 1700 Germany, is about a back and forth conversation between Henry and Liza. Henry needs to fix his leaky bucket. In each stanza, Henry asks Liza for advice. In the end, he needs a bucket to carry water to repair his bucket.
What if every children’s song had its own national day? Sheesh!
May 25
When I was a young woman, I just loved That Girl. I’d rush home from school to watch. Later, several of us would watch in the common room of our dorm at college.
Over the years, I’ve owned videotapes, DVDs. My mom bought me an episode guide for Christmas one year – which I still have.
I was absolutely excited a few years ago when I found Season 1 is available on Amazon Prime – for free. I thought it would be just the perfect way to spend these rainy afternoons we’d been having. I don’t think I’ve watched it all year, though. LOL
This year, it’s on my TiVo, two episodes a day and I am watching. some – but I remember almost all just by the little description Tivo provides.
Each episode begins with a pre-credits teaser in which an odd incident occurs or a discussion foreshadows the episode’s story. The scene almost always ends with someone exclaiming “…that girl!”, just as Ann wanders into the shot or the character notices her. The words “That Girl” would appear over the freeze-frame shot of Ann. The opening credits during the first season featured Thomas, in character, strolling the streets of New York.
That Girl starred Marlo Thomas as the title character Ann Marie, an aspiring (but only sporadically employed) actress, who moves from her hometown of Brewster, New York to try to make it big in New York City. Ann has to take a number of offbeat “temp” jobs to support herself in between her various auditions and bit parts.
Ted Bessell played her boyfriend Donald Hollinger. Many times during the show, Ann would say “Oh, Donald”. It’s become a catchphrase in our family.
I was so sorry when he died in 1996. It seemed like we were losing a family member.
LOS ANGELES, Oct. 8, 1996— Ted Bessell, the actor who starred with Marlo Thomas in the television comedy series ”That Girl” and was a director of the ”Tracey Ullman Show,” died on Sunday at the University of California at Los Angeles Medical Center. He was 57.
The cause was an aortic aneurysm, his family doctor said.
Mr. Bessell’s acting career spanned three decades, with appearances in at least 30 television productions including ”Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.,” ”Breaking Up is Hard to Do” and ”Don’t Drink the Water.” Perhaps his best-known role was as Donald Hollinger, the steady but suffering boyfriend of Ms. Thomas’s character in ”That Girl,” from 1966 to 1971.
”To this day when I’m walking in the street, people stop and ask me, ‘How is Donald?’ ” Ms. Thomas said today.
Ms. Thomas said Mr. Bessell was discussing a feature film remake of the series in which the two main characters, now 25 years older, would meet again and fall in love. ”That Girl,” set in New York City, was one of the first on television to focus on the life of a single woman.
That Girl also included a wonderful array of guest stars including Bernie Kopell, Ruth Buzzi, Dabney Coleman, Rob Reiner, Richard Dreyfuss, Carroll O’Connor, Teri Garr, Ethel Merman, Rob Reiner, Bill Bixby, Dick Shawn, Gary Marshall, Sid Caesar, Barry Williams, Vic Tayback, Larry Storch, Danny Thomas, McLean Stevenson, Avery Schreiber, Monty Hall, Jack Cassidy, Carl Reiner, Pat Boone, Russell Johnson, Cloris Leachman, Kenneth Mars, Regis Philbin, Joe Flynn, James Gregory, Reva Rose and Dick Van Patten.
Back to my show and my youth…
May 25
Each year, May 25 is Towel Day. Do you know why?
Towel Day is celebrated every year on 25 May as a tribute to the author Douglas Adams by his fans.
On this day, fans carry a towel with them, as described in Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, to demonstrate their appreciation for the books and the author.
The original quotation that explained the importance of towels is found in Chapter 3 of Adams’ work The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapours; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (such a mind-bogglingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.
More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitchhiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have “lost.” What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is, is clearly a man to be reckoned with.
Hence a phrase that has passed into hitchhiking slang, as in “Hey, you sass that hoopy Ford Prefect? There’s a frood who really knows where his towel is.” (Sass: know, be aware of, meet, have sex with; hoopy: really together guy; frood: really amazingly together guy.)
—Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
This book is important to me because I read it while I was at NIH waiting for pituitary surgery.
In case you like poetry, you might be interested in this: Vogon Poetry Generator.
Here’s mine:
See, see the old sky
Marvel at its big grey depths.
Tell me, Clyde do you
Wonder why the armadillo ignores you?
Why its foobly stare
makes you feel yucky.
I can tell you, it is
Worried by your qwerty facial growth
That looks like
A tofu
What’s more, it knows
Your rolf potting shed
Smells of pea.
Everything under the big old sky
Asks why, why do I even bother?
You only charm fish.
May 24
May 22
Each year on May 22 we observe National Buy a Musical Instrument Day. The day is all about playing music. If you are a musician, it might be time for a new instrument. Maybe you can learn to play a second or third one. If you have never played an instrument before, National Buy A Musical Instrument Day might be the motivation you need to start.
Naturally, here at the O’Connor Music Studio, a piano, keyboard with weighted keys (and 88 of them!) or organ is recommended but this day is for all types of instruments and is for people of all ages. Grandpa can play his ukulele while the grandkids play the drums, trombone, and flute. Together they can all make terrific music!
Adapted from http://www.nationaldaycalendar.com/national-buy-a-musical-instrument-day-may-22/
Feb 04
Since I’ve done the Nicholas Brothers and Busby Berkeley, it’s time for Cab Calloway, another old movie favorite of mine.
I think the first time I ever came across anything related to Calloway was in the late 1960s when I was watching That Girl on TV – Ann’s father (Lew Parker) sang Minnie the Moocher for a talent show. The song stuck in my head. I wish I could find a video of that performance.
“Minnie the Moocher” is a jazz song first recorded in 1931 by Cab Calloway and His Orchestra, selling over a million copies. “Minnie the Moocher” is most famous for its nonsensical ad libbed (“scat”) lyrics (for example, “Hi De Hi De Hi De Hi”).
In performances, Calloway would have the audience participate by repeating each scat phrase in a form of call and response. Eventually Calloway’s phrases would become so long and complex that the audience would laugh at their own failed attempts to repeat them.
“Minnie the Moocher” was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999.
Lots of others have sung this song, as well including Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie in “Jeeves and Wooster”.
and the Three Mo’ Tenors performed it in 2001
Calloway appeared in the 1980 film The Blues Brothers and sang a shortened version “Minnie The Moocher” in the film, in the original style of big band.
Cabell “Cab” Calloway III (December 25, 1907 – November 18, 1994) was an American jazz singer and bandleader. He was strongly associated with the Cotton Club in Harlem, New York City, where he was a regular performer.
Calloway was a master of energetic scat singing and led one of the United States’ most popular big bands from the start of the 1930s through to the late 1940s. Calloway’s band featured performers including trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie and Adolphus “Doc” Cheatham, saxophonists Ben Webster and Leon “Chu” Berry, New Orleans guitar ace Danny Barker, and bassist Milt Hinton. Calloway continued to perform until his death in 1994 at the age of 86.
An old Paramount short film of Cab Calloway singing many of his hits.
“The Old Man of The Mountain” is non-stop Cab from beginning to end. He appears first as an owl, singing the title song. The words have been changed for the cartoon, in which the Old Man is a villain. In the original song, the Old Man is a benevolent character. Next we see Cab as the Old Man himself, rotoscoped and singing, “You Gotta Hi-De-Hi,” followed by “The Scat Song.”
The cartoon begins with live footage of Cab and his Orchestra playing around with the tune of Minnie the Moocher while Cab scats mildly and grins at the camera. Whereas Cab may have been caught by surprise when they used live footage of him in the earlier cartoon, “Minnie the Moocher”, this time he is ready. He and his band are in dress white uniforms, Cab’s hair is slicked back, and he pays attention to the camera. (The drummer, Leroy Maxey, is still playing with his drumsticks, though!)
Of the three cartoons starring Cab Calloway, this one has the least interesting and least surreal plot, and the animation is the crudest. Never-the-less, the very early live footage of Cab is a treasure, and this cartoon showcases his music from beginning to end, featuring three of his songs. He does some of his most remarkable ever scat singing in this version of The Scat Song.
In all of the Fleisher cartoons, Cab’s characters are set in caves with menacing and ominous background illustrations: skeletons, skulls, ghosts, leering faces, and gambling, alcohol and drug paraphernalia. People have claimed that the Fleischers were unaware of the drug references in Cab’s songs (for example, “kicking the gong around” meaning “smoking opium”), but the imagery in the animations suggests otherwise.
Cab’s scat singing, dancing, comedic personality and flashy elegance had made him a star and a million-selling recording artist. He continued to perform right up until his death in 1994 at the age of 88.
Gunther Schuller sums up Calloway’s brilliance as an entertainer: “People still remember Cab Calloway as a dancer and vaudevillian with his wonderful white tuxedos and all of that — and, as a great, great showman.”
Jan 22
Our wonderful daughter-in-law is Chinese, so we are celebrating, too.
This is the Year of the Rabbit.
The rabbit (兔) is the fourth in the twelve-year periodic sequence (cycle) of animals that appear in the Chinese zodiac related to the Chinese calendar.
The Year of the Rabbit is associated with the Earthly Branch symbol 卯.
Jan 13
Today, January 13, holds a couple anniversaries for me. I remember the day of the Air Florida Flight 90 Crash in 1982 so well.
We were living in the Metro DC area and our young son had just turned 2 in December. Tom, my DH, worked in DC and I was never sure the route that he drove home from work. Sometimes, he left his car at the Vienna Metro lot and took the subway. It all depended on traffic, what he had to do that day, how late he was running.
Light snow started falling in the early morning. By noon, moderate-to-heavy snow had spread over the entire area, and by early afternoon the snowfall rate was very heavy. There was enough snow to close Washington National Airport (now Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport)
I think I had the TV off and on in the early afternoon because I was worried about the snow. Tom worked for the government then. Many federal offices in downtown Washington had closed early because of the quickly developing blizzard conditions – but I didn’t know if Tom’s was one of them. Although we were both from New England, had lived in Milwaukee and knew very well how to drive in the snow, I was concerned about other drivers.
According to the TV news, an extremely cold Arctic outbreak had spread across the eastern half of the United States, dropping temperatures to -25°F in Chicago and near 0°F in Atlanta. There was a major freeze in the central Florida citrus groves. At National Airport, the temperature dropped to 2°F.
There was a one-hour period during the early afternoon when the snow dropped visibility at National Airport to a sixteenth of a mile. Approximately 2-to-3 inches of snow fell during that hour. Then, the snow ended abruptly in the mid-afternoon.
During this day, I was also heavy with memories. On this date in 1976, I had had a miscarriage. We were living in Silver Spring, MD, then. I remember waking up in the night in pain, bleeding. We called my gynecologist in Alexandria, VA (we hadn’t lived in MD long) and he said to get to Alexandria (VA) Hospital at once.
We packed up our dog – she wasn’t trusted to stay at home alone. But her antics are for another day.
We raced around the Beltway at top speed to get to the hospital. I was admitted and I don’t remember a thing until the morning when I heard that I’d had a “missed abortion”. The doctor (or someone at the hospital) had performed a D&C (dilation and curettage) and the baby was gone. Even though I was pretty drugged up for the next several days, the mental pain was more than I ever could imagine.
I always wondered if this miscarriage was related to an accident we were in at Christmas. We were in Boston to visit Tom’s family and there was snow, of course. A young woman hit our car from behind. None of my doctors would confirm, or deny, that this was a contributing factor in the miscarriage but I always wondered.
I was remembering these events on January 13, 1982, tending to my young son, worrying about my husband when the news got worse. There was no internet then, no cell phone, only radio and TV reports.
The Air Florida’s scheduled departure time was delayed about 1 hour and 45 minutes because of the temporary closing of Washington National Airport. Moderate snowfall continued and the air temperature was 24 °F.
From Wikipedia:
The plane had trouble leaving the gate when the ground services tow motor could not get traction on the ice. For approximately 30 to 90 seconds, the crew attempted to back away from the gate using the reverse thrust of the engines, which proved futile. Boeing operations bulletins had warned against using reverse thrust in those kinds of conditions.
Eventually, a tug ground unit properly equipped with snow chains was used to push the aircraft back from the gate. After leaving the gate, the aircraft waited in a taxi line with many other aircraft for 49 minutes before reaching the takeoff runway. The pilot apparently decided not to return to the gate for reapplication of deicing, fearing that the flight’s departure would be even further delayed. More snow and ice accumulated on the wings during that period, and the crew were aware of that fact when they decided to make the takeoff. Heavy snow was falling during their takeoff roll at 3:59 p.m.
…
At 4:01 p.m. EST, it crashed into the 14th Street Bridge across the Potomac River, 0.75 nautical miles (1,390 m) from the end of the runway. The plane hit six cars and a truck on the bridge, and tore away 97 feet (30 m) of the bridge’s rail and 41 feet (12 m) of the bridge’s wall. The aircraft then plunged into the freezing Potomac River. It fell between two of the three spans of the bridge, between the I-395 northbound span (the Rochambeau Bridge) and the HOV north- and southbound spans, about 200 feet (61 m) offshore. All but the tail section quickly became submerged.
Meanwhile, at 4:29, the subway system (Metro) suffered its first fatal crash at the Federal Triangle station near Tom’s office. In my mind, Tom could have taken the subway…
The news on TV was just getting worse and worse when…our power went out.
When Tom finally did get home, safe and sound, it was cold, dark, cranky baby, hysterical mom, frantic dog…but our little family made it through that day.
We were lucky – many others didn’t 🙁
From the description of the video above:
Air Florida Flight 90 was a scheduled U.S. domestic passenger flight from Washington National Airport to Fort Lauderdale – Hollywood International Airport with an intermediate stopover at Tampa International Airport. On January 13, 1982, the Boeing 737-200 registered as N62AF, crashed into the 14th Street Bridge over the Potomac River. The aircraft had originally been purchased by United Airlines in 1969 and flown with the registration number of N9050U. It was sold to Air Florida in 1980.
The aircraft struck the 14th Street Bridge, which carries Interstate 395 between Washington, D.C. and Arlington County. It crushed seven occupied vehicles on the bridge and destroyed 97 feet (30 m) of guard rail[3] before it plunged through the ice into the Potomac River. The crash occurred less than two miles (3 km) from the White House and within view of both the Jefferson Memorial and The Pentagon. The aircraft was carrying 74 passengers and five crewmembers. Four passengers and one flight attendant survived the crash. Four motorists from the bridge were killed. The survivors were rescued from the icy river by civilians and professionals. President Ronald Reagan commended these acts during his State of the Union speech a few days later.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) determined that the cause of the accident was pilot error. The pilots failed to switch on the engines’ internal ice protection systems, used reverse thrust in a snowstorm prior to takeoff, and failed to abort the takeoff even after detecting a power problem while taxiing and visually identifying ice and snow buildup on the wings.
Major real-life air disasters are depicted in this TV series. Each episode features a detailed dramatized reconstruction of the incident based on cockpit voice recorders and air traffic control transcripts, as well as eyewitnesses recounts and interviews with aviation experts. Sometimes, interviews with investigators who dealt with the disaster or even actual footage are featured. In Canada, where the series originated, the show is called ‘Mayday’. In the US it is ‘Air Emergency’. Everywhere else it is called ‘Air Crash Investigation’.
Dec 25
It was one of those brilliant, yet failed ideas.
Last night, I set up a bunch of gift cards in amazon to send today, Christmas. I had planned to send them to myself so I could give them out individually to our son and family in New York.
When I got to my amazon cart this morning to send, they had disappeared. So I tried to recreate the cards. Some were no longer available, like WholeFoods – I thought that was especially odd since amazon owns them. Oh well.
Finally, I had the appropriate cards in my cart and pushed “proceed to checkout” again. Yay!
I got an email from amazon that showed that my credit card had been charged.
Then I got an email from amazon that showed that my account was suspended.
We believe that an unauthorized party may have accessed your account. To protect your information, we have:
— Disabled the password to your account.
— Reversed any modifications made by this party.
— Canceled any pending orders. You can ignore any confirmation emails that you received for these orders.
— Restored any pre-existing gift card balance that may have been used. It may take 2 to 3 days for the gift card balance to be available in your account. Any gift card balance that may have been added by the unauthorized party during the account compromise activity will be invalidated.
— If Two-Step Verification has been enabled during the unauthorized access, we have disabled it. Please reset and enable two-step verification on Amazon and enable if appropriate.
Allow 2 hours for these actions to take effect.
After 2 hours, you will be able to reset your password and regain access to your account. On the Amazon sign-in page, select “Forgot your password?” and follow the instructions. If you do not have a phone number in your account, we recommend adding it by clicking “Account Settings” on our Help page:
http://www.amazon.com/help
In the meantime, we recommend that you do not use the same password that you use on other sites, including your email provider. Actively monitor all your accounts, including your email, and any unauthorized change to auto forwarding or deletion rules of your email setting. We also recommend that you review all recent activity in your payment methods, and report any unauthorized charges to your financial institution.
Once you regain access to your account, you may need to:
— Re-enter your complete payment method information the next time that you place an order. — Re-enter any addresses that you recently added to your account. — Check your subscriptions, if you have any. You may need to update them.
To ensure safety of your account, please enable Two-Step Verification on your account by going to Your Account > Login & Security > 2SV Settings.
I started texting with my son:
So, the first card was successfully sent to my son’s email.
I tried a second one.
Next to make sure my credit card wasn’t really charged the initial expense.
If the second one goes through, I’ll finish up.
I have wasted almost 4 hours on this, so far.
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