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A shaggy dog story, in a comic vein

April 6, 2010

So…

The other day, I was chatting with the award-winning cartoonist who created the Flaming Carrot and the Mystery Men, and for whom SpongeBob SquarePants was named.

The artist said to me, “You know, now that Marvel is rebooting the X-Men movie franchise, you’d be the perfect actor to play Hank McCoy.”

“How so?” I asked.

“Well, you’re a rather squat and stocky individual, yet quite graceful and agile,” the artist said. “You’re also intellectual and erudite, as is Hank.”

Although flattered, I demurred. “They’d never cast a little-known voice actor in such a prominent role in a big-budget, live-action property,” I said. “That’s why Kelsey Grammer got the role in X-Men: The Last Stand.”

“Nevertheless,” reiterated the cartoonist, “if I were directing the next X-Men film, I’d cast you as Hank.”

To which I could only respond…

“I’ll never be your Beast, Bob Burden.”

Thank you! I’ll be here all week!

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Celebritiana, Cinemania, SwanStuff

Comments: 1 Comment

On television, everything dies

March 29, 2010

As evidence of the title of this post, I offer the following three exhibits.

Last Wednesday, Robert Culp died.

Robert Culp first became a TV star in the late 1950s as the lead in a Western series entitled Trackdown. Culp played a Texas Ranger whose job involved — as the more mentally nimble among you will already have surmised — tracking down criminals and bringing them to justice. Trackdown, which ran for two seasons, is probably less well remembered than the other Western series that spun off from it: Wanted: Dead or Alive, the show that launched Steve McQueen on his road to superstardom.

Forgettable though Trackdown was, Culp’s next series would be the stuff of TV legend. I Spy featured Culp as espionage agent Kelly Robinson, who masked his real occupation under the guise of a professional tennis player. Robinson’s fellow spy, Alexander “Scotty” Scott, played by Bill Cosby, masqueraded as Kelly’s personal trainer and coach. I Spy became the first network series to share top billing between Caucasian and African-American actors, and to portray a true partnership of peers between men of different races (even though the “I” of the show’s title was presumed to be Robinson — then again, We Spy wouldn’t have made as catchy a title).

Nearly two decades later, Culp returned to weekly TV on The Greatest American Hero, as the tough-as-nails FBI man who becomes the “handler” of a hapless superhero played by William Katt. More recently, Culp had a recurring role on the sitcom Everybody Loves Raymond, playing the father-in-law of Ray Romano’s put-upon sportswriter. In around all of the above acting roles, Culp also built a respectable career as a director and screenwriter.

Last Thursday, At the Movies — the long-running syndicated film review program — died. (Or was canceled, which is how shows die on TV.)

It’s fair to say that At the Movies had already died three deaths before Disney pulled the plug. It died first in 1999, when Gene Siskel, the Chicago Tribune critic who originally occupied the aisle seat opposite Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times, passed away from cancer. Richard Roeper — who, quite frankly, I never much cared for — replaced Siskel the following year.

The show died a second time in 2006, when Ebert’s health difficulties (originating with surgery to remove a cancerous salivary gland) escalated to the point that he could no longer appear on camera. An endless stream of guest hosts — some fine, several wretched — filled in the empty chair next to Roeper over the next couple of years.

(I will presume that most of my readers — savvy bunch that you are — already know that Ebert subsequently lost both the ability to speak and the ability to intake food and drink orally due to further complications from this surgery. Uncle Roger would want you to know, however, that he is alive and alert and continuing to write prolifically — as lead critic for the Sun-Times, on his own website, and on Twitter, where he posts with prodigious frequency.)

At the Movies suffered its third death in 2008, when Ben Mankiewicz, the Vanna White of the Turner Classic Movies cable channel, and Ben Lyons, an entertainment reporter for the E! channel whose primary qualification as a film reviewer was genetic (his father, Jeffrey Lyons — along with film historian Neal Gabler — replaced Siskel and Ebert on Sneak Previews, the PBS show S&E left in 1981 to start what evolved into At the Movies), took over for the medically unavailable Ebert and the dismissed Roeper. With the two Bens occupying the storied seats, At the Movies crashed and burned like nothing had since the Hindenburg. Disney realized its error after one grotesque season, ditching the Bens in favor of the perfectly acceptable A.O. Scott (from the New York Times) and Michael Phillips (from the Chicago Tribune), but the fatal damage had been done.

At the Movies will limp on for the remainder of this final season with Scott and Phillips at the helm. By rights, the show should have been laid mercifully to rest with poor Gene Siskel.

Finally, last Friday, 24 died.

When it exploded onto American TV in 2001, 24 was unlike anything viewers had seen before: A fictional 24-hour day that unfolded in real time, over the span of 24 hour-long episodes. (Well, “real time” in TV terms. Part of the fun was noting the many events that transpired with impossible swiftness; i.e., cross-Los Angeles car trips accomplished in 10 minutes.)

The show centered around the perfect hero for the New Millennium: Jack Bauer (played to teeth-gritting perfection by Kiefer Sutherland), a rule-bending intelligence agent employed by a super-secret federal antiterrorist unit. Bauer confronted national security crises and enemies of the state and beat, shot, tortured, and shouted them to death in the space of a single revolution of the planet. In that groundbreaking first season, Bauer saved the life of Senator David Palmer, who by Season Two had become the nation’s first African-American President — foreshadowing (and in the mind of more than one social scientist, helping to facilitate) the real-life election of Barack Obama to the White House by the end of the decade.

Jack Bauer has had seven more “really bad days” since Season One, the last of which is playing out Monday nights on FOX at this writing. It was difficult for many viewers — yours truly among them — to see how the show’s novel premise would survive repetition, but for the most part, 24 has worked. If you buy into the premise, are sufficiently forgiving to overlook continuity errors the size of Martian craters, and most importantly, get into Jack Bauer and his ever-changing supporting cast (the show’s cast turns over almost completely from one season to the next, with Bauer and tech wizard Chloe O’Brian –played by Mary Lynn Rajskub, who signed on in Season Three — the only consistent mainstays), then 24‘s seat-of-the-pants thrill-ride can prove addictive.

Now, as Jack has bellowed repeatedly (and to much-lampooned effect) over the years… “We’re running out of time!”

And so, indeed, it must be. Because on TV, everything dies eventually.

Except maybe The Simpsons.

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Celebritiana, Cinemania, Dead People Got No Reason to Live, Disney, Listology, Reminiscing, Ripped From the Headlines, Teleholics Anonymous, The Swan Tunes In

Comments: 4 Comments

Supergirl is now officially Superwoman

March 25, 2010

Twenty-one years ago today, my daughter KM was born.

And, as they say in the comics, nothing would ever be the same again.

Clearly, from my perspective, KM’s birth is far and away the most significant event ever to occur on March 25 throughout the entirety of human history. (Which, if you think about it, is all the history there is. It’s not as though any of the other creatures who inhabit this planet are writing this stuff down.) If, however, one wanted to think about the importance of this date from a more global perspective, here’s some grist for the mill.

  • According to tradition, Venice (the one in Italy, not the one in southern California) was founded on this date in 421.
  • Robert the Bruce assumed the royal throne of Scotland in 1306.
  • Titan, the largest moon of Saturn (and the birthplace of Saturn Girl, of Legion of Super-Heroes fame), was discovered by Christiaan Huygens in 1655.
  • Slave trading was abolished in the British Empire in 1807. (About time!)
  • Greece — a lovely country where I spent two years during my halcyon youth — declared its independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1821, and found itself compelled to make its own footstools from that point forward.
  • Beginning one of the most notorious travesties of the American justice system, the Scottsboro Boys were arrested in 1931.
  • The European Economic Community (what we Americans used to call the Common Market) was founded in 1957.
  • John Lennon and Yoko Ono began their first Bed-In for Peace at the Amsterdam Hilton in 1969.
  • In 2006, Kyle Huff shot and killed six people at a party in Seattle before turning his weapon on himself, in what came to be known as the Capitol Hill massacre.

KM shares her birthday with such notables as…

  • The late sportscaster Howard Cosell.
  • The equally late Patrick Troughton (the Second Doctor in Doctor Who).
  • Astronaut Jim Lovell (who narrowly avoided becoming “the late Jim Lovell” aboard Apollo 13).
  • Film critic Gene Shalit.
  • Feminist icon Gloria Steinem.
  • The Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin.
  • The Queen of Rock and Roll, Elton John. (Sorry, Sir Elton, but you know you’d have made that same joke.)
  • Actresses and style-setters Sarah Jessica Parker and Marcia Cross.
  • American Idol contestants Katharine McPhee, Carmen Rasmusen, and Jason Castro.
  • Auto racer and GoDaddy pitchwoman Danica Patrick.
  • Three former members of KM’s beloved Golden State Warriors: Avery Johnson, Bob Sura, and Marco Belinelli.
  • The charming proprietor of my local comic book shop, Kathy Bottarini.

Happy birthday, Punkin. Your mom and I love you very much.

You go, Supergirl! I mean… Superwoman.

Yeah, that’ll take some getting used to.

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Celebritiana, Hero of the Day, Listology, My Home Town, SwanStuff, They Say It's My Birthday

Comments: 1 Comment

Dancing in the dark, walking through the park, and reminiscing

March 23, 2010

This headline struck me with a lightning bolt of nostalgia:

Fruitport Township Board OKs casino agreements with Little River Band

You know, I loved me some Little River Band back in the day. A series of charmingly pleasant pop hits made the Melbourne, Australia-based LRB ubiquitous on American Top 40 and Adult Contemporary radio in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Their 1977 album Diamantina Cocktail broke LRB big-time in the U.S. — that recording went gold, and the pair that followed it, Sleeper Catcher and First Under the Wire, both scored platinum sales. LRB earned another gold album with 1981’s Time Exposure, and smashed the multi-platinum barrier with a 1982 Greatest Hits compilation. The band charted three more albums in the States as they began the long, slow slide into bargain bin obscurity.

Never the most distinctive or innovative act in the business, the Little River Band nevertheless cranked out the kind of innocuous, infernally catchy tunes that bore their way into your cranium and dare you to stop humming them. I’ll be honest, I dug quite a few of those melodious confections. I still have some LRB LPs collecting dust on my living room bookshelf with the rest of my old vinyl.

Here for your singalong enjoyment, we count down Uncle Swan’s 10 Favorite Little River Band Songs…

10. “Reminiscing.” The group’s first Top 10 U.S. hit. Any pop song that name-checks Glenn Miller deserves a thumbs-up.

9. “The Other Guy.” Everyone loves a good relationship-gone-wrong song.

8. “Happy Anniversary.” Despite the seemingly upbeat title, this is another now-you’ve-gone-and-left-me number. They had issues, those LRB guys.

7. “Full Circle.” A non-single from Time Exposure, this one spotlights the LRB’s flawless harmonies completely a cappella through the first verse, gradually bringing in the rhythm and string sections as the song builds. Awesome stuff.

6. “Lonesome Loser.” Another song with an a cappella opening, this “unlucky in love” tune was one of the group’s biggest hits. Back in my DJ days, I occasionally opened my radio show with this.

5. “Help Is On Its Way.” This is the Little River Band song you probably forgot was a Little River Band song. It’s turned up in commercials a number of times over the years, for everything from UPS to Nutri-Grain granola bars.

4. “Man On Your Mind.” Not to be confused with “Man in the Mirror,” which is a Michael Jackson song.

3. “Cool Change.” Probably the most profound number LRB ever recorded, it’s a paean to being the captain of one’s own ship and the master of one’s own soul. Plus, it’s got an albatross and a whale in it.

2. “Lady.” If you were in high school in the late ’70s, this song still says, “Prom night.”

1. “The Night Owls.” Because I am one.

I’m not sure exactly how the Little River Band got into the casino business, but I’m happy to know that the boys from Down Under are still making a living.

Huh? What?

Oh… the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians.

Not the Little River Band.

Hm.

Never mind, then.

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Celebritiana, Listology, Reminiscing, Ripped From the Headlines, Soundtrack of My Life

Comments: 1 Comment

What it was, was Oscar

March 8, 2010

Congratulations! We survived another Oscarcast. Observations follow.

At least it wasn’t Ray Milland and Rosey Grier: The two-headed host — Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin — turned out to be a dreadful idea. Not because either was terrible, but because they simply didn’t work smoothly and effectively together. I don’t know whether Martin and Baldwin were poorly rehearsed, or just suffering from awkward chemistry. One host or the other would have been adequate, if not especially scintillating — Martin hosted the awards solo in 2000 and 2002, in not-particularly-memorable fashion — but the combination fell flat.

The sound of one man yawning: None of the major awards turned out to be a huge surprise, unless you really thought the Academy was going to pass up a chance to stick it to notoriously unpopular James “King of the World” Cameron by honoring his ex-wife Kathryn Bigelow and her magnum opus. The favorites in each of the big categories triumphed.

Double the displeasure: Expanding the Best Picture category to ten nominees was, as expected, a pointless drag on the production. No one really thought that there were more than five real contenders; namely, the films represented in the Best Director category — the victorious The Hurt Locker, Avatar, and dark horses Inglourious Basterds, Precious, and Up in the Air. Padding the show with twice as many introductory film clips merely took up air space.

Up with people: In a refreshing change, all four of the acting winners gave engaging, entertaining speeches. (I can’t prove it with verified test results, but I suspect that Jeff Bridges’s Dude-esque ramble may have been… what shall we say… chemically enhanced.) Equally refreshing, all four were people that most viewers would be glad to see win.

Sore loser: Quentin Tarantino, who looked as though Kathryn Bigelow had vomited in his lap when she won Best Director and he didn’t. I dig your films, QT, but your sportsmanship sucks.

Spare me the song and dance: We didn’t have to sit through performances of each of the Best Song hopefuls this year. A welcome omission, because seriously, when was the last time all five of the nominated songs were actually good? On the other hand, someone thought it made sense to stage an elaborate interpretive dance number incorporating music from the Original Score nominees. (Funny, I didn’t realize there was breakdancing in Sherlock Holmes.) Redeeming the moment, winning composer Michael Giacchino (Up) gave one of the night’s best acceptance speeches, encouraging young people to pursue their creative impulses and not allow naysayers to convince them that they’re wasting their time.

Didn’t work: The trend, continued from last year’s Oscarcast, of having each of the Best Actor and Best Actress nominees regaled with a speech by another celebrity. With the rare exception of an unexpected star turn by someone like Oprah Winfrey (who feted Gabourey Sidibe, nominated for Precious), these fawning tributes only serve to make both audience and nominees uncomfortable.

Worked, in kind of an off-kilter way: The tribute to recently deceased writer-director John Hughes, which culminated in the appearance onstage of numerous actors and actresses who became stars via Hughes’s legendary run of hit films in the 1980s. Cool to see these folks together in one place, but man… are we all getting old, or what?

Speaking of getting old: I understand why they do it, but I grow annoyed with the increasing insertion into the Oscarcast of no-talent young stars with no genuine cinematic credibility (i.e., the ubiquitous Miley Cyrus), just to draw in the teen audience. Uncle Oscar says: Get off my lawn, you meddling kids.

The death of me: I’m always curious to see who gets tagged with what I call the “Dead People Gig,” introducing the memorial segment honoring movie folks who’ve shuffled off this mortal coil since the last Oscar ceremony. This year, it was Demi Moore pulling double-death duty (she was also one of the participants in the John Hughes tribute). James Taylor performed an acoustic rendition of “In My Life” while the clips rolled. For once, there was no moment of shock generated by the appearance of someone I didn’t know had died. Interestingly, Michael Jackson — whose filmography consists basically of The Wiz — made the cut, while Farrah Fawcett — mostly known for TV work, but she did make several films, including such “classics” as Logan’s Run and Saturn 3 — missed.

Fashion forward: Oscars 2010 proved rather low-key on the sartorial front. Understated glamour was the norm this year, so there were fewer what in the name of Vera Wang was THAT? moments on the red carpet than at previous Oscarcasts. The most egregious offenders were Sarah Jessica Parker, whose strapless gown came equipped with an enormous silver breastplate that resembled a leftover centerpiece from an office Christmas party, and Charlize Theron, wearing what looked like two pink-frosted cinnamon rolls stuck to her bosom. Best-dressed of the evening included several of the usual suspects — Kate Winslet, Helen Mirren, Meryl Streep, and Queen Latifah. Jennifer Lopez’s lovely pink dress would have gained high honors, if not for its ridiculous train. Likewise, Best Actress winner Sandra Bullock lost points for her garish lipstick.

The voice of choice: As she did last year, voice actress Gina Tuttle contributed a pleasant and unobtrusive announcing job. And if Gina ever gets tired of that gig, Oscar producers… I’m in the book.

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Celebritiana, Cinemania, Dead People Got No Reason to Live, Listology, Ripped From the Headlines, Sexiest People Alive, Teleholics Anonymous, The Swan Tunes In

Comments: 2 Comments

Dominance and Submission

March 2, 2010

We don’t do memes very often here at SSTOL, but every once in a blue moon, someone on my blogroll will post one that looks kind of fun.

The man known only as the Mysterious Cloaked Figure served up this intriguing challenge a while back: Answer a series of 20 questions about yourself, using titles of songs recorded by one of your favorite musical artists. I immediately came up with a couple of possibilities, but ultimately went with the one whose catalog offered the most entertaining possibilities.

So, without further ado, here’s my life as told by Blue Öyster Cult. (For the record, I’m using titles only from the period during which I was actively buying BÖC records, which ended with their 1983 album The Revölution By Night.)

1. Are you male or female?
Subhuman

2. Describe yourself:
Veteran of the Psychic Wars

3. How do you feel about yourself?
I’m on the Lamb But I Ain’t No Sheep

4. Describe where you currently live:
Shadow of California

5. The first thing you think of when you wake up:
This Ain’t the Summer of Love

6. If you could go anywhere, where would you go?
Cities on Flame with Rock and Roll

7. What is your favorite form of transportation?
Wings Wetted Down

8. Your best friend is:
Godzilla

9. What is your favorite color?
Heavy Metal: the Black and Silver

10. What’s the weather like?
Feel the Thunder

11. If your life were a TV show, what would it be called?
I Love the Night

12. What is life to you?
Goin’ Through the Motions

13. What is the best advice you have to give?
Don’t Fear the Reaper

14. If you could change your name, what would it be?
Baby Ice Dog

15. What is your favorite food?
Unknown Tongue

16. How would you like to die?
O.D.’d on Life Itself

17. Your soul’s present condition:
Redeemed

18. The faults you can bear:
7 Screaming Diz-Busters

19. How would you describe your love life?
Before the Kiss, a Redcap

20. What are you going to post this as?
Dominance and Submission

Postscript: People who know me as a middle-aged adult are often surprised to discover that I was a huge Blue Öyster Cult fan in my younger days. To them I say…

You’re Not the One (I Was Looking For)

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Blogosphere, Listology, Reminiscing, Soundtrack of My Life

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Vancouver memories and Canada dreams

March 1, 2010

I miss the Winter Olympics already.

Miscellaneous thoughts and observations from the 21st Winter Games in Vancouver…

The start of the Games was overshadowed by the death of Nodar Kumaritashvili, a luger from the former Soviet republic of Georgia, in a crash during a pre-Games training run on the day of the opening ceremonies. All of the sliding events (luge, bobsleigh, and skeleton) were subsequently altered, with the men starting from the (lower) women’s launch point and the women starting at the junior-level gate. Even with these adjustments, we saw a higher-than-usual number of wipeouts in these events, even among the most skilled competitors.

The Canadian women’s curling team had a member who was five months pregnant. Seriously, if you can do it at a world-class level when you’re heavily gravid, it’s really not much of a sport.

Speaking of curling, a shout-out to local Sonoma County company Loudmouth Golf, suppliers of wackily patterned pants for the Norwegian men’s curling squad. Seriously, if you can do it at a world-class level wearing ludicrous trousers, it’s really not much of a sport.

Canadian Joannie Rochette skated the short program of her life, less than three days after her mother’s sudden death from a heart attack. Joannie’s free skate was equally dazzling, netting her a bronze medal and the adulation of millions.

Bode Miller skiied home with a complete set of medals — a gold in super-combined, a silver in super-giant slalom, and bronze in the downhill. In so doing, he actually managed to seem slightly less full of himself than he did four years ago in Torino, where he was a total bust.

Memo to NBC’s Bob Costas: Put. The Just for Men. Down. Although, to Bob’s credit, his dye jobs looked better in Vancouver than they did two years ago at the Summer Games in Beijing.

Shaun “The Flying Tomato” White and Jeret “Speedy” Peterson busted out impossible-seeming aerial moves in the snowboard halfpipe and freestyle skiing, respectively, proving that if you want to be really good at anything, you need a snappy nickname.

Women’s halfpipe starred its own pair of tomatoes — silver medalist Hannah Teter and bronze medalist Kelly Clark.

Thanks to Bill Demong, Johnny Spillane, and their Nordic Combined teammates, Team USA won three medals in a class of events where no American had so much as sniffed the podium in, like, forever.

Has there ever been a more amazing female figure skater than South Korea’s Kim Yu-Na? If so, I must have missed seeing her. In technique, in artistry, and in power, Yu-Na was so many light-years ahead of the rest of the competitors that I almost felt embarrassed for the field.

Lost amid the highly deserved excitement over Apolo Ohno’s becoming the most decorated U.S. Winter Olympian ever was the fact that his close friend Shani Davis won Team USA’s only speed-skating gold, in the men’s 1000 meters. Shani added a silver in the 1500. The most heart-warming story in speed skating came via J.R. Celski, who earned a bronze in 1500 meter short-track (thanks to a spectacular wipeout involving two Korean competitors) in his first competition after a horrific injury last fall.

We love Steve Holcomb and the Night Train, the gold-winning team in men’s four-man bobsleigh (and yes, that’s how they spell it at the Olympics). Steve’s celebratory “Holkie Dance”? Not so much.

Smackdown of the Games: Evan Lysacek’s win over the Ivan Drago of figure skating, Evgeni Plushenko.

Russian President Vladimir Putin was so incensed by his country’s lack of gold medals in Vancouver that he called for the ouster of Russia’s sports ministry. Tough sledding (pun intended) since that Soviet machine went away, eh, Vlad?

Proving that she does, in fact, know her shin from Shinola, Lindsay Vonn overcame a much-publicized injury to bag gold in the downhill and bronze in the super-G. Her teammate Julia Mancuso took home a pair of silver medals, in the downhill and super-combined.

Seth Wescott repeated as the only man ever to win gold in Olympic snowboard cross, a sport that I am convinced recruits its participants from insane asylums.

Halfpipe bronze medalist Scott Lago was sent home by the U.S. Olympic Committee, after photos appeared on the Internet showing Scott and a female companion engaging in risque business with his medal.

Memo to NBC’s makeup department: The technician who worked on the broadcast crew at the figure skating events needs to be fired.

Hannah Kearney and pink-tressed Shannon Bahrke displayed knees of steel as they pounded to gold and bronze, respectively, in women’s moguls. Bryon Wilson notched a bronze in the men’s version. How anyone could stand up after that event is beyond me.

Silver was the color of the season for Team USA hockey, with both the men’s and women’s teams coming in second to the homestanding Canadian squads. The USA men drove the Maple Leafers to overtime in the gold-medal game, with a last-minute goal by Zach Parise of the NHL’s New Jersey Devils. Buffalo Sabres goalkeeper Ryan Miller battled valiantly between the pipes, earning recognition as the hockey tournament’s Most Valuable Player.

Perhaps the most shocking moment of the Games — aside from the Kumaritashvili and Rochette tragedies — occurred in the men’s 10,000-meter speed skating event. Dutch skater Sven Kramer lost the gold medal following his disqualification after the Netherlands’ coach, Gerard Kemkers, directed Kramer into the incorrect lane for the race’s final lap. An understandably angry Kramer appeared inconsolable after the race. If the Dutch have an equivalent to the witness protection program, Kemkers is probably in it right now.

I don’t believe ice dancing is really a sport — it’s more of a competitive exhibition — but silver medalists Meryl Davis and Charlie White did us proud nonetheless, as did fourth-place finishers Tanith Belbin and Ben Agosto.

Neither of our teenage figure skaters, Mirai Nagasu and Rachael Flatt, came home with a medal (they finished fourth and seventh), but both gave their finest performances to date. Watch out for Mirai in 2014 — she’ll be on the podium for sure.

Will we ever forget the image of the malfunctioning hydraulics on the Olympic cauldron at the opening ceremonies? Good on the Canadians for poking fun at themselves by revisiting the misfire at the end of the Games.

And oh yeah… how did we ever watch the Olympics before HDTV?

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Celebritiana, Random Acts of Patriotism, Ripped From the Headlines, Sports Bar, Teleholics Anonymous, The Swan Tunes In

Comments: 4 Comments

Hero of the Day: Abby is nine

February 28, 2010

Happy birthday to my personal assistant Abby, who is celebrating her ninth birthday today.

Abby says: "Nine years old, and they still make me wear this stupid hat."

That makes her about 50 in prorated human years, which means that, relatively speaking, she’s now older than I am.

Abby would like you to know that she is never too old to wear a silly hat and play with a new toy on her birthday.

Or watch a little Olympic hockey.

Abby says: "Take the picture already -- I've got a toy to gnaw on."

Well… she doesn’t really care about the hockey.

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Hero of the Day, My Home Town, SwanStuff

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Guam to run all night, Guahan to run all day

February 18, 2010

This just in from the South Pacific…

To mark the beginning of his final year in office, Felix Camacho, the governor of Guam, issued an executive order changing the name of Micronesia’s largest island to Guahan — the original name of the island in the language of its indigenous people, the Chamorros.

Guam — begging your pardon, Guahan — has an interesting — and in many ways, tragic — history. Ferdinand Magellan made the first European pit stop on the island in 1521, during his famous (or infamous, depending on one’s perspective) circumnavigational voyage. The Spanish colonized Guam in 1668, and held control of it until 1898, when both Guam and the Philippines were passed to U.S. hands at the end of the Spanish-American War.

The Japanese captured Guam the day after after the Pearl Harbor attack and occupied it until American forces reestablished authority in July 1944. (Ironically, Guam’s primary source of income today — aside from the extensive U.S. military presence — is Japanese tourism.)

My own peregrinations as an Air Force brat took me to Guam once, albeit so briefly that it barely rates mention. On our way back to the States from our two-year tour in the Philippines, we had about a three-hour layover at Andersen Air Force Base on the island’s northern edge. Not that we saw much. As I recall, we spent the time between flights sitting in a tiny coffee shop in the air terminal, in stiflingly humid heat.

Since World War II, Guam has held a peculiar status as a United States territory. It has its own elected internal government, much like a full-fledged state of the Union, and its people are U.S. citizens. (Unlike, say, the people of American Samoa, who are U.S. nationals — meaning that they are entitled to travel with a United States passport — but not U.S. citizens.) Guamanians, however, do not vote formally in the U.S. presidential elections (Guam casts a straw poll vote for President, but has no standing in the Electoral College), and they have only token representation in Congress — a single delegate to the House of Representatives (a delegate without voting privileges) and no U.S. Senator.

Over the years, there have been a number of initiatives to elevate Guam to commonwealth status, like that of Puerto Rico, and more recently, Guam’s nearby neighbor, the Northern Mariana Islands. Thus far, none of these proposals has succeeded. Many Guamanians — with some justification — feel themselves second-class citizens, in that they have the title but lack two of the most significant benefits: a voice in the federal government, and a genuine say in the choice of President.

That status seems unlikely to change, regardless of what the island’s people call themselves.

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Random Acts of Patriotism, Reminiscing, Ripped From the Headlines, The Body Politic

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While my guitar gently weeps

February 16, 2010

This explains the police helicopter overhead the other night.

I’d read over the weekend about the murder of local artisan Taku Sakashta, an internationally renowned creator of hand-crafted guitars. Early Monday morning, Rohnert Park police chased down and eventually captured a suspect in the slaying — Joshua “Crash” Begley, a recently released felon with a list of priors stretching back more than a decade — just a block or two from our house.

At the moment, it’s unclear why Begley might have killed Sakashta — although, given Begley’s history of drug-related offenses, money for dope looks like a decent bet from here. Sakashta’s body was discovered last Thursday evening near his car, a Nissan 350Z, so there’s some thought that he might have surprised Begley attempting to steal the vehicle.

Sakashta’s custom guitars sold for upward of $30,000 each. He’s described by friends — including Ken Tominaga, owner of our little burg’s best sushi restaurant, Hana — as a sweet, gentle man who routinely worked late hours in his shop without locking the front door. He leaves behind a wife and many friends.

As for the suspect, he was in custody last Monday on drug charges when he briefly escaped using a handcuff key he’d secreted in his mouth. He was recaptured, then released on bail on Tuesday.

Less than three days later, Taku Sakashta was dead.

Nice going, Sonoma County law enforcement.

Categories: Aimless Riffing, Dead People Got No Reason to Live, My Home Town, Ripped From the Headlines, Taking Umbrage

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