Will, Lynne, Bill, Jim, Big J, Ian, Edgar, Steve, Jeanette, Gloria, Ray and Rollo (in the Rollomobile). Guest appearances by Javier.
Hot outside and even hotter inside. The burning question of the evening was why Javier gave Ian an extra big dollop of cream on his desperately wanted ice-cream. More of that later.
Bill is busy, so the responsibility of recording the proceedings has gone, temporarily, to a reluctant Lynne. The last time she did something like this was when she was a cub reporter trying to make council minutes sound interesting. At least she now has exciting subject matter, very exciting, especially tonight (Thank you Ian).
Gloria arrived in a pretty top and a green pork pie shaped hat with a dusty pink rim. She was without her blue-tooth ear piece, but she was wearing a gold pin which said AKA 100. This, she explained, was not a reference to a birthday but a sorority pin. “We had our centenary last year.”
Bill told everyone that Lynne had knobbly knees. She gave the table a flash and Jeanette reassured her that her knees were nice. She simply had big dimples. Jeanette should know. In her career as a nurse she has seen thousands of naked knees.
Hearing the words knobbly knees got Ian talking to Bill about exotic British seaside knobbly knee contests. Strangely the non-Brits did not ask any questions.
Big Jay is just back from another European tour. In east Germany he performed at free afternoon concerts. He and Gloria, easily the oldest among us, sat side by side. Big Jay, who clutching his sax throws himself about the stage with wild abandon, and the vivacious Gloria (who enthusiastically embarks on lengthy road trips) talked about …aging bodies letting them down.
“Have you ever imagined yourself in an 80 –year-old body? asked a sun-kissed Jeanette later. She was the only one who had. Or who admitted it.
Will, weary from the drive from the annual Bronco Billy silent film festival in Niles, left early without paying his bill. Soon after he rang Bill from his car (Hope you pulled over Will) asking him to pick up the tab. This was only fair ’cos Will had picked up Bill’s tab recently when Bill exited the historic Hollywood Studio Bar and Grill in debt.
Will recommended the festival at which, he told us, Bob Birchard had been honored. Congratulations Bob.
Ray, who arrived last, said he had just seen Bob, our resident film historian, on Turner Classic Movies. Ray was in a saucy mood and on hearing that mail boxes were called pillar boxes in Britain inquired what female boxes were called.
Jim Dawson brought in copies of Sh-Boom which he used to edit. “I was the only white guy on staff and we made it as Street as possible,” he recalled. Inside was a picture of a bearded Jim looking like Edgar’s older brother. Even Edgar acknowledged the likeness. Is there something we should be told? Lots of undercurrents tonight.
Inside it is cold, then hot, then very cold. Lynne cannot grumble as usual about the air conditioning with Barbara, who along with Bobb is away. What a night to miss.
Lynne and Steve were on the same side of the health debate, volubly. Ian, in between them, covered his ears. He is pleased with the latest print of his new book but does not understand talk about dpi (dots per inch). He is not alone.
Ian now has a You Tube critic who calls him a wanker, and worse. But Ian also has a fan who likes his bottom. So it evens up.
Ian was not himself. But then that is Ian. He was still smarting at the way he always has to ask for his ice-cream when “it is part of my meal that I have paid for". And where was the drink he had ordered (white wine because it was cheaper than red)? Another table (“Christians,” said Ian dismissively) had already received their drinks even though they ordered later.
Javier and Ian locked antlers, full of retorts and hisses. Ian left. Never to return, he said. Fifteen minutes later he was back. He and Javier made up out of sight of the rest of us and he sat down to relish his specially topped-up ice-cream, plunging his spoon in deep. Rollo, who makes friends wherever he goes including tonight in the parking lot, had been left at home before the touching reunion. Too emotional for him, Ian had decided.
“I had to come back,” said Ian. Unable to go to sleep on a quarrel?
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
It was the first time I had to put on my driving glasses to pass my driving test.
I am tired of everyone in Southern California being so charitable.
You mean Republicans go to heaven?
If your head appears big it means your body is small.
It’s five past 12, we have to go soon. Oh I got that wrong it’s 10 past nine.
As we give welfare to disabled, maybe we should give money to Republicans.
Jimmy Ruffin needs a comeback song
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Rip, Ray and Rockabilly
Rip, Ray, Ian, Edgar, Lynne, Bill, Bobb, Barbara, Jim, Will, Joel, Art, Steve, Jeanette
Ian was still visibly shattered by a devastating snub from a group of his former fellow students at Trinity College, Dublin.
He said: "Maybe two years ago, my journalist friend Jeremy Lewis told me that several of people I thought were friends of mine at Trinity were putting together a book of reminiscences about their time at the college in the 1960s, which I'd written about many times. I was annoyed because they never asked me to contribute, and finally one of them who I'd known said they'd like something from me, so I just sent them one of my Letters from Lotusland where I'd written about my first day at Trinity.
"A year goes by and I get emails from them about the non-progress of the book, and I just ignored them. It was all organised by a bunch of amateurs, very much an English upper-class set, hunting, shooting, fishing, and I hadn't been part of them. But on Saturday I got an email from a chap in Dublin saying he'd seen a review of a book called Trinity Tales in the Irish Times. I thought I must be in it, so I wrote to Jeremy and he said, 'Alas, you're not,' but all these nobodies are. They turned me down! And the worst of it is, it's a beautifully produced book with 37 contributors - and I didn't make it. I feel humiliated. But I heard from Barry Humphries's assistant asking me to get in touch with them at Megastar Productions in North London. I'd rather have him as a pal than these snobs."
"You think that's bad," said Lynne, "I was at a social lunch once and I got told how to hold my knife and fork."
In what turned out to be a busy night for distinguished visitors, Rockabilly star Rip Masters was just back from playing in Nottingham, England - "I thought I liked Nottingham because it's the prostitution capital of England, but maybe because it's also the because gun capital. I thought most of the prostitutes had guns, so maybe they kinda combined the two - at least the ones I met did. It can be rough, though: they told me not to go down the local pub alone."
Rip reported "good Indian food, good Italian food, good English food. But they have great Indian food everywhere in England now."
"It's because of the Indians," said Ian.
"We went to a little town nearly Manchester," said Rip, "and found an Indian restaurant with a 20-page menu, and it's all great. And the pub food is just great too. I went there in 1980 and it was absolutely horrendous. It was very hard to get a good meal anywhere, but people have traveled more since then and they don't take crap any more. The English had 200 years to adulterate their food, but now it's recovering. They've gotten much better. I love England but no, I would never move there. I had a wonderful week on somebody else's expense. When I went to school in England, in Claygate, Surrey, I used to walk to school. They can't do that any more. It's a meaner world. It's the same way here."
Lynne and I reported on our first comedy class, at the Ice House on Sunday.
"It was very much an introductory session," said Lynne, "about a dozen of us, our teacher Bobbie Oliver explaining the rules most of the time and we each went up to the mike to talk about ourselves for a few minutes, not tell jokes. And it will end up with a graduation evening to which you're all invited.
"She wants everything original, no props, no gags, no playing characters, She was very hard on Robin Williams because he steals material - allegedly. We'll just be interested to see how far we go with it."
Jim asked: "Did the teacher tell you that one good topic is your mother in law?"
No.
Ian: you don't need a teacher to tell her what she told you, you just do it."
Jim added that it's about coming up with some kind of gimmick about yourself - which, said Rip, Some people have made a career out of.
Jim said: "One guy made a career out of 'Wanna buy a duck?'" (Joe Penner, born 11 November 1904, died 10 January 1941, a Hungarian-born American 1930s-era vaudeville, radio and film comedian. He was born Pintér József in Nagybecskerek, Hungary, now part of Serbia).
Ian didn't quite say "Wanna buy a book?" but he did produce a musty, brown-paged Penguin paperback edition of After The Ball, his iconoclastic history of pop music in the 20th century.
Ian recalled: "I used to deliver beer in Putney in south London - it was my first encounter with the working classes. I came across that English working-class mentality that we're not going to get any further so we'll do all we can to destroy the company we're working for - drinking on the job, petty criminal damage to spite their employer."
We were then joined by two more distinguished visitors: Joel Selvin, music critic of the San Francisco Chronicle, and musicologist and Phil Spector associate Art Fein, who runs the website www.sofein.com.
Joel's arrival prompted a strange story of a confrontation involving Ian in the garage under San Francisco's Union Square.
Ian was driving out of the garage, with Joel the passenger, but was trying to leave through the entrance. He encountered across a car coming the other way. Both got out of their cars and it looked to be heading for a fight, when the other man got in his car and backed off. Why? Because Ian had said: "I am fully armed."
As people began to leave, Steve and Jeanette were drawn further down the table and into the conversations. It is clear from Steve's blogs and letters that the undying admiration of President Obama is beginning to fray a little at the edges, particularly over health insurance. His equivocation over the Iranian election protests has bothered some on left and right.
We always knew that healthcare was going to be a tough one, and so it is proving.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
The flow is right - it's just that the dates are wrong.
You usually only see behinds like that in Britain or Africa
When I'm not here, you know, even more people come here
The black contribution to rock n roll is nearly zero.
I'm more literate than most English people you will meet.
You were forewarned, forearmed and foreskinned.
I like being told to be a good boy.
Spiders in England are getting bigger - they're this big! They say it's the central heating.
I've never seen such a quick volte-face in my life.
You know I'm a complete and utter mindreader, don't you?
I'm good on the gospels.
Kiss Me Deadly is one of my favorite films, even though I now know that it is also a hit song.
I think we ought to abolish junior highs and put the kids to work.
I'm not trying to put down blacks - well, maybe I am...
Ian was still visibly shattered by a devastating snub from a group of his former fellow students at Trinity College, Dublin.
He said: "Maybe two years ago, my journalist friend Jeremy Lewis told me that several of people I thought were friends of mine at Trinity were putting together a book of reminiscences about their time at the college in the 1960s, which I'd written about many times. I was annoyed because they never asked me to contribute, and finally one of them who I'd known said they'd like something from me, so I just sent them one of my Letters from Lotusland where I'd written about my first day at Trinity.
"A year goes by and I get emails from them about the non-progress of the book, and I just ignored them. It was all organised by a bunch of amateurs, very much an English upper-class set, hunting, shooting, fishing, and I hadn't been part of them. But on Saturday I got an email from a chap in Dublin saying he'd seen a review of a book called Trinity Tales in the Irish Times. I thought I must be in it, so I wrote to Jeremy and he said, 'Alas, you're not,' but all these nobodies are. They turned me down! And the worst of it is, it's a beautifully produced book with 37 contributors - and I didn't make it. I feel humiliated. But I heard from Barry Humphries's assistant asking me to get in touch with them at Megastar Productions in North London. I'd rather have him as a pal than these snobs."
"You think that's bad," said Lynne, "I was at a social lunch once and I got told how to hold my knife and fork."
In what turned out to be a busy night for distinguished visitors, Rockabilly star Rip Masters was just back from playing in Nottingham, England - "I thought I liked Nottingham because it's the prostitution capital of England, but maybe because it's also the because gun capital. I thought most of the prostitutes had guns, so maybe they kinda combined the two - at least the ones I met did. It can be rough, though: they told me not to go down the local pub alone."
Rip reported "good Indian food, good Italian food, good English food. But they have great Indian food everywhere in England now."
"It's because of the Indians," said Ian.
"We went to a little town nearly Manchester," said Rip, "and found an Indian restaurant with a 20-page menu, and it's all great. And the pub food is just great too. I went there in 1980 and it was absolutely horrendous. It was very hard to get a good meal anywhere, but people have traveled more since then and they don't take crap any more. The English had 200 years to adulterate their food, but now it's recovering. They've gotten much better. I love England but no, I would never move there. I had a wonderful week on somebody else's expense. When I went to school in England, in Claygate, Surrey, I used to walk to school. They can't do that any more. It's a meaner world. It's the same way here."
Lynne and I reported on our first comedy class, at the Ice House on Sunday.
"It was very much an introductory session," said Lynne, "about a dozen of us, our teacher Bobbie Oliver explaining the rules most of the time and we each went up to the mike to talk about ourselves for a few minutes, not tell jokes. And it will end up with a graduation evening to which you're all invited.
"She wants everything original, no props, no gags, no playing characters, She was very hard on Robin Williams because he steals material - allegedly. We'll just be interested to see how far we go with it."
Jim asked: "Did the teacher tell you that one good topic is your mother in law?"
No.
Ian: you don't need a teacher to tell her what she told you, you just do it."
Jim added that it's about coming up with some kind of gimmick about yourself - which, said Rip, Some people have made a career out of.
Jim said: "One guy made a career out of 'Wanna buy a duck?'" (Joe Penner, born 11 November 1904, died 10 January 1941, a Hungarian-born American 1930s-era vaudeville, radio and film comedian. He was born Pintér József in Nagybecskerek, Hungary, now part of Serbia).
Ian didn't quite say "Wanna buy a book?" but he did produce a musty, brown-paged Penguin paperback edition of After The Ball, his iconoclastic history of pop music in the 20th century.
Ian recalled: "I used to deliver beer in Putney in south London - it was my first encounter with the working classes. I came across that English working-class mentality that we're not going to get any further so we'll do all we can to destroy the company we're working for - drinking on the job, petty criminal damage to spite their employer."
We were then joined by two more distinguished visitors: Joel Selvin, music critic of the San Francisco Chronicle, and musicologist and Phil Spector associate Art Fein, who runs the website www.sofein.com.
Joel's arrival prompted a strange story of a confrontation involving Ian in the garage under San Francisco's Union Square.
Ian was driving out of the garage, with Joel the passenger, but was trying to leave through the entrance. He encountered across a car coming the other way. Both got out of their cars and it looked to be heading for a fight, when the other man got in his car and backed off. Why? Because Ian had said: "I am fully armed."
As people began to leave, Steve and Jeanette were drawn further down the table and into the conversations. It is clear from Steve's blogs and letters that the undying admiration of President Obama is beginning to fray a little at the edges, particularly over health insurance. His equivocation over the Iranian election protests has bothered some on left and right.
We always knew that healthcare was going to be a tough one, and so it is proving.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
The flow is right - it's just that the dates are wrong.
You usually only see behinds like that in Britain or Africa
When I'm not here, you know, even more people come here
The black contribution to rock n roll is nearly zero.
I'm more literate than most English people you will meet.
You were forewarned, forearmed and foreskinned.
I like being told to be a good boy.
Spiders in England are getting bigger - they're this big! They say it's the central heating.
I've never seen such a quick volte-face in my life.
You know I'm a complete and utter mindreader, don't you?
I'm good on the gospels.
Kiss Me Deadly is one of my favorite films, even though I now know that it is also a hit song.
I think we ought to abolish junior highs and put the kids to work.
I'm not trying to put down blacks - well, maybe I am...
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
The mystery of Ian's ice cream
Ray, Edgar, Bill, Lynne, Ian, Bobb, Barbara, Jim, Will, Glenn, Mary, Steve G
This diary entry is longer than before, because for the first time I used a digital recorder and so captured more of the scintillating conversation (and the crap too, but that's another story). Because of the greater length I have introduced subheadings so it is easier to see where one topic ends and another begins. There are also a lot more Caught on the Breeze lines.
As ever, all feedback gratefully received.
The evening began on a note of death and destruction. The violence after the LA Lakers' NBA championship win last night was roundly condemned, prompting me to recall how much worse it often is at English and Scottish soccer matches - particularly Rangers v Celtic in Glasgow. The odd thing about the Lakers looting and vandalism was that there were no opposition supporters there, as the championship-winning game had taken place in Florida. Soccer violence is usually a product of rival fans taunting one another, but the Lakers crowd didn't seem to need that needle to get them going. At least the oft-condemned LAPD was apparently a model of restraint.
David Carradine
David Carradine's death prompted Ray to recall that his buddy Paul Harper did a dozen Kung-Fu's with David Carradine. But the table was unsure whether the death was suicide, murder or accident.
According to Fox he bought a lot of bondage equipment just before he left for Thailand. Sounded like he was planning a bondage party - a one-in-a-bed romp! But he cannot have been doing that alone, can he? Maybe room service helped, then left? Or a hired accomplice? 'It'll take another year or so before we find out,' Lynne suggested.
'It doesn't have to be foul play, it can still be an accident,' said Edgar.
If you go to the edge of killing yourself, every so often it can go wrong.
People have died by putting plastic bags over their head. 'If you stretch it far enough, you can use a condom for the same thing!' Ray added.
Carradine's unfortunate end led to another review of the Phil Spector case. Ian said: 'I was talking to a lawyer who said Spector should have claimed Lana Clarkson was accidental death, then he'd have just got manslaughter. No one believed it was suicide.'
The missing ice cream that never was
Ian was complaining, as he often does, 'I haven't had my dessert - I've paid for it, you know, it's in the price, but I haven't had it.'
Just after he left for the loo, Javier served the missing confection.
Lynne said "Hide it, just to make him upset for ten seconds - Why? because I'm evil, and because it's fun!'
So Will took Ian's dessert and sat there with it in front of him, spoon in hand, as if it was his.
'Javier just gave it to me, that's what I'm going to say,' he declared.
'You'll have to claim you're the 100th customer tonight!' I offered.
Ian came back grumbling about the receptionist at the Caltech gym, who refuses to get Ian's name right.
'Have you always have trouble handling servants?' I asked.
'It's cultural snobbery,' Ian insisted. 'I just don't understand it. Now he just says "morning sir".'
Suddenly Ian saw Will with an ice cream in front of him and said, 'Javier simply will not get my dessert. Why didn't he get it to me?'
Will said you can have my one, I'm not eating it...
Ian was on the verge of stomping off to the kitchen when we all called him back - fearing fisticuffs - and Ian realized what had happened, and collapsed in a wide grin - 'You got me, I stand corrected.'
Bobb said 'It was the prankster here that set it up,' outing Lynne.
Mary added 'Lynne has a naughty sense of humor.'
Barbara declared that in future no one will ever be able to go to the loo.
That spun Lynne off into saying she was in 'KY Jelly mode', because someone had been served KY Jelly at a Daily Mail Christmas party in London years ago. But alcohol had been consumed on that occasion. Not like at Conrads. Not at all.
Some Like It Hot
Will, Mary, Lynne and Bill went to the Million Dollar Theater on Saturday to see a 50th anniversary showing of Some Like It Hot - originally the title of a movie starring Bob Hope.
Tony Curtis, all of 84, was on stage and endured some banal French questioning in order to tell the stories he wanted to anyway, about Monroe and about filming on location.
Ian said 'I think it's a perfect film, I never get tired of it.' Will said he saw things in it on Saturday he didn't remember seeing.
Are they waiting for Curtis to die to do a remake? I wonder. The sex scene between Curtis and Monroe is so unrealistic, because he says he can't make love and all they do is kiss! They'd have to update that.
Narcissistic movie stars
Ian told the story of Barbara Hutton showing Cary Grant some of her priceless porcelain behind glass and he seemed surprisingly interested in it. 'Truth was that he had caught sight of his reflection - I do it myself. Grant was supposed to be gay, but actors are so into themselves they don't care who they do it with.'
Maybe we'd better give Rollo a quick call in case he gets a surprise visit!
Well, come to a British public school, said Ian in one of his recurring themes.
'Cary Grant told me to get that microphone out of his face, at a party I'd been invited to by Mae West,' said Ray.
By today's standards Monroe is fat in SLIH. Ian and Will agreed that actors didn't look toned, except for a few such as Curtis and Burt Lancaster, who was quite vain.
Conversation turned to the artificial names, such as Rock Hudson, bestowed by agents on their clients. Then it turned rude.
Jim mentioned one of his favorites, Seymour Butts.
Ray cackled over The Tiger's Revenge by Claud Balls
Bill innocently contributed The KO Kid by Esau Stars
That reminded Will he was going to see John Thomas, who is not cockney rhyming slang - unlike Hampton (Wick) and Berkeley (Hunt), Ian reminded us.
A rival salon
Ian also reported on another salon he has been to, in one of Pasadena's smarter districts, given by Kenton Nelson, a highly prosperous Southern California landscape painter, in his Pasadena house - 'he owns the whole street, with a square at the end'. I've only been to one, beautiful house, lovely food laid out, there were film directors, trailer makers, musicians there last time. The trailer man said he'd like to use one of my songs. You never know, but it's worth doing, maybe something will come of it in five years' time. Anyway tomorrow night I'll be stuttering like mad, which I always do when I've got to be modest and I think there's a chance of some work! I've had this all my life, and it's all part of selling yourself.'
'I've known so many talented people turn up in this town,' said Will, 'and leave because they couldn't get a meeting with anybody.'
To which Ian replied: 'But you've got to have the drive, Will, and I've seen you, you can be very determined. It's been true of my first book, my first record, I got them published because I kept battering on doors. You get lots of refusals too, but you've got to keep at it.'
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
He called me 'green-eyed Mexican lady'
I wrote a letter to the Red Ryder ranch when I was 12, but I chickened out and never mailed it. I covered it with deerskin.
If there had been email earlier in my life I'd have kept in touch with many more people
When I die I'd much rather be awake
Janet's gone to Australia: I feel sorry for the Australians, quite frankly
Fancy making a million for overdubbing - we all overdub!
So in a conjugal visit at a halfway house, do you only get to shake hands? No tongues!
It was a case of a beautiful leading actress being, well, a beautiful leading actress.
I always feel at home on a Monday night
There's a worship of American culture, like rockabilly.
Leaving a good tip is like picking in high cotton
I don't mind death, it's dying that bothers me
Carlos is singing - something must be wrong
Have you heard the song I'm in Love with a Girl on Death Row - now there's a short story
If I murder a hippy, will you come to my defence? I hate hippies.
She took them by storm - or by surprise
A fake psychic - isn't that a redundancy?
I've got one side of me pushing and the other side saying 'Don't push'
Everything sounds better in Latin.
Chester Gould sent you a signed autograph of Pogo? That would be great, if Chester Gould drew a picture of Pogo looking like Dick Tracey
A character in my new book has rigged up twitter to send a tweet every time he farts: 'I tweet therefore I am'
This diary entry is longer than before, because for the first time I used a digital recorder and so captured more of the scintillating conversation (and the crap too, but that's another story). Because of the greater length I have introduced subheadings so it is easier to see where one topic ends and another begins. There are also a lot more Caught on the Breeze lines.
As ever, all feedback gratefully received.
The evening began on a note of death and destruction. The violence after the LA Lakers' NBA championship win last night was roundly condemned, prompting me to recall how much worse it often is at English and Scottish soccer matches - particularly Rangers v Celtic in Glasgow. The odd thing about the Lakers looting and vandalism was that there were no opposition supporters there, as the championship-winning game had taken place in Florida. Soccer violence is usually a product of rival fans taunting one another, but the Lakers crowd didn't seem to need that needle to get them going. At least the oft-condemned LAPD was apparently a model of restraint.
David Carradine
David Carradine's death prompted Ray to recall that his buddy Paul Harper did a dozen Kung-Fu's with David Carradine. But the table was unsure whether the death was suicide, murder or accident.
According to Fox he bought a lot of bondage equipment just before he left for Thailand. Sounded like he was planning a bondage party - a one-in-a-bed romp! But he cannot have been doing that alone, can he? Maybe room service helped, then left? Or a hired accomplice? 'It'll take another year or so before we find out,' Lynne suggested.
'It doesn't have to be foul play, it can still be an accident,' said Edgar.
If you go to the edge of killing yourself, every so often it can go wrong.
People have died by putting plastic bags over their head. 'If you stretch it far enough, you can use a condom for the same thing!' Ray added.
Carradine's unfortunate end led to another review of the Phil Spector case. Ian said: 'I was talking to a lawyer who said Spector should have claimed Lana Clarkson was accidental death, then he'd have just got manslaughter. No one believed it was suicide.'
The missing ice cream that never was
Ian was complaining, as he often does, 'I haven't had my dessert - I've paid for it, you know, it's in the price, but I haven't had it.'
Just after he left for the loo, Javier served the missing confection.
Lynne said "Hide it, just to make him upset for ten seconds - Why? because I'm evil, and because it's fun!'
So Will took Ian's dessert and sat there with it in front of him, spoon in hand, as if it was his.
'Javier just gave it to me, that's what I'm going to say,' he declared.
'You'll have to claim you're the 100th customer tonight!' I offered.
Ian came back grumbling about the receptionist at the Caltech gym, who refuses to get Ian's name right.
'Have you always have trouble handling servants?' I asked.
'It's cultural snobbery,' Ian insisted. 'I just don't understand it. Now he just says "morning sir".'
Suddenly Ian saw Will with an ice cream in front of him and said, 'Javier simply will not get my dessert. Why didn't he get it to me?'
Will said you can have my one, I'm not eating it...
Ian was on the verge of stomping off to the kitchen when we all called him back - fearing fisticuffs - and Ian realized what had happened, and collapsed in a wide grin - 'You got me, I stand corrected.'
Bobb said 'It was the prankster here that set it up,' outing Lynne.
Mary added 'Lynne has a naughty sense of humor.'
Barbara declared that in future no one will ever be able to go to the loo.
That spun Lynne off into saying she was in 'KY Jelly mode', because someone had been served KY Jelly at a Daily Mail Christmas party in London years ago. But alcohol had been consumed on that occasion. Not like at Conrads. Not at all.
Some Like It Hot
Will, Mary, Lynne and Bill went to the Million Dollar Theater on Saturday to see a 50th anniversary showing of Some Like It Hot - originally the title of a movie starring Bob Hope.
Tony Curtis, all of 84, was on stage and endured some banal French questioning in order to tell the stories he wanted to anyway, about Monroe and about filming on location.
Ian said 'I think it's a perfect film, I never get tired of it.' Will said he saw things in it on Saturday he didn't remember seeing.
Are they waiting for Curtis to die to do a remake? I wonder. The sex scene between Curtis and Monroe is so unrealistic, because he says he can't make love and all they do is kiss! They'd have to update that.
Narcissistic movie stars
Ian told the story of Barbara Hutton showing Cary Grant some of her priceless porcelain behind glass and he seemed surprisingly interested in it. 'Truth was that he had caught sight of his reflection - I do it myself. Grant was supposed to be gay, but actors are so into themselves they don't care who they do it with.'
Maybe we'd better give Rollo a quick call in case he gets a surprise visit!
Well, come to a British public school, said Ian in one of his recurring themes.
'Cary Grant told me to get that microphone out of his face, at a party I'd been invited to by Mae West,' said Ray.
By today's standards Monroe is fat in SLIH. Ian and Will agreed that actors didn't look toned, except for a few such as Curtis and Burt Lancaster, who was quite vain.
Conversation turned to the artificial names, such as Rock Hudson, bestowed by agents on their clients. Then it turned rude.
Jim mentioned one of his favorites, Seymour Butts.
Ray cackled over The Tiger's Revenge by Claud Balls
Bill innocently contributed The KO Kid by Esau Stars
That reminded Will he was going to see John Thomas, who is not cockney rhyming slang - unlike Hampton (Wick) and Berkeley (Hunt), Ian reminded us.
A rival salon
Ian also reported on another salon he has been to, in one of Pasadena's smarter districts, given by Kenton Nelson, a highly prosperous Southern California landscape painter, in his Pasadena house - 'he owns the whole street, with a square at the end'. I've only been to one, beautiful house, lovely food laid out, there were film directors, trailer makers, musicians there last time. The trailer man said he'd like to use one of my songs. You never know, but it's worth doing, maybe something will come of it in five years' time. Anyway tomorrow night I'll be stuttering like mad, which I always do when I've got to be modest and I think there's a chance of some work! I've had this all my life, and it's all part of selling yourself.'
'I've known so many talented people turn up in this town,' said Will, 'and leave because they couldn't get a meeting with anybody.'
To which Ian replied: 'But you've got to have the drive, Will, and I've seen you, you can be very determined. It's been true of my first book, my first record, I got them published because I kept battering on doors. You get lots of refusals too, but you've got to keep at it.'
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
He called me 'green-eyed Mexican lady'
I wrote a letter to the Red Ryder ranch when I was 12, but I chickened out and never mailed it. I covered it with deerskin.
If there had been email earlier in my life I'd have kept in touch with many more people
When I die I'd much rather be awake
Janet's gone to Australia: I feel sorry for the Australians, quite frankly
Fancy making a million for overdubbing - we all overdub!
So in a conjugal visit at a halfway house, do you only get to shake hands? No tongues!
It was a case of a beautiful leading actress being, well, a beautiful leading actress.
I always feel at home on a Monday night
There's a worship of American culture, like rockabilly.
Leaving a good tip is like picking in high cotton
I don't mind death, it's dying that bothers me
Carlos is singing - something must be wrong
Have you heard the song I'm in Love with a Girl on Death Row - now there's a short story
If I murder a hippy, will you come to my defence? I hate hippies.
She took them by storm - or by surprise
A fake psychic - isn't that a redundancy?
I've got one side of me pushing and the other side saying 'Don't push'
Everything sounds better in Latin.
Chester Gould sent you a signed autograph of Pogo? That would be great, if Chester Gould drew a picture of Pogo looking like Dick Tracey
A character in my new book has rigged up twitter to send a tweet every time he farts: 'I tweet therefore I am'
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
The bubbling breeze
Bobb, Barbara, Ian, Will, Nancy, Bill, Lynne, Edgar, Jim, Jeanette, Steve L, Bob
The Diner Diarist is back from the land where the nearest thing to a diner is the sort of low-grade cafe known evocatively - and accurately - as a greasy spoon. So it was a relief to return to the Conrads embrace and a bigger turnout than some of us expected on Memorial Day. You'd think we didn't have homes to go to.
It was an unusual evening, in that there were few major conversational topics, give or take the regular political analysis from Bob and Steve's end of the table, but a record number of entries for Caught on the Breeze.
I tried to explain that the LA Times hasn't really captured the full implication of the House of Commons expenses scandal, which could bring down the government and replace it with a cabinet of showbiz celebrities - anyone, really, who hasn't been caught with their fingers in the till. Anarchy is closer than most Americans appreciate. But, in true Brit style, it could all fizzle out and the LA Times will be justified for taking a laidback attitude. Gordon Brown hopes so, anyway.
Will reluctantly celebrated his birthday which, as many of us have come to realize, is an extremely movable feast. But Nancy saw to it that a candle-topped cake was produced by Javier with due ceremony.
But this week the stage belongs to the one-liners:
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
What do you call an Italian suppository? An innuendo.
Nancy said it was the third best show we had done. Thanks, Nancy.
It's strain F for 'I have the flu'
Alec Guinness: isn't he the nice guy with the forelock?
I find Dickens really quite frightening
They said 'Let's sing happy birthday' and I said 'What key?'
You've been liberated, Bobb!
I like it up this end of the table, I really do
Beverly Hills people keep their valets in the Valley
I can't wait to die - every day. And I hate Waiting for Godot
This so-called afterlife had better be good, or else
Give me anything with Bugs Bunny in it.
She looked great, when the light went down
This is a restaurant, after all
Does your mother put your tacos in the blender? So swallow your pills!
Ass me another
The Diner Diarist is back from the land where the nearest thing to a diner is the sort of low-grade cafe known evocatively - and accurately - as a greasy spoon. So it was a relief to return to the Conrads embrace and a bigger turnout than some of us expected on Memorial Day. You'd think we didn't have homes to go to.
It was an unusual evening, in that there were few major conversational topics, give or take the regular political analysis from Bob and Steve's end of the table, but a record number of entries for Caught on the Breeze.
I tried to explain that the LA Times hasn't really captured the full implication of the House of Commons expenses scandal, which could bring down the government and replace it with a cabinet of showbiz celebrities - anyone, really, who hasn't been caught with their fingers in the till. Anarchy is closer than most Americans appreciate. But, in true Brit style, it could all fizzle out and the LA Times will be justified for taking a laidback attitude. Gordon Brown hopes so, anyway.
Will reluctantly celebrated his birthday which, as many of us have come to realize, is an extremely movable feast. But Nancy saw to it that a candle-topped cake was produced by Javier with due ceremony.
But this week the stage belongs to the one-liners:
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
What do you call an Italian suppository? An innuendo.
Nancy said it was the third best show we had done. Thanks, Nancy.
It's strain F for 'I have the flu'
Alec Guinness: isn't he the nice guy with the forelock?
I find Dickens really quite frightening
They said 'Let's sing happy birthday' and I said 'What key?'
You've been liberated, Bobb!
I like it up this end of the table, I really do
Beverly Hills people keep their valets in the Valley
I can't wait to die - every day. And I hate Waiting for Godot
This so-called afterlife had better be good, or else
Give me anything with Bugs Bunny in it.
She looked great, when the light went down
This is a restaurant, after all
Does your mother put your tacos in the blender? So swallow your pills!
Ass me another
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
No hugs from me!
Bill, Lynne, Bobb, Barbara, Will, Edgar, Jim, Ray, Andy
It was a busy weekend for this week's rather exclusive gathering, so early conversation explored what everyone had been up to.
Most had been to the Vitaphone Varieties at the Billy Wilder theater on Wilshire on Saturday night, which seems to have been a fascinating show. There are apparently hundreds of 1920s variety acts recorded on film, in one take just as if in performance, leaving an amazing record of a bygone era. The lassoist who kept the rope spinning for ten minutes seemed to impress most. Mary Mallory says he was Tex McLeod, a Texan with a Scottish father and a Brazilian mother. I expect he was fond of a shot of whisky in his coffee...
Lynne, Will and I went with Nancy to her condo in the Colorado mountains, which involved 36 hours' driving but the reward was spectacular scenery and two trips to Peggy Sue's 50s diner in Yermo CA. The purpose was to attend an amateur melodrama in the 1890s village of Silver Plume, to help raise funds to keep the original buildings standing. In between we managed a stroll round the delightful ski town of Frisco and took turns to stand in the one-time jail.
Jim and Mary Katherine went to the UCLA book fair, which I think Mary Mallory was intending to go to as well (let me know if you did, Mary). Gore Vidal told one hopeful "If you have to ask how to write you're not a writer", but Jim got Joe Wambaugh to autograph his latest crime novel with the message "Give Ian my best wishes".
While I was wishing I could have been in three places at once over the weekend, Barbara led calls for a Conrads wish list - things we'd like to see on the menu, like caffeine-free diet coke, sprite and root beer (Barbara) and veggie curry, chilli and moussaca (Edgar, Will, Lynne).
Meanwhile, Edgar and I quietly speculated on how a Mexican-run diner like Conrads will survive the swine flu epidemic, if it really takes hold. Monday nights might even have to move. Let's hope not.
Last week I ran a 'Caught on the Breeze' about not hugging except during sex - which, not entirely coincidentally, chimes with a remark Ian made to Barbara about not having to hug during his recent theatrical run (on the contrary, he was complaining that the actors snubbed him and the rest of the band).
But that got Barbara asking everyone whether they liked being hugged. The answers were varied, and not entirely enthusiastic. Maybe no one wanted to advertise - as it was I said I didn't mind and suddenly found Ray grasping me from behind warmly by the throat. It's all right, Ray, don't feel obliged to hug me, I won't hold it against you - or at least, I'll try not to.
We decided it was a class thing, with people from humble backgrounds and/or from the north of their homelands being less likely to hug than affluent southerners. All theories on a postcard, please.
Jim has not yet been able to see Phil Spector in jail yet, as visits are strictly rationed, but he has heard from Rachelle that he is being treated well and his 23 hours a day solitary confinement are regularly broken up by visits from his lawyers. Hate to think how he'll feel if he gets an 18 stretch and the appeal fails, though.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
I'm thinking of doing a popup version of Fart Book 3
Did you know that Dietrich = diet rich?
Yes, and Therapist = the rapist
I know Howdy Doody's birthday
They didn't have to wear a whole lot of make up in those days - men or women
The magic period lasted only that long
Rock Hudson had all these wild parties up from where I lived, then I realized everyone there were men
Cliff can't be gay - he tours with Helen Shapiro!
It was a busy weekend for this week's rather exclusive gathering, so early conversation explored what everyone had been up to.
Most had been to the Vitaphone Varieties at the Billy Wilder theater on Wilshire on Saturday night, which seems to have been a fascinating show. There are apparently hundreds of 1920s variety acts recorded on film, in one take just as if in performance, leaving an amazing record of a bygone era. The lassoist who kept the rope spinning for ten minutes seemed to impress most. Mary Mallory says he was Tex McLeod, a Texan with a Scottish father and a Brazilian mother. I expect he was fond of a shot of whisky in his coffee...
Lynne, Will and I went with Nancy to her condo in the Colorado mountains, which involved 36 hours' driving but the reward was spectacular scenery and two trips to Peggy Sue's 50s diner in Yermo CA. The purpose was to attend an amateur melodrama in the 1890s village of Silver Plume, to help raise funds to keep the original buildings standing. In between we managed a stroll round the delightful ski town of Frisco and took turns to stand in the one-time jail.
Jim and Mary Katherine went to the UCLA book fair, which I think Mary Mallory was intending to go to as well (let me know if you did, Mary). Gore Vidal told one hopeful "If you have to ask how to write you're not a writer", but Jim got Joe Wambaugh to autograph his latest crime novel with the message "Give Ian my best wishes".
While I was wishing I could have been in three places at once over the weekend, Barbara led calls for a Conrads wish list - things we'd like to see on the menu, like caffeine-free diet coke, sprite and root beer (Barbara) and veggie curry, chilli and moussaca (Edgar, Will, Lynne).
Meanwhile, Edgar and I quietly speculated on how a Mexican-run diner like Conrads will survive the swine flu epidemic, if it really takes hold. Monday nights might even have to move. Let's hope not.
Last week I ran a 'Caught on the Breeze' about not hugging except during sex - which, not entirely coincidentally, chimes with a remark Ian made to Barbara about not having to hug during his recent theatrical run (on the contrary, he was complaining that the actors snubbed him and the rest of the band).
But that got Barbara asking everyone whether they liked being hugged. The answers were varied, and not entirely enthusiastic. Maybe no one wanted to advertise - as it was I said I didn't mind and suddenly found Ray grasping me from behind warmly by the throat. It's all right, Ray, don't feel obliged to hug me, I won't hold it against you - or at least, I'll try not to.
We decided it was a class thing, with people from humble backgrounds and/or from the north of their homelands being less likely to hug than affluent southerners. All theories on a postcard, please.
Jim has not yet been able to see Phil Spector in jail yet, as visits are strictly rationed, but he has heard from Rachelle that he is being treated well and his 23 hours a day solitary confinement are regularly broken up by visits from his lawyers. Hate to think how he'll feel if he gets an 18 stretch and the appeal fails, though.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
I'm thinking of doing a popup version of Fart Book 3
Did you know that Dietrich = diet rich?
Yes, and Therapist = the rapist
I know Howdy Doody's birthday
They didn't have to wear a whole lot of make up in those days - men or women
The magic period lasted only that long
Rock Hudson had all these wild parties up from where I lived, then I realized everyone there were men
Cliff can't be gay - he tours with Helen Shapiro!
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Book signing
Will, Bobb, Barbara, Edgar, Bill, Lynne, Libby, Jim, Ian, Mary, Bob, Ray, Glenn, Joan, Andy
We are now in that limbo, film-festwise, between the noir season (yes, I do literally have the t-shirt) and the glorious prospect of Cinecon.
While Bob becomes more taciturn than ever at the prospect of being buttonholed for free tickets, we punters can look back on a noir season that was more eccentric than ever. But it was so successful that plans are afoot to stage two seasons a year. Presumably that means that the definition of 'film noir' will be stretched even further than it was this time in an effort to fill screen space. About all that linked the latest crop was that they were in monochrome, although the last night was possibly fit to stand comparison with any: a Paul Stewart double bill of Walk Softly, Stranger and Chicago Syndicate. In the first Stewart supports Joseph Cotten as a thinking thief whose perfect crime is foiled by the Stewart character's, well, character weakness.
One idea for future noir seasons: a feature of that era is that nearly everyone smokes, so why not get a license to let the audience smoke. Then we'd seen the films through the sort of haze the directors go to such lengths to create.
Lynne, Ian and I were still feeling the after-effects of a visit to the Academy last Friday to see Fellini 8-1/2 (clever chap that Fellini: no one talks about Lean's Lawrence of Arabia or Hitchcock's Psycho as if they were the titles of those films).
We watched it in true Fellini style. After a mishap (leaving my keys in the car door) I got separated from the other two and consequently saw what seems to have been an entirely different movie. They nearly walked out. I thought it was about 40 minutes too long, but enjoyed seeing which bits every other director had subsequently pinched. I'm sure Danny Boyle (Susan's secret son?) is indebted to Fellini for having the Slumdog boy drop into the latrine. It seems Fellini-ish somehow, just as every other line in Hamlet is now a cliche.
Slipping back to old technology, our gathering is turning out to be extraordinarily fecund, if Jim will pardon the lack of pun. First there was his definitive account of Angel's Flight, set to be a smash hit if only they'll get the tiny railroad running again. Now he has followed that with Motherfucker, another tome after which there is nothing left to say.
Meanwhile, Ian struggles with the production and design difficulties of giving his collection of Lotusland musings the literary environment they so richly deserve. Our very own James Joyce seems determined to turn Altadena into Dublin with himself as Leopold Bloom. Rollo is on his guard. It will, I'm sure, be the toast of LA well before my maiden attempt at fiction bursts on the west coast literary scene. But that's another story for another Monday night.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
I don't think I'm going to risk Fellini again
This book is my last gasp
The back of my legs still hurt from all that walking
Susan Boyle should be banned
We are now in that limbo, film-festwise, between the noir season (yes, I do literally have the t-shirt) and the glorious prospect of Cinecon.
While Bob becomes more taciturn than ever at the prospect of being buttonholed for free tickets, we punters can look back on a noir season that was more eccentric than ever. But it was so successful that plans are afoot to stage two seasons a year. Presumably that means that the definition of 'film noir' will be stretched even further than it was this time in an effort to fill screen space. About all that linked the latest crop was that they were in monochrome, although the last night was possibly fit to stand comparison with any: a Paul Stewart double bill of Walk Softly, Stranger and Chicago Syndicate. In the first Stewart supports Joseph Cotten as a thinking thief whose perfect crime is foiled by the Stewart character's, well, character weakness.
One idea for future noir seasons: a feature of that era is that nearly everyone smokes, so why not get a license to let the audience smoke. Then we'd seen the films through the sort of haze the directors go to such lengths to create.
Lynne, Ian and I were still feeling the after-effects of a visit to the Academy last Friday to see Fellini 8-1/2 (clever chap that Fellini: no one talks about Lean's Lawrence of Arabia or Hitchcock's Psycho as if they were the titles of those films).
We watched it in true Fellini style. After a mishap (leaving my keys in the car door) I got separated from the other two and consequently saw what seems to have been an entirely different movie. They nearly walked out. I thought it was about 40 minutes too long, but enjoyed seeing which bits every other director had subsequently pinched. I'm sure Danny Boyle (Susan's secret son?) is indebted to Fellini for having the Slumdog boy drop into the latrine. It seems Fellini-ish somehow, just as every other line in Hamlet is now a cliche.
Slipping back to old technology, our gathering is turning out to be extraordinarily fecund, if Jim will pardon the lack of pun. First there was his definitive account of Angel's Flight, set to be a smash hit if only they'll get the tiny railroad running again. Now he has followed that with Motherfucker, another tome after which there is nothing left to say.
Meanwhile, Ian struggles with the production and design difficulties of giving his collection of Lotusland musings the literary environment they so richly deserve. Our very own James Joyce seems determined to turn Altadena into Dublin with himself as Leopold Bloom. Rollo is on his guard. It will, I'm sure, be the toast of LA well before my maiden attempt at fiction bursts on the west coast literary scene. But that's another story for another Monday night.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
I don't think I'm going to risk Fellini again
This book is my last gasp
The back of my legs still hurt from all that walking
Susan Boyle should be banned
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Film noir and female anger
April 6
Ian, Will, Bill, Lynne, Jim, Big Jay McNeely, Steve L, Jeanette, Andy, Bob, Steve
A rare appearance from Big Jay McNeely who, as ever, sat there Sphinx-like surveying the regular chatter and lending an air of mystery and distinction to the evening.
Most of us had been to the first weekend of the current Film Noir season at the Egyptian, so plenty of opinions bounced around the table. Everyone seemed to enjoy the offerings but no one was overwhelmingly impressed. Jim wondered whether the organizers were beginning to scrape the bottom of the barrel after 11 years, reflecting an email debate involving Bill, Mary and Will over whether some of this season's films really are noir.
That of course depends on how you define the genre. The Foundation leaves it to Eddie Muller's "vivid co-mingling of lost innocence, doomed romanticism, hard-edged cynicism, desperate desire, and shadowy sexuality" to express its view. Whether the enjoyable Fly-By-Night, shown last Friday, fits all those requirements is doubtful. Will and Jim certainly didn't think that Ray Milland's devilish title role in Alias Nick Beal was more than an accomplished decoration to what was essentially a study of how a politician can be corrupted by the prospect of power, rather than true noir.
It would be interesting, though, so see whether contemporary audiences saw as many inconsistencies in plot and continuity as our group did, Maybe in the 1940s and 1950s they were more grateful and therefore more willing to make allowances. But Will pointed out that his parents thought when it was released that West Side Story went too far in straining credulity with its dancing, prancing gangsters. So they weren't all saps.
The assessment of the weekend was a little chippy, partly because of the relentless boosterising tone of the nightly introductions to the films - even the pair of B movies shown on Saturday. Maybe the noir season format needs rejuvenating - with regular injections of Angel's Flight, if Jim has any say in the matter.
Discussion of the devil took us through Lucifer and the Da Vinci Code to reincarnation, which Steve Lamb dismissed as pointless. That does assume that we know what the point could be, whether there is a God and whether that God ever goes in for pointless pursuits. I can think of plenty of pointless people, but then the poet William Cowper did ask us to accept that God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform, adding: 'His purposes will ripen fast, Unfolding every hour; The bud may have a better taste, But sweet will be the flower.' I suspect though that this is not the sort of sentiment that wins enthusiastic nods of approval in the Coffee Gallery, or even on an Altadena omnibus. What is the man on the Altadena omnibus thinking - now there's a subject.
In saying that, I did not of course intend to demean or disparage in any way the often vociferous views of Altadena's female population, who are nevertheless the living embodiment of Lynne's assertion that women are not allowed to get angry in the same way men are.
'Women's voices rise when they are angry,' said Lynne, 'then men call them hysterical or tell them to calm down. They don't often tell other men to calm down.'
But if homo Altadena has an ounce of sapiens in his head, he instantly falls silent when his mate is launching forth on the many injustices still meted out to women, even after the glorious flowering of no fewer than 77 sunrises under the bountiful and omniscient Obama.
Take snoring. It is a well-known fact, especially to anyone living north of Pasadena, that women simply do not snore. Men, however, do it all the time, particularly after a certain age or after ingesting a certain quantity of alcohol. Penalty: exile, possibly for life.
Then there's housework. Men simply don't do enough of it. However much they do. This is confirmed by the Financial Times, no less, as reported by the fragrant Lucy Kellaway should you be tempted to Google it. Penalty: too many to mention.
At that we left Javier and his male assistant to clear the table.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
There was no jazz in The Jazz Age- I saw to that
A rattlesnake almost got me today
Standards? What standards?
It seems like the 70s were a forgotten decade
If writing isn't consistent, civilization goes
In a previous life I was a carpenter
Everything evens out - in the bed and at the dinner table
Ian, Will, Bill, Lynne, Jim, Big Jay McNeely, Steve L, Jeanette, Andy, Bob, Steve
A rare appearance from Big Jay McNeely who, as ever, sat there Sphinx-like surveying the regular chatter and lending an air of mystery and distinction to the evening.
Most of us had been to the first weekend of the current Film Noir season at the Egyptian, so plenty of opinions bounced around the table. Everyone seemed to enjoy the offerings but no one was overwhelmingly impressed. Jim wondered whether the organizers were beginning to scrape the bottom of the barrel after 11 years, reflecting an email debate involving Bill, Mary and Will over whether some of this season's films really are noir.
That of course depends on how you define the genre. The Foundation leaves it to Eddie Muller's "vivid co-mingling of lost innocence, doomed romanticism, hard-edged cynicism, desperate desire, and shadowy sexuality" to express its view. Whether the enjoyable Fly-By-Night, shown last Friday, fits all those requirements is doubtful. Will and Jim certainly didn't think that Ray Milland's devilish title role in Alias Nick Beal was more than an accomplished decoration to what was essentially a study of how a politician can be corrupted by the prospect of power, rather than true noir.
It would be interesting, though, so see whether contemporary audiences saw as many inconsistencies in plot and continuity as our group did, Maybe in the 1940s and 1950s they were more grateful and therefore more willing to make allowances. But Will pointed out that his parents thought when it was released that West Side Story went too far in straining credulity with its dancing, prancing gangsters. So they weren't all saps.
The assessment of the weekend was a little chippy, partly because of the relentless boosterising tone of the nightly introductions to the films - even the pair of B movies shown on Saturday. Maybe the noir season format needs rejuvenating - with regular injections of Angel's Flight, if Jim has any say in the matter.
Discussion of the devil took us through Lucifer and the Da Vinci Code to reincarnation, which Steve Lamb dismissed as pointless. That does assume that we know what the point could be, whether there is a God and whether that God ever goes in for pointless pursuits. I can think of plenty of pointless people, but then the poet William Cowper did ask us to accept that God moves in a mysterious way His wonders to perform, adding: 'His purposes will ripen fast, Unfolding every hour; The bud may have a better taste, But sweet will be the flower.' I suspect though that this is not the sort of sentiment that wins enthusiastic nods of approval in the Coffee Gallery, or even on an Altadena omnibus. What is the man on the Altadena omnibus thinking - now there's a subject.
In saying that, I did not of course intend to demean or disparage in any way the often vociferous views of Altadena's female population, who are nevertheless the living embodiment of Lynne's assertion that women are not allowed to get angry in the same way men are.
'Women's voices rise when they are angry,' said Lynne, 'then men call them hysterical or tell them to calm down. They don't often tell other men to calm down.'
But if homo Altadena has an ounce of sapiens in his head, he instantly falls silent when his mate is launching forth on the many injustices still meted out to women, even after the glorious flowering of no fewer than 77 sunrises under the bountiful and omniscient Obama.
Take snoring. It is a well-known fact, especially to anyone living north of Pasadena, that women simply do not snore. Men, however, do it all the time, particularly after a certain age or after ingesting a certain quantity of alcohol. Penalty: exile, possibly for life.
Then there's housework. Men simply don't do enough of it. However much they do. This is confirmed by the Financial Times, no less, as reported by the fragrant Lucy Kellaway should you be tempted to Google it. Penalty: too many to mention.
At that we left Javier and his male assistant to clear the table.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
There was no jazz in The Jazz Age- I saw to that
A rattlesnake almost got me today
Standards? What standards?
It seems like the 70s were a forgotten decade
If writing isn't consistent, civilization goes
In a previous life I was a carpenter
Everything evens out - in the bed and at the dinner table
Friday, April 3, 2009
Film noir and brilliant TV
March 30
Ian, Bill, Lynne, Bobb, Barbara, Will, Edgar, Jim, Steve L, Jeanette, Bob
I'm bookending March, with Diner Diaries immortalising only the first and last Mondays of the month thanks to Douglas Fairbanks's silent pranks and Will Ryan's considerably noisier Cactus County Cowboys!
Although he hasn't been awarded much sympathy by the public - many of whom, it seems from press and radio, have decided he's guilty - Phil Spector has been remarkably cheerful while he awaits the jury's verdict, according to Jim. While no one expected the jury to make their mind up in a trice, every obstacle appears to have been placed in the way of a definite conclusion to the five-month trial, from letting the jury stay home in case downtown was clogged up by crowds celebrating Cezar Chavez day or one of their number falling ill. When you consider that he could spend the rest of his life in jail, it has been a considerable achievement for him to surround himself with friends like Jim, generously taking them out to meals and generally living as normal a life as possible. Most murder suspects have only the four walls of a prison cell to look at while they await a verdict, but it can be just as hard to go out in public.
As far as I know, Spector has not recently visited Micheli's, the Italian tourist trap off Hollywood that really should be the automatic choice for a meal before seeing a movie at the Egyptian. But it shows just how many doubts surround the place, that its merits are so often debated. Now was one of those times, ahead of the April film noir season at the Egyptian. It has few real fans among our group and some definite detractors, notably Ian and Lynne.
I'll take the liberty of jumping ahead of myself to say that Lynne, Will and I went there on the season's first night and had a good meal, promptly served. That may have had something to do with the recession thinning out the number of customers, but let's take it as a good omen for both film noir and Cinecon. Perhaps the real puzzle is why the area doesn't have a whole bunch of excellent restaurants clamoring for our dollars. Taking tourists for granted can be a hard habit to shake off..
How much TV should we watch? That question has been asked far more than how often we should or should not go to the movies - because that has traditionally meant getting out of the house? Because movies are more of an art form than TV? Barbara revealed that she rations herself, either despite or because she wants to clear away space to watch American Idol, among other attractions of the small screen. But I haven't heard of anyone rationing themselves with regard to movies, unless to save money, so I think TV has had an undeservedly bad press. Aside from Idol, which Lynne and I also follow avidly, the debate on TV's merits were prompted by a new series that launched on HBO on Sunday, a serialization of Alexander McCall Smith's Botswana-based books, The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. This really is a marriage made in heaven: excellent books, a fine lead actress in Jill Scott, great producing and directing from the late Sidney Pollack and Anthony Minghella, and wonderful Botswana scenery. Don't ration yourselves!
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
There's so many more people know you than you know
I've been free for a long time of worrying about what people think of me
Every man would like to be randy for a day
Do you really mean to say that a man with a beard can't be sexy?
I saw Johnny Mathis driving down Sunset once
Touching is all right for sex, but that's it as far as I'm concerned
Ian, Bill, Lynne, Bobb, Barbara, Will, Edgar, Jim, Steve L, Jeanette, Bob
I'm bookending March, with Diner Diaries immortalising only the first and last Mondays of the month thanks to Douglas Fairbanks's silent pranks and Will Ryan's considerably noisier Cactus County Cowboys!
Although he hasn't been awarded much sympathy by the public - many of whom, it seems from press and radio, have decided he's guilty - Phil Spector has been remarkably cheerful while he awaits the jury's verdict, according to Jim. While no one expected the jury to make their mind up in a trice, every obstacle appears to have been placed in the way of a definite conclusion to the five-month trial, from letting the jury stay home in case downtown was clogged up by crowds celebrating Cezar Chavez day or one of their number falling ill. When you consider that he could spend the rest of his life in jail, it has been a considerable achievement for him to surround himself with friends like Jim, generously taking them out to meals and generally living as normal a life as possible. Most murder suspects have only the four walls of a prison cell to look at while they await a verdict, but it can be just as hard to go out in public.
As far as I know, Spector has not recently visited Micheli's, the Italian tourist trap off Hollywood that really should be the automatic choice for a meal before seeing a movie at the Egyptian. But it shows just how many doubts surround the place, that its merits are so often debated. Now was one of those times, ahead of the April film noir season at the Egyptian. It has few real fans among our group and some definite detractors, notably Ian and Lynne.
I'll take the liberty of jumping ahead of myself to say that Lynne, Will and I went there on the season's first night and had a good meal, promptly served. That may have had something to do with the recession thinning out the number of customers, but let's take it as a good omen for both film noir and Cinecon. Perhaps the real puzzle is why the area doesn't have a whole bunch of excellent restaurants clamoring for our dollars. Taking tourists for granted can be a hard habit to shake off..
How much TV should we watch? That question has been asked far more than how often we should or should not go to the movies - because that has traditionally meant getting out of the house? Because movies are more of an art form than TV? Barbara revealed that she rations herself, either despite or because she wants to clear away space to watch American Idol, among other attractions of the small screen. But I haven't heard of anyone rationing themselves with regard to movies, unless to save money, so I think TV has had an undeservedly bad press. Aside from Idol, which Lynne and I also follow avidly, the debate on TV's merits were prompted by a new series that launched on HBO on Sunday, a serialization of Alexander McCall Smith's Botswana-based books, The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency. This really is a marriage made in heaven: excellent books, a fine lead actress in Jill Scott, great producing and directing from the late Sidney Pollack and Anthony Minghella, and wonderful Botswana scenery. Don't ration yourselves!
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
There's so many more people know you than you know
I've been free for a long time of worrying about what people think of me
Every man would like to be randy for a day
Do you really mean to say that a man with a beard can't be sexy?
I saw Johnny Mathis driving down Sunset once
Touching is all right for sex, but that's it as far as I'm concerned
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Cactus County Custard
March 2
Will, Bill, Lynne, Jim, Edgar, Ian, Bob, Steve L, Jeanette
Jim is busy pitching for a third volume of his definitive magnum opus on breaking wind, and the rest of us were eager to share the glory by contributing more of our own fart stories.
Lynne started, aptly enough, by repeating the IFart application on her newly acquired iPhone, and I recalled that Peter Sellers farted several times in his Pink Panther films (infinitely superior to the feeble Steve Martin version, but that's just my opinion), and Sellers's fellow Goon Harry Secombe was prone to raspberry farts on the Goon Show. However, that was on radio so it probably didn't count. Maybe that was why the Goons never transferred successfully to television.
Hitler was anoher famous farter, and we speculated that his strange bowel irruptions may have accounted for the concentration camps, the Holocaust and even the whole of World War II, which the historian Hugh Trevor-Roper may have described as the 20th century's biggest fart. Or not.
Maybe that was the giveaway line in what proved to be Hitler's fake diaries when they were published in the early 1980s: 'Must stop farting, or Jim Dawson will stick me in one of his books.'
But Jim's most sensational revelation was that Greta Garbo must have been a compulsive farter. He has spent untold hours studying Garbo's role in the film Grand Hotel where, to Prof Dawson's immense satisfaction, the sultry Scandinavian seamstress unmistakably farts in a solo bedroom scene. Maybe that silver-screen indiscretion is not so unmistakable: Bob, our resident cinematic authority, was sceptical, delivering the magisterial verdict that 'I seriously doubt they would let Garbo fart on screen,' which prompts the image of the director going up to Louis B Mayer or one of the Warner brothers and asking if he could let the grande dame break wind while the cameras were rolling. ('No, no, she has a fart-break clause in her contract, it would cost us more than the studio is worth').
Ian's current problem is less to do with breaking wind as breaking into print with his latest collection of Letters from Lotusland, for which he is employing the relatively untested technique of self-publishing (not to be confused with vanity publishing). He is employing a middle man who is supposed to be preparing the work for the printer but is falling short of Ian's exacting standards. Other would-be self-publishers are watching Ian's experience closely for hints and tips.
The latest victim of the economic collapse that day, was Virgin Megastore closing its Times Square branch in New York and considering shutting the rest - including one next to Grauman's Chinese Theater. I discovered later that the Megastores no longer have anything to do with Richard Branson, other than the Virgin name, as the shrewd Branson sold out to a couple of property guys a couple of years ago. The chain has already shrunk from eleven to six stores. The only profitable branch is the Times Square one, and they want to sell that because it is so valuable.
Bob mused over why the Megastores should be closing while Amoeba Records apparently sails on untroubled on Sunset. It's probably not a fair comparison, given the property element in the Megastores, but Amoeba may be a real estate play too, depending on the lease. Also they pack every square inch with product, and I suspect they pay the staff less than the price of a bent CD.
Discussion continues to rumble on over the merits or demerits of Slumdog Millionaire, which Bob argues is a throwback to the old Hollywood movie theme of poor kids getting rich and everyone lives happily ever after. This morphed into a debate over the lack of social glue nowadays, what with media being so fragmented and so there are very few films or TV progs that everyone watches - like Dallas or Peyton Place. Superbowl is still a magnet, but for only one day a year. Ditto the Oscars, thought its audience is shrinking as it shuns the blockbusters like Dark Knight. American Idol still draws 30 million, but it's in its eighth season and is beginning to lose momentum.
Much vitriol hurled at Leno and Letterman, seen as poor substitutes for the peerless Johnny Carson. But isn't that always the case, that past performers acquire that golden hue that overshadows today's pale imitations. I suspect, though, that Leno and Letterman will be looked back in through rose-tinted glasses.
Ian raised the perennial question of Will: the strange date of birth in his Wikipedia entry and why Will creates radio and stage personae for himself, rather than promoting himself - as Ian does, to take a totally random example.
In a delicious piece of stage business, Ian tried to embarass Will into revealing his actual age, at one point going round the table asking us all what year we were born. We all naturally replied, truthfully as far as I know, whereupon Ian turned triumphantly to Will and said: 'There! They've all said when they were born, Will - so when were YOU born?' He might as well have been talking Mandarin, for all the good it did.
But we all agreed, those of us who had seen them at least, that Will's latest series of shows as the Cactus County Cowboy have been a great success, wonderfully varied and talented ensemble, great atmosphere. At which point Will threw his eyes to heaven and said: "Well there you go, it just shows you...."
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
You keep talking, I want to talk to Will
I like doing your show more than anyone else's
After film noir - we're going to have Obama noir!
Do people really care about Octomom?
The evangelicals are trying to shed their southern Gothic, Flannery O'Conner image
I think you will agree you are a performer of great skill but relative obscurity
Being very rich takes some of the excitement out of life
Oh god, my bloody brain
I'd have really loved to be in a western
I wanted to be Warren Beatty for a time, but the feeling passed
Will, Bill, Lynne, Jim, Edgar, Ian, Bob, Steve L, Jeanette
Jim is busy pitching for a third volume of his definitive magnum opus on breaking wind, and the rest of us were eager to share the glory by contributing more of our own fart stories.
Lynne started, aptly enough, by repeating the IFart application on her newly acquired iPhone, and I recalled that Peter Sellers farted several times in his Pink Panther films (infinitely superior to the feeble Steve Martin version, but that's just my opinion), and Sellers's fellow Goon Harry Secombe was prone to raspberry farts on the Goon Show. However, that was on radio so it probably didn't count. Maybe that was why the Goons never transferred successfully to television.
Hitler was anoher famous farter, and we speculated that his strange bowel irruptions may have accounted for the concentration camps, the Holocaust and even the whole of World War II, which the historian Hugh Trevor-Roper may have described as the 20th century's biggest fart. Or not.
Maybe that was the giveaway line in what proved to be Hitler's fake diaries when they were published in the early 1980s: 'Must stop farting, or Jim Dawson will stick me in one of his books.'
But Jim's most sensational revelation was that Greta Garbo must have been a compulsive farter. He has spent untold hours studying Garbo's role in the film Grand Hotel where, to Prof Dawson's immense satisfaction, the sultry Scandinavian seamstress unmistakably farts in a solo bedroom scene. Maybe that silver-screen indiscretion is not so unmistakable: Bob, our resident cinematic authority, was sceptical, delivering the magisterial verdict that 'I seriously doubt they would let Garbo fart on screen,' which prompts the image of the director going up to Louis B Mayer or one of the Warner brothers and asking if he could let the grande dame break wind while the cameras were rolling. ('No, no, she has a fart-break clause in her contract, it would cost us more than the studio is worth').
Ian's current problem is less to do with breaking wind as breaking into print with his latest collection of Letters from Lotusland, for which he is employing the relatively untested technique of self-publishing (not to be confused with vanity publishing). He is employing a middle man who is supposed to be preparing the work for the printer but is falling short of Ian's exacting standards. Other would-be self-publishers are watching Ian's experience closely for hints and tips.
The latest victim of the economic collapse that day, was Virgin Megastore closing its Times Square branch in New York and considering shutting the rest - including one next to Grauman's Chinese Theater. I discovered later that the Megastores no longer have anything to do with Richard Branson, other than the Virgin name, as the shrewd Branson sold out to a couple of property guys a couple of years ago. The chain has already shrunk from eleven to six stores. The only profitable branch is the Times Square one, and they want to sell that because it is so valuable.
Bob mused over why the Megastores should be closing while Amoeba Records apparently sails on untroubled on Sunset. It's probably not a fair comparison, given the property element in the Megastores, but Amoeba may be a real estate play too, depending on the lease. Also they pack every square inch with product, and I suspect they pay the staff less than the price of a bent CD.
Discussion continues to rumble on over the merits or demerits of Slumdog Millionaire, which Bob argues is a throwback to the old Hollywood movie theme of poor kids getting rich and everyone lives happily ever after. This morphed into a debate over the lack of social glue nowadays, what with media being so fragmented and so there are very few films or TV progs that everyone watches - like Dallas or Peyton Place. Superbowl is still a magnet, but for only one day a year. Ditto the Oscars, thought its audience is shrinking as it shuns the blockbusters like Dark Knight. American Idol still draws 30 million, but it's in its eighth season and is beginning to lose momentum.
Much vitriol hurled at Leno and Letterman, seen as poor substitutes for the peerless Johnny Carson. But isn't that always the case, that past performers acquire that golden hue that overshadows today's pale imitations. I suspect, though, that Leno and Letterman will be looked back in through rose-tinted glasses.
Ian raised the perennial question of Will: the strange date of birth in his Wikipedia entry and why Will creates radio and stage personae for himself, rather than promoting himself - as Ian does, to take a totally random example.
In a delicious piece of stage business, Ian tried to embarass Will into revealing his actual age, at one point going round the table asking us all what year we were born. We all naturally replied, truthfully as far as I know, whereupon Ian turned triumphantly to Will and said: 'There! They've all said when they were born, Will - so when were YOU born?' He might as well have been talking Mandarin, for all the good it did.
But we all agreed, those of us who had seen them at least, that Will's latest series of shows as the Cactus County Cowboy have been a great success, wonderfully varied and talented ensemble, great atmosphere. At which point Will threw his eyes to heaven and said: "Well there you go, it just shows you...."
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
You keep talking, I want to talk to Will
I like doing your show more than anyone else's
After film noir - we're going to have Obama noir!
Do people really care about Octomom?
The evangelicals are trying to shed their southern Gothic, Flannery O'Conner image
I think you will agree you are a performer of great skill but relative obscurity
Being very rich takes some of the excitement out of life
Oh god, my bloody brain
I'd have really loved to be in a western
I wanted to be Warren Beatty for a time, but the feeling passed
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
From Oscar to Alaska
Feb 23
Ian, Edgar, Bill, Lynne, Glenn, Rita, Mary, Ray, Bob, Andy
Another nomad returns to the fold: after Libby last week it was Glenn, fresh from the surgeon's knife. about 25lbs lighter but happily claiming the procedure and its aftermatch were virtually pain-free. He was made to walk around just a few hours after coming round from the anaesthetic, and left hospital a mere five days later. Thanks to modern surgery, a triple bypass has become almost a routine op - and Glenn said one of the other patients had had a sextuple bypass. Amazing. But since he has been out, the old remedies have kicked in: regular exercise and a strict diet, which had him eating salmon tonight. But it's driving him nuts that he can't drive: the saintly Rita is his chauffeuse.
They said how thankful they were that they had an HMO health insurance policy, which covered them totally for the $96,000 that the hospital stay cost, BEFORE the surgeon's and anaesthetist's fees.
'I'd have been in a hotel room in the Huntington if we had had a PPO,' said Glenn, 'but we couldn't have afforded the 20% deductible.'
Being the night after the Oscars, the annual shebang was much trawled over with the help of Mary, who kindly brought her program for us all to peruse, with a sheaf of instructions on the night such as having to have a driver's license or passport to pass the ID checks. The general opinion was that the TV show was better than usual: at least they tried a few new ideas.
That led us into a wider discussion of movies and a trip down memory lane to the days when we used to see a B movie, maybe a cartoon or two and a newsreel before the main feature - often all shown continuously so you could turn up when you liked and just stay until you said 'This is where we came in'.
You can do something like that now at the multiplexes, because one ticket can let you flit from screen to screen and see several movies for your money. I've never done that, but I've often been tempted.
'But multiplexes have killed the movies,' intoned Bob, 'because they have allowed films to become bloated beyond audience endurance. Because multiplexes can play the same film on dufferent screens, a film can start every half hour without regard to running time. In a single screen set up, running time was a consideration because you need to get so meny screenings in per day to bring in enough dough to keep the doors open. Now it doesn't matter if a picture is 14 reels long, because it can play in three or five theaters in a multiplex and achieve the needed number of showings. Directors become self-indulgent and shoot extra footage--that extra footage costs money (sometimes as much as 40% below the line) and very few stories are worth the kind of screen time the extra footage entails. That is why mutiplexes have ruined the movies.'
The LA Times pointed out that the nominated titles for Best Picture had taken around $200m so far, but in 2003 the comparable figure was over $600m - a significant decline, not helped by the fact that there's just so much more grabbing our attention, from DVDs to Facebook.
Bob is a recent adherent Facebook in order, so he admitted, to generate publicity for his various projects. I suggested he put create a Facebook Group for Cinecon, which would make it much more interactive than at present. I also repeated my plea to be allowed to start a Rollo Fan Club, and I can reveal that Regina has - after consulting the peerless hound - agreed. I've started preparations already.
As often happens, one of the most interesting tales emerged right at the end, when nearly everyone else had gone home. Andy told us some of his exploits as a lawyer in Alaska, north of the Arctic Circle, with no electricity, no running water, no locally grown vegetables (too cold for them to survive), no restaurants, no libraries, no telephone - just hiking, fishing, listening to a crackly radio and praying that the ship delivering supplies is not blocked by ice.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
The only people who come up to me in restaurants are three-year-old kids
What happens when you pass your old age?
If you have yr face lifted any more you'll have a goatee
I was a piccallily, not a piccaninny.
You have to have a god complex to be a surgeon
The camera just loves people with small bodies and big heads: don't ask me why.
If you can survive a Conrads dinner, you must be feeling ok
Ian, Edgar, Bill, Lynne, Glenn, Rita, Mary, Ray, Bob, Andy
Another nomad returns to the fold: after Libby last week it was Glenn, fresh from the surgeon's knife. about 25lbs lighter but happily claiming the procedure and its aftermatch were virtually pain-free. He was made to walk around just a few hours after coming round from the anaesthetic, and left hospital a mere five days later. Thanks to modern surgery, a triple bypass has become almost a routine op - and Glenn said one of the other patients had had a sextuple bypass. Amazing. But since he has been out, the old remedies have kicked in: regular exercise and a strict diet, which had him eating salmon tonight. But it's driving him nuts that he can't drive: the saintly Rita is his chauffeuse.
They said how thankful they were that they had an HMO health insurance policy, which covered them totally for the $96,000 that the hospital stay cost, BEFORE the surgeon's and anaesthetist's fees.
'I'd have been in a hotel room in the Huntington if we had had a PPO,' said Glenn, 'but we couldn't have afforded the 20% deductible.'
Being the night after the Oscars, the annual shebang was much trawled over with the help of Mary, who kindly brought her program for us all to peruse, with a sheaf of instructions on the night such as having to have a driver's license or passport to pass the ID checks. The general opinion was that the TV show was better than usual: at least they tried a few new ideas.
That led us into a wider discussion of movies and a trip down memory lane to the days when we used to see a B movie, maybe a cartoon or two and a newsreel before the main feature - often all shown continuously so you could turn up when you liked and just stay until you said 'This is where we came in'.
You can do something like that now at the multiplexes, because one ticket can let you flit from screen to screen and see several movies for your money. I've never done that, but I've often been tempted.
'But multiplexes have killed the movies,' intoned Bob, 'because they have allowed films to become bloated beyond audience endurance. Because multiplexes can play the same film on dufferent screens, a film can start every half hour without regard to running time. In a single screen set up, running time was a consideration because you need to get so meny screenings in per day to bring in enough dough to keep the doors open. Now it doesn't matter if a picture is 14 reels long, because it can play in three or five theaters in a multiplex and achieve the needed number of showings. Directors become self-indulgent and shoot extra footage--that extra footage costs money (sometimes as much as 40% below the line) and very few stories are worth the kind of screen time the extra footage entails. That is why mutiplexes have ruined the movies.'
The LA Times pointed out that the nominated titles for Best Picture had taken around $200m so far, but in 2003 the comparable figure was over $600m - a significant decline, not helped by the fact that there's just so much more grabbing our attention, from DVDs to Facebook.
Bob is a recent adherent Facebook in order, so he admitted, to generate publicity for his various projects. I suggested he put create a Facebook Group for Cinecon, which would make it much more interactive than at present. I also repeated my plea to be allowed to start a Rollo Fan Club, and I can reveal that Regina has - after consulting the peerless hound - agreed. I've started preparations already.
As often happens, one of the most interesting tales emerged right at the end, when nearly everyone else had gone home. Andy told us some of his exploits as a lawyer in Alaska, north of the Arctic Circle, with no electricity, no running water, no locally grown vegetables (too cold for them to survive), no restaurants, no libraries, no telephone - just hiking, fishing, listening to a crackly radio and praying that the ship delivering supplies is not blocked by ice.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
The only people who come up to me in restaurants are three-year-old kids
What happens when you pass your old age?
If you have yr face lifted any more you'll have a goatee
I was a piccallily, not a piccaninny.
You have to have a god complex to be a surgeon
The camera just loves people with small bodies and big heads: don't ask me why.
If you can survive a Conrads dinner, you must be feeling ok
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Sinatra's secret
Feb 16
Ian, Regina, Edgar, Bill, Lynne, Will, Jim, Libby, Bob, Ben, Steve L, Jeanette, Andy, Ray, Joan
We were delighted to be able to greet Libby's return to the fold, in an all-too-rare visit that we all hope will be converted once again into regular appearances - with or without fur coat and wig.
Ian made a great fuss of Libby, buoyed as he was by the realization that the play he is in - The Jazz Age - has the makings of a huge success. A packed house is a packed house, however small the venue, and Ian even allowed himself the dream of accompanying it on a London run, in some edgy venue off-off West End. If only...
With less than a week to go before the Oscars, and an Academy voter (Will) in our midst, there was much talk of the chances of the nominees. Milk and Slumdog Millionaire had their devotees for best picture, Sean Penn seemed to be the local favorite as best actor and Philip Seymour Hoffman as best supporting. No broad agreement on the two actress Oscars, although it seems to be between Meryl Streep and Kate Winslet for the top female award.
The long-running question, Do We Still Like Obama?, got another airing with most people reassuring one another that, whatever he does, he will still be better than either Bush or McCain - understandably, given the way McCain still keeps putting his foot in it on the stimulus and housing rescue packages. Myself, I see the beginnings of a trimmer whose top priority is going to be survival. I think the forgiveness will have worn thin by Labor Day.
Edgar was telling Libby how his employers regularly ditch, or at least give to thrift stores, library books that are rarely read, and few borrowers choose fiction that is more than ten years old - let alone the classics. This is sad, but part of the iPhonisation of books and newspapers, where the soundbite dominates at the expense of the considered work of prose, fiction or non-fiction.
I was horrified to discover that the US, land of the free and defender of property rights, has no equivalent to the British Public Lending Right, which pays authors a small royalty every time their book is borrowed from a public library. It's not much - I've just received six pounds and thirteen pence in ye English monnie for last year, which at current exchange rates doesn't even buy me a Conrads dinner, but at least it recognises the principle that potential sales are being lost through free-at-point-of-selection libraries. Time for a campaign: are you listening, Barack
Some of us have continued to attend the Phil Spector trial, which is dragging on to its conclusion amid schoolyard name-calling by the rival attorneys. Let's hope the final speeches and the judge's summing up will make sense of it. At any rate, Judge Fidler must know more about Spector than any other man alive.
Will ended by telling a long but fascinating tale about his upclose experiences with Frank Sinatra, mainly at the Greek Theatre in the 1980s. On the third and final occasion he had the luck to be in the wings as Sinatra went into his act - and saw that the great man was reading the words off a Teleprompter! I suppose he had too many songs to remember by then, but it somehow tarnishes the effortless impression he gave. Ho hum, another god with feet of clay.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
He looks gay just walking up steps
Do you know where I can get cowgirl clothing?
Some people aspire to prostitution
We don't want Will to be promiscuous, do we?
You know best - in this regard, at least
She was developing another boyfriend
We've met a lot of your old girlfriends - and they were all very nice, really they were
Ian, Regina, Edgar, Bill, Lynne, Will, Jim, Libby, Bob, Ben, Steve L, Jeanette, Andy, Ray, Joan
We were delighted to be able to greet Libby's return to the fold, in an all-too-rare visit that we all hope will be converted once again into regular appearances - with or without fur coat and wig.
Ian made a great fuss of Libby, buoyed as he was by the realization that the play he is in - The Jazz Age - has the makings of a huge success. A packed house is a packed house, however small the venue, and Ian even allowed himself the dream of accompanying it on a London run, in some edgy venue off-off West End. If only...
With less than a week to go before the Oscars, and an Academy voter (Will) in our midst, there was much talk of the chances of the nominees. Milk and Slumdog Millionaire had their devotees for best picture, Sean Penn seemed to be the local favorite as best actor and Philip Seymour Hoffman as best supporting. No broad agreement on the two actress Oscars, although it seems to be between Meryl Streep and Kate Winslet for the top female award.
The long-running question, Do We Still Like Obama?, got another airing with most people reassuring one another that, whatever he does, he will still be better than either Bush or McCain - understandably, given the way McCain still keeps putting his foot in it on the stimulus and housing rescue packages. Myself, I see the beginnings of a trimmer whose top priority is going to be survival. I think the forgiveness will have worn thin by Labor Day.
Edgar was telling Libby how his employers regularly ditch, or at least give to thrift stores, library books that are rarely read, and few borrowers choose fiction that is more than ten years old - let alone the classics. This is sad, but part of the iPhonisation of books and newspapers, where the soundbite dominates at the expense of the considered work of prose, fiction or non-fiction.
I was horrified to discover that the US, land of the free and defender of property rights, has no equivalent to the British Public Lending Right, which pays authors a small royalty every time their book is borrowed from a public library. It's not much - I've just received six pounds and thirteen pence in ye English monnie for last year, which at current exchange rates doesn't even buy me a Conrads dinner, but at least it recognises the principle that potential sales are being lost through free-at-point-of-selection libraries. Time for a campaign: are you listening, Barack
Some of us have continued to attend the Phil Spector trial, which is dragging on to its conclusion amid schoolyard name-calling by the rival attorneys. Let's hope the final speeches and the judge's summing up will make sense of it. At any rate, Judge Fidler must know more about Spector than any other man alive.
Will ended by telling a long but fascinating tale about his upclose experiences with Frank Sinatra, mainly at the Greek Theatre in the 1980s. On the third and final occasion he had the luck to be in the wings as Sinatra went into his act - and saw that the great man was reading the words off a Teleprompter! I suppose he had too many songs to remember by then, but it somehow tarnishes the effortless impression he gave. Ho hum, another god with feet of clay.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
He looks gay just walking up steps
Do you know where I can get cowgirl clothing?
Some people aspire to prostitution
We don't want Will to be promiscuous, do we?
You know best - in this regard, at least
She was developing another boyfriend
We've met a lot of your old girlfriends - and they were all very nice, really they were
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Naked or nude? That is the question
Feb 2
Bill, Lynne, Ray, Ian, Bob, Steve L, Jeanette, Andy, Will, Jim, Ben
Although there were eleven of us at Conrads on Monday night, there were never more than eight at any one time because Will and Bob left early while Jim, Ben and (of course) Andy arrived late.
Ian, who was sporting another Band-Aid on his nose from shutting the back door of his car, was again worrying about the recession.
'Why are all the restaurants I go to so busy? I don't think there's a recession,' he said. 'It's not just here - Cantalini's is the same.'
I pointed out that high-end venues - even higher-end than Cantalini's - were suffering first, places like Parkway Grill. It's like in retail: Neiman Marcus is well down while Wal-Mart is up. We'll know the recession is really biting when people stay at home rather than go to even the cheap places. But, we pledged, Monday nights at Conrads will go on, come what may?
That may be more than can be said for the Mayflower Club, which Ray was promoting as a home-from-home for British expats. Its numbers are down, too - not surprisingly, judging from the menu.
Bob got us talking about his great expertise, old movie stars, he is lecturing at the Barn next week on two of them, Francis Ford and Grace Cunard. By little or no coincidence, one of Bob's favorite film, How Green Was My Valley, was directed by Francis Ford's younger brother, John. Pressed by Lynne, though, he admitted that his absolute favorite was Orson Welles's The Magnificent Ambersons. Lots of people seem to rate How Green as among their top films, but it is of course immediately disqualified as far as I am concerned as it is all about Welsh folk. Still, I suppose they seem quite charming from this distance.
Via a diversion onto films noir - the annual Egyptian season isn't far off - we somehow got talking about WC Fields and Charlie Chaplin. Ian, the great defender of British music hall, insisted that Fields had got his act and overall style from Harry Tate (1872-1940), the Scottish comedian - who, ironically in view of later history, was born Ronald McDonald. Now why would you give up a name like that in favor of Harry Tate, unless someone in showbiz already owned it?
This gave Ian the excuse he needed to have a go at another icon, Chaplin, and how he had pinched his stage mannerisms from the lesser British comedians in Fred Karno's Army, the group that brought him to America.
Another member of the Karno troup was Arthur Jefferson, later Stan Laurel who, as Jim remarked, was nothing until he was teamed up with Oliver Hardy by Hal Roach in 1920 - as with all the other famous double acts, they were nothing on their own and breakaways were rarely successful, right up to and including Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.
Bob had, like Bill and Lynne, been to see Minsky's at the Ahmanson Theatre, which got us onto the history and origin of burlesque and how it was eclipsed by striptease - and now, so I am told, by lap dancing.
Minsky's, we agreed, is a rattling good evening in the old tradition - nothing original, but what it does it does well.
The nearest to burlesque in London was the Windmill Theatre where, thanks to the iron rule of the Lord Chamberlain* in those days, the women could be naked but could not move or speak. The only speech came from the comedians who had the thankless task of keeping the almost entirely male audience amused between scene changes.
While the girls were naked they were always referred to as nudes. The two words mean the same: so what's the difference? It turns out that nude is Latin while naked is Old English and therefore considered more vulgar.
*The Lord Chamberlain licensed every show, and had to be sent every script before a show could be staged, until the law was changed in 1968.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
If that man comes he'll never stop talking
What do you care what I'm having? Are you going to eat it? I don't think so!
Drapes don't wear out - just wash them
I've always loved WC Fields
What you've got to do is get your head out of the way, then you won't hit your nose
There are ten million stories in a naked city, but no nudes is good nudes
I'm going to enjoy life without drink, I really am
Bill, Lynne, Ray, Ian, Bob, Steve L, Jeanette, Andy, Will, Jim, Ben
Although there were eleven of us at Conrads on Monday night, there were never more than eight at any one time because Will and Bob left early while Jim, Ben and (of course) Andy arrived late.
Ian, who was sporting another Band-Aid on his nose from shutting the back door of his car, was again worrying about the recession.
'Why are all the restaurants I go to so busy? I don't think there's a recession,' he said. 'It's not just here - Cantalini's is the same.'
I pointed out that high-end venues - even higher-end than Cantalini's - were suffering first, places like Parkway Grill. It's like in retail: Neiman Marcus is well down while Wal-Mart is up. We'll know the recession is really biting when people stay at home rather than go to even the cheap places. But, we pledged, Monday nights at Conrads will go on, come what may?
That may be more than can be said for the Mayflower Club, which Ray was promoting as a home-from-home for British expats. Its numbers are down, too - not surprisingly, judging from the menu.
Bob got us talking about his great expertise, old movie stars, he is lecturing at the Barn next week on two of them, Francis Ford and Grace Cunard. By little or no coincidence, one of Bob's favorite film, How Green Was My Valley, was directed by Francis Ford's younger brother, John. Pressed by Lynne, though, he admitted that his absolute favorite was Orson Welles's The Magnificent Ambersons. Lots of people seem to rate How Green as among their top films, but it is of course immediately disqualified as far as I am concerned as it is all about Welsh folk. Still, I suppose they seem quite charming from this distance.
Via a diversion onto films noir - the annual Egyptian season isn't far off - we somehow got talking about WC Fields and Charlie Chaplin. Ian, the great defender of British music hall, insisted that Fields had got his act and overall style from Harry Tate (1872-1940), the Scottish comedian - who, ironically in view of later history, was born Ronald McDonald. Now why would you give up a name like that in favor of Harry Tate, unless someone in showbiz already owned it?
This gave Ian the excuse he needed to have a go at another icon, Chaplin, and how he had pinched his stage mannerisms from the lesser British comedians in Fred Karno's Army, the group that brought him to America.
Another member of the Karno troup was Arthur Jefferson, later Stan Laurel who, as Jim remarked, was nothing until he was teamed up with Oliver Hardy by Hal Roach in 1920 - as with all the other famous double acts, they were nothing on their own and breakaways were rarely successful, right up to and including Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.
Bob had, like Bill and Lynne, been to see Minsky's at the Ahmanson Theatre, which got us onto the history and origin of burlesque and how it was eclipsed by striptease - and now, so I am told, by lap dancing.
Minsky's, we agreed, is a rattling good evening in the old tradition - nothing original, but what it does it does well.
The nearest to burlesque in London was the Windmill Theatre where, thanks to the iron rule of the Lord Chamberlain* in those days, the women could be naked but could not move or speak. The only speech came from the comedians who had the thankless task of keeping the almost entirely male audience amused between scene changes.
While the girls were naked they were always referred to as nudes. The two words mean the same: so what's the difference? It turns out that nude is Latin while naked is Old English and therefore considered more vulgar.
*The Lord Chamberlain licensed every show, and had to be sent every script before a show could be staged, until the law was changed in 1968.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
If that man comes he'll never stop talking
What do you care what I'm having? Are you going to eat it? I don't think so!
Drapes don't wear out - just wash them
I've always loved WC Fields
What you've got to do is get your head out of the way, then you won't hit your nose
There are ten million stories in a naked city, but no nudes is good nudes
I'm going to enjoy life without drink, I really am
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Krumping at Conrads
Jan 26
Ian, Will, Bill, Lynne, Jim, Edgar, Steve L, Bobb, Barbara, Ray, Andy, Joan
There is, I hope no one will deny, a distinctly self-improvement side to Monday nights at Conrads. It's by no means the main aim, it happens almost by accident, but barely a week goes by without some of us learning at least something - it's how Lynne and I have become almost fluent in Californian (I did say almost).
This Monday was no exception, for some of us learned about Krumping. That it was a real word, as opposed to something Jim had made up, another term for farting, perhaps.
No, Krumping was written, in black and white, in print, in a newspaper, so it had to be real.
It was just a throwaway line in a Culver City freesheet review of Cantalini's and Ian's show there. A friend of the writer might as well have been somewhere else krumping, we were told.
As is becoming a regular ritual, I promptly whipped out my iPhone to google the word. Glenn holds the Conrads record for fastest googling on a handheld device while eating, but he alas was not with us for health reasons, to which I return below.*
It was left to me to define krumping, and it turns out to be a new urban street dance-form that began in South Central Los Angeles and "is characterized by free, expressive, and highly energetic moves involving the arms and chest," says Wikipedia. It has become a major part of hip hop dance culture, I understand.
As it was such a stuffy, sychophantic restaurant review I can only surmise that the reference to krumping was a rare burst of irony. The review itself was so fawning that it even embarrassed Ian, which takes some doing, I think we would all agree.
The entrance of Wikipedia onto the stage led to renewed discussion of Ian's, Will's and my Wiki entries and how or whether they should be edited, and by whom. This was prompted by a recent scandal in which someone altered Senators Edward Kennedy and Robert Byrd's entries to say they were dead, so there is a move afoot to have every alteration reviewed by a team of super editors, who will presumably be overwhelmed by the backlog. Alterations take weeks to appear in German Wiki, where this regime is already in force.
So I urged Will to update his entry quickly, as he has complained for some time that it says he was born in 1939, making him out to be much younger than he really is (OK, older, just kidding Will!).
This of course got Ian going on the perennial subject of his Wiki slights, not the least of which is to do with the now-deceased British TV rock music series, Old Grey Whistle Test. Ian has been completely overlooked as the first co-host of the series, for a month anyway, because he stuttered in rehearsal on the first night. This might not have mattered, except this was 1971 and it was going out live. The executive producer, Mike Appleton, was taking no chances and so earned Ian's undying hatred even though he was allowed to conduct interviews.
Stuttering is naturally a subject of some interest at Conrads, as Ian and Jim can sometimes take ten minutes to pass the pickled pepper to one another over d-d-d-dinner. But, as they soon point out, their stutters vanish when confronted with a microphone, at least one that is switched on.
They are in the company of many famous stutterers, from Marilyn Monroe to Winston Churchill, who were OK on camera and therefore not known to the general public for their affliction. Which raises the question why those who do suffer from this ailment don't simply pretend they are speaking into a microphone, or even carry a dummy one around with them, to put on the table at Conrads and elsewhere? But what do I know, not being a victim myself?
One of the best, if temporary, cures for stuttering is to read strong, rhythmic poetry, such as Ian was forced to learn as a lad at Dotheboys' Hall or wherever his doting parents dumped him in his formative years. Tennyson, Browning, Noyes, Sassoon and even Wilfred Owen have been pressed into service in this noble cause.
At the opposite end of the artistic spectrum, we wondered why there was such a vogue for novelty songs, and why they have largely disappeared - maybe too naive for these worldly times. The Witch Doctor song by RossBagdasarian, Purple People Eater by Sheb Wooley and the classic of the genre, "Gilly Gilly Ossenfeffer Katzenellen Bogen By The Sea", recorded in 1954 by the Four Lads over here and the oily Max Bygraves in Britain the same year. Thank goodness the public grew up enough to move on, if only to Cumberland Gap.
* Glenn had a triple heart by-pass op on January 19. All apparently went well, so we signed a get-well card for him with best wishes for a swift return to Conrads
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
When you think about it, a movie about Obama would have to be a film noir
As I get older I blurt things out more: there I go again!
Write that one down, Bill, that'll be a good Caught on the Breeze....
You must tell him one thing at a time - but tell him often
Soy is the devil's workshop
Ian, Will, Bill, Lynne, Jim, Edgar, Steve L, Bobb, Barbara, Ray, Andy, Joan
There is, I hope no one will deny, a distinctly self-improvement side to Monday nights at Conrads. It's by no means the main aim, it happens almost by accident, but barely a week goes by without some of us learning at least something - it's how Lynne and I have become almost fluent in Californian (I did say almost).
This Monday was no exception, for some of us learned about Krumping. That it was a real word, as opposed to something Jim had made up, another term for farting, perhaps.
No, Krumping was written, in black and white, in print, in a newspaper, so it had to be real.
It was just a throwaway line in a Culver City freesheet review of Cantalini's and Ian's show there. A friend of the writer might as well have been somewhere else krumping, we were told.
As is becoming a regular ritual, I promptly whipped out my iPhone to google the word. Glenn holds the Conrads record for fastest googling on a handheld device while eating, but he alas was not with us for health reasons, to which I return below.*
It was left to me to define krumping, and it turns out to be a new urban street dance-form that began in South Central Los Angeles and "is characterized by free, expressive, and highly energetic moves involving the arms and chest," says Wikipedia. It has become a major part of hip hop dance culture, I understand.
As it was such a stuffy, sychophantic restaurant review I can only surmise that the reference to krumping was a rare burst of irony. The review itself was so fawning that it even embarrassed Ian, which takes some doing, I think we would all agree.
The entrance of Wikipedia onto the stage led to renewed discussion of Ian's, Will's and my Wiki entries and how or whether they should be edited, and by whom. This was prompted by a recent scandal in which someone altered Senators Edward Kennedy and Robert Byrd's entries to say they were dead, so there is a move afoot to have every alteration reviewed by a team of super editors, who will presumably be overwhelmed by the backlog. Alterations take weeks to appear in German Wiki, where this regime is already in force.
So I urged Will to update his entry quickly, as he has complained for some time that it says he was born in 1939, making him out to be much younger than he really is (OK, older, just kidding Will!).
This of course got Ian going on the perennial subject of his Wiki slights, not the least of which is to do with the now-deceased British TV rock music series, Old Grey Whistle Test. Ian has been completely overlooked as the first co-host of the series, for a month anyway, because he stuttered in rehearsal on the first night. This might not have mattered, except this was 1971 and it was going out live. The executive producer, Mike Appleton, was taking no chances and so earned Ian's undying hatred even though he was allowed to conduct interviews.
Stuttering is naturally a subject of some interest at Conrads, as Ian and Jim can sometimes take ten minutes to pass the pickled pepper to one another over d-d-d-dinner. But, as they soon point out, their stutters vanish when confronted with a microphone, at least one that is switched on.
They are in the company of many famous stutterers, from Marilyn Monroe to Winston Churchill, who were OK on camera and therefore not known to the general public for their affliction. Which raises the question why those who do suffer from this ailment don't simply pretend they are speaking into a microphone, or even carry a dummy one around with them, to put on the table at Conrads and elsewhere? But what do I know, not being a victim myself?
One of the best, if temporary, cures for stuttering is to read strong, rhythmic poetry, such as Ian was forced to learn as a lad at Dotheboys' Hall or wherever his doting parents dumped him in his formative years. Tennyson, Browning, Noyes, Sassoon and even Wilfred Owen have been pressed into service in this noble cause.
At the opposite end of the artistic spectrum, we wondered why there was such a vogue for novelty songs, and why they have largely disappeared - maybe too naive for these worldly times. The Witch Doctor song by RossBagdasarian, Purple People Eater by Sheb Wooley and the classic of the genre, "Gilly Gilly Ossenfeffer Katzenellen Bogen By The Sea", recorded in 1954 by the Four Lads over here and the oily Max Bygraves in Britain the same year. Thank goodness the public grew up enough to move on, if only to Cumberland Gap.
* Glenn had a triple heart by-pass op on January 19. All apparently went well, so we signed a get-well card for him with best wishes for a swift return to Conrads
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
When you think about it, a movie about Obama would have to be a film noir
As I get older I blurt things out more: there I go again!
Write that one down, Bill, that'll be a good Caught on the Breeze....
You must tell him one thing at a time - but tell him often
Soy is the devil's workshop
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Inauguration Eve Dinner
Jan 19
Will, Bill, Lynne, Ian, Edgar, Bob, Bobb, Barbara, Jeanette, Steve L
This was one of those rare occasions when Monday night was sandwiched between two historic events: the inauguration of President Obama and the 32nd Doo Dah Parade.
Despite Obama's efforts to make as much a mess of the swearing-in as he could, there was little doubt that the Doo Dah was the bigger disappointment. There appeared to be fewer floats than usual, towards the end there were huge gaps between floats so the crowd got restless, and the protest floats lacked their usual zip. Hard to tell if this was because the recession is squeezing spending, or the lack of political targets now that Bush is history.
There was one half-hearted attempt to have a go at McCain and Palin, but it didn't amount to much. And as, according to a poll, most American voters are willing to give Obama two years to get things right, maybe we won't see floats protesting his record until 2012. Could be a bit dull for a while, then.
Poor Bobb and Barbara were caught under a balcony on Raymond where the occupants were spilling champagne and the glasses containing the bubbly, as well as necklaces, lumps of marshmallow and lots of the other stuff that was flying to and fro across the street. Understandably, they quit early and I don't reckon they missed too much. But the sun shone and it was an entertaining couple of hours before the traditional police car followed the last float to signal that it was time to go home.
This sparked the now-obligatory discussion at this time of year about our organizing a Monday Night float for the next Doo Dah. I wouldn't bet on it, though, unless Conrads can be persuaded to pay for it - and I wouldn't bet on that either.
At least the parade took Ian's mind off the problems he is having as musical director on The Jazz Age, which the Blank Theater Company is putting on in Hollywood next month.
According to the publicity, the play will feature "the pulsating beat of a live jazz trio" playing a original score which Ian is supposed to be writing. Trouble is, the live trio are his Bungalow Boys, who aren't best known for jazz riffs. Even worse, on Sunday night Ian invited the lady who owns the show to hear him and the Boys at Cantalini's. She was apparently unimpressed with Ian's preferred repertoire.
What's more the director is apparently taking the politically safe line of allying himself with the boss, leaving the spotlight firmly on Ian. Time for one of Rollo's rescue acts, methinks.
But at least Ian was sufficiently happy with the forthcoming 800-page collected volume of his Letters from Lotusland to buy Barbara's meal last night, in return for her sterling efforts as the book's editor. And he even split his bread pudding with her too.
The subject of editing led to the perennially fraught question of Will's Wikipedia entry, notorious for claiming that he was born in San Francisco in 1939. It was actually St John, Nova Scotia, in 1989 (OK, just kidding).
Will protests, as ever, that he cannot get it changed, and Wikipedia does now guard its entries far more jealously than in the early days, when anyone could and did put anything into the entries, often maliciously or hoaxily (I just made the word up, but then a neologism a day keeps the pedant at bay).
However, it can't be that difficult to update an entry, because I have just added the Cactus County Cowboys to Will's. Just give us the facts, Mr Ryan, just the facts, and we'll get it all put right.
The evening ended, sort of, on a hygiene note. As we are so used to seeing the A, B, C grading system to rate the cleanliness of LA restaurants, so of us trusting souls, me included, thought it applied to Pasadena. Not so, because the crown colony has its own health department and they don't run any system at all that the public can easily latch on to. Consequently you never know how clean they are. Or otherwise. I was glad we'd finished eating by the time this came up, if you'll pardon the expression.
Conrads is, of course, beyond reproach cleanliness-wise.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
It's such a depressing play
How do you get a seat at the Doo Dah Parade?
I count my blessings - Rollo, Simon and Regina
You can see men kissing and holding their crotches - just like Cantalini's, then?
Ooh, she's come dressed as a nurse: but she is a nurse!
Electric cars suck.
I don't look at my portfolio, these days there's no point
It's like a long 8-year migraine coming to an end
Solar cars are great - as long as you don't leave them in the garage
Life isn't for the faint-hearted
Perfection and procrastination are my two guiding principles, or should that be principals? I'll tell you later
Will, Bill, Lynne, Ian, Edgar, Bob, Bobb, Barbara, Jeanette, Steve L
This was one of those rare occasions when Monday night was sandwiched between two historic events: the inauguration of President Obama and the 32nd Doo Dah Parade.
Despite Obama's efforts to make as much a mess of the swearing-in as he could, there was little doubt that the Doo Dah was the bigger disappointment. There appeared to be fewer floats than usual, towards the end there were huge gaps between floats so the crowd got restless, and the protest floats lacked their usual zip. Hard to tell if this was because the recession is squeezing spending, or the lack of political targets now that Bush is history.
There was one half-hearted attempt to have a go at McCain and Palin, but it didn't amount to much. And as, according to a poll, most American voters are willing to give Obama two years to get things right, maybe we won't see floats protesting his record until 2012. Could be a bit dull for a while, then.
Poor Bobb and Barbara were caught under a balcony on Raymond where the occupants were spilling champagne and the glasses containing the bubbly, as well as necklaces, lumps of marshmallow and lots of the other stuff that was flying to and fro across the street. Understandably, they quit early and I don't reckon they missed too much. But the sun shone and it was an entertaining couple of hours before the traditional police car followed the last float to signal that it was time to go home.
This sparked the now-obligatory discussion at this time of year about our organizing a Monday Night float for the next Doo Dah. I wouldn't bet on it, though, unless Conrads can be persuaded to pay for it - and I wouldn't bet on that either.
At least the parade took Ian's mind off the problems he is having as musical director on The Jazz Age, which the Blank Theater Company is putting on in Hollywood next month.
According to the publicity, the play will feature "the pulsating beat of a live jazz trio" playing a original score which Ian is supposed to be writing. Trouble is, the live trio are his Bungalow Boys, who aren't best known for jazz riffs. Even worse, on Sunday night Ian invited the lady who owns the show to hear him and the Boys at Cantalini's. She was apparently unimpressed with Ian's preferred repertoire.
What's more the director is apparently taking the politically safe line of allying himself with the boss, leaving the spotlight firmly on Ian. Time for one of Rollo's rescue acts, methinks.
But at least Ian was sufficiently happy with the forthcoming 800-page collected volume of his Letters from Lotusland to buy Barbara's meal last night, in return for her sterling efforts as the book's editor. And he even split his bread pudding with her too.
The subject of editing led to the perennially fraught question of Will's Wikipedia entry, notorious for claiming that he was born in San Francisco in 1939. It was actually St John, Nova Scotia, in 1989 (OK, just kidding).
Will protests, as ever, that he cannot get it changed, and Wikipedia does now guard its entries far more jealously than in the early days, when anyone could and did put anything into the entries, often maliciously or hoaxily (I just made the word up, but then a neologism a day keeps the pedant at bay).
However, it can't be that difficult to update an entry, because I have just added the Cactus County Cowboys to Will's. Just give us the facts, Mr Ryan, just the facts, and we'll get it all put right.
The evening ended, sort of, on a hygiene note. As we are so used to seeing the A, B, C grading system to rate the cleanliness of LA restaurants, so of us trusting souls, me included, thought it applied to Pasadena. Not so, because the crown colony has its own health department and they don't run any system at all that the public can easily latch on to. Consequently you never know how clean they are. Or otherwise. I was glad we'd finished eating by the time this came up, if you'll pardon the expression.
Conrads is, of course, beyond reproach cleanliness-wise.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
It's such a depressing play
How do you get a seat at the Doo Dah Parade?
I count my blessings - Rollo, Simon and Regina
You can see men kissing and holding their crotches - just like Cantalini's, then?
Ooh, she's come dressed as a nurse: but she is a nurse!
Electric cars suck.
I don't look at my portfolio, these days there's no point
It's like a long 8-year migraine coming to an end
Solar cars are great - as long as you don't leave them in the garage
Life isn't for the faint-hearted
Perfection and procrastination are my two guiding principles, or should that be principals? I'll tell you later
Friday, January 9, 2009
Caltech connection
Edgar, Ray, Glenn, Mary Katherine, Ian, Bobb, Barbara, Jim, Will, Bob, Regina, Steve L, Jeanette, Bill, Lynne
This was one of those weeks when the conversations I heard never really took off, maybe just my luck and if anyone got some exciting exchanges do pass them on.
While Javier arrived exactly on time at 6, Conrads Xmas decorations were still hanging around.
A backgrounder in the LA Times on UK knife crime set some of us off talking about the guns v knives debate. Brits - and middle-class liberal Americans, especially on the east coast - love to deride the US gun culture exemplified by the splendid gentleman who recently shot a family who persisted in talking in the row behind him at a screening of Benjamin Button. When they and everyone else fled, he sat down and watched the rest of the movie!
There is something dramatic about being able to pull a gun on someone, and it always stops the target in his or her tracks. Knives can have a similar effect, like any sudden change in the balance of power in a fight. While guns are reasonable effectively under control in Britain, knives as weapons have spread like a virus in the schools. I was shocked to learn that 250 people died from knife wounds in the UK last year, in a country where 50 murders a year was unusual.
Maybe the actual weapon doesn't matter so much as people's increasingly casual and callous attitude to human life and the rule of law. The police do what they can, but they can't be everywhere all the time and killers know this, however they are armed.
This gloomy mood was surprisingly lifted at the end of the evening by a group of about eight youngsters who had been occupying the big corner booth. It turned out they were all from Caltech, one through JPL, and they were every bit as geeky as you might expect. But they were also highly entertaining, full of stories about Star Trek and Dr Who as well as scorning Caltech's ugly new Astrophysics block - one of them was an astrophysicist. Ian and I bravely clung to our Caltech connection, the flimsy one of using the gym and pool (which they had of course never gone anywhere near).
So impressed were the remnants of our crowd that invitations were immediately issued for any of them to join us in future. Students being students, we will probably never see any of them again, but it was an oddly cheering episode.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
It's the wine not the toothpaste
We get B movies on our kitchen TV
Women are deceitful, nasty, sly creatures
Everyone shOUld have the opportunity of working in a hospital
You're in your once-a-month weirdo mood
Are you wearing someone else's dinner on your pants?
I'm free - no you're not, you're very expensive
This was one of those weeks when the conversations I heard never really took off, maybe just my luck and if anyone got some exciting exchanges do pass them on.
While Javier arrived exactly on time at 6, Conrads Xmas decorations were still hanging around.
A backgrounder in the LA Times on UK knife crime set some of us off talking about the guns v knives debate. Brits - and middle-class liberal Americans, especially on the east coast - love to deride the US gun culture exemplified by the splendid gentleman who recently shot a family who persisted in talking in the row behind him at a screening of Benjamin Button. When they and everyone else fled, he sat down and watched the rest of the movie!
There is something dramatic about being able to pull a gun on someone, and it always stops the target in his or her tracks. Knives can have a similar effect, like any sudden change in the balance of power in a fight. While guns are reasonable effectively under control in Britain, knives as weapons have spread like a virus in the schools. I was shocked to learn that 250 people died from knife wounds in the UK last year, in a country where 50 murders a year was unusual.
Maybe the actual weapon doesn't matter so much as people's increasingly casual and callous attitude to human life and the rule of law. The police do what they can, but they can't be everywhere all the time and killers know this, however they are armed.
This gloomy mood was surprisingly lifted at the end of the evening by a group of about eight youngsters who had been occupying the big corner booth. It turned out they were all from Caltech, one through JPL, and they were every bit as geeky as you might expect. But they were also highly entertaining, full of stories about Star Trek and Dr Who as well as scorning Caltech's ugly new Astrophysics block - one of them was an astrophysicist. Ian and I bravely clung to our Caltech connection, the flimsy one of using the gym and pool (which they had of course never gone anywhere near).
So impressed were the remnants of our crowd that invitations were immediately issued for any of them to join us in future. Students being students, we will probably never see any of them again, but it was an oddly cheering episode.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
It's the wine not the toothpaste
We get B movies on our kitchen TV
Women are deceitful, nasty, sly creatures
Everyone shOUld have the opportunity of working in a hospital
You're in your once-a-month weirdo mood
Are you wearing someone else's dinner on your pants?
I'm free - no you're not, you're very expensive
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)