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
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
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
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
'Twas the Monday after Xmas...
Dec 29
Will, Glenn, Rita, Bill, Ben, Jim, Steve L, Jeanette, Edgar, Bob, Bobb, Barbara, Mary, Ray, Lynne, Andy
One of the best Mondays for several months: big turnout, lively conversation, everyone on good form in that unreal period between Christmas and New Year.
In Ian's absence we had the unusual and welcome sight of Bobb and Barbara back and center in the booth. Appropriately, Bobb was wearing a t-shirt reading 'Bobb. The man. The myth. The legend.'
As often happens, a contender for most fascinating conversation of the night came right at the end when most people had gone home. Bob and Ray started exchanging tales about their days working front of house in LA cinemas in the 1950s. It ranged from having Lee Marvin serving popcorn to Marlon Brando sitting in the second row because of his bad hearing, how to skim ticket money, the martinet but corrupt district managers who insisted on everything being spotless and couldn't stop interfering, even on their days off and how Ray got 50% added to his normal week's money for cleaning the cinema one night at union rates. I treasure the memory of the young Birchard and Campi in their tuxedos showing people to their seats (or not).
A news item got the other end of the table earlier on talking about exhuming bodies: Jim told of how Big Bopper, Jape Richardson, was removed from his coffin in Texas, whereupon his family put the old casket up for sale on eBay! As Jim said, they ought to fix it so when it's opened a voice says 'Oh Baby, you know what I like!'
This could start a trend. In fact, there already is one: exhumation is one of those taboos we love to break, on the slightest excuse. Abe Lincoln was disinterred so his extended jaw could be examined for a malformation, and the apparent Parkinson's Disease suggested by the blurring of his fingers in the long photo exposures that were required in his day.
Frustratingly, they never did get to exhume Hitler because his body was reportedly burned, giving rise to a good 20 or 30 years of rumours that he had escaped and was living in South America. And the biggie that everyone has (I think) resisted so far is Shakespeare. Let's face it, you couldn't really tell if he had written those plays just by examining his skeleton, but then some people think he didn't really exist at all.
The recession is of course a running theme, week by week. This week Lynne came in late after a visit to Target, grumbling that the lines were being held up by so many people cashing Christmas gift vouchers. Another problem diners have been encountering is more people paying with cash instead of plastic. This met nods around the table, as if credit cards were some drug that we need to be weaned off. Personally I just use mine as a payment card and pay it off every week, but I know that not everyone finds it that easy. At least half the Monday night diners use the folding stuff when Javier comes round with his little silver trays.
'This recession will bring us all back to earth, especially the amount they pay ball players,' said Jim.
'Don't get me started,' Rita agreed, a trifle bitterly I thought. Does she secretly own the Dodgers or the Lakers, that players' wages should bother her so? I think we should be told.
Ray joined us after his usual visit to Mijares, to say that they too are hurting financially.
'They got 20 waiters, 5 chefs, 5 doing the accounts, that's a lot of overhead,' Ray pointed out, 'and they're just not getting the business. They've been there 85 years and they own the freehold, but they're wondering whether they're going to have to sell.'
One of the plus sides of the recession is the Obama infrastructure program - not that there is one yet, but we're all hoping, and it could be just what we need to build a decent light rail network in LA. Mind you, every other sizeable city is saying the same, so resources could get a little stretched.
That led to a comparison of the ease of parking in cities around the world, mainly LA versus New York versus London versus Vienna - the worst, said Andy. And no one could argue with him on that one.
Bob nailed what he regarded as the myth that the freeways were a big conspiracy got up by the auto industry. He recalled: 'My father used to come home cursing the Red Cars for the congestion they caused, and it was that that created the political pressure for the freeways to be built. So dies another urban myth.
London's parking reminded me about London's weather - freezing now, with -13c to come in the next couple of weeks. So do we have global warming or not? Whatever the truth, Al Gore did pretty well to scoop the Nobel Peace Prize AND an Oscar on the strength of that light-weight film he made. Timing is all.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
Geese don't like lawyers - smart birds
It was a farcical built for two
That's a clear case of bad pun disease
Heard of the hotfood Indians? They go ho ha hahaha ho ha ha when they eat jalapenos
My dad was born in a house with a dirt floor
Is she clean? She's fastidious!
He's ok, he just doesn't know it
Now which half of Mr Ed did he own?
I'm not allergic to anything, and then suddenly this happens
I'm open to anything, really
I'm just not a "reach out" sort of guy
I was going to run a 10k race in Pasadena and even before I started I was coughing
I got picked up by the cops for parking my car in a Beverly Hills street
Projectionists have no one to talk to all day, so they go a little nuts
Will, Glenn, Rita, Bill, Ben, Jim, Steve L, Jeanette, Edgar, Bob, Bobb, Barbara, Mary, Ray, Lynne, Andy
One of the best Mondays for several months: big turnout, lively conversation, everyone on good form in that unreal period between Christmas and New Year.
In Ian's absence we had the unusual and welcome sight of Bobb and Barbara back and center in the booth. Appropriately, Bobb was wearing a t-shirt reading 'Bobb. The man. The myth. The legend.'
As often happens, a contender for most fascinating conversation of the night came right at the end when most people had gone home. Bob and Ray started exchanging tales about their days working front of house in LA cinemas in the 1950s. It ranged from having Lee Marvin serving popcorn to Marlon Brando sitting in the second row because of his bad hearing, how to skim ticket money, the martinet but corrupt district managers who insisted on everything being spotless and couldn't stop interfering, even on their days off and how Ray got 50% added to his normal week's money for cleaning the cinema one night at union rates. I treasure the memory of the young Birchard and Campi in their tuxedos showing people to their seats (or not).
A news item got the other end of the table earlier on talking about exhuming bodies: Jim told of how Big Bopper, Jape Richardson, was removed from his coffin in Texas, whereupon his family put the old casket up for sale on eBay! As Jim said, they ought to fix it so when it's opened a voice says 'Oh Baby, you know what I like!'
This could start a trend. In fact, there already is one: exhumation is one of those taboos we love to break, on the slightest excuse. Abe Lincoln was disinterred so his extended jaw could be examined for a malformation, and the apparent Parkinson's Disease suggested by the blurring of his fingers in the long photo exposures that were required in his day.
Frustratingly, they never did get to exhume Hitler because his body was reportedly burned, giving rise to a good 20 or 30 years of rumours that he had escaped and was living in South America. And the biggie that everyone has (I think) resisted so far is Shakespeare. Let's face it, you couldn't really tell if he had written those plays just by examining his skeleton, but then some people think he didn't really exist at all.
The recession is of course a running theme, week by week. This week Lynne came in late after a visit to Target, grumbling that the lines were being held up by so many people cashing Christmas gift vouchers. Another problem diners have been encountering is more people paying with cash instead of plastic. This met nods around the table, as if credit cards were some drug that we need to be weaned off. Personally I just use mine as a payment card and pay it off every week, but I know that not everyone finds it that easy. At least half the Monday night diners use the folding stuff when Javier comes round with his little silver trays.
'This recession will bring us all back to earth, especially the amount they pay ball players,' said Jim.
'Don't get me started,' Rita agreed, a trifle bitterly I thought. Does she secretly own the Dodgers or the Lakers, that players' wages should bother her so? I think we should be told.
Ray joined us after his usual visit to Mijares, to say that they too are hurting financially.
'They got 20 waiters, 5 chefs, 5 doing the accounts, that's a lot of overhead,' Ray pointed out, 'and they're just not getting the business. They've been there 85 years and they own the freehold, but they're wondering whether they're going to have to sell.'
One of the plus sides of the recession is the Obama infrastructure program - not that there is one yet, but we're all hoping, and it could be just what we need to build a decent light rail network in LA. Mind you, every other sizeable city is saying the same, so resources could get a little stretched.
That led to a comparison of the ease of parking in cities around the world, mainly LA versus New York versus London versus Vienna - the worst, said Andy. And no one could argue with him on that one.
Bob nailed what he regarded as the myth that the freeways were a big conspiracy got up by the auto industry. He recalled: 'My father used to come home cursing the Red Cars for the congestion they caused, and it was that that created the political pressure for the freeways to be built. So dies another urban myth.
London's parking reminded me about London's weather - freezing now, with -13c to come in the next couple of weeks. So do we have global warming or not? Whatever the truth, Al Gore did pretty well to scoop the Nobel Peace Prize AND an Oscar on the strength of that light-weight film he made. Timing is all.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
Geese don't like lawyers - smart birds
It was a farcical built for two
That's a clear case of bad pun disease
Heard of the hotfood Indians? They go ho ha hahaha ho ha ha when they eat jalapenos
My dad was born in a house with a dirt floor
Is she clean? She's fastidious!
He's ok, he just doesn't know it
Now which half of Mr Ed did he own?
I'm not allergic to anything, and then suddenly this happens
I'm open to anything, really
I'm just not a "reach out" sort of guy
I was going to run a 10k race in Pasadena and even before I started I was coughing
I got picked up by the cops for parking my car in a Beverly Hills street
Projectionists have no one to talk to all day, so they go a little nuts
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
'Twas the Monday before Xmas....
Dec 22
Bob, Will, Lynne, Bill, Jim, Steve G, Bobb, Barbara, Jeanette (only to give everyone a bag of coffee), Ray, Lisa, Ian, Gloria, Andy
A distinctly festive air about Conrads tonight, everyone looking forward to Christmas, several planning trips out of town or even out of state, to visit relatives - and they even seemed to be looking forward to it. Just shows how a few reindeer can crack up the spirit of bonhomie. Yo. Ho. Ho.
Ray and I were wearing matching velvet jackets, red for him, blue for me. No Santa hats this week, though. You can go too far.
Bob surprised the early arrivals by being the first, plonked firmly midtable, coat on, book in hand - about film, inevitably. 'Some academic from Toronto, I mean just listen to this....' Bob wasn't impressed, but he nobly ploughed on.
Lynne and I complained of the cold, especially at home. We'd already been regaled by Will with tales of his freezing home, and Bob was in no doubt that it's the fault of global warming - presumably because someone else is getting the warm weather we should be having. I mean, snow in the San Gabriels! The very idea!
While Will puts coats on his bed, Bob confied that he wears a nightshirt, like someone out of a Dickens novel - pick a character to suit. Bob had at least heard of draft excluders called sausages, common in chilly Britain, hard to find in California. No double glazing. Cracks in between double doors. Bob admitted he sometimes got out of bed, put on the central heating then got in his car and drove around while the house warmed up. There has to be a better way, I can't help feeling.
Jeanette turned up with a large box of bags of Steve's special blend of coffee beans - minus Steve, who was ill, as was Edgar. Probably the same long-lasting cold that I have had and Lynne is catching. Winters, who needs 'em?
Ian turned up at about 7.30, hotfoot from retrieving Regina from her brother's grand-sounding mansion in Pacific Palisades, probably the very least that a top honcho from Goldman Sachs could be expected to put up with. Ian seemed happy to be back in the warm bosom of Conrads, though.
Merry Christmas to Javier and everyone who pops in on the Monday night crowd - however briefly or infrequently. This bonhomie is infectious, dammit.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
You'll shoot your eyes out - Barbara's t-shirt, from Christmas Story.
My other t-shirt says: 'Be nice. I know Santa.'
Mutt and Jeff has been going 100 years but it's been lame for the last 50 years
Javier, there is no red sauce with the spaghetti, it's just the meat. Pass the ketchup!
It was a moral gesture, nevertheless I'll take the immoral dollar
It's a bad sign if you own more cars than books
We had a Christmas show but we couldn't get in the mood
The whole trick is not to do too much- but isn't that true of life?
Bob, Will, Lynne, Bill, Jim, Steve G, Bobb, Barbara, Jeanette (only to give everyone a bag of coffee), Ray, Lisa, Ian, Gloria, Andy
A distinctly festive air about Conrads tonight, everyone looking forward to Christmas, several planning trips out of town or even out of state, to visit relatives - and they even seemed to be looking forward to it. Just shows how a few reindeer can crack up the spirit of bonhomie. Yo. Ho. Ho.
Ray and I were wearing matching velvet jackets, red for him, blue for me. No Santa hats this week, though. You can go too far.
Bob surprised the early arrivals by being the first, plonked firmly midtable, coat on, book in hand - about film, inevitably. 'Some academic from Toronto, I mean just listen to this....' Bob wasn't impressed, but he nobly ploughed on.
Lynne and I complained of the cold, especially at home. We'd already been regaled by Will with tales of his freezing home, and Bob was in no doubt that it's the fault of global warming - presumably because someone else is getting the warm weather we should be having. I mean, snow in the San Gabriels! The very idea!
While Will puts coats on his bed, Bob confied that he wears a nightshirt, like someone out of a Dickens novel - pick a character to suit. Bob had at least heard of draft excluders called sausages, common in chilly Britain, hard to find in California. No double glazing. Cracks in between double doors. Bob admitted he sometimes got out of bed, put on the central heating then got in his car and drove around while the house warmed up. There has to be a better way, I can't help feeling.
Jeanette turned up with a large box of bags of Steve's special blend of coffee beans - minus Steve, who was ill, as was Edgar. Probably the same long-lasting cold that I have had and Lynne is catching. Winters, who needs 'em?
Ian turned up at about 7.30, hotfoot from retrieving Regina from her brother's grand-sounding mansion in Pacific Palisades, probably the very least that a top honcho from Goldman Sachs could be expected to put up with. Ian seemed happy to be back in the warm bosom of Conrads, though.
Merry Christmas to Javier and everyone who pops in on the Monday night crowd - however briefly or infrequently. This bonhomie is infectious, dammit.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
You'll shoot your eyes out - Barbara's t-shirt, from Christmas Story.
My other t-shirt says: 'Be nice. I know Santa.'
Mutt and Jeff has been going 100 years but it's been lame for the last 50 years
Javier, there is no red sauce with the spaghetti, it's just the meat. Pass the ketchup!
It was a moral gesture, nevertheless I'll take the immoral dollar
It's a bad sign if you own more cars than books
We had a Christmas show but we couldn't get in the mood
The whole trick is not to do too much- but isn't that true of life?
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Here comes Santa
Jim, Ian in Santa hat, Regina, Frank and Sue from Seattle, Lynne, Bill, Ray, Edgar, Glenn, Bob, Jeanette, Steve L, Andy
Dec 15
A big hello to all my loyal (and the disloyal) readers after two weeks' absence: will we ever find out what happened on those two Missing Mondays?
And apologies for filing slightly late, but I've had a code in de doze. I can't tell you what it does to my keyboard...
It was great to see Andy back after a long absence, as opinionated as ever. Ian wore a bright red Santa hat with white trim, but as far as I know no one referred to it. Don't worry, Ian, we did see it and appreciate the seasonal gesture.
As our gathering prides itself on being up to the minute, the evening would not have been complete without theories from both ends of the table as to how Bernie Madoff got away with it for so long.
Jim came up with the idea of the Golden Child, in that people believe in and act upon improbable things because they believe in their gut that they are exceptional in some cosmic way.
He explained: 'It goes back to our infancy when large beings shower us with love and attention all the time. The odds of winning the lottery may be greater than being struck by lightning, but that little internal golden child assumes that it will buck the odds--because it deserves to. A guy will believe in a God "whose eye is on the sparrow," i.e., omniscient, because his internal golden child assumes that he is being watched and looked after. Ditto for UFOs. Sure, you're a hillbilly with an eighth-grade education living in Bumfuck, W.Va., but when that superior intelligence flies 50 light years to Earth, is it going to land in front of the White House? Of course not, It will hide in the boonies, despite its superior technology, and contact only some hillbilly in a rowboat. Only a golden child could believe that scenario.'
I prefer the notion of the golden father figure, which Madoff fits, all-seeing, all-knowing, promises to take care of you and see you right. As there is more than a hint of insider trading about his remarkable investment returns, there may be something in that on this occasion. He also played around with options on the shares he bought, which is enough to make the most hardened stock market analyst glaze over.
At the kitchen end of the table, Steve had no doubts: it was thoroughly justified punishment for greed, and of course he's right up to a point.
Madoff had the aura of the charmed circle about him, and existing clients only had to drop hints over the dinner table about this guy's magical abilities and everyone else wanted to get in - the classic pyramid or Ponzi scam.
Lots of people are staggeringly naive, taking too much on trust, at the same time regarding investment as a cross between boring and incomprehensible, so there is an overwhelming temptation to trust someone who seems to know what they're doing. Big mistake.
I also suspect that the whole thing got too much for Madoff. Every successful fund manager knows that feeling, when his or her fund gets too big to be able to nip in and out of promising situations without the rest of the market knowing what you are doing. Some funds have even turned away investors for that reason. I think it got too much for Madoff and he didn't want to admit it.
Happily, though, no one at Conrads was admitting to having any money with the old rogue.
The chat turned to TV quiz shows, started by Ian telling the old joke 'I've started so I'll finish.' It was a catchphrase of Magnus Magnusson, an Icelander who used to host a pretentious UK quiz called Mastermind. Contestants got two minutes to answer general knowledge questions, and another two minutes on a subject of their choice. If Magnusson was in the middle of asking a question when the two-min buzzer sounded, he would sonorously declare: 'I've started so I'll finish.' This gave rise to ribald jokes about him having sex with his wife when the phone goes. Fill in the blanks for yourself.
America led the way with quiz shows in the 1950s, partly because the powers that be imposed a limit on the top prize UK TV stations could offer - something pathetic like 1,000 pounds, while the 64,000 Question was handing out exactly that, $64,000. Eventually the UK limit was seen to be absurd and was abolished. Then, ironically, British independent producers started inventing shows like Who Wants to be a Millionaire? that were franchised round the world
Bob, Steve and, yes, I took great delight in recounting the sufferings of Sam Zell now that he has had to get Tribune Company to file for bankruptcy, including the LA Times. So that is probably the end of Zell's grand scheme to get his hands on $8 billion of assets for $300 million.
Trouble was, he wouldn't sell the LA Times when there were buyers because he thought he was going to make a fortune out of it, and now he can't sell it for anything like what he regards as a tolerable price.
Meanwhile, as Steve pointed out, Zell sits in a vast Malibu spread that he has carefully kept well away from his newspaper business, what there is left of it.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
I got 4 cats and no pension
You're here to sing: why else do you think we invited you?
There's not enough people on the council to vote for anything - it's totally corrupt
My entire life I've been ruled by women. I like it that way
Dec 15
A big hello to all my loyal (and the disloyal) readers after two weeks' absence: will we ever find out what happened on those two Missing Mondays?
And apologies for filing slightly late, but I've had a code in de doze. I can't tell you what it does to my keyboard...
It was great to see Andy back after a long absence, as opinionated as ever. Ian wore a bright red Santa hat with white trim, but as far as I know no one referred to it. Don't worry, Ian, we did see it and appreciate the seasonal gesture.
As our gathering prides itself on being up to the minute, the evening would not have been complete without theories from both ends of the table as to how Bernie Madoff got away with it for so long.
Jim came up with the idea of the Golden Child, in that people believe in and act upon improbable things because they believe in their gut that they are exceptional in some cosmic way.
He explained: 'It goes back to our infancy when large beings shower us with love and attention all the time. The odds of winning the lottery may be greater than being struck by lightning, but that little internal golden child assumes that it will buck the odds--because it deserves to. A guy will believe in a God "whose eye is on the sparrow," i.e., omniscient, because his internal golden child assumes that he is being watched and looked after. Ditto for UFOs. Sure, you're a hillbilly with an eighth-grade education living in Bumfuck, W.Va., but when that superior intelligence flies 50 light years to Earth, is it going to land in front of the White House? Of course not, It will hide in the boonies, despite its superior technology, and contact only some hillbilly in a rowboat. Only a golden child could believe that scenario.'
I prefer the notion of the golden father figure, which Madoff fits, all-seeing, all-knowing, promises to take care of you and see you right. As there is more than a hint of insider trading about his remarkable investment returns, there may be something in that on this occasion. He also played around with options on the shares he bought, which is enough to make the most hardened stock market analyst glaze over.
At the kitchen end of the table, Steve had no doubts: it was thoroughly justified punishment for greed, and of course he's right up to a point.
Madoff had the aura of the charmed circle about him, and existing clients only had to drop hints over the dinner table about this guy's magical abilities and everyone else wanted to get in - the classic pyramid or Ponzi scam.
Lots of people are staggeringly naive, taking too much on trust, at the same time regarding investment as a cross between boring and incomprehensible, so there is an overwhelming temptation to trust someone who seems to know what they're doing. Big mistake.
I also suspect that the whole thing got too much for Madoff. Every successful fund manager knows that feeling, when his or her fund gets too big to be able to nip in and out of promising situations without the rest of the market knowing what you are doing. Some funds have even turned away investors for that reason. I think it got too much for Madoff and he didn't want to admit it.
Happily, though, no one at Conrads was admitting to having any money with the old rogue.
The chat turned to TV quiz shows, started by Ian telling the old joke 'I've started so I'll finish.' It was a catchphrase of Magnus Magnusson, an Icelander who used to host a pretentious UK quiz called Mastermind. Contestants got two minutes to answer general knowledge questions, and another two minutes on a subject of their choice. If Magnusson was in the middle of asking a question when the two-min buzzer sounded, he would sonorously declare: 'I've started so I'll finish.' This gave rise to ribald jokes about him having sex with his wife when the phone goes. Fill in the blanks for yourself.
America led the way with quiz shows in the 1950s, partly because the powers that be imposed a limit on the top prize UK TV stations could offer - something pathetic like 1,000 pounds, while the 64,000 Question was handing out exactly that, $64,000. Eventually the UK limit was seen to be absurd and was abolished. Then, ironically, British independent producers started inventing shows like Who Wants to be a Millionaire? that were franchised round the world
Bob, Steve and, yes, I took great delight in recounting the sufferings of Sam Zell now that he has had to get Tribune Company to file for bankruptcy, including the LA Times. So that is probably the end of Zell's grand scheme to get his hands on $8 billion of assets for $300 million.
Trouble was, he wouldn't sell the LA Times when there were buyers because he thought he was going to make a fortune out of it, and now he can't sell it for anything like what he regards as a tolerable price.
Meanwhile, as Steve pointed out, Zell sits in a vast Malibu spread that he has carefully kept well away from his newspaper business, what there is left of it.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
I got 4 cats and no pension
You're here to sing: why else do you think we invited you?
There's not enough people on the council to vote for anything - it's totally corrupt
My entire life I've been ruled by women. I like it that way
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
A Right Royal Evening
Will, Jim, Ian, Regina, Bill, Lynne, Edgar, Bobb, Barbara, Ray, Steve L, Jeanette
Nov 24
Royal succession: how it works and why. A rather grand theme, you might think, for the humble surroundings of Conrads, but it happened like this.
Will is putting together a bit of business for his next show at the Steve Allen Theater on Dec. 8, involving Lynne as a very English royal expert challenging Will's right to be called King of the Cowboys.
Trouble is, very few people who live outside monarchies such as Britain - and quite a few who do live in them - don't understand the exact rules, and why should they care?
It seems logical that elder brother succeeds as King. But if he dies before becoming King, shouldn't his brother or sister take over? Not if dead brother has any children of his own, because they take precedence. Bit of a yawn, really, but you wouldn't believe how obsessed some people get by all this in England (the Scots and Welsh hate the English all the more because of it).
Regina raised the fascinating question of how the means of expressing ourselves affects and influences the content of what we express. Every typist knows that typing prpduces a more staccato prose style than writing by hand. I knew a journalist on the Daily Mail who always wrote his columns in long hand and gave them to his secretary to type for the printers (who never accepted anything but typescript in those pre-computer days).
But it goes further than that. Typing on a typewriter produces different results from using a computer keyboard, which flows better and involves less physical effort. Writing with a pencil is different from using a ballpoint pen, which differs again from using a really expensive fountain pen. Speaking is different from writing, whispering from shouting and so on. The medium really is the message, as Marshall McLuhan put it.
Lynne's OCD tendencies came out, largely as a result of tales of moving house and putting things on shelves in the right order. But Lynne claimed that, compared with some people, she was only a little bit OCD. Isn't that like being a little bit pregnant? Either you are or you aren't, though some people do take it to clinical extremes. Howard Hughes, for example.
Wicked! the musical is coming off at the Pantages in January - a particularly suitable theater for it, according to Will. That set off reminiscences about The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Frank Baum's 1900 book, which spawned a stage version only two years later, and of course the classic 1939 film starring Judy Garland.
Ian said Baum wrote the story as a deliberate (and successful) attempt to produce an American children's fairytale to rival the many European ones. Motivation is a strange thing, but at least it gets things done.
A tawdry postscript to the epic presidential election contest: the National Inquirer says McCain's wife has been having a long-running affair with Dino, a used car dealer. It was all kept quiet during the campaign, which must have been quite an achievement, probably helped by the liberal use of bribes and hush money.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
I didn't realize you had such a curved thumb: it's a sign of intelligence, my father always said.
I'm just scratching my nose to think
No iPhone, no answers
You can probably find him - he'll be under the table
It's not a play, it's a coincidence
Singing is honest labour
My sister is very beautiful - in Morocco
I don't sleep - I snore
Nov 24
Royal succession: how it works and why. A rather grand theme, you might think, for the humble surroundings of Conrads, but it happened like this.
Will is putting together a bit of business for his next show at the Steve Allen Theater on Dec. 8, involving Lynne as a very English royal expert challenging Will's right to be called King of the Cowboys.
Trouble is, very few people who live outside monarchies such as Britain - and quite a few who do live in them - don't understand the exact rules, and why should they care?
It seems logical that elder brother succeeds as King. But if he dies before becoming King, shouldn't his brother or sister take over? Not if dead brother has any children of his own, because they take precedence. Bit of a yawn, really, but you wouldn't believe how obsessed some people get by all this in England (the Scots and Welsh hate the English all the more because of it).
Regina raised the fascinating question of how the means of expressing ourselves affects and influences the content of what we express. Every typist knows that typing prpduces a more staccato prose style than writing by hand. I knew a journalist on the Daily Mail who always wrote his columns in long hand and gave them to his secretary to type for the printers (who never accepted anything but typescript in those pre-computer days).
But it goes further than that. Typing on a typewriter produces different results from using a computer keyboard, which flows better and involves less physical effort. Writing with a pencil is different from using a ballpoint pen, which differs again from using a really expensive fountain pen. Speaking is different from writing, whispering from shouting and so on. The medium really is the message, as Marshall McLuhan put it.
Lynne's OCD tendencies came out, largely as a result of tales of moving house and putting things on shelves in the right order. But Lynne claimed that, compared with some people, she was only a little bit OCD. Isn't that like being a little bit pregnant? Either you are or you aren't, though some people do take it to clinical extremes. Howard Hughes, for example.
Wicked! the musical is coming off at the Pantages in January - a particularly suitable theater for it, according to Will. That set off reminiscences about The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Frank Baum's 1900 book, which spawned a stage version only two years later, and of course the classic 1939 film starring Judy Garland.
Ian said Baum wrote the story as a deliberate (and successful) attempt to produce an American children's fairytale to rival the many European ones. Motivation is a strange thing, but at least it gets things done.
A tawdry postscript to the epic presidential election contest: the National Inquirer says McCain's wife has been having a long-running affair with Dino, a used car dealer. It was all kept quiet during the campaign, which must have been quite an achievement, probably helped by the liberal use of bribes and hush money.
CAUGHT ON THE BREEZE
I didn't realize you had such a curved thumb: it's a sign of intelligence, my father always said.
I'm just scratching my nose to think
No iPhone, no answers
You can probably find him - he'll be under the table
It's not a play, it's a coincidence
Singing is honest labour
My sister is very beautiful - in Morocco
I don't sleep - I snore
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