Brigham's Blog: January 2012

31 Jan 2012

I am sad. I watched the last two episodes of The Wonder Years last night; I now have no more to watch. I have seen all 114 episodes. (Actually, there were 115, but one of them was an end-of-season clips show that Netflix streaming doesn't have for some reason.)

I have written this before: What a thoroughly well-written, high quality television show this was! It never jumped the shark (the phrase used to designate the unfortunate turning point when a show is no longer as good as when it started); the quality of the writing was as good in the last season as it was in the first. Actually, I saw only one episode that I thought was under par: "Frank and Denise" from Season 5, which seemed like a launch episode for some spin off series which never happened. Only one... that's pretty amazing for a run of 115 episodes.

The ratings fell off when Kevin moved from junior high school and into high school (the last two seasons); apparently viewers wanted Kevin to somehow become frozen in time. But that's not at all what the show was about - far from it. It was about societal, family and individual change and growing up, and the story would be incomplete if the producers somehow focused on the school or the setting rather than with Kevin, the protagonist. Life isn't static and neither was The Wonder Years. In fact, part of the fun is watching the cast age.

The show is set from Fall 1968, when Kevin is a seventh grader, to Independence Day 1973, between Kevin's junior and senior years in high school. It is nominally set in Anytown, USA - but it's clear to me that the action takes place in Southern California, specifically, Burbank. As I have written before, Kevin was a twelve year-old seventh grader in 1968; so was I. He was sixteen during the 1972 presidential election, as I was. The attraction of the show for me is therefore obvious: It's about me and my peers, growing up in the suburbs during the 1960's and 1970's.

The only quality television production I can think of that is as well written, funny, heartwarming and with the same sense of wistfulness and poignancy is the Megan Follows Anne of Green Gables series from the mid-1980's. And seen from start to finish and viewed as an overall story, the closest thing I have seen to The Wonder Years on television was when I watched the BBC/Time-Life Shakespeare chronicles from King John to Henry VIII. Yes, Shakespeare! The Wonder Years was that good!

All of the episodes were good, but some stand out (warning - plot details follow):

- Kevin's first kiss, after the brother of the "girl next door" Winnie (who becomes Kevin's great love) is killed in Vietnam. This was the very first episode, and started off the season with real dramatic impact and perfectly set the tone for what followed.
- A stressful day at work with his father, when Kevin finally understands why he comes home so grumpy so often.
- The "St. Valentine's Day Massacre" love triangle two-parter, which sets up the relationship with Kevin's vengeful junior high school arch-enemy Becky Slater.
- The three story arc about Kevin's problems with algebra and an austere teacher whom he comes to respect. The last installment, when the teacher unexpectedly died, may have been the single best half hour of television I have ever seen. (It won two Emmys and was Fred Savage's favorite episode.)
- "Daddy's Little Girl," about the growing estrangement between Kevin's father and sister. (This one really pushed my buttons.)
- Kevin attends the bar mitzvah of his friend Paul.
- The story about Kevin's experience working at a mom and pop hardware store, which turns into a requiem for small businesses in America. I saw this memorable episode when it was first broadcast and made a mental note to check this show out later in life.
- The wistful show where Kevin's grandfather - no longer able to drive safely - makes his final car trip and gives his Oldsmobile to his grandson.
- Kevin becomes swept up in the Nixon-McGovern election of 1972, and becomes disenchanted with politics.
- "Kevin Delivers," an account of an eventful evening delivering Chinese food in town.
- An episode describing an evening's poker game between Kevin and his high school friends. What was great about this was when the producers fancifully advanced the story some 40 years, showing the friends as grumpy, squabbling old men.
- The last two-parter where Kevin and Winnie may or may not have had sex. The producers wisely framed it in such a way that it's left up to the viewer to decide. The episode works either way. There's also a series wrapping-up narrative in the final moments, where we learn the fates of Kevin and his family. Kevin doesn't wind up with his lifelong love Winnie; he describes the occasion when he meets her at an airport with his wife and young son. This causes some fans of the show grief, but if they were paying attention all along they shouldn't have been surprised. Life is like that: Things don't often happen as expected.

...but there were so many good episodes. Almost each one had some especially funny or thought-provoking moment.

I maintain that a television show like The Wonder Years cannot excel unless it has some spiritual aspect, either explicit or suggested. Stated simply, the spiritual angle of this show was the Wonder of Life.

We Mormons believe that there was a pre-existence before we came here to earth, where we lived with our Heavenly Father. It is accepted as a truism among us that we are therefore not earthly beings intended to have a spiritual experience (at church) - we are spiritual beings intended to have an earthly experience. Encountering good and evil, the bad and the good and opposition in things helps us to grow.

This is the greater theme of what The Wonder Years is all about. Kevin is a good soul, a protagonist with a conscience. Thanks to the narrative style of the show (where we are always privy to what he's thinking), when he does or says something wrong or hurtful, he ruminates about it and almost always seeks to rectify the situation, or at least feels guilt. We therefore pull for him and take part in his life. He is a surrogate for ourselves as viewers.

I began writing the work about my own childhood I call Avocado Memories in 1988, when the show began. I wasn't a viewer, however, and so the show was not an influence upon my own writing. But I was aware that there was a well-known television show roughly describing my own experience out there, and took the final narrated lines of the show as a frontispiece quote for Avocado Memories since it fit so well:

Growing up happens in a heartbeat.
One day you're in diapers; the next day you're gone.
But the memories of childhood stay with you for the long haul.

I remember a place... a town... a house like a lot of houses...
A yard like a lot of other yards...
On a street like a lot of other streets.
And the thing is... after all these years,
I still look back... with wonder.

30 Jan 2012

The other day I decided that I wasn't quite finished with the Angry Birds video game on my iPhone; a lot of my levels were single stars and places where I got bored and sent the "Giant Eagle" in to flatten the landscape and destroy all the green pigs. So I went back. I am amazed at just how many levels and games there are in this application - for one dollar! Good "vlaue for money," as the British say.

Over the weekend I watched a Netflix docu-drama about Tchaikovsky - it was pretty good. It, however, gave the old, more or less standard cholera cause of death, which I don't believe. Professor Robert Greenberg is a proponent of the "court of honor" story which persuaded Tchaikovsky to take his own life via arsenic, because of a scandal involving a homosexual encounter with a nobleman. (That account is described here.) It's interesting that my old friend Rimsky-Korsakov is also involved in this... he witnessed a drunken cellist kissing the dead Tchaikovsky's face, which would have been strictly forbidden in the case of cholera. The archives of Tchakovsky's letters in his country home are not open to researchers - the Russians appear to be hiding something, or covering something up. It may be that we may never know the circumstances of Tchaikovsky's death; to quote Winston Churchill, Russia is "...a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma." Or, if the old adage that "truth is the daughter of time" is valid, perhaps enough time hasn't yet passed.

Tchaikovsky was, of course, the master of melody. More than just about any other composer he could write beautiful lyric melodies that went right to the heart. He was revered and scorned (by intellectual music snobs) for this ability. Well. I've heard a lot of serial music, that is, pieces composed by the twelve tone row method of composition Schoenberg developed where melody was supposedly "emancipated," but I have yet to hear one I could or would want to whistle.

The Pinewood Derby was held Saturday morning, a couple of photos are here. We had a nice new racetrack this year, courtesy of a parent. The son of the Cubmaster running the thing won overall fastest car - ha ha! How embarrassing! That happened to me the first year my son took part, back in 1992. I guess it's the way of the Derby Gods to thank the Cubmaster for putting on the event.

I was sitting in my basement watching television when I noticed the reflected sun illuminating my iron Punch doorstop in an unusual way, photos here. Looks a bit eerie, no?

I finished "Think Small," the book about the development of the Volkswagen Beetle. I wrote an amazon.com review of it, but it's not up yet. I'll link to it tomorrow. The book caused me to reflect on advertising catch words and phrases. Watching 1930's movies it is clear that the word "radio" had high-tech connotations to Americans, and held immediate interest. Burbank inventor Maurice Poirier wanted to transmit power by radio. And I recall an unlikely serial about Gene Autry and the denizens of his Radio Ranch taking on subterranean evil-doers, Phantom Empire (1935). (How was the ranch "radio?" They kept in contact with a base station via radios, I guess... I forget. Bey hey, man, it was radio.)

In the 1950's everything was atomic: muffler shops, laundromats, consumer goods.

Are we immune from this silliness today? Absolutely not! Reflect upon the prefix "i" Apple successfully introduced (iPhones, iPods, etc.). What does it mean, precisely? Does it matter? When the Top Gear gang decided to build themselves an electric car, they named it the Hammerhead Eagle i-Thrust. According to Jeremy Clarkson, "i means eco, so you've got to have that." The cast of MadTV had some fun with the designation, too. (Politically heavy-handed, but that only adds to the humor, I think.) In fact, I'm sure I've seen the designation i-something used on a truck in a parking lot recently, but I forget which make. How is a pickup truck "i?" And how is Carly "i?"

So... what will the next universal advertising gimmick be? I hope I'm alive to see it.

27 Jan 2012

Well, I tried. A documentary called Rembrandt's J'accuse (2008) was available via Netflix streaming video; it looked very promising. The plot: In his celebrated painting "The Night Watch," Rembrandt accuses a man of murder. The 34 visual clues are in the painting, but we - in a text-based society - are so visually illiterate, director Peter Greenaway has to describe how. Generally, I like European art house stuff like this, but I got about 30 minutes into it and gave up. It was boring, and the narrative wasn't up to the task of helping the viewer figure out what was going on and how the clues were related to one another. So I moved on to another work in my streaming queue.

Objectified (2009) is a documentary about our relationship with manufactured objects (potato peelers, chairs, an iPhone, etc.). I gave this one about 25 minutes and quit. The problem here was the highfalutin', pompous, excessively wonky quotes by designers. "An object has an intrinsic value and utility that is an innate objectified whole. Designers must appreciate the utility of objects they design, and seek to harmonize their worldview with the worldview of the user," etc. You catch my drift. Cari, who was sitting in another part of the room listening and knitting, fired up the B.S. alarm, and I agreed. So it was on to the next film in my queue.

(Before proceeding, I should mention that in the film one Germanic designer looked sternly at the camera and cited Apple Computer as being a place where good design flourishes. I'd agree, more or less, but three months into iPhone ownership I have a bone to pick. The featureless, slablike design of the phone leads to a recurring problem I'm having: I constantly have to look at it and feel around on it to turn it 180 degrees to get the button on the bottom where it belongs. There is no obvious and immediate tactile clue as to what end is up on that thing. Maybe make it a bit more shaped, so it fits into the hand naturally only one way? Or maybe it's just my colossal hands.)

Giving up on documentaries for the evening I lighted upon Noel Coward's Tonight at 8:30 aka Meet Me Tonight (1952), a comedy trilogy. Can't go wrong there, right? Well, I liked the first two short comedies, the second, Fumed Oak, being one of the most wickedly mean-spirited (but funny) things I've ever seen. The adenoidal daughter was so horse-facedly homely and miserable she was actually hard to look at. Sadly, I cannot find an image of her in this role on the Internet. But let's just say she provides competition for Aki Kaurismaki favorite actress Kati Outinen in the "Ouch-She's-Hard-To-Look-At" category.

The last, alas, I dozed off during. It was the least successful of the three stories, I think. And it had the wry, funny, fetchingly pretty Valerie Hobson (shown above) in it - one of my favorite British actresses! So what have we learned? If you're doing a comedy, maybe it's safer to use homely women, not beautiful ones.

My pard Don Tracey found a hilarious write-up concerning the 37th Iowa "Graybeards" regiment and their wretched commander. Go here, scroll down. He instituted waterboarding 140 + years before the Global War on Terror! I think the tale of this unit is so funny and unique... I can well imagine the attitudes of these guys. I've see it in my reenacting career. At the start, patriotic and well-intentioned. Later on, peevish and resentful, culminating with an, "Oh, the hell with this" demeanor. War was simply not meant to be waged by men over about 35 or so. Not only are the bodies not up to it, neither are the minds. An older man, far more so than a twentysomething, is strongly disinclined to do things they think is a waste of time.

One of my New Year's Resolutions was to lose some weight. So I loaded the MyFitnessPal app onto my iPhone and started tracking my daily calorie intake. I also resumed walking at least three times a week for a half hour. (I clocked my pace on a marked trail yesterday: 3.6 mph. At my weight this results in burning about 250 calories.) Anyway, I have lost 7.2 pounds in three weeks, for an average of 2.4 pounds per week. Nice. I shall continue. My clothes are starting to fit a little better.

I attend the Cub Scouts Pinewood Derby tomorrow morning, the annual contest of father versus father. Okay, nominally, cub versus cub. But we know better. Some of these Dads are relentlessly competitive. So much so, in fact, that once, at the end of an especially long run as a Cubmaster I had become so disgusted I was ready to cancel the whole thing. Not having a horse in the race, so to speak, I may be at the finish line again, calling out the results. I do a schtick where the guy at the starting line calls out, "Are you ready?" and I bellow back, "Yes, O Great Leader" (with variations). At the last race I reply, in a world-weary tone of voice, "Yeah, let's get this over with and get out of here," which always elicits a laugh.

Have a great weekend!

26 Jan 2012

My pal Don, always on the lookout for amusing Civil War tales as they relate to Civil War reenacting, has discovered an interesting real unit, the 37th Iowa "Graybeards" regiment, composed of men generally over the age of 45. Article here. They represent a way forward for an aging participants of the reenactment hobby. Unsurprisingly, their term of service was not considered "brilliant" and apparently their commander really sucked; I'm in the process of editing some text about him. More later.

Last night I watched Milton Glaser: To Inform and Delight (2008), a documentary about this celebrated graphic artist. You know his work - he's the one wot did that "I (Heart) NY" logo and the now iconic profile of Bob Dylan. Interesting guy with much to say - but he needs to get out of Manhattan from time to time to see how the rest of the nation lives and what they believe. He is apparently possessed of the notion that people in New York City are superior because they're measurably more tolerant and broad-minded, etc. the usual liberal conceit. Do I need to mention that he did some anti-George W. Bush work?

I also watched the hands-down best zombie film I have ever seen: White Zombie (1932), starring the always-fascinating Bela Lugosi. I've known about this film all my life but have never seen it. Honestly, I expected it to be unwatchably corny. It's not promising: the acting is rather stilted, the dialogue is somewhat silly and the plot is rudimentary. Yet the whole far surpasses the sum of its parts and you wind up forgetting about the weak stuff. And Bela! With his Hungarian diction he could put more evil and menace into a line of dialogue than anyone else in Hollywood. He often emphasizes all the wrong words in a line of dialogue, but for him, it works. I find that I appreciate the classic 1930's horror films (Frankenstein, Dracula, The Black Cat, the Mummy, etc.) far more than their 1940's remakes. There's an earnestness there and a focus upon the horror that was lost later on.

A short biographical sketch: born Bela Blasko, which in Hungarian would be rendered Blasko Bela, he was born in 1882 in Lugos in what was then Austria-Hungary, hence his stage name, "Lugosi." The place has since been renamed Lugoj and is now in Romania. Romania, of course, is a nation associated with the historical Dracula, Vlad Tepes "the Impaler" (1431-1476). Vlad can get his own blog entry someday. Everyone knows Lugosi as Dracula, of course - but he also portrayed Jesus Christ in a 1909 Passion Play! Photos here.

Finding Hands of the Ripper (1971) as an entry in Netflix streaming, I checked that out as well. It's one of those Hammer films that mixes Kensington Gore with a hint of toplessness in one scene; by 1971 they were getting more daring. You know, it's one of those Brit horror flicks: "Cor, luv, wot's that in yer 'ands, then?" STAB, gasp, etc. The plot: as a small child, Jack the Ripper's daughter (!) sees him murder her mother and therefore becomes a murderess herself. You know, I always wondered how traits like that get passed from generation to generation - now I know. The end was cool: Molly Rippersdottir winds up in the whispering gallery at St. Paul's in London (a movie replica, not the real one - the request to film there was denied, go figure) with what is almost certain to be her next victim. Her mortally wounded psychotherapist (making his way all around London after being run through with a saber) calls to her from the level far below down below and... well, you can guess. A fun flick.

On the drive into work this morning I listened to the Oriental Rhapsody by Alexander Glazunov, an unfairly-overlooked composer who wrote in the Rimsky-Korsakov/Mussorgsky/Borodin late 19th C. nationalist style. (This is hardly surprising as Glazunov was a student of Rimsky's.) I think I'm going to like his work. Prof. Robert Greenberg exhorted his listeners to seek out this fellow's music, which I am glad to do.

Why I love Virginia: You can take a casual lunchtime walk (I work in Shirlington, which is part of Arlington County) and come across history. (There's another photo after this one - use the arrow to advance.) Neat!

I put up some Burbank stuff yesterday.

And that's all.

25 Jan 2012

I listened to the Borodin Second Symphony on the way into work this morning; it's a work I first got to like in 1972, when I was sixteen. Whenever I hear this particular piece I think of back when I was a teenage hermit.

When I was twelve, in the sixth grade, I had a bad case of acne which persisted until eighth grade or so, when I was fourteen. As I recall, it finally cleared up when I was about fifteen. Sixth grade was miserable; according to a psychiatric exam I was borderline neurotic. Partially as a result of schoolyard taunting, partially as a result of puberty, I became almost pathologically introverted. People would address me and I wouldn't look them in the eye, and, in general, I avoided making contact with people entirely. Life was just easier that way. So, all through junior high school instead of eating lunch in the cafeteria I would walk to the library and read a book, by myself. If the library was closed for whatever reason, I would stand on the outskirts of the cafeteria and read, leaning against a pole, listening to the mayhem and noise going on - kids being social. In the three years I was in junior high, I can't remember ever sitting down to eat in the cafeteria for lunch. One teacher, on his daily way to something or another, would encounter me and ask why I wasn't in the cafeteria with everyone else. I forgot how I answered, but he took to calling me the "Pole-leaner." That's how he signed my yearbook: "Good luck to the pole-leaner."

It was during these days that I developed an ulcer. I really, really hated gym, and can remember getting terrible stomach aches in the class prior, which I would just endure because I suspected they were psychosomatic. I knew they would subside once gym was over. Years later, after my first endoscopic exam, the doctor asked me, "Did you know you once had an ulcer?" No... but I wasn't at all surprised. So junior high was pretty miserable for me, and when it finally came time to graduate I was very ready to leave.

I remember being pleased to learn that high school was a different situation: the student body was more mature, and, in general, I could fade in with the larger crowd and become unnoticed. Dances, sports games and proms were for other people. As was my habit in junior high, during lunch I brought a book with me to the library to read. After I discovered classical music, via special permission from the head librarian who liked and encouraged me, I would sit up in the upper floor storeroom by myself near a window and read, with the Wollensack cassette deck connected to a set of headphones. I used to plunk myself down next to a rather poor model of the Globe Theatre some student had constructed, undoubtedly in connection with a class module about the Shakespeare plays. And there I sat, reading, listening to Borodin's Second Symphony on the Wollensack, doing my best to avoid the rest of the student body. I assumed life would be this way until I graduated - and perhaps beyond.

My withdrawal from teenage society ended when I first met my friend Mike in eleventh grade biology class in September 1972. (He's the fellow I do the Burbankia stuff with nowadays; I mention him frequently in this blog.) He sat in front of me. I had no idea at the time that he would become my lifelong best friend. But as we began to hang around with each other and his church friend Bob (I communicate with him all the time now, too), I finally began to integrate back into society. We used to eat our lunches in the flatbed of Bob's Mazda minitruck, which was invariably parked on the same street in front of the same house near school. He put AstroTurf in the bed of the truck; I became enormously fond of those occasions, that AstroTurf and that truck. I am sure Mike and Bob do not know how much it meant to me, and what a turning point it represented. And I recall the occasion when they pulled up at my house after school and called for me with the P.A. system Bob had installed in the truck; I was enormously flattered. Hey... I now have friends!

As I write this I am finishing up watching all of the Wonder Years episodes, which perfectly capture the sweet, confusing and sometimes frustrating and sad years of teenage growing up. The protagonist, Kevin (who is described as being twelve in 1968 as I was) was no hermit - he couldn't be. If he was there would be no show, would there? The Wonder Years has caused me to reflect. At age 55 I recognize that regrets in life are pointless, but I now wish that I had eaten lunch in the cafeteria with everyone else, attended a dance, a game or a prom occasionally and had gone to Grad Night at Disneyland with Mike and Bob. It is true that I got something from all of that book learning: a substitute high school history teacher once asked me to lecture briefly about England after 1066, which I could do, easily. He kept asking me, "And then what happened?" and I believe I got us all the way into Elizabeth's reign. But I now fully realize what I missed, and it saddens me.

A late bloomer, I am not at all the person I was as a teen. A stint in the Marine Corps removed most of my uncertainties and turned me into an extrovert. Playing rugby for years completed the process. I talk to complete strangers easily, initiating all sorts of conversations in elevators, meetings and other occasions. And while I still like to read (I read somewhat voraciously), it's far from the be-all and end-all of life. In fact, lately I have become persuaded that reading isn't all that it's cracked up to be. Doing anything in excess is bad - even that. It shouldn't preclude having a normal social life.

24 Jan 2012

I got about halfway through Windtalkers (2002) the other night and quit. It's a pity because it's about the Marine Corps Navajo Code Talkers - certainly a worthy subject for a film. It's a John Woo film; I'm told he's known for overdoing it with pyrotechnics. Yes... I drew the same conclusion. The main reason I quit is Nick Cage, doing a real bad Clint Eastwood imitation. Honestly, I don't how that guy gets work in Hollywood as a leading man. He makes me think of the kids at high school we used to throw against wall lockers. Another problem is Peter Stormare (the "Vee Dub in da haus" German automotive engineer in those great VW ads), who plays a Gunnery Sergeant - with an unlikely, thick Northern European dialect. (Stormare is a Swede.) This film is a mess.

Much more fun was Circus of Horrors (1960), a British horror film which could have been called Circus of Cleavage. This one starred another icy Teuton, Anton Diffring. He shows up from time to time in productions where a severe blue-eyed German villain is called for. In other words, he's more or less a professional cinematic Nazi. So... was he in Germany during the war? No. Ironically, he fled Germany in 1939 for Canada.

Some the dialogue is funny. A scantily-clad circus performer is strapped to a revolving table, where a guy dressed like an Indian throws knives at her. Diffring's henchman interferes with the table's motor, which causes the Indian's aim to miss - and he strikes the woman in the throat with a knife, killing her (which is what Diffring intended). "Quick, get her to a doctor," he says, "And send ze clowns in." Hahaha! About a woman who was formerly a prostitute: "I must say, she's even better at soliciting applause than she was at soliciting men." Much more fun than John Woo making stuff explode.

On the drive into work this morning I listened to a collection of Judy Garland Capitol recordings. Yes, Garland was one of the most justly-celebrated talents in Hollywood; nobody approached her ability to impart meaning and drama into a song. (Exhibit A.) I could listen to her sing a random page out of a phonebook. But as I listened to Miss Garland's perfectly-modulated phrases and exquisitely-executed vibrato, it occurred to me: I'd sooner listen to a CD full of Julie London than Judy Garland. Julie London had what she called an "oversmoked voice"; not a belter like Garland, her style was more intimate, more closely-miked and whispered. (One of my favorite examples is Bye, Bye Blackbird - with an amazingly focused bassist.) She's my fave. But I like Judy Garland, too.

What about Doris Day? Doris Day?!? She had a notable cinematic moment doing a torch song, and it's a good one: Ten Cents a Dance. Funny quote: "I knew Doris Day before she was a virgin." - Oscar Levant.

I can't leave the subject of torch singers without mentioning one of my favorite scenes from film noir: Ida Lupino's cynical and worldwise rendition of "One for my Baby" from Road House (1948). Yes, yes, I know, Frank Sinatra owns this number. But Lupino personalizes it with cigarette burns on the piano.

Here comes the solar storm! Here comes the solar storm! I plan to check out the sky tonight; maybe we'll see some glow to the north. This last happened in Northern Virginia in 2001 (I think it was). I happened to notice an odd, unaccountable red glow in the northern sky, and called News Channel Eight, who confirmed that, yes, it was a very rare appearance of the Northern Lights and yes, we've been getting calls all night about it.

TSA detains a Senator. How silly! I don't know... I'm a pretty humble guy and reluctant to pull rank, but if I were Rand I think I would have come up with something like, "Look, I'm a United States Senator. There are only 100 of us in this nation of 300 million. I can call press conferences for fun. If you don't let me pass I'm going to give your boss, your bosses' boss, his boss and his boss some very bad publicity - not to mention a tough time in a Congressional hearing." Senator Rand allowed himself to be detained for two hours; which speaks very well for his sense of patience.

The Academy Award list has come out, yawn. We saw The Artist earlier this month. It was good. We liked it.

23 Jan 2012

I was at the local Sunoco station this weekend when I noticed that the cashiers were wearing promotional tee shirts which read "Ask me how you can win a free cruise!" or some such thing. What does anyone immediately think of right now seeing the word "cruise?" That ship off the coast of Italy, lying on its side. Spectacularly bad time to have that particular promotional! As my kids would say, FAIL.

I found an old (1969/1970) TV ad from when I was a kid - I knew it would wind up on youtube eventually. I've been looking for it for years to see if I had remembered that little trumpet call correctly, and as it turns out I did. I always liked this ad; wry, very dramatic. And, of course, my family were big antacid customers...

I donated blood on Saturday, and yes, I took a cell phone photo. It was a satisfying experience to be in the room with the local community's minor nobility. Geez, the battery of questions and the size of the form has certainly increased since I last did this. I saw, "Please do not donate blood to determine if you have HIV." Sigh. You know what I noticed, looking around the room? No tattoos. Anyway, I look forward to getting back on a donation schedule.

We took possession of our Sleep Number full mattress on Saturday, and assembled it. Now guests have a newer, larger, more comfortable bed to use. I like a firmer mattress, Cari a softer one. It uses a compressor and what I was assured was a very high quality, leak proof rubber bladder to increase or decrease the firmness of the mattress. I hope we don't regret buying this the way we did our various leaky guest air mattresses. What a waste of money those were!

I finished The Wonder Years Season 5 over the weekend. While the show is not quite as funny as it was as Kevin grows up - I suspect the best season was probably season 3, when he was a junior high schooler - it still hasn't "jumped the shark." With the exception of one awful episode, they maintained the quality of the show. I have started Season Six - the last season. I'll be sorry to finish this show... it is now one of my all-time favorite television shows.

I also watched a couple of Professor Robert Greenberg lectures. The one on Arnold Schoenberg (the rather severe-looking fellow shown above) was a good try; an appeal to listen to and fully appreciate the music of this difficult composer. I like the way it began, "Welcome, you fine, good, brave people..."

Not familiar with the music of Arnold Schoenberg? He was one of the revolutionary musical figures of the 20th century. After writing music written in the style of late Romanticism (tonal, but pushing it), he developed a system of writing music using a twelve tone row. His idea was to "emancipate" the melody from the requirements of the key signature major-minor/tonic-dominant narrative style used for hundreds of years. For instance, a Beethoven symphony is written with a key signature, and the music is developed and modulated through various other keys in a way that tells a sort of music story. We have become conditioned to expect music to do this. Schoenberg's music is atonal, that is, there is no key signature and no one note is allowed to dominate the melody or harmony to give the piece a pseudo-key. How does it sound? Like so. In Neil Finn's words, "Try whistling this." Naturally, this kind of thing leads to humor.

Schoenberg's music is accused of being, "All brains and no heart," academic, difficult and hard to like. It is certainly not popular; nothing will kill a orchestra society's finances like a season of the music of Schoenberg and his followers. In the past I've listened to Schoenberg's stuff and tried to like it - but I always return to Bartok, Prokofiev, Stravinsky and other 20th century masters. His early pieces are okay: Transfigured Night, Pierrot Lunaire. But by and large I avoid Schoenberg and listen instead to his disciple Alban Berg, who was able to take the sow's ear of serialism and make silk purses. Berg's music is the subject of his very own blog which I may write someday...

I am now reading Thinking Small, by Andrea Hiott, a book about the development of the Volkswagen Beetle. It is a much better and more interesting work than Small Wonder, the more corporate-sanctioned and image-conscious paperback which you got from dealerships when you bought a Bug in the 1960's. (I didn't get one when I bought mine in 1975; I had to find it at a yard sale.) This book describes the very great interest Adolph Hitler had in Ferdinand Porsche's "People's Car" design. As it turns out, Hitler was a major Car Guy. Who knew? I didn't. This book is a sort of triple biography of Adolph Hitler (promoter), Ferdinand Porsche (inventor) and Bill Bernbach (ad exec).

20 Jan 2012

A couple of stills from the upcoming Johnny Depp/Tim Burton adaptation of Dark Shadows. Way, way overboard on the Goth. This is going to suck, big time.

Yesterday I posted my Maurice Poirier article to Burbankia, a scoop, I think. Mike and I have been investigating Burbank history for decades and we've never heard of him. Fascinating guy! Rockets into space, innovative time devices for the aerospace industry, airborne weapons of war, over-the-air transmission of power, automotive independent suspension... this "ten ideas per minute" fellow was into everything. So... how come he appears in none of the Burbank history books, not even a mention? He seems to have been entirely forgotten. Well... no more. It appears that he died as recently as 1990. I wonder if some Poirier relative will be contacting us now...

Last night I watched another Professor Robert Greenberg lecture, this one on Bela Bartok (Greenberg's favorite 20th C. composer - shown above); it was one of his best. I, too, like the music of Bartok a great deal. I'm not sure if he's my favorite 20th C. composer, however. That might be Igor Stravinsky. But I do find myself listening to Bartok a lot. Last year I started listening to one of his string quartets - from Greenberg's lectures it now seems necessary to get to know his piano concerti as well.

Bartok wrote one of my very favorite operas, Duke Bluebeard's Castle, a moody, dark, impressive piece where the melodies and harmonies seem to have come, not from traditional Western concert music, but from a place hidden away deep in the Eastern European soul. Curiously, it is the one symphonic piece that invokes the idea of colors within me: deep, rich shades of maroon, navy and black. It is a one act opera, and is therefore only about an hour in length.

The plot is simple: Bluebeard arrives in his castle with his new bride, Judith. She wants to know all about Bluebeard's past and illuminate his life. But Bluebeard's past is bloody and forbidden to her. Nevertheless, she insists upon discovering what's behind the doors of his castle. One by one she opens them, to her eventual doom. I have a CD of this piece sung by renowned basso Samuel Ramey... one day I was listening to it when Ethan, who was then a little boy, came into the room. He asked what I was listening to, and I described the plot and what was in the room behind this particular door: a Lake of Tears. He shrugged and walked off. Sometime later he asked me about the "sad pond" music - haha!

I have blogged about Bela Bartok before. No doubt I will again. I shall conclude by noting that one of my very favorite British directors, Michael Powell, directed a version of this opera for West German television in 1963. I very much want to see it!

Speaking of things British, I watched one of the Pinewood Studios "Carry On" movies, this one Carry On Cruising from 1962. (It's the only one Netflix has.) The "Carry On" films are an English institution; I felt that in order to fully appreciate the culture I needed to see at least one of them. I can't say I liked it much - the humor was a bit too lowbrow for my taste. It reminded me of a goofy NBC sitcom from 1965. I liked the "Doctor" series better. My wife and I noted that part of the film's intended appeal was via showing the two blond lead actresses in their underwear, swimsuits and various states of disarray. One of them, Liz Fraser, was stunning. (And I knew that image would be on the Internet somewhere...)

Tomorrow I'm donating blood for the first time in over twenty years. I used to donate all the time, and then my ALT and AST (liver enzymes) rose with age and, probably, weight. It's genetic; my Mom had high ALT and AST readings, too. The problem is that twenty years ago those markers were partial determinants for hepatitis types B and C. I don't have hepatitis - I had it checked - but the policy of the American Red Cross was to refuse to use my blood so I (regretfully) quit donating.

I was in the local library late last year during a blood drive, and one of the workers asked if I would donate. I said "No" and explained why, and she told me that now the Red Cross has advanced tests to screen for hepatitis, and that if it was a simple matter of elevated liver enzymes they could now use my blood. Great! Problem was, however, that on the Caribbean cruise earlier that month I had visited a certain area of Guatemala, and therefore had to wait a year to donate. So tomorrow I expect to give satisfactory answers to the screening questions in order to donate once again.

Have a great weekend!

19 Jan 2012

On the 11 January blog entry I mentioned that a YDNA match on my Clark line turned up, and that I sent an e-mail to the person with whom I share a common ancestor. I finally received an email from him today. As is so often the case with this maddening family, it sheds no new light on the central problem I am trying to solve, namely, who was my 3rd great grandfather Clark. I knew back in 1982 when I saw "unknowns" filled in by a clerk on the parents line of my 2nd great grandfather's 1888 death record that this would be a difficult puzzle to solve. Perhaps someday...

Last night I watched what had been a lost film (from 1938 to 1969), The Ghoul (1933), a British production starring Boris Karloff and a host of other notable British actors, namely Cedric Hardwick, Ralph Richardson, Ernest Thesiger and comic actress Kathleen Harrison - a favorite actress. (Have you ever seen that 1951 Alastair Sim version of A Christmas Carol? That brilliantly crazy cockney housekeeper is Harrison.) The good stuff: outstandingly crafted expressionist sets by Alfred Junge and marvelously eerie lighting. The cast, of course. And that stylishly 1930's art deco poster which I reproduce here. The bad: The plot and dialogue. It's one of those "old dark house" flicks from the early thirties, where all sorts of improbably odd things happen in a crumbling manse during a thunderstorm, and the cast alternatively shrieks and discusses them. It's a film genre that, let's face it, has not aged well.

Still, it's always fun to see Kathleen Harrison, and she's given full play in this. At one point she encounters a man who claims to be an Arab sheik, and is immediately smitten. (This was just after the Rudolph Valentino era, don't forget.) He mentions how sheiks treat female servants who don't behave: they strip them to the waist and whip them. Then he demands a pot of coffee. One of the sly, high points of the film is when Harrison shyly but hopefully asks what will happen if the coffee is no good. Also... when we travel and have to rent a car I'm fond of calling the cheesy compact cars we get (Chevy Cobalts, Nissan Versas, etc.) "reprehensible." At one point in this flick Harrison gets into the cramped back seat of a small, open car on a cold night and calls the car "unspeakable," so she's given me a new adjective for our rental cars.

I also watched another fascinating Professor Robert Greenberg Teaching Company lecture, this one on 20th C. French concerti. He mentioned that French composer Francois Poulenc was called "half monk, half hooligan." I could describe myself that way, I think. Anyway, as I have blogged before, Greenberg is wonderful; the best lecturer I have ever encountered. He's forgotten more about classical music than I'll ever know. I could listen to him for hours and, indeed, I have. I've heard all of his Great Music, Beethoven Symphonies, Symphony and Great Composers series; I'm almost done with the Concerti series. Great stuff, highly recommended, and a perfect use of one's time.

Greeberg spoke briefly about modern French composer Henri Dutilleux, about whom I would like to know more. I also need to spend some more time listening to his compositions. I came across a CD of his Cello Concerto (properly called Tout un monde lointain - "A Remote World") at a yard sale a few years back (!) and naturally bought it. It's an amazing work, which Greenberg covered all too quickly.

Dutilleux is not some long dead fossil... he's still alive and, presumably, at age 96, still working. He works very slowly, only releasing a new piece of music once in a while. But according to Greenberg they are all gems, masterpieces. Certainly that's the case with his Cello Concerto. From wikipedia: "It is one of the most important additions to the cello repertoire of the 20th century and is considered one of the composer's major achievements. In five movements, Tout un monde lointain is a nocturnal, mysterious work with a delicate orchestration and an eerily beautiful, yet highly virtuosic solo part. While most of the concerto is introspective and meditative, it also has occasional outbursts of violence and a frantic build-up to the ambiguous, suspended finale." I heard this piece played at the Kennedy Center: 2005 program notes. It was one of the highlights of the many concerts I've heard there.

I shall close with one of the Baudelaire lines used in Dutilleux' Tout un monde lointain, typically Gallic:

Hold on to your dreams
Those of wise men are never as beautiful as those of fools!

18 Jan 2012

Our first grandchild is a boy! And here's how we learned: The Cupcake Reveal.

A boy. I remember when we learned this with our son after an ultrasound test in 1983. The first thing that ran through my mind was, "Maybe he'll like the same toys I did when I was a kid!" Indeed, Ethan became a Legomaniac, just as I was, and he enjoyed drawing comic books, just as I did. (But he was better at it.) My mention of furnishing yard sale Legos at the end of the video is not a joke. I have a bunch now.

They don't have a name picked out yet; Sarah was running on the assumption that the baby was a girl. The family genealogist - me - pointed out that ever since about 1814 or so, for nearly two hundred years, every male in my line has had "Wesley" somewhere in his name: Wesley H. Clark (c. 1814-1888), John Wesley Clark (1850-1922), Harry Wesley Clark (1884-1942), Wesley Harry Clark (1912-1983), Me, Wesley Harry Clark, Jr. (1956), Ethan Wesley Clark (1983). My half brother was John "Jack" Wesley Clark; his son is Steven Wesley Clark. No pressure...

(Why all the Wesleys? I cannot yet prove it, but I think it's because the family was Methodist after being Quakers for generations, and was honoring the founder of the faith, John Wesley.)

In the video Sarah mentions that the Clark name will be maintained after all. That's a reference to a short conversation we had over the holidays, when she asked if I preferred a boy or a girl. I said a boy, but then added that either one is fine, of course. I then mentioned that the reason I preferred a boy was that so, after the countless hours I have spent doing genealogical research on the Clark family line, that the surname be maintained into the next generation. A bit of scholarly selfishness, I guess.

During yard sale seasons I refrain from buying things "...for grandchildren I didn't have." What's to restrain me now?

My wife, that's what.

Yesterday I listened to Ralph Vaughan Williams' The Wasps (Aristophanic Suite) via a library CD. What a great piece of music! How come I never heard it before? VW went to Paris to study orchestration under Maurice Ravel (one of the great masters of scoring for musical instruments), and this piece shows it. It just sparkles.

I had a Webelos Den meeting last night; a wondrous and loud meeting of ten year old male minds. I think I mentioned that I have one kid who has some sort of bizarre potato fixation; he constantly mentions them. One of the requirements for the engineering activity pin was to draw an outline of your home, like a blue print. This lad did that. Can you guess how he labelled the kitchen? "Where potatoes are cooked." Naturally, outside, a potato patch was located on the front yard. When we discussed various types of bridges - suspension, beam, truss, etc. - he repeatedly volunteered "Potato bridge." Can you guess what his nickname is now? We have the pinewood derby a week from this Saturday. I told him that I would be seriously disappointed if the popular tuber didn't provide the design inspiration for his car. Last year his car was designed to look like a dollar bill on wheels, with his face, not Washington's, in the middle. Clearly, this is a merry soul who marches to the beat of his own accordion.

17 Jan 2012

My new favorite boy's book: Do you know what I'm going to do Next Saturday?, by Helen Palmer, 1963. I like the hyperactivity and bravado - and the Marine Corps reference. (Note: There is an urban legend about a banned Dr. Seuss book - this ain't it.)

On Friday night Cari and I stopped at a local Starbucks for hot chocolate. I came across an article in the Washington Post about how youtube may be forecast to be the dominant new media provider. My video on the subject is here. Will youtube replace television in some way? I don't know or care, really. Although, there are times when I made a bowl of popcorn, sat at the computer and "channel surfed" youtube instead of watching a movie. When I did find interesting is that I could come across such an article, shoot a brief video with my cell phone about it on the spot, edit it quickly with free software when I got home and upload it onto my very own youtube channel for friends and family to look at. That's fun.

Is anyone "tuned in?" Does it matter? After all, it doesn't really affect my need to be creative. But, as it turns out, yes, somebody tuned in. Watching my "Mike are you there?" video, one person - a total stranger - commented "This is truly the greatest video ever. No joke." Wait... do you think maybe he's joking anyway?

Stranger: "This is truly the greatest video ever."
Kip: "As if anyone could know that, Napoleon."

Friday night my wife and I watched Onibaba, a 1964 Japanese arthouse drama/horror film. I gave it an 8/10, Cari gave it 2/10, later, 3/10. It's neat: It takes place during a civil war in medieval Japan. Wounded soldiers are ambushed and slaughtered by two desperate women living in tall grass, who strip them of armor which they resell for money and food; they toss the bodies into a deep hole. The horror elements occur when a male neighbor returns from the wars - there is sex, jealousy and resentment - and the sudden appearance of an unusual samurai wearing a demon mask, which is repurposed by one of the women. The black and white cinematography is excellent, and I especially like the confined, claustrophobic world of the tall grass the women live in. I am not a big fan of Japanese cinema, but this is one I like. A good short review is here.

I cannot say the same for Kaidan (2007 - not to be confused with the superior 1964 film of the same or nearly same name). It was overlong and kind of cheesy, I thought.

I've blogged before about J.W. Fawkes, olde-tymey Burbank inventor of the "Aerial Swallow," a prop-driven tram suspended by a cable. Turns out there was another later on, Maurice Poirier. He proposed an unnecessarily violent airplane, not to mention transmitting electrical power via radio. What was it about Burbank that fostered all this over the top creativity?

I finally got a listen to the Beatles' Let It Be... Naked, the collection of songs on the standard issue Let It Be album, but without the Phil Spector (over) production. The story is that in 1969 the Beatles gathered in a cold, drafty and inhospitable studio warehouse setting to record some songs. Squabbles and differences ensued, and the project was abandoned. "Wall of sound" producer (and, later, convicted murderer) Phil Spector was called in to create an album out of the various bits of tape, which he did in 1970. This was the standard Let It Be record. Paul decried the heavy-handed orchestrations, choirs and embellishments, and fans have ever since wondered what the production might have sounded like with a different producer. Paul spearheaded the "Naked" remix in 2003.

What a revelation! I never cared for this album much - it is, in fact, my least favorite Beatles album, but remixing and stripping the songs of their unneeded orchestra and choruses really improves them and makes them persuasive. John's Across the Universe and Paul's The Long and Winding Road and Let It Be are much improved. Good work!

On a personal note, we got a scare yesterday. My pregnant daughter-in-law was involved in a traffic accident when her SUV hit a jersey wall on a snowy/icy Utah road. She is okay, but sore. She went to see the doctor who said that all is well. Thank goodness! The SUV may or may not be totalled. My son hates that car, so maybe it's a blessing in disguise...

13 Jan 2012

Grandparenthood Chapter Two: The Cupcake Reveal. So, young parents these days want to know what sex their baby is before actually giving birth. I kind of liked being surprised 2/3rds of the time. But my son and daughter-in-law are going to find out on Tuesday. What's planned is that the doctor will write the baby's sex on a piece of paper, which he'll give to Sarah, who won't look at it. She'll take it to a cupcake shop and have cupcakes made: blue frosting for a boy, pink frosting for a girl. They'll be in a sealed box. She and my son will open it for a FaceTime video connection with us in Virginia, which I, of course, will videotape and, this being 2012, post. Pretty neat, huh? So stay tuned.

This is what star quality looks like.

I downloaded Twitter onto my iPhone. I am not totally convinced yet that this is worth it. For instance, the Old Farmer's Almanac tweeted, "In times past, barbers were also surgeons. Among their primary tasks was bloodletting, a remedy thought to cure many diseases. The red-and-white-striped pole originally represented a bleeding arm wrapped in bandages." Hmmm. Sounded like an urban legend to me. But confirmation is here and elsewhere, and I can't find anything which debunks it. So, okay, OFA, I'll give you that one.

The Weird Al Yankovic tweets are pretty funny. But I find myself being compelled to come up with clever and original one-liners for tweets and, frankly, I don't need the literary pressure. (I suppose that last sentence counts as a tweet.)

Finally, it's unseemly for a former Marine to "tweet." (And there's another possible tweet.) So I may be giving that app the heave-ho. If I don't you may "follow" me - why would anyone want to do that? - at "@wesleyhclark."

My son pointed out - in a tweet, of course - that it's yet another way for he and I to communicate: e-mail, cell phone voice calls, Face Time videoteleconferencing, text messaging, comments on my blogs, Facebook, iChat (haven't tried that one yet) and face-to-face talking. Possibly telepathy is next.

...which smoothly brings me to the topic of a father and sons Wonder Years episode I saw, where Kevin describes the failure of he and his father to communicate. The situation is so bad that the idea of the two of them heading out to a men's store to buy Kevin a suit is something akin to torture. In this particular episode he is fourteen, which is, there's no denying it, a difficult age. Junior high school/middle school - eck. But I don't understand the episode. When I was fourteen my Dad and I went on many Sunday rides in his Karmann-Ghia, and we got along just fine. We stayed up late at night and watched old movies on TV. If there were any times of stunted communication, I don't remember them.

Likewise, while my own son went through some unpleasant stages (I remember thirteen as being rather bumpy - he seemed unusually insolent then, and worse, parted his hair down the middle), I don't recall times when we would just sit in a car and refuse to communicate. Anyway, I am happy to report that we get along just fine now. We always have, really.

Anyway, getting back to the subject of The Wonder Years, I am nearing the end of the fourth season. It hasn't jumped the shark yet. In fact, I am continually surprised at just how good the writing was for this show.

I found an amusing Flickr page, "j.i's photostream" (a more memorable title might be a good idea). Anyway, there's all sorts of interesting vintage images here, including covers to 1960's Scholastic books.

I got a kick out of:

The Dude magazine, July 1958 - Can you imagine telling your friends that you read The Dude magazine? Or, worse yet, Satan magazine? Wait, I know. Back then you didn't tell anyone you read these.

Adam magazine - I found a discarded copy of an Adam magazine, once, when I was a kid. In the letters to the editor section I learned that strippers afix tassels to their, uh, pointy parts, with a special purpose gum. It caused me to wonder, "Where on earth does one buy that gum?"

The Lunch Box Cookbook - "Taste-tempting?" Not entirely.

Chantal Montellier's 1996 - I loved this strip. Trying to figure out what the characters were saying was part of the fun.

Danny Dunn and the Homework Machine - Undeniable appeal to kids, I would think.

Glazunov's The Seasons - I like this album cover.

Antal Dorati - So that's what he looks like. I have a bunch of his albums, none of which have his photo.

More attractive album cover art - Where did this guy get all these?

Till Eulenspiegel - My favorite, I think.

...and so many more. Take a look!

Have a great three day weekend!

12 Jan 2012

Two mysteries solved!

#1: Yesterday I wondered about a melody I was familiar with; I mentioned that it was invariably connected with dogs and used as a sort of musical shorthand for walking down the street with a doggie. I got an e-mail from a reader named Andy: " Hey Wes - I believe the tune you referred to in your blog is the one Buckwheat "whistles" in (I think) "The Pinch Singer" - "The Whistler & His Dog," a Sousa-era piece - or maybe composed by Sousa? I'm not sure. I recognized it from the Buckwheat gag! Love the blog - Andy." A quick check on youtube confirmed that this is indeed the piece I am thinking of: recorded performance here - The Whistler and His Dog. It was composed in 1905 by Arthur Pryor and released as a novelty song. Andy was close - Pryor was associated with the Sousa band. Thanks, Andy!

#2: When I was a boy I had a recurring dream about Disneyland. I haven't had it for decades, but I've had it about three times in my life. Details are sketchy and half-remembered, as you might appreciate in the case of a dream, but the main feature of it was that I could get in and out of the park by a remote, little-known and little-used route across the railroad tracks which surround the park. The crossing was in the neighborhood of a place with Old West style buildings, obviously, Frontierland. But there was some confusion between this locale and Knott's Berry Farm, which had a Old West theme. "Am I in Disneyland or Knott's Berry Farm?" was a part of the dream.

Everyone who has ever been to the park knows that there is only one footpath into and out of the park: the main gate, past an image of Mickey Mouse's head made of flowers, through two tunnels. This was completely intentional on Disney's part - he wanted to impress guests with the illusion that they were leaving their workaday world and entering into a place of creative fantasy. In other words, he wanted to control the transition to the "show" that the park represented. So why did I have a dream about an alternate entrance into Disneyland? Why was this significant enough to form a recurring dream?

I mentioned that I am currently reading an encyclopedia about Disneyland which contains a description of every past and present ride and attraction. Last night I came across the entry for an old attraction called "Holidayland." It was a park area outside the berm, adjacent to the park. (It stood where the ride buildings for the Pirates of the Caribbean and the Haunted Mansion now stand, where the expansive parking lot used to be.) It featured a tent for performers (often, TV Mouseketeers), a playground for children and a refreshment stand. Disney's intended use for the area was as a spot for corporate parties, picnics, softball games and gatherings; it was opened in 1957 and closed in September 1961. A map is here. A feature of this place was that it had its own entrance into Disneyland, across the railroad tracks and into a section of Frontierland - see my arrows in red. (I had a major Ah-Ha moment when I learned this.)

Holidayland closed in September 1961, when I was five and a half. Mystery solved! I am guessing that my parents probably took me through Holidayland and into the park before this date, quite possibly around the same time we also visited Knott's Berry Farm in April 1960, when Mom took home movies. I dimly remembered this via a recurring dream I had as a child. It also explains my confusion between the two places, Knott's and Frontierland in Disneyland.

At any rate, I feel gratified: I dreamed about an alternative entrance into Disneyland because, once, there used to be one - and I must have gone through it!

I posted a couple of cool old photos to my Burbankia site: Nixon in Burbank (1971), and Pacific Electric Car, 1955. Yes, I am well aware that there was color photography back in 1955, but it always comes as a minor shock to see anything beyond about 1957 portrayed in full color camera shots. Especially in images like this, where the dyes have shifted so little. Must have been Kodachrome. As Calvin's father (of the household with Hobbes, the stuffed toy tiger) once assured his son when they were looking though old family photographs, back then the world was in black and white. Color wasn't introduced until the 1960's.

One last thing and then I'll quit: I forgot to mention that one of the notable features of the Christmas visit to Utah was that Ethan and I watched the unbelievably awful two hour Star Wars Holiday Special as a RiffTrax production. (RiffTrax is like Mystery Science Fiction Theatre 3000, where viewers insult the film throughout play.) In case you're not aware of this legendary work, it was broadcast on television in 1978 and stars the Star Wars cast plus Harvey Korman, Beatrice Arthur and Art Carney, along with some others whom I am mercifully forgetting about. George Lucas has stated that, if he could, he'd destroy every copy. In the Internet Age that is, sadly, impossible.

Where do I begin? The intrusive and unfunny Harvey Korman scenes? The bar room song sung by Bea Arthur? The boring Boba Fett cartoon? The bizarre bronzer makeup on Mark Hamill's face? The exceedingly lame "Life Day" holiday Wookie plot? The clumsily erotic Diahann Carroll sequence, as viewed by a creepy, geriatric Wookie? Concentrated awfulness! This must be seen to be believed; I have never seen a franchise trashed so thoroughly.

11 Jan 2012

I am excited! When I opened my e-mail inbox this morning I learned that a fellow surnamed Clark submitted his DNA for testing/classification via FamilySearch DNA, and that a match has been identified between his YDNA markers and mine. In layman's terms, that means we share an ancestor surnamed Clark. I sent in my DNA back in 2004 as a birthday gift to myself. Match results have come in ever since every now and then.

Statistically, the evidence is rather off-putting: In comparing Y-DNA 37 marker results, the probability that this fellow and I share a common ancestor within the last 4 generations is only 3.89%; 8 generations is 26.96%, 12 generations is 57.78%, 16 generations is 80.12%, 20 generations is 91.90%, 24 generations is 97.03%, and 28 generations is 98.99%. I can only go back five generations with my documented Clark research. Genetic links can go back considerably further than that - into pre-history, in fact. What the evidence is telling us (he also got an e-mail informing him of the link) is that in the Middle Ages there is an almost 99% probably that we shared a common ancestor down our father's father's lines - a Clark. Statistically the Most Recent Common Ancestor (MRCA) becomes less sure through time. BUT... his surname is Clark, the same as mine. That means that anything he gives me is a guaranteed piece of the puzzle, no matter how remotely related. Or closely related!

So I e-mailed him with a suggestion that we exchange genealogical information to look for a possible link. His earliest documented ancestor is a fellow who was born in 1801 and who died in 1864. This fellow is therefore a peer of my great-great-grandfather, Wesley H. Clark (b. circa 1814, d. 1888), my earliest known Clark. I am intrigued and am looking forward to his reply. (The odds are good that I'll get one. Doing a YDNA test costs just over $100. That sort of winnows out the lazy genealogists from the eager ones.)

We had Webelos Den last night; the boys were unusually noisy and boisterous. Funny thing, though... we discussed engineering and, to fulfill one of the requirements for an engineering activity pin, we went over various ways power can be generated. One of the boys mentioned nuclear power, and I used that as an opportunity to briefly tell the story of the 1946 Los Alamos "demon core" accidental radiation poisoning incident. As I did so you could hear a pin drop, it got so quiet. Come to think of it, the two other adult leaders had incredulous looks on their faces as well.

Over the years I have noticed that ten year old boys seem to be fascinated with the possibility of plague, accidental dismemberment, massive blood loss, grievous sickness and, in general, death. Want a quiet room of scouts? Tell how to treat for a cut artery, mention the flesh-eating bacteria or describe how poor hygiene can lead to influenza pandemics. That'll get their attention every time.

A boy's concern about fatality extends even into their communications with the Divine. It is something of a cliche in Mormondom that if you ask a young man to give a closing prayer he'll invariably request that, "...no harm or accident befall us as we travel home." And yet I've never ever heard about a family getting killed on their way home from church. I wonder how this nervous interest developed. Perhaps it's wholly genetic. I've heard that females are concerned with life, males with death. Maybe that's it.

Speaking of stories for children, I am currently watching some stories from the Storybook International series, gentle short tales adapted from traditional stories for children. Yes, they're for kids - but they're very well made and timeless, and so can also entertain adults. Well, I find them entertaining, anyway. I blogged about a set of these last May. Each begins with an animated sequence of a troubadour singing, I'm the storyteller/And my stories must be told... I used to watch them with my kids. You can buy all 64 stories in a ten DVD set. I may do that someday. For the grand kids, you know.

I am on another one of my musical crusades; these obsessive things come up from time to time in my life. I'm trying to identify the name of a melody. It was used a lot back in the 1940's-1960's, invariably, it seems, when a dog was shown. In fact, the link seems so complete you might call it "The Doggie Song." A few older gents recall it's circus music of some kind. Every baby boomer I've hummed it to knows it - but nobody knows it by name or context. I am uncertain whether it was from a cartoon, a movie or a television show. TV, I think. Youtube searches turn up nothing with the search terms I come up with. What's the melody? This one. (Sort of. I go out of pitch at the end.)

The last time I was on one of these crusades was with some 1960's introductory music used for the KTLA Channel 5 (in Los Angeles) Evening News. I finally identified that one using youtube. And then, about ten years ago I finally identified a tune in my head as being a 1964 Burt Bacharach song, Any Old Time of the Day. That took a while.

10 Jan 2012

Yesterday we got an inch of snow. That's nothing to the rest of the country, but here in the D.C. area that's enough to thoroughly screw up traffic. Heck, a little rain does that. So it was with some hesitation that I drove into work this morning rather than take the Metro. As it turned out, things were fine, with only more or less nominal amounts of traffic and backups being apparent. No ice.

Still, there was a delay due to one of my pet peeves: a couple of police cars pulled somebody over - or somebody had a problem - and so there were two cop cars with their blue and red lights on at the side of the main road into D.C. This has the effect of screwing up traffic for miles as drivers slow down to see what's going on. It's disgraceful - the area police are one of the main sources of traffic problems in this area! I distinctly recall, as a kid, my parents having to slow down to 55 or so on the Harbor Freeway when emergency personnel were tending to a person injured in an accident. You could see the injured woman on a gurney being loaded into the ambulance! Around here that would cause things to come to a complete and resounding halt all across the region. In Southern California c. 1972 it only had the effect of causing people to slow to 55. Move along, people, and quit rubbernecking. There's nothing to see on the side of the road that you won't see in a television cop show.

On the way in I listened to a classic rock album I had never have the occasion to listen to before: Van Morrison's 1970 Moondance. I quite liked it! Of course I had heard the title song before; there's no getting away from it, and my bass teacher once had me learn it to work out how a walking bass line works. But the other songs were more or less new to me. It's a bit of a surprise to me that I would like it, as a Gaelic soul, jazz and R&B mix wouldn't normally appeal to me. And I've never been a Van Morrison fan.

I also recently tried listening to Miles Davis' 1960 recording Sketches of Spain. One of the big recent surprises to me was that I really liked his Kind of Blue, a 1959 recording I had found on a fifty cent CD at a yard sale a couple of years ago. Modal jazz! I guess I'm ready to listen to some jazz (I had never cared for it) - of the right sort. But I'm sorry to say that Sketches of Spain, which was recommended in various articles I had read, kind of turned me off. The problem is that I'm familiar with the melodies from their original symphonic settings. Listening to them as jazz just makes me want to hear the symphonic versions. It's like listening to people covering Beatles songs - it just makes me want to hear the originals. But... I think I'll give Sketches another try on some future commute.

I have started my VW Bug stories article. As I mentioned, posting it is one of my New Year's resolutions.

I watched another installment of the Doctor series last night; as I mentioned yesterday, these are British comedies made at Pinewood Studios (get it? Hollywood/Pinewood?) outside of London in the 1950's. (The 007 films were made there.) These comedies are amusing and fun rather than ha ha funny. There are a number of other installments in the series, but I won't be able to see those because Netflix doesn't have them. Drat.

There were some wonderful films made at Pinewood - check it out.

I am now reading my Disneyland encyclopedia, a Christmas book. I would have liked to be able to walk the park on Opening Day, in 1955, just to see what the Disney's original conception of the place was like. When you think about it, the creative process behind Disneyland was daring and brilliant: define large scale areas, themes or "lands" (Tomorrowland, Frontierland, Fantasyland, etc.), then define adventures within those lands. Then, with time, refine and "plus up" the shows and rides - add details, variations and evolve the idea. This has been going on there for 57 years now; there is simply no other place like it. What's great is that I remember the park from the 1960's and have seen how the creativity applied to the place has - by and large - improved it.

My mother's favorite ride was always It's a Small World, which, these days, seems trite and precious. The ride is essentially a mechanized doll show with an obsessive theme song and a somewhat sappy philosophy. But when I rode the attraction last June I was pleased to see that there were new things to see along with the familiar old sights. Somehow Disney had made it more colorful and more interesting by varying details. Best of all, that white stylized cityscape facade now serves as an evening screen for an amazing seasonal high-tech light show. Wonderful! How many other rides developed in 1964 seem as vital?

(We saw "The Magic, the Memories and You" show - check it out here, in full screen HD. It was amazing.)

My favorite thing about Disneyland is not the rides or the food or the show experience, as good as those are. It's seeing the applied creativity in almost every square inch of the park. The hidden or not so obvious features and the constant updates. Creativity unbound! Sometimes I feel like I have badly missed my calling, career-wise. Should have worked at Disney.

9 Jan 2012

Somebody ripped off my lunch entree from the freezer at work on Friday. I'm thinking he or she must have been hungry and/or desperate. Or lazy and morally unconcerned.

We went shopping at the local Whole Foods store; I always feel like the only Republican on the premises. Anyway, they feature scary food: Packaging designed to give kids nightmares, bread that might bite back.

Over the weekend I watched a couple of the 1950's British comedy "Doctor" series: Doctor in the House (1954) and Doctor at Sea (1955). These are amusing and fun rather than ha ha funny; I like them. There are more - I plan to see them. The two I saw star a bluff, loud roarer named James Robertson Justice. I always thought Brian Blessed was the first of the English cinematic roarers, not so. This fellow came first. Bridgette Bardot played a generic French tart.

Anyway, I learned about these Doctor movies by watching a documentary about Pinewood Studios entitled The Golden Gong (1985), about Rank Organisation films. You know how Rank films always begin with a muscular fellow (the "gongman") striking a gong? Hence the gong. Whenever we encountered one of these late at night watching TV with my Dad, he'd say, "It's a Rank film!" (In another voice) "Oh, I didn't think it was that bad..."

I have read - and believe - that classic film buffs claim that what's about to follow that famous gong stroke is going to be special - the best the British can do. I have always always felt that way. I see that logo and think, "Post-war British. I'm probably going to like this."

It's worth noting that that famous gong is made of papier-mache, not bronze or brass. In the documentary Michael Caine taps it and it goes "thunk."

I also watched a lot of The Wonder Years episodes over the weekend. I am halfway through season four. I am happy to report that I haven't noticed it jumping the shark yet.

On Saturday Cari and I went to IKEA to purchase items for the Home Guest Bed Upgrade Program (we're replacing a twin with a full). We at first supposed that inflatable mattresses would be a good solution for visiting family members and friends. Wrong! I haven't met one of those wretched things that didn't develop leaks or simply mysteriously lose air through the night, leaving guests to wake up about an inch from the floor. I shall never buy one again. Those things are no replacement for a bed.

I am now reading an encyclopedia of past and present Disneyland attractions and main creative personnel. I don't recall Don DeFore's Silver Banjo Barbecue, however, but I do recall the Aunt Jemima Pancake House. I hated... wait. I already blogged on that topic. Never mind!

Over the weekend I also read a book about when Washington D.C. comes to Utah, or, in other words, when visiting presidents of the United States made visits to Utah. Utah being the reddest of Red States you might think that the closest and most cordial relationship between the Mormon church president and the United States President was between Ronald Reagan and somebody, but you would be wrong. It was between David O. McKay and Lyndon B. Johnson. Johnson really appreciated counseling with McKay, and saw him as something of a father figure.

"I've met Billy Graham and the others," Johnson wrote in his journal, "...but there is something I like about President McKay." He even once had the pilot of Air Force One touch down on an unannounced call to Salt Lake City to chat with President McKay. Interesting. I suppose if I had people chanting my name and demanding to know a daily deathcount ("Hey, hey, LBJ/How many kids did you kill today?") I'd be in need of some heavy duty spiritual counsel as well.

6 Jan 2012

It was Date Night for my bride and I last night. We had dinner at the Irish pub near where I work (bangers and mash - Irish sausages and mashed potatoes - I like bangers and mash) and then we took in a movie, The Artist (2011). We don't often go out to the movies because it's gotten rather expensive and something of a bother. It's far easier and cheaper to see movies at home, something the industry has been wrestling with since the 1950's.

Anyway, we liked this charming film. It wasn't epic or great - it was amusing, clever and entertaining. Leave it to the French! While everyone else is making grand IMAX 3-D productions with multi-channel sound, the French turn in a neat little movie with a stunningly retro theme in a black and white silent format with a nearly square aspect ratio! Mix A Star is Born with Singing in the Rain , a leading man who reminds one a lot of Gene Kelly and Douglas Fairbanks and stir in some je ne sais quoi and you get The Artist. Well done, recommended.

We saw this movie at the AMC Shirlington Theater. I asked somebody working there how old the place was, and he said, "Old." Not helpful. 1950's? 1970's? So while waiting for the film to start I did some quick investigation with my iPhone. I didn't find out how old the theater was, but I did learn that the place where I work, Shirlington Village, was one of the D.C. suburbs' very first major shopping destinations, begun in the 1940's. Modified through the years to suit changing retail tastes, the place is now built along "New Urbanist" lines.

I was unacquainted with the phrase. What's New Urbanist? A description is here, but, in short, think walkable, with traditional streets and gathering spaces. Definitely not an enclosed mall surrounded by a huge parking lot. Actually, New Urbanism is simply the stuff people were doing at the turn of the last century (the pre-automobile era), building with a sense of community. As with the film we saw, that which was passe is once again fashionable.

More evidence: It's official, Vinyl record sales were up 39% in 2011. I bought about six of them that year, but all at yard sales and library sales, however, so my contribution doesn't count. Could it really be that 33 1/3 rpm vinyl is making a comeback?

I finished my book about Volkswagen stories. Time to start on my own web page.

More Fawkes! I found the obit for J.W. Fawkes in the pages of the 29 June 1928 Los Angeles Times for this colorful early Burbank citizen. I don't know how I overlooked that before...

I learned of the death of a high school friend yesterday, Mike Acord. He died just over a year ago. We were in elementary school together as well as high school; he graduated in the class ahead of me. We used to play chess in study hall. I was a bit flattered by this because he was also a popular jock, but he was a well-rounded, intelligent jock. It lifted my spirits to know he was my friend. He was the kind of guy you wanted as a friend: stable, confident, personable, friendly, supportive and encouraging. The high school version of a man's man; I wanted to be more like him.

(Remembrance: The entire male population of our fifth grade class adored and worshipped Lori Marsalis; a girl of gentle demeanor and soft glances. Mike lived next door to her on Lamer Street, and we always considered him somehow favored because of this. We counted on him to impart special information about her - but none was ever forthcoming. The conclusion I drew later on in life was that the down-to-earth Mike and the fey and angelic Lori were not suited as a couple, and so they didn't communicate much.)

I am not at all surprised to learn that Mike had a happy 34 year marriage and that his wife misses him greatly. I haven't seen him since he graduated in 1973; I had always hoped that I would see him again at a reunion or something. Now I know I won't and it saddens me.

Well. The weekend arrives once again, as it does, by definition, each week. We have no plans. The Anglo-Saxon Horde at the National Geographic Museum looks promising, but that's open until March and therefore rewards procrastination. I got all my scrapbook archive DVDs produced and mailed off to the kids and friends, so that's done. Hmmm.

Have a great weekend!

5 Jan 2012

Of all the Christmas presents I got last month, the best by far and away was my son Ethan's announcement of an upcoming grandchild, the first. (I couldn't blog about this before because Sarah didn't want the news to go out before she could tell her co-workers; this has since happened.)

The nominal purpose for gathering us all together at a Salt Lake City eatery was a late birthday celebration for Ethan. He cleverly used it for the announcement and, better yet, had the iPhone camcorder running. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree after all.

In the video, Cari points at Sarah and accuses, "You lied to me!" This refers to a Face Time videoteleconferencing conversation we had with her a week or so earlier. She reported that Buddy, her dog, was following her around ceaselessly. "Are you pregnant?" my wife quickly asked. "No," Sarah replied. Gotcha! The baby is due in early June, around the 5th.

Sarah asked me, "Do you want a boy or a girl?" "A boy," I quickly replied, but added, "...but either is fine." As things stand right now, Ethan is the last biological Clark. Given the countless hours of genealogical research I've done, I'd like the surname to persist in my family. But... daughters are fine, too. No pressure. After all, each new generation is genetically a product of half the father and half of the mother. It doesn't matter.

Me... a grandfather. As I suggest in the closing seconds of this video, it scarcely seems possible. We can't be that old. But we are! Like walking into a room and forgetting what you wanted, weight that won't come off, failing hearing, stumbling and groping for a familiar word or forgetting the names of people, it's yet another reminder that the years are now speeding by and we are aging.

Actually, the decades are now speeding by...

I once heard somebody say, "The worst thing about becoming a grandfather is that now you're married to a grandmother." Hmm. Well, this doesn't bug me as I've always found older women attractive.

I well remember when it was announced that I was to become a father to Ethan. I just stoically accepted it - restrained rejoicing, after my fashion - and reflected that life was about to become very different. So... what does a grandchild mean? For one thing, it has turned my wife into a knitting machine, and booties are in process. She bought a knit hat - a preposterous thing (which I'm assured is cute) designed to look like an acorn atop baby's head. For my part, I keep promising that I will be burying my kids with yard sale grandchild items. It's only fair! For years I have refrained from buying items for grandchildren I don't yet have (unlike the woman in my church whom I keep bumping into at yard sales who constantly shops for grand kids). Now the governor is off, whoo-hoo!

How does one behave around a grandchild? I have no role models as I never had grandparents. Well, yes, of course, I did - I mean that I never knew any of them. The last to go (Dad's mother) died when I was eight; thanks to the messed-up social structure of my family I never met her. Mom's father died when I was four; I never met him, either, for the same reason. Is this partially the reason why I compulsively do genealogical research? Possibly.

So. There it is. Upcoming grandfatherhood. I am assured by my grandfatherly peers that grand kids are heaps of fun; more fun than the kids were, actually. An added benefit is that when they act up or need changing you simply hand them back to your kids. I got the distinct impression that this was the case, observing my mother when my kids were little. She came alive when they started calling her "Gan'ma." In fact, I once saw my mother's face absolutely light up when my daughter Julie first referred to her in this fashion. So I expect this will be fun. Compensation for growing old, perhaps.

Expect much more blogging on this topic later this year. I will try to keep from becoming obnoxious about it, I promise. It's one of my resolutions.

I have blogged in the past about Burbank's very own nutjob inventor J. W. Fawkes and his weird, troubled, litigious relations with his brothers and parents. A couple of new Los Angeles Times articles from 1898 have come to light, dealing with a brother, Howard. Scroll down to July and December, 1898 in the link I supplied, if interested. I get a kick out of the reporter's words: "...the drear monotony of suburban life has been relieved, and the courts of the county have been prevented from stagnating by having the Fawkes cases to adjudicate." Ha ha!

My Burbank pal Mike, intrepid researcher wot he is, recently found a 1911 magazine article about J.W.'s claim to fame, his "Aerial Swallow." I reprint it here: Technical World Magazine Page one, Page two, Page three. These are uncommon photographs... they aren't in the holdings of the Burbank Historical Society that we're aware. Neat! Mike and I have now become, I think, the World Experts on All Things Fawkes. (Unless, of course, there are knowledgeable descendants running around somewhere. A directory search shows nobody surnamed Fawkes in Burbank. I wonder where they all got to?)

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