Month: July 2011

What TV Shows Are You Looking Forward To This Fall?

Are there any shows YOU are looking forward to?


I’ve been rereading the extensive list of shows that will be on ABC and CBS and NBC and FOX and the CW. I came to the conclusion that there probably isn’t a single new show that I’ll start watching. I’ve ODed on police procedurals, the comedies don’t sound particularly funny, and the few shows I might have given a chance to (ABC’s Pan Am, about the hassles of being an airline stewardess in the 1960s, for one) won’t last more than a month.

This is not such a bad thing, mind you. Every year for the last couple at least, I say I’m not going to add any more new shows to my DVR recording. two years ago, I lapsed and started to watch The Good Wife, but last year, nada. (I don’t think so, anyway.)

Are there any new shows YOU are looking forward to? I feel that I should be into FOX’s Terra Nova, especially with Steven Spielberg’s name attached, but I’m just not.

Carol is 30, again

It’s her stuff cluttering the office and the kitchen counter. That said, she’s much tidier than I.

My wife’s birthday is today, and I thought I ought to celebrate that fact with some random observations.

A couple of weeks ago, she was talking about Nixon and the Checkers speech. When she met me, she didn’t know what the Checkers speech was, and she says it’s due to my influence that she does now. I don’t know if this is a good thing or a bad thing.

When she watches Dancing with the Stars, she’s always behind. The last episode this season was May 24, which she STILL hasn’t watched. The amazing thing is that she STILL doesn’t know who won. Heck, I don’t even watch the show and I know who won.

She’s a decent cook, but an excellent baker.

Her two favorite singers are in the adjacent sections of the collection: Alison Krauss and Diana Krall.

She was born in a small town in upstate New York and used to belong to the 4H Club. Sometimes, she still has that small-town sensibility, especially in contrast with my more cynical nature.

She was a teacher for a couple of years and left it to be in the insurance business. She got all sorts of designations, an alphabet soup of them. Then she quit her job, went back to college to become a teacher again, this time of English as a Second Language.

Her brothers are even taller than she is, and she is quite tall. When I shrink, she’ll DEFINITELY be taller than I am.

She’s one of the best, safest drivers I know.

She enjoys yard work.

It’s her stuff cluttering the office and the kitchen counter. That said, she’s much tidier than I.

She has a solid moral center.

If we’re at a party meeting new people, she is MUCH better at remembering names than I am. She’ll say at some point, “we should leave in 15 minutes,” and I dutifully get ready at the appointed time, only to stand around for an additional 10-15 minutes while she chats.

She’s better looking than I am, but I’m more photogenic.
***
Here’s a duet between Linda Ronstadt and Kermit the Frog. It’s also Linda’s birthday today (she’s 65), and I am also green.

France, Sorry About That

In the runup to the Iraq war, lots of people, including many in the United States, were opposed to it. While they may have understood the battle in Afghanistan, at least at that time, fighting a war in Iraq seemed off track with our stated mission to respond to 9/11. The governments of France and Germany, suppportive of the Afghan war, opposed the incursion into Iraq. As a result, France singularly caught a lot of backlash, not just from the punditry, but even from the US Congress, which renamed French fries “freedom fries”, and other such silliness.

I’ve come to believe that those folks had confused American patriotism with a blind and scary form of nationalism.

So I apologize for the irrationality of my fellow countryfolk. Know that this was not a universally held antipathy. In fact, when I was at a massive antiwar rally in New York City on February 15, 2003, about a month before the war began, there were folks from France who were cheered by the crowd.

I can’t begin to further explain the antipathy, so I won’t even try.

Reunions

Karen made it known to the waitress that I had been on JEOPARDY! in 1998 and that she had been in the audience. But except for that, and one obscure mention of a milk truck, it wasn’t a trip down memory lane.

Last weekend (July 8-10), we went down to my hometown of Binghamton, NY. The initial motivation was The Olin reunion, my mother-in-law’s people, who can trace their lineage back over 300 years.

But there turned out that there was another event. My friend Carol, who I have known since kindergarten, was in town from Austin, TX, where it has been over 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 Celsius) for at least 23 days this summer. She was in town visiting her mom and her other relatives for a couple of weeks. At the same time, my friend Karen in NYC, who I have also known since K, was in town visiting HER mother and other folks.

Karen picked me up where my family was staying, and then to Carol’s mom’s house. Carol’s mom was one of the parents I knew and loved best growing up.

The three of us ended up in a Greek restaurant in nearby Endwell and talked for hours about religion and faith, politics (those things you’re not supposed to talk about unless you’ve known people for five decades), death, media, and other fun subjects. Somehow Karen made it known to the waitress that I had been on JEOPARDY! in 1998 and that she had been in the audience. But except for that, and one obscure mention of a milk truck, it wasn’t a trip down memory lane.

Interesting, though, that, based on Carol’s recommendation, Karen went to a local bookstore and bought a book When All the Men Were Gone: World War II and the Home Front, One Boy’s Journey by Ron Capalaces who grew up in the First Ward of Binghamton, NY, a working-class neighborhood anchored by Clinton Street…attended the Daniel S. Dickinson School, just as we had, only a decade or so earlier. A lot of specific references to places we all knew.

I’m the VP of the local Olin group, an honor for an in-law; apparently, I’m only the second in-law in 75 years to so serve. When I got back from dinner, my friend DeeDee informed me that I had to get to the Olin reunion venue at 10 a.m. the next day, rather than 11 because the president, Ken, had major car trouble. So, with transportation by my friend Jason, I got to the site to hold it. We had a great time at our gathering. In the genealogy report, we discovered that the Olins are related distantly to both Barack Obama and Dick Cheney.

Busy reunion weekend.

Z is for (Led) Zeppelin 1969

The Dixon composition was so similar that Led Zeppelin reached a settlement with Dixon over the royalties for the song, and credited Dixon as the writer when this appeared on Led Zeppelin’s How The West Was Won live DVD

I have such mixed feelings about the band Led Zeppelin.


Their eponymous first album I loved. I recall quite clearly the day I first heard it. It was a sunny and warm day in late May or early June 1969, when I was 16.

I was riding a borrowed bicycle and was riding over from the First Ward to the South Side of Binghamton, NY, along with my very good friend Carol, to visit friends. The bike had hand breaks, which I had never had on any of my bikes; one “broke” by putting one’s foot back. Got down Front Street without having to slow down, but crossing the bridge, I was gaining on Carol, and couldn’t stop, so I put my foot to the ground to slow down, flipped the bike, and crashed to the ground. I got a nasty gash on my right forearm. Carol said, “Are you OK?” and I lied, “Sure.” And that’s when I learned about hand breaks.

We rode the rest of the way, talked with our friends, had some food, and someone played that LZ album. I was immediately entranced by the opening chords of Good Times, Bad Times.

Then my friend Lois noticed the gash on my right forearm, just above the elbow, and she, Carol and Karen started removing gravel from the abrasion. It hurt, a lot actually, and left a scar that remained until the vitiligo obliterated it only a couple years ago. But it didn’t matter, because I’m really enjoying this music. My first favorite song was Communications Breakdown.

When I bought the album shortly therafter, I noticed it had two songs by the blues legend Willie Dixon, You Shook Me and I Can’t Quit You Baby, and attributed as such. The biggest deception was the 3:30 running time for How Many More Times, which was more like 8:30, apparently a trick to try to get radio stations to play it.


Led Zeppelin II was even more entertaining, but ultimately it became problematic for me. The first song, Whole Lotta Love was attributed to the band, Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, John Paul Jones, and John Bonham. But I discovered a few years later that it bore a distinct similarity to You Need Love as performed by Muddy Waters, which was a song written by Willie Dixon. As described here, the Small Faces had nicked the song even before Zeppelin.

“Another blues classic on Led Zeppelin II became famous as The Lemon Song. Derived directly from Howlin’ Wolf’s “Killing Floor”, there is also the infamous quote about squeezing lemons that comes from Robert Johnson’s “Traveling Riverside Blues.” Chester Burnett, a.k.a. Howlin’ Wolf, received no credit for The Lemon Song. In the early ’70s, Arc Music sued Led Zeppelin for copyright infringement. The suit was settled out of court.

But the most egregious theft, I thought, was Bring It On Home. As described here: This was influenced by a song of the same name recorded by Blues great Sonny Boy Williamson and written by Willie Dixon. The Dixon composition was so similar that Led Zeppelin reached a settlement with Dixon over the royalties for the song, and credited Dixon as the writer when this appeared on Led Zeppelin’s How The West Was Won live DVD. Plant’s beginning vocal even imitates Williamson’s.

I just don’t understand the need for misattribution. Yet, which album did I ultimately buy on CD? You guessed it: LZ II.

I have other Zeppelin albums, but that’s enough for now, except for this
Republican congressman quoting the group on the floor of Congress. Oy.

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