Category: Gordon

Roger Answers Your Questions, Scott and Gordini

The blogger Scott, husband of Marcia and father of Nigel, one of those people who still cares about the NHL, was kind enough to ask:

1. What do you think are the chances of us seeing another “Subway Series” this October?

You must have me mistaken with someone who has any idea. I had the St. Louis Cardinals losing every round they played (and won) last year.

That said, highly unlikely. In fact, much to my surprise, I think the Yankees have a better chance of getting there than the Mets, much to my disappointment. I’m rooting for the wild card to come out of the NL West (and for the Mets to win their division) because I think THEY think they can’t beat the Phillies in a second round matchup, whereas the Yankees could beat Boston, if they get past the first round. Though the Yanks have had a difficult time with the Angels this season, so if the Angels beat the Red Sox, the Yankees may be in trouble. Incidentally, yesterday was the centennial of the birth of original Angels’ owner, Gene Autry.

(When you asked a few days ago, the Mets were up by 2 games. Now they’re tied with a game to go, with no guarantee that they’ll even get IN the playoffs.)

2. What do you consider your favorite TV Drama of all-time?

Quite possibly St. Elsewhere, although Hill Street Blues and Homicide are up there. My favorite show as a kid, though was the Defenders, a lawyer show with E.G. Marshall and a pre-Brady Bunch Robert Reed. I was also fond of East Side/West Side with George C. Scott. There was an anthology show called The Bold Ones, and The Senator segment with Hal Holbrook was great, got Emmy love, but it lasted but a season. Was Twilight Zone a drama? That gets its own special mention.

3. What do you consider your favorite TV sit-com of all-time?

The Dick van Dyke Show. The perfect balance of home life and work life. Great physical comedy by DVD. MTM’s capri pants. And Richard Deacon from Binghamton, NY. Lasted five years – not too short, not long enough to wear out its welcome, which I’m afraid M*A*S*H, arguably a better show in its prime, did for me.

Though I must give some consideration to the Mary Tyler Moore Show, with a magnificent evolving cast, also did home and work well, as did, now that I think of it, the Bob Newhart Show, the one where he plays the shrink.

A comedy that evolved into a good show was Barney Miller, which scrapped any real pretense of a home life after the first season (Barbara Barrie played Barney’s wife), and found its voice.

4. What scares you the most about Lydia growing up?

I suppose I’m dreading that inevitable teenage period when she thinks I’m an irrelevant, archaic druid. But I have to say that the great thing about having no idea what you’re doing as a parent – in that most of my preconceived notions about fatherhood could be tossed into the Dumpster – is that I don’t think too much about her Growing Up; I’m trying to take care of her Now.

I am reminded, again, about racism and racialism. I had never heard the latter term until I watched some Nelson Mandela speech right after he was released from prison. Some people use the terms interchangeably, but I feel a distinction. To me, racism is blatant inequity under the law or in society; e.g., the Jena 6 charged more harshly for their crimes than the white students who had assaulted black kids. Whereas, racialism is more the “damn fool” things people say and do, such as Bill O’Reilly.
I just started reading Anti-Racist Parent. By “just”, I mean yesterday; interesting stuff.

Back to TV: Lydia decided just this week that she wanted to put on her right sock, then her right shoe, left sock and left shoe. This reminded me of a conversation that Mike Stivic had with Archie Bunker (a sock, sock, shoe, shoe guy) on All in the Family; that was a good show, too.
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Meanwhile, blogger Gordon, newly re-minted Chicagoan, podcaster, and most importantly, March Piscean, writes: “OK, well, here’s a question that I think you can answer: do you ever have a moment where you think ‘I’m so full of hot gas?'”

Immediately, I started writing this rambling epic indicating how there are several areas where I have no opinions at all, that the opinions I do have are often based on reason and experience, and that I don’t love the sound of my own voice as much as many do. I noted how, in keeping with a conversation he and I had privately, that I read other viewpoints; in fact, I spent some time this week listening to some of the speeches on the White Nationalist News Network, which I found by clicking Next Blog.

I addressed how an old girlfriend accused me of Male Answer Syndrome, which I rejected, not because it wasn’t possibly true, but because the thing I was answering (about alpacas being more pleasant than llamas) I actually DID know from research in my job. (And not so incidentally, claims that I have MAS has dropped SIGNIFICANTLY since I appeared on that game show. And there was other stuff about my good listening and observing skills.

But, sure, OK, don’t we all feel like we’re fakin’ it sometimes? Don’t at least many of us feel as though we’re about 11 and are pretending to wear grown-up clothes periodically?

So, Gordon, I could have just said “Yes.” But somehow, I thought you wanted a little more than that.
***
Oh, and another one of my favorite reads, Tom the Dog, who has been on one more game show than I have, says nice things about me. Right back at you.

ROG

ROG

Interview by Dymowski


Gordon writes: As promised, here are my five interview questions for your blog.

1) You’ve discussed Rod Serling multiple times on your blog. My question – what are your favorite Serling-written pieces? (You can pull from anywhere – the Playhouse 90 stuff, Twilight Zone, Night Gallery, et al)

There were some pre-Twilight Zone pieces, and maybe a Night Gallery or two, but I think I’ll stick with Twilight Zone, because there were so many:
“Time Enough at Last” with Burgess Meredith as a man after a nuclear war with time enough to read (finally!), but then who breaks his glasses.
“The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street” with Claude Akins and Jack Weston. The power goes out. Is it the aliens? It turns out the monsters are ourselves. For some reason, in some ways, reminds me of an old EC comics story about the guy who is not saluting the flag, so the crowd beats him to death, figuring he’s a Commie, when, in fact, he lost his sight fighting in the war on our side.
“It’s a Good Life” with Billy Mumy as a very scary, and powerful, kid.
“A Game of Pool” with Jack Klugman, playing the game of, and for, his life.
“Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” with William Shatner. Is there something on the wing of the airplane, or is he crazy? This segment also appears in the Twilight Zone movie, perhaps to lesser effect.
I’m sure there are others: “The Dummy”, “To Serve Man”. There’s one, Little Girl Lost, with a kid going under the bed and ending up in another dimension, that TERRIFIED me in the day. I must also mention “Walking Distance”, that DOES have a carousel that reminds me of Rec Park in Binghamton. There was a segment, Nightmare as a Child, that was also in the Twilight Zone movie; I laughed out loud when I saw it at movie’s world premiere in Binghamton, because it namechecked Helen Foley, his favorite teacher and one of mine, who was in the audience at the time.
BTW, Gordon sent me this link to a bunch of “The Twilight Zone” TV Bumpers; here’s a definition of a bumper. Lots of them are for cigarette ads, especially early on; tobacco killed Rod Serling far too young. Oh, the picture above was purloined from here; when IS that museum going to open?

2) As a relatively new father, what aspect of parenting – or your daughter’s future – are you a little concerned about? Any adjustments that you think you will have to make?

There is always a balancing act between letting her do as much as she wants and making sure she doesn’t get hurt or frustrated or spoiled. She tends to be wary of strangers, which has its good and not-so-good elements. The world can be scary, and I want her to be cautious without being paranoid. It’s a fine line, that.

3) Does your local public library have a summer reading program? And if so, do you participate?

Yes, and as a matter of fact, as a member of the Friends of the Albany Public Library has authorized money to subsidize the program. Do I participate myself? No, but I’m sure we will in the future.

4) What strange, hidden secret of Fred Hembeck do you think the comics-reading public should know?

Interesting. I saw Fred, his wife Lynn, and daughter Julie just yesterday. He is a piler. He has piles of stuff. Reference materials for his blog here, reference materials for his cover redoes there. His Superman DVDs under those for Gilmore Girls. It’s not messy, exactly; it’s rather organized chaos.

5) What is your all-time favorite book?

I once said the World Almanac, and it’s probably true, or maybe one of those Billboard singles or album books. But if you’re talking about books with actual paragraphs, O Albany! by William Kennedy. I know this is sacrilege, but I’ve never gotten through any of Bill Kennedy’s Albany-based fiction, and I’ve tried. But I enjoyed his non-fiction piece. Favorite fiction, and I read very little these days: A Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood.

ROG

ROG

I AM the Iron Lady

Dennis, are you at the gin again?
Which Annoying B-list Celebrity Are You?
Brought to you by Rum and Monkey.

It’s the librarian in me. Cartoonist Doug Marlette died recently, but he’s not showing up in Dead or Alive. The Pulitzer Prize winner was as least as significant as Kerwin Mathews, who “starred in the movie ‘The 7th Voyage of Sinbad’ and “had other swashbuckling film roles in the 1950s and 1960s”, who died on July 5; or Claudia Cohen, the “high-profile gossip reporter often seen on ‘Live with Regis & Kelly'”, who passed away on June 15. So, I’ve submitted Marlette’s name, so far unsuccessfully. Maybe if enough folks do it, they’ll change their minds. They’ve done it before with singer Ruth Brown, who they initially ignored.
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In this worrisome article, an argument against the (mere) censure of the President suggested by Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) is made, whereas this piece says that censure is an appropriate “senatorial compliment to the burgeoning movement for impeachment.” I would support the censure.
But the main thrust of the former article is that there will be some self-generated trigger to send a population already primed for an attack on the “homeland” to war: Chertoff’s “gut feeling”, followed by a more stark “national intelligence estimate” (NIE) of the situation, compared with 15 months ago, to show that the intelligence community was “correct”. So, say, San Francisco is secretly attacked by our own government and this will justify an attack on, e.g., Iran? Very paranoid, I hope.
In any case, Mark Evanier, who linked to this article nailed it: “If [the new NIE is] right, we’re in for more terrorist attacks. Isn’t it comforting to know that either that’s true or the entire U.S. intelligence community doesn’t know what they’re talking about?”
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A YouTube video called Led Zeppelin – Rip-off Artists. I like LZ, yet this, admittedly, is a hardly exhaustive examination of the appropriation of songs by the band.
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ADD linked to a wonderful reminiscence of the glory days of local TV news in Albany by former anchor Ed Dague (the best news anchor Albany, New York ever had). This is almost certainly true. He justified the link in his mostly comic-related blog because I have a comment.

Scott answers my questions about God and baseball.

I provided 5 questions to a bunch of folks. Here are the replies from ADD and Greg and Johnny B and the person who gave me questions in the first place, Jaq.

Also, I did a meme, and at my request, Mrs. Lefty and Edwin and Gordon responded to it.

Those relationships I get, people I mostly don’t know, but I’ve read their stuff, and they mine. But I was looking at my Technorati thingy, and found that I got picked up by a couple aggregators, including this one. The Internet continues to fascinate and confound me.

Oh, speaking of Gordon, something I did a while ago and forgot about:

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matches

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with
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Take CoffeeAchiever’s MatchMe Test
Take ersie’s MatchMe Test

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***
Spam is 70. Possibly literally.

ROG

ROG

My Mind Is Very Balanced, But a Little Cluttered

Brain Lateralization Test Results
Right Brain (52%) The right hemisphere is the visual, figurative, artistic, and intuitive side of the brain.
Left Brain (50%) The left hemisphere is the logical, articulate, assertive, and practical side of the brain

Are You Right or Left Brained?
personality tests by similarminds.com

Your Mind is 58% Cluttered

Your mind is starting to get cluttered, and as a result, it’s a little harder for you to keep focused.
Try to let go of your pettiest worries and concerns. The worrying is worse than the actual problems!

And speaking of a cluttered mind, Fred Hembeck told me last week that he remembers the first FantaCon, a comic book convention run by the store I eventually worked at in the ’80’s, coincided with the death of Vivian Vance, Lucille Ball’s sidekick in three TV shows, in August 1979.

Maybe Fred’s just excited about getting a call from SpongeBob SquarePants! REALLY! Read all about it here. I wish someone had captured the conversation in a podcast.

Speaking of podcasts, I listened to my very first one just last week, when Gordon answered a bunch of questions, one or two of which were asked by me. I’m sure I’ll be doing one soon – maybe by 2011.

Here’s something I didn’t know until recently: Kurt Vonnegut worked at GE in Schenectady years ago. Here’s a news story and an editorial in the local paper on that point. The former begins: “When Kurt Vonnegut’s mercurial recurring character and alter ego, Kilgore Trout, took his own life in 2004 by drinking Drano, the character did it in Cohoes.”

Hey, Tosy, the guest critic on Ebert and Roeper this week is John Mellencamp!

ROG

ROG

Not Such a Good Friday

I’m sitting in the choir loft last night, listening to the Passion reading from Luke as the lights get lower and lower, and suddenly get a vivid sensation about why I so oppose the death penalty: the execution of the innocent. It was a point I had reached intellectually before, but this was a more visceral understanding that I’m not sure I can explain.

In any case, I’m still feeling rather awful. Looking at computer screens is particularly not recommended, because everything looks fuzzy. So, I’ll be brief:

Thanks to Gordon for answering one of my questions,. One down, about a dozen to go. Microsoft Paint, eh?

Thanks to Scott for embracing his 2003-ness and citing me as the inspiration.

Congrats to Gay Prof for not having to go back to Texas, but will instead be at BMU.

Thanks to uberblogger Mark Evanier for posting a video AFTER I DID. This pleases me, and I’m not sure why. And thanks to Dan for sending it to me in the first place.

Thanks to Lefty’s Mixed CD pals, even Greg, and to little Stevie Brown, Lefty’s intelligent iPod.

Special thanks to ol’ what’s his name who I spoke to by phone yesterday for the first time in a while.

I’m going to rest most of the day so that I can try to sing tonight. I had about a six-note range last night, mostly in the lower register. Wish me luck.

ROG
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