AmeriNZ Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

Sunday Stealing: blueberry muffins

Bonnie, Neil, Diana, and Mac

Here’s another installment of Sunday Stealing, which is reason enough to have a picture of blueberry muffins. The first question is, What’s your guilty pleasure?

I’ll list foods I should not eat but crave for this exercise. These tend to involve pastry with fruit, such as banana bread, blueberry muffins, and apple pastry.

Which meal is your favorite: breakfast, lunch, or dinner?

Dinner, because it tends to be the most varied. Breakfast is almost always oatmeal. Lunch is whatever leftovers might be kicking around. Dinner tends to be the most interesting.

What do you do when you want to chill out after a long day?

It tends to be watching television, specifically the Evening News, which we record and fast-forward through the commercials. So, I’ve managed to miss the bulk of the political ads running. Then, my wife and I play the New York Times Connections together.

How would you spend your ideal weekend?

On Saturday, we usually attend some event: a concert, play, musical, movie, or social gathering. Sunday involves going to church and then talking to my sisters on Zoom.

MUSIC, of course

Do you listen to podcasts, or mostly just music? What’s your favorite podcast?

I listen to a lot of music, usually seven CDs per day. Bonnie Raitt, Diana Krall, Dr. John, and Neil Young are currently heavily in the rotation. But not many podcasts because I can’t multitask. I have to listen intently. It’s the same reason I can’t listen to audiobooks and do something else, as some people, notably my wife, can. I am utterly incapable. I have to concentrate on the item. So, besides Arthur’s occasional AmeriNZ item, the only podcast I listen to regularly is Coverville, which is mostly music.

Brian Ibbott usually picks covers of artists whose birthdays are divisible by five. So in November, he might select Chris Difford (Squeeze), 70, on the 4th; Bryan Adams, 65, on the 5th; Corey Glover (Living Colour), 60, on the 6th; Rickkie Lee Jones, 70, on the 7th; Bonnie Raitt, 75 on the 7th, etc.

Do you prefer to go to the movies or watch movies at home?

Cinema, always. I saw many movies at home during COVID-19, but it wasn’t the same. I remember going to the Spectrum Theatre when the vaccine was available, but social distancing and masks were the norm, and it was such a treat to see the films on the big screen.

TeeVee

What was your favorite TV show growing up?

The Dick Van Dyke Show. Mark Evanier has linked to his ten favorite episodes. (His #2 may be my #1)

What’s your favorite TV show now?

CBS Sunday Morning, a magazine on the air since 1979.

How would you spend your birthday if money was no object?

I’d rather throw a surprise party for Kelly with a few dozen of his closest friends and family in Washington, DC.

What’s your favorite season? What do you love most about it?

Spring. It could have snow or 86°F/30°C, but ultimately, it will have new life.

Do you prefer camping or going to the beach?

I don’t like either. If I had to choose, I’d say go to the beach, but I’d need a huge umbrella to protect me from the sun.

Which phone app do you think you use the most?

I probably use Noom because it can track all my food consumption. After that, I’ll probably use Venmo to send money to my daughter and the CDTA navigator so I can get around on the bus in Albany.

Steppin’ Out

Would you instead cook, order delivery, or go out to eat?

I would eat out almost every meal, every day. There’s something about other people preparing your food for you and then cleaning up afterward. It’d be different restaurants with a variety of levels of fanciness.

How do you drink your coffee?

I don’t drink coffee. I know it’s unAmerican.

If you could have any animal as a pet, what would you choose?

I don’t want another pet. We had two cats this year; one of them died. It’s much easier to go away when you don’t have a creature depending on you. I liked having them and love our remaining cat, but I reckon we won’t have another one.

Upstream Life with Sunday Stealing

Making ADD happy

This week’s Sunday Stealing Stealing is Upstream Life.

1. Your favorite sport.

Baseball. Something Kelly said recently resonated with me. “I’ve been paying more attention to baseball the last few years than I had basically from 2000 to, oh, 2015 or thereabouts. In the 90s, I loved baseball, and I almost always had a game on the teevee if there wasn’t something else we were watching (and it was baseball season, of course). While I’m not much for televised sport anymore, I’ve found it appealing to follow sport the way people probably back in the days before television: they read about it!” This is exactly correct for me as well.

2. A quote to live by.

“No matter where you go, there you are.”

3. A city in the US you would like to move to.

Given the vagueries of climate change, it’d certainly be in the Northeast or upper Midwest. Madison, WI or Burlington, VT.

4. 3 beautiful little things in your life.

The door of our house refracts the light so that, most mornings, I see rainbows on the walls and/or the carpets.
My very full built-in bookcase.
Flowers that grow between the cracks in the sidewalk.

5. What made you laugh today?

Some off-the-cuff banter between a nurse and me.

6. A good deed you did today

Apparently, I was very nice to that same nurse, who had a subsequent patient be not nearly so nice.

7. Activities you like to do when you are bored.

I’m never bored. That said, play pinochle, chess, or spades on my phone; read.

8. Are you a procrastinator?

No. The consequences of procrastination make me anxious.

And then

9. Your thoughts about dying

There is about a 99.999999999999999999999999% chance that it will happen. To everything, there is a season.

10. What superpower would you like to have?

Flight, mostly as a timesaver. But also, I always enjoyed my dreams in which I am flying, so much so that I’ve awakened to be very disappointed that it did not actually happen.

11. Top 3 Netflix series

n/a – I’ve never had access to Netflix.

12. Things you want to do before you die

Go through my diary to scope out all of the FantaCo references, which would probably make ADD very happy.
Make sure my daughter is reasonably secure in her life.
Write a book: about what, I’m unsure.

13. Your biggest fears

Humans will make the earth uninhabitable via climate change, war, or another catastrophe.

14. What makes you angry?

Disinformation, which some folks are trying to fix.

15. Do you listen to podcasts?

Three regularly. Coverville; Brian Ibbott has been playing cover songs since 2004. AmeriNZ; Arthur Schenck, one guy, two countries, since 2007. Hollywood and Levine; writer Ken Levine, since 2017.

April Rambling: Ads about Rape, and Media

“To be able to catch genius when it’s just beginning, just starting out; when it’s in its embryonic form, or in its very nest. It’s an unforgettable experience.”

In response to her strong poem, Reflector Babe, Amy at Sharp Little Pencil received a link from Anna at HyperCRYPTIcal. It is to a UK ad considered the most shocking ad ever? Rape campaign aimed at teens to be shown. It’s sexually explicit (no ‘bits’ are shown), but it is powerful. This could not air in the US, I’m fairly certain, but the problem it addresses is very much an issue here.

What the New Sgt Pepper Cover Tells Us About Modern Britain.

And speaking of the UK, How news coverage evolves. Imagine how the Guardian “might cover the story of the three little pigs in print and online. Follow the story from the paper’s front-page headline, through a social media discussion, and finally to an unexpected conclusion.”

Goldie Hawn recalls an unpleasant encounter with a famous cartoonist.

Sex’s first revolution. The author of “The Origins of Sex” explains how the ’60s – the 1760s – changed our views of lust, adultery, and homosexuality

“ALEC is accustomed to hiding its agenda and its legislation behind closed doors. At secretive conferences and over e-mail chains the public never sees, the organization allows its corporate donors to manufacture bills and then send them to be passed in state legislatures without the public ever knowing about their origin. But these ALEC staffers can’t hide who they are, and what they do for an organization that harms almost every area of American life.” And now, corporate America is jumping off the ALEC ship, and ALEC Retreats, Sort Of, though its vision of pre-empting EPA coal ash regulations passed the House this month.

For China’s driving test, be ready for almost anything: “There are questions on the proper way to carry an injured person in a coma (sideways, head down), the best way to stanch the bleeding from a major artery, and how to put out a passenger on fire (hint: do not throw sand on the victim).”

SamuraiFrog’s 30 Favorite John Williams Pieces (and Then Some).

50 minutes of songwriter-math teacher Tom Lehrer doing a live show in Copenhagen in 1968. Includes that smash hit Poisoning Pigeons in the Park.

Thought the Monkees were a faux band? Wait until you read about Gary Lewis & the Playboys. I was always a sucker for the song Jill, for no discernible reason.

Jaquandor launched yet another series, this one called the ‘A to Z Challenge’ and he decided to “give it a Fantasy and Science Fiction turn,” as is his wont. (I love the word ‘wont’.) So each entry in this series will take its inspiration from something or someone from F&SF, that starts with the respective letter of the day.

Original pitch-reel for the Muppet Show is delightfully bonkers. Plus, the much more recent Kermit’s Party.

To be able to catch genius when it’s just beginning, just starting out; when it’s in its embryonic form, or in its very nest. It’s an unforgettable experience. BTW, the author in question has seen this piece.

Pop culture’s Rosetta Stone. A company known for its memorable full-page comic book ads continues to influence graphic design today.

Robert Crumb: Interview by Paul Gravett

Two actors turned 75 this month and I missed them. So here are Jack Nicholson: Unpublished Photos of an Actor on the Brink from LIFE magazine, 1969, and the website of George Takei.

Mike Sterling’s Progressive Ruin, finally off the daily schedule after 8 years, 4 months. This means, if I keep this up for another year and a half, I can pass him!
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GOOGLE ALERTS

What could Archie Andrews possibly have meant?

Long-time Exploring and Special Programs volunteer and advocate, Roger Green, was presented the 2012 Silver Beaver Award during the Council Court of Recognition Dinner held at Base Camp on Saturday, March 31.

Everything about Roger is designed to impress and attract attention, from his demeanor to his augments to his actions. While he’s naturally piss-poor at stealth or shutting the hell up…

For The Right Price: Roger is willing to render practically any service he’s capable of, provided that he is adequately compensated. He’s not the type to turn his back on his current employer(s), but whatever’s required of him, he’ll do it.

The cartoon is from an e-mail; original source unknown to me.