Some Amusing Double Features

Here are some amusing "double features" to watch. For example:

“The Postman Always Rings Twice” (1946) followed by “You've Got Mail” (1998).  Or how about “Meet the Parents” (2000) followed by “High Anxiety” (1977). Can you think of others???

More at this link.

Blessing of the Animals

October means it's Blessing of the Animals season again. Churches all around the world conduct the service where owners bring their pets to church for a blessing. He's a photo from a previous service I attended. No, I'm not in the photo - not even the one with the pink ribbon. This year's stories are featured in the Charleston Post and Courier and the Montgomery Advertiser.

Amazing Drug Bust - According to Yahoo

I love this Yahoo headline error from this morning. Glad I snapped a photo of it before they took it down. Not surprisingly, the commenters where giving Yahoo a hard time about their lack of editing skills. Some were even doing all sorts of calculations to figure out how many suitcases you would need to carry 1.3 million tons of cocaine, and what the street value would be. I think it was larger than the GNP.

Kidney Stones

Ever had a kidney stone? If you’ve never experienced the agony of a kidney stone, give thanks for your good fortune. At its worst, the intense pain radiates from the lower back to the groin to become utterly debilitating, relieved only by passing the stone or, in the interim, powerful narcotics..... full story in the Montgomery Advertiser.

 

What if Janet Leigh saw the Geraldo Photo?

I always thought Hitchcock’s “Psycho” had the most horrific bathroom scene ever captured on film....until I saw the half-naked, self-portrait Geraldo tweeted over the weekend. And I think we all know what would have been Janet Leigh’s reaction to seeing the Geraldo photo ......

(The Geraldo photo is here. You've been warned).

A Little Chemistry Bonding

Taught a great Intro Chem class this summer.
But office hours can get a little hectic!

Rejected Movie Plots

I’ve been pestering the Hollywood moguls with original movie scripts for years, but all my ideas have been rejected. For instance, I had a really good outline for a sequel to Hitchcock’s avian thriller, “The Birds.” But Universal Pictures didn’t like my title: “12 Angry Wren.”

I was hopeful that Orion Pictures would embrace my comedy about an aspiring hairdresser who practices on her sleeping siblings. But eventually they declined the rights to “Hannah and her Scissors.”

More of my other dazzling film outlines and their proposed titles, all of which were, for some reason, rejected, in the Hometown Journal.

Exotic Coffees

While I can embrace the invigorating morning aroma of freshly brewed coffee percolating in the kitchen, I’ve never found the taste as rewarding as the fragrance. Perhaps I should invest in fancier blends, instead of buying the local discount store’s two-for-one, past used-by date, bargain brand, “Grounds for Complaint.” Read more here.

Lenka is back with "Shadows"

UPDATE: Lenka interview in the Cambridge Chronicle
Some contemporary pop music can damage my old ears, but Lenka's is sweet and melodic. We talked recently, as she was preparing for her current US tour and release of new CD, "Shadows."  There are some really good tracks on "Shadows" and the more you listen, the more you will like. "Nothing Here but Love" and "After the Winter" have that great Lenka melody, while "Nothing" and "Top of Memory Lane" are just two of the slow ballads that grow on you with each playing.  Check out Lenkaland, and this delightful, live version of The Show below. Her live performances sound just as good as the studio recordings!

 

Best from the Correspondents' Dinner

Here are some of the best lines from this year's (and some recent year's) White House Correspondents' Dinners in the Kern Valley Sun. Conan did a pretty good job, yes?

Larry the Cable Guy

Larry the Cable Guy - extremely funny or not? My interview is in today’s Montgomery Advertiser. He does come up with some great, witty lines, but is definitely not politically correct. Larry's web site.  

Star Wars: Episode VII

Well, you could have knocked me down with a hydrospanner. It seems the original cast might be reuniting for "Star Wars: Episode VII" in 2015. But can Luke, Leia, and Han take a break from tai chi class and still save the galaxy from the dark side?

See story in the Delaware County Journal.

 

Caption: Owl vrs Mouse

This photo, from National Geographic, begs for some inventive captions. Any suggestions?

Eg....
"Sometimes you're the mouse; sometimes you're the cheese."

Hippo Tales

Think you know everything about hippos?

Here's a hippo primer in the Daily Courier.




(Photo Credit)

His father's name was Hymie

Dick Gautier is a man of many talents. Don't recognize the name? Would you believe, he's one of the characters in this photo? In addition to his many acting talents, Dick is a great caricature artist. Check out the art on his web site. I'll post a link to the story and interview with him here, when it's published shortly. Anyone remember this show? Hint - KAOS vrs CONTROL.
               Update: Story now in the Best of Times.

Hilary from the Smitten Image reminds us of the TV show Dick starred in called "When Things Were Rotten." Basically, it's Mel Brooks running amok in Sherwood Forest. The show was released on VHS but so far not on DVD. Only 13 episodes aired on ABC in 1975. The show featured some other greats. Talk about men in tights!

And Dick shared this story with me. He has a cane collection which, he says, he has developed more of an appreciation for due to a bad back:    

“My cousin came down from Canada and asked me what cane I would really like to have in my collection. I said I’ve always wanted the cane that Claude Rains used to kill Lon Chaney Jr., in the original Wolf Man (1941). It was a beautiful cane, and the top was a wolf’s head. Well about a month later [my cousin] walked into my house and handed me the cane! I said ‘Wow, how did you get that?’ He said there was a guy named Bob Burns who has all sorts of movie memorabilia, including the original cane which was made out of foam rubber and was sprayed silver – so that Claude Rains wouldn’t really kill Lon Chaney Jr.! So my cousin had someone make a mold of the original cane in brass and chrome, and made a beautiful cane for me. It’s amazing and looks just like the one in the movie.” Now that's my kind of cousin!

Restaurants with Themes

Oh dear. The Heart Attack Grill, in Las Vegas, recently claimed another victim. But not all themed restaurants require their customers to eat like a whale. Here's a look at some of the nation's oddest themed restaurants in the Mesquite News. Are there any restaurants near you that have cool themes?

New Pope on the Block

 Fellow chemists may find this interesting. First, it seems Pope Francis has a master’s degree in chemistry. Very cool! Second, how do they get the black smoke so black and the white smoke so white in the Sistine Chapel chimney smoke signals? For black, they use a mixture is potassium perchlorate, anthracene and sulfur. For white, potassium chlorate, lactose and a pine resin. Very exothermic! This fellow looks like a keeper.

I Could Care Less

Do you grind your teeth and spit infinitives every time you see or hear someone use the term "I could care less"?

You are not alone.

See story in the Richmond County Daily Journal.

Sheldon's Greatest Bits

Do you watch CBS's Big Bang Theory? Who's your favorite character? Here's some of Sheldon's best lines:

• Sheldon (to Raj): Interesting. You’re afraid of insects and women. Ladybugs must render you catatonic.

• Sheldon (to Leonard): Please don’t take this the wrong way, but the day you win a Nobel Prize is the day I begin my research on the drag co-efficient of tassels on flying carpets.

• Sheldon (to Penny purchasing vitamins): There’s some value to taking multivitamins, but the human body can only absorb so much. So what you’re buying here are the ingredients for very expensive urine.

Read more in the Richmond County Daily Journal.

My Subway is short

When is a Footlong not a foot long? The answer, apparently, is when it’s a Subway sandwich. It seems these tasty, elongated snacks haven’t been measuring up to vigilant customers’ expectations lately.

Armed with their trusty yardsticks, pernickety patrons aross the country have resolutely sunk the Sub’s promotional promise of being one foot long (or exactly 12 inches for the dimensionally challenged). Many of the $5 Subway sandwiches have been “weighing in” at a stunted 11 inches.

Full article in the Mountain Democrat.

Kooky Conspiracy theories

I recently wrote about the crazy conspiracy theory folks out there (including Florida professor James Tracy who thinks Newtown was a hoax). Seems my story, which was about the current python hunt in the Everglades, was picked up as being REAL by some foreign sites. I guess parody doesn't translate too well.

Recognize this guy?

Are you old enough to recognize this guy?  So did he steal milk from your front doorstep, too?