Recommended Reading

Sometimes, it seems like our leaders have sequestered their brains. As Fred Kaplan notes, the cutbacks that may occur in the military would not be the wisest ones due to the way the rules have been concocted.

Getting Dressed in a Jif

Back in this post, my longtime buddy Scott Shaw! told the story of how for the costume competition of the 1972 World Science-Fiction Convention in Los Angeles, he covered himself with peanut butter and went as "The Turd," a character he'd recently concocted for an underground comic. It's one of those stories that sounds like it couldn't possibly happen but it did, it did. I was there. In fact, I took this photo of Scott clad in a stocking mask, shorts and an awful lot of Skippy Chunky-Style…or whatever brand it was.

scottshaw04

During the day at the con, a hat was passed. Folks were asked to put up a few bucks towards the obviously-worthy cause of covering Scott with peanut butter. I tossed in a few though, like the other donors, I didn't believe it would actually happen. I mean, nobody does things like that…right? Then that evening as a group of my friends were heading down in the elevator for the ceremony, we noticed a familiar smell in the air. "What's that odor?" someone asked. It took a few seconds to place it but I think I was the one who uttered — with a gasp of shocked realization — "It's…it's peanut butter." And we all looked at one another in amazement: He really did it?

We could spot traces of Scott's "costume" as we walked towards the ballroom. Here and there on the floor, we'd spot a tiny mound of peanut butter. And about a third of the people we passed had a smear of the stuff on one of their shoulders, having brushed past him. I got there in time to see Scott waddle up to Forrest J Ackerman, extend his arms and say, "Hug me, Forry! I'm a monster!"

The reaction to him was fascinating. The last time I'd been to an s-f convention, the costume event had been the subject of a controversy: Two women had entered without costumes — one wearing nothing, the other wearing darn near nothing. There were folks who'd spent months and mucho dinero designing their costumes…and here they were being upstaged by ladies who'd spent zero dollars and no time. As I explained here, arguments ensued and the judges finally opted to create a new, separate category for nude women.

At the '72 WorldCon, Scott managed to create an even greater argument. From what I could tell, there were some judges who felt that the sheer effort could not be ignored; that it was worthy of some kind of recognition. There were others who felt what Scott had on was not a true costume, and also that he'd caused enough mess that he should not be trophied and therefore approved of. When all the arguing levelled off, the decision was to create a new, separate category for Most Disgusting Costume. Would that Congress could solve the sequester problem with such patient wisdom.

Soon after, some WorldCon committee passed a rule that banned the wearing of edible substances in future costume contests. This struck me as a rather myopic way to prevent the cleaning problems Scott had caused. There was no law preventing you from covering yourself with mud or tar or even feces…but you couldn't cover yourself with a substance that most people love.

Anyway, that's the story. For a few years later, Scott was known to many as "that guy who dressed up in peanut butter." Then he became a very successful, popular cartoonist and now he's "that guy in the Hawaiian shirts who likes to draw Flintstones." I'm not sure it's an improvement in status but it pays better.

Important News

I just received this vital press release…

Official Statement from Girls Gone Wild

Yesterday several of the U.S. operating entities for Girls Gone Wild joined the ranks of companies like American Airlines and General Motors having sought reorganization under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy code. Girls Gone Wild remains strong as a company and strong financially. The only reason Girls Gone Wild has elected to file for this reorganization is to re-structure its frivolous and burdensome legal affairs. This Chapter 11 filing will not affect any of Girls Gone Wild's domestic or international operations. Just like American Airlines and General Motors, it will be business as usual for Girls Gone Wild.

Doesn't it make you feel good about the economy to know that American Airlines and General Motors are just as financially stable as Girls Gone Wild?

Recommended Reading

Joe Brancatelli says we just might be living in a Golden Age of Air Travel. Now, if the airlines could just give us all that and also show a profit…

Then Again…

I dunno, just as you dunno, how the Supreme Court will rule on the matter of Gay Marriage. I see its opponents everywhere throwing in towels and conceding its inevitability so you might expect that even Scalia and Thomas would figure "What's the point?" and vote for it, if only to make their righter-wing decrees seem more reasonable. If they want to say, "We don't always vote against minorities," this might be a good time to do that. Then again, you'd also figure Scalia would see some value in not making it clear on most issues that he has his mind set in concrete well before the oral arguments.

Then again, the Field Poll in California, which is the poll always cited on this topic, now says that denizens of my state support by a margin of almost two-to-one, the right of gay couples to wed. That's enough that if a measure went on the ballot to allow it, I would think its opponents would have a hard time raising funds or generating outrage to defeat it. Then again, some folks have pocketed a lot of money and also manipulated votes on other matters by panicking some voters into thinking the world will end if Gay Marriage is not defeated…so someone will try it.

Then again, they won't win. This battle is over.

Honest…

I know and knew how to spell the surname of Dr. C. Everett Koop.  My spell-checker, however, doesn't so it corrected it to the place where a chicken dwells and I didn't notice.

I have fixed that post.  My thanks to every single person who uses the Internet for letting me know about this.

Today's Video Link

Very little remains of The Tonight Show from the years Jack Paar hosted. What we have here is almost 19 minutes from the festivities from September 21, 1960 with Hermione Gingold, Shelley Berman and Cliff "Charley Weaver" Arquette, plus announcer Hugh Downs is in there. You may note that the conversation is clearly less planned and more spontaneous than anything you'd see on the major talk shows today. You may also notice that this is not The Tonight Show.

The show was originally called Tonight. After Paar had been there a while, it was quietly renamed The Jack Paar Show. When Paar announced his departure, it was quietly changed to The Jack Paar Tonight Show and then when he left, it became The Tonight Show.  Here it is from not long before that happened…

Ol' Doc Koop

I recall the tumult and bickering when Ronald Reagan nominated Dr. C. Everett Koop to be Surgeon General of these United States. Reagan's staff had assured Conservatives that Koop would run his department the "right way," meaning that the science that emanated from it would conform to what they wanted it to be. Today's equivalent of what was expected of him then was that he would proclaim that rape was not a justification for abortion because, of course, women never get pregnant from "legitimate rape." Democrats lined up against him but Doc Koop gave a pretty sane, mature performance before the committee and he was soundly confirmed.

He turned out to be one of those nominees who was ultimately loved by those who'd opposed him and called a quisling by those who'd backed his candidacy. He was against abortion but to the frustration of many, refused to use his office to advance their goals in that area. At a time when the Reagan Administration was trying really hard to ignore AIDS, he made sure it didn't, often to the point of public correction of the "facts" cited by Republican leaders. And he did more than anyone else I can think of to make smoking less fashionable.

There are some problems that are solved in part by just embarrassing people. Once upon a time, smoking was cool and adult. Now, it's widely regarded as a filthy and foolish habit practiced by folks who lack the strength of character (or wisdom) to quit. C. Everett Koop, who died the other day at the age of 96, had a lot to do with that, which means he had a lot to do with saving a lot of lives. We could use more like him.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year…

tomatosoup

Every March — to celebrate my birthday and for no other reason — the Souplantation restaurant chain stocks its soup bars with my favorite soup, their Creamy Tomato Soup. I am only a modest fan of tomato soup elsewhere. It's theirs I like so much that I will be hiking (literally hiking) to the one nearest to me many times throughout the month for a bowl or two. Or nine. You might like to join me in a bowl (not literally in the bowl or even sharing the same bowl).

In some cities, Souplantation goes by the name of Sweet Tomatoes. You can find if either is near you at this site…and while you're there, sign up for their Club Veg so they'll e-mail you really good discount coupons.  The only thing better than good soup is cheaper good soup.  Anyway, it starts on or around March 1.  Most Souplantations seem to change their offerings on Saturday so it may not be there Friday.  If you go and enjoy it, join me in nagging them to make it a regular.  Tell the manager of the one you visit and also call their Customer Service Line.  Thank you.

Recommended Reading

Matt Taibbi on The Grand Sequestration. I don't always agree with this guy but I think I do on this one. Our putative leaders aren't all that concerned with doing what's right for the country. They're more concerned about not pissing off their bases…and maybe some of their major campaign donors.

Woodward Ho!

I'm afraid I agree with Alex Pareene that reporter Bob Woodward has become a very poor example of what a reporter should be. This is an opinion I've held since about half past Wired, the book he wrote about John Belushi. Even if he got the details of that story straight — and there's some question that he did — he sure seemed to miss the human side of what he was reporting on…and it was the kind of story where only the human side mattered.

Since then, Woodward has become somewhat larger than whatever he writes about. Pareene says the same thing I've believed for some time about Woodward; that important folks talk to him because he's Bob Woodward, they give him their versions of whatever happened, he decides which one to believe and then that's it. Usually, he opts for the one that seems to include the juiciest-sounding inside details…and then the people who want to believe his story think he's a great journalist and the ones who don't think he's lost it. Me, I think he lost it a while ago and I don't trust him even when he's revealing bad things about politicians I already distrust.

And as the article notes, some of Woodward's credibility on All the President's Men has slipped away. It does appear that he and Bernstein distorted some of the truth, not about Nixon or the story they covered, but about how they covered it and how good their sources were. I don't think they were worse than the average good reporter but they also weren't a whole lot better. A lot of their notoriety comes from the fact that they were working for the Washington Post, aka "The newspaper Nixon hates." Others in the press exposed as much of the Watergate story as did Woodward and Bernstein but no one else was as directly attacked by the White House for their reporting. That meant that when Nixon went down, no one else looked as heroic and vindicated. It's a shame they became such celebrities because they were more valuable to us as reporters.

Today's Video Link

As I've mentioned many times here, I was and am a big fan of Allan Sherman. I write poems and lyrics for a lot of my projects — in fact, I'm writing lyrics for a cartoon show this evening — and my two heroes of lyric-writing are Mr. Sherman and MAD's Frank Jacobs. Oh, that Sondheim guy's all right when you need to rhyme "personable" with "coercin' a bull" but the guys who really inspired me were Sherman and Jacobs. Frank still turns up in the pages of MAD every now and then.

Sherman had a very brief career as a comedy star. He set some sort of record for going from living on unemployment insurance to having the hottest act in show business…then back to living on unemployment insurance. Others have done it but no one's done it faster. The story of how he made it into the Big Time has been told by many, including him in his autobiography, and you can read it in this piece by Stan Cornyn, who was working for Warner Brothers Records when Sherman did for them what was then the fastest-selling record in history: My Son, the Folk Singer.

One interesting detail (interesting to me, anyway): In his autobiography, Sherman said he got in with WB Records because a friend of his — Louis Quinn, a character actor on the TV show, 77 Sunset Strip — knew the execs there. Cornyn says it was George Burns who arranged things. Maybe it was both.

I'm hoping Mark Cohen can straighten it out. Mark is working on an exhaustive biography — Overweight Sensation: The Life and Comedy of Allan Sherman (Brandeis U. Press. 2013) and I'll let you know when it's time to order copies. In the meantime, one thing he's dug up is Sherman's parody of "Seventy-Six Trombones" from The Music Man. This was recorded live on January 18, 1963 in Santa Monica at, I think, the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium…

Fast Food for Thought

Many fast food restaurants have "secret items" that aren't listed on their menus. Here's a rundown of some of them. There's reportedly even an option at KFC to get actual chicken.

And in a similar area, the president of In-N-Out Burgers explains why they aren't expanding into more states.

The Death Reel

Amidst the complaints about Seth MacFarlane, one finds another category of Oscar gripes on the web at the moment: Complaints about folks omitted from the "In Memoriam" montage.

I suppose it's inevitable. No matter how many names you include, there are always a few folks who, true, were in a movie once but don't make the cut. Someone could certainly justify not including Larry Hagman, Sherman Hemsley, Phyllis Diller and Richard Dawson — folks whose names are known to us because of their TV work, not their few film credits. Still, if I were putting the show together, I think I would have cut one chorus of "We Saw Your Boobs" to have time to include them, a few more on the cusp…and especially, Andy Griffith. A Face in the Crowd will continue to resonate for a long, long time.

Most of the online lists I see that ask "How could you leave this person out?" mention Ben Gazzara and Whitney Houston as shocking omissions. They were both in last year's montage. Some mention Frank Pierson. He was in this year's montage. Someone hasn't been paying attention.

Tales of My Mother #12

talesofmymother02

This will be a short one. My mother died on October 4, 2012. She was covered for the last 55 years of her life by a health plan paid for by the federal government in connection with my father's pension as a government employee.

Yesterday, she received a letter from the insurance company that begins as follows. Keep in mind that though it came to me, it was addressed to her…

Maintaining consistent health care is important for you and your family. While we've been directed to end your group-sponsored health plan coverage effective at 12:01 AM on December 1, 2012, be assured that you still have many options for continuing her health care coverage.

…and then it goes on to suggest various health plans she may wish to buy, all of which are described in an enclosed brochure.

So I'm trying to figure out how her insurance company, which I notified of her death the day it happened, doesn't know she's gone and waited almost three months to tell her she was no longer covered and to try and sell her a new policy.  Especially since maintaining consistent health care is so important…