So this A.M., I get up at an ungodly hour to take someone to the airport. On the way back, I stop off for a bite o' breakfast at Pann's, a "Googie" style coffee shop located not far south of LAX. It's one of those places that you might frequent for the homey atmosphere or even for the architecture, but the food's pretty good, too.
Now, you may need to picture this. I'm sitting at the counter eating Something and Eggs, and two stools to my left, there's a man wearing blue sweats and he's talking. At first, I think he's talking to me but then I realize he has a Bluetooth® headset in the ear I can't see and he's talking to someone else.
And then a minute or three later, I notice that in a booth to my right, about ten feet away, a guy in a security guard uniform is sitting and eating and he also is talking on a Bluetooth® headset. It's an interesting contrast to the fifties' decor of Pann's: All these people sitting around, communicating via space-age contraptions.
And then a couple of minutes later, I realize the following: That the other party with whom the fellow in the blue sweats is conversing is the security guard in my right. They're talking to each other. In fact, just as I'm figuring this out and I'm still not completely certain, the gent to my left says, "Oh, you should have seen this cake…it was this big!" And he holds his hands up so that the security guard can see them and get some idea how big that cake was. Later, when the security guard has to leave, he comes over and shakes hands with Mr. Blue Sweats and then he walks out of the restaurant…and all this time, the conversation is continuing.
I'm not sure how I feel about this or even if it's necessary for me to have any reaction at all. I'm just hoping neither of them said, "Well, it's been nice having breakfast with you."
I got a lot of replies to my query about the smell at Subway sandwich shops. This message, from a person who asked to remain anonymous, touches on a lot of points that were in other messages…
The problem is that despite what the ads might lead you to believe, Subway shops do not bake their own bread from scratch. They thaw and then bake frozen dough. I'm not sure if it's in the thawing or the baking or both but the smell comes mostly from that. I realized that from working there and noticing when the smell was at its worst. It clings to the pans and racks that are used in the baking process and it also clings to the people who work there, as any of their family members with attest. I think it has something to do with the yeast in the dough.
I think it also comes partly from the marinara sauce with the meatballs in it, especially if we haven't been selling a lot of meatball sandwiches that day. The longer the meatballs sit in that sauce, the more you can smell them throughout the shop. The smell you notice is a combination of those two fragrances.
And I will note that every Subway employee who wrote to me (and two Blimpy staffers) mentioned taking the smell home with them in their clothes and hair.
By the way: I know this will horrify some of you but I kinda like Subway sandwiches. In the last year or two, I've lost my taste for most fast food. Burger King, McDonald's, KFC…all those used to be okay in a pinch. Now, I have to be really pinched to eat them because they don't even offer the cheap taste thrills they used to impart. Even the beloved In-and-Out Burgers aren't as yummy as they once were to me. However, Subway's tuna sandwiches or even their odd-smelling meatball subs are still okay when I'm trapped in Food Court Hell at an airport or somewhere.
What is that weird aroma that all enclosed Subway sandwich shops seem to have? They claim to bake their own bread in those places but they never smell to me like a bakery. They smell like…well, I don't know what they smell like but no other kind of business, and certainly no restaurant, has that odd Subway smell. The subways in New York don't even smell like that and they can smell pretty odd.
On the web, you can learn all sorts of stuff you didn't know before, even about your friends. One of mine — although I haven't seen him for a few years — is a comedy writer named Rowby Goren. He pronounces his first name as if it rhymed with "Moby," as in "Moby Dick." Why does he do that? For that matter, why did he change his name to Rowby in the first place? It's all just one of the many Mysteries of Rowby. We worked together on a number of TV variety shows years ago, and he wrote on even better programs, like the original Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, without me. (He won an Emmy for his work on Hollywood Squares. Once, this came up in a conversation for which I was present. Someone asked him just what he wrote on Hollywood Squares and he explained, "All those funny things the celebrities ad-lib.")
Anyway, as you may know (because I wrote about it here), one of the great regrets of my life is that I passed up an opportunity to go meet Stan Laurel, one of my two favorite performers. The other was that fat guy he used to hang around with. As a kid, I could have gone to Mr. Laurel's apartment but I cluck-cluck-chickened out and every now and then, I give myself a swift kick for my cowardice. Or should.
I was amazed to learn just now that Rowby, with whom I worked many years, had a similar invite and took Stan up on his not once but twice. Somehow, Rowby never mentioned it to me. But he put up a short video about attending Stan's funeral, which is below, and he wrote briefly on his weblog about going to meet him. Rowby, how come you never told me about this?
Barack Obama's got to be spending some time thinking who he'll pick as a running mate. I have a hard-to-explain gut feeling that despite all the articles that says it won't be, it may well be Hillary Clinton. But it might not be and he's certainly considering others at this moment.
A very likely prospect would be Senator Sherrod Brown from Ohio. Brown has experience, especially with his opposition to NAFTA and he's pretty militant about Universal Health Care. He's a good campaigner and he's quite popular in his home state, which looks to be a key swing state in the coming election. Anyway, that's a logical, sane thought I had. Here's one of lesser sanity…
Back in '72, advertising consultants counselled Richard M. Nixon that as much as possible, his campaign buttons, posters and bumper stickers should say, "Re-elect the President." The advisors felt that "Nixon" was a bad name for the product. "Nix" had a negative connotation to it.
Richard Milhouse presumably pointed out to them that that badly-named product had won the presidency…but he also liked the idea that he was "The President" so he went along with their thinking. An awful lot of Nixon advertising omitted or downplayed the name, "Nixon."
So I'm wondering if anyone in the Obama campaign is fretting over the following concern, should they decide that the gentleman from Ohio should be on the ticket. They want to downplay the whole issue of race in this campaign. Are they going to be concerned if so many bumper stickers say, "Obama-Brown"?
Here's the pilot for the short-lived 1976 version of I've Got a Secret. Bill Cullen was the host, and there's something to be said about that. Mr. Cullen was, of course, a longtime member of the panel on the earlier version of I've Got a Secret, the one hosted by Garry Moore. When Moore departed that show in 1964, Cullen seemed like the natural replacement but the producers decided to bypass him and bring in Steve Allen instead. Why? Well, it was not exactly a secret but it also wasn't publicized that Mr. Cullen had a bad limp from a childhood problem with polio. As an adult game show star, it prevented him from working "on his feet" and the producers of Secret felt that their host had to be able to do that. Too many of their best spots had required that of the moderator.
So on the panel he stayed. In '76 when they brought the series back for a few weeks to fill a time slot that needed filling, it was decided that it was more important to try and capture the flavor of the old show…and Cullen seemed like the host most likely to achieve that. So they avoided spots that would have required him to stand or move about and they installed him as Master of Ceremonies. It didn't help. This version only lasted four weeks.
The guest in this segment is Rodney Dangerfield but that's not what's interesting about it. His secret involves a gentleman named Vance Colvig. Actually, his name was Vance Colvig, Junior. His father (Vance Colvig, Senior) was also known as Pinto Colvig, the voice of Goofy and many other classic cartoon characters. Dad was also the original Bozo the Clown, initially on records and then on early television.
Later, Vance Junior became a Bozo. He was Bozo the Clown on Los Angeles TV, appearing every weekday on KTLA, Channel Five from 1959 to 1964. He was also an occasional cartoon voice, most notably playing Chopper the Bulldog on the Yakky Doodle cartoons for Hanna-Barbera. Later, he did all sorts of film and TV acting jobs and for some reason, usually wound up playing a wino or derelict. One of his last roles — as a bum, of course — was in the Weird Al Yankovic movie, UHF. Anyway, if you were a fan of anything he did, here's a rare chance to get a look at him.
Also in this clip is a gentleman named John Twomey, who billed himself as a "manualist," playing music by emitting farting sounds from his hands. He did it once on Johnny Carson's show and it was such a funny spot that offers poured in, and Mr. Twomey wound up with an actual career, playing lounge shows in Vegas and elsewhere. A few years ago, Garrison Keillor had him play "Stardust" on Prairie Home Companion…not a bad gig for a guy who did what he did.
A picture caption with an article on Saturday about a legal victory for the heirs of Jerry Siegel, a creator of the Superman action character, misstated the given name of his co-creator. He was Joe Shuster, not Max. The article also misspelled Mr. Siegel's family name as Seigel in one reference.
A little while ago, I was talking with my pal Richard Howell about our pal Jim Mooney, who passed away yesterday. (As a point of info: Jim's last regular assignment in comics was inking Soulsearchers, which Richard edited for Claypool Comics.) We were discussing what a great guy Jim was and how he drew so many of our favorite comics…and I remembered something I oughta mention here. One of those personal notes…
I have eighty quadrillion comic books and I don't know what the first one I owned or read was. Probably something Disney. But I do remember the first super-hero type comic I read. I first learned of this guy Superman on the TV series starring George Reeves and then I traded a duplicate issue of something Disney to a friend of mine for a comic with Superman in it. It was Action Comics #250, cover dated March of 1959. I probably got my mitts on it in late 1960 or early '61.
The lead story was a Superman tale written (I later learned) by Bill Finger and drawn by Wayne Boring. In the back were two short stories — an adventure of Congorilla, a strip which even insulted my intelligence at that age, plus a tale of a spaceman named Tommy Tomorrow. That was my favorite story in the issue and it was drawn by Jim Mooney. In a way, he was my first favorite artist.
One of the most prolific artists to ever draw comic books, Jim Mooney, passed away in Florida on Sunday. He was born in 1919 and had been in failing health for some time, especially since the passing of his wife Anne in 2005.
Reared in Los Angeles, Mooney moved to New York in 1940 and was a part of the comic book industry almost from its inception. His first job was probably drawing The Moth, a Batman imitation for Fox Publication's Mystery Men, and he worked for the legendary Eisner-Iger shop which he soon left, he said, because he was intimidated by how good all the other artists there were. He next worked for Fiction House and began freelancing for Stan Lee at Timely Comics (later Marvel), starting an association that lasted on and off for the next half-century. At first, he drew funny animal strips but Lee soon found that Mooney, along with being very dependable, was kind of a utility infielder who could do a little of everything. He was especially good at drawing cute ladies and a lot of his assignments were chosen with that in mind. (Asked how he drew such beautiful women, he usually pointed out that his sister had been a Ziegfeld Girl so he often found himself around lovely ladies.)
Around 1946, he began getting work from DC, where the editors were so impressed with his work on The Moth and other Batman imitations that they hired him to draw Batman. He was one of many artists whose work appeared on that strip under the signature of Bob Kane, though he never actually worked for Kane. For DC he did many other strips, including Tommy Tomorrow, The Legion of Super Heroes and the Superman-Batman team-ups in World's Finest Comics, but his two most famous runs were on Dial H For Hero, which appeared in House of Mystery in the sixties, and his long stint as the artist on Supergirl in Action Comics.
For those who grew up reading comics in the sixties, Mooney was the Supergirl artist. He was assigned to the strip for the most prosaic of reasons — her strip replaced the Tommy Tomorrow strip in Action Comics, and it was easier on the schedule to keep the same artist on that slot. Al Plastino drew the first installment but Jim took over after, making the character his own and drawing her from 1959 to 1968. During much of this time, he lived back in Los Angeles, managing an antiquarian bookstore on Hollywood Boulevard and drawing pages there when he wasn't waiting on customers. At one point, he hired some young art students to help around the store and they occasionally inked backgrounds for him, as well.
By '68, he'd moved back to New York, just in time to quarrel with DC editor Mort Weisinger, who was seeking a "fresher, more modern" look for the Superman-affiliated titles. Mooney phoned his old boss, Stan Lee, and the timing couldn't have been better. Marvel was on the verge of expanding and Stan needed new artists. He especially needed someone who could get the right look on Spider-Man, and that's what Mooney wound up doing primarily for the next few years. At first, he inked the pencil art of John Romita or finished rough layouts. Later, he pencilled Spider-Man stories himself, and also branched out to other strips, working on almost everything Marvel then published at one time or another. He enjoyed an especially fruitful collaboration with writer Steve Gerber, with whom he did Man-Thing and Omega the Unknown.
Jim was so reliable that Marvel didn't hesitate when in 1975, he asked for a contract that would guarantee him steady assignments if he moved to Florida. It turned out to be a ten year deal and after its expiration, he cut back on his work, freelancing when he felt like it for Marvel and occasionally for DC and even several independents. Comic historians have been known to debate who, in the history of the form, worked on more pages of comic art…and while names like Jack Kirby and Gil Kane and Curt Swan are often mentioned, I sure wouldn't bet against Mooney.
In semi-retirement, Jim began making the rounds of the comic conventions, appearing on panels and selling re-creations of some of his most famous covers and pages. We became good friends and I always enjoyed his company. I remember the four of us — he and Anne, Carolyn and me — spending an evening at a lovely seafood restaurant in Seattle with an ocean view. We got to the table just as the sun was setting over the water and it was just spectacular. Jim joked, "It's so frustrating. No matter how hard we try, none of us will ever draw anything a thousandth as beautiful as that." Maybe not…but measured against his peers, Jim Mooney did just fine.
Slate is running a series of articles under the umbrella title, "Fixing It." They're about how to repair the damages done to the world by the Bush administration. And first up, we get two (well, one and a half) Fred Kaplan articles. In this one, he lays down some proposals for putting U.S. diplomacy on the right track. And he co-authored this one, which is about what needs to be done to get our military back to where we want it in terms of size and budget and efficiency.
Whether you agree with Mr. Kaplan or not, these are the kinds of plans I'd love to hear all the candidates weigh in upon. Instead of just saying over and over they'll restore America's honor, I'd like to see them write with at least this level of specifics if not a greater one, how they figure to restore military enlistment and other concerns that need to be put right.
Thanks to about a third of the Internet for suggesting The Jitterbug as the phone I want to get for my mother. Robert Spina was the first one in with the nomination so he gets thanked by name. For the rest of you, we have lovely parting gifts, a copy of the home game and this much anonymous gratitude.
I got a few non-Jitterbug recommendations and I'm going to look into them and then decide. I'll report back on what I learn because it seems like I'm far from the only one with an elderly parent who needs a cell phone for emergencies.
Laura Gjovaag had this to say in a message I received yesterday…
My husband and I live in the Seattle area which has no Souplantation or Sweet Tomatoes restaurants. However, my husband was called to do the Jeopardy tryouts in Portland Oregon on March 29th. Lucky for us, you reminded us of the Creamy Tomato Soup the Thursday before, and we found a restaurant practically on our way in Vancouver Washington (that's the closest one to us!).
Well, we stopped on the way back and both tried the soup. It was excellent. I think I liked it more than my husband, but he doesn't particularly like tomatoes anyway, and he still liked the soup. I had two bowls, and totally broke my diet for the day (which is ok, I recover quickly from such disaster days).
Anyway, when we told them we were first-timers they gave us each a survey card, and we were sure to mention why we drove 200 miles to get to their restaurant and ask that the soup be served full-time.
I'll be blogging about the whole trip over on my blog in the next day or so, but I thought you'd like to know. You converted two more.
And you can read Laura's blog over the next day or so at this link. It's always well worth a click.
Not to talk this Creamy Tomato Soup thing to death — and yes, I know I passed that stage long ago — but I went in on Saturday for a couple of bowls and I also had a mission. Souplantation doesn't give out their recipes but they do have a book you can inspect that lists all the ingredients in each of their prepared items. I decided I'd find out what was in their Creamy Tomato Soup and then, if it didn't seem too complicated, I might try to figure out my own recipe for it.
I asked, every so politely and a nice lady hauled out the book, showed me the list…and right there, I thought, "Well, let's give up on that idea." There were about forty components and even if I'd been able to remember them all and jot them down, I'm not going to try to cook something with that many ingredients. Not only would it be too labor-intensive to gather them all but I'd have too many variables. If it was just tomato paste, carrots, celery, chicken stock and whipping cream, fine. I could experiment with the ratios of one item to another until I found a nice mix. But the Souplantation Creamy Tomato Soup involves all five of those plus about 30-35 others, some of which had chemical-sounding names.
End of brilliant notion. If and when the remodelling of my kitchen is completed — we're still hoping for this century — I may take a stab at conjuring up my own Creamy Tomato Soup. But it would be so much easier if the Souplantation people would just recognize that this blog speaks for all of America, yield to popular opinion and make the C.T.S. part of their regular lineup. And while they're at it, could they get us out of Iraq, please?
