Finally, it’s Friday once again. And it’s almost over now, since I get to leave at 3:30 today. Unfortunately, the weather has turned to shit. It’s chilly and rainy, which is kind of a bummer, because it’s “Olde Home Days” in my little town. That means a parade (not exactly sure where they do their parading, but I assume it’s the entire four blocks of Main Street, but maybe they go from South to North street, and across Main), concerts all weekend, fireworks, ride, chicken barbeques, all kinds of shit for sale, and, of course the big Duck Race on Sunday. I have not bought a duck.
The old-timers at the VFW will be out there selling flags, too. Me? I try to avoid the whole thing. Way too many people milling about in the village for my tastes. I read they expect 5,000 people to show up, which is about 2.75 times as many people as live in the whole village, and only about 1,200 less than live in the entire town. So that means all kinds of congestion at the traffic light.
I didn’t move out to the sticks so I could get stuck in traffic jams, fer chrissakes.
Oh well, a half hour more to kill, and then I’m outta here.
Just be careful not to try making any careful distinctions
between heroes, veterans and whether war is a moral action around
any VFW types in town. You’d be in the same commie boat
with Chris Hayes
Dick Beals dies at 85; voice of Speedy Alka-Seltzer
‘His unique voice really helped make animation in the 1950s and 1960s,’ an expert says of Dick Beals, who voiced Speedy Alka-Seltzer and others over a long career.
By Valerie J. Nelson, Los Angeles Times
May 31, 2012, 5:09 p.m.
Dick Beals, a voice actor best known for injecting youthful enthusiasm into the character of Speedy Alka-Seltzer in mid-20th century television commercials for the pain remedy, has died. He was 85.
Beals, whose radio and television career spanned seven decades, died Tuesday at Vista Gardens Memory Care in Vista, said his friend Peter Gorman.
“He was one of the great voice actors of all time,” Ron Simon, curator of TV and radio at the Paley Center for Media, told The Times on Wednesday. “He was one of those anonymous people who pioneered what animation would become today.”
Beals’ notable stop-motion animation roles included originating the voice of the title character in the late 1950s in “The Gumby Show.” He was also the voice of the first Davey in the early 1960s for the television series “Davey and Goliath,” a show “that meant a lot to many people,” Simon said…
🙁 :gate:
how sad. 🙁 Speedy Alka Seltzer was always one of my favorites.
Vista Gardens Memory Care — sounds like kind of dismal place.
Totally worthy of a Mourning Remembrance memoriam! :gate:
Good idea.
Mr. Edwards and the Shrimp
By GAIL COLLINS
Published: June 1, 2012
John Edwards: Sort of not guilty. The Justice Department must now decide whether to retry him in another lengthy case during which we could relive his degrading affair, his awful marriage and his wife’s fatal illness, and watch his daughter and elderly parents loyally and miserably accompany him to court.
Finally, the American public has found something it would rather do less than have another Congressional debt-ceiling debate.
Edwards thanked the jurors for acquitting him of one count of campaign finance violations and failing to come to a decision on the other five. “I don’t think God’s through with me,†he added. That seemed to suggest a new career, although Edwards was appropriately vague about what he thought God had in mind. He did say he hoped to do something to help children “in the poorest parts of this country.â€
I believe I speak for many Americans when I say that this cannot be allowed to mean discussing childhood poverty on a cable TV talk show. Think of it as the Eliot Spitzer rule.
It would be nice if he started a low-profile legal foundation to represent young people in, say, an extremely remote area of rural Appalachia. We would really think well of Edwards if he did that, although, of course, we would never actually know, since part of the deal would be that he would never once appear in the media to discuss the good work he is doing.
We’ve been through a lot with John Edwards since he ran as the Democratic vice-presidential nominee in 2004. Remember when everybody was so worried that John Kerry would pick Richard Gephardt instead? When Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post jumped the gun and had the big “Kerry’s Choice†headline with the picture of …
No?
O.K., just trust me. Edwards was once the Democratic nominee for vice president. And then he ran for president in 2008. You have to recall that. In one of the debates, he made fun of Hillary Clinton’s outfit.
There was a time when many of the great minds in the Democratic Party thought John Edwards would be the perfect presidential nominee. He was cute and from the South, and the son of a millworker, and he talked about poor people and had lots of position papers.
Unfortunately, he was about as deep as a melted ice cube.
I was in a car with him once, driving to the airport from a campaign event in which he had expressed his support for South Carolina shrimpers who wanted to ban the import of Vietnamese shrimp. I asked him whether voters of the Red Lobster persuasion would be willing to pay the far higher price of home-caught shrimp. And when he waved the point away, I asked him about the trade implications, and what it would mean to the Vietnamese shrimp farmers. Edwards stared out the window and finally drawled: “You really care a whole lot about shrimp, don’t you?â€
For somebody with “big, bold positions,†Edwards really had very little to say that wasn’t slick and evasive. You have to look out for candidates who keep using the word “bold.†Mitt Romney does it all the time, and he is so not.
I’ve listened to in-depth policy discussions with a lot of presidential hopefuls. I once rode in a car with Bill Clinton, during which he gave a nonstop disquisition on highway funding that I found a little disjointed until I looked over and noticed that he had actually nodded off and was talking in his sleep. There was one with John Kerry in which the candidate was fully engaged, but the room of listeners seemed to be dozing. There was one with George W. Bush in which Bush tossed off a remark about something obscure — possibly disaggregation in student test scores — and smiled happily and said: “Didn’t think I knew that, did you?â€
Anyhow, some major presidential candidates are more enthralling when they talk about what they believe than others, but they can generally at least show you how they came to be at the table. John Edwards, not so much. Yet it was hard to put your finger on what was lacking, aside from his dismissiveness of the shrimp situation. He had an excellent stump speech and was really good at not saying anything that sounded stupid in a quotable way.
But somehow, the public realized that this guy who looked so good and sounded so glib was really a fraud. Even without knowing about the secret love child or the sleazy right-hand man, or the impressive ability to stare right into a TV camera and lie like a rug, they got his number and picked other people to run for president. Voters’ gut instincts are generally pretty good. They certainly were with John Edwards. Which is, in a way, a happy ending to an awful story.
I saw a pretty good Collins the other day that I don’t think you posted. She’s good. I think I was not the only one around here who liked Edwards in 2008. Just goes to show you. I have seen a lot of people jumping him in the last few days leaping to huge conclusions at the same time. I don’t think he plans to re-enter the political ring. If nothing else, Dems do seem to have a sense of shame and don’t seem to try to come back from this kind of ‘episode’. I wish Gary Hart, Elliott Spitzer, Anthony Wiener and a few others would have the gall of Newt and get back in to the arena but I don’t see it. I would like to think Edwards actually intends to do some good. He’s rich and talented and if he spends the rest of his time trying to do some of the good he mouthed as a politician, bless his heart.
Many of us liked Edwards. I do sincerely hope that he uses his time to do some good. We certainly need some good to be done.
I liked him. Would have voted for him in the NY primary, except he quit before it happened. Still not convinced that he wouldn’t have been better than what we got.
That lawsuit was bogus from the start. But what a sorry man.
Looks like there’s some kind of hat day in the UK today.
I don’t think it was because of this.
Wisecracking former ‘Family Feud’ host Richard Dawson dies in California at age 79
🙁 :gate:
Yesterday was race day and today is the flotilla on the River Thames. Lots of opportunities for hat attacks. Love the Jubilee!
Of note yesterday, Prince Andrews’ daughters were a disappointment as they usually ooze flamboyance.
Might I suggest raining hats on the blog for the official Hat Day celebration on June 16?
Watch this full screen, if you can can.
I just did. I have some great friends who chipped in and bought me a new iMac with a 21.5″ screen and it looks fantastic. I keep trying to get out of the Apple thing and they keep pulling me back in.
I always liked this one. The first version I found was with Duck Dunn but I like this band a lot more and Ben Keith is in it. I thought the “Day in the Life” might have been a missing man formation with Ben’s pedal steel sitting there but it was a year before he passed and he poked up over on the organ after a while.