George S. Irving has died. He was 94.
Mr. Irving was a Tony award winner (for a revival of “Irene” in which he acted opposite Debbie Reynolds):
He was also a television spokesman for White Owl cigars, and narrated episodes of “Underdog”.
But he was perhaps best known as the voice of Heat Miser in “The Year Without a Santa Claus”. He was also in “A Miser Brothers’ Christmas” (which I’d never even heard of, but I was apparently in my 40s when that premiered).
Well, found my 2017 calendar. (Okay, it is a little expensive, and I already have a Gunsite 2017 calendar that I picked up in Tulsa. But I’m taking a flyer on the CIA one because the thumbnails of the art look incredible: I’m seeing this described as more of an art book that you hang on the wall. I’ll do a follow-up once I get it.)
I’ve never liked the Philadelphia Eagles, but this story makes me feel a bit better about them: Quarterback Carson Wentz bought his offensive line a present.
Each of them is getting a personalized Beretta shotgun.
The great thing about this? Not only is a cool present, but it should make all the right people’s heads explode.
The Grim Reaper finally caught up with Vesna Vulovic (or Vesna Vulović). She was 66 years old, and had managed to outrun him for nearly 45 of those years.
If that sounds callous, well, Ms. Vulovic had an amazing story. You might even remember it if you were an obsessive reader of the Guinness Book of World Records when you were young.
Ms. Vulovic was a flight attendant on JAT Flight 367 between Stockholm and Belgrade on January 26, 1972. She had actually swapped places with another girl and wasn’t originally scheduled to work this flight. As we see so often in movies and television, this never ends well…
An hour into the flight, the plane, a DC-9, blew up over the Czech village of Srbska Kamenice. As others were believed to have been sucked out of the jet into subfreezing temperatures, Ms. Vulovic remained inside part of the shattered fuselage, wedged in by a food cart, as it plunged.
Trees broke the fall of the fuselage section and snow on the hill cushioned its landing.
Ms. Vulovic is believed to have fallen 33,000 feet, which (according to Guinness, at least) is the longest documented fall survived without a parachute. She was badly injured, but Ms. Vulovic was the only survivor of Flight 367. It is generally believed that the plane was blown up by a terrorist bomb in the forward cargo hold.
I think the Wikipedia page (I know, I know) on Flight 367 has a fairly good explanation of why this theory is bolshie bushwa. Here’s a hint: the black boxes…
I could buy a couple of Communist countries being in on the conspiracy. But the Dutch?
Sometimes there’s just nothing you can say. Debbie Reynolds: NYT. LAT. A/V Club.
Missed this one on Monday: Bob Diaco out as head coach of the University of Connecticut football team. 11-26 over three seasons, and had his contract extended in May.
Bob Bradley, who is American, was fired yesterday as the manager of Swansea City, which is apparently an English Premier League soccer club with American owners. I gather he was the first American to manage a Premier League club, and lasted 11 games before being fired, but I don’t follow soccer at all, so this mostly just baffles and confuses me.
I think I’m going to wait until tomorrow to try to pull together the Carrie Fisher obits. Not that it was entirely unexpected (though I think we were all hoping for the best for her), but I feel better letting things sit for a day.
By way of Lawrence: Richard “Watership Down” Adams. A couple of pithy quotes:
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“If I saw a rabbit in my garden I’d shoot it,” he once said.
By way of my beloved sister-in-law: Vera Rubin, noted female astronomer.
Rex and Rob Ryan both OUT in Buffalo.
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Babou (either one), call your office, please.
Meanwhile, the BBC reports that the cheetah is “rapidly heading towards extinction”. While sad, this comes as no great shock to us…because, as we all know, cheetahs never win.
This is kind of cool, at least to me: a homebrew short-range transmitter that sends out time signals on the WWVB 60 KHz frequency. Why would you want to do this, other than for the challenge?
Looks like I had good reason to be worred about this game.
NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:
None.
One the one hand, I’m glad that my Browns fan relatives don’t have to see their team be the second one in history to go 0-16. On the other hand: seriously, San Diego?
And on the gripping hand, this is just more evidence for my belief that San Diego is a horrible team, that Philip Rivers should be drummed out of the NFL, and that (instead of letting the team move to LA) the Chargers franchise should be revoked, the team disbanded, the current stadium burned to the ground, the rubble plowed into the earth, and the earth sown with salt.
The former sheriff of LA county got to open his present a few days early:
The LAT reports that the jury was “split 11 to 1 in favor of an acquittal”, which makes me wonder if the prosecution is even going to attempt a re-trial. As noted previously, Baca is also in “the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease”; an attempt at a retrial may run into competency issues.
Related LAT editorial:
If hypocrisy, mismanagement and detachment were crimes, Baca would surely be staring down a long prison term.
But they are not, and they do not warrant criminal conviction or incarceration.
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How hard is it not to beat prisoners and obstruct justice?
“It’s just not Christmas until I see Hans Gruber fall from the Nakatomi Tower.”
The Jacksonville Jaguars have already fired head coach Gus Bradley.
But at least they let him take the plane home.
He was 14-48 overall with Jacksonville:
By season, the Jaguars were 4-12, 3-13, 5-11 and 2-12 under Bradley.
Finally found a reliable source to confim: Zsa Zsa Gabor. (Edited to add 12/19: NYT. A/V Club.)
You know, I have seen “Touch of Evil”, but I don’t remember Zsa Zsa at all. (It was a while ago, though. It might be worth watching that again, especially since I think the current version is slightly different than the restored version I saw.)
Well covered elsewhere, but for the historical record: Dr. Henry J. Heimlich, inventor of the epinonimous maneuver.