Whipped Cream Difficulties

Great and good friend of the blog RoadRich pointed out that Ernesto Miranda was born on this date in 1941.

You may remember Mr. Miranda from Miranda v. Arizona. Today’s feature video: “Right to Remain Silent: Miranda v. Arizona” from AnnnenbergClassroom.org.

Bonus: well, the discussion of Mr. Miranda kind of went a little sideways, what with talk of trying to find autographed Miranda warning cards and semi-related matters. (I can’t turn up any of the autographed ones online.) Lawrence mentioned in passing that Carmen Miranda was only 46 when she died, which is a fact I was not conscious of, and it kind of shocked me.

Carmen Miranda’s last performance on “The Jimmy Durante Show” in 1955.

According to Durante, Miranda had complained of feeling unwell before filming; he offered to find her a replacement, but she declined. After completing “Jackson, Miranda, and Gomez”, a song-and-dance number with Durante, she fell to one knee. Durante later said, “I thought she had slipped. She got up and said she was outa breath. I told her I’ll take her lines. But she goes ahead with ’em. We finished work about 11 o’clock and she seemed happy.”
After the last take, Miranda and Durante gave an impromptu performance on the set for the cast and technicians. The singer took several cast members and some friends home with her for a small party. She went upstairs to bed at about 3 a.m. Miranda undressed, placed her platform shoes in a corner, lit a cigarette, placed it in an ashtray and went into her bathroom to remove her makeup. She apparently came from the bathroom with a small, round mirror in her hand; in the small hall which led to her bedroom, she collapsed with a fatal heart attack.

Good news: I have a day off today, thanks to Cisco’s recent policy of semi-regularly granting “a day for yourself”.

Bad news: I have an engagement today that I expect will take all day.

So, this is a scheduled sampler pack.

There is a man named Charles Ingram. He used to be a major in the British Army.

In September of 2001, he appeared on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” in Britain. His wife and brother-in-law had previously appeared on the show, and had each topped out at 32,000 GBP. Major Ingram made it all the way and won 1,000,000 GBP.

And almost immediately, questions arose.

“Major Fraud”, from “Tonight” with Trevor McDonald.

Bonus #1: “The Guys Who invented the Video Tape Recorder”. This is an approximately 30 minute interview with Jim Wheeler, a senior engineer at Ampex…the guys who invented the video tape recorder.

On a semi-related note, I was amused by this article that came across Hacker News about the Cambridge University Tape Recording Society for two reasons:

On the evening of 2 March 1969, a chauffeured Rolls-Royce pulled up outside Lady Mitchell Hall and disgorged two celebrity passengers. One was Yoko Ono, who had been invited to take part in a freeform jazz concert; the other was her fiancé, John Lennon. “That was the first time I had appeared un-Beatled,” Lennon later said of the couple’s improvised half-hour of atonal guitar and shrieking vocals.

“atonal guitar and shrieking vocals”. Need I say any more?

The activities of CUTRS were threefold. The first was recording performances at the University and the second was inviting leading audio professionals to give bi-weekly lectures. Both were partly funded by the third: buying blank tape in bulk and selling it to members at a discount.

“Frankly, we’re losing our shirts on this deal. But we’re looking for audiophiles who are interested in high-quality cassette tapes…”

Bonus #2: “Of Dolls and Murder”, about Frances Glessner Lee and the Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Deaths. If you’re not familiar with the Nutshell Studies, well, read the Wikipedia page, and then strap in, folks.