Stephen Sondheim’s 1966 made-for-TV musical, “Evening Primrose”, starring Anthony Perkins (no kidding) is coming out on DVD Tuesday.
Just in case you were wondering where you could find it and how much it goes for, here’s a link to “Evening Primrose
Interestingly, Tuesday is also the day that Sondheim’s Finishing the Hat: Collected Lyrics (1954-1981) with Attendant Comments, Principles, Heresies, Grudges, Whines and Anecdotes
The Austin Aztek are leaving for Orlando, Florida.
Speaking strictly for myself, I have to say, “Who?”
Edited to add 2: Breaking! The Oklahoma City Yard Dawgz (stet) will not be playing in the AFL next year.
Speaking strictly for myself, I have to say, “The AFL? I thought they folded last year.”
Edited to add 3: The above led to a discussion with Lawrence about the various developmental leagues; for example, did the players actually have to pay to play in the developmental leagues? The Information Supercollider is unclear, but it did lead me to this.
The New United States Football League? Seriously, guys; the best you could come up with is to associate yourself with a legendary failure?
Bonus: The San Antonio Gunslingers.
And that’s not even the most bizarre Gunslingers story, but I’m leaving the footlocker one out, out of deference to the more sensitive members of my audience.
Edited to add 4: I was going to post a whine, “When are the 30 For 30 movies coming out on DVD?” but I checked the Google. It looks like the first 15 are coming out December 7th. And that’s wonderful, because the first 15 include “Small Potatoes: Who Killed the USFL?“, Barry Levinson’s “The Band That Wouldn’t Die“, “The Legend of Jimmy the Greek“, and “Without Bias“. I don’t have cable, and iTunes seems to be pretty spotty about making the 30 For 30 films available, so this is relevant to my interests.
Amazon preorder link here
Robert “Ratso” Rizzo, the indicted former city administrator of Bell, California, has lost his horse owner’s license. The license was suspended after he failed to appear at a hearing to answer charges of “conduct detrimental to horse racing”.
According to the LAT, Rizzo owned “dozens” of horses
including a thoroughbred named Depenser de l’argent — French for “to spend money”
See also the Daily Racing Form‘s summary, which gives more details on Rizzo’s racing ventures.
Dallas doesn’t play until Monday night, so don’t expect a coach firing until Tuesday.
What the heck, Saints?
This week’s Asteroid Bowl (as in, I’d rather see the stadium hit by an asteroid strike than have one of these two teams win): San Francisco – Carolina.
NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:
Buffalo
This is what my EyeTV program guide is telling me about tonight’s episode of Cops:
Click to embiggen.
Weirdest damn episode I’ve ever seen, but okay…
The Texas Rangers are in the World Series.
Let me repeat that: the Texas Rangers are in the World Series.
Yes, those Texas Rangers.
Unless you live in the City of Chicago, where Daisy (yes, the airgun company) is on the Chicago Police Department “Roster of Unsafe Handguns“.
Note that “Where a model or type is not specifically referenced, all models from the listed manufacturer are designated unsafe.” It seems to me that could easily be interpreted as not only banning Daisy handguns, but even the Red Ryder and other Daisy long guns. I know, it sounds silly, but do you really want to trust the jackbooted thugs of Daley and the CPD?
Hattip on this to Jay G., who also points out that the list bans Smith and Wesson models with “spur triggers”. Smith and Wesson hasn’t made a gun with a spur trigger for over 100 years.
I know, two updates in one day about Austin’s police chief, but this is too good not to share.
Remember the APD officer who got fired for DWI? The one who shot an 18-year old back in May of last year? Yeah, this guy.
Remember how Chief Acevedo’s firing and promotion decisions keep getting overturned by arbitrators?
Can you guess what’s happened now? Yes. Officer Quintana has been reinstated by the arbitrator.
Robert “Ratso” Rizzo has been charged with two more crimes: conflict of interest, and “misappropriation of funds for a value exceeding $1.3 million”.
If he is convicted of the second count, Rizzo would have to provide a DNA sample.
But he won’t have to provide a DNA sample if he’s convicted of the first crime, or any of the other 53 felonies he’s been charged with?
(Edited to add: Well, according to the California Attorney General’s web site, “Starting January 1, 2009, Prop 69 requires that the Department of Justice begin taking samples for any adult arrested or charged with any felony offense.” So it seems that Rizzo should already have had to give up his DNA based on the previous 53 felony charges; I’m not sure why the LAT felt that it needed to call out #55 in particular. I’m also not going to comment on the whole “any adult arrested or charged with any felony offense” thing.)
And I wanted to note this yesterday, but it snuck past me. Guess where at least some of the money to pay Rizzo’s salary came from? If you said “a fund that was supposed to be used to provide housing for low-income residents“, take two gold stars and advance to the next blue square.
Links to obits, to keep the record straight: Bob Guccione, Tom Bosley, and Johnny “Boy” Sheffield.
The University of North Texas has fired football coach Todd Dodge.
(Thanks to A.T. for the tip on this.)
And our old friend Art Acevedo has made his decision; the Austin Police Department is standardizing on the Smith and Wesson M&P in .40 as their issue weapon.
I pretty much come down on the side of letting officers carry whatever they can qualify with, subject to minimum power requirements. And I find the argument that it’ll make it easier for officers to share ammo in a shootout somewhat specious; if officers are in a high volume firefight like that, they should be fighting their way to their patrol rifles. Or calling in SWAT. Or the National Guard.
On the other hand, I’m not an expert in police tactics, and I’m willing to acknowledge I could be wrong about this. On the gripping hand, it puts more money in S&W’s pocket (which, as an S&W fanboy, I appreciate), and it may lead to more high-quality former police weapons showing up at the gun shop.
“But the name of the game is be hit and hit back…”
—Warren Zevon, “Boom Boom Mancini”
I come up with a word count of 9,215 words in this week’s “Tuesday Morning Quarterback” column. Of those, I count 1,701 (about 18%) devoted to this week’s helmet to helmet hits and the NFL concussion problem. (I’m not counting the additional concussion material in the reader comments.)
I don’t want to seem like I’m dismissing TMQ’s emphasis on the problem. I agree with his main points; the NFL doesn’t penalize dangerous play, the sports media actively praises dangerous play, and things aren’t going to get better until the NFL cracks down. And I would much rather see him hammering on player safety than on the “blur” offense. The problem, though, is that these points have been made by pretty much everyone, starting with Rodney Harrison on Sunday. Now, TMQ is just preaching to the choir. I think it’s fair to ask TMQ to go beyond preaching.
Gee, isn’t it interesting that Boise State is ranked third, and TCU fifth, in the first BCS standings? Which leads to the possibility that the two schools will play each other in a bowl game, instead of each school playing another school from one of the conferences that automatically qualifies for a bowl?
Who names their child “Jocey”? I’m impressed by the fact that she’s a public defender, which shows she has some intellectual heft. Out of deference for the sensibilities of my mother, who is known to read this blog, I will refrain from commenting on her other assets.
Sweet and sour plays: New England – Baltimore, Green Bay – Miami, Baltimore – New England, Detroit – Giants, Kansas City – Houston.
Speaking of endowments (see Jocey above), another of TMQ’s obsessions is that rich people should stop giving money to Ivy League schools. TMQ’s belief is that the Ivy League schools already have enough money, and that the rich should concentrate on giving to schools like Morehouse, where their money might actually make a difference. Here’s the Vanity Fair article on the fate of Harvard’s endowment.
“Adventures in Officiating”. Favre Favre Farve. “Friday Night Lights”. You know something? I’m sick and tired of hearing about “Friday Night Lights” and how it’s “the best show nobody is watching”. I don’t watch it because I. Don’t. Freaking. Care. Stop trying to ram it down my throat.
Christmas creep. Coach creep. Martz watch.
While WCD appreciates TMQ’s willingness to cover the latest developments in the world of astrophysics, we are getting a little tired of Easterbrook’s constant repetition that “humanity so far knows about 1 percent of what can be known”. Really, Gregg, we get it. So do most of the professional scientists we’re aware of.
Colts run the blur offense, Redskins run the Times Square defense. Chicken-<salad> punts: Baltimore and Dallas.
Offensive linemen. Still. WCD is starting to get offended.
Nick Saban doesn’t like agents who pay college players; he compares them to “pimps”. TMQ points out that the current scandals involve “relatively small” amounts of money. TMQ also calls Saban a “hypocrite” for suggesting that college football “throw the NFL out”, since college football programs “depend on the illusion that most players will make the NFL”. Finally, TMQ asks: how is a college football coach whose program only graduates 55% of the players who come in any better than a pimp?
“Wasteful spending on bodyguards” continues with yet another shot at Rick Perry.
“Dallas is on a 1-5 streak and seeming to play dumber every week.”
Lindenwood 90, Culver-Stockton 19. Trinity (Texas) 17, Sewanee 3.
Reader comments: Saints, free kicks, and concussions.
And, finally, “many readers with good memories” commented that Easterbrook forgot to run his 1972 Miami Dolphins item after the Kansas City loss, so he runs it this week. The Dolphins item is my single biggest yearly annoyance with TMQ.
First of all, it’s lazy writing. Literally, lazy writing; Easterbrook brags about how he has the entire paragraph in his Microsoft Word AutoText, and plans to keep it there “because no NFL team’s going to go 19-0”. I’d root for the Detroit Lions to go 19-0, if it would just shut TMQ the heck up.
Second of all, it’s wrong. Wrong wrong wrongity wrong. I can’t believe readers haven’t written in and told Easterbrook this; it’s on freakin’ Snopes, for crying out loud! Given the amount of time and space Easterbrook devotes to bashing other non-fiction authors and publishers, it seems odd that he continues to knowingly and willfully repeat this error.
Tune in next week. Hopefully, we won’t have any NFL players die on the field between now and next Tuesday.
Two interesting obits from the police blotter:
Melvin Lane Powers. I meant to note this last week when it appeared in the HouChron, but somehow it got past me. Powers was a prominent developer in Houston, but before that, he was a defendant in the Candace Mossler murder trial.
(Edited to add: for comparison purposes, here’s the HouChron obit.)
P. Basil Lambros, L.A. defense attorney and sharp-dressed man. This didn’t ring a bell with me until I read the obit and realized he was Spade Cooley’s defense attorney. John Marr did a fantastic piece on the Spade Cooley murder in issue 19 of “Murder Can Be Fun“; I commend it to your attention. (No, it isn’t online, but sending John Marr $2 isn’t going to break you.) If you can’t wait, here’s the Wikipedia entry on Spade Cooley, who was a leading competitor of Bob Wills, and actually beat him in a battle of the bands.
Robert Schuller’s Crystal Cathedral has filed a Chapter 11 bankruptcy petition.
I missed this yesterday, but the Minnesota Golden Gophers fired coach Tim Brewster. The Gophers are 1-6 so far this season.
(Hattip: FARK.)
Benoit Mandelbrot. I vividly remember reading about the Mandelbrot set in Martin Gardner’s “Mathematical Games” column in Scientific American back in the day, and then having hours of fun generating Mandelbrot sets on my computer.
When I say “hours of fun”, I mean “hours of fun” as I was using a Radio Shack Color Computer with a blazing fast 6809E processor running at 0.89 MHz (or 1.78 MHz: does POKE 65495,0 mean anything to anyone?) It pretty much took an entire day of processing to generate sets.
Also among the dead: Simon “Manimal” MacCorkindale. When A.T. mentioned this on Saturday, it occurred to me that, with current CGI technology, the time is ripe for a “Manimal” revival on NBC. Lord knows, it couldn’t be any worse than their current programming.
Here’s your Barbara Billingsley obit.
Jerry Jones says “I would never consider (firing a coach) during the season.” Never?
NFL teams that still have a chance to go 0-16:
Buffalo (bye week)
Carolina (bye week)