Ian Fraser Kilmister, also known as Lemmy from Motörhead.
Obit watch: December 29, 2015.
December 29th, 2015100 years ago today…
December 29th, 2015…on December 29, 1915, Robert Chester Ruark, Jr. was born.
Obit watch: December 28, 2015.
December 28th, 2015Obit watch: December 27, 2015.
December 27th, 2015I hadn’t heard of him before the NYT obit, but he led an interesting life: he became an Eagle Scout in 1925. In 1928, he and two other Eagle Scouts were selected to go on a safari with Martin and Osa Johnson; the three Scouts later published a book about their experience. He later went hunting for whales and bears off the Alaskan coast (and wrote another book), flew with Amelia Earhart in an early autogyro, and spent more time in Alaska stomping around with “the Glacier Priest” (and got another book out of that).
This has been floating around for a few days, but I finally found an obit I was willing to link to: George Clayton Johnson. Johnson wrote several of the best “Twilight Zone” episodes (odds are, if the episode you’re trying to remember wasn’t a Matheson episode, it was one of his). He also wrote “The Man Trap” for “Star Trek”, the story that “Ocean’s 11” was based on, and co-wrote “Logan’s Run”.
And what was in those ships?
December 25th, 2015I think if you do it two years in a row, it becomes a tradition, and you have to keep doing it.
Also, I really do like this song.
Merry Christmas, you guys.
A Christmas Story.
December 24th, 2015I’ve been threatening to tell this one for a while now. What pushed me over the edge was this (because, hey, Christmas story), and a conversation with my mother about the first “Star Wars”, which filled me with nostalgia. (Or that may have been indigestion from a combination of three cup chicken and the pills I’m taking; sometimes, I can’t tell the difference.)
(We were trying to reconstruct the circumstances around seeing “Star Wars”. My father took my sister and I to the theater at Greenspoint Mall in Houston (which was the closest good one) to see it first run. My younger brother didn’t go with us, because he was roughly 2 1/2. So the questions that came up were: what did we do with him, and when did he first see it? I always thought my dad took us as just a nice gesture, while my mother thinks she had a Tupperware party going on that night and wanted to get us out of the house.)
End of introductory digression.
One year, over the Christmas break from school, I decided I wanted to read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Anyway, I checked it out of the school library and brought it home with me.
1D20.
December 24th, 2015Speaking of Ross Thomas, I’ve been meaning to link to (and bookmark) Ethan Iverson’s “Ah, Treachery!” essay for a while now. There are a few things in it that I disagree with, but I think Iverson’s essay is generally perceptive about Thomas and his writing; I find myself referring to it periodically.
Young Joseph Wambaugh and the hobo, from the LAT.
Dave Barry’s year in review, in case you haven’t seen it yet.
For the record: NYT obit for Joe Jamail.
Obit watch: December 24, 2015.
December 24th, 2015Marine Gunnery Sgt. Eden Pearl.
Sgt. Pearl was critically injured by an IED in 2009, and died on Sunday as a result of his injuries.
Fernande Grudet, aka “Madame Claude”. I note this here for two reasons:
1) Hookersnblow.org.
2) In one of my favorite Ross Thomas books, The Seersucker Whipsaw
TMQ Watch: December 22, 2015.
December 23rd, 2015We pretty much have all of our Christmas shopping done now, barring a possible few last minute gifts or accessories for gifts already purchased. With that out of the way, we can focus on TMQ.
And what does he have to say this week?
Obit watch: December 23, 2015.
December 23rd, 2015Joe Jamail, noted Houston attorney.
He was also a major booster, contributor, and power behind the scenes in University of Texas football. Here’s an article from Texas Monthly in 2014 about the relationship between Jamail and UT.
And another TM article (by way of Popehat) profiling Jamail.
Now that’s a eulogy.
Art, damn it, art! watch (#50 in a series)
December 22nd, 2015I don’t remember how this originally came up – I’m pretty sure it was by way of someone’s Twitter – but over the weekend Mike the Musicologist and were discussing odd gingerbread constructions. I wouldn’t exactly call them “houses”…
I got to wondering: has anyone ever done a gingerbread Fallingwater?
That would be a “yes”, Bob. And the conversation moved on from there. But I had it in the back of my mind: could you do a gingerbread Guggenheim? Doesn’t seem like it should be that hard, should it?
The answer is also “yes”.
And a gingerbread Tate Modern. And five other museums.
(Now I want to do a gingerbread Reichstag. Mostly because at the end of the Christmas season (which, as we all know, is January 6th), I can pour brandy on it and set it on fire.)
Shrimp for Christmas!
December 22nd, 2015I’ve been trying to keep up with the Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow trial. Really, I have.
But the press coverage has been kind of pathetic. I keep looking for stories in the San Francisco newspapers, but no joy.
The latest update is from the LAT: apparently, we’re now into the defense phase of the trial, and “Shrimp Boy” is testifying.
…
Do you want to read that? I kind of want to read that, though “Chow doesn’t always understand English and that his diction and tenses are not always used correctly.”
Worse than Ashley Madison?
December 22nd, 2015Obit watch: December 18, 2015.
December 18th, 2015British mystery writer Peter Dickinson. The Telegraph.
Dickinson is a writer who’s fascinated me since I read HRF Keating’s Crime and Mystery: The 100 Best Books
Unfortunately, I’ve also always had some difficulty finding his work in the US: somewhere I have a paperback of The Poison Oracle
Hmmm. Hmmm. Hmmm. I may have to revisit this after Christmas…
Cahiers du cinéma: The Library of Congress recommends…
December 16th, 2015I just have one thing to say about the latest list of movies added to the National Film Registry…
