The Burgess Meredith Catastrophe.

October 28th, 2012

Last night, after the SDC, some of us decided to watch movies over at Lawrence’s.

The main feature of the night was “Kiss Me Deadly” (the Criterion edition, with both endings). I’m not sure if Lawrence is going to review that or not, so I’ll hold off on commenting for now. (I may have some things to say later.)

But before we started that, we felt like watching something short. I’d brought over the first season of “Night Gallery“, and Lawrence was curious about their adaptation of “The Little Black Bag“, so we watched that.

Frankly, it wasn’t very good. The parts where they stuck closest to the original story are also the most talky parts, and the changes they made don’t enhance the story; actually, I think they make it weaker. Somebody who is doing an anthology series for television ought to go back and revisit this story. I think you could make a fine adaptation of it today, with a minimal budget, using CGI and a script that sticks closer to the story.

But I digress. The major point here is that “The Little Black Bag” features our old friend Burgess Meredith again. I knew he was a prolific actor, but it seems like he’s showing up everywhere these days in the stuff we watch.

So the idea came to me: how about a Burgess Meredith Video Night some night? After all, the late Mr. Meredith was not only prolific, but he was a fine Cleveland boy, so why not a night devoted to his work?

What would you put in it?

  • I’m kind of embarrassed to admit this, but it turns out Lawrence and I have never actually seen “Time Enough At Last“. In my case, it just never seemed to come around when I could watch re-runs of the original “Twilight Zone”. I believe those episodes are available on Netflix Instant, though…
  • Lawrence suggested “Rocky“. I’ve never seen it, and I have to say that I’m less wild about it than he is. I don’t know why.
  • In that vein, I’m going to say: probably not “Grumpy Old Men” and “Grumpier Old Men”.
  • I am somewhat interested in seeing “Magic“. though. Besides Burgess Meredith, it also has a William Goldman script, which pushes another button of mine.
  • “The Manitou“, just because that’s supposedly completely ridiculous at a MST3K level.
  • I’ve never seen “The Day of the Locust“, either, and I’d like to. Plus: it has Donald Sutherland! And William Atherton! And the Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black!
  • Speaking of batshit crazy, “Skiddo“?
  • I’ve never read any of Allen Drury’s work, and I may want to read the book first, but I’d also be interested in seeing “Advise and Consent“. Look at that lineup of actors: they don’t make that kind of movie any more.

That’s probably more than enough for one night. We could always pad things out a bit, too, with episodes of some of the many, many television series he did guest bits on; at least, the ones that are actually on DVD or Netflix.

Any other Burgess Meredith roles I’m missing? Feel free to leave them in comments.

Posted in Movies, TV | 4 Comments »

Things I did not know (a continuing series of infinite length).

October 26th, 2012

Jacques Barzun lived in San Antonio?

Posted in Books, Clippings, History, Obits | Comments Closed

Going to Montana soon…

October 25th, 2012

“These inmates can make a weapon out of a chewing gum wrapper,” said Steven Kayser, whose company sells a floss product advertised as prison-safe. “Floss is right up there on the danger list.”

And yet, the cries for gun control continue.

In other news: gee, I really miss Frank Zappa.

Posted in Clippings, Guns, Law, Music | Comments Closed

Just guessing here…

October 24th, 2012

It’s hoped that bite marks on Francisco Javier Solorio Jr.’s board will help determine what kind of shark killed the surfer.

I’m thinking it is the kind with big sharp nasty teeth, myself.

Posted in Clippings | Comments Closed

Yo! Omar’s covering up!

October 24th, 2012

Remember James Kwon, “Maritime Director” of the Port of Oakland? Mister “Spent $4,500 on strippers at Treasures”?

New developments: Mr. Kwon has a boss, “Executive Director” Omar Benjamin.

Port officials, however, redacted Benjamin’s name from the copies of the party receipts that were turned over to us and others in response to public-records requests. According to a source close to the investigation, Benjamin insisted he didn’t remember being at the club.

Would you like to guess what Mr. Kwon is saying? Yes: not only was his boss at Treasures, but Mr. Benjamin actually authorized him to pick up the tab. Mr. Benjamin and Mr. Kwon are both on paid suspensions from their positions.

Also, the receipt in question “listed a half dozen directors and vice presidents from BNSF Railway as being in attendance”. This is interesting, because the port claims they followed “‘a standard protocol of redacting the names of all persons that appeared on the reports’ – except the person named in a media public-records request” in explaining why Mr. Benjamin’s name was redacted from the receipt. So if they redacted all the names, how were the BNSF directors listed?

Setting that aside, though, BNSF says that they’ve checked travel records and spoken to their people, and there’s “no evidence its executives were at the party, or even in Houston at the time”. (If they were in Houston, it could have been perfectly legit, as there was a conference going on.)

The way the press is treating this story also strikes me as odd. Both the SFChron and the HouChron seem to be treating this as more of a gossip column item (the HouChron even reprinting, word for word, the SF paper’s story) instead of a story about political corruption, while the Oakland paper seems to be totally silent about the entire issue.

Is it the strippers? Do the papers just not take stories that feature strippers seriously? Remember: it was a stripper that brought down Wilbur Mills.

Posted in California Über Alles, Clippings, Law, Media, Stupid | Comments Closed

Random fun: October 24, 2012.

October 24th, 2012

Remember our old friend Randy Adams, former police chief of the California city of Bell, who was seeking a $510,000 a year pension based on his contract with the city?

Ask not who the fail whale tolls for: it tolls for Randy Adams.

The chief, the judge wrote, also wanted to keep confidential an agreement that would have eventually granted him a disability retirement, meaning that half his pension would have been tax-free. His decision included an email that Adams sent to Spaccia during contract negotiations. “I am looking forward to seeing you and taking all of Bell’s money?!” he wrote. “Okay…just a share of it.”

Adams still has the option to appeal the ruling. In the meantime, instead of collecting $510,000 a year, his pension will be a mere $240,000 a year.

Glen Berger is writing a book. “Who?” Glen Berger, one of the writers of “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark”. Mr. Berger’s book currently bears the title “Song of Spider-Man: The Inside Story of the Most Controversial Musical in Broadway History”.

Mr. Berger is by no means an impartial observer in the troubled gestation of “Spider-Man,” the most expensive show in Broadway history. He was brought onto the project by Tony winning director Julie Taymor, with whom he co-wrote the book, but he and Ms. Taymor had an ugly split when she was fired in 2011, and a new writer and director were brought in to make the musical more family- and tourist-friendly.

And in other news, the NYT would like for you to shed some tears over the death of poor pitiful Dan Fredenberg.

What did Mr. Fredenberg do?

It was Sept. 22, and Mr. Fredenberg, 40, was upset. He strode up the driveway of a quiet subdivision here to confront Brice Harper, a 24-year-old romantically involved with Mr. Fredenberg’s young wife. But as he walked through Mr. Harper’s open garage door, Mr. Fredenberg was doing more than stepping uninvited onto someone else’s property. He was unwittingly walking onto a legal landscape reshaped by laws that have given homeowners new leeway to use force inside their own homes.

Harper shot and killed Fredenberg. The DA declined to prosecute, stating that the shooting was justified under Montana’s “Castle Doctrine”. This greatly upsets the NYT, and many of the morons who read the paper and leave comments.

But there are some inconvenient facts.

  1. Mr. Fredenberg was drunk at the time he was shot.
  2. Mr. Fredenberg entered Harper’s home; he wasn’t standing in the driveway or out on the sidewalk.
  3. Mr. Fredenberg and his spouse had a history of mutual spousal abuse (physical and verbal), according to the local DA.
  4. Mr. Fredenberg’s spouse was having a relationship of some sort with Harper. She denies it was sexual, but states that they were “intimate”.
  5. Mr. Fredenberg and Mr. Harper had “once clashed at Fatt Boys Bar & Grille in Kalispell”.
  6. Ms. Fredenberg and Mr. Harper were driving around the block that evening shortly before the incident; they were pursued by Mr. Fredenberg, which led to the shooting.

“You don’t have to claim that you were afraid for your life,” Mr. Corrigan, the county attorney, said. “You just have to claim that he was in the house illegally. If you think someone’s going to punch you in the nose or engage you in a fistfight, that’s sufficient grounds to engage in lethal force.”
It was immaterial that Mr. Fredenberg was unarmed. What mattered was what Mr. Harper — who declined to comment through his lawyer — later told investigators: that Mr. Fredenberg was charging toward him, angry, “like he was on a mission,” and that Mr. Harper was scared for his life.

Was Mr. Harper supposed to wait until he was attacked by a drunk man who he’d previously had an altercation with, in the privacy of his own home? Apparently, the NYT thinks the answer to this question is “yes”.

Castle Doctrine didn’t kill Mr. Fredenberg: poor judgement killed him.

Posted in Books, California Über Alles, Clippings, Guns, Law, Theatre | Comments Closed

Finished with my manager…

October 24th, 2012

They haven’t even started playing the World Series yet, and Ozzie Guillen is out as the Florida Marlins manager.

In his one season with the team, it went 69-93, finished last in the NL East, and Ozzie managed to tick off the local Cubans (and get himself suspended for five games).

The decision was announced just 13 months after the Marlins traded two minor-leaguers to the Chicago White Sox to get Guillen and signed the manager to a four-year deal worth $10 million.

How about a little musical tribute to Mr. Guillen on a Wednesday morning?

Posted in Clippings, Firings, Sports | Comments Closed

The Quick and the dead.

October 23rd, 2012

This was on FARK, but it touches on so many things covered here, and is such a fascinating story, that I wanted to make note of it.

Thomas Quick was perhaps the most prolific serial killer in Scandinavia. During the 1990s, he confessed to over 30 murders, and was convicted of killing eight people.

Except his name wasn’t Thomas Quick. It was Sture Bergwall.

And he was being fed diazepam while he was confessing to the murders.

And he probably never killed anybody. There is a total lack of physical evidence linking him to the crimes. In several cases, he was convicted based only on his confessions, and in spite of the fact that there was physical evidence directly contradicting those confessions. (For example, in one case, recovered DNA didn’t match Quick/Bergwell’s DNA.)

And he was probably being fed information – information he used to build his false confessions – by the cops. (Henry Lee Lucas, call your office, please.)

There’s a book on the case that, as far as I can tell, does not have a US publisher. I’m hoping it finds one, as this is a heck of a story. (There’s also a good story behind the book; the author was a prominent documentary filmmaker/”investigative journalist” who started looking into Quick’s case, discovered the inconsistencies and other issues, and ended up having Quick/Bergwall tell all to him. As I understand it, this was the author’s first book. He died of cancer three days after finishing the manuscript.)

(Is this, like, a thing in Scandinavian countries? Dying before your book is published?)

Posted in Books, Clippings, Law | 1 Comment »

TMQ watch: October 23, 2012.

October 23rd, 2012

Before we start in on this week’s TMQ, we want to note a story from today’s New York Times that bothers us. We think it is appropriate to talk about here, as it deals with things TMQ has been hammering on as well. After the jump, we’ll get started…

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Clippings, Firings, Food, Movies, Neuroscience, NFL, Safety, Sports, TMQ watch, TV | 1 Comment »

Weirdness.

October 23rd, 2012

This is a “chocolate pudding parfait” I purchased from our little lunch spot/snack bar downstairs at work.

It kind of looks like they had some issues with the topping.

Indeed, I might even go so far as to say that they were having…whipped cream difficulties.

(Thank you. I’ll be here all week.)

Posted in Food | Comments Closed

Formula 1 is slightly less heckish.

October 23rd, 2012

I wrote previously about the proposals to close large swaths of downtown streets, including Congress Avenue, so people could party when Formula 1 came to town.

We have a deal. The Congress Avenue proposal (from an independent promoter) has been dropped, and that festival is merging with the official F1 “Fan Fest”.

Unfortunately, Congress Avenue is still going to be closed, but it looks like the closures will be for a shorter period than under the original “Experience Austin” proposal.

A bigger festival for 2013 could be held at the circuit in southeastern Travis County, Carroza said. “As COTA becomes more and more finished, it becomes apparent that people will want to spend more and more time there.”

This sounds like a fine idea to me, assuming there is an F1 race here in 2013. I wouldn’t recommend counting that chicken until it hatches, though.

Posted in Austin, Cars, Clippings, Sports | Comments Closed

Speaking of things that make me want to go full Nelson…

October 22nd, 2012

…in the “Ha ha!” sense:

Parking in New York City is also expensive. Especially near Yankee Stadium on game days.

Good news: there’s a train! And a subway!

Bad news for the people who own the parking lots: they didn’t plan on having a train stop near the stadium.

Bronx Parking Development Company, the operator of the lots, has defaulted on nearly $240 million of its bonds because of overambitious forecasts and less expensive transportation alternatives for fans, like the subway and Metro-North Railroad.

More:

If new revenue is not found and costs are not cut in the coming months, the company could go bankrupt even though the city provided more than $200 million in subsidies, some of which were used to replace parkland where parking lots now stand. The company’s next debt payment is due in April.

I find myself wondering where “new revenue” is going to come from, unless BPDC blows up the train and subway tracks. Come to think of it, this is New York; they could probably find a couple of guys who’d do that for a price.

Interestingly, the city’s Industrial Development Agency issued the bonds for BPDC, but the city does not have to pay if BPDC defaults. I’m not clear on how that works. But, “the company owes the city $25.5 million in rent and payments in lieu of taxes accumulated since 2007.”

Also, just to be clear: BPDC is a separate company from Satan’s minions, the New York Yankees. The Yankees don’t own the parking and have no say over it. Which is a shame; at least the Yankees could manage a team into the playoffs, so why not let them have a shot at parking?

Posted in Cars, Clippings | Comments Closed

Banana republicans watch: October 22, 2012.

October 22nd, 2012

Gas is expensive in California.

Even as gasoline consumption has declined in California in recent years because of high unemployment and increased vehicle fuel efficiency, refiners have been able to keep prices about 35 cents a gallon higher than the rest of the country.

Gee, I wonder why that is?

…the reason refiners made a killing while retailers such as Arya lost their shirts isn’t conspiracy, it’s economics. Oil companies operate what amounts to a legal oligopoly in California — an arrangement that probably will contribute to more wild gas spikes in the future.

You don’t say? Tell us more, Los Angeles Times.

That’s because the Golden State’s gasoline market is essentially closed. The state’s strict clean-air rules mandate a specially formulated blend used nowhere else in the country. Producers in places such as Louisiana or Texas could make it, but there are no pipelines to get it to the West Coast quickly and cheaply. As a result, virtually all 14.6 billion gallons of gasoline sold in California last year were made by nine companies that own the state’s refineries. Three of them — Chevron, Tesoro and BP — control 54% of the state’s refining capacity.

But why doesn’t someone come into the California market and open new refineries? Or re-open some of the mothballed ones?

Refiners contend that the price of gas reflects the higher cost of doing business in California. It costs as much as 15 cents a gallon more to refine the state’s clean fuel blend, and green regulations chip away at the bottom line. Fuel taxes, too, are higher than in many other regions.
“It’s a very difficult, challenging market,” said Tupper Hull, spokesman for the Western States Petroleum Assn., whose members include most of the region’s oil companies and refiners.
In August, the group released a report predicting that state rules to limit greenhouse gas emissions and push alterative fuels could force as many as eight of California’s refineries to close in coming years.

By the way:

At the same time, the number of refineries operating in California has declined to just 14 today from 27 in the early 1980s.

Posted in California Über Alles, Cars, Clippings, Law | 1 Comment »

Obit watch: October 22, 2012.

October 22nd, 2012

Russell Means, controversial Indian activist, actor, Libertarian Party presidential candidate, and vice-presidential nominee during Larry Flynt’s attempt to get the Republican nomination in 1984, has died. (LAT. NYT.)

Noted:

Told in the summer of 2011 that the cancer was inoperable, Mr. Means had already resolved to shun mainstream medical treatments in favor of herbal and other native remedies.

How’s that working for you?

I thought I’d give the George McGovern obits a day, which is why I didn’t post them on Sunday. For the record: NYT. LAT. WP.

Posted in Clippings, Obits, Politics | Comments Closed

Also worthy of immortalization.

October 22nd, 2012

Another exchange from the weekend:

Me at the gun show, looking at a Remington XP-100: When I was six years old, I thought that was the coolest gun in the world.

My nephew: Why?

Me: Because I was six years old.

My nephew: (nods sagely, as if this actually makes sense to him).

(I still want an XP-100 chambered in the original .221 Fireball caliber. The one we were looking at was rechambered to .223, which I will admit is a lot more practical. However, the asking price on it was $1,300, which is much more than I’m willing to pay.)

(I also want a S&W Model 53, even though .22 Jet is even more impractical than .221 Fireball. I keep meaning to sit down and do the math to determine if you could actually do a .221 Fireball conversion of a Smith; off the top of my head, I think the cartridge length would require an N-frame or X-frame sized cylinder, so it wouldn’t exactly be a compact field gun like the Jet…)

Posted in Guns | Comments Closed

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