Triple Jeopardy

I just missed this. We had Jeopardy! on last night but I had to leave the room before Final and got distracted and missed the ending. All three contestants ended up tied. I saw this happen once before, and I've seen several two-person ties, including one in a tournament. Tune in Monday...

Hitch a Ride cont'd

We have now learned that Mr. Delp's death was at his own hand. Somewhat contradictory to his outward personality, but a tragedy for his family nonetheless.

Hitch a Ride

Brad Delp has died. He was the lead singer for Boston on four of their five studio albums and had one of the best rock music voices I've ever heard. Only Greg X. Volz (formerly of Petra) had similar range to my untrained ear.

I saw him in concert with Boston twice -- in 1995 and 1997. By then he'd turned over the tougher parts to younger singers including Fran Cosmo, but on both occasions I was floored when he performed flawlessly on Mort Than a Feeling, including -- specifically -- the final note, which was no mean feat for any vocalist, in his prime or otherwise.

I was also impressed -- from a distance -- by his humility. Although Tom Scholz was the lead musician and creative force being Boston, Brad was clearly the glue that held them together, at least on the stage. At the first concert (1995), I wasn't sure who the players were, other than Tom who was easy to recognize. Since Brad hadn't appeared on their most recent album (Walk On), I was somewhat surprised when I figured out (by process of elimination) that he was touring with them. They didn't introduce themselves until the end of the show, and Brad refused to introduce himself. Tom eventually did it, and Brad got a standing O.

While Brad had multiple opportunities -- with and without Boston -- to showcase his talent, it's a shame that Tom Scholz wasn't a little more prolific at producing albums. Although Brad returned to Boston for their last (ie most recent and also, in all likelihood, final) album, Corporate America, the same energy wasn't there as it was for their earlier work together. Five albums in 26 years strikes me as a disappointment, but that's what comes of being a perfectionist.

In any case, a tragedy for his friends, family, and the music world, but he leaves some great material behind. Tributes & news articles include:

Official Boston site
Un-Official Boston site
Barry Goudreau
Boston Globe also here

Number 38 (1913-2006)

One of my earliest posts (scroll down the August 06 Archive) was on the subject of President Gerald Ford. There's been plenty of other tributes to the Great Healer the past week or so. RIP #38.

These events remind of a joke I heard during the Carter administration:

A small plane carrying President Carter, President Ford, Heny Kissinger, a priest and a hippie develops engine trouble, and the pilot and co-pilot immediately bail out, leaving only four parachutes for the five passengers.

President Carter says, "well, I'm president of the United States -- I'm certainly entitled to one." He grabs a parachute and jumps out.

President Ford says, "I've got an important golf game that I can't miss." He grabs a parachute and jumps out.

Kissinger says, "I have to be at a state department reunion tonight." He grabs a parachute and jumps out.

That leaves the priest and the hippie. The priest says, "well, I've lived a good, long life, young man. You can have the last parachute."

The hippie replies, "no way, man -- we can both make it."

"What do you mean?" asks the priest.

"The smartest man in the world just jumped out of the plane with my knapsack."

Somehow I don't think Henry would find that all that funny.

Variations on Top Ten

I saw this in a newsletter recently and thought it an interesting variation of one of those intrusive getting-to-know you questionnaires that often circulate via e-mail, so I'll give it a shot:

Potato Salad's Top Ten:

10 out of 10 almost describes my passion for: Exercise -- just don't do it enough.

9 times out of 10 I'd eat (calories aside): Cheeseburger pie or Mrs. Salad's famous Broccoli Salad.

8 hours a day at my dream job would be: 8 hours a day in my current job would be a blessing, actually.

7 days on a dream vacation would be spent: Somewhere historic; probably Washington DC.

6 seconds after I launch my Internet browser I'm on: Usually Salad Days, checking some of my links.

5 minutes is all the time I have for (pet peeve): Phony people.

4 stars is my rating for:
TV - Hogan's Heroes
Book - The Magic Touch by Joseph Kessel
Movie - Hoosiers, of course.

3 things always on my desk: Files, adding machine, and sharpened pencils.

2 people (living or dead) I wish I could meet: Winston Churchill and Robert Kraft.

1 thing that might surprise most people about me: To date, I've only been to one live, in-person football game at any level (and it was a preseason NFL game 12 years ago). Partial explanation -- I never played, and neither my high school or college had a football team.

Of Meredith and Millionaires

Old friend JB -- the game show fanatic -- procured tickets for a taping of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire?" in NYC two weeks ago, so I met him there and spent the day with him in Manhattan. A few observations --

(1) It was COLD. I'd been there an hour and already lost feeling in eight of my remaining nine toes. And I had a jacket, hat, gloves, scarf and earmuffs. JB showed up with little more than a windbreaker, but he's a heartier soul.

(2) The taping was fun. We saw three shows being produced, which will air in May 2007. Enjoyed cheering the contestants and participating when called upon (each one "asked the audience"). They said we'd be there about 3 hours and it was really close to 5 because it took about 2 hours for them to start the tapings. Still, a good time.

(3) There was also a 30-question multiple-choice audition test which we had 10 minutes to complete. During the last taping the announced about 12 names that had "passed." Yours truly was the first name called, and even more ironically, JB missed the cut. Following the last taping I did a 60-second interview with one of the producers and had a polaroid taken, while submitting a previously-completed questionnaire. For one of those reasons (interview, polaroid, questionnaire), I was advised about a week later that I would not be considered in the future as a contestant. Must have been the glare from my bald spot.

(4) Dinner at the ESPNZone in Times Square -- a reasonable wait for a Friday night, and surprisingly reasonable prices. JB then caught his train back up north and I wandered around Rockefeller Center for a few minutes before catching the bus.

(5) While leaving the aforementioned R-Center, I was accosted by a pizza delivery man on a bicycle who asked me to clarify an address affixed to his precious cargo. I had to tell him I had not a clue -- I hadn't even been to NYC in nearly eighteen years.

(6) The "slick" map I purchased the day before was worth its weight in gold. Not only did it help me maintain my orientation in a city of tall buildings and on a day of virtually no sunlight, it also had most subway stops marked, allowing for greater ease of travel.

We'll try to do it next year . . . hopefully before December!

All is quiet . . . finally

Well, it's the 23rd of December and I haven't posted anything in over a month. Oddly enough, things are rather quiet in the Salad household this weekend, two days until Christmas. Mrs. Salad took care of all the planning and shopping this year while yours truly was slaving away with his agency. It was actually enjoyable to go to Wal-Mart this afternoon. Although the place was nothing short of a Roman circus, I felt strangely at ease and under absolutely no pressure once I had located the final package of economy C-cells this side of the Mason-Dixon line. Looking forward to some relaxing days ahead, with no travel or other adventures planned. Maybe I'll even have some more entries here. Merry Christmas to all!

M*A*S*H*E*D

Robert Altman has died. His filmography is here.

I can't say I was a big fan of his -- another Hollywood leftist whose work followed his politics. His most famous work, M*A*S*H is often cited among top-100 lists and so forth, but only because (1) it resulted in a wildly successful television series (with which Altman had no involvement) and (2) it reinforced the left's mealy-mouthed antiwar sentiments.

Altman was said to have joked that Johnny Mandel made more profit from M*A*S*H simply by writing the theme song, thus gaining exponential royalties when it moved to TV.

While the movie has its moments, I found it rather uneven -- kind of an attempt to stretch a half-hour sitcom into a feature-length picture, which in itself is odd since of course the movie came first, but, again, Altman and Ring Lardner Jr. had an agenda.

Politics and inaccuracies aside, M*A*S*H is palatable and at times even enjoyable until the completely incongruous football sequence at the end, at which point the entire picture degenerates from a comedic yet at least somewhat thoughtful antiwar commentary into an almost unwatchable slapstick. "Hotlips" O'Houlihan goes from Nurse Ratchet to Britney Spears with one cut -- again, completely in contradiction to the first 3/4 of the movie. I've never figured out what Altman et al were trying to do with that.

For its part, the TV series -- although a different breed of humor than Hogan's Heroes -- is very well done if you can accept the underlying anti-war / anti-establishment tone and you can handle Alan Alda in small doses. Perhaps the only case where the spinoff TV show was better -- and (much) more successful -- than the movie which inspired it.

Veteran's Day

Here's a Veteran's Day tribute worth a pittance of your time.


We were at the WWII Memorial on Veteran's Day. They were indeed the greatest generation.

12077322

The Greatest Pumpkin

It's the 40th Anniversary of "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown," which needs no further introduction. Here are some celebrity stories, trivia and related fun stuff.

Hard to believe that there was a time in our nation's history that the term "Great Pumpkin" was unknown.

Game Show Mania

Long-time game show authority JB brought this site to my attention:

http://www.pageoclips.com/

Comments Welcome

I've changed the settings on Salad Days to allow for comments from "anyone" subject to word verification (you'll see what that means if you leave a comment). So you don't have to be a registered user if you want to harass me. We'll see if this works...

Earl Weaver Forever

From a fan:

You still play "Earl Weaver Baseball"? What is this - 1985???

Mike

I play it on my old 386SX machine I have from college. I can play a full game in about 12 minutes -- 5 if I speed it up.

Hard as it may be to believe, I've tried various programs over the past twenty years or so, and none has been able to emulate the features that I get with EWB -- obviously, the newer stuff has better graphics and more bells & whistles, but I still prefer EWB. It also has several bugs that I wish I was smart enough to fix (it can't be that hard, considering it's an old DOS program).

Have a Coke and a...

There really are too many people out there with too much time on their hands. You have to see this.

halp us jon carry

Many of you may have seen this. The story is here (I couldn't post the photograph here for some reason).

Kerrying On

I interviewed John Kerry many years ago when I was a (very) fledgling radio reporter in Pittsfield MA. Politics aside, I came away with the unshakable impression that he was the classic "empty suit" -- an aristocratic bearing, a haughty delivery, and the repitition of boilerplate liberal platitudes seemed all that he was capable of (albeit, characteristics not entirely unwelcomed in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts). His only sliver of credibility seemed to depend on the fact that his speech pattern was so unbearably heavy-handed that many were apparently convinced that he actually knew what he was talking about (and, heaven forbid, many have even believed it). His Senior partner in the US Senate -- not exactly a favorite of this reporter, either -- has at least compiled a substantial legislative record through combination of hard work, his family name, and 40 years of influence. Kerry, it would seem, had none of this. Even his initials -- JFK -- seemed at least a semi-intentional grasping at credibility. I've seen very little in the past three years that would disabuse this notion.

So earlier this week JFK-2 was at a political rally and wanted to take a cheap shot at the president. Okay, that's politics. The problem, however, is something his handlers -- and, of course, Kerry himself -- should know by now: People who have no sense of humor should not be given the additional burden of trying to be funny.

Granted, even if he'd said "get us stuck" instead of "get stuck," it wouldn't exactly have been worth inclusion in a Jay Leno monologue, but beyond that, this guy has the delivery of a walrus and the timing of an epileptic kitten. John Kerry trying to tell jokes is like me trying to wire a ceiling fan, except that I know I can't do it. He really should know better.

Rob Long must be loving this. I'm surprised he hasn't weighed in on it (to my knowledge). Others have said this is (was) the "Dean Scream" of the 2008 Kerry Campaign. He's done.

One final note -- President GWB once said to a group of graduating seniors (I believe at Yale, but I'm too lazy to look it up right now and I'll paraphrase the quote) -- "To all you A-students, congratulations. You've done great! To you C-students -- just think, you, too can become president of the United States." Can we get Kerry for plagiarism, too? (Maybe we could, if he'd actually deliver his material correctly.

Big Red's Machine

That Red Auerbach (1917-2006) was the greatest coach in NBA history is so far beyond question that it seems frivilous to even raise the point. Phil Jackson may have the same number of titles (as a coach) and Lenny Wilkens might have more career wins, but neither of them would have jobs in professional basketball if it hadn't been for Red. A true legend that it's hard to imagine the Celtics -- or the NBA -- without him.

There are, of course, media reports everywhere on Red. All I have to add is:

1. Len Bias. Red -- and, consequently, the entire organization, never recovered from this one.

2. The 16 championships are nice, but Red also needs to be remembered as an early crusader against racial and ethnic prejudices in a relatively hostile city.

3. Every NBA team needs to do something to honor Red. He built the NBA in its early days from a afterthought to the highly profitable enterprise it is today.

4. The Celtics, too, should honor Red -- by putting a winner on the floor! It would take a magical move or two, but zero banners in twenty years (after 16 out of 30) is ridiculous.

Comings and Goings

I've removed the Sons of Sam Horn link; I've tried for a year to get privileges on their site with no response, and they've made it more difficult to get to the other threads on the site even as a lurker. Enough of their elitism; I'll find intelligent sports discussion elsewhere.

In the meantime, welcome RudyBaga's blog for some intelligent commentary on current events.

In The News

Blogger has finally (albeit perhaps temporarily) resolved my account & password issues, so I can finally start getting caught up on all the wonderful postings I had been formulating in my mind.

First, some recent deaths worth noticing:

Christopher Glenn (10/17/06) -- Growing up on Saturday morning cartoons in the 1970's, Christopher Glenn is most remembered by my generation for his "In the News" segments.

Joe Niekro (10/27/06) -- Phil's little brother. I didn't even know he was sick.

Trevor Berbick (10/28/06) -- Jamaican legend and the last boxer to face Mohammad Ali.

P.W. Botha (10/31/06) -- Last of the Apartheid hard-liners has finally crossed the Rubicon.

Richard Reeves' Imagination

My most recently-completed book-on-tape is by Richard Reeves -- President Reagan: The Triumph of Imagination. I entered into this endeavor with full knowledge that Reeves is a bona fide left-winger, but with the hopes that he'd at least have some semblance of objectivity.

For the first several chapters, it wasn't too bad. I have pretty clear memories of the Reagan administration, particularly the early years, and Reeves provides a good narration of the inauguration, assassination attempt and budget legislation.

Unfortunately, the book has several shortcomings. First of all it is, literally, about President Reagan -- beginning at his inauguration and ending in January 1989, with a brief epilogue about his later years and death. First and foremost, this makes it a biography without context. Stylistically (and, for that matter, philosophically), it becomes tediously bogged down in unending recitation of obscure details and statistics.

The philosphical problem is that while Liberals such as Reeves might enjoy the chance to point out the mistakes and mis-steps of the Reagan Administration (I await with great anticipation Reeves' chronicle of the first two years of the Clinton Administration), members of the VRWC such as this observer will be quick to point out that Reagan and his Administration weren't exactly detail-oriented in terms of their attitude towards governnance in the first place. In other words, Reagan was about big ideas and getting the big issues right.

Since Reeves can't deny that the Cold War is over and the Soviet Union no longer exists, he can only resort to insignificant minutia, while while taking cheap shots at his primary subject and those around him (including not-so-subtle insinuations that Reagan was suffering from Alzheimer's Disease during his presidency), but at Republican leaders that are still visible today -- Dick Cheney, Newt Gingrich, George H.W. Bush, etc.

While Reeves is obsessed with detail and jabs at conservatives, it is ironic that the book contains a large number of errors that any editor -- regardless of political leanings -- should have noticed. Reference to John Hinkley as having "shot and killed a Washington policeman" indicates that Reeves may have suffered a memory warp to his JFK project. Trent Lott is identified as the Senate Majority Leader while he was still in the House of Representatives (he was elected to the Senate in 1988). Since I listen to this in the car, I can't exactly write down everything, but there's many more. Maybe not critical in and of themselves, but if a writer can't get the simple things right, then what about the important stuff? Reeves should know better.

On the positive side, I will say that the narration by George K. Wilson is exceptional, particularly in Wilson's somewhat unusual ability for changing his voice to match all of the principal characters. Reagan's is a voice that has been parodied by many, but Wilson imitates his voice almost to perfection without giving into the obvious temptation. In addition, he shifts gears flawlessly to Vice President Bush, James Baker, Oliver North, Donald Regan, Tip O'Neill and others. An impressive accomplishment; too bad the author can't produce material worthy of the narration.