Dustbury Archives - Page 30 of 34

September Rambling: overcoming adversity

One of my oldest friends is going to be working with Paul McCartney!

Why is September a slow writing month? Haven’t even gotten to look at many interesting links I have set aside to peruse later, then “later” never comes. Jaquandor’s having writing problems too, but it appears to have been rectified, according to his Facebook posts.

Arthur has had a woeful time on HIS blog, but maybe it’s the way it is after seven years of blogging. Or maybe he’s just excited about the fact that on Friday, November 1, he and Nigel are going to the registry office in Auckland, New Zealand to change their civil union to marriage. Mazel tov!

My friend Claire’s annual blog post.

SamuraiFrog was in a wedding. He was extremely anxious about it, but he did very well! Still, he’s still dealing with some stuff; good luck, guy.

My ABC Wednesday buddy Leslie on her beau’s improving health, but also her own self-described klutziness.

Phil Hansen: The art of the imperfect.

The oddest Facebook conversation I had about the owner of Barilla pasta and his anti-gay comments, which has spurred calls for a boycott, forced me to write: “It is necessarily true that one does not know the bigotry of every CEO. I don’t know how that translates to ‘since I don’t know what they all think, I’ll ignore this one’s bigotry.'”

An interview with Mark Evanier. Stories of his father featuring Harry the Gonif and ambulances. Plus a story about David Frost NOT about Richard Nixon.

I’ve been napping all wrong…

A suspected surrogacy scam revealed something remarkable. Plus, an arm and a fin.

Arthur shares his Labor Day message and an ad I like.

Dustbury manages to write about Microsoft Windows and the 1908 Chicago Cubs in the same post.

The Evolution of Alex Trebek’s Mustache.

COMIC BOOKS:
Back in the early 1950s, comic books were the Grand Theft Auto of the day, a “fall guy” along with rock ‘n’ roll for a nation looking for simplistic explanations for complex societal problems.

Evanier on coverless comics and the early days of Marvel Comics. BTW, Mr. Frog is still writing about those old Marvels.

Polite Scott is back with his medical reviews of current comic books. And you don’t even have to have read the comics to appreciate the analyses.

I imagine we’ve all felt a bit like Dougie McCoy.

MUSIC (mostly):
One of my oldest friends is going to be working with Paul McCartney! Here’s his NEW song.

Bobby McFerrin’s science lesson.

Comedian Gary Owen on “Black Churches”; and Lyle Lovett: Church.

Noshville Kotz, with apologies to John Sebastian.

The Fox by Ylvis. And I STILL don’t know what to make of this video. Maybe seeing the parodies of it, compiled by Chuck Miller, will help.

Chuck has also unearthed The Ballad of Albany and found a composer of the song. http://www.nippertown.com/2013/09/27/other-voices-other-rooms-119/#sthash.1wlWkrbF.dpuf

Before he was famous, Jimmy Buffett was in this faux band called the Now Generation. Here are amazingly “inspiring” versions of These Boots Are Made for Walking and Come Together.

GOOGLE ALERT (me)

Arthur and Jason spent episode 91 of the 2political podcast responding to comments I left on their previous episode. “Jason also talks about his experience after being attacked and robbed, including dealing with the criminal justice system.”

GOOGLE ALERTS (not me)

Ex-reporter lifts lid on his wrestling career. Roger Green’s book, titled Memoirs of a TV Wrestler, is available to download. “It is a no-holds-barred semi-autobiography, which lifts the lid on the wrestling business during the 60s and 70s.”

So to the age-old trick of putting an attractive lady beside a ‘hand’ (hello Roger Green, ex of Evo and now Radical marketing man) in a fast car and making both her and the tyres squeal.

It’s not my technophobia; it’s THEM

“Remember: it’s update, not upgrade. “

Every once in a while you read a blog post that you not only enjoy, it edifies your very being. I’m talking about Dustbury’s post Demotional rescue. Now you need to know that Chaz, who runs the joint, has been online close to 20 years, and he’s approximately 314.15 times savvier, technologically, than I will ever be. And I’m OK with that.

Still, Chaz installed OpenOffice 4.0.0, only to discover “feature bloat and unnecessarily complicated toolbars …
then it started to crash on a regular basis. I figure any spreadsheet software that fails on an effort to insert four lousy lines — no formulas or anything — into a 16k single-sheet document needs to die, and pronto. I banished the offending version and went back to 3.3.0, which I still had in a directory somewhere.”

Then: “DivX, a nice little package of codecs and converters and whatnot, has been pestering me for updates for some time now, and when I gave in, they threw up a whole new splash screen telling me how wonderful this new toolbar was. Now I look upon toolbars approximately the way I look upon cold-air intakes: they might have been useful twenty years ago, but they’re not getting near my engine. I duly unchecked the box, which also threatened me with a whole new search engine, and a new splash screen came up with the option greyed out — but still, technically, checked. Out you go, DivX, and never darken my drives again.”

When I load software, after reading the manual, thank you very much, I always assumed it was my inability to grasp the technology. (Some dopey tech people didn’t help in this regard. Don’t they know English?)

It seems, though, that at least SOME of the time, that update makes things worse, not better. What was instinctive is now incomprehensible. Hey, I’m still a technophobe, but at least I know I have a good cause! As Chaz wrote: “Remember: it’s update, not upgrade.”

August Rambling II: Smart is sexy and stupid is not

A reference to my piece about David Cassidy made it into the print version of the paper because “it was a good post, and filled with what we like: short, timely and to the point :)”

The New York Times’ prophetic 1983 warning about the NSA, which naturally leads to Glenn Greenwald killed the internet.

My Feelings About the Harriet Tubman Sex Tape in 10 GIFs.

Invisible Disabilities Day is October 24. I have this friend with rather a constant neck pain, but she doesn’t LOOK sick, and therefore feels diminished by those who actually don’t believe her. Conversely, The Complexities of Giving: People with Disabilities as Help Objects.

Photos of the worldly goods of inmates at the Willard Asylum. I backed the Kickstarter for this and wrote about it a couple years ago.

“Each week, TIME Magazine designs covers for four markets: the U.S., Europe, Asia, and the South Pacific.” Often, America’s cover is quite, well – different. I had noticed this before. I don’t know that it’s “stunning,” but it IS telling.

The Peanuts gang meets The Smiths, in which This Charming Charlie masterfully blends Charles Schulz’s comics with lyrics by The Smiths.

Mark Evanier’s Tales of My Father, featuring Tony Orlando. Also, Tales of My Cat.

A friend’s letter from his brother. (Can one read this sans Facebook?)

Yes, smart is sexy and stupidity is not.

Eddie, the Renaissance Geek is cancer-free!

So I have survived my first grown-up move. Moving as an adult, it turns out, is radically different from moving as a student.

John Scalzi: To The Dudebro Who Thinks He’s Insulting Me by Calling Me a Feminist.

Air New Zealand celebrates marriage equality.

Lake Edge United Church of Christ in Madison, WI: “Worship at the Edge” PRIDE Sunday.

My old buddy Matt Haller has a new blog and writes about lies my shampoo bottle tells me about dating.

Arthur challenges his own snap assumptions.

SamuraiFrog writes about the list of best movies that EW had on the list in 1999, but which had fallen off the list by 2013 and also other great films. Re: a comment he made: that will require a blog post from me. He’s been musing on the early Marvel comics, which have all been interesting, and I was glad to play a small part in his understanding of Thor.

21 Jokes Only History Nerds Will Understand.

German, not Swiss, Orson Welles.

Marian McPartland, ‘Piano Jazz’ Host, Has Died. I loved how she way she not only performed but, probably, more importantly, INFORMED about music.

The late Elmore Leonard’ TEN RULES FOR WRITING. His New York Times obit.

David Janower has passed away. He was the choral director of the fine Albany Pro Musica, and I knew and liked him personally, so I am sad. He had surgery a few months back and suffered a stroke from which he never really recovered.

A worthy neologism found by Dustbury.

The God of SNL will see you now.

Dolly Parton’s original recording of “Jolene” slowed down by 25% is surprisingly awesome.

Paul McCartney “In Spite Of All The Danger” & “20 Flight Rock” (Live), the former a cover of first Beatles record. Also, the Beatles’ final photo session, August 22, 1969.

Chuck Miller has posted every day for four years, over 2,000 blog posts on the Times Union site.

Dueling banjos: Steve Martin, Kermit the Frog. Sesame Street does Old Spice parody with Grover.

No ukuleles were harmed in the making of this video.

What did I write about in my Times Union blog this month? That annoying JEOPARDY! Kids Week story and Should ‘citizen initiative and referendum’ come to New York? and The prescient David Cassidy song. Cassidy got arrested locally for felony DWI, and a reference to my piece made it into the print version of the paper because “it was a good post, and filled with what we like: short, timely and to the point :),” FWIW.

If you are an NYS homeowner, read Tax Department Launches Statewide STAR Registration. The Data Detective blog has some other interesting stuff – if I do say so myself – such as On being ‘right’ in science.

Jaquandor answers my questions about the Pittsburgh Pirates baseball team and unfriending.

Spontaneouss goat manure fire.

Of magpies: WWII black veterans edition

I wrote a blog post, in part, about an Ebony article from October 1946 about black GIs in Germany after World War II, of which my father was one.

Dustbury noted that he and I have something in common: we are both magpies. As he put it: “The Eurasian magpie… is wicked smart, especially for a bird… I am not quite sure how “magpie” became a descriptor for humans who flit from topic to topic unless it has to do with the bird’s tendency to be attracted to Shiny Things, but I’m pretty sure I fit that description, and I have several readers who seem to do likewise.”

The problem with that is that I often move onto the Next Thing, less out of boredom, but the need to find something mentally Shiny, I suppose. Intellectually, at least, the phrase “Jack of all trades, master of none” is pretty true of me. I know very few things in depth, but I know a little about a lot of things.

Sometimes, people have suggested that I ought to focus this blog on one or two topics. There’s only one reason why I don’t: I don’t wanna. But it is interesting that people look to me for whatever expertise I might have.

When I stopped working at FantaCo, the comic book store in Albany, in 1988, and subsequently quit collecting comics, I figured that was the closed chapter of my life. Yet I find myself working on a FantaCo bibliography this month.

A few years ago, I wrote a blog post, in part, about an Ebony article from October 1946 about black GIs in Germany after World War II, of which my father (pictured above) was one. A German documentary filmmaker wanted a high-resolution scan of the story, and thanks to a Facebook request, I was able to get one.

Incidentally, one of my sisters is convinced that one of the guys pictured on this page of the Ebony story is my father. I’m not entirely convinced. What do you think?

In any case, even though I’m not an expert at much of anything, I can be rather useful.

Songs That Have Hit #1 By Two Different Artists

Why were the 1957 songs be left off the Wikipedia list?

Here’s the back story about this post: I was listening to my favorite music podcast, Coverville, which was doing a cover story of Kylie Minogue, cover songs of and by the Aussie singer. At some point, the host says the song The Locomotion went to #1 (implicitly, on the US charts) three times. I know this is inaccurate, as I’ve heard the claim before. Little Eva #1, Grand Funk #1, Kylie only to #3, which is still impressive. Kylie’s version DID go to #1 in her native land.

So what songs HAVE gone to #1 more than once? Wikipedia and other sources note these:

1 “Go Away Little Girl” — Steve Lawrence (1963) and Donny Osmond (1971)
2 “The Loco-Motion” — Little Eva (1962) and Grand Funk (1974)
3 “Please Mr. Postman” — The Marvelettes (1961) and The Carpenters (1975)
4 “Venus” — Shocking Blue (1970) and Bananarama (1986)
5 “Lean on Me” — Bill Withers (1972) and Club Nouveau (1987)
6 “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” — The Supremes (1966) and Kim Wilde (1987)
7 “When a Man Loves a Woman” — Percy Sledge (1966) and Michael Bolton (1991)
8 “I’ll Be There” — The Jackson 5 (1970) and Mariah Carey (1992)
9 “Lady Marmalade” — Labelle (1975) and Christina Aguilera / Lil’ Kim / Mýa / Pink (2001)

BTW, I own both versions of 2-4, 8, and 9, but only the older versions of 5-7. (I didn’t even REMEMBER Bolton’s version.)

But the website cites footnote 28 which is Retro-Hits.com, which additionally lists:

“Butterfly” – Charlie Gracie (1957) and Andy Williams (also in 1957)
“Young Love” – Sonny James (1957) and Tab Hunter (also in 1957)

Why were the 1957 songs be left off the Wikipedia list? (I own Williams and James.)

I asked THE guru of all things pop music history, Chaz Hill, a/k/a Dustbury: “Well, it does say specifically ‘Billboard Hot 100,’ a chart which wasn’t actually created until 1958. (Before that, there were four different charts: Best Sellers in Stores, Most Played by Jockeys, Most Played in Juke Boxes, and ‘Top 100,’ which isn’t quite the same.) I’m assuming that they’re using the stricter definition at Wikipedia, the looser one at Retro Hits. (Joel Whitburn, who compiles all those chart books, does his figuring on the looser definition.)”

Thanks, Mr. Hill. This reminds me of a lot of library reference questions. They may seem easy on the surface, but there are often nuances to make them a bit more complicated.