Goodbye 2009

The old year is drawing to a close. Tomorrow is New Year's Eve and many thoughts are swirling through my head as I am about to go to sleep--

--2009 was an exciting year. I got to go to Chicago, Puerto Rico, Louisville, New Orleans, Winter Park, Florida, Plattsburgh, NY, Vermont, and Athens. My company was sold (but "I'm not afraid" as Bette Davis said to Gladys Cooper in Now Voyager). I had the enormous challenge of staging a major event--rounding up speakers, putting together panels, etc. I was on the red carpet at the Tonys. I served as treasurer for my co-op. I added to my comic book collection.

--I feel sad that Broadway cannot sustain even well-reviewed shows like Brighton Beach Memoirs, Ragtime, and Finian's Rainbow just because they have no big names.

--I like Web Soup on G4 because the host Chris Hardwick is super-cute and funny, but it's weird watching G4. It's a real straight-boy network full of video games and girls in lingerie. A sort of geeky version of Spike. Not at all like Bravo or Lifetime.

--In a way I'm very geeky but in a gay way. I DVRed the new episodes of Doctor Who on BBC-America. BTW, why is Docto Who no longer on the Sci-Fi Channel or SyFy as they now call it.

--I saw Up in the Air on Monday at BAM with my friend Diane. Afterwards we went to the apartment where she was catsitting for friends who were vacationing for the holidays. We had some red wine while the cats roamed the place. It was strange drinking in an apartment where neither of us lived. Diane was going to sleep over, so at about 10 PM I went into the unfamiliar Brooklyn streets to take the G train home. It was equally strange to take that train since I never do. All those strange stations with names I didn't recognize.

No new year's resolutions. Just continuing on. These are the last few random ramblings of 2009 of my scatteshot mind. Tomorrow we are driving to Philly to visit my parents.

Farewell to Athens

On my last day in Athens, I had to send out all my postcards. The stamps were so beautiful, I bought some extra and addressed a postcard to myself so I could have the cancelled stamp. I collect postcards from places I've been or from friends who sent them. This would be the first time I sent myself one. This way I'd know when everybody else got theirs. It gave me an odd sense of accomplishment. Then I was determined to find the Herakleidon Museum which had an exhibit of Degas sculptures. It was difficult to find, tucked away on a little side street near the Thissio metro station, but it was worth it. The Herakleidon is a small gem of a museum, a former private home, very intimate. There were over 70 gorgeous Degas sculptures including the famous one of the young ballet dancer. I'm not sure if it's the same one as in the Clark Institute in Williamstown. Beautiful music from the period played.

After lunch, I strolled around the Thissio square, near Monasteriki. Street vendors were selling stamps, coins, old watches, binoculars, pins from the Olympics, and various bric-a-brac. There were hordes of black men with huge bundles running from place to place from the police. They would drop their burdens which contained what appeared to be knockoffs of designer bags until they got a signal that the cops were nearby. Then they'd pick up and run off.

I wandered to the Royal Gardens and found a gallery which sported an exhibition of movie posters from various eras and countries. That was a lot of fun. Back in the hotel, I watched TV til Jerry got back from Turkey--interesting how the news media in Europe is totally to the left, there was a commentator on RT, the Russian network who suggested the Obama administration bribed the Nobel committee to get the president the Peace Prize--and then we all went out to celebrate our last night. We ate at a very good place with a view of the Acropolis. I told Jerry and his colleagues if I needed to write a doctoral thesis it would be on The Cult of the Virgin: Athena, Mary, Elizabeth I, and Doris Day. Prior to this trip, I hadn't known Athena was a virgin goddess.

The flight back to NYC was about ten hours, but I had my anti-jet pills. They showed four movies--all garbage. Four Christmases, The Time Traveller's Wife, Land of the Lost, and Post Graduate. I didn't watch any of them--that is I didn't listen to the sound on the headphones. The images were enough to tell me how stupid they were. All I could think of the films were "Wow, Carol Burnett, Robert Duvall, and Sissy Spacek must need money." Then they showed TV episodes and it was the same episode of The Simpsons I saw on the last Delta flight I took which was about a year ago!

More Photos from Greece

In the previous post, the stupid thing uploaded the photo of the fisherman rather than the temple. So here's the temple and a shot of Hydra, my favorite of the three ports. Besides, I hear blog posts should be shorter anyway.

Mini-Cruise of the Islands

(ATHENS, GREECE) On Thursday, Dec. 17, Jerry went on to Istanbul for another conference, while I stayed behind in Athens. Thurs. morning we both went to the Byzantine Museum and during lunch in Syntagma Square we watched the general strikers--Mike told us the day before in Delphi that they have these strikes about twice a month, just for the unions to make a point. Note: They also had a small Andy warhol exhibit since it was also about icons. Then Jerry left to catch his plane and I took one of the City Tours. I had seen a lot of what was covered including the Acropolis and the Agora, but it was good to get a feel for the whole city. I also got a much better look at the Academy of Arts and Scienes which was decorated with beautiful statues of Athena and Apollo. Someone had spray painted the word RESIST on the columns.

The next day, I was up at 6 a.m. for a very touristy cruise to three Greek islands--Agina, Poros and Hydra. The passengers were about 20 percent American and European and the rest were Asian, but overwhelmingly Japanese. We basically had about an hour in each port to stroll around the picturesque waterfront area.In Agina, for an extra 25 Euros, we could take a tour of the temple to Apheia, the river goddess (pictured).

I latched onto an older American couple from Florida and by coincidence, the husband had his wallet stolen at the same metro as Jerry. So here's another travel tip--when in Athens avoid the Monasteriki station. By another coincidence, the husband was a classmate of Gore Vidal at Philip Exeter and I was reading Hollywood by Vidal at the time.

Of the three islands, I liked Hydra (pronounced HEE-dra) best. The waterfront was full of stray dogs and cats and donkeys--there are no cars allowed because the streets are so narrow, so the donkeys are the main means of transportation. I wandered around and took shots of fishermen, donkeys, churches, brightly painted windows, old men and little boys pushing carts--there are no cars, remember.

After Hyrda, we had lunch on board. The American couple and I sat with three people from Egpyt. Poros was next and not as cute as Hydra, but I got a great shot of a fisherman mending his net. I just tried to upload it and stupid Blogger erased everything I had written since the last upload. So I'll put that in a separate post.

Then in Agina, we took a bus out to the mountain to see the temple of the river goddess. We were on the bus with the Chinese people. Our guide from the boat--a cigarette-voiced woman who sounded like Melina Mercouri, it seems all Greek women sound like that--would tell us about the pistachio nut trees and the legend of the island, then hand the microphone to the Chinese guide.

We had 20 minutes at the temple and it was very tourist-y with four busloads of people from the boat taking pictures. But it was worth the trip because it was sunset and the effect was quite dramatic against the ancient columns. Of course, there was a souvenir stand where we were sold pistachio nut ice cream--a huge slab of it with goat cheese for four Euros.

Back in the town I walked around and almost missed the boat. They had pulled the gangplank back and the sea was incredibly choppy. I had to run all the way back from the dock. "Can you swim?" asked a crew member, but then he put the gangplank back. I was the last one on board. On the cruise back, we were given a "Greek folklore show" with two dancers in traditional costumes and a comic who did impressions of Elvis Presley, cats from different countries (saying meow in various accents), and dressed in drag as frumpy cleaning woman.

Back in Athens, I had the bus drop me off near the Plaka and I found a nice restautant where I had lamb wrapped in grape leaves. At the next table two flight attendants bitched about their jobs and it was more entertaining than the folklore show. Then back to the hotel and I watched Al Jazeera and BBC. The next day Jerry would return from Turkey and it would be the last full day in Greece.

A Christmas Yule Blog

It's Christmas Eve and something has been bothering me. You know that song "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year"? You usually hear Andy Williams singing it while you're shopping for last minute gifts for people you don't really like at the K mart around the corner or on that lite music station that goes all-Xmas all-the-time on the day after Thanksgiving. Anyway, there's this one line: "There'll be scary ghost stories and tales of old glories of Christmases long, long ago." Who tells "scary ghost stories" on Christmas? Did the lyricist get yuletide mixed up with Halloween like in that Tim Burton movie? That's always bothered me.

In a similar vein, there was one Christmas when my family was visiting us upstate and we didn't tell scary ghost stories, but we did watch Westerns. American Movie Classics was showing a marathon of westerns. I think they called it Cowboys at Christmas or something. This was when the network actually lived up to its name and showed old movies instead of Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and 1980s movie bombs. I'l watch a Western if it's good--like The Searchers, High Noon, or Stagecoach. But my dad likes anything with horses and guns--literally, he will watch the worst piece of crap you can imagine as long as there is a shoot-out in it somewhere. So after turkey dinner, we gathered round the electronic fire and viewed Winchester 73 and Bend in the River, both starring Jimmy Stewart.

Winchester 73 has everybody you could think of in it--Stewart, Shelley Winters, Tony Curtis (when he was still Bernie Schwartz), Will Geer (Grampa Walton as Doc Holliday), Dan Dureya as a snivelling coward (his usual role), Rock Hudson as an Indian brave, and that guy who played the studio head in Singin' in the Rain.

Bend in the River was later in Stewart's career. Big, technicolor epic. You can picture seeing it at the drive-in with the whole family on a Saturday night and being overwhelmed by the color and the wide vistas. Stewart co-starred with another big cast, agin with Rock Hudson (he was still doing second leads), Arthur Kennedy as the villain, Henry Morgan before Dragnet and MASH,and Aunt Bee from the Andy Griffin Show. It was almost like we were out on the plains, because it gets really dark upstate.

A Day at Delphi

(ATHENS, GREECE) Wednesday Dec. 16, we took a day trip to Delphi. Our driver was named Mike and he was excellent. Along the way--it was about two and half hours outside Athens--we stopped at the new Olympic stadium, an olive oil factory, a cheese store, a touristy place in this skiing village where we bought a pair of gloves and a statue of Hermes. At Delphi, the main attraction is the Temple of Apollo where oracles would breath in fumes and make with the prophesies. As I said in my previous Athens post, this reminds me on when Steeve Reeves went to the Oracle at Delphi and she told him something about not displeasing his father Zeus. He was to stay on earth for a while. Then it rained and Steeve got all those gorgeous muscles soaking wet and... but I digress.

There was also the temple of Athena and a museum with the finer pieces and statues found at the temple. The temple was set in a mountain and it meant a long climb up. Afterwards, as it was getting dark, one of Jerry's therapist colleagues wanted to see the crossroads where Oedipus killed his father Laius. Mike was not familiar with the spot, but he found out from another driver named George where it was. Evidently, once in 15 years someone had asked to see it. There is no sign or plaque or anything to mark the legendary encounter. There was a memorial to an accident victim (pictured). There are dozens of these along the road from Athens to Delphi. Simple boxes mounted on poles with pictures of the victim, flowers, icons, etc. They are like folk art and I took a picture of the one by the Oedipus crossroads. If I were a professional photographer I would go to Greece and take pictures of all these home-made memorials.

One more thing about Hercules: I used to watch the TV cartoon series in the 1960s and it totally departed from the classic myths. In this version, which came on Sundays on this cheesey local Philadelphia kid's show hosted by a clown named Lorzeno,Herc has a magic ring which gave him his super strength and an annoying sidekick--a centaur named Newton. There was also a girlfriend named Helena, an evil wizard named Daedalus, and a witch named Wilhelmina who has a parrot. None of these elements occured in ancient Greece, except Daedalus was a kind inventor who was the father of Icarus.

Stopolis at the Acropolis or It's Just a Big Pile of Rocks

(ATHENS, GREECE) I arrived here in Athens Sunday morning after a flight which left JFK on Saturday afternoon. I took some anti-jet lag pills and felt fine. (Delta is pretty cheap by the way, they don't even have those TV sets in the back of the seats.) Jerry and his colleagues were off to their conference, so I looked in the guide book and discovered the guard was changed in front of the Parliment building at 11AM every Sunday. If I hurried I would just make it. I found the metro (notice that only in America is it called the subway) and saw the elaborate ceremony with the soliders in their traditional uniforms with the white skirts, tasselled slippers, and funny hats. There are 400 pleats in each skirt for the 400 years of Turkish occupation.

Then I walked to the flea market and from there to the Acropolis area. It was a long walk, but I finally found it. Across the street was Hadrian's Gate and the remains of the temple of Olympian Zeus which is a series of huge columns and a pile of rocks as a result of earthquakes. I then walked up the hill to the Acropolis--steep and tiring. It was actually warm, a shock considering how cold it was in NYC. The Acropolis is a series of temples erected to the gods. The main one is the Parthenon, built to honor Athena, goddess of wisdom and the protector of the city. The pediments--which are reconstructed in the new Acropolis museum--depict the birth of Athena and her contest with Poseidon, her uncle, for the right to be patron of the new city later called Athens in her honor.

The legend goes that Zeus, king of the gods, had a terrible headache. Hepheseus, god of fire and the forge, split his head open with an axe to relieve the pain (they obviously didn't have a public option) and out sprang Athena, fully grown in armor and full of her father's wisdom. I'm sure Zeus said, "What the hell was that?" The other pediment depicts Athena's contest with her uncle Poseidon, Zeus's brother, for control of the city. Poseidon struck the earth and produced a sword. Athena did the same and out sprang an olive tree-symbol of peace. Athena won!

My quesion is how does this jibe with all those Hercules movies starring dreamy Steeve Reeves? And does it overlap with the Thor comics where Hercules fights Thor and somehow Asgard and Mount Olympus both exist in the modern world? Jack Kirby later offers a different explanation in his The Eternals.

Anyway, we all got together and had drinks at the Hotel Bretany. On Monday, we visited the Archaeological Museum with plenty of hot male statues. Tuesday, we went back to the Acropolis--I was the only one who had already been. We--myself, Jerry and two colleagues--hired a guide named Athena who explained quite a bit while the winds howled and dogs followed us barking and humping each other. There are a lot of stray dogs and cats around the Acropolis, but not as many as in Istanbul. I was surprised there was no audio guide you could rent. After all, this is one of the most famous--if not THE most famous--spots in the world. Probably guides like Athena who are unionized fought tooth and nail to prevent this potential dent in their income.

After the Acropolis, we walked through the Agora, the ancient marketplace where most of the Athenians did their daily thing. The most interesting site was the prison where Socrates was executed for thinking a bit too freely. He drank hemlock. There was nothing left of the site. But it was moving to think a philosopher could be killed for exercising freedom of thought--and it still happens today.

The next day we took a day trip to Delphi which I will detail in the next post.

Barefoot in Athens

(ATHENS, GREECE) Here's another travel tip for you. If you happen to be in Athens and you have to ride the metro, avoid crowds and keep your wallet in your inside shirt pocket with your jacket zipped up. Yesterday, my partner Jerry was rushing onto the metro in a vey big crowd--Athens is terribly crowded--I got into the car ahead of him. There was a bunch of young men pushing and shoving. Jerry got into the car and the young men got out, acting as if they were on the wrong train. We looked down and saw a wallet on the floor. At first we thought it belonged to somebody else, but then Jerry reached into his pants and realized it was his. I suddenly said, "Check to make sure you haven't been robbed." He opened the wallet and all the cash--Euros and dollars-- were gone. The young men had distracted him so he didn't even feel the wallet had been lifted.

Well, what can you do? We had enough money elsewhere and we managed to get some cash from a Greek ATM. Strangely enough, I was reading an interview with Diane von Furstenberg in the Delta magazine on the plane coming over and she was pickpocketed on a recent European trip. Other than that we've had fun--the Acropolis, Agora, Plaka, wonderful food. More from Greece later.

Pre-Greece Jitters

Here's a travel tip for you: If you want to check-in online the night before your international flight, make sure your passport isn't going to expire in less than three months. I'm leaving for Athens tomorrow and I received an email from Delta inviting me to check in online. I go to the website, punch in my passport number and expiration date which is next Feb. and I get one of the little red lines saying "You cannot check in if your passport expires within three months. You must see an agent at the airport." My heart stopped. I have visions of having to go the Greek embassy or winding up like Zev and Justin of The Amazing Race when they lost their passports in Cambodia and losing first place. So I called Delta and was on hold for 20 minutes--don't worry I amused myself by watching Jonny Quest--it was the one set in Norway with the acrobatic dwarf disguised as a gargoyle in order to steal the anti-gravity device.

Finally a human got on the line and explained when your passport is within three months of expiring you're not allowed to check in on line. They have to make sure you won't stay past your expiration date--they think of you like a quart of milk. But I said I'm returning in a week, it's even on my return ticket. For some reason, they need a human agent to verify you won't get stuck in Athens for three months.

Oh well, it's off to the airport tomorrow. I'm taking the E train all the way to nearly the last stop and getting on the airtrain to JFK. This is the first time I've done it going to the airport, I've done it coming back. I was tempted to go a comic book sale in the morning, but it's deep in Brooklyn and with this new wrinkle, I want to get to the airport in plenty of time. I'll have to skip it.

I do like travelling in spite of these little hiccups. I love my little blue bag of toiletries I can hang on the towel rack in the hotel. I love sitting in the airport terminal reading a left-over copy of USA Today. There's a travel store on 12th St. where I bought some anti-jetlag pills. They had two fascinating books--one with transit maps from all over the world and another filled with pictures of tickets--from airlines, trains, theatres again from all over the world. There is some fascinating about these little souvenirs and scraps of paper giving glimpses of yours or other people's lives. I bought a Thor comic at Time Machine the other day. (It was #128 with Thor and Hercules fighting the forces of Pluto, the god of hell.) Inside the plastic bag containing it was a credit card receipt dated 2000 from a comic book store in Scranton, PA. I wondered who bought it there and how it wound up in New York. Will someone look at my boarding pass and think "That idiot should have renewed his passport sooner."?

Gay Marriage in the Garden State

I don't know if I can live through this again. The New Jersey State Senate will take up the gay marriage debate and vote on it by the end of this week or early next week. I'll be in Europe then so I won't be thinking about it, but it's really rattling me that my value as a member of society is being decided. Well, maybe that's an exaggeration. The thing is they are bringing this to a vote before governor Corzine leaves office because he said he would sign it into law and his Republican sucessor Christie (not to confused with Florida's closeted Republican Christ) would veto it without hestitation. What a fat pig! (I said it and I'm glad!)

I was trolling the internet and came across a story about a rabbi who was speaking out against this gay marriage bill, I presume to the NJ senate or a committee that was voting on the bill. The rabbi said he pitied a poor lonely orphaned child who would be forced to be adopted by a gay couple. That didn't bother me as much as David Link, a gay blogger at Independent Gay Forum.com who said we shouldn't think of this well-intentioned man as a bigot. That we should be careful in labelling those who speak against us as bigots. Link goes on to say we should be generous and give the rabbi the benefit of the doubt.

"That is a blindness, but I don’t think it is necessarily blameworthy. To my mind, it not as condemnable as the actions of those who can (and do) see us in our ordinary lives, yet intentionally exploit the bias against us for political advantage. The harm to our equality is the same in either case, but there is a moral difference that we should acknowledge. (HA!)

It is possible this learned man falls into the latter category. But until we know for sure, I don’t think we can call him a bigot. We can, though, wish him to see us more generously."

I'm sorry, but this man IS a bigot. He is making judgments about people he doesn't even know based on their sexuality. He's presuming a gay couple will automatically be a harmful influence and can in no way be fit parents. That is the same as saying something sweeping about all Jews, blacks, or Latinos, etc. When will people wake up. Call things by their proper name--it's bigotry and I have no respect for those who spout it or those who excuse it.

I'm afraid we'll lose again in New Jersey. The economy's to blame, apologists say. People aren't concerned about gay rights when they can't put twinkies on the table. Horse Hockey!, as Colonel Potter used to say on MASH. It's not like we're going to stop legisilation to get married. If anything, gay marriage helps a state's economy. All those New Yorkers deprived of getting married will cross the border into Weehawken where enterprising preachers will join them and they can return to the Empire State where their union will be recognized.

The Amazing Race Finale--How Sweet the Sound

This was one of the better finale episodes because any one of the three teams could have won. They were all on the same flight from Prague to Vegas and at every challenge they were all right on each other's heels. I did not want Meghan and Cheyne to win because I hate it when the expected team triumphs. I would have prefered Team Zebra or even the gay brothers which would have driven 90 percent of the viewership crazy. And how could they not know who the final team was when they were in the airport in Prague? Did they stop sequestering everyone together?

I guess Meghan and Chayne did deserve to win. Despite going to the wrong hotel for the penultimate challenge and Cheyne closing his eyes during the face-first repel, they finished counting the million in chips first because they kept their cool and didn't get all flustered like Dan did. Now on the Amazing Race 16.

I got a Facebook email from my friend and fellow TAR enthuiast Lydia that several teams were seen leaving the LA airport on Nov. 28 for The Amazing Race 16 including two guys from Big Brother 11--I have no idea who they are, the only Big Brother I watched was the one with Evil Dick--and a former Miss South Carolina who gave the stupidest answer in the history of pageantdom--even dumber than Carrie Prejean's. This girl's the one who didn't know her geography very well and just rambled for 15 minutes. They made a joke about the irony of her being on the Amazing Race on The Soup this weekend, so it must be true. Will the new Amazing Race 16 overlap with Project Runway 7 so my life will have meaning again?

Final summary Day 17--leave Prague, fly to Vegas with a layover in London. Day 18--race to Elvis impersonator chapel--was the real the wedding for that couple? I hope not; face-first repel (BTW, how could you not know Monte Carlo is the capital of Monaco?), Cirque du Soleil challenge, race to the MGM to meet a face-lifted Wayne Newton, finish line at Newton's house. Malibu Ken and Barbie win, Sam and Dan second, Erika and Brian third. We now know Erika's family hasn't fully accepted Brian because of his race, but is Brian's family all hunky-dory with the whole interracial thing? I guess so.

Blanches and Hamlets I Have Known

Last night we went to see Cate Blanchett in A Streetcar Named Desire at BAM. Here are all the Blanche DuBoises I have seen:
1. Vivien Leigh (1951 movie version)
2. Shirley Knight (1976 in Philadelphia, I think it was the McCarter Theatre)
3. Blythe Danner (Circle In the Square, 1988 or so)
4. Jessica Lange (1992 Broadway with Alec Baldwin, she also did it for TV)
5. Ann-Margret (also TV version opposite Treat Williams)
6. Elizabeth Marvel (weird-ass New York Theatre Workshop production)
7. Natasha Richardson (Roundabout Theatre Company)
8. Marin Mazzie (2009 Berkshire Theatre Festival)
9. Cate Blanchett

Hamlet seems to be the male equivalent of Blanche as a role much sought after. Here are all the Hamlets I can remember seeing:
1. Laurence Olivier (1940s film version)
2. John Glover (1976 or 77, Walnut Street Theater. I remember a girl I knew in high school saying "Hamlet's a fox")
3. Derek Jacobi (BBC TV version, ironically Patrick Stewart was Claudius and later played it opposite David Tenant's Hamlet. Tenant is Doctor Who and that Hamlet is going to be on TV next year sometime)
4. Kevin Kline (twice at the Public)
5. Mel Gibson (1990s movie)
6. Kenneth Branagh (later 1990s movie)
7. Stephen Lange (crappy Roundabout Thetre version)
8. Peter Stomare (Ingmar Bergman production at BAM in Swedish)
9. Villanova production, two or three Off-Off-Bway productions I can't remember
10. Ralph Fiennes (on Broadway)
11. Maggie Smith's son (in London)
12. Michael Stuhlbarg (in Central Park last summer)
13. Jude Law
14. Richard Burton (on a DVD of his 1964 Broadway performance, he was in love with the sound of his own voice and not playing the part)
15. Bob Denver (in the musical version on Gilligan's Island--"Neither a borrower nor a lender be/ There's just one other thing you've got to do/ To thine own self be true!"--directed by Ida Lupino).

The Check-Out Line at Whole Foods and Other Sources of Aggravation

Have you ever shopped at Whole Foods? You need a engineering degree to figure out the check-out line. While buying French butter with my partner at said establishment, I commented that it was like being in a sci-fi movie where you would be zapped if you didn't unscramble the code of numbers and letters to get you out of the maze on the hostile planet. There are five separate lines to stand in, each with it own color. When you get to the front of your respective line you are confronted with this giant Bingo board with various numbers lighting up. You have to match the number to your color. If you are standing in the red line, you have to wait until a number shows up in red on the giant screen and then you go the register with the corresponding number. There are about 40 registers. The only trouble is the colors on the board don't always match the color of the lights. I was standing in the purple line and the one on the board was more of a blue.

In other grocery store aggravation news, I was standing behind two young women at Food Emporium the other day. They were purchasing some product and disputing the price with the cashier. She had to call her supervisor who checked and found out that the larger size of the item was on sale, not the size the two customers wanted. They said never mind and left without buying anything. What an outrage and a crime against humanity. They wasted five of my valuable minutes. Some people.

2012 GOPers A Panicked Herd of Elephants

The Republican field of 2012 presidential hopefuls continues to shift and reshape itself. Mike Huckabee appears to have met his Willie Horton for pardoning a convict while he was governor of Arkansas. The guy recently killed some police officers. Pope Billy O'Reilly has officially granted him clemency with a dispensation from on high: "It wasn't your fault, governor." I will say that at least Huckabee stands by his faith and isn't a mean-spirited, nasty sort like most of them--like the senators who remain silent on the gay-execution law in Uganda. (Rachel Maddow did a whole tihng on the connection between the Family on C Street and anti-AIDS money going to Uganda tonight, but I digress).

Mitt Romney--as some clever person called him on the Huffington Post--Guy Smiley (the mupper game show host on Sesame Street) continues to try to grab our attention with an editorial in USA Today advocating deregulating Wall Street because that worked out so well last time.

Lou Dobbs is apparently getting all soft on them foreigners and Dick Chaney just says forget it. Who's left? Oh yes, Sarah Palin. I came across a special magazine devoted to her at Wal Mart. She just wants low taxes, no government interference, and lots of military protection.

No Gay Marriage in NY Thanks to Hiram the Hypocrite

(Pictured: A loving couple unable to be married)Today I went from elation to depression. The day started with the news the NY State Senate would debate and vote on Governor Patterson's gay marriage bill. There was talk it might actually pass. I watched live streaming of the debate and only heard those in favor deliver passionate and moving arguments. I had to go into a meeting and when I emerged I heard the measure was defeated. To make matters worse, my state senator voted no. Guess who he is? Hiram Monseratte, the shining example of healthy heterosexual relationships who slashed his girlfriend Karla Giraldo and was almost jailed for it. The only reason he got off was because the stupid woman refused to testify against him and claimed it was accident. Not coincidentally, he agreed to marry her. Her silence or rather compliance was bought for a ring on her finger--excellent way to help stabilize the institution of marriage.

I called Monseratte's office in Albany and unloaded on an innocent office aide. "I know you only work there and have no influence on the senator, but I'm going to say this anyway. Who the hell is he with his personal history to pass judgement on anyone else's relationship? Slashing your girlfriend's face is not going to bolster the sagging sacred institute of marriage." The worker thanked me for not getting mad at him personally and said he would tell Monseratte my feelings. I also said I would remember this vote at election time.

Obviously the popular vote against us in Maine and California has moderate Democrats scared and Republicans emboldened. Do they really think they would be voted out if they favored gay marriage? But I am confident time is on my side. Younger people are fine with gay marriage. The day will come when our great-great grandchildren will say to each other "Can you believe those bigoted old pigs, voting to deny marriage equality?" Just as we now say to each other "I can't believe people used to actually believe slavery was perfectly okay."

The Amazing Race Episode 10--A Kafka-esque Experience

Once again, ignornace of world literature trips up players on the Amazing Race. Big Easy obviously did not read Kafka in college or he would have remembered that Franz was the guy's first name and he was from Prague. Just like last season, when only Victor recalled Chekhov was the name of a Russian playwright and was able to spell his name.


The more serious question is was Sam (or was it Dan?) wrong in not giving Big Easy the answer after agreeing to work with him? He was right not to help since it worked in knocking the Globetrotters out of the game and leaving a weaker team--Brian and Ericka to compete against. But he did say he would work with Big Easy, implying that if he got the right answer, he'd share it. I would not have agreed to work together with Big Easy in the first place since at this late stage of the game every second counts. The brothers are being roundly condemned for stealing Brian and Ericka's cab last week and now not living up to their word, but their strategy is working. However, Chayne was almost as bad when he told Brian and Ericka he'd call them a cab a few weeks ago and never did. I agree with all the Sam and Dan haters who are tired of their bickering and screaming. Dan is a big baby, moaning about how heavy their golem was and continually telling Sam to shut up.

This was one of the better episodes since there was no time wasted at the airport and it was in a city I have visited. I remembers several of the sights including the Charles Bridge and the synagogue. The speed bump for Brian and Ericka looked easy--drinking some absinthe--but then they all seem to be. The poker chicks had to deliver some tea and Pinkie and the Brain had to sit in a sauna.

The suspense was good because it was never entirely clear if the Globetrotters would be eliminated since there was the possibility the broken arm on Sam and Dan's golem could have disqualified them or delivering the booze would have taken too long for Brian and Ericka. I also enjoyed seeing Sam, Dan and Brian shirtless in the deep freeze cabinet. I don't feel too badly for the Globetrotters, they won a trip to Turks and Calcos and some other prizes, plus they must make at least six figures each as professional athletes so they don't really need the $1 million prize.

Chayne and Meghan will probably win--I hate it when one team wins most of the time. Sam and Dan will fight too much and Brian and Ericka aren't as organized and skillful with Ericka always bitching about how everything's so hard.

Day 15--(or so, there's no way of telling if they've had more than one day of rest)--Kafka challenge with ringing telephones and stone-faced bureaucrats which probably none of them got the references to kafka's work, Flight Time and Big Easy give up and take four-hour penalty; Brian and Ericka have boozy speed bump; Cryo-freeze chamber; Golem or beer delivery road block; Cheyne and Meghan win again--two flat-screen TVs. Globetrotters eliminated.

Scenes from the Life of an Amateur Comic Book Collector (8)

Just before Thanksgiving I went on another comic buying binge at Time Machine. I know; it's getting bad. Soon I might have to join Comic Buyers Anonymous. This haul includes

House of Mystery 156, 158, 170, 171, 173

Mystery in Space 107

Metal Men 10

Thor 157

Strange Adventures 130

I bought a bunch of House of Mysteries (or Houses of Mystery) because the feature of this comic during the latge 1960s was Dial H for Hero, starring young Robby Reed, a nerdy kid with blonde hair and glasses who resembled a guy I went to junior high school with who was not the typical nasty idiot but an actual nice person (I don't remember his name). Anyway, while cave exploring (how science geeky can you get?) Robby finds a mystery dial--much like Dr. Don Blake finds Thor's legendary hammer. When he dials the letters H-E-R-O he becomes a grown-up superhero, a different one each time.

Imagine the psychological impact--a small, weak bookworm tranforms into a muscular, superpowerful champion at the spin of a dial. Robby lives with his grandfather--affectionately called Gramps--and the housekeeper Miss Millie in the town of Littleville (I guess because Smallville was already taken). It follows Robby's parents are dead. Presumably Gramps and Miss Millie are in a platonic relationship, so Robby has no role models. He's probably teased at school for his brain (in the comic he has friends and roller skates and has impromptu dance parties with the all the other kids, but let's take the more realistic view that he's an intellectual outcast). Now he has a big secret he can share with no one--he's all those dozens of supermen flying around Littleville.

His numerous alter egos include Quakemaster, The Squid, Baron Buzzsaw, Don Juan, Sphinx Man, The Human Icicle, Strata Man, Gill Man, Whirl-i-gig, the Yankee Doodle Kid, the Mole, Giant Boy (a little too close to Collosal Boy of the Legion of Super-Heroes), Chief Mighty Arrow, the Mighty Moppet, and many others. How does he cope with it and what about his burgeoning sexuality? In House of Mystery 170, he tranforms into a flying version of Don Juan while vacationing in Spain. While battling a gang of smugglers, he is mobbed like a rock star by local ladies (who are all dressed as if they were in a production of Carmen). How would that make a kid in a man's body feel? He runs away as the women tear at his clothes like the chorus of The Bacchae. Does he ever just get horny and think to himself, "I'll dial myself into a big, hunky superhero and grab that snooty girl from English Lit. She'll fall for me, we'll have a date, I'll definitely score, then return to being Robby." Or maybe he's in the closet and imagines transforming in a big hunky superhero and flying to the Village or San Francisco.

The Mystery in Space of this era featured a similar split personality protagonist in the form of Ultra, a space pilot who through a freak accident takes on a composite body with four equal parts belonging to different aliens. He can never reveal to his girlfriend he is really her fiance. He's not as interesting as Robby. More thoughts on these vital topics later.

Thanksgiving Friday with George of the Jungle

It's the end of the Thanksgiving weekend. This Sunday brings to mind four-day vacations from school. It also meant more cartoons--I don't recall if it also meant more Broadway musicals, because I don't think Macy's parade did numbers from Main Stem tuners back then. Anyway, one Thanksgiving we were visiting relatives in Massachusetts and the Friday after Thanksgiving, ABC was showing its entire Saturday morning line-up. They even had a commercial promoting it with an animated turkey playing a rock guitar. I recall watching it with my brother in the basement of a cousin's house. I had to be 1968 and the shows included the Hanna-Barbera version of The Fantastic Four, which was pretty sophisticated for a kid's cartoon, Spider-Man, also sophisticated, and George of the Jungle, a very funny parody of Tarzan made by the same people who did Rocky and Bullwinkle, Hoppity Hooper, the Quisp and Quake and Cap'n Crunch commercials.

When I recently visited my parents in Philly, a Blockbuster video store was going out of business and I found a DVD of George of the Jungle episodes (all 17) for $10. I had earlier not bought a Jonny Quest DVD for $10 which I had regretted ever since. So I snapped it up. Very funny, grown-up humor. George is a clumsy, hunky apeman who perpetually crashes into trees while swinging to the rescue and is so dumb he thinks his elephant Shemp is a big, long nosed doggie. As an example of the sophiticated humor, in one episode, an evil witch doctor is aiming darts at a board which reads "Medicare." In another George is exhibits his skill in animal calling. He calls for hippos and a tribe of long-haired weirdos shows up. "George, you called for the hippies, not the hippos," explains his assistant. an Ape named Ape who speaks with a Ronald Coleman accent. The George cartoons are not as funny as the supporting features which appeared weekly--Super Chicken and Tom Slick.

Super Chicken is a riotous send-up of superheroes with millionaire playchicken Henry Cabot Henhouse III who is in reality the super-powered fowl battling for truth and justice against such villains as the Zipper, the Oyster, the Noodle, the Fat Man, Salivador Rag Dolly, Merlin Brando (who lives on the Isle of Lucy), and the Laundry Man (an incredibly racist stereotype of a Chinese villain). In one episode, a mad scientist creates a giant raging toupee which Super Chicken subdoes by causing it to worry thus making its gigantic hair fall out. He is assisted by a lion named Fred who appears to be his butler, but is dressed in a red sweater with a backwards F and sneakers. (I found the above illustration with Super Chicken and Fred which is a panel from a George of the Jungle comic book which I had as a kid.)

Tom Slick is a race car driver whose overwhelming goodsportsmanship is a source of annoyance for his main nemesis Baron Otto Matic. Every week Tom would convert his car the Thunderbolt Grease-Slapper into a balloon, drag racer, locomotive, snowmobile, submarine, skateboard, etc. for a big race. He was accompanied by Marigold, a lovely young lady, and Gertie Growler, a caustic old lady (with the same voice as Super Chicken). owner of a garage and presumably his mechanic. My favorite villain on Tom Slick was Sonia Nar and her Aqua-Nuts who lived in Drown Town (a metropolis beneath the waves) and who supplied the dirty tricks to stop Slick during a submarine race. June Foray gave her the same voice as Natasha Fatale on Rocky and Bullwinkle.

This Thanksgiving in between cleaning out the gutters and putting up the fake Christmas tree, I watched a few George of the Jungle episodes and they made me feel nine again. Other cartoons of the era I remember enjoying are Frankenstein Junior and the Impossibles, Birdman and the Galaxy Trio, the Super Six, Underdog ( I recently met George S. Irving who was the narrator on that show at a reading of a George Bernard Shaw play), and the Superman-Batman Adventure Hour. You can tell I spent entirely too much time in front of the TV just like now.

Why Are Republicans Eating Each Other Alive?

I hate to admit it but the GOP is in a fairly good position for 2010. There is growing dissatisfaction with Obama because he doesn't seem to be able to clean up the enormous pile of shit left behind by the previous administration with a wave of his magic wand. The economy hasn't been fixed and it's been almost a whole year. C'mon already, what are you waiting for, the impatient babies of the nation are whining. So the Repubs can take advantage of that by seizing the volatile independents in the middle who have no political convictions, they just want their meals on the table, cheap tickets to NASCAR and for their asses not to bet blown up.

But the party of Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt seems to shooting itself in the collective foot--or rather the right foot is stomping on the left. But skewing to the extreme right with these tea bag nut jobs, they risk losing the center. You win elections by kissing up to the middle. Just ask Barack and Bill and both Bushes. Even Ronnie knew enough not get too Archie Bunker-ish.

The tea parties will definitely help them in the south, but it will kill them up north. Ironic isn't it since tea parties started in Boston.

So I am kinda worried about the midterms, but I still feel OK for 2012. How have they got to challenge Obama? Palin is a joke but a dangerous one that some take seriousky. Huckabee is even-tempered and presents a pleasant front, but is too religious. Romney is an insincere stiff and the evangelics think he's a heretic because he's a Mormon. Maybe someone will emerge we haven't even thought of yet. But Obama's saving grace may be that independents will think he's not so bad when you compare him to the crop of losers on the other side.

Carrie Prejean and Levi Johnston--Exploiters or Exploited?--with a Wink to Adam Lambert

In the ongoing political media circus where the competing rings are entertanment and politics--and the two sometimes spill over--two figures have recently emerged who are attempting to stretch out their allotted 15 minutes. Both are prostitutes to a certain degree in that they are trading on their seuxal appeal in exchange for notreiety and money, but one is a hypocrite about it and the other is not.

If you haven't guessed which is which, Carrie Prejean is the hypocrite and Levi Johnston is the honest whore. Prejean has been riding her high moral horse onto the sets of Today, Larry King, The View, etc. while Johnston makes no bones about flashing his youthful physique for cash. Both of these brain trusts were thrust into the spotlight as a result of the confused sexual politics of America 2009. Prejean gave a confused politically incorrect answer to an inappropriate question asked by an idiotic gossip columnist at a beauty pageant. Johnston had the good or bad luck--depending on how you look at it--of not using contraception with the daughter of a symbol of traditional marriage (meaning you're supposed to be a virign when you waltz down the aisle).

Now don't get me wrong. Prejean has every right to express her opinions on gay marriage, just like Jefferson Davis had every right to say he supported slavery. But who cares what a beauty contestant thinks about hot political topics? What have civil rights got to do with your ability to fill out a bathing suit and sashay around in a tacky evening gown? The wrinkle here is she claims she's standing up for family values and was smacked down for it by the liberal media. HA! It turns out this skank has eight---count 'em eight--solo sex tapes floating around. Plus countless topless photos. So it's not like she made one little mistake. And the evidence seems to indicate she knowingly exploited herself, no big bad pornographer forced her to make these tapes or pictures. So who is she to look down on anyone for their sexuality? This paragon of het marriage would deny us gays social sanction for our unions while she's been selling videos of her body.

Johnston is just trying to take advantage of his sudden fame. His mom has been arrested for dealing drugs. He hasn't got a job--I don't think. So why not. His ex-future mother-in-law was exploiting him by using him as a prop at the Republican National Convention (Look at my nice normal family, we're just like the Brady Bunch, family trumps experience every time, America), so why shouldn't he do some exploiting of his own?

And speaking of sexual hypocrisy what is all this indignation over Adam Lambert on the AMAs? What about Justin Timberlake ripping off Janet Jackson's top at the Superbowl? I notice nobody got upset with him over that. What responsible parent is going to let their kid up that late anyway? I can see the simulated oral sex upsetting some people, but it was really the male kiss that pissed everybody off. They couldn't even get away with guys tonguing each other on Will and Grace. There has been more man kissing on Brothers and Sisters in the past season, but America still has a problem with open expression of gay male love. Women doing it don't seem to bother them that much. I think there was not as much of a ruckus when Madonna kissed that other female pop star because they knew it was just for a laugh and not real. Maybe Adam and Carrie should have a debate.

Amazing Race Episodes 7,8 and 9

I'm finally catching up with the vital job of giving my impressions of my favorite reality shows. We're getting down to the wire on the Amazing Race and the teams are showing their true colors. In tonight's episode in Prague, Brian and Ericka are still naively believing they can play fair and get ahead while Sam and Dan are stealing their cab. Last week, Megan and Chayne said they'd call a cab for Team Zebra and never did. Stealing a cab was uncool and I would not have done that. However, this week Chayne was perfectly justified in taking a cab at the tram station while the Globetrotters waited. He was taking advantage of an opportunity and not being sneaky or rude as whiny Megan was bitching he was.

Sam and Dan are bickering constantly now and I'm getting tired of it. So I won't be heartbroken if they lose and Cheyne and Megan win. Though it was pretty dumb of Megan to say she wanted to work with the Globetrotters when they didn't need to. According to the preview, it looks like they are stuck in Prague for another episode and Brian and Ericka will probably not make the final three.

Summary of the last three legs:
Still Day 11--Teams leave Amsterdam at 9:30 PM, have to wait in airport for morning flights to Stockholm. Day 12--Arrive Stockholm, Tivoli Gardens, then dynamite challenge, switchback--haystack roadblock, Flight Time and Big Easy win trip to Turks and Calcos, 2:33 AM, teams leave to catch the ferry for Tallen, Estonia.
Day 13--Ferry doesn't leave until 5:45 PM, takes 16 hours to get to Tallen. Day 14--solve medieval mystery at the house of the blackheads, detour with mud volleyball or slingshots, Meghan and Chayne win again (I forget their prize). Pinkie and the Brain eliminated.
Day 14--12 midnight, teams leave for Prague, flight at 5:20 a.m. for Riga, then transfer for Prague. Kayak or rope challenge, find miniature violin in the opera house while a tenor sang Don Giovanni, Cheyne and Megan win again--trip to Hawaii.

Project Runway: Finale, Yawn!

I've been busy having a real life so I haven't blogged in a few weeks. Project Runway came to end and like the rest of this first season on Lifetime, the last few episodes were a big yawn. What a disappointment that the first season I blogged about was so lackluster. While visiting my family in Phila., I was chatting about how bad it was and my dad mentioned that he had read the reason Nina Garcia was not a judge for so many of the episodes was that she had to go to Paris and Milan for the fashion shows, so they sent people further down on the masthead at Marie Claire. He was reading this in a magazine while waiting for the steamroom at his gym.

Anyway, I was so glad they aufed pretty boys Logan and Christopher. Though the episode where Logan finally bit the dust, I would not have objected to Gordana taking the pipe. Her outfit was so drab compared to Logan's zipper-crazy thing.

In the two-part finale, it was kinda dull because Tim Gunn only had to go to Long Island and Manhattan to visit Carol Hannah and Irina. The furthest he had to fly was Ohio to see Althea. I wonder if he looks forward to these trips--sitting in the Cleveland airport, probably having to change planes somewhere, then renting the car, and meeting the film crew, having dinner with the folks. I did think Carol Hannah's mother was very pretty and Irina's dad was handsome as a young man in that old photo.

None of the three collections did anything for me. The gown with the long train was the only thing I liked about Althea's. Irina's was too costume-y (Tim's critique) with all the S&M stuff and those goofy hats. I did like the T-shirts, but there weren't enough of them and you couldn't see them too well. At least Carol Hannah's had some color and I don't care if it didn't tell a story--it didn't put me to sleep like the other two.

My friend Lydia joked that she thought that fashion critic-judge from the International Herald Tribune looked like Aunt Harriet on Batman (Madge Blake for you trivia buffs). But I loved her leopard skin outfit. Tres chic, Aunt Harriet. Getting ready for your date with Liberace?

Now that the whole painful thing is over we can look forward to season seven which is right around the corner on Jan. 14. I pray they will drop Models of the Runway, but I have a bad feeling it's Heidi's baby and she wants to keep it. The final episode of the Models was nothing but a clip-fest. I didn't care about the models, if I did I'd watch Tyra Banks. Because of them, there was only one non-model challenge using "real people"--the divorcee one. Having nonprofessionals to design for was what gave the Bravo Project Runway variety. Hopefully, we will be getting some more and a more dynamic group of contestants next time.

Scenes from the Life of an Amateur Comic Book Collector (7)--The Phila. Connection

Two weeks ago I visited my parents in Philadelphia and spent Sunday morning at the Philly Comic-Con held at the Ramada Inn by the airport. It was quite small and took up only two ballrooms. No celebrities giving out autographs or panels, just comic-book dealers. I didn't spend as much as at the last one (see previous blog). Here's a breakdown of the haul:

Archie as Pureheart the Powerful # 3--Archie and Reggie as superheroes

Brave and the Bold #120

Demon # 6, 11 (almost completes the entire run except from #1)

Detective Comics #310, 319, 325

Flash #169 (80 page Giant)

From Beyond the Unknown #1 (completes the entire run)

Inferior Five #4

Kamandi #3 (almost complete run of Kirby issues except for #1)

Lois Lane #60

Magnus Robot Fighter #36

Mystery in Space #28, 86, 99, 101

Strange Adventures #111, 174

Strange Tales #142

Tales of Suspense #82

Super DC Giant--Challengers of the Unknown #S-25

Thor #156 (two pages of story missing, damnit!), 160, 162, 169.

Some impressions of this haul and the last one: Lois Lane and Superman are really dysfunctional. In Lois Lane #60 (see illustration above), Lois and Lana pretend to go into suspended animation to be awakened thousands of years in the future when Superman while be dead...dead...dead! Supie attempts to bring them back by flying into the future, but their bodies disintegrate. It's all a practical joke to teach the man of steel a lesson for being short-tempered with the gals for demanding so much of his time--needing to be rescued and all that. They all laugh it off. "Oh, I thought you were dead and you scared the shit out of me, but I guess I deserved it. Ha! Ha!"

In a Superboy issue I bought at the Big Apple con (#121), a teenaged Jor-El, Superboy's father, arrives in Smallville from Kyrpton thanks to a time machine. Superboy doesn't want to reveal the true nature of their relationship since he would have to tell his future dad his world will be destroyed. "I won't reveal I'm his son," says Superboy's thought balloon, "for that would lead to telling him of Krypton's doom laying ahead. He might brood. I'll just have to enjoy my father's companionship as a...er...boy pal!" (boldfacing was in the comic) Ewwww! That is wrong on some many levels. Not the least of which is the brooding.

The Strange Adventures and Mystery in Spaces are strangely beautiful, as is the very first From Beyond the Unknown which was a reprint series from the 1970s, collecting sci-fi stories of the 1950s and early 60s from the forementioned mags. In Strange Adventures #111, published in 1959, there's a story of Earth 100 years in the future. The Star Blazer returns from a 50 year mission with crew as young as when they left, proving the theory of relativity (I think). A Spacelator breaks down, causing traffic to be stalled for a hour. A sudden downpour is halted by weather control stations. The busy day ends with an exciting broadcast from the badlands of Venus where an explorer is trapped and a quick game of space polo between earth and Pluto. Of course earth wins.

In Mystery in Space #86, the usual Adam Strange story is accompanied by a tale of The Star Rovers--a trio of space adventurers consisting of writer-hunter Homer Glint, markswoman and former beauty queen Karel Sorensen, and star athlete Rick Purvis. Each of the three encounters the same space mystery and they each have a different version of the solution. It's a sort of sci-fi Rashomon. I find these simplistic futuristic tales so fascinating. There's also Star Hawkins, a 21st century private eye with a robot secretary, and Space Cabbie, a galactic hack driver.

More in future blogs, I'm getting deeper and deeper into this like the guys on Big Bang Theory. In a recent episode, Wallowitz bet Sheldon his Fantastic Four with the first appearance of Silver Surfer versus Sheldon's Flash of Two Worlds with the Silver and Golden Age Flashes. The sad part is I knew exactly what they were talking about.

Halloween on Bourbon Street

Exhausted after putting together a huge event for my job, my partner and I decided to get away and have some fun in the Big Easy. By coincidence, it was Halloween weekend, so our trip would be capped by a big costume party on Bourbon Street. I had been to New Orleans before--it was the starting point of a cruise I took with my friend Diane--but Jerry had never been. It really is a unique city in the US. Very relaxed and casual. These people have a party at the drop of a hat. In addition to the bacchanal known as Mardi Gras, they have parades on St. Patrick's Day and then so the Italians don't feel left out, another one a week later on St. Anthony's day.

I bought a Superman costume in New York before leaving (I had a layover in the Memphis airport which looks like a bus station). We had a wonderful time, had dinner at some great restuarants (Arnaud's, Pauline's, the Gumbo Factory), listened to jazz at the Maison Bourbon, took a walking tour of the Garden District, a bus tour of the whole city including the Ninth Ward still dealing with the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, walked around the French Quarter, visited the Confederate Musuem, and dressed up for Halloween. I had my Superman outfit, complete with muscles. We bought a funny hat for Jerry which he wore with a mask and a feather boa--he was a sort of a generic Mardi Gras person. We ran into lots of costumed revellers on Bourbon Street including a group of superheroes consisting of Captain America, Batman and Robin. The photo above is of our meeting plus one non-costumed partygoer. One man was dressed as a priest with a doll of a young boy strapped to his groin. He was a big hit. There were Halloweeners as beer bottles, traffic lights, Sumo wrestlers, Jesus Christ, and lobsters.

The whole city was beautiful and fun, smelling like sweet blossoms and beer. Wonderful food of which I probably ate too much. The famous cemetries were interesting. They bury whole families in one crypt, above ground. When a new body needs to go into, they just sweep the remains of the old one to the back of the crypt. This saves lots of space. Our guide also told lots of fascinating stories including one about Edgar Degas and his brother--who lived in the city. The brother left his blind wife for the younger woman who was hired to read to her. "You can't make up a story like that for Days of Our Lives," the guide laughed.

The Amazing Race, Episode 6: Midpoint

I haven't blogged about anything for a while because Jerry and I went to New Orleans for a few days and then my laptop was infected with a nasty virus and I had to call India to get it cured. More on the Big Easy in a separate blog, but I finally caught up with TAR a few days later and was surprised it was not a non-elimination leg. They've only got five teams left and we're only halfway through the whole race.

There were so few teams that it wasn't as exciting. I always prefer it when there are lots of teams competing, but I guess the thinking is they want you to concentrate on a few as they get closer to the finish. It's just that it's only been what seems like a few episodes.

As I hoped, all couples caught up with each other thanks to a late-night flight out of Dubai to Amsterdam. So Megan and Cheyne lost their three-hour advantage. It looks as if the twelve-hour rest period rule is totally abandonded. It was about 12 noon during the day when this leg started and that had to be more than 12 hours since they finished the day before. Maybe they are genuinely concerned about racers' health and are giving them more time to relax.

Once in Amsterdam, Team Zebra really fell behind, first not knowing how to drive the car, then not being able to count the bells, and finally not reading the clue properly and walking in those wooden shoes rather than riding a bicycle. The wife (I forget her name) was constantly nagging and whining "Brian!" It was good to see Megan frustrated at the golf challenge and to see Team Malibu Barbie and Ken come in second to the gay brothers--who finally came out to the others (surprise!) The poker chicks showed some class at the end and admitted they couldn't do either task. Their sneakiness from the first episode came back to bite them in the ass, karma wise, but they accepted defeat gracefully. So it was really suspenseful thanks to editing because we didn't know who was going to finish last--Team Zebra or the Poker Chicks. There were probably hours of difference, but we didn't know that. I thought it was more interesting that stupid Mika being scared of the water slide last week.

Next week will HAVE to be a non-elimination or a two-part leg. I am disappointed that they are starting to rely on challenges from previous seasons with the needle-in-the-haystack thing.

Summary: Day 10: Wait all day at the airport for a midnight flight to Amsterdam. Day 11: Arrive in Amsterdam, count bells at church, dance and eat herring or sport challenge. Sam and Dan win a sand buggy, poker chicks quit. Probably would have not been eliminated if they had stuck it out, but it did look impossible for them to do either task--hitting bell or hitting balls. Only five teams left. Still have to catch up with Project Runway, probably will combine two episodes in one blog. What will I do when both shows are over?

Double Dose of Reality: The Amazing Race Episode 5 and Project Runway Episode 10

Didn't get around to expressing my thoughts about this week's Project Runway until just after The Amazing Race, so I thought I would combine them. Runway is pretty much the same as last week with Logan and Christopher getting saved from elimination while a not-as-pretty designer gets the axe. Nicholas's look was pretty lame, but so were Logan and Christopher's. Irina did deserve to win, it was the most tailored and imaginative of a sorry lot of dresses. But she's such a bitch. I predict either Christopher or Logan MUST go next unless Gordana really loses her confidence. This will be the first time all of the final three will be women.

I've noticed Tim's critiques are getting shorter and shorter, mainly consisting of "You have a lot of work to do." and "Go, go, go." Also did you notice that for Top Chef both Padma and Tom were nominated for a best reality host Emmy, but only Heidi is nominated and not Tim? He is the show for me. Heidi just comes out at the beginning and says same basically the same thing every week. Then makes the judgement and delivers the same lines at the end. I could recite her lines along with her. "As you know in fashion, one day you are in and the next day you're out..."

On Amazing Race, they stayed in same city (Dubai) two episodes in a row. That's annoying. The past few seasons they have been doing that, maybe to save money, but not this early in the race. Also they started out at 8:17 AM. But they finished the last leg much earlier than 8:17 PM. It was early in the afternoon. I guess the twelve-hour rest period rule is out the window or they only use it when it's convenient.

Team Malibu Barbie and Ken had a big advantage of 90 minutes since they won the fast forward last time. That's another thing I don't like about staying in the same city. If a couple has won the fast forward and there's no flight to another city to equalize everybody, chances are excellent they're going to win. Maghan and Cheyne stayed ahead the whole time without any signs of slipping (except for a brief moment at the hookah challenge).

Some of the dynamics have changed with the Annoying Poker Chicks now actually being honest and nice with the Gay Brothers (It's not clear if they still don't know if the boys are gay, evidence: the Baywatch comment with the Poker women drooling over the brothers' physiques). The two teams helped each other out at the gold-counting challenge by sharing information and a calculator.

Was I drunk or are there more commercials than before on this show. I was downloading the episode onto a DVD while I watching it and it seemed the breaks kept getting longer and longer. When we got to the final break, I thought, "Wait a minute, there's only two teams left and they're both at the last challenge. How are they going to stretch this out to fill up the time?" Just then the Chinese food arrived so I haven't reviewed the whole thing, but I got the jist. The last ten minutes was all about the Nashville girl having a breakdown because she was scared of going down the water slide. That was uncool of the Globetrotters to feed into her fears, but her partner didn't handle the situation properly. He should have encouraged her and let her know he loved her no matter what she did, but that she'd feel much better if she faced her fear and conquered it.

It looks like the next stop is in Holland--due to the little commercial about destinations. Hopefully, the rest will catch up with Meghan and Chayne.

Summary: Day 9--stay in Dubai, paddle to yacht, gold or glass, water slide, Meghan and Cheyne win for the second week in a row, win a watercraft each. Mika and Canan eliminated. Time for a non-elimination next week.

Truth and Illusion, George, You Don't Know the Difference.

The title of this blog is a quote from Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and applies to too many people these days. Some mix up the two--truth and illusion--in search of fame. The father of the balloon boy perpetrated a hoax in order to gain publicity and has probably damaged his son's perception of reality in order to get on reality TV.

Another example is Fox News' resident whacko Glenn Beck who can't tell TV images from real life. Or at least his television persona can't--I don't think he believes half of what he says. In a recent segment of his show, he called on America to harken back to the days when we all got along and believed in the same basic principals. To illustrate his point, he showed two TV commercials from the late 60s-early 70s when he was a boy: the Coke ad with Mean Joe Green taking the beverage from a young fan and then rewarding the kid with his sweaty, stinky jersey; then the Kodak commercial with Paul Anka singing "Good morning, yesterday/You wake up and time has slipped away..." while home movies of Christmas and other holidays unspool.

There is something basically screwy about using TV commercials to illustrate an ideal past. They're advertisements used to sell a product. They create an idealized, unreal image in order to get you to associate that warm fuzzy feeling with the product so you're plunk down your two dollars and get the soda or the film (now obsolete) or whatever. Plus, it wasn't that ideal a time anyway.

Beck is about my age, maybe a little younger. I can remember that era and America was torn apart by Vietnam and Watergate. We weren't all holding hands and singing "Kumbaya" (except for my younger brother who liked to croon that tune because he knew it annoyed the hell out of me). Also, blacks, Hispanics, women, gays and other minorities groups weren't exactly dancing a jig over how wonderfully and equally they were treated.

Beck then proceeded to tell a long convoluted metaphor about America being like a teenager who disobeys his parents' curfew and is now at a party where everyone is drunk and he knows he's going to be punished. He'll have to spend the next Saturday night grounded (read be more fiscally responsible). Okay, I'll concede it's a legitimate point, but it's corporate America that's been overspending, not the average citizen whom Beck was addressing. Then he actually began to cry (again!) I can tell he's acting when he tears up like that. He's almost as bad an actor as Spencer on The Hills.

This goon has also compared the Obama administration to Mao's China for advocating volunteerism with the cooperation of Hollywood. So volunteerism is evil all of a sudden? That's a bit of a leap. And here's another one--Obama is giving too much power to these psychos by launching this "war" against Fox. He should just ignore them. By targetting them and freezing them out of certain stories he's driving up their ratings and giving Murdoch and Ailes a legitimate beef.

The Amazing Race Episode 4: Sand and Snow

It's a good thing I was home Sunday night. Damn stupid football was one hour and 15 minutes overtime. I always DVR Three Rivers right after the Amazing Race just in case it runs over, but I don't DVR Cold Case which follows. I would have missed the final 15 minutes and that would have made me furious.


The timing on this week's episode--once it finally started--also had me confused. In episode three, everybody got into Phnom Pehn sometime in the afternoon, they had left Ho Chi Minh City at about 12:30PM. So they must have finished their tasks by 5 or 6 at the latest. It was still light out. So why did they start episode 4 at 12:30PM? They're supposed to have 12 hours rest, not 24. So that would put them at Day 7. Well, at least they got out of Asia. The teams' first clue was to fly to the Persian Gulf and find the world's tallest building.

Sam and Dan are real cute, but are not the brightest crayons in the box. Last week they couldn't identify Jackie Kennedy, for which they should have turned in their gay cards. But this week took the cake. I can see not knowing where the world's tallest building is, but going up to an airline counter and asking for a ticket to the Persian Gulf is just plain dumb.

We discovered that Brian is way too nice, telling practically everybody where the water in the desert was. He figures karma will pay him back. The annoying poker chicks ran over a spike in the parking lot and ruined their car. But then Sam and Dan stayed with them til a new car arrived. Do they still not know the boys are gay?

It was great to see Lance and Kerry, the Fran Drescher sound-alike with the Boston accent, just wilt in the heat and get lost. It was as if they deflated. All the bragadoccio totally left Lance the lion and he was totally humbled. There was a little piece of asshole left in him when he asked if he could kick the snowman they had to build. "Do you want your clue?," the lady said like a school teacher to a naughty little boy. Excellent! I would have just built the snowman first because finding that tiny snowman in that huge ice mountain would have been pure luck.

Team Malibu Barbie and Ken took the fast forward and came in first, winning a trip to Jamaica. They're kinda boring. I hope they don't win. It's looking like either them or the Globetrotters. I'd rather see Team Zebra or the gay brothers or even Pinkie and the Brain (father and son) take it.

Summary: Day 7: 12:25 PM, leave Phnom Pehn, Cambodia-all teams on the flight to Dubai which stops in Bangkok.

Day 8--5:30 AM Desert challenge to find water, then back into Ski Dubai for snowman challenge. Meghan and Cheyne win trip to Jamaica. Lance and Kerry eliminated. Preview of next week: Team Nashville practically have a meltdown when Nashville girl will not go down steep water slide because of her fear of heights. It looked like he was actually going to push her down. I think that slide is still in Dubai. I remember it from an earlier season. I hope they're not going to be cheap and spend a whole other episode in the same city.

Scenes from an Amateur Comic Book Collector's Life (6)--Big Apple Comic Con

I am one sick ticket. I spent Saturday at the Big Apple Comic Con which has recently been bought by Wizard Entertainment and moved from the Pennyslvania Hotel (or whatever it's called now) on 34 th Street all the way down to the ass-end of the West Side on Pier 94 at 12th Avenue. I had a lot of fun. Previously the Big Apple cons were crowded into this one floor at the hotel with dealers and a few second-tier celebs selling their autographs (Bill Daly, Larry Storch, Mason Reese, etc.) Now the event has exploded with panels, talks, video game demonstrations, and literally dozens of celebs. It still doesn't approach the big Comic Con at the Javits Center or the Star Trek conventions I used to go to all the time, but it's a definite step up. (the pix are of two convetion-goers--the Golden Age Green Lantern I've seen before at Comic-Con. The blue alien is from a Star trek Episode. I said to her as she was eating, "Are you a Tellerite?" "No, an Andorian" Both species were on the episode Tower of Babel. Side note: my friend Lydia gave me some Star Trek episodes she got a garage sale. This episode was not on them, but it did have Court-Martial, one of the best ones. Thanks Lydia. Lots of other costumed conventioneers, but not as many as one would see at comic-con)

The day started with two Q&A sessions with Star Trek people: Kate Mulgrew and Brent Spiner. Both were funny and glad to meet their fans. I told Spiner I thought he was fantastic as John Adams in 1776 at the Roundabout a few seasons back.

Then I hit the comic dealers and went bat-shit crazy, buying 41 old comics. Actually that's not so bad. I didn't spend more than $5 for any one book and some I got for as low as $1.

Here's the haul: 2001: A Space Odyssey #7 (Jack Kirby art)

Action #380 (Superman and a really good Legion of Super-Heroes feature)

Adventure #392 (Supergirl)

Atom #9

Blackhawk #237

Capt. Johner and the Aliens No. 1 (formerly a second feature with Magnus Robot Fighter)

Detective #292 (coverless)

House of Mystery #160

Jimmy Olsen #48, 51, 73, 96, 101, 117

Journey Into Mystery #116 (Kirby)--with the Mighty Thor before he became the mag's title character

Legion of Superheroes 273

Lois Lane #25, 35, 46, 62, 80. (#62 looks like a real winner with Lois and Superman running against each other for senator, just like that time Greg and Marcia ran against each other for student body president.)

Magnus Robot Fighter 6 (the earliest one I've ever found)

Metal Men, 17, 25, 27

Strange Adventures 131, 151, 152, 231 (the last is a 64-page giant. I wasn't sure if I had it, but I didn't)

Superboy 121

Superman 171, 177 plus Superman Annual 4

Superman Family 176

Thor 138, 140, 153, 171 (all by Kirby)

World's Finest 163, 185

In between buying binges, I visited the autograph area were celebs were selling their autographs and photos. I didn't buy any (at $20 a throw), but it was fun to see Mickey Dolenz (my sister's favorite Monkee), Nichelle Nichols, David Hedison (Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, the handsomest man on TV in the 60s, now totally white-haired and still handsome), Bruce Weitz (Hill Street Blues, who I once interviewed for Theater Week magazine), Carol Cleveland of Monty Python, and of course Julie Newmar, the original Catwoman. I was standing by her booth and said hello. I said "You know I was looking at Youtube and you can find the What's My Line episode where you were the Mystery Guest. That was when you were in The Marriage Go Round on Broadway." She smiled and said "Thank you." Another surprise--Pete Rose was selling his signature too, but for a lot for than Julie Newmar or Todd Bridges.

The whole day was like going into a tunnel and escaping reality, emerging in this alternate universe were the DC and Marvel worlds, Star Trek and Star Wars were all real. Well, back to reality--or reality TV anyway. In future blogs, I'll deconstruct the comics I bought.

Project Runway Episode 9: Pretty Boys Must Go!

Logan and Christopher are toast! For the second week in a row, the two pretty boys of Project Runway--one straight and one gay--were in the bottom three and the only reason theis asses were saved was because of their looks (just like in prison!) This is like season one when they brought back the hot sexy straight designer after he had been eliminated to "help" the remaining contestants. When the real reason was to provide eye candy for us gays and the ladies.

Logan's mink wrap on top of a peppermint stick was only marginally better than Christopher's black bubble bottom with the slut girl top. Shirin's gown did have a nice top as Nina pointed out but the bottom was so poorly put together with those streamers of fabric flowing awkwardly. In the close-up it looked really ragged. I liked that Nina said Shirin had talent. I miss her being a judge more often. How can she get a sense of a designer's talent unless she is there week after week. We are missing a sense of a continuing relationship this season between the judges and the designers because they keep changing the judges.

Gordana just gave up and made this ugly thing which somehow was matronly and a prom outfit at the same time. Thank God she had immunity.


Christopher and Logan will be gone very soon, they are running out of sacrifical lambs (poor Shirin--I think she's cute with that adorable little beret she sometimes sports). That will leave Nicholas as the only boy.


Carol Hannah deserved her win with the elegant combination of black feathers and glittler. It's obvious they are casting Irina as the bitchy one with her snide comments on everyone else's work. I loved that Carol Hannah won after Irina said nasty things about her. She was equally mean about Shirin. There are three challenges left before the final three are chosen. I predict it will be Nicholas, Irina, and Carol Hannah.

My Top Ten Favorite TV Shows

We all gotta get silly sometimes. So here's my top ten favorite TV shows of all time. Please add your own in the comments spot. (I never get any comments, boo-hoo! Is anybody there, as William Daniels sang in 1776.)

In no particular order:

1. Rocky and Bullwinkle. Funny and satirical and way over my head as a kid. Boris and Natasha, the Giant Metal Moon Mice (while disguised as a moon mouse, Boris was reading a book called Mice Kampf), Cloyd and Gidney, Fearless Leader (when I was little I thought he was named Phyllis Leader), fractured Fairy Tales (Snow White: We used to have a line of giants, but we had to cut them out, too much overhead), Peabody and Sherman (Oh, no, Sherman, in this Indian dialect "ta-ta" means "Let's Have a War"), Wrongway Peachfuzz, and of course the flying squirrel and moose. I actually met June Foray at a sci-fi convention once and got her autograph.

2. Hill Street Blues. Real-life drama. I interviewed Bruce Weitz (Mick Belker) and saw Joe Spano (Lt. Henry Goldblume) on the subway. Robert Prosky (Sgt. Jablonsky) grew up across the street from my grandparents in Philly.

3. Dr. Who. Greatest sci-fi series ever, still going on. I've met six of the ten doctors and several of the companions at various sci-fi conventions.

4. The Amazing Race. Of course, read blog entries on the current season for more details.

5. The Dick Van Dyke Show. (Funniest moment: Millie and Jerry discovering Laura with the inflatible raft.)

6. The Mary Tyler Moore Show (Rhoda: I don't know why I'm eating this chocolate, I should apply it directly to my hips)

7. Theater in America. PBS series in the late 1970s spotlighting a different regional theatre production every week. Arena Stage, American Conservatory Theatre, Negro Ensemble Company, Shakespeare in the Park, etc. How I wish there were something like that on TV now, but even with all the dozens of cable channels, nobody cares enough about theatre to present one.

8. Upstairs, Downstairs. (Ruby, it's 6 o'clock, what should you be doin'? Not speculatin', Mr. 'udson. I'll speculate you, my girl!)

9. Mystery Science Theatre 3000. Too much magnificence to go into. This deserves an entire column.

10. Batman with Adam West and Burt Ward. Of course, my favorite show from ages seven to ten. We didn't think it was funny at the time. But now it's wonderfully campy.