Protest-news -free Saturday for me

 #PrincessBeatrice was married on Friday and wore the same tiara that her grandmother Queen Elizabeth wore on her own wedding day in 1947. No photographs of Beatrice's dad Prince Andrew and  no new recording of the Sex Pistols, God Save the queen.

I found an old interview online of the late Jim Carroll labeling his writing as 'Burroughesque", a recorder or conduit of stories. For the most part, Ol Bill Burroughs was better at removing himself from the scenes he was writing about.

I 'm about a third of the way through Hakan Nesser's, Stranglers Honeymoon. It's been great catching up on fictional, Swedish detectives.

It was great to hear Teardrops, by Womack &Womack.

July 21, 2020

I guess the salamander's slimy coating is why the word is used in titles for TV shows and movies.The Golden Salamander is an ok flick from 1951 about  Tunisia, and the French and British interests there. I can see why #AnoukAimee , the French actress, was all the rage

Salamander is the title of a Belgium cop series that aired from 2012-18

July 25, 2020

While watching The Bootlegger, a 2016 documentary about Henry(Killie) Wagle (1886-1929) of Colchester , IL, the  voice of a radio news reader had a flat, midwestern sound  that reminded me a bit of author William Burroughs(1914-1997), a writer who was born in St Louis, MO which is about three hours from Colchester.

July 30, 2020

After a few trials #christineConnor  was found guilty in Belfast of the attempted murder of police officers who she lured  to areas with bogus 999 calls.  Also, she posed online as a blonde Swedish model called Sanne Anderson to recruit helpers to carry out her plans. Detective fiction writers will be 

using some of this material in future novels.

August 1, 2020

The Space X astronauts are hoping to land in the Gulf of Mexico today in the  first splashdown return for US astronauts in 45 years.

I started reading The Summer of Kim Novak by Hakan Nesser and came across a new acronym TPW for an old expression, The Perfect Woman.

Aug 6, 2020

 Saniniu Laizer, who has been in the mining business in northern Tanzania for more than 15 years, hit it big after selling three rough Tanzanite stones for $5.4m.

Aug 9 

I 'd never considered rubbish as a verb  and saw it was used in the past tense in Belfast Telegraph article yesterday. #SinnFein rubbished claims that Gerry Adams was an MI5 informant.

Aug 16, 2020

 While watching  a documentary on corruption in Bulgaria, which referenced the after-effects of Soviet occupation and battles with the Ottoman Empire, I got to wondering about well known folks from Bulgaria. Some historians believe #Spartacus was a part of the Thracian tribes (Bessi, Maedi or Getae), the ancient ancestors of today’s Bulgarians, who lived in what is present day Sandanski in southwest Bulgaria. 

Aug 31, 2020

  The Vanishing of Sidney Hall(2017) provided plot answers, but you had to watch  the entire movie as the chronology of events, at times felt random.  Hall, played by Logan Lerman, is a  best selling author of modern suburban angst, who is not treated with kid gloves  by the the movie's director, Shawn Christensen. I was hoping they were going to delve deeper into censorship demands and results.

Sept 7

Clicked  on U-Turn (1997) , a movie starring Sean Penn, Nick Nolte and J-Lo, yesterday and was pulled in by how bad it was. Penn and JLo are a mismatch. Nolte improves as the movie bounces along. Jon Voight as the Blind man   bordered on a complete goof.

Hey, Oliver Stone is the Director , which explains why  it's lacking direction.

Sept 13

 The Courier had some interesting  scenes and Gary Oldman was decent, but the countless ways in which Olga Kurylenko's, a Ukrainian-born actress, character managed to survive made this thriller into a farce. 

Sept 26

Curiosity about threats to the Roman Empire led me to this name.  #Boudicca , the warrior queen, an uprising against the Roman Empire,after the death of her husband Prasutagus ,who ruled East Anglian people of the Iceni. The Romans prevailed and she committed suicide in 61 AD.

oCT 18

I watched a 1986 flick, In Defense of the Realm, and have become nearly immune to  a prevalent theme of British kids who were Communists in college, then shift slightly to center as Labor Party politician, and are later framed for spying for Russia or East Germany. As if Philby were an aberration.

Oct 25

Inherit the Viper is a solid movie about small town Appalachia drug dealing of pharmaceutical opioids, and how the Conley siblings sort out their differences. #MargaritaLevieva , the leader of the Conley drug crew, nabbed my attention. I was surprised by the ending in this flick not filled with stereotypes.

nov 8

A sports channel was running clips of the 2015 KC/NYM World Series , and I could not recall the name of the Mets Manager.  #terrycollins  was the Mets MGR from 2011-17. He "retired" from managing and moved into the Mets front office. #NedYost was the Royals MGR in that World Series.

Nov 15

#CoreyConners of Listowel, Ont., shot the lowest round by a Canadian at the Masters, a seven-under 65 in Round 2. The previous record was 68.

Nov 19

I've been captivated lately by episodes of #Decoy, a 1958 American TV series about a NYC policewoman starring #BeverlyGarland , who later played the stepmom in My Three Sons. Some of the stories aren't too hokey and  the film footage of NYC in 1958 is great.

Nov 23, 2020

Garland's character, Casey Jones, in Decoy threatened an aggressive informant with arrest for mashing. That a new term to me so I went searching and found : Enrico Caruso, the great opera singer, was arrested at the Central Park Zoo in 1906 after pressing himself up against a woman and  was fined $10 in court for mashing.

Jan 17, 2021

Jeju Shinhwa World, one of the largest resorts on Jeju Island, reported to police that over 14 billion  Won notes, the equivalent to $13 million dollars, had gone missing from the Landing Casino. It was in smaller denomination notes so it wouldn't have been an easy move. A female employee from Malaysia who had been in charge of the cash but hasn't returned to work after leaving for a vacation at the end of December, is the top suspect.

Jan 23, 2021

Some dates won't leave my cranium. I went to a Catholic elementary school that had an affiliation with Pallottine nuns. Saint Vincent #Pallotti died January 22, 1850  at the age of 54.

Feb 2, 2021

I started reading Pirates of the Chesapeake Bay last weekend and  learned that thieves ruled the day in that area in the 1600s. Great Britain was slow to react, while MD and VA argued over territorial rights ,and the  thieves would head south to the Carolinas when they felt threatened.

March 13, 2021

Narcosubs, semisubmersibles that float mostly below the waterline, have been used in to transport cocaine from Columbia to Central America.  In February Spanish police discovered a narco-sub in Malaga on Spain’s Costa del Sol that was most likely intended to transport cocaine ashore from a larger vessel.

March 21, 2021

I watched a few episodes of West of Liberty, a spy  TV mini-series filled with  Russian mobsters, CIA pricks, Arab terrorists, and Stasi vets, yesterday, and the character Lucien Gell, obviously based on Julian Assange,  was portrayed as a man with many masters. It was entertaining and  had enough  diversity to piss  off anyone viewing it through  the lenses of his or her favorite political agenda.

april 25, 2021

I watched a few episodes of Aber Bergen, a Norwegian  TV Series (2016–2018) about lawyers, yesterday and was a bit surprised that nearly all the cultural references were to famous American entertainers.

may 8, 2021

I checked out this tune after reading a WSJ review on Van Morrison latest album“Latest Record Project: Volume 1”  that mentions 

only a song      a  number with a harmonic structure similar to his tune “Wild Night"

June 19, 2021

When I needed  foreign language  credits in college I saw a chance to get them  by taking a course taught in German and English on the Weimar Republic. Four years of German classes in high school, in what I later learned was High German, helped a little and opened my eyes wider to an era in which Brecht and the Mann brothers were thriving in literature, the Bauhaus was influencing Architecture, while Hitler was battling Hindenburg for political power. Below are some  political ads in Berlin in 1932.  

July 5, 2021

#kremilinletter , a #johnhuston flick from 1970,   entertained me this weekend. I was a bit mesmerized by #BibiAnderson , and needed a scorecard sometimes to keep track of the plot twists and how often Richard Boone used the word nephew. The opening ten minutes included  #GeorgeSanders  as a drag queen so you knew  this was going to be a little different.

July 26, 2021

I found this tidbit while reading  some June 2021 news. When a 49-year-old Greek man was arrested on June 28, 2021 and  asked why he stole the Picasso painting, the Mondrian, in 2012 from the  Athens Pinacotheca, he said he grabbed the first paintings he encountered. However, this painting was so "hot" he was unable to find a buyer willing to take the risk.

August 1, 2021

When I saw the names, Fritz Lang and Bert(Bertolt) Brecht associated with this 1943 Hollywood movie ,Hangmen Also Die!, I thought I was in for a treat , and it had some decent moments, but it felt a bit stunted and gave the feeling of a play put on film. It was loosely based on the aftermath of the assassination of  Reinhard Heydrich, the SS Chief of the Reich Security Main Office, by the Czech resistance in 1942. 

Walter Brennan as Professor Stephen Novotny was a revelation.

Aug 21, ,2021

On August, 21, 1970 my parents gave me the Steppenwolf Live album for my eleventh birthday, which was a big deal since my budget allowed for an occasional 45 rpm purchase.

Sept 19, 2021

Dorothy Tapper Goldman, plans to use proceeds from the upcoming sale of one of 11 surviving copies of the first edition USA Constitution for her foundation, which funds grants intended to help improve the understanding of democracy. Sotheby's Auction House estimates it will sell for between $15M and $20M dollars.

oct 26, 2021

Morton & Eden Ltd hopes to get 300 thousand dollars for a rare coin that was minted in colonial Boston in 1652 and was recently found in the UK inside a candy tin. The mint responsible for producing North America’s first silver coinage was shut down by King Charles II in 1682 because he considered the operation treasonous.

Nov 27, 2021

I found a thick book titled The War Chronicles, for five bucks at B&N a few weeks ago, and it has refreshed my brain on war stories that occurred during BC. The author does the reader a favor by adding a note to ancient city names, this is modern day ___ in ___. 

Dec 11, 2021

I checked out "My Man Godfrey", a 1936 screwball comedy, yesterday for the fourth or fifth time in my life because I wanted some laughs, and Carole Lombard certainly provided them. It's filled with noble poor/ stupid rich cheap shots, but also has some great one- liners.

Then I checked out Demimonde, a 2015 Hungarian film about a courtesan, her housekeeper/ long -time associate, and a recently hired maid, living in Budapest of 1910s. The interplay among the three women was intriguing and, at times, I kept thinking of Emile Zola's book Nana.

Dec 25, 2021

Erroll Garner (1921-1977), a jazz pianist, on never learning to read music, “Hell, man, nobody can hear you read.” 

Don't confuse him with Erle Gardner(1889-1970), the author of the Perry Mason series.

Jan 22, 2022

I like the taste of milk chocolate and of dark chocolate M&Ms and could care less about the M or whatever image is on the candy. However, to be more inclusive Mars will switch the footwear from boots to sneakers on the green M&M. Am I showing my age(62) or do most folks stare at a piece of candy for a long time before consuming it?

Jan 27, 2022

Netherlands unveiled the Ijmuiden lock which will allow large, modern cargo ships to reach the port of Amsterdam without having to wait for a favorable water level. 

Feb 16, 2022

Eleven years ago, Borders, a 40-year-old retail book superstore chain that began as a used book shop in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and at one point had 650 locations and 19,500 employees, filed for bankruptcy. I used to go to the Towson, MD store often.

May 5, 2022

Midges, non-biting flies which are found near lakes and smaller bodies of water, are blanketing Chicago. 

May 13, 2022

Three musical instruments including a 1758 violin were stolen from a town home in the South Loop Wednesday morning while a family of musicians was sleeping.

May 15, 2022

MingHuan Xu, a resident of the South Loop in Chicago and a professional violinist and director of the string program at Roosevelt University, said an antique violin, made in 1758 by Nicolò Gagliano, was stolen from her house.

According to surveillance cameras in her neighbor’s garage, the thief entered her house after being able to open Xu’s closed car and clicking the garage button inside the car.

July 3, 2022

I watch Bowery at Midnight with Bela Lugosi,  but Wanda McKay snared my attention. Man, she appeared in a zillion things.  

July 23, 2022

Surfskating, a version of skateboarding that uses a more flexible front-end wheel assembly to enable deeply carved turns akin to surfing, is all the rage in Chinese cities since the spring, particularly among women. 

August 1, 2022

While watching The Adventures of Tartu. a WW2 pro Allies film, I was dozing off when a line something like "the High Command shouldn't fraternize with the Czech girls," woke me up. Then I focused on Valerie Hobson (1917–1998) who played the role of Maruschuka Lanova in the flick.

August 14, 2022

I was watching Port of New York, a 1949 film that features great shots of NYC and the screen debut of Yul Brynner. The cops are tracking an opium smuggler in Penn Station, and I hear the ETD announcement for several east coast cities including Baltimore, which the station employee pronounces Bal-tee more.  I spent the next five minutes trying to recall if I've heard it pronounced that way in my nearly 63 years on the planet.

Sept, 11, 2022

I hit pause on football games to watch Beautiful Kate, an interesting movie about sibling incest in the Outback,AU produced by Rachel Ward. Bryan Brown, Ward's husband, played the father of the family. 

Story bounced around but the familial difficulties were not candy-coated.

Dec 17, 2022

While watching The Birthday Cake(2021) last night, I was guessing if Val Kilmer's speech problems, due to a tracheotomy, were built into the plot? Definitely wise to use sub -titles. Movie felt half-real , half mob spoof.

Dec 31, 2022

Another discovery of #BeverlyGarland before she played the stepmom on My Three Sons. This time she was beguiling thief in a 1960 episode of Tales of Wells Fargo.