Noose wurthee

Lessee now. Just a jumble of new-ish stuff I wanted to pass on. The owner of a company that does online tarot card and psychic readings, Tom Higgins, bought Charles Dicken's writing desk and chair and plans to use it to write letters on. Oh good. This is the desk Great Expectations was written on. He better not put a TV on it.

Here's one that's dear to my heart: according to the Canadian Press, 43000 railway wheel sets have a "have a high susceptibility to loosen", so says the The Transportation Safety Board of Canada. OK, so fucking tighten 'em. Seems the railway industry has some history with statistics like this. Lets lock the passengers in, or keep driving over cast iron bridges, or make trains too long for the curve. An update to that article claims that the number is actually 12000. I feel better already.

And, CBC sez that "Guy Ritchie, the British filmmaker behind crime capers Snatch and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, is set to give iconic literary sleuth Sherlock Holmes a modern-day makeover."

And to top the day off here's an AP story about Bill Shatner. Seems he'd been laid up after surgery and couldn't sleep, so, late at night he found an old episode of Star Trek on. Shatner confess he rarely watches the shows or movies he is in and was pleasantly surprised. "I haven't seen myself playing Captain Kirk in a long, long time," he says. "And I watched it now, from my perspective of 40 years later, and I thought, 'You know, that's rather good.'

Monday night shows. Do not adjust yer set.

TCM gets the night rolling with They Died With Their Boots On, an Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland monster about General Custer. It's on 1t 6pm. It's the start of an evening of hay burners. At 7:30 they have Sitting Bull, Seventh Cavalry at 9:30, and at 11, a real cool movie called Little Big Man.

AMC has The Hustler at 12:45am. Stay up for this one.

History Television gets their licks in with Dogfights: The First Dogfighters at 8pm then Rome: De Patre Vostro (About Your Father) at 9.

CBC has Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room at 1:05am. Nasty little eye opener. Great doc.

A&E has The Impressionists: The Road to Impressionism at 1am. Just in case you can't watch that other show.

The History Channel has a decidedly NON history line up tonight. Better write a letter.

I can't help it

I was so depressed about not finding any good TV on tonight I went looking for some humour to cheer me up. In my usual lost while looking for something else way of getting at the truth I came across a bit of joke history.

Seems the ancient Egyptians had the jump on joking around. Picture based jokes (cartoons) were the most common. Animal cartoons the favourite. Many were very crude. Depictions of odd couplings with obvious reference to politicians of the day were very popular. Nothing new there.

Many of the animal cartoons weren't rude, but amazingly modern. Cartoons featuring cavorting monkeys playing musical instruments or ducks and cats biting people on the ass appeared throughout Egypt. Even the dogs playing cards and smoking was upstaged by the silly Egyptians. There is an ancient papyrus with a lion and an antelope playing checkers or something.

The ancient Greeks liked jokes too. Here's one from Philogelos or The Lover of Laughter, a 4th century joke book, replete with 265 jokes.

No.9"Wishing to teach his donkey not to eat, a pedant did not offer him any food. When the donkey died of hunger, he said "I've had a great loss. Just when he had learned not to eat, he died."

or

No. 203: Someone went to a charlatan prophet and inquired if his rival would come back from a voyage. The prophet promised that he could not. But the man found out a few days later that he had come back. "Well," said the prophet, "how shameless can you get?"

Wed nes day . Pod people

You know, before I begin, I must say that I sacrifice alot to put this little directory up of what's watchable on the history front. Any idea what it's like reading TV listings? And I mean I read all of them to catch any good shows. But for the love of Christ do you any idea what's on TV anymore? Shows about parking and tow trucks. Shows about dating, relationships, brothers, sisters, jello and big trucks. And lots of them. People wacking each other with paddles. Sorry.

That said there is absolutely sweet dooda on tonight. I've been stumped. But if you want some cool flicks just for fun, TCM has Sophia Loren movies on all night. Stylin.

Tuesday, June 3

No surprises tonight. History Television kicks it off with Digging for the Truth: Timbuktu at 8. At 9, more digging, this time its in Holland with Digging Up the Trenches. Then, if you can, stay up for Battlefield Detectives: The War of 1812: The Chesapeake and the Shannon at 2am.

An odd little night going on at TCM. They seem to have a whole shit load of Japanese / English silent movies on, a la Lon Chaney-Lillian Gish variety. Try and watch em all.

Over on the History Channel they have, as usual, mega shows. Starting at mega 9pm they have Mega Disasters: Comet Storm and at 10pm it's Ancient Discoveries: Mega-Structures of the Deep. OK.

Good for now readers, have fun.

Tiled walls are best.

I pride myself in being able to whistle pretty good. I may not do complete sonatas but I can warble a very recognizable Four Seasons. As anyone who whistles knows, there are a few choice spots that just have the right acoustics to give your twitterings body, depth and dimension. No other place serves this purpose better than a good public bathroom. The tiled walls, the yards of mirrors, the hard floors breath life into this simple instrument.

One melody I enjoy most is the Star Trek theme from the original TV series. I have been whistling it for years. I am ashamed to say I never took the time to find out where it came from. I, like most others, just thought, well, it came from the TV show. Some contract writer pumped it out.

Well, that isn't too far from the truth. Alexander Courage, a musical arranger for Twentieth Century Fox got the nod to do the theme for the pilot. In one of those weird twists of business fate, Gene Rodenberry wrote some lyrics to go with it, (believe it or not) and in so doing cut in half any royalties Courage would have received on the playing of that song over the past 40 years.

Alexander Courage was definitely the real deal. Emmy winner, Oscar nominated. He arranged such hits as My Fair Lady, Hello Dolly and Fiddler on the Roof. But you do just one thing that marks your career for ever. And that was Star Trek in 1965. He also did some music for The Waltons and Lost in Space.

Courage died May 15 at the age of 88.

S'monday.

Ooooh. Dogfights: Jet vs. Jet. The first jet fighter battles anywhere in the world happened between the F 86 Sabre and Mig 15's during the Korean War. History Television at 8pm, naturellement. And at 9, that other superb series Rome, with the latest episode: Deus Impeditio Esuritori Nullus (No God Can Stop a Hungry Man)

And TCM has a bunch of Glenn Ford hayburners on all night. Whoa.

Over on the History Channel at 11pm they have Man, Moment, Machine: Al Capone and the Machine Gun Massacre.

That's the crawl. Looks like an early night.