64 responses to
“A few of my favorite things.”

1. coozledad said on December 18th, 2008 at 9:53 am

   Boy. That pic­ture is the six­ties encap­su­lated. Everyone’s so goosed on ben­zedrine they for­got to put a can of pop’n fresh bis­cuits in the oven.
   Who’d eat them anyway?

2. Kirk said on December 18th, 2008 at 10:03 am

   Dick and Pat are sloshed any­way. David’s think­ing, “God bless us every one!” Thank you so much for that pic­ture. What a riot. Reminds me of the vis­ceral hatred I had for Nixon that I’ve never quite been able to feel toward Bush, though I know he deserves it.

   And the three pup­pies that remain are get­ting increas­ingly wild. The other day they knocked the pup­py­cam askew, so that it was shoot­ing through some kind of screen, with the floor either at the top or on one side of the image. It was kind of hard to tell.

3. Dorothy said on December 18th, 2008 at 10:17 am

   That’s not the real Nixon fam­ily, right? They’re paper dolls manip­u­lated to sit and smile, to LOOK like a real family.

   GAH — that wall mural!! What the hell were they think­ing?!?!?! The only thing worse in this pic­ture is the ugly mir­ror over the fireplace.

4. brian stouder said on December 18th, 2008 at 10:17 am

   The secret to a good col­umn or blog, it seems to me, is: leave them want­ing a lit­tle more; and our Pro­pri­etress has a tal­ent for pithy clos­ings that never fail to pro­duce a chuckle. Take today’s:

   Off to relieve stress. Back later.

   The first thing I thought was — Alan is a lucky guy! (‘course, there doesn’t have to be an inten­tional dou­ble enten­dre for most fellers to see one. Like that fel­low on My Big Fat Greek Wed­ding that can take any word, and show you the Greek root of it.…which, come to think of it, is the same ‘tal­ent’ Rush Lim­baugh [et al] has, in tak­ing any Blago news, or any bad eco­nomic news, or any bad weather news — and show­ing you how Obama is at the root of it!)

   Didja see the story about the cat roundup?

   http://​www​.msnbc​.msn​.com/​i​d​/​2​8​2​92558/

   money quote: “The demon­stra­tors held up ban­ners say­ing “Cook­ing cats alive! Shame on Guang­dong!” and “Res­olutely oppose cruel slaugh­ter” as they met with a rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the Guang­dong office.”

   Edit: Kirk — my the­ory is, you only can do that once (main­tain a burn­ing anger at [fill in the blank]), and then you’re past the abil­ity to do it again; Sorta like catch­ing chicken pox, and then it’s out of the way

5. MichaelG said on December 18th, 2008 at 11:03 am

   I don’t know, Dorothy. That rug’s no prize either. What a hor­ri­bly cold room. The idea of eat­ing on that lit­tle table in the mid­dle of that huge room is creepy and I can believe that the Nixons actu­ally ate that way. But then the Nixons were creepy in a way that no pres­i­den­tial fam­ily I’ve seen has ever been.

   Nance, you turned me on to the Detroit Blog sev­eral years ago and I’ve been check­ing it weekly ever since. It’s a won­der­ful spot.

   Reliev­ing stress? Many, many years ago I worked in the Oak­land unem­ploy­ment office. One morn­ing a woman who worked for me came in about a half hour late. I kind of raised an eye­brow at her and she explained: “Well, when I woke up, my hus­band rolled over and said ‘Wanna have a good time?’ so here I am. Late.” She was my best pro­ducer. What could I say?

6. nancy said on December 18th, 2008 at 11:13 am

   Out of the gut­ter, you guys — Tues­days and Thurs­days are Flex Appeal class at 10 a.m., Pointe Fit­ness. Today the trainer had us jump­ing rope like Tommy Hearns. I may never recover.

7. jeff borden said on December 18th, 2008 at 11:43 am

   Nance,

   Back in 1999, when I still gave a damn about my health, I signed up for three months of a “boot camp” style work­out ses­sion. It was held out­doors at Diversey Har­bor from 6 a.m. to 7 a.m. Many of the instruc­tors were ex-jocks or ex-military includ­ing a for­mer Army Ranger. We ran in for­ma­tion while chant­ing Army/Marines chants, which the instruc­tors said enhanced our breath­ing, for about a mile, then did warm ups, then did either more run­ning or strength con­di­tion­ing like pushups, pullups, squats, situps, etc. It was mur­der, par­tic­u­larly for some­one who is most def­i­nitely not a morn­ing person.

   I hated every nanosec­ond of it, but it was the only time in my life I had real mus­cle def­i­n­i­tion in my noodly arms. The down­side was I usu­ally fell asleep by 7:30 p.m. every night.

   Jump­ing rope is great, great exer­cise, but be care­ful of your knees.

8. Kirk said on December 18th, 2008 at 11:44 am

   Brian, that thought has occurred to me, too. Guess I shot my life’s wad of humon­gous hatred on Nixon. More mis­spent youth.

9. Jason T. said on December 18th, 2008 at 11:58 am

   Cue Dan Aykroyd as Nixon: “My God … He does look like Howdy Doody!”

10. brian stouder said on December 18th, 2008 at 12:01 pm

    Kirk — in 1996 – 98, I har­bored a seething, burn­ing hatred for Tony George and Bill Clin­ton, at the same time!

    I was a huge fan of CART, which was cemented for­ever* at the US-500 at Michi­gan Inter­na­tional Speed­way in May of ’96, and thought George was the worst doo­fus of all time. And — I had voted for WJC in ’92, but by ’96 I was com­pletely sick of him and his unde­served luck (Bob Dole for an oppo­nent? Good God!)

    So any­way — I learned about how wrong I was capa­ble of being (ie — pretty damned wrong, in both cases!) — which a worth­while wife can also illuminate.

    At least you spent your right­eous anger on a worth­while villain!

    *“for­ever” turned out to be about seven years

11. LA Mary said on December 18th, 2008 at 12:05 pm

    You must have done your kegels if you can jump rope with­out embarrassment.

12. brian stouder said on December 18th, 2008 at 12:14 pm

    Mary — you’ve sent me right back into the gutter!

13. Kirk said on December 18th, 2008 at 12:21 pm

    Yes, Tony George suc­ceeded in mak­ing the Indy 500 nearly irrel­e­vant for a few years there, didn’t he?

14. Hattie said on December 18th, 2008 at 12:25 pm

    I actu­ally shook hands with Richard Nixon once. How that hap­pened I do not want to dis­cuss. He had more pan­cake makeup on than I have ever seen on any­one. What a phony.

15. Kirk said on December 18th, 2008 at 12:43 pm

    I once shook hands with the exe­crable Gov. James A. Rhodes, who sent national guards­men to Kent to kill col­lege students.

16. MichaelG said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:19 pm

    I saw Rea­gan when he was gov here and he wore pancake.

    Tony George is evil. That whole CART, IRL thing was about noth­ing more than his lit­tle rich boy ass. Also Bernie E.

17. nancy said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:29 pm

    The more I look at that Nixon pic­ture the more I notice about it. Both Pat and Julie are wear­ing white shoes, and appar­ently the very same ones. Everyone’s color-coordinated matchy-matchy with the room, right down to the Trickster’s neck­tie, per­haps so that if any­one passes out, they won’t clash with the rug. And what are those two glow­ing orbs in the dark maw of the door­way? The ser­vice ‘bot?

18. Kirk said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:33 pm

    Could be Chuck Colson.

19. LA Mary said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:35 pm

    Gor­don Liddy?

20. MichaelG said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:36 pm

    No wine glasses. What’s that by David’s right hand? Could it be a bell to sum­mon the help? I like it, Kirk.

21. coozledad said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:36 pm

    Or Gor­don Liddy hold­ing both hands over the warm­ing candles.

22. Kirk said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:46 pm

    Is David giv­ing a thumbs-up with his left hand, or is that some­thing else in his lap?

23. coozledad said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:50 pm

    Kirk: I think he’s hold­ing a pomade dispenser.

24. Kirk said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:56 pm

    He was a Boy Scout, wasn’t he?

    Mean­while, they’re all won­der­ing, “Where the hell is the lob­ster bisque?”

25. Gasman said on December 18th, 2008 at 1:59 pm

    brian,
    Nope, your the­ory doesn’t wash with me. I detested Nixon, Agnew, and Rea­gan with the white hot hatred that I reserve for ene­mies of our Con­sti­tu­tion. W and Cheney have achieved new lev­els of dis­dain for me. I am rather enjoy­ing lis­ten­ing to the pathetic bleat­ing from W and Cheney as they try to rewrite his­tory. They haven’t done a damn thing right in 8 years and now they seem to care how pos­ter­ity will judge them. I hope they both live long enough to real­ize just how much the nation as a whole finds them contemptible.

26. Dorothy said on December 18th, 2008 at 2:00 pm

    You’re right, MichaelG, the car­pet is gaggy, too.

    I think Tri­cia and Pat’s out­fits are made from the same fabric.

    Maybe the glow­ing orbs are the switches for the chan­de­lier. Flip the magic switch, and the light fix­ture turns in to a disco ball!! Oh wait — disco was the 70’s. Never mind.

27. Julie Robinson said on December 18th, 2008 at 2:14 pm

    About how about the hair? The women have at least a can of Aqua Net apiece.

    I’m guess­ing we won’t hear too much about redec­o­ra­tion because the Oba­mas have too much com­mon sense to let that become a focus. Too expen­sive, too friv­o­lous. Sure, they’ll dis­tract us with the new puppy, but they know in today’s econ­omy the nation would be infu­ri­ated with new china.

28. brian stouder said on December 18th, 2008 at 3:01 pm

    Kirk —  wow! If that is some­thing else in his lap, then one won­ders how he got past the Secret Ser­vice! Talk about your Tricky Dicks…

29. LA Mary said on December 18th, 2008 at 3:06 pm

    That mural looks like part of some Frank Frazetta fan­tasy book cover.

30. Jim in FL said on December 18th, 2008 at 3:43 pm

    I’m guess­ing the two orbs are door knobs, reflect­ing the photog’s flash.

31. John said on December 18th, 2008 at 3:48 pm

    I’m with Jim on the door knob idea.

32. MichaelG said on December 18th, 2008 at 3:51 pm

    What kind of salad is that?

33. LA Mary said on December 18th, 2008 at 4:11 pm

    I’m not sure which I like bet­ter, the ser­vice bot idea or Chuck Col­son, wide eyed and lurk­ing. Imag­in­ing Richard Nixon speak­ing to a ser­vice bot is keep­ing me amused.

34. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on December 18th, 2008 at 5:19 pm

    It’s the Fam­ily Res­i­dence Din­ing Room upstairs, and the wall­pa­per is gone, picked by Jackie and deep sixed by Betty — http://​www​.white​house​mu​seum​.org/​f​l​o​o​r​2​/​p​r​i​v​a​t​e​-​d​i​n​i​n​g​-​r​o​om.htm

35. LA Mary said on December 18th, 2008 at 6:10 pm

    I think Frank Frazetta should do all the walls in the White House.

    http://​frank​frazetta​.org/

36. Dexter said on December 18th, 2008 at 6:20 pm

    Nuts to Nixon!
    The Chipin Club story is fas­ci­nat­ing. It gave me a chance to remem­ber the places old guys hang out ; many bars open very early and old men play crib­bage on back-room tables and sip cof­fee, I recall that from my third-shift days when I drank 7:00 A.M. beers. Most of us can prob­a­bly name a place where old guys hang out, but I can’t recall any­thing like the Chipin Club, where the men run it like a for-real club.
    Thanks for post­ing that story.
    LAMary…do the old guys still hang around “On the Nickel” in LA? Tom Waits sang about Fifth Street there in a song.

37. nancy said on December 18th, 2008 at 6:25 pm

    Frank Frazetti should def­i­nitely become speech­writer. I like his prose style:

    A word of cau­tion:
    Frank Frazetta’s art
    occa­sion­ally depicts
    the human form
    devoid of coverings.

38. LA Mary said on December 18th, 2008 at 6:43 pm

    Dex­ter, Fifth Street is Skid Row, and yes, there are many guys hang­ing out on the nickel. There are some sort of trendy loft build­ings on Sixth, but for the most part, that neigh­bor­hood is as it’s been for a long time. I think they fig­ure there are 70,000 home­less peo­ple in LA and Skid Row has the high­est concentration.

39. coozledad said on December 18th, 2008 at 6:57 pm

    To which I would add:
    Frank also depicts the covering-devoided female form
    as it is and was always con­ceived
    by hormone-stricken boys
    shud­der­ing at the precipice
    between stu­pid­ity
    and insan­ity.
    (ages 13 – 35)

40. MichaelG said on December 18th, 2008 at 7:02 pm

    If you like Frank Frazetta you’ll prob­a­bly also like Boris Vallejo. Just Google. There are a mil­lion sites. His women, though, tend to be a tad more devoid of cov­er­ing than Frazetta’s.

41. joodyb said on December 18th, 2008 at 7:06 pm

    that decor was the fash­ion of they day. i know, right? yikes! pho­tog­ra­phers had ways of enhanc­ing portrait-type work like that back then. when you find these edited prints today, with their odd matte fin­ishes that ape oil paint­ing, many have ‘matured’ and the cyan tones pop out. i don’t know nothin’ about the actual sci­ence of it all, but i’ve looked lots of pho­tos of this vin­tage lately. surreal.

42. coozledad said on December 18th, 2008 at 7:08 pm

    This guy is actu­ally an incred­i­bly tech­ni­cally gifted artist, but he’s totally kicked Dali to the curb in the freak depart­ment: Ladies and gen­tle­men, the King of Kitsch…
    http://​www​.ner​drum​.com/

43. Catherine said on December 18th, 2008 at 7:54 pm

    Jeff, fun link. I enjoyed the pic­ture of Amy Carter read­ing at the table.

44. joodyb said on December 18th, 2008 at 8:53 pm

    i love that link, jttmo.

45. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on December 18th, 2008 at 11:41 pm

    Speak­ing of slimy yet oddly com­pelling under­sea crea­tures — http://​news​.nation​al​geo​graphic​.com/​n​e​w​s​/​2​0​0​8​/​1​2​/​p​h​o​t​o​g​a​l​l​e​r​i​e​s​/​t​o​p​-​t​e​n​-​p​h​o​t​o​s​/​i​n​d​e​x.html — and you thought Nixon made you nervous!

46. brian stouder said on December 19th, 2008 at 8:52 am

    WooHoo!! We had an ice storm in the Fort, in the wee hours this morn­ing. (I bet Motown got glazed-over, too).

    This morn­ing at 7, our power was on, but all our neigh­bors and were blacked out. Then, our lights went out, and chan­nel 15’s big diesel gen­er­a­tor started up.

    When I went out to scrape the car, the tem­per­a­ture was right at the tip­ping point, between 32 and 33 degrees; all the trees and bushes were bowed down, and there was a sin­gu­lar ‘creak­ing’ sound all around.

    Pam had mul­ti­ple strings of Christ­mas lights strung up to the top of the flag pole, which has now assumed the shape of a banana; I went to lower the lights, and of course failed (the pul­ley at the top of the pole is pre­sume­ably glazed over) — and in the process wors­ened the prob­lem. The pole now looks like a paren­the­sis, and I think it may well snap.…but it IS at least bend­ing away from the house, so that’s good!

    On the way to work, the streets were slushy and col­ored every shade of grey — except where they are flooded (every low-spot is ponded up); and limbs and branches are down everywhere.

    Act II (pre­sume­ably later today) will be when the ice chunks begin to come off of the TV tower back at home. If it warms up quickly, the bom­bard­ment can be quite intense — a non­stop mix of chunks that vary in size from pop cans to stew pots.

    The first time I ever wit­nessed this, it finally struck me (par­don the pun) why the folks who owned the house before we did planted the tree that had always annoyed me, between our house and the neighbor’s. The limbs are always brush­ing our roof, and the thing drops leaves right into our gut­ters — and it gen­er­ally always used to irri­tate me… right up until the first time I saw the tree do its real job, which was to deflect/breakup/catch chunks of ice intended for my car or roof or siding.

    Edit: Actu­ally, Act II appears to be another round of limbs crash­ing to the ground. Pam called to say that sev­eral more big limbs of our neigh­bors’ have snapped off and fallen into their yards, and into the street

47. Danny said on December 19th, 2008 at 9:19 am

    Wow, Brian hope all stays rea­son­ably well. Ice storms suck. My remem­brance of them car­ries no hint of com­fort­ing nostalgia.

    But this is an excel­lent segue into me ask­ing a ques­tion of you all: What should I take to wear in Hawaii? We’re leav­ing tomor­row. First time for me.

    Don’t worry, I’ll be think­ing of you all every moment. Every. Moment.

48. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on December 19th, 2008 at 9:23 am

    Duh. Hawai­ian Tropic!

    What? You’re going to a pub­lic beach? Oh.

49. Dorothy said on December 19th, 2008 at 9:31 am

    Gang, I just have to share my excite­ment for an impend­ing event tomor­row. My son is com­ing home for 15 days after being at Basic Train­ing (Army National Guard) since mid-October. My daugh­ter decided to fly in today from Vir­ginia to come with us to the air­port tomor­row to sur­prise him. The air­port is going to be just wild for us — I know he’s going to be thor­oughly sur­prised. My daugh­ter and I will be cry­ing, that’s a given. Not sure about Josh, though, if he’ll suc­cumb. Any­way, we are buzzing with antic­i­pa­tion for the fun. Think of us, and pray the weather coop­er­ates! It’s rain­ing like mad here — at least the morn­ing ice has melted.

50. Julie Robinson said on December 19th, 2008 at 9:39 am

    Dorothy, hug that boy good! Here the ice storm con­tin­ues. Our power has blinked off and on about 25 times and trees with limbs 20 feet up are brush­ing the ground. I’d love to take some pix but the DH has the cam­era. I’m torn between wor­ry­ing about a lenghty power out­age and the accom­pa­ny­ing water-in-the-basement-woes and the awe­some beauty. Every object, every detail is encased in half-inch thick ice. If the sun were out it would be blind­ing. It’s rain­ing now and sup­posed to begin snow­ing soon. Go winter!

51. Danny said on December 19th, 2008 at 9:49 am

    Majel Barrett-Rodenberry died yes­ter­day. She was the widow of Gene Roden­berry, cre­ator of Star Trek. In the orig­i­nal series, she played Nurse Chapel, but I remem­ber her most as the sexy com­puter voice for the Enter­prise. Dang.

    Oh, and Deep Throat died too, but that doesn’t mean what some of you think it means.

    EDIT: Dorothy, I hope all goes well with the reunion with you son. Have fun!

52. Dorothy said on December 19th, 2008 at 9:57 am

    Thanks Danny. Behave your­self in Hawaii!! And Julie, I will cer­tainly do as you instructed! He might not be able to breathe for a few sec­onds after I get done squeez­ing him!

53. moe99 said on December 19th, 2008 at 9:59 am

    Jeff (tmmo): all beaches in Hawaii are public.

    And the term skid row was orig­i­nally skid road and orig­i­nated in the Pacific NW:

    http://​en​.wikipedia​.org/​w​i​k​i​/​S​k​i​d_Road

    Finally, we can be grate­ful that we do not live in Galve­ston:
    http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2008/12//galveston_false_arrest.php

54. Danny said on December 19th, 2008 at 10:00 am

    Duh. Hawai­ian Tropic!

    No, Jeff, I have it. I’ll wear plaid Bermuda shorts, a white fruit-of-the-loom, crew-neck t-shirt and leather san­dals with knee-high black socks. Peo­ple will think I’m from the 70’s and that I’m there to mow lawns and drink Schae­fer beer.

    Jeff (tmmo): all beaches in Hawaii are public.

    Moe, even Come­onI­wan­nalayya beach? I’m not sure, but I think that is where we are stay­ing. Hee!

55. Kirk said on December 19th, 2008 at 10:38 am

    Danny, did you see that San Jose native John Byrne, lead singer for the oft-forgotten Count Five, died this week? Remem­ber “Psy­chotic Reaction”?

56. LA Mary said on December 19th, 2008 at 10:59 am

    “…No, Jeff, I have it. I’ll wear plaid Bermuda shorts, a white fruit-of-the-loom, crew-neck t-shirt and leather san­dals with knee-high black socks. Peo­ple will think I’m from the 70’s and that I’m there to mow lawns and drink Schae­fer beer…”

    Minus the lawn mow­ing and the Schae­fer and peo­ple will think you’re Eng­lish. Espe­cially the socks and san­dals bit.

57. Danny said on December 19th, 2008 at 11:11 am

    Kirk, when you first posted that a day or so ago, it did not reg­is­ter with me. I could not rec­ol­lect that song and I was too busy try­ing to wrap stuff up at work. But I just lis­tened to Psy­chotic Reac­tion on Youtube and I def­i­nitely remem­ber that song. Great song.

58. Sue said on December 19th, 2008 at 11:17 am

    Dorothy, I’m excited for you — I’ll give my son a hug on Sun­day in honor of you and your son. Ok, an extra hug. And it goes with­out say­ing that we’d all like to hear how it goes.

59. brian stouder said on December 19th, 2008 at 11:30 am

    Well Dorothy, what Sue said!

    It sounds like you and yours will have a mar­velous Christ­mas (the air­port scene you describe sounds like a Hall­mark movie I just saw)

    Danny, Hawaii?! If I were in San Diego, I’d be happy! — we expect a full report upon your return (espe­cially includ­ing things that must be seen, for the day — if ever– that Pam and I make it out there)

    Mean­while, the pro­ces­sion of hol­i­day foods and sweets keeps show­ing up here at the office. Ven­dors send in all sorts of can­dies and cheeses and breads and meats and cook­ies and pop­corns (I pre­fer caramel, but the cheese goes quickly); and we sort of graze

60. LA Mary said on December 19th, 2008 at 11:44 am

    Brian, Danny and I are in the mid­dle of what is con­sid­ered a deep freeze. It was 34 when I left my house this morn­ing and the highs don’t get above 60 by mid after­noon. True, it causes ter­ri­ble prob­lems for the farm­ers, but from the way it’s reported on the local news you’d think we were in the frozen north somewhere.

61. Danny said on December 19th, 2008 at 11:46 am

    Danny, Hawaii?! If I were in San Diego, I’d be happy!

    Brian, yeah, that is one of the con­ver­sa­tions I’ve had with my wife over the years. When she would explain why we should visit Hawaii, I’d respond with: “Hey, we have sun and ocean and sand here.”

    But she says that it is dif­fer­ent there. Way bet­ter. We’ll see.

    My par­ents and brother and sis-in-law will be there too. So fun seems unavoidable.

    EDIT: Mary, you left out the most ter­ri­ble part. We got… RAIN! {{shud­der}} I can’t wait to leave this god­for­saken, win­tery hell-hole that is South­ern California.

62. LA Mary said on December 19th, 2008 at 11:57 am

    Oh God yes, Danny. Rain. A week of local sta­tions being on “STORM WATCH” as rain approached us. I nearly wished I had worn a coat this morn­ing, but I got over it. My sweater was ade­quate by the time I got to the office. I had to use an umbrella sev­eral times this week as well. It’s not fit for habi­ta­tion, this place.

63. Kirk said on December 19th, 2008 at 1:08 pm

    Prob­lems get­ting on pup­py­cam, but here’s a new one (more Shiba Inus):

    http://​www​.ustream​.tv/​c​h​a​n​n​e​l​/​s​h​i​ba-inu’s-west-chester-pa

64. MichaelG said on December 19th, 2008 at 1:14 pm

    We’ve been suf­fer­ing through a cold spell here as well. The bank thermo I pass on the way to work in the morn­ing read 28 degrees yes­ter­day at 5:00 AM. That stuff should be illegal.