Comments on: First a hologram, now this.

By: Dexter

Dexter — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 06:34:41 +0000

OK, I know sports takes a back seat at NN.C, but here’s my Freep post:

Mark Fidrych was little different in fame than a pop band as huge as The Beatles. Everybody loved him.
Little kids tuned in to his persona, old grandpas laughed and shook their heads and probably recalled the Dean brothers of the old Gashouse Gang.
Young girls went crazy over him and old women gazed with approval.
Above all, Mark made us feel good about ourselves.
I would catch a report on the previous night’s game and it would make me feel good about doing eight or twelve hours in a hot factory, running and maintaining huge punch presses for the auto industry.
He wasn’t a clown and he wasn’t really anything but a genuine star, and we all loved him. I would listen to the games on WJR and listen to J.P. give the recap in the morning on the way to work.
I would drive to Cleveland or Chicago , too, for games on weekends or off days . We’d see Mark and say “hi! ” and he’d always wave back and sometimes exchange a few words with us. He was just special, one of my favorite people

By: Dexter

Dexter — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 03:29:55 +0000

I caught the last inning of the NY Mets opener at …gulp!… Citi Field.
At least the Astros of Houston pulled the plug on Enron Field and changed the name ASAP…the Mets are opening a stadium honoring Citi!! It’s really very incredible. …ok now..chillin’ to some John Prine and Townes van Zandt tunes….

By: Connie

Connie — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 03:16:44 +0000

I get a big refund too, thanks to the various tax breaks for those of us who are paying our kids’ college tuition. And just like last year, the refund goes right into the tuition account to be recycled. One more year! No more FAFSAs!

By: Jeff (the mild-mannered one)

Jeff (the mild-mannered one) — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 01:15:50 +0000

Can’t imagine why you’d think the Irish Republican Party is worth a donation, Nancy.

By: Dexter

Dexter — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 01:15:01 +0000

…never saw animation like that…say goodbye to three pirates, courtesy of Eugene Field, and yes, the goddam shoe really did come down from the sky:
“All night long their nets they threw
To the stars in the twinkling foam—
Then down from the skies came the wooden shoe,
Bringing the fishermen home;
‘T was all so pretty a sail it seemed
As if it could not be,
And some folks thought ‘t was a dream they ‘d dreamed
Of sailing that beautiful sea—
But I shall name you the fishermen three:
Wynken,
Blynken,
And Nod. ”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~……..and I get cash back, too, which is already spent, of course.
And Detroit and the baseball world mourn Mark Fidrych,The Bird, killed at his farm, working on his truck. I saw him pitch one fine day in Cleveland, 1976. He was truly special, 54 years old and still much-loved in Detroit.

By: LA Mary

LA Mary — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 00:00:33 +0000

Just watched the video again, and now I remember what it reminds me of. My kids used to watch a show on Nickelodeon called Kablaam! and on that show was something called Action League Now, which had kids toys playing the parts in some adventure. It was a little better than that boat/ship animation. I think you can see Action League Now someplace online.

By: LA Mary

LA Mary — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 23:55:20 +0000

The dish of what I assume is artichoke parmesan spinach dip, looks revolting in a tubercular sort of way. I work in health care. Everything is about disease.

By: alex

alex — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 23:53:34 +0000

At one point WBBM handed their losing news show to Carol Marin and gave her free reign to reinvent it, which she did. As I recall, she tried a show that was much more heady, more like the shows of Jim Lehrer or John Callaway on PBS. The ratings still didn’t budge for Channel 2, and in fact might have gotten worse.

Carol got her serious news creds largely by way of very publicly jumping ship at Channel 5 when the station threatened to install Jerry Springer as a co-anchor in order to goose the ratings.

EDIT: Rana, it’s amazing that people pay their hard-earned money for this when there are so many better alternatives, including what they could pour out of a can in their own damn kitchens.

By: Rana

Rana — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 22:56:53 +0000

Not only was that animation jaw-droppingly bad, but so was the anchoring. It just reeked of the Portentious Voice of NOOZ! that turned me off of television news coverage a long time ago. Thanks for the reminder of why I don’t watch it!

As for Applebee’s – based on my experience there, those pictures of food really ought to be called out as false advertising. I’ve rarely seen such sad, over-salted, over-cooked things on my plate as the time I was there. Lots of iceberg lettuce, too.

By: harrison

harrison — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 22:26:26 +0000

nancy, you said:

(I cannot walk past Lester Holt without stopping, I am so fascinated by his utterly immobile upper lip. My old neighbor, the ex-dental hygienist, theorized he’d had extremely good cleft-lip surgery at some point in his life. But never mind that.)

another celebrity who had immobile upper lip was the actor jason robards, jr. he got it after facial surgery when he was in an auto accident in 1972.