Monthly Archives: October 2024

I got two more calls today from folks pretending to be from Walgreens, trying to pry medical information out of me. I told the first guy he was a fraud and he said, "No, I have your complete medical history here." I don't think any pharmacy has my complete medical history and if he sure didn't have it because he was asking me who my primary care physician was. I said to him, "Really? Name three prescriptions I've had filled at Walgreens" and he started naming drugs I've never heard of, let only taken. I think one of them was for women.

The other person reacted badly to me telling her she was a fake. She started yelling she had a great offer that would save me tons of money but since I was so mean to her, she wasn't going to offer it to me.

Someone asked me why I answer these calls at all. The answer is that I occasionally get real calls that I don't want to miss and they look like they might be spam calls on my phone. I got one today I was real glad I answered. And if I got a call and didn't answer it, I'd sit here wondering if I'd made a mistake. It's faster to answer and get rid of them.

When a new show doesn't do well on Broadway, it usually disappears forever. No one, after all, is eager to invest money in a flop. But there are exceptions. The 1981 musical Merrily We Roll Along ran for 44 previews and 16 performances and if anyone but Stephen Sondheim had written its score, you'd probably never have heard of it again. In this case, all sorts of folks wanted to take a whack at revising its book and changing its staging and it's been revived more often than many huge Broadway hits.

Something similar happened with the 1974 musical Mack and Mabel with a score by Jerry Herman. Its Broadway run lasted five previews and a paltry 66 performances but it keeps getting revised and revived and revised and revived and revised and revived. Though none of these revisals were revived for long, Mr. Herman to his dying day insisted it was the best score he ever wrote — an amazing viewpoint from a guy who wrote the scores for Hello, Dolly!, La Cage aux Folles and a few other smash successes.

One of the things that is said to have kept it alive was, of all things, an ice skating demonstration. In '82, the award-winning skaters Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean performed at the World Figure Skating Competition with a routine set to the Entr'acte of the original Broadway production of Mack and Mabel. They won a gold medal and their performance, televised around the world, prompted a run on the cast album. People reportedly rushed to buy it because they liked the one number to which the duo had skated. (In the video below, it's identified as the Overture from the show but it was actually the Entr'acte, which is the secondary overture that opened Act Two.)

The sudden surge in album sales convinced any number of producers that Mack and Mabel was deserving of another try and, like I said, there have been many of them and there are probably more to come. Maybe one day one of them will even run for a while…

I've decided to not look too much (if at all) at the news today.  I feel so bad for the people whose lives are being imperiled and disrupted by Hurricane Milton and I'll probably feel worse if I keep seeing wet reporters showing us homes underwater and trees crushing cars.  If my witnessing this would make things any better, I'd be glued to my Roku but it won't.

I may have said here a couple times that my number one political issue is ensuring that everyone has access to good, affordable medical care.  A close second — and in a way, it's the same issue — is making sure that agencies like FEMA are fully-funded and fully-competent.  And we really oughta do more about this thing called Climate Change.  How many "once-in-a-thousand-years" weather catastrophes do we have to have before everyone gets on board with this idea?

Once again, I refer you to my favorite charity, Operation USA.  If you can afford to donate to help out folks in the states impacted by Helene and Milton, that's a good place to send money.  I know some of the people behind it and I know that they spend very little on administration and themselves and that most of what you send them will be put to good and immediate use.  There are, of course, other places to donate. I just choose to send what I can send to them.  Here's their banner one more time and I'll be back later with something non-topical…

If you search this blog for the term "October Surprise," you'll find a lot of posts where I suggested in some presidential election year that the "October Surprise" was that there was no "October Surprise." This year, we're only nine days into the month and we seem to have several contenders including the fact that Donald Trump shipped Covid tests to Vladimir Putin while telling Americans that we shouldn't be testing and the fact that Donald Trump doesn't know how to deal with a state of emergency other than trying to spin it as a reason to vote for him.

Maybe that last one isn't a surprise. Oh, and I guess the latest revelations from Special Counsel Jack Smith might qualify as an October Surprise. There may be more possibilities on the way.

Something that struck me with all the interviews that Kamala Harris has done in the last few days is that I don't think she's even trying to win any Trump voters over. I think someone made a decision that Trump has roughly 44% of the vote and it's solid and that all her campaigning should be aimed at the (roughly) 8-9% of the Undecideds out there. At least, that thought came to me while watching her interview last night with Stephen Colbert. And it must gall Trump that there's no way he can go on any of those late night shows.

Here's something nice. The Huffington Post reported…

The Republican congressman who represents a western North Carolina district badly damaged by the remnants of Hurricane Helene is tired of the conspiracy theories about recovery efforts circulating online. In a lengthy statement, Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-N.C.) praised the support his district has received but also noted "an uptick in untrustworthy sources trying to spark chaos by sharing hoaxes, conspiracy theories, and hearsay about hurricane response efforts across our mountains."

Gee, I wonder what "untrustworthy sources" he could be talking about. I'm glad he did that because the folks in the paths of Helene 'n' Milton need all the honest information they can get. They're also going to need supplies and medical care and a whole lot of other things. This would be a good time to donate to my favorite charity…

And here's what happened earlier this morning in Las Vegas: Huge fireworks show followed by the demolition of the remaining two towers of the Tropicana Hotel. This was a very Vegas moment…

Hey, the Pink Panther theme song and the James Bond theme song go well together. Give a listen and see if you don't agree…

Tonight in Las Vegas a few hours after Midnight, there will be an implosion/demolition of what's left of the Tropicana Hotel. It's a relic of Old Vegas that opened in 1957 and the last time I was in it, it didn't look like it had been cleaned since the administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson.

There has been talk of its closure and razing for a decade or two now and they finally closed it last April and began emptying the place. The last two towers come down tonight right after a huge fireworks display.

The bringdown will be done by a company called Controlled Demolitions, Inc. that seems to be the leader in this field. It's owned and/or operated by the Loizeaux Family, having been founded in 1947 by John D. "Jack" Loizeaux. Around 1981, I was a writer on the TV show That's Incredible! and we had a bunch of Loizeauxs on to talk about their unusual profession and I spent an hour or so talking with them before the taping. It's really a fascinating skill because they usually have to do it to a building that's close to others that no one wants to see damaged. One of them said, "How it falls is not anywhere near as important as where it falls."

One of the Loizeauxs explained their craft in great detail to me. I didn't understand all of it then — it involved a lot of math — and I don't recall a lot of it now. I do recall that it was a lot more complicated than one might think because buildings are made of all sorts of different materials and are put together in different manners. Some years later, I was present for the implosion of the Hacienda Hotel, very near the Tropicana, and it was really an impressive thing to see in person. I'm not sure if that was a Loizeaux job. (I wrote about it here.)

Tomorrow or the next day, I'll try to find some video of the end of the Tropicana and post it here. I hate seeing part of Old Vegas go away but this was a place I don't think too many people will miss. I did win a lot of money there once at Blackjack but I don't play that anymore.

I can't believe it's that time again. Open Registration for the 2025 Comic-Con International in San Diego will take place on Saturday, October 26, 2024 commencing at 9:00 AM Pacific Daylight Time. And if it goes the way it's gone in past years, it'll be over around 9:45 AM Pacific Daylight Time. This is the moment when anyone — yes, even you — can log into their web portal and try to score badges for the convention. The convention, by the way, runs July 24-27 of next year with a Preview Night on Wednesday, July 23.

If you want to participate in this stampede for tickets, study this page well in advance. The folks who succeed in their mission that day will all have done this and they'll be ready to pounce.

You might also consider attending WonderCon Anaheim which will take place March 28-30 next year at the Anaheim Convention Center. WonderCon is run by the same folks who operate Comic-Con International but it's a smaller convention. It's whelming. It's just not overwhelming. Badges for that are not yet available and when they are, they probably won't sell out as rapidly. I'll try and let you know when they go on sale.

I expect to be at both conventions, my ankle permitting. And before someone asks — because someone always asks — I don't expect to be at any other conventions next year.

The New York Times/Siena College poll — which has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.4 points — says Harris/Walz is three points ahead of Trump/Vance. That ain't bad news but it's still closer than it oughta be. If you look around, you can easily find one that shows either ticket in a better position.

Jonathan Chait argues that Harris is running a terrific campaign by being more centrist than a lot of her supporters would like.

Ed Kilgore explains how the Trump campaign is trying to twist and exploit the hurricanes ravaging the southeast.

And Ed Kilgore (him again) lists all the different things that the Trump campaign claims constitute "Election Interference." It's pretty much anything that anyone says against voting for Trump.

I don't imagine anyone visiting this site needs to hear any additional reasons to vote for the Harris/Walz ticket. If you're not going to by now, you're probably not going to. But just in case, here's another one that they'll probably claim is "Election Interference"…

I spoke the other evening to a friend in Florida who's between hurricanes. He's not too worried for his area but pretty concerned for folks not-all-that-far from him. If you live in an area that's threatened and you're reading this, I hope it's from a safe place even if you had to evacuate to get to it.

And it's hard to think of much more beyond that at the moment but I'll try to come up with one thing…

Oh, I know. I'm getting a ridiculous number of spam calls lately from folks who claim to be calling from Walgreens Pharmacy — a business which has no business whatsoever with me. They've never filled a prescription for me or sold me anything more medicinal than a bag of Cheetos. Nevertheless, the callers want to "update" my records with them and they have all sorts of medical-type questions they want to ask me. If I play along at all, the questions go like this…

LYING CALLER: We need to verify the name of your primary care physician. Could you let me have that please?

ME: Don't you have that in your files?

LYING CALLER: Yes but we have so many names here. Please tell me the name of your primary care physician.

ME: Read me some of those names and I'll tell you when you get to the right one.

LYING CALLER: There are too many here to read to you. Just tell me the name of your primary care physician.

ME: It's Boombatz. Dr. Vinnie Boombatz. Do you see him there on your list?

LYING CALLER: Ah, yes. There he is…

But I actually had one of these lying callers go honest on me. He told me he was calling from Walgreens and I said, "No, you're not. You're just trying to gather information that's none of your f'ing business and you're going to ask me to name my primary care physician." And he said, "You're right. This is just a scam deal but it's the only job I could get" and he hung up. This guy would never make it in politics.

The auctions are open! A group of cartoonists have done or donated drawings to the cause of electing Guess Who as the next President of These United States. As I understand it, the funds collected go to groups backing the Harris/Walz ticket so here's your chance to score a lovely piece o' art and contribute to that effort.

Here's a 1986 profile of Joe Barbera on 60 Minutes. First, some notes: The voice actor you'll see briefly is Stanley Ralph Ross, who was more of a writer (he wrote the Adam West Batman show and developed the Lynda Carter Wonder Woman show among many other credits) but he sometimes acted and did voices. Huckleberry Hound was not the first product of the Hanna-Barbera studio. That honor belongs to The Ruff & Reddy Show.

There's a scene in there where Barbera is pitching to NBC execs and I, who pitched to them myself many times, recognize Phyllis Tucker Vinson and Sam Ewing. There's a creative meeting with writers and artists at the H-B studio and I recognize Glenn Leopold, Tom Ruegger and Iwao Takamoto.

And I think when Joe is talking about networks laundering his shows, he's overstating the problem somewhat but I've written about this elsewhere here. It is a nice portrait of a fascinating man who was a great salesman and an important part of a lot of lives, mine included. Thanks to "John G." for sending me this link…

Something of interest will be here later today. No, let me amend that: Something will be here that's about as interesting as anything ever is on this blog. You'll be the judge of whether it's of interest to you…as this post probably is not. But I'm dealing with deadlines and meetings these days and I'm also looking in horror at what the poor folks in the path of that one-two hurricane punch may be living through..and of course, we hope they all live through it.

Marjorie Taylor Greene says that someone somewhere is controlling the weather. I wish that was so because then maybe more benevolent weather controllers could take over and stop this horrible destruction. I don't think that's possible but maybe we could do a lot more to prepare for events like this.

Did you ever see this? It's a music video for Herb Alpert's rendition of "Puttin' on the Ritz" and it's said to have been shot in one continuous take with no edits. One online page says it's a creative collaboration between Alpert, artist Glenn Kaino, filmmaker Afshin Shahidi, producer Kerith Lemon and choreographers Napoleon & TabithaD'umo. The lead dancer is Vincent Noiseux. This has been around for a while but somehow I never was aware of it until recently…

The Charlotte Observer, a newspaper in hurricane-devastated North Carolina, has published an editorial entitled "Shame on Donald Trump for worsening NC's Helene tragedy with political lies." You can read the entire piece here but I'll quote just the beginning…

Western North Carolina is trying to pick up the pieces left behind by Hurricane Helene, which decimated the region, leaving communities destroyed and a death toll in the triple digits. This is not a situation to capitalize on for political gain. But former President Donald Trump has politicized the situation at every turn, spreading falsehoods and conspiracies that fracture the community instead of bringing it together.

And it ain't much nicer to Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, the self-described "Black Nazi" who's running for governor and is only, according to the latest poll, seventeen points behind his opponent.

What is with these guys who don't understand that human lives are involved here? That people are killed, homes are destroyed, businesses are outta business, etc.? I don't think there's any greater test of leadership than leadership in a time of life-threatening emergency.