The proponents arguing for "huckle bearer" did not give a lot of justification for their position, youtube chats don't allow for a great deal of explanation, but one reason I heard repeatedly was "huckleberry doesn't make any sense." Which itself makes no sense. People really expect to listen in on conversation from the past and understand every word intuitively?
Idioms of the past usually don't make sense. "I'm your huckleberry" means "I'm the one you want," "I'm the man for the job." You can read about further examples of that in the old west here.
I'm increasingly getting the ultra-strange experience of remembering a certain blog post and finding that it actually doesn't exist. Many years back I got the full DVD set of Live Aid and made detailed notes for a blog post (or series of blog posts) about the whole thing. Today I find no such blog post exists. Where was I writing all those observations? What am I remembering? I'm not going to try again.
Regardless, one of the main stories of Live Aid was how Led Zeppelin reunited for it but when the time came for the full concert footage to be released on DVD (the one I watched), they refused to let their performance be included.
Remembering all of this recently, I wondered whether the footage had shown up on the web, and found that it had.
I don't post it here because it's great, but because of the historical uniqueness of it. "Rare" footage of a famous performance and all that.
I love donuts and I'm passionate about them. For my money, cake donuts are not donuts - there is only yeast. Everything else is pointless and a waste of time.
I'll throw something else out there that will probably affect nobody in the world. When I was in elementary school, we had a day where we were all sat down and shown a movie where someone invents a donut making machine that goes haywire and makes infinite donuts. The conundrum of the movie is literally that a machine won't stop making donuts and they're just piling up and they don't know how to stop it. The movie was terrible but the image of the delicious donuts, as well as the mechanization aspect, were enough to keep me interested and leave an indelible memory.
If you're looking for that movie, it's "The Doughnuts" from 1963 and you can watch it here. All the top youtube comments are people talking about how they also remember watching it in school. And it is still terrible. But thanks to the above video I now know that the machine in the movie is making cake donuts.
A compilation of the game "Please Stop Calling Me Chief" which later became "Please Stop Calling Me Debbie" which, if I recall correctly, eventually became "Please Stop Calling Me Monty." Dave never liked doing it and it never really turned out the way one would hope but that was why it's one of my all-time favorites.
The new trailer for Tommy Wiseau's new movie "Big Shark":
Do you see how it stops being a trailer mid-way through? And the official website doesn't work. And sometimes it does work and just goes to Tommy's store. Yeah, that sounds about right.
Meanwhile, someone on Reddit says that Greg Sestero said the trailer is just a joke trailer with no real movie incoming. But so far, the rest of the internet is taking it seriously. We shall see.
This business of time signatures and changing time signatures is mostly alchemy to me - it makes some sense but finer points escape me. Still, I found the video to be worthwhile.
Small-time stand-up comedian Chad Zumock is doing a podcast when he gets a threatening message on his phone that includes a photo of his house. Later that night he's back on youtube with a black eye and a story about how thugs - perhaps sent by Anthony Cumia (of Opie and Anthony fame) - attacked him. Is he lying? Is it true? Does the truth lie somewhere in the middle?
I know that "True Crime Podcasts" are especially hot these days, is there room for a "True Dumb Crime" genre?
Re-watching the MST3K episode "Warrior of the Lost World" recently and who should I (re)discover is the lead actor in that film? Robert Ginty!
One of the running jokes of the episode, ironically, is that they never refer to Robert Ginty by his name, no one knows his name, he is only referred to as "The Paper Chase Guy."
Just as with this episode of MST3K, I had a fondness for "The Paper Chase," the 1973 film about the pressure to make the grade for first year students at Harvard Law School, but had no recollection of Robert Ginty being involved. It was the perfect movie night suggestion.
Re-watching "The Paper Chase" I found it really holds up well. It really brings back all the memories of staying up for an exam and the stress of learning. The opening scene where it starts with an empty auditorium and progresses until the room is full is so simple but so evocative of that feeling. And I think I could watch John Houseman in anything.
The only problem with the movie is that Robert Ginty is nowhere to be seen. How is The Paper Chase guy not actually in "The Paper Chase." It turns out that Robert Ginty played a supporting role in the television series that was based on the movie. So now I'm watching the television series.
I'm generally enjoying the series, so far, it is a test of the hypothesis that I could watch John Houseman in anything - in the show he reprises the role he played in the movie. I have yet to resolve how they'll make a multi-year series about a guy/professor/class relationship. Will they do the Simpsons thing where time runs in the real world but is suspended in the show? Or will they do the Boy Meets World/Saved By the Bell thing where the teacher follows the students through the years? I wouldn't expect them to do that but what I would expect the least is that they'll be true to life and have John Houseman disappear after the first year, to be replaced by other professors.
The main conclusion and the main thing worth noting so far is that I've discovered "The Paper Chase" has the most 70s, wussiest, lamest theme song possibly in the history of television. People say that the "Family Ties" theme is lame, but that has the redeeming quality of being pretty. This theme is just... it's like a parody of bad folk songs. It's like an Adult Swim simulation of a sitcom that never existed.
In this case, the clickbait title "A pool game with live action cutscenes." actually gives you a good sense of the episode. The acting is so precious. I wonder if there's any connection to "Mad Dog McCree."
Before CGI, long before, how were certain special effects in movies created?
In addition to being a big Buster Keaton fan and wanting to highlight his work, I'm also reminded of the tornado in "The Wizard of Oz." That thing was so scary as a kid but still feels incredibly eerie today.
I've been frustrated with Youtube recommendations for a long time. It's not that I hold them responsible for entertaining me, but I've suspected that their algorithm is purposely designed to recommend videos they already know I have no interest in.
With that said, I got a chuckle today as "Himiko Kikuchi - Flying Beagle (1987)" was recommended to me.
In the past I've dipped my toes in the "Japanese Jazz/Funk" genre and enjoyed it. Plus, I'm a fan of smooth music in general (hence the blog title). And I don't usually publicly talk about this but I have a soft spot for videos of beagles, particularly when trying to relax. And so I recognize Youtube's ability to find a recommendation that (sort of) combines these disparate genres into a single file. Hats off to them in this particular instance.
Someone painstakingly recreates what Marty's guitar playing actually sounded like at the rhythmic ceremonial ritual. We may not be ready for this yet but our kids are gonna love it.
