John Gushue . . . Dot Dot Dot

An instant Halloween classic

I posted about this New Yorker cover when it appeared in 2009 ... but I loved it so much, I wanted to look at it again. 

Tonight, incidentally, was the first time our son hit the neighbourhood on his own, so I wasn't one of those parents glancing at their phones while the little monsters tricked-or-treated. 

Old youngsters

"You can't put off being young until you retire." 
- Philip Larkin  

 

How many of these books have you read?

This is a feature from Esquire with the very Esquire-y title of The 75 Books Every Man Should Read. 

Of the 75, I've read 15, and I started more than a handful of others. (Not finishing books is a specialty!) 

A bit hefty on the macho and the American and the 20th century, but I found a good nudge to get back to reading more books. 

 

Baby I'm Yours

This song, by Breakbot, came out last year, and has a fascinating video: great animation, with the use of more than 2,000 hand-done watercolours. 

 

Young Frankenstein comes to call

The Halloween season definitely had something to do with it, but Martha and I love Young Frankenstein at any time of the year. On Friday, I picked it out for a family movie night. I can't say I was surprised, but Nick howled as much as we did, except that his laughs were funnier to our ears, simply because he was watching and hearing the gags for some time. 

He also got some context some of the long-running lines in the house, such as my habit of saying "Vahrm meeelk? Ovaltine?" 

'Steve always aspired to make beautiful later'

If you read one thing today, or even this week, make it Mona Simpson's eulogy of her brother Steve Jobs. She did not meet him until she was 25, but they evidently became close. The essay, published today in the New York Times, is full of wonderful ancedotes, including the observation above about what drove Jobs. (Innovation may have been one thing, but beauty trumped all.) 

And keep going until the ending. It's quite moving. 

Cornerstone

This Arctic Monkeys tune from a couple of years ago is the tune o' the day. 

 

Trouble

"Trouble is a part of your life, and if you don't share it, you don't give the person who loves you a chance to love you enough." 
- Dinah Shore  

 

Buy art

Buzzard lessons

Every now and then, we all need a kick to get going.

New Ghost Protocol trailer

While I'm still getting used to the lack of colons in the new Mission: Impossible (sorry, it belongs there) title, here's the new trailer.

Frightening commas

" 'See you in hell Sheldon.' The most frightening thing about that is the missing comma."
- Sheldon Cooper, in this week's Halloween episode of The Big Bang Theory

The Santa lifestyle

Works one day a year ... and then what?

So obvious

"The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer."
- Edward R. Murrow

 

Hero Takes a Fall

Susanna Hoffs & co. at the beginning, before the mega-hits and gloss, and when the comparisons to the Go-Go's were inevitable. This is as catchy as pop tunes get; the video (from 1984) is hilariously dated. 

If you had a crummy day ...

... it probably didn't beat these folks.

This would be my recent appearance on Strombo

Actually, this is, of course, John Lithgow ... the actor with whom I'll admit I share a resemblance. Every now and again, more often when he appears in something popular, someone will say something like, "Has anyone ever told you you look like ..."

Yep, I'll nod. As I have nodded for years, particularly since my hair fell out and I looked remarkably like that guy from Footloose.

Lithgow's appearance on Dexter as the Trinity killer changed things a bit, with a few people noting that I suddenly seemed ... creepier.

This clip from the Strombo show is about that very role.

That blank look

"When I model, I'm pretty blank. You can't think too much or it doesn't work."
- Paulina Porizkova

Get It While You Can

Janis Joplin, with a hair arrangement that only that era could produce, in a live performance on The Dick Cavett Show. 

Rick Mercer and holding bullies accountable

Rick Mercer's rant from last night has generated a lot of attention, and for a good reason. He brings a focus to the aftermath of the suicide of a gay teenager: that is, the bullies who made it happen. 

Caramel

This smoky tune from 1996, from New Yorker Suzanne Vega, is the song of the day. 

Freedom

"You can only be free if I am free."
- Clarence Darrow  

Two interpretations of the upcoming Avengers movie

The official one. 

The totally unofficial one. 

Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye

I read today that Paul Leka had died. Leka is behind of the great trivia points in pop music history, and millions have heard his music even if they would never have placed his name. 

Leka wrote Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye years before Steam made it a No. 1 hit, in 1969. Here's the joke: there was no Steam. It was a name created to be put on a label (Fontana, to be precise) because a hastily performed version of the song, which Leka had intended to be just a B-side to another song he was producing, was judged good enough to be an A-side on its own right. 

The catch was that Leka, who produced the song and played keyboards on it, didn't want it released that way, and certainly didn't want to be associated with it. 

And that was that. 

Years later, Na Na Hey Hey became a sports-stadium staple. I actually bought the 45 at a flea market, and remember listening to it when I was growing up; what jumped out at me was the propulsive drumming. I was surprised to learn today that the drums were lifted from another recording session for another song! 

This video screams 1969. You can see the made-up band lip-synching their way through the tune, not at all concerned about hitting notes. Not shown, for instance, is the organ (and other keyboards) that made the tune rip. (Don't forget, too, that the organ sound was what attracted a Chicago sports-stadium organist to riff on Na Na Hey Hey in the first place.) 

Steam - Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye by DwightFrye

An infographic on collisions in St. John's

We tried something new at cbc.ca/nl today - an infographic. Peter Gosse, our web developer, and I had been talking for a while about doing one. Yesterday, Peter Gullage, the executive producer of our newsroom, came up to me and said, "You want an infographic? Here's an infographic."

It was the annual collisions report prepared for St. John's city council - filled with interesting tidbits, and kind of heavy on the numbers. I picked out some facts and wrote some text, and Peter Gosse produced the following. It was published here, as part of this report.

I was really happy with the results, and would definitely like to do more. An infographic, after all, adds to the palette of the ways we can tell stories.