from Bruce
Anecdotes
Alcohol
• The family of William Warren Woollcott, the older brother of famous drama critic Alexander Woollcott, was at times unconventional. During the time of Prohibition, when alcoholic beverages were forbidden, Billy Woollcott made his own beer. On special occasions, he would bring up an extra bottle and let his very young daughters have a little beer along with the adults. This beer was a special treat to them. Of course, their father was a good parent. He would sometimes tell his two youngest daughters, “Drink your milk. The one who doesn’t finish her milk won’t get any beer tonight.”
• Operatic tenor Leo Slezak knew an alcoholic who called every drink an “okrepa” — that is, a strengthener — so he called the alcoholic “Okrepa.” The alcoholic spent all his money on drink, and so he never bought a railway ticket. Instead, he would arrange to be in the dining car when the ticket inspector came, and instead of purchasing a ticket, he would draw the ticket inspector into conversation and buy him drinks. Unfortunately, this always cost the alcoholic much more than simply buying the ticket would have.
• Mrs. Sarah Siddons was playing Lady Macbeth on a very hot day. Being thirsty, she asked her dresser to get her a drink, so he sent a small boy to get her a glass of beer from a local pub. Returning with the beer, the boy asked where Mrs. Siddons was. Informed that she was on stage, he walked out in full view of the audience and said, “If you please, ma’am, I’ve brought you your beer.”
• Sometimes people in other countries don’t quite do American things right. While in France, Peg Bracken ordered an iced tea, but after drinking half a glass, she felt like singing loudly and putting a lampshade on her head, so she asked the waiter, “Did you put gin in this?” The waiter, surprised replied, “Mais oui, madame” — as if to say, “Doesn’t everyone?’
• A dying Scotsman asked his minister if any whiskey was in Heaven. Noticing that the minister looked surprised, the dying man said, “Understand, it’s not that I care for it, but it does look awfully well on the table.”
Animals
• In August 1996, Cerise Summers was inside her home watching a soap opera. Inside with her was Bambi, her seven-month-old pet beagle. Outside, playing in a sandbox where she could hear them, were her three-year-old son, Troy, and his playmate, Mika Paloma, who was two and a half years old. Cerise said, “At a crucial part of the program, Bambi started whining and barking to be let out. I told her to wait.” Bambi would not wait. When Cerise reached out to give Bambi a swat, Bambi snapped at her — something that she had never done before. Cerise said, “I was shocked. And maybe that brainy beagle knew that was what it would take to make me pay attention to her. Anyway, that was when I began to think seriously that something must be wrong to make her act in such a manner.” Cerise let Bambi out. Cerise said, “The moment she was free of the house, she began snarling and growling like she was ready to do battle with a bear, I ran after her to see what had so upset her — and then I got the shock of my life!” The shock was a strange man who had Troy under one arm and Mika under the other. Bambi bit the man, who dropped the two children. Cerise said, “He was cursing Bambi a blue streak, but by this time I had a garden hoe in my hands and was charging toward him. He took one look at the rage in my eyes, the hoe in my hands, and the fury in Bambi’s snapping teeth, and jumped over the fence. That’s when I really started to scream, and several neighbors came out to see what was happening.” Bambi received a very nice reward for saving the two children from the strange man: a huge serving of her favorite meal — hamburger and French fries and ketchup.
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Presenting
Michael Egan
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION
BANDCAMP MUSIC
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION OF BANDCAMP MUSIC
Track: "Beer is a Necessity"
EP: RURAL STREETPUNK
Artist: Dead City Dealers
Artist Location: New Castle, Pennsylvania
Info:
“I've been writing music for a good while, and have done time in various bands, including Dead City Dealers, Bob Sagget & the FullHouse, The Disliked, The RUNS, and The Reversatiles. I also have an ongoing solo project called Sam Sinister and the Plastic Sinister Band, in which I play mainly with myself [ha ha].” — Sam Sinister
Sam Sinister - vocals
Chris Vermin - bass
Mario Sapanero - rhythm guitar
Andy Fabich - rhythm and lead guitar
Tony Sapanero - drums
Visit Dead City Dealers' Facebook page
Five tracks: 14 minutes
Price: FREE Download of five-track EP
Genre: Punk
Links:
RURAL STREETPUNK
Sam Sinister on Bandcamp
Sam Sinister on YouTube
Other Links:
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Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
David E Suggests
The Voices
David
Thanks, Dave!
New Venture
Michael Egan
BRUCE'S RECOMMENDATION
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Other Links:
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Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Reader Comment
Current Events
Lying GOP SCOTUS
Two very good embedded videos in this article plus anger and sarcasm from Evan:
that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Curly Top Rand Paul asked how we can tell if it's disinformation - how about if it comes outta his mouth?
Class Of 2022
Rock Hall of Fame
Eminem, Lionel Richie, Carly Simon, Eurythmics, Duran Duran and Pat Benatar have been inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, a list that also includes Dolly Parton, who initially resisted the honor.
The honorees — voted on by more than 1,000 artists, historians and music industry professionals — “each had a profound impact on the sound of youth culture and helped change the course of rock ’n’ roll,” said John Sykes, the chairman of the Rock Hall, in a statement Wednesday.
To be eligible, artists are required to have released their first record 25 years prior to induction. Parton, Richie, Simon and Duran Duran were selected on their first go-round. Simon was a first-time nominee this year more than 25 years after becoming eligible. Eminem becomes the 10th hip-hop act to be inducted, making the cut on his first ballot.
The hall also announced Wednesday that Judas Priest and Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis are getting the award for musical excellence and that Harry Belafonte and Elizabeth Cotten will be honored with the Early Influence Award.
Rock Hall of Fame
Tackled On Stage
Dave Chappelle
Comedian Dave Chappelle was tackled during a performance at the Hollywood Bowl Tuesday night and a man was later arrested.
Security guards chased and overpowered the attacker, and Chappelle was able to continue his performance while the man was taken away in an ambulance.
The assailant was carrying a replica handgun with a large blade that folded out of it similar to a pocket knife, according to a photo released by police.
Isaiah Lee, 23, was detained and arrested for assault with a deadly weapon, said Officer Alba Mendez, a Los Angeles Police Department spokesperson.
Chappelle was attacked as he was wrapping up a routine in which he talked about how comedians have to worry more about their personal security in the wake of this year’s Academy Awards ceremony where the Oscar-winning actor slapped Rock on live television in reaction to a joke about his wife.
Dave Chappelle
Urged To Vote
Brazil
Hollywood stars Leonardo DiCaprio and Mark Ruffalo joined other celebrities making a final push for voters in Brazil to register before the Wednesday deadline, prompting dismissive responses from President Jair Bolsonaro.
In recent days, A-listers in Brazil and abroad have used their prestige and social media platforms to call for young, first-time voters in Brazil to register to vote in the October presidential election that is expected to pit far-right incumbent Bolsonaro against former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of the leftist Workers’ Party.
In Brazil, voting is mandatory for anyone aged between 18 and 70, and failure to vote entails paying a small fine. Those 16 and 17 can vote, but are not obligated and young people have been at the center of a nationwide get-out-the-vote campaigns.
At home, legendary Brazilian actress Fernanda Montenegro and singer Anitta also encouraged young people to vote. The latter told her nearly 17 million fans on Twitter that she had discussed the issue at length with DiCaprio at this week’s Met Gala in New York City, and that the actor knew more about the environment than Bolsonaro.
Brazil
Sentenced To 16 Years
Kidd Creole
Rapper Kidd Creole, who was a founding member of Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five, was sentenced Wednesday to 16 years in prison for stabbing a homeless man to death on a New York City street.
The 62-year-old rapper, born Nathaniel Glover, was found guilty of manslaughter last month for the death of John Jolly, who was stabbed twice in the chest with a steak knife in midtown Manhattan in August 2017.
Prosecutors accused Glover of stabbing Jolly after becoming enraged because he thought Jolly was gay and was hitting on him. After stabbing Jolly, who was 55, Glover headed to his workplace nearby, changed his clothes and washed the knife, prosecutors said. Glover was arrested the following day.
Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five formed in the late 1970s in the Bronx. The group’s best-known song is “The Message” from 1982. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007, the first rap group to be included.
Kidd Creole
Satanic Temple
Boston
The Satanic Temple is requesting to fly a flag over Boston City Hall after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled this week that the city violated the free speech rights of a conservative activist seeking to fly a Christian flag outside the downtown building.
The Salem-based group tweeted a request filed Tuesday with the city property management department to raise a flag marking “Satanic Appreciation Week” from July 23-29.
Lucien Greaves, the organization’s co-founder, said in an email Wednesday that the group wants to show that religious liberty must mean respect for “all forms” of religious practice and religious opinion.
“When government officials are able to impose arbitrary restrictions on claims of conscience, or to abridge the civic capacities of some based on their religious identity, we fail to be a free, democratic republic,” he wrote in part.
The Satanic Temple is separate from the Church of Satan, which was founded in the 1960s. Founded in 2013, the Satanic Temple doesn’t believe in Satan and describes itself as a “non-theistic religious organization” that advocates for secularism.
Boston
'May Be True'
Wisconsin
U.S. Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican from Wisconsin, responded to a man claiming COVID vaccines give people AIDS by telling him "everything you say may be true."
Johnson was speaking to Todd Callendar, who bills himself as an "international lawyer" and "leader of a group trying to stop the Biden regime's effort to destroy the U.S. military via injections of the so-called vaccine that contains HIV." During Callendar and Johnson's conversation on the rightwing video-sharing platform Rumble, Callendar again claimed the various COVID vaccines give users AIDS and that health officials need to be "held accountable."
"You've got more than a hundred doctors here, all of whom will tell you these shots caused vaccine-induced AIDS," Callendar said, even though no reputable doctor has made such a claim. "They purposefully gave people AIDS...this is criminal intent."
Johnson interjected, but not to refute Callendar's lies about the vaccines. Instead Johnson said Callendar and other anti-vaxxers have to continually spread falsehoods about the shots so they can convince people they give people HIV or AIDS.
Wisconsin
Secret Cave
Alabama
The cave in the northern Alabama countryside (the researchers are keeping its precise location a secret) is the richest prehistoric cave art site in North America, Simek said.
It’s one of thousands of caves within the southern part of the Appalachian Plateau, a huge region of “karst” — heavily eroded limestone — that runs from southern Pennsylvania to Alabama.
Known to science only as the “19th Unnamed Cave,” it extends for miles beneath the surface. Hundreds of carved figures are incised into the ceiling of the “dark zone” filled with stalactites and stalagmites just beyond the light from the entrance.
The team estimates the carvings were made about 1,000 years ago by people who lived during the late Woodland phase of the Native American culture in the region.
Caves were regarded in many Native American traditions as entrances to an underworld, and the distinctive style of the cave art seemed to reflect this, he said.
Alabama
Looted Priceless Roman Bust
Texas Goodwill
A priceless work of Roman art went missing after World War II— until it was sold for $34.99 at a Goodwill store in Texas.
The marble bust, titled simply “Portrait of a man,” was sculpted some time in the 1st century B.C. or early A.D., according to the San Antonio Museum of Art, where it is on display as of May 4.
How it traveled 2,000 years and untold miles to a resale store in Austin is a mystery only partially unraveled.
Experts believe that the sculpture was looted from a German museum after WWII and taken home by a U.S. soldier, according to the SA Museum of Art. But what happened between then and it’s arrival at Goodwill decades later is anyone’s guess.
The bust was revealed at the San Antonio Museum of Art on May 4, and will remain on display there until May 21, 2023.
Texas Goodwill
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