Nothing More To Be Said Here

Alright but I've said it before, Betty White is a living legend.

And the winner is...

Is it just me or does it seem that Jay Leno isn't really sitting on the same sofa with Oprah and Dave, but just added in digitally?



Oh and I'm sure I've said this before, but Betty White is the hardest working person in showbiz today and maybe ever. She is not only a Golden Girl but she should be recognized as a national institution also.

Rambling Relays

I think I’m trying to avoid writing about something. There are a couple of things that are on my mind, but I don’t know how to go about writing them. I tell myself I just need to season the idea little, turn a phrase here or there and relate it to this or that so that I can be comfortable with it, but I never do. I have a few unfinished pieces on Word with one or two paragraphs and that’s it. Truth be told, even if I were to go back to them, they’d be so old that I probably couldn’t figure out what it was that I was trying to say originally. So I will just ramble on a bit.

It’s Penn Relay weekend and I have nothing that I want to do. There are of course the games. But I think that I have gotten to an age where I am just interested in the athletic performances and not the ancillary performances of the spectators looking for dates or whatever both in and out of the stadium that often accompanies the Relays.

If I were to go with friends, I would be the one seen as putting a downer on the whole thing because I would be the one looking to see who was winning a race, whereas they would be the ones looking to see who had the most to jiggle up front, or behind, or see who was built like a brick shit house and what they’d like to do with them. Not that there’s anything wrong that, but what the hell does it mean to be built like brick shit house anyway? I can see the brick house part, but where and how does shit make it even more of a compliment?

Anyway, since it is Relay Weekend that means that it’s the official or unofficial Black Gay Pride weekend in Philadelphia. It also means that there will be plenty of parties that I will not be invited to and I few where I wouldn’t show up even if I were invited because I never have been a real party person unless of course the liquor was flowing the way that it should be and or I was comfortable with the people that were there. It also means that there will be the clubs or bars dedicated to getting that black gay dollar this weekend from people of questionable ages that I will also avoid like the plague, just because I know how the kids get when they are trying to act all grownup and Miss Thing. God, was I ever like that? Also could I make these sentences any longer? Changing gears.

Today I was out in the sun for a few hours doing a few things and decided that I would go to my gym for quick shit and a shower because I was feeling sweaty and stinky. Actually I’m joking about a quick shit because I have something about public toilets that one or two therapy sessions still wouldn’t be able to help me with and why I thought showering and putting back on the same stinking clothes would make a difference is beyond me. But there I was drying off and I noticed I had a tan line on my upper arms from wearing a tee-shirt.

And?

Well for me, that’s a big thing. I am dark and I can get even darker. One time I went to Guadeloupe and I turned so dark there were highlights that I saw on my chest that were actually purple when the sun hit it just right. That was interesting. It was also fun. Nice work if you can get it and it’s time to start working on that again and getting back to my Maasai roots. "But the Maasai are from East Africa” you say, “and slaves were taken from West Africa.” To which I would reply that my family has always travelled and who is to say that they weren’t vacationing in sunny Ghana or Nigeria at the time?

I was going to downshift even further and talk about another “Golden Girl” leaving us but I think that I’ve gone on too long as it is and may leave it for another day. Nevertheless I truly believe that Betty White is going to survive everybody and keep working although at this point that’s not going to be much of a bet, but I’m still taking wagers right now if you’re interested.

Everything Old is New Again

In a strange way, if you have read my last post, this post is sort of related to it.

There is this German guy who has been working in one of the soaps since, if not since I was born then at least for the last 30 years. He was in the 3rd Planet of the Apes movie, the one that proved that sequels can never be as good as the original. And he was in my favorite science fiction movie all time, The Forbin Project. He plays a scientist in charge of a giant supercomputer that is given control of all of the American nuclear missiles. Then with its Russian counterpart, it starts to take over mankind. It is really good, or at least it seemed so back in the 80’s when I first saw it.

Anyway, this German guy is always marrying someone or threatening someone else on his soap and my mother loves him. I have never been able to understand why. I mean how can someone do the same story line year after year and not get bored. How can someone else watch that person year after year and not get bored as well. How can anyone watch a soap opera period, and not get bored. This has always been, as Yul Brynner used to say, “A puzzlement.”

I took this class on public speaking once, and we were told that whenever you gave a speech, you were supposed to relate to your audience in order to get across what you wanted to get across. One of the best ways of this was to start with a joke, a witticism or story that the audience could grab a hold of and believe that you were part of them while you prattled on about the crap that no one was really interested in. It needed to be something that the people there either knew about already or something they could easily catch and move on with.

After each speech from the class was given, there would be a question and answer period. After one of my speeches about social security, or maybe it was about plagiarism, someone asked me, “who was Yul Brynner?” …Apparently the little bastard was too young to know who Yul Brynner was and I saw my grade slip a notch right in front of me. If you are in that cretin’s age group and don’t know who the great Yul Brynner was, then look for the King and I on PBS, or wait until next Easter and watch The Ten Commandments and you’ll know who I mean.

Well as of tonight, I now know what dearest Mama goes through when she watches her soaps. I was able to catch in the middle, Regis Philbin’s latest game show from New York and I realized it had a familiar ring to it. I thought immediately of Dick Clarks Pyramid. But then Regis pulls out Betty White and she started to slip words back and forth with the game show’s players and I know that it is Password.

So I’m watching Miss White, she was called Miss Betty White even by her husband Allen Ludden when he was hosting Password and was still alive, and I’m transported back to 30 years ago and I recognize the same head and body movements, the same false gasp of incredulity at getting an answer correct that this old pro has been using for all of her game show career, which may go back even further than the 30 that I’ve known her. There was a certain comfort in watching her create a false sense of surprise and suspense as the single words were played back and forth between her and the contestants. I watched as she gave that warm folksy show business personality of yester year and I knew as an audience member that I was in the hands of an expert.

I doubt that the show will last very long, it seems kind of weak. But like my mother, there is something about watching a professional at work, looking at them hone their craft and sharpen their skills that will make me watch out for Betty White again and again and again.