Doctor (Roentgen) Who?

Roentgen Who?

"Scooby Google, Where Are You?" Part 5

"Scooby Google, Where Are You?" Part 4

"Scooby Google, Where Are You?" Part 3

"Scooby Google, Where Are You?" Part 2

"Scooby Google, Where Are You?" Part 1

Sputniks & Beatniks &...

Today is the 53rd Anniversary of the first artificial satellite put into near-Earth orbit by the U.S.S.R., "Sputnik" and less than a dozen years later before the 12th Anniversary the U.S. lands

2 men on the Moon.

A dozen years, then nothing manned outside of Earth's orbit since 1973 --ya call that progress?

Your current cell phone has more computing power than all the mainframes in Houston Mission

Control or Cape Kennedy had then, yet they could do it...

But we can't.

"Ool Ya Koo"

"We'll have a gay old time"...circa 1,001,960-66 B.C.

(Before Cable)

MACY'S: "X-Mas in Summertime"

Well, don't that beat all!

Went yesterday to the Newport Mall in Jersey City NJ, and what do I see

on the very last day of Summer?

Christmas!

MACY'S so very desperate for business apparently decided to 'jump start'

the 'holiday spirit' with displays more appropriate to mid-November than

Fall Equinox Eve.

They once open a time, long, long ago, in a galaxy far, far away used to WAIT

actually wait to put this stuff out just before Black Friday, the day after all

the turkeys gobble-up everything.

Wha hoppen?

Who's A Pollock?

Pollock St. & West Side Avenue, Jersey City NJ

Dr. Seuss

Grade AAA

Quark: Betty 1 or Betty 2?

My FavOrite Martian

Century 21

We're Only #2...Why Try Harder?

Why Indeed?

March In August

Joe The Lion

What would "The Wizard of Oz" have been like if the

Cowardly Lion had been played by traitor Stooge

Joe 'Stinky' Besser?

1969 & 2010

Forty-One years ago the first (?) men from the Earth landed on the Moon, and humanity's longest hoped for dream was fulfilled, the promise of greater things to come: Lunar colonies that were self-sustaining for the most part, exploration of new resources and materials that could only exist in a 1/6th of Earth G environment, possibly a base from which to construct other more advanced vehicles to travel to Mars, the mysterious Asteroid Belt, onwards and outwards with faster and perhaps =faster= than even light ships...

So wha hoppen?

Well a lot of things, too many to name, but let's just say that they were and are the same as they were then, the same root cause: Richard M. Nixon.

'nuff said.

Then in 1984 the Peter Hyams' sequel to Stanley Kubrick's landmark "2001: a space odyssey" was released, also based on an Arthur C. Clarke book, "2010: odyssey two", retitled for the movies as "2010: The Year We Make Contact".

Well I went to see it opening night, a Friday, in December at the Loew's Astor Plaza in NYC which was the premier spot for 70mm format, larger than life movies, movies such as "Star Wars", "Superman", etc.;

The movie was the exact opposite of "2001" as it was 'hot' as opposed to its predecessor, and of course the special F/X were really special - and an untethered space walk in Jupiter orbit from the U.S.S.R. Leonov to the tumbling end-over-end Discovery, with the liquid lava light surface of the gas giant morphing in the background.

Breathtaking!

But there were a lot of flaws and anachronisms too: the makers decided to dispense with rear projected images to simulate the video displays aboard both ships, which at the time seemed like a good idea, a step towards realism.

BUT (and that's a pretty big but), viewing it now, in the real year 2010, it looks silly as even the actual displays are thinner than the ones used on the 1987 episodes of "Star Trek: The Next Generation", and that's supposed to be the 24th Century or around thereabouts.

Also the original "2001" rainbow-hued spacesuits were nixed in favor of circa 1970's "Apollo" mission suits, which it is true that they haven't fundamentally changed so at least that's partly correct.

But "OMNI" magazine ceased being an entity around 15 or so years ago, Kubrick & Clarke even though they served as the images of the U.S. and U.S.S.R. on the cover of the dummy issue of "TIME", have been both deceased for several years now.

The funniest thing is the soundtrack of the music of this movie, which was David Shire on all sorts of primitive synthesizers, sounding very dated now, but so happening at the time.

Andy Summers of "The Police", who did "Walking On The Moon" in 1979, also did "Theme From 2010" which was his take on "Also Sprach Zarathustra", not as jazzy as Deodato's 1973 version but enjoyable nonetheless.

This was included on both the A&M vinyl and Cr02 cassette, but not on the 8-Track because by 1984 there weren't any -- dead format you know.

And since it's really the "2010", this time for real, where the hell are the spaceships to Jupiter BTW?

Oh well, guess I'll listen to Summers' "2010" in the "Summer Of 2010"...

Teslamania!

Today is Tesla's birthday, going relatively unnoticed here in the good ol' U. S. of A.,

yet everything we do and take for granted in the 21st Century owes an enormous

amount of debt to Mr. Tesla, not so much to Thomas A. Edison, despite what the

history books say.

Frida People

"There's two kinds of people in the world:

Those who "get" what Frida Kahlo did,

and those who don't."

-- Don ("Z") Diego

?

?

Sum-Sum Summertime

Today is when >BOING!< Spring had sprung already, and now Summertime, Summertime Sum-Sum Summertime...

Gemini Duality

Just in case anyone's wondering, today is both Flag Day and St. Che Guevara's B-Day.

Talk 'bout Gemini duality!

Jumpin' Jupiter

What's up with the 5th planet, eh?

Chaikovsky

After all the attention that the lisping sci-fi 'holiday' received- "May the 4th be with you." -and the very next day after with Cinco de Mayo- remember reading an old MAD magazine where their did their usual TV satire with, what else, "TVarzan", spoofing the Ron Ely series where darkest Africa was actually Mexico with a graphic representation of a map of Mexico with the word Mexico crossed out and Africa in its place instead; in one scene TVarzan and the nubile Polynesian-looking female were in danger from a mongrel bunch of bandoleros, wearing the cliche sombreros and the leader looking and sounding like the Frito Bandito, and telling TVarzan and island girl that at the count of five he's going to waste 'em; so since their at the edge of a cliff overlooking either the Pacific or Atlantic Oceans, Ron Ely has a plan: on the count of three he and the babe will leap over the baddies into the waiting water below; so when the Mexicali villain started the countdown, in Spanish, as planned the hero/heroine jump over and as thwey make their descent he cries, "Into the drink-o, before that fink-o, can say "cinco", and we're stink-o"; at the time I was a 10 years old so didn't know whether he was trying to yell all this as Johnny Weissmuller, or Harry Belafonte- I still don't know.
No sir, none of that faux jokey Lucasfilm inspired comedic holiday for me, or a Mexican beer celebration- after all isn't every day a Mexican beer day anyway?
I instead will enjoy the mashup version of "Dance Of The Sugar-Plum Fairy", with breakbeats and scratching, with real scratches as it's probably from the same ol' 78 r.p.m. that Bob Clampett used in his "Beany & Cecil" 'toons, and later John. K. continued the tradition on the early '90s "Ren & Stimpy", and sip from a mug some spiced-tea from Celestial Seasonings, Tchai, and listen to to an Isao Tomita '70s synth of the rest of the works of Chaikovsky.
"Take tea and see!"

S@tellite Ov Lofe

Earth Day - 40 Years Later

I'm baaack!

So sorry that I've not been 'ON' lately but am as bizzzy as a 'B'...

Will return in several days with some recollections of Earth Days for you--

from people who were actually there.

Chow!

(Purina Dog)

Focus: Hocus Pocus & Frisbee

Oh Carroll...

Ground Control To Major Hog...

James Cameron's Time Tunnel

"Michael Rennie was ill,

The Day The Earth Stood Still,

but he told us where we stand..."

-- Richard O' Brien Science Fiction Double Feature

So AVATAR is now the biggest blockbuster of all time with apparently no end in sight, but it was a long time a comin' because ever since the initial sensationalism of Bwana Devil and the first successful 3D hit 1953's "House Of Wax" the format nearly died and was barely kept alive by cheaply shot soft-core porno flicks in the '60's & '70's, and another attempt in 1982 -83 with "Coming At Ya", "Spacehunter: Adventures In The Forbidden Zone", "Metalstorm: The Destruction Of Jared-Syn" (a real letdown as I thought that 'Jared-Syn' was like a phantasmagorical mythical sci-fi planet or city but alas, another Aussie villian leftover from the

Mel Gibson "Road Warrior/Mad Max" movies), and even "Jaws 3D".

Years ago I told my then Trekkie friends that both 3D movies and 3DTV would become commonplace soon-- this was 1980 before the early '80's 3D 'fad' --but it took about 30 years

to get it right, mostly through the diligent efforts of master auteur James Cameron.

Cameron topping Kubrick when it came for having elaborate sets and rigging-- 2001's centrifuge was the first for verisimilitude when it to simulating weightlessness and artificial gravity --witness the sealab and actual underwater filming for "The Abyss", or the recreation of the various areas of the Titanic in "Titanic", really goes the distance to the nth degree by making the audience a part of the show.

Not just stuff thrown at you, but you enter a world of for all intents and purposes virtual reality.

Yeah, I know it sounds cliche, but that's what it is.

Too bad Don LaFontaine wasn't around to do the trailer, "In a world...", eh?

But what is really of interest to me and I'm certain of to you (or otherwise you wouldn't be reading this) is the influence of Michael Rennie whether directly or indirectly, intentionally or unintentionally, consciously or sub-consciously.

Huh? What?? Isn't this one going to about James Cameron and The Time Tunnel?

Well consider this-

HDTV

You know that by now most of you tech-savvy bloggers out there probably have ditched your old analog glass tube TVs for one of the new digital HDTV flatscreen rigs with their 50", 65", and up image area.

Not me.

Because after you've gotten used to all these newfangled gizmos, the electronic industry is going to throw you a real curve ball-- 3DTV.

So while you've spent beaucoup buck$ on this stuff, I'll wait a little longer when prices really plunge and while you're scrambling to keep up with the 'Joneses'-- and am certain that a lot of you are 'jonesin' for a three-dimensional experience similar to the theater -- simply pick up this stuff cheap.

But remember that no matter how good 3DTV will get, it'll never be as good as the one in the 1963 pilot for the "Outer Limits" entitled "The Galaxy Being".

Now that's something I'd really love to see!

Wouldn't you?

Poe: More Than A Poet? Definitely!

Yesterday was the celebrated birthday of Martin Luther King Jr., and rather than trying to equal or top all the blog entries regarding him, his life, his death, I will later hopefully cover him in another as yet to be ascertained 'item'- I always liked Kolchak The Night Stalker when he spoke into his little tape recorder and before noting an entry he would say 'item', kind of like William Shatner with his 'Captain's Log';

Today however is noted and renowned scribe the late Edgar Allan Poe's B-Day, which had its Bi-Centennial last year (which I missed naturally), and so now I toast Mr. Poe with some green tea and organic jam on those round Silvercup bread thingies which, alas!, they don't make anymore:

"Better late than never (c'mon, say it -more, more...)! "

Oh yeah, it's Tippi Hendrin's birthday too-- wonder what kind of bird she fancies?

Gee, I guess I sound like a raven lunatic.

Gumby Gumma

Evils Of Elvis

The Wayback Machine