Monthly Archives: August 2012

I Melt With You

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A Monday again, and another mass murder, courtesy of a white supremacist in Wisconsin. Shot 5 Sikh followers at their temple, and a police officer who arrived on the scene. The piece of shit murderer was shot by another police officer and slain. I guess the piece of shit thought the Sikh communities were Muslim, therefore worthy of slaughter. Muslims don’t wear turbans though, only the Sikh do. Two weeks ago it was the shootings in Colorado, this week it’s Wisconsin. And of course shootings go on all the time. It’s a fact of life and a fact of death.

I guess there should have been a discussion on gun control between Colorado and Wisconsin. Some said it was too soon when people were still recovering in the hospital and the dead were still being buried in Colorado. So no discussion was had. I don’t suppose the memo stating when the discussion could take place was distributed properly at the appointed time. Too soon becomes too late. And here we are, all of us with blood on our hands. A terrible tragedy and a terrible reminder that something really needs to be done about the easy access of semi-automatic guns.

Away from the gunfire, things are alright relatively speaking. Yesterday Bill had gotten us tickets to see ‘Siren’s Heart- Norma Jean & Marilyn Monroe in Purgatory’. Yes, an off off Broadway show in the middle of the theater district. At a synagogue of all places, the Actor’s Temple Theater. It was also the anniversary of Marilyn Monroe’s death which added poignancy to the evening. I headed into the city via the Path train, knowing that there would be a lot of traffic on a Sunday night. It turned out to be a smart idea, at least it was on paper.

I snagged a seat on the train and got as far as Ninth Street where the train stopped and the power was shut off. The reports were of a police action at the 33rd Street station so everything had halted. I was due to meet Bill at 7:00 and it was going on 6:00 and knowing that the information could very well be misinformation I decided to get off the train and walk the rest of the way. That was a walk from Ninth Street and Sixth Avenue to West 47th Street between Eight and Ninth Avenues.

I had a cigar and proceeded to walk the hummus streets. By the time I got to 14th Street I was quite sweaty. By 23rd Street I was drenched and people were staring. I didn’t care, I was listening to Led Zeppelin. Rain was expected so I wore my boots as I trudged up the avenues. I was reminded about how I don’t really get around Manhattan these days, too many people who don’t know how to walk on the sidewalks.

I made it to 47th street about 15 minutes early. No sign of Bill so I sat in a concrete playground near the temple and texted Bill where I was. He was then in front of the temple and texted me back telling me just that. He was happy to see me, I was sweaty and not so happy. I knew I needed to get into a better mood so I did my best. Once we were inside things got better, my mood elevated and my temperature dropped.

The play was alright, it was the second show of the first day so there were a few flubs. Sound cues were missed and stage props fell off the back curtain during the show and Marilyn could have been miked better. And 2 different knobs had their cellphones go off despite being told to turn off your phones before the show. Louisa Bradshaw did a great job of it, playing Norma Jean and Marilyn with humor and grace and not too much pathos. It was a nearly filled house, or temple and it went over well. I told Louisa Bradshaw that she did a great job considering and she seemed grateful to hear it.

Apparently during the show the skies opened and everything was drenched when we went outside. We decided to walk to the bus terminal after I checked the Path schedule and hitting my jaw with my umbrella when it would close properly. No glass jaw here. Bill and I watched The Newsroom and then he went to bed. I stayed up and watched True Blood (a lot going on there). I missed Harpy’s call since my volume was down on the phone since the theater. I also missed Casey Chasm’s call the other night.

I was about to go to bed and instead I watched the landing of Curiosity module on the Mars surface. I watched it from the NASA website, all the techs and engineers in the control room anxiously watching or listening to the events as they happened. Millions of miles away, things were delayed by about 14 minutes I guess. I was impressed and anxious myself. I wondered what we would find if everything worked, would we be upsetting something that shouldn’t be disturbed.

Too many science fiction movies I guess. Time will tell. So it goes.

Happy birthday Andy Warhol.




art installation in my hallway






06 Radioactivity (Hiroshima)

Is that you Mr. B?

I Melt

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Yesterday I had Turner Classic Movies on and it was Tarzan Day in honor of Johnny Weissmuller’s birthday. I only wanted to see Tarzan’s New York Adventure which was a classic when I was growing up. It was usually shown on weekends, so kids could see it. I wanted to see Tarzan jump from the Brooklyn Bridge. According to the information about the movie on TCM, it was not filmed in New York and they used a dummy thrown into a studio back lot swimming pool to create the effect of Tarzan jumping into the East River to escape the police.

There were interviews with Maureen O’Sullivan and Johnny Weissmuller’s son, as well as some Edgar Rice Burroughs know it alls. I enjoyed it a lot and still love watching the Tarzan movies all these years later after I first saw them which is many years later when they were first released. I never saw the one with Bo Derek and I never saw the television series either. I guess its Johnny Weissmuller for me. I sure would like to have that Tarzan yell though. Still pretty impressive I think. Carol Burnett did a decent job of it I suppose.

Today is the 50th anniversary of the death of Marilyn Monroe. Dead at 36 which is a really a terrible shame. Way too young. So on Turner Classic Movies it seems to be all Marilyn Monroe. Gentlemen Prefer Blondes was just on, and now it is the Seven Year Itch, from Howard Hawks to Billy Wilder. Lately I’ve been just putting Turner Classic Movies on. Perhaps it is escapism from the mundane reality. In any event it works for me. Memories of movies that my mother used to like and movies that I liked when growing up and seeing them on TV.

I am also reading Commando: The Autobiography of Johnny Ramone. What a tough nut he was. Definitely not someone I would like to get to know. I did meet Joey a few times, the last time was the day after Christmas at Farfetched. He bought a slew of holiday cards since they were now half price and I didn’t recognize it but he certainly had some obsessive compulsive disorder, which Johnny puts down throughout his book. He ran the Ramones like an army unit, tough rules and schedules but he did make sure they got paid.

They never made much money from record sales and survived by ceaseless touring. Johnny wrote how they made more money once they broke up than they did when they were a band. Most of the money came from merchandizing. Those Johnny, Joey, Dee Dee t-shirts really brought in the dough. I can only guess Tommy and Marky must have gotten a cut. And Tommy and Marky are the last two surviving Ramones. Of course that discounts CJ Ramone And Richie Ramone. Elvis Ramone went back to playing drums for Blondie.

Johnny certainly had a lot to say besides praising George Bush when the Ramones were inducted into the hall of fame. It’s an interesting book and though he was a pain in the ass to deal with, he was focused and looked after the band since if he didn’t then it probably would have fallen apart a lot sooner than it actually did.




03 Danny Says