Tag Archives: Bill

Release the Stars

Late night posting. Or later than usual. Just got back from Manhattan after attending a memorial service for a friend of Bill’s David Sheppard. Nice gathering, quite a lot of people, theater folk since David Sheppard was a director at the Theater for the New City on First Avenue.

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Bill helped organize the memorial through Facebook.

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Facebook! For all your impromptu (or planned) organizing needs!

Bill also played some piano at the service and it’s always good to hear Bill behind a piano.

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Right now, Broadcast News is on. Such a good movie, I keep getting distracted. Why haven’t Holly Hunter and Albert Brooks made another movie together?

Last night was a good night for TV. I somehow started watching a special on WNYC on Men’s fashion which I thought would appeal to me, but it turned out to be a piece on 2 Dutch designers, Viktor and Rolf who really put on a fantastic show at their couture viewings.

Not your average runway walkers either. One show had all the women done up like Tilda Swinton, pale skin and red hair. The real Tilda Swinton was feature, she being such a good pal of Viktor and Rolf. Other runways had the models wearing lighting scaffolds as they walked the gangplank, or wearing motorcycle helmets, or wearing 10 jackets over 10 shirts.

You really had to see it, it was mesmerizing. And surreal in the proper sense of the word. Surreal is a word that gets used too frequently and improperly these days. Andre Breton must be spinning in his grave and adding more names to his list.

After that I wound up watching Charlie Rose interviewing the recently deceased Harold Pinter and that was incredible. What a mind, what a playwright. No Ouija boards were involved since it was taped a year prior to Pinter’s death on this past Christmas Eve.

Charlie Rose makes anyone interesting, and if the guest is interesting already, the conversation goes up several notches.

After that I decided to take Rand and Bill’s advice and give Craig Ferguson a chance. Ferguson wasn’t on yet and I caught the band on the Letterman show, Bon Iver who were surprisingly very good.
And here is that clip.

Craig Ferguson was pretty good too.

Ooh William Hurt in braces! Sorry Broadcast News again.

I was up, not tired and wound up channel surfing and watched Louis CK doing stand up. He was hilarious. Usually not my cup of tea but the stars seemed to be aligned and I found myself laughing out loud as he discussed his wife and children.

If only Julio were around to hear Louis CK talk about changing diapers, I’m sure he could relate. Sounds pretty gross for all concerned. After all that entertainment and intellectual stimulation I needed to go to bed.

I woke up and did my usual rounds around Hoboken. People are beginning to return to Hoboken and the holidays are almost over. Used Christmas trees line the gutters.

Julio and Stine return with Kal-El on Monday. It will be good to see them all again.

I have to see them, I have their mail

Slip Kid

It’s Friday but in this week, at this time of year the days seem to blend into each other and if it weren’t for the TV shows I wouldn’t know if it’s a weekday or a weekend. Well I could look at the new calendar I bought or the watch on my wrist or even my cellphone.

Those are actually better than TV to determine the day since regular viewing has been preempted by end of the year shows or football games named after flora.

Last night, or rather yesterday was pretty good, an excellent way to start out the year. Bill and I just sitting around the apartment alternating between the Twilight Zone marathon and a Looney Tunes marathon.

It was all timed quite nicely, after an episode of the Twilight Zone, we’d watch a 10 minute cartoon, preferably from the 1940’s-50’s. We saw the episode with Jack Klugman and Jonathan Winters in a Billiard Parlor and the Art Carney Santa Claus episode.

Couch surfing didn’t require much interaction with the remote control, I just kept hitting ‘last’ on the device. Yes, we were that lazy. Or at least I was since Bill did put my computer in order once again which was great.

He was planning to head out and catch the 8:30 bus after all that, but when he saw the Bucket List on he stayed and watched it. I watched it too and there wasn’t as much dreck as I expected. It was only slightly cloying.

Bill left after the movie and watching him descend the stairs I had started to miss him. I was going to walk with him to the bus stop but it was 20 degrees outside and I was wearing slippers.

Instead I continued watching the Twilight Zone, finishing up with ‘It’s a Good Life’ featuring Billy Mumy and Cloris Leachman and ‘A Penny for Your Thoughts’ starring Dick York.

‘It’s a Good Life’ was even creepier than I remembered. I guess little Billy Mumy destroyed the rest of the world, saving his hometown for his own amusement.

Went to bed after that. Woke up and puttered around. It sucked not having Bill around. I didn’t even go out to get the papers. Too damn cold out. I made some coffee and read the news online which is what I usually do.

Still I was bored and decided to head into the city and check on the office. As expected there was some mail to deal with, which I dealt with. Had a slice of pizza which was ok and soon I was walking towards the Path train, smoking a La Flor Dominicana Double Ligero.

I was wearing Bill’s hat which according to Bill makes me look like a real old school gangster. All that was missing was a violin case. A walk through Hoboken followed. Not too many around just like how it was in Manhattan, only in Hoboken there are very few tourists.

Now I am just hanging out at home, taking it easy. Spoke with Pedro on the phone. I was worried since I had heard from the monkey king in a few days and he almost always calls on New Years Day.

All is well in Otisville and he told me he loved Gran Torino, the new Clint Eastwood movie. I told him I watched a documentary that he recommended called Bigger Faster Stronger about steroid use. Not something I am into but he has flirted with them a few years ago.

It was actually a pretty good documentary, much better than I thought it would be. I do like to look at those bodybuilders and even though there were very few of them in this I still enjoyed it.

It’s mainly about 3 brothers who get into the steroid world, one wants to be in the WWE and even though it seems he won’t make it (too old and not the type they wanted) he still dabbles in steroid use. Really a well made documentary.

And here’s some after party pics from this afternoon….

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