These Foolish Things - Rosemary Clooney

I'm watching Mad Men again!

I haven't watched it since it originally aired. I own all of the DVDs. My wife and I are going to watch an episode a night.
I remember when I first saw it. Season one had already aired. But AMC was running it in a 24 hour loop just prior to the start of Season 2. I was flipping channels one Saturday afternoon, came across the middle of some episode and decided I would watch for a few minutes. I could barely tear myself away six hours later.
I aspire to be Don Draper but I'm afraid I'm really Roger Sterling.
Now where did I put my martini shaker?

Joe Frazier knocks out Rudy!

I read some of the appellate opinion suspending Rudy from the bar. It makes for interesting reading. It is very specific about the lies Rudy told, the specific instances where Rudy told the lie (including specific dates of his radio broadcast) and the reasons Rudy must have known it was a lie.
One such lie, which I wasn't aware of, which was told numerous times, was that someone had voted using the name of the late great boxer Joe Frazier. The court decimated Rudy. Frazier's name had been removed from the Philadelphia voting rolls a few months after Frazier's death in 2012.
Years after his death Joe Frazier was able to knock Rudy out of the ring!

Is social dancing The Answer

For single men in search of a mate? Just a few days ago a fellow DUer was complaining about internet dating.
I thought I would expand a thought I had into a more general post. Is there a type of music that you like? Today there is someone teaching every form of dancing from hip hop to foxtrot. I'm not talking about highly choreographed performance dancing but rather social dancing, where you learn a half dozen or so moves and look pretty good on the dance floor.
I love the music of the big bands and the Great American Songbook. It took a while, but I got pretty good at Swing and the Foxtrot, ok at the waltz, never too good at those latin dances. When I started I didn't really have an idea of meeting woman. I just wanted to be able to dance to the music that I loved. But it turns out that a lot of woman like the idea of being held when they dance. I don't think I was ever turned down when I proposed: "I love big band music. Would you like to go out dancing some night?"
I suspect the same would hold true for any type of dancing.
Will someone marry you just because you can dance. Not likely. But it does add something to the package. I do think it was one of the reasons my wife decided to marry me. Our wedding song was a swingy version of Cole Porter's 'Night and Day'.
Years ago we were at an academic dinner and my wife was sitting next to an attractive woman in her thirties and for some reason I became the subject of their talk. At some point in the conversation the young woman exclaimed: 'You mean he can dance too? Where on earth did you find him?'
I still have to blush.

Misdemeanor pleas entered on the 1/6 insurrection.

The New York Times and the Washington Post are reporting that a Virginia couple entered pleas to a single count of trespass today. Apparently the two went into the Capitol rotunda and did nothing else. Their range of sentencing is 0 to 6 months. The US Attys made no recommendation as to sentencing. It will be up to the judge if they do any time at all.
Even more interesting the Times reported that a similarly situated woman is expected to enter a similar plea on Friday and has agreed to waive a presentence report. She will be sentenced on Friday. About 200 other misdemeanor defendants will be sweating that hearing out.

Listening to Rosemary Clooney's: For The Duration.

In my old age I listen to my parent's music. Rosie had a big career in the 50s. She was a great friend of Bobby Kennedy. She was actually present at the Ambassador Hotel the night he was shot
Bobby's death apparently took a toll. She suffered a mental breakdown and ended up in a locked mental ward. Her career was in ruins. It took years for her to recover. Say what you will about Bing Crosby, he was a true friend. Out of the blue he called and asked to perform with him at a concert. It turned into an international tour. After that she never lacked for bookings.
In later life she recorded albums for the Concord jazz label. I guess she smoked her entire life and died of lung cancer too young. It never affected her voice. Her CDs endure. She was one of the great practitioners of the Great American Songbook.

Sometimes we can use a little FDR optimism.

All my life I have read books about President Franklin Roosevelt. It's given me perspective on the politics of today. No matter how awful the dark right fed rumors about President Obama (He was born in Kenya. Bill Ayers wrote his books) or the junk about President Biden that gets published on FR today, it was nothing compared to the right wing sludge that was spread about FDR: He was a crippled imbecile controlled by Eleanor. He was secretly Jewish (that sort of story is always with us). He planned the bombing at Pearl Harbor. And on and on. FDR faced opposition from the conservative elements of his own party. He faced a reactionary Supreme Court. He couldn't pass all of his agenda. He wanted there to be health care component to Social Security but couldn't get it through. He tried to expand the Supreme Court. He just came close but couldn't quite do it.
Through it all he never lost faith in the country or in the ultimate triumph of his policies. Maybe something to bear in mind as we deal with similar problems today.
I do have one FDR story that I think tells us something about his personality and his way of dealing with the issues that confronted him. Admittedly this comes at the very end of his life.
Arthur Krock was the then very conservative columnist for the New York Times. In maybe March of 1945 he was attending a public dinner where FDR was present. As FDR was rolled down the aisle at the end Krock noticed the grey pallor, the slack jaw, the fact that FDR was slumped over in his wheel chair. The look of concern must have been evident on Krock's face. Then FDR spotted him and everything changed. The President was sitting up straight, his cigarette holder was clenched at a jaunty angle, the famous Roosevelt grin spread across his face.
"Cheer up Arthur." He said as he was rolled by. "Things are rarely as bad as you say they are."
We've been here before. We are going to keep making progress.

I hope someone with more computer skills

Than I will put up a link to the recently posted NY Times story about the young woman (not Ashley Babbitt) who died during the indirection on 1/6. No judgments. It's interesting reading.

Thinking of my father this Memorial Day weekend.

He grew up in the Depression.He volunteered for the Navy in April 1942. He told me once he was watching a baseball game and couldn't stand the thought of not serving. He signed up the next day. He was on a ship in the South Pacific for a year. Then he was one of three selected out of 1000 sailors to be sent to officers school in the V12 program. After the war he served in the Reserves. Then he was called on again to serve on active duty for the duration of the Korean War.
He stayed in the Reserves and eventually retired as a reserve officer.
He loved the Navy. All his life he would say: "There's a right way. There's a wrong way. And there's the Navy way."
In the later years of his life he reconnected with some he served with during the Korean War through a retired officers association. He never missed a reunion of his WW II ship, the USS Wharton. I drove him to his last one in Asheville, NC.
President Roosevelt was thinking of my father when in 1936 he said: "To some generations much is given. Of other generations much is expected. I believe that this generation has a Rendezvous with Destiny."

The fate of TCM

I'm a bit worried about what is going to happen to TCM. It really only exists because Ted Turner loved old movies. As long as it was owned by Time Warner and Ted was on the board TCM had a protector. Then it and all of the Time Warner entertainment entities were sold to ATT and existed at the whims of corporate cost cutters. Now it's being sold again to some entity controlled by the Discovery Channel (I think).
TCM used to be a go to channel when we had Comcast Cable. We cut the cord years ago but I did read recently that Comcast had taken TCM off basic cable and stuck it with some sports channels in a premium, pay extra tier. The reason given was that TCM didn't have enough viewers.
I was so happy, after cutting the cord to find Sling TV offering a package of all the news and finance channels plus TCM. My life was complete. But I am worried that there will be no one at this new entity to protect old movies. I don't know what can be done about it.