I have to wonder how many leaning dead trees the leaning live tree leaning over the trail can hold...
The money shot for today
Bobby disparaged my attempt at portraying mountainous areas here? Well, as you can see, it DOES get a little hilly...
Start out at 5:45 AM...
What have we here?
Why, it's Mr Owl!
He was trying to enjoy a breakfast of what appeared to be squirrel when we came along.
He was a little guy, but had a BIG voice...
And we spotted a couple of deer hanging out..
Oh, I have been sitting on this story a while, and I better tell it whilst Alzheimers doesn't prevent it! We were just starting out on a walk last week, crossed the street in front of our place, and started up the sidewalk. A couple and their tiny little canine where just getting in their car in the parking spot about five from the end of the lot,, when a black cat shot out from underneath. Bad luck? Yes, but not for us. The cat stopped briefly, looking absolutely panicked, within a couple feet of Scrappy, who was blissfully "reading his pee-mails" on a road sign post. Convinced Scrappy was an evil genius who was cunningly biding his time (rather than the "nose-only" single tracker he is), the cat decided to flee across the street- not looking at the oncoming traffic. "Look out, kitty!" I shouted, but I knew the cat needed a miracle. He got two.
The car saw him coming, and tried to speed up to beat him. They never had a chance at that one, but the cat started doing a "leaping run"- and managed, instead of going underneath, to jump face first INTO the driver's door! With a loud "THUMP", he bounced off, did a roll or two- and ran apparently unharmed off behind our building. I was reminded when we saw what I think was him walking without any noticeable damage out back this morning.
It's Time Machine week 27, we're going to '72, there are 27 songs in the panel list, and I had Laurie randomly pick a song on the top 100 of summer and she, unwittingly, picked #72! Any numerologists out there? Anyway, as we come in for a landing, we find G Gordon Liddy chewing out James McCord because that infamous wire tap of his on Larry O'Brien's phone wasn't giving them anything useful- and his team wasn't going to get any more money "because the job should have been done correctly the first time".
And we won't talk about who the idiot was that hired you...
And now that I have spent my teaser at the beginning of the post, how about I just add that the unknown song has a very familiar voice, the panel's #1 is the summer 100's #90, and what the Cardigans, No Doubt, Matchbox 20, and Green Day have in common- besides being music acts that hit on the alternative charts in the 90's! So ready your listening device and let's be about this thing!
The panel this week features KAAY, Little Rock; KCBN, Reno; WFSO, St. Petersburg; WDGY, Minneapolis/St Paul; WIXY, Cleveland; WHB, Kansas City; WCRV, Washington, DC; WDRC, Hartford; WLOF, Orlando; KXOX, St. Louis; CHUM, Toronto; and KFIV, Modesto. As I may have mentioned, they collected 27 different songs, including 4 songs from the summer 100- The Cornelius Bros and Sister Rose with Too Late To Turn Back Now (#89), which had one vote; Bill Withers' Lean On Me (#96), which also got one vote; and one more, which you'll learn shortly in the panel top four. Also in the group were a record 4 songs that got #1 votes without making the panel four- Free with Little Bit Of Love, a song that did not chart nationally, but sat at #1 on the St Pete chart; Joe Tex's I Gotcha, which was on top in Kansas City; Troglodyte (Cave Man) by the Jimmy Castor Bunch, on top in Orlando; and The Royal Scots Dragoon Guard with their version of Amazing Grace, in Toronto. And in the panel four:
Number four, with 13 points and the number one of Modesto, the week's national #4, Dr. Hook's Sylvia's Mother.
Number three also had 13 points, but had #1s from Minneapolis and DC, the national # 7- and the summer # 100- Gallery with Nice To Be With You.
Number two, with 20 points- 5 points back- and the #1s of Little Rock and Reno, the national #12, Neil Diamond's Song Sung Blue.
And at #1... stay tuned.
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The unknown song this week had a very known personage in it. Python Lee Jackson was an Australian band formed in 1965. After a string of minor hits down south, the band broke up in 1968. But several members ended up travelling to the UK, and they reunited under the PLJ name just 10 months later.
There they were discovered by famous Brit DJ John Peel (no known relation to Emma), and went into the studio. There were a handful of songs that lead singer David Bentley didn't think he could do justice to- so the studio called in a ringer- Rod Stewart. And Stewart sang on their biggest hit, which was at #4 on the St Pete chart this week- when it had been re-released on the success of Stewart's You Wear It Well. It would peak at #56 on the US charts- might have done better with a little name recognition...
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This got me wondering if there were any other Aussie acts on the summer 100. And the sad truth is, there are just two acts that can claim Australian "origin" the Bee Gees and little brother Andy. They were born in the UK, and moved to Oz when Barry was 12, the twins were 9, and Andy was 5 months. They returned to Jolly Ol' about 8 years later, so the Aussie claim is tenuous, but it's all we got. The Brothers hit the summer 100 with How Can You Mend A Broken Heart (20) and Jive Talkin' (21) appearing back to back. Andy made it with I Just Want To Be Your Everything (24), and one more... and this is as good a time as any to let you know I'm not giving out the top ten until the very end! (And yes, that means he's in it...)
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And now, Bottom's Up!
And here with this week's best of the bottom, I give you Scrappy Beagle!
"Thank you, father. And hello, everyone, I welcome you to this segment and hope you will enjoy my take on them...
Number ten is a song that Daddy mentioned earlier, Too Late To Turn Back Now, a concept I do not understand. I can go in any direction, and I get Daddy all tangled..hmm? Oh. It is at #59 in it's third week on the chart.
Number nine is a song Daddy likes to sing at work, but usually forgets the order the words go in. It's called Day By Day by Godspell, and after 4 weeks it is at #61.
Number eight is by those guys Daddy really likes, the Guess Who. They are at #70 after three weeks with Guns Guns Guns.
Number seven has horses in it. I saw a horse once at the Dairy Queen in Grabill. It scared the crap out of me! Anyway, the song is Conquistador by Procol Harum (a name I hear they got from a -yukkk!- cat), and after 2 weeks it is at #75.
Number six Daddy says is in it's second time in the countdown and after 12 weeks it is only at #76. It's called Layla by Derek and the Dominoes. The really high guitar parts hurt my ears.
Number five is a guy, but he's got a girl's name! Alice Cooper. Or maybe he's just a really ugly girl, I'd have to sniff his butt to be sure. He's at 78 after two weeks with School's Out.
Number four is another guy that Daddy likes, Bobby Vinton. He's at #80, and it's a debut, whatever that is. How many weeks, Daddy? Oh, THAT's what debut means. Oh, the song is called Sealed With A Kiss.
Number three is also a debut- heck, all the rest of them are! Some guy named Harry Nilsson did a goofy song called Coconut, and it starts out this week at #84.
Number two is by a lady Daddy says has been on Time Machine before, but she's not been in the part of the Beauty Contest I pick yet. Her name is Donna Fargo, and she's the Happiest Girl In The Whole USA. Hm? Oh, that's the name of the song! It's at #86.
And the number one?
Argent with Hold Your Head Up! Aroooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
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Thanks, Boofus! Great job!
Next up, we have a six degrees that starts with an answer to the question in the teaser- those acts all got screwed by Billboard on a song because of the way the numbers were figured. If you remember a few weeks back when Natalie Imbruglia's Torn was #1 on the shuffle, I mentioned that it charted so low because at the time, Billboard only counted physical units on the hot 100, not downloads. They changed the rules near the end of the song's run, but the four acts mentioned got completely boned on their songs- No Doubt's Don't Speak, Matchbox 20's 3 AM, Green Day's When I Come Around, and a song called Lovefool by the Cardigans. The Cardigans other well known hit was a "duet" with Tom Jones covering the Talking Heads' Burning Down The House, which hit #7 in 1999. The original was a #9 hit in 1983. The Heads made their first dent in the US charts in 1978 with the #26 Take Me To The River, a song Al Green made big. His co-writer was Mabon "Teenie" Hodges, who also played guitar on our six degrees victim- #3 on Cashbox this week, but no love from the panel- Al's Look What You've Done For me.
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1972 had a few other hits on the summer 100. Alone Again Naturally by Gilbert O'Sullivan was at #27, Looking Glass's Brandy was at #49, Luther Ingram and If Loving You Is Wrong (I Don't Want To Be Right) is at #53, and guess who's at # 86?
Yep, Wayne Newton with Daddy Don't You Walk So Fast!!!!!!!!!!!! (You knew I had to use that picture again someday!)
And as I have been letting you in on 12 songs a week, and we are one short, here comes the song Laurie picked seemingly randomly- Tommy James and the Shondells at #72 with Hanky Panky!
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And now, the shuffle ten:
A song I mentioned on the lead in to the summer 100, the Kinks are at #10 with Sunny Afternoon, a #14 hit in 1966.
The Bay City Rollers ended at #9 on the 1976 charts as well as on this week's shuffle ten with Money Honey.
Number eight is the Outlaws, a too-ignored band with their 1975 #34, There Goes Another Love Song.
The Beach Boys are the second act to get five shuffle tens, and they do it with their 1967 #12 Heroes And Villains.
And yet another appearance for the Cornelius Bros and Sister Rose, this time with their #3 from 1971, Treat Her Like A Lady at #6.
And at #5 is a single that we wore the grooves off as kids... Johnny Horton's The Battle Of New Orleans, a number one in 1959.
Three Dog Night claims their second shuffle ten with the song at #4- their #4 in 1974, their last really big hit, The Show Must Go On.
Barry Manilow places his fourth shuffle ten at #3 this week- his #11 from 1978, Ready To Take A Chance Again.
Susan Jacks and the Poppy Family are at our runner up spot with a song that hit #9 in Canada and #29 here, That's Where I Went Wrong.
And at number one? Let's see if I get this right this week, as I called both of them shuffle #1s last week!
Survey says....
The number 90 song of summer, Sammy Davis, Jr, with The Candy Man!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And, shuffle says...
...the Cyrkle with Red Rubber Ball!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This song hit #2 in 1966, while Candy Man was the #1 nationally this week as well.
Original pic had glowing eye and near invisible chipmunk.
Afternoon walk today, tried to get a good shot of this beautiful Bunting, but SOMEBODY was yanking his change...
First odd fungus of the season... looked just like dead leaves...
Ladybug, ladybug...
Damselfly..
I don't know what these are, but they're pretty cool.
Cottonwood fuzz on the river
In the puddle with the cottonwood fuzz
Saw a bunch of ground hogs... at least I did. I let him off the leash once, but he was too tuckered to build much momentum.
This little guy, cute as a button, was the highlight. Barely moved, even to the point that Scrappy was about six feet away... AND LOOKING THE OTHER WAY. Then, he just turned and calmly waddled away.
The owner of a Holon pizzeria was arrested this week after police discovered that the pizza they ordered was sprinkled with synthetic marijuana instead of oregano. Police became suspicious after two of the officers from the Tel Aviv District Police were hospitalized for dizziness, vomiting and hallucinations shortly after eating the pizza. When police returned to the restaurant several days later to question the owner, he confessed to sprinkling the drug, commonly referred to as “Mr. Nice Guy,” on the officers’ pie. “I knew the order was placed by police officers,” the owner confessed to police. “But the officer who called in the order seemed cool — plus he told me to add whatever toppings I wanted.” “So instead of oregano, I sprinkled some ‘Mr. Nice Guy’,” he said. According to Cannabis, a Hebrew online magazine, a police spokesperson confirmed that the pizza leftovers were sent to a lab for further testing, but the results have not yet returned. The magazine reported that police intend to shut down the restaurant on the grounds that it constitutes a danger to public health. The pizzeria owner was to appear in court Friday where his remand was expected to be extended. In 2011, “Mr. Nice Guy” and other synthetic cannaboids, which became increasingly popular in Israel in recent years, were banned; they had previously been approved by the health and welfare committee in the Knesset.
And so you added fake marijuana to a COP'S pizza. The owners' only hope is to become a Rastafarian and claim protection based on Israel's version of RFRA laws.
ITEM: On the subject of e-mails, I have a bucketfull of spam comments for you. It seems somebody's bot took a liking to a post from May 29, 2012, and on Friday and Saturday it hit the poor post with some 4 dozen spams. The first half were from Indonesia, as they translated as being Sundanese...
Krakatoa's gonna get ya for that...
Most of them translated to something like, "Dropped in to say, let me help you make..." but never really said what they were going to help with. Except for one, which mentioned business opportunities. About three in the afternoon on Sunday, they switched to German text with the Sundanese link, mostly complementing what a nice blog I have... This went along for a while, then the text switched to English:
Thanks meant for providing these types of fantastic articles.
Keep up the excellent work and generating the
crowd!
Still with the Sundanese link. After I hit close to fifty, I finally figured out how to turn off comments on a single post and let them find something better to do.
ITEM: Sometimes the headline says more than enough... Like this one from the Mirror:
Have you heard the one about the Small Penis Pageant? There's a shortage of contestants
Kings County Saloon in Brooklyn ( the UK's Brooklyn, not ours) has actually come up with this contest, coming on June 13th, "In an effort to put some pride into the petite penis arena".
Those taking part will pose in eveningwear, swimwear and talent portions of the show, before attempting to win over the crowd in a question and answer session.
Nominations are through ShipingAD**k.com with winners bagging £325, a crown, a sash - and pride in their taking a stand for smaller men everywhere.
ITEM: Oh, yes, and I wanted to bring Bill Nye to this forum to dissect his latest scientific postulate:
“Well, first of all, I think denying climate change is in nobody’s best interests,” Nye told Vox in a recent interview. “But I also think denying science in general is in no one’s best interests.”
“When you have people denying this basic process, and how we all got here, it’s offensive to me intellectually,” Nye added. “And I happen to think it’s unpatriotic. Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution says the government shall ‘promote the progress of science and useful arts.’”
Really, Bill? Let's see what Article 1, Section 8 REALLY says:
Here’s Section 8 in its entirety: “To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.”
In other words, it establishes PATENT LAW, not government protection for Professor Whoopie and his magic re-drawing board...
Duh, gee, Bill, yer a real idiot...
So tell us, Professor Nye, what exactly ARE your qualifications?
"I applied to be an astronaut four times, but I never got the gig, because I just don’t have the PhDs,” Nye told Vox, adding that he started doing stand-up comedy instead.
“I won a local Steve Martin lookalike contest, and I started doing some standup comedy on the side,” Nye said.
And this is what happened with his stand up career...
ITEM: Usually I am a ruthless raider of things, but this you'll have to see for yourself. A kindergarten teacher has started an instagram account where she takes funny quotes from students (the little kid kind) and puts them into memes. It's called livefromsnacktime, and it is well worth the click.
ITEM: I was recently ruminating on how many pounds of pickles get wasted by people like me and Laurie, and decided to dig in. There was a whole big survey on the subject in the UK, but here in the states I found but one list of the most wasted foods:
5- Citrus. The story mentioned specifically lemon wedges, and I have to raise my hand as a violator on that one.
4- Bread. I bet I'm on the good side of that, even consuming the crusts that someone in this house who shall remain Laurie refuses to eat.
3- Fresh herbs. Ah ha! There's one you can't blame on us!
2- Produce. I can see that, but we are pretty decent here. The article said celery is the main offender, and we very rarely have any of that stuff around here.
And at #1??????????
Sour Cream. Laurie says we do decent on that, and she would be the one who would know.
The British chart is a little more general...
5- Dairy
4- Bakery items
3- Leftovers from prepared meals
2- Drinks
1- Fresh vegetables.
ITEM: Food news from India... where a company sells Hitler Ice Cream Cones!
The newspaper (The Daily Mail) said the name of the cones is not shocking to Indians because of the lack of Holocaust education in the country.
In 2012, municipal authorities in the Indian state of Gujarat removed the sign for a men’s clothing store named Hitler. The sign — on which the letter “i” was dotted with a swastika — was removed after hundreds of complaints from both within and outside of the Jewish community.
A year earlier, an Indian network premiered a daily soap opera called “Hitler Didi,” or “Auntie Hitler,” in which the lead character is a young woman known in her locality as a strict disciplinarian who takes a no-nonsense attitude with her family.
I was going to do a bit about German Ice Cream, but if you google it, you get ice cream made to look like spaghetti, and after the spam ordeal, I've chased enough ethnicities for one post.
ITEM: Next, the directionally challenged, part one:
The Netherlands' version of PBS was was droning a camera over an area of ponds when an Egyptian goose (apparently a member of the Muslim Brothers' Avian Auxiliary) attacked it.
Drone 1, goose 0:
OWWWW!!! Mayday, mayday, going down!
That put a dent in the coming animalpocolypse!
ITEM: The directionally challenged, part 2:
A 47-year-old UK lady who just got her license (which means she had a bright green "P" stuck on her back bumper to scare- er, warn- drivers to give her room) was trying to make a three point u-turn in an alley overlooking an home when her foot mistook brake for gas as her hand on the gearshift simultaneously confused thisaway and thataway, and well...
Apparently she crashed an elderly gent's birthday party, just missing going through the kitchen window and causing real damage. How she was removed from her ten-feet high perch it didn't say.
A lone man looking for means of expression in a tsunami of information. Seeking truth justice and the American way in the perspective of a Nixon conservative. And the Commissioner of the free world's smallest and best fantasy football league.
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