Actually it's partly about you, buddy! As you know, Scrappy has fallen on "hard times in his old age". Particularly, last week at this time he was having a real streak of 1) not wanting to eat- or really even beg; 2) a spate of increased accidents- made worse by the cold, wet weather; and 3) his breath was really coming hard after any exertion. With this in mind, we made a "wellness appointment" for the other Old Man for Saturday. In the meantime, he snapped out of the worst of it around Tuesday, but was it just a brief reprieve?
Results?
"I don't know if I want to hear 'em..."
No, it's okay! Doc said stomach was fine, lungs were fine, heart was strong. Only thing the Doc was real concerned about was his legs. And even their problems are just the typical "getting as old as Methuselah" stuff...
"That's great! But 'Methuselah'... really?"
Well, the "dog year conversion chart" calls you between 74 and 78 in people years, but those legs are saying "between Betty White and George Burns". In fact, here's a story from the vet visit. The nurse left us in the exam room to get the Doc. Scrappy decided to lay down- a process that now is basically letting his legs slide out from under him in a controlled manner. He was by the Doc's door, and Laurie said, "I think that door opens inwards," meaning, "Chris, get him to move before he gets bopped." Before I could reply, or move for that matter, he heard his Mommy and started pushing up with his front feet, his back end staying still, until he was sitting up and out of the way. We laughed our butts off, and Scrappy struggled over to see what was so funny.
Due to the fact that his legs basically work like a quadruple amputee on stilts, the Doc prescribed an anti-inflammatory and a revisit in 2 weeks to see if they help. I expressed my leeriness about this, because our last dog, Fred, was close (but not quite, I don't think) to Scrappy's age when he developed a limp. He got put on meds that helped for a while, but came the day it got worse and the Doc (not the same one) decided to try another med- BUT he had to take two days off of the old ones before he could start.
Within 18 hours, he couldn't move. Just stare at me saying, "Help". I told the Doc that story.
"We're not going to let that happen," she said. "We'll give him the right medicine."
So I feel better- some. I'll have to let you know about whether HE is, but it's one pill in right now.
Now the other announcement- it's Expanding Martin Planet time again...
Peanut is getting a little full-brother or sister, around mid September! I've known for a bit now, but wanted to wait until the kids were ready to make it public. Since Jessica posted this last night, I assume it is that time. Right now, I'm betting on a girl and for the time being calling her "Pistashio". KC floated out the name Londyn for a girl. Mom isn't real happy with either one of us...
This week, David Jeremiah was in the midst of an end times series. And one of those days, he spoke at length about how before the Tribulation, Babylon needs to be rebuilt. A real, physical Babylon, such as was attempted (and to no great surprise, abandoned) by Saddam Hussein. I have never believed that. Forged in the Hal Lindsey school, I know that Revelation calls for TWO Babylons to fall:
Rev 14:8 Another angel, a second, followed, saying, "Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great, she who made all nations drink the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality."
Fallen, fallen. And the first Babylon referenced is the "religious" system symbolized by the Great Harlot sitting on 7 hills...
Rev 17:9 This calls for a mind with wisdom: the seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman is seated;
Which is of course more than likely saying that that system is going to be based on the corpse of the Roman church. But the other is the Great City, whose demise is described in Revelation 18, and Dr Jeremiah sees to be a physical Babylon. In a moment, I'll tell why I don't believe that... however, I have to say that there are reasons where you might get that.
Zec 5:5 Then the angel who talked with me came forward and said to me, "Lift your eyes and see what this is that is going out."
Zec 5:6 And I said, "What is it?" He said, "This is the basket that is going out." And he said, "This is their iniquity in all the land."
Zec 5:7 And behold, the leaden cover was lifted, and there was a woman sitting in the basket!
Zec 5:8 And he said, "This is Wickedness." And he thrust her back into the basket, and thrust down the leaden weight on its opening.
Zec 5:9 Then I lifted my eyes and saw, and behold, two women coming forward! The wind was in their wings. They had wings like the wings of a stork, and they lifted up the basket between earth and heaven.
Zec 5:10 Then I said to the angel who talked with me, "Where are they taking the basket?"
Zec 5:11 He said to me, "To the land of Shinar, to build a house for it. And when this is prepared, they will set the basket down there on its base."
There are other examples, including one where Jeremiah relates:
Jer 51:26 No stone shall be taken from you for a corner and no stone for a foundation, but you shall be a perpetual waste, declares the LORD.
And yet, Wiki says...
Babylon is mentioned in medieval Arabic writings as a source of bricks,[19] said to have been used in cities from Baghdad to Basra.
Noting, of course, that "Medieval Arab writings" aren't as accurate as they might seem. But several of their reasonings are just not right (and this is not saying that Dr Jeremiah went extra-Biblical to form his theories); for example, one "expert" uses the answer, "We haven't seen Babylon used as other than a Physical place anywhere else... why would we now?"
Sorry, next caller. Even without going to the story in question, I can disprove that...
1Pe 5:12 By Silvanus, a faithful brother as I regard him, I have written briefly to you, exhorting and declaring that this is the true grace of God. Stand firm in it.
1Pe 5:13 She who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings, and so does Mark, my son.
1Pe 5:14 Greet one another with the kiss of love. Peace to all of you who are in Christ.
And many scholars believe this is a reference to the Church in Rome. But more damning is that Ezekiel 27 is an almost exact replay of Revelation 18 except for one thing- Ezekiel calls the city Tyre, not Babylon. Both passages refer to future judgment on a "city" who is known for its luxury, and its seaborne trade:
Rev 18:9 And the kings of the earth, who committed sexual immorality and lived in luxury with her, will weep and wail over her when they see the smoke of her burning.
Rev 18:10 They will stand far off, in fear of her torment, and say, "Alas! Alas! You great city, you mighty city, Babylon! For in a single hour your judgment has come."
Rev 18:11 And the merchants of the earth weep and mourn for her, since no one buys their cargo anymore,
Rev 18:12 cargo of gold, silver, jewels, pearls, fine linen, purple cloth, silk, scarlet cloth, all kinds of scented wood, all kinds of articles of ivory, all kinds of articles of costly wood, bronze, iron and marble,
Rev 18:13 cinnamon, spice, incense, myrrh, frankincense, wine, oil, fine flour, wheat, cattle and sheep, horses and chariots, and slaves, that is, human souls.
Eze 27:24 In your market these traded with you in choice garments, in clothes of blue and embroidered work, and in carpets of colored material, bound with cords and made secure.
Eze 27:25 The ships of Tarshish traveled for you with your merchandise. So you were filled and heavily laden in the heart of the seas.
Eze 27:26 "Your rowers have brought you out into the high seas. The east wind has wrecked you in the heart of the seas.
Eze 27:27 Your riches, your wares, your merchandise, your mariners and your pilots, your caulkers, your dealers in merchandise, and all your men of war who are in you, with all your crew that is in your midst, sink into the heart of the seas on the day of your fall.
Eze 27:28 At the sound of the cry of your pilots the countryside shakes,
Eze 27:29 and down from their ships come all who handle the oar. The mariners and all the pilots of the sea stand on the land
Eze 27:30 and shout aloud over you and cry out bitterly. They cast dust on their heads and wallow in ashes;
Eze 27:31 they make themselves bald for you and put sackcloth on their waist, and they weep over you in bitterness of soul, with bitter mourning.
Read the full passages, and tell me these are not referring to the same event. Then re-read the descriptions- how the emphasis was not only put on the cargo by seas, but also on the location amidst the seas-
Eze 27:2 "Now you, son of man, raise a lamentation over Tyre,
Eze 27:3 and say to Tyre, who dwells at the entrances to the sea, merchant of the peoples to many coastlands, thus says the Lord GOD: "O Tyre, you have said, 'I am perfect in beauty.'
Eze 27:4 Your borders are in the heart of the seas; your builders made perfect your beauty.
Rev 18:21 Then a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea, saying, "So will Babylon the great city be thrown down with violence, and will be found no more;
Now, tell me, from John and Ezekiel's perspective, what nation would be in the midst of the seas, with so much luxury, so much trade. Who has that now?
Uh-huh.
Another point I would like to make is that, yes, with God nothing IS impossible. And he could certainly make a New Babylon spring up overnight, as Dr Jeremiah and others suggest. It would be a miraculous thing, such as the rebuilding of Israel, and would certainly fit the desire of Satan to counterfeit everything God does. And he could certainly open it up to all that luxury, all that fame, in a very short time. But being miraculous, you'd think it would be among the descriptions of the Antichrist's deeds in the Bible, and that I don't see. And once you link Ezekiel and John's stories, and realize it doesn't necessarily HAVE to be Babylon- or Rome- you know we have a much more logical candidate right here in the United States- especially given that it would be the USA in a world where the Church has been raptured, and nothing remains to hold the secularists from all their preferred debaucheries of today.
Final point: Some of those who debate for New Babylon point out the problematic nature of constructing a city like this in the heart of Islam, and explain that away by saying that the "Gog War" (Ezekiel 38-39) would come BEFORE its founding... but that would contract the timeline even more. The sudden "fleshing up of the dry bones" to remake Israel was at least a forty year process, and you want to build a New Babylon, make it rich beyond belief, all in a couple of years as every curse in Revelation pours down on the earth?
Final, final point: We might be nowhere close to the end times by our perspective. Everything could change between now and then. Hildebrand saw the signs of the end times back in 1000 AD.
Today is March 8th, 1959- and according to Wiki, the Marx Brothers retired today. It was, really, the last time the three together appear in a single scene, in a short for General Electric Theater called The Incredible Jewel Robbery. It is the first time the three appear in the same scene in 13 years; Chico would die 2 years later, at 74, and Harpo 3 years after that, at 75.
In a mini 6D, I discovered that in 1966, Filmation tried to make a Marx Brothers cartoon, and some heavyweight voices were lined up to voice it:
Pat Harrington is Groucho. In the (Lou) Scheimer book, he says "an old vaudeville guy" was the Indian, and you'll clearly recognize in the film as (Curly) Joe Besser, sounding identical to "Babu" (Did he think no one would recognize the name?) Another guy sounds like Paul Frees, but Scheimer had said Ted Knight did all the other voices.
The story goes that (thankfully) the cartoon was tested but never finished.
*******************************************
Welcome to this week's Time Machine, where we may have just hit the highlight (translation: No good intro lined up), a surprise from this week's POTM, the Crescendos, and two new debuts! As Groucho once said, "If you've heard this story before, don't stop me, because I'd like to hear it again."
Before we kick it off, here's some junk food for thought: the M10 hit it's 100th #1 in 183 weeks. Cashbox, by my count, went 331 weeks from the launch of the Martin Era 2.0 to their 100th #1- Take Good Care Of My Baby by Bobby Vee, in September 1961. Why the difference? The M10 has had 7 songs that lasted four weeks- but no more. Cashbox in their 331 weeks dealt with 40 songs at #1 for 4 weeks OR MORE.
And now, the odd story of the Crescendos- through the eyes of backup singer Janice Green:
Thanks for coming by, Janice! So you sang on Oh, Julie, but...
...but, I wasn't really a member. I was this 16 year old geeky kid who had an audition at the studio, and was the arm grabbed when some producer decided they needed a "woman's touch".
The Crescendos started as 'The Spades', and had a female pianist at one point, but were now lady-less and piano-less.
Yes. And they stayed that way- I never got an invite or anything. That was all right with me, I wanted to be a country and western singer.
How did that go for you?
Uh, not good. I sang at fairs and festivals- one night, I got brought up on stage by Elvis, in '56 or '57...
It was '57, baby. An' it was a good time!
It sure was, King. But I moved on, married Luke Morgan, who was a driver for a country western tour bus, that included stars of the day like Carl Smith, Little Jimmy Dickens, and Goldie Smith. We had a kid in '60, and for a while I gave up on singing, since they told me I didn't have a voice for C&W. But I was a good background vocal, I guess, because eventually I ran into Bob Crewe, who had me do some vocals on the 1st Four Seasons lp! But then I... just got out of the business. Life goes on, I guess...
All right, here's the list this week- 12 contestants from 19 stations, so this is kinda spread out again. Basically, we have the Final Three and the One Vote Wonders. And given that the winner logged 31.6% of those votes, it wasn't close again. Start out with the one and dones, okay?
Sure. Okay, we have Ray Anthony's cut of Peter Gunn, it's at #9 on Cashbox... We have Billy Parsons with The All-American Boy at #19... The Chipmunks with Alvin's Harmonica at #3... aww, I wanted them to win! The Crests and 16 Candles at #14... Brook Benton and It's Just A Matter Of Time at #6... Buddy Holly's It Doesn't Matter Anymore... at #100?
Yep, and not only is it the first time our #100 (or 101) is a Panelist, but it's also the only Panelist on this week's UK chart, at #16 there!
Wow... Then we have Chris Barber's Petite Fleur at #8... Lloyd Price and Stagger Lee at #4... And the Fleetwoods with Come Softly To Me at #66.
And that final three....
Yes, you get to choose from Frankie Avalon's Venus at the top, the Coasters and Charlie Brown at #2, and the Bell Notes and I've Had It at #10!
There you are, folks! Will it be the big guns, or the lesser known this week? Stay tuned...
**********************************
I mentioned I have two debuts, and they are both a bit... elevated... the first one comes in at #7, from the new lp Good At Falling, this is Amber Bain, AKA The Japanese House...
Stay tuned for the next debut, even higher and just as much an M10 star...
**************************************
I'm going to lead into the 6D with a track you might not know. Listen for drummer Ritchie Frost playing- I kid thee not- 2 Coke cans on this one...
This title track was supposed to be- again, I kid thee not- a prospective James Bond theme, with Brian Wilson's working title of Run James, Run. Another player other than Brian (those were rare on this disc) on this track and others was Carole Kaye on bass guitar-
The only lady member of the Wrecking Crew, she was known for bass, learned 12-string, but started as a rhythm guitarist, including the hit La Bamba and its a-side, our 6D victim this week, Ritchie Valens and Donna at #5.
************************************************
Debut #2 this week is a newly released single from Polyvinyl records, featuring another act on the b-side, and on the a-side, a two-time #1 M10 artist. This was off her demo to Polyvinyl before her lp Quit The Curse came out, but just newly released as a single- here's Anna Burch at #5:
***************************************
Sta Pack:
Despite a pair of top tens that moved 14 spots this week- the #1 Venus from 15, and the #3 Alvin's Harmonica from 17- the BIG mover was back at #26 after a FIFTY-THREE notch leap from #79- Rick Nelson with Never Be Anyone Else But You.
I knew 18 of the UK top 50- but not this week's #1, As I Love You by Shirley Bassey.
I have another little mini 6D involving our #59 in '59 this week. And it involves a song I know better as a cover by Donny and Marie- the #8 from 1974 Morning Side Of The Mountain. In 1959- and in '51- it was done by the great Tommy Edwards. His original peaked at #24; the second, and one we're having here- peaked at 27 as the b-side of another twice-done for Tommy, the classic Please Mr Sun. 1952 was the big year for that song; Perry Como took it to #12, and Johnny Ray backed by the Four Lads hit #6. Tommy's version back then hit #22; as the a-side to Morning Side, it made #11 in '59.
For me, though, I like the Vogues 1966 version, which topped out at #48.
*********************************************
So now we are in the fourth calendar year of the M10, and I thought maybe every so often we could look back at what was topping my chart in years past. In 2016, it was...
...Eleanor Friedberger's Two Versions Of Tomorrow, which was a three-week #1...
In 2017, we had...
The Pretenders with Neil Tennant doing Let's Get Lost...
Last year at this time...
...it was the first week of the legendary Iron Ceiling, with Beach House at the top with Lemon Glow.
********************************
And you know what? I never did figure up how many I knew on Cashbox this week! Let's see...umm... umm... 23!
***************************************
The remaining M10:
The bottom of the chart has three dropping songs, so next week will be a busy one! Fast Romantics fall to #10 with Mexico in week #4... Criminal Hygiene's Greetings From A Postcard to #9 in week seven... and also in week seven, Roseanne Cash's The Only Thing Worth Fighting For to #8.
On the other hand, Pure Bathing Culture gets their highest charting position as Devotion moves to #6 this week.
Santana's In Search Of Mona Lisa slips a notch to #4...
...and Leonard Cohen follows his pattern- 9 to 7 to 5 to 3 with You Want It Darker.
Holding at #2 is Liz Cooper and the Stampede with Outer Space- which means that it will almost certainly enter the all-time top 10 next week.
And at #1 for a second week:
...it's #1 for The Dig and You're Not Alone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And our Panel winner...
....Frankie Avalon with Venus!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
After giving it some thought and prayer, I believe- at least for now- I'm going to go through an alphabet of Bible characters, using as a study basis something the Lord laid on me a few nights back. "What don't I know, what CAN'T I understand?" And I believe that Aaron is a good place to start that.
Not for the good that was in him- but for what he did WRONG. Not so much what he did, but how he was still named, by God, High Priest in spite of it. So let's start at the beginning. In Exodus 19, we learn that Aaron is not the first priest of the Hebrews:
Exo 19:21 And the LORD said to Moses, "Go down and warn the people, lest they break through to the LORD to look and many of them perish. Exo 19:22 Also let the priests who come near to the LORD consecrate themselves, lest the LORD break out against them."
Now Aaron was not made High Priest yet, and the commentators speculate that these priests were the patriarchs of families or clans, which makes sense since Job was both father and priest to HIS family. But after this, the Priesthood falls to Aaron and his sons only-
Exo 29:8 Then you shall bring his sons and put coats on them,
Exo 29:9 and you shall gird Aaron and his sons with sashes and bind caps on them. And the priesthood shall be theirs by a statute forever. Thus you shall ordain Aaron and his sons.
And from there on, you don't hear the others called "priests", but only "chiefs" or "elders". But here's the thing: Aaron had at least three strikes against him, and if I may lean hard onto Spring Training, why wasn't he out? The first was the biggest- he made the Golden Calf- and this I've never understood from him. I saw there is a Jewish tradition that says that Hur ( the man who helped Aaron hold Moses' arms up during the victory over Amalek), had stood against the rebelling people demanding a "god they could see", and had been killed in front of Aaron. I also saw a commentator say that, since he asked the people to take off their gold jewelry and give it to him to make this idol, he thought they would be too greedy to comply and the whole thing would dry up. And, I myself noticed this:
Exo 32:4 And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, "These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!"
Exo 32:5 When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made proclamation and said, "Tomorrow shall be a feast to the LORD."
Which makes me think that he was hoping perhaps to satisfy the worst elements of the crowd with the calf, and satisfy God with a feast with a "visual aid". Which of course didn't work- compromise never does- and Aaron's "feast to the LORD" became just another sacrifice to Apis as they'd seen the Egyptians do. And some of this may be true, but I don't think that Hur getting martyred was. First off, while it is true that Hur HIMSELF never gets mentioned- and a commentator suggests that Hur's grandson Bezalel got the job to build the Tabernacle (Exodus 31) as an honor to Hur's death, the Bible itself doesn't say that- and it would certainly have been a better excuse than the lame one Aaron gave Moses:
Exo 32:21 And Moses said to Aaron, "What did this people do to you that you have brought such a great sin upon them?"
Exo 32:22 And Aaron said, "Let not the anger of my lord burn hot. You know the people, that they are set on evil.
Exo 32:23 For they said to me, 'Make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.'
Exo 32:24 So I said to them, 'Let any who have gold take it off.' So they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf."
"..and out came this calf..." Probably, were it not so sad, the funniest line in the Bible.
Now God, when Aaron did all this, told Moses, (paraphrasing here), "Step back, I'm going to zap this whole sorry bunch and start over with you!" Which Moses would have been justified in saying, "Let 'er rip", but instead he thought first of God and the dishonor among the pagans His name would receive if He could not redeem His own people. And he prayed for Aaron, too. Apparently effectively, because God went through with naming his family the new priestly caste in spite of it.
But right after they were consecrated, his top two sons, Nadab and Abihu, got fried by God for "offering profane incense". There was an exacting secret formula for the incense to offered to God to be made, and a strict procedure on how to do it, so they might have screwed this up in any of many ways- though I recall a tradition that they were BUI (burning under the influence) from somewhere. And this struck me that Aaron lost two sons as a priest... generations later, Eli lost two wicked sons as priests... and Samuel himself had two sons go bad. Is this an injunction against priests having two sons? (Of course not- actually, Aaron himself had two other, more righteous sons, that stepped into their place.) This can be a lesson on how, no matter what you do, your kids are responsible for what they do with what you teach. You cannot question Samuel's character, and he had two bad seeds. Eli barely qualified as HAVING a character, and his sons were lemons. And Aaron's character?
Well, here's where the story turns.
More than one place I went in researching said that, while Aaron can't be faulted for righteousness (as far as God's grace to him), his strength of character is a bit suspect. As Moses walked with God, his strength of character grew and grew. Aaron seemed to hit a level and stopped.
And that made me think: where else have I seen a story with one man whose character grew and grew as he walked with God- and a follower who leveled out? How about Abraham and Lot?
Wait, Lot? This is the guy who pulled the "strangers" inside- and minutes later was willing to sacrifice his daughters to the mob? Concerned enough to plead with his pagan sons-in-law to come with him, yet got drunk and got his daughters pregnant? Let's see what an expert like Peter has to say...
2Pe 2:6 and the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah having turned to ashes, with an overthrow did condemn, an example to those about to be impious having set them ;
2Pe 2:7 and righteous Lot, worn down by the conduct in lasciviousness of the impious, He did rescue,
2Pe 2:8 for in seeing and hearing, the righteous man, dwelling among them, day by day the righteous soul with unlawful works was harassing.
So we see that righteous, in God's context, doesn't equal "never made a mistake".
So just what was it in Aaron that made God give him a post apparently beyond him? I don't know, any more than I know why He allows me to try to share what I learn in these posts. But it might have something to do with what God said to Moses when he TOLD God he wasn't worthy...
Exo 3:11 But Moses said to God, "Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?"
Exo 3:12 He said, "But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain."
So tonight (Monday) I am cleaning out my backlog of Opinion Outpost surveys. If you haven't done this, it may be tedious at times but it's a great way to get free stuff on Amazon. (If you are a friend that has published a book and I bought it, likely it was purchased in this manner...) In respect for the rules, I can't go into what each survey was about, but I thought I would put in some of the fun things that happen with a survey.
Survey 1
This was what I call an, "I'm listening, but not really" survey, because answers that don't follow where they want to lead are basically ignored in the interest of getting you to answer questions you've told them don't apply to you. I knew that we were having a disconnect when it asked, "Which of these states is your practice in?" It was a pet survey, and even without checking the "my dog has itches/hot spots" box, it proceeded to ask me about my itchy dog. (The least of our worries, I assure you.) I thought I might get out of it when it wanted itchy dog's age in years and months by putting zero and zero. It informed me I couldn't put a zero in the year, so I put a 1. It informed me I couldn't have a zero in the month, either. Apparently there's some new goverment edict that a dog having reached the day before a birthday is shunted a month ahead in time. Obviously, at this point I bailed.
Survey 2
This was what I call a "thrown under the omnibus" survey. It collected info on a large number of "services" and for me it took the two I acually use- our financial advisor and our grocery store. After taking about 15 pages of questions to whittle it down to these two, it then asked the SAME million or so questions about each one. Two things stood out annoyingly from the rest. One, a minor deal, was a certain page that a list of "extremely satisfied to extremely unsatisfied" questions were asked. In fairness, several of them had a "not applicable" choice. UNfortunatley, the ones that didn't were the ones where it was the only honest answer for me.
The other was the text box between many questions asking, "Why did you give fill-in-the-blank this score? Give as much detail as possible." Many surveyors have learned that I have a very low tolerance for essay questions before they start getting snark. One of the financial questions was answered with, "they have free pop and cookies"; one of the grocery questions got, "You're asking for a lot of detail for a little grocery trip."
Conclusion: 11 points! That's $1.10 in Amazon.
Survey 3
They were briefly interested in my shoe inserts. But the last ones I got were an off-brand they weren't interested in, and I got gonged.
See how you are, Jamie? See if I go to Tony Packos again...
Survey 4
After a "survey on hold", the next one was one of the "since you're a valued member, extra points" deal- which usually means it will be some specific product I can't afford. AND it's about where I would go for certain medical procedures. "Would you go to Goshen clinic, Elkhart Clinic, or Elkhart General?" Gee one's 57 miles away, one's 68 miles away... could we maybe do this local? Then I notice that they're making up how long it would take me to get there- so they want to see my time v. recommendation v. cost thinking.
This one gets boring fast. One of their three-headed "option choices" gave me the SAME place for two of the choices- but one of the two "sames" was 45 minutes closer and $100 cheaper. I start flipping over to FB and Twitter. Answer a few comments on the post I put up. See how many likes I got from stealing Bobby G's meme and posting to FB:
(Answer: 3 likes and 2 laughs in the first hour.)
But- I stick with it and get another 11 points- I am waaay ahead of the game at this point.
Survey 5
Ugg! I know this one all too well. About six pages of every consumer product known to man, asking if I have bought any of them in the last 3 months, and woe betide you should you say you did, because they'll want to know brand, serial number, warranty info, what you paid, etc, etc.
YES.
Survey 6
This is one of those annoying ones that try to squeeze from you every bit of info on every TV show (and all accompanying ads) you've so much as thought about watching in the last 24 hours. That would be a "TV? what's a TV?" from me.
Survey 7
Typical cell phone survey. With the typical flaw- before they start asking you "who's the best voice, the best quality, the best etc etc," perhaps you might ask if you have been with more than one company? (Answer: no.) Of course, the nice thing about this survey is it reminded me I needed to stick my phone on the charger...
Take a break. Check the meme (4 likes, 3 laughs). Let the dog out. Get a snack. It's the Kraft Trios Snak-fulls, with cheese, chocolate, and banana chips.
Asks me (twice) if I want to answer a few more questions. Like an idiot, I say okay. But I stick it out, and get 16 points. This is by far my biggest point day in the 10 or so years I've done surveys!!!
Survey 8
At this point, I've been at this for right around two and a half hours, and am hoping for a big streak of "survey on hold"s.
Do you want to take this in english or espanol? English
This survey is about blah blah blah, do you agree? Yes.
That's all the questions we have for today. Thank you for your time.
Thank you, Jesus...
Just 4 more left on the board...
Survey 9
Getting tired, accidentally deleted that one instead of opening. Drat!
Survey 10
This one's on beverages I buy at the store. Mainly milk and diet soda. Racked up another 11 points. Dog wanted out again. This is waaaay most points I ever got in one night, maybe triple.
Survey 11
This one wants me to do a 24-hr diary of my music listening starting Wednesday morning. $10 bucks cash money. Why not? And it paid me 3 points for saying yes! Good grief, we're up to umm... ummm... 52 points...
Survey 12
"Check back later!" And the evening is at last over!
Today, we're going to do a bit of a spin on the ol' Newspage Go! format. I'm picking two headlines that seem to be at cross purposes with each other. I don't know that these won't be a bit of a stretch... but hopefully they'll be amusing, informative, and maybe give me something to vent about after a day that I spent listening to people vent...
Couple #1: Fox News
First headline: Kavanaugh slams church treatment as court nixes religious liberty case
Second headline: Dems introduce resolution condemning anti-Semitic remarks amid Omar scandal
Put it in perspective: The first story involves a pissed-off Supreme Court Justice who is mad that the "supposedly more conservative" SCOTUS declined to hear a case involving what he called "pure discrimination against religion". While the other involves the Liberal side of the fence actually looking to censure one of their own for hate-speech. In the meantime, Cornwallis' band played, "The World Turned Upside-Down".
Couple #2: BBC
First headline: Chechnya gets women-only taxis
Second headline: Turkmen police stop women drivers
Put it in perspective: The first story shows the Islamic faith "trying to be progressive"- the UAE is footing the bill for a "by women-for women" taxi service, saying it will be "suitable for transporting women passengers in terms of religious standards and traditions". In the second, Turkmen cops are pulling over women at all the busiest intersections, " and searching their cars for any reason to take them off the road, according to Chronicles of Turkmenistan, a prominent opposition news site." So I guess Allah is a bit conflicted over women's transportation, as well. I begin to think the best thing we could do for the Muslim world is to get Allah a wife- and the requisite mother-in-law.
Couple #3: Moscow Times
First headline: Muscovites Warned: Carry Umbrellas to Fend Off Crow Attacks
Second headline: A Day to Consider Russian Cats
Don't you just love when your plan needs no further elucidation?
"Couple #4": Xinhua
Experts at efficiency, China manages to combine both elements into one headline:
Commentary: Sprinting toward a moderately prosperous society
"Sprinting" towards "moderate" prosperity. If you are sprinting, shouldn't you be aiming a bit higher? Maybe they should have used jogging... or lumbering...
Couple #5: Australia's News.comAU
And now, for the extremes of each:
First headline: Toxic wife banished after exposing lies
Second headline: Pig farmer chained, raped woman
This would definitely be a match made on CraigsList....
Couple #6: Japan Times
Now here comes a real stretch-
First headline: Public will be invited to greet Japan's new Imperial Couple on May 4, earlier than planned
Second headline: Who's been sleeping in my bed? An unexpected guest
Wow, that really IS too early, huh?
Couple #7: Deutsche Welle
This one is a real fairly tale match-up, which might not be amusing on the surface, but there is a picture involved, so...
First headline: Facial recognition software for pigs in China — 'I want to see the scientific evidence'
Second headline: German environment minister Schulze takes aim at wolves
Because you need the pig facial recognition to give them added security against wolves? Anyway, the best part I thought was the picture that came with the wolf story:
It looks to me like Schulze isn't the only one taking aim...
Yes, I'm done teasing you all! Due to a relentless lobbying campaign by a certain song, we now have the 100th #1 song in M10 history! And because of that, I'm gonna spend a LOT of time telling you who it ISN'T this week! Also this week, we have Sonny James to tell us about 1958, a 6D that might be an even bigger failure than my "what 45 in on the The Beths video" adventure (though this time it's not my fault), and I promise, no Pat Boone in leather this week! Fortunately, I have no time to tell you what happened on our target date of March 1st, 1958 ( a good thing, 'cause all there was was a Turkish shipwreck that Wiki can't agree with itself on the casualty count), But I can tell you the obvious...
...Liz Cooper and the Stampede's Outer Space, which slips to #2, is NOT the 100th #1!
Ladies and gentlemen, let's hope our time with THIS vet goes a bit better- Sonny James!
Glad to be here- I guess... this isn't considered a club, is it?
No, Sonny, and with Elvis in charge of the commissary, no alcohol. I made sure that you'd be comfortable. Folks, he left his first big break- a tour with Slim Whitman- because his family had never approved of playing in clubs when they were together. That cover it?
Pretty much.
Now you served in Korea. I bet you'd be amazed that it's taken us this long to elect a President willing to try and make peace- on our terms- with the North Koreans.
How long would that be?
From where I grabbed you, 61 years...
GEE willikers! Just now? I thought with that Krushchev guy taking over in Russia, things might change a bit...
Well, that actually took about 30 years...
Man... maybe we'd best git back to the music...
I think you're right. You have a list of 13 songs from 25 stations this week, so it's a tight race and the votes are real spread out. So I'll give you the one vote wonders, and throw in the only two-vote choice...
Okay! Lessee here... Jimmie Rodgers is at #15 on the Cashbox charts with a tune called Falling In Love Again. Then comes Maybe by the Chantals at #26...
And then comes two more songs that ain't #100! One of them is...
...Leonard Cohen's You Want It Darker, which does move up from 7 to 5. Also on that not-number-one list is...
...the Essex Green, who slip one more spot to #7 in their 6th week with Sloane Ranger...
Are you gonna do that a lot? 'Cause that's kinda annoying...
Er, well, not during your particular segment.
Good. Ed Sullivan never did that to me, an' I was the first country and western act on his show...
Sorry, Sonny...
Anyway, next is CB's #1 this week, Elvis doing his hit Don't.
Ya know, I'm a bit disappointed in my vote totals here the last couple weeks...
Yeah, me too, buddy...
The Royal Teens were at #3 with Short Shorts... E: Huh? My song got beat by that stupid thing?
No, you got the same votes. But at least you were number one...
S: Hey, guys, I ain't gettin' paid for this... C and E: Sorry, Sonny... S: Mitch Miller was at #22 with the River Kwai March- if'n you like a lot of whistlin'... Pat Boone had a Wonderful Time Up There at #34... E: Until he showed up in that there leather suit. Chris, don't you do it...
I won't... this week.
S: Finally, the 2-vote song was the Silhouettes with Get A Job at #2.
Which means the top 3 on CB got a whopping 4 votes- one less than the winner got by itself. And here are the finalists...
S: Awl right, make your choices from Chuck Berry and Sweet Little 16 at #18, the Champs and Tequila at #23, Perry Como's Catch A Falling Star at #4, or the Crescendos and Oh Julie at #6.
Thanks, guys, and here's a couple more to chew over on the "I'm not #1" list. The 100th #1 is NOT...
...Santana's In Search Of Mona Lisa at #3, climbing one notch. And it is not the debut at #10, which Laurie picked from a three way tie for me! For their big return since last being on the M10 since November of 2015, here is Pure Bathing Culture at #10...
****************************************
So our 6D song- the one that charted highest this week without a Panel vote- is the #5 Sail On Silvery Moon by Billy Vaughn's Orchestra. I noted that the first time it charted (according to a stumbling Wiki) was in 1937, by Bing Crosby, who hit #4. And I thought it might be fun to find out what three songs beat him out of the top. So I went to a site which had top tens for all these bygone weeks, and looked for it.
Well sir, Bing either by himself or in duets or with orchestras, had a BUNCH of hits in 1937. Blue Hawaii got to #8. There's A Gold Mine In The Sky, Sweet Is The Word For You, and The One Rose (Left In My Heart) made #7, I Still Love To Kiss You Goodnight made #5, Too Marvelous For Words hit #3, as did The Moon Got In My Eyes; Sweet Leilani and Never In A Million Years hit #2, and Remember Me? and Pennies From Heaven hit the top.
But no Sail On, Silvery Moon.
So I tried MusicVF, where I always go first when Wiki fails me. It agreed with the Wiki claim of it hitting #4. And, it claimed that it charted in between two particular songs; but when I referred back to the charts I found, those songs charted 6 months apart, in April and September, and needless to say, he had a lot of other hits float in between. Next up, I found a video that claimed first that it wasn't even recorded until September of '37, but still insisted it made "Billboard's Best Sellers Chart" that same year.
Then, I found out that the Billboard Best Sellers Chart wasn't actually started until 1940. Huh?
Then I found an article from 1987, which said this whole "pre-1940 charts thing" was a bunch of BS. He critiqued Joel Whitburn's research as sloppy and making stuff up, and that several sites had fallen for his inaccurate work- mentioning by name Wikipedia and MusicVF. Which makes sense, because MVF got the number from Whitburn's book and Wiki got it from MVF.
Whitburn had debated the issue with the blogger, who told him, "I have microfilm copies of all the sources you list in my personal library". Whitburn had then apparently agreed to "look into things, and work with you on fixing errors", but according to the blogger, 20 years later that had not happened.
Sigh.
So as I'm typing this, I thought to myself, "Was it the b-side of one of these other hits?" And I learned, b-side yes; hit, well...
I went through a record discography and I never quite found the song on any a or b side. So I decided to try permutations of "Bing Crosby, Sail On Silvery Moon, Decca" (Decca being the label it was most likely on) on Google images. That led me to the song of which Sail On was in fact the b-side- a tune called When You Dream About Hawaii. And then I went back to wiki and MVF, and none of them had it as a charting hit. And then I saw what might just be the reason why...
Both sides, right under the Decca logo, are "clearly labelled": NOT LICENSED FOR RADIO BROADCAST.
No airplay, no hit. So how did Whitburn get it to be a #4 hit? For that matter, how did he have Sweet Leilani as the top song of the year by a wide margin, when Pennies From Heaven spent January AND February at or near #1 and SL only hit #2? Answer, both charts are BS. The first chart I found- the one which had no Sail On- claims to be a Hit Parade chart. And wiki says, back then EVERYBODY called their top ten a Hit Parade.
So who did finish ahead of Bing? Either it was three songs we'll never know, or every song that ever played legally on the radio. You choose.
So who else WASN'T the 100th #1? Well, it wasn't...
...Criminal Hygiene's Greetings From A Postcard, which in a bad week for songs in their 6th week fell from three to 6. And since I bad mouthed the 6-weekers, that means you can also cross off the bookies' odds-on favorite...
...Roseanne Cash's The Only Thing Worth Fighting For, who exhausted herself against Liz Cooper and falls two spots to #4.
************************************************
I had a pretty sorry Stat Pack this week. The big mover was the Crickets and Maybe Baby, going up 17 to #36, and the Brit #1 was Perry Como with Magic Moments.
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.
Posts
