Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, Or, How The Dude Abides

Have yourself a merry little christmas
Let your heart be light
From now on our troubles will be out of sight

Have yourself a merry little christmas
Make the Yule-tide gay
From now on our troubles will be miles away

Here we are in the olden days
Happy golden days of yore
Faithful friends who are dear to us
Gather near to us once more

Through the years
We all will be together
If the fates allow
Hang a shining star upon the highest bough
And have yourself a merry little Christmas now

Kudos go to cool cat, Frank Sinatra for settin this holiday bummer on the right path. Ol' Blue Eyes loved the melody but not the melancholy feel of Hugh Martin's original lyrics. So much so that Martin was asked to come up with something more uplifting, less a-bummer-ish (mine) so that the song could be included on Frank's album, A Jolly Christmas, which is now the version best remembered.

The original, made famous by Judy Garland, was taken from the 1944 MGM musical, Meet Me In St. Louis. About a St. Louis father who upsets his family by taking a better paying position in New York. I believe the song's original point of view is that of an older sister to a younger sister that while yes, it is rather shitty that our father is leaving us, but that down the road, when he settles in, we will rejoin him. Sheesh, melancholy is right, and it goes something like this:

Have yourself a merry little Christmas, it may be your last
next year we may all be living in the past

Have yourself a merry little Christmas, pop that champagne cork
Next year we will all be living in New York

No good times like the olden days, happy golden days of yore
Faithful friends who were dear to us, will be near to us no more

But at least we all will be together, If the fates allow
From now on we'll have to muddle through somehow
So have yourself a merry little Christmas now

Thanks for comin to the rescue on that one Frank, and merry Christmas!

Credits:
-carols.org.uk
-wikipedia ( where else was I gonna look at 3 o'oclock in the morning)
-art work of Santa by the chimney from Haddon Sundblom for Coca-Cola
-words and music to Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas by Hugh Martin
and Ralph Blane

Coke Scores A Two-fer

Coke and Santa, if you don't know any better, is really not such an odd pairing when you consider the workload S. Claus had to deal with. His annual record for continually mushing those reindeer from rooftop to rooftop speaks for itself. But wouldn't ya think if he were to send a memo out in advance, say, like a month or two, to have everyone leave their garage door open so that he could just swing in, dump em and go. That chimney entrance has GOT to be brutal...and dirty. I mean, if I've got as much as a cat hair on my Lands End rugby, I'm freakin.

Coca-Cola's red and white imagery and branding, like Marlboro Reds and Budweiser, is as iconic today as ever. Back in 1931, Coke began its new ad campaign using Muskegon, Michigan born
Haddon Sundblom. With travel deemed too much of a luxury still for many post depression and pre-war Americans, The Saturday Evening Post, Ladies Home Journal and National Geographic served as the portals in which to see the world. And within those magazines were the Coca-Cola ads of Sundblom's Santa, the roly-poly, rosy cheeked home invader we know and love. His vision of Santa Claus continues to be my vision of Santa Claus. And he was like from practically down the street for cryin outloud. Sundblom that is, not Santa. I'm relativaly sure Santa is not from Muskegon.

Credits: overstock.com
americanarchives.com
thecoca-colacompany.com
Wikipedia

Pin-Ups, Pancakes and Santa

Michigander, Haddon Sundblom, illustrated his way into Americana in the early 30's. Giving us the Coca-Cola Santa, Aunt Jemima's Mammy and the Quaker of Quaker Oats. His cherubic Santa style also paved the way for many of the major pin-up artists of the era. More tomorrow...




Credits: americanartarchives.com

But Why Is This Important

Many of you have written in asking what TV shows I was watching in 1967, and why? Well, we were really an ABC kind of family. What does that mean? Well... remember how differently your buddy's mom made up tuna sandwiches from how your own mom made up tuna sandwiches, and how you liked your mom's much more. I think it mostly had to do with the pickle relish.
And it was like that with channels 3, 8 and 13. It wasn't good or bad, there was just something different about a family who didn't predominantly tune into ABC.

That said, I offer you a list of shows that ran in the Fall of 1967 with, of course, the occasional remark.

Sunday Nights:
ABC - Voyage To The Bottom of the Sea, FBI, ABC Sunday Night Movie - YES to all
CBS - Lassie, Gentle Ben, Ed Sullivan, Smothers Brothers, Mission Impossible - only ES and SB
NBC - Walt Disney, Mothers In Law, Bonanza, High Chaparral -Nah

Monday Nights:
ABC - Cowboy In Africa, Rat Patrol, Felony Squad, Peyton Place, Big Valley - ABC had it all
CBS - Gunsmoke, Lucy, Andy Griffith, Family Affair, Carol Burnett - Okay, Carol Burnett
NBC - The Monkees, Man From Uncle, Danny Thomas, I Spy - Monkees over Cowboy in Africa. Rat Patrol over Man from Uncle and I Spy over Big Valley ( even though the girl who played Barbara Stanwyck's daughter was a looker, the Coz still ruled).

Tuesday Nights:
ABC - Garrison's Gorilla's, The Invaders, NYPD, Hollywood Palace
CBS - Daktari, Red Skelton, Good Morning World, CBS News
NBC - I Dream Of Jeanne, Jerry Lewis Show, NBC Tuesday Night at the Movies C'MON!

Wednesday Night:
ABC - Custer, 2nd Hundred Years, ABC Wednesday Night Movie
CBS - Lost In Space, Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, He and She, Dundee and the Culhane
NBC - The Virginian, Kraft Music Hall, Run For Your Life - must have worked on homework...yeah, probably not.

Thursday Night:
ABC - Batman, Flying Nun, Bewitched, That Girl, Peyton Place, Good Company
CBS - Cimarron Strip, CBS Thursday Night Movies
NBC - Daniel Boone , Ironside, Dragnet, Dean Martin - pretty fluffy for ABC, CBS is moot and Raymond Burr was killin it

Friday Night:
ABC - Off To See The Wizard, Hondo, The Guns of Will Sonnett, Judd for the Defense
CBS - Wild Wild West, Gomer pyle, CBS Friday Night Movies
NBC - Tarzan, Star Trek, Accidental Family - My man James and his man Artimus, they don't mess around

Saturday Night:
ABC - Dating game, Newlywed Game, Lawrence Welk, Iron Horse
CBS - Jackie Gleason, My Three Sons, Hogan's Heroes, Petticoat Junction, Mannix
NBC - Maya, Get Smart, NBC Saturday Night at the Movies - Out drinkin and dronin'
(just kiddin, I wasn't really dronin)

Credits:
The Flying Nun Courtesy of everyjoe.com
tvparty.com, tvland.com, and wikipedia

By-Tor And The Snow Dog

" MY SNARE," I hollered, craning my neck stage left toward the roadie (a post-Jurassic era term for what's now known as tech, i.e., drum tech, guitar tech, spatial awareness tech etc.) My look of urgency was greeted with a Yeah?...So, gesture of indifference.
But a few seconds later Mr. I Shouldn't Be Lifting A Finger For You must have taken pity on this pimply, country bumpkin who probably had no business being on this stage to begin with, for out it came, Neil Peart's gleaming #2 snare. And seconds after that, I'm poppin on it.

I'll admit, I often fantasized about being mid-song and wacking a boom stand out of place and having a "tech" run out crouching down as if invisible, and repositioning the mic, then racing back off stage like a NASCAR pit crewmember. And I just watched it play out for real, on my rig. What a narcissistic ass I was, er, am?

Just a couple hours earlier that evening, our band was led into an area backstage reserved for "talent" and crew. Nobody from Rush's table raised an eyebrow as we bashfully shuffled around a couple of card tables with thoughtfully arranged party platters brimming with lunch meat, bread, cheese, lettuce, French's mustard and salad dressing beautifully represented. Sorta cool cuz it was just for us. You kinda wanted to pocket some of it as a momento cuz when was this ever gonna happen again. But of course, the stench.

I was never a huge Rush fan to begin with ( not to be sour grapes) cuz they were so not Tequila Sunrise. I just couldn't get passed Getty Lee's shrill, nasal narration of viking lords descending upon the hobbits. But I gotta tell ya, Neil Peart's guns-a-blazin attack and those prog-style time signatures are what made them the ferocious power trio that they are, period.
Plus 2112 is like the college thesis of air-drum work outs.

Amusing Unrelated Photo of Sophia Loren and Jayne Mansfield at Romanoffs in Beverly Hills From theinsider.com - Just Because

Blix, Pox and Blunder

Busy Busy Busy Shop Shop Shop Sleep Sleep Sleep. Legend is one of my favorite Ridley Scott flics, not to mention one of the best takes on the spirit of evil, Tim Curry's Lord of Darkness. A heroically bland but likable Tom Cruise and the lovely Mia Sara as the women who demurely holds his heart.
Great fantasy flick. Great cinematography. HEY...NETFLIX?













Photo From Photobucket

B. S. A.

I was at the 2 year mark in art school when an instructor of mine told me this is usually the point where fine art students drop out, as it gets much tougher from here.
Well, even though my interests were not in fine art, I took it as an obscure sign and bailed.

A similar scenario played out in my youth. Only this time not as student, but as a Webelo.
A Webelo is like the junior high of scouting. You start out as a Cub Scout in elementary school then graduate to Webelos. Then, if you decide to cross that hurdle into geekdom, you're a Boy Scout. Finally, the ultimate in uniforms. The WW II like, Khaki shirt and matching shorts with the thick-knit, knee high socks that can only belong to...the Eagle Scout - the Frat Boys of scouting.
Only I never advanced to Boy Scouts. No, I didn't have a scout leader pull me aside to say "Look son, you either got it or you don't." This was my own undoing.

Two memories emerge from my numbered days as a Webelo. Each one at opposing ends of the enjoyment spectrum. The first one I took as a positive. And could have even motivated me a bit to continue into scouting.
It required me to participate in the making of a meal over a fire at a campsite. One of my 2 directives here, involved me rummaging through the woods for firewood. The other was the careful implementation of the varied vegetables that were destined for the roiling pot and the eventual devouring of said meal, which, as turns out, was a pretty tasty vegetable stew. These two difficult tasks gave me points towards some distant merit badge, kinda like S&H green stamps.

The second was an overnight, father and son camp-out at the Gerber Scout Camp. It is with great emotional pain and scarring that I describe this. Unfortunately, my memory blocked everything BUT the early morning hours just after sunrise when I awoke, as did everybody else in a 1 mile radius to my father's paint peeling, concrete busting, jack-hammer snoring. I sat up horrified, imagining a ring of scouts outside, snickering and elbowing each other as they pointed toward our tent. It never occurred to me to wake him, after all, he sounded like he was gonna inhale his own face inside out. You'd think that would do it.

My scouting Days? Finished. I couldn't bare the potential ridicule. So I bailed.
Besides, I was about to enter the 6th grade and the chicks I knew were definitely not into uniforms.