Category: Pop Culture

Two turntables and…

Thirty-eight years ago tonight: my first airshift on @WUAG was heard by maybe six people, starting as it did after a baseball game that ran way overtime. HIghlights included “Mesopotamia” by the B-52s, “From the Air” by Laurie Anderson, and “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” by the Beatles.

I was all of 17 years old.

The number one record in the county that week was “Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor. I sometimes feel like my whole adult life has been a reaction to that unfortunate fact.

Happiness is…

Making me happy this week:

  • St. Elsewhere reruns on Hulu.
  • OpenRefine and Oxygen.
  • This article that references some weirdo who’s obsessed with supermarket history.
  • Apple fritters from Aldi.
  • The potential for three consecutive days of sleep (or at least a reasonable proportion of those three days).
  • Cleveland and Detroit in April, with maybe a side detour through Southern Ontario.

And you?

What’s up doc?

Strange work dream:

Mel Blanc was mad at us because we wouldn’t include something he donated in a digital collection. I observed that I was pretty sure it had to be Mel Blanc‘s son who made the complaint, because Mel Blanc himself was dead.

Just as I was about to look it up and see when he died, I woke up. Of course, I immediately went for my phone and looked it up anyway.

Mel Blanc died in 1989.

My Ella story

ella

One night in 1996, I picked up a very adorable boy at a bar in Sacramento (the Wreck Room, I believe) and we went back to his flat a few blocks away. All night long, we made out to the sounds of Ella Fitzgerald, which made me like that adorable boy even more.

The next morning, as I was driving back to my room at the Motel 6 or wherever, I heard on the radio that Ella had died the previous night while we were curled up in bed listening to her. It made me very sad. I never heard from the boy again either, which also made me sad.

I loved Ella even as a child, and I have very sketchy memories of seeing her on the Ed Sullivan Show when I was really young (maybe this one?). In that proverbial game of dead celebrities you’d like to have at a dinner party, she makes my list every time.

Happy 100 and rest in peace, Ella.