Well, dear readers, the annoying of event of yesterday turned out to be annoying only because it was, as it came to pass, a non-event. I had girded my loins for an event and there was no event. I simply showed up, things began, and then I left because others we were told would show up did not show up hence there was no point in my sticking around. Isn’t that enigmatic?
Last night I ate an artichoke. Now, shouldn’t “artichoke” win some kind of award for being a stupid vegetable name? And talking about mutant vegetables, have you actually looked at an artichoke lately? That is one ugly vegetable. In any case, how do you look at that unseemly thing and come up with the name “artichoke”? Well, I’ll tell you how, because I know you like to have the arcane knowledge that we can provide here at haineshisway.com. You see, one fine day Mr. And Mrs. Arthur Bannister were having a little argument on the stairs of their home. Mrs. Bannister, Brandy, had discovered a strange ugly vegetable, with leaves that you could pull off – she’d immediately boiled the strange ugly vegetable in a pot of water, pulled off a few leaves and tried a tiny portion of said leaves, which she found quite boring. She melted some butter and dunked one of the leaves in it, tried it again, and this time was quite pleased with the result. She immediately told her husband Arthur of her discovery. “Artie, look at this strange ugly vegetable I found. I just boiled it and dipped one of the leaves in melted butter and it was delicious”. Artie looked at Brandy and said, “You, dear, are a wazoo”. Brandy didn’t know what a wazoo was, but she didn’t like the sound of it. Artie went on to tell her that she was an idiot for eating a strange ugly vegetable, butter notwithstanding. This made Brandy very angry indeed and she said, “You insidious ort, I will name this vegetable and I will be famous the world over for having discovered it, while you will sit here and grow old with no fame whatsoever. You will age poorly and die in a pool of your own drool.” Artie thought a “pool of drool” was funny, so he began laughing. That made Brandy even angrier and she began to choke her husband to death. He finally managed to escape her iron grip and ran upstairs away from his now-crazy wife. Brandy went back into the kitchen and ate some more of the strange ugly vegetable. Whilst eating, she thought of how she had choked her husband Artie, and she decided right then and there that she would name the strange ugly vegetable an artichoke in honor of her almost killing her husband. The rest, of course, is history. That is a true story, dear readers. Only the names have been changed to protect the innocent.
We won’t even talk about the word “vegetable”. Other than asking who decided to stick the word “table” on to the word “vege” to make a whole other word?
We had a bit of a brouhaha here at haineshisway.com this morning. Apparently in yesterday’s notes, someone posted a very long post, which caused some problems for others. That caused some rather caustic comments to be made and the fur was flying. Well, we simply must not have flying fur here at haineshisway.com. I pride myself that we are family here at haineshisway.com. I’m quite certain that the long post was not meant in a harmful way, and would never have been made if the poster knew it would be problematic for anyone. My feeling is this – if something like this happens in the future, just drop me a line and I’ll deal with it, rather than publicly airing it on the site. That way we can avoid the brouhaha, which, of course, is right up there with “artichoke” in the stupid word department. In any case, we’re all friends here, and that’s why this is such a fun site and why we will take over the internet and be the most popular site of all. Where else, for example, can you get the true story of the naming of the artichoke? Nowhere else, that’s where else.
Well, now that we’re all calm and collected and also collected and calm, let’s all click on the Unseemly Button below to avoid any further brouhahas or artichokes.
By the way (or BTW in internet lingo), I thought the posts of yesterday were very interesting indeed – if you missed them do take a look. Also, I received several preorders for both book and DVD yesterday, which is a wonderful thing. I do want to point out that only the first pressing of the DVD will include the bonus CD soundtrack, so don’t wait too long to order. Also, if I can have it ready in time, for those who preorder the book, there may just be a special surprise in store when you receive it. I’m going to repeat the links to each of our new sections today, because Mr. Mark Bakalor hasn’t gotten them up on our handy-dandy splash page yet. Here they are:
If you haven’t seen Mr. Mark Bakalor’s superb designs go take a look. If you have any questions about how to order, the complete breakdown of things is in yesterday’s notes, as well as yesterday’s mashed potatoes, but the complete breakdown of things is not in yesterday’s artichoke, because the bulk of yesterday’s artichoke is in my stomach which is, by the way, having a complete breakdown.
This morning my handy-dandy gardeners arrived quite early where they proceeded to noisily mow outside my bedroom window. I kept hoping they’d go elsewhere so I could sleep a bit more but they did not. No, they kept mowing and mowing, which is peculiar since there is no grass outside my bedroom window, only a stone walkway. Damn them, damn them all to hell. Perhaps I shall go outside next time they do this and perhaps I shall artichoke the very life out of them, hence causing a brouhaha or, in my case, a brucehaha.
Well, dear readers, we have several High Winners in this week’s Unseemly Trivia Contest, and our handy-dandy electronic hat has chosen a Highest Winner from amongst them, and the Highest Winner shall receive a sparkling prize if they will send us their sparkling address. As you may or may not remember, we started off with one question and ended up with another, because despite repeated warnings, someone posted the answer to the original question to the site. This gentleman was a poster from far away France – what I find interesting is that that was his first post, and he has not returned to post since. In any case, that original question was proving harder than I thought it would, so maybe it was a good thing that we changed questions. The original question was, what musical theater star also wrote a huge hit pop song? The answer to that question was Jim Dale and the song was Georgy Girl. Here is the replacement question:
A musical by a well-known theater composer, had in its cast someone who would become a multiple Academy Award nominee. This musical by a well-known theater composer was, in fact, produced by another well-known theater composer. Name the musical, the well-known composer, the well-known composer who produced the show and the multiple Academy Award nominee.
And the answers:
The musical: Rex
The well-known composer: Richard Rodgers
The well-known composer who produced: Richard Adler
The multiple Academy Award nominee: Glenn Close
One dear reader guessed Pal Joey, which was produced by Jule Styne, but Mr. Gene Kelly was not a multiple nominee, he was only nominated once (he didn’t win – in fact, his only Oscar was a special one). Our High Winners are Freedunit, JMK, Michael Shayne and Steve Gurey. And our electronic hat chose Mr. JMK as our Highest Winner. Thanks to one and all and also all and one for playing and we’ll have a brand spanking new question come Saturday.
Speaking of questions (and weren’t we?) tomorrow is Ask BK Day, so get your excellent questions ready as I am already ready to readily answer them.
If you haven’t checked out this week’s new radio show, do so; it’s a lot of fun. Last night I checked out the brand spanking new Special Edition DVD of Memento. It’s two discs, and the second disc has tons of extras according to the sheet that accompanies the DVD. However, after spending an hour trying to figure out how to access them I gave up and will wait until someone posts about this on the Internet. The menus are all designed as a series of questions, and each time you answer you are taken to new questions, and I suppose if you answer them in a certain way you get to the extras. I must not have answered them in a certain way, however, because I never found one extra. Thankfully, they tell you how to access the movie on disc one.
Well, dear readers, the gardeners are mowing away and I’m getting a headache so I shall take me leave or perhaps leave my take. I shall do the things I do and be done with the things I do once I have done them. Today’s topic of discussion: Without giving anything away, what is your favorite “twist” ending in a film or book? I’ll start: My favorite twist ending is actually from an Alfred Hitchcock Presents television show, one of the hour-long episodes called An Unlocked Window. It was so unexpected and so shocking I don’t even know how they allowed it on television. I wasn’t taken in at all with the twist endings of The Sixth Sense or The Others, but I was with Unbreakable. I rather like the twist in Hitchcock’s Stage Fright, the ending of Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is beyond brilliant, and there is a twist that occurs within Ira Levin’s first novel, A Kiss Before Dying that is beyond beyond brilliant. There’s also a wonderfully creepy twist in a novel called The Walter Syndrome by Richard Neely. There is nothing like a twist when they’re done well, and Rodgers and Hammerstein also felt there was nothing like a dame. And I very much like the ending of The Sting. Your turn (but don’t give anything way – no spoilers here at haineshisway.com, and no brouhahas or artichokes either).