Haines Logo Text
Column Archive
January 23, 2011:

THE WHEAT FROM THE CHAFF

Bruce Kimmel Photograph bk's notes

Well, dear readers, perhaps it’s time to separate the wheat from the chaff. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, it is time to separate the wheat from the chaff. My problem with so doing is that I don’t seem to have any wheat around here, let alone chaff. How many people here have even seen chaff? I think if I were to actually see chaff I would laugh. Now, if chaff is chaff and laugh is laugh, why can’t it be chaugh and laugh, or laff and chaff. These are the questions that are going around like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel. What the HELL am I talking about? What does wheat and chaff have to do with the price of a beet? But somehow, that expression came to me yesterday and I have been saying it ever since. The meaning is, of course, to separate the things of value (the wheat) from the things of no value (the chaff). The problem with this is that when you are a collector you sometimes value the chaff just as much as the wheat. In any case, this saying is what we call a metaphor (rphpatem, spelled backwards). You know, it occurs to me that this entire paragraph is chaff. Where the HELL is the wheat, that’s what I’d like to know. I see a whole HELL of a lot of chaff in this paragraph, whilst the wheat has not made an appearance.

This paragraph will be filled with wheat and no chaff. If anyone sees any chaff, kick its butt cheeks right on out of here. Yesterday was quite a nice day – rather a Spring day with blue skies and warm, sunny weather. I got up at nine, futzed and fixed the eleven pages I wrote yesterday and made a few additions to them, and then I wrote three new pages. I then went and had some matzo brei and two bagels, after which I did some errands and whatnot and picked up an important envelope. Then I came back home and wrote another six pages. I’m quite in the home stretch now and this part of the process is sometimes a little tricky, but I’m having fun getting everything ready for the denouement (that’s French, you know). Then I wrote a blurb, I listened to our new master, which sounds excellently excellent, I listened to the source material for an upcoming release, and then I finally sat on my couch like so much fish.

Last night, I watched a motion picture on DVD entitled Not Of This Earth, a film by Mr. Roger Corman. This was an early Corman, when his budgets were so low they probably wouldn’t pay for what the craft service table costs today. I always enjoy these wacky films, and somehow I’d never seen Not Of This Earth all the way through – I’d seen snippets, although the entire movie seems like a snippet at only sixty-seven minutes. But there’s something very fun about the film, including the entirely weird performance of Paul Birch as one who is not of this Earth. With his weird blank eyes and odd vocal inflections it’s a totally creepy performance. Beverly Garland is fetching as his nurse, and it’s always nice to see Jonathan Haze and Dick Miller doing their thing. There are some nice location shots in Hollywood, and I believe the picnic park scenes were most likely shot in Bronson Canyon (or maybe Griffith Park). The score by Ronald Stein, is excellent (I issued it on a compilation CD at Varese Sarabande). The transfer is, I suppose, as good as we’re going to get, i.e. it’s off a print, has scratches and a few splices, but that’s oddly in the film’s favor. At least it’s in its proper screen ratio. I’m looking forward to the other films in the set.

After that, I wrote another page, for a total of ten. I listened to some music, and I got everything ready for Monday’s announcement.

Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because I think it’s time to separate the wheat from the chaff and while we’re at it the chaff from the wheat.

Today, I shall be writing for most of the day, and then I’ll be supping at Sterling’s at Vitello’s and seeing Jason Graae’s Jerry Herman show, which I’m very much looking forward to. I will try to write at least seven to ten pages but, as I said, the next two chapters are very tricky so I may go a little more slowly. Then again, it totally depends on how things fall into place and how my mind is working.

Tomorrow, I’ll be up at six to announce our new release, and then I’ll write, and then the interim helper will help ship out a LOT of CDs, then I’ll do a few other things, as well. Tuesday we have our first rehearsal, and I also have some meetings and meals to have, along with writing every day. So, a busy week ahead, but hopefully a fun one.

Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, write, and then I must sup and see Jason Graae’s show. Today’s topic of discussion: It’s free-for-all day, the day in which you dear readers get to make with the topics and we all get to post about them. So, let’s have loads of lovely topics and loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland where I shall most assuredly separate the wheat from the chaff and vice versa.

Search BK's Notes Archive:
 
© 2001 - 2024 by Bruce Kimmel. All Rights Reserved