Well, dear readers, I am currently feeling younger than Springtime and yet older than rancid cheese. I believe this is called a dichotomy. On the one hand, I can get out of my chair and walk hither and thither, hence younger than Springtime. On the two hand, I can no longer recite The Story of Jerry and the Dog, hence older than rancid cheese. Once upon a time, I was younger than rancid cheese and older than Springtime, but that’s another story. As I sit here like so much fish, writing these here notes, the notes of the Beethoven seventh are playing, the famous second movement to be exact. I would have to say that this is my favorite music of Beethoven. This is a lovely version by Bruno with a B Walter. Isn’t it amazing how many famous classical composers have last names that start with B? Just think about it – we have your Bach, your Beethoven, your Bruckner, your Berlioz, Borodin, your Barber, your Bartok, your Bax, your Britten, your Berg, your Bernstein, your Bizet, your Bliss, your Blitzstein, your Bloch, your Boccherini, your Bruch, your Bridge, your Brahms – and believe me, that’s only the tip of the B composer iceberg. I am quite tired as the Beethoven seventh comes to a close because I had a long, occasionally weird, but ultimately okay day, not necessarily in that order.
Once again, I was up at six after two-and-a-half hours of sleep. I fell back asleep around seven-thirty and woke up at one and began the day – so eight hours of sleep that didn’t feel like eight hours of sleep. That is when I was feeling older than rancid cheese, if you must know, and clearly you must. Older than Rancid Cheese – that’s the title of my next novel. I did whatever needed doing, did some Kritzerland show work, ordered from Jersey Mike’s – one regular Eyetalian sandwich, and one mini turkey and provolone for later. Food arrived about thirty minutes later and I ate the Eyetalian and put the other one in the refrigerator. Then I spent the next two hours mixing the group vocals with Richard Allen. This is, as you might expect, a little wacky trying to do on the phone, so it took several tries to get right, but eventually we did. We also had to adjust one other track and got that done and to the singer.
At five, I was asked to watch one of those Stars in the House things that really don’t interest me – this one being an A Chorus Line reunion. The first thing that surprised me is that clearly they were doing this thing on Zoom live. And as with all these Zoom things there were technical difficulties, horrid sound, and I guess people don’t care because over 700 viewers were watching on the Tube of You. It was fun to see the folks involved, which did not include everyone, obviously. The could, in fact, only fit ten people on the screen, which I also don’t understand. No Priscilla Lopez, no Ron Kuhlman, no Kelly Bishop – but we did get Robert LuPone, Donna McKechnie, Baayork Lee, Ron Dennis, Nancy Lane, Trish Garland, Donna Drake, and the reason I watched, Kay Cole. Baayork kept freezing and hiccupping, so that was frustrating. Seth Rudetsky and his partner hosted. There were some funny moments, a couple of touching moments, and it lasted over ninety-five minutes. For some reason, I thought with all the money behind these shows that somehow it would be a little more professional. We did a whole week of Zoom tests for the Kritzerland show and even though there was software for us to do everything we’d need to, I wasn’t about to take the chance of those kinds of technical screw-ups. You’d think with the sudden popularity of Zoom, which came out of nowhere to overtake the world and has become a “thing” now, that they’d figure out these technical and sound issues. After that, I sat on my couch like so much tired fish.
Last night, I tried to watch a motion picture on Blu and Ray entitled Secret Beyond the Door, a motion picture I’ve begun any number of times but never finished. Yesterday, I was determined. After all, it’s directed by someone I really like, Mr. Fritz Lang, and it’s from a good Lang period, when he made my favorite Lang film, Woman in the Window. I kept dozing off, unfortunately, and finally gave up. The Blu-ray has real audio issues, but I did end up seeing about thirty minutes of it, so I’ll continue on this evening. The audio is mastered so damn low that you can’t even hear, let alone understand, Joan Bennett’s narration and the rest is also very low, although then you’ll occasionally get a really loud sound out of nowhere. It’s completely inept and it’s inept because the folks at Olive don’t care what they put out. They’re a bulk business and they just accept whatever transfer they’re given, it’s doubtful they even watch it. They just hand it off to their authoring house and all they do is slap it on a disc. It would have been so easy to fix the sound, but Olive isn’t about to spend one penny trying to make things right. The image quality is okay – the sound is unforgivable.
After that, I did a quick trip to Gelson’s, as I thought a little low-cal sweet might make me feel younger than Springtime, so I got some rice pudding. I also got food for today and tomorrow so I can make stuff here. I came home, ate some of the pudding, and then listened to music.
Today, I’ll be up when I’m up, I’ll do whatever needs doing, I’ll do a quick run to the mail place since I didn’t go yesterday, I’ll do some Kritzerland show stuff, I’ll eat, and then at some point I’ll watch, listen, and relax.
Tomorrow, we begin a busy week, mostly getting everybody ready for the Kritzerland show, but I also have a lot of other stuff that needs to get done and do those things I shall. I need some food adventures, too, as long as they’re calorie friendly. I may do that Daughter’s Deli again – in fact, friend Marshall Harvey went there and sat outside and had the sandwich I had, so I may try that. It’s really only a fifteen-minute drive over there. We shall see.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up when I’m up, do whatever needs doing, do a quick run to the mail place, do Kritzerland show stuff, eat, then watch, listen, and relax. 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, hoping that I feel younger than Springtime rather than older than rancid cheese.