Tales from the Corners

There are has been some tragic news this week. Glenn Beck says he is preparing to leave the U.S. for Israel.  Hardly Knew Ye! Glenn says that he needs to get to Jerusalem so that he can broadcast from there before the U.S. shuts down his operation. Is Glenn guaranteed broadcast rights in Jerusalem? Inquiring minds would like to know. Yes, there are folks out there saying that they will help The Beckinator pack. Others will say, "Delta is ready when you are." No! Glenn doesn't get out that easy! There is hope left at the moment. Glenn feels that current presidential candidate/ U.S. Senator from Texas and former Blockbuster Tape Rewind Manager Ted Cruz will protect The Beckinator's media operation if elected president. This is why Glenn endorsed Senator Cruz. Stay tuned because this will get interesting.

TV advertisements set my curiosity meter quite high. Take for instance the new ads featuring a pregnant woman praising the qualities in a cocoa butter formula. The formula in the cream supposedly reduces stretch marks. What are those ‘qualities’ in the cocoa butter formula? Argan Oil, Almond Oil, Shea Butter, Collagen and Elastin which will make those marks disappear. I remain a skeptic. It all sounds too good to be true. The statistics claim that, ’97 percent of women tested say their skin elasticity improved. Note to self: check skin elasticity. I wonder how one checks skin elasticity. Are these ‘rub-on’ products as great as they say they are? Aside from the pregnancy cream, there are other creams, gels or ointments that reduce the appearance of dark spots and others that claim to hide scars. Obviously, we’re not falling for ‘The Miracle Cream’ here. The user knows that the product is something that has to be continually used to reduce those scars, spots, lines and/or wrinkl...

This is a brilliant clip from CBS-TV's The Late Show with Stephen Colbert  arguing that U.S. Senator and presidential candidate Bernie Sanders cannot be the only one who has an ice cream named after him. I must share here:

Sam's clear driveway was in full view from our front door. Photo is circa late 1970s From January 2013 It’s nice to be greeted with a sunny yet brisk January day after several evenly-lit gray days. We’re lucky here to be in the Southeast where the sunny days prevent most of us from seasonal depression. I vaguely recall feeling a bit blue from a lack of light in my youth when growing up on Ohio’s north coast. Back in my youth, issues like “light” and “sunshine” didn’t matter to me. Of course during most of the winters, it was all about sledding and building snow figures. In heavier winters, my friends and I were into constructing igloos and/or going down huge snow piles on our behinds or stomachs. The magic of winter grew old to me through the years. Starting in second grade through the time I left Ohio in my early 20s, it was my duty to remove snow from the driveway. In the early days of my “snow shoveling career,” I took the job seriously because I had a snow-shovelin...

Photo from Marc Maron/WTF It's no secret that I'm a huge podcast fan. The podcast that keeps me coming back is WTF with Marc Maron.  This week's episode features Michael Moore, filmmaker of scores of documentaries. The discussion highlighted Moore's latest effort titled, Where To Invade Next  as well as his previous film releases including Roger and Me , Bowling for Columbine , Fahrenheit 911 and Sicko . WTF's podcast episode 675 contains a wonderful conversation with Moore, but talk of his books was absent. I fondly remember loving Dude, Where's My Country? and my favorite, Stupid White Men , which I reviewed here . After that review, I got the chance to meet the legendary filmmaker. Michael is an intelligent and humble person who loves to converse and listen to stories.  Anyway, if you get a chance, listen to the podcast episode here.  

I love stumbling upon new talent. Give this one a listen: Watch this video on The Scene .

Winter weather storm Jonas packed a punch quite a bit more than most systems at this time of the year. Here we went again. Milk, bread, canned Spam, shovels, water, Charles in Charge DVDs, Netflix etc - check, check, check, check, check, check and check. Sound ridiculous, right? If creatures from other planets saw this thing going on, of course they would pass it all up to a quieter planet that contains far less panic. We all know that we get made fun of more in the South than anywhere else when someone like Jonas comes to visit, but where were the comedy shows skewering D.C. the other day? A few days ahead of Jonas, about an inch fell on our nation's capital only to create enough panic on the scale of the debacle that happened in the Atlanta metro area just two years ago. It took hours for folks to get home. Some abandoned their vehicles, accidents galore - yadda, yadda, yadda.  Perhaps I missed the sketches and monologue jokes, but if they were produced, I'm sure ...

I confess that I was one of the many who missed Madonna on this last tour stop which came to Atlanta on January 20. Shocking indeed. Even though I rarely attend big arena concerts these days, I doubt that I would set aside the dollars to see someone like Madonna again. Yes, ‘again.’ I saw Madonna over 30 years ago. Nowadays the cost to attend the spectacle is outrageous. I read in the local paper that one attendee spent $400 for his seats, not including transportation and food for the evening. Look, anyone can spend their hard-earned money any which way they see fit, but wow, hundreds (maybe even a thousand or more?) for one evening? There’s no doubt that Madonna is a gifted performer and from what I read in the local paper’s review, it sounds like the evening was amazing. There was one glitch: Madonna’s show didn’t start until 11 p.m. That’s flat-out insane. Why the long delay? We have known for years that Madonna is a diva and quite proud of it, but 11 p.m.? Some folks h...

It’s beyond no secret that 2016 has started out rough in a few ways. With the passing of musicians/songwriters/actors David Bowie and Glenn Frey along with actors Alan Rickman and Dan Haggerty, the unfortunate news gets one to thinking about life in general. On the surface these were all famous men in their late 60s/early 70s, each one who courageously battled a form of cancer or in the case of Mr. Frey, a mix of complications. For many the news of so many well-known people passing within days of each other is a shock. Even though most of us did not personally know any of them, they touched our lives through their crafts. We remember where we were when we heard the sounds of David Bowie and Glenn Frey at home when we bought their music or in the car.  For me, I can  never forget hearing Bowie’s  “Fame”  for the first time on the way to attend yet another one of my big sister’s theater rehearsals. I never heard anything like that on the radio before or after f...

Flashback: November 2004 In this day and age, men of all stripes should feel good about themselves. We are told that dads are contributing members to their family and society, but the culture today makes "Dad" look like a helpless boob who is unable to care for himself and others.  Look at today's television commercials:  Why is it that moms are the "choosy" ones in the family who are qualified to buy peanut butter? Is Dad not savvy enough to purchase something as simple as a jar of peanut butter?  Then there are the ads for frozen dinners where Dad is pretending to whip up a gourmet feast for the family, but we find out that he is really nuking the meal in the microwave and even then, he is "just getting by".  Apparently, it would seem to a cough syrup maker that "Dumb-Downed Dad" is not smart enough to administer the medication to his sick child, so it is "Dr. Mom" to the rescue. I suppose the makers of the medicine feel that ...

We’re a quick fix nation. Fast food. Fast delivery. Fast service. We expect results with little efforts like... yesterday. On television, the hucksters try to sell us good physical health. “For minutes a day, this elliptical will get you to shred fat giving you a lean, healthy physique featuring six pack abs!” the announcer screams. If it’s not some caffeinated announcer, it’s Chuck Norris attaching his celebrity to a quick fix health product. Sorry, but it takes a lot more to get that that ‘model-perfect’ look well beyond some contraption that can be used for ‘minutes a day.’ One needs to only ask actor John Krasinski who sports an uber-toned physique in the new Benghazi, Libya-thriller  13 Hours  - on how to look more than in shape. Kraskinski showed up on the CBS-TV late night program  Late Show with Stephen Colbert  and confessed that he’s been in excellent condition for years while appearing on NBC-TV’s  The Office , but for  13 Hours , Kra...

The following blog post is from early January 2012-the following was written upon the first anniversary of Gerry Rafferty's death. While this is someone who has been a a part of the soundtrack of my life, Rafferty remains mysterious to me. For me, music evokes a time and a place which creates my own playlist or personal soundtrack. I was thinking of my playlist on the one year anniversary of musician Gerry Rafferty’s death. Rafferty’s heyday was throughout the 1970s as a member of the band Stealers Wheel and later, as a solo artist. He wasn’t a household name. Rather, his voice was woven into Americana much like his more popular contemporaries like The Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Elton John or Billy Joel. If you still don’t know Rafferty, you would know Rafferty’s voice if you heard it. Whether you’re shopping for grapes at Publix or in the dental chair, that golden voice emanates from the speakers whenever his hit singles are played. “Yeah, that’s ‘what’s his name,’” you might ...

A runner hit and killed while in a crosswalk. A cyclist hit and severely injured on a side-street. A motorcyclist struck and killed on a massive thoroughfare. A young driver and his young passenger attempting to make a left on a highway hit and killed by an oncoming vehicle. These are just a few of the tragedies that have plagued the Peach State in recent years on its winding, challenging roads. According to recent numbers, there has been an uptick in traffic accidents involving vehicles, bicycles, motorcycles and even trains. Almost 1400 people have been killed on our roads in the past year. That number is close to 20 percent over the previous year. How did we get here? Is it all distracted driving, inexperienced drivers, DUIs, bad road design, poor traffic signals, driver error or all of the above? Those who are experts on road travel don’t have a one-size-fits-all answer, but they see the rise in accidents paralleling the use of smartphones. Another disturbing finding  t...