Team Saturdazzle: The One with Bits and Pieces.

Today's Team Saturdazzle is just a quick compilation of stories, clips and jokes.

Like many days when I was a kid it starts with Sesamee Strret and it ends with a snack,

One of the things I liked about Sesamee Street from an early age was the guest appearances.  One of the ealriest I remember probably since I like puns so much is when the cast of Bonanza came on the show.  They were on a lot of season 2 and did segments where they counted or recited the alphabet or demonstrated math problems like the video below.  

 

In the episode I remember they do a play on the Ernie and Bert banana in my ear sketch (original sketch below) except instead of saying banana in my ear they actually say Bonanza in my ear. Epic!

Sesamee Street has continued with their guest appearances.  I just discovered this gem with Billy Joel and Marlee Matlin (CODA, West Wing, Children of a Lesser God) . I'm a big Billy Joel fan and also love writing new lyrics to old songs and Joel does this by tweaking one of his standards and adapting it to Oscar The Grouch.  

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Yesterday I had one of my days where I was out of the house at 6:30 and not back for good until after midnight. I was home for about 90 minutes in the afternoon.  My wife and daughter were preparing for  an impromptu game night, where they had invited several people a day or less before the party was slated to begin.  A few people did manage to come, but when I was home the only people they had heard from were unable to attend.  This gave me an idea for a wry observation which I shared on my personal FB page:

A lot of times when people can't make it to an event youv'e asked them to attend, they will respond something like that sounds great, but I'm busy that day. Just once can't they say that sounds like an awful time, but I'm not doing anything see ya at 7?

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This morning, Amy and I were judging another speech tournament.  This time it was at held at Lucy's old high school.  When you walk in the hallowed halls of a high school there are pictures of accomplished student athletes and plaques with the names of students who received accolades, awards, accomplishments, and some words that don't start with A like scholarships. None of those halls in any of those schools contain my picture.  I wasn't that kind of athlete, and I was not that kind of student.  However the apple must have fallen far from the tree because my daughter class of 2024 is pictured at least twice and her name is engraved on a plaque as a recipient of a scholarship for mastery in Language Arts.  

Ending the day with a snack

My college friend Angela Rumbold's birthday was earlier this week.  We had many fine times over the years.  When she first moved from Illinois to Georgia, I had occasion to visit her there and she introduced me to boiled peanuts.  It was love at first soggy bite.  years later when I lived in South Carolina for 2 years the boiled peanut became my go to snack as there was a street vendor outside our local Walmart.  I generally did not go more than a fortnight without grabbing me a bag.  

When I ventured back to Illinois in '97 to forsake all others and marry my best friend, I also  ending up forsaking regular visits with my favorite boiled legume.  This +25 year absence of a boiled peanut routine ended about 2 years ago when I discovered inside A BP in Frankfort, Illinois where my sister in law  lives, a boiled peanut station.  So now 4 or 5 times a year on visits to her family I get the fruits of Jimmy Carter's first job (Boiled Peanut deliverer).

Tonight was one of those nights.  My Niece Gracie was in a production of Finding Nemo Jr.  Which is not it turns out a quest to find Nemo's progeny but a children's adaptation of the musical Finding Nemo.  I was glad to attend, but everyone in my family knew there was a boiled peanut quid pro quo in my attendance.  

By Jennifer Woodard Maderazo - https://www.flickr.com/photos/jenniferwoodardmaderazo/3563681031/, CC BY 2.0, Link

Well that's all the Team Saturdazzle I have for you today.  We learned some math, heard some jokes, watched some videos, I shared some stories and  even had a snack.  It's not exactly 3 points and a poem, but it will have to do.  

Not Sure How This is A Writer's Workshop But I'm In.

Here are the prompts for this week’s Writer’s Workshop: 

1. Write a post based on the word surprise. 
2. Write a post in exactly 8 sentences. 
3. Tell us about your favorite restaurant when you were a kid. 
4. Share links to 5-10 of your favorite non-political YouTube videos from this past week. 
5. Tell us about a time you had a really elaborate project in elementary school. 
6. Tell us how you named one (or more) of your pets.

I love writing too much, too look for a loophole when it comes to these Workshop prompts.  But if I were, prompt 4  would be right up my alley.  A writing prompt that just has me sharing links?  Bring it on.  

Some of the videos are not from  the past week but were in my you tube feed in the past week.  I had already put a few You Tube links in previous posts which is why I have the minimum amount.  Yet another loophole.  

Bob Bennett Weekly Live 1/12/2025

 

Ving Rhames Give His Golden Globe to Jack Lemon

MLB Remembers Legendary Broadcaster Bob Uecker

1987 Dal@Phi Buddy Ryan Runs Up The Score

The Newsroom: That's How I Got To Memphis

That was almost too easy,  So I decide to do # 6 as well. It's how I renamed a pet.

When I was in highschool my family bought a cat.  They named him Tiger.  I say they because If I had been conulted in the naming process such a predictable name would not have escaped my lips.  One of my best friends already had a cat named tiger, and of course every other striped cat was named tiger.  

Not only did I refuse to call the cat Tiger. I unilaterally decided to change his name.  So in my family of 7 people, 6 people called  our new cat Tiger and I called the cat Larry. I was very aggressive  and vocal with my naming preference. While no one switched over immediately I wore people down. My Dad would  accidentally call  him Larry, sweat under his breath and switch back to Tiger. I was always a pretty obnoxious teenager but this was me ar my most obnoxious.

in the early 80s VCRs were coming on the scene and our family got one before a lot of my other friends had them. So that summer I had a big party and we watched a number of movies. In between and even during movies people hung out I’m different places in the house and on the front porch and people came and went freely.

At some point during the party Larry/Tiger went freely but didnt come back. He probably got tired of  all the name calling. We never did see Larry or Tiger again. 

Team Saturdazzle: The One With Downtown Chicago

Third Saturday of the year. Third Team Saturdazzle post. For Christmas this year I gave Amy tickets to a Bulls game. We used them this weekend and drove to the city to watch The Bulls lose a close one to the Charlotte Hornets. Amy likes either playing sports or watching them live. I like those as well as watching sports on TV. , listening to sports on the radio and reading the accounts of a game in a newspaper or online.  But being with Amy makes everything even losing to the Hornets better.

Horace Grant 87-94 Bulls (1st 3 championships)
Randy Brown 95-00 Bulls (Last 3 championships)

A case in point is after I gave Amy the tickets she decided that staying overnight in Chicago would be better than driving back to our home in the suburbs. This is why I sit here at a Chicago hotel chronicling our adventure so far early on a Saturday morning.

One thing Amy and I like about staying in a hotel is television. In the 26-plus years we’ve been married many of those years have been spent without a TV. A few more years have been spent owning a TV. You can only watch DVDs or video cassettes.  So on those  occasions when we have stayed in hotel rooms we have enjoyed watching broadcast television. Yesterday after the game we watched a couple episodes of Seinfeld followed by an episode of Friends.  After that we turned on TUBI and watched a part of an episode of What's Happening and part of an episode of The Floor,  We watched the former because one of the Bull's bench players, Jalen Smith gives off a big Roger vibe from the show.

The latter is because we have been catching up on the 2nd season of the Fox game show sporadically over the past few months.  

This morning I went downstairs for some breakfast and I encountered a young man with a Hornets hoody and a Bulls Cap.  It's the kind of thing I would do with Cubs and Sox gear so he let me take a pic of him. The breakfast was good.  I don't see grits as an offering very much in the Chicago area but was glass to partake.

Bulls Cap Hornets Hoodie

Breakfast these days takes grits and hard-boiled determination.

Checkout at the hotel wasn't until noon.  So we lingered and then on the way home we stopped by a restaurant I'd seen on Friday that appealed to several parts of my nature.  

1. It's a classic Chicago Hotdog spot.

2. The name of the place, LuLu's is also one of our nicknames for our youngest daughter.

3. Three Words: Home Made Chili

4. Art work reminiscent of the Little Lulu comics without giving any of the credit. 

5.  When I went  in I decided I would see if they could put Chili on my Polish.  Not only could they but the Chili Cheese Polish, which I thought I had invented seconds before, was their special of the day.

While I don't subscribe to the no ketchup on hot dog 

theory, I do appreciate the wry wit of this poster.

For the last 3 years our Saturdays were too busy in the winter to get away for the weekend.  Almost every weekend, we were judging a speech tournament which took a huge portion of our Saturdays.  Even yesterday we drove by a high school on our way home blissfully unaware that the Larkin Speech Team was participating in a tournament there.  

Last 5 Sporting Events

1/17/2025 Charlotte Hornets Defeat Chicago Bulls 125-123 @ The United Center Chicago Illinois

11/16/2024 Class 7A Football Quarterfinal IHSA Batavia 17 Downers Grove North 7 @Batavia High Scool Batavia IL

11/2/2024 Dad's Day Weekend Minnesota 25 Illinois 17 Memorial Stadium Champaign IL 

10/26 Mt Carmel 34 Loyola Academy 20 Mt. Carmel High School, Chicago IL

10/19 100th anniversary game of Dedication of Memorial Stadium Illinois 21 Michigan 7 Memorial Stadium Champaign IL 

 

Jimmy Carter on What's My Line

Jimmy Carter passed away on Sunday. Here is a video of him a few years before he became President.

You Can't Take It With You - Saturdazzle Adjacent Post

The past coupla Saturdays I've tried and failed to put out a Team Saturdazzle post. The truth is my Fridays have been frenzied lately and my Saturdays have been swamped. The phrase 20 pounds in a 5-pound bag aptly describes them. My best friend noticed yesterday that yesterday at least until mid to late afternoon was anything but dazzling and told me to stop what I was doing, go home, and spend a quiet evening with my wife. This worked out well for my best friend and my wife as they are the same person.  

So I went home, and we watched a movie together.  The Movie was the 1938 Film: You Can't Take It With You.  I have blogged about it before here,  as the Y entry in "A Month at the Movies" from the  2023 A to Z challenge.  

It did Saturdazzle my weekend right up.  So much so, that I am taking some time on a Sunday to breathe a little and blog a little.  In the A to Z post, I shared the below YouTube video which is a good synopsis and review of the movie.  

 

T.V. in the Background: A Very Brady Christmas 

Donald Trump and Megan Mullally singing the "Green Acres" theme song at ...

Avengers: Infinity War Cast Sings "The Marvel Bunch"

Have not posted for awhile. More on that later. Now that I'm back, let's get righ to it with this Brady Bunch Avengers parody which is just a little bittersweet as it includes the late Chadwich Boseman.  Just a little in the box thinking from the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon.

 

T is For The Muppet Movie

 A to Z Challenge

A Month At The Movies

Hello and welcome back to A Month at the Movies,  my contribution to the A to Z challenge for 2023.

This year I am copying from a myriad of other A to Z  challengers by reprinting the same synopsis about my theme with every letter.  You can skip over this part if you want to.  

I love movies and have decided to share with you a movie each day that I have enjoyed to one degree or another.  With each entry, I'll give a brief synopsis of the film, share a positive and negative review from Rotten Tomatoes ( a website, I didn't use much at all until preparing for the challenge), discuss its resiliency (the theme of the A to Z challenge this year), and other tidbits like whether the film may appear in my top 100 film list, which I have been revamping this year. I think that's enough in the way of introduction, considering you'll be reading it (hopefully) 6  more times this month.

Film: The Muppet Movie (1979)\

Director: James Frawley

One of our most famous family quotes goes like this.  My wife was asked why she didn't like a certain movie.  Perhaps it was Princess Pride, perhaps it was something else  Her reply was:

"I like movies about real things, like the Muppets."

I don't remember if she was being serious or silly, but there is a degree of seriousness we can find in it.  Just like Roger Ebert talks about in the review below, in a way, The Muppets are real.

  

Positive Tomato: Jolson sang, Barrymore spoke, Garbo laughed, and now Kermit the Frog rides a bicycle... If you can figure out how they were able to show Kermit pedaling across the screen, then you are less a romantic than I am: I prefer to believe he did it himself. Roger Ebert - Chicago Sun-Times

Negative Tomato: while The Muppet Movie is certainly entertaining, the shift to a coherent, linear, feature-length narrative deprives the film the show's brilliantly structured inanity. James Kendrick - Q Network Film Desk 

The Muppet Movie is a movie within a movie.  We watch the Muppets screening The Muppet Movie, a movie about how The Muppets became rich and famous.  For those who grew up watching The Muppet Show, we are familiar with the basic concept, Muppets and humans interacting together in the real world.  

  

 

Resiliency: In the show the world was limited to the Muppet Theatre.  In the film, The Muppets are in swamps, churches, county fairs, restaurants, bars, and Ghost towns, all on their way to Hollywood. Jim Henson and all the Muppeteers had to show great resiliency in performing and filming. Click here to get an idea of what Henson had to go through to film the opening sequence of the movie.

Kermit at the Smithsonian

Scooter and Steve Martin on The Muppet Show

On The Muppet Show, the Muppets did perform many musical numbers but the majority of these were either pop tunes or standards.  The Muppet Movie is a musical and none of the songs existed until Paul Williams wrote them for the movie.  If you ever wonder whether the Muppet Movie has any lasting impact, try to imagine a world without Rainbow Connection or Movin' Right Along.

  

Top 100:  I have mentioned before that I basically have 3 favorite movies of all time that are essentiallly in a tie for my favorite film.  In the Challenge so far, I have revealed that 2 of these films are It's A Wonderful Life and Ordinary People.  The Muppet Movie is the third.  

Next Time: Used T.V Station available cheap.  

23 23 Aziz Ansari

Today is the 23rd of February. It is also the year 2023. Starting on January 23 (Actually, I started today read more about that by clicking here.)    I began making posts about people born on the 23rd of the current month.

Today I am featuring Aziz Ansari who played Tom Haverford on the NBC comedy Parks & Rec.

                  A Typical Tom Haverford Pose

Ansari was Born on February 23rd, 1983 in Columbia, South Carolina.  I was born on the23rd of September in 1964.  I graduuated from High School in 1983, and I lived in Columbia for 2 years from 1996 to 1998.  If you are not familiar with Park & Rec, the  scene below  is a really good intro to the Tom Haverford character,

The # 1 song in the United Kingdom on February 23rd, 1983 was Too Shy by Kajagoogoo. 

23 23 Mariska Hargitay

As you know this is the year 2023.  My father and I were each born on the 23rd day of our birth month.  I decided that this year on the blog each month on the 23rdI would feature someone famous or otherwise who was born that day.  I am writing this on February 23rd and postdating it on January 23rd as I clean forgot about doing this for January.  

Mariska Hargitay was born on January 23rd, 1964.  I was born on September 23rd, 1964.  She and I have the 23rd and 1964 in common.  She is now 59 and I have 8 months (or so) to have that in common with her as well.  

 

                                                        This is the go-to pose of her SVU character

Hargitay's mother was actress Jayne Mansfield who died when Hargitay was 3 years old.  Hargitay is best known for her role as Olivia Benson on the Law & Order spinoff series, Law & Order SVU.  

On January 23rd, 1964 the # 1 single in the United Kingdom was Glad All Over by The Dave Clark 5.

Keith Green and Rich Mullins celebrate another posthumous birthday.

In the world of Contemporary Music their are few bigger names than Keith Green and Rich Mullins. Admittedly, there are literally  bigger names as the aforementioned take up only 5 combined syllables and fit comfortably  on the 1/3 of the first line of this text.  Their actual names may be small but their impact on the lives of believers has been great indeed,

Keith Green share many of the same attributes including the same birthday, today, October 21st (Keith in 1953, and Rich in 1955). They were both gifted musicians and lyricists.  They both were outspoken in their faith and counter cultural in their approach to ministry.  They also died very young in vehicular accidents.  

Due to a plane crash in 1982, Keith Green did not live to see his 30th birthday and Mullins who covered a Green song on the 1992 tribute album No Compromise died in a car crash in 1997, just over a month before his 42nd birthday.  

  

Green before his conversion to Christianity was headed to a career as a rock and roll teen sensation.  The below footage is from a guest appearance on the panel show I've got a Secret when he was 11 years old.  After revealing his secret The youngster performs one of the songs he composed.  

     

It is no secret that the music, the vulnerability, and the passion of both Green and Mullins has informed my own journey.  It is fitting that they shared the same birthday , the same passion for Christ and the same method of expressing that passion.  They also share a place in my heart for how their music and ministry still inspires me to this day.

Leap of Dave Summer Reading Blog: Book #10: The Stranger in the Woods

Leap of Dave Summer Reading Blog: Book #10: The Stranger in the Woods:   

On what would have been her 100th birthday, film will recount life of Betty White

Film will recount life of Betty White: WORLD is a news organization producing biblically sound, daily coverage of global, national, and cultural current events.

Captain Kirk actor "Shatners" oldest person in space record

 

For Captain James Tiberius Kirk space was the final frontier.

For William Shatner, the actor who portrayed him on network television, Saturday Morning cartoons and multiple motion pictures space was just another step in a long and illustrious career.  The 90 year became the oldest person in space on October 13th ,making the trek from science fiction to science fact.  

Z is for Zero,

                                                                                

                                                                                Zero Mostel
 

                                                                                Years lived before 1921: Six

                                                                                Years lived after 1921: Fifty Six

When I think of Zero Mostel, I think of Tevye from Fiddler On The Roof. I never saw him on Broadway and he was not in the motion picture version.  However I listened to the Broadway album many times as a kid and now own it on c.d.  He put his stamp on that role more than any other actor ever had.  

 Born Samuel Joel Mostel, he received the moniker Zero when performing  in the New York night club, cafe society because "he was a guy starting with nothing.  

Besides being a night club comic, he worked on the stage, in movies, and on television.  This career was derailed somewhat in the 40's and 50's as he was blacklisted in Hollywood before there even was a blacklist.  In 1952 he was officially blacklisted by the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and called to testify in front of HUAC in 1955.  His testimony is very reminiscent of Jim Carey's character's testimony in The Majestic.  One highlight is when he refers to his former employer 20th Century Fox as 19th Century Fox because of (in his opinion) their antiquated views.

By reading this it is pretty easy to infer that Zero Mostel was a little odd.  So it didn't surprise me that his 3 Tony awards were in odd years.  In 1961 He won best actor in a play for Rhinoceros.  In 1963 he won his first Best Actor in a Musical Tony for A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Forum, and In 1965 he won his secon Best Actor in a Musical Tony for his career defining role in Fiddle on the Roof.  

Speaking of Broadway, Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder starred together in Mel Brook's movie The Producers which years later became a Broadway smash.  Mostel and Wilder reunited in the famous Electric Company segment Letter Man with Wilder voicing the title hero and Mostel in the role of the evil Spellbinder.  

Mostel also appeared on Sesame Street and the Muppet Show.  He is the only guest star on The Muppet Show who passed away before their episode could be aired.  Mostel is one of at least 3 of my a to z profiles who hosted The Muppet Show, the other two are Peter Ustinov and Ethel Merman.  Now that the A to Z challenge is over, I may watch all 3 of those episodes on the Disney Plus App with the extra time coming my way. 

So that's it 1921 A to Z has come to an end.  I wonder what anybody might say about it 100 years from now.

A To  Z Extra

Some of my Faavorite Electric Company Segments  at Dave Out Loud. This of course includes Mostel as the Spellbinder. 

   After you've looked at the additional content on my other blogs head back to The A to Z challenge and  continue exploring.  

Some of my favorite Electric Company segments

Letter Man

Speedy Reader

 

 Fargo North, Decoder

   Spiderman

Doctor Knows Best

                                                            Robert Young

                                                            Years lived before 1921:Fourteen 

                                                            Years lived after 1921: Seventy-Seven

When I first encountered Robert Young he was playing  The titular role of Marcus Welby on primetime and Jim Anderson on Father Knows Best in reruns.  Back then there was very little I knew about him.

I did not know he had originated the Father Know's Best Role on radio in the 1940's before reprising it on T.V.  I did not know he had played opposite John Gielgud and Peter Lorre in Alfred Hitchcock's Secret Agent.  I did not know he was in one of my wife's favorite movies, The Enchanted Cottage. (To be fair at this point, I was a kid and did not have a wife.)

Discovering these facets of Young has been a delight.  He has quite a filmography and I hope to continue to make future discoveries of his stage,  film, radio and television career  that spanned nearly sixty years.

For more a to z challenge click here.  

 

W is for Waltons

'

The Walton's is a 1970's CBS program about a family  of 7 children their parents and paternal grandparents living in rural Virginia during the depression. Earl Hamner who wrote and narrated the show  and was the person that the character Johm Boy Walton was based on was born in 1923 so would not qualify for this list.  However the actors who portrayed the grandparents Will Geer, and Ellen Corby were alive in 1921 .  

Ellen Corby

Years lived before 1921: Ten 

Years lived after 1921: Seventy-eight

Will Geer

Years lived before 1921: Nineteen

Years lived after 1921: Fifty-seven

Fun fact: Both Geer and Corby were involved in two iconic Christmas programs.  Geer was in the season 2 Christmas episode of 8 is enough where he plays a man who steals all the Bradford's Christmas gifts and tries to pass himself off as Santa Claus co Nicolas.  In It's a Wonderful Life Corby character  is kissed by Jimmy Stewart after only asking for $7.50 during the run on the Building & Loan.  They both were veteran character actors but their portrayal of Zeke and Esther Walton stands out as the role of their lifetimes.  

For more a to z challenge click here.  

V is for Venn

                                                            John Venn

                                                            Years lived before 1921: Eighty-seven

                                                            Years lived after 1921:two

John Venn was a mathematician, logician and philosopher who is best remembered for his Venn diagram. V can be a difficult letter to fill some years but this year was an exception.  I did not want to leave out  former White Sox owner, Bill Veeck nor  actor Abe Vigoda from the challenge, so I created this Venn diagram that shows what they have in common and what is different about them.

 

                                                        Bill Veeck

                                                        Years lived before 1921: Seven

                                                        Years lived after 1921: Sixty-five

                                                    Abe Vigoda

                                                    Years lived before 1921:Zero

                                                    Years lived after 1921:Ninety Five

Well, It's Venn fun bit it's time to run.  For more a to z challenge click here.

Peter Ustinov on Disney Plus

Peter Ustinov

Years lived before 1921:Zero.

Years lived after 1921:Eighty-three

Peter Ustinov's acting career extend over 60 years between his first and final movie appearance.  He received two Oscars for best supporting actor in the 1960's.  Today I'd like to focus instead on what we can see of Mr. Ustinov's career on the Disney Plus app.  He stars in the 1968 film Blackbeard's Ghost as Blackbeard the pirate.  He costars in the 1976 Disney film The Treasure of Matecumbe as Dr. Ewing T. Snodgrass. He also appears in one of my favorite Disney cartoons and twice with the Muppets.

                                                                        

Ustinov provided the voice for Prince John

Robin Hood 1973

Ustinov and Fozzie The Bear tell a joke

S1 E 12 The Muppet Show

Peter and Miss Piggy

Great Muppet Caper 1981

The episode of the Muppet Show that features Ustinov is definitely worth watching.  Ustinov plays a number of diverse characters and does very many different accents even doing a pretty good Kermit impression at the end of the show.  Kermit also sings "It's not easy being green" in this episode which was his signature song before the Rainbow Connection from The Muppet movie.

For more A to Z challenge click here.