Blergh

NOT to get political here. However; it needs to be said that Mr. Eastwood came of age during the Depression and WWII and ,whilst those times definitely had folks who used ethnic slurs right and left with no regard to how others viewed them, even back then these were considered rude words by those who cared if others thought they were being rude and/or ignorant. Moreover, using the p-word describing people instead of cats and using the f-word back then would have risked a male using them in women's presences to get knocked down by other men. Sad irony is that ,even two decades ago, I could have imagined Mr. Eastwood playing a character who WOULD have punched out another male's lights for using that kind of talk around women.

Can I say I regret not telling off more folks in my youth?

Yep, the best part about that is that one doesn't have to worry about one's monies going to fund said celeb's despicable activities/causes. If I survive Mr. Eastwood , Mr. Gibson and a few others THEN I may start paying money towards their films again but not before after what they've pulled.

GH Scorpio, I have to admit I'd be tempted to do the same were it not for the fact that X amount of my monies would go to help support someone whose activities I disliked. To each their own, though.

I don't know who or what this person was doing but about twenty years ago, for roughly a solid year, I got phone calls asking for " Zach" ONLY in the overnight hours and often despite repeating my phone number, the numerous callers often refused to believe "Zach" wasn't at my number.

The Swedish-born Jenny Lind became a worldwide celebrity with her flawless soprano to the degree that more than one U.S. town built opera houses just so she could make a stop in their locale on her US tour -and she had quite a few novelty items from soup to furniture made with her name and/or image on it that sold like hot cakes. ALL this took place in the 1850's through 1860's- decades before the phonograph or radio had been invented so only her reputation living up to her hype made her a celebrity since no one outside her immediate vicinity could have heard her voice.

One thing I chanced upon in recent years overseas is that in some European countries, they're still re-running the Pippi Longstocking series produced in 1969 and dubbed from Swedish. I'm not knocking Pippi per se but I have to wonder why there'd still be children interesting in seeing something that only had a small number of episodes made that their grandparents had cut their teeth on and was originally in another language to boot.

As long as we're doing a military thread, for her work in entertaining Allied troops in sometimes downright chaotic and dangerous conditions during WWII, Marlene Dietrich received the US Medal of Freedom in 1947. Although from as early as Molly Pitcher and Deborah Sampson in the US Revolutionary War there HAVE been women who fought in combat in the US, it's only relatively recently that they've been able to do so officially so I thought it worth bringing a female celebrity who honored for doing so.

The 8th Season Premiere has gotten me on the verge of cancelling Modern Family. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Every single character had become a mean spirited parody of their former selves - Jay and Lily were the closest things to being vaguely likable and did I mention how all the 'minority' characters (Columbian, gay and . .. . rural?) had become crude stereotypes? Unless the next episode does a 180 and become the humorously, realistic show with likable if flawed human characters I originally liked , I'm DONE!

Would it be wrong for me to say that IMO, No Doubt's "It's My Life" not only did a much better vocalization and instrumental than the 80's band Talk, Talk but their cine noir whodunnit (frameup?) video was far more imaginative than the original safari scenes with the odd shadow flitting about?

Jaded, That's so horrible for the Farrows and I hope someone in that extended family is actively trying to help Mia who has cared for so many but, no doubt, needs some very attentive care for herself.

Now that would be interesting to contemplate what the two CG's could have talked about during their Boxing Day unboxings, Cherpumple. Here's a name humdinger one from the Golden Age: Iconic platinum blonde Jean Harlow used her own mother's full maiden name as a stage name (her own given name being Harlean Carpentier). However; from infancy onward all her family and friends called her 'Baby' or 'the Baby' to such an extent that when she during her first day of school, she had no idea who 'Harlean Carpentier' was when the teacher called her legal name. Oh, and as a coincidence to this nugget 'Babe' was what friends called the portly comedian Oliver Hardy and the two of them worked in a silent movie called Double Whoopee (1929) in which Mr. Hardy and his thinner pal Stan Laurel played bellhops in a fancy hotel who suddenly had to save the 18-year-old ingenue Miss Harlow's rep in the crowded hotel lobby. So one may wonder if at any point during the filming did the two of them hear 'Babe' and simultaneously respond?

I agree- and the historian in me cringed at how the DD folks barely even attempted to pretend to dress or perform music from the supposed timeframe just two decades before the movie's release. Hello, if George Lucas could somehow convince a large number of performers smack in the counterculture when American Graffiti was produced to somehow trim up to look like and play music like they walked out of Wally Cleaver's soda shop , how tough would it have been to find performers in the 80's to do the same re the early 1960's? It annoyed me enough to be able to shrug off Jennifer Beal's character in Flashdance being able to live solo in a loft the size of a Borough when she was a welder aspiring to be a ballerina.

While Clark Gable and Cary Grant had very different interests and virtually nothing in common they DID each have a strong desire to keep from letting things go to waste to the degree that they had a tradition that they'd meet every December 26th- to exchange monogramed Christmas gifts each himself had had no liking for and couldn't return to stores but thought that the other might have use for.

OK, this isn't a sidesplitter but a rather poignant fact about Cary Grant born Archibald Leach. Although his mother Elsie Kingdon Leach would be depressed over the early death of his older brother, she was a doting mother to him even encouraging him to develop entertainment skills despite the family's struggling circumstances. This came to an abrupt end when he was nine and he came home from school and was told that she had 'gone on a long holiday' by his father Elias who soon moved his mistress into the Leach family home then vaguely inferred that Elsie had died before the mistress gave birth to Cary's half-brother. The reality was that Mrs. Leach had been committed to an asylum by her husband and her son wouldn't find out until shortly before Elias's death and he himself had become famous. As soon as possible, Cary took her out of there and had her in more comfortable surroundings. She would live to 95- becoming a grandmother at 88 with the birth of Cary's only child Jennifer.

I think I'll do backsies on Sarah Jessica Parker. I'll skip why I couldn't stand her for now (and it had nothing to do with appearance) and give her kudos for actually giving up a good amount of change by ending her endorsement of Epi Pens after they skyrocketed the cost. I'll sub Sarah Silverman instead -considering that the most positive emotion I feel for her is pity after seeing and hearing her speak.

lordonia, DD covered it well in the citation. I just hope everyone else in my workplace is able to find gas for however long this is to be.

And a sad way to go. :( Well, to try to keep things from being totally gloomy, I think it's a bit odd that she claimed she got her stage surname of Carr due to the director Robert Wise believing that her actual birth surname of Farnon made her full name too long. How come it was okay for Christopher Plummer and Eleanor Parker to keep their names, then? I seriously doubt anyone stayed away from the movie just because the latter two performers' names were 'too long' and their names appeared in the billing promoting the movie whereas Miss Carr's name only appeared in the credits -along with Nicholas Hammond, Heather Menzies, and Angela Cartwright all of whose names were longer than hers!

Yep, it's funny to see (but not always funny to have it happen) when a technical adult gets chastised by their parent. I recall reading that there was a time when Eunice Shriver was having a disagreement with her octogenarian mother Rose Kennedy with neither side giving an inch before Mrs. Kennedy declared "Eunice! Be still!" and not only did the 50-something Mrs. Shriver drop her end of the argument but seemed to temporarily revert to being a tiny child on the verge of being sent to her room.

I'm grateful I was able to top off my gas tank in one of the last working gas stations in my city so I will be able to get to/from work safely until this mess gets resolved.

Yes, I went through that with my elderly parents. My father [rest his soul] couldn't leave the house to get a hearing aid in the last part of his life and my mother had a bad build up of wax that all attempts proved too painful for her to endure. Long-short is that that they wound up blasting the TV virtually as loud as any 1970's stereo they dissed my late sister for having too loud and I couldn't help but think she likely had a posthumous ironic laugh at their expenses. Thankfully, after my father's death, my mother FINALLY had her wax cleaned out (albeit painfully) and no longer are the sets on full blast.

Wasn't there a Calvin Klein scent years ago called 'Eternity' which featured a hetero couple in which a man asked if the woman would still love him if he were a woman and she responded "as long as I could always be your man"? I think perfume folks should do an ad featuring Pepe Le Pew . Speaking strictly for myself, anything besides a tiny dot of rosewater at the nape of the neck smells as unpleasant as skunk-spray.

OK, here's one about Katharine Hepburn: In the late 1930's, she had a dalliance with the billionaire Howard Hughes but was quite open about this with her family. Anyway, she brought him to their Connecticut home for a weekend party where none other than her ex-husband Ludlow Odgen Smith was also present filming home movies. This caused no skin off of Miss Hepburn's nose but the increasingly paranoid Mr. Hughes raised a huge fuss. Without missing a beat, her father Dr. Thomas Hepburn, Sr. said ' Howard, Luddy's has been taking pictures of all of us for many years before you joined us and he will be taking them long after you've left. He is part of this family.' Yes, Dr. Hepburn had his faults but I'm glad SOMEONE stood up to Howard Hughes and came away unscathed.

Nice trivia re Miss Lamarr, Aiming! I'd also like to add that the core of the guidance system was via player piano rolls.

I know this is a first world problem and the folks who made the call likely won't pay attention to this however. . . I'm annoyed that Antenna TV put Wings in the timeslot formerly occupied by Barney Miller then Family Ties as I looked forward to seeing these shows after my shift and I never liked Wings the first time around. How the latter show lasted even one season much less all the seasons it did is something akin to not getting why Jerry Lewis is popular in France, IMO.