Psst! Want to Know What THEY Don't Want You to Know?

Well, you came to the wrong place.  The only things you'll learn from these books is breathless fourth-hand stories of something that somebody three times removed said they heard about from somebody they can't name.

You see, the government knows all about it.  The aliens have made a deal with the government.  The government lets the aliens take and experiment on us and the aliens in return are supposed to give the government new, advanced technologies.

Only problem is, those sneaky aliens have gone back on their word and have started kidnaping a lot more of us than was originally agreed.

Most of these experiments happen in these underground installations, you see, which were originally intended for human use but have been mostly taken over by these alien critters with big eyes and scalpels.

And if you believe things like that, then you probably believe things like Masons running the world and crystals from Atlantis.

All this stuff is pathetic and silly, folks.  The only documented alien stranger to this Earth is due back soon.  We celebrated his Resurrection a couple of weeks ago.

 

More Dumb Amazon Suggestions

 Another head-scratcher.  What does the ethnicity of Hawaii have to do with Superman?  Does the "Suggested for You" algorithm think that the two are inter-connected through the Superman-as-Immigrant idea?  Who knows!

These wicked-looking things are tools for carving wax.  Bomboozled is a rabidly left-wing book-length abhorration of the Cold War and the USA's nuclear strength (that kept us alive and un-bombed).   However, the volume is a GREAT repository of Cold war imagery, and that's why I'd like to own a copy someday.

What does Cold War America have to do with wax shaping tools?

Happy Easter!

The "Man from U.N.C.L.E." Theme Has Lyrics!

Yes, Jerry Goldsmith's dynamite theme to the TV show The Man from U.N.C.L.E. DOES have lyrics.  They are kind of like the lyrics to the original Star Trek, in that they weren't performed on the show at any time.

Music by Jerry Goldsmith, lyrics by Ernie Sheldon.  Ladies and germs, I present to you, sheet music!

Here is a transcription of the written words:



Come when he calls you, young man,

U.N.C.L.E. is calling.

Kiss her goodbye now,

You’ve got to fly now.

Don’t keep him waiting, young man,

U.N.C.L.E. is calling.

Trouble is brewing,

Drop what you’re doing,

U.N.C.L.E. is calling, young man.

             Thrushes in the trees

             Sing deadly melodies.

             Go where he calls you, young man,

             U.N.C.L.E.’s calling.

Where there is danger,

You are no stranger,

U.N.C.L.E. is calling, young man.

Not very inspiring, huh?  You can imagine ol' "Velvet Fog" Mel Torme crooning the words.

(image from an old FILES Magazine)

See you next time!

More Dumb Amazon Suggestions

Perhaps the logic here is that if you buy bags for your vacuum cleaner, then you are likely to be a breast-pumping female???

I suppose that if you vacuumed most of your kid's Lego pieces up and filled up your vacuum-cleaner bag (thus needing to buy new vacuum-cleaner bags) -- then you might want to placate the kid by buying more Legos?

How about you guys -- have you come across some such wacky suggestions?

Dreaming About Superman

One of the things I love about life is when I have a crazy or wild dream, AND REMEMBER IT.

So, in this dream (that I woke up from AN HOUR AGO) I suddenly discover that I am Superman/Clark Kent.  As in most dreams, I am suddenly thrust in medias res (check your Homer if you don't know what that is), walking down the streets of a very 1940s Metropolis, as if I'm inside the a Fleischer cartoon.

I'm wealking East, towards the river ahead, which has a drawbridge almost up, because steaming down southwards in the river is a absolutely HUGE passenger steamer.

As I pause a hundred yards away to look at it, I see on its black-painted side its name, which doesn't make any sense to the waking me.  It's a weird name that seems Hawaiian now that I think about it.  It was something like, ILLELLELEIA, in a nice cursive script.  (Wish I could remember if there were a HMS or USS or something in front of the name.)

I stand and look around at this big, golden, sunwashed city.  Big civic sculptures abound; on top of a nearby church I see a twenty-foot golden-gilt angel with a mesh banner emblazened WELCOME POPE.

Past that I can see not one but TWO cartoon-generic variations on the Statue of Liberty.  One of them features not only a Lady Liberty figure, but also a man and two children standing next to her on her pedestal (which is at the top of a Space-Needle-looking thing), as if to say, :"Families are welcome too."

So, knowing I'm Superman under my Clark Kent clothes, I stand there and look around, thinking that this bright, shining city seems to be doing all right by itself, without me.

Then, suddenly, there is an explosion about forty feet up in the side of a building to my right, accross the city square that I seem to be on the edge of.

Just behind me and to my right, at the edge of an alley, is a small structure the size of a dumpster.  Maybe it was a newsstand in my dream.  I duck down behind that and then make a sharp left back into the street out of the alley.  I am running and looking ahead towards the building on fire, while in the meantime:  I can feel my fingers touch my waist, and an ankle (lifted up as I run), and the back of my neck.  All my attention is focused straight ahead at the fire and on moving FAST.  Even so, some backseat part of my consciousness knows that the brief touchings that I felt were when I was reflexively REMOVING my Kent clothes, in superspeed, to reveal my Superman outfit below.

And in my dream I simply fly into the fire, give a hard breath into it once, and swoop around in circles outside the bulding (as if to siphon the smoke away), and it's over.

Very quickly I am walking down the street away from the scene (this would be going west), back in my Clark clothes, on the lefthand sidewalk.  Only now a very Fleischerean Lois Lane is walking (on the inside, of course) down the sidewalk next to me.

And here is the interesting part of that dream.  For some reason, in character as Clark, and knowing I am Superman, I verbally start really ripping into Lois.

We sit down on a bench and I am very conscious that my "Clark voice" is several steps higher than my "Superman voice."  I start berating Lois on her obsession with Superman and on her conviction that I (Clark) am him (Superman).

"What is it with you?" I say.  "You act like you think Superman is dreamy, yet you won't give me the time of day.  It's as if it's some psychological need to idolize somebody you can never have."

I smack the back of the park bench and start walking in circles around it.  (No, I didn't hit the bench hard enough to show super-strength.)

"Is it some passive-aggressive thing?" I asked her.  She just sits there, watching me.

I go on, "Clark is available, he's right here.  You could have him if you wanted.  But that's too easy.  If you were with Clark you'd have to be in a 'relationship.' " (Maybe in my dream I did the quotation-mark-thing with my fingers.)

"But no," I tell her.  "A relationship would compromise your oh-so-tough image.  Lois Lane, who can outscoop the men, who's tough as nails, who doesn't need anyone."

Then I make a standing 360-degree turn, like a TAHH-DAHH! -- a quick spin on my toes, and am facing her again.  I go on with my rant.

"And then there's Superman," I say, stretching out the name and making fun of it.  "He's safe to have unrequited dreams about.  He's so much the ideal, the PERFECT MAN.  He would be good enough for Lois Lane the perfect one.  But since he's Superman, he's unattainable.  He belongs to the whole world.  Nobody can have him.

"So it's safe for you to go all mooney-eyed over HIM.  Because he's like some otherwordly God.  You can hero-worship him and dream about him and sigh about HIM.  Because you're never going to have him.

"He's always going to be the great SUPERMAN--" and here I swung my arms wide over my head, like waving at a plane overhead-- "and there's no real danger that he would ever take you up on yur puppy eyed devotion."

I stop and take a breath.  Lois is not talking back,  Her black eyes are simply looking at me.

"As I said, maybe it's a subtle passive-aggressive thing," I say in summation.  "It's easy to spurn the guyu who's right here--" banging myself on the chest-- "and swoon over The Big Guy," waving a hand in the air.

"Clark isn't good enough for you BECAUSE YOU CAN HAVE HIM.  Superman is wonderful and grand.  And he's safe to swoon over, because YOU CAN NEVER HAVE HIM."

I drop my hands to my sides.  "So maybe you should just keep going on in your little world.  It is safe there.  Superman will always be there to swoop in and save the day.  And Clark will always be there looking at you with devotion and being spurned.  You can HAVE hero-worship and you can GIVE hero-worship.

"And you won't have to get your hands dirty by coping with real feelings or forgiveness or disappointment."

+ + + + + + +

AND THAT WAS THE END OF THE DREAM.

I thought it was a pretty interesting analysis of the early Clark-Lois-Superman relationship.  I bet (if they were real of course) Clark certainly would feel like saying something like this to Lois after being blown off for the hundredth time.  (Think of Superman: The Movie, when Lois says, "That's Clark, nice.")

But as I sat down to type this up and share with you, my waking self started analyzing the scene.  I thought, "Boy, WHAT A JERK."  Because if Clark really said these insightful things to Lois, knowing that he was Superman and that he was keeping this from Lois, WHAT A JERK he must be.

And since Superman's not a jerk, I guess such a rant would never take place.

But still, on waking, the whole passive-aggressive, safe-Superman/ignore-Clark thing sounded pretty spot-on.

What do you think?

See you next week.

  

They Don't Know the Truth, But They Hope You Will Buy Their Book

Here's another instalment in the "What else will people believe?" deartment.

Well, it's like this, see:  Something MIGHT have happened.  And nobody knows for sure what happened.  And since nobody knows for sure what happened, then by golly almost ANYTHING could have happened!

After all, Atlantis will rise by the year 2000 to herald a New Age!

CONFESSION TIME:  Like all of the book covers featured, I actually bought these books.  If it makes any difference, the fact that I bought them secondhand means that I didn't DIRECTLY give any money to the writer.  Does that make a difference?

Dumb Amazon Suggestions ( a Series)

I appreciate that Amazon's helpful promptings are intended to make them money by parsing your previous purchases and trying to tell you about other items "you might like."

But sometimes I think that their algorithms are out to lunch!

Here are a couple of silly examples.

The book mentioned as the basis for these recommendations is just another in the "Who-was-Jack-the-Ripper" library.  What the HECK does Jack the Ripper have to do with these cooking utensils? 

True, in 1888 a human kidney was sent to the Metro Police with a letter in which Jack claimed that he had nibbled on the other one.

True, there was a 1911 book, The Lodger, by Marie Belloc Lowndes, in which a meek couple rents their upstairs room to a guy that readers are led to believe was Saucy Jack.  And the brand name for these items is "Lodge."

But, still!?!  You tell me -- can you think of a reason for these suggestions?

More to come in this tale of consumer silliness!

"The Final Affair" by David McDaniel

David McDaniel wrote several of the Ace U.N.C.L.E. paperbacks and was a fan not a hack. after the series' cancellations he wrote The Final Affair, his own version of the resolution of the series concepts.

It was never published, and for years/decades was a rumor and hard to find. For more info on McDaniels, here is one source: http://www.manfromuncle.org/mcdanielbystine1.htm

Now, with permission from a Cousin, here is a PDF of the text. It's been available in other places online, but sharing is good!

Here is the link: http://www.mediafire.com/?0okhzm69zywi6bs

See you next time!

A Drive-In Artifact

While going through some books to get rid of some, I came across this slip of paper, a relic of the past.  In "the good old days," there were these outdoor movies, see, and they were called "Drive-ins."

There used to be several her in OLC when we got married in the late1970s.  Here in OKC there was one on S Portland Ave close to the airport -- I remember going there once.  Now its site is occupied by a field with a couple of oil pumping stations.

There was another at S 59th St and Santa Fe Ave.  We went to see Star Trek II there when Matthew was a baby ( circa 1982-3).

The Winchester Drive-In in OKC on S Western is still in business!  Every winter when they shut down they put on their marquee:
     WHEN SPRING HAS COME
     AND FLOWERS HAVE RIZ
     THIS IS WHERE
     THE MOVIES IS
and being a fan of cheesy humor, I like that.










Anyway, here is the ticket thing:

This is on regular-weight paper, probably cut with a paper-cutter.  It was run off on a mimeograph machine (another relic of bygone days).

See you next week!

The End of the Issue

Here are the last page and inside/outside rear covers of The Adventures of Bob Hope, dated October-November, 1964.  It's one of the few comics I have in its original copy -- that is, this is the one from my childhood, as opposed to most of the other 2000+ that I have re-acquired copies of.

I think I read somewhere that the toy soldiers were three-dimensional, but not actually fully rounded.  They were VERY FLATTENED to save plastic.  They kind of looked like soldiers from Flatland.  And, of course, the "footlocker" was thin cardboard.

You can't really read the signature on the He-Man book, but it ain't "Charles Atlas."  Also notice the Mercury dime.  That hsn't been minted since the FDR dime came into circulation in 1946!  Of course, also notice that the tagline at the top of the ad, "Brother, can you spare a dime," comes from the lyrics of a 1931 song of that title.

I never sent in to sell greeting cards, either.  And that's for the best.  The company's procedure was to send you a few boxes that you had to pay for.  It was up to YOU to sell them to somebody else!  Wimp that I was, I would end up with those boxes of cards sitting on a closet shelf for twenty years before I got up the nerve to try to push them off on somebody.

Of course, if the grown-ups I knew were as friendly-looking as the ones shown in the ad, I might have made some BIG BUCKS.

See you next week!

(And check out the new link for the CBS Mystery Theatre to the right.)

   

End Matters

These are the next three pages from The Adventures of Bob Hope #89.

 Interesting that DC found it hard to fill even a half-page with letters to Bob.  Instead they dragged some chestnuts out of some old edition of Cap'n Billy's Whiz Bang.

If only the reality could match the thrilling art in these battle scenes!

See you at the end of the week for a wrap-up.

Finding the Treasure

Bob, in his quest to find the treasure whose map is hidden inside the Golden Gazelle, has traveled back in time and agreed to battle Roman General Octavian in order to cover Cleopatra's escape with Mark Anthony.  In return, Cleo showed Bob that the treasure is buried at the Temple of Osiris.  If only Bob and Harvard (his dog) can survive the battle.

But don't worry -- Bob and Harvard have a supply of Nile Blue Cheese -- whose odoriferous properties carry the day!

One of my favorite comics panels of all time is the top one on this page, where the big lug says, "You slay me and then I'll slay you."  Kind of like heads I win, tails you lose!

Note Harvard's use of the term "chemical warfare," and the last panel on the page, where the term "fall out" is used for yuks.

The only thing left to do is return home to 1964, since they now know where the treasure is buried.  But first, some cheese sandwiches!

Well, here they are at the Temple, but *gasp* it's under "10 billion tons" of water!  And for the Pièce de résistance, check out the statues.

The BAD NEWS:  Here in the present century, they can't get the treasure because it is Egyptian government property now.

ONE THE OTHER HAND:  It seems that Cleopatra found a way of thanking Bob and Harvard for their heroics!  Plus, ol' Cleo correctly divined the TRUE NATURE of Bob and Harvard's relationship, too!

Voice trained, indeed!  This last joke harks back to the opening scene of the story, when Harvard was helping Bob win that chess match by giving instructions through an earpiece.

As my sainted high-school English Lit teacher Della Craighead used to say, this story comes "circle full round."

See you in a few days to wrap up this issue.

Cheese It, the Romans!

With Harvard's urging, "Mastah Hope" is negotiating with Cleopatra to discover the Golden Gazelle.  But then, NUTS to that.  What they are really after is the treasure map INSIDE the Gazelle.  So, if Cleo wants Bob to run interference for her and Mark Anthony against the Roman Emperor Octavian, she must tell Bob what's inside the statue.

At last we know!  The map is to Cleo's dad's greatest treasure, buried between two great statues at the Temple of Osiris.  In real life, this structure is at Abydos.

(Cleo's dad was Ptolemy XII Auletes -- once again, IRL.)

So, now Bob knows the location of the treaure.  If only he can live to dig it up!

So here he is on one of Cleopatra's war ships.  Only problem is, Cleo wouldn't give him any oarsmen!  It's just Bob and the faithful Harvard Harvard III.

They are sighted by Octavian, but how much of a threat can one ship, with only a single catapult, be?  Let's find out ...

INCOMING! *squoosh*

Perhaps this is the inspiration for Lynyrd Skynyrd's song, "That Smell"  (or perhaps not).  Anyway, how fair is Bob's tactic, sending over Nile Blue Cheese on the catapult?  At least he wasn't hitting below the belt, just striking at the nose.

Aroma-Side!

See you at the end of the week for another scent-imental instalment!

Everybody Loves Bob, Especially Cleopatra!

Bob Hope and his genius dog-sidekick, Harvard Harvard III (the Third), have been taking increasingly HUGE jumps backwards in time in their quest for the elusize Golden Gazelle.

Since we've already seen the HOW ofr their arrival -- falling out of the sky -- we can now start this section of the tale in medias res -- Google that term -- with Cleopatra and Mark Anthony.  These two lovebirds (or felons if you wish) must escape from Roman general Octavius, if only they can find somebody stupid enough to act as a decoy and lure Octavius away...

BING!  You asked for a stupe?  Right on time!  With his little dog, too!

(Notice how subtly we get to see Marlon Brando's fizzog as Mark Anthony in the last panel.)

When a femme fatale starts wending her magical way around some dumb lummox's earlobes, I always wonder why the gal's guy (watching behind the curtains) doesn't figure out that he, the peeking partner, is just as 'whipped (pardon my French) as the poor schmuck she's kissing now.

On this last page, here's a great argument for having a dog.  He won't fall for feminine wiles of the two-legged kind.  Here Harvard is trying to keep "Mastah Hope" on track in asking about the Golden Gazelle, but Bob is off in Dreamland, imagining a Sphinx with his schnozz. 

Is there enough granite in Egypt for that?

Find out next Monday or Tuesday!

Ve Didn't Know Der Sockses (und Der Clockses) Vas Loaded!

To prove he's not an English spy, Bob Hope, Time-Traveller, has agreed to help General George Washington in his sneak attack on the Prussian camp December 26, 1776.

Since there was already a Santa Claus onsite, he pulled his fake beard over his head to become - voila! - MISSUS Santa Claus, the better to deliver Washington's booby-trapped cuckoo clock.

But then the Prussian Santa wants to get frisky!

After a little bait-and-box, Bob and Harvard get out of there, just in time.

And THEN they find out that the oarsman who pulled them out of the Potomac is the elusive Nigel Wednesday.  Of course he doesn't have the Golden Gazelle, this story's MacGuffin, in his backpack; he left it at home.

So how a lowly American Revolutionary War soldier came across a treasure from Cleopatra, we don't know.  But instead of investigating the discovery of cottage cheese, it's off to Actium in 31 BC.

See you at week's end for our next leap backwards in time.

That Sneaky George Washington!

Our hero Bob Hope, in his quest to find the Golden Gazelle, has gone back in time to December 26, 1776, because one of George Washington's men is Nigel Wednesday, its last known possessor.

Having arrived by falling into the Potomac, they must convince General Washington that they aren't Prussian spies.  So, they undertake a little mission . . .

Don't ask (or tell) if 18th-century tenchnology could contrive a time bomb that would fit into a leetle-bitty old alarm clock.  We'll just handwave it and blame it on the Steampunkers.

Problem is, there's already a Santa in the Hessian camp!  So, it's off to the gender-bender closet, and voila! Instant MISSUS SANTA CLAUS.

The only problem with that is, MISTER Claus wants to get a little frisky.  Time for Rocky and Bullwinkle to save the day!

Oops, that was a commercial.  Anyway, we'll see the next page or three Monday or Tuesday.  Until then, Bob must endure Santa's schnapps breath!

Money-Saving for British Spies -- hmmm?

The next page in The Adventures of Bob Hope #89 contains two ads.  The top ad is for the entertainment venue made immortal by songwriter (and Gong Show Guru) Chuck Barris and singer Freddy "Boom Boom" Cannon, the eponymous "Palisades Park."  I sure wish somebody could tell me what the "Crazy Crystals" ride was all about!  As a kid from Oklahoma, I never made it farther east than Chicago.  Also, that's a processed version of a Wayne Boring Superman at the top left of the ad.

The bottom half of the page is DC's standard-at-the-time subscription ad.  If you subscribed to a year's worth, you got ten 12-cent comics for $1.  That's a fine deal, but I always bought MY comics from a greasy guy in an alley.  Not really, it was the local grocery store.

With Part Three of our silly story, "A Comedy of Eras," Bob and his smart pooch Harvard Harvard III have gone even FURTHER back in time in search of the Golden Gazelle, all the way to George Washington's famous sneak attack across the Delaware on December 26, 1776.

The first problem is in the way they arrive, dropping from the sky like the murdered skydiver in last night's CSI: Miami.  Good news?  They land in water.  Bad news?  It's December water.  Also,  our well-intentioned loudmouth (Bob Hope, not your humble blogger) starts shouting so loud that General Washington immediately decides that they must be British spies.

More of Part 3, "A Ridiculous St Nick-ulous," in a few days.