Death Pool

Hey, we finally hit a quinella. Tom Snyder and Ingmar Bergman on the same day. Paid thirty to one! I bet it feels like the guy back in November, 1963 who had the C.S. Lewis/J. F. Kennedy quinella.

Dean Martin - Phyllis Diller

Johnny Cash - Sunday Morning Coming Down

Shakespeare at Mary Rippon

We went up to Boulder last Friday to stroll once more through the Economics Building and Hellems and a few others. Classics, it seems, is no longer in the Education building. Like Pacino in "Scent of a Woman", we are touring historical pleasures one last time before we put on our dress blues and end the suffering . It's all come full circle. A Midsummer's Night Dream was playing at the Mary Rippon outdoor amphitheatre and we took the chance to catch it. Very good production. This play means a lot since we were in a production of it at the Jewish Community Center back in summer of 1978, I think, after I graduated from GW. And, the year before that, I had gone up to Boulder for an Engineering School sales pitch. We saw "The Merchant of Venice" at Mary Rippon that August of 1977. We saw the news of Elvis's death on a TV in the dorm. I did love it up at CU. And it made sense to hang around eight years. It would never be that cheap to attend classes and the perceived opportunity cost was still close to zero.

Seinfeld-Kramer's Merv Griffin Set

The single funniest bit from the whole Seinfeld series.

Dean Martin Together Again Tour 1988 final performance

Dean Martin: The last 10 minutes of his career

"Come on, I don't want to miss 'The Rifleman'!" Priceless. Dino in early 1988 before he told Frank to stuff it and went back home. We saw him in Vegas in July, 1991--one of his last ever performances. The death of Dino, Jr. in 1987 was a tough one.

Sammy Davis Jr on the MD Telethon

I saw Sammy in Denver in the seventies at the Auditorium Theatre. He was, simply, The Best.

The Great Mistake--Lucy and Dino

Dino doing a guest spot on Lucy's TV show in the sixties. I have been looking for a this episode for years.

DEREK AND THE DOMINOES ON JOHNNY CASH SHOW

Johnny Cash-I Walk The Line

Dean Martin - Everybody Loves Somebody (1964)(Full length)

Dean Martin - 1977--Bad, Bad Leroy Brown

Dean Martin Interview - Wimbledon

tbd

Pater Noster: In Memoriam

Found a box of my dad's papers. He was a good man. Would that I had lived up to that standard.------

Remembrance of First Holy Communion

10 May 1936, St. Mary's Cathedral, Wichita, Kansas

Cathedral High School

This Certifies That

John Philip Guldaman

has sucessfully completed the courses of Study prescribed

for the High School Department and is therefore entitled to this

DIPLOMA

Given at Wichita, Kansas, this 25th day of May, 1947

HONORABLE DISCHARGE

from the National Guard of Kansas

PFC John P. Guldaman

137th Infantry Regiment

Kansas National Guard

Character: Excellent

DOB: 15 Nov 28; Separation date: 18 Jun 50

Louis Armstrong and Johnny Cash - Blue Yodel No. 9

Beautiful.

Cannon

Ah, what a joy to find this on YouTube. Love that theme music. I used to hum it in junior high. Cannon was my hero in that big old Continental Mark IV. Now, let's try and find Barnaby Jones!

Caligula-Nerva Commits Suicide

Back from the day when porn films had great casts, style and historical relevance.

Tetelestai

Don Juan DeMarco. Lovely film. Brando. Johnny Depp.

Jerry Lewis at Actors Studio part 2

Dean and Jerry from Colgate Comedy Hour

Performing "Two Lost Souls" from Damn Yankees!

La Classe Américaine -

Jimmy Stewart wasn't in Rio Bravo so what is the name of his movie?

Rio Bravo - My Rifle, My Pony And Me

Paved Paradise

"You don't know what you've got (or had) until it's gone
Paved paradise, put up a parking lot..."

Happy Independence Day. 070707 coming up. We are just waiting until someone comes and takes the house. We heard from a realtor that foreclosure was working its way through the system. All those commercials now for companies looking to rip-off people in the foreclosure black hole. Good luck with ours. LOL. Remember the movie STRIPES? Bill Murray, parking in front of the army recruiting office: "We're not parking it, officer, we're abandoning it!" Well, that's our house. We can't stand to even look at the mail. What's the point? Had 30K plus. Then nearly doubled it. Then lost the whole thing. So it goes. Tenth anniversary of our brother's suicide this summer. I wonder if that's the key? Twenty years with the City last fall. Like someone hanging on to playground rings, the grip eventually loosens and you let go. We've let go. But, maybe it was a long time ago that we let go. I don't know. The Manzanares thing fascinates me because, in some small way, I can relate. A DUI last summer in Vegas is hardly comparable to his public crucification. But, these things are relative. And we are always looking for rationalizations and last straws--loosing most of one's stake is a good one. Yet, we carry on. Velocity still not zero. Of course if it is approaching asymtopically, it only reaches zero as time approaches infinity. How long, though, can we sustain a minimal velocity before we just go ahead and expedite infinity? We enjoy this blog, especially the Dino clips from YouTube. I hope whoever else stumbles across this blogs enjoys those clips as well. Kris came over and we had a nice late third and early Fourth of July. She took a couple cute pictures of Kitty, whom my late brother called 'Ole Lady. It was his cat and I took it in since it was so hard to live on the streets and keep a cat. I wouldn't have thought of getting a pet had it not been for my brother. 'Ole Lady continues to be his noisy legacy. By the way, thanks George for linking to this little blog.

Dean Martin - Houston

Prius Hits 100

Perhaps it's easier to save the earth than it is to save one's own family or one's self for that matter. I had wondered whether the Prius could hit 100 mph or not. Never got around to pushing our Purchasing agency Prius that hard, or later, one from the motor pool. We once had some fun, though, with the old agency '89 Camry. Got that little four cylinder up to just under 100 mph in the Eisenhower Tunnel on the way to a summer purchasing association meeting in Vail. I kept my promise to Carmen to keep it under a hundred!

http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN0428148420070705?feedType=RSS&rpc=22&sp=true

Buckley on The Sopranos

Only William F. Buckley Jr. could work the word "onanistic" into a column on the final episode of The Sopranos. And it's spot on. Enjoy.

http://author.nationalreview.com/latest/?q=MjE0Ng

The Swimmer

We've just watched again a great but obscure movie, The Swimmer, starring Burt Lancaster. Made in 1968 from a John Cheever short story. Sad and gripping and faithful to Cheever's story. Well worth trying to find on netflix or cable.

(Copied from a web site): "The Swimmer has long been one of my "holy grail" titles, a rare gem that captures the essence of its time, as a powerful and compelling commentary on the decay of the American ideal, and of one man's odyssey of self-realization. Surrounded by the decadent aura of late-1960s upper-middle-class suburbia, Lancaster delivers a superb performance in this gripping character study."

Here's a link discussing the Cheever short story: http://www.salon.com/weekly/cheever960930.html



Another classic movie we've just watched for the first time is The Guns of Navarone from 1961. Peck, Niven, Quinn. Great special effects and locations. The prologue starts with a shot of the Parthenon in Athens similiar to one that we shot during our visit to Greece, now eleven years ago. And I was also watching a Frank Sinatra tape set that consisted of an edited Rat Pack show at the Sands around 1963 and a tape of Frank and Friends. The second tape, coincidentally, had a clip from a charity concert Frank did at the two thousand plus year old Herodes Atticus amphitheatre located at the base of the Acropolis in Athens. Hard to imagine Dino flying to Greece. How about: The Rat Pack at the Acropolis!

Post Mortem (literally)--Disgraced Former Denver City Attorney

What made this guy's career so distinguished in the first place? Sure, husband and friends. Was he a father? Maybe a step-father. But distinguished? Cole Finegan--that's distinguished. All that Harvard Law School graduate stuff. Came back to Denver and couldn't quite make partner, we suppose. Then just one of many career district court judges. And, then, he accepted the position of Denver City Attorney. Finally the fast track, huh? Is THIS supposed to be a great career move? It took months to find a sucker for that job. Herding those bunch of cats on the 11th and 12th floor. Accepting that job was the first clue that just maybe he wasn't all that distinguished. Here are some comments from a Rocky article that seem germane:

Why the "distiguished career" headlines. This judge just wasn't that great. He made no important rulings; he didn't help the poor, or work hard to change the docket. He sucked up to the silk stocking lawyers during hearings like he was looking for a job. He was a mid-level judge, at best, who could not even get motions resolved in a year. Thank goodness there is only one other Denver judge left that is so pompus and shallow - Mike Martinez.

Having spent time visiting a college roommate during his spell at Harvard's law school, Larry's travails are a sharp reminder of the exquisite arrogance and entitlement many of the law students displayed in their everyday lives. Although I wish Larry no harm, his arrogant bearing in and around the court house was a constant reminder of his alma mater; it is simply not believable he would condescend to interact with someone he didn't know in the parking lots adjacent to the City County Building -- he did so only with great difficulty in the confines of the courthouse. Please also consider the toxic effects of Harvard trained lawyers )and MBAs) throughout the economy and the polity. Sign me Denver Trial Lawyer.

And, from the Rocky on June 14:

Manzanares' name was linked to a case involving two stolen laptops in 2005, reports Jeff Kass.
When two state court computers were stolen in 2005, a now familiar name popped up: Larry Manzanares. Both of the stolen computers were taken in the month of July - one during the July Fourth weekend.
One was taken out of an unnamed judge's chambers, and the other was taken out of a locked storage area in Room 39 of the Denver City and County Building, the same area from which the laptop was probably taken this year.
"The (2005) thefts coincided with the process involved when transferring courtrooms," according to the affidavit. "In the reports documenting those two thefts, Lawrence Manzanares' name was identified as a judge who was either being moved or was having equipment installed."
The affidavit says the computers were never issued to Manzanares. It does not mention whether any other people were named in connection with their disappearance.
The Rocky's editorial says the indictment of Manzanares is an implicit rebuke of of the state court administrator's office which had attempted to quash the prosecution.

Perhaps this guy felt entitled to take the occasional laptop. We can all relate to that, can't we? Harvard grads are entitled. He did so much good; who's going to care? But that laughable story of buying the thing out of some guy's trunk. It took a healthy heap of arrogance combined with studipity to think that that dog would hunt. The truth. It's the cover-up that got him. He was nailed by one or more insiders for stealing the laptop. There are people out there who know the truth. Maybe one of those assistant city attorney cats that got passed over and was pissed off. All he did, really, was steal the equivalent of several (gross) pens. Felony theft. Big deal. Not something heinous, like getting caught in flagrante delecto in the Quiet Room! Or, raiding the break room refrigerators. Had he just confessed (mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa) then maybe, just maybe, he takes a bit of heat and Hick lets it blow over. And the City gets to keep its affirmative action City Attorney hire.

But that doesn't excuse the Rocky and the Jeffco DA for being way too over the top on this. Maybe because he was such an easy target. Or, maybe that Jeffco DA was another one like that guy in the Duke case. Who knows. And that one article quoting all the defense lawyers about how Manzanares was washed up even if found not guilty. I wonder how sweet that payback looks now after his suicide. I wonder what the suicide rate is for Harvard Law School Graduates? This one probably spiked it not a little bit. Not even to mention the suicide rate for former City and County employees.

Suicide is a tough topic. The only ones you hear about in the news are public figures, like Manzanares, or Vincent Foster. Otherwise, a gag order is in place, understandably. Families don't want that taboo publicized. But it also means that suicide is not thought about nearly enough. Review all the articles, comments, et cetera that preceeded the suicide and you'll not find one that worried about the possibility that Manzanares might check out and put the matter to rest permanently.

It's all speculation, of course. One reads that he took several trips with his wife. Get in a little pleasure before carrying out the plan? We can relate to that. We don't want to live with a DUI conviction from Vegas from last summer. We didn't have to let the DUI thing engulf us, but we did.

"There is only one truly important philosophical question, and that is the matter of suicide."---Camus