Quips and Quotations (Go Lightly and Carry a Big Jackhammer Edition)

 

 

Everybody has to feel superior to somebody[...] but it's customary to present a little proof before you take the privilege.

--Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany's

 

Navel Maneuvers

 

Remember these two? 

Of course, there was another man in her life...

...and I ain't talkin' Greg Allman!

Bob Mackie, Fashion Designer 1939-2026

Quips and Quotations (A Whiz of a Ms if Ever a Ms There Was Edition)

 

1934-2026

The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.

None of us can be liberated if other groups are not.

--Gloria Steinem

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vital Viewing (What a Way to Make a Living Edition)

 

1946-2026

 Dolly Parton explains the above look and more to the last person you'd think would be interviewing Dolly Parton (but he's welcome to nonetheless), 60 Minutes' Morely Safer:

Yes, it's true, during her long career Dolly was never afraid to show a bit of...

Get it?

While I'm sure Dolly got a nice check for putting her name on that product, the in-some-ways secret of her success was her musical artistry, a musical artistry that ultimately transcended the self-professed silliness. Here are two of my favorite examples:

I'm not sure which is closer to the stratosphere, Dolly's wig or Porter Waggoner's pompadour.

Finally, though Dolly insisted she patterned her look after the town tramp, some in the LGBTQ community can be excused for wondering if she got her inspiration elsewhere:

She didn't seem to mind the comparison.

 

Wings of Desire

Oh, don't look so surprised. Of course, he's an angel. After all, he has a...

...Harp.

 

Graphic Grandeur (H2OMG Edition)

 

The problem.

The solution?

Cartoon by Jeremy Banx

 

 

 

Quips and Quotations (How the Other Half Lives Edition)

 

And so, in the summer of 1885, Sitting Bull joined Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, traveling throughout the United States and into Canada. He drew tremendous crowds. Boos and catcalls sometimes sounded for the “Killer of Custer,” but after each show these same people pressed coins upon him for copies of his signed photograph. Sitting Bull gave most of the money away to the band of ragged, hungry boys who seemed to surround him wherever he went. He once told Annie Oakley, another one of the Wild West Show’s stars, that he could not understand how white men could be so unmindful of their own poor. “The white man knows how to make everything,” he said, “but he does not know how to distribute it.”

--Dee Brown, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee

Frame and Fortune

 

"You shall not crucify mankind on a cross of gold!"

As it turned out, the nails were needed elsewhere.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Vital Viewing (Miracle Whipped Edition)

 

Oh, Gawd, there's ol' Sigmund again, trying to bore the hell out of us. Well, I'm not going to let him. You want wish fulfillment? I'll give you wish fulfillment:

If I remember the rest of the story correctly, the prince asks Cinderella to try on the slipper and that's how he knows she's the one he danced with the night before (you'd think he'd be able to tell just by looking at her face, but, who knows, he could have been boozing it up at that ball and so his memory's kind of fuzzy.) The both of them reportedly lived happily ever after. 

However, it's the unintended consequences of a wish fulfilled that we see in this next video:

To be on the safe side, make sure that fulfilled wish comes with a warranty.

Pat Oliphant 1935-2026

(Here's another post I did on Oliphant--Kirk)

Paris Is Burning

 

Looking for something to blog about, I checked to see if there were any holidays/observances today. I found two.

 In France, it's Bastille Day.

And the other holiday/observance?

Let's hear it for liberation--in whatever form it takes.

 

Quips and Quotations (Fernwood Femme Fatale Edition)

 

1939-2026

...Louise Lasser's Mary Hartman was lethally funny. She was the mirror image of a stretched-beyond-reason reality, to help the viewer see what the media and consumer culture was turning us into.

--Norman Lear

(I wrote about Lasser here--Kirk)

Heat Retreat

 

Today is World Refrigeration Day...

...so just chill.

Signing Off

 

The show about nothing.

The war about nothing.

Wrap party

Smart Art (Chlorine Clarion Edition)

 

A Bigger Splash (1967)

I instinctively knew I was going to like it and as I flew over San Bernardino and saw the swimming pools and the houses and everything and the sun, I was more thrilled than I have ever been in arriving in any city.

--British expatriate artist David Hockney, on the many sun-drenched paintings, particularly those of swimming pools, that he produced while living on the West Coast.

1937-2026

 

 

True Colors Pride

Cyndi Lauper, honored by Outright International this past June 1 for her longstanding support for the LGBTQ community, yuks it up with transgender actress Laverne Cox, who emceed the event. Further evidence, as if any was needed, that girls, whether they were assigned as such at birth or not, just want to have fun.

Graphic Grandeur (Postmarks and Toothmarks Edition)

I once dreamed of living in LA. I also once took a United States Postal Service exam. The latter wasn't a dream, just what was in those pre-internet days a practical goal of job security and a good pension. I got 60%, enough to pass the exam but it didn't put me high on the list, so I was never hired. Actually, I'm surprised I got that good a score, as a portion of the test required memorizing addresses. I can barely remember my own! Anyway, had I gotten a job as a mailman, it would have been in Cleveland, not Los Angeles, and that may have been a good thing if the above chart is any indication, as it would have meant 40 less chances of getting bit. Finally, I ask that you not judge canine mailman-phobia too harshly. According to cartoonist Gary Larson, it may someday be our only hope:

Quips and Quotations (Say You, Say Me Edition)

 

Those of us who shout the loudest about Americanism in making character assassinations are all too frequently those who, by our own words and acts, ignore some of the basic principles of Americanism:

            The right to criticize;

            The right to hold unpopular beliefs;

            The right to protest;

            The right of independent thought.

The exercise of these rights should not cost one single American citizen his reputation or his right to a livelihood nor should he be in danger of losing his reputation or livelihood merely because he happens to know someone who holds unpopular beliefs.  Who of us doesn’t?  Otherwise none of us could call our souls our own.  Otherwise thought control would have set in.

--Senator Margaret Chase Smith (R-ME), "Declaration of Conscience" speech, 6/01/1950

Vital Viewing (Sultry Subtlety Edition)

 

Lusciously low-key song stylist Peggy Lee was born on this day in 1920 (she died in 2002.) She sits down with Johnny Carson in this 1977 clip:

 

Peggy comes across as very likable in her chat with Johnny, and that trait is fine in conversation. However, when she does the thing she does best, it's not likeability so much that I want from Peggy Lee as a certain moodiness:

She runs from hot to cold. How's that for a mood swing?

 

 

Quips and Quotations (Served with Distinction Edition)

 

1940-2026

I'm used to being in the minority. I'm a left-handed gay Jew. I've never felt, automatically, a member of any majority.

--Barney Frank, 16-term congressman from Massachusetts. 

This Day in History

 

On May 19, 1536, Anne Boleyn got her head lopped off over trumped-up (no pun intended) accusations of treason, adultery, and incest, though of course the real reason had to do with her inability to provide King Henry VIII with a male heir to the throne (a female heir considered too scary a proposition.) Such was the problem of trying to ensure an orderly transfer of power back in the day. You know, I sometimes get frustrated with democracy. After all, there's been some huge blunders committed on Election Day, but all it is I have to do is look at a picture like the one above reminding me what we're trying to avoid that restores my faith in popular sovereignty.

Oh, and another thing is we've totally gotten over our fear of a female succeeding a male as head of state.

Um...er...hmm...Well, at least they kept their heads. 

Graphic Grandeur (Weighing the Evidence Edition)

 

Meanwhile at the Justice Department:

 

Cartoon by Mike Luckovich

Voices Carry

 

Just who do Mel Blanc and Arthur Q. Bryan think they are?

This should answer your qwestion, heh-heh-heh-heh-heh.