The Enduring Love of Blondie and Dagwood

Dagwood and Blondie (née Boopadoop) Bumstead are celebrating 81 years of marital bliss (the anniversary date is Feb 17, 1933).

"Blondie" remains among the longest-running  newspaper comics of all time at 80+ years and counting.

Creator, Chic Young (January 1901 – March 1973) explained in an interview (1960s) with writer William Zinnser why "Blondie" possessed such staying power:

“It’s simple. I keep Dagwood in a world that people are used to. He never does anything as special as playing golf, and the people who come to the door are just the people an average family has to deal with. The only regular neighbors are Herb and Tootsie Woodley. If a new neighbor came over with his problem, nobody would be interested.” (After Chic Young's death, his son Dean Young kept the comic strip going along with various illustrators.)

Dagwood Bumstead renounced family wealth and status (his father was a railroad baron) to marry the sassy working-class blond who makes incredible sandwiches. Since his family objected to the marriage, Dagwood settled for an ordinary life of working for J.C. Dithers & Company and running into the
mailman as he scrambled, late, out the door for work.
And Blondie's big sandwiches.

Visit Blondie's blog.

Blondie, The Bumstead Family History (Thomas Nelson, 2007)  "The lives of Blondie and Dagwood and their interactions with their children Alexander and Cookie, their neighbors Herb and Tootsie Woodley, the family dog Daisy, Dagwood's boss Mr. Dithers, the mailman Mr. Beasley, and the neighborhood kid Elmo Tuttle. Included are Blondie and Dagwood's courtship, their early beaus, their wedding, Dagwood at work, Blondie's catering business."

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Tony Rooke Took on the BBC for False Reporting on 9/11, and Won

By Wendy Murray

Tony Rooke after winning his case
regarding false reporting of WTC7

A year ago this month, British citizen Tony Rooke stood before Horsham Magistrates’ Court in West Sussex, charged with not paying for his needed license to access the BBC.

The then-49 year-old Rooke refused to pay his required TV license because he believed the BBC covered up facts about the 9/11 terrorist attacks. He said that paying his bill would be tantamount to supporting "the practice of terror." In that hearing he was found guilty of using an unlicensed television set and given a six-month conditional discharge and ordered to pay £200.

A few months later, in April 2013, he represented himself in court. He did not deny owning a TV and watching it without a license. He cited the Terrorism Act, Section 15 of the 2000 Act, as his reason for withholding payment. The Terrorism Act states that it is an offense for someone "to invite another to provide money, intending that it should be used, or having reasonable cause to suspect that it may be used, for terrorism purposes."

In court Rooke made the case that to pay funds to the BBC was tantamount to furthering the purposes of terrorism and "I have incontrovertible evidence to this effect. I do not use this word lightly given where I am," he said.

Rooke cited that during the attacks of September 11, 2001 the BBC reported that World Trade Centre 7 had fallen, when, in fact it still stood erect and intact over the shoulder of the reporter reporting it. The news story occurred 20 minutes before building actually collapsed. (The

screen capture, right, shows a BBC reporter announcing the collapse of WTC7, even while it stood erect behind her; it collapsed 20 minutes later).

He said to the court: "The BBC reported it 20 minutes before it fell. They knew about it beforehand. Last time I was here I asked you (the judge): 'Were you aware of World Trade Centre 7?'" (WTC 7 was a 47-story skyscraper that was not hit by a plane on 9/11 but imploded at free-fall speed later that day.) "You said you had heard of it. Ten years later you should have more than heard of it. It's the BBC's job to inform the public. Especially of miracles of science and when laws of physics become suspended."

Rooke argued that since the BBC had prior knowledge that the building was doomed and did not warn Americans about it, it made them complicit in the attack.

The judge ruled that he while "did not believe he had the power to rule under the terrorism act," he agreed that Rooke had a reasonable case and thus found him not guilty.  He was not fined for failure to pay the licensing fee.

BBC editors assert the reporting was a mistake but that they "no longer have the original tapes of our 9/11 coverage for reasons of cock-up, not conspiracy."

Best of the Week, Feb 10 to 15

Alexander Solzhenitsyn Warns the West of Its Tilt Toward Totalitarianism

 . . . "A decline in courage may be the most striking feature which an outside observer notices in the West in our days."

Bob Dylan's Changing Times
" . . . he could be seen as the prophetic figure who presaged the era of upheaval the Beatles and so many others represented, most notably, Dylan himself."

John Lennon: Don't Let Me Down
" . . . Written as an anguished love song to Yoko Ono."

Bob Dylan's Changing Times

The Beatles are not the only ones making history 50 years ago this week. On this day, Feb 10, 1964  Bob Dylan released his classic   "The Times They Are a-Changin,"  on his 3rd album (Columbia Records). Perhaps he could be seen as the prophetic figure who presaged the era of upheaval the Beatles and so many others represented, most notably, Dylan himself. 

 

The line it is drawn 

The curse it is cast 
The slow one now 
Will later be fast 
As the present now 
Will later be past 
The order is 
Rapidly fadin' 
And the first one now 
Will later be last 
For the times they are a-changin'.

See John Lennon's Don't Let Me Down.
See George Harrison's Let It Roll

George Harrison: Let It Roll

Let It Roll (Ballad Of Sir Frankie Crisp)
George Harrison

From Wiki:

Harrison wrote the song as a tribute to Frank Crisp, a nineteenth-century lawyer and the original owner of Friar Park – the Victorian Gothic residence in Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire, that Harrison purchased in early 1970. Commentators have described the song as a cinematic journey through the grand house and grounds of the estate. Crisp's eccentric homilies, which the former Beatle discovered inscribed inside the house and around the property, inspired subsequent compositions of Harrison's, including "Ding Dong, Ding Dong" and "The Answer's at the End". Together with the Friar Park-shot album cover for All Things Must Pass, "Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp" established an association between Harrison and his Henley estate that has continued since his death in November 2001.

See more

John Lennon: Don't Let Me Down

Don't Let Me Down
John Lennon

(From Wiki:)

"Written as an anguished love song to Yoko Ono, Paul McCartney interpreted it as a "genuine plea", with Lennon saying to Ono, 'I'm really stepping out of line on this one. I'm really just letting my vulnerability be seen, so you must not let me down.' "

See more

Best of the Week, Feb 3 - 7

Remembering the Roles That Made Me Love Him: Philip Seymour Hoffman
. . . "It's as if Perry and I grew up in the same house. And one day he stood up and went out the back door, while I went out the front."

Sherlocked 
. . . . Sherlock is a self-described “high functioning sociopath” with regular spontaneous digressions into his "mind palace," the place in his head where he processes a dizzying combination of multiple possible logical deductions. We all must simply let him go there and wait until the hard drive exhausts the unyielding process. At that point Sherlock arises wide-eyed and euphoric . . .

The Beatles Let Us Be
. . . When you've got that much talent and genius coming together in conjunction with their human side:  John's neediness, Paul's effervescence, George's mysticism and Ringo flamboyance; it is bound to trigger something. . .




See Thoughts on Addiction.

The Beatles Let Us Be

By Wendy Murray

This weekend marks the 50th anniversary of the arrival of the Beatles on American soil. On that Sunday night the universe tilted. They took the stage on the Ed Sullivan Show and gave us "All My Loving," which at the time was passionately reciprocated and still is.

In a way that is impossible to track definitively this band defined a generation -- the baby boomers -- who came of age with Ringo, Paul, George and John harmonizing in the background. As The Beatles grew up, we grew up. When they dissolved, a corner of the heart of an entire generation dissolved too. They gave expression to our times during an age in transition and in turmoil, though they began as mere sheepish lads from a working-class town named Liverpool.

The sheer force of the "whole" took everyone by surprise, including its respective parts, the boys didn't know what hit them. (George Harrison would write about it in his song, "Wah Wah": Bein' there at the right time, cheaper than a dime.) Does anyone remember the indignation aroused when they shockingly claimed aloud they "Want to Hold Your Hand"? Only a few years later we see the image of a naked John Lennon tangled in bed sheets and curled in a fetal position in the arms of Yoko Ono.

In the end there was no place else for them to go but into inevitable chaos. When you've got that much talent and genius coming together in conjunction with their human side:  John's neediness, Paul's effervescence, George's mysticism and Ringo flamboyance; it is bound to trigger something. To borrow the phrasing of Chesterton, they came together from four directions at the top of their energy; all burning, all at once and all thoroughly. It generated the perfect storm: the ship rose, pitched, banked then blew. Since then, we simply have had to let it be. They taught us that, too.

~    ~    ~

 Let It Be: the song written and performed by Paul McCartney; the album and the film with the same name were released on 8 May 1970; the Beatles had already broken up by that time. 

 ~   ~   ~

The Beatles' last live concert: On a rooftop 30 January 1969 in London on the roof of the Apple building (The Beatles' record company).  It was a cold day with a bitter wind blowing. To cope with the weather John Lennon borrowed Yoko's fur coat and Ringo wore his wife Maureen Starkey's red coat. The concert lasted for 45 minutes  before the police intervened and literally pulled the plug, ending an era.

"We were playing virtually to nothing -- to the sky, which was quite nice." 

--Paul McCartney

Sherlocked

The love is in their faces

By Wendy Murray

[SPOILERS]
The long-awaited Season 3 of Masterpiece Mystery's  Sherlock has come and gone with the fleetness of its hero. We were riveted, in the back of our minds, during the two-year hiatus after Season 2 ended with Sherlock's suicide-by-flying-leap off a rooftop. His arch-nemesis James Moriarty made him do it, mocking and one-upping him mercilessly, taunting Sherlock that all his friends would be executed if the waiting gunmen, lasers already fixed on various foreheads, did not see Sherlock jump. Moriarty laughed and mocked some more, then put a gun to his head and met his demise (so it seemed) with a self-inflicted shot. So Sherlock jumped. His devoted sidekick, Dr. John Watson, watched from below and collapsed seeing his friend dead on the ground. (Sherlock and Watson are rendered in consummate performances by Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman.)

Then, in the episode's final scene, we were moved and devastated with John Watson as he was grieving at Sherlock's grave. But wait. There is Sherlock himself watching from a distance in the shadows, head tilted in the singular way, his narrow eyes glancing around, while we (the viewing audience) -- now, ecstatic -- are horrified that he would leave poor John bereft!

Welcome to our world -- the exhilerating, riveting, shocking, stunning, complicated, logical, horrible, hilarious non-stop world of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes in the 21st century.

The dismay of Season 2 was indeed resolved in the opening episode of Season 3. The new stretch of the (only!) three-episode season began with John's shock at Sherlock's reappearance, now two years later. Their first exchange finds Sherlock explaining to John that while on the roof with Moriarity that time, he had to work-through deductively 13 possible escape scenarios that would give the impression he had in fact died while simultaneously actually cheating death (and Moriarity). John is not impressed. He wants to smack him, and does.

On it goes -- Sherlock ever configuring logical deductions while Watson, at once awed and appalled, sometimes can respond only, "Sherlock, shut up."

Sherlock is a self-described “high functioning sociopath” with regular spontaneous digressions -- hands to temples and elbows splayed -- into his "mind palace," the place in his head where he processes a dizzying combination of multiple possible logical deductions. We all must simply let him go there and wait until the hard drive exhausts the unyielding process. At that point Sherlock arises wide-eyed and euphoric seeing the now obvious logical explanation.

"Of course!"

On his first meeting with Watson, Sherlock's mind palace rendered total insight into the man whom he had known less than five minutes:

Your haircut, the way you hold yourself, says military. But your conversation as you entered the room said trained at Bart's, so army doctor. Obvious. Your face is tanned, but no tan above the wrists: you've been abroad but not sunbathing. The limp's really bad when you walk, but you don't ask for a chair when you stand, like you've forgotten about it, so it's at least partly psychosomatic. That says the original circumstances of the injury were probably traumatic: wounded in action, then. Wounded in action, suntan: Afghanistan or Iraq. You've got a psychosomatic limp. Of course you've got a therapist. Then there's your brother. Your phone—it's expensive, email enabled, MP3 player. But you're looking for a flat-share. You wouldn't waste money on this. It's a gift, then. Scratches—not one, many over time. It's been in the same pocket as keys and coins. The man sitting next to me [John] wouldn't treat his one luxury item like this, so it's had a previous owner. The next bit's easy, you know it already. [The phone is engraved "Harry Watson — from Clara xxx"] Harry Watson: clearly a family member who's given you his old phone. Not your father, this is a young man's gadget. Could be a cousin, but you're a war hero who can't find a place to live. Unlikely you've got an extended family, certainly not one you're close to, so brother it is. Now, Clara: who's Clara? Three kisses [xxx] says a romantic attachment. Expensive phone says wife, not girlfriend. Must've given it to him recently; this model's only six months old. Marriage in trouble, then—six months on, and already he's giving it away? If she'd left him, he would've kept it. People do, --sentiment. But no, he wanted rid of it—he left her. He gave the phone to you. That says he wants you to stay in touch. You're looking for cheap accommodation and you're not going to your brother for help? That says you've got problems with him. Maybe you liked his wife. Maybe you don't like his drinking. [Drinking?] Power connection: tiny little scuff marks around the edge. Every night he goes to plug it in and charge but his hands are shaky. You never see those marks on a sober man's phone, never see a drunk's without them. There you go, you see? You were right. The police don't consult amateurs.

Season 3 saw Sherlock stumble into new territory: the human realm.
It first showed itself when he was called upon to

Sherlock thanking Molly for a
particular kind of help

be the Best Man at John's wedding, which meant -- as Molly Hooper put it (Sherlock's lovelorn endearing pathologist): "He'll have to make a speech in front of people. There will be actual people there actually listening."

It gets worse, but endearingly. He betrays a degree--if restrained-- of emotion during the best man's toast. Somehow supporting his best friend at this fine hour has changed Sherlock. He came out of complicated universe inside his head to think about John. More, he raised a glass to John in front of actual people who are actually listening:

. . . I am the most unpleasant, rude, ignorant and all-round obnoxious arsehole that anyone could possibly have the misfortune to meet. I am dismissive of the virtuous [he looks at the priest.], unaware of the beautiful [he looks at the maid of honor], and uncomprehending in the face of the happy [he looks at Watson and Mary]. So if I didn't understand that I was being asked to be best man, it is because I never expected to be anybody's best friend. And certainly not the best friend of the bravest and kindest and wisest human being I have ever had the good fortune of knowing. 

John, I am a ridiculous man [John agrees], redeemed only by the warmth and constancy of your friendship. But, as I am apparently your best friend, I cannot congratulate you on your choice of companion. Actually, now I can. [To Mary] Mary, when I say you deserve this man, it is the highest compliment of which I am capable. 

John, you have endured war and injury and tragic loss - so sorry again about that last one [the roof bit] - so know this; today you sit between the woman you have made your wife and the man you have saved. In short, the two people who love you most in all this world. And I know I speak for Mary as well when I say we will never let you down and we have a lifetime ahead to prove that.

So he's human after all. This fact becomes more stark and hauntingly real in the remaining episodes of Season 3 -- another twist we didn't see coming. That is the way it is in the ever-evolving, always-expanding, brilliant, exasperating, thrilling, crushing, addicting world of Sherlock.

Season 4 can't come too soon.

    

Remembing the Roles of Philip Seymour Hoffman

by Wendy Murray

I remember Philip Seymour Hoffman in the roles that made me love him:

As Lester Bangs, in Almost Famous

"You CANNOT make friends with the rock stars. That's what's important. If you're a rock journalist - first, you will never get paid much. But you will get free records from the record company. And they'll buy you drinks, you'll meet girls, they'll try to fly you places for free, offer you drugs... I know. It sounds great. But they are not your friends. These are people who want you to write sanctimonious stories about the genius of the rock stars, and they will ruin rock and roll and strangle everything we love about it." 

~   ~   ~

  The Savages (with Laura Linney, 2007)

"Dad's not the one that has a problem with the Valley View. There's nothing wrong with Dad's situation. Dad's situation is fine. He's never gonna adjust to it if we keep yanking him outta there. And, actually, this upward mobility fixation of yours, it's counterproductive and, frankly, pretty selfish. Because it's not about Dad, it's about you and your guilt. That's what these places prey upon."

~   ~   ~

Capote (with Catherine Keener, 2005)

"It's as if Perry and I grew up in the same house. And one day he stood up and went out the back door, while I went out the front." 

~  ~  ~

The Master (with Joaquin Phoenix, 2012)

"Free winds and no tyranny for you, Freddie, sailor of the seas. You pay no rent, free to go where you please. Then go, go to that landless latitude and good luck. If you figure a way to live without serving a master, any master, then let the rest of us know, will you? For you'd be the first in the history of the world."

Read my reflections on addiction.