Upstarts Are On Their Way

Just when you thought Japan couldn't get any crazier, the hairdressers get in on the act! You'll Never Forget Japan's Tomato Hairdo

WHERE IS MY SNOW SHOVEL LEGO Spill Shuts Down Highway Lane In West Virginia

These reviews are insane. Amazon.com: Customer Reviews: Hutzler 571 Banana Slicer

More video strangeness:

Blocking Up The Scenery, Breaking My Mind

A few signs I've seen around that I thought were, to say the least, interesting.

Here's the name of a road that runs a couple miles away from the new place, and its photograph for proof.

What waters? We're in the desert.

You read that right. Sandune. Not sand dune. It's like it goes by the spelling rules of 50's marketing, as in 'drive-thru' or 'tonite'.

Heh. Drive-thru Sandune tonite!

Here's a good double take for you. This was taken on Murray Avenue in Squirrel Hill, in front of a gas station.

What if I wasn't using it in the first place?

The intent is to prevent people walking along the road from cutting through the gas station and possibly getting run over. At least that's my guess.

Then there's this one from the South Side.

Yinz guys stop litterin' n'at. 

Am I the only one who finds official city signage that uses a regional expression (for cleaning, for those of you from other states) very amusing?

Here's one that's pretty straightforward.

Confusing US presidents since 1948

Well, except for the fact that it begs the question: what the hell is a prothonotary?

Better Strap On My Guitar, Gotta Be A Big Rock Star

Apparently this is a thing.

Yes, that is Donnie Iris and The Cruisers playing The Black Keys' 'Your Touch'. It's not the first time our boy from Elwood City has done a cover song, though.

On 1982's The High and The Mighty Donnie and the boys covered the British Invasion classic 'Glad All Over', originally by The Dave Clark Five. Interestingly, during The Beatles' first run of number one singles, only Dave and company were able to knock them out of that spot. Donnie and company didn't do quite so well on the charts with the song, but they did a good job on it regardless. Check it out:

More recently, on 2006's  Ellwood City, Donnie and crew decided to cover the Sam & Dave soul classic 'Soul Man'. The arrangement rocks, unbelievably so. It's really damn good; but I can't find the album version on YouTube. This horrible-quality live version will have to do. 

And you thought Donnie was just Pittsburgh's token rock star. 

And A Couple Of Paintings From Sears

I recently moved into a new townhouse with my sister's fiance, and we've been here about two weeks. We're settling in pretty well, but I've mainly been troubled that the walls are still so bare. It doesn't feel like we live here yet.

I attempted to rectify that tonight.

I hope Jake doesn't mind.

Now that feels more like home.

The Overground Will Pull You Down

And Sunday Makes A Good Wife

I've always felt that the phrase 'husband-&-wife team' was redundant.

All The Lonely Feelings And The Burning Memories

I've been watching a few episodes of the first season of M*A*S*H, and I was reminded of a character I'd forgotten about. There was a fourth surgeon who shared the 'Swamp' with Hawkeye, Trapper, and Burns. This guy's name was, apparently, 'Spearchucker' Jones.

"I swear, if you're not talking about my Hail Mary pass...."
Actor and football player Timothy Brown as the good doctor. 

According to Wikipedia the character's full name is Dr. Oliver Harmon 'Spearchucker' Jones. But I am still surprised that a character could be given a somewhat racially offensive nickname on network television, even in the early 1970's. I kinda wondered if the character had been dropped for that reason; but also according to Wikipedia the writers dropped the character because they felt there wasn't room to develop him, with Trapper and Hawkeye being the focus, and also being told that no actual MASH surgeons in Korea were black. 

So where did that nickname come from? Turns out it was in the 1970 MASH movie, which in turn brought it from the original novel. The character of 'Spearchucker' Jones was a surgeon and former football player brought in by the 4077th to play as a ringer in a football game against a rival MASH unit. And yes, the nickname does, at least partially refer to his skill with the passing game. 

"We're not surgeons, we just play them on TV."
Also actor and also football player Fred Williamson, right; Donald Sutherland, left.. 

This would explain why actors and former football stars Fred Williamson and Timothy Brown were tapped to play the character in the movie and TV series, respectively. While such a game never happens in the first season, there is at least one scene in the first episode showing Jones tossing a football with another member of the unit. It seems like a reference to the source material. 

Of course, MASH wasn't the only war movie that Donald Sutherland appeared in during 1970. The other was the combat/caper movie Kelly's Heroes, with Clint Eastwood, Telly Savalas, Don Rickles, and Sutherland playing an anachronistic proto-hippie tank driver named Oddball. 

"To a Pittsburgher like you, a hoagie is some type of...wait, where are you from again?"
Sutherland as Oddball.

Honestly, this bizarre role was much better suited to Sutherland's efforts than his part as Hawkeye Pierce, in my opinion. To me, Alan Alda is Hawkeye and Donald Sutherland is Oddball. Incidentally, that Sherman he drives, as well as the German Tigers that appear are the real deal and a very well-done mock-up, respectively. Since the movie was made in Yugoslavia, the producers had access to genuine Shermans held in reserve by the Yugoslav army, as well as a replica of a Tiger made for a government-sponsored movie about World War II.

Of course, Kelly's Heroes wasn't the only WWII movie made in 1970 that was full of armored action. George C. Scott delivered a masterful performance as Ol' Blood And Guts himself, General George S. Patton in the classic Patton. However, armored accuracy was another story. While Kelly's Heroes was able to present accurate fighting vehicles, Patton, filmed in Spain, went with what was on hand.

"George, it's not fair, using tanks that haven't been designed yet. You've got an unsporting advantage. Not that the fact seems to bother you much."

The armor used to portray American and British tanks in the movie were M24 Chaffee light tanks, while for the German armor, the larger, heavier, and more ironically-named in this instance M47 Patton tanks, both used by the Spanish army, were thinly veiled for the purposes of the movie.

"HA HA HA! VE HAFF GESCHTOLEN EIN PANZERS FROM ZE FUTURE SIEG HEIL!"

Of course, I've run out of war movies from 1970. 

We Go Down With The Dew In The Morning

No, not in combination. Surely they had iPods by the time the lightsaber was invented. Star Wars and Vinyl Records: Evidence That Technology Will Not Save Us

Well, more of a hippie, really, but close enough. Unexpected Hipster #8 - Oddball (Donald Sutherland) - Kelly's Heroes

Some very good advice. How To Avoid Graduating College Summa Cum Debt

A day in the life of a Canadian grain elevator. Grain Elevator by Charles Konowal

I'm Making Records, My Fans They Can't Wait

It's been a few weeks, and I'm updating this post to my current vinyl wants. Self-titled works in caps.

The Messenger - Johnny Marr
Untamed Beast - Sallie Ford & The Sound Outside
Give You The Ghost - Poliça

DJANGO DJANGO

Parrot Flies - Algernon Cadwallader

Up From Below - Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros

Push The Sky Away - Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

Psychedelic Pill - Neil Young & Crazy Horse

Tempest - Bob Dylan

Wrecking Ball - Bruce Springsteen

Port Of Morrow - The Shins

I did get Wild Flag's debut and I Bet On Sky by Dinosaur Jr. and both discs are phenomenal. Hopefully a VLP will be forthcoming so I can review them for you. I'm also waiting on Cobra Juicy, the new disc from Black Moth Super Rainbow and the Yeah Yeah Yeah's' Mosquito. Sadly, there seems to be no chance left to pick up BMSR's Dandelion Gum on vinyl, unless one comes up on eBay for a reasonable price.

UPDATE: I'm also looking for the Foo Fighters'  Wasting Light and The Replacements' Songs For Slim EP. Songs For Slim is on red vinyl, too, I've been told. I'm a sucker for colored vinyl. 

The Corners Are Glowing

...more lost than M.C. Escher in Intro Geometry.

Would you believe that someone at Current Employer today thought that M.C.  Escher was a rapper?

Kids these days.