Thursday, August 3, 2023

God gives the nuts, but he does not crack them.

Today is National Grab Some Nuts Day.


I don't believe this able to be celebrated in all 50 states, (especially Florida and Texas.)

How you celebrate is between you and your god.


August 3, 1926 -
To me, life is a gift, and it's a blessing to just be alive. And each person should learn what a gift it is to be alive no matter how tough things get.


Anthony Dominick Benedetto, last of the great saloon singers was born on this date.







The world is obviously a little less bright now that we've lost Tony


August 3, 1929 -
Four famous vaudevillian performers took a chance on the new medium of 'talking pictures' with the general release of the film, The Cocoanuts, starring the Four Marx Brothers --


Chico, Groucho, Harpo and Zeppo, on this date,.



The film has the first use of the overhead camera shot (from the roof of the sound stage looking down at the dancers forming kaleidoscopic patterns.)  The technique is usually credited to Busby Berkeley, the Broadway dance director whom Samuel Goldwyn brought to Hollywood to stage numbers for Eddie Cantor comedies. But a year before Busby's appearance on the scene in Whoopee!, the overhead shot is seen in The Cocoanuts.


August 3, 1941 -
Martha Kostyra, business magnate, television host, author, magazine publisher and ex-con was born on this date.



Remember folks, please don't piss off Martha - she's a woman of a certain age, who raises her own poultry, hold her hard liquor, hangs out with rappers, and has her own line of CBD products.


August 3, 1963 -
Allan Sherman released Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah (A Letter from Camp), in the US on this date.



Sherman was a writer on The Steve Allen Show and created the game show I've Got a Secret. He went on to record comedy albums. The song won a 1964 Grammy Award for comedy.

And somehow in the same universe, The Beach BoysSurfer Girl was released on this date as well. (This is the first song Brian Wilson ever wrote and the first one he produced.)



Ah, sweet mysteries of life. (The B-side of the single was Little Deuce Coupe.)


August 3, 1970 -
Shelved for two years after a disastrous test screening at which audiences yelled at the screen and walked out of the theater, Warner Brothers finally released Performance, directed by Donald Cammell, and Nicolas Roeg, and starring James Fox, Mick Jagger, Anita Pallenberg, and Michèle Breton, on this date in New York City. (Bunkies, please check with your folks before you click on the link above, the film contains nekked people engaging in adult behaviour.)



Donald Cammell and Nicolas Roeg (mainly responsible for the 'look' of the film) also benefited from a lack of interference from Warner Bros. studio executives, who believed they were getting a Rolling Stones equivalent of A Hard Day's Night (1964). Instead, they delivered a dark, experimental film which included graphic depictions of violence, sex and drug use.


August 3, 1973 -
Stevie Wonder released his 16th studio album Innervisions, on this date. Wonder played nearly all instruments on six of the album's nine tracks.



Three days after the album's release, Wonder was in a terrible car accident and lay in a coma for four days before his friend and tour director Ira Tucker was able to get a response from him: "I got right down in his ear and sang 'Higher Ground'. His hand was resting on my arm and after a while his fingers started going in time with the song. I said yeah, yeah!! This dude is going to make it!"


August 3, 1979 -
The Talking Heads release their third album, Fear of Music, on this date.



The album, produced by Brian Eno, was recorded in Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth's New York City loft where the band often rehearsed. They parked a mobile recording unit outside to record the tracks as they played from the loft.


August 3, 1985 -
Tears For Fears found themselves again on the Billboard charts when Shout hit No.1 on this date, (Everybody Wants To Rule The World was their first hit.)



This was written by Tears For Fears frontman Roland Orzabal and keyboard player Ian Stanley. In the liner notes to the single, Orzabal explained: "The song was written in my front room on just a small synthesizer and a drum machine. Initially I only had the chorus, which was very repetitive, like a mantra. I played it to Ian Stanley, our keyboardist, and Chris Hughes, the producer. I saw it as a good album track, but they were convinced it would be a hit around the world."


August 3, 1991
Pearl Jam plays the club RKCNDY in Seattle on this date. The show is filmed and used to create their first video for the song Alive. The audio from the show was used in the video, as the band hated the idea of lip-synching.



The music for this song was written by guitarist Stone Gossard before the band had a lead singer. It was part of a three-song instrumental demo they made at London Bridge Studio in Seattle while looking for a vocalist and drummer. Jack Irons, a friend of Gossard's who played drums in The Red Hot Chili Peppers, was approached about joining the band, but he had another commitment. He thought Eddie Vedder might be a good fit as the singer, so he gave Eddie the demo tape. At home in San Diego, Vedder wrote lyrics and added his vocals to the song using his four-track recorder. The band liked what they heard and made him lead singer.


August 3, 1996 -
The Macarena by Los Del Rio appeared at #1 on the pop charts on this date. (For God sake, please don't listen. Save yourself from the ensuing madness.)



This was originally released on a local label in Spain in 1993, where it did fairly well. The next year, the American label BMG bought the Spanish label and set out to make Macarena a hit in America. They marketed an English language version to dance clubs and cruise ships, then released it as a single in 1995. It was a minor hit until the summer of 1996, when the Macarena dance craze hit America.


August 3, 2001 -
Disney's surprise comedy hit, The Princess Diaries, directed by Gary Marshall and starring Julie Andrews, Héctor Elizondo, and introducing Anne Hathaway, went into general release in the US on this date.



During her audition, Anne Hathaway fell out of her chair, and was immediately given the part as clumsy Mia Thermopolis.


Another ACME Safety Film


Today in History:
August 3, 1492 -
File this under: more lies my teacher told me.



Christopher Columbus famously sailed from the port of Palos de la Frontera, in southern Spain across the ocean blue in a fleet of three ships: one ship was owned by Juan Niño, and was named the Santa Clara, but became known by its nickname, the Nina , the second ship was owned by Cristóbal Quintero, and was named the Pinta and the third, Santa Maria de Nuestra Senora la Reina de Los Angeles de Porciuncula.

(Every thing else you think you know about Columbus is a lie.)


August 3, 1921
Under the direction of the Ohio Department of Agriculture, Lt. John A. Macready, a U.S. Army pilot, made the first application of 175 pounds of lead arsenate pesticide with a modified Curtiss JN-6 "Super Jenny.", thus creating crop dusting.

Lt. Macready flight over a six acre Catalpa tree grove near Troy, Ohio, killed almost 99% of the Sphinx Moth caterpillars, saving 5,000 trees. The government then utilized aerial application in the Southern states.


August 3, 1943 (I have seen this event posted as happening on August 30th)-
Gen George Patton bitch slapped shell-shocked private Charles Kuhl, in the hospital accusing him of cowardice, on this date.



The incident nearly ended Patton's career; he was ordered by Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower to apologize for this and a second, similar episode. It seemed to help Francis Ford Coppola's career though.


August 3, 1946 -
Santa Claus Land, the world's first themed amusement park, opened in Santa Claus, Indiana, on this date.



The park offered a Santa, a toy shop, toy displays, a restaurant, and themed children's rides, one of which was The Freedom Train. Santa Claus Land didn't charge admission until 1955 and changed its name to Holiday World & Splashin' Safari in 1984.


On August 3, 1958, the U.S. nuclear submarine Nautilus accomplished the first undersea voyage to the geographic North Pole.



The world's first nuclear submarine, the Nautilus dove at Point Barrow, Alaska, and traveled nearly 1,000 miles under the Arctic ice cap to reach the top of the world.


August 3, 1966 -
Comedian and social critic Lenny Bruce died of a morphine overdose in his Hollywood Hills home on this date, two years after his original obituary was published in The Realist.



At the time of his death, Bruce was being maliciously harassed by police and districts attorney in various states for his groundbreaking standup performances, causing great difficulty in finding venues at which to perform. After his death, he became a cult hero, many other comics, like George Carlin and Richard Pryor, considering him a martyr to the cause of free speech.


August 3, 1977
Tandy Corporation announced the TRS-80, one of the world’s first mass-produced personal computers.



The basic model originally shipped with 4 KB of RAM.



And so it goes.

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