Saturday, October 5, 2013

Sometimes I should just turn back

I watch a lot of videos to get my daily posts ready.  Sometimes, my search takes me to places I probably shouldn't go.



I'm going to be troubled for a while with the thought of Hulk Hogan's surprisingly firm buttock.


October 5, 1950 -
You Bet Your Life, hosted by Groucho Marx with his announcer George Fenneman, premiered on NBC TV on this date. Its' run lasted 11 years.



The name of the mangy prop lucky duck that had the "Secret Word" was "Julius", Named after Groucho Marx's real first name.


October 5, 1956 -
The huge, hulking, biblical spectacular, The Ten Commandments (the last film directed by the master showman, Cecil B Demille) opened on this date.



There is a longstanding rumor that future Cuban dictator Fidel Castro was an extra in this film, possibly playing an Egyptian soldier. In her book "My Lucky Stars", Shirley MacLaine recalls asking Castro if he indeed was in the film, and she received an ambiguous answer.


October 5, 1961 -
Blake Edwards' adaptation of Truman Capote's novel, Breakfast at Tiffany's, premiered at Radio City Music Hall in New York City on this date.



John Frankenheimer was hired to shoot the film with Marilyn Monroe. When the producers suddenly moved to Switzerland and Audrey Hepburn replaced Monroe, she said she had never heard of Frankenheimer and insisted that he be paid off and another director be hired.


October 5, 1962 -
Parlophone Records
released the Beatles first single, Love Me Do, in England on this date. (The b side was, P.S., I Love You.)



John Lennon and Paul McCartney wrote Love Me Do in 1958, when John was 17 and Paul was 16. They made time for songwriting by skipping school.


October 5, 1969 -
The British Empire had been on a long slow decline for many years. The last flourish of that dying world power happened on this date - Monty Python's Flying Circus made its debut on BBC-TV.



The head of comedy at the BBC said that the title had to include the word "Circus", because the people at the BBC had referred to the six cast members wandering around the BBC offices as a circus, so they added "Flying" to make it sound less like a real circus and more like something out of the first world war. And in front of that, added "Monty Python" because it sounded like a really bad theatrical agent, and also that the large, constricting snake was appropriate imagery. Other possible names for the series were "Gwen Dibley's Flying Circus", "Owl-Stretching Time" (which was used as the name for one episode), "Bun, Whackett, Buzzard, Stubble and Boot", "A Toad Elevating Moment", "Sex and Violence", "A Horse, a Bucket and a Spoon". One early working title for the series was simply, "It's..."


October 5, 1990 -
Henry & June
, the first NC-17-rated film was released in the US on this date.



This movie precipitated the creation of the NC-17 MPAA rating, which it earned in place of an "X". The two to three second shot of Anais looking at an explicit illustrated postcard involving a Japanese woman and a squid, less than three minutes into the opening credits of the film, was the cause of the NC-17 rating.  .


Today in History:
October 5, 1877
-
... I am tired of fighting. Our chiefs are killed; Looking-glass is dead. Too-hul-hul-suit is dead. The old men are all dead. It is the young men, now, who say ’yes’ or ’no’[that is, vote in council]. He who led on the young men [Joseph’s brother, Ollicut] is dead. It is cold, and we have no blankets. The little children are freezing to death. My people--some of them--have run away to the hills, and have no blankets, no food. No one knows where they are---perhaps freezing to death. I want to have time to look for my children, and see how many of them I can find;maybe I shall find them among the dead. Hear me, my chiefs; my heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever! ....



Chief Joseph, exhausted and disheartened, surrendered in the Bears Paw Mountains of Montana, forty miles south of Canada ending the Nez Percé war. Thunder Rolling Down the Mountain was born in 1840 in the Wallowa Valley of what is now northeastern Oregon. He took the name of his father, (Old) Chief Joseph or Joseph the Elder. When his father died in 1871, Joseph or Joseph the Younger, was elected his father's successor. He continued his father's efforts to secure the Nez Percé claim to their land while remaining peaceful towards the whites.


October 5, 1902 -
Ray Kroc
was born on this date.



Mr Kroc invented McDonalds, which caused the collapse of the Soviet Union and made us all fat, allowing us to buy sub prime mortgage properties, which ultimate will bring down the United States as a dominant world power.


October 5, 1970 -
PBS
became a network on this date.



Unlike the model of America's commercial television networks, in which affiliates give up portions of their local advertising airtime in exchange for network programming, PBS member stations pay substantial fees for the shows acquired and distributed by the national organization.


October 5, 1974 -
David Kunst left Waseca, Minnesota on  June 20, 1970 and completed the first journey around the world on foot, returning to Waseca, Minnesota, on this date, four years, three months and sixteen days later.



He crossed four continents, walked 14,450 miles and went through 21 pairs of shoes. On October 21, 1972, he and his brother were shot during their portion of the trek through Afghanistan (his brother, John, was unfortunately killed in the incident.)  After four months of recuperation, Dave continued on his walk with his other brother Pete.


October 5, 1989 -
Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, the 14th Dalai Lama (Tenzin Gyatso), was named the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize for nonviolent efforts to free his homeland from China.



The Committee’s citation read, “The Committee wants to emphasize the fact that the Dalai Lama in his struggle for the liberation of Tibet consistently has opposed the use of violence. He has instead advocated peaceful solutions based upon tolerance and mutual respect in order to preserve the historical and cultural heritage of his people.

Oh great, I keep blowing my chance of being read in China.



And so it goes.

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