And then one day you find ten years have got behind you

The way we experience life is not linear, but logarithmic. We’ve all noticed that a year keeps feeling shorter, but it’s because there’s a mathematical formula for it.



It’s called Weber’s Law. Life is truly too short. Before we ever notice, it’s over.


January 18, 1973 -
The third season finale of Monty Python, The British Showbiz Awards (aka Grandstand,), aired on this date



This is the only episode of the series that does not feature the opening credits. (It is, however, the third and final episode to feature Her Royal Highness the Dummy Princess Margaret.) This is the last episode to feature John Cleese.


January 18, 1974 -
The sci-fi series, The Six Million Dollar Man, starring Lee Majors, premiered on the ABC-TV on this date.



Early episodes of the series had Austin killing villains on occasion. As it became clear that Austin was becoming a role model for kids, the level of violence in the series decreased, with Austin rarely (if ever) actually killing anyone.


January 18, 1975 -
The Jeffersons, a spin-off of All In The Family premiered on CBS-TV on this date.



When the show first started, George constantly referred to Tom as a honky. After a few seasons, Sherman Hemsley asked the writers to stop having George call him that, as he felt that the characters were friends, and that George would not use a racist term on a friend. When the writers refused to stop, Hemsley simply mumbled the the word every time he said it, forcing re-shoots. Eventually the writers stopped using the word.


January 18, 1977 -
The last wet dream of the Nietzchian Uberman came to fruition when Arnold Schwarzenegger was introduced to America, when George Butler’s bodybuilding documentary Pumping Iron hit the theaters on this date.



Arnold Schwarzenegger admitted that he had made up several stories in the movie for attention because the producers told him that without drama it would be boring. One of the stories made up was the fact that he did not attend his father's funeral because of a body building competition that was going to happen in a couple of months. Arnold did actually attend his father's funeral and spoke to him shortly before he passed.


January 18, 1984 -
The Coen Brothers made their directorial debut (as well as the first major cinematography work by Barry Sonnenfeld) with the release of Blood Simple, starring John Getz, Frances McDormand, Dan Hedaya, and M. Emmet Walsh, on this date.



The title is based on a phrase from the Dashiell Hammett novel Red Harvest, in which "blood simple" is a term coined to describe the addled, fearful mindset people are in after a prolonged immersion in violent situations. Blood Simple writers Joel Coen and Ethan Coen later made Miller's Crossing, which is loosely based on that novel.


Today's moment of Zen


Today in History:
January 18, 1836 -



Knife aficionado Jim Bowie arrived at the Alamo to assist its Texas defenders on this date.


On January 18, 1871, while Prussian guns blasted all hell out of Paris, William I was proclaimed Emperor of a united Germany in nearby Versailles.

For this reason, the Germans have always had a soft spot for France, and have returned often.


January 18, 1882 -
The third-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the majority. The second-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the minority. The first-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking.



Alan Alexander Milne was born on this date.


January 18, 1892 -
That's another fine mess you've gotten me into.



Oliver Hardy, American comedian, actor and the other half the the world's greatest comedy duo, was born on this date.


January 18, 1903 -
President Theodore Roosevelt sent a radio message to King Edward VII: the first transatlantic radio transmission originating in the United States.

Unfortunately, once again, the ill-chosen "Prince Albert in the can" joke is used - and 'Bertie', the King had already heard the joke ad nauseum (Prince Albert, penis ring wearing enthusiast, was his father ) and was not amused.


January 18, 1904 -
My formula for living is quite simple. I get up in the morning and I go to bed at night. In between, I occupy myself as best I can.



Archibald Leach, noted actor, acrobat and over the top orgy participant, was born on this date.


January 18, 1911 -
The first landing of an aircraft onto a ship took place on this date. Pilot Eugene Ely was the first person to land a plane onto a ship, the USS Pennsylvania, in San Francisco Bay (less than ten years after the airplane was invented.)



Two months previously Ely had made the first successful take off from a warship. The technique would later become commonplace as aircraft carriers became major wartime assets.


January 18, 1912 -
Explorer Robert F. Scott reached the South Pole - only to discover that Roald Amundsen had beaten him there by almost a month.



The Norwegian Amundsen's expedition beat that of the British Scott's by a little more than a month, which Scott discovered upon reading a letter that Amundsen had left at the site.

As my girls would say (and I'm paraphrasing - it must have sucked to be him.)


January 18, 1913 (or 1911) -
When I stopped making films, they were getting on to the more realistic films and the explicit films and all. They were depicting life as it is, and some of it was unpleasant. I gradually moved away from that.



David Daniel Kaminsky, UNICEF ambassador, comedian, actor, was born in Brooklyn on this date.


January 16, 1955 -
Kevin Costner was born in Lynwood, California on this date. He is the youngest of three boys (the middle of whom died at birth) of Bill and Sharon Costner.



Before hitting it big in the acting business Kevin Costner worked as a skipper on the ride, the Jungle Cruise, at Disneyland in Anaheim, California. His first film role was in the 1981 low-budget softcore film Sizzle Beach.


January 18, 1958 -
Afro-Canadian Willie O'Ree was the very first black player in the NHL Signed by Boston Bruins he made his NHL debut with the Bruins on this date, against the Montreal Canadiens.



O'Ree appeared in two games that year playing as a winger, and came back in 1961 to play 43 games, scoring 4 goals and 10 assists. O'Ree is referred to as the "Jackie Robinson of ice hockey" due to breaking the black color barrier in the sport.


January 18, 1968 -
At a White House luncheon to discuss the rise in urban crime, Eartha Kitt gets into a notorious spat with First Lady Claudia Taylor "Lady Bird" Johnson, declaring, "Vietnam is the main reason we are having trouble with the youth of America. It is a war without explanation or reason."



Although accounts of the entire argument differ, Kitt is subsequently blacklisted in America.


January 18, 1990 -
Rusty Hamer, the actor who played Danny Thomas' son on Make Room For Daddy, shot himself in the head with a .357 Magnum in DeRidder, Louisiana on this date. Rusty was 42 years old.

Uncle Tonoose made him do it.


January 18, 1990 -
Washington DC mayor Marion Barry was arrested on cocaine possession charges at the Vista International Hotel, as he tokes on a glass crack pipe while being videotaped with his mistress Rasheeda on this date.



Kids remember, say NO to drugs, especially while being videotaped.


Before you go: One late entry - I just saw that David Elrich posted his 2021 film mash-up compilation about a week ago



I always enjoy his videos and look forward to them each year.



And so it goes