And the blog played on...

Been a while since I did a current events post, so it's back the ol' grind...

JOHN HUGHES, 1950-2009
Hard to imagine what the ‘80s would’ve been like without this man’s body of work.  Filmmaker John Hughes, who died yesterday of a heart attack, quietly put together a fairly prolific career as writer/director/producer of such ‘80s teen fare as The Breakfast Club, Sixteen Candles, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Weird Science and Pretty In Pink, as well as John Candy vehicles Trains, Planes And Automobiles (vehicles—get it?) and Uncle Buck, along with Mr. Mom, Christmas Vacation and the 1990 blockbuster Home Alone.  Sixteen Candles is oft-quoted around our office—"Oh, Dong…grandpa is talking to you!", "Automobile?!?", "She’s gotten her boobies," and "Donger need food!" etc.  Another favorite of mine was "Can you describe the ruckus?" from Breakfast Club.  Oddly enough, we hadn’t heard much from Hughes after Home Alone, with his last directing credit being the 1991 clunker, Curly Sue.  JH generally shunned the limelight, and was a bit of a mysterious individual, rarely being interviewed or photographed.  I’m sure everyone else is using this line in their blog tributes to Hughes, too, but as the line in Ferris Bueller goes, he was a "righteous dude".

A MOMENT OF SILENCE, PLEASE…
…for my #2 favorite local BBQ emporium, K.C. Masterpiece, which closed down last week.  Located just a few blocks from my workplace, KCM had even better brisket than my #1 local favorite, Gates BBQ, but their ribs weren’t quite as good.  Another menu item that was a big favorite around our office was the "Fall Off The Bone" salad that had shredded pork mixed in with the greenery, and I gladly made many a lunch run for my co-workers.  Masterpiece was bought out by some other company a couple years ago, and we noticed the quality of the food gradually diminish in the process.  I knew something wasn’t right when they closed their location at the Country Club Plaza (which you often had to wait in line for) and it turns out this company owed Uncle Sam a boatload of back taxes, hence the closure of the Overland Park location.  According to the paper, these boobs claim they want to re-open in suburban Blue Springs later this year with a "new concept", but it all sounds like spin-doctoring to me.  All that that remains is the famous K.C. Masterpiece line of BBQ sauces, which you can still buy at the grocery store.

ONE MORE MOMENT OF SILENCE, PLEASE…
…for the Arena Football League, which suspended operations apparently for good, this week.  We’ll keep it a brief moment of silence, though, since I don’t think I’ll miss it all that much.  The sport was too gimmicky and playing tackle football on half a field is like playing hockey in a phone booth—too claustrophobic for me…

IT WAS A VERY BAD YEAR…
Bryan Adams overlooked a few things in his hit song "Summer of ‘69", because the 40th anniversaries are hitting us hot and heavy these days, and we’re on the eve of yet another—it was 40 years ago tomorrow that the Manson Family scared the hell out of California (and the nation) with their brutal slayings of actress Sharon Tate and her friends on August 8, 1969, followed by more mayhem the next night at the LaBianca house in L.A.  It’s amazing to think you had the Manson murders, Woodstock and Hurricane Camille all occurring within about ten days of each other—quite an eventful period.  And just for perspective, yours truly even started kindergarten a couple weeks after that, too.  The second half of 1969 was full of landmark events (both good and bad), what with the Apollo 11 moon landing in July, the "Miracle Mets" winning the World Series in October and the infamous Rolling Stones Altamont concert in early December.  It was also quite a memorable time here in K.C. as 1969 saw the advent of the expansion Royals, and more importantly, the Chiefs’ Super Season when they won it all.  Not only that, but Apollo 13, the breakup of The Beatles and the Kent State tragedy were just around the corner in 1970, too.  Forty freakin’ years, already?  Hard to believe…

OH, WILL YOU LET IT GO, ALREADY!!
When are the conservatives/Republicans going to knock off this witch hunt over Obama’s citizenship?  Naturally, Rush Limbaugh is one of the fools leading the charge to convince everyone that B.O. is an undesirable alien—this coming from a man who once changed his legal name (and bringing shame to the good name of Brian in the process).  This is just more sour grapes because their guy lost the election in November.  I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating—we put up with their village idiot in the White House for eight years and look what it got us.  Let’s give the new guy a shot and see what happens.

I LIKE BEER…
…but not when it’s used for a photo-op/publicity stunt/damage control like Obama did last week in his contrived "Beer Summit" with this Professor Gates character and the cop who busted him for trying to break into his own house. [Hope you’re paying attention, Tom and John—I’m bashing Obama here!]  Beer Summit sounds like something Dubya would've come up with, doesn't it?  That whole thing got totally blown out of proportion anyway, and if Gates had merely produced some ID, he probably wouldn’t have been handcuffed.  As for the neighbor who called 911, I can’t believe she didn’t even recognize the man who lives nextdoor to her.  I’m not real crazy about my current nextdoor neighbors, but I at least know what they look like!  Btw, I’m surprised the media didn’t automatically refer to this thing as "Gates-gate".

"YOU WON’T FIND ME IN AN OLD FOLKS HOME…"
But you might find the Old Folks Home at the Kansas City Chefs training camp, as they’ve continued their tradition of signing elderly players, and this time it’s former N.Y. Giants wideout Amami Toomer, who joins the almost equally-old Bobby Engram on the squad.  Why is it we always get these Pro Bowl-caliber players at the END of their careers, like Joe Montana, Marcus Allen, Patrick Surtain, Pete Stoyanovich, Ty Law, Morten Andersen, et al, instead of finding guys like them in the draft?  Dare I say it?  This is getting really OLD!

CLASSIC MISHEARD FAMOUS NAME #1
Gore Vidal—When I was a kid watching Johnny Carson, I always thought he was talking about someone named "Gorvy Dahl".

CLASSIC MISHEARD FAMOUS NAME #2
Franco Harris—When Franco first came to fame with the Pittsburgh Steelers, I first thought his name was "Frank O’Harris"!  That was, until I saw his name on his jersey and realized he was Italian instead of Irish…

REALLY BAD TELEVISION
Just for shits and hoots, I recently borrowed a VHS copy of the "Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts" from the library.  I used to think these shows were the cat’s ass back when I was a kid in the ‘70s, but viewing them now with 45-year-old eyes, they are positively putrid.  The lame skits, hackneyed one-liners and forced laughter amongst those on the dais were bad enough, but what I found amazing was how the person being roasted—the late Carroll O’Connor and Redd Foxx, on this tape—looked as if they would much rather be somewhere else!  And those shows all seemed to have the same set of panelists every time out—Nipsey Russell, Milton Berle, Phyllis Diller, Marty Allen, Don Rickles, Jimmie Walker, Foster Brooks, Joey Bishop, et al—and amongst all of them, only Rickles managed to make me laugh out loud.  The celebrity roast genre has been revived on cable here over the last couple years, but sadly, it’s every bit as cheesy now as it was then.  The Gene Simmons roast featuring such "funny" men as Andrew Dice Clay, Danny Bonaduce and Carrot Top made me want to throw up in my mouth.

CLASSIC OVERUSED TV/MOVIE CLICHÉ #22
Are there any TV sitcoms out there that haven’t used the lame old gambit where two or more characters find themselves locked inside a cellar/storeroom/vault (or trapped in an elevator or on a rooftop) for an extended period of time?  I can think of at least ten without even trying:  "Happy Days", "Friends", "The Nanny", "All In The Family", "The Munsters", "Frasier", "MASH", "WKRP In Cincinnati", "The Jeffersons" and "The Love Boat" are just a few examples.  Not terribly creative, that’s for sure…

IN YOUR FACE(BOOK)
Against my better judgment, I created a Facebook account recently, but I’m still not completely sold on it yet.  The thing I dislike most about it is how it’s sort of replaced blogging in general.  I’ve noticed a major decline in activity on the blogs that I read regularly, and I think a lot of it has to do with Facebook and the whole Twitter thing, which appeal to the short attention span crowd more.  I’m much more at home here on the blog where I can write whatever and however much I want, whereas you’re very limited and have to censor yourself on Facebook a lot more.  I also don’t like how it’s taken the place of personal e-mails too, as some of my good friends tend to blow mine off without responding to them, which pisses me off sometimes.  And based on some of the stuff my longtime friends post on Facebook, it’s almost like they’re strangers to me sometimes.