The Wellington Files

  • 10,000 Crystals

    It’s the midway point in this year’s Tour de France, which is one of the three races comprising the Grand Tour, along with the Giro d’Italia in May and the Vuelta a España in Aug/Sept. They each last 3 weeks. The French Tour was celebrated in today’s puzzle. The nicest theme answer was at 16D: CHAMPS ELYSEES, where the race sometimes ends — not this year though — it ends in Nice this year. There were also circled letters sloping upwards spelling out
    ALPS and PYRENEES – where the toughest parts of the tour may occur. Then the clue at 40A was “Hard patterns to break … or a punny description of the climbs up the circled letters:” VICIOUS CYCLES.

    Phil’s covering the race for Owl Chatter this year, but so far this is all he’s sent back to us.

    There was also a good clue/answer at 55A: “How to become a whole new hue.” Answer: DYE.

    A sports card show in Allen TX was the location of a spectacular heist last Sunday, according to Allen police officer Sammy Rippamonti, a great name in any context. The theft was a coordinated effort by four men to distract the card dealer and make off with 170 extremely valuable cards in a briefcase that had been kept under a table. The men spent an hour stacking chairs and performing other tasks that gave the impression they worked there.

    Six Mickey Mantle rookie cards were taken. The best was graded 6 (out of ten) and selling for $175,000. This one is graded 5 — you can see it’s off-center and the corners could be sharper.

    Two 1948 Jackie Robinson cards were taken too. The story did not say what condition they were in, but this beauty (graded 7, near mint) is selling on eBay for $150,000.

    Also mentioned as taken was a mint Tom Seaver rookie card.

    As you can see, Seaver is paired with another pitcher, Bill Denehy, on the card. Denehy’s lifetime record in the majors was 1-10, with an ERA of 4.56. Any claim he can make to fame would revolve around his being traded by the Mets for manager Gil Hodges, in November of 1967. Hodges of course managed the Mets to the world championship in 1969 and is in the Hall of Fame. Denehy is still living and is 78. Sadly, he started losing his eyesight in 2005 and became totally blind in 2018.

    When it comes to the U.S. Olympic Women’s gymnastics team, if Simone Biles ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy. But Biles loves the new leotards designed for the Paris Olympics by GK Elite, the company that started designing them two years ago. Each athlete will have different ‘tards to wear for different events, but the design for the final event is the most spectacular and includes close to 10,000 crystals meticulously sewn into the fabric. Take a look:

    That many crystals also adorn this model, which will be worn for several floor events.

    Biles opened the box containing the leotards on the Today show. Her response: “Wait — these are beautiful!”

    But we can’t wait, SB — knock ’em dead, ladies.

    Owl Chatter heads up to Amherst MA tomorrow to attend this year’s Klezmer Festival — Yidstock — at the Yiddish Book Center. The Klezmatics open tomorrow night. We’ll let you know how it goes.

    Thanks for stopping by!

  • Enger Management

    The clue at 17A today was “Sting operation at a senior center?” and the answer was BOOMER BUST. Ouch! It’s a play on “boom or bust” but it seems to take for granted that boomers are in senior centers these days. Alright — I’ll be 75 in January (if I make it that far), but you don’t have to rub my nose in it in the goddamn NYTXW!

    The puzzle was co-constructed by Gary Larson — not the cartoonist — who is very good. At 35A the clue was “What the first call to a receptionist might come in on,” and the answer was LINE ONE. Remember those old phone systems where you had those clear thingies at the bottom of your phone and they would blink if a call was coming in on that line until you pressed it down? Here’s one that even has a rotary dial.

    OMG, it’s ringing!! Can you get that, someone from the 1950s please?

    See that photo? There’s quite a story behind it. That’s Paal Enger. That’s not a typo for Paal — he was from Norway, where they play fast and loose with vowels. He died a few weeks ago, at only 57. He had heroes he emulated when he was growing up. One was soccer great Diego Maradona, and the other was fictional crime boss Vito Corleone. He was a rising soccer star and was also so taken by The Godfather that he visited NYC to see the locations where it was shot. And he was drawn to a life of crime, culminating in his theft of Munch’s great painting The Scream. His soccer teammates sorta knew he was dabbling in crime: he often showed up to practice in fancy cars he had stolen and lived quite a lavish lifestyle.

    His first attempt at The Scream failed. He snuck into The Munch Museum through a window, but a glitch in his plans caused him to grab Munch’s
    Love and Pain (aka Vampire) instead (see below).

    Enger and his partner kept the painting hidden in the ceiling of a pool hall he owned that was frequented by off-duty police officers. “They don’t know it’s hanging just one meter from them,” he said. “That was the best feeling. We let them play for free just to have them there.” But his partner blew their cover and Enger spent four years in prison: all the while still itching to cop The Scream.

    Once he was out, he waited until the country was distracted by the Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, and on Feb. 12, 1994 climbed a ladder and broke a window to get into the National Gallery in Oslo. Within 50 seconds, he slipped back out with the painting. Our Phil, of course, was on hand and got this shot of the exterior. Phil is afraid of ladders so he didn’t follow Enger inside.

    Enger and his partner left behind the ladder, their wire cutters and a note: “A thousand thanks for your poor security.” The crime was so well executed that even though Enger was an obvious suspect, no evidence could be produced against him. And he taunted the police, calling in false leads. They devoted an entire squad to him called Enger Management (no they didn’t).

    He was eventually caught via his efforts to sell the painting and sentenced to six years in prison. He began painting in prison. In the photo of Enger with The Scream, above, the painting is a version of it that he painted. In 2011, his abstract paintings were exhibited at a gallery in Norway. His inclinations towards crime remained strong, however, and he was charged with stealing 17 paintings from an Oslo gallery in 2015.

    Here’s how his obit in the NYT by Alex Williams ends:

    This is not to say that he was wholly averse to acquiring art by legitimate means. In 2001, he bought an unsigned Munch lithograph at auction for about $3,000. Leaving the auction house that day, he ran into the former head of security for the National Gallery. “Congratulations,” he told Mr. Enger. “It’s great that you’ve actually bought a Munch — much better than stealing one.”

    Here’s Munch’s Love and Pain, followed by, well, you tell me.

    Here’s something I learned recently. When you are recycling a can, it may be important not to crush it, as some folks like to do. If your recycling system has you separate cans yourself, go ahead and crush it to your heart’s content. But if your system is like mine — you mix everything together — paper, glass, cans, etc. — and it’s sorted later, it’s very important NOT to crush the cans. If you crush them it can screw up the sorting and result in the whole mess having to be used as landfill, defeating the whole porpoise of your effort. This has to be true, because I heard it on the radio in the middle of night when I couldn’t fall asleep.

    Look at this poor guy!

    Flipping around the stations just now, I fell upon a classic Yankee game from 2011 — July 9th, in fact — exactly 13 years ago today. It was the game in which Derek Jeter got his 3,000th hit. I remembered that it was a home run, but I had forgotten that he had five hits that day — going 5 for 5. Only one other player got 5 hits in the game in which he got his 3,000th hit. That was Craig Biggio, who went 5 for 6 when he did it. Jeter’s is the only 5 for 5.

    Even more amazing, perhaps, is that Jeter is the only player ever to have 3,000 hits as a Yankee. (A-Rod had over 3,000 hits, but not as a Yankee.) Lou Gehrig had 2,721 and Babe Ruth 2,518 for second and third places. There are so many little surprises in this list. Bernie Williams, at 2,336 is ahead of Joe DiMaggio who had 2,214. How could that be? And where have you gone?

    Last points on Jeter: In 2012, when he was 38 years old, he led the major leagues in at bats (683), plate appearances (740) and hits (216), while batting .316. His 3,645 lifetime hits is sixth most in MLB history. More than Willie Mays, Ted Williams, Mel Ott. Over a thousand more than Jim Rice.

    Did you know that Gertrude Stein’s famous line is not, “A rose is a rose is a rose?” It came up today because the clue at 14A was “Thrice-repeated words in one of Gertrude Stein’s truisms” and the answer was A ROSE. But the actual line from her poem Sacred Emily is “Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose.” Who knew? My old (now dead) tax professor Bernie Wolfman used to say that Stein wrote Section 61 of the Internal Revenue Code defining “gross income.” “Income is income is income,” he said.

    My dad loved roses. I remember him watering the rose bushes he grew in our Brooklyn garden on President Street. My sister Bonnie’s middle name was Rose. What a beautiful name: Bonnie Rose. And Lianna’s middle name is Rose too.

    Here are some red ones. OMG, look at this face! Could you plotz?

    Can’t top that. Not in a million years. See you tomorrow.

  • Washed Up and Left for Dead

    We’re delighted to report that Owl Chatter has reached another gallstone: The post on Welly’s 60th birthday several days ago was our 550th. Hooooooray! And we’re going to keep at it until we get it right, by crackie.

    Also happy to report we’ve tracked down the Gil Shaham mystery, thanks to long-time Owl Chatter friend Newton Don. Here’s what Marc had to say:

    “I didn’t say anything specific about Gil Shaham at all. He’s a great violinist whom I’ve always liked, and whom I’m typically happy to hear. In recent years he’s developed some distracting visual mannerisms in terms of physical posture and how he moves around on stage, but the solution is to avoid watching him too much.

    “The only thing I could possibly have said about Shaham that might have been construed as in any way negative was that it was too bad that Hillary Hahn cancelled and Shaham was the soloist instead.”

    So there you have it: Gil Shaham does not stink!

    But don’t take our word for it. Decide for yourself.

    That expression you have surely heard: “It’s the greatest thing since sliced bread” has an historical foundation. First, yesterday was the anniversary of the first sale of sliced bread, back in 1928. Before, bread was sold in solid loaves, or people baked it themselves. The slicer was invented by Otto Frederick Rohwedder, a jeweler from Davenport, Iowa, but he had a tough time convincing people of its worth. The fear was that the separate slices would go stale. Otto first tried to solve that problem by holding the slices together with hatpins: not a good idea. (not kidding) Next, he tried wrapping the sliced loaf in waxed paper. That was better but he still had a tough time selling the concept until he met a baker in Chillicothe, Missouri willing to give the five-foot-long, three-foot-high machine a try. Bread sales went through the roof. And, still, close to 100 years later, we talk of a new idea as “the greatest thing since sliced bread.”

    This is a photo of the actual first loaf of sliced bread, from 1928. (No it isn’t.)

    Run to the post office and buy stamps. Why do I say that? Because on July 14, the price of a forever stamp is going up from 68 cents to 73 cents. You may have to decide among horses, turtles, manatees, RBG, and Nancy Reagan. BTW, they are called “forever” stamps because whatever you mail will take forever to get there.

    Remember BJORK? “One-named singer from Iceland.” Hardly a name you’d expect to see often in Crossworld, with those letters. But there she was today at 49D, hobnobbing with KEN Jennings the new Jeopardy host (off of the K in Bjork). She is unusually beautiful, with looks that are very changeable. Phil should get no argument from her on either of these.

    Whenever there’s a band playing and they ask for requests, I ask for “Jumping Jack Flash.” This poem is called “Request.” It’s by Lawrence Raab and it appeared in today’s Writer’s Almanac. We have that in common, apparently.

    For a long time I was sure
    it should be “Jumping Jack Flash,” then
    the adagio from Schubert’s C major Quintet,
    but right now I want Oscar Peterson’s

    “You Look Good to Me.” That’s my request.
    Play it at the end of the service,
    after my friends have spoken.
    I don’t believe I’ll be listening in,

    but sitting here I’m imagining
    you could be feeling what I’d like to feel—
    defiance from the Stones, grief
    and resignation with Schubert, but now

    Peterson and Ray Brown are making
    the moment sound like some kind
    of release. Sad enough
    at first, but doesn’t it slide into

    tapping your feet, then clapping
    your hands, maybe standing up
    in that shadowy hall in Paris
    in the late sixties when this was recorded,

    getting up and dancing
    as I would not have done,
    and being dead, cannot, but might
    wish for you, who would then

    understand what a poem—or perhaps only
    the making of a poem, just that moment
    when it starts, when so much
    is still possible—

    has allowed me to feel.
    Happy to be there. Carried away.

    This list of phobias was posted in the Dull Men’s Club (UK) today.

    Have you got a favorite? Pogonophobia and Xanthphobia are new to me and pretty good. Here are some comments from club members:

    Ray Wells added: AIBOHPHOBIA. Fear of Palindromes.

    David Mortimor noted: For those who think Eurotophobia can’t be a real thing. It is often triggered by watching birthing videos in reverse!

    Keyo Langford wrote: I think you’ll find that ecclesiaphobia is actually a fear of cakes.

    Rosie Barker made a good point, IMO: Aren’t cremophobia and eremiophobia the same thing? Murray Atkinson replied: No, one starts with c and the other with e.. (D’oh!)

    Another member posted: Chronomentrophobia (fear of clocks), batophobia (fear of being close to tall buildings). I have a very specific one – fear of being close to clock towers – so I guess that would be chronomentrobatophobia.

    Leanne Brown gets the last word: Wrong group: way too interesting.

    See you tomorrow!

  • Does Gil Shaham Stink?

    Broadcasting this fine afternoon from the air-conditioned confines of the Berkshire Valley Inn in Hancock MA, belly full of decent-but-not-as-good-as-Hot-Tomatoes pizza from CRUST in Williamstown. The good local ale was a plus. (Burp!)

    If you like bawdy limericks (and who doesn’t?) Rex commenter JOHN X is your man. He must have been away for awhile because he was warmly welcomed back by the gang. I hope he stays because his post, which I am reposting in its entirety below, is just about perfect, IMHO. Here it is, limerick and all:

    I haven’t done a crossword puzzle in ages, ever since I killed those two guys in that bar. When you’re in jail they take away your iPad, unless you (or a friend) can smuggle one in up your ass. But I got off with a $400 fine ($200/victim). Between the killin’, the trial, and my release, it was the longest six hours of my life.

    On the chest of a barmaid from Yale
    Were tattooed the prices of ale.
    And on her behind, for the sake of the blind,
    Was the same information in Braille.

    This puzzle was pretty easy, is all I’m saying.

    [Here’s that Ivy League barmaid, but covered up. Smoky eyes.]

    Ignorant boor that I am, I needed the crosses to get FRANZEN as the answer to “Author of 2001’s ‘The Corrections’” in today’s puzzle. It was quite a big hit, if you consider a best-seller that wins the National Book Award (in 2001) big. But did you hear about the flap that arose between Franzen and Oprah? The Big O selected it for her book club and he dissed her! The book achieved a balance between entertainment and serious literature and he felt the Oprah imprimatur could tip the balance too much into entertainment, or have it be viewed as a “woman’s” book. He damned some of her selections as “schmaltzy.” She refused to invite him on her show — the only author selected by the club that was snubbed in that fashion. He later apologized and they made up in 2010 when she selected a different book of his and it went smoothly.

    Special thanks to Owl Chatter friend Sandee for reaching out with a “like” for the post on Welly’s birthday. Sandee is missing from our gathering this year, since she is vacationing far away — so it was especially nice of her to chime in! We miss you! (Jeff too.)

    It was opening night at Tanglewood last night and we all went to catch their all-Beethoven program: the violin concerto and the Eroica. Gil Shaham replaced Hilary Hahn for the concerto and a question arose. Shaham, you may know, is considered one of the world’s great violinists, and he certainly seems great to me (ignorant boor that I am, see above), but word reached us second- or third-hand that our friend Marc thinks poorly of him. Marc spent his career writing the programs for the Boston Symphony Orch, so he knows a thing or two about the subject. We’re trying to track the story down and will get back to you on it, unless we forget.

    He looks just a bit deranged in this shot. Phil — did you give him something? We’ve spoken about that!

    Crazy stuff in the Astros-Twins game in Minny last night. Houston held on to win 13-12, but almost blew an eight run lead in the ninth inning. And how about this catch by someone named Joey Loperfido? Never in doubt!

    It’s back to Jersey tomorrow. We’ll see you there. Thanks for stopping by.

  • Happy 60th Welly!

    Welly had the best time at his 60th birthday party at the Berkshire Valley Inn in Hancock MA. Everybody sang. Mary gave him a little gift, and we read a special birthday message from Worthy in Michigan. Wilma was thrilled.

    To 120, old friend. We love you!

  • Totally Tubular

    Hey, these are two of Frank Zappa’s kids: Moon Unit and Dweezil. It’s from 1988.

    Gorgeous! They are opening for us today because the clue at 39D was “Totally tubular pasta.” The answer was RIGATONI — pasta in little tube shapes, but the use of tubular harkens back to when it was slang for awesome. The term was used in the Valley Girl song Moon Unit and Frank released. Fer shure!

    Frank came up with the guitar riff and (14-year-old) Moon supplied much of the content, speaking typical “valley girl” or “Valspeak” phrases she heard at “parties, bar mitzvahs, and the Galleria.” It was Zappa’s only top 40 hit in the U.S.

    I saw Frank Zappa perform back in the day in the Central Park summer concert series in the Wollman skating rink. He was excellent: a great guitarist.

    A few months after the 40th anniversary of Valley Girl, the following animated version was released by the Zappas. It’s great!

    Here’s what egs had to say: If you want to receive an undeserved award for your Broadway play, you might try to RIGATONI.

    The theme was prognostication: We had a CRYSTAL BALL, a OUIJA BOARD, TAROT CARDS, and I CHING COINS. [So two mentalists run into each other. One says to the other: You’re fine. How am I?]

    On the theme, Rex shared this song by The Beths that was new to me. It’s called “Future Me Hates Me.” The Beths are new to me too, except for the song of theirs we shared just a few days ago (with the bungee jumping). They are my new favorite band of the next ten minutes.

    We’ve already discussed the rough welcome Caitlin Clark has received in the WNBA, despite her greatness and popularity. This story appeared in The Onion today:

    LAS VEGAS—Following another highly physical game for the rookie point guard, Indiana Fever player Caitlin Clark reportedly brushed off the 23 stab wounds she received from her own teammates on the court Tuesday. “The physicality doesn’t bother me one bit—it’s all part of the game,” the pale and visibly woozy WNBA star said at a postgame news conference during which reporters questioned her reaction to the knife-inflicted injuries suffered at the hands of her fellow Fever players and a pool of blood collected on the floor beneath her chair. “Emotions run high, and every once in a while that’s going to boil over into someone being brutally stabbed on the court multiple times. I really don’t take the coordinated effort to assassinate me personally. If anything, violently taking a shiv to my back, chest, and neck during a breakaway shows how much passion these women have for the game, and I’m lucky to play alongside them.

    Here’s a nice shot of Caitlin playing some other sport.

    A weird clue/answer was at 34D: “Activities that might require 20-sided dice, for short.” Answer: RPGS, for role playing games. A role playing game is like Dungeons & Dragons, which I know nothing about. I don’t usually hesitate to blather on ridiculously on topics I’m ignorant on, but I’ll limit myself today to showing this neat photo of a 20-sided die. I tried to read up on RPGs but my head kept slamming into the keyboard as I nodded off over and over again.

    Wow, it’s quite the day for women sports stars. George! — check the fridge! ALYSSA Thompson popped in! Her clue tells us she is a “U.S. soccer star who made her World Cup debut at 18.” Wow! She’s still only 19.

    Alyssa is African-American, Filipino, and Peruvian, but speaks fluent Yiddish at home. (No she doesn’t.) She’s from the LA region in California. She also runs track, like, very fast. George — where’s that cold Fresca for our guest? We’ll be keeping an eye on you, Alyssa — knock ’em dead.

    See you tomorrow (maybe?).

  • Cranachan

    Lucille Clifton was born in Depew NY on 6/27/1936, married a Philosophy professor at U. Buffalo, and they had six kids. That’s life! She died in Baltimore in 2010 at age 73. She was the Poet Laureate of Maryland for six years and was a finalist twice for the Pulitzer Prize in poetry. The Poetry Foundation selected a poem of hers today to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

    Girls in her family were born with an extra finger on each hand, a genetic trait known as polydactyly. Hers were removed when she was a small child for reasons of superstition and to avoid social stigma. So the expression “to give someone the finger” has a special meaning to her. (No it doesn’t.) [Is there no depth to which I will not descend for a cheap laugh? Apparently not.]

    Her poem “jasper texas 1998” is wrenching in the extreme. Its subject is the racial killing of the Black man James Byrd Jr. by three whites in the most brutal and inhuman fashion. They dragged him behind their pickup truck. His head and arm were severed at one point and they deposited his torso in front of a Black church. Two of the killers were the first whites ever to be put to death by Texas for killing a Black man, one in 2011 and the other in 2019. The third is in prison serving a life sentence and is eligible for parole in 2038. Texas passed a hate crimes law as a result of the killing. Then-Gov. George W. Bush opposed it, arguing justice was served in the case so it was not needed. Rick Perry signed it into law.

    James Byrd Jr. was married with three children and worked as a vacuum salesman. He was 49 when he was killed. His cousin was Rodney King’s first wife and the mother of King’s daughter Lora. Here’s Clifton’s poem:

    i am a man’s head hunched in the road.
    i was chosen to speak by the members
    of my body. the arm as it pulled away
    pointed toward me, the hand opened once
    and was gone.

    why and why and why
    should i call a white man brother?
    who is the human in this place,
    the thing that is dragged or the dragger?
    what does my daughter say?

    the sun is a blister overhead.
    if i were alive i could not bear it.
    the townsfolk sing we shall overcome
    while hope bleeds slowly from my mouth
    into the dirt that covers us all.
    i am done with this dust. i am done.

    Cranachan is not just any Scottish dessert: it’s the king of Scottish desserts. Traditionally, it was made after the raspberry harvest. It’s raspberries and cream, with oats and whiskey blended in. It’s an offshoot of crowdie, a popular breakfast in which crowdie cheese is combined with lightly toasted oatmeal, cream, and local honey. A traditional way to serve cranachan is to bring the individual ingredients to the table and have the diners combine them for themselves.

    I mention it because it was in the puzzle today in the clue for OATS: “Ingredients in the Scottish dessert cranachan.” That’s a good example of how it’s the cluing that makes a puzzle hard or easy. That’s an impossible clue for OATS. An easy one would be something like “What mares eat.”

    The theme was “all signs point to YES.” The word YES was the answer right in the center of the grid and there were eight different types of “signs” with their letters in circles that “pointed” to the center: PLUS, DOLLAR, STAR, NEON, STOP, PEACE, EXIT, and CALL.

    This song by Tall Tall Trees is called “A Number of Signs.” Hope you like banjo music as much as I do.

    To your heartbeat, I can dance. . .

    Here’s ANI DiFranco. She was in the puzzle today. She pronounces it Ah-knee, not Annie, in case it ever comes up.

    And there was a great clue/answer at 3D. The clue was “Unleashing emotion in a less-than-attractive way.” Answer: UGLY CRYING.

    I was today years old when I learned that Virginia is the state that has the most planes flying over it without landing in it. I guess that’s not too surprising with all the flights in and out of DC. That reminds me: I should check in with the Dull Men’s Club (UK).

    Here’s a post by Lewis Cush:

    My cousin bought a new lawnmower and is very excited, so much so that he had to send pictures into the family group chat.

    Jan Brady asks: Does he realize it needs to go on grass?

    I’ve made a few comments to posts in the club, but have not posted anything myself yet. I better get on the stick, whatever that means. Don’t want to be seen as a slacker.

    Ever have a bad vacation? We spent a week at the Jersey Shore when the kids were little and it rained every day. Here’s what happened to Ernest Hemingway.

    In 1953, Hemingway decided to go on safari in Africa, and he chartered a plane to fly over the countryside. On the first flight, the hydraulic system of the plane wasn’t working well, and they had to make an emergency landing. When they took off again, they almost collided with a flock of birds and crash landed on the shore of the Nile River. Hemingway sprained his shoulder, and his wife broke several ribs. But still, they climbed into another plane for a third flight, and this one crashed almost as soon as it took off. Hemingway fractured his skull, got a concussion, cracked two discs in his spine, and suffered from internal bleeding.

    He never fully recovered and began drinking and falling apart. Today is the sad anniversary of his suicide 63 years ago. His wife was still asleep when he killed himself with a shotgun. The noise woke her. She said it sounded like a drawer being shut.

    Back to the puzzle for our close. At 9D the clue was “Rogers’ partner in classic Hollywood.” The answer was ASTAIRE, of course. Did you know Ginger Rogers was a guest on Love Boat once? It was during Season 3. They cooked up some reason for her to perform.

    We’ll be heading up to the Berkshires on Thursday, for our annual July 4th get-together. May miss a few days of chatter. You’ll live.

    Thanks for popping in.

  • Mistaken For Clover

    The great Hall of Fame pitcher Fergie Jenkins said he found pitching easy — it was life that was hard. He had his share of tsouris. That certainly applies in the case of Orlando Cepeda too (though he was a slugger, not a pitcher). As we noted yesterday, Orlando passed away last Friday at the age of 86. After Clemente, he was the second Puerto Rican inducted into the Hall of Fame.

    Cepeda’s dad, Pedro, was a great ballplayer too. He played shortstop and was known as the Babe Ruth of PR. He might have made it to the major leagues had the color bar not been in effect. Orlando got off to a great start, winning Rookie of the Year honors in 1958 with the Giants in their first year in SF. His first minor league team was Kokomo in the Mississippi-Ohio Valley League. (It’s not the same Kokomo from the Beach Boys song we heard a few days ago. This one’s in Indiana.)

    Cepeda was the NL MVP with STL in 1967, the year they beat Boston in the World Series. But he had an even better year in 1961 with the Jints, slamming 46 homers and driving in 142 runs. He turned the tables in 1973 at the age of 35, when he played 142 games for Boston as their DH, hitting .289, with 20 HR and 86 RBI. He retired the following year after a short stint with KC. He was Boston’s first DH, since the position was only initiated for the 1973 season. He hit Boston’s first HR by a DH on April 8, 1973, against the Yankees, with Sparky Lyle pitching.

    Things nose-dived for him in retirement. He spent ten months in federal prison for marijuana smuggling from Colombia. Upon his release, his name in PR was sullied. He went 15 years without being voted into Baseball’s Hall of Fame, but gained entry in 1999 via the Veterans Committee. He held various positions in baseball, but got in trouble again in 2007 when he was stopped for speeding and drugs were found in his car.

    Happily, his final years were good. Here’s how his obit in the NYT ends:

    For all the years he was shunned in Puerto Rico, Cepeda won redemption when he was elected to the Hall of Fame. The Puerto Rican government brought him back for a parade in his honor. It began at the San Juan airport, where he had been arrested 24 years earlier, and passed through Old San Juan along streets lined by crowds.

    The Giants retired Cepeda’s No. 30 two weeks before his induction into the Hall of Fame. In September 2008, they honored him with a bronze statue outside their stadium. It stands alongside statues of Mays, McCovey, Juan Marichal and Gaylord Perry.

    After all his travails, Cepeda was extremely gratified.

    “When things like this happen to you,” he told The San Francisco Chronicle at the unveiling of his statue, “that’s when I say to myself, ‘Orlando, you’re a very lucky person.’”

    A major city in Florida was named after him. (No it wasn’t.)

    Rest in peace, Cepeda.

    Ogden Nash was in the puzzle yesterday and someone shared this poem of his I hadn’t heard before:

    Two nudists of Dover
    Being purple all over
    Were munched by a cow
    When mistaken for clover.

    I also learned a new take on his famous llama verse:

    The one-l lama, He’s a priest.
    The two-l llama, He’s a beast.
    And I will bet A silk pajama
    There isn’t any Three-l lllama.

    In certain editions, it is said that Nash added that “some people say a three-l lama is a large conflagration in Boston.” (Get it?)

    Next: If called by a panther — don’t anther.

    Last, his verse on ketchup:

    Shake and shake
    the ketchup bottle.
    First none’ll come
    And then a lot’ll.

    Are you ready for it? Here are two videos that are related. The first is Taylor performing “Ready For It” on her ERAS Tour. The second is Simone Biles who used the beat from the song in her floor performance for the Olympic trials. It’s pretty hard-core Taylor. (Turn it up.) And Biles is just not from this planet.

    Incredible, ladies — so good to see both of you! Please, take a load off — just push that crap off the couch. George! — bring up some cold Diet Sprites for the girls! And see if there’s any hummus and chips left — Phil may have gone through it before blacking out last night. Do you guys know you’re both “attached” to NFL players? Tay and Travis of course, and Simone’s hubby is Jonathan Owens, a safety for the Bears. They will face each other in a preseason game in KC in August. Are you ready for it?

    I visited the Dull Men’s Club (UK) today and found this post (with photos) by Tim Sharman:

    In 1978, a girlfriend I had at the time, gave me what I thought at the time, to be one of the dullest postcards ever (top photo). It shows Slough Road in Iver Heath, Bucks. Lately I’ve rediscovered the postcard and realised it’s actually a bit intriguing. For instance, what is that large boat doing in the car park of what was “The Prince of Wales” pub? Notice also the cars including a Morris Minor estate and a Vauxhall Viva. Notice also the neatly clipped hedge next to the shop and the advertising banner for the Slough Express.

    I thought I’d check on Street View (my grateful thanks to Google) what the location looks like now( bottom photo). Sadly the photo taken on a dull day in June 2023 shows the pub is now an office, the shops have changed and the hedge and front garden next door have been swept away and replaced by concrete. It’s funny how something which originally seemed dull can over the years become quite interesting!

    It has generated 46 comments so far, including, from me: It’s not really all that interesting. [I think that’s considered praise in the club.]

    Several folks noted that one of the locations was an Indian restaurant for a while.

    My autograph of Orlando Cepeda is an autographed baseball.

    See you tomorrow!

  • Erdős Numbers

    Owl Chatter’s trip to Vermont went very well: Good food, good friends, good weather, and a good, fun production of The Mikado at the Unadilla Theater in Marshfield VT (or maybe Calais (pronounced callous, I think), because that’s its mailing address. It’s about 30 minutes from Montpelier, where the pizza at Positive Pie is very good (and the beet and arugula salad). I’m sure you’ve seen The Mikado. Why, if you haven’t, it’s like not knowing what a logarithm is.

    When we first saw The Mikado at the Unadilla, the kids were pretty little. It was about 30 years ago, and it was magical. Very funny, wonderful silliness — the script and the songs — utter nonsense, just like we love it. And then, for just a few minutes, the most beautiful young woman took the stage alone and sang an exquisite song with the sweetest voice. Here’s a version of it that I found online.

    We stopped in Middlebury for lunch on the way up. The Otter Creek Bakery has excellent baked goods and sandwiches. Here’s a view from the banks of Otter Creek.

    Today’s puzzle was a celebration of bad puns. It had twelve theme answers, each of which was a state noted via a bad pun. Here are the simplest: “Jaded miner’s remark?” ORE AGAIN!!?? (Get it? Oregon) “Parent’s encouragement to a budding chef?” WHISK ON, SON “Captain and nine crew members?” TEN ASEA.

    The worst was VERGE IN, YEAH?, clued with “Mm-hmm, get a little nearer?” Quite a stretch IMO. Rex thought a better effort would have been a clue for VERGE, ENYA? (the singer). Then he shared this song by her. You know, I must have filled her name in in puzzles a dozen times, but I had no idea what she looked like or sounded like, or even if she was a she. Enya? Now I know.

    The second song Rex shared today was based on 101D: “What’s left of the Colosseum.” RUINS. My heart was diving and soaring, with the seabirds flashing by. . .

    One thing about taking short trips is you lose touch with the world a bit. For example, we missed the debate. How’d it go?

    Phil refused to cover the debate, instead slipping us this old photo of a pretty Jill Biden looking eerily a little like a blonde Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Maybe it’s the bed head.

    From today’s poem in The Writer’s Almanac by Ciaran Carson called “The Fetch” I learned what the fetch of a wave is. Carson was born and died in Belfast, the latter on October 6, 2019, three days before his 71st birthday.

    I woke. You were lying beside me in the double bed,
    prone, your long dark hair fanned out over the downy pillow.

    I’d been dreaming we stood on a beach an ocean away
    watching the waves purl into their troughs and tumble over.

    Knit one, purl two, you said. Something in your voice made me think
    of women knitting by the guillotine. Your eyes met mine.

    The fetch of a wave is the distance it travels, you said,
    from where it is born at sea to where it founders to shore.

    I must go back to where it all began. You waded in
    thigh-deep, waist-deep, breast-deep, head-deep, until you disappeared.

    I lay there and thought how glad I was to find you again.
    You stirred in the bed and moaned something. I heard a footfall

    on the landing, the rasp of a man’s cough. He put his head
    around the door. He had my face. I woke. You were not there.

    Let’s dip into the Owl Chatter mailbox and see what you readers are saying. Meg Bordle writes: “Your math department has been quiet for a long time. I like math. What gives?”

    Well, you got us there, Bordle. It has been a while. Happily, in today’s puzzle the clue way up at 7D is “Paul ___, Hungarian mathematician with over 1,500 published papers,” and the answer is ERDOS. New to me, duh. I’m used to Euler in the puzzles when it’s math. Anyway, yeah, no mathematician published more papers than Erdős, although the aforementioned Euler published more pages in his roughly 800 papers.

    He was Jewish and fled Hungary for the U.S. in 1938. He mostly worked with others — colleagues — more than 500 of them. In fact, Erdős spent most of his career with no permanent home or job. He traveled with everything he owned in two suitcases, and would visit mathematicians he wanted to collaborate with, often unexpectedly, and expect to stay with them, have them feed him, do his laundry, etc. A schnorrer!

    [Groucho:

    Hooray for Captain Spaulding
    The African Explorer!
    Did someone call me schnorrer?
    Hooray hooray hooray!]

    Erdős’s friends developed the concept of an “Erdős number” which measures the closeness of any mathematician to collaboration with Erdős. [Judy, you hear of this?] Say Tom has written an article with Erdős. Tom has an Erdős number of 1 as a direct collaborator. (Erdős himself is zero.) If Sally has not collaborated with Erdős, but has written an article with Tom, she gets an Erdős number of 2 (one greater than Tom’s). Every mathematician thus has an Erdős number equal to 1 greater than the smallest Erdős number of the people the mathematician has collaborated with. Since collaboration with Erdős is a feather in one’s cap, you want an Erdős number as low as possible. Someone who has not collaborated with anyone who has worked with Erdős (i.e., a total loser), is said to have an Erdős number of infinity, or an undefined one.

    Of course, your Erdős number only tells part of the story. You can earn an Erdős number of one with only one collaborated article. So we also want to look at how many collaborations there are within the “Erdős One” group. Since you asked, Andras Sarkozy leads that group with 62 collaborations. Outside the field of math, Albert Einstein has an Erdős number of 2. Enrico Fermi, Richard P. Feynman, and Hans A. Bethe are 3s. Milton Friedman is a 3. Amazingly, Hall of Famer Roberto Clemente somehow has an Erdős number of 4. (No he doesn’t.)

    Erdős taught himself to read through mathematics texts that his parents left around in their home. By the age of five, given a person’s age, he could calculate in his head how many seconds they had lived.  Due to his sisters’ deaths, he had a close relationship with his mother, with the two of them reportedly sharing the same bed until he left for college. I’m guessing he was a blanket hog, like most schnorrers.

    Here’s Erdős himself — our big fat zero (Erdős number, that is).

    Anybody can find dozens of stories by now of pregnant women denied life-or-death health care by doctors reasonably fearful of prison, or loss of licensure, for violating cruel or sadistically ambiguous anti-abortion laws. So Nicole Miller’s story in the NYT today about her experience in Idaho is really nothing special. But one small piece of it caught our eye.

    Nicole was in her 20th week of pregnancy when she started bleeding heavily. Her doctor told her to leave the state for treatment. Incredulous, she said, “You’re not going to help me?” He told her he wasn’t willing to risk his 20-year career. She was rushed to the airport where a small plane was to fly her to Utah. By then, she had lost a liter of blood. In Salt Lake City her treatment went well — a dilation and evacuation, and she’s fine. All of that is par for the course in many states these days — hardly worth noting.

    But here’s the part that caught my eye. Doctors at Idaho’s largest hospital system said that six pregnant women had to be airlifted out of state for care in the first four months of the year, compared with only one the previous year. The response of the state’s Republican attorney general, Raul Labrador, was to note that the doctors were not under oath when they provided those numbers. He said “I would hate to think that any hospital is trying to do something like this just to make a political statement.”

    So don’t think it, you worthless moron. Do something to help the citizens of your state who voted you into office and are now deprived of basic medical care. Jeez Louise, you have to wonder about anything that makes New Jersey look good.

    We’ll give Nicole the last word. She reserved special praise for the (male) nurse who accompanied her in the ambulance to the airport. “He was the first person that day who showed me any kind of compassion.” Yup. It’s always the nurse. (Hi Caity!)

    Baseball great Orlando Cepeda passed away at the age of 86 last Friday. He had a tough life in some respects. We’ll take a look at the “Baby Bull” in our next post.

    It’s nice to be back! See you tomorrow.

  • I’m Walkin’ Here!

    Let’s open with a riddle today: What type of bear is least likely to bump into a tree? Give up? A spectacled bear.

    Ever hear of such a bear? Me neither. It was in the XW at 30D today: “Where spectacled bears live.” Answer: ANDES. It’s the only bear native to South America. Facial markings can make it seem like it’s wearing glasses.

    Careful, Philly — nice shot!

    I posted the following on Rex’s blog: “I expect a spectacled bear would be quite a spectacle. It shouldn’t be confused with spectacled beer — which is beer in glasses.”

    Do you remember this classic line from Midnight Cowboy? “Hey! I’m walkin’ here!!” The following clip has the original line from the film, followed by quite a few later applications.

    The clue for the puzzle’s “revealer” today was: “Memorable ad-lib in Midnight Cowboy.” And the theme involved three famous people from history who would use that line in particular locations. So, e.g., for Neil Armstrong, the answer was: TRANQUILITY BASE. You are supposed to picture him walking on the moon saying, “Hey, I’m walkin’ here.”

    Then there was Dorothy Gale. That’s Dorothy from The W of Oz. Did you know she had a last name, Gale? The answer for her was YELLOW BRICK ROAD. “Hey!” she says to the scarecrow — “I’m walkin’ here!”

    The last one was Jesus. For Jesus it was SEA OF GALILEE. Folks found it amusing to picture Jesus walking on water and saying, “Hey, I’m walkin’ here.”

    E.g., had to laugh picturing Jesus walking on water when a fishing boat nearly sideswipes him, and he yells out in a Brooklyn accent, “I’M WALKING HERE!” 

    Joke: A Unitarian watches Jesus walk on water and mutters sneeringly, “Guy claims to be the son of God and he can’t even swim!” 

    Midnight Cowboy won an Oscar for Best Picture and John Schlesinger for Best Director in 1970, the only X-rated film to win Best Picture. Voight and Hoffman both got nominated for Best Actor but lost out to John Wayne (True Grit). There is some confusion over whether Hoffman’s great line was an ad-lib or not.

    Let’s give egs the last word: “Ad libbed line from Best Supporting Actor in The Deer Hunter: ‘I’m Walken here.’ (Christopher Walken won an academy award for this film).”

    BTW, this was a nice comment by pabloinnh about W of Oz:  Any reference to The Wizard of Oz is aces with me, an all-time favorite. Q: “How can you talk if you don’t have a brain?” A: “I don’t know.” Simple and elegant.

    At 49D the clue was “Participate in a crawl, perhaps,” and the answer was BAR HOP. Says egs: I’ve been known to “participate in a crawl” after too much BARHOPping.

    At 58A today the clue was “Flattening, informally” and the answer was SMOOSHING.

    It led commenter Gary to post:

    Has anyone ever smooshed?
    By showering in Dijon I’ve douched
    I’ve worn my Nikes so I’ve swooshed
    In olden times I drove a barouche [type of horse-drawn carriage]
    On a minibike I don a tarboosh [fez]
    I’m known for being louche [disreputable]
    Some say I’m quite farouche [sullen or shy]
    But have I ever smooshed?
    Has anyone ever smooshed?
    When fitting five into a booth
    We feel the whoosh of smoosh

    Which induced Carola to share:  My high school boyfriend failed an English class vocab quiz on Robert and Elizabeth Browning by defining “barouche” as “the sound an elephant makes when it sneezes.”

    Calls to mind the old joke: What’s the difference between a tavern and an elephant farting?

    One’s a bar room, and one’s a ba-ROOOM!

    Gotta give the Pods credit for last night’s very heated victory over the Gnats. I knew that the night before the Padres dealt a devastating blow to DC, overcoming a three-run deficit in the bottom of the tenth. Ouch. But I wasn’t aware that after Jurickson Profar had the game-winning hit, he taunted the Gnats. So when he came out to bat in the bottom of the first last night, Gnats catcher Keibert Ruiz confronted him and the dugouts emptied. No blows were thrown — baseball fights are like dances. (No MLB player would last ten seconds in a hockey rink. Breeds apart.)

    Anyway, the umps issued warnings to both teams. The very next pitch to Profar was a ball thrown at him by Mackenzie Gore, but it him in the legs — nowhere near the head, and the ump didn’t deem it enough to toss Gore. The Padre manager, Mike Shildt, came out roaring — incredulous that after the warning and hit batsman on the very first pitch Gore wasn’t thrown out. So the ump threw Shildt out! Gotta love it!

    But once passions settled, the battle was to be waged on the field. Pod Manny Machado blasted a two-run homer, thus making his statement: F*ck you, Gnats. But the Gnats roared back with four runs of their own to take the lead. “No! Fuck YOU Pods!” But San Diego came out on top at the end 9-7, with the crushing blow a goddamn grand salami by, you guessed it, J. Profar. A very hard loss.

    The time has come to excoriate The New Yorker again for the shabbiest collection of cartoons all of which are the opposite of funny in the July 1, 2024 issue. I’ll go through them one by one. Let’s drop the bar as low as it will go — I dare you to find a single one even mildly amusing.

    Page 13, a backyard BBQ scene. The men are standing around a grill near a fence. The neighbor is on the other side of the fence, clearly not invited to the BBQ and he’s glaring at the guy working the grill (the host). One of the guests says to the host: “Don’t let him get to you. I’m sure there are lots of people you didn’t invite.”

    You don’t need my comments on how unfunny that is. Res ipsa loquitor: the thing speaks for itself.

    Page 17. Edgar Allen Poe is standing in the doorway of a home, looking out at a raven who is standing outside. Poe says: “Once upon a midnight dreary, while I waited weak and weary, Over many a package of goods galore—While I nodded nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As if Amazon gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door—But it’s a stupid bird and nothing more.”

    Apparently, the humor is in having Poe open his door for an Amazon delivery and finding a raven. Shall I pause to let you compose yourself?

    Page 18. Two people walking on a city street near a parking garage. One says: “The city never fails to excite after two hours of traffic.”

    I am not making these up, folks. That is intended to be funny.

    Page 25. The next is by Ed Koren, whom I love. (Hi Bob!) It’s a take on Egyptian hieroglyphics. You get the option: Reading time: 4 days; Listen: 7 seconds.

    Sorry, Ed. No sale here this time. Love the drawing. But no laughs. I guess it’s a play on how long it would take to decipher the hieroglyphics. Take a look:

    Page 26. A boy talking to his parents: He says: “Listen, I know you’re both worried that I haven’t made any friends, but it will really pay off in twenty to twenty-five years, when I’ll be spared from having to attend a wedding every weekend.

    OMG, that is so not funny, I wouldn’t know where to begin to flay it. Plus it’s way too long. Gotta be punchy. “Take my wife — please.”

    Page 30. In the command room on Star Trek. The hilarious line is: Captain, the shields are down and also the air-conditioning.”

    What am I missing? Puh-leeeeze.

    Have any of these even come within a long-range missile strike of a weak chuckle? I ask you.

    We soldier on.

    Page 37. A man crouching in an aisle in Home Depot, talking into his phone. He says: “Yeah, I’ll be a minute. ‘Landslide’ just started playing at Home Depot and now I’m crying in lamps and light bulbs.”

    Oy, amirite?

    Page 40. This next one is so bad, I’m speechless. Have a look:

    Page 44. Five people around a table with laptops or writing pads. Apparently trying to come up with ideas. One says uproariously: “I’m just wondering why you only say ‘no bad ideas’ after my suggestions, Janice!”

    Page 49. A play on God as an employee somewhere. He’s at a desk, having taken his glasses off.

    The caption says: And, on the seventh day, God rested his eyes. Just for a second. He didn’t nap. That would be so unprofessional. He wouldn’t do that while on the clock. Please don’t fire him.

    God-awful.

    Page 52. A doctor at his patient’s hospital bed. Apparently the patient is near death because the doctor regales him with: First the good news, Mr. Edmonds: you’re going to get closure.”

    As a son and brother of doctors, and the father of a nurse, that one is offensive. I wouldn’t mind offensive, believe me — if it were the slightest bit funny.

    This next one on page 54 may be the least horrifying of them. It’s silly. And we like silly at Owl Chatter. Not funny though.

    And, finally, on page 62, the always-popular source of great humor — a cookbook cartoon. It’s a cookbook with a picture of a carrot and a cracker on the cover, and its title is “365 Meals of Quiet Resignation.” Quite the thigh-slapper.

    That’s it, folks. That’s every single cartoon from the July 1 issue. I rest my case.

    That’ll do. We’re off for a night in Albany tomorrow, followed by The Mikado in Vermont Friday night. Vermont Liz is joining us, with dinner in Montpelier before the show. So it’s northward in the morning!

    Thanks for popping in!