The Wellington Files

Wow. No sooner do we finish watching the first season of HBO’s White Lotus, with Sydney Sweeney playing the rich couple’s daughter, than she shows up as the hot babe in the Rolling Stones’ video of their new song “Angry.” Our Phil was able to call in a few favors and get an advance copy of it for Owl Chatter — check it out! It’s vintage Stones.

And here’s Syd:

Mick’s 80, Keith is 79, and Ronnie Wood is the baby at 76, but the only one who has lost a step or two is drummer Charlie Watts, who died in 2021. Watts had recommended the new drummer, Steve Jordan, about whom Keith said it would have been a lot harder moving on without Charlie’s blessing. Charlie is missed “incredibly.” He’s on two of the tracks on the new album, Hackney Diamonds. It’s been 18 years between albums, which Mick explained by noting the band is a bit lazy.

The story in the NYT today ended with the following observation about their unannounced theater performance promoting the new album:

“As the huddle to see the band grew, three schoolgirls walking past asked what was happening. Told it was the Rolling Stones, Anya Morrison, 16, said, ‘I’ve heard of them, I think.’ Then she got on a bus home.”

Let’s not let go of Sydney so fast. It’s her birthday next Tuesday: she’ll be 26. She was born in Spokane to a criminal defense lawyer mom and hospitality professional dad. Makes us wonder if the smarmy Armond in White Lotus has a little of the dad in him. Hope not, though I did love poor Armond.

Sydney was raised in northwestern Idaho in the panhandle region along the Washington border at a rural lakeside home that her family has inhabited for five generations. Sweeney says she has a “religious family,” in which case let’s hope they don’t see the Stones’ video.

She’s not just a pretty face. She studied entrepreneurship at UCLA, which is nearly impossible to spell, let alone study. They couldn’t come up with something less letter-y? And she’s already earned two Emmy nominations (for Euphoria and White Lotus). She was a sports nut in HS, participating in every sport she could, including wakeboarding, which was the subject of a joke in White Lotus, when her dad calls it waterboarding. Roaring, she corrects him: “It’s wakeboarding, Dad — waterboarding is a form of torture.” Oh, yeah. That.

FYI, wakeboarding is like water skiing except you try to stay in the boat’s wake and perform aerial maneuvers.

Yeah, she looks athletic. How’d you keep up with her Phil?

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The clue at 13D today was “___ ipsum (placeholder text),” and the answer was LOREM. Lorem ipsum is a truncation of dolorem ipsum which means “pain itself,” not to be confused with dolorem assum which means, well, you can figure it out. It’s Latin writing that’s used when you just need some text to take up space until what really goes there is ready. Thus, “placeholder text.” Here’s how it can be used in a sentence:

A strong case could be made that Owl Chatter in its entirety is nothing but lorem ipsum.

Commenter Mary shared this standard Lorem Ipsum passage from lipsum.com, used since the 1500s:

“Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.”

Thanks Mary!

Another doozy today was at 62A where the answer was TURING TESTS, which Alan Turing devised (duh). It was also called the imitation game. It’s a test to distinguish between a human and a machine. That is, if you are conferring with a party and you are not sure if it/he/she is a person or a machine, the Turing Test will let you know. It was devised as part of Turing’s investigation into whether machines can think. I don’t think I should take it any deeper than that. Here’s Turing.

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Some cute clues today: 15A “Adam’s apple locale.” You might think neck or throat, but it’s EDEN.

And 43A was “What often has a heart beat?” and the answer was SPADE. As in playing cards — in some games a spade “beats” a heart.

The puzzle overall was very funny, IMO. The constructor, Ryan Patrick Smith, was pretending it was written by a computer pretending to be a person. So the clue at 17A was “What this puzzle is definitely not, having been created by me, a real and true human being,” and the answer was AI GENERATED.

And at 62A the clue for TURING TESTS, discussed above, was “Assessments I would pass with flying colors — if I had anything to prove, which I don’t, since I’m human.” (Get it?)

My favorite was at 40A. The clue was “Ambitious objective for, um, a total villain, not a human like me! How did this answer even get in here? (Nervous synthetic laugh),” and the answer was WORLD DOMINATION.

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The Gnats snapped their losing streak at 6 games by beating the Mets last night 3-2. In one of the middle innings, the final out by the Gnats was a fly ball caught by Met outfielder Brandon Nimmo. Before heading for the dugout, he took several steps towards the outfield stands and threw the ball into the seats. He seemed to be aiming for, and the camera showed, one girl, about ten, wearing a Mets jersey standing in a small sea of kids wearing Gnats-phernalia. The announcers and we surmised Nimmo was trying to get the ball to her. But a little kid in a Gnats jersey caught it instead. The announcers and the camera followed the drama. The Mets girl pleaded her case to the little boy — he meant to give it to me!, she said. And the little boy gave it to her — she held out her glove and he let it plop into it.

The announcers were effusive in their praise for the little boy — he did the right thing. He should feel good about it, although sad about losing the ball of course. A nice character study, except it didn’t end there. The camera came back to them the next inning to show the little girl and her dad enjoying the ball, and showing the poor little boy crying. His mom was trying to console him, but, you know, f*ck that. Searing human drama at Gnats Park.

Happy ending: Word of the drama reached the Gnats higher ups and they came over to the section and thanked the little guy for doing the right thing and they gave him a ball.

God Bless America.

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Good night, everybody. Thanks for dropping in!

The theme of yesterday’s puzzle was symbiosis and it featured three crossing pairs of answers that are in a symbiotic relationship: clownfish/anemone; tickbird/rhino; and fruit bat/fig tree. It was Lianna’s first day back in school (8th grade) and it feels like we’re back in science class too.

First, some carping. Jberg wrote: I’m not a biologist, but I don’t think any of those pairs qualify as SYMBIOTES. When I hear the word I think of benign intestinal bacteria, or some other pair much more closely related.

And Adam12 replied: I’m not a biologist either but these relationships are all generically symbiotic. Meaning they’re associated in life. I think you may be referring to the further distinctions of saprophytic, parasitic and mutualistic. (Thank you, Mr. Rubin, 1979 AP Bio.)

OK, we’re glad that’s cleared up.  The anemone provides the clownfish with protection and shelter, while the clownfish provides the anemone nutrients in the form of waste while also scaring off potential predator fish. It’s a win-win. BTW, the clownfish got its start on the Tonight Show and was heavily influenced by Codney Dangerfield and Phil Silverfish.

The tickbird and the rhino share a relationship because the rhino hosts the tickbird, and when the tickbird rides on the rhino’s back, it eats parasites and other insects off of the rhino’s back. The tickbird benefits the rhino because a rhino typically has near-sighted vision, and the tickbird has great vision, so when it sees a predator, it will squawk to alert the rhino.  It will also occasionally say “Watch where you’re going, you fat idiot — you almost walked us off a cliff.”

Last, a fruit bat will eat half of its weight in figs every night. A fruit bat who is selfish is where the phrase “I don’t give a fig” comes from. [No it doesn’t.] The bat will often take the fig away from the tree to eat it and fig seeds will fall as it’s eating, so the bat benefits the tree by spreading the seeds. It also spreads the seeds by pooping them out.

Here’s a fruit bat hanging upside down in a fig tree.

I’m with Rex on this next point — an oxpecker is so much funnier than a tickbird, no? Here’s what he says:

“Tickbird is slang I’ve never heard, and I don’t really get using it here, given that the name of the specific bird found on rhinos is the oxpecker, and guess how many letters oxpecker has? Yes, the same number as tickbird. There is no universe in which oxpecker doesn’t beat tickbird. There is no universe in which oxpecker doesn’t beat most things. Kindly add oxpecker to your wordlists and disperse it liberally throughout all future grids, as a fruit bat disperses fig seeds (though maybe less messily).” 

Here are a couple:

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This is the second puzzle in a week with a Z-led northwest (opening) corner. We had ZOMBIE and ZAPS recently, and today it’s ZORBA and ZAGS. ZORBA was factually clued with “1964 title role for Anthony Quinn.” If you saw the black-and-white movie, as I did twice, this tune (and the dance, the sirtaki) will be quite familiar to you. Here are the Rockettes performing it.

Nikos Kazantzakis wrote the book. These are his words:

“When an almond tree became covered with blossoms in the heart of winter, all the trees around it began to jeer. ‘What vanity,’ they screamed, ‘what insolence! Just think, it believes it can bring spring in this way!’ The flowers of the almond tree blushed for shame. ‘Forgive me, my sisters,’ said the tree. ‘I swear I did not want to blossom, but suddenly I felt a warm springtime breeze in my heart.”

*******
“I said to the almond tree, ‘Friend, speak to me of God,’ and the almond tree blossomed.”

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No Glam Slam. Handsome U.S. tennis star Taylor Fritz made it to the Sweet Sixteen (quarterfinals) but ran into the wall called Djokovic and lost in straight sets, 6-1, 6-4, 6-4. At least Djokovic didn’t throw a BAGEL at him. Did you know a “6-0 set, in tennis lingo” is called a BAGEL? That was 7D in the puzzle today. In baseball it’s a “goose egg,” and any number larger than one is a “crooked number.”

In an unusual note on the tennis tourney in Queens, according to today’s NYT, Alexander Zverev of Germany, the No. 12 seed, had a spectator thrown out for making Nazi references during his match with Italy’s Jannik Sinner. Zverev complained to the umpire who asked the man to identify himself. When he didn’t, other spectators pointed him out to security personnel, and he was escorted out. Zverev later said the man was singing the Nazi anthem, “Deutschland Uber Alles.” The anthem was banned after the war. It was later reintroduced, but with that phrase and verse deleted. Zverev won the match with Sinner in five grueling sets lasting 4 hours and 41 minutes, the longest match at the Open this year, so far. Poland fell in less time.

Zverev has been in the news for more than inspiring Nazi anthems. He was accused of abusing former girlfriend Olya Sharypova, but an investigation turned up insufficient evidence to support the claim. Another claim by a former beau met the same fate. Hmmmmmm. Owl Chatter’s view: Never trust a man who looks good in glasses.

The Gnats lost their sixth straight game to the Mets last night, 11-5. The wheels are coming off the bus.

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As I read today’s poem and decided to share it, I wondered if I’ve been favoring poems with children in them, like this one. I may be nostalgiac for that time — not for when I was a child myself, but for when my Caitlin and Sam were about nine and seven and I was the dad. I’m still the dad, but you know what I mean. This one is called “Nature Walk” and it’s by Gillian Wegener. It’s from today’s Writer’s Almanac.

The fern fronds glow with a clean, green light,
and I lift one and point out the spores, curled
like sleep on the back, the rows so straight,
so even, that I might be convinced of Providence
at this moment. My daughter is seven.
She looks at the spores, at the leaf, at the plant,
at this wise, wide forest we are in, and sighs
at my pointing out yet another Nature Fact.
But look, I say, each one is a baby ready
to grow. Each one can become its own fern.
But she is already moving down the path
toward the bridge and whatever’s beyond.

We often took hikes with the kids. Once we tried to take one on an estate called Skyland, but were besieged by bugs. Sam was so miserable he succeeded in getting us to cancel our plans after a short distance of trying to tough it out. As we were heading back to the car, Sam said, in his squeaky little voice: “I know this place is called Skyland, but it should be called Bugland.”

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According to a story in today’s NYT, the general manager of the Quality Inn in Absecon, NJ, complained to Det. Kiamos of the Galloway Township Police that the color of the pool at the inn was being tampered with. “It has to be by a drone,” she told him.

Instead of dismissing her as a lunatic, he said, “You might be on to something.” A drone was later tracked to a nearby business and Patrick J. Spina, IV, was arrested and charged with criminal mischief and harassment. He was using drones to drop packets of “Sea Dye” into local area pools changing their water color into bright neon shades. It’s a product used by people in need of rescue at sea — it serves the same function as a flare.

Spina was doing it as a prank and had a lot of fun. He’s in deep sh*t now because his victims had to spend thousands of dollars to have the dye removed. We’re setting up a small area in the idiot’s wing of the Owl Chatter Hall of Fame for him. Step right in, Pat!

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Enough nonsense for today? Enough. See you tomorrow.

Opinions may differ — as the commentariat sometime says, YMMV (your mileage may vary), but IMHO this poem from yesterday’s Writer’s Almanac is absolutely perfect. It’s called “The Sound of It” and it’s by Annie Lighthart.

Just a piano playing plainly, not even for long,
and yet I suddenly think of fields of timothy
and how a cow and I once studied each other over a fence
while the car ticked and cooled behind me.
When I turned around I was surprised that it had not
sprouted tall grass from its hood, I had been gone
so long. Time passes in crooked ways in some tales,
and though the cow and I were relatively young
when we started our watching, we looked
a bit younger when I left. The cow had downed a good
steady meal and was full of milk for the barn.
I drove away convinced of nothing I had been
so sure of before, with arms full of splinters
from leaning on the fence. There was no music—
I was not even humming—but just now the piano
played the exact sound of that drive.

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A special shout out to the head of the Owl Chatter math department, Bala Cynwyd Judy, whom we had dinner with last night on our way back from a jaunt down to DC for the Gnats game. We did better on the trig test she gave us than on the algebra, but enjoyed the visit overall very much.

The Gnats did gnot do well. In fact, since I raved about them last Tuesday, they’ve dropped five in a row. Ouch! When we were there they fell behind 9-1 by the fourth inning, so there wasn’t much drama. But it was a fun scene, Dominick and Laney popped dingers, and there was a great defensive gem by CJ that was breathtaking. There were 28 hits overall: 18 by Miami. We drowned our sorrows with Ethiopian food when it ended with a final score of 11-5.

Parking at the ballpark is very difficult, unless you are willing to pay $40 which I am not. So I prepaid ($17) for a spot in a lot about a mile away. When I arrived, I followed the instructions and placed the QR code I printed under the scanner. Nothing. I pressed a button and a female human voice greeted me. I explained the situation and she said she would open the gate for us. I waited about a minute before pressing the button again. “Are you opening it?” I asked. “Didn’t it open?” she said — not a good sign. She tried again with the same result. She said there was nothing more she could do on her end and we should drive around the block to the other entrance to the lot — the one my instructions told me not to use. I scanned the code there and it didn’t open at first, but then it did and I sped through before it could have second thoughts.

After the game we found our way back to the lot. I had to scan the code again to get out. It didn’t work. I pressed the button and a male voice answered this time. I explained about the code not working and he started saying something, but after three or four words the gate lifted. I burned rubber and didn’t look back.

Here’s a story from years ago I’ve always loved about Delaware (soon-to-be-Pennsylvania) Nancy’s dad, may he rest in peace. He was exiting a parking lot and there was a long line of cars waiting to pay and get out. When his turn came, the attendant told him owed for 2 hours and ten minutes. He explained he had been waiting on line for fifteen minutes and he wasn’t willing to pay extra for that time. The attendant said, “I’m sorry, but that’s what the machine says you have to pay.” So Nancy’s dad turned off the engine, took the key, left the car right where it was (blocking all the cars in line behind him) and started walking away. The attendant ran after him: “Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay . . . . “

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In yesterday’s puzzle, the clue at 23D was “Hesiod’s ‘Theogony’ and ‘Works and Days’” and the answer was EPICS. It prompted this exchange.

Rick started with: Pedantic comment: No one who has read Works and Days and Theogony would call them “epics.” Epic has a more specific meaning in ancient literature, and neither of those fits it.

Then, Mike in Bed Sty countered:

Pedantic, but incorrect. “Epic” does have a specific meaning, and that specific meaning is a poem in dactylic hexameter, regardless of the narrative content. The meaning of epic to which you are referring is the meaning in modern literature, not ancient literature.

[Of course!]

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Deion Sanders, no relation to Bernie, is the only athlete ever to play in both the Super Bowl and the World Series. He won the Super Bowl twice, once with SF over San Diego and once with Dallas over Pittsburgh. In four games of the 1992 World Series with Atlanta, Sanders batted .533 with four runs, eight hits, two doubles, and one RBI while playing with a broken bone in his foot. The Braves lost to Toronto. In refusing to give up one of the sports, Deion explained: “Football is my wife, and baseball is my mistress.” You may recall Michael Jordan tried his hand at baseball and couldn’t hack it. Deion was spectacular at football, and not too shabby at all with the mistress. He’s had some health issues of late — several toes from his foot were removed due to blood clots.

He’s back in the news (his nickname is Prime Time) as a college football head coach with Colorado. He was very successful coaching Jackson State last year and was offered the bigger spot at Colorado. His son Shedeur is the quarterback. Colorado went 1-11 last year and was a 20-point underdog going into yesterday’s game with TCU (Texas Christian U) at TCU. TCU, we painfully recall, put a hurt on Michigan in the playoffs last year — they good.

Sanders cleaned house at Colorado, encouraging a record number of players to transfer elsewhere, and he brought in his own folks. Travis Hunter plays for them — he was the nation’s #1 recruit and he’s a “two-way player,” i.e., he plays offense and defense. Yesterday he played in 129 plays, catching 11 passes for 119 yards, and intercepting a pass on the goal line. Sanders said they’re going to put a hot tub on the plane for him.

With 7 minutes to go, TCU took a 42-38 lead. Sanders knew his boys would score again so the issue was could they stop TCU to hold on? There was 4:25 on the clock when Colorado’s Dylan Edwards hauled in a 46-yard TD pass from Shedeur, who finished the day with 510 passing yards, a school record. Deion’s son Shilo is on the team too and led them with ten tackles. The stunning upset was complete when the defense held.

If you don’t know Sanders — he ain’t shy. Here he is after the win:

“We’re gonna continuously be questioned because we do things that have never been done. And that makes people uncomfortable. When you see a confident Black man sitting up here and talking his talk, walking his walk, coaching 75 percent African Americans in a locker room, that’s kind of threatening. Oh, they don’t like that.

“But guess what, we’re gonna consistently do what we do because I’m here, and I ain’t going nowhere. I’m about to get comfortable in a minute. I’m about to get comfortable in a minute.”

Here’s Deion with ESPN’s Ed Werder, who must have dissed the Buffaloes before the game.

“What’s up, boss? Do you believe now?”

Werder continued to ask his question.

“Hold on. Hold on. Oh, no. Do you believe now? Huh? I read through that bull junk you wrote. I read through all that. I sifted through all that. Oh, no.”

“Can I ask my question?” Werder asked.

“Do you believe?”

“Believe what?” Werder asked.

“You don’t believe. You just answered it. You don’t believe. Next question.”

We’ll be keeping an eye on the Coloradans this season, their coach and his kids. For sure.

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Deion has been married and divorced twice and has five children. He is currently engaged to marry, and is living with, Tracey Edmonds, a very successful show biz producer. She was married to Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds with whom she has two children. After that she married Eddie Murphy but they split after twelve days. Guests at the wedding said they could hear the couple shouting. Not a good sign.

Babyface said he had bad vibes about Murphy but raved about Deion when he (Babyface) was on Oprah. He said Deion reached out to him to set up a lunch meeting. Deion told him Tracey was going to introduce him to the kids and he didn’t want to meet them before getting to know their dad a little. Pretty classy, Prime Time.

I always liked Deion. He was (and still is) the hottest of hot dogs. But he backs it up. Owl Chatter wishes Tracey and him and the Buffaloes much success.

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The puzzle today had mountains as a theme. So I posted:

The Old Man of the Mountain, aka Old Stone Face, was a series of five granite cliff ledges in Franconia, New Hampshire, that appeared to be the jagged profile of a human face. It was a symbol of significance for several Indian peoples and became a cultural icon for NH.

It collapsed on May 3, 2003, prompting folk singer Tom Rush, who is from NH, to comment: You know you’re old when you outlive geological formations.

Pabloinnh posted this later:

True dat about The Old Man of the Mountain. If you’re ever in NH on May 3 and wonder why everyone is wearing black or what the “two minutes of silence” are for, that’s it.

Nah-just made that up. We do have two nice pieces of art depicting The Old Man, and you can look through special telescope type things with inserts at where he used to be to see what he looked like, if that’s your idea of a good time.

From one old man to another– we miss you Buddy. See you tomorrow folks!

When Dobbs was decided, historian Heather Cox Richardson “suggested to a group of people that it was only a question of time until we saw laws designed to make it impossible for women to travel across state lines. They told me there was no way such a thing could happen in the US.”

Yesterday she noted “Alabama attorney general Steve Marshall claimed in a court filing on Monday that Alabama can prosecute people who help women travel out of the state to obtain an abortion as part of a ‘criminal conspiracy.’” 

And Caroline Kitchener reported in the Washington Post that at least 51 jurisdictions in Texas have passed ordinances to make it illegal to transport anyone on roads within city or county limits to get an abortion. Their hope is to target interstates and the roads around airports to block off routes out of Texas.  The laws also allow any private citizen to sue any person or organization they think is violating the ordinance.

Richardson notes: Such barriers are precisely the same as those for people trying to leave authoritarian countries. Someone who is prohibited from leaving a jurisdiction is not a citizen but a subject. Authoritarian countries also urge people to turn on each other, reporting them to the state for punishment.

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This poem by Seamus Heaney was in The Writer’s Almanac yesterday. It’s called “Digging.”

Between my finger and my thumb
The squat pen rests; snug as a gun.

Under my window, a clean rasping sound
When the spade sinks into gravelly ground:
My father, digging. I look down

Till his straining rump among the flowerbeds
Bends low, comes up twenty years away
Stooping in rhythm through potato drills
Where he was digging.

The coarse boot nestled on the lug, the shaft
Against the inside knee was levered firmly.
He rooted out tall tops, buried the bright edge deep
To scatter new potatoes that we picked,
Loving their cool hardness in our hands.

By God, the old man could handle a spade.
Just like his old man.

My grandfather cut more turf in a day
Than any other man on Toner’s bog.
Once I carried him milk in a bottle
Corked sloppily with paper. He straightened up
To drink it, then fell to right away
Nicking and slicing neatly, heaving sods
Over his shoulder, going down and down
For the good turf. Digging.

The cold smell of potato mould, the squelch and slap
Of soggy peat, the curt cuts of an edge
Through living roots awaken in my head.
But I’ve no spade to follow men like them.

Between my finger and my thumb
The squat pen rests.
I’ll dig with it.

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Gotta run! Shooting down for a quick trip to catch the Gnats tangling with the pesky Marlins. Pizza on the way in Baltimore (with clams!) at Joe Squared. Already drooling. See you later.

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Let’s wallow in glamour today, at least a little bit. Is there a more glamorous couple in the public eye right now than #1 US tennis pro Taylor Fritz and his babe Morgan Riddle? To argue against, you will need to explain why they were splashed across the front page of today’s NYT Style section looking, well, pretty damn glamorous. (I’m not using the pics from the Times because Phil’s are so much better. He gets into their souls. It’s a gift. See below)

Taylor is ranked ninth in the world and #1 in the U.S. He’s 25 years old and 6′ 5″. He has a son with his ex-wife Raquel Pedraza, who also played pro tennis. “Pedraza” means to pick up a stone and throw it and injure somebody. I can see how that could be annoying.

Morgan turned 26 last month, was born in Minny, and went to college at Wagner on Staten Island. She’s 5′ 7″. She’s sharp and has her fingers in many pies, if that’s the expression. Tik Tok, fashion, show biz, etc. She grew up in an ice hockey universe, but it’s all tennis now.

They met through the dating app RAYA in 2020 and are very close, especially in this picture.

If he’s stupid enough to ever let go, you’ll see she looks like this.

She’ll be keeping her pretty eyes on Fritz as he competes in the U.S. Open this week, and so will we.

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Owl Chatter is hitting the road in October with a trip to Ireland. My doc said no special vaccines are necessary, and I’m sure no travel warnings would be more serious than “The beer in this pub is flat,” or “The fiddler in that pub will hurt your ears.” But starting last Tuesday, some Canadians are getting a more troubling warning from their government and it’s not about Ireland.

According to the Times, gay Canadians are being warned by the Canadian government that parts of the U.S. may not be safe to visit. They are being told they may be affected by a series of recently enacted state laws targeting gays. Helen Kennedy, the director of Egale Canada, an LGBTQ rights group, noted that some of the problem states, e.g., Florida, are popular tourist destinations. But gay Canadians are starting to ask, “Is this the best place to spend my money?”

God Bless America.

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Oil and gas companies, their shills in the GOP, and others opposed to responsible climate action are increasingly turning to crackpot conspiracy theories to make their case, according to today’s NYT. E.g., social media that racked up millions of views blamed the Maui fires on a “directed energy weapon.”

Not buying that one? Well, let’s blame it on Oprah then. A Youtube video claims she started the fires hoping to seize land from the natives. Its proof was she recently bought a large plot on the island and her properties escaped damage. (The NYT noted she has lived on the island part time for 15 years, and her home was far from the fires.) What clinched the argument was that Oprah was interviewed about the fires and “failed to appear sufficiently sad.” Here she is, insufficiently sad, trying to see if she smells smoke.

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As we discussed yesterday, Crossworld exploded over yesterday’s puzzle, mostly with very negative comments. There were a total of 247 comments on Rex’s blog, the third highest total ever. I joined the minority view — I kinda liked the puzzle.

Here is a comment from B$ that was posted today, and a reply from Rex.

“I just wanted to comment on the tenor of the comments from yesterday. There was an overall harshness that was quite, to my mind, unnecessary. I can’t tell if people are just sort of taking their cue from Rex, who had nothing nice to say about the puzzle, or if folks in general just need to vent. To me the puzzle was a very creative attempt that had some obvious flaws to it, but at the end of the day it’s just a puzzle. The string of unrelenting harsh, negative comments (Lewis, NOT YOU!) had a real sour tone. But maybe that’s just where America is in 2023, and this blog is just a sad microcosm of that.”

Rex replied:

“I think the ‘sad microcosm’ is the babies who cannot handle any criticism, and who demonize and disparage people simply because they have different opinions. The ‘only say nice things’ tyranny/inanity is exhausting. I am happy that some enjoyed yesterday’s puzzle. But some of y’all really need to learn to live in a world where not everybody likes what you like. I have. People lay into my write-ups Daily. It’s (mostly) … fine?” —RP

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Women’s volleyball is pretty big in Nebraska. The University’s team has been a powerhouse for years under coach John Cook. They routinely sell out their home venue which holds 8,000. But last night’s game against Omaha was something on a different order altogether. It was moved to the football stadium where it was watched by 92,003 fans. Not a typo! It was the largest crowd for a women’s athletic event anywhere, ever. The atmosphere was electric. Nebraska won. Here’s what it looked like at game time.

And Coach Cook.

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In the learn-something-new-and-worthless-every-day dept., a puzzle I worked on in the New Yorker by Wyna Liu whom I met at the tournament, had a clue that was “punk mentality, e.g.,” and the answer turned out mystifyingly to be DIY, which I know stands for do it yourself, like on home repairs, etc. What does it have to do with, like, punk rockers and their ilk? Well, I undertook serious and extensive research (you know, a couple of minutes online), and I see now how it works:

In creating your punk “look,” the “mentality” is to put it together yourself and eschew products spewed forth by corporate america. For example, don’t buy pre-ripped jeans, create them yourself. And my beautiful Lianna, who is not punk but who is a “cool person” (almost 14), has shown me how she makes her own artsy buttons/pins, to safety-pin onto her clothes. So I can see how DIY works as an answer for that clue. There is that element in the ethos.

Hi girls! Take a load off — let me see if I can scare up an ash tray. Care for some borscht? — it’s not vegetarian, if that matters. Glad you could stop by — it’s been a quiet day.

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Glad you could stop by too — see you tomorrow!

The Gnats played up in Toronto last night. There was a very good crowd of over 40,000. It was Loonie Night. A loonie, you may know, is a $1 Canadian coin. What made it Loonie Night is the Blue Jays were selling hotdogs for just a loonie. They called them Loonie Dogs. The scoreboard showed how many loonie dogs were sold by the eighth inning. Wanna guess?

Over 70,000.

That ducklike bird on the loonie is, of course, a loon (duh). The coin is an eleven-sided Reuleaux polygon, i.e., the sides are circular arcs. Reuleaux was a German engineer. That lady on it is Lizzie — not our Vermont Lizzie, — the other one, from England.

The Gnats won 5-4 — a brilliant game that meant nothing to them and everything to the Blue Jays who are in the playoff hunt. The Gnats are playing solely for the love of the game and for each other. For an old jaded baseball fan like me, it’s beautiful to watch. I can’t remember enjoying a baseball season as much as I’ve enjoyed this one.

The Gnats threw a rookie into centerfield — Jake Young, a good-looking young man who played college ball at U. Florida, started the season in the low minors and steadily worked his way up, arriving in DC just last week. He turned 24 four days ago. An early 5-1 Gnat lead was cut to 5-3, and Toronto had a runner on third in the eighth inning with only one out. The runner was Alejandro Kirk — a good hitter but chunky, and very slow afoot. I wondered why they didn’t pinch run for him since he represented a key run and it was getting late. But they didn’t. Sure enough, the batter hit a fly ball to medium center field. Young catches it and Kirk tags and starts waddling home. Young let loose a gorgeous perfect throw to catcher Ruiz who caught it and slapped the tag on Kirk. It was incredibly close — any other runner would have scored easily. The ump called Kirk out, for the third out, but as the announcers were cutting to commercial you could hear that Toronto was challenging the call — they saw something on the tape that lead them to believe Kirk was safe. We held our breath and waited for the commercials to end. When they did, the call was upheld. The runner was out. Take a deep breath. It was still 5-3. Our closer Kyle Finnegan would nail it down in the ninth. No question.

Except he gave up two hits on two pitches and walked the next batter. Bases loaded, no outs. Arggggh. But he didn’t look rattled — he looked determined. The next batter, Schneider, had homered and doubled for Toronto, but Finnegan struck him out. Okay. That’s good. Now Guerrero was up — their slugger. He came in second in the MVP voting just two years ago. His dad’s in the Hall of Fame. He swings big but taps a slow roller to third. Vargas charges in. The runner from third was going to score, there was nothing Vargas could do about that, but he fired the ball off balance all the way across the infield to Dom Smith at first. Smith has to shift his feet on the base and extend his reach as far as he can to catch the ball with Guerrero bearing down on him, but he does it all like a dancer and the ump calls Guerrero out. It was just by a hair, but he looked out to me, and anyway the Jays used up their challenge on the call at the plate. The run that scored made it 5-4, but that out was the second out. The advantage swung back to the Gnats. Vargas and Smith had handed the game back to Finnegan. It would take a hit now for Toronto to tie the score. And Finnegan was done giving up hits. The next batter popped out and it was over.

In the post-game interview manager Davey Martinez was asked how Finnegan was able to work through the inning after getting into so much trouble and he just said “Ice.” He’s made of ice and never feels the situation is beyond his control.

Treat yourself to a Loonie Dog, Kyle — they’re only a buck tonight.

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When I’m deciding whether to include a poem in the day’s chatter, I read it several times. It’s not a test, but it’s nice when I like it more each time I read it. This poem is from today’s Writer’s Almanac. It’s by David Budbill and is called “Invisible Visitors.”

All through August and September
            thousands, maybe
tens of thousands, of feathered
            creatures pass through
this place and I almost never see
            a single one. The fall
wood warbler migration goes by here
            every year, all of them,
myriad species, all looking sort of like
            each other, yellow, brown, gray,
all muted versions of their summer selves,
            almost indistinguishable
from each other, at least to me, although
            definitely not to each other,
all flying by, mostly at night, calling to each
            other as they go to keep
the flock together, saying: chip, zeet,
            buzz, smack, zip, squeak—
            those
sounds reassuring that we are
            all here together and
heading south, all of us just passing
            through, just passing
through, just passing through, just
            passing through.

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I really should read more stuff by Molly Ivins, or any, tbh. She was born on this date in 1944 in California but was raised in Texas. After studying at Smith and Columbia’s School of Journalism she spent her career as a journalist and humorist skewering right-wing Texas politicians. Low-hanging fruit for sure, but she was very very funny.

One time, she wrote about the Republican congressman from Dallas: “If his IQ slips any lower we’ll have to water him twice a day.” It reminded me of one of my favorite Barney Frank ripostes. He was at a town hall and a woman asked a question that revealed her to be a moron. Frank said, “Madam, talking to you would be like talking to a table.”

Ivins died of breast cancer in 2007 when she was only 62. How good was she? She could even be funny about that. “Having breast cancer is massive amounts of no fun. First they mutilate you; then they poison you; then they burn you. I have been on blind dates better than that.”

Thank you for lending your voice to the madness, Molly. Happy Birthday.

What do you say, folks — let’s remember her young, pretty, and alive.

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It’s also the birthday of Mary Shelley (1797). Here’s how her novel Frankenstein starts:

 “It was on a dreary night of November that I beheld the accomplishment of my toils. … It was already one in the morning; the rain pattered dismally against the panes, and my candle was nearly burnt out, when, by the glimmer of the half-extinguished light, I saw the dull yellow eye of the creature open; it breathed hard, and a convulsive motion agitated its limbs.”

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The puzzle by Alex Eaton-Salners today was unusual and Rexworld exploded. There have been over 200 comments. Rex started it (well, duh) with: “One of the most unpleasant solving experiences of all time.” Ouch! The majority of comments piled on. I kinda liked it. What happened was every one of the across clues was a “fill in the blank” that told a story about a young couple meeting and falling love. The girl’s name was Ava and she falls for Dana, who could be a boy or a girl. A down clue for HODGES is: “Obergefell v. ___, Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage,” so I’m guessing it’s gay girls. Ava plays the Oboe and Dana the tuba.

All of the across clues/answers work together to tell their cute story of a young romance. The last three are: (68A) Ava and Dana shared their first kiss over cream SODAS. (69A) And of course THEY lived (70A) happily EVER after.

I don’t know why it was hated so deeply by so many. Here’s a typical comment. It’s by whatsername. (Lewis is someone who is always positive, and Nancy sometimes mentions throwing the puzzle at the wall in disgust.)

“A puzzle only Lewis could love. While I always try to appreciate the effort to do something different, this inanity stretched the limits of my generosity. I almost pitched it at Nancy’s wall about the halfway point but decided to see it through. I’m not commenting on the content of the “story“ – I will leave that for others to discuss if they so choose – but this was like following one of those maze puzzles on paper place mats that restaurants give kids to keep them occupied. It felt insulting to have one handed to me as an adult.”

I chimed in with: “C’mon folks — how about a little sympathy — the kid played the tuba. I’m in the thumbs up camp – ah, young romance — there’s nothing like it, in any format.”

In addition to the concept, Rex hated some of the clues/answers. 24D was “Like buses and bicycles,” and the answer was RIDABLE. Here’s Rex on it: Nothing to say about this one. Oh, except RIDABLE, LOL, what? RIDABLE!? A risible answer. Is that even a word? “Is this bus RIDABLE?” “No.” “Uh … but …” “Sorry, no, UNRIDABLE. You want the 15 Northbound.” [Door closes in would-be rider’s face] [End scene].

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Pabloinnh mentioned yesterday that his wife and he were celebrating their 53rd anniversary so many of us offered congratulations and today he thanked us and said: “We had a low-key day but learned something from our five-year old granddaughter, who informed us that she ‘wears stretchy clothes to bed in case I get wider.’ Bet you never thought of that.”

Yup. It happens.

Poster Gary Jugert shared this non-puzzle note with us:  I am back home from travels in Wyoming and Montana. Stunningly beautiful places. You can still drive 90 miles an hour for hours and see absolutely nothing. And did you know that 100% of hotels allowing dogs and offering free breakfast also play Fox News blaring really loud, and according to the shows and the commercials supporting the shows … this came as news to me … liberals are bad. So apparently, if you’re woke, you should stop doing that. I saw a young woman in Thermopolis wearing a t-shirt reading “0% Woke and 100% sick of their shit.” When I was her age I wore t-shirts that said, “Pink Floyd.” These days I wear Carhartt t-shirts because they last longer.

Yesterday, poster Gill I. mentioned her 2004 Ford Taurus that has 200,000 miles on it which she hopes to take to the grave with her. It prompted me to share this joke:

This very rich guy in a small town in Arkansas puts in his will that he is to be buried in his white Cadillac convertible. So he dies and the undertaker sets his body up in the Cadillac. Two local kids are watching the burial from a nearby hill. As the Cadillac is lowered into the grave, one turns to the other and says, “Man, that’s livin’”

I told Phil I’d be using that joke and here’s a shot he came up with. The guy’s incredible. In the photo, it’s a 1973 Pontiac the decedent requested to be buried in.

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Let’s close today with a sweet song by Nanci Griffith. It’s called “One Blade Shy of a Sharp Edge.” Rex shared it as part of his grumbling over “Curtain trims, e.g.,” answer: EDGINGS. Sadly, Nanci died two years ago at the age of 68. She was a Texas girl.

See you tomorrow! Thanks for popping by.

Linda and I were waiting in a medical office this morning. The nurse called Linda’s name and, before she led her back, said “Your husband can watch your bag.” That’s me, and I said “Sure,” even though it completely didn’t go with my outfit. Anyway, a woman sitting alone a few seats over said to me, “Can you watch mine too when they call me?” (I didn’t.)

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Here’s a poem by Rita Dove. It was her birthday yesterday (71). She’s from Akron and is a crossword puzzle fanatic. This poem is called American Smooth.

We were dancing—it must have
been a foxtrot or a waltz,
something romantic but
requiring restraint,
rise and fall, precise
execution as we moved
into the next song without
stopping, two chests heaving
above a seven-league
stride—such perfect agony,
one learns to smile through,
ecstatic mimicry
being the sine qua non
of American Smooth.
And because I was distracted
by the effort of
keeping my frame
(the leftward lean, head turned
just enough to gaze out
past your ear and always
smiling, smiling),
I didn’t notice
how still you’d become until
we had done it
(for two measures?
four?)—achieved flight,
that swift and serene
magnificence,
before the earth
remembered who we were
and brought us down.

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We had lunch afterwards at Destination Dogs, a terrific bar/hot dog place in New Brunswick, NJ. I learned of it from Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. We split two dogs. The first was called “Pig Trouble in Little China” and was linked to SF as its “destination.” Here’s its description: Cantonese sausage, fried shrimp, hoisin sauce, pepper jelly, orange zest, sesame seeds, scallions. It was out of this f*cking world. Our second I designed myself: Bratwurst, queso fresco, cole slaw, cherry pepper relish, scallions, black beans, and horseradish sauce. Also excellent.

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David Wineberg sent this in to the NYT, as a “reimagined song:”

On the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me:
Twelve NFTs
Eleven forests burning
Ten migrants trudging
Nine bots a-tweeting
Eight cows a-belching
Seven drones a-spying
Six trolls a-doxxing
Five plastic sporks!
Four Covid tests
Three face masks
Two climate skeptics
and a cartridge for an AR-15

[I had to look up NFT. It’s a “non-fungible token:”  a unique digital identifier used to certify authenticity and ownership (as of a specific digital asset). And “doxxing” means to publicly reveal personal information about someone, like for revenge. (“Outing” could be used to reveal that a person is gay or a person’s private gender identity.)]

Here’s a cow a-belching. What the hell is she eating? That can’t be healthy.

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Take me out to the ballgame — and then straight to the emergency room!! Yikes — two women were shot at the White Sox game last Friday. Police determined the shots came from inside the stadium and asked for the game to be halted for safety reasons, but the Chisox said, “Nah, let’s just keep playing.” It was a big mistake: they lost 12-4. Both women are okay — one sustained leg wounds and the other was just grazed and refused medical attention. “I said no!”

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In yesterday’s puzzle there was a clue about people who are season-ticket holders to several different teams and the answer was SPORTS NUTS. It led egsforbreakfast to post:

I think North Carolina passed a bill that says “No person who SPORTSNUTS at birth shall be allowed to participate in women’s athletics.”

Charlie Chaplin was in the puzzle today, as a bow-tie wearer, along with COLONEL SANDERS, KRUSTY THE CLOWN, and THE CAT IN THE HAT. It was National Bow Tie Day this week (I’m not kidding). As to Chaplin, one poster noted he was dyslexic and often wore a BLOWER.

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There are so many areas about which I’d have to confess ignorance, and pro wrestling is certainly one of them. So it’s no surprise that I was puzzled when I read yesterday’s obit by Eduardo Medina in the NYT on Hall of Fame wrestler Terry Funk, who died at age 79. It said “He became known as a fierce wrestler who wielded improvised weapons against his opponents: chairs and ladders, barbed wire and bats, trash cans and fire.”

What? Aren’t there refs at these matches? You can bring stuff like that into the ring — barbed wire and ladders? No one was suspicious in between rounds when he started unspooling barbed wire or lit up a torch? I’m mystified. Medina goes on:

“Many of his highlight reels show him a bloodied mess, his long wet hair slicked back and his face bleeding from some kind of punch, kick or chair shot.”

“Chair shot?” Is that a thing like a type of hold?

Terry’s dad Dory Sr. was a well-known wrestler and promoter in Texas after serving in the South Pacific in WW2 and it was in Texas that Terry’s love of the sport deepened. In 1989 he had one of the most acclaimed matches of his career against Ric Flair. I’ll let Medina describe the action:

“The 20-minute contest was an ‘I Quit’ match, in which both men would scuffle and fight until one man surrendered. The match, now regarded as a classic, was a showcase for the brutal realism that drew fans to pro wrestling.

“There were chest slaps from Flair, headlocks by Funk, tosses out of the ring, wrangling along the sidelines, hair yanks and repeated shrieks from both wrestlers: ‘Want to quit?’

“Finally, when Flair wound Funk into a figure-four leg lock, Funk, his face contorted in pain, said the words that prompted the bell to ring: ‘I quit.’”

Terry and Ric Flair were life-long friends. See below (Terry’s on the right).

Funk married his wife Vicky Ann in 1965 and they were married for 53 years until her death in 2019 — she was his longest hold. Cause of death was a “chair shot.” [No it wasn’t.] They had two daughters, Stacy and Brandee, and three grandchildren. Funk is also survived by his brother Nelson, and his step-brother Half-Nelson.

The obit ends with the following statement of Funk’s:

“When I grew up, I was fortunate enough to live the wrestler’s life, a life that gave me stories to tell, just like the ones I had heard as a boy. Pirates, millionaires, kings and adventurers have nothing on me! I would trade my life with no one.”

Rest in peace, Terry.

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David LaFlamme also passed away this month, at 82. He and his wife Linda formed the band It’s a Beautiful Day in 1967, and wrote the song “White Bird,” which you old-timers should remember. Oddly, as a single, it didn’t make the top 100, probably because of its length, but it was a favorite on FM channels. LaFlamme also formed a band called Electric Chamber Orkustra, with Bobby Beausoleil who would later be convicted of murder as a follower of Charles Manson. Creepy enough for you?

Here are David and Linda in 1970 singing “White Bird.” Recognize the venue, anybody? — It’s Tanglewood.

White bird
In a golden cage
On a winter’s day
In the rain.

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See you tomorrow! Thanks for stopping by.

It’s a very quiet celebration this time around at Owl Chatter headquarters. Taylor is off touring outside the country. Our sports heroes are battling their battles, or getting ready to start the new NFL season. And we’re all still in shock over dear Yevgeny’s terrible demise. I checked the freezer downstairs to see what he left us from his visit a few months ago. It’s a big vat of his famous borscht (a beet soup, if you don’t know). He may have known he didn’t have much time, because he left this note and an instructional video.

“Dear Owl Chatter friends. How honored it was for men and me for invitation to big celebrate. My heart was warm from watching enjoyment of foods and vodkas. Tyler Swift and Owl Wilma have much beauty and grace. All best wishes from your friend Yevgeny P. and entire Wagner Group. Here is secret borscht video – even Putin doesn’t have. F*ck him!”

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Whew. Hard to follow that. But Yev would not have wanted us to grieve, so let’s be joyful, let’s do our best. In addition to Wilma and Welly today, we’re just having our incredible staff photographer Phil and one special surprise guest who insisted on “crashing the party” — his favorite subject: Ana! First, come on in Philly!! — always great to see you! Here, let me help you find a seat. How about a cold Zaydie? We’re having borscht too!

Now let’s see if you can top your earlier work with Ana, — hard to imagine there’s room for improvement!

Wow — should have never doubted you, Buddy — Ana, spectacular as always. So good of you to stop by. Please grab a cold Zaydie or a seltzer – the borscht should be ready soon. Dammit! — I don’t think we have crackers. Wilma — do we have any crackers for the borscht? Check the cabinet over the toaster.

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Thanks for sticking with us, everybody.

Here’s Leonard Cohen to walk us off tonight — You got us singing!

See you tomorrow!

We’re trying not to be too sad about the end of summer here at Owl Chatter. It’s good, in that respect, that my semester starts early, so I can busy myself a little with classwork. We try to look forward to what the Fall will bring. Welly and Wilma will be visiting their son Worthington in Michigan for Thanksgiving, which is otherwise their least favorite holiday, centered as it is on the devouring of birds.

So let’s make today’s poem from The Writer’s Almanac our final sad note on the passing of summer. It’s by Faith Shearin and is called “The Last Swim of Summer.”

Our pool is still blue but a few leaves
have fallen, floating on the surface

of summer. The other swimmers
went home last week, tossed

their faded bathing suits aside,
so my daughter and I are alone

in the water which has grown colder
like a man’s hand at the end of

a romance. The lifeguard is under
her umbrella but her bags are packed

for college. We are swimming against
change, remembering the endless

shores of June: the light like lemonade,
fireflies inside our cupped hands,

watermelon night. We are swimming
towards the darkness of what

is next, walking away from the sounds
of laughter and splashing, towels

wrapped around the dampness of our loss.

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A quick follow-up note on yesterday’s chatter about Pattie Boyd, the British model in the Sixties who married George Harrison and then Eric Clapton. I forgot to mention that she was the inspiration for Harrison’s Beatles song “Something.” He took the opening line (Something in the way she moves) from a James Taylor song. Pattie was also the inspiration for Eric Clapton’s massive hit “Layla.” The name comes from a Persian love story.

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Anybody recognize that number up there? It’s You-Know-Who’s booking number in Georgia. I’ll spare you the mug shot.

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We can’t let it go unremarked upon how well the Gnats are doing. They beat the Marlins again last night with a two-out-ninth-inning rally. I was asleep already, but the winning run came in on a passed ball. Weird. The Miami catcher just didn’t catch the pitch.

Their record now is 61-69, which is two games ahead of the Mets, and identical to that of the Padres, who have a lineup that reads like an all-star team and a bloated payroll. They’re only a game and a half behind the Yankees. Of course all three of those teams I named are having very disappointing seasons. And the Gnats aren’t. The expectations were low and they have been very much exceeded with some very good play.

Just a little more than a month to go in the regular season. We may be rooting for Atlanta when the playoffs start. Owl Chatter fave Max Fried pitches for them. Since coming off an injury August 4th, he’s pitched well in five starts, going 3-0. We will also be cheering for Baltimore.

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Here’s a hot-off-the-press scoop! One of the most beloved of Rex’s commentariat is “Nancy.” And she just let us know an item of hers was accepted by the NYT and will appear tomorrow in their “Favorite Songs and Prose, Reimagined” feature. Readers are invited to “rework” famous songs or writings. Nancy gave us a sneak preview of hers, below. (My favorite line is the rhyming of Alito with finito.)

The Ballad of SCOTUS (or Thomas’s Promises)
(to the tune of “June Is Busting Out All Over”)

Cash is pouring in all over,
The court is a great big money tree!
Lots of billionaires pursue me
And the gifts they offer to me
Are expensive and extensive as can be!

Yachts to take me to Bermuda!
Planes to whisk me off to France!
Though it may appear unseemly,
I will rule for you supremely,
Every time I have the glimmer of a chance.

Because it’s June! June! June!
Rulings come in June! June! June!

Decades of progress will be smashed,
Once all your checks are duly cashed!

Money’s pouring in all over!
Stare decisis is kaput.
With the help of Sam Alito
Roe v. Wade is now finito —
And I’ll soon be crushing Griswold underfoot!

Money’s pouring in all over!
I’ll be at your beck and call!
Ev’ry fabulous vacation
Makes me lower your taxation
To the point at which it won’t exist at all!

Because it’s June! June! June!
Rulings come in June! June! June!

Tossing aside with bad intent
Every last shred of precedent.

Perks are pouring in all over!
Travel’s more splendid than before.
With your money in my pocket
I’ll devote my shadow docket
To the N.R.A., Big Pharma and much more!

Cash is pouring in all over!
Ev’ry decision can be bent:
Though my rulings may be lawless,
Still my reasoning will be flawless
When I tell them what our founders really meant!

Because it’s June! June! June!
Rulings come in June! June! June! …
They’ll be coming Soon! Soon! Soon!!!

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Edgar Rice Burroughs was having a tough time of it. He failed the entrance exam for the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and tried his hand (and did badly) at being a cowboy, shopkeeper, gold miner, and railroad cop. But he was reading a lot of pulp magazines and he realized “if people were paid for writing rot such as I read in some of those magazines, I can write stories just as rotten.” He had never written anything, but so what? He hit paydirt when he invented Tarzan,  a white baby orphaned in the African jungle and raised by the she-ape Kala. He settled on the name Tarzan after considering “Zanter” and “Tublat Zan.” I think Tublat Zan might have been good – TZ for short.

Whatever you want to call him, he was a phenomenal success, generating over 24 novels and more than 40 films. It had a profound impact on the culture and science. Jane Goodall starting reading the Tarzan books when she was 11 and credits them with inspiring her determination to work in Africa. Ray Bradbury memorized passages and recited them to friends. He said, “Burroughs is probably the most influential writer in the history of the world.”

Get this — in the books, Tarzan is well-spoken and thoughtful. Burroughs did not like the rough, semiliterate film character with his “Me Tarzan, you Jane.” That most famous of lines is never uttered in the books. He made a fortune, of course, and bought 550-acres of ranchland east of LA and called it “Tarzana Ranch.” Today, it is Tarzana, a suburban neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley region of LA.

We are chattering about him because it was on this date in 1912 that the character of Tarzan “came to life” in All-Story Magazine.

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OK folks, I’m catching the next vine out of here. See you tomorrow for Post #300 — hope you can make it! Our photographer Phil will be on hand with some special shots of a favorite guest.

Today’s ‘zzle had the unmitigated gall to reference the Ohio State marching band! Hrummmmph, with a capital Hrum! It was at 23D and the clue was “It dots the “i” in the Ohio State marching band’s spelling of “Ohio.” The answer was SOUSAPHONE. I would have clued it with: What does a Sousa use when it has to make a call? An anonymous post on Rex’s blog compounded the sin by posting the video of the OSU band doing what the clue says it does. I couldn’t just let that pass, but I felt I had to remain civil. So I posted the following, with mitigated gall:

As a rabid Wolverines fan since pouring five years worth of (out-of-state) tuition into UMich (worth every penny), I would have been happy not to see the OSU band, but thanks for stoking the fires as the season is about to begin. BTW, the Michigan fight song, Hail to the Victors, was written by a UMich student, Louis Elbel. According to Wikipedia, Michigan alum and composer Charles D. Kountz said that John Philip Sousa told him that “The Victors” was “one of the nation’s finest military marches and the best original college song” he had ever heard. Go Blue!

Carola posted the following in response (I’m “Liveprof”):

Liveprof – Thank you for the note about Sousa and Michigan. As a native Wisconsinite, I’m a loyal Badger fan, but I think the Michigan fight song is terrific. I never go to football games, but the UW marching band practices in a field near where I live and so I hear every rehearsal – my ears always perk up when Michigan is coming to town. Apart from “On, Wisconsin” it’s the only college tune I know.

And here’s my reply:

Carola. You’re welcome! I’ve always been a sports fan but had no interest in college sports until my son went to UM. We tried to attend one game a year with him in The Big House back then, and I remember the first time their enormous band marched across the field before the game, playing their song. There’s nothing like it. I remember not liking Jim Harbaugh when he coached in the NFL. He seemed like a lunatic. He seems even more like a lunatic now, coaching Michigan, but he’s our lunatic and I love him. I bought my son a Jim Harbaugh bobblehead doll.

I was out visiting Madison WI back in the 80’s — loved it. I remember attending a minor league baseball game: The Madison Muskies. They left town in 1993.

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I just got a reminder call from a doc’s office and the person gave her name as Noah but it was a female voice, so I asked her how she spelled it and she said NOA, and that it’s also from the bible — a female Noa. That was new to me. It seems like it should be a popular name in Crossworld but I’ve never seen it.

Apparently, it’s a popular girl’s name in Israel. There is a story in the Bible about the daughters of Zelophehad. He did not have a son so the daughters (Noah, Tirzah, Mahlah, Hoglah and Milcah) went to Moses to ask God for the legal right to inherit their father’s property. God said OK and they became the first women in the ancient world to have legal rights to property ownership, apart from their fathers or husbands. The deal was they had to marry within their tribe so the property wouldn’t pass outside the tribe and they were okay with that. I guess they felt there were enough jerks in the tribe willing to marry them. The important thing was the mutual fund portfolio.

In modern Israel the name when used for women dropped the “h” to soften it. So that’s the story on NOA. Of course, we’ve all seen Zelophehad countless times in crossword puzzles — he’s a veritable Mel Ott.

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This story in tomorrow’s Met Diary is by Julia Kell.

Returning from a trip when I was a poor college student living on the Upper West Side, I decided to take mass transit home from the airport.

Boarding a bus for the last leg of the trip home, which in those days was a two-hour ordeal, I struggled my way on, dragging my suitcase and trombone.

A man sitting near the door lost his patience and began to yell at me for holding up the bus. Embarrassment washed over me as I continued to struggle.

Suddenly, I heard a woman a few seats away yell out in a commanding voice. “You leave her alone!” she bellowed.

I soon found a seat.

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I’m not sure why I love that story so much, but I am sure that I do. Do we each have one of those women in our family — a decency cop? We’re lucky if we do. Brava!

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The puzzle was an absolute bear today — halfway through it I thought I’d have to cave in and abandon it. But a few guesses worked and I was able to stagger through it. Of course, when I checked Rex’s blog, he labeled it “Easy.” D’oh!

Here’s a nice example of how hard, but clever, it was: At 56A the clue was “They’re often worn at long public events,” and the answer was FAKE SMILES. Been there, for sure. And how about 37D: “See star?” The answer was PONTIFF, as in The Pope, as in the Holy See. Ouch, right?

At 18A the clue was “Takeoff in pole position, perhaps?” and the answer was STRIPTEASE. Good one! Hold on a sec, I need to enter that into the Dirty Old Man Dept., along with its partner at 26D: “On a streak?” — NAKED.

I didn’t know 30A but I think I should have: The clue was “Model Boyd of London’s ‘Swinging Sixties’ era,” and the answer was PATTIE. Any of you remember Pattie Boyd?

She was a drop-dead gorgeous model who changed the concept of what is beauty along with Jean Shrimpton back in the 60’s. She was cast as a schoolgirl when she was 20 in the first Beatles movie A Hard Day’s Night. Long story short — she married George Harrison in 1966. They couldn’t have kids and George didn’t want to adopt. Sadly, they split up in 1974, due in part to George’s many infidelities — his sleeping with Ringo’s wife Maureen was the last straw. Oh, no! Say it ain’t so! The divorce was very amicable, with George and Pattie showing much respect for each other.

Get this! George and Eric Clapton had become best friends and Clapton fell head over heels in love with Pattie. After George and Pattie split, she and Eric married. George and Clapton remained close friends — Harrison called Clapton his “husband-in-law.”

They tried to have kids but failed too, and Clapton had serious drinking and drug problems and was unfaithful, albeit not with Ringo’s wife, and he and Pattie split up too.

Happily, Pattie met Rod Weston in 1991, a real estate developer (not a guitarist) and they’ve been together since — getting married in 2015. Weston said of the marriage:  “It’s almost our silver anniversary so we thought we had better get on with it.” Pattie is 79 now. Here she is when she had the world on a string.

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Two of my three classes were good yesterday — the third was at 4pm and it was Friday, and they looked like the living dead. I’ve got bad vibes about that group. Good energy in the first two, though, especially the giant law class with 90 students – yikes! The room was packed but eventually attendance will drop by at least a third. Count on it

See you tomorrow!