Monday Morning Video Laugh - December 7, 2009

More fun at Adolf's expense...

Dinner last night: Turkey and swiss melt at Cafe 50s.

The Sunday Memory Drawer - Me and A Lot of Pregnant Women

Continuing on with my groinecological timebomb that was lit in last Sunday’s memory drawer, I pretty much ascribed to the notion that “ignorance was bliss.” I was ignorant and blissful. Unless I looked down yonder, the problem was frequently out of sight and definitely out of mind. And since I rarely had to visit a doctor for almost two and a half decades, nobody bothered me about it. At the same time, my father had been ignoring his doctor for perhaps four and a half decades.

Then he died of prostate cancer. My father, not his doctor.

Suddenly aware of how nasty family genetics can be, I decided to adopt a crusade for my own health and well being. I needed doctors of all shapes, forms, and specialties. ENT. Gastro. Podiatrist. You name it. I was collecting the business cards of some of the finest physicians in Westchester County. And I even landed with a general internist, who would be charged with giving me my first physical examination since the Mets’ World Series win in 1969. Dr. Fink.

He would live up to his name quickly. Because he naturally zoned in on the problem first detected by Dr. Fiegoli from the days when the Dick Van Dyke Show was still in prime time.

”You know that you have…”

Yes, I do.

”And it probably should have been addressed before…”

Uh huh.

”So, what do we want to do about it now?”

Can I come back in another 25 years with the answer?

No dice. Literally.

Dr. Fink said no immediate action was needed. We could monitor it on an annual basis with an ultrasound exam.

Hmmm, I thought. Ultrasound? That word doesn’t sound very sharp at all.

”Well, we want to keep on top of this because it could develop into cancer…”

Hello???

I got the name of the nearest ultrasound facility on my way out.

Over the next few years, I had two such places in my life. One in White Plains, New York and the other in Santa Monica, California after I moved to the Left Coast. And the experience was the same every time as I went in for my annual look to make sure that no, gasp, cancer, had occurred as a result of my congenital condition. Every time I went in for the exam, it was the same.

I was the lone guy in a room full of pregnant women. The magazines in the waiting room were always of the same mindset. ‘Babies.” “Women’s Day.” “Parents.” There was not a “Sports Illustrated” to be found for miles. One time, a lady asked me if my wife had already gone in for her exam.

”Don’t you want to be with her when you find out the sex of your child?”

I bitchslapped her in my mind. But my audible response to her was a bit more cordial.

”We just had a fight and she can’t stand the sight of me.”

Ms. Busybody recoiled a bit.

”Oh.”

She buried herself back in her magazine and proceeded to rip out some coupons for tampons. I was called in myself several minutes later and I left this addled loon in her naturally confused state, wondering just what my real story was.

There was another instance while having an ultrasound at St. John's Hospital in Santa Monica. One more time, I am surrounded by expectant mothers. I was the only drop of testosterone in the entire place. I tried to avoid eye contact but couldn't help but zero in on one lady off to the side. She looked damn familiar. Where the hell have I seen her before? Her head was covered by a veritable lion's mane of hair, but, deep down, the face was there and recognizable. I got my answer when the nurse called for the next patient to enter the magical magnetic chamber.

"Hayley Mills, please."

A-ha.

Okay, I doubted that Pollyanna was there for any baby-related business. I am guessing those eggs had turned to dust several years earlier. But, she smiled as she walked past me. I longed to see that busybody from my previous exam. She might have thought that I was Mr. Hayley Mills. "Let's get together, whadda you say..."

My fun only began when I got called for my turn in front of the big camera. Pants down. Underwear down. Lie down, please.

"Are you comfortable, sir?"

Duh.

"Okay, this is going to feel a little warm on you."

Ugh. Out came the green goo that preceded any ultrasound. And it got liberally applied all over my...

To make matters even worse, over the course of having this done to me for about six years in a row, never once did I get a male technician. Nope, every year, it was a lady. Usually someone around my age or younger.

Ten minutes a year always felt like ninety. And, lucky me. Each technician was incredibly thorough. Guiding their machine...and usually their right hand...all over the area directly south of my navel.

Miss, aren't you even going to buy me dinner first?

There was one year where the technician was particularly attractive. It didn't feel so bad that time.

"Miss, I'm going to give you thirty minutes to stop doing that."

Eventually, the imagined pain subsided and I squished my way out of the center, knowing that there would be another time perhaps 365 days away. Until, one year, there was a call from my doctor, who is a terrific urologist based in Santa Monica.

"Er, I think we spotted something we didn't want to see."

Gulp.

"It's probably best we remove it."

And we pause one more time. To be continued. Next Sunday.

Dinner last night: Chicken a la Romana at Fabiolus.

Classic TV Commercial of the Month - December 2009

For Pete's sake, didn't Santa use the electric razor he was hawking on TV?

Dinner last night: Seafood alfredo with my good friends Leo and Connie.

Dinner Last Night?

On Thanksgiving, the conversation had meandered off the way lots of conversations do. We started to talk about the ridiculousness of Facebook. I naturally chimed in on the stupidity of it. Especially when you have grown and seemingly sane people openly taking sex drive quizzes or fertilizing and live-stocking their virtual fields on some loony device called Farmville. I lamented about peoples' needs to let us know the most trivial moments of their day.

"I'm so happy to hug Grandma."

"I just had Mom's stuffing. Yummmmmm!"

"Ninja Assassins was the bomb!"

Who the fuck cares? I said rather emphatically.

But, then, my possibly ex-friends made a counter observation.

"Well, you do the same thing in your blog. You tell everybody what you had for dinner last night."

Hmmmmmmm.

Oh, and thanks for the comment. Hope you enjoyed today's turkey dinner. You won't be back next year.

But then, I gave some serious thought to the notion. Was I being hypocritical? Am I contributing to the "over information" frenzy by adding this little inconsequential line to my blog every day? Could it be that, gasp, I am as bad as everybody else?

Frankly, this is unsettling. I don't like to be grouped with, ugh, "everybody else."

I thought back to how this started. When I began the blog, I was looking for some sort of hook that would require me to do this every single day. If I had to update the previous evening's dinner, that would also mean I'm writing every day. Of course, as crafty as I am, I soon figured out that I don't have to write every single day to have a daily blog entry. I compose a lot in advance and simply save it. Then I access it the night before to load the dinner listing and I let it fly. You'll all be very happy to know that I don't plan my meals so far in advance that I know I'll be having "salisbury steak" at the Cheesecake Factory two weeks from next Monday.

I actually stole the daily meal reference from another blog done by a Hollywood screenwriter. She would include the contents of her previous day's lunch. That didn't work for me. Pretty much, every day you'd be reading about non-fat yogurt and fruit. Breakfast would be no better. The only daily variable is whatever I choose to spread on my toasted English muffin. Or the odd days where I opt for a bowl of Cheerios. Dinner for my blog made the most sense. And, as you can see, I did it more for me, than for your morbid curiosity.

Secretly, there was another selfish motive. I wanted to do this so I could monitor what I was eating. And perhaps even dine more healthy. The only trouble is I never bothered to check back historically to see just how well or poorly I was eating.

Until now.

Going back to the genesis of this blog, I can tell you that I eat out way too much. I frequently complain about families who have forgotten to gather around their own dining table every night for a home-cooked repast. Well, me, too. My roommate and I too often fall into the trap of "grabbing a bite to eat" at one of ten nearby restaurants. Statistically, the most frequented was the Cheesecake Factory, followed by Cafe 50s Diner and then BJ's in Westwood. If we stopped going to any of these places for a month or so, I am convinced that they will call to inquire about our health. Or send a mass card.

Yes, I know I eat way too much sausage. Sausage and peppers. Bratwurst. Dodger Dogs. I have a distinct affinity for meat in any kind of edible casing. I am German. Did you expect anything else, Vigates?

There used to be a lot more home-cooked meals in my house and you can certainly tell the difference. If you see "sandwich" or "salad," I'm home and I'm on my own in the kitchen. If you see "Chicken Francese with mushroom risotto," my roommate has cooked.

On two instances over the 1000 or so blog postings, I forgot to do the meal update. By 10 o'clock the next morning, I had ten e-mails inquiring as to whether I was ill and/or dead. I was not the former and definitely not the latter.

The dinner updates have also presented another problem for me. Over the past two years, there was a handful of days where I had to fabricate a meal. You see, I might have been engaging in a little white lie about my plans. Perhaps, I didn't want to do X, so I could do Y, but I didn't want to be entirely honest about Z. That's generally not an issue, until you realize that the recipient of said fib reads your blog and would instantly know that you did Y instead of X. There were four or five times over the life of this blog that a dine-out meal doesn't have a restaurant name attached. Now you know why.

I now realize that all of the above paragraphs also now can be classified as too much information.

I don't care. My friends can come back next Thanksgiving, but "Dinner last night" ain't going anywhere.

DINNER LAST NIGHT!!!!!!: Leftover minestrone soup and grilled sausage (what else???)

Season's Greetings From Mr. and Mrs. Tiger Woods

Dinner last night: Homemade minestrone soup.

And Wednesday's Very Special Guests Are...

Take a look at the guy on the left. Not only did these two crash the party, but they also brought along their cab driver.

---Just when you completely have lost faith in Washington DC's ability to make you laugh, this happens.

---By the way, the plot was done years ago. Remember when Lucy tried to sneak into Ricky's rehearsal at the Tropicana nightclub.

---Who's in charge of these White House parties anyway? I'm betting they even ran out of onion dip.

---It's obviously very easy to get into the White House. Just look at how Obama got there.

---POTUS has thrown the Secret Service under the bus for this snafu, but now it's coming out that the real fuck-up here came from his own party planner, Desiree Rogers (pictured on the side).

---Desiree, who also looks like one of Martha's Vandellas, is one of Michelle's chums from Chicago. Which means that "incompetence" is listed as a hobby on her resume.

---This chick will get none of the heat over this. Because Obama doesn't want to hear all the yammering from the screaming wench on the other side of the mattress.

---Jeez, Ms. Rogers, I'm thinking the next party you plan should be at Chuck E. Cheese.

---I had better security working the guests at my place on Thanksgiving.

---And we had onion dip left over.

---You just know that terrorists are watching this play out and laughing their Arab asses off.

---Hell, Desiree Rogers probably already got picked up by one at Starbucks this morning.

---It was tougher to get into a Best Buy last Friday.

---If you went out shopping on the day after Thanksgiving and got to the store before 8AM, your friendship with me has officially expired. Please turn in your ID card and your "Len Speaks" decoder.

---I watched the news reports about all these idiots on line at shopping malls. And I took a good look at them.

---Now I know why they call it "Black Friday."

---Speaking of which, the day was even darker for that dumbbell Tiger Woods, who may or may not have suffered injuries due to a car crash.

---Come on, Stupid, admit it. Your wife took a nine iron to your head.

---Because she finally figured out where you've been sinking your putts.

---At 2:45 in the morning. Can you really golf at that hour?

---I've heard about early tee times, but that is ridiculous.

---But maybe that's the best time to get somebody to handle your club.

---Or grip your bag.

---Okay, I'll stop.

---Now, I'm totally fantasizing. What if Obama and Desiree are really...

---Somebody smack me to my senses, please.

---I've got a great cable system in LA. Here's how they described on the program guide the Paul McCartney concert that aired on Thanksgiving night.

---"Paul McCartney returns to New York and gives a dynamic concert at legendary Shea Stadium."

---I watched this show primarily because I had friends attend the live event and they raved about it.

---The music was terrific. The camerawork, however, was from the Braille Institute.

---It was so sloppily and cheaply put together that the producers used video that some of the fans had shot on their cell phones.

---Meanwhile, somebody please bring Paul in for a re-do on that horrible plastic surgery.

---It's was like Joan Rivers had become one of the Beatles.

---The way he looks now, if Paul sang "I Am The Walrus," nobody would dispute it.

---For five minutes, I thought I had accidentally tuned into a PBS pledge drive concert with Johnny Mathis.

---Perhaps he should have just turned to his plastic surgeon and said, "let it be."

---Now, I'll definitely stop.

---No, no, one more. Meredith Baxter has just revealed that she's gay.

---So, Bridget really loved Betty?

---Done.

Dinner last night: Grilled beef sausage with beet salad.

The Best Movie Playing in LA Last Saturday Night...

...was seventy years, four hours long, and pretty much devoid of video game-like effects.

And it still got several hundred people to show up at the historic Egyptian Theater on Hollywood Boulevard. It was obvious that, after stuffing themselves on Thanksgiving dinner, people had no interest in any of the turkeys being served up at the local multiplex. Garbage like "Precious," "2012", and "The Blind Side." Nope, it was a perfect time to revel one more time in arguably the greatest motion picture of all time.

I myself have probably now seen "Gone With The Wind" a half dozen times in my lifetime. In screen time, that's one entire day of my life spent with Scarlett, Rhett, Melanie, and Mammy. I've seen some relatives less. Never once have I been disappointed with the events at Tara. Meanwhile, I'm pretty much always disappointed by certain relatives. But, I digress... Let's get back to a civil war that is worth talking about.

Whenever you revisit GWTW, you marvel that this epic could have been created by a Hollywood that was still in its veritable infancy. Talkies had only been around for a decade or so. Meanwhile, when you are enraptured by vistas like the setting sun behind Tara or the desolation of a Confederate army lying wounded in the streets of Atlanta, you are convinced all over again how great a film can be. Compare it then to modern day junk like "The Dark Night" or "Inglorious Basterds" and you'll be convinced that what comes off those reels is nothing but Quilted Northern two-ply toilet tissue. For instance, the last Batman nonsensical epic was almost three hours long and felt like a week. GWTW goes on for about four hours and feels like two. There is never a wasted shot or moment. Indeed, its storytelling is remarkably economical. There was a bunch of stuff in the original 1000 page novel by Margaret Mitchell that didn't even make it to the screenplay.

Amid all this greatness, the stories about GWTW's ignoble production are now legend. Producer David Selznick was rewriting the script on a daily basis. Ultimately, Victor Fleming is the one director credited, but there are about three others who filmed various segments of the movie. GWTW was created in a constant state of extreme confusion, yet none of the frenzy shows up on the screen. Once again, take a movie directed solely by hack Quentin Tarantino. He's fully in control and in charge, but the result is still nothing but the bottom of a Taco Bell dumpster.

The GWTW performances are spot on always. Vivien Leigh is magnificent in perhaps one of the toughest female roles ever essayed for a celluloid strip. Clark Gable is his usual dynamic self with an amazing ability to make big ears and dentures look sexy. In the past, I've always dismissed the work of Olivia DeHavilland as Melanie and Leslie Howard as Ashley and considered them secondary to the rest. Not so during my most recent viewing. Even they were marvelous. But then again, who doesn't look good in the most glorious (and restored one more time) Technicolor ever fashioned for a movie audience? GWTW looked like it was made last week. Pristine and sparkling. As it should be.

Now, I have one nincompoop for a friend out here. A Black writer who refuses to see GWTW because of the depiction of slavery. Okay, it was the friggin' Civil War! Like it or not, slavery was a part of our history. You can't rewrite or ignore the facts. Yet, if you watch GWTW and concentrate on the Black actors as I did the other night, you will discover something quite amazing. They're not stereotypes at all. Oh, sure, they talk like slow-witted fools, but the roles are written with such amazing layers of emotion and sensibility. When you focus on the character of Mammy, this is no Aunt Jemima. She is wise beyond her years and, despite her illiteracy, can read Scarlett like a book. There is tremendous substance behind Hattie McDaniel's acting choices in this film. No wonder they giftwrapped a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her, even if the Academy probably sat her in the kitchen for the awards ceremony.

"Gone With The Wind" looks wonderful on DVD, but it breathes best on a huge screen. Not one in your media room. I am talking about a big canvas in a fabulous movie palace. With an audience delighted by every plot turn.

Try to find that at your local AMC.

Dinner last night: Meatloaf at the Cheesecake Factory.