Sunday, November 2, 2014

I enjoyed the extra hour of sleep

Did you remember to set all of the clocks back - the VCR (does anyone still use tehir VCR?), the microwave, the automatic coffee pot in the kitchen? 



If you already did so, you can watch this; we'll wait for the others.


Do you have friend running the Marathon today?


Don't forget to remind them that the first guy who ran one died at the finish line.


November 2, 1934 -
Ernst Lubitsch
charming adaptation of the famous Viennese operetta The Merry Widow starring Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald premiered on this date.



The final film collaboration between Maurice Chevalier, Jeanette MacDonald and director Ernst Lubitsch.


November 2, 1940 -
Look at me fellas I'm a yo yo! I'm a yo yo!




Another funny Porky Pig Looney Tunes, The Sour Puss, premiered on this date.


November 2, 1942 -
Another Preston Sturges laugh out loud comedy, The Palm Beach Story, opened on this date. (Sturges, himself, had to shove a handkerchief in his mouth to avoid ruining a take by laughing.)



In the long dolly shot of Joel McCrea and Mary Astor strolling on the pier from Rudy Vallee's yacht, the director Preston Sturges makes a rare Hitchcock-style appearance as the chubby, mustachioed leader of the crew toting Claudette Colbert's luggage.


November 2, 1946 -
Walt Disney's
'politically incorrect' feature, the partially- animated film, Song of the South, was released on this date.



Widely regarded as the "pariah" of the Disney family, the bastardized film has been primarily disowned by the company. However, the classic music can still often be heard throughout the theme parks and other various outlets - unknown to most younger generations who have no association with it.


November 2, 1957 -
The often edited for S & P (I definitely should know) Bugs vs. Daffy Looney Tunes cartoon, Show Biz Bugs, premiered on this date.



The segment when Bugs and Daffy were dancing to "Tea for Two" was used for the opening scene, (as other Warner Brothers' popular animation stars walked across from right to left behind Bugs and Daffy, during their dance) of the "Bugs Bunny and Friends" TV series on WNEW-TV in New York for much of the 1970s and into the early 1980s.


Today in History:
November 2, 1944 -
Thomas Midgley Jr.
, an American chemist who developed both leaded gasoline and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), was notoriously known as "the one human responsible for more deaths than any other in history".



As if it was nature's idea to get revenge on him he was left disabled in his bed due to lead poisoning and polio at the age of 51.



Keeping his inventive juices flowing, he designed a complicated system of strings and pulleys on his bed so that he could lift himself up when needed. This invention was the cause of his death at the age of 55 when he was accidentally entangled in the ropes of his bed and died of strangulation.

Talk about double irony.


November 2, 1947
-
In California, industrialist, film producer/director, philanthropist, syphilitic bisexual germaphobe Howard Hughes flew the maiden (and only) flight of the Spruce Goose; the largest fixed-wing aircraft ever built.



The plane was crafted out of 200 tons of plywood. The war ended before the plane was deployed


November 2, 1948 -
President Harry S.Truman somehow roused himself from his alcoholic stupor and was re-elected in an upset victory over the presumptive winner, Republican Thomas E. Dewey.



The Chicago Tribune had printed a banner headline 'DEWEY WINS!' prematurely. Truman defeated Dewey by 2.2 million popular votes and 114 electoral votes.


November 2, 1959 -
Game show contestant Charles Van Doren admitted to a House subcommittee that he'd been given questions and answers prior to appearances on Twenty-One, the NBC game show.



Oops!


November 2, 1963 -
South Vietnamese President Ngo Dihn Diem and his brother were assassinated in a military coup. Coup leader Duong Van Minh explained that "They had to be killed - Pres. Diem was too much respected among simple, gullible people in the countryside."



A 3rd brother was later tricked into surrendering to US forces and was turned over to coup leaders and killed by firing squad. (President Johnson admitted the CIA's part in the coup.)

Once again, American diplomacy at work.


November 2, 1984 -
Velma Barfield
becomes the first woman executed in the United States since 1962 for the murder of her mother, her boyfriend and two others with rat poison in their food.



That will learn her.


November 2, 1988 -
The Internet Worm was released by Cornell grad student Robert Morris on this date. His ingenious program was meant to explore the Internet harmlessly, but due to a bug, it crashed some 6,000 computers.

Morris parlayed the incident into a career, he is now an associate professor at MIT.

Kids, this is not the way to get ahead.



And so it goes.

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