Nothing too special happened in this month. The burden of everyday life has taken its toll on my weary body, and I've been drifting aimlessly in the cold and noisy streets of this monster of cement and metal like a fallen leaf on the long way down to the hard and trashy ground. The hours of everyday have been... Okay, okay. Enough of this. Just listen to the highlights of the previous month and decide for yourself.
There are about 90 Cable TV channels that I receive (not presonally), courtesy of Time Warner Cable. Channel 6 is called Nickelodeon, and is one of the "pass-over" channels: If you see channel 5 (FOX - Party of Five, for example) and you want to switch to channel 7 (ABC) you double click on the channel-up button.
Every night they have reruns of old shows like "The Jeffersons", "I love Lucy", "Bewitched", "Happy Days", "Laverne & Shirley", "Brady Bunch", and many more. Actually some of these shows are probably quite good, but I usually don't have time to watch them. If I missed it by more than 15 years, I can't go back to it.
One night, as I was double-clicking through the channels I saw the opening song of "All in the Family". Remember Archie Bunker? You probably do. Even if you don't remember the show, you probably remember the opening song. I'm almost sure you can whistle it. Now let's conduct a small experiment. Click on the next image to hear the opening song. It's quite a small file - just 270KB
Did you listen to the song? Now tell me what are the words... I heard this song tens of times and you did too. If you're like me, you didn't understand half of the words. Am I right? I know I was a lot younger the last time I heard it but still... Okay, now listen to the song and try to get the words. Still some words missing? Part 2 will follow...
The following story might as well be an urban legend like the story about the Aligators in the sewers of New York, but still, it's a nice one, so listen. Barry is a co-worker with quite a few amazing stories about himself. This one is about a friend of his, who's now retired, but quite a few years ago was a pilot at TWA (Ask Yael if you don't know what's TWA).
That pilot was flying a commercial TWA plane to Munich, Germany. He got a request from the tower at the Munich airport. He followed the request, but forgot to say something back on the radio (Like the way they make you repeat instruction in the army when you're firing in a firing range). The German air traffic controller got angry and shouted on the radio: "Maybe in America you can do that, but here in Germany we do it by the book. Haven't you ever flown above Germany before?". To this the pilot replied "Well, actually I did just once, but it was back in 1944."
And if we're talking about airplanes, I heard a comedian doing a sketch about how the security personnel ask you those stupid questions before you check-in. He was wondering - After packing a handbag and a suitcase with all the standard things, and after being asked if he "has anything that can be used as a weapon", how would MacGyver respond?
The 2000 Academy Awards ceremony took place on March 26th in the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. I saw the very long ceremony on TV. I even saw parts of the pre-show, where you see all the stars walking on the red carpet on the way in. Just wanted to comment a few things about the Oscar:
- You know who my definite winner is. Best movie, best screenplay, best of the best and so forth. It's "The Sixth Sense", of course. I have seen the movie 3 times (the last one on DVD) and it's still an amazing movie. American Beauty (BTW, did you know "American Beauty" is a type of rose?) was also very nice, but let's put things in proportion.
- The number of Oscars awarded to "The Matrix" - 4. The combined number of Oscars awarded to "The Cider House Rules", "The Green Mile", "The Insider", and "The Sixth Sense" - 2.
- I think David Letterman said it best when he said: "It's amazing that a show that runs 4 hours long gives an award for editing".
- The pre-show is the most male chauvinist thing in the world. There's this old witch called Joan Rivers that nags all the celebrities as they walk on the red carpet. If it's a man she'll say something like "I saw your movie, you played so well, I really loved it... (add your best honey dripping bullshit to fill up 30 seconds)". But if a woman is nearing it's always: "I love your dress, who are you wearing?". This could be Meryl Streep or Frances McDormand, but that bitch Joan doesn't care about THAT. She's only interested who is the fashion designer that was graceful enough to brighten our day by letting us peek at his divine creation. "Who are you wearing?" who!!!
- So the ceremony's kudos goes to Trey Parker and Matt Stone (the creators of South Park) who wore what everyone should have been wearing for the ceremony... (Left and right on the picture below)
I'm not the most religious person around, but I do have some respect for the Bible. It's a work of art, which was probably created by men, and it's really old. During the last 8 years or so, I've had my (small) share of trips in which I stayed in hotels. These were usually business trips. I think that every time I stayed in a hotel there was a Bible in a drawer in the room I was staying in.
The trip to Florida last month was no different in that manner. I found the Bible, and for some reason (which is known only to God himself) I decided to look at it. To my amazement I found in the first few pages things that to me seem almost sacrilegious, and if not sacrilegious, then at least very funny. Read it and weep:
The concept of giving a list of things you should read when you're in some kind of trouble just seems too much for me. If you're lonely, just read Isaiah, yeh, that will do the job. What are you crazy? Go outside. And if that's not enough, here's a list of things that are important in the Bible - we suggest you read the following places first (all the rest is probably not that important):
As a service to the readers, the BOT brings you the lyrics of the song "Those Were the Days", written by Charles Strouse and Lee Adams:
Boy the way Glen Miller played Songs that made the hit parade. Guys like us we had it made, Those were the days. And you knew who you were then, Girls were girls and men were men, Mister we could use a man Like Herbert Hoover again. Didn't need no welfare state, Everybody pulled his weight. Gee our old LaSalle ran great. Those were the days.
Of all the citizens of the the Holyland, one has traveled in the last few months back and forth on the line Tel-Aviv - New York line ten times more than Gili on the line Tel-Aviv - Hadera.
This is Adam, and I hereby declare him a Honorary Citizen of the City of New York. I contacted the Mayor of New York, and he agreed to conduct a full ceremony with appetizers and formal dress in honor of Adam next time he's in the City.
Actually, the only time Adam stayed in my apartment was when I was in Israel. But still, we spent quite a lot of time together, almost as much time as we spent during the decaying months of Comfy. The following picture was taken in Central Park a few months ago. Adam made me swear that I would not publish this picture, but I'm mad at him since he hasn't been to New York City for more than two weeks. I got spoiled.
If you see this person, bring him back to me - dead or alive.
