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I dare ya! Double Daredevil ya!

April 11, 2015 /

They never saved a child. They never defeated the bad guys. They never wore the mask and took a beating. They never stood up for the weak, the oppressed. I suspect their word is no code of honor. They never read a comic book.

Reviews of the new Marvel series – Daredevil – have been mixed – as reviews tend to be. But complaining about the dialog? Hey! It’s a video Stan Lee! Didn’t you ever-

Oh, yeah. We established that you critics bypassed the fun reads for J-school. And I suppose that’s where they teach the snarky elitist patter that reviewers rely upon. Maybe all the schools teach it. I probably just didn’t get it at the time.

Violence?

Hello. He’s a crime fighter. Sometimes they don’t turn themselves in, the way you turned in that semester final. Shuffling up to the desk and wishing it was an award-winning screenplay, which is never going to happen. You opted for academia.

And that particular episode with the super bad guy? The one you noted in your review? It is no more graphic than the Hitchcock films you so lovingly praised so many decades ago. Oh wait. You weren’t born even born then.

Here’s the lowdown for the non-stuffy press among you. If you read Archie and Veronica, you probably should take a pass. Classics Illustrated? Nah. Reread The Gold Bug. Weren’t a comics reader? Then you should stick to CNN and Fox. Netflix’s new series was never meant for you.

For the rest of us?

Daredevil has more action than Hawaii Five-O, more grit than landscaping episodes of This Old House. It has more heart than the cast of The View on their most compassionate day. It’s storytelling like the old comic books, with video. Oh. Wait a minute. It’s from Marvel. The comic book company.

Did I mention that Daredevil was a personal favorite of mine?

Oh.

It was that obvious… Well, I’m just sayin’…

What’d you say? Oooooh.

April 23, 2014 /

Luckily, most interview subjects are cordial during the session. But the others more than make up for it. Take for example, the reply given to the BBC’s Sandra Harris in an interview with British author Barbara Cartland…

Harris: Have English class barriers broken down?

Cartland: Of course they have, or I wouldn’t be sitting here talking with someone like you.

Ouch.

There is a bit o’ snide. Personally, I prefer the snappy comeback. My best in-person snappy is the one my father volleyed back when I pointed out the orchestral music he was listening to was actually a Beatles song. “Too bad the Beatles can’t play it like that,” he replied, without missing a beat.

Another quick-draw that remains one of my all-time favorites came from musician Frank Zappa. The interviewer was a fellow named Joe Pyne, who employed an argumentative and confrontational style. Pyle walked on a prosthetic leg after a bout with cancer, but it didn’t slow down his verbal assaults.

Joe Pyle: “So Frank, you have long hair. Does that make you a woman?”

Frank Zappa: “You have a wooden leg. Does that make you a table?”

Ooooh.

Merely repeating the quote from Winston Churchill leaves me red-faced with embarrassment for Betsy Braddock, who encountered the British Prime Minister at a party.

Braddock: Winston, you’re drunk.

Churchill: Bessie, you’re ugly, but tomorrow I shall be sober.

Eeek.

Then, there are those casual observations that go beyond the mark, like that of then Senator Robert Dole of Kansas. He remarked on the Washington party that brought together former presidents Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, and Richard Nixon, a trio that Dole described as “See No Evil, Hear No Evil, and Evil.”

Pow.

Then again, some observations jab with a sharpened funny bone, like the words of comedienne Joan Rivers describing Mick Jagger and his lips of renown.

“I saw him suck an egg out of a chicken,” said Rivers. “He can play a tuba from both ends. This man has got childbearing lips.”

Oh, what an Awful Thing to Say. In fact, that’s the name of the book, with quotes gathered by William Cole and Louis Phillips. It may say something of the acerbic wit of Oscar Wilde that so many of his quotes found their way into the pages. He praises George Bernard Shaw as “an excellent man. He has not an enemy in the world and none of his friends like him.”

Bam.

Scanning through the volume makes me wonder whether these famed talkers stayed up late dreaming up these barbs and jotting them down in an ever-handy notebook. I suspect though, that some people have sharp enough tongues that – if they ever nodded off – the pillow impaled at their lips would smother them before sunrise.

No insults here, so – Come Visit!

McHuston

Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
122 South Main St. Broken Arrow, OK!

Water Water Everywhere.

June 13, 2013 /

It was sort of like one of the zombie movies. Empty parking lots. McDonald’s – closed. Starbucks – closed. Main Street tavern – lights out, windows dark. Hanging on the front door, slightly tilted, a sign: Closed.

The water is running again. The news came too late for me. Probably should have gone to the internet at the break of dawn to check the status of the boil-the-water order, which prompted the Health Department to close all the Broken Arrow restaurants.

It doesn’t take long to realize how much we take those taps and faucets for granted, and how many people can be affected when the supply dries up.

The call from BA’s robo-dialer came about 10:30am, and since everything is prepped daily, there wasn’t enough time to make the stew and the soup and the mashed potatoes before the lunch hour. It was a sandwiches-only day.

Ironically, no tap water is used in the food preparation here. When the kitchen remodel was first completed and the hand-sink faucet was tested, the water had a chemical odor. Smelled like chlorine to me. Same water as everyone else’s faucets, but it seemed different in the new kitchen. I figured if I could smell it in the water, it could probably be tasted as well. Some tea and coffee brewers are directly attached to the plumbing, but our machine requires the water to be poured manually.

Buying the pure-filtered water is a chore sometimes, but I’ve had people comment about the great flavor of the tea – which I believe starts with unadulterated water. Same thing for the stew and soups. Using bottled filtered water didn’t save me from being shut down along with everybody else in town, but least I had books to sell and didn’t have to close completely like so many others.

I’ve done some vegetable chopping this afternoon. Getting a head-start for Friday morning. The water is running again. The dishes are washed and sanitized.

Bring your appetite.

McHuston

Booksellers & Irish Bistro
Rose District
122 South Main St. Broken Arrow OK!

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