Sunday, September 20, 2020

The Rams Knock Out the Eagles

Began my second early morning in a row with breakfast and one of my Classic Disney CDs. I picked up this set way back in 2007 with a gift card from Getanything.com Lauren gave me for my birthday, but I had the cassette version of the 4th disc since I lived in Wildwood. Favorite songs on disc 4 include the hilarious "On the Open Road" from A Goofy Movie, "Just Around the Riverbend" from Pocahontas, "Ten Feet Off the Ground" from the live-action musical The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band, and "Enjoy It!" with Maurice Chevalier and Haley Mills from the non-musical adventure yarn In Search of the Castaways

Just made it to work. We were steady for most of the day, not overwhelmingly busy, but busier than we were last Sunday. People must need to restock now that the kids are either back in school, or learning at home and eating more. No problems whatsoever. It died so quickly by quarter after 2, I was able to leave a few minutes early.

Took the long way home down Nicholson Road. The weather was too glorious not to! No wonder we weren't busy. While it was very windy, it was also sunny and a bit warmer, probably in the upper 60's. Nicholson Road was a bit busy, but the only people out in Oaklyn were kids on bikes. I saw one car after I went over the hill and onto Atlantic Avenue.

Put the Eagles game on as soon as I got home. Boy, was that lousy. I'm glad Dad didn't live to see it. He would have complained the entire time. The Eagles were starting to catch up 23-19 when I got home, but the Rams intercepted what would have been a touchdown and ran it in the opposite direction. That more-or-less ended things. The Eagles just couldn't catch up the rest of the game. It's probably just as well Jodie went to Dana and Jesse's to celebrate Dana's 30th birthday and had nothing going on today. I was exasperated enough watching it at my place.

My cookies didn't go much better. I made Apples Rolled In Autumn (apple-oatmeal) Cookies from the one-bowl cookie cookbook Lauren sent me a few years ago. I guess I'm still getting the hang of that new stove. The first batch got way too brown, and a few cookies burned badly in all the batches. I haven't been baking that much. It's been too hot. At least I'll have a few months to get used to it.

Worked on writing for a while after the game ended and the cookies were out of the oven. Princess Elaine wants to heal Malade with her pure magic, but it may not be possible. Malade reveals she has a concentrated potion of all their magic; drinking it makes her even larger and more powerful. Charles calls down below for her to sing, and the others to bring light...

Broke for dinner at quarter of 7. Switched to the Broadway cast album for the stage version of Mary Poppins. There's a lot that's different here, from the "Jolly Holliday" being a romp with moving statues in the park to "Supercalafragilisticexpaldioucious" now set in a shop where words are bought and sold. There's also a rather scary sequence where the kids' toys put them on trial for mistreating them, "Temper Temper." (Apparently, that one was deemed too scary; all current versions of the stage show use a watered-down version called "Playing the Game.") Like the Disney sequel, the stage show also adds a villain, in this case Mr. Banks' former nanny Ms. Andrew, whose strict ways still terrorize him to this day. Of the new songs, I'm especially fond of "Being Mrs. Banks," where she tries to explain why she's having such a hard time with her husband, and the rousing finale "Anything Can Happen." (I do wish they'd kept one of the two ballads, the lovely lullaby "Stay Awake.")

Ended the night with three more vintage game shows, all with celebrity panelists. Started off with the oldest and rarest, Showoffs from 1975. There's a single episode left of this early version of Body Language. Here, we have four celebrities switching off playing charades with two contestants. The contestants have to guess 5 words (no puzzles here). If they can guess the words, they win points. Whomever has the most points after two rounds moves on to the bonus round. Here, the contestants act out three words for the celebrities, winning a thousand for each correct guess. They can stop after two thousand, or try for five. 

The first man didn't think he could manage "princess" and didn't try for the $5,000, but the lady who won later was easily able to perform "razor blade." Karren Morrow, Mike Farrell, Dick Gautier, and Dr. Joyce Brothers were the celebrities...and I suspect the only reason this episode exists is Brothers hurt her ankle doing a stunt and had to be carried everywhere. Dancer Bobby Van took over as host from Larry Blyden, who died in a car accident a few months before the show went to air.

All-Star Secrets from 1979 is even more fun. Eight episodes are known to exist; I went with one from the spring. Bob Eubanks hosts. Three contestants have to guess which of five celebrities the secret describes. In this case, the celebrities were Bill Cullen, Della Reece, John Schuck, Arte Johnson, and Nannette Fabray. One celebrity gives their opinion on whom it might be. Winners split the pot. The bonus round was a "blind item," where the contestants guessed with no celebrity help. I thought this one was absolutely hilarious, and actually kind of interesting, especially with one of Arte Johnson's secrets. 

All-Star Blitz is another Hollywood Squares/Battlestars variant, this one from 1985. Four celebrities try to bluff a contestant; if they guess correctly, they lit one of the stars around a monitor. Each monitor revealed part of a word. If they guessed the phrase the words formed, the won the round. Basically the same deal as Battlestars with squares instead of triangles and a Password element added in. Charles Nelson Reilly is joined by soap opera stars Stuart Damon and Abby Dalton and original Hollywood Squares panelist Rose Marie, and all of them are pretty darn funny. Long-time Squares host Peter Marshall presided here, too. 

Here's all three episodes on YouTube; Secrets and Blitz come complete with their original commercials.

Showoffs (1975)

All-Star Secrets (1979)

All-Star Blitz (1985)

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