Heaven Help the Fighting Woman

Began the morning with breakfast and Little Bear. Little Bear wants to stay "Up All Night" and see the sunrise, but he ends up dreaming about it instead. After he gets muddy, "Little Bear's Bath" turns into an adventure where he meets a mermaid caught in a net. "Father Bear Comes Home," and Little Bear and all of his friends are excited about the surprise he's bringing them. They think it might be a mermaid, but he has something that's even more fun.

Spent the next couple of hours checking the schedule for adult programs at the Cherry Hill Library and watching the 2011 remake of Footloose, which I go further into at my Musical Dreams Movie Reviews blog.

Footloose (2011)

Watched Remember WENN during lunch. Elderly janitor Mr. Eldridge (George Hall) is excited when his old friend and former vaudevillian Pepper Carnasie (Eddie Bracken) visits the station. Unfortunately, he's there with Blair Foley (Michael Patrick McGrath), an overbearing hearing aid salesman who uses Pepper as a shill. They're more "Like a Brother" than Blair is with his younger brother, the silent sound effects man Mr. Foley (Tom Beckett). It's Scott and Foley who use the laugh track machine Foley made to bolster Mackie's comedy act on the real joke - Blair's puffed-up opinion of himself.

There's "Magic" in the air at the station when sponsor Kurt Holstrom (David Leary) comes to see Hilary and Jeff's mind-reading act on their show Magic Time. Scott's more concerned about the decoded messages on their Amazon Andy kid's show not making sense. As it turns out, those codes are a lot more than just "be sure to drink your Ovaltine," and Holstrom is more than just a sponsor. It's a night of mayhem, memories, Scott revealing a hidden talent, and Mackie being nervous when Hilary says "someone at this station will pass through the doorway between life and death." She's right, but not in the way she thinks when, alone late at night, Betty has a visitor she never expected to see again...one who supposedly died in London months ago...

The second and third season are by far my favorite of the show. Scott's in his element as the fast-talking station manager, and this is probably the season where Hilary and Jeff get along the best and have some of their wittiest lines. The classic hour-long Christmas episode is far and way my favorite of the season, along with "Scott Sherwood of the FBI," "Close Quarters," and the touching "Radio Silence." Take note of the events of "Magic" and the return of a certain supposedly dead former station manager, though, because things will be getting very messy from here on in...

Called Uber soon as "Magic" ended. Yes, I know it was much warmer today, but my knee has been really sore, to the point where I put a wrap on it. I have no idea why it would have been so busy at 2:30, but I couldn't get a ride for 17 minutes! I was 15 minutes late to work. I had a hard time getting a driver going home, too. At least the second driver arrived in a mere 2 minutes after the first canceled.

And my being late was not a good thing. Though we only had 20 younger kids today, they're all rowdy from being cooped up all week. I didn't have any really major problems with my group at the bathrooms. I enjoyed reading to a few of the kids while the others finished their snacks. The real trouble didn't start until we moved the kids to the library. They wouldn't listen to the head teacher read them stories. One girl threw a tantrum when another grabbed rubber ducks from her and just would not stop crying, for nearly ten minutes. When I scolded the other girl, she lay on the floor and ignored me. (After I talked to her yesterday about using her words.)

The same girl begged me to read a book about wolves and grizzlies attacking their prey that was really for older kids. I read it...until the very end, when I refused to read the last few paragraphs about the wolves overwhelming the grizzly or show her the blood. I kept asking her if she really wanted to read it and pointing out that it wasn't appropriate for her, but she kept insisting on it. The boys just kept running around and crawling on the floor when they explicitly told not to. It was a major relief when we finally moved the kids back to the cafeteria shortly before I left.

When I got home, I went straight into dinner and Match Game Syndicated. We finished off the week with Stephanie Edwards, Fannie Flagg, and Robert Pine. Brett spent the week alternatively mourning Charles going away to Broadway for a role the next week and being glad him and his poky writing were going.

Finished the night working on my Footloose review while listening to the 2-disc Starburst set. The title sounds like something K-Tel put out in the late 70's, but it's actually from 1969...and boy, is it from 1969. This is one of the most eclectic assortment of songs I've ever seen on two records. You get rock numbers like "God Bless the Child" by Blood, Sweat, and Tears and "This Girl Is a Woman Now" by Gary Puckett and the Union Gap, vocalists like Tony Bennett singing "I've Gotta Be Me" and Johnny Mathis's version of the "Love Theme from Romeo & Juliet," instrumental covers of rock numbers ("Up, Up, and Away" by Terry Baxter and His Orchestra, "Spinning Wheel" by Moog Machine), and even country numbers from Tammy Wynette ("Stand By Your Man") and Johnny Cash ("Daddy Sang Bass"). If you want to hear a little bit of pretty much everything the late 60's had to offer, this is worth digging up for the variety alone.