Friday, September 01, 2023

The Sunshine Is Right

Started off the late morning with breakfast and The New Scooby Doo Movies. Velma takes the gang to her old high school for their annual sports day. She's shocked to discover that the athletes and coaches have fled, thanks to the ghost of former athlete Fireball McFain chasing everyone off. Only Tim Conway, who is acting as a coach for a movie role, is still around. Turns out that the only athletes left for "The Spirit Spooked Sport Show" are Scooby and Shaggy, who can outrun the greatest athletes when a ghost is chasing them!

Charlie & Lola love the city building play set their grandparents bought them, but Lola's frustrated when Charlie's martians and block towers crowd out her animals and zoo artwork. For once, it's Charlie who learns the lesson when she quits and gets upset. They have to figure out how to make both sides of "My Little Town" work together.

Switched to Match Game '77 as I made my grocery list and had lunch. Suzanne Somers of Three's Company made her only appearance on the show this week. Gene is more than happy to give her a welcoming kiss in the first episode. In the second, Gene "kisses" a lady from Alaska, who reminds him that they rub noses instead.

Got my schedule while the show was on. I'm pretty much going to be working the entirety of Labor Day Weekend. I have 8 hours tomorrow, 8 1/2 Sunday, and 7 Monday, and Sunday is early. On the other hand, I only work four hour days the rest of the week, Tuesday and Thursday off. (The former is for a dental check-up and an appointment with PNC.) 

Headed out around 1 PM. I had a few errands to run, starting at Target. I was hoping to buy batteries here, but they only had a small display up front, and the prices weren't great. I just picked up my favorite glazed almonds and moved on. 

The Westmont Acme was next. I'm not going to make it to the farm market this week or next week, so I really had some restocking to do. The red Candy Snaps grapes were on a good sale for $1.99. Big bags of apples were $.99 a pound with a digital coupon, and peaches were $1.99. Had a digital coupon for those Made Good granola bars, too. The honey on sale was pushed so far back on the shelf, I had to ask one of the teenagers stocking the shelves to retrieve it for me. The AA batteries were only a slightly better price than Target's, but I needed them. Picked up more coconut milk and a small slice of carrot cake for dessert tonight. (And forgot popcorn, which I also needed.)

It was a gorgeous day to take the long way home across Collingswood and Newton Lake Park. It remained sunny, breezy, and dry, if hotter than yesterday. Everyone was out and about, enjoying the gorgeous weather. Target had pre-teens and teenagers celebrating their last weekend of freedom before school starts next week all over the place. People strolled past the glittering bottle-green waters of the lake, walking their dogs and with each other. 

Put everything away when I got in, then went back out for a walk. It was just too nice to stay inside all day. I wanted to see if CVS had something, but they didn't. Thought of getting soft pretzels for later in the weekend, but they just closed right before I got there. I ended up strolling home instead, past people walking their little dogs and a house being totally rebuilt. 

Watched The Big Store after I got in. I'll go further into the last movie the Marx Brothers made for MGM tomorrow for Labor Day Weekend. 

Worked on writing for a while after the movie ended. Joyce helps Charles the scarecrow down from the pole. He can barely walk. She has to keep him on his feet. He wishes he had brains, so he could figure out who he is and where he comes from. Joyce knows the Oz story and is aware that the Wizard probably won't be able to give him brains, but she thinks he'll be a great traveling companion, and maybe he'll see someone who might jolt  his memory on the way.

Broke for dinner and Match Game '79 at quarter after 7. Paul Williams makes his first appearance on the show, joined by Grand Ol' Opry cowboy Guich Kotch and Debralee Scott. I came in time to see Brett get the top match for "__ Yonder" on the Audience Match. Gene teases Betty about the lions on her jacket in the opening. Debralee Scott is more nervous helping with "Very __" in the Head-to-Head in the next episode, while Gene asks a question about what fruit bigger than a Cherry Guich's fellow Texans put in their drinks.

Finished the night online with more tributes to Bob Barker. CBS did theirs last night. Drew Carey, the current Price host, showed us clips from Bob's more than thirty years in charge of the show. We saw bits of the rare first episode of the current version, but most of the sequences were from later episodes in the 90's and early 2000's. Loved the segment with the many glitches over the years, especially with the Flip Over and Squeeze Play games. We even got to see celebrities who turned up occasionally, including Burt Reynolds, Betty White, and Chuck Norris. Adam Sandler read a poem reminding Bob of how he'd beaten him up in the movie Happy Gilmore. (Apparently, they remained friends for the rest of Barker's life. Sandler actually produced and directed this tribute.) 

Moved to YouTube for an actual episode of Price I might have seen as a 12-year-old from February 1991. It was a good one to honor Bob with, too. Everyone won their pricing games that day, including a big $10,000 win on the Punch-a-Bunch board and a Showcase win. 

Finished the night with more of MGP's Match Game Bob tribute. Bob turned up with Eva Gabor and Joyce Bulifant in 1977. While a slightly cranky Richard Dawson tried to make heads or tails of the blondes on either side of him, Bob strained to hear Gene's bad imitations over an audience that was incredibly noisy and rambunctious even for this show. He was pretty happy to hear Eva call him a sex symbol in the PM episode from that week, too! 

Bring your hotschcakes and diamonds to Bob's late 70's party, dahhling! 

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