Hurried out to work after that. Needless to say, we were dead the entire morning. It's the day after the biggest food holiday of the year. Food is the last thing on most people's minds right now. I swept the store, pushed carts, and gathered trash. Other than one of the trash bags making a mess, there were no problems. Even Mother Nature cooperated. It started out cold and cloudy this morning. By the time I finished at 2, the clouds were vanishing, the sun was out, and it was a little warmer, into the lower 50's.
Had grocery shopping of my own to do after work. Needed to restock granola bars and yogurt - both were on good sales. I did buy grapes, but they cost a fortune. I thought I had an online coupon for them, but I guess it didn't work. I won't be getting them next week unless they're on sale. Found a solo cinnamon roll for dessert later.
Also got my schedule for next week. Other than working at noon on Sunday, it's pretty much the same thing I had before this week. Three days off, Tuesday, Thursday, and next Friday; Monday is the only early day.
Went straight home after that. Watched Password Plus with Allen Ludden, Marcia Wallace, and Wesley Eure on Buzzr. Marcia is normally really good at this, but Wesley's contestant won the round and made it to Alphabetics.
Let it go into Super Password after. One of the show's most interesting weeks came early in 1987, when Betty White and Estelle Getty of The Golden Girls played Lucille Ball and her screen daughter Ann Dusenberry from Lucy's short-lived final sitcom Life With Lucy. Lucy more than held her own against sassy Estelle and seasoned Betty and played very well with Ann. They even made it to the Super Password bonus round. (Which Lucy did move rather slow on.)
Stayed at Buzzr for their annual Black Friday Frenzy marathon. This year, three episodes of Supermarket Sweep were followed by three episodes of Sale of the Century. Sweep started off with a random episode from early in the original run. David Ruprecht wore a crazy sweater, the women still had big hair, and there were only the huge inflatable bonuses and the shopping list in the Big Sweep. The remaining two episodes were from a "Double Your Cash" week in I believe 1998. Dave's now sporting silvery hair and a crazy tie, the hair is flatter, and there's far more bonuses in the Big Sweep, including candy, grinding your own coffee, and remembering a bread list.
(And I wish we could have seen more of "Double Your Cash" week instead of the 1992 episode. I want to know if the couple who got that almost 2,000 total in the first episode ended up winning the $5,000.)
Sale of the Century ran its Thanksgiving episodes from 1988. Pretty similar to the 1985 Thanksgiving episode I watched last Monday. Once again, everyone's playing for holiday-themed goodies like a trip to New England, a beautiful blond wood table, and pretty Limoges china and a certificate to a dessert-of-the-month club. Two people missed the guess-the-subject Bonus Round, but one guy did win $5,000 on it.
Oh, and the next Buzzr marathon is going to be a big one. Buzzr opted to keep their tribute to Bob Barker anyway, whether he made it to 100 or not. Along with the Bob on Price Is Right special CBS ran last summer, there will be episodes of Tattletales, Match Game, and the late 80's Family Feud featuring Bob. Price Is Right: The Barker Years will finally show half-hour episodes from 1972 and 1973. It's so big, it'll run the whole first full week of December.
Worked on writing after that. I went back and added an earlier scene of Cora fleeing to the garden to escape Stephen's dull parties with dignitaries and his wenches. She's strolling through the garden when she notices the hunchback servant working in the garden, lovingly spreading mulch and removing dead leaves. She helps him remove a dead leaf that his short, stubby fingers can't grasp. As she's praising his work in the garden, the head gardener comes around the corner and scolds him for dilly-dallying when he should have been working. She tells him there was no harm done and asks him to be gentler to the man from now on.
Broke for leftovers and Match Game '79 at 7 PM. Buzzr jumped back to the week they skipped a while back with Foster Brooks, Lorna Patterson, and Betty White. Gene Rayburn rubs the shoulders of a nervous contestant in a way that would likely get him into trouble nowadays near the end!
Finished the night on YouTube after a shower with variations on The Nutcracker. The exquisite Playhouse 90 TV version from 1958 was only rediscovered in its original color a few years ago. Kudos to whomever found and restored the color, because it's gorgeous. It really adds magic to this New York City Ballet production. George Balanchine not only choreographed, he played Godfather Drosselmeyer. Clara and her prince remain children during the entire Candyland sequence. The Sugar Plum Fairy performs her dances with four cavaliers. Other than men in striped leotards representing candy canes replacing the Russian trepak dancers, this is a traditional but quite well-done version of the show.
Ran across two unique animated Nutcrackers after that. I remember seeing the Russian Nutcracker from 1973 in school as a child. Here, it's a servant named Marie who rescues the Nutcracker. His backstory follows "The Hard Nut," only it's the prince who is cursed, rather than the princess. When Marie frees him, he turns her into a princess, and they go to his parents and never return to Marie's former place of employment. This relatively dark and ominous retelling haunted me for years.
A British stop-motion Nutcracker and the Mouse King from 1978 is a bit lighter. Once again, it follows "The Hard Nut," only it's a prince who cracks the nut for the ugly princess rather than Drosselmeyer's nephew. The flashback sequence is done in regular animation, made to look like Russian tapestries. It was done by Bob Bura and John Hardwick, who apparently specialized in stop-motion TV shows in England and had won awards for their work. No wonder. Everything here looks smooth and fluid. The Nutcracker is actually rather cute; the Mouse King and his followers most certainly aren't, but they're not too scary for young kids.
Older children who are ready for a slightly darker version and don't mind that it's dialogue-free may want to check out the Russian cartoon. Younger kids looking for an introduction to the story that's only slightly scary may be more interested in the stop-motion short.
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