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Chef extraordinairePaul Prudhomme - from whom millions of people have learned that there's more to Cajun cookin' than just having a bottle of red pepper handy and who has sometimes been blamed for the near-extinction of the redfish - was hit by a stray bullet while preparing food on a golf course near New Orleans during a PGA event two days ago.
Prudhomme felt a sting on his right arm above the elbow and thought he had been stung by a bee.
Turned out that he had been grazed by a .22 caliber bullet.
So what did Prudhomme do? He kept on cooking! Minutes later he was back in action and served up some tasty cuisine for the golfers, caddies and guests at the Zurich Classic.
Doesn't surprise me at all. Having known some, I can attest that them Cajuns are a good and hardy folk. Glad to hear that Prudhomme is okay, and is back to making more tasty gumbo!
John C. Larsh, better known to countless fans during decades of radio work as Jack Armstrong, has passed away at 63.
Armstrong is probably most recently remembered around here for being a longtime DJ at WMQX Oldies 93. I used to listen to him every day: Armstrong was easily one of the liveliest radio personalities that I've ever found on the dial. But before that, the Chapel Hill born-and-bred Armstrong had also worked in the Boston, Pittsburgh, Los Angeles and San Francisco markets. During his long career he got to hook up with Elvis Presley, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Chuck Berry, Frank Zappa, and many other musical legends.
Armstrong's zest for life reflected in his radio work, especially after the Guinness World Records certified him as being the "world's fastest talking human". Armstrong also pulled off the rare feat of being a double-record holder when he broke the one for most revolutions on a roller-coaster: 750 on the Thunderbolt in Pittsburgh, riding it for 34 hours (my butt's sore just thinking about it...). And Armstrong's passion for radio would eventually lead to his being ensconced in the Rock 'N Roll Hall of Fame as part of the "This Is Dedicated To The Ones We Love... 100 Jocks From 1935" exhibit.
You can find out much more about Jack Armstrong at his official Myspace page, which is already becoming a shrine to his memory.
Thanks for the many good laughs and great tunes, Jack. We'll miss ya.
EDIT 8:42 a.m.: Want to hear just how fast Jack Armstrong's voice was? Here is his trademark sign-off in MP3 format (and thanks to WBFO for hosting it). Here's what Armstrong is saying, in case you need a guide...
"Don't get none on ya, do it twice, be nice. It's very nice to be important, but more important to be very nice. Let it all hang out, drag it in the sand, and make a deep rut. People who live in glass houses shouldn't... A bird in the hand makes it hard to blow your nose. One good turn takes most of the blankets. You can lead a horse to water, but don't push him in. Nothing smells any worse than a wet horse, or you can lead a horse to water, push him in and teach him the backstroke, then you've really got something. Wash your face in the morning, neck at night. Love is life, life is love. Light your own candle and the world will be a much brighter place. When you get to the end of your rope, tie a little knot, hang on and swing. Stay calm, try to adjust. You can't live with 'em or without 'em. Hoo hee, HEE HOO! Don't let your six gun get rusty. It's been a business doing pleasure with you, it's been real... and your LEEEEEEADAAAAAAAAH love you-ah!"
The first time I ever saw Richard Widmark act in a movie, it was The Long Ships. WFMY aired it as a Saturday afternoon movie when I was eight years old. I happened to start watching right at the scene where Widmark's character Rolfe, the dashing Viking, is about to ride the "Mare of Steel" and that crazy Moorish king Aly Mansuh (played by Sidney Poitier) gives him a "demonstration" first. I can't say that I remembered Widmark himself much from that scene: the sight of a long curved razor blade that the condemned was forced to slide down belly-first made a much bigger impression on my young mind.
Since then I've watched Widmark in Kiss of Death (his breakout film), Judgment at Nuremberg, and many others. At Butt-Numb-A-Thon 9 this past December one of the early movies on the program was Pickup on South Street starring Richard Widmark as "Skip" McCoy. It was a huge hit with the crowd. I must admit: I had come to be a fan of Widmark but that was one movie that had stayed under my radar until then. It was one of the films I discovered there that made the trip to the festival very worthwhile.
This requires a bit of set-up for readers who aren't in this part of North Carolina/south-central Virginia ...
Two or three times a week on Reidsville's WGSR Star 39 television station, a group of local ministers calling themselves the "Church of Christ" do a series of live broadcasts. The shows have various names, but they're all pretty much the same: a show starts, the minister runs some old video of a Baptist or Pentecostal or preacher of some other other denomination that they don't agree with (sometimes it's video of a debate of that night's "Church of Christ" guy hashing it out with another pastor). While the video is running that night's preacher silently stands on the set giving the camera a stern gaze, then he stops the video and begin blasting whoever it is that's on the "hate list" for the evening.
So these "Church of Christ" guys believe that everyone is a hellbound sinner who is not a member of their brand of church. To them, there is no salvation outside of their "Church of Christ".
I guess that's their right to believe that (and to spend thousands of dollars a month to air their views) if they wish. Just like it's my right to believe what I do about salvation, and how it comes by the grace of God after we realize our need for forgiveness. In my Christian philosophy, that's all that we need to do to secure our destiny for eternity. Because anything else is of human effort and always doomed to fail.
If we have faith in Christ, that alone is enough. It's more than enough.
What really bothers me though is when these "Church of Christ" people display so much vitriol and outright hatred toward anyone who they perceive as "following false doctrines". If I were not a believer in Christ, and I were to come across their programming, there's no way that I could be convinced that Christ is real. It would probably just affirm for me that Christ is only something else that's meant to control us. I know better though: that a life in Christ is a free one, liberated from legalism.
But to hear it from these "Church of Christ" guys, a Christian life is about nothing other than legalism. Some of the things I've heard them say in their shows would make the Pharisees of Jesus's time seem even libertarian in comparison.
These local "Church of Christ" people don't even believe that a person can go to Heaven unless they were baptized. I suppose that according to them I'll go to Heaven anyway, because I was baptized (by immersion, in case anyone's wondering) not long after I came to Christ while in college. But it was never something that I did because I thought I had to do it to secure a place in Heaven. It had no supernatural power at all: I just did it because I wanted to publicly identify with my Lord and Savior. That's all it can do. But as it is, the adamant stance about baptism by these "Church of Christ" guys comes perilously close to outright Gnosticism.
Anyway, I've been watching them for awhile, and particularly a dude named Johnny Robertson who seems to be the ringleader. Or at least the most seeker of controversy (he was mentioned on this blog almost two years ago when the Westboro Baptist Church "God Hates Fags" gang came to town). He does a live program every Sunday night called What Does The Bible Say? (click here for show's website). He's also currently running a very ridiculous commercial for his show on WGSR, that you'll see at the beginning of this video.
I don't know if these guys are at all what could be called the "Church of Christ" as most people understand that denomination (knowing full well that Robertson and his brethren will bristle at being called a "denomination"). I've worshipped lots of times in a Church of Christ congregation, and I've never seen the bitterness and rancor that the local "Church of Christ" as represented by its ministers on WGSR every week display toward what seems like everyone imaginable. There were some members of one Church of Christ, in another part of North Carolina, that helped me through a very difficult time some years ago and I'll always be thankful for God putting them there at that moment.
I guess that it's what people like the Reidsville/Martinsville "Church of Christ" are doing every week in lashing out at those they don't like, that's one of the reasons why I'm so honked-off about this, because I do believe that Johnny Robertson and his crew are giving the sincere Church of Christ members a very bad name.
Well, for the past few weeks I had been feeling compelled to call up Robertson during his show, and ask him a question. One simple question, that I would have really enjoyed having an answer for. And it so happened that Easter night is what moved me to pick up the phone and take action.
I wanted to ask him: "How is what you guys are doing giving glory to Christ?"
So how did he respond? Here's the video ...
As you can see, Robertson could not answer such a simple question. He instead tries to gauge that I'm not a real Christian because I'm not a tough-enough opponent of "false doctrines" and then he tells me to "go listen to Benny Hinn".
Ummmm... saywhu...?
I've thought for awhile now that where Robertson and his bunch go wrong is that they refuse to see following Jesus Christ as anything but an act of corporate worship. As much as they fixate on the Baptists, the Pentecostals, attacking pastors of various denominations etc., I don't know if worshiping Christ as an act of the individual fits into their theology at all. He attacked me without knowing anything about me, assuming that I was "denominational". I've never professed to being any denomination. Oh sure, I've worshiped in various churches during my life, but not once have I called myself a "Baptist" or "Methodist".
Can't I just be a follower of Christ? Can't anybody? Not according to these "Church of Christ" people in Reidsville and Martinsville.
It's the classic case of becoming so obsessed with the enemy, that a person becomes the enemy. Robertson and his "Church of Christ" gang have so defined themselves by how they are not a "denomination", that they have not only become a denomination but they have become everything that is possibly wrong with a denomination. More than one person has even told me that they aren't anything but a bona-fide cult. I'm hard-pressed to disagree, unfortunately...
So Mr. Robertson, if you ever read this, I was wondering if you could please tell me: How is what you guys are doing serving and giving devotion to Christ, and showing His love toward others?
That's what this hinges on the most: where is the love in what you are doing?
Because if this is just a thing about works, without the real love toward others, then what you are doing is already a dead thing that God cannot possibly bless.
(For more perspective on the "Church of Christ" as represented on WGSR, check this blog out.)
It was Thanksgiving eve Back in 1971 He had on a pair of sunglasses There wasn't any sun He used the name Dan Cooper When he paid for the flight That was going to Seattle On that cold and nasty night
-- "The Ballad of D.B. Cooper" by Chuck Brodsky
More than 36 years after Dan Cooper bailed out of the back of a 727 into stormy night and American folklore, a parachute has been found in Washington state that the FBI is speculating could have been used by the legendary skyjacker.
It was on the night before Thanksgiving in 1971 that a man calling himself "Dan Cooper" (more often erroneously called "D.B. Cooper") boarded a Northwest Orient flight in Portland, Oregon bound for Seattle. Shortly after takeoff Cooper told a stewardess that he had a bomb, and gave instructions to have $200,000 in unmarked bills and four parachutes ready upon landing: two loaded in the front of the plane and two in the rear. The demands were met, Cooper allowed the passengers to leave and then the 727 took off again, this time headed south. About a half-hour into the flight, Cooper went to the back of the plane and was never seen again. He took the money and one of the parachutes and jumped out of the plane via the aft stairs.
Ever since that night, there have been all kinds of theories and rumors about what happened to Dan Cooper. In 1978 a 727 placard describing how to lower the rear stairs was found in the Washington woods by a hunter, and a few years about $6,000 from Cooper's haul (the serial numbers matched those of bills that were given to Cooper) was discovered on the banks of the Columbia River near Vancouver.
Some believe that given the fierce wind, heavy rain and freezing temperature along with how Cooper was described as wearing normal clothes that would not have provided much protection from the elements, the general consensus of law agencies is that Cooper did not survive his jump and that his skeleton is still laying around somewhere deep in the forests of the Northwest. And then there are others who believe that he not only did survive his caper/stunt, but that he took the money and went on a lavish spree. The story I've heard over the years is that Cooper had someone (usually a girlfriend) waiting for him, and they wound up blowing the wad at the casinos in Las Vegas.
Personally, I think Cooper made it all the way down alive. And if this parachute was his, then the following detail from the story certainly indicates that he survived the fall...
Children playing outside their home near Amboy found the chute's fabric sticking up from the ground in an area where their father had been grading a road, agent Larry Carr said. They pulled it out as far as they could, then cut the parachute's ropes with scissors.
Sounds like someone didn't want that parachute to be found. And whoever it was, they were alive long enough to bury it.
I've been a Dan Cooper buff ever since I was nine years old. This is one story that I'm certainly going to be keeping my eye on.
(And along with the radioactive cat story, this is the second post in a row pertaining to the Seattle area. Pretty weird, huh?)
A lot of people will be glad to know that Rock Band is getting ported to the Wii. But how long is that going to last when these details about the release become widely known? To exclude the downloadable content feature and online play is an insanely bad move by Harmonix. From a business standpoint, it makes no sense at all! Nintendo Wii is the best-selling video game system on the market today, consistently outpacing both the Xbox 360 and the PlayStation 3. Now bear in mind that for those two systems already, Harmonix has sold over 6 million copies of new tracks that have been made available since the game's launch in November.
Obviously, the downloadable content is one of Rock Band's most popular points. Harmonix is courting disaster by consciously stripping it from the Wii edition. They aren't just going to be losing millions of dollars in potential profit from lack of downloaded tracks, but a lot of Wii owners - and I'm one of them - are going to see this move as petty at best, and outright insulting at worst.
Besides, there is no reason at all why the Wii could not support either the downloaded content or online play for Rock Band. It can save tracks to an SD card, and I'm sure that some kind of encryption/encoding scheme is possible that would prevent tracks from being illegally copied. Technically, the online capabilities of Rock Band could certainly be shared with the Wii version. So why aren't they?
The suits at Harmonix had best reconsider, and announce that the downloaded content and online play are going to be in the Wii version too. Or else they're going to wind up with tons of unwanted Rock Band for Wii boxes that'll take up a hella lot more space in a landfill than those E.T. cartridges ever did.
You see, this is part of the reason why I absolutely hate what America has turned into. It used to be that government in America was "of the people, by the people and for the people". Today government in America is "do what we tell you to do or we will kill you!"
And now, said government is more interested in destroying the life of a bona-fide original American character than it is in stopping an invasion by millions of illegals who are entering this country (not to mention that our politicians are way too fixated on one baseball player to care about how their little war with no purpose has just notched its four-thousandth American fatality) ...
"Weird" Ed sent me a clipping of this story from the Asheville Citizen-Times about how Popcorn Sutton - Maggie Valley, North Carolina's resident moonshiner/bootlegger/subject of numerous documentaries/author of Me and My Likker/business owner/curio collector/stuff that I've been sworn to silence on/living legend - is now in jail in Tennessee after a bust by federal and state agents. The G-men shut down Sutton's operation that included three 1,000-gallon stills, almost 900 gallons of finished "firewater", hundreds of gallons of corn mash, and apparently guns of some kind. That alone might send Sutton to prison for 10 years because he's already considered a convicted felon, having serving time for liquor violations going back to the 1970s. Each separate moonshine charge could also get him an additional five years.
Right now Popcorn Sutton is being held in jail without bond in Greeneville, Tennessee.
The first thing I'm compelled to say about this is that Popcorn should never have "expanded his business" into east Tennessee. If he had stayed in Maggie Valley, there's little doubt that he'd still be brewing his 'shine today. He's too much of a local institution there. Everyone in Haywood County knows Popcorn, either personally or by reputation. They respect his art, which he learned from his father and grandfather. Moonshining in those mountains goes back a way long time. And folks out there, they don't cotton much to outsiders coming in and causing trouble that's not wanted... even if someone comes in wearing a federal badge. Besides, a lot of people have noted that Popcorn goes out of his way to produce the safest moonshine possible.
But the moment Sutton set up shop across state lines, he was a marked man and he should have known it.
Why? Because making your own "likker", although not an immoral act, is illegal. But it's only illegal because the government feels obligated to tax everything it possibly can. And what happened here is that Popcorn Sutton put himself square in the sights of greedy government officials who couldn't stand it that they haven't been able to shake him down for the money they feel is "owed" them somehow.
This quote from the story says it all...
But, the ATF agents who helped arrest Sutton said moonshine operations like his should not be treated too lightly.
"Moonshine is romanticized in folklore and the movies. The truth though is that moonshine is a dangerous health issue and breeds other crime," ATF Special Agent James Cavanaugh said in a statement.
"The illegal moonshine business is fraud on taxpayers in Tennessee and across the country," he said.
These bastitches in the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives have killed more innocent people than Popcorn Sutton could ever accomplish if he was using the dirtiest condensing coil imaginable. Not to mention that the federal government and too much of modern law enforcement is corrupt to the core and "breeds crime" already: who the hell are these people to tell us that a guy like Popcorn Sutton is a threat to public safety?
It's just government wanting to interfere with our own lives again, folks. It can't do anything else but throw its weight around and compel us at gunpoint to obey it.
Well, here's what I got to say about that...
ATF Special Agent James Cavanaugh, if you ever read this: I pray that you'll someday get ordered to go on a raid deep inside "Little Canada". And I hope you'll be wise enough to leave instructions to your next-of-kin when you do.
(Anyone who knows something about that part of the state will no doubt recognize the severity of what I just suggested.)
In the meantime: Free Popcorn Sutton! And if you want to know more about Popcorn and his trade, here's his "how-to" video on YouTube:
So the government now wants to put an "EMD Bracelet" on all airline passengers, and this bracelet would allow the Homeland Security bastitches to shock someone like a taser.
Here's the video...
They really are getting bold about bringing us a police state, aren't they? How long would it be before "The Powers That Be" started insisting that everyone wear one of these things, "for the public good"?
I think that anyone who seriously believes in mandating this thing, should have an EMD Bracelet wrapped firmly around their circular reproductive units and rendered the maximum level of electric shock continuously for not less than 24 hours.
No doubt that a lot of the so-called "neoconservatives" will thump their chests and howl and gloat about how "their guy" Dick Cheney is thumbing his nose at those who have been opposed to his little war in Iraq.
And then there are those of us who watch this video, and we are saddened at the downward spiral that America has taken, when people like the Vice-President of the United States (and the President, remember he called himself "the Decider") can openly boast about how they enjoy the feeling of not being held accountable by anyone.
Here it is folks: your Vice-President doesn't give a damn what you think about how he and Bush are wasting American lives and resources...
The lesser angels of my nature would like to suggest that someday, Dick Cheney might be found face-down in a gutter bleeding to death and crying for help. One guy could walk past him. And that dude will look at Cheney, someone in need of dire medical assistance, then he'll shrug his shoulders and say "so?" and he'll keep on going his way, leaving Cheney to die begging for sympathy.
It would make for a great episode of The Twilight Zone. Except for a morality tale to be effective, its audience must possess a soul. Something that I don't know if Cheney and Bush and their kind ever had to begin with.
Give it up for Harmonix: they are definitely one software company that listens to its fan base. Yesterday they pushed a patch for their hit game Rock Band that addresses several issues that players have been having. And with the update comes one very cool innovation: Rock Band Store, an in-game way to purchase new songs without having to leave the game for Xbox Live Marketplace or the PlayStation Store.
I just installed the update and messed around with the game (the Xbox 360 version) and I am extremely pleased with what Harmonix has done with this update. The Rock Band Store even lets you preview songs that you might consider purchasing before doing so.
In addition to the Rock Band Store, the new patch fixes the random song lists bugs, tweaks the cap on fans in Band World Tour mode, improves some issues with the microphone (which was a big deal with the PlayStation 3 version), and the downloaded content is said to be much faster in loading 'cuz after this update it's now being cached.
The update is free. Just turn on your system with the Rock Band disc, and if you're on Xbox Live or PlayStation Store it should automatically ask if you want to install it.
I am not hopeful about this movie at all. So much of it screams wrong, like having the G.I. Joe team, an American counter-terrorist group, based in Belgium. And a far-too-young Cobra Commander.
But there have been a few things about G.I. Joe that have piqued my curiosity. Christopher Eccleston as Destro, f'rinstance. And Ray Park as Snake-Eyes. And the fact that Larry Hama, who pretty much defined the entire look and tone of the Eighties-era G.I. Joe mythology, is aboard the production team.
And then yesterday Ain't It Cool News, courtesy of Larry Hama himself, delivers the first officially released photos of Snake-Eyes from the film...
Here's the other pic, after I played around with it in Photoshop to bring out more detail...
That's Snake-Eyes alright. No question about it. The only thing I don't like is that he's got the Arishakage clan's hexagram emblazoned on his costume's shoulder, when I much prefer it tattooed on his arm and out of sight. But the fact that the hexagram is being used at all makes up a bit for that quibble.
I must admit, I really like how they've got Snake-Eyes looking here.
(By the way, I still have in my possession my almost-pristine copy of G.I. Joe issue #21: the legendary "Silent Interlude" story. Along with #25 and #26 of the same run. So if these pics can impress me, that's sayin' something :-)
Last week on Lost, Sayid and Desmond were still on the freighter and the captain made it clear that their mission was to capture Benjamin Linus. Then while being taken to new quarters they were introduced to the ship's janitor: "Kevin Johnson".
It was Michael (Harold Perrineau).
When we last saw Michael, it was the finale of Season 2 and he was in a small boat along with his son Walt headed on a compass bearing of 325 away from the Island, after making a traitorous deal with the Others. Linus told Michael that they would soon find rescue.
Now one month later in story time (though what we know of time on the Island now, that doesn't really mean anything), Michael is back.
Speculation has been rampant for months about "Meet Kevin Johnson", tonight's episode and the last completed before the writer's strike. The cast list alone already guarantees this one to be a must-watch for the Lost mythos: Cynthia Watros as Libby, M.C. Gainey as Tom/Mr. Friendly, Mira Furlan as Danielle, not to mention that Alex, Karl, most of the original helicopter people (including Naomi), Minkowski, and a ton more that have been revealed from the credits. But the real draw is that "Meet Kevin Johnson" is said to be a Michael-centric flashback revealing what happened to he and Walt from the time they left the Island until he was shown mopping floors last week.
One thing's for sure: Michael is probably quietly praying that he's never, ever going to be left alone with Sayid.
Enjoy it while it lasts, fellow Losties: tonight's is the last episode until the five new post-strike produced ones begin airing on April 24th.
It ain't looking good for the Knight household though: this year the NCAA honchos have put the three teams we have the most affection for in the same region! Duke (my longtime favorite Atlantic Coast Conference team along with N.C. State), Georgia (Lisa's alma mater) and Baylor (where Lisa's brother is attending) are all playing in the West. In fact, if they both come out of their first games intact it's going to be Baylor and Georgia playing each other! And then of course whoever wins that will be sent home by the Blue Devils, but anyway...
Unfortunately, Elon is not in this year's tournament. Again. Someday before I die, Lord willing I will see the Phoenix make it to the Big Dance. And then like Gonzaga was a few years ago (yeah they're in it this year again too) all the sports commentators will be going "Elon?! Where the heck is Elon?!" and I'll be able to smile and laugh about our little school getting a few seconds of footage in the "One Shining Moment" video that CBS Sports always runs after the championship game :-)
Chef extraordinaire Paul Prudhomme - from whom millions of people have learned that there's more to Cajun cookin' than just having a bottle of red pepper handy and who has sometimes been blamed for the near-extinction of the redfish - was hit by a stray bullet while preparing food on a golf course near New Orleans during a PGA event two days ago.
