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The Daily Dose/May 17, 2011
By Gaylon Kent
The Writer's Shack
Notes from around the Human Experience...
WHERE THE HELL YOU BEEN? Sorry we've been away. This isn't an official hiatus, we swear it. We've been busy, lately. Apologies are issued, and columns should return to a more or less regular schedule this week!
CAPSULE BUSINESS TRIP REVIEW: Needles, California: Friends, if business takes you to Needles someday, we recommend you find another line of work. Or find some way to get whatever needs to be done completed at the home office. Or get fired. Whatever it takes to not have to go to Needles, California.
We didn't have those options, unfortunately, so last week found myself and a couple of others there. The weather was actually rather mild, only 95 or so, cool for Needles in the spring, and Lord knows there was plenty of sunshine.
FunFact: The actual work we were there to do, sports officiating, was actually pleasant.
Dry, Dusty, Technical Matter: The city of Needles, though, is a rat hole. And we know from rat holes. We've lived in a few. It's hot and rather dusty, and old and not too new, either.
Bright Spot: We were saved from having to call in air strikes because we did find a decent place to eat, the upset of the year, but even then we were whining - imagine that - because The Wagon Wheel was more or less our only non-fast food option, which abound in Needles because it's right there off Interstate 40, about the only stop between between Barstow and Kingman, Arizona, so if you are making that drive it's likely someone in the car is hungry or has to use the can, and there is no shortage of fast food joints.
Shouldn't This Be A Capsule Review, Too? The Wagon Wheel did well. The Wagon Wheel is sort of like a local edition of The Cracker Barrel, with a small shop that sells crap you neither want nor need at really high prices. The service was all right and the food rather good.
Fabulous: Needles was founded in the 1800's as a railroad town. For settlers fleeing the Dust Bowl in the 1930's Needles was usually the first California town they saw, which probably sent them fleeing back to Oklahoma.
Aren't You Worried About Repercussions? No. One, they're still on dial-up in Needles, and, two, there's a municipal regulation requiring the Internet to be accessed alphabetically, so either way it will be a while before anyone there gets down to the W's.
THE SHAVING CREAM PROJECT: Perhaps because we were in Needles, or maybe because we had heard the song recently, we found ourselves thinking of the old novelty song Shaving Cream. You know, the one where the second line ends in word that rhymes with "it" and the last line always sounds like it is going to end with a four letter word beginning with "sh" and also rhyming with "it".
Thank You Lennon and McCartney: Well, we had some time to kill, so we came up with a couple of verses on our own:
Last week I wrote me a song
I thought that it might be a hit
But when the DJ on the radio played it
He said it sounded like shaving cream
Be nice and clean, shave everyday
And you'll always look keen
On Wednesday I was down at the courthouse
I was there to file my writ
But when the judge made his ruling
He said it was chock full of shaving cream
Be nice and clean, shave everyday
And you'll always look keen
Writer's Shack Smackdown: We would like to urge the regular readers of this crap to come up with their own verses! Our goal is to have 100 original verses, none of which are dirty. You can email us your verses, or post them on the official Writer's Shack message boards. Either way, the very best ones will be featured in future episodes of The Daily Dose!
THEY'RE HEADING FOR HOME: Aristides wins the first Kentucky Derby on this date in 1875. On June 12, he would come in second in the ninth running of the Belmont Stakes.
FunFact: The first Kentucky Derby was a mile and a half long, a distance it would remain at until it went to a mile and a quarter in 1896.
FunFact II: Of the 15 jockeys in the first Kentucky Derby, 13 were black.
We'll Be Back Right After This: A sporting event is televised in the United States on this date in 1939, as NBC carried a baseball game between Columbia and Princeton universities played at Baker Field in New York. Bill Stern called the action for the viewers of the 400 or so TV sets in New York City that could receive the broadcast.
Oh Yeah: Princeton won 2-1, in ten innings.
FunFact III: This game was actually the second game of a doubleheader. Princeton also won the opener 8-6.
FunFact IV: Future football Hall of Famer Sid Luckman played shortstop for Columbia that day. He went 1-8 and even made a key error in the first game.
Who The Hell Wants To Hear Actors Talk? The New York Times wasn't too impressed with the new technology, stating:
...it is difficult to see how this sort of thing can catch the public fancy.
Nevertheless: NBC was pleased with its telecast, which cost them $3,000, and later in the season would televise a Brooklyn Dodgers game.
Great Moments In Litigation: The United States Supreme Court rules, unanimously, in favor of the plantiffs in Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. The ruling declared state laws establishing separate public schools for whites and blacks unconstitutional. Brown was actually a consolidation of five segregations cases from four states.
Take Me Out To The Ballgame: David Wells of the New York Yankees pitches the 15th perfect game in major league history on this date in 1998, defeating the Minnesota Twins 4-0. Wells threw 120 pitches, the most of any perfect game pitcher for whom such a stat was kept, and struck out eleven.
Thought For The Day: Why should a man be in love with his fetters, though of gold? - Francis Bacon
Answer To The Last Trivia Question: The National League record for most consecutive hitless innings in a season is 21, by Johnny Vander Meer of Cincinnati in 1938.
The trivia question will return. Honest.
Comments? Recipes? Complaints? Email the Writer's Shack here!
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