Happy Canada Day! 2025

Like many Canadians, I am so grateful to be living in this great country... especially so, given the fascist state forming just below us.

Tales of Television Centre — Telly Documentary

Tales of Television Centre, a BBC Four documentary from 2012, gets one nostalgic for a place of work even if one did not work there. The sprawling complex wasn't merely a place of work, just as importantly, as pointed out by several interview subjects, it was a place of immense creativity.

BBC Television Centre — located in White City, West London — was a hotbed of television production for over half a century (1960 to 2013), and its ultimate reconfiguration remains a touchy subject for many Brits. "Why?"

With the help of British television entertainment luminaries such as David Frost, Brian Blessed, David Attenborough, Peter Davison, and Terry Wogan, the how, where, and why are covered briskly but with some necessary detail. And with a lot of smiles.

The Centre was a culture all its own. Magic was in and on the air.

I wish I had worked there. (Here in Toronto we have the CBC's boring Canadian Broadcasting Centre. Only in Canada, eh? Pity.) Many presenters (hosts), actors, comics, technicians, designers, writers, and producers are thankful they did. There's that wistful nostalgia one expects to wrap up a ninety-minute telly documentary titled Tales of Television Centre.

On a humorous final note, I must mention that one thing I found obvious in the building's architectural style was the overall "Soviet" vibe. This uncanny overtone is brought up by a few interviewees. The similarities are striking. (Does it mean anything?)

——

After closing in March of 2013, the complex was refurbished, opening anew in 2017 with residential apartments ("flats"), and retail and office space. However, BBC Studioworks maintains three studios, allowing the "Beeb" to live on in parts with a continuing electronic stake in the property.

Picturing: TTC Subway Train Rider in Black and Cap

Any rider of the TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) should be allowed to travel and chill in peace. This part-time "street photographer" is very discrete when taking photographs of strangers. The issue of discretion is made easier if a lone subway train rider is in daytime sleep mode.

The lady knew when she had arrived at her stop. "Next stop...."

My Canon EOS R100 camera data:

ISO speed: 3200

F-stop: f/6.3

Exposure time: 1/125

Athot for the Day: Stinky Human!

Cats tolerate our kisses.

The Restoration of the "Mind the Gap"

Mind the Gap (1985, Super-8, 5 minutes)

The epic short documentary was more a tone poem than a conventional doc. Images and music to tell a story: taking the TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) subway train to school and about the city.

Slightly earlier that film-school year (1984/85) my fellow crew and I made a Super-8 epic titled The Chase which involved some shooting on the transit system. "Yorkdale" station was featured prominently at the film's beginning; intrigue on the platform was the setup to the story. This experience convinced me that the subway would make an interesting subject for the required first-year "personal documentary". I had no desire to do a dry treatment. My interest in transportation would ensure that the mechanics of moving people about in a city would star front and centre. Also, the subway was convenient since I took it everyday to school. Pearson Airport would be a more problematic shoot. (I love the mechanics of moving people places on aircraft.)

As per the course requirements I had to pitch my film idea to my instructor, Pat. He gave the project the thumbs up after I presented the script, and several storyboard frames illustrating key moments.

I had picked the title Mind the Gap very quickly. The sign "Mind the Gap" was on every subway platform alerting and reminding riders there was a small gap between a parked train and the platform. For my uses it more meant: please be patient, another train will be along shortly.

My first order of business was to obtain a permit to shoot video or film on the TTC — consumer video/film was not really a thing, but anyone who appeared to be recording something more than their Uncle Johnny boarding a train during his visit to Toronto might very well be questioned with a terse: "Do you have a permit?" (Now, of course, there is no other option. One must show a permission slip.) Off I went to the Commission's headquarters to obtain a pass. The public relations officer was a pleasant chap. He asked me what date I wanted it to expire. I said, "April eleventh". He questioned me with, "Are you sure?" Yep. As it turned out....

The shoot was fun. Jonathan, a buddy of mine since high school, agreed to act in Gap: the narrative thread involved a rider rushing to catch his train on time. This we shot at Eglington West station. The light was best there for this sort of thing. The film stock I decided to use for the entire shoot was Kodachrome 40, a relatively 'slow' emulsion rated at 40 ASA.

For the audio mix I visited one of my old high school teachers, Ben, an amateur filmmaker, but one who had a fairly sophisticated Super-8 post production setup at home. First, however, I had the lab put magnetic stripes down the edited film so I could record synchronized-to-picture the music I always had in mind: a cue from the 1979 film, The Great Train Robbery. Jerry Goldsmith's wonderful and propulsive steam locomotive theme was a perfect fit for a electrified subway train. I had somehow known from the get go that this clash-up would work.

(A more complete "Making of" I'll save for another time. I'm enjoying this too much too soon.)

The screening: The instructor was surprised by the end result. Pat said he was expecting something a little different. He appeared to be mildly disappointed. I took this to be a good thing.

After a repeat screening a few days later, Pat said: "I liked it better this time . . . It's a tone poem."

Exactly. It's the better way.

In 2019 I made noises about restoring Mind the Gap. Get it on track, man!

A Monday Morning Smile: Squeak Squeak Squeak

I read that Donald Trump got his military parade, but that the crowd-size was underwhelming.

I had heard a "squeak squeak squeak squeak squeak" but took it to be the creak of his supporters.

Father's Day 2025: H.W. St. Laurent, RCAF / CAF

Athot for the Day: Witnessing a History Replay

So! It looks like a once-great democratic nation is morphing into a fascist state before our very eyes: "die Sturmabteilung der Vereinigte Staaten von Amerika" is in action....

Athot for the Day: On Losers' Row

The Toronto Maple Leafs and the Conservative Party of Canada have something in common....

They both need to be razed, and rebuilt from the ground up.

Sunday Fun: UAPs, UFOs, LOLs

"Unidentified Aerial Phenomena." Perfect. UAP sounds an awful lot like an old film production and distribution company, but maybe that's the joke. Five years ago the U.S. Department of Defense released video footage captured by U.S. Navy fighter jets which seemed to bear out the notion that these objects are something right out of a 1950s UFO flick.

The DoD feels the clips do not reveal anything that might compromise national and planet security. I'm guessing the chiefs and staff couldn't detect any ray-gun turrets protruding from the speeding objects, or anything that might compromise the integrity of the human race.

Do I believe that aliens from another world are visiting us?

Not really.

Not at all.

A friend told me he thinks we're alone in the universe, and he was quite passionate about it.

My reaction was typical. "In this entire universe, we're the only advanced beings?" Knowing that he is a fan of space-themed television shows, I thought I would add a brain buster:

"And there aren't humanoids out there that speak a passable English?"

He smiled at that one. Then he shook his head gently from side to side to reaffirm his earlier point.

I'm of the mindset that possibility breeds probability. We just don't know about one another. These otherworldly intelligent beings are restricted by the same physics that govern us humans.

We will never meet.

A romance will never happen.

We're doomed to a solitary existence.

There will be no "phasers on stun".

We'll have to depend on stellar flicks like (the underwhelming) Close Encounters of the Third Kind and (the brilliant) Starship Invasions to keep us believing....

Fight Forward Not Backward

"Fight forward!"

A talented and hard-working friend falls into the pit of self-doubt. He worked for years in film and television, and after getting turfed from the business he so loved, it came time to try his hand at self-employment. The road may not feel so inviting, but it is inviting.

The hardest-working man I know.

A multi-talented friend: short films in a top film festival; a feature-length film as producer and shooter; a writer; a designer and artist. He's not of the "I work in the film and television business" kind — there are certainly enough of those superstars — but he's a guy who intimidates some, certainly the "I work in the film and television business" superstar kind.

A bump in the road, there will be many, but he will push forth.

They put you down because you can do more than one thing, and well.

Real talent can be scary to those who just get by.

"Fight forward!" Not backward.

 

Film Design: Cosmonaut Costume Test Polaroid

The Polaroid's blank space has nothing written on it, but it should read:

"Cosmonaut flight-suit costume test-fitting, Marty."

I designed this piece of wardrobe for my (unfinished) 35mm short film Hyper-Reality. Two cosmonaut costumes were built, fitted specially for the actors to play them. The above picture was taken in the film studio, here in Toronto, where we were to shoot a few weeks later.

Those readers who are familiar with the 1960 East German/Polish feature film Der Schweigende Stern — "The Silent Star", released as First Spaceship on Venus on this side of the pond — will recognize my flight-suit designs. I based them heavily on that flick's cosmonaut suits. The First Spaceship version I saw on the big screen in Germany when I was a kid: its visualizations and stylings projected at CFB Baden-Soellingen's Astra Theatre had a pretty profound affect on me, certainly when I later designed a film that was not far removed from its aesthetic inspiration.

Designing wardrobe is a lot of fun for me: from my initial noodles, to more detailed drawings, to hiring seamstresses to realize them, it's one of my favourite parts of film design. (For the flick in question, my partner, Tim, and I rummaged around all the wonderful shops in Toronto's Kensington Market. We found some terrific outfits in Value Village, too.)

I've long said that "film is architecture". If a script calls for original design work, it's something I attack with great enthusiasm. Considering that it's an independent short film, "Hyper-Reality: The Unfinished Motion Picture" is loaded with design work. A few years ago I joked with my brother: "If I can't design something and send it to the mill to be built, what's the point of making a film?"

It's time to get back to the drawing tablet.

Postscript: When I was in my late teens I asked my mother if she could teach me on how to use her Singer sewing machine. The funny thing is she didn't seem to be too taken aback with my request and wasted no time in proceeding to train me on the essential operations in a clear and easy to understand manner. However, while I can be pretty handy with a sewing machine and fabric shears— especially so given the fact that I'm a straight guy — I leave the actual building to seamstresses.

Pencil Sketch: Sea Thing (On the Beach)

Like many self-proclaimed artists, I can, with varying degrees of success, draw what Archie Bunker might call "normal tings": Humans, buildings, oxen pulling plows, and a house cat playing with a ball of yarn. However, I remind myself that I am not afraid to conjure up strange things.

Fastened above is a pencil sketch that I commissioned myself to render in December of 1984. It is titled, simply enough, "Sea Thing (on the beach)". The original is approximately 8" by 8".

Looking at the drawing now, the workmanship doesn't look to be of anything special, even by my own questionable standards, but it is an example of what I can pull out of my hat... well, the subject matter, not the actual subject. Cripes, if I were to pull that out of my hat....

My excuse is that I spent a few of my formative years living in (West) Germany. As anyone would tell you who was in that lovely country back in those days — 1960s/1970s — there was a lot of kids, around my own age, who were physically deformed, some horribly. All thanks to a little drug used to treat "morning sickness", called Thalidomide. Pretty upsetting stuff.

It was very common to see children with flippers for arms, or malformed legs.

I remember driving with my family across the German countryside and my mother blurting out with some emotion, "Oh, look at that little boy, he's horribly deformed". Due to the speed that my dad was driving, I was not able to see anything — probably a good thing. The description my mother gave me was more interesting than anything else. Kids are inquisitive.

And some of them go on to draw and paint. I've drawn more-offbeat things than our featured imaginary denizen of the great big sea....

Yes, "Strange Things from a Strange Mind".

Happy 36th Birthday, SkyDome Forever!

The name "SkyDome" was not my first choice. A contest had been held in 1987, while the structure was under construction, to come up with an appropriate moniker for this new and impressive soon-to-be stadium; the first one with a "fully retractable roof".

Although I never submitted anything, I came up with my own pick very quickly once I heard about the contest: "Trillium." It just happens to be the official provincial flower of Ontario. (Attention, some American readers: Toronto is in the province of Ontario.) In addition, "Trillium" sounds "big" — it does to me, at least.

Once the name for Toronto's new stadium was chosen and announced, I was underwhelmed. "SkyDome? That's totally uninspired." (Totally.)

Now I like that name. It's certainly better than "Rogers Centre". To be honest, most Torontonians don't say "Rogers Centre", and rarely do I hear the stadium referred to by that name unless I'm listening to a Sports news reader on the radio. "Live, down at the Rogers Centre....".

No, "Sky Dome".

 

Post Notes: I survived the SkyDome opening ceremonies back on June 3rd, 1989. There was a contest at work and I won two tickets, so in turn I took my old school mate Jorge to the promised grand event. It turned out to be an all too tacky affair. More than once during the song-and-dance stuff Jorge and I cracked up laughing. He quizzed earnestly to my left ear, "What's with all the Broadway numbers?"

To impress, the dome was then opened. The sky had opened.

Sunday Fun: Starship Invasions Movie Review 1977

In the spring of 1977 — June to be exact — I visited Toronto with friend Chris. Our mission, which we did accept, was to tour OECA (Ontario Educational Communications Authority; now TVOntario). Courtesy of Travelways bus line, and a two five-dollar return tickets, we made our way to the big smoke.

My friend and I took a break from our tour and visited a shop nearby which happened to have a magazine rack loaded with a good spread of material. One particular magazine caught my eye as on the front was a full-sized photo from Star Wars, a movie that I had just heard of a few weeks before. With the help of some unseen force, I bought it.

On the bus ride home I scanned this geek-sweet new magazine; specifically, issue 7 of Starlog. In addition to a rundown on Star Wars were bits and bites on various other science fiction and fantasy movies, one of which was an interesting-sounding film, shot here in Canada, by the name of "Alien Encounter". I can still picture the picture affixed to the blurb: Tiiu Leek and Christopher Lee. "Christopher Lee?" The text said something about "Encounter" being a throwback to 50s sci-fi flicks, but with the advantage of colour photography.

A few months later, Starship Invasions, its new name, was released to a theatre near you. Considering that Star Wars hit the screens a few months earlier and had set the bar for what is expected from "space movies", Starship was fun, with some impressive visual effects. I really dug the effect of a flying saucer crashing at high speed into the First Canadian Place tower (now BMO).

A few weeks after this, friend Chris threw down a copy of Cinema Canada Magazine onto the high school library table where I was seated, specifically opened at the page where Starship Invasions had been reviewed. I reviewed the article and thought it was an honest summation.

Well, dear readers, for those of you who care, for your reading enjoyment above is a picture of a photocopy I made years ago of the story in question. (I found the review while doing research at the magnificent Toronto Reference Library, the Toronto Public Library system's big house on Yonge Street just north of Bloor Street.)

Postscript: the budget figure of one million dollars as itemized in the review is incorrect. (In addition, Douglas Trumbull supervised the visual effects for Close Encounters of the Third Kind, not Star Wars. The reviewer meant John Dykstra.) Someone who worked as a higher-up on Starship Invasions told me that it cost just under two million to produce. Someone else told me that one pet name used by the crew during production was "Alien Turkey".

Canadian Armed Forces Day 2025

I had not realized till minutes ago that here in Canada it's "Armed Forces Day". This was an embarrassing and unconscionable oversight by this proud "Brat".

Once a brat, always a military brat. My father was career RCAF/CAF. My appreciation of our men and women who serve, and who have served, this great country knows no bounds.

The RCAF roundel above is a shoulder patch from my RCAF 100th Anniversary Hoodie, which, incidentally, I wore this morning during my Sunday Tim Hortons coffee pickup. Perhaps I'm not as unconscious as previously thought. Even I can be full of surprises sometimes.

The Death Probe of Television

Not long ago I saw a few pictures that someone had posted online of the old and short-lived science fiction television series Logan's Run (1977 - 1978), a quick-to-television spinoff of the feature film from the year before. For some reason I almost never watched it; but when I did, it was in a casual way, unfocused and in little bits scanned from my bedroom's television set tuned to local station CKVR. I ignored Logan's run simply because I was growing out of watching television as appointment television.

When does one slow down on watching television? I'm speaking of American prime time dramatic programs — or sitcoms, which I almost never watched. Even with the litany of kids' things many of us in that time of our lives still managed to clock a lot of TV. But the ritual stops as we discover other things on our road to maturation. Or whatever. Some people just enjoy watching their favourite shows. It makes them happy, often after a long day.

I started to drift away in my mid to late teens. For example, this once regular viewer of The Six Million Dollar Man didn't watch the show's fifth and final season (1977 - 1978). I remember popping down and into the rec room one evening to grab a book from the bookcase and caught my siblings watching the follow-up episode to "Death Probe": "Return of the Death Probe." I turned to them and said: "You're still watching this?" Their even more youthful faces than my own beamed enjoyment. There on the television rolled what appeared to be an armoured go-kart, somewhat like the first model, but even more equipped.

(Both "Death Probe" and "Return of Death Probe" were two-parters.)

An admission: I enjoyed "Death Probe" when it first aired, even if it did feature a cruder version of machine compared to the sequel vehicle of destruction. This then youth knew the whole concept was rubbish, but, as was the case with more than a few Six Million episodes, there was an entertaining comic book fun vibe to "Death Probe".

But, my times were changing.

One day in 1995 I got a nasty wake-up call. A few of my coworkers emoted shocks and 'tears' as they recounted the latest episodes of Chicago Hope and ER. I stood in awe and bemusement as my mug of coffee got cold.

"Death Probe", first or second story, started to sound appealing.

Last year, courtesy of The Six Million Dollar Man Complete Series DVD set, I rewatched "Death Probe", the first installment in the robotic line. It was entertaining, in a 'back to my youth' sort of way. Being a two-part episode it did feel at times to drag a little, running at about the maximum speed of the probe prop — not very fast. Part Two's climactic, and major, set piece, an extended sequence featuring Steve Austin's attempt to stop the runaway rolling robot dead in its tracks, is not without interest or tension, but it would have benefitted from a little trimming. (Keep in mind that a completed episode needed to consist of about 4,500 35mm feet to fill a one-hour television timeslot back then.) The positive aspects, of which there are a few, are topped off by its drawing power for a young person: in January of 1977 I was on the probe's radar set.

Now that I have the complete-series set, and "Death Probe" charged me enough to give it a passing grade, I can consider scanning "Return of Death Probe". First, however, I'll watch a documentary on the Soviet "Lunokhod" lunar rovers. Now that I think about it, the Six Million Dollar Man writers should have written an episode, a two-parter, of course, where Steve is sent back to the moon to stop a rampaging Lunokhod 3 rover. (Oscar Goldman: "Pal, it's heading for the OSI's secret lunar remote intelligence-gathering station, and it must be stopped.")

Nostalgic television rocks.

Athot for the Day: Duck! And Cover!

Life's but a septic tank explosion.

The Dogs and Cats Difference

While doing some work here at home, I realized something very important... something that ethologists may want to consider as being important to their research. (No doubt they know.)

The difference between dogs and cats:

With a dog, his or her personality is dictated by the breed.

With a cat, his or her personality is dictated by the cat.

Sunday Fun: The Shulman and Medical Files & Titles

The Shulman File

"Look at you. You're a bunch of weirdos!"

So explained Dr Morton Shulman to his crowd of guests as he rocked back and forth in his comfy office chair. In that week's case his invited targets were into fetishes. One mustached guy in particular wore a half-face masquerade mask and would express himself by answering the show host's questions with a simple question: "In what context?"

"Morty" was not afraid to stick it to his special guests, be they politicians, labour union leaders, or an assortment of the offbeat.

The embedded video clip above is from a show titled: "UFO's and Psychics. Fact or Fraud?" (1983)

The Shulman File premiered in 1977, and from that point onward I watched on a regular basis. It did not matter to me what any given week's theme was. After all, there was that great theme tune to get one in the mood for some television fireworks.

Toronto television station CITY-TV was great at one time. In its mix of creative programming sat a controversial presenter. Morton Shulman, politician, physician and coroner, stirred things up, but did so from an intellectual platform ― not sensationalism for the sake of sensationalism, and ratings (as in Bill O'Reilly).

It would be nice to see complete episodes; there are bits and pieces to enjoy on YouTube.

We need a show like The Shulman File today to grill our surfeit of "weirdos".

The Interns

It's a curse. I must be called "The Chop Guy". It seems that whenever I took — yes, the past tense — to a television series, word would get around that it was not long for this world. My television viewing past is littered with what I thought were quality programs, but ones that didn't last past one year, barely touch two, or didn't even manage to get that 'mid-season pickup', if it did managed to reach 13 episodes at all. Hour-long dramatic series such as: Planet of the Apes (1974 - 1974), Lucas Tanner (1974-1975), The Gemini Man (1976 - 1976) and The Fantastic Journey (1977 - 1977) would fall into that box; as would.... 

How I discovered The Interns I do not remember, but I do remember making sure I caught the CBS medical show every week on the Sony black-and-white portable upstairs. To this then young one the subject matter was adult at times — there was an intense episode which featured a prison — but for some strange reason I could handle the material, even if I did not always understand it.

Seeing the show intro on YouTube a few years ago brought back the memories. While watching it I realized that I had remembered so much of its imagery and narrative, especially the climactic bit where the intrepid young medics run into an unimpressed Broderick Crawford.

A few years ago I watched a complete episode on YouTube: The Interns was a product of its era, which is not necessarily a problem, with the titular characters too-heavily involved in one another's stories; whereas in the real medical and doctoring world, each would have his or her own patient — their own "case". In the show I watched, the entire intern cast visited a location to check for some evidence. This is hardly the reality of that field. However, it is "television"... which is why I'm hardly around to curse any programs these days. (I should note that I once worked as a hospital photographer, including in "Emerg" for some of that time.)

The cast: Crawford, "Mr Highway Patrol" himself, of course; Christopher Stone; Stephen Brooks; Hal Frederick; Sandy Smith; Mike Farrell; and Skip Homeier. (Even then I was familiar with some of these actors as I had seen them in other television series.)

The Interns and I enjoyed just one season.

Toronto Maple Leafs: Declassified!

It's time "Toronto Maple Leafs" be made public domain.

(Hey, maybe they'd even win a Stanley Cup under such ownership.)

Project: Satiated!

I am not a nutritionist. But I am aware of my own gastronomic and gastric requirements. Vegan dishes are regarded by some as lacking in essential ingredients: meat. A few years ago I met a young vegan lady through a mutual friend. Little did I know when I was introduced to Caroline that she would almost change my dinner plate.

It was bound to happen. After she slipped me some publications on the wonderful world of veganism I decided to give the culinary component a shot ― with her guidance, of course.

Caroline cooked up a storm, and during the event, she gave me notes on what it was she was doing with what food items and ingredients, and what each and every one contributed to the nutritional indexes.

What a fabulous meal, that was; quite possibly the greatest I've ever experienced. This was the best part: When I awoke the next morning I was not compelled to run for an emergency food source. My metabolism is such that even if I chow down on something based around meat the night before, by the next morning I am more than a little peckish. Caroline's vegan plate somehow convinced my brain that I was not starving, even hours later.

After I recounted the story to another vegan friend he told me why I had felt so satiated: "She probably packed it with nutrients."

For some reason I've not been able to go off meat completely, even if it continues to be a small portion of my dinner plate. The issue of animal abuse is something that bothers me. What will it take to convince me to go over? No doubt I'm not alone in facing that dilemma.

Donuts!

Athot for the Day: Paradox on Ice

I'm beginning to think that "Toronto Maple Leafs" has become a philosophical conundrum.

It's Victoria Day here in Canada — HMS Victoria

As it's Victoria Day here in Canada, and another lovely day — if a bit on the cool side for this time of year — here in the great city of Toronto, I thought it might make some sense for me to post something with the name "Victoria". A few years ago I read a fine book titled Castles of Steel - Britain, Germany, and the Winning of the Great War at Sea.

Written by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Robert K. Massie, the amount of detail brought to life by a wonderful sense of story-telling is most impressive.

John Rushworth Jellicoe (1859 – 1935) was Admiral of the Fleet in Britain's Royal Navy during "The Great War" (better known today as World War I); Massie spends some time giving background to "Jack": Guys like Jellicoe did, and still do, their time on a series of warships before reaching the top office. One vessel on which he served in the late 1800s was HMS Victoria; and he almost drowned after the ship was accidentally punctured by another. When the 'bang' happened Jellicoe was in bed with a dysentery-induced 103 degree (Fahrenheit) fever. He ran up to the deck to see what had happened. Not long after he began to help fellow sailors abandon the sinking Victoria, the once-mighty battleship started to capsize. In the name of "every man for himself" the executive officer fell off the side and into the sea. As Jellicoe noted in a letter he wrote to his mother after the close-call: "The curious thing is that my temperature today is normal, so the ducking did me good."

This hull-head was not familiar enough with that Royal Navy vessel, so, naturally, I consulted Wikipedia: 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Victoria_(1887)

On it I saw a photograph that I had initially believed to be a contemporary painting. The image has a painterly quality, making my error understandable. It is a lovely, multi-textured photograph ― taken in 1888....

That Special Time of the Year — Leafs to the Greens!

Game 7 between the Florida Panthers and the Toronto Maple Leafs finished minutes ago. News from the Leafs' home base of Scotiabank Arena is not good news to hometown fans:

Panthers 6 — Leafs 1

Post-season analysis, a tradition with pundits and Leafs-fans alike:

"The Leafs have some issues to address before they can promote themselves as serious Stanley Cup contenders"... "It was a fine regular season run but it goes to show you the playoffs are a much tougher league"... "All those young Leafs players have to be convinced it's important to carry their play from the regular season into the playoffs"... "It's been said the playoffs separate the men from the boys; an aphorism which required but a few games to entomb a certain club in ice"... "The facts are incontrovertible: the Toronto Maple Leafs' icebound scramblings were not good enough."

***

Time for a (flash) poem I wrote in 2022, one 'dedicated' to that special team, and, apparently, and unfortunately for Leafs fans, one lushly evergreen....

Whither Leafs?

To where does a withered Leaf fall?

To the manicured green grasses below

of course....

Snip: Content Warning: Graphic Content (?!)

When I tweeted the above this morning I was taken aback by what replaced the actual picture.

Content Warning: Graphic Content

X labeled this post as containing Graphic Content

Was it the text?

"Picturing: Conical Red Peppers Stuffed with Cheese

https://simonstlaurent.ca/2024/10/picturing-conical-red-peppers-stuffed.html

Three please!

No. Obviously it was the picture. Why are the items in this image objectionable to X/Twitter?

Food for thought.

Here's the tweet

A Story: Which Picture Should We See? This or That?

While I was visiting Toronto with a high school buddy in the summer of 1978 a decision had to be made: the right one could bring cinematic pleasure (not that kind of movie!), the wrong one could make us reel. We were teenagers, sponges, but James and I did want to do the right thing that beautifully warm and sunny day.

Outside the Imperial Six theatre — remember that? those? — on Yonge Street we stood, monitoring the colour television monitors which unreeled clips from the movies on offer.

Should we make a bee-line for producer Irwin Allen's new epic, The Swarm, or take a promised ride with some novice's Corvette Summer?

This could take some time, and it did, believe me. Deciding some years later what VHS tape should be rented from the local video store had nothing on trying to pick between two new hot summer films — ones aimed perfectly at teenagers.

Corvette Summer, starring that Mark Hamill guy from the summer before, was a pleasant surprise. It was entertaining and had some good characterizations: an order of abundant fun in a darkened movie theatre on a summer's day.

As for The Swarm? Word got around quickly regarding the cinestatic disaster from the "Master of Disaster". James and I must have known. The Towering Inferno from four years earlier was a towering achievement for Mr Allen, but his bee-movie turned on him and kicked his ass.

"... and James and Simon avoided getting stung at the ticket wicket."

It's Breakfast Time!

Looking for canned peas. But somehow I end up in the wrong aisle: the breakfast cereal section. Look at all the multi-coloured boxes! Which reminds me of a story of when a friend of mine came into town to visit TIFF (the Toronto International Film Festival).

As per just about any month or year, in September of 2006 my cupboards lacked any boxes of cold breakfast cereal. Not even one to impress, or feed, visitors.

My friend and I would have to eat in the morning. His visiting me was cause for celebration: going out to eat. "There's a really good diner just around the corner." For the duration of this special occasion my buddy and I whirled a variation on this brekkie thing.

Later on I heard something that broke my breaky heart: "Going without cereal for so many days was tough on me."

"You should have said something! I would've picked up a couple boxes of Froot Loops."

Drive Them Crazy — Unfortunates

To all those folk out there who might be afraid to take further steps....

There are people who don't like to see you succeed. If there are no putdowns, directly or indirectly, a strange silence fills the void.

Don't listen to them. Just do it to them.

Produce. Produce something. From this springs accomplishment.

Accomplishment, however small, drives them crazy. (Most unfortunate.)

Athot for the Day: No Greenlight

I'm lamenting the reality of David Lynch never getting to make Ronnie Rocket.

Sunday Fun: Opening Titles for Two UK SF Shows

UFO

The 1970 - 1971 television season was exciting for this then child: Gerry and Silvia Anderson's first live-action series, UFO, was the flagship.

The CTV (Canadian Television) network ran the series here in Canada, and the network's flagship station, CFTO, in Toronto, was where the dial turned to on our Zenith colour television set. My parents watched, too. It was what we would now refer to as "appointment television".

UFO was what now would be considered to be very adult material for that time. For some reason the Brits were ahead of us in some departments on this side of the pond. They would not be afraid to address matters such as a death in the family, or family dysfunction (like a marriage falling apart). Wait a minute... it's called "UFO". There was the space stuff, of course, and the show's premise of a hostile alien force attacking us could be exciting, but the best episodes were not space-based — believe it or not. "Sub-Smash", "A Question of Priorities", and "Confetti Check A-O.K." are standouts. A few years ago I watched those three episodes, along with a few others, for the first time in decades, and was convinced.

Unfortunately for the fans, UFO lasted just one season; totaling 26 stories.

Things went downhill after that for the Andersons as a husband and wife production team. Their later interstellar effort, Space: 1999 (1975 - 1977), was a big step down — mainly in the characterization, acting, and scripting departments — from what they had achieved with UFO. (With Space, somehow, any sense of fun had been left outside the airlock.)

The good news is the couple survived as separate producing entities: Gerry, after the 'stigma' of Space: 1999 and a few years of barely getting by financially — over the years he had pumped much British pound sterling into the family home but the real estate market crashed in England and he owed a lot of money in alimony — he eventually teamed up with German producer Christopher Burr, thereby relaunching a television production career; Sylvia enjoyed a long career, three decades worth, as a London-based talent scout for HBO.

Doctor Who (Jon Pertwee's first opening title version, 1970-73)

OECA (Ontario Educational Communications Authority), now referred to as TV Ontario, ran adverts in the summer of 1976 announcing their Fall scheduling of a British programme from my childhood, Doctor Who — which at that point had not yet stopped production, eventually wrapping in 1989; a twenty-six year BBC production run.

As a very young child living at RCAF Station Greenwood, Nova Scotia, I saw the first "Dalek" story; its affect on me was profound enough that I never forgot kneeling in front of the Admiral monochrome television set and being: scared!... by the BBC via the CBC. (Those panning eyestalk cameras lining the Dalek city's hallways gave me the creeps.)

Back to OECA.

Starting that September I was there in front of the tube every Saturday evening. That was my introduction to the third doctor, Jon Pertwee, and because of the network's two-year Who run featuring the time and space "dandy", he was, and remains, my favourite of all the actors to play and interpret "the Doctor". (In September of 1978, OECA switched to the Tom Baker Doctor Who stories, which had begun running four years earlier on the show's home network.)

Of special note is the classic theme tune composed by Ron Grainer; what must be noted is Dalia Derbyshire's "arrangement", an electronic transcription, really, from the composer's score paper. This theme burns into one's electronics.

While the original Doctor Who's production crews lacked today's wonderful technologies, they somehow managed to tell some terrifically entertaining stories. (So you know, dear reader, you are not imagining my cynicism.)

Every Saturday at 6pm, this then young geek, sat in front of the living room's 10-inch B&W Sony, glowing along in phase with the set's cathode ray tube. During the following week's run of high school I lost the glow but regained it again on the following Saturday. A friend told me a few years ago that he too felt somewhat despondent as a given week's Doctor Who episode's title cards came to a close. "I had to wait a whole week for the next one."

You really had to be there and then to understand.

Athot of the Day: On Procrastination

The Province of the Creative.

Poem: We'll Meet Again?

It was a year ago, this week
that we last met...

under that ship's
crane as it unloaded
a shipment of cheap
products from the "orient"

however, as you remember, but
perhaps you don't
that crane did drop its
   swinging
 load

right

on

us!

...

And with that bad luck,
my sweet
it's not possible for
you and I to ever meet

under that crane, or
anything else again.

___

2017

Simon St. Laurent

Picturing: St. Laurent and Saint Laurent on Bloor St.

A couple of weeks ago an old friend of mine was visiting Toronto, and as we walked westward on the north side of Bloor Street, towards Avenue Road, my buddy pointed across my bow and laughed. I turned to see what was running by my right shoulder.

Saint Laurent

Very good! That wall art must have been erected fairly recently.

Chris popped out his smart phone and did the right thing, with no prompting from moi.

Years ago, a friend of mine, an 'Interior Design' college student at the time, said to me: "You're so lucky to have that name. How did you get it?"

"I was kinda born with it."

With all this "Saint Laurent" talk I'm trying to remember if I've ever worn any apparel so marked. (Looking at this picture now I realize I'm wearing all Uniqlo.) This morning I might just visit 110 Bloor Street West. It's just a quick walk.

$$$

Oh, that's right.

Perhaps I should just keep on walking....

Flash Poem: Writers' Rights!

Writers write!

Any where

Any time

Any way

it comes naturally

sans inhibition

without limitation:

in a diary

on a script

a postcard

a napkin

Writers write!

All ways....

___

2022

Simon St. Laurent

Athot of the Day: There's No Pussyfootin' Around!

I love cats so much that I cannot stay faithful to just one. Wilhelm knows! He 'senses' it....

Video: Launching The First American into Space

On this day in 2021, NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) uploaded the above video, a then 60th anniversary celebration of astronaut Alan B. Shepard's spaceflight — America's first. It was a great technical success, paving the way for the moon landings: with Shepard commanding Apollo 14, the third such mission to succeed.

Mercury-Redstone 3 "Freedom 7" launched 64 years ago today and its success was celebrated the world over, partly because the mission was broadcast/televised live, and not done in secrecy. (Yuri Gagarin's Vostok 1 flight a few weeks earlier was kept under lock and key — as per the Soviet way — till the Cosmonaut was safely back on mother Earth).

Alan B. Shepard, American Hero.

Alan B. Shepard — First U.S. Astronaut in Space

"It was really exciting!"

When I was a little one of five or six years of age my mother told me the story of an important event from just a few years earlier. It was the United States of America's first manned spaceflight, and the astronaut's name was Alan Shepard. Everyone had gathered around the television to witness an important part of human history.

This was the first time they were able to see a manned rocket launch. The Soviets had not broadcast to the world, or even its own citizens, the lift-off of Vostok 1 three weeks earlier, and only after Yuri Gagarin returned safely to Earth from his orbital flight did they announce this stellar and humanity-changing feat. The name of the hero cosmonaut then travelled around the globe.

Citizens of the Earth could not be made to feel as participants in a great adventure until the National Aeronautics and Space Administration got to show its stuff.

Mercury-Redstone 3 ("Freedom 7") was to be a suborbital mission: Shepard's spacecraft would follow a planned ballistic trajectory. A big arc. The Mercury capsule would be shot into space, then float at high speed for some time before Earth's gravity initiated its re-entry.

One interesting element of the mission was that, unlike Gagarin's trip, which was fully automated, Shepard would take some control of his spacecraft. While up there, free from our planet's atmosphere, he manually operated the attitude control system in order to test Freedom 7's pitch, roll, and yaw capabilities, proving them to be properly functional.

The fifteen-minute voyage was a great technical success: The capsule went 101 miles up and flew 263 miles "downrange". The splashdown took place in the Atlantic Ocean. Shepard and Freedom 7 were recovered by waiting U.S. Navy vessels. (John Glenn's orbital flight would not happen for ten more months. Two cosmonauts will have already orbited the Earth by that time.)

Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr was chosen to pilot MR-3 some months earlier by Project Mercury head Robert Gilruth. Competition was fierce amongst the program's seven astronauts. Not only were these men skilled test pilots ― as were all U.S. astronauts in the earliest days of space flight ― but they were equipped with the latest in personality types: Gus Grissom, for instance, who would become the second American in space, did not say much minute-to-minute during training, but when he made it known he was about to whisper something to his fellow astronauts they would shut up, lean forward, and wait for the expected words of profundity.

Shepard, on the other hand, was more gregarious by nature. He not only spoke a more regular beat, when he had something important to relate you'd better be listening, and if you didn't take your work seriously or were at any time sloppy in your training, at least from his perspective, you were sure to hear about it.

They were of a special breed: Shepard, Virgil "Gus" Grissom, John Glenn, Scott Carpenter, Wally Schirra, Gordon Cooper, and Deke Slayton (who was grounded for medical reasons).

I know way too much about this whole subject. Before I go on any further I'm going to execute a deorbit burn. (See?)

But first:

On May 5th, 1961, sixty-four years ago today, NASA's star astronaut, Alan B. Shepard, became a trailblazer. The world watched as his Redstone rocket sat on a launch pad at Cape Canaveral:

"... light this candle!"

Star Wars Day: It Was Some Unknown Force

"... It's called Star Wars. One set alone cost twelve million dollars."

That is how I first heard of Star Wars. It was the spring of 1977. I had the Grundig stereo on in the living room and as I walked from the kitchen into the dining room I heard an on-air host from Toronto radio station CKFM say the magic words. My reaction to the announced set cost must have been one of awe ― I later learned that the movie cost about ten million dollars to make ― but it was the name of this mysterious new flick that really intrigued me.

Star Wars not only hit  the marketplace, but entered our culture....


That could have been the opening crawl to my two-part series recounting my introduction to Star Wars. It all started for me when I heard that radio piece. But everyone has a different story. And already I've read a few online; interesting stories, all.

In the pre-Internet age, it was a different game.

After learning of a new and anticipated movie going into production, one had to sometimes dig to learn more than what was readily available from the mainstream media outlets. For most pictures the wait was, more often than not, off our radars.

However, do not think for a moment that pre-release or pre-production hype used by the major film studios is a recently developed tool. Films from the 1970s were following an old model but with new tricks. Promotional featurettes, shot on 16mm film, were taken to a refined state during those years. Major studio productions like The Poseidon Adventure, The Towering Inferno, and King Kong were promoted heavily while they were still in production. In the case of Kong the casting of the new beauty was covered in local and national newscasts. I remember watching Buffalo television station WKBW late one evening and seeing newsfilm of Jessica Lange on stage holding a bouquet of flowers (it was a press conference).

Who could forget watching the excellent and dynamic promotional film showing the production crew of The Towering Inferno doing their magic? Irwin Allen directing over John Guillerman's head by using a megaphone was exciting and memorable. ("Mister Newman!") Accompanied by an authoritative but not staid voice over, bulldozers dug down into a sound stage floor in order to give the already voluminous space even more fly. These promotional shorts were nothing less than recruitment films. "I want to do that!"

By the time big pictures such as Poseidon, Inferno, Kong, Earthquake, and The Hindenburg hit the screens, an educated, of sorts, audience was awaiting. And I was an enthusiastic young member of that audience, in all five examples.

There was none of that for Star Wars. It just sneaked up on us....

Star Wars Day: Admit One Repeat in 1977

The forty-eighth anniversary of the original release of Star Wars is coming on the 25th of this month, and for us older folks, the question sometimes comes up: "How many times did you see Star Wars when it first came out?"

The movie made a lot of money because it was what's called "a repeater". Young people, especially, went back to the movie theatres over and over to see what was then a new thing; a high-quality comic book on the big screen.

Perhaps due to my age at the time, sixteen, I saw Star Wars, enjoyed it, and did not rush back to see it again. This was not helped by the fact that it left town after just three weeks. No doubt it was 'bicycled' to another theatre waiting for such a precious print. (King Kong had played for a full month across the street at the Big House.) Once was enough for me, however, as there were other movies to see and I was interested in many other things.

In September of 1977 I became friends with a guy at my high school who was a huge fan of the film. He was a couple of years younger — it was through a school club that we first met. Two or three weeks later, Star Wars reappeared in Barrie, Ontario, this time at one of the exciting Bayfield Mall's two screens, and my fan friend and I, with colourful umbrellas in hand, trotted off one rainy night to see again the silver screen's smash hit of '77.

I saw Star Wars two times that year: First, in July at the "Imperial 2" in beautiful downtown Barrie; then it was a tinny movie house in stunning uptown Barrie.

My favourite film in 1977 was Annie Hall. I saw it once.

Book: The Rebel Christ (Coren)

The Rebel Christ

by

Michael Coren

Dundurn Press

2021

***

From a previous posting....

This atheist must keep an open mind, always. Right now I'm reading Toronto-based author Michael Coren's The Rebel Christ (2021). I actually bought the book last October, and read its "Introduction", but my reading queue is always pages long ― meaning it had to wait in line. The Rebel Christ is more than good, even at just a couple of chapters in....

The writer quotes G.K. Chesterton: "The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried."

As readers here may have heard, members of the Christian right have been going barmy over the Reverend Coren's work. I doubt they've even read The Rebel Christ, or perhaps some have but find its reaffirmation of Christ's message of peace and love to be rebarbative.

Before I go back to coffee and reading, I must add: The author maintains a good sense of humour as he addresses certain concerns. This sent me funny....

"Personally, I prefer a nice card, a box of chocolates, and some roses."

Well folks, I have to say that The Rebel Christ is "required reading at the Academy".

So you know where I stand on Christianity and religion in general, I am a card-carrying atheist. As a matter of fact, I have the hard-to-acquire "Platinum Card". As I wrote in April of 2017, I rejected 'faith' very early in my life. "From a Dependent Brat: The Church of Me" goes into a little detail as to when and how this happened. I've not wavered since then.

Now that you have an IMF (Impossible Missions Force) dossier on me, here I go....

Non-believers and believers would have much to glean from Michael Coren's effort to set the record straight on a few matters; matters that have been hijacked and distorted by those who wrap themselves in the bible, even if they've never actually read it, to reaffirm what they believe were Christ's teachings. As Mr Coren states assuredly more than a few times in his work, Jesus never actually addressed certain issues, and if he did, it was ever so slightly. Too often his teachings have been perverted beyond all recognition: an interpretation of an interpretation, scrubbed of any chromatic scaling to fit one's already dichotomous thinking.

I would agree that Jesus preached love and forgiveness above all. (What's so hard to understand?)

This atheist has adopted a certain phrase, one heard a lot these days from non-believers such as myself: "Even I'm more Christian than many of these so-called Christians."

Final note: Travelling on Twitter/X, especially, introduces one to a lot of far-right anger, anger all too often suggesting violence. Check out a given bio and see "Loves Jesus".

Yeah, buddy, I believe you.

But I do believe Michael Coren. The Rebel Christ is outstanding, and highly recommended... take it from this "card-carrying atheist".

"Please believe me when I say that Jesus would not hurt or abuse,

would not reject,

would not exclude."