Back in the day, all you needed was four buttons to access ALL 82 channels. That’s right up my alley. Simplicity. Why have we made this so complicated from what it was in 1980?
Jupiter is still a bonafide planet, right?
The new RCA FD500 had everything one could want, including programming a week’s worth of shows. Who needs TIVO? Not only did it shut itself off after The Late Show, but it could turn your lamps off and on intermittently to ward off would-be robbers and thugs. Let’s hope they didn’t know you had scored the latest RCA, or you were done for! Even the AutoProgrammer could wake you up. No alarm needed!
And the colors were so vibrant! See how right the colors can be.
Yep, I think that’s pretty much all the colors.
I recall we were all a lot thinner then, but THIS IS RIDICULOUS. Somebody feed her! She is about to collapse under the weight of her videocamera!
And if you’re gonna do it, do it right. Don’t skimp on lesser models when you could go full on stately cabinet, pecan-veneered Marandino.
Or the Glenrich, a contemporary highboy. Oh, that’s a good name for a blog, come to think of it. Maybe I’ll change mine. Anyhoo, the point is not to skimp. You want to watch Thursday’s Mork and Mindy and Bosom Buddies in style, don’t you? Just think, you could be THIS guy.
Actually, the flame was due less to Richard Simmons and more to the perils of frying turkey for Thanksgiving, which Shatner discusses here:
Flame-free and portly, he’s still truckin’ at 82 years old (and several months older than Regis!). Last year, he performed in a one-man show on Broadway, called Shatner’s World: We Just Live in It, and he makes consistent appearances on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Clearly, he’s having the last laugh.
Most of us remember Antonio Salvatore Ladanza from his TV series Taxi or later, Who’s The Boss? but Tony Danza is also an accomplished boxer, tap dancer, and Broadway actor. And as you can see from the picture above, in his latest movie, Don Jon, this 62-year-old is still pretty ripped. He explained that he did nothing to prepare physically for the role,; he maintains this level of fitness from his years as a prize fighter. But I have a celebrity fitness book from 1983 that reveals his secret:
“YOU CAN STAY IN SHAPE WITH JUST SEX AND NOTHING ELSE. THEN, YOU CAN EAT ALL THE MACARONI YOU WANT.”
At the time, he was still acting on Taxi with Marilu Henner, who has said that he wanted to “drill a hole through her dressing room wall.” Apparently, this misplaced testosterone could lead to barroom brawls, if not directed into workouts. Here he is punching a speed bag.
Mr. Danza circa 1983
I particularly enjoyed the last line of the interview: “I’m self-conscious because I’m getting older–I just turned 32.” Scoff if you will, but many celebrities never made it past the age of 32: Karen Carpenter and Cass Elliot (talk about night and day), as well as Bruce Lee, Keith Moon, and one of the guys in Milli Vanilli. Congratulations, Tony, on maintaining your fitness in the 30 years since this was published. And here’s to 30 more. Buon lavoro!
What you are witnessing surpasses the pairing of peanut butter and jelly, Jack and Diane, or even Tanqueray and Tonic. It is indeed a combination of the Extra-Terrestrial and the celebration of the Savior’s birth. My mind is too blown to continue. If you are unaware of the merits of wrapping paper, feel free to go back in time and check out: https://sanceau.com/2013/02/01/thats-a-wrap/.
Oh, sweetheart, what can be done about this? Even Jazz Hands, overdone blush, a Mardi Gras Reynolds Wrap sash, and a Newton-John headband cannot distract from what’s at hand here. Bless your heart.
And this one could have been easily prevented with a razor. Can this even be real?
Burt Reynolds ain’t got nothin’ on me.
Usually pleated pants are the worst part of a photo op, but not in this case:
At least his trousers aren’t VINYL. What is up with that? Even the cat is struggling to break free from that anemic woman’s wardrobe choices. I’d rather don a cat collar than whatever that is around her neck. And who chose that poor man’s Big Bang background? It’s like a swirling cosmic soup where galaxies collide at the corner of Where Is His Belt and Please Button Your Cuffs. And let’s not forget the photographer, complicit in this atrocity, who allowed the female to wear her hair tucked behind those ears. What the what? I sure hope that kitty Rockette-highkicked its way out of that couple’s life.
So I’m watching–yes–another episode of the FINAL (gasp!) season of What Not To Wear, while wearing a crazy cute floral skirt and blouse myself, feeling confident and yet saddened by the former Jennifer Keaton of Family Ties fame, played by Miss Tina Yothers. First off, I can easily get past her substantial weight gain; we all get old and puffy (even Renee Zellweger at times). But I cannot get past her black Goth hair. Right now, she is telling Ted, the stylist, “Once you go black…” But, in this case, that is untrue. I had black hair when I was 17 years old, but I’m not 17 anymore. You CAN go back. I realize this is a free country, and I realize this is also a rerun, so I should have gotten over it by now, but I simply cannot. There is freedom, and then there is sanity. Freedom of fashion choice does not exclude one from the NEED to dress age-appropriately. Or wear age-appropriate hair. You might look pretty cute in pigtails or a Crissy Snow side-pony, but you wouldn’t go in public like that over the age of 12.
There are only four reasons to have black hair if you are a porcelain-skinned white girl like Miss Tina:
1) You were born with it.
2) You are Katy Perry (herself a natural blonde who will probably grow it back out once she matures).
3) You are Veronica from Archie comics.
4) You are Snow White.
Now back to Tina. For one thing, she says she hasn’t tried clothes on in a dressing room in “like five or six years.” WTH? Do you know many how styles have come and gone in six years? You think six years isn’t much? Think about your cell phone six years ago. Think about your laptop and your old beige monitor. Having kids is not an excuse for giving up. Don’t be that woman in pajamas at Wal-Mart. You are better than that. It’s not about being trendy or even about vanity; it’s about being the best version of yourself.
Tina, like another guest named Teresa (“T”) whom they tackled on Season 8, has a fear of wearing dresses. I DO NOT GET THIS!! Admittedly, T had some serious issues she needed to work through, regarding mandatory Catholic school uniforms or something like that, so now T is rebelling (too old to rebel) against society and now nobody tells T to put a dress on. In fact, T often gets mistaken for a male. She wears men’s clothing, wifebeaters, and Crocs. I wonder if she goes by “T” because the name “Teresa” is not masculine enough? All I know is T has a winning smile and lots of potential. Rejoice in what you are: a woman. And cute, too boot! You don’t have to prance around like Shania Twain, declaring, “Man, I feel like a woman!” But sweet Mary and Joseph, I think feminists go so far trying to be the Anti-Barbie that they might as well grow their armpit hair out and wear a cup. You can sit in the middle of the see saw, sweetie. You don’t have to soar to the end of the spectrum. T even admitted at the end of the show, “This process has shown me you can be powerful and still be soft.” What what?
And, yes, I understand that Jane Lynch and Ellen Degeneres are never going to be out buying A-line skirts and flouncy dresses, but why is this a hurdle for straight women? If you enjoy your femininity, why do you abhor dresses? Do you feel objectified or sexualized? Dresses are actually pretty freeing, and your thighs stay well-ventilated. Shallow or not, most women want to feel attractive. They want to have a good hair day more than they would EVER want world peace, and they want their lashes to look full and not to have raccoon circles under their eyes. You can talk a good game upside down about how you want equal pay for equal work, but you know a good support bra and panties that don’t ride up rank right up there, too. Keep this mantra in mind: It’s nearing the end of the show, and Tina is wearing a coral dress and a black blazer. She just said, “I feel like a woman…It’s beautiful, and I love it!” Yes! Victory! One week under the tutelage of Clint and Stacey, and her broken brain got unbroken. They fixed it, reprogrammed it to the default setting, which is XX chromosomes=embrace your womanhood. Look, it’s 2013. We’re not cattle rustlers in the Old West, forced to wear long, hot skirts in the heat and dust. You shouldn’t have to ride sidesaddle in a skirt. I get that. You should have the right to throw some trousers and chaps on.
But guess what? We can vote now, so go ahead and wear your clamdiggers and your slimming jeans and even your yoga pants with the holes in the crotch. But don’t walk into a clothing store, having already written off half the inventory. Rock a dress or skirt every now and again. There is a balance between Amish and skank. Find it. And BTW, it’s soooo much quicker to pee if you’re in a dress. Just lift and go.
Now Tina is looking in the mirror, giddy, saying, “I can’t believe I’m wearing a scarf.” There you go–she not only conquered the dress obstacle, but cruised right on into accessorizing. And that black hair might just be growing on me… Either way, It’s a new and improved Tina. You go, girl.
In my youth, Pace Picante Sauce commercials were on high rotation, showing incensed cowboys riled up after Cookie attempts to serve them a salsa made in “New York City.” One of them goes so far as to suggest they “get a rope,” presumably to hang Cookie for his offense. From these commercials, I learned that New Yorkers did not know squat about Mexican food. And that meant something was wrong with them. I presume they didn’t show this ad in NYC itself, but from what I’d learned on TV about the city, they were too busy getting beaten up on dirty subways and mugged in littered streets filled with apathetic people dressed only in neutrals.
I watched the Sweathogs on Welcome Back, Kotter, and they always seemed in need of a good scrubbing. They lived in a land called Brooklyn, but I knew it must have been close to New York City, because there were no trees around. Where were the pine trees and the live oaks? Did they all live in ghettos and tall buildings with no yards? Where did they learn to ride bikes and rollerskate? Where was the laundry blowing on the clothesline in the sun? Oh, wait, there it is.
shorpy
I’d stayed up past eleven by elementary age, so I knew the funny comedians lived on the east coast and yelled, “Live from New York” each Saturday night. But I also knew Johnny Carson was in Burbank, and he was happy and funny. The mean, bitter guy with the gap in his teeth and the bald keyboardist lived in New York. Something just wasn’t right with that town.
Movies depicted a congested mecca of highrises and brash, fast-talking businessmen in Wall Street and The Secret of My Success, as well as a decadent drug-infused nightlife in Bright LIghts, Big City. New York was a city where Ninja turtles lived in the sewer, where dirty, grimey homeless people begged for money in Trading Places, and ghosts infested grand hotels in Ghostbusters. Even the muppets had a hard time taking Manhattan and finding work. And it was in NYC where Kramer battled Kramer, the first time that it had occurred to me that a mother would ever conceive of leaving her child to find herself. What kind of sick place was that?
Nevermind the Civil War, Yankees were odd. They talked funny. Their accent was nearly incomprehensible. They said “youse guys,” an abomination of grammar, when we used “y’all,” a contraction of “you” and “all,” which made perfect sense. And we’d heard tale of the Yankee reputation for callousness and poor manners. Not only did they not smile and shake hands with strangers, they ignored them altogether. What kind of hospitality is that?
Consequently, I never had a desire to go to New York, no matter how cool and funky Monica and Rachel’s apartment was on Friends. I knew the truth; a one bedroom could cost a THOUSAND DOLLARS a month, and they had rats!! Yuck!
xhsyoung.pbworks.com
Then the Twin Towers fell, and we all watched in horror. Our hearts went out to New York City; people in Texas wore “I (heart) New York” shirts and Yankee baseball caps. The whole country rallied around the fallen and felt the devastation. But it just made it even more clear: I never, ever want to go to New York. No matter how good the bagels or the reuben sandwiches, no matter how pretty the trees in Central Park, I never needed to visit that place.
Then in 2005, the Discovery Channel gave me a reason to want to visit The Big Apple. Cash cab. Now that looked fun! Getting inside a taxicab is far from desirable, whatwith the Hep C and polio virus inevitably covering all of the upholstery (is there any regulation as far as when to wipe those with Clorox wipes?), but that would pale in comparison to having Ben Bailey crane his giant bald head around to invite me to get paid (PAID!) to show off my incredible talent for trivia. Oh, glorious day (or night, when winnings were doubled) to ride and play, answering questions about general knowledge.
I still get mad when I watch the episode in which two men risked all their earnings on a video bonus round, which required them to identify the rodent-like animal roaming about. The question even referred to the Captain & Tenille song, but they still got it wrong. How does one not know about a MUSKRAT? “Muskrat Love!!” I wanted to yell through the TV set. I wanted to shake those Guidos, who weren’t even born when the song came out. Well, that’s what you get for not knowing your pop music! Out of the cab. Kick ’em to the curb, Ben. I couldn’t live in a city where people cannot properly identify muskrats. I won’t even visit.
Today we delve into the bowels of one of my former teen mag subscriptions, “Star Hits,” for the 4th Annual Readers’ Poll Results. The cover reveals the top stars of April 1988. Check out who’s included in the Most Promising New Acts.
Curiosity must have serious killed the cat.
Duran Squared’s own John Taylor topped the list of most desirables, with those pouty lips and bedroom eyes.
Don’t worry; Johnny Rotten was not desirable in the least; he was #2 for “Hairdo From Hell.”What? Miss Whitney?
George Michael’s video was voted the 4th best video of 1987. As it turned out, the limelit half of Wham! (Bam, thank you, Sir, may I have another?) actually did NOT want pretty Asian model’s sex. Not remotely. Not even in a filthy public restroom with e-coli-covered stalls.
Maybe George should be the one blindfolded.
The lyrics should have given us a clue:
There’s things that you guess and things that you know There’s boys that you can trust and girls that you don’t
Girls are untrustworthy, huh? Perhaps that should have been included on the Bummer of the Year. Michael Jackson’s comeback was determined to be the biggest bummer. And Iran/Contra was number four??
But the most interesting reads are what the stars themselves chose. Siouxsie Sioux’s most desirable pick was Yul Brynner. The King and I? At least she didn’t have the nerve to list herself, as Andy Fletcher did.
And note the difference in tone maturity level between the choices of former GoGo’s singer Belinda Carlisle and the Beastie Boys (R.I.P. MCA).
Who knew Belinda was so mad about Fred Astaire, and so rocked by the PTL scandal?(R.I.P. Tammy Faye Bakker.) And The Beastie Boys chose Sssss-Samantha Fox as the BEST female singer? Is that because she sang from her diaphragm so well? I won’t hate on her; naughty girls need love, too.
Hands down, this is the guy. This is the guy you want leaning intimately into you, inviting you to be in cahoots with him, to share the secrets he’s learned on the road.
Forgive me. I was premature in my assumption. THIS is the guy.
Ontario, California 1988
Yes, the one with the mutton chops, driving his Rebel Flag-decked out Bandit up to California. Is he sucking a Lemonhead? Is he dipping Skoal? He’s a man of mystery. I just feel a strong sense of… Gary Sandy surrounding him. Yes, that’s it. He must be related to Gary Sandy. You know, Andy Travis from WKRP?
Whoa. Is it hot in here? I’m feeling faint, and it’s not a touch of Johnny Fever. Believe me. Okay, time to refocus. Surely, there’s some trucker in this book who can compete with an aging sitcom star.
Bourbon, IN 1990
Um. No. That is NOT the ticket. Perhaps this young fella?
Senatobia, MS 1994
His head says Yankee, but his body says Confederacy. Who has time for a cocksure whippersnapper with an identity complex? Not me. I haven’t got time for the pain. Okay, let’s spin the wheel. Surely there’s SOMEONE.
Carlisle, Pennsylvania 1988 from Marc Wise’s” Truck Stop”
Wayne is caught up in the ambiance that IS a Pennsylvania truck stop. So filled with anticipation is he of this new day, that he could barely push his hat down on his head. And who could blame him? Just walking into this charming lounge would brighten anyone’s day.
Sikeston, Missouri 1990
Across this great nation of ours, other truckers speedily consume their meals, rejoicing at the prospect of what the road will offer. George can barely contain himself.
Bristol, TN 1994
Harlan is busting at the seams. As soon as he finishes this cigarette, it’s out of the comfort of this red booth and into the luxury of the big rig.
Houston, TX 1989
Young Buck, Jr is positively stoked to be spending the day with Buck, Sr, rolling across the wide open spaces of Wyoming, counting bug corpses as they splatter on the windshield.
Sinclair, Wyoming 1988
Dick shares a glance with Kevin, a glance that conveys what words never could. Finish up your pie there, son, and let’s hit the road. Back to the snow and the relentless wind. We don’t get paid to sit. Well, technically, we DO, but you know what I mean.
Just saw this hilarious video on the Fresh 102.5 blog, but it’s much easier to just watch on YouTube. If you like funny 80s movie references, it will delight you to no end. It did for me!
I’m so excited. And I just can’t hide it. Seriously. I convey this both in my posture and my expression, which exude a certain joie de vivre.
Cottondale, Alabama 1994
All ye men in trucker caps, dig through your cab until you find the mix tape with “Eye of the Tiger” and “Don’t Stop Believing” and play the bejesus out of it until you get your heads on right.
Breezewood, Pennsylvania 1994
These pics aren’t even from the same STATE, but it looks like the same place, the same hopeless truck stop, filled with men filled with defeat. Seriously, brothers–y’all got to start listening to some Joel Osteen or something. Here, I’ll get you started:
I’m the head and not the tail.
I’m more than a conqueror.
I’m the victor and not the victim.
And just in case you can’t find that mix tape, here’s Jerry Reed’s inspirational “East Bound and Down”:
I Don't Get It 