I forgot to mention a wonderful, ordinary thing: on Wednesday I went down to WCCO to do the monthly appearance on the Hines show, and since Daughter was out of school I brought her along. She took the mike with ease, and had a great response about when it’s time to stop trick-or-treating. It’s not when you feel you’re too old, it’s the look you get from the person who opens the door. And more. It’s hard not to be proud, especially when she gives me a few shots to bring me down a peg or two.
And so the week concludes with a bit of a chill, but sun that still has some strength. It’s a long slow ride down, and it’s been perfectly paced. It was a good week, and hard to believe I was in Chicago a week ago.
Oh! Speaking of which.
Outside the window at the breakfast place was a small structure with noble details. 535 Wells.
I googled it; used to be a restaurant, which of course closed, and there were plans to open a new one. That was three years ago.
The history of these places is small, dense, and unknowable. There’s probably a record of its original owner, and the architectural firm that designed it. But someone wanted it to be his accomplishment, his mark. There’s an initial:
B.
Below are two identical crests - two dragons, eleven castles. This site says:
"The serpent is a symbol of wisdom and defiance. In addition, a symbol of fertility and renewal. Because of its forked tongue, it was also associated with lightning and the sun. Snakes represent the knowledge."
535 N Wells St is a Single family located in Near North Side, IL, in Cook county. Built in 1875, this property was last sold for $2,000,000 in 2015 and currently has an estimated value of $894,523.
It lost half its value in a year? More interesting, thoughts the date - that’s not an 1875 facade. That’s, oh, 1923. But this site says it was built in 1892.
There are three rondels, all with the same face:
The main floor looks battered.
Once upon a time it was . . .
Crofton’s, a one-star Michelin restaurant, lauded since 1998. Closed by 2013. If you use the wayback function in the Street View panel, you'll see the glory days for the restaurant.
That's one building in a city of hundreds of thousands.
Got two minutes? Here.
The other side of the KA project. Fresh cement covers up four floors of parking ramp. This will all fill up in the next month.
Another exciting . . . hole! This time it's the Opus tower, and I have a good vantage for the rest of the shots. The cranes are being installed, and the first footings have been poured.
As with the KA project, there seems to be about nine guys at work, total.
BOILERPLATE TEXT: Back to music cues for "The Little Things in Life," Peg Lynch's last continuously running sitcom. The cues run from substandard 60s cues to cringingly 70s, and I'm surprised at how few there were. I think I'm already repeating what I previously played. In fact I know I'm already repeating the fact that I think I'm repeating myself, but on we go: this is the sound of narrative radio in its strange last gasp.
Where did this one come from? Never used before on the show.
Someone got a bit Gershwinny.
A little Margaret Hamilton at the end for spice:
When the budget will only cover one instrument.
Again, these things don't always work well in the same show, let alone over the course of many episodes. Did anyone care that the underlying musical ides of the show were inconsistent?
I have the suspicion I've played this before, but it's here in the folder with this date, so perhaps not. It's notable for proving a point no one ever seemed to learn: most athletes are horrible pitchmen.
Sell that product, Bill. Sell!
Thanks to the low bitrate of some of these encodes, the entire show is sometimes smaller than some of the standalone bits. So here's another, including one of my favorite bits, the Sports-o-Phone.
The whole thing! 59.02.23
Yes. He did this.
Always played a nervous type, didn't he? Wikipedia:
Knotts' father William Knotts was a farmer. Don's mother was 40 at the time of his birth. Don's father suffered from mental illness; he had a nervous breakdown due to the stress of Don's birth. Afflicted with schizophrenia and alcoholism, William sometimes terrorized Don with a knife
That explains everything, or nothing; some people with the same experience end up utterly unruffled. Wikipedia has nothing on his stand-up days, but does list his occupation as "Actor, comedian, inventor." That's a good life.
What he invented, I don't know.
You can detect some Newhart influence, no?
Annalysis was something all the smart people did. Because everyone had problems. People who didn't have problems were plastic.
That'll do, right? Right. See you around.
