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This week's radio appearance coffee cup:
It has a crack, but not a fatal one. Now, you may think: his wallpaper is a previous operating system; isn't he up to date? I am up to date. But I like the previous OS's wallpaper better. As for the mug, I bought it in Southwold, a town by . . . the seaside. And I do like to be beside it. I can't bear to toss it until I get a replacement. I know exactly where it is on the shelf in the store, too.
It's from this place, and I like their stuff.
Sometimes you get a call to action, and you think: am I that man? I should be that man.
I saw a note on a local subreddit asking if anyone could do wedding photography on short notice. And by “short” I mean “an hour.” The couple was getting hitched at the Government Center, and their photographer had bailed.
The Government Center is across the street from my building. Ergo I cannot refuse the call. The only question is whether I go straight across the street, or take the nice warm skyway. I opt for the latter. This takes me past Lobby Pizza, into the skyway to the Pillsbury Building (which hasn’t been that for a long time)
. . . past the empty office that hugs the perimeter of the building . . .
, then around the corner past Burger Place (where I never go because the burgers are downtown-dear, too costly. They have a small a statue of a chef holding a burger aloft, like Big Boy’s European father. I think during the pandemic he wore a mask.)
Then you turn right to another broad skyway, and you’re in the great atrium in a minute.
Ah: many weddings! Of course: it’s Valentine’s Day. There’s a piano-and-flute duet tootling and tinkling nice romantic terms. The ridiculous man who wear brilliant robes and declaims racial-biblical nonsense, always accompanied by a silent young women in equally vibrant garb, have fallen silent for a while to let people have their merry moment. Otherwise everyone would have to endure his amplified rantings. Can’t bum-rush him out by his belt, of course. It’s so fargin’ vibrant you could plotz, as they used to say in Mad. Also, Ecch. I look around for someone who might fit the username - it was nerdy - but then I find the check-in table, see that everyone’s checked in for 1 PM but one couple, AND the guy’s name has a root element that matches the user name. They show up a minute later. The fellow is, shall we say, surprised that the call was answered. The fiancee is delighted. The Hennepin County Wedding Facilitator descends and tells them they’ll be heading up to the eighth floor walkway over the atrium in just a second, and I ask if there’s time to snap some shots at the little backdrop with a small floral display. There is! So I hustle them over.
“I’ll pay you for this,” he says, and I scoff: of course you’re not going to pay me for this! Happy to help. I burst-shoot a batch, and then it’s up in the elevator to the place where they get hitched by a Marrying Samantha. The county has a videographer and by now there’s a witness who’s snapping shots. I get a few. I tell the guy I’ll DM him and he can shoot me an email.
The shots are fine. I color correct and straighten, and confess that I used AI (20 credits) to make him look straight ahead when he gets a cheek-kiss instead of looking off to the site. I include a video that has an establishing shot of the exterior and the interior of the venue. Wrap them up in a container and shoot ‘em off via WeTransfer six hours after the event, DM him the info.
Sunday night I get a notice: the files have not been downloaded and the transfer expires in 12 hours.
Smacked, the gob is.
So what do I do with the pictures?
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It’s 1940.
That year always interests me, because we think it was WAR WAR WAR, but it wasn’t, not here, not yet.
But it’s coming. There's a reference to the Finnish War, which we now fold into the whole magilla, I guess.
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"They're actresses. Write it as if there are no other things in their world but movies and actors and fictional characters."
Of course, Philo Vance and Charlie Chan arrived after the crime had taken place. And they never showed up together.
Ultra-modern looks a bit . . . spare to modern eyes, no? But that was the style. Note: turquoise and yellow.
Gone today.
It was the subject of a news story on the next page, and a huge ad.
It was touted as a “year-‘round store” which says something about the commercial culture of the day.
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Wikipedia:
Bolita (Spanish for Little Ball) is a type of lottery which was popular in the latter 19th and early 20th centuries in Cuba and among Florida's working class Hispanic, Italian, and black population. In the basic bolita game, 100 small numbered balls are placed into a bag and mixed thoroughly, and bets are taken on which number will be drawn.
A reference to the front page story about critical materials denied to Japan. I wonder how many people would get the reference today.
I also wonder why Herblock didn’t put a tag on the Japanese fellow that said JAPANESE OFFICIAL, or why Uncle Sam doesn’t say So Solly.
A random quote:
He lost. To Wilkie. But I think this is the only newspaper publisher who tried something like this.
That will do for today.
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