A Crummy Commercial

Troubled efforts at backing up this blog to the Archive.org Wayback machine have been mentioned before: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2025/12/the-gap.html   But yesterday Archive.org and the Wayback seem to have registered all my efforts at backup of this blog ?: the backups for the end of 2025 are there ! However I also tried a backup of the kit pages and got this: haven't seen this error before When the wayback was tried this morning I got this: same errors ? One step forward, one step back, doing the wayback dance ? Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm  

While reading the book: Bomb Shelter: Love, Time and Other Explosives by Mary Laura Philpott, she mentions this poem: the poem the mention of the poem by author Philpott source: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43118/for-the-anniversary-of- And now in turn that idea has been planted in my brain as well !  But luckily with my always unreliable memory it will probably flee.  Hopefully no fine days will be darkened by the thought that this might be the same calendar day that I finally die. But I guess that's the idea of art, specifically poetry/song to make an indelible impression on the brain.  So now I've been infected with a concept but time will only tell if it takes hold. The Cathedral by Rodin was also mentioned in the book: source:  https://rodinmuseum.org/collection/object/103413 Of course I associate Rodin with The Thinker , which then leads to Dobie Gillis : 360p, sorry video quality mavens At the start of each show, Dobie would speak directly to the a...

At one time 7 Up contained lithium ?: BTW lithiated is a real word even if the spell checkers don't like it source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGTkk7gqA4Q the semi-obligatory Wiki link:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7_Up The Prof has never lied to me yet ! My first reaction is to shake my head at those wacky folks back in the 20th century.  But considering the current dystopian environment which seems to be a blend of 1984 AND Brave New World  who am I to shake my head ?  We get the authoritarianism of 1984 blended with the novelty obsession of Brave New World .  And since lies are now presented as truth, who knows what to believe as far as health recommendations - let the marketplace decide, no need for those nasty regulations by actual scientists.  So as far as beverages, I'll stick with distilled water - no nutrients but no poisons either ! Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm

The Tenth Victim was a movie based on a story by Robert Sheckley published in the April 1953 issue of Galaxy Magazine: The Seventh Victim (there was victim inflation then ?): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventh_Victim Here is the story: https://archive.org/details/galaxymagazine-1953-04/page/n39/mode/2up And here is the episode on X-1: https://archive.org/details/XMinus1B/xminusone_570306_TheSeventhVictim.mp3 But I didn't remember either the original story or the radio version.  I remembered the movie, or at least I remembered the opening: https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x8kvh0m In Milwaukee channel 4, WTMJ, showed movies in the afternoon, they were called Theater 4 or Theater at 4, something like that.  The hostess was Judy Marks, the weather lady at the station.   I forget what time the news started but WTMJ had to cut the movies up quite a bit to get them into an hour or an hour and a half.  The Tenth Victim is a terrible movie but that ballistic brassiere ...

I heard the news that Stewart Cheifet has died: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/01/stewart-cheifet-pbs-host-who-chronicled-the-pc-revolution-dies-at-87/ https://obits.goldsteinsfuneral.com/stewart-cheifet I used to watch the Computer Chronicles a lot.  It was a good show but the thing I really remember was the Cheifet "cutoff" - when he was done interviewing a person he would just walk away at the end, no closing words, just an abrupt transition :) My last job was at a company called Powercore in Manteno IL.  It was a Windows "shop" but they were expanding into Mac software at the time - later the whole Mac team (3 people) quit at the same time.  The main product at Powercore was called Network Scheduler (see the video below for details).  This was before the internet had really arrived.  Powercore had a dialup BBS to deliver software updates.  If an important customer was having trouble getting into the BBS one of the guys would go in and just hangup ...

Saw that someone in Arkansas had won the 1.8 billion dollar Lotto prize December 24, 2025.   Later Youtube served this movie, The Jackpot , coincidence ? source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8fEBzpLICc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Jackpot Before viewing I read the article by John McNulty in The New Yorker, February 19, 1949: The $24,000 prize inflated: Only found 1/2 of an isolated episode of the old time radio show:  Sing it Again : https://www.oldtimeradiodownloads.com/quiz/sing-it-again/sing-it-again-1st-half-only-19xx-xx-xx They must have changed the concept slightly in this episode because the show did call the winner in the New Yorker article before the show.  Also the first and third contestants didn't even try to guess who the phantom voice was - maybe they didn't want the hassle of disposing of $30,500 of prizes like the family in The Jackpot ?  Thankfully the show ends after about 21 minutes. One of the prizes was a Rembrant Television ? nev...

I remember listening to this record when I was a kid: Maybe it's the booze but they all look happy, even the pooch ! https://archive.org/details/lp_sing-with-the-four-roses-society_four-roses-society_0 It's also available on Youtube but at the cost of possible commercial interruptions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=McVvbAviBqA Who Anne Jeffreys and Robert Sterling were I had NO idea.  Likewise, it never occurred to me that Four Roses was what was in those glasses they are holding :)  But I liked the singing. Isn't it interesting that only the men had the glasses of brown liquid, it was the 1950s :)  Also the back of the record cover was just the lyrics, no hard sell. I still have that record around here but no way to play it anymore.  But now I can listen online whenever I like, nice ! Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm