WA2K Radio is now on the air

Hello Letty, I don't know whether this has been mentioned yet, but the great Ronnie Barker died yesterday at the age of 76.

Who is Ronnie Barker, you may ask.....but knowing you, you will already be familiar with his comedy.

If you want to know more about Ronnie.....see here......

http://www.able2know.com/forums/about60858.html


In the meantime, I will leave you with one of his pieces of work. I wish I could be so concise..........


......"Good evening.......
My name is Jimmy Dimwiddie.
Now, I want to talk to you tonight about an important consumer organization called The Anti-Shoddy Goods Committee.

Now the purpose of The Anti-Shoddy Goods Committee is to protect you from the crafty baddies that are selling goods that are grotty, dirty, dowdy, gaudy or shoddy.

Now let's take an example. Supposing you go into a pet shop and they try to sell you a mangy corgi or a pudgy budgie or a namby pamby bambi that you think is a ruddy pansy?
Don't get bally huffy with the shop assistant chappie. Just come along to us, and in a jiffy, if you're lucky, we'll thrash out the nitty gritty and clear up the hanky panky. We love the hurly burly of a juicy argie bargie, and we will not shilly shally until all is hunky dory.
And the same applies to buying a house.

We're the people to complain to if an estate agent tries to sell you a filthy, slummy semi with a nasty sooty chimmney with a topsy turvy study and a gloomy, dingy lobby that's as niffy and as smelly as a privvy in the navy.

Or a baby in a nappy.

Or a cosi in Bengazi.

Now, a lot of compaints we receive, of course,. are about food in restaurants. The other day a man came in and told us that he'd taken his wife out to dinner in the West End.

He'd ordered a suki yaki with some really spicy chutney
And a cup of milky coffee and a scrummy chocky bickie.
The hoity toity flunky with some gravy on his dicky
Brought them yucky tutti frutti and it didn't have a jelly.
Then they found a creepy crawly had committed hari kari
In a sticky roly poly on the mucky sweetie trolly.

And the chili wasn't beefy and the turkey was all tacky
And plate of ministrone tasted more like cockaleekie.
And his tummy felt quite rummy. For the café was so sleazy,
He contracted beri beri and was feeling mighty queasy.
When he went to spend a penny, he felt such a silly billy,
He couldn't dilly dally, it just happened willy nilly.


He was looking really pique-y and was feeling really grotty
And he spent all day on Sunday sitting sadly on the potty.
So, he came along to us, The Anti-Shoddy Goods Committee
And we told him very plainly why he felt so ruddy shi . . . er, shocky.
So, if you've bought a whiskey and it's made you rather frisky,
Or are just a little cookie that's looking for some nookie,
Or if you're feeling dicky and if Dickie takes the mickey
Or if you're feeling in the pinkie and if Pinkie's feeling perky
Or if Perky's feeling rocky and Rocky's feeling kinky,
Then you'll all be very lucky if you don't end up in Chucky.
You can do the Hokey Cokey, it's jolly hockey sticky
If the wicket is all sticky and the nicky nacky noo!
If the goods are shoddy, there's no good to anybody
And the only thing to do is Hinky pinky parlez vous!

And if you think that'll do any good, by golly, you must be pretty silly, ruddy crazy or just jolly sloppy!
Nightie nightie!!!


MARVELLOUS!

Did you remember all that, milord? Respect!

'ellpus, I read through the Two Ronnies, and you are right. I do not know the guys, but I appreciate your tribute To Ronnie Barker. I tell you, listeners, British humor is fantastic, especially when it's cockney.

Loved that skit, ellpus, and the song was hilarious. Thank you, indeed.

"We interrupt this broadcast for a special bulletin."................

"The Metropolitan Police today denied that prisoners in their custody are excessively pampered. This follows yesterday's report that a man was hustled out of New Scotland Yard with an electric blanket over his head."

"And we've just heard that a juggernaut of onions has shed its load all over the M-1. Motorists are advised to find a hard shoulder to cry on."

"Following the dispute with the domestic servants' union at Buckingham Palace today, the queen, a radiant figure in a white silk gown and crimson robe, swept down the main staircase and through the hall. She then dusted the cloak room and hoovered the lounge."

"After a series of crimes in the Glasgow area, Chief Inspector McTavish has announced that he's looking for a man with one eye. If he doesn't find him, he's going to use both eyes."

"The perfect crime was committed last night, when thieves broke into Scotland Yard and stole all the toilets. Police say they have absolutely nothing to go on."

"And we've just heard that in the English Channel, a ship carrying red paint has collided with a ship carrying purple paint. It is believed that both crews have been marooned."

And now, back to our regular programme . . .

(the two Ronnies)

Oh, my Gawd, ellpus. That is a prose "pun" worth waiting for.

You are a marvel, Brit. I'll never master cockney rhyming, however:

This is for everyone:



Song: Why Can't the English? Lyrics

Henry Look at her, a prisoner of the gutter,
Condemned by every syllable she ever uttered.
By law she should be taken out and hung,
For the cold-blooded murder of the English tongue.
Eliza Aaoooww! Henry imitating her Aaoooww!
Heaven's! What a noise!
This is what the British population,
Calls an elementary education. Pickering Oh,
Counsel, I think you picked a poor example. Henry Did I?
Hear them down in Soho square,
Dropping "h's" everywhere.
Speaking English anyway they like.
You sir, did you go to school?
Man Wadaya tike me for, a fool?
Henry No one taught him 'take' instead of 'tike!
Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?
This verbal class distinction, by now,
Should be antique. If you spoke as she does, sir,
Instead of the way you do,
Why, you might be selling flowers, too!
Hear a Yorkshireman, or worse,
Hear a Cornishman converse,
I'd rather hear a choir singing flat.
Chickens cackling in a barn Just like this one!
Eliza Garn! Henry I ask you, sir, what sort of word is that?
It's "Aoooow" and "Garn" that keep her in her place.
Not her wretched clothes and dirty face.
Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?
This verbal class distinction by now should be antique.
If you spoke as she does, sir, Instead of the way you do,
Why, you might be selling flowers, too.
An Englishman's way of speaking absolutely classifies him,
The moment he talks he makes some other
Englishman despise him.
One common language I'm afraid we'll never get.
Oh, why can't the English learn to set
A good example to people whose
English is painful to your ears?
The Scotch and the Irish leave you close to tears.
There even are places where English completely
disappears. In America, they haven't used it for years!
Why can't the English teach their children how to speak?
Norwegians learn Norwegian; the Greeks have taught their
Greek. In France every Frenchman knows
his language fro "A" to "Zed"
The French never care what they do, actually,
as long as they pronounce in properly.
Arabians learn Arabian with the speed of summer lightning.
And Hebrews learn it backwards,
which is absolutely frightening.
But use proper English you're regarded as a freak.
Why can't the English,
Why can't the English learn to speak?

i've posted this before, but it's one of my faves from flanders and swann, so here it is again

The Gas Man Cometh
Flanders and Swann

'Twas on a Monday morning the gas man came to call.
The gas tap wouldn't turn - I wasn't getting gas at all.
He tore out all the skirting boards to try and find the main
And I had to call a carpenter to put them back again.

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do.

'Twas on a Tuesday morning the carpenter came round.
He hammered and he chiselled and he said:
"Look what I've found: your joists are full of dry rot
But I'll put them all to rights".
Then he nailed right through a cable and out went all the lights!

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do.

'Twas on a Wednesday morning the electrician came.
He called me Mr. Sanderson, which isn't quite the name.
He couldn't reach the fuse box without standing on the bin
And his foot went through a window so I called the glazier in.

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do.

'Twas on a Thursday morning the glazier came round
With his blow torch and his putty and his merry glazier's song.
He put another pane in - it took no time at all
But I had to get a painter in to come and paint the wall.

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do.

'Twas on a Friday morning the painter made a start.
With undercoats and overcoats he painted every part:
Every nook and every cranny - but I found when he was gone
He'd painted over the gas tap and I couldn't turn it on!

Oh, it all makes work for the working man to do.

On Saturday and Sunday they do no work at all;
So 'twas on a Monday morning that the gasman came to call...

and this monty python skit, which proveded the alt rock band "toad the wet sprocket" with their name


Rock Notes
Monty Python's Contractual Obligations Album

Newscaster:
Rex Stardust, lead electric triangle with Toad the Wet Sprocket has had to have an elbow removed following their recent successful worldwide tour of Finland. Flamboyant ambidextrous Rex apparently fell off the back of a motorcycle. "Fell off the back of a motorcyclist, most likely," quipped ace drummer Jumbo McCluney upon hearing of the accident.

Plans are already afoot for a major tour of Iceland. Divorced after only eight minutes, popular television singing star, Charisma, changed her mind on the way out of the registry office, when she realized she had married one of the Donkeys by mistake. The evening before in LA's glittering nightspot, the Abattoir, she had proposed to drummer Reg Abbot of Blind Drunk, after a whirlwind romance and a knee-trembler. But when the hangover lifted, it was Keith Sly of the Donkeys who was on her arm in the registry office. Keith, who was too ill to notice, remained unsteady during the short ceremony and when asked to exchange vows, began to recite names and addresses of people who also used the stuff.

Charisma spotted the error as Keith was being carried into the wedding ambulance and became emotionally upset. However, the mistake was soon cleared up, and she stayed long enough to consummate their divorce. Dead Monkeys are to split up again, according to their manager, Lefty Goldblatt. They've been in the business now ten years, nine as other groups. Originally the Dead Salmon, they became for a while, Trout. Then Fried Trout, then Poached Trout In A White Wine Sauce, and finally, Herring.

Splitting up for nearly a month, the re-formed as Red Herring, which became Dead Herring for a while, and then Dead Loss, which reflected the current state of the group. Splitting up again to get their heads together, they reformed a fortnight later as Heads Together, a tight little name which lasted them through a difficult period when their drummer was suspected of suffering from death. It turned out to be only a rumor and they became Dead Together, then Dead Gear, which lead to Dead Donkeys, Lead Donkeys, and the inevitable split up. After nearly ten days, they reformed again as Sole Manier, then Dead Sole, Rock Cod, Turbot, Haddock, White Bait, the Places, Fish, Bream, Mackerel, Salmon, Poached Salmon, Poached Salmon In A White Wine Sauce, Salmon-monia, and Helen Shapiro. This last name, their favorite, had to be dropped following an injunction and they split up again. When they reformed after a record-breaking two days, they ditched the fishy references and became Dead Monkeys, a name which they stuck with for the rest of their careers. Now, a fortnight later, they've finally split up.

(telephone ringing)

Hello.

"Hello"

Yes?

"What do you think of Dead Duck?"

What do I think of Dead Duck?

"or Lobster?"

Lobster?...

dj, my dear, you may play that song as often as you like, because not only is it funny, but it's true.

Don't we love spoofs, listeners?

Here, Canada, it's the meter reader cometh. <smile>and we so enjoy your Monty Python's delightful lobster. (Florida lobster is terrible)

It is so very quiet tonight in my little corner of the world. I can here the sounds of nothingness as I drift back to my childhood:

"...I said hello to autumn in the glade, when first I felt and smelt the hue of brown. Her garments were from changing leaves all made, and golden rod her bright and shining crown...."

The season's sing to us, do they not?

Life is a book that we study,
Some of its leaves bring a sigh,
There it was written, my buddy,
That we must part, you and I.

Chorus:

Nights are long since you went away,
I think about you all through the day,
My buddy, my buddy, no buddy quite so true.
Miss your voice, the touch of your hand,
Just long to know that you understand,
My buddy, my buddy, your buddy misses you

Anyone know the history behind that song?

and it's time to say goodnight.

So I shall now cut out the light.

click.

From Letty with love.

Rollin' With The Flow
By Charlie Rich

Once was a thought inside my head,
Fore Id reach thirty Id be dead.
Now somehow on and on I go-o-o.
I keep on rollin with the flow.

Folks said that I would change my mind.
Id straighten up and do just fine.
Ahh, but I still love rock and ro-o-oll.
I keep on rollin with the flow.

I dont guide my age on raisin kicks.
Im raisin hell just like I did.
Ive got a lot of crazy friends,
And they forgive me of my sins.

Some might be callin me a bum.
But Im still out there havin fun.
And Jesus loves me, yes, I kno-o-ow.
So, I keep on rollin with the flow.
(keep on rollin with the flow)

I dont guide my age on raisin kicks.
But Im raisin hell just like I did.
Ive got a lot of crazy friends,
And they forgive me of my sins.

Cant take it with you when youre gone.
But I want enough to get there on.
And I aint ever growin o-o-old.
So, I keep on rollin with the flow.
(keep on rollin with the flow)

I aint ever growin o-o-old,
If I keep on rollin with the flow!
(keep on rollinkeep on rollin)

Keep on rollin with the flow.
(keep on rollinkeep on rollin)

Keep on rollin with the flow.
(keep on rollinkeep on rollin)

Goodtime Charlie's Got the Blues
By Charlie Rich

Everybody's gone away.
Said they're movin' to L.A.
There's not a soul I know around.
Everybody's leavin' town!

Some caught a freight. Some caught a plane.
Find the sunshine, Leave the rain?
They said this town's a waste time.
I guess they're right, it's wasting mine!

Some gotta win! Some gotta lose!
Good time Charlie's got the blues!

You know my heart keeps tellin' me,
You?re not a kid at thirty-three.
You play around you'll lose your wife.
You play too long you'll lose your life!

I?ve got my pills to ease the pain,
Can?t find a friend to ease the rain.
I know I should try and settle down.
Everybody?s leaving town.

Some gotta win! Some gotta lose!
Good time Charlie's got the blues!
Good time Charlie's got the blues!

Champagne Charlie



1.
I've seen a deal of gaiety through out my noisy life
With all my grand accomplishments I ne'er could get a wife,
The thing I most excel in is the P. R. F. G. game,
A noise all night in bed all day, and swimming in Champagne.

<Chorus:>
For Champagne Charlie is my name, Champagne Charlie is my name
Good for any game at night, my boys, good for any game at night, my boys,
Champagne Charlie is my name, Champagne Charlie is my name
Good for any game at night, boys, who'll come and join me in a spree.

2.
The way I gain'd my title's by a hobby which I've got,
Of never letting others pay, however long the shot,
Who ever drinks at my expense are treated all the same;
From Dukes and Lords to Cabmen down, I make them drink Champagne.

<Chorus:>

3.
From Coffee and from supper rooms, from Poplar to Pall Mall,
The girls on seeing me exclaim "Oh! what a Champagne swell!"
The notion 'tis of ev'ry one, if ´twere not for my name,
And causing so much to be drunk, they'd never make Champagne.

<Chorus:>

4.
Some epicures like Burgundy, Hock, Claret, and Moselle,
But Moet's Vintage only satisfies this Champagne swell;
What matter if to bed I go, and head is muddled thick,
A bottle in the morning sets me right then very quick.

<Chorus:>

5.
Perhaps you fancy what I say is nothing else but chaff,
And only done, like other songs, to merely raise a laugh;
To prove that I am not in jest each man a bottle of Cham
I'll stand fizz round - yes that I will, and stand it - like a lamb.

<Chorus:>

Good morning, WA2K radio.

well, edgar and dj. This seems to be "Charlie" day. Thanks for playing those blues and champagne songs.

I may has well follow suit, listeners:



Goodbye … Charlie
Hate to see you go
Goodbye, Charlie
Gee ... I'm feelin' low
But, Iamb clean' you in
Someone's din' you in, pal.

Goodbye … Charlie
Hate to see you fade
My, my Charlie
Thought you had it made
But, they're dampen' you off
After bumpin' you off, pal.

Don't you know lechery
Leads you to treachery
Things boomerang
Someone you trifle with
Pulls out a rifle without a pang
Bang … bang … bang!

Goodbye … Charlie
Casion' in your chips
Wild-eyed Charlie
Time you came to grips
There ain't … no doubt …
Strike three … you're out …
Goodbye … Charlie
Goodbye!

Now don't you know lechery
Leads you to treachery
Things boomerang
Someone you trifle with
Pulls out a rifle without a pang
Bang … bang … bang!

Goodbye … Charlie
Casion' in your chips
Wild-eyed Charlie
Time you came to grips
And, there ain't … no doubt …
Strike three … you're out …
Goodbye … Charlie
Goodbye!

I guess that's what happened to Charlie when he had too much of the bubbly. <smile>

Somewhere in the news, folks, I read that a Burmese python swallowed an alligator and exploded. It occurred, I believe, in the everglades. Wild life regulators are quite concerned with people who release their pet pythons for fear that they may well disturb the eco system.

A pet python? Yikes!

Janet Gaynor
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Janet Gaynor (born October 6, 1906; died September 14, 1984) was an actress who in 1928 was the first winner of the Academy Award for Best Actress.


Born Laura Gainer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, her family moved west to San Francisco when she was a child. Upon graduating from high school, Gaynor decided to pursue a career in acting. For two years, she supported herself with odd jobs in Los Angeles while taking minor roles in films. Finally, in 1926, she was cast in the lead role in a silent film called The Johnstown Flood, the same year she was selected as one of the WAMPAS Baby Stars. Her outstanding performance won her the attention of producers, who cast her in a series of films.

Within one year, Gaynor was one of Hollywood's leading ladies. Her performances in Seventh Heaven (the first of twelve movies she would make with Charles Farrell) and both Sunrise and Street Angel (in 1927, also with Charles Farrell) earned her the first Academy Award for Best Actress in 1928. It was the only time in Oscar history that this prestigious award was given for multiple roles. The award was given on the basis of the actor's total work over the year, and not just for one particular performance.

Gaynor was one of only a handful of leading ladies who made a successful transition to sound movies over the next decade. In 1937, she was again nominated for an Academy Award, this time for her role in A Star Is Born. Soon after, despite the success of the film and the acclaim for her performance, she left film for almost twenty years, returning one last time in 1957 in Bernardine. Her departure was possibly related to her bisexuality, despite the fact that she was married with children but which may have threatened to cause the studio bad publicity or embarrassment; otherwise bisexuality and homosexuality were open secrets usually tolerated provided discretion was exercised and protected whenever possible, but sometimes destructive to the career of someone who violated the protocol and let the mask slip in front of the gimlet eyes of the columnists, paparazzi, blackmailers, etc in that "less enlightened" time.

She died in 1984 at the age of 77 partly as the aftermath of a traffic accident in San Francisco in which a driver running a red light crashed into her taxi, killing one of the passengers, and injuring the rest; she never fully recovered.

She was interred in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood, California

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janet_Gaynor

Carole Lombard
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Carole Lombard (October 6, 1908 - January 16, 1942) was an American actress. She was born Jane Alice Peters in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Her parents were Frederick C. Peters and Elizabeth Knight. Lombard's paternal grandfather, John Claus Peters, was the son of German immigrants, Claus Peters and Caroline Catherine Eberlin. Lombard's mother's family originates in England; her ancestors John and Martha Cheney emigrated to the U.S. in 1634.

She made her film debut at the age of twelve when she was spotted playing baseball in the street by director Allan Dwan, who cast her as a tom-boy in A Perfect Crime (1921). In the 1920s she worked in several low-budget productions. In some of her early movies she was credited as Jane Peters, and then as Carol Lombard. In 1925 she was signed as a contract player with 20th Century Fox. She also worked for Mack Sennett and Pathé Pictures. She became a well known actress and managed to make a smooth transition to sound films, starting with High Voltage (1929). In 1930 she began working for Paramount Pictures.

In October 1930 she met William Powell and then eight months later they were married on June 26, 1931. Carole age 23 and William age 39 were married for 23 months but divorced in 1933. They stayed friends and film partners.

Carole Lombard became one of Hollywood's top comedy actresses in the 1930s. In comedies like Twentieth Century (1934) by Howard Hawks, My Man Godfrey (1936) by Gregory La Cava, for which she received an Academy Award for Best Actress nomination, and Nothing Sacred (1937) by William A. Wellman, she proved a marvellous comedic talent, and a rare class.

In the mid-1930s Carole Lombard started an affair with Clark Gable. Between the two actors there was a sincere and passionate sentiment. After their marriage in 1939, they bought and lived in a ranch in San Fernando Valley, California. They nicknamed each other Ma and Pa and were role modeled as the ideal marriage.

When at the end of 1941 the US entered World War II, Carole went home to Indiana for a war bond rally. At four o'clock in the morning of Friday, January 16, 1942, Lombard, 33 years old, and her mother boarded the plane home to California. After refueling in Las Vegas, the plane took off on a clear night, and twenty-three minutes later crashed into a mountainside 30 miles southwest of Las Vegas. All of the 23 passengers aboard were killed. Just before boarding the plane in Indiana, Carole had addressed her fans, saying, "Before I say goodbye to you all, come on and join me in a big cheer! V for Victory!" President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who admired her patriotism, declared her the first woman killed in the line of duty during the war and posthumously awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom. The Liberty ship SS Lombard was named for her, and Gable attended its launch on January 15, 1944.

Her final film, To Be or Not to Be, directed by Ernst Lubitsch and co-starring Jack Benny - a witty satire about the Nazism and the World War II - was in post-production at the time of her death. In this movie she gave what many regard as her best perfomance, at the same time ironic and intense. The film's producers wisely decided to cut part of the film in which her character asks, "What can happen in a plane?"

She is interred in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California. Although Gable remarried, he was buried next to her when he died in 1960.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carole_Lombard

Thor Heyerdahl
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Thor Heyerdahl (October 6, 1914 in Larvik, Norway-April 18, 2002 in Colla Micheri, Italy) was (originally) a Norwegian marine biologist with a great interest in anthropology, who became famous for his Kon-Tiki Expedition in which he sailed by raft 4,300 miles from South America to the Tuamotu Islands.
Thor Heyerdahl

This expedition demonstrated there were no technical reasons to prevent people from South America from having settled the Polynesian Islands. Nevertheless most anthropologists continue to believe, based on physical and genetic evidence, that Polynesia was settled from west to east, migration having begun from the Asian mainland.

In the Kon-Tiki Expedition, Heyerdahl and a small team went to South America, where they used balsawood and other native materials to construct the Kon-Tiki raft. Kon-Tiki was inspired by old drawings made by the spanish Conquistadors of Inca rafts. After a 101 day, 4,300 mile journey across the Pacific Ocean, it smashed into the reef at Raroia in the Tuamotu Islands on August 7, 1947, showing that pre-historic peoples could have traveled from South America. The only modern technology the expedition had was a radio. For food, they lived off the fruit of the ocean. The documentary of the expedition, itself entitled Kon-Tiki, won an Academy Award in 1952.

In subsequent years, Heyerdahl was involved with many other expeditions and archaeological projects. However, he remained best known for his boat-building, and for his emphasis on cultural diffusionism. He built the boats Ra and Ra II in order to demonstrate that Ancient Egyptians could have communicated with the Americas or transferred pyramid-building technology. On May 17, 1970 Heyerdahl set sail from Morocco on the papyrus boat Ra II to sail across the Atlantic Ocean to Central America. Yuri Senkevich, who was a doctor during this expedition, later became a popular TV host in USSR and Russia.

His next boat Tigris was intended to demonstrate that trade and migration could have linked the Indus Valley Civilisation in India with Mesopotamia. The Tigris was deliberately burnt in Djibouti, on April 3, 1978 as a protest against the wars raging on every side in the Red Sea and Horn of Africa. In Heyerdahl's open letter to the Secretary of the United Nations he said in part:

' Today we burn our proud ship... to protest against inhuman elements in the world of 1978... Now we are forced to stop at the entrance to the Red Sea. Surrounded by military airplanes and warships from the world's most civilized and developed nations, we have been denied permission by friendly governments, for reasons of security, to land anywhere, but in the tiny, and still neutral, Republic of Djibouti. Elsewhere around us, brothers and neighbors are engaged in homicide with means made available to them by those who lead humanity on our joint road into the third millennium.

'To the innocent masses in all industrialized countries, we direct our appeal. We must wake up to the insane reality of our time.... We are all irresponsible, unless we demand from the responsible decision makers that modern armaments must no longer be made available to people whose former battle axes and swords our ancestors condemned.

'Our planet is bigger than the reed bundles that have carried us across the seas, and yet small enough to run the same risks unless those of us still alive open our eyes and minds to the desperate need of intelligent collaboration to save ourselves and our common civilization from what we are about to convert into a sinking ship.'

Thor Heyerdahl also investigated the pyramidal mounds found on the Maldive Islands in the Indian Ocean. There, he found sun-oriented mounds and courtyards, as well as statues with elongated earlobes. Both of these archeological finds fit with his theory of a sea-faring civilization which originated in what is now Sri Lanka, colonized the Maldives, and influenced or founded the cultures of ancient South America and Easter Island. His discoveries are detailed in his book, "The Maldive Mystery."

In 1991 he studied the pyramids of Güímar on Tenerife and discovered that they cannot be random stone heaps, but actual pyramids. He also discovered their special astronomical orientation. Heyerdahl advanced a theory according to which the Canaries had been bases of ancient shipping between America and the Mediterranean.

His last project was Jakten på Odin, the search for Odin, in which he initiated excavations in Azov, near the Sea of Azov at the northeast of the Black Sea, to search for the possible remains of a civilizations to match the account of Snorri Sturluson in Ynglinga saga about the emigrating tribe of Æsir with their leader Odin, who Snorri said came to Saxland, Fyn and Sweden and got the reputation of being a God (see also House of Ynglings and Mythological kings of Sweden).

Heyerdahl was also an active figure in 'Green' politics. He was the recipient of numerous medals and awards. He also received 11 honorary doctorates from universities in the Americas and Europe.

Heyerdahl's expeditions were spectacular, and his heroic journeys in flimsy boats caught the public imagination. But his diffusionist theories were considered eccentric and old-fashioned by some archaeologists. His central claims that migrations linked comparable ancient civilisations have not been supported by more recent evidence. He has even been accused of an 'imperialist' mentality. However Heyerdahl undoubtedly increased public interest in ancient history and in the achievements of various cultures and peoples around the world.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thor_Heyerdahl

Good morning, BBofB.

Great bio's today, and not a Charlie among them.<smile>Of course, by now, all of our listeners are aware of Thor Heyerdahl, because he captured the world's imagination. I do believe, folks, that Kurt Vonnegut is campaigning to save a vanishing species, the imagination.

Probably one of the things wrong with our public schools today, is that a student no longer has to rely on the "inward eye" as Wordsworth puts it. Someone's else's imagination is mechanized for them. Such a pity, no?

Question for the day:

What song sung by Judy Garland was supposed to have been inspired by Clark Gable's photograph?

You made me adore you.

Close, edgar, very close, but not quite. <smile> Want to try again?

Thor Heyerdahl was a hero of my youth. I must have read Kon-Tiki ten times or more.

My song today contains:

"Don't try to understand 'em
Just rope 'em, throw 'em, brand 'em
Soon we'll be living high and wide..."