WA2K Radio is now on the air

Golden slumbers kiss your eyes,
Smiles awake you when you rise.
Sleep pretty wantons, do not cry,
And I will sing a lullaby;
Rock them, rock them, lullaby. - Thomas Dekker

lol, it was the hamsters, they must have really liked my song, made me post it a million times

Righty ho....I have my guitar ready, and will now give you a recital of the theme tune from the popular TV show, Bonanza........


<shuffle shufle >

TWANG TW-TW-TWANG TW-TW-TWANG TW-TW-TWANG TW-TWANG TWANG

TWANG TW- TW- TWANG TW-TW BOING........

Bugger! One of my strings has broken......I'll get back to you....

Good morning, WA2K listeners and contributors.

First, allow me to thank all of you in our audience for the well wishes and goodnight songs.

Ellpus, you are a riot, buddy. That guitar misfire gave me a smile this morning.

Today is Veteran's day in the U.S. and later, we will try and recognize all of the ones who have served.

Later, all, after coffee.

F. Van Wyck Mason
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Francis Van Wyck Mason (November 11, 1901 - August 28, 1978, Bermuda) was an American historian and novelist. He had a long and prolific career as a writer spanning 50 years and including 65 published novels.

Life

Mason was born to a patrician Boston family which traced its roots back to the 17th Century. His early life before he started writing was filled with adventure. His first eight years he lived in Berlin and then Paris where his grandfather served as U.S. Consul General. After a few years in Illinois he left for Europe in 1917 while still a teenager to fight in World War I. Like many future writers, he was an ambulance driver for a while. He then managed to enlist in the French Army where he became a decorated artillery officer. By the end of the war he had worked his way into the U.S. Army, rising to the rank of Lieutenant. After the war he went to prep school before attending Harvard where he received his Bachelor of Science (SB) in 1924. At one time in his student days, he was mistakenly arrested for murder. Having borrowed a dinner jacket, he was wrongly identified for a waiter who at the time had committed a murder.

His hopes of entering the diplomatic corps were thwarted after the death of his father and he started an importing business instead. He spent the next few years traveling the world buying rugs and antiques before getting married and settling down. His travels were extensive and included Europe, Russia,the Near East, North Africa (9 weeks with own caravan), the West Indies, Central Africa, and a ride across Central America on horseback. He lived in New York City and was in a famous Cavalry division of the National Guard and played quite a bit of polo.

Mason married socialite Dorothy L. MacReady in New York City in 1927 and while expecting the birth of his first son, he started writing for the pulp magazines. This turned out to be successful for him because he sold his first 18 stories without a rejection, and went on to publish his first book in 1930. This book, The Seeds of Murder introduced Captain Hugh North, a detective in Army Intelligence and the hero in a long series of "intrigue" novels. He also settled his family around Baltimore, Maryland about this time.

By 1931 he had made the transition to full-time writer, publishing two more Captain North novels and his first historical novel, Captain Nemesis, which was republished from an earlier pulp serial. The historical novel apparently did not sell well because he went back to the mystery/intrigue books, publishing a dozen or so over then next 7 years. He developed his Hugh North character, who was Mason's alter ego, in these books. North was a prototype for James Bond in that he a smooth, capable spy, as well as quite a lady killer. This series of books also seemed to predict actual military events before they took place, including a sneak attack on Pearl Harbor.

Mason was still selling historical stories for the pulps during this period and in 1938 returned to the genre for a major novel, Three Harbours, about the early phases of the American Revolution. This book turned out to be very popular and changed his focus to historical fiction for the rest of his career, though he would continue to write Hugh North stories until 1968.

He wrote two more companion books to Three Harbours, Stars on the Sea and Rivers of Glory, as well as three more Hugh North mysteries in the years leading up to World War II. These books all did very well, especially Stars on the Sea which was a top 10 bestseller for 1940, and Mason was in his prime before the war interrupted his writing for a time. He reenlisted at the beginning of the war and suspended his writing career though he did manage to write some youth oriented war stories during the war under the name Frank W. Mason as well as publishing a couple of reworked pulp serials under the name Ward Weaver. During World War II he worked as Chief Historian serving on General Eisenhower's staff. His main responsibility was to document the war for future generations but he did lend a hand to write the famous communiqués which announced the activities of D-Day to the world. As part of his duties he followed behind or with advancing troops as they worked their way into enemy territory and was one of the first into some of the concentration camps including Buchenwald.

After the war he settled into a more leisurely pace of a little more than one book per year, which he was to maintain for the next quarter century. His style was well refined by this time and he was able to publish a string of fairly popular books. He finished his American Revolution series with Eagle in the Sky in 1948, wrote a popular novel about the famous buccaneer, Henry Morgan called Cutlass Empire in 1949, and started a trilogy on the Civil War in 1951.

He rewrote more of his pulps for the paperback market during the fifties and had a successful youth book called The Winter at Valley Forge in 1955. He would continue to write historical novels for the youth market after that as part of his mix. He also moved to Bermuda from the Baltimore area during the '50s. His wife was ill during this period and finally died in 1958.

He was soon remarried to Jean-Louise Hand, his long-time secretary. He spent the rest of his life in Bermuda, writing historical fiction for both the adult and youth market as well as several more Hugh North novels. He drowned off the coast of Bermuda in 1978 after having finished his final novel, Armored Giants, about the battle between the Monitor and Merrimack, which was published posthumously in 1980.


Writing Style

Mason's writing style was colorful though straightforward. He seems to use his own voice in telling these stories in the third person, though he only lets a little of his personality come through as narrator. His stories usually revolve around a heroic gentleman character. This hero is usually a little rough around the edges and may be forced to extreme measures by circumstances, but in the end, comes out on top. Based on his own life which involved extensive travel, his stories are usually either set in exotic locations, as in the Hugh North stories, or involve main characters who are getting about quite a bit. His historical stories nearly always involve some kind of warfare and frequently include naval battles. While one may learn a little history and geography when reading his works, the main point of his stories is the excitement provided as he first makes the reader care about his main characters and then puts them into dire circumstances where they have to fight for their lives.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F._Van_Wyck_Mason

Robert Ryan
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.


Robert Bushnell Ryan (November 11, 1909 - July 11, 1973) was an American actor born in Chicago, Illinois. He graduated from Dartmouth College in 1932, where he was also the school boxing champion. After graduation, not finding work to his liking, Ryan worked as a stoker on a ship, a laborer, and a ranch hand in Montana.

He attempted to make a career in show business as a playwright, but had to turn to acting to support himself. He studied acting in Hollywood and appeared on stage in small film parts during the 1940s. During World War II he served in the Marine Corps. While he had made films starting in 1940, his productive career commenced after his discharge from the military. He also became involved in many liberal causes, remaining active even while others feared to speak out.

He married Jessica Cadwalader on March 11, 1939, and they remained married until her death from cancer in 1972; they had 3 children.

He died from lung cancer in New York City the following year at the age of 63.

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

Stubby Kaye
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.


Stubby Kaye (November 11, 1918 - December 14, 1997), born Bernard Kotzin in New York, New York, was an American comic actor.

Kaye is best known for defining the role of Nicely-Nicely Johnson in Guys and Dolls, first on Broadway and then in the film version. He also played Marryin' Sam in Li'l Abner (which featured his signature song, "Jubilation T. Cornpone"), again on both stage and screen. In 1962 he played the Mikado in Michael Winner's The Cool Mikado. His last featured role was as Marvin Acme in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Around this time he also made an unexpected guest appearance on the British science fiction series, Doctor Who.

During the 1960s, Kaye became well known in the UK as host of a weekly children's talent show, Stubby's Silver Star Show. Concurrently, he also hosted the children's Saturday-morning game show Shenanigans on ABC.

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


Ballad Of Cat Ballou Lyrics
By: Nat King Cole
From the album: Unknown



-artists: nat king cole and stubby kaye
-words by mack david and music by jerry livingston
-title song from the 1965 film starring jane fonda, lee marvin (who won an oscar
-for his dual role as a drunken lawman and his counterpart, outlaw kid sheleen)
-cole and kaye, as strolling minstrels, functioned as a greek chorus, commenting
-on the action (?)


Well now friends just lend an ear
For you're now about to hear
The ballad of cat ballou
It's a song that's newly made
And professus and the shade
And the sunrise kid are singin' it for you

Cat ballou, cat ballou

It's a hangin' day in wolf city, wyomin'
Wolf city, wyomin', eighteen ninety four
They're gonna drop cat ballou
Through the gallows floor

She killed a man in wolf city, wyomin'
Wolf city, wyomin', killed a man it's true
And that is why they're a-hangin'
Hangin' cat ballou

She has the smile of an angel
(fights like the devil)


The eyes of an angel
(bites like the devil)
The face of an angel
(i say she's the devil)
(she's mean and evil through and through)

Cat ballou, cat ball-ou-ou-ou
She's mean and evil through and through

With her outlaw band they're now tellin' a story
Now tellin' a story how she rode the plain
The wildest gal in the we-est
Since calamity jane

And today's the day that she's goin' to glory
She's goin' to glory for the way she sinned
They'll be a-speedin' her soul
On a wayward wind

She has the smile of an angel
(fights like the devil)
The eyes of an angel
(bites like the devil)
The face of an angel
(i say she's the devil)
(she's mean and evil through and through)

Cat ballou (cat ballou)
Cat ball-ou-ou-ou (cat ballou)
She's mean and evil through and through

Cat ballou, cat ball-ou-ou-ou
She's mean and evil through and through

Kurt Vonnegut
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.


Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (born November 11, 1922) is an American novelist, satirist, and most recently, graphic artist.


Biography

Kurt Vonnegut was born to fourth-generation German-American parents in Indianapolis, the setting for many of his novels. He attended Cornell University from 1941 to 1943, where he served as an opinions section editor for the student newspaper, the Cornell Daily Sun and majored in chemistry before joining the U.S. Army in World War II. He is a combat infantry veteran and holds a Purple Heart. His experiences as an advance scout with the U.S. 106th Infantry Division during the Battle of the Bulge, and in particular his witnessing of the bombing of Dresden, Germany, while a prisoner of war, would inform much of his work. This event would also form the core of his most famous work, Slaughterhouse-Five.

After the war, he attended the University of Chicago as a graduate student in anthropology and also worked as a police reporter at the City News Bureau of Chicago. He left Chicago to work in Schenectady, New York, in public relations for General Electric. He attributes his unadorned writing style to his reporting work.

From 1970 to 2000, Vonnegut lived in an East Side Manhattan brownstone, with his wife, the renowned photographer Jill Krementz. On January 31, 2000, a fire destroyed the top story of his home. Vonnegut suffered smoke inhalation and was hospitalized in critical condition for four days. He survived, but his personal archives were destroyed, and after leaving the hospital he retired to Northampton, Massachusetts. He taught an advanced writing class at Smith College for a period in 2000, and he was recognized as New York State Author for 2001-2003.

Vonnegut is a humanist; he currently serves as Honorary President of the American Humanist Association, having replaced Isaac Asimov in what Vonnegut calls "that totally functionless capacity". He was deeply influenced by early socialist labor leaders, especially Indiana natives Powers Hapgood and Eugene V. Debs, and he frequently quotes them in his work. He is a lifetime member of the American Civil Liberties Union, and recently did a print advertisement for them.

He currently writes for the magazine In These Times, focusing on subjects ranging from contemptuous criticism of the Bush administration to simple observational pieces on topics like a trip to the post office. In 2005, many of his essays were collected in a new bestselling book entitled A Man Without A Country. Vonnegut referred to the book's success as "a nice glass of champagne at the end of a life," although the emotionally-charged essays belied no diminished energy on the author's part.


Writing career

His first short story, "Report On the Barnhouse Effect" appeared in 1950. His background at GE influenced his first novel, the dystopian science fiction novel Player Piano (1952), in which human workers have been largely replaced by machines. He continued to write science fiction short stories before his second novel, The Sirens of Titan, was published in 1959. Through the 1960s the form of his work changed, from the orthodox science fiction of Cat's Cradle (which in 1971 got him his master's degree) to the acclaimed, semiautobiographical Slaughterhouse-Five, given a more experimental structure by using time travel as a plot device.

These structural experiments were continued in Breakfast of Champions (1973), which included many rough illustrations, lengthy non-sequiturs and an appearance by the author himself, as a deus ex machina.

"This is a very bad book you're writing," I said to myself.
"I know," I said.
"You're afraid you'll kill yourself the way your mother did," I said.
"I know," I said.

Vonnegut's mother committed suicide while he was in his early twenties. He himself attempted suicide in 1985 and later wrote about this in several essays.

Many hostile reviewers found the book formless, but it became one of his best sellers. It includes, beyond the author himself, several of Vonnegut's recurring characters. One of them, Kilgore Trout, plays a major role and interacts with the author's character. (Kazak, a dog from Galápagos and The Sirens of Titan, was apparently a major character in an earlier draft; she attacks Vonnegut's character as retribution for being cut out.)

Although many of his later novels involved science fiction themes, they were widely read and reviewed outside the field, not least due to their anti-authoritarianism, which matched the prevailing mood of the United States in the 1960s. For example, his seminal short story Harrison Bergeron graphically demonstrates how even the debatably noble sentiment of egalitarianism, when combined with too much authority, becomes horrific repression. A case could be made for Vonnegut's form of political satire through extrapolation and exaggeration requiring a science fiction theme, simply as a milieu for proposing alternative systems, while remaining essentially political satire nonetheless. It is therefore easy for those ignorant of science fiction's long-established (and, for commentators such as Kingsley Amis, dominant) vein of satire to claim that Vonnegut does not write science fiction. However, his work is clearly in the science-fictional tradition descended from Swift's Gulliver's Travels.

In much of his work Vonnegut's own voice is apparent, often filtered through the character of science fiction author Kilgore Trout (based on real-life science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon), characterized by wild leaps of imagination and a deep cynicism, tempered by humanism. In the foreword to Breakfast of Champions, Vonnegut wrote that as a child, he saw men with locomotor ataxia, and it struck him that these men walked like broken machines; it followed that healthy people were working machines, suggesting that humans are helpless prisoners of determinism. Vonnegut also explored this pessimistic theme in Slaughterhouse-Five, in which protagonist Billy Pilgrim "has come unstuck in time" and has so little control over his own life that he cannot even predict which part of it he will be living through from minute to minute.

In 1974, Venus on the Half-Shell, a book by Philip José Farmer aping the style of Vonnegut and attributed to Kilgore Trout, was published. This action caused a falling out of the two friends and some confusion amongst readers.

According to a 1996 online interview, Vonnegut said he had "sold the [film] rights to Cat's Cradle outright and for all eternity to Hilly Elkins, who has never done anything with it and never will and won't sell it back. Cat's Cradle now lies at a crossroads with a stake through its heart. Jerry Garcia had the rights to Sirens of Titan for many years. When he died, we bought the rights back from his estate. Player Piano was bought outright by Ed Pressman quite a while ago. We've been talking to him, asking him to do something with it or let us have it back."


Design career

His work as a graphic artist got its start in the illustrations he did for Slaughterhouse-Five and, more particularly, in Breakfast of Champions, which included numerous felt-tip pen illustrations of sphincters and other, less indelicate images. As he lost interest in writing, his focus shifted to graphics artwork, particularly silk-screen prints, pursued in collaboration with Joe Petro III in the 1990s.

More recently, Vonnegut participated in the project The Greatest Album Covers That Never Were, where he created an album cover for Phish called Hook, Line and Sinker, which has been included in a traveling exhibition for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Family

Kurt Vonnegut has three children biologically. In addition, when his sister Alice died of cancer at the age of 41, he adopted three of her four children. Thus he has a total of six. Two of these children have published books, including his only son, Mark Vonnegut, who wrote The Eden Express: A Memoir of Insanity, about his experiences in the late 1960s and his major psychotic breakdown and recovery; the tendency to insanity he acknowledged may be partly hereditary, influencing him to take up the study of medicine and orthomolecular psychiatry. Mark was named after Mark Twain, whom Vonnegut considered an American saint, and to whom he bears some resemblance, in both style and facial appearance. [1] [2].

His daughter Edith Vonnegut, an artist, has also had her work published in a book entitled Domestic Goddesses. Edith was once married to Geraldo Rivera. She was named after Kurt Vonnegut's mother, Edith Lieber. His youngest daughter is Nanette, named after Nanette Schnull, Vonnegut's paternal grandmother. He is also the younger brother of atmospheric scientist Bernard Vonnegut, now deceased.

Vonnegut's three adopted children are his nephews: James, Steven and Kurt Adams. They were adopted after a traumatic twenty-four-hour period, in which their father's commuter train went off an open drawbridge in New Jersey and their mother, Kurt's sister Alice, died of cancer. The fourth and youngest of the boys, Peter Nice, went to live with a first cousin of their father in Birmingham, Alabama as an infant.


Trivia

Vonnegut smokes Pall Mall cigarettes, which he claims are a "classy" way to commit suicide.

Vonnegut used to run a car dealership called "Saab Cape Cod" in West Barnstable, Massachusetts but he failed to sell the Swedish two-stroke SAAB cars, and went into bankruptcy. He has jokingly said that this may be the reason he has never received a Nobel prize. [3]

He was a close friend of fellow author (and World War II veteran) Joseph Heller.

The asteroid 25399 Vonnegut is named in his honour.

There was a widely-circulated urban legend on the Internet that Kurt Vonnegut gave a commencement address at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1997 in which he advised students to wear sunscreen - the main theme and title of a quite odd pop song by Baz Luhrmann. In fact, the commencement speaker at MIT in 1997 was Kofi Annan and the putative Vonnegut speech was an article published in the Chicago Tribune on June 1, 1997 by columnist Mary Schmich.

Vonnegut did, however, play himself in a cameo in 1986's Back To School and is invoked as a pop culture reference in many teen flicks such as "Can't Hardly Wait", in which the character Preston (Ethan Embry) is bound for Massachusetts to attend a writing seminar by the acclaimed author. He also appears very briefly in Keith Gordon's film of his novel Mother Night.

Vonnegut also has a brief cameo as a TV commercial director in the film version of Breakfast of Champions.

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

Jonathan Winters
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Jonathan Winters (born November 11, 1925 in Dayton, Ohio) is an American comedic actor. His full birth name is Jonathan Harshman Winters III. He's descended from Valentine Winters, founder of the Winters National Bank in Dayton, Ohio, now part of JPMorgan Chase. At 17, during World War II, Jonathan enlisted in the Marines and served in the South Pacific. After his discharge he studied cartooning at Dayton Art Institute, where he met Eileen Schauder, whom he married in 1948. He began comedy routines and acting while studying at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio.

Beginning as a stand-up comic with a madcap wildness, Winters recorded many classic comedy albums. Probably the best known of his characters from this period is Maudie Frickert, the seemingly sweet old lady with the barbed tongue. He was a favorite of Jack Paar and appeared frequently on his television programs.

Winters has now appeared in nearly 50 movies and several television shows, including particularly notable roles in the film It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and dual roles of Henry Glenworthy and his dark, scheming brother, Rev. Wilbur Glenworthy, in the film adaptation of Evelyn Waugh's The Loved One. His fellow comedians that starred with him in "Mad World", such as Arnold Stang, claimed that, in the long periods while they waited between scenes, Winters would entertain them for hours in their trailer by becoming any character that they would suggest to him.

On television, he appeared as Robin Williams's infant son in the television program Mork & Mindy. Robin Williams calls Jonathan Winters his idol and greatest influence. Winters has also done some wonderful dramatic work, as evidenced in the Twilight Zone episode "A Game of Pool" (episode # 3.5) 13 October 1961.

He was also the narrator in Frosty Returns and recorded Ogden Nash's The Carnival of the Animals poems to Camille Saint-Saëns' classical opus.

In 1999 he was awarded the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor.

Winters now lives near Santa Barbara, California, and is often seen browsing and hamming to the crowd at the antique show at the Ventura County fairgrounds. He spends time painting and has been presented in one-man shows of his art. In 1997 he published Winters' Tales: Stories and Observations for the Unusual. Other writings have followed, and he is said to be working on his autobiography.

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

LaVern Baker
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.


LaVern Baker (November 11, 1929 - March 10, 1997) was an American Rhythm & Blues singer, originally billed as "Little Miss Sharecropper", then "Bea Baker". She had taken the first name "LaVern" by 1952, when she began recording with Todd Rhodes and his band.

Born Delores Williams in Chicago, Illinois, in 1953, Baker signed with Atlantic Records, and immediately began releasing hits, such as "Soul on Fire" and "Tweedlee Dee". Georgia Gibbs soon covered "Tweedlee Dee" with a whitewashed version of the song, and Baker unsuccessfully attempted to sue her.

In addition to singing, Baker also did some work with Ed Sullivan and Alan Freed on TV and in films. In the late 1960s, Baker fell ill after a trip to Vietnam to entertain American soldiers, and she stayed in semi-retirement until 1988, when she performed at Madison Square Garden for Atlantic Records' 40th anniversary. She then worked on the soundtrack to Dick Tracy and appeared in Black & Blue, a Broadway musical, and released a comeback disc that sold moderately well.

In 1991, she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Her song "Jim Dandy" was named one of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.

LaVern Baker passed away in 1997 and was interred in the Maple Grove Cemetery in Kew Gardens, New York.


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

LaVern Baker - Tweedlee Dee Lyrics
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Tweedlee Dee
LaVern Baker and The Gliders
(Scott)

Tweedlee tweedlee tweedlee dee
I'm as happy as can be
Jimminy cricket jimminy jack
You make my heart go clickety-clack
Tweedlee tweedlee tweedlee dee

Tweedlee tweedlee tweedlee dot
How you gonna keep that honey you got
Hunkies hunkies fishes bite
I'm gonna see my honey tonight
Tweedlee tweedlee tweedlee dot

Tweedlee dee tweedlee dee
Give it up give it up
Give your love to me
Tweedlee dot tweedlee dot
Gimme gimme gimme gimme
Gimme all the love you got
Hump-be-ump-bump-bump

Tweedlee tweedlee tweedle doe
I'm a lucky so-and-so
Hubba hubba honey dew
I'm gonna keep my eyes on you
Tweedlee tweedlee tweedlee doe

Tweedlee doe tweedlee doe
Give that kiss to me before you go
Tweedlee dum tweedlee dum
Lookie lookie lookie lookie
Look at that sugar plum
Hump-be-ump-bump-bump

Tweedlee tweedlee tweedlee dum
You're as sweet as bubble gum
Mercy mercy pudding pie
You've got something that money can't buy
Tweedlee tweedlee tweedlee dum
Owww, tweedlee tweedlee dum
Owww, tweedlee tweedlee dum
FADE:
Owww, tweedlee tweedlee dum
Owww, tweedlee tweedlee dum
Owww

Demi Moore
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.


Demi Moore (born Demetria Guynes on November 11, 1962 in Roswell, New Mexico) is an American actress with a trademark husky voice. She is of varied ancestry including French, Welsh, and Cherokee (Native American) heritage.

Moore's father Charles Harmon left her mother, Victoria, before she was born. Because of this, Demi Moore did not share his last name on her birth certificate. Her stepfather, Danny Guynes, did not add much stability to her life, either. He frequently changed jobs and made the family move a total of 40 times. To make matters worse, operations on her left eye during childhood caused her to wear a patch. Although Moore was born in New Mexico, she spent much of her childhood and teenage years in the suburbs of Pittsburgh. Danny and Victoria kept on drinking, arguing and beating each other, until Danny finally committed suicide.

Her then-friend, Nastassja Kinski, persuaded Moore to drop out of Hollywood's Fairfax High School at age 16 to become an actress. After quitting school, Moore went to work as a pin-up girl. Her big break came playing the part of Jackie Templeton on the ABC soap opera, General Hospital, a role she played from 1982 to 1983. Her character was frequently romantically paired with actors twice her age on the soap opera.

From the first General Hospital salaries, Moore celebrated by partying and snorting cocaine. Moore's drug abuse lasted more than three years, until director Joel Schumacher fired her from the set of St. Elmo's Fire when she arrived on the set intoxicated. She soon received withdrawal treatment and returned clean after a week and stayed clean. (Incidentally, Moore's character in St. Elmo's Fire, Jules, was also a cocaine addict.) Moore had to sign a contract stipulating that she would stop her own alcohol and drug abuse, an agreement that caused her life to turn around. In the 1980s, she appeared in several youth oriented films, and was listed among the "Brat Pack."


She appeared nude on the cover of Vanity Fair magazine in August, 1991 while seven-months pregnant with her daughter Scout LaRue, with enormous attendant publicity. The image was endlessly parodied (including by Spy magazine, which placed her then-husband Bruce Willis's head on her body), but also spawned honest imitators as other pregnant celebrities posed nude. Moore again appeared on the cover of Vanity Fair in August 1992, wearing only a body painted "suit".

For a time during the 1990s, Moore was the highest paid actress in Hollywood; she was the first actress to reach the USD$10 million mark for salary. Moore was coming off of the heels of a string of box office hits such as Ghost, A Few Good Men, and Indecent Proposal. Not all of the attention she received during this period was positive, however; for example she was spoofed with a cartoon version (called "Dewmi Moore") in the popular video game Leisure Suit Larry, and had numerous other parodies played on her name and likeness. Moore's career suffered though when starring vehicles like The Scarlet Letter, The Juror, Striptease, and G.I. Jane (a movie in which Moore went as far as shaving her head) failed at the box office and mostly garnered poor reviews.

According to an article in the now defunct Buzz magazine, she was so demanding when it came to perks and fringe benefits, her nickname around Hollywood studio executives was "Gimme Moore."

After a break from her acting career, Moore returned to the screen as a former member of Charlie's Angels in the film Charlie's Angels 2: Full Throttle. As the film was about to be released, media attention focused on how the 40 year old mother of three repeatedly had plastic surgery to remove fat on her hips, abdomen and buttocks, as well as breast enlargement.

In addition, Moore became the subject of much tabloid fodder thanks to her romantic relationship with actor Ashton Kutcher, who happens to be 15 years Moore's junior. Both would eventually spoof the public's fascination with their age difference during the monologue on the March 19, 2005 episode of Saturday Night Live. Kutcher, who served as guest host, brought Moore on stage while Moore was made up to appear like a very elderly woman, who constantly babied Kutcher. Moore and Kutcher were married on Saturday, September 24, 2005 in a lavish private ceremony attended by about 100 close friends and family.

This is Moore's third marriage. Her first was to musician Freddy Moore, whom she married when she was 18 years old. She has three daughters from her marriage to Bruce Willis: Rumer Glenn, Scout LaRue, and Tallulah Belle. Moore was also briefly engaged to fellow Brat Pack member and occasional co-star Emilio Estevez.

Her primary residence is currently in Hailey, Idaho, near the famous Sun Valley resort, although she spends a lot of time in the L.A. area with Kutcher.

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

Good morning WA2K. Wishing all a pleasant day.

Today's birthdays:

1050 - Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor (d. 1106)
1154 - King Sancho I of Portugal (d. 1212)
1155 - King Alfonso VIII of Castile (d. 1214)
1220 - Alphonse of Toulouse, son of Louis VIII of France (d. 1271)
1493 - Paracelso, doctor († 1541)
1493 - Bernardo Tasso, Italian poet (d. 1569)
1599 - Prince Octavio Piccolomini, Duke of Amalfi, Austrian field marshal (d. 1656)
1633 - George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax, British statesman (d. 1695)
1668 - Johann Albert Fabricius, German classical scholar and bibliographer (d. 1736)
1743 - Carl Peter Thunberg, Swedish naturalist (d. 1828)
1744 - Abigail Adams, First Lady of the United States (d. 1818)
1748 - King Charles IV of Spain (d. 1819)
1764 - Barbara Juliana, Baroness von Krüdener, Russian writer (d. 1824)
1791 - Josef Munzinger, Swiss Federal Councillor (d. 1855)
1792 - Mary Anne Evans, English wife of Benjamin Disraeli (d. 1872)
1821 - Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Russian novelist (d. 1881)
1828 - Sri Deep Narayan Mahaprabhuji, Hindu saint (d. 1963)
1852 - Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf, Austro-Hungarian field marshal (d. 1925)
1863 - Paul Signac, French painter (d. 1935)
1864 - Alfred Hermann Fried, Austrian pacifist, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (d. 1921)
1869 - King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy (d. 1947)
1882 - King Gustav VI Adolf of Sweden (d. 1973)
1885 - George Patton, American general (d. 1945)
1887 - Roland Young, American actor (d. 1953)
1889 - Clifton Webb, American actor (d. 1966)
1891 - Rabbit Maranville, baseball player (d. 1954)
1897 - Lucky Luciano, American gangster (d. 1962)
1898 - Rene Clair, French film dirctor (d.
1899 - Pat O'Brien, American film actor (d. 1983)
1900 to 1999

1901 - F. Van Wyck Mason, American author (d. 1978) (I remember reading"Eagle in the Sky", a novel about three physicians during the American Revolution and thinking it was the greatest.)I wonder what I'd think of it now.

1903 - Sam Spiegel, Austrian-born film producer (d. 1985)
1904 - Alger Hiss, American government official and spy (d. 1994)
1904 - J. H. C. Whitehead, British mathematician (d. 1960)
1909 - Robert Ryan, American actor (d. 1973)

1914 - Howard Fast, American author (d. 2003) Blacklisted by the HUAC and imprisoned for three months. Began "Spartacus" while in prison.

1914 - Henry Wade, American lawyer (d. 2001)
1915 - William Proxmire, U.S. Senator
1918 - Stubby Kaye, American comic actor (d. 1997)
1919 - Martin Balsam, American actor (d. 1996)
1919 - Kalle Päätalo, Finnish novelist (d. 2000)
1920 - Roy Jenkins, British politician (d. 2003)
1922 - Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., American novelist
1925 - June Whitfield, British comedienne
1925 - Jonathan Winters, American comedian and actor
1927 - Mose Allison, American musician
1928 - LaVern Baker, American singer (d. 1997)
1928 - Carlos Fuentes, Mexican writer
1928 - Mircea Muresan, Romanian film director
1929 - Hans Magnus Enzensberger, German writer
1938 - Ants Antson, Estonian speed skater
1939 - Denise Alexander, American actress
1940 - Barbara Boxer, U.S. Senator
1943 - Doug Frost, Australian swimming coach
1944 - Jesse Colin Young, American musician (The Youngbloods)
1945 - Daniel Ortega, President of Nicaragua
1950 - Mircea Dinescu, Romanian poet
1953 - Marshall Crenshaw, American musician
1959 - Lee Haney, American bodybuilder
1960 - Peter Parros, American actor
1960 - Stanley Tucci, American actor and film director
1961 - Corinne Hermès, French singer
1962 - Demi Moore, American actress
James Morrison, Australian musician
1964 - Judith Edelman, American musician
1964 - Calista Flockhart, American actress
1967 - Gil de Ferran, Brazilian race car driver
1969 - Carson Kressley, American fashion expert
1973 - Jason White, American musician (Green Day)
1974 - Leonardo DiCaprio, American actor
1977 - Ben Hollioake, English cricketer
1981 - Natalie Glebova, Russian beauty queen
1985 - Kalan Porter, Canadian singer

Clifton Webb: The Razor's Edge, Cheaper by the Dozen, Titanic, Laura, and more

[/IMG]
Martin Balsam: Psycho, Twelve Angry Men; Breakfast at Tiffanys, and too many more to list

Leonardo DiCaprio
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.


Leonardo Wilhelm DiCaprio (born November 11, 1974) is an Academy Award-nominated American actor well known for roles in blockbuster movies like Titanic (1997) and The Aviator (2004).


Biography

DiCaprio was born in Los Angeles, California, the son of George DiCaprio, a half Italian-half German distributor of comic books, and Irmelin Idenbirkin, a former legal secretary who was born in Germany. His name allegedly came about because his pregnant mother was standing in front of a Leonardo da Vinci painting at a museum in Italy when he kicked, which made her decide to name him after the famous artist. His parents divorced when he was a year old. He grew up in Echo Park.

At age five, he appeared on his favorite television series, Romper Room, and was almost fired for misbehaving. He attended John Marshall High School in Los Angeles. He was rejected by an agent early in his career for having a name that sounded too foreign, suggesting that it should be changed to Lenny Williams, but DiCaprio refused.

His acting career began in 1990 when he was cast in the role of Garry Buckman on the TV version of the hit film Parenthood, where he met his best friend Tobey Maguire while working on an episode. In that same year, DiCaprio appeared on the soap opera Santa Barbara in the role of Mason Capwell (in flashbacks as a teenager). From 1991 to 1992 he had the role of Luke Brower, a homeless boy, on Growing Pains.

However, DiCaprio is most famous (and respected) for his roles in motion pictures. His debut role was as Josh in Critters 3 (1991), a film that was released straight to video.

Two years later, his break-through came with the role of Toby in This Boy's Life (1993) co-starring with Robert De Niro and Ellen Barkin, which led the New York Film Critics and the National Society of Film Critics to name him runner-up for Best Supporting Actor. In the same year he also convincingly portrayed a mentally handicapped boy in What's Eating Gilbert Grape (1993). The role earned him an Academy Award nomination.

The black-and-white movie Don's Plum, a low-budget drama featuring the actor and some of his friends (including Tobey Maguire) was filmed between 1995 and 1996. Its release was later blocked in the United States and Canada by DiCaprio and Maguire, who argued they never intended to make it a theatrical feature. Nevertheless, it later premiered on February 10, 2001 in Berlin.

In 1996, DiCaprio also played the male lead in Romeo + Juliet, a slick and updated modern-day version of Shakespeare's play, directed by Australian director Baz Luhrmann.

The move from 'star' to 'superstar' came when DiCaprio played Jack Dawson in Titanic (1997). The highest grossing movie ever, it tied with Ben-Hur (1959) for receiving the most Academy Awards, though DiCaprio himself was not nominated.

In 2002 DiCaprio starred in two epic movies; Catch Me If You Can (directed by Steven Spielberg), and Gangs of New York (directed by Martin Scorsese). Both films were very well critically received. Forging a collaboration with Scorsese, DiCaprio most recently starred in the award-winning Scorsese-directed film The Aviator, portraying the eccentric Howard Hughes.

DiCaprio continues his run with Scorsese (some claim him to be Scorsese's 'new De Niro') in the upcoming movie, The Departed (2006).

Recently, DiCaprio has taken to political issues. He is especially fond of environmental causes and has devoted a great deal of his time and money to such issues. His official website (see link below) provides more information on the subject.


TV

* Growing Pains (1985) Luke Brower (1991-1992)


Awards

In 1994, DiCaprio was nominated for an Academy Award for 'Best Supporting Actor' for 'What's Eating Gilbert Grape'. A decade later, he was nominated for his second Academy Award for his performance in 'The Aviator'.

At the Golden Globes, he has been nominated for the 'Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role' for 'What's Eating Gilbert Grape'; 'Best Performance by an Actor' for 'Titanic'; and 'Best Performance by an Actor' for 'Catch Me If You Can' (which co-starred Tom Hanks). Di Caprio was also nominated and won the 'Best Actor' award (Drama) at the 'Golden Globes 2005' for 'The Aviator'.


Trivia

* DiCaprio sued Playgirl to stop the New York-based monthly magazine from publishing unauthorized photos of him in its July 1998 issue. Some reports claim the photos were secretly taken while the actor was lounging in the nude, while others say they came from stills of his nude scenes in, or from outtakes of, the movie Total Eclipse (co-starring David Thewlis). The case was settled on June 29, 1998 for an undisclosed amount.

* Leo once "starred" in a Japanese Orico credit card commercial, in which he played a cop/detective, and they punned his name as Dekka Purio (Dekka meaning 'cop' in Japanese). He speaks one line "Orico card, ok!"

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

Well, folks. Here are our Bob and Raggedy with background and birthdays of celebs. Thanks, you fabulous duo. <smile>

So many notables from which to choose, listeners; however, the name Mary Ann Evans conjured this poem.






The Choir Invisible


Oh, may I join the choir invisible
Of those immortal dead who live again
In minds made better by their presence; live
In pulses stirred to generosity,
In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn
For miserable aims that end with self,
In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars,
And with their mild persistence urge men's search
To vaster issues. So to live is heaven:
To make undying music in the world,
Breathing a beauteous order that controls
With growing sway the growing life of man.
So we inherit that sweet purity
For which we struggled, failed, and agonized
With widening retrospect that bred despair.
Rebellious flesh that would not be subdued,
A vicious parent shaming still its child,
Poor anxious penitence, is quick dissolved;
Its discords, quenched by meeting harmonies,
Die in the large and charitable air,
And all our rarer, better, truer self
That sobbed religiously in yearning song,
That watched to ease the burden of the world,
Laboriously tracing what must be,
And what may yet be better, -- saw within
A worthier image for the sanctuary,
And shaped it forth before the multitude,
Divinely human, raising worship so
To higher reverence more mixed with love, --
That better self shall live till human Time
Shall fold its eyelids, and the human sky
Be gathered like a scroll within the tomb
Unread forever. This is life to come, --
Which martyred men have made more glorious
For us who strive to follow. May I reach
That purest heaven, -- be to other souls
The cup of strength in some great agony,
Enkindle generous ardor, feed pure love,
Beget the smiles that have no cruelty,
Be the sweet presence of a good diffused,
And in diffusion ever more intense!
So shall I join the choir invisible
Whose music is the gladness of the world.

George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans)

Interesting about Patton, Bob, since this is Veteran's Day in the U.S. and Demi Moore did the worst job with the remake of The Scarlet Letter. Found out later that she never read the book.

here's a nice song from Jesse Colin Young & the Youngbloods. i'd like to dedicate it to everyone in Dover, PA.

Love is but a song we sing
And fear's the way we die
You can make the mountains sing
Or make the angels cry
Though the dove is on the wing
You need not know why

(*) Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another right now

Some will come and some will go
This will surely pass
When the one who left us here
Returns for us at last
We are but a moment's sunlight
Fading in the grass

Repeat (*)

If you hear the song we sing,
You will understand
You hold the key to love and fear
It's in your trembling hand
One key unlocks them both, you know
It's at your command

Repeat (*)

I say,
Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another right now
Right now
Right now

Making Love
Roberta Flack lyrics

Here close to our feelings
We touch again
We love again
Remember when we thought
Our hearts would never mend
And we're all the better for each other

There's more to love I know
Than making love

Here no more confusion
We see our lives
We live our lives
Remember when we thought
We never would survive
But now neither one of us is breaking

There's more to love I know
Than making love

Some things never change
Some things sometimes do

----- Instrumental Interlude ----

And now I'm feeling strong enough to let you in
And now neither one of us is breaking
Knowing now there's more to love
Than making love
And I'll remember you and making love
And I'll remember you
And I'll remember you
And I'll remember you
And I'll remember you

Following along with remembering, listeners:

Was it Tahiti?
Were we on the Nile.
Long, Long ago, say an hour or so
I recall that I saw your smile.
I remember you,
You're the one who made my dreams come true.
A few kisses ago.
I remember you, you're the one who said : "I love you too," I do,
didn't you know?
I remember too, a distant bell,
And stars that fell like rain, out of the blue.
When my life is thru
And the angels ask me to recall
The thrill of them all,
Then I shall tell them I remember you. you.

Mr. Turtle, that song I do remember. Thanks, buddy.

continuing the globe trotting, the band sweden had this to say about bolivia

Going To Bolivia
Sweden

I cut myself a two-foot switch from some tropical hardwood nearby.
and the sounds of a carnival drifted miraculously
through the air from a thousand miles away.
the monkeys jumped from tree to tree.
it sent a deathly chill through me
in bolivia

wildcats I had never seen claimed places in my room.
animal noises rang through the thick brush like voices from the tomb.
I saw the freshly polished chrome
gleaming in the mid-day sun.
and I knew that you were coming home
to bolivia.

hey hey