The Skeleton in My Kitchen

            On Sunday morning I memorized the chorus of “Joujou a la casse" (Dolly to the Trash) by Serge Gainsbourg and continued to revise my translation.

            Around midday I removed the rest of my comic books and comic magazines from the credenza in the kitchen and put them in the bedroom. I moved the credenza away from the wall to clean behind it and buried in the dusty cat hair was the skeleton of a newborn kitten . It would have to be at least five years old since I think the last time my late cat Daffodil had kittens was about six years ago. It could have been there even longer since I don't think I've cleaned under there for ten years. The only recognizable part of the skeleton was the skull withy a little hair on it and part of the spine extending from its base. I threw the rest away but washed that and dried it in the sun because it was too interesting to trash.

            I also moved the metal two-drawer filing cabinet to the left of the credenza and shifted the credenza further to the right. I think the room looks much better with the filing cabinet in a less central place.

            For lunch I cut the mould off a focaccia triangle, sliced the bun in half and had it toasted with peanut butter.

            I spent most of the day finishing my Food Bank Adventure and catching up on my journal so I didn’t do any exercises at home or take a bike ride.

            For dinner I had a fried egg and another de-moulded and toasted focaccia bun with a beer while watching two episodes of The Adventures of William Tell.

            In the first story Tell comes to meet a rebel leader named Rudolph, who is late. Rudolph’s men want proof that Tell is whom he says he is and so he immediately satisfies them by hitting a mark on a tree after walking several paces before one of them shouts “Now” and then turns to quickly hit the mark dead on. It seems like a strange criteria of identification, since there must be other good shots around. They did the same thing a few times in the Robin Hood series.

            They go looking for Rudolph and find him dead from a crossbow bolt, with horse tracks nearby. Tell wants to find the killer and so they start their search by asking questions at a nearby castle. Tell knows Gustaf Werner the lord of the castle because he has supplied the resistance with swords for many years. Today just happens to be the night of the betrothal of Gustaf’s daughter Eva to Eric Reichman, the owner of an iron mine. Klein, the old man that reluctantly lets them into the castle warns them of the curse that always results from Werners and Reichmans getting married and says that three men will die. Eva does not want to marry Eric because she loves Klaus but also because she believes in the curse. A betrothal cup that all will drink from is passed first to Tell’s comrade Hans, for him to give the toast, but the wine is poisoned and Hans dies immediately. Eric blames Klaus, who has been seen sneaking around the castle. Tell has his other comrade Anton guard Eva's door but Klaus sneaks in through the window. When he wakes her she is startled and screams and so Anton comes to attack him. But Klaus knocks Anton out and escapes. Tell searches the castle and then returns to find Anton dead with Klaus captured by Eric and his servant Heinz. They want to kill Klaus but Tell says he must get a fair trial and takes him into his custody. Later Eva sneaks from her room and runs to Klaus’s arms. Tell goes to see Gustaf and says he wants to see Eric’s bow and shafts. Gustaf says Eric keeps them in Werner castle. The shafts that Gustaf shows Tell match the one that killed Rudolph. When Eric walks in Tell confronts him but Eric says they are Gustaf’s shafts. They turn to look at Gustaf and he is pointing a crossbow at Tell. Gustaf has been supplying arms to the Austrians and Rudolph was killed because he found out. When Gustaf shoots Tell ducks and the arrow kills Eric. Gustaf runs from the room but Heinz carries him back in and throws him down. Tell informs Gustaf that he will hang to complete the curse of three men dying. Klaus and Eva live happily ever after.

            Eva was played by Caroline Denzil.

            In the second story Mario Rossi, who has been supplying arms for the Swiss resistance has been murdered by a gang of cutthroats known as the Black Brothers. The Blacks have taken the arms for themselves to sell. Since Tell represents the only market for the arms he goes to the Blacks to buy them but he won’t pay until the arms are delivered to Hedda. He asks Hedda to give her to give the courier her ring so that when it is brought to him he will give the Blacks the money. He buries two bags of money in separate places and goes to the Blacks with nothing. The older brother Luigi agrees to the deal but insists that Tell stay as a hostage until it is done. But behind Tell’s back Luigi sends two of his men to Switzerland to notify the Austrians that they are holding William Tell for the reward. The arms are delivered to Hedda and she gives the token, which is returned to Tell. When Tell gives them the money they won’t let him leave, insisting that he must stay and drink with them to complete the bargain. Meanwhile when the men come to Hedda to pick up the arms they explain they are late because they had to go around Austrian soldiers crossing the Italian border. Hedda concludes that her husband is about to be betrayed and heads for Italy with some men. That night Tell escapes but around the same time the youngest brother Guiseppe kills his brother Pietro and steals the money because he wants to run off to Milan with the brothers’ sexy servant girl Anna. The brothers think that Tell killed Pietro and go after him. They catch up to him just after he’s retrieved his own buried gold but they think that it’s theirs. Luigi has a knife fight with Tell and loses. The other men insist that Guiseppe fight with Tell to avenge the death of his brother but he’s afraid. He is forced into it but almost immediately Tell overpowers him and when Tell grabs him the stolen gold falls from Guiseppe’s belt. Guisseppe tries to run but one of the men throws a knife at his back and kills him. Tell tries to leave but Tell is told that the Austrians are coming for him. Tell draws his knife as the men surround him but suddenly arrows start hitting the bandits as Hedda and her men emerge from the bushes with their crossbows. Tell gives the rest of his gold to the widow of Mario Rossi.

            Granny Rossi was played by Eileen Way, who at sixteen was the youngest student at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts. She played the first character to die in the Doctor Who series. She was married to psychiatrist Felix Warden Brown.

            Anna was played by Gillian Vaughan, who was in “The Moonraker”, “The Horse’s Mouth” and “The White Trap”. She was married for many years to British TV star Des O’Connor.

            Luigi was played by Roger Delgado, who played the first incarnation of The Doctor’s arch enemy “The Master”. In fact the character was created specifically for Delgado to play. He certainly was the best one up until Missy came along.

August 31, 1990: Nancy was three days late for her period

Thirty years ago today

Nancy stayed overnight at my place and told me she was three days late for her period, so she might be pregnant. She also gave me $15 that I hadn't remembered that she owed me.

At lunch time Lorne had a talk with me about the way I worked. He said the quality of my work was fine but I was too slow. This was a new situation for me because in any other jobs I'd had there were no complaints. I couldn't work any faster and so I felt unappreciated and uncomfortable with my occupation.

After work I went to my bank and got a new card, then I cashed my cheque and on the way home bought beer and groceries.

I talked with Elaine on the phone.

I'd been feeling cold symptoms. I went to sleep for a while and when I woke up I wasn't sure if I was up to going to the Claremont.

August 30, 1990: At work I had no money for lunch and I was feeling weak

Thirty years ago today

I stayed over at Nancy's and we made love for the first time in a long time.

In the morning I checked when I came back to my room but Elaine hadn't called.

I only had enough money for a large coffee from McDonald's on my way to work. I found some fruit in some back yards but I was feeling pretty weak for most of the day. When I got home I pigged out on bread, peanut butter, apple butter and french fries, and Judy gave me a piece of curried chicken.

I made some iced tea.

Mia had Nancy's key and a videotape of "Turner and Hootch" and so at 19:30 we went over and watched it. I like Tom Hanks and the movie was okay but not up to par.

Food Bank Adventures: Taking Holy Communion at Mass Psychosis

            On Saturday morning I forgot that I’d already done my yogic leg raising exercises and did some of them twice. I’d forgotten because my mind was occupied with remembering that Albert Moritz has forgotten about me. In December I had sent him the revisions I’d made of my book of poems, based on the critiques he'd made last summer. He had told me that he'd have time for them over the Christmas holidays but when the end of April came I still hadn't heard from him. I emailed a reminder and he said that he wouldn’t be able to look at my book until May or June at the latest, but now at the end of August I still haven’t heard from him. I assume that he's forgotten because he’s a nice guy and I’m pretty sure that if it was on his mind he would drop my a line to let me know that he’s still tapped for time. I know that as the Poet Laureate of Toronto he has a lot on his plate but it feels lousy to be forgettable.

I memorized the second verse of “Joujou a la casse" (Dolly to the Trash) by Serge Gainsbourg and then spent some time reworking my translation. Often my initial translations are done before bedtime when I don’t have the brain power left to do anything else. But once I begin singing a song I tend to get a better idea what it’s about.

During song practice I was a little depressed because I was thinking about how hard I work on these songs but then when I make videos of them and upload them to YouTube they hardly get any hits. One would think that out of ninety-six Facebook friends and twenty-one Twitter followers an amount more than zero of them would watch my videos.

At 9:35 I headed for the food bank. As I was unlocking my door I saw my neighbour Shankar locking his. I told him that I’d run into our mutual friend Tom Fisher at the Beer Store two days before. Tom hadn’t known that we live in the same building. I shared with Shankar that Tom said he’s a very nice guy but I joked that I’d set Tom straight about that and told him what an evil person he really is. Shankar just smiled and nodded so he might have zoned out from my western humour.

Beth was there when I arrived, wearing a slicker and all ready for the rain that didn’t fall after all. When she saw me she said, “There’s my favourite person!" After I’d locked my bike and walked up to the orange pastel heart behind Beth she told me that she’d saved me a spot, but I hadn’t noticed anyone else trying to get it.

Beth reacted frantically a few times to wasps that were flying nearby. She said that she’s allergic to bee stings and doesn't know if she's allergic to wasp stings but doesn't want to find out. I commented that they are all drunk this time of year because of the rotten fruit that’s hanging around.

Beth said that they say that a lot of crazy people are going to die young. It’s true that people with severe forms of mental illness live on average twenty years less than the general population but not all for the same reasons. Some don’t get enough exercise; some have problems negotiating the process of looking for medical help; some self medicate with drugs and cigarettes; and some gain too much weight as a side effect of taking certain prescribed psychiatric medications. 

I said it also depends on what we mean by “crazy”. Most people believe in god and if it turns out that there is no supreme being then it means that the majority of people now and throughout history have suffered from delusion, which is the main feature of psychosis. But even the people that believe with certainty that there is no god are also delusional because they are sure of something they cannot know. A considerable portion of the foundation of our society was shaped by the actions of people motivated by their belief in god. Therefore civilization itself may to a great extent be the result of mass psychosis.

I pointed out that since humans are animals we repress hundreds of animal instincts in order to get along with one another in society. The necessary process of holding our instincts down can’t help but cause us to be dysfunctional.

Beth was admiring a pigeon on the sidewalk and said she liked the way they bob their heads when they walk. Apparently they do this in order to see where they are going in relation to the motion of their surroundings. The head moves forward, the body catches up and then the head moves forward again and so on. The whole process looks like bobbing. Humans do the same thing but without moving our heads because we use rapid eye movement instead.

I told her I prefer crows because they are smarter and more interesting. I said that crows have been shown to be able to make tools in order to solve problems while no dog or cat has ever made a tool. Crows placed in situations where they needed to get food out of holes have bent wires to make hooks in order to grab the food. I also find their mimicking talents to be a sign of intelligence. Crows have been observed, when they come upon a dead animal that they can’t tear open, to imitate the calls of coyotes in order to bring them to the corpse to open it up for them.

Beth argued that pigeons are also smart but I said that there’s a difference between being sensitive to and adapting to a human environment and having the ability to work out problems. Studies have shown that as birds go pigeons and doves are not very bright. She told me that she saw on TV that pigeons can detect cancer. I asked if she was talking about trained pigeons but she said no. I looked it up and found that pigeons can detect cancer but that it is the result of being taught how to do it. But what pigeons can learn to do is distinguish cancer by looking at microscopic images. They can’t play the role of a cancer sniffing dog and find cancer in a person.

Beth told me that she thinks I’m a really great person. I said that it was very nice of her to say so. Later when the guy came with the clipboard to take our names and membership numbers he asked if my name was spelled with a “C" or  "K". I said “It's C, the same as the religion” but it didn’t occur to me until later that in some languages the religion is spelled with a "K".

Beth said, “You rock" and "You're awesome!” If only people I'm attracted to would talk to me that way. She declared she likes me because we have a lot in common. We’re both creative people. She said that she writes poetry too. She added that she likes to draw and make cakes. She told me that she’s creative with cooking and described a dish that she makes with shellfish. She said that she has an idea that she’d like to try, which is to combine shrimp with macaroni and cheese. I pointed out that people tend not to combine shellfish with cheese, although they do dip it in butter. Other than the tuna melt people there’s no common dish that combines cheese and fish. Italians traditionally never combine cheese and fish and although in North America one would find anchovies and cheese together on pizza, the original Italian anchovy pizza did not have cheese on it. The French make an exception with lobster thermidor which contains gruyere cheese but it's pretty hard to taste the lobster when it's overpowered by the cheese. For it to work the cheese has to be mild and the fish has to be enhanced in some way as is the case for a bagel with smoked salmon and cream cheese.  However, there seem to be as many shrimp with macaroni and cheese recipes online as there are shrimp in the ocean. I asked Beth to let me know how it tastes if she ever tries it.

A man came down the line handing out bags containing various fruits and vegetables. Mine contained three bananas; four small peaches; one straightneck squash; three and a half cucumbers; and three potatoes. Beth asked me if I wanted her bananas but I could see that hers were as rotten as mine. I commented that I’d probably be able to cut one little edible piece of one of my bananas and the rest would go in the garbage. The woman in front of Beth turned and nodded in agreement.

Beth got her crate before me and coincidentally one of her items was a frozen macaroni and cheese meal. I said, “There ya go! Just add shrimp!" For Beth this was further evidence that she's psychic but macaroni and cheese is not an uncommon item to receive at the food bank. I would have been more impressed with her prophetic prowess if we’d been discussing fettuccini alfredo with shrimp and that had shown up in her crate.

The guy behind me said “Move up!” because now that some people ahead had gotten their food there were empty spaces in the line. I stepped ahead a few hearts. There was one more designated space free but it was the skewed one on the other side of the sidewalk. The guy behind urged me to move further but I told him I was going to stay where I was. I pointed out that he was going to get his food anyway and asked, “Why should we move up?” He answered, "So he doesn't have to walk as far." The guy that brought me my crate overheard that and said, “I appreciate that! Thank you!" First of all when people move up they tend to throw social distancing out the window and end up standing next to the people that are sorting through their food. Secondly it’s not that long a walk and thirdly, what happened to the cart that they’d used on previous occasions to carry several crates at once? It seems to me that it makes more sense for the clients to stay on their spots and to sort their food there as well.

I kept the box containing two packets of “beefy onion recipe soup and dip mix". On the side of the box there are instructions for making the soup but none for the dip, although there was plenty of space for them to print it. I assume that the recipe is the same for onion dip made out of onion soup mix, which is to just add sour cream, but it seems to me that if one is going to put the words “soup" and "dip" equally on the name of a product one should provide instructions for both. If one goes on the Lipton website the recipe is not readily available there either. It might be there somewhere but I got tired of digging after four pages. The site is more buyer greedy than customer friendly.

I took two individually packaged chocolate chip cookies; a can of Sprite; a bag of milk; a bag of six eggs; two small containers of fruit bottom yogourt; a little container of fruit salad; one bagel; and a bag of six organic whole wheat bagels. I also got the same box of frozen macaroni and white cheddar with bacon that Beth got, although I won’t be adding shrimp.

The final item that I accepted was another bag of face masks but a different kind than before and there were six this time instead of five. The brand is called “Mad Engine”. At first sight they were more interesting than the previous masks because there was more than one colour. But on closer inspection they are just as ugly as the blue ones we got and they seem to be made from recycled material because some of them have faded printing with only parts of words. The two white ones have some part of a faded orange, red and blue pattern but in the white part of one there is part of a word that ends with “user-Busche”. The other white mask has a little more and reads “euser-Busche” and when I saw that I realized the complete word has to be “Anheuser-Busche”, the company that makes the pissy tasting US beer Budweiser. The grey masks have on one the letters “DA” and the other has part of another letter plus “EL”, both large and in very faded black. I might wear masks with printing while sanding plaster in my bedroom but I wouldn’t be caught dead with them on my face in public. The other two masks were just blue and there’s more of a possibility that I’d wear them around people. After saying that however I noticed that one of the blue masks has three tiny little red stains that look a lot like blood that didn’t wash off completely. So of the six masks I would only wear one of them in public. Mad Engine is an apparel manufacturing company that makes clothes for various brand names including Disney, Marvel, Star Wars and Walmart. I assume they make t-shirts for Anheuser Busche as well since it looks like they made these masks from leftover product material. Their headquarters is in San Diego but they have branches all over the world, including Toronto. The masks are part of a recently formed charity branch of the company called “One Million Masks”.

I put what I didn’t want back in my crate and walked back down to Beth to offer it to her. She took the box of sugary cereal; the bag of rice; the gummy candies; and the pack of little chocolate chip muffins. I found someone else to take my pack of tofu and my can of corn kernels.

The only meat given this time was the little bit of bacon that came with the macaroni and cheese. There was no fruit besides the overripe bananas and the only green vegetables were the not so fresh cucumber. I give this week at the food bank a C-minus.

I took my food home to put it away and then headed out to the supermarket. At No Frills I got one bag of grapes; two bags of cherries; a pint of blueberries; a plastic basket of peaches; a sirloin steak; mouthwash; orange juice and a container of Greek yogourt. I also bought a tin of coffee even though I already had a full one at home. On Thursday I’d bought a can of Melitta and found it disgusting and so this time I got Maxwell House. I’ll save the Melitta for emergencies.

For lunch I had the rest of my cheddar cheese with Ritz crackers.

I spent most of the afternoon working on writing my Food Bank Adventure.

I saw a mouse in my apartment for the first time in more than twenty years. That’s not entirely true since the cats used to bring them in to hunt and kill, but it was definitely the first unharrassed mouse I’d seen in all these years. I saw it sneak into my bedroom from behind the electric guitar. Later it came back out the same way and ran under the tall bookshelf. I poked around under there with a meter stick but maybe it had already gone someplace else.

That night I had a fried egg and a sliced and toasted focaccia triangle while watching two episodes of The Adventures of William Tell.

In the first story the young Stefan is bringing food to the Bear from the village to give to Tell for feeding the resistance fighters. But suddenly they are ambushed by Austrian soldiers. Stefan hides but the Bear is captured and taken away. When Stefan informs Tell of this he says that the soldiers must have followed him. But Tell’s man Hans casts suspicion on Stefan because he has been seen visiting the castle of the Austrian General Bellanger. That night they follow Stefan and see him build a fire to signal Castle Bellanger. Someone inside waves a white handkerchief and lowers a rope which Stefan climbs into the arms of Bellanger’s daughter Maria. One of the soldiers sees this and tells the general. Tell follows Stefan and finds to his surprise that the Bear has been imprisoned there. He takes out two guards but has no time to free the Bear because more guards have been alerted. Both Tell and Stefan escape. Gessler happens to be visiting the general and sees Stefan’s relationship with Maria as the key to capturing Tell. They decide to use Maria as bait to lure Stefan there and so the general lies to her that he approves of their romance. Tell asks Stefan to help him get back into the castle so he can rescue the Bear. The next night Maria innocently escorts Stefan to her father only to see him seized by soldiers and to realize that her father lied to her. Meanwhile Tell is able to climb up and work open the Bear’s cell door. When two guards come in Tell and the Bear take them out. Tell has overheard that Stefan has been captured and so he goes first to Maria to get her help to rescue Stefan. Tell then walks boldly in on Gessler and Bellanger while Stefan is being tortured. Tell informs them that they’d better let himself and Stefan go free if Bellanger wants to see his daughter again and then tells him to look out the window, He sees Maria walking away from the castle with the bear towards a troop of resistance fighters at the edge of the woods. Gessler protests but Bellanger reminds him that Maria is betrothed to a kinsman of the emperor. An exchange is arranged but Maria wants to stay with Stefan. Tell insists that she must go back because of Tell gave his word. But while Maria is walking towards the castle, archers on the wall open fire at Tell. She runs back to take shelter with them behind a rock and says that since her father broke his word to Tell she does not have to go back. Resistance fighters move forward behind uprooted bushes to camouflage them and they escape to the woods.

In the second story Tell takes his son Walter on what was supposed to be a peaceful mission to deliver some swords. But when Austrian soldiers stop them they find the weapons and they have to run. They escape into the mountains and hide under a cliff. But then they are attacked by a resistance fighter named Hans who thinks they are Austrian spies. When Tell finally beats Hans, with the help of Walter biting his leg, they are captured by Hans’s comrades and taken to their camp. They won’t believe he’s William Tell unless he shows them what a great archer he is and so he throws an apple into the air in front of a target and not only pierces the apple but hits the bull’s-eye with the same arrow. After they are all friends tell notices that these men train with only wooden swords and so he plots to raid Castle Schwartzburg nearby for its store of weapons. The first thing that Tell needs to do is scout the inside of the castle and so he and Hans find a troop of Austrian soldiers marching, take out the last two and steal their uniforms. Disguised as soldiers they are able to walk into the castle. Tell measures the height of the wall and locates the armoury. In a bedroom adjacent to the armoury he determines that the wall could be broken through from that chamber. But by coincidence Gessler is visiting the castle and that is his bedroom. When he walks in he finds Tell and they draw swords. Gessler calls for the guard but it’s Hans who walks in and knocks him out. They fight their way to the wall and jump into the moat. They practice and plan and then the night of the raid they hoist Walter on a pole to the top of the wall where he ties a rope and then climbs back down. The men climb the rope and use the pole to walk across to the castle. They cut through the castle roof down into Gessler’s room and bind and gag him. They cut through the wall into the armoury and steal the weapons. They throw the weapons over the wall and Tell closes the portcullis so the soldiers can’t get out right away and then Tell goes over the wall.

Tell sure did put his son in a lot of danger. It’s more child abuse than Batman did to Robin.

August 29, 1990: It was the first time I'd met Elaine not coming from work. Her hair was free

Thirty years ago today

I made it home from work in time to get some work done and take a shower. I was just about to leave when Elaine called to tell me that she was going to be a half an hour late. I was relieved because it gave me time to shave and wash my face.

She wasn't there when I arrived but I waited quite a while doing my research into the history of song lyrics. I found a whole bunch of change including my front door key in the lining of the briefcase/shoulder bag that Jennifer had given me.

I bought a large cone at Dairy Queen and it was half finished when Elaine showed up. It was the first time I'd seen her not coming from work and so she was dressed much more casually, with her hair free. We went for a beer on Queen and she paid.

Perlita Neilson

On Friday morning I ran through “Ah! Si j'avais un franc cinquante” (Oh If I Had A Dollar Fifty) by Boris Vian once in French and English and then started posting it on Christian’s Translations. I finished posting my translation of “La petite rose" by Serge Gainsbourg and memorized the first verse of his  “Joujou a la casse" (Dolly to the Trash).

The morning got away from me and so by the time I’d washed myself and shaved the dishes it was almost time for lunch.

I had a bag of those chickpea snacks that I got from the food bank and they were horrible.

In the afternoon I did my exercises while listening to another recycled Amos and Andy episode. Kingfish and his mother in law have a competition to see who can get a job the fastest. They both take the aptitude test to work for a new department store. Kingfish switches his test with Ramona’s but outsmarts himself because he’d actually gotten the best score. Ramona ends up as Kingfish’s boss in the delivery department and she is a mean taskmaster. Kingfish convinces the boss that Ramona has left twelve children destitute and spent her money at the racetrack and so she is fired. There is a new test to see who will replace Ramona. Kingfish sees “Stevens” at the top and thinks he’s gotten the job but it turns out to be his wife Sapphire.

I took a bike ride along Bloor to Yonge, south to Queen and then west. An SUV gave me a scare when it suddenly squeezed very close to me to get by.

I listened to the recordings that I made of my song “Calendar Girl” this summer and decided on preparing the one from July 1 for uploading to YouTube. It’s the best of my performances despite or because of the fact that I bit my tongue while I was singing. I uploaded the camera video and the Voice Recorder file to Movie Maker and started a new project.

            I made a new batch of gravy and had some with a potato, sautéed onion and orange pepper and two drumsticks while watching two episodes of “The Adventures of William Tell”.

            The first story begins with Gessler buying a chest of flawless gems as a birthday present for the emperor. He threatens the jeweller with being charged of treason if he doesn’t sell the jewels at half price. The jeweller is forced to agree but even then Gessler says that he will owe him the money. But while the jewels are being transported to Austria Gessler robbed by the resistance leader Rinaldo. Rinaldo comes up behind Gessler while he is eating a roasted bird, puts a knife to his throat, grabs the fowl, takes a big bite out of it and then takes the jewels. Tell sends Fritz to get the jewels from Rinaldo so they can trade them for weapons for the resistance but Fritz is a week late returning. His wife is worried and so Tell goes looking for him. In a tavern near the Italian border Tell sees a barmaid wearing Fritz's amulet. She says she found it in the mountains and takes him to the spot. Nearby Tell finds Fritz's body. Tell sends her back and goes on into the mountains where he trips over a rope and is captured by Rinaldo’s men. He tells Rinaldo that his name is William Schwartz and that he has come to join him. After an archery test that Tell shows skill in but deliberately holds back from winning, he is accepted into the band. That night he sneaks into Rinaldo’s treasure cave where he finds the knife that he had leant to Fritz. Tell is caught in the cave and reveals whom he really is. Rinaldo assures him that Fritz left his camp with the jewels but Tell says that one of them followed Fritz afterwards and killed him. Rinaldo says Tell has insulted his men and challenges him to the fight of the single knife. A knife is thrown into the ground and Tell and Rinaldo stand back to back on either side of it, take three paces and when the referee shout “now" they turn and go for the knife. Rinaldo is quicker and gets the knife. After a while of fighting Tell grabs a cloak and uses it to blind Rinaldo and to get the knife. Tell does not kill Rinaldo and gives him back his knife. Rinaldo says he will find out which of his men murdered Fritz and kill. They search the camp for the jewels and finally find them. Tell leaves with the jewels but notes that he’s being followed. That night he is attacked by a cloaked figure at his campsite. After Tell beats him he pulls back the cloak to find it’s Rinaldo. Tell takes Rinaldo back to the band and they prepare to hang him. Rinaldo runs, gets a knife in the back and falls off the mountain.

            Eva the barmaid was played by Simone Lovell, the daughter of Canadian actor Raymond Lovell. She was married to prolific British actor Peter Halliday. She guest appeared on several British TV series of the 50s and 60s.

            In the second story Gessler’s daughter Anna is being brought to Switzerland for a rare visit with her father but on the way her caravan of soldiers is attacked by Swiss rebels. At first Jakob Muller the leader tells Anna to stay in her litter and no harm will come to her but when she announces that her father is Landburgher Gessler it changes everything. Because his own daughter was beaten to death on the streets of Altdorf by drunken Austrian soldiers, Jakob considers Anna a means of exacting justice. He forces Anna to come home with him and when his wife learns who Anna is she also believes that fate has smiled on them. They force Anna to wear peasant’s clothing and make her their slave on the farm to perform the hardest of chores. Jakob puts out word that he will exchange Anna for a ransom of 10,000 duckets. A soldier is brought blindfolded to pay the money but when the soldier tells Jakob that when Anna describes him to them they will track him down, Jakob decides to keep her and the money and so the soldier is sent away. Gessler decides that there is only one person that can help him and so he arranges for a one on one unarmed meeting with William Tell. Tell at first doesn't believe that Swiss patriots would kidnap his daughter since they don't make war on women, but he agrees to Help him. Tell visits various homes in the territory and when he meets Jakob and introduces himself, Jacob is unimpressed. He accuses Tell of taking all the credit for the blows the partisans strike. Jakob says the only women on his property are his wife and a servant but he is welcome to look around. When Tell sees Anna struggling with what would be ordinary work for a peasant he offers to help her. He takes Anna’s hand and realizes they are too smooth for a servant and tells her he will return her to her father. But Jakob attacks Tell with his pitchfork. They struggle and when Jakob is down his wife tries to hit Tell with a shovel, but Anna screams and Tell moves just in time. Jakob and his wife let Tell take Anna and she reunites with her father. Tell takes Anna and Gessler to a neutral hut to wait for Gessler’s soldiers but the soldiers capture Tell. At first Gessler orders them to release him but then he thinks that since Tell is a rebel and not a soldier he doesn’t have to honour agreements with him. Anna is angry and says she is going back to Austria. Tell is tied to a tree for the night but later while the soldiers are sleeping Anna sneaks out and cuts Tell free. The next day Gessler lies that he let Tell go and so Anna decides to stay. Gessler advises his soldiers to always turn defeat into victory.

            Anna was played by Perlita Neilson, who started out in theatre, most notably in 1957 as Anne Frank. She later guest starred in various television series and television movies. She starred in the 1957 telefilm “The Boy David".

            Frau Muller was played by Catherine Finn, who starred in the 1967 film “The Deadly Bees" which became a cult classic.

            Anna’s nurse was played by Patsy Smart, who played a lot of motherly servants in various films and TV shows. She played Miss Roberts in the TV series “Upstairs, Downstairs”.

August 28, 1990: Darkman seemed deliberately hokey

Thirty years ago today

There was a half hour delay on the subway after work. I got off where the train was stalling at Dufferin. I caught the Dufferin bus to King and walked home from there.

I discovered that I'd lost my bank card again, probably on the same night that Nancy lost hers. I would be broke because of that until Friday.

Nancy, Susan, Mia and myself went to St Clair and Yonge to see Darkman. We'd decided on the 21:30 show but had to go early to get our tickets. We hung around for an hour and a half and then joined the enormous line-up.

Darkman had an interesting plot but the acting and the script were lousy. That might have been on purpose though because it seemed deliberately hokey.

A Trip to the Beer Store

On Thursday morning I finished working out the chords for “Ah! Si j'avais un franc cinquante” (Oh If I Had A Dollar Fifty) by Boris Vian. I also finished the chords for “La petite rose" by Serge Gainsbourg. I went through it in French and English and then started posting it on Christian’s Translations. I was surprised that I didn’t have to adjust any font sizes or add italicizations this time.

Around midday I got my two garbage bags full of beer cans ready so I could take them to the beer store later that afternoon. I took all of the comic books out of the upper shelf in the credenza and put them in order on my bedroom dresser. The credenza is light enough to move now but I think I’ll take all of the comic magazines from the lower shelf too because I plan on cleaning both the outside and the inside. It will also be easier to move back and forth without scratching the floor during the few days it’s going to take me to scrub and clean the floor underneath it and the wall behind.

For lunch I had two cold chicken wings.

In the afternoon I left early for my bike ride to the Beer Store. I’d found out from the web site that only certain stores are taking empties back and the nearest one I could see was the store on Bathurst between Dundas and College. It was awkward riding my bike with the two bulky though light garbage bags full of cans. It might have been quicker to just take Dundas to Bathurst but I went up to Bloor so I could make only right turns while managing the bags. I had green lights almost all the way.

There was a line-up of people returning cans and bottles. When I was at the front I saw Tom Fisher coming out. He said he made $16 but competing with the Chinese ladies wasn’t worth it. We chatted for a while. I told him that his friend Shankar is my second floor neighbour. He said he met Shankar around the same time he first met me. We talked mostly about the late Nik Beat, who had been Tom’s best friend. He still misses him.

I made $10.70 for thirty five weeks worth of beer cans.

I stopped at Freshco on the way home where I picked up seven bags of red grapes, a basket of nectarines, a jar of honey, a box of spoon size shredded wheat, some raspberry skyr, a can of coffee and a pack of paper towels. Because the grapes made the bill very high and because she knew that I buy a lot of grapes there, the cashier took pity on me and did a price match, saving me almost $20.

I grilled eight chicken drumsticks in the over. After I turned them my neighbour Benji said that it smelled better than Popeyes. He told me they are opening on Monday.

            I finished editing the video of my performance of “Person” and uploaded it to YouTube. I’d like to put that song to bed and bring in another that I need to work on but “Person” is the song that inspired me to learn to whistle. There’s another song that I whistle on but I’m not ready to practice it every day until some other songs have been worked on, so I’ll keep playing “Person” for a while.

            I had two drumsticks, a parsnip and gravy while watching two episodes of The Adventures of William Tell.

            In the first story Tell travels to the sword making town Linzon to find out why they have ceased providing weapons for the resistance. He also wants to know what became of his comrade Joseph whom he sent there two weeks before. The burgomeister of the town claims that the iron mine went dry and so they’ve had to turn to farming but Tell notices that they live very well for neophyte farmers. Tell is also told that Joseph never arrived in Linzon, although when Tell asked on his way there Joseph had been seen in every town. The burgomeister seems to want to get rid of Tell and suggests that old Andreas who is taking a load of cheeses to market in the next town, can give Tell a lift. Andreas says market day is tomorrow but burgomeister Martin insists he’s being forgetful. On the way Andreas assures Tell that market day is tomorrow and that the burgomeister knows it. He also informs Tell that Joseph did arrive in Linzon. Tell gets off and goes back to Linzon. Tell returns to the tavern where Heinz, one of the locals picks a fight with him and loses. Tell addresses the townspeople in the inn and tells them not to try to run him out because he’s staying until he finds out what’s going on in Linzon. That night a local named Karl comes to Tell’s window. He says that the town needs Tell’s help because it is under the thumb of the burgomeister. He plays on their fear and their greed to control them and he has plenty of money. Karl is about to inform Tell where the money comes from when Heinz shoots him in the back with crossbow. In the morning the barmaid Dina comes to Tell with breakfast and tells him that Joseph did come to Linzon but he died in a fight with her boyfriend over her. She offers to take Tell to Joseph’s grave but when they get there he is ambushed by Heinz. They have a shootout on the rocks and Heinz is killed. Dina runs back to warn the burgomeister that his plan failed. When Tell returns he sees that Linzon’s mine did not run out of ore but that they are now selling arms to the Austrian soldiers. Tell shoots a soldier and crosses swords with another. Martin tries to shoot Tell but Tell moves the soldier in the path of the arrow. One of the miners stands against Tell and when he dies some other run away. Tell fights to more miners while another named Gerhard looks on. Finally Gerhard begins fighting on Tell’s side.  They take on the traitors and the Austrians and Tell kills the burgomeister. Gerhard explains that he held back because he was afraid but now he will make swords for the resistance again.

            The second story takes place in Burgundy. A Swiss agent named Bertold is there to form an alliance between the Swiss resistance and the Duke of Burgundy but he has fallen in love with a young lady named Anna. They are riding to the lake for a picnic when Anna feels faint. He lays her down on the grass and then suddenly he is attacked by two assassins who kill him. Back in Switzerland the resistance leaders known as The Council of Three learn that Bertold has been murdered. The counsel of Three sends Tell there to assist another agent named Louis that they’ve sent there on the same mission as Bertold. Louis is staying with a man named Quirini, who is sympathetic with the Swiss cause but is also Anna’s uncle. Tell is to pose as Louis’s servant and help him complete his mission but he is also to kill whomever is responsible for Bertold’s death. Louis has become romantic with Anna. Anna’s uncle is trying keep Anna’s mouth shut by making her and everyone else think that she is mentally unstable. He tells her that she was never at the lake and since after she became unconscious she was carried back to her bed and when she woke she was told that she’d dreamed the whole thing. A doctor prescribes a potion for Anna based on symptoms her uncle has made up but tells Anna’s uncle that she should not take stimulants such as wine with the potion because it will cause confusion. Louis trusts Quirini and reveals to him Tell’s mission. Tell learns that Quirini is only a guest on the estate and it is his niece Anna who owns it. Louis and Anna go for a picnic at the lake and her servant Aldo serves wine. He knows but she and Louis do not know the effect it will have on her. She again becomes faint and Louis is attacked just as Bertold was, while Aldo takes the unconscious Anna back to her bedroom. But this time Tell arrives to assist Louis and they kill the assassins. Tell makes Louis stay away from everyone so they can be told he is dead. When Tell questions Quirini he tries to incriminate Anna in the murders. Tell lets Quirini believe that he is going to avenge the deaths by killing Anna and he merely asks Tell to be swift. Tell questions Anna and she didn’t even know about the attack. She grabs Tell’s knife and says if Louis is dead she doesn’t want to live but Tell stops her. Later Tell informs Quirini that Anna will no longer betray Swiss patriots and Quirini thinks that means he has killed her. The Duke of Burgundy arrives and Quirini informs him Anna has been murdered. But the duke already has been informed that Quirini is the traitor. Anna and Louis come in together. Quirini and Aldo draw their swords and Tell and Louis fight them and win. Louis will marry Anna.

            Anna was played by Diana Lambert, who was in “The Nun’s Story”, “Chaos on a Wet Afternoon” and “Vicky’s First Ball”. She played Captain Peacock’s wife on ‘Are You Being Served?”.

August 27, 1990: Elaine found my writing sexist but agreed to get together anyway

Thirty years ago today

I called Elaine at about 20:30 but the line was busy so I occupied my self with other stuff for a while. I got through to her a little later but she said she'd call me back. When she did we talked for a long time. I told her about the negative feedback that I'd gotten over my submissions to Grubb Magazine, which claimed to have no censorship. She asked me what I had written and so I read it to her. When I was finished I asked her if she still wanted to meet on Wednesday. She said she wasn't sure now because of what she had just found out about me. She told me that she'd found my writing to be very sexist but she agreed to get together anyway.

            Nancy came over when I was in bed but she was annoyed that I wouldn't move over so she could lie down and so she left. 

Parkdale Halo

On Wednesday morning it was cool for summer but I kept the windows open anyway. I just wore sweat pants and socks all day instead of shorts and bare feet.

I worked out the chords for all but the final line of “Ah! Si j'avais un franc cinquante” (Oh If I Had A Dollar Fifty) by Boris Vian. I also worked out the chords for the instrumental intro to “La petite rose" by Serge Gainsbourg. The music for each verse seems to be the same as the intro.

Around midday I brought the stepladder down from the landing between the second and third floors. I cut a length of the super strong black thread that I’d found a several months ago and wound and tied one end to the bolt at one side of my twisted bicycle rim. Then I climbed with it up on the ladder under the light fixture in my kitchen. I loosened the finial and wrapped and knotted the other end of the thread around the screw before retightening the fixture more securely than it was in the first place. It was easier than I thought it would be and it seems to be holding, although I avoid stepping directly under it in case it comes crashing down. I think it might look pretty good if I painted it red but that’s a distant future project. Also now that I’m looking up it becomes more obvious that I’ll have to scrape, sand and paint the ceiling eventually.

For lunch I split a had a focaccia bun, toasted it and had a cheddar and lettuce sandwich with mayonnaise.

In the afternoon I did my exercises while listening to Amos and Andy. This was another rehashed story. A wealthy elderly woman tells Kingfish she wants to adopt an adult male so he pimps out Andy to be her son. They think they are going to be on easy street but she puts Andy to work. When Andy learns that she’s actually broke he tries to get the adoption annulled but the judge rules that since he’s now legally her adult son he must provide her with $40 a week.

I synchronized the camera audio with the computer recording of  my July 3 rehearsal and then saved it as "Person" so I can separate that song and upload it to YouTube. There are a few soft pops when I sound half of the “p”s but there's not much that I can do about that now.

For dinner I had a fried egg, two sausages and a toasted focaccia bun with a beer while watching two episodes of William Tell.

In the first story Tell, Hedda and the Bear are stealing the tax money from the tax collector’s safe. Tell is wounded by a soldier's crossbow and the arrow head has broken off inside his body. Hedda and the Bear get Tell to a hiding place in the city but Gessler and his men are closing in. Tell gets the Bear to get the patriots in the neighbourhood to pretend that the plague has stricken their quarter. The letter X is painted on every door and people are calling “Bring out your dead”. A woman touches Gessler and he thinks he has been infected. The immediate physicians have wild treatments that they want to try like a paste made of frogs eyes or an amulet in the shape of a lizard. Gessler wants Dr Von Eckenburg, his own army surgeon but on his way to Gessler the doctor is abducted by the Bear. The doctor pretends to be willing to treat Tell but he does not follow a Hippocratic oath and he betrays them, escaping to tell Gessler that he doesn’t have the plague and to inform him of Tell’s location. But when Gessler gets there Tell is gone. And when the doctor arrives in his own home he finds that Hedda and the Bear have broken in with Tell. This time they swear that they will kill him if Tell dies. Eckenburg removes the arrow head but says he can’t stop the bleeding without a certain potion from the apothecary. He writes what he says is a prescription in Latin and Hedda takes it to the apothecary. The druggist gives Hedda something but after she leaves he goes to see Gessler because the prescription had also contained a message in Latin for the governor to come to his home. Gessler understands immediately that Tell must be at the doctor’s house and goes there with his men. Meanwhile Tell has recovered to a surprising degree and so Hedda and the Bear tie up Eckenburg. The Bear goes out the window to the roof and over the wall, he helps Tell down just as the soldiers break in. They get one shot at Hedda but miss just as she goes over.

            In the second story a young Austrian officer named Fritz, who has just been stationed in Altdorf is disturbed by Gessler’s treatment of the peasants. When the peasant Hoffman says he can't pay the twenty five kulen because his family only has thirty for the winter, Gessler makes him pay not only the twenty five but an extra five for resisting. When Hoffman says he only has one cow the soldiers also find a calf and so Gessler says he will make an example of Hoffman and have him beheaded. When Hoffman’s eleven year old son attacks the arresting soldier the boy is also arrested and condemned to death. This is too much for Fritz and so he goes to ask for advice from a Swiss priest who tells him that his conscience comes from a higher authority than his military superiors. Fritz seeks out William Tell, but assures him that he is no traitor and would fight him to the death on the battlefield but he can’t stand by and let innocent people be executed. He says he has a plan to rescue the prisoners but he needs Tell’s help. Tell sneaks into the castle in an empty wine barrel. While Fritz is giving his soldiers instructions in the dungeon he has them facing him with their backs to the cells. Tell comes in behind them and lets the father and son out. They sneak up the stairs while the soldiers still save their backs turned. But by coincidence Gessler brings the Grand Duke of Austria downstairs to inspect the dungeons and discovers the prisoners missing. He has the gates closed and searches the wine wagon that is about to leave with its empty barrels. He not only recaptures Hoffman and the boy but also William Tell. Fritz has another plan to rescue Tell and the others but when he tells the Bear that he needs six men to carry it off he is captured. The Bear believes Fritz has betrayed Tell and that the new plan is just another trick to capture more partisans. He goes to Gessler and offers Fritz in exchange for Tell but the officer is not important to Gessler. The Bear goes back to prepare to hang Fritz. Meanwhile Tell has to escape on his own. He gets the guard to come close to the bars with a promise of buried gold and then knocks him out to take his keys. They fight their way out of the dungeon and Tell manages to reach the Grand Duke to hold him hostage until they are free of the castle. Back at the rebel camp the Bear is about to hang Fritz when Tell intervenes and says Fritz would have saved them if the Bear hadn’t stopped him. The Bear begins, “But I thought …” but Tell interrupts and advises him not to think because it always gets them into trouble. Fritz decides not to stay because with Gessler in charge the same situation would arrive again. Tell arranges for Fritz to go to Italy.

August 26, 1990: That crazy hooker asked to come over but when I wouldn't give her any money she left

Thirty years ago today

I stayed overnight at Nancy's.

She got up at 7:30 and left for work. I rose at 11:30, had some fruit, juice and coffee and then went out to the bank machine to take out $40. I ran into that crazy hooker and she wanted to come over to my place, so I let her. She asked me for money but I said no and so she left.

I cleaned my camera and then took it for a walk. I went along King to Roncesvalles, then east on Queen. I bought a cream soda slush and drank it as I made my way to Ossington as I looked for lawn sales. I returned home along King.

I called Carol but she said she had company. I suggested that we get together for a drink and she said she'd call me about it.

Yvette called to chat for a while and said she had a cold.

Nancy came by to do her laundry. 

Christopher Lee

            On Tuesday morning I finished memorizing “La petite rose” by Serge Gainsbourg and looked for the chords online. I was surprised that nobody posted them because it's a nice melody sung by Nana Mouskouri. I only had time to figure out the first chord.

            The morning got away from me again and so after shaving off my full beard, taking a shower and doing the dishes I didn’t have much time for any of my home improvement projects. I just washed the twisted bicycle rim that I’m going to try to hang from my kitchen ceiling.

            I had canned chickpeas and faba beans on lettuce for lunch.

            In the afternoon I did my exercises while listening to Amos and Andy. In this story Kingfish, Sapphire and Ramona have just received an eviction notice. Sapphire says they gave Kingfish $100 to pay the rent and now they want to know what he did with it. He says he’ll tell them the truth but hesitates. Ramona tells him to spit it out. Kingfish tells her to be patient since he’s an amateur at telling the truth. Kingfish tries to sell his car but even the junk dealer won’t buy it and tells him to get it out of his yard before it brings his property values down. Later he is looking out the window and sees someone stealing his car. He doesn’t stop it because he has $100 in theft insurance. In order to make his claim look good to the insurance company he puts an ad in the paper offering $100 for the return of his car. The insurance company pays him $100 but then someone returns the car to get the $100 he offered.

            I took a bike ride. On Bloor Street there are now posts dividing the new bike lane from Brock all the way to Shaw. I don’t know how far it extends west of Brock, but I’m guessing it goes as far as just past Lansdowne to connect with the Toronto Rail Path.

Near Bay about ten cop cars came from behind with their sirens blaring and took over the bike lane.

I spent a half an hour synchronizing the audio from the camera and the voice recorder from the recording of my July 3 rehearsal. They were still a few seconds apart when I had to stop for dinner.

I had a potato, sautéed onion and green pepper and a chicken breast with gravy while watching two episodes of The Adventures of William Tell.

In the first story Tell stops to visit his old friend Heinrich but finds that except for him and his son Peter the whole village has been abandoned. The place had been a community of hunters until an eccentric Austrian prince named Maximilian took over the island and prevented the people from hunting there because he wanted the deer for himself. Tell takes a boat to the island and chases Maximilian from the island. Tell goes to sleep back at his friend’s home and the father and son decide to go and bag a deer since Tell has cleared the island of the oppressor. But Maximilian has returned to the island with soldiers. The soldiers serve Gessler and they consider Maximilian to be out of his mind but Austrian royalty outranks the governor and they have to follow his orders. When Tell wakes up he finds Heinrich and his son gone. He sees their boat missing and takes the other to the island. There he finds Heinrich and Peter caught in a bear pit. For some stupid reason rather than just finding a way to pull them up he goes down into the pit to help them. Maximilian springs the trap and a big wooden cage swings down over the pit. Maximilian tells the men that he is going to hunt them to the death. Heinrich argues that animals have the weapons of teeth, claws, horns and tusks and so Maximilian lets them each have a knife. He gives them a head start and then Maximilian and the soldiers, with their hunting dogs follow. Tell sets a trap that disables one of the soldiers but Maximilian leaves the man to suffer and continues the hunt. Tell throws off the dogs only briefly by going  through water. They split up with Heinrich going one way and Tell another. Maximilian follows Heinrich and Peter to a cave and then begins to smoke them out. Meanwhile Tell jumps three soldiers, gets one of their swords and kills them, so he now has a crossbow. Heinrich and Peter are forced by the smoke to leave the cave. As Maximilian prepares to fire Heinrich steps in front of his son but Tell kills Maximilian. Tell simply orders the soldiers to run and they do so. Heinrich and Peter join the resistance.

Maximilian was played by Christopher Lee. Lee said the three films that made him famous were “A Tale of Two Cities”, “The Curse of Frankenstein” and “Dracula”. He considered his greatest performance to be as Muhammed Ali Jinnah in “Jinnah” and his best film to be “The Wicker man”. That original version of “The Wicker Man” was a great movie. He said he was emotionally blackmailed into doing most of his horror films because the producer would tell him that all of his friends would be out of work if he didn’t do them.

In the second story Tell has been selling some of the food donated by the Swiss people to Austrian soldiers. They willingly pay twice as much as the market price because they are forbidden to deal with the Swiss and their army rations are not enough. Tell uses the money to buy more weapons with which to kill Austrian soldiers. Tell’s strategy is controversial with some of the Swiss because they are also hungry. Tell’s man Klaus goes to the local Borgomeister, who represents the Swiss people during the Austrian occupation. Meanwhile merchants that are supplying food to Tell are being stabbed to death by a mysterious figure cloaked in black. The burgomaster and other Swiss officials meet with Gessler to ask for law enforcement in response to the murders. Gessler says that merchants that help the resistance get what they deserve. When everyone leaves the landburgher but the burgomeister, he drops the pretence and reveals that he is in league with the Austrians.  When Gessler learns that Tell is selling the food to his soldiers he plots to make it look like Tell is keeping the money for himself and arranges for the burgomeister to “find” Tell’s hiding place. Later at a meeting with Swiss leaders the borgomeister and his wife Anna reveal to them that Tell is not only the thief but that he is also the mysterious killer. The “hidden” gold is found. That night after another Strauss gives grain to Tell he is killed just as Tell is leaving. Tell confronts the dark figure but is surprised when his knife breaks against the attacker’s stomach the murderer escapes. Frau Strauss finds Tell kneeling over Strauss’s body holding the dagger. The burgomeister thinks that in discrediting Tell his part is finished but Gessler insists that he must kill Tell. Gessler says he didn’t buy the borgomeister the finest chain mail just so he could kill a few peasants. The burgomeister needs one more farmer to use as a trap for Tell and so he sends Anna to talk to her father, who has always wanted to be of service to the resistance. Anna’s father sends for Tell and he comes to get the food. In the barn the dark killer attacks Tell but while they are fighting Anna’s father tries to help Tell and is stabbed by the disguised burgomeister. Tell unmasks the burgomeister but he escapes. Tell sneaks into the burgomeister’s house to find proof of his betrayal. He is confronted by the burgomeister and Anna. Tell informs Anna that the burgomeister killed her father. She is very upset and grabs her husband. Gessler and his men break in and Tell escapes. Gessler has the burgomeister arrested and sentenced to death. Anna says it serves him right.

Anna was played by Monica Grey, who guest starred on several British TV series, including “Quatermass”, “The Jazz Age”, “The Guardians” and “The Archers”.

August 25, 1990: I chastized Nancy for not buying her own food

Thirty years ago today

I saw Carol at the Claremont and wished her a happy birthday but we didn't talk long because she was with people.

Nancy, Susan and I stayed there until 2:30. We walked as far as Gladstone and then caught the streetcar to the 7-11.

Nancy slept over.

She got up at 9:00 and I chastized her for not buying her own food.

After a breakfast of peanut butter and apple butter on rye with coffee and juice I went to the CKLN Demo Demo. Is there an echo in this diary? It went a lot better for me than I thought it would and the equipment was not as complex as I'd expected it to be. It lasted about three hours.

I walked home from Ryerson, on the way taking pictures and checking out lawn sales. I bought a turntable for $4.00.

I called Elaine and made a date for Wednesday.

Joanna Dunham

On Monday morning I worked out the chords for the third line of “Ah! Si j'avais un franc cinquante” (Oh If I Had A Dollar Fifty) by Boris Vian.

I memorized the second verse of “La petite rose" by Serge Gainsbourg.

Around midday I made one more attempt to get the big screen monitor that I’d found working but I couldn’t and so I put it outside. The guy downstairs testing the fire alarms in Popeyes and the yet to be rented restaurant space next to it came out and commented that it was an antique. I didn’t think it was more than ten years old and it’s hard for me to think of anything as an antique that wasn’t around before I was born. He warned me that I'd be hearing some loud noises over the next little while. So now I’ve cleared the space in front of the credenza. Next I want to see if I can hang the bicycle rim that got twisted so beautifully in my accident from the ceiling without causing the ceiling to come crashing down in my kitchen.

For lunch I had a lettuce, tomato and sausage salad with a dressing made from mayonnaise and honey garlic barbecue sauce.

In the afternoon I did my exercises while listening to Amos and Andy. In this story the Kingfish's mother in law Ramona has been staying out late at night. She also has money, jewellery and a new green dress that sapphire doesn’t know where she got the money to buy. Kingfish reads in the paper that there is a female jewel thief called “The Green Orchid" and he thinks that it’s Ramona. Meanwhile Ramona reveals to Sapphire that she has a wealthy boyfriend named Clarence Shepherd. That night Clarence comes and proposes to Ramona and Kingfish is just coming in the back when he overhears the couple planning their elopement. But the way they are describing him sneaking around the back with a ladder makes Kingfish think that they are planning a robbery. Kingfish decides that the only thing he can do is take Sapphire’s jewels and her green dress down to the police station. Meanwhile however the police have discovered that the Green Orchid is actually a man in drag and so all they have to do is look for a man carrying a green dress. So Kingfish is arrested but after three days in jail he is released when they arrest the real Green Orchid, who turns out to be Clarence.

I didn’t take a bike ride because there was a chance of a thunder storm although it didn't look like it. I wanted to take the time anyway to finish my grant application.

            I photographed three government letters indicating how much money I’ll be getting over the next year. One from the Toronto Housing Allowance, another from Ontario telling me I’ll get $83 a month and a third from the GIS telling me how much pension I’ll be getting a month this year. I converted each picture into a PDF but two of the PDFs made by my ABBY reader garbled some of the numbers and letters into symbols and so I uploaded them to Cloud Convert where I made them into clean PDF copies. Then I used ABBY to combine all three PDFs into one so I could upload them to my Noah Meltz grant application. Then I completes the form and submitted it, which is a load off my mind. Maybe now I can focus on making videos of my songs for what I have left of my summer.

            After getting caught up on my journal I had about half an hour left before dinner. I would have had time to synchronize the two audio recordings of my July 3 rehearsal but I was tired and so spent the time scanning some negatives, which takes a lot less brainpower.

            For dinner I had a potato with spinach and a chicken breast with gravy while watching two episodes of The Adventures of William Tell.

            The first story begins with The Bear being captured. Tell plans on ambushing the soldiers that are escorting him back to Altdorf but suddenly some Swiss strangers attack the Austrian soldiers. Their leader is Peter von Breck who says he comes from the Elkhorn (Alphorn?) Valley. He says the Austrians are rounding up all the men in his territory for slavery and so he’s come to Uri to fight for William Tell. Peter clashes with Tell from the start and thinks he’s too cautious. He's learned of a diamond star that Gessler has bought as a gift for the emperor and he wants to steal it en route but Tell says it’s too risky. They fight and Tell wins. Peter says he’ll do what he's told from now on but then he goes off on his own and captures the star. Tell is suspicious because he doesn't believe that Gessler would have such a thin guard around something so valuable. Tell decides to go to Elkhorn to investigate Peter’s background. At Peter’s home Tell is welcomed by Peter’s wife Ingrid von Breck. She pours him wine, which she drugs, but Tell only tastes it and suspects treachery. He smells the wine and when Ingrid is out of the room he dumps it out of the window. Then he pretends to be groggy. He is helped to a bedroom and later when they are sure that Tell is unconscious, Peter’s servant Rudi sneaks into the room with a knife. Tell is ready for him and after a fight, Rudi is killed. Meanwhile Peter informs Tell’s comrades that he's learned that Gessler is bringing in reinforcements through the pass from Vienna at night in three days. Peter suggests that the whole resistance get together to ambush and eliminate the troops. He organizes a meeting of the leaders of the three other biggest resistance groups for the next day. At the meeting place Austrian soldiers are waiting in ambush. But Hedda Tell sends the Bear to look for William and then goes to the location ahead of the meeting to tell Peter that she will discourage the leaders from following his plan. Suddenly a soldier grabs and restrains her. The resistance leaders arrive and are ambushed. peter orders them all, including Hedda, to be hung right there in the barn. But since Peter thinks that Tell is dead William has the element of surprise when he and the Bear sneak into the hayloft and jump the soldiers. Considering how many soldiers there were they get taken out pretty easily and it isn’t even shown how. Tell and Peter sword fight and tell wins but doesn’t kill him. He says he will be hung in public to show what happens to Swiss traitors.

            Ingrid was played by Colette Wilde.

            In the second story, Gessler is so frustrated by his soldiers’ inability to capture William Tell that he issues a proclamation that any officer of whatever rank that captures Tell will immediately be promoted to general. Word of this reaches Gertrude, the bored wife of Colonel Wentzel who is in charge of the quiet Swiss town of Ettlingen. She has had enough of her husband’s lack of ambition and has decided that Gessler’s proclamation is the key to her husband rising in the ranks and her getting out of this boring town. She happens to know that Gretel, the younger sister of Tell’s wife lives in Ettlingen and so she pays Honest Karl the travelling peddler to take a message to Hedda that her sister is very sick. He does so and Hedda leaves for Ettlingen immediately. But when she gets there Gertrude has her placed in the dungeon. Gretel goes to inform Tell of Hedda’s incarceration and to warn him that it’s a trap. When he gets to Ettlingen he learns that an old man that used to tell Gertrude and Hedda stories once lived in Ettlingen Castle. It turns out that he helped to build the castle and knows of a secret passage that the Austrians would not be aware of. The only thing is that it leads into the Wentzel bedroom through a stone door behind the fireplace. When the Wentzels walk in Tell grabs Gertrude and threatens to kill her if Hedda is not released. Gertrude knows that Tell would not harm a woman and tells him so and he releases her. Tell fights off Colonel Wentzel and a few guards and then jumps into the moat. Gertrude then declares that if Tell does not surrender by sundown Hedda will be beheaded on the castle grounds and Gessler will be coming as a witness. Gretel lures a soldier into her house and Tell knocks him out to take his armour. Now in disguise he returns to the castle the same way as before and this time when he grabs Gertrude he makes her understand that he would kill her to save Hedda. He makes her take him to the dungeon where Hedda changes clothes with Gertrude before they tie her up. They are free of the cell but still in the dungeon when Wentzel and Gessler come down to see Hedda. Gertrude is released and the Tells are discovered. Tell fights their way back to the Wentzel bedroom and bars the door. The secret door is stuck but he finally gets it open and they escape. When the soldiers break in there is no one there. Gessler demotes Wentzel to captain and sends the couple to an even worse town.

            Gertrude was played by Harriette Johns, who starred in “Meet Mr. Callaghan”, “An Ideal Husband”, “Pride and Prejudice” and “A Night to Remember”.

            Greta was played by Joanna Dunham, who studied painting at the Slade School of Art in London under Lucien Freud. She attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art with Brian Epstein, the future manager of The Beatles. She was recommended by Marilyn Monroe for the role of Mary Magdalene in “The Greatest Story Ever Told”. She became pregnant during the year long production and so the director had to use special camera angles so it wouldn’t show. She returned to painting when her acting career slowed down and opened a gallery in a converted farm building in Suffolk.