Regis Toomey

            On Friday morning I revised my translation for the eighth verse of "Au bon vieux temps" (In the Good Old Days) by Boris Vian. 

            I revised my translation for all but the last two verses of "Le Couteau dans le play" (The Knife in the Play) by Serge Gainsbourg. I'll probably have that finished on Saturday and will also have time to run through it in English and upload it to my Christian's Translations blog. 

            I audio and video recorded song practice while playing my Kramer electric guitar. There's always one chord in Megaphor that sounds a little off. The final take of Sixteen Tons of Dogma seemed to have come through okay. The rattling on the sixth fret is gone since Gian repaired it. The camera battery timed out sooner than usual. 

            I had to pause Audacity and put the recording session on hold a little after 8:00 because I had an appointment at 8:30 with the Parkdale Community Dental Clinic. I actually didn't expect to be treated this morning because the receptionist had asked me if I'd received a new Ontario Seniors Dental Plan and I hadn't. I didn't tell her but I received a rejection notice last year. When I got there she asked me my income and I said it's about $25,000 a year. She said that if it's over $23,000 I don't qualify for the Ontario Seniors Dental Plan but she surprised me when she said there's a municipal dental plan that kicks in for those Toronto residents who are rejected by Ontario if their income is less than $27,000. I assured her that my income is less than $27,000. She said I needed to bring my notice of assessment from the CRA to prove that but they'd let me keep my appointment today. 

            I had a cleaning by Eva, who I haven't met before. She gave me a fluoride treatment as well. She was very nice. We discussed foods that are risky for the teeth and she agreed that cherries are very dangerous. She gave me a new toothbrush. I got a booking to fix my front fillings on February 12 and for another cleaning on February 23. 

            I went home and downloaded my notice of assessment. It says I made $25,900. I printed the first two pages and my printer chewed the first page and the second jammed, so I had to take out the toner cartridge and remove the page, then start again. I took the notice back to the clinic. The receptionist told me I definitely qualify for the municipal plan. I said I'd never heard of the municipal dental plan. She said it's not promoted and it only kicks in upon rejection by Ontario. I was relieved to learn that I can get dental care at the clinic. I like the staff and their work much better than Smile City. 

            I came back and finished my song practice. 

            I weighed 83.9 kilos before a late breakfast or early lunch at 12:00, which is the lightest I've been at midday in about four and a half months. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride and stopped at Freshco on the way back to buy Sponge Towels. They also had raspberries on sale and so I got two packs. 

            I weighed 84.3 kilos at 17:30, which is the least I've weighed in the evening in two weeks. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 18:49. 

            I reviewed this morning's song practice video. I didn't catch the off chord in Megaphor that I heard in the audio recording. Only two songs were fully recorded on video this time. I made it all the way through to the ending of Sixteen Tons of Dogma when I fumbled a chord and decided to start over. I didn't make it to the end when the camera timed out but the battery went to sleep earlier in both parts A and B this time. Part A usually lasts 29 minutes but this time it stopped at 22:49 minutes. Yesterday part B died at 19:24 but today it conked out at 8:09. I wonder if the fact that the light was dimmer makes the camera work harder. 

            I started a Movie Maker project for my song Megaphor. I imported the Riot Gallery concert video and the studio audio master track without drums. In the concert video I talk to the audience at first and then the camera still shows my face when I begin the percussive guitar part. It looks dumb to just show my face and so decided to insert images of gods and have the pictures change according to the beat of the intro. I wasn't even sure one could import still images into Movie Maker but was glad to find out I can. I posted the photo I took of my Nadaraj statue and saw that by default a still image takes up five seconds of the timeline. I cut that image so it ends with the first beat I strum on the guitar. Then I added the image of a statue of the black Vishnu. I can just line up each image with the wave forms of the beats. I think I need a total of 18 gods for the intro. I have a few images of gods on file but I need to track down some more. Knowing now that I can insert still images into videos opens up all kinds of possibilities. 

            I scanned the rest of the single negatives on the sleeve-sheet of twenty. Almost all of the shots are of my daughter at the age of about three on one of the occasions when I took her to work with me at the Ontario College of Art. I started a new sheet of singles and it looks like those are of my daughter and I just after she was born. I think they were taken by my daughter's Aunt Susan. 

            I had a potato with gravy and a piece of pork loin while watching the season five finale and the season six premier of Petticoat Junction.

            In the first story, Kate Bradley is coming home. It is implied that she was on a trip but it doesn't say where. In reality Bea Benaderet was being treated for lung cancer. Everyone is preparing a celebratory greeting for Kate but the problem is that Joe, Sam and the mayor can't agree on where the greeting is to take place. Joe wants it at the Shady Rest, Sam wants it where the train stops in front of his store, and the mayor wants it in the Hooterville town square. Hooterville having a mayor is a new twist. At the end of the second season there was no mayor and Joe wanted to becomes the first. Sam Drucker's General Store is supposed to be the only store in all of Hooterville Valley and the valley only has 250 people. Everyone gathers to greet Kate at Hooterville station and the mayor and Joe are both ready to transport Kate to their conflicting places. But 15:00 passes and Kate has not arrived. We see Kate sitting in front of Pixley station waiting to be picked up. She had sent a note telling where she would be but everyone was so excited they didn't read the post script, which tells them she will be waiting in Pixley. When it's read everybody jumps on the Cannonball to head for Pixley and hold the bumbling celebration there. Kate says to herself that she is definitely home. 

            In the second story Betty Joe is visibly pregnant. Steve announces that his uncle is connected with the finest hospital in Baltimore and he wants Betty to have the baby there. Everyone is shocked because it was just assumed that Betty would have her baby delivered by Doc Stuart like she and her sisters were, as well as 800 other babies in the valley. Steve insists it would be safer in the city. Betty is confused and asks her mother for advice. Kate says to follow her husband. One stormy night Doc Stuart asks Steve to fly him to Mosher Flats to deliver a baby. By the time Steve gets back he is so impressed with Doc Stuart that he has changed his mind and he wants the baby to be born in Hooterville. 

            Roof Davis, who played Floyd Smoot quit at the end of season 5 after the producers refused to guarantee him a certain number of episodes. He was replaced by Byron Foulger, playing the new Cannonball engineer Wendell Gibbs. It is mentioned that Floyd now has a desk job, which is hard to believe since early in the series a lot of fun was made of Floyd being barely literate. Byron Foulger started acting in community theatre. He made his Broadway debut in 1920 and after that made several Broadway appearances. In the 1940s he became part of film director Preston Sturges company of players with supporting parts in five of his classic movies. Playing Gibbs on Petticoat Junction was his final television role. 

            The newest and I think at least third Doc Stuart was played by Regis Toomey, whose first film was Alibi. He co-starred in Other Men's Women, and You're in the Army Now. He had supporting roles in several successful films. He was a regular on the Mickey Rooney Show, he was on 16 episodes of Richard Diamond Private Eye, and 64 episodes of Burke's Law. He said supporting actors last longer than stars.