Ann Prentiss

            On Saturday morning I memorized the third verse of “On fait des rêves” (We Keep Dreaming) by Boris Vian. There are a lot of repetitions but there is really only one new verse left to learn. After that it’s only a matter of remembering the sequence of lines. 

            I continued to struggle with working out the chords for “Quoi toi moi t’aimer tu rêves” (What You Love of Me is what You Dream) by Serge Gainsbourg, based on the extract on Apple Music from the middle of the song. But I’ve settled on the chords for the chorus and I’m slowly arriving at agreement on the verse chords. I might have that figured out tomorrow. 

            I played my Kramer electric guitar during song practice for the third of four sessions. My amplifier has been in the shop for ten days now. Gian at L’il Demon said it would take a week to ten days but he’s said that before about guitars and it took over a month. 

            I weighed 87.7 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I rode down to No Frills. I had planned on doing another experiment with using my bike trailer for grocery shopping, this time with the plastic milk crate as a basket. But I decided it would be too time consuming since I can more easily use my backpack and one recyclable shopping bag. Maybe I’ll try it next Saturday. At the supermarket all the grapes were too soft and so I took instead four bags of expensive cherries. I also bought a watermelon, a pint of blueberries, bananas, a pack of chicken drumsticks, four artisan naan, a bottle of olive oil and a small container of skyr. I forgot to buy milk but what I have might last until early in the week. I had a conversation in aisle two with an elderly woman who told me about her difficulty finding digestive biscuits. The cashier commented several times about how much I must like cherries. Then another customer asked, “Did I miss the sale on cherries?” I told her there’s no sale. She said, “You just love them then”. 

            I weighed 87.5 kilos before lunch. I had saltines with five-year-old cheddar and a glass of iced tea. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back and was in just my undershirt for the first time in a long time. 

            I weighed 87.2 kilos at 17:30. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 18:30. 

            I compared the videos of my August 20 and September 3 performances of “Kenya”. I prefer the light and the guitar sound of August 20 despite the fact that September 3 is already synchronized in Movie Maker. I compared September 5 to August 20 and I still like August 20 better. I compared September 15 to August 20 and I’ve decided that the August 20 take is the electric version of “Kenya” that I’ll synchronize in Movie Maker and upload to YouTube. So the acoustic and electric takes of “La bas c’est natural” that I’ve picked are September 6 and August 19, and those of “Kenya” will be September 11 and August 20. Interesting that the good electric takes are all early and the better acoustic takes were recorded later. I copied the September 6 Movie Maker project as “La bas c’est natural” but discovered that I’m singing in English. I might have written down the wrong date so I’ll have to clear that up tomorrow. I figured out later that the Movie Maker project I’d copied was from August 6 and that’s why it was in English. 

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the studio recording of my song “Angeline” I had to cut out some of the concert video at the beginning of the instrumental at the end of the second chorus. The instrumental is introduced when I sing “Angeline” more dramatically but in the concert video I extend singing the name longer. So I cut the concert video at the point where the singing stops in the studio audio. I added the last clip of Mickey Dolenz falling through the sky in the movie Head. Then I had to cut some more of the concert video because that extends longer than the studio audio as well. The most disposable part of the concert video of the instrumental is the beginning when it shows me playing guitar, so I shaved about three seconds off that end. The audio was still ahead by about half a second when I quit for the evening. Another problem I’ll have to deal with at the end of the instrumental is that I changed the lyrics slightly for the beginning of the third verse. The concert video of the third verse starts with, “You’ve got problems like a mountain range”, but later in the studio I changed it to, “Problems heavy like a mountain range”. So the synchronization I’ll have to try for will be at “like a mountain range”. I might have to add an outside clip to replace the video of me mouthing “You’ve got problems”. There’s a brief segment in the 1926 film Torrent in which Greta Garbo is holding a guitar. That might be a good segue for the end of the instrumental. 

            I made pizza on naan with Basilica sauce, a sliced hot Italian sausage, and five-year old cheddar. I had it with a beer while watching season 2, episodes 31 and 32 of Bewitched. 

            The first story is a continuation from episode 30 in which the Robbins Baby Food Company is considering having Darrin run their advertizing campaign. But Barclay the executive in charge of advertizing for the company wants to make sure Robbins only deals with those who have clean reputations. So he hires a private investigator named Charlie Leach to investigate Darrin and Samantha. Darrin comes up clean but Leach observes unbelievable occurrences around Samantha. When he relates them to Barclay he is fired because Barclay thinks he’s crazy. But now Leach plans to blackmail Samantha and we left off with him threatening to cause Darrin to lose the contract. So Samantha gives in and meets Leach’s demands. She gets him a new car, new furniture and new clothes. When Darrin finds out that he and Samantha were being investigated he goes with Samantha to confront Mr. Robbins. Robbins is shocked that Barclay hired a private investigator. He fires Barclay and begs Darrin’s forgiveness, which he gives. Darrin gives Samantha permission to take care of Leach and so she makes herself invisible and goes to his apartment. She causes several accidents to wreck the new furniture, a strong wind tears off Leach’s new clothes, and she turns his new car into a toy. Leach comes to Samantha and tells her he’s going to keep coming back until he gets what he wants. She transports him to a bullring in Mexico and he finds himself dressed as a matador. He barely escapes the charging bull. Next we see him hitchhiking back to the United States. 

            In the second story Darrin is expecting his Uncle Albert to visit his home while he is at work. He tells Samantha to take good care of him but warns her that he is eccentric and likes to play tricks. Meanwhile two out of work former vaudevillians who performed under the name of Dilliway and Dunn are in Samantha’s neighbourhood begging from door to door. Horace Dilliway knocks on Samantha’s door and she thinks he is Uncle Albert so he plays along. He sings to Tabatha and Samantha finds him charming. Later Horace answers the door and the real Uncle Albert is there. Horace tells him that the Stevens family moved away two weeks ago. When Harriet Kravitz comes to visit, Horace steals her watch but Samantha notices. She thinks it’s one of the tricks Darrin warned about and just uses magic to put the watch back on her wrist. Later Samantha discovers Uncle Alert’s picture and realizes that Horace is an impostor. Darrin is supposed to work late and is dictating a letter to his secretary Betty when he learns that a meeting is canceled and he can go home. He’s excited to see his Uncle Albert but Samantha informs him the visitor is not Albert. She says she and Tabatha like him and she begs Darrin to pretend the man is Uncle Albert for one night. That night Horace’s partner William insists that they rob the Stevens home. They take all of the furniture and appliances from downstairs while Darrin and Samantha are in bed. As they are driving away Horace is overwhelmed with guilt because Samantha and Darrin were so nice to him. Horace gets out of the truck and walks back. Meanwhile Samantha appears on the TV set they stole and warns William to bring everything back, so he does. Horace comes to Samantha and Darrin to apologize and is flabbergasted that they forgive him. Samantha is sure he can change and he leaves moved by her kindness. 

            Darrin had several secretaries named Betty. The one in this episode was played by Ann Prentiss, who co-starred in California Split. She co-starred in the sitcom Captain Nice. In 1997 she was convicted of plotting to have her father, her brother in law, and nephew murdered. She was sentenced to 19 years in prison and died there after serving 12 years. She was the sister of Paula Prentiss.