Nobu McCarthy

            On Monday morning I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice for the last of two sessions. It’s still going out of tune pretty much as soon as it’s strummed. 

            I weighed 86.45 kilos before breakfast. 

            I weighed 87.1 kilos before lunch, which is the heaviest I’ve been in the early afternoon since February 23. 

            In the afternoon before taking a bike ride I checked and saw that Metro Cycles was open. I don’t know why I thought they were closed on Mondays but Mark said they never have been. I asked about raising my handlebars and so he installed an extension for the post. He struggled with the first one until he realized a bolt was missing and so he opened up another package. I paid $80 cash. By the time he was done it was too late to ride all the way downtown so I just rode to Ossington and Bloor. What a difference raising the handlebars makes! It’s much more comfortable now. When I got home I raised the seat slightly to get it on par with the height I’ve been used to for years of riding the Raleigh. At first I tried to measure the height and get them the same but found it easier just to straddle both bikes and feel how my feet are hitting the floor. 

            I weighed 87 kilos at 18:30, the same heaviness in the evening as on February 24. 

            I was caught up on my journal at 19:30. 

            I finished watching Riot on the Sunset Strip but there was no riot. I looked at some clips from Rebel Without a Cause but still haven’t found anything to fit my line “Mom and dad want baby’s freedom”. 

            I reviewed the song practice videos of my Gibson electric performances of “Sixteen Tons of Dogma” on September 23 and 24. On September 23 the take at 32:30 didn’t sound good and I hit a few wrong chords. On September 24 the take at 33:45 was OK but I couldn’t play the E flat chord. 

            I grilled three chicken legs and had one with a potato and gravy while watching season 3, episode 18 of Batman. 

            Barbara Gordon is looking hot in red drawstring leggings and a red polka dotted crop top, showing her midriff. She is visiting Bruce Wayne’s beach house on Ambergris Bay because he’s asked her to co-chaperone a party Dick Grayson his having with his friends. Dick and his friends arrive with a big hunk of ambergris they found. Bruce tells him a piece that size is worth a fortune on the perfume market. But Dick and his friends were followed by Louis the Lilac and his gang. They take the ambergris and kidnap Bruce and Dick. They are taken to Louis’ hideout at the Lilac Perfume Factory. Louis’ perfume technician, Lotus is at work in the lab and she appreciates the ambergris but needs other ingredients as well. She asks Louis for the scent pouches of Abyssinian civet cats, the glands of as many muskrats as possible, a large supply of beaver castor follicles, and the Tonquin from a herd of musk deer. He tells his men to get the animals and put them in the basement. Louis has Bruce and Dick tied up and he tells Bruce that since he’s heard that he’s an expert on animals, he’s going to remove the scent pouches from the animals (That’s the first time we’ve heard Bruce is an authority on animals). Batman and Robin are missing and for some reason Commissioner Gordon shows home movies of Batman to find clues. What we see are escape scenes from previous episodes that we’ve seen but in that world there would have been no cameraman standing around to film Batman and Robin while watching them potentially dying. Then Gordon gets a call from the zoo that all the Abyssinian civic cats, beavers, muskrats and musk deer have been stolen. Barbara goes to see Bruce Wayne’s butler Alfred, who is the only person who knows she is Batgirl. The phone rings in the study and she follows him in there even though not even Aunt Harriet is allowed in there since it’s where the red Batphone direct line to Gordon’s office is located, which she should recognize if she saw it since the same phone is in her father’s office, and it’s directly in her view when she walks in the door. Then it starts to beep and flash but Alfred throws a dust cloth over it. He also has to stop her from touching the bust of Shakespeare that opens the secret door to the Batpoles. She tells Alfred that she suspects Louis the Lilac has kidnapped Bruce and Dick. “Suspects”? She was right there at gun point when he kidnapped them but for some strange reason she didn’t even report it to the police. More lazy writing. Later Alfred calls Barbara to tell her that Louis’ hideout is in the defunct perfume factory on Lavender Lane. She asks where he got the information. He can’t tell her that he got it from the Bat Computer so he just says it was an anonymous informant. Barbara goes to change to Batgirl but finds an unannounced maintenance worker in her bedroom applying tools to her wall. He says people downstairs have complained about a grinding noise. He asks if she knows that her wall revolves. He doesn’t seem to have actually seen the wall revolving and he hasn’t yet opened it up to find any mechanism so it’s curious how he would know. She explains she knows it revolves but that it leads to a secret storage area, which she offers to show him. She pushes a secret button labeled “Secret Batgirl Room Instant Transformer” and then takes him into the room which is suddenly full of boxes and trunks piled up, which would be impossible to suddenly happen with the push of a button. More lazy writing. Then she tells him that she keeps several guns and so an unannounced visitor could get shot. That’s fucked up but very Middle North American. After he leaves she pushes her Secret Batgirl Room Re-Transformer and the wall revolves so she can change to Batgirl. Alfred communicates to Bruce through a speaker that is loud enough to be heard by Louis but isn’t. Alfred sends the Batmobile to that location by remote control and calls the police. Batgirl arrives just after the Batmobile. Bruce tells Louis he refuses to operate on the animals because it is criminal mutilation. Louis communicates to the cops not to come inside or he’ll kill Bruce and Dick. Batgirl confronts Louis and within a second is disappointingly knocked out by a lilac. I guess the producers had no time for her to put up a fight. She is placed in a chamber that will be filled with boiling oil so she can be transformed into perfume. Bruce says he will perform the surgery on the animals if he spares Batgirl. Bruce and Dick are sent downstairs to the basement. Louis asks what they need and Bruce says two glasses of warm water. When they are alone Bruce drops a different pill into each glass and they expand into Batman and Robin costumes complete with utility belts. More lazy writing according to my Christian Christian lazy writing bullshit detecting device. Louis tells Lotus he’s going to kill Batgirl anyway. She says she was hoping he’d say that. Batman and Robin break out of the basement with a laser so they can arrive from the front. The big fight takes place. Batgirl wakes from her mesmerized state and uses her Batgirl Vat Opener and joins in the fight. More lazy writing because they couldn’t think of a clever escape. Louis is defeated. We learn that a civic luncheon in Gordon’s honour is being planned next week. We also learn that the Feminist criminal Nora Clavicle will be there to let him know that he is no longer the police commissioner. 

            Lotus was played by Canadian actor Nobu McCarthy. She was born in Ottawa because her father was secretary to the Japanese ambassador to Canada but she was raised in Japan. She studied ballet, was a model and choral singer and became Miss Tokyo. She moved to Middle North America in 1955. Her film debut was in The Hunters in 1958. She co-starred in Two Loves in 1961. She guest starred on the Bing Crosby Show for the 1964 season. She starred in the film The Wash in 1988 and was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for her performance. She was artistic director of the East-West Players from 1989 to 1993.