Mildred Clinton

            On Sunday morning I translated the fourth verse of “Au revoir mon enfance” (Goodbye My Childhood) by Boris Vian. 

            I ran through singing and playing “Le rent' dedans” (The Pick-Up) by Serge Gainsbourg in French and then I revised my translation. Tomorrow I’ll run through it in English and then begin working on a photo video of the song to upload to YouTube. 

            I weighed 88.35 kilos before breakfast. 

            I played my Kramer electric during song practice for the last of four sessions. It stayed in tune for a little less than half the songs. 

            Around midday I cleaned my warm mist humidifier for the first time this season and set the other one working. 

            I weighed 89.7 kilos before lunch. 

            My upstairs neighbour Shawn has not been around much all summer but now he’s back and complaining about the heat being switched off. It’s been fairly warm outside and so I shut it off when it gets too hot but his unit seems to be colder than mine. It’s colder tonight and so the heat has to be on anyway. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. 

            I weighed 89.55 kilos at 18:00, which is the heaviest I’ve been in the evening since before the summer. 

            I was caught up in my journal at 20:00. 

            I listened to a bit more of the cassette tape with the recording of my rehearsal with Brian Haddon. I mentioned on it we’d be recording at Mike’s place in Peter Fruchter’s garage on the next Monday. But I didn’t mention Mike and said “Peter’s place” so this might have been the beginning of our recording project. 

            I made pizza on a slice of multigrain sandwich bread with marinara sauce, tomato pesto, some wedge oven fries, and five-year-old cheddar. I had it with a glass of Creemore while watching season 1, episode 2 of Car 54 Where Are You? 

            The desk Sergeant Sol Abrams is approaching his 25th anniversary on the force and Toody is chairman of the gift committee. But Toody is driving the other officers crazy because it’s his first time in such a position and he wants to do everything right and insists on proper committee procedure with motions, seconds and carries. They finally arrive at an identification bracelet as a gift for Sol but then they see he already has one. Sol is suspicious because everyone is quiet whenever he walks into a room these days. He tells his wife Sandra that he thinks they are going to retire him because of his bad feet. He says they’ll send a police surgeon from downtown and then it’ll be all over. Haberdasher Harry has been arrested for stealing clothing and is in the property room and Toody is looking at a smoking jacket for Sol. But the clothes thief says he likes Sol and won’t sell any of his stuff to him. He recommends a dressing gown at a certain store but says, “Don’t say I sent you”. But next door to the clothing store is an orthopaedic shoe shop and Toody says that’s what they need to get Sol. He calls for assistance and all the patrol cars arrive with sirens blaring just to vote on orthopedic shoes as a gift. But Webster the orthopedist tells them they can’t just buy a pair of orthopaedic shoes. He has to observe Sol walking, analyze his old shoes for stress points and make a mold of his feet. When Webster enters the station Sol thinks he’s the police surgeon and tries to demonstrate how light on his feet he is by running up and down the stairs. He collapses and when he comes to one of his shoes is missing. Then Toody and Muldoon get Sandra to help them. She slips Sol some sleeping pills at dinner. Muldoon oils his feet but he wakes up when he hears a noise and they hide. He hears something in the bathroom and when he opens the door Webster is smiling at him as he prepares the mold plaster. Muldoon knocks Sol out and they make the mold. Later Sol just thinks it was a dream. The next day he gets his surprise party and thinks it’s his retirement party but then he gets his shoes and when he walks on them he’s in heaven and begins dancing with Sandra.

            Sandra was played by Mildred Clinton, whose film debut was in The Trapp Family in America in 1958. She played Frank Serpico’s mother in Serpico. She co-starred in Alice Sweet Alice. She performed in several plays for CBS Radio Mystery Theatre. She played Judge Sussman on The Edge of Night. She played supporting roles in three Spike Lee movies. She had a one woman show called One Woman’s Experience on WABD TV in New York City.