Darrell Larson

            On Sunday morning I finished memorizing “L'amour en cage” (Love in a Cage) by Boris Vian. I did a quick check for the chords and there is at least one set that’s been posted, so I’ll transcribe them tomorrow. 

            I memorized the first verse of “La Robe de Papier” (The Paper Dress) by Serge Gainsbourg. There are only six lines left and so I’m pretty sure I’ll have the whole song in my head on Monday. 

            I played my Kramer electric guitar during song practice for the first of two sessions. It was in tune from the start despite the humidity but it did go out after about 75 minutes. 

            I weighed 87.35 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I sanded the drywall compound that I’d applied to the reachable part of the southern wall in the bathroom above the sink. All that’s left now to sand is the door and the door frame. Then I need to clean the dust from all the areas I’ve sanded to prepare them for a little more drywall compound. 

            I weighed 87.35 kilos before lunch. I had saltines with five-year-old cheddar and a glass of ice tea. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and back. It was pretty hot but not unbearable. 

            I weighed 86.7 kilos at 17:41. 

            I was caught up with my journal at 18:35. 

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the Christian and the Lions studio recording of Brian Haddon’s song “The Ballad of My Chest Cavity” I continued to work on synchronizing the concert video with the studio audio. I found that for the third verse line, “Where the beach is soft as eiderdown” the video was again ahead of the audio so I had to look for another outside video to push it back. At first I looked for “eider ducks on a beach” but saw that those birds don’t look all that soft when they are alive and the beaches they frequent don’t look very soft either. Instead I found a three minute video of waves coming in to a deserted beach at sunset. I downloaded it with ClipGrab and tried to convert it to AVI with WinX but the app couldn’t do this one. I was able to convert it with Cloud Convert but it took several minutes and the first attempt failed. I imported the converted file to Movie Maker and tomorrow I’ll edit it. 

            In my 2024-09-19 Song Practice Movie Maker project I deleted everything up until the final take of “Laisse tomber les filles”. Then I saved the project as “Laisse tomber les filles” and isolated the song. I added some effects like Posterize, Sharpen, and Old Film and then published the movie. I took some screenshots and composed three pictures to use as thumbnails. Tomorrow I’ll probably upload the video to YouTube. 

            I grilled five cheddar sausages. I sliced two of them and put them on a pizza made with multigrain bread, marinara sauce, pesto and five-year-old cheddar. I had it with a beer while watching season 2, episode 21 of The Bill Cosby Show. 

            The running gag of Chet’s coaching of athletic teams at Holmes High School is that they always lose. He is trying to prepare his track and field team for an upcoming meet but his boys are not good. Suddenly a young man who’s not on the team runs up while carrying books and does a broad jump far further than the others and then he takes to the track and whizzes past the others who are running. Chet becomes obsessed with finding him and getting him onto his team. He sees him in the hall and loses him but later finds him at the lockers. He asks him to join the team but he’s not interested. He at least finds out his name is Chuck Kern when they shake hands to part. Chet notices his watch is missing and thinks he left it on the field. He goes to the school office to ask for the file on Charles Kern and inside it he finds his watch. Later Chet goes to meet his girlfriend on the university campus and runs into Chuck, who is walking with a friend who calls him Ralph. Chuck says he takes an extension class in Chinese at the university. Chet continues to try to tempt him to join the team. He says he could get a sports scholarship but Chuck says his grades will give him a scholarship. Chet says he could be king of the campus if he became a star athlete. Chuck says being a star is undesirable because he wants to be a spy and a spy must be anonymous. Chet threatens to expose his secret plans but Chuck says no one would believe him. Chet picks up his date and takes her back to his place but Chuck follows them secretly. Chet feeds Marcella dinner and a lot of bullshit lines about how he’s always chosen to be solitary until he met her. The next time Chet sees Chuck the boy gives him the slip. Chet stakes out Chuck’s locker and begins to spy on him. When Chuck walks by Chet grabs his arm but Chuck does a judo move that puts Chet against the wall with his arm twisted behind him. Chet tells him he only made two mistakes. Chuck wants to know what they are and Chet says they have to meet in the gym after class so he can show him. Later Chet is able to make Chuck fall twice and his student Alfonzo takes some pictures. Chet tells Chuck he will publish the picture with the caption that he is a cousin of Ringo Starr if he doesn’t compete in the track meet. Chuck agrees but on the day of the competition there is suddenly blasting over the loud speaker a recording of Chet’s voice saying all the bullshit lines that he’d fed Marcella the other night. Chet finds Chuck locked in the control room and has to exchange the picture for the tape. Chet tells Chuck if anybody could make it as a spy it would be him. 

            Chuck was played by Darrell Larson, who made his acting debut on Marcus Welby M.D. He made his film debut in The Student Nurses. He co-starred in Mike’s Murder. He teaches acting classes at Columbia University. He became the artistic director of a New York City performing arts group called The Culture Project. He wrote a rock opera called “Drive All Night” using the songs of Bruce Springsteen.

July 7, 1995: I spent the day writing

Thirty years ago today

            On Friday I spent the day writing.

Jewell Lain

            On Saturday morning I copied the proper lyrics for “La Robe de Papier” (The Paper Dress) by Serge Gainsbourg. I had previously tried to transcribe them while listening to the song but when I do that what I get is usually only marginally correct. Tomorrow I’ll start memorizing the song, which shouldn’t take long because there are only ten lines. 

            I played my Gibson Les Paul Studio electric guitar during song practice for the second of two sessions. Tomorrow I’ll begin a two session stretch of playing my Kramer electric. 

            I weighed 87.2 kilos before breakfast. 

            Around midday I rode down to No Frills where I bought five bags of red grapes, a pack of Ontario strawberries, some bananas, a small whole chicken , mouthwash, hair conditioner, sandwich bags, tomato pesto, a jug of iced tea, a jug of orange juice, a large container of 0% skyr, a small container of 4% skyr, a bag of Miss Vickie’s original chips and another of the apple wood smoke flavour. 

            I weighed 86.95 kilos at 14:05. 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. 

            I weighed 86.7 kilos at 18:00. 

            I was caught up with my journal at 18:34. 

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the Christian and the Lions studio recording of Brian Haddon’s song “The Ballad of My Chest Cavity” I finished editing the animation of the liver. I copied two clips of the liver and pasted them into the main timeline just before the beginning of the line, “At night my liver goes to the beach…” That moved the concert video behind the studio audio and so I cut out the part that show me scratching my nose and that lined them up again for “…to lie upon the sand”. But the video and audio seem out of sync again for “Where the beach is soft as eiderdown…” I’ll find out tomorrow where the video is ahead or behind at that point. 

            I made pizza on a slice of multigrain sandwich bread with marinara sauce, basil pesto, a chopped slice of back bacon, and five-year-old cheddar. I had it with a beer while watching season 2, episode 20 of The Bill Cosby Show. 

            Chet’s colleague Bob has been smoking three packs of cigarettes a day for 20 years and now he intends to quit because he learned his 15 year old son has started smoking. He smokes his last cigarette in front of Chet and says it’s going to be easier than he thought. He wakes Chet up at 2:00 and tells him it’s going to be harder than he thought. He wants Chet to help him quit and so he moves in with him. He has his first breakfast without a cigarette and is so overwhelmed by the taste that he eats Chet’s breakfast as well. Chet will be throwing a party in a few days and the real test for Bob will be all the smokers. He helps Chet unpack his groceries and finds a carton of cigarettes, which Chet says he bought for his smoking guests at the party. Bob is very upset and asks Chet to hide the carton. Later he begs Chet to tell him where he hid the carton. Chet tells him he’s locking him in the house and Bob rips Chet’s shirt. Chet still won’t tell him and Bob tears his shirt even more. Chet tells him where the carton is and now Bob is mad that he told him. He’s about to light a cigarette when Chet says, “Your child should see you now!” and he stops. They go to a movie and there’s a guy smoking next to Bob. Just before the party Bob is panicking and so Chet says he’s going to hypnotize him. He plans to make Bob susceptible to any command and then he will replace Bob’s urge for a cigarette with one for potato chips. At the party Chet is carrying around a bowl of potato chips. Bob tells him to keep an eye on him and so Chet begins to silently follow him. A woman tells Chet she must have the painting above his mantle and Chet takes it down and hands it to her. Bob tells the woman’s husband about Chet’s helping him quit smoking. The husband says, “I’d like to see you stop my wife from smoking” and Chet reaches out and grabs her cigarette from her. Bob says, “If you put a lit cigarette in my mouth right now I wouldn’t smoke it”. Chet puts the woman’s cigarette in Bob’s mouth. Bob takes it out and tells Chet he’s a genius. After the party Bob tells Chet to go to sleep while he cleans up. Chet throws himself on the couch and goes to sleep. Then a guest returns to say his wife forgot her purse. Bob tells Chet to wake up and he’s no longer hypnotized. He’s forgotten the last few hours and thinks the party hasn’t started yet. 

            The woman was played by Jewell Lain, who took ballet lessons as a child and made her acting debut at the age of 8 in “Five Little Peppers and How They Grew”. After high school she enrolled in the American Academy of Dramatic Art. She became a Conover Model and was awarded the title “Miss Television Film”. She debuted on the New York stage opposite Steve McQueen. She was a regular on Playhouse on Broadway. She moved to LA in 1955. She dated Cary Grant for a year and a half. Her film debut was in Death of a Scoundrel. She was a Wampas Baby Star of 1956. She co-starred in Suicide Battalion. In 1968 she married her lawyer and gave up acting. She divorced him in 1974 and found it difficult to find work again as an actor.

July 6, 1995: I spent the day writing

Thirty years ago today

            On Thursday I spent the day writing.

Kathy McKee

            On Friday morning it was 14 degrees when I got up but it wasn’t too cold even with the window open a crack. 

            I memorized the fifth verse of “L'amour en cage” (Love in a Cage) by Boris Vian. There is just one verse left to nail down. 

            I finished editing “Rêves et caravelles” (Dreams and Caravelles) by Serge Gainsbourg, and which I call “Vehicles Like Love”, on my Christian’s Translations blog and published it. I posted my translation on Facebook. I looked for the next Gainsbourg song that I haven’t completed and found still in the 1969 file “La Robe de Papier” (The Paper Dress). I must have tried to transcribe it from the audio because I’ve got the lyrics wrong. I see the proper ones are posted now and so I’ll transcribe them tomorrow. 

            I played my Gibson Les Paul Studio electric guitar during song practice for the first of two sessions. The action sounds like it’s dropped again so I think I’ll take it up to Alex Wood to be adjusted again when he lets me know he’s ready to repair my Epi acoustic guitar. 

            I weighed 87 kilos before breakfast. Around midday I finished sanding the drywall compound that I applied to the walls under the lower bathroom shelf. All that’s left is the lower part of the northern wall above the sink, the door frame and the door. 

            I weighed 86.85 kilos before lunch, which is the lightest I’ve been in the early afternoon since last Friday. 

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

            I weighed 86 kilos at 17:30. June 24 was the last evening when I was that light. 

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

            In the Movie Maker project to create a video for the Christian and the Lions studio recording of Brian Haddon’s song “The Ballad of My Chest Cavity” I checked and saw that the concert video is ahead of the studio audio. It’s in front by almost 15 seconds at the beginning of the third verse when Brian sings, “At night my liver goes to the beach…” I needed something to push it back so I looked for a video of the liver and found one with no watermark. I downloaded it with ClipGrab, converted it to AVI with WinX, then imported it into Movie Maker. I copied it to the end of the timeline and started editing it. Tomorrow I will probably have the clips I want and will insert them into the main timeline. 

            In my 2024-09-2 Movie Maker project I finished deleting all the clips preceding “Leave the Naïve Alone”, then I started a “Leave the Naïve Alone” Movie Maker” project. On that day last year I nailed the song in one take and so it was easy to isolate it. I published it and made a photo from a screenshot of the end because that’s when I’m sort of smiling. I uploaded the video to YouTube. 

            I started a new Movie Maker project for the video of my September 19, 2024 song practice during which I played my Gibson electric guitar. 

            I roasted a Canadian beef sirloin tip and had a slice with a potato and gravy. It was delicious and I ate while watching season 2, episode 19 of The Bill Cosby Show. 

            Chet’s mother is going to visit her sister and while she’s away she wants to have the apartment painted and for Chet’s father to stay in a hotel. Chet offers to have his dad stay with him so they can bond. Chet cooks a stew and accidentally puts in too much salt, but Chet’s father thinks it needs more. He’s one of those people (including me) who puts salt on their food before tasting it. He says the stew needs onions. Chet passes him a big onion from the stew and he puts salt on it before eating it. They talk about a whipping he once gave Chet and his father says, “It hurt me more than it hurt you” (I think my father used that line at least once). Shiela calls Chet about a party he is invited to but he says he’s with his father. Then Shiela says he should bring his dad along. A young woman named Eloise drags Chet’s father on the dance floor and he just stands there while she’s dancing and he calls for Chester to save him. Chet meets a girl named Margo and they dance. Chet has a very weird style of dancing where he makes sudden movements to the beat and then suddenly stops, then moves again before freezing again. She gives him her phone number and says to call her later that night. Chet and his father are supposed to get up at 5:00 to go fishing, but after calling Margo he sleeps in and so Chet’s dad goes fishing without him. Chet arrives at the fishing spot but his dad has already caught a bunch of fish and leaves. They go to a carnival game place where they throw balls, shoot guns and play miniature golf, and Chet’s dad always wins. They go see a movie that Chet’s dad doesn’t like because he thought it was going to be about cowboys. Chet says it won two Academy Awards so it couldn’t have been Midnight Cowboy, which won seven. Back at home they try to talk but it’s not very deep. Then Chet’s mother calls and says she’s home and so Chet’s dad immediately packs and leaves. Later when Chet is over for dinner Chet and his dad tell her what a great time they had together. 

            Margo was played by Kathy McKee, who started as a Las Vegas showgirl. She worked with and was engaged to Richard Pryor. During the 70s she was Sammy Davis Jr.’s mistress. She was a morning talk show host. She became a casting director. In 2014 she disclosed that in Detroit in 1974 when she was touring with Sammy Davis Jr. (who was a friend of Bill Cosby’s as was Kathy, who had dined with Cosby and his wife). Cosby asked her to pick him up at his hotel room as they were all going to a boat party. But when she arrived he immediately raped her. She didn’t want to say anything at the time, perhaps partly because she was secretly Sammy Davis Jr.’s mistress and that might have hurt Sammy and his marriage. Cosby responded that she was lying and so she sued him for defamation of character and took it to the Supreme Court. Her suit was dismissed because she made herself a public figure by talking to the press about the rape rather than going only through the courts.

July 5, 1995: I went to the Art Bar in the Csarda on Elm Street

Thirty years ago today

            On Wednesday evening I went to the Art Bar reading series to perform on the open stage at its new location in the Csarda Hungarian restaurant on Elm Street.

Hazel Medina

            On Thursday morning I memorized the fourth verse of “L'amour en cage” (Love in a Cage) by Boris Vian. There are two verses left to learn. 

            I ran through singing and playing “Rêves et caravelles” (Dreams and Caravelles) by Serge Gainsbourg in French. I made some slight adjustments to my translation and ran through it in English. I uploaded it to my Christian’s Translations blog and began preparing it for publication. I should have it published tomorrow and then I’ll move on to my next unfinished Gainsbourg translation. 

            I played my Martin acoustic guitar during song practice and it needed tuning at first but stayed in tune after that for the whole 90 minute session. Tomorrow I’ll begin a four session stretch of playing my electric guitars. 

            I weighed 87.55 kilos before breakfast. 

            I published my Batgirl 14 video based on season 3, episode 14 of Batman, but containing only the scenes that feature Batgirl. I started Batgirl 15. 

            I weighed 87.55 kilos before lunch, which is the heaviest I’ve been in the early afternoon since June 22.

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown and on the way back stopped at Freshco. I bought five bags of red grapes, some bananas, a basket of Quebec strawberries, a pack of chicken legs, a pack of Full City Dark coffee, a jar of marinara sauce, a jar of salsa, and some 2-in-1 shampoo-conditioner.  

            I weighed 86.95 kilos at 18:30. 

            I found a 17 second video of water drops slowly falling into water and making ripples. I downloaded it with ClipGrab, I converted it to AVI with WinX and imported it into Movie Maker. I copied it to the timeline of my “Ballad of My Chest Cavity” project just before the line “and just one drop to wet my lips…” That pushed back the concert video so that it was lined up with the studio audio for the beginning of the word “and”. But in the concert video Brian Haddon extends the word “aaand” causing the word “just” to be behind the studio audio. So I deleted the first parts of the extended “and” until “and just” was lined up with the audio. From that point on in the video the rest of the chorus was in sync with the audio, all the way through the instrumental and up to the beginning of the last verse. So now in the video the line “At night my liver goes to the beach” is out of sync with the audio but I don’t know if it’s ahead or behind. I’ll figure it out tomorrow. 

            I had a potato with gravy and my last grilled chicken leg while watching season 2, episode 18 of The Bill Cosby Show. 

            Chet has just gotten an enormous antenna installed by his friend Bob and now he can pick up stations from 350 to 500 kilometers away. His motivation is this Sunday’s football game between the Rams and the Packers. The game is sold out and all the local LA TV stations are blacked out from broadcasting the game. However the San Diego station is covering it and now Chet can pick up San Diego. Bob advises Chet not to tell anybody but the next day at work he can’t help bragging about his antenna. That leads to several of his colleagues begging to be able to come to Chet’s place and watch the game. On Sunday fifteen people crowd into Chet’s apartment, but his TV is not working. He calls Bob who says he wants to spend Sunday with his wife and kids but he finally comes over. He says there’s a blown tube and he can’t replace it on a Sunday. He suggests that Chet borrow someone’s TV and hook it up to the antenna. Chet goes to his friends and neighbours next door but the child Davey answers to say his mother is out and his father is sleeping and his mother told him not to let anyone in. Chet eventually convinces him that since he’s visited their place lots of times and since he is called “Uncle Chet” there he’s not just anyone. Davey lets Chet in and we see the child is holding a baseball bat. Chet says he’s going to borrow the TV set but Davey hits him in the arm with the bat and tells him he can’t take it. Then he hits him again. Then he hits him in the head and says if he takes the TV he’ll miss Sesame Street, which he watches every Sunday. He hits him two more times and says he can have it after Sesame Street is over in two and a half hours. Chet invites Davey to watch the game but Davey doesn’t like football. He says he wants to learn numbers. Chet tells him he can learn numbers better in football because the players are wearing numbers. Davey says they explain things better on Sesame Street. Chet says there are 11 players on the teams. Davey says he only knows the numbers 1,2,3,7,8, 9 and 10. Chet says he’ll teach him 11 and he’ll throw in 4, 5, and 6. Davey says today they are going to learn the letters E, O, and W on Sesame Street. Chet says he’ll teach them those letters after the game. Davey wants to learn them on Sesame Street because it’s more fun. Chet tries to tempt Davey with an ice cream soda and five comic books. Davey’s mother comes home and Chet explains the situation. She says he can borrow the little portable TV in her bedroom. It has a screen about the size of a paperback but it works. But once Chet has that TV connected and the game is in view, he can’t find a seat in his own apartment to watch it and so he gives up and reads a book. 

            Davey’s mother was played by Hazel Medina, who was born in Panama. She was a member of Theatre West and a founding member of the Group Repertory Theatre. She made her screen debut on I Spy in 1967. Her film debut was in Watermelon Man in 1970. She was also a social worker. The humidity dropped tonight quite low for summer, down to 50.