What is it about tattooed people? A disdain for their skin?

After yesterday’s piece on the results of the man with the a Romney tattoo on his head, this bunch of tattoos popped up on the web (can you believe it?!):

So it doesn’t matter whether you are a Republican or a Democrat, if you have the amazing need to defile yourself as a party poster, you fall into a category of folks that is beyond my understanding, not that I am fond of the current trend to cover yourself with all kinds of tattoos at all.

Related articles

• Harry Styles continues colouring in his naked body with another tattoo (mirror.co.uk)
• Harry Styles Tweets Photo Of His New Tattoos! (lukewilliamsgossip.wordpress.com)
• Tat’s my baby! (nypost.com)
• scarlett johansson horseshoe tattoo (thesun.co.uk)

Now that the Political Season is 0ver…

After the most expensive and longest and most frustrating presidential campaign in our history, we can now get back to0 the important stuff. To me, of course, that is the Arts, especially Visual Arts and Theatre. To kick off my searches and good feelings, here’s some verse by Kurt Vonnegut that my pal Joe Bratcher uploaded to Facebook:

I agree with you, Kurt. We have enough investment bankers, corporate execs and politicians already. Artists we need more of.

Hey Radio Fans… I’ll be on from 10:30 to Noon today…

This will probably be the last time in the next two weeks that I can be on the air, given my forthcoming hospital visit next week. So… I’ll be thrilled to get your call-ins on “Talk To Me” (304-876-5369).b You can talk about anything you want to, as usual, or make an esoteric music request that you challenge me to find in a few minutes… it’s always fun for me.

If you are not in the 50 mile radius of WSHC at 89.7 FM, Shepherdstown WV, then you can go to 897wshc.org/listen-live. There are folks all over the country who listen, now (and a few friends in other countries) and I look forward to playing for everyone.

So, tune in this morning to “Talk To Me”. BTW, my daughter, Cassandra (from Connecticut) is my guest this morning. You can talk to her, too.

– Bill

 

Related articles

• My congratulations to Stephen Skinner…My best wishes to Elliot Simon (underthelobsterscope.wordpress.com)
• Hey radio fans… we have a special schedule today due to football season: (underthelobsterscope.wordpress.com)

 

Hey radio fans… we have a special schedule today due to football season:

My “Talk To Me” show will be on WSHC this morning from 10:30 AM to Noon. We’ll have 90 minutes for your eclectic song requests, discussion of politics with 3 days to go until all of this is decided, and perhaps some comments on the results of Sandy.

If you are too far away to call in at 304-876-5369 remember you can also Listen Live at our web site from anywhere in the world. Just go to 579WSHC.org and click on “Listen Live” and you can join our regular morning call-in group (join Ralph, Stu, Bobby and Oinky and the rest of the gang… we’d love to have you on the team.

Elliott Simon’s shown is on before ours from 9:00 to 10:30 AM.

OK… I’m putting my show together so I can get out of the house on time.

 

Saturday Morning and I’m getting ready for the 11 o’clock show…

Our regular schedule at WSHC (89.7 FM) is back this week, so my show, Talk To Me, is on from 11 AM to 1 PM and I’ll be taking calls from listeners at 304.876.5369. Remember, if you are not in our listening area (which unfortuneately ony covers about 50 miles around Shepherdstown, WV) you can listen live on the web site: http://897wshc.org.

As usual, I am putting together the list of songs I’d like to play on the show, but I expect my regular callers and more will call in with hard to find requests (which I usually pull out of the air) and their music, as usual, outplays mine. It’s really worth listening to if you have a desire to hear work from the 40s, 50s or 60s. Those are the years most of the requests fall into.

I also expect Ralph Petrie to show up around noon for one of my favorite parts of the show, The Petrie Dish. Ralph brings in his historic music list which really educates all of us on the history of rock ‘n roll.

I love the Saturday show and I hope you might as well.

 

I’VE GOT THE MORNING RADIO SHOW ALONE…

John is away this morning so I have to do the Winners & Losers show alone from 7:30 to 9 on WSHC (89.7 FM). To listen on line live from anywhere go to http://897wshc.org.

Elly, of course, is upset that she has to get up so early to take me into the station. John usually picks me up on his way in.

So right now I’m putting my music list together. I’ll be taking requests for music at 304-876-5369 if you want to hear yourself on the air.

 

Finding something to do to keep from going mad!

 

I’ve had a bad day today… physically tripped up by a small seizure while I was doing dishes and an afternoon of trying to stay awake. This is, unfortunately, what life has become… I can’t drive (by law…until I’ve gone a year without a seizure as certified by a doctor) and, since Elly works (which I can’t do outside of the house), I bounce off the walls and am bombarded by televised boredom. If it were not for my laptop and the internet I might as well be in a coma.

So I guess I’m going to start writing something outside of my blog. There is a joy in constructing ideas out of words which I am beginning to look forward to each morning. What I do with what I write is not apparent right now, but I expect it will be realized sooner or later.

I’m tending toward creating a radio drama that I might be able to add to my Saturday show at WSHC, or do with John on the Friday morning show. I’ve been researching radio scripts from the 30s and 40s and I find them fascinating. Some are funny, some are adventures, all of them are strongly character-based since there is little opportunity for scenery (other than sound effects) in radio work.

When I get something finished I’ll let you know.

Related articles

• TT: When radio wasn’t (artsjournal.com)
• Lean & Hungry Theater to Perform and Record Radio Drama Version of The Winter’s Tale, December 4 and 5 (prweb.com)

 

Cartoon(s) of the Week – Romney handles foreign policy

 

A note about this section of Under The LobsterScope. Every Sunday, unless I am hospitalized or on the road to a far away place, I do Cartoon(s) of the Week. If it’s a week where one editorial cartoon has stood out as towering above the others, that’s all that will appear. Most weeks, however, I present several of the best cartoons I have found, usually on a current news theme.

Your comments on this section, whether you agree with my choices or not, are greatly appreciated. If you send a sample of your favorite to appear with your comment, please include the cartoonist’s name (often hard to make out on the cartoons) and the publication it appeared in.

– Bill

John Branch in the San Antonio Express-News:

Perhaps Mitt should have avoided ANY comments until learning about the situation…

– and –

Bill Shorr from Cagle Cartoons:

Then again, why nor use foreign policy to campaign with?

– and –

Jim Morin in the Miami Herald:

Of course, supporting the President is un-Romneylike.

– and –

Mike Luckovich in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Mitt – you live in the mess you’ve made.

 

Related articles

• Cartoon(s) of the Week – Is anything what it seems? (underthelobsterscope.wordpress.com)
• Cartoon Nails It (ken_ashford.typepad.com)

 

Back on the radio this morning… I’m so glad!

I’m over in the outer studio at WSHC 89.5  as Elliot Simon finishes up the last hour of his show. I’m setting up my music list for the two hours I’ll be on the air from 11 AM to 1 PM (and, by the way, if you are out of our very small listening area, you can hear the show on the internet by going to http://897wshc.org/ and clicking on “listen live”. Actually, I have friends and family all over the country who listen, so I know we have the reach.

This is the first time in several weeks that I’ve been able to do the show, since I had my accident, broke a bunch of bones and was in the hospital, then laid up at home for quite a while. When I was finally able to move around last week we went to Wisconsin for my son’s wedding, so I missed last Saturday as well. But the “Talk To Me” show is back on today… if you want to call in and talk or request a song, the number is 304-876-5369.

Since this is one of my favorite activities, this is a happy day. I hope my pal Ralph Petrie gets in for the12 to 1 hour so we can have the segment we call “The Petrie Dish”… no one knows more about popular music history than Ralph and it’s fun to get questions answered.

Bye, now… tune in if you can.

Fluent Magazine is NOW AVAILABLE!

Take a look at Fluent Magazine, the on-line Arts, Culture and Events magazine for the Eastern Panhandle area.

Yours truly is one of the Associate Editors on it, having written reviews of the CATF season and an article on CATF Director Ed Herendeen.

What’s more there are articles on art, poetry, fiction and much more. And you can subscribe for free!

I hope you’ll take a look at it.

Just came home from the morning radio show…

 

John Case

John Case and I did Winners and Losers on WSHC this morning and, as usual, we had a pretty good show… especially with our regular callers Ralph Petrie and Stu Brown.

I’ve been thinking lately about how much I enjoy doing the two radio programs I’m on each week (got my Saturday show, Talk To Me, tomorrow from 11 to 1) and don’t really know what I’d do without them. Fortunately John picks me up and drives me home on Fridays and my wife gets me to the station on Saturdays and Ralph Petrie drives me home. As long as this keeps up, I have no problems.

Me

So now I’m putting together the song list for tomorrow morning’s show, plus picking a couple of comedy bits from the Bob and Ray collection, and going over various talking points to cover. Lately I’ve been getting quite a few call-ins — especially challenge requests for rare songs —  so the show has been quite a project.

If you want to call in tomorrow, the number is 304-876-5369… and no matter where you are, you can listen live on the internet at http://www.897wshc.org.

 

My life has changed… not for the better, I’m afraid

Following my radio show this morning, I’m sitting over at Mellow Moods having coffee while I wait for my friend Cecil to pick me up

He’s over at  workshop at the Contemporary American Theater Festival and are schedules our slightly skewed.

This not being able to drive, what I have been condemned to since my accident, stands a real possibility of going on for the rest of my life. If I were in a city with public transportation to everything going on, it would be one thing, but I’m a few miles out of town in an empty, rural neighborhood where walking to anything is out of the question and there are no buses or anything else.

I’m dependent on family and friends to go out, can no longer do the grocery shopping, which I enjoyed, and, basically I feel trapped. The internet is my only way out, so you, dear blog readers, are now my connection to the world. I enjoy hearing from you whether you agree with me or not.

Think I’ll go buy another cup of coffee while it becomes 102° outside.

Back to the Radio…

I just got into the WSHC (89.7) studio and I’m setting up for my 11 – 1 show. Given the Shepherdstown Street festival combined with the number of trees that came down in the storm last night, getting in here took longer than I expected.

Elly did the driving, since I am banned from doing it for at least six months (assuming I have no more seizures.) It’s another hot day out but the studio is AC’d and relatively comfortable.

If you are outside of our area you can listen on the web at http://www.897wshc.org.

I’m on my way over to CATF this morning to interview Ed Herendeen…

Ed Herendeen

Given his tight rehearsal schedule, I have been lucky to snare 20 minutes with Producing Director Ed Herendeen this morning at the Contemporary American Theater Festival. I am doing this for Fluent, Nancy McKeithen’s forthcoming on-line arts magazine which will appear on or about July 1st.

Ed is a theatre professional that I greatly admire and his festival is one of the reasons Elly and I moved to Shepherdstown. Indeed, because of the CATF even more arts organizations and programs have built up here and, if you can’t live in short travel distance to NYC, this is a great place to be.

Anyway, I’ve got to get out of the house. I’ll be back on line later…

Related articles

• CATF Plays in Running for National Critics’ Award (prweb.com)

Ray Bradbury is Dead at 91…

He took us into the future and then farther into the future. He showed us where our politics and lifestyles could take us in books like “Fahrenheit 451.” He created a whole civilization and then related it to the Cold War in “The Martian Chronicles.” He created a monumental body of books, film, television and theater…so much that it is hard to conceive of one man writing it all.

But he did.

Did you know he scripted the 1956 film version of “Moby Dick?” Or that he was a regular writer for “The Twilight Zone?” Or that his work has been published in over 30 languages? Or that he wrote about 600 short stories which appeared in more than 1000 school textbooks?

And his approach to work:

“Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things.

– Ray Bradbury

Bradbury was our science fiction evangelist and we will miss him… but we are so happy that he left so much amazing work behind. Rest in Peace, Ray.

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• Ray Bradbury on Doing What You Love and Reading as a Prerequisite of Democracy (brainpickings.org)
• Ray Bradbury on Facing Rejection … and Being Inspired by Snoopy (theatlantic.com)
• At What Temperature Does an eBook Burn? (cultofmac.com)
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Dick Beals dies at 85; voice of Speedy Alka-Seltzer

Richard “Dick” Beals was an American voice actor who performed many voices in his career,  spanning the period from the early 1950s into the 21st century. He specialized primarily in doing the voices of young boys. He was well known as Davey in the Davey and Goliath animations.

Perhaps his most recognizable characterization was the voice of the stop-motion animation figure called “Speedy Alka-Seltzer“, featured in TV ads for more than 50 years….

I’ll be on the radio alone tomorrow morning…

John Case just called to tell me he and his wife are going camping in Pennsylvania and I’ll be doing our joint show, Friday Winners and Losers, alone tomorrow.

If you want to tune in and you are within 50 or so miles of Shepherdstown, WV, it’s 89.7 on the FM dial.

If you are from anywhere else in the great wide world, go to http://897wshc.org and tune in from there.

Oh, hell…another video before I drop off for the evening…

Romney Vs. Reality…

Is it that he speaks without having listened? Or does he think the true reality of things is so unimportant?

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Sitting over at Mellow Moods…

John Case was still away, so I did the morning radio show alone and unprepared… but it went OK. Now I’m over at the Mood for post-show coffee and talking with local friends who hang out here.

Can’t tell what the weather will be like for the rest of the day. It’s nice out now, but there are some dark clouds rolling over and it is a little windy… if we have rain later in the day I won’t be surprised.

Shepherdstown is setting up for an active weekend. Tomorrow is Eastern Panhandle Earth Day at Morgans Grove Park all afternoon and into the evening. There is the Really, Really Free yard sale on The Wall on German Street both Saturday and Sunday. And, of course, I have my regular WSHC show, Talk To Me, tomorrow from 11 AM to 1:00 PM.

Elly is doing a lot of different things today and, I guess, for the rest of the weekend, so I’m pretty much on my own. We’ll see how it goes.

I hope you all have a great weekend.

Seymour Chwast hits it right on the head (with both faces)

Chwast is such a great illustrator. When I saw this I felt that it summed up women’s issues and Romney in a simple image:

Chwast, of course, is one of the great names in advertising and a founder of Pushpin Studios with Milton Glaser.

To my readers: sorry for such a late start today…

I didn’t get any sleep last night – half an hour at the most – and then I had to go in to cover for John Case on the early morning show on WSHC. When I got home around 9:45, I fell asleep for the rest of the morning until two barking dogs decided to tell me it was lunch time.

Anyway… I haven’t browsed the news yet, or figured out what is going on for the rest of the day. Tomorrow we are going to DC to see a production of The Taming Of The Shrew with our friend’s Linda and Cecil. Oh yes, I’ll still be doing the Saturday morning radio show, but we’re on the sports-related short schedule tomorrow, so the show will be from 1o – 11 AM.

If I can get to bed early tonight I’ll be all ready for WSHC… and this blog… in the morning as usual.

Saturday Morning and I’m getting ready for my radio show…

“Talk To Me” is on WSHC FM from 11 Am to 1 PM today and I’m getting my music list and discussion topics ready for the broadcast. If you are outside of our local area (we’re a very small university radio station at Shepherd U.) you can listen by going to the web site at http://897wshc.org/listen_live/index.html. and feel free to call in and, well, talk to me: 304-876-5369.

We have only one line, so if someone else is talking you’ll have to wait til they are done (and my regulars, Ralph and Stu, talk a lot.) I also don’t answer the phone when I’m playing old Bob and Ray cuts.

Elly is going to Frederick, MD, this morning for a student Graphic Design Portfolio Review for the Blue Ridge AIGA… this the third time she’s done the portfolio review and she’s going there with our friend, designer Jill Harner. That gives me most of the day to myself, so after the show I’ll be going back home to continue unpacking at the new house.

Another Saturday in West Virginia.

 

Thomas Kinkade Dead at 54…

As my wife, who has been an artist who associates with professional artists and has for the last 40 years, points out, the death of Thomas Kinkade will stop the production of some of the world’s most awful art.

Things like this:

…which, at best, can be called kitsch, decorate the living rooms of millions of Americans with clear plastic covered couches. Nothing says more for the need for art education in our schools… something the reactionary budget strippers cut first.

Yet, Kinkade made a fortune at it. Who would have guessed?

Thanks to Beverle Bloch for supporting Under The LobsterScope

My thanks to Beverle Bloch for today’s donation to Under The LobsterScope. Watch your e-mail, your Bill’s Cast O’ Characters font is on the way!

– Bill

If you’d like to help us out at Under The LobsterScope (and we hope you will), go HERE.

Take a break…

A wonderful film for a Wednesday Night:

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore from Moonbot Studios on Vimeo.

This has been nominated for a short film Academy Award and I think it is surely worth it. Make sure to watch it at full screen.

Have a great time… more fun than watching politicians.
For those of you who are my radio listeners I’ll be on WSHC (89.7 FM) tomorrow morning from 7:30 AM to 9:00 AM substituting for John Case(on the web at http://www.897wshc.org).