Chilling? Perhaps not. Chill? Most certainly.

Vince Guaraldi was a real find in the making of the Peanuts specials. He did the Christmas special first, of course. Halloween isn't a sentimental holiday in the same way Christmas is, or at least isn't always thought of as such. But it does have its own feel, its own tenderness. Which Guaraldi and his combo captured without apparent effort.

...und drang

You may or may not have heard, but Rhode Island got hit with quite a storm on Sunday night. While it didn't have a name, I can attest that it at least felt more intense than some of the hurricanes we've been touched by. (Up here, that is, not in the areas further south where they first landed.) You can trust me on this as someone who was taking out the trash while some of the less full containers were flying into the street.

Some people lost power for a few minutes. Some for longer. There were stores in the suburbs that never opened today because they were still off the grid. School was canceled everywhere.

Also, it seemed today like there was a greater number of fire engines out. I'm guessing that had to do with the power outages. I mean, October 30 is Devil's Night, but that doesn't start until sundown.

Spooky times

So there seems to be an unwritten rule that if Halloween falls on a weekday, the Saturday before it is basically Halloween (observed.) For adults, anyway. Kids trick-or-treat on October 31 as they always did. But the costume parties and other events crest on Saturday night.

And sometimes there are things going on Saturday during the day. Today I was in the supermarket and saw Freddie Krueger. Well, a guy dressed as him. Minus the scars. And the knives on the hands. I don't think the store would have appreciated him slicing up fruit he wasn't going to buy.

Giant steps

A book I'm reading now is American Goliath, by Harvey Jacobs. It's inspired by the Cardiff giant, a hoax meant to prove that America was actually the Biblical birthplace of humanity. As supporting evidence, though the connection isn't obvious, a statue was produced which was meant to be a fossilized giant. Again, this is a true story. The book is fictionalized, though. Jacobs was a science fiction writer, and there's an undercurrent of fantasy throughout and many tall tale moments. Still, the whole thing was so over the top to begin with that it can be hard to tell where reality ends and embellishment begins. America had at least been metaphorically considered as a new Israel since before the War for Independence, which probably didn't hurt in finding some believers.

And that's Cardiff, New York. Cardiff, Wales has its own share of bizarre incidents, I'm sure, but this isn't among them.

Poltergeist

We're getting some rain tonight, but what really stands out are the strong winds. So strong, in fact that my bedroom door is being slammed shut, then opened again, then slammed again, all without me touching it. The noise was startling at first. Then I decided it was cool as long as it didn't bother the neighbors. Knock on wood.

Sly

Foxes have been domesticated at least once, in an experiment with interesting results. Some of their special vulpine traits fade in later generations, though. They seem to thrive as wild animals. A cute sort of wild, obviously, but still.


Fox Kits Playing from Dale Bohlke on Vimeo.

Note to self/Listen, self

I keep forgetting, but need to remember. Don't leave anything on a ceramic place if you're heating it up in anything but a microwave.What happens is the food may only get to lukewarm, but the plate absorbs all the heat and you can't pick it up without startling pain. There doesn't seem to be any way around this.

Something to ponder

I wonder, how can you tell when you're learning? I mean, if you're learning algebra, you have the answers at the back of the book. If you learn to cook something, you're successful when the product is edible. But on larger stuff? Things with less immediate results? That's the rub. It's hard to tell what you know from what you're just guessing.

Getting cool

The biggest seasonal transition in the year is probably from summer to autumn. True autumn, that is, which can be delayed by any number of natural and man-made causes. But yes, whether or not you need to dress in layers in order to keep warm is more of a distinction than just how many layers you need, or how thick.

It feels like we're finally crossing that rubicon this year. Definitely you needed a substantial jacket today. That's sort of a homecoming. The heater didn't quite click on. That's not too far off, though.

Straight Man Problems

Above is a recreation of the first scene of the Marx Brothers' I'll Say She Is. This was their first Broadway hit, which was never adapted for the movies, although Monkey Business did reuse the dueling Chevalier imitations.

Notably, the first Marx Brother we hear speaking is Zeppo. He's confident, he's got good delivery. His only problem is the material. He gets all the generic lines. So even before Hollywood made him the not-funny one, he didn't have much opportunity to cut up. Groucho once reported telling a producer that they were twice as funny without Zeppo, thus ending his time with them on-screen. Maybe the act just worked better with three that with two. And maybe it was a bad time to be the baby of the family.

See, observe

My own complete happiness, and the home-centred interests which rise up around the man who first finds himself master of his own establishment, were sufficient to absorb all my attention, while Holmes, who loathed every form of society with his whole Bohemian soul, remained in our lodgings in Baker Street, buried among his old books, and alternating from week to week between cocaine and ambition, the drowsiness of the drug, and the fierce energy of his own keen nature.

That is, of course, from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, which I just started rereading this week. The ascription of "drowsiness" to cocaine jarred me. I've never touched the stuff but my understanding is that its effects are quite the opposite. Did Doyle not know what the drug did? He had medical training, I'm pretty sure, so that shouldn't be the case. According to possibly reliable sources a drowsy effect might result if the coke is cut with something. So it might have been with Holmes, although what I don't know. Anyway, Doyle would drop that aspect of the character soon enough, and maybe the sniggering of actual druggies was another reason.

The stories are highly enjoyable, of course. Holmes and Watson are a natural pair even though they're no longer roomies. These shorter cases have a low-key charm, an ambling quality, that doesn't generally make the jump to the Sherlock TV series. Oh well, you enjoy what you can, and Benedict Cumberbatch does have the ideal voice for the character.

Monk Diamond Anniversary

In honor of Thelonious Monk hitting his centennial.

Monk's music takes me to a serene place, and often a joyful one. I know some people are put off by it, find it discordant. Oh well. You get different responses to the call of an owl as well.

Constitutional

For much of the day I had a headache I couldn't seem to shake. I'd take a couple of ibuprofen and it would fade, then come back. Most of the day, like I say.

A little after dinner it seemed to have faded. Just to kind of put a stake in its heart I went out for a breath of fresh air. It was well after dark, but a nice night. We'd had some rain earlier in the day.

I saw a couple of women outside of the library. The library is closed for the whole three day weekend we have for Columbus Day. They had their laptops open and were chatting with each other. One I know from seeing her around is a little touched, but they seemed to be having a nice talk.

Articulation

So I'm trying to learn more about body language. I figure there must be a lot I miss, that I could pick up from other people but don't, and messages I don't know I'm sending out. Reading is a big part of my lesson plan, of course. The first book I read gave some tips had kind of a different focus from what I was looking for. Plus there was a lot of repetition about how women are just better at it. Not helpful. I'm not going to just suddenly become female. That's a whole job in itself.

Say what?

https://youtu.be/r6XKV1RSQOY

I don't know about this (non-embeddable) ad. The creators never seem to have met an actual dog. The dog won't go near the baby because the baby is crying? Huh? And needs a lion costume so (s)he can join in the family fun?

Dogs just dive in, man. They go where they want and aren't really hung up on accessories. This spontaneity is one of the reasons I'm more of a dog person. Not because I'm already like that, but because it's something I'd like to emulate.

If the rain comes

The Storm - A Stop Motion Short from Paper House Studios on Vimeo.

Simple forms seem to work well with stop-motion animation. From what I can suss out this one tells us something about making the best of things.