Big Wheel

Lex Luthor Luther Vandross Carole King

Guys, just be thankful that they didn't have the Internet when most of you were college freshmen. I'll probably have nightmares 20 years down the road from some of the shit we made each other watch back then...

Out of all the record dates Alfred Lion had for Blue Note in 1955, only one person is playing tenor saxophone: Hank Mobley. (at least, I think--not sure if Gil Melle stuck to bari for his 1955 date. There were only 15 BN sessions that year, by my count.)

That's not a bad theory. My first and last name are both very common so it's not impossible that's what happened. The only other thing I can think of is that I misheard her when I thought she said my last name. Then it could have just been a regular wrong number. Also, it looks like there are three women in the Boston phone book by her name, so it's possible that the crazy story has nothing to do with this woman.

Conrad Black Red Mitchell Leon Trotsky

Arthur Digby Sellers Peter Sellers Herbert Lom

Freddie Mercury Venus de Milo Sun Ra

Dennis Farina The Quaker Oat Man Chef Boyardee

Not much time to cook this week as I was out of town Tuesday night to Thursday, out Friday and at my relatives' Passover seder Saturday. Tonight I defrosted some bison I'd had for a while and threw it on the Foreman grill for a couple of minutes. Not bad, probably would have been better fresh and whacked a few times with a mallet to loosen it up a bit. Also made a really easy but good recipe for Swiss chard sauteed with leeks.

Would this be the best (or close to the best) introduction to Ayler?

St. John Joe Cuba Montego Joe

He plays (and I mean PLAYS) on two Tyner albums, Expansions and Extensions. He matches wits with Sam Rivers on Tony Williams's Spring. And he also shows up on a few albums by Lee Morgan and Donald Byrd. I'm sure I'm missing one or two other BN sideman appearances. Guy Only two, one of which was not released for quite awhile: Some Other Stuff and Lou Donaldson's Lush Life.

I'm just worried that this is some kind of identity theft thing. If it is, I'm not sure why they bothered to call my phone.

So I'm out and about this morning, get to the office (working on a Saturday ) , and see there's a missed call on my cell from an unfamiliar local number. I call the number back and ask if anyone called me, and the woman on the other end asks me for my name. I give my first name, but I'm almost positive I did not give my last name. Then this woman says "oh, [my last name]." Do you know Laurie Cunningham?" I don't. Then I hang up. The weird thing is that I then do a reverse lookup and google that person's name. A couple stories come up from a decade ago about a woman by that name from the area who was beaten by her husband, then had him killed by someone else, went to jail, and got out on parole. I've only had this phone for three months. AFAIK there is no directory with this number in it. How the hell did somebody get my number and name? Could this be a scam?

Don't forget the oeuvre of Lennie's obscure brother, Arr Niehaus.

I was only 6 when my grandma took me to the Automat on my first trip to NYC, and barely remember it, but do have a fond memory of heading to that HoJo's on my second trip about 10 years later.

Actually, it depends. Period yes, comma yes, question mark and colon, no. edit: I am wrong. It's actually even trickier. (LINK)

bullshit Actually, I thought about this afterwards for a while tonight, and I changed my mind. Apologies. I still don't think there are more than a tiny handful of gay people out there offended by the word "gaydar," though.

I'm not opposed to all stereotyping, just the wrong kind of stereotyping. I think we all know it when we see it: "Jews are all greedy, Poles are all stupid, Mexicans are all lazy." Generally, greed, stupidity, and laziness are frowned upon in our culture. The gaydar thing is only wrong to a person who already thinks there's something wrong with being gay. One might make the argument that it's making fun of gay people for having meticulously kept and preciously decorated houses, but I think most people wouldn't say there's anything really wrong with such decorating--it's just not how they, personally, would choose to decorate their own houses.

Am I the only one who thinks that sounds a lot less like Pops and a lot more like a cross between Grover and the Cookie Monster?

I have no idea why, but my work's web filter (WebSense) blocks bagatellen. I can only guess that it thinks the words "bag a ...." in a URL have a sexual connotation.

It's going great...in fact, for extra credit, I just asked the gay secretary who works next to me what he thinks. The verdict: not pejorative, gay people use it amongst themselves all the time, and have no problem when straight people use it. p.s.: Anyone here want to take bets on whether Weizen or The Groper can ever respond to me without making mention of the fact that I live in Cambridge?

"Gaydar" is not a pejorative term--you can think someone might be homosexual without making a value judgment on homosexuality. Using "gay" to describe someone or something that you detest is.

Since a fair amount of the Red Line of the Boston T is underground, most cell phones don't work on it. (I have T-Mobile, and do get a signal in a couple of downtown stations because they installed an antenna down there.) But most of my commute is cellphone-free.