The Shortest Day Of The Year, Darlings!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                  According to what I was taught, today, December 22, is the SHORTEST day of the year.  Which is good news for those of us who deplore this time of year, when it starts getting dark at 4:30 in the afternoon.  Then, slowly, the days get longer, till we culminate with June22, which is not only the LONGEST day of the year, but also Meryl Streep's birthday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                  I only have one question!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                  If today is the shortest day of the year, when is the LONGEST night?????????  Is it tonight?????????  Or was it last night????????????  If it was the latter, it sure didn't seem like it, because I sailed through on sleep, so the night did not seem long at all.  Back in childhood, sleeping, or trying to on Christmas Eve, was always the longest night!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  But now, with adulthood, and the telecast of Midnight Mass, all that has changed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                    So, enjoy as much of this day as you can, darlings, as we segue into longer and longer daylight periods!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                      And only six month's till Meryl's birthday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Won't You Turn Me On, Like The Neon, That You See On....BROADWAY!!!!!!!!!!"

       
                                "It's great to be back , Back, BACK ON BROADWAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

                                   That, of course, is the great opening sequence of "Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol," where Quincy is driving in (against the traffic, of course), probably from his home in New Jersey, because he was a Rutgers grad!!!!!!!!!  It is brilliantly performed by the late, great Jim Backus, and it always set the tone for this great Holiday classic whenever I watched it.

                                      Well, darlings, amidst much fanfare, "Mister Magoo's Christmas Carol" is going to be shown on some NBC affiliates tomorrow night!  I am not sure if New York is one of them, though I should hope so.  After all, it was us Baby Boomer Metropolitan Area kids who made this a classic!!!!!!!

                                        Much has been made of the fact it has not been aired for decades!!!!!!

                                        But guess what, darlings???????????????

                                        They are going to still fuck it up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                         How?  Well, according to what I have read, they are going to cut this opening from the broadcast!  You will get the entire onstage play (which means "Winter Was Warm;" thank God, because, over the years, that too has been cut!!!!), but not this absolutely brilliant opening, which sets the tone for what is to follow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                           This is not only robbery, it is desecration of a classic!!!!!!!!!!!!!  How to get even?????????????

                                           I will tell you how, darlings!  At the time this is aired, all of you who own a copy, pop your DVD edition (which WILL be complete) into the player!!!!!!!  Not only will you see this classic the way it was MEANT to be seen, you will screw up NBC in the most viable way by cheating them out of the high ratings they are expecting to get from this!!!!!!!!!!!

                                             Heh! Heh! Heh!  I am such a fiend!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                             The REAL fiends are those who would DARE to cut this brilliant sequence from this classic!!!!!!!!!!!!  To quote Scrooge, "they should be boiled in their own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through the heart!"

                                                But you show them ,darlings!!!!!!!!!  You watch your DVD, so you can cheat NBC out of ratings!!!!!!!  That way, like Quincy, you will be able to say--

                                                  "Oh, Magoo, you've done it again!"

Girls, Remember That Bugs Bunny Cartoon???????????

                                           The cartoon, darlings, opens, with Bugs coming out of his hole. The ground is clear and dry!!!!!!!!!!!  He goes to a tree, where there is a calendar, dated December 20th, removes it so it is the 21st..   Then he says, in that Bugs Bunny voice, "December twenty-foist!  Foist day o' Winter!"

                                           From above, comes a massive glop of snow, and the Season is set!  Which is how it sometimes seemed, when I was a child!!!!!!!!!!!

                                            Well, girls, today is that day on the calendar, so Happy First Day Of Winter, Winter Solstice, or whatever you choose to call it!!!!!!!!!!

                                              A season of lit fireplaces, cozying up, reading Victorian novels (they always seem to go better in the Winter, don't they????????  Even to a literary maven, like me!!!!!!!!!!!), Steve and Eydie singing "That Holiday Feeling" ("Let's roast chestnuts by the fire/Any little thing you desire;" "When Santa Claus begins his flight/I hope he gets a flat tonight!"), or however you choose to honor and acknowledge Winter!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                I still would like to know what the hell figgy pudding is!!!!!!!!!!

                                                 Face it, lambs, only here would you get someone whose first image of Winter is Bugs Bunny!!!!!!!!  I mean, what else??????

                                                  If you wanted something more humdrum, there is always the New York Post!!!!!!!!!!!

                                           

Bye, Bye, Autumn!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                  I told you earlier, girls, this was a day of lasts!   Well, today, according to how I was taught, is the last day of Autumn, since tomorrow is the First Day Of Winter!!!!!!!!!!!

                                    The good news is Proserpina is now halfway through her six month sentence in Hell!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  The bad news is she has three more, and I don't know what it is about Winter, but these next three months always seem the longest. I think it has something to do with, having been in the throes of the Holiday Season since Thanksgiving, things come to a screeching halt on January 2.  We will just have to find more things to do, darlings!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                      And what an Autumn it was!!!!!!!!!  From unseasonably warm weather necessitating the use of an air conditioner in November, to the disaster that was Hurricane Sandy!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                       "The Faaaaaaaaaaaaling Leeeeeeeeeeaves drift by my windowpaaaaaaaaaaane!"

                                         So Long, Autumn 2012!  You were quite a Season!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"If Fantine Doesn't Look Out, Watch How She Goes, She'll Be Out On The Street!"

                                Another look, darlings, at Anne Hathaway as Fantine in "Les Miserables," which, by my calculations, I will not be seeing until December 29.  And I won't be going alone. Because when I read or see the story of Fantine, I live it.  I am Fantine.  When I look at this photo of Anne, I see me.

                                 We live in such a capitalistic society that has no mercy for the downtrodden, just like the France of "Les Miserables."  In New York, especially, you have to hang by your claws, or, if you don't, you end up out on the street, like Fantine!  So, when I read, or see Fantine, I am confronting this worst fear about myself!  Which, much as I want the role, I would hesitate about taking it on--it would tear me up too much, emotionally--and why I don't sing "I Dreamed A Dream" too many times, unless under rare and special circumstances, because, in order to do it, I have to go to this place where Fantine is, and living in that moment is not a bit pleasant, I can tell you!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                     I can tell just from this photo alone, Anne will nail Fantine like no other.  From what I have seen, this will the rawest and most realistic portrayal of her story. No wonder people are saying when she goes, the movie takes a dive.  Though you can't fault the film; it goes back to Victor Hugo--by starting out with Fantine, he shoots his bolt in a way.  You really don't care about the other characters (except maybe Valjean and Cosette)--not that silly Eponine, and not those silly student insurrectionists.  And yet, so great a grasp has Fantine on things, that, even when not there, her presence hangs over the story.

                                      I am telling you, I will be carried from the theater on a gurney!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                      "Looooook, Monsieurrrrrrrrrrrrrr, where all the chilllllllllllldren plaaaaaaaaaaay!"

                                        I cannot wait to hear Anne sing that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                   

No Surprise Here, Darlings!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                     Girls, as odd as it may seem, you have to feel a little sorry for James Holmes!!!!! Having fired a galaxy of bullets into a Colorado movie theater on July 20, he was certainly looking good for Bitch Of The Year!!!!!!!!!  That is, until last Friday, December 14, when Adam Lanza shot his mother at their Newtown, Connecticut, home, then drove to Sandy Hook Elementary School, gunning down twenty first graders, and six caring adults!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                       Not only is he indisputably this week's Bitch Of Th Week, he is looking good for Bitch Of The Year!!!!!!!!!!! To think someone actually displaced James Holmes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                        Of course, with both Adam and his mother, Nancy, deceased, the reasons behind this tragedy may have been taken to their graves.  Psychotherapists and behaviorists will be piecing this together for some time, and we may not know the full story.  But does it matter, in the wake of so many dead, in something that, somehow, could have been prevented??????????

                                          Adam Lanza was a time bomb that needed detonation.  Who knows what efforts his mother made, but was it too little too late?  A 20 year old, and she is still searching for a school for him; he was supposedly going to one in Washington?????  What does that mean? At his age, he should be a sophomore or junior in college!!!!!!!!!  And reports are that he was brilliant, so why was he being treated like someone who needed to be in a Special Ed class for adults???????????   Where were the social workers, the crisis interventionists, in evaluating Adam?????????  Why did his mother remove him to be home schooled????????  Did the school system have his number, and she didn't like what she heard, and chose to ignore it?????????

                                           I am sure many people, most especially the victims' families, are asking these questions, and more!  And Peter Lanza, Adam's father, has much weighing on his shoulders than anyone should have to bear!!!!!!!!!  Let us not forget him!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                           And let us not forget what Adam did, so that others like him do not do it again!!!!!!!!!!!

A Day Of Lasts, Girls!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                Well, not too many, darlings, but the important one, is when the day ends today, I will have worked my last day in 2012.  The next time I put the mill to the grindstone will be in the year 2013, when who knows what will happen, be told off, or removed to the cornfield, courtesy of Little Anthony Fremont!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                  For the next two weeks, I will be celebrating the Holidays with my beloved, as well as visiting my sister and father. And you know we are going to see "Les Miserables," which you will be sure to get a full report on, girls, when I do!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                   I have reading, writing, celebrating Monsieur's birthday (he is a New Year baby!!!!!!!) so the next two weeks should be fun ahead!!!!!!!!!!  I plan to be on here, as much as I can, but
I want to start by wishing all my girls the Happiest of Holidays and the Merriest of Christmases!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                     Yule Tide greetings to all!!!!!!!!!!!! Burn that log!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!