Classic Rant #973 (May 30, 2013): "Giant" Heart Throb

Today, Deanna Lund is 76 years old.

Happy birthday, Deanna.

Most of you don't have the slightest idea who I am talking about, but if you were a boy in the late 1960s, you probably know exactly who I am referring to.

Lund was the sexpot on the popular Irwin Allen TV series, "Land of the Giants." The show was about an aircraft somehow breaking a barrier and ending up in a land where everyone around them was huge, and they were the size of dolls.

The show revolved around how they survived in a land where their kind was hunted. It was an extremely clever series, taking over the spot of another Allen series, "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" on the ABC schedule.

The show starred Gary Conway, Don Marshall--who, along with Nichelle Nichols of "Star Trek," were the first black actors to appear as regular characters on an American TV science fiction/action/adventure series--and Don Matheson, Lund's later husband, but to all preteen boys with hormones starting to erupt, Lund was the centerpiece of the entire show.

She played Valerie Ames Scott, who, if I remember correctly, was an actress who, let's say, fit into her outfits very well. There were other women on the series--Heather Young played the heroic stewardess--but all boys' eyes were on Lund.

Through two seasons and 51 episodes, from 1968 to 1970, the show ran, and it featured the exploits of how the lost crew and its passengers survived in a land where they were fish out of water.

The show closely resembled another Allen series, "Lost in Space," and quite frankly, it really didn't have the charm of that series, but it was clever enough to know it and run with what they had.

At the time, each episode set a record for cost, and with all of the large-sized props and elements of the show, one could see why.

Anyway, after the show ended, Lund appeared here and there on TV and in the movies. She had a major part in the film "Hardly Working," Jerry Lewis' comeback movie, and she also wrote a novel which revisited the "Land of the Giants" motif, told from the perspective of her character.

Her stardom was short-lived, but any boy like me who watched that show each and every week had to notice Lund. She kind of stuck out like a sore thumb on that show, but in a very good way.

So here's to Lund, whose role on the show lives on in TV reruns and on DVD.

Have a "Giant" birthday!

Rant #2,324: Talk Talk

Today, March 5, is the 64th day of the year.

This means that we have 301 more days until 2020.

Whoopee doo!

I have nothing else to say today ...

Not true, not true at all.

Time for a stream of consciousness Rant, so here goes--

First of all, the article that I had published in Newsday on Sunday had one tiny error, something I didn't even know about until one of the people who read the article brought it to my attention.

Here are the before and after photos, only in the online edition. Do you see something different between the caption from the first and the caption from the second, updated version?

In the first version, the caption said the photo was from the 1970s.

That was just so incorrect, it was from 1966, when the show first debuted on NBC!

This information came from the esteemed Getty Images, so why should Newsday quibble with it?

The second photo had its caption slightly altered when I brought it up to the newspaper, so that the date was removed.

Again, minor quibbles, and it does not detract at all from what I wrote.

What else can I pontificate about today?

Well, I have to go to the dentist today, which, quite frankly, is like pulling teeth for me.

I have to get a cleaning, which I am looking forward to like getting bronchitis.

Oh yes, I had bronchitis already, just a few weeks ago.

But what I did not tell you then is that right after the bout of bronchitis and right before I had my stomach ailment, my crown on a tooth on the right side of my mouth fell out.

Heck, I wasn't even eating anything on that side!

But it just popped out, I did not swallow it, and I rushed to the dentist, only to be told that the crown I had could not be used again.

The dentist put in a temporary crown, and now I have the pleasure of the next two Tuesdays--today and on March 12--spending time after work getting my teeth worked on: today a cleaning, next week to get my permanent crown (no such thing based on my personal experience) put on.

Onto the next thing--

Yes, I know that Luke Perry suffered an untimely, and kind of sudden death yesterday.

He died at just 52 years of age from the effects of a massive stroke.

Why are people so young suddenly getting strokes? I have no idea, but I did hear this morning on the news that it is because the risk factors of strokes are coming earlier in Americans, including obesity, but I don't buy that. What about in the generations prior to the recent ones where people ate what they wanted, smoked like fish, and generally abused themselves willingly?

Where were the strokes then?

In older people, so I think it all has to do with work stress, family stress, and overall stress.

We have to acknowledge that people cannot--and more importantly, should not--go 25 hours a day anymore. One has to slow down, which is something I am learning right now.

But back to Perry ...

I am sure thousands of people will reminisce about Perry as I did about Peter Took, and that is fine. One heartthrob of one generation and another heartthrob of another generation, leaving us back to back ... yes, it is very sad.

Me, I never really watched anything with him in it, so I am a true outsider looking in on this situation, knowing his name, knowing who he is, but not knowing his work really well.

He had that look though, which is very hard to define, but it is something that puts certain actors over others, and he certainly had his popularity for a spell, didn't he?

R.I.P., another one gone before his time.

Now what else can we talk about today.

If it's Tuesday, this must be Belgium.

Nah, that is taken already by a Suzanne Pleshette movie from the 1960s. and quite frankly, it makes no sense anyway ... unless you see the movie, I guess.

Other than that, I have nothing else to talk about today, but I promise that tomorrow, I will have plenty more to say.

So I will speak to you again on the 65th day of the year--

And on Wednesday, we will have just 300 more days to go until 2020.

I like that nice, round number better than 301, don't you?

Classic Rant #972 (May 29, 2013): We Still Dream of Jeannie

Who is the most beautiful woman in the world?

To me, my wife is the most beautiful. She has all the attributes that make her beautiful, both inner beauty and beauty that you can see.

But she is not famous. She is my wife and I love her to the nth degree.

As far as famous women, one of the most beautiful--at least outwardly, because I don't know her personally--is Barbara Eden, who rose to fame in the 1960s as the iconic title character in the hit sitcom "I Dream of Jeannie."

Eden, who is somewhere between 78 and 81 years of age depending on the source you use, has it all.

She has not only a pretty face, but a fantastic figure, which she showed off as much as the censors would allow on that 1960s sitcom, where she starred with Larry Hagman and Bill Daily.

Well, the other day, Eden proved that she still had it, even about 50 years later.

At the Life Ball charity event in Vienna, Austria, she donned her pink crop top and harem pants there, and shocked everybody by how good she looked in the outfit, the same one she wore on the series.

"Here it is folks--the navel that put NBC on edge," she tweeted, with a photo of her in costume.

And by the photo, she hasn't lost anything--she looks fantastic.

Heck, she even showed up former President Bill Clinton, which is a really difficult thing to do.

Eden has seemingly been around forever.

You might remember that years prior to Jeannie, she entered the public consciousness as the sweet young thing on two "I Love Lucy" episodes, the object of Ricky Ricardo and Fred Mertz's attention. Lucy and Ethel didn't like it, but what man wouldn't go ga ga over Eden?

And Eden has since spoken about that experience, saying that she was nervous the entire time because Desi Arnaz was so "handy" with her.

She made a few films after that, and then came "Jeannie."

"Jeannie" was always thought to be NBC's more sexy reaction to ABC's wildly successful "Bewitched" sitcom starring Elizabeth Monthgomery and Dick York.

"Jeannie" was never as good as "Bewitched" was, but it was a very good show on its own, pushing the censors to the brink of despair.

In those days, Eden had to cover her navel so as to be on the good side of the censors. And the scripts had to be just right, because on this show, Eden and Hagman weren't married, or at least until the end of the show's run.

So they became one of TV's first couples to live together without the benefit of marriage, although the show was very careful to point out that Tony Nelson lived in a house and Jeannie lived in a bottle.

Yeah, right.

Anyway, all these years later, how many of us could actually fit into, let's say, our bathing suits that we wore 50 years ago, 40 years ago, even 30 years ago?

I know that I couldn't. (Yes, I know, I was six years old 50 years ago, so the chances of me fitting into that bathing suit are nil. But, just for comparison sake, I know that I couldn't fit into my bathing suit of 40 years ago, when I was 16. No way, no how.)

Although it wasn't a bathing suit that Eden fit into very nicely the other day, her genie outfit is comparable, and her ability to fill it as well as she did decades ago proved that through probably excellent genes and a good diet, she can still do it and that she still has it.

Amazing!

Rant #2,323: I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter

First, the snow ...

As I told my wife yesterday as we drove back and forth to the Veterans home in Stony Brook, Long Island, to see her father--about a 100-mile round-trip for us--it was too warm for us to get much snow yesterday, and it appears that I was correct in my summation.

I am not saying it isn't bad out right now, but as we were driving back and forth there, the temperature, according to my car's readings, was 48 degrees.

Yes, it dropped to freezing levels, or near freezing levels, but I simply did not believe that it was actually going to drop enough for us to get a substantial amount of snow, and although the TV weather forecasters said we could get anywhere from three to nine inches, I look outside my window right now and it doesn't look like we got that much ... or maybe the rain washed away what we did get.

It still looks kind of messy out there as it is, so whatever we got will be bad enough.

Now, let me try to make a segueway to the gist of this post.

I am a writer, not a shoveler, and that came out to anyone who doubted that yesterday.

In Newsday, Long Island's daily newspaper, in the Act 2 section--the section of the Sunday newspaper basically devoted to older Long Islanders, anyone from about 50 on up--I had an article published in the My Turn section, where readers can send in their views on just about any subject under the sun.

The previous Sunday, right after I got up and ate breakfast, I decided to go on the computer and write about the life--and death--of the Monkees' Peter Tork. something I had written about pretty extensively already both here and on Facebook.

His passing was still a fresh wound, and I guess, as a writer, that I needed to express my feelings even further.

I sat down at the computer, typed up what I wanted to say in literally about five to 10 minutes--the piece just flowed out of me, almost writing itself--and I sent it to Newsday for a specific section in the newspaper--

And it was quickly rejected, as not fitting the theme of that section.

However, the editors still liked the piece, so they sent it to the editor of the Act 2 section, and lo and behold, it fit into the "My Turn" part of that section like a glove. Through the week, I was in contact with the editor of the section, who edited the piece down to a more workable length, and also worked with me to get photos of myself from 1966--the year the Monkees burst on the scene--which in the final product, weren't used.

I told few people--my wife and son, my parents, and one person at work--and that was that.

And yesterday it was published, and at 7 a.m. in the morning on a Sunday, my sister called me, and told me how surprised she was to see my efforts in the newspaper, and all day, I got numerous kudos on Facebook about the story, so I am satisfied and happy with the response.

In a nutshell, I basically paralleled, to a certain extent, Peter's rise and fall and rise again with my own peccadillos over the years, and how the news of his death put me in a certain state of mind.

Like I said, the story basically poured out of me, wrote itself, and it was tightened up a bit by some editing, but in the final copy, it really read pretty well, I thought.

I had been in Newsday many times before over the past 40 some years or so, but I hadn't been in the newspaper since the reunion of my old neighborhood a couple of years ago.

Ironically, this coming Saturday, my family and I are going to see "The Micky and Mike Show," pretty much what is left of the Monkees today with Peter's passing and Davy Jones' passing a few years ago.

I think it should be a generally happy affair, but it will also be a poignant one, as Peter--who was not part of this tour, handling his own health matters--will certainly be remembered.

The outpouring of interest--and love--for Peter when he died took a lot of people by surprise, and it even forced MeTV to put the Monkees TV show into their Sunday TV sitcom rotation.

Maybe it will open some eyes at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, although I am certainly not holding my breath on that. Nominations and entrance voting appears to be as phony there as a WWE match, so you throw the baby out with the bathwater trying to reason out such things.

But whatever the case, a piece of my childhood is gone with Peter's passing, and I hope I got across to readers exactly how I was feeling at that time and place.

You can access the article at https://www-newsday-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.newsday.com/amp/lifestyle/retirement/peter-tork-s-death-takes-part-of-baby-boomer-childhood-1.27830766?usqp=mq331AQCCAE%3D&fbclid=IwAR33-JJkcKKqVwwp9fNOkaBLo7JixrlRpxQyTcQpSgxS8AoqP07werFApiQ&amp_js_v=0.1#referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newsday.com%2Flifestyle%2Fretirement%2Fpeter-tork-s-death-takes-part-of-baby-boomer-childhood-1.27830766

Classic Rant #971 (May 29, 2013): Graduation Situation

Now that Memorial Day is behind us, we are firmly in the period where schools across the country graduate their senior classes.

Many colleges have already held their commencement ceremonies, and from now into June, middle schools and high schools will send out their seniors into the world.

And part of the process is getting the dreaded graduation picture.

I remember in junior high school--that is what it was called back then--we went as a class into the library and we had a class picture taken.

No individual photos were taken, if I remember correctly, and that class photo was given to parents and ended up in our yearbook, which I am currently posting on my Facebook site honoring my old neighborhood or Rochdale Village, South Jamaica, Queens, New York.

In high school, I remember that we had our pictures taken during the summer, in August. I remember the day very clearly. It was a hot and windy day, and like most boys at the time, I wore my hair fairly long. We were told to wear suits and ties, and like most of the other guys, I wore a suit and tie on the top, and since it wasn't going to be a long shot, I wore shorts and sneakers on the bottom.

I walked to school, as I was about three months away from getting my driver's license. The wind swirled that day, and by the time I got to school, my hair was a mess. I didn't have a comb, so I patted it down, took the picture, and that was that.

The way the picture came out spoke a thousand words about what I thought about high school--and myself--at the time.

My college photo I don't remember at all. The only thing I do remember is that my hair was combed a bit better than it was for my high school photo, and that it came out pretty good.

Now, I am going through this picture-taking process with my son, who graduates high school next year.

This is going to be a photo for the ages, as at least right now, he isn't going to college, so my wife and I want this photo to be the best that it can be.

Things are done much differently now. Kids are given an assigned time to take the picture, which is not taken in the dead of summer anymore, but during the school year.

Next Wednesday, at 5:08 p.m., he has his appointment.

Suits and ties are not required anymore, just a nice top for the boys, so he won't wear a tie, just a nice shirt.

He has to get a haircut this weekend, so he won't have a problem with his hair like I did.

It should go well, I hope. We have told him that his high school portrait is one for the ages. It forever defines him, and will be referred back to when people go through their yearbooks 10, 20, 30, 40 and more years afterward.

It is among the most important photos he will ever take.

I went through this with my daughter, but it was very, very different.

Her mother was uncooperative during the whole process, and I couldn't even go through the school to get the photo. I had to go through the photographer, who also gave me hell, but finally, it was all sorted out and I received her photo, which was pretty good at that.

So on Wednesday, my son will have his picture taken, and my wife and I hope it turns out just great.

Clearly, my on does not understand how important this photo really is, nor should he understand.

But by the time he is my age, he will understand, I can guarantee you that.

Rant #2,322: Everyday People and Crimson and Clover Build Me Up Buttercup and Touch Me Proud Mary

Well, enough Marilyn Munster already!

And enough about Amazon reconsidering their decision to pull out of having their second headquarters in Long Island City, Queens. New York legislators can literally get on their knees and beg them to reconsider--which Governor Cuomo and others have been doing for the past month since the announcement--but Amazon would have to be absolutely crazy to go back on what they said.

Once bitten, twice shy, as has been said.

So, enough Marilyn Munster, enough Amazon, let's get to something that is far more interesting and fun to look back at--

The top singles for this week 50 years ago in 1969.

Sometimes you have to look back to move forward, and I think looking back at what we were listening to in music in 1969 is the perfect tonic for the troops, and it will help me continue to get better with my own health--where I am 99 and 9/10 percent back to where I should be.

So let's go back 50 years on this first day of March and see what was happening on the Billboard Hot 100 a half century ago.

For the week beginning March 1, 1969, the top record in the country--and probably the top band at this point in time--was "Everyday People" by Sly and the Family Stone. Led by Sylvester Stewart, the music-bending band tapped into rock, soul, and rhythm and blues and came out with funk, and this was one of their best songs to demonstrate this then-unique mix.

Right behind it at No. 2 was its predecessor at No. 1, "Crimson and Clover" by Tommy James and the Shondells. The band almost seamlessly moved from AM radio darlings to AM/FM radio superstars with this tune, and it led off a whole slew of AM/FM hits for the band.

What the British call "Northern Soul" was firmly at the No. 3 position on the charts, as the Foundations' "Build Me Up Buttercup" came in the "show" position for the week, followed by the Doors' "Touch Me" at No. 4.

Rounding out the top five was "Proud Mary" by Creedence Clearwater Revival. Its placement so high on the chart signaled the emergence of "Swamp Rock," a murkier kind of pop music, into our sensibilities.

The Turtles took an old Byrds' tune and made it their own with "You Showed Me," which came in at No. 6 this week, followed by "This Magic Moment"--another cover version, originally done by the Drifters--by Jay and and Americans at No. 7.

Motown continued to be ubiquitous on the Billboard Hot 100 into 1969 and beyond, and at No. 8 was "Baby, Baby Don't Cry" by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles. Of all their biggest hits, this one, for whatever reason, gets the least airplay on oldies radio today.

Yet another cover version came in at No. 9 this week, as the Brooklyn Bridge's "Worst That Could Happen" filled the No. 9 slot. This song was an almost note by note cover of the 5th Dimension's original version of the tune from a year or so earlier, and the song is another in the canon of Jimmy Webb.

Rounding out the top 10 most popular songs for the week was "Dizzy" by Tommy Roe, one of the all-time great bubblegum hits which made a dizzying path to the No. 1 slot, which it would occupy just two weeks later.

The highest debuting record on the Hot 100 this week was "Rock Me" by Steppenwolf at No. 63. This would eventually be the third and final Top 20 song for the band, hitting No. 10, but John Kay and his band would hit the Hot 100 10 other times through the mid 1970s with other songs.

Edwin Starr's "25 Miles" was the biggest mover on the chart, jumping from No. 94 to No. 66 in just one week. The song would eventually reach No. 6, one of more than a dozen Hot 100 hits by the singer through the late 1970s.

So there you have it ... no Marilyn Munster, no Amazon, just some absolutely great music, one classic after another.

Speak you again on Monday, Have a great weekend.

Classic Rant #970 (May 24, 2013): Memorial Day

Coming up on Monday is Memorial Day, the day we honor those who have served, and gave their lives, for our country in the numerous wars we have fought leading up to our country's creation in 1776 and beyond.

Once known as Decoration Day, the holiday falls every year on the last Monday in May.

In recent years--or for as long as I can remember--Memorial Day has taken on a different meaning.

Not to knock our service men and women--who continue to protect our country from unimaginable peril each and every day--the holiday means so many other things now.

First of all, many of us have off on that day, including, incredibly, myself.

I personally get so few holidays off during the year that I look forward to Memorial Day like a bee looks forward to the next flower it can pollinate.

Memorial Day also signals the beginning of the summer season.

Notice I say "the summer season," because summer actually doesn't come for several weeks after, in late June. But it signals warmth, hot nights and days, and so the holiday is thought of as sort of a gateway to summer and all the fun that that season brings.

And finally, Memorial Day generally signifies the day when many of us, myself included, have our very first barbecue of the year.

Honestly, I can taste those hot dogs right now! I love to barbecue, so if the weather holds up, it will certainly be my family's maiden barbecue of 2013.

Many parades are held during this holiday, and most of them are seemingly precursors to barbecues, so even if we honor our war dead--and again, this is not a knock against any of our service people--we gradually move toward family oriented events during the holiday.

This makes Memorial Day one of the most family oriented holidays on the calendar, and a day we can all look forward to.

As it is, my wife has to work on this holiday. I don't like it, she doesn't either, but at least I will be home with my son, and hopefully see my daughter that day for our barbecue, which we will have when my wife gets home from work.

If nothing else, it gives her a day off from cooking.

For me, Memorial Day represents a brief respite from work, and it comes at a very good time.

I hope it does for you too.

Have a nice holiday, and I will speak to you again on Tuesday.