Monthly Archives: December 2023

December 31, 2023 · 5:10 am

2023 had some plot twists I didn’t see coming

As usual, I’m devoting the last day of the year to a review of my year’s performance. As I wrote at the start of 2023, I didn’t set as many goals for the year as usual and some of the goals were vaguer than best practices recommend, such as “promote my writing” and “cook challenging things.” Then I let myself set specifics for each month. I think it worked fairly well but I didn’t get specific enough in some of my monthly goals. I shall do better this year.

Happily I met most of my goals. I wrote more than 240,000 words of fiction; finished six short stories; submitted well over the 24 stories I’d set as my goal; published 19-Infinity (which was going to be Magic in History a year ago); and signed up for Medicare. I’ve been on regular dates with TYG and I’m enjoying our marriage even more. I signed up for Medicare and improved mys social life — regular visits to a local tea-and-coffee place with friends, visits home, visits to Mensa events (and this one too!)

The first half of the year, it looked like I was really going to surge past most of my goals. Then Wisp injured her leg.

Her disgruntlement at being in a cast meant I got next to no sleep in July (she kept beating it on the bed to see if it would come off) and even after the vet removed the cast, adjusting to her as an inside cat was a lot of work. My productivity never quite recovered. It was hard exercising because she’d come and investigate what I was doing(she seems to have gotten over that) and lack of exercise affected my health and my weight (nothing I can’t recover from). Just having her an inside cat (which is better for her, better for local birds and wildlife) means another distraction on top of Plushie and Trixie.Plus while I really enjoy being back in journalism, writing articles for The Local Reporter often took more time than planned. I’m a lot more efficient than when I freelanced for the Raleigh Public Record a decade ago but not efficient enough. This year, I have to do better.

There were several goals I didn’t come close to making. I’d planned to make at least one in-person writing group meeting a month; even before the Wisp Cast I’d blown that one. I enjoy meeting in the flesh but having the zoom meetings scratches a lot of my itch to hang out with my writing friends. Plus with the added demands of pet care (as they grow older the dogs need a lot more treatment, for instance) I don’t have the flex time in my schedule — if I get up two hours late, I’m not going to get those two hours back. If I go out after the group I’m going to end up getting home so late that I’ll be useless the next day. Next year I’m going to shoot for six meetings. We’ll see if I make it.

Also, I didn’t finish The Impossible Takes a Little Longer, which I’d planned on. The group’s reaction to Let No Man Put Asunder was favorable enough I prioritized that one. Which is cool — goals aren’t a straitjacket if something better comes along — but post-Wisp’s cast, that one suffered too and my progress bogged down. Next year I’m going to finish the Asunder draft and write a second one. At least that’s the plan.

Still, overall it was a good year. The dating thing has been very good for our marriage; while I have a couple of health problems that I need to work on several others have disappeared over time so I must be doing something right. Plushie’s current health regimen means he’s livelier than he’s been in a long time. I ended the year with more money than when I started — not a lot more, but “a lot” wasn’t the goal (I know better).

Onward into 2024, which will be the topic of tomorrow’s post.

#SFWApro. Top cover by Gil Kane, 19-Infinity cover by Kemp Ward. All rights to images remain with current holders.

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December 30, 2023 · 5:15 am

We’ll miss you, Christmas!

Due to various schedule challenges, I didn’t watch as many old favorites as usual, but that should make them more fun next year. As to what I did watch …MR. MAGOO’S CHRISTMAS CAROL (1962) has a framing sequence that’s always puzzled me, the short-sighted Magoo (Jim Backus) appearing as Scrooge in a Broadway musical version of Dickens (according to the New York Times, the creators were afraid casting Magoo, an established cartoon character, as Scrooge would otherwise confuse people). But that’s a small problem compared to the excellent musical score, the loneliness of Young Ebenezer (“Where is the voice/To answer mine back?/Where is the click/to answer my clack?”), and all the usual highpoints of the story (except nephew Fred, who got cut to fit the limited running time). Well worth an annual visit. “We’re reprehensible/We’ll steal your pen/And pencible!”

2005’s THE FAMILY STONE isn’t one I normally watch but it’s one of my sister’s favorites so I picked it up when I found a copy at a local thrift store. This has Dermot Mulroney take tightly wound Sarah Jessica Parker home to his family for Christmas. Parker’s insecure enough to make this tricky in the best circumstances; it gets worse when Mulroney’s sis and mom (Rachel McAdams, Diane Keaton) take a dislike to her, then she puts her foot in it a couple of times confirming their take. Can Parker’s sister (Claire Danes) or Mulroney’s laid-back brother (Luke Wilson) set things to rights? Like Holiday in Handcuffs, Christmas is just an excuse to bring the family together, but the results are charming. I’m sure I’ll be watching this at a subsequent Christmas. “You’ve got a freak flag — you just don’t fly it.”

THE CLAUS FAMILY (2020) is a Belgian entry in the Santa’s Kids subgenre, as a teenager grieving his father’s death discovers who his grandfather is and that with Dad gone, it’s on the kid to inherit the mantle (Santa is passed down to the eldest child, boy or girl, much like Lee Falk’s Phantom). Can he step up or will his grief swallow him? Will Mom be able to keep the cookie maker she works at from going under? Could these two questions possibly turn out to have related answers? Decent enough. “Can someone explain what the cookie revolution is?”

Switching subgenres, 12 DATES OF CHRISTMAS (2011) is my favorite Christmas time-loop film, as Amy Smart starts looping her awful Christmas Eve and becomes convinced it’s so that she can reunite with her ex; therefore her blind date with Mark Paul Gosselar is nothing but a pointless distraction, right? A good Christmas rom-com. “The thing is, Phyliss is not coming. She is never coming.”

My goodness, judging by past blog posts it’s been a decade since I rewatched LOVE, ACTUALLY (2003) despite the fact it’s such an extraordinarily good movie. Liam Neeson helps his son deal with True Love, Emma Thompson discovers spouse Alan Rickman has a bit on the side, lobsters attend the birth of baby Jesus, Prime Minister Hugh Grant defends his secretary from lecherous American president Billy Bob Thornton, Laura Linney loses her shot at romance, Bill Nighy sings, Keira Knightley ends up torn between two lovers and Colin Firth falls in love with a woman who only speaks Portuguese. In a film with so many stories, it’s not surprising they’re a mixed bag — I don’t buy Knightley being torn with any indecision, for instance, and Thompson has a pretty miserable endpoint to her story. Then again, I don’t have the problem with Firth’s romance that some do — trying to marry someone you’ve never really communicated with is daft, but I’m willing to accept it in a rom-com. “We might want to have sex in every room — including yours.”

I loved SCROOGED (1988) when I caught it in the theater but it’s never been much fun to rewatch. For one thing, the topical jokes that made me chortle — Olympic gymnast Mary Lou Retton, the Solid Gold Dancers — don’t have much punch 30 years later, even though I understand them (god knows what I’d think if I were Gen Z). For another it’s surprisingly soft for such a supposedly cynical movie: where Scrooge dies alone, Murray gets mourners! While it does have some fun with the mythos, such as Carol Kane’s bludgeoning Christmas Present, I’d pick Chasing Christmas or Karroll’s Christmas for an unconventional Dickens riff. “Tiny Tom doesn’t just throw away his crutches, he vaults over a lamppost!”

CHRISTMAS WITH THE CAMPBELLS (2022) is an uninspired low-key parody of Christmas rom-coms in which a recently dumped woman winds up spending Christmas with her ex’s family anyway. Most notable for a lot of raw sex talk but that doesn’t make it worth watching.

I’m surprised the excellent CLAYMATION CHRISTMAS SPECIAL is so hard to find streaming — I have it taped off the air but the quality’s poor — but as always it’s a great fun to watch as dinosaurs debate Christmas snacks, Quasimodo leads an orchestra and walrus Margo Pontoon ice-dances with Rudolph Nerves-on-Edge. “I don’t recognize that conductor but his name sure rings a bell.”

For me, THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF SANTA CLAUS (1985) is the best of Rankin-Bass’ many stop-motion animated specials (also their last). Based on the novel by L. Frank Baum (the first of many, many origins for Santa and for Christmas traditions), it tells how an abandoned baby grows up under the care of a wood-elf and a lioness, then becomes the giver of Christmas toys despite the opposition of the grotesque Agwas that drive children to misbehave and see Klaus as a threat to their power. A remarkable piece of work.

ZOEY’S EXTRAORDINARY CHRISTMAS (2021) was a TV special wrapping up plotlines from Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, about a woman who acquires the power to see people’s innermost thoughts, but they’re expressed as musical numbers. Here she and her family are facing the first Christmas since Dad (Peter Gallagher) passed and most of the family are planning to go off solo — can Zoey convince them to stick around and celebrate as a family still? Pleasant enough but I have no regrets not catching the show. “Learn more about equine therapy!”

VIOLENT NIGHT (2022) is an oddball film in which a burned-out Santa stop for a nap along his Christmas Eve route. Wouldn’t you know, the place he picks is billionaire Beverly D’Angelo’s compound, where a gang of crooks seize her and her family with an eye to looting the $300 million slush fund from her vault. Not really Santa’s concern but there’s a little girl in the middle of all this and she’s definitely on the Nice list … I’m not sure I’ll watch this again “Okay, I changed my mind — shoot the alcoholic bitch first.”

As always, TYG and I watched A CHRISTMAS STORY (1984) after unwrapping presents. This year I found myself appreciating Melinda Dillon’s performance as Mom — as straight woman to the comic antics of Ralphie, his brother and the Old Man (Darren McGavin) she doesn’t get as showy a role but she does it well. I also thought about the visuals which do such a great job capturing an era gone by and wondering what viewers even further removed from that setting than I make of it. None of which musing stopped me enjoying the film, in case you were wondering. “You used up all the glue in the house — on purpose!”

#SFWApro. All rights to images remain with current holder.

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December 29, 2023 · 2:56 pm

The year ends, not with a bang, but not really a whimper

Just kind of quiet. And a little unsatisfactory: I’d planned on a full four days of work but I think I blew about half of them. Come 2024 I need to stop falling short.

I did more work on Savage Adventures, a little bit of work for The Local Reporter (mostly laying groundwork for stuff to do in January) and met with my editor and some of the other reporters for coffee (well, tea in my case) earlier today. Did a lot of extra dog care as TYG had a lot of year-end work stuff to do.

And then there was Christmas. Last weekend was a little odd because, being a three-day Christmas weekend, I felt like not doing much. And it’s very rare for me to just lie around on the weekend. Like so many other people, serious leisure takes a conscious effort to completely chill, but I managed it.The day itself was lovely. My presents skewed unusually practical: a new enameled cast-iron pot (the one I’ve used for four decades no longer has a handle on the lid), socks, trousers, shorts. Plus food. I did get the third Epic collection of Dr. Strange from my brother and I used some of my gift money to get the second, which is out next month. As we’re closing out the year, why don’t I talk about my 2023 blogging stats (everyone else does). Just like a year ago, my Hellboy Chronology is still the top draw. It’s nice to know it’s appreciated.  My Sherlock Holmes post discussing the quote “There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact” came in second, with two more Holmes-quote posts in the top ten. The Shirley Exception post came in at number three, down from two last year. Matt Walsh advocating for compulsory marriage and no divorce was fourth. Also in the top ten, a post about John Carter rights and one about my issues with League of Extraordinary Gentleman. A related post, about Moore’s use of the Golliwog, made #11. Most of that is close to last year’s patterns; the Matt Walsh post came in late December, too late to get on the list for 2022, but a 2021 Matt Walsh post made the cut.

The real surprise is my #9 post on the “Taylor Swift is George Soros’ puppet” bullcrap the right wing’s beens pouting. As it came out Dec. 14, I’d have expected any impact to be on next year’s list but nope. Apparently Swift’s name carries a lot of weight. Don’t worry, I’m not going to start inserting it into title gratuitously.Over at Atomic Junk Shop I reposted a blog I did some years about Christmas Carol adaptations, plus one about the badly written conspiracies in Kingsman and Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty.

At The Local Reporter, I have an article about Chapel Hill-based GoFundMe pleas. At Con-Tinual’s YouTube channel, I’m in a panel about time travel. It is, after all, an interest of mine.I wish everyone a Happy New Year and a happy 364 days after that.

#SFWApro. Comics covers by Frank Brunner (t), Matt Smith and Carmin Carnero, all rights to images remain with current holders.

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December 29, 2023 · 5:15 am

Wisp looks up. Plushie looks down

A couple of unrelated pet photos for your Friday.#SFWApro.

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December 28, 2023 · 5:13 am

Whose freedom? Wilhoit’s law

You may have heard of Wilhoit’s Law: the basic conservative principle is that the law protects Us and does not restrain Us, while it restrains Them but does not protect Them.

There’s a lot of truth to this. As Kristin Kobes Du Mez says, when someone waxes nostalgic about community and tradition, “with each sentence, with each mention of ‘citizen,’ of members of communities, families, the nation—is he talking about women, and if so, how? (The question of race is of course also important to consider in this way).” All too often the vision of the past comes with a vision of women in the kitchen, supporting the menfolk and without a life beyond that (as one woman calls out here). Case in point, Bryan Caplan who longs for the unregulated free market of the 1800s and so pretends this offered more liberty for women than such modern trivialities as equality, the right to vote, and the right not to be beagen by your husband. Or control over your body.

An article from Reason makes the same point as Du Mez about people who wax nostalgic for an imagined Golden Age of freedom. Right-winger R. Emmett Tyrell, for example, says his utopia “would be the late 18th Century but with air conditioning….With both feet firmly planted on the soil of my American domain, and young American flag fluttering above, tobacco in the field, I would relish the freedom.” Given that tobacco was picked by slaves (and in that era, possibly indentured farm labor), that’s one heavy dog-whistle — Tyrell wants his readers to know the freedom he values is for white dudes.

Same thing with freedom of speech: many conservatives are in favor of it as long as it’s their side’s freedom.  Or consider Elon Musk who says letting anti-semites rant freely on Xtwitter is free speech but criticism from the ADL is oppression. The law should protect his side’s right to speak but restrain the other side. Likewise, when 30 percent of Trump voters say they support the president breaking the law, it’s a safe bet they want it broken in ways that benefit them, not for a Democratic president to push policies they don’t like. And Trump’s fine with the idea of cutting off tax breaks to liberal colleges — hell, remember when Jared suggested doing nothing about covid because it would mostly hit blue states?

And while Republicans rant endlessly against “wokeness” in the military, they’re outraged the military tries to fight right-wing extremism in its ranks.

Or consider Clinton. After he was exposed as an adulterer he did what you’re expected to do in evangelical churches (he’s been evangelical his whole life I believe) — admit you’ve sinned, apologize, ask for forgiveness. Republicans make a big deal about how we are all sinners but Jesus offers redemption so we can put the bad stuff behind us. Because Clinton was a Them (Democrat, liberal) rather than an Us, he got no forgiveness, ever. By contrast Rep. Tim Burchette is very forgiving to members of his party whom he claims are being lured into sin, then blackmailed:

“Why in the world would good conservatives vote for crazy stuff like what we’ve been seeing out of Congress? Here’s how it works. You’re visiting, you’re out of the country or out of town or you’re in a motel or at a bar in DC and, whatever you’re into – women, men, whatever — comes up and they’re very attractive and they’re laughing at your jokes. And you’re buying them a drink. Next thing you know, you’re in the motel room with them naked.

“And next thing you know, you know you’re about to make a key vote. And what happens? Some well-dressed person comes out and whispers in your ear, ‘Hey, man, there’s tapes out on you.’ Or, ‘Were you in a motel room or whatever with whoever?’ And then you’re like, ‘You really ought not be voting for this thing.’

This makes perfect sense for some interpretations of the word “good” but none of them resemble the way I’m inclined to use it

I think a Wilhoit’s Law applies to the way so many organizations divide the world into the In group — their members, their tribe — and the outgroup. Police, for example, close ranks against anyone who threatens dirty cops: when a cop in Mississippi ran over a kid and killed him, police covered up the truth for months. Body cams were supposed to help take down the bad apples but police have undermined that.

The judiciary polices itself and that doesn’t work either.

Or consider the pastor quoted in this article: “When someone comes to bring a formal public accusation against an elder or a pastor, we are not to listen to that. We are not to entertain that. We are not to investigate that.” That’s a clear statement of Wilhoit’s law: the church protects its leaders, the in-group, and women are automatically the outsiders. The same view prevails in many other churches.

Or the current right-wing mantra that parental rights should determine the course of education. No support for gay or trans kids without parental permission. Banning books parents don’t like. Yet when Jewish parents object to schools pushing Christianity on kids (“A set of Jewish parents sued the school after learning it was holding prayer sessions, teaching Christian songs in class and promoting a teacher-led prayer group called Stallions for Christ that met during recess. The Jewish parents, who had two children at the school, also cited a teacher with a Christian cross on the classroom door, a Nativity scene in the school library and a graduation program featuring Christian songs and a student-led prayer, and religious speeches delivered by two local sheriff’s deputies.”) future Speaker Mike Johnson was outraged, claiming it was an attack on the Gospel.

Which means while putting up rainbow flags is bad because it upsets Republican parents, putting up a cross that offends Jewish parents is fine.

Wilhoit knew what he was talking about.

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December 27, 2023 · 5:15 am

Another round of date-night photos

Though as usual it’s day-date photos. These from some while back, when TYG suggested we check out a store at Southpoint Mall selling fossils.#SFWApro.

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December 26, 2023 · 5:05 am

A smattering of writing and related creative links.

Cait Corrain had an agent, a publisher and a promising career. Here’s how she shot herself in the foot. Goodreads failed to notice her review-bombing tactics (targeting other fantasies coming out around the time hers was) which has people suggesting Goodread’s time is done.

“Patriots is less an alternative history than an alternative Wikipedia entry. Evoking a sense of time and place, developing full-bodied characters, detailing complex chains of causality—things that can’t be copied and pasted from the news—are barely attempted.” — a look at one right-wing writer’s output.

Comics artist Colleen Doran tells about a publisher who tried and failed to impress her.

Much like people can engage with Marvel characters through movies instead of comics, Barbie the movie is some girls’ gateway into Barbie the doll.

The Michael Jackson estate got unreleased Jackson tapes pulled from an auction.

Setting up a fake news site is incredibly easy with AI.

Given its history, Germany is struggling with what criticism of Israel is acceptable from artists.

Are streamers yanking shows from their services to avoid paying residuals?

The right-wing freaks out over Jill Biden posting a Nutcracker Suite video. Just like Stalinists and fascists, they prefer art conform to Party doctrine.

A woman claimed Scholastic’s Drama got her addicted to porn (having read the book, I can say with certainty No Way!). By a strange coincidence she works for a rival publisher.

I’m not a sports guy but I’m all in favor of quality sports journalism. Unfortunately Sports Illustrated‘s current management apparently is not.

“I think the problem is not power, I think the problem is who you are, and whether you’re broken, and how you react to, and how you make that happen. So all of that kind of fed into the idea of an incredibly powerful being who was absolutely, in an awful lot of ways, screwed up, and could not get out of his own way.” — Neil Gaiman on writing characters as powerful as Superman.

The documentary This Changes Everything discussed how many times “after this movie’s success Hollywood will have to take women seriously!” has been a false prophecy. At Elle, Hollywood’s women creators say that’s still true.

Best Buy is about to stop selling DVDs and BluRays. The online record store Bandcamp is floundering under current management. This is bad news because physical media belong to us whereas Playstation (to use one example) is deleting content customers paid to own permanently.

Fred Clark on the awful writing of the Left Behind book series.

How romance comics taught the great Marvel artist John Romita to plot stories well.

Karen Smith, new Bucks County school board head, was sworn in on a stack of banned LGBTQ books.

Speaking of bans, just because a middle-school book has sexual topics doesn’t make it obscene — which will be news to police in parts of Massachusetts.

Speaking of sexual topics, porn performers are finding an upside to using AI in their work.

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December 25, 2023 · 5:15 am

Merry Christmas, everyone

If you don’t celebrate Christmas, then I hope you’ve been enjoying peace and good will this month just the same. If you, I hope you have wonderful gifts and a terrific Christmas dinner.

Best wishes too from the Teen Titans.BatmanAnd Plush Dog!#SFWApro. Covers by Nick Cardy (top) and Neal Adams, all rights to images remain with current holders.

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December 24, 2023 · 5:20 am

Filipina Americans, Gen Xers, Hellboy and Batman ’66: books read

Cozy fans seem to love the series cast and following their lives from book to book but that doesn’t usually hook me. MURDER AND MAMON: Tita Rosie’s Kitchen Mystery #4 by Mia P. Manansala is an exception: I really enjoyed watching the Filipina-American protagonist and her sprawling family more than I cared about following the mystery. Not that the mystery — a visiting relative gets murdered, harassers target the protagonist’s family’s laundromats — was bad, it’s just that the family turned out captivating. I’ll try another in the series eventually.

Alex Robinson’s BOX OFFICE POISON might have worked if I’d bought a copy and read it in small doses, but that wasn’t an option with a library copy. And at 600+ pages, the 1990s stories of a circle of 20something friends wasn’t compelling enough to keep me readn gmore than half way through the book .

HELLBOY AND THE BPRD: The Secret of Chesbro House by Mike Mignola and various collaborators is an excellent collection in which Hellboy battles a cyclops, a couple of haunted houses and a ghostly street in Budapest. Good, fun horror and monsters.

BATMAN ’66 MEETS STEED AND MRS. PEEL by Ian Edginton and Matthew Dow Smith is the kind of crossover that used to be confined to fan-fiction, not that I’m complaining. When British businesswoman Michaela Gough (the name will be a dead giveaway to a lot of Avengers fans — it certainly was to me) visits Bruce Wayne, Gotham City is suddenly under attack by the unstoppable robot Cybernauts. Steed and Mrs. Peel (for obvious reasons the comic didn’t go with the Avengers name) have defeated them before — but when the robot are backed up by Lord Ffog and Mr. Freeze? Good thing there’s a couple of Yanks who can team up with them, eh? This isn’t a perfect mashup — the Avengers style is quite distinctive and doesn’t fit smoothly with the Adam West show — but it’s a very fun one nonetheless.

#SFWApro. All rights to image remain with current holder. And for those who celebrate, have a Merry Christmas Eve, y’all.

 

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December 23, 2023 · 5:32 am

Christmas comes but once a year—so does my Christmas viewing

I’m not watching as much as usual this year for various reasons but I’m doing my best. For starters, one that I’ve never seen before and probably never will again, CAROL FOR ANOTHER CHRISTMAS (1964).

This TV special should have been a classic. We have Joseph Mankiewicz directing, Rod Serling writing, Sterling Hayden as the Scrooge figure, Mr. Grudge, and Ben Gazzara, Steve Lawrence, Robert Shaw, Peter Sellers, Pat Hingle and Eva Marie Saint in the cast (Peter Fonda makes a nanosecond appearance as Hayden’s dead son Marley Grudge).

The movie opens with Grudge and his idealist nephew Fred (Gazzara) in a heated argument over Grudge blocking an international exchange where one of our scientists goes to the Soviet bloc and one of their scientists works here. Fred believes only by reaching across borders can we avoid another nuclear war; Marley’s death (in Korea, I’m guessing) has convinced Grudge that isolationism backed up by the threat of nuclear weapons is our best hope for peace. The actors, talented as they are, can’t overcome that they’re not characters, they’re spokespeople for a clash of philosophies.Then the fantasy kicks in. Steve Lawrence as Christmas Past reminds Grudge of the huge body count from all the wars of the past. Christmas Present (Hingle) forces Grudge to contemplate the children left impoverished, desperate and sick by warfare; a sneering Future (Shaw) shows mad Peter Sellers ruling over a mad but inevitable post-apocalyptic dystopia (“When the first bomb dropped on Hiroshima, the fate of man could have been predicted by a cut-rate [Roma]!”).

Part of the problem, I think, is that Past and Future don’t relate to Grudge at all. Rather than showing us Grudge’s past — the usual approach for these things — Past just makes poetic speeches about the dead. Future likewise doesn’t show a horrible fate for Grudge, just a horrible future in general; having his butler (Percy Rodriguez) face death doesn’t change that. In the end it’s just a pretentious mess. “Nothing on this earth can force me to eat while starving people watch me!”

Despite the title, MIDWINTER OF THE SPIRT (2015) doesn’t take place at Christmas as I’d assumed. Not that would improve things much: this story of a vicar turned apprentice exorcist (“Your job is to protect people from the intrusion into their lives of entities half the professed Christians in this country don’t believe in.”) coming up against a Satanist and the wreckage left in his wake has no supernatural element so any common copper could have tackled this one just as well. Proof even British TV doesn’t bat 100 percent. “I am not taking a crippled gazelle to the watering hole.”

Circumstances forced me to use WHITE CHRISTMAS (1950) as something of a talking lamp — a shame, since while the plot hardly requires close attention, the dance numbers certainly deserve it. Still good entertainment, though, as Bing Crosby becomes Rosemary Clooney’s white knight, a general learns he’s not a forgotten man and snow finally falls on Vermont. “When I figure out what that means, I’ll come up with a crushing reply.”

While down in Florida I caught FROSTY THE SNOWMAN with my sister and Cindy; I agree with Cindy that this story of a wizard and a snowman struggling for control of a magic hat is one that works better when you’re young (not something I say of all Christmas specials). Given that it’s a Rankin-Bass production, I wonder why they didn’t do it stop-motion like so many other specials? “I hate to lose and run, but I have to get to writing.”

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