Cat or Pitcher - 12/07

     Let's start with a riddle:  "What's the difference between a cat and a pitcher?"

     You'll get the answer if you have the stamina to read the whole blog. I've been told that I would have a wider readership if I would stop being so long-winded. No one is holding a gun to your head to force you to read the entire article. Since my blog is free, there's no subscription to cancel. That's what I did to Newsweek when that magazine had the audacity and bad taste to hire Karl (Turd Blossom) Rove  to write a weekly column and provide the opportunity to blame Congress for starting the Bush War.

     >Before getting to the main topic, let me update a few previous matters. Youssit, the five-year-old Iraqi boy almost burned to death, is making progress at a burn unit in LA. He has been given a new lower jaw. Back in Baghdad, two more of the mistreated orphans have died of cholera from tainted water. The British teacher in Sudan escaped with a light sentence for allowing her class to name a teddy bear MUHAMMAD. I find that strange having had two friends in Casablanca with the same first name-- MUHAMMAD.

     >Here's a scary revelation:  terrible tempered Bob Knight packs heat. He's now coaching in Texas. Do you suppose we could arrange for him to go on a hunting trip with VP Dick Cheney?  Dick's wife reported that when Dick was told that Obama was a distant relative, Dick said: "I knew there was something weird about him."

     > Now it's Opa-and-Oba on the campaign trail together. Hillary may be in trouble in Iowa. Internet blogs and right-wing radio misogynistics are engaging in a reprehensible, anti-feminist vilification of Clinton. The lugubrious Rush Limbaugh babbles about "Clinton's testicle lock box." Tucker Carlson of MSNBC comments: "There's just something about her that feels castrating, overbearing, and scary." Limp wrist Carlson has nothing on him to put into Rush's lock box. There's no way I can discuss the operation performed on the animated show "South Park." What a spectacle of our democracy roiling around in the gutter with the whole world looking on!

     >At a recent GOP debate, Rudy and Romney had a sharp exchange about who provided the most extensive sanctuary for illegal aliens. It brought to mind a matter I've often thought about since 9/11. THE NEW YORK TIMES published a daily list of the those unfortunates who died in the Twin Towers disaster. About 80% of the names seemed to be of Hispanic origin. I wondered if the families of the deceased were taken care of by the employers or Mayor Giulian's city. Probably quickly forgotten--after all some of them were illegal aliens. So many Americans come down hard on them, like Lou Dobbs. We all should take a look at the wealthy fleeing the CA recent fires in expensive cars, while in the fields those despicable Mexicans went on harvesting crops amid toxic fumes and debris from the fires threatening their existence. We use then, then abuse them. Whatever happened to loving one's neighbors, Mr. Dobbs?

                   End of Stagehands' Strike

     They're singing and dancing again on Broadway. The New York City theater district is alive once more with plays and musicals. Even before the strike ended, the Grinch pried open the doors of a theatre, and the scoundrel got busy stealing Christmas.

                                          

Other productions soon followed. but not before the city lost $38 million. Many restaurants in the district lost between $30.000 to $60,000. Joe Allen, owner of a well-known actors' restaurant (and incidentally my brother-in-law), said that his sales fell off about 30 percent. Joe declined to say how much he lost. "I don't want to talk money," he said. "It's gone forever. It's like being the innocent victim of  a runaway train. People talk about making it up in the spring. That ain't going to happen."

     Joe doesn't sound as upbeat as he was during an earlier strike when he served refreshments to those walking the picket lines. Broadway theatre has always had an up-and-down reputation. Some years ago, people were asking if the fabulous invalid was really dead.

     Successful productions have been based on the poetry of Dr.Seuss. His Cat in the Hat has appeared in various versions.

                                            Here are a few lines by Dr. Seuss in person:

"Oh-oh," Sally said, 

"Don't you talk to that cat,

That cat is a bad one,

That Cat in the Hat.

He plays lots of bad tricks.

Don't you let him come near.

You know what he did

The last time he was here.

     Back in 1997, he played a very mean trick. The three-story Cat in the Hat air-balloon in Macy's 71st Thanksgiving Parade knocked down a street light, injuring four of the one million spectators. One of the injured with Marta as a first name suffered a fractured skull and spent a year in the hospital. In memory of this event, I wrote a few lines of doggerel and called them "No Longer Seussable."

Would you look up there...see that?

                              It's that naughty bad Cat in the Hat.

Under the candy-cane hat, he's really unbearable,

                              Made worse pumped up ever so air-able.

See how he bobs without showing a care?

That cat doesn't know he's full of hot air.

His handlers try hard to stay on their feet:

A deadly tug-of-war along the jammed street.

The spectators' love of that cat is no longer dabatable.

A crack on the head calls for a cat less inflatable.

The wind is giving that cat the whizz-ems.

Clearly the parade has become a cataclysm.

The handlers' feet are beginning to drag.

Someone must let the cat out of the bag.

The dented hat bows as if to offer a toast.

And knocks the daylights out of the post.

Spectators run holding their heads,

All the time wishing they were safe in their beds.

They cried out: "Please, please, give us a break."

And that's what they got, plus a Cat scan ache.

     End of story? Not quite. I mentioned the injured spectator, Marta, who spent a year in the hospital, recovering from a fractured skull. On her release, she moved back to her apartment in a NYC high-rise. She could afford it because her lawsuit against Macy's had awarded her $300 million.

     You may recall my riddle:  the difference between a cat and a pitcher. I'll a give you a clue.

                                                A terrible tragedy:  a single-engine aircraft carrying New York Yankees pitcher Cory lidle and his flight instructor slammed into a 40-story apartment building on Wednesday (Oct. 11, 2006). Both men were killed in the crash that rained flaming debris onto the sidewalks.

     A number of apartments were seriously damaged. One of those apartments belonged to Marta, who this time avoided any injury.

     And now you know the answer to the riddle. Don't you?