December 31, 2012

Welcome to Week 84 of these visits with you, the last ‘chapter’  for this year, and brought to you this time by the Committee to Make a Resolution to Avoid New Year’s Resolutions at all costs.  Hope you had a nice Christmas with your family and didn’t encounter any yucky weather if you had to travel.  The big Midwestern storm of Dec. 19 and 20 affected a lot of folks, including one of our staffers who was all set to head out to see family in Iowa and found out that roads, including big ol’ I-80, were closed across Nebraska.  He finally got out a little later than he had planned on, but he was able to make the trip.

For our part, we are getting some snow as I write this on New Year’s Eve day,  plus we had a ‘titch’ of snow on Christmas Day, just enough to whiten up the ground in a few spots.  We did have plenty of cold temps and wind to go around.  Lucky us!

One good thing from that Dec. 19th storm was some welcome precipitation across the heartland, which has been on a starvation diet all year and even longer. They got so much snow in the upper Midwest that the Army Corps of Engineers said they might not have close down navigation on the upper Mississippi after all.  The river up there was so shallow that even barges, which don’t draw a lot of water, could not make it through.  We have crossed the Upper Mississippi quite a few times on vacation trips and have always enjoyed seeing all the tow boats, barges, cruise boats and everything else that goes up and down that part of the river.  It’s hard for us to imagine a water situation so dire that they might have to close the river to navigation. I understand it has happened a few times in the past, but not recently. My old home state of Wisconsin got a ton of snow out of that storm, anywhere from 8 to 16 inches in some spots, mainly across the southern half of the state. My home town of Manitowoc, which usually gets more than it’s share from any storm due to the ‘lake effect,’ escaped this time with ‘only’ 4 to 6 inches of  the stuff.

Well, enough of all that.  Let’s talk some about a few more Christmas tunes for the last time this year  before we get to Trivia results:

1.  ‘Run Run Rudolph’ by Chuck Berry.  This is a bona fide rock and roll Christmas classic that’s been around since the 60s. As usual, Berry writes an entertaining lyric and backs it up with his always great guitar and a propulsive dance rhythm.  If you consume a few too many Christmas cookies, just put this on, crank it up and dance off those calories.

2.  ‘Sleigh Ride’ by Leroy Anderson.  He’s the guy who wrote this gazillion seller and still does the best version of it.  It’s been recorded by hundreds of artists in both instrumental and vocal versions.  And (obscure trivia) it’s one of the very few songs in history that mention the 19^th century print makers Currier and Ives.   See what valuable stuff you learn here?

3.  My third favorite is a tie between about 5 dozen other Christmas tunes, but I would have to say ‘Silent Night’ is still on top.  This beautiful classic says ‘Christmas’ to me better than anything else.  Even ‘Jingle Bells’ in Pig Latin (yes, there IS such a version) doesen’t even come close.

So, after a two week break, how did we do on Trivia?  Mixed results.  Terry got the answers to the Scrooge’s first boss question: Mr. Fezziwig, a Dickensian name if there ever was one. Congrats, Terry.  Honors go to Gary also for his knowing ‘Mistletoe and Holly’ by Sinatra as the song that has “oh by gosh, by golly,” which I seriously doubt Frank ever said in real life.  Joe also checked in and knew the song was by Sinatra, but didn’t have the title for us.

Still no takers on the question about why Jimmy Stewart called Zuzu “my little ginger snap” in the movie ‘Wonderful Life.” I’ll just give it to you: there was a cookie called ‘Zuzu’s Ginger Snaps’ in the 30s and 40s, and the movie’s script writer thought it might be fun to name the girl Zuzu.  So there you go.

Another quick music note: Terry asked what I thought of the great folk classic ‘Michael, Row The Boat Ashore.’  One of the best of the ‘folkie’ era, no doubt.

Okay, a new trio of brain busters is in order to kick off the new year:  What President’s wife pretty much ran his office for the last year or so of his term?  She was basically the nation’s first unofficial woman President.

In the movie ‘A Christmas Story’ the Chicago Bears, who used to be called ‘The Monsters of the Midway’ are mentioned sarcastically by Ralphie’s Dad.  What did he suggest they be called?

And a music question:  A guy named Bill Parsons had a huge  hit in 1959 with a song called ‘All American Boy.’  It was a novelty hit making fun of the Elvis craze and it topped out at Number 2.  What was unusual about this song?

That’ll wrap it for this week. Have fun.  Happy New Year!!!

John