samhexum

Granted, I have a garage spot, but I'd rather live anywhere in the northeast than anywhere in California. I once went to LA for work, and as I drove my rental car off the lot, a voice on the radio told me it was the 200something consecutive sunny day in LA. I almost turned the car around right then and there. I hate heat and excessive (meaning more than 5 days a week) sunshine. I always laugh when the designers on HGTV rave at all the 'natural light' flooding the rooms from sun pouring through the windows. My first instruction to a designer would be: THICK, DARK curtains to block out as much sun as possible.

I got good numbers in my company's Stupor Bowl pool.

Right after getting hired at “60 Minutes,” Ira Rosen witnessed one of Mike Wallace’s signature meltdowns. It was 1980 and Rosen, then 26, was on his first assignment for the legendary news program, investigating union violence in Los Angeles. The newly minted junior producer had spent weeks sweet-talking a federal investigator into agreeing to appear on camera with Wallace, CBS News’ top correspondent. But while Wallace was in transit to the West Coast, the source bailed out. Senior producer Allan Maraynes broke the bad news as he drove Wallace into town from the airport, with Rosen in the back seat. “Mike went crazy,” Rosen writes, grabbing fistfuls of documents from Maraynes’ briefcase and hurling them into his face as he struggled to keep the vehicle on the road. “Wallace cursed Allan, told him that he was a failure as a producer, and that he would be demoted as soon as we returned to New York. It was the most astonishing verbal abuse I had ever witnessed.” Later, a shell-shocked Rosen asked Maraynes how he withstood the tantrum. “I tuned him out,” his colleague explained wearily. “If you are going to listen to everything he says, you will go crazy, so I figured out a way to go into a cone of silence.” That incident set the blueprint for Rosen’s next four decades. “I’d rather work with a talented asshole than a nice person without talent,” Rosen writes in “Ticking Clock” (St. Martin’s), out Feb. 16, his memoir about his career at “60 Minutes” and its competitors, ABC’s “20/20” and “Primetime Live.” Luckily for him, the TV news business is stacked with talented assholes. When Rosen joined “60 Minutes,” Wallace, then 62, was a journalism legend, known for his hard-hitting exposés and tough interviews that held wrongdoers’ feet to the fire. The CBS ad department made his reputation a slogan — “The four most feared words in the English language: Mike Wallace is here.” “Unfortunately,” Rosen says ruefully, “that applied to those working with him as well.” Wallace gave Rosen his big break, taught him the ropes of investigative journalism and provided a master class in interviewing and showmanship — all while spewing a constant barrage of invective and belittlement. In public and in private, Wallace “seemed to define his life by how much trouble he could cause.” He delighted in loudly quizzing Rosen about his sex life when the two were out to dinner and wrecked Rosen’s wedding by whispering dark comments to the father of the bride (“Does she know what she is getting into?” he said, sighing deeply. “I have to tell you about him — wait, the wedding is starting”). At the office, he was notorious for his “Neanderthal behavior” toward women, snapping their bra straps and slapping their bottoms. When one female producer reacted with a furious smack in the face, Wallace was perplexed. “What the hell is her problem?” he wondered aloud. Co-workers today “might call HR, hire an attorney, and threaten a very public lawsuit,” Rosen admits. “But in those days the possibility of such actions never even crossed my mind.” Indeed, since Wallace left the airwaves in 2008, a string of CBS News correspondents and executives — including Charlie Rose, CEO Leslie Moonves, and “60 Minutes” boss Jeff Fager — have been ousted over allegations of sexual misconduct. It wasn’t only underlings who got the Wallace treatment. He ran roughshod over his fellow correspondents, too, regularly poaching stories from colleagues Ed Bradley and Morley Safer. “Mike would send his producers out to steal a source or a character who was key to a story, and then he would quickly film it before the other correspondent found out,” Rosen writes. Safer, especially, took offense at these thefts. “Months would go by in which Safer would not speak to Wallace, even though their offices were next door to each other.” Picking fights with colleagues “gets your blood moving,” Wallace once told Rosen. “It makes you feel alive.” Although Wallace’s behavior was extreme, he wasn’t alone. Rosen writes that the industry is rife with divas and head cases who make life miserable for their crews. The “two-faced” Diane Sawyer was infamous for her behind-the-back insults. “If she was overly friendly and began to kiss you on the cheeks to say hello, chances are she was trashing you behind your back,” Rosen dishes. Sawyer would be all smiles when she ran into Barbara Walters in ABC’s hallways, chuckling over rumors that the two were at odds — and dropping the act the moment Walters was out of range. “Inside the elevator, Diane looked at me and said, ‘I hate that woman. Don’t believe a word she says. She knifes me any chance she gets,’ ” Rosen writes. “She had the look of someone who wanted vengeance.” In 1998, when ABC execs made Sawyer and Walters co-anchors of a Sunday night show, their secret enmity made the forced collaboration a nightmare. “They fought over who greeted the TV audience and who said good night,” Rosen recalls. After much negotiation, Walters was given welcome duties and Sawyer had responsibility for the sign-off. But no one could stop Walters from adding a final “good night” a moment after Sawyer bid the audience adieu, giving her the last word every week and enraging her on-air partner. “They even counted the number of words each one had, introducing the stories,” Rosen writes. “It was a total disaster.” Chris Cuomo, now an MSNBC anchor, brought little journalism experience — but a heaping helping of entitlement — to ABC when he landed a correspondent’s job there. “His brother [now-Gov. Andrew Cuomo] nicknamed Chris ‘Mansion Boy’ because Chris spent his teen years at the governor’s Albany mansion” during their father’s administration, Rosen snickers. In 2003, execs at “Primetime Live” asked Rosen to mentor Cuomo in investigative journalism. “I reluctantly agreed,” Rosen writes. “Cuomo greeted me with, ‘I understand that you are my new bitch.’ ” “He lost me at hello,” Rosen recalls. “That son of a bitch Cuomo, I thought, he is definitely going to go far in this business.” While his caustic arrogance was unwelcome at ABC, Cuomo made it part of his act on cable. Katie Couric infuriated Rosen during her short and unhappy “60 Minutes” stint. “Lazy and disengaged, and thought she was smarter than all of us who worked on the show,” he judges. “She wasn’t.” In 2008, at the height of Hillary Clinton’s presidential primary battle with Barack Obama, “60 Minutes” scored a coup: Both candidates agreed to let the show behind the scenes of their campaigns to film twin segments that would run in the same Sunday night slot. Couric was assigned the Clinton interview. But while producers wanted to challenge the former first lady with weighty questions, Couric was determined to go with her trademark perkiness. She tossed Rosen’s script and went for the fluff. “How do you do it? … I’m talking about pure stamina,” Couric began as Rosen steamed on the sidelines. Clinton answered with a laundry list of grandmotherly inanities: “I take vitamins. I drink tea, not coffee anymore … Wash your hands all the time. And if you can’t, use Purell.” “The interview went downhill from there,” Rosen gripes. “I kept thinking, ‘For this, they are paying Katie $15 million a year?’ ” Mike Wallace never mellowed with age. At ABC, Rosen partnered with Chris Wallace, who had a fractious relationship with his father both personally and professionally. “I now found myself in the weird position of passing along the lessons I learned from his father to his son,” Rosen recalls. In 1997, as Chris Wallace prepared a story on comedian Chris Rock, his father derailed it — by convincing Rock to do a sit-down with him instead, since “60 Minutes” had better ratings. “This was a betrayal on so many levels. I felt I had to call Mike,” Rosen writes. “ ‘Mike, why would you rip off your kid?’ I asked. “ ‘He’ll get over it,’ Mike replied.” Rosen begged him to reconsider, saying, “Your choice is simple. You can have Chris speak at your funeral, or you can do the profile of Chris Rock.” “Fifteen minutes later, Mike called. ‘I solved the problem. I gave the story to Ed Bradley.’ ” Father and son did not speak to one another for nearly a year. But when Mike Wallace died in 2012 at 93 years old, Chris still paid tribute to his father: “My dad was everything you saw on television: fascinating and funny, challenging and exasperating,” he said in a statement. “And while work often came first for him, over the last 20 years, he worked hard to make connections with his family. He became my best friend.”

On the other hand, Liza might not need a harness and invisible wires to do the flying. ☺?

LeBron James and Giannis Antetokounmpo might be competitors in rival conferences, but they share the same sentiments regarding the league's plans to hold an All-Star Game in March in Atlanta. Fresh off a 33-point, 12-rebound performance in Milwaukee's 123-105 win at Cleveland on Friday night, Antetokounmpo backed James' position on the game happening in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. "I think every player was looking forward to those five days, seven days, whatever the days are. We've got to all follow the big dog," Antetokounmpo said, referring to James. "The big dog says he has zero excitement and zero energy for the All-Star Game, and I'm the same way. I really right now don't care about the All-Star Game. We cannot see our families. "Like, I can't worry about the All-Star Game. I want to see my family. I want to go see my little brother in Spain, I want my brother to come see me," he added. "So I'm the same way. I've got zero energy, zero excitement. At the end of the day, if they tell us we're gonna show up, we've got to do our job. I'm always gonna do my job. I'm always showing up, showing the right example. But at the end of the day inside, deep down, I don't want to do it. I want to get some break." Antetokounmpo's remarks came a day after James criticized the league's All-Star Game plans. Other stars spoke out against the game Friday, including the Brooklyn Nets' James Harden and the LA Clippers' Kawhi Leonard. Antetokounmpo was second behind Brooklyn's Kevin Durant in the Eastern Conference's frontcourt in the first fan returns of NBA All-Star voting. The reigning back-to-back MVP and Defensive Player of the Year has played in the past four All-Star Games, citing his 2020 experience in Chicago as being "very fun for the fans." "At the end of the day, if we have the All-Star Game, I hope fans can be there and we can give back to them," Antetokounmpo said. "At the end of the day, if we have the All-Star Game just to have the All-Star Game and have no fans, I don't see the point of having the All-Star Game." Antetokounmpo, like James, said he was under the impression that the league wouldn't hold the yearly showcase until reports indicating otherwise began to surface. He said he would much rather use the time to decompress from basketball rather than competing on that night. "I thought about it, obviously. Coming into the season, what we knew was there's not going to be an All-Star Game, it was going to be a time to spend time with our family," Antetokounmpo said. "Obviously, when the protocol changes it's kind of hard because on the road, your family cannot come on the road. Back home you cannot leave the house, you only can go to the practice facility or to the arena, and you don't have time to take your family to a nice dinner or your family coming on the road or like just escaping the game." Phoenix Suns guard Chris Paul, who is president of the players' union, responded Friday to negative comments made by players about the All-Star Game. "Guys are entitled to their feelings, decisions and everything," Paul said. "I think the job for the union is to try to make sure our players are healthy and safe. This is something that was a decision by the league, and we are definitely, day in and day out, trying to figure it out. But we have 450 players that we are always trying to get insight from, and it's tough, so we are trying to figure it out right now." Harden on Friday night said he feels "the same way" about the All-Star Game as stars such as Antetokounmpo and James. "There's so much going on as far as we're trying to calm the virus down -- and we're putting on an event, you know?" Harden said. "I know what the reasoning is for, but I feel like, especially with a condensed schedule, it feels like everything was forced upon players. It's already draining to be playing a lot of games in a week. I feel like that was a week for us to kind of relax, be with our families and kind of take a step back away from basketball." Leonard said the league's decision is a matter of valuing "money over health." "I mean, we all know why we are playing it. You know, there's money on the line," he said. "It's an opportunity to make more money. ... Just putting money over health right now, pretty much. Yeah, we are playing games now, and it is still a pandemic. We are doing all these protocols and rules, so it doesn't really surprise me." Paul said he has had recent discussions with players such as James and Golden State Warriors star Stephen Curry and acknowledged the difficulty of the league's schedule and being away from family. "We get on calls and we try to figure it out with different situations of guys who've been playing a lot of games who haven't really had much of breaks," Paul said. "I'm sure I'm not the only guy in the league that lives without their family, so guys look at that break as an opportunity to see their families. "... The union has always got the full body of players in mind. But emotions happen, guys have feelings and you gotta be able to express them, and I respect that."

Hugh Jackman and (as Jack McFarland said) his huge ackman.

If I were her, I think I'd go with Elizabeth.

How about...???

What, you couldn't see Liza as Mary Poppins? ?? How about Julie opposite Dudley Moore in Arthur? ?

I think Bjorn sang it best:

You keep trying to make up words by phonetically spelling things that look and sound ridiculous. Look at most of the names others have posted. Some may be like what you do, but the majority take an actual name and then make a pun out of it. For example, Anna Phalaxys (by @Lchnsf) or the legendary Hedda Lettuce, which I sometimes use to send my friend product samples (c/o Caesar Salad).

https://www.gocomics.com/the-born-loser/2021/02/06

Valerie Mahaffey was right in the middle of my original list of actors you can't stand, but I have to say I enjoyed her more in her last couple of scenes in this week's episode than I ever did before.

What are your plans for Stupor Bowl Sunday? I'll probably start doing my taxes.

Hope the :mad:Dodgers:mad: would sign a premium free agent (so the :mad:Mets:mad: wouldn't get him) or Have an in-home wellness visit (after they raised the gift card incentive from $15 to $25 to $50 and finally $75) or Buy my nephew a new guitar for Christmas (it was actually a pack of twelve 22-inch blow-up guitars of different colors, so that he can impress girls by color-coordinating his guitar to his outfit)

At least I didn't say anything about how her performances could be fixed by pouring Liquid PLUMMER into the toilet.

I didn't say she's terrible. I said she's annoying. She did an episode of SVU in which a serial rapist was preying on disabled women, and she played a (very) paranoid schizophrenic who was attacked but helped the cops apprehend the guy. Each time I've seen the episode (I watch Stabler-era SVU reruns a lot) and she exhibits all of the quirks and tics of the character I think either "Finally! Amanda Plummer found the perfect role to showcase her acting style!" or "Yet another typical Amanda Plummer performance." She was quite effective in the role, but I'd rather hear Yoko Ono sing than watch Amanda Plummer act in anything that doesn't have Christopher Meloni's ass in it.

Try using lube. ?

AMANDA PLUMMER!!!!!!

Millionaire forced to tear down his illegal $70M French chateau https://nypost.com/2021/02/05/millionaire-forced-to-tear-down-illegal-70m-french-chateau/ What are they gonna do — make me tear it down? Yep. British developer Patrick Diter has been ordered to demolish his $70 million custom-built mansion in Provence, France, which he seemingly built without the right permits. Diter spent over a decade fighting for his self-named Chateau Diter, but the highest French appellate court made its final decision in December: The Tuscan palace has to go. Now Diter has only 18 months to make the 32,000-square-foot home completely disappear. Diter spent €57 million — or about $68.6 million — from 2005 to 2009 creating the house made of imported Italian stones, according to the Daily Mail. The property near Monaco has two helipads, a salt water swimming pool, a medieval cloister, a bell tower and a greenhouse, plus 17 acres of gardens, vineyards, olive groves and lily ponds, according to a rental listing. The 18-bedroom house is filled with chandeliers, 15th-century fireplaces and fresco paintings. There is also a reception room, a library, a screening room, lounges, dining rooms, a steam room, a staff kitchen and a cellar with a wine-tasting room, another listing shows. Over the past 15 years, the house has been a TV set, a wedding venue and a vacation spot, with rates ranging from $300 to more than $1,000 a night. Eight of the 18 bedroom suites have a private garden or terrace, and one apparently has a painted fresco ceiling. Diter allegedly had a building permit — a verbal one from the mayor’s office. But he reportedly began work on the property before receiving an official paper permit. And the permit supposedly didn’t cover all the major work he did — it only covered a “small extension” of the original 2,000-square-foot farmhouse on the property, according to AirMail. Also problematic: Diter allegedly paved a 2,000-foot driveway through environmentally protected lands. Now, it inadvertently funnels rainwater to the outskirts of the town, causing flooding, according to AirMail. But the major sticking point? Loud parties. Diter’s neighbors claim that the noise has made life in their own French chateaus unbearable, and they have been major players in the campaign to have the house torn down. Diter has not conceded to tearing it down and may escalate the decision to the European Court of Human Rights, according to AirMail. “That’s ridiculous. Nobody has violated Patrick Diter’s human rights. His rights have been taken into account every step of the way during this legal journey,” a local official said. If the house is still standing in June 2022, Diter will rack up charges of $600 each day,according to the Daily Beast — which is only about $220,000 a year. Maybe he can afford it.

So what does she owe you?

It's sad that he died, but why is it a tragedy? Everyone dies eventually. He lived a good life, had much success and recognition in his chosen career, and lived to 91. I think most people would happily choose being able to have that said about them after their death. Although most people probably wouldn't want to be known for gifting the world with one of its most annoying actresses. (daughter Amanda.)

It's sad that he died, but why is it a tragedy? Everyone dies eventually. He lived a good life, had much success and recognition in his chosen career, and lived to 91. I think most people would happily choose being able to have that said about them after their death. Although most people probably wouldn't want to be known for gifting the world with one of its most annoying actresses. (daughter Amanda.)

I'd be Jake 60th.

I'd be Jake 60th.