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Friday, November 16, 2012

Without a Trace


I've unwittingly noticed a bit of a pattern in the various topics that I have chosen over the last couple of weeks or so on Fridays. Perhaps you've noticed it too? If not, I'll explain what I mean.

With the exception of the entry that focused on the various Simpsons Treehouse of Horror specials, the last month, I've featured television shows that have three things in common.

1 – They were all shows that aired on CBS
2 – They were all shows that were drama series on CBS
3 – They were all shows that ended up being canceled by CBS.

Who knew that “Ghost Whisperer”, “Joan of Arcadia”, and “Cold Case” had so much in common?

Well, why break with this trend? Today's show also happens to be a dramatic series that aired on CBS until it was canceled.

What I found interesting about all of these shows was the fact that all of them had a unique theme to them that helped them stand out. “Ghost Whisperer” featured a woman who could communicate with the spirits of the dearly departed, “Joan of Arcadia” showcased a teenage girl who could speak with God, and “Cold Case” featured a team of detectives who re-investigated old murder cases that were never solved.

And for today, we'll be looking at show that featured a team of detectives that worked for the Federal Bureau of Investigations (otherwise known as the FBI) aiding in the search for missing people.

I'm not talking about the missing people whose faces could be found in department store lobbies or milk cartons. I'm talking more along the lines of people who have disappeared more recently than that, like within a 48-hour time period.

I'm not exactly sure where I heard this statement...for all I know, I could have heard it on this show...but I have heard that the more time that passes after the initial 48-hour period, the less of a chance that a missing person is found alive. So it's incredibly crucial that investigators and police work as quickly as possible to make sure that they can save the life of a person who has gone missing.

As many of you know, the circumstances in which a person can go missing are plenty. They can be kidnapped or abducted, they could have some sort of disease or mental illness that causes them to wander off, they could have gotten lost in an unfamiliar area...and in some bizarre cases, they could even fake their own deaths.

All of these plots and more could be found in this television show.



The Jerry Bruckheimer produced program “Without A Trace” is our topic for today, a show that aired on CBS from September 26, 2002 until May 19, 2009.



The series depicted five (six as of season four) detectives who worked for the FBI offices in New York City. Each episode, they would be alerted to a missing person (or in some cases, persons), and they would have to work together to try and locate the person before something terrible happened.

In almost all the cases, the missing person was found alive...but sometimes the ending wasn't a happy one. And in some cases, the missing person ended up being involved in criminal activities, and the team had to try and locate them before they caused innocent people harm.

You think that's stressful enough? That's not even counting all of the personal struggles that all six of the detectives had to deal with during the course of the series.

What sorts of personal problems are we talking about?

Well, let's start with introducing the team members and go from there.



The leader of the team is Special Agent John Michael Malone, otherwise known as Jack (Anthony LaPaglia). During the first two years of the series, he has to take care of his ailing father (Martin Landau) who is battling Alzheimer's Disease. He also ends up getting divorced from his wife, and struggles to be a single parent to his two daughters. Jack also gets abducted and is tortured by his kidnapper, and suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, which leads to him getting demoted. He does get reinstated as team leader in the final season. He also gets involved in a couple of relationships during his time on the series, including one of his own team members...



Special Agent Samantha “Sam” Spade (Poppy Montgomery) is introduced as the other woman that Jack is having an affair with at the beginning of the series. And would you believe that the affair goes on and off during the entire length of the show's run? But by the end of the series, Sam ends up finding her one true love, and gives birth to a child. Samantha's time on the series was quite memorable as well. At the end of the first season, she gets shot, and ends up getting severely beaten up while going undercover in a missing persons case. Samantha also ends up having a secret relationship with fellow detective Martin Fitzgerald, and she also has a strained relationship with her family after it is revealed that she murdered her mother's boyfriend with a shovel after she discovered that he was sexually abusing her sister.



Special Agent Vivian “Viv” Johnson (Marianne Jean-Baptiste) is the second-in-command of the missing persons team at the FBI. If anything were to happen to Jack, she would immediately take over. When Jack moved to Chicago in order to try and save his marriage, Viv took over. But when Jack came back after his marriage inevitably failed, he returned to his old job, which caused tension between her and Jack. She and Jack did settle things, and she probably understood Jack better than anyone else. She has a teenage son named Reggie, and she underwent open heart surgery in the middle of the series, making a full recovery.



Next up is Special Agent Danny Taylor (nee Alvarez) (Enrique Murciano) probably has the most troubled background out of anyone. He lost his parents in a car accident when he was little, and shouldered most of the blame on himself, as the car crashed as his father turned away from the wheel to yell at him. He ended up being shuffled from foster home to foster home, and as a result is sympathetic to children with poor home situations, much like Samantha. Danny helps Martin get over some personal issues, sees Jack as a father figure, and has a very close relationship with Samantha and Viv. His brother ended up becoming a drug addict and Danny did whatever he could to get him on the straight and narrow. At the end of the series, he ended up marrying...



Special Agent Elena Delgado (Roselyn Sanchez). As you may have learned from the last paragraph, Elena ended up marrying Danny at the end of the series. She actually didn't join the series until the fourth season. When she first appears, we quickly learn that she fled from her ex-boyfriend Carlos Aguilar, and is a single parent to her daughter, Sofia. She didn't have a huge role in the series until she got involved in a nasty custody battle with Carlos. The battle climaxed with Carlos kidnapping Elena, but she was rescued by the team and began seeing Danny shortly after.



The final member of the team is Special Agent Martin Fitzgerald (Eric Close), who has quite a huge role on the series. Originally with White Collar Crimes in Seattle, Washington, Martin's father had him transferred to the FBI offices in New York. The pilot episode of the series was Martin's first day. Despite some of the team (Danny in particular) believing that Martin's transfer was brought on by favortism, Martin's relationship with his father is lukewarm at best. Martin ended up shooting a suspect in suspicious circumstances (which Viv witnessed), and the two of them kept it under wraps until Martin confided in Jack what really happened. Martin ended up having a brief relationship with Samantha, and ended up getting shot several times while transferring a prisoner to a detention facility. The shooting caused Martin to develop an addiction to painkillers...one that Danny helped him kick.

So, that's about all that I have to say about the characters of “Without A Trace”. Now for some of the cases. I don't have a lot of time to go over all of them in detail, but I will briefly talk about some of the more memorable cases below. I'll write down the season and episode number for you, in case you want to find them yourselves.

Season 1, Episode 1 (9/26/2002) – The episode where it all began. It's the perfect episode to introduce the team characters, as well as the premise of the show.

Season 1, Episode 5 (10/24/2002) – When a teenage boy goes missing from a private school, Jack discovers that the headmaster may be responsible. And believe it or not, this episode is the beginning of a storyline that lasts almost a whole year!

Season 1, Episode 11 (1/9/2003) – The victims are just two young girls...and Samantha develops an obsessive need to find them before something terrible happens.

Season 1, Episodes 22 and 23 (5/8/2003 and 5/15/2003) – Doing a case based around the 9/11 attacks just a year and a half after they happened was a risky move, but I think these two episodes did a fantastic job handling a sensitive subject. This is also the story arc where Sam gets shot.

Season 2, Episode 1 (9/25/2003) – This case was unique as an entire school bus filled with children goes missing, and it's a race against time to find them before something bad happens.

Season 2, Episode 6 (11/6/2003) – The case is about a missing high school student, but it also got slammed by parents groups, who sued CBS for its display of a teenage orgy on screen.

Season 2, Episode 15 (2/14/2004) – As a child who was bullied, I recommend that EVERYONE SEE THIS EPISODE just so they can understand how much of an impact it can have on a child.

Season 3, Episode 5 (10/28/2004) – Ever seen those extreme makeover shows with the plastic surgery? Believe it or not, this episode focuses on one of these shows...as well as the negative effects that can come from them.

Season 4, Episode 6 (11/3/2005) – The first episode to visit another country, the team goes to Mexico in order to save a man who was kidnapped on a vacation with his wife.

Season 6, Episode 6 (11/8/2007) – Believe it or not, this show did a crossover with CSI, as Gil Grissom (William Petersen) makes a guest appearance.

Thursday, November 15, 2012

The Thursday Diaries


Do you remember how last Thursday, I was getting excited about starting up a brand new feature for Thursdays?  And, how I had typed out an entire blog entry in preparation for the debut of this new feature only for my laptop computer to unexpectedly crash to the point where I had to reboot it, and when I got the computer started back up again, my blog entry did NOT SAVE?  I was so frustrated by the whole thing that I ended up substituting a piece that I did a year ago because I didn’t have time to retype it.

But it’s a whole new week, and a second chance to try this thing again. 

I should explain why I’m changing the Thursday theme for the third time since I began this blog entry.  It’s really no big secret that Thursdays have been one of the lowest-rated theme days.  When I first began this blog, Thursdays were all about video gaming and electronic toys...but there was only so much that I could talk about before I ended up running out of topics.  And besides, the target audience for video game themed blogs is very limited.

So at the beginning of 2012, I changed Thursdays to the Thursday Confessional, where I shared some of my deepest and darkest secrets with all of you.  Unfortunately, my secrets weren’t quite so deep and dark...and after about thirty-five weeks, I ended up running out of confessions.

It took me a few weeks to come up with a different theme day for this and every other Thursday.  I really tried to come up with several different ideas, and each one had potential, but I didn’t think that it would make for much interesting conversation.

But then I was inspired by a rather unusual source.


Above is the first issue of a short-lived Archie comic serial entitled “Betty’s Diary”.  The series was previewed in the Archie Giant Series line of titles in 1985 with issue #555, and was spun-off into its own serial a few months later in early 1986.  The series lasted for five years, wrapping up in 1991.

The whole premise of the “Betty’s Diary” series was this.  Each of the four stories inside a typical 32-page issue of “Betty’s Diary” featured Betty writing inside her diary as she talked about a particular adventure she shared with her friends, family, and other people close to her.  Many of the stories were humourous, but some were sad, some were filled with anger, and some were poignant.  It was probably one of the most heartfelt and realistic comic book serials ever created in the Archie library.

So, I was thinking to myself...why don’t I do something like that here?   After all, a blog is supposed to have some inkling of depth and personality to it, right?


Henceforth, Thursdays in the blog will be known as THE THURSDAY DIARIES, a chance for me to talk about whatever comes through my mind at the time.  It could be as short as a YouTube video, or as long as a six-page essay.  This is the space where I will be talking about what I want most out of life, as well as the successes and failures that I have had, and what I have learned about myself from these failures.  It dawned on me that I sort of steered away from bringing up life lessons in this blog in favour of more pop culture topics.  And, I suppose that this makes sense, given that this blog is supposed to be about pop culture.  But I really want to try and show people who might be experiencing some of the same issues themselves by talking about how I dealt with (or in some cases, am STILL dealing with) certain problems.

In some cases, it’s going to take some courage to do this.  In a lot of cases, people keep their diaries (or journals) in secret places, never to be shown to anyone.  And, I realize that by making every Thursday a diary entry, I’m basically putting myself out there for all to see...and I'm taking the risk that what I might have to say might not necessarily be something that some of you will agree with.  But I've developed a thick skin over the years, so I can take it...mostly.

This goes way beyond a simple confession.  This is life, angst, joy, sorrow, wisdom, and surprises all rolled into one. 

That said, I’m going to start off this week on a light note, just to show all of you what future Thursday diary entries are going to look like.  I’m even going to do all the Thursday entries in a different colour and a different font to make it look like a handwritten page inside of a diary.  Unfortunately, the only font that I can find that is suitable is the Georgia one, so it will have to do for now until I can experiment with more appropriate fonts.  Just picture me writing in a diary with a royal blue Papermate brand ball point pen.

Now with fewer smudges!


November 15, 2012

Dear Diary,

I'll admit that while I really want my name to be associated with being a writer, and doing writer related things, the reality is that I'm just a stocker in a department store's grocery section.  Do I see myself doing this job forever?  Heck, I may just as well have, as next month, I'll be celebrating my 8th anniversary at my current paying job.  But while I readily admit that I want to make a living doing what I love to do...I'm okay with what I am doing.

At least for NOW.

For most of my time at my current job, I have worked in the dairy department, stocking milk, cheese, butter, and other food items that contain some sort of dairy product in them.  But, I've also worked in the pantry section, the produce department, the meat area, and just recently, the frozen foods department.

To be honest, I don't mind working in another department every now and again.  While I am most familiar in my department, I admit that working in other departments can be a nice change.

Change can be a good thing.  It can also be a scary thing as well.  But, I think a little bit of a change can do us good.  Just ask Sheryl Crow.



Did you know that when I was first hired on at my job, I worked as the shopping cart pusher/maintenance man/guy who carried out heavy television sets for customers to load into their vehicles?  And, did you know that I absolutely HATED that job?  I struggled my way through that position for thirteen months (which included two Christmas seasons), braving the elements, lifting heavy objects...and cleaning bathrooms.  And believe me, cleaning a public bathroom is something that is not for the faint of heart.  Trust me on that one.

After thirteen months, I knew that I needed a change, and I knew that the only way that I could make it happen was to talk to someone about it.  But the possibility of change scared me.  Sure, the job I was doing eight years ago wasn't a job that I really wanted to have, but I stuck with it thinking that if I did a good enough job, people would notice.

However, I forgot about one particular life lesson.  "The squeaky wheel gets the grease".  If I wanted change to happen, I had to be proactive and make it happen.  I talked to my main boss at the time, told him my feelings, and within a couple of weeks, I moved to the food department, where I have mostly remained ever since.

I took the chance to make a change, and it worked out for the better.

But here's the thing.  I think I'm at the point where I'm ready to make another change in my life.  That change involves changing careers completely, and it's a change that will require a lot of planning.  I'll have to find a school to attend (or check out online courses), maybe even possibly move out of the town that I have lived in practically my entire life.  It's a very scary process to get through.

At the same time, I know I have to get through it if ever I want to have the life I know in my heart I deserve.  

One of these days, I'll get there.  If I tell myself enough, I have to believe it, right?





Wednesday, November 14, 2012

The Hoopla of Twister


I think that I have played quite a few board games during my early childhood. Before I donated most of them to charity shops, or sold them at yard sales, or gave them as gifts to other people, I had a collection of at least three dozen. I had the old standbys such as “Monopoly”, “Clue”, “Trivial Pursuit”, and “Sorry”. But I also played with board games that maybe weren't as well known. Have you ever heard of games like “Shark Attack”, “Jig Jag”, and “Garfield: The Board Game”? It's okay if you haven't. Who knows? I may end up doing blog entries on these lesser-known board games in the near future.

For today's blog entry, I thought that I would take a look at a game that millions of people have owned, or at the very least played at least once.

This is a game that I have never owned...and the one and only time I did play the game, I ended up doing so terribly at it that I never played it again.

You see, unlike most board games, this was one in which you had to display your flexibility. In fact, this game actually encourages you to flex your muscles and bend your body in ways that you never believed were possible.



That's right...today we're going to be looking at the classic game known as “Twister”.



Twister” was created by Charles F. Foley and Neil Rabens, who submitted the patent for the game forty-six years ago in 1966. The game immediately took off after people watched Johnny Carson and Eva Gabor playing it on the set of the “Tonight Show” for the May 3, 1966 broadcast.



Developed by Milton Bradley, the game's rules were very simple. In each game was a plastic mat with sixteen dots...four red, four blue, four yellow, and four green. There is also a spinner that looks like this.



Each turn, the wheel would be spun, and wherever the arrow pointed, the person had to stick either their hand or foot on one of the coloured dots. For example, if the arrow pointed to “RIGHT FOOT BLUE!”, all the players would have to place their right foot on blue. Then on the second spin, suppose it landed on “LEFT HAND GREEN!”, the players would then put their left hands on green WHILE keeping their right foot on blue. Just like the number of dots, there are sixteen possible combinations that can be called on the Twister spinner, and as the game proceeds, it becomes harder and harder to stay upright.

In order to win the game, you have to be the last player remaining on the board without falling down...and depending on the combinations that can be spun, that can be challenging. I dare you to try having both of your hands on red, and then trying to have one foot on blue, and the other one on green. That's the combo that did me in on the one game that I attempted to play.

Now, there's really no limit as to how many people can play the game. You really only need a minimum of three to play (one to spin the wheel and the other two on the mat), but if you have more than four people playing, it becomes a bit of a tight squeeze. It's recommended that if more than four people play, that they tape two or three Twister mats together to expand the fun.

When “Twister” was first released, it immediately became a cultural phenomenon, and it was praised for being a game that people of all ages could enjoy. However, the game was also the subject of criticism by other toy manufacturers, claiming that the game of “Twister” was nothing more than “sex in a box”.

Which is an allegation that I find absolutely ridiculous...well, unless you were playing the game naked...which is cool if you like that sort of thing.



Now, there have been various versions of the game that have been created since the original one was released in 1966. “Finger Twister” is similar to a travel-sized board game, where instead of your whole body, you just use your fingers. There's a “Twister Hoopla” game which eliminates the game mat, and instead forces you to play with coloured rings. I could explain the game to you, but I think Ellen DeGeneres does a better job down below.



And would you believe that there's a “Twister Dodgeball” game? I've never played it, and I am honestly not even sure how you would play it, but here's the visual aid for it below, if you're interested.



And did you know that the board game “Twister” is associated with several world records? When I was doing research on this board game, I never really realized just how many records there were.

For instance, did you know that the world record for the largest Twister game board was set in June 2010 in Belchertown, Massachusetts? The board was made up of 1,008 Twister mats, and covered an area of 24,156 square feet! The construction of the mat was for a great cause though, as the mat was designed as part of the kickoff for a school fundraising drive.

The largest game of Twister ever played occurred in April 2005 in the Netherlands, with a game board that measured 2,453 square feet. There was also a record for most players to ever play a Twister game, which was initially set in 1987 by 4,160 people at the campus of the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. However, this record was later disqualified due to officiating inconsistencies, and the category was temporarily banned between 1988 and 1992.

Oh, and for those of you who may be suffering from colour blindness or have vision impairment, fear not...there are ways in which you can play too. In fact, I found a set of rules on how to play the game which I will post for those of you who cannot tell the difference between green and red. Instead of focusing on colours, one way is to cut out four different shapes, and assigning each colour to a shape. For example, using the suits in a deck of playing cards...

RED = HEARTS
BLUE = DIAMONDS
YELLOW = SPADES
GREEN = CLUBS

All you really have to do is place the shapes on the dots, and when the spinner is spun, just shout out “LEFT HAND SPADES!” instead of “LEFT HAND YELLOW!Simple as that!

All right. That's all I have to say for today. If you excuse me, I'm going to try playing another game of Twister now.

RIGHT FOOT BLUE!
LEFT FOOT RED!
LEFT FOOT GREEN!
RIGHT HAND YELLOW!
RIGHT FOOT YELLOW!
LEFT HAND RED!
LEFT FOOT YELLOW!
AAAAAAAUGH!!!! @_@

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

November 13, 1974


Hello, everyone! Are you ready for another Tuesday Timeline special?

Today is the thirteenth of November, and I'll admit that I had a bit of trouble selecting a topic. Of all the possible topics I could have chosen, many of them were ones that I had already featured, or ones that I weren't really interested in. There are also some instances in which for some of the topics, I couldn't do them justice in a blog entry.

So, I ended up getting a little bit creative, choosing a subject that I wasn't familiar with, and found one that was interesting, yet tragic.

I'll get into why later on.

Firstly, why don't we begin by wishing the following famous people a happy birthday. Celebrating a birthday today are Tom Atkins, Daniel Pilon, David Green, Mel Stottlemyre, John Hammond, Jay Sigel, Timmy Thomas, Joe Mantegna, Terry Reid, Mary Lou Metzger, Frances Conroy, Tracy Scoggins, Chris Noth, Whoopi Goldberg, Ginger Alden, Rex Linn, Stephen Baxter, Caroline Goodall, Neil Flynn, Vinny Testaverde, Jimmy Kimmel, Steve Zahn, Noah Hathaway, Ari Hoenig, Chanel Cole, Nikolai Fraiture (The Strokes), Monique Coleman, and Austin Williams.

And, for historical events on November 13, we have the following...

1002 – The St. Brice's Day Massacre takes place in England

1160 – The wedding of Louis VII of France and Adele of Champagne

1841 – James Braid observes a demonstration of animal magnetism, which leads to his study of what would later be called “hypnotism”

1864 – The new constitution of Greece is adopted

1887 – Bloody Sunday clashes in London

1901 – The 1901 Caister Lifeboat Disaster

1916 – Australian Prime Minister Billy Hughes is expelled from the Labor Party over his support for conscription

1918 – Allied troops occupy Constantinople, the Ottoman Empire capital

1927 – The Holland Tunnel opens to traffic, making it the first Hudson River vehicle tunnel linking New Jersey and New York

1941 – HMS Ark Royal is torpedoed by U-81, sinking the next day

1947 – Soviet Union completes the development of the AK-47

1950 – General Carlos Delgado Chalbaud, them president of Venezuela is assassinated in Caracas

1956 – The United States Supreme Court declares Alabama laws requiring segregation to be illegal, which puts an end to the Montgomery Bus Boycott

1965 – SS Yarmouth Castle burns and sinks off the coast of Nassau, killing 90 people

1969 – Thousands of protesters against the Vietnam War stage the “March Against Death” in Washington D.C.

1970 – A cyclone strikes the Ganges Delta region in Pakistan, killing an estimated half a million people...the worst natural disaster of the 20th century

1982 – The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is dedicated in Washington D.C.

1985 – The eruption of Nevado del Ruiz melts a nearby glacier which causes a volcanic mudslide that buries the entire town of Armero, Colombia

1988 – Ethiopian born law student Mulugeta Seraw is beaten to death in Portland, Oregon by Neo-Nazi group East Side White Pride

1990 – Aramoana Massacre takes place in New Zealand in which David Gray kills thirteen

2001 – United States President George W. Bush signs executive order allowing military tribunals against foreigners suspected of planning terrorist attacks, or being connected to any terrorist attacks against the United States

2002 – Oil tanker Prestige sinks off the Galacian coast which causes a huge oil spill

2004 – Russell Tyrone Jones – otherwise known by his stage name Ol' Dirty Bastard – dies of a drug overdose two days before his thirty-sixth birthday

2005 – Wrestling star Eddie Guerrero dies at the age of 38 in Minneapolis, Minnesota

For today's look back through time, we're going back in time almost 40 years.



November 13, 1974.

On November 13, 1974, a woman, just twenty-eight years old, was on her way to meet with a man named David Burnham, then a journalist for the New York Times. Steve Wodka, an official of the woman's union national office was also scheduled to be present at the meeting. The meeting was set to take place in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. She had left a union meeting at a cafe, armed with a bundle of documents and a binder. Whatever the meeting was going to be about, it had to be something explosive...something that would make the front page of every newspaper in the country.

Tragically, Karen Silkwood never made it to that meeting.

Her body was found inside of her car later that evening, after the car had veered off the side of the road and into a culvert. She was pronounced dead on the scene. What followed were suspicions of foul play, as well as one of the biggest workplace scandals involving health and safety violations, concluding with a huge lawsuit.

But, why don't we start at the very beginning?



I'm going to introduce you to the late Karen Silkwood. Her picture is above. Quite the beautiful young woman, wasn't she? She was born on February 19, 1946, which would make her 66 years old today had she lived. She was born in Longview, Texas, the daughter of Merle and William Silkwood, and when she was young, her family moved to Nederland, Texas, where she was raised. In 1965, she had gotten married to William Meadows and had three children with him, but the marriage would end seven years later, in 1972. 1972 would end up being a rather memorable year for Silkwood. She moved to Oklahoma City, and took on the job that would be the starting point of what would become her worst nightmare.



1972 was the year that Karen Silkwood began working at the Kerr-McGee Cimarron Fuel Fabrication Site just outside of Crescent, Oklahoma where her job was to manufacture plutonium pellets for nuclear reactor fuel rods. Shortly after being hired, she joined the local Oil, Chemical & Atomic Workers Union, and actively took part in a worker's strike at the plant. Once the strike was over, Silkwood was elected to the union's bargaining committee, making history as the first female elected to the position since the plant opened.

One of her main duties that Karen held as part of that position was to investigate any and all health and safety issues within the plant. It didn't take long for Silkwood to find all sorts of violations within the company, including exposing workers to contaminated substances, workers using faulty or damaged respiratory equipment, and improper storage of samples. She also had the belief that the lack of adequate shower facilities could cause a negative impact on the health of its employees, putting them at risk of contamination.



In the summer of 1974, Silkwood testified to the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) about having been contaminated, alleging that the safety standards had been slipping due to an increase in the production speed. Prior to that, the Oil, Chemical, and Atomic Workers Union had come to the conclusion that the plant had been manipulating product inspection records, had been manufacturing faulty fuel rods, and risked employee safety, and was threatening to file charges against the company.



Just a few months later, on November 5, 1974, a frightening event took place. On that day, Silkwood was performing a routine self-check and was alarmed to realize that she had 400 times the allowed limit for plutonium contamination inside her body! She underwent immediate decontamination at the plant, and when she went back home, she was given a testing kit so that she could collect bodily fluids for further tests. Tests done at the facility proved that there was plutonium present on the surfaces that she touched with the gloves that she had been using, but there were no holes inside the gloves. The only conclusion that could be made was that the contamination had come from a source outside of the glovebox.

The next day, she tested positive for contamination again, despite the fact that her duties only involved filing paperwork, and was given a more intense decontamination. The next day after that, she entered the plant and once more tested positive for contamination. This time, the contamination was so severe, she was actually expelling traces of plutonium from her breath. A team of health physicists accompanied her back home where they discovered traces of plutonium in her refrigerator and bathroom. The entire house was stripped of its furnishings and decontaminated, some of Silkwood's belongings having to be completely destroyed, and Silkwood, her partner Drew Stephens, and her housemate were sent to Los Alamos National Laboratory for further tests.

All the while, the question of how Silkwood ended up becoming contaminated between November 5 and 7, 1974 was still lingering. Silkwood did offer a possible explanation for the traces found in her bathroom on the morning of November 7, as she believed that it may have come from her accidentally spilling the urine sample that she had collected the day before. The tests also showed that the samples from her home had a higher level on concentration than the samples taken at Los Alamos.

The only conclusion that Silkwood could draw was that she had gotten contaminated at the plant. But she wasn't prepared for the statement that Kerr-McGee had issued, claiming that she had made herself sick on purpose to portray the company in a negative light. It was an allegation that Silkwood would not accept.

Over the next few days, Silkwood compiled a bunch of documentation that included company papers to support her claims. And part of the reason why she called the reporter from the New York Times was because she was ready to go public with her claims in regards to her own theories as to how she really ended up contaminated.

The meeting was scheduled to take place November 13. She never made it.



Upon examination of her body, the police report had stated that Silkwood had fallen asleep at the wheel, and a state trooper had remembered seeing a couple of sedatives inside the car, as well as some marijuana. An autopsy on her body later proved that she had traces of the sedatives inside her bloodstream at the time of her death...at least twice the recommended dosage.

Still, the crash site was suspicious enough for people to speculate about how the accident really happened. It was speculated that Silkwood's car was forced off the road in an attempt to keep her from talking. Skid marks from Silkwood's car were also present on the road, which suggested that she was trying to stay on the road after she was rammed from behind.

Perhaps the most glaring piece of evidence that suggested that Silkwood's death was no accident was the fact that the documents that she had reportedly taken with her in the car were nowhere in sight, and according to Silkwood's family, she had received several threatening and menacing calls in the days leading up to the accident.

Silkwood's organs were examined by AEC and the State Medical Examiner, and the findings showed high levels of radiation in her lungs and gastrointestinal system. Her death inspired a lot of public suspicions, which in turn lead to a police investigation into the plant. The National Public Radio reported that as much as sixty-six pounds of plutonium had been misplaced or had gone missing at the plant.

The ultimate result ended with the closure of the Cimarron plant one year later, in 1975. Almost twenty years later, the Department of Energy had declared the plant decommissioned and decontaminated.

The epilogue of this story is this. Silkwood's family eventually launched a lawsuit against Kerr-McGee for negligence on behalf of her estate. The jury eventually rendered a verdict of over half a million dollars in damages, and ten million dollars in punitive damages. The settlement was appealed, which reduced the monies awarded to just five thousand, and completely voided the punitive damages. It wouldn't be until 1984 that the decision was reversed, and Kerr-McGee settled out of court for $1,380,000, the whole time maintaining that they had done nothing wrong.

In the end though, a whistleblower ended up losing her life...all in the name of ensuring that everyone that she was working with was entitled to a safe workplace. Regardless of your opinions on the case, you have to admit that the case of Karen Silkwood had opened up the eyes of many people, and exposed a company's shortcomings in the process.



If you want to learn more about this case, there's a couple of sources that you can look into. In 1983, a movie adaptation was released entitled “Silkwood”, which starred Meryl Streep as Karen Silkwood. The film also starred Cher and Kurt Russell. I'd definitely watch this movie, as Streep's performance is outstanding.



Or, if you want a more in-depth look, check out Richard L. Rashke's book, The Killing of Karen Silkwood.

And that's what happened on November 13, 1974.

Monday, November 12, 2012

Beauty and the Beast


All right.  I’m opening up this blog entry with a question.  How many of you know that classic fairy tale “Beauty and the Beast”?


I’m only under the assumption that most of you probably have heard some variation of the classic fairy tale.  But for those of you who haven’t, here’s a little bit of a run down.

The story originated almost four centuries ago, in 1740.  The first rendition of the fairy tale was penned by a French woman named Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve.  However, the version that most people became familiar with was published sixteen years later, in 1756, which was more or less an abridgement of de Villeneuve’s work by Jeanne-Marie Le Prince de Beaumont.

(Man, the French had some impossibly long names back in those days.  If driver’s licenses had existed in the eighteenth century, I’d wonder how they would fit all of that on one card!)

Anyways, the basic plot of “Beauty and the Beast” is like this.  When the story begins, we’re introduced to a wealthy merchant who has three beautiful daughters.  Two of them are spoiled rotten, and have absolutely no concern for anything except material things.  Only the youngest daughter, Belle, is described as being pure of heart.

When the merchant ends up losing everything to a tempest at sea, he and his daughters are forced to work and live in a tiny farmhouse.  The merchant soon hears that one of the cargo ships carrying his riches did make it safely to port, so he goes to the city to see if there is anything that could be salvaged that he could sell.  When he asks his daughters if they would like him to bring something home with him upon his return, two of them naturally ask for gold, diamonds, beautiful dresses...basically anything that a “What Not To Wear” gift card can buy.  Belle, on the other hand is much more frugal.

All she wants is a simple red rose.  Since roses were very rare where they were, a rose was all that she needed.  A beautiful request from someone pure of heart.

The merchant is dismayed to learn that upon arriving in town, the cargo inside the ship has been liquidated in order to take care of his debts, leaving him without a single penny to spend on presents for his three girls.  To add insult to injury, he ends up getting lost in the woods.  Luckily for him, he ends up stumbling across a palace.  Upon entering, he discovers that there is food and beverages available for him to sample, courtesy of the unseen owner.  The merchant spends the night there.  Upon leaving the palace, he discovers a rose garden outside of the castle, and he remembers Belle’s request.  He picks the biggest, most beautiful rose out of the garden, and sets out back home...when he is attacked by the most hideous beast known to man!

(No, seriously, the beast confronts the man.)

He actually does more than that.  The rose he picked was the beast’s prized possession, and because the merchant couldn’t keep his paws off of it, he must die.  The merchant, obviously regretting ever going near the flowers, pleads with the beast to let him go, telling him that the flower was a present for his daughter, Belle.  The beast decides that threatening to kill the merchant was a bit harsh...so he lets him go with the rose and all the presents that he can carry...but he must return one day.

So the merchant arrives back home, gives his daughters the presents, and makes a promise to himself never to tell Belle what happened.  But you know how persistent teenage girls can be, and when her father explains what happened, she goes to the beast’s castle, taking her father’s place.  Upon arriving, Belle is treated like a queen by the beast, and bestows love, attention, and everything her heart desires.  He is smitten by the young girl, and each night he asks for her hand in marriage, which Belle politely declined.  She only has her heart set on marrying a handsome prince, which she mistakenly believes is held captive by the beast himself.

If only she knew.

Anyway, I’m not going to spoil the ending of this classic story because I never like to reveal movie endings.


Because, in 1991, Disney created an animated movie based on this classic tale.


“Beauty and the Beast” was released on November 13, 1991.  It was directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise, produced by Don Hahn, and the screenplay was written by Linda Woolverton.  And the songs were all composed by Alan Menken and the late Howard Ashman, including this one...


ARTIST:  Celine Dion & Peabo Bryson
SONG:  Beauty and the Beast
ALBUM:  Beauty and the Beast
DATE RELEASED:  November 16, 1991
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS:  #9

The voice cast was very good as well.  Paige O’Hara played Belle, and Robby Benson played the Beast.  Other voices included Angela Lansbury, David Ogden Steirs, Jerry Orbach, Richard White, and Bradley Michael Pierce.


The plot of the movie version was loosely based on the classic fable, but there were some significant differences...in particular with the Beast’s backstory.  Having a curse placed upon him by an enchantress, the servants of the Beast are transformed into household furniture.  Lumiere (Orbach) becomes a candleabra, Cogsworth (Stiers) turns into a clock, and poor Mrs. Potts (Lansbury) and her son, Chip (Pierce) turn into a teapot and a tea cup respectively.  The Beast is also given a magic mirror which can see into the future, as well as an enchanted rose, which will continue to bloom until the day he turns 21.  If he does not find true love before the last petal falls off the rose...well...no, I can’t say.  I have said too much.


There’s a little bit of a difference in Belle’s backstory as well.  Belle lives in a little French village with her father, Maurice (no sisters present in this version), and Belle is actively pursued by the smug, arrogant, evil Gaston (White).  Other than that, the story goes almost exactly the same as the classic fable. 

And would you know that there are lots of things about this film that I didn’t even know about? 


Did you know that the role of Chip was only supposed to have one line of spoken dialogue in it?  Turns out that Bradley Michael Pierce did such a great job with his one line that the writers actually wrote in more lines for him to say as a result of it!

Did you know that when the Beast was being designed, the animators drew inspiration from several animals including an American bison, a bear, a gorilla, a lion, a wolf, and a wild boar?  Talk about mutant species!

Did you know that the original name for Mrs. Potts was supposed to be Mrs. Chamomile?

Did you know that Tony Anselmo worked on the animation of the film?  In case you’re wondering who Tony Anselmo is, he is currently the voice of another Disney character, Donald Duck.

Did you know that the film won two Academy Awards for “Best Original Song” and “Best Original Score”?  It was also nominated for four others.

Did you know that the line that Cogsworth says that begins with “flowers, chocolates, promises you don’t intend to keep...” was ad-libbed by David Ogden Stiers?


Did you know that in the village scenes, Belle is the only person in the town to wear blue as a predominant colour?  There’s only one other person in the movie that wears a lot of blue...I wonder who it could be?

Did you know that there is at least one scene that was reused animation from “Sleeping Beauty”?  I can’t really reveal what that scene is, but it’s near the end of the movie.  It was done as a time-saving measure.

Did you know that the film was shown with a 70% completion rate at the New York Film Festival two months before the film was officially released?  To make up for the thirty per cent still under construction, storyboard reels and rough animation pencil tests were put in place.  It reportedly received a standing ovation at the festival.

Did you know that before Angela Lansbury got the part of Mrs. Potts, the role was initially written for Julie Andrews?

Did you know that Howard Ashman came up with the idea of turning the enchanted objects into living creatures with their own distinct personalities?

Did you know that the film’s soundtrack takes up a little over a quarter of the entire movie’s length?

Did you know that in order to disguise Robby Benson’s voice when he was portraying the Beast, it was mixed in with the growls of real lions and panthers?

Did you know that before Paige O’Hara was hired on as the role of Belle, the Disney crew considered Jodi Benson for the role?  Jodi Benson, of course, played Ariel in “The Little Mermaid”.



Did you know that Patrick Stewart was initially on board to play Cogsworth, but had to turn it down due to shooting conflicts with “Star Trek: The Next Generation”?


Did you know that the movie was adapted into a Broadway musical in 1994?  It is the seventh longest running Broadway play ever, ending its run thirteen years later, in 2007.

Did you know that the stained glass window that appears in the end of the film was added into Disneyland shortly after the film was released in 1991?

Did you know that this film was the first animated feature film to be nominated for the “Best Picture” Academy Award?  It lost out to “Silence of the Lambs”.

Did you know that this film is the 30th animated feature film by Disney?