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Sunday, November 20, 2011

Sunday Jukebox - You're So Vain by Carly Simon

Have you ever had one of those times where you plan something out over a couple of days, and then you realize that both things have something in common? That's what ended up happening this weekend, as both topics that I had planned to talk about have to do with a similar subject.

Yesterday's entry on the children's show 'Ghostwriter' dealt with a group of kids solving mysteries that kept happening in their Brooklyn neighbourhood. Today's blog subject is also the subject of a mystery that has lasted almost forty years now. A mystery that maybe not even the Ghostwriter kids could solve.

It's one of music's best kept and closely guarded secrets. Only a select few have been let in on what the secret is, and reportedly, they paid a pretty penny to get the information. The singer of the song in question has been incredibly coy about who the subject of the song she sang back in the early 1970s was, and while she has publicly shared clues towards who the mystery person is, the speculation still continues, as she has never revealed the source. It's entirely possible that the few clues she has revealed are 'red herrings', and were dropped as a way to throw everyone off the right track. Still, millions of theories behind the song's creation have been proposed since its release, and the purpose of this blog entry is to examine each of these theories, and possibly come up with some more theories behind who the song is about.

So, why don't we listen to the song first? I mean, it's only fair, right?


ARTIST: Carly Simon
SONG: You're So Vain
ALBUM: No Secrets
DATE RELEASED: December 2, 1972
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS: #1 for 3 weeks



Carly Simon. Born June 25, 1945 in New York City. Although she had wanted a career in music since she was a teenager, she didn't get her first big break until 1971. Over the past forty years, Carly Simon made a name for herself as a solo artist, and has enjoyed success throughout the 1970s and 1980s, charting several top ten hits on the adult contemporary charts, and having made steady appearances on the Billboard Top 100 between 1971 and 1989. She would later make a surprise appearance on the charts in 2001 when she did guest vocals for Janet Jackson on her song “Son Of A Gun (I Betcha Think This Song Is About You)”, sampling Carly's signature hit.



That signature hit, of course, is the one you heard earlier in this blog. It is well-known to be Carly's most recognizable hit, and her only song to hit the pole position on the Billboard 100, reaching #1 in early 1973 (though her '77 hit 'Nobody Does It Better' hit #1 on the Adult Contemporary charts).

It also happens to be a song that has a secret. A secret that Carly Simon has kept from the public for thirty-nine years and counting.

Who exactly is 'You're So Vain' really all about?

The whole chorus kind of pokes fun at whoever the subject is about, almost suggesting that the person is so vain, they think that Carly would write a song especially for them.

In fact, I'm going to do a first for this blog. I'm going to post the lyrics of the song out for all of you to read, and we'll look at them piece by piece, and maybe we'll get some clues out of it all.

You walked into the party
Like you were walking onto a yacht
Your hat strategically dipped below one eye
Your scarf it was apricot
You had one eye in the mirror
As you watched yourself gavotte
And all the girls dreamed that they'd be your partner
They'd be your partner, and
You're so vain
You probably think this song is about you
You're so vain
I'll bet you think this song is about you
Don't you? Don't you?
You had me several years ago
When I was still quite naive
Well, you said that we made such a pretty pair
And that you would never leave
But you gave away the things you loved
And one of them was me
I had some dreams they were clouds in my coffee
Clouds in my coffee, and
You're so vain
You probably think this song is about you
You're so vain
I'll bet you think this song is about you
Don't you? Don't you?
I had some dreams they were clouds in my coffee
Clouds in my coffee, and
You're so vain
You probably think this song is about you
You're so vain
I'll bet you think this song is about you
Don't you? Don't you?
Well, I hear you went up to Saratoga
And your horse naturally won
Then you flew your Lear jet up to Nova Scotia
To see the total eclipse of the sun
Well, you're where you should be all the time
And when you're not, you're with
Some underworld spy or the wife of a close friend
Wife of a close friend, and
You're so vain
You probably think this song is about you
You're so vain
I'll bet you think this song is about you
Don't you? Don't you?

Okay, so assuming that this song is based off of a personal experience in Carly's life, and assuming that she's telling the truth completely, we can take a few things into consideration from the lines within the song.

First, it seems as though the subject of the song was once a romantic interest for Carly. When she sings about how the subject “had her a few years ago when she was quite naive”, it almost seems to imply that she's known this person for quite a long time. It's entirely possible that he could have been her first love, or a love that was significant to her. We also learn that our song subject apparently kicked her to the curb and broke her heart...which could explain the motive behind why the song was written in the first place.

I'm just speculating that this person who Carly wrote about in the song was someone who was rich, famous, or both. I mean, you'd kind of have to be to fly a Lear jet to Nova Scotia, right? As well, there's a reference to the horse racing events that take place in Saratoga Springs, New York during the summer months, and which are often witnessed by the rich and famous.

The part about the 'total eclipse of the sun' is another little nugget, because it seemed to imply that if this song was based on a real-life instance that a solar eclipse would have been a rather specific detail. So, I did some research on solar eclipses that occurred right around the time 'You're So Vain' was released, and there were in fact two that happened. One was in March of 1970, the other one in July of 1972.

So, we now have a possible time frame that this event happened...right around the time that Carly Simon was kicking off her solo career. Very interesting, no?

So, given that the song was officially released three weeks before Christmas in 1972, we know that the event that spawned this song had to have happened before then. So, let's take a look at some of the likely suspects at the time.



Suspect #1: Singer/songwriter James Taylor (also known as the now ex-husband of Carly Simon). Back in 1972, Carly and James were married (they divorced eleven years after 'You're So Vain' was released), and the most common theory was that James Taylor was the subject of the song. But Carly herself has made the declaration that Taylor was NOT the subject of the song.



Suspect #2: Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger. It sort of makes sense in a way, as Mick ended up contributing the backing vocals for the song. And Angela Bowie (the former wife of David Bowie, who was also named as a possible suspect for who the song was about), had said in an interview that Jagger had a bit of an obsession with Carly. In fact, she even came out and said that she was the “wife of a close friend” that Carly referenced in the song. But Carly Simon has said that the song was not about Jagger.

It wasn't about Nick Nolte either, although Simon has stated that he was the man wearing the apricot scarf that she sang about in the first verse of the song.



Then there's Warren Beatty.

Warren Beatty may have settled down with wife Annette Bening these days, but before that, Beatty was quite the playboy. One report stated that he had been with over twelve THOUSAND lovers during his lifetime! He was linked to such famous women as Julie Christie, Joan Collins, Janice Dickinson, Diane Keaton, Natalie Wood, and Madonna.



And Carly Simon, reportedly.

Carly revealed in an interview she did a little over a decade ago that yes, the song may have been about Beatty, but only a smidgen, and certainly not the bulk of the song. So, I guess we can probably call that a no. Although Warren Beatty reportedly called Carly on the telephone and thanked her for the song. He later said in 2007 that he KNEW the song was all about him all along.

Other subjects up for consideration in regards to who “You're So Vain” is about were Kris Kristofferson, David Cassidy, and Cat Stevens...




...or, is he known as Yusef Islam now? I don't even know anymore. There was even the theory that Carly had wrote the song with several men in mind, and that she took traits from each one to form the lyrics of the song.

Regardless of which, this song was at the center of one of the biggest kept secrets in the music industry.

Though over the years, Carly has revealed her secret to some people. And she's given out clues to narrow it down for the public to figure out. In August 2003, Carly Simon participated in a charity auction as one of the prizes. The prize was a once-in-a-lifetime event. Carly would offer up a private performance of the song at her home and following that, she would tell the winner the identity of the song's subject. The winner was the president of NBC Sports, Dick Ebersol, who placed the winning bid of $50,000 to learn the secret. And Carly told him everything...on one stipulation. He was allowed to reveal a clue to the public, but nothing else.

So, Ebersol revealed this clue. That the subject of the song had the letter “E” in his name.

Over the years, Carly herself offered up two more letters in the name. An “A”, and an “R” were also present.

So, given the fact that the letters E, A, and R were in the name, we can eliminate Kristofferson, Cassidy and Stevens Islam. We can also cross Nick Nolte off as well. But surprisingly enough, Jagger, Beatty, and Taylor remain on that list, even though Simon has denied that the song is about them.

(Coincidentally, my full name also contains those three letters, but I KNOW the song isn't about me.)

Another name that popped up for discussion was revealed in 2008. That year, author Sheila Weller released a book entitled Girls Like Us: Carole King, Joni Mitchell and Carly Simon – and the Journey of a Generation, which detailed the lives of the three women. It's very interesting to note that under Carly Simon's section was a detailed account of a relationship that Carly shared with guitarist Danny Armstrong. It was reported that Armstrong and Simon had a relationship that lasted about two years. They broke up months before “You're So Vain” was released. Though Simon would move on with other affairs and relationships, she never really got over Armstrong, and reportedly tried to reignite the flames of passion between her and Armstrong, but to no avail. She described Armstrong as a gifted guitarist who definitely was not modest about his skills, reportedly bragging that he was the first and only electric guitar specialist in the world at the time.

If one were to write out Danny Armstrong's name in full, it would contain the three letters A, E, and R. Further proof came from another of Carly's ex-husbands, Jim Hart, who stated that the subject of the song was NOT someone famous. If that were the case, Armstrong would meet that criteria for the song's subject for sure. It hasn't really been confirmed though by Carly though.



One final clue as to the song's subject was revealed in a 2010 interview that Carly did with Uncut magazine. She said that if you played a re-recording of the song backwards, the first name of the subject of the song was revealed in a whispered voice. Naturally, people began digging out their copies of the song, and played it backwards, and one name that was clearly made out was “David”.  And many media outlets quickly broadcast that the subject of the song was then Elektra Records executive David Geffen, believing that the song was Carly's response to her jealousy of Joni Mitchell, a singer that Geffen was showing a lot of attention towards. This theory was declared false by Jim Hart, and Carly Simon's publicist later confirmed that the song was definitely not about Geffen. But Carly also stated that right around the time that she wrote the song, she hadn't even met David Geffen yet, instead stating that there was a man named David that had passed through Carly's life at some point, and who was connected to the song in some manner. It was also reported that the name “Warren” and a third unintelligible name could also be heard when the song was played backwards, which could confirm the belief that Carly had written the song with several men in mind, including Warren Beatty.

My question is, who do YOU think the song “You're So Vain” is about? I'd love to hear your opinions and your thoughts.

My take? Well...give me fifty thousand dollars and I'll share.

No dice, huh?

My initial thought was that the song was about Warren Beatty myself, but now I'm not so sure. I guess maybe I'm in the camp that believes that the song is a composite of several men myself. But, again, I'm not entirely sure. As of now, the secret still remains safe, and right now many men who are at least 60 years of age and older probably still think this song is about them.



Right, Warren?

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Saturday Morning: Ghostwriter

DISCLAIMER:  I am well aware that this show did NOT air on Saturdays...but there was a remake of the show that DID.  And, besides, it's educational, so go with it.  :)


One question that someone once asked me is how I became interested in writing. I have always wondered how I could answer this question, because the truth is, I don't really have one definitive answer.

I guess the obvious answer that I could give for this question is that I always did well in school subjects that involved some usage of the English language. It could have been language arts. It could have been history. It could have even been spelling, grammar, and punctuation lessons. If it involved writing notes, essays, book reports, and written presentations, I was all over it. This could explain why my average in school was usually in the high 70s or low 80s. I usually ended up in the 90s for English related assignments, but bottomed out around the low 60s for math and science classes.

Darn you, algebraic equations and periodic table of elements! Darn you to heck!

However, I think the meaning behind why I enjoy writing goes a little bit deeper than the fact that I only liked it because I got good grades from teachers in it. It goes much deeper than that.

The real reason? Writing allows me to be myself in the best possible way that I can be.

I'll lay it on the line right here. I am definitely not the best oral communicator. For one, I tend to stumble and stutter somewhat when trying to have spoken word conversations with people. The less I know a person, the worse communicator I am. I suppose part of it could stem from a case of nervousness, as being a bit timid when meeting someone for the first time is part and parcel.  And maybe it's all in my head, and I actually communicate with people a lot better than even I'm aware of. But for some reason, I've always felt more comfortable expressing myself through written methods.

Plus I feel as though I have the world's most geekiest, unmanliest voice in the world. But again, that's a matter of perspective, and some may find my voice sexy. I've never HEARD that compliment, but again, perspective.

So I've readily admitted that I sometimes struggle to keep a conversation going through spoken word. Either I forget the point I'm trying to make midway through the conversation, I stumble when I try to think of the right word to say, or I get so tongue-tied that I may end up speaking a completely different nonsensical language altogether.

But when I have the chance to write it out instead of talk it out, I find that I can get ideas out a lot better. I have the chance to read and re-read what I write and can change, add, or erase words at my leisure to ensure that the point I want to make gets out the way I meant. I guess what I'm saying is that when I have the choice between communicating through written means or verbally, I would undoubtedly choose written communication, because it's much easier for me to feel at ease.

Of course, there are some situations where I don't have the luxury to use written communication. Certainly if I'm calling an order in at work where I am using the telephone, I pretty much have to suck it up and speak. And I'm trying to improve my oral communication skills each day, and am trying to gain more confidence in the art of public speaking. But I will also say that I think part of the reasons why I have been turned down for job applications is because I bombed the interview portion of the application, which again stems from my lack of confidence in public speaking.

Sigh...if only I could be more like the subject of today's blog post for today. Of course, in order for me to be more like the subject of the blog, I would have to be dead...and that wouldn't be very much fun.



Those of you who are my age or younger might recognize the above symbol. But, for those of you who don't, I'll introduce you. This little guy is named Ghostwriter. In literary terms, a ghostwriter is a professional writer who is paid to write books, articles, or stories that are credited to another person, and this Ghostwriter sort of does this as well. He can fly around a room, borrow letters, numbers, and punctuation symbols from various sources and put them together to form a word or a sentence.

Oh, and only people who Ghostwriter has revealed himself to can read the messages that he spells out.



That was the basic premise behind the popular PBS show, Ghostwriter, which premiered in October 1992 and ran until early 1995 (A Saturday morning revival of the show in 1997 on CBS failed miserably). The show focused on a group of middle school students who all ended up meeting Ghostwriter when he happened to fly out of a book that had fallen down while one of the kids was helping clean out the basement of his home. By using letters from posters, books, and magazines, as well as being able to communicate through computer monitors and those really retro looking computer modems, Ghostwriter could help the gang solve mysteries ranging from sabotaging school elections to foiling an illegal chemical dumping operation.

You know, I'm going to actually post an episode for you to watch before I go on.  This one just happens to be one of my favourite episodes, and it'll really get an idea as to how Ghostwriter worked, as well as will provide all of you with some humourous perspective behind how computers looked 20 years ago.

I'll post the first episode to the story arc, “Who Is Max Mouse” now, and during the course of the episode, I will add the other three episodes as we proceed. So, for episode one, follow the links HERE, HERE, and oh, yeah, HERE.

When the show first began, we only got to see the first four members of the team. By the show's conclusion, we would be introduced to at least three more permanent members, plus members in Australia, the UK, and three from the year 1928. (And, yes, as I go on, this will make sense)



Okay, so the first member to meet Ghostwriter is Jamal Jenkins. It was in Jamal's basement that Ghostwriter resided in for presumably years. He lives with his parents, and his grandmother (Marcella Lowery), and while he is a good student with English, his real interest is science, and he has dreams of attending the High School of Science after graduating from Zora Neale Hurston Middle School in Brooklyn, New York. Here's a scene of Jamal first encountering Ghostwriter.



He may be freaked out by him at first, but as the show progresses, we find that Jamal probably had the closest relationship with Ghostwriter, and perhaps with good reason too. Although we never really find out who Ghostwriter is during the show's three year run, it was originally intended for Ghostwriter to be one of Jamal's ancestors, perhaps one that escaped a life of slavery and educated himself and learned the value of reading. Jamal's story arcs seem to confirm this. He is the first one who can see Ghostwriter. Ghostwriter helps Jamal's friends clear his name when he's accused of torching a video store owned by Mr. Brinker. Ghostwriter even ends up going back in time to 1928 to help three children solve a mystery of their own...which turns out to help Jamal out as one of the kids that Ghostwriter helped in 1928 grew up to be the doctor that saved his father's life before Jamal was even born!

Oh, and Ghostwriter also helped Jamal clear his name when a computer hacker named Max Mouse threatened to destroy him. A perfect opportunity to showcase episode two of that story arc HERE, HERE, and HERE.



The second person Ghostwriter showed himself to was Lenni Frazier. Lenni was in the same grade as Jamal, and before Ghostwriter revealed himself to Jamal, was more of an acquaintance to Jamal. Lenni lived in a loft with her widowed father, and thanks to her father's love of music, Lenni also had the dream to become a singer and songwriter. Back in 1992, female rappers were starting to grow in popularity, and Lenni was destined to become the next Salt 'n' Pepa. And Ghostwriter helped Lenni make that dream come true. Lenni's biggest story arc in the series was the one entitled 'Don't Stop The Music', where a record executive hears Lenni's demo tape and wants to make a music video of her song. But when someone on the video crew goes out of their way to sabotage the video, Ghostwriter helps the team put the pieces together to save the shoot. The end result is this video...a video that even Ghostwriter managed to be a part of!



There were other arcs that Lenni ended up being a part of. She comes up with the idea for the team to enter a contest to be drawn into a comic book (with help from Ghostwriter), and she almost ends up losing a friendship with the guy down below after the musical instruments of Lenni's dad were accidentally destroyed in a car accident caused by this boy's dad.



Alejandro “Alex” Fernandez was the third person to see Ghostwriter. He's also in the same grade as Jamal and Lenni, and his parents own a bodega (in which the Frazier family live upstairs from). A first generation Salvadorian American, Ghostwriter becomes fluent in both English and Spanish thanks to Alex. His abilities in writing are made evident through the dozens of pen pals he has located all over the world (one of which betrayed Alex by selling his secrets to his opponent in the sixth grade school elections), and while Alex can develop a hot temper at times, he is probably the most headstrong (and in my opinion, the most developed) character of the whole series. One of Alex's story arcs was banned on the children's network “Noggin” because of the subject matter, which was Alex being offered drugs by a friend of his who later gets caught up in a robbery scheme. Alex later ends up falling for a future member of the Ghostwriter team, but we'll get to that later on. Most of Alex's story arcs tend to be shared with this person.



Like most shows, there has to be a brother and sister combo present somewhere. In this case, it's in the form of Alex's younger sister by two years, Gabriela “Gaby” Fernandez...the only character to be recast during the show's run. 



The fourth person to see Ghostwriter, Gaby is talkative, inquisitive, and sensitive. While Ghostwriter seemed to be closest to Jamal, Gaby was probably the one who cared about Ghostwriter the most, and even makes a word bed for him to sleep in during the Who Is Max Mouse story arc (Watch Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of Episode 3 inside this bracket).

Gaby's story arcs are well-defined. She gets sick due to chemical poisoning in a community garden prompting the team to investigate what made her sick. She ends up stealing money from her family's store to buy a Galaxy Girl costume, which ends up being the catalyst for another mystery at the school. Towards the end of the series, she ends up finding a rare cockatoo, which unbeknownst to her was owned by a couple of crooks.



Gaby's best friend in the series is Tina Nguyen, a Vietnamese-American who makes her first appearance in the first story arc. However, it's not until the Who Burned Mr. Brinker's Store arc that she actually sees Ghostwriter for the first time, and is officially the fifth member of the team. An aspiring filmmaker, Tina's video camera has been very effective in assisting the team with cases. Tina's story arcs are not as huge as some of the other members of the team. She does end up working for a legendary film actress who is the subject of a slew of hate mail (in which Ghostwriter helps them find out who sent it), as well as befriending an exchange student from Africa and using Ghostwriter to help find her when she runs away from home. She also develops a mild romance with Alex, and they end up sharing their first kiss while investigating the illegal chemical dumping case.



Rob Baker becomes the next person to see Ghostwriter. Initially he is accused of smearing Alex's election campaign, but when Ghostwriter actually appears to Rob, and the rest of the team realizes this, he becomes a huge help to the team. An aspiring author (hmmm...kind of like me), Rob's gift with words has helped the team out in many ways. When Rob ends up getting trapped in a subway tunnel in an effort to help reunite a homeless Vietnam war veteran with his daughter, Ghostwriter is there to help the team locate and rescue the two. Unfortunately, with Rob being in a military family, he is forced to leave New York after his family is forced to move to Australia. But before he leaves, the gang send him off with a bunch of new writing notebooks, telling him that they'll never forget him.



Taking Rob's place is Hector Carrero (and yes, you are correct in realizing that the actor playing Hector was once in a season of MTV's The Real World). Alex becomes Hector's 'Big Brother' when he signs up to volunteer for the program. When we meet Hector, he's fluent in Spanish, but sometimes has difficulty reading and writing English. Through Alex's help, as well as some help from Ghostwriter, Hector learns to grasp the language better. Hector even ends up standing up against a bully in the fourth and final part of Who Is Max Mouse (which is posted HERE, HERE, HERE).



Another minor character is Jamal's cousin, Casey Austin. A practical joker who first appeared during the story arc for Lenni's music video shoot, the gang initially thought that Casey was responsible for the pranks. But when Casey was feeling sad because she missed her mother (who was in rehab for alcohol addiction), Ghostwriter wrote to her to make her feel better, and by the last season, Casey was a full-fledged member of the team. Casey was also the star of the last story arc, which was an arc about how the team helped her write a short story for a contest.

There were other minor characters who could see Ghostwriter. A kid named Craig (played by Growing Pains star Jeremy Miller) could see Ghostwriter during the Who Burned Mr. Brinker's Store arc, and when Jamal went on vacation in England, his two British friends, Becky and Sam could see him. And, of course, the three kids who Ghostwriter helped back in 1928.

If you're keeping track, that makes fourteen people in total who knew of Ghostwriter's existence.

And how did the team meet up for cases and meetings? All they had to do was write down the word RALLY plus the first letter of the person's name calling the rally. For instance, if Lenni called the rally, it would be RALLY L, or if Tina called it, it would be RALLY T and so on.

It was a really great show, and honestly if it wasn't for the fact that the show ran out of funds to produce the program (it did air on PBS after all), it might have lasted longer than three years. But in a time in which shows seem less and less educational these days, Ghostwriter is sorely missed. I probably was a little too old to watch it when it originally aired, but I just found it fascinating. Maybe because it dealt with words and language and spelling and other things that I was good at. Or maybe because the show was really well written for a children's show. I don't know.

Or maybe it was because I could identify with Ghostwriter because like me, Ghostwriter didn't really need to say a word to get his message out. All he needed was enough letters to form sentences and that was enough. Maybe it took time for the kids to figure it out, but eventually they did.

And maybe it might take me time to get what I want to say out at times, but eventually, I know that day will come for me too.


Friday, November 18, 2011

TGIF: Ross and Monica Geller from Friends

Siblings.

For quite a few of us, we have them. Some of us may only have one. Others may have more than one. If you're a member of the Duggar family, you're soon to have nineteen brothers and sisters.

There's some cases in which siblings would do anything for one another. Conversely, there are cases in which siblings decide to go the Cain and Abel route, where each one plots the demise of the other. Of course, cases like these are quite rare.

Sibling rivalry can be a really big deal though in many families. Particularly with families in which there may only be an age difference of a year or two in between each sibling. My 15-year-old niece and 13-year-old nephew are a perfect example of this, as I can't recall any given time in which both of them made it through an entire day without getting into some sort of silly, petty argument. Of course now that both of them are teenagers, I'm predicting that their rivalry will get worse before it gets better.

I will say that in my own family, there wasn't a whole lot of sibling rivalry. But there was a reason for this.

You see, my family is one where there are huge age gaps in between my siblings and I. I guess in many ways, this could be somewhat hereditary because there happens to be a 23 year age gap between my mother and her youngest sister.

The age gap between me and my siblings isn't quite that wide, but it's wide enough. I don't know whether my parents planned this out or whether it was merely a fluke, but somehow my parents ended up going with the one child per decade parenting plan. They had a child in the 1960s, a child in the 1970s, and a child in the 1980s. Kind of freaky, isn't it? I can actually remember being nine years old in 1990 asking my mom when she was going to have another baby now that we were in the 1990s. She just stared at me, and gave me the dirtiest look.  So alas, after I was born, that was it.

My two older sisters are nine and fifteen years older than I am. I was born when one was finishing up the ninth grade, and the other one was in third grade. By the time I had gotten old enough to attend school for the first time, one sister was in high school, and the other one went off to nursing school. By the time I was eleven years old, both of my sisters were out of the house, essentially making me feel like I was an only child ever since.

Now, as I said before, there wasn't really a whole lot of sibling rivalry. Certainly as their bratty little brother, I caused them great grief by doing some rather annoying things like sneaking into their rooms to play music, or by burying their Barbie dolls in the backyard, or drawing all over their stuff with black permanent marker.

(And yes, I admit to doing each and every one of these things. In fact, I bet if you were to go to my childhood home and dig up the backyard, you'd probably find the decapitated head of a Malibu Barbie buried deep within.)

But because of the wide age gaps between us, it effectively nixed any sibling rivalries between any of us. I mean, I was so much younger than the other two, so really, I was sort of outmatched in regards to trying to win an argument, or prove a point. Being the only boy worked out to my advantage as well.

But there was a downside. Because my sisters were so much older than I was, I didn't feel as though I could relate to them as much as kids who had siblings closer to their age could. And going through the turbulent school years that I had in which I was picked on and bullied frequently, it would have been nice to have had a brother or a sister who were closer to me in age to stand up for me, rather than having to go through it alone. But, that was the birth order we all experienced, and there wasn't anything I could do about it.

Even now as an adult, I know that my older siblings would be there for me when times were tough. Having undergone a health scare a few months earlier, and seeing them rally by my side to help me through did help confirm that. Still, I always wondered what it would have been like to have had a sibling closer to my age. Would we have gotten along great, or would we hate each others guts?  And seeing how my mom's relationships with her youngest siblings are more or less invisible, there is a bit of a worry that one day, my own relationship with my siblings could end up that way.

I don't feel like it could go that way, personally...still, there's always that sliver of doubt. But, I'm not a fortune teller here, so I won't even attempt to tempt the hands of fate with this one.

In keeping with the spirit of this blog post, today's topic will be about a brother and sister team who are a lot closer in age to each other than me and my siblings are. And yes, sometimes they fight, sometimes they compete against each other, and sometimes they give each other bad advice. But for the most part, they love and support each other. And when put in the right situation, they make a great team (you'll want to fast forward to 3:03 for this one...)



As you've probably guessed from the clip up above, today's subject is about one-third of the cast that made up the television show Friends. 



The brother-sister duo of Ross and Monica Geller, played by David Schwimmer and Courteney Cox.



When Friends debuted on NBC in the fall of 1994, it was expected to do very well on the airwaves. It definitely exceeded everyone's expectations, having a ten season run, which ended in May 2004. Part of the reason for the show's success was the brilliant casting of the show, which in addition to Schwimmer and Cox also included Jennifer Aniston, Lisa Kudrow, Matthew Perry, and Matt LeBlanc.

And one relationship that I always seemed to be fascinated by was the one between the Geller siblings.



At first glance, the siblings could not be more different from one another. Ross is the elder of the two siblings, and his occupation on the show was that of a paleontologist with a Ph.D. From Columbia University. He has been rather unlucky in love on the show. His first marriage collapsed because his wife ended up coming out as a lesbian (though the union did produce a child, Ben). His second marriage to his English love interest, Emily was doomed from the start when Ross accidentally said the name of his former flame, Rachel Green, during his wedding vows. A dalliance with a Chinese woman named Julie also ended because of his conflicting feelings with Rachel. And as for Ross and Rachel, well, they were the ultimate on-off relationship. He is more into teaching his son about the Jewish faith that he and Monica grew up with, and he is best described by his friends as being geeky and wimpy, with really bad hair. And these are his FRIENDS saying this!



Compare that with Monica. The younger of the two, the career she partakes in is one in the food industry, but she manages to hold down quite a few jobs during the course of the show's run. She worked as a waitress, a sous-chef, a head chef, and at one point tried her hand at a catering business. Monica only managed to have two serious relationships. The first one was with a man named Richard (Tom Selleck), but the relationship ended when he didn't want to have children...a dream that Monica had for as long as she could remember. The second one was with her brother's best friend, Chandler Bing. The second relationship ended up being the charm, as the couple got married in 2001, and remained together until the end of the series. In the end of the series, they end up adopting two children, a boy and a girl. Contrasting from Ross' description, Monica is bossier, stronger, and arguably more competitive than Ross, likely stemming from Monica's belief that her parents favoured Ross over her.

Want an example of this competitive streak in action? Watch this clip from the Season 3 episode “The One With The Football”.



A little extreme, but it illustrates my point.

For all their differences though, Ross and Monica do care and love each other very much, though sometimes it's not quite smooth sailing, and sometimes they make choices that they keep secret from each other because they feel as though they would hurt them if they knew...only for them to find out the secret on their own, and making the situation even worse.

Kind of like the time when Monica started dating Chandler, and everyone else found out EXCEPT Ross?  And how Ross only managed to discover it after moving into the apartment formerly occupied by the Ugly Naked Guy and seeing Monica and Chandler making love through his living room window?

Yeah, that was a little awkward. But, hey, none of them knew how he would react. Monica was just doing what she felt was right, and luckily for her, it worked out well. Of course, if she had let Ross in from the moment it happened, none of this would have happened, but then again, it would make for a boring episode of Friends.

Their early childhood and adult experiences also let us in on a little bit of the background in how the Geller siblings grew up.

Beginning with Ross, it's interesting to note that before his first marriage busted up, Monica revealed that Ross was never the jealous type. That said, Monica also revealed that on most of Ross' dates, it was pretty obvious that his dates were cheating on him with other people. Well, obvious to everyone except Ross, that is. This could explain why his relationships have more or less crashed and burned on the show. Despite this, Ross could always count on Monica being there for him. And for some reason, Ross is quite concerned with his physical appearance, and in both cases where he tried to improve on his looks (by using spray-tans and teeth bleaching), he failed miserably. He ended up with only half a spray-tan, and teeth that glowed in the dark. Still, Monica was there for him, even though she probably got a chuckle from his misfortune.

And Monica herself went through a lot as well. When we first met her on Friends, she was a beautiful, buxom brunette. What we initially didn't know was that Monica was half the woman she used to be. When she was in high school, she was a lot chunkier, revealing that she peaked at a weight of 255 pounds when she was a teenager. Although she had a friendship with the very popular Rachel Green, Monica didn't really date much. The motivation behind Monica dropping all the weight was after meeting Ross' college roommate, Chandler, who called her fat. When Monica, Ross, Rachel, and Chandler got together for Thanksgiving 1988, Monica planned to get revenge on Chandler by seducing him, but it ended badly when Monica accidentally cut off Chandler's toe.

Kind of ironic that Chandler and Monica would later end up a couple.

Despite Monica's struggle with her looks and her appearance back then, Ross was a supportive older brother to her. In fact, it is to Ross' credit that Monica probably ended up developing her inner strength. After all, when Monica was at her lowest, it was through the love and support of her best friend Rachel and her brother, Ross.

Monica proved to be there for Ross in return. When Ross broke up with Emily, Monica was the first one to offer up her support for her brother, and one could argue that Monica was one of the key people who helped Ross get back on his feet again.

And really, I think that's what siblings should do for one another. You don't always have to get along, and you don't even have to like each other some days.  But when times get tough, and when the situation becomes dire, if we're lucky enough to have our siblings stand by us through it all, I have to believe we can get through anything.

Kind of like my siblings did for me when I was sick.

In fact, I'm going to suggest an activity here. You don't have to participate if you don't want to, of course, depending on how fractured your relationship with your brothers and sisters is. But if you haven't talked to a sibling of yours in a long time, regardless of what the reason behind the drop in communication was, reestablish it in some form. Whether it's through an e-mail, a Facebook message, or just a simple phone call saying Hello, just do it. You might be surprised at the outcome, and you may end up reestablishing a relationship. But again, it's up to you to make that move. If you feel that there is no way to rebuild that bridge that was burned long ago, that's fine. There may be reasons behind it. But if it's simply a loss in communication that neither of you know how it became that way...isn't it worth it to try?


Thursday, November 17, 2011

Thursday Night At The Arcade - Edu-Ma-Cational Games!

Anyone who has had game consoles in their childhoods, as I have had with mine has probably heard all the flak that they get from parents and other adult figures.

They'll cause you to be violent, they say.
They'll make you a couch potato, they say.
They'll rot your brain, they say.

In the case of my own family, they said a lot of things to that extent. And yes, back then I completely tuned them out because I had deemed their opinions false and wrong.

Yes, there are violent video games out there in the world, but my personal preference is usually not towards these types of games. I hold the belief that playing violent video games does not make one violent themselves. Though, I also hold the belief that video game playing time should be monitored by parents if the child is at an impressionable age. I know it sounds contradictory on my part, but it's true. If parents can supervise their children, and make responsible choices for them, then there's a good chance that their child won't end up starring in their own live-action version of Grand Theft Auto.

There's also the argument that video games make kids sluggish, gain weight, and stay on the couch all hours of the day. And yes, with some of the retro gaming systems out there, I can see how this may have been the case back then. Not so much now though. With such games as Wii Fit, XBOX Kinect Adventures, and Dance Dance Revolution, people haven't had as much fun exercising! There's even video games based on the television show 'The Biggest Loser', a show designed to help people lose weight! So, that argument, especially over the last five years, is a moot point.

And then there's the whole idea of video games rotting the brain away. How video games couldn't possibly be educational. How they were just electronic devices destined to make kids turn into mindless zombies.

I say poppycock and balderdash. Everyone knows that the real things that are turning everyone into zombies is text messaging.

But, all kidding aside, the idea of video games being uneducational is a common misconception held by parents throughout the years.

And the reason why I describe it as a misconception is because there were dozens of educational video games available. Some were fantastic and well-done. Others weren't worth the microchips used to make them.



But when you take into account that some of the most popular toys going this holiday season are Leapsters, Leapfrogs, and other toys with the word 'Leap' in the title, there certainly is a market for educational video games.

So, for this blog entry, I've compiled a list of video and computer games that I have played over the last few years, and my goal is to hopefully convince you that video games can be both fun AND educational.

Let's start off with one of my favourites from my childhood.



PICK-A-DILLY PAIR (1983)

On the surface, it may seem like a standard matching game. Well, that's because it is. You have a whole bunch of numbered cards and you have to flip them over to make a match. It's especially fun when you play the Jokers & Villains mode, where the game is made more challenging. We used to have one of these computers in my second grade classroom, and this was probably one of the more popular games in the class. Come to think of it, if memory serves me, I held an 'undefeated' title in my second grade classroom for Pick-A-Dilly Pair. Every kid who dared to go up against me in the game did their best, but not one of them could defeat me. Hey, you take your victories wherever you can get them.

But I'm sure you're wondering how this game is educational, and I am getting to that right now. The game helped improve my already terrible short-term memory. By trying to memorize where the cards were placed, it became easier to make matches. The more matches I made, the better my memory became. I would think that to be true for any memory improving game.

The next game on the list was another popular game that kids played in second grade.



NUMBER MUNCHERS (1981)

Our classroom just had the Number Munchers game, but the company that manufactured the game (Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium) also made several other games with the same theme, including Word Munchers, Math Munchers, Fraction Munchers, and Knowledge Munchers Deluxe. The game allowed you to control a little green man known as a Muncher through a grid of squares. At the top of the screen would be a criteria, such as 'Multiples of Five', or 'Equations that equal the total of 9'. And your job would be to eat all of those numbers that met that criteria. But be careful. If you eat the wrong number, or get caught by the evil beings known as the Troggles, well, it's your funeral buddy.

Hmmm...so why am I getting a Square One flashback here?



Okay, admittedly that's not QUITE how the game was played, but you get the idea.



THE UNISYS ICON COMPUTER SYSTEM (1980s)

There's so many games to talk about for this educational system that we used in Canadian elementary schools. I first used one in the fourth grade, and one of the first games that I played for this system was a game known as Type Away. You would be taught a lesson, with each one corresponding with a pair of letters. The first few lessons taught you where the keys were on the middle row. The first lesson was the letters F and J, and the second was D and K, and so on, and so forth. Wow, I can't believe that I remembered that...funny how some things get burned into your memory, isn't it?

Anyway, at the end of each lesson, if the computer feels you've grasped it, you get a chance to practice your skills, and the letters typed would form a picture.  It could be a snail, a sailboat, even a Canadian flag!

There were other educational games too. Some dealt with morality issues and decision making, such as 'New Kid In Town' or 'A Week In The Life Of...', and some taught you how to do mathematics (Mathville). But it was a neat little computer that taught the user a whole bunch of skills.



READER RABBIT (1986)

Think of the Electric Company had it been turned into a video game. The star of the game was Reader Rabbit, and he helped teach children in between grades three and six not only how to read better, but how to sound out words, how to spell words, and even taught some basic math skills over the years. It was a very popular franchise back in the day, and rumour has it that for the game's 25th anniversary for 2011, the Nintendo Wii was working on developing a Reader Rabbit game for its console. It was a very cool game for children to learn from, but I have to say that for me personally, it bored me to tears. Still, the staying power of this franchise is nothing short of remarkable.



MARIO IS MISSING (1992)

Okay, now let's get into actual consoles here, and what better way to do this than with Nintendo's flagship character, Super Mario? I am not going to talk about the regular NES version of this game, because let's face it...8-bit graphics could only do so much. But the SNES version was a bit better. You got to play as Luigi in this game, and the object was to save Mario from Bowser's castle in Antarctica, after Mario was kidnapped in their quest to retrieve 45 stolen objects stolen from all over the world by Bowser and his children. You would have to go to various places all over the world such as Australia, Brazil, Japan, and Greece, trying to find the artifacts, bring them back to where they belonged, and take a snapshot of the landmark once you returned it. By completing each stage, you got one step closer to saving Mario.



Oh, but you also had to study the pamphlets collected about the landmarks. For the information clerks will ask you questions about each landmark in order for you to successfully return them. Oh, one more thing. If you can figure out where in the world you are, you can summon Yoshi to the very place you think you are.  If successful, Yoshi will join you, and you can make the speed of the game go a lot quicker.



Mario Is Missing dealt with the subject of geography, but a 1993 sequel called Mario's Time Machine was released, which had Mario going back in time to bring back historical artifacts that Bowser had stolen, adding a little bit of American and World history to the mix. And both games were a fun distraction for kids who grew up during that time period. But I admit that one game that also dealt with the subject of geography did it better.



WHERE IN THE WORLD IS CARMEN SANDIEGO? (1985)

This was a game that absolutely fun to play, and later inspired a television quiz show for children that aired between 1991-1996.



You played a detective from the ACME Detective Agency, trying to find a criminal named Carmen Sandiego. She and her henchmen have caused trouble all over the world, and it is your job to travel to various places all over the world to apprehend her henchmen (and ultimately, Carmen herself). People on the street will give clues as to what the henchmen look like, as well as the location where they were travelling. You had to keep track of both very closely, because if one were to make the wrong guess, you could end up on a wild goose chase. To make it even more complicated, you had a deadline to solve the case. If you didn't make the deadline, Carmen and her goons got away. You really had to know your world geography to get through this game, but you also had to keep track of the clues so that you could get an arrest warrant for the right suspect.

I hope that these examples that I have provided for you will illustrate my point that video games can be educational and fun at the same time, putting an end to the argument that video games are mindless entertainment.

Of course, they can also be unintentionally creepy as hell.