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Friday, April 19, 2013

MacGyver


Okay, here's a game that I want to play with all of you to kick off another Friday entry. You can play along if you wish. It's all hypothetical anyway.

All right. I'm going to give you a list of items, as well as a dangerous situation that you might experience (although in all likelihood, the odds are rather slim). Your job is to try and survive the experience just by using the items that you are equipped with. Let's begin.

SITUATION #1: You're sleeping in your bedroom when all of a sudden, you smell smoke. There's a fire right outside your door and it is preventing you from getting out. You have a window that you can climb out of, but it is two and a half stories high, and you know that if you jump out, you risk serious injury. All you can get a hold of are your bedsheets, a package of rubber bands, some scotch tape, and a skipping rope. What will you use? As far as what I would do, I'd tie two sheets together with the skipping rope, and use the sheets to climb out of the window. I suppose that I could also use the rubber bands and tape, but they wouldn't hold my body weight. I still may end up injured, but it would only be minor.

SITUATION #2: You have been kidnapped by someone and are trapped inside a room that is locked from the outside. You are tied to a chair with a rope around your ankles, and the only possessions you have are a belt buckle, a watch, a couple of credit cards, some pocket change, a couple of business cards, and a ceramic coffee mug nearby. What do you do? Well, first, I'd find a way to get out of my tied up state, so I'd try to break apart the ceramic mug (my legs may be tied, but my arms are not). I'd rub the mug pieces against the rope to cut it. Once I was freed, I'd need something to break the lock, and three items can help me do it. If I use the nub on the belt buckle, a credit card, or a business card and slide it in the door jamb, I could manage to unlock the door if I twist it the right way.

SITUATION #3: You're walking down the street with a bag of groceries, and you happen to find yourself caught from behind by a mugger who wants everything you have. He is also armed with a gun. You have to think fast, but the only things you have in your grocery bags are frozen salmon, Diet Coke, a package of Mentos, a carton of grapefruit juice, and mango poppyseed salad dressing. How are you going to get out of this one alive? Well, I suppose you could use the Diet Coke and Mentos to spray a steady stream of fizz in the man's face, but that could take some time. I would just grab the grapefruit juice and splash it in the mugger's eyes. He would be so busy screaming in agony over the acidic juice stinging his eyes, that you could get away quite easily.

Of course, these are just fictional scenarios. They are however linked to today's show, as the star happens to be one of those men who finds ordinary weapons like guns and knives to be boring. He'd rather use his mind and his skills in chemistry, physics, and mathematics to create spur of the moment inventions to help him fight crime, protect the innocent, and save himself from complete annihilation in the process.

Two weeks ago, I featured an action-drama beginning with M that aired on CBS. Last week, I featured an action-drama beginning with M that aired on NBC. This week, it's ABC's turn.



We're taking a look at the long-running series MacGyver!



MacGyver ran for seven seasons on ABC and was one of the network's most successful prime-time series. It ran from September 29, 1985 until May 21, 1992. The show was a joint production between Henry Winkler and John Rich, and was created by Lee David Zlotoff. The show also made Richard Dean Anderson a star and sex symbol, as he portrayed the main character of Angus MacGyver.



TRIVIA: One of the running gags in “The Simpsons” involves MacGyver. Marge's sisters Patty and Selma have been fans of MacGyver forever, and the first three seasons had a lot of MacGyver jokes inserted into each episode. Richard Dean Anderson even made a guest appearance on the series, in which Patty and Selma actually kidnap him!



MacGyver is a secret agent whose weaponry doesn't include guns or assault weapons. His tool of choice is a Swiss Army knife, which has helped him escape more sticky situations than you could even count. Although he will use a revolver or an AK-47 if there is absolutely no other option, but the reason why he has abhorred guns is because of a childhood accident in which one of his friends accidentally died from a gunshot wound.

Therefore, it's not uncommon for MacGyver to use his Swiss Army knife, along with a combination of other household items to find a way out of the most precarious positions. It was this ingenuity and creativity that kept audiences hooked for seven seasons, and at one time was responsible for an increase in enrollment at engineering programs at college and university campuses all over the world.

In short, MacGyver did for engineering what CSI did for forensic sciences.



Also appearing on the series was Pete Thornton (played by Dana Elcar). Thornton is MacGyver's boss and closest confidant. At first, he is an operative of the Department of External Services, but by later seasons, becomes director of operations at the Phoenix Foundation (which MacGyver also becomes a part of).



MacGyver is also joined by his best friend, the comical Jack Dalton (played by Bruce McGill). He is well-meaning, but often acts on impulse and stupidity when he forces MacGyver to clean up the mess he makes when another one of his get-rich schemes blows up in his face.

Here's some more trivia about the show.

01 – Richard Dean Anderson performed most of his own stunts during the first few seasons of MacGyver, but had to quit doing stuntwork in the 1990s following injuries to his back and feet.



02 – The show was the lead-in to ABC's Monday Night Football for six years, likely aiding in its popularity.

03 – Dana Elcar was diagnosed with glaucoma near the end of the series. It was written into the show.

04 – When Henry Winkler and John Rich were looking for actors to cast in the role of MacGyver, Anderson was given the part because of the human touch he gave the character (unlike the other actors who according to Winkler “hulked their way through the audition”).

05 – The series finale aired on April 25, 1992...but an unaired episode aired nearly a month later on May 21, 1992.

06 – The reason why MacGyver was pulled from the ABC schedule despite it still scoring decent numbers was due to Anderson being too physically exhausted to continue with the series.

07 – There were two MacGyver made for television movies that aired after the original series wrapped up. Both aired in 1994.



08 – The show is still spoofed today, with the most recent one being on Saturday Night Live, where Will Forte played the role of “MacGruber”.

09 – Some of the ideas for MacGyver's inventions and innovations came from fans themselves. The show even encouraged people to send in their ideas by offering them cash prizes for the best ideas. Henry Winkler particularly singled out the idea that one viewer sent in...that if you cracked an egg over a vehicle's cracked radiator, the egg would seal up the crack!

10 – Richard Dean Anderson reprised his role of MacGyver in 2012 for a series of advertisements for Mercedes-Benz.

11 – A comic book series starring MacGyver began being published in October 2012.

12 – The role of MacGyver's arch-enemy, Murdoc, was played by Michael Des Barres. In the episode entitled “Cleo Rocks”, he actually composed the song of the same name that was performed in the show!

13 – There was an incident in which a pair of teenage boys attempted to make a bomb themselves which accidentally detonated, killing one of the two. The other one claimed they got the idea from an episode of MacGyver, but no such episode existed, clearing the show of any wrongdoing.

14 – In a related note, whenever a “MacGyver-ism” was shown, not all the steps were shown in the episode, for the very reason that the producers didn't want kids risking their safety to recreate it.

15 – Look closely at the directing credits for the first few episodes of the series, including the pilot episode. They were all directed by Allen Smithee. The Smithee name is used by directors who refuse to allow their real names to be linked to a project out of embarrassment or out of fear that the work they put out wasn't their best.

16 – The first few episodes of the show were filmed in Los Angeles, California, but when the cost of producing the show became too high, resulting in ABC threatening to cancel the series, production was moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.

I could go on, but I just realized that my computer battery is beginning to die out, and all I have are thumbtacks, a magnet, duct tape, a lemon, and some Trident chewing gum to try and get the battery powered back up.

Gotta go.  

Thursday, April 18, 2013

Thursday Diary - Unscripted


This is another one of those Thursday Diary entries that is half typed and half written. I was inspired to jot a few pages of notes down and I've decided to share my thoughts in another edition of a real, honest interpretation of my Thursday Diary series.

It's unscripted, it's unedited (aside from the one goof-up I did on the last page), and it's about as rough a copy as one can get. Let's just say that recent events got me thinking.

April 18, 2013

This is going to be a piece that may appear to be very light on text, and very heavy on pictures. It's another attempt at a handwritten blog, and this time, I actually used a pen that WILL show up.

I was also listening to my iPod at the time, and will insert videos of the songs I was hearing while writing each page, as well as providing visuals of some photos to supplement each section.

I began writing this piece while I watched Big Brother Canada on television. When the commercials came on, I wrote page one as fast as I could. Here was the song that was playing at the time.



And, here's page one (to make it larger, just click on the image).




It took a while to compose page two, but this was the song that was playing on my iPod while I was writing the second part of my hand-written blog.



Part 2 begins now.



For the conclusion, I'm going to enter what I have learned from the events over the last few days.  I initially had the song included with this post as it was what I was listening to at the time, but listening to the lyrics, there's one part that might get some people bent out of shape.

If you want to know what the song was, it was Frente's "Ordinary Angels".  The introduction should clue you in as to why I decided not to use it...





I figured that I would try the handwritten notes once more because it got some positive feedback the first time I tried it out. Would you like to see more? Please let me know in the space below!

Wednesday, April 17, 2013

Hangin' Out in the School Playground


Hey, everyone! This Wednesday, we're going to be continuing our look back on outdoor activities. After all, that's what the theme for every Wednesday is in the blog for the month of April.

And, for today's topic, a subject in which most of us can probably relate to. But first, I want to tell you all a little bit of a story.



For most kids, I would assume that recess was the absolute best part of the school day. For fifteen minutes every morning and for fifteen minutes every afternoon, the schools would kick the kids outside onto the school playground for a session of play. And, truth be told, a lot of kids that I knew looked forward to recess, as it was a time in which they had full control over what they wanted to do.

Myself? I had more of a love/hate relationship with recess. There were some days in which I absolutely hated recess. For one, I didn't really have many close friends that I could spend the entire recess period with, so I spent most of them walking around the back field by myself until the bell rang. Truth be told, I would have rather stayed inside the school for recess, and was thrilled to death when rain, heavy snow, and other horrible weather meant that we could stay inside for recess. This was particularly true back when I was in grades 1-3, as a lot of the older kids used to spend their recess periods trying to beat me up!

However, there was one thing about going outside for recess that I liked.

The playground equipment.

Mind you, when I was in school, I almost never got the opportunity to go on the playground equipment. With almost 500 kids at my elementary school, the play structures were always overcrowded with kids. It wasn't until I started attending the summer playground program (which were held at the various elementary school playgrounds all over town) that I really allowed myself to enjoy the play structures the way that they should be enjoyed.



I was actually walking by my old elementary school just the other day, and it boggled my mind over how different the playground looked. Mind you, I graduated from elementary school eighteen years ago, so I imagine that some of the playground equipment had to be replaced due to old age. But, I didn't expect the whole thing to look completely different. It was like a completely different place. The play structures were replaced, the bleachers looked as if they had been redone, and there was even a scoreboard erected on the side of the playground.

(Our elementary school playground also contained the football field for the high school located nearby...hence the need for a scoreboard.)

But you know, even though the school playground looks completely different than it did back when I was a kid, I still have those fond memories in spite of my flip-flopping attitude towards recess.

For instance, one of the things that I remember the most about my elementary school playground were the dozens of hopscotch courts that were painted onto the pavement. Hopscotch was a game that I loved to play when I was seven or eight. It was also a nice little game that I could play solo if I had to. All I needed was a small stone (which the playground was filled with), and I could keep myself amused for the entire fifteen minute recess.



Another thing that I remember about the school playground was the courtyard which had basketball hoops. I could be remembering this wrong, but when the weather warmed up in the spring, the yard duty teacher would often give out basketballs and soccer balls that we could play with during the entire recess (well, provided that we returned them). Of course, not all of them would get returned, as some balls found their way up onto the roof of the school. Though, I'll admit that it was fun on the last day of school when the school janitor would go up on the roof to throw down all of the balls, frisbees, and kites that accumulated up there during the course of the school year. I think I even caught a ball one year. I don't even think it was one that I owned, but since the kid that threw it up there was probably long gone by then, finders keepers!

As far as the playground equipment itself went, I have so many personal tales, stories, and in a couple of cases, a couple of battle scars to tell you about. What can I say? No child ever escapes the confines of a school playground without sustaining a few scars, scrapes, and bruises, right?



One of the main things that I remember about my elementary school playground was the gigantic wooden bridge (similar to the one above) that spanned between the curvy yellow slide and those rings that kids could swing on. I loved that bridge with a passion, and one of my favourite activities on that bridge was playing a little game called “Earthquake Bridge”. I would walk onto the bridge with one or two other kids on it, and we'd swing the bridge back and forth to simulate an earthquake. Sometimes the motion would be nice and gentle, and other times the movement would be so jerky and violent that we wondered if we would fly over the side of the bridge. Luckily, we did no such thing.



Although I did end up getting a minor injury sliding down the curvy yellow slide. I think I spoke of this before on the blog, but I now have a permanent scar on my right knee from when I did a crash landing after sliding on the yellow slide the wrong way.

Ah well...as I said before, almost every kid has a playground injury at some point in their lives.

At least my injury wasn't as bad as the one that a kid in the grade below me sustained after taking a tumble off of the monkey bars one afternoon. At first I didn't realize just how serious the injury was...until I saw that the kid's entire forehead was covered in blood. I'm not sure exactly how he managed to get such a serious injury, but he had to hit his head on something hard.

I think it was shortly after that incident that they began the plan to renovate that particular section of the play area so that it was safer.

Aside from the monkey bars though, that wing of the playground had a lot going for it. It was the section where all of the bike racks were, so it was easy to find. There were the teeter-totters that many kids played on, but unfortunately I didn't get much of an opportunity to. Apparently some of the kids felt that I was too heavy for them to play with, which was ridiculous in my eyes! I was heavy set as a kid, true, but I didn't outweigh the kids by THAT much. It was all in their minds.

(Well, at least I see it that way NOW. I didn't always.)



And, can we talk about the swing sets? I tell you, I was a huge fan of swing sets as a kid. Both sets of grandparents had swing sets located in their backyards, and I spent the majority of my time swinging on those things. Swings were cool. I didn't get to play with the swing sets much when I was in school, but during the summer playground program, I would spend a lot of time sitting on the swings by myself. I did a lot of daydreaming when I was a kid (which I'm told is supposed to be a common personality trait for creative types), and swinging on the swing set was a great place to be alone with my thoughts.



The school playground was also a fantastic place to play on during the epic Canadian winters that I grew up with. Obviously whenever we had a huge snowfall, the snow plows would be called into the playground area to clear off the pavement to make it safer for us to play in. One of the perks of this? Eight foot tall snow walls which turned into impromptu snow forts. All of us had great fun climbing on these huge walls of snow and ice, and we would pretend that we were climbing Mount Everest. I'm sure that had the school not put the kibosh on snowball throwing, we would have tried to repel “enemy soldiers” with an arsenal of snowballs on top of that. Alas, the school declared it to be too dangerous.

Let's recap. We couldn't throw snowballs, but they let us climb up snow walls that were more than twice our height. Seems counter-productive, doesn't it?

There was also a little hill in the playground that was located next to the play structure that contained the curvy yellow slide and wooden bridge. That hill was nothing too spectacular during the warm months. But if we had a dusting of freezing rain fall, the surface of the hill would become one hundred per cent solid ice...which made it a fantastic sliding hill! Most of us stayed warm though, mostly because our teachers forced us to wear those big, bulky snow pants. If it were up to me, I'd be doing a pantomime of the Robert Munsch classic “Thomas' Snowsuit” every single recess. I despised snow pants with a passion!

But the freezing rain could also be quite dangerous. I recall a couple of incidents in which freezing rain caused me much discomfort. When I was in the fourth grade, I slipped on a patch of ice and slid right into a gigantic puddle! Luckily I didn't live too far away from school, so I changed quickly and only ended up being ten minutes late for school. Better to be late than freeze to death in the classroom, right?

The second incident happened when I was in the first grade. The bell rang and I was all the way in the back of the playground. I ran as fast as I could to the door, so I wouldn't be late for school, and wasn't aware that the pavement was covered in black ice. I slid, and did a faceplant right in front of the door where everyone could see. I wasn't that embarrassed though. If anything, I was more in pain. The impact bloodied my nose and I honestly believed that I had broken it. Turned out that I didn't, but I think I went through half a box of Kleenex trying to stop it from bleeding. It was a messy and PAINFUL experience.

Anyway, those are just a few of my own personal school playground memories. What are some of yours?

Tuesday, April 16, 2013

April 16, 1971


Before I kick off another Tuesday Timeline, I need to say something.

By now, I'm sure that all of you have heard about the senseless tragedy that took place yesterday afternoon in Boston, Massachusetts at the 2013 Boston Marathon. At least two people were killed and hundreds more injured when a series of bombs were detonated near the finish line at the Boston Marathon. The actions that took place yesterday are barbaric and inexcusable, and I will never understand why someone would commit such a violent act at what is supposed to be a peaceful and joyous event.

I just wanted to take this time to offer my prayers to those who were in the Boston area the afternoon of April 15, 2013, and to those who either lost a loved one, or knew someone who was seriously wounded in the attacks, my deepest sympathies and condolences to all of you. I know it's of little comfort, but I just wanted to offer my public support to everyone affected by this tragedy.

And, now...on with the Tuesday Timeline for April 16.

We'll begin with those celebrities who are unwrapping birthday presents today. A very happy birthday to Pope Benedict XVI, Peter Mark Richman, Bobby Vinton, Ann Romney, Billy West, Peter Garrett (Midnight Oil), Ellen Barkin, Scott McKinsey, Jimmy Osmond, Jon Cryer, Martin Lawrence, Max Beesley, Peter Billingsley, Akon, Nick Pickard, Lukas Haas, Natalie Blair, and Claire Foy.

And, here are some of the happenings that have taken place throughout history on April 16...

73 A.D. - The Great Jewish Revolt comes to an end with the fall of Masada, a Jewish fortress

1799 – Napoleon Bonaparte drives Ottoman Turks across the River Jordan

1818 – The U.S. Senate ratifies the Rush-Bagot Treaty, which eventually establishes the border dividing the United States and what would become the nation of Canada

1881 – Bat Masterson fights his final gun battle in Dodge City, Kansas

1889 – Silent film star Charlie Chaplin is born in London

1912 – Harriet Quimby becomes the first female pilot to fly an airplane across the English Channel

1924 – Composer Henry Mancini is born in Cleveland, Ohio

1939 - Singer Dusty Springfield is born

1941 – Cleveland Indians pitcher Bob Feller throws the only Opening Day no-hitter in the history of Major League Baseball

1945 – Nearly one million troops fight in the Battle of the Seelow Heights

1947 – Texas City, Texas catches on fire following an explosion on board a freighter docked at port, killing 600 people

1962 – Walter Kronkite assumes the lead anchor position for the CBS Evening News

1963 – Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. writes his Letter from Birmingham Jail

1990 – Dr. Jack Kevorkian participates in his first assisted suicide

2007 – 32 people are killed, and another 23 people are injured in the Virginia Tech shootings

For today's blog entry, we're going to take a look back on a singer who could have had it all. She was already an established starlet in the Tejano music market, and was looking at expanding her fanbase to the English speaking world. Tragically, her life was cut short in a senseless act of violence, and nearly twenty years later, people still wonder if she could have had as lengthy and successful career as other musical artists such as Gloria Estefan and Jennifer Lopez have had.



She was born on April 16, 1971. Had she lived, she would be turning 42 years old today. Unfortunately, she died less than three weeks before her twenty-fourth birthday.



This is the story of a young woman named Selena. All she wanted was to sing and to make people happy. And, I think that's why so many people were saddened and angry when in 1995, Selena was taken from the world in such a senseless and violent manner.

Born in Lake Jackson, Texas on April 16, 1971, Selena Quintanilla was the youngest of three children born to Marcella and Abraham Quintanilla Jr. She began singing at the age of three, and when the family relocated to Corpus Christi, Texas, Selena and her siblings performed at every public event they could book – from weddings, to quinceaneras (kind of similar to a Sweet 16 party except that in the Latino world, the fifteenth birthday is the most important teenage birthday for girls). Selena's popularity continued to rise to the point where she was constantly performing and touring, and when she was fourteen, her father pulled her out of school so she could perform and record music full-time.

Fear not though. Selena did earn her high school diploma by correspondence in 1988, when she was seventeen.

As luck would have it, the very year that Selena left school was the same year that Selena got her first break. In 1985, she recorded what would become her first album. Funny thing about it was that it took nearly a decade before the public would get a chance to listen to it. Her father was so proud of Selena's accomplishment that he bought every copy of the original album that was released at the time! It was later re-released in 1995 under the title Mis Primeras Grabaciones (My First Recordings). Shortly after that, Selena began releasing other albums – six in total – without having an official recording contract from a major record label!

Even more impressive was that she won the Best Female Vocalist Award at the 1987 Tejano Music Awards when she was just sixteen years of age! She would later win the same award for a consecutive NINE YEARS, three of which were awarded posthumously.

Is it any wonder that by the time the 1980s ended, Capitol/EMI became interested in signing Selena to a recording deal? Jose Behar signed her onto his label because he believed that she was going to be a huge star. He felt as though she could be the next Gloria Estefan.



Teaming up with her brother (Abraham Quintanilla III), Selena released the album Ven Conmigo (Come With Me) in 1990, which became the first album by a Tejano artist to reach Gold status.

INTERESTING FACT: Initially, the album cover was to be shot in colour, but Selena had dyed her hair black the night before, and some of the dye actually got on her face. The album cover became black and white to camouflage the mistake. Interesting what you can find out, huh?




1990 was also a rather interesting year for Selena, as two people would cross paths with her and change her life forever. One was Chris Perez, a man who she had met two years prior. When Selena's family hired him to play in her band, a spark flew between the two, and they immediately began dating. Unfortunately, Selena's father was completely against the pairing, and he even fired Chris from the band to keep him away from Selena! In time, Chris became accepted by the entire Quintanilla family, and the two married in April 1992.



Also in 1990, a woman by the name of Yolanda Saldivar approached Selena's father with the idea to start up an official fan club for Selena's fans. After hearing Yolanda's idea, Selena's father gave her the okay, and within the year, Yolanda became the president of Selena's official fan club, no questions asked.

It would only be five years later that Selena's father would come to realize that he was too hard on one person and tragically too lenient on the other.



Over the next four years, Selena's star continued to rise within the Latin American community. In 1992, Selena released the song, “Como La Flor”, which became a #1 hit on the Latin American charts, and in 1994, Selena's album Amor Prohibido (Forbidden Love) had sold 400,000 copies in the United States, was nominated for a Grammy Award, and had four #1 hits on the Latin American charts, including the one featured below.



ARTIST: Selena
SONG: Bidi Bidi Bom Bom
ALBUM: Amor Prohibido
DATE RELEASED: August 13, 1994
PEAK POSITION ON THE HOT LATIN TRACKS CHART: #1

At the end of 1994, Selena was well on her way to becoming a talented, successful, wealthy young woman. In addition to her music, she had also opened up two boutiques under the name “Selena Inc.” (which Yolanda Saldivar managed), founded a successful clothing line, and began acting in telenovelas. She even had a bit part in the 1995 feature film, “Don Juan DeMarco”, where she played the role of a ranchera singer. She also began speaking at local schools and became involved with the D.A.R.E. Program, which increased her fan base. By the time 1995 rolled around, Selena was considering breaking into the mainstream pop music market with an English-language album, to see if she could have just as much success as she did in the Tejano music scene.

Unfortunately, Selena would not get a chance to live out her dream.

In the first three months of 1995, Selena began to grow suspicious of Yolanda Saldivar and her true intentions. On the surface, Yolanda appeared to be Selena's biggest fan and closest confidant. However, Yolanda was also stealing from the very person she adored the most. She was caught embezzling money from Selena's own fan club, and a hurt and betrayed Selena fired Saldivar from her job at the boutique, as well as from her role as president of her fan club. Just three weeks after she was fired, on March 31, 1995, Selena agreed to meet Saldivar in a Corpus Christi hotel room to retrieve financial records related to the time period in which Saldivar was alleged to have stolen the money. Saldivar had been refusing to hand Selena the documents and Selena was getting impatient. Saldivar was getting more and more desperate the more Selena asked, even going so far as to tell Selena that she had gotten raped in Mexico to hold off the handover! When that tactic failed, Selena once more asked Saldivar to hand over the financial papers.

And Saldivar responded by pulling out a gun and shooting Selena in her right shoulder. Wounded, Selina managed to run to the hotel lobby to try and get some help, but it was too late.

On March 31, 1995 at 1:05pm, Selena Quintanilla-Perez was dead at the age of 23. The cause of death was loss of blood due to the severing of a major artery caused by the bullet wound. Yolanda Saldivar was arrested for the murder of Selena Quintanilla, and was sentenced to life in prison, with the possibility of parole after serving thirty years (or until the year 2025).

As for the aftermath of Selena's death, millions of people mourned her death all over the United States and Mexico, and some 60,000 people came out to pay their last respects to Selena. Several celebrities called the Quintanilla family to pay their respects, including Gloria Estefan, Julio Iglesias, Celia Cruz, and Madonna, just to name a few.



At the time of her death, the English language album had only been half completed, but in the summer of 1995, the English tracks that had been recorded were released along with the Spanish language songs that helped make Selena a star on the Latin Charts. The album was titled, “Dreaming of You”, and when it was released on July 18, 1995, it sold two million copies in one year! I imagine that many people who bought the album did so to honour their favourite singer, but I'll be the first to admit that I thought her songs were fantastic, and had a lot of heart and soul. We can only speculate what the full album would have sounded like, but I think that had Selena lived, she would have still had the same amount of success. It's just a shame that her life was cut too short.

In 1997, a feature film was made on Selena's life, with Jennifer Lopez taking on the role of Selena (I recommend this film as well, and Lopez does do a very convincing job). And in 2006, a life-size bronze statue of Selena was erected in Corpus Christi, along with a Selena museum.

But ultimately, the legend that Selena will be remembered most for is her music. And, as we close the book on April 16, 1971, let's close off this piece with one of my favourite Selena songs.




Monday, April 15, 2013

Wall Street


Hello, everyone out there in Internet land, and if you happen to be living in the United States, I want to wish all of you a Happy Tax Day!



(Well, okay, if you have been audited, it's not exactly going to be a “happy” one. And, even if you did get a huge refund, the steps that you took to get that refund probably isn't considered to be a happy experience either.)

Okay, how about this. HAPPY “YOU DON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT TAXES FOR ANOTHER YEAR” DAY!!!

Yes, in the United States, April 15 is the absolute deadline for filing your income tax papers for the year (Fear not, Canadians, you still have two more weeks to go, as tax day for us isn't until April 30). And, let's face it. Nobody really likes doing taxes. I bet even the accountants at H&R Block and other businesses dedicated to filing people's taxes despise doing them. But, alas, taxes is one of the things in this world that one simply cannot avoid. The other thing being death.

Wow...that sounds bleak and depressing, doesn't it?

At any rate, since today is tax day, I thought that for the subject of today's blog entry, I would try to talk about a topic that is also linked to money, finances, and the lengths that some people go to in order to be filthy rich.

And, I can only think of one movie right off the bat that does exactly that.



First, a question for you. How many of you have owned (or currently own) stocks in the stock market? Come on, don't be shy! I actually own some stock in the company that I work for. It isn't much, mind you. Since I entered the company's stock program a year and a half ago, I've only managed to accumulate seven shares. It's pocket change compared to most people, but I'm okay with that. The fact that I have a smidgen of shares in what can be an unstable venture is fine with me...

...well, at least until the stock prices go crashing down, that is.

The truth is that the stock market can be a really fickle place, and it involves just as much gambling as a night out at a casino, or buying hundreds of those Powerball lottery tickets. And, to be completely honest, as much as the gamble can potentially pay off, I'm not that much of a risk taker to put all of my savings into the stock market.

Mind you, the savviest of stockbrokers have done their research and come into the New York Stock Exchange well prepared and researched into what companies are doing hot, and what companies are...well, not.



But even the most intelligent brokers can't rely on the Wall Street Journal alone to make huge decisions in the stock exchange. A little bit of luck is involved as well. Sometimes luck can make the difference between making a small fortune, or losing a big one.

And, sometimes events happen that can cause huge hardships, no matter how great your stock portfolio is. Just take a look back at the October 1929 crash which sent the world into a Great Depression for the better part of a decade. See also the crashes of 1987, 2001, and 2008 as well – the latter one being one that we're still feeling the effects of five years later. And the 2001 collapse of Enron also destroyed the lives of many people due to the accounting scandal that saw the price of the stock drop from $90 a share to below 90 cents a share by the beginning of 2002.



And, that's where the risks come into play. It's easy enough to decide to purchase shares in the stock market. As long as people remember the rule to buy low and sell high, that should ideally be a feasible guideline to go by. But, that doesn't take into account the possible insider trading, sweetheart deals, and other corrupt behaviour that can take place on and off the trading floor. I would like to think that most stockbrokers know how the game is played and try to win the game as fairly as possible, but there are always going to be people who want to win at all costs no matter how many lies they tell or how many people they throw under the bus.



That scenario seems to be the main theme in Oliver Stone's “Wall Street”, which was released in theatres on December 11, 1987. The film was a box office smash, making $44 million on a budget of $15 million. The film had some real star power as well, with already established actors Michael Douglas and Daryl Hannah being cast in the film, as well as then rising star Charlie Sheen.

The film was critically acclaimed by many well-known critics including Jay Scott, Richard Corliss, and Roger Ebert, and nearly a quarter of a century later, the film spawned a sequel, with Douglas and Sheen (in a cameo) reprising their roles and Shia LeBeouf and Carey Mulligan as the new faces on the street.

The film also exhibited the general mantra of the 1980s in general. Greed is Good. Say it with me, people.



Thank you, Mr. Douglas!

The film begins in the year 1985. Bud Fox (Sheen) is an up-and-coming stockbroker who works for Jackson Steinem & Co, who wants nothing more than to become a real player on Wall Street. Despite his blue-collar upbringing by his father (played by Sheen's real-life father, Martin Sheen), who serves as president of the machinist's union at Bluestar Airlines, Bud has decided to idolize a man who could not be more unlike his old man. Gordon Gekko (Douglas) is a ruthless Wall Street trader who would not stop at anything to nail down a huge money making deal, even if he resorts to illegal measures to do it.



The partnership between Bud and Gekko begins as Bud pays him a visit and is given an interview. However, Gekko remains stoic and unimpressed by Bud's pitch...until Bud hands Gekko some insider information on Bluestar Airlines (that was casually mentioned in a conversation between Bud and his father. Gekko immediately starts purchasing Bluestar stock and becomes a client of Bud. Soon after, Bud is given an assignment by Gekko to spy on a British corporate raider and predict his next move so that Gekko can get dibs first. The tactic works, and Bud and Gekko quickly form a partnership and allegiance.

At first, things couldn't be going better for Bud. Thanks to the perks that Gekko promised him for doing his dirty work, Bud finds himself with a corner office, a Manhattan penthouse, and a beautiful blonde girlfriend named Darien (Hannah). But Bud's tactics – which include using friends as straw buyers and trading insider information illegally – attract the attention of the Securities and Exchange Commission, which immediately puts Bud on their watch list.

Still, Bud feels no guilt over anything he has done, content to living the high life as one of New York's most successful brokers, albeit attached to Gekko the same way that a marionette would be attached to its strings.

Things begin to unravel in the Bud/Gekko partnership following an idea that Bud had to purchase and expand Bluestar Airlines with Bud as president. Bud even persuades his father to get the union on his side. But Gekko pulls the wool over everyone's eyes when he reveals his plan to dissolve the company and sell off its assets to access cash from the company's pension plan, which would leave the entire staff of Bluestar unemployed and penniless...including Bud's own father. Bud quickly switches allegiances and tries his best to save his father's company...but when you have Gordon Gekko as an enemy, it won't be easy.

And, that's where I'm going to end this piece off. The ending is satisfying though, I promise you that.

Since I still have some space left, why not end this look back on Wall Street with this set of behind the scenes trivia.

01 – This was the very first feature film to feature the cell phone! Well, a cell phone that was big, bulky, and weighed three pounds!!!

02 – Before Michael Douglas won the role of Gordon Gekko, Oliver Stone really wanted either Warren Beatty or Richard Gere for the part.

03 – Tom Cruise really wanted the role of Bud in “Wall Street”, but Stone had already promised the role to Sheen. Stone and Cruise would later work together three years later when the movie “Born On The Fourth Of July” was released.

04 – The film's original title was going to be “Greed”.

05 – Michael Douglas won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in the film.



06 – On the flipside, Daryl Hannah won the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Supporting Actress. Ouch.

07 – Oliver Stone's son, Sean, plays the role of Rudy Gekko.

08 – Oliver Stone had two actors in line to play the role of Bud's father. One was Martin Sheen, and the other was Jack Lemmon. Stone gave Charlie Sheen the choice as to which actor he wanted. Gee...can't imagine what went into his decision...

09 – Many people apparently came up to Stone to tell him that they felt Daryl Hannah was miscast as Darien, but Stone stood by his decision.

10 – Heck, not even Daryl Hannah was happy being cast in the role, as she felt that she was nothing like the character she was playing. Hmmm...maybe that's why she ended up with the Razzie.



11 – Sean Young was cast as Gordon Gekko's wife...but she really wanted the part that Daryl Hannah was cast in, and she made it very clear at every opportunity. Geez, what is it with Sean Young causing havoc on every movie set she was a part of? In every single Monday Matinee that I've done featuring Young as one of the actresses, she's always had something scandalous written about her!

12 – The film was finished five days ahead of schedule, as Stone had increased the hours of filming in the movie's last few weeks of shooting, partly due to a looming Director's Guild strike on the horizon.

13 – Charlie Sheen's character was originally named Joe Fox. It had to be changed after a real-life trader with the same name refused to let the film use his name.

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Promises, Promises


This is the Sunday Jukebox entry for this week, and as always, I will be featuring a song in which we're going to have a discussion. However, this Sunday Jukebox is going to be a little bit different, because at first glance, it may seem more like a Thursday Diary entry.

I'll still be talking about the band that made the song, as well as some information on the song itself, but I'm also going to be adding a personal confession that is linked to this song. I'll give you a hint...it has to do with the song title.



So, let's not wait any longer. Here's the song of the day, courtesy of the British New Wave group, Naked Eyes.



ARTIST: Naked Eyes
SONG: Promises, Promises
ALBUM: Burning Bridges
DATE RELEASED: July 16, 1983
PEAK POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD CHARTS: #11



NOTE: In the United States and Canada, the album title was simply “Naked Eyes”.



Now, you might be wondering why I have chosen this song. It certainly isn't one of the band's most well known songs. Certainly their 1982 smash “Always Something There To Remind Me” is much better known to the general public. Of course, in North America, this doesn't mean much since Naked Eyes were one of those two-hit wonder bands that seemingly disappeared as quickly as they arrived.



But, I digress.

The reason why I chose to do a spotlight on this song in particular is twofold. Firstly, I actually like this song better than “Always Something There To Remind Me”. I always got distracted by the latter song's intro, which should have belonged to a wedding march, or a Christmas carol. That plus the fact that almost all of the 1980s compilations I ever owned had “Always Something There To Remind Me” included on it. I grew to loathe that song something fierce. It didn't matter that the legendary Burt Bacharach sang it first...by the five hundredth time I heard that song, I never wanted to hear it again!



But, “Promises, Promises”? Now, that is a great song (and one that was penned by Naked Eyes themselves!). If you're lucky enough to get the 12” version of the single, you can hear pop siren Madonna adding vocals to the mix.

It's also a very appropriate song given what I have to say about promises. But, I'll get to that a little bit later.

For now, why don't we talk a little bit about “Naked Eyes”, shall we?



The group was formed in Bath, England in late 1981/early 1982 by two childhood friends – Pete Byrne (vocals) and Rob Fisher (keyboards). Prior to forming Naked Eyes, they played in a band called Neon, which also featured Curt Smith and Roland Orzebal (who would later go on to form the successful UK based band “Tears for Fears”).

The band released their debut album in 1983, which peaked within the Top 40 on the Billboard 200 Charts, and their follow-up album, “Fuel for the Fire” also had minor success as well. Though it only managed to peak within the eighties on the Billboard 200, it did give the band one final Top 40 hit with “(What) In The Name Of Love”, peaking at #39 in 1984.

Shortly after the band's second album was released, both Byrne and Fisher went their separate ways, with Byrne relocating to the United States and Fisher remaining in the UK. Although the duo had limited success together as Naked Eyes, they racked up a series of solo projects which brought them much fame.



Let's take a look at Pete Byrne for example. He worked alongside Stevie Wonder on his 1985 single “Part-Time Lover”, sang background vocals for Rita Coolidge and Princess Stephanie of Monaco (Stephanie was quite the pop star in the mid-1980s), and even wrote a song for Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen! He's currently touring using the “Naked Eyes” name, and as recently as 2008, he reunited with other 1980s artists ABC, Belinda Carlisle, and The Human League for an American tour.



Rob Fisher also had some solo success. In 1987, Fisher teamed up with Simon Climie to form the UK based band Climie Fisher. The band had several hits before breaking up in 1990. In 1991, he helped co-write Rick Astley's hit single “Cry For Help”, and as the 1990s drew to a close, he was talking about reuniting with Byrne to release a brand new Naked Eyes album. Unfortunately, in 1999, Fisher was diagnosed with bowel cancer, and after undergoing a surgical procedure in an attempt to slow down the progression of the cancer, Fisher passed away on August 25, 1999 at the age of 42.

And, that's the story of Naked Eyes and their short-lived career.

So, how does “Promises, Promises” tie in to a personal confession that I will be sharing in this blog entry? Well, it has to do with the title.



This is an opinion piece about people who make promises...and why I have a hard time dealing with people who always break promises in a malicious manner.

Notice how I said malicious. Sometimes circumstances happen in which promises have to be broken to prevent something bad from happening to somebody else, and sometimes promises break all on their own to the fault of neither party. But for people who break promises faster than this dog busts balloons?



Well, I'll be blunt. I'm not very keen on people like that, and have made it a mission to cut them out of my life for good.

I'm going to be completely honest with all of you when I say this. I've always had a bit of difficulty putting my complete and total trust in people. It probably could explain why I haven't been in a serious relationship with anybody, or even why I have only a few strong friendships and connections with people. I guess in some ways, while I've made peace with things that have happened to me, I'm still a little guarded when it comes to what I reveal to people.

I know it seems like a shock, given how open and honest I am within this blog. But, typing it out and writing it down somehow seems better than trying to talk it out in person with someone. When you speak to people, sometimes the words don't come out the way you want them, or they're twisted around in such a way that they lose their meaning, or you completely forget that you even said them in the first place. But typing it out where the words are clearly visible means no backtracking on something that you claim you didn't say. It's out there, clear as day, staring at you like a white elephant in the room.

So, I'll be the first one to say that in the past, I've picked my friends very poorly. In elementary school in particular, I tried to be everyone's friend, and I would do almost anything to get that friendship. If it meant sharing my cookies at recess (in which by 'sharing', I mean, I gave them the entire hoard of cookies while I eat the chocolate chip that remained). It it meant giving them the answers to tests or how to spell words correctly, that's what I did. Unfortunately, things quickly turned pear-shaped, and when I needed something from them, they turned their backs on me and walked away. Nice, huh?

I also seem to recall several instances in which I was paired up with people in school projects, and we had to work together to make sure that the project was done well. Too often I was stuck in a group that had people who promised to do their part in the project. All they had to do was research the topic, or provide the visual aids, or put together the project, and time and time again, they would shirk the responsibility on someone else just so they didn't have to do the work. So, ultimately what happened was that I got stuck doing all of the work on the project. The good news was that the work that I did on the project ended up getting good marks. The bad news is that the people who did nothing to contribute to the project also got those same marks.

On one hand, that infuriated me...but looking back on it, I did have it coming for not standing up for myself or alerting a teacher about what was going on. But that was how I was misled into believing that was how I kept friends. You did everything they asked, and they would like you.

As we all know, that's not the truth. And, deep down inside, I think I knew it, but I was too gullible to realize it. Back when I was a kid, I bought into the promise of friendship like a fish would to a nice tasty worm hanging from a hook. And, I bought it hook, line, and sinker. The so-called friends that I was trying to impress weren't really my friends. They told me that if I helped them with their homework (which meant me doing the work and them getting the credit), and if I gave them things, then they would be my friend, and sit at my table, and hang out with me after school.

They made me promises, promises. Knowing I'd believe. Promises, promises, they knew they'd never keep.

Now, some of you might be looking at this moment as though I'm taking what a bunch of bratty kids did a little too seriously, and by all means, you do reserve the right to have that opinion. I won't fault you for it. But, all I'm saying is that my distrust and dislike for people who constantly break promises was infused in me at an early age. I've gotten a little soft as I grow older in that I am a little more open to trusting people again, but I don't take promises at face value anymore.

And, this isn't just limited to grade school either. At work, I expect people to keep their promises as well. I want them to treat me with respect the same way that I treat them. If I agree to switch shifts with someone, I would hope that both parties will live up to their agreements. And, if one party fails to live up to that agreement, then I doubt that there will be any shift trading in this or any lifetime.

Truth is, I've had a few co-workers burn me rather badly with promises that they had absolutely no intention of keeping, and as a result, I choose not to associate with them at all because I know they don't have my best interests at heart. If anything though, it's a win-win situation for me. I don't reveal anything to them that I don't want known, and they're left trying to bum a ride from someone else because they've burned their bridges.

I guess the moral of this tale is that if you make a promise to someone, you'd better have a really good reason for not keeping your word. If this were the game of Survivor, one might accept the fact that it is a game, and that breaking your word is essential for moving ahead in the game.

But life ain't no reality show. In the real world, there are consequences to poor actions and broken promises. I think some people need to realize that.