Chit Chat

By Ted Belman

From now on comments on every post must relate to the content of the post.

Comments that don’t relate to the post must go here.

Any person who contravenes this demand will be put on moderation. Also their offending comment will be trashed.

The reason for this demand is so that people who want to read comments which pertain to the post, don’t have to wade through the chatter.

Everyone will be happier.

April 16, 2020 | 9,017 Comments »

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50 Comments / 9017 Comments

  1. @Sebastien
    Indeed, the irony of the truth of such a statement is quite a striking reality. Being honestly described as a banana republic by a banana republic is both a sad and terrible reproach upon America, but it is both a fair and honest reproach and I thank Almo for having the tenacity and independence to acknowledge it as such. America would be better served by her allies should they join Almo’s condescension for this too well practiced antic of the installed junta, but then again, America’s allies are not allies of the American people so much as they are allies of the installed junta which is dominating the American public.

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  5. 20 year old Dr. Greta Thunberg, not a joke, whose claim to fame, as Candace Owens pointed out, was refusing to go to school to protest Climate Change, was just awarded an honorary PhD in Theology from Helsinki University.

    This is why comedy is dying. Can’t compete with the news.

    —

    “Scientists warn Earth spinning faster than usual”

    Am I being paranoid or is this going to be the latest globalist salvo?

    https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/357471

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  6. Seb-

    No that’s not it. Can you think of any of the others if there are several on that theme. This is about the hapless husband, the critical father-in-law AND, the HUGE fireplace. I am pretty certain that there are none featuring a huge fireplace but this one only.

    The unveiling comes at the end with a CRASHING musical sound…. PRESTO. !!

  7. Seb-

    You certainly seem to be a movie buff. So I have a question for you. It’s been very frustrating to me. I saw a movie many years ago that I really liked. I’ve described it on the various internet “find the name of that movie” pages with no success. I want to describe it to you and you may succeed. I’d bet you’ve seen it.

    O.K. A just married young couple buy a house. They get an unexpected visitor, the girl’s father from Italy. He is a stonemason, and a self styled know everything sort. He is fat, very critical. The first thing he does is grunt st the house, and roll a bottle on the floor showing how badly is sags in one corner. He interferes with sarcastic remarks driving the husband crazy. He’s budding author who’s trying to complete a book.( I think he writes in a hut at the bottom of the garden.)

    Anyway, the father decides to make then a REAL gift. He strings a large sheet across the middle of the living room and gets to work behind it. Masses of dust drift around everything.

    At the end , he unveils his gift, …….a HUGE floor to ceiling ,wall to wall FIREPLACE of natural stone.

    You must have seen this movie It was in colour and possibly 60s/
    It isn’t the Mr. Blandings one.

  8. MICHAEL-

    I didn’t see much of Bob Newhart, In fact, although I may be wrong, he seemed to have a “nervous” delivery style. Maybe part of his schtik, and I may be thinking of another person altogether.

    I much prefer the “Yiddish” kind of comedians, the Potash and Perlmutter kind, as I grew up with with people who came from the Shtetl and spoke very much like those comedians I like. They actually, as well as being broadly funny, can be very subtle too.

    In fact, and no kidding, some of them, if they’d been in America could have made a very good living as comedians ,, as they were, every day unconsciously funny, both in their speech and what they said

    I recall vividly, and I’ve related it here before, a scene in the Jewish Men’s Club, where during an argument around the card table, between an older man, born in a shtetl, and a young man who, although born in Dublin, hardly ever went to school and grew up with both his Yiddish only parents..

    The older man …”Lissen to dot feller, vat kuddnet even shpoke prrraper, de Kenk’s English:.

    The waiter dropped his tray of pickled geef sandwiches, and was rolling on the carpet howling, and everyone else, including my late uncle, were hysterical with streaming tears .

    So perhaps you can understand my preference.

  15. SEBASTIEN-

    What’s that suppsed to mean. I merely asked you if you knew the name of the mediocre comic with the battere cornet.

    He actually could play well and had been in several bands.

  17. SEB.

    I forgot to mention that Shecky Greene was really a top example of a 2nd or 3rd rate comedian. He was funny

    , in a mediocre way, no personality appearance or drawing power. Rodney Dangerfield was in the same bracket for many years and rose to the top mostly by attrition.

    He was better than Shecky.

    By the way, who was the guy who always came onstage with a battered old cornet, which he occasionally blew raucously. His schtik. I see him in my mind’s eye but nor his name. I have had ideas but am not sure.

  19. SEB-

    Twain’s essay on Fenimore Cooper was brilliant, but as we knw, was highly exaggerated in his own particular style. You see no humour in it. I’m more than a bit shocked, a few years ago you would have. Why do you have to compare Orwell’s stuff to Twain, he was strictly a hunourist.

    To “highfalurin’ for me, and THAT is something that I hvae noticed for a good while creeping into your posts.

    Myron Cohen was a top linestand ypm comedian on a par with all the greats, Mson and others. He was so for over 20 years top billing everywhere.

    So….you don’t like his humour… 5 million Jews and innumerable Christians loved it, and made him a handsome living.

    As for your concept of “symbolism”…I say… shimbolsm , who cares. ??
    It was aTV show, concocted to MAKE MONEY. Whatever any viewers saw in it was in their own imaginations. If it was good for the show it made MORE money. They were just actors with learned scripts, expressions to order, and and movements controlled by a director. The cameras were there just out of sight of the finished product.

    This is what I mean by referring to your creeping REVERSE metamorphosis.

    Sorry…I’m sentimental, but a realist. I gave away my TV over 50 years ago, after and before that used it mainly for making boxing tapes, of which I have hundreds, maybe thousands, now likely all stuck together and unuseable…

    I see someone clicked an approval. Rare but appreciated.

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  20. @Sebastien
    @Honeybee
    Sticking your tongue out : 😛
    Type ‘&’ followed immediately by ‘#’ followed immediately by 128539 followed immediately by a semicolon

    I have to confess I don’t know the finger gestures, not even the thumb’s up or the A-OK formula

  24. Edgar Actually, I was. A lot of your references go past me, as well. For example, I thought the Twain on Cooper, written in 1895, which I got part way through, was brilliant analysis sounding a lot like Orwell’s 1946 essay, “Politics and the English language,” which I’m sure it influenced. But, humorous? And Myron Cohen. He just told jokes expressionlessly with poor timing and the jokes aren’t that funny. I never heard of him growing up. Or Shecky Greene, another one had never heard of before a black antisemite assumed that was my style.

    For the life of me, I can’t understand why you are missing the message of that scene from Kung Fu when it is so literally explicit. It’s the whole point of the scene!

    But, I was polite enough just to not respond.

    Ted: When can you remove the timer? Thoughts don’t come conveniently all at once.

  26. Seb-

    I know all about the TV series, I have watched it. One of the Carradines; shaven head trying to act as if he’s an acolyte of the “blind” monk.

    My opinion, based on the whole action, is that “grasshopper’ was an affectionate pet name from the master to the willing pupil. Nothing to do with wisdom.

    I’m sure you were not expecting me to know that your “grasshopper” was your attributing wisdom to me, It was too obviously from the TV show . Like calling someone “a young tiddler”. Patronising..

    I recall reading years ago that David Carradine died by suicide aomewhere in Thaiand.

  28. Kung Fu (tv series 1972-75) He is also searching for his American roots. This is the period when Alex Haley’s “Roots” came out and suddenly everybody wanted to explore their roots. These two shows transformed the culture.

    @Edgar In Vietnam, it’s the turtle. No relation to Dr. Steve.

    @Edgar You misunderstood my intended symbolism. Grasshopper is a traditional symbol of wisdom in China. The early 70s, Buddhist western miniseries about a half Chinese Shao Lin monk on the run from the emperor’s assassins who helps people in the old American West, is about half flashbacks to his childhood in the monastery. His master – whose murder at the hands of an aristocrat he later avenges – is a blind elderly monk who – in the scene where they meet after he was the only candidate who was accepted into the monastery – tells him to charge him with a stick bur he can’t touch him. Then he asks him what he perceives with his five senses and says, “Are you not even aware of the grasshopper at your feet?” And the boy is surprised as the grasshopper flies away. From then on, the old master called his talented pupil, “grasshopper”. A very famous bit. So, it symbolizes, at once, great wisdom, and great naivety as I was using it. I was merely teasing you, not insulting or shouting at you. Remember, my background is more in East Asian Buddhist and Hindu lore. Growing up, I knew next to nothing about Judaica apart from borscht belt comedians whose recordings I loved.

    @Edgar No, Chai don’t.

  30. Seb-

    If you’d referred to me as “bug” you’d still be hearing about it. A grasshopper is insulted by being called a bug, It is practicaly Jewish. A Noachibde… it eats only kosher food. It is almost exactly like a locust, which is a kosher article of food. Maybe, being so, contrary, you’ll have some for Pesach, a memorable time to have them.

    I’ myself don’t partake, being a vegetarian.

    And the “poetry” you mention HAS to be of the
    H-Y-M-A-N K-A-P-L-A=N_kind. “Poyetry” and not Byron.
    I hate poetry, –

    except “The boy stood on the burning deck” sort.

    Di you know that this ditty was composed because of a true event. It refers to a real person; the very young son of the captain of a French ship-of-the-line at Aboukir Bay. I read about it very many years ago and it stayed with me. Very sad in fact.

    Then there is the Billy Bunter/Bessie Bunter poem;. I rea dthat whenI was about 5 years old. In the Magnet which I got weekly.

    They sat in beauty side by side
    They filled the house with glee
    Their mouths were opened far and wide
    for breakfast, lunch, and tea.

  31. Sed-

    Yes and I responded that it was not meant by e to be “shouting” but a respectful heading, because it IS a heading for the comment.

    I call you Seb, as a more friendly nickname kind of address, and will do so for the future. That is , if I’m not “trashed” again through inadvertence.

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  32. @Edgar Not to be too prickly, myself, I like, “Seb,” or “Sebastien” and dislike “SEBASTIEN”. I have mentioned to you in the past that all caps is universally read as shouting. It’s quite rude.

    “While all caps can be used as an alternative to rich-text “bolding” for a single word or phrase, to express emphasis, repeated use of all caps can be considered “shouting” or irritating.”

    “All caps” – Wikipedia

  35. @Edgar 😀 Be grateful I didn’t call you, “bug,” in the interests of brevity, if you will forgive me levity, ignoring the gravity of your concerns, for the sake of preserving sanity, while temporarily forsaking all propriety at the risk of some notoriety though we have since called bygones bygones in the interest of congeniality for the sake of unbreakable unity and fraternity, in the name of poetry . 😀

  37. TED-

    Naturally I have seen that notice; I’m not blind-everyone has. And it’s routinely disregarded by everyone. It was I myself who suggested that our comments should be in Chit-Chat. I commenced to do so. But the last, which you trashed without warning, was posted on the same page as the comment to which it was responding. This comment also should have been in Chit Chat.

    This is the 2-3rd time I’ve repeated the same thing. Yes, please restore the comments from Trash.

    The term “trash” does not have the same connotation for me as for you.

    If yo did not remove my post asking the other to be restored, it nevertheless disappeared. Perhaps computer issue.

  39. @Edgar
    If you look above I wrote

    Any person who contravenes this demand will be put on moderation. Also their offending comment will be trashed.

    And that is what I did except I didn’t put you in moderation.
    Nor did I remove your comment asking me to retrieve the posts.

    So what do you want me to do exactly. Is it enough if I just retrieve your comments?

  43. SEBASTIEN

    I am a very old-fashioned guy about certain things. A principle. A bit prickly around. the edges. I have never been “trashed” before. Yes Michael is a friend. Although we exchange acrimonious remarks, they are not really serious.
    You are also a friend, but, when your “grasshopper” became tiresome, I closed you out, knowing it was temporary.

  44. @Mr. G. The emperor of Japan, being a fellow violist, is therefore my cousin so You may henceforth call me, “Your Royal Highness” unlike the pop singer, “Prince,” who changed his name to a glyph with no pronunciation. Or just:

    “His Imperial and Royal Majesty the Honorable Mr. Sebastien Zorn the First, Esq., , By the Grace of God and the Constitution of the Republic, Emperor of the French, King of Italy, Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine, Mediator of the Swiss Confederation and Co-Prince of Andorra, Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland

  45. @Edgar Don’t sweat it. Nobody looks at old chit chat, anyway. We had a nice exchange in real time but it’s over. I’m sure Belman was unable to transfer the comments to chit chat without a laborious cut and paste for each one as opposed to hitting the delete button. No particular reason to preserve this acrimonious exchange between friends, You did call Michael a friend? Ted refers to me as Zorn, now, so I am calling him Belman. I like the formality.Very polite. Very old world. Or Korean. I think I will call Michael, S. Shall I call you, G? Tanna calls me Mr. Zorn. 😀

  47. TED_

    It would have beenbetter to leave the posts and make sure we knew the bext posts would be removed.

    Your arbitrary action is unpleasanrt .. Not in the spirit of Israpunsit at all.
    Nor my principles ..

  50. TED-

    I do not see my comments in Chit-vhat. I saw the beginning of your decision to remove them but it was not complete so I do not know the rest of it. Of course you are right and I suggested they should be there, and did put some there, but I responded in the subject because Tanna’s comment was there. She and Michael were discussing Ezekiel which also should have been in City Chat.

    So WHERE ARE MY COMMENTS NOW.???