On Tue, 17 Jul 2007 15:03:11 -0500, notbob > wrote:

>On 2007-07-17, blake murphy > wrote:
>
>
>> i hadn't heard of the jean shepherd angle. i love him, too. i can
>> understand that he was not entirely pleased.
>
>I can't say I do. Let's face it, Jean was a bit like Murray in that
>he was an astute, if cynical, observer of the human condition, yet
>still able to find endless humor in it. Here's a piece he did for Mad
>Magazine half a century ago which is still dead on target:
>
>http://www.flicklives.com/Magazines/Mad/mad.htm
>
>This silliness is still rampant, today. Starbucks doesn't have
>sml/med/lrg, it's tall/grande/venti. WTH is a venti? Whatever it is,
>I've heard of starbies actually insisting on proper use of the terms.
>My ISP is way beyond "associate". Its phone flunkies are Customer
>Account Executives! Creeping Meatballism is alive and well.
>
>Maybe JS didn't like being portrayed as unemployed, though I can't
>imagine that as he was an freelance writer who hawked his stuff to
>everyone. I first read his short stories in Playboy (yeah, I DID read
>the articles! ...too
>
>nb

some years ago, the p.b.s. radio station rebroadcast some of his work
on w.o.r. radio. that was where shepherd's genius really lay. he'd
go off on these wild-ass tangents, and seemingly hours later he would
circle back to his starting point, and you'd go, 'oh, yeah, that's
what he was talking about...'

and of course, 'a christmas story' is the only seasonal movie even
worth talking about, but then i thought potterville was a much better
place than bedford falls.

shepherd was one of a kind.

your pal,
blake