Saturday 9

Heart to Heart (1982)

Unfamiliar with this week's song. Hear it here.


1) With whom did you most recently have a "heart-to-heart" talk? My friend Henry. He seems to want to reconcile with his father, from whom he's been long-estranged, before it's too late. (Dad is 80-something.) I hope he does, and I hope his mother -- divorced from Dad for 30 years -- doesn't make him feel guilty about it.


2) When this song was on the charts, audiences were tuning in to a TV show called Hart to Hart. Are you familiar with it? Vaguely. I watched a rerun from a hotel room while on a business trip and thought it was completely unrealistic. Like it made Murder, She Wrote look like Forensic Files. I never watched it again, but I do recall thinking Mrs. Hart (Stefanie Powers) had great clothes.

I like her earrings, too.

3) In the music video, Kenny Loggins plays an illustrator. It’s said that the hardest thing to draw is a straight line, because all the joints in your hand have to work together in sync. Can you draw a straight line, without the aid of a ruler or a straight edge? It is a dichotomy of my life: I have beautiful handwriting but I can't draw. Anything. Can you figure that? I can't.

4) This video also prominently features teddy bears. A 2018 article in the NY Post estimates that 4 in 10 adults has a plush toy of his/her own. Are you one of the 40%? Yes. As I write this, I'm looking at stuffed animals I received as gifts from my late mother and my friend, Henry.

5) Kenny Loggins performed in a tribute to Aretha Franklin at Carnegie Hall. Do you have a favorite Aretha Franklin song? Enjoy!

 

6) Kenny cowrote this song with Michael McDonald of the Doobie Brothers. You can also hear Michael on the background vocals. Do you have a favorite Doobie Brothers song? I love this one because the music sounds upbeat, but the lyrics are so poignant.

 

7) The third cowriter is David Foster. 1982 was a big year for Foster, since Chicago had a big hit with another of his compositions, “Hard to Say I’m Sorry.” Do you have a favorite Chicago song? I like my Chicago old school.

 

8) In 1982, when this song was popular, Tylenol capsules laced with cyanide killed 7 people in Chicago. In response, tamper-proof packaging was introduced. What’s the last thing you opened that required you break a seal? Salad dressing. First I had to peel away the wrapper around the cap. Then I had to remove the cap to peel off the seal over the bottle. A lot of work for a little honey mustard goodness.

9) Random question – You’re having a party. Which guest annoys you most: the one who arrives 20 minutes early, or the one who shows up 20 minutes late? 20 minutes early, because I will not be ready.

Reflections on Jury Duty

I was called in by The Feds! I was summoned for jury duty at the Federal Courthouse on Dearborn. I've served on two juries, but they were local affairs and this was my first time offering up my wisdom to federal proceedings.

The case at hand was, technically, a bank robbery, which is a federal offense. A man was lurking outside a Chase location before the bank opened. When an armored car arrived to collect cash from the ATM out front, the man used a gun and pepper spray to steal more than $100,000. It falls to the jury to decide if the defendant in custody is the man who committed the crime.

While I was not empaneled, I did sit through voir dire. More than 30 of us were interviewed to get 14 jurors. This gave me, literally, hours to observe my fellow northern district residents and here are my observations:

• Many of my fellow citizens have master’s degrees. I was surprised.
• We were asked what shows we watch, and Blue Bloods is very popular, with people of all ages. Go figure.
• Only women watch This Is Us, and only men watch 2 ½ Men reruns.
• Lots of adult children still live at home
• When asked what the members of our immediate household do for a living, lots of parents and adult children have no idea. As in: “My dad does pipefitting or something, I think” and “My daughter works in an office … and um …”
• I look good for my age. I am proud of that.

They can’t call me again until 2020! Yea! (Wait! That’s less than two months away …)