Saturday, August 22, 2015

Saturday 9

Hello, Dolly!

1) This song is about a woman returning to the town where she was happiest. How many towns have you lived in? Just two.

2) Crazy Sam played Ernestina in her high school production of Hello, Dolly! and still remembers one of her lines: "Hey, you with the big ears! What are you doing after the show?" Tell us something that you memorized for school that is still rattling around in your brain. "Twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe." Jabberwocky. Quite possibly the most useless thing rattling around in this old head of mine.

3) This week's featured artist, Louis Armstrong, got his start entertaining diners on riverboat dinner cruises. Have you ever taken a dinner cruise? Christmastime, years and years ago. My friend in the Keys has a December 22 birthday. I was visiting him and we celebrated with a tasty dinner while watching the sunset into the Gulf of Mexico.

4) Armstrong took his nickname, "Satchmo," from "Satchel Mouth" -- a slang term for someone with a wide mouth, which Louis believed was his most distinguishing feature. What do you think people notice first about you? I've been told it's my very green eyes. I suspect it's my multiple chins.

5) In 1936, Louis became the first African American to get featured billing in a Hollywood movie. Have you seen any of this summer's big movies? Inside Out, Spy, Jurassic World, Trainwreck, Man from UNCLE. For what it's worth, I think this summer the ladies have it. Spy and Trainwreck were my favorites.

6) When "Hello, Dolly" composer Jerry was growing up, he was close to an aunt named Belle who encouraged his love of music. Tell us about one of your aunts or uncles. My Aunt Jo was my dad's baby sister and my godmother. She didn't move from the Chicago suburbs to the Tampa suburbs until she was nearly 40, but she considers herself as Southern as Dolly Parton. Her passions include country music, motorcycles and NASCAR!

7) Though famous for composing the scores of Hello, Dolly!, Mame and La Cage Aux Folles, Jerry Herman can't read music. Can you? Nope

8) Now retired, Mr. Herman lives in Miami. This is Miami's "wet season," which lasts into October. When did it last rain where you are? Tuesday night it rained, as my old neighbor would have said, "like a sovunagun."

9) Random question: Have you suffered a sunburn this summer? Not yet. And hopefully I won't.
 

August Happiness Challenge -- Day 21


Friday's Happy Cone goes to  walk in the park. I can't believe it. Here it is the end of August and I strolled through one of our parks for the first time. Really, I hadn't been there since last fall! It was charming. Kids on bikes, moms with strollers, dogs on very long leashes ... everyone enjoying the lush green and the feathery tall reed grass.

What's that you say? What's the August Happiness Challenge?

Each day in August you are to post about something that makes *you* happy. Pretty simple. And, it doesn't even have to be every day if you don't want it to be. It's a great way to remind ourselves that there are positive things going on in our lives, our communities, and the world.


If you want to play along, just come back here (meaning to this blog, not this individual post) each day in August, looking for the happy chocolate cone. Every day I will try to have a post with the headline: August Happiness Challenge: Day [X]. Leave a comment and then post your own daily happiness, with August Happiness Challenge in the title to make it easy to find.