Saturday 9

Saturday 9: I Fall in Love Too Easily (1945)

Unfamiliar with this week's tune? Hear it here.

1) In this song, Dinah Shore admits that her impetuous romances don't work out. Do you consider yourself impulsive? No.

2) The songwriting team of Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne composed this in a single evening. Since the song is rather short Sammy considered adding another verse, but Jule thought better of it, saying, "No. That's it." Are you more like Sammy and keep revising, tinkering and tweaking? Or, like Jule, do you find it easy to leave well enough alone? A little of each. I learned during my advertising career that my first idea was usually my best idea and I should trust my gut. That said, I've never done anything that can't be improved. The trick is knowing when the extra effort is worth the stress and the resources. If I'm at work, being paid, I'll expend it. At home, I'm very much a "good is good enough" kinda gal. 

 

3) The song was introduced in Anchors Aweigh, a movie about two sailors who find love during a two-day leave in New York. Have you ever enjoyed a romance while on holiday? No.

 

4) Though Frank Sinatra sang the song in the movie, Dinah's version was also popular. Her record sales in the 1940s were boosted by concerts, radio appearances and performances for the troops. What singer who is no longer with us do you wish you could have seen in concert? So many! But here is the first one who came to mind.

 

5) Dinah was shy with new people, but discovered as a high school cheerleader that she was good in front of a crowd. Give us one of your high school cheers. "Sway left. Sway right. Stand up. Sit down. Fight! Fight! Fight!" At my age, I would have trouble popping up and then sitting back down in time with the cheer. I'm now a creaky old broad.

 

6) She loved golf and was so good at it, she became the first woman admitted as a member to the prestigious Hillcrest Country Club in Los Angeles. What's your best sport? I'm a decent swimmer. I suck at everything else.

7) Dinah found her greatest success in television. She was so popular for so long that she was able to afford a luxury home, built to her specifications, in Palm Springs. Leonardo DiCaprio now owns it. Do you know who lived in your home before you moved in? Yes. She was a single mom with two pre-teen kids. I disliked her intensely. When I took possession, I found the family cat hiding in a closet. Can you imagine? How could she do that to the cat? How could she do that to her children? She maintained she thought he'd run away. PUH-LEEZE! It's a fourth floor unit in an elevator building. Did he hit the elevator button with his paw? I didn't have her phone number so I called the lawyer who represented me at the sale. He sensed how angry I was (perhaps because my every other word was profane) and said he'd contact her. He charged her for the litter box I'd put out and the food I gave her cat and told her when she had to be here to retrieve him. She showed up with an envelope and the good grace to seem embarrassed. If it wasn't for her kids, I would have just kept that skinny black tomcat. But it's natural for children to love their pets and I figured they had enough to cope with, changing homes and schools and all. (And her for a mother!)

 
8) In 1945, when this song was popular, Abbott and Costello appeared in the movie The Naughty Nineties, which featured their famous "Who's On First" routine. Do you know it? Who is on first, What is on second, and I Don't Know is on third. I learned this while watching the movie Rain Main in the 1980s.

 

9) Random question – Fill in the blank: After all these years, I still ____________. Struggle with fitted sheets. When I wash them, I always find a wash cloth or sock twisted in one of the corners. After 50 years of doing my own laundry, I have concluded that you have to be a sorcerer to fold them.