Daily Doings at the Line of Death Bar & Grill

So, I've been listening to the radio a lot lately. And one of the commercials I often hear is John Cummuta hawking his "Transforming Debt Into Wealth" tape and/or CD. I've thought about calling and requesting his no-obligation free tape/CD, but at the same time, I'm skeptical that his system would work for me. And so the yellow flag of caution is raised.

Based on the comments I received from my last post, I'd imagine that a significant amount of revenue for the Cummuta organization comes in from the sale of programs, seminars, etc. This is probably true of any organization trying to sell a wealth building system. The late Charles Givens tried to do this in the 1980s and 1990s. And others appear to be following in his footsteps.

The internet is full of critiques of the system -- some favorable, some not so favorable. Meanwhile, a voice from my past echoes, "Would you rather be right, or would you rather be rich?" Right now, I don't want to be snookered into buying a system I can't afford. Like Rich Dad Poor Dad, I'd probably be best off if I obtained this from the local library.

So I've taken a week off from most everything, as I went through some paper records and futzed with the computers.

I filed my unemployment claim the day after I was laid off. (To recap: The project I was working on was running over time and over budget, as software projects tend to do. As a result, the client had to make some budget cuts. Part of those cuts included letting go of two contractors. C'est la vie.) Now I wait for the nameless faces in Columbus to decide whether or not to give me unemployment compensation.

Yesterday, 6 months' worth of receipts from 1999 went into the shredder. They were still printing entire credit card numbers on receipts back then. I'm glad they don't do that any more. As for the receipts printed on thermal paper, it appears that the printing has faded on a lot of them.

( Meanwhile, I bought a new toy. )

Shout-outs for today: happy birthday dragonfeydaile!

Last night, one of my soda pop bottles froze in the refrigerator and shattered the glass bottle containing it. I spent a good half hour carefully picking up glass shards and mopping up diet black cherry soda.

This morning, I get word from my account manager that my contract is ending at the end of this month due to budget cuts, 2-3 months sooner than I expected.

I was looking for my MP3 player this morning as well, and couldn't find it. The last time I saw it was in the car about a couple of weeks ago. I hope no one stole it. (And if they did, why would they take only the MP3 player and leave everything else? I hope it's just misplaced.)

And to top things off, I dropped my plastic water cup at the water cooler, spilling the water, getting everything drenched, and breaking the cup.

Hope your day has gone better than mine.

Shout-outs: Happy birthday tollers!

1) Singer and writer Jim Carroll, author of The Basketball Diaries and best known for his 1979/1980 hit "People Who Died". Somehow it seems perversely apropos to post a link to an anime video to the tune of the song. Sing along if you feel up to it and/or know the words. Teddy sniffing glue, he was 12 years old....

2) Actor Patrick Swayze, best known for his role in "Dirty Dancing". The tabloids warned this that this day would come.

I'll let thatcrazycajun and filkertom write the obits. They seem to do a better job than me.

[Updated 19:56 15-Sep] Here's a link to the song without the silly anime.

Somewhere in my mind is a vague memory of a Saturday morning kids' show where the Archie gang tries to out-Scooby the Scooby gang. They go and visit haunted houses, trying to look for ghosts. But they don't rip off the masks of the villains. Or maybe they were visiting friends of Sabrina the Teenage Witch. Did this show actually exist, or am I hallucinating?

I'll be offline from LJ and FB for the next few days. I won't be getting DSL at my new place until early next week. I'll have limited access to email, though.

My nostalgia trip down YouTube Avenue continues into the land of Saturday morning cartoons. Lots of old TV themes are there. All I had was a cassette recorder back then, so I have audio of some of the themes of the shows that aired back then, but no video.

I sometimes watch the stuff that's on now, and think to myself, "Are these better or worse than the shows I grew up with as a kid?" I look at the Doodlebops and think "escapees from a Sid & Marty Krofft theme park".

Some of the major networks have dispensed with Saturday morning cartoons hows altogether, choosing to go with news programming instead.

I know I watched a lot, but I can remember only a handful of them. Houndcats, Hong Kong Phooey, Fat Albert & the Cosby Kids, the animated Star Trek, Sealab 2020, Lidsville, The Bugaloos, Big John Little Jon, Inch High Private Eye, Emergency +4, Storybook Squares, and of course, Scooby-Doo. And that's only the ones I can remember right now.

The sad part is, some of these shows probably got purged by the networks after they aired, in an effort to recycle tapes, not thinking there'd be a market for them years down the road.

What were your favorites growing up? And are todays kid shows better or worse than the ones we grew up with?

I continue my nostalgia trip down Memory Lane and YouTube Avenue.

Back in the silver age of television, before afternoon TV was dominated by syndicated talk shows and daytime dramas, there were game shows. Lots of them. With colorful sets, lots of blinking lights, and flipping digit counters (the numbers were painted on metal "leaves" which flipped either horizontally or vertically).

Here's a somewhat comprehensive list of American TV game shows, courtesy of Wikipedia. Here's what I remember watching in my 1970's childhood: The Price Is Right, Jeopardy! (with Art Fleming), Concentration, Password, Match Game, Let's Make A Deal. And a whole bunch of obscure ones that probably didn't last beyond a year: Three On A Match (with the late Bill Cullen), Baffle, Almost Anything Goes, The Moneymaze, Tattle Tales, Spin-Off, Jackpot!, Musical Chairs, Celebrity Sweepstakes, High Rollers (where Alex Trebek got his start), Gambit, Card Sharks, and Whew! That's not counting the ones I can't remember of think of as I write this. Updated 26-Aug 00:20: How could I forget the Hollywood Squares and the Joker's Wild?


Since I grew up in a border town, I got to see some Canadian TV game shows as well: Definition, Party Game, I Saw That, Supermarket.

Aside to jhayman: Is CHCH-TV (Channel 11) still on the air?

What were your favorites? Are there any I missed? And who are/were your favorite game show hosts? Mine's the late Bill Cullen.

After much arm-twisting from athenawindsong, and a few other friend invites, I'm finally on Facebook. Look for me under my real name.

No, I'm not going to solicit everyone in my email address book to join FB. If you're already on FB, drop me a line.

My "mad money" purchase for this month was the last upgrade for my laptop computer for the foreseeable future.

( The gory details, caveat emptor, etc. )

My laptop is now happily maxed out at 512 Mb of RAM. And I recommend Memtest86+ to anyone contemplating a memory purchase.