Smoke Rise

 A chilly Friday at 38°F... 

Welcome to Saturday: 9.   What we've committed to our readers is that we will post 9 questions every Saturday.   Sometimes the post will have a theme, and at other times the questions will be totally unrelated.  Those weeks we do "random questions," so-to-speak. We encourage you to visit other participants po ts and leave a comment   Because we don't have any rules, it is your choice.  We hate rules.  We love memes, however, and here is today's meme!

Saturday 9: Smoke Rings (1933)

Unfamiliar with this week's song?    HEAR IT HERE

1) In this song, Donald Mills of the Mills Brothers encourages us to "puff, puff, puff" our cares away. When did you most recently smoke a cigarette?  

 Never.  I was never interested in smoking and so I never even tried it.

2) In the 1930s, when this week's song was recorded, an estimated 40% of American adults smoked cigarettes. By the early 1960s, that number reached a high of 42%. According to the CDC, the percentage of adult smokers dropped to 11%. Do many of your friends and relatives smoke or vape? 

No, not many at all.

3) Donald was the youngest of the singing Mills Brothers, and he's the one who most often sang lead. That squares with popular birth order theory, which proposes that the youngest tends to enjoy being the center of attention, the middle child is the diplomat, and the oldest is the high-achiever. Think of your own family and the families of your friends. Do you think this theory holds true?

No I don't.  I am sure it applies in some families but none that I have ever seen.

4) The Mills Brothers were one of the first famous singing brother acts. The Williams Brothers – which featured future TV star Andy Williams – followed in their footsteps. Can you think of another group of singing brothers?

• The Osmond Brothers. 
• The Jackson 5
• The BeeGees
• The Wilsons of the Beach Boys
• The Everly Brothers
• The Jonas Brothers
• The Nelson Brothers (Ricky Nelsons twin sons)

 5) In addition to recording hit records, The Mills Brothers were a staple on radio in the 1930s. They were among the first African American artists to host their own radio show and sang jingles for Standard Oil and Crisco. What commercial do you recall having seen, or heard, recently?

 There are very creative commercials for Resilia on YouTube recently. Resilia is aged oil of oregano and black seed oil capsules.

I also like the Ryze commercial with the little mushroom.

6) In 1933, when this week's song was popular, actor Robert Montgomery and his wife had a daughter they named Elizabeth. That little girl would become famous in the 1960s for her own TV show. Without looking it up, do you know what show Elizabeth Montgomery starred in? 

 Elizabeth was Samantha on Bewitched.  

7) Johnny Cash was also born in 1
933.    Do you have a favorite Johnny Cash song?

 Jackson which he sung with his wife June Carter Cash.

8) In 1933, five French airlines merged to form Air France. Think of the last time you were at an airport. Were you taking a flight or meeting a flight?

I was meeting a flight.

9) Random question: Your best friend just received a certificate for completing a car maintenance course at your community college. Would you let them work on your vehicle?

 Sure.   I'm a Jersey girl. If  they make a mess, they will regret their life choices.  hehehe.

See ya later..

Ber Months

Hello friends,

From this Side of the Pond

1. This week's Hodgepodge lands on 'Back To The Future Day'. October 21, 2015 was the date the movie characters (Marty McFly, Doc, and Jennifer Parker) traveled to in the future in the 1989 film Back To The Future Part 2. 

Did you see the movie?  Yes I saw the movie. Did you know the character of Biff was patterned by writer Bob Gale on his relationship with D J Tr ump in the casino days.

Tell us a something about what was happening in your life in the fall of 2015.  The famous anonymous was a young teen and the little was in elementary school.  Life was much fuller then.

2. Which -ber month is your favorite? (September, October, November, December).  I like them all. They all have wonderful attributes. 

Explain why.  September is back to school.  October is turning leaves and Halloween.

November is a bunch of family birthdays including mine and Thanksgiving Day.

December is the silver month filled with holiday expectations and family warmth.

 

3. Red, yellow, orange, bronze...your favorite fall color to wear?  I like the combination of  camel and navy blue, bronze and red, bronze and blue... all good.

To eat? Orange... as in oranges, Clementines, cinnamon,   Pumpkins and sweet potatoes.

 To see in nature?   Here in the northeast we see all those colors in spades in trees and shrubs.. gold along the sea side.

These photos will also be for my Friday photos.

 

Except for the top photo, these are my backyard.

4. What do you miss most about being 20?  Being able to dance, run, jump, swim, ride horses, ice skate, camp in the mountains, surf!  Go places. Walk!!!   

5. We're roughly three quarters of the way through the year. What's one goal, habit, or mindset you want to purposely carry into the final weeks of the year? Elaborate.  

This post is late because I don't have any answer and waited to try and think of one.  I can't.

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

 This is my living room.  I had AI paint my walls green, change out my wall art  and change my furniture to leather to match my leather hassock that I use as a coffee table.    It also added bookcases on the side of my TV table etc.  They put a light on the piano .  Not much else is changed.  You might think it's dark but I am a fan of English Gentleman's club/Dark Academia looks and while I like the light airy stuff in someone elses' home, I don't want it here.

What do you think of these?  

 

Here is the second idea it gave me

Then I asked to see where AI thought a Christmas tree should go.   It failed to move the chair but, it does show where I had planned for the rree to go. 

Bookish Pursuits

White washing the fencefrom Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer

Welcome to Tuesday 4 kept up in honor of it's founder Toni Taddeo.   

Over 12,000 books, many once required reading in schools and including children's books have been banned.  Even Jane Eyre finds itself under scrutiny..

1.Do you think any book or series has  helped form your view on things.. life, love, etc?

  Many will say the Bible but how about more secular books that you feel have taught or influenced you?  The Little House on the Prairie series influenced me with a greater respect for pioneers and the difficulties they faced.   

The biography of  George Washington Carver made me get my nose to the grindstone in school instead of goofing off. He is one of my heroes. He was a genuinely good man.

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens which made a heavy impact on taking care of the poor and homeless.

"It may be, that in the sight of Heaven, you are more worthless and less fit to live than millions like this poor man's child. Oh God! to hear the Insect on the leaf pronouncing on the too much life among his hungry brothers in the dust!"   

There was a Scottish series of books my mother's friend sent her yearly called The Friedhship Book. of Francis Gay.   My mother never read them but I did.  It was full of  inspirational stories and poems   I devoured them as a teenager and ever since too.  

 Francis Gay was the pen name of Herbert Leslie Gee (1901–1977), a prolific English writer, journalist, and ardent Methodist born in Bridlington, Yorkshire.

I've done a few posts on his articles.  Here is one very short story from his books.

Mister God, This is Anna.. heart breaking but inspirational. 

 My grandmother read the pamphlets called The Upper Room and I read them after she did.

2.  What is your favorite book or book series and why is it  a favorite?

I am a fan of the Robert B. Parker Spenser series of books and  his books based on the character of Jesse Stone.     I like them because they are fast paced, lean on words and descriptions . They get to the point!

Like Toni, I am also a fan of Agatha Christie's mysteries and have read most of them.

3. If your favorite book or book series was being cast for a TV/Movie series, who would play the main characters?

Spenser for Hire was cast with Robert Urich playing Spenser and Jesse Stone was cast with Tom Selleck as Jesse Stone .   Avory Brooks, a professor at Rutgers (where I went to university) played the part of Hawk.  

Miss Marple was best played, I believe, by Joan Hickson.

Hercule Poirot was best with David Suchet I think.

4.  Are there any books you have read many times?

One Fifth Avenue by Candace Bushnell

 44 Charles Street by Danielle Steel

Early Autumn by Robert B. Parker

A White House Diary by Lady Bird Johnson

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens.

The Song of Hiawatha by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The Complete Sermons of John Wesley