laurushka.org/blog

*I originally wrote this in 2005 for my private journal, but I thought I’d put it here and edit it a little. *

In the summer of 2000, I had an internship with WHYY TV Promotions. I spent every Friday that summer looking at television schedules and writing copy for “Community Connections,” something they no longer do. At that time, if you turned on WHYY at 8 PM, you would see a host introducing the upcoming shows for the evening. After the show, the host would mention a community organization that had some sort of tie-in to the show. For example, a local museum’s exhibit of photographs of the North and South Poles was plugged after a show called “Sled Dogs: An Alaskan Epic”. The connections involved a lot of thought– I had to research the show to find out what it was about, and then go through the pamphlets from local organizations to see if there were any connections. We didn’t have a lot of info from local organizations, so I searched the internet for places in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware (it was required I give equal attention to all three).

Sometime in May or early June, I saw that on July 13th, WHYY would be showing a biography of Steve McQueen. Because my mom’s friend B had once called us excitedly to tell us The Blob was on television, and that we HAD TO WATCH IT because it was FILMED RIGHT DOWN THE ROAD IN PHOENIXVILLE, I knew that Steve McQueen had a local connection. I remembered the cool diner in The Blob and started searching for info on it… but there isn’t an easy way to tie-in a for-profit diner with public television, so I kept looking. I found The Colonial Theatre. This historic theater had recently been restored, and was showing children’s and independent films. I called them up, and explained the Community Connection, and that I wanted to feature them. The next week, the director of the theater called me and said she was going to rent the Blob to show the weekend following the Steve McQueen documentary. I worried that my 30-second copy would end up being cut (that sometimes happened) and stammered, “Are you sure you want to go to all that trouble?” She assured me they had been meaning to show it anyway, but hadn’t gotten around to it, and this was as good a time as any to show it. I went ahead and wrote the copy and kept my fingers crossed:

For: Steve McQueen: Man on the Edge
Steve McQueen’s breakthrough role was in the 1958 camp classic movie The Blob, filmed not far from Philadelphia in Downingtown, Royersford and Phoenixville. The historic Colonial Theatre in Phoenixville presents The Blob July 16th as part of the theatre’s ongoing Sunday Classics series. Built in 1903, the Colonial Theatre is one of the oldest opera houses in Pennsylvania and holds a variety of art and independent films as well as children’s programs.

That month, I got to log the tapes of all the hosts that month, and saw Flicks’ host Patrick Stoner speaking my words. The Community Connection did not get cut, and did air on July 13th. On August 1st, the director of the theater faxed us to thank us for the plug– over 600 people had shown up for the Blob!

The following year, I noticed that it was playing again. In 2003, I saw a national news store about the 4th annual BlobFest. And a few days after I originally wrote this post in 2005, the BlobFest was featured on NPR’s Weekend Edition with Scott Simon. Here is info on the 2010 BlobFest.

Last year, I was surprised to see BlobFest featured in Jerry Spinelli’s book, Love, Stargirl. I wanted to write to him and let him know that I helped start BlobFest. Haha. I feel strangely responsible for BlobFest, even though I have never attended, and had nothing to do with what must be an incredible amount of work to put on such a festival every year since 2000. Some day, I will get to BlobFest–it usually falls on my birthday weekend– but this year it is the week before, and I have to work. I have seen a couple films at the Colonial– it’s a really great theater– the kind of theater that Philadelphia is lacking.

Here’s a scan of the thank you fax sent to WHYY from Colonial Theatre. It is addressed to my internship supervisor.

I sent this email to WHYY-TV, our PBS station today:

My daughter and I sat down to watch the Sesame Street 40th Birthday episode yesterday morning (November 10th) at 10 AM.
No mention was made of the 40th birthday celebration. Michele Obama did not make an appearance. I could tell that it was a new season episode, due to the new credits and a new segment. After looking at the Muppet Wiki website, I see that the episode that was supposed to be shown was Episode 4187:
http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Episode_4187 (supposed to air 10/10)
but what was shown was Episode 4188:
http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Episode_4188 (supposed to air 10/11)

I am very disappointed that WHYY was not able to show the episode that was supposed to be shown. I would like to know when the actual 40th anniversary show (Ep 4187) really aired.

Thank you,
Laurushka
–

I received an automated response letting me know they were busy, blah blah blah, and that I could call. So I did. They said that Season 40, Episode 1 (4187) aired at SIX IN THE MORNING. It was shown again today, November 11th, at 10 AM. We didn’t watch it today because we were busy. But who wants to watch Episode 2 before Episode 1?

I cannot believe that on the day that every news program on WHYY-FM and the Philadelphia Inquirer ran special stories on the 40th anniversary of Sesame Street, and the special first episode featuring Michelle Obama, that WHYY-TV would decide not to show the first episode at the normal 10 AM time slot. I was expecting the woman on the phone to explain that it was a MISTAKE. I could forgive a mistake. But this was some kind of irrational planned decision on their part. It’s just bizarre. I am probably irrationally upset about this, but I can’t let it go. I don’t often build up a TV show for Lilia. But we both love Sesame Street and I thought it would be fun to watch it together. My sister put it this way: “You got your 3 year old excited about something and it DIDN’T HAPPEN.” My 3 year old is pretty easy going, and enjoyed the Sesame Street episode anyway (although I was NOT impressed with the new Abby Cadabby part). In fact, after Sesame Street, season 40, episode 2 was over yesterday, she spent the rest of the morning gathering presents and wrapping them in construction paper for Sesame Street’s birthday. On the other hand, I am not quite as easy going and I’m still P.O.ed. Ah well.

This seems like a good place to insert this picture of Lilia with her Sesame Street Friends.

*Today’s blog title is brought to you by my witty friend Parker*

I’ve been boring my faithful readers with my writing… I know what you really want… you want Lilia posts!

While I worked through three summer courses, poor Lilia got very familiar with PBS Kids and a stack of DVDs I checked out from the library. She likes absolutely everything that is geared towards kids. If I change the channel to news, she gets very sad– we haven’t watched much of the Olympics, but she was interested in the actual events (diving, gymnastics), and when Bob Costas (ugh, do I dislike him!) would come on, she thought we had switched the channel on her! Her favorite shows: Curious George, Teletubbies, Sesame Street, and Barney. *Edited to add: we don’t have cable, so we don’t get Phillies games on TV often… but there is one tonight, and Lilia is very excited!* The videos from the library were my favorites.

A Tomie dePaola collection with a story called, “Charlie Needs a Cloak“– he shears the sheep, cards the wool, spins the wool into yarn, dyes the yarn with berries, weaves the yarn into cloth, and sews his own cloak! This is one of those cases where the video is better than the book… they are both great, but seeing it come to life is more entertaining than my reading of it, I’m sure.

I also loved Sesame Street: Old School, Volume 2 (1974-1979). I loved it so much, I bought it, and have just ordered Volume 1 (which the library doesn’t have). Our favorite clip: Two little dolls (enjoy!)

And Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and other stories, which had Rosie’s Walk by Pat Hutchins and The Foolish Frog by Pete Seeger. Pat Hutchins is great! We have Good-Night, Owl! already, and I just checked out The Wind Blew, which is a new favorite. Lilia loves wind!

Speaking of Pete Seeger, did I mention that Lilia recognizes the sound of a banjo? Seriously, I spend most of the day in awe of Lilia. I don’t care how she compares to other little kids– it just amazes me that in less than 2 and a half years on this planet, this little girl can hear a couple strums on a banjo, and say “Banjo”!

The “Fall” semester starts Monday, and I anticipate we will be watching more PBS and checking out more videos from the library. We did manage to get out of the house a bit during my classes, and more after I finished on August 9th.

Walking with Daddy at the Schuylkill Center

Lilia STILL loves swings!

Driving the Trolley at the Please Touch Museum

Last Saturday, we went for a drive and saw three beautiful hot-air balloons in the sky. We managed to catch one of them landing!

On Sunday, after a really nice brunch at a restaurant Bonnie Mac recommended (Ida Mae’s Bruncherie), we went to a playground and a community garden. Look at this goldfinch chowing down on this flower:

Well, I hope that satisfies all you Lilia fans for now! As I said, classes start again on Monday… but my anticipated graduation is December!

I was listening to Weekend Edition Saturday, hosted by my publicly-declared (on this blog) crush Scott Simon, and I heard this funny story about “Friend” Etiquette on the Internets. I held off signing up for Facebook for a few years– I have had MySpace for a while, and HATE IT– all the ads, all the blinkies, all the stuff slowing my already slow computer down. But I finally submitted to Facebook in January– all because I heard there might be pictures of my friend Becky in a pregnant state– and have been obsessed ever since. Scrabulous, Scramble, Pieces of Flair! Fun stuff!

I decided that I wouldn’t “stalk” anyone on Facebook. You know, “stalk” as in like when you find out that someone you know has a MySpace page or a blog, and you read it or and never comment and they have no idea you know they have a MySpace page? I decided that I would come out of the woodwork and “friend” people– but only those I actually know in Real Life (or have known online for a while, so it feels like “real life”!). So, I’m NOT friending Scott Simon. Or asking him to play Scrabulous with me. But if he decides he would like to play Scrabulous, or wants to send me some flair, I’m totally open to that.

Radio
Saturday mornings mean listening to Saturday Weekend Edition on NPR with Scott Simon. I have harbored a crush on Mr. Simon for several years now, and confessed this to my in-laws at Thanksgiving. It turns out my love for Scott Simon was not shared– and my husband and his father actually dislike… or even hate Scott Simon! How could this be? They don’t like his guffaws– they sound fake. They don’t like when he puts on his regular “I’m a sports fan” voice. But what about his sensitive essays? And now, their dislike has poisoned my opinion of him– today as he guffawed with the Annoying Music Show guy, I understood! How could I have been so wrong? But then, Mr. Simon redeemed himself with another insightful essay, and my crush was validated.

Television

Having no cable really limits our choices. But we still get all the regular networks (albeit with snow), and even some hidden gems. Last week, we spent four hours watching the Temptations docudrama on the Ion network. Oh, poor doomed David Ruffin! Oh, the dramatic Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone scene!

We also watch Jeopardy! almost every evening. The past two weeks were Jeopardy! Teen Challenge, and I was rooting for Zia, who won $50,000 in his first match. But he was no match for sophomore Rachel, who just blew everyone away.

We are watching Lost this season. Wow, things are actually happening! We started watching it during the 2nd season– caught up by watching DVDs of all the episodes within a couple weeks. This made us unprepared for the slowness of the next few seasons! We almost gave up on it. I just keep reminding Joe– there are only 2 more years (is that right, even?). It has an end date. We can watch it, it will be over, and then we can throw our TV away when the country converts to HD, and we can be TV-Free. (Well, this is what Joe wants… I happen to enjoy the dumb box.)

The Internets

I think I’m an Internet addict. In addition to Friendster, and LiveJournal, and MySpace, I have recently joined the Facebook world. Why are there so many ways to waste time? I need to read more.

Books

I’m in the middle of reading forty books for Young Adults. I will share my reviews with you in April, after I turn them in for class. But I do want to recommend Whirligig by Paul Fleischman. It’s about a metamorphosis– “He was lodged in his own chrysalis but had no idea what he was turning into”…

Film

Oscars tomorrow. I used to know all the nominees. I used to try to see all the movies. I would put serious thought into guessing who might win. I’d make popcorn and enjoy the show. Joe has no patience for Hollywood or awards shows. If I watch it, I’ll watch it alone (although Joe is camped out sick on the couch, so he may be an unwilling viewer). In the past two years, I have seen two movies in the movie theater. The first one,Neil Young – Heart of Gold , about a week before Lilia was born. The second was this summer. The film was not nominated for an Academy Award. Can you guess what it was? Out of all the movies in 2007, what did we see?