Happy Halloween! 🎃

 Have Fun! 

Saturday 9.. Halloween!

 Saturday 9: I've Written a Letter to Daddy (1962)

Hi Fellow Niners!

 

Unfamiliar with this week's featured song? Hear it here.

 

1) This song is from Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, which was released on Halloween Day, 1962. Do you like scary movies?

I love scary movies.  Not necessarily ones drenched in blood,  just scary ones.

 

2) The "Baby Jane" of the title is Baby Jane Hudson. Jane was a child star, singing and dancing in vaudeville. She was so popular that Baby Jane dolls sold well at her shows. Tell us about one of your favorite childhood toys.  

 

I loved my Kewpie Doll, Given to me by my grandparents.  Mine was made, like all the dolls of the time, of something that should never be left out in the rain.  And of course it was.  I loved her anyway, crumbling away over the years.

 

3) Baby Jane's career hit the skids when she hit her teens and audiences no longer found her cute. Adolescence can be a tough time for many of us. Did you ever go through an awkward phase?  

 

Not that I know of.  My problems weren't in that area.  I was always oblivious to any of the prejudice that I suffered, having a French last name that everyone thought was "Mexican".  My grandfather and his brother, my grand uncle Luis,  both had blue eyes and blonde hair!  

 

I just thought I was OK, i.e. just another kid.  When I started to look back on it all, I realized the path of my life had been narrowed by having to grow up in California, and not in New Orleans. 

 

4) Meanwhile, Jane's older sister Blanche blossomed into a beauty and became a major movie actress. Her career was cut short when, at the height of her popularity, her back is broken in a car accident involving a drunken Jane. Most of the movie takes place in the mansion Blanche bought back when she was a star. Blanche is confined to a wheelchair and completely dependent on Jane, who is bitter, jealous, and well, bonkers. Very bad things happen. Can you think of another movie where scary things happen in a big old house?   

 

Not unless you want to include "The Munsters".  My brother and I had a talk about our childhood before he died, and we decided that we had LIVED through enough horror growing up, that things in  movies weren't even scary.  We knew what scary was.  Sort of  like what the fictional Blanche went through, only REAL.  

5) As a (crazy) older woman, Jane convinces herself she can relaunch her career and recapture the love of the public. She dresses like she did as a little girl and makes up her face to look like those Baby Jane dolls that were sold long ago at her childhood performances. Then she rehearses this week's song. The result is so memorable that now, more than 60 years later, you can still find "Baby Jane" Halloween costumes online. Tell us about a Halloween costume you really enjoyed wearing.   

The one that I remember was dressing up as an airline pilot.  I used stuff I bought at Goodwill, and put my long hair up under a short, gray wig, and put The Captain's hat up top.  It was mad fun! 

 

6) Which kind of spooky movie villain do you find scarier: supernatural monsters (Dracula, Wolfman, ghosts, etc.) or human monsters (Baby Jane, Michael Meyers from the Halloween franchise, etc.)?  

Human Monsters, hands down.  I had terror and fear of them engraved on my soul from my childhood.  There is nothing more horrible than a human monster.

Questions inspired by Halloween ....

7) Orange and black are the traditional Halloween colors, with orange representing the autumn harvest and black symbolizing all things scary and mysterious. Are you wearing either color as you answer these questions?  

 

No Ma-am.  I am wearing Pink.

8) Jack-o-lanterns originated in Ireland, though instead of pumpkins, they carved gourds. When Irish immigrants arrived in the US, they used pumpkins because they were more readily available. Did you decorate your home with a jack-o-lantern, or anything else, for Halloween?  

 

I used to go all out, with decorations in windows and all the way to the door.  But now I don't have to desire to even answer the door.  We chance it, and leave all the lights out. 

9) Think back to your trick-or-treating days. Which candy were you happiest to find your bag?  

 

Abba Zaba Bars.  I loved them.  I just found them on Amazon!  Imagine!  Need to go order a life time supply!  

  

 

 

Thanks so much for joining us again at Saturday: 9. As always, feel free to come back, see who has participated and comment on their posts. In fact sometimes, if you want to read & comment on everyone's responses, you might want to check back again tomorrow. But it is not a rule. We haven’t any rules here. Join us on next Saturday for another version of Saturday: 9, "Just A Silly Meme on a Saturday!" Enjoy your weekend!

 

 

Three on Thursday .....The origin of SABLE in one short story...

1.The Hands: "You can't make me knit!"

2. Me:  "The Hail I can't!"

3.  Enter the Stash:  "The Hail she can't!” However, knitters must have some place to stash yarn, and I have a Stash closet, 

Gratuitous CUTE Image of a Hamster, who is  knitting herself a sweater. 

 

 

Wordless Wednesday … 🤫

Eastern Australia..  🤫 shhhhh

Tuesday Toss up .... very Rando....

Dang! 

Monday Music Returns!

 A new way to do this... This is great and now I just have to remember all the hoops to jump through to keep doing Monday Music!

Sunday Komeekz

 

Saturday9: Smoke Rings {1933)

 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?  When I was 22.  Never started again after that and that's when my hubby quit as well. 

 

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? Some others smoked but have quit.  My mom did but she always smoked outside when she visited.  I've never met a person who vaped. 

 

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?  I would have sung lead, that I am certain of.  But we never sang as a family growing up.  However, Grandpa, her dad, played guitar and sang for his grandkids, when we stayed in Ohio after my two brothers were born.  And all the little grandkids  sang along with him.  I sang all my young life, in church and school choirs, after my mother didn't go back to Ohio anymore. 

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 Beach Boys, the Eberly Brothers, and the Mills Brothers just off the top of my head.  The Osmond Brothers.  And then The Jackson Five.  But I'm certain there are more. 

 

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?  I never hear or see a commercial.  Streaming, all the way!  In fact I've begun to eyeball getting rid of the commercials in say, YouTube, that pop up there by simply not going where they are.  I pay enough for cable, etc.      

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?  No, sorry, I  had to look her up.

 

7) Johnny Cash was also born in 1933. Do you have a favorite Johnny Cash song?  Didn't he do, I Keep my Pant's up with a Piece of Twine?  Oh Wait!  Lol... "I Walk the Line"   

 
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?  Meeting.  My twins flew into town for a visit. 

 

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?  My best friend is over 80, and he gets younger people to fix his own car.  He wouldn't be fixing my car, either.