Odds & Ends: News/Humor (with a "Who Lost the Week?" poll)

I post a weekly diary of historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I often feature in "Cheers & Jeers".

OK, you've been warned - here is this week's tomfoolery material that I posted.

CHEERS to Bill and Michael in PWM, our Laramie, Wyoming-based friend Irish Patti and ...... well, each of you at Cheers and Jeers. Have a fabulous weekend .... and week ahead. If you celebrate it — Happy Thanksgiving.

ART NOTES— an exhibition entitled Called to the Camera: Black American Studio Photographers— more than 250 images of the 19th/20th centuries, by Gordon Parks and others — is at the New Orleans Museum of Art to January 8th.

SPORTING NOTES #1— yesterday, cross-town rivals Stanford and Cal-Berkeley squared-off in their annual Big Game college football rivalry. It was the final such game broadcast by Joe Starkey— who’ll be forever known for the wild finish (forty years earlier) in the 1982 game, when the Stanford band came onto-the-field early, and the winning touchdown for Cal was scored by a player who knocked-down in the end zone a Stanford … band trombone player.

THURSDAY's CHILD is named Oscar the Cat— a Nova Scotia kitteh who makes a habit of visiting a hospice, where the terminal patients find comfort with him.

PROGRAMMING NOTE— there will neither be an Odds & Ends diary next weekend (nor a Friday post in Cheers & Jeers) as I will be traveling for the Thanksgiving weekend to see family/friends. I will post a “Who Lost the Week in Trump World?” poll for readers who always seek one for Sunday, November 27th (though it will be posted early; so there may be late entries missing). Will return at the beginning of December.

SPORTING NOTES #2— because of the heat in the Middle East — the men’s World Cup begins on Sunday. The three group matches for the US team all begin at 2:00 PM Eastern: vs. Wales (Monday the 21st), England (Friday the 25th) and Iran (Tuesday the 29th). All will be on the Fox broadcast network (the NFL home).

FRIDAY's CHILD is named Garfield the Hero Cat— a Massachusetts kitteh whose constant rubbing against an amputee’s remaining leg convinced the man to seek medical care: it was infected but able to be saved (due to the early detection).

BRAIN TEASER— try this Quiz of the Week's News from the BBC ...… and the usually easier, less UK-centered New York Times quiz.

THE OTHER NIGHTyours truly hosted the Top Comments diary with an ode to the late Top Comments artist (rserven, Robyn Serven) who died this past July, the switch in craft beer from bottles-to-cans and the word “Tankies” - just seems inadequate for those on the right.

Reader Suggested SEPARATED at BIRTH from Audri — which is actually a combination that I used … back in April 2010. Since the two men have aged a bit since, here goes an updated version: TV/film stars Josh Duhamel ("Las Vegas", "Transformers") and Timothy Olyphant ("Deadwood", "Scream 2").

...... and finally, for a song of the week ...........................… although it was written by Joni Mitchell: each year at this time, I feature the man who popularized it and — according to Rolling Stone— ushered in the singer/songwriter era.“I wasn’t sure if they were crediting me or accusing me,” he remarked.

Say what you will, Tom Rush gets around. He was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, came-of-age in Massachusetts, made his mark at the Boston/Cambridge coffeehouses of the early 1960's, has lived in the Rockies and the West Coast, then Vermont, now back in Massachusetts and who-knows-where tomorrow (as he counts having moved twenty-six times).

As Steve Leggett of the All-Music Guide puts it, “Rush's warm and slightly world-weary baritone” has a way of growing on you, and he was one of the first performers to feature works by Jackson Browne and others when they were just beginning. Garth Brooks has cited him as an influence, with James Taylor going so far as to say, "I took as much from Tom Rush as possible and unwittingly modeled myself on him. Like a lot of people who do what I do, I owe my career to him".

For a few years, Tom Rush has had an album of humorous tunes Trolling for Owls - which he notes is "not available in stores!" And one of them - The Remember Song - has received in excess of 7.3 million hits on YouTube. After being told it had gone viral he wrote, "I thought I was being accused of being a musical equivalent of Ebola ......... but my children explained to me ... that this was a good thing".

And for several years, The Very Best of Tom Rush has provided listeners with his classic songs (as well as a 2013 documentary film). But it wasn't until 2009 that he released What I Know— which was his first new studio recording in 35 years— because as he explained, "I don't like to rush headlong into these things".

In 2018, he released the album Voices— with some traditional tunes as well as several new songs— of which he says, “There are very few labels that are just content to put out good music and make a reasonable profit at it. Appleseed Recordings, the label I’m on, is one of them, and I’m very thankful to be working with them.”

This marks the 60th anniversary of the career of Tom Rush and — at age 81 — is still quite active. In 2012 he recorded What's Wrong with America?— a spoof of Mitt Romney's notorious “47%” comments. He performs in a lot of college towns and — without mentioning you-know-who by name — said a few years ago:

In terms of the politics, I try to create kind of a little oasis from the problems of the world. So I don’t tend to get political, because I really don’t want to remind people of how much things suck. I’d rather give them a little holiday from all the turmoil.

On the other hand, there are times when I just can’t help myself and have to comment on something. I’ve been saying lately there are aspects of the recent election cycle that make you realize we really have to spend more on education. You can make of that what you will.

For many years he performed an annual show in Boston's Symphony Hall in December. This year, he has some shows in Arizona this week (one along with Dave Mason and Al Stewart) then New England in December, then some more in the new year — most accompanied on piano by Matt Nakoa.