Baltimore Diary

A Local Legend Falls

—Wide World of Sports intro (ca. 1972)

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By now I'm sure you're aware of the news that sportscaster and Monkton resident Jim McKay has died at the age of 87. Curiously, the Sun reported the story without mentioning that he was once a reporter there. (Oops.) He gave up that job in 1947 to become THE first voice Baltimoreans ever heard on television, on WMAR.

UPDATE 6/9/08: They've finally caught on to their omission. I'm not saying that's because they saw something here, but I have no reason to think it isn't, so I'm just going to go ahead and take credit for it.

Although he was well-known among the Horsey Set in Maryland (He's the founder of Maryland Million Day), Jim McKay was perhaps best known for two things: host of ABC's Wide World of Sports and his coverage of twelve Olympic games. Most people joke that they usually tuned in to see the "agony of defeat" guy fall off the ski ramp, but the fact remains that in the days before there were eight thousand versions of ESPN and its like available, Wide World of Sports was the one place that people had to see athletic competitions that weren't local, weren't championship games and were unlikely to get any television coverage at all. You could argue (much as you do for ESPN nowadays) that the "sports" aspect of some of these events might be a little thin (Lumberjacking? Chess?), but the show's inclusiveness was part of its greatness.

McKay also distinguished himself by being television's point man during the Munich Olympic Games in the summer 1972. I remember this well because the Winter Games, in Sapporo, Japan, took place around the time of my birthday. My friend came to the house for a sleepover and my father put a TV in the bedroom so that we could stay up late and watch the games. As a result I had a lot of interest in the Olympics when the Summer Games came around.

About midway through the events, on September 5, Palestinian terrorists took 11 Israeli athletes hostage, demanding the release of prisoners in Israeli and Geman jails. 18 hours and an aborted rescue attempt later, it was over and the entire Israeli team was dead. That particular Olympics should have been marked by the athletic triumphs of Olga Korbut and Mark Spitz. It's unfortunate, but instead we usually remember it with the footage of McKay ending the drama:

"When I was a kid my father used to say our greatest hopes and our worst fears are seldom realized. Our worst fears have been realized tonight. They have now said there were eleven hostages; two were killed in their rooms yesterday morning, nine were killed at the airport tonight. They're all gone."

But even McKay, who thought that the subsequent 34-hour stoppage of the Games was a bit short, recognized that even though the Olympics, and sports in general, lost their innocence that day, he also saw that when you're out there Spanning the Globe, it's not just about Munich. And he helped us get back on track as the Games, and our lives, resumed.

So to you, Mr. McKay, I say thank you and goodbye.  

Outro to Wide World of Sports, 1982 

S-M-R-T

Homer: I saw this in a movie about a bus that had to SPEED around a city, keeping its SPEED over fifty, and if its SPEED dropped, it would explode. I think it was called, "The Bus That Couldn't Slow Down."

--The Simpsons, "The Springfield Files" (1/12/97)

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Because I promised Yellojkt, here is me as a Simpson:

This one comes from the Simpsons Movie website and is strictly do-it-yourself; if you go to Simpsonizeme.com you have to upload a photo. And...why not whore out the comments. What do you think? Do I have a reasonable image of myself? What? You don't know me? Sucks to be you.

National Joke

Jon Stewart: ...Washington DC is violent, but they're not finding 30-50 corpses in the street every day!
Field Reporter: Well, of course not; it's not Baltimore.

—The Daily Show (5/10/07)

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I'm not usually one to jump on bandwagons, but the above quotation seems to have gotten very little attention, with the exception of the Ed Norris Show on WHFS yesterday. So either I'm at the start of the groundswell, or I'm actually ahead of the curve, or I'm full of crap. None of these options are mutually exclusive, by the way.

But the fact is that Baltimore is still close to the top of the list in terms of the murder rate. In 2006, New York City had 597 murders, according to that city's report. Baltimore had 275, per the Murder Ink column in the City Paper. Now, you could be all outraged and say "Yo, it's not so bad here! They've got twice as many murders!"...

...Except that New York City has 8.1 million residents. And nearly twice that many inhabitants during the day. Baltimore has somewhere in the neighborhood of 650 thousand people. So they have roughly twelve times the permanent population and only twice the number of murders. Oh, and we're actually ahead of last year with the murders. That is, there are more murders in Baltimore City this year than there were on the same date last year.

It's not surprising that the police force is horribly understaffed—would you want to work in a city that can't get its shit together? How are they going to staff these beat patrols? and GunStat? and whatever else? The cops who are out there don't get nearly the support they need. How can anyone successfully recruit officers?

At least the City Council members get another $8000 in their paychecks starting next year, and the mayor gets a $23K bump. And all they had to do for it was take no action whatsoever. Which appears to be exactly what they're doing about the crime rate.

It's no wonder this city has become a nationwide punchline.

Sorkinese, How I've Missed You

MARTHA: Thank you. That's a nice tux, is that Hugo Boss?

MATT: Yes. And the way I know is that a huge Bavarian model came to my house with a big rack of tuxedos and said--
(German accent)
--dees ah from Hugo.

DANNY: Well, you picked a nice one.

MATT: You think?

DANNY: You look like the Number 2 guy in a Colombian drug cartel.

MATT: I think it says formal but not stodgy.

DANNY: I think it says Hi, my name is Johnny Cash.

---dialogue cut from the pilot of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip (2006)
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Got my copy of Studio 60 via Netflix yesterday. WooHoo! You know I had it in the DVD player within 20 minutes.

What can I say? The pilot looks good. All of the characters look pretty strong and well fleshed-out already, and Thomas Schlamme's direction is incredible, the sort of stuff that will stand up to multiple viewings and allow you to sit back later on and really watch it for all the cool details that you don't see the first time. And, as Bradley Whitford has already said, Aaron Sorkin is the best writer in television. In the mouth of the right actors, his lines have a rhythm, pitch and timbre that are unequalled.

So yeah, this one will be appointment TV for me.

 

Winging into History

This past Sunday, The West Wing aired its farewell episode on NBC.

There's not a lot that I can add to all the chatter that's already gone on about it, except to note that it was one of the few "appointment TV" shows I've ever had on my list. In the first four seasons it featured smart, snappy dialogue and one of its signature visual styles was the "pedeconference", where characters would walk and talk at the same time and the camera would stay just a pace or two ahead of them during the whole tracking shot.

After the fourth season, creator Aaron Sorkin left the series for a number of reasons. Some say the heart went out of the show at that point, and I tend to agree. The fifth season was a mess and I think that's where the show lost a huge chunk of its audience. The focus changed from the characters' driving the plot, to the plot driving the characters. And everyone blamed new Executive Producer John Wells. It may be fair, it may not. He was given a pretty difficult situation to resolve. What's clear to me is that the plot began to drive the characters rather than the other way around.

Having said that, the last season and a half have been very good, covering the elections to replace President Bartlet. There was still a lot to deal with, including the death of John Spencer, the actor who portrayed Leo McGarry, in December. This reportedly threw the story arc into a bit of a tailspin but the recovery was good.

Not many television series get the opportunity to wrap up most of the storylines and give the viewer some idea of where the characters end up, so the last few episodes of The West Wing were pretty satisfying in that sense. Someone at the website Television Without Pity compared it to watching a movie that's about 140 hours long, where the story ebbs and flows and ultimately comes to an end. That's not a bad analogy, actually.

If you haven't seen the show, go catch the re-runs on Bravo. Then send me a nice Thank-You email after you've seen a few.

Anyway. This is just a quick open "Thanks" to everyone involved who made the show happen. The West Wing made me believe in an America that can happen if we choose to stay involved and informed.

Raaaaaaaaaace!

(No spoilers in this post.)

I nearly missed last night's The Amazing Race because of a Community Association meeting. I won't go into that fiasco. But clearly there are times when I look at that crowd and pray that these people don't vote.

But fortunately, The Amazing Race is now on at 10:00, so I only missed a few minutes. And this week we're still in South America; in fact we haven't left Brazil yet. The Hippies and the Fratboys are still asshats, Lake is still a whack job and Fran & Barry, who still don't have a nickname, are still doing better than they deserve because other teams screw up worse than they do.

If you're new to the show, here are a couple of things to watch for: Phil popping his eyebrow (this week's episode? Best. Eyebrow Pop. Ever.), and Phil saying "racearoundtheworld" as though it were all one word.

A Bit of Monday Morning Fun

A link from You Tube. Someone took the time to make a live-action video of the opening sequence of The Simpsons.

You can see it here. Great fun if you're a fan.

Raaaaaaaaaaace!

I've mumbled about it before, but I'm willing to admit it: I do enjoy some of them Reality TV shows. But consider me a classicist because the only two that I make a point of watching (or recording if I'm not going to be home) are Survivor and The Amazing Race.

For me, Survivor is becoming a kind of TV comfort food. It's there and it's pretty reliable and I can get some good snark out of it. The Amazing Race is generally fun to watch, and that's the cool part.

An aside: we're not going to talk about last season's "Family edition", which didn't even leave North America and had fourteen million contestants, many of whom were gone before you had a chance to really hate on them. The original format is back and we're happy now.

So eleven teams of two start out from (this time) Denver, Colorado. At the end of the first leg, which terminated in Brazil, we have Eric & Jeremy, who the other teams have dubbed "the frat boys" and who are recognized by some as the tools they are, in first; and BJ & Tyler, the self-styled hippies in second place. What's cool about these two teams is that they're both incredibly aware of the camera and have no trouble mugging for it, talking to it, and so forth. And yet, at the same time, neither pair has any real self-awareness. Fun! Also, a little irritating!

In third place we have Wanda & Desiree, who are just an adorable mother-daughter pair. Desiree reminds me of Norah Jones. The parent-child couple doesn't always go terribly far, but I'm hopeful in this case. Fourth place went to Dave & Lori. Most people who spend enough time on the Internet to read blogs should like Dave & Lori. They are a true case of Nerd Love. Lori is practically a stereotype.

Lake & Michelle took fifth place. One of the other racers nicknamed Lake as "Scott Peterson" and it couldn't have been more perfect. This couple is this season's Personality Disorder pair. In sixth we have Joseph and Monica, who dubbed THEMSELVES "MoJo", even to the point of having T-shirts made up with "Mo" or "Jo" on the back, as appropriate, and the front reading "Mo      Jo", just like that, with the big space in between. At first I'd thought that Monica had named her breasts.

Seventh-place finish went to Ray & Yolanda, who are pretty cool and I hope they start racing a little better soon. Taking the eighth place slot were Fran & Barry, the traditional older couple who will probably make it through several episodes mostly through other teams making bigger blunders than they make.

Danielle & Dani are a couple of girls from Staten Island who know just how cute they are, if you know what I mean. (Puke.) Lisa & Joni are, I think, this year's version of the Bowling Moms from a couple of seasons back, except they're unintentionally funny. The Bowling Moms were just out to have fun and they came off well. These two are...I don't know. Maybe they'll redeem themselves but I'm thinking probably not.

Finally, we have the first team eliminated from the Race. John & Scott, who are described as "lifelong friends". These two are so far into the closet that Lewis and Clark couldn't get them out. The Amazing Editors did catch them holding hands as they were Philiminated at the end of this leg. (It was right after the shot you see here.) Personally, I don't really care one way or the other about someone's sexual orientation, but I do care about this weird dissembling of it. Isn't Massachusetts (their home state) a little more friendly about this sort of thing? The show has had openly gay couples previously, so it's not an issue for the producers or for CBS. I'm not sure what their deal is.

I'm not going to do a full recap of every episode or a complete list of standings like I did this time, but I will come back to it every now and again. If you're not familiar with the show, give it a shot. It's on Tuesdays at 10 this season. Go. Have fun.

Claim To Fame

I took Keiko out to Patapsco Valley State Park today to visit with a friend and her dog. This is one of the area's better-kept secrets. At least, I knew nothing about it until today, but that's not saying a lot. Anyway, I met her at the "Daniels Area", which is just above the Daniels Dam and is supposedly a very good place to go canoeing. (My friend told me that because she recently acquired a canoe, but that's a very different story).

As you approach the Daniels Area of the park, if you go by a certain route you pass the Rockland United Methodist Church. Apparently they have a Fall Festival coming up. This was the sign that they had near the road (as usual, click to embiggen):

I may have to go to this thing. I'm actually a fan of Survivor and I wouldn't mind meeting Mr. Skupin, but if I do, now the first thing out of my mouth will probably be to ask him for his reaction to that sign.

Speaking of Survivor, we're seeing way too much of the Stephenie and Bobby Jon interviews with this edition. I still don't know who the other people are.

Stream O' Consciousness, or: Yeah, I'm a Sick Puppy

Here's the sort of thing that pops into my head when I have too much time on my hands.

I was reading an article about the TV show Lost. (Premiering September 21, by the way--I left that one out the other day). One of the things that they mentioned is that the character Sawyer is played by Josh Holloway.

Here's where my brain starts to spin outta control.

I'd just heard a story on the news about Natalee Holloway. She's the girl, you'll recall, who disappeared from Aruba several weeks ago. The story was about her mother finally giving up the search leaving Aruba. So she was kinda-sorta on my mind. Immediately I linked the two together, wondering if Josh Holloway was somehow related to Natalee Holloway. Because it's SUCH an uncommon name. (eye roll)

Now, remember this started because the ACTOR'S name is Holloway. So I recognize how screwed up this is.

The next mental leap was to wonder if perhaps Natalee's disappearance wasn't a gigantic publicity stunt on ABC's part, and that Natalee was going to appear, as herself, on a future episode of Lost, just wandering onto the beach with no recollection of how she got there. Last thing she remembers, she was in Aruba.

Then I realized how ridiculous that was, because Natalee is a real person, of course, and we oughtn't play with people's lives like that. But then again, I recently saw Wag the Dog and I understand that it isn't so ridiculous after all.

I'm not belittling the whole Natalee Holloway deal; I honest to god believe that a young girl has gone missing and may have suffered a fate that we'd rather not consider. But wouldn't that be all kinds of screwed-up if ABC were to pull exactly that sort of publicity stunt?

By the way, if ABC pulls exactly that sort of publicity stunt, I want them to send me a BOATLOAD of money. 'Cause you saw it here first.