by John Walters

Starting Five

Taking Debate

We were too busy working our second job of the day—is this what you mean by low unemployment, Donald?—to watch Dem Debate, Episode 2, Round 1, from Detroit last night. Our not-so-sneaky suspicion is that when they pare down this group to the swimsuit competition, the final six will be Bernie, Biden, Liz, Kamala, Mayor Pete aaaaaaaaaaand…Marianne Williamson.

The last one because Marianne’s sort of like the Puck of this field. She’s nutty but she makes just enough sense, plus she’s a renegade and the viewers love her. And if CNN (and others) have learned nothing else from 2016, they’ve learned that they can turn any presidential race into America’s favorite reality TV show.

Williamson, a native Texan, dropped out of college in the early Seventies and moved to New York City to become a cabaret singer. It’s as if Betty Buckley is running for president.

Ohio Players

The Cleveland Indians trade their staff ace, Trevor Bauer, to Cincinnati, which in turn sends tempestuous but talented outfielder Yasiel Puig up Lake Erie way. There are a few other players and one more team involved, but that’s the gist of it.

This is baseball’s version of wife swap. My wife’s crazy. I hear that, so’s mine. But your wife’s hot. So’s yours. Hey, whaddaya think if…

In Case Of Emergency, Do NOT Break Glass

Fine, China. You’re the world’s greatest country when it comes to suspended glass walkways. Three years ago you put up the above path on Tianmen Mountain.

Next month, in the Huangguoshu scenic area, China will open the world’s longest glass suspension bridge (1,804 feet), which also spirals. Will this induce you to travel to China?

Manitoba Manhunt: Trail Goes Cold

Where are they? It has been 10 days since anyone can say with certainty they spotted suspected killers Kam McLeod, 19, and Breyer Schmegelsky, 18. The RCMP has thrown the full weight of its search efforts at finding the Walmart fugitives and yet…nothing. In an age when use of cellphone or credit card would allow law enforcement to pinpoint your location, this duo has gone totally off the grid.

Which to us means that they’re either dead, or holed up in an abandoned cabin, or already hundreds of miles away from where they were last seen, in Gillam, Manitoba. One of the three.

A reminder: each of them is 6’4″, roughly 170 pounds. Tall and thin. It’s hard to put on a disguise to hide that figure.

This account from the last person who accidentally encountered them, outside Gillam, on July 21 is chilling:

In Cold Lake, Alberta., Tommy Ste-Croix said he encountered the suspects stuck in a grey SUV on a muddy road near his brother’s house on July 21 and unwittingly helped them on their way.

“I assumed they were young teens with mom and dad’s SUV,” Mr. Ste-Croix said in an e-mail. As he helped free the vehicle, Mr. Ste-Croix said he ribbed them about getting their parents’ vehicle covered in mud. He said Mr. McLeod replied: “Oh don’t worry, they told me to go for a long joy ride.”

He said the two seemed good-natured – albeit “a little nerdy” – but said they appeared nervous, which he attributed to their stuck SUV. He says when he saw the suspects on the news his “jaw dropped,” and he called the RCMP.

Tough Times For Endurance Athletes

A 44 year-old Norwegian woman was struck by lightning and killed at the Sudtirol Ultra Skyrace in northern Italy. The 75-mile race winds its way through the scenic Dolomite mountains. The race had been halted due to weather conditions 30 minutes earlier but that news had not been dispersed to all runners in time.

Meanwhile in Ohio, another 44 year-old woman was killed during a 70.3 Ironman Triathlon when a semi truck hit her as she was cycling on a state road. Her name was Kristen Oswald so for all we know she was also of Norwegian descent. Weird.

****

Gotta run to our gig so we’ll just post quick bits: Apple (AAPL) shares are up 4% after a positive earnings report after the bell yesterday…Castor Semenya will not be allowed to defend her 800 title at the Worlds…We’re pretty fired up about the idea of both Jon Gruden and Mike Mayock working with the Raiders and being on Hard Knocks in August…South Carolina will have the most difficult schedule in college football this season as the Cocks get Clemson, Alabama, Georgia, Florida and Texas A&M. If for any reason the Cocks go 12-0, just, in the words of Dennis Green, “crown their ass!”

by John Walters

Tweet Me Right

This image perfectly encapsulates how good it felt to finally put together a good jump, regardless of the rain & all I've been through with injuries this season. Grabbed my 5th U.S. National Title 🙏🏼🙌🏼 pic.twitter.com/X4EAiwRIQ4

— Sandi Morris, OLY🇺🇸 (@sandicheekspv) July 29, 2019

Starting Five

Narrow World Of Sports

Long before ABC Sports found itself under the umbrella of Disney and Bob Iger, it was the fiefdom of a true sports visionary, Roone Arledge. My former SI colleague, Steve Rushin, once wrote an outstanding profile of Arledge as part of SI’s celebration of its 40 years in print.

Arledge, not unlike Christopher Columbus, shrunk the world by traveling far and wide across the globe. Whereas Columbus brought Europe to North America (with catastrophic effects, we might add), Arledge brought Europe and Asia and even Acapulco into the living rooms of North Americans in the 1970s via ABC’s iconic Saturday afternoon TV show Wide World of Sports.

“Spanning the globe to bring you the constant variety of sport…” announcer Jim McKay intoned by way of the show’s introduction, accompanied by a majestic score, and we were off. Evel Knievel making some bizarre leap on his motorcycle. Muhammad Ali or some other boxer fighting in a place we’d never heard of. Figure skating from San Moritz. And yes, cliff diving in Acapulco.

What a wonderful and humanistic venture. No one at the United Nations may have ever done more to promote, well, globalism, than Arledge. Sure, we loved the NFL (the league’s apotheosis was the 1970s and you’ll never persuade us otherwise), but we also looked forward to expanding our sports horizons as ABC’s cameras traveled across other horizons.

Sadly, for reasons of budget, of tail-chasing and, yes, of rights fees, ESPN/ABC now has a distinctly antithetical approach to sports coverage than Arledge did. Just last weekend for instance, the Tour de France concluded (with the youngest champion in more than a century), and Olympic tuneups the World Swimming Championships and USA Track & Field Championships also concluded. Athletes who should’ve become household names this week such as Egan Bernal, Caleb Dressel and Simone Manuel, and those who should already be, such as Sandi Morris (above), Jenny Simpson and Emma Coburn, were completely ignored by both ESPN and espn.com.

Yes, part of the equation is that these events were televised by NBC/NBC Sports, but why should that matter to a network/brand that promotes itself as “the worldwide leader in sports?” And sure, ESPN did provide nominal coverage of the Women’s World Cup and Megan Rapine (which aired on Fox), but it too was largely muted.

Instead, we get a daily diet of Screamin’ A and others projecting on what the Lakers will do this season (it’s July) and hot training camp updates from the NFL. Future historians and/or sociologists will note the parallel paths of nationalism taking place in the U.S.A. and ESPN’s coverage of sports and ruminate on how one impacted the other, and vice-versa.

Now I’m sure Jamie Horowitz would never pitch this, and I’d probably be laughed out of Jimmy Pitaro’s secretary’s office, but given how much easier it is to “span the globe” these days electronically and digitally, I have to wonder if there’s an appetite out there for fans who want more. For those who’d be entertained by a program, even if it were a weekly, that brought the world of sport to our laptops and televisions. I’d watch. We might even call it “The Worldwide World of Sports.”

Badgers-Bama

Might there really be good news in college football, much less on the planet? People doing the right thing because it’s the right thing? Well, blow me down, Olive.

Yesterday the University of Alabama and the University of Wisconsin, two Power 5 schools that wear big boy pants but are not in the same conference, announced 1) that they will play each other in the years 2024 and 2025 and 2) that they will do so not inside Jerry World on at the Mercedes Benz Dome but in Madison and Tuscaloosa.

If you’re wondering, Does this mean that Nick Saban is hanging it up after the 2023 season, well I am, too. Seriously, though, could this be the inception of an encouraging new trend in college football, one that has largely been absent since the late 1970s (with apologies to the University of Miami, which continued doing so through the mid-1990s)? That is, the resurrection of the much-loved intersectional matchup, and on campus? In the words of Oliver (but not erstwhile Tide defensive coordinator Bill Oliver), “Sir, I want more, please!”

Meanwhile, CBS Sports provided its preseason Top 10 yesterday and if you’re curious, it goes a little something like this: Clemson, Alabama, Oklahoma, Georgia, Ohio State, LSU, Michigan, Florida, Texas, Notre Dame.

From that list, LSU is the only one that will face three other Top 10 schools. The Tigers get Texas, Florida and Alabama. Meanwhile, Auburn gets four—Florida, LSU, Georgia and Alabama—and that’s not even counting their games versus Oregon and Texas A&M, while the Aggies also get four as well: Clemson, Alabama, Georgia and LSU.

Manitoba Manhunt (Cont.)

It’s a grisly story, of course, but we are daily fascinated by the ongoing freedom of Canadian teenagers Kam Mcleod and Breyer Schmegelsky, who have now been on the run somewhere in Canada for nearly two weeks.

Think about it: they’re missing and they have not contacted a soul to declare their innocence, so they’re either dead or more likely, guilty. And if you understand how vast and underpopulated Canada is, once you take Toronto and Montreal out of the equation, then factor in that both boys are 6’4″ (difficult to disguise that), it’s downright bizarre that the RCMP, using drones and dogs and infrared cameras and who knows what else, have yet been unable to find them.

Fact: Canada ranks second overall in geographical size but 222nd in terms of population density. Which, to our way of thinking, should make these two fugitives easier to find. One wonders if the trail has gone cold, if the RCMP is simply guessing as to where they are. If they’ve been able to make it to Toronto, Canada’s largest city, they’re going to be much more difficult to nab. And you have to wonder how much heat the people in charge of this manhunt are taking, being outwitted to this point by a pair of high school-educated, ex-Walmart dropouts. It’s as if Beavis and Butthead are up against Tommy Lee Jones’ character from The Fugitive and winning.

One telling fact: they apparently haven’t killed anyone in more than ten days, which tells me they’re more interested in remaining on the lam than in a killing spree. Or they’ve been claimed by the wild and no one has found their corpses yet (and may never).

This story from the Toronto Globe and Mail provides a pretty good update of how the teens have thus far eluded capture and how the RCMP appears to be basically lost in terms of narrowing the search area.

The Bowel-ry Boy

A mad pooper is on the loose in Staten Island. The serial pooper has twice gone No. 2 outside the same home in New York City’s most quasi-borough this month and cops have told the residents of the house that there isn’t much they can do about it. Now, if he happens to be attempting to be selling cigarettes on the sidewalk…

Golden Taint

So everyone’s favorite ex-Notre Dame wide receiver this side of Tim Brown and Rocket Ismail (and maybe Jeff Samardzija), New York Giant Golden Tate, has been suspended four games for taking a banned substance: a fertility drug.

Where does this rank on his career misdeeds? Less or more serious than his break-in at Top Pot Doughnuts in Seattle? And aren’t both less grievous than former Irish teammate Michael Floyd’s DUIs? When did the Irish get so gangsta? Tate, whom Irish fans have always found appealing, is himself appealing the NFL’s suspension.

Music 101

Dog & Butterfly

Alright, we were inspired by our friend’s moon fraud piece to go back and listen to this Heart tune from 1978. It only peaked at No. 34 on the charts, but sisters and Ann and Nancy Wilson have fared well, critically, as the decades have passed. Vocalist Ann is as talented as any female singer post-Carly/Carol/Joni as far as we’re concerned. And Nancy married Cameron Crowe.

Remote Patrol

Democratic Debates

8 p.m. CNN

This is the greatest field entrance of all time #TXHSFBCHAT pic.twitter.com/MenxQRBwvc

— #TXHSFBCHAT🏈 (@txhsfbchat) July 29, 2019

Live from the FOX Theatre. You got owned, Dems!

by John Walters

Starting Five

Training Wheels

Colombian Egan Bernal, just 22, becomes the youngest Tour de France champion in more than a century and the first from his nation to stand atop the podium. Pedaling for formidable Team Ineos, Bernal defeated teammate and defending champion Geraint Thomas by only 71 seconds, ending a streak of four consecutive British winners.

Telling: News of Bernal’s victory is not up on espn.com’s morning “Top Headlines” list.

Manitoba Manhunt

They’re still on the loose in the land of Canada Goose. Teenagers Kam McLeod and Breyer Schmegelsky have now successfully eluded capture for more than one week in a remote area of northern Manitoba with few people. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police have manpower, dogs, drones, etc. and these two high school graduates and former Walmart employees have been able to out-Arctic Fox them for eight or nine days.

They are alleged murderers, sure, and dangerous. But it’s somewhat incredible that they’ve been able to remain fugitives this long and that authorities have now moved the populated area they believe them to be in from remote Gillam, near Hudson’s Bay, to York’s Landing, which is more than 100 miles south.

They may be captured today. They may be in Toronto. Who really knows?

Caleb Makes a Phelpsian Splash

As Susie B. has been telling you in the comments, American Caleb Dressel is swimming’s next big fish. Dressel, 22, won a record eight medals at the World Championships in Gwanju, South Korea, including six golds. During the meet, in which he also took two silvers, the University of Florida alum also broke Michael Phelps’ 100 butterfly world record.

There are now only four swimmers who’ve won at least four golds at a single worlds: Phelps, Ryan Lochte, Katie Ledecky and Dressel. Even though Dressel’s name is NOWHERE TO BE FOUND on espn.com’s homepage this morning, NBC will have made him a household name—and face—by this time next summer when the Tokyo Games are underway.

Bauer Out(r)age

We’ve all been there. One of our co-workers fails to do his job and that has a negative collateral effect on our performance (welcome to the cookoutateria, summer of ’19). It’s like Mark Wahlberg famously said in The Departed: “I’m the guy doing his job; you must be the other guy.”

So in the fifth inning of yesterday afternoon’s game in Kansas City, Cleveland Indians outfielder Oscar Mercado lost a ball in the sun that landed on the warning track. Then Bauer gave up three consecutive dinky singles, one that landed less than 10 feet from home plate.

A fifth inning that began with Cleveland in front 5-3 turned into a nightmare as Bauer allowed five runs. When manager Terry Francona stepped out of the dugout to yank his staff ace after what amounted to his career-worst performance (seven earned runs), Bauer tossed the ball over the centerfield wall. Francona, without even attempting to shield his mouth, “What the f%&$ are you doing?!?”

The dog days have arrived.

Track and Feels

On the final day of the USA Track and Field Championships, yet another sporting event espn.com ignored this morning, the men’s 1500 and men’s 5000 were decided by less than half a second. In the 1500, the metric mile, Craig Engels held off reigning Olympic gold medalist Matthew Centrowitz by 4/100ths of a second. In the men’s 5000, Lopez Lomong won by 27/100ths in 13:25.

Also, Notre Dame alum Molly Huddle won her fifth consecutive national championship in the 10-K and her 28th national championship overall. Erect a statue of her on campus!

Editor’s Note: Last weekend my friend Michael DePaoli wrote a piece published here placing skepticism on the veracity of the Apollo 11 mission. The article, “Moonfraud,” asked questions about the July 1969 mission to the moon based solely on the physics of the journey.

The response to his piece has inspired him to write this follow-up. I can’t speak to the astrophysics of his argument, but the logic is entirely sound (even if he does coyly reference a lame Heart song). Please read it. –JW

by Michael DePaoli

After reading the comments from Don and Fresh Air following my “Moonfraud” piece, I thought I should take a step back and introduce myself before I discuss its merits. I am just a poor, downtrodden, debt-ridden lawyer who has an intense curiosity about things. When I was a kid, I drank Tang, I ate Space Food Sticks, and I had posters of astronauts on my wall. I believed in the Apollo Space Program and I watched the landings on television. I also watched the Nixon resignation on television. Later, I went to law school where I learned how to read way too much. 

Now, apparently I stand accused of writing “an insult to mankind” because I dared to ask questions about the lunar landing. On top of that, the comments have even invoked Santa Claus against me. Sadly, I have heard similar things before. In the past when I have asked my Moon questions I have elicited responses that included references to the JFK assassination, Elvis being alive, the Easter Bunny, anti-vaxxers, etc. This saddens me because the essence of scientific advancement springs from the asking of questions. But, for some reason, when it comes to the Moon we throw the scientific method out the window and we attack anyone who might ask any questions. 

Personally, I do not really care about the Moon missions, themselves. Indeed, I consider the Moon missions to be a joke. If we faked the missions, then that would be the funniest thing in human history. And, if we actually went to the Moon to collect rock samples and play golf, then that would still be a huge joke because we could have used all that NASA money to do something worthwhile, such as cure cancer or build the wall (I’m joking! Calm down). 

What I do care about is the culture and attitude of our country where you are not free to ask questions about the greatest technological achievement of all time. For me, it is about justice and speech, it is not about the landings. We live in a society where someone will verbally attack you and throw Santa Claus in your face when you dare to question the official NASA story about the Moon. Is that what we want? Is that right? 

You see, the puppy chases the butterfly. But, as the puppy matures into a dog its curiosity wanes, its enthusiasm diminishes. First the dog loses the will to chase the butterfly. Eventually, the dog will become too old and cannot give chase, anymore.

I do not want my country to become an old dog. I want the children of our country to be free, and to be curious, and to ask questions, for as long as they can. I do not want the children to be confined to conformity. I do not want people to accept an official story just because it comes from the government. And, I do not want the people of my country to become unthinking followers of doctrine. 

I entitled my eBook “On Being Wrong: Moonfraud” because it would be nice if I were wrong. But, even though I might be wrong, I also want to retain the right to ask the questions so that I could see the proof of what might be right. 

It is interesting because one of the negative comments against me invoked Galileo, who was one of the greatest scientists of all time. This is ironic because in his later years Galileo was convicted of heresy and he was confined to house arrest until he died. What did Galileo do wrong? He correctly stated that the Earth revolves around the Sun. Blasphemy! 

I suspect that if Galileo were alive today, he would completely ignore all those lunar landing photographs, and he would take a look at all the facts and figures and numbers and velocities of the lunar landings. He would do his own calculations and try to figure out whether the NASA story might be plausible (that Galileo and I are both of Italian heritage is purely coincidental). 

And, that is what I tried to do. I actually read the NASA story, and the parts that made the least sense to me (and sounded the most fishy) were the Trans-Earth Injection (when the rocket engine blasted Apollo 11 out of lunar orbit) and the Re-Entry Corridor (when Apollo 11 re-entered Earth’s atmosphere). 

Here is just one aspect of the Apollo 11 mission for you to ponder: After the Trans-Earth Injection blasted the command/service module out of lunar orbit, Apollo 11 was traveling escape velocity relative to both the Earth and the Moon. 

Why is this important? Well, escape velocity has that word “escape” right there in it! The Earth travels extremely fast around the Sun. Seriously, this is true. The Earth does travel around the Sun. Thank you, Galileo! The velocity of the Earth is roughly 67,000 miles per hour. So, when you are not in orbit around the Earth you have a problem because the Earth will move away from you at the rate of 67,000 mph, which is about eighteen miles per second. There is zero chance that Apollo 11 could have caught the Earth, which is why Apollo 11 needed to stay in orbit! 

Instead of catching the Earth, Apollo 11 would have entered a hyperbolic trajectory where the Moon’s gravity would be strong enough to change Apollo 11’s flight path resulting in a curved direction of travel (hyperbola), but Apollo 11 would be traveling too fast for the Moon’s gravity to force another lunar orbit. At the same time that Apollo 11 entered escape velocity with respect to the Moon the command/service module also would have been traveling escape velocity relative to Earth. One moment Apollo 11 would be inside two orbits (orbiting the Moon which in turn is orbiting Earth), and then the next moment Apollo 11 would have been flung out of both orbits. 

NASA’s official story is that the gravitational pull of the Moon slowed down Apollo 11 and then the astronauts coasted back to Earth. But, once you are on a hyperbolic trajectory such fanciful things are not going to happen. Instead, the Moon itself would be moving along as it revolved around the Earth. The Earth would pull you one way, the Moon would pull you another way, but you would still be hyperbolic. So, the gravity of the Earth and Moon would have resulted in a changed trajectory of Apollo 11, but it would not have created a new orbit around Earth for the Astronauts. 

NASA does not account for the velocity of the Moon in the return voyage. The problem here is that the Moon is not standing still. The Moon moves, and its gravitational pull on Apollo 11 would have changed the hyperbolic trajectory of the command/service module and it would have increased the velocity. 

As soon as you scratch the surface, there are so many numbers that need to be checked for accuracy and plausibility. Like, NASA claimed that once inside the re-entry corridor the Apollo 11 command module could slow down in only 1,285 nautical miles (1,479 land miles) of atmosphere, which does not appear to be nearly enough atmospheric friction when the command module was traveling 36,194 feet per second (6.85 miles per second, or 24,677 miles per hour). Apollo 11 would not slow down at all until the force of the wind resistance exceeded the force of gravity.

But, an object as heavy as the command module traveling at extreme hypersonic speeds does not obey the normal rules of wind resistance. Instead, the command module would have exploded the thin air, cutting through the upper atmosphere like a hot knife through butter. In less than four minutes the command module would have exceeded 1,285 nautical miles without slowing down. 

And, the number 36,194 itself was nothing more than a predicted theoretical velocity that was published in the official press kit prior to Apollo 11’s launch. Then, after the mission NASA used that same theoretical calculation as if the number had actually been measured up in the atmosphere. The question is how many other numbers did NASA just invent on paper! 

NASA also claimed that the design of the command module provided “lifting characteristics” that would add lift after re-entry into the atmosphere. NASA did not quantify the amount of lift. NASA also did not explain how a hypersonic fireball could ever have those alleged lifting characteristics. 

So, am I wrong? Of course I am wrong. I would truly hope so. But, telling me that I am “an insult to mankind” is not going to prove the issue one way or the other. It would also be more proper to say humankind, or humanity. The point here is that I have questions, and it would be a better Earth if I were allowed to ask my questions without fear of being ridiculed.

by John Walters

Tweet Me Right

Dick Van Dyke, 93, Carl Reiner, 97, Mel Brooks, 92 and Norman Lear, 96. pic.twitter.com/IdQtfRfXEU

— Rocky Mountain Mike (@RockyMntnMike) July 25, 2019

The Reader’s Digest was correct: Laughter is the best medicine.

Starting Five

Namaste On The Moon

Lost in all the Apollo 11 50th anniversary retrospectives the past week, India on Monday (Moonday?) launched its own lunar mission, Chandrayaan-2.

While there will be no actual Indians (or cowboys) touching foot on the moon, India would become the fourth nation (after the U.S.A., U.S.S.R. and China) to achieve what is known as a “soft landing” on the moon’s surface.

Boston Massacre

The Red Sox and the Yankees have been playing each other since 1902 and never has Boston put up more runs on the Bombers than they did in last night’s 19-3 win. The Yanks, whose plane landed in Boston at 5 a.m. yesterday morning after Wednesday night’s win in Minnesota, hit the snooze alarm. The weird part is that their worst performer was pitcher Masahiro Tanaka, who allowed seven first-inning runs. He’d flown ahead of the team the day before to get a good night’s rest.

Meanwhile in Anaheim, the Orioles and Angels each used 10 pitchers in Baltimore’s 10-8 16-inning win. Baltimore center fielder Steve Wilkerson picked up the save, pitching a perfect 16th inning, and in so doing became the first position player in MLB history to pick up a Save (Rule No. 7).

Day To Night

Honestly, our intention was only to pick up some Carvel in Southampton last night, but directly across the street is the Southampton Arts Center. And a nice lady told us they were having a good speaker in 20 minutes, so I decided to stick around.

Well, the speaker was legendary photographer Steve Wilkes and the talk was part career retrospective and part presentation of his “Day To Night” technique, which has taken him all over the world and produced many an iconic shot. What Wilkes does is position himself in one spot (often in a crane) for 18 to 36 hours and continually take the same shot, hundreds of them. Then afterward he blends the photos together (I didn’t stick around long enough to listen how, the matter of having to return the rental car in time so as not to be charged for a second day).

There is nothing in these photos that is not real. The only “doctoring” is how Wilkes blends them to look as one. You may see the same person (or animal) in the same photo numerous times. Part of Wilkes’ intention, or discovery, is to illustrate the passage of time in one spot.

You can visit Wilkes’ website to see more of these or simply buy his book. We went on cnn.com this morning and realized they’re suddenly on to him, too. If you get a chance to see Wilkes give this presentation, go. It’s fantastic and he has some great stories about his career. Also, there’s a fabulous lesson in all of this: a kid from Great Neck, N.Y., took a keen interest in photography and that interest has taken him all over the world (I mean EVERYWHERE) and brought him a little wealth and a lot of professional approbation. Shoot your shot, playa!

Meanwhile, and we found this hilarious, if you’re in Southampton tonight the SAC is holding a free outdoor screening of Get Out. We’ll leave it at that.

Alexandre Dumbass

You remember the scene in The Shawshank Redemption when the inmates are reorganizing the library and one of the happens upon The Count Of Monte Cristo? “By Alexandre Dumbass (Dumas),” says Heywood. Andy Dufresne smiles and says, “You’ll like that. It’s about a prison break.”

Is it ever? So we finally picked up and finished Dumas’ 19th-century classic and we never quite realized what a template it served for Stephen King’s book (the in-film reference was anything but happenstance): young man is wrongly imprisoned; he makes one very close friend during his confinement; his escape involves water (and a lot of patient digging); there’s a little revenge on his chief antagonist; he amasses a fortune; he buries something for someone; and there’s a famous line about hope.

Andy Dufresne was based largely on Edmond Dontes. I never knew!

High Steaks Issue

In Arkansas, a new law is scheduled to take effect this week that would ban the use of “meat-related terminology” to describe a meatless product? Hence, “veggie burger” would be prohibited.

Of course the ACLU has its panties in a wad over this, claiming it’s First Amendment infringement. On the other side, a lawmaker who voted for the bill made the specious argument that you couldn’t slap a Porsche hood on a Buick and call it a Porsche. But those are brand names, dummy. You could manufacture either car and talk about its HORSEPOWER even though there are literally no horses in any automobile.

Also, there are no puppies (or their parents) in a hot dog and no ham in a hamburger. Obviously this bill was passed after some heavy lobbying (and likely a little graft) from the local cattlemen’s association. Meanwhile, and we just don’t understand how or why, shares of Beyond Meat (BYND) have risen from $177 to $237 just this week. Even if you did not get in on the BYND IPO and waited until the end of its opening day (May 2) of trading to buy it at $65, the stock is up ago nearly 275% since then. In just under three months.

Music 101

Listen Up

She’s not the most famous musician from the Jersey shore, but maybe just the most accomplished female musician? Nicole Atkins, from Neptune, N.J. (same hometown as Jack Nicholson), is a 41 year-old whose style reminds many of Carole King or someone from the Brill Building era. This tune came out in 2017.

Remote Patrol

The Women and Wuthering Heights

All month long, TCM is devoting Friday nights to the classic movies of 1939. Tonight’s double feature begins with a film about catty New York socialites, and stars Norma Shearer, Joan Crawford and Rosalind Russell. It stands out, particularly for the era, in that all 130 speaking roles were female. Not a single male is seen. So, You’ve Got No Male. I’m sorry. It’s the weekend, let it slide.