by John Walters

Starting Five

How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria?*

The MH film musicals department reminds readers that 1961 Academy Award Best Picture winner West Side Story featured a Puerto Rican character named Maria, but that it was 1965 Oscar Best Picture winner The Sound Of Music that had a Maria, decidedly not Puerto Rican, who was the subject of the above lyric. The staff regrets any misunderstandings.

Hurricane Maria, having left Puerto Rico “100% without power,” possibly for months, now heads towards Turks and Caicos. Imagine that: no electricity for months. The night is dark and full of terrors.

2. Top Jimmy Struts

This is what a beatdown looks like. And what a double-down, as well as a refusal to back down, looks like. Good for you, erstwhile co-host of The Man Show. 

Plus, Jimmy Kimmel has the facts on his side. What I’m reasonably certain of is that we asked Kimmel and the president to take a shot test on the details of Obamacare and Graham-Cassidy, that the late night talk show host would record a much higher score. What does that tell you?

3. Hey! My Balance Sheet Is Up Here

 

Is the woman above A) In the top 100 players on the WTA Tour B) the lead singer in a Chaka Khan cover band C) the CBO of one of the most oft-mentioned companies in America?

This is Bozoma Saint John, the 40 year-old Chief Brand Officer at Uber. Boz, as she is known, was born in Ghana but her family emigrated to Colorado Springs (back when that town was not riven by the strife caused by The Mad Pooper!) when she was 14. A graduated of Wesleyan, Saint John went from being a marketing executive at Beats, to holding a similar job at Apple after that monolithic brand acquired Beats, to her present-day job at Uber.

Her Twitter handle is @badassboz and we believe it. This is a dynamic, smart, beautiful, confident (Above: “I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid. I’ve never been afraid of anything“) and strong African-American woman. And as the first black woman at that high a level in Silicon Valley, Boz is also a pilgrim. If you’re wondering when Cosmopolitan is going to do a feature on her, they already have.

4. Bronx Bombings

The New York Yankees swept a three-game set from the Minnesota Twins this week, but what may linger more in our memory were the strikes by balls (see what we did there?). On Tuesday night Chase Headley was struck dangerously close to the Holy of Holies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvTEEwlbltc

Yesterday, teammate Todd Frazier nailed a foul ball line drive that struck a young girl. She remains hospitalized this morning. The girl’s family declined to provide her or their names, but expect her to be the Rosa Parks, so to speak, of protective netting extending along the sidelines of Yankee Stadium.

5. What A Foo Believes

How about pairing one of America’s hardest-rocking bands with late-night TV host James Korden? Nothing about this conceit is new, of course, but sometimes it works better than others. This, with Dave Grohl and Foo Fighters, is one of those times. Who knew you could shred to a Rik Astley tune? That’s Pat Smear (wonderful name), bleached-blond in the back center, who used to be sorta the fourth member of Nirvana.

We love the answer as to why the Foos all pile into one van together even though they regularly have three vans prepared to transport the six members: “Because you don’t want to be the one guy not in the van” “Because then you know who they’re talking about.” Honest and hilarious.

It’s not actually much of a secret, but Foo Fighters have a tremendous sense of humor. Stick around to the very end to see what we mean.

Related: The Foos have never been featured in the segment below. We’ll fix that next week.

Reserves

 

No words. pic.twitter.com/btsaBZLrpf

— Alex Seixeiro (@alexfan590) September 21, 2017

Too good not to include.

X squared + Y squared = Z squared

Music 101

I have no need of friendship/Friendship causes pain/It’s laughter and it’s loving I disdain…

By 1966, teenybopper rock songs (“Wake Up, Little Susie”, for example) seemed inappropriate in a world in which JFK had taken a bullet to the head, Vietnam was becoming that problem that would not go away, and civil rights unrest here at home was no longer something that people could pretend was not happening. The Beatles released Revolver that year and the Beach Boys Pet Sounds, but Simon & Garfunkel were months ahead of them with Sounds Of Silence, an album whose first words were “Hello darkness, my old friend…” This song, the final track, reached No. 3 on the Billboard charts.

Remote Patrol

The Vietnam War (July 1967-December 1967)

PBS 8 p.m. (re-airs at 10 p.m.)

Now we’re deep into the shit. As Dr. Benjamin Spock of all people said in last night’s episode, and I’m paraphrasing, This is a war in which tens of thousands of American men and Vietnamese will die because of LBJ’s pride (that’s a president, not a Sweet Pea).

“Life isn’t fair; get used to it.” That was the advice the commander at the Army Ranger Training School, Chargin’ Charlie Beckwith, gave his recruits. Incidentally, Beckwith was a former University of Georgia football player who was good enough to play in the NFL but chose the Army instead; he later would lead the ill-fated raid in Iran to rescue the hostages but instead resulted in the deaths of eight men.