Posts Tagged ‘Transformers’

WHAT PRICE HOLIDAYS?

Wednesday, July 24th, 2024

   I wonder if anyone will get the play on word reference I’ve used for the title of this blahg.Scott Reading A Book  Or will someone fault my grammar and inevitably say the phrase is I was or am on holiday and not I was or am on holidays.  Potato, potato, macaroni.  That won’t make sense either unless you pronounce the two ways of saying potato.  Don’t ask about the macaroni.  The title references an old 1932 film title, “What Price Hollywood?”  That film was similar to and led to the 1937 remake “A Star Is Born” which in itself resulted in remakes of “A Star Is Born” in 1954 with Judy Garland and James Mason, the 1976 version with Barbara Streisand and Kris Kristofferson, and 2018 with Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper.  I haven’t seen the Streisand version but the restored 1954 version with Judy Garland is phenomenal.  Don’t settle for less, the restored version is best.  If you’re counting there was also a 1951 television version, “Robert Montgomery Presents: A Star Is Born.”  I haven’t seen that one either.  That’s enough digression for now. 

   Last week I was on holiday or holidays.  Take your pick.  TFCON TorontoI always take the same week in July that corresponds with the TFCON TORONTO.  To be truthful, the TFCON or Transformers Convention, is held every year in Mississauga at the Hilton Mississauga.  There are some events on the Friday evening but we don’t usually attend those.  Saturday and Sunday are the big days with a huge dealer room and panel sessions with guests.  Before I get into all of that, I have to back up the week before when I was anticipating my holiday. 

   My wife and I decided it was time to upgrade and trade in our 2008 Hyundai Santa Fe.  It had well over 300,000 kilometres and sometimes when it broke down, the cost of repairs was getting to be to much.  The garage we deal with in Demorestville, Village Auto, has sold us our last number of vehicles and they do repairs on site so when we saw a couple of Toyota Rav 4s in the lot, we decided to spring on one.  We finally took possession of a 2017 version last Tuesday. 

I drove the vehicle most of last week and didn’t notice any issues.  I was just happy that the air conditioning and key fob unlock were working.  My Santa Fe had lost function on those two features.  As I said, I didn’t notice any issues while driving it to and from work.  On the drive to Mississauga on Friday July 12th, with our destination being the Hilton Mississauga, we noticed loud and continuous clunking coming from the rear.  We stopped at a rest stop and looked down underneath but couldn’t find the issue.  We decided to continue on.  Later at the Hotel, after Jeanette, Abbie, Emily, and I had a lovely dinner, we looked down underneath where the jack and spare tire are kept.  We noticed the jack was loose and a luggage shield bar seemed to make an odd noise when we shook it.  We took these items out and put them in the back seat of the car.  That eliminated the continuous clunking noise.  With that noise eliminated however, we began to hear a scraping/grinding in the rear driver side wheel.  We suspected it to be a brake issue.  The short version of this is that we drove home safely on the Sunday and the car was looked at and repaired on the Tuesday.  Apparently a bolt in the caliper (brake related) was loose and causing the grinding and when we went over a bump the caliper would sometimes clunk.  All resolved however by the guys at Village Auto to our satisfaction. 

   Now back to the TFCON.  I tend to digress quite a bit.  Abbie and I did a count on how many times we’ve attended TFCON.  We both recalled that our first year was 2016 because the great voice talent Frank Welker was there but we didn’t get to see him.  We had just driven up for the day and we didn’t get to see Welker’s panel.  Luckily, in case you are interested, his panel from that year can be viewed on YouTube: 

Frank Welker has not been back since but if I had been able to ask him a question it would have been this:  “What Was It Like To Work With Don Knotts in ‘How To Frame a Figg’?  Check out the trailer below.  You can see Frank Welker in a few scenes but jump to the 1:31 mark and you can see him interact with Don Knotts. 

Frank Welker, if you’re reading this, I’m still waiting to ask my question.  I know what you’re thinking, who goes to a Transformer convention to ask Frank Welker, the voice of Megatron from the 1980s cartoon, about a movie he made with Don Knotts?  I would, if I had the chance. 

   Okay, and yet another moment of digression.  So Abbie and I have been attending the TFCON since 2016.  There was no convention in 2020 due to Covid 19 nor was there one in the summer of 2021.  TFCON 2021 was held December 10-12 that year.  We attended that one but skipped the July of 2022 because it was so close to the December one and less than a year apart.  My wife and I attended July 2023, last year, because Abbie was working in the United Kingdom.  So adding it all up, Abbie and I were both at the 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021, and 2024.  In addition, I went to the 2023 without Abbie but with my wife Jeanette in attendance.  That’s seven times for me and six for Abbie.  The last time we were together was at the TFCON 2021.  I wrote in a previous blahg, 2021: WHAT DID I ACCOMPLISH THIS YEAR? a little about the convention and how I was selected for a table read after I auditioned for a character called “Tripredacus.”  Here’s the audio of my table read, courtesy of Abbie: 

Abbie did a script reading in 2019 and luckily someone has posted that to YouTube.  Abbie is the one in the middle with the black transformers shirt:

Goober, who will get mentioned later on, is at the far right.

   I mentioned about the vendor room and panel sessions but I’ve left out the evening events that we usually attend on the Saturday night of the convention.  The table read was fun and Abbie was chosen in 2019 for her table read.  There is also a game show with contestants from the audience.  The first few years it was a thing called “Faction Feud.”  This is based on the Family Feud game show.  You have to make up teams of 4 and then compete against another team.  One year I was on a team without Abbie and another year Abbie and I were together on a team.  I could not find a more recent video of a Faction Feud event but here’s a video from 2009.  This video is interesting in that the first person you see in the video is a guy I know from the convention as “Goober”:

I was never that good at the trivia part and usually guessed at everything, mostly wrong but with an occasional right answer or I leaned over to Abbie and asked her for an answer.  We never won the championship so my litle cheating didn’t amount to much.  In recent years, Faction Feud has been replaced with  “Wheel of TF Con.”  Here’s a video from 2023: 

I didn’t attend the evening events in 2023 because Abbie was in the United Kingdom so my wife and I only went up for the day.  Abbie and I both participated in 2021 at the December TFCON but at separate times.  Goober and I and one other person competed against each other and I handily beat out Goober.  That’s because he kept spinning and landing on “Bankrupt” several times which allowed me to finally fill in enough letters to guess the final puzzle.  Wheel of TFCon is so much easier, for me, than Faction Feud.  This year, Abbie and I stayed for the evening events but were not chosen to participate in the Wheel of TFCon.  The host did remark however about a few years ago when Goober hit all those Bankrupts.  Ah, of course, no one remembers the winner.  It was me.  I just told you that! 

   Well, now on to the Dealer Room.  I didn’t take any pictures but this video shows some clips someone took in the Dealer Room.  If you look in the background at the 4:25 mark you can see me come into frame followed by Abbie.  I’m wearing a black shirt with white.  Wish it was the other way round but at least it’s proof I was at TFCON 2024! 

I’m not the huge collector like Abbie but occasionally I will be aware of something I want to purchase.  This year, I was on the hunt for a Draculus: 

Draculus

This figure came out in 2021 and coincided with the 90th anniversary of the Bela Lugosi ‘Dracula’ film.  I had seen the figure at my local ToysRUs for around $90 Canadian but I didn’t like the price as much as I liked the figure.  I kept watching the price come down and said to myself if it ever dropped below $50 I’d buy it.  Unfortunately ToysRUs sold it and didn’t get another one in.  I started looking online at ToysRUs for it again earlier this year but there was no online stock and the nearest store that had one was in Downsview up around Toronto.  Their price was $42 and I thought if I didn’t find one at TFCON 2024 then I’d drive to that Downsview ToysRUs and buy it.  I searched all day in the Dealer Room but didn’t see one.  There was one seller who said he had one at home and if he got home he’d bring it back in the next day.  The next morning, I was heading downstairs to the Dealer Room and the seller was getting off the elevator.  He recognized me and said he’d gone home and had the figure for me and it was in box.  We hadn’t discussed a price so I was a little leery.  I met up with him at his booth and he suggested $35.  It was still in box so I offered $40.  He and I were both happy.  I didn’t have to pay tax or drive out to Downsview where I would have had to pay $42 plus tax and maybe only to find they didn’t have in the store afterall.  Here’s a video from YouTube of someone showing of their Draculus: 

I should add that while I was searching the Dealer Room on Saturday for a Draculus, I discovered another Transformer Universal monster tie-in.  This one is Frankentron, a Frankenstein tie-in that was released in January of this year: 

I found it for $50 at one table and because there’s no tax or shipping, I thought it was a good deal.  Here’s a review of the figure from YouTube:

One final footnote, when researching Draculus and Frankentron I discovered there was a Transformers/Stranger Things crossover of the Surfer Boy Pizza van.  There was one seller of Stranger Things collectibles in the Dealer Room but he wasn’t aware there had been a Transformers/Stranger Things crossover.  Apparently it came out in November of 2023.  This might be what I’ll look for next year:Surfer Boy Pizza Figure   I’m not like Abbie or other Transformers collectors when it comes to my interest.  I like the more interesting crossover items.  I guess I’m nostalgic that way.  A few years ago there was a Ghostbusters crossover called Ectotron: 

Of course I had to buy that.  Then there was the Back To The Future crossover figure Gigawatt: 

You know it, I had to buy that one, too.  Before I move off my Dealer Room finds, I need to mention I also purchased a Micronauts Battle Cruiser.  Here’s what it would have looked like in the box (mine wasn’t in box): 

I was and still am a huge fan of the Marvel Comics adaptation of Micronauts based on the toy line.  I have a few items and I’ll think I’ll save that information for another blahg.  I did write a blahg back in 2016 about finally acquiring the Micronauts Rocket Tubes set.  You can check that out at IT’S NEVER TOO LATE.  Here’s what my Battle Cruiser purchase looks like currently on my shelf:

My Micronauts Battle Cruiser

I’ll probably post better pictures of it once I write that Micronauts blahg.  Seriously, I’m going to write it one of these days. 

   Before I move off the TFCON part of my holidays, I should mention that in the middle of the Saturday TFCON festivities, my wife and I left Abbie at the convention so Jeanette and I could go into Toronto to see a musical.  Our daughter Emily had purchased us matinee tickets to Wicked, not knowing it was the same weekend as TFCON.  Jeanette and I drove twenty minutes to a Go Station and took a train into Toronto, walked up to the Princess of Wales Theatre, ate a sausage, me, and a hot dog, Jeanette, from a street vendor and then saw the musical.  Here’s a picture of Jeanette from inside the lobby:

Jeanette at Wicked

I have read all of the books in the Wicked series by Gregory Maguire, “Wicked”, “Son Of A Witch”, “A Lion Among Men”, and “Out of Oz” and two of the new ones in a related Oz series, “The Brides of Maracoor” and “The Oracle of Maracoor.”  In researching this blahg, I discovered there is a third book in this new series, “The Witch of Maracoor.”  It came out last year so I’ll have to pick that one up.  The books have a lot going on in them and the musical “Wicked” changes up the story somewhat.  Even though I enjoyed the musical, I enjoyed the books more.  I highly recommend all of them.  Still, it was a great day to spend with my wife and we got back to the Hilton Mississauga in time for Abbie and I to participate in the evening events including “Wheel of TFCon” even if we weren’t chosen and the host didn’t remember I was the one who beat Goober a few years back.  Ah, fond memories. 

   Okay, one more thing on the TFCON, even though I’ve hinted a few times I’m moving on, but this is important.  TFCON always has great guests.  These include voice talents who worked on various shows and artists and writers who worked on the shows or contributed to the numerous comic book releases.  This year, it was announced that Terry McGovern would be at TFCON 2024.  Here’s what was posted on the TFCON website: 

TERRY MCGOVERN
TFcon is very pleased to welcome Terry McGovern the voices of Wildrider, Windcharger, and Onslaught in Generation 1 as a guest at TFcon Toronto 2024 for his first-ever Canadian appearance.
Terry will be taking part in a Q&A panel and autograph sessions with the attendees.

I wasn’t really all that enthused by it but Abbie attended the panel with Terry McGovern and discovered something interesting.  Terry McGovern is also famous for voicing Lanchpad McQuack in the 1990s Ducktales & Darkwing Duck animated series.  Whoa, stop the truck!  I’m a huge Darkwing Duck fan.  Abbie and I both enjoyed the series but I also have collected Darkwing Duck figures.  Here’s a photo of my shelf of collectibles from Darkwing Duck: 

My Darkwing Duck shelf

Okay, Deadman from the DC Comics really doesn’t fit in but I had no place else to put him.  Not shown in the above photo is the Thunderquack jet with Gosalyn and Honker Muddlefoot.  Unfortunately you also can’t see the figure of Lanchpad in the sidecar to the Rat Catcher.  Here’s what his figure looks like up close: 

So, when Abbie said Terry McGovern was also the voice of Launchpad, and further proposed we split the cost of an autograph, I quickly agreed.  Here’s the signed photo we got from Terry McGovern 

Terry McGovern autograph

Jim Cummings was the voice of Darkwing Duck in the 1990s series and I’d love to get his autograph on the same photo.  Unfortunately the voice actress Christine Cavanaugh who voiced Gosalyn passed away in 2014 so that’s one autograph I won’t be able to get.  I also have the Funko Pop issues of Darkwing Duck figures and there’s an upcoming blahg about that as well.  I promise to get to that one someday soon, as well. 

   And now for something completely different…different in that it’s not about TFCON 2024 but still keeping with my holiday break.  The day after we got home from TFCON, I woke up with hives.  I had them for two days.  Food?  Stress?  The excitement of getting Terry McGovern’s autograph?  Not being recognized as the person who beat Goober a few years ago in “Wheel of TFCon?”  Who knows.  Wednesday I was overly tired but my Mother had been in the hospital with C. difficile and she was released that day so I had to take her home.  I had two naps that day.  Later, we went for an 8pm showing of Kevin Costner’s film “Horizon.”  I liked it but it still needs to come together for me to understand it all and I’m hoping part two will do that.  Thursday we went thrift shopping in Brockville.  I didn’t find anything.  Friday, Saturday, and Sunday were spent doing yard work.  Yesterday I went back to work.  That about sums it up.  TFCON weekend was the real highlight of my time off. 

   So what about the title?  Well, “What Price Hollywood” tells the tale of the cost of fame and how it can take its toll.  “What Price Holidays” is my tale of the cost of my holidays.  I’m not talking about the cost of the passes to TFCON or the hotel stay or food or going into Toronto to see Wicked or my purchases in the Dealer Room or the fee for Terry McGovern’s autograph.  It’s also about hives and being tired and my Mother being in the hospital.  Was the price too high for my holidays?  Not really.  I got a blahg out of it and an idea for two more.  “What Price Holidays?”  Who knows, just send me the bill.

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THE 2022 FALSE DUCKS VIDEO RAMBLE

Tuesday, January 25th, 2022

    What a busy January this has been!  Scott Henderson on the last day of 2021I recorded this Video Ramble nine days ago and I haven’t even had a chance to post it.  Since then the temperature has dropped even colder and we had a wicked snow storm last week.  I had a Covid scare last week and was home for a couple of days waiting on the results of a couple of rapid tests.  Both were negative but then our furnace conked out again on Friday night and again Saturday afternoon.  This is the third time in the past two weeks.  Let’s hope they have fixed the problem this time.  My Father used to do this for a living but I’m not the son who inherited any of that knowledge.  Speaking of my Father, he passed away on January 19th, 2019.  On January 20th of this year, I remembered the anniversary of his passing.  I think that’s okay because I really don’t want remember his passing but rather his life.  Love you Dad! 

   Have a look at the 2022 Ramble video and I’ll highlight some things below.

  

The Cool and Lam series are the following books written by Erle Stanley Gardner as A. A. Fair.  The series consists of the following 29 books (now 30, with the discovery of an unpublished work in 2016).  I have read 1-9 in the following list plus number 30 as it was written to be the second book in the series but was left unpublished until 2016.  So, I’ve read exactly one third of the books in the series.  This is from the Cool and Lam Wikipedia page:

  1. The Bigger They Come (1939)
    Donald Lam is hired by Bertha. His first assignment is to serve a subpoena on a man that nobody can find. This first entry in the series turned on a real loophole in the extradition laws of the State of Arizona which made it possible, under certain conditions, to commit a murder without being punished provided one remained in Arizona. After its publication, a public outcry caused the Arizona Legislature to convene in special session to plug the loophole.  Gardner had used this device earlier in his ‘Ed Jenkins’ stories, locating the loophole in California law (this time, fictitiously) so that Jenkins (though a known crook) could operate in California without being extradited for crimes in other states.  The Cool and Lam stories were written under the pen name “A.A. Fair”, and Gardner’s authorship was not revealed till the 1940s.
  2. Turn on the Heat (1940)
    William Morrow and Company, January 1940
    Dr. “Smith” is looking for his wife who left him 20 years before. It was made into a 1958 TV pilot for an unproduced show called Cool and Lam.
  3. Gold Comes in Bricks (1940)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1940
    A blackmailing gambler, a corrupt lawyer, and an expert in salting gold mines, all are grist to Donald’s mill.
  4. Spill the Jackpot! (1941)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1941
    Set in Las Vegas. A runaway bride and a slot machine-fixing ring seem to have no connection. Bertha loses the weight, and falls in love! But…
  5. Double or Quits (1941)
    William Morrow and Company, December 1941
    Detectionary: “First—the missing jewelry. Second—the client found dead in his garage, and Cool and Lam are trying to get from an insurance company double indemnity for the lovely widow.” Bertha begins fishing.
  6. Owls Don’t Blink (1942)
    William Morrow and Company, June 1942
    Donald has two intertwining cases: finding a lost girl and bringing to justice a murderer. Set in the French Quarter of New Orleans. America has entered the war, and Bertha thinks she has helped gain Donald’s immunity from the draft.
  7. Bats Fly at Dusk (1942)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1942
    Donald has calmly volunteered for the Navy to fight the Japanese, and Bertha fumes. She works on a case involving a blind man and a pet bat, with help from Donald via telegram. Donald’s —Police Detective Frank Sellers—is introduced. Bertha gets in over her head and quits; Donald flies down on a military pass, solves it, and flies back. Bertha only finds out later.
  8. Cats Prowl at Night (1943)
    William Morrow and Company, August 1943 
    Bertha must locate a client’s missing wife, who controls all his money. No signs of Lam are seen at all, though he is heard of. She manages somehow, but almost fails. Frank proposes to her.
  9. Give ’em the Ax (1944)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1944
    Donald returns, and takes control of the agency. The case is of a wife cheated with car insurance and blackmail.
  10. Crows Can’t Count (1946)
    William Morrow and Company, April 1946
    A case involving both stolen and smuggled emeralds, the latter half of which is set in the nation of Colombia.
  11. Fools Die on Friday (1947)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1947
    Donald Lam tries to put “psychological handcuffs” on a potential poisoner, but things do not work out the way he planned. “Fools Die on Friday is about the best of the series since the first two. Perhaps since the very first. 
  12. Bedrooms Have Windows (1949)
    William Morrow and Company, January 1949
    Case involving “a pocket edition “, in which Donald himself is suspected by the police of a serious crime. Sleazy nightspots, dubious photographs, a stay at an auto court goes wrong—could there be blackmail? More spice than usual. Gardner originally wrote this series under a pen name because he wondered if some of the plot points he intended to use with Cool and Lam would be bad for his image. However, laxer standards in the 1940s and on made him decide to admit writing the series.
  13. Top of the Heap (1952)
    William Morrow and Company, February 1952
    Previously, Bertha has complained that Donald had been getting the agency in over its head lately. Donald then promptly shows the agency was used as a cat’s paw to prove a phony alibi, in a case involving gangsters, gambling houses, Point shaving, a former stripper, a money laundering scam, and phantom gold mines. Bertha is mad enough to try and dissolve the partnership. Available in the Hard Case Crime series.
  14. Some Women Won’t Wait (1953)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1953
    The question is: did Donald’s beautiful young client poison her rich and decrepit husband, or didn’t she? Set in Hawaii. Bertha tries to dance the hula.
  15. Beware the Curves (1956)
    William Morrow and Company, November 1956
    Suspect in the murder is trying to figure out if it is safe for him to return to his beloved six years later. The victim was her husband who had sent the suspect to die in Amazonia to marry her.
  16. You Can Die Laughing (1957)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1957
    Donald clashes with a client, with whom he has a written contract to locate a certain woman. He thinks the client is lying to him, but takes the case.
  17. Some Slips Don’t Show (1957)
    William Morrow and Company, October 1957
    Set in San Francisco and environs. Practically everyone ends up on a plane at one point or another, so almost anyone could have caused that guy to be found dead in his motel room. Donald knows it wasn’t him. The worry is: do the police know that? Fancy footwork with fake keys and real claim checks could help.
  18. The Count of Nine (1958)
    William Morrow and Company, June 1958
    A rich dilettante “Explorer” finds his poisonous blow gun he had brought back from the Amazon used for a murder. Or so it seems … This one is notable for two things: First, Gardner re-uses a favorite trick from his Perry Mason series; juggling duplicate bits of evidence. Instead of guns or bullets, Lam has a more interesting set of twin jade Buddhas with a ruby in the forehead. It will pay the reader to watch closely who has which, and when, and why. Secondly, the key plot point has a resemblance to G. K. Chesterton’s Father Brown story, The Arrow of Heaven. This may be unintentional, but arguably, Gardner has come up with a more imaginative use of the concept.
  19. Pass the Gravy (1959)
    William Morrow and Company, February 1959
    Stacked blondes, hitch hikers and trips by several people to Reno to gamble are incidental to the two main points. 1. What are the legal issues surrounding the exact way the assets of a spendthrift trust are to be distributed? 2. And what are the exact legal circumstances surrounding the death of a man with a double indemnity policy on his life? If he is dead.
  20. Kept Women Can’t Quit (1960)
    William Morrow and Company, September 1960
    An armored car is robbed while one of the two guards are inside having donuts and coffee and ogling the waitresses; and when Police Detective Sgt. Frank Sellers catches one of the robbers, he is accused of pocketing the loot for himself. Naturally, he puts the pressure on Donald to solve the case for him, gratis, and get him off the hook. Much money floats about – in fact, a little too much. Whose? (At this time, thousand-dollar bills were still in fairly wide circulation, making it possible to use only a little space to hide fairly large sums.
  21. Bachelors Get Lonely (1961)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1961
    Industrial espionage, a Peeping Tom, little is what it seems. More than one woman falls for Lam in the course of this investigation, due to his habit of playing square and treating them like human beings. Sgt. Sellers is a little dense at first, taking Lam for the Peeping Tom. The investigation moves to Arizona at one point.
  22. Shills Can’t Cash Chips (1961)
    William Morrow and Company, November 1961
    Bertha lands a nice, respectable insurance adjustment claim, and hands it to Donald. Donald uncovers assorted ulterior motives, pretends to be an ex-con, hot-wires his own car to impress a gorgeous witness and gets leaned on by a gangster. Then one of the parties involved ends up dead.
  23. Try Anything Once (1962)
    William Morrow and Company, April 1962
    A worried heel of a husband is hand-wringingly anxious to keep his late night visit to a motel with a cocktail hostess quiet. Unfortunately for him, the deputy D.A. in a hot murder trial was found dead in the motel pool the same evening. The resulting investigation will expose the husband. Donald smells a rat lurking within this story, but finally accepts the fat fee offered to keep Bertha happy. The attempt to protect the client has unexpected side effects, including several women removing their garments for one reason or other, a horrifically false accusation against the straight-shooting Donald and the exciting courtroom climax he engineers in the above-mentioned trial.
  24. Fish or Cut Bait (1963)
    William Morrow and Company, April 1963
    When Cool and Lam are hired for day-and-night coverage of a harassed woman, a tortuous tale involving a high-class ‘escort service’ unfolds. Donald is dismissed from the case, but inserts himself back in self-defence after the madam comes to an untimely end. He must convince the police it wasn’t him.
  25. Up for Grabs (1964)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1964
    Insurance again, this time a company that wants to set up an ongoing project to expose phony whiplash claims. Big ongoing retainer, big fees for each claim – Bertha’s eyes glitter at all the legit dollars up for grabs. Donald is packed off to a dude ranch in Arizona to investigate the plaintiff in the first claim, with stern instructions not to stir this one up. It’s not his fault someone’s wife ends up dead in the Sierras, or that Sgt. Sellers is so annoyed at his ‘amateur’ interference that he throws away a key piece of evidence at the scene of the death.
  26. Cut Thin to Win (1965)
    William Morrow and Company, April 1965
    Gardner has Lam himself review the case – from the back of the 1966 Pocket Books edition. Bertha has her doubts about taking a certain case, “…but I talked her into it when our client laid twelve one-hundred dollar bills on his desk. ‘Fry me for an oyster’, Bertha said. ‘It’s your baby, and you can change the diapers’. Less than a week later, Sgt. Frank Sellers announced he was going to take away my license, Bertha Cool announced that our partnership was dissolved and my secretary was crying on my shoulder. ‘Donald, please – please be careful’. ‘It’s too late to be careful now’ I told her. ‘I’m dealing either with a crooked lawyer, a jealous boyfriend, a scheming daughter, one hell of a wealthy father or a combination of any number of them. When you go up against a combination of that sort, you can’t be careful'”.
  27. Widows Wear Weeds (1966)
    William Morrow and Company, May 1966
    Blackmail was a dirty business, and Donald Lam liked to stay clear of it. But for his partner, Bertha Cool, no business was too dirty to handle at the right price. And the price for this job was certainly right. What was wrong, though, was a payoff for pictures that weren’t worth a dime, a free dinner that cost the blackmailer his life, and more than a couple of double-crosses that framed Donald Lam quite neatly for a charge of murder.
  28. Traps Need Fresh Bait (1967)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1967
    Someone is advertising for a witness to an auto accident in such a way as to seem to be suborning perjury. Also, an earlier claim was settled with evidence obtained in this way. The client wants Cool and Lam to find out what is back of it all. Gardner kept up with the law, and knew of the implications of the recent Miranda Rights decision of the Supreme Court for gathering evidence. He believed he had found a loophole allowing evidence improperly gathered under the new rules to be admissible, if obtained investigating another incident, such as a private detective searching a flat without permission. When Donald introduces the loophole, it brightens up Sgt. Sellers’ day no end.
  29. All Grass isn’t Green (1970)
    William Morrow and Company, March 1970
    Dope smuggling and a witness who is both more, and less, than he seems. It all starts when a client wants to find a missing writer – just to talk to him. A little digging (with descriptions of tracing techniques) shows his girlfriend has vanished too, and the trail goes south, to the Mexican border. Crossing the trail, going north, is a shipment of cannabis. Unsurprisingly for this business, someone ends up dead and the whole thing lands in court. Sorting out who did what and why taxes even Donald Lam’s talents to the limit. Lam shows his considerable ability in courtroom manoeuvring, which reminds the reader that he was a lawyer once.
  30. The Knife Slipped (1939)
    Hard Case Crime, December 2016
    Originally written to be the second book in the Cool and Lam series but rejected by Gardner’s publisher, The Knife Slipped was found among Gardner’s papers and published for the first time in 2016. Assigned to prove a philandering husband’s infidelity, Donald Lam uncovers a scheme to enable a certain type of municipal corruption. As well as a dead body.

 

   I won’t talk about the Weepies in this blahg.  I’m saving that.  I do mention Dottie Reid who will also be the focus of an upcoming blahg but here’s a teaser of her singing with Muggsy Spanier and his orchestra on “More Than You Know”: 

 

   In my previous blahg, 2021 – WHAT DID I ACCOMPLISH THIS YEAR?, I posted about attending the Transformers convention in December in Mississauga.  I was lucky enough to be selected for the annual script reading when I auditioned for the character of Tripredacus even though I didn’t know who  that was.  Later research from the Transformers Wiki for Tripredacus, https://tfwiki.net/wiki/Tripredacus, explains that he’s a character from Transformers Beast Wars.  Here’s their explanation: 

Tripredacus is a slimy “Battle Master” who prefers to emerge from underground to attack Maximal fortresses in the dead of night, tenaciously crushing all before him, spreading plague-like destruction wherever he goes. The weapons of his composite members form a slashing mega-missile launcher that he uses to tear his way into battle.

Tripredacus is composed of the three-member Tripredacus Council:

  • Ram Horn
  • Sea Clamp
  • Cicadacon

 Abbie had recorded the audio of the script reading and I finally got it from her last week and here’s the reading: 

  

  That’s about it for unpacking the 2022 Ramble.  It’s still cold but I’m still going strong.  Enjoy the day!  Enjoy your life!  Live, love, and be happy!

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