Tomorrow is the 60th anniversary of very first appearance of Charles M. Schulz’s iconic comic strip, Peanuts. Good Ol’ Jay, of BRI “Brainteaser” fame, wrote the definitive BRI history of the strip in Uncle John’s Triumphant 20th Bathroom Reader just a few years ago. In honor of good Charles’ comic strip birthday, here’s a good, lengthy excerpt, telling the story behind the strip’s characters:
Is there a word for how a song can, once rattling along in your head, suddenly become another song? It keeps happening to me—maybe it’s an age thing? This morning I woke up with this in my head:
Shoo fly, don’t bother me / Shoo fly, don’t bother me / Shoo fly, don’t bother me — and dance by the light of the moon.
For those of you not familiar with ancient Americana songs, that’s a nonsensical combination of lyrics from “Shoo Fly, Don’t Bother Me,” and “Buffalo Gals.” It’s happened in a hundred different ways. Once it was this:
Holy cow, this 40-minute film, featuring songs from Neil’s new album, Le Noise, just went up yesterday, premiering for free on YouTube. Neil Young—nobody like him. We’ve watched several minutes so far, and, wow. Really, wow.
We’re hard at work here on Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Tunes Into TV – and we just came across this blast from the past. Anyone out there remember Winky Dink and You?
Yippee! We just received advance copies of the newest, greatest Big John. Can you spot the newest title in this shelf of books? Post your answer (title of book) on the blog/Facebook/Twitter. All correct answers will be entered in a random drawing to win your own advance copy of the book. You have till midnight tonight (9/28) to post your answer. We will reveal the cover design tomorrow.
And remember, the book will hit stores in November and it is never too early to pre-order.
Oddee has a collection of links to some particularly oddee things that you could actually buy once upon a time.
A few favorites include the scalp massager:
Here’s another edition of “Ledes We Love,” accounts of openings to news stories that are so good you hardly have to read any further—but you’re going to. Because you must. Today’s entry:
Manitoban Janis Ollson and family are in magazine ads for the esteemed Mayo Clinic for a very good reason: she’s the first person surgeons cut in half, removed much of a cancerous midsection, then put back together with a happy ending.
We told you the story about the English woman who thought it was “funny” to dump a neighbor’s cat in a garbage can – where it was stuck for fifteen hours.
Waiter: We’ll have the just desserts, please. Thanks.
Extra: Some cat dumped a woman in a garbage bin in revenge! Watch!
Uncle John’s Astronomer: There are rings around Uranus!
Football season is in full swing and we are celebrating by re-reading Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Sports Spectacular.
Want a copy of your own? Comment below/on Facebook/on Twitter with the name of your favorite football team (yes, college football counts…and since in the rest of the world, football = soccer, we will accept those as well) and be entered in a random drawing.
You have till Sunday, Midnight PST to enter.
Howdy, BRI fans, we’re busy working on our next book, Uncle John’s Tunes Into TV, and I’ve got a request: I’m working on an article about the history of closed captioning—the subtitle-like text that allow’s you to read, rather than listen to, a show’s dialogue. It’s a surprisingly fascinating subject. Just imagine, for example, that millions of deaf or hard-of-hearing people were not able to fully enjoy that most ubiquitous of modern life experiences—watching the television—until the 1970s, and that it didn’t become truly widely available until the 1980s.
There was a segment on NPR this morning about the growing number of higher education students defaulting on federal school loans. The numbers are astounding: More than 238,000 students with federal loans are in default. And we’ve all heard the horror stories of students accruing debts that will take a decade—or decades—to pay back. (That’s crazy!)
The Aussies just say no to Puke My Fish Up:
Circus-goers in Australia hoping to see a woman swallow and then regurgitate a live fish will be disappointed, as authorities decided it was cruel to the fish.
Now just what the heck is going on in the world when a person can’t get the kids together, put ’em in the station wagon, and take them down to the circus to watch a lady swallow a live fish and then throw it back up again, still alive? What kind of a world? Next we’ll hear you can’t throw kittens in trash bins! “It was fun,” for goodness sake!
Mana the Magnificentand BRI fan Ken Lerner send us to The Society Pages, where we get a look at how male and female are symbolized on public restroom doors around the world:
As such, washroom signs are very telling of the way societies construct gender. They identify the male as the universal and the female as the variation.
An example we all recognize:
The most common type of washroom sign, pictured at the top of this post, is another example. Typically, these signs depict men as people, and women as people in skirts.
Or men as naked and women as dressed?
Anyway, do go give it a look. It’s a thought-provoking post, and there are a bunch of examples, many funny and some just strange. One more:
Because you can’t get good toilet paper news just anywhere.
• Interesting toilet paper holders.
• The toilet paper wedding dress. (I do. Eww.)
• Newark, New Jersey mayor: No toilet paper for city offices. (Read it and wipe weep.)
If you haven’t seen this story, get a wallet or something to bite on first:
Mary Bale, 45, was caught on CCTV petting four-year-old tabby cat Lola before picking her up, tossing her into a trash can and closing the lid.
This story almost has the feel of a hoax:
“It is the second-lightest element in the Universe, has the lowest boiling-point of any gas and is commonly used through the world to inflate party balloons. But helium is also a non-renewable resource and the world’s reserves of the precious gas are about to run out, a shortage that is likely to have far-reaching repercussions.
