Do you miss Phyllis Diller’s comedy? Sometimes, I miss some of it. She could be hilarious, especially early in her career, in the days when tv comedy was supposed to be clean and women were supposed to be ladylike. Not Phyllis. She could imply more with a look and a flick of her cigarette than words could state.
SO ANYWAY, when she passed, she left her vast joke collection to the American Museum of American History. She wrote most of her jokes, but she bought some and she accepted some from fans. Each joke was on a card, with attribution, so the world can see who wrote what. Oh, and “Fang” was what she called her husband in her routines. Oh, and the museum has put some of the joke cards online! Some of them are actual jokes, but some are just notes from which jokes could be constructed. Most interesting.
Do you have a cat? I do. Does your cat walk around on or lounge on your keyboard? Mine doesn’t. But, if yours does, you need this app. It’s called PawSense, and it registers random keystrokes. So I guess it would be good if you have children with busy little fingers, but not good if you’re a poor typist.
Have you heard Hadestown? It’s a folk opera by Anais Mitchell. I love it. I love it SO MUCH. It’s reviving now, on the tide of Trump’s wall, because … Oh, many reasons. But the bit that bites is “Why We Build the Wall”. Here it is, with lyrics.
A WRITING PROMPT BASED ON MY POST: What does your main character believe about the afterlife? If they believe in an afterlife, what do they actually think it will be like? Will everybody be in one place, or will there be separations based on life choices? Will it be like Happy Earth, or very different?
John Holton
April 17, 2018 at 5:27pmFunny, funny lady. We watch reruns of the old Ed Sullivan shows, and she was on a lot. Mom had a couple of her party albums, which I was forbidden from listening to, so of course I waited until Mom was out of the house to listen. Never got caught, either…
Marian Allen
April 18, 2018 at 7:39amIf you were forbidden from listening to them, I would imagine they were fairly blue — for the time, of course. These days, most of George Carlin’s “Words you can’t say on television” are said all the time on television. Things were different when I was a girl. And you kids get off my lawn! š
John Holton
April 18, 2018 at 9:27amThat was the weird thing. There wasn’t anything especially blue on them. Funny, funny stuff. On a related subject, did you ever hear her play the piano and harpsichord? She was fantastic!
Marian Allen
April 18, 2018 at 9:53amNo! I didn’t know she could play!
Marian Allen
April 18, 2018 at 9:57amSo of course I had to look it up! https://youtu.be/3mRK5A45Qrc
joey
April 6, 2018 at 9:04amI loved Phyllis Diller too. Bawdy, and even funnier tongue-in-cheek.
Clara USED to sit on my keyboard and do all kinds of terrible things when she was a kitten. I wish I had PawSense back then!
Marian Allen
April 7, 2018 at 7:32amI suspect its help is limited. By the time a cat has hit Select All and Delete, it’s too late to lock the keyboard, yeah?
Dan Antion
April 6, 2018 at 7:14amI think it would be a very bad day for my ego if the cat-sensing keyboard app identified my attempts at writing to be “cat scratching” and ignored it.
Whaaaa
I did enjoy Phyllis Diller. I remember seeing her on Johnny Carson’s show.
Marian Allen
April 6, 2018 at 8:38amI loved that bray of a laugh: Ah HAAA ha ha ha haaaaa!