Share Your World – February 19, 2018
How do you like your eggs?
Not much. I’m not a big fancier of eggs, although I do like omelets. My mother was an awful cook and made really disgusting eggs. It sort of ruined me for the egg experience.
Have you ever met anyone famous?
President William Clinton and Hillary Clinton. And Chelsea. Twice. Kate Taylor and other brothers, but not James. Charlton Heston. Henry Fonda. Sidney Poitier. Alfred Eisenstadt. A lot of TV people and I really don’t remember all of them because it was mostly at parties and I’m bad with names. Patricia Neal. John Kerry. Lots of pols.
Garry with his heroes of baseball. Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY
But you have to remember — Garry was a reporter, so HE was considered a “famous” person in a regional way. He gave autographs. Sometimes, he still does. The big deal for me was Alfred Eisenstadt because I had always admired his photography and to get to really know him, even though it was the very end of his life, was a really big deal for me.
I have “met” a bunch of authors online, though not in person. I treasure ever tiny communication with all of them. I adore writers. Some I love even more than others.
What was the first thing you bought with your own money?
The only thing I remember buying with my money — a believe it was a $5 gift from my Aunt Kate — was a Ginny doll. We had a local toy store and Ginny dolls were quite The Thing for little girls.
Otherwise, until I left home, I didn’t have money unless someone gave me some on my birthday. Any money I earned over the summer or part-time after school went into my college fund and I never got my hot little fingers on it. I had enough money for the bus, the subway, and occasionally, lunch.
If I wanted more money, I had to walk to school … which I did. Four days of walking to school equaled two slices of pizza and a coke. My parents weren’t big on handing out cash to kids. But to be fair, none of the parents of my friends were big allowance givers either. It was a blue collar neighborhood and money went to savings accounts, mortgages, and home repairs. We all got the minimum amount we needed to do what we needed to do and that was it. No mall rats in our crowd.
What did you appreciate or what made you smile this past week? Feel free to use a quote, a photo, a story, or even a combination.
I took a few pictures I really like. I feel better than I felt last week. And … we are one week closer to springtime.
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Categories: #Photography, Humor, Personal
WHAT WOULD McQUEEN HAVE DONE? by GARRY ARMSTRONG 
TRULY MY MOTHER 
REVEAL TO CONCEAL 
SERENDIPITY - SEEKING INTELLIGENT LIFE ON EARTH 
Those Ginny dolls would have scared me when I was a kid! I was convinced every toy came alive at night. lol
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You’d hate it here. We have dolls all over the house! Garry likes them. They are his plastic pals.
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Haha! I would not last a day I’m afraid!
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Ha! I was part way reading through the list of people when I thought, she married someone famous! Then I read the next paragraph. Sidney, I think it would be great to meet him!
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Sidney was in “Guess Whose Coming to Dinner” and Columbia Studios was just up the street. He went to lunch. I went to lunch. For about a month, there was a daily viewing of Sidney. Lord, he was handsome. And so TALL.
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That is so cool. I heard Graham Greene ( a Canadian actor) frequented a place for coffee near by and went there a few times hoping to catch a glimpse. I didn’t get to see him though. The place burned down recently, so I guess he won’t be back.
Sidney was a big guy and handsome!
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I kept be impressed by how TALL he is. I’m short and getting shorter (one day I think I will entirely disappear). The combination of good looks and height did it for me. I became a puddle every time he was near me. Woo hoo!
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I am still laughing at this comment. 🙂
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Hey, you liked Sidney more than me. Geez!
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Love that picture of Garry in front of the baseball hall of fame figures.
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It was a great moment for him, too. He is such a passionate baseball fan!
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Always dreamed of playing centerfield at Ebbets Field as my hero’s, Duke Snider, successor.
Just a dream.
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I’ve been waiting to read your response to the famous people question. Since Garry, as you stated, is famous and has met some famous people. I enjoyed reading your post. 😀
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It was fun. Alfred Eisenstadt was the big one for me. I had a few of his books of pictures and he went through every page of the books. He was very old, probably close to 90 by then, but he remembered every shot. The film, the camera, and what it was that made him take that specific picture. I learned an insane amount from him just listening.
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I like eggs fried hardhard–otherwise they are gross to me.
I have met tons of famous people, since I know musicians, and now live near Woodstock NY, and have some as clients etc. there and elsewhere Some are great, some are jerks, some look fascinating up close with the chin and cheek implants and work they’ve had done, and it’s hard how they feel so pressured to look great according to someone else. They seem to have the same concerns as anyone else, only maybe sometimes their job concerns or money concerns are bigger numbers than other people’s.
I am sure the first things I bought with my own money would have been christmas presents for family. I remember saving something like seven dollars in a year as a young person.
I love watching the birds and wildlife outside, so that cheers me up. I also enjoyed some good chocolate and some lovely snow and fresh air this week.
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I remember the first time I realized that some famous folks, when you got to know them, were — well — dull. They had better stuff than us, but they didn’t have better lives. It’s a useful lesson to learn. Woodstock will be gorgeous in about a month and a half!
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It’s already quite nice here–more snow today, which makes it lovely.
I sat near a famous woman recently, whose claim to fame as an actress was very largely her looks, and it intrigued me to see the things she used to look younger–it must be my stage manager background, or just basic life curiosity. Most mesmerising for me was a sort of hair volume that was probably a hairpiece on top or with her real dyed hair. It was too bad that what she spoke about–held forth about–a bit too loudly was self-aggrandising and very thin of substance. In a word, dull did sum her up. Most of the others just discreetly have their food, chat with friends or look at their newspapers, and just be. No one bugs them, and they can just enjoy.
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I sat next to one of those people at a dinner somewhere — I think Garry was speaking or moderating. What I really learned was the quality of your makeup has a lot to do with the quality of your brushes. I know that doesn’t sound like a big deal, but it improved my makeup. I used to wear makeup. Hard to remember these days.
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Yeah, and airbrushing–the technology is very advanced. I am lucky if I remember sunscreen these days–makeup only would make me look worse.
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I think most older women don’t look great in most makeup. Especially the heavy makeup older women often wear to disguise their age. I think it makes us look older. And you have to wear it differently. We used to wear makeup to make our eyes look deeper in the sockets. But we already HAVE sunken eyes. Now when i bother — and it’s usually because I know someone is going to be taking my pictures, so i feel obliged to at least make an effort — I need to make my eyes look less sunken. I have makeup I haven’t opened in more than a year and the next time I open it, I’m sure I’ll discover it’s all dried up.
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Mine is old too. I was stage amanger on half a dozen musical shows in the past five years or so, so sometimes i kept the unopened ones around in case others needed them, but I just haven’t done a show in maybe two-three years. Sometimes if I sing onstage I do throw on mascara, simply for the eye definition, but then again my face gets really red, so I ought to use some kind of foundation, but then it has to be blue and other shades to neutralise the red and not powdery to make worse lines, and blahblah details, so I simply don’t bother. OH well.
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I used to have a makeup company that specialized in makeup for women of a certain age and they were great. Nothing glittery, everything was soft and the colors went well with the way our skin stops being pink and gets more yellow with age. Then, SHE got old and went out of business, leaving me with whatever I have left — if any of it still can be used. The next time I’ll need or want makeup in is late April when we are supposed to go to a big reunion of Garry’s colleagues — the group he refers to as “the media geezers.” A few of them are still working, but most are retired and more than a few are ill so there’s a big push on to get everyone to show up. Who knows if and when there will be another. Garry won’t be able to hear anything in that kind of setup, so I am his translator and he is not really happy about it. If they weren’t pressuring him so hard to come, he wouldn’t go — and if I don’t go, he won’t go either.
Makeup. A nice dress. It’s my last best hope. But — what will I do about shoes? I can’t wear heels, not even for a few minutes. Oh, what fun this will be!
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So you really do know your way around makeup–that’s a good skill, especially being able to help others with it. I think they make attractive shoes that are flats these days, since there really is a demand for them. I often wear Naot shoes, no heels at all, or my old motorcycle boots, which has the built-in heel of an inch or two, but those get tiring if I wear them too long. I hope you find great comfortable stylish shoes for yourself. It’s wonderful to go to reunions, but when there is pressure, it helps to look good and feel comfy!
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Donna, you cudda gone on as a stage manager and come back as a star!!
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Most of the larger than life “legends” I’ve met seem at ease with themselves off stage and off screen. You develop a sense of whether they are real or “faking” real.
Two examples — Name Dropping 101
— Mother Theresa — bullies her way through a huge throng of well wishers and media. Confronts a very bewildered Garry and face to face, challenges Garry to “…report good news, positive stories that will be uplifting to people…don’t just cover negative stories about violence that send the wrong message to impressionable young people”. Mother Theresa pulls Garry aside and tells him she knows how hard it is to be in the public eye and do the right thing. “It’s not about you”, Mother Theresa tells Garry. “It’s about using your position to do good work”. 30 or so years after that encounter, I still don’t know why I was singled out by Mother Theresa…but it was very REAL. Nothing phony about her.
— YUL BYRNNER — the 80’s , Byrnner is on what would be his final tour of “The King And I” in Boston’s theatrical district. His dressing room is dark. All the walls are colored black. All the furniture and rugs are black. Brynner makes am “entrance” and flicks on subdued lighting. He’s dressed in black –head to toe. He speaks in low, firm, cadenced tones. The camera is rolling and Byrnner looks at the camera and then at me as he speaks before I ask a question.
It’s like a scene from “The Magnificent Seven “. Byrnner is “Chris”. The entire interviews is edgy and very surreal.
As I walked out, I quietly told my cameraman, “The old man was right”.
I think I heard Brynner laughing as we left.
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Donna, there’s a celeb “switch”.
You are your normal self doing normal stuff. I recall Marilyn and me deeply immersed in argument at a restaurant. A fan approached us. In the blink of a second, my anger disappeared-replaced by my phony TV smile and a warm greeting to the fan.
As the fan walked away, I think Marilyn laughed at me. I laughed at myself.
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I went to the same school as Paul Anka’s sister, Merriam. She boarded right across from me.
Leslie
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Everyone has met someone famous, I think. I met a couple of writers who became sort of famous — and a few musicians — because they went to high school with me. I didn’t know them well, though. They were just other people in my school. And in college, too, now that I think about it. One of them has just been indicted for sexual assault and I have NO doubt he absolutely deserves it. What a jerk.
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Karma bites….HARD.
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Leslie, did Paul ever sing “Diana” to you. Guess it wouldn’t have made sense since you are not Diana.
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The thought of “paying” her kids to do their jobs was abhorrent to my mom, so we didn’t get allowance either. So I babysat for money. Plenty of families on Navy bases that needed babysitters. A dollar an hour was enough to feed my comic book and movie going habits. ^_^ I had no aspirations towards college when I was a kid so no college fund.
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I never got the babysitting jobs. I wasn’t assertive enough, so my friend down the block got most of them. Mostly, I had to babysit my younger sister and you do NOT get paid for babysitting your kid sister. I always wondered how come my brother never had to babysit for me. No one babysat for me and the was fine. I didn’t earn anything until I finally started to get summer jobs when I turned 15. Before that, I was too young to employ.
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I was sure you had met a few of the famous. They are really memories to cherish. Not so special people just because everyone knew them, but special because you actualy saw them.
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We even got to know a couple of them. Not intimately but enough to do more than say “hi.” It was fun. But that was because Garry had that kind of job. I just followed his lead 😀
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Pat, I’ve been sharing notes with a former colleague who’s a bona fide movie critic, semi retired and living in Southern California. My friend tells me his TV reviews were watched by “A list” movie stars who would engage him in conversation at restaurants. Nice and not so nice.
I’ve described myself as a “fan boy” cloaked in reporter clothing. I always tried to keep “fan boy” deeply hidden and be strictly professional as a reporter. My body of work shows I did an “okay” job.
But– but — there were times when I met the likes of John Wayne, Sophia Loren and Katherine Hepburn — among others — when it was difficult to be professional and keep “fan boy” quiet.
I guess the perk is in sharing stories about my encounters with these celebrities. At times, it feels like I am playing an old, broken record. But folks keep saying they enjoy the stories so I ‘ll keep spinning them…..
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Keep telling us about it, and I will definitely keep listening. Sophia Loren came to our little town of Solothurn where they were filming scenes for The Brass Target the story of General Patterns mysterious death. She was not here very long and most of her scenes were played by her double. The world of celebrities.
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AH, SOPHIA. SOPHIA, MIA.
(Pat: Sophia Mia KISSED me after we did an interview. Yes, I was in bliss.)
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being up in NH I’ve met quite a few politicians, shaking the hands of both W. and H. Clinton on several occasions. But I never tried to swipe one of Bill’s pens, as your regionally famous husband tried to do 😉
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You live in Pol Central. I’m surprised you never met Garry. He logged a lot of hours covering one pol or another.
Swiping pens is the fun part of being a working reporter. The rest is deadlines and people complaining they didn’t like your reporting. Accuracy has never been popular.
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It is possible I bumped into Garry at some point, but I really didn’t pay much attention to the news teams covering the events. Also, I really didn’t get very active until 2004 – I don’t want to be political on the blogs, but in 2004 I wanted to do my part to get rid of W. When did Garry stop covering the events?
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2001, a month after 9/11. Before that, he was everywhere.
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Ah, so I most likely missed him.
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tRENT, YOU MISSED ME.
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Watching “The Candidate” again the other night reminded me of all the unglamorous days on the campaign trail. My stomach died a thousand times from the “food” and drink.
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Trent, I am trying to turn my life around from my pen theft days.
I swear I am new man. Hey, can I just get a glimpse of your pen, Trent?
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lol. I guess if you have a reputation to maintain….
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TEMPTATION, TRENT.
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The concept of kids getting an allowance always amused me when I was a kid. I mean…. where was mine? Unless I did an odd job for someone (Granny was always good for a few bucks if I mowed her lawn), I never had any money when I was a kid. You helped out around the house to earn your keep, or you got sent to the orphanage… well, OK, maybe not that strict, but asking for an allowance was laughable when you grew up poor.
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My allowance was exactly enough money to pay for the bus to and from school — which was 3 miles away. So when I was too young to work, I walked home as often as I could and that gave me an extra 15 cents. Back then, no one got money from home. We just didn’t. We got what we needed to get to school and back, but that was it. Anything else had to come from birthday presents of one of the Aunts that always slipped you a five when you parents weren’t looking.
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Growing up as an only child on a farm, allowance wasn’t heard of, etc. Earned some money cleaning the eggs we took into local stores @ 3 cents a dozen, but didn’t get paid until is was clothes shopping time just before school started… wished I had had a n allowance so I could learn how to handle money!!!
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Oh, by the way, my name is Karin, the blog title refers to the sandy knoll that the main house on the farm stood on… My dad would sometimes call me Princess of Sandy Knob. I was the only child and grandchild in the family….. And my aunt (his sister) was my nemesis – was my teacher in 3rd and 4th grades, and lived in the little house that my grandparents moved on and fixed up when my parents got married… After 6th grade dad paid her to help in the house as both he and my mom were busy with farm work of once sort or another and mom tended the two large gardens.
For what it’s worth, my aunt would call my mother “super critic” when she was the one that could not say a good thing about my mother. My mom kept her mouth shut, and I sometimes wondered how she did it.
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Our parent’s generation seemed to be better at shutting up than we are and a WHOLE lot better than our grandchildren, who just don’t know that shutting up is ever an option. My mothers’ family were pretty nice to each other. Supportive. My grandparents died when I was too little to remember them — on both sides. No idea what the interaction might have been.
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My dad’s mother is the only one I remember. Lost her when I was in 4th grade… We shared the same smile… My dad’s father and my mom’s mother both died within 3 months of my 3rd birthday. Although we all were on the farm, I have little memory of them Also lost my badly wanted little sister about the time my grandfather died. She was only 2 1/2 pounds in 1950…. 8 hours after birth. My mother’s mother about the time of my 3 rd birthday, and her father back in about 1934.
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I think I was maybe three or four also, so I have a few very basic, non-speaking memories. I really wish I’d had them around for a little while, but that didn’t happen. They were all immigrants and I think they were older when they finally made it to this country. No old, but older and my mother wasn’t a kid when I was born, either.
I was lucky that my mother talked to me. At least I have her memories.
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My dad’s parents came from Sweden. My mother’s parents were first generation Norwegians whose parents came from Norway some in the 1840’s to the eastern edge of Wisconsin even before it was a state… Some long generations there.
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I think by the time my grandmother finally got here — my grandfather had been here for five or six years trying to earn enough to bring the rest of the family over. I think that was typical of how immigrant families managed to get here. The men came, worked, and sent money home and eventually — with a little luck — it all came together.
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Hi, Karin. It’s good to reread comments. I completely missed you telling us your real name the first time around.
Karin is a lovely name.
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Don’t remember an “allowance” but that was long, long ago. I did EARN money. Paper route and other stuff. Mom did give me change for the local movie house. Tickets were 11 cents for kids. A dollar would cover ticket, 2 hot dawgs, pop corn and a drink. ALL day entertainment.
Eggs: anywaywhich way for me. “sunnyside up” probably my favorite.
Celebs: My job gave me access to many celebs — old Hollywood stars, athletes, crooked pols, royalty, despots, gangsters, and a few “adult” movie actresses.
A wonderful life.
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