Stevenson 13, Albright 6

The Mustangs improved to 4-0 for the first time ever by winning a second straight defensive slugfest on the road.  This time, they held off Albright despite amassing only 39 passing yards.  An all-offense, no-defense outfit during their first two seasons, the Mustangs now appear to be hurtling towards the other extreme.  They haven't scored more than 20 points in a game since the opener and continue to shuttle quarterbacks in and out (they've used three thus far).  But the D continues to play remarkably well, having surrendered no more than 14 points in the first four games.

Now comes the real test -- a road game at Lycoming, ranked #25 nationally in Division 3.  I'm pleased to note that the Lycoming Web site calls the matchup of unbeatens "the first big benchmark game" for the Warriors in 2014.  It's rather nice to have ascended to "benchmark" status.  Now, let's see if the Mustangs can take that next step.

Stevenson 40, N.C. Wesleyan 19

A good beginning for the 2014 Mustangs last night, as they posted an impressive road win over the Battling Bishops and racked up almost 600 yards of offense.  SU has only four home games this season and plays four of its first five games on the road, so it will be imperative to get off to a decent start.  The first home game is September 20 against Lebanon Valley.


Oh, and I CERTAINLY mustn't neglect to mention...

To say 31-0 was unexpected is an understatement.  The Irish could be interesting (in a good way) this year.

For the First Time in 19 Years...

... Notre Dame is ranked #1 going into its final regular-season game at Southern Cal.  Get by that fairly sizable roadblock and the Irish will play in the BCS title game.

The last time ND was at the top of the heap, in November 1993, was during what one might call "the Fall of my discontent."  I had washed out of Randolph-Macon College's math department the previous Spring and was trying to make ends meet while holding down two part-time teaching positions.  I was going through a serious crisis of self-doubt without a very strong support system and was very much uncertain as to what the future held.  ND's success on the football field was a welcome distraction.  It culminated with an epic 31-24 upset win over #1 Florida State that pushed the (relatively) lightly regarded Irish into the catbird seat.

I had already experienced a fan's high of sorts earlier in the Fall, as the surprising Phillies stunned the heavily favored Atlanta Braves in the NLCS and went on to face the defending World Series champion Toronto Blue Jays in the Fall Classic. You may remember this as a team of lovable slobs and oddballs, with the likes of John Kruk, Lenny Dykstra, and Mitch "Wild Thing" Williams playing major roles.  No one gave the Phils a tobacco plug of a chance against the lordly Jays, but they overcame a painful 15-14 Game Four loss and staved off elimination with a Game Five victory that took the series back to Toronto.  There, manager Jim Fregosi's stubborn insistence on using an obviously shot Williams as his closer backfired in the worst possible way, with Joe Carter hitting his famous ninth-inning home run to win Game Six and the series.

As hard as the Phillies' loss was for me to take, I had to admit that the Blue Jays were the better team.  Notre Dame didn't appear to have that problem as it played its last regular-season game against Top-20 Boston College.  But, suffering the (non-blessed) mother of all letdowns, ND was completely outplayed and fell behind 38-17 before a desperation comeback...

... and, while I was able to get off the deck and secure a full-time job at Virginia State a few months after this, it's taken the ND football program almost two decades to recover.  Hopefully, a loss to USC this Saturday won't morph into another 20-year sojourn in the wilderness.

The Latest in Pigskin

In Stevenson's second football season, the Mustangs duplicated the 2-8 record of their inaugural campaign, posting wins over Misericordia (itself a first-year program) and FDU-Florham (in the season's final home game).  That second home win in SU history, in all honesty, was something of a dud spirit-wise.  It had to be rescheduled several times and was finally turned into a Saturday night game, but the band, for some reason, failed to make an appearance, and the night grew cold enough that Nicky and I decided to leave at halftime.  We followed the rest of the action online.

The record may not look like much, but the Mustangs were considerably more competitive this season.  The defense was better, and the team put up gallant fights against superior opponents on several occasions.  Aside from the near miss against Lebanon Valley, the Mustangs showed their best form against Wilkes in the homecoming game.  The "jernt" was packed to the rafters and SU responded by staying ahead of or tied with Wilkes until literally the last few seconds of the game, losing 38-35 on a gun-beating field goal.  Now the team just has to learn how to close the deal.

Needless to say, I've been delighted by how well Notre Dame has done this year.  No, make that stunned.  Despite a spotty offense and occasional recourse to strange-looking gear (see picture above), the Irish continue to grind out wins and now stand just two victories away from a 12-0 record and a possible berth in the BCS Championship Game.  At the moment, the latter is contingent upon either Kansas State or Oregon dropping a game, which has some folks (including a few without any particular pro- or anti-ND axe to grind) upset.  If the Irish wind up #3 and on the outside looking in at the title game, however, I won't be too upset.  They have massively overachieved in 2012.

As for the Eagles?  Leaning on a broken Reid at the moment.  The regime is finished and it's time to clean house.

Delaware Valley 34, Stevenson 10

Stevenson's football team is 0-3 at this point of the season... but not all losses are created equal.  The Mustangs lost their first home game 26-16 to Shenandoah, a team that they lost to by almost 40 points in their inaugural game last year.  I don't have any footage or pics from that game because it was delayed for quite some time due to a lightning storm and Nicky and I decided to leave before the game finally got under way.  Last week, SU lost 29-22 in OT at Albright after the opposing kicker booted a long field goal to tie the game at the gun.  That game, too, had issues with lightning delays.

Weather wasn't a problem yesterday afternoon as the Mustangs squared off against Delaware Valley.  Competitiveness, however, was.  SU lost 34-10 and was frankly fortunate to keep the score that close.  Losing to DVC, which started the season in the Division III Top 25, was probably to be expected, but the Mustangs actually seemed beaten before the game had even begun.  I haven't seen such unimaginative play-calling since Gerry Faust was doing his "Pinkett, Pinkett, Pass, and Punt" routine at Notre Dame in the mid-80s.  SU didn't even try to move the ball right before halftime when they still had three timeouts.  I have to admit, I booed.  It was that "Philadelphia-fandom upbringing" coming out, I suppose.

The SU Marching Band is now officially the "Marching One Hundred" and has been outfitted with actual uniforms for the new season.  The "manner of presentation" has been slicked up, as well, as you can see below.

As impressive as "The Band, Mark 2" sounds, Nicky and I both agreed that the sense of fun we experienced during the inaugural season somehow seemed to be missing.  There's something to be said for a semi-spontaneous "scramble-band" approach, especially at the Division III level.

Back next week -- weather permitting -- as the Mustangs host Lebanon Valley.

A Special "Friend of N&V" Post! (Book Review: THE TECHNOLOGISTS by Matthew Pearl (Random House, 2012))

As I learned most memorably following my review of kaboom! DUCKTALES #3, a fair number of people follow this blog. I really appreciate the continuing interest and thank all those my visitors for their "virtual patronage." Even so, a recent email commenting on some of my comics posts came as a huge surprise. The correspondent was Matthew Pearl, a NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author, recognized authority on the works of Dante and Edgar Allan Poe, and, as I learned, a big Duck fan. He offered to send me his latest novel, THE TECHNOLOGISTS, and I accepted with glee. I've just finished reading the work -- as you might guess from the nature of many of my book reviews, it's the first novel I've read in a fair amount of time -- and what better way to recommend it than to say that it is a novel that many Duck fans would probably love. No, not because the characters go in search of a long-lost treasure, or even (as would probably be more apropos given Pearl's interests) the literary wares hidden in an ancient library. It is Pearl's careful attention to meaningful detail, plus his deft mixing of real-life historical personages with well-crafted fictional creations, that should raise a smile from anyone raised on the works of Barks, Rosa, and company.

Pearl has carved out quite a niche for himself as a writer of "historically-based mystery thrillers." His first big success cast such literary lions as Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and James Russell Lowell in the roles of detectives using their knowledge of Dante to investigate murders based on scenes from THE INFERNO. (I believe that the phrase "Write what you know" applies here.) Later works centered around the strange death of Edgar Allan Poe and Charles Dickens' last novel. As can be gleaned from the title, THE TECHNOLOGISTS is a slightly different breed of cat.

In 1868 Boston, the struggling Massachusetts Institute of Technology is about to graduate its first senior class. MIT's novel approach to education and its piebald student body -- which includes working-class "charity scholars," black-sheep offspring of scandalized Brahmin families, and even a brilliant freshman woman -- have put it in very bad odor with a number of institutions and groups in the city, including the haughty denizens of Harvard (then a rather retrograde institution more interested in classical and spiritual education than in applied science) and local labor agitators worried about lost jobs (some things never change, I suppose). When a series of bizarre "scientific disasters" strike the city, MIT's already-shaky image takes an even harder hit. Feeling a sense of obligation to MIT and to its ailing President William Barton Rogers, a group of MIT students decide to investigate the phenomena themselves -- and to try to stop the "experimenter" before he strikes again, or the dream of this new Mecca of technological education is dashed for good...

THE TECHNOLOGISTS does take a while to pick up steam (hyuck!), so much so, in fact, that I was occasionally reminded of another real-life, Boston-based cataclysm. But if you stick with the narrative and allow the characters and the richly filigreed detail of the narrative to grow on you, then the urge to read on will quickly become irresistible. A number of major and minor characters, including the idealistic President Rogers, Ellen Swallow (the aforementioned pioneering female, who really was restricted to her lab and not permitted to attend classes with the male students) and a number of other MIT students, imperious MIT professor and future Harvard president Charles Eliot, and cantankerous, anti-Darwinian Harvard zoologist Louis Agassiz, are drawn directly from life. Pearl does takes some understandable liberties with character portrayals for the sake of the narrative. For example, Agassiz, as the representative of the "old-fashioned science" hired by the police to conduct the "official" investigation, is presented as something of an archaic, ineffectual figure, the better to use as a foil for the MIT "Technologists." Agassiz may have gotten evolution wrong, but I don't think that he was quite the bumbling fusspot depicted here. But, of course, Teddy Roosevelt wasn't wholly the semi-comedic blusterer of Don Rosa's LIFE AND TIMES OF SCROOGE McDUCK, either. (See what I did there? I told you Duck fans might appreciate this.) No matter who the character is, Pearl pays attention to diction and tone; everyone sounds as if they belong in 1868. This is no small matter.

"Steampunk" is a rather nebulously defined term, but I certainly think that parts of Pearl's tale would qualify as such. Diving suits, submarines, and steam-powered robots are among the wonders glimpsed here, and the "experimenter"'s nefarious deeds involve enough 19th-century verisimilitude to seem legitimately achievable. The would-be climactic attack is as close as a 19th-century city would probably get to "mass destruction." The identity of the "experimenter" is expertly concealed by a series of ingenious red herrings.

The one feature of the book that I honestly didn't much like was the "rivalry" between the main hero -- MIT senior, "charity scholar," and former Civil War POW Marcus Mansfield -- and the pompous Will Blaikie, head of Harvard's notorious secret society, Med Fac, and denigrator of all things Tech. Some of the "confrontation scenes" involving the pair and their friends and allies, to be honest, had something of a Dover Boys flavor to them. (Or perhaps 19th-century college life really did have a cartoonish aspect. I wasn't there. Heck, I didn't even attend a university that had fraternities.)

If you are up for a "thinking person's thriller," then THE TECHNOLOGISTS may be for you. Thanks again to Matthew for giving me the opportunity to read it.

Gentlemen (and Ladies), Start Your Brackets!

In lieu of typing out my picks for the NCAA Tournament, as I did last year, I'm simply displaying my entry in the ESPN Bracket Challenge. Click on the image for a better view. The slenderest limb onto which I crawled this year was picking Harvard to get to the Elite Eight; I think that Syracuse's loss of its best big man to academic ineligibility gives the Crimson a good puncher's chance of getting past the Orange. Notre Dame is probably good for one win, no more, but that's still a lot better than the sub-NIT fate that seemed to be in store for the Irish after their terrible start.

THE BEST (AND REST) OF KIMBA, Episode 35: "The Pretenders"

Refer to last week's entry to get caught up to speed on the first chunk of this wildly uneven two-episode tale.

Link to episode on Hulu

After we learn of Kimba's near-fatal accident at the end of the extended flashback, everyone seems to remain in a bit of a daze for a while. Kimba's lair is suddenly perched on the edge of a precipice, presumably to lend the long, slow tracking sequence even more drama and pathos than one would expect it to have under the circumstances. For purposes of security and safety, I can think of a whole lot of reasons not to have Kimba's home in such a place.

In all honesty, despite his shaky opening response to the faithful Kitty, Kimba doesn't seem all that badly injured. We see a bandage on his leg, a few dirt streaks, and that's about it. For sure, it won't take him very long to snap back to full strength. In their brief (and utterly pointless) dialogue following the lair scene, Bucky, Dan'l, and Pauley actually come across as far more somnolent and mind-croggled than our wounded jungle prince. C'mon, Gil, "I'm afraid he's plotting some kind of revenge" shouldn't sound so, well, wistful.

Kimba's "He must really have changed... but completely!" is a fascinating line to me. Out of nowhere, Billie Lou Watt suddenly tosses off a bit of slang that was 20 years out of date at the time this was recorded. It's like a character in a WWII-era movie suddenly breaking into a chorus of "Vo-do-de-oh-do," or a "contemporary urban dancer" abruptly adopting trash-bag pants and an open vest. (Magic shoes optional.) Then, when you factor in the odds that a lion in the middle of Africa, even one with an ultra-rare gift of speech, would come up with such a phrase independently... But if you think this was anachronistic, well, just wait until the curtain goes up on Tom and Tab.

OK, I'd almost be willing to accept T&T magically producing hats and canes out of nowhere, since they are arguably the most consistently "Toony" characters on the show. In their effort to convince the jungle youngsters that "the bad guys have all the fun," it would have been perfectly fine for T&T to have play-acted in exaggerated fashion, perhaps mutating themselves into "international objects" along the way. But I defy even the staunchest proponents of the "anything goes in Toontown" theme to explain how the hyenas managed to stage THESE "antihero animal antics" in the manner depicted.

The Wild West and Kimba do NOT mix! 'Nuff said.

Well, this sequence actually did work for me, at least a bit. I like the character design on Captain Kidd's cat a great deal; this character might even have worked as a legitimate "furry" somewhere else.  Perhaps he could have done a walk-on on some series like Cats & Company.  But, still, we are supposed to believe that the boys were somehow able to stage a SEA battle on a stage in the middle of the jungle... and how did T&T learn of all these characters, anyway? Did they visit the Jungle Library where Roger Ranger got his reference materials?

All of a sudden, I'm nostalgic for the Al Vermin era of Bonkers.

One unfortunate side effect of this entirely-too-long side trip to Toontown is that we never actually get to see how Cassius, T&T, and Claw managed to lure all of Kimba's subjects into being captured. Distracting the children, I can see the logic of that, but where were all the adults while this was going on? And how did Claw et Cie. instantly manage to construct a massive rocky barricade, complete with sturdy wooden gate, around the amusement park? After this cascade of improbabilities, I can almost understand Kimba's seemingly foolish decision to try and smash the gate down himself. In such a seemingly random "universe," why couldn't Kimba pull off such a feat? Perhaps if he hadn't been so *ahem* "badly hurt," he might have done it.

In his dialogue with the wrathful-turned-tearful Kimba, Claw drops the pretense that he wants to "rule" the jungle in a manner even remotely close to Kimba's. Earlier, Dan'l reported overhearing Claw say that, with the other animals imprisoned, he "[wouldn't] have to hunt for his food." Now, every animal for roughly 75 miles around must have heard Claw threaten to "destroy" the others unless Kimba abdicates. Strangely, however, Claw will soon be trying to arm-twist Kitty into becoming the "queen" of a presumably functioning kingdom. So what would Claw and Kitty be ruling, exactly? Maybe he needed to consult with Big-O on that matter before proclaiming his enmity to the assembled masses.

Kimba's breakdown and sad, silent retreat are the first truly powerful scenes in what has, up to now, been a crazy quilt of an ep. In "Running Wild," just three episodes down the line, Kimba will suffer an out-of-nowhere emotional collapse that is so over-the-top and improbable, it's actually half-comical. Here, Kimba isn't bawling, he's legitimately weeping for what he clearly believes is the death of his dream. Also, there's a real sense of finality to Kimba's gradual, self-sacrificial disappearance into the wilderness. Not until "Destroyers from the Desert" will Kimba appear to be so thoroughly vanquished.

So, we're now officially in "action drama" mode, right? Wrong. We still have to endure one final gag-stuffed sequence in which Claw piddles away virtually all of the dignity that he had managed to earn through his fearsome performances during "Jungle Fun" and the park-gate scene. If anything, Kitty doesn't slap him down hard enough for making such an ass of himself.

And I thought tigers... I mean, Tiggers... didn't live in Africa.

If you have good eyesight, then you may have seen The Black 4 snatch Kitty and haul her under the gate and inside the park. Like their sudden appearance at the end of "Jungle Fun," what they were doing there wasn't explained. Now, following up on Cassius' whistle, we should have gotten our formal introduction, or a reasonable facsimile, to the conniving quartet. The lyrics (translated below the Youtube of the deleted scene) don't explain why the B4 are specifically working for Claw, much less what they expect to get out of the deal, but they do clearly establishes the leopards' freelance brand of villainy.

Living in the dark, we are the Black Four. Come to us and tell us what you want. We specialize in... Doin' dirty business in style! The infamous shadow of evil. Yes, we are the Black Four. Excuse us, but we have to go. We're off to do another job... We'll get it done... Piece of cake!

Or not. The B4 give a much better account of themselves in battle during "The Day the Sun Went Out," and one reason may be that they are working for themselves in that situation. Amazing how self-interest focuses the mind and toughens the sinews... just as the threat of being eaten galvanizes Kimba's subjects into putting up a much stiffer fight against Claw and his minions here than they did in "Gypsy's Purple Potion." Kitty leads the charge, flashing her most ferocious fighting skills of the series. Next in line for awards are, if you can believe it, Dot, Dash, and Dinky, who alternate stomping on Tom and Tab with treating the hapless hyenas as literal punching bags -- a little less impressive than the brave attack at the start of "Jungle Fun," perhaps, but impressive nonetheless. I only wish that more animals had been given a chance to visibly pitch in, as opposed to fighting in the "FCC-friendly dustcloud of doom" (thanks, Greg).




Characters seem to be able to "teleport" to where they need to be with shocking ease in this ep. How did the B4 track down Kimba so fast? How did Dan'l manage to find Kimba equally fast? Above all, how did Kimba locate that "weak spot in the wall" so effortlessly, after spending several minutes beating his brains out in a frontal assault? The fight between Kimba and Claw is the most vicious one of the series -- check out the bit in which Claw grabs Kimba in his maw and worries him like a Jack Russell terrier manhandling a chew toy -- but, even here, Kimba doesn't really maul Claw as much as out-wrestle him. The beaten Claw's tottering rise to his paws, however, underscores this as being the evil lion's "ultimate defeat." He would indeed appear again, but never again would he pose such a dire threat to the peace and safety of Kimba's jungle. We may also safely assume that the amusement center would endure for the duration, thereby cutting off Claw's source of food and, presumably, forcing him to ultimately "abandon the field" for purposes of survival.

Dan'l and Kimba provide a fitting end to a schizophrenic story by, respectively, spouting off a Revolutionary War-era non sequitur and channeling "Fair Catch Corby" for no apparent reason. Surely, the most "epic" story of the series -- in structure, if not in content -- deserved a better wrap-up than this rather lame coda. Or, perhaps the very pointlessness of the ending makes a point. All that Kimba wanted to do with his amusement park project, after all, was to allow the animals to enjoy a little harmless and, yes, pointless fun while engaged in the arduous task of building a civilization. Not every vestige of "human civilization" worth imitating has to possess gravitas, after all.


Up next: Episode 36, "Monster of Petrified Valley."

Still In Between Home Machines...

... and, between the time for delivery of the new all-in-one and the time that will be required to set everything up, I probably won't be able to post anything truly substantial until this coming weekend at the earliest. I WILL, however, provide some newsy notes:

(1) The first Stevenson home football game on Saturday night was an amazing experience. It would have been first-rate theater regardless of the outcome, but SU actually WON the game, a double-overtime thriller that ranks right up there with the ND-Michigan Harry Oliver game of 1980 as the best game I've ever seen in person.  Nicky and I took some extended movies which I'll be converting into YouTube format and posting as soon as I can.

(2) My brother-in-law Terry was involved in two car crashes within the space of one week. Neither was his fault, and he wasn't seriously injured, but both of the family cars were totaled. How much the combined insurance will pay for is still an open question, and the family needs two cars...

(3) DUCKTALES #4 is indeed slated for release this week, according to ComicList. So is the delayed reprint of THE BARKS BEAR BOOK from IDW. Those of you who have the original paperback, however, would be well served to hang onto it. Apparently, this tome will not reprint the full contents of the original, no doubt for copyright-related reasons. Still, half a loaf, and all that...

Shenandoah 49, Stevenson 21

Pretty much an expected result for your first-ever game -- especially one on the road, hundreds of miles from home, against a team with a highly regarded wide receiver. First play from scrimmage by Shenandoah: a long touchdown pass. Score at halftime: Shenandoah 42-7. Touchdowns for great WR: five. But, hey, Stevenson won the second half -- and they actually made fewer mistakes than Notre Dame did in that slopfest against South Florida! That's something, at least.

This coming week is "Stadiumpalooza," a week-long series of events culminating with the first home game against Christopher Newport next Saturday night. Nicky and I, season tickets in hand, will be there for an on-the-spot report.

Book* Review: HARRY THE K: THE REMARKABLE LIFE OF HARRY KALAS by Randy Miller (Running Press, 2010)

* Of the electronic persuasion, that is. This is the first book that I've purchased and read on my recently acquired Kindle. Nicky has had one for some time, but, occasional technophobe and full-time nickle-nurser that I am, it took some persuading on her part -- along with a fall in the device's price, of course -- before I was willing to take the plunge. By that time, there was an ulterior motive, as well. Some of you know that I've been working on a book -- a history of the NCAA Basketball Tournament -- since some time between the date of the Earth's cooling and the good Dr. Naismith's finalization of the rules. At least, it seems that long sometimes. In any event, after trying to place the book with several publishers but having no success, I've decided to go the e-route and publish it to Amazon in Kindle-ready format (in parts, to be sure -- it's MUCH too long to be published as a single e-entity). In order to do this the right way, I wanted to make sure that I understood Kindle formatting and other issues related to electronic publication. Getting one of the things seemed like a logical way to start.

Oh, the review... This is a warts-and-all biography of the much-loved Phillies' radio and TV broadcaster, presented with honesty but no sense whatsoever of score-settling. We learn of Kalas' generosity to fans, colleagues, and the wider community, but also learn the details of his drinking, his womanizing, and a nasty feud with fellow Phillie broadcaster Chris Wheeler. I had heard about the latter from afar, having moved away from the Philadelphia area by that time, but it appears to have been far more unpleasant than I'd suspected. Author Miller is a newspaper reporter, and it shows sometimes to a rather troubling degree; the start of each chapter reads very much like the start of a brand-new column, with characters being reintroduced to us on a constant basis. This made the narrative flow of the book rather awkward. There are a number of typos and factual errors, as well. Still, there is much to enjoy here, especially for a Phillies' fan.

I distinctly recall watching the TV broadcast of the opening of Veterans Stadium in 1971, which was also the first time that Harry appeared as a Phillies' broadcaster. I subsequently spent more than a little time during my teenage years in the audiovisual company of Harry, Richie "Whitey" Ashburn, Andy Musser, Wheeler, and, later, a just-learning-the-ropes Tim McCarver -- easily, the best baseball broadcast team that I ever heard. Harry's career, of course, was much more diverse than most, as he also did voiceovers for NFL Films, NFL game broadcasts, various national and local commercials, Philadelphia Big Five basketball, and even Notre Dame basketball and (replay) football broadcasts. After missing a chance to broadcast the 1980 World Series due to network restrictions, a much older, clearly-flagging Harry finally cashed in by getting to do the 2008 Fall Classic. He died the following Spring, in the broadcast booth before a game in Washington. He will always be missed.

Chicago et (non) Cetera

Two years after Hippiefest 2009, I, Nicky, and Nicky's uncle Jeff (this time, accompanied by Nicky's cousin Stephanie) finally followed up with another visit to Baltimore's Pier 6 for another nostalgia-flavored concert. Actually, Nicky and I did have one false start earlier in the Summer when we tried to attend a gig featuring Michael McDonald and Boz Scaggs. That was during the period of extremely hot weather, however -- if you live on the East Coast, then you probably remember which one -- and we couldn't stay past the end of McDonald's set. I can't say I enjoyed that experience. Seeing Chicago, however, more than made up for it. It was decaffeinated Chicago, to be sure, since lead vocalist Peter Cetera hasn't been with the band for some time, but everyone else was there, with considerably less hair and apparently mellower politics (they even displayed an American flag during the encore!) but still giving forth that distinctive and enjoyable horn-flavored sound.

Speaking of horns, that's where I have a connection to Chicago, of sorts. Supposedly, while the band was developing at DePaul University, they sought brass instruction from a young priest, Fr. George Wiskirchen. Fr. Wiskirchen later served as assistant band director at Notre Dame for three decades. When I attended ND, Fr. Wiskirchen directed me in the concert band and brass ensemble.

The band opened with "Make Me Smile" and pretty much played straight through for two hours or so, with occasional breaks for solo performances and the like. Breaking the official Pier 6 policy on videography, they invited the audience to take all the pictures and videos it wanted, since "it all winds up on Youtube in the end anyway." Matters were sufficiently relaxed that, as part of an ongoing benefit for Susan G. Komen for the cure, some schmo who had won an auction on the Chicago web site got to perform a dangerously realistic version of karaoke by signing the Cetera part in "If You Leave Me Now." He didn't do half badly, though his voice was about a half-octave lower than it needed to be, almost as if he were trying to "Elvis" the thing up.

Guest vocalists aside, there was far less "cheese" visible here than during Hippiefest, where several of the participants self-consciously treated their performances as something of a joke. The only tacky moment came when the band did "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree" to promote their upcoming Christmas album. That wouldn't have been so bad, except that a lighted Christmas tree was carted on stage and the boys goofed around with it a bit, including a run-around-the-pine-perimeter routine ("Rockin' Around," get it?) that got positively Little Black Sambo-esque before the end. The song sounded good, at least, so I don't think we're looking at a Yuletide disaster of Dylan-esque proportions here. What made this so irritating in retrospect was that the band later only performed part of my favorite Chicago song, "Feelin' Stronger Every Day" -- the fast part -- to end the performance. What's the point of doing the fast part without the slow part? It's like turning on the car and instantly accelerating to 55 mph. I would gladly have traded a couple of those scampers around the tree for a full version.

Are we ever going to see bands like Chicago again? I seriously doubt it. Music is simply another mass-produced item now; Nicky and I are constantly joking about how every young male or female singer sounds the same. As for rap and hip-hop, no comment. This "sunset glimpse," however, was great.

A New Corral Opened, An Old Tradition Renewed

Last week was extremely busy for me, which explains the nine-day gap between postings. The period was not "all nose-to-the-grindstone, all the time," however. Nicky and I managed to get away for a couple of notable sporting events. One you may have heard of. The other... not so much, but it's a big deal in this particular "neck" of the Baltimore County woods.

On Monday the 15th, Stevenson's new Owings Mills Gymnasium hosted men's and women's basketball for the first time. A record crowd of 1,000 packed the place to watch SU's men battle Keystone College, preceded by the women taking on Arcadia University. Neither team won, but the improved atmosphere created by the shifting of game action to SU's residential campus will definitely give both teams a boost. It's clear already, in fact, that the men's team is quite a bit better than last year's shambolic 2-23 outfit with its occasionally misplaced sense of direction. The Mustangs have just finished going 2-1 in the eight-team Pride of Maryland Division III Tournament, which SU hosted. The women are 0-3 but at least have been competitive in all of their games, lacking only the ability to "finish." It should be an interesting season.

On Saturday, at the end of a hellacious week of work, Nicky and I joined the Notre Dame Club of Maryland on a "there-and-immediately-back-again" trek to New York and the new Yankee Stadium. Target: the first Notre Dame-Army game to be played in the South Bronx since 1969.  The site of the legendary old ball yard is now a barren, walled-off construction area (which, I'm told, is to be converted into a park of some sort) directly across the street from the gleaming facade of the new digs. As for said new digs... well. Mighty, mighty impressive. We did take the "high life" route -- eating dinner at NYY Steak, where the small plates are shaped like baseball diamonds (cute) and the noise exuded by the bar-hugging crowd was more akin to that of a neighborhood corner hangout (not so cute, given the price we paid) -- and thus did not quite have the "typical" fan experience, but it's clear that even the hoi polloi (or what passes for such in such an outrageously expensive establishment) are treated royally at the new Yankee. The concession stands, for example, are positioned so that people waiting in line for hamburgers, hot dogs, Cuban sandwiches, chicken, pizza, etc. only need to turn their heads to continue following the action. The seats are comfortable and the restrooms plentiful and reasonably clean. And, of course, there are many, many places where one can buy stuff... which, for this event, included Notre Dame and Army gear, stashed in and among the rows of Derek Jeter, A-Rod, and Javier Vasquez (Vasquez? Is Vasquez still in the league?) replica shirts. The game was technically an ND home game, so there were more Irish chatchkas on hand than Army baubles, but that probably would have been the case even if the game had been played on the plains up at West Point. Nicky and I contented ourselves with a couple of shirts and some small Yankee-themed Christmas gifts.

Our seats were out in left field, which, in this case, translated to being at about the 20-yard line. The gridiron fit quite nicely into the playing surface without the need for any crazy ground rules such as the ones that had been hastily drawn up for the Illinois-Northwestern game at Wrigley Field earlier in the day. The atmosphere wasn't at all the canned, corporate sort I had half expected; the crowd was noisy and lively (the presence of the ND Marching Band -- a real rarity for a regular-season game far from the Midwest -- certainly helped), and ND "rode the wave" to an easy win that continued their late-season resurgence. The concept of "subway alumni" may be a bit anachronistic, but there is evidently still a large reserve of good will towards ND in the New York area. Well, either that, or all the well-heeled alumni on the East Coast pounced on tickets that they wouldn't otherwise have had a chance to get for an Irish "home date."

Comics reviews should recommence later this week.

A "Disney Princess by Proxy" Gets Aid & Comfort

This was a pretty rough weekend for a Notre Dame graduate and Philadelphia sports follower. I was able to put it in perspective, though. My niece Zoe broke her arm in a playground mishap, and said appendage is now in a cast. Her family is now living in the Orlando area, so she was able to seek aid and comfort from some friendly folks in the neighborhood...

Zoe's "boo-boo" casing was also signed by Minnie Mouse, Peter Pan, and others. No amount of "magic dust" can replace good, old-fashioned modern medical healing, however.

In other medical news, Nicky is about a week to 10 days away from finally being able to walk unaided. She will be joining me tomorrow at Susan Slattery's memorial service on the Stevenson campus. We've also been invited to a reception with the family at Gramercy Mansion, a bed and breakfast across the road from the college.

Harry O plus 30

This Saturday, Notre Dame hosts Michigan, 30 years less nine days after the most memorable ND game I ever attended during my four (mostly) glory-starved years in South Bend. I was unlucky enough to get Gerry Faust as coach for my sophomore, junior, and senior years, but the 1980 ND team was pretty darn good, despite being lightly regarded. It finished 9-1-1 in the regular season, losing only to USC, and lost to Georgia in the Sugar Bowl in a game that it just as easily could have won. The spark that lit the fuse for Dan Devine's final season as coach was the second game of the season, against the Wolverines. ND was coming off a big win over a good Purdue team, but Michigan, with a super wide receiver named Anthony Carter, was a much sterner test. The game was only broadcast locally, which was a real shame. We go into the last drive of the game with less than a minute to play and Michigan leading 27-26...



I was sitting up in the student section above the end zone that the Irish were driving away from. I saw at least one fan prepare for the historic boot by pulling out and quickly running through her rosary beads. The story goes that, just as Oliver kicked the ball, the wind that had been blowing from that end zone towards "our" end suddenly died. I can't vouch for that, but that ball seemed to hang in the air for about five minutes. We only knew that it had sneaked over the crossbar when we saw the people begin rushing the field. It took a good long while, but I eventually meandered on down on the turf myself. Keep in mind that this was only the second game I'd ever attended. I figured that similar heroics were BOUND to happen over the next four years. Nope, this one was pretty much it, at least in terms of home games. But, if I had to have only one great moment of ND football, this was a pretty good choice, one routinely listed as one of the Top 20 ND games of all time. The "God Bless Harry Oliver" signs lingered in the South Bend area for a long while. (Sadly, Oliver died just a few years ago.)

The Michigan radio announcer's call of the same climactic play is worth hearing, as well, if only because the "shock to the system" appears to have been so great that he temporarily forgot how to count!

Some "Flakes of Brain-druff" on a Snowy Day

Stevenson finally gave up the ghost about an hour ago and closed the school for the day. When was the last major March snowfall on the Eastern Seaboard? I'm thinking 1993, but I could be wrong. Anyway, here are a handful of notes and comments on the passing scene...

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Gemstone Publishing's Disney comics line appears to be, as Gregory Weagle might say, dead, done, and toe-tagged. The Gemstone web site has removed all references to current comics releases and subscriptions and now offers only back issues. Before you begin to blame the rotten economy, consider the following:

(1) Gemstone's marketing strategy left a lot to be desired from the get-go. If Steve Geppi had trouble (and he has had) spreading the word about Geppi's Entertainment Museum, that well-intentioned but cash-draining white elephant of a glorified "fanboy" project down at Camden Yards, then it's not surprising that the need to actively sell the comics was crippled from the same sort of "publish it and they will come" mentality.

(2) The cancellation of the "standard-format" ...AND FRIENDS comics some time ago made Gemstone products much more of a luxury item. UNCLE $CROOGE and WALT DISNEY'S COMICS AND STORIES were handsomely produced and judiciously edited, to be sure, but they were no one's idea of an entry-level product.

(3) Gemstone made a mistake by cancelling the ADVENTURES pocket-book line, which, with adequate promotion, might well have served as the aforementioned entry-level publication that the company so desperately needed.

(4) The four-year gap between the demise of "Gladstone II" and the debut of Gemstone unquestionably leached away at least some of the fan base that had begun to drift off after the "Disney Comics Implosion" of 1991 and was further alienated by Bruce Hamilton's meddling with the content of the "G-II" comics. Given that American Disney comics was working from a perilously narrow base of support to begin with, all of these "aftershocks" rendered the Gemstone line less likely to survive any period of ill fortune.

Who... if anyone... picks up the American Disney comics baton next? Or is a "last-second reprieve" in our future? Stay tuned.

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I recently encountered "Xibit A" illustrating the sham of the modern-day "anti-war" movement. Traveling north on I-83 out of Baltimore, one passes an art studio called "Xibitz". For several years, the roof of the building featured a large peace sign. The last time I drove by the place, the sign was gone. Sure, the elements may have knocked the thing down, but it seems suspicious that the sign disappeared right after Barack Obama took office. Last time I checked, we still had troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we still will until at least the middle of 2010, if Obama's announced timetable is accurate. Are ongoing wars only palatable if a Democrat is running the show? (The same sort of mindset is at work when homeless people suddenly disappear from the news once a Democrat gets elected.)

Understand, I don't resent real, live, religious-based pacifism of the Quaker/Mennonite/left-wing Catholic variety. My uncle and aunt are anti-war in the "Catholic Worker" tradition, but I recognize and respect the reasons for their views, even though I don't philosophically agree with them. But this sort of ideologically driven pacifism, which we first saw during the Vietnam era, is another matter. What if another 9/11 crops up while a Republican is in the White House, and we are forced to take military action? Are we fated to have to endure active internal opposition anytime this happens, even when military force is supremely justified?

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Tonight, Notre Dame takes on Villanova in a Big East game that will go a long way towards determining the Irish's NCAA Tournament fate. Stevenson's men's and women's teams have long since packed up the ball-bags after another wretched campaign. Nicky and I support SU's teams as best we can, but next year, we need to see SOME evidence that the athletic department takes hoops success seriously. Both current coaches have been on the job ever since the programs began, and, if my student evaluations looked anything like their lifetime won-loss records, I'd be checking out the career Web sites about now.

BTW, for those interested in the progress of my NCAA Tournament book, I'm planning to spend a large chunk of the Summer trying to get as close to finishing it as possible. By August, I should be ready to contact publishers.

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The overall Disney front is as dreary as the outside weather right about now, but here's a cheery note: two days hence will mark a special anniversary for Disney TV Animation fans. Check back for a special tribute.

Well, At Least The Stock of the Phillies and Irish is Up...

I'm trying bravely not to get too giddy about the Phillies' chances in the NLCS against the Dodgers. The Phillies' come-and-go offense is prone to lengthy collective funks, and that's not a recipe for postseason success. But one can always hope, can't one?

Notre Dame is 4-1 and heading into a stretch of road games, starting this weekend vs. North Carolina. The Irish are maturing quickly, and my hoped-for record of 8-4 and a decent bowl game both seem within reach. In November, Nicky, my Mom and I will be at M&T Bank Stadium to watch the Navy game.

No classes tomorrow due to Yom Kippur. I'll be back in a bit with a review of UNCLE SCROOGE #379.

Treading "HO"

A week without any posts, but my comics "inbox" is currently empty and I haven't yet started on my next reading "assignment": MEANWHILE..., R.C. Harvey's monstrous biography of Milton Caniff. I may get started on that one tomorrow, as a breakdown of the water supply has caused classes at the Greenspring campus of Stevenson to be cancelled until tomorrow evening.

On other fronts, I'm obviously delighted that Notre Dame has started 2-0 following last season's train wreck. Not even Charlie Weis' ugly ACL injury could stop the Irish from avenging a couple of recent beatdowns at the hands of Michigan. I'd still be plenty happy with 7-8 wins and a minor bowl game from this rebuilding team... The Phillies' sweep of the Milwaukee Brewers cost Milwaukee's manager his job and propelled the Phils into a good position in the wild-card race -- not to mention the division, which the Mets seem to be in the process of coughing up for the second straight year. The Phils have handled adversity well this season... success, not so much. They just need to take care of business on the road this week.

Nicky asked me to let you know that Rick Wright, keyboardist for Pink Floyd, passed away today at age 65 from cancer.