Category Archives: Entertainment

The House on the Rock

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Here’s a list of some of the things we saw at The House on the Rock on Saturday. It’s only a partial list, and most of the categories represent a large number of individual items: books, Tiffany-style lamps, dolls, Japanese dolls, Japanese lanterns, musical instruments, self-playing musical instruments, stained-glass windows, stained-glass panels, paperweights, stuffed birds, antique guns, dueling pistol sets, rifles, coin banks, model trains, suits of armor, swords, faux crowns, Fabergé-like eggs, 19th-century doctor, barber, and pharmacy equipment, scrimshaw, model ships, nautical equipment and ephemera, cash registers, model airplanes, bottles, mounted newspapers, brewery equipment, cheese vats, bells, doll houses, cannons, and circus miniatures.

The House on the Rock is also home to an enormous calliope; what’s asserted to be the largest carousel in the world (and it could well be); and a 200-foot-long model of a sea monster, about three stories high, poised in mid-fight with an enormous squid.

HouseontheRockObvThe self-playing musical instruments were many, some small and maybe from the golden age of such devices, the late 19th century (it’s always a maybe at The House when it comes to authenticity), and others were room-sized and created for The House. Most were operated by nicely designed gold-colored tokens that were available for four for a dollar. I kept one as a souvenir, and used a handful of others to play the automatic tunes.

All of these items are housed in a complex of buildings built on hill in rural Wisconsin. It’s a successful tourist trap, quasi-museum, psuedo-antique gallery with some possibly valuable items mixed in, a remarkable piece of outsider architecture, a monument to a highly energized eccentric collector named Alex Jordan Jr. who might have his own cable show were he living in our time, and most of all a mass agglomeration of stuff acquired according to the idiosyncratic lights of Mr. Jordan, dead now more than 25 years, but maintained as all of these things (and a viable business) by a successor he picked. I’ve never been any place like it before.

Actually, I have. Once or twice a year, I have a phantasmagoria dream, usually involving my passage through a street or a cityscape or a tunnel among a constantly shifting complex succession of images and things. Usually these are good dreams, but sometimes there’s an edge of anxiety, such as the time I passed through the phantasmagoria trying to remember where I’d parked my car (I woke relieved to realize my car was in my driveway). The House was no dream, but as you walk through, it’s for sure a complex succession of images and things.

Back on August 4, 2007, when we visited Taliesin, which is a few miles away, we talked about a return trip to The House on the Rock someday. That day turned out to be May 30, 2015. Yuriko, Yuika, Ann and I set out by car for Madison on the afternoon of the day before. We spent the night in a motel there, and the next morning drove the 50 or so miles to Spring Green, Wis., and then the few more miles to The House.

On the 29th, we arrived in Madison in time for dinner. I picked La Taguara on Washington Ave., a Venezuelan restaurant I discovered via online search. I’ve been to many kinds of restaurants, but this was a first for me, and everyone else. I can report that it satisfied our need for a good dinner, as well as my periodic urge for food novelty. I had the Pabellon a caballo, which the menu called the Venezuelan “national dish”: black beans, white cheese, shredded beef, rice, deep-fried sweet plantain pieces, and an arepa — flatbread made of ground maize dough — along with a fried egg. We had fried yucca for an appetizer, and I had passion fruit juice to drink.

Since it was still light after dinner, we made our way to downtown Madison by car, and eventually on foot to Monona Terrace, a meeting and convention facility that happens to have a rooftop terrace with a fine view of Lake Monona. The last time I was there, ice covered part of the lake. A late May view is a lot more pleasant. The opposite direction from the lake included an equally fine view of the capitol catching the day’s dying light.

After leaving The House on the Rock in mid-afternoon on the 30th, I drove a slightly out-of-the-way route back home, by way of Mount Horeb, New Glarus, Monroe, and Beloit (everyone else was napping). I did a driveby look at New Glarus, a town founded by Swiss settlers, and which includes the Swiss Historical Village, an open-air museum and something else in Wisconsin to see someday.

But on this trip, everything besides The House on the Rock was just a bonus. That was the focus of the 27-hour, 400-mile trip. It didn’t disappoint.

The Flight of Excalibur IX, 1975

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Pictured: Bill and his little brother Dick on the grounds of Woodridge Elementary School in San Antonio on May 22, 1975. I hung out with Bill mostly during our junior high years, which were about to come to an end when I took this picture. For a few months, I helped Bill launch his model rockets, such as the one he’s setting up here: an Excalibur brand rocket.5.22.75ExcaliburIX-1Next, he’s doing final preparations on the launching pad, which was made of wood planks nailed together, fitted with a guide wire for the rocket, sticking up like a spindle. We called it Excalibur IX because this was the ninth time we’d launched this particular rocket.ExcaliburIX-2

That was a lot of launches for a rocket like this, because there was always the risk of never seeing it again. One time I remember the wind catching one of the rockets after its parachute deployed and taking it far into the neighborhood around the school; we jumped on our bicycles to chase it, and found it at the edge of a street somewhere. Another time we set out to look for a rocket we never found. And yet another time, the parachute failed and the rocket came crashing to the ground, wrecking it.

Off it goes. I don’t remember if this was a successful flight. I kept detailed notes on all the flights, but I don’t have them handy — I think they’re on some closet shelf somewhere at my mother’s house even now. In this case, I decided to take pictures too.

ExcaliburIX-3I do remember that the last of these flights — an attempt, because the engine fizzled on the pad — was on July 4, 1975. For whatever reason, I didn’t participate in rocket launches with Bill after that.

Chicago Amble

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On Sunday — which on a holiday weekend, feels like a Saturday — we went to the city and spent some peripatetic hours showing around our niece Yuika (and first cousin of our children). She’d never been to Chicago before. We took a water taxi from near Union Station to the dock under the Wrigley Building, headed north on Michigan Ave., east through River North, eating there, then south again along State St. and eventually to Millennium Park.

It was absolutely nowhere new for me, except for a shop on Michigan Ave. that wasn’t there until recently, and a newly remodeled interior of a hotel we ducked into, to use the lobby bathrooms. Yet I enjoyed the walk. Part of it was walking with someone who’d never seen any of these streets or any of the changes over the years; someone for whom Chicago was previously just the name of a large city. Besides, the city was very much alive with residents, tourists and service workers, despite it being a Sunday.

I’m glad to report that the statue of Nathan Hale, which stands in front of one of the Tribune Tower entrances, decided to participate in whatever consciousness-raising a red rubber nose is supposed to promote.

Nathan Hale, May 24, 2015
I had only the vaguest notion of it. Anti-poverty, I think. It would be so very easy to look it up, but I’m going to pursue willful ignorance in this case, since it smells of something invented to show off celebrities as much as to further a worthy cause.

In the northern section of the Tribune Tower is the brightly colored Dylan’s Candy Bar, which apparently opened earlier this year.

Dylan's Candy Bar

It’s the latest of 10 locations nationwide, with others in New York, Los Angeles, a couple of airports and some other places where the retail formula Make Something Simple Elaborate works well. There’s a certain genius to that approach, after all, as the foundation (for example) of the Starbuck’s empire.

Further north on Michigan Ave. was Gold Gurl. Gold Gurl May 24, 2015

Gold Gurl is not, I suspect, one of several exactly like her, but the only one, though across the street another character standing on a platform moved to the beat periodically, as Gold Gurl did after standing perfectly still for a while. I had Ann drop a 50-cent piece in Gold Gurl’s collection bucket. Busking needs to be supported in this city.

Thursday Squibs

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Sometimes at the bank I get a roll of dollar coins, which totals 25 all together. These days, most of them are presidential dollars, though some Sacagaweas and Susies are usually mixed in. Since the presidents after Garfield have relatively low mintage — Garfield had a total of 74.2 million from both mints, while Arthur had only about 10 million — it’s rare to see one of the later presidents. This week, a TR coin turned up (one of 9.2 million minted) in a roll. In worn condition. Odd.

“What’s syncopation?” Lilly asked recently. Being in band, I thought she’d know that. Maybe not. I learned about it in high school, but when she asked I realized I’d forgotten how to describe it. Just what YouTube is for: this is a lucid explanation, and he even makes Philip Glass a little more interesting.

In line at a grocery store the other day, a man behind me was carrying on a vigorous conversation on his phone. Nothing unusual about that anymore, unlike the day in 1989 when I saw a woman pull a brick of a phone from her purse at the McDonald’s that used to be on the Mag Mile and start talking into it. Overhearing one side of a call these days might even be annoying, depending on the conversation.

I couldn’t pin down his language. It didn’t quite sound like Russian, but it was some kind of Slavic tongue. Maybe Ukrainian. Anyway, he had a good voice, so I listened. There wasn’t much else to do in line anyway. Then I started to notice: talktalktalktalk OK talktalktalk OK talktalktalktalktalktalktalk OK talktalktalktalktalktalk OK.

I know OK is practically universal. (Or do the French resist?) That wasn’t a surprise. Still, I marveled that a bit of 1830s American slang, whose origin even now isn’t quite certain, has traveled so far. So naturally did he use the word, it might as well have been native from his point of view.

New fact for the day (a couple of weeks ago for me, when I learned it): Neil Diamond wrote “Red, Red Wine.” A strange notion at first, but then again he’s written other songs with an alcohol motif. Then I learned that that’s his actual birth name: Neil Diamond, son of Akeeba and Rose Diamond of Brooklyn. It always sounded like a stage name to me.

In Branson in 2012 I met a fellow whose act was a Neil Diamond impersonation (tribute, as they say). He had the enormous mane and the good looks of young Neil Diamond, but I didn’t get to hear whether he had similarly impressive pipes. I’d hope so.

The last episode of Mad Men is on Sunday. A lot of shows now have last episodes, so it isn’t quite like the novelty of watching the end of The Fugitive (which I don’t remember) or even, come to think of it, The Mary Tyler Moore Show (which I do). Here’s an interesting essay about final shows, though maybe covering something that doesn’t really deserve an essay, namely the last episode of Hogan’s Heroes.

Still, I’ll be watching Mad Men. If only to see whether Roger Sterling gets one more funny line or scene.

Thursday Misc.

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More spring on the way: a baseball game in the field visible from our back yard; budding bushes; woodpeckers; almost warm days, though I hear that next week won’t be so warm. Such is the seesaw of spring.

Ad leaflets are appearing at my door, promising yard service. One recent one was a large Post-It-like notice, stuck to my door, offering to keep my lawn to bourgeois standards for only $25 a week. That wasn’t quite the wording, but never mind. I suspect unkempt lawns are going to be the fashion in a few decades anyway. Either because a new-found appreciation for the aesthetics of long grass, or maybe because in a hotter and drier climate, long grass will be harder to grow, and therefore more prized.

I found out today that the Colorado House Speaker is named Dickey Lee Hullinghort. Say what you want about Colorado pols, they’ve got some interesting names, including Gov. John Hickenlooper as well. (The President of the state Senate is a more prosaic Bill Cadman, though).

Recently I did a short squib about a drive-in movie theater that managed to raise the money necessary to re-fit with digital projection equipment, and so will be able to stay open (that’s a blow for Americana, or something). Then I thought, we should go to a drive-in. The family’s never been to one. There’s a functioning drive-in in the suburb of West Chicago, which isn’t the one I wrote about, and which already has digital projection.

Trouble is, I don’t want to see Home, which is one of the features, and I really don’t want to see Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2, which is the other. Previews for that movie have been showing up on YouTube recently, and as far as I can tell, its formula is Kevin James Falling Down = Funny. I’ll go along with that, except substitute “≠” in that formula. (Also, what kind of name is Blart? Did they pick it because it rhymes with “fart”?) Maybe something better will come along.

Philip Glass 1985

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Thirty years ago this evening, I went with some friends to see Philip Glass conduct some of his music in Nashville. At least I think that’s what he did. I have an image in my head of him standing in front of musicians, waving his hands, and them playing. But maybe he sat down at a keyboard. It’s a been a long time.

Glass85I can’t remember why I went, but I’m sure it was worth $2. At some point, I owned Glassworks on CD, which is considered his most popular recording, but I don’t remember when I got it. Since I didn’t own a CD player until ca. 1988, I didn’t have it when I saw the concert. One of my housemates during my senior year in college might have had it on vinyl, or possibly even reel-to-reel. A lot of odd things were floating around that house.

Also, I saw Koyaanisqatsi sometime in the mid-80s. That might have been before this concert. Or after. Things get jumbled over the decades.

Oddly enough, I heard a little of a Philip Glass interview last week on the radio. He must be making the rounds to talk up his memoirs, which have just come out. The NYT reviewer of the book asserts that “enough time has passed for him to sell his own distinct musical language, developed through a blending of Western and Indian traditions, in which repeated musical cells form patterns to hypnotic effect. To many listeners it remains perplexing and even infuriating, but the influence of Mr. Glass’s music, called Minimalist despite his protests, is pervasive in all genres of music.”

Sure. If you say so. I like the idea of his music better than the music itself, though I haven’t spent much time with the likes of “Satyagraha” or “Einstein on the Beach” in the last 30 years. Philip Glass composes the kind of music that you start playing, listen to for a few minutes, and then realize 30 minutes later that it’s been in the background for nearly 30 minutes.

I didn’t fall asleep during the concert — like I dozed off at a Pat Metheny concert once — but I vaguely remember being tired. After the concert, it being a Friday night, we repaired to a nearby Italian restaurant. Who then showed up for dinner, a few tables away? Philip Glass and a small entourage. We noticed his presence, but didn’t approach him. Just as well not to pester publicly known people in public — can’t say he was exactly famous in this case, but still.

The Blue Beetle

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After Saturday’s small comic con event (see yesterday), and completely by coincidence, I was listening to WDCB’s old-time show radio, Those Were the Days, and learned about the The Blue Beetle. The name made me laugh.

The theme of this particular Those Were the Days edition was successful radio and programs and their imitators. The Blue Beetle was paired with the The Green Hornet, which it clearly imitated.

Later, I looked up this oddball imitator. Apparently the character, especially as a comic book hero, was more successful than it had any right to be, and he’s still kicking around. One of these days, maybe he’ll get the big-screen CGI treatment. Not that I would pay money to see it, or even watch it for free. But I like the idea. Lesser-known characters (e.g., Captain Canuck) should get their 15 minutes.

Along the same comic-book hero lines, this is a good use of YouTube: The Complete 14 Batman Window Cameos.

Comic Book Characters at the Library

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On Saturday, Ann asked to go to our local library’s Comic Con, an event held in its main lobby and various rooms, so I took her. I’d never thought of it before, but it seems that “comic con” is generic. I’m a little surprised that it isn’t anyone’s trademark, such as the organizers of big event in San Diego, but I guess it’s too late for that.

I took a look at some of the displays. One fellow had a nice collection of 1950s and ’60s comics, professionally graded according to a number system, which speaks to the fetish for mint-condition collectibles. I also took a few pictures. Such as this display.

TardisAnd of costumed characters wandering around, posing for pictures. I didn’t recognize some of them, but the storm troopers were easy to pick out.

Schaumburg Township Libary March 21, 2015The right line for that fellow would have been, “Aren’t you a little short to be a storm trooper?”

Schaumburg Township Library, March 21, 2015Ann and her friend, with a storm trooper. I don’t know who the ones in red and orange are supposed to be. The girls enjoyed the event, spending about two hours there. After about 10 minutes, I couldn’t muster any further interest in the goings-on, but we were in a library, so I found much else to do, looking at various books and reading.

The Yeomen of the Guard

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The Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Co. drew a solid crowd for the matinee of The Yeomen of the Guard on Sunday afternoon. Not a full house, but a decent turnout, including a small busload of seniors from somewhere or other. But unlike at some events, I wasn’t one of the younger members of the crowd. There was a good mix of ages.

Yeomen of the Guard 2015Mandel Hall was the venue. A handsome place on the University of Chicago campus — I’d like to see it in this light — and almost as old as Yeomen, since it was originally designed in 1903 by Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge. Not the Savoy, but what is?

Though done at a college, the show wasn’t collegiate. The highly accomplished company goes back to 1960, and, according to the program notes, “has a policy of alternating the signature operas with the obscure, taking into consideration anniversary years and programming by other local companies.” This was its seventh production of Yeomen, with HMS Pinafore, The Mikado, and The Gondoliers also done that many times over the years. (At the other end of the spectrum, Utopia, Limited and The Grand Duke have been done once each in 55 years.)

Good fun, as G&S should be, but also not quite as much levity as you’d expect in a romantic romp of switched identities, instant attractions, and lines like this: “These allusions to my professional duties are in doubtful taste. I didn’t become a head-jailer because I like head-jailing. I didn’t become an assistant-tormentor because I like assistant-tormenting. We can’t all be sorcerers, you know.”

Spoken by Wilfred, the head jailer and assistant tormentor of the Tower, portrayed by Brad Jungwirth, a bald slab of a baritone, whose voice and character I enjoyed the most. The rest of the cast turned in fine performances as well, in as much as I’m qualified to judge, as did the University of Chicago Chamber Orchestra.

Maybe there should be more romantic comedies in which love doesn’t quite conquer all, as in Yeomen. After all, it ends with three couples paired up, two of which involve less-than-enthusiastic participants, and one of which leaves a sympathetic character (the merryman Jack Point) as the odd man out, much to his anguish. Then again, I guess a movie that ended that way wouldn’t test very well among focus groups.

Spock Makes a Funny

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By chance today I saw about ten minutes of “The Naked Time,” the Star Trek episode in which a pathogen of some kind invades the Enterprise and lowers inhibitions among the crew. At one point, famously, a shirtless Sulu brandishes a sword at various extras, and then shows up on the bridge to point it at the captain. The fiction of Dumas is clearly Sulu’s inspiration.

SULU: Richelieu, at last.

KIRK: Sulu, put that — [discovers that the point is sharp] — put that thing away.

SULU: For honor, Queen, and France! [lunges]

UHURA: Sulu.

SULU: Ah.

UHURA: Sulu, give me that.

SULU: I’ll protect you, fair maiden.

UHURA: Sorry, neither.

SULU: Foul Richelieu! [Distracted by Uhura’s escape, Kirk is able to grab Sulu and Spock does a neck-pinch]

KIRK: I’d like you to teach me that sometime.

SPOCK: Take D’Artagnan here to Sickbay.

Take D’Artagnan here to Sickbay. Nimoy delivered the line as almost an aside, while a lot else was going on, so I thought for a moment: did he really say that? He did. That was worth a chuckle. I must have seen this episode a dozen times — more than 30 years ago, but still — and I don’t think I ever noticed that line. (Or Uhura’s pithy line; think about it.) I wouldn’t have known D’Artagnan in junior high, but later I did. Even so, I missed it.

So the writers gave Spock a joke, or at least a witticism. Not, “Take Mr. Sulu to Sickbay,” or “Take him to Sickbay,” which would be the unadorned, hyperrational thing to say. Nice touch. Nice delivery. RIP, Mr. Nimoy.