October 28, 2018
Halloween is usually this blog’s favorite time of year. But this season things are a little light on the Mr. Blog spooks and scares. But don’t worry, there’s a perfectly good reason for that. A perfectly good spooooky and scary reason! (Read that in your best Count Floyd voice.) Nevertheless, I’ve got a few things to say about Halloween 2018.
The Monster Mash
Now matter how old I get, I will still love this song. It takes me back, way back (way way back it seems on some days) to when I was a kid. Not that Mr. Blog is old. In fact, I feel as good as a man almost twice my age. (No, that’s not a typo. That’s exactly what I mean. Oy vey.)
I honestly feel that it is not Halloween until I hear Monster Mash on the radio. Really, I feel unfulfilled and without the Halloween spirit if I don’t hear it. That’s true. But it’s getting harder and harder to hear it on the radio since it’s hard to find stations that play songs like that. Last year I did not hear it until Halloween day and I was getting tense, believe you me. And I have a strict rule. I have to hear it on the radio, at random, whenever the station decides to play it. I cannot listen to the CD, I can’t find it on Pandora or search for it on YouTube. I have to independently stumble across it. Think it’s hard being me? You should ask my wife what it’s like being married to me.
This year I first heard it last week. BINGO! And then every single day since then, sometimes two or three times a day. And frankly I’m running the risk of getting burnt out on it. But I have a confession to make. Although I have to stumble on Monster Mash at random, I stacked the deck by playing the Halloween station on iHeart Radio. So on the one hand yes, I heard it at whatever random time they played it, but no, I knew they would eventually play it. Did I cheat? I don’t know. It isn’t like when I reshuffle the cards in the middle of solitaire and yes, I do that too.
There were so many good images for the Monster Mash that I made this Monster Mash Mash-Up
The Addams Family
When it comes to the great Addams Family vs. The Munsters feud, I am firmly in the Addams Family camp. (I also side with Kirk vs. Picard and Cocoa Pebbles over Count Chokula.)
The Munsters is fun, no doubt about it. I like it. But The Addams Family cracks me up. I watched an episode this morning and I literally laughed out loud like a loon. Luckily no one was home. It was the episode where lurch was learning to dance for the big Butler’s Ball and he threw his back out. Gomez wanted to help him align his back but Lurch was nervous. Here’s the dialogue that cracked me up.
GOMEZ: Don’t worry Lurch. These hands have healed more people than Albert Schweitzer!
MORTICIA: It’s true. The medical community was agog over his cure for Granmama’s bad back.
GOMEZ: Agog? Aghast!
It may not be lol here, but if you saw John Astin deliver that last line you would have stained your shorts too. (Not that I did that. It’s just an expression.) And that is what makes The Addams Family better. While they both have similar broad humor, the writing is simply better and funnier than The Munsters. But it takes a good actor to deliver a good line and John Astin is amazing. Just look at him. Look at the expression on his face and especially the look in his eyes. When you see Gomez, you think “John Astin is insane.” There’s a subtle yet manic lunacy in his performance. It is very similar to what he did with the role of Buddy, Harry Anderson’s father on Night Court, except he was less manic and more laid back. But the lunacy was in his eyes. He really is a great actor and if you go back to his small scene as Glad Hand in West Side Story he shines in that too, even if he is only on screen for mere seconds.
And yeah, I side with Carolyn Jones over Yvonne DeCarlo too,
The eyes have it!
HAPPY HALLOWEEN FROM THE EDITORS AND STAFF OF MR. BLOG’S TEPID RIDE!
.
Mr. Blog's Tepid Ride 
Your Comments