HAVE A HAPPY, MERRY and all that JAZZ

ONE OF MEL'S GREATEST MOMENTS

Mel Brooks performs the title song from "High Anxiety", every last saloon singer cliche intact.
It's a great tune all on its own, written by - I shouldn't have to tell you.

JUST BEAUTIFUL...
What is it about Asian kids, and ANY string instrument?

SAMMY!!!!

Granted, this has nothing to do with Christmas, but someone passed this along to me, and I just had to share.
The textbook definition of the term, "Entertainer"... Really miss him.

"THE PERSONAL HISTORY, EXPERIENCE AND OBSERVATIONS OF WHATABEEZER SCROOGE THE MISER, OF ANAHEIM, AZUZA AND CUC...AMONGA, WHICH HE NEVER MEANT TO BE PUBLISHED ON ANY ACCOUNT"


Once there was a miserly old screw named, Whatabeezer Scrooge.
He had received his name at birth, when during delivery and asked if it was a boy or girl, the doctor replied, "I'll let you know once this nose stops coming out!"
Whatabeezer ran an accounting business with his partner, Bob Marley, a reggae musician who'd gone into accounting when he developed an allergy to steel drums.

Well one fine day, Marley croaked, leaving Whatabeezer with no partner and a office full of blunts that would choke a horse - something that was not likely to happen again after the Hialeah incident.
But being the afore-mentioned miserly old screw, Whatabeezer didn't care. Now he had the business all to himself, and his first decision was to drop the health insurance on the firm's only employee, Bob Dangit.
Being a devoted Catholic, Dangit had a large family, and he was constantly tacking things like shoes, food and Play Station 3's onto his plan. His desk was littered with photos of his wife and children, giving Whatabeezer a full-time job drawing moustaches on all of them, except Mrs. Dangit who already had one.

So with great satisfaction, Whatabeezer announced to Dangit that not only was his health plan kaput, but to cover the cost of disposing a choked horse, he'd have to work Christmas Day!
Pissed as hell, but not enough to lose his job, Dangit meekly agreed, deciding he could blow off steam later by beating his wife before midnight mass.
His son Tiny Tim would just have to wait on that Playstation 3. Tim was never his favorite anyway, what with playing that ukelele while singing like a girl, and his refusal to get his hair cut.

"That's just the way the tootsie rolls!" Scrooge laughed, converting Mrs. Dangit's moustache into a handlebar affair with a grease pencil. "Bob Dangit!"

The resigned devastation on Dangit's face warmed the cockles of Whatabeezer's skinflint heart, and he went dancing home that evening in a time step that only warm cockles can induce - sort of a cross between a Charleston and a Fox Trot - that nearly got him arrested twice on Main Street before reaching his front door.

Once inside his dark, gloomy and generally depressing mansion, Whatabeezer sat himself before the fire with a dinner of cold ramen noodles, still chuckling over the events of the day.
Suddenly, as if a ghost, the spirit of Bob Marley appeared before him.

"Whatabeezer Scrooge!" the vision groaned, bathed in a whirling cloud of Jamaican Gold. "I am Marley's ghost!"
"Marley's goat?" the surprised Scrooge answered, cocking his good ear.
"Ghost!", the spirit moaned.
"Oh. Well, that's a damn shame, because goats I believe in, but not ghosts!"
"I've come to warn you of the doom you face in your afterlife!"
"What?" Scrooge replied, a hand to his ear. "Still can't hear you. Maybe if you went, bahhhhh!"
"As in humbug?"
Scrooge nodded appreciatively.
"Say, that's got a real ring to it, don't it?" he cackled. "But I still don't believe you're a goat or a ghost!"
The spirit rolled its dead eyes.
"Well, suppose I said I didn't believe you were, Whatabeezer Scrooge?" it asked.
"Whatever would give you that idea?" Scrooge blurted.
"Well, for one, you sound nothing like Jim Backus..."
Scrooge shifted testily in his chair.
"Like most goats, you make no sense!" he huffed. "Now state your business and begone, my noodles are getting sticky..."
"In order to see the error of your ways, tonight you will be visited by three gh- er, spirits!"Marley groaned.
"Three!?" Scrooge gasped.
"Yes!" the vision intoned. "A Democrat, a Republican and a Libertarian..."

Wide-eyed in horror, Whatabeezer slipped from the chair to his knees, the fallen bowl of noodles spelling out the obscene word for mayonnaise in cursive writing on the carpet.
"No, most gentle goat!" he pleaded. "Anything but that! Pray, I beseech thee!"
"Talking like a Quaker ain't gonna save your ass, this time!" Marley moaned. "Expect your first visitation when the clock strikes one!"
"One!?" Scrooge gasped. "But I don't stay up past nine!"
Marley's dead eyes rolled again.
"...make an effort, will ya?"
Then with a great swirl of rosin, the spirit vanished as if it had been a ghost.

Quaking on his knees, even though he knew it wasn't gonna save his ass, this time, Whatabeezer's eyes flashed to the digital clock on the VCR.
12:00, it blinked repeatedly.
"Only one hour!" he whispered in terror, and quickly stored his wallet in the wall safe, lest the first vistitation be the Democrat...

NEXT WEEK: CHAPTER TWO -

"I DON'T STAND A CHANCE WITH A GHOST LIKE YOU"

IT'S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE...

...AND THE SKITZO SAGA CONTINUES...

Your Daily Horrorscope

A MERRY THANKSGIVING TO ALL!

AND TO ALL A GOOD BITE!
















Here in the states we have a tradition celebrating the Pilgrim's arrival in the New World.

They had a great feast with some friendly Indians, who if they'd known what was coming would have eaten the Pilgrims on the spot with maize and mayonaisse on the side.

In fact, it is recorded that several tribal wise men did know what the future held, but nixed the idea of smoked Pilgrim on the grounds that the buckles would be indigestible.
They weren't called wise men for nothin'.

Anyway, the whole idea in present day Thanksgiving or as it's known in some circles, "Christmas' Warm-Up Act", is to give thanks for all the blessings we enjoy today - like an economy in the tank (and after the recent spike in gasoline prices, it doesn't take a wise man to figure out how that happened!), the ressurection of the Clinton Administration, jobless rates at an all time high and of course, Donny Osmond winning,"Dancing With The Stars".

Too many blessings to count.

Americans celebrate by gathering together with various relatives they don't like, gourging themselves with turkey and too much beer, screaming like loons at football games on tv and then going their separate ways, battling traffic, indigestion and tired children, all the while swearing they'll never go through this again.
Until next year - when they know only too well that tradition's tradition and they're stuck like toothpicks in a Vienna Sausage.

But that's Thanksgiving folks, and just like William Shatner never going away, we've learned to live with it.
For sure, there are some things better than Thanksgiving and some things worse - but there is nothing exactly like it.

Hope yours is a genuinely happy one, that you spend all your rent money clicking our sponsors products on this page and to all the countries outside this one, tell your bosses Derek said you could take the next four days off as well.
If they balk, for a nominal fee I'll be glad to write you all excuse notes.

As for us, we'll be back on Monday because, well...tradition is tradition, ain't it?
Like it or not, it's just too many blessings to count!

Seriously enjoy,
Ryan, Derek, Scott and Sometimes Celine

MR. HARDY
1949










By 1949, save the ill-received, yet noble effort of ATOLL K, in 1950, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy's screen careers were over.

While Stan was never to appear in another film without his partner, Babe wasn't above showing up once in a while on his own, notably in Capra's RIDING HIGH of 1951, and here with golfing bud, JOHN WAYNE in THE FIGHTING KENTUCKIAN.
In the film, Hardy plays Wayne's sidekick, Willie Paine and as you'll see, much of what he was asked to do is old, familiar territory. However, it did give Babe the opportunity to sport his acting skills as well, an all too rare treat for his fans.

Below, a little sampling of both we hope you'll enjoy.
Babe was Babe, right to the very end.