Orange Crate Art

Monday, May 31, 2021

Some of the old songs, Sam

That Applebee’s commercials rely on the theme songs from Cheers and Welcome Back, Kotter to encourage a return to in-person eating tells you something about the chain’s target audience. Cheers signed off twenty-eight years ago; Welcome Back, Kotter, forty-two years ago.

[Let the record show: Elaine and I have been to an Applebee’s just once. We did not laugh; we were not needed; and no one knew our names.]

Paving-stones

Back at Madame Beck’s school after a concert.

Charlotte Brontë, Villette (1853).

This passage seems to presage one in Marcel Proust’s Finding Time Again (1927). As Proust’s narrator enters the Guermantes’ Paris courtyard, its uneven paving stones bring back the past: “And almost at once I realized that it was Venice,” and the narrator experiences the sensation he felt “on the two uneven flagstones in the baptistery of St. Mark’s.” There’s nothing like an exact resemblance here: Lucy Snowe is back at the scene of a crucial moment in her life; remembering it, she notices a detail she noticed then. For Proust’s narrator, one discrete moment brings back another without conscious effort. Still, paving-stones.

A colorful detail about one of the hired men in the male brothel in this volume of Proust’s novel: he was involved in the murder of a concierge at La Villette. La Villette is a Paris park.

Related reading
All OCA Charlotte Brontë posts (Pinboard)

[Translation by Ian Patterson (London: Penguin, 2003).]

Memorial Day

[“Gloucester, Massachusetts. Memorial Day, 1943. A Legionnaire sounding taps for the War dead during services.” Photograph by Gordon Parks. From the Library of Congress. Click for a much larger view.]

Sunday, May 30, 2021

“The radiant present”

Off to a concert. Lucy Snowe begins to see more of the city of Villette, capital of the fictional French-speaking kingdom of Labassecour.

Charlotte Brontë, Villette (1853).

Related reading
All OCA Charlotte Brontë posts (Pinboard)

Saturday, May 29, 2021

Lois Ehlert (1934–2021)

Lois Ehlert, artist and author of countless books for children, has died at the age of eighty-six. Publishers Weekly has a lengthy obituary and appreciation.

If Lois Ehlert’s name doesn’t ring a bell, think Chicka Chicka Boom Boom.

Today’s Newsday Saturday

Today’s Newsday Saturday crossword is credited to “Stock and Vasquez.” I think this must be their first Newsday Saturday. Matthew Stock has a site where he publishes crosswords: Happy Little Puzzles. Quiara Vasquez has a site too: QVXWordz. I’ve seen their names together on an Atlantic Sunday crossword.

Today’s puzzle is tough but fair, as students sometimes say of teachers. And verging, I’d say, on Saturday Stumper difficulty, as students probably never say when describing teachers.

Some clue-and-answer pairs I especially liked (with a minor hint for 44-D):

10-D, six letters, “Matthau’s Odd Couple costar on Broadway.” No, not him. Another guy, and I’m ashamed to say it was news to me.

13-D, five letters, “Piece of one’s mind.” Clever, and a good reminder of what it, the piece, is meant to be.

15-A, nine letters, “They’re tinny and tasty.” My mind went first to ALTOIDS. Too short, or small.

20-A, four letters, “Squat.” Clever.

24-A, twelve letters, “Field full of seeds in the spring.” Even I got this one easily, which might be one reason I liked it.

37-A, three letters, “Open-and-shut case grp.” The clue redeems the answer.

39-D, seven letters, “The ____ did it (solution to ‘Murder at the Winery’).” Groan.

44-D, five letters, “Legislate or recreate.” Heteronym alert!

48-A, four letters, “Sticks together to keep youngsters safe.” Youngsters — that’s sweet.

56-A, nine letters, “Renegade and Renaissance, for the Obamas.” I swear that my first thought was GOLDFISH. Did Malia and Sasha have pet fish way back when? I came back to reality soon enough.

One answer that still baffles me a bit: 55-D, three letters, “Fusion-reaction energy source.” When I typed in the final letter, I thought it had to be wrong. It seems odd to pair this answer with a clue involving science. But I may be missing something.

No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.

From the television

“For many of us, Memorial Day marks the official start of summer.”

I think they mean unofficial.

But as Elaine said, official is the new unofficial.