Saturday, November 16, 2013

10 useless things you don't know about me

A question swirling around Facebook is "what are 10 useless things people don't know about you?"  (There are not enough privacy issues with Facebook as it is.)  Anyway, I dutifully answered (since I do whatever Facebook tells me to do) and figured, what the hell, share the answers here as well even though there's nowhere to click "like."   So here dey is:


1. O.J. Simpsons was an uninvited guest at my wedding. -- He happened to be at the hotel, walked by during the ceremony, and just stood in the back, and watched.  A Facebook commenter asked, "Did he cut the cake?"
2. I once wanted to be a cartoonist -- Even drew a comic strip for our hometown paper while in high school.  Got $5 a month and was fired for budgetary reasons.
3. I don't like salmon -- I don't like any fish that swim upstream.
4. I was in a cyclone in the Tasman Sea -- See my travelogue.
5. Joanie Sommers is one of my favorite singers -- What can I say?  I'm in the Pepsi Generation.
6. I once stepped on Reggie Jackson's foot and put him on the DL -- The crybaby. 
7. I was thrown off the Dating Game -- see blog post or better yet, read THE ME GENERATION... BY ME. 
8. I've been doing improv for 30 years and still can't do a single accent -- including American.
9. I'm obsessed with Natalie Wood's death -- RJ knows more than he's telling us.
10. Six of my baseball play-by-play partners are in the Hall of Fame. I am not, nor ever will be -- The six are: Jon Miller, Chuck Thompson, Jerry Coleman, Dave Niehaus, Johnny Bench, and Vin Scully. 

15 comments :

Jay said...

Ken, I know you love HuffPo's lyrical headlines from time to time. Here's one on today's homepage that simply sang: "George Stephanopoulos' Wife Says Awesome Things When He Gets Home".

Ruth Harris said...

Profoundly useless. Thank you for an outstanding contribution. :-)

pumpkinhead said...

This is the second 10 things list I've seen in the last 10 minutes that included Reggie Jackson. The dude gets around.

ddatch54 said...

I think everyone knows about your obsession with everything Natalie Wood.

Corey said...

So, did we serve you and Deb Salmon when you were last here (a gazillion years ago)? And is that why we haven't seen you since????

Note: Chef Spencer always thought that was the case...

Melissa C. Banczak said...

I ignored my husband today and read your book. It was good fun and I encourage everyone else to check it out. And post a review. I was surprised at how few reviews you have. As you were writing, were you worried that someone would decide they were one of the characters and show up at your door one rainy night?

Johnny Walker said...

I've started following the UCB improv way of thinking, and one of their core tenements when doing a scene is to find the "game" in it. Which, to me, sounds like what a writer should be doing for every scene they write: Finding the purpose and the place for everyone in that scene, and then having fun around that.

I've explained it really badly, but I'm tired of typing on my phone. Does that sound right to you?

Johnny Walker said...

Also: tenements should be tenets.

LouOCNY said...

What in heck is the Reggie Jackson story?

Sounds as bad as the 'Wade Boggs injuring his foot putting on a cowboy boot' story.

Wendy M. Grossman said...

I'm sorry, Ken, but number 9 doesn't count. We *all* know you're obsessed by Natalie Wood's death.

You'll need to come up with a replacement.

wg

Wayne said...

Don't underestimate Robert Wagner. He cleverly uses his reverse mortgage money to distract Ken from investigating Natalie Wagner by funding Facebook and Blogger.

Anonymous said...

I hoped that there was "one boy" besides me who still loves Joanie Sommers. The Pepsi Generation is dwindling.

benson said...

Speaking of 60's commercial music, I wish I could find some of the "Heaven Scent" jingles from that era. Not many products had jingles that would've made good songs. Kind of like the Honey Bee's You need me song from Gilligan's Island. Shoulda been a hit.

I didn't know you worked with Johnny Bench.

I'm only on Chapter 10, but so far so good.

Greg Ehrbar said...

Joanie Sommers did her one and only cartoon voice on the Rankin/Bass cartoon special, "The Mouse on the Mayflower" in 1968.

Speaking of Gilligan's Honeybees that should have been a hit, how come no one has put Gilligan's version of "Hamlet" on Broadway with Nathan Lane in the Phil Silvers part?

By the way, buy Ken's book. I'm counting the days for its arrival from amazon. I paid $325 for an "acceptable" copy.

Unknown said...

9. and Christopher Walken?? What's HIS story?