Plugging Up A Site: DeeT's 70s Page

Ahh, THIS site.  DeeT's 70s Page.  Now this one is a true and unadulterated classic.

Now when I first got into the whole Internets thing in 1994 or so, I can remember that this is one of the first websites I visited.  Why?  Because this is all done by a guy who has a singular love of what he does...much like anyone else who has their own website.

The owner, operator and CEO of DeeT's 70s Page, one David B. Thomas, is a man who had the foresight as a 10 year-old to record a lot of passing fancies on TV and the radio with his ever-present tape recorder, preserve them and unearth them for all posterity, thus bringing to all humanity the hope and glory that was the 1970s.

You know: Boy-O-Boy-Ar-Dee, Patty Hearst, "A Fifth of Beethoven", all those TV ads for the Better Business Bureau, Orson Welles talking about Paul Masson wine, John Travolta's singing career - all of it is here, including an "ancient Chinese secret" or two.

There are audio clips, video clips, reminisces, radio ads, TV ads, all of them either from DeeT's personal archives or donated by various benefactors.  Being a child of the era myself, this stuff really took me back to a time when polyester, shiny dress shirts, bell bottoms, Sweathogs and Dandy Don Meredith were all in fashion.  He even has a page where you can download the software necessary to play the clips - now THAT is a thoughtful guy!

In fact, there is even this really fun test you can take to see just how much you remember about the Seventies and all of its pop culture enclosed within. TAKE THE TEST HERE and see how you do; funny, I hadn't thought about a Marathon Candy Bar in ages....

Speaking directly to my homies here; if there are any of you who remember anything about this decade, you probably should go over to DeeT's 70s Page right now.  This is one site which will not disappoint you.

...And to you, David Thomas - thank you so much for taking the time and effort to making a website that is fun, is entertaining, and brings back so many memories I thought were long gone forever. 

Dope out.

- TGWD

Univarn: A Blogger Missed Around Here...

It seems I have ticked off yet another blogger.

Yeah yeah, I know: so what else is new?  It's not like you leave many readers happy, Dope.  Hey, no news here.

Problem is that the blogger in question this time out, Univarn (pictured here) is one of those bloggers whom I used to read quite constantly over at A Life In Equinox.

But even since I insulted his sensibilities - and apparently those of the LAMMY voting constituents - with my post back in April, wherein I tried (and failed) to promote myself for a LAMMY, he let me know that thsi was the wrong way to go about it.

Well, duh.

Rest assured, I will not even try to run next year on the basis of my all-out failure this year, but that's neither here nor there.

For those who missed the fireworks, here is his response to my clomping about:

Univarn said...

Oh no.... you didn't. You went Full Self Promo. You never go Full Self Promo! At best you play Half Self Mocking Promo. Or Mini Self Promo. Shame... you had such potential.

And with that, he has completely shut himself off.

What do I mean?  He has not posted here since then, the last mention I got on HIS blog was back on April 4th, a good 19 days before my spouting off.  Before that, a mention at least once a month, constant talking-up.  Whole nine yards-plus.  See what happens when you lose your potential?

I guess I'm getting at the fact that I miss seeing his sigs on my posts every so often and at least dropping in with a commentary.  He's one of these erudite types who classes up the joint, natch, and when he isn't around to let you know you're on the point or that you stink, well, you miss that.

It's a given that he isn't reading my blog anymore, seeing as he hasn't commented on anything here or on A Life In Equinox in over three months.  But just in case he is:

Uni, I promise I will never self-promote myself again.  Sorry I insulted your intelligence with such dross and, in the process, squandered what potential I seemed to have had.  But hey, there's still time to catch the downward spiral if you want to be part of that!  I'll save you the aisle seat, leave the light on for you and save a Slim Jim for you to snap in to.  We cool, homes?

There.  I feel much better now.  We'll see what happens from there.

You may go on about your business now, bloggers.

Dope out.

- TGWD

Plugging Up A Site: T-Shirt Bordello

Kids, you who know me know that I do not talk up websites if they don't live up to the hype.

When I go to all the effort of telling you what a great place a certain website is and that you should visit it even if you have to type out the address with your nose, you should listen.

Really.  You should.

The site I'm about to tell you about now is a place that is altogether wonderful, outrageous and, in a word, fashionable.  Yes, consider this your style wake-up call, brothers and sisters.  This is a place you should visit now, in fact. Go on.  Go!

Oh wait!  I need to tell you about it first!  Jeez, sorry; got carried away.

Don Myers (whose middle name just happens to be "Of The Dead"...I like that middle name) contacted me a while back and gave me the heads-up on a site of his that, while up-and-coming, still needs to be made known to the public at large.  I wholly agree...as a matter of fact, I think this is a place that needs to be better known.  I'm completely serious here..look at me, do I look like I'm kidding here???

The name of the place is T-Shirt Bordello, a nice little place that originates out of Florida and is really starting to leap up and make waves.  Sure, there's other places like this online, but I think we've got a winner here.  Especially for the discriminating hunter and collector such as yourself.

T-Shirt Bordello is a site which specializes in t-shirts (duh), but not just any t-shirts.  These are shirts that you, as an individual, a regular reader of this site and someone who appreciates a good chuckle need.  Yes, thee are shirts which are funny - andnot funny in a Big Johnson shirt way.  We're being eclectic, here....

After all, we have a fine selection of preshrunk 100% cotton shirts (no blends here, kids - 100% COTTON!) which feature imagery from such well-respected standards as Star Trek, Doctor Who, Star Wars, Battlestar: Galactica, The Shining, Friday the 13th, Psycho and Ghostbusters.  Not to mention such well-respected individuals as Stephen King, George A. Romero, H.P. Lovecraft, David Hasselhoff, Bigfoot, John Stewart and Chuck Norris...well, of course you gotta have Chuck Norris in there, too.  That's a given.

Not just shirts, though...NO, not just shirts.  If this was a site that specialized in just shirts, then we'd need to go on to something else.  But T-Shirt Bordello also specializes in items such as coffee mugs, beanies, baseball caps, tavern glasses, ashtrays, keychain fob thingys and professionally-printed business cards from a reputable-looking place in Europe called Elite Hunting.  Very nice.

I'm sure Don and company won't mind, so here are a couple of pictures of their product (complete with direct links to the site so you can BUY THEM NOW).  Just look at this:

Are you kidding me; this is must-have stuff!

So go on over - right now - to T-Shirt Bordello, buy two or three t-shirts, pay promptly and thank me later. 

You're welcome.

Dope out.

- TGWD

Sad News About "Snark After Dark"...

Well, it looks as though my days of sponsoring a different blog are now over.

You see, those of you who are familiar with my posts wherein I extolled the virtues of some bright enterprising young men who were going to take on the responsibilities of blogging about their favorite late-night programming movies on their own blog (called Snark After Dark) found out just how difficult it is to keep up with the demands of maintaining a blog, keeping stuff up on it, getting people interested in it, making it take on a life of its own and, most importantly, keeping up enthusiasm for the project even after it has launched.

Oh, I told them of the pitfalls of blog management and maintenance and what has to be done (and sacrificed) in order to do a blog about what you love. Unfortunately, life being as it was for them, decided they had more important things to do than to be on the computer for all their free time and write.

I mean, can you IMAGINE??

Anyways, I spoke with them this weekend and let them know there were no hard feelings, let bygones be bygones and we just decided it best to let it go, erase the thing and move on. Of course, should they decide to do this again whenever, they will now have the knowledge on how to do it all by themselves. So hey, at least I gave them the experience they needed....

So farewell, Snark After Dark; your month or so of semi-life now ebbing away from us. Here is to what was, what might have been and, perhaps someday, to what may be.

Dope out.

- TGWD

CONGRATULATION! A Winner Is Me!

Well, look at what we got here!

You see this? Well, get a good look at it because this is the first DVD I've ever won in a contest!

I had to take a minute and rest here from doing the Snoopy Happy Dance all day to first explain: a while back I entered a contest over at Erick's Wonderful Wonderblog, a blog I've not only visited more than once but one that always fascinates me with its wealth of entertaining posts, subject matter, and the fact that I think he may very well be an even bigger movie fan than yours truly.

And that, kids, is saying something.

The reason for my jubilation, my winning the DVD you see to the left, is two-fold. One: because I'm not usually the kind of individual who goes around winning every contest he enters, which makes this prize all the more outstanding.

And two: it's a Val Lewton!

Don't you dare say "who?" at that name....

Oh, you already did. Heathen.

For those who know no better: Val Lewton was a legendary producer who began as a publicist for MGM Studios, worked his way up as a writer, literary property scout for and censor board liaison for David O Selznick. But his greatest work came when he was hired in the 1940s as a producer for RKO Pictures, where he was given three conditions on the films he would produce: they had to be cheap ($150,000 or less), they had to be short (75 minutes or less) and his bosses got to choose the titles for each.

Yet it was from these conditions that movie-lovers and fans of deep, psychologically complex drama and horror everywhere got such gifts as Cat People, Youth Runs Wild, The Leopard Man, Bedlam, The Ghost Ship, and others.

The DVD I received has two of Lewton's classic endeavors - I Walked With A Zombie and The Body Snatcher. These are two of the most important and most wonderful movies I remember seeing as a young lad and cowering behind my pillow on the couch in a dark living room while watching late on a Saturday night. And now I can relive those moments time and again....

My thanks go out to Erick again, for the chance to win, the chance to watch my favorite movies again and for the opportunity to give a shout-out to a fellow blogger-in-arms when it comes to cinematic tastes. Go visit the Wonderful Wonderblog right now and see what I mean about this guy. Now. Do it. Go.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go wait by my mailbox....

Dope out.

- TGWD

My Interview With The Newest Blogger Out There: Snark After Dark!

Okay, ladies and gents. I promised you I'd let you know when things were ready for that little endeavor I said I would be helping with a while back.

Well, this is it.

The big announcement of what the endeavor is.

It's a blog about late-night programing in the Eighties.

And the name of it is...

Snark After Dark.

Catchy title, huh?

Right now, they have their banner to share with you as well. Just click on the pic itself to see exactly what it looks like (and maybe it'll give you a hint as to what to expect on their blog.









In fact, I have an interview with the proprietor of said blog. His name (as we will know it) is the same as the site itself.

Kids, meet Snark After Dark.











(I'm not sure, but I don't think this is his actual face. I could be wrong, but who knows, right?)

I sat down with SaD (as he likes being called) and garnered a little information about what he is, who he is, how he got into this and what he plans on doing with his blog. Join us, won't we?

-----

(TheGreatWhiteDope) - Snark, thanks first off for letting me talk to you.


(SnarkAfterDark) - Thanks to you, and thanks especially for helping me out with this; I never would have known how to get everything set up for this without your help.

TGWD - Glad to help out a fellow blogger. Now let's start by asking a little bit about yourself.

SaD - Well, I grew up as a teenager with this huge satellite dish on the back of our porch. My dad sold 'em for a living and so always had the most updated dishes and receivers to bring home and try out. That's where I learned about the wonderful world of transponders and satelltes.

TGWD - I remember those growing up, too. My family had a huge one. And I remember the satellites, too. Galaxy 1 was the main one...

SaD - Right! And there was also Anik D1 with the Canadian programming, Satcom F1 R with a couple of feeds out of Denver and NBC network feeds as well, and then we get into Satcom 4 which had the Playboy Channel feed and Spacenet 1 with American Extasy - which later became American Exxxtasy.

TGWD - Ah, the good old days of satellite TV viewing,


SaD - Amen to that.


TGWD - You remember those days, apparently.


SaD - Vividly. In fact, I was surprised by how many people I've met whom I mention those satellites to and their channels who remember quite well watching their first pornographic movies therein. Or at least as pornographic as they could at the time.

TGWD - Between all the scrambled squiggles.


SaD - There was something going on in those squiggles and in-between all the edited cut-aways, even then we teens knew that. It was through diligence that we found out what was going on.

TGWD - And a well-placed descrambler.


SaD - God bless the descramblers.


TGWD - So what made you decide to blog about those good old days?


SaD - I came across some old tapes from back in the day of when my dad had copied some feeds from various satcoms and they had some great old stuff on 'em. A few of these were from Showtime after Dark, Skinemax, Playboy Channel, American Extasy AND some selections from their latter-day incarnation Tuxxedo Channel.

(EDIT - SaD has been clear in informing me that NO, as a matter of fact, his tapes are NOT for sale and he has no facilities for copying them. Sorry)

TGWD - So you sat down, watched them and...


SaD - And I remembered how much of my teen years were spent watching these flicks and TV shows and how much I enjoyed them.

TGWD - You mean, how much you...


SaD - Appreciated the female form.


TGWD - Good.


SaD - Okay. (laughs)


TGWD - So with this in mind, you decided this would be a good topic to blog on?


SaD - Yep; lots of good memories and happy times were spent back then, appreciating the female form and so on.

TGWD - Now, I'd be remiss if I said you were doing this by yourself.


SaD - No, no; I have three like-minded friends of mine I know as far back as my college days who also grew up the same way. Their memories are as happy as mine and I think that together we have a lot of stories to tell.


TGWD - Names, aliases...?


SaD - Blue Bloxx, he's agreed to handle the American Extasy / Tuxxedo Channel section; Late Night Lurker, who prefers the Playboy Channel; and UnderSeer, he'll take on Skinemax and Showtime Friday After Dark.

TGWD - So where does that leave you?


SaD - Oh, I have views and reviews to pop in with every so often; I'll be there to fill in some blanks in each section. Besides which,m we'll all take on the movies and TV specials in each others' respective sections.

TGWD - A group effort.


SaD - Absolutely.


TGWD - Sounds like you got everything figured out on this, Snark.


SaD - We do; I just hope we can live up to the expectations everyone's going to have for us.


TGWD - So when can we expect the debut for Snark After Dark?


SaD - After the first of the year, definitely. we'll hit the ground running.


TGWD - You heard it here first, folks. First of the year!


SaD - Mark my word on that!


TGWD - Snark, it's been great talking with you. Good luck with this.


SaD - Thanks a lot.


-----

Well, there you have it - an exclusive!

Watch for Snark After Dark sometime soon after January 1, 2011! Good luck to SaD and the other fellas over there!

Dope out.

- TGWD