» On 9/10/2023 04:06:00 PM Mountain Standard Time, Alan wrote:
Edd Hall/Tom Snyder/Jay Leno. 

Edd Hall, who acted as Jay Leno's announcer for many years, was one of my colleagues on the NBC NY Page staff. We all knew we were in the presence of greatness when Edd did his fire-eating act, plus a flawless impression of Tom Snyder on The Tomorrow Show in 1980.

In fact, our Page class was bursting with talent, as you can see from this performance by The Front Pages (Pamela Senatore, Mark Traub, Ramon Plaza, Mindy Green, Lesley Gallo, Mark Lyons, Alan Goldfarb, Candy Korman and Rose Riggins) on that same Tomorrow show. Several other Pages also performed individual acts. Later, Norm Gunzenhauser, Peter Johansen and Mark Lyons collected many Emmy awards and nominations, while Robert "Bob" Beuth acted in dozens of films, TV shows and commercial campaigns. Other Pages held top-level positions at NBC, CBS, HBO, ESPN, Showtime, etc. A few of us (Candy Korman, Linda Marr and myself) even wrote books.

Labels: acbpage, emmy

 
» On 9/09/2023 07:00:00 AM Mountain Standard Time, Alan wrote:
It's Eclipse Season Again! 

Annular Eclipse on 14 October 2023:
Closest to Phoenix: Albuquerque, New Mexico (6 hr 20 min, 419 miles)
https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Phoenix,+AZ/Albuquerque,+NM
89.73% coverage of Sun, duration of annularity: 4 minutes, 48 seconds
https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/map/2023-october-14?n=394
(Partial solar eclipse visible in Phoenix - 79.24% coverage of Sun.)

Total Eclipse on 8 April 2024:
Closest to Phoenix: Kerrville, Texas (13 hr 6 min, 919 miles)
https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Phoenix,+AZ/Kerrville,+TX
100% coverage of Sun, duration of totality: 4 minutes, 25 seconds
https://www.timeanddate.com/eclipse/map/2024-april-8?n=%4011788322
(Partial solar eclipse visible in Phoenix - 64.07% coverage of Sun.)

The Atlantic, 8/8/2017: «Ever since it was first published in 1982, readers—including this one—have thrilled to "Total Eclipse," Annie Dillard's masterpiece of literary nonfiction, which describes her personal experience of a solar eclipse in Washington State. It first appeared in Dillard's landmark collection, Teaching a Stone to Talk, and was recently republished in The Abundance, a new anthology of her work.»

NB: We are lucky to be alive in this era of total eclipses. Every year, the Moon gets 3.8 centimeters further away from Earth. Which means there will come a time when the Moon will never completely eclipse the Sun. It will simply appear too small in the sky. And that will happen in about 650 million years... so don't hold your breath. 😉

Updates: eclipse zone animation (SpaceWeather), how to watch (CNN), eclipse cycles (Wikipedia).

Below: annular eclipse of 2012May20 @ 6:38pm, as the 83% maximum arrives in Mesa, AZ. Tree leaves act as "pinhole cameras," diffracting the sunlight while casting crescent shadows on a side wall and back fence post of our home, highlighting the shape of the Sun and Moon.


Updates below: annular eclipse of 14 Oct 2023 @ 9:32am, as the 79.24% maximum arrives in Mesa, AZ.

 
» On 9/08/2023 09:25:00 PM Mountain Standard Time, Alan wrote:
Facebook Spam Settings. 

FYI, for Facebook Group Admins: Facebook's software is automatically canceling some postings as "spam," simply for including links. The system is incorrectly assuming the links are "credit card numbers." If this is happening in your Group, go to Manage, Group settings, Potential spam, uncheck two boxes, and Save.

(This will not cause problems in most Groups - the spam settings were designed for Groups with hundreds of postings per day.)

 
» On 9/01/2023 12:05:00 AM Mountain Standard Time, Alan wrote:
Egosurfing. 

Just discovered a site featuring 10 wallpapers with 2 different quotations by yours truly.

Hmm. Still trying to decide whether to be flattered or outraged. 😉

QuoteFancy.com/alan-c-baird-quotes     (Includes: "My highest aspiration in life is to serve as the Limerick Laureate of Nantucket.")



UPDATE: I recently sent these three to the Nantucket Limerick Challenge:

There once was a jerk from Nantucket
Who piled Krugerrands in a bucket
His bitcoin he frittered
By purchasing Twitter
And shot it to X in a rocket     [ref]

There was a young gal from Nantucket
Whose weird "twisties" caused her to muck it
So she took some time off
Though her critics did scoff
And her landing, now she has stuck it     [ref]

There once was a thug from Nantucket
Though some say his visa, he snuck it
Windows, he averted
But planes get diverted
The Kremlin, they claim, you can't buck it     [ref]