Author: DOuG pRATt

“You-do-it” No Mo’

For ten years, my commute took me along Route 128, no longer dubbed “America’s Technology Highway.” On my way home, if I wasn’t stopping at Sight & Sound, the LaserDisc store in Waltham, I would sometimes hang out at You-Do-It Electronics in Needham.

As you can see, there’s a TV transmitter tower near the store. There are more of them on the other side, as those guy wires show. The Yagi directional outdoor antenna I have on the porch is pointed precisely at those towers, some 15 miles away.

I’m sure the engineers working at those nearby TV stations helped to keep You-do-it in business all of these years, but now the store is scheduled for closure. Boston and America’s Technology Highway aren’t what they used to be.

https://www.boston.com/news/business/2024/05/24/you-do-it-electronics-center-announces-store-closure/

Meet Them in St. Louis

Shades of R. Crumb and His Cheap Suit Serenaders! Look at what tastewar put up on YouTube today.

In 1998, I heard Howard “Louie Bluie” Armstrong perform “Saint Louis Blues” at the Lowell Folk Festival.

Before Ghost World, former Cheap Suit Serenader Terry Zwigoff was known for the documentary about his pal Crumb. His first film was about Louie Bluie.

Friday Morning at 7:30

This post is set to appear at the scheduled start of my cancer surgery. If there are no complications, it should take about an hour.

Please be seated in the waiting room.

Here’s some waiting room music.

Follow-up: The nurses said the surgery was routine. The fact that I didn’t see the surgeon post-op is, in itself, a good indicator. Of course, he may have left to get an early start on the Memorial Day weekend. 😉 I will, of course, have a follow-up appointment with him.

There is significant swelling at the site, which is very tender, but the pain is, so far, manageable with Ibuprofen. Final biopsy results should be available by the end of next week.

The Fabulous Batles

My big sister at the Beatles 1965 Shea Stadium show

My eldest sister occasionally likes to remind me that she attended both of the Beatles shows at Shea Stadium. The legendary 1965 concert was held two weeks before Mary Quant’s New York fashion show, where Prue introduced miniskirts to America.

Sandy Moss, Sarah Dawson, and Prue Bury: NYC – September 1, 1965

The unprecedented success of the Beatles at Shea Stadium gave promoters the idea that the venue would be good for other acts, as seen in this 1966 poster.

Here’s the batty tale of how Batman followed the Beatles to Shea Stadium, and why Bob Dylan didn’t.

https://fredbals.medium.com/holy-shea-stadium-the-batman-beatles-and-bob-dylan-connection-5e3b20b50196