On "The Andy Griffith Show," it is quite possible, that many of the characters from the show were named after North Carolina towns, that were within 50 miles of Andy's hometown. Andy grew up in Mt Airy, North Carolina.

If you took a circular drive from Mt. Airy & travel East for 29 miles, you will arrive in Lawsonville, North Carolina (ie Floyd Lawson.) Traveling South, next stop 28 miles away, would be Walkertown (ie Ellie Walker - girlfriend first season.) 72 miles Southwest of Walkertown is the metropolis of Taylorsville (ie Sheriff Andy Taylor & his family.) The final stop is located 64 miles North by Northwest, and that town is named Crumpler (ie Helen Crump.)

Below is a map of the area. You will also see that Pikeville is in the upper left corner. Mayor Pike named after Pikeville?

Charlie Brown's dog has accomplished a lot in his short puppy life. He was a WWI flying ace, an inventor of an electric Snoopy toothbrush & a great novelist. An excerpt from his novel 


 It Was A Dark And Stormy Night
by Snoopy
Part I
It was a dark and stormy night. Suddenly, a shot rang out!
A door slammed. The maid screamed.
   Suddenly, a pirate ship appeared on the horizon!
   While millions of people were starving, the king lived
in luxury. Meanwhile, on a small farm in Kansas, a boy was
growing up.

          Part II

   A light snow was falling, and the little girl with the
tattered shawl had not sold a violet .............

Getting back to Snoopy's accomplishments, he "invented the Snoopy battery powered electric toothbrush. He really did, I have here a 1974 comic book advertisement to prove it:





If you wish to purchase a slightly used Snoopy toothbrush, you can contact TV TOY MEMORIES

Oh, and by the way, it was used by humans & not by Snoopy. FOR COLLECTIBLE PURPOSE ONLY

A WASHINGTON D.C. snow storm photo.

_______________________________________________________











_______________________________________________________


VERY HEAVY SNOW!!!!!

(In case you don't get it, it's a joke. A picture of a whiteout. HA! HA!)

The very funny, Tim Conway will be doing a live concert, on Sunday May 23, 2010. He will be returning to The Paramount Theatre, in Aurora, IL.

He has been to The Paramount Theatre before. His partner on that occasion, was the late Harvey Korman. Conway & Korman would perform their old characters, from "The Carol Burnett Show." On a few occasions, Tim Conway would team up with Don Knotts. Whomever Mr. Conway would team up with, it was always a very funny show.

Don Knotts & Harvey Korman passed away within a two year time span & Conway didn't seem to want to do his stage show anymore. He cancelled a show that was scheduled for The Paramount Theatre, about a year after Korman died.

I met Tim Conway, on two occasions. The first time was in Milwaukee. I found Mr. Conway extremely friendly & personable. He was willing to goof around & make silly comments. I love it when a celebrity takes the time to interact with his fans.

I really shouldn't speak ill of the dead, but I will. Harvey Korman seemed to be EXTREMELY shy. While Conway would be working the crowd of autograph seekers, Korman waited until the absolute last second before the limo would be leaving. He would also leave from a different door & try to sneak into the limo, without being confronted with the fans.

Korman did the same escape routine when I saw Mr. Conway & Mr. Korman, about a year later, at The Paramount Theatre. I really wanted Harvey to sign a photo of Hedy Lamarr's "Hollywood Walk of Fame" star. Korman played a character in Blazing Saddles, named Hedley Lamarr. His character always had to correct people when they called him Hedy Lamarr.

Korman wasn't mean & he was always polite but he seemed to be unable to interact with the fans. In other words, shy. I find a lot of celebrities are a different person on stage compared to their off-stage persona

It will be great to see Tim Conway performing his old characters again. Keeping busy keeps these guys young. Mr Conway will be 77 years young, this year. 

A photo of a Tim Conway comic book is shown below. It was from a very short-lived comedy western, named "RANGO."  TV TOY MEMORIES has two "FILE COPY" near mint comics. One of the books has been autographed & the other is as beautiful, as the day it came off the printing press

 Back in 2008, I remember reading about a Flintstone village, which Saddam had ordered to be built, for the use of his grandkids. How incredibly ODD. Saddam considered everything American as evil - except for the "Modern Stone-Age Family."

I decided to do some research & I found an extremely well written blog, with excellent photos of "The Flintstone Village." Lt. JG James Aalan Bernsen is the author of the blog. The Lieutenant was a Deputy Press Secretary, for U.S. Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX), in Dallas. After 9/11 he decided to enlist, even tho he was a few months shy of his 30th birthday, which is the usual cutoff age for enlistment.

I've only read a few of his entries, but I plan to read them all. I assume his political leanings are different than mine, since he did work for Sen. Gramm, but he is such a good writer, I would suggest anyone who is reading this to scoot over to  Lt. Bernsen's blog. He stopped writing the blog after his time in Iraq was finished. The last entry was posted during the middle of July, 2008, after he was back in U.S. & the entry was about what he was doing on 9/11.

Once again, an excellent writer.

In my humble opinion, President Obama is an excellent humorist, with the ability to stab his opponents with dry sarcastic wit. Also, in my humble opinion, his opponents are usually far too stupid to understand it. I'm not talking about a simple spelling or grammar mistake type of stupidity, which everybody seems to be an expert. I'm talking about the inability of some people to think LOGICALLY.

This video of President Obama using an "intelligent" form of humor, which can be described as "dry humor." will definitely be OVER the tiny (microscopic) brains of the BIRTHERS.  Just the same, it is very humorous

Some movie stars are proud of their TV roots, Tom Hanks & Leonardo DiCaprio would be examples of that group. Other movie stars fail to mention their TV heritage. Warren Beatty, on the other hand, would DENY ever working on TV. He denied it for many years, but the truth came out. The old recordings of "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis," ratted him out. During the mid 1980's, NICK at NITE played reruns of "..... Dobie Gillis" & everybody could see the young TV hearthrob, Warren Beatty.

The star of the show was Dwayne Hickman along with Bob Denver (Gilligan's Island) as a regular cast member. Mr. Denver played the role of a beatnik, along with bongo drums & goatee beard. When Hickman started the show, he had just been a regular on "The Bob Cummings Show" and the "Gillis" producers were afraid that people would mistake him for the old character. They had him dye his hair from brown to blond & gave him a crew cut, after a few years, he went back to his brown hair.

Boy, TV producers really think the public is DUMB. Not everybody is like "Alaska Sarah" or "W."

Warren Beatty played the character, Milton Armitage who was a rich snob. Milton was Dobie Gillis' competition for the girl-of-his-dreams, Thalia Menniger. Thalia was played by Tuesday Weld, Dobie definately had excellent taste in women.

In case Warren needs more proof, here is one of his 6 TV appearances of "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis."

A New Zealand pizza restaurant chain created a very  funny billboard to advertise their pizzas & express their opinion of "W." The chain is called "HELL PIZZA" and I hope their advertising executive got a HUGE BONUS.

Look at the billboard & check out the company phone number



 

One of my favorite shows is "Burn Notice", on the USA cable network. Jeffrey Donovan plays the role of Michael Weston, a disavowed U.S. spy. He did a no-no & the government doesn't want anything to do with him. He is trying to get back on their good side, by showing his ex-bosses what a good little spy he is. He doesn't do that 24 hours a day. He also solves difficult problems for people using his training as a spy.

It is like McGyver, only with better writing.

The woman who plays Michael Weston's mother is Sharon Gless, the ex-star of "Cagney & Lacey." On the first episode of the third season, Michael needs to solve a problem for a woman caught up in an auto crash insurance scam. Michael needs official information on other victims so that he can set the bad guys up. He uses his 60+ year old mother to befriend the "gatekeeper" of the information. The "gatekeeper" is played by Tyne Daly, who was the co-star of Sharon Gless on "Cagney & Lacey.

I love it when stars from old shows reunite on newer shows, playing different characters.

I told you all of the previous information so that I can write another blog post, about the time that I met Sharon Gless. Sort of a tie-in, kind of.