Thanksgiving At My House

HAPPY THANKSGIVING
Here's a few old photos of Thanksgiving dinner at my parents house. We never did anything too spectacular. Mom made a big meal and we watched the parade and football. It was usually just me, my brother, mom and dad. As I've done for the past ten years or so, I'm spending Thanksgiving at my in-law's house this year.
1988 - Mom, my brother and dad digging in
1989 - Me, mom and my brother
1995 - Dad and mom (nice job getting their faces in the photo)
1995 - Me buttering my rolls

Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade

This is my 200th post. Boy, how time flies.

It just didn't seem like Thanksgiving unless I watched the Macy's Parade every year when I was growing up. Unfortunately, my wife doesn't like to watch parades on TV, so I have to sneak it in if I can.

I decided to search YouTube for some parade clips from the 70's and 80's. I found some from the 80's but none from the 70's. I did find a cool clip from the 60's though. I also threw in a few from the early 90's. Enjoy.

The Munsters Escort Santa


1981 - Aileen Quinn as Annie


1984 - Fraggle Rock Float


1985 - Care Bears Float (with Miss America Susan Akin)


1987 - Marvel Universe Float


1989 - Marvel Universe Float (with Melba Moore)


1989 - The Joker Float


1993 - Spider-Man Balloon (with deflated head)


1993 - Sonic The Hedgehog Balloon (Not shown - Sonic smashing into a lightpost and exploding. Yes, the hedgehog's balloon happened to pop, thus prompting the crew to use stock footage of Sonic before the collision.)


1993 - Bart Simpson Balloon

"Mr. Whipple", RIP

LOS ANGELES (Nov. 19) - Dick Wilson, the actor and pitchman who played the uptight grocer begging customers "Please, don't squeeze the Charmin," died Monday. He was 91.

The man famous as TV's "Mr. Whipple" died of natural causes at the Motion Picture & Television Fund Hospital in Woodland Hills, said his daughter Melanie Wilson, who is known for her role as a flight attendant on the ABC sitcom "Perfect Strangers."

Over 21 years, Wilson made more than 500 commercials as Mr. George Whipple, a man consumed with keeping bubbly housewives from fondling the soft toilet paper. The punch line of most spots was that Whipple himself was a closeted Charmin-squeezer.

Read the full story here.

Turkey Stuffing Mix

Here's my Turkey Stuffing Mix. You know, there really aren't that many Thanksgiving "carols". Included in this mix are some commercials furnished by the National Goose Council called "Goose Who's Coming To Dinner?", narrated by Bill Cullen.

Stephen put a link to a song in the comments section that you can add to the mix. I suggest you get it. Thanks Stephen.

Track Listing

1. A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving - George Winston
2. A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Dialog 1
3. Beware Of Geese? - Bill Cullen
4. Prayer For Thanksgiving (Valerius) - Arthur Fiedler & The Boston Pops
5. A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Dialog 2
6. It Should Really Be Called Goose Day - Bill Cullen
7. Thanksgiving At My House - Pat Godwin
8. Turkey Gobble 1
9. National Bird? Why Not The Goose? - Bill Cullen
10. Thanksgiving Canon - Girl Scouts
11. Thanksgiving Day - John McCutcheon
12. Thanksgiving Day - Bob Hope
13. A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Dialog 3
14. What's Really Traditional? You'd Be Surprised - Bill Cullen
15. Thanksgiving Day Parade - Spencer Ross
16. The Thanksgiving Song - Adam Sandler
17. A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving Dialog 4
18. Turkey Dinner - Ruth Roberts
19. WKRP Turkey Drop 1
20. WKRP Turkey Drop 2
21. Turkey Gobble 2
22. Woman's Work and What a Job They Did - Bill Cullen
23. Turkey In The Straw - Erich Kunzel & The Cincinnati Pops Orch.

Click below to download --

--> Turkey Stuffing Mix <--

Here's some clips of "The Turkey Drop" from the classic episode of WKRP In Cincinnati. Some sound bites of this are included in the Turkey Stuffing Mix. Clips courtesy of SchradeBOFH.

Re-Up's

I've had some requests to re-up some expired links. Here they are --

Toon Tunes: Action-Packed Anthems & Funny Bone Favorites
Christmas In The Stars: STAR WARS Christmas Album
A Classic Cartoon Christmas
A Classic Cartoon Christmas, Too

To complete the Classic Cartoon Christmas trilogy, you'll need to download this compilation that I put together -- A Classic Cartoon Christmas, Three

Paul Norris (Co-Creator of Aquaman), RIP

Comic book artist Paul Norris died Nov. 5, 2007 at age 93.

He co-created Aquaman with DC Comics writer-editor Mort Weisinger in More Fun Comics # 73 (Nov. 1941). Paul also worked on, among others, the Sandman in Adventure Comics.

By 1942, Norris was drawing the newspaper strip Vic Jordan for the New York daily, PM. He worked with Prize Publications creating Power Nelson, Futureman and Yank and Doodle.

His contract with PM required that he work exclusively for that publication, which he hadn't realized when he signed up, so he had to stop working on Aquaman about a year after he created it.

But he got other breaks. Norris went on to work for King Features Syndicate and had stints on Flash Gordon and Secret Agent X-9. In 1948, he took over the Jungle Jim Sunday feature for a few years when Austin Briggs gave it up.

In 1952, he took over the science fiction comic strip Brick Bradford from artist Clarence Gray. He drew the strip for 35 years, until he retired in 1987.

Read a tribute to Mr. Norris from Mark Evanier's News From Me.

Paul Norris on Wikipedia.

Are You Ready For Some Football?

Does anyone have any novelty football songs? The ones usually made by local personalities about NFL teams or players. I've only got one track and it's a Christmas song called The 12 Days of a Cleveland Browns Christmas. I'd like to put together a compilation of these songs. If anyone has any, could you email an mp3 of the song to me? I'll post the compilation before football season ends (if I get anything).

Speaking of football, Sunday is the Pittsburg Steelers vs the Cleveland Browns. I've been a life-long Steelers fan while my wife roots for the Clowns Browns. It should be a fun afternoon.

Funny Bone Favorites Volume II

OK, I guess we can forget about a Thankgiving Countdown :). Let's move on to some other stuff.

Back on August 11, I shared my version of a record I had in the 70's called Funny Bone Favorites. You can still download it here. I decided to make another volume called, amazingly, Funny Bone Favorites Volume II. Just like the original, all the songs are from the 1970's or earlier.

Track Listing

1. The Ballad Of Bilbo Baggins - Leonard Nimoy
2. Daffy Duck's Rhapsody - Mel Blanc
3. Gitarzan - Ray Stevens
4. God Bless My Underwear - Peter Pan Singers
5. Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh - Allan Sherman
6. Inka Dinka Doo - Jimmy Durante
7. King Tut - Steve Martin
8. Lumberjack Song - Monty Python
9. Mahna Mahna - Mahna Mahna & The Two Snowths
10. Mr. Jaws - Dickie Goodman
11. My Ding-A-Ling - Chuck Berry
12. Popcorn - Hot Butter
13. Rubber Biscuit - The Blues Brothers
14. Shaving Cream - Benny Bell
15. The Streak - Ray Stevens
16. Surfin' Bird - The Trashmen
17. They're Coming To Take Me Away, Ha-haaa! - Napoleon XIV
18. Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport - Rolf Harris
19. Ting-A-Ling-A-Loo - Benny Hill

Click the link below to download --

--> Funny Bone Favorites Volume II <--

Thanksgiving Countdown 2007

Who's up for doing a post-a-day Thanksgiving countdown?

Anyone?

Hello? Is this thing on?

I'm Done...

Not with the blog, just the Halloween posts. I had a great time sharing all my monsterous memories with everyone. I hope you enjoyed it also. I'm going to take some time off from blogging (maybe a week or so) to get some stuff done that I've been neglecting the past month. Thanks to everyone that took the time to leave comments, I'll try to respond to most of them in the next few days. I'm also a few days behind on reading all of the other blogs that participated in the Halloween Countdown. I have a lot of catching up to do. Thanks again and I hope you had a wonderful Halloween.