79 Seconds of Fame

They come into our consciousness and quickly vanish. And we forget how the media, including YouTube, takes the real life hopes and dreams of talented unknowns and squashes them right in front of us.

 

“Did you hear the YouTube video yet?” “Yeah, I saw the English lady. She was really good.” What English lady, I asked, as usual, last to know. Kyle had emailed Marlee, Marlee Facebooked Judy. I thought, what am I, chopped liver? “Email me the video.” That was Saturday night and I checked my Blackberry Pearl. Nothing. I got bupkes from my kids and wife.

            It’s not like I am totally out of it. I know Adam Lambert and Danny Goike, the top contestants from this season’s American Idol and I know that the guy from Grand Rapids, Michigan was given a lifeline last Thursday, so he still has a slim chance to win. But I have to admit, I just don’t spend that much time on YouTube and I hadn’t tried Hulu yet. I mean, what should I do, spend my life on the web? Instead, Judy and I downloaded Yes, Man from Direct TV and then fell asleep after the first half hour.

            I woke Sunday, forgetting anything about YouTube, as I went outside to get my Detroit Free Press. Mitch Albom was already writing about it. “By now, you’ve probably heard of Susan Boyle, the 47-year-old unemployed church worker with the voice of a Broadway diva,” he wrote. (“Up like a rocket, but then what?” Detroit Free Press, April 19, 2009, Page 23A) No, Mitch, I hadn’t. I guess I was not one of the 40 million who had seen the video. Brian Dickerson on Page 27A wrote his essay, “If Detroit had a Susan Boyle moment,” and then I had enough.

            I turned on the computer and clicked on www.youtube.com and searched for Susan Boyle. There were a few entries, all with the same Susan, the top one being 7 minutes and 7 seconds long. I was Number 29,952,437. Hey, not bad, I was in the first 30 million viewers for this one. Susan Boyle was a contestant on Britain’s Got Talent, the original version before it was exported to the USA. She faced funny faces from the judges and audience members when she walked onto the stage in what Mitch called her “frumpy dress, unwieldy hair, stout figure, like a middle-aged Scottish woman who lives alone with her cat.” When she started singing, “I Dreamed a Dream,” from Les Miserables, the audience started clapping and the two hosts backstage chimed in, “You didn’t expect that, did you?”

            Out of the 7 minutes, the song itself was about 79 seconds, which included constant clapping, the audience howling, the two hosts talking, and quick edits of the judges’ jaws dropping, and Simon Cowell’s face turning into a huge smile. Number 14,321, which she wore above her dress, sang powerfully and in tune. But the panning cameras, quick editing, smiling Simon Cowell and awe from the other two judges seemed almost orchestrated, as if they were all tipped off that Susan was one heck of a singer. 

            This is the modern world of fame, which has been reduced from 15 minutes or 900 seconds to just over a minute, or 79 seconds to be precise. We have attention spans slightly longer than fleas. We catch onto the latest swept-up sensation or root for the newest underdog singer, who in this instance looks a little bit like a cross between John Candy and John Goodman, with thicker eyebrows. If you take away the curly hair and the pearls, she could be a member of the English Parliament.

            Boyle told the cameras in one of the YouTube videos that she was “never kissed” and never had a date. She is the latest “slumdog millionaire,” which Judy and I finally saw a week ago, except she is broke and technically not from the slums. And the money being made is not hers or Google’s which owns YouTube but the show’s itself and its producers, which includes the usually bombastic and caustic Simon and that other judge who’s also a judge on America’s Got Talent. You know, that annoying, overly critical one on the left and no, I don’t feel like googling his name. You can if you don’t remember it.

            Maybe Susan, who has sung for 35 years, will wind up being a bigger British export than the Beatles or the modern British iconoclasts, Radiohead. Why not?  She is a breath of fresh, frumpy air, unlike Fergie who sings poorly but sells well. Maybe she’ll wind up being like Mandisa, the 9^th place finalist on American Idol’s Season 5. Mandisa has done moderately well, which includes releasing Freedom, her second CD, last month. Or maybe she’ll be like Christina Christian from Season 1. You don’t remember her? Either did I but when I looked her up on Google, she was Number 6 from Season 1 and was eliminated after singing Peggy Lee’s “The Glory of Love.”

            They come into our consciousness and quickly vanish. And we forget how the media, including YouTube, takes the real life hopes and dreams of talented unknowns and squashes them right in front of us. And we consumers, reeling from the losses of Circuit City, Sharper Image, and possibly Saturn and Hummer on the horizon, take it in and get lost in the overwhelming blur of it all.

            I dreamed a dream last night, that I was in front of a cast of judges and when I tried to sing, “I Dreamed a Dream,” I froze and the words got caught in my throat. I was thrown off the show with the gong from the 1980s Gong Show. Then, I woke, happy that it was all a dream.

            Today, I see Susan Boyle in my mind’s eye. Next year, I doubt if I’ll remember her name.

The Bird is Gone

 

The thrill of the Bird is gone. He came and went in a time when the Detroit Free Press and Detroit News were thriving, a time when GM and Ford were still kings of the city and the world of cars.

 

I didn’t know it first thing this morning because the Detroit Free Press is now only delivered 3 days a week and Tuesday isn’t one of those days. I used to go outside when I arose before 6:00am, in good weather and bad, with a little thrill in my heart. I always looked forward to getting the newspaper every morning, never knowing what would capture the front page.

            I exercised, showered, and ate before I left for work and heard the news on the radio today that Mark (The Bird) Fidrych died the day before, apparently a victim of a freak accident. He was found on his farm, dead underneath his dump truck.

            The Bird, who was the Thrill of 1976, is gone. 1976, the 200 year anniversary of our country, the year after I graduated high school and was a freshman at Wayne State University in Detroit, was for me and most every sports fan in Detroit, the Year of the Bird.

Mark Fidrych, only two years older than me, was the rookie pitcher that aroused a city and nation after Nixon and Watergate. Looking like Big Bird from Sesamee Street, Fidrych became a baseball and pop culture phenomenon. He pitched fast, talked to the ball, lifted his arm in wild gestures, and won 19 games in 1976 for the Detroit Tigers. He became the All-Star game starter that year and was voted Rookie of the Year. He was featured in TIME, LIFE, and Newsweek magazines. He got to talk to President and Michigander Gerald Ford about baseball and filled Tiger Stadium when no one else could. The Tigers since its thrilling World Series win in 1968 had faded from my consciousness, until the birth of the pitcher, the Bird.

I remember going to see him, the stadium alive with excitement, 50,000 people screaming and cheering. I never got to see the Beatles live but was lucky enough to see the Bird. In all of my 52 years, I have never seen anything like the passion of Bird and his fans.

It didn’t last long. Injuries took a toll on the Bird and he only won 10 more games in his next five years with the Tigers. On September 2, 1980, his last complete game, he didn’t allow the Chicago White Sox an earned run and won the game, 11-2. Thrilled with the moment, he took the game ball and handed it to his friend and minor league manager and mentor, Jim Leyland, now coach of the Detroit Tigers. When Leyland was asked yesterday about Fidrych, he chose not to speak, his words stuck in his throat.

Dick Tracewski, Tigers’ first-base coach in 1976, said, “This is the way I’ll remember him; He was always happy, but always thrilled, even after his playing days, about the place in the sunlight that baseball had given him.” (“Antics didn’t sum up ‘Bird’), Tom Gage, Detroit News, April 14, 2009)

The thrill of the Bird is gone. He came and went in a time when the Detroit Free Press and Detroit News were thriving, a time when GM and Ford were still kings of the city and the world of cars. Today, the newspapers try to survive by cutting home deliveries, and it looks now as if GM is likely heading toward a “prepackaged bankruptcy.” On the front page of the Detroit News, which I bought at the Seven Eleven, the front page also says that, “counting those who have settled for part-time jobs or abandoned their job search, the number (of working-age Michiganders) exceeded 900,000.” One in five is out of work “and the percentage is growing.”

The state of Michigan is in a virtual “Depression,” whether it’s official or not. As motivator, Anthony Robbins, says, “You need real emotional muscle” to deal with the current economic time.

It’s time to mourn for Mark the Bird Fidrych and the plight of Detroit, Michigan. But it’s also time to flex our emotional muscles and feel lucky that we had a chance to see what the gift of passion can bring. The Bird was “always happy, always thrilled” to have the chance to be a Detroit hero.

I will always remember his gifts to me and everyone in our state: the thrill of his joy and his exuberant passion. We need this now more than ever.

The Shlomimeister

Believe it or not, it’s only $19.95. And if you pick up that phone now, we’ll add two Sham Wow towels plus the Slap Chop, for no extra charge! Can you say, “Holy hellsapoppin!?”

 

How many times when you’ve bitten your tongue, have you thought, wow, what a shmuck I am?

Better yet, have you ever had your tongue bitten by someone else and when you struggled to pull your mouth away, the tongue-biter held on for dear life and would not let go? No, don’t go getting ice cubes from the freezer. Instead, get your Shlomimeister today. Just suck on one of our Shlomimeisters and your pain will instantly disappear.

How do we do it? Call it instant Novocaine, the stick that has the trick. No, not that trick. Instead, we use a secret anesthetic ingredient in our lollipop that takes your pain away instantly, 12 times as much as the nearest pain reliever. And it’s even made in Germany. You know the Germans make good stuff. Just think Mercedes and Hindenburg. And better yet, the Shlomimeister doesn’t drip and doesn’t make a mess. You’ll say, “Wow, Shlomi, every time.”

Believe it or not, it’s only $19.95. And if you pick up that phone now, we’ll add two Sham Wow towels plus the Slap Chop, for no extra charge! Can you say, “Holy hellsapoppin!?”

I can only imagine the commercial above when I think of the Sham Wow pitchman, also known for his food choppers, arrested last month. Who knew his real name was Vince Shlomi? I just think of him as Sham Wow, and now can more comfortably see him as Scam Now. Shlomi, 44, was arrested last month on a felony battery charge following a violent confrontation with a prostitute in his South Beach hotel room. According to an arrest affidavit, (“The Smoking Gun,” March 27, 2009) Shlomi met Sasha Harris, 26, at a Miami Beach nightclub on February 7 and subsequently retired with her to his $750 room at the lavish Setai hotel. Shlomi told cops he paid Harris about $1000 in cash after she “propositioned him for straight sex.” Shlomi said that when he kissed Harris, she suddenly “bit his tongue and would not let go.” Shlomi then punched Harris several times until she released his tongue. The affidavit noted that during the 4 AM fight Harris sustained facial fractures and lacerations all over her face. After freeing his tongue, a bleeding Shlomi ran to the Setai lobby, where security summoned cops.

So say it with me, “KEBLAM POW!” (just like on the old TV Batman series.) I wonder if Shlomi used one of his Sham Wow towels to wipe up the blood from his tongue.

You know, it sometimes feels good to give one of these famous celebrity hucksters (think Madoff, Kwame, Spitzer) some good old American shame. Okay, what should I have against Shlomi besides him being too darn slick and effective in selling some German-made overpriced crap? About two months ago, I walked into Bed, Bath, and Beyond and they were unloading two pallets of Sham Wow. I was so happy I didn’t fall for the con and give them $19.95 for some towels.

I knew if I bought them that I would never use them. When I want to clean up dirty liquid spilled on the floor, I like to throw out the paper towels, not twist them in the sink and save them for later.

Paper doesn’t last forever in the environment. I’ll be Sham Wow does.

Now, can we get this Shlomi face off the TV once and for all? His 15 minutes of fame have long ago expired.

Opening Day

Yes, it may be a crappy time to live and work in Detroit, but we have as much hope as anyone in any city has.

 

It was the best of days; it was the worst of days.

Well, let’s forget for a moment about the worst of days, which involves a Detroit reality check: a lousy, disappointing season last year for the Detroit Tigers, a record win-loss ratio 0-16 for the Detroit Lions, a nearly cataclysmic last few months for GM and Chrysler and major auto suppliers in deep debt and near extinction, and the Detroit City Council, led by the belligerent President Monica Conyers bringing almost as much infamy to the city as ex-mayor Kwame Kilpatrick did.

When a judge allowed the city council’s rejection of the Cobo Hall compromise legislation that took five years of negotiations between the state of Michigan and the Detroit regional authority, Conyers was ecstatic. She slapped the courtroom table and yelled, “Yes! We won!” Oakland County Executive L. Brooks Patterson had a slightly different reaction. “In-friggin’-credible,” he sighed. “What City Council has done is overturn five years of hard negotiation that was Detroit’s last best chance to secure long term funding for Cobo Hall and frankly the North American International Auto Show.”

The auto show and the Detroit auto industry loses but Detroit is the winner, in Conyers’ eyes. I say, let her try to sell the lowest priced houses in America (many selling for the same price as a McDonald’s Medium Fries) to the same citizens from the city with the highest unemployment rate in the country. That’s what I call a win/win.

But close your eyes on Opening Day and smell the newly cut grass at Comerica Park. When Opening Day comes, allow the citizens of the Detroit Metro area to be hopeful. And that’s just what we were when we scampered downtown on a partly cloudy, partly sunny day that thankfully had no rain.

Anything is possible on Opening Day. My son, Kyle and I, parked at the parking lot of the legendary Leland Hotel on Bagley which was built in the glory days of 1927. When we got to Comerica Park, we searched the stones outside the stadium ground but couldn’t find the memorial stones that I ordered in 1999 before Comerica Park was finished. We searched for the three stones: “BLESS YOU, BOYS—SID G & HARRY G,” in memory of my Uncle Sid and in honor of my cousin Harry, “KYLE GOLDMAN—BAR MITZVAH ‘99”, and “KENNY GOLDMAN—A TIGER FOREVER.”

When we sat down amidst the sold-out crowd, we waited to see if they were going to honor my cousin, Harry, as we had heard, as one of 25 who had been to the last 25 Opening Days. That never happened but instead, we honored legendary Tiger player and announcer George Kell who had recently died. We viewed the new logos on both sides of the General Motors logo on the tribute wall under the water fountain which owner Mike Ilitch paid for himself. We stood for a moment of silence for LA rookie pitcher, 22-year-old Nick Adenhart, who was killed along with two others the night before after a drunk driver ran a red light and broadsided their car. Then, three long-time employees of Chrysler, Ford, and GM threw out the first pitches and were hugged by Detroit rock star Kid Rock. And the game finally started.

The Detroit Tigers made it a memorable Opening Day by walloping the Texas Rangers, who had just swept the Cleveland Indians in their opening series. There was great pitching and even better hitting, led by superstar Miguel Cabrera who kept up his torrid hitting pace with a grand slam hit over the left center field wall and another shot that was a few inches short of a second home run. It was one of those games with lots of cheering and smiling under the 54 degree sunshine and very little tension, as we took the lead and kept building on it until the 15-2 final score. My son, Kyle, got a little sunburn on his face but he didn’t care. He was thrilled to be at another Opening Day, his third already by age 22, and I was happy to share it with him. I felt like Ferris Bueller without any guilt. I had taken a personal day to enjoy the hope that a good spring baseball game can bring. The Tigers may not win the World Series but wouldn’t be nice if they did? After the riots of 1967, Al Kaline, Willie Horton, and Denny McLain led the city to an unbelievable come-from-behind World Series win. Why can’t Verlander, Cabrera, Granderson, and Gallaraga lead us this year? If they did, Monica Conyers could once again scream out, “Yes, We Won!” And the rest of the city and Detroit area would join in with her.

            Yes, it may be a crappy time to live and work in Detroit, but we have as much hope as anyone in any city has. We just have to turn back the clock to 1927, the Roaring Twenties, when the Leland was built, and imagine when the city was young, the auto industry was the fastest growing industry in the world, and the Tigers had just let go Hall of Famer Ty Cobb. Yeah, they trailed the league-leading New York Yankees by 27 ½ games at the end of the season, but so what? The world was ours.

            Today, the movie industry is making movies in Detroit. So if Motown can go to LA, Hollywood can come to Detroit. If we don’t become the next movie-making mecca, we still have Mike Ilitch’s Detroit Tigers to root for and if not them, we still have Ilitch’s Red Wings.

            Let’s forget cynicism. It’s been a very hard winter and now it’s Opening Day. Today, in this birthplace of renewal and hope, we can take the time to dream, just dream….