Potluck Quote of the Day (7 of 10): Bill Murray

Happy National Radio! We are recognizing the occasion by listening to "Snap Judgment" with Glynn Washington on our local NPR radio station.

Alas, we have to keep this short as we desperately need to get back to arguing about religion and politics on Twitter! While we are it, we can also see if Paula Poundstone or Sarah Silverman have something witty to say there.

But, we do want to congratulate Ekaterini Stefanidi for winning gold in the pole vault for Greece, one of three gold medals for the nation. Similarly, we salute Nur Tartar, another female athlete, for winning bronze for Turkey in taekwondo.

Here is our quote from Bill Murray; today we are quipping alums of "Saturday Night Live" (yes, we know when Murray was on the show John Travlota was in "Saturday Night Fever"):

"There aren't many down sides to being rich, other than paying taxes and having relatives ask for money. But being famous, that's a 24-hour job right there."

http://snapjudgment.org/

http://sarahsilvermanonline.com/

http://www.paulapoundstone.com/

Friday Night Tweets: Big Ben and Domestic Politics

Greetings to our blog readers in Turkey, France, and Mexico........


We are closing out July with three consecutive blog entries (hmmm.....yea, we changed our mind), this one is dedicated to tweets that were posted during the 9-10 p.m., eastern US time, many of which dealt with the partisan political divide in the country.......

1) Big Ben (yeah, that clock in London, pict. top): BONG BONG

2) UbertFacts: Osama bin Laden was obsessed with Whitney Houston (pict. late) and wanted to make her one of his wives (alas the pop singer died a few years ago as did Osama)....

3) The Daily Signal: Senate leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky; pict: bottom) commits to Planned Parenthood defunding vote next week (He does NOT have the support of comedian Sarah Silverman who mocked pro-life groups with a video that is causing quite a stir)

4) Urban Dictionary: White Man_ A term used to describe a group of people who are blamed for all the problems in the world.

5) Adam Owens (A tv news reporter for WRAL, Raleigh, NC): Raleigh Police investigate fatal accident on Roy Road....

6) Psychological Facts: If you think someone is starting at you: 1. Yawn 2. If they yawn, they were staring

7) Martin DeGarmo: The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers (a quote from Ralph Nader as the tweeter cited)

8) Jon Winokur (Advice to Writers): Talent is like electricity. We don't understand electricity. We use it. (a quote from Maya Angelou as the tweeter cited).

9) The Job Guy: "The only limits are, as always, those of vision," James Broughton, a late American poet.

http://www.dailysignal.com

http://www.urbandictionary.com

http://www.job-guy.com (This might not be the same job guy we mentioned!) 

Quotes from Famous Authors (5 of 5): Dorothy Parker

Greetings to our blog readers in Denmark, Montenegro and Yemen.......well, perhaps it's a boring Sunday afternoon in Aden!

Here is our quote from Dorothy Parker:

"This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force."

Now to get back to watching Sarah Silverman host "Saturday Night Live."

Quotes from Off the Beat and Path (5 of 6): Sarah Silverman

Since we fully realize we will never the blog hits that Andrew Sullivan or our good friend Chris Knight will get from their blogs, we hope that by quoting the always brilliant lightning rod  stand-up comedian/actress Sarah Silverman that a few people in Ecuador pay attention to us.

Silverman, 43,  is an agnostic Jew who admits that she likes Jesus; religion is one of her favorite topics to make fun of.

Here is one of her quotes:

"I have a ton of Holocaust stuff, and some of it is hard core."

http://www.andrewsullivan.com

We're Back: The Last 10 Films We've Seen

We are back from our ice-fishing trip to Colorado (ok, we are kidding a bit), but we were away for a long time. Hopefully those of you in Atlanta, Ottawa, London, Praque, Istanbul and Dubai were able to find other ways to inform/educate yourselves. And, with that in mind, here are the last ten films we've seen. Many of these were from Netflix streaming, which we are getting more hip towards.


The image of stand-up comedian Sarah Silverman is meant to be ironic, as she was one of the Jewish stand-up comedians who was NOT interviewed for the documentary film "When Jews Were Funny," which we heard about when the film was being screened at the River Run Film Festival in Winston-Salem, NC.

Here we go:

1) "When Jews Were Funny" doc. 2013. dir: Alan Zweg (top image)

2) "Like Crazy" 2011. dir: Drake Doremus

3) "Days of Being Wild" Hong Kong. 1990. dir: Wong Kar Wai.

4) "Blue is the Warmest Color" France. 2013. dir: Adellatif Kechine (center image)

5) "Into the Abyss" doc. 2011. dir: Werner Herzog (bottom image: the film is about an execution in Texas, the American state with the highest number of executions)

6) "Barbara" Germany.  2012. dir: Christian Petzold

7) "West of Memphis" doc. 2012. dir: Amy Berg

8) "No" Chile. 2012. dir: Pablo Larain

9) "Soylent Green" 1973. dir: Richard Fleischer (it's a science-fiction film with Charlton Heston)

10) "Climates" Turkey. 2006. dir: Nuri Bilge Ceylan



http://www.whenjewswerefunny.com


http://www.sarahsilvermanonline.com


http://www.tcadp.org


http://www.wernerherzog.com

http://www.filmcomment.com

Sunday Night Tweets_ Remembering George

Here are some tweets from the 20:00/8:00 p.m. New York time hour; we should point out that the figure in the middle is Cam the Ram, the mascot of Colorado State University in Fort Collins, Colo., and the judge beneath him is far-right Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. You will understand the reasons for these images as you read our tweet log. We also want to mention the passing of the great George McGovern (1922-2012) and we hope to have a full tribute to the man who lost the 1972 presidential election to Richard Nixon later in the week.

Gunaydin to those of you in Istanbul, Turkey, where it is not 9:30 a.m., and good morning to those of you in Dubai  where it is now 10:30 a.m., Monday morning.

Here are the tweets:

1) @PeterBeinart (Peter Beinart, a columnist for "The Daily Beast"): "George McGovern was a lousy pres candidate but not only was he right to oppose Vietnam, he was right to oppose to global containment itself.

2) @MarkKnoller (Mark Knoller is the CBS News, White House correspondent): "Moving statement from Nixon daughters, Tricia Nixon Cox and Julie Nixon Eisenhower on the death of George."

3) @denverpost ("The Denver Post"): "Presidential campaigns hit Colorado hard this week" (yes, that is our reason for Cam the Ram).

4) @HuffPostPol (Huffington Post Politics): "Michael Bloomberg invokes 'socialism' in criticism of Elizabeth Warren," in reference to the progressive Democrat running for the U.S. Senate in Massachusetts.

5) @thenation ("The Nation," a liberal magazine): "More than 1 in 3 Americans live on less than $46,042 for a family of four."

6) @CatalinaByrd (Catalina Byrd, a blogger in Baltimore): "I'm so sick of Black GOPs acting like they are victims, they things that are racist and insulting to Blacks supporting Obama" (yes, that is our reason for the image of Clarence Thomas).

7) @SarahkSilverman (Sarah Silverman, a provocative comedian/actress): "I could die of a broken heart from worrying if someone I pass on the street  is lonely."

Quote of the Day/Week__Jennifer Connelly

Today, we continue to quote famous people born in 1970, when I was born, with a quip from the talented and lovely actress Jennifer Connelly who turns 42 on Dec. 12.

Connelly won a Best Supporting Actress for "A Beautiful Mind" (2001). Her other famous roles include "Requiem for a Dream" (2000), "House of Sand and Fog" and "Little Children" (2006).

Connelly has also been an active human rights activist with Amnesty International.

Here is her quote:

"I didn't expect to win the Oscar. You grow up watching the Oscars on tv and you think it happens to famous people. It was very surreal."

SIDEBAR: We thought we'd put 'a teaser" (movie lingo for coming attractions) for next week's entry in this series as we will quoting 'retiring' film director Kevin Smith, who was also born in 1970. Yes, the man who made it big when he was quite young when he directed the independent film "Clerks" (1991) about mischievous convenience store clerks in New Jersey told NPR he will quit making films soon, and focus on side projects.

And, though we won't be able to quote the highly outrageous standup comedian/actress Sarah Silverman, who also turns 42 on Dec. 1, has been quoted for saying the following: "I don't set out to offend or shock, but I also don't do anything to avoid it."

Top 10 List- Favorite Celebrities to Follow on Twitter

Oooops! In our last entry, we forgot to mention our "High School of the Week," which is Eastside High School in Gainesville, Fla. For those of you residing in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, this town is also where the University of Florida Gators play football (and other sports!). On Aug. 14, Eastside High School, where Jeff Charbonnet is the principal, will hold a Stop the Violence rally.

Now for our main subject manner which is my top ten favorite celebrities to follow on Twitter. Those of you who are fans of the singer Julian Casablancas will be disappointed to learn that he finished 11th!

Here is our list:

1) "Zippy the Pinhead" (pictured here): Yes, Zippy the Pinhead is a comic strip character who is the brainchild of Bill Griffith, but he is so much fun to follow on Twitter! Most of the tweets from Zippy/Griffith are actually quotes from back strips including this one from today: "In 1993, Nancy Sinatra will lead a bloodless coup on Guam."

2) Sarah Silverman: Well, we honestly can't post many of her tweets here because they could get one stoned to death in Qom, Iran, but today the standup comedian/actress said that: "I try not to be as hard on myself as I am on other people." She's great, isn't she!

3) Rainn Wilson- The star of "The Office" always posts great Tweets including an entry on Friday in which he said that: "Today should be Val Kilmer Day."

4) Amanda Palmer- The lead singer of The Dresden Dolls is just slightly less irreverent than Sarah Silverman which always makes for an unpredictable guess as to what she'll tweet next?!

5) MoRocca- We're not exactly sure exactly what MoRocca does or how he became a celebrity except that he's on NPR about as much as Big Bird is on PBS. The always funny Mo said that he was hanging out in Bogota with Miss Colombia. Earlier, he tweeted that he watched "Alf" in Spanish in his hotel room.

6) Paris Hilton- An actual recent tweet: "Going to bed. Sweet dreams everyone." Yes, she is not known for intellectual commentary but the heiress has 2.3 million followers on Twitter, and she is on occasion quite amusing.

7) Pee Wee Herman- He may actually be even more of a narcissist than Sarah Palin, but we love the '80s tv star who tweeted this weekend that he was going to reinact his 'Tequila' dance at the huge bikers' rally in Sturgis, South Dakota!

8) Kim Kardashian- see Paris Hilton

9) Kevin Smith- The director of "Clerks" is always fun to read on Twitter. Recently, he mentioned "Mallrats," so perhaps like those of us who couldn't get a date in high school (incidentally, Smith and I were both born in 1970) perhaps he can't 'move on.'

10) Apolo Ohno: This Winter Olympic speed-skating sensation spent the day helping needy children in Seattle, which should make all of us who slept 'til noon today feel even guiltier than normal!