I am sitting in a coffee shop basking in glory: I got ten cents off the cup by naming the “Living Dead” movies in chronological order. It’s not that difficult. Start with “Night of the Living Dead,” then “Dawn” then “Day” then “That Grey Area Between 4:30 and 5:30, Too Late to be Afternoon, Too Early For Evening of the Living Dead,” then “Dusk of the Living Dead,” then “Lifestyles of the Living Dead” and finally “Land of the Living Dead.” Hey, did you know that the one set in a shopping mall could be seen as a critique of consumrism? True! Because isn’t there something zombielike about shopping in a mall? The way people stagger around devoid of any purpose, without any will of their own. The stores push a certain style of color and people are compelled to buy it, regardless of their true desires.

I get tired of the mall critique. Okay then. WHERE DO YOU WANT ME TO BUY JEANS. If there’s another place where I can get in and out and purchase a few needed items of clothing, please tell me. I’m open to suggestions. Don’t say “online” unless they deliver it within 30 minutes.

Looking for column ideas. Many ideas, as always; every day presents a hundred things to write about. But the column has to be local, and topical. Some will arise. It always does.

Watched a (buffering) documentary (buffering) on Netflix last night about new Pompeii revelations. These new discoveries were SHOCKING and revealed things we did not know at all about Pompeii. In fact the discoveries were so fresh and hot and new and startling that the narrator kept pacing back and forth, almost sweating, unable to contain himself, desperate to get the next set of facts out because new shocking facts might be coming any second now.

A little research revealed that the site was discovered in 1974. It’s not exactly something they cracked open yesterday.

This site says:

Nearby is the more recently discovered Villa of L. Crassius Tertius. found in 1974. A bronze seal found at the site gave the name of its last owner. This villa, which contained a large number of amphorae, was not deserted at the time of the eruption: beside the bodies of the unfortunate victims, coins and jewellery were also found.

Another site says:

The Caldarium : nearby is the more recently discovered Villa of L. Crassius Tertius discovered only in 1974. A bronze seal found at the site gave the name of its last owner. This villa, which contained a large number of amphorae, was not deserted at the time of the eruption: beside the bodies of the unfortunate victims, coins and jewellery were also found there.

Ah, but let’s turn to wikipedia for the definitive pronouncement:

Nearby is the more recently uncovered Villa of L. Crassius Tertius, discovered in 1974. A bronze seal found at the site gave the name of its last owner. This villa, which contained a large number of amphorae, was not deserted at the time of the eruption: beside the bodies of the unfortunate victims, coins and jewelry were also found.

We now have conclusive proof that the people of this era “cutted and pasted,” a term they used to do describe moving text from one place to another. Anyway. Aside from the breathlessness of the narration - which occasionally ran straight into the brick wall of a taciturn Nordic scientist who handled bone forensics - it was an interesting show. You have to ask yourself what you would have done if you’d been sitting in the theater and noticed the mountain was smoking. It’s your home. You’d never seen anything like that. No one had. Perhaps the portents made you nervous - the ground shakes the day before, the smells, the rumors of Titans walking in the night - but maybe you were a sensible soul who put no stock in signs and divinations. Don’t know. But I do know that this is interesting:

A reconstruction of a Fourth Style fresco on one of the buried villas. That’s right: they had four styles. The first was faux stone; the second emphasized fake architectural vistas that fooled the eye, made it seem as if these windowless chambers had windows that looked out to fanciful landscapes. The third, oddly enough, was all anime. They’re still trying to figure that out. The fourth. as you can see above, was a synthesis of the previous styles - fake stone, realistic painting, imaginative landscapes. When you’re used to seeing Roman remains in their battered and desiccated state, seeing something bright and clear and accomplished is quite startling.

I said “buffering” at the top because Netflix, at some point, just decided to hang, and took forever to call up the program. Could have been on my end. Could have been on their end. There’s nothing you can do except growl. What was once a miracle is now commonplace, and so you’re impatient when the product is not instantly forthcoming. But it’s always been so: the TV used to “go out,” requiring a visit from a repairman who would come to your house with all the tubes, and make the TV work again. Or you’d bang on the top to make the picture stop rolling. That’s something modern TVs have lacked for sometime: HOLD controls. Vertical and horizontal hold. I don’t remember the picture ever zipping from side to side, but sometimes it would just lose its purchase on the screen and roll up into the set, chasing itself over and over again. No one knew why this happened. But you’d use the Hold dial to calm it down, like a skittery horse, and make it stay in the frame. It would still twitch and buck as if it wanted to go again, but most of the time it worked. Kids would play with those buttons. Parents would instruct them not to.

The TV had other mysteries, and I don’t just mean the strange places on the dial where no station could be seen, of a ghost image of an adjacent channel could be perceived through the static. There was the UHF dial - dozens of stations, all empty - and the “Contrast” and “Brightness” buttons, neither of which improved the picture at all but gave you a sense of control. At some point on the old TVs even the main channel selector would go out; the knob would lose its purchase on the shank within, and when you pulled it off you discovered all the plastic was worn away. For the next few months you tilted the knob up while turning, and when that failed, you threw away the knob and used a pliers. It's one of those things that kids today would find utterly baffling: a TV set with a pliers sticking out of the front.

Something else I learned from the Internet today: clicked on an ad for “MYHABIT.” Their tag: “My Fashion. My Home. My Sales Events” which irritated me for the usual reasons - A) I am easily irritated some days, and B) I hate that “My x” construction, since it seems to assert such unearned importance. Goes back to that Redbox ad at McDonald’s, with a sullen kid sucking on a 64 oz cup of sugar is pointing the remote at your face, and the tag is “My Movie. My Time. My Choice” or something like that, as if he’s finally gotten one over on the movie-rental cabal that forced him to watch movies he hated at a time of their choosing.

Anyway, here’s the ad:

Okay then. Look familiar?

From the 70s TV show "UFO." History repeats itself, first as tragedy, then as advertising.

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New! Disney Shorts. See you around.