Friday Blog

A certain Professor Whalen from Boston College always sends me notes about how much he enjoys my Friday blogs. He then proceeds to complain that I have never written about the 27 Club- a collection of music greats who died in their 27th year. This one’s for you, Professor.

Robert Johnson

Johson recorded fewer than 50 songs but most experts agree that he was the most important blues artist of all-time. Most rock fans were introduced to Johnson’s compositions through Cream  (“Cross Road Blues”) and the Rolling Stones (“Love in Vain”).  Keith Richards opined “You want to know how good the blues can get? Well, this is it.” Unfortunately in 1938, a jealous husband gave Johnson a bottle of whiskey laced with strychnine. Johnson died three days later and is buried in an unmarked Mississippi grave.

Brian Jones

At age sixteen, Brian Jones began playing saxophone because of his love of the great Charlie Parker. At seventeen, Brian became obsessed with Robert Johnson’s blues and started playing slide guitar. A founding member of the Rolling Stones, Jones was an amazingly versatile  musician. On the 1960s Stones albums, Brian played slide, sitar, organ, recorder, dulcimer, harpsichord, saxophone and oboe. In 1969, he quit the Stones and months later was found dead in his swimming pool with a mix of drugs and alcohol in his system. Jones’ cause of death continues be debated by conspiracy theorists.  

Jimi Hendrix

Most polls rank Jimi as the greatest guitar player of all time. Despite his short career, guitarists still study his dazzling techniques and improvisational genius. Jimi invented his own fusion of blues and psychedelia and popularized the use of feedback. Despite his stardom, Hendrix was a troubled soul. By 1970 he had difficulty sleeping because of several professional lawsuits. On September 18, 1970 Jimi overdosed, swallowing nine barbiturate tablets- eighteen times the amount needed to put a man to sleep for eight hours.

Janis Joplin

Growing up, Janis Joplin never quite fit in. She was bullied mercilessly at her Texas high school and during her brief stint in college. She moved to San Francisco where she developed a taste for Southern Comfort and heroin. In 1967, Janis became a sensation as lead singer for Big Brother and the Holding Company.

Janis embraced the blues, performing covers of “Summertime” and “Ball and Chain”. After leaving  “Big Brother’, Janis formed the Full Tilt Boogie Band which produced the 1970 album “Pearl”. Unfortunately Janis died of a heroin overdose before the classic album was released.  

Jim Morrison

As a boy, Jim Morrison loved Frank Sinatra, poetry and reading. Jim would eventually write poetry and songs that channeled Albert Camus and Aldous Huxley among others.  

The combination of Morrison’s lyrical magic and The Doors’ dark, jazz-tinged psychedelia was incredibly potent.  The Doors paid homage to blues legends with “Back Door Man”, a song written by Willie Dixon and recorded by Howlin’ Wolf. Surprisingly, the Doors’ hit “Roadhouse Blues” was a Morrison original not a blues classic.

The hard drinking drug abuser died of heart failure in Paris in 1971.  

Kurt Cobain

I was a never a huge Nirvana fan but am starting to realize they produced some great music. One of the original Seattle grunge bands, the group sold 75 Million records during their three years of stardom. Nirvana disbanded after front man Kurt Cobain’s suicide in 1994. Cobain struggled with heroin addiction, crippling depression caused by professional pressures and a tumultuous marriage to Courtney Love. Rolling Stone has included him on its lists of the 100 greatest song writers, 100 greatest singers and 100 Greatest Guitarists.

Amy Winehouse

Amy was heavily influenced by jazz legends, Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington and even Thelonious Monk. Her 2006 Grammy winning album “Back to Black”  displayed Amy’s captivating brilliance. At age 24, she began displaying erratic behavior fueled by drugs and alcohol. She finally agreed to go to rehab and in 2008 reached her peak winning five Grammys. Rehab didn’t take and soon Amy’s drunkenness was getting her booed off-stages across the world. In 2011, she died of alcohol poisoning.

Blame the professor for the depressing stories. Thankfully, the music is eternal.

Have a great weekend.

If you enjoyed this blog please consider buying my new book, “Get Smarter-Be Amazed”.

You can find direct links to Amazon and Barnes and Noble at Books (tedcurtinstories.com)

I recently read that  in November 2023, Luke Willett  broke the Guinness World Record for the fastest nine holes of golf. The 39- year-old Willett is the British speed golf champion, a sport that combines golf and running. Guiness timed Willet at Jumeirah Golf Estates in Dubai. He only  carried three clubs and completed the round in just 20 minutes and 12 seconds. Following his achievement, Willet said: “ This is my life. I run really, really fast around golf courses and hopefully create great history”.

Well, hats off to Luke and good luck to any of you who want to combine golfing and sprinting. My only fairway run will continue be my trot to the nineteenth hole.

Speaking of crazy world records, check these out:

Feats of Strength

In order to promote her favorite charity Australian Eva Clarke trained her sights on the Guinness World Record for most pull ups in a 24-hour period. The mother-of-three set the record by doing 3,737 pull ups.  She also holds the  Guinness women’s record for the most knuckle push-ups in one minute (70) and most burpees in 24 hours (12,003).  If you are unfamiliar with the dreaded burpee, check it out online.

In February 2024, Kenta Adachi set the male record for most pull ups in 24 hours(an astounding 8,940). Kenta’s traditional regimen had been doing a relatively pedestrian 100 pull- ups per day. He significantly upped his training three months prior to the big day. Kenta hopes that  his incredible performance will inspire others to follow their dream (mine is to find a good breakfast burrito within two miles of my house).

In 2018. Tazio Gavioli of Italy set the record for consecutive pinky pull-ups (36). Tazio was driven by his desire to show solidarity with his cat that had lost its paw in an unfortunate accident. 

Just Silly  

In 2017, Davinder Singh of India set the record for typing with his nose. It took Davinder 40.19 seconds. to type the following mandated sentence: “Guinness world records have challenged me to type this sentence using my nose in the fastest time.”

Kim Seung Do from South Korea set a record by eating five watches in 1 hour and 34 minutes. It should be noted he wasn’t required to eat the wristbands (talk about a wimp!). Kim eats up to 600 grams of metal per day and estimates that he has eaten approximately four tons of metal in his lifetime.

112-pound Michelle “Cardboard Shell” entered the record book by consuming three-and-a-half jars (five pounds) of mayonnaise in just three minutes.

In 2019, David Rush broke a new world record by holding and lighting100 candles simultaneously in his mouth.

Shridhar Chillal has the honor of growing the world’s longest fingernail. His thumbnail measured 6 ft 4 in. It is on display at Ripley’s Believe It or Not! in New York City.

Multi Year Records

Longest  attack of hiccups.

In 1922, Charles Osborne took a bad fall while he was trying to carry a hog on a Nebraska farm.  His injury led to a non-stop case of hiccups that lasted 68 years. His doctor theorized that Charles had broken a blood vessel in his brain. Charles was unable to find a cure but led a normal life including marriages to two women and the fathering of eight children.

In February 1990, Osborne’s affliction stopped for reasons unknown. He died in May 1991 following what must have been a wonderfully hiccup-free year . It’s estimated that Charles experienced over 430 million hiccups in his lifetime.

Longest Pilgrimage

American preacher, Arthur Blessitt has been traversing the world for fifty six years spreading the word of Jesus. He has walked over 43,340 miles in 324 countries, island groups & territories. Arthur has logged over 86 million steps carrying a 6 ft by 12’ft cross that weighs 45 pounds.  Arthur’s wife, Denise drives in front with supplies. Since Arthur is 84 years old, we hope that her kit includes Advil and a foot spa.

Have a great weekend. Good luck trying to break one of these records.  

If you enjoyed this blog please consider ordering a copy of my new book, “Get Smarter-Be Amazed”. Please visit Books (tedcurtinstories.com) for direct links to Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the wonderful moms out there.  Here is some Mother’s Day food for thought I wrote down four years ago.

The roots of the holiday trace back to the Civil War. Julia Ward who wrote the lyrics to “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” started a campaign in Boston for a mother’s day that celebrated peace and protested war. Meanwhile in West Virginia, Ann Jarvis, who had spent years helping poor mothers, formed a committee to foster friendship between mothers from the North and the South.  After Ann’s death, her daughter Anna Jarvis decided to continue her quest for a national day for moms.

Anna’s efforts were rewarded in 1914 when President Woodrow Wilson set aside the second Sunday in May as a nationwide holiday. Businesses immediately seized the opportunity to sell flowers, candies, and cards. Anna Jarvis felt the commercialization was detracting from the spirit of Mothers’ Day and began staging boycotts of the holiday she created. Jarvis eventually used her last dollar in the unsuccessful fight. She died broke and blind at the age of 84 in a sanitarium. Evidence indicates that persons connected with the floral and greeting card industries paid the bills to keep her in the sanitarium.

Trivia

Because one of the first utterances babies make is a “ma” sound, most languages around the world use that sound as the basis for their word for “mother. The Mandarin word for “mom” is “mama”, the Icelandic word is “mamma” and the Vietnamese word is “me”.

Most countries set aside an annual mother’s day and some have unique traditions. For example, mothers in Serbia are tied up with rope or ribbon until they give sweets and gifts to their children.  

47% of moms think that fathers should buy the mother of their kids a gift while only 6% of dads agree. 

Cheating websites such as Ashley claim that on the day after Mother’s Day there is a dramatic increase in mothers signing up. Could it be because of the gift disconnect?

On average, people spend $196 on Mother’s Day compared to $133 on Father’s Day.

When landline telephones were the norm, Mother’s Day was the busiest day of the year for long distance calls. Father’s Day set the record each year for number of collect calls.

Each of those sweaters that helped make Mr. Rogers famous were hand-knit by his mother.

Hugh Hefner went to his father for a loan to finance a magazine that would become Playboy. His public accountant father refused because he thought it was a bad investment. Hefner’s mother grabbed Hugh before he left the house and gave him $1,000 to kick-off his venture.

Some Bad Muthas

Most mothers I know are wonderful women and perform feats I cannot even imagine. However, history and fiction are rife with examples of horrible moms. A list of real-life worst mothers includes murderers, Kardashians or even worse- the mother of Honey Boo Boo. Here are my awards for the worst fictional moms (apologies to Mrs. Robinson who missed the cut):

Bronze Medal: Betty Draper from “Mad Men” – Betty is also winner of the coveted “Worst mom with whom to spend a pandemic” award. The ultra- self-centered housewife, brilliantly played by January Jones, perpetually ignores her children. When her son complained that he was bored, Betty responded “Go bang your head against a wall. Only boring people are bored.” Betty gets a mulligan for being married to a serial cheater but she is still a dreadful human being.

Silver Medal: Livia Soprano of “The Sopranos”- One of the most miserable characters in TV history, played superbly by Nancy Marchand. I’m sure many moms have thought about putting out hits on their sons but Livia actually ordered one.

Gold Medal: Eleanor Shaw Iselin from “The Manchurian Candidate (1962) – Angela Lansbury plays the sadistic, creepy puppet master of both her politician husband and her tragic war-hero son.

Special Lifetime Achievement Citation – Norma Bates from Psycho – She certainly did a number on her cross-dressing serial killer son.

Happy Mother’s Day and have a great weekend.

If you enjoyed this blog please consider ordering a copy of my new book, “Get Smarter-Be Amazed”. “Mother’s Day Ramblings is one of 100 stories contained in the compendium.

Please visit Books (tedcurtinstories.com) for direct links to Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

May 3rd marks the 89th anniversary of the birth of the first person to be enshrined in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. James Brown was known for his song writing, phenomenal singing and electrifying performances. He released over 50 albums and became known as the “Father of Funk”, “Godfather of Soul” and “Grandfather of Hip-Hop”.

Even JB’s funeral was a grand event. After his passing in 2006,  Brown’s  24 karat gold coffin was pulled by white horses through the streets of New York.  

Brown became larger than life but his upbringing was unimaginably difficult. Born in 1933, James’ family lived in a tiny shack in rural South Carolina.  The house had no windows, running water, electricity, or toilet. There were no neighbors, James had no friends and he wore rags for clothes. When he was four, James’ mother left because of her abusive alcoholic husband.  At the age of eight, James was taken in by his aunt who ran a bordello.  He enticed potential clients into the establishment with his dancing and he eventually learned to play the piano, guitar and harmonica in order to entertain the johns.

James dropped out of school in the sixth grade. He was arrested for robbery at age fifteen and sentenced to the Georgia Juvenile Training Institute where he started a gospel group. Bobby Byrd, a famous gospel singer visited the prison and was told about an inmate known as  “Music Box. After hearing James sing, Byrd convinced the warden to release the teen into his care. James joined Byrd’s gospel group  and started writing  songs and perfecting new dances. James eventually left Byrd’s ensemble and started The Famous Flames. Their big break came when they opened for Little Richard.

Brown became known as “the hardest-working man in show business”. He gained worldwide fame with his 1965 masterpiece  “I Got You (I Feel Good)” . He followed-up with the iconic “Live At The Apollo” album, his bestselling hit “Night Train”, and the tasty “Papa’s Got A Brand New Bag”.  

Brown leveraged his fame to advocate for racial equality. He became a peacemaker in Boston one day after Martin Luther King Jr.’s tragic assassination. He convinced the mayor to rescind his decision to cancel Brown’s scheduled concert. The live show was broadcast on television. Brown urged viewers to avoid violence and his calm persuasiveness kept potential rioters off the streets. After his Boston concert, the federal government finally agreed to allow Brown to perform for our troops in Vietnam (he had been prohibited due to a tax issue).

Brown’s career nosedived when the disco craze hit America. He was rediscovered when John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd asked him to play a preacher in 1980’s “The Blues Brothers”. Eventually, JB’s original recordings gained newfound popularity and he earned millions from the hip-hop records that sampled his work.

Unfortunately the 1980s witnessed Brown developing a fondness for Angel Dust, a hallucinogenic that causes anxiety, paranoia and violent hostility. He was frequently arrested for domestic violence. In 1988, police were called to an office building where Brown was threatening people with a shotgun. JB fled  and was pursued across two states. After police finally shot out his tires, JB disembarked from the car, performed his “Good Foot dance”, and  sang “Georgia on My Mind”. He was sentenced to six years in prison for endangering  police officers but was paroled in 1991. Brown observed “It wasn’t so terrible. I needed the rest bad.”

After his release, Brown continued to find trouble because of his bizarre antics. At the same time he donated generously to children’s causes and advocated for kids to stay in school. He recorded songs emphasizing that message including “Don’t Be a Dropout,” and “Killing is Out, School is In.”

JB continued to perform until weeks before his death from heart failure on Christmas Day 2006. Reports of his net worth ranged from 5M to 100M. A battle over the sixty-three year old’s estate ensued featuring his many children, the children’s mothers, sixteen grandkids, various mistresses and thirty lawyers, After fifteen years, the estate was finally settled in 2021.

James has left the building but his music lives on.

Have a great weekend.

BTW, I am pleased report that my first book was published last week, It’s called “Get Smarter- Be Amazed” My publisher describes it as “A compendium of tantalizing trivia and obscure facts” It’s available on:

Get Smarter. Be Amazed: A Compendium of Tantalizing Trivia and Obscure Facts: Curtin, Ted: 9781977271570: Amazon.com: Books

Get Smarter. Be Amazed: A Compendium of Tantalizing Trivia and Obscure Facts by Ted Curtin, Paperback | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com)

April 19 marks the 142nd anniversary of the death of evolutionary biologist Charles Darwin. The intellectual heavyweight was born on February 12,1809, the same day as fellow non-slacker, Abraham Lincoln. Unlike Abe, who was famously born in a log cabin, Darwin descended from a  family of prosperous physicians and scientists. At age sixteen, Charles began his medical studies at the University of Edinburgh. He found  the lectures boring and was repulsed by the sight of blood so he opted to enroll in divinity school.  

Darwin became pastor of a small church where he became interested in Naturalism, a theory that related scientific method to philosophy.  He had become interested in natural history while studying taxidermy at Edinburgh under the tutelage of John Edmonstone, a freed slave. When Captain Robert Fitzroy invited Darwin to serve as the naturalist on a five year voyage to South America, Charles persuaded Edmonstone to accompany him.

The Mission

Fitzroy’s ship, The Beagle  visited ecologically diverse regions including Brazil, Chile and Australia. While visiting the Galapagos Islands, Darwin observed that island finches shared similarities with finches on the mainland but had modified features that allowed them to gather food easily. This inspired his supposition that evolution occurs by a process of natural selection.  

The Theory

Upon returning  from the voyage, the twenty-eight year old scientist formulated his theory of the origin of species. However, he was reluctant to publish his hypothesis because the British scientific community was heavily influenced by the Church of England. The theory he developed in 1837  was not  made public until 1858 when he made a joint announcement with British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace.  Wallace had approached Darwin with his own theory of natural selection and Darwin did not want the other scientist taking all of the credit.

Reaction from scientists, the church and the public was extremely negative. Conventional wisdom held that species were unchanging parts of a designed hierarchy and that humans were unrelated to other animals. Nobody wanted to hear that he had descended from apes. Darwin’s professional reputation was tarnished and he described his experience as “living in Hell”. “On the Origin of Species” became a bestseller but Darwin’s theory would not become scientific doctrine until the 1930s.

The primary assertions of the hypothesis  are:

• Individuals in a population vary significantly from one another.
• Much of this variation is heritable.
• Individuals more suited to the environment are more likely to survive and more likely to reproduce and leave their heritable traits to future generations, which produces the process of natural selection.
• This process results in populations changing to adapt to their environments, and ultimately, these variations accumulate over time to form new species.
• It is not the strongest of the species that survive nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.

Potpourri

Always true to scientific processes, Darwin weighed the benefits of marriage in his journal:

“ Pros: Children and Companionship

Cons: Freedom, Travel, and of course, Not forced to visit relatives”

Decision: Charles married his first cousin, Emma.

Three of their children died from illnesses and the remaining six suffered chronic poor health. Darwin knew the risks involved in marriages between cousins but estimated that hundreds of millions of the world’s unions involved two people who were related. Ultimately,  Darwin blamed his children’s illnesses on the fact he married his cousin.

After returning from his famous voyage, Darwin began suffering chronic headaches and heart palpitations that would persist for the rest of his life. Some speculate that he contracted a parasitic illness that eventually led to the cardiac damage, which ultimately caused his death. To combat his illnesses, Darwin followed a strict daily schedule. This included playing two games of backgammon with Emma every night. Of course, the scientist recorded that he had won “2,795 games to her piddling 2,490.”

Darwin was honored with burial at Westminster Abbey, just a few feet away from fellow scientific heavyweight, Isaac Newton.

Although the phrase, “survival of the fittest” is usually attributed to Darwin, it first appeared in  Herbert Spencer’s 1864 publication, “Principles of Biology”.

I calculate Emma’s backgammon winning percentage against the great scientist as 48.96%.

Piddling indeed!

Have a great weekend.

April 15, 2013 witnessed one of the worst terrorist events in American history. The celebration of the 117th Boston Marathon was shattered by two pressure cooker bombs set off by two subhuman losers. 260 people were seriously wounded and three spectators died including seven year old Martin Richards. The citizens of Boston managed to rally and people from across the world vowed to attend the following year’s Marathon in order to pay tribute to the bombing’s victims.

Meb

A stalwart member of the world’s marathon community was moved by Martin Richards’ death and made plans to participate in the 2014 event. Thirty-eight -year- old Meb Keflezighi was ten years removed from winning an Olympic silver medal. It had been five years since he had become the first American to win the New York City Marathon in nearly three decades. But win or lose, he wanted to participate in Boston’s healing.

Meb’s journey to marathon greatness is the stuff from which movies are made. His family was forced to flee war-torn Eritrea for sanctuary in San Diego when Meb was eleven. One of ten children, he became an All-American runner at UCLA and became a naturalized citizen at age 22.

Meb arrived in Boston several days before the 2014 Marathon and had an emotional meeting with Martin Richard’s parents. He privately decided he was going to try to win the race even though he knew his best running days were behind him.

Wearing a bib on which he had written the names of the 2013 Marathon murder victims, Meb stepped to the starting line in Hopkinton. As a rule, elite long distance runners form a pack for at least the first thirteen miles of a marathon. Thus the pack was surprised when Meb and Josphat Boit started pulling away at mile ten and were shocked when Meb dropped Boit at mile fifteen.

Meb’s brother and manager, Hawi observed , “I’ve seen so many marathons where, when you have a pack of runners chasing one person . . . the chances that someone from that pack catches the leader is almost 99 percent.” The pack assumed that Meb would burn out but Meb thought  “They’re making the biggest mistake of their lives”. ’

There was widespread concern that the 2014 crowd would be understandably somber. Luckily for Meb, the crowd was more joyous than ever and provided enormous inspiration.  Still, with one mile left, Meb was being closely chased by Wilson Chebet. Meb was at his physical and mental limits and almost stopped to vomit. He thought about easing off to save some energy but Meb knew if Chebet caught him, all momentum would be lost. Then, Meb reasoned “He must be hurting. Am I willing to hurt a little bit more? ”

As he made the turn onto the final leg, the devout Christian  crossed himself and found one more gear.  Meb was attired in red, white, and blue and the crowd started chanting  “USA! USA!”. Meb pumped his fists and signed the cross one last time as he passed the site where the first bomb had detonated one year earlier. He held his arms high as he broke the tape.

With an American flag draped around his shoulders Meb climbed the podium to accept the golden wreath. It was the first time in 31 years that an American man had won Boston. The victor wept as the national anthem played.

Healing

Many in the record field of 36,000 had their own poignant story. Some survivors of the 2013 attack who’d lost limbs competed either in wheelchairs or on newly fitted prosthetic legs.

At 2:49 p.m. the moment the first blast had rocked the previous year’s event, the crowd hushed. When the clocked registered 2:50, the crowd erupted in cheers.

Meb Keflezighi retired from competitive marathoning in 2017 but he returned to Boston this past month, wearing bib number 2014 to commemorate the year of his historic victory. He finished 2024’s race in a terrestrial  3:08.

Along with the courageous survivors of the 2013 attack, Meb will always be remembered for turning one of Boston’s darkest days into one of its most joyous.

Have a great weekend.