Oh, Kentucky

Don't know yet.

Daily, weekly and monthly records are falling at Owensboro's 65-year-old Wonder Whip.

At the Nicholasville Road Walmart, to mask or not to mask?

Ten new infections and six additional probable positives June 19-23 in Hopkins County, after nine new cases confirmed May 12-June 18. But state officials say that's not really the metric to be watching, Al Cross reports at Kentucky Health News.

"I want to thank Governor Beshear and Senator McConnell for bringing a positive resolution to this longstanding issue. The $8,043,076 that our hospital will receive could not come at a better time and will make a significant difference in our ability to deal with the ongoing pandemic and its financial impact." I pity the writer of this complicated, delicate press release from the governor's office; I can't imagine it went through fewer than 20 drafts. Chase is that Pikeville Medical Center and 53 other rural hospitals are getting some dough back, perhaps as early as next week.

This press release, on the other hand, does not appear to have been particularly challenging to write or manage through review cycles; it's merely freaking terrifying: "The Department of Justice announced today the unsealing of an indictment charging Ethan Melzer, 22, of Louisville, Kentucky, for allegedly planning an attack on his U.S. Army unit by sending sensitive details about the unit – including information about its location, movements, and security – to members of an extremist organization named Order of the Nine Angles (O9A), an occult-based neo-Nazi and white supremacist group. Melzer is charged with conspiring and attempting to murder U.S. nationals, conspiring and attempting to murder military service members, providing and attempting to provide material support to terrorists, and conspiring to murder and maim in a foreign country."

Album Reviews: Lena Horne, Freddie Hubbard

Here are two good albums. I'm pretty sure I bought both of them in the summer of 1989 at a used-record store on Bardstown Road in Louisville.

I learned from Wikipedia today that It's Love by Lena Horne with Lennie Hayton and "His orchestra" (that's really how they capitalized it on the cover) was released in 1955 and was her first complete studio album. The liner notes by Fred Reynolds ranks Horne's "crystal-clear enunciation" in the Frank Sinatra class. The album includes 11 songs, all pleasant. Actually, "Frankie and Johnny" is not pleasant at all--it's about some woman whose lover cheats on her, so she shoots him six times. It's not my thing, and I would rather it was not on the album. The rest is a smooth collection of short love songs--my favorite is probably the title track, which is actually the last song on the album, but, truthfully, I don't really separate the numbers--that are expertly sung and perfect for a 21-year-old to put on an imagine what being married might be like. 

Lena Horne and Lennie Hayton ... wow! Man, there's a musical for you right there.

At the end of that summer in Louisville, one of the editors at The Courier-Journal had all of us interns and several other members of the newsroom over to his house for a pool party. Oh, I was so nervous to go to that thing, and I really do still get embarrassed thinking about some of the ways I acted out that night in my awkwardness. Well, anyway, at one point during the event, some music was playing over the backyard speakers that caught my attention, and I asked the host who the performer was. It was Freddie Hubbard; I'd never heard of him. So I went out not long after that to the Bardstown Road shop and found this album, Straight Life. I don't think I'd ever listened to it all the way through until today, and I don't think I'd ever paid a lick of attention to the cover design. Anyway, it's quite good if you're in the mood for 35 mostly unbroken minutes of "soul/funk influenced jazz" (Wikipedia's phrase). And I'm excited to see that it's going to come out in November 1970; rich Hoptown 1970 me will have to pick that up later this year.

One more thing about Freddie Hubbard of Indianapolis, from Wikipedia the Great:

Freddie Hubbard had close ties to the Jazz Foundation of America in his later years. He is quoted as saying, "When I had congestive heart failure and couldn't work, The Jazz Foundation paid my mortgage for several months and saved my home! Thank God for those people."[14] The Jazz Foundation of America's Musicians' Emergency Fund took care of him during times of illness. After his death, Hubbard's estate requested that tax-deductible donations be made in his name to the Jazz Foundation of America.

I think Matthew would give It's Love by Lena Horna, Lennie Hayton and His orchestra and Straight Life by Freddie Hubbard 2 stars each.

Movie Review: Les Diaboliques (1955)

Over the summer, Number Two Son is supposed to watch some French movies for his AP French class.  So the other night, he and I settled in to watch Les Diaboliques, a 1955 thriller by Henri-Georges Clouzot, one of the most famous of French directors.  In the United States the film was released with the title Diabolique.  We watched the excellent version put out by the Criterion Collection, which has done such a great job of preserving many high-quality films that are not as well known in this country as they should be.

We had a blast, because this is a great movie.  Les Diaboliques means "The Devils," and the film tells the story of two women who plot against the same man.  The man is Michel Dalassalle, who runs a second-rate boarding school close to Paris.  One of the women is Michel's wife, and the other is his mistress, and both of them work at the school, which Dalassalle runs as a tyrant.  As the film opens, the two women are working on a plan to deal with Michele once and for all.  But something goes wrong, and the tension mounts as the two women argue over what to do next.

I can't say much more than that, because it would be criminal to give away one of the very best movie plots I have ever seen.  Les Diaboliques actually concludes with a plea to the audience not to reveal what happens, and that seems like a fair request to me.  I will only say that Les Diaboliques is often compared to the great Hitchcock movies of the era, and that this comparison is fully justified.  The plot was taken from a story by two French writers:  Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac.  Hitchcock later took a different story from the same writers to make Vertigo.  Of the two stories, I think the one for Les Diaboliques is better, and I am certain that if Hitchcock had made this movie, it would be regarded as one of his greatest triumphs.

I realize, of course, that not everyone likes thrillers.  But if you do, and if you would like to have the joy of watching a great thriller that you haven't already seen, then you are in for a treat.

Finally, here's the trailer for Les Diaboliques, which does a better job of capturing what it's like than I can do in this review.

Oh, Kentucky

The Jessamine County Public Library does not have bedbugs.

Cumberland, however, has a new pizzeria. Crofton is getting a new miniature-golf course; Pineville, a new dialysis center. Bowling Green may be getting a new Dollar General Store (again). Columbia's Best Western is not new, but it's owners are.

Woodford and Fulton counties continue to set the poles on the range of unemployment rates across Kentucky.

Disconcerting jobs news from Hawesville.

One of two Mammoth Cave ferries have reopened.

A Houdini and an American Idol finalist are on the docket for the "Little Green Men" Days Festival in Kelly.

Kentucky's "First Family of High School Basketball"--and more from Zach Greenwell in Bowling Green's Daily News from Saturday's KHSAA hoops hall induction in Elizabethtown.

The defending Class 5A KHSAA football champs are tuning up.

So are the marching Green Dragons of Harlan.

Hooray for first responders!

U.S. Open Wrap-Up: Round 1

Thanks so much to Eric, who did a great job covering the first round of the National Open from the Olympic Club in San Francisco.

This club has featured an odd collection of U.S. Opens. The first Open held here was in 1955. Ben Hogan finished with 287, and was widely believed to have won his fifth National Open. But Jack Fleck, a municipal-course pro from Iowa, played the last four holes in two under par to force a playoff. Fleck then beat Hogan 69-72 in the playoff. Hogan never won another major tournament.

The second Open here was in 1966. This time Arnold Palmer had a seven-shot lead with only nine holes left. Amazingly, Palmer blew the entire lead with bogeys on 10, 13, 15, 16, and 17, and just barely parred 18 to force a playoff with Billy Casper. In the playoff, Palmer had a two-shot lead at the turn. But he collapsed on the back nine, and lost 69-73 to Casper. Palmer never won another major tournament.

The third Open here was in 1987. This turned into a battle between Scott Simpson (who won 7 tournaments in his PGA career) and Tom Watson (who won 39). Watson had a one-shot lead with nine holes to go. But Simpson overtook him down the stretch to win by one shot. Watson never won another major tournament.

The fourth Open here was in 1998. After three holes on Sunday, Payne Stewart led Lee Janzen by seven shots. But he blew the entire lead and eventually lost to Janzen by one shot. Remarkably, Stewart came right back and won the 1999 U.S. Open. However, he died in a tragic accident a few months later.

So now, as we approach the fifth Open at Olympic, I'm a little nervous about what will happen to Tiger Woods. On the other hand, it may help that Woods is a native Californian, that he played his college golf at Stanford, and that he's already won two National Opens in California. Certainly he looked like his old self today. But it should be a great tournament. The leaderboard after the first round is filled with big names -- although I've never heard of the leader. Michael Thompson, is a virtual unknown who currently ranks 90th in the Fed Ex Cup. He did reach the final of the 2007 U.S. Amateur, which was played at Olympic, and that probably helped him today. We will see if it helps him tomorrow.

Before we do the leaderboard, here is how the World's Top Ten golfers are doing. You can write off Donald, McIlroy, Bubba, and Dustin Johnson, but the others have a good chance:

1. L. Donald (ENG): +9

2. R. McIlroy (NIR): +7

3. L. Westwood (ENG): +3

4. T. Woods: -1

5. B. Watson: +8

6. M. Kuchar: Even

7. J. Rose (ENG): -1

8. H. Mahan: +2

9. J. Dufner: +2

10. D. Johnson: +5

And here are your leaders after Round 1:

1. M. Thompson: -4 (66)

T2. G. McDowell (NIR): -1 (69)

T2. N. Watney: -1 (69)

T2. J. Rose (ENG): -1 (69)

T2. T. Woods: -1 (69)

T2. D. Toms: -1 (69)

T7. J. Furyk: Even (70)

T7. M. Kuchar: Even (70)

T7. I. Poulter (ENG): Even (70)

T7. Mr. Beau Hossler (a): Even (70)

T7. J. Bohn: Even (70)

T7. J.B. Park (KOR): Even (70)

T7. R. Karlsson (SWE): Even (70)

T7. A. Presnell (AUS): Even (70)

Note: Mr. Beau Hossler is a 17-year-old high school student from Orange County, California. He actually qualified for last year's Open at Congressional Country Club, but he missed the cut.