Frankenstein's Moon

Did you know scientists have long doubted Mary Shelley's account of what drove her to write the novel "Frankenstein"? Why do scientists give a shit? I don't know- but click HERE and read all bout it!

Apparently, other scientists are now disputing this! They agree that maybe MS was awakened in the night by a shining full moon and then she wrote that book. Although, I thought she was dared to write the book? Who knows? Who cares? I read that book in 8th grade and hated it so violently that I actually burned it after the class was over. I BURNED it. True story.

I was in 8th grade- my brain wasn't fully formed. I still like Frankenstein (the movie monster) though!

Have You Heard of the Poe Toaster?

Well, for the last 200 years (until 2009) an unknown someone was known for coming at midnight and toasting Edgar Allan Poe at his gravesite on the anniversary of his birth. The mysterious "Poe Toaster" would leave roses and a half filled bottle of cognac for the long dead author of the macabre.

BUT in 2009 the tradition apparently came to screeching halt. Read all about it HERE as you celebrate today- which (in addition to being National Treasure Dolly Parton's birthday) is also Edgar Allan Poe's cake day!

(Not that kind of toaster, dumb dumb).

Too Much Twilight!

Now I am in favor of Robert Pattinson's big mop of greasy hair just like all the other girls I'm in sixth grade with- BUT! This "Wuthering Heights" tie-in is too much! Must classic literature be sold upon the basis of these (watch out) not very good books???

Now in the interest of fairness and transparency, I will admit I've never read "Wuthering Heights"- but I did read "Twilight" and . . . didn't care for it! It wasn't horrible- I just read through 400 pages where NOTHING happened and even though I had another 100 pages left I found I couldn't possibly care less what happened to these people. No offense!

Now I do like vampires well enough, and maybe I didn't care for "Twilight" because I already had a vampire series to read: Charlaine Harris' Sookie Stackhouse books (the basis for HBO's 'True Blood')- which, I will have you know, I read BEFORE they became a show. I bought the first book "Dead Until Dark" from an old dude selling paperbacks on a card table outside Walgreen's beneath the Astoria-Ditmars subway stop in Queens. I believe I paid $1.25 for it.

Now I've gotten this out of my system. Is everybody as ready for Halloween as I am? All this vampire chatter has me excited!

Hath Not Shakespeare Eyes?? Find Out!

Click HERE to read all about how we know now what old William "The Bard-o-rama" Shakespeare looks like even though we thought we knew before!!!

Spoiler: He looks similar!

History Lesson time again!!!

Okay kids, it’s that time again! You may want to take notes.

Born today in 1473, Copernicus was a great astronomer who told us the earth revolved around the sun. Of course today we know the earth revolves around Cliff and Kendall.

Skipping ahead to 1878, Thomas Edison did us all proud by patenting the phonograph. Originally thought of as a tool for office dictation, someone had the bright idea of putting music on the thing and thus the precursor to the modern mp3 was born.

A few years later in 1906 a man woke up hungry, poured some milk over some dried up old flakes of corn and then went out and founded the Kellogg’s breakfast cereal company.

In 1940, the soul singer/weepy clown Smokey Robinson was born. When the doctor was asked why he couldn’t put the newborn in a crib like all the other infants, he replied “He’s really got a hold on me.”

And finally, in 1951, February 19th saw the death of Andre Gide. Gide was a noted French author and Nobel laureate who would later be quoted on an episode of “Cliff and Kendall: Coast to Coast.” You may remember “It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not.”

Another favorite Gide quotation: “Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again.”