And when she's singing, you see that she can't

[sovay]

Well, last night was a horror of sleeplessness having nothing to do with native insomnia and everything to do with being repeatedly woken on a night when I had been trying to sleep specifically to make up for not doing so. Have some links.

1. I had no idea there ever had been a 1930 Broadway play of Grand Hotel preceding the 1932 Hollywood movie. Absolutely nobody in it appears to have transferred to the film except Raffaella Ottiano (which I now suspect explains why her equivalent character in the 1989 musical is named Raffaella rather than Suzette). Sam Jaffe looks perfect as Otto Kringelein. If I couldn't get Buster Keaton, I'd have gladly accepted him.

2. Courtesy of skygiants: my new favorite Bletchley Park story. "The mistake led to a moss specialist being deposited into one of the most intense covert operations of the war."

3. Courtesy of mooncustafer: "Franz Kafka's Part Time Job."

4. Courtesy of larryhammer: Thomas Bailey Aldrich, "Sea Longings."

5. Currently on internal repeat for reasons unknown to me: Theodore Bikel's "The Kretchma." I love how he can shrug and play a guitar at the same time.

Prior to the sleeplessness, spatch and I made Monte Cristo sandwiches for dinner and they were great. No powdered sugar was involved, but I recommend the use of cinnamon and nutmeg in otherwise unsweetened egg batter. We even got back from the grocery store in the rain before our paper bags melted.

Comments

[gwynnega]

I love that photo of Sam Jaffe. It always amazes me to see him youngish, since I only knew him as an old man. I really wish he had talked about his career in my presence, but as far as I can remember, he never did.

That Bikel clip is lovely. He's pretty hilarious in I Bury the Living, speaking in an almost unintelligible Scottish brogue and annoying the increasingly freaked-out protagonist with his intermittent singing.

[ashlyme]

2. Holy crap. It's like somebody mashed up your interests and mine and made it real. That is *wonderful*.

[yhlee]

I'm sorry about the sleep. *support support* I hope you're able to get some zzz's soon.

[selkie]

You don't have sleep! I don't have spare time! Where do we file the complaints on this one?
Your godchild is reading on a ninth-grade level and was pissed when I wouldn't let them get the pre-algebra workbook at the bookstore. (They did 4th grade math this year and will do 5th grade math next year in 4th grade, but then in 6th grade -- no, I don't know what happens in 5th for the compacted-accelerated students, maybe geometry -- everyone comes together for an unleveled seminar madness course called 'Exploring Fundamentals,' which may be pre-algebra who knows wtf?)

[choco_frosh]

I am sorry about sleeplessness!
That is indeed a great Bletchley Park story.

[thisbluespirit]

Aw, I am sorry about the sleep - how frustrating! <3

That Blatechley Park story is great.

[skygiants]

It's SUCH a good Bletchley Park story. I was recounting it to my coworker today and by the end two other coworkers had popped up like meerkats over their cubicles to hear the thrilling conclusion.

I've still never seen the Grand Hotel film, but we did the musical my junior year of high school; unfortunately I've only retained the bits of it where lyrics overlap with the names of popular restaurants, and the part where the school heartthrob got his tragic stage death.