Remember the recent eclipse of the moon?

Written by Jim Heffernan for The Duluth News Tribune/05-28-22

Many readers might still recall the big moon eclipse of two weeks ago. Things are happening so fast lately — conquest, war, pestilence, monkeypox, Johnny Depp — it’s hard to keep up with stuff.

I dutifully watched the first half of the eclipse — the part where we lost the moon. I let nature or whatever take its course from there on in, confident as I hit the sack that the moon would be back in due time as I slept.

 

Watching eclipses can be a bit tedious, despite the wonder of it all, with the earth blocking the light of the sun on its surface, turning the silvery moon into a muddy dark orb. It takes quite a while for the earth’s shadow to make its way across the whole moon, as you might have noticed if you were watching.

 

I was bound and determined to watch it though, out on our patio in a comfortable lawn chair on a beautiful clear night, with a good cigar to draw on. There are certain times for a cigar, and a total eclipse of the moon is one. If you only smoke during eclipses it’s probably OK health wise.

 

Still and all, though, as significant an extraterrestrial event as an eclipse might be, let’s face it: They can be a little on the boring side. It’s kind of exciting when the shadow first comes up on what they call the moon’s penumbra, but then the show lags a bit. 

 

So as I watched, I found myself ruminating about many other things — “shoes and ships and sealing wax and cabbages and kings, and why the sea is boiling hot, and whether pigs have wings,” as the walrus puts it in Alice in Wonderland. Mainly, I thought about how the moon shows up in so many old songs, as the melodies coursed their way through my consciousness as earworms.

 

“By the light, of the silvery moon, I like to spoon, with my honey in June,” is an ancient number not in step with the hip hop generation. I don’t think they call couples’ billing and cooing “spooning” any more, not that billing and cooing is exactly common parlance today either. But you know what I mean.

 

Hey, get a load of that, I thought as the earth’s shadow took another bite out of the bright, full moon. Another melody came to mind that I hadn’t thought of in a long time:  “Fly me to the moon, and let me sing among the stars, let me see what spring is like on Jupiter or Mars…”

I’ve been thinking a lot about what this spring is like right here in Northern Minnesota. Maybe it’s better on Jupiter or Mars. Wouldn’t take much.

 

Oops, here’s another ditty that invaded my consciousness: “I see the moon, the moon sees me, down through the leaves of the old oak tree, please let the light that shines on me, shine on the one I love.” Does ANYBODY remember that? It was popular when I was a kid.

 

So much moon in music, so increasingly little of the moon’s still visible surface as I watched the shadow envelop fully half of the fading sphere, the rest still bright.

 

“Hey diddle diddle, the cat and the fiddle, the cow jumped over the moon, the little dog laughed to see such a sight, and the dish ran away with the spoon.” Where’d that come from? It’s not even a song, but a Mother Goose nursery rhyme. But that Old Devil Moon kept coming up in so many ways as the earth’s shadow continued its journey across the moon, not a cow in sight.

 

There’s more. “Full moon, and empty arms,” the first line of lyrics of a pop song set to the main theme of Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto. That’s the music in the movie “The Seven Year Itch” when actor Tom Ewell is making whoopee with Marilyn Monroe as he romances her with the immortal line, “I’m going to take you into my arms, and I’m going to kiss you, very quickly and very, very hard.” Right then she falls off the piano bench.

 

Jeez, that’s a goofy thing to be thinking about as I watched the moon darken, becoming fainter and fainter. Besides, my cigar having long played out, I was getting a little hungry.

 

“When the moon hits your eye like a big-a pizza pie, that’s amore.” Thank you Dean Martin. Yeah, what’s not to love about pizza?

 

The moon is almost covered now, bringing to mind when, “The moon was yellow, and the night was young,” according to the lyrics to an old song nobody remembers. The lyric continues: “Beyond that Cupid fellow, behold the moon is yellow, and the night is young.” They don’t write song lyrics like that anymore.

 

But for me, the night was no longer young, and the moon was no longer yellow; just a dark ball barely visible with the naked eye — clearly not a good time to “dance with the girl with the hole in her stocking, dance by the light of the moon.” (Caution: Do not attempt during a lunar eclipse.)

 

Jim Heffernan is a former Duluth News Tribune news and opinion writer and continues as a columnist. He can be reached at jimheffernan@jimheffernan.org and maintains a blog at www.jimheffernan.org.

The Lone Ranger rides again--on stranger plains

By Jim Heffernan

Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear when, from out of the past, come the thundering hoof beats of the great horse Silver. The Lone Ranger rides again.

I didn’t put quotation marks around those words to fool readers into thinking I might have written such a powerful opening paragraph, which rivals such other strong opening paragraphs as, “In the beginning God”, “Elmer Gantry was drunk”, “It was a dark and stormy night in the best of times and the worst of times…” and so on and so forth.

Of course we are talking here about a part of the opening narration for the radio version of “The Lone Ranger,” which had a profound influence on my life in my eternal quest for “truth, justice and the American way,” or was that “Jack Armstrong the All-American Boy”? It gets kind of fuzzy as time passes.

“Faster than a speeding bullet…” Oh, excuse me; I’m getting carried away.

Why all this talk of the Lone Ranger now? Well, for a very good reason. The Walt Disney Studio in – brace yourself – Hollywood, California (where all the Democrats are), is making a movie of the Lone Ranger story starring none other than Johnny Depp.

Johnny Depp as the Lone Ranger? No, no, no. The quirky actor (see “Pirates of the Caribbean on Stranger Tides” than its two predecessors in a movie franchise that has struck an iceberg) will be playing Tonto, the Lone Ranger’s faithful Native American companion. Armie Hammer plays the Lone Ranger in this updating of the old story, to be released next year. Armie Hammer is not yet a household name outside of people who bake a lot.

I had thought Tonto had fallen victim to political correctness but here he is again, and portrayed by Johnny Depp, a Caucasian actor if there ever was one. At least Tonto on radio and TV was played by an Indian actor named Jay Silverheels (real name Harold J. Smith), who is dead and has lost popularity himself among Native Americans. We often lose popularity after we die, with the exceptions of Abraham Lincoln, James Dean, Marilyn Monroe and Jeremy Bentham. (You won’t find those four names in the same sentence very often.)

But enough Tonto talk. He’s on his way back, and that’s that. Take it or leave it.

I actually wanted to say a word about the Lone Ranger’s mask. Even more famous than the Phantom of the Opera’s mask, or The Scarlet Pimpernell’s for that matter, does anyone really believe that putting on a Lone Ranger mask, covering just the eyes and bridge of the nose, would disguise a person’s identity? Come on!

The scanty mask was not a problem on radio, but on TV the minute you saw the Lone Ranger you knew it was Clayton Moore, the actor who played him on the tube. That powder blue official Lone Ranger uniform helped.

Did they really expect us to believe that the outlaws who killed his Texas Ranger brother wouldn’t recognize him in THAT mask? I don’t think so. You’d think they’d have learned from raccoons. They have a similar band across their eyes and nobody mistakes them for, say, cats, except that woman in the TV commercial you probably didn’t see.

Not to take anything away from the Lone Ranger, who had a profound influence on my life. I listened to him on radio every day in my childhood. The program was often on the kitchen radio when we ate supper (now known as “dinner”) in my childhood home, stifling family conversations about the meaning of life and stuff like that.

The half-hour program always ended when the Lone Ranger has fought for law and order in some Old West town and rides off on his fiery horse at the speed of light crying “Hi-yo Silver, away” as some character like the local sheriff asks, “Who WAS that masked man?”

As if they didn’t know with that teensy weensy mask. Get real, sheriff.

Duluth's Tall Ships: Johnny Depp and more lore of the Bounty II

The nine Tall Ships currently in our Duluth Harbor have caused quite a flurry of activity in our town.

Everyone who lives here–and tons of tourists–have populated the Canal Park and harbor area just to see the ships. And no one is disappointed. It's festive and fun for everyone. While we only had three ships in port during the last Tall Ship event in Duluth, we now have nine vessels docked in the harbor. The crowds are big and everyone has a better shot at touring and seeing the ships with nine of them here.

One ship, however, has become the most popular, with long waiting lines to get on board. The popular Bounty II is the one everyone wants to see. It's a movie star, with Brando's "Mutiny on the Bounty" as it's first performance and many more recent roles, including Johnny Depp's pirate ship in those films. Guess there is a Johnny Depp look alike on board this visiting Bounty and he's causing quite a stir.

You can read more about the Bounty II history and learn more of its lore by checking out the link to today's  Duluth News Tribune site HERE.

And... if you want to pay $150 a night per person, you can travel with the crew as they complete their Great Lakes United Tall Ships Challenge by checking the Bounty site schedule for openings HERE.

The other ships also will book passage and you can check the Visit Duluth site HERE to learn more about those sailing experiences as well as catch all the updates on Tall Ships Duluth 2010 Festival.