Newsday TV Book, September 25-October 1, 1977.

From the previous post we jump back almost a year, to the first full week of autumn, 1977.

I was entering the third grade at St. Pius, and I think it was around this time that I saw an interview with O.J. Simpson in one of those kids' magazines--Dynamite, or Pizzazz, perhaps even Bananas--where he was asked what his motto was. If I recall correctly, it began "If it doesn't fit..." (Sorry, that was pretty hacky.)

I went to one of my brothers and asked what a motto was. He explained, and I immediately resolved: dammit, I need me a motto! I chewed it over for days, trying to determine the saying I had learned in my eight years on the planet that was most meaningful to me, and thus, useful words for all others to conduct their own lives by.
The motto I settled on?
"Don't shit where you eat."
Do not ask me how I arrived at this. My, what an odd boy. Anyway, back to the TV Book...

I must have looked at this cover (with Alan Alda and Talia Shire in the TV movie "Kill Me if You Can") a hundred times over the twenty or so years I've had the issue. It wasn't until I read the article by Bill Kaufman--which mentions that Alan Alda wore nose and dental appliances to play death-penalized Caryl Chessman--that I realized, oh yeah, that almost doesn't look like him! (Note that, in one of the photo captions, they identify Alda as his dad.)
(Click on pics to clarify the text.)

TV Line not only addresses such perennial mysteries as the Harry/Henry Morgan conundrum, whether Schnozzola was sick or what, and the pleasing distribution of Barbi Benton's spatial volume, it also lists the TV Book's editorial staff (including the 21-year-old daughter of reviewer John Cashman).

When I read over the Sunday listings of yesteryear, I always think to myself, "Man, the programming was so much better in those days!" Realistically, however, I suspect most of these shows would put me to sleep as expeditiously now as they did back then.

Here's some of Sunday night's schedule, with an ad for the Chessman movie, and a close-up on the ABC Sunday Night Movie, The Longest Yard. It was never missed by me or my Pius peers, and Monday's recess was spent imitating our favorite scenes, delightedly parroting the censored lines ("I think you broke his freakin' nose!").

Here's Monday afternoon, mostly for the diet pill ad cheesecake (and the Genovese Super Drugs logo). The amphetamine found in the pills is now mainly used to help dogs with incontinence.

Amidst Monday's listings is this full page ad for Dinah!, prime time on WPIX channel 11, with a stellar Vegas line-up.

Yes, I am compelled yet again to include the Noseless Preggo of Dan Howard's Maternity Factory Outlet. She's seen here in an outfit worn by every knocked-up, smocked-up 70's kindergarten teacher.

I include Tuesday evening for the tantalizing fare featured at the Blue Dolphin of East Farmingdale, a restaurant at which you could "eat your way through Italy." Apparently their "Neopolitian-Seafood" offerings were not to the area's liking, as I can't exhume the first thing about them from the vast internet graveyard.

I present now all of Friday, with the morning listings accompanied by a bakery ad that raises several questions. The first, which I've asked before: is there a reason it's called "Laurette Pastry's" and not "Laurette's Pastries"? But this particular ad also makes me wonder: did they really think reducing the font size halfway through the line
"AT A PRICE YOU CAN AFFORD to go out of your way for!"
would, like, fool somebody or something?

Also, I looked up the servings of a half sheet cake, here quantified as 30-35. I found a range of answers (with the most common being around forty), from 18 to... 108?!? I'd say either someone doesn't know what the hell they're talking about, or there are a lot of disgruntled First Communion party attendees milling around with a sliver of raspberry cream vanilla sponge cake that's slightly thicker than the Dixie plate it's smeared on.

The afternoon programs are listed beside an ad that's rare in my collection. The Cleveland Hair Clinic seems at first glance to be offering transplantation that's affordable because it is done one cranial hemisphere at a time. (Nope, a closer look reveals that's "before" and "now" portrayed simultaneously.) The other ads I've seen for the CHC (not to be confused with the world-renowned Cleveland Non-Hair Clinic) have school teacher Ken Kotula's likeness sporting a full head of genuine ersatz follicles.

I have addressed the U & Me Haircutters ad previously, with its depiction of an unkempt Gordon Lightfoot (if he was addicted to a canine incontinence remedy).

The shows of the Saturday morning schedule are of an era when anything that didn't air on ABC was a mystery to me, one which I simply presumed to be inferior. Hey, I got my Superfriends, Laff-a-Lympics and Krofft Supershow '77--go piss up a rope, Space Academy!

At one in the a.m., stoners, Monster Kids, and stoned Monster Kids were forced to choose between Frankenstein (the Karloff classic) and The Mummy (not the Karloff classic).

I'm not 100% certain that the reviews of the Cable TV (that is, HBO) section are all by John Cashman (as opposed to the regular Newsday Movie critic Joseph Gelmis) but most sure sound like his voice.

A few ads for ya... The SmokEnders program promised an end to the "agony of cold turkey withdrawal." Oh yeah, it's brutal--I suffered that when I gave up Thanksgiving leftovers!
Btw, Plainview shout-out: Midway Jewish Center, woot-woot! (Although I think that was actually in Syosset, as implied. Whatever.)

The Westrock Beef ad is nearly ubiquitous in the TV Books of the seventies, but I usually skip scanning them. This one, however, has a cool-looking, full-page Black Angus and a large lariat logo, with the featureless WB Cowboy riding a horse that appears to be wearing stylish slacks.

Today is the first day of autumn and the weather instantly complied with an even-colder-than-average forecast--so look for appropriately crisp and chilly, pumpkin-spiced October posts, coming soon!

In the meantime, kiddies, remember: Don't Shit Where You Eat!