GOOD, BAD AND UGLY, AND WE MEAN THAT IN THE BEST WAY

The piercing eyes. The big mustache. The even BIGGER gun. These images come to mind when you think of actor Lee Van Cleef.

Clarence Leroy Van Cleef Jr. was born in 1925 in New Jersey, of parents of Dutch ancestry. While performing in a touring theater company’s production of “Mr. Roberts”, Van Cleef was discovered by Stanley Kramer, who cast him in High Noon, and Van Cleef was officially on the map. He is perhaps best remembered as a badass in spaghetti westerns such as For a Few Dollars More, and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.

Van Cleef also overcame three accidents—two by fate, one by birth—that most people would probably never notice unless they were pointed out. He lost a kneecap in a car accident, but recovered sufficiently to ride a horse again; another accident took the last joint of his middle finger; and colored contact lenses disguised the fact that he was born with one blue eye and one green eye.

Lee Van Cleef died in 1989, at the age of 64.

SOME THINGS I’D LIKE TO SEE GO AWAY SOON

We all suffer from occasional iconic overload. Here are some things I've had more than enough of.




Ikea. Besides the cheap, spindly furniture, they gave their employees bikes, instead of money, as holiday bonuses. Nothing against bikes, but that’s what your parents and Santa are for. To add insult to injury: the bikes required assembly.

“Jersey” anything, and The “Real” Housewives of anywhere. Seriously, do you actually know anyone like that? Oh, and a fake orange tan after Labor Day? Fail.

S#*! My Dad Says. The Twitter page was hilarious for about 20 minutes. When will people learn: Hollywood ruins everything.





Those little white decals, of a nuclear family or some spinoff of Calvin & Hobbes, on the back windshield of cars and vans. It’s not cute if everyone’s doing it. Honorable mention: “Baby On Board” signs. They make people want to intentionally rear-end you, just to knock some reality into your brat in the back seat.

Radio Personalities. Besides the two words being mutually exclusive, aren’t we just over that as a form of entertainment? Isn’t it time for that to just retire, like movie theater Newsreels and carnival barkers?

 “Lazy-Folks” gadgets and products. Admit it, some of you actually bought Snuggies. You know who you are.

Auto-Tune, and every recording artist who relies on it. Getting rid of that alone will thin the herd considerably.





The Palins. All of them. Except Michael from Monty Python.

Constantly being asked to care about water on Mars, the reproductive habits of celebrities, or what Oprah thinks you should be reading. If you honestly believe Oprah has time to sit down and read entire books, please send me a color postcard of your home planet.



 

Lady Gaga.






“American Idol”, “America’s Got Talent”, or any other American no-talent show that promotes glorified Karaoke, with people whose musical “training” has entailed standing in front of a bedroom mirror, singing into a hairbrush.

The recent mushroom-like proliferation of Classic Rock radio stations in major Metro areas. Classic Rock Station? Fine. Five or six of them within a 3-county area? C’mon… how much ZZ Top are you nostalgic for?





People getting famous for having multiple-birth families. It never ends well. Did we learn nothing from the Dionnes?





What did I leave out? Feel free to add to this list. (pleeze keep it G-Rated tho.)  :)