September 20, 2025
Rip Taylor is a classic comedian whose career in show business spans over 50 years.
He is known to many as the king of confetti for his trademark act of throwing confetti into the audience. First gaining initial prominence as the crying comedian on the Ed Sullivan show, he has worked on various TV shows including the Jackie Gleason show, the Monkees, Sigmund and the Sea Monsters, the Gong Show as well as on stage broadway and Las Vegas.
If I still believed the things I was told when I was a teenager, barely able to distinguish truth from fiction, I would be as cranked up about a vast liberal conspiracy to control my every action, take my guns away, and teach my offspring to be sexual deviants as the vast majority of Americans. Actually, that’s not exactly correct.
Since the election of Donald Trump, I have been haunted by aphorisms. Nothing happens in a vacuum. Everything is connected. There are no accidents. Life is but a dream.
If you have been paying attention—and if you haven't, shame! There will be a quiz at the conclusion of this installment — you know that around this time last year I wrote an epic poem…
For many it remains an open question whether the tricentenary of one of J. S. Bach’s most famous tunes—or, to be more precise, the work that eventually spawned that tune—should be a moment of celebration…
London — ‘Tis the season to think about the next season. Before letting the wave of Christmas gifts crash of over their heads and/or into the digital stockings, and before undertaking their own yuletide retail…
For over a month now, at least half of the nation has been suffering from PTSD: Pre-Trump Stress Disorder. Our nation has self-inflicted a very serious sickness - actually, a relapse of a recurring, chronic, ugly syndrome. And when Patti Smith, standing in for Bob Dylan at the recent Nobel ceremony, sang his "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall," I could only think, Alas, yes indeed.
