Erin's Journals

Just a thought… This too shall pass. When things are bad, remember: It won’t always be this way. Take one day at a time. When things are good, remember: It won’t always be this way. Enjoy every great moment. [Doe Zantamata]

I’m sorry there’s no written journal today – if you go to the video version you’ll understand why. You’ll find it on my Facebook page or on YouTube. And for the folks who don’t have speakers (I hear from one kind lady) just hit the CC under the YouTube screen and you should be fine.

I messed myself up skating yesterday. Fortunately, you can’t see the injury and neither can I. So don’t be squeamish – come in for a laugh and stay for the pathetic story. And have a safe and healthy weekend.

Just a quote… What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered? [Groundhog Day]

Yeah, it’s just a bit too true to be funny, but here we are. For a video version of today’s blog go to my Facebook page or YouTube.

Hey, welcome to February. I don’t really care what some rodent does tomorrow; unless it comes up wearing a mask, it’s really kind of out of tune with what’s going on in the world. And, honestly, why would you wake someone up who’s lucky enough to be sleeping through all of this, anyway? Let him get his beauty rest.

You might as well ask a raccoon for the lottery numbers. Makes about as much sense, whether you’re talking to Wiarton Willie, Punxsutawney Phil, Shubenacadie Sam…or whatever moniker they’re going by.

I don’t know if you’re like me, but I love to greet someone by their name. If you were ever on a listener trip with me, you’ll know that I studied names and pictures on the flight to our destination so that I’d have every listener and their travel partner’s name memorized by the time we landed.

It didn’t work every time – like if a couple wasn’t together and I had committed Mark with the mustache: Mustache Mark…Mork and Mindy…Mark and Mandy!­ to memory. It was all about association and, much of the time, it worked.

Why go to that trouble? It comes back to some wisdom a sales manager once told me – something that I think originated with Dale Carnegie, the self-improvement and public speaking guru – that went like this: “There is no sweeter sound to one’s ear than the sound of his name.” Perhaps this is truer in sales than anywhere else, but it was a nugget of gold that I tucked away as just another way to connect with people.

I do this a lot in my real life – whatever that is these days – although I do question it sometimes. I call servers by their names if they introduce themselves. If a cashier at the grocery store wears a name tag and I have a question or want to thank her, I’ll use her name. Especially to thank her these days.

I was talking with my son-in-law and his wife a few weeks back and asked how the person on the receiving end of their name feels about it. Both seemed rather lukewarm; they said it depended on the tone with which the person was using it. I get that; as a couple who’ve both worked in the food hospitality business, I’m sure that there have been plenty of rude or implacable customers who have connected Phil or Brooke’s names to a complaint or some snark. And that’s unfortunate.

Tone can also be used to imply that the person on the receiving end is somehow lesser than the one who’s speaking it. That pains me even to write, but you know it’s true because there are a lot of jerks out there who don’t recognize that a human being is serving their coffee or reaching out the drive-thru window in sub-zero temperatures or reminding them to please keep their grocery bags on the little pull-out shelf and not in the area where the items that have been rung through are sitting (of which I was guilty yesterday – thank you, Anna, for pointing that out).

Anyway, Phil and Brooke’s opinions were valuable, but I’ll never stop saying someone’s name, in hopes that my efforts land softly, as they’re intended.

One time I did it, and caused some all-out laughter. I was in a liquor store and the woman serving me had on a name tag. As she rang my purchases through, I looked at her little plastic plaque and said, “Oh, BYID! Is that Welsh?”

“No,” she replied, “It means Bring Your ID.”

OMG we laughed. That was just classic me: best intentions, but putting my foot in it. We’re still laughing – ’cause these days, you have to, right?

Have a great day – thanks for coming by. And we’ll be with you here again on Thursday with another journal.

Just a thought…  Let whatever’s going to happen, happen. Don’t judge it before you do it. Sure, sometimes it will be terrible, but sometimes it will just be amazing. That’s where the gold is. [Cloris Leachman]

As always, you can watch a video version of this journal here on Facebook or here on YouTube.

I want to share with you a memory that I have of some time spent with a very special woman. In a later time, she could have been one of those stars known by just one name, like Gwyneth or Meryl. She’d have simply been Cloris.

The brilliantly funny multi-award-winning actress Cloris Leachman left us at age 94 yesterday; she died in California of natural causes and I’d love to think she had a sweet little dog curled up at her side.

By today you will have heard or read many tributes to the actress whose exceptional talents garnered her an Oscar for her role in The Last Picture Show, and an astounding 22 Emmy nominations, with nine wins. For many of us, she’ll always be Frau Blücher in Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein or Mary Tyler Moore’s landlady, Phyllis Lindstrom. Her career continued well into her late years, with regular and, of course, spectacular sitcom work. Cloris Leachman was one of a kind. With the emphasis, I can tell you personally, on “kind.” 

I’d like to share something with you. In my radio days, there were plenty of stars – rising, current or fading – who came through the studio doors and were promoting their work: a play, a new movie that didn’t have a big budget, a fresh single or album. For the most part, those people came to play and were warm and wonderful guests. The general rule was that the bigger they were – Katy Perry, Ted Danson, Lynda Carter – the nicer they were.

There were a few notable exceptions like John Mayer, who was snarky and cynical, Blue Bloods‘ Donnie Wahlberg, who was heard at the elevator snarling “get me the F outta here” and Gary Sandy (who played program director Andy Travis on WKRP in Cincinnati) – he didn’t want to talk about the well-loved TV show that made him famous. I wanted to say, “Yes, but please DO tell me about the door-slamming farce you’re doing at a dinner theatre and for which we’re giving you free promotion….” 

The good guests FAR outweighed the bad; Sandy’s WKRP cast-mates who played Mr. Carlson and Herb Tarlek were a delight, Young Frankenstein bombshell Teri Garr was wonderful to shoot ads with, as was Gilligan himself, Bob Denver. I’ve got so many memories of stars I grew up watching who turned out to be just lovely in person.

photo courtesy Toronto Star

Cloris Leachman, though, was in a class all her own. Funny, sassy, dirty, sweet and, oh, so talented. This was back in about 1999 and she was in Toronto, probably doing theatre somewhere on Yonge Street, and was booked on my Rogers Cable show. You may not remember it, but, yeah, I had a TV show for two years on channel 10 back before we had a million choices and I’d joke that you had to pass by our channel to get to something better. The ratings were good and, although it was all hands on deck, Rob and I worked as a team and with a great team to make it just the best it could be.

One night we had Ms Leachman booked as a guest. She came into our studios and was as nice as you could hope as she settled into the makeup chair. But as she emerged onto our set, she made a detour to where we had a beautiful baby grand piano set up. Cloris sat down and started to play the most gorgeous rendition of Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” I’ve ever heard. Our jaws dropped. I called out to our volunteer crew, “Please tell me we had a camera rolling!” but we didn’t…and I didn’t have the nerve to ask her to wait until we could set up lighting and a camera to try to capture the moment again.

We had no idea that Ms Leachman possessed such talent and thus it was a little gift, a moment she gave to those of us who were lucky enough to be there that was unforgettable. Then she got up and walked over to where I put on her mic as we cooed over the sweet little shih-tzu on her lap, and we were treated to a warm and friendly chat that went on for half an hour. 

Somewhere in a basement bookcase among all of the VHS tapes saved of the two years’ worth of shows we did (do not ask me why!) the Cloris Leachman episode is hidden. You’ll just have to take my word for it – it was wonderful. Or do what I did, and click here to find an episode where Phyllis learns that her Lars is having an affair with Happy Homemaker host Sue Ann Nivens (Betty White). It’s worth a watch. 

Enjoy your weekend and we’ll talk to you in February. Yes, Monday is February. We’re getting there.

Just a thought… Having kids – the responsibility of rearing good, kind, ethical, responsible human beings – is the biggest job anyone can embark on. [Maria Shriver]

Welcome in, and today I have a treat for you. Last week, CNN’s Daniel Dale, whose job, thanks to his work at the Toronto Star, has been to tally the lies of politicians (with one in particular) wrote a personal piece about what the last four years have been like. It’s here if you’d like to read it, and I recommend that you do.

Daniel Dale cut his journalistic teeth in the Rob Ford era in Toronto politics. When he started paying attention to the lies coming out the former resident of the White House, CNN beckoned him to come to DC and work for them.

Watching him grow into the role has given me a strangely motherly sense of pride and it turns out I’m not alone: responses to @ddale8 and his piece last week included a lot of “Twitter moms” who have been worried about him.

So it occurred to me to reach out to his REAL mom via Twitter. She offered me a chance to connect to Daniel himself, but I wanted a mom-to-mom conversation, which you’ll hear today.

You can follow her @JennieDale24. She’s a delightful woman who shares her perspective on her son’s meteoric rise and who has her own message to impart about dense breasts and their link to cancer (densebreastscanada.ca in case you don’t listen all the way to the 14 minute mark of our chat and hear what she has to say).

But it’s an important piece of information that Jennie knows first-hand, and it follows a talk filled with light and laughter (how DID a kid who went to business school end up in show biz, anyway?) as though we were two friends sitting down over coffee. Grab your beverage of choice and listen in – and I’ll be back here on Thursday.