Countrified Tom and Jerry

Pecos Pest, the 96th Tom and Jerry, made in 1953 and released in theaters two years later, was the last of this cartoon to be produced by MGM's Fred Quimby before his retirement. The singer is Shug Fisher, an Okie who was born in 1907 and enjoyed a long career as a comedian and country musician before turning to the screen in the 60s, appearing in Ripcord, Gunsmoke, and as "Shorty Kellums," a regular on The Beverly Hillbillies.

Bugs Bunny Does The South

The girls have broadened their tastes from Chilly Willy and Roadrunner to Tom and Jerry (161 episodes between 1940 and 1967) and the Merrie Melodies ouvre, which includes Bugs Bunny. I'm finding myself seriously getting into these. Tonight we hit on a few that were notable in their disdain for the South. Not exactly PC, but pretty damn funny nonetheless. There's a bit a few minutes into the 1950 Hillbilly Hare where Tuck & Punkinhead look for all the world like ZZ Top. The routine with Bugs calling squaredance steps is wonderfully cruel. In the second video,the 1953 Southern Fried Rabbit, he goes south of the Mason-Dixon line to mess with an unreconciled Civil War holdout. There's a scene where Bugs does blackface that's often removed, but I didn't find it nearly as offensive as some of the stuff I've seen in Tom and Jerry. In the next scene, he appears as Abraham Lincoln. and then later as Stonewall Jackson and Scarlet O'Hara. Awesome.

Tom, Jerry, Dick, and Larry

In case anyone wonders whether the cultural workers of the twenties and thirties were loaded on opiates, this should help them decide. Tom and Jerry was an early sound animation created over 1931-1933 that never quite made it to the big time. It's a little on the edgy side. The characters were renamed Dick and Larry in the forties to avoid confusion with the cat and mouse. Frozen Frolics (1930) is another, earlier, offering from the stoners at Van Beuren Studios

Smart Mouse, Mean Cat

This morning I was talking to one of our vendors, a pretty together sort of guy who's been sleeping out in one of Seattle's finer parks. Not surprisingly, many of the "higher functioning" homeless people opt out of the largely oppressive and chaotic shelter system for the independence of taking care of themselves. This, given that the shelters are packed to the rafters, winds up working for everyone.

Except the City, which has declared war on people like him, and last year unleashed a campaign of systematic harassment. This includes defining homeless campers as criminals, throwing away their stuff whenever possible, and portraying them as urine-soaked vectors of disease and the source of the international drug trade.

"They leavin' you alone," I asked?

"Nah. I'm playing cat and mouse with 'em. There's no traffic in the middle of the night, so when the cruisers come through with their spotlights I always hear them first."

"Nice, stayin' a step ahead. Haven't they got anything better to do?"

"They do. But that doesn't stop them. I'm OK, but I could really use a good night's sleep."