All My Children (Tuesday, April 24th, 2009)

My colleague and all-around groovy gal Michele Phillips is a huge fan of the ABC soaps, particularly All My Children. So at lunch yesterday, she was ecstatic when she told me there was a reference to Scranton on Tuesday's episode (March 24, 2009).

On Tuesday's episode, characters Randi Morgan (Denise Vasi) and Frankie Hubbard (Cornelius Smith Jr.) asked a minister at the Pine Valley Justice of the Peace to marry them. The minister said he could not because they did not have a witness, who was visiting someone in Scranton. Then Frankie's parents Angie (Debbie Morgan) and Jesse (Darnell Williams) arrived and offered to be the witnesses.

Last year, the folks at All My Children published a novel by character Kendall Hart titled Charm! that featured numerous references to the city of Wilkes-Barre.

All My Children airs weekdays at 1 PM on ABC, and repeats of the soap air weeknights at 8 PM on SoapNet.

A big thanks to Michele Phillips, one of my all-time favorite people, for this reference.

Web Sites About Wilkes-Barre Band The Buoys and Their Song "Timothy"

This posting is in reference to a previous entry on The Bouys, which originated in Wilkes-Barre and scored a hit song with 1971's controversial Timothy.

Greg M. Woodrow recently emailed me the following links that include some interesting information about The Buoys and Timothy:

"I came across your page, http://wb-scranton-movies.blogspot.com/2008/03/bouys.html, and saw your request for information about The Buoys, and their song, Timothy.

I have a website, The Last Standing Man (www.laststandingman.com), that details the career of Jerry G. Hludzik, one of members of The Buoys. My site contains pages specific to The Buoys, some of which you may (or may not) find useful.

Here are links to specific pages about Timothy, Rupert Holmes, and The Buoys:

Timothy's Time, by Jack Smiles - http://www.laststandingman.com/The%20Press%20Room/timothys_time_by_jack_smiles.htm

The Buoys, by John Chintala - http://www.laststandingman.com/The%20Buoys/The%20Buoys,%20by%20J.%20Chintala.htm

The Pina Colada Man, by Maxim Furek - http://www.laststandingman.com/The%20Press%20Room/pina_colada_man.htm

Casey Kasem Intoduces Timothy to America (contains the audio from American Top 40 where Kasem introduces Timothy in the countdown) - http://www.laststandingman.com/Casey%20Kasem.htm

Meet The Buoys, Part II, by Joe Middleton (I couldn't find Part I) - http://www.laststandingman.com/The%20Press%20Room/meet_the_buoys_-_pt_2.htm

The Buoys Have a National Hit, by Joe Middleton - http://www.laststandingman.com/The%20Press%20Room/buoys_have_national_hit.htm

The Buoys Discography - http://www.laststandingman.com/The%20Buoys/The%20Buoys%20Discography.htm

The Buoys Photo Pages (includes a page dedicated to Timothy related items)- http://www.laststandingman.com/The%20Buoys/The%20Buoys%20Photos%20Main%20Page.htm

I hope you find this information useful, or at least interesting.

Greg M. Woodrow
Press Chief"

A big thanks to Greg M. Woodrow for this collection of awesome links. His website, Last Standing Man, is truly incredible.

The MP3 for Timothy by The Buoys is available to purchase at iTunes. Timothy was also released on a CD compilation titled Have A Nice Day: Volume 6. To place a hold on the CD, click here.

Zombie00 by Brad Gooch (2000)

"It all started at the Everhart Museum."

This sentence begins the 2000 novel Zombie00 by Kingston native Brad Gooch, who recently released the criticially acclaimed Flannery: A Life of Flannery O'Connor.

Zombie00 is an avant garde novel about a strange young man from the fictional Truckstown, PA which, according to Gooch, is "located near Scranton." A visit to a mummy exhibition and voodoo chamber at the Everhart Museum inspires him to move to New York City, acquire the name Zombie, and ponder the issues of dominance and submission in his journey of "zombification." The novel has heavy themes of homoeroticism and sadomasochism.

The first three pages include many local references, in which "Zombie" journeys with his parents from Trucktown to the Everhart Museum, located in the nearby city of Scranton:

"It all started at the Everhart Museum. The way to the museum was blocked by a huge ugly fountain."

The second paragraph of the novel reads:

"The museum rose before us in a park called Nay Aug Park that never seemed quite right."

Page three decribes "Zombie" seeing the mummy at the museum for the first time:

"It was wrapped in bandages. I was amazed that Scranton, Pennsylvania was important enough to be entrusted with one of the ancient Egyptian dead. That made me feel a lot better about myself, since Truckstown was located near Scranton."

To place a hold on Zombie00, click here.

Brad Gooch, Author (1952 - )

Last week, on February 25th, a new biography about author Flannery O'Connor was released to enormous acclaim (from Library Journal to Vanity Fair to even O!), and it was also featured as the cover story of the March 1st New York Times Book Review with a glowing rave.

The title of the book is Flannery: A Life of Flannery O'Connor; its author, Brad Gooch, is a native of Kingston, PA.

Brad Gooch was born in Kingston, Pennsylvania on January 31st, 1952. He graduated Magna Cum Laude from Columbia College in 1973, and he earned his Ph.D. with honors from Columbia University in 1986.

In addition to being a freelance author, Gooch is a Professor of English at William Patterson University in Wayne, NJ.

Gooch's first books were a collection of short stories titled Jailbait (published in 1984) and biographies of 1980s pop stars Hall & Oates and Billy Idol, published in 1984 and 1985, respectively.

Gooch's first novel, Scary Kisses, detailing the ups-and-down of a male model, was originally published in 1988 and reissued in 2003. Coincidentally, Gooch also worked as a model himself, most notably for a print ad campaign for Chanel's Allure. His second novel, The Golden Age of Promiscuity, published in 1996, also dealt with beautiful people in pre-AIDS downtown Manhattan. Zombie 00, a novel about sadomasochism that is partially set in Scranton, Pennsylvania, followed in 2000.

Gooch's first serious biography of a renown author was titled City Poet: The Life and Times of Frank O'Hara, published in 1993. Other of his nonfiction works include 1999's Finding The Boyfriend Within and 2003's Dating the Greek God (both dealing with gay issues and relationships), and 2002's Godtalk: Travels in Spiritual America.

Gooch also regularly contributes to magazines including The Nation, Vanity Fair, American Poetry Review, Paris Review and Partisian Review.

To place a hold on Brad Gooch's latest book, the critically acclaimed Flannery: A Life of Flannery O'Connor, click here; to read the rave for Flannery from The New York Times Book Review, click here.

You may also place holds on other Brad Gooch titles that are in the Lackawanna County Library System, including Zombie 00 (which is partially set in Scranton), Finding The Boyfriend Within, and City Poet: The Life and Times of Frank O'Hara.

Merci Beaucoup to the forever-hip-and-happening Evelyn Gibbons for this reference.