HossC

Another day, another obituary. Yesterday we lost Fleetwood Mac member and solo artists Christine McVie at the age of 79. She was one of eight members of the band inducted into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame in 1998. I've posted 'Songbird' before, but it was back in 2011, and out of my limited choice of one word song titles in her collection, it's the most well-known.

Carbon

So, the USA and England go through to the next round. The USA now play the Netherlands on Saturday, and England play Senegal on Sunday.

Next year in F1, Daniel Ricciardo returns to Red Bull as a reserve/test driver, while his place at McLaren is taken by 2021 Formula 2 champion and current Alpine reserve driver Oscar Piastri. F2 driver Logan Sargeant takes Nicholas Latifi's place at Williams. Nico Hulkenberg returns to F1 to replace Mick Schumacher at Haas. 2021 Formula E World Champion Nyck de Vries joins F1 to replace Pierre Gasly at Alpha Tauri. Gasly moves to Alpine to replace Fernando Alonso, and Alonso moves to Aston Martin to replace Sebastian Vettel. Driver line-ups at Red Bull, Ferrari, Mercedes and Alfa Romeo remain the same as this year. In other news, McLaren Racing boss Zak Brown has called for a change to the current driver qualification system to make it easier for IndyCar drivers to join F1 by employing a similar 'super-licence' system to Formula 2. It was also announced last week that next year's Chinese Grand Prix has been cancelled due to the country's Covid policies.

I've been a bit lazy reporting the last couple of races of the F1 season because the Drivers' and Constructors' Championships had already been decided. The season finished on November 20th, but it's taken me a week to post the review. Like last year, the final race of the season was in Abu Dhabi, but this time without the controversial ending. For the race, the top three teams qualified in pairs, with the Red Bulls on the front row, the Ferraris on the second row and the Mercedes on the third row. This year's champion, Max Verstappen, got a good start and never looked back, taking an easy win for a record-breaking 15th time in a season. Lewis Hamilton had a first lap incident with Carlos Sainz and great game of cat and mouse with Sergio Perez, but eventually had to retire with hydraulic issues. It's the first year of his F1 career where he hasn't had a pole position or win. Charles Leclerc held off Sergio Perez to claim second place in the race and the Drivers' Championship, and also secured Ferrari's second place in the Constructors' Championship ahead of Mercedes. A fair bit of the weekend's coverage was devoted to four-time World Champion Sebastian Vettel, who has decided to retire from F1. He managed to claim a single point for finishing 10th in his final race. You can watch the race highlights here.

MOROCCO Bound (Animated episode)

The list certainly has quite a few questionable entries. What I found weird is that the picture they used for #23 is a publicity shot of Joaquin Phoenix as The Bandit from the re-make 'Smokey and the Bandit Rides Again' which was originally due for release in 2020. As far as I can see, this reboot has disappeared without trace.

I never intended this to be a tribute thread, but it seems to be a good place to collect the tributes. I'd love to see more posts here of one word song titles by people who hadn't just died! Tonight I've just read that Irene Cara has died at 63, although the cause of death has not been released. Along with "Flashdance - What a Feeling", Fame is probably her best known song.

I'm not a big soccer fan, and I didn't watch last night's game, but while you can get thrilling 0-0 matches, I'd always prefer a few goals. You don't often get 5-5 draws - most matches a won by one or two goals. From what I've read, last night's game wasn't one of the thrilling ones, and the England players were booed of the pitch. BTW. Does US TV show each half of a soccer match commercial-free, or do they takes breaks during the play?

Well, it turned out to be a 0-0 draw. England now have to play their neighbors, Wales, while the USA play Iran.

Talking of 'Any goals in 2022?', the USA play England in the World Cup tomorrow night. It's now 56 years since England won the World Cup (we may mention it occasionally ), but we never stop believing!

Tom Hanks I deleted whatever weird code it was that you managed to post.

JAKE Rainey (Bootlegger in 'Moonrunners')

The great HAZZARD HAYRIDE

Ron FRIEDMAN (Wrote 'Dukes Meet Cale Yarborough')

It happens in some movies. If you look at the cast and crew of 'The Godfather', over half of the actors (mostly the ones without named parts) are uncredited. Paul Baxley was also uncredited as second unit director on 'The Godfather'. As you go down the crew list, most of the second unit, the art department, the sound department, the stunts, the camera and electrical department, the editorial department, the musical department, etc., etc. all go uncredited.

I've never looked into it before, so it's news to me. According to his IMDb page, his role as stunt coordinator on 'The Godfather' was uncredited. He was also stunt coordinator on other movies I like such as 'It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World', 'Coogan's Bluff' and 'Diamonds Are Forever'. I guess I can dig it, man!

AMY Creavy

The same joke the other way around appeared in the British prison sitcom 'Porridge' about 10 years later. 'Porridge' was remade in the US as 'On The Rocks' featuring Rick Hurst, so the joke may have been used there as well. I'm guessing that it's an old joke that both sets of writers incorporated into their scripts, rather than one copying the other.

That brings us to yesterday and the Brazilian Grand Prix from Interlagos. For many years, this was the last race of the season, but money has now taken that to the Middle East. It's also one of my favorite tracks, and didn't disappoint this year. For the third time this year, the starting grid was determined by a sprint race. Haas driver Kevin Magnussen took a surprise pole for that, but could only finish eighth. It was the resurgent Mercedes team that took first and third, split only by Carlos Sainz Jr who had a 5-place grid penalty in the race for taking a new engine. In the main race, Daniel Ricciardo clipped Kevin Magnussen on the first lap, and the resulting crash ended both of thir races and brought out the safety car. A couple of corners into the restart, Lewis Hamilton and Max Verstappen came together, leading to front wing damage and a 5-second penalty for Verstappen. Red Bull managed to change his tires and front wing in 10.0 seconds. Hamilton fought back up the field to finish second, but yesterday belonged to George Russell who took his first F1 victory and fastest lap. Sergio Perez, under team orders, let Max Verstappen by near the end to try and take the cars in front. When that didn't happen, Verstappen then refused to let Perez back past leaving Perez tied with Charles Leclerc for second in the championship with only one race left. With no Brazilian drivers in the field, the local crowd seem to have adopted the Mercedes team and particularly Lewis Hamilton as their favorites, so the one-two finish was very popular. The race highlights are here. Next week is the season finale from Abu Dhabi.

A week later, F1 moved to Mexico. Even at altitude, it proved to be another easy win for Max Verstappen. In taking victory, he also set the record for the most wins in a season with 14 (out of 20 at that time), although there are more races than there used to be. Mercedes kept up their newly re-found form with Lewis Hamilton finishing second again (albeit 15 seconds behind Verstappen) and George Russell in fourth. They were separated by Verstappen's team mate, Sergio Perez. Highlights of the Mexican race are here.

I haven't posted summaries of the last F1 races, partly because the Drivers' Championship has already been decided, and partly because the races have been in the Americas, so I've gone straight to bed when they finished due to the time difference. So here I make amends. First, the US Grand Prix from Austin on October 23rd. Ferrari's Carlos Sainz Jr took pole position, but Max Verstappen beat him away from the line, and then he got spun by George Russell at the first corner. This ultimately led to retirement for Sainz and a time penalty for Russell. Fernando Alonso got his car airborne after clipping Lance Stroll, but miraculously changed his front wing and battled back to finish seventh. Mercedes finally appeared to have a competitive car, but it wasn't quite a match for Verstappen's Red Bull. Up and down the field there were some good cat and mouse battles. In the end, Max Verstappen won to cement the Constructors' Championship for Red Bull. It was an emotional weekend for Red Bull as Dietrich Mateschitz, co-founder of the drinks company and driving force behind the F1 team, died the day before the race. Lewis Hamilton claimed second place and Charles Leclerc recovered to finish third. You can catch up on the race highlights here.

pie

Enos, the oldest VIRGIN in Hazzard County

TROUBLE at Cooter's