Mack Daddy Blows It

Mack's giving it all he's got for International Jazz Day, but he'd better take a breath before he passes out. I don't recall a lot of jazz references on the show, but I could definitely see a few of the characters as fans. Who on Daria do you think would be a jazz aficionado?

It was also on this day in 1803 that Thomas Jefferson signed the Louisiana Purchase. This nearly doubled the size of the country and was a big factor in the doctrine of Manifest Destiny. If you don't know what Manifest Destiny is, just ask Daria. She'll concisely and unemotionally sum it up for you!

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Labor Day, with a hi-di-hi-di-hi, and a ho-di-ho-di-ho!

It is supposed to be a major fashion "don't" to wear white after Labor Day, the reasons being unclear. As a Fashion Club reminder to the less fashionably aware, we give you Ms. Li, the principal of Lawndale High, in a white tuxedo. She will be today's Labor Day icon. (No representative student from Holiday Island High was available.)

Notice that Ms. Li is on a stage in front of a curtain, singing into an old-time microphone. Ms. Li actually appears here as Cab Calloway, the world famous jazz singer, dancer, orchestra conductor, and guest star in the 1980 movie, The Blues Brothers, where he sang one of the songs for which he is best remembered: "Minnie the Moocher." (Click the link and the white tuxedo-and-tails thing will become immediately obvious). He was also famous for "Hi Di Ho Man," which he sang with the Muppets (again in his white tux).

This is one of the older alter egos used on Daria for which no description was given, so it is up to extremely aged people like me to figure out what the secret cultural reference is. Those MTV animators were clever little devils, weren't they?

Speaking of Labor Day, Kara Wild noted in the introduction to one of her DWU fanfics that "All But Forgotten" and "Memory Road" take place during the Labor Day weekend. In another fanfic, Quinn Morgendorffer offers the following quote: "IF I were Jesus, I'd wouldn't wearing ANYTHING florescent this soon after Labor Day, that's just as blasphemous as wearing white shoes." Love that.

What would the HIH student known as Labor Day be like? Hmmm...

On another topic, while checking some of the links at left (in "The Daria Directory"), I found a few that were extinct. I've managed to recover them using the WayBack Machine and relocate them in the Blasts from the Past section. Version Daria, one of the great old supersites, has finally vanished. Few of the AOL ones that disappeared can be recovered, however. The Web is ephemeral. All things come and go. Alas! Anyway, if you notice a broken link, just let me know.

New PPMB Iron Chef: Sick, Sad Worldisms!

The Man Who Gave Us Bebop

Although the MTV website did not identify this alter ego as such, this is Mack Mackenzie posing as famed jazz trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie. (I thought that bent trumpet looked familiar.) Today is the 91st anniversary of Dizzy's birthday. Play some bebop jazz to celebrate.

This is also the 79th birthday of world-famous SF/fantasy writer Ursula K. Le Guin, who is quoted at the start of this fanfic. I read loads of her stuff when I was younger. Maybe Daria did, too.

This is also Apple Day. No, really. Look it up. This is the Holiday Island High kid who thinks he/she was cheated out of a better holiday theme by everyone else (i.e., Apple Day has become a "bad apple.")

Remember the jazz.