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"HEY!"  

UPDATE ON THE NEW ADDRESS OF MARY STU'S TAVERN

Okay, we have it straight from Angel Fire, the new home of the Tavern, even though we are still running in parallel here at Geocities. The domain name has been activated. It is not the domain name we expected. It is a Dot COM address, which took me by surprise. Anyway, if you think you will come to this place at least a few times every month, or maybe four or five times each year, you might want to make note of the address and bookmark it so you don't forget. It has been great here at Geocities. We don't really want to leave, but are forced to move to keep the site going for a while longer. When I came back here about a month after my mother's funeral, I was still debating keeping the site alive, or taking it down. When I found Yahoo was going to make the decision for me, that was too much. This was a decision for me, not a corporation. So, the Tavern was moved to Angel Fire. We hope you will stop by and visit sometime. It's been over eleven years. I couldn't keep up the updates for four of those years, but for good reasons. Something like this just can't be the most important thing in life. If it is, well, that's a PROBLEM, not a hobby or diversion. Saying that, I'll still do the best I can to make it as informative as the amount of news allows, and as entertaining as possible. We're going to add some other features in the future. Some of them will go off in different directions. There are other things in life and I want to show those to you, too. Anyway, here is the new address. Hope to see many of you there sometime.

http://www.marystustavern.com/index.html

ADDITIONAL ADVISORY REGARDING VISITS TO BARN DOOR PRODUCTIONS

I don't think the previous post about the address for MSM's production company, Barn Door Productions, was direct and explicit enough, so please read the following advisory about the sending of anything that can be defined as FAN E-MAIL at any address posted on the Barn Door Productions Site. I do not believe that the partners of Barn Door Productions want swamped with fan e-mail. That is a BUSINESS SITE, not a fan site like this one. It would be best if you DID NOT SEND ANY FAN-RELATED E-MAILS TO ANY ADDRESS THERE. Just stop in and see what is going on, what movies or TV shows they have in production, etc. If you have some kind of movie making skill or background, are a recent film school graduate and have some behind-the-camera skills, or have some other professional connection to the movie or television business, you might want to send an inquiry. If you are far enough along in film school to be in an intern program, you might want to send them something, but fan mail is probably not a good idea. Again, it is a BUSINESS WEB SITE, not a fan site. Use good judgment, consideration for others, and be CAREFUL out there.

PITTSBURGH PENGUINS----2

DETROIT RED WINGS----1

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE STANLEY CUP CHAMPIONS!!!

We know how the Penguins won. It was the caption under the photo of MSM at the top of this page that did it! That photo went up early in the playoffs. We put the "whammy" (as Bob Prince, late voice of the Pirates would say) on all the other teams in the playoffs. We never worried about it. HONEST! Maybe one of the Pens could take the Cup up to New York sometime this year. Those visitors who are Red Wings fans, your team played extremely well and have nothing to cause them to hang their heads. This site originates from Western Pennsylvania and I am a Penguins fan with no apologies. The Wings are a great hockey team, extremely well coached, and will be back in the hunt for the cup next year, I hope with Chris Osgood still in goal.

SPECIAL NOTICE

As indicated in the previous FYI page, now archived as FYI Archives 16, Yahoo is going to close down Geocities in the later part of 2009. I HAVE moved a working copy of this site to Angel Fire. I tried to load the site to Yahoo, but they did not register the domain, and it appears as if Yahoo's Web service is geared to small business operators only. Unless Angel Fire and the few other services offering home pages to the amateur Webmasters out there can make that system profitable, the age of the home pages might be over some day, but not today. The Tavern works just fine in Angel Fire's service, and we will have a domain name. The Yahoo-originated domain I cited in an earlier announcement was never registered as active. Without an active domain, it was impossible to access the pages for testing or editing. I had waited weeks for activation, and Yahoo told me it was activated. The Whois site at Internic had no record, so there was no domain. With the clock runnning on Geocities, I had to do something. I went to Angel Fire. This entire operation, from TWO uploads of all images and pages, one at Yahoo and the other at Angel Fire, along with testing and debugging took from this Monday until right now, about 8:00 PM Thursday, June 11, 2009. I don't think I want to go through this again. The domain at Angel Fire is not yet active, but here it is:

http://www.marystustavern.net

Wait for at least another five business days before trying it. There is only site work access at Angel Fire right now on non-public pages. Until Yahoo eliminates Geocities, you can still come here, but be prepared to move because I think the end might be coming in the next six-to-eight weeks. It has been great here at Geocities, but we have reached a fork in the road. As that sage, Curly Howard, would put it, "A fork in the road beats a spoon! Nyuk!, nyuck, nyuck!!"

 VISIT THE MARY STU'S TAVERN MUSEUM

I just love to flirt around something that would take a little search engine work to find, but somehow still miss it. You just miss the bullseye with the dart. On the Biography page, I described Barn Door Pictures without naming it, as the name was unknown to me. Basically, MSM is involved in a movie producing partnership with her brother Peter and Steve Weisman, one of the filmmakers behind THE FLORENTINE, a movie I enjoyed very much and defended on an earlier version of the FYI pages (see FYI Archives Number 16, "Don't Be a Supporting Role Whiner"). Barn Door Pictures is making "Tickling Leo," which is also mentioned on the Biography page. Barn Door is Ms. Masterson's production company, along with her brother and Mr. Weisman. It also has a website, which is accessed by the link below. This is going up on the Links Menu page, too. Wouldn't want any of you lost on the Internet. There are only so many Saint Bernards to go around, and I could use one of those little kegs they carry myself!

NOTE: There are e-mail addresses there. Let's be reasonable about sending unsolicited e-mails to people trying to run a business. Yes, people like to read nice things about themselves, but let's not spam anyone. It is more important to never "meet" anyone than to try and make a miserable impression doing it. Just take a look at the place, and see what Barn Door is up to. If you have a few comments, use good judgment before sending them! Thank you, and let's be careful out there.

Don't forget: Sometime over the next three months the address for this site will be: http://www.marystutavern.net. This is not a typo. There is no apostrophe s ('s) at the end of marystu. This announcement will be repeated as other postings take their place on top. The real important news, such as Ms. Masterson expecting her first child, her birthday, and the brief eulogy to the late author and Pulitzer Prize winner Horton Foote will be moved periodically to their rightful position near this one until this page is archived.

I dropped by the old Yahoo! MSM group to see if anything was being discussed there and there was a lone post from sometime yesterday that stated People.com was reporting that Mary Stuart Masterson is expecting her first baby sometime in October. Congratulations to Ms. Masterson and husband Jeremy Davidson. The article also jogged my memory. I got to see MSM act with Jeremy Davidson when Claudia Kehl and I saw them in "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" five years ago at the Kennedy Center. Mark Harmon just gave me a whack on back of my head for not remembering. "Wake up, Probie!!"

I just thought of a link that might be helpful to our Future Mom. For her convenience, it is right below:

HORTON FOOTE

My apologies for not discovering this much earlier. Horton Foote, author of such praised works as Two Kill a Mockingbird, The Trip to Bountiful, Lily Dale, 1918, and so many others passed away. I've experienced several of his works in both books and films, especially To Kill a Mockingbird, a personal favorite. There were several references to Mr. Foote on the FYI pages in past years, particularly after watching him being interviewed by Catherine Crier on Fox News back in 1999. It was the first lengthy interview of Mr. Foote I had watched, and couldn't leave my chair. In an era when it is more common for people to express hatred than love, Horton Foote's work stood as a contradiction to that modern affliction. We extend our deepest sympathies to his family and friends.

 

June 28th is Mary Stuart Masterson's birthday. I know it's early, but this idea was burning a hole in my cerebellum. We used to use the same "traditional" (lame) Web page greeting card year after year. Well, we're doing something different this year. No, it isn't a NEW (still lame) Web page greeting card. It is something a lot better. Anything has to be better than the equivalent of mailing MSM a birthday card, slipping into her place when she's gone, stealing the card back, then sending the same card NEXT birthday. This is one of the prettiest pieces of music ever recorded by the late Artie Shaw. It is called "I Cover the Waterfront." Like an earlier music link, this one will only be available for a short period, but this time it will be for two weeks, not one. Full length songs take up a lot of space in here. I'll have to delete it from the files, but will provide the source for where you can purchase the song on compact disc after the deletion. The new Yahoo address won't have this problem.

 Note: the link to playing the music was eliminated on the wiser thinking of a lawyer friend of mine, as noted in a posting below. What appears below is a link to AMAZON's page of the recording where it can be purchased. My apologies for not thinking before linking.

Yeah, I got interviewed again, shortly after the news that Yahoo gave me a domain name. This time I hid the tape recorder in the hula dancer centerpiece on my kitchen table.

One thing that might be done is the addition of one or more sub-sites that are linked to this one. One will be of digitized photos of some of the locations where my job has taken me, such as San Diego, San Francisco in California; Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Erie, Altoona; in Pennsylvania; Washington, DC and surrounding towns like Arlington, Manassas, Culpepper, and Winchester in Virginia, and many more. I have some nice pictures of the 1999 wedding of a close friend of mine that maybe some would like to see. So, the photos will be available through one small site. Oil City people and scenes might be in another site. We'll see what develops as I go through old photo collections and have them digitized.

No, this isn't the Museum page, but it just hit me that back in 2001, I sent the CBS Television Network a Favorite Site Award from here. This was back in the days when "Kate Brasher" was on the air, and CBS set up a nice site to promote the show. This site was the only one with the cheek to do that. Eight years later, CBS is still sending me e-mails about their new shows. Hey, hire the right actresses, and we'll do it again, even though they didn't post the award image and link back to us. That wouldn't have happened if Walter Cronkite and Lassie had still been working there!

The first news is that we not only have a large chunk of space at Yahoo, but they also got a domain name for us, so you won't have such a long address to bookmark. The new address is (I'll wait while you get something with which to write this down): http://www.marystutavern.net. No, I didn't spell it wrong. The apostrophe and s ('s) was left out as the domain name service would not accept a special character. Once again, for the few stragglers who have managed to find this place over the past six weeks or so, the new address of Mary Stu's Tavern will be:

Files will begin to get moved into the new location shortly. Since we will run in parallel for the next three months, you will be able to access this site at both Geocities and Yahoo when all the files are active in both locations.

Secondly, we were accepted as a site on the Internet Railroad. When I first started surfing the Internet, I found Erin B. Lillis' site, Fried Green Obsession, at AOL Hometown. The site is now in a new location as AOL whacked all of their sites with no prior warning to the owners. Back when she was on AOL, Erin had Fried Green Obsession on the Internet Railroad and I considered using the service for the Tavern, but never got around to it. Back then, we were swamped with visitors almost immediately. That is not true right now. Business is SLOW, but hopefully it will pick up. Anyway, the link to the Railroad is at the bottom of Site Central, right above the Counter image. There is a link to Erin Lillis' new Fried Green Obsession on the Links Menu page here. The front page of the older version of the site is in the Mary Stu's Tavern Museum. The page isn't exactly like it was then, but it is still a pretty page. Erin knows how to cook good pages.

Since I used to handle all of the finances for my mother as she was incapcitated with vascular dementia, I've been helping my sister, the Executrix of our mother's estate, by "marshaling the assets" of the Estate for my mom's old lawyer. I just met with him at 2:30 this afternoon on my way to my next job assignment. After concluding our business, he asked how my sister and I were doing. My sister is busy finishing up her academic year tasks as Chair of the English Department at a Pittsburgh area college, then going away for awhile with a couple of our female cousins. I was back at work, trying to catch up some personal things delayed over the past four years, and reviving an old Web site I let go during that period. The lawyer asked what had been updated on the site, and I told him how I set up my first music links, but could only have them up for brief periods because they take up too much storage space. That's when he asked, "Did you purchase a broadcasting license for the music?" Of course, I don't have such a thing, but he informed me that it would be necessary under copyright law as that is in essence what I am doing in here---BROADCASTING. The attorney went on to recite such legal principles as the "Walt Disney Rule" that copyrights materials up to, and not necessarily limited to, "seventy five years after the holder's death." He asked how much traffic I get here, and admitted not too much, as it was a "grave site" for four years. It was up, but not kept current since 2005. "Well, you might be all right to leave the link to the music there, as you are probably flying under the radar, but getting rid of it is best." To which I remarked, "I don't want to fly under the radar, I want to fly right." So, the music link under the announcement of MSM's birthday has been REMOVED. A link to where you can purchase the CD that includes the piece is in its place.

My apologies for not performing my due diligence. I have been more interested in being "more creative" than in being careful, and probably for reasons that have nothing to do with this Web site, but a lot more with wanting to keep busy and not do too much thinking about other things. At least that is what the lawyer thinks. I am not editing my screwup off of the page as there are some important legal and ethical concepts that we all need to learn on the Internet. Nothing drives the point home than someone saying, "Hey, I screwed up, and here's how." Just because something can be done doesn't mean you should do it. Make sure you are right first, then go ahead. I think Davey Crockett said that first, too, but it might be in the public domain by now!

 

Every once in awhile, people ask me questions about what I'm doing maintaining this Web site again after four years, among other things. I just happened to record one of these amateur interviews, and here are some of the replies to the more interesting inquiries.

This link is going up on the Links Menu Page today, too. There are all kinds of video tributes made by MSM's fans at You Tube, along with the telecast of "The View" in which she was the guest co-hostess. All the videos will keep you busy for awhile, but we have to call the History Channel's Mega Movers and get the Tavern moving to its new address before Geocities turns into a pumpkin. You can stop in for a beer, or pie and coffee, after you are done viewing. Tip the waitress! Oh, and don't try this with dial-up. They will find your cobweb-encased skeleton still waiting for You Tube to buffer.

 

 

 

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MARY STU'S TAVERN