Services are Monday on his roof

Walter Fredrick Morrison, who has been credited with inventing the Frisbee, has died at the age of 90, The Associated Press reports.

With no mononey down

A local car dealership's commercial proclaims: "FINANCINING AVAILABLE."

That dry cappuccino looks so natural....

USA Today reports that cemeteries and funeral homes across the nation are offering “environmentally friendly burials” that include “biodegradable caskets made of pine, wicker or even cardboard.”

Not a bad idea, but the paper quotes one Georgia man who might be a mite too enthusiastic:

“I’m trying to be more green in my everyday; why not be more green in eternity? I’ve actually thought about buying my casket and using it as a coffee table.”

Haven't I read this before?

Zelda Rubinstein, who played the psychic in “Poltergeist” (“This house is clean!”) died last week.

Sir Clement Freud, grandson of Sigmund Freud and a noted broadcaster in his own right (I remember seeing him with Jack Paar many years ago), died last April.

You might be hard put to come up with two people who have less in common than these two, but there is one bond that they indubitably share.

When I saw each one’s obituary, I had the same reaction:

I thought they’d already died. I was sure I’d heard they’d died.

But nope. To paraphrase Mr. Twain (who must be getting sick of being paraphrased, especially because, as far as I know, he doesn’t get paid for being paraphrased), my memories of their deaths are premature.

But how to explain it?

Is it some subcategory of déjà vu?

(Hey, look, my word-processing software automatically added those accents – both up and down! How cool! And yes, I’m a sucker for card tricks, too.)

How about “deja deceased”?

(Hey, wait a minute. Where are the accents this time? Does this software give only one set of accents to a customer? Or does it happen only when you type “déjà vu”? Ah, yes, that’s the answer.)

It’s quite possible – and quite possibly more than possible – that I’m the only one who thought these two were dead. (And it’s happened to me with other celebs, too.)

But am I the only one who has ever prematurely buried a celeb? (Come to think of it, with some of the celebs around today, that wouldn’t necessarily be a bad idea.)

Has this ever happened to you?

Or, to pose an even scarier question:

Are there people out there who think I’m already dead?

And do they know something I don’t?

This could explain a lot

When I want to take money out of the bank, I usually use ATMs. But when it comes to depositing checks, I’m still neurotic enough to want to deal with a live human being.

Not too long ago I went to a branch of my bank with a check and was waited on by a person identified by her nameplate as (name uncreatively changed to protect the innocent):

JANE DOE
PROFESSIONAL TELLER

I’ve been out of the daily journalism biz for some time now, but it seems to me that the biz news biz may be missing out on a big story here.

If the bank is taking pains to identify Ms. Doe this way, does that mean that (unbeknown to us all) the bank has been allowing amateur tellers to handle our money?

And if so, have these people been doing the job without pay and just for the “love” of handling money?

Does the bank have “pro-am” events, where the amateurs team up with the pros to process our transactions? Is there a banquet afterward? Is a trophy awarded to the amateur who has improved the most? (“This year Joe caused only three banks to fail, down from 16 in 2009!”)

Is it easy to tell amateur tellers from professional ones? I should think there would be some telltale signs:

They say things like: “Wow! I didn’t realize Benjamin Franklin invented $100 bills, too!”

They ask for your driver’s license and your high school graduation picture “because I always like to see how people change over the years!”

They count out your money and ask if you want fries with it.

Where has the year gone?

Imagine my surprise when, a couple of weeks ago, I happened to glance at this blog and notice that I hadn’t posted anything in a long time.

I’m sure some of you regulars – there might be two or three of you – thought that I was trying to get over an excruciatingly long New Year’s hangover. Which would have been a neat trick, considering that I’m a teetotaler. (Come to think of it, where did that word come from? Sounds like a job given to the lowliest of caddies at the pro shop.)

But this year is moving kinda fast. And … well … I might as well come right out and admit it …

I’m trying to adjust to the breakup of a longtime relationship.

Yes, I know, you’ve probably read far too many confessional blogs, blogs where the writer – to use a phrase from my younger years that now sounds quaint – “lets it all hang out.”

OK, OK. But I hope you’ll indulge me just once. And maybe you’ll understand. Chances are you’ve been through something like this yourself.

I am, of course, referring to my relationship with the pay phones of America.

For years, dear readers, I often fed a pair of quarters into these things so I could call people. Could be wrong, but I think I even remember the days when you only needed one quarter to do it. Maybe even one dime before that.

And for years I scoffed at the idea of getting a cell phone.

For one thing, I couldn’t understand why it was necessary for me to stay in constant potential contact with other people. There are times when I like being alone, thank you very much. And that’s not to mention my revulsion at the sight of people who walk down the street, talking on their phones, or looking up something on them. At best, they’re missing the world around them. At worst, they’re risking injury by being oblivious to other people – not to mention drivers, some of whom, of course, are talking on their cell phones, and at least a couple of these folks have nearly made mincemeat out of me (and a possible fortune in mincemeat for some lawyer) by almost running me down.

And then there are those cell phone contracts. My life is complicated enough, thank you very much again.

But then, about a year ago, my mind began to change, with (as per usual for me) the speed of your average continental drift.

I was in Brooklyn, at the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, when my airline needed to talk with me. Because the only number the airline folks had was the one for my home phone, they had to call there and get someone out of bed, and that someone had to leave a frantic phone message for me at my hotel room while I was cluelessly grappling with crossword clues downstairs.

It was then that I decided I needed a cell phone – at least by the time of the next tourney.

And not too long ago, someone pointed out the existence of cell phones that come without contracts and require only the occasional purchase of more time.

I was finally sold.

So, now that we’re well into the 21st century, I have finally jumped into the tail end of the 20th.

But it has been a bittersweet achievement, as I am reminded whenever I furtively file past one of my old pay phone friends at the mall. And it doesn’t in the least ease my conscience to know that even without my defection, their number is up.

At the (old) movies: 'Dressed to Kill'

Some notes from another meeting of the local cinephile society….

I should tell you right off that we’re not talking about the 1980 movie directed by Brian DePalma or the 1946 Sherlock Holmes film that share this title.

“Dressed to Kill” (Fox, 1941) stars Lloyd Nolan as detective Michael Shayne, whose cases were described in a series of novels and short stories that were published under the byline of Brett Halliday, which was the pseudonym of a guy named Davis Dresser. Dresser wrote many of Shayne’s exploits but eventually handed the detective over to ghostwriters.

As a mystery writer of some repute (if Roget will accept “some” as a synonym for “minuscule”), I’m ashamed to say I’ve never read a Shayne story. I suspect that unlike the works of Hammett, Chandler and Ross Macdonald, they’re out of print and available only in used-book stores, along with copies of a magazine bearing Shayne’s name that was published for many years.

The Fox film is one of a B series that also included the studio’s Charlie Chan and Mr. Moto movies. Director Eugene Forde was a veteran of the Chan films.

If “Dressed to Kill” is any yardstick, I’m sorry to say that the Shayne series is the least of the Fox mystery movie series. It’s like a car that starts out almost out of gas and eventually runs only on fumes, and in this case the fumes are provided by Lloyd Nolan, who seems to be trying his best to make this work as he looks in vain for the nearest filling station.

He’s not helped by various roadblocks put in place by the writers.

Early on, for example, Shayne finds two bodies in a hotel room – a double homicide. Is he horrified? Does his discovery whet his appetite for justice?

Nope – he’s delighted, because he can call one of the newspapers and give the editors a scoop in exchange for some cash. Not the most sympathetic lead character I’ve ever seen, though the screenwriters are kind enough to stop short of having him kick a baby down a flight of stairs.

But Nolan makes it work (barely) by playing such scenes for all their comic worth, even if “all,” in this case, turns out to be – what was that word again? – minuscule.

The plot also involves a murder device that is supposed to be ingenious but comes across as needlessly complicated, to the point where I was expecting the cops to issue an APB for Rube Goldberg.

Speaking of cops, one bright spot is Nolan’s nemesis, a police inspector played by William Demarest who is once again playing, well, William Demarest. And to me, there’s nothing at all wrong with that. (I have little patience with people who criticize some old-time character actors for playing the same characters each time. You want a William Demarest type? Who could do it better than old Bill himself? And in “Dressed to Kill” we are reminded once again that nobody did pratfalls quite like old Bill, bless him.)

The cast also features Mantan Moreland, who later played Chan’s chauffeur, in a stereotypical scene that aims to take comic advantage of his big, scared eyes but which these days induces cringes that could give the Richter scale a workout.

But there’s also Henry Daniell, villain extraordinaire, who is engagingly cast against type as a sort of doofus. (Something tells me that if you Google “Henry Daniell” and “doofus,” this might be the only hit you’ll get.)

Shayne, who is about to be married as the movie begins, manages to solve the case but lose his impatient fiancée, played by Mary Beth Hughes, one of the queens of Fox’s B movie lot.

By this time I had lost more than a little patience myself, but the movie wasn’t all that long, and the popcorn was good.