Sybil Bruncheon's "True Tales Of Tinsel Town":

Jane Fonda, of course, won the Oscar for playing Bree Daniels, a call-girl trying to be an actress in the mystery/thriller KLUTE (1971). Set in NYC it was directed by the great Alan J. Pakula... I, on the other hand, was offered the low-budget slapstick sequel called KLUTTERMAN (1973)... set in Boca Raton and directed by Moe Howard… yes, that Moe Howard, of Three Stooges fame. I was cast as Bris Danielovich... a female rabbi with a fabulous recipe for calamari... Confusion and merriment ensues!!

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A Christmas Special on PBS!!!...

...it's the famous Christmas Special, EBENEEZER & DRACULA MEET FROSTY THE ABOMINABLE SNOWMAN & THE HANUKKAH GHOUL (1962). A holiday screwball comedy-horror romp starring Rathbone, Price, Lorre, Karloff, and featuring Christopher Lee as Prancer, Peter Cushing as Mr. Potter, Lon Chaney, Jr. as Hermey the Misfit Elf, and Sabu as Tiny Tim.... with Angela Lansbury as Mrs. Santa Claus, Yvette Mimieux as Little Dorrit, Linda Hunt as the Mistletoe Monster, and Herve Villechaize as a plum pudding...ON FIRE!!. (This program is made possible by the George and Mary Bailey Very Charitable Trust… and by contributions to your PBS station from Viewers .....Like YOU! Thank You!)

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Sybil Bruncheon’s Solstice Silliness!...

Well, here it is Facebook Friends!! The Winter Solstice! Which, after all the scientific explanations, means that the days will begin getting longer, and the nights will get shorter. I KNOW it's CALLED "The First Day of Winter, but more accurately it should be called "MID-Winter".... so! Even though we've got months of shivering ahead of us up here in the Northern hemisphere, it is SOME consolation to know that in a wide variety of cultures and civilizations, this was the day that reassured the ancients that Spring would be coming soon!.... well, ....soon-ISH!

...And as for our friends in the Southern hemisphere, isn't it strange to imagine that they think of December, January, and February as "get-to-the-beach-days", "bikini weather", and "sunburn season"??? Good Heavens, I just realized, what "season" are they actually experiencing?? Do they call it "Summer" down there...or does the word "Winter" mean piña coladas, cabaña & bañana boys, grass skirts, and coconut brassieres to them?!?.....I must find an old issue of National Geographic and find out!!

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Sybil Bruncheon's "HEALTHY HINTS for the HOLIDAYS!"...

Darlings! Are you losing the weight-losing battle on the Thanksgiving-Christmas battle-field? Yeah, me too!! SO!...

...I've started my own special diet with the help of Dexter, my 8 year old nephew, and the nice Fisher-Price Toy people. Instead of snacking on cheeses, crackers, and calorie-loaded capicola, I've gotten this delightful set of plushy treats with their luxury faux-marble accessories and serving utensils. An afternoon mixer with some of Dexter's Cub Scout pals, a pitcher of extra-dry martinis (with REAL olives, please!) and the usual craft & badge chat fueled by cocktails and a poly-rayon charcuterie, and you have a perfect guilt-free solution to the diet dilemma. (The bouclé brie was particularly brilliant!)

And after the party, toss the martini glasses in the dishwasher, and throw the snack-set-up into the laundry hamper. Warm wash and tumble dry!… and no softener required. Put the "cute" back into char-CUTErie!! And I simply adore Dexter and his friends. We arranged flowers for the centerpiece, chose fabrics and a corsage for my Mrs. Santa Claus outfit, and compared recipes for a cotton and cashmere Christmas turkey and felt stuffing. I especially liked the polyester yams with corduroy marshmallows. YUM!

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Sybil Bruncheon's MORE THAN THEY SEEM STORIES... “What She REALLY Wants For Christmas!!"…

Mandy Fletcher had always dreamed of being a perfect wife! She had made her first wedding gown and veil at 4 years of age out of twelve rolls of toilet paper!... the luxury brand! And when she finished high school and had been the president of both the Home Economics Club and the 4H Regional Housekeeping Arts & Sciences League, she passed on going to college for a business degree. Nope. It was marriage to her sweetheart Jim Cambridge from the Cambridge Grain & Feed fortune.

Sad though that like many wives in 1954, her marriage began to stale… no matter how hard she tried to keep it fresh, exciting, and new. Some of her girlfriends would commiserate over martinis and bridge; Jan Calber made sure that she and Calvin took at least one separate vacation a year, often two or three, and hers were to Paris, Rome, or the Caribbean, and 5-star all the way. Helen Lort had a large and growing collection of the astounding jewelry that Larry added to on even the slightest occasions. Helen often said that “diamonds indeed are a girl’s best friend!”. And Penny Fretser was known for her incredible wardrobe and the new Cadillac convertible, both of which were updated every Fall, and often coordinated so that she looked like a magazine cover when she’d arrive at the club for afternoon mixers!

All of her friends seemed to be in the strange thrall of that 1950s glazed-eye thing that science fiction films hinted at and the politicians warned about as a conspiracy of some sort from overseas. But Mandy genuinely and deeply loved her Jim. And being so basically warm-hearted and genuine in her simple needs and dreams, she didn’t care about diamonds, furs, fancy cars or faraway places… or being far away from Jim, even though his business trips seemed to be getting more and more frequent and lasting longer and longer. Still, Mandy stayed as cheerful as possible, cooking, cleaning, and making their home a Midwestern showplace just like she had promised the world (and herself!) back in Home Ec. and the 4H Club. Perhaps that’s why, finally, after several years of the same dour grind of her marriage, she awoke one Christmas morning to a present that meant so much more to her. Jim was away for an extended time again and wouldn’t be back until some time in mid-January… or later. And Mandy couldn’t figure out how the present had gotten inside the house or under the tree… but there it was. Sparkling new as if it had been dropped from a fancy showroom window at Macy’s right into her own little suburban living room… The Hoover 28!... with all the latest attachments and tools… and a Moth-omizer.

Mandy sat there on the floor, her bright blue eyes beginning to prick with happy tears, her smile so wide that it actually hurt her dimpled cheeks. And she thought about what Helen and Penny had told her about wives who are abandoned for weeks on end by their husbands and what they do about it. And she remembered that Jan had invited her to go away on a camping vacation with her some time soon, and maybe they’d plan it at a bridge party or barbecue that Mandy could throw for all of them… and wouldn’t that be nice.

And so, on that December 25th in 1954, Mrs. Mandy Cambridge née Fletcher of 1250 Elco Drive, knelt on her living room carpet by the perfect Christmas tree, taking each attachment and tool out of the Hoover 28 packing, reading their descriptions and possible uses, and marveling at what the Moth-omizer might be for, or what it might be used for. The world suddenly seemed oh-so-bright!... because Santa had indeed been very good to Mandy.

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Holy Hilarity & Seminary Silliness!":... that heavenly glow...

Sister Bridget saw MOMMIE DEAREST on the Late, Late Show and remembered when nice Joan Crawford put her face into the sink full of alcohol and ice to make her skin so beautiful. So she and the girls took a barrel of the vintage chablis and... well... it was the Mother Superior's birthday!

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Holy Hilarity & Seminary Silliness!": ... a disturbance out front...

"Take that, Lucifer! Thou disguisest thyself as a holy sister, but thou art nothing more than a penguin in spectacles and comfortable shoes! I banish thee from our Bingo Hall with this snow made from Holy Water!"...

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Didja Know??"... all about Hummels; Part 1…

Did you know that all Hummels are in fact just stale, very stale German cake frosting that are quite edible... after they've been soaked for a few days in a combination of hot Earl Grey tea and two drops of kerosene! They come in a variety of interesting, entertaining, and even instructive shapes and formats! "The 8 Year Old Milk Maid & The Rough-Handed Blacksmith", "The Prepubescent Pirate & The Nun With The Torn Wimple", "The Candle-Maker Makes His Wick Hot", "The Lonely Bearded Lady & The Overly Friendly Goats", and "Fritzi Reads The Paper While Making A Boom-Boom" are particularly tasty. Just bite off a hoof or a buttock and ENJOY!!!

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Sybil Bruncheon's "Tales From Christmases Past"... Little Bethena Wilkers...

Little Bethena Wilkers!... she had always been at odds with other little girls in the Sister Stephanata Bryerly School that she attended. Instead of classes in cooking, sewing, and home-making, she preferred mathematics, geo-sciences, and physics.... indeed, it was only because her grades were so consistently excellent that the faculty voted unanimously to allow her to take both advanced classes in the subjects she preferred and that she be allowed (chaperoned, of course!) to go to the adjoining St. Athanaseus Boys Academy for them since most of these subjects were not even offered to girls at that time.... 

Bethena thrilled (in her family's case) and confounded (in the boys' case) with her academic brilliance. She completed trigonometry, algebra, geometry, and advanced calculus all by the time she was 11, and she received statewide accolades at science fair competitions with her highly controversial inventions and displays... including on that one particular Christmas in 1930. 

She had decided to create, in honor of her hardworking mother, the Fully-Portable Happy Holiday Home-Maker, a device which allowed "the modern woman to create all the cheer and festivity of the Christmas Season while still maintaining a hygienic home and providing delicious and nutritious meals" as the promotional brochure stated...and it worked! It was a little itchy, especially under the arms, and the zipper placement still had to be finessed, but the blueberry muffins came out of the built-in oven/dishwasher perfectly with the lovely crusted sugar sprinkles on top and the requisite 26 blueberries in each muffin. And the refrigerating unit neither over-chilled the grapefruit juice into slush, nor under-froze the cranberry-papaya sherbet into goop.The washer/dryer/six-burner stove was inspired, and the fold-away formica counters were immaculate and didn't interfere with the vacuum or silver-polishing attachments. The placement of the appliances around the body of the wearer was still in need of some strategizing, but the Christmas lights twinkled merrily, the garlands of popcorn came out of the popper perfectly, and the ornaments remained on their hooks without dropping even when the roller-skate motor was throttled up to full speed...three miles per hour....and faster if you were doing a triple axel, triple toe loop. The one setback was when some tinsel drooped into one of the roller wheels, and little Bethena tripped and spilled the Baked Alaska onto the reviewers' table. "Flammable Foods" had been one of the strictest precautions that the exhibition managers had warned about, (especially after the demonstration about baked beans and hydrogen-filled zeppelins the year before!), but the ever-prepared Bethena saved the day, AND the Baked Alaska! Just under her Christmas star, she had concealed a fire extinguisher/water sprinkler system which not only knocked out the flames, but also provided a chilly blast of CO₂ "snow" to make everyone feel the Christmasy spirit to the max! Clever little Bethena not only received the blue ribbon in her category, "Sciences: Sweet & Savory" but also Best In Show... and a contract with the nice people over at Frigidaire.

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Sybil’s Tales & Tails: Oscar on a snowy morning....

Oscar always was the first one to be ready on a snowy morning for box-sledding... he liked the snow to be absolutely perfect before all the other kitties had messed it up!... But then he liked everything to be "just so". His water bowl, his treats, his ear fur, his pillow, his toys, his kitty collar, even his fresh kills. "A kitty should be surrounded by perfection... why do you think they call it PURRRING?" was his motto, and he'd wink!.... and on a sparkling, silent morning like this, with the whole world still curled up asleep in their beds, everything, EVERYTHING was just that!... perfect.

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