Monthly Archives: August 2025

COLLEGE FOOTBALL RESULTS FROM AUGUST THIRTIETH: BALLADEER’S BLOG

HEADLINES

NAIA TOPPLES NCAA DIVISION ONE – The WEBBER INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY WARRIORS from the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics played giant-killer at the higher division NCAA DIV. ONE STETSON UNIVERSITY HATTERS. At the Half the Warriors led 17-7, then went on to consummate the Upset by a final score of 31-21. 

KNOCKING OFF NUMBER THREE – In the NAIA the 4th ranked BENEDICTINE COLLEGE RAVENS welcomed the number 3 team in the nation – the MORNINGSIDE UNIVERSITY MUSTANGS. The 1st Quarter ended with the Mustangs on top 14-7 but by Halftime the Ravens held a 17-14 edge. The 4th Quarter started with a 31-27 lead for Benedictine College and ended in a 38-34 Ravens win.

ANOTHER NUMBER THREE TAKES A FALL – Over in NCAA Division Two, the UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT THE PERMIAN BASIN FALCONS played host to the number 3 UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL OKLAHOMA BRONCHOS (their spelling). The Falcons put UCO on Upset Alert with their 13-7 edge at the midpoint, then coasted to a 34-14 victory from there. Continue reading

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VENUS: MARVEL/ TIMELY’s 1948-1952 SUPERHEROINE

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog looks at the Marvel Comics heroine Venus, from back when they were known as Timely Comics.

VENUS

Created By: Stan Lee and Lin Streeter

Secret Identity: Vikki Starr

First Appearance: Venus #1 (August 1948) Her final Golden Age appearance came in 1952.

Origin: The Golden Age Venus was the alien ruler of the planet Venus. For centuries she ruled over a planetary paradise protected from human eyes by the perpetual cloud cover of that planet. Wearying of being revered, adored and obeyed she decided to start dividing her time between her home world and Earth, where she hoped to try leading a simpler but more challenging life.

She teleported to the Earth, where her beauty made her such a sensation that she was hired as a model and editor for Whitney Hammond’s fashion publication called Beauty Magazine. Venus had a series of adventures ranging from mild fantasy to world-saving as she learned Earth ways and battled sci-fi and horror menaces. Continue reading

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BALLADEER’S BLOG’S COLLEGE FOOTBALL RESULTS FROM AUG 28th

HEADLINES

DOWN GOES NUMBER FIVE – The NAIA’s 11th ranked MONTANA TECH OREDIGGERS welcomed the NAIA’s number 5 team in the nation – the UNIVERSITY OF MONTANA-WESTERN BULLDOGS. The Orediggers piled up a 31-7 lead in the opening Quarter, a score that was unchanged come Halftime. UMW made it a 31-21 game to end the 3rd Quarter, but Montana Tech won out 38-27. 

NUMBER TEN TAKES A FALL – Also in the NAIA, the LINDSEY WILSON COLLEGE BLUE RAIDERS took the field against the visiting number 10 TEXAS WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY RAMS. The Blue Raiders parlayed their 14-3 1st Quarter advantage into a 28-10 lead at the Half. From there, Lindsey Wilson College went on to clobber the Rams by a final score of 45-10. Continue reading

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NEWS, MEMES AND POLITICAL CARTOONS ROUNDUP: AUGUST TWENTY-NINTH

Independent Voter Site Balladeer’s Blog does another current events roundup.

ICE ARRESTS ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT PEDOPHILE FOUND LIVING INSIDE A CHILDREN’S DAYCARE CENTER IN DEMOCRAT “SANCTUARY” STATE CALIFORNIA. As usual, perpetrators get “sanctuary” but not the public. More HERE.

MEXICO’S PRESIDENT POINTS OUT THAT BILL CLINTON DEPORTED MORE MEXICANS THAN TRUMP HAS. If so, that’s because Clinton didn’t have pathetic District Judges overstepping their authority by trying to block his every move and requiring months-long appeals to higher courts.

PRESIDENT TRUMP’S POLICIES CAUSE THE ECONOMY TO SOAR HIGHER THAN EXPECTATIONS. More HERE.

CONSUMER PRICES FALL AND INFLATION STYMIED.

MINNEAPOLIS POLICE CHIEF: MANY PARENTS AND TEACHERS WANT POLICE OFFICERS BACK IN SCHOOLS. He also says a day doesn’t go by that they don’t need outside help HERE. It’s like Democrats with their defunding and other attacks on police plus no-cash bail have left the cities they run in dire straits.

DHS HEAD KRISTI NOEM: OVER FIVE THOUSAND ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS CAUGHT IN DEMOCRAT “SANCTUARY” CITY LOS ANGELES.

DEMOCRAT CONGRESSMAN JOHN LARSON CALLS FOR “UPRISING” AGAINST ICE ENFORCEMENT OF IMMIGRATION LAWS. Even now, it is STILL “Illegal immigrants uber alles” with Democrats.

WINSOME SEARS’ PRIVILEGED WHITE DEMOCRAT OPPONENT ABIGAIL SPANBERGER VOWS TO TURN VIRGINIA INTO A SANCTUARY STATE FOR ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS. More HERE.

DEMOCRAT GOVERNOR GAVIN NEWSOM STILL IGNORING LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY STANDARDS FOR TRUCK DRIVERS. See above. How many more have to die, Gavin? Continue reading

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SWASHBUCKLER MOVIE: GIANT OF THE EVIL ISLAND (1965)

GIANT OF THE EVIL ISLAND (1965) – Also released as The Mystery of the Evil Island, this film starred Mission: Impossible‘s Peter Lupus going by the name Rock Stevens. After mild success in a few Italian peplums, Lupus got his one and only swashbuckler movie with this little honey.

Peter stars as Captain Pedro Valverde, a Spanish Empire naval officer who is out to bust up the evil pirate Captain Moloch and the various crews that prey on shipping while using Moloch’s fortress on the Evil Island as a base. That being said, Pirates of Evil Island would have been a more fitting title, but what can ya do?

Pedro’s predecessor as captain of his ship has retired after a career of fruitlessly trying to nab the pirate Moloch. Newly arrived Captain Valverde meets cute with the local governor’s daughter Bianca (Dina DeSantis) and the two fall in “love.” 

Our hero soon goes undercover – well, he wears black clothing instead of his uniform and tilts his hat slightly over one eye – in the nearest town. Pedro ends up in a swordfight to help a beautiful young lady named Alma (Halina Zalewska) in a violent dispute over her jewelry. Continue reading

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ANCIENT SCIENCE FICTION: THE DOOM OF LONDON (1892)

Doom of LondonTHE DOOM OF LONDON (1892) – Written by Robert Barr. In the “far future” of the mid-Twentieth Century the narrator of this tale looks back at the catastrophe that hit London in the 1890s.

The premise is that our narrator is outraged by a piece written by a Professor Mowberry in which the professor ventures the opinion that the destruction of London was an overall beneficial event. His reasoning is that it got rid of millions of unnecessary people. Pretty callous attitude, unless you’re talking about getting rid of the Kardashians.

At any rate we readers are informed that in the mid-Twentieth Century fog has been completely done away with (?), preventing what happened to London in the 1890s from ever happening again. It turns out that what started out seeming to be nothing but the usual London fog was actually deadly gases unleashed from deep in the Earth by careless mining. Continue reading

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THE PAGEANT OF LETTERS (c 402 B.C.) ANCIENT GREEK COMEDY

THE PAGEANT OF LETTERS (c 402 B.C.) – Here is another examination of an ancient Greek comedy. This one deals with a subject that still affects a very large part of the world to this very day – our alphabet. 

The Pageant of Letters (AKA The Tragedy of Letters and The Spectacle of Letters) was a comedy dealing with the Athenians officially adding four new letters to the Greek alphabet, making a grand total of twenty-four. Since twenty-four also happened to be the number of members in the all-important chorus of Attic Old Comedy, it presented an obvious subject for the Athenian stage.

The addition of the four new letters (eta, xi, psi and omega) was causing a certain amount of confusion, as could be expected. Imagine if we suddenly added four new letters to the alphabet now, say, possibly single characters to express sounds formerly covered by two letters together, like “th” or “ph”.

Naturally everyday usage and ESPECIALLY official documents would be subject to all manner of confusion for quite some time. The Pageant of Letters dealt with the confusion the Athenians were experiencing because of the change. There is disputed authorship of this comedy and I’ll address that below.

THE PLAY

Each member of the chorus was costumed as a letter of the newly-expanded alphabet. Individual costumes for each member represented an extravagance but always made a big impression on the audience and the judges. Since the comedies (like the tragedies) competed against each other at festivals to Dionysus that was a crucial consideration. Continue reading

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AUGUST TWENTY-SEVENTH ROUNDUP OF NEWS, MEMES AND POLITICAL CARTOONS

Typical anti-Trump fundamentalist

Time for another current events roundup from Independent Voter Site Balladeer’s Blog here in an America where anti-Trump fascists continue with their daily unhinged headlines that are on the order of TRUMP HAS INCREASED THE NUMBER OF CHILDREN HE EATS ON A DAILY BASIS! and DEMOCRATS VOW TO MAKE 24/7 HYSTERIA THEIR STRATEGY FROM NOW ON!

Anyway, the ignorance shown by so many Trump-haters is why I want to remind them that they should ask themselves a few questions before they mindlessly go along with The Party’s daily dose of panic – 

Can they name at least 7 or 8 previous presidents and their political party affiliation without looking online? Can they trace the process through which a bill becomes a law? Can they name the sources where the general public can look up political contributions? Can they use their own words to explain their political opinions – if “political opinions” isn’t too strong a term for their childish “Trump is evil” babbling. 

Can they even name their state’s Senators or House reps or Governors? Grow up, anti-Trump fundamentalists. Learning the routine, mundane details of politics may give you less of a rush than apocalyptic ravings, but they can certainly help to calm you down and stop frothing at the mouth.  

VIRGINIA DEMOCRATS TRY BLAMING BLACK REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE WINSOME SEARS FOR THE RACIST SIGN A WHITE DEMOCRAT WAVED AT HER.

GORKA ON ABBEY GATE AND PRESIDENT TRUMP. Related HERE.

ZOHRAN MAMDANI FAILS AT HIS WEIGHTLIFTING APPEARANCE.

TEN FBI WHISTLEBLOWERS AGAINST THE BIDEN REGIME’S POLITICIZING OF THE BUREAU GET VINDICATION. Continue reading

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BAD MOVIE: TOWING (1978) WITH JOE MANTEGNA, SUE LYON, DENNIS FRANZ AND MIKE NUSSBAUM

TOWING (1978) – How obscure is this flick? As of this writing there are only 2 user reviews of it at IMDb. That actually makes Towing better known than some of the other flicks I’ve reviewed here at Balladeer’s Blog, but the fact that Joe Mantegna, Sue Lyon, Dennis Franz, Mike Nussbaum, Jennifer Ashley and J.J. Johnston are in this movie make it worth examining.   

What’s this movie about? Well, let me start by pointing out that sometimes bad movies are as effective as folk songs at preserving a tiny portion of history or cultural zeitgeist that would otherwise be completely forgotten as the decades go by.

Towing is about that period in the 1970s when Chicago tow-truck operators scandalously began towing vehicles out of parking lots based on VERY questionable grounds of being in violation of city regulations. The sleazy towing companies would charge the vehicle owners much larger than reasonable fees to get them back. Continue reading

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COOL NAMED SPORTS TEAM: GULF COAST CHRISTIAN COLLEGE

To get over disappointment about the postponement of last Saturday’s football game in the new NSAC league, here’s a look at one of their member institutions whose team name towers above the overused Eagles, Tigers, Bulldogs and Wildcats.

GULF COAST CHRISTIAN COLLEGE Continue reading

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