Val & More

3 min readMar 24, 2026

World mental health crisis update. Caption from nypost.com: “Unmasked ICE agents have been deployed at major airports across the country to bolster exhausted and unpaid TSA agents — and they’re being hounded by flyers and photographers trying to shame them for their jobs.” Thankless job.

From NYP: “Repeat offender nears 100th arrest after theft spree, drugs and wild high-speed chase.” Are authorities waiting until he kills someone to put him away?

RIP actress Valerie Perrine, 82, always a bright screen presence, who succumbed to Parkinson’s. Born in Galveston, she was an Army brat. She dropped out of college and got a gig in Vegas as a topless showgirl, signaling her ease with nudity. She moved to L.A. and lived a hippie lifestyle until she was discovered at a party by an agent who got her a role in Slaughterhouse-Five (1972), the same year she did a layout in Playboy. She proved a natural, soon earning a Best Supporting Actress Oscar nod for her portrayal of the long-suffering wife of the comedian/free speech activist in Lenny (1974). There are 67 titles under her name at IMDb, screen career stretching to 2016. Here are other films in which she appeared: W.C. Fields and Me (1976), Superman (1978), Superman II (1980), The Border (1982), What Women Want (2000), to name five. She did numerous guest shots in primetime and starred in several TV movies. She never married. A fine career. Thank you, Madam. Photo from Google Images:

Good thing I’d bundled up on this beautiful day, as a cold breeze was blowing through the Anti-Inflation Book Shop. My thanks to the gentleman in the wheelchair and his caretaker, who bought ten books, and to the woman who donated a bag full of Russian titles, and to all the other buyers. Here’s most of what sold: the screenplay to Citizen Kane (1941) by Herman J. Mankiewicz & Orson Welles, The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower by Stephen King, The Collectors by David Baldacci, The Pound a Day Diet: Lose Up to 5 Pounds in 5 Days by Eating the Foods You Love by Rocco DiSpirito, Guinness World Records 2024, two detective novels in Russian by Marinina, a translation of Danielle Steel’s One Day at a Time in that language, DVDs of Running Scared (2006),Kill Bill (2003) and The Year of the Dragon (1985). My thanks also to the lovely elderly lady library volunteers, who gave me an ornamental frond and a bar of Russian chocolate.