Malden and Mom

I wrote about my mother yesterday; kept it short and sweet. She was both; short and sweet. But she had a sorta comical mean streak as well, with a short and sweet list of things she could not abide. Heading that list were pigeons, peanut butter, and strangely, Karl Malden, whom she habitually derided as "Bignose" Malden. When I wanted to break her chops I would tell her that Karl Malden had just sent her a peanut butter sandwich by carrier pigeon, and it was under her pillow. She would gag and call me an unprintable name. I read in the obits today, (she would call it the Irish funnies), that Karl Malden just died, age 97. He was aces in my book. I liked his acting a lot. A total pro, sitting at the same table as Ernie Borgnine, blessedly still with us. "One Eyed Jacks","Streetcar" "Waterfront", "Patton" - he was memorable in all of them, and I'm sure others will be brought to mind. "Gimme a beer", he said in 'Waterfront', and I think he lit a cigarette and wiped his mouth on his cassock. Now, that's a priest! He offset George C. Scott perfectly in 'Patton'; I remember him raising an eyebrow when Patton prematurely pinned a third (?) star on his own shoulder. He was a lunch bucket actor, and that is high praise. I think that because there were so many things that my mother loved, she cherished her little hatreds, without taking them at all seriously. (Well, she really did detest pigeons). But whatever........I dug Karl Malden all the more, if just to annoy her. I dug him enough for both of us. He was 'old school', just like her, and it doesn't get any better than that. auld slang sign off