According to FBI consultant Frank Abagnale, in the near future we may not need to remember all those #$%*! Passwords for various internet websites. Abagnale says there is already technology that can identify your specific computer and authenticate it without the need for passwords.

Along with being the first generation to exposed to television and diet soda, Baby Boomers were the first to experience that classic summer fun toy, Slip ‘n Slide.

Introduced in 1961 by Wham-O (who else?), Slip ‘N Slides quickly became known for two things:

1.) killing grass in suburban backyards and

2.) causing pretty serious injuries as we came into contact with hard ground and each other while traveling at very fast speeds.

Somehow, Wham-O avoided costly lawsuits and is still in the Slip ‘n Slide business to this day, although, now, the toy does warn that it’s not recommended for anyone but small children.

By the way, the toy was invented by a guy named Robert Carrier. We'd write more, but we gotta scoot!

Waking up in the middle of the night with heartburn? Relax! It could be your diet.

Cut down on these foods and see if that doesn't make a difference:

• Alcohol
• Chocolate
• Tomatoes
• Citrus Fruit
• Spicy and/or Fatty Foods
• Caffeine
• Peppermint
• Spearmint

It just keeps happening. We read an account of The Bee Gees’ career by a noted “music historian” that repeated the lie. The farther away we get from this time in music history, the more urgent it becomes to set the record straight.

What is the lie?

Glad you asked. The lie is that the Bee Gees were washed-up and desperate before they wrote the soundtrack for Saturday Night Fever.

Poppycock! Balderdash! And other archaic exclamations!

Yes, the Bee Gees’ career (like many other bands – see also, “The Beach Boys”) had ups and down, but here is the true story…

The Brothers Gibb had begun performing in 1958. Born on the Isle of Mann in the UK, their parents had emigrated to Australia, where the lads first cracked the pop charts in 1965. They had a genuine hit in Australia in 1966 with “Spicks and Specks.”

That hit encouraged America’s Atlantic Records to take an interest in the trio, and they achieved their first U.S. success in 1967 with “New York Mining Disaster 1941.” It sounds strange now, but many listeners and a few DJs back in the day thought the Bee Gees might be the Beatles recording under a pseudonym!

The lads followed up with a very impressive string of pop hits, pushing 6 more songs into the American Top 20 in just over a year.

Then the Bee Gees hit their first speed bump. Internal fighting between siblings (see also, “The Everly Brothers”), led Robin, then the primary lead singer for the group, to leave in 1969. Less than a year later, he was back and the Bee Gees achieved back-to-back Top 10 hits with “Lonely Days” and “How Can You Mend a Broken Heart,” the latter becoming the boys’ very first #1 record in the U.S.

In 1972, the band put “Run to Me” into the Top 10.

Then, a brief dry spell ensued. 1973 and 1974 saw the boys recording, but the public wasn’t buying. Enter Ahmet Ertegun, the legendary head of Atlantic Records. He recommended the Bee Gees start working with Atlantic’s equally legendary producer Arif Mardin and urged the group to move their sound in a more R&B direction. Their friend, Eric Clapton suggested that the brothers relocate to Miami and record there.

All those suggestions were pure gold (as in gold records). Mardin produced the Bee Gees’ next album, Main Course. Both Mardin and the group’s manager, Robert Stigwood, urged the Bee Gees to absorb the influences of Miami’s then burgeoning disco scene. They took the hint. Released in 1975, the album’s first single “Jive Talkin’” raced up the charts, giving the Bee Gees their second #1. They followed that with “Nights on Broadway,” which also reached the Top 10, and “Fanny (Be Tender with My Love)” which reached #12. The album itself did quite well, reaching #12 on the LP chart and becoming certified as a gold album.

The Bee Gees then followed that success with Spirits Having Flown, which hit #1 on the LP charts, was certified platinum and produced the hits “You Should Be Dancing” (their 3^rd #1), “Love So Right” (#3) and “Boogie Child” (#12).

That was followed by the group’s first live LP, Here at Last… Live, a double album that also went platinum.

It was at THIS point that their manager asked the band to write some songs for a movie he was producing titled Saturday Night Fever.

Yes, the movie and soundtrack exploded; and for a year or more, the Bee Gees seemed to be everywhere.

But the idea that they were washed-up before SNF is garbage. They had racked up 3 hit albums, and 7 Top 20 hits in the year just prior to the film’s release. You could argue that the Bee Gees helped the film succeed because radio stations began playing their songs from the soundtrack even before the film was released based on the trio's recent track record.

The Bee Gees eventually paid for their dominance of pop music in the second half of the 1970’s. By 1980, no radio station wanted to touch them, so strong was the disco backlash. Undaunted, the brothers turned to writing and producing hits for others (including Dionne Warwick, Diana Ross, Kenny Rodgers and Dolly Parton) while they patiently waited for their second reputation rehabilitation.

The boys finally returned to the Top 10 in 1989 with “One” and from then on, remained rock & roll icons.

Two relatively new CDs may be of interest to Baby Boomers. They are both 2-disc live recordings. The first is a bit of a time capsule. The second is a more recent recording capturing one of rock’s great singer/songwriter/producers running through bravura versions of his greatest hits.

The Who Live at the Fillmore East 1968 was supposed to be released back in the day as the band’s follow-up to The Who Sell Out and before their massive breakout LP, Tommy. Recorded during a two-night stand at NYC’s Fillmore (the shows were the first by a British act at that venue), the tapes sat on the shelf for years due to audio problems. The first couple of songs were not satisfactorily recorded on either night. But thanks to modern technology, the surviving tapes were cleaned up, and we now have the shows just in time for their 50^th anniversary.

This is still the raw, energetic Who before superstardom overtook them. You get two Eddie Cochran covers (the perennial Who concert fave “Summertime Blues” and the much less heard “C’mon Everybody"). You also get two songs from The Who Sell Out as well as an extended version of their first “mini-opera,” “A Quick One.”

The second disc captures a tremendous 30-minute version of “My Generation” that concludes with the guitar smashing and drum kit destruction that was the band’s calling card back in the day.

The other new release is from Jeff Lynne, Wembley or Bust, featuring his newly constituted group Jeff Lynne’s ELO. For various reasons, Lynne does not use the full Electric Light Orchestra name. Just as well, as Lynne is the only original member present. But as he was the composer, lead singer, arranger and producer for all of the band’s albums, we doubt you’ll notice the difference.

If you had heard that ELO was not as big in their native England as in the States, don’t believe it. This 2-disc set was recorded in June of 2017 at sold-out shows in London’s Wembley Stadium. You’ll hear tens of thousands of Brits applauding and singing along as Lynne and his cohorts roar through a set that includes ELO’s very first song, “10538 Overture,” right up to a selection from ELO’s comeback album, Alone in the Universe. Lynne also manages to squeeze in one of the tunes he wrote and recorded with the Traveling Wilburys (“Handle With Care”) and yes, he does perform the title track from Xanadu, the movie that ended Olivia Newton-John’s acting career. Too bad it was such a cheesy movie because the title song is a pretty good little rocker.

One minor quibble: each of the tracks on the CDs fades out at the end rather than flowing one into another as they would at the live show.

However, as an added bonus, the set does include a Blu-Ray disc of the live show, and on video, the concert is presented without fade-outs.

If you are a fan of either band or both bands, these two releases come highly recommended!

1. It was the first network sitcom centered around a single working girl who was not a maid. Previously, woman who were sitcom stars tended to be a.) wacky housewives (see I Love Lucy), b.) family matriarchs (see The Donna Reed Show) or 3.) domestics (see Hazel). TV historians say her show paved the way for The Mary Tyler Moore Show just a few years later.
2. Donald Hollinger was originally supposed to be Ann Marie’s agent as well as her boyfriend. After they filmed the series’ pilot, producers must have decided that agents can sometimes be a little sleazy. So Donald changed jobs and became a magazine writer. (He was played by Ted Bessell in both that never-broadcast pilot and the subsequent series.)
3. There was a connection between That Girl and The Dick Van Dyke Show. The Van Dyke show was produced by Marlo’s father, Danny Thomas and two of the show’s main writers, Bill Persky and Sam Denoff, became the creators of That Girl.
4. Marlo Thomas came up with the show’s concept. She was the one who insisted that her character be a small-town girl who comes to the big city to try and find work as an actress. (Although her real life was that of the daughter of a rich, famous comedian, which made her entrance into show business much easier.)
5. Her first next door neighbor was also a Broadway leading lady. Bonnie Scott who played her original next door neighbor, Judy Bessemer, starred on Broadway opposite Robert Morse in the hit musical How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. Bonnie left the series because the shooting schedule took too much time away from her young kids.
6. Ruth Buzzi and George Carlin made appearances on the show. Ruth played a neighbor of Ann’s in several episodes while Carlin played her agent (replacing Ronnie Schell) in just one episode.
7. Marlo wanted to call the show Miss Independence. That was the nickname her father had given her as a young girl.
8. The network wanted the series finale to be the wedding of Ann Marie and Donald. But Marlo Thomas thought that might send the wrong message to the single girls she felt were the series’ core audience. You know, she gets married and “they live happily ever after.” So, she and Donald did get engaged during the show’s fifth season, but the series ended with Ann Marie still single.

Finally, is there any human being who watched the show and thought Ann could really be a virgin living in New York City in the mid 1960’s, especially if she was working in show business?
Didn’t think so.

A thought for Memorial Day: Anybody but us remember when THIS was "the American Way?"