AGING ALONG WITH QUINCY JONES, BILL RUSSELL, AND JERRY JONES

Time goes on and we’re aging along and it’s still hurry, hurry, hurry?

If you need to ask if it’s necessary, the answer is YES.

But, maybe it’s just me?

For better answers I watched documentaries about three men in their eighties.

Quincy Jones told all in Netflix’ ‘Quincy.’

From his hard time early life, to finding his music, his arrangements, and ruling the music world with his work, Quincy was a jumper from current times to his early days and back. I like good timing.

His whole life looked exhausting with the travel and people and sounds.

I’m not here to harp on alcohol, but the doc included four days in a diabetic coma from too much booze.

Q liked his vodka. His family helped, his staff helped, and he dropped.

Now he’s working clean, with the emphasis on working. Still working.

He showed great sadness over the people who had died on his watch, more and more, until he joined them in November, 2024.

If there’s ever a shadow cast by a giant, Quincy’s would cover the planet like the Quincy Eclipse.

Did he follow Bobby D’s advice, or the other way around?

 

Do It Now. Don’t Wait

Bill Russell came to Boston after winning back to back NCAA basketball championships in San Francisco.

The Netflix documentary showed the state of the NBA at the time. 

The gyms were shoddy, the players plodding, and here comes someone faster and stronger than any of them.

My big takeaway was Russell saying how he played for the Celtics, not the city of Boston who liked black guys while they wore Kelly green, not after they changed clothes.

He said it back to the Celtic fans when he had his number 6 retired in front of an empty arena with only his teammates on the floor with him.

Later in life he found his way back to Boston for one last hurrah, and it was a tear jerker.

Like Quincy, he learned his true meaning to the people he played in front of.

He was needed so bad it hurt.

 

The Pain Of Jerry Jones

Watching ‘America’s Team: The Gambler And His Cowboys‘ wasn’t painful in the ‘ouch that hurt’ sense, but it hurt something.

It used an interview technique I don’t remember seeing before: A long shot of the subject sitting alone before creeping up closer and closer.

I’m not saying Jimmy Johnson and Jerry Jones would have looked better in their old Arkansas helmets, but I’d like to it see for comparisons.

The big news about them: they made up for the cameras, smiling, hugging, backslapping like good ol’ boys do.

The cloud that hung over the entire doc? What could have been.

 

Jerry: I should have been more understanding.

Jimmy: I should have listened more.

 

For sometime the Cowboys have been the most lucrative sports team in the world.

No Super Bowl in thirty years, but still earning. Why?

 

Jerry: America loves a good soap opera.

 

Jones had a mentor when he started in 1989, Al Davis, owner of the Okaland/LA/Oakland/Las Vegas Raiders.

Just Win, Baby. That Al Davis.

Jerry learned the business from Al. He’d come to the NFL from the oil business.

A businessman through and through, he did what businessmen do: he made money.

Three Super Bowls in four years matched the Celtics span of championships, but ended before the next eight like Boston won.

I wanted more Cowboys. What I got was another decade of Danny White, this time named Tony Romo, then another decade of Danny named Dak Prescott.

And no Super Bowl. Even as the Cowboy bank account grew, no Super Bowl.

My lasting impression came from Troy Aikman sitting in that stage set-up for the close camera work.

He said he resented Jerry Jones firing Jimmy Johnson and taking over football team building, namely the draft and trades that keep teams current.

 

Troy: I felt like he was learning the job of professional football on my time.

 

After clip after clip of Troy getting crushed and slung around, Jerry seemed like a slow learner.

The three documentaries taken together create a message echoed in the top pic.

Time goes on and eventually you see the error of your ways.

Then it stops and the forgetting begins.

Who was Bill Russell and who cares?

Quincy Johnson was the guy in TV and played a doctor?

Jerry Jones needs to fire his general manager.

 

PS: 

You can’t stop time, but you can slow it down with slow TV:

 

• Train Journeys: The original 7-hour camera view from the front of a train traveling from Bergen to Oslo.

• Boat Cruises: A 5.5-day live broadcast of a ship sailing along the Norwegian coast.

• Crafts and Nature: Live coverage of knitting a sweater from raw wool or salmon swimming upstream.

PSS:

If you really want to slow time down, make your own slow TV reel, and watch it.

Or, join a group that shows their vacation pictures.

Ideas? Any ideas? Try writing a blog post every day.

Soooooooo slooooow. lol