the groundhog day project

It seems like I write about Bill Murray every day. But, really, I think I only ever focused on him once or twice. I know there was Day 196 – keep the talent happy , for example, in which I place Groundhog Day in context of his larger career, but without actually getting into a lot of detail about each and every film he’s been in because that would be tedious. I wrote about Murray’s feud with Harold Ramis on Day 214 – i am not making it up and I wrote a little bit about Murray’s marriages in on Day 267 – this glass is half empty … usually I just write about Phil Connors instead of Bill Murray. But, today, for practical reasons— I think I’ve mentioned my folder of unused Groundhog Day articles; well, it’s got nothing but Bill Murray articles left inside —and because I can generally label myself as something of a completist— seriously, it bugs the hell out of me, for example, when the new set of collectible LEGO minifigures come out and I’m missing just one; similarly, as I’ve gott...

I’ve dealt with obituaries before in this blog— Jane Catherine Lotter , an author who wrote her own; Martin Manley , a sportswriter who planned and blogged about his suicide; and even Lucina Paquet Gabbard , who played a small part in Groundhog Day —so I thought it worth bringing up this bit from an obituary I saw online today: Marianne Theresa Johnson-Reddick born Jan 4, 1935 and died alone on Aug. 30, 2013. She is survived by her 6 of 8 children whom she spent her lifetime torturing in every way possible. While she neglected and abused her small children, she refused to allow anyone else to care or show compassion towards them. When they became adults she stalked and tortured anyone they dared to love. Everyone she met, adult or child was tortured by her cruelty and exposure to violence, criminal activity, vulgarity, and hatred of the gentle or kind human spirit. It reminded me of Orson Scott Card’s Speaker for the Dead , in which a Speaker spends time with and interviews those wh...