The Chris Moeller Archives

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Estelle Getty, the veteran stage actress cast as octogenarian Sophia Petrillo in "The Golden Girls" in 1980, died yesterday at the age of 84. The Sophia character had suffered from a mild stroke that supposedly limited her ability to filter her comments, and this conceit allowed the diminutive Getty to claim many of the series' most comedic lines.

In the late 1980s, I became familiar with a concept called a "Q score," and it was first in passing reference to Estelle Getty. A "Q score" is the measure of the "likeability" or appeal of a product, company, or personality. It's used primarily by marketing, advertising, and public relations outfits . The higher the Q score, the more popular that subject with the general public, and Estelle Getty's was apparently off the charts-high. (Christina Applegate's score was also quite lofty, as I recall, as was-- one would suspect-- Tony Danza's.)

Getty had lived in Los Angeles since being cast in "The Golden Girls" (alongside Bea Arthur, Betty White, and Rue McClanahan). Her husband of 57 years preceded her in death in 2004.

Here's Estelle in action, from YouTube.

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What information will you find in Saudi Arabian schoolbooks? For one thing, the answer to this query--

Is belief true in the following instances?:
a) A man prays but hates those who are virtuous.
b) A man professes that there is no deity other than God but loves the unbelievers.
c) A man worships God alone, loves the believers, and hates the unbelievers.

The kingdom's answer here.

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Are men of genius wise to avoid the entanglements of marriage?

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By my rough count, the home of the baseball Cardinals, Busch Stadium, features statues (or busts) of no fewer than the likes of Dizzy Dean, Red Schoendienst, Lou Brock, Bob Gibson, Ozzie Smith, Gussie Busch, Jack Buck, Enos Slaughter, George Sisler, Cool Papa Bell, and two of Stan Musial. A completed statue of Mark McGwire sits still hidden in storage, and they would have one erected to Jazz Age hitting star Rogers Hornsby too, if anyone could remember what he looked like.

But the White Sox dedicating a statue to their first base coach, Harold Baines, is going way overboard.

Salon's King Kaufman agrees. He suggests that all of baseball is suffering from "statue inflation".

posted by CM @ 8:35 PM