This being the kitchen table and all, conversation can flow in any crazy direction it likes. From Charles Dickens to Charles Chan.

Now that the Holiday season is over and we're starting to get our strength back, it's time to crank up the old Charlie Chan movies. We'll watch one tonight. Both Ruth and I grew up watching the Sydney Toler Charlie Chan movies, with Charlie's various numbered sons. It wasn't until years later that I discovered that Warner Oland was the first Charlie Chan. There was serious doubt that the series would survive when Oland died and they went on a Star Search to find a replacement. All of this was before my time, if you can imagine that...

In the last couple of months I've picked up a boxed set of four movies starring Toler and another one starring Oland. Sunday night's are Ruth's mystery night, alternating between Murder She Wrote, Diagnosis Murder, Matlock, and the other series with the detective whose last name starts with "M" that doesn't come to mind. They're showing the holiday made to tee vee uplifting, heartwarming, tear-jerking, happy ending movies for the umpteenth time, but there's nothing like a murder to make people happy. Tonight I think we'll watch a Warner Oland Charlie Chan. The mysteries are more front and center, and the comedy is less pervasive. The movie will have a happy ending too. The bad guy always gets caught.

Jerry