One of Jay's all time likes is cinema.

Jay's father managed several theaters for a time, and when Jay was still quite young he help the old man out, learning to run the projectors, change the reels of film, rewind the movies' many reels with a hand-operated contraption, and change the electrodes in the carbon arc projectors. Jay's always appreciated machinery, maybe stemming from that experience. The job had its rewards. At an early age, Jay was able to appreciate the work of Marilyn Monroe and other bombshells of the day, from the projection rooms, inbetween projection duties.

Movie houses were mostly nicer, prettier, and better appointed than the ones we suffer with today. Going to the movies was a big deal, like going to a concert. Besides the wonderful, ubiquitous concessions, there was a mystique to moviegoine. Especially in nicer theaters in the evenings, flashlight-wielding ushers guided customers to seats. Managers summarily tossed out troublemakers, and since cell phones hadn't been invented nobody made or answered inane calls during the feature. Ahhh, the good old days.

Jay gave up going to actual theaters years ago, though he still watches many movies. The DVD player has to do, mostly for its useful pause button, but also for the availability of a fast-forward function when the directors wax poetic about something stupid, something boring, or something infuriating, offensive, or sick. Jay particularly dislikes movies in which he hates all the characters - not uncommon among current flicks. He dislikes violence - always has - and will put up with it only if it's absolutely essential to the story being told. Sex is much better. Do sex; imply violence. Much better. And please don't confuse the two.

Same with drugs. Filmmakers, pay attention! It doesn't take much footage to convey that a character has a drug problem, is a drug dealer or whatever. Move on! There is absolutely nothing entertaining, expository, or useful about watching other people use drugs. Any drugs, and that includes nicotine. Except coffee drinking. That's okay, but do move on, or suffer the indignity of a burst of fast forward.

Jay would much prefer to watch movies in a nicely appointed theater. By himself. No cell phones allowed. No loudmouths, hecklers, crying babies or other annoyances, but with a few pauses allowed from time to time for bathroom breaks or to refresh drinks, The DVD does the job, though the screen is small and the sound barely adequate - till Jay can replace his stereo.

Jay's favorite movie is hard to pick. Way hard - there are so many masterpieces to choose from. He's a major fan of the works of Hayao Miyazaki, especially "Princess Mononoke," and of Jean-Pierre Jeunet, especially "A Very Long Engagement." He loved "Network," the original one from 1976 about television (quote) news (unquote), and a wonderful old French movie named "Le Roi de coeur" (The King of Hearts). Rope in most of the classics, too, especially the Chaplin comedies, the Peter Sellers slapsticks, and lots of other rib ticklers. Not to mention "Yes Giorgio" already mentioned in these columns. Jay likes mysteries and even puts up with the violence entailed in them. His favorites are those from the novels of Agatha Christie - Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot, to indulge in a little name dropping. So picking one favorite, not going to happen. Picking a thousand favorites, maybe, but why?

Jay loves animated movies. Goes back to his early experiences in the projection rooms. The main features came comprised a dozen or so reels of around twenty minutes each. After Brigitte Bardot finished doing her on-screen thing, or whatever, the cartoons started. The more the merrier for the audience, though the projectionist had quite a time of it. Those seven-minute reels gave little time to load up the second projector with the next one, so there was zero chance to actually watch the cartoons. Jay's father generously handled loading the projectors by himself so Jay could devote undivided attention to the cartoons. The rewinding task waited till the next feature started. One must have one's priorities!

The picture has little to do with movies, but a lot to do with Jay's sad farewell to Kodachrome, for which the only remaining processing plant closed at the end of 2010.

The many better-traveled people out there are by now cringing that they can't pack off hate email for Jay's meager travels being touted in the previous post. Fact is, Jay's been around mostly locally, and had a great time doing so. He'd rather explore the streets of Pageland, South Carolina, for the season's best watermelon or ride the Ridge west toward Leesville and Gilbert for July's best peaches than put up with leg-cramping, knee-aching, interminably boring flights to parts of the planet beyond the ponds.

Pageland, as it turns out, is on Jay's list of favorite places for the good times he had there. It's a cute, quaint, friendly, definitively small town. Jay's in no danger of moving there, the locals will be delighted to learn, but he's visited many times and enjoyed every trip. He's been to Boston many times, too, and big city that it is he enjoyed those visits. That was before Yoyo Ma, one of Jay's current heroes, played Bach on the cello for Beantown's benighted city council. Now, Jay'd have to think carefully before visiting Boston again. Well, okay, visit might be okay but calling on the city council is out of the question. Not that they care.

Jay had a great time in San Francisco, including a culinary adventure already detailed, and would like to visit again, stay longer, and maybe leave wiser but leave just the same. Chicago, too. Jay got snowed on there once in April. April! What a ridiculous time of year to have cold weather, much less snow. But Jay likes huge, hulking Chicago, having visited there many times and never once going shopping in the touristy designer shops area. Put Charlottesville, Virginia, on the like-em-a-lot list, too. Great small town that thinks it's a big city. Or maybe wishes it was.

Curiously, both times Jay's been to Virginia Beach, Virginia, it snowed. Well, it was January. Nice place, and Jay enjoyed going there but found it difficult to get comfy with snow and ice in the way.

Time's short this week, so this discussion has to hold for another installment.

We haven't yet explored Jay's passion for the Keys, his unenthusiasm for Jackson, Mississippi, or his fondness for Charlotte, North Carolina. Here's a picture from Newport, Rhode Island, another of Jay's favorites, to tide you over till next week.

Musically, Jay's always preferred classical. He hesitates to use the term, because it's so frequently misunderstood. People often confuse "classical" with "elevator." Oh how much pleasanter elevators would be if Mozart and Beethoven soothed the riders.

Jay defines classical music broadly as music that is lyrical, including baroque and even some 20th Century compositions. He doesn't much like modern "classical" music, the stuff that sounds like someone dropped the orchestra - the infernal twelve-tone, for example, plus any a-tonal riffs that sneak in. Mostly, he doesn't like Brahms' symphonies, either, and doesn't care for much of Wagner's melodramatic leitmotivation. A few years ago, he discovered Brahms quartets and quintets at a concert at the Newberry Opera House, and loved them, adding several nice CDs to his collection. But his dislike of Brahms' symphonies persists.

Not much of an opera buff, Jay can't recite the lyrics of even famous arias, much less recount the plots or name the characters. Yet he loves some operatic music. That includes anything sung by Kathleen Battle, most any Mozart except the dire Don Giovanni, the better Verdi, and virtually all of Gilbert and Sullivan, plus the usual Puccini, Vivaldi, Offenbach, Gounod and whoever else. Jay first became interested in opera in the Sixties while working at a newspaper. Relegated to holding down the newsroom by himself on Saturdays, Jay brought along a small radio, and while surfing the dial landed on a Texaco broadcast of Humperdinck's Hansel und Gretel from the Metropolitan Opera. The performances became his weekly thing, except the infamous Ring cycle, respite from the clatter of the teletypes.

Besides Miss Battle, some of Jay's favorite singers are Diana Damrau - her Queen of the Night is way impressive - Detlef Roth, for his Parisian Papageno, and Luciano Pavarotti for, well, everything he ever sang, really, but also for Yes, Giorgio, his fabulous movie. "I saw it five times," Jay recounts, "with a very patient friend in the one theatre in town that played it for the short time it played." There's major irony at work during the linked aria, as the character on stage is victorious in love, while the singer's love interest is busy leaving, added poignancy to an incredible performance. Layers, you know. Lots of layers. Makes for a great movie. Rummage on Ebay for a (scarce!) copy of the video, but don't think you'll ever get Jay's.

In addition to Miss Bobo, Jay's teacher Hall of Fame (He also has a Teachers' Hall of Infamy, but is sparing you that for now) includes the late William T. Slaughter. An accomplished organist respected for his technically superb and musically inspired renditions of Bach fugues, Mr. Slaughter taught band instruments in all six (!) grades at Aiken Junior and High schools. He was a one-person staff - no assistant teachers back then - ably assisted at the High School by a student staff that included (ta-da!) Jay.

Mr. Slaughter taught all the instruments. Reeds, flutes, percussion and brass. Glockenspiel and timpani, oboe, clarinet and saxophone. French horn and trombone. Maybe he knew and played stringed instruments, too, but he didn't teach them, referring interested students to teachers in nearby Augusta, Georgia.

He gave private lessons in a back room of his house in downtown Aiken, and Jay, who stuck with band from Seventh to Twelfth grades, was one of his students, a half-decent one in his later years. Jay played cornet, the "symphonic" version of the trumpet. At the outset of band class in the Seventh Grade, Mr. Slaughter examined the facial structure of each new student in turn and recommended an instrument that suited them. He probably skewed the choices to what instrumentation the high school band would need three years into the future, but he never let on. Jay's choices were cornet or French horn, the latter of which, Mr. Slaughter warned, was quite difficult to play.

Easy choice, really. Jay took the path of least resistance, with blessings from his father, who disliked music in general except for the military bugle call "Taps." After an impressively inauspicious start, Jay caught on to getting a sound out of the instrument, moved up to shaky scales and the occasional arpeggio, and kept at it, even practicing occasionally as whim and necessity dictated. When Mr. Slaughter recommended private lessons, Jay's parents footed the bill, and Jay's father even sprung for a silver Conn Connstellation cornet, the stuff of dreams for a cornetist then and now. He'd already bought a baby grand piano that took up much of the livingroom.

Jay's hero list took on new musical entries. Harry James, of course, because he was still the rage in the early Sixties. And Bourbon Streeter Al Hirt, who had popular tunes in the Top Forty of the day. Good ones.

Jay's love affair with music started even earlier, as his Sainted Mother insisted he have piano lessons. She so wanted to be able to play the piano herself, but didn't take lessons. Instead, she dutifully pursued a mailorder self-study course in which the middle piano keys were numbered on a cardboard overlay. The course ignored basics and moved right into songs. Eventually, she learned to play her favorite piece, "The Merry Widow Waltz," quite well, but after that she stopped studying.

On the other hand, Jay flopped at piano. He learned to read music and count rhythms, but never got the knack of reading both treble and bass clef lines at the same time. When he figured out that he could improvise the music by reading only the treble clef, that was the end of piano studies. After exhausting only two piano teachers, the first being one of his cousins, he got stuck on "Flow Gently Sweet Afton," and gave up, turning his attention to the cornet, which only entailed one clef at a time. He took up piano many years later and learned to play a few of his favorite classical pieces - long after giving up all hopes of professional musicianship.

Jay played first chair cornet in the Aiken High School Bands and helped organize the Pep Band at the University of South Carolinia (slash) Aiken. That was pretty much the end of his career, however - although at the urging of a colleague, an accordion player at the newspaper where he worked, he played hymns and carols with the Salvation Army Band on Main Street a few times. Decades later (see the picture and don't laugh at the hot pink hat), Jay again had delusions of musical adequacy and relearned the cornet, but that episode was cut woefully short by health and other troubles.

Jay’s never been one to limit himself to a single obsession at a time, so the heroic Clark Kent shared Jay’s fancies with other personages of fact or pulp or electron beam. Not that Clark was ever really out there into obsession territory, mind you. Jay splurged extraordinarily conservative percentages of his meager allowance on a few Superman comics, expensive at mere dimes a pop back then, plus a few spinoffs like Superboy and Krypto the Superdog, but he didn’t bother with other heros' trappings in the high-tech-marketing-challenged Fifties. Neither did Jay-dimes land on those paradigms of herohood Batman, Spiderman, and the their ilk. Jay’s favorite comics were Little Henry and Dennis the Menace, heavier emphasis on the former.

The Jay Library and Archives, if one could ever exist, would contain few dog-eared dime wasters, because Jay’s other, dearer heroes didn’t have comic books to their credit. Something about the none-too-marvelous marketing potential of Benjamin Franklin, Mark Twain, Jackie Gleason, and W.C. Fields comic books, although they richly deserve such grandiosity.

Independent of his scandalous carryings-on in France, Benjamin Franklin was one of Jay's mild-mannered heroes. Franklin's start as a mere printer's apprentice interested Jay, who performed printer's apprentice tasks early on. But really, apprentice isn't quite descriptive of Franklin’s station in life. Franklin was a "printer's devil." That's the person in the print shop who returns metal type (now way obsolete) to the sorting cases after a job is printed.

Holy Gutenberg, Batman! Hand typesetting comprised sets, called "fonts," of single characters cast onto blobs of lead-and-tin alloy about an inch high. These were sorted letterwise in broad, compartmented trays, the famed “California Job Case” among them. To "set" type, a typesetter person (now also way obsolete) picked up each letter in turn and arranged them in word order, adding spaces, ruled lines, whatever, in a metal “composing stick,” a two-sided hand-holdable brass tray, there to be accumulated into a “galley,” a larger, three-sided steel tray that often wasn’t very hand-holdable, owing to the weight of its charge of heavy type, rules and spaces. Eventually, these "forms" were wedged into "chases," four-sided iron frames, placed in the printing press, inked and printed onto (at last!) actual paper.

It took considerable time to set type, so printers often kept intact any jobs that they expected to be reprinted. The rest of the “forms” were re-distributed to the typecases to be used again. The people assigned to the re-distribution task occupied a position somewhat lower than office cat: the printer's devils. If you worked really hard, put in extra long hours, and studiously kissed the correct cans, you could start as a printer's devil and end up as a typositor, or a printer, or something even fancier like ambassador to France, as it was with ol' Ben.

By all accounts, Ben's ambassadorship didn't result from his labors in the print shop, however. It was more the reward for his artistry with the stuff of type before type is set: namely, words. And that’s not to even mention the revolutionary ideas behind them. That if nothing else qualified him for Jay-hero-hood. Benjamin fought with words battles that might’ve otherwise been relegated to flying lead - and not the kind from which type is made. He was inquisitive and inventive, notwithstanding being somewhat sight-impaired (Jay relates, as he’s worn thick glasses since Third Grade), and also self-made, wise, and witty. Jay heard about Benjamin’s better deeds at school, of course, churning out the requisite book reports, bio’s and essays.

Ben’s shadier doings were conveniently skipped in the schoolbooks, so Jay learned of these on his own. Ben’s hero status remained, nonetheless, unimpaired. If anything, he earned Jay’s additional respect for doing as he pleased at a time when nonconformity in matters moral was rewarded with a chunk of rope formed into a final necklace.

All around, Ben’s easy to like as a hero, and so is Thomas Jefferson. Tom, however, tainted lofty principles with tacky travesty, and practiced different preaching from what he treatised. Indeed, Tom let Jay down, bad. The more Jay’s learned about the real Thomas, the less Jay’s inclined to reserve him any space in emulationville. Thomas carried on something awful about ending slavery right at the outset of these United States. Yet, the man kept slaves. Kept them, even though he could’ve easily afforded to free them, setting an example for others to follow.

Maybe in Virginia it was just “done,” and you could argue (feebly) that freed slaves in a slave-holding society would've put them at great risk. However, such was hardly the case in France while the French were annoying themselves and the rest of the world with their own confused revolution. Two-faced Thomas didn’t seem to notice, though his slaveholding rightfully ruffled French feathers.

The public didn’t seem to notice Tom’s indiscretions in the White House, either, but that was before television, and CNN et al weren’t there for obsessive-compulsive blow-by-blow instant-replay descriptions, either. The supremely homophobic Tom is therefore way far off his original pedestal in Jay’s mind, respected only grudgingly for the beauty of his buildings. The rest of it was arrogant puffery, flowery prose that meant nothing to himself, inspiring as some of it was to others. The man should’ve stuck to architecture, and left idealism to those with conviction.

You can tell a great deal about somebody if you know what heroes he holds dear. It's like knowing who he hangs out with and in what pub. It’s as good as stalking him for a week through the gutters of the city - or through the coffeehouses or the jazz clubs, as the case may be. We are what we eat, for sure, but we are who we emulate, just as certainly. So, let's get started analyzing Jay (this is, after all, the UNauthorized auto-bio) by detailing who some of his heroes are, were, have been. And why.

Jay’s favorite heroes have rarely been who you might expect, definitely not the usual crowd. But then, Jay’s not the usual lot himself, he urges it to be said. “I’m not noted for conformity.”

First off, the Man of Steel. Nope. No way. Jay's peers admired Superman - that is, if Jay can be said to have had any actual peers. Jay’s "contemporaries," we’ll call them with a wicked grin, took their hero worship seriously. They donned capes fashioned of faded beach towels and were able to leap tall sand sculptures in a single bound. They were faster than a speeding Lionel train set. Big fat hairy deal.

Jay, on the other hand, didn't consider the Caped One eligible for hero worship, much less emulation. On the contrary, he considered Superman’s other half, Clark Kent, the stuff of wannabe dreams. Clark was so immensely coooool. Definitely the stuff of hero-hood, au contraire the brash Superman. The oh-so-cool Mister Manners could do the presto-change-o thing in a handy phone booth, stomp the appropriate villains, and reappear all pressed and clean with his reporter's notebook full of pithy information. And just in the nick of time for the first-edition deadline at the ol’ Planet. Talk about a nose for news!

When Metropolis - the town, silly... When Metropolis was threatened, and Superman’s talents were called forth, Clark was a sure follow-on, dependably scooping up duhh-on-the-street interviews, gathering background information, and oh, by the way, saving Aiken - oops, Metropolis - from harm in his other identity. He never even got winded. Must've never got long-winded, either, ‘cause the editors never appeared to give him any grief about eating up too much space on the front page.

Through it all, and “it all” was quite an ordeal every afternoon on television, Mister Kent managed his double identity without ever requiring the services of a therapist. The Phone Company might have been a little peeved from time to time, but they never let on. His bosses at the newspaper, supposedly none the wiser about his double identity, either never suspected or were too busy with their editorial pens and chose to ignore their reporter’s cute tricks. So, Clark gracefully held onto his job at the newspaper office, gathering the scoops in spite of constant interruptions for saving the town or the dunce Lois from doom. Or themselves. Now THAT was a hero!

Would Clark make a go of it at CBS News now? CNN? Mister Mild Manners probably wouldn't last ten minutes or one dead princess, whichever came first. Something about mild manners and shoving a microphone into a grieving face would probably not click. Besides, the world was easier to save back then, when the good and bad guys were easy to tell apart. And politics weren’t required.

Jay admired not only Clark's dual role, but also his very mild manneredness. Clark Kent was truly a gentle man, keeping his powerful alterself a secret even when showing off would have been soooo much fun.

During most of Jay's early years he was beset, tortured, taunted, and otherwise made miserable by aggressive male contemporaries, not to say peers. So, it’s hardly surprising that his hero wasn't the swashbuckling aggressor half of the Superman bundle, but the debonair Clark. The fact that Clark made his way as a newspaper reporter was even better. Ah, the stuff of heroes: pad in pocket and press pass tucked into the ubiquitous hat, but secretly attired in tights underneath the Fifties’ most conservative suit. Let the next-door neighbor boys and the down-the-street brats emulate Superman with their striped towels, their blue pajamas, and their short flights off high porches. Jay wore glasses and carried a notebook.

Maybe it sounds dramatic from this perspective, but even in Jay’s days as a child he wanted a career in communications. Printing and publishing, maybe, newspapering, bookwriting, even radio. Not television, but that would have been okay if none of the others came through. As it turned (turns?) out, Jay eventually achieved plenty more things that hadn't been invented back in the days of leaping over low hedges with the imagination on high beam. Yes, there was electricity, and you didn’t have to fly a kite to get a charge out of it.

Jay was good enough at some things to make a go of them later in life, and bad enough at lots of things to develop a serious aversion to being laughed at. Kite flying was one of those latter. And basketball. And baseball. And... well, lots of other things.