June is the 40th Anniversary of the movie "ROCKY II," my all-time favorite!! In this inspirational sequel to "Rocky," the irrepressible Italian Stallion WON the World Championship for the first time and the movie debuted exactly one month after I started my business, "All-Out Carpet Cleaners." I related to the movie VERY much as I also came from poverty and was "fighting my way up" in life. And just as Rocky got married and then Adrian was expecting their first child in "Rocky II," Beth and I had just wed and SHE got pregnant with our first, soon after. I related to this movie a LOT.
My business began on May 15th, 1979 and "Rocky II" debuted on June 15th. I get a LOT of flak for admitting how much this movie "got me going" but I don't care, obviously...God used it in my life to motivate me to get "All-Out" off the ground!! ("All-Out" was my THIRD attempt to start a carpet cleaning business and it lasted 35 years, by God's grace!!)
Mays's Greatest Day---Today is also the 55th Anniversary of my favorite baseball player of all-time, Willie Mays, having what *I* call "Mays's Greatest Day." You see, 55 years ago today, 5-31-'64, Willie played both games of a doubleheader against the New York Mets...Game 2 went 23 innings and so Mays played a total of 32 innings that day!! Additionally, Mays had just been named THE FIRST BLACK CAPTAIN OF A MAJOR LEAGUE TEAM IN BASEBALL HISTORY and it was even thought that he might be the first black MANAGER one day!! He had a chance to STILL be hitting .400 as the month of May ended and was on pace to be the one to break the career home run record...meaning he would have had a shot to surpass two venerated WHITE players, Ted Williams (last to hit .400 in a single season) and Babe Ruth (who held the career home run record, at that point.) All of this was in an era when minorities were allowed to PLAY Major League Baseball, but were minimized in subtle ways.
Five years ago I wrote a book (never published) about that day and I've recently RE-READ it, and tweaked it slightly, hoping to self-publish it one day SOON. It WAS called "Mays's Greatest Day" but I'm now retitling it "32 In '64: Mays's Greatest Day."
Clint Eastwood is 89 Today---Clint is getting OLD. As I wrote when his last movie came out (see blogs in December of last year), I pray he'll get SAVED. As with "Rocky" and Mays, I draw SOME inspiration from Clint, and the way he has expanded his talents over the years, even into his 70s and 80s, though he could have "rested on his laurels." For years, I had a blog site named "CLINTSPIRATIONS" because of how Clint inspired me when "Million Dollar Baby" came out as he turned 75. But again....Clint Eastwood needs to be SAVED, and it's very, very obvious, in his case!!
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