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Ask Luke’s Mother-in-Law: Jack Webb, Muscles, Guns and Swallowing


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Luke’s mother-in-law is former LAPD, a licensed property appraiser and a self-described crazy cat lady. None of which has prepared her for TR readers. All questions and answers are real.

Hello all. I hope you all had a good Easter holiday if you celebrate, or a good weekend if you don’t. Anyway, Mrs. LYT visited for the weekend and LYT got to come up after WonderCon; he drove all the way to the desert just for Easter dinner and then back to work on Monday. On Saturday we went to the Earth Day events in Yucca Valley and then out to lunch at a great Thai restaurant in Joshua Tree. I also worked on my yard project that I showed a bit of last week (see above for the latest). So far it is a pretty cheap project. Everything but the pavers is free, and my labor. The plants all came from other parts of the yard, rocks were free and the other objects were also in other places around. Pavers are only $1.13 each so the project is going to be around $100. We even have an old bathtub that is going to be turned into a patio seat.

Yes, LYT ate everything I served for Easter dinner. I made turkey with gravy, rolls, carrots, green beans with mushrooms, cranberry, mashed potatoes, stuffing etc. He cleaned his plate.

William B: If you start out with one kitten and end up with six, have you crossed the line from “cat owner” to “crazy cat person”?

Not necessarily. If you love cats you may have more than 1. It is nice if they have other cats to play with and annoy. You probably have crossed the line to crazy cat person if you talk to them all the time and they answer. Or if you dress them up like children. If you bring a toy home for your kid you also bring one home for the kitty. They have a chair at the dinner table and you expect table manners from them. My cats, for example, have chairs at the table and they sit there during dinner. They know that they may not put paws on the table and must sit quietly in the chair – then they get treats. Mine talk to me and I understand what they are saying. They are my fur babies.

Jamie D: Hydra or S.H.I.E.L.D?

Two totally groups from Marvel. Hydra is a criminal terrorist group whereas S.H.I.E.L.D agents are the good guys. I favor the good guys, but hey, we have to have evil to have good to combat it. I am not terribly fond of the TV show that is currently on.

William B: What is your favorite Superhero of all time?

Has to be Superman. I love the old TV Superman George Reeves. Grew up on that show. He was so handsome. Then my next favorite is Christopher Reeve. To die for. Every Superman since Christopher Reeve has been a shadow of the character.

Lucy P: Why do muscular guys keep hitting on me?

Gee, I don’t know. Most muscular guys I know are pretty cute, or are you running into the ones that look like Hulk? I like well-toned muscular guys. Professional body builders not so much, as they are over the top. Then a lot also depends on the personality. Some muscular guys are way to into themselves, always preening and posing. Don’t care for that type, muscular or not. I would bet you have a good personality and are very nice looking, so that is probably why they are hitting on you.

Ryan L : Batman or Iron Man?

My favorite is Batman – but the Adam West version. Most of the other ones are too dark for me.

What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?

African or European? It’s roughly 25 mph. Much depends on the weather and the exact weight of the swallow.

hyalopterouslemur: S&W .38 police special. Good choice.

Thank you, it is a sweet gun.

In LA Noire‘s defense, the entire noire genre is about black-and-grey morality as much as it is about action. So obviously that means a lot of dialogue.
On that, any other retro fashions you might recommend?

Retro fashion. Love the Nehru jackets from the 1960’s. Also love bell bottom pants.

doctor_mindbender: Hi Luke’s Mother-in-Law:
I have two questions:
1) What does the Y in Luke Y. Thompson stand for? Luke has staunchly refused to even acknowledge the question so I know it must be something really juicy like Yog-Sothoth

Well, I do know what the Y stands for, but if he has not said then I probably cannot say either. However if you search around on some sites you will probably find it. I know it is out there on the net. It is interesting and not a very common name.

2) As a former police officer, what do you think of Dragnet, Adam-12 and other shows in the Webbiverse?

I cut my teeth on both Dragnet (original version with Jack Webb) and Adam-12. Jack Webb’s offices are still at Universal Studios in LA. Anyway, Mr. Webb was a great friend of the LAPD and thus he had good access to files for stories. He was pretty much a PR mouthpiece for LAPD. It was amazing how they could solve a case in less than 30 minutes. If you watch Dragnet enough you will see some of the same actors on Dragnet that were also in Adam-12 and Emergency. I still watch both shows and in my area you can see them on ME-TV starting at 4pm PST with Dragnet, Adam-12 and finally Emergency.

Love Adam-12 – it shows the great relationship between rookie Jim and his training officer Pete. Training officers can be very good and I was lucky to have ones that were similar to the Pete character.

Interesting fact: Emergency came about when LA was getting the paramedic system rolling. Again, Mr. Webb saw a need and this was a great way to get the word out about how valuable paramedics were as a standalone unit of the fire department. There are many references in the show that reflect some of the problems that were happening with the newly formed division.

skrag2112: What super villain do you think you could take in a fight?

Penguin, as I could turn up the heat on him.

dnjscott: What was it like working for the LAPD? They have a big of a rough reputation. Did you ever interact with Darryl Gates?

Chief Gates was a good chief. I only got to see him 1 time up close; that was during an inspection at the Police Academy. LAPD officers are very well trained. Not everyone makes it through the Academy or the process even before you get to the academy. LAPD has the rep for being one of the best departments in the country. In college I did a research project on the differences between East and West Coast departments, and by far the West Coast departments had the best reputations and least corruption. This study was done in the 1970s so many things have changed since then.

As with any group, you have good and bad eggs in the basket. Even LAPD has had some bad cops, but the department takes great effort to weed them out. Overall, most of the officers that I worked with were very professional and very hard working. Yes I did work with some that I cringed when I heard they were rolling on my call, but that was a very few compared to the ones that I was very happy to hear that they were rolling my way.

Police work is very difficult and you see many more people in their bad times rather than good times. There are very few thank yous in the job.

Gallen_Dugall: QUESTION! What super power would you want and why?

To be able to eat everything I want and never gain a pound. My second would be to be able to read peoples’ minds. For the first one – I love to eat. For the second, I love to know how people tick and thus being able to read minds would help me know what they are all about.

Well, friends, that’s it for another week. I have to go and tend my crock pot. I have a mini one which is great for one person. Making a beef and veg soup. I love soup. I had a bunch of left over veg from the weekend and some steak, so into the pot it goes. Yum. Talk to you all next week. Keep the questions coming – you all come up with some interesting ones. Be good to each other and Huggs.

If you’d like to add your questions to the pile for Luke’s mother-in-law, leave them in comments below.