RIP Andy

Andy Griffith has left us.

My earliest encounters with him were him as a comedian back in the 1950s, a very Southern comedian. I could recite "What It Was, Was Football" line for line, and I had a cat named Big Orange, after the line "I believe I will have another big orange" (said in response to the drunk saying "buddy, have a drink"). And the best explanation of what football is about is his "run from one of that cow pasture to the other without either getting knocked down or stepping in something."

I love his hick persona explaining the ballet Swan Lake, using the all-purpose explanation "And the curtain fell and time passed."

And then I saw him in the movie "Face in the Crowd," where he played  a scheming preacher who becomes massively popular and moves on into megalomania. He was amazing. Highly recommended.

I thought "The Andy Griffith Show" was good and full of well-done characters (Don Knotts was fabulous), but it was a little too rural and sweet for me. And his later shows as a lawyer didn't much interest me, though they were filmed in Wilmington, my hometown, so I enjoyed the setting.

I'll miss him.