Boomers on the Launching Pad

This month on "Heart to Heart with Michael," Philip Proctor is back this time with fellow Boomer, Jamie Alcroft. Recorded back in those thrilling days of yestermonth when men could sit at the same table and share a microphone. In this episode, which we call Boomers on the Launching Pad, Jamie reveals the shocking truth about John Wilkes Booth, maple syrup, and Joseph Kennedy's Lincoln, while Philip shares a shocking tale from a Thai restaurant. It's all snails and adventure. BUT THERE'S MORE! For those of you who make a chunky contribution through Patreon, you may receive the picture portion of our picmition! But don't stop there.... Come back in May for Part 2!

Transcript

Michael Liben:   0:01
Hi, this is Michael. Before we begin today's program, I wanted to commit to remember a friend that we had heart to heart recently lost. David Franco was an adult with CHD and served at Hearts Unite the Globe in many capacities. He was cohost of Heart to Heart with Nicole and David. He was an editor and director on heart to Heart with Anna, and above all, David Franco was a good friend. He was the kind of friend who took on any job, any task that was needed. His only concern was to do whatever he was asked to do as well as could be done. David was a part of the project that upgraded the sound in the editing of heart to heart in all of its forms. He was there when we needed him, and he will. Well, he was just always there. David was a friend and partner and we had heart to heart will miss him dearly. When he finally succumbed to his heart condition, he faced the end bravely and with a sense of accomplishment. His choices were few and brave, and he left this world with all the dignity he shared while in this world, David will be missed by all who knew him and Hebrew. We say he is a crowbar. Oh, may his memory be a blessing for his family and for all who knew him.

Michael Liben:   1:16
heart to heart With Michael, a program for the brief community. Our purpose is to empower our community with information and support. Today's program features our first ever panel of guests, and it promises to be a very special program indeed with us in Studio two comedians Philip Proctor on his third visit with us and Jamie All Croft. Philip Proctor is a founding member of the thrice Grammy nominated Firesign Theatre. Recognized as one of the 30 greatest acts of all time. His archives were recently purchased by the Library of Congress. He's appeared on and off Broadway in the USSR with the El Russian chorus in numerous local and regional theaters, on radio and in scores of films, video games and TV shows. He recently appeared with his darling wife, Melinda Peterson, in a live audio play at the World Kansai Fi Convention in Dublin, and their longtime members of NTS Theatre company NTS. Come and see us. He's won the Theater World L. A Weekly L. A Free Press and Drama Critics Awards, and his voice credits include Toy Story, Spirited Away, Monsters, Inc Inside Out, Seahorse Bob in Finding Nemo, The Drunken French Monkey in Dr Dolittle, Doctor Vidic, An Assassin's Creed and Howard de Ville in the three time Emmy winning Red Rats, which has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. His best selling memoir, Where's My Fortune? Cookie? Is now available as a podcast and audio book, and his latest book, What to Say to Your Crazy Right Wing Uncle. Talking Points for Liberals has just been released a CZ well. He is presently developing a new podcast series with longtime friend and producer Ted Bonnet called Phil and Ted's sexy Boomer Shell aimed at that special and unrepresented demographic and will be starring as the socialist firebrand Eugene V. Debs in a national radio project dramatizing his life. When does he sleep? It doesn't. He's the hardest working man in show business. Behind the wheel, right? I'm doing the BIOS, man. Jamie has been entertaining audiences as 1/2 of the comedy duo Mac and Jamie for over 35 years. His appearances with Mac on The Tonight Show, both with Johnny Carson and Jay Leno, led to 125 original episodes of the syndicated half hour comedy Break With Mac and Jamie Jay. Leno said Mac and Jamie are the top there. The funniest duel working today. Jamie is in the elite corps of L. A voice. Actors providing voices for many national commercials, Plus The Simpsons, Rugrats, Power Beach, Justice League, Adam's Genders, eight Crazy Nights and Scores, A video Games, most recently Years of War One and Two and Three and five Transformers, Halo and numerous film Moving for celebrities such a Sean Connery, Harrison Ford and even John Lennon. Jamie was named Westlake Village Citizen of the year for a successful fundraising for area schools. He has been named one of the top 25 most influential people in Ventura County. After a 12 year battle with congestive heart failure, he received a new heart and liver on September 24th 27 game at Cedars Sinai in Los Angeles. Together, they start on the YouTube series of their own, making rumors on the bench, and it is as boomers we're all here tonight in a sparkling episode recall rumors on the launching pad. So the panel clocking in at only 60 years old and no worse for the wear, is myself the youngest boomer. It's 72 years old and slightly refurbished.  

Michael Liben:   4:24
Jamie, all craft is here with his previously enjoyed heart and liver in used but spanking Lee. Good condition. Jamie, Thank you for joining us. It's pleasure to be here, Michael. Are others gave enjoined? Actually, yes. Our elder statesman Boomer, at just 79 years old, is Philip Proctor, who brought along his personal cardiac pacemaker. So please, no flash photography. Welcome back to the program.  

Michael Liben:   4:46
I think you just back off. Okay. All right. All right. It went off and I just had to do without you there. Hello? I am. Oh, I'm here, boy. That night I was the one that everybody Wait a minute. We're telling a story. I was with him one night in a restaurant when his pacemaker went off. Yeah, three times, Only shooting across the floor. Yes, it was wonderful. It was just a show never never to be forgotten. Yeah, I had a pacemaker put in because I had longer with Mia, which is, you know, fear of logs. Abe Lincoln suffered terribly. Yeah, and that's why I moved out of the cabin into a potentially the White House eventually. But you know that that Abraham Lincoln was born in his father's log cabin and John Kennedy once built log cabin syrup in his father's Lincoln.  

Michael Liben:   5:37
You have amazing, amazing the arts coincidences between Kennedy and I refused. There is no coincidence that that is a that's ah, that's a conspiracy. Lee Harvey Oswald's wife was named Marina John Wilkes Booth's wife went to school with the girl whose parents on the boat that they kept in Anna Maria, you know. Yes, this is a great wow. Never heard. But what's your story? The things you learn on this program are arm level. Yeah, that's the word for it. They're absolutely unbelievable, agrees the mind. I could just put Theo. We'll get some coffee mute. My skin will be like herring mug. Harry Anderson gave me this when I appeared on his show called Dave's World and on the back it says, I got this mug. I got my mug on Dave's world. That's Harry for you got my mug. I'm a bodyguard. You got your mugger and hunt. Too heartless Michael. And we're proud. He he left us far too soon. Uh, he did. Yeah. Yeah. You know what that was?  

Michael Liben:   6:43
That was for later on. But I'll start with that one, OK, That question is it was near the end, but I finally got anywhere near the vicinity. Yeah, looks like it can I s ee you guys allowed on Facebook and, uh, felt so secret that every time Hollywood loses another luminary, it's general to somebody you knew or somebody you know are killed. Yeah. Yeah, Okay. But listen between us. Well, my question is that well, you're right, nobody watches. But my question is this, um I think it just seems because the Hollywood world, the entertainment world is so much more open it and so much more visible to everybody. But I think it happens to every We reach a point where our contemporaries start leading What? What? What are you feeling? Are the walls closing in or do you feel something different, you know?  

Phil Proctor:   7:36
No, I know the competition's disappeared. Yeah, More work for us. Really? You know, the fact that I've had the bus and opportunity of working with so many talented, wonderful people are meeting them. Mike, I met Kirk Douglas. He was recruiting us for the Boy Scouts of America, who, by the way, are in the news today after 11. Yeah, they filed chapter. We're prepared for you. Just a blue state. But anyway, I'm Yeah, I met all these wonderful people, and I worked with many of them Bob Cummings and Ali and And they're going to die because I worked with him when I was in my twenties and they were okay in their forties or fifties. S O. I mean, it was inevitable. It's a little, but it also what affects me more in a funny way, because the people that I lose, like Harry Anderson, who was a dear, dear friend, right up to the end. So I'm about two months before the flu took him out. These people still live with me and and they bring me great joy when I think of them. And I'm so grateful for having spent time with them. I've gotten to know them not just his actors and actresses, but a cz real people, you know, And, uh and yet I also lost a dear friend named Steve Kaplan, who I went to a country school with to the ravages of Parkinson's after seven years of suffering from it. And that happened at the same time that these five or six luminaries passed away on. That affected me just a CZ much because all the memories of the great times I had with Steve we were on that. We were editors of the school newspaper of Riverdale Country School in the Bronx, and he was a wonderful, funny dear guy and I saw him at summer unions and things that, you know he's living with me, too, and the fact that our class, which has ah ah website it was able to celebrate his life together, is another wonder of the modern age, you know, kind of like an online memorial for Steve telling stories about our experiences with him and our love of him, you know, So it's a little bit different. Print its way, don't feel hand in. I really feel more like we're part of the infinite right. They expand expansion of life, which includes death, you know, I mean, that's the circle. My favorite sign language. I know if I can show you is Indian sign language for birth and death and let's say it goes for a birth and death, right? You know, rises at the end that it's a cycle. It's a circle. It's it's the circle of life. It's what it is. A circle death. And it will come to us all and I hope you know however it comes but being born, I don't remember it being particularly traumatic. So I don't think that leaving is gonna be any more traumatic. And maybe we'll even be reborn. We don't know who knows. But I know that I don't I don't remember anything before I was. You don't remember me from. I guess I don't ever wanna have roused way. Have breakfast? Not, You know, I don't think I've had dinner. We got 10 hours. But see, not what were we talking about? You know, I don't like it is I don't remember anything before or is boring. So I don't plan on knowing or being conscious of anything when I die. Uh, birth is beginning of life. Death is the end of life and we really don't know anything for sure, but on either end of. But here we are. Did you hear me? Yeah, I can. When you were er previously on this program you surprised me. You said that you were ready for what comes after. Uh, and in some sense, maybe looking forward to it. I got all upset, but, um what what do you think comes? Do you have a concept of heaven or afterlife? I was saying to Jamie because we're in the entertainment industry. Uh, there is there is a thing we call the after a life theme American Federation of Television and radio artists. And the fact is that that once you're in the public, I, uh, and people know who you are and love what you do and, you know, are part of your expanded universe. You can never really leave the planet. So, you know, it's a sure way

Phil Proctor:   12:04
on dhe. The fact is, there are movies and television chosen recordings of rum, makers of and books and everything Waleed behind live forever and they'll live forever, As as we hope we will in the hearts of those lovers forever by the baby Blue sound collective. I think what I love so much about this CD is that some of the songs were inspired by the patient's many listeners will understand many of the different songs and what they've been inspired. Our new album will be available on iTunes. Amazon dot com. Spotify. I love the fact that the proceeds from this CD are actually going to help those with congenital heart defects. Join Music Home Tonight Forever Hi, my name is Jaime Al Croft, and I just published my new book, The Tin Man Diaries. It's an amazing story of my sudden change of heart as I went through a heart liver transplant. I can think of no better way to read the Tin Man diaries than to cuddle up in your favorite hearts. Unite the Globe sweatshirt and your favorite hot beverage, of course, in your hearts Unite Blow mug, both of which are available. The hug, podcast network, online store or visit Hearts Unite theglobe dot This content is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. The opinions expressed in a podcast are not those of hearts unite the globe but of the hosts and guests and are intended to spark discussion about issues pertaining to congenital heart disease or bereavement. You are listening to heart to heart with Michael. If you or someone you know would like to be a guest on Michael's program, please email him at Michael at heart to heart with michael dot com. Now, back to our program.

Michael Liben:   14:03
You mentioned books that will live forever. So I'm just gonna do this, that Zach here and we'll talk about them in a little while, okay? And so did she show Jamey's? Yeah. Damn. Is this year. Well, I got the teary and air is right here. Jim. You telling his amazing story and my handmade cover. Yeah. This is the This is, I think, not the final release. No, but and I have Where's my foot on Cookie? Which is, uh, Phil's amazing story. And we'll get to that. I'm sure later on in the program. I just want it over yet. The story's not over yet. Yeah, they're not. Continue on. Continue on. I I I don't think myself on the launch pad yet. I think I'm more in the departure lounge. Well, actors, I think get that and the rest of us. Don't we just You know. George Carlin said, Everybody gets two minutes. No, Everyone gets one minute, but actors get two minutes after Carla. So it may be that you get more time in the lounge. I won't explain that. I had an uncle who I love dearly, and he was the head of the Goddard Space Station. Really? Uh, yeah, in in Maryland. And Ah, so he and his wife would often use NASA language. They had been with NASA, so he had been with NASA since the 1st 7 astronauts. And so that was our love that island for his, because when my mom and his and his wife were in their fifties and they thought they were getting very old, my aunt Shirley used to say, Well, we're on the launching pad now. Um, uh, she made it past 90 and my mom is 93 still with us. So they got a lot of time in that departure last. But that's where that's where launching pad comes from. For tonight's episode, the nice way to look at the transition as a launching pad. Sure. You think you know because you feel like you're going somewhere? Well, yeah. And in fact, I would have had a dear friend named Vanna Bonta. Ah, whose husband was a rocket scientist. Well, he still is a rocket scientist and she is in orbit now. What was a tracker on my cell phone and see where where Vonna is right now, which is particularly suitable because she not only was a beautiful actress and a singer and voice artist, but she wrote a book called Quantum Was it called Flight called Flight, which was the first quantum science fiction novel. And and so it's absolutely fitting the she buried a rocket scientist and isn't it was launched now in into space after physical being. Our physical work was over on the her ashes are her ashes. I don't think anybody thought that she was Actually, it's a rash is, I think. Okay, I just want to clarify E what expensive these air. All the many satellites now she went up with, like, 100 other Alright holds? Yeah, and they're all in orbit somewhere up there, chatting away. Where are you now? Colliding over South Africa? Yeah, Back off. Get off of my cloud, you know. Alright, Onward. Well, I the reason I asked if you had a vision of heaven was because I did once. And then I realized that one man's heaven is definitely another man's hell. And I was thinking, Heaven is great. You can, like, see anybody performing anywhere, Anytime. You just want to go. And that sounds great, right? So today we'll go through the Beatles and tomorrow we'll go see the stones. And then next week, we're gonna go see fire signs doing Bozo's. That's gotta be performers. Hell, if you're spending all of eternity performing for the rest of us port sides, we're having a great time. We lived. We loved to perform. But there's got to be my favorite time of day is when I'm on stage. Yeah, you are you are you Are you taking a lot of dates now that you're back with the transplant and everything? Uh, I work when I asked me to assure you because I know you're also seriously for a moment. I know you're also seriously advocating for heart transplants and that sort of become a mission, right? Minutes and talk about that. Well, I, uh I have become an ambassador for one legacy, and one legacy is the local Donate life chapter here in Southern California. And they're the ones that found my heart and liver. And I thought, Well, what can I do to pay back? And I thought of being a volunteer in the hospital to go talk to other people that are waiting for their organs. But, um, I chose to instead to go around speaking about Donorship and encouraging Donorship on Lee. 54% of the people in America recycle their bodies. 86% of us recycle our garbage, but the most the most treasured that might be. You might have that backwards. I wish I did know. I mean, some people have a lot of garbage inside, is saying Oh, I see. No, no, I, um e I I speak to Quanis Clubs, Lions clubs go to ground zero and I speak to D. M V groups because the Department of Motor Vehicles here in the States is ground zero more donorship because that's where you sign up on your license to become a doctor, right? Many countries, I don't believe Israel has it yet, but several countries in it and I know Spain has it. Where is when you get your driver's license, you automatically become a donor, and then after six months, you can opt out. So Spain has a much higher donorship level. I think it's in the 70 75th percentile, and, um so more people are saved. And what struck me was that 22 people a day die waiting for organs. They need 22 people a day. Added up. So if I could go on a speaking date once a week, and I couldn't get eight people to sign up, that's eight times 24 lives we could save. I mean, if I get eight people to sign up, I beg your pardon. That's eight lives we can save. So that's eight times eight. That's a lot of people. I got me a donor card in Israel. It's not part of your driver's license. It has gotta actually wanna get a donor card. Okay, um, I got mine. Actually, Before my daughter died, I got mine because a very good friend of mine from from days of pediatric cardiology in the old days, before we could do this newfangled stuff with video and stuff, we were on the list. Serv. If anybody remembers that We were emailing each other every day about our families with congenital heart defect. But our kids and one of these guys came in actually moved, tried to live here. It was very tough on him. But he lived here for a while and he was a heart transplant. And I didn't know that until you got here. And, um, he would help me do some of the driving with my daughter, and I would take him for his checkups. What? He had to go in here and get up. And it was it was because of him that, um, we went in our family started getting our cards on. Just by coincidence, we had them when when the l was was dying. Uh, I don't think do this in states, but if you have a card in Israel, you get to jump the line over someone who doesn't have a card if you need it. And it's one of the factors they'll consider her need is Are you willing to donate? Do you have a card? It's interesting. I I I'm not sure that's a great idea because I think it might prevent some people from contacting, but I understand why they do it because they need more people to sign up. Yeah, they The world's in desperate need of donors, and it's a very passive prestige. Er, that's right. As you know, once you sign that donor card, that's all you have to worry about. That's all you ever have to worry about. And, um, you leave incredible legacy. I mean, people want to leave something behind on this Earth. They say, Well, I want to make a difference. That makes one big difference because you're saving at least eight lives with your organs and many hundreds more with your skin tissue and corneas. Yeah, we did that. We were able to leave skin. One cornea was usable and cartilage is, well, cartilage

Phil Proctor:   22:12
and muscle mass. Yeah, it's just amazing the things they're replacing these days. I was five hours old when I had my first surgery. The only advice I could really give someone like that is to be there for your family. This is life and you have two choices. You either live in Are you in a corner and cry. I am in a Gorski and the host of heart to Heart with Anna. Join us on Tuesdays at noon Eastern time on Speaker R Block. Talk radio will cover topics of importance for the congenital heart defect community. Remember, my friends, you are not. If you've

Michael Liben:   22:49
enjoyed listening to this program, please visit our website hearts, Unite theglobe dot or GE and make a contribution. This program is a presentation of hearts Unite the Globe and is part of the Hug Podcast Network Heart. Tonight The Globe is a nonprofit organization devoted to providing resource is to the congenital heart defect community to educate and power and enrich the lives of our

Phil Proctor:   23:08
community members. If you would like access to free resource is pertaining to the CFC community, please visit our website at congenital Heart defects dot com for information about CHD hospitals that treat CHD survivors, summer camps for CHD families and much, much more. You are listening to heart to heart with Michael. If you have a question or comment that you would like a dressed on our program, please send an email to Michael even at Michael at heart to heart with michael dot com. Now back toe heart to heart with Michael.

Michael Liben:   23:43
Are you following what's going on with in the world with the different companies around the world making hearts now. Israel, I think. I think it's in Israel. They've with with a three D printer. They've made a rabbit heart that yes, if they're testing and that it's delicious to buy the right sauce, just like I wouldn't know rabbits, not kosher man contr Amish Amish rabbits are definitely not kosher. We eat hooves. Why in the Amish community, So the way. But they have to be because that's all you have. Yeah, that's right. You know what the question was? Are you following what's going on? Because from what I understand, especially with livers and also with kidneys, they're doing really, really well. That will, I think, takes some of the pressure off. On the one hand will also make people who would have otherwise sign say, they don't need me anymore. Exactly. And that's what I'm afraid of. Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of. It's doing these. These manufactured to three D organs are in such a embryonic stage. Ah, it's going to be years and years and years before they can actually put it into a human body and save a life so I don't Frankly, I don't like the publicity that that is getting because that makes people complaisant. Makes them feel like they have to come donors on. I thought I'm a big objected to that. Well, they are doing. But objective, they're doing it. No, I don't object them doing it, but I object them talking about it. I'm publicizing it Now I know why they do it because they want to get more money for re sturgeon, and that's probably a good thing. So it's just my own little peccadillo and I'll get over it. You know, the first thing they did was they grew an ear in a Petri dish or something like that. An ear o be treated, Oh, God. But like he said, it's gonna take years and years and years, years before they actually way go. You guys feel like Yes. I mean, this happened in my family, and my sister was right about my father having a heart attack since the day you turned 50. You made it to 85 it wasn't a heart attack. Um, do you find like your family's like like closing in and watching and making sure that 40 my sister wouldn't let my father shovel the snow anymore. And I have sisters who have Ah hovered over me a little bit and they're kind of helicopter ish at first. But now they know that everything's fine. I mean, I've got a originally had a 46 year old heart, and now I have a 48 year old heart because it's been two years and it's do we find and nobody's worried about me, right? Uh, they were just, uh It's a miracle. And we accept it, and we're not. Nobody's being a nudge about it. 20 Philip, you only recently, uh, had your first far as I know, heart difficulties. And you got your pacemaker implanted. Yeah. It also the beginning didn't go so well. You want to tell us a little about that at the beginning? Didn't go so well. Know everything. I think after you had it in it. Triggered Oh, no. Yeah. But that was only because it triggered because there was a problem. Identified the problem, and then he was able to go to the hospital. Then I I didn't have my dinner. I had. We all just was a time. You get ordered Yeah, we had to wear a tie to go into the booth Too much. Seems the fact was that I had the heart is a muscle and a electronic device. Electrical device. That's what makes it beat. Hey! And and it's crazy, man. And in my instance, one of I'd had what they call a minor heart attack, which we apparently have all the time left. Little scar left a little scar on my heart, and it affected one of the nerves. Then you kept the hard going. Yeah, and so this this crazy little nerve got confused and would go off at the wrong time. And that caused, like, a tram er over here in my heart by my area, which was fast heartbeat. When they finally diagnosed it, I went in and they oblate id the nerve right now. My mom had that right. They burned it. And so and they put in this pacemaker in case it should re occur in some capacity. And when we were at this late lunch at a Thai restaurant in the wound had not completely healed yet, right? There was a little touch of log arrhythmia, and the thing went off to basically get my heart back to where Waas. But since it was a damaged nerve, it didn't do like just once. It can't kept going. And it was like getting kicked in the in the chest by a whore. He literally shot three feet and I did across the floor. It was it was not a pleasant experience chair. I was sitting next to me. Uh, you know, soon I looked up to talk to him. He was gone, you know? Wow. He was behind me by three feet. Happened three times, so we called the ambulance. But I've had absolutely no difficulties. Not going would since then. Yeah, well, he upgraded to the better pacemaker. He got the X m Sirius Radio and Non Star. And he has climate control. Now. What kind of plan? Make light of it. We gotta do, right. Let's see what kind of climate I can get. You guys. That's right. It's a tropical forest. What a group. It's funny, too, because we did that album. What is it? How can you be in two places at once? Yeah, I think. Yeah, sure. Anywhere at all. Anywhere I we came up with the idea of climate control in the car. And you know that that very year they created climate control in the car. I had it first because I can't get a futuristic courses with thunderstorms and your story, right, Kane. But yes, As Jamie and Field trail off into the sunset, I can assure you that they will be back next month to finish this conversation. But for now, we're out of time. And I'd like to thank you for joining us this month on heart to heart with Michael. If you're watching this on video congratulations and thank you for joining the heart to heart team through Patriot until next month on behalf of all of us at heart tart and hearts unite the globe. Please stay safe. Stay inside, stay well and take care of the ones you love. Thank

Phil Proctor:   30:15
you. Thank you again for joining us. We hope you have gained strength from listening to our program. Heart to heart with Michael could be heard every Thursday at noon Eastern time. We'll talk again next time when we'll share more stories