‘Merver’ ….not ‘Mercer’. There was a black boxer called Ray Mercer, he knocked out the ‘Great White Hope’ Tommy ‘Duke’ Morrison in the early nineties. Violent stuff, the ref should’ve stopped the mauling a lot earlier, and shoulda been barred from ever officiating another boxing match for his failure to do just that.
*At secondary school we had a Canadian PE teacher, his surname was Merver and he was a Vietnam vet. Looking back I think he might possibly have had some Ashkenazi in him. I recall a Cypriot classmate lent him a music tape of a very popular Arabesque music singer at the time called Ibrahim Tatlises. ‘Tatlises’ transl. means sweet-voice. Tatlises is a Kurdo-Arab and his music is too ethnic for my liking, but Mr. Merver absolutely loved it, surprisingly. I still remember him looking so happy listening with his headphones connected to his Walkman and he kept pronouncing the artists name as “ABRAHAM Tatlises” with a cheeky smile. Cool guy!
*There’s a musician from Toronto called Steve Kudlow. He plays in a Speed-metal band called ‘Anvil’. Great guitarist whose solos hit the spot, euphoria inducing… and then some. I like his vocals too, nothing annoying unlike some others. ‘Kudlow’ sounds like an East European name. He looks vaguely reminiscent of the more famous/infamous Gene Simmons who was born in Haifa and formed KISS in the US. I say infamous because Gene by his own admission has slept with more than 4000 women, and taken a polaroid photo of each encounter as a momento. That said I actually respect his teetotal, drug-free lifestyle which was unusual back in their heyday. If only other KISS members Pete Criss and Ace Frehley were teetotal too. Gene and Paul Stanley practically own the KISS brand, and decide on business affairs. Sorry, but no prizes for guessing Paul Stanley’s provenance.