Words & Pictures

Back

2010-07-25T06:06:00.000-07:00

I know that I had a few people following this blog when I abruptly ceased writing a few months ago.

Well, my job is settled and I have moved and FINALLY have time to sit and write.

Random-er-oo

2009-11-30T15:25:00.000-08:00

Several random thoughts:

1. Auburn. The Auburn defeat at the hands of Alabama this past Friday was very painful to watch. I am not a sport authority and don't pretend to be one: I am a fan. This one hurt. I wish Auburn the best in whatever second-tier bowl game they participate in. And for the next four days I am a University of Florida fan as the SEC Championship game comes up this Saturday. Go Gators!

2. C-Span. Watched a couple hours of C-Span this weekend including a segment by a bunch of Political Scientists dissecting the 2008 election cycle. Key take-aways: The size of the Independent vote was larger in 2008 than in recent elections and that Independents were swayed primarily by the War on Terror (Afghanistan and Iraq) and the Economy.

3. Apple. Best Buy is recommending that its Apple buyers get they machines "tuned" before they go out the door. I wonder how long before Mr. Jobs pulls Apple products out of Best Buy.

Neil

2009-11-09T15:48:00.000-08:00

Neil Vipond

Neils Bohr

Dr. Neil deGrasse

Neil Armstrong

Neil Young

Anniversary

2009-11-08T11:35:00.001-08:00

We are rapidly approaching the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. To Americans of my age, the Berlin Wall was a powerful symbol of everything wrong with socialism.

Yesterday while driving my wife and I discussed the news in general. And, she asked me "how do I tell truth from spin?" A very good question. I noted the current reporting of the terrorist shootings at Fort Hood in Texas. I told her that it was my opinion that the shootings were terrorism - nothing more and nothing less. That she should watch the news and read the news and see which organizations described the shooter as a terrorist and which did not. Wolf Blitzer is particularly amusing when it comes to this overt bias.

Same thing with President Reagan. Reagan never got the respect that he was due, and in fact, his place in history continues to be challenged. Just pay attention to how his legacy is reported: that will tell you everything you need to know.

So, on the anniversary of the falling of the Berlin Wall: a quick reminder about the power of words from someone who was capable of doing more than reading them from a teleprompter.

Hopper

2009-11-05T16:03:00.000-08:00

I am saddened to hear that 71 year old kick-ass actor Dennis Hopper has been diagnosed with cancer. Here are a few photos of the man with which to consider his art:

Thoughts

2009-10-29T14:44:00.000-07:00

Another one of those times where there are lot of interesting things going on around me, but none stand out as being worth the effort to research and write about. So, here are some odds and ends:

1. The excerpts that I have seen from the "This is it" movie have shown an engaged, healthy and highly-interacting singer. Jackson did not appear sick. He did not look like the 30 year old dancer/singer which I have locked in my mind since the 1980s. He did look like a very athletic, somewhat thin 50 year old with really good moves.

2. The woman Roman Polanski is alleged to have raped is asking California authorities to drop charges. The media has been a pain to her since this issue with Polanski flared up recently and the tabloids, papers and tee vee outlets have been pestering her and her children. I am mixed with this one. I recognize the need for the woman to have a peaceful life, but crimes are crimes. Those who violate the law have violated social contracts which are superior to individual interests. How about we toss Polanski into California State Prison for a couple of weeks? That should even out the rape thing nicely. Also: I read in the LA Times that Gore Vidal (83 and no longer relevant) believes that poor Mr. Polanski is being harassed because he is a Jew? Really? I thought it was because he was (allegedly) a child rapist.

3. The President did the right thing in visiting Dover AFB early this morning. It would have been a much better thing if he'd done it without cameras and the press corps. The presence of the press corps turns which should have been the President's devotion to those who have given their lives for our country, into a photo op in advance of a policy decision.

LA

2009-10-23T17:19:00.000-07:00

I reconnected with my inner-automotive-self this morning as I cruised down the Sepulvada pass at 80 miles per hour in Los Angeles.

Having moved from California ten years ago I have not made it back to the Golden State except on rare occasion and this morning’s drive was like coming home again. My rental car, a Chevrolet Aveo S struggled to get to speed but once there was able to maintain highway speeds.

So, there I was in pack of cars hurtling down the freeway, five feet off the bumper ahead of me at 80 miles an hour: sublime.

There were other things, besides excessive highway speeds which struck me during my brief trip back:

* There was a lot more graffiti on the public property than I recall. Quite a few signs were illegible due to gang tagging. 

* For a state teetering on bankruptcy the sports bar I visited was packed. I dined at BJ’s in Oxnard on Monday evening and had to wait 30 minutes to be seated. I thought California was in a recession. 

* Brown. I forgot how many shades of brown there are there - California is essentially a desert state save for the water the SOCALs steal from the North.

Bottom line: Maybe one can truly never go “home again”, but you can always visit.

Missing

2009-10-14T17:07:00.000-07:00

I note that I have never seen the network news channels pick up and carry the story of lost, exploited or missing children of color.

It was during my MBA at the University of Maryland where we were challenged by a day-long discussion of ethics. It was not until the afternoon session that race relations were finally discussed - uncomfortably so. Our class was a very diverse group but even among those there was a reluctance to dive into this sensitive issue. We grabbed the third-rail of politics and dove in.

Maybe the ethics session worked because a few days ago I was made uncomfortable again when I happened upon a site which focused on lost and missing individuals of color. The site does what local and national news organizations are unable to do: focus on the lost, missing and murdered among the African American community.

So the next time you see lawyers and reporters yelling at each other on tee-vee about a missing child: think about the children you are not hearing about as their plight is as real and as dire.

WTF?

2009-10-10T12:06:00.000-07:00

More than most I have had my doubts about the Celebrity President. Little did I know that after only twelve days in office (the end of the nomination period for his year ended on day #12 of Obama's administration) the Nobel Committee was able to determine that he was the One.

What is there to say? I have a few friends fuming about the selection what with Pope John Paul working his entire life for peace. And of course, that nasty Ronald Reagan: all he did was reduce nuclear stockpiles by 80%.

From what I hear - Obama, a crafty lefty, is the likely American League Cy Young Award winner this year on the strength of his tossing out the opening day first pitch. As well deserved as the Nobel. As well deserved.

Cy Young and Nobel Award Winner Obama Warms Up

Randomizer

2009-10-06T15:53:00.000-07:00

Some random thoughts for a Tuesday.

Blogger Update. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that it will be regulating the Internet increasingly like it regulates other broadcast media. In particular it is applying the screws to disclosure. For instance, the FTC is going to demand more transparency from bloggers when they review or rate something. Apparently we dim witted consumers of the blogisphere are unable to make sense out of outrageous reviews from serious reviews. Is there ANYONE who thought that disclosure was an issue for the blogisphere? Buehler? Buhler? Or is it as I suspect more evidence that the current administration cannot stop itself from sticking its regulatory nose into everyone's business?

Olympics. Boy, oh boy, did I get that one wrong! I was certain that the President Obama was going to secure the 2016 Olympics for Chicago. What with all of his success in withdrawing our troops from Iraq and Afganistan, his numerous strategy meetings with General McCrystal, balancing the budget and providing universal health care the Euros had no choice but to gift the Olympics to the President. I am going to have to start re-thinking about the accomplishments of the current administration.

Commissioning. I have written a couple of times about Admiral Wayne Meyer and my admiration for this great American. This coming Saturday this nation will show its thanks as the guided missile destroyer named for him is commissioned in Philadelphia. It is deeply unfortunate that he did not live to see the ship named for him commissioned into service, but we take solice in the awareness that he knew the day was coming and that the honor was to bestowed. In an age where thoughts are more important than action, it is high time we recognize those men and women (such as Meyer) who strive and achieve greatness.

Prayer

2009-10-03T17:24:00.000-07:00

George Herbert was a 17th century parson. As James M. Gordon noted, this has, "...more spiritual perception and honesty than the sonnet's constraining fouerteen lines have any right to contain."

Prayer 1.
by George Herbert

PRAYER the Churches banquet, Angels age,
Gods breath in man returning to his birth,
The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav’n and earth ;

Engine against th’ Almightie, sinner's towre,
Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
The six daies world-transposing in an houre,
A kinde of tune, which all things heare and fear ;

Softnesse, and peace, and joy, and love, and blisse,
Exalted Manna, gladnesse of the best,
Heaven in ordinarie, man well drest,
The milkie way, the bird of Paradise,

Church-bels beyond the stars heard, the souls bloud,
The land of spices, something understood.

Dunaway

2009-10-01T16:49:00.000-07:00

Faye Dunaway photos from one of my other favorite movies: Thomas Crowne Affair.

Damn. She. Is. Hot.

Chinatown

2009-09-30T14:41:00.001-07:00

It remains my favorite motion picture: Chinatown with Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway. Nicholson, a young man plays a detective investigating a plot to steal water in the early days of a booming Los Angeles. And Dunaway, an absolute knock-out. Beautiful to behold, subtle and carrying a dark secret. Written by Robert Towne and directed by Roman Polanski.

I'll not spoil the film for those who have not seen it. It is however a classic and should be viewed.

I am not going to re-hash the felony to which Mr. Polanski plead guilty to all those many years ago. Rather, what I find interesting is the outflowing of support from the Hollywood elite. A few samples from today's media outlets:

"He is sweet and very strong and is very, very demanding, in the tradition of an auteur," said Sigourney Weaver.

"We stand by and await his release and his next masterwork," said Zurich Film Festival Jury President Debra Winger.

"An online petition has been signed by directors such as Marin Scorsese, Woody Allen and Pedro Almodovar, as well as actors" said a CNN.com posting today.

So. The Hollywood establishment thinks that an adult man having sex with a 13 year old girl is no big thing. Well, perhaps the support is because he is one of theirs. Can you imagine the bellowing and posturing should this have been a conservative republican, and PLEASE don't tell me that would not be the case.

The hypocrisy of the Left continues to confound me. Further, the inability of alleged unbiased popular media astounds me. The CNN.com article barely mentioned the reason that that Hollywood elite was supporting Polanksi: the alleged rape of a minor.

I am sure that a candle light vigil is in the works. And rest assured, it is not for the victim. It is for the perpetrator.

Old

2009-09-27T12:36:00.000-07:00

One of my absolute favorite blog sites is that of Richard de Pesando's Grey Area. He is a graphic designer and has a very modern view of the world and has inspire me to look for art in more common things around me. Here are a few less modern photos (not mine):

Racist?

2009-09-26T14:11:00.000-07:00

Jimmy Carter the former President and current political gadfly is making a name for himself these days. Granted, it is the sort of name that most of us reserve for a crazy uncle, but it is a name after all.

President Carter has gone on record as saying that the majority of those against the current President are racist. The former President would do well to choose his words carefully. Racism is a serious charge and harkens back to the bad old days of segregation and poll taxes. That Mr. Carter chooses to equate political disagreement with racism is troubling at best and, at worst, a political precursor to fascism.

The entire point of the First Amendment to the Constitution of these United States is to protect political speech. Political speech. The actions of Mr. Carter, overt or not, act to decrease the political discourse necessary in this great nation. Mr. Carter knows this. More troubling is the reluctance of President Obama to distance himself from crazy uncle Jimmy, thus giving the ravings more credibility than they deserve.

So, is my disagreement with President Obama on the issue of health care sufficient for Mr. Carter to consider me a racist? Or perhaps, I am a racist because I think it is silly that he is putting a vegetable garden on the White House grounds. Maybe I am a racist because I believe that cancelling the F-22 program is very bad for national defense.

Taking Mr. Carter at his word: for every two complaints against the President one of them must be based on racism.

Bottom line: With Mr. Carter grading the test you'd better be careful how many times you disagree with the President, lest you should be marked with the R for racist.

Likes

2009-09-25T11:16:00.001-07:00

Thought I'd continue on the theme of music and bore you all with a small handful of my favorite music. They are not in any particular order:

1. Adagio for Strings, by Samuel Barber. Performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic directed by Leonard Bernstein. The tempo of this emotive piece of music is so measured that it feels as though it is going to fall apart. To those who think that a conductor doesn't matter they need only to listen to Bernstein's deliberate interpretation to destroy that idea. Written as a slow movement for a string quartet by Barber the music has been adopted by many. I recall sitting in the audience at the Kennedy Center on the 19th of September 1991, only ten days after 9/11, listening to the NSO perform this piece and the muted sobs from the audience - as emotional an evening as I have ever experienced.

2. Almost anything by Neil Young. I have quite a bit of his music on albums, CD and in digits and find that there is an arc to his performances. His early work is very athletic, almost muscular in the way he plucks and bangs on his guitar or any other instrument which finds its way into his hands. Of all of his albums, it is his 1971, "Live at Massey Hall" which best displays his musical muscularity. Of all of his individual songs, it is the 1976 song, "Like a Hurricane" on the "Unplugged" which is my favorite favorite, where Young plays the song almost entirely on foot organ.

3. Cecila Bartoli, "The Vivaldi Album". I love the sound of women singing and Bartoli is the new classic female mezzo soprano of our generation overtaking Frederica von Stade. Now, I know that hardly anyone who isn't a classical music fan would know either Bartoli or von Stade. I would offer that both are worth seeking out and listening.

Listening

2009-09-25T09:38:00.000-07:00

I was feeling just a little nostalgic the other day after listening to the Beatles Abbey Road CD and it got me thinking about how differently we consume music in 2009 as compared to 1969.

When I was in college I owned a pair of Bose 301 bookshelf speakers and for a poor student in the fall of 1973 they were a significant luxury. They were paired with a Marantz receiver and a turntable which gave me warmer, deeper interpretations of the music than I deserved.

What I remember about those days was the way we'd listen to music. A small handful of students in a cluttered room listening intently, purposefully to a new record album. I don't recall sampling songs or jumping from track to track - we listened as a group, song-by-song until we flipped it over and listened to the second side. This seems to differ greatly with the advent of digital music where we are increasingly Balkinized with each of listening to only that precise piece of music we choose to purchase. The upside is, of course, better value per unit purchased. The subtle downside is that the individual misses out on new or different music that they might like had they listened to it - a self-imposed musical censorship.

Randomness

2009-09-21T15:47:00.000-07:00

"...and in the end, the love you take
is equal to the love you make."

I picked up a re-mastered copy of the Beatles' Abby Road CD this weekend and spent time bathing in the delicious melodies. It is astounding how well much of their music stands up to time, age and changing musical fashion. My daughter was riding in the car with me as I played it loudly for the second time much to her delight. She was fascinated by Maxwell's Silver Hammer: a song she'd never heard before and found creepy and interesting.

There are two songs which I am fond of: 1) Carry that Weight and 2) Come together.

There are a lot of links to be found regarding this album.

Bias

2009-09-10T16:03:00.000-07:00

Interesting that CNN hurried out a survey of 427 individuals regarding the President's most recent speech regarding health care. Not surprising was that CNN television reported that 66% of those surveyed had changed their opinion about the health care plan as a result of the speech and crowed those results all evening.

So, apparently Obama has changed the opinions of a lot of Americans. Well. Maybe. Maybe not.

Those who know me know that I love numbers. If you dig into the numbers you'll find that the CNN sample was comprised of the following self-identified political break-down:
Democrats: 47%
Republicans: 18%
Independent: 35%

Interesting. The sample included 2.6 times the number of Democrats as compared to Republicans.

My liberal fans are fond of bashing Fox News for their bias, but are reluctant to acknowledge the same sins of CNN.

Chizik

2009-09-07T14:46:00.000-07:00

The Coach Chizik era at Auburn University began well this weekend with 556 yards of offense and a win Saturday against Louisiana Tech. A good start. A good start indeed.

Betrayed

2009-09-05T15:45:00.000-07:00

Oil for terrorist?

This weekends Telegraph reports that the sleazy deal between the U.K. and Libya is worse than it first looked.

Scottish MP Doublas Carswell said, "This is further evidence that our Government has done a grubby deal with a nasty regime,” he said. “It is an oil-for-terrorist deal. The Government has always presented the medical advice as being totally objective, but it now turns out it was being paid for by Libya. It shows the Government in a poor light.” (Source www.telegraph.co.uk)

At issue is the Scottish release of mass murderer Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi whose compassionate release was based on reports that he had less than 3 months to live.

Turns out that the medical reports were cooked as the doctors who assessed al-Megrahi were all on the payroll of the Libyan government: how convenient.

More galling is that British PM Gordon Brown appears to be a key culprit for selling out the United States. For those of you who may have forgotten part of the agreement between the U.K. and the U.S. for the prosecution of al-Megrahi was that the man would serve his sentence in the U.K. So much for the word of the U.K.

The special relationship between the U.K. and the U.S. will not be undone by this under-the-table betrayal. That our two great nations see the world and act in the world similarly based on our shared history and sense of justice is not disputed. What is at the heart of this matter is the betrayal of trust by the Prime Minister of the Britain.

There is NO DOUBT that the release of al-Megrahi was accomplished less for compassionate reasons than for business reason. In the short term the U.K. has shored up its financial relationship with a despotic regime. In the long run, the U.K. has betrayed it's truest ally.

Schooldaze

2009-09-03T17:21:00.000-07:00

The TelePrompter of the United Status (TOTUS) notes in his website that political indoctrination of our youth begins next week as, "... we'll be beamed live into every public school classroom across America. It's true that this has been done before in places like the Soviet Union, China, North Korea and Venezuela, but this will be a first here in the U.S. and we can't be prouder to be the first administration with the TV programming chops to pull it off."

How true. As of today the President who is famous for being a celebrity has held 111 news conferences. Hard to imagine what the news conference total will be next week when the explains to the kids that health care is essential to their parents. Without which, their parents will die and not be able to buy them candy.

I am also told that the President will be giving out homework. Humm. Can't wait to see what THAT looks like.

Cohen

2009-09-02T11:45:00.000-07:00

"But I admired the Communists
for their pig-headed devotion
to something absolutely wrong.
It was years before I found
something comporable for myself:
I joined a tiny band of steel-jawed zelots
who considered themselves
the Marines of the spirtual world."
~ Excerpted from Leonard Cohen's poem, "The Party Was Over Then Too".

Harrison

2009-08-31T16:23:00.000-07:00

Barking

BY JIM HARRISON

The moon comes up.
The moon goes down.
This is to inform you
that I didn’t die young.
Age swept past me
but I caught up.
Spring has begun here and each day
brings new birds up from Mexico.
Yesterday I got a call from the outside
world but I said no in thunder.
I was a dog on a short chain
and now there’s no chain.

----------------------------

Holy shit. Poetry and cooking are so similar and I love each. Understand, I don't like each - I LOVE each. I think about how my chef friend takes a huge pot and fills it with water and veal bones. He cooks, and cooks and cooks and pulls out the bones. Then he cooks it down some more. After a couple of days the liquid is removed into a very small pan and cooked some more. He calls it reducing. He adds spices and cream and cooks it some more. Reduced and concentrated. Reduced and concentrated. Until...until it is so concentrated and so flavorful that any additional work would be too much.

It was like the morel and foi gras soup at Citronelle: so great it made me cry. And, at the Louvre when I was stopped dead in my tracks.

Good behavior is so difficult. Good food and good poetry is difficult in the best sort of way. Give me more.

Give me more Jim Harrison.

MacBook

2009-08-31T14:16:00.000-07:00

I take back much, but not all, of what I have said about Apple and their products. In fact, I am doing so from my 13" MacBook Pro laptop at this moment.

When I was originally in the market it had been my intention to buy a reconditioned Mac from the online Apple Store for my children to share. I researched the products and determined that I was going to get the machine and that the kids would have to make due sharing a desktop PC.

I like the weight and screen size and still getting accustomed to the keyboard. It just feels a little odd: can't describe it anymore than that. I miss a key from time to time. Perhaps it is a scale issue. Maybe I just have fat fingers.

Yes it was pricey. But it loads superfast and closes superfast. So far it has done everything that I have asked of it.

Now for the bad part: I HATE the physical Apple Store. I purchased mine Macbook at the Apple Store at Fashion Center (Pentagon City, VA) and I really dislike visiting the store and will keep my interactions with the Brand via the internet. So, what don't I like? Snobbery. Being treated like a fool by the 20-something college student who assumes that I know nothing about computers. While it is true that I know nothing about Macs, me and machine code go way back and I'd be willing to bet that I have written more ones and zeros than the entire freakin' Apple Store. But, as usual, I digress.

I have an Apple one-on-one scheduled for the 9th of September and am dreading the visit. While I know that I need some basic instructions on drinking the Apple kool-aid, I am not looking forward to some white-lanyarded 20 year old providing it.

So: August and Sherry you were right. I enjoy the Mac. Thanks.

Random-er

2009-08-30T05:00:00.000-07:00

Raleigh, NC

Signature Cigar, Washington DC

Waterworks Park, Greenville, MI

Random

2009-08-29T05:48:00.000-07:00

I recently purchased a 13" Mac Book pro and had the Apple Store move my flies from my old Toshiba to my new piece of milled aluminum. When they were completed the woman at the counter looked at me, somewhat confused, and said, "11,000 photographs"? My response was: "Sounds about right."

Here are three of those 11,000

Compassion

2009-08-22T13:01:00.000-07:00

It was the words, "Clipper 103 requesting oceanic clearance", which were the last spoken by the Captain of the doomed Pan Am flight en route from London to New York. Departing over an hour late from Heathrow Airport the aircraft suffered a catastrophic depressurisation resulting from a bombs explosion in a cargo hold.

Moments later 270 men, women and children were falling to their deaths through the cold, dark Scottish sky. Some died instantly from the blast itself, some suffocated, some were torn to pieces by the tornadic air velocity of 400+ mph at 31,000 feet and a lucky few survived until impact with the soil in Lockerbie, Scotland.

Perhaps it was compassion that caused Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi to choose the use of a bomb to kill 270 innocents. Perhaps it was compassionate of him that he chose a death which would linger only a minute or two for his victims. Perhaps it was compassionate of him to only kill 270. Perhaps.

What is known is that he was convicted of the crime and sentenced to life in prison. Despite that, he is a free man today and a hero in Libya. A hero. Welcomed upon his return by senior Libyan leadership. Welcomed by a crowd of well-wishers.

There are many ways to measure compassion. Absent from the discussion of the perpetrator"s terminal cancer has been any concern about compassion for the family of the victims. What measure of compassion is afforded the victims who walk, who breathe and who still live?

That Scotland would release this man is challenging to understand and perhaps hides something larger at work between governments. Perhaps this is a quid pro quo between Libya and the world that in exchange for a dying man they will continue to be better citizens on the world stage. Perhaps some other deal which is invisible to us is taking place. Perhaps.

On the face of it: there must be more to this release. There must be. There MUST be.

Confused

2009-08-16T14:54:00.000-07:00

I went and watched the new Peter Jackson movie, District 9 with my son last evening. We enjoyed it, sort of, and have been struggling to understandy just why we enjoyed it - sort of.

That Peter Jackson enjoyed great commercial success with the J.R.R. Tolkien franchise is no where evident in this film as the non-human characters are not warm or fuzzy as were the Hobbits of Middle Earth.

What was lacking was a way to describe the movie. What we saw was confusing with gobs of ambiguity - if that is what Mr. Jackson desired he got it in Spades.

Was it politial? Maybe. Was it a commentary? Maybe. If it was to have subtle undertones than he succeed too well because I don't know what the hell the movie was about.

It was entertaining - yes. But, if there was a deeper meaning then I have yet to comprehend precisely what that meaning is.

Lunch

2009-08-11T17:00:00.000-07:00

Apparently the White House and the media has taken exception with this as it touches on the President's daughters. And they are "off limits".

Apparently the little troublemaker wants a vegan offering at her school. Geeze.

Cigars

2009-08-05T17:02:00.000-07:00

I suppose I could find some lame quotes regarding cigars to include with the photos. The words would be those of some famous person with, perhaps, some insight or wit.

I choose to do otherwise.

Cigars are poems which you smoke. You may quote ME on that!

Things

2009-08-05T16:05:00.000-07:00

A lot of things are like a lot of other things. I know it sounds silly to say, but it is true.

I think of music: Beethoven is easy and approachable while Brahms takes time and effort to fully appreciate.

I think of wine: When I first started drinking wines I was seduced by the fragrance of off-dry wines whose subtle sweetness lured me from bottle to bottle. It took years to work away from the sweetness to appreciate the deft touch and gentle breezes which which make a great dry wine.

I think of poetry: Like almost all who take the time to read, it was love which drew me to poetry. Not love of poetry, but love of a woman and seeking someway to describe that which exists beyond words. Over time the passion and heat of youth subside and a deeper emotion continues to pull the reader on deeper and deeper.

When I was young, I COULD NOT TOLERATE ROBERT FROST. I just didn't get it, didn't get it at all. With time, I have come to comprehend, to understand, accept and appreciate.

The Nobel Laureate Robert Feynman said that when he was working though a problem, the formula to describe the problem would appear to him visually with certain parts of the equation in one color and another part yet another color.

Frost has come to me in a similar fashion. When I read Frost, I hear old friends speaking to one other in low voices, in comfortable room. Quiet. Almost a murmur.

The Mending Wall
by Robert Frost

Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them
made,

But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbour know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go.
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
" Stay where you are until our backs are
turned!"

We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, "Good fences make good neigh-
bours."

Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
"Why do they make good neighbours ? Isn't
it Where there are cows? But here there are no
cows."

Before I built a wall I'd ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offence.
Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That wants it down." I could say "Elves" to
him,

But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,

Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father's saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, " Good fences make good neigh-
bours."

Small

2009-08-04T16:38:00.000-07:00

Small homes.

There is a value in living small.

Taxes?

2009-08-03T17:01:00.001-07:00

President Obama would do well to remember what happened to Bush 41 when he broke his promise not to raise taxes.

This past weekend it appeared that his operatives were testing the waters trying, in a very Clintonesque fashion, to suggest that revenue enhancements were not taxes.

Umm...Walks like a duck, and talks like a duck.

O

2009-08-01T19:10:00.000-07:00

Apparently Oprah is not the only magazine which has a serious dosage of "O".

The Oprah Magazine

The Obama Magazine

People

2009-07-26T15:54:00.000-07:00

More people you should know:

Marty Cooper. If you are an electronic uber-nerd than maybe, just maybe you are aware of Mr. Cooper's contribution to all the wireless communications devices that you now depend upon. To a very large extent, it was his vision as an engineer at Motorola in the 1970-1971 time frame to create the first cell phones and to strongly advocate their being a consumer product and not just some high priced toy. He made the very first public cell phone call from a New York City street to the head of AT&T advanced technology section. He later created a billing system for cell phone usage and created a company which optimized the antennas which are used on the phones as well as the towers.

Minni Riperton: Oh. What a voice. Unless you are 45 years old, or older, you may never have heard of Ms. Riperton but you most certainly have heard her voice and lyrics. You just didn't know it was her. She was a difficult to categorize singer who mixed classical arrangements of blues and R&B to create a fusion before fusion was fusion. In fact, it was just this issue which in many ways caused her to find a stable audience: she just didn't fit any existing musical genres. In my opinion Michael Jackson gets a lot of credit for pioneering "crossover" which in all rights belongs to Ms. Riperton. Her most famous song is "Lovin' You" and if you are not familiar with is well worth BUYING and loading on you favorite MP3 player. If you can find them, listen to her albums, Come to my Garden (jazzy and classical) and Perfect Angel (R&B and Soul). She died young of cancer.

Admiral Marc Mitscher: You should be aware that it is Navy protocol to travel at night with all lights extinguished and in the waining days of the battle in the Pacific he did just the opposite. He was the commander of a Task Force which had inflicted serious damage on the Japanese fleet in the Battle of the Philippine Sea. His fighters and bombers returning the U.S. carriers were all running low on fuel were unable to locate the ships so that they could safely land. It was Mitscher who gave the order to "turn on the lights" thus allowing the aircraft to find the carriers and safely land - thus saving the lives of many naval aviators. While it seems a small thing today, before the wide adoption of radar the invisibility of ships at night was an absolute necessity for their safety. His was a bold move with signficant risks and in its absence could have cost the Navy dozens of aviators and aircraft.

Tatoos

2009-07-12T16:25:00.000-07:00

Physics

2009-07-12T14:58:00.000-07:00

One day our professor was discussing a particularly complicated concept. A pre-med student rudely interrupted to ask, “Why do we have to learn this pointless information.”

“To save lives.” the professor responded quickly and continued the lecture.

A few minutes later, the same student spoke up again. “So how does physics save lives?” he persisted.

“It keeps the ignoramuses like you out of medical school,” replied the professor.

Source: http://talklikeaphysicist.com/2008/03/page/2/

Bauhaus

2009-07-12T13:40:00.000-07:00

Finished reading, "From Bauhaus to Our House" by Tom Wolfe (the same guy who wrote Bonfire of the Vanities) last week. It is a short, easy read and does a splendid job of documenting why new buildings are ugly, square slabs. You won't be surprised that the answer has to do with socialism.

The Bauhaus movement was borne in the post-revolution fervor in early 1900's Europe seeking a way to build Utopian housing for workers. The ugly, unadorned slab-sided monsters of today are the remnants of that school of thought.

That socialism excels in architecture is puzzling.

Thanks to Bauhaus we have ugly buildings.

Schwinn

2009-07-12T12:17:00.000-07:00

My favorite was the "Stingray" bike.

Success

2009-07-05T15:16:00.000-07:00

I need some help.

Last week while I was on travel the U.S. military turned over the defense of the
Iraqi cities to the Iraqi military. This is a HUGE deal and reflects a great deal of effort and success by the U.S. Army and Marine Corps.

I have been looking for the President's press conference commending the military on this success and applauding the efforts of the Army and Corps and I just can't seem to find it.

Has anyone heard or seen the Commander in Chief noting this achievement?

Anyone?

Anyone?

Sotomayor

2009-06-29T09:54:00.000-07:00

Like so many words or phrases these days the root meaning has been lost or obscured.

Take for instance the term “conventional wisdom” coined by John Gailbraith in his book from 1958, “The Affluent Society”. His original intent of that phrase was to highlight ideas or theories which seemed obvious and were widely adopted by a large number of individuals without benefit of deep analysis or reflection. In short, conventional wisdom is a pejorative aimed at those who fail to take time to consider the facts.

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor will be confirmed: make no mistake.

That she will be confirmed without much informed discussion by the popular media speaks to the acquiescence of that media. I am reminded of the comments by the comedian Wanda Sykes at the 2009 White House Correspondents Dinner where she wished cancer upon the President's political opponents (yes, the President laughed). That is another case where the media failed in its first duty to speak truth to power. Failure to call out Judge Sotomayor and Ms. Sykes for their intellectual honesty and cruelty makes the media nothing more than court jesters juggling the facts for the amusement of their sovereign.

Washington Correspondent's Dinner

Sorry. Off topic.

Senator Leahy finds no problem with the nominees’ comments regarding, “Latina Woman making a better decision''. I doubt he’d have been so sanguine had Judge Roberts uttered a comment alluding to something like “White Men making a better decision”.

It is deeply troubling to me that this view has been all but ignored.

Add to this the Supreme Court overturning with comments critical to the opinion rendered by Sotomayor and two others related to the Fire Fighters upon appeal. Leahy takes consolation that four judges were in agreement with Judge Sotomayor.

“Whatever the city's ultimate aim -- however well intentioned or benevolent it might have seemed -- the city made its employment decision because of race," Justice Kennedy wrote.

"The city rejected the test results solely because the higher scoring candidates were white."

The conventional wisdom is that Judge Sotomayor is a centrist.

Sliderule

2009-06-28T17:48:00.001-07:00

My uncle was a good friend to my father and they hunted and fished together in the woods of Northern Michigan. My father died in 1970 and my uncle has lived on 39 years.

I visited him last weekend after not seeing him since my father died and I am struck by how much I have missed - as though a part of my dad was still alive in my uncle as he told me stories.

At 90 he is trying to give away his personal property and offered me quite a few items, "take it if you want it" he told me several times.

During the Depression he picked wild blueberries and sold them to buyers in Chicago. He told me that he earned $600 one year doing that: "Damned good money".

He is almost totally blind but still sees well enough to play poker at the Elks Club. Not sure how that works and I think he must have some help.

He was part of the Army that was planned for the invasion of Japan. I'd read stories that the Department of War estimated that we'd lose over 4 million men if the invasion took place. Fortunately we had unfair weapon. An unfair weapon? This is not about nuclear weapons, but how can a weapon be unfair if it induces surrender?

He was posted to Nagasaki only days after the atomic bomb was dropped destroying the city. "they hated us," he told me "but they couldn't do anything about it". He was assigned to dig through the ruins of an aircraft factory outside of Nagasaki which was not completely destroyed. He found a slide rule there, kept it and brought it home.

He spent two years in an Army hospital after the war getting over the diseases he contracted fighting in the jungles of the Pacific losing one kidney in the process.

For over fifty years the sliderule sat above his workbench in his basement. He used it occasionally, but not too often he told me.

"If you see anything you want, take it" he told me again. "What about that sliderule?" I asked and he told me the story about how he came to have its ownership: I took the sliderule.

Metro

2009-06-24T17:39:00.000-07:00

It was a tough night Monday with the Metro wreck in DC. It was very difficult to watch the news as I ride the Metro quite often and there isn't much difference between me and the 9 souls who died when one train ran atop the other.

So, I watched television. Here is what I saw.

Unrest

2009-06-24T05:56:00.000-07:00

“What if you knew her and found her dead on the ground?" ~ Neil Young

It was the summer of 1970 when National Guard solders opened fire on a crowd of anti-war protesters at Kent State University killing four.

While the years have softened the memory of this horrific event its impact at the time was cataclysmic and contributed to the build-down and eventual withdraw from South Viet Nam.

Just a short calibration to those who might think that the killing of student protesters in Iran won’t lead to anything.

Art

2009-06-17T12:54:00.000-07:00

JUNE 12--A North Carolina man is facing criminal charges for creating an amusing piece of public art from construction barrels. Joseph Carnevale, 21, was nabbed Wednesday after a Raleigh Police Department investigation determined that he was responsible for the work (seen below) constructed May 31 on a roadway adjacent to North Carolina State University. Carnevale, pictured in the mug shot at right, was charged with misdemeanor larceny for allegedly building his orange monster from materials pilfered from a construction site. According to an arrest warrant, Carnevale "destroyed three road blocking barrels by cutting and screwing them together to form a statue." Police estimated that Carnevale's artwork caused $360 in damages to Hamlett Associates, the North Carolina construction company that owned the barrels. Carnevale is scheduled for a July 21 court appearance in Wake County.

Rosebud

2009-06-16T17:18:00.001-07:00

The movie, "Citizen Kane" is playing right now.

Gawd I love that film. It is so beautiful in glorious black and white.

The shadows. The light. Patience. Sounds. Echos. Smoke. Light. Echos. More shadows.

The newpaper man asks, "What were his last words?"

"Rosebud"

We all have our secrets.

"Before the beginning and now after the end."

"It's no trick to make a lot of money if all you want to do is make money."

"I don't know my plans myself."

"The news goes on for twenty-fours a day."

"Rosebud".

As a young man I remember watching the movie several times and each time that I see it again I recall the first time.

"Rosebud".

Found3

2009-06-13T14:27:00.000-07:00

Last of my found art:

Found2

2009-06-12T11:35:00.000-07:00

More found art from around the home.

Found

2009-06-12T11:31:00.000-07:00

A few items from around the house.

Reading

2009-06-12T10:06:00.000-07:00

Last summer I posted a list of my favorite books, and this season I will doing something similar.

The list below are books which I intend to read this summer, or will re-read to gain a deeper insight. So here goes.

1. "Book of Longing" by Leonard Cohen. I have been a fan of Leonard Cohen since I was in high school primarily for his music. A sort of an anti-hippie of his generation he wrote and sang songs of sex, love, longing and drugs while wearing a suit. He is such an interesting mix of contradictions. I purchased this book two summers ago with full intention of reading and comprehending and have only just read it. This summer I plan on comprehending.

2. "The Blue Sweater" by Jacqueline Novogratz. Came upon this book quite by accident and began reading last evening. The subtitle of the book is: "Bridging the gap between rich and poor in an interconnected world". The dust jacket says that she gave up a career in banking to apply venture capitalist processes to charity in the 3rd world. Sounds interesting to me. I don't know much about Ms. Novogratz other than that she wants to save the world.

3. "The Road" by Cormac McCarthy. McCarthy is like Vonnegut quite a lot and not at all, and they both employ their own distinctive "voice" when they write. McCarthy writing is like running one's hand across rough hewn stone. I adore his writing style as it is spare and economical. I know almost nothing about the book other than a quick 10 minutes I stole away at my local mega-bookstore. It sounds like him. I understand that it is a post-apocalyptic tale: so, I am not expecting a happy ending.

4. "Outliers" by Malcolm Gladwell. Again, it is the writing style of Gladwell that first grabs my attention. He provides a strong narrative and combines it with analysis and insight which I find with no other author. You can get a taste of his writing by following this link.

5. "The Y. O. B. Exposure System: Precise Exposure Control in Color and Black and White" by Parry Yob. Mr. Yob was the man who derived the "zone system" in photography and was a mentor (if you can believe it) to Ansel Adams. He is the Eudora Welty of the photo scene.

Photo

2009-06-10T10:10:00.000-07:00

I see
I see in him his mother’s eyes
A striped shirt
A nametag

He smiles
Aware and unaware
Only hours
Only hours before

A car runs upon
The sidewalk
Striking him
Walking, his back

Towards the driver
The driver
Ran his car
Onto the sidewalk

The driver
Ran his car onto the sidewalk
The driver ran his car
Onto the sidewalk.

Detroit

2009-06-09T16:02:00.000-07:00

It is very fashionable right now to demean the U.S. auto industry given it's current situation. For where we sit it all seem so obvious that the auto executives were out of touch with America and were forcing product down our throat that we didn't want. Bull.

I do not for a minute disagree that Detroit spent too much time lobbying for import duties on foreign cars. Time which would have been better spent improving quality. But they were not out of touch: they gave us precisely what we wanted. We wanted big, we wanted fast and we wanted glitzy. We wanted it all and we wanted it gold plated with leather interior, custom seats and 20" rims. That is precisely what we wanted until gasoline prices started to climb and then suddenly we were all eco-conscious and clammoring for hybrids.

One of the advantages of age is that I am able to remember what was - and the photos below are examples of the awesome product that Detroit routinely put out the door.

As a kid I remember being exciting (really excited) to see what the new model year cars would look like. Chevrolets looked, and sounded different, from Fords and Dodges. Each car line would have its own following: some people were Dodge people and some people were Ford people.

Bottom line: The next time your hybrid is passed by a 1960's American muscle car - bow your head in repect.

Reagan

2009-06-08T04:52:00.000-07:00

A 500 pound bronze statue of President Ronald Reagan was installed in the U.S. Capitol this past week to commemorate the fifth anniversary of his death.

Sounds like time for a Reagan quote or three:

1. Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.

2. Government does not solve problems; it subsidizes them.

3. Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

That America is more receptive to government intervention and activism was confirmed by the last election. Increasingly the electorate seems wedded to the idea, quite the contrary of the the Great Communicator, that government IS the solution to the problem: whatever the problem may be.

The May 30th edition of The Economist contains a small chart which shows the public attitude towards the regulation of business by the federal government. In 1986 40% felt that there was too much regulation and in 2009 that figure falls to 28%. Something is afoot.

I see this as something generational. Most men of my age (50+) are firmly in the Reagan camp favoring smaller government with deregulation and less federal oversight. We lived through the disasterous Johnson and Carter administrations which over-reached in every direction. My discussions with twenty-somethings indicates that they see regulation as a necessary, positive responsibility of government.

Bottom line: Ronald Reagan served as President from 1981 - 1989 and to many Americans that is a very long time ago.

Landmarks

2009-06-07T10:02:00.000-07:00

And so it goes.

My son sat quietly Friday evening and read Vonnegut's classic, Slaugherhouse Five. My son is very active and something has to be very good to cause him to sit and read quietly for three hours. It was and he did.

A few weeks back I listened to Vonnegut's first commercial success, Breakfast of Champions on my Apple Nano and upon reflection am surprise at how similiar the two books are to one another. Not similiar in content, but similiar (almost identical) in style and composition. I don't know why I didn't notice this before.

Like most youth, I was introduced to Vonnegut in a high school class: his politics make him an ideal candidate for most English or Literature teachers. (Note: Despite their indoctrination I became successful in the Defense Industry.)

Vonnegut today is sort of like what commercial television was in the 60s and 70s. In those days most of us had 3 or maybe 4 television channels to select from. Vonnegut was a literary channel in the 60s and 70s - one of a very small handfull of authors who reached across a wide cultural swath of America. Norman Mailer is another literary channel.

The ultimate value of authors such as Vonnegut and Mailer is that they provide cultural landmarks which resonate with a very wide cultural background. That you agree or disagree with their viewpoints or characters is 100% irrelavent: what is important is that YOU READ THEM and SO DID I. That simple act provides a framework across which bridges of gender, cultural and race can be built.

Other channels from the 60s and 70? Louis Armstrong, Big Bird and The Beatles.

While the immersive nature of our literature and music is all pervasive today, it is not all encompassing. Narrow-casting ensures that all types of music, art and literature find their way to market. The cost is, of course, that narrow casting tends to self-select people out of the potential pool of artistic participants. Rap music will never find a home among middle-aged engineers.

Bottom line: The likes of Vonnegut and Mailer may not come this way again.

Education

2009-06-06T18:50:00.000-07:00

Education matters.

Source - http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2009/06/unemployment-rate-and-level-of.html

Calculating

2009-06-06T18:36:00.000-07:00

Stephen Wolfram is a smart guy. Really smart guy. He is the guy who authored Mathematica and graduated with a PhD in physics at the age of 20.

Mr. Wolfram is busy at work with a new website Wolfram/Alpha (http://www.wolframalpha.com). The stated goal of the site is to: "Today's Wolfram|Alpha is the first step in an ambitious, long-term project to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable by anyone."

The emphasis on computable seems to be an effort by Mr. Wolfram to differentiate his efforts with the search engine community which is largely dominated by Google.

It is an interesting idea. I have played with it and there are island of value amidst a sea of emptiness. While it was easy to calcuate Reynolds number for various materials, various sizes and various viscosity it was less easy to get information easily found on Google.

When you do get information the site will generate some really great looking graphics to go along with information which it has calculated.

Bottom line: Wolfram Alpha is not Google and maybe that is a very good thing.

Manistee

2009-05-29T07:56:00.000-07:00

About twenty-five years ago my mom and her sister (my aunt) had a falling-out and they never spoke to one another again. They lost touch with one another - each more stubborn than the other.

About a year ago as her sister was dying at the age of 89 my aunt's daughters tried to find my Mom and were only successful in locating her after it was too late. The two never made up to each other.

I have been exchanging emails and telephone calls with those cousins for several months now, and I am slowly coming to realize how much I have lost because of the stubborn, pointless bull-headedness of my Mother and aunt. I think back over the years as an adult when I'd return to Michigan for a vacation or to visit, I'd never visit this part of the family. It was as though my Mother's stubbornness had bled into my life and that I was ignoring them as well. It never occurred to me to that the associative property of her stubbornness was impacting my life.

Emails have flown between us and I will fly to Manistee, Michigan in June and visit with my Uncle and his daughters. Last night I was speaking with my cousin Laura and we tried to determine how long it has been since we'd seen one another. We estimate somewhere between 35 and 40 years. Can you imagine?

I examine my life often and have been told that I am too "self aware". Maybe so. Over the years I have not taken the time to continue the family relationships as I should have and now it is time to catch up.

Decoration

2009-05-27T05:26:00.000-07:00

I am old enough to remember watching the Decoration Day Parade in my hometown of Greenville, Michigan. When I was a child it was called Decoration Day as it was the day that the graves of service members were decorated with U.S. flags and flowers. There would be the high school band, a float or two and rows of veterans – some of whom were in uniform. Among them in these mid-1960s parades were the last remaining vets of World War I marching in their khaki and tin helmets.

Today it is the World War II veterans who are dying off. It seems so odd to me to think that the men of my childhood are old men today, and it doesn’t seem fair. Now that I am finally old enough to have something meaningful to say they are now mostly all dead.

I wear a ring on my right hand that was given by my father to his brother after Uncle Bob enlisted in the Marine Corps. It is a simple gold ring set with a synthetic ruby yet it is special because of the family connections. Maybe twelve years ago my uncle passed the ring to me. As much as I love my Auburn University, I gave up my Auburn class ring to wear this ring that traveled across the Pacific and was worn by my uncle.

My Uncle Bob fought in a number of battles and I am told that his experiences at Guadalcanal was that which changed him. I am certainly not a historian but I do know that the Marines on Guadalcanal had it particularly tough with the Japanese, the mud and the rain. Years later my mother told me that he wasn’t the same person when he returned home after the war.

I think I understand the subtle shift from Decoration Day to Memorial Day in that the former implies that the individual has a responsibility for action while the later has no such obligation. My mother and I would visit the graves of our family on Decoration Day and put down flowers near the headstones. She would tell me about this person or that, how they lived and what they meant to her. It would be my job to pull weeds from around the headstone and lug gallon jugs of water from the water spigot back to the freshly planted flowers.

Memorial Day means that we need only remember the sacrifices of those who fought for us and who died for us. Decoration Day demands our attention and activity.

In Flanders Fields
By Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

I am very pleased to have spent those Decoration Days with my mom as we visited with the dead, planted flowers and remembered.

Walcott

2009-05-26T08:58:00.000-07:00

That so few people read poetry it is not surprising that the on-going mess regarding the Oxford Professor of Poetry is not being reported on this side of the Atlantic.

The heart of the matter was the smear campaign against Nobel Laureate Derek Walcott – who had the inside track for the position. And when I say position, it is really not much more than a sinecure office with very little in the way of duties or, for that matter, salary. Like many things poetic: it was gesture in being offered the position which provided the most value.

The smear was interesting: a series of anonymous letters sent to university officials dredging up allegations of sexual misconduct some twenty-five years ago.

Now, here is where I detour from the mainstream. I simultaneously find the misconduct disqualifying and qualifying. Stay with me. A great poet is able to transcend beyond words into shared experiences which cut deeply into the heart of man. Chief among them are the devils which dwell in the souls of each of us which they bring out, examine and put away for safe keeping. That Walcott’s devils were known is the only difference between he and the other contenders: we know his demon. It is the mastery of these demons that make poets so valuable in this world.

Love After Love
by Derek Walcott

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

Let’s hope that Oxford is able to find someone whose demon seethes quietly under their rough skin and erupts into the light as words, actions and verse to endure the ages.

Things

2009-05-23T17:17:00.000-07:00

I was thinking about a couple things today, and I don't know if they really tie together.

I was thinking about how geography has become less egalitarian. I think about "Chesapeake" it is a name that describes the bay West of my home and connects to the Atlantic Ocean. It is a native American word which means something like "great shellfish bay". In the days that we humans were less motorized geographic words which imparted some usable charactistic were critically important.

These days the names of things are almost exclusively chosen by corporations or and have little to do with the natural terrain. There is a new housing development outside of my city called, "Rowan's Mill" and as far as I can tell there is no mill, and no river to power that mill anywhere near by. It is my expectation that the naming of that development had less to do geography and more to do with focus groups.

And.

The movie Lonesome Dove ends with the following words read by the charcter portrayed by Robert Duvall: "Life is a voyage between two eternities". The scale of the movie and the rough-hewn nature of Duvall's voice made me think of time and distance and scale and the need for solitude and quiet.

It is so difficult to be at peace with oneself these days. I recall reading one of Leonard Cohen's poems about his two-year effort to be come a Buddist monk in a monestary the moutains outside of Los Angeles and how he gave up his quest: he preferred women and scotch whisky. I envy his ability to make the effort.

The Lovesick Monk, by Leonard Cohen

"I shaved my head
I put on my robes
I sleep in a corner of a cabin
sixty-five hundred feet up in a mountain
It's dismal here
The only thing I don't need
is a comb"

Dad

2009-05-05T17:02:00.000-07:00

I was not quite fourteen that awful morning when my mother awoke me by squeezing my toe. She said to me, “Don’t smile, your father is dead.”

Thirty-nine years later I still remember that morning vividly. I remember that I didn’t cry, and that by younger brother did. I cried later.

One uncle came by and helped himself to my father’s tools. Years later while visiting, I saw my father’s electric drill on the dirt floor of my uncle’s garage. I never forgave him.

I sometimes wonder about the connections between love and loss. Both rend the heart deeply and leave scars which never heal. This is where it isn’t fair being a male in this society. I ache with the loss of my father in ways that continue to surprise me – there is so much about him that I’ll never know and never understand. I used to get angry at him for having deserted me and leaving me alone to shoulder the burden of being the man of the house. I hated it when fools called me that.

I didn’t go to my father’s funeral. I understood death, but I did not understand the ceremony which surrounded death. Staying home with a friend we played catch with a baseball in the yard and talked. He was worried about me and my lack of reaction. It was kind of him and perhaps the best therapy I could have asked for – had I asked.

When my mother remarried less than a year later she married an alcoholic a-hole. She later told me that she felt that we (my brother and I) needed a man in the house. Well, that would have been nice but she picked a drunk.

It was a lovely June day. Then cars began arriving mid-afternoon. Aunts, uncles, my father’s friends, my mother’s friends, people I didn’t know, cousins all descended upon our small home. My mother shooshed me inside and told me to put on some clean clothes: I didn’t have any. In all the confusion of death and ceremony the laundry had piled up.

Casseroles appeared from the thin air. Cakes. Pies. Sliced ham. Food everywhere. My mother who had just lost her husband now had to play hostess. Something else for which I resented my selfish family.

I felt that everyone was aware that I was wearing dirty pants, though I think I had a clean shirt. It went on like this for a few days and then the newness of having a dead father wore away.

In the fall when school started one of my teachers announced in class that I had lost my father during the summer. If I could have crawled under my chair, I would have done so.

I really don't know what it has all meant to me as I sit here drinking a beer on my father's birthday - his 86th. It is likely that some other malady may have claimed him had he not had that heart attack. And yet, I still feel like I have missed so much and yet I cannot identify precisely what it is that I have lost. It certainly made me grow up faster, and that has made me the man that I am today for good or ill. It makes me feel the fragility of life on a daily basis. It makes me want to hug my kids every chance I get.

In the long run...well, you know what we all are in the long run.

Ch'ing

2009-05-04T15:44:00.000-07:00

Plum blossoms in pots
a few open
perfume filling the room

I stare at them
forgetting everything else

When I chance to go into
the inner house
my daughter
thinks it odd

And asks me
“Why does your gown
smell so good?”

Yuan Mei, Ch’ing Poet

T'ang

2009-05-04T15:41:00.000-07:00

You ask me:
Why do I live
On this green mountain?

I smile
No answer
My heart serene

On flowing water
peachblow quietly going
far away

This is another earth
This is another sky

No likeness
to that human world below

Li Po, T'ang Poet
701 – 762

Mugs2

2009-04-29T15:46:00.001-07:00

José Rios, 45, has been charged with arson second degree and aggravated cruelty to animals after police said he set fire to the house he lives in and left a decapitated snake by the homeowners bedroom door.Suffolk County Police Arson Section detectives said Third Precinct officers responded to a house fire on Branch Avenue in Central Islip. Officers said Rios, who rents a room in that house, had intentionally poured gasoline in the home and set it on fire.The home was occupied by the owners, Larry Maxwell and Jorene Palms, when Rios started the fire police said.Additionally, Rios had placed a decapitated common boa at the homeowners bedroom threshold after he alerted them of the fire and then left the scene, police said.The Central Islip Fire Department extinguished the small fire police said. (April 18, 2009)

Police said Anthony Badalamenti, 31, and his girlfriend, Jessica Muniz, 29, were arrested charged with assault second degree, possession of a dangerous weapon and endangering the welfare of a child. According to detectives, on Oct. 31 at 9 p.m. First Precinct Police officers responded to a home on Meadowbrook Road in Merrick after a report of a child being abused in an upstairs apartment. When officers arrived, they attempted to make contact with people in the apartment but there was no response. A short time later, with the help of the Emergency Service Unit, officers entered the apartment, where they found a 6-year-old boy with multiple lacerations and contusions to his right hand, right leg and buttocks area. After an investigation, the victim's mother, Muniz, 29, and Muniz's boyfriend, Badalamenti, 31 were arrested. Two belts, a 3-inch leather weight lifting type belt with a metal buckle, and a black leather belt were recovered. The victim was taken to a hospital where he was treated for his injuries. (PDNC / November 1, 2008)
Adriana Devito of Baldwin was charged with DWI. Nassau County releases the photos of individuals charged with DWI. The gallery represents the charge at the time of the photo. Newsday.com will not be updating the status of these cases. All are presumed innocent unless proven guilty. (N.C.P.D. / October 20, 2008)

Second Squad detectives have identified Troy Kosse, 46, of Jericho, as the man responsible for allegedly assaulting a woman and stealing her vehicle at the Walt Whitman Mall parking garage on March 21. Kosse was arrested by Nassau County police on a different robbery and will be charged with this incident at a later date. (NCPD Photo / March 23, 2009)

Mugs

2009-04-29T15:26:00.000-07:00

Howard Brooks, 24, of Port Jefferson. Police said Brooks shook the 11-week-old daughter of his girlfriend. The infant died April 1. (April 2, 2009)

In addition to the DWI drugs charge, Nicole P. Marty is charged with endangering the welfare of a child and criminal possession of a controlled substance, police said. She is also charged with harassment for injuring a police officer who was guarding her at Southside Hospital, police said. (SCPD Photo / April 20, 2009)

Michellie Chambers, 36, of Baldwin, is charged with violating Nassau County's social host law. According to police, officers responded to a radio call for a disturbance at the corner of Washington Avenue and Eastern Parkway involving a taxi fare dispute. The investigation determined that a subject involved in that dispute fled into a residence at 1093 Washington Place. As officers entered the residence to search for the subject, (whom they did not locate) they found a large house party, many under-age youths who appeared to be intoxicated and several empty bottles of alcohol within the home, police said. The homeowner, Chambers, who was present, and aware of the party, was arrested and charged with violating the Nassau County social host law, resisting arrest and two counts of violating Town of Hempstead noise ordinances, police said. (NCPD Photo / April 11, 2009)

These mug shots were taken from New York Newsday (newday.com) who remind us that, "These are arrest or booking photos provided by Long Island law enforcement officials. A criminal charge is merely an accusation. A defendant is presumed innocent unless proven guilty."

Long?

2009-04-12T16:40:00.000-07:00

Excerpts from the poem, "And How Long" by Pablo Neruda

"How much does a man live, after all?

Does he live a thousand days, or one only?

For a week, or for several centuries.

How long does a man spend dying?

What does it mean to say 'for ever'?"

2009-03-27T09:36:00.000-07:00

This file was taken from Post Secrets...one of my favorite web sites.
One of the many summer-time employees eeking out a living selling crumby food on the Ocean City, MD boardwalk.

The morons who run the city counsel in Salisbury, MD decided to let a retailer use the only pedestrian access to the downtown plaza as a storage for his used junk. So freakin' stupid are these people. First they killed downtown, and then with this drove a stake through its heart.

People

2009-03-26T03:42:00.000-07:00

Kids

2009-03-25T10:51:00.000-07:00

Kell

2009-03-24T13:09:00.000-07:00

George Kell the long-time television broadcaster for the Detroit Tigers baseball team died today. At 53 years of age I grew up listening to George as the voice of the Tigers in good years (occasionally) and the bad years (more than I'd like).

He was 86 years old and from all accounts was healthy and aware until the end of his life. I hope that is true.

His death steals away some of my memories of youth: Of playing in the yard listening to the game blaring out of the living room window while we played catch.

Baseball has lost its grip on the American imagination and is no longer the preeminent sport having lost that to Football. And that is a shame. There is so much right with baseball and the men and women who present the sport to us on television and the radio. It is not the sort of thing which elicts the "bang" and "boom" of a John Madden call - in fact, I think Mr. Madden would make an awful baseball announcer.

Rather, the sport takes a large degree of introspection, calm and patience to describe to the public. That is where Mr. Kell excelled: he did not try to make the game something that it wasn't. He let the game come to him, and in turn come to us the public.

Though he hasn't broadcast a game since 1996, I feel a deep personal loss.

In some obituaries there are request for this and for that. Well, I don't have a completed obituary for Mr. Kell, but I do have the closing:

"In lieu of flowers, it is requested that you take your son to a baseball game." I think he'd like that.

Neruda

2009-03-17T09:26:00.000-07:00

Spanish revolution was a horrific time for Spain: a dry run for Hitler's weapons and tactics. This is a difficult poem to read - not so much for its format, but for its content.

"I'm Explaining a Few Things", by Pablo Neruda

You are going to ask: where are the lilacs?

and the poppy-petalled metaphysics?

and the rain repeatedly spattering

its words and drilling them full

of aperatures and birds?

I'll tell you all the news.

I lived in a suburb,

a suburb of Madrid, with bells,

and clocks, and trees.

From there you could look out

over Castille's dry face:

a leather ocean

My home was called

the house of flowers, because in every cranny

geraniums burst: it was

a good looking house

with its dogs and children.

Remember, Raul?

Eh, Rafael?

Fredrico, do you remember

from under the ground

where the light of June drowned flowers in your mouth?

Brother, my brother?

Everything

loud with big voices, the salt of merchandises,

pile-ups of palpitation bread,

the stalls of my subur of Arguelles with its statue

Like a drained inkwell in a swirl of hake:

oil flowed into spoons,

a deep baying

of feed and hands swelled in the streets

metres, litres, the sharp

measure of life,

stacked up like fish,

the texture of roofs with the cold sun in which

the weather vane falters,

the fine, frenzied ivory of potatoes

wave on wave of tomatoes rolling down to the sea.

And one morning all that was burning,

one morning the bonfiresleapt out of the earth

devouring human beings --and from then on fire,

gunpowder from then on,and from then on blood.

Bandits with planes and Moors,

bandits with finger-rings and duchesses,

bandits with black friars spattering blessings

came through the sky to kill children

and the blood of children ran through the streets

without fuss, like children's blood.

Jackals that the jackals would despise,

stones that the dry thistle would bite on and spit out,

vipers that the vipers would abominate!

Face to face with you I have seen the blood

of Spain tower like a tideto drown you in one wave

of pride and knives!Treacherous generals:

see my dead house, look at broken Spain :

from every house burning metal flows

instead of flowers,from every socket of Spain

Spain emerges

and from every dead child a rifle with eyes,

and from every crime bullets are born

which will one day findthe bull's eye of your hearts.

And you'll ask: why doesn't his poetry

speak of dreams and leaves

and the great volcanoes of his native land?

Come and see the blood in the streets.

Come and see

The blood in the streets.

Come and see the blood

In the streets!

Coen

2009-03-16T08:12:00.000-07:00

Rented the Coen brother's film noir semi-classic, "The man who wasn't there" featuring Billy Bob Thornton.

I am not an art critic, nor do I pretend to be one. But I do have my thoughts about the film:

While it is a black and white movie, there are certain scenes which are strictly black and white reducing the film to nearly comic book proportions. There is a scene shot from the top of a building looking down as Thornton exits a building which stands out. My 14 year old daughter said one word, "beautiful." I agree.

The Thornton character drifts along like dust in the wind.

The Coen's are not afraid of silence. I admire them for their willingness to use the silence between words or action to fill the moment.

The sort-of love interest with the younger girl was creepy.

Makes me want to rent Blood Simple.

People

2009-03-12T08:21:00.000-07:00

What We Should Know

The older I get the less I know. I am constantly coming upon events, individuals, art and accomplishments with which I was not familiar. I began cataloging these anomalies a few weeks ago, and here are a few excerpts from the list:

Vannevar Bush: “Bush was a prominent policymaker and public intellectual ("the patron saint of American science") during World War II and the ensuing Cold War, and was in effect the first presidential science advisor.” Wikipedia.

What is interesting about this guy was how visionary he was: many see him as the true visionary of digital storage and the world wide web long before there was even a hint of the enabling technology. A PhD friend of mine mentioned Bush in passing a few days ago and recommended that I read up on him. I followed a few links and came upon an article published in, “The Atlantic” in 1945. In reading the article I was at times tempted to believe that is was some sort of forgery – so forward looking was Mr. Bush in 1945. Recommend you follow this link and judge for yourself: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/194507/bush

Another Place: Anthony Gormley is an English sculptor and creator or “Another Place”, “Angel of the North”, and “Event Horizon”. I came upon Mr. Gormley’s work completely by accident as I followed a blog of a graphic artist in the U.K. (http://depesando.blogspot.com/) who featured photos of Gormley’s sculptures on the blog.

“The sculpture consists of 100 cast iron figures which face out to sea, spread over a 2 mile (3.2 km) stretch of the beach. Each figure is 189 cm tall (nearly 6 feet 2½ inches) and weighs around 650 kg (over 1400 lb).”

John Hartford: Mr. Hartford was a musician who specialized in extending the limits of the distinctly American idiom of bluegrass music while simultaneously preserving its roots. He was both famous and unknown with his media fame coming in the late 1970s and early 1980s as a regular on several musical variety television shows – a format which has sadly died away.

I would describe his media presence since the early 1980s as subtle as though he didn’t really care for exposure and already having sufficient financial success. He continued to work, to record and to play. He was one of the musicians who played the music featured by the “Soggy Bottom Boys” in the movie, “Brother Where Art Thou?” But, you wouldn’t know if you didn’t look. My favorite John Hartford album was his 1976 release, “Mark Twang” where he dallies in the deep water of Mississippi riverboat men.

Weak

2009-03-09T09:27:00.000-07:00

Foreign policy?

Knuckle under to the Russians.
Lose military bases.
Sell out Georgia.
Begin talks with Taliban.
Seek out dialog with Iran.

And this weekend: Chinese ships and aircraft harass a U.S. surveillance ship operating in international waters.

The audacity of being weak...

Good-day

2009-03-01T15:15:00.000-08:00

During the summers of 1971 and 1972 I worked for HJ Heinz at their plant in Lakeview, Michigan where they made green pickles. During the "green season" when the cucumbers were coming in, the job was a 5:30 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. job - made for long days.

It was during this time that I first paid attention to Paul Harvey and his 15 minutes of news and opinions which were presented daily (including Saturday) from 11:45 a.m. until noon. I came upon Mr. Harvey quite by accident and it only took one or two listenings to his folksy, plain speaking to hook me. Thereafter, I took lunch so that I could listen to him each day.

At the time, I thought he was an old man. In fact. I am shocked and dismayed to realize that Paul Harvey was 53 at that time - the age that I am right this moment. I don't feel old and doubt that neither did he at that moment.

Those years at HJ Heinz do not seem all that distant from me now, yet a lifetime of changes have taken place since those long summertime days. I have travelled the world, married, enjoyed being a father and mused about life in general.

It is a slap to the face of my mortality to realize that there are some around me who consider me to be an old man. I took an on-line assessment a couple of years ago, and based upon my age, sex, and life-style decisions (weight, cigar smoking and alcohol consumption) that I should expect to live to be 86 years old. Thirty-three more years of life is not a lot of time to finsh all of the things which remain undone: the friendships, the love, the poetry, the art, the children, the yet-to-be conceived grandchildren, and always (always, always, always) being thankful for what is and letting those around me know that they are important to my life.

I wish I could give everyone I have ever known, who have contributed to my life, have been my friend, or who have helped me in anyway a really big hug.

Mr. Harvey died today at the age of 90.

Keats

2009-02-26T11:45:00.000-08:00

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

Marine

2009-02-25T09:56:00.000-08:00

Washington DC is a city of memorials. If you look in any direction you'll see a memorial to this or to that.

The Marine Corps Memorial is located on a hillside overlooking the District next to Arlington National Cemetary. It is worth a visit should you visit the city. The tour busses come and they go with the inattentive high school students who gawk unknowlingly at the monument - some making faces as they stand before the monument to have their photograph taken.

On occasion you'll see a older person - usually a man approach the monument. He'll rub his hands slowly over the dark granite where the words, "...uncommon valor was a common virtue" are enscribed. They will pause. No joking around. No funny faces. Memories. Just memories.

Smoke

2009-02-24T13:02:00.000-08:00

There is little in life more pleasurable than a cigar smoked in the presence of friends.

Huh?

2009-02-20T09:32:00.000-08:00

You cannot make this stuff up: Muzzammil Hassan, who founded Bridges TV in November 2004 to counter anti-Islam stereotypes has surrendered to the police having been charged with beheading his wife.

I don't think this sort of thing is helpful to Mr. Hassan's efforts to counter stereotypes.

Fore the complete story: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,493645,00.html

Detroit

2009-02-19T03:30:00.000-08:00

The football team of Detroit, Michigan had an awful season this year.

Say the name and read the number. That says it all. My complements to Phil Bard for passing this photo along to me.

Droogies

2009-02-16T12:28:00.000-08:00

It was 1972.

Clockwork Orange was released and all hell broke loose. Living through the turbulent early 1970s it is difficult today to comprehend the shock and dismay the Kubrick film caused upon hitting the silver screen: Vulger. Crass. Loud. Rude. Uncomprehended. Uncomprehending.

In many ways the film is still shocking in 2009: but for different reasons. The sensibility of the 70s was wrapped around the issue of violence and it having reduced British society by the mid 1990s. The shocking aspect about the movie to me (today) has to do with the shift in perspective of the viewer. We have the violence that Alex created yet we endure.

For all of the alleged liberalism of society today it is highly unlikely that Kubrick would have the ability to portray the women in the film as he did twenty-seven years ago. Group rights of women would trump Kubrick's art seven days a week.

I bought it this weekend and have played it four times. The movie is eye candy. Loud. Flashy. Colorful. And, not so tame by even the jaded standards of the 21st century.

Tu

2009-02-11T05:58:00.000-08:00

Much love
- why did it seem no love at all?
Over the last bottle, nothing:
could not rouse a smile.

The candle
gracious enough to regret our parting
made tears for us.

Dawn came in awhile.

Tu Mu, Tang poet

Heart

2009-02-08T09:47:00.000-08:00

I found this heart earring amongst the crushed rock outside an abandoned grain elevator in Southern Delaware. Weathered and rusted it stood out in stark contrast with the crushed granite.

BTW: There is no naturally occuring gravel in Delaware. If you want gravel, you have to purchase crushed rock.

The presence there on the ground made me wonder about the circumstance: Of how it found its way there. Abandoned? Tossed? Given up by a woman after breaking up with her boyfriend? A gift never given?

Drizzle

2009-01-28T04:16:00.000-08:00

The best way describe the art of Jackson Pollock is describe what it isn't:

Isn't descriptive

Isn't representative

Isn't easy to characterize

Pollock gained his fame with his "drip" or "drizzle" art which occupied only a small portion of his creative output. He was traditionally trained and his traditional art does not get the love and attention that it deserves.

His work, more than most, is best appreciated in person. A flat photograph does not do it justice.

Was it art: Yes of course.

Do I like it: Yes, with a preference to his "non-drip" work.

World

2009-01-26T08:19:00.001-08:00

Take away all of your furniture except a small table and two chairs. You'll be sleeping on the floor using a blanket as your mattress.

Take away all of your clothes except one shirt, one tee shirt, one pair of trousers and one pair of shoes.

Take away all of your food except a little sugar, salt, rice, oil, flour and a handfull of beans.

Take away your house and move into your shed. Remove the floor from your shed. Remove the electrical outlets from your shed.

That is how much of the world lives.

This weekend I overheard a couple complaining about how tough their lives were. They were complaining about the stock market and the decreasing the value of their investments.

All the while, I am certain this couple lived in a nice home with a full pantry, heated rooms, and running water.

Our freedom in American has made our country great and strong. It has made us capable of performing great acts of kindness. Yet, we are too often arrogant and not mindful of just how well we have life as compared with the overwhelming majority of humans on this small planet.

I just wish we wouldn't complain when our mouths are full.

Football

2009-01-23T13:25:00.001-08:00

The "big game" is over a week away and I am already sick of hearing all the hype on the radio and television.

I think it is a huge mistake to have a two week lay off between the Conference Championship game and the Super Bowl game: but, I am just a consumer of the product so what do I know.

Items which I am already sick about hearing:

- Impact of the game on residences who live near the stadium.

- Coach Bill Cowher's seeming preference for the Cardinals.

- Lefties demanding that the game go "green".

- Steelers defensive dominance.

I know that this is a really lame posting, and perhaps I'll have something more profound on the matter shortly. For the moment: enough already!

Blow

2009-01-22T12:26:00.000-08:00

For no particular reason that I can discern: the suicide of Isabella Blow came to mind this afternoon. Ms. Blow was a flamboyant, over-the-top designer who came to an unfortunate end by consuming weed killer. Typical of Ms. Blow: even her choice of suicide was unique.

Some photos of Ms. Blow:

Swimming

2009-01-19T16:28:00.000-08:00

My son and daughter swim for this team - assembled this montage using "animoto".

Wyeth

2009-01-16T07:56:00.000-08:00

Andrew Wyeth died today.

If success for an artist is measured by public acceptance then he was a great

success. My first memory of seeing his art was that hanging on the wall in high school. He was sufficiently unoffensive so as to be acceptable by boards of education and timid parents.

To me his art was as exciting as a dead fish. It never moved me. More damning is that the collection of his work appears to be aimed at its lack of offense than a
exaultation of the spirit.

To me he was a skillful illustrator and nothing more.

Art

2009-01-15T02:05:00.000-08:00

A millennium ago the inhabitants of Chauvet Pont d'Arc in France scratched the images of bulls, horses, and hunting scenes into the dark cave walls with the most basic of tools.

I don’t think that the motivation of the artists is relevant. Whether the drawings were simply a description of the hunt, or a manifestation of the need to communicate concepts and expressions beyond words is irrelevant. Someone took up tools and created a representation: that is enough.

With the passage of time the ability to communicate visually has undergone significant changes. Chisels carved the yielding marble, saws cut granite, oils and pigment are applied to canvas and photons impacting charged coupled devices create current flow and thus digital images.

The essence of art is to communicate that which defies description. Ideas, hopes, and dreams which sink under the weight of everyday description can be made alight at the touch of an artist. It is a tricky matter. How to communicate that which defies description, that which is beyond words?

Malcomb Gladwell describes experiments in his book, “Blink” where one group was given a warm-up exercise which contained words with positive intellectual connotations. A second group was given a similar warm-up exercise which contained words with negative intellectual connotations. Both groups were then given tests. The group which took the warm-up exercise with the positive words consistently scored higher on the test than those whose warm-up contained negative words. The experiment, Gladwell explains has been conducted by various researchers at various locations over time and the results are consistent. Simply reading positive words before a test caused the test takers to score higher on the test.

What then of art?

Suppose you read a book of poetry, walk through a portrait gallery or listen to music. Given the impact of the positive and negative words cited above, how would your attention to art affect your actions? If the experiment holds true then you should expect significantly different responses from individuals who listen to Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings” and Body Count’s “Cop Killer”.

It is interesting to consider that art could do harm. We don’t often consider that the inwardly looking experience art could cause and individual to act out violence, and that might be the case.

Friends

2009-01-10T18:48:00.000-08:00

Horses

2009-01-08T18:53:00.000-08:00

This is very quick survey taken during the Florida v. Oklahoma football game. It seems like there is something about horses which make the poets sing. Bly, in particular, rings with love and spirituality in those four short lines: the essence of poetry is to express the unexpressible.

Robert Bly:

Every breath taken in by the man
Who loves, and the woman who loves,
Goes to fill the water tank
Where the spirit horses drink.

Pablo Neruda

I heard its red horse neighing
bare-backed, unshod and radient.
I ride him over the churches
gallop through garrisons emply os soldiers
persued by a raffish army.
His eucalyptus eyes plunder the darkness
his bell-like body gallops as it strikes.

William Carlos Williams

Mother darling, I wasn't able to get away.
Oh that's too bad. It was just a show;
they make the horses walk up and down
to judge them by their form.
Oh is that all? I tho't it was something else.
Oh they jump and run too.
I wish you had been there,
I was so interested to hear about it.

Hooray for Minnesota!

2008-12-31T08:47:00.000-08:00

I'd like to express a deep, heart-felt "thank you" to the citizens of Minnesota for, what appears to be, the election of Al Franken as Senator. Mr. Franken appears to have achieved a 50 vote land-slide over his Republican competitor, Senator Coleman and will be carrying that madate to DC next week.

There will be plenty of time in the coming weeks to discuss the supression of absentee votes by the Democrats: but, the voting franchise of service personnel overseas is a small price to pay for what will be YEARS of banal policy, thin-minded speeches all provided in that whiney-nasal voice that only Mr. Franken can utter.

So, this evening when the New Year's toasts roll around to me I'll be ready with mine: Here is to Minnesota - home to Senator Al Franken.

Caroline

2008-12-30T17:24:00.000-08:00

"Overall, [Kennedy] was slippery, and regrettably, because I admire her, I came away with the feeling that she views her single best credential for the Senate seat as her celebrity, and, secondarily, her wealth." Salon Magazine comments after an interview.

Meaning

2008-12-24T12:32:00.000-08:00

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the
glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid. And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.' That's what Christmas is all about, Charlie Brown.

Ladyship

2008-12-23T07:37:00.000-08:00

In a democracy with a regularly elected president and no concept of succession or dynasty, Caroline Kennedy - or rather Mrs Schlossberg - is a private citizen, and a very wealthy one at that, not a crown princess in waiting, nor even a seasoned politician at 50 - some 45 years after the death of her father while in the highest office.

Mrs Schlossberg is doing very well what well off ladies-who-lunch do - she has a social circle, she supports liberal causes - there is no requirement for her to make a late entry into politics: she inherited no mantle to take up.

She would not gather any consideration had her father not been the President. Name a single accomplishment in her past that would make her a viable candidate for the Senate seat. It is only the accident of her birth, what then Vice President Gore called the, "...lottery of life," which has broken in her favor.

The arrogance and sense of entitlement of Mrs Schlossberg is palpable.

Nigella

2008-12-18T11:45:00.000-08:00

Follow this link for a great write up of the TV cooks this holiday season. Hilarious!

Not so very long ago, Nigella Lawson claimed that she didn't want to be seen as 'some blow-up doll in the kitchen'. Well, excuse me while I snort with laughter into my glass of seasonal eggnog. And let's all try to hide from her non-stop barrage of double entendres.

Blagojevich

2008-12-18T10:05:00.000-08:00

Is that a crappy courtroom sketch, or what? Back in the days before cameras were allowed in courtrooms, there was a healthy industry of courtroom artists who'd capture the drama of the proceedings. Based on the quality of the first drawing I must assume that 5th grade art classes are now responsible for courtroom drawings in Chicago. Seriously: that is crap.

Otherwise: Nice photos of the the Governor. I wonder why he just didn't post the Seanate Seat for sale on ebay...

Greece

2008-12-17T08:10:00.000-08:00

I am unequipped to comprehend the destruction that is taking place in Greece. I behold the photographs and see a contridictory mix of well-dressed young adults, fire bombs, police, blood and destruction. I see wanton disregard of human life. I see pain and I see frustration. There is certainly more here than can be absorbed from this side of the Atlantic.