The Best and The Brightest

David Halberstam 1934-2007


We lost one of our greatest journalists and writers earlier this week in a car accident. David Halberstam was a sublime chronicler of American history and culture. During his life just to mention a few he covered the failings in Vietnam, the firefighters who died in 9/11, and the friends surrounding Ted Williams' final years. He was one of the best prose writers I have ever read and his two books chronicling the Red Sox and Yankees, Summer of '49 and October 1964, should be required reading for all baseball fans. It was not too long ago that I read his latest (last?) book on the making of Coach Bill Belichick with great pleasure at the insights and depths of such a slim volume . Mr. Halberstam was clearly still at the height of his powers. I would recommend reading him in his own words before reading the links below about him. There is a piece from ESPN.com here on fishing vs. the Super Bowl.

The NY Times obituary is here.

Jim Caple over at ESPN.com remembers him here.

His Wiki biographical entry is here with list of published books.

Chapter One: 11:56 p.m.

Eyes mark the shape of the city. Through the eyes of a high-flying night bird, we take in the scene from midair. In our broad sweep, the city looks like a single gigantic creature—or more like a single collective entity created by many intertwining organisms. Countless arteries stretch to the ends of its elusive body, circulating a continuous supply of fresh blood cells, sending out new data and collecting the old, sending out new consumables and collecting the old, sending out new contradictions and collecting the old. To the rhythm of its pulsing, all parts of the body flicker and flare up and squirm. Midnight is approaching, and while the peak of activity has passed, the basal metabolism that maintains life continues undiminished, producing the basso continuo of the city’s moan, a monotonous sound that neither rises nor falls but is pregnant with foreboding."

The above is excerpted from the new Murakami novel due out May 8th. More of the excerpt is here at the Random House site. It is shaping up to be a promising spring with the new Wilco due out May 15th and they will be appearing on David Letterman that evening. I am pretty sure Jeff Tweedy planned this to all coincide, at my request of course, with the celebration of S's birthday.

You can pre-order album with DVD extra and other goodies here. There is a free download of the new song "What Light" from their website. What else? Oh yeah, they are playing in Davenport at the Adler Theatre on June 13th. Tickets on sale now. I might even have two extra tickets if another couple is out of town that week and can't make the show.

The Temptation of St. Anthony

I am back in Iowa. There were just a few things left to clean up as you can see by the photo above. I have been pressed into service helping out on some other things before heading out to New Mexico next month. I will get some pictures up and mention some of things I have been buying with the intention of reading but not actually reading.

I have been really into the new Arcade Fire, Neon Bible. (Gotta love almost any John Kennedy Toole allusion.)

Last Weekend in Review

I miss the Ocean

Going to see New England's own reunited Sebadoh tonight at Hotel Congress. Even better its an early (7:30) show so I can still get a respectable amount of sleep. I am meeting a friend whose wife is due to give birth any day now. She has a cool site, Ocotillo Grove, that I have only had time to briefly peruse. Check it out. I will also add it to my list.

Just a quick update on Vonnegut. There is a transcript of discussion of his work led by Micheal Dirda here. Although probably not considered one his best I always liked the novel Bluebeard about the painter first introduced in Breakfast of Champions. I seem to remember reading somewhere that Vonnegut based this character on Mark Rothko so I put one up that struck me.

The Trooper

http://www.myspace.com/missfits138




One thing led to The Other. The Bitchfits myspace page had a friend, She Guevara, and her page linked to the above video. More Gaucho Salta videos at their webpage. "Don't Cry For Me Argentina"

P.S. I also am working on feed subscribe buttons but am still figuring them out so they don't work yet.

The desert bloom photographs of Dr. John P. Schaefer (above) are being show at Arizona-Sonora Desert Musuem here in town and I would like to visit it this time around. I want to see a mountain lion too and I hear they got one. There is also a Rembrandt and Dutch exhibit at Phoenix Art Musuem that I want to see and visit with Juche and family. I am trying to ensure we do not have to work this weekend. Wish me luck.

why must itself up every of a park

why must itself up every of a park
anus stick some quote statue unquote to
prove that a hero equals any jerk
who was afraid to dare to answer "no"?
quote citizens unquote might otherwise
forget(to err is human;to forgive
divine)that if the quote state unquote says
"kill" killing is an act of christian love.
"Nothing" in 1944 AD
"can stand against the argument of mil
itary necessity"(generalissimo e)
and echo answers "there is no appeal
from reason"(freud)--you pays your money and
you doesn't take your choice. Ain't freedom grand

E. E. Cummings


Cummings and Vonnegut, veterans and POWs, who both experienced the absurdities of war and took a decided approach against such matters after. Neither one would be considered pacifists but anti-war for sure and they earned the right to speak against. I first read both of these writers while in the Army. (This was of course before I was required to enter a theatre of combat operations and the operative word must still "combat" simply because people died for real and not "theatre" despite the cast of clowns in charge. I swear I mean that.)

I put this poem up in memory of Vonnegut and his stand against stupidity. He used to live in Iowa City. Although I am uncertain of precisely where the famed Vonnegut House is.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. 1922 — 2007

"Kaibutsu"

I found this guy in the pool. I fished (or mothed) him out of the pool after the shot as he was heading towards the pool filter despite his best butterfly stroke. I wish I could have taken a better close up because he really reminded me of Mothra. If you click on the pic you can zoom in.

I am taking a dinner break before I return to work and watching the Red Sox and Matsuzaka work his way out of jam in the 2nd inning against the Mariners. Sox down 1-0. I was watching highlights of the home opener and they celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Impossible Dream Team, the 1967 Red Sox who almost surprised the Cardinals in the World Series. The heart attack kids made famous in that other Updike essay about the Sox.

I have only been to one major league Opening Day game but it was at Fenway in 1997. I can't recall who won the game but I do recall it was a great time and I still have the baseball they handed out. This the year of Nomar but also Heathcliff Slocumb. (I just looked it up on the amazing Baseball Almanac. The Sox lost 5-3 to Randy Johnson and it was also on 4/11 and also against Seattle.) Johnson is now back in Arizona I would love to see him pitch again.

The Boys

The photographer hates it when his subjects pointedly ignore him.

Slept in today since I am covering the night shift and realized way too much time has passed since I put up a picture of the boys. The latest report from home had them eating some flowers that had bloomed outside but needed to be brought inside to save them from the cold. Such good boys they are. A poem for them:

The boys i mean are not refined
They go with girls who buck and bite
They do not give a fuck for luck
They hump them thirteen times a night
One hangs a hat upon her tit
One carves a cross on her behind
They do not give a shit for wit
The boys i mean are not refined

They come with girls who bite and buck
Who cannot read and cannot write
Who laugh like they would fall apart
And masturbate with dynamite

The boys i mean are not refined
They cannot chat of that and this
They do not give a fart for art
They kill like you would take a piss

They speak whatever's on their mind
They do whatever's in their pants
The boys i mean are not refined
They shake the mountains when they dance

E.E. Cummings

"If you're not into yoga, if you have half-a-brain..."

I was fairly certain that El Duderino would probably be the only Air Force trained weather specialist I would ever meet. I of course was wrong. Not only did I meet two other gentleman of the same prior service experience one of them even had the same first name as The Dude. The picture is from one of the weatherman's apartment complex in the foothills of the Catalinas. Some one dubbed it Beach Drink Easter. It's a little fuzzy but then again so were we.

Actual text message I received this morning from the weatherman read as follows:

"Rabbit Fur Coat Brings the Flood of a Century That Looked Like a Blonde on Blonde. Beach Drink Easter hurt my head.”

We listened to a lot of Dylan and some Jenny Lewis & The Watson Twins which may explain the non sequiturs.

Signs of the Apocalypse?

I had K. sign me up for the Oprah book club while I was telling her about being surprised by Oprah's latest selection. Surprised is an understatement. I signed up chiefly so I could find out when Oprah will have an exclusive interview with Cormac McCarthy. And also to read about tidbits such as the following from the website: "Is The Road a cautionary tale of the all-too-near future? Could such a disaster happen to us? Coming soon."

This will be epic. In other news No Country For Old Men directed by Coen brothers will be released Aug 2nd. It has to be better then 300. I think the film rights to The Road have been sold but I couldn't find any details about who is involved.


UPDATE: I just found something from the Oprah site which K. had read to me over the phone.

"Have you read Cormac McCarthy's The Road? What do you think happened to the earth? How long could you "carry the fire"? How far would you go to protect your child? See what others have to say about this mind-blowing novel."

'How far would you go to protect your child?' What kind of question is that? Until they kept whining about starving to death? Until a mindless army of cannibals was approaching and then I would throw him to them in order to facilitate my own escape? The unintentional comedy scale is going to be off the charts. I would say more but I do not want to spoil this amazing book for anyone that has not read it yet. And if you haven't now is the perfect time to pick up a trade paper copy with the Oprah seal of literature on it.

I am not trying to sound like a book snob. Well okay maybe a little since I am one. "It's not what your like it's what you like" of the Rob Gordon school of thought and all that. I do appreciate what Oprah has done for reading. Her choosing such niche writers as Rohinton Mistry (whose A Fine Balance selection was overshadowed by the Franzen fracas) and introducing millions of readers to classic authors they might have been afraid to try on their own more than makes up for fiascoes like James Frey and a preponderance of "issue" books. I have forgotten some of the really good choices she has made and I think she has come to understand the power she has and the responsibility that goes with it.

Late night in Tucson. In a few hours I am going to a swap meet. I am very, very, excited. And I don't mean that in an Eddie Haskell way.

A Very Good Friday

I found out today that I do not have to work this weekend. Even though Pitchfork hated it (At least Popmatters enjoyed it) , the above cd will be cranked up in the Mazda and the top will be down.

I get to sleep in two days in a row and do multiple loads of laundry so I thought this poem from Ted Kooser's ALP column was appropriate to all things going on. Happy Easter!

Laundry

All our life
so much laundry;
each day's doing or not
comes clean,
flows off and away
to blend with other sins
of this world. Each day
begins in new skin,
blessed by the elements
charged to take us
out again to do or undo
what's been assigned.
From socks to shirts
the selves we shed
lift off the line
as if they own
a life apart
from the one we offer.
There is joy in clean laundry.
All is forgiven in water, sun
and air. We offer our day's deeds
to the blue-eyed sky, with soap and prayer,
our arms up, then lowered in supplication.


Reprinted from "Making the Bed," Main Street Rag Press, 2004, by permission of the author. Copyright (c) 1995 by Ruth Moose, whose latest book of poetry, "The Sleepwalker," Main Street Rag, due out in 2007. This weekly column is supported by The Poetry Foundation, The Library of Congress, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. This column does not accept unsolicited poetry.

Hajimemashite!

The Daisuke Matsuzaka era has begun. He was apparently impressive in his debut striking out 10 and getting the win. I say apparently because I did not get to see any it because for some bizarre reason the debut of an international phenom with a price tag of over $100 million did not have enough hype to be broadcast to a national audience. That or a Royals game merited a blackout to everyone except the New England/Kansas City area because it had its first sell out since George Brett left town.

Granted I had to work but I was planning on a long lunch to catch some of it only to find out I was SOL. The Sports Guy kept a running diary of the game for those interested. Also reading the Sports Gal's review of the first episode of The Bachelor was a pleasant distraction from work. Sort of a "Desperation is the world's worst cologne/perfume" theme played out for our entertainment. Good stuff.

"Still Life with Apples,Pears,and a Gray Jug" by Paul Cezanne, 1893-1894.

Study of Two Pears

I
Opusculum paedagogum.
The pears are not viols,
Nudes or bottles.
They resemble nothing else.


II
They are yellow forms
Composed of curves
Bulging toward the base.
They are touched red.


III
They are not flat surfaces
Having curved outlines.
They are round
Tapering toward the top.

Wallace Stevens

From the poem a day email I mentioned previously from Knopf.

The Boys of Summer

Cubs and Angels warming up at HoHoKam Park

Former Red Sox standout Shea Hillenbrand at the plate

Ju Che's son behind the bullpens. Kerry Wood (left side of Cubs pen) came into the game and blew a 1-0 lead late for the Cubbies.

Here are a few pictures from the Sunday before last. I had hoped to catch a few more spring training games but work got in the way. I am still holding out hope for a Diamondbacks game. I had to bail on the Son Volt concert tomorrow night because I am covering a night shift. Sebadoh is coming to town on a reunion tour with original lineup (I think) so my fingers are crossed that I will be able to make that one. Robyn Hitchcock must now live in Tucson as he seems to play here every time I visit. Or maybe this is winter home. Both bands will be at Hotel Congress.

Along with the return of the national past time it is also National Poetry Month.

Poetry Daily has special feature email of a featured poem a day during as does Knopf. Although at least one person is speaking out against this flowering of April verse.

Our Daily Bread

"The fine art of surfacing?" Email from The Walker led to cool photo from German film about food production.

Dust off the cobwebs

A beautiful Saturday morning here in Tucson. At least that is what it looks like from inside this cavernous warehouse type building where I am working. I should have a little more time next week to post some pictures from last weekend's Cubs game with Juche & son. The Kermit link was from The Sports Guy via The Sports Gal. I am probably the last person to have seen it but here it is. I am looking forward to picking up the new Jonathan Lethem book. His site is cool.

Also this is the perfect time of year for a new Fountains of Wayne album.

Happy Birthday!

Today is my sister's birthday. If I am 40 then she must be...hmmm?

I am heading off to Chandler, AZ to celebrate another birthday girl, Ju Che's daughter, who just turned 1 yesterday. I picked up a new cd on a whim for the road trip up, Lily Allen. Check out her Myspace page to hear the super catchy song Smile. Sort of like a British Gwen Stefani with a sense of humor and better music.

"Work is the curse of the drinking class."

Busy. Busy. Busy.

I do have a spring training game to look forward to this Sunday with Ju Che. We are going to see the Cubs at Hohokam Park (Which is fun to say).

By the time I get to Phoenix...

Drive by shot of Orange Grove in Tempe

Downtown Phoenix

I spent some time with Ju Che Child & Family this morning. Ran into downtown Phoenix to do some errands. They are tearing the whole place up to put in a light rail system. The orange grove is close to Ju Che Child's house and it was for Churlita. Not a great shot but she did mention something about orange blossoms and I aims to please. The unseasonable weather we had in Iowa a little while ago was also down here as it hit the upper 90's which apparently is high this early in the year even for Arizona. So things may be blooming ahead of schedule.

Flight down yesterday was uneventful. I finished Kate Atkinson's One Good Turn (sequel to Case Histories). Can't say enough about both of them. Love the intertwining plots and all the twists and turns. They also inspire me to visit Edinburgh. Not exactly a place that was high on my list especially after reading Irvine Welsh. After changing planes in Dallas I began reading Seamus Heaney's Beowulf, excellent stuff. I did start drifting off to sleep right before Grendel's mother arrived. The poem caused me to wonder about Earth Goat's Grendel and how he was doing over in the Netherlands. He has an update and some more pics up.

I was extremely fortunate in the rental car pickup. I managed to snag a 2007 Mazda MX5 convertible. I think it was due to high volume of people combined with an afternoon arrival that caused a shortage of vehicles available but the Mazda was the only car left besides a couple of PT Cruisers. Bonus is that they are still charging the same rate if it had been a Corolla so the corporate office can't complain. Somebody will I am sure but I am covered. I had my eye on a Mustang but the woman in front of me grabbed it. So I shoehorned my luggage into the styrofoam cooler sized trunk and hit the road.

The car has a manual/automatic shift which took me a while to get used to it but you can shift it like a standard or just switch it on the fly to auto. I figured it out after I had it up to 5000 rpms in 2nd gear. Next stop Casa Grande and the Toltec Tavern for lunch.

Patience & Fortitude

Hopper striking a Bob Roberts pose and Iggy a slightly more relaxed one.

I am leaving town tomorrow morning so one more cup of coffee and a cat picture before I go. We had a mellow mellow St. Patrick's Day yesterday just a few pints and some corned beef and cabbage. We rented Borat which I felt did have its funny moments but I still thought overall was the film was just okay. I think the half-life of this film is about 2 years before we see it again and wonder what all the fuss was about. In fact it felt a bit dated already after all of the hype, lawsuits etc... I have to give Sacha Baron Cohen credit as he does know how to make an audience cringe. The next post will be from Arizona.

P.S. I also have to mention that after watching 300, even with my diminished expectations, it was still disappointing. Who knew the Persian ruler Xerxes also could have doubled for a really tall version of the transvestite in The Crying Game? Also some of the scenes were reminiscent of the Castro district in San Fran on a Saturday night in the late '80s. It just needed a techno-dance soundtrack to complete the scene. The movie was beyond campy plus it directly ripped off Lord of the Rings a couple of times. Wait for the video (game).

Beware the Ides of March

"Some days I feel like Janet Leigh"

Some days I feel like Janet Leigh in Touch of Evil —
I wake up, sunny and blond, but by the time midnight
rolls around I've been hijacked by Akim Tamiroff's
greasy thugs, shot up with heroin, framed for murder,
and I'm out cold in a border town jail. I didn't kill
Akim, of course, it was Hank Quinlan — drunk, overweight
Orson Welles — who for thirty-odd years as sheriff
has been framing creeps for crimes they maybe did. Enter
Mike Vargas, tall handsome Mexican cop — Charlton
Heston with a weird little mustache and a dark tan
from a can. "You don't talk like a Mexican," Welles
says to Heston, which speaks to me, because talking
like a Mexican could solve any number of roadside hells
I am currently running away from — well, walking.



Barbara Hamby
Five Points
Volume 9, Number 3

Yes, I know another poem but Hamby is always worthwhile and it is being retired from the Poetry Daily archive.

I just finished up a mini-project for work and I am running around trying to prepare for a return to Tucson for a month long assignment. I need to make sure I have all things done that are supposed to get done plus we are working on a mini Spring cleaning. A cold has slowed me down since last weekend's debate (probably where I caught the cold). First things first though, today I think I will catch a matinee of 300. I can get some more stuff done tomorrow. The cats are getting there nails done.

Just finished reading Kate Atkinson's Case Histories which I enjoyed quiet a bit and have just checked out the sequel from library. I first ran across her by accident picking up a copy of her Emotionally Weird at used bookstore because of the cover and then reading the jacket. I have read that one at least twice and recommend all of her books. Other than that I am still plowing through Ross Macdonald. I think I am up to the 13th book in the Lew Archer series and they continue to get stronger. Quick reads but I have to find most of them through inter-library loans which takes time.

Last night saw Casino Royale (Daniel Craig not David Niven)...I like the idea of starting a new Bond from scratch and look forward to the next chapter. I enjoyed Craig in Layer Cake more though with a bit more action. The Bond film had some extended quiet longueurs while building up the romance angle. Off to the post office.

Coming Soon: Cat Pictures!

300

The title of the movie and probably the number of negative reviews it will receive. I still want to see it.

My favorite blurb is from NY Times' critic A.O. Scott, "300 is about as violent as Apocalypto and twice as stupid. " I read his whole review and while it probably is an accurate assessment it hardly matters to me if the film is excessively violent or sophomoric. It's from a comic book by Frank Miller not Herodotus. As the NY Post reviewer states in his 2 out of 4 star rating. "Its philosophical underpinnings are not freedom and courage but Itchy and Scratchy. "

I am hoping that I feel more like Richard Roeper after seeing it. "It is excessively, cheerfully violent -- and it is gorgeous to behold. It looks like the world's most sophisticated and expensive video game, and I mean that in a good way. "

I am off to go eat and catch some of the Iowa game. Later I get to help judge a high school debate tonight.

A little Madness in the Spring, Is wholesome even for the King.

One of my former roommates used to disappear in the spring and return with bags of morels. I had never tried them before moving to Iowa and they are quite yummy. Of course most things dipped in flour and sauteed in butter will taste pretty good but that was how he liked them. I have since had them cooked in other manners and love their flavor. The ones pictured above are actually Italian morels but I liked the purple flower so there it is.

Mr. Kooser seems to be a nice man so I wanted to follow the rules completely about using his column as noted in the postscript below. A pdf of the column suitable for framing or sharing is here. Enjoy!

(Consider yourselves fortunate as I was very close to posting another picture of the cats when I found this poem in my email.)

American Life in Poetry: Column 102

BY TED KOOSER, U.S. POET LAUREATE, 2004-2006

Those of us who have hunted morel mushrooms in the early spring have hunted indeed! The morel is among nature's most elusive species. Here Jane Whitledge of Minnesota captures the morel's mysterious ways.


Morel Mushrooms

Softly they come
thumbing up from
firm ground

protruding unharmed.
Easily crumbled
and yet

how they shouldered
the leaf and mold
aside, rising

unperturbed,
breathing obscurely,
still as stone.

By the slumping log,
by the dappled aspen,
they grow alone.

A dumb eloquence
seems their trade.
Like hooded monks

in a sacred wood
they say:
Tomorrow we are gone.


Reprinted from "Wilderness Magazine," Spring, 1993, by permission of the author. Copyright (c) 1993 by Jane Whitledge. This weekly column is supported by The Poetry Foundation, The Library of Congress, and the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. This column does not accept unsolicited poetry.
******************************
American Life in Poetry provides newspapers and online publications with a free weekly column featuring contemporary American poems. The sole mission of this project is to promote poetry: American Life in Poetry seeks to create a vigorous presence for poetry in our culture. There are no costs for reprinting the columns; we do require that you register your publication here and that the text of the column be reproduced without alteration.

Closely Watched Trains

I got caught at a railroad crossing yesterday while a very long cargo train passed. I realized this is something that almost never happens in New England but frequently occurs here in the Midwest. Once on a trip down to Columbia, MO I swear we were on a main highway with the speed limit around 60 and there was a railroad crossing bisecting it. Insane.

Warhol

I liked the John Wayne...

... and S. preferred the Annie Oakley.

Yesterday we went to Cedar Rapids and visited The National Czech and Slovak Musuem to see the Andy Warhol exhibit. It was a small exhibition by well worth the short trip. Definitely a better value than our recent trip to the Figge. If you are in the area I recommend seeing the Warhols before they leave on March 11th.

We had some good sushi at House of Sushi before heading off to see Delbert McClinton's son Clay at Mahoneys. Small bar good show.

Web 2.0

I meant to put this up a while ago. I ran across this through a friend (Doolittle) of a friend's website, We'll Know When We Get There. One of my goals was to be more web savvy this year and apart from watching this video I have done little about it. "But I am trying Ringo."
(There is a clue that last bit as to how Doolittle got her nickname from Smooch or Blaze. For about 2 months at UConn I thought that was her real last name. Smooch's nickname is self-explanatory and it rhymes with his last name.)

Anyway the video is interesting in the non-pejorative sense although a tad bit new-agey near the finale but I still thought that the three or four people that read this that don't already read the aforementioned blog would get something out of it or enjoy where it takes them. I added the link to my blog list which makes for a nice counter balance to El Duderino's reactionary-libertarian anti-Clintonian rants. I would say that Allison and her blog rate high on what one of my Poly/Sci profs used to call "political efficacy". I forgot what that means.

I am also throwing up some torrent sites chiefly for my own use. I recommend getting into them if you have the bandwidth as it is a great way to get live music of all sorts. Granted there is lot of jam bands but you can sort through the Leftover Salmon/Dead/Phish to find some great shows. How else could I assuage my obsession with all things Mould, Tweedy,and Dylan?

International Incidents

1.

Wang Ping asks if
we went to a seder
last night
She did,
in Minneapolis
No, I say, we're not
observant
as though we constantly
overlook details


2.

The teachers in the lounge
crowd around the
Swedish visitor
You must be very proud
one of them beams
to be Swedish
She has no idea
what that means
She says,
I don't _dislike_
being Swedish


3.

Who's ever met a Bulgarian?
he would shout in the bar
Then one night
two homely blond sisters
smiled and said
_We_ are Bulgarians!
They smiled for two weeks
then went away forever


Robert Hershon
Calls from the Outside World
Hanging Loose Press

The above is a poem that was retired from Poetry Daily archives last week.

Besides a bedpan I did acquire some other birthday loot. K. introduced me to the The Singing Loins with a double cd of their ballsy Celticish folk songs. (Check out their web site for some mp3s. )

I had to treat myself for the upcoming baseball season so I bought a Red Sox replica road jersey. I might have an opportunity to wear it at some Spring Training games in Phoenix or Tucson in a few weeks.

Since we are 'Talkin Baseball', I should mention that I had a good $3 find at The Book End yesterday. A hardcover copy of Sandy Koufax: A Lefty's Legacy by Jane Leavy. One of the better sports books or just plain books I have read about one of the classiest guys inside and outside of baseball. Jane Leavy does a wonderful job seperating the man from the myth and uses intercalary chapters to recap his perfect game from Sep. 9th, 1965.

Red State Librarian sent me this link to a Korean Food Journal. Hmmmm spicy squid. I feel a trip to Aoeshe for lunch coming up.

My friends treated my 40th birthday with grace and good taste. Especially the gifts.

The Assassination of Little Tree

Cats and plants are sometimes not a good mix.

I woke up one morning last week to find this crime scene in the kitchen. The prime suspects were sound asleep when picked up, literally, for questioning. It seems to be true that it is the guilty who sleep soundly. There was evidence in the water bowl that the culprit had attempted to clean up afterwards. The tree has been moved to the laundry room and after a few pints of soil is in stable condition.

I managed to survive last week's birthday celebration..barely. I will try and keep up some postings a little more frequently. Bookwise I have been working my way through Ross Macdonald's Lew Archer detective series...as one critic pointed out Macdonald essentially wrote the same book over and over but it was a very good book.

The wedding party photo from my parent's wedding in Honolulu, May 1965.

My grandfather was stationed in Honolulu for his civil service assignment and so my mother attended high school and business school there and met my father who was in the Navy.

My paternal grandparents John & Hilda with my Uncle Frank and his fiance shortly before his wedding in West Palm Beach. My Aunt Gerry still lives in this trailer where photo was taken.

My maternal grandparents (Roy and Alice) arriving in Tokyo (Aug 23 1969). My grandfather was working for the government and they traveled quite a bit.

My first Santa Pub Crawl...literally.

I have some more pictures of my parents and grandparents that I want to put up as a way of thanking them for my being brought into this world. It will take some time however and I must devote myself now to actual work if I want to leave here today and celebrate. A gathering at the Dublin Underground is scheduled for this evening. See you there. I will get those pictures up if I can though.

"Nobody Does it Better"

St. Valentine Baptizing St. Lucilla Jacopo Bassano

Sonnet XXIII

As an unperfect actor on the stage
Who with his fear is put besides his part,
Or some fierce thing replete with too much rage,
Whose strength's abundance weakens his own heart.
So I, for fear of trust, forget to say
The perfect ceremony of love's rite,
And in mine own love's strength seem to decay,
O'ercharged with burden of mine own love's might.
O, let my books be then the eloquence
And dumb presagers of my speaking breast,
Who plead for love and look for recompense
More than that tongue that more hath more express'd.
O, learn to read what silent love hath writ:
To hear with eyes belongs to love's fine wit.

William Shakespeare

Happy Valentine's Day!

Obligatory Cat Picture of the Month

Extremely bored from posing for one shot too many.

David Sedaris has an essay online about wild flowers and weed at The New Yorker. This is one of the stories he did in his show in Cedar Rapids in the fall and I imagine it will appear in his next collection.

Indexed

I added this site back to list of blogs (that word still grates). If I recall it was Ondine who first clued me into this site. I was catching up on the archives and there was a post about a short film clip which incorporates some of the graphs and charts. It is pretty cool. Although the narrator sounds like Werner Herzog from Grizzly Man and I keep excepting to see an animated graph about one's proximity to starving bears and the likelihood of being eaten. I think there is a correlation but I am no mathematician. The site for film is here. A direct link to movie is here. You need Quicktime/Itunes to run it.

The Last Picture Show

Grant Wood...

Overall I would say I was underwhelmed by our trip to the Figge. There are some good pieces there but the museum as a whole seems to suffer from an identity crisis. A very modern building with an eclectic but not very modern collection. It all depends on what the visiting or rotating exhibit is. We saw a bunch of quilts. Definitely check it out before going. We did luck out as the day we went there was no admission fee.

They did have some cool things for kids. They had easels and paper set up in the Winter Garden overlooking the river for sketching. And there was an interactive room with fancy architecture blocks.

...and Grant Wood's chair and table.

I took a few more pictures before security informed me that photos were not allowed. There are some good things in the permanent collection such as a Durer engraving and a Bierstadt painting of waterfalls but it is mostly a muddled hodge-podge of styles. I think we expected more modern art to go with the modern building and some photography, design etc. The chair above is in the collection but the design/museum store in the lobby is selling the Eames Lounge Chair. (My birthday is coming up so if anyone has six grand for a chair it's on the wish list.) Anyway I would definitely go back (in warmer weather) if there was a decent exhibition offered.

The Iris Dement/Pieta Brown show was very good although a little steep at 30 bucks a pop. Pieta sounded better than I remember and she of course was paired with Bo Ramsey who is always sublime backing her up. I can't recall the last time I saw Bo do a solo show although he did have a new album of blues covers out. Apparently Greg Brown was in the audience but alas my hoped for duet did not occur. Iris' set was almost identical to her Englert performance but still worth hearing again. She is comically neurotic and her stage banter plays off of that. Iris also has some great new songs about her mother, her marriage, and her husband etc... so I wish she would just record them and release an album. She sang a couple of amazing covers, Johnny Cash's I Still Miss Someone and Greg's The Train Carrying Jimmie Rodgers Home.

I liked the cabaret seating of the River Music Experience even if the energy seemed a little better at Englert and if the weather was better I would be inclined to return this weekend to catch Alejandro Escovedo. We managed to avoid the river boats and gambling completely. Not sure how that happened.

More Scenes from the Museum

Feast of the Patron Saint by Franklyn Gile Latortue

Behind the Scenes at the Museum

View from the Winter Garden of the Figge

Happy Birthday Elmo

My nephew Andrés sporting Elmo.

I was watching The Today Show before leaving for work. Elmo appeared on the show because it was his annual 3rd 1/2 birthday and to promote a literacy campaign. He also squeezed in some time for some serious macking on news anchor Ann Curry. Check out the video from Today show website.

Heading to Davenport tomorrow to explore the Figge and to see/hear Iris Dement & Pieta Brown at the River Music Experience. (I keep hoping Greg will show up at one of these shows and join Iris for a couple songs.) Naturally I also had to pick the coldest weekend of the winter to make this trek to the Mississippi.

Browsing the shelves recently revealed some great finds at the library's used book store as well as some eye catching titles from the library's new book shelves most notably Celia Rivenbark's Stop Dressing Your Six-Year-Old Like a Skank: And Other Words of Delicate Southern Wisdom.

I didn't check it out but made note of it for the future. I did grab another verbosely titled book, Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them by Francine Prose. She breaks down close reading advice with excerpts from other works and has a list of suggested books to read as she puts it "immediately". A list is always a good place to start arguing and she provides ample fodder by inclusion(Franzen) or omission(McCarthy) for such discussions.

Enjoy the weekend.