Sunday, April 01, 2007
Spring
A pair of sparrows have built a nest on a crossbeam of the front porch and the whole thing is visible from where I sit at my desk. But I never noticed until this morning when I was plucking caterpillars off of my Romneya coulteri and lively chirps caught my attention. Good luck, sparrows.
Friday, March 23, 2007
Why I like spring
Because it's pretty. Trees have lots of little flowers on them. And because in P and SFO spring is a time of great vinosity, with people standing at every corner passing out glasses of Musar, Christoffel, Gary Farrell, Gimmonet, Fevre, Beaucastel and other tasty wines.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Monday, March 05, 2007
Proof
As if further evidence that Nicolas Cage is the worst actor on the planet were necessary: http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/next/
Also constitutes proof that Julianne Moore is the second worst.
Also constitutes proof that Julianne Moore is the second worst.
Sunday, March 04, 2007
The role of silence in e-mail communication in the early twenty-first century
Have you noticed how silent an e-correspondent suddenly gets when things turn a bit touchy? A suggestion fails to draw a response. A critical comment goes unrebutted. And if that correspondent writes again, the subject of the previous dialogue is not mentioned. E-mail is a good medium for people averse to engagement. Of course, it's also the favorite medium of flamers and nutjobs.
Saturday, March 03, 2007
Listening
The Byrds "Untitled"
Elsa Lanchester "Songs for a Smoke-Filled Room"
Love & Rockets "Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven"
The Guillemots "From the Cliffs"
"The Best of the Cowsills"
Jelly Roll Morton "The King of New Orelans"
The Beautiful South "Superbi"
Elsa Lanchester "Songs for a Smoke-Filled Room"
Love & Rockets "Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven"
The Guillemots "From the Cliffs"
"The Best of the Cowsills"
Jelly Roll Morton "The King of New Orelans"
The Beautiful South "Superbi"
speculation
What if the god who made this world is the lowest deity in a pantheon that includes far wiser creatures? Is there an appeal process? How do we get this lowly god's handiwork reviewed? I think it's about time some managerial god interceded. I mean, would a higher-ranked god have made a world without vegan donuts? Not in a googol years, my friends.
Friday, March 02, 2007
Sunday, February 25, 2007
A flit of waxwings
Drying lettuce, I stood under dripping skies in the gravel pit out back. And suddenly, marvelously, a flit of cedar waxwings sprang—thirty birds at once—from the tree overhead and curved off and up and then back, landing with a sound like raindrops. They did this, singly, in sixes, all together, again and again until the eucalyptus to the east seized their interest. They are small, crested birds.
William Forsythe's new work, "Atmospheric Studies"
Though it contains some nice things, the new piece is a failure. As though he was incapable of making any decisions, Forsythe includes everything, crowding the stage with movement and ideas until it's just a blur. The idea was to dissolve the distinction between a woman suffering because her son has died and artistic depictions of that suffering, using dance, color, dialogue, distorted and very loud sounds, and that old genre somewhere described by Michael Baxandall, the literary description of a painting. The problem is that we remain on the margins, distanced by a range of quasi-Brechtian techniques that remind us again and again that the artist's enterprise is doubtful, visible, too artificial by half. The dancing is a bore, the dialogue devolves into a moment straight out of "Sprockets," and the final scene is a mess. Naturally the applause at Zellerbach on Friday night went on and on. (I spotted Peter Sellars when he arrived and there were marvelously dressed women in the audience.)
Friday, February 23, 2007
What is Important in a Compost Mix?
In the wild, many alpines grow in situations where water drains away very quickly and easily—this is known as "sharp" drainage. This results in many air spaces around the roots. When growing in a pot, we need to provide similar conditions and make a mix that while holding sufficient water to supply the plant, drains excess water very rapidly to leave lots of air spaces. Before looking at how to achieve this, let's first ask:
Why is it important to have lots of air spaces?
Roots not only take up water, they take up and need oxygen too. Roots are normally covered by a thin film of water. Oxygen has to diffuse across this before it can enter the root. Oxygen diffuses through water relatively slowly. So the thicker the layer of water around the root, the longer it takes oxygen to diffuse through it to get to the root, which may result in the roots being starved of oxygen. Without it, they cannot metabolise and perform their functions—one of which is to take up water. This explains why the symptoms of plants being over-watered or under-watered are the same: If under-watered there is insufficient water to supply the plant and so it wilts. If over-watered, there is plenty of water around but the roots cannot take it up due to being short of oxygen. So the result is the same—the plant may be sitting in water but it wilts because it cannot take the water in.
The reason for going into all this is that plants vary on just how sensitive they are to the amounts of oxygen in the growing medium - and alpines are among those plants that require a high degree of aeration. This is why when growing alpines we aim to produce a mix which is very free-draining, so leaving plenty of air spaces in the medium. The percentage of the volume of a medium that contains air after it has been saturated then allowed to drain is called the Air Filled Porosity (AFP). For the majority of plants, a figure between 10% and 20% AFP is aimed at; for alpines this figure needs to be at the higher end of this range or even above. So when we say a plant needs good drainage, it may be more informative to say that what they need is good aeration (which is created by good drainage).
What factors affect drainage?
1. Pore Size - Pores are the spaces between (and within) the solid parts of a medium and they contain the air and water required by the plant for growth. Pores vary enormously in size. The relative numbers of large and small ones, the way they are grouped and how interconnected they are will determine the rate of water movement through the mix and also determine how much air and water are retained. It is these factors that you can alter by adding drainage material such as grit, and the extent of the effect will vary depending on the particle size of the grit you use and the amount you add to a mix.
The most important factor is the relative proportion of big pores to little ones. This is because of a key point: small pores hold onto water more strongly than large ones—due mainly to capillary action. This means that small pores (called micropores) retain water, which leaves no room for air, while big ones (called macropores) tend to drain most of their water leaving air in its place. It follows that fine sands are not suitable as drainage components- the fine particles simply fall into the larger air spaces, clogging them up and producing smaller pores that hold on to water—in other words you get poorer drainage, the opposite of what you want. So, use only coarse grits as drainage material—in practise, this means ones with most of the particles larger than 1.6mm diameter.
2. Quantity of Grit Used - If you add a very small amount of grit to a medium it will not help the drainage, it will simply displace some of the medium. For grit to work as a drainage medium there must be enough of it so that it exceeds what is called the threshold proportion. The threshold proportion is where there is just enough grit that the particles touch each other. At this point, the pores between the grit are still filled with soil and humus and no new macropores have been created. More grit must be added to further "dilute" the medium so it exceeds the threshold. At this point, new macropores are created that drain readily and provide aeration. In practice, most alpine growers use between 30% and 50% (by volume) of grit in their mixes to achieve this.
3. Pot Depth and Perched Water Tables - When you water into a pot and excess starts coming out the bottom, it is coming out due to a mix of gravity pulling on it and the weight of water above pushing down on it (the "hydraulic head"). As water drains, there is a point at which gravity or the hydraulic head are insufficient to push any more water out. So at the bottom of each pot there is a layer where ALL the pores are filled with water. This is called a perched water table. This is true of all pots whatever mix it contains - at the bottom of every pot there is always a perched water table. Wouldn't it be good if we could prevent this?
This brings us to the old myth. "Put a layer of grit or other coarse material at the bottom of pots and containers to provide drainage." You will hear such advice repeated again and again in books, on websites and TV programmes. Materials recommended for such use may include gravel, grit, sand, broken up clay pots or polystyrene bits, all to be added "for drainage." If you ask the person giving this advice as to EXACTLY why they think this will work, they often don't know - it's just something they have been taught or read about and they have never stopped to think why it might work. If they do have an explanation, it is usually to point out that coarse materials have large air spaces that drain more easily than small air spaces. This is of course correct as we saw earlier. HOWEVER this applies to the materials ALONE. They don't stop to think what happens if you start putting materials in layers. What actually happens is that drainage is HINDERED by this practice and water tends to accumulate at the boundary between the two layers. This happens for two reasons:
a) As we learned earlier, small pores hang on to water more strongly than large ones. Because of this, when you have a medium with smaller pores above one with larger pores, the water has difficulty crossing the boundary. There is insufficient "strength" in the larger pores to pull the water out of the smaller ones above where they are held more strongly by capillary action. So instead of the water draining evenly from the pot, it drains to the interface between the two layers then slows down or may even be stopped altogether until a sufficiently large hydraulic head has built up again to force it across the boundary. This of course means when the compost above is completely saturated! Since the stated goal for using a layer of coarse material is "to improve drainage," it is ironic that this practice actually causes the very state it is intended to prevent!
b) Secondly, the natural "perched water table" we learned about has now been forced to form higher up the pot giving what is called a RAISED perched water table. This leaves even less of the volume of the pot which contains well-drained and well-aerated compost.
There is however a way to remove the perched water table from a pot, so that the whole volume of the pot is well drained: Plunge the pot in a sand plunge. For this to work, ensure that the compost in the pot makes good contact with the sand beneath. This has the effect of greatly increasing the length of the pot so that the perched water table doesn't form until the water reaches the bottom of the plunge. Sometimes people put a piece of broken pot over the drainage hole of clay pots—but this will break the continuity between the compost and the plunge so this will not then work. A good modern alternative is to cover the drainage hole in clay pots with a piece of plastic net. This will help stop compost trickling out but not entirely break the continuity between compost and plunge. Removing the perched water tables from pots is probably the most important function that a plunge serves, so it is strange that this aspect is rarely mentioned these days when the functions of a plunge are discussed.
Why is it important to have lots of air spaces?
Roots not only take up water, they take up and need oxygen too. Roots are normally covered by a thin film of water. Oxygen has to diffuse across this before it can enter the root. Oxygen diffuses through water relatively slowly. So the thicker the layer of water around the root, the longer it takes oxygen to diffuse through it to get to the root, which may result in the roots being starved of oxygen. Without it, they cannot metabolise and perform their functions—one of which is to take up water. This explains why the symptoms of plants being over-watered or under-watered are the same: If under-watered there is insufficient water to supply the plant and so it wilts. If over-watered, there is plenty of water around but the roots cannot take it up due to being short of oxygen. So the result is the same—the plant may be sitting in water but it wilts because it cannot take the water in.
The reason for going into all this is that plants vary on just how sensitive they are to the amounts of oxygen in the growing medium - and alpines are among those plants that require a high degree of aeration. This is why when growing alpines we aim to produce a mix which is very free-draining, so leaving plenty of air spaces in the medium. The percentage of the volume of a medium that contains air after it has been saturated then allowed to drain is called the Air Filled Porosity (AFP). For the majority of plants, a figure between 10% and 20% AFP is aimed at; for alpines this figure needs to be at the higher end of this range or even above. So when we say a plant needs good drainage, it may be more informative to say that what they need is good aeration (which is created by good drainage).
What factors affect drainage?
1. Pore Size - Pores are the spaces between (and within) the solid parts of a medium and they contain the air and water required by the plant for growth. Pores vary enormously in size. The relative numbers of large and small ones, the way they are grouped and how interconnected they are will determine the rate of water movement through the mix and also determine how much air and water are retained. It is these factors that you can alter by adding drainage material such as grit, and the extent of the effect will vary depending on the particle size of the grit you use and the amount you add to a mix.
The most important factor is the relative proportion of big pores to little ones. This is because of a key point: small pores hold onto water more strongly than large ones—due mainly to capillary action. This means that small pores (called micropores) retain water, which leaves no room for air, while big ones (called macropores) tend to drain most of their water leaving air in its place. It follows that fine sands are not suitable as drainage components- the fine particles simply fall into the larger air spaces, clogging them up and producing smaller pores that hold on to water—in other words you get poorer drainage, the opposite of what you want. So, use only coarse grits as drainage material—in practise, this means ones with most of the particles larger than 1.6mm diameter.
2. Quantity of Grit Used - If you add a very small amount of grit to a medium it will not help the drainage, it will simply displace some of the medium. For grit to work as a drainage medium there must be enough of it so that it exceeds what is called the threshold proportion. The threshold proportion is where there is just enough grit that the particles touch each other. At this point, the pores between the grit are still filled with soil and humus and no new macropores have been created. More grit must be added to further "dilute" the medium so it exceeds the threshold. At this point, new macropores are created that drain readily and provide aeration. In practice, most alpine growers use between 30% and 50% (by volume) of grit in their mixes to achieve this.
3. Pot Depth and Perched Water Tables - When you water into a pot and excess starts coming out the bottom, it is coming out due to a mix of gravity pulling on it and the weight of water above pushing down on it (the "hydraulic head"). As water drains, there is a point at which gravity or the hydraulic head are insufficient to push any more water out. So at the bottom of each pot there is a layer where ALL the pores are filled with water. This is called a perched water table. This is true of all pots whatever mix it contains - at the bottom of every pot there is always a perched water table. Wouldn't it be good if we could prevent this?
This brings us to the old myth. "Put a layer of grit or other coarse material at the bottom of pots and containers to provide drainage." You will hear such advice repeated again and again in books, on websites and TV programmes. Materials recommended for such use may include gravel, grit, sand, broken up clay pots or polystyrene bits, all to be added "for drainage." If you ask the person giving this advice as to EXACTLY why they think this will work, they often don't know - it's just something they have been taught or read about and they have never stopped to think why it might work. If they do have an explanation, it is usually to point out that coarse materials have large air spaces that drain more easily than small air spaces. This is of course correct as we saw earlier. HOWEVER this applies to the materials ALONE. They don't stop to think what happens if you start putting materials in layers. What actually happens is that drainage is HINDERED by this practice and water tends to accumulate at the boundary between the two layers. This happens for two reasons:
a) As we learned earlier, small pores hang on to water more strongly than large ones. Because of this, when you have a medium with smaller pores above one with larger pores, the water has difficulty crossing the boundary. There is insufficient "strength" in the larger pores to pull the water out of the smaller ones above where they are held more strongly by capillary action. So instead of the water draining evenly from the pot, it drains to the interface between the two layers then slows down or may even be stopped altogether until a sufficiently large hydraulic head has built up again to force it across the boundary. This of course means when the compost above is completely saturated! Since the stated goal for using a layer of coarse material is "to improve drainage," it is ironic that this practice actually causes the very state it is intended to prevent!
b) Secondly, the natural "perched water table" we learned about has now been forced to form higher up the pot giving what is called a RAISED perched water table. This leaves even less of the volume of the pot which contains well-drained and well-aerated compost.
There is however a way to remove the perched water table from a pot, so that the whole volume of the pot is well drained: Plunge the pot in a sand plunge. For this to work, ensure that the compost in the pot makes good contact with the sand beneath. This has the effect of greatly increasing the length of the pot so that the perched water table doesn't form until the water reaches the bottom of the plunge. Sometimes people put a piece of broken pot over the drainage hole of clay pots—but this will break the continuity between the compost and the plunge so this will not then work. A good modern alternative is to cover the drainage hole in clay pots with a piece of plastic net. This will help stop compost trickling out but not entirely break the continuity between compost and plunge. Removing the perched water tables from pots is probably the most important function that a plunge serves, so it is strange that this aspect is rarely mentioned these days when the functions of a plunge are discussed.
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Why I hate Russians
I wrote the following:
This book of postcards presents thirty of the finest paintings from the fabled collection of the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia.
Founded by Empress Catherine the Great, the Hermitage occupies ten buildings, five of which were erected in the eighteenth century. Grandest of all is the Winter Palace, the richly ornamented home of the ruling Romanov dynasty until the Russian Revolution. So imagine that you are walking along echoing halls, across gleaming parquet floors, under vaulted ceilings from which hang gold-plated chandeliers, as you take in this assortment of landscapes, madonnas, still lifes, and portraits from Russia, Italy, France, England, Holland, Flanders, and Germany.
They wrote:
Vaulted ceilings are hardly typical of the palatial and museum interiors - please rephrase
I wrote:
Dear Olga,
Gina has passed to me your request for a series of
changes to the back cover text, which I wrote. Thank
you for your careful and thorough inspection. I have
never visited the Hermitage and so am at a real
disadvantage when it comes to describing the museum. I
had to rely on information and images presented on the
official Hermitage website, hence my confusion. My
suggestion that a walk through the Hermitage might
involve passing under vaulted ceilings was the
unfortunate result of the website's pictures of the
Raphael loggias, the War Gallery of 1812, the Peter's
(Small Throne) Room, the Alexander Hall, the Gothic
Drawing Room of Grand Princesses, the Gold Drawing
Room, the White Hall, the Corner Drawing-Room of
Emperor Nicholas I, and the Study of Empress Alexandra
Fyodorovnas. My apologies.
Yours very truly,
Sam Gilbert
And Steven Linberg commented, from Paris:
It would be odd if the Hermitage didn't have vaulted ceilings. The fucking
thing wasn't built by the Bauhaus, after all. Believe me, as a translator,
I've encountered this thing a million times. If queried, it will turn out
they think "vaulted" means either that there are safes in the ceiling
or Sergey Bubka cleared it at one go.
Soviet-built steamrollers, Olga and Nataha replied to another part of the text, which reads:
Friend of French philosophers and foe of Russian serfs, Catherine the Great acquired a collection of fine European paintings with which she adorned the Winter Palace, a treasure-house the empress coyly likened to the retreat of a hermit. Forty-five years after Catherine’s death, the nineteenth-century traveler Johann Georg Kohl noted the preponderance of Netherlandish works in the collection, citing “more unroasted and roasted game, than roasted martyrs; more hares transfixed by the spit of the cook, than St. Sebastians by the arrows of the heathen.” Culinary subjects lost their prominence as Catherine’s successors snatched up masterpieces by Titian, Leonardo, and Raphael; Fragonard, Sisley, and Renoir; Gainsborough, Gauguin, and Friedrich—all of whom are represented in this book of postcards. Under the reign of Joseph Stalin dramatic changes reshaped the Hermitage, as an antibourgeois purge of many works was followed by an influx of art taken as booty by the Red Army during World War II.
Today the Hermitage is incontestably one of the world’s greatest museums. Its doors long open to all, it has not served as a monarch’s private retreat since 1852, when it was first opened to the public. Most recently, satellite Hermitages have popped up in Amsterdam, London, and Las Vegas; one will soon open in Ferrara.
They said:
There is a problem with intro text. It looks funny and even smart, however, unfortunately, it's untrue in most of its statements and cannot be published in a book of postcards which we are going to sell inside the Hermitage museum.
For your guidence, attached please find some texts taken from the official Hermitage web site and from the St Petersburg Rough Guide. We do hope this will be helpful and useful to create something more plausible for this and forthcoming postcard books on the Hermitage collection.
I could only say
I mean, how am I supposed to cope with such boneheads? If they knew a vaulted ceiling from a Gazprom stock offering I'd be willing to enter into a conversation with these ignoramuses but when they fail to identify a single error or inaccuracy in my introduction and summarily reject it I just want to point every anti-ballistic missile in Europe at Saint Petersburg and fire away. I'd crawl over broken glass from Moscow to Khartoum if Olga showed me a single mistake in my introduction.
This book of postcards presents thirty of the finest paintings from the fabled collection of the State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia.
Founded by Empress Catherine the Great, the Hermitage occupies ten buildings, five of which were erected in the eighteenth century. Grandest of all is the Winter Palace, the richly ornamented home of the ruling Romanov dynasty until the Russian Revolution. So imagine that you are walking along echoing halls, across gleaming parquet floors, under vaulted ceilings from which hang gold-plated chandeliers, as you take in this assortment of landscapes, madonnas, still lifes, and portraits from Russia, Italy, France, England, Holland, Flanders, and Germany.
They wrote:
Vaulted ceilings are hardly typical of the palatial and museum interiors - please rephrase
I wrote:
Dear Olga,
Gina has passed to me your request for a series of
changes to the back cover text, which I wrote. Thank
you for your careful and thorough inspection. I have
never visited the Hermitage and so am at a real
disadvantage when it comes to describing the museum. I
had to rely on information and images presented on the
official Hermitage website, hence my confusion. My
suggestion that a walk through the Hermitage might
involve passing under vaulted ceilings was the
unfortunate result of the website's pictures of the
Raphael loggias, the War Gallery of 1812, the Peter's
(Small Throne) Room, the Alexander Hall, the Gothic
Drawing Room of Grand Princesses, the Gold Drawing
Room, the White Hall, the Corner Drawing-Room of
Emperor Nicholas I, and the Study of Empress Alexandra
Fyodorovnas. My apologies.
Yours very truly,
Sam Gilbert
And Steven Linberg commented, from Paris:
It would be odd if the Hermitage didn't have vaulted ceilings. The fucking
thing wasn't built by the Bauhaus, after all. Believe me, as a translator,
I've encountered this thing a million times. If queried, it will turn out
they think "vaulted" means either that there are safes in the ceiling
or Sergey Bubka cleared it at one go.
Soviet-built steamrollers, Olga and Nataha replied to another part of the text, which reads:
Friend of French philosophers and foe of Russian serfs, Catherine the Great acquired a collection of fine European paintings with which she adorned the Winter Palace, a treasure-house the empress coyly likened to the retreat of a hermit. Forty-five years after Catherine’s death, the nineteenth-century traveler Johann Georg Kohl noted the preponderance of Netherlandish works in the collection, citing “more unroasted and roasted game, than roasted martyrs; more hares transfixed by the spit of the cook, than St. Sebastians by the arrows of the heathen.” Culinary subjects lost their prominence as Catherine’s successors snatched up masterpieces by Titian, Leonardo, and Raphael; Fragonard, Sisley, and Renoir; Gainsborough, Gauguin, and Friedrich—all of whom are represented in this book of postcards. Under the reign of Joseph Stalin dramatic changes reshaped the Hermitage, as an antibourgeois purge of many works was followed by an influx of art taken as booty by the Red Army during World War II.
Today the Hermitage is incontestably one of the world’s greatest museums. Its doors long open to all, it has not served as a monarch’s private retreat since 1852, when it was first opened to the public. Most recently, satellite Hermitages have popped up in Amsterdam, London, and Las Vegas; one will soon open in Ferrara.
They said:
There is a problem with intro text. It looks funny and even smart, however, unfortunately, it's untrue in most of its statements and cannot be published in a book of postcards which we are going to sell inside the Hermitage museum.
For your guidence, attached please find some texts taken from the official Hermitage web site and from the St Petersburg Rough Guide. We do hope this will be helpful and useful to create something more plausible for this and forthcoming postcard books on the Hermitage collection.
I could only say
I mean, how am I supposed to cope with such boneheads? If they knew a vaulted ceiling from a Gazprom stock offering I'd be willing to enter into a conversation with these ignoramuses but when they fail to identify a single error or inaccuracy in my introduction and summarily reject it I just want to point every anti-ballistic missile in Europe at Saint Petersburg and fire away. I'd crawl over broken glass from Moscow to Khartoum if Olga showed me a single mistake in my introduction.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Cultural Quiz
(1) What is The Gherkin?
(2) Who is William Forsythe?
(3) Why did Elgin want the marbles?
(4) What piece of technology was crucial to the house that Mickey built hard by MoCA?
(5) What book did Philip Roth declare "the best English novel written since the war"?
(6) Which painter wrote a book disproving the myth that van Gogh sold only a single painting in his lifetime?
(7) When did espionage become a subject for serious books and movies?
(8) Name a poet who makes you laugh.
(9) Does anyone write symphonies any more?
(10) Who owns Olivier Messiaen's ondes Martenot?
(11) What is it about Finland?
(12) Which novelist do I refer to as The Pisspot and why?
(13) Is anyone safe?
(14) Which great composer wrote wonderful dance music?
(15) Who has a nice voice?
(16) When all else fails, do a crossover album--ok or not?
(17) Can a movie be exciting without guns or cars or hiphop dancing?
(18) Should painting be decorative?
(19) Should Bill Viola switch to cello?
(20) What is your favorite song?
(2) Who is William Forsythe?
(3) Why did Elgin want the marbles?
(4) What piece of technology was crucial to the house that Mickey built hard by MoCA?
(5) What book did Philip Roth declare "the best English novel written since the war"?
(6) Which painter wrote a book disproving the myth that van Gogh sold only a single painting in his lifetime?
(7) When did espionage become a subject for serious books and movies?
(8) Name a poet who makes you laugh.
(9) Does anyone write symphonies any more?
(10) Who owns Olivier Messiaen's ondes Martenot?
(11) What is it about Finland?
(12) Which novelist do I refer to as The Pisspot and why?
(13) Is anyone safe?
(14) Which great composer wrote wonderful dance music?
(15) Who has a nice voice?
(16) When all else fails, do a crossover album--ok or not?
(17) Can a movie be exciting without guns or cars or hiphop dancing?
(18) Should painting be decorative?
(19) Should Bill Viola switch to cello?
(20) What is your favorite song?
Faith
I don't want religion, I just want the church dinners and the warm greetings of one hundred of my townsmen on a weekend morning.
Monday, February 19, 2007
Today's music
Mercury Rev "All Is Dream"
Radiohead "Kid A"
Nick Drake "Way to Blue"
Jonathan Richman "You Must Ask the Heart"
Jeff Buckley "Grace"
Johannes Hieronymus Kapsberger "Libro quarto d'intavolatura di chitarone"
Josef Haydn "Andante con Variazioni f-moll Op.83 Hob.XVII:6"
"Stan Getz Meets Gerry Mulligan in Hi-Fi"
Radiohead "Kid A"
Nick Drake "Way to Blue"
Jonathan Richman "You Must Ask the Heart"
Jeff Buckley "Grace"
Johannes Hieronymus Kapsberger "Libro quarto d'intavolatura di chitarone"
Josef Haydn "Andante con Variazioni f-moll Op.83 Hob.XVII:6"
"Stan Getz Meets Gerry Mulligan in Hi-Fi"
Thursday, February 15, 2007
O my gawd
Possibly the most hilariously awful dancing ever.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfGc4wcil2g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfGc4wcil2g
Friday, February 09, 2007
Things I don't like
war
new age thinking
Brussels sprouts
cruelty
selfishness
waste
tobacco
bad skin
refusal to confront evil
Liszt
Schumann
Robin Williams
TV
football
baseball
extraordinary renditions
cellular telephones
parties
baseball caps
spring-loaded hair clips
take-out food
coffee breath
new age thinking
Brussels sprouts
cruelty
selfishness
waste
tobacco
bad skin
refusal to confront evil
Liszt
Schumann
Robin Williams
TV
football
baseball
extraordinary renditions
cellular telephones
parties
baseball caps
spring-loaded hair clips
take-out food
coffee breath
Things I like
the walk along the railroad tracks (some madman is making Mark Di Suvero sculpture on a big lot upstream from the feed and hay place)
rowing on Tomales Bay, morning and dusk
nuts
citrus
Eloise and Lucy
dancing
萊陽酥餅
Elephant Rock, between Tomales and Dillon Beach
flowery perfume
making juice with Won Sun and Eloise and Lucy
Musar
Christoffel
traveling with Liz
臺北
spider-leg tea
remembering my dreams
Stan Getz
my vacuum cleaner
walking in San Francisco
hand-me-down clothes
calochortus
rowing on Tomales Bay, morning and dusk
nuts
citrus
Eloise and Lucy
dancing
萊陽酥餅
Elephant Rock, between Tomales and Dillon Beach
flowery perfume
making juice with Won Sun and Eloise and Lucy
Musar
Christoffel
traveling with Liz
臺北
spider-leg tea
remembering my dreams
Stan Getz
my vacuum cleaner
walking in San Francisco
hand-me-down clothes
calochortus
Thursday, February 08, 2007
The agony of Saint Lambert
A seventh-century Flemish patron of surgeons, Lambert was once sentenced by abbey elders to a night in a snowdrift for breaking his monastic vow of silence: he had farted.
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Fantasy
If you could inhabit any creature for a day, another for a week, another for a year, what would they be? For me, a day of being a trout would be enough, a week of being a cheetah would go by in a flash, and a year would permit me to experience all the seasons of a merlin's life. But a year as Michael Stipe would be fun too.
Monday, February 05, 2007
Friday, February 02, 2007
Why Yahoo is losing market share
Hello Sam,
Thank you for writing to Yahoo! Address Book.
Our engineering team is aware that it is no longer possible to send an email using the nickname only. They are diligently exploring efficient and effective methods that will resolve this issue in as timely a manner as possible. However, there is no timeline for a resolution. We appreciate your patience in this matter.
Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! Customer Care.
Regards,
Elizabeth
Yahoo! Customer Care
Thank you for writing to Yahoo! Address Book.
Our engineering team is aware that it is no longer possible to send an email using the nickname only. They are diligently exploring efficient and effective methods that will resolve this issue in as timely a manner as possible. However, there is no timeline for a resolution. We appreciate your patience in this matter.
Thank you again for contacting Yahoo! Customer Care.
Regards,
Elizabeth
Yahoo! Customer Care
Thursday, January 25, 2007
to the beach
I went to the beach and she wasn't there. I went to the forest and she wasn't there. I went to the mountains and she wasn't there. I went to my house and opened the door and there she was. Together we went to the beach, the forest, the mountains.
Monday, January 22, 2007
The good wrought by imperialism
Buc'hoz, Pierre-Joseph (1731-1807)
Dissertation sur le durion, arbre des Indes orientales, qui donne un fruit bon à manger et qui mérite d'être cultivé dans nos colonies
Dissertation sur le durion, arbre des Indes orientales, qui donne un fruit bon à manger et qui mérite d'être cultivé dans nos colonies
Friday, January 19, 2007
Thursday, January 18, 2007
I am so not from Chicago, guys
| What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North You may think you speak "Standard English straight out of the dictionary" but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like "Are you from Wisconsin?" or "Are you from Chicago?" Chances are you call carbonated drinks "pop." | |
| The Midland | |
| The Northeast | |
| Philadelphia | |
| The South | |
| The West | |
| Boston | |
| North Central | |
| What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz | |
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Sunday, January 14, 2007
American Constitution, acticle 1, section 8, in part
Section 8. The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;
To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;
To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;
To establish post offices and post roads;
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress . . .
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;
To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;
To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;
To establish post offices and post roads;
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress . . .
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Cowardice among the powerful
In today's Financial Times is an excellent opinion piece by Jacob Weisberg, an FT columnist and the editor of Slate.com. Weisberg points out that the constitution of the United States of America very specifically grants the legislative branch sole authority to declare war and the power to create, fund, and regulate the armed forces. The 1973 war powers resolution, Weisberg reminds us, "creates a 60-day period after the onset of hostilities for presidents either to get congressional approval or withdraw troops." Plus, "a provision of the war powers resolution states specifically that the president must remove forces when Congress so orders." This provision was invoked again and again by Republican Congresses under Clinton. So enough with the whining, Democratic senators, the time has come to stop this war.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
Renditions
I am reading "Ghost Plane," which opens with an imaginary visit to a secret prison in Damascus that was, in 2002 and 2003, home to a number of suspected terrorists abducted from various places around the globe. These prisoners, tortured daily, were part of the now well publicized CIA covert renditions program authorized by George Bush after September 11. At the same time that he was publicly excoriating Syria for human rights abuses, including torture, Bush was enthusiastically supporting a program that took advantage of the the willingness of the Syrian government to torture terrorists. Or suspected terrorists. Many of whom proved to be innocent, as investigations in Canada and elsewhere have shown. The CIA and the SIS (aka MI5) would fax lists of questions to the interrogators at the Syrian prison. I have a lot more to read.
Sunday, January 07, 2007
Remember Haditha
In the vast list of wartime atrocities, Haditha ranks very low, but the remarkable transparency provided by the American media permits us to look closely at a small massacre (fifteen people) to understand how men act in war.
Here are a few passages from the New York Times article of 7 January 2007:
"An American government report on the killing of 24 Iraqis, including several women and children, by marines in the village of Haditha in 2005 provides new details of how the shootings unfolded and supports allegations by prosecutors that a few marines illegally killed civilians, government officials said yesterday.
"The report, by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, contains thousands of pages of interviews with marines, Iraqi Army soldiers who had accompanied them and Iraqi villagers who had seen the attack. The shootings followed a roadside bombing that killed a young lance corporal and wounded two other marines, said a senior Defense Department official and another official who had read the report.
"The evidence contained in the report, the most exhaustive of several inquiries begun by the military last year to determine what happened in Haditha that day, led prosecutors to charge four enlisted marines with murder. Four marine officers, who were not present during the attack, were also charged with dereliction of duty and other crimes for failing to properly report details of the episode.
"The four enlisted men charged with unpremeditated murder, all members of a squad of Company K, Third Battalion, First Marines, are: Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich of Meriden, Conn.; Sgt. Sanick P. Dela Cruz, 24, of Chicago; Lance Cpl. Justin L. Sharratt, 22, of Carbondale, Pa.; and Lance Cpl. Stephen B. Tatum, 25, of Edmond, Okla.
"The attack on the Iraqis began after the roadside bomb blew up one of four Humvees the marines were traveling in on Nov. 19, 2005. Minutes after that, the report portrays Sergeant Wuterich, the squad leader, and Sergeant Dela Cruz as killing five men who had nervously piled out of a taxi that had stopped near the marine convoy, the officials said.
"The men 'were shot by Wuterich as they stood, unarmed, next to the vehicle approximately 10 feet in front of him,' the report said, according to a person who has read it.
"Sergeant Dela Cruz said that as he approached the taxi, he saw some men standing near it with their hands in the air, officials said. After Sergeant Wuterich shot them, he continued shooting as they lay on the ground, and later urinated on one of them, an official said.
"The marines, taking small arms fire from several locations near homes on either side of the convoy, attacked a home nearby, killing six people, including a young boy, a woman and two elderly people, none of them armed, the report said, according to officials and people who have read it.
"In one of the houses the marines raided, the report said, a 13-year-old girl, Safah Yunis Salem, said she survived by pretending to be dead after marines killed several family members, including her 3-year-old sister and 5-year-old brother, government officials said."
Here are a few passages from the New York Times article of 7 January 2007:
"An American government report on the killing of 24 Iraqis, including several women and children, by marines in the village of Haditha in 2005 provides new details of how the shootings unfolded and supports allegations by prosecutors that a few marines illegally killed civilians, government officials said yesterday.
"The report, by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, contains thousands of pages of interviews with marines, Iraqi Army soldiers who had accompanied them and Iraqi villagers who had seen the attack. The shootings followed a roadside bombing that killed a young lance corporal and wounded two other marines, said a senior Defense Department official and another official who had read the report.
"The evidence contained in the report, the most exhaustive of several inquiries begun by the military last year to determine what happened in Haditha that day, led prosecutors to charge four enlisted marines with murder. Four marine officers, who were not present during the attack, were also charged with dereliction of duty and other crimes for failing to properly report details of the episode.
"The four enlisted men charged with unpremeditated murder, all members of a squad of Company K, Third Battalion, First Marines, are: Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich of Meriden, Conn.; Sgt. Sanick P. Dela Cruz, 24, of Chicago; Lance Cpl. Justin L. Sharratt, 22, of Carbondale, Pa.; and Lance Cpl. Stephen B. Tatum, 25, of Edmond, Okla.
"The attack on the Iraqis began after the roadside bomb blew up one of four Humvees the marines were traveling in on Nov. 19, 2005. Minutes after that, the report portrays Sergeant Wuterich, the squad leader, and Sergeant Dela Cruz as killing five men who had nervously piled out of a taxi that had stopped near the marine convoy, the officials said.
"The men 'were shot by Wuterich as they stood, unarmed, next to the vehicle approximately 10 feet in front of him,' the report said, according to a person who has read it.
"Sergeant Dela Cruz said that as he approached the taxi, he saw some men standing near it with their hands in the air, officials said. After Sergeant Wuterich shot them, he continued shooting as they lay on the ground, and later urinated on one of them, an official said.
"The marines, taking small arms fire from several locations near homes on either side of the convoy, attacked a home nearby, killing six people, including a young boy, a woman and two elderly people, none of them armed, the report said, according to officials and people who have read it.
"In one of the houses the marines raided, the report said, a 13-year-old girl, Safah Yunis Salem, said she survived by pretending to be dead after marines killed several family members, including her 3-year-old sister and 5-year-old brother, government officials said."
Saturday, January 06, 2007
Martin Scorsese's list
Among the movies to which Scorsese makes admiring mention in "A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese through American Movies" are the following.
All That Heaven Allows (written by Peg Fenwick, directed by Douglas Sirk, 1955)
All That Jazz (written by Robert Alan Arthur and Bob Fosse, directed by Bob Fosse, 1979)
America, America (written and directed by Elia Kazan, 1963)
Anna Christie (written by Frances Marion from a Eugene O'Neill play, directed by Clarence Brown, 1930)
The Bad and the Beautiful (written by Charles Schnee, directed by Vincente Minnelli, 1952)
The Bandwagon (written by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, directed by Vincente Minnelli, 1953)
Barry Lyndon
Bigger Than Life (written by Cyril Hume and Richard Maibaum and Ray and Mason and others, directed by Nicholas Ray, 1956)
The Big House (written by Frances Marion and others, directed by George Hill, 1930)
The Birth of a Nation
Bonnie and Clyde
Broken Blossoms
The Cameraman
Cat People
Citizen Kane (written by Pauline Kael)
Colorado Territory (written by John Twist and Edmind H. North, directed by Raoul Walsh, 1949)
Crime Wave (written by Crane Wilbur, directed by André de Toth, 1954)
The Crowd (written by King Vidor and others, directed by King Vidor, 1928)
Death's Marathon (written by W. E. Wing, directed by D. W. Griffith, 1931)
Detour
Double Indemnity
Duel in the Sun (written by David O. Selznick, directed by King Vidor and William Dieterle, 1946)
East of Eden
Faces
The Fall of the Roman Empire (written by Ben Barzman and a guy with the wonderful name Basilio Franchina, directed by Anthony Mann, 1964)
Footlight Parade (written by Manuel Seff and James Seymour, directed by Lloyd Bacon, 1933)
Force of Evil (written and directed by Abraham Polonsky, 1948)
42nd Street (written by James Seymour and Rian James, directed by Lloyd Bacon, 1933)
Forty Guns
The Furies
Gold Diggers of 1933 (written by Erwin Gelsey and James Seymour, directed by Mervyn Leroy, 1933)
The Great Dictator
The Great Train Robbery
Gun Crazy
Hell's Highway
Her Man (written by Tom Buckingham, directed by Tay Garnett, 1930)
High Sierra
Intolerance
I Walk Alone
I Walked with a Zombie
Johnny Guitar
Kiss Me Deadly
Land of the Pharoahs
Leave Her to Heaven (written by Jo Swerling, directed by John M. Stahl, 1945)
The Left-Handed Gun (written by Leslie Stevens from a teleplay by Gore Vidal, directed by Arthur Penn, 1958)
Letter from an Unknown Woman
Lolita
The Magnificent Ambersons
The Man with the Golden Arm
Meet Me in Saint Louis
Murder by Contract
The Musketeers of Pig Alley
My Dream Is Yours (written by Harry Kurnitz and Dane Lurrier, directed by Michael Curtiz, 1949)
The Naked Kiss
The Naked Spur
One, Two, Three
On the Waterfront
Outrage (written by Collier Young, Malvin Wald, Ida Lupino, directed by Ida Lupino, 1950)
The Phoenix City Story (written by Crane Wilbur, Daniel Mainwaring, directed by Phil Karlson, 1955)
Pickup on South Street (written and directed by Samuel Fuller, 1953)
Point Blank
The Public Enemy (written by Kubec Glasmon, John Bright, directed by William Wellman, 1931)
Raw Deal (Anthony Mann, 1948)
The Red House (written and directed by Delmer Davies, 1947)
Regeneration (written by Raoul Walsh, Carl Harbaugh, directed by Raoul Walsh, 1915)
The Roaring Twenties (written by Jerry Wald and others, directed by Raoul Walsh, 1939)
The Robe (written by Philip Dunne, directed by Henry Koster, 1953)
Samson and Delilah (written by Jesse Lasky, Jr., Fredric M. Frank, directed by Cecil B. De Mille, 1949)
Scarface (Hawks)
The Scarlet Empress
Scarlet Street
The Searchers
Seventh Heaven (written by Benjamin Glazer, directed by Frank Borzage, 1927)
She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
Shock Corridor
Silver Lode (written by Karen De Wolfe, directed by Allan Dwan, 1954)
Some Came Running
Stagecoach
A Star Is Born (written by Moss Hart, directed by George Cukor, 1954)
A Streetcar Named Desire
Sullivan's Travels
Sunrise
Sweet Smell of Success
The Tall T (written by Burt Kennedy, directed by Budd Boetticher, 1957)
The Ten Commandments (1923)
The Ten Commandments (1956)
T-Men (written by John C. Higgins, Anthony Mann, directed by Anthony Mann, 1948)
2001: A Space Odyssey (written by Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke, directed by Stanley Kubrick, 1968)
Two Weeks in Another Town (written by Charles Schnee, directed by Vincente Minnelli, 1962)
Unforgiven (written by David Webb Peoples, directed by Clint Eastwood, 1992)
The Wedding March (written by Erick von Stroheim, Harry Carr, directed by Erich von Stroheim, 1927)
Wild Boys of the Road (written by Earl Baldwin, directed by William Wellman, 1933)
All That Heaven Allows (written by Peg Fenwick, directed by Douglas Sirk, 1955)
All That Jazz (written by Robert Alan Arthur and Bob Fosse, directed by Bob Fosse, 1979)
America, America (written and directed by Elia Kazan, 1963)
Anna Christie (written by Frances Marion from a Eugene O'Neill play, directed by Clarence Brown, 1930)
The Bad and the Beautiful (written by Charles Schnee, directed by Vincente Minnelli, 1952)
The Bandwagon (written by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, directed by Vincente Minnelli, 1953)
Barry Lyndon
Bigger Than Life (written by Cyril Hume and Richard Maibaum and Ray and Mason and others, directed by Nicholas Ray, 1956)
The Big House (written by Frances Marion and others, directed by George Hill, 1930)
The Birth of a Nation
Bonnie and Clyde
Broken Blossoms
The Cameraman
Cat People
Citizen Kane (written by Pauline Kael)
Colorado Territory (written by John Twist and Edmind H. North, directed by Raoul Walsh, 1949)
Crime Wave (written by Crane Wilbur, directed by André de Toth, 1954)
The Crowd (written by King Vidor and others, directed by King Vidor, 1928)
Death's Marathon (written by W. E. Wing, directed by D. W. Griffith, 1931)
Detour
Double Indemnity
Duel in the Sun (written by David O. Selznick, directed by King Vidor and William Dieterle, 1946)
East of Eden
Faces
The Fall of the Roman Empire (written by Ben Barzman and a guy with the wonderful name Basilio Franchina, directed by Anthony Mann, 1964)
Footlight Parade (written by Manuel Seff and James Seymour, directed by Lloyd Bacon, 1933)
Force of Evil (written and directed by Abraham Polonsky, 1948)
42nd Street (written by James Seymour and Rian James, directed by Lloyd Bacon, 1933)
Forty Guns
The Furies
Gold Diggers of 1933 (written by Erwin Gelsey and James Seymour, directed by Mervyn Leroy, 1933)
The Great Dictator
The Great Train Robbery
Gun Crazy
Hell's Highway
Her Man (written by Tom Buckingham, directed by Tay Garnett, 1930)
High Sierra
Intolerance
I Walk Alone
I Walked with a Zombie
Johnny Guitar
Kiss Me Deadly
Land of the Pharoahs
Leave Her to Heaven (written by Jo Swerling, directed by John M. Stahl, 1945)
The Left-Handed Gun (written by Leslie Stevens from a teleplay by Gore Vidal, directed by Arthur Penn, 1958)
Letter from an Unknown Woman
Lolita
The Magnificent Ambersons
The Man with the Golden Arm
Meet Me in Saint Louis
Murder by Contract
The Musketeers of Pig Alley
My Dream Is Yours (written by Harry Kurnitz and Dane Lurrier, directed by Michael Curtiz, 1949)
The Naked Kiss
The Naked Spur
One, Two, Three
On the Waterfront
Outrage (written by Collier Young, Malvin Wald, Ida Lupino, directed by Ida Lupino, 1950)
The Phoenix City Story (written by Crane Wilbur, Daniel Mainwaring, directed by Phil Karlson, 1955)
Pickup on South Street (written and directed by Samuel Fuller, 1953)
Point Blank
The Public Enemy (written by Kubec Glasmon, John Bright, directed by William Wellman, 1931)
Raw Deal (Anthony Mann, 1948)
The Red House (written and directed by Delmer Davies, 1947)
Regeneration (written by Raoul Walsh, Carl Harbaugh, directed by Raoul Walsh, 1915)
The Roaring Twenties (written by Jerry Wald and others, directed by Raoul Walsh, 1939)
The Robe (written by Philip Dunne, directed by Henry Koster, 1953)
Samson and Delilah (written by Jesse Lasky, Jr., Fredric M. Frank, directed by Cecil B. De Mille, 1949)
Scarface (Hawks)
The Scarlet Empress
Scarlet Street
The Searchers
Seventh Heaven (written by Benjamin Glazer, directed by Frank Borzage, 1927)
She Wore a Yellow Ribbon
Shock Corridor
Silver Lode (written by Karen De Wolfe, directed by Allan Dwan, 1954)
Some Came Running
Stagecoach
A Star Is Born (written by Moss Hart, directed by George Cukor, 1954)
A Streetcar Named Desire
Sullivan's Travels
Sunrise
Sweet Smell of Success
The Tall T (written by Burt Kennedy, directed by Budd Boetticher, 1957)
The Ten Commandments (1923)
The Ten Commandments (1956)
T-Men (written by John C. Higgins, Anthony Mann, directed by Anthony Mann, 1948)
2001: A Space Odyssey (written by Stanley Kubrick, Arthur C. Clarke, directed by Stanley Kubrick, 1968)
Two Weeks in Another Town (written by Charles Schnee, directed by Vincente Minnelli, 1962)
Unforgiven (written by David Webb Peoples, directed by Clint Eastwood, 1992)
The Wedding March (written by Erick von Stroheim, Harry Carr, directed by Erich von Stroheim, 1927)
Wild Boys of the Road (written by Earl Baldwin, directed by William Wellman, 1933)
Monday, January 01, 2007
07.01.01
Morning light is streaming through my front windows, warming me and the cat, lighting up boxes and piles of books and the deserted saucers for the pots still dripping on the back porch. No music, just the susurrus of passing cars and motorcycles and the bass of upstairs voices and shifting furniture. Can the world really be as peaceful as this? Might it be?
Sunday, December 31, 2006
Conclusion
At year's end a passionate thanks to my friends for all they do for me. Without Won Sun, Nitzan, Howard, Michael, Liz, 美足, Scott, Hannah, Steven, 平一, Nell, Pam, Gina, Dani, Jennifer, Levon, Joe, my sister, my mother, my father, Eloise and Lucy, life would be hollow.
This year's writings are dedicated to Cuchulain.
This year's writings are dedicated to Cuchulain.
R.I.P. Saddam Hussein
The coverage I've seen of the slaying of Saddam has been vile. Every word seems calculated to justify his death, with no room for the remotest possibility that he was a human being for whom we might feel compassion. There is no justice in killing people, only sometimes, under certain conditions, a reason that can't be ignored. The reason here is something called revenge, and revenge is bestial. We are not at our best when we hang people, shoot people in the head, put poison in people's veins, send large amounts of electricity through people's bodies. Some people are guiltier than others. Some people have more blood on their hands. But we have a great deal of blood on our hands, we solemn executioners.
Invitation
The cat needs to be able to come and go as the whim strikes her. I leave the back door ajar. This makes it fairly cold at night. It also invites homeless people, possums and lunar moths to visit me. So far none has accepted the invitation but it's only a matter of time, right?
Friday, December 22, 2006
We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.
The reflection of one who has given up on a great deal, this sentiment is, even for the most determined, deeply attractive. We have Oscar Wilde to thank for it.
Tuesday, December 19, 2006
Authorial fixations
Zadie Smith is really into sweat. In "On Beauty," all of her characters sweat and often quite copiously. Weather has nothing to do with it. Does she think sweat is beautiful?
Friday, December 15, 2006
Cuchulain
On Saturday, December 9, Cuchulain died in his sleep. He was not the shrewdest dog but he was gentle and good. I loved him.
Thursday, December 14, 2006
Filth
Rain does not make things cleaner. Witness Sam. He arrived at work, after cycling only three miles, covered from nose to toes in filth. The rain did that. With each revolution of the pedals I saw great gobbets of filthy fluid leap up at me and into them I dove.
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
I eat lots of nuts
Macadamia, cashew, peanut, almond. I do not eat them raw. I have eaten more macadamia nuts in the last three months than in the first forty-two years of my life. I have also been eating great heaps of banana chips. Has my complexion been affected? My whiskers seems stubblier and fall away in little pale nubbins.
Friday, December 08, 2006
Reading
"The Marquise of O— and Other Stories" Heinrich von Kleist
"Elephant Bill" J. H. Williams
"On Beauty" Zadie Smith
"Elephant Bill" J. H. Williams
"On Beauty" Zadie Smith
Tuesday, November 28, 2006
The Year 1981
1. Super Freak - Rick James (*)
2. Let's Groove - Earth, Wind and Fire (*)
3. Just the Two of Us - Grover Washington Jr & Bill Withers
4. Celebration - Kool and The Gang (*)
5. Jessie's Girl - Rick Springfield (**)
6. Don't Stop Believin' - Journey
7. Endless Love - Lionel Ritchie and Diana Ross
8. Give It To Me Baby - Rick James (**)
9. Back In Black - AC/DC
10. Same Old Lang Syne - Dan Fogelberg
11. I Love You - Climax Blues Band
12. Lady (You Bring Me Up) - Commodores
13. She's A Bad Mama Jama (She's Built, She's Stacked) - Carl Carlton
14. America - Neil Diamond
15. Fantastic Voyage - Lakeside
16. Start Me Up - Rolling Stones
17. In The Air Tonight - Phi Collins
18. Double Dutch Bus - Frankie Smith
19. Hey Nineteen - Steely Dan
20. We're in This Love Together - Al Jarreau
21. De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da - Police
22. Woman - John Lennon
23. Waiting For A Girl Like You - Foreigner (**)
24. Love T.K.O. - Teddy Pendergast
25. Urgent - Foreigner (***)
26. Fire and Ice - Pat Benatar
27. Being With You - Smokey Robinson
28. The Tide Is High - Blondie (**)
29. Don't Stand So Close To Me - Police
30. Tempted - Squeeze (*)
31. Treat Me Right - Pat Benatar
32. Our Lips Are Sealed - Go Go's (*)
33. Burn Rubber (Why You Wanna Hurt Me) - Gap Band
34. Who's Making Love - Blues Brothers
35. Guilty - Barbra Streisand and Barry Gibb (*)
36. Winner Takes All - Abba
37. Queen of Hearts - Juice Newton
38. Controversy - Prince
39. The Stroke - Billy Squier
40. Watching the Wheels - John Lennon
41. Say Goodbye to Hollywood - Billy Joel
42. Fashion - David Bowie (***)
43. My Girl (Gone, Gone, Gone) - Chilliwack
44. No Reply At All - Genesis
45. The Old Songs - Barry Manilow
46. All Those Years Ago - George Harrison
47. Slow Hand - Pointer Sisters
48. 8th Wonder - Sugarhill Gang
49. Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic - Police (*)
50. Winning - Santana
51. Rapture - Blondie (***)
52. Jones vs. Jones - Kool and the Gang
53. 9 to 5 - Dolly Parton
54. Tom Saywer - Rush
55. Elvira - Oak Ridge Boys
56. Private Eyes - Hall and Oates
57. (Ghost) Riders In The Sky - The Outlaws
58. Working in the Coal Mine - Devo
59. Keep on Loving You - REO Speedwagon
60. Super Trooper - Abba
61. Physical - Olivia Newton John (**)
62. Wasn't That a Party - The Rovers
63. Ah! Leah - Donnie Iris
64. Arc of a Diver - Steve Winwood
65. While You See a Chance - Steve Winwood
66. Teacher, Teacher - Rockpile (***)
67. Hello Again - Neil Diamond
68. Skateaway - Dire Straites
69. Sukiyaki - A Taste Of Honey
70. Sign of the Gypsy Queen - April Wine
71. (There's) No Getting Over Me - Ronnie Milsap
72. All American Girls - Sister Sledge
73. Boy from New York City - Manhattan Transfer
74. Morning Train (9 to 5) - Sheena Easton
75. This Little Girl - Gary U.S. Bonds
2. Let's Groove - Earth, Wind and Fire (*)
3. Just the Two of Us - Grover Washington Jr & Bill Withers
4. Celebration - Kool and The Gang (*)
5. Jessie's Girl - Rick Springfield (**)
6. Don't Stop Believin' - Journey
7. Endless Love - Lionel Ritchie and Diana Ross
8. Give It To Me Baby - Rick James (**)
9. Back In Black - AC/DC
10. Same Old Lang Syne - Dan Fogelberg
11. I Love You - Climax Blues Band
12. Lady (You Bring Me Up) - Commodores
13. She's A Bad Mama Jama (She's Built, She's Stacked) - Carl Carlton
14. America - Neil Diamond
15. Fantastic Voyage - Lakeside
16. Start Me Up - Rolling Stones
17. In The Air Tonight - Phi Collins
18. Double Dutch Bus - Frankie Smith
19. Hey Nineteen - Steely Dan
20. We're in This Love Together - Al Jarreau
21. De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da - Police
22. Woman - John Lennon
23. Waiting For A Girl Like You - Foreigner (**)
24. Love T.K.O. - Teddy Pendergast
25. Urgent - Foreigner (***)
26. Fire and Ice - Pat Benatar
27. Being With You - Smokey Robinson
28. The Tide Is High - Blondie (**)
29. Don't Stand So Close To Me - Police
30. Tempted - Squeeze (*)
31. Treat Me Right - Pat Benatar
32. Our Lips Are Sealed - Go Go's (*)
33. Burn Rubber (Why You Wanna Hurt Me) - Gap Band
34. Who's Making Love - Blues Brothers
35. Guilty - Barbra Streisand and Barry Gibb (*)
36. Winner Takes All - Abba
37. Queen of Hearts - Juice Newton
38. Controversy - Prince
39. The Stroke - Billy Squier
40. Watching the Wheels - John Lennon
41. Say Goodbye to Hollywood - Billy Joel
42. Fashion - David Bowie (***)
43. My Girl (Gone, Gone, Gone) - Chilliwack
44. No Reply At All - Genesis
45. The Old Songs - Barry Manilow
46. All Those Years Ago - George Harrison
47. Slow Hand - Pointer Sisters
48. 8th Wonder - Sugarhill Gang
49. Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic - Police (*)
50. Winning - Santana
51. Rapture - Blondie (***)
52. Jones vs. Jones - Kool and the Gang
53. 9 to 5 - Dolly Parton
54. Tom Saywer - Rush
55. Elvira - Oak Ridge Boys
56. Private Eyes - Hall and Oates
57. (Ghost) Riders In The Sky - The Outlaws
58. Working in the Coal Mine - Devo
59. Keep on Loving You - REO Speedwagon
60. Super Trooper - Abba
61. Physical - Olivia Newton John (**)
62. Wasn't That a Party - The Rovers
63. Ah! Leah - Donnie Iris
64. Arc of a Diver - Steve Winwood
65. While You See a Chance - Steve Winwood
66. Teacher, Teacher - Rockpile (***)
67. Hello Again - Neil Diamond
68. Skateaway - Dire Straites
69. Sukiyaki - A Taste Of Honey
70. Sign of the Gypsy Queen - April Wine
71. (There's) No Getting Over Me - Ronnie Milsap
72. All American Girls - Sister Sledge
73. Boy from New York City - Manhattan Transfer
74. Morning Train (9 to 5) - Sheena Easton
75. This Little Girl - Gary U.S. Bonds
Monday, November 27, 2006
Reading
"Are Women Human?" Catharine MacKinnon
"Koba the Dread" Martin Amis
"The Saga of the Volsungs"
"Koba the Dread" Martin Amis
"The Saga of the Volsungs"
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
S is for Q
What horrible Edward Gorey Death will you die? |
 You will sink in a mire. You like to think you're normal, but deep down you really just want to strip off your clothes and roll around in chicken fat. Take this quiz!  Quizilla | Join | Make A Quiz | More Quizzes | Grab Code |
Friday, November 17, 2006
Noam Shalit
An Israeli soldier named Gilad Shalit was captured on the twenty-fifth of June by a Palestinian group operating in Israel. Yesterday Gilad's father Noam visited Palestinian victims of Israeli shelling in a Tel Aviv hospital to express his sympathy and repeat his request that negotiations for his son's release move forward. A soldier is not the same as a civilian, certainly, but Noam Shalit's act is deeply humane and I was very moved by this story.
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
Reading
"Scoop" Evelyn Waugh
"Machiavellian Intelligence" many evolutionary biologists
"Coriolanus" William Shakespeare
"Machiavellian Intelligence" many evolutionary biologists
"Coriolanus" William Shakespeare
Odor
I suppose fingerprints and armpits. Shouldn't we all have distinct odors? To hear a bloodhound tell it, we do. But I have been sniffing people for the past couple of weeks and, though I've been complimented by pros for my finetuned nose, I can't smell much at all at such moments. A woman in my office smells like the shavings in a hamster cage and another smelled vaguely nice today, but the first may be a result of her upholstery and the second could be hormonal. Not to be confused with pheremonal. I definitely have a scent--Eames calls it musk. But to be a proper officeworker I've subdued it. I sniffed my shirt today: I've worn it two days running and it barely speaks my name. I love my scent and that of a few others. I want to know more people's scents. I am without fear.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Reference
The New York Public Library telephone reference desk. Every day, except Sundays and holidays, between 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, anyone, of any age, from anywhere in the world, can telephone 212-340-0849 and ask a question. The library staff will not answer crossword or contest questions, do children's homework, or answer philosophical speculations.
Isn't that neat?
Isn't that neat?
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
Robert M. Gates-scummier
From the New York Times, Nov. 4, 1991
Mr. Gates' Past, The C.I.A.'s Future
When the Senate votes tomorrow on the nomination of Robert Gates, it will be judging more than his fitness to lead the Central Intelligence Agency out of the past. It will be judging its own fitness to oversee intelligence.
The confirmation hearings did little to dispel doubts that Mr. Gates misled Congress during the Iran-contra scandal. They reinforced suspicions that he tailored intelligence estimates to please his superiors. And they raised questions about his role during the Iran-Iraq war.
Even so, the Senate Intelligence Committee chose to give Mr. Gates the benefit of the doubt, voting 11 to 4 in favor of confirmation. That vote sends and unfortunate message: Instead of overseeing intelligence, the Committee chose to look the other way. Now it's up to the Senate to confront Mr. Gates's past and say he's not fit to lead the C.I.A. into the future.
The Iran-contra question is simple. Did Mr. Gates know about the illegal diversion of proceeds from arms sales to Iran to the Nicaraguan contras? In 1985 and again in 1987, he told Congress he knew nothing about it. He clings to his story--despite evidence that he was warned about it in some detail by subordinates.
Charges that Mr. Gates slanted intelligence assessments, leaving Congress in the dark and more amenable to Administration policy, stand unrefuted. He now acknowledges suppressing dissent to a 1985 intelligence estimate justifying the covert sale of arms to Iran.
Then, when he was accused of `killing' estimates that showed waning Soviet activity in the third world, he obliquely acknowledged that he `may have found a specific paper inadequate.'
Further, Mr. Gates distributed an assessment making the case for Soviet complicity in the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II and endorsed it, enthusiastically, as `the C.I.A.'s first comprehensive examination' of the issue. A C.I.A. post-mortem found that `no one at the working level other than the two primary authors of the paper * * * agreed with [its] thrust.'
The hearings left another question dangling: did Mr. Gates play a role in suspected intelligence-sharing and arms transfers with Iraq? The C.I.A., the committee concludes, shared vital intelligence with Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war and failed to report it to Congressional intelligence committees, as required by law.
A related question, let unanswered and still troubling to some senators, was whether the C.I.A., which is supposed to monitor suspicious arms deals, looked the other way while U.S. companies unlawfully armed Iraq as well as Iran.
All three reservations about Mr. Gates--his denying knowledge of Iran-contra, slanting intelligence and winking at reporting requirements--suggest that he is a man used to doing business the old way. Yet a new era requires new ways. The Senate would mortgage the C.I.A.'s future to its past and deny Congress's constitutional role of oversight if it confirmed Mr. Gates as C.I.A. director.
Mr. Gates' Past, The C.I.A.'s Future
When the Senate votes tomorrow on the nomination of Robert Gates, it will be judging more than his fitness to lead the Central Intelligence Agency out of the past. It will be judging its own fitness to oversee intelligence.
The confirmation hearings did little to dispel doubts that Mr. Gates misled Congress during the Iran-contra scandal. They reinforced suspicions that he tailored intelligence estimates to please his superiors. And they raised questions about his role during the Iran-Iraq war.
Even so, the Senate Intelligence Committee chose to give Mr. Gates the benefit of the doubt, voting 11 to 4 in favor of confirmation. That vote sends and unfortunate message: Instead of overseeing intelligence, the Committee chose to look the other way. Now it's up to the Senate to confront Mr. Gates's past and say he's not fit to lead the C.I.A. into the future.
The Iran-contra question is simple. Did Mr. Gates know about the illegal diversion of proceeds from arms sales to Iran to the Nicaraguan contras? In 1985 and again in 1987, he told Congress he knew nothing about it. He clings to his story--despite evidence that he was warned about it in some detail by subordinates.
Charges that Mr. Gates slanted intelligence assessments, leaving Congress in the dark and more amenable to Administration policy, stand unrefuted. He now acknowledges suppressing dissent to a 1985 intelligence estimate justifying the covert sale of arms to Iran.
Then, when he was accused of `killing' estimates that showed waning Soviet activity in the third world, he obliquely acknowledged that he `may have found a specific paper inadequate.'
Further, Mr. Gates distributed an assessment making the case for Soviet complicity in the attempted assassination of Pope John Paul II and endorsed it, enthusiastically, as `the C.I.A.'s first comprehensive examination' of the issue. A C.I.A. post-mortem found that `no one at the working level other than the two primary authors of the paper * * * agreed with [its] thrust.'
The hearings left another question dangling: did Mr. Gates play a role in suspected intelligence-sharing and arms transfers with Iraq? The C.I.A., the committee concludes, shared vital intelligence with Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war and failed to report it to Congressional intelligence committees, as required by law.
A related question, let unanswered and still troubling to some senators, was whether the C.I.A., which is supposed to monitor suspicious arms deals, looked the other way while U.S. companies unlawfully armed Iraq as well as Iran.
All three reservations about Mr. Gates--his denying knowledge of Iran-contra, slanting intelligence and winking at reporting requirements--suggest that he is a man used to doing business the old way. Yet a new era requires new ways. The Senate would mortgage the C.I.A.'s future to its past and deny Congress's constitutional role of oversight if it confirmed Mr. Gates as C.I.A. director.
Robert M. Gates-scum
GATES NOMINATION (Senate - November 07, 1991)
[Page: S16305]
[Begin insert]
SENATOR TOM HARKIN. Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the nomination of Robert Gates to be Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Mr. President, at the outset of the confirmation hearings, I had serious reservations about the nominee. The confirmation hearings only raised more questions and greater doubts. Questions and doubts about Mr. Gates' past activities, managerial style, judgment, lapses in memory and analytical abilities. Questions and doubts about his role in the Iran-Contra Affair and in providing military intelligence to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war; and questions and doubts about whether he will be able to remove the ideological blinders reflected in his writings and speeches or whether Mr. Gates is so rooted in the past, that he will not be able to lead the Agency into the post-cold war era. Because of these concerns, I have concluded that Mr. Gates is not the right person for the important job of overseeing our intelligence operations in this New World.
Mr. President, Robert Gates is a career Soviet analyst and former Deputy Director of the CIA who was wrong about what CIA analyst Harold Ford described as `the central analytic target of the past few years: the probable fortunes of the USSR and the Soviet European bloc.' And I believe that the committee report points out one possible reason why the CIA failed to predict the collapse of the Soviet Union. According to testimony, Mr. Gates was busy pursuing hypotheses and making unsubstantiated arguments attempting to show Soviet expansion in the Third World, instead of looking for or paying attention to facts that pointed in the opposite direction. Why? Why, as Mentor Moynihan has pointed out, was the CIA able to tell Presidents everything about the Soviet Union except the fact that it was falling apart?
Mr. Gates was also wrong about the Soviet threat to Iran in 1985. The 1985 Special National Intelligence Estimate on Iran stressed possible Soviet inroads into Iran. Gates admits that the analysis was an anomaly. It was a clear departure from previous analyses and almost immediately proven wrong by subsequent events. Gates was involved in preparing that analysis. According to Hal Ford, whose testimony the nominee never refuted, Gates leaned heavily on the Iran Estimate, in effect, `insisting on his own views and discouraging dissent.' What was the result? The 1985 estimate was skewed and contributed to the biggest foreign policy debacle of the Reagan administration, the sale of arms to Iran.
Mr. President, Graham Fuller, the CIA's National Intelligence Officer for the Near East, suggested that the 1985 SNIE estimate was based on intuition in the absence of hard evidence. I agree there is nothing wrong with preparing worse case scenarios or using `intuition' as opposed to hard evidence in the preparation of analysis, provided it is made clear to policymakers that the finished analysis is based on intuition and not hard evidence. It is the job of the CIA to sort out fact from fiction, not convert one into the other.
Mr. President, I also have doubts and questions about Mr. Gates' role in the secret intelligence sharing operation with Iraq. Robert Gates served as assistant to the Director of the CIA in 1981 and as Deputy Director for Intelligence for 1982 to 1986. In that capacity he helped develop options in dealing with the Iran-Iraq war, which eventually involved into a secret intelligence liaison relationship with Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Gates was in charge of the directorate that prepared the intelligence information that was passed on to Iraq. He testified that he was also an active participant in the operation during 1986. The secret intelligence sharing operation with Iraq was not only a highly questionable and possibly illegal operation, but also may have jeopardized American lives and our national interests. The photo reconnaissance, highly sensitive electronic eavesdropping and narrative texts provided to Saddam, may not only have helped him in Iraq's war against Iran but also in the recent gulf war. Saddam Hussein may have discovered the value of underground land lines as opposed to radio communications after he was give our intelligence information. That made it more difficult for the allied coalition to get quick and accurate intelligence during the gulf war. Further, after the Persian Gulf war, our intelligence community was surprised at the extent of Iraq's nuclear program. One reason Saddam may have hidden his nuclear program so effectively from detection was because of his knowledge of our satellite photos. What also concerns me about that operation is that we spend millions of dollars keeping secrets from the Soviets and then we give it to Saddam who sells them to the Soviets. In short, the coddling of Saddam was a mistake of the first order.
Mr. President, I've stated a very simple case for rejecting the nomination of Robert Gates to be Director of the CIA. The fact that he was wrong on major issues which in some instances led to foreign policy debacles. I haven't addressed concerns about the allegations of his politicization of intelligence analysis, his apparently poor managerial style or still unanswered questions about his role in the Iran-Contra affair. Regarding the Iran-Contra affair, I should mention that I was quite disturbed to hear testimony that portrayed Robert Gates as someone concerned about Agency's role and not sufficiently concerned about pursuing possible illegal Government activities. In his opening statement before the Intelligence Committee, Mr. Gates said that he should have taken more seriously `the possibility of impropriety or possible wrongdoing in the Government and pursued this possibility more aggressively.' I agree.
I should also mention, Mr. President, that aside from Mr. Gates' poor judgment in not pursuing the possibility of Government wrongdoing more aggressively, I still find it incredible that the Deputy Director of CIA was not aware of that major covert operation. How could such a high ranking official not know about the CIA's efforts to support the Contras? Did he purposely avoid trying to find out what was happening? The testimony seemed to indicate he did. Gates' selective lapses in recall about the affair by a man with a photographic memory raises serious doubts.
The U.S. Congress and the American people depend on accurate and reliable intelligence information. Our expenditures on defense and other areas are often decided on the basis of that information. We cannot afford to waste billion of dollars in the future. After reviewing the record, I do not believe that the Central Intelligence Agency under the directorship of Robert Gates will provide the clear intelligence assessments necessary for Congress to make decisions to deal with the future threats confronting our nation.
Mr. President, I do not believe that Robert Gates is the right person to lead the CIA at this time. The cold war is over and it's time for some of the old warriors to rest. Now we must take a fresh new look at the world, think new thoughts and reassess the future role of the intelligence community. I urge my colleagues to vote against Robert Gates.
[Page: S16305]
[Begin insert]
SENATOR TOM HARKIN. Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the nomination of Robert Gates to be Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Mr. President, at the outset of the confirmation hearings, I had serious reservations about the nominee. The confirmation hearings only raised more questions and greater doubts. Questions and doubts about Mr. Gates' past activities, managerial style, judgment, lapses in memory and analytical abilities. Questions and doubts about his role in the Iran-Contra Affair and in providing military intelligence to Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war; and questions and doubts about whether he will be able to remove the ideological blinders reflected in his writings and speeches or whether Mr. Gates is so rooted in the past, that he will not be able to lead the Agency into the post-cold war era. Because of these concerns, I have concluded that Mr. Gates is not the right person for the important job of overseeing our intelligence operations in this New World.
Mr. President, Robert Gates is a career Soviet analyst and former Deputy Director of the CIA who was wrong about what CIA analyst Harold Ford described as `the central analytic target of the past few years: the probable fortunes of the USSR and the Soviet European bloc.' And I believe that the committee report points out one possible reason why the CIA failed to predict the collapse of the Soviet Union. According to testimony, Mr. Gates was busy pursuing hypotheses and making unsubstantiated arguments attempting to show Soviet expansion in the Third World, instead of looking for or paying attention to facts that pointed in the opposite direction. Why? Why, as Mentor Moynihan has pointed out, was the CIA able to tell Presidents everything about the Soviet Union except the fact that it was falling apart?
Mr. Gates was also wrong about the Soviet threat to Iran in 1985. The 1985 Special National Intelligence Estimate on Iran stressed possible Soviet inroads into Iran. Gates admits that the analysis was an anomaly. It was a clear departure from previous analyses and almost immediately proven wrong by subsequent events. Gates was involved in preparing that analysis. According to Hal Ford, whose testimony the nominee never refuted, Gates leaned heavily on the Iran Estimate, in effect, `insisting on his own views and discouraging dissent.' What was the result? The 1985 estimate was skewed and contributed to the biggest foreign policy debacle of the Reagan administration, the sale of arms to Iran.
Mr. President, Graham Fuller, the CIA's National Intelligence Officer for the Near East, suggested that the 1985 SNIE estimate was based on intuition in the absence of hard evidence. I agree there is nothing wrong with preparing worse case scenarios or using `intuition' as opposed to hard evidence in the preparation of analysis, provided it is made clear to policymakers that the finished analysis is based on intuition and not hard evidence. It is the job of the CIA to sort out fact from fiction, not convert one into the other.
Mr. President, I also have doubts and questions about Mr. Gates' role in the secret intelligence sharing operation with Iraq. Robert Gates served as assistant to the Director of the CIA in 1981 and as Deputy Director for Intelligence for 1982 to 1986. In that capacity he helped develop options in dealing with the Iran-Iraq war, which eventually involved into a secret intelligence liaison relationship with Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Gates was in charge of the directorate that prepared the intelligence information that was passed on to Iraq. He testified that he was also an active participant in the operation during 1986. The secret intelligence sharing operation with Iraq was not only a highly questionable and possibly illegal operation, but also may have jeopardized American lives and our national interests. The photo reconnaissance, highly sensitive electronic eavesdropping and narrative texts provided to Saddam, may not only have helped him in Iraq's war against Iran but also in the recent gulf war. Saddam Hussein may have discovered the value of underground land lines as opposed to radio communications after he was give our intelligence information. That made it more difficult for the allied coalition to get quick and accurate intelligence during the gulf war. Further, after the Persian Gulf war, our intelligence community was surprised at the extent of Iraq's nuclear program. One reason Saddam may have hidden his nuclear program so effectively from detection was because of his knowledge of our satellite photos. What also concerns me about that operation is that we spend millions of dollars keeping secrets from the Soviets and then we give it to Saddam who sells them to the Soviets. In short, the coddling of Saddam was a mistake of the first order.
Mr. President, I've stated a very simple case for rejecting the nomination of Robert Gates to be Director of the CIA. The fact that he was wrong on major issues which in some instances led to foreign policy debacles. I haven't addressed concerns about the allegations of his politicization of intelligence analysis, his apparently poor managerial style or still unanswered questions about his role in the Iran-Contra affair. Regarding the Iran-Contra affair, I should mention that I was quite disturbed to hear testimony that portrayed Robert Gates as someone concerned about Agency's role and not sufficiently concerned about pursuing possible illegal Government activities. In his opening statement before the Intelligence Committee, Mr. Gates said that he should have taken more seriously `the possibility of impropriety or possible wrongdoing in the Government and pursued this possibility more aggressively.' I agree.
I should also mention, Mr. President, that aside from Mr. Gates' poor judgment in not pursuing the possibility of Government wrongdoing more aggressively, I still find it incredible that the Deputy Director of CIA was not aware of that major covert operation. How could such a high ranking official not know about the CIA's efforts to support the Contras? Did he purposely avoid trying to find out what was happening? The testimony seemed to indicate he did. Gates' selective lapses in recall about the affair by a man with a photographic memory raises serious doubts.
The U.S. Congress and the American people depend on accurate and reliable intelligence information. Our expenditures on defense and other areas are often decided on the basis of that information. We cannot afford to waste billion of dollars in the future. After reviewing the record, I do not believe that the Central Intelligence Agency under the directorship of Robert Gates will provide the clear intelligence assessments necessary for Congress to make decisions to deal with the future threats confronting our nation.
Mr. President, I do not believe that Robert Gates is the right person to lead the CIA at this time. The cold war is over and it's time for some of the old warriors to rest. Now we must take a fresh new look at the world, think new thoughts and reassess the future role of the intelligence community. I urge my colleagues to vote against Robert Gates.
Life's cruelest blows
The adoption of the unprecedented policy of banning short trousers from Kiss (Taipei's Super Disco) some time between fall 1988 and summer 1996.
The closing of Hermann's Salads on Geary Boulevard between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, replaced by a Gap.
The death of Midnight.
The destruction of the Embarcadero Freeway.
Various romantic disappointments.
The closing of Playland by the Sea.
Whiskers.
"Remain in Light"
The time I had to siphon shark shit out of a large tank at Steinhart.
The closing of Hermann's Salads on Geary Boulevard between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, replaced by a Gap.
The death of Midnight.
The destruction of the Embarcadero Freeway.
Various romantic disappointments.
The closing of Playland by the Sea.
Whiskers.
"Remain in Light"
The time I had to siphon shark shit out of a large tank at Steinhart.
Monday, November 06, 2006
Why life is wonderful
There are so many things to dislike! Waking up each day, I know that my life has purpose because I will discover new things to bitch about. Here's today's: the phrase "grace with -- presence." It's now on the banned and forbidden list.
Thursday, November 02, 2006
Reading
"The Autograph Man" Zadie Smith
"A Social History of Truth" Steven Shapin
"Le chef-d'oeuvre inconnu" Honoré de Balzac
"Runaway Slaves" John Hope Franklin & Loren Schweninger
"Dionysos at Large" Marcel Detienne
"A Social History of Truth" Steven Shapin
"Le chef-d'oeuvre inconnu" Honoré de Balzac
"Runaway Slaves" John Hope Franklin & Loren Schweninger
"Dionysos at Large" Marcel Detienne
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
Unclothed
Yesterday I removed a good portion of my hair to play the part of Magwitch more thoroughly. This morning I scraped off the remainder. I feel so very naked.
Monday, October 30, 2006
The Bridge
Every couple of weeks, some unhappy soul kills himself by jumping from the Golden Gate Bridge. I walked down the middle of the bridge nearly twenty years ago unscathed: the bridge was closed to car traffic in celebration of its fiftieth anniversary. But I've never found walking across the bridge much fun. It's very windy and the noise of cars is unpleasant. One can't say much for the view, which has nothing on that from the Marin headlands. But it's the most photographed structure in America and I've gotten a fair amount of use out of it. After seeing a documentary on Saturday that shows a half dozen men and women plunge to their death from the bridge, I'm in favor of erecting tall barriers all along the pedestrian (east) side of the bridge. Why wasn't this done long ago? I don't mind if people kill themselves but what if those jumpers hit a seal or a grouper?
Friday, October 20, 2006
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Friday, October 06, 2006
Those who spurn god together stay together
Religion % have been divorced
Jews 30%
Born-again Christians 27%
Other Christians 24%
Atheists, Agnostics 21%
Jews 30%
Born-again Christians 27%
Other Christians 24%
Atheists, Agnostics 21%
Thursday, September 14, 2006
I did not write this
There is often a contradiction between the meaning of our actions toward a person and what we say we feel toward that person in a journal. But this does not mean that what we do is shallow, and only what we confess to ourselves is deep. Confessions, I mean sincere confessions of course, can be more shallow than actions. I am thinking now of what I read today in H's journal about me - that curt, unfair, uncharitable assessment of me which concludes by her saying that she really doesn't like me but my passion for her is acceptable and opportune. God knows it hurts, and I feel indignant and humiliated. We rarely do know what people think of us (or, rather, think they think of us) . . . Do I feel guilty about reading what was not intended for my eyes? No. One of the main (social) functions of a journal or diary is precisely to be read furtively by other people, the people (like parents + lovers) about whom one has been cruelly honest only in the journal.
Wednesday, September 06, 2006
Banned words and phrases
on the same page
down time
merely
alas
terrorist
sea change
welter
all good
I'm confused
graced us with his presence
notwithstanding the fact that
a phyletic vestige with no current adaptive value
down time
merely
alas
terrorist
sea change
welter
all good
I'm confused
graced us with his presence
notwithstanding the fact that
a phyletic vestige with no current adaptive value
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
History and Politicians
Rumsfeld claimed yesterday that the lesson learned from World War Two is that appeasement does not work. He's such an ignoramus. There is no such thing as a lesson learned from a single historical event. Appeasement worked extraordinarily well for imperial China over many centuries, as emperors routinely bought off aggressive neighbors by showering them with hugely valuable gifts. Liberals use Vietnam in the same way: the lesson of that quagmire is don't pour lots of troops into conflicts with guerrillas. This is stupid too. Why have we allowed the political discourse in this country to become so historiographically impoverished?
Saturday, August 26, 2006
Farallon, part 2
Time exists on the slack hypotenuse
Strung between sky and gutflutter,
Each peak and valley of pulsing wet
Taking us further from our footing
From what it feels like to lean, to stand
Without being threatened, without the surround
Speaking, without splashing. Sea lions applaud
The lurching circus of lenses and the odd wince.
Strung between sky and gutflutter,
Each peak and valley of pulsing wet
Taking us further from our footing
From what it feels like to lean, to stand
Without being threatened, without the surround
Speaking, without splashing. Sea lions applaud
The lurching circus of lenses and the odd wince.
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
Farallon, part 1
We ride upon the thin edge of the water
Casting our image on it, withdrawing from
The fatiguing guesswork we had about wet
About what it's like to look up from deep down.
The thing supporting us, keeping us from
Slipping deep into the softly rolling water
Is part of a whale, its image of us as a film
Infecting its dark eye, itching its attention.
Other things ride around the slick of oily us
Barking, fluttering, wanting to be less wet
And less adhesive. Water claims them thickly.
Us it salts, rolls, moves about on its tongue.
We meet the wanderers out here where land fails
Slipping suddenly into utter dimness. Water
Draws a sort of penitential piss from the boat
Which burps and moves utterly nowhere.
Casting our image on it, withdrawing from
The fatiguing guesswork we had about wet
About what it's like to look up from deep down.
The thing supporting us, keeping us from
Slipping deep into the softly rolling water
Is part of a whale, its image of us as a film
Infecting its dark eye, itching its attention.
Other things ride around the slick of oily us
Barking, fluttering, wanting to be less wet
And less adhesive. Water claims them thickly.
Us it salts, rolls, moves about on its tongue.
We meet the wanderers out here where land fails
Slipping suddenly into utter dimness. Water
Draws a sort of penitential piss from the boat
Which burps and moves utterly nowhere.
Friday, August 11, 2006
Roger Clay's Proposal
I may be oversusceptible to news
But what I see in the papers leaves me numb.
The bomb. The ultimatum. Wires hum—
Adult impersonators giving interviews,
As if that helped. What would? I've thought of it.
With all due ceremony—flags unfurled,
Choirs, priests—the leaders of a sobered world
Should meet, kneel down, and, joining hands, submit
To execution: say in Rome or Nice—
Towns whose economy depends on crowds.
Ah, but those boys, their heads aren't in the clouds.
They would find reasons not to die for peace.
Damn them. I'd give my life. Each day I meet
Men like me, young, indignant. We're not cranks.
Will some of them step up? That's plenty. Thanks.
Now let's move before we get cold feet.
Music we'll need, and short, clear speeches given
Days of maximum coverage in the press.
We'll emphasize disinterestedness,
Drive the point home that someone could be driven
To do this. Where to go? Why not Japan,
Land of the honorable suicide.
And will the world change heart? Until we've tried,
No one can say it will not. No one can.
by James Merrill
But what I see in the papers leaves me numb.
The bomb. The ultimatum. Wires hum—
Adult impersonators giving interviews,
As if that helped. What would? I've thought of it.
With all due ceremony—flags unfurled,
Choirs, priests—the leaders of a sobered world
Should meet, kneel down, and, joining hands, submit
To execution: say in Rome or Nice—
Towns whose economy depends on crowds.
Ah, but those boys, their heads aren't in the clouds.
They would find reasons not to die for peace.
Damn them. I'd give my life. Each day I meet
Men like me, young, indignant. We're not cranks.
Will some of them step up? That's plenty. Thanks.
Now let's move before we get cold feet.
Music we'll need, and short, clear speeches given
Days of maximum coverage in the press.
We'll emphasize disinterestedness,
Drive the point home that someone could be driven
To do this. Where to go? Why not Japan,
Land of the honorable suicide.
And will the world change heart? Until we've tried,
No one can say it will not. No one can.
by James Merrill
Friday, August 04, 2006
Nuts
Feeling distinctly preverbal today. Want to do nothing but eat macadamia nuts, drink apple juice, and stare out the window.
Tuesday, August 01, 2006
Hiroshima Day on August 6
On August 6 1945, at a quarter after eight in the morning, Hiroshima was destroyed by the United States and a nuclear bomb named Little Boy. By December 140,000 human beings had died. The American attack on Nagasaki, on August 9, killed 74,000 more. Never forget.
Friday, July 28, 2006
Thursday, July 27, 2006
rats
www.ratlife.org
I learned about this from an article on research on rodents that appeared in the recent issue of AV Magazine.
I learned about this from an article on research on rodents that appeared in the recent issue of AV Magazine.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Quid pro quid
If I slap a man and he kills my mother and father as retribution, are their deaths justified?
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Easily the most irritating poem I've read this century
Irish Poetry
by Billy Collins
That morning under a pale hood of sky
I heard the unambiguous scrape of spackling
against the side of our wickered, penitential house.
The day mirled and clabbered
in the thick, stony light,
and the rooks’ feathered narling
astounded the salt waves, the plush coast.
I lugged a bucket past the forked
coercion of a tree, up toward
the pious and nictitating preeminence of a school,
hunkered there in its gully of learning.
Only later, by the galvanized washstand,
while gaunt, phosphorescent heifers
swam beyond the windows,
did the whorled and sparky gib of the indefinite
wobble me into knowledge.
Then, I heard the ghost-clink of milk bottle
on the rough threshold
and understood the meadow-bells
that trembled over a nimbus of ragwort—
the whole afternoon lambent, corrugated, puddle-mad.
http://www.poetrymagazine.org/magazine/0706/poem_178394.html
by Billy Collins
That morning under a pale hood of sky
I heard the unambiguous scrape of spackling
against the side of our wickered, penitential house.
The day mirled and clabbered
in the thick, stony light,
and the rooks’ feathered narling
astounded the salt waves, the plush coast.
I lugged a bucket past the forked
coercion of a tree, up toward
the pious and nictitating preeminence of a school,
hunkered there in its gully of learning.
Only later, by the galvanized washstand,
while gaunt, phosphorescent heifers
swam beyond the windows,
did the whorled and sparky gib of the indefinite
wobble me into knowledge.
Then, I heard the ghost-clink of milk bottle
on the rough threshold
and understood the meadow-bells
that trembled over a nimbus of ragwort—
the whole afternoon lambent, corrugated, puddle-mad.
http://www.poetrymagazine.org/magazine/0706/poem_178394.html
Friday, July 07, 2006
Thursday, May 18, 2006
Van Gogh bullshit
All that hooey about van Gogh never selling a painting, or selling only a single painting for the equivalent of eighty dollars, is crap. He sold lots of sketches and small paintings in Paris, as Gauguin pointed out in "Avant et aprés." See the van Gogh volume in the Time-Life Library of Art, pp. 75–76. See also the tale of van Gogh's lost works, on p. 71. Lots of these were sold too, it happens.
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Thursday, April 20, 2006
Byronic kisses
Byron makes a date with a young Greek woman for midnight at the Parthenon. Lady Elgin has a rendezvous there at the same time. Chekhovian confusion and a kiss.
Saturday, April 15, 2006
Pirates
During his return from Greece, Byron discovers that he is traveling with a shipment of Elginian booty. He also learns, from a singularly garrulous soprano, that Elgin has been humiliated by his adultrous wife, has lost any chance of a diplomatic career, and is broke. When North African pirates board the ship, Byron determines to save the Pathenonian booty from savages who might dump it in the ocean.
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
Byron vs. Elgin
The two lords never met, but they will in my opera. Picture the beautiful young poet landing a headbutt on poor Elgin's already infirm nose. All in the name of Greek self-determination.
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
Who is Hermester Barrington?
http://www.geocities.com/nodotus/peeps.html
http://tinyurl.com/lxbyb
http://tinyurl.com/faggj
http://www.geocities.com/nodotus/index.html
http://tinyurl.com/lxbyb
http://tinyurl.com/faggj
http://www.geocities.com/nodotus/index.html
Music
I've discovered the archive of musical performances at KCRW's "Morning Becomes Eclectic" web page and have recently listened to The Guillemots, Rosanne Cash, Jackie Greene, and Jenny Lewis. These performances are archived in video and audio, meaning that one can see a bit about how a radio studio works. The host's interviewing skills are limited, certainly (e.g., when Rosanne Cash explains that she wrote _Black Cadillac_ over the course of a time when she lost her parents and stepmother, commenting "Luckily, I don't think I'll ever have to write this kind of record again," the host replies, "Well, I guess not. Obviously. Um . . .") and one often wants to skip through the talk portions. The music is marvelous.
Visit http://tinyurl.com/3yamn
Visit http://tinyurl.com/3yamn
Thursday, March 30, 2006
"The Marbles"
An opera in two acts and two songs
Book and libretto by Samuel Ross Gilbert
(1) A naked and pale male figure appears at center
stage with the rising sun. As he sings we learn that
he is Dionysus, the pedimental figure from the east
side of the Parthenon. His aria is a paean to a savior
whose imminent coming will liberate him from his 2,200
year imprisonment.
(2) Morning on the Acropolis. A British couple, an
Italian painter, a hunchback, a team of Greek workers.
Huge carved blocks are being wrestled from the
Parthenon frieze. The couple, we learn, are the Earl
of Elgin, ambassador to Constantinople, and his
frivolous wife Mary. While Elgin sings of his plans to
improve British taste through these fifth-century-BC
masterpieces, Mary talks of her health, how sick she
was on the crossing, etc.
(3) Evening in London. Elgin, his health devastated,
is divorcing his faithless wife. He has ruined himself
with the taste-improvement enterprise. His nose has
come off, erased by some Turkish bug. He visits the
temporary hall where his loot is housed, and despite
the praise of ghastly figures--Canova, Visconti,
Hayson, West, Fuseli--he can only hear the lasting
curses of Byron, champion of the modern Greek.
(4) Dionysus reappears, sings a plaintive ode to the
Thames and hints of another savior to come.
Book and libretto by Samuel Ross Gilbert
(1) A naked and pale male figure appears at center
stage with the rising sun. As he sings we learn that
he is Dionysus, the pedimental figure from the east
side of the Parthenon. His aria is a paean to a savior
whose imminent coming will liberate him from his 2,200
year imprisonment.
(2) Morning on the Acropolis. A British couple, an
Italian painter, a hunchback, a team of Greek workers.
Huge carved blocks are being wrestled from the
Parthenon frieze. The couple, we learn, are the Earl
of Elgin, ambassador to Constantinople, and his
frivolous wife Mary. While Elgin sings of his plans to
improve British taste through these fifth-century-BC
masterpieces, Mary talks of her health, how sick she
was on the crossing, etc.
(3) Evening in London. Elgin, his health devastated,
is divorcing his faithless wife. He has ruined himself
with the taste-improvement enterprise. His nose has
come off, erased by some Turkish bug. He visits the
temporary hall where his loot is housed, and despite
the praise of ghastly figures--Canova, Visconti,
Hayson, West, Fuseli--he can only hear the lasting
curses of Byron, champion of the modern Greek.
(4) Dionysus reappears, sings a plaintive ode to the
Thames and hints of another savior to come.
Monday, March 27, 2006
Seagulls, Woodpeckers, and a Fox
Yesterday morning I saw a red fox in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Two years ago I'd seen one in Strybing Arboretum. There are all sorts of plants and animals in the park. For example, I saw an orange fish that looked something like a goldfish and must have been over two feet long in Mallard Lake, which lies close to the south edge of the park at Twenty-Eighth Avenue. And in addition to the many Red-eared Sliders in Spreckels Lake, I saw another turtle that looked like a Spiny Softshell (http://tinyurl.com/psuxh). I sat by that lake for an hour, inspecting the seagulls floating on the water and referring frequently to "The Sibley Guide to Birds." Gulls are not easly identified and I've too often postponed the tedious work involved in learning to distinguish a Western Gull from a Herring Gull. Having stared and stared, I am now confident that more staring is needed. Eared Grebes paddled by, Barn Swallows and Tree Swallows skimmed the water. I sauntered through the woods west of the lake, circled Middle Lake, and walked home.
Once home, I learned the following: David Sibley, author of the guide I'd used to study the Western Gulls on Spreckels Lake, has the audacity to dispute the identification of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker by the Cornell team. The audacity! Worse still, Kenn Kaufman concurs. It's so damned easy to be a sceptic, isn't it. I choose to believe. Faith is a personal thing.
Once home, I learned the following: David Sibley, author of the guide I'd used to study the Western Gulls on Spreckels Lake, has the audacity to dispute the identification of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker by the Cornell team. The audacity! Worse still, Kenn Kaufman concurs. It's so damned easy to be a sceptic, isn't it. I choose to believe. Faith is a personal thing.
Friday, March 17, 2006
More answers
• What time did you get up this morning?
7:15 PST. Birds atwitter; starlings in the rosemary. Moved the car. Noted absence of newspaper on front porch. Ate nuts and dried fruit.
• Diamonds or pearls?
Diamonds in my teeth, pearls round my neck.
• What was the last film you saw at the cinema?
"Dave Chapelle's Block Party" Four stars
• What is your favorite TV show?
No TV for me. I have enjoyed "I, Claudius," "Family Feud," and "Bigtime Wrestling."
• What did you have for breakfast?
Chorizo, ham, and a cheese omelette.
• What is your middle name?
Ross Applesauce
• What is your favorite cuisine?
Salad
• What food do you dislike?
Innards, Brussels sprouts, 臭豆腐, Coca Cola, 7 Up, scotch, bottled salad dressing, foie gras
• What is your favorite potato chip?
Kettle brand rippled with salt and pepper in the big bag
• What is your favorite CD at the moment?
Manze & Egarr playing Mozart sonatas; Sinead singing reggae; Salif Keita's "Moffou"
• What kind of car do you drive?
Red Honda Civic
• Favorite sandwich?
BLAT or Reuben
• What characteristics do you despise?
Lack of critical thinking
• What are your favorite clothes?
My Bottes Sauvages, my fox hat, my Tibetan coat, my Glen plaid Peter Tilton suit, my 826 Valencia t-shirt, my OP shorts w/ many velcro closures, socks my mom knitted for me
• If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you
go?
1988 Ubud
• What color is your bathroom?
Off-white and gold chrome
• Favorite brand of clothing?
None
• Where would you want to retire to?
A city inhabited by beloved friends and family
• Favorite time of day?
Sunset
• Where were you born?
Children's Hospital in San Francisco
• Favorite sport to watch?
Tennis
• Coke or Pepsi?
No
• Are you a morning person or night owl?
Not really
• Any new and exciting news you'd like to share with everyone?
My opera proceeds apace.
• What did you want to be when you were little?
A private dick.
• What is a favorite childhood memory?
Roof jumping with Teddy and Michael
• What are the different jobs you have had in your life?
Volunteer aquarist at Steinhart, clerical librarian at Regenstein, espressist at Espresso Yourself, counter guy at Mr. Soup, pasta maker and driver at Auntie Pasta, English teacher, journalist, driver for Super Shuttle, photocopy guy at IBM, research assistant, teaching assistant, editor, writer
• Nicknames?
Mule, Shazam, Shasm, Applesauce, Ginger Lemon Creme
• Any piercings?
No
• Eye color?
Brown
• Ever been to Africa?
No but possibly to the Cape later this year
• Ever been toilet papering?
No
• Been in a car accident?
Once while Mom was driving, twice while I was driving, once while Dave Crane was driving
• Favorite day of the week?
No
• Favorite restaurant?
Pasta Linea
• Favorite flower?
Dutchman's pipe, Eschscholzia californica, peonies, Calypso bulbosa
• Favorite ice cream?
Maggie Mudd asphalt
• Favorite fast food restaurant?
A potsticker place in Yonghe halfway between Jennifer's rooftop apartment and my unfurnished suite
• Which store would you choose to max out your credit card?
Caves Augé
• Bedtime?
Highly variable. Generally before midnight.
• Last person(s) you went to dinner with?
Won Sun and Steffen
• What are you listening to right now?
Sweet silence
• What is your favorite color?
Paisley
• How many tattoos do you have?
None
• Who sent the e-mail message you got before this one?
Colby
7:15 PST. Birds atwitter; starlings in the rosemary. Moved the car. Noted absence of newspaper on front porch. Ate nuts and dried fruit.
• Diamonds or pearls?
Diamonds in my teeth, pearls round my neck.
• What was the last film you saw at the cinema?
"Dave Chapelle's Block Party" Four stars
• What is your favorite TV show?
No TV for me. I have enjoyed "I, Claudius," "Family Feud," and "Bigtime Wrestling."
• What did you have for breakfast?
Chorizo, ham, and a cheese omelette.
• What is your middle name?
Ross Applesauce
• What is your favorite cuisine?
Salad
• What food do you dislike?
Innards, Brussels sprouts, 臭豆腐, Coca Cola, 7 Up, scotch, bottled salad dressing, foie gras
• What is your favorite potato chip?
Kettle brand rippled with salt and pepper in the big bag
• What is your favorite CD at the moment?
Manze & Egarr playing Mozart sonatas; Sinead singing reggae; Salif Keita's "Moffou"
• What kind of car do you drive?
Red Honda Civic
• Favorite sandwich?
BLAT or Reuben
• What characteristics do you despise?
Lack of critical thinking
• What are your favorite clothes?
My Bottes Sauvages, my fox hat, my Tibetan coat, my Glen plaid Peter Tilton suit, my 826 Valencia t-shirt, my OP shorts w/ many velcro closures, socks my mom knitted for me
• If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you
go?
1988 Ubud
• What color is your bathroom?
Off-white and gold chrome
• Favorite brand of clothing?
None
• Where would you want to retire to?
A city inhabited by beloved friends and family
• Favorite time of day?
Sunset
• Where were you born?
Children's Hospital in San Francisco
• Favorite sport to watch?
Tennis
• Coke or Pepsi?
No
• Are you a morning person or night owl?
Not really
• Any new and exciting news you'd like to share with everyone?
My opera proceeds apace.
• What did you want to be when you were little?
A private dick.
• What is a favorite childhood memory?
Roof jumping with Teddy and Michael
• What are the different jobs you have had in your life?
Volunteer aquarist at Steinhart, clerical librarian at Regenstein, espressist at Espresso Yourself, counter guy at Mr. Soup, pasta maker and driver at Auntie Pasta, English teacher, journalist, driver for Super Shuttle, photocopy guy at IBM, research assistant, teaching assistant, editor, writer
• Nicknames?
Mule, Shazam, Shasm, Applesauce, Ginger Lemon Creme
• Any piercings?
No
• Eye color?
Brown
• Ever been to Africa?
No but possibly to the Cape later this year
• Ever been toilet papering?
No
• Been in a car accident?
Once while Mom was driving, twice while I was driving, once while Dave Crane was driving
• Favorite day of the week?
No
• Favorite restaurant?
Pasta Linea
• Favorite flower?
Dutchman's pipe, Eschscholzia californica, peonies, Calypso bulbosa
• Favorite ice cream?
Maggie Mudd asphalt
• Favorite fast food restaurant?
A potsticker place in Yonghe halfway between Jennifer's rooftop apartment and my unfurnished suite
• Which store would you choose to max out your credit card?
Caves Augé
• Bedtime?
Highly variable. Generally before midnight.
• Last person(s) you went to dinner with?
Won Sun and Steffen
• What are you listening to right now?
Sweet silence
• What is your favorite color?
Paisley
• How many tattoos do you have?
None
• Who sent the e-mail message you got before this one?
Colby
Thursday, March 16, 2006
Friday, March 10, 2006
Where would we be?
My friends and I lean very heavily on certain words and turns of phrase. We all use the word "actually" far too much. Second place goes to "essentially," the hot new adverb that Levon and MiJin use as frequently as they draw breath. When I was young it was "obviously," a word many of my friends and all my family members would have paid to have amputated from my glossary. We begin questions with "so" and we try to summon conversational inspiration with the ritual words "but" and "um." Some need five false starts to get through a sentence. Others would be speechless if deprived of certain formulations. I loathe "Be well." It's even worse than "Take care," which I first heard from Don Lindgren (of New York State) in 1981, long before it became current in California. To the next bozo who orders me to "be well" I'm going to reply, "Be swell." Meaning swollen like Augustus Gloop.
Wednesday, March 08, 2006
Tuesday, March 07, 2006
San Francisco Ballet-Robbins Program
Dreaming, a young dancer on the sunny floor of a dance salle. He contracts, stretches, rises—the flute has summoned him. While he dances, hips forward, another dancer enters the practice room. She is young, flirtatious, utterly narcissistic. Whenever he catches her aloft she tosses her long black hair and stares into the mirror that lies somewhere between her and us.
Yuan Yuan Tan (譚元元) dances the role of the nymph in San Francisco Ballet's first staging of Jerome Robbins's "Afternoon of a Faun." Who cares who dances the faun's part?
Yuan Yuan Tan (譚元元) dances the role of the nymph in San Francisco Ballet's first staging of Jerome Robbins's "Afternoon of a Faun." Who cares who dances the faun's part?
Friday, March 03, 2006
Diet of terrorists
Detainee is offered a fish sandwich, French fries, coke and a yogurt parfait.
(see http://tinyurl.com/q8jl6)
(see http://tinyurl.com/q8jl6)
Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Monday, February 27, 2006
"Brokeback Mountain"
To understand what Ennis Del Mar feels for Jack Twist, you need to smell the blood on their shirts. It's not only the blood of cowboys thrown by spooked horses, of husbands protecting their wives from disrespectful scum (and themselves from the implication that they are not manly enough to silence lowlifes), of sheep ripped apart by prowling wolves, it's also the blood of every queer man and women killed by thugs unleashed by Bible-thumping TV and radio evangelists. It's the blood that passes turbulently from father to son, that marks a father's daughter as chattel exchanged for a promise to submit, to give in to the father and yield to him the knife that slices through the animal's dead body. To understand Ennis you need to see that a certain way of squaring the shoulders and a reliance on very few words could make the difference between being hung dead on a barbed wire fence and surviving until cancer gets you. To understand Ennis you need to see why he lifts his hand against his wife. The blood on their shirts is the blood they shed so that they would be taken for men, not queers. And the same blood marked the unspoken oath that both swore as they began their retreat from Brokeback Mountain.
Sunday, February 26, 2006
Dream
I would like to wake tomorrow and find that America is home to a large indigenous population of echidnas.
Saturday, February 25, 2006
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
Where the cow goes
Her blood: plywood adhesives, fertilizer, fire extinguisher foam, dyes
Her fat: plastics, tires, crayons, cosmetics, lubricants, soaps, detergents, cough syrup, ink, shaving ream, fabric softeners, synthetic rubber, jet engine lubricants, textiles, corrosion inhibitors, metal-machining lubricants
Her bones: for refining sugar and making ceramics, cleaning and polishing compounds
Her collagen: yogurt, matches, bank notes, cardboard glue, paper
Her fat: plastics, tires, crayons, cosmetics, lubricants, soaps, detergents, cough syrup, ink, shaving ream, fabric softeners, synthetic rubber, jet engine lubricants, textiles, corrosion inhibitors, metal-machining lubricants
Her bones: for refining sugar and making ceramics, cleaning and polishing compounds
Her collagen: yogurt, matches, bank notes, cardboard glue, paper
Sunday, February 12, 2006
Nature
That which is not man's creation is natural. An elephant on the rampage is natural. A mudslide is natural. Countless extinctions are natural.
Man did not invent rape: it is natural. Same-sex sex is common among many species: it is natural. Violence and aggression are natural.
Man's aggression is natural, unless it is an aggression aimed at plants and animals and soil and water and air, in which case it is anti-natural.
Cats are curious; curiosity is natural.
Man did not invent rape: it is natural. Same-sex sex is common among many species: it is natural. Violence and aggression are natural.
Man's aggression is natural, unless it is an aggression aimed at plants and animals and soil and water and air, in which case it is anti-natural.
Cats are curious; curiosity is natural.
Monday, February 06, 2006
The "Cesar" Trilogy
The appeal of the three movies based on Marcel Pagnol's popular plays is their local flavor, the marvelous physical acting of Raimu, Fernand Charpin, Paul Dullac and Alida Rouffe, and the irresistible story of love and war between the generations in 1930s Marseilles. "Marius," "Fanny" and "Cesar" are the most delightful movies ever made.
Alice Waters named her restaurants after two of the characters from the movies.
Alice Waters named her restaurants after two of the characters from the movies.
Wednesday, February 01, 2006
The Philosopher of Life
Along the beach you watch for crabs,
Sideways thoughts that give you hope
In a desert zone licked by not yet
Saltless water, thick enough to tread on.
I am studying you studying her:
Your wife, by lamplight,
Tired of her home.
They comfort you, the homely crabs,
Catching the stick you extend,
Their sidelong society your balm.
Sideways thoughts that give you hope
In a desert zone licked by not yet
Saltless water, thick enough to tread on.
I am studying you studying her:
Your wife, by lamplight,
Tired of her home.
They comfort you, the homely crabs,
Catching the stick you extend,
Their sidelong society your balm.
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