December tunes

The last day of November, and it’s sunny and cold here today.  

November is a tiring month for me, and I’m always glad when the 29th is over.  Although the sharp grief is past, I can’t forget it’s the date when my dad died – much too young – suddenly, after a heart attack.  Many years ago.  Sometimes when I think about those days it feels like a few lifetimes ago.

I’m looking forward to December.  I’m not real big on some of the hoo-hah that goes on in the name of Christmas.  But I enjoy seeing (other peoples’) decorations, even the tacky garish ones. 

And I like a lot of Christmas music. 

Allow me to highly recommend some:

Cindy Horstman’s two CDs:  Christmas Harp and Christmas Harp 2.   Utterly beautiful solo jazz harp.  I’ve had these CDs for years and have never tired of listening to them.  I’ve given more than a dozen of them as gifts.  Right now I’m importing them into my iTunes library so I can take them with me on my iPod. 

Baroque at Christmas.  “We were going to do Brahms or Beethoven for Christmas, but we’re BAROQUE!” – Scarlet Rivera & Tommy Eyre with The Newport Chamber Orchestra.   I found it in a bargain bin somewhere; it’s a fine companion for the season.   Traditional Christmas carols alternate with less obviously “Christmas” music, in a satisfying combination.  

Winterlude - Instrumentals for a Contemplative Christmas.  One of a series, I think.  Another bargain bin find, certainly not elevator music but very good quiet-times listening.

And any CD  you can find with the original rendition of Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer.  And rousing choral versions of Joy to the World, Hark! the Herald Angels Sing, and the Hallelujah Chorus.  Although probably not all on the same CD.

Wishing you all the joys – contemplative, heartwarming, and just plain silly – of the season.

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I spy

I took the “If You Were a Spy…“ quiz on gURL.com
		I am a… hannah senesh Does everyone always exclaim how brave and fearless you are? Maybe when you were two, you had no qualms about jumping off furniture or going down the big slide. Your spy personality is Hannah Senesh, meaning that you’re probably courageous, loyal and strong. Read more…Which spy are you?

HT to Ms. Kitty for this.  If you click on “read more” above, you’ll learn:

In 1943 Hannah Senesh was just 22-years old when she enlisted in the British army in the hopes of liberating her mother from Nazi rule. As one of the first females to volunteer as a paratrooper, Hannah proved herself fearless, however she didn’t make it further than her first mission–she was captured by German soldiers in Budapest. Her captors tried using torture to make her reveal her secret communication code.  . . . She never did. She went to her death keeping her secret and her comrades safe.

Today, Hannah’s memory lives on through her beautiful poetry and letters she wrote during World War II.

It’s an appropriate result to the quiz, in that lately I’ve been reading accounts of WWII spies.  Just because I’m interested.  Starting with The Wolves at the Door, about Virginia Hall.  Then there was A Life in Secrets about Vera Atkins who was not (exactly) a spy, but in charge of many.  Tonight I’ve just started reading Between Silk and Cyanide.   Waiting on the shelf:  Sisterhood of Spies.

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Stalls of shame

I have season tickets for a regional theater company here.   The last several times I’ve queued up in the main floor ladies’ room there, no matter which stall I end up in, I have found that the stall no longer has either the fold-down purse shelf which each stall used to have, or the basic purse/coat hook which also used to be there.  Which means that to use the facility as intended:  I had to hang my purse around my neck or put it on the floor, and if I had an overcoat I had to lay it over the top of the door (and hope it didn’t slide off).

Bad enough, but we’ve attended plays there twice in two weeks this month and each time I used that restroom, I tried three different soap dispensers at the sinks, and they were all empty.

So I went online to their website and found an email link to someone under the heading “facilities.”  A woman, to whom I sent a polite email of complaint about these experiences.  I received a nice reply later that day, which besides noting that the soap dispenser situation would be remedied immediately, said this (I’ve added the bolding for emphasis):

Thank you for your email and I apologize that you have been dissatisfied with a small part of your theatre experience at the [major downtown theater complex whose initials are DCPA]. I have directed your inquiry to our Facilities Manager and he is making arrangements to add hooks to the stalls in the womens’ bathrooms. I learned that not having the hooks was the current choice, because there was a general consensus that hooks greaten the likelihood of purses and other personal items being left behind.

Yep, what that woman so tactfully related is that someone – I suspect a MALE someone – decided that the little ladies would be less likely to leave their purses and umbrellas and coats behind in the bathroom stalls, if they just had no way to let go of them while attending to calls of nature.   Never mind how difficult it is for a female to use the toilet while clutching a handbag and wearing an overcoat; just think how more efficiently those guys can manage the facilities if there are fewer items left behind to end up in the lost and found.

Thank goodness a woman has been heard on the issue.  I’m expecting to see purse hooks the next time I use that ladies’ room.

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It didn’t start with the Big Mac

Yesterday I watched a documentary on MSNBC about McDonald’s.  It was a repeat; the show was first aired last July.   Hosted by Carl Quintanilla, the program featured some critics of McDonald’s who view it as the insidious purveyor of unhealthy food which it shamelessly markets to children. 

It got me to wondering about the social history of the American hamburger.  I’m old enough to remember the days when there wasn’t a McDonald’s on every corner in every town in the US.   But we were all plenty familiar with hamburgers, fries and soft drinks.  Also with drive-in hamburger joints.  Maybe it was a regional thing, and they didn’t have such things in the Northeast until McDonald’s got there.

I’m wondering about this because some of the critics of McDonald’s food sound like they think McDonald’s invented hamburgers and fries.  Like regular Americans were all happily eating whole grain bread, granola and fresh fruit for lunch until (cue the horror movie music) the crazed geniuses working for Ray Kroc invented hamburgers and fries and foisted them off on an unsuspecting innocent populace.

I’m no hard-core libertarian, and I don’t patronize Mickey D’s unless I’m on a road trip – they have clean bathrooms and good coffee – but listening to a few of those anti-Mac fanatics brought the phrase “nanny state” to mind.   And “out to lunch.”

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What would Jesus give?

Denver Post editorial writer Bob Ewegen is my favorite Republican newspaper columnist.  Who, I’m sure, the people in charge of the GOP these days wish would just die.  Because he’s rational, compassionate, smart, and can think for himself.   His column today is posted in whole below the fold in case the link doesn’t work. 

Having bought nothing yesterday, I’m happy to read this:

For years, I’ve cringed at the pagan festival of Greedmas, which kicked into high gear yesterday as “Black Friday” lured consumers into big box temples to separate them from their cash and max out their credit cards.

A long time ago, this season was known as “Christmas.” But it no longer honors the message of Jesus.

Lest we forget, that message was reported by a far better journalist than me, by the name of Matthew:

For I was hungry and ye gave me meat. I was thirsty and ye gave me drink. I was a stranger and ye took me in. I was naked, and ye clothed me. I was sick, and ye visited me. I was in prison and ye came unto me. Verily, I say unto you, inasmuch as you have done it unto one of these of the least of my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

Sadly, the least of our brethren are mostly ignored during Greedmas — they don’t have credit cards

He goes on to suggest donations to World Vision and Heifer International, organizations which work to give people in developing nations the tools to survive and thrive.

Thank you,  Mr. E.

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When turkeys flew

Many thanks to Cranky Prof for posting this.  It’s so much fun that I just have to post it too.

WKRP:  admit it, you still miss it sometimes.

EDITED to add:   Take a peek at this much too cute dog waiting for turkey.

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Networked

 As reported in the Denver Post, this kid has the right idea of networking:

Marisol Tanguma is a little girl with a big heart who understands the power of networking.

On Tuesday, Courtney Tanguma, 4-year-old Marisol’s mother, told the Castle Rock preschooler that the Denver Rescue Mission was in need of donated turkeys to feed homeless people. “I asked her how many turkeys she thought we should buy for the rescue mission,” Courtney remembered.

When Marisol replied 50, her mother laughed and said, “We can’t afford 50 turkeys.”

“Mommy, you know we have lots of friends,” Marisol replied.

It was about noon when she and Marisol began e-mailing friends and relatives asking them to contribute what they could toward “Mari’s great turkey mission.”

By 4 p.m. they had pledges of $445.

Marisol and her mother drove 50 turkeys to the Denver Rescue Mission.

Happy Thanksgiving, Marisol.

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Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines

I almost always worked the day after Thanksgiving, because I almost always worked for state or local government agencies who do not observe the day after Thanksgiving as a holiday, and I saw no reason to burn a day of vacation leave on it. 

On Thanksgiving Friday the office was quiet.  It was the perfect time to catch up on work without a lot of interruptions from phone calls and other things.  Like chatty co-workers, because most of them had taken the four-day weekend.  I doubt that blessed quiet will survive the Blackberry culture, now that the boss and everybody else can generate annoying email traffic from offsite. 

One of the most blessed things about working the day after Thanksgiving was NOT SHOPPING ON BLACK FRIDAY.   I do not have the words for how much I hate shopping in crowded stores.  For how my gut literally churns when I read the inevitable news stories about innocent kids trampled by sweaty fat adults rushing through the doors of Wal-mart to grab one of the loss leader color TVs. 

But here’s another scary thing.  According to this morning’s newspaper ads, the stores are opening so early tomorrow that determined shoppers can hit a few selected targets and still get to the office on time.  If they aren’t injured in the earlybird frenzy.

In case anyone wants to plan their Black Friday shopping, here’s a schedule of retail store opening times for Friday, November 23:

OPENING AT 4:00 A.M.:

• Kohl’s
• Penney’s

OPENING AT 5:00 A.M.:

• Best Buy
• Circuit City
• Linens N Things
• Michaels
• Old Navy
• Pepboys auto supply
• Sam’s Club
• Toys R Us
• Ultimate Electronics
• Wal-Mart

OPENING AT 6:00 A.M.:

• Bed Bath & Beyond
• K Mart
• Macy’s
• Office Depot
• Staples
• Target

OPENING AT 7:00 A.M.: 

• Burlington Coat Factory
• Cost Plus
• Dillard’s
• Office Max
• Ulta

OPENING AT 8:00 A.M. OR REGULAR HOURS:

• Car Toys
• Home Depot
• Mike’s Camera
• Wolf Camera
• Lowe’s

A few stores are opening this afternoon or tonight.  I refuse to give them free publicity.  They should let their employees have the day off.  Grinches.

If you go shopping tomorrow, be careful out there. 

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I predict a very special Darwin award for this product

The Consumer Product Safety Commission has recalled candles wrapped in birch bark because they are, well, a fire hazard.  

I am surprised that:  (1) somebody decided this would be a good product line, (2) somebody else filled the orders to make the products, and (3) other people decided to sell them to the public.   Okay, not so much by (2); these were manufactured in China, where apparently nobody turns a hair at making anything possible, regardless of the toxicity of the ingredients or whether the finished product is capable of wiping out hundreds of people at a go when being used as directed, even if that’s not the intended result.

Thanks to my cousin for passing along the recall news me by email in which he wrote:

Gee, what a surprise!

Birch bark, particularly paperbirch bark, has been known since man first started making fire as an excellent tinder for getting a fire going.  It doesn’t make a good primary tinder (that into which one would directly strike a spark) because it doesn’t catch a spark easily.  However, once a flame is available and applied to strips of birchbark, it burns hot and well.

I am constantly amazed by the ignorance of people.  I guess it is just a consequence of the fact that many people have been completely removed from reality by modern conveniences and have no practical knowledge of things that used to be common knowledge.  Consequently, it isn’t a great leap for someone to think how pretty a candle looks wrapped in birchbark and not realize that birchbark is wood and burns.  Soak a little candle wax into it…. and it burns even better!!  What a concept!!

This story cries out for the superb snarkiness skills of, say, Cranky Professor.  I am not worthy.

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But I’m pretty sure I have a handle on the breathing and eating activities

An unsung writer of book jacket copy blew out some brain wiring over Rosie O’Donnell’s new book, Celebrity Detox.  The jacket copy ends with a flourish:

Rosie O’Donnell illuminates not only what it’s like to be a celebrity, but also what it’s like to be a mother, a daughter, a leader, a friend, a sister, a wife…in short, a human being.

You know, isn’t it wonderful what these selfless celebrities will do for us poor clueless regular unfamous dregs of society?  I mean, Rosie could be out walking her dogs or calling her hogs or otherwise living her exciting famous Hollywood star life.  And instead she sat down at a computer and sweated out a WHOLE BOOK to tell us WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE A HUMAN BEING.

And I for one am damn grateful for this sacrifice.  Just the other day I was wondering about this human being business.  I mean, do I really know what it’s like to be one? 

I could have been doing it ALL WRONG, for all these years.  And never known.

So I checked this critically important and helpful book out of the library last night, so that at NO ADDITIONAL CHARGE (unless I keep it out too long and incur overdue fines) I can finally learn what it’s like to be a human being.

I’m sure I will want to take notes when I’m reading it.

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Next episode

Eight months ago I was freed from the daily routine of holding a job.  It’s been fun.  Some weeks I slept late and stayed up later.   I took some wonderful trips.  Played with my new digital cameras at home and away.  Read lots of books just for fun.  Spent time with family and friends.  Blogged more.  And watched too much TV.  Way too much TV.

All the while, intending that I’m not permanently retired, just enjoying a welcome hiatus from the rat race and expecting to rejoin the world of paid work sooner or later.

That encore I was working up to, is almost here.  A nice opportunity has dropped into my lap.   For a few months I will work a few days a week.  I’m not going to blog about the specifics.  Depending on getting the contract signed, I’ll probably start in a week or so.  And be done in time for a spring vacation.  Sweet!

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Homeland security

 

Our fine bureaucrats in the Department of Homeland Security [sic] would rather watch our country’s buildings burn down than let a single questionable person sneak across the border.  On a firetruck.  With flashing lights and sirens.  Responding to a fire call.

I wish I were making this up.  This federal agency has gone beyond incompetence – into insanity.

Full article below the fold if the link’s expired.

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Another bubble busted

I admitted here the other day that I’ve been watching too much TV.   But over the weekend I didn’t watch much TV.  Instead, when home (and I did go out and do things) I spent way too much time browsing the fora* over at Television without Pity, a site I found on Friday.  I had much snarky fun reading and contributing to discussions of some of the obscure shows I watch on HGTV, BBC America, TLC and the various Discovery channels.   And learned some things.

But with knowledge comes disillusionment. 

Thus with the HGTV show Freestyle - which according to the network website is “a no-cost design show where professional re-arrangers de-clutter, reorganize and move furniture and accessories around in a room, to give homeowners a dramatic new look without spending a dime!”

Nice idea.  But they lie. 

Last year Freestyle was busted in a Washington Post article by Jill Barshay, one of their makeover subjects.  The makeover cost her $1,000, thanks to a pre-show shopping trip with the show’s designer in which Barshay bought a daybed for $750.  She also had some original artwork framed for another $250 - the producer nixed the pieces.  Barshay muses:  “Apparently a Rodin-like nude is considered pornography. Who owns HGTV, I wondered, John Ashcroft?”

Among other revelations:  the TV crew rearranged Barshay’s furniture into a really bad layout before starting the shoot; the producer made Barshay repeatedly rehearse her “ad-libbed” introduction, then whined that it sounded too scripted; and: 

The crew, meantime, was peeling off price tags and planting $1,000 worth of newly purchased furniture and accessories in other rooms. Then later, we could conveniently “find” them, exclaiming how great this lamp, those pillows and that bamboo mat would work in the living room.

The whole article cracked me up and confirmed my suspicions about the veracity of all those “redo a room or three in your home for free/$500/$1000/$2000″ shows.   (Click on “continue reading” below if the WPost link doesn’t work and you want to read the story.)

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*I know, they call them “forums.”   But I took Latin in high school.  I just can’t.

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Hocus Pocus and Doctor Poo

I’ve been watching too much TV lately.  OK, I don’t literally sit in front of the tube holding the remote and staring at the screen.   The TV is on a lot when I’m home.  I’m usually absorbing the TV shows while I’m on the computer (as I’m doing right now), reading, twiddling around in the kitchen, or sorting laundry.   I sometimes sit down and focus on the tube – for instance, to watch the excellent cable series Mad Men (AMC) and Saving Grace (TNT).

Among the TV content beaming into my living room most of the time:  Court TV, other true crime and detection shows, a little Animal Planet, and some shows from Across the Pond on BBC America.  

The true crime detection shows often feature either criminal profilers or psychic detectives.  In this week’s New Yorker, [Glen Baxter's illustration is at left] Malcolm Gladwell concludes that FBI profilers are about as effective as psychic detectives when you get right down to predicting the identity of the actual perpetrators of crimes.   Gladwell cites a researcher’s review of an FBI profiler’s case analysis:  “when he broke down the rooftop-killer analysis, sentence by sentence, he found that it was so full of unverifiable and contradictory and ambiguous language that it could support virtually any interpretation.” 

Citing a book I now want to read, Ian Rowland’s The Full Facts Book of Cold Reading, Gladwell lists the types of statements which are used in combination by psychics and astrologers to “convince even the most skeptical observer that he or she is in the presence of real insight:”  the Rainbow Ruse, the Jacques Statement, the Greener Grass technique, the Diverted Question, Sugar Lumps, Forking (!!?), and the Good Chance Guess.   Quoting the profile created by FBI profilers and given to Wichita, Kansas, cops who were looking for the BTK Killer, Gladwell points out: 

If you’re keeping score, that’s a Jacques Statement, two Barnum Statements, four Rainbow Ruses, a Good Chance Guess, two predictions that aren’t really predictions because they could never be verified—and nothing even close to the salient fact that BTK was a pillar of his community, the president of his church and the married father of two.

On BBC America, I enjoy the camped-up reality show “How Clean is Your House?” on weekdays. 

Which is how I happened to see the show that follows HCIYH, an exercise in pseudo-science and public bullying called “You Are What You Eat.”   It stars a skinny acidulated bleached blonde female who enthuses over the flavor of strange food concoctions, scolds the overweight junk-food-addicted subjects, acts perplexed when some of them nearly gag on exotic concoctions of health food, diagnoses their health quite specifically by inspecting their tongues and (yes!) their poo, 

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54,997

As of this moment, that’s the number of spam comments that the Askimet spam-blocker has prevented from being posted on this blog.

At no charge to this here blogger.

Thanks, WordPress.

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Unruly judiciary

un • ru • ly – adjective, -li·er, li·est.
not submissive or conforming to rule; ungovernable; turbulent; intractable; refractory; lawless: an unruly class; an unruly wilderness.  *

It’s like the bad old days of policing in the USA:  bring in a suspect, interrogate him, and if he doesn’t say what you want, beat the crap out of him.  And then charge him with resisting arrest and disorderly conduct.

Pakistan’s President/General Musharraf has just done his own macro version of that.  Order judges to rule the way he wants – regardless of what the law says – and when they won’t play along, declare a state of emergency, including over the court system.  And say it’s because they were “unruly.”

According to BBC News:

The president, who is also head of the army, has said he declared the state of emergency because of a crisis caused by militant violence and an unruly judiciary.

Let’s see.  His strong political opponent finally returns to the country and coincidentally somebody bombs the welcoming streets full of celebrating people – somebody whom Musharraf’s troops and tame secret police just couldn’t learn about and stop beforehand.  Despite that ELEVEN BILLION US DOLLARS of “antiterrorist” aid Musharraf’s received from the Bush Administration since late 2001, there was this “militant violence.”  Uh-huh. 

And gosh, it must also just be a coincidence that the nation’s supreme court was about to issue a decision as to whether Musharraf’s re-election as President was voided by his failure to step aside as head of the armed forces as required by law.  But, well my goodness, what with all that unruliness going on, there just wasn’t a minute to lose to slap down the court system after individual justices refused to be pushed around by Musharraf’s administration.

Sounds to me like the only thing unruly about Pakistan’s judiciary is that its members have resisted the dictator’s attempts to push them around.

And don’t you just KNOW some of the farthest-out-there Bushies wish they could do the same thing to the United States courts?  I would like to think it could never happen here. 

I would also like to think that if it did, US lawyers would show the same courage and take it to the streets like our Pakistani counterparts. 

Also, for the record, courtesy of the BBC, here’s a list of the “emergency” restrictions Musharraf has put in place:

• Constitutional safeguards on life and liberty curtailed

• Police get wide powers of arrest

• Suspects can be denied access to lawyers

• Freedom of movement restricted

• Private TV stations taken off air

• New rules curtail media coverage of suicide bombings or militant activity

• Chief justice replaced, others made to swear oath of loyalty

• Supreme Court banned from rescinding emergency order

Full BBC story here if the link above doesn’t work. 

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*”unruly.” Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1. Random House, Inc. 06 Nov. 2007.)http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/unruly

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Stomping on the law in Pakistan

I am sitting here at my computer just pissed off as can be, after reading this story online.

 Many lawyers in Pakistan have mobilized to protest their President’s seizure of essentially absolute power – he suspended the constitution.  Just ahead of a supreme court ruling on whether said President’ re-election was legal.  Lawyers are being arrested by the hundreds.  Even those who are not protesting are being grabbed off the streets and taken to jail.  Just for being lawyers. 

I am sure that the Bush Administration – which shows damn little respect for the rule of law and the independent authority of the courts as a branch of government in its own country which is also MY country - will do essentially nothing about this.  Oh, they’ll tell Condi Rice to squawk a little about human rights.  But at the end of the day, the Bushies will keep all that US money flooding into Musharraf’s pockets in the name of “antiterrorism.”  I am feeling more than a little terrified right now.  Oh, by the way, Pakistan has nuclear weapons.  

Here’s the caption to this picture: “Policemen beat a lawyer outside provincial High Courts in Lahore November 5, 2007. Pakistani police used teargas and batons on Monday against lawyers protesting at President Pervez Musharraf’s imposition of emergency rule and detentions mounted, prompting Washington to postpone defence cooperation talks. REUTERS/Mohsin Raza (PAKISTAN).”

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Seen at the public library

 An evocative list of subjects (Ross – University Hills branch).

Uneasy shelf-fellows (Schlessman branch).

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Speaking of judgments

Whacked-out Fred “all hate, all the time” Phelps and his traveling band of Kansas nutcases have been slapped with a judgment against them of $11 million in a Maryland civil case filed by the father of a solider whose funeral was targeted by the Phelps traveling circus. 

Couldn’t happen to a more appropriate bunch. 

This whole deal will take awhile to play itself out:  appeals, then attempts by plaintiffs to collect.  I really hope that Mr. P. does something really illegal in the course of avoiding payment of the judgment.  For which he could land in a prison somewhere.   With unsympathetic roomies.  Awww.

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