Let Us Sing of Thanksgiving

Reminding people that the holiday song for Thanksgiving is Arlo Guthrie's "Alice's Restaurant Massacree". If you don't have a copy of the music at home, you can listen (or download) a 1997 version at http://www.arlo.net/massacree/ ...

please ignore the "buy" thingies underneath this fair-use image from wikipedia -- fotomoto doesn't quite recognize the difference between my stuff and other people's, and i have no idea how to remove it for just this one image :)

Hoping to Win...

I'm a Facebookie. Yeah, hard to believe, but among the many reasons I've found to stay is a simple contest: Give up something dear to you for a chance to win airfare and a few nights in Amsterdam next year...

I've entered a poster I created using a local Australian Shepherd; if I win, the contest promoters will obtain the ownership rights to the poster, and I will receive the trip.

EEEHHHHAAAA!

If you are on Facebook (and perhaps even if you aren't!), please vote for me. Often! Apparently, you can vote once every 24 hours until the contest is over (second week in December, if I remember correctly)... So, please, OFTEN! I haven't been to Amsterdam in a few years, and it may be the only way I'll make it there before I retire...

Here is the poster itself:

Glenn Gould's Mozart

Currently listening to Glenn Gould's interpretation of the first few Mozart Piano Sonatas... he certainly takes liberties with tempo; oh, and you can hear him humming along in the background, though not as pronounced (usually) as Errol Garner :)

Wow. An Honest Commercial!

You have to admire an honest individual...
[ thanx to grrlscientist for finding this jewel! ]

Happy Birth Anniversary, Ursula

One of the more fascinating fiction writers of our time is celebrating her 80th birth anniversary today... Among the first books I read while I was in college (for the first time), "the Lathe of Heaven" and "the Left Hand of Darkness" were fantastic and thought-provoking to me...

Her website is www.ursulakleguin.com. Pay a visit, say "hi" ...

more links:
http://blog.bookviewcafe.com/?s=ursula+birthday

http://www.sfwa.org/2009/10/happy-birthday-ursula-k-le-guin/

A Young Man and His GPS

a fun, if subtly fantastic idea regarding a young man and his GPS device...

Bach on a Möbius Strip

I've always loved Bach.  Though I believe Mozart was the more natural genius, here is an example of Bach's incredible talent...

Men Who Stare at Goats

what more needs to be said? i think i'm going to be in a cinema near me on the release date :)



what could go wrong? :)

Opting Out, Google-style

I have to say, I've enjoyed the occasional Onion Network video for its truthiness, but this one truly scares me...


Google Opt Out Feature Lets Users Protect Privacy By Moving To Remote Village

Perpetuum Jazzile

crank up the volume here. you will not regret it.

for what it's worth, this is some incredible a capella singing from a group i'd not heard of before, but i will look for their work in the future...


the original group is Toto, and the song's name is "Africa", and it is wonderful in its own right. link stolen from GrrlScientist's website - http://scienceblogs.com/mt/pings/114229

Street Portraits, Dead Simple

I have to say, this is one of the finest quick-n-dirty explanations of what a GREAT street / portrait photographer does, and if you aren't shy, it's dead simple:

Uncomfortable Short Reviews

An interesting posit: Take a story, then break it down into the shortest possible summary that tells the most plot, and what comes out tells a subtly-different story, nominally quite unpleasant when stripped of most/all niceties.

My favourites include:

• ALIENS: An unplanned pregnancy leads to complications
• AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON: Tourist causes riot
• BATMAN: Wealthy man assaults the mentally ill
• DEBBIE DOES DALLAS: Cheerleaders develop valuable entrepreneurial skills
• DEEP THROAT: Medical anomaly earns woman new friends
• DELIVERANCE: Tourists experience local hospitality
• DIE HARD: Dysfunctional cop saves marriage by murdering foreign national
• DOCTOR FAUSTUS: Scholar learns nuances of contract law
• DRACULA: Immigrant clashes with locals
• E T : Out-of-control pet causes mayhem, sadness
• FRANKENSTEIN: Scientific advancement proves unpopular with general public
• GHOSTBUSTERS: Unemployed college professors destroy hotel with nuclear weapons
• KARATE KID: Boy gains acceptance through violence
• KING KONG: Endangered animal stolen, shot
• LOLITA: Man encourages step-daughter to take chances
• LORD OF THE RINGS: Midget destroys stolen property
• ROSEMARY’S BABY: An unplanned pregnancy leads to complications
• STAR TREK, the Original Series: Over-sexed officer routinely places crew in danger
• STEPFORD WIVES, the: Woman has difficulty adjusting to suburban life
  
• SWEENEY TODD: Businesses flourish when freed from stringent regulation
• TAXI DRIVER: Modern dating proves challenging for working class man
• TERMINATOR: An unplanned pregnancy leads to complications
• TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE: Tourists have difficulty with regional cuisine

Between unplanned pregnancies, problem dating, tourists, and immigrants, it seems a fair number of popular movies have very little originality. Hmmm...

Tangerine Thai

a few years ago,a friend told me about a thai restaurant that was incredible. it was located in the bellevue galleria, top floor, and said you simply must try them.

several years later, they've moved from the galleria to the expedia building ground floor. this was an expansion dream, with over twice the dining and kitchen space...

thursday night, Tangerine Thai had their grand opening, and oh what an opening. the owners, jeff and a, beautiful as ever. the support staff, ever helpful. the food?

to.
die.
for.

give them a try. invite me. i haven't eaten there in two days, and i'm feeling withdrawal pains.

the palace dishes (chicken or tofu, with caramelized basil and garlic) must be tried to be believed. crab wontons that melt in your mouth. crispy eggplant that makes the carnivore in me drool it is so good. i could go on with their panang curry, the tom kha gai, etc.

you just have to visit, try something, anything, to be hooked. it's that easy.

thai in bellevue that beats everyone else. hands down.

call me. we'll do lunch.
or dinner.

Her Morning Elegance

photography by eyal landesman, music by oren lavie... it's been quite some time since i've seen anything quite this remarkable in photographic stop-motion involving humans...



makes me want to get out there and see what i can come up with. as someone else stated, "who needs a video camera to make videos?"

indeed.

my thanks to doug plummer for making me aware of this...

To Kill a Mockingbird

based on the award-winning novel of the same name, To Kill a Mockingbird is simply a tour-de-force combining deft dialogue with subtle and sure performances from the entire cast.

the story carries two simultaneous story lines:

• life in a small southern town for a six-year-old tomboy named Scout, her older brother Jem, and a visiting acquaintance nicknamed "Dill";
• the trial of Tom Robinson, a young black man accused of the rape of a white woman. Tom is defended by Atticus Finch, the father of Scout and Jem.

what better way to spend a snowy winter afternoon than to be reminded of the best of human nature in the seemingly-eternal effort to defeat the worst.

i have to admit being surprised by the number of actors who were, or were on their way to, becoming household names: gregory peck, robert duvall, paul fix, alice ghostley, william windom, and brock peters as Tom.

odd trivia:

• the author, harper lee, was a longtime friend of truman capote.
• so far, To Kill a Mockingbird is her only published novel
  
• it was a pulitzer prize winner that was later made into a movie, which itself was nominated for eight oscars, winning three...

the infallible 0-10 opinion scale:

• 9.0 for acting
• 8.5 for writing
• 9.0 for cinematography
• must watch == TRUE
• must own == SHOULD
  

final note: for all of the idiots who believe the book should be banned from schools for its language (as has been "huck finn", etc), with requisite context it is my considered opinion it should be required reading by age 15, required viewing by age 12...

Uncle Jay's 2008 in Review

If you haven't heard of Uncle Jay, you are in for a wonderful treat... Here, he disassembles 2008 for those who may have been sleeping last year... :)

The Giant Behemoth

Ah, yes, to be transported back into time, maybe as far as 1959. Pick any weekend afternoon when for some reason you aren't outside playing, doing chores or homework. Maybe it is raining outside, or you have the measles.

On channels around the world, sponsored by manufacturers of products so shoddy in nature the only advertising on TV they could afford was usually either very late-night or weekend Bad-B-Movie-Time.

One of the movies you probably would have seen: The Giant Behemoth.

As a kid, I was utterly intrigued by the likes of these monsters; Gamera, the Beast from 20k Fathoms, Them, Godzilla, and a whole host of others. Most of these movies would have displays of atomic blasts in the first 10-15 minutes, if only to underscore the dangers of radiation. Kids would recount on the school playgrounds how many times Tokyo was obliterated, complete with sound effects and movie quotes.

Much as I'd like to say this one isn't that bad, I can't. It's worse. The "special effects" appear to be (and probably are) a bath tub, some inanimate puppets, and in one scene, plastic cars on a plastic toy ferry that tips over in the bath tub. The acting runs the gamut between pretty good and incredibly bad.

Even so, it was my choice for a different weekend of rain. As I was leaving the library last Sunday, the DVD cover caught my eye, transporting me. As bad as it was, it was fun to watch and be taken back to less-sullied days, when (to a kid's eye, anyway) the world was a much simpler place...