Long Weekend

Beautiful day in New York today: hot, sunny, mimosa-worthy; kind of perfect for what is treated as the unmeteorological-yet-quite-official First Weekend of Summer.

Relaxing morning followed by a nice walk to brunch followed by a lingering and even nicer walk to run some errands and now we're back in Chelsea listening to Django Reinhardt and about to get ready for a Sweet 17 birthday party for one of Cory's clan.

Very sad to read about Gil Scott-Heron last night. He had a hard life in a lot of ways, but did some very good, very important work. Very happy to have shared some time on this earth with him.

For him and for the day, here are a couple shots of a sculpture in a park in San Francisco - called Ecstasy in its current incarnation, it's a repurposed and reclaimed piece that Karen Cusolito and Dan Das Mann originally did for a huge Burning Man project. Fortunate to have crossed paths with this beautiful work while it was out in public.

SF MoMA

Happy Birthday Bob!

And not just that, but happy 70th birthday to the singing cowboy who wrote the number that gives this blog its name. Very exciting, and there are some good events to honor the occasion.




First, and most immediately I suppose, is that WBAI is devoting the whole day to archival interviews, studio sessions, and Dylan-related audio artifacts. You can listen to 99.5 FM or stream by clicking the link above. It's their semi-annual beg-a-thon too, so be warned about that. Small price to pay. (Hey, a station's gotta make a living. Especially a station full of dissenters, most of whom volunteer their time.)

Film Forum is showing a couple flicks documenting the early days. Don't Look Back, the D.A. Pennebaker doc that's been around since '67, and Murray Lerner's The Other Side of the Mirror, which covers the performances at the Newport Folk Festival from '63-'65, but was just released in '007. They're playing through June 2, so don't delay too much if you want to catch them.

And, of course, there is no shortage of ways to celebrate online. Articles, editorials, shoutouts, discussions, suggestions, photo essays, tributes, and of course blog entries...

Have at it!

R.E.M. Sleep

First of all, a shoutout to Carrie for getting through finals; and a special shoutout to Sherin who is somewhere in the final stages of her Master's (so thoroughly embedded in research and writing that I don't even know exactly what's left for her, but I know she's nearing the finish line, if not yet across it).

And so here's a testament to one of the presumed, if elusive, rewards of getting through grad school, which is also a nod to the screening/talk with Michael Stipe (about the very cool short 'films' curated by Stipe to accompany the songs on Collapse Into Now) Cory and I went to a couple weeks ago.

Long Pause

SO - this is the most out of it I've been since I started this thing. I think.

I was out for a variety of reasons, including travel, work, ennui and inertia. Then I started and restarted responses to the responses to Bin Laden's death, but didn't want to go with any of them. Suffice to say that I am not among those who feel that the event was a good excuse for a Frat Party/Girls Gone Wild moment, nor a mediathon around that reaction.

With that, here's a quotation from MLK, a few photos from his memorial in San Fran, and then we'll get back to it.

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. … Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.

Check out the Freedom Riders documentary on American Experience tonight, if you have a moment. We caught a preview screening and talk a while back - it's very worthwhile.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

Variation on the Magic

Tried an experiment with iTunes today - turned out to be worth mentioning. Sort of a key word variation on the ol' Magic 8pod.

I was reading some article that referred to the R.E.M. cover of the Wire song "Strange" which made me want to listen to it, which sent me to the computer (and of course that's a whole other box of wine), which gave me an idea: what would come up if I searched for the word "strange" on the music library that happens to be loaded on the hard drive on this particular day?

Funny you should ask.

Fugazi - Strangelight
Duke Ellington - Strange Feeling
Duke Ellington & His Famous Orchestra - Isn't Love The Strangest Thing?
Johnny Cash - Come In, Stranger
David Byrne - Strange Ritual
R.E.M. - Strange (this of course being the song that led me down the rabbit hole)
The Smithereens - Strangers When We Meet
Leonard Cohen - The Stranger Song
Beck - Strange Apparition
Andrew Lloyd Webber & Tim Rice (Jesus Christ Superstar cast album) - What's The Buzz/Strange Thing Mystifying
Jeff Buckley - I Woke Up In A Strange Place
U2 - Stranger in a Strange Land
Prince - beautiful strange
Prince - Strange But True
Prince - Strange Relationship [it bears mentioning that this list is sorted by album, not artist, and yet three Prince songs from three different albums end up adjacent.)
Yo La Tengo - Mr. Ameche Plays The Stranger
The Everly Brothers - Love Is Strange
The Magnetic Fields - Strange Eyes




There's some potential in this, wouldn't you say? Get in a mood, and see where your tunes take you. Put in a word and see what pops up.

Strange days, indeed...

Saturday in the Park with George

Ok, first things first: today is Cory's birthday. That is momentous, and I think you should take a moment to acknowledge the awesomeness of the occasion. Perhaps light a candle and sing a song. Or something. Something juicy.

Cory came up with the title for this post. You see, as part of her birthday celebration, she got a girls' day and night with our friends from last year's birthday day out. They took a trip to the outlet malls, and while that sort of sounds like punishment to me, they actually planned the whole thing out and were looking forward to it and everything.

One thing Kristin did ask of me was to look after her dog George for the day. "Ummm... ok!"

I mean!

So they came to Chelsea and dropped off George, then took off to Woodbury Common. And George and I got a day together. I'd send them little phone photos with text updates: "George at brunch" (I took him to brunch. No, I didn't feed him from the table.) "George finds the chair." "George finds the couch." "George finds my lap."

It was a ridiculous amount of fun.

And after brunch, and walking through the Village, and listening to part of an opera, and watching a movie together, we decided to go to the dog park in Madison Square.

See, this is life. One day: no fun. Another day: So much fun!

I could go on, but for now, here's a little photo essay of George's interaction with a Weimaraner puppy at the dog run. It's a little scary at first, but it gets better...

See? You think he's in trouble, don't you?

Total stand off.

But many things can be resolved with a little bit of sniffing.

Followed by a little more sniffing.

Those kids are going to get along just fine.

And that's how a bill becomes a law!

There's more to share, but I have to get ready for the Big Birthday Dinner!!!!

Happy Opening Day!

It's not feeling too springy, but it's the first day of the baseball season! Woo hoo!

Gotta tell you though, this kind of thing just feels weird and wrong.

Season of Tennessee

Maybe you realize that Saturday was Tennessee Williams' 100 Birthday. Maybe you don't. The fact that it's an open question is something of a problem, in my view. This is one of those things that should be cause for a year-long celebration of National Pride, festivals on the White House lawn, parades in Memphis and New Orleans and New York, marathon readings and TV specials and Oscar-worthy biopics devoted to the life of this man, the Great American Dramatic Poet.

What we do have is a few more productions of Tennessee's shows. So that's, well, something.

Scott Brown wrote an article for New York Magazine a few weeks ago discussing Williams and the neglect his centenary is suffering. He does a pretty good job of opening up some of the issues that may have stood in the way of the celebration Tenn deserves, most especially this maddening sense that he stopped being good somewhere around 1961 and that the last 20 years of his life were just wasted, which pushes me around the bend a little bit. What do you people want? Even if it were true (which it is not) that everything after Night of the Iguana sucks, what would you have preferred? That Tenn had died in a James Dean-esque car crash so we could cast him in the Too Fast to Live, Too Young to Die role? That perversion aside, I think that 'bad' Tennessee Williams is a little like the 'bad' Shakespeare plays and the 'bad' Dylan records - you may have to dig a little deeper and open up a little more, but I still don't want to live in a world without Titus Andronicus, or Saved. And in terms of history, the night is pretty young for Signore Williams. Just as people have come around on The Tempest (and, it's worth mentioning, have turned away from the Henry VI plays to a certain extent) I wouldn't be surprised if people learn how to see and hear Small Craft Warnings over time .

By the way, I didn't catch Vieux Carré (quelle domage! For reals. I'm borderline despondent to have missed that, but the tix were elusive.) but I did see the Michael Wilson-directed The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore at the Roundabout, and I may see it again. And so should you. 'Twas most worthy.

I have to include this last one, from the 1959 film of Suddenly Last Summer, for Elizabeth Taylor. We'll miss you, Liz.

Supermoon

Lincoln Memorial, meet astronomical phenomenon.

Photo: Bill Ingalls. Nicely done, Bill.

Equinoctial

Happy First Day of Spring, everybody!

So far, I've been celebrating by not even leaving the apartment, but that just seems wrong, so I'll shift gears soon. but first I wanted to say I hope you all had a good winter (as uncooperative as the weather tended to be) and that you're in good health (no small wish in this era of earthquakes and tsunamis and wars and floods).

This week was a full one, with networking and socializing on Monday, a kind of a night off on Tuesday, Lucia di Lammermoor at the Met on Wednesday (great! It's part of the HD broadcasts too, so you can catch it at a theater near you...), The Motherf**ker with the Hat on Thursday (which evening included dinner with a couple of my good friends who had somehow managed not to be in the same room with Cory until now), the Premier of the Mel & El webisodes at Ars Nova on Friday (featuring yours truly as a Mean Man, according to the credits; my bitchy gay character was rechristened by Kevin and Carl as one of the Mean Girls. I'll take the career boost.) and the Martha Graham Dance Company at Jazz at Lincoln Center last night (featuring the company of out-of-town guests from both Virginia and Italia)

Whew!

How do we do it? The secret is to sacrifice cleanliness.

Anyway, it's clearly time to change over the wallpaper photo on my phone from the snow-covered branches outside our window to something more printemps. I'll try to grab something this afternoon.

Night Off

It's thunderous in Nuevo York. We just watched a viddy (Dream of Life) on our only night off this week, and now the thunder is raising a ruckus. We have to clean up from dinner before we crash - very good simple meal: brown rice pasta with red sauce with lots of garlic, onion and mushroom, green salad with mushrooms and kalamata olives, a surprisingly excellent sourdough, and some predictably excellent cheeses to round it out. Oh, and some a Wisconsin beer I've never had before called Eastside (don't know why, but it's kind of hard to get non-mass-produced Wisconsin beer out here). I also got us a bottle of acqua minerale because I've been thinking about Rome, in part because our Roman friends are coming to NYC in a couple days.

Anyway, it's good to have a night off sometimes. Rain will turn up as we sleep.

YLT on FMU

You all know that I have a deep appreciation for Yo La Tengo. You'd have to be paying a little closer attention to realize that I also appreciate the awesomeness of East Orange's own WFMU. SO - it only makes sense that I throw them my greatest support when they get together to kick out the jams.

Which they did the other night as part of the annual (yes public radio listeners, just once a year!) fundraiser. YLT returned from their tour this year to play, as they've done for a good long time, a set of requests from people who donate to what might be the best free form radio station in the world, and is certainly the best one I've found in this or any other area. You may have enjoyed this event on the radio or online in the past, or perhaps you've sampled the sonic offerings as documented on the legendary (some might say anti-heroic) Yo La Tengo Is Murdering the Classics.

We stayed in on a Friday night to listen. Well, ok, it's not the only reason we stayed in on a Friday night, but it was a factor. And we put our heads together to make our request (Cory had the singular inspiration to request Because the Night) and made our donation to a good cause and even watched along on the webcam for a while. Here's a screen shot of them taking on Patti and Bruce in their inimitable fashion:

No sign of Gil as far as we could tell, but there's Bruce Bennett helping out on guitar and knowledge of tunes common and obscure.

Superfun.

And now, to read Patti's book until I drift into oblivion.

Even yet still more birthdays

"What?" you say, "Haven't we had enough of these incessant birthday celebrations you keep babbling about? Is nothing going on in the world besides celebrations of the day somebody happened to be born? Because, you know what? I think a few other things are going on!"

Yes, you may say that, and you'd have a point. But let's look at the data from another vantage: today is not simply the birthday of Ira Glass of This American Life. It's not just the birthday of actresses Miranda Richardson and Jessica Biel and the 100th birthday of Jean Harlow. It's not only the birthday of inventor Alexander Graham Bell and athletes Herschel Walker and Jackie Joyner-Kersee. Nay - it is also the birthday (and not just any birthday, but his 13th birthday: that luckiest of numbers and his entree to the world of teenagedness) of my very own nephew Sam, who's way out in Phoenix and I won't be able to see him, but it's worth celebrating anyway, wouldn't you say?

Happy Birthday, Sister!

In honor of what I hope is a VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY for one of my favorite women - my sister Lori - here's an article from Gloria Steinem in today's Times Style Magazine. As reproductive rights, health care, and women's rights in general have been taking some punishment lately (that's putting it lightly) we can take some small comfort (while continuing the resistance to such hideous attempts) that the Senate and White House will surely stifle the attacks (right??) and that there is also some really good news out there in terms of women in politics and policy that should not be allowed to be buried under the depressing weight of "reality" TV.

I have some mixed feelings about the fact that this piece ended up in the Style Magazine, but no matter what ads surround it, this reminder is welcome and overdue. Thanks, Gloria.

Happy Birthday Lori!!

On Wisconsin

This is a bizarre time. There is something very much like a full-on attack on women's rights and workers' rights going on in the U.S. right now, but there are some heartening developments: the Justice Department backing away from the "Defense of Marriage Act;" widespread popular resistance in Wisconsin. (though I have to ask, as I did in November - where well all y'all on Election Day when your brothers and sisters voted those union busters in?)

Not surprisingly, both trends are easier to spot if you peek a little bit beyond the mainstream media. Ladies and Gents, I love the Times in a bunch of ways, but it is now what it pretty much always has been: a tool of big business. It's just extra-special obvious these days.

I went to a rally by the FOX news building the other day to stand with my union in support of the workers. I was glad to be part of it, but it was kind of deflating too. A few hundred people doesn't seem like that many in a city of this size. And there's something downright sad about hearing a 'the workers united will never be defeated' chant fall apart in disunity (while on the other side the "FOX lies!" chant faded away, in spite of its accuracy).

So today I thought I'd share with you something I never thought would get any space in this forum: a link to community access TV in Madison. It's every bit as cheesy as you'd think it would be in some ways, but Wayne's World it ain't. There was just a live stream of Amy Goodman and Sharif Abdel Kouddous speaking at a theater near the Square; and citizens talking in church basements about the practical aspects and repercussions of limiting Medicaid, and the philosophies of Bob La Follette's is actually pretty cool to see.

Photo from The Progressive Catholic Voice, copyright 2011

The Empress of Sex

That being the title of the play we performed (well, in staged reading form) with the Hive Theater company a few weeks ago in Times Square. It was, of course, somber tragedy. Oh wait, no: it was a sex comedy. A ridiculous sex comedy. I have described it thusly: "Sort of a live-in-person cross of The Hangover, No Strings Attached, Twelfth Night, and that cable series Spartacus. Maybe a dash of Porky's." Like I said, ridiculous. BUT - with some good writing, some good acting, some good music, and plenty of laughs, if I may say so myself.

It was very staged for a reading, so there was also some skin. One purpose of a staged reading is to get a sense of how a show might work in full production, and this is one of those shows that you really just won't be able to tell how it works if there isn't a certain amount of boobage. And butts. And simulated sex acts. Cory came with our friend Joe and they were sitting at about the 4th table back (this happened in a comedy club with cabaret-style seating). One of her comments was something along the lines of: "I didn't have a very good view of that part where you were on the floor surrounded by those three topless muses and you had all those boobs in your face. Yeah, I was ok with that." It was a big mess, but legitimately funny, I think, and quite a bit of fun for a bunch of people.

And no, I did not show any excess skin of my own. Probably for the best...

And Speaking of Birthdays...

Yesterday was James Dean's 80th. Which is worth mentioning.



I don't know where this photo is from or what photographer to credit, but I love it.

And tomorrow is JP's b-day. And Laura Dern's. Pretty good company, friend.

More Fun with Economics

Would it be curmudgeonly, in this era of Celebrating Reagan's Centennary, to remind people that his so-called Economic Theories were big steaming piles of (oh, let's be kind) error? I say 'so-called' to modify the word 'his' in that sentence, because I remain unconvinced that the Gipper himself ever did so much as pay attention through an extended, detailed economic discussion, much less come up with any actual theory, even one as elementally flawed as Trickle-Down. [He sure was good at selling those bullet points, though, wasn't he?] The term 'so-called' also applies to the word "theories" in that sentence too, because I think what we're talking about as far as Reaganomics is concernes is more of a Sales Pitch. Or maybe a Snow Job. Or a really really BIG Big Con.

You see, a real live scientific theory is based on logic, evidence and/or applicable principles, is proveable and repeatable. Trickle Down is based on made-up logic, has no evidence backing it up, and counts on specious principles involving an impulse among profit-driven corporations to share with each other and with the workforce out of the goodness of their hearts, or maybe some sense of patriotic responsibility. (I know, I know - but a lot of people bought it then, and buy it now.) And what's been proved, repeatedly, is that these sorts of policies lead, not to increased job creation, but to increased poverty, and to a big increase in the gap between rich and poor.

Along these lines, read this piece by Robert Reich. It doesn't mention our dear departed national treasure by name, but it does paint a picture of the indelicate balance between Reaganomics and what's starting to look like Obamanomics.

...I've been watching (and occasionally trying to deal with) the Chamber [of Commerce] for years, and all I know is it has a deep, abiding belief in cutting taxes on the wealthy, eroding regulations that constrain Wall Street, cutting back on rules that promote worker health and safety, getting rid of the minimum wage, repealing the new health-care law, fighting unions, cutting back Medicare and Social Security, reducing or eliminating corporate taxes, and, in general, taking the nation back to the days before the New Deal.

There's no secret to creating lots of jobs by reducing the median wage, slashing benefits, compromising health and safety at the workplace, and, effectively, reducing the standard of living of millions of Americans. We've been doing it for years.

Those people who consider this situation to be perhaps less-than-ideal should pay extra-special attention to policy developments that are presented as 'victories.'

And, oh yes, no disrespect meant toward the Great Communicator who restored everyone's faith in Democracy and made people Believe in America (all rights reserved) again. National Treasure, American Hero, God rest and keep him safe in Mary's bosom.

(Not much of an actor, though...)

Some Kind of Sunday

Ok.

I have my Packers t-shirt.

I have my GO PACK GO sign.

I have all the fixings for a big vat of chili.

My friend (from Green Bay, no less) who is hosting the party is putting together a big spread of Wisconsin cheeses to make grilled cheese sandwiches.

There will be beer.

One of my best friends who is doing very well in acting is THERE in Dallas playing in a 'celebrity' flag football game and gets to go to The Game too.

That is all. Carry on.

Oh wait, one more thing:

Go Pack GO!!!!