A little harsh first thing on Monday morning

It's Monday morning, a day when I was working I dreaded. But now I awaken when I awaken, eat when I want to eat, check out the weather to decide if I will venture out today, and if not maybe catch a movie on the TV. But today I decided to flick on the internet and see what has been stirring as I slept. My God the first crack out of the box I read this little article from the Washington Post. Now I don't think I am over sensitive on the subject or unaware of old folks importance in the scheme of things at my stage of life, but this..this was a little harsh, not new news but the first thing on Monday morning? Jeeze!!

Sorry, older folks, but by some business strategies, you're obsolete

By John Kelly

Tuesday, March 15, 2011; 11:42 AM

No offense, but if you are old, no one cares about you.

They don't care what makes you happy. They don't care what makes you sad. They don't care what opinions you have, how you spend your time, or what your life was like before you were old.

I come to this conclusion sadly, but not surprisingly. It was ever thus. Life is a factory that turns babies into old men and women. To be human is to be on a constantly-moving conveyor belt. The people at the beginning of the conveyor belt don't think they have much in common with those at the end of it.

For example, dozens of people called and e-mailed me to express how disappointed they are that Verizon is discontinuing its 936- weather line and 844- time line. In the space of just 10 minutes last week, I spoke with two women who both began the conversation exactly the same way: "I'm 89-years-old, and I call that every day."

All I could think was: "Eighty-nine years old? Oh, sweetheart, Verizon really doesn't give a blip about you."

And why should Verizon? Save for a few outliers who are in their 30s or 40s and have kids who dial the weather line, the phone company knows most of the service's users are older people who will be dead before too long.

Verizon would never say that, of course, but behind its pronouncement that the service is obsolete - supplanted by shiny new technologies - is the unspoken belief that the people who use it are a bit obsolete as well - and supplanted by shiny new people.

And I'm afraid many of the people who have gotten in touch with me do little to refute that argument. "I do not have Internet at home," wrote one. Several others wrote that they don't want to have to turn on their computers first thing in the morning to check the weather.

You mean your laptop isn't blazing away 24/7? What's wrong with you?!

We definitely have a prickly generation gap. Some of the people who commented on my story online were downright contemptuous of the people who were still clinging to the service. "Take your head out of the sand," wrote one. "There's a whole new world out there."

DCist, the Web site for the young and hip, snarkily headlined its blog post: "Verizon Killing Weather, Time Service You Didn't Know Still Existed."

(Age contempt can go both ways, it should be pointed out. I remember how irritated I was as a teenager when old people - in their 20s, say - wouldn't take me seriously.)

Verizon won't tell me how many people use the service. It apparently isn't enough to make it worth the company's while, even as a public service - a public service for blind people, several of whom contacted me. And rheumatoid arthritis sufferers, who base their dosage on the day's barometric pressure and told me the recorded weather report on Verizon is the only regular source of that information. And people whose homes lose power all the time, where the land line phone is the only thing that works, and thus the only source of weather information.

(I know some younger readers are going: Land line phone! Where do you keep it, Grandpa? Next to the Victrola?)

Someone started a Facebook page "Save the Verizon DC Weather Line." As of Monday, a paltry 99 people had "liked" it. But then that's not really how members of the weather-line demographic would express themselves, is it? They would write Verizon a letter, which would be ignored. They would call Verizon's toll-free number, then give up when they got mired in automated phone-tree hell.

I hear from lots of readers in this job, so many that I can't remember them all. But there's one reader I can't forget: a woman who called not long after I started writing this column seven years ago. I don't recall the exact topic of her call, just that she felt she was having trouble articulating what she wanted to say.

"You'll have to forgive me," she said, flustered. "I've never been old before."

No one has. Getting old - being old - will be new for each of us. It would be nice if we could show the same sort of empathy while we're young that we hope we're shown when we're old.

By the way, Verizon's fourth-quarter profits last year were $4.65 billion.

The sign says:

If you've had enough snow and cold, PLEASE raise your hands.



We have had two days of sun in a row and we have taken to the road. Of course we are septuagenarians and a half hour of 'walk' is about enough for now.

chess game comes alive through claymation

I've played some games that feel as exciting as a war, but mostly I am outmatched and lose meekly and quickly.

Coney's built at home

All you out there who like occasionally to partake of "coney's" will want to take heed of this product. When we get hungry for a coney, but don't want to drive to where they are, we sometimes go the home-made route. Of course onions, and mustard are no problem, but the sauce is usually not exactly right. Except this time we have found one that is really very good, and it is spicy too. Tony Packo's hot dog sauce, which we found at Krogers is great. Try it coney fans.

The natives are getting restless

..taken out of context. Written by Ronni Bennett of the website TIME GOES BY.

I wish I trusted the president. What have we gotten from him in a little more than two years?

A transfer of untold riches from the citizens to banks and corporations
Collapse of housing values, impoverishing millions of non-rich people
Refusal to prosecute the perpetrators of this transfer of wealth
Continuation of senseless wars at the cost of trillions of dollars and thousands of lives
Reduced taxes for the rich
Elimination of public unions
And now he will not speak out to assure today's and future elders that he will defend the most successful social program in the history of the United States (probably the world), one the people have paid for from their wages and has nothing to do with the deficit.

Worse, it will not surprise me if the president signs a budget bill that includes those $1.7 billion in Social Security cuts.

Obama entered office at an extraordinary moment in American history when the people of the nation were in dire need, hurting nearly as much as during the 1930s. He could have used his office, his power, his bully pulpit to hold fast against Republicans and tea partiers and thereby have become one of the great presidents.

Instead, he bowed to the wealthy, leaving everyone else to fend for themselves.

No way do I believe that McCain/Palin would have done better. And I don't see a single person on the Republican roster whom I could vote for in 2012, even holding my nose.

That leaves only one recourse: constant, unrelenting protest via phone, email, blog posts, urging friends and relatives to do so too and, when the time comes, showing up for demonstrations in our cities and states.

Garrison Keillor Says He’ll Retire In 2013 « CBS Minnesota

Garrison Keillor Says He’ll Retire In 2013 « CBS Minnesota

Should I Buy an IPAD2?

I have been pondering whether I should buy an ipad. I currently have a laptop pc, and a kindle ereader and am happy with both. But for some reason I keep trying to justify bringing home an ipad, which is not an easy decision. After all it requires me slapping down five hundred bucks, and I don't do that willy nilly. I reached out to google to help me persuade myself one way or the other. I zeroed in on these two websites and they answered my questions.

3 questions you should ask before buying an ipad2

Rock, paper, scissors, should I buy a ipad 2, kindle, or a pc



These two sites helped me make my decision. Take a look for yourself.

The Japanese Catastrophy

Can I feel sorry for a country? Of course I can. Japan is suffering through its third nuclear attack. This current one is not from an enemy nation, but from within. This one portends to be worse than the other two as it seems impossible at this time to stop its growing menace to the population. I read now that it has the capacity to work its way into the food and water sources. The pictures we see show devastation as bad as or worse than during world war II, as one nuclear reactor fails after the other, and another.

We here in the states have made jokes about the situation on twitter, and others have breathed a sigh of relief that most importunately their investments are safe. This is from just a micro-small percentage of people, but wouldn't you think they could just shut up with the jokes or the greed of worrying about their bottom line for all the world to hear.

When the situation settles itself, it will be time for us to become a good world neighbor and do whatever is asked of us, but until then concern and caring and a prayer or two is not too much to ask of a civilized society one for another.

Funny People: OGDEN NASH

Ogden Nash

Frederic Ogden Nash was born in 1902 in Rye, New York.

This American humorist was educated at Harvard University, and his comical and nonsensical verses are what made him famous. Puns, rhymes, asymetrical lines, and amusing parenthetical statements were what made Nash's verses amusing and magical.

"The Termite"

Some primal termite knocked on wood
And tasted it, and found it good,
And that is why your Cousin May
Fell through the parlor floor today.

"The Fly"

God in his wisdom made the fly
And then forgot to tell us why.

Set your clock ahead

Daylight savings time is in effect reminder.

Matilda

Needs a couple clicks to enlarge it. Enjoy

TV I LIKE CURRENTLY.

TV watching of my favorite shows makes a slim listing. Right now I think my favorite is Blue Bloods with Tom Selleck and Donny Wahlberg. I've liked Wahlberg since I caught him in the series BAND OF BROTHERS, and Selleck forever. I think Selleck is a presence on the small screen now. He's getting older and he can play moody characters. He looks great with that great mustache ala Sam Elliot.

A funny one I like is THE MIDDLE. It stars EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMONDS tv wife Patricia Heaton. It is great, it always assures laughs. She has the quirkiest kids on tv, and this time quirky means nothing but good.

Finally for a serial type show, THE WIFE can't be beaten. Good acting all around every week and great writing, which of course is the thing that you have to have to stick around any length of time.

MAD MEN when they're around is fun.

Double Lemon

My sweet tooth is compelled to report on a great dessert. This was sighted and landed at our local Wal-Mart. Double Lemon, lemon muffin filled with lemon pudding. Oh Yeah, it is sooo goood. Those extra o's denote oh so good.

Veggies, picked for taste or looks? Both I think.

Hazel has a love affair with her camera and shopping for veggies. I think she starts out with recipes in mind, but I'm not too sure she isn't struck by colors and shapes in her selections. Whatever, when it gets to me at the table it is ultra yummy.

Superfunny

Comment accompanying superman: That’s the stupidest damn thing, and it makes me smile every time i see it.

I agree.

Doctors Who Feel Your Pain Heal More Patients

Doctors Who Feel Your Pain Heal More Patients

This is a subject that causes my blood to start percolating. Fourteen years after the fact I still look back and my blood turns cold. I had just retired from the work-a-day world, and was feeling great, that is except for a little back pain. I went to the doctor and he took x-rays and prescribed some pain pills. I returned for a follow-up and the doctor took another x-ray, then asked me to walk for him. I did. He did not like the way I walked, and looked at the x-ray once again. He sat me down, and said he had no good way to tell me this, but I had multiple myloma and it was fatal. He asked for an interview with my wife. At the interview, he questioned our glum attitudes saying, "why so glum? I had two years to live. On the strength of one x-ray he diagnosed me as having a fatal disease. To make a long story short, they put me through three weeks of tests until they finally did a biopsy. It turned out I had disease of the hip and it was a mess. The x-rays had shown that part of my anatomy as a black area and the doctor had concluded it was a malignant cancer. It turned out it was a missed diagnoses and I am still here, but the cavalier and unfeeling way he treated me and my wife I still find unconscionable. He did the right things, but in a cold uncaring way that scalded those days on my memory. I still get chills thinking of it. It would not have changed anything in the final outcome, but a few kind words at that moment would have made what followed much easier to take. I understand that doctors cannot become personally involved in all their patients lives and still maintain some objectivity, but ice cold indifference is unacceptable.

Queen Victoria becomes political commentator

For us in Ohio the queen is not speaking with forked tongue. There was never much of a chance that it would ever really happen, but I sort of hoped it would. The Tories, oh I mean the republicans have taken over and they took care of any chance very nicely.

An old joke

ca·no·pic jar noun \kə-ˈnō-pik-, -ˈnä-\
Definition of CANOPIC JAR

: a jar in which the ancient Egyptians preserved the viscera of a deceased person usually for burial with the mummy


Origin of CANOPIC JAR

Canopus, Egyptian
First Known Use: 1893

Ben Goossens

Take a look at Ben Goossens

Ah, Life condensed to the basics.

The Factory

Yes it was a real factory. It has long been abandoned and will be demolished this spring. In its heyday it stood on three square blocks.

THE FACTORY

A PROSE POEM
By Jim Kittelberger





The smell that permeated for miles around, a mixture of smoke, exhausts and that slight aroma of something electrical burning, was an unmistakable beacon, an unneeded street sign that harkened all who would encroach upon these streets that you had entered the dedicated area that the factory dominated, lock, stock and people. For indeed the people who populated the streets a mile hence and a mile yon were assets of the factory as if they were iron ore or coal.



The factory that spread over six city blocks consumed raw materials and people twenty-four hours a day, its insatiable appetite never sated never tired never rested. As it’s appetite increased, train tracks were laid to accommodate boxcars filled with more and more fodder pouring into the bottomless maw. Conveyor belts sped the metal, the rubber, the glass, north, south, east and west into every environ of the factory to be hammered, screwed, shaped, cut, shined, buffed, fitted, assembled into product by human beings rooted into one spot receiving, performing a task, moving it on; receiving, performing a task, moving it on; receiving, performing a task, moving it on and on and on until every muscle, every nerve, every part of the persons brain wishes to scream, STOP, I’m a person, I have an identity, I am someone. But the factory does not care about your identity, your thoughts, your hopes, your fears. They want product, product, product. Do your task or move away to be replaced by another nameless raw material in the never-ending chain, in and out, in and out, faster, faster and faster. Product is profit, more product means more profit. A Christmas turkey and fifty dollars is yours if you hold on. What about the wife and kids, the bills, the bills, the bills.



Hands wrinkled, scarred and aching reach for the gold watch as the speaker talks about the years of devotion to the factory. Legs tired and arthritic struggle one last time through the factory saying good-bye to younger faces still not lined with worry, searching in vain for those he finally remembers went out before him. Slowly, sadly, he struggles toward the exit one last time. The factory has used him up, has taken all that he had to give and threw it onto the conveyor belt to be used along with the metal, the rubber, the glass, his sweat, his sinew, his spirit and converted it all into product.



The weather is sweet and the smell of the factory hardly recognizable anymore as the rocking chair on the porch beckons him and he willingly lowers his used up body, sighs a little and soon dies.



The factory sends its regrets, misspells his name, and states he was a fine man and is sure that his son’s will live up to their father’s legacy at the factory.

EPILOGUE:

My grandfather and my father spent their lives in that factory. I didn't, I couldn't follow in their footsteps. Perhaps it was the oncoming technological age, I was able to see possibilities where they didn't. I can't say I achieved great things, I did not, but my spirit was never crushed out of my body by years of hard mind crushing labor. In defense of my fore bearers they never seemed beaten by the factory so perhaps it is all a state of mind.

Grapes of Wrath today.

The country continues its slippery slope to the right as Ohio eliminated the right of its public workers to collective bargaining. Gasoline is increasing quickly upward in large increments. Food prices are rising each week. Driving on Ohio's roads which are disintegrating it seems hourly and town budgets nearly empty makes driving an all-season sport with weaving and dodging necessary to maintain your cars alignment and undercarriage. Repair of the roads in the spring is dicey as town treasuries are nearly empty. I remember Obama mentioning on the stump again and again that our infrastructure is a must do. I sometimes still hear echo's of that refrain, but nothing happens anywhere to show proof that its or will be done. I fear for those citizens of our country whose bottom line has completely run dry with little hope of refilling it anytime soon. It's all starting to look and feel like grapes of wrath in everybody's backyard.

How much money is enough?

From the Washington Post

Here's something to think about as Congress tries to agree on budget cuts. A report by

Moody's Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi says the Republican plan to cut federal

spending by $61 billion this year would destroy 700,000 jobs through 2012. Zandi's

report follows a Goldman Sachs report whose conclusion was even more dire: The

proposed cuts would slow economic growth by two percent in the second and third

quarters of this year. The report isn't all ammunition for Democrats, though. Zandi

also says that even a thriving economy won't be enough to balance the budget

without "significant government spending restraint."

» Read it at The Washington Post

wouldn't $61 billion be considered enough of a significant government spending cut to do the trick?

Does anybody around here know what they are doing? No, I don't think so. Please dear God, save

us from the experts and the politicians. Does anyone who is supposed to be running our ship of

state have any idea what they are doing. No, I think it's all a roll of the dice. If this doesn't work

let's try this. Oh nuts we all know what they are, they're all jerks.

Natalie Portman and her IQ

Do you want to feel a little better? Do you want to feel more optimistic about our future? Although these women have to thank genetics or just luck for their IQ's I don't care, it makes me feel good to read about it. Especially when being bombarded by unwanted news about Charley Sheen and schnooks like him. Take a look.

From Mental Floss re: A signer of the Declaration of Independence

Reese Witherspoon is a direct descendant of John Witherspoon, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. I think that may be as awesome or maybe more so than an ancestor coming over on the Mayflower.

John Witherspoon – the one who coined “Americanism”Originally hailing from Scotland, Rev. John Witherspoon was the only active member of the clergy to sign the Declaration. His legacy in America, though, isn’t in politics, but in education – Witherspoon was the sixth president of the College of New Jersey, now known as Princeton University. It took two years for representatives of the school to get Witherspoon to come to America (his wife in particular was initially opposed to the idea). Once the reverend took over at the helm in 1768, the school flourished.

According to the president’s biography on the Princeton website, he was “a man of strong convictions,” but introduced students to ideas with which he had publicly disagreed. He is remembered as a dynamic intellectual who brought the thinking of the Scottish Enlightenment into the mainstream in the colonies. Indeed, his ideas have a direct link to the nation’s history, since the students who graduated during his tenure included one president (James Madison), one vice-president (Aaron Burr), 60 members of Congress and three Supreme Court justices.

But even though he had only a meek presence in the political sphere, Witherspoon was the person who coined the term “Americanism” in an essay on language. When John Adams visited Princeton in 1774, he met with Witherspoon and was seriously impressed. The future president of the U.S. said the college president was “as high a Son of Liberty, as any man in America.”

On a less historical note, Reese Witherspoon, who played Elle Woods in the Legally Blonde movies, is a direct descendant. John would surely be proud.

The inventor of the computer died last year.

The man who mentored Bill Gates and Paul Allen died last year.

H. Edward Roberts was given his due by Gates and Allen

eeeek, it's alive!!

If you were a fan of sci-fi you would have loved these comics. The subject was always indestructible, at least for a while. Great imaginations and dedication to the genre must have been a necessity for the creators of the magazine.

We do other important things such as....

Indeed it is as good as it is advertised.

lol

Banksy's Girl with Red Balloon

Banksy is the pseudonym of a British graffiti artist, political activist and painter, whose identity is unconfirmed.

The Computer Moves In

The cover picture and story are talking about this new thing in town, the computer. It is unbelievable it was only 28 years ago when it was a new toy that we were wondering what does it do? can we play games on it? is it an encyclopedia? we didn't have any idea did we? What a 28 years it has been technology-wise.


The Computer Moves In. READ WHAT WE WERE THINKING.

Gershwin

Book review: 'George Gershwin,' a new biography by Larry Starr
Sunday, February 20, 2011; B06

It is a truth universally acknowledged that George Gershwin (1898-1937) wrote some irresistible melodies. After that, the debate begins.

Was Gershwin an inspired tunesmith, pure and simple, who nevertheless remained a rank amateur when he attempted to compose in larger forms, such as in his piano concertos or for the opera house? Or did his early death rob us of a distinctly American master, somebody who might have yoked all the strains that made up our wondrously polyglot musical culture of the mid-20th century - jazz, blues, popular song, European classical stylings, modernist experimentation - into a sustained and unified expression?

Larry Starr's valuable new book, titled simply "George Gershwin," makes a strong case for the latter view. This is not a traditional biography (although Starr shares some potent biographical vignettes in a section called "Snapshots") but rather an insightful, technically intricate yet easy-to-follow study of Gershwin's music, particularly as it came out of the Broadway tradition. For, whatever else he was or might have become, Gershwin was a creature of American musical theater: He wrote the music for 19 complete shows on Broadway or on film and concluded his career with the opera "Porgy and Bess."

Starr traces the evolution of Gershwin's style through an in-depth examination of two of the composer's most famous songs - "The Man I Love," written for one of his first hit shows, "Lady Be Good" (1924); and "Love Walked In" (1937), published six months after the composer's death - in loving and precise detail. He sets the scene, comparing Gershwin to two other Broadway composers, Jerome Kern and Irving Berlin, without attempting to elevate one at the expense of another. "Berlin and Gershwin (and Kern, and [Richard] Rodgers, and [Cole] Porter; the list could go on and on) were constantly listening to and learning from one another in an environment that was as stimulating and nurturing as it was competitive," the author observes.

The book's tour de force is probably the 33-page chapter devoted to "Of Thee I Sing," a musical comedy about American politics, which opened at New York's Music Box Theater in December 1931 and which Starr describes, Monty Python-style, as "Something Completely Different." It was, and the overture must have mystified its first listeners. "There was no traditional curtain-raising musical gesture leading quickly into a memorable tune," Starr recounts. "Indeed, the overture and 'Wintergreen for President' could justifiably leave one wondering whether in fact this material is truly Gershwin's, or the work of some previously unknown but brilliant theater composer who had obviously learned a lot from Gershwin, while managing to forge a fresh and highly personal musical language of his own." Such insights abound throughout the book.

Which leads us inevitably to "Porgy and Bess." The composer and critic Virgil Thomson summed up Gershwin's only more-or-less traditional opera with his usual pith, calling it "an interesting example of what can be done by talent in spite of a bad set up. With a libretto that should never have been accepted on a subject that should never have been chosen, a man who should never have attempted it has written a work that has some power and importance."

Thomson's qualification is a savvy one. Nobody, to my knowledge, has ever doubted the beauty and energy of the best music in "Porgy." Yet once "Summertime," "Bess, You Is My Woman Now," "It Ain't Necessarily So" and several of the other hits have been sung and played, what remains - for some of us, at least - is a dreary, awkward and unbearably ponderous opera that feels longer than two back-to-back performances of Wagner's "Ring" cycle.

Starr hears it differently: "It is difficult to conceive just how Gershwin might have gone beyond 'Porgy and Bess.' The work is so rich, consisting virtually of one musical and dramatic high point after another, that it can seem as if Gershwin was determined to pour every last ounce of himself into this single opus." He calls it a "special, monumental, and ultimately unclassifiable achievement in a brilliant and unclassifiable career." Many musicians and scholars will agree with him, and they will find thoughtful, passionate support in this book. And so the debate continues.

Tim Page is a professor of journalism and music at the University of Southern California. His most recent book is "Parallel Play."

GEORGE GERSHWIN

By Larry Starr

Yale Univ. 194 pp. $45

George Gershwin

By Larry Starr

Yale Univ. 194 pp. $45

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Kopi Luwak: The World's Most Expensive Coffee

Kopi Luwak: The World's Most Expensive Coffee From Time magazine these few facts upfront. It costs $227 per pound, and the essential ingredient is parts of a stool from a civet. My wife's humor was in high gear this morning, she says it must be a mom and poop business. Sorry, but to paraphrase a show title from years ago, its all part of the wide world of weirdness.

5 best twilight zones

From THE GREAT ENTERTAINERS MEDIA ARCHIVE this post of the five best Twilight Zones. It does not include my favorite. An old country boy and his dog drown together and go to heaven is my favorite. Check out the archive, a good site.

cat herding is tough business

Just saw this on TIME GOES BY and had to pass it along. Not new but vintage.

President chat

Not particularly funny, but I thought it was kind of nice having the guys out and about and chatting again.

New World Symphony "Largo"

Marin Alsop explains the New World Symphony

April 18, 2008 - Dvorak's Symphony No. 9, the New World Symphony, is played so often that it runs the risk of sounding hackneyed. That fact became painfully obvious to me during a recent visit to Japan, when I heard the symphony's beautiful English horn melody in a cheesy, electronic rendition, signaling "all clear to walk" at a bustling Sapporo intersection.

As I returned to Dvorak's popular symphony recently, I was struck by how incredibly fresh the music really is. I was reminded of how Johannes Brahms was moved by Dvorak's melodic gifts, as well as his ability to spin a seemingly infinite number of variations on a tune. This, combined with Dvorak's Bohemian heritage, results in music unlike any other composer's.

Symphony No. 9 is nicknamed New World because Dvorak wrote it during the time he spent in the U.S. in the 1890s. His experiences in America (including his discovery of African-American and Native-American melodies) and his longing for home color his music with mixed emotions. There's both a yearning that simmers and an air of innocence.

The music, for me, evokes images. As the symphony opens, I picture Dvorak at the stern of the ship that carries him to America, away from his country. As the land drifts out of sight, he is suddenly jarred by the thought of the unknown with a blast from the French horn.

This slow introduction conveys many emotions — sadness, fear, suspense, even a ray of hope — in its brief 23 measures, until Dvorak eventually chooses which main melody will take over the main part of the movement. A nostalgic folk tune provides simplicity and variety, leading to the second theme, which is really a variation of what came before, illustrating Dvorak's inventiveness with melody.

The New World Symphony's best-known melody surfaces in the "Largo" movement, with its aching English horn solo. It was later adapted into the song "Goin' Home" by Harry Burleigh, a black composer whom Dvorak befriended while in New York. But I'm always moved by the church-like chords that come before that now-famous tune. In a stroke of innovative genius, Dvorak brings these opening chords back at the climax of the finale, where all the melodies from the symphony, reappear, transformed by the journey.

In the scherzo movement that follows, Dvorak explores the dance rhythms and melodies of his heritage. They feel new and fresh, yet familiar at the same time. It contrasts with the finale, which begins with a newfound urgency, setting up the nobility and majesty of the main melody heard in the brass.

The New World Symphony is for me, above all, a journey — Dvorak's journey to America, getting to know its people. But more importantly, it's Dvorak's own spiritual and emotional journey: from his intense longing for his beloved Bohemia to the thrill of the "new world" and its varied peoples, to thoughts of going home.

When all the melodies return at the end of the symphony, I feel as though Dvorak's American adventure has come full circle. The end reminds me of an old film where the last scene is frozen and the circle of the lens closes in until a black screen is all that remains.

Nanking

I finished re-reading WAR AND REMEMBRANCE. For those who have read the book will remember, it depicts in length scenes of cruelty and inhumanity to man in it's depictions of several death camps. What the Germans were capable of boggles the mind.

In another book by Iris Chang, THE RAPE OF NANKING depicts the Japanese killings of mass numbers of Chinese, 350,000 men, women and children killed and raped. Those of us who have never fired a gun in anger or had one fired at us sometimes find it hard to believe these events took place only 70 some years ago.

One other detail if you watch the film NANKING, one of the people in the group John Rabe, who tried to save as many Chinese as he could was unbelievably a member of the Nazi party in Germany. He attempted to get Hitler to intervene. He alone saved 200,000 souls. How could this be? My only thought is that he was a party member in the thirties and he did not really know what Hitler would turn into. Maybe, I don't know.

Watch more free documentaries

Watson bests Jennings and Rutter

The computer beat the daylights out of the two former champions, and I'm not sure what it means. I did see when Watson got control of the button he was too fast for the human brain to finger reflex. Is Watson smarter than the humans? I don't know.

It does prove that computer technology continues to blaze a trail to I don't know where. I will not be around to see where it leads, but won't it be exciting.

Greatly entertaining for 4 mins and 47 seconds.

Barbershop champions, DON'T LEAVE. Try it you will be glad you did.

Edward Hopper, American Artist

a snack fan alert

cheez-it fans!! a new flavor 'baby swiss' is available and it is yummo.

Abigail Washburn 3 song set

a couple sad notes and a couple funny things

On the sad side two deaths. George Shearing the pianist, and Kenneth Mars who was a funny man and who appeared in What's Up Doc.

On the funny side Simon the cat, and a cartoon that is very timely with the academy awards just around the corner.

Watson versus Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter

IBM has built a computer that they think can beat the two best JEOPARDY players ever. The testing is done, and this week Monday through Wednesday Watson will play Ken Jennings who has won more games than anyone ever, and Brad Rutter who has won more money than anyone ever. It ought to be great to watch. CHECK IT OUT.

Hazel's Cancer Journey

Thank God Hazel's mammogram came back clear. Who was worried? I think this calls for a trip to the DQ for a Buster Bar. Hazel says: YAHOO!!

lol.com

Bad Birthmark

Whoa, maybe a trip to the nip and tuck guys is in order, or a long coat.

Is Parental Advice Wanted?

I don't remember my dad giving me any advice. He was of the generation that believed in strong and silent. I grew up in the silent generation and didn't really want too much advice. I bet there is a parenting for dummies book available, or plenty of reruns on Dr. Phil that covers the subject. Is Jerry Stringer still on? Now there was a hands on approach, although the encounter sessions were dangerous. Watch out for that flying chair! Giving advice can be a violent business. Careful out there.

Telling My Kids About Cancer: An Excerpt from The Foremost Good Fortune by Susan Conley - The Daily Beast

Telling My Kids About Cancer: An Excerpt from The Foremost Good Fortune by Susan Conley - The Daily Beast

An excerpt from a new book just out titled THE FOREMOST GOOD FORTUNE by Susan Conley. I have some personal experience (one person removed) trying to cope with the catastrophe that is cancer. My wife Hazel is a cancer victim and a one year survivor. We have consumed untold articles and news releases from all over the world on the subject. We have become very familiar with doctor speak, and odds, and living with it everyday. One conclusion I have come to is that women are much braver than men or maybe I should just say, me. I am not someone who would be chosen as a press secretary for the cancer society.

In order for Hazel to start her second year as a survivor she has to undergo a mammography and a visit once again to her oncologists for their interpretation of what the picture on the black celluloid x-ray where all our hopes and prayers and crossed fingers are focused says to their trained eyes. By all accounts she should be fine because like the old song by Helen Reddy, I AM WOMAN, I AM STRONG, she is handling it all very well. I on the other hand...well.

OMG Not a chocolate shortage.

World chocolate shortage ahead?

Cocoa futures are near three-year highs as a drought in Africa combines with changing consumer tastes to pressure the chocolate supply.
By Elizabeth Strott

It's every chocolate lover's nightmare: a chocolate shortage.

A drought in Western Africa and unrest in the Ivory Coast -- the world's biggest cocoa producer -- has combined with rising consumer taste for cocoa-rich dark chocolate to raise concerns about a shortage in supply.
As a result, cocoa futures have been trading at three-year highs, with prices rallying since the beginning of the year.
"In the last few months, cocoa prices have rallied on expectations for a smaller crop from the Ivory Coast and Ghana," said Boyd Cruel, a senior analyst at Alaron Trading who covers the cocoa market.

Talk back: Are you ready to pay more for chocolate?
World production of cocoa is down 5.5% on a year-over-year basis from 2005-2006, according to the International Cocoa Organization -- and cocoa's price has risen 44% since November 2005.
But don't fret over $5 Snickers bars just yet: Cruel said that markets have already factored in the supply issue. The highs reached this week are technical in nature, he said, because news of the drought has been out for months.
Another commodities analyst agrees.
"On the fundamental side, we don't expect to see changes in demand," Barclays' Sudakshina Unnikrishnan told Bloomberg News from London. "Going into the second quarter, the real wild card continues to be based on the conditions and political situation in Ivory Coast."
Blame the trend?
Part of the problem, say chocolate experts: As customer taste has shifted from milk chocolate to dark, demand for cocoa has risen; the darker the chocolate, the more cocoa is required for production.
Dark chocolate has recently been considered the "healthier" of the chocolates, with high levels of flavonoid antioxidants; it has also been found to lower blood pressure.

(Yes I need my medicine)

Chocolate manufacturers have been happy to encourage the trend, as dark chocolate is also a higher-margin product.
"Consumers are very interested in the goodness benefits of chocolate, including the antioxidants found naturally in dark chocolate," said Michele Buck, Hershey (HSY, news, msgs) chief marketing officer, in a statement today. "This interest is driving explosive growth in dark chocolate."
In the U.K., dark chocolate bars are outselling their milk chocolate relatives in the retail chain Woolworths for the first time ever. In the United States, retail sales of chocolate have climbed about 3% every year since 2000, the National Confectioners Association has reported, with dark chocolate one of the fastest-growing categories.
Get free, real-time stock quotes on MSN Money
"Two years ago the hot thing in chocolate was white. Now dark is the flavor of the month," Woolworths CEO Trevor Bish-Jones told British paper The Independent. "Consumers are doing the same thing in chocolate as in the rest of the food market. They are trading up and being more discerning about what they buy," Bish-Jones said.
Should candy companies worry?
In the short term, candy companies like Hershey and Cadbury Schweppes (CSG, news, msgs)should be able to absorb the boost in price as they hedge aggressively for the volatile cocoa market.
"In terms of resell prices, this won't have a major impact immediately," Alaron Trading's Cruel said.
But there could be problems down the road if the drought continues.

The Last Time the Cavaliers won...

The last time the Cavs won - Twitter users put Cavs streak in context


The Cavaliers' losing streak has reached historic proportions, and social media has taken notice yesterday as the the Twitter hashtag #lasttimethecavswon became a trending topic.

Here is a sampling of what Twitter users all over the world had to offer in response to the last time the Cavaliers won a game.

The last time the Cavs won ...

"... I didn't get to see it because there was a new episode of 'Friends' on." - ROJO36

"... gas was 2 dollars." - MrStealYurGrl

" ... Seattle had an NBA team." - natubTrill

" ... Dinosaurs roamed the Earth." - lilroeofficial

" ... I was enjoying a refreshing glass of Crystal Clear Pepsi." - danmillerotown

" ... Sinbad was relevant." - avadakadankra

" ... The Heat bandwagon was empty." - SkyWalker11_fan

" ... Pluto was a planet." - DaAnswerNova

Darn it, I wanted to believe they were monogamists

Valentine’s Day? Not For Birds | Blog | eNature">Birds do it, but not with a one and only.

Picasso mistress, what a dish.

Picasso Portrait Sells for $36M

Matt Dunham / AP Photo
A portrait Picasso painted of his teenage mistress sold for $36 million in London Tuesday. The artist met the 17-year-old blonde, Marie-Therese Walter, outside the Paris metro in 1927. Icebreakers are apparently pretty easy when you’re a world-famous artist; Picasso approached her and said, "I am Picasso. You and I are going to do great things together.'' They remained together—albeit secretly—for many years.
Read it at The Telegraph

What makes up the price of U.S. gasoline?

If you can believe what you read in the newspapers and ahem blogs then read this and try to figure. Read the third comment down by Aj Draiman.

What makes up the price of U.S. gasoline?

Beetle and my sons

I just saw on the site THE FABULOUS FIFTIES, this news blurb. On March 13, Beetle Bailey will celebrate? his 60th year in the army. Does he have a stripe? Without going back and looking I couldn't tell you. I served 4 years in the military. That was more than enough time for the military and me to come to the conclusion that four years was plenty for both of us. My son's did better (which is no surprise) than I did. Mike served for ten years, and Tim did all of us proud when he served twenty and retired the undefeated champion.

Getting older?

A truth none of us can escape is each day we get older, and sometimes each step along the way gets a little more painful.

One of my favorite websites is TIME GOES BY where it deals with problems facing us older folks. Today she writes about how businesses are pitching in, or not. The Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times are two sources and it is interesting. More so to me (age 73) than you of course, but interesting none the less. Take a look.

oxymoron

THE GREAT DEPRESSION, The best example of an oxymoron ever in literature.

Spring training and baseballs best 100

Baseball spring training is only about a week away. Hope will spring eternal amongst we small market fans while you fans of teams with money to throw around smirk and nod knowing it will take a small miracle for one of us to end up on top in October. Well maybe this will be the year. To tone up our baseball knowledge in the meantime here is the Sporting News list of the 100 best players ever.

The Thinker by Thomas Eakins

The Thinker: Portrait of Louis N. Kenton, 1900
Thomas Eakins (American, 1844–1916)
Oil on canvas
82 x 42 in. (208.3 x 106.7 cm)
John Stewart Kennedy Fund, 1917 (17.172)

Louis N. Kenton (1865–1947) was Eakins' brother-in-law, having married Elizabeth Macdowell (1858–1953), sister of the artist's wife Susan, in 1889. Elizabeth studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia, exhibited professionally, and traveled widely. Her marriage to Kenton was stormy and apparently brief, and very little is known of it, or of Kenton. The title associated with this portrait, The Thinker, was at one time based upon an inscription on the reverse that apparently was placed there by Susan Eakins. Beginning in 1900, the portrait was in the Farnsworth Library and Art Museum in Rockland, Maine.


Source: Thomas Eakins: The Thinker: Portrait of Louis N. Kenton (17.172) | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art

William had a mean streak

Don't make William angry:William Shakespeare (1564-1616) QUOTATION: Fill all thy bones with aches. ATTRIBUTION: The Tempest. Act i. Sc. 2.

You better come home cat.

As anyone who feeds and provides a home for a cat knows, he or she will give you a meow or a purr whenever they want to. If they don't want to, they won't. Cats are on loan from God or sometimes maybe the devil. Here Garrison Keillor sings a ballad about just those wonderful/nasty/charming little creatures, the cat.

Chess instructions

Oh for crying out loud, so that's the way it's done. I love the game when I win but it is so seldom that I do that, that I figured there must be some little trick to it.

POSH

One of my favorite words currently is POSH. What I think it means is refined, above the ordinary, really nice. You get the idea. Now lets see what it really means. Click here and all will be revealed.

The Errant Knight Returns

I wish I knew who to give credit for this, but alas I don't. What I can say about this is that I look at this picture and others like it in admiration for the creativity they have.

Coincidently I am reading a novel right now about Auschwitz and my immediate reaction to any plan to preserve the site is WHY? The preserving of a place so evil should not be considered.

Auschwitz decays, prompting preservation effort

By VANESSA GERA, Associated Press

OSWIECIM, Poland – The red brick barracks that housed starving inmates are sinking into ruin. Time has warped victims' leather shoes into strange shapes. Hair sheared to make cloth is slowly turning to dust.

Auschwitz is crumbling — the world's most powerful and important testament to Nazi Germany's crimes falling victim to age and mass tourism. Now guardians of the memorial site are waging an urgent effort to save what they can before it is too late.

Officials last week launched a global campaign to raise ?120 ($165 million) to create a "perpetual fund" whose interest can be drawn on indefinitely to repair barracks, watchtowers, crematoria and other structures at the Auschwitz-Birkenau state museum and memorial in southern Poland.

The Nazis opened Auschwitz soon after invading Poland in 1939, the act that triggered World War II, using it first as a concentration camp for Poles and political prisoners. As they implemented a plan to exterminate Europe's Jews, Gypsies and others, they built the neighboring death camp of Birkenau.

The Germans ended up transporting people in cattle cars from across the continent to the death camp in the heart of Europe, and murdered at least 1.1 million in gas chambers or through other acts of barbarity.

Museum director Piotr Cywinski made an emotional appeal for help during ceremonies last week marking the 66th anniversary of the camp's liberation by Soviet troops, as he launched the fundraising campaign. Called "Intervene Now," the campaign's message has been spread on Facebook, in newspapers and elsewhere.

"There are no more remains of Treblinka, Kulmhof, Sobibor and Belzec," Cywinski said, referring to extermination camps that the Nazis destroyed in an effort to hide their crimes. "Let us not allow the biggest of these death camps — and the only one that is still recognizable — to fall into decay due to the ravages of time and our indifference."

The efforts got a big boost with a donation of ?60 million ($82 million) from a still repentant Germany. Together with pledges from the United States (?12 million), Austria (?6 million) and smaller amounts from other countries, the fund has now raised ?80 million — about two-thirds of what is needed.

The museum plans to start putting the money to use with a massive effort in 2012 to save 45 brick barracks at Birkenau where freezing, starving women once piled together onto hard wooden bunks before being worked or gassed to death.

Just a few years ago, visitors could enter all of the barracks. Today only four can be viewed in the best weather conditions, as marshy ground and tourism take their toll. Even those in the best shape have badly buckled floors strewn with loose bricks, walls that are cracked and roofs held up by damp wooden beams.

"We really can't wait any longer," Cywinski said in an interview with The Associated Press. "In 10 years, these will be ruins."

Part of the challenge comes from the fact that the barracks and other structures at Auschwitz were built in a rush during the war to serve a murderous purpose and were never made to last. Add to that the pressure of modern tourism: the site drew nearly 1.4 million visitors last year — triple the number in 2001.

Tourism has increased as Poland, formerly a communist nation behind the Iron Curtain, has been transformed into an economically vibrant member of the European Union. Budget flights now bring in tourists to nearby Krakow from all over Europe.

But the growing interest also stems from the iconic role that Auschwitz holds in Holocaust memory — a fact underlined by the many people visiting not just from Europe, Israel and the U.S., but also from as far away as South Korea and Japan.

"A visit to Auschwitz is more than just a visit to a memorial," said Paul Shapiro, director of the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.

The Germans blew up gas chambers and burnt warehouses at Auschwitz as the Red Army moved in, but their retreat was made in chaos and they did not manage to destroy everything. Today many original structures still stand, making the site a powerful visual testament to the crimes committed there.

It also helps people today understand what happened at places like Treblinka and Belzec, extermination sites that the Germans completely destroyed. Today those are marked only by memorials.

"You can actually picture the full horror of what happened there," Shapiro said. "You can picture what took place in the death camps that were built by the Third Reich."

With time against them, conservation experts in white lab coats and gloves work in modern laboratories at Auschwitz to save what they can. Recently, brown leather shoes were laid out on a table as experts worked with great care to undo some of the deformity wrought by time.

In one room, a woman used a state-of-the-art machine to scan a massive trove of SS papers. In another, a worker photographed pieces of the "Arbeit Macht Frei" sign — the notorious and ironic slogan meaning "Work Sets You Free" which spanned the entrance gate at Auschwitz. It was stolen in December 2009 and cut into pieces before police tracked it down and arrested the thieves. So vandalism, too, is taking its toll.

The preservation department is staffed by many young, highly trained people, many of whom began their studies thinking they would one day restore art masterpieces. Instead, they find themselves grappling with questions like how to preserve toothbrushes and other everyday objects from the early 20th century that are almost never the object of meticulous preservation work.

The driving philosophy of the work is, above all, to protect authenticity and do no harm. In practice, this means preserving Auschwitz as it was at war's end, when the Germans had just bombed the crematoria and gas chambers before the Red Army moved in.

It also means accepting that not everything can be saved.

The human hair, shaved from victims' heads and recycled into cloth, will be allowed to decay completely. Today one of the most moving exhibits at Auschwitz is an enormous mound of hair shaved from the victims. Once, the hair was of various colors, but it has since turned into a mostly mangled mass of gray, with only an odd blond strand or braid standing out.

Cywinski said that to intervene and try to save the hair would amount to a "brutal and morally unjustified disturbance" of these human remains, and all that can be done is to keep them in conditions will help them last as long as possible.

Just a little bit on the economy

Pretty good news I think.

Factory Index Rises At Fastest Pace In Nearly 7 Years

by The Associated Press

February 1, 2011

Factory activity expanded in January at the fastest pace in nearly seven years, as manufacturers reported a sharp jump in new orders.

The Institute for Supply Management, a private trade group, said Tuesday that its index of manufacturing activity rose last month to 60.8. The sector has expanded for 18 straight months, and January's reading was the highest since May 2004. Any reading above 50 indicates expansion.

The manufacturing sector bottomed out at 33.3 in December 2008, the lowest point since June 1980. It has helped drive growth since the recession ended in June 2009.

Consumers are spending more on autos, appliances and other goods, while businesses have invested in more industrial machinery and computers. Those trends boosted economic growth to a 3.2 percent pace in the October-December quarter, the Commerce Department said last week.

Factories healthy pace of expansion is likely to continue in the coming months. Manufacturing firms surveyed by ISM said their backlog of orders jumped in January, pushing an index measuring that activity to 58 from 47.

U.S. factories are also benefiting from rising overseas sales. The index of export orders jumped to 62 in January, from 54.5 the previous month. That matches a recent peak reached in May.

The employment index also rose, a sign that manufacturing companies are hiring more workers. And the prices paid index, which measures whether manufacturing companies are paying more for raw materials, jumped sharply. That's a sign that inflation could pick up soon.

If manufacturers are unable to pass on the higher costs, it could cut into their profit margins.

It is also reported that construction of new homes is down. Isn't that to be expected with all the houses now on the market.