lalspeak

Smoking at the first aid tent occupy London

2011-11-17T08:21:00.001-06:00

New solar-powered bike rental station at Vilas Park

2011-06-25T11:13:00.000-05:00

Nice view of Lake Michigan

2010-07-24T22:10:00.001-05:00

The city has become a stage

2010-06-14T11:45:00.001-05:00

PARIS, France — It is the Paris Literary Festival in which famous actors and authors read poetry and prose in public places all around the city!

Lock up your commitments

2010-06-12T07:42:00.000-05:00

PARIS, France -- When couples make a commitment to each other, they put a lock on this bridge over the Seine River.

? firefighter dining

2009-01-02T13:26:00.000-06:00

Queen Nefertiti

2008-07-19T06:43:00.001-05:00

BERLIN, Germany -- Behold, the 3,400-year-old bust of Queen Nefertiti at the Altes Museum.

parking woes

2008-07-18T11:19:00.002-05:00

after finding a parking spot in the center of the old city part of nurenberg we noticed that the parking lot closed at 830pm. but also noting that there was an automated machine to pay the parking fee i assumed that it meant that there was no attendant and one had to pay at the machine........uh uh.
at 1030 when we returned--the parking lot was shut tighter than a drum. gates closed.no entry.
no exit. it was time to read the notice more carefully!
hmmmmm.parking lot CLOSES at 830. mega-fine for opening lot............but, a number to call.
nurembergers are pretty much done with the day at 1030 pm---the streets are verrry quiet.
we call the number and are reprimanded but told that a colleague of the voice is on his way.
20 minutes later a none too pleased young man shows up with a bunch of keys and a big log book to record the details of miscreants and of course a money purse to make change for the fine.
we are all foreigners so it seemed worth a try to claim ignorance,stupidity or some combination.
he is quite impatient with all this and asks if we need an atm to get money for the fine.
no no no we want to get out ; we want to pay the fine.
but this is germany: before we can pay the fine he wants details--name, address ,licence etc.
we give him the information and only then is he willing to accept the fine--so it's over ,right?
uh uh......we haven't paid the parking fee itself. ok we'll pay , we need to get back to wurtzburg.
uh uh ....we can't pay him .we need to pay the money in the proper machine.
ok where is the machine---in another locked area of the parking garage.
reluctantly he takes us to this area and unlocks the door.
no problem we have credit cards---but the machine doesn't take our credit cards and it's out of change.
among the four of us we come up with the exact change.
he is very pleased. everything is in order. every box has been checked.
auf wieder sehen. tschus. bye bye.

X-rays discovered in Würzburg

2008-07-14T06:12:00.001-05:00

WURZBURG, Germany -- Here is where Wilhelm Röntgen discovered x-rays (or Röntgen rays) in 1895.

Local time

2008-02-06T11:40:00.001-06:00

QUITO, Ecuador -- I went to the local tourist office at 9 a.m. to sign up for a walking tour. They informed me quite formally that tours began only at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m.

No other tours were available, she said.

But she added that if I really wanted to, the tour could start at 9 a.m.

How sweet.

From the LAL archive

2007-09-26T15:28:00.001-05:00

Date: Sat, 25 Oct 1997 10:17:01 -0500 (CDT)
From: *******@Waisman.Wisc.Edu
Subject: !holafrom spain!

hi so i was interviewed on spanish television
for my scholarship you say
uhuh
not
i was on my way to the real madrid-olympiakis game
at estadio bernabeu-----106000 screaming meshugoyim
about 40000 of whom are in standing room
with flags the size of our living room and constantly
cheering clapping and dancing---they even have a clap
that is exactly like the muskie jaw clap ----except they say
puto de 7$%$7!
listen up sections o and p --they make you seem comatose)

so anyway
here i am and the madrid tv show --interviewing the man on the
streetabout news of the day
grabs me and asks me whos going to win the BIG gane next week
real madrid or barcelona
---now at this time im surrounded by a jillion real madrid hooligans
dancing and singing the real madrid cheer---
so whaddamigonna say? RRRRRReal madriddd!
so the crowd loves me they try to pick me up(one guy also tries to relieve me
of my wallet but the sound man gives him a shove and the crowd gtes on his case majorly --hes lucky to be around )

then the ballooon gets punctured the interviewer (who by the way is
movie-star beautiful) asks me who my favorite real madrid player is
---ooooops I HAVE NO IDEA who is on the team !!!
so i say er well i actually dont know anything about the team
the crowd does NOt like this
murmers of !joder ! and worse aruse
---how soon they forget
i was then lucky to get out of there
more later
hope all is well
love
dad

vive le communisme

2007-09-18T19:33:00.002-05:00

vive le communisme

2007-09-18T19:33:00.001-05:00

Young communists

2007-09-18T19:31:00.003-05:00

festival of l'humanite

2007-09-18T19:31:00.001-05:00

i went to the communist party be-in held in paris and it was quite a scene.
there was a crowd of thousands to take in the offerings of 3 days of discussion, debate, music and this is france after all---food,food,food.

i was surprised by the number of young people who were there as young communists handing out literature and proselytizing for
leftist causes----of course many youth were there for cruising,eating,drinking and hip-hop (not much rock and roll)
there was a tent city for hippy nomads who seemed to be having a good time.

what was very appealing was that each local communist organization had a tent featuring food from their native region
--and of course a local band to sing songs of revolutions gone by.
there was a tent for the friends of the paris commune of 1871----these guys were not quite like our own civil war enactors____they
are serious about the lessons and ideals of the paris commune.

there were many oldsters who are still fighting the battles of trotsky et al
and aficionados of the spanish civil war.

the iconic pictures of che were much in evidence but what blew me away was that
mumia abu-jamal had quasi rock star status---there was a load of literature on the amerikan
so called justice system and the trials of mumia as well as hagiographic references to him
as the latest sacco/vanzetti or rosenberg.
meetings on mumia abu jamal are scheduled well into the fall.

not withstanding michael moore i went to a discussion of health care and found that many seniors were very worried about
sarkozy taking away some of their heqlth cqre benefits.

indeed whenever an audience seemed restless there was nothing better than referring to sarko-fascism to
get a big response from the crowd-----much more than an anti-amerikan remark--which is both because sarko is local and also anti-amerikan
remarks so commonplace they begin to lose their valence.

most people spoke of the amerikan parties as tweedledee and tweedledum.
hollande is not much liked by the communists and their response to socialist party
desires for a united front is the sound of one hand clapping.

Eat kosher in France

2007-09-18T07:30:00.001-05:00

Buddhist temple in Paris parking lot

2007-09-17T14:27:00.001-05:00

Who's watching the gaydar?

2007-08-10T12:57:00.000-05:00

last night's democratic "debate" on lbgt issues was predictably an "i'm ok ,you're more than ok"
lovey-dovey-rama.
but as has happened in previous outings dennis the k. shined.
he says what needs to be said without worrying about tiptoeing around controversy.
he, of course, is insufferable in tooting his own horn but let's be honest---he's a breath of fresh air
among the pusillanimous crowd.

On the beach

2007-08-10T12:07:00.000-05:00

whenever i am planning a beach vacation i check with dr. beach's website to see his latest ratings but of late have been disappointed with his rating system.
i dissent from some of his high ratings.
also he retires previous winners from the ratings, which seems to miss the point of finding out which are truly the best beaches any given year.

sitting pretty

2006-06-15T02:46:00.000-05:00

whenever i get satisfied that we have the ultimate in advanced gadgetry in the u.s. it's time for a visit to japan.
the toilet seat in my hotel room in tokyo has a console of control buttons that resembles the cockpit of a 747--choices of sprays at various temperatures and warm air blasts are included with a heated toilet seat. there is of course a flush control as well.
the bright lights of shinjuku make times square's illumination seem dim but that's true for several other asian cities such as shanghai as well.

cheney reaction

2006-02-15T10:45:00.000-06:00

there are many parts of the cheney shooting story which don't seem to fit with the information given to us so far.
we are now told that one or more birdshot pellets penetrated the chest and "migrated" either into or abutting the heart muscle.
we were led to believe that the victim was many yards away from cheney when the incident occured.
for birdshot to penetrate the victim's street clothes and outer clothes including a padded orange hunter's jacket and skin and tissue between two ribs (it would not go through the sternum or a rib-bone itself) it would have to have been shot from fairly close. close enough so that even in the very short time it takes to decide on a target it should have been obvious that the victim was not a quail (that's why they wear orange--right?).
so what did happen--well,obviously we can only guess---but what happened was very probably NOT what we've been told so far. possibly the gun went off by accident when cheney tripped or got bumped who knows ---certainly not the press or the american public.

now to get to the cheney pr mavens--isn't it interesting that the hospital called the event a heart attack---all the information they gave us actually suggests that the victim suffered a direct heart injury as a result of a penetrating gunshot wound.
no one uses the term heart attack for this type of event. if this happened (as it does with bullets on the streets of dc it would be : victim shot in the heart!).
of course (like clinton's meaning of "is") technically the heart was "attacked" or injured----but the term heart attack is a label which removes the onus of guilt from cheney: the poor guy's heart weakened by age ,stress or bad eating habits wimped out
after an unfortunate accident.

of course all the newspapers and tv newscasters use this line without a moment's reflection-----once again; game,set,medal to the bush/cheney pr machine.

fountain of youth

2006-02-06T14:40:00.000-06:00

once again mick jagger and the boys strut their stuff without a hint of arthritic limbs or aerobic limits.one wonders:
drugs,sex and rock and roll couldn't be all that bad. indeed it brings to mind burroughs in his very interesting if demented book -junkie. he argued that heroin was quite good for you.
in any case all this comes to mind after going to a concert by ed trickett--a stalwart of clean ,granola,hippie living
who certainly does look his age ( calm down,his singing is still beautiful).

brokeback to the future

2006-02-03T13:26:00.000-06:00

for all you brokeback fans, check this out:

/www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfODSPIYwpQ

bye bye krater

2006-02-03T08:56:00.000-06:00

there are some works of art that have an aura--special power to awe,inspire,transform,transfix--elicit an emotional response of pleasure ,surprise,sympathy.

one such work is the head of cleopatra now in berlin---another ,for me, is the euphronios krater which since 1972 has been in new york at the met.

it is now recognized by the met to have been looted from an archeological site near rome and is being sent baaaack. no more krater visits on my trips to new york.

thank you dubya

2006-02-01T19:11:00.000-06:00

it's reallly hard to stay tuned to any speech by george w. but all of a sudden last night i heard "switch grass". ????switch grass ---never heard of the stuff, but waddya know it grows right here in wisconsin on marshy land---and, get this can be used to make ethanol as a source of energy. i have a totally marshy back yard--are you getting the picture--first global warming so that i can put in an orange grove and now energy crisis so i can put in a switch grass farm and grow my own fuel.
thank you george!

hyper-major cd

2006-02-01T10:28:00.000-06:00

every now and then you hear a catchy tune which grabs your attention and simply won't let go.
here we have much more than a one-tune hook.
run do not walk to your nearest cd outlet and grab: dimanche a bamako by amadou and mariam.

wait til next year!

2005-09-29T15:04:00.000-05:00

in an article notable for it's poor timing vis-a-vis beach season the new issue of nature physics has important data on the stability of sand-water mixtures (i.e. stability of sandcastles).
the bottom line: 1 part water :: 8 parts sand.

the gardener and penguins

2005-09-29T09:52:00.000-05:00

the constant gardener is one of le carre's less successful efforts. the plot is at times incoherent but
as always le carre's characters are interesting and twisted into knots by ethical dilemmas--i'm
talking about the book --so i am interested whether the film "linearizes" the plot. the book is at the end a scream against the evils of big pharma--i'm also interested in whether the film pulls any of this punch.

what can i say about the penguins----it's a powerful argument against intelligent design.

movie odds and ends

2005-09-27T22:07:00.000-05:00

amc has had a bunch of really good films in the past week.
last night i watched" the green years "with charles coburn,hume cronin,jessica tandy,elsa
lancaster and the young dean stockwell. it's one of those family saga poor/orphan/lost boy
makes good after many social/family crises--a bit like "how green was my valley" which no one else in my family appreciates but which i think is one of the top films ever made.

george raft appears in a minor role---as a priest no less--but he maintains his usual deadpan usually reserved for his roles as a gangster.

i almost went to see "flightplan" with jodi foster tonight after reading a very positive review in the daily cardinal but how good could this film about a mother looking for her child in a plane for 2 hours be. interestingly i recently saw jodi foster in a french film playing a totaly minor role
( i mean a walk on character for 2 minutes). it was quite a surprise--after all --she is a STAR.
her french was perfectly fluent (although the character was supposedly not born in france).
i thought of jodi foster because there was a news story about hinckley possibly being released which must be distressing to her whether or not he in fact gets released or whether or not he is now risk free.

our last netflix viewing was "divorce italian style" with the young marcello mastroianni. i hadn't seen it for many years but it holds up well. wonderfully constructed story line and marvellous background music.

the aristocrats

2005-09-27T15:17:00.000-05:00

well , it was an interesting film. and in fact somewhat of a surprise---in the sense that i was truly surprised to find so little nuance,talent or insight among the slew of so-called comedians
on display. how do these people make a living or why does the public pay money to see them?

to be sure there were exceptions --george carlin, robin williams and perhaps sue silverman.
carlin who was the only comedian with extended time who had any talent on display was first so
basically the entire film after carlin's first appearance was on a steep downward trajectory.

by now most people know the story of the aristocrats-----a family shows up at an agent's office
with a new act. the act consists of every and any act of sexuality or fluid elimination separately and together possible or imagined--at the end the agent says that's a helluvan act, whaddya call it---
the aristocrats!

the art of comedy is in the inventiveness,taboo and nuance of the description
---and in the dozens of retellings only carlin really pulls it off.
the others wallow in the wilderness of their rather banal imaginations.

robin williams is robin williams --he actually tells another rather funny joke.
sue silverman does an eery impersonation of one of the actors in the aristocrats but it's hardly comedy.

soooo, interesting--yes for a look at a roster of the no-talents who are the popular "comedians" of today. but generally not worth most people's time.

r.i.p. uri bronfenbrenner

2005-09-27T15:05:00.000-05:00

uri bronfenbrenner a longtime professor of human ecology at cornell university died at age 88.
he had a briliant intellect, was a dazzling speaker and a force of nature in the pursuit of
educational and social opportunity for children in poverty.

i remember going with him to soup kitchens for street children in brazil. he didn't do anything half way. he tore into the glop they served with gusto.

he was an important advocate for the creation of head start. we need so many more people like him.

travel can be fun

2005-09-26T15:51:00.000-05:00

well i have been away from the blog for a while. mostly because of travel and the
vagaries of phone -line connections.

but here's one travel story:

so one fine day last month i set out from marseille to la ciotat a lovely town on the
mediterranean (the first movie was made and shown there by the lumiere brothers-but
that's another story).

the fastest way to get there is by train so i took the metro from my hotel to the train station.
when i got to the metro stop for the train station i and several other passengers found that the entry way to the train station was shuttered and locked. we asked a metro employee who was satnding there but he simply shrugged and said try the main entrance around the corner--
so off we went around the corner to the main entrance (did i mention that around the corner meant shlepping luggage up three flights of stairs and by the way the temperature over 90?).

we get to the plaza at the top of the stairs (which by the way has a magnificent view of marseille if you can see it through the stinging sweat which makes you squint your eyes not to speak of the bright sun which is in your eyes) and find a very large crowd milling about surrounded by rather heavilly armed police--what's going on i ask .

well it seems that there has been a bomb threat --and they're checking into it.
oyyy--i think a moment :

a--it's very hot there with no shade

b-if there is a bomb do i want to be hanging around that spot.

c--why not take a bus

now the main bus station is just around the block (did i mention that it means shlepping the luggage down the same stairs).

i go around the block to the bus station and wait on a long line to get a ticket. 1 ticket to la ciotat
i say---ah la ciotat the guy says,
buses to la ciotat go from the other bus station.

what other bus station i say.

oh don't you know for your convenience there's a separate bus station for all southern destinations it's just a few metro stops away.

so i take the metro to the stop for the other bus station and when i get out there's no bus station to be seen.
i ask at a local bistro and the guy tells me just around the corner there's a ticket office.
ok
i go around the corner and find that the ticket office is closed (did i say it was sunday).

but it does list buses for la ciotat but there's no indication of where the %^&% the buses stop.
this is an area where many streets are criss-crossing in all the cardinal and not so cardinal directions.

so i go back to the bistro--the guy says he has no idea but the bus for cassis (which is a town close to la ciotat stops just accross the street and the bus is sitting there).

AHA-- so i shlepp accross the street and it turns out that the bus for la ciotat is run by a different bus company--the driver tells me to ask at the ticket office (the one that is closed).
i'm a bit tired of all this but i don't give up.

i go to the newstand (i love it that they still have newstands in europe a convenience long lost in almost all us cities). the guy has no idea BUT a young woman there says oh yes the bus for la ciotat stops down the hill and around the corner.

by this time it's starting to rain---it's hot and wet. i go down the now water-logged hill and find a guy sitting at a bus stop filling out the racing form and when i ask he says --yeah he's waiting for the bus to la ciotat--VICTORY! ----but it've just missed the last bus and we have to wait an hour.
noooo problem i feel very accomplished.

other people arrive and then a group of plaintive chinese arrive begging if any one knows how to speak english.
i do them one better --i speak to them in chinese--it turns out they have been wandering around for a looong time trying to find where the bus for cassis stops. they have been directed to several stops where they waited and found that the bus doesn't stop there.

that's one thing i do know--so quite authoritatively i direct them to the cassis bus stop.

the crowd around me is quite impressed---one woman compliments me and several others say nice things about me . i feel quite virtuous and then the woman asks where i am from ---america i say.
she looks at me and says the americans are doing terrible things in iraq and looks at me as if i personally had started the war. i say some negative things about the war but useful discourse has come to an end.

anyway the bus comes and when i get on the driver says one euro (instead of 5)-- is that all i say--it's the fare for seniors he replies. so much for how i look.

we get to la ciotat and after an interminable walk to my hotel which turns out to be muuuuuch farther from the bus stop than it seemed on the map (i hate these overview maps which have no scale and leave out minor streets)---did i say it was in the 90's.

so finally i get to my meeting in la ciotat and run into someone who got there from marseille.

so how did you get here i ask.

oh, i took the train.

but what about the bomb scare ?

oh is that what it was---i don't speak french so i just waited and five minutes later they let everyone into the station--the train got here very fast---how did you get here?

fathers' day

2005-06-19T20:39:00.000-05:00

happy fathers' day to all.

it's a time to remember my own father who was wonderful,attentive and a beacon of intelligence,rectitude,kindness and loyalty.so many good memories.
thanks dad.

phoenix

2005-06-19T20:29:00.000-05:00

i'm in phoenix this weekend at a meeting and am totally blown away by how extraordinarilly unpleasant this city is for any kind of human existence. the temperature hovers around 110 every day. the city is
spreeeeaaad out for miles in every direction. there are very few venues
of interest within walking distance of each other---and who can walk more than a few blocks without the need for cpr in this heat?
there *are* a number of vistas of very tall palm trees and geometrically interesting outcroppings of sharp peaked mountains surrounding the city but architecturally the city is a hodgepodge of generally ugly ,new skyscraperettes sitting among and between one story strip malls.
why do old people want to come here for retirement --is it a halfway house to prepare for hell?

blast from the past

2005-06-19T20:19:00.000-05:00

the literary trope of fueling the narrative by alternating multiple narrators seems to be catching on big these days but neil gordon in
-the company you keep- does it with a vengence. this book is compelling.it takes you by the collar and doesn't let go.
anyone wanting to reflect on u.s. political culture among thoughtful,social-justice commited college students during the 60s and 70s---this is the novel to read. don't care about the 60s and 70s?--read
it anyway. it's a can't-put-the book-down story.

r.i.p. susan goldberg

2005-06-14T13:14:00.000-05:00

susan goldberg died this morning in toronto, canada. she was a colleague and friend of very long standing. her research at harvard ,brandeis and the university of toronto integrated our understanding of culture ,biology and psychology in
the development of young infants and children particularly those born prematurely or with a chronic disease.
she was a person of great personal warmth and with a passion for social justice.

she will be sorely missed.

my sincere condolences to her children.

jackson "not guilty"

2005-06-14T12:58:00.000-05:00

thanks to a blackberry message from d. i was able to rush to a tv set and watch the denouement of the jackson trial/extravaganza. i was quite surprised at the verdict --i had expected that the jury would be reluctant to find him guilty on the most serious charges because of the checkered past of the accuser's mother (the whole family really). but it seemed inevitable that they would find him guilty of one of the lesser charges for which ample supporting (and believable)
testimony had been given. jackson's lawyers must have given quite a summation and the judge's instructions (98 pages) overwhelming and confusing.
perhaps the one heartening take home message is that in the u.s. today you can be a total freak in looks and behavior and member of an historically oppressed minority group and still get a sympathetic hearing in court (at least if you are a world-famous -superstar-multi-millionaire).
i'm not betting that his musical career is over. if his mind and body has the endurance (which isn't a sure thing--he looked very frail and spaced out during the trial) he could have at least one round of a very successful world tour given his fan base and now over-the-top notoriety.

crash

2005-06-13T08:30:00.000-05:00

crash is the most interesting and best constructed film i have seen this year.
it is a tightly intertwined story of the lives of a multi-racial cast of characters as they play out the endearing and despicable aspects of their beliefs and desires.
they are all neither saints nor scoundrels but the touchingly flawed people we all are. the film privileges race as the focus of how the characters perceive each other---it's not a pretty picture but gives a fair and often nuanced view of how
racial stereotyping plays itself out amidst the stresses of everyday life in a big
u.s. city which throws the diversity of humankind together on a very uneven playing field.

see this film.

the creeps at crp

2005-06-02T11:31:00.000-05:00

well ,the slimeballs and moral scum from the nixon era crp have
been skimmed for all the radio and tv talk shows where they have been
"ouraged" at the "traitorous acts" of the erstwhile "deep throat".

it would be hilarious to watch these hypocrites stand on their new podia of moral righteousness were it not for the truly dangerous state
of political discourse in the u.s. these days.

blossom dearie

2005-06-01T20:03:00.000-05:00

yes apparently that's her real name. 77 years and with an angelic voice. i'm sitting here in the
living room simply rivetted by her music. evidently she's currently appearing in new york--
it's definitely worth the trip---i'm thinking about it.

deep throat indeed!?!

2005-05-31T22:25:00.000-05:00

you must check out joan hoff on www.hnn.us. she very succinctly and compellingly
points out that the story of deep throat isn't over by any means.
there is very good reason to believe that the one deep throat figure is a literary conceit invented for the sexing up of woodward and bernstein's book all the president's men.

the sith: creating darth vader

2005-05-31T14:54:00.000-05:00

j. and i saw the new star wars episode 3. it filled in a lot of blanks ---making the story a tad bit more coherent. the light sabres have been juiced up substantially. as usual the visual effects are
spectatcular ---but the star wars series has raised the bar substantially since the first episode so we expect the visual display without surprise and awe.

episode 4 the ,first one, remains the best.

in episode three jar jar binks thankfully has a rather minor role (although it's as a senator!) but lots of time unfortunately is
given to the equally unappealing character of general grievous who seems to have an
asthmatic cough no doubt exacerbated by his chilled thorax open to the air and seemingly constructed of radio shack quality spare parts (really, lucasfilm should be able to do better than this).

although lucas says that he is finished with the series it's hard to believe that the draw of
hundreds of millions of dollars will not ultimately result in at least several more in the series pre-
prequel and post-sequel.

deep throat

2005-05-31T14:47:00.000-05:00

the shoe has dropped. the secret is out. after allll these years we now know the identity of deep throat. mark felt, former #2 in the fbi. a straight arrow type, he acted to correct the corruption
and dishonorable actions of the nixon administration. regerettably there seems to be no
equivalent deep throat to put the bush team's feet to the fire to correct the corrupt policies and dishonorable actions of that despicable group.

hold your fire!

2005-05-26T20:17:00.000-05:00

we began the star wars film festival with #1 because # 4-6 were checked out at the video store.
the staff at lalspeak made an executive decision to begin the screening with #1 because it was available and the intense time pressure to prepare for #3 by the weekend.
we do appreciate the sage advice received although in the end the indicated guidelines were
not followed.

phantom-feh!

2005-05-26T09:36:00.000-05:00

we began the long journey into star wars last night with episode 1----what utter trash.
yeah yeah i agree that the visuals were quite impressive at times BUT in the service of what?
an incoherent plot, totally wooden dialogue, acting evoking the emotive range of a to b and
insipid cartoon characters like jar jar binks et al.

it's interesting to speculate about what cinema history would be like if star wars # 1 were
to have been released as #1----the whole series may not have seen the light of day.

more on in/up

2005-05-25T19:22:00.000-05:00

as noted in the comments below when one sucks air in there is a change of posture and indeed a
more erect posture is associated with the vim and vigor of preparation to do battle. hence the
notion of "up." but the action is sucking "in" so it seems natural to one's logical sense to say
"suck it in". i concede though to popular authority--the expression is "suck it up".

sucking in/up

2005-05-25T15:21:00.000-05:00

i notice that i wrote suck it *in* rather than suck it *up*---neither seems fully right or wrong to my ear. the key is :what in fact does this sucking represent?
i look forward to some answers.

grand chelem and other bits

2005-05-25T15:09:00.000-05:00

one of my favorite french words is chelem--it means slam as in grand slam but it always
sounds to me that it was borrowed from yiddish.

many thanks for the advice on star wars--i guess i will suck it in and screen the whole shebang starting with no. 1---fast forwarding through jar jar binks will save time and nausea.

for the life of me i can't understand the democrats crowing over a victory on the filibuster issue.
we get 3 abominable judges, the possibilty of frist reviving the next 2 from the twilight zone of jurisprudence and the renewal of bitterness at a later date as to what defines "extraordinary"
circumstances.
it may very well be the best that could be done given the present republican majority but it's nothing to celebrate.

i was told yesterday,by the way, by r. from british columbia that he has received 3 calls
from americans looking for jobs in canada because of their despair over the direction of u.s. policy and politics.

star wars

2005-05-24T12:02:00.000-05:00

well it's high time i saw the new star wars installment. there is one teeny problem: j. hasn't seen any of them and doesn't want to go until this is remedied.
i would eagerly rewatch 4,5 and 6. but the thought of 1 and 2 ---sitting through
jarjar binks' shenanigans is paralyzing.
woould it be good enough to show j. 4-5-6 and then the part 3 finale?
better yet how about 4 and 5 alone and then the new one?

4 and 5 are really the outstanding ones in the bunch ---and she would know enough----or would she? i need some advice here.

end of semester

2005-05-24T11:53:00.000-05:00

the semester has ended--not really with a bang or a whimper. but i have miles to go
before i sleep...many deadlines which have to be met. summer is always the time of "big plans" finishing this project and starting that one.it's soooo easy to say--oh yes i'll finish that chapter by the end of the semester---but now it's the end of the semester and i'm definitely not finished.but i am (mostly) hard at work today.
i always find the beginning of a semester uplifting.it's nice to have two beginnings a year instead of just one.for an academic there are multiple "new year" celebrations.

they're baaack

2005-05-10T13:58:00.000-05:00

i just saw jon bennet's picture on the cover of the enquirer with the headline--parents have been cleared. i guess i'll have to go back and read it---i was too rushed before. either that or call s.
although she may not be keeping up with the jonbennetwatch since leaving boulder.

visors

2005-05-10T13:52:00.000-05:00

d. has a visor now--although i haven't seen it yet. i really don't get visors instead of a hat. if it's really sunny and hot the sun beats down on the top of your head and it feels terrible---and therein
lies the benefit of a hat---ahhhhh the relief.
i must admit though i did have a visor when i was in college--it was one of those transparent green eyeshade-visors that old-time telegraph operators used to wear. it was great for shading your eyes from the glare of a desklamp.

learning from vegas

2005-05-10T13:41:00.000-05:00

d. just got back from a weekend in las vegas. his trip brings back memories of my first visit to
las vegas. i was about 19 and it was my first trip to the west. i remember the 1.99 all you can eat
buffets and the over the top casinos that were open 24/7 and i remember the dry heat. it was
summer and it felt like an oven.after about 24hours i had had enough.
much later after reading "fear and loathing in las vegas" and "learning from las vegas"the place took on a new interest---but even since i have had the same feeling after about 24 hours.
--but i haven't visited again in many years. not since the bellagio and certainly not since wynne's hotels have been built. maybe it's time.

bloggomania

2005-05-09T22:04:00.000-05:00

so within 20 minutes of starting this blog i was interupted by several phone calls and had logged out--when i tried to log back in my password didn't work!
had i forgotten it? within 1 hour!
well not exactly after several hours of frustrating attempts to contact blogger.com i realized that my spam filter was filtering out blogger's replies--
and now all is well. i had forgotten my username which i suppose is just as bad as forgetting the password.

in the beginning

2005-05-09T16:48:00.000-05:00

hi everyone--
because my typing skills are minimal at the moment i plan to defer the use
of majuscules until further notice.
i just found out that m. has gotten tickets to the nats-brewers game for may 16th --
i'm eager to see the new dc team and maybe develope a new team loyalty since the brewers
have been nothing but frustration and bad management for some years now.