Garrison Keillor: Ignore the noise, sing for the ones in back
I remember a concert in an outdoor amphitheater in Atlanta where a hundred drunks in the corporate seats down front clanked their wine bottles and chortled and heckled through "Sempre libera" from Verdi's La Traviata until you wanted to put garbage bags over their heads, but the valiant soprano onstage simply lifted her chin and sang beyond the drunken vice presidents of marketing to the 6,000 people sitting out in the dark, her true audience. She trusted the acoustics of the place, that her beautiful voice would carry up into the dark and that the privileged peabrains in the $100 seats would be like distant traffic. There is a principle here: don't mind the jerks, just be as good as you can be for the people who know the difference and care. Illegitimi non carborundum. Ignore them all.
Paul Waldman: Are Democrats missing the most important fight of 2020? (Washington Post)
Every Democrat agrees that countering voter suppression and enabling turnout are absolutely critical, and there's no one better to do these things than Abrams, who has worked on this issue in Georgia for years. Liberal donors ought to be falling all over themselves to give her their money. The budget for this project should be $50 million, not $5 million. Or more.
Helaine Olen: The Resistance comes for Equinox, SoulCycle and their billionaire owner (Washington Post)
I've pointed out again and again that it's dangerously naive to expect business interests to oppose Trump because he's corrupt, or a racist, or encourages violence. If there is money to be made by making nice with Trump, it's all but impossible to expect our business leadership class to take themselves out of the game. They are the end result of decades of taking statements like "greed is good" literally and not ironically.
This song by Len Chandler, and covered by The Serendipity Singers, was banned in Pittsburgh and Boston in 1964. It was also covered by Pete Seeger in 1966, adding a new verse about "Mrs. Jay's little son Alby". What is the title of this song?
"Beans in My Ears" is a song created and sung by protest singer and contributing editor to folk-centric Broadside Magazine, Len Chandler. It became a hit single when covered by The Serendipity Singers, reaching number 30 in June 1964. Doctors protested that many children were actually putting beans in their ears so it was banned in some places such as Pittsburgh and Boston. Numerous public health boards reportedly blacklisted the song, as well, according to Chandler. "Some television shows asked us to do something different," said Bryan Sennett of the Serendipity Singers. "Understandably so--it was dangerous. Obviously, (the song) was a statement about adults not listening to children." Pittsburgh radio station KDKA's program manager Jack Williams imposed the ban due to the number of listener complaints and doctor reports about children putting objects in their ears in the three weeks following the song's release on the station.
The insistent chorus goes
My mommy said not to put beans in my ears, beans in my ears, beans in my ears.
The song was covered by Lonnie Donegan in 1964 on the Pye Records label. It was also covered by Pete Seeger on his 1966 album Dangerous Songs!?. Seeger's version satirically attacked Lyndon B. Johnson's involvement in the Vietnam War. In addition to Chandler's original lyrics, Seeger sang that "Mrs. Jay's little son Alby" had "beans in his ears", which, as the lyrics imply, ensures that some people do not hear what is said to them. To those opposed to continuing the Vietnam War, the phrase suggested that "Alby Jay", a loose pronunciation of Johnson's nickname "LBJ", did not listen to anti-war protests as he too had "beans in his ears".
Source
Randall was first, and correct, with:
Beans In My Ears
Mark. said:
"Beans in Ears."
Jim from CA, retired to ID, wrote:
Beans in My Ears
Deborah responded:
I think it was "Beans in My Ears." Otherwise, I don't know. That's a pretty obscure question.
Roy the Libtard Snowflake in Tyler, TX replied:
Beans in My Ears by the Serendipity Singers was a protest song indicating adults were not listening to children. Wise adults in Boston and Pittsburg banned the song because kids were actually putting beans in their ears! Those darn kids are so impressionable! I'd be willing to bet we could get them to eat Tide Pods or something like that.
David of Moon Valley wrote:
i'm going with Beans In My Ears and i bet that's probably wrong but it's the only song of theirs i know the title to and i don't care anyway cuz it's gonna be freakin' hot here today and we're all gonna melt so it doesn't matter... maybe i'll be back tomorrow and maybe i'll just end up being a blob of ooze in my backyard like a pile of crayola crayons that got left in the sun too long.....
Barbara, of Peppy Tech fame said:
The answer is "Beans in My Ears." I didn't get your reference to "Mrs. Jay's little son Alby" in the Pete Seeger version until I listened to it. Nice jab at a certain president as only Pete could do!
Here it is on YouTube
Alan J answered:
Beans In My Ears.
DJ Useo replied:
It took me over 4 hours to remember this, but I did. "Beans In My Ears". I think it's a great novelty song, but my wife immediately commanded I turn it off.
Then, she had it stuck in her head. YoW! It took some Falco music to drive it out, it seems. ;)
zorch responded:
"Beans in My Ears." I haven't heard that in decades.
Cal in Vermont wrote:
Beans In My Ears. It was a novelty tune which enjoined children not to put beans in their ears. Emergency rooms across this great land of ours were inundated with sheepish children and anxious mothers for weeks. Concern was so great that Pittsburgh and Boston banned the song. Boston would ban anything at the drop of a derby so it was quite an anomoly that Pittsburgh would follow suit. Everyplace else had more sense or less concern.
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• Opera tenor Enrico Caruso became a coin collector through his old friend Mr. Amedeo Canessa. During a conversation, Mr. Canessa showed Mr. Caruso a gold coin on one side of which the head of Queen Arsinoë was engraved. Mr. Canessa said, "That little thing costs 500 francs." Mr. Caruso replied, "It's beautiful. I like it. But what is the use of one? I don't want one coin." Mr. Canessa said, "There is only this one. It is a very rare specimen." Mr. Caruso really liked the coin. He said, "Very well, then. It's mine." He then began to collect coins - more than 2,000 of them - as well as antique glass, bronzes, enamel, furniture, pottery, and watches. Mr. Caruso was generous with his wealth. A street cleaner - an elderly Italian - once saw him stopped on a street in a car. The old Italian shouted, "Carus!" Then he jumped on the car's running board. Enrico engaged in conversation with him in the Neapolitan dialect, and he shook his hand. As the old Italian turned to go, Enrico stuffed some money into one of his pockets.
• Walter Damrosch hired Emil Fischer, bass from the Dresden Royal Opera, to sing at the Metropolitan Opera Company. Mr. Fischer made $250 per appearance, but he was not happy in his marriage and requested that his written contract state that he made $200 per appearance and that he receive the other $50 in cash. This was a way for him to hide about $600 per month from his wife so he could have some money of his own. His wife complained to Mr. Damrosch, "I do not know why my Emil is so badly paid while all the others get these enormous salaries. My Emil sings better than any of them, and he has to be content with only two hundred dollars an appearance!" Mr. Damrosch kept Mr. Fischer's secret.
• Philip Crispano was a friend of the very popular opera tenor Enrico Caruso. Knowing that, an official of a town's Chamber of Commerce came to him and offered him $2,000 if he could convince Mr. Caruso to sing in the Chamber of Commerce's town. Mr. Crispano mentioned the offer to Mr. Caruso, who explained that his managers drew up his itinerary, and he had no idea if he would sing in that town. Mr. Caruso then added, "But look - you lose two thousand dollars because of this, don't you?" Mr. Caruso immediately wrote a check for $2,000 and gave it to Mr. Crispano, who thanked him for it - then tore it up.
• In his student days, basso Luigi Lablache once ran away from the conservatorium, signed a contract to sing at Salerno and received a month's salary in advance. However, he had a good time in Naples and spent all the money. He owned a portmanteau, but had nothing to fill it with. Aware that he could not appear in Salerno without luggage, he filled his portmanteau with sand and had it taken to Salerno. However, he was forced to return to the conservatorium. To recover the month's salary he had paid in advance, the impresario took possession of Mr. Lablache's portmanteau, but was disappointed with its contents.
Just starting to read this article about Mr. Vaginal Probe Cuccinelli, but the first paragraph is fabulously true!
"Acting US Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Ken Cuccinelli has been spending this past week running frantically from microphone to microphone, demonstrating just how little he knows about the history of immigration in this country, shaming his own immigrant ancestors by expressing his sincerest desire to be even shittier to today's immigrants than people were to them, and promising a return to a time in American history that we all once considered pretty darned shameful. At the moment, he appears to be incapable of shutting up."
CBS opens the night with a RERUN'Big Bang Theory', followed by a RERUN'Young Sheldon', then a FRESH'Big Brother', followed by a FRESH'Elementary'.
Scheduled on a FRESHStephen Colbert are Kirsten Dunst, Adam Devine, and Lee Pace.
Scheduled on a FRESHJames Corden, OBE, are Michael Douglas, Will Forte, and Nicole Byer.
NBC begins the night with a RERUN'The Wall', followed by a FRESH'Hollywood Game Night', then a RERUN'L&O: SVU'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Fallon are John Travolta, Marlon Wayans, Mary Beth Keane, and Caroline Jones.
Scheduled on a FRESHSeth Meyers are Jake Tapper, MJ Rodriguez, and Nate Smith.
On a RERUNCarson 'The Scab' Daly (from 3/27/19) are Natalie Morales, HÆLOS, and Grace Van Dien.
ABC starts the night with a FRESH'Holey Moley', followed by a FRESH'Family Food Fight', then a FRESH'Reef Break'.
Scheduled on a FRESHJimmy Kimmel are Gerard Butler, David Alan Grier, and the Avett Brothers.
The CW offers a FRESH'The Outpost', followed by a FRESH'Two Sentence Horror Stories', then another FRESH'Two Sentence Horror Stories'.
Faux has a FRESH'MasterChef', followed by a FRESH'Spin The Wheel'.
MY recycles an old 'The Good Wife', followed by another old 'The Good Wife'.
BBC -
[6:00AM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 1-Night
[7:00AM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 2-Drone
[8:00AM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 3-Extreme Risk
[9:00AM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 4-In the Flesh
[10:00AM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 5-Once Upon a Time
[11:00AM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 6-Timeless
[12:00PM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 7-Infinite Regress
[1:00PM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 8-Nothing Human
[2:00PM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 9-Thirty Days
[3:00PM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 10-Counterpoint
[4:00PM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 11-Latent Image
[5:00PM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 12-Bride of Chaotica
[6:00PM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 13-Gravity
[7:00PM] STAR TREK: VOYAGER - SEASON 5 - EPISODE 14-Bliss
[8:00PM] CONTACT (1997)
[11:30PM] DUNE (1984)
[2:30AM] DUNE (1984)
[5:30AM] HIDDEN HABITATS - SEASON 1 - EPISODE 5-Canada's Coastal Forests (ALL TIMES EDT)
Bravo has 'Million Dollar Listing NY', another 'Million Dollar Listing NY', followed by a FRESH'Million Dollar Listing', 'Flipping Exes', then a FRESH'Watch What Happens Live'.
FX has the movie 'Captain America: The First Avenger', followed by the movie 'The Hangover Part III', then a FRESH'Baskets', and another 'Baskets'.
History has 'Ax Men', followed by a FRESH'Ax Men', then a FRESH'Mountain Men', followed by a FRESH'Alone'.
IFC -
[6:00A] The Three Stooges - I'll Never Heil Again
[6:15A] The Three Stooges - Rockin' Thru the Rockies
[6:40A] The Three Stooges - Saved by the Belle
[7:05A] The Three Stooges - Slippery Silks
[7:30A] Butter
[9:30A] The Bone Collector
[12:15P] Ghostbusters II
[2:45P] Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment
[4:45P] Police Academy
[7:00P] Home Alone
[9:30P] Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
[12:15A] Home Alone
[2:45A] A Night at the Roxbury
[4:45A] Sherman's Showcase - Behind the Charade
[5:15A] Sherman's Showcase - Enemies
[5:45A] Night Flight - The Who and the Damned (ALL TIMES EDT)
Sundance -
[6:00am] The Andy Griffith Show
[6:35am] The Andy Griffith Show
[7:10am] The Andy Griffith Show
[7:45am] The Andy Griffith Show
[8:20am] The Andy Griffith Show
[8:55am] The Andy Griffith Show
[9:30am] The Andy Griffith Show
[10:00am] The Andy Griffith Show
[10:30am] The Perks of Being a Wallflower
[1:00pm] Law & Order
[2:00pm] Law & Order
[3:00pm] Law & Order
[4:00pm] Law & Order
[5:00pm] Law & Order
[6:00pm] Law & Order
[7:00pm] Law & Order
[8:00pm] Law & Order
[9:00pm] Law & Order
[10:00pm] Law & Order
[11:00pm] No One Saw a Thing - Don't Mess With Skidmore
[12:00am] Law & Order
[1:00am] Law & Order
[2:00am] Law & Order
[3:00am] No One Saw a Thing
[4:00am] Hap and Leonard: Mucho - Pie a la Mojo
[5:00am] Hap and Leonard: Mucho Mojo - No Mo' Mojo (ALL TIMES EDT)
SyFy has the movie 'Blade II', followed by the movie 'Twister'.
TBS:
On a RERUNConan (from 7/20/19) are Orlando Bloom and Cara Delevingne.
Guns N' Roses have agreed to settle a trademark infringement lawsuit against a brewery, Colorado's Oskar Blues, that sold beer and corresponding merchandise dubbed "Guns 'N' Rosé" without permission. In a Monday court filing by the band's lawyers, both parties agreed to settle in principle on July 31st and are drafting a written settlement intended to dismiss the case, Reuters reports.
In their original May 9th lawsuit, the band - whose partners comprise classic-era members Axl Rose, Slash and Duff McKagan - argued that the brewery "should not be entitled to continue to sell infringing products and intentionally trade on GNR's goodwill, prestige, and fame without GNR's approval, license or consent." The group, which was seeking unspecified damages, claimed the company was selling merchandise like T-shirts, stickers and bandanas.
Meanwhile, Guns N' Roses recently extended their long-running reunion tour. The fall U.S. run of their "Not in This Lifetime" trek kicks off September 25th in Charlotte, North Carolina and runs with a pair of shows in Las Vegas, Nevada on November 1st and 2nd. Classic-era members Rose, Slash and McKagan are taking part in the tour, which originally ran from April 2016 to December 2018 to become one of the highest-grossing in history.
Slash confirmed in a recent Rock Cellar interview that Guns N' Roses are "just getting started" on their follow-up to 2008's Chinese Democracy, which would be their first since 1993 to feature both the guitarist and McKagan.
One of the biggest mysteries out there in the Universe is inching closer to answers. An astonishing eight new repeating radio signals known as fast radio bursts (FRBs) have been detected flaring from deep space.
At the start of 2019, just one of these mysterious signals, FRB 121102, was known to flash repeatedly. In January, scientists reported a second repeating one (FRB 180814).
This new paper - available on preprint server arXiv, and submitted to The Astrophysical Journal Letters - describes eight new repeating signals detected by the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) radio telescope.
This brings the known total of repeating FRBs to 10. It means we're starting to build a statistical database of repeaters, which could help astronomers to figure out what these signals actually are.
Most FRBs are only detected once and can't be predicted, so tracing them back to their source is really tricky (although, as demonstrated earlier this year for the first time, not impossible).
With two pairs of fine-tipped tweezers and the hands of a surgeon, Cheryl Hayashi began dissecting the body of a silver garden spider under her microscope.
In just a few minutes she found what she was seeking: hundreds of silk glands, the organs spiders use to make their webs. Some looked like mashed potatoes, others like green worms or air-filled rubber gloves. Each lets the spider produce a different type of silk.
Some silk types can be stretchy, others stiff. Some dissolve in water, others repel it.
Hayashi has collected spider silk glands of about 50 species, just a small dent in the more than 48,000 spider species known worldwide. Her lab at the American Museum of Natural History is uncovering the genes behind each type of silk to create a sort of "silk library." It's part of an effort to learn how spiders make so many kinds of silk and what allows each kind to behave differently.
Hayashi has been at this for 20 years, but improved technology only recently let scientists analyze the DNA of silk faster and produce artificial spider silk in bulk.
A 400-year-old temple in Japan is attempting to hot-wire interest in Buddhism with a robotic priest it believes will change the face of the religion -- despite critics comparing the android to "Frankenstein's monster."
The android Kannon, based on the Buddhist deity of mercy, preaches sermons at Kodaiji temple in Kyoto, and its human colleagues predict that with artificial intelligence it could one day acquire unlimited wisdom.
"This robot will never die, it will just keep updating itself and evolving," priest Tensho Goto told AFP.
"That's the beauty of a robot. It can store knowledge forever and limitlessly.
Developed at a cost of almost $1m in a joint project between the Zen temple and renowned robotics professor Hiroshi Ishiguro at Osaka University, the humanoid -- called Mindar -- teaches about compassion and of the dangers of desire, anger and ego.
Greenland is known for its glaciers, but in the past month, the island has shed ice and taken on fire.
Scientists didn't expect to see Greenland melt at this rate for another 50 years: By the last week of July, the melting had reached levels that climate models projected for 2070 in the most pessimistic scenario.
On August 1, Greenland's ice sheet lost 12.5 billions tons of ice, more than any day since researchers started recording ice loss in 1950, The Washington Post reported.
The Arctic's melting season starts each year in June and ends in August, with peak melting in July. However, the scale of ice loss in Greenland this year was extraordinary. From July 30 to August 3, melting occurred across 90% of the continent's surface, dumping 55 billion tons of water over 5 days. That's enough to cover Florida in almost 5 inches of water.
Similarly above-average melting was observed in Switzerland - glaciers there lost 800 million tons of ice during the heat waves of June and July. Alaska also saw record sea-ice melt in July.
Trophy-hunters may be allowed to shoot jaguars and other endangered wildlife "for sport" in Brazil's critically important rainforests, conservationists are warning.
Parrots, otters and monkeys could also be killed or captured alive - even in nature reserves - in the country that is the world's richest in biodiversity, according to opponents of the plan.
A bill that would legalise hunting, breeding and selling animals could mean commercial hunting grounds being set up for the first time in more than half a century, critics say.
It's estimated at least 1,100 species in Brazil - home to the Amazon rainforests - are already threatened with extinction from deforestation, human expansion and poaching.
And the country has lost more forest habitats than any other country since 2001 - 1.3 million hectares last year alone, research shows.
A sheriff said in a text message to another white elected official that a Hispanic state lawmaker is "worse than a black person."
The Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal used a public records request to obtain Lee County Sheriff Jim Johnson's messages.
The newspaper reports Johnson exchanged messages in 2017 with Lee County Supervisor Phil Morgan about building a new jail. Both men complained about state Rep. Shane Aguirre (ah-GARE-ee). A screenshot of the exchange shows Johnson wrote: "He's worse than a black person, your not going to please him."
Johnson tells the newspaper he was "aggravated" but should not have mentioned race.
Asked if he believes black people are difficult to please, Johnson said: "I think when you play the race card, yes, it's difficult to please some people."
What do surfers, kayakers and Neanderthals have in common?
New research published Wednesday revealed that abnormal bony growths in the ear canal, also called "surfer's ear" and often seen in people who take part in water sports in colder climates, occurred frequently in our ancient cousins who died out around 40,000 years ago.
But unless Neanderthals were righteous dudes searching for the perfect wave, the findings may mean they fished far more frequently than the archaeological record suggests, the scientists behind the study published in journal PLOS One said.
"It reinforces a number of arguments and sources of data to argue for a level of adaptability and flexibility and capability among the Neanderthals, which has been denied them by some people in the field," lead author Erik Trinkaus at Washington University in St Louis told AFP.
That's because in order to be successful at fishing or hunting aquatic mammals, "you have to be able to have a certain minimal level of technology, you need to be able to know when the fish are going to be coming up the rivers or going along the coast -- it's a fairly elaborate process," he said.
Trinkaus and his colleagues, Sebastien Villotte and Mathilde Samsel from the University of Bordeaux, looked at well-preserved ear canals in the remains of 77 ancient humans including Neanderthals and early Homo sapiens found in Europe and west Asia.
Deep beneath Australia geologists have discovered a Jurassic world. Sadly, it doesn't contain any living dinosaurs (and probably few dead ones either) but it does have more volcanoes than a Hollywood director's dream, even if they've been extinct for well over a 100 million years.
The Cooper-Eromanga Basin underlies what are now some of the driest parts of Australia. It's Australia's largest onshore oil and gas producing region, and while its fossil fuels are fairly paltry by international standards that still means its geology has been more heavily explored than many other parts of the continent. Despite this, no one noticed at least 100 remarkably well preserved extinct volcanoes within the Basin.
The volcanoes were active 180-160 million years ago. Their presence was somewhat unexpected because most volcanoes occur at the edges of tectonic plates, but these existed in an area that was as much mid-plate then as it is today.
Dr Simon Holford of the University of Adelaide told IFLScience that, besides no one anticipating them, the volcanoes were missed through 60 years of oil exploration in part because exploration methods haven't been well suited to finding volcanic provinces. Holford's team has developed world-leading techniques for detecting the signal from ancient volcanoes in seismic reflection surveys, and ended up finding a province close to home.
Sadly, however, Holford doubts there will be much paleontological benefit. Drilling rigs make holes so narrow the chance of them hitting a fossil is small at the best of times, and Holford noted Australia's Cretaceous rocks have been a much richer source of dinosaur bones than those of Jurassic age.
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