Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Poor Elijah (Peter Berger): The 16th Annual Emperor's Awards (irascibleprofessor.com)
Before we embark on the new school term, it's always helpful to review the past year's magic education moments. The Emperor Awards annually commemorate the monarch of underwear fame and his devoted admirers so we can profit from their example in the months ahead.
Mark Morford: The young lion goes to Vegas (sfgate.com)
Can you hear the desperate roar over the thump of the DJ?
Alex Ross: "INFINITE PLAYLIST: New frontiers in digital sound" (newyorker.com)
The other day, with a few clicks on my computer keyboard, I travelled in time to 1943.
Laura Barnett: "Portrait of the artist: Tim Rice, lyricist" (guardian.co.uk)
'After 'Evita,' a critic said I had put in another strong claim to be the worst lyricist in the world.'
The fabulous life of Bette Bourne (guardian.co.uk)
After four decades as a drag queen, actor and activist, Bette Bourne has a few tales to tell. Mark Ravenhill on why he turned them into a stage show.
FRANCES YEE: Forever's Gonna Start Tonight (curvemag.com)
Legendary trans drag entertainer Vicki Marlane is immortalized in Michelle Lawler's new indie documentary.
An Interview with Jamia Nash (thecelebritycafe.com)
You probably know her as Ana Hamilton on the daytime soap "The Young and the Restless," but Jamia Nash wowed audiences when she sang at the 80th Annual Academy Awards. This talented young performer is lending her voice and image to Build-A-Bear Workshop's Love. Hugs. Peace Movement, a charity that helps children around the world.
Will Harris: A Chat with Bobcat Goldthwait, Writer and Director of "World's Greatest Dad" (bullz-eye.com)
About five or six years ago, I just went, 'You know what? I'm not doing this anymore. I'm only going to do stuff I enjoy doing. I'm going to turn down work. If I wouldn't watch it, I'm not doing it.' That changed my whole life.
Richard Roeper: Partly stupid with a 90 percent chance of boredom (suntimes.com)
Given that a good percentage of people who work in movies have also worked in TV, you'd think movies about TV would be ... smarter. Yet with a few exceptions -- "Broadcast News" always comes to mind -- most movies about television seem rather clueless about the basic workings of the business.
Roger Ebert: Visiting Mommie Dearest at home (from 1981)
This is the sort of Irony that Hollywood understands: Joan Crawford spent her entire life in the painstaking construction of an image, only to have a movie reveal the things she tried to hide behind the image.
The Weekly Poll
New Question
The 'Manifest Destiny on film' Edition
According to AMC, Western Films or TV programs are the major defining genre of the American film industry... This indigenous American art form focuses on the frontier West that existed in North America (and) often portrays the conquest of the wilderness and the subordination of nature, in the name of civilization, or the confiscation of the territorial rights of the original inhabitants of the frontier. They truly show 'The Good, the Bad and the Ugly'
events of that part of our history. Love'em or loathe'em, their impact on our culture can not be denied...
If you are a fan what are your top 3 Western Films or TV programs and who are your favorite actors?
If you are not, feel free to rail away. I understand. I have Ojibwe ancestors (Sault Tribe of the Chippewa) and they suffered at the hand of the White man via broken treaties and confiscated land here in Michigan...
Send your response to
Results Tuesday.
wrote:
Another History's Mystery
The Piri Reis Map
The Piri Reis Map...
In 1929, a group of historians found an amazing map drawn on a gazelle skin.Research showed that it was a genuine document drawn in 1513 by Piri Reis, a famous admiral of the Turkish fleet in the sixteenth century.
The Piri Reis map shows the western coast of Africa, the eastern coast of South America, and the northern coast of Antarctica. The northern coastline of Antarctica is perfectly detailed. The most puzzling however is not so much how Piri Reis managed to draw such an accurate map of the Antarctic region 300 years before it was discovered, but that the map shows the coastline under the ice. Geological evidence confirms that the latest date Queen Maud Land could have been charted in an ice-free state is 4000 BC.
The question is: Who mapped the Queen Maud Land of Antarctic 6000 years ago? Which unknown civilization had the technology or the need to do that?
BadtotheboneBob
Thanks, B2tbBob!
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
Yer Friendly Neighborhood Folksinger
Tom Loud
I just set a new world record. I, and 1,858 other guys and gals, are now the largest guitar ensemble in the world. We played "Luckenbach" for 5 minutes. Then, just to make sure, we all played "This land is your land"
Proceeds will go to provide music therapy to returning American troops. You can just see the country songs forming in the air.
Tom Loud )O( Yer Friendly Neighborhood Folksinger
Obi-Zen Folksinger
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. … [T]hose who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. -- C.S. Lewis
Congratulations, Tom!
Link From RJ
Dorothea Lange
Hi there
I hope you find this interesting!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Hot and ddry.
No So Colorblind
Microsoft
Software giant Microsoft Corp. is apologizing for altering a photo on its Web site to change the race of one of the people shown in the picture.
A photo on the Seattle-based company's U.S. Web site shows two men, one Asian and one black, and a white woman seated at a conference room table. But on the Web site of Microsoft's Polish business unit, the black man's head has been replaced with that of a white man. The color of his hand remains unchanged.
The photo editing sparked criticism online. Some bloggers said Poland's ethnic homogeneity may have played a role in changing the photo.
Microsoft
Recalls 1960s Death Rumours
Paul McCartney
Former Beatle Paul McCartney has described rumours that he had died, which surfaced more than 40 years ago, as "ridiculous" and an "occupational hazard" for a member of one of the world's biggest bands.
The conspiracy theory began in October 1969, when a Detroit-based DJ claimed that the three other Beatles -- Ringo Starr, John Lennon and George Harrison -- had recruited a lookalike replacement for McCartney after he died in 1966.
He argued that because the man "posing" as McCartney on the cover of the Beatles' 1969 album "Abbey Road" had bare feet meant it represented a corpse, and that the number plate on a car in the photograph was LMW 28IF -- denoting McCartney's age, if he had lived.
"It was funny, really," McCartney, 67, told MOJO music magazine in an interview. "But ridiculous. It's an occupational hazard: people make up a story and then you find yourself having to deal with this fictitious stuff.
"I think the worst thing that happened was that I could see people sort of looking at me more closely: 'Were his ears always like that?'"
Paul McCartney
New Evidence It's Addictive
Running
Just as there is the endorphin rush of a "runner's high," there can also be the valley of despair when something prevents avid runners from getting their daily fix of miles.
Now, researchers at Tufts University may have confirmed this addiction by showing that an intense running regimen in rats can release brain chemicals that mimic the same sense of euphoria as opiate use. They propose that moderate exercise could be a "substitute drug" for human heroin and morphine addicts.
Given all of the benefits of exercise, many people commit to an active running routine. Somewhere during a longer, more intense run when stored glycogen is depleted, the pituitary gland and the hypothalamus release endorphins that can provide that "second wind" that keeps a runner going.
This sense of being able to run all day is similar to the pain-relieving state that opiates provide, scientists have known. So a team led by Robin Kanarek, professor of psychology at Tufts University, wondered whether they could also produce similar withdrawal symptoms, which would indicate that intense running and opiate abuse have a similar biochemical effect.
Running
Withdraws From Off-Broadway Production
Parker Posey
Parker Posey has withdrawn from a lead role in the upcoming Playwrights Horizons' production of "This" after developing Lyme disease.
Artistic director Tim Sanford says the play by Melissa James Gibson will open Dec. 13 as scheduled at the off-Broadway theatre. Previews begin Nov. 6. A replacement for Posey will be announced shortly.
"This" concerns the tribulations of a poet who happens to be a single mother, struggling with her love life and the well-meaning attention of good friends.
Parker Posey
Faster, Cheaper, Easier
Meth
This is the new formula for methamphetamine: a two-liter soda bottle, a few handfuls of cold pills and some noxious chemicals. Shake the bottle and the volatile reaction produces one of the world's most addictive drugs.
Only a few years ago, making meth required an elaborate lab - with filthy containers simmering over open flames, cans of flammable liquids and hundreds of pills. The process gave off foul odors, sometimes sparked explosions and was so hard to conceal that dealers often "cooked" their drugs in rural areas.
But now drug users are making their own meth in small batches using a faster, cheaper and much simpler method with ingredients that can be carried in a knapsack and mixed on the run. The "shake-and-bake" approach has become popular because it requires a relatively small number of pills of the decongestant pseudoephedrine - an amount easily obtained under even the toughest anti-meth laws that have been adopted across the nation to restrict large purchases of some cold medication.
Using the new formula, batches of meth are much smaller but just as dangerous as the old system, which sometimes produces powerful explosions, touches off intense fires and releases drug ingredients that must be handled as toxic waste.
Meth
Joining Rupert Business Channel?
Don Imus
Don Imus and the RFD cable network say they've mutually agreed to end the TV simulcast of Imus' weekday radio talk show.
This Friday will mark the final telecast of "Imus in the Morning" on Nashville-based RFD-TV after nearly two years.
Imus has reportedly been in discussions to make Fox Business Network his new TV outlet.
Don Imus
Another Day, Another Lawsuit
A&E Network
The owners to the rights of the bluegrass standard "Rocky Top" are suing the television network A&E over the use of the tune in a crime documentary.
The lawsuit claims the network used the tune in a 12-second clip, even after the song owners said A&E could not use it. The lawsuit is seeking financial compensation.
Felice and Boudleoux Bryant penned the song in 1967 and the couple's children own the rights under the corporate name House of Bryant.
The A&E show, called "City Confidential," highlighted an attempted contract killing in Knoxville in 1994. The episode first aired in 2004.
A&E Network
Buys Maktoob
Yahoo!
US Internet giant Yahoo! said Tuesday it had signed a deal to purchase popular Jordan-based web portal Maktoob, expanding its reach to millions of consumers across the Arab world.
Maktoob was founded in 2000 and claims more than 16.5 million users in countries like the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
The portal "reaches one in three people online throughout the Arab world," the companies said.
Through the deal, Yahoo! will offer Arabic-language content for the first time and versions of its products and services, including instant messaging and email, in Arabic.
Yahoo!
Cable Nielsens
Ratings
Rankings for the top 15 programs on cable networks as compiled by Nielsen Media Research for the week of Aug. 17-23. Day and start time (EDT) are in parentheses:
1. "The Closer" (Monday, 9 p.m.), TNT, 5.32 million homes, 7.31 million viewers.
2. "WWE Raw" (Monday, 10 p.m.), USA, 3.94 million homes, 5.90 million viewers.
3. "Royal Pains" (Thursday, 10 p.m.), USA, 3.92 million homes, 5.32 million viewers.
4. Auto Racing: Nascar Sprint Cup (Saturday, 7:30 p.m.), ESPN, 3.73 million homes, 5.32 million viewers.
5. NFL Exhibition: Panthers vs. Giants (Monday, 8 p.m.), ESPN, 3.60 million homes, 4.56 million viewers.
6. "WWE Raw" (Monday, 9 p.m.), USA, 3.53 million homes, 5.16 million viewers.
7. "True Blood" (Sunday, 9:02 p.m.), HBO, 3.48 million homes, 5.33 million viewers.
8. "Monk" (Friday, 9 p.m.), USA, 3.46 million homes, 5.16 million viewers.
9. Major League Baseball: Yankees vs. Red Socks (Sunday, 8 p.m.), ESPN, 3.43 million homes, 4.58 million viewers.
10. "NCIS" (Wednesday, 8 p.m.), USA, 3.26 million homes, 4.19 million viewers.
11. "Project Runway" (Thursday, 10 p.m.), Lifetime, 3.24 million homes, 4.23 million viewers.
12. "Army Wives" (Sunday, 10 p.m.), Lifetime, 3.23 million homes, 3.86 million viewers.
13. "SpongeBob SquarePants" (Saturday, 9:30 a.m.), Nickelodeon, 3.14 million homes, 4.01 million viewers.
14. "NCIS" (Monday, 8 p.m.), USA, 3.08 million homes, 3.94 million viewers.
15. "Suite Life on Deck" (Friday, 8:30 p.m.), Disney, 2.99 million homes, 4.31 million viewers.
Ratings
In Memory
Ellie Greenwich
Ellie Greenwich, who co-wrote some of pop music's most enduring songs, including "Chapel of Love," "Be My Baby" and "Leader of the Pack," died Wednesday, according to her niece. She was 68.
Greenwich, a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, was considered one of pop's most successful songwriters. She had a rich musical partnership with the legendary Phil Spector, whose "wall of sound" technique changed rock music. With Spector, she wrote some of pop's most memorable songs, including "Da Doo Ron Ron" and "River Deep, Mountain High." But Spector wasn't her only collaborator.
She also had key hits with her ex-husband Jeff Barry, including the dynamic song "Leader of the Pack" (years later, Broadway would stage a Tony-nominated musical with the same name based on her life).
Greenwich was a native of Brooklyn. While she garnered her greatest success as a songwriter, Greenwich started out as a performer. She performed in talent shows as a child, and by the time she was a teen, she had her own group, called The Jivettes.
She went to college, where she met Barry, and shortly after graduation, began working for songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, where she got her break. She had her first chart success with the Jay and the Americans song "This Is It," which she wrote with Doc Pomus and Tony Powers.
She also had success with Barry as the duo The Raindrops with the songs "What a Guy" and "The Kind of Boy You Can't Forget."
She is also credited with helping Neil Diamond get his start and was a co-producer of early Diamond hits "Cherry, Cherry" and "Kentucky Woman."
Among the more famous songs she wrote are "Baby I Love You," "Do Wah Diddy Diddy" and "Look of Love."
Greenwich is survived by a sister, brother-in-law, nephew and her niece.
Ellie Greenwich
In Memory
Dominick Dunne
Author
Dominick Dunne, who told stories of shocking crimes among the rich and famous through his magazine articles and best-selling novels such as "The Two Mrs. Grenvilles," died Wednesday in his home at age 83.
Dunne was part of a famous family that also included his brother, novelist and screenwriter John Gregory Dunne; his brother's wife, author Joan Didion; and his son Griffin.
A one-time movie producer, Dunne carved a new career starting in the 1980s as a chronicler of the problems of the wealthy and powerful.
Tragedy struck his life in 1982 when his actress daughter, Dominique, was slain - and that experience informed his fiction and his journalistic efforts from then on.
Dunne was born in 1925 in Hartford, Conn., to a wealthy Roman Catholic family and grew up in some of the same social circles as the Kennedys. In his memoir, he traced his fascination with Hollywood to a childhood trip he took "out West" with an aunt. They took one of those home of the stars bus tours and he vowed to come back and be part of the glamorous world he had glimpsed.
While in the Army, he was awarded the Bronze Star for heroism in 1944 for carrying two wounded men to safety at the Battle of Merz in Feisberg, Germany.
At Williams College in Massachusetts, he and a fellow student, Stephen Sondheim, appeared in plays together. After college, he went to New York where he landed a job in the fledgling TV industry as stage manager of the "Howdy Doody" children's show. NBC took him to Hollywood to stage manage the famous TV version of "The Petrified Forest" with Humphrey Bogart.
Among his credits as a producer were the TV series "Adventures in Paradise" and "The Boys in the Band," a pioneering 1970 drama about gay life. Two of his films, "The Panic in Needle Park" and "Play It As It Lays," were written or co-written by his brother and sister-in-law.
Dunne and his wife, Ellen Griffin Dunne, known as Lenny, were married in 1954. They divorced in the 1960s but he wrote that afterward they remained close nonetheless. She died in 1997.
Beside Dominique, they had two sons, Alexander and Griffin.
Dominick Dunne
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