Friday, December 28, 2012

Anil Dash Take Heart: Jon Swift's Smaller Blog Roundup Continues

Back on December 13, someone I follow retweeted this from Anil Dash: "I am very appreciative of the very kind responses to my piece about The Web We Lost. But if you liked it, BLOG ABOUT IT. Don't just tweet." I was intrigued. Someone entreating blogging over tweeting.  I clicked back...
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Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Merry Christmas, to the Charlie Brown in Us All

A "Charlie Brown Christmas tree." A poignant concept that has entered the language. Things we try to do, things we make that don't work out all well by arbitrary, limited human standards. But it's the trying, with a sincere heart full of love, that's important. It's something which hopefully...
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Monday, December 24, 2012

Snoopy and the WW1 Christmas Truce

Six crazy guys from Ocala, Florida, wrote a great Christmas song for everyone's favorite World War I Flying Ace and his Christmas Eve battle with his archenemy, Manfred von Richtofen, the Red Baron. It recognizes the actual Christmas Truce of 1914. Pop song with a little history.  I love that. The...
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Sunday, December 23, 2012

Looking at Fictional TV Shootings After Newtown

First graders. I often see classes of city kids on the #1 train going on a class trip amid the crush of morning commuters. When it's the first graders, you can't help but smile as they hold hands with each other, gently pushed by the teachers & parents into the middle of the car to hang onto the lower third of the silver poles. Their tiny height and bright faces are greatly accentuated by the...
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Monday, December 3, 2012

Light Within a Shimmering Aural Cloud

I was recently reminded of this piece by Morten Lauridsen, "O Nata Lux." It's part of his Lux Aeterna suite, and includes the main motif. I sang it once, and it was transcendent to be an inner voice within these stunning chords. "O Nata Lux" is the office hymn for the Litugy of the Hours for Lauds (morning prayer) for the Feast of the Transfiguration.  It is very, very old. O nata lux de lumine,Jesu...
              

Monday, November 26, 2012

"I'll hum it for you: Da-die da-die da dum"

Casablanca turns 70 this year, and TCM celebrated by bringing it back into commercial theaters across the country for one night in March that sold out so quickly that they brought it back for one more night in April, which I got tickets to. I am a life-long fan who never saw it on the big screen....
              

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Skyfall: Giving Thanks for Bond, from Thy Bounty and IMAX

"Jesus said, “I have observed Satan fall like lightning from the sky" Luke 10:18 Since it's nearly Thanksgiving, I frame my experience of this new Bond as I was very grateful to see Skyfall yesterday in an IMAX theater.  The cinematography at that scale is truly breathtaking, delivering a...
              

Sunday, November 11, 2012

Armistice Day in New York City

Ninety-four years ago today at 11:00 a.m., in a railroad car in the forest of Compiegne, France and Germany signed the armistice ending World War 1. That was to be the war to end all wars. Sadly, not. The Commonwealth celebrates Remembrance Sunday today, which will find me at that little faux acre...
              

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Election Day 2012

Good luck and best wishes to all our neighbors who in the midst of the suffering of the loss of homes and lives, and the continued struggle with no power, heat, or running water, make the effort to stand on lines for the shuttle buses to where they can vote, stand on line to vote, and get back on the shuttle bus to go home. No one said democracy was easy, but many bear the burden to a much greater...
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Saturday, November 3, 2012

Drowned Dreams

The Tristate area joins New Orleans and Florida in the deep knowledge of how nature can tear apart everything that man can build.  American Red Cross www.redcross.org/hurricane-sandy Brooklyn Recovery Fund www.brooklynrecoveryfund.org Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York Citywww.nyc.gov/html/fund/html/home/home.shtml Salvation...
              

Monday, October 29, 2012

Escaping into Beatles Psychedelia in the Throes of the Storm

To drown out the HISSING, HISSING, WHIPPING winds outside the window and the enveloping sickly wet grayness, I am escaping into the psychedelic COLORS of the Magical Mystery Tour, and then crawling over to Pepperland. The Paley Center screened the newly remastered print of MMT, with a panel discussion...
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Sunday, October 28, 2012

Life Imitating Art: The Storm and Two Cathedrals

What separates Sandy from the power of the mere Hurricane Irene is its historic convergence of meterological phenomena. From Newsday: "It's been 69 years since the metropolitan area was hit by a late-season hurricane. Sandy's expected turbulent merger WITH a cold front moving in from the west, AND...
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Sunday, October 21, 2012

Trafalgar Day Meets Me and the First Filmed James Bond

Lord Horatio Nelson and the first screen appearance of James Bond share a particular detail with me: October 21. It was the date Nelson died at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805; the date the Climax! anthology series on CBS brought Ian Flemming's Casino Royal to the small screen with Barry Nelson as...
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Saturday, October 13, 2012

Funked by the Emmys, Revived by Rick and AJ

I have been afflicted a bit lately from the nearly 6-year itch of the blogger, which hits different people at different times. Tim Footman recently chronicled his own near-anniversary with an homage to "old style blogging," when unrelated ideas flowed so easily, one to the other. Besides the general...
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Sunday, September 16, 2012

Tumblring in Washington, DC

I happened to find myself in Washington DC this past week, as 9/11 bled into the horrifying murders of Ambassador Chris Stevens, information officer Sean Smith, security specialist Glenn Doherty and a fourth American whose name I don't think has been released. Except for a quick visit to the Library...
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