NewMexiKen has seen so many studies and articles over the years recommending exercise as important to good health that I’m beginning to think there might be something to it.
Anyone have any personal experience with this approach?
The Oscar® Igloo updates its predictions.
Current top films:
Brokeback Mountain
Good Night, And Good Luck
Crash
Walk the Line
Capote
And don’t count out:
The Constant Gardener
Munich
A History of Violence
Oh, and Reese Witherspoon — “Simply unstoppable.”
If Go Fug Yourself doesn’t do it for you, how about a pair of mugging mug shots from The Smoking Gun?
… was established on this date in 1930.
Located in the Northern Neck of Virginia, 38 miles east of Fredericksburg on Virginia Route 3, George Washington Birthplace National Monument preserves the heart of Augustine Washington’s plantation, the 17th century homesite of the immigrant John Washington, and the Washington Family Burial Ground.
George Washington’s Birthplace contains a Memorial House and dependencies constructed in 1931 near the site of the original Washington home. Here, in the peace and beauty of this place untouched by time, the staunch character of our hero comes to the imagination.
Well, NewMexiKen yammered when Kobe went out of a game with 62 points, so let’s send him some basketball love. This is from the Lakers Blog:
When Brian Cook and Kobe Bryant combine for 83 points, there’s not much the opposition can do.
Down 14 at the half, Kobe took a potentially season crushing loss at home to the Raptors and turned it into a 122-104 win… and history. 81 points, the second highest total in NBA history behind only Wilt Chamberlain’s 100 in ‘62. 55 in the second half, before leaving to a standing ovation and a hug for Phil Jackson with 4.2 seconds left, capping a performance that even he couldn’t have dreamed up. And unlike 62 (you remember 62, right?), this time Kobe wasn’t coming out of the game. Sam Mitchell tried every defense he could think of, but none of them helped as Kobe took a game the Raptors had in hand and made it his. The explosion took (some) of the sting away from the ending of his consecutive free throw streak at 62. To cap off the evening? How about a call from Magic?
There may be critics of 81 (don’t know who yet), but they’re misguided, says Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports. Kobe is rewriting the rules of what’s possible, even if it means overshadowing NFL championship Sunday — no easy feat. Exact comparisons to Chamberlain are tough to make, but it’s very possible Kobe’s feat was more impressive.
Either way, save the box score. It’s a keeper.
was born on this date in 1832. The following is from an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art — Edouard Manet and His Influence:
It is hard to image a time when Paris was without broad, tree-lined streets or when the life of the city did not interest French artists. Yet this was the case in 1850 when Edouard Manet began to study painting. Young artists could expect to succeed only through the official Academy exhibitions known as Salons, whose conservative juries favored biblical and mythological themes and a polished technique. Within twenty-five years, however, both Paris and painting had a new look. Urban renovations had opened the wide avenues and parks we know today, and painting was transformed when artists abandoned the transparent glazes and blended brushtrokes of the past and turned their attention to life around them. Contemporary urban subjects and a bold style, which offered paint on the canvas as something to be admired in itself, gave their art a strong new sense of the present.
…
Several artists had begun to challenge the stale conventions of the Academy when Manet’s Olympia (now at the Musée d’Orsay, Paris) was accepted for the Salon in 1865. Never had a work caused such scandal. Critics advised pregnant women to avoid the picture, and it was rehung to thwart vandals. Viewers were not used to the painting’s flat space and shallow volumes. To many, Manet’s “color patches” appeared unfinished. Even more shocking was the frank honesty of his courtesan: it was her boldness, not her nudity, that offended. Her languid pose copied a Titian Venus, but Manet did not cloak her with mythology. She is not a remote goddess but emphatically in the present, easily recognized among the demimonde of prostitutes and dancehalls. In Olympia’s steady gaze there is no apology for sensuality and, for uncomfortable viewers, no escaping her “reality.”
Manet’s succès de scandale made him a leader of the avant-garde. In the evenings at the Café Guerbois, near his studio, he was joined by writers and artists, including Monet, Bazille, and others who would go on to organize the first impressionist exhibition. Manet’s embrace of what the poet Charles Baudelaire termed the “heroism of modern life” and his bold manner with paint inspired the future impressionists, though Manet never exhibited with them.
… of actress Jeanne Moreau. She’s 78. Moreau is best known for French New Wave films Jules and Jim (1962) and The Bride Wore Black (1968). Roger Ebert:
This is ridiculous, I told myself. You’ve interviewed Ingmar Bergman. Robert Mitchum. John Wayne. You got through those okay. Why should you be scared of Jeanne Moreau? Simply because she’s the greatest movie actress of the last 20 years? Simply because she’s made more good films for great directors than anybody else? Simply because something in her face and manner has fascinated you since you sat through “Jules and Jim” twice in a row? She’s only human; it’s not like she’s a goddess.
But I suspected that she was.
… of Mariska Hargitay. Jayne Mansfield’s daughter is 42. (She was in the car when her mother was killed in 1967.) Ms. Hargitay plays Detective Olivia Benson on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
It’s the birthday of Humphrey Bogart, born on this day in 1899. Bogart was nominated for the best actor Oscar for Casablanca, The Caine Mutiny and The African Queen; he won for The African Queen. According to The Writer’s Almanac:
[Bogart] was expelled from Massachusetts’ Phillips Academy and immediately joined the Navy to fight in World War I, serving as a ship’s gunner. One day, while roughhousing on the ship’s wooden stairway, he tripped and fell, and a splinter became lodged in his upper lip; the result was a scar, as well as partial paralysis of the lip, resulting in the tight-set mouth and lisp that became one of his most distinctive onscreen qualities.
And, born on this date in 1910, was Django Reinhardt. the first significant jazz figure in Europe — and the most influential European in jazz to this day. Play Jazz Guitar.com has some interesting background:
A violinist first and a guitarist later, Jean Baptiste “Django” Reinhardt grew up in a gypsy camp near Paris where he absorbed the gypsy strain into his music. A disastrous caravan fire in 1928 badly burned his left hand, depriving him of the use of the fourth and fifth fingers, but the resourceful Reinhardt figured out a novel fingering system to get around the problem that probably accounts for some of the originality of his style. According to one story, during his recovery period, Reinhardt was introduced to American jazz when he found a 78 RPM disc of Louis Armstrong’s “Dallas Blues” at an Orleans flea market. He then resumed his career playing in Parisian cafes until one day in 1934 when Hot Club chief Pierre Nourry proposed the idea of an all-string band to Reinhardt and Grappelli. Thus was born the Quintet of the Hot Club of France, which quickly became an international draw thanks to a long, splendid series of Ultraphone, Decca and HMV recordings.
The Red Hot Jazz Archive has some on-line recordings of the Quintette of the Hot Club of France.
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