Emily, official younger daughter of NewMexiKen, is on a business trip to southern California and sent this along just now.
Month: June 2008
The Lincoln ‘Family Room’
I first posted this two years ago today and thought it worth reprising.
Between the drapes, wallpaper and carpet, no wonder Lincoln was melancholy and Mrs. Lincoln was crazy.
NewMexiKen photo, 2006. Click image for larger version.
It’s beyond me why June 9th isn’t a national holiday
Donald Duck, Cole Porter and Les Paul!
Lester William Polfus is 93 today. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as Les Paul.
The name Les Paul is synonymous with the electric guitar. As a player, inventor and recording artist, Paul has been an innovator from the early years of his life. Born Lester William Polfus in 1915 in Waukesha, Wisconsin, Paul built his first crystal radio at age nine – which was about the time he first picked up a guitar. By age 13 he was performing semi-professionally as a country-music guitarist and working diligently on sound-related inventions. In 1941, Paul built his first solid-body electric guitar, and he continued to make refinements to his prototype throughout the decade. He also worked on refining the technology of sound, developing revolutionary engineering techniques such as close miking, echo delay and multitracking. All the while he busied himself as a bandleader who could play both jazz and country music.
…In 1952, Les Paul introduced the first eight-track tape recorder (designed by Paul and marketed by Ampex) and, more significantly for the future of rock and roll, launched the solid-body electric guitar that bears his name. Built and marketed by Gibson, with continuous advances and refinements from Paul in such areas as low-impedance pickup technology, the Les Paul guitar became a staple instrument among discerning rock guitarists.
Robert S. McNamara is 92.
Dick Vitale is 69 today, baby! Not exactly a diaper dandy.
Michael J. Fox is 47.
Two-time nominee for the Best Actor Oscar, Johnny Depp is 45.
Tedy Bruschi is 35.
Natalie Portman is 27.
Cole Porter was born in Peru, Indiana, on June 9th in 1891.
Mr. Porter wrote the lyrics and music for his songs, and to both he brought such an individuality of style that a genre known as “the Cole Porter song” became recognized.
The hallmarks of a typical Porter song were lyrics that were urbane or witty and a melody with a sinuous, brooding quality. Some of his best-known songs in this vein were “What Is This Thing Called Love,” “Night and Day,” “Love for Sale” and “Begin the Beguine.”
But an equally typical and equally recognizable Porter song would have a simple, bouncy melody and a lyric based on a long and entertaining list of similarities, opposite or contrasts. “Let’s Do It” ticked off the amiable amatory habits of birds, flowers, crustacea, fish, insects, animals and various types of humans, while “You’re the Top” was an exercise in the creation of superlatives that included such items as “the nimble tread of the feet of Fred Astaire,” “Garbo’s salary” and “Mickey Mouse.”
Still a third type of Porter song was exclamatory in both lyrics and melody. “Just One of Those Things,” “From This Moment On” and “It’s All Right With Me” were instances.
Night and Day was one of the NPR 100, their list of the 100 most important American musical works of the 20th century. The first note is repeated 35 times.
Donald Duck is 74 today. He debuted in the Disney Silly Symphony cartoon “The Wise Little Hen” on this date in 1934. (Donald Duck is one of three Disney characters with an “official” birthday. The others are Mickey and Minnie, who debuted on November 18, 1928.)
Donald Duck actually appeared in more theatrical cartoons than Mickey Mouse — 128. Donald’s middle name is Fauntleroy.
Uh oh, I think I’ve lost it
My cell phone that is. I think I’ve lost my cell phone. I guess I’ll just have to get a new one. In that case it might as well be an iPhone. As soon as the new model reaches the store.1
Yup, that’s when I’m going to lose my cell phone — just as soon as the new iPhones reach the store.
1 July 11th.
Best redux line of the day
“Adding up the numbers, approximately 81 billion modern humans have lived altogether. For every person alive today, twelve have died. If people really go to heaven after death, then the afterworld is a crowded place.”
Steve Olson, Mapping Human History. First posted here four years ago today.
Post mortems
NewMexiKen hasn’t spent much time reading the numerous “Why Hillary Lost” articles and blog entries, but I have glanced at a few. What I haven’t seen anywhere yet is that she lost because she was already in the White House for eight years. That’s the primary reason I didn’t care for her candidacy. Was I alone?
Even more exciting NewMexiKen poll
{democracy:34}
Want a collector’s item?
“Decent Model T’s and Model A’s have sold on eBay recently for as little as $6,000.”
From an article in at NYTimes.com on affordable collector cars.
“Want a convertible instead? A Mazda Miata is a great pick, and there are plenty of choices for around $5,000. A recently reported sale on eBay of a 1990 red air-conditioned convertible with less than 100,000 miles for $4,575 is indicative of the market.”
Best redux line of the day, so far
“Most people, he concluded, were selfish, greedy, unprincipled, venal, utterly irredeemable shit-eaters, but he’d also observed that these same people were highly sensitive to criticism.”
From Empire Falls by Richard Russo. First posted here three years ago today.
Bryce Canyon National Park (Utah)
… was designated a national monument on this date in 1923. It became a national park in 1928.
Bryce Canyon, famous for its worldly unique geology, consists of a series of horseshoe-shaped amphitheaters carved from the eastern edge of the Paunsaugunt Plateau in southern Utah. The erosional force of frost-wedging and the dissolving power of rainwater have shaped the colorful limestone rock of the Claron Formation into bizarre shapes including slot canyons, windows, fins, and spires called “hoodoos.”
Click National Park image for larger version.
The people’s choice — oops, choose again
The results of a Dallas City Council-sponsored poll to rename Industrial Boulevard were released late Friday and, by an overwhelming margin, voters chose César Chávez Boulevard.
The choice to name the road for the legendary civil-rights activist who agitated on behalf of farm workers but had scant ties to Dallas is certain to stir yet more controversy over the long-disputed Trinity River project.
. . .And in the past week, several council members have downplayed the poll’s importance in the effort to find a new, more glamorous name for Industrial, a road known more for its bars and bail bond shops than the river it winds along.
Bet the council members wouldn’t be second guessing if the choice had been Roger Staubach Boulevard or Owen Wilson Boulevard.
New Deli Choice
“A chance encounter in Israel between vets and a giraffe has led to a rabbinical ruling that the African animal is kosher.”
What are the best drink swaps?
A study from the University of North Carolina found that we consume 450 calories a day from beverages, nearly twice as many as 30 years ago! This increase amounts to an extra 23 pounds a year that we’re forced to work off—or carry around with us.
There’s good news and bad news when it comes to liquid calories. The bad news is they are the most difficult calories for us to gauge, because we have none of the greasy, cheesy visual cues we get when we go face-to-face with a plate of loaded nachos or a triple cheeseburger. The good news is that they are the easiest calories to cut from your diet.
There’s an accompanying list. For example, Beck’s Premier Light has 64 calories, Bud Light 110. Honest Tea Green Dragon Tea has 60, Arizona Iced Tea 200. A Long Island Iced Tea has 700 calories.
Historic day
According to AAA, today is the first day regular gasoline averaged $4 in the U.S.A. Good job Bushie.
Mexican Hat
NewMexiKen read the second of Michael McGarrity’s Kevin Kerney mysteries this afternoon and evening, Mexican Hat
The fact that I read Mexican Hat pretty much without putting it down is all you really need to know by way of a recommendation. This time the tough but lovable former Santa Fe cop solves a smuggling-murder crime wave in the Gila Mountains of western New Mexico.
Thoroughbred
Jill, official older daughter of NewMexiKen, sent this along today:
“Here’s Mack starting his kick for home, leaving the other kids in the dust…a 3:57 half mile…in 90-degree heat…after getting up at 6:15 and swimming at a swim meet.”
He’s 7. Amazing how much energy he can get from a diet consisting pretty much of peanut butter and jelly and chicken nuggets.
Click image for larger version.
Best line of the day, so far
“Da’Tara wins the Belmont at 38:1 odds, but who do they interview when it’s over? Big Brown’s jockey.”
Debby, official sister of NewMexiKen.
Class
NewMexiKen is just an old bleeding-heart liberal, but both Clinton and Obama showed a lot of class today. This is from the Obama website.
Her speech:
Omnivore’s Dilemma
NewMexiKen has finished Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals
This isn’t a cook book or a health book. It’s well-done journalism, reporting facts, history and trends, while profiling various people and places. The omnivore’s dilemma is that because humans can eat almost anything, we are easily confused (and manipulated). Pollan thinks we need to be better educated about the source of our foods so that we can make more informed choices. He sets out to increase his (and the reader’s) awareness about what we eat and where it comes from. He does so without grossing you out or trying to convert you (well, maybe a little). Pollan is not a vegetarian or animal rights absolutist.
[Pollan] embarks on four separate eating adventures, each of which starts at the very beginning — in the soil from which the raw materials of his dinners will emerge — and ends with a cooked, finished meal.
These meals are, in order, a McDonald’s repast consumed by Pollan with his wife and son in their car as it vrooms up a California freeway; a “Big Organic” meal of ingredients purchased at the upmarket chain Whole Foods; a beyond-organic chicken dinner whose main course and side dishes come from a wondrously self-sustaining Virginia farm that uses no pesticides, antibiotics or synthetic fertilizers; and a “hunter-gatherer” feast consisting almost entirely of ingredients that Pollan has shot dead or foraged himself.
Here’s a lengthy adaptation from the final (but perhaps least interesting) section of the book — The Modern Hunter-Gatherer.
Best line of the day, so far
“If you spent as much time carefully thinking about the world’s problems as you waste dissing me and other liberals, perhaps you wouldn’t be so utterly, totally, irrevocably, and completely, wrong about everything.”
Camera thieves caught on camera
A woman who had her camera stolen got a close-up of the thieves when photos they took of themselves were automatically uploaded to her computer.
Alison DeLauzon had her digital camera stolen while she was on holiday in Florida, meaning she had to accept the loss of many treasured family snapshots.
But not only did she get those images back, she also got a few new ones – of the men who stole her camera posing with their prize, totally oblivious to the fact the pictures were being transmitted via cyberspace.
Equipped with a special memory card with wireless Internet capability, DeLauzon’s camera had not only automatically sent her holiday pictures to her computer, but also uploaded photos of the miscreants who swiped her equipment bag after she accidentally left it behind at a restaurant.
Daniel Boone
| … first looked west from Cumberland Gap into what is now Kentucky on this date in 1769. The Kentucky Historical Society celebrates June 7 as “Boone Day.”
Boone was not the first person through Cumberland Gap; he wasn’t even the first European-American. He was, however, instrumental in blazing a trail, which became known as the Wilderness Road. According to the National Park Service: |
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Immigration through the Gap began immediately, and by the end of the Revolutionary War some 12,000 persons had crossed into the new territory. By 1792 the population was over 100,000 and Kentucky was admitted to the Union.
During the 1790s traffic on the Wilderness Road increased. By 1800 almost 300,000 people had crossed the Gap going west. And each year as many head of livestock were driven east. As it had always been, the Gap was an important route of commerce and transportation.
NewMexiKen photos 2006. Click image for larger version.
What do brain surgeons know about cellphone safety that the rest of us don’t?
Last week, three prominent neurosurgeons told the CNN interviewer Larry King that they did not hold cellphones next to their ears. “I think the safe practice,” said Dr. Keith Black, a surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, “is to use an earpiece so you keep the microwave antenna away from your brain.”
Dr. Vini Khurana, an associate professor of neurosurgery at the Australian National University who is an outspoken critic of cellphones, said: “I use it on the speaker-phone mode. I do not hold it to my ear.” And CNN’s chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, a neurosurgeon at Emory University Hospital, said that like Dr. Black he used an earpiece.
Hit and run
Hartford, Connecticut, May 30th.
The victim is 78. Notice the good Samaritans rushing to his aid.
He was jaywalking but the cars that hit him were both on the wrong side of the street!
W
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Poster for W from Oliver Stone. Click image for larger version. |
Thanks to Byron for the tip.