Tuesday, June 30, 2009
NAUGHTY PARISIANS
Today's NYTimes 1176 Best Film was Ernst Lubitch's
with Maurice Chevalier, Charles Ruggles and Jeannette MacDonald in a freshly restored Criterion Eclipse (bargain) DVD.
I have seen this before and ordered it by mistake but was quite happy to see it again. As I recall, the print I saw before was disastrous by comparison and now I can see how important the quality of the disc can be.
This is a fast paced, funny pre-code bedroom farce and is quite sexy and the jokes hold up even today including the few good gay jokes.
Chevalier is incredible to watch. McDonald not so much but, somehow, women's fashions are more radically different today than at that time.
This is 1931. Almost as old as me.
Interesting that the next film will be a Frank Sinatra / Debby Reynolds musical The Tender Trap. I am sure there will be contrasts and the story will be essentially the same.
In any case, this was fun again and since I have now seen it twice through and liked the second time more it rates a 4 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
Monday, June 29, 2009
HET AND HOMO BRO'S
The New York Times has discovered that there are actually gay and straight men who are friends. Even best friends. Sometimes business partners!
They can't even get through using innuendo in the title.
They got to this through the American Idol guys who I have seen were roommates and all and are still close. They are sweet together. Adam Lambert and Kris Allen.
Leave it to the teevee to reveal new levels of social intercourse. Or not.
When I was young, there actually was tension in some of my friendships with straight men.
A lot of this came about because I came out during the relationship and, I think, they were always a little uneasy about my motives.
Since then though, where I have entered gay and out and have been friends with straight men, I have had very good friendships which endured. Some even today over long distances and time separations.
My business partner was straight. One of the closest relationships in my life. And still is.
In a way, I don't like to analyze it or even think too much about it because it seems that it is obvious we would be friends and that making a thing out of the orientation somehow disrupts what had been a smooth thing. Examination affects the examined. Heisenberg?
So I won't examine it.
It is worth noting that I also have three straight sons. All A+ relationships.
I think the Times article is a little too "gee whiz" but it is nice to see and might set a tone or an atmosphere for some straight men to think it over before they distance. More importantly that gay men get the message. I know too many gay men who ghettoize. Not good.
Straight men are good for us. My father was a straight man and he was good for me. So are all my good het friends.
Enough. I am analyzing a good thing. I don't want to fuck up the balance and the good vibes around it all.
Labels: gay life
TRUST ME
Here, I think, Obama plays straight with "the gays".
All of the issues mentioned require strenuous working of the system.
The canard that Obama can rescind past laws and regulations with a "stroke of the pen" is difficult to drown.
Here, he says, that Don't Ask Don't Tell will be rescinded but it has to be done in a way that will "take". And I agree with him.
A lot of us are very naive about how the system works.
It is a good thing that it is slow and deliberate. It is good that Obama is determined to do it the right way. Once. None of us want to see any of these issues arise again.
I think that is what he is talking about when he says that "years from now we will wonder what this was all about". It will stick if it is done right.
And I plan to stick with him.
Hush up there in the bleachers, you impatient ones!
Labels: Administration Obama, gay politics, gay rights
NOT OVER
In celebration of Stonewall, which happened today, I submit this story to show that this shit is still going down. Shortly after midnight on Sunday, police raided a gay bar in Fort Worth, TX, and arrested seven customers for public intoxication. (One man was reportedly taken to the hospital “with bleeding in his brain after officers threw him to the ground and used zip-ties to handcuff him.”) Police said they were simply conducting an “alcohol beverage code inspection” when several customers made sexual advances toward the officers. However, the owner of the Rainbow Lounge, J.R. Schrock, said that claim was a “lie.” “The groping of the police officer — really? We’re gay, but we’re not dumb,” Schrock said. Todd Camp, the founder of Q Cinema and former reporter for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, was at the Rainbow Lounge when the police showed up: “I have friends who are cops and I know what to do when officers are working,” Camp said. “No one was acting aggressive to officers.” Camp said that he has been attending bars for years in Fort Worth when TABC conducts raids. “Usually, they’re very orderly and respectful –- they work with the bar staff and check IDs, it’s quick and painless and then it’s over and then they’re out,” Camp said. “This was not that. This was harassment, plain and simple.“ The Rainbow Lounge incident came on the 40th anniversary of the famous Stonewall uprising that sparked the modern LGBT movement, when police also raided a gay bar in New York City. Today, protesters rallied in downtown Forth Worth over the weekend’s raid. (HT: Pam’s House Blend)Police raid a gay bar in Texas on the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising
>Only in Texas? Probably not. Somewhere, someone in authority is taking down a gay man or men in some abusive manner. It happens all the time.
Labels: gay history, gay rights
OH OH HOT
I made too much of the cool June.
Now I am getting payback.
The summer heat has come. We have had several 110 days. There is "imbedded moisture" up there so we are getting a lot of cloud cover today which will cut it down a bit but still.........
I went to a pool party yesterday for awhile. This is really the only kind of party you can have this time of year.
I, unfortunately, chose to not take a suit. It was a walkthrough.
I could only do it for about half an hour. Their house was open with the air on but that isn't too pleasant.
I had a good time though. A lot of friends were there and I didn't have to stand in the introvert's corner. It seemed to be filled with some other people who I went and talked to as well.
I don't go to many of these but two young men who I really like a lot were putting it on and it was a way to let them know how much I appreciate them in my life.
That seems to get over my self absorption and get me into the "swim of things" even though I didn't take the suit.
Labels: gay life, heat, weather
Sunday, June 28, 2009
THE BASICS
Today's NYTimes Best 1176 Film was Aki Kaurismäki's
Tulitikkutehtaan tyttö / The Match Factory Girl (1990)
This short (69 minutes) almost wordless film shows the bitter result of a good time had in bad times gone bad. Think about it. A revenge story.
The style here is the thing.
Bleak, bleak, bleak but the revenge is sweet. Sort of.
But it is mesmerizing to watch. I was putting on my sneakers as it began and I sat holding one of them in my hand for 15 or more minutes.
The Finns are people of few words and it is all here without them. The acting is superb as are the beautifully mundane surroundings.
The match factory is a fascinating metaphor for the life depicted. The match ignites. Then, well, goes out.
I liked it a lot and will get the rest of the trilogy of films discussed at the link.
The Proletariat Trilogy.
It sounds dangerously socialistic.
I will give it a 4 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
WANKERS
Some guy has decided to build a toaster from the ground up.
I mean from mining the materials to making the plastics from oil. All that.
He hopes to show the futility of capitalism. Or something.
As far as I can tell, he is showing the futility of being a wanker.
I love living in a world that such nonsense can be seriously addressed.
I am right with him on the so-called evils of capitalism but when you come right down to it, I will use my toaster several times a day and to hell with him and his bullshit.
This article does remind me of a wonderful piece of work which I read a few years ago.
I, Pencil which makes the opposite point quite effectively.
Well, as it turns out the pencil probably causes deaths in Uganda as well. Not something that I am going to think about as I jot a note to myself. (In No.2 lead incidentally as the Oriole model shown).
Thanks Andrew Sullivan
Saturday, June 27, 2009
CIRCUS
When all the celebs have given their tearful eulogies and the police and docs have had a go at trying to explain the unexplainable, we still have Jesse to stir the pot and wring just a little bit more out of the situation for his own aggrandizement.
Rev. Jesse Jackson says family wants 2nd autopsy
Did you see Liz Taylor's weeper?
Labels: culture
INDEPENDENT
I am proud to say that my very own Representative Mary Bono Mack voted for the President's clean air and energy act in the House yesterday.
This makes several issues in which Ms. Mack has bucked the leadership of her own party.
One might be cynical and note that her district is more liberal than she has been and voted for Obama in the general election but this has never bothered her or her late husband, Sonny, before.
When Sonny died, she became a hostage of the Republican House leadership and, I am convinced, was intimidated into voting against her constituency and her own personal point of view.
She is emerging from this and becoming her own person. Good for Mary. I might even vote for her over the Democrat in the next election. He is kind of beige. Gay beige, but beige.
Labels: global warming, Republicans
TWITS AND ROTTERS
Today's NYTimes 1176 Best Film was Mike Leigh's
This is black comedy, class warfare and a nasty swipe at Thatcherism.
It helps if you are a Brit of a certain age when you watch this picture. I am not.
Leigh uses improvisation and builds his script from his actors work together. I am not sure this is a good idea.
The product is always over the top and overheated. I like parts of it. Funny, incisive. Good ideas. But somehow, the nastiness and the over reaching get to me.
This film does not offer a "hearing impaired" option so I only understood about a half of it. Too fast, too many accents.
I will have to give this a 3 out of Netflix5. If I do a Mike Leigh festival I won't include this one.
Labels: best films
WHAT? WHERE?
Walking Booker last night, I noticed that Ron the Right Winger, our neighbor, has a new bumper sticker on his Cadillac. Actually, not a bumper sticker. He made this himself with those stick on letters you can get.
"Obama: Bite me"
Nice.
I have always wondered about this expression, actually.
I looked it up. It means "bite me in the ass". I am still wondering.
Where I come from, this isn't such a bad thing. But I guess Ron and I don't come from the same place.
The slang dictionary says it means "get lost" or some such.
Well, why "bite me in the ass"?
I am still trying to unravel it but I am sure there is some lurking subconscious homoeroticism in there.
Ron is taken with walking around without a shirt. Not something I would mind if Ron was in better condition. His moobs are bigger than mine. But still, preening is preening. And I don't think it is for the ladies.
The funny thing is that Ron always has some kind of Rush Dittohead sign or bumper sticker somewhere and we have never, ever discussed it. He is a nice guy. So am I. I know he knows we still have the Obama sticker on all our cars. No problem. Neighbors are neighbors. Our dogs even like each other.
So it goes. Neighbors before politics I say.
Labels: republican whack jobs
MORE BETTER RECOMMENDS
You know that I have been a tireless bitcher about the Netflix recommended list which continually produces clunkers for me to watch.
I was heartened when they announced a prize to improve the algorithm. And now, we have a result.
And the Winner of the $1 Million Netflix Prize (Probably) Is …
Just to show the current accuracy, they are recommending Ma Vie en Rose.
Convinced he's a girl trapped in a boy's body, 7-year-old Ludovic (Georges Du Fresne) expresses his true self by regularly donning girls' clothing, putting a strain on his perplexed family -- and, of course, sending shockwaves among his bigoted neighbors. But Ludovic innocently carries on, oblivious to the chaos he's creating. This whimsical Belgian comedy was an international film festival smash and received a Best Foreign Film Golden Globe.
Sure. Send it. Aaaaargh.
Friday, June 26, 2009
LANG IN HOLLYWOOD
Today's NYTimes Best 1176 Film was Fritz Lang's
There are a lot of nice touches in this blatant propaganda film. A lot of it doesn't add up but still, the parts are very good.
Lang had left Germany and had a new artistic and life home in America. So he made a British war film!
Walter Pidgeon, Joan Bennett star with a gaggle of German character actors including the very non-German George Sanders with a monocle.
An interesting aspect of this film is that the Germans talk German to one another. There are no sub titles. You don't need them. Even Sanders is talking kraut to his komrads.
It has John Carradine cast in a perfectly ambiguous role. But he plays it for all it is worth. I bet they cut a lot of it out or it would make more sense.
There are great sets and lighting. The plot is preposterous but, what the hell, it is war time.
I wouldn't want to see it again but once was OK.
I will give it a 3 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
THE "A" WORD
Medication a Focus of Jackson Inquiry
Watch very carefully now. They are going to find that he died with a mix of drugs in his body.
They are going to find shit in the Las Vegas doctor's car.
They are going to find prescription drugs all over his house.
There will be more info on the $100,000 pharmacy bill that he ran up.
But he will not be labelled an addict at any time. He will not be considered dead from an overdose. It will be an unfortunate combination of drugs.
If you want to see the chapter on verse on how this is done look at the proceedings after Heath Ledger died. He wasn't an addict either.
This doesn't matter to Ledger or Jackson. They are dead.
What matters is that many people who are drug dependent, prescription whores, pain pill junkies and so on will not get the straight story.
It is like privileged alcoholics used to have nervous disorders.
Yup.
Labels: culture
EYEWITNESS
Here is an eyewitness account of the Stonewall Riots.
As usual, Lucian K. Truscott the Fourth puts himself front and center but it is still a compelling read.
He refers to the "famous" Fred McDarrah photo of participants outside which he says he organized.
More veterans. Young club kids who, on the first night, refused to be pushed around.
Truscott also points out a fact that I have know from previous histories. The bar sting was by the vice squad for the purpose of uncovering payoffs to the local precinct and also to unmask the real ownership which, as most gay bars were at the time, mafia connected. A blackmail ring was said to be in operation.
Here is the photo. All kids. God bless 'em. Their older peers stood on the sidewalk and worried about the poor image the kids were creating. Closet cases.
Thank god that over the years the closet cases came out as a result of these kids' rebellion. Of course, you know my dear, they were all at Stonewall.
We used to have this in Boston in the old days.
It was not "Pride" then. It was a gay rights march and we were in it. No floats. Lots and lots of signs. And, again, a lot of young people.
On the sidewalks? A lot of queers that we knew from the bars or the neighborhood. A lot, indeed, from City Hall where John worked. WATCHING!
So, the chant. "Off the sidewalks and into the streets". We embarrassed some of them to make the leap. One small step for man and, what is it? A great leap for mankind? Or something. The gay equivalent.
Another, different, eyewitness account. The second night.
This is more about the surrounding issues. This guy is not a bystander like Truscott IV.
Labels: gay history, gay military, gay rights
OPEN BOOKER
Booker came to me and barked to go outside and visit with Frank the poolman.
This is new.
We have figured Booker to be more of an introvert. Not gregarious as Franklin was. No. We do not compare. We only observe.
So, given that I am a compliant and willing to please Airedale dad, we went out for a visit.
Frank is still recuperating from rupture surgery down there so has his son helping do the pool work. Frank supervises.
Booker went right over to Frank and did more than the usual cursory greeting. Wag, wag, wag and a few more licks than usual and then he got busy supervising the son and following Frank around.
Now, Frank sees Booker, at most, twice a week but not usually that because we miss him or ignore him. So his observation of Booker is more like time lapse photography.
Frank said that Booker was "more open" and I had to agree. That is it.
He continues to come out of himself as a social being and friend.
He is here. He is on the case. He is going to stay.
Back at the pool, Booker is celebrating life with all his pals.
He loves the scoop net. Too much. But he will hold back if told. He loves the ripples in the pool and includes us in his delight. Looking over to see if we are noticing the beautiful patterns that are there. He comes up and gives everyone a small kiss and then goes back to his "work".
He is a delightful being.
All of this open character comes out in the walks, the playing around at spa time, ball playing, riding in the Jeep and so on.
Little by little, a day at a time, he is growing to join the family and friends and we are excited and energized to be with him.
AN UNKNOWN SOLDIER
This is the only surviving NYPD mugshot* of the original Stonewall protesters arrested on the first night of the riots, June 28, 1969. Forty years ago this week.
At the moment, he is unknown.
He is one of the fathers of the gay rights movement.
Look at this face and tell me about bravery and fortitude. He has just been arrested and he gives the camera a look of gentle defiance.
I am very touched by this face and what the man behind it launched for all the rest of us.
*The Mug Shot shown here is the only one survinging from the riots in the public record. This comes about because, in the years following Stonewall, many people were able to have friends in the police department remove their records, or "lose" portions in order to protect their identity.
Labels: gay history, gay rights
Thursday, June 25, 2009
HUH?
I am always amazed at the fanadulation of Michael Jackson.
He goes by me.
Canned, processed, auto pilot performances.
Yeh, the dancing, yeh the voice, yeh the songs and the costumes but, yawn, can we move along and get a little rock and roll please?
All I caught was the sick, the weak and wobbly side.
I am amazed that CNN allowed an interview with Cher to get through.
She said that she worked with him when he was an adolescent and that he was an on-stage phenom and off stage shy, needy kid. She liked him.
Then five years later, she worked with him again and he was awful. A diva. Weird. She didn't like him.
To her, and apparently everyone else, the prime time was the adolescent, young, young adult time. She said this all with compassion not the usual show biz attitude. Like she was really there.
Well, we will have to put up with a few more days of this stuff. The entire fucking top of the page in the LATimes and four articles.
Then, as the bizarre details slip out, we will get the re-examinations and all. Painful.
What details? The cause of death. The reported 400 million in debt. The clouded custody of the kids. The rest of the story as "intimates" start to come out of the woodwork. The books. He can't sue anyone anymore.
This is all the wreckage of a kind of America that I hate.
Labels: culture, gay life, life
COMEBACK UNLIKELY
They still play his Jackson Five videos at my gym.
He is a right little robot.
It is very sad.
And he passed it on to his own three children.
Celebrity adoptions.
An American tragedy.
Labels: gay life, life, nostalgia
OBAMA STAYS IN TOUCH
Obama To Hold Job Performance Review With Every American Worker
Labels: Administration Obama
MORAL QUESTIONS
Gallup today:
A recent Gallup Poll finds 92% of Americans agreeing that having an extramarital affair, such as the ones South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and Nevada Sen. John Ensign have confessed to, is morally wrong -- making it the most objectionable of any issue tested.So I guess he did get his crank caught in the wringer.
I am surprised about the percentage. It is very high.
I think that it is about the implications for public service. Lying, duplicity, hurting others, self centeredness or egoism.
It would be interesting to see what poll results would be for a normal man or woman not in public life. What would people think of their stepping out on a spouse? What would the presence of kids introduce?
I have lived through some of this I can tell you that the closer you get to the reality the more the moral ambiguity. Especially if you are the perp.
The fact is that the incidence of marital infidelity is very high in this country. I speak from experience of friends who have had to deal with it either as the perpetrator or the perpetrated against.
You probably will not be surprised to hear that there is also gay infidelity in gay marriages and partnerships. I mean those in which monogamy is agreed upon. In legal marriage, monogamy is a given by definition. That doesn't mean that people act accordingly.
So I wonder what the disapproval rating was for McGreevey, the NJ governor who transgressed with a man. I wonder if a homoerotic dalliance is as disapproved or more. Certainly the shock value is more for the heterosexuals who assume that the only gays are already out and cavorting around shamelesly.
Certainly no married man could be gay, right? Wrong, of course.
It is all very interesting to me.
The main ingredient for my outrage here is the moral hypocrisy. This guy is one of the fringe right who condemn gays and gay marriages and defends so called family values for a living. Now that is a matter for outrage. These double dealers are hurting others every day for what they are doing on the sly themselves. Horsewhip them.
Labels: gay marriage, gay politics, politics
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
MEDITATING CATARACTS
I do want to add one thing.
Last year, when I went to the eye doc, and had about the same adventure I did today, I did have one thing that shook me. I was told that my cataracts had advanced a good deal and that I had lost a line of vision because of it.
I do not want my eye sliced.
So, I began to include a short eye meditation in my daily routine. Nothing special. Not a prayer to be cured, for god sake. Just a focus on the eye for healing.
Today I had no change in the cataracts since last year.
I don't claim anything here but guess what little meditation routine will continue for another year a day at a time?
Labels: eye
IMPATIENT OUTPATIENT
I had to go for my annual eye checkup today.
My ophthalmologist is very good. Actually a group practice. And my own GP likes them because they don't "sell" their wares. They just do their job.
I used to go to an old guy who smelled a bit musty. He retired two years ago and now I have a young, almost callow young Doc who is very earnest but, I think, competent. He is just a bit dim on real life.
They are methodical. A euphemism for slow.
They are also bureaucratic. There is a system and the system will not be broken. Another slowdown.
I am impatient. And I am outspoken.
Today, there were a series of complaints. First, I had to fill out the form again with name, address, and all that. "Why not just ask if there are any changes" I ask. "Well, that is the way we pick them up". A nonsense answer.
I went in for the first exam by a techie. She was a bit more lively than others I have had. She smiled and had a reasonably good sense of humor. We went into a new room and followed a different procedure. I asked why. I think that she didn't know so she gave me a non-answer. "We have to see if your prescription needs to be changed".
Now, I know when I am being patronized. I also know when I am being treated as a simple minded geezer. These are all answers that you give to the faltering, the feeble, the almost but not quite demented.
This cranks me up a little.
We do OK though. She thinks she is humoring me through it. I think that she is on the wrong wave length.
We get the dilation drops and then she takes me outside to the lobby to wait for the doctor. I get a phone call. I take it.
Now the sign says "Please do not use cellphones in examining rooms".
I am waiting in the lobby.
Two people at the desk in unison tell me that it is not allowed. I keep talking. Fuck'em.
It was a short conversation.
When I get done I tell them that I wasn't really talking to anyone, but I wouldn't do it again. They were not amused.
Then they came to get me to go to the second examining room. The doc was in the hall. I say "hi". He "hi's" back. And then goes into the other room. I sit. I meditate. He comes out. He takes a call outside my room. Then he goes into another fucking room!
I go out and complain about waiting.
I am burning up my political capital here but I can't help myself.
The two phone-banners in the lobby tell me that while I am out in the lobby he could be looking for me out in the exam room. I know this isn't the case. He is still in the other room.
Finally, he gets to me. I complain. He says it is a system and takes some time. They always blame the dilations which, of course, is bullshit.
Then I get the exam. I am fine. No glaucoma, no change in my cataract status, no need for a new prescription. Done for another year.
I am glad to be done. They are glad to be rid of me. By next year no one will remember what happened today. I will have to fill out the same forms again, I will go into one room then wait before going in another, I will sit and wait and wait. If I am lucky I will get a phone call and I will be able to break a rule and cause a sensation.
No one ever breaks rules in these places. No one ever complains. That is because most of the patients are actually the faltering, the feeble, and the almost but not quite demented.
I have made everyone's day by providing some adrenaline and a power of example in resisting the encroaching medical bureaucracy. I have entertained myself through an otherwise boring experience and will do it again in 2010.
ECONOMICS I
I didn't mention that I got a beautiful bouquet from my husband for Father's Day.
It was mostly green things but there was some queen anne's lace mixed in.
I grew up with this flower except, when I was a kid in Pennsylvania, it was a weed.
It grew everywhere.
Here we have the law of supply and demand in full flower, so to speak.
When a plant, no matter how lovely, is ubiquitous, no one wants it. It is a weed.
But in a place of scarcity like the deserts of California, which is most of the State, there is no wild queen anne (or even a sedate one) and so the flowers are in short supply.
Bingo!
A dollar a stem in the wholesale market.
I wonder if they were flown here from back east?
I doubt it.
But maybe. They didn't last all that long. Two or three days tops.
Anyway, we enjoyed them and are happy to have had them on our dining room table.
A reminder of the distant past.
Labels: flowers, holidays, horticulture, nostalgia
WHAT IS IN THE WATER?
If they all drank from the same stream, which, of course, they do metaphorically, you would think that it was a virus. But that isn't it.
Gov. Sanford Admits Affair and Explains Disappearance
All these far right GOoPers get caught thinking with their dick and then apologizing as if there was something wrong with it. Having some well deserved recreation.
He is a good looking guy. A hunk, in fact. I would do him. But that isn't the point here.
There is something wrong with it, on two counts. One count is the marital contract which they have violated to say nothing of hurting people I assume they love. Wife and kids.
The second count is on the hypocrisy scale. Way up there. Everyone knows that "the libruls" fuck anything that walk regardless of gender or any other damn thing.
No surprise there. But it is almost always the wing nuts that get caught.
Is it a death wish kind of thing? A desire for exposure?
And how dumb is it for someone who is a Governor, for chrissake, in the public eye and expected to be on the job 24/7 with a security detail?
Way dumb.
But he is pure. He didn't want that stimulus money for his poor folks.
Yeh. I know. Sometimes a lefty gets caught with his pecker in the payroll or romancing some dolly, male or female, that he shouldn't but it still falls to the christers and holy rollers to pull the most blatant stunts.
Of course, the next phase is to seek redemption and then become a scold to every one else like Newt the Snoot Gingrich. Another pillar of not walking the talk.
I don't like to point fingers but I don't like scolds and hypocrites, hence my comments.
Labels: republican whack jobs
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
OFF CYCLE
Kevin Drum post: From Barack Obama, asked why he won't spell out the consequences of further violence in Iran right now:Good for him. He drives his own bus."I know everybody here is on a 24-hour news cycle. I'm not. OK?"
This is a great mashup of the news conference. A bit contentious and even a bit contemptuous of the press' position statements.
Labels: Administration Obama
HEROES
George Prince was my first boss in the management training business.
He died last week at the age of 91.
George Prince, consultant who sparked innovation, founded international firm
We didn't get along very well but he taught me a lot. You don't have to get along with someone to be inspired by their example.
I worked around him, rebellious and sometimes resentful, for five years. He was always teaching. No let up.
It was a wonderful experience.
George had the curiosity of a precocious child. Very frustrating. Very freeing.
He was a paradox. A vital leader of the innovation business and a guy who couldn't manage his way out of a paper bag. A gentle soul.
You can see how ambivalent I am about him.
George opened my eyes to the possiblities in other people. That listening is a most powerful tool and means to get together with others even in the most upsetting conflict.
He hatched outrageous ideas like hens lay eggs. It was so fucking annoying. We would be working with clients to help them solve an invention problem and, out of the blue, George would just come up with some off the wall idea that would make us all cringe. But he preached that we should consider everything and we did and out of his hare brained contribution, we often force fitted an elegant solution.
So he was a teacher and practitioner of creativity. A most successful one. Many inventions bear his fingerprints.
I could only stand working around him for the five years. I was young and impetuous and figured I had learned it all. In fact, I had learned a lot and I knew that I was OK and could go out on my own. A fledgling.
I remember saying goodbye to him. I never saw him again.
He was actually glad to see me go. No wonder. I was a thorn in his side and a pebble in his shoe. But he did love me. He had a sparkle in his eye.
He told me what I wanted to hear more than anything.
He said that no matter what I had gotten or not gotten out of working for him, I had become someone who could get 600 dollars a day for my work. And it was true.
In those days that was top dollar.
I had earned my keep. George, for all his flightiness and human values, loved money and making it. It was the bottom line. The proof of the pudding.
And he was right. I did stay at the top of the line for all the years I was in the training business.
I never went back to creativity but I did other stuff creatively and used the basics I learned from George. Never let up. Don't pat people on the head and kill them with kindness. Challenge them. Stay in balance and above all tell the truth about things.
Not bad lessons at all.
Labels: life, nostalgia, wisdom
THE THOUSAND YEAR OLD MAN-AGER
I was asked to give an interview about management.
It has been a long time since I was a manager or thought much about it. When I retired, I retired.
People ask me to look at their stuff and I decline as gracefully as I can. I am not in the management business anymore.
But this time my ego won out and I said "yes". It went pretty well.
In fact I like the result.
It was done on email so the Q&A is intact.
Maybe there are some other people interested in what the old manager has to say.
Q: What is your background in terms of education and experience?
A: I have had three careers, actually. I trained as a biochemical engineer and my first job was in the engineering department of a large food company. I worked on automated production lines. Coffee roasting, dairy, and so on. During this time I learned that if workers in a processing plant are not on board with a project its probability of success is substantially reduced. I got interested in production.
So, I began work as a production planning manager at another company. This position had to do with all aspects of a production operation from raw material to final product. Getting the resources required at the right place at the right time for the maximum profit. Once again, I saw the importance of people's managerial skills. No matter how well the production was planned the execution would suffer if people were not managed well. And positively.
This led to my interest in management training, particularly creative group problem solving. I left "real work" and joined a small training company that was doing ground breaking work in the field.
Eventually I became interested in group leadership and managership and joined forces with another guy who had a PhD (I did not) and a track record in this field. We started our own company and it lasted for 35 years before we let it go to others to manage.
Up to founding my own company, I spent about 5 years at each of the jobs that I had. This was a good formula for the times and may still be but I seem to experience that young managers move around more frequently now. I think that is too bad. No depth in one discipline.
Q: Now for the hard ones...What is your definition of leadership?
A: Easy one. I pull it out of my hat. The old American Management Association definition still holds: Getting things done through other people.
Q: In your opinion, what does a leader do that distinguishes him/her from others?
A: A good leader is flexible in the use of management skills. S/he designs the approach to problems by analyzing the situation and choosing the most appropriate tools or style to manage the process. For example, most situations require one of 5 different styles or approaches: The first would be a logical approach, a reliance on facts to get people on board and committed. A second would be personal motivation. Showing how you expect specific things from the person. Evaluating their performance in the past and offering incentives as well as pressures to change the way they are doing the job. A third style would involve careful involvement of the other's opinions or blocks to progress. A willingness to disclose one's own uncertainties and difficulties and a commitment to deep listening to the other's needs in the situation. A fourth style would involve inspiration. Creating a common set of values and creating a joint vision of success. A fifth style would be to disengage. Let the followers follow on their own. Provide clear goals and then let go with occasional meetings to check on progress.
I am cheating though. This is the model that we taught at my company. Most people are good at one or two of these styles or approaches but not the others. To have all five is to be ultimately flexible.
Q: How would you characterize your own leadership style?
A: Almost all personal assertion of wants and needs and bargaining personally with the other to achieve the outcome. The second style. I can do all the others but that is the one I am best with. I am also good at disengaging and letting go. Giving others space to get the job done on their own speed and approaches.
Q: Whom do you consider as a "great leader?" Why?
A: Currently, I would say, Barack Obama. He is a pragmatist. He leads by vision and sharing common ground (number four) in the public eye and face to face, I hear, he uses them all.
Q: How do budgets influence how you lead?
A: I have to work with someone to get the budget I need or want. Then I don't have to worry about it. In my own company, I was the boss so I got what I wanted. I did have partners but mostly we worked from the same principles.
Q: What are some personal rewards you experience as a leader?
A: Here we are back at the definition of management. Getting things done through other people. Results. The score board. In my own company it was healthy growth. We got to about 25 employees in one spot. The most I could manage.
Q: One final question. How did you handle people with different abilities and intelligences?
A: First, I never assumed anyone was either differently able or differently intelligent. Truly.
Not because I believed it to be true but I was the last person to figure out who was and who was not either one.
And I never, ever accepted others' estimates of their peer's abilities in advance.
That basically means that I started from the "they are OK" end and allowed performance to tell me what deficits there might be.pResults oriented.pI am not a naive manager. I would not put someone deeply over their head
But, in the average situation, where someone is already in place, I would work from results.
I know that people have strengths and weaknesses but I would rather they be revealed in action rather than in the abstract. Then coaching and teaching become the manager's responsibility with the employee in question.
I cannot give people abilities or intelligence. I can give them a chance to perform and improve their performance.
It is critical incidentally that the manager know how the job could be done preferably from having done it him or herself at one time or another.
You would be amazed (or not if you think about it) at how some real dumb asses can get a job done and some real smart asses can hinder a team's performance or, if working individually, can have their ego and self love interfere with results and piss other people off.
Performance, performance, performance. Coaching, coaching, coaching.
Labels: life, management, wisdom
CROSS DRESSING
Today's NYTimes Best 1176 Film was Billy Wilder's first American comedy
The Major and the Minor (1942)
with Ginger Rogers and Ray Milland.
This preposterous situation comedy wherein Rogers dresses as a 12 year old girl and gets away with it, more or less, somehow becomes totally probable when you see the film.
It is amazing that we are drawn into the scheme of things. A lot of this has to do with Roger's skill. She is a powerhouse and carries every scene. She is in all of them!
The movie is very funny and has a platoon of familiar character actors to make it work like a machine. The Wilder touch is evident here at the beginning of his work in this country. He sure captures the American spirit in a funny way. Outsiders see things differently.
One side benefit here is that the humorist Robert Benchley appears as a dirty old man. I loved Benchley as a kid. I read all this stuff and even used a monologue of his for a high school competition in "radio speech".
I wouldn't mind seeing it again but I wouldn't go out of my way. I think it would be thin stuff the second time through.
I will give it a 3 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
Monday, June 22, 2009
KODACHROME
Cameras have always been a bit marginal in my life but this is kinda upsetting:
Sorry, Paul Simon, Kodak's taking Kodachrome away
In reality, I didn't take slide photos. It was too much trouble. All the racks and projectors and shit.
I mostly used Kodacolor, the print film. They quit that brand in 2007. The Kodak company is sort of disappearing into the digital age.
When I started writing this item I was all nostalgic and now I realize this has no nostalgia value for me at all.
Why am I writing this?
Blogging is like that some days.
I see a piece of news and I take off. Midstream in the post I realize that it doesn't really matter much.
When was the last time you saw someone's Kodachrome slide show?
Weren't you dying to have it over after the first few slides?
Wasn't it a pain in the ass?
Good riddance. Fucking Kodachrome. A pox on our society for 74 years.
If you want to see Kodachrome now, you will have to go to the Kodachrome Basin Park south of Zion National Park and take a drive around. We did that. It is very colorful and no slides. The real thing.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
ABANDONED
Today's NYTimes Best 1176 Film was Louis Malle's
Les Avent / The Lovers (1958)with Jeanne Moreau and Jean-Marc Bory.
The story is a rather simple one. Very french.
A young woman is bored with her marriage and unsatisfied with her lover and so, when a new boy shows up, she is ready to go.
It is not like that of course. Moreau turns in a wonderfully credible performance as the wife who is truly conflicted about the life that she has chosen. When her car breaks down and she is given a lift by a handsome archeologist she resists the obvious and then wham, they connect.
It is beautifully done and even anti-romantics will like it very much. Even cheer.
This film is unintentionally revolutionary in that it broke many obscenity censorship rules in America and went all the way to the Supremes. And won.
It is obscene by 50's standards. Today it would play as rather pedestrian and a bit closeted.
There are no female nipples, no asses, and no real nudity although there is a bath together but the water obscures the detail.
My theory is that the problem with the film, for the blue noses, is that the sex that is shown is mostly oral (off camera) and the rapture is all on the part of Moreau, the woman. She has a glorious orgasm.
The male, Bory, puts the focus on the woman's pleasure. Radical. In the old days, the guy would strut and the woman would grin and bear it.
This new take on sex would not go down well, so to speak, in Ohio where a Cleveland theater owner was jailed for showing it.
All that aside, it is a beatiful film with a lot of show, don't tell moments that read beautifully. The lovers are quite handsome and totally appealing. The husband and other suitor are not made to be jerks. They just don't fit in, quite. I could phrase that another way I suppose.
I really liked this movie and would not mind seeing it again at all. I think that I would notice even more Malle moments. It is great to watch.
A 4 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
DOWN AT THE HENGE
We missed it again this year.
We didn't get to be with the gang at the henge. Watchin' the sun come up.
I love the pictures. You can make the sun come through the stone "holes" if you put the camera in the right place.
It is all in good fun though.
I wonder what the druids make of the jet streams in the sky?
My main thing about the summer solstice is that the evenings will start to get darker early again. Booker and I wait and wait at the evening walk for the sun to go down. We don't want to burn our toes.
And, this year, the solstice coincides with Father's Day.
I will be looking at the sun while I sit around and wait for phone calls from everybody. Keeping score and all.
If you are a Father, have a great day. If not? Have a great day anyway even though you missed something really wonderful.
Of course, if you have a father, call him.
Some people have two Dad's you know.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
INTERNATIONALE
Today's NY Times Best 1176 Film was the documentary
The Good Fight: The Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War (1984)
This fills in a blind spot in recent American history.
The 3200 men and women who went to fight the fascists in Spain in the 1930's were ignored and, because they were activists, in some cases, punished for the bravery.
The United States and their allies refused to intervene in the Spanish Civil War and therefore lost the first opportunity to turn fascism back. The Republicans (the good guys) were unable to resist once they ran out of supplies and armaments.
This is one of those films that has lots of original footage as well as the people themselves talking about their experience. Studs Terkel is the narrator.
It is very good. There were actually 45,000 "foreigners" who volunteered in the war. They were all pulled back towards the end in the hope that the Germans and Italians would also retreat and let the fight be just between Spanish. That did not happen.
All of this occurred just before I was born.
Everyone who tells their story in this film are dead now.
Their story remains.
If you are a lefty, this film is a MUST. If you are an alien, then it will be interesting and informative about how people of a conservative bent and those who choose to do nothing can stand in the way of history or, I suppose actually make a terrible history by not acting on their avowed principles.
You will see and hear Ernest Hemingway in this, incidentally. A small bonus.
I would not mind seeing it again. I will give it a 4 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
CANDIDATES
Gail Collins reviews the array of GOoPer presidential candidates in her usual hilarious manner.
Labels: Republicans
TRIPLEX
Hard Times for New England’s 3-Deckers
In Boston, they are called triple deckers but maybe in New York it is by another name.
What is sure is that there are no triple-deckers out here in the desert.
Anything over one floor is either a motel or office. Most condos. But very few third floors. Can you say "earthquake"?
The idea of a triple decker was that you would live on one floor and rent the other two. Affluence led to renting all three. Now, the collapse as a lot of people borrowed on their real estate equity. Just like everywhere else.
I suppose that the triple isn't very fashionable any more. It probably never was. More a matter of efficiency or necessity.
We had friends who lived in them. They were nice. A front and back porch. Good sized rooms.
You really wanted to be on top so you wouldn't hear the footfall.
Gay guys bought them and converted them to two floors for the owner and one for the renter.
I once owned one in Plymouth. When I was married and had five kids plus a small extended family of three adults.
We had two floors and a renter on the third and then got rid of the renter, an old lady who bitched all the time about us. She didn't even have the footfall part.
It was nice. Big. Airy. Porches.
If you ever fly into Logan, take a look. You will see East Boston just below you. All triple deckers. If you swing out and get to see the outer communities, the same.
Another good thing going to hell.
Friday, June 19, 2009
CLICKER
I think this is legit.
If you go click this each day, advertisers give as much as a half bowl of food to a needy animal.
Not a lot but the clicks add up.
Click to give at the Animal Rescue Site
No. It doesn't cost you anything. It costs their advertisers something.
Labels: nature
WELL TEMPERED
This is a very good piece by Kevin Drum:
And it includes a comment on the controversy about gay issues.
Read it.
The man knows what he is doing. Let's allow him to do it and keep our own powder dry.
It also explains the "rope-a-dope" tactics that he uses so well.
Indeed it is not a tactic. It is his way of being.
The result is for less well tempered others (the GOoPers for example) knocking themselves out whaling away at him while he just ducks and dives and has a good time shootin' hoops. When the time comes, when they are tired out and people have gotten sick of their shit, he will come out reasonably and clearly and have the thing done.
Labels: Administration Obama
WHEN THE TOUGH GET GOING
Today's NYTimes Best 1176 Film was Roberto Rossellini's
Il Generale Della Rovere / General Della Rovere (1959)
with Vittorio De Sica as the general.
A con man and actor gets caught by the Nazis and is put in the role of a famous Italian general who was overzealously slain when discovered returning to the country to run the underground resistance.
By pretending to be the general, the con man becomes a leader and more.
He discovers Della Rovere's motto: "When you don't know which path to take, choose the hardest one."
I have found this to be true in life when I look back at my choices. The easy ones didn't lead to much.
The film is very good. The time flew. De Sica is wonderful. The Nazis are just sympathetic enough to carry us along with sort of hoping the plot works. In fact the viewer is asked to take the hardest path.
I liked it a lot and wouldn't mind seeing it again.
That would make it a 4 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
BOOKER IN THE FLESH
In response to many requests, here is the Aire boy in the Jeep. Ready to go to the supermarket.
He carries the ball to amuse himself while travelling. Sometimes the scenery and company fail to fascinate and a brisk, self administered game of tennis ball is called for.
Labels: Booker
MIRROR BOY
Yesterday, Booker really discovered the mirrors.
We aren't embarassed to admit that we bought a house that is mirrored to the tits. We used to be and would explain tediously that we didn't install them.
The bedroom particularly has one entire wall as well as the large, long accordion doors to the walk in closet.
Very Southern California.
We can finally let go and enjoy them. We are true SoCals. They show us from ten angles. You can see yourself coming and going.
Make that arriving and going.
Yesterday, Booker suddenly got that he was able to see himself, or another dog, in ten different places at one time.
It started with the video console which has a smoked glass panel door. Not technically a mirror, but still.
He looked and put his paw on the image. He barked.
Then he went to the folded accordion door. He saw me in the mirrors watching him. He barked at me. He saw himself in the mirror. He barked.
He saw me in two different places. Bark.
John came in and got into the fun. Booker barked at two or three Johns. I couldn't tell as I wasn't in that picture.
Then he got into the dog he was looking at. He pawed the door and then walked around, inside the closet, to see the other side. He pawed the inside of the door. There is no mirror on the inside. Came out again and barked.
Our laughter sort of put him off and he left it for awhile. A bit indignant to be the butt of fun. But we caught him, later, going back to look again. Both sides.
And later still.
I guess they don't have so many mirrors at floor level in Reno.
He has actually been interested in another reflection and that is on the pool surface. Only when it is calm.
This would be at night when the pump is off or early in the morning. He looks over the edge and will occasionally try to paw the surface of the water. Of course, that makes the image disappear.
He didn't have a pool in Reno either.
Today, he seems to have forgotten the entire mirror project or, perhaps, he got his answers and is moving on.
When I was looking for images of a dog looking into a pool, I found this one. It is unrelated and it is not Booker but it is a pretty good dog/pool shot.
Labels: Booker
Thursday, June 18, 2009
BATTY
I am not much of a baseball fan but I am always happy to see a good looking jock play games with his bat.
This is the Long Beach CA Armada team.
Labels: sports
MACimprovements
I am a big Mac fan. But sometimes their improvements are not.
The most recent update of Safari includes a graphic page turner thing which displays all of one's bookmarks like a photo album.
There is no discernable advantage to this. At all.
Also, a tableau of "top sites" used is now on the header. Another non-starter.
It seems to me that it is just a techno-wanker showing off.
Or I am missing something and I will soon hear from some techno-wankers explaining just what I am missing.
In the mean time, I have squeezed the page turner thing down to a small black bar and continue to punch in my bookmarks from the bookmark file.
Now having said that, I have to report that the new update is lightning fast. Amazing. Much more of an improvement. Thanks Mac. And get well soon, Steve.
Labels: macintosh
TO HIS CREDIT
Arnold stands down on defending Prop 8.
Schwarzenegger decides against defending Prop. 8 in federal court
This is weird. It means that there will no one on the other side when the current challenge comes up in Federal Court. This is the one that Ted Olson and David Boies are litigating.
There will be a voice for the other side but it will have to be proponents of 8. Citizens. It will cost them some more money. Deep Mormon pockets.
Pat Brown, our State Attorney General has already weighed in on the side of the challengers as he did with the State Supremes who blew him off. And us.
Labels: gay marriage, gay rights
THE COOL WAVE IS OVER
We are done with the marine layer that dominated our weather for almost a month and gave us the coolest June on record.
It is a normal 105 today and it is nice. That heat that bakes your nose and face.
The beginning of desert summer.
Labels: weather
FACING CURRENCY
I hadn't seen this trick yet.
I was going to write about facing the currency in my wallet and then I found this picture.
Another conspiracy of the mujahim and the elders of zion working together to undermine our money.
Facing currency.
When I had my first job, in a drugstore at 14, I was taught that currency was to be placed in the drawer facing right to left and all in place.
For a long time, banks would only take "folding money" that was faced.
A few years ago, I was treasurer of an outfit that took up a collection. Actually 30 collections a week. 2400 a week. I counted the cash and I faced the bills.
One day, when I took the money to the Bank of America, I pointed out how carefully I had faced the bills and that the BofA ATMs did not.
The teller told me that no one did it anymore. All the paper currency was counted by machine and it could count no matter which way it went into the bin.
with an air of superiority, she told me that she, a 20 year career person, still faced all her bills and counted them out that way to her customers but a lot of the tellers did not.
Do tell. All that facing and it didn't matter a bit.
I didn't give up. I kept at it. And I still do, in a more limited way.
I go to the ATM and get my cash for the month and, sure enough, the bills come out any old fucking way.
Before I even get into my car, I face the bills.
I am writing this as a piece of oral history from "the way things used to be and are not anymore".
Back to the money folding games. Origami for those who are flush with cash.
Here is another one.
I know how to make Lincoln or Jackson smile. You can also make him frown by inverting the fold.
Actually it works on any of them. Even old wooden toothed George but it comes out more like a simper.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
GAY WHINERSupdated 0618AM
OK. I am going to be on the wrong side on this one.
The pressure and tantrums from the gay politicos over Obama's "neglect" of gay issues rankles me quite a bit.
This is why I hate special interest and identity politics.
There are those who wanted DADT* overturned the first week, others who want the DOMA repealed. Still more want Obama to step out front and do more for "the gays". What, exactly, is not clear.
There is no doubt that the brief filed by the DOJ in Orange County is insulting and wrong headed. No doubt done by a holdover attorney. It takes years to steer the big ship around after an election.
But look.
We are six months into an administration that has such a full plate that one can hardly blame them for rationing their political capital or their time and attention.
Believe me on this. DOMA and DADT repeal will burn plenty of political capital. Fast. Can I say two words? Bill Clinton.
My strategy would be to get some other success under my belt and then gently ease these issues across the plate.
Sometimes we should be waving the American flag before we hoist the rainbow banner.
I am tired of the whining.
Now, when the Obamas, and it is clear that this is offered to staunch the flow of bad feeling, change the policy on domestic partner benefits for government employees it is belittled as too little too late and just throwing gays a bone.
This pisses me off.
Of course, if you are a gay lobbyist or politico with a one horse issue and your job depends on it, you will be outraged and indignant over all the expectations you dished out to your constituency to get them to vote for Obama.
I understand.
The HRC is one of the most ineffective lobbies for gay people there is and their inactivity over the years should have had them abolished long ago.
Pot meet kettle.
Here he is today signing the order and there is a statement about DOMA. He is for its repeal.
*For the acronym impaired: DADT=Dont Ask Don't Tell, DOMA=Defense of Marriage Act, DOJ=Department of Justice, and HRC=Human Rights Campaign Fund. They don't even use the word "gay" they are so militant—not.
Labels: Administration Obama, gay politics, gay rights
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
MOUNT BOOKER
No. Not the location. The activity.
Last night, one more time, we encountered an old Franklin friend who had not heard of his death.
It is fairly easy now to move through the story and not get tripped up with tears. Until we meet a good friend.
We cut through the Steinmart shopping center. It is a nice place. A huge fountain. Cobblestones. A lot of grass.
And there on the grass is a neighbor playing Frisbee with his border collie.
The collie and Franklin have a checkered past. The guy used to (I don't think he does any more and I am glad that he doesn't) bike past with the collie on a long leash running along side.
I think this borders on cruelty to say nothing of danger of accident for both dog and rider.
It used to drive Franklin nuts.
Then, one day we were walking and the man and dog were in front of their house with no leash and the dogs met. Voila! Peace in the valley. Sniff, sniff, BFF!
This helped the guy and I have a few words other than "Goddamit" and we bonded too. No sniffs although I would have liked to. This is one of the handsomest guys in the area. Also the longest pony tail in a half braid woven in with a ribbon. Hunk. Smile to die for. But I digress.
We actually never saw them in the bike combo again but Franklin would decide to walk along to their house and we would find them at home often enough to repeat the trip. We all got to be more friends.
It was hard to tell the story again.
It is not hard with casual acquaintances any more. The other night a couple came along and said "hello Franklin" to Booker and so I told them. They were clearly uncomfortable to hear it. A hello would have been enough. They were not buddies. There are non-dog people who pretend to like dogs. Like that. I would rather they just go past and not fake it. We all know. At least the dog, whoever he is, and I know.
Where was I?
There we were, the two of us, on the grass at the Steinmart center (remember now?) and he was genuinely sad and so was I.
I happened to look over at the dogs who had been nosing and sniffing and saw his collie getting up on Bookers backside. The collie is off leash.
I have never ever had this happen to my dog. Here it is. Now what?
No worry. Booker growled and gave the collie a very mean look, the collie got it and retired from the mount and they were buddies again.
The guy laughed and so did I. The collie, who incidentally is named Boomer, one letter away from Booker, does this a lot. He is not docked. He gives up fairly quickly in most cases I am told. I didn't want to hear about the other cases.
I liked this interaction a lot. The adults kept their cool, Man stuff, eh?
The dogs kept their cool. Just a misunderstanding. Sorry. OK.
Booker didn't even seem nostalgic or envious. Remember. He just got his testicles removed 5-6 weeks ago. Perhaps, in his time, he has done the same here and there.
I like the no-fault aspect of it.
A lot of dog owners have to figure out whose fault it is if two dogs don't get along.
While we are on the mounting issue, if it is an issue, it is amusing to note that another neighbor, an old dithering fart, has a dog that is nasty to Booker. He says that Booker tried to mount his dog.
I see this as wish fulfillment fantasy on the fart's part and a bit of transference. I never saw a single move that Booker made toward his dog's ass beyond the sniff.
Mostly it is about the fart needing to find fault and point a finger.
Not to make a federal case out of it but after the accusation his dog did another snarl, bared teeth, at Booker and on Sunday we had a repeat performance as the dogs come towards each other.
A family conference had already established that we ain't going to play with this dog ever again, so I said, "We aren't getting together". The dithering fart was all indignant about having his dog snubbed.
Such is life in the doggy neighborhood. The thing is that the people get as involved in it as the dogs and there you go. Skirmishes on the social scene.
These are the days that I am glad to be an introvert. No social entanglements deep enough for drama and if there is some I don't give a fuck. It is one sided. I don't play.
We are pretty well convinced Booker is the same. He is fine to say hello, even sweetly, then, off to the walk and no chitter chatting between the humans please and if it has to be endured it will be suffered at the end of the leash looking in the opposite direction.
Boy do I know that position. My favorite.
I want one more thing out of all this writing. Recognition for not once using the phrase "doggy style" in this post.
WEBBED FEET
Every so often I print out my daily web run. Today is the day. Most sites are obvious from the address. Those that are not will be left as an exercise for the reader. I have not hot buttoned these. You will have to copy and paste on your own. I have also not listed the gay sites that I attend to. Not to be homophobic but I figure this is a general interest listing. If you want the hot stuff I will respond to specific requests.
http://www.mydesert.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?Category=news01
http://quake.wr.usgs.gov/recenteqs/Maps/116-34.htm
http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/
http://www.outsports.com/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/?sub=AR
http://www.salon.com/index.html
http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/
http://www.dailykos.com/
http://www.politico.com/
http://www.politico.com/politico44/
http://www.whitehouse.gov/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/whitehouse/
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/obama_approval_index_history
http://www.gallup.com/Home.aspx
http://www.pollster.com/polls/us/fav-obama.php
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
https://moviereviewintelligence.com/index.aspx
http://www.californiacoastline.org/
http://pixdaus.com/
http://www.imdb.com/
http://www.eqca.org/site/pp.asp?c=kuLRJ9MRKrH&b=4026385
(MIT ALUMNI SITE not public)
http://www.theonion.com/content/index
http://www.towleroad.com/
http://www.wherethehellismatt.typepad.com/blog/
http://thisisindexed.com/
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BUT WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN?
Today's NYTimes Best 1176 film was Sydney Lumet's film based on E L Doctrow's novel
with Timothy Hutton, Mandy Patimkin, Lyndsay Crouse, Ed Asner and some of the best character actors in film at the time.
When I was a kid, the Rosenberg trial was a huge media event.
I was in high school at the time. I think that my own family were ambiguous about the Rosenberg's guilt. I remember, particularly, my worry about the Rosenberg kids. What would happen to them.
That is the theme of this film.
Ebert, in the linked review, is all bent because the film and novel do not take a definitive position on the guilt or innocence of the Rosenbergs et. al.
As it turns out, he is wrong and they are right. Years later it was shown that at least Julius was guilty of passing data to the Russians although Ethel knew about it she did not participate. Lumet and Doctorow would have been wrong no matter how they put the case.
Besides, the film is about the kids.
They are red diaper babies, brought up in an atmosphere of high political drama. There is no equivalent for this today.
The communist party of the thirties and forties in this country was an intense commitment. Double dealing was prevalent.
I knew a woman who grew up in this ferment and she got out of it pretty well. She led a non-conformist apolitical life. But the affect was still in her. She could laugh about it but with a kind of grim set of the mouth.
These kids in the film are not the Rosenberg kids. But they are red diaper kids whose parents are put to death for conspiracy. They are made up people around similar circumstances.
We see what has happened throughout their life as the Party took precedence over family life.
In some ways this film and the novel are a catharsis for my worry and anxiety for these kids. (I have to admit that against my life policy I have read the book. "No films seen based on novels I have read and no novels read that are based on films I have seen")
Not that anything really good happens to them. It is hell.
But there is a soft positive outcome for one of them. Not the other.
I do not need to see this film again. It is not easy to watch and, as a film, I think that it does have some soft holes around what really happens with the parents and their associates. But there are no copouts as far as the kids are concerned.
I will give it a 3 out of Netflix5.
Labels: best films
ANNIVERSARY
I had my last drink thirty years ago today or yesterday depending on how you count your days.
My first day without any booze in my system would be today. Well, there was some in there. It takes a while to leave. There just wasn't going to be anymore.
I don't need to tell you my story here. There is another place for that. But, as you might imagine, it is a very significant day in my life.
What was to follow was not easy. I had a thirty day detox in a medically oriented hospital. Physical rehab. Ventilation therapy. Heavy vitamins and some other drugs but not drug drugs.
Stuff like that. And medical lectures.
The only other treatment was the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.
A miracle to end up in a place like this. Straight talk, tough love, physical recovery.
More places than not, today, would drive a man back to drink with all the frills and psychobabble. The recovery industry.
In this place, there was no way around the facts of the matter. A life or death situation.
I got life.
As it turns out, in my case, a life sentence wasn't too bad. I'm still here and sober a day at a time. And I still place my recovery first and foremost. Another gift.
Monday, June 15, 2009
WINNERS
Maybe I should mention that the Lakers won the NBA title. But I won't.
I have nothing against them but nothing for them either. They sure consumed a lot of space in my morning paper throughout the playoffs.
Less trees will be killed tomorrow.
Labels: sports
PLAYING DOCTOR
We took Booker to the vet today just to have a baseline for him. And to show him around.
Franklin was a great favorite there and they have been very interested in Booker.
I think that he did well with all the attention. It is not his favorite thing. "Give me a pat and then let me continue on my way".
He is still a little shy and there was a small bit of clinging in the excitement of the big reception area. He did say hello to a few other dogs.
The visit with our doc was great.
Booker was a bit shy at first but then dogged up and got his brave on. He stood and sat and did all the stuff a doc wants you to do.
He even quit panting and sat quietly while doctor listened to his heart and lungs.
The results were not too surprising really. He is in excellent health. Nothing wrong and a lot right.
Clear lungs and good heart. Eyes, nose, ears all OK.
But we knew this more or less. He was examined and had some work done before we got him.
The main thing is that he met the man who will take care of him and they got along fine. The interaction part of it went really well. By the end, they were good friends.
Being friends with your doc is pretty important.
Then we left to more attention from the staff. I paid the bill. The most painful part. And not that bad a pain really.
Oh. He should lose another five pounds. We took 7 off him according to the scales and we will keep on going. Until we feel ribs.
Labels: Booker
Sunday, June 14, 2009
DREAM TIME
I normally don't remember my dreams but there are some classics that are not only memorable but stereotypical. Somehow I want my memorable dreams to be unique but I can't come up with any.
I just had one of the classics. I am at MIT and it is the middle of the term and I have yet to go to class.
There is more than a grain of truth in this, actually. I did not attend some classes. I got behind in some work. I was more interested in the extra-curricular and the surrounding city than I was an academic.
In this one I have attended no classes at all in any courses and am hatching a scheme to go in and get started in time to save my ass.
Other standard dreams that I remember have to do with my work as a management trainer. The one where I have no material or the easel pads don't work or the class doesn't show up or they are dismissive of my presentation. Sometimes I am naked as well. Somehow I do not mind this.
There are the travel dreams. I am going somewhere but I am not sure where and don't seem to have a ticket. Often, the destination is international. I look to phone for information and can't read my cell phone. Or find it.
I rarely travel naked.
I do occasionally get a flight. Sometimes the flight doesn't actually leave the ground or it only goes about fifty feet high and swoops under trees. Sometimes I have no seat and have to stand.
All of these have a lot of reality to them. Anxieties about work or travel are pretty standard.
The classroom one is based on events fifty years ago. The training and travel not so long.
In all of these it is possible that I will add a short piece on an apartment that I have had for a long time but not used and it can appear as a safe haven. I could go there to study or train or stay somewhere at the end of a trip. The apartment is the one we rented in Hawthorne Place in Boston and while I might forget the combination to the mailbox there is always a key and the place is always ready to use. Food in the refrigerator. Clean. Home.
OK. Get out your Dreambooks.
This is going nowhere. I am just saying.
CLASSIC
Today's movie was Clint Eastwood's
I liked this a lot more than I expected to, mostly because of the good humor tucked into it here and there.
It is not a predictable film even though the theme of the "melting pot" is as old as America.
The hard ass America-firster gets to know some strongly ethnically foreign people and there you are.
But in this case it is not that simple. New discoveries are won at high costs.
Eastwood is an icon and yet he is able to make films that defy his previous personna. On the other hand, the film depends on our belief that the old Clint will rise again. It adds to the tension.
Very well done.
I will give it a place in the Eastwood fest and that means it gets a 4 out of Netflix5.
IN THE COOLER
It's still cool here. Ninety max. 60's at night.
Even with the sun on us this morning the traditional threesome Sunday walk was comfortable.
But not for long. We are headed for "seasonal temperatures" next weekend. The 100's. Low, but still.
I don't mind. I like the heat. Just until September, then I have had enough. And then it is over.
Labels: weather
Saturday, June 13, 2009
MORE ISOLATION
Not to go on about this.
But the GOoPers are doing a pretty good job of isolating themselves and digging the hole deeper.
It is interesting to watch.
I would never have dreamed that the military industrial complex (a phrase from my youth that still resonates) would be engaging with the Democrats and scared to shit about the Republicans.
Labels: republican whack jobs
