Just Kill Me Already?

From BBC News:
The letter they sent to President Napolitano came from a convicted mobster, Carmelo Musumeci, a 52-year-old who has been in prison for 17 years. It was co-signed by 310 of his fellow lifers.

Musumeci said he was tired of dying a little bit every day, "We want to die just once...we are asking for our life sentence to be changed to a death sentence".

It was a candid letter written by a man who, from within his cell, has tried hard to change his life. He has passed his high school exams and now has a degree in law. But his sentence, he says, has transformed the light into shadows. He told the president his future was the same as his past, killing the present and removing every hope.

Under current laws, prisoners serving life can obtain the right to brief periods of release after 10 years and conditional release after 26 years of good conduct. The Communist Refoundation party's senator, Maria Luisa Boccia, has proposed draft legislation to abolish the life sentence and replace it with a maximum sentence of 30 years.

Pre-Summer Mixtape Bonanza!

Spurred on by ben and his 'most favorite of 2007 so-far' mixtape released late last week, several others have been put together and here they are in no particular order:

First, my own, similar to ben's, it's a compilation of my own favorites from 2007 thus far (with the caveat that I limit myself to 1 song per artist, with one exception this time):
My Mix:
Loney, Dear - I Am John (Loney, Noir)
Aqualung - Rolls So Deep (Memory Man)
Ryan Shaw - I am Your Man (This is Ryan Shaw)
Fountains of Wayne - Strapped For Cash (Traffic and Weather)
Amy Winehouse - Tears Dry on Their Own (Back to Black)
Mika - Big Girl [You Are Beautiful] (Life in Cartoon Motion)
Lewis Taylor - Yeah (The Lost Album)
Joss Stone - Baby, Baby, Baby (Introducing Joss Stone)
Tyrone Wells - Dream Like New York (Hold On)
The Feeling - Fill My Little World (Twelve Stops and Home)
Bobby Baby - The Some Place New
Erib Bibb - Shine On (Diamond Days)
Lavender Diamond - Find A Way (Imagine Our Love)
The Broken West - Hale Sunrise (I Can't Go On, I'll Go On)
Norah Jones - Sinkin' Soon (Not Too Late)
Musiq Soulchild - Ridiculous (Luvanmusiq)
I'm From Barcelona ft. Loney, Dear - This Boy (Let Me Introduce My Friends)
Jon McLaughlin - People (Indiana)
Mika - Happy Ending (Life in Cartoon Motion)

Further mixes have also been cobbled together by Koan and Gee.

If you like to try before you buy (well, download to be exact), here are the tracks::
Koan's 'Glorious Songs of 2007' tracklist: Josh Ritter - Idaho, The Snake, The Cross, The Crown - Electronic Dream Plant, Loney,Dear - Saturday Waits, Marissa Nadler - Famous Blue Raincoat, The Papercuts - John Brown, Low - Pretty People, Panda Bear - Bros, LCD Soundsystem - Someone Great, Sea Wolf - You're A Wolf, Field Music - A House Is Not A Home, Brandi Carlisle - The Story, Lifesavas - Shine Language, The Besnard Lakes - And You Lied To Me, The Snake, The Cross, The Crown - Gypsy Melodies, Josh Ritter - Thin Blue Flame

Gee's 'Songs For The Summer' tracklist: Elvis Perkins - Without Love, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones - Aimum, Duke Ellington - Uph, Feist - One Evening, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Satan Said Dance , Elliot Smith - L.A. , Grizzly Bear - Central and Remote, Jack Johnson - Dreams Be Dreams, Jean-Luc Ponty - Caracas, John Lennon - Instant Karma, Johnny Cash - Ballad of a Teenage Queen, Kings of Leon - The Bucket, Led Zeppelin - Bron-Yr-Aur Stomp, Phish - Farmhouse

Enjoy!

Snap Out Of It, American Athletes in Non-Major Sports

Sunday, the Indianapolis 500 was run again, except this time instead of the Indy 500, it was a pathetic Indianapolis 415, shortest 500 in 30 years. How can you crown a winner of a 200 lap race after only 166? Sure it was raining, but why can't we pull the cars back out Monday or Tuesday after the storm blows through and finish it up? And to top it all off, the event was "won" by a Scotsman. A freaking skirt, err, kilt-wearing, competitive log-throwing, Paolo Nutini-listening Scot. Sorry, Dario Franchitti, I know you got the jug o' milk on Sunday, but you will forever be asterisked in my book for winning some of the Indy 500.

Today (or yesterday) at the French Open, the American men went 0-8, including our last best hopes James Blake and Andy Roddick. Of course, Roddick already set his sights low coming into the event, ""Different goals. Going into Wimbledon or the (U.S.) Open, it's like, 'OK, I'm looking to make a run to a final here, and here, I want to make the second week." The next highest ranked American was reportedly forced to withdraw with injury sustained kicking a field goal during a visit with an NFL Europe team, as if we didn't already think poorly enough of tennis players. Getting yourself a notch below NFL Europe kicker in the sports pantheon is putting you down toward being on par with an MLS goalie. This view is only further enhanced by the controversy of Andy Roddick's super guns on the cover of a recent issue of Men's Fitness Magazine. Judge for yourself:

Regular Roddick

Super Roddick


And in a sad irony, the hockey team from Anaheim of all places in up 1-0 in the Stanley Cup finals over a team from Canada.

What is this world coming to?

Memorial Day Week: Closing Ceremony

As this Memorial Day Week 2007, filled with the usual vigorous valorization of the military, comes to a close I am left with one lingering question: Throughout the day I heard several people in the media say, "Regardless of your politics or what you think about the war, you should support/thank the troops."

For the majority of people, this is a reasonable position, but what of the pacifist? If one believes in war as a concept, but not a particular war or other that is one thing, they should support those who serve today and have done so in the past (akin to the axiom that "you can't be a little pregnant, you either are or you aren't", one can't be a little pacifistic), but if one abhors violence of all kinds, are they, too, obliged to "support the troops"? And if they don't does that make them less "patriotic"? And if so, what does that mean for them?

I am reminded of an episode of Cartoon Network's The Boondocks (especially because my brother constantly references the show, which is really quite good if you haven't seen it. Season two is set to start this summer from what I hear, and I am already anxiously looking forward to the episode 'Invasion of the Katrinians'....wow that was a long side-bar, back on topic). In one episode, the main character has a dream in which it turns out Martin Luther King Jr was not killed when he got shot, he only went into a coma, and he wakes up in 2003 to much fanfare. He ends up on one of those cable news talk shows and they ask him if his ideas of non-violence still apply and if he has a problem that the US went "on the offense" (to use the GOP parlance of today). Dr. King responds that in the bible it says if a man strikes you, you are to turn the other cheek. Well, this causes an uproar, he is deemed a traitor and asked on a subsequent show "One question, Dr. King, why do you hate America?"

Is it just that simple? Pacifists hate America, liberty, and all that is right with the world? If denouncing violence is tantamount to a denunciation of America, what does that say about America, and possibly modern civilization as a whole? (I believe this was one of the themes in the Aussie Western The Proposition, which you should check out if you already haven't). Is violence, as Oliver Wendell Holmes posited here earlier in the week, man's natural state, and therefore not subject to the shifts of time, space, and culture and thus we should strive to incorporate, or at the least, sublimate it, into our culture, rather than make futile attempts to restrict or remove it altogether?

Once again, just questions. I have no answers; maybe you do.

And on that note, and as a Memorial Day gift, ben just posted his 'mid-year: most favorite of 2007 mixtape', available for free download; so should you share his musical tastes (or even if you don't for that matter). The tracklist can be found here. Commence pira...sharing.

Memorial Day Week: George W. Bush, 2002

George Bush giving a Memorial Day speech on May 27, 2002, at the US Normandy Cemetery in France:
More than 9,000 are buried here, and many times that number have -- of fallen soldiers lay in our cemeteries across Europe and America. From a distance, surveying row after row of markers, we see the scale and heroism and sacrifice of the young. We think of units sustaining massive casualties, men cut down crossing a beach, or taking a hill, or securing a bridge. We think of many hundreds of sailors lost in their ships...The war correspondent, Ernie Pyle, told of a British officer walking across the battlefield just after the violence had ended. Seeing the bodies of American boys scattered everywhere, the officer said, in sort of a hushed eulogy spoken only to himself, "Brave men, brave men."

All who come to a place like this feel the enormity of the loss. Yet, for so many, there is a marker that seems to sit alone -- they come looking for that one cross, that one Star of David, that one name. Behind every grave of a fallen soldier is a story of the grief that came to a wife, a mother, a child, a family, or a town. A World War II orphan has described her family's life after her father was killed on a field in Germany. "My mother," she said, "had lost everything she was waiting for. She lost her dreams. There were an awful lot of perfect linen tablecloths in our house that never got used, so many things being saved for a future that was never to be." Each person buried here understood his duty, but also dreamed of going back home to the people and the things he knew. Each had plans and hopes of his own, and parted with them forever when he died.

The late President, Francois Mitterrand, said that nothing in history compares to D-day. "The 6th of June," he observed, "sounded the hour when history tipped toward the camp of freedom." Before dawn, the first paratroopers already had been dropped inland. The story is told of a group of French women finding Americans and imploring them not to leave. The trooper said, "We're not leaving. If necessary, this is the place we die."

Memorial Day Week: The Duke and the People's Park

Today marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of Marion Morrison, known to most of us, of course, as John Wayne, icon of the cinematic OId West and WW2, thus making him a veteran of the cinema, but not of the military, but someone had to entertain and inspire the masses during those troubling times, right? (Reportedly, it was his studio who requested (or demanded) his deferment and he regretted deeply having never served). He was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal on his 72nd birthday, just 2 weeks before his death by lung cancer. Anyhow, let's hear from the man in his own words:

“Life is hard; it's harder if you're stupid."

“Women have the right to work wherever they want, as long as they have the dinner ready when you get home”
“If you've got them by the balls their hearts and minds will follow.”

“If everything isn't black and white, I say, "Why the hell not?"”

“I don't feel we did wrong in taking this great country away from them. There were great numbers of people who needed new land, and the Indians were selfishly trying to keep it for themselves.”

“I stick to simple themes. Love. Hate. No nuances. I stay away from psychoanalyst's couch scenes. Couches are good for one thing.”

“Healthy, lusty sex is wonderful”

And one that would make Chuck Norris jealous (and thus probably inspire a roundhouse kick): “I'm the stuff men are made of”

In 1969, while John Wayne was busy making True Grit, up in the Bay Area the hippies were under assault of another actor, one Ronald Reagan. The students and faculty at UC Berkeley decided to make a park on campus that would be a free speech area in classic hippie sense: free to listen to music, use drugs, plant trees, and exchange philosophy and free love. Reagan deemed it an act of communist sympathizing and an abuse and misuse of publicly-owned property, and when it became clear that the students would not back down on their plan, Reagan announced, "If there has to be a bloodbath, then let's get it over with." He declared a state of emergency, called in the National Guard and there was a 2 week standoff (starting on "Bloody Thursday") between the authorities and the students/protestors, 13 students were hospitalized with shotgun wounds. James Rector died one week before Memorial Day, despite being a spectator, watching from a rooftop, killed by a group of officers who came to be dubbed "The Blue Meanies" (no doubt named after the characters from The Beatles' Yellow Submarine).
Today the park is overrun by drug dealers and the homeless.
Here you can read what amounts to a blog entry about the event from 1969.

Memorial Day Week: Convention Day

On this day 30 years ago the first (and/or fourth) "episode" of the legendary film Star Wars series released in theaters, Harrison Ford became a cinema icon, George Lucas became a billionaire, Memorial Day weekend came to be the unofficial start of the new, but growing, summer movie season, and the rest, as they say is history. The series created such the phenomenon that the USPS is releasing a commemorative set of Star Wars stamps, set to launch this coming week, to coincide with the 30th anniversary. Also, though not as popular as those for Star Trek, Star Wars has plenty of related conventions for fans, followers and freaks alike to gather together and join in worship of all things Lucas (one such event is invading the LA Convention Center this weekend).

Speaking of conventions, today also marks the 220th anniversary of the start of the Constitutional Convention at the Pennsylvania State House. James Madison rose and spoke, Govenour Morris wrote and wrote, George Mason objected and scowled, and lo and behold, some 3 months later, our constitution was born.

And in breaking with convention, on May 25, 1861, Abraham Lincoln officially denied a writ of habeas corpus to John Merryman, was told by the Supreme Court he didn't have the authority to do so and did so anyway, declaring it necessary to suppress the Confederate rebellion during the Civil War, which, as we all know, became the catalyst for the holiday we now know as Memorial Day.

Memorial Day Week: Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., 1895

Preface: An Address Delivered by former Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. on Memorial Day, May 30, 1895, at a Meeting Called by the Graduating Class of Harvard University. President Theodore Roosevelt's admiration for this speech was a factor in Holmes' nomination to the US Supreme Court.

Excerpted from The Soldier's Faith:
The society for which many philanthropists, labor reformers, and men of fashion unite in longing is one in which they may be comfortable and may shine without much trouble or any danger...Most of my hearers would rather that their daughters or their sisters should marry a son of one of the great rich families than a regular army officer, were he as beautiful, brave, and gifted as Sir William Napier (I believe it's this one anyway). I have heard the question asked whether our war was worth fighting, after all. There are many, poor and rich, who think that love of country is an old wife's tale, to be replaced by interest in a labor union, or, under the name of cosmopolitanism, by a rootless self-seeking search for a place where the most enjoyment may be had at the least cost.

Meantime we have learned the doctrine that evil means pain, and the revolt aginst pain in all its forms has grown more and more marked. From societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals up to socialism, we express in numberless ways the notion that suffering is a wrong which can be and ought to be prevented, and a whole literature of sympathy has sprung into being which points out in story and in verse how hard it is to be wounded in the battle of life, how terrible, how unjust it is that any one should fail.

And yet from vast orchestras still comes the music of mighty symphonies...For my own part, I believe that the struggle for life is the order of the world, at which it is vain to repine. I can imagine the burden changed in the way it is to be borne, but I cannot imagine that it ever will be lifted from men's backs. I can imagine a future in which science shall have passed from the combative to the dogmatic stage, and shall have gained such catholic acceptance that it shall take control of life, and condemn at once with instant execution what now is left for nature to destroy.

War, when you are at it, is horrible and dull. It is only when time has passed that you see that its message was divine. I hope it may be long before we are called again to sit at that master's feet...In this snug, over-safe corner of the world we need it, that we may realize that our comfortable routine is no eternal necessity of things, but merely a little space of calm in the midst of the tempestuous untamed streaming of the world, and in order that we may be ready for danger. We need it in this time of individualist negations, with its literature of French and American humor, revolting at discipline, loving flesh-pots, and denying that anything is worthy of reverence--in order that we may remember all that buffoons forget.

...high and dangerous action teaches us to believe as right beyond dispute things for which our doubting minds are slow to find words of proof. Out of heroism grows faith in the worth of heroism. The proof comes later, and even may never come. Therefore I rejoice at every dangerous sport which I see pursued...If once in a while in our rough riding a neck is broken, I regard it, not as a waste, but as a price well paid for the breeding of a race fit for headship and command.

We do not save our traditions, in our country...It is the more necessary to learn the lesson afresh from perils newly sought, and perhaps it is not vain for us to tell the new generation what we learned in our day, and what we still believe. That the joy of life is living, is to put out all one's powers as far as they will go; that the measure of power is obstacles overcome; to ride boldly at what is in front of you, be it fence or enemy; to pray, not for comfort, but for combat; to keep the soldier's faith against the doubts of civil life, more besetting and harder to overcome than all the misgivings of the battlefield, and to remember that duty is not to be proved in the evil day, but then to be obeyed unquestioning; to love glory more than the temptations of wallowing ease, but to know that one's final judge and only rival is oneself: "Life is not lost", said she,"for which is bought Endless renown."

As for us, our days of combat are over. Our swords are rust. Our guns will thunder no more. The vultures that once wheeled over our heads must be buried with their prey. Whatever of glory must be won in the council or the closet, never again in the field. I do not repine. We have shared the incommunicable experience of war; we have felt, we still feel, the passion of life to its top.

30 Years Ago at Indy

That's Indy as in Indianapolis 500 (not the be confused with "indie", the prefix of pretension), coming up this Memorial Day weekend
From history.com:
In 1977, Janet Guthrie became the first female to qualify for the Indianapolis 500. Guthrie failed to finish the race due to mechanical troubles. The next year, however, she not only finished the race but landed in ninth place, a remarkable achievement considering her meager race funding. Guthrie explains her career beginning as the result of her passion for adrenaline rush and the purchase of her first sports car. "I've always loved adventure," she said. "I went parachuting when I was 16, and got my pilot's license when I was 17. I went to school for physics... and when I got out of school I bought a Jaguar, from my $125-a -week salary and my superb sense of moderation." After 13 years of racing, Guthrie's break came when she was asked to test a car at Indy. Her participation brought her immediate fame. Many men objected strongly to her driving at Indy. "The alarm and commotion took me by surprise," she said. "The woman part of my participation was irrelevant to anything on the track. But people thought we were plotting a revolution... they said women will endanger our lives." Guthrie responded to the criticism simply by racing the best she could. "In racing there is no room for a readout from your nervous system. Your body becomes part of the machine."

Memorial Day Week: Theodore Roosevelt, 1916

That title may read as a peculiarity, but I see no reason why Memorial Day can't be stretched out to fill a week here on the ol blog, so I'll scour the net for Memorial Day related bits and pieces to fill the time and space here until I think of something to write myself. So without further ado, I give your our 26th president, on Memorial Day, 1916 in St. Louis, discussing then, what we find our current crop of politicians discussing today (okay, so maybe that intro wasn't exactly "without further ado, I apologize for misleading you):
"I appeal to all our citizens, no matter from what land their forefathers came, to keep this ever in mind, and to shun with scorn and contempt the sinister intriguers and mischiefmakers who would seek to divide them along lines of creed, or birthplace, or of national origin...The effort to keep our citizenship divided against itself by the use of the hyphen and along the lines of national origin is certain to a breed of spirit of bitterness and prejudice and dislike between great bodies of our citizens. If some citizens band together as German-Americans or Irish-Americans, then after a while others are certain to band together as English-Americans or Scandinavian-Americans, and every such banding together, every attempt to make for political purposes a German-American alliance or a Scandinavian-American alliance, means down at the bottom an effort against the interest of straight-out American citizenship, an effort to bring into our nation the bitter Old World rivalries amd jealousies and hatreds."

Then the next year, on the 4th of July, this:
"We must have in this country but one flag, and for the speech of the people but one language, the English language. During the present war all newspapers published in German, or in the speech of any of our foes, should be required to publish, side by side with the foreign text, columns in English containing the exact translation of everything said in the foreign language. Ultimately this should be done with all newspapers published in foreign languages in this country."

I think this one is particularly interesting because the other day on a local radio program an irate caller made the point that while our English-language television news programs use the SAP (secondary audio program) function so Spanish-speakers can hear/read (via captioning) what is being said on the English-language broadcasts, there is no such feature from Spanish (or any other language) to English, so we English-only speakers have no real idea how the issues of the day are being framed on Spanish-language television; naturally this came up on the radio in discussing the most recent Congressional immigration proposal, but certainly it goes to other issues/events. If we believe the news coverages shapes/frames how the viewer/public look at and understand things, how are we to know what those who prefer their news in Spanish think? Really, the underlying question was, I believe, is or is not Telemundo part of the "liberal media"?


And if none of that interests you, how about this? The amazing first trailer for the fourth and "final" installment in Sylvester Stallone's Rambo franchise. It starts out a little slow, setting up plot outline and back story, but around 1:45-2:00, you begin to understand why there is a 100% chance this film will be awesome when it releases, sometime around Memorial Day 2008.

Asian Pacific American Heritage Month?

This is another 'why didn't anybody tell me', although, halfway through the month is, I suppose, an appropriate time to discover that it is in fact Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month, given their complete absence from the national conversation (Michelle Malkin, regrettably, excepted).

While Black History Month is, I believe, the most popular ethnic-based gala, I do wonder what, if anything, it says that we "celebrate" black history and, by contrast, Asian Pacific heritage, one extolling the actions of those who have come and gone, the other embracing the culture. Why the difference? Or have I read to much into the naming of these relatively meaningless displays of multicultural pandering?

So, how are you celebrating?

In other multicultural news, German-born Dirk Nowitzki was officially named NBA League MVP today for the 2006-2007 season, making it the 3rd straight season that a non-American is the league MVP, and Tim Duncan, born in the Virgin Islands was MVP for the 2001-02 and 02-03 seasons, making Kevin Garnett in 2003-2004 the only NBA MVP born in America-proper in 7 years....get it together contiguous Americans...we're losing our beloved game to the clutches of the freedom-hating, terroist-loving world outside of our great 48 (+2).

Fresno is #1! (and #2!) (and #317!)

According to most reporting, Fresno High student Cinthia Covarrubias (also known as Tony) was the first known transgender candidate for Prom King in the country last month. She ended up losing, but gay rights activists praised California and Fresno Unified School District for even letting her participate in her gender of choice (or "true" gender, depending who's telling the story).

Well, try to imagine how they felt yesterday when it was announced that Johnny Vera (also known as Crystal) is in the running for Prom Queen at Roosevelt High School, also of Fresno.

That's right, not only were we first, we were also second! We win!

What do we win? I'm not sure exactly. We are definitely on the front lines of the continuing erosion of the concept of gender as we know it in this country, for better or worse. How Fresno, historically a strong socio-politically conservative safe-haven, became the state's oasis of liberal progressivism is a mystery to me. (Then again, our police chief wants to GPS paroled known gang members and set up Eye in the Sky surveillance cameras around the city to watch over us, so maybe we're not quite San Francisco just yet.)


At the other end of the spectrum, we were ranked 317 out of 375 in a recent study of best cities/metro areas to live in...unless, of course, you are a transgender teen with a dream of prom royalty, or a police chief with a totalitarian streak.

Why Didn't Anyone Tell Me About Lewis Taylor?

Stumbled across this artist browsing through Borders yesterday and, well, read on:
Review of Stoned, Pt. 1
Taylor is one of those bedroom geniuses who handcrafts his music by his lonesome in a home studio. Yet there isn’t a second of stiffness or uncertainty here, and, though he makes plentiful use of sequenced keyboards, his unabashedly romantic songs have a warmth and expansiveness that most self-manufactured albums lack.

His principal avatars can be apprehended in the album-opening title cut. After a burbling synth intro, the number rocks in on a rubbery beat and some wah-wah guitar right out of Sly Stone’s book. The love-drugged lyrics (“You stoned me, baby, and I don’t think I’ll ever recover now”) lift a page from Marvin Gaye’s lubricious Let’s Get It On epoch, while his vocal growls evince a familiarity with Stevie Wonder’s classic early-’70s work. As the song reaches its climax, a fat Prince-style guitar solo roars up out of the mix.

Those models, plus a vocal sweetness one associates with Curtis Mayfield and some swirling production out of Norman Whitfield’s classic Temptations period (“Positively Beautiful”), supply the basic template for most of Taylor’s material and sound. But other pop influences clatter around as well: In full cry, his singing tears a sheet from Paul McCartney’s book, and the rising, layered harmonies on tunes like “Back Together” and “Lovelight” manifest the imprint of Brian Wilson. (In a bit of bold homage, Taylor bows deeply to Wilson with a gorgeous a cappella cover of “Melt Away,” from the Beach Boys maestro’s 1988 solo debut.)

Review of The Lost Album:
"A first spin of The Lost Album can get you to wondering if what you've just heard has any relation to soul, the sound on which the enigmatic British crooner Lewis Taylor has built his next-big-thing reputation. In a dozen songs, he drifts from the ringing guitars of classic '70s rock ("Hide Your Heart Away," "Send Me an Angel") to the warm textures and brilliant atmospherics of a classic Brian Wilson composition ("Let's Hope Nobody Finds Us") to a couple of vaguely Beatlesque songs ("Say I Love You"). Along the way, he manages to conjure up Laura Nyro, Todd Rundgren, and Syd Barrett, too -- no small feat for a guy who was once supposed to be the next Al Green."

NPR World Cafe interview/concert from last February

Listen, be amazed, purchase (or download if you hate capitalism), spread the word....or tell me I have poor taste in music. Either way.

Footnote: I wonder if this is just coincidence:

Thank A Teacher (or two) (or ten)

From Learning Resources:
For the past 15 years, the first full week in May has been designated Teacher Appreciation Week, with that Tuesday, this year May 8, being National Teacher Appreciation Day. The purpose of the week is to set aside time to show teachers that they are appreciated.

As far as feeling appreciated, the majority of the teachers surveyed said that it was important to them, but most said they don’t always feel appreciated.

In spite of modest salaries, crowded classrooms, anxiety about meeting standardized testing goals and lack of resources; teachers say that all they need to feel appreciated is a thank-you and effort on the part of students and their parents, according to a recent survey.

Doing good class work and a simple thank-you were the top picks of the surveyed teachers for how students can show their appreciation. Teachers selected being involved in their child’s education and a simple thank-you as the two best ways for parents to show their appreciation.

As one California educator stated, “I do not need gifts. It is the thank-you, or a comment like, ‘I learned a lot in your class’ that is the best reward. It is knowing that my efforts are appreciated and effective.”

**Addendum** If you are currently nearing the end of your school year/semester, it may not be prudent to all of a sudden shower your current teachers with praise (unless they're in the Communication department); it's probably best to seek out those from years past.

Clinging to the Past

Today's there's a (possibly) classic bout and the 133rd running of the Kentucky Derby, and if it were 1957 there might be some mainstream interest , but it's 2007 so, for the most part, no one cares. Nevertheless, I feel compelled to make predictions:

Mayweather - De La Hoya: I'm taking the Golden Boy (de La Hoya) in a Cinco de Mayo upset, handing Floyd his first career loss

Kentucky Derby: Scat Daddy (Place: Street Sense, Show: Circular Quay)

Art History: The Third of May 1808, and other related works

From Wikipedia:
The Third of May 1808: The Execution of the Defenders of Madrid is a 1814 oil painting by the Spanish painter Francisco Goya. It depicts a scene from the Spanish war of liberation when many innocent citizens were shot by Napoleon's troops following a popular uprising in Madrid.

Both the night and symmetrical composition of the subjects stress the drama: the faces of those about to be shot are filled with feeling, while the soldiers are shown from behind, their humanity erased and their being reduced to mere components in the implaccable machinery of death.

The positioning of the soldiers and the man with arms upraised is a concious reversal of the poses of the main characters in Jacques-Louis David's Oath of the Horatii (right) but is also a reminder of the crucifixion of Christ. The white of the victim's shirt represents the innocence and purity of the some 5,000 Spanish civilians who were executed between May 2 and May 3.
The central hero's deeply suntanned appearance and clothing unmistakably indicates that he is an outdoors worker - an ordinary annonymous man at the centre of this great unfolding tragedy. He alone looks straight at the faceless enemy. Though on his knees he is a giant who towers above all at the very moment before his death. The scene makes the canvas one of the most dramatic and visually impressive images ever made.
Its influence on later war painters is extensive, most famously Picasso's Guernica.


End note: I recommend following the links to the works for larger reproductions so you can actually see them if you are unfamiliar with them.

For No Reason In Particular

God Comes to Campus

Excerpted from the International Herald Tribune:
Peter Gomes has been at Harvard University for 37 years and says he remembers when religious people on campus felt under siege. To be seen as religious often meant being dismissed as not very bright, he said. No longer. At Harvard these days, said Gomes, the university preacher, "There is probably more active religious life now than there has been in 100 years."

Across the country, on secular campuses as varied as Colgate University, the University of Wisconsin and the University of California, Berkeley, chaplains, professors and administrators say students are drawn to religion and spirituality with more fervor than at any time they can remember.

Lesleigh Cushing, an assistant professor of religion and Jewish studies at Colgate, said: "I can fill basically any class on the Bible. I wasn't expecting that." The number of student religious organizations at Colgate has grown to 11 from 5 in recent years. The university's Catholic, Protestant and Jewish chaplains oversee an array of programs and events. Many involve providing food to students, a phenomenon that the university chaplain, Mark Shiner, jokingly calls "gastro-evangelism."
Increased participation in community service may also reflect spiritual yearning of students. "We don't use that kind of spiritual language anymore," said Rebecca Chopp, the Colgate president. "But if you look at the students, they do."

Some sociologists who study religion are skeptical that students' attitudes have changed significantly, citing a lack of data to compare current students with those of previous generations. But even some of those concerned about the data say something has shifted. "All I hear from everybody is yes, there is growing interest in religion and spirituality and an openness on college campuses," said Christian Smith, a professor of sociology at Notre Dame. "Everybody who is talking about it says something seems to be going on."

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Happy Anniversary, Citzen Kane

66 years ago today, RKO Pictures unleashed the oft-considered Greatest Film of All-Time, Citizen Kane, on the world.

As Richard Corliss of Time Magazine wrote for the 50th anniversary:
"Fifty years ago last week, Hollywood was the home of the avant garde. RKO released an experimental film made by a 25-year-old novice who didn't know the rules, didn't care when his studio elders said, "You can't do that!" Outrageous, iconoclastic, with warning shadows and baroque camera angles, Citizen Kane told future moviemakers that anything was possible."

Coming back to today, the latest release from RKO Pictures was the Ice Cube-family "comedy" Are We Done Yet, a remake of 1948's Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House (which wasn't that great to begin with, despite starring the incomparable Cary Grant, and was already remade as The Money Pit in the 80's) and a sequel to 2005's Are We There Yet.

We've come a looooong way, wouldn't you say?

Do yourself a favor and see Kane if you haven't. Even if you have seen it, see it again.