Weather: The thaw continues -- rain on top of ice, and melting snowpack. My eaves are clear of ice where I used the commercial melting mush, so that water doesn't back up behind "ice dams" and drain into our house.

Wildlife: The deer family was bedded down around the bird feeder this morning.

Charity Alert: The Hunger Site : Give Food for Free to Hungry People in the World

At the College: Digitizing some overhead transparencies to go onto CDs later today. Those data projectors are getting used! Hmmm -- Will I have to make them all into Power Point slides? Maybe so -- some photo display software packages are no damn good, and each display computer is configured differently. They all have Power Point, though.

Might as well write about "Global Friends" later today -- we have a young lady from Kenya (Kikuyu nationality), and a lady even older than I, who has been around Guatemamla and Chiapas a lot lately. Last time we talked about languages and odd specific sounds that aren't used in English. LATER IS NOW: Prof. Gerda Reeb told about her life growing up in the grim Soviet satellite nation of Romania, especially under the kleptomaniac rule of Charcesceau (sp?). She told how her family was ransomed by relatives and the West German government, after waiting 21 years, by the additional bribe of a remote-controlled TV set to a bureaucrat in 1986. After a few years in Europe, she chose to attend college in Eugene, Oregon -- luckily one of the most accepting, easy-to-live communities in the whole USA.
We talked about how repression and corruption attacked the souls of societies, and heard examples from Chiapas, and Kenya. On a positive note, we spoke of a spring fair and a website devoted to regional arts before adjourning.
Gerda also mentioned hearing English for the first time via TV shows like Dallas and Dynasty. Sharon grew up using Kikuyu in her neighborhood, English in school, and Swahili in big cites like Nairobi.

Media Watch: I was a lazy slug last night -- no reading, snoozed completely thru the NPR news, and watched some televised drek called "Awesomely Bad Videos" on VH1. It was a string of catty C-list comedians beating up on the folks who star in those kind of unfortunate, misbegotten productions -- which might be fair if the celebrities mentioned had any control, but often they don't -- that's a whole other subject, though. The mean-spirited syndicated series' "Behind the Music that Sucks" and "Videos that Suck" are actually funnier that the VH1 show.
Football: Super Bowl this Sunday! I'm "betting" on New England, but I'm always hoping for a well-played, close game.
I don't give a rat's ass about the commercials -- $4.6 Million per minute is obscene. I'm going to write to CBS and tell them that I'm planning to change channels at every commercial on purpose -- people with that kind of money don't need any of mine! (NOTE: I did write and tell them.)
Car Stereo: (Here's a new subject) Best of the Box Tops -- bought it on tape for a buck, and am enjoying almost every track. It's late-60's pop-rock with a soulful edge, courtesy of producers Chips Moman, Dan Penn, Spooner Oldham, and singer Alex Chilton, who was only 16 years old when The Letter was recorded. My favorites are Soul Deep, and Neon Rainbow. I wish Midnight Angel was in this collection. It's also sad that Chilton and his bandmates got almost no money and little respect for their fine work -- they COULD play up to the standards of the fine Memphis studio musicians who did the backgrounds on these records.
Here's one telling of Chilton's story:
Alex Chilton: A brief history of rock and roll's influential "high priest"