Dancing with the Stars is done! (See below). A little bit of snow plus LOW temperatures made the roads very dangerous yesterday morning -- luckily, it got above freezing, melted, and evaporated most of that stuff before nightfall.

Sitemeter Sez: Visitors from Lakeland, Florida (researching the Byrds); Lamont, Alberta and Jamaica, New York.

REAL SLC Punk, not the movie, at: Theater X-Net

Starring: Ida Rubinstein Belle Epoch Russian/Parisian beauty.
Ida's Places in Paris -- from my first jet-lagged day by the Seine.
Read more about Ida in Sisters of Salome by Toni Bentley

Visit: Michael's Montana Web Archive
Theater, Art, Flash Gordon, Funky Music and MORE!
Spitfires of the Spaceways
Wilma Deering & Dale Arden to the rescue; Bodacious Princess Aura I; Hapless Aura II; The fiery Emperor Ming; The Orson Welles Rumor Debunked; and BOTH incarnations of Jean Rogers!





Thanks to Jim Keefe (Visit his Website) -- the LAST Flash Gordon illustrator of the 20th Century, and Flash's first illustrator of the 21st, for his recommendations -- HERE!

Charity Alert: Make a Holiday Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day. Also check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site.

In The Community: I delivered my videotape to the cable company at last -- wanted to do it in the morning, but was too damn busy up at the college to get away. I walked around the block to learn that we had Xmas decoration problems at the Hockaday Museum of Art -- something odd happened to the roof lights after some bulbs were replaced by the contractor over the weekend. I myself had some problems replacing ceiling flourescents inside, but we had some fun afterwards setting up a sixty-plus year old Santa Claus animation made by our namesake Hugh Hockaday.

Media Watch: I took time from my November Novel to check out the last twenty minutes of Trash A Go Go. The winning team was Julianne Hough and Helio (Apollo) the race-car driver -- Hough is a remarkably complete performer and fantastic teacher, but Sabrina the Cheetah Girl was still the best celebrity dancer this last season, PROVING it in her guest-spot, and further exposing the flaws in their f***ed-up system. I couldn't really say if Helio or Mel C was the better of the second-bests or not. At least Osmond's rabid fans didn't push her into the final two. Congrats to big Maksim for the fierce competition.
BTW -- the reformed Spice Girls' first single flopped badly, I hope whomever is behind their comeback has written or commissioned some decent material for them to sing, otherwise the public will just turn their own behinds, and walk away from yet another empty package.

Enough about cheap beer, lets talk about cultural champagne! My friend, Choreographer/Dancer Katie Duck (long story about that surname) is in New York all this week -- November 29 to December 1 - Workshop Katie Duck / 14:00- 17:30pm / $75 Eden’s Expressway 537 Broadway

November 30 Friday Performance St Marks Danspace 20:30 - Katie Duck, Justin Morrison, K.J. Holmes, Alex Waterman (cello) as part of the Movement Research FALL Festival 2007.
For more information and to enroll go to: amandaloulaki@movementresearch.org

All that and a Sunday talk show, of a sort: Focus group discussion - December 2, 2007 - 5.30 pm - 8.30 pm - Eden’s Expressway 537 Broadway Topics - Improvisation, as a subject with aims and objectives, as a pedagogy, as a festival focus


Digital dancing by Katie Duck and Justin Morrison (with Magpie Music/Dance) from a video on http://katieduck.com.
(Click to see a larger image.)
I've compared her with Jazz masters like Eric Dolphy, but it would also be fair to say Keith Jarrett, since he is her contemporary.