June is here, and hardly a cloud in the Big Sky -- I'm going to have to start watering my growing things soon, but I'm off to the other side of the state of Montana tomorrow morning, for Art's sake!

Sitemeter Sez: Visitors from Jamaica, New York; Malm, Sweden; Marratxi, Spain; Hayward, California; Arvada, Colorado; Santa Barbara, California; Milan, Italy; Austin, Texas; Northfield, Ohio and Saint Michael, Minnesota. (No! Never been there, not named for me.)

ROCK against Reaganomics 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!
NEW --Launching NOW! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and Cellulose to Celluloid, Flash Gordon in the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many 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: Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: The Hockaday Museum of Art is tearing down its old shows and putting up Rails, Trails, and A Road -- honoring the 75th Anniversary of Going To The Sun Road in Glacier National Park.



Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Media Watch: Yoko Ono's 100 Acorns is a lot of fun -- highly recommended! (See my list of "Friendly Sites")
So You Think You Can Dance seemed to be about the choreographers and costumers more than the dancers who are being judged for the decisions others make for them. Hmmm -- that's show biz.

A Sample from Yoko Ono's 100 Acorns:

summer

Imagine a dolphin dancing in the sky.
Let it dance with joy.

Think of yourself at the bottom of the ocean
watching.

Imagine a group of dolphins dancing in the sky.
Blow kisses to them
in your mind.

Concerts: George Clinton & The P-Funk All-Stars are in LONDON next.
Here's the rest of the schedule:
Jun 21 2008 8:00P
Massive Attack Meltdown Fest London, England
Jul 4 2008 8:00P
4th of July Celebration Louisville, Kentucky
Jul 5 2008 8:00P
Nelson Ledges Garrettsville, Ohio
Jul 6 2008 8:00P
Citifest Detroit, Michigan
Jul 9 2008 8:00P
Lupos Heartbreak Hotel Providence, Rhode Island
Jul 10 2008 8:00P
Hampton Beach Casino Hampton Beach, New Hampshire
Jul 11 2008 8:00P
The Wolf Den UJncasville, Connecticut
Jul 12 2008 8:00P
Palladum Worchester, Massachusetts
Jul 16 2008 8:00P
House of Blues Atlantic City, New Jersey
Jul 18 2008 8:00P
Bottle and Cork Beach Concert Dewey Beach, Delaware
Jul 19 2008 8:00P
9:30 Club Washington, DC
Jul 20 2008 8:00P
Millennium Center P Funk Radio Winston Salem, North Carolina
Jul 24 2008 11:30P
10,000 Lakes Festival Detroit Lakes, Minnesota

Clinton supports Obama!

Electoral Madness: Barak Obama called out his volunteers to help with sandbagging against high water in Iowa and Illinois while John McCain was cozying up to Texas millionaires, and talking about "September 10 mindsets." Does that mean there's more to life than using wars and disasters to stuff your own pockets? If the National Guard was at full strength instead of standing between various factions of Iraqi militias and Blackwater-style mercenaries, and our infrastructure was properly maintained, many bad things happening in our OWN country wouldn't be as bad.
Support our troops -- bring them home.

June is bustin' out all over, and the weather has been mellow.

Sitemeter Sez: Visitors from Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin; Sao Paulo, Brazil; Sydney, Australia; Kansas City, Missouri; Breskens, Holland; Vienna, Austria; Sunnyvale, California (Silicon Valley again); Bangalore, India (S.V's Far East rival); Cascade, Montana; Oakland, California; Amsterdam, Holland, and Ballwin, Missouri.

ROCK against Reaganomics 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!
NEW --Launching NOW! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and Cellulose to Celluloid, Flash Gordon in the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many 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: Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: The Hockaday Museum of Art is tearing down its old shows and putting up Rails, Trails, and A Road -- honoring the 75th Anniversary of Going To The Sun Road in Glacier National Park.

Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Media Watch: NPR was playing Selected Shorts with stories by three of my favorite writers -- Ray Bradbury, Italo Calvino, and Edith Wharton.

Ch-Ch-Changes: One of my favorite dancers passed away after a long, inspirational life -- Cyd Charisse was 86.
From Wikipedia: (She) was born as Tula Ellice Finklea in Amarillo, Texas, the daughter of Lela Norwood and Ernest Enos Finklea, Sr. (She) studied ballet in Los Angeles with Adolph Bolm & Bronislawa Nijinska* and subsequently danced in the Ballet Russes as Celia Siderova and, later, Maria Istromena ...
*Nijinska was the sister of Vaslav Nijinski, chief choreographer of Ida Rubinstein's Ballet, and like her brother, patron, and student, performed with Ballet Russes.

Click to enlarge this image.
Cyd Charisse in part of a solo dance sequence from an early-50's movie, choreographed by Fred Astaire's pal Hermes Pan. From photos found on the Web HERE.

Cyd Charisse was confidently sexy. Her strong gorgeous body was the result of long hours of discipline and practice. She was passion personified when she danced. The world of Mass Entertainment was never mature enough to fully appreciate this fine lady's talent, but she had a long career anyway -- and a private life. Congratulations to a very successful artist.

Click to enlarge THIS one too!
(L to R) Over thirty years of Cyd Charisse's extraordinary career in photos -- fresh out of the Ballet to the fleshpots of Hollywood where she danced with both Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly, then married crooner Tony Martin and stayed married, took her skillful, frank, and bold dancing to stages around the world after the old star system faded away, and continued to step out of the confining frames of age, sex, and cynical expectations. Undressed, dressed up, or dressed down, she was always beautiful.

Mild, sunny weather -- looks like June for a change.

Sitemeter Sez: Visitors from Jamaica, New York; Birmingham, UK; Mountain View, California (Silicon Valley); Plaisir, France; Sorrento, Italy; Burlington, Vermont; Columbia, South Carolina; Vigo, Spain; Skvde, Sweden; Alexandria, Virginia; Lakewood, Washington; Lethbridge, Alberta; Hoboken, New Jersey; Great Falls, Montana; Highland Park, New Jersey; Taunton, UK (near my old stomping grounds in Cornwall -- the best-selling scrumpy was named Taunton Cider); London, UK; Lehigh Acres, Florida; Poplar Bluff, Missouri and New York, New York.

ROCK against Reaganomics 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!
NEW --Launching NOW! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and Cellulose to Celluloid, Flash Gordon in the Saturday Matinees and Sunday Comics.





Many 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: Check into Terra Sigilata blog -- donate $$$ to cancer patients just by clicking onto the site. Keep that Resolution to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: The Hockaday Museum of Art is tearing down its old shows and putting up Rails, Trails, and A Road -- honoring the 75th Anniversary of Going To The Sun Road in Glacier National Park.



Check out Fall for Glacier -- a fundraiser for several programs that make Glacier National Park even better!

Media Watch: I have been busy -- no operas or movies. I did watch So You Think You Can Dance, but I have no emotional attachment to that show. I'm reading In Search of Schrodinger's Cat at night to help me go to sleep -- works very well. There is a NEW movie based upon Marvel Comics' Incredible Hulk, and it's getting better reviews than Ang Lee's wishy-washy attempt of a few years back.

An all-too-rare collaboration between my friend, the late Jack Kirby (pencils), and still-living Steve Ditko (inks) who I've never met. Ditko was the co-creator of Spider Man, and deserves more than poverty for his awesome efforts.

Electoral Madness: Hewlett-Packard, once one of the most-respected engineering companies in the world, is now just letters on logo-plates stuck on subcontracted hardware, thanks to Carly "I'm So Vain" Fiorina. John McCain is now trying to use her "clout" with women to try and poach angry Clinton supporters.
"Having started as a secretary and eventually become a chief-executive officer, I not only have great admiration and respect for Hillary Clinton and her candidacy and her leadership, but I also have great empathy, I must tell you, for what she went through," Fiorina said.

Hold your nose -- somebody's been eating beans:

"I also believe though, if we are striving for a gender-blind, color-blind society, that we really ought to be focused on the person that we think will make the right judgments, the right decisions and have the right positions. That person is John McCain," she said.
... McCain was quick to point out political differences with Clinton, saying he thought the Supreme Court decision in "Roe vs Wade" on abortion was a bad one.
Any woman who would vote against her own interests for McCain was never a Democrat in the first place.

Yes, they are contractually obligated to mislead you.

Mind your own body's business, McCain! A hundred years in Iraq isn't fine with me either. The first thing to do is:
Support our troops -- bring them home.