We had some rain, and a cold wind, but it is still Spring! Lots of Mallard chicks in the Slough.

Sitemeter Sez: Dodsland, Saskatchewan, East Calais, Vermont; Fort Worth, Texas; Louth, Ireland (Hi Pal!); Liverpool, New York; Mc Lean, Virginia; San Francisco, California; Burlington, Vermont; Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Poway, California, and Issoire, France (near Footsbarn).

NEW Mime Troupe History 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!
MORE UPDATES! Outre Space Cinema -- Featuring: 1930's Rocketry, Spitfires of the Spaceways and especially Cellulose to Celluloid, Even more Flash Gordon comparisons from 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 including my efforts on his Flash Gordon Resources Page -- along with actual creators like Alex Raymond, Al Williamson, and others!

Charity Alert: Play the FreeRice Game -- improve your vocabulary, and donate food to the United Nations. 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. BTW -- AIDtoCHILDREN.com is a bit simpler than FreeRice Game.

In The Community: Seldom Seen II and Larry Johnson's photos of local characters. Montana On The Move, New Artists, are on display at the Hockaday Museum of Art. Dan Fagre's show will go up again next week -- it is about the vanishing glaciers of Glacier National Park, and a true labor of love by Fagre and other scientists from the USGS. Here's another website comparing glacier photos from the early 20th Century and recent decades.

I ran sound for Carol Buchanan's public discussion of her historical novel God's Thunderbolt -- The Vigilantes of Montana at the community college. Here's the link to a live-blog of the event.

Media Watch: Trash A Go Go ("Dancing with the Stars") finished its 8th season with a surprise -- 16 year old Shawn Johnson won the trophy. The public has spoken! I would have preferred Gilles Marie, but no matter -- Mark is now a 2-time champ like Cheryl, and his former partner Julianne. I thought the schlub-fest at the beginning of the Awards Show was tedious, and would have liked to see more pros dancing. Speaking of which, Anna the Russian will be an excellent cast member next season. Chelsie Hightower was a new pro this season, and handled herself very well with Ty the cowboy, who never really understood what he was doing.
I first heard of Lady GaGa on this show, as regular readers well know, so I was pleased to see Stefani (GaGa) Germanotta doing two numbers -- the first was a remix of Just Dance again, where she sported a piled-up plastic white wig, with spiders painted on her eyes, and a black arachnid costume covering her figure, over what appeared to be a dark body stocking showing one long naked leg. She threw a kiss to the national TV audience while sitting down afterward.
The second song Love Game was presented deep into the show. She had on a one-piece red textured costume covering her trunk and legs, with flaring Space Opera shoulders, leaving her arms bare. It was a minor detail, but the glow from her scepter-like prop, the "Disco Stick" was overwhelmed by studio lights, and it looked more like a toilet brush. For the first time I've seen her on TV, she wore a yellowish-blond wig instead of a white one. (Germanotta is a natural brunette.) She sang full-out, exhorting the audience, which is the thing I like best about her, even though there was lots of electronics going on -- whatever, she's a DJ, and is GOOD at this stuff. Speaking of which, the single of Love Game contains sonic references to Lady Miss Kier and Dee-Lite in the mix, as well as some Bollywood influences. In both songs, Lady GaGa performed with a mixed-sex, mostly-male posse, and strode around a bit more than she did before, although she did VERY well when she uncorked her own dancing.

Let's have some fun ... Lady GaGa, redigitized from the video of Love Game on her MySpace site. (Looks like she's touring Australia with the Pussycat Dolls next week.) She is more overtly sexy in the Pop Video medium than she is on conventional TV, changing costumes a lot, and dancing all over the place -- including the subway.
You GO, GaGa!