Over 2000 students came down with H1N1 (Swine Flu) at Washington State University, about 400 miles away from here. Luckily, they were all minor, but annoying, cases and nobody was hospitalized or died. Did I mention that the community college where I work has its highest enrollment ever?
Sitemeter Sez: Hicksville, New York; (Yes, there IS such a place.) Hempstead, New York; Hampton, Virginia; Oakland, California; Anchorage, Alaska; Aldeburgh, UK; Oakland, California, and Cramlington, UK.
The Mime Troupe Saga continues: 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
Many thanks to Toni -- she sent me an autographed copy of Winter Season; A Dancer's Journal (1982) for making a video of her presentation at Harvard University about Ida!
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.
News and Events at Flathead Community College
Then and Now -- Disappearing Glaciers of Glacier National Park.
Tears and Laughter about our broken health care system HERE
President Obama gave two speeches this last week, which both brought out the crazies who'll never support him (or good sense) anyway, and put the majority of this country on alert that ignoring grim reality isn't an option for sane people. Obama can certainly lead, but everyone's going to have to do their share to work our way out of this recession -- including standing up FOR good ideas and AGAINST bad ones, like those put forth by racists and goofball ideologues who simply want our government to fail, or dumb-assed schemes like madated "junk insurance" which wouldn't pay upfront costs of illness anyway, placing a double burden on afflicted persons.
The crazies are marching in Washington D.C. today, led by former congrssional kingpin Dick Armey, one of the architects of this recession. Too much ugly in one place.
Media Watch: An audition show for Trash A Go Go III (AKA: So You Think You Can Dance) Not bad -- no wallowing in the bad or inept. The notion of an audition SHOWING what a performer can do came through, and the judges' panel was fairly humorous.
Trash A Go Go I (AKA: Dancing with the Stars) will start soon, with the corrupt ex-congressman 'Bug Man' Tom Delay, a major leader of the aforementioned crazies who have benefitted from bankrupting their own country, as a contestant. I'm boycotting that show while he's on, and telling ABC so.
No, I didn't watch America's Got Talent -- don't ever want to see it again either. Somewhere else, Simon Cowell, the producer, reminded people what an ass he is by joking about The Beatles, with Ringo in particular, never making it through a talent contest. Probably true, considering that gatekeepers like Cowell suppress creativity rather than encourage it, by patronizing sentimentality and Lowest Common Denominators.
So Cowell was joking, big deal -- the hubbub brought out a rant by one of my favorite rant-meisters, Mary Scott O'Connor. (Google her name.) I agree with her mostly, and sometimes not at all, but she can spin out colorfully enraged verbage like nobody else.
Ch-ch-changes: The great comedy writer Larry Gelbart passed on yesterday. Before we get to his great accomplishments, he wrote blog posts like I do, and Mary Scott O'Connor used to, on Daily Kos. His best-known success was the anti-war TV version of M*A*S*H, but after starting out in radio, he was a major force in the 50's as one of Sid Caesar's team of writers -- along with Neil Simon, Mel Brooks, performer Carl Reiner, Woody Allen, Selma Diamond, and about ten other geniuses. He did Broadway with the magnificent Zero Mostel, a Hollywood movie with Dustin Hoffman, and many other projects.
Time for a cold shower under the waterfall!
