Hot child in the city, as Nick Gilder used to sing. It's too early in the year to start watering the damn lawn! (See wildlife photo below.)

Footbarn's Celebration of Theatre: 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! Spitfires of the Spaceways
Watch Dale Arden rescue Flash Gordon for a change!

Charity Alert: Make a resolution as Summer approaches to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: It's going to be regular Sundays at the Hockaday Museum of Art for the time being -- it's nice to be needed though. The new buildings at the Community College are almost ready for equipment installation and cable-pulling.

Media Watch: Verdi's La Traviata was on our local PBS station -- that's the opera with the Anvil Chorus punctuating the conversations sung by the principals up front. Odd and rare Psychedelic Music was playing on College Radio to let modern listeners know what was competing with Sgt. Pepper four decades ago. Yeah, just like today, there was some real dreck on the airwaves, but Pink Floyd's Astronomy Domine and Interstellar Overdrive continue to be formidible pieces of music! May I mention they were both written by the late Syd Barrett? His life was very publically blighted by commerce, drugs, and hyper-expectations at a very vulnerable age. He lived to be sixty, but it was a hard struggle for him to maintain his physical and mental health.
I've also been reading the great German rocket pioneer Willy Ley, discussing people's fascination with Planet Mars in the days before Mariner IV and subsequent satellites. He mentioned Wells' War of the Worlds, and a couple of other novels, but somehow skipped Edgar Rice Burroughs completely.
There is still a lot of interest in Interplanetary Space today -- the new head of NASA made a bloody fool of himself (again) this week while replying to criticisms of some very expensive future manned exploration programs he's trying to push, to the detriment of practical here-and-now duties of the agency. I'm romantic enough to desire voyages to Mars and the Moon, but these projects need to be led by level-headed adults, not corrupt, thieving Bu$hCo cronies and hacks.


I am still visiting Middle Foy's Lake -- this Mama Mallard and her brood were there to greet me!

Still hot, but milder than yesterday. Ravens are haunting the grounds of the Hockaday Museum -- trying to scam some squirril food no doubt.

Footbarn's Celebration of Theatre: 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! Spitfires of the Spaceways
Watch Dale Arden rescue Flash Gordon for a change!

Charity Alert: Make a resolution as Summer approaches to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: Lyle Olsen's Views of India at the Hockaday Museum of Art. The late Joe Abbrescia's plein aire paintings of Glacier National Park are going up starting Monday.


View from lower Going To The Sun Road
by Joe Abbrescia (1936-2005)

TOO hot for this time of year -- praying for some rainfall. The Killdeer are setting up their nests -- sometimes called Plovers, they are cheery, ground-dwelling birds that resemble little barber poles.

Footbarn's Celebration of Theatre: 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! Spitfires of the Spaceways
Watch Dale Arden rescue Flash Gordon for a change!

Charity Alert: Make a resolution as Summer approaches to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: I got Lyle Olsen's Views of India hung at the Hockaday Museum of Art. He covers holy men, common worshippers, and the stark contrasts of very rich and desperately poor in the vast subcontinent via his photographs.

Media Watch: Forty years ago today -- Sgt. Pepper was the disc to play! Unlike much of the USA, we heard it all over the AM stations in my hometown of Salt Lake City. The Summer of Love was in full swing in San Francisco, and the breezes of the REAL 60's were blowing through dusty corners of the universe like Utah. My friend Michael G. Cavanaugh played A Day In The Life every night on KCPX Radio that summer, allowing the long final fading chord to rumble on for almost a minute.
Whatever else might have happened, the standards of Popular Music rose to much higher levels after Sgt. Pepper. The powers-that-were tried to slow things down or exert their control, but lowly record buyers like me went out looking for more albums which were creative and stimulating. Groups like the Incredible String Band and Moody Blues found their audiences. The rough and tumble Velvet Underground & Nico was a masterpiece in it's own right. Previously-neglected artists like the Doors and Buffalo Springfield (Neil Young + Steven Stills) were rediscovered, and unknowns like Jimi Hendrix and Cream became stars by the next year. All this ferment had been bubbling for years, but Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band remains a special vintage on the shelves of recording history.


Within the same year, Frank Zappa put out We're Only In It For The Money, an incisive, but sneering, satire about counter-cultural delusions. He used Sgt. Pepper's basic cover design, but literally turned it inside-out!

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes -- I've moved away from Middle Foy's Lake. I saw a mother Duck and her Ducklings while packing, and a pair of Loons last Saturday!

Footbarn's Celebration of Theatre: 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! Spitfires of the Spaceways
Watch Dale Arden rescue Flash Gordon for a change!

Charity Alert: Make a resolution as Summer approaches to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: The Hockaday Museum of Art's Spring for Glacier Auction in Glacier National Park was a million laughs. We made some money for the non-profits, and everybody had a good time, even though we worked 'till 'way late, and gab'd on and on 'till even later.

Media Watch: I'm promoting my friend Joan Merwyn's new show on Daily Kos. It has a political theme, plus it's better than cussin' and moanin' about thangs! Here's what I'm saying:
SEE this show if you can get to Providence RI -- I'm stuck in Montana. Joan Merwyn is nearly six feet of skill, energy, and clarity who has a new production ready for the boards, which I do not hesitate to recommend to all East Koast Kossaks.


(L to R) Joan Merwyn as I drew her in Bari Rolfe's mask workshop, and in Still Life, SHIFTINGS -- MONEY MATTER$ digitally redrawn from an original photo by Andrew Hammer

Joan’s new work is called DISSENT! and will be presented on June 9th at Perishable Theatre in Providence, RI. --- part of a program called Dancestravaganza with other Modern Dance and Movement pieces -- 95 Empire Street, Providence RI 401-331-2695
DISSENT! Questions the notion of patriotism within the contemporary climate of war in Iraq. Exploring the impact of civilian casualties on an ancient civilization, Merwyn creates haunting and provocative images of the consequences of this war, accompanied by a blazing, rock and roll sound track.
DISSENT! Created and Performed by: Joan Merwyn
Artistic Consultant: Stephan Geras
DISSENT! is a reflection / meditation on the impact of innocent civilian casualties, which are now 80-85% of all casualties in Iraq. The majority of these casualties are children. Let's compare this to WW1, when soldiers were the majority killed, at a ratio of 10 to 1. In WW2 it was 50 / 50. Civilian casualties have increased more and more with each successive war. Keep our troops safe. Bring them home now and find diplomatic solutions to this crisis.

"All wars are wars on children"
Howard Zinn

Joan says: This performance is dedicated to the loving memory of Rhoda Klitzner Bailey, artist, mentor and devoted friend. She encouraged me to develop this piece. For more information, please go to www.joanmerwyn.com

Changes are coming -- I'm moving away from Middle Foy's Lake in the near future, but I'll just make wildlife reports from elsewhere. We recently saw some Black Terns migrating through. Swallows, Night Hawks, and other insect-eaters are out in force as the weather has been been wet and mild lately.


Footbarn's Celebration of Theatre: 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! Spitfires of the Spaceways
Watch Dale Arden rescue Flash Gordon for a change!

Charity Alert: Make a resolution as Summer approaches to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: Check out Hockaday Museum of Art's online preview of the 4th Annual Spring for Glacier Auction on May 25, 2007 in Glacier National Park!
The auction itself is this Friday -- I'll be there helping our Director with the myriad details involved in an event like this, plus taking the preview items off the walls of the Hockaday the night before and having them ready to transport up to Glacier Nat'l park the next morning.

Media Watch: All that Trash must Go Go! My favorites, Apolo Anton Ohno and Jullianne Hough, won the trophy on Dancing with the Stars. Joey & Kim were in second place, Laila & Maxim were third in the competition. (Las Vegas oddsmakers picked L&M to win at the start.)
Book TV had an interesting counterpoint to it's recent GOPropaganda-filler with radio host Laura Flanders and her book Blue Grit: True Democrats Take Back Politics from the Politicians. She talked about the Democratic Party reviving itself in unexpected places. She argued that Democracts would do well to embrace those on the progressive side of the party, instead of "rushing to the center." (A phrase which means capitulation to radical right-wing thieves who never budge or compromise.)

Theater/Theatre: Workshops - Studio 7 - Independent studio for dance, voice and body work Eerste Nassaustraat 7 1052 BD Amsterdam www.studioseven.nu
July 7-16 Katie Duck -- Dance Improvisation for dancers and musicians. Contact: katie@katieduck.com (performance with the workshop group on Friday July 13 at the OT301 Amsterdam)


Masterful dancer Katie Duck with Magpie Music/Dance Collective.
Thanks to videos found on http://justinmorrison.net/

Spring Semester is just about DONE -- and so are the students and faculty. The weather couldn't be better. Gotta keep that Skunk-gate up on my back deck. We think he/she found an unused, nearly-forgotten pet door leading from the pantry to the back deck and tore the none-too-sturdy fixture away. Insulation was pushed in from the outside wall of the pantry, and it's all-too-possible that one of these badger-like creatures was the culprit. About six weeks ago we saw one at the same spot. A Skunk in the pantry, or ANYWHERE inside your house, is too ugly to contemplate!


Footbarn's Celebration of Theatre: 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! Spitfires of the Spaceways
Watch Dale Arden rescue Flash Gordon for a change!

Charity Alert: Make a resolution as Summer approaches to click on The Hunger Site every day.

In The Community: Check out Hockaday Museum of Art's online preview of the 4th Annual Spring for Glacier Auction on May 25, 2007 in Glacier National Park!
I'm videotaping the keynote speaker tomorrow at Flathead Valley Community College's graduation ceremony. The last time I was anywhere near one of those things was back in 1979 when I was pedaling my 10 Speed up a long sweaty hill at the University of Utah on a hot weekend afternoon. Suddenly I was navigating through a sea of suits, ties, and other formal wear, while I was only clad in cut-off Levis. (I'd clamped my shirt and other scraps of clothing onto the back of the bike.) "This is MY college graduation!" I thought, and I was correct -- my Bachelor of Fine Arts degree arrived in the mail soon afterward.
My high school graduation ceremony was a full cap-and-gown affair, and everyone had a pretty good time -- until Robert Kennedy died from an assassin's bullet later that night.

Media Watch: T - R - A-S-H! That spells TRASH! Cheryl Burke wasn't able to loosen up her uptight partner Ian enough on dancing With The Stars to advance any further. We voted completely for Apolo and Jullianne Hough, even though Kym Johnson and Joey were alright in their second dance. Karina Smirnoff and Edyta Slyvinska did an ultra-slow number, with professional partners, to an ultra-slow ballad by Enrique Inglesas (and the Lip-Sinques). The women were decked-out in typical Edyta costumes -- mostly nude with fabric flowing off the limbs on one side, which worked well for all the turns and flourishes they needed to liven up that dead-weight song. Someone might ask in fun, "Why don't all these ballroom dancers wear their dresses over the MIDDLE of their bodies like everyone else?"

Theatre/Theater: Footsbarn Theatre's The Man Who Laughs by Victor Hugo

Mankind is a mouth, of which I am the cry
One night, one night of storm, a little deserted child, an orphan, alone in this immeasurable creation, I made my entrance into this darkness which you call society; the first thing I saw was the law, under the form of a gallows; the second was riches, your riches, under the form of a woman dead of cold and hunger; the third, the future, under the form of a child, left to die; the fourth, goodness, truth and justice, under the figure of a vagabond whose sole friend and companion was a wolf.
This adventure begins on the coast of Cornwall in a stormy night, where Footsbarn began it’s own epic journey 35 years ago. Our protagonists are travelling clowns. Set against the background of a Shakespearean world, we travel to Southwark Fair and the royal court in London -- An epic, a great human adventure to be told simply and fully, what’s more exciting!?!


Remaining Tour Dates -- Montbard, France
25th May - 8.30pm
26th May - 8.30pm
27th May - 5.00pm