This weekend, we hope to see Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams, filmed under extreme conditions within Chauvet cave. Besides the remarkable images themselves there is the equally remarkable claim that they are in the realm of 30,000 years old, twice the age of other dated cave paintings. This is being hotly disputed by at least one expert who says, in effect, "no they ain't!" He criticizes the dating work (C14 dating of organics in the cave walls.) The original researchers countered with DNA analysis of cave bear skulls found in situ and compared with the believed extinction date of said bears. They now argue that a) some of the images in Chauvet are of cave bears and b) the latest possible date for live cave bears is 24,000 years back, so there. The other side of the debate calls this analysis "sloppy" and says the images are brown bears, not cave bears, anyway.
Me, I don't have an opinion. Maybe I will after I see the movie.
More interesting (to me, probably alone) is a controversy over the authenticity of some lead flippy-card documents found in Jordan, the so-called lead codices. Like the extra-terrestrial life claim of a couple months back, the media picked up on one press release and ran with it, without, apparently, looking very closely into the background of the person who released it. "The 'British archaeologist' who is named as apparently trying to get these things into a Jordanian museum and who is one of the few who has actually seen them, one David Elkington, is not an archaeologist ... He doesn't seem to occupy any post or other academic position, and his writings on how acoustic resonance is responsible for major world religions wouldn't be accepted by any academic or scholar I know ..."
Here we go again.
2011 5 9: Wikipedia has an entry for this nonsense, which seems to be doing a good job of collecting the links as they accumulate. Jordan appears to be agitating about getting the so-called codices back, since they are alleged to have been found there. The general attitude of others seems to be that Jordan is welcome to them.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Monday, May 2, 2011
Interesting week
Since Thursday, April 28th, we have seen:
My friend Mike was from the Upper Peninsula, a musician, occasional radio host, and a man with a combined cynicism and big-heartedness that exceeded anything I'd encountered. He was helping one of his daughters with a move and had a heart attack. There is a group of us, friends from the appalling seventies, who have stayed in touch; Mike is the first direct loss. What a shame.
As far as the Correspondents' Dinner goes, you can see the videos all over the internet. Obama has some damned good writers working for him, and his comedic timing has improved. If you haven't seen any of it, it's worth looking up the highlights, just as an demonstration of brains versus money. If the Trump bubble isn't burst by now, then I weep for my country.
And then, almost the next day, we announce that we got Osama. And we got him with special operations, JSOC, specifically SEAL Team Six, not with Rolling Thunder, Shock n' Awe, or drone strikes. Some individual (forever anonymous, I hope, for his or her sake) hit Bin Laden with a pair of small arms rounds. The operation, as it's being reported, was classic special operations work; a small force, trained to the maximum, inserted and recovered by helicopter. No Ospreys. No tanks. In and out and gone, all conducted far inside the borders of a country we're not at war with.
It was a needful thing. You can't perpetrate something like 9/11 and not reap personal consequences. It's a very important message for the world to hear: we can find you, and we can come and get you. It may take a while ... But far more than just removing bin Laden himself, the assault demonstrates a waning of al-Qaida's influence with Pakistan. It seems very unlikely that we could have brought the attacking force as deeply into the country as Abbottabad without their agreement.
It does, I admit, make the uprisings in the Middle East a bit more concerning -- if al-Qaida has to go looking for a new home, a country that has just ousted a western-backed dictator makes a good starting point. Of course, our old pals the Russkies, wouldn't be unhappy to have a bit more distance between al-Qaida and, say, Chechnya. That should be worth something.
Anyway, a mixed week. Congratulations to Pat and Charlotte (proud parents.) Condolences to Mike's daughters. No condolences to Trump. And congratulations to the special operations community; regardless of the circumstances, they pulled it off.
(1) That's as specific as I can be, without slashes, commas, or semicolons, about what I've spent my career doing.
- The long-anticipated birth of my grandson, Orion James
- The unexpected death of an old, old college friend of mine
- The rendering for hog fat of Donald Trump at the White House Correspondent's Dinner
- Followed by an encore: the long-anticipated death of Osama Bin Laden
My friend Mike was from the Upper Peninsula, a musician, occasional radio host, and a man with a combined cynicism and big-heartedness that exceeded anything I'd encountered. He was helping one of his daughters with a move and had a heart attack. There is a group of us, friends from the appalling seventies, who have stayed in touch; Mike is the first direct loss. What a shame.
As far as the Correspondents' Dinner goes, you can see the videos all over the internet. Obama has some damned good writers working for him, and his comedic timing has improved. If you haven't seen any of it, it's worth looking up the highlights, just as an demonstration of brains versus money. If the Trump bubble isn't burst by now, then I weep for my country.
And then, almost the next day, we announce that we got Osama. And we got him with special operations, JSOC, specifically SEAL Team Six, not with Rolling Thunder, Shock n' Awe, or drone strikes. Some individual (forever anonymous, I hope, for his or her sake) hit Bin Laden with a pair of small arms rounds. The operation, as it's being reported, was classic special operations work; a small force, trained to the maximum, inserted and recovered by helicopter. No Ospreys. No tanks. In and out and gone, all conducted far inside the borders of a country we're not at war with.
It was a needful thing. You can't perpetrate something like 9/11 and not reap personal consequences. It's a very important message for the world to hear: we can find you, and we can come and get you. It may take a while ... But far more than just removing bin Laden himself, the assault demonstrates a waning of al-Qaida's influence with Pakistan. It seems very unlikely that we could have brought the attacking force as deeply into the country as Abbottabad without their agreement.
It does, I admit, make the uprisings in the Middle East a bit more concerning -- if al-Qaida has to go looking for a new home, a country that has just ousted a western-backed dictator makes a good starting point. Of course, our old pals the Russkies, wouldn't be unhappy to have a bit more distance between al-Qaida and, say, Chechnya. That should be worth something.
Anyway, a mixed week. Congratulations to Pat and Charlotte (proud parents.) Condolences to Mike's daughters. No condolences to Trump. And congratulations to the special operations community; regardless of the circumstances, they pulled it off.
(1) That's as specific as I can be, without slashes, commas, or semicolons, about what I've spent my career doing.
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Great books, Cabela's Style
Dispelling the myth that midwesterners, outdoorspersons, and those-who-need-to-deceive-ducks are anti-literate, the 2011 Cabela's Camping catalog I've just received contains one entire page of books. They include:
For those unfamiliar with the overloaded term "Dutch Oven," most of the world (correctly) thinks of it as a cast iron and probably enameled pot with a tight fitting lid, central to many of Europe's great long-cooked dishes, such as daubes, brassati, and so on. But to a small number of people, many of them associated with a religious faith that denies them alcohol and caffiene, the term implies a large iron pot with feet, a bail, and an inwardly dished lid. The lid allows the fool operating it to place hot coals on top of the pot as well as under it, thus drying out the ingredients twice as fast, and all the while enabling his pretensions to be a genuine old cowpoke and to wear a four hundred dollar hat on a ten dollar head.
- Lovin' Dutch Ovens Cookbook
- Beer-can Chicken Cookbook
- A Texas Treasury of Dutch Oven Cooking
- The All-American Cowboy Cookbook
- Barbecue, Biscuits, and Beans Cookbook
- John McLemore's "Dadgum, That's Good!" Cookbook
- The SAS Survival Guide
For those unfamiliar with the overloaded term "Dutch Oven," most of the world (correctly) thinks of it as a cast iron and probably enameled pot with a tight fitting lid, central to many of Europe's great long-cooked dishes, such as daubes, brassati, and so on. But to a small number of people, many of them associated with a religious faith that denies them alcohol and caffiene, the term implies a large iron pot with feet, a bail, and an inwardly dished lid. The lid allows the fool operating it to place hot coals on top of the pot as well as under it, thus drying out the ingredients twice as fast, and all the while enabling his pretensions to be a genuine old cowpoke and to wear a four hundred dollar hat on a ten dollar head.
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Feelin' old ...
Unlike most of you whippersnappers, I can remember when this paragraph, taken from a piece by Jared Spurbeck in Yahoo's contributor network, would have had the xxxs replaced by the word "Microsoft" or even "IBM."
xxx has almost $60 billion just sitting in the bank. Consider that, before voting for politicians who offer tax cuts for the wealthy so that companies like it will "create jobs." But also consider the effect that this has on less well-funded companies, which struggle to get hardware suppliers to notice them when xxx can make down payments on everything. Or to defend themselves in legal battles, against a much more powerful company.
I'm a fan of xxx's products, but I don't think they're right for everyone. And I'd rather that they didn't become everyone's only option.
The rest of the article is similar in tone and content. I remember when we railed against MS and its practices, cast Bill -- what's his name?, oh yeah, Gates -- as a combination of Shylock and Mephistopheles, and demonized his products right, left, and center. Before we had MS to kick around, IBM was the great Satan; I have a comic book from the late Seventies, crudely drawn, obviously by an Engineer. It's a parody of Star Wars, with IBM as the Empire and DEC (remember DEC?) with its hip, rebellious mini-computers as the bold opposition.
Thing is, Mr. Spurbeck's article isn't about Microsoft. It's about Apple. And except for his somewhat naive take on the economics of 60 millon cash and job creation, he has a point or two. Apple, so long the technical poster child of the unthinkingly rebellious (do you know that people actually have Apple bumper stickers on their cars, still?) has gradually become evil.
Surprised? Nah. There needs to be a revised version of the old "power corrupts" tag, dealing with EBIT. But I bet there are still people out there who are surprised at the sort of nonsense Apple does and gets away with. What do you suppose the tea baggers would say to a federal law that required all documents written in English to be approved by a committee before they could be sold? But nobody's all that upset about Apple's proprietary operating systems and their control over, if not in fact outright censorship of applications written for them.
Oh, well. It seems to be the case that somehow, open operating systems keep creeping up on the exposed flanks of the monoliths. Android offers a possible avenue of escape (I haven't taken the plunge yet -- I'm still cursing at a Windows Mobile-based piece of poorly-assembled gear from HTC.) But it all contributes to a sense of aging, both on my part and on the part of the industry. It all sounds so familiar.
xxx has almost $60 billion just sitting in the bank. Consider that, before voting for politicians who offer tax cuts for the wealthy so that companies like it will "create jobs." But also consider the effect that this has on less well-funded companies, which struggle to get hardware suppliers to notice them when xxx can make down payments on everything. Or to defend themselves in legal battles, against a much more powerful company.
I'm a fan of xxx's products, but I don't think they're right for everyone. And I'd rather that they didn't become everyone's only option.
The rest of the article is similar in tone and content. I remember when we railed against MS and its practices, cast Bill -- what's his name?, oh yeah, Gates -- as a combination of Shylock and Mephistopheles, and demonized his products right, left, and center. Before we had MS to kick around, IBM was the great Satan; I have a comic book from the late Seventies, crudely drawn, obviously by an Engineer. It's a parody of Star Wars, with IBM as the Empire and DEC (remember DEC?) with its hip, rebellious mini-computers as the bold opposition.
Thing is, Mr. Spurbeck's article isn't about Microsoft. It's about Apple. And except for his somewhat naive take on the economics of 60 millon cash and job creation, he has a point or two. Apple, so long the technical poster child of the unthinkingly rebellious (do you know that people actually have Apple bumper stickers on their cars, still?) has gradually become evil.
Surprised? Nah. There needs to be a revised version of the old "power corrupts" tag, dealing with EBIT. But I bet there are still people out there who are surprised at the sort of nonsense Apple does and gets away with. What do you suppose the tea baggers would say to a federal law that required all documents written in English to be approved by a committee before they could be sold? But nobody's all that upset about Apple's proprietary operating systems and their control over, if not in fact outright censorship of applications written for them.
Oh, well. It seems to be the case that somehow, open operating systems keep creeping up on the exposed flanks of the monoliths. Android offers a possible avenue of escape (I haven't taken the plunge yet -- I'm still cursing at a Windows Mobile-based piece of poorly-assembled gear from HTC.) But it all contributes to a sense of aging, both on my part and on the part of the industry. It all sounds so familiar.
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Chaad's in the Times
Linda saw this article, quoting Chaad (our wine-soaked ... that is, wine-obsessed friend) about a $410 corkscrew. As most of you know, I'm opposed on engineering and religious grounds to other methods of uncorking a bottle, and it's nice to see that those with more money than they know what to do with are perceived to be enough of a market for this kind of thing.
For substantially less, you can have this (if you can find one; Kershaw discontinued them,) which is my personal favorite, a gift, years ago, from friends. It doesn't get the volume usage that a sommelier would give a wine key, but it works like a charm and like the expensive one is also a one-handed open for the foil cutter.
For substantially less, you can have this (if you can find one; Kershaw discontinued them,) which is my personal favorite, a gift, years ago, from friends. It doesn't get the volume usage that a sommelier would give a wine key, but it works like a charm and like the expensive one is also a one-handed open for the foil cutter.
Friday, April 15, 2011
Somebody really should be keeping track ...
... of the people making rules in public schools. There ought to be a database for making sure you're not about to hire someone who is this insane.
Or the person behind this brilliant idea.
Or this bunch ofimbeciles New York State officials.
Or this set of morons.
Or the person behind this brilliant idea.
Or this bunch of
Or this set of morons.
Friday, April 8, 2011
Fifth Quarter Closes
Update: Wrong again. Another Old Ann Arborite points out that the Fifth Quarter isn't the thing across from the Michigan Theatre -- it's where the old Fifth Forum theatre used to be, on 5th Avenue. My fault -- I glanced at the picture and it looked vaguely like the Old Nectarine Ballroom entry way, but I failed to do the necessary fact checking -- like carefully reading the first sentence of the article I cited, which gives the place's 5th Avenue address, right there in plain English.
I find it hard to imagine that anyone reading this blog cares at all, but the essentially forced closing of theInsane Clown Posse Fan Club Fifth Quarter night spot is at least interesting in that it sets some kind of bar (pun intended) for the amount of sheer bad behavior it takes to get a place shut down in Ann Arbor. I won't bother to copy the stats regarding fights and yoof drinking that went on (no "allegedly" here - no one's really denying much of anything,) but I did think it was telling that on October 25th., 2010, they called in twenty cops and still couldn't restore order.
Owner Jeff Starman pretty much sums it up: "90 percent of the nights were great and the 10 percent that were bad were bad." In other words, there were incidents of public drunkenness, disorderly behavior, battery, and underage drinking 1 night out of 10. I don't know if the place was open all week, but even if it skipped Mondays and a couple of major holidays, that's still a solid month of jackass behavior, right across the street fromthe Michigan Theater whatever it's right across from, for Christ's sake.
I find it hard to imagine that anyone reading this blog cares at all, but the essentially forced closing of the
Owner Jeff Starman pretty much sums it up: "90 percent of the nights were great and the 10 percent that were bad were bad." In other words, there were incidents of public drunkenness, disorderly behavior, battery, and underage drinking 1 night out of 10. I don't know if the place was open all week, but even if it skipped Mondays and a couple of major holidays, that's still a solid month of jackass behavior, right across the street from
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Aging in America
As Linda and I get on in years (Speak for yourself, bald boy! - LMB) one of us occasionally has to ask the other party to help locate a misplaced cell phone, somewhere in the house. The approved technique is simply to call the missing phone and see where the ring comes from.
This morning, Linda asked me to call her phone. After the usual AT&T latency (which apparently involves getting Executive approval, on a call by call basis, to even be in the cell phone business,) her phone rang. I was sitting on the couch, and the phone was clearly near by. In fact, the ring tone was coming from under a 70 pound accumulation of German Shepherd, sleeping on the other end of said couch. The dog didn't budge -- I'm not even sure she woke up.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Help me reconcile ...
... the on-going odium that is being poured on the heads of the wealthy, lazy, fat-cat public sector employees in Michigan with this tale of hiring woe.
I was of the impression that it was the suffering lower and middle-middle class that was going, somehow, to profit from the ousting of the Democrats from power. Instead, it seems like a kind of war is being declared on them. I wonder when and if they'll figure it out.
I was of the impression that it was the suffering lower and middle-middle class that was going, somehow, to profit from the ousting of the Democrats from power. Instead, it seems like a kind of war is being declared on them. I wonder when and if they'll figure it out.
Monday, March 28, 2011
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