It’s somewhat startling how many of her rules and guidelines stem from the basic principles of putting others first and protecting them from our rougher feelings: how to write a thank-you note for a present you didn’t like; how to respond to a friend who gets embarrassingly drunk at a party (and how that friend ought to behave the next morning!); how to politely and charitably point out that someone has cut in front of you in a line. Even the correct way to refuse an invitation (apologize, but say no firmly, and don’t make excuses) is concerned in part with sparing others’ feelings: If you say, “I’d love to, but I’m afraid I’ll be flossing my otter,” you not only invite argument and attempts to persuade you away from your excuses. You also let your friends know exactly where they rank on your scale of priorities — possibly above cleaning the gutters, but definitely below otter dental hygiene.
Category: Culture and anti-culture
On pointe
It’s probably going to be close to two months before I can photograph ballet again. (The doctor says the bones are healing “perfectly,” but bones and ligaments take time, lots of time.) If you miss the pictures of dancers, visit Bill Luse’s page.
Traditional/historical painting methods and cicadas
Tiepolo’s Cicadae, pastel 2007, Judith Baker Waller
Judith Baker Waller, an old friend of mine from Wichita State, is exhibiting some of her art at the University of Wisconsin now through March 21. If you are in the Menasha area, it’s worth a visit.
Monday morning culture
A little bit of Mozart with unconventional instrumentation.
Here’s something different by the same perp and his colleagues.
Still life with Marx and Engels
Fred recently discovered Komar and Melamid. I first encountered them half a lifetime ago when they made an appearance at Wichita State. Their schtick then was that they bought and sold souls. They were particularly proud of purchasing Andy Warhol’s. The business wasn’t as lucrative as they had hoped, though, so by then they only accepted souls on consignment.
They came to Fred’s attention through their fusion of musicology and statistics. By polling, they attempted to define the characteristics of the “most wanted” and “least wanted” songs, and then realize the songs. I’m afraid that I’m the in the 28% that dislike the wanted song. The unwanted song, however, is an amazing hodgepodge of accordion, bagpipes, tuba, banjo, operatic soprano and obnoxious kids, and it’s worth 22 minutes of your life. Once will probably be enough.
Oh, yeah, Komar and Melamid are painters, too.
*****
Mr. Darwin is the son of a planetarium lecturer. He reminisces about the artificial skies here.
Dance and more
Let’s take a break from ballet and look at some other kinds of dance. Via Mark Sullivan comes this example of dance as a martial art:
Bonus points if you can identify the pianist.
Via Robert the LLama Butcher, an outstanding canine performer.
And there’s the dancing stormtrooper of Akihabara.
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One more reason why I intend to remain the last person in North America without a cell phone.
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If three women together mean “mischief,” what would, say, three geeks mean?
*****
An epic win for the Japanese: the Gurren-Lagaan Jack.
*****
Let’s get into the Olympic spirit:
Pre-holiday miscellany
Congratulations to the LLamas, who turn five today.
Congratulations also to Angus and Sarah.
Final Fantasy A+ (Via Shamus).
One way to handle a telemarketer (Via Ken the Brickmuppet).
I found a website that makes Flash jigsaw puzzles from pictures on your computer. There’s one made from one of my photos below the fold.
Update: A memory from my days in the SCA that I’d like to forget.
Continue reading “Pre-holiday miscellany”
He’s back …
… yet again. John Salmon, that is.
Virtual Catholicism
Inside the Basilica Cardinale, with the light of two suns shining through the windows. Curiously, outside the front door of the church it’s raining.
I spent recent lunch hours investigating how much of a Catholic presence there is in Second Life. There’s not a lot. A search for “Catholic” places yields only ten results, some of which I’m staying far away from. ((Here‘s what turns up when you search for “jesuit” places (warning: offensive). (The Society of Jesus may be well-intentioned, though.) )) A search for “Catholic” groups finds twenty-eight, some of which are not the least bit religious. Some do appear to be sincere, though, and one or two might be worth joining if I had more time, e.g., The Catholic Tolkien. Still, I’m more than a little leery of such organizations as Fr. Simoni’s “Second Life Catholic Church,” whose charter advertises Mass, Confession and sloppy proofreading.
During my investigations, I took numerous snapshots. Here’s a selection.
Links for the extra hour
Virtual culture
I’ve recently been spending lunch hours exploring Second Life, a sort of MMORPG without the RPG. Initally, my fear was that I would become obsessed with it and log in whenever I had a moment. I needn’t have worried. Although it’s fun to customize your avatar and to fly, the novelty soon wears off. Once you’re past the tutorials and into Second Life proper, your impression is likely to be one of desolation. There’s plenty to see — elaborate buildings, shops full of clothing and curious things (need feline eyes or pink hair?), galleries of photographs — but there’s nobody there. You can join various groups or visit the popular places, but it is as hard in Second Life to connect with someone sharing your interests as it is offline.
It’s not a complete waste of time, though. There are frequent concerts, in which Second Life residents stream live performances while their avatars go through the motions on stage. Most are undistinguished — there are as many guys with thin voices strumming acoustic guitars in SL as in your local coffeeshops — but there are surprises. Earlier today, for instance, the Schumann Duo performed a selection of lighter classical fare ranging from Handel to the twentieth century. Clarissima played piano, and Kahuna oboe, English horn and Stanley Handyman saw — quite well, too. I’ve never much cared for the Bach-Gounod “Ave Maria,” but playing Gounod’s melody on the saw does make it more palatable.
There’s also ballet in Second Life, choreographed for avatars and performed live. I watched one yesterday. It was an interesting experiment, but I’m afraid not a successful one. Possibly with a superfast connection and a more powerful computer it would have been more watchable, but what I saw was too jerky to seem like dance — all keys and no tweens, so to speak — and I couldn’t make much sense of the choreography.
A curiosity I came across: the Dulcimer Museum, devoted to the late David Schnaufer.
Without giraffes
Fred‘s current exercise is writing the openings to SF stories. The first one is here. They get worse, or better, depending on how you reckon such things.
On a very different note, here’a a haiku, courtesy of dylan, who recently celebrated the fifth anniversary of his weblog’s inception.
In April one seldom feels cheerful
Miscellaneous notes
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I didn’t much care for Peter Jackson’s version of The Lord of the Rings, but it did make The DM of the Rings possible. Shamus is about to wrap the story up. It begins here. Shamus’ next project will be here.
*****
The first tune I heard Saturday morning was “Wipeout.” I also heard “American Pie,” some Jethro Tull and an a capella rendition of the riff from “Smoke on the Water.” Where was I?
Spoiler
The Minnesota Renaissance Faire.
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Observation
I returned home a few minutes ago from renewing my driver’s license. During the time that I spent at the license bureau, at least two hundred people stood in line waiting their turns. Not a single person (other than me) brought a book to read.
There are no grownups
Doug Marlette, the artist responsible for Kudzu, one of my favorite comic strips, died recently. I’ve been going though the posts on my old weblogs to see if anything is worth saving, and I came across this link to excerpts from a commencement address Marlette gave. It’s worth posting again.