anadamous

Hey guys, my SAT kids are reading a passage tomorrow on Wanda Landowska... it's an extremely gutted version of this 1996 essay, from what I can tell. In their version, the notion is that Landowska's playing is remarkably "expressive" and "florid" compared to what came before her. That she's a bit slurry and improvisational. The essay is mostly about her playing Bach, on the harpsichord.

It occurred to me as I was reading this, "Hey! I have a ton of Wanda Landowska playing Bach on the harpsichord!" They seemed to appreciate when I brought in A Field Guide to Sprawl after they read a passage on suburban sprawl, so I thought I'd let them listen to a little bit of Landowska. But I'm not sure what to play.

Also, I'm interested in showing the contrast that the article points out - her playing being more florid and expressive. But really, in my current collection, the only pair of recordings I have that show something like this are Glen Gould and Landowska playing the Chromatic Fantasy. (Jeez, YouTube has them too - Gould verses Landowska.) This sort of works, because Gould is very staccato and distinct, so the contrast the article is trying to make would be pretty clear to their ears. But it's also a big lie - Landowska wasn't responding to Gould. There are too many lies like that around already.

Does it matter? Can you all think of some recordings I should play instead? As long as it's something I can buy off iTunes or Amazon, I'd be all set...

What novels would your recommend for high school ESL (Cantonese, Mandarin) boys currently scoring ~300 on the verbal portion of the SAT? What's a little challenging, not too slangy, and awesome?

Internet searches so far are turning up recommendations for Stephen King's The Cell and Lolita. I guess that I also don't want these kids parents to come after me with torches.

I was thinking: Hemingway short stories, except that they can have a ton of mid-century slang in them. It's even worse with, say, Dashiell Hammett. Both of those guys came to mind, though, as examples of good writing - the kids' writing tends to be overly flowery, emotional and run-on when it's not clipped.

I really want to make them read The Great Gatsby, but is that the sort of thing that appeals to high school boys? I think maybe not. I also want to make them read Middlemarch - ha.

( recommendations from other places )

Also, from Facebook friends:
Ender's Game, The Chocolate War
Jack London, Gary Paulson, Gordon Korman, Andrew Clements
Graphic: Runaways, Pride of Bagdad
The Bread Givers, Katharine Patterson

I went canvassing in Philly on Saturday. I was surprised at how good I was at it, and how fun it was, especially after Julia's horror stories. My partner and I knocked on over 100 doors, talked to over 50 people, and had long conversations with maybe like 20 of them. Of those 20, 8 were very racist and 3 were sexist, answering that age-old question of whether America is more racist or more sexist, at least for this one tiny Catholic Philly neighborhood. My favorite examples of racism...

( Cut, for length and for potential lack of interest )

Check out this post by John Quiggin on Crooked Timber:

Much more useful in thinking about the likely impact of aid is the amount per person per week. With (very roughly) a billion people in Africa and a billion in the developed world, the aid that’s been given amounts to about $10 per person per year, or 20 cents per person per week on each side of the transfer. So, the implied complaint of the average Northerner to the average African can be translated "I’ve been giving you 20 cents a week for years now, and you’re still poor – you must have squandered my generous help".

This doesn’t answer the question of why Africa has remained poor while so many in Asia have grown rich, or at least much better off. But unless you impute truly magical rates of return to aid, the question "why hasn’t aid made Africans rich" can be answered very simply "there’s never been enough to make a difference".

Right. I suppose that of all the questions to ask about aid, this is the one I've taken the least seriously, because it's always seemed pretty obvious to me that the amounts of aid we've been sending were fairly small. Still! Someone else whipped out his calculator and for that I am grateful.

( The more important question remains... )

I'm going to totally miss seeing the moon and Mars together because it's due to rain like hell all weekend. In fact, there are cloudy skies for most of the East Coast. However! Yiling, you may actually be able to see Mars pass behind the moon if you're still in Renton and the weather is good. All my CA homies might have clear enough skies, but the event is going to happen pretty early in the evening for you. Blast!

Even though I get hilariously ill every time I go to London, I may have to go back in 2008. Will this be the only Hamlet I ever tolerate (aside from the ones I produce in my imagination)? Signs point to "let's find out!"

I need to take a break from data entry (ASPCA stuff) and go to sleep before I make any decisions, though. ::commence jaw-cracking yawn, periods of oblivion interspersed with vivid hallucinations::

I'm so thankful for Granny Smith apples. Even in the worst grocery store, even at a truck stop in the middle of nowhere, at an airport, in London, in your mother's fruit bowl, there's still a good chance you'll find some that are tart and crisp and perfect. Thank you, dear little apples.

It got down to the sixties yesterday. What a reprieve. Come on, autumn...

I'm torn between getting an extremely cheap cellphone with a $30/month plan (the cheapest with Verizon), or even cheaper, and getting something with teh intarwebz, that I can keep my calendar and notes on. I'm also torn between getting something that I know will work all over the country (Verizon), and something that might just work in town and most places I travel.

( ponderings, details )

Edit for posterity: I ended up getting a Samsung SCH-u740 phone with a Verizon basic plan with web access. I think I might end up needing to write that database web application I've been hemming and hawing about for years... Hopefully I'll get the phone by Monday or Tuesday and can tell you all my new number. In the mean time, please stop texting me. Thanks!

I just heard about the 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis. Are you guys okay? Are your friends and family okay?
Edit: Okay, a quick check of my friends lists reveals that most everyone has checked in. Has anyone heard from EV? From Emily? Gut? Susie? Katie and Dave? Andrea? Jason? Best wishes to all of you and your loved ones...

You know why, above all else, the ends don't justify the means? ( Because humans are stupid. )

The 10 days of Squidmas, beginning with Cephalopodamus on December 22nd and extending to New Year's Eve, represent the squid's eight arms and two feeder tentacles. Squidmas was invented by onceupon and mightywombat in pious fear and awe of the mighty squid. As we all know, cephalopods are the true telos of Intelligent Design, and "Cthulhu and the Flying Spaghetti monster are probably therefore just visions of the Great Octopus".

Wave your tentacles in celebration and open your beaks wide in joy! Spread the Squidmas love! And, who's in town on Friday the 22nd who would like to come to a Cephalopodamus party at my place?

YAY I got 5 packages mailed off this morning. I only have another 6 to send, since I'm going home to MN. 25 people on my list this year, counting "everyone at the office" as one person, which is pretty exciting. I'm almost done shopping, too. Whew!

Several people have asked me what I want - the number one thing is donations to charities. Here's a 2004 list of all my favorite charities, in which I wax on and on about how wonderful they are, and here's a list of ones that I don't give to, but wish I did - hence, they're perfect gifts! I also want to add ModestNeeds.org and NEW, Non-Traditional Employment for Women to the first list. Since I've moved to Vermont, I've also funded WARMTH and the local food shelf and shelters, all of which I endorse. I'm still giving to Glide and Project Open Hand in SF, because I think they're just that awesome. Any of these charities on any of these lists, I highly encourage you to support. They're all doing great, important work, and are efficiently run. Oooh yeah, and if you feel like supporting a Vermont arts organization, think about giving to Equinox Theatre, which brings you such delicious entertainment as Nightmare Vermont and The Green Mountain Renaissance Festival - without which Burlington would have no Renaissance festival and no awesome Halloween event for the over-16 crowd.

If you want to get me something small and material, I like candles and incense, rather than jewelry, toiletries, or tchotchkes/ornaments/clutter. I'm also looking for strong and interesting/weird fridge magnets, more "fishnet"-style tights (size tall/ginormous if they're not one size fits all), those no-slip velvet-covered hangers, noise-cancelling/earbud headphones, and various books on my amazon wishlist, which seriously, are all things I should buy for myself, but I'm too lazy.

The latest entry on the Tesla Motors blog gives the details and history of their AC motor. Woo! AC power rocks! <does the AC power dance: 3 limbs 120° out of phase, rockin out>

Aw schnap: sucks to be Pluto, sucks to be Charon. But then again, it always did! This is the most coherent solution, I think.

I've had approximately 1.2 hours of sleep. I miss Ginny already. She's visiting in September!

The executive committee of the International Astronomical Union has added Ceres, Charon, and Xena to the list of official planets. Opening the door to chaos and anarchy, I say! <shakes walking stick with arthritic arm> ("There are 53 objects that meet the panel's criteria and probably many more to be discovered.")

For those of you worried that Charon's new status means that Ganymede and Titan will become planets:

The proposal defines a planet as an object that circles the sun and is massive enough that its own gravitational forces compress it into a roughly spherical shape. Depending on its composition, a planet would have to be at least roughly 250 to 500 miles in diameter to qualify. It designates a new subcategory of planet, the "pluton", a Pluto-like planet that takes at least 200 years to circle the sun. Pluto, Charon, and Xena are all plutons, and scientists expect many more to be discovered. Under the proposal, Ceres is an ordinary planet.

Moons are excluded from planetary status, using a criterion that depends on the relative mass of two bodies that are gravitationally tied. If one body is much smaller than the other, then it is considered a moon. Pluto and Charon are closer in mass, and so they are dubbed a double planet. The Earth's moon is round and much larger than Pluto, but it is so much smaller than Earth that it is considered a moon, not a planet.

Did you know that there's more than one Tesla opera?

Tesla, score by Carson Kievman, libretto by Thomas Babe. Premiered 1990. Samuel Clemens narrates the clash between Edison and Tesla. Also features Westinghouse and JP Morgan.

Violet Fire, score by Job Gibson, libretto by Miriam Seidel. Soon to premiere in Belgrade, in which Tesla's famous pigeon love sings to him about the mysteries of nature. The opera covers Tesla's life and work. It will be in NYC 10/18-21 at the BAM Next Wave Festival. I think I may have to go. (NPR)

Lightning in His Hand, by Dr. Ljubo Vujovic. Premiered 2003. Based on major episodes in the life of Nikola Tesla (1856 - 1943), such as his friendship with the famous Czech Composer Anthonin Dvorak and The War of the Currents with Thomas Edison. (more)

Nikola Tesla, by Vladimir Nemet. UK Premiere was 2001. Apparently out on CD by New Music Ensemble Zagreb? Oh, I must get my grubby hands on this CD. Inspired by his biography, and features lyrics from James Joyce and e.e.cummings? Trying to find copies of the libretto... I can't even find a place to order the CD.

Richard II is my favorite play for ever and ever:

BUSHY	The wind sits fair for news to go to Ireland, But none returns. For us to levy power Proportionable to the enemy Is all unpossible.
GREEN	Besides, our nearness to the king in love Is near the hate of those love not the king.
	RII, II.ii.126-131

I had to include Green's lines because I love how weasely they are. But Bushy's the man of the hour.

I love Richard Ferber's personality. I want to make a coffee table book of intellectual phenotypes, as well as the facial phenotypes one I was talking about... at some point in the past. Awesome.

Geneticists are creating human-animal hybrids just like Bush said they would! And the worst part is, they're creating them in the fossil record, which as we all know is the source of much heresy. Heh heh heh.

This article rather supports what I've thought all along - namely, that it's essential that there be a variety of public transit choices in order for any given type of public transit to succeed. I am annoyed that the shiny new station is way the hell out in the suburbs, surrounded by a sea of parking, though. I hope there's also a station actually in the city - or that there's a free shuttle from downtown, which gets out there quickly. (There's probably just a bus connection that takes 3 hours and 2 transfers, though. :P)

Jane Jacobs died this morning! She was in the hospital since Saturday, due to an apparent stroke, and I had no idea.
I should note that I don't know her personally; I've just hero-worshipped her for the past year or so. I should have written her a gushing fangirl letter like I told myself it would be stupid to do.

Toronto Star
Toronto Globe and Mail
NY Times (Reuters)

I wrote this a couple of months ago: ( Jane Jacobs, the 20th Century's Most Brilliant Mind )

There was also a recent post on 2 blowhards that had a lot of information about her. This post on Crooked Timber, which links to it, has some interesting discussion. Sigh.

Edit, 4/26: The New York Times has really good biography of Jacobs today, which is linked by Chris Bertram at Crooked Timber, who promises to link other things as he finds them. (The FT article is a waste of time.)

I'm so sad that she's gone.

Please give me your favorite haiku and tanka. Please include the author, if known.

( for your enjoyment )

Also, any really short poems, or any few lines from a poem that you really love, are welcome. No Ogden Nash.

Hooray! ::makes blustery snow sounds, and runs around in circles making airplane wings with arms::

From Cambridge University Library's "Marginalia and other crimes" pages:

Books marked in ink are beyond economic restoration. The cost of hours of conservator's time greatly exceeds the value of the modern text. So we purchase replacement copies, but store the original damaged copy in closed stacks at "Class Z". As the centuries pass, the original copy gets no use, and stays in relatively good condition except for the markings. Eventually it becomes rare enough and valuable enough to justify the expense of restoring it.

Octopus Intelligent Design Theory

Best part: "...Cthulhu and the Flying Spaghetti monster are probably therefore just visions of the Great Octopus."

All the propositions were defeated. I admit I voted in favor of the communistic Prop 79, but I never really thought it would pass. Oh well.

Anyway, so I got to experience the infamous Diebold machines last night. It's really unsettling to vote on them, and leave with no paper proof of your vote. I understand the advantages of insta-counting and all that, but this is what I would like to see: You vote on a machine, then the machine prints out a pre-filled paper ballot, which you verify. The piece of paper has a stub you can tear off and keep, with a random id number on it, which is also on the vote (like 389834ARN2938XB or something) page (as well as the electronic vote). The paper is fed into a scanner, which also insta-counts. Then at the end of the day, if there's a discrepancy between the scanners' numbers and the touchscreen machines' numbers, (instant recount!) you not only know exactly what the discrepancy is, but which ballot needs to be examined. So all disrepancies should be resolvable.

Also, the voters get their unique ID number. So they should be able to enter that ID number on the website, and verify the vote that was recorded as they intended. Also, 3rd-party organizations should be able to download the full results from, say, a district and make sure that the numbers add up. The numbers should be clumped into at least groups of 1,000 (so a polling place may be too small a clump), and out of order, so that there's no chance of guessing what a particular person voted. But I think this would be a good way to balance accountability and secrecy: a person's vote is still private, but every vote is a matter of public record.

Someone just asked me for college recommendations, and the unofficial Chicago fight song/chant came rushing back to me:

Themistocles, Thucydides,
The Peloponnesian War,
X squared, Y squared,
H2SO4!
What for? Who for?
Who the hell are we cheering for?
Underwhelm them ineffectually!
Underwhelm them intellectually!
Logarithm, biorhythm,
Entropy, kinetics,
MPC, GNP, bioenergetics!
Maximize and integrate,
Titrate and equilibrate!
Maximize our GNP,
Titrate their solution;
Calculate their MPC,
Crush their revolution!

Parasites cause grasshoppers to drown themselves

Oh yeah, and the situation in NOLA is still awful. As if you were wondering! Crooked Timber, Sadly No, and Playahata have all said it better than I could...

Crocodile blood may yield powerful new antibiotics

I just like how the scientists in this story talk like a bunch of guys drinking beers at a barbeque:

"The crocodile has an immune system which attaches to bacteria and tears it apart and it explodes. It's like putting a gun to the head of the bacteria and pulling the trigger," he said.

For the past 10 days Britton and Merchant have been carefully collecting blood from wild and captive crocodiles, both saltwater and freshwater species. After capturing a crocodile and strapping its powerful jaws closed the scientists extract blood from a large vein behind the head.

"It's called a sinus, right behind the head, and it's very easy just to put a needle in the back of the neck and hit this sinus and then you can take a large volume of blood very simply," said Britton.

...

"We may be able to have antibiotics that you take orally, potentially also antibiotics that you could run topically on wounds, say diabetic ulcer wounds; burn patients often have their skin infected and things like that," said Merchant.

Yeah, take that, all you weenie, non-crocodile-wrestling science nerds!