The Trees of Buenos Aires

a slide show from my trip:

Beauty Blooming

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Location:Oak Park Access Rd,Fort Lauderdale,United States

From There To Eternity

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Location:N Ocean Blvd,Fort Lauderdale,United States

BBC Adapting Birdsong for Television!

Birdsong was one of my favorite books and one of my mom's favorites too.  Not sure about the casting, but regardless I am excited.   Here is the full notice from the BBC:

Eddie Redmayne (My Week With Marilyn, Richard II) and Clemence Poesy (28 Days Later, Harry Potter) star as the passionate young lovers Stephen and Isabelle, brought together by love and torn apart by the First World War, in BBC One's adaptation of Sebastian Faulks's modern classic, Birdsong.
Adapted by Bafta award-winning Abi Morgan (The Hour, Iron Lady), the two parter spans the decade of the First World War, telling the story of Stephen Wraysford, a young Englishman who, in 1910, arrives in Amiens, Northern France, to stay with the Azaire family and falls desperately in love with Isabelle Azaire.
They begin an illicit and all-consuming affair, with huge consequences for them both. Years later in 1916, Stephen finds himself serving on the Western Front in the very area where he experienced his great love. As he battles amidst the horror of the trenches he meets Jack Firebrace, a tunneller who unexpectedly helps him endure the ravages of war and enables him to make peace with his feelings for Isabelle, who he is destined to meet again.
Eddie Redmayne stars as Stephen Wraysford, Clemence Poesy is Isabelle Azaire, Joseph Mawle is Jack Firebrace, Richard Madden is Weir, Laurent Lafitte is Rene Azaire, Matthew Goode is Captain Gray, Anthony Andrews is Colonel Barclay and Marie Josee Croze is Jeanne Fourmentier.

Who Is Your Favorite - Mom or Dad?

This video is amusing and well done.  Those Aussies!

My Theme for 2012 - Blossoming!

Life of flowers (Жизнь цветов) from VOROBYOFF PRODUCTION on Vimeo.

Some Images from Buenos Aires

DC versus NYC

One of my favorite writers discusses life in DC versus life in NYC. Often a dilemma for me too.

Would Andrew Ever Leave DC?

Sullivan on Hitchen's Work and Play Compulsion

Andrew Sullivan writes of Hitchens that he didn't worry about Hitchen's drinking and smoking but rather...

But I sometimes wondered about this compulsion always to be on the move, always to say yes, always to file on time, always to take that trip, when a little restful weekend might have been healthier. 

I have a few friends, one in particular, about whom I wonder and, yes, worry that he is always on the move, always traveling, always working.   When some rest might be healthier.   Remind those you love to rest some this holiday season.


Read the loving post, which also takes on the cliche of drinking and writing here.  

Love Letter to DC

Wow, great night time video of Washington DC.  Check it out.

Sad News - Cesaria Evora Died

Gosh - first Christopher Hitchens died on Friday.  I plan to write and post about him, what he meant to me and why - but I've not been able to yet.  I will.  I will.  And on Vaclav Havel too.


And now the very, very sad news that Cesaria Evora has died.  She had a stroke in September.   The LA Times obituary wrote this:  

Her singing style brought comparisons to American jazz singerBillie Holiday and the great French singer Edith Piaf.   

"She belongs to the aristocracy of bar singers," French newspaper Le Monde said in 1991, adding that Evora had "a voice to melt the soul."

She melted mine.  I got to see her once here in DC, at the Lisner Auditorium.  I will never forget it.  Such joy and astonishing beauty moved me to tears.  She is one of my goddesses.   

The only music concert DVD I own is hers.   I own all of her albums and play them all the time, but among my favorite of her songs are Angola, Sodade, Embarcacao and, of course, the magnificent "Carnaval De Sao Vincente."  I love listening to that one on a summer day with the roof down.  Whenever, where ever, it never fails to make me smile.  Except for today.  

If I die a slow death I hope to do so while listening to her singing as I don't know a better soul to usher me into the divine.   


Here is her official web site. 

Hitchens rattled my brain but she moved my heart.  Thank you, barefoot diva.    

Which Preferred? Outright Rejection or Silence?

I listen the Slate's Political Gabfest podcast nearly every week.  And at the end they all provide what they call "cocktail chatter," wherein they discuss something offbeat, intriguing or appealing to discuss at your weekend cocktail parties.  They are often interesting.  This week, one particularly interested me.

You can listen here.   The cocktail chatter begins at 45:51.   Emily discusses a poor man's letter that was on Reddit, then Jezebel from a man indignant that a woman he had dated once had not even deigned to provide him with a response of rejection.   Sadly for this man ended up on the internet.  I went and read it and frankly I just felt sorry and compassion for the guy.  Every one has been the recipient of similar missives, though maybe not as long and not quite as weird and for different reasons.  I can't quite recall but I certainly hope I was kinder, provided some response.

Emily brought it up because she felt that feeling is universal - the feeling of being mystified when you thought you had clicked with someone in someway and it clearly turned out you were wrong, thats a really upsetting feeling.  The other two men felt she was abusing and subjecting this poor man to ridicule.

Emily admitted she was both rubbernecking, yet felt it seems really sad that she was so heartless.  "I do think that not responding the is cruelest thing of all.  I would much rather get bad than no news.  Do you guys feel that way?"

Both her male companions each agreed that they would prefer bad news to no news.

Then they did a quick auditory poll of the audience.  After a first date, you are not going to go out with person x after the first date, would you respond in the negative?  And if you are a person who doesn't respond at all?  - seemed pretty even (though second one seemed more male!)

And if you were to get the email, "sorry this just isn't going to work."  Is there anyone who would rather get no email, no call back?  Any one in the room?   Would you prefer silence? Make noise if you would prefer silence.  Dead silence ensues.  

Emily noted that this is the cause of a lot of suffering - the acute universal sense that a response is always better.

At the end they always  - they discussed the trend of facial hair among young people, which fascinated me because.   That segued into why beards were so popular around the time of the Civil War, revealing   1861 Adam Goodheart - tells the stories of that year.  Theory was that because during the war it was heard to "tend to yourself" but soldiers in earlier wars weren't bearded.  Reason was a form a political nationalism - expressing masculinity and indomitable will.  Started 5-6 years before the war, after pictures from the revolutionaries of 1848 were all bearded and photographs of them made it to the US so men in the 1850s started to grow beards.

Pretty cool.

"Once" Again and Again and Again

Last night, as I typically do, I went to the NPR website to survey the day's stories and add them to my playlist.  I switch them around in order of importance, hit play, and try to fall asleep.  The monotone tenor and the interest of the stories usually serve well enough to distract me from the pain and enable me to slip into some slumber.

But last night, I was incredulous to see this story "Once" and Again: A Love Story Gets A Second Life that aired yesterday morning on Morning Edition.  It's actually a third life, but more on that in a second.

When the film was out on DVD, in 2007, a friend I have loved and admired for over twenty years told me I had to see the film, Once.   I did of course and I did like it.  But I didn't quite understand his deep affection for the film.

Edna Walsh, the Dublin playwright adapting the film for the stage said this in the NPR interview:

Her character sort of barely existed on-screen, but for me [she] was all about the light — was all about someone who could change your world and change your life, immediately," Walsh says. "There's this sort of maelstrom of sort of emotion that goes on with her."When he was called for this project, he confesses, Walsh had never seen the movie."I watched it and I thought, 'Oh right, this is It's A Wonderful Life, effectively.' You know, the story of a guy who's sort of given up on stuff, and this sort of angel arrives and casts a light over his life somehow, and the people around him."

Well, now I do understand.  And agree.

It's strange because I've been thinking of my friend a lot lately and things connected to him have been popping up all over.  In a theater, to watch a film last week, while the previews were being shown much to my surprise there was a preview for a film I'd not even heard of (rare for me) - The Swell Season.   It's a documentary about Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova, and that's the second life.   I had read they had broken up; the cynic in me wasn't surprised.  But here, years later, was a non-fiction film about their lives, on tour, in the aftermath of Once's popularity.   I was surprised, heartened and pleased to tears.   I have not yet seen The Swell Season but I plan too.  Maybe later today I will go do that.

Here is the preview:




And then last night the NPR story, which illuminated for me other aspects of the appeal of the story.  I am keen to see the play in NYC.  And so then I google for the New York Times review of the Off Broadway production and to read and find out more, and here is the fourth life for the story - Even Before Off Broadway Opening Once Announces A Move To Broadway.   Was posted on the Arts Blog last night around 7 pm.

Just as the musical “Once” was about to open at New York Theater Workshop Tuesday night, the show’s commercial producers announced that it would go directly to Broadway after the Off Broadway run.Based on the 2007 movie of the same name, “Once” will begin previews at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theater on Feb. 28, with opening night set for March 18.

Well, I can't wait to see it - off Broadway or on.  I very much hope I can - sometime, somehow, do so with my long and lost friend.

I remember seeing this 35 minute Tiny Desk Concert a few years back, in 2009.  Here's the description:

Fans of the musical Once will recognize its stars, Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova, in this enormously charming Tiny Desk Concert straight from NPR Music, in which they showed off six new songs before finishing up with "When Your Mind's Made Up." It's impossible to convey how lovely — how warm and genuine — this performance was in person, but seeing the video, which really does show them sitting behind Bob Boilen's real desk surrounded by Bob Boilen's real stuff, is really stunning. 

I agree.

And here is the video:

Great Expectations for Great Expectations

Which is to say, I expect this drama to eventually appear in the US - either on PBS Masterpiece or on BBC America.   Meanwhile, here is the yummy British preview:

 Great Expectations is my second favorite Dickens novel (the first being A Tale of Two Cities) but I must say Great Expectations is more often dramatized on television or film, and often very well.   Maybe because so many scenes are so vivid. I still love the one with Anne Bancroft and Ethan Hawke. I seem to even remember the haunting music.

Intelligence, Agency, Attractiveness and Perception

This news is unbelievable and certainly resonates for me.

A friend first posted the piece on Facebook and then Andrew Sullivan highlighted The Psychology of Nakedness by Jonah Lehrer over at Wired.com.

It's worth clicking over to see the pictures.  Will make me consider wearing an off the shoulder dress, for sure!  

And I really appreciate the discarding of Descartes' division,

This work also raises important philosophical questions. Ever since Descartes, it’s been suggested that people are natural dualists, dividing the world into an immaterial realm full of souls and a physical world full of objects. This simple framework, however, appears to be a bit too simple.

Indeed.  I found that framework too simple and unhelpful in yoga and disease as well.

Then there is this:

 Instead of seeing the individual as having agency, he or she became a means to an end, nothing but a vessel for our satisfaction. Kant was describing a phenomenon known as objectification, in which seeing a body turns the entire person into a physical object. This idea is frequently invoked when describing studies like this, which found that women are far more likely to appear in magazine advertisements as an attractive body, while men are typically represented by their faces.

Followed up by this:

Of course, this doesn’t mean that the redistribution of mind can’t do damage. If you’re a female applying for a job, the sometimes sexist tendency of men to focus on the body will unfairly diminish perceptions of agency and intelligence; you will be punished for having breasts. Although the woman won’t be literally objectified, the redistribution of mind will still make her much less likely to be hired.

It's surreal to have experience and instinct backed up by now by new science.  The minds of men, when they perceive attractiveness, have trouble believing an attractive woman also enjoys intelligence and agency.  Hence the disturbing tendency of some intelligent women to downplay their sexual attractiveness and keep that light under a bushel.   What a quagmire.  What a shame.  

Medieval Knights, Violence and PTSD

The SAXO Unit at the University of Copenhagen is studying the subject of knights and violence which I find fascinating.  As reported at ScienceNordic.com in a piece entitled Violent Knights Feared Post-traumatic Stress, violence was not as glorified as we have been lead to believe.  

They discuss a book written by a knight who fought in the 100 Years War, which is really cool.  Check out the whole thing over at the original link, but here's a taste:

In his book, de Charny advises knights on how to relate to the fact that they must kill people when they are at war. He also mentions some of the hardships knights face: poor sleep, hunger, and a feeling that even nature is going against them.

It also notes that sometimes the justice system failed to provide justice so men took retribution into their own hands and that was considered acceptable, acknowledging the limits of society issuing justice.