Sunday, August 26, 2007

Shoppin’ with the girls.

Friday, August 24, 2007

Better late than never?

[[What does 3 life terms mean when you’re 72? Evil old bastard... “reputed...klansman” what’s he gonna be doing? flashing his membership card?]]

Seale Gets 3 Life Terms for '64 Killings By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS (Associated Press Writer) From Associated Press—August 24, 2007 1:42 PM EDT

JACKSON, Miss. - James Ford Seale, a reputed Ku Klux Klansman, was sentenced Friday to three life terms for his role in the 1964 abduction and murder of two black teenagers in southwest Mississippi.

Seale, 72, was convicted in June on federal charges of kidnapping and conspiracy in the deaths of Charles Eddie Moore and Henry Hezekiah Dee, two 19-year-olds who disappeared from Franklin County on May 2, 1964.

The young men's bodies were found more than two months later in a backwater of the Mississippi River.

Seale showed no emotion as U.S. District Judge Henry T. Wingate read his sentence.

Wingate told Seale the crimes committed 43 years ago were "horrific" and "justice itself is ageless." Wingate denied a defense motion to allow Seale to be free on bond while his case is appealed.

Monday, August 20, 2007

Orange you lovely.

Friday, August 17, 2007

Max Roach R.I.P.

[[From Jess Harvell on idolator.com...the only obit i could find that had a little soul. Basin Street cover photo one of my favorite pix of Max, by my friend Chuck Stewart. Max actually died on Thursday, but I just found out today.]]

In the first music death that's truly punched me in the gut in quite a while, drummer Max Roach, who left his rhythmic stamp on so much post-war jazz, passed on today. Over a career that stretched some 60-plus years, from young bebop turk to universally respected elder statesmen, political firebrand and restless intellectual, Roach recorded numerous classic dates as a leader, worked as a sideman with enough giants to fill up a jazz textbook, and managed to swing with a heartstopping funkiness or a fingertip-tender caress whatever the mood of the date he was playing on or the musicians he found himself playing with. I’m planning on celebrating Mr. Roach tonight by cranking Money Jungle, his indelible trio record with Duke Ellington and Charles Mingus. If you’ve never heard it, I suggest you hit iTunes or the record shop on the way home from work and do the same. Roach was 83, and the cause of death has still yet to be announced.

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Redeye to New York.

Monday, August 13, 2007

On not giving up (Pt. 4)

He [Raymond Chandler] started out writing second-rate poetry and essays, but couldn't get much published, so he gave up and took a bookkeeping class, got a job at a bank, and went on to become a wealthy oil company executive.

He lost his job when the stock market crashed in 1929. So at the age of 45 he began writing for pulp fiction magazines, which paid about a penny a word.

Chandler was one of the first detective novelists to become known for the quality of his prose, and he became famous for his metaphors. In one novel he wrote, “She smelled the way the Taj Mahal looked by moonlight.” In another he wrote, “She gave me a smile I could feel in my hip pocket.”

Sunday, August 12, 2007

Saturday, August 11, 2007

Rudy, Rudy, Rudy...

[[While I was proud of Giuliani for a while for being the standup Mayuh during a terrible time that was unlike any in my lifetime, AND I was really proud of him for finally snipping that horrible comb-over...he has unashamedly made a freakin’ fortune off of the tragedy that was 9-11, as a “security expert” selling his services at top dollar all over the globe. And now he’s a good idea for President? And what is this “mis-spoke” thing...like something just jumped out of your mouth unbidden? It sounds like a Seinfeld-ism...like “re-gifted” Politics...]]

Giuliani: I Misspoke About Ground Zero
By LIBBY QUAID (Associated Press Writer)
From Associated Press—August 10, 2007 7:58 PM EDT

WASHINGTON - Republican presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani said Friday that he misspoke when he said he spent as much time, if not more, at ground zero exposed to the same health risks as workers combing the site after the Sept. 11 attacks.

“I think I could have said it better,” he told nationally syndicated radio host Mike Gallagher. “You know, what I was saying was, ‘I’m there with you.’”

The former New York mayor upset some firefighters and police officers when he said Thursday in Cincinnati that he was at ground zero “as often, if not more, than most of the workers.”

“I was there working with them. I was exposed to exactly the same things they were exposed to. So in that sense, I’m one of them,” he told reporters at a Los Angeles Dodgers–Cincinnati Reds baseball game.

Fire and police officials responded angrily, saying Giuliani did not do the same work as those involved in the rescue, recovery and cleanup from the 2001 terrorist attacks, which left many workers sick and injured.

On Friday, Giuliani said he was trying to show his concern for the workers' health.

“What I was trying to say yesterday is that I empathize with them, because I feel like I have that same risk,” he said.

“There were people there less than me, people on my staff, who already have had serious health consequences, and they weren’t there as often as I was,” Giuliani said, “but I wasn't trying to suggest a competition of any kind, which is the way it come across.”

Giuliani’s explanation further angered his ground zero critics, prompting several to issue a statement demanding an apology.

“He is such a liar, because the only time he was down there was for photo ops with celebrities, with politicians, with diplomats,” said deputy fire chief Jimmy Riches, who spent months digging for his firefighter son.

“On 9/11 all he did was run. He got that soot on him, and I don't think he’s taken a shower since.”

Harold Schaitberger, president of the International Association of Fire Fighters, a union that fiercely opposes Giuliani, said he doubted Giuliani misspoke.

“I think he was simply showing what his true character is—a self-absorbed, self-deluded promoter who got caught and is now just simply trying to backtrack,” Schaitberger said.

Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards offered his own criticism of the former mayor. “That's all we need is another person trying to exploit the tragedy of 9/11,” Edwards said while campaigning in Las Vegas. “What he ought to be talking about instead is trying to explain why the firefighters and the first responders didn’t have the equipment to get the job done.”

A former deputy mayor, Joe Lhota, said the critics are politically motivated and wrong.

“They're taking their anger out in the wrong direction,” Lhota said. “He was literally there four and five times a day; he did anything but run away.

“They're losing sight of the fact that this country, and this city, was attacked on that day by terrorists; it’s their fault. Rudy Giuliani coordinated efforts in this city like no one had ever seen before.”

Also Friday, Giuliani named another former deputy mayor, Rudy Washington, chairman of his campaign in New York City. Washington played a role in ground zero operations for weeks after Sept. 11 and received medical coverage for debilitating asthma and other health complications.

Thursday, August 9, 2007

Lil’ Baby Rhino.

Friday, August 3, 2007

Run Grandma, it’s them bugs again!

[[This is not actually from today, but from sometime in the last few weeks from Writers Almanac. We can’t recognise a good pestilence these days even when it’s thick around 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue]]

It was on this day in 1875 that the largest recorded swarm of locusts in American history descended upon the Great Plains. It was a swarm about 1,800 miles long, 110 miles wide, from Canada down to Texas. North America was home to the most numerous species of locust on earth, the Rocky Mountain locust. At the height of their population, their total mass was equivalent to the 60 million bison that had inhabited the West. The Rocky Mountain locust is believed to have been the most common macroscopic creature of any kind ever to inhabit the planet. Swarms would occur once every seven to twelve years, emerging from river valleys in the Rockies, sweeping east across the country. The size of the swarms tended to grow when there was less rain—and the West had been going through a drought since 1873. Farmers just east of the Rockies began to see a cloud approaching from the west. It was glinting around the edges where the locust wings caught the light of the sun. People said the locusts descended like a driving snow in winter. They covered everything in their path. They sounded like thunder or a train and blanketed the ground, nearly a foot deep. Trees bent over with the weight of them. They ate nearly every living piece of vegetation in their path. They ate harnesses off horses and the bark of trees, curtains, clothing that was hung out on laundry lines. They chewed on the handles of farm tools and fence posts and railings. Some farmers tried to scare away the locusts by running into the swarm, and they had their clothes eaten right off their bodies. Similar swarms occurred in the following years. The farmers became desperate. But by the mid 1880s, the rains had returned, and the swarms died down. Within a few decades, the Rocky Mountain locusts were believed to be extinct. The last two live specimens were collected in 1902, and they're now stored at the Smithsonian.

Wednesday, August 1, 2007

Smoke gets in yr eyes.