My Blog

The Blog is Dead/Long Live the Blog

2007-10-20T16:58:00.000-04:00

I have moved my blog to a new address:

from now on, go to

www.arthurthinks.wordpress.com

It will be better, I promise.

Highlights of Our Recent Trip to Michigan (20 cents)

2007-10-19T17:13:00.000-04:00

Detroit:

1. The restaurant in Greektown which, in spite of its menu, had no fish tonight. At all.

2. The suite at the Athenian Plaza Hotel, a converted warehouse, with frosted glass doors into the hallway, so you can see the outlines of people inside, with frosted glass doors between the bathtub and the sleeping area with the same results, where the living room (ha!) and the sleeping room are separating by four steps, which are unlit at the top, and with the bathroom on the upper level and the bedroom on the lower, where there are gigantic round pillars in the middle of both rooms (just sitting there)and where $20 can get you valet parking, which means that they take your car right across the street to an $8 lot.

3. My cousin's very nice four bedroom coop in a highrise building, with glass walls on two sides and views of the U.S. and Canada, which she hopes to be able to sell for $125,000. (that's about what a parking space costs here)

Bay City, Michigan

1. The omelets at the omelet shop which look so much better on the menu than on the plate.

2. The Bay City Antique Center, which has about 400,000,000,000 things for sale, not one of which you would want in your house.

The Traverse City, Michigan Area.

1. Where the Bluebird Restaurant in Leland serves most things "in the Bluebird style" (which appears to be some sort of fried), but has on the menu whitefish which can be either broiled or served in the Bluebird style. When I asked the waitress how it was broiled, she said that "it is really good in the Bluebird style, and that is what we are known for." But I said, well, I really just want it broiled. And that is how I got it and it was very, very good, and I told her so, that she should not be afraid to recommend it that way. And she answered: "we are known here for the Bluebird style and if I recommended it broiled, I might lose my job". I told her I would not like to see that happen.

2. How about the amorous couple in room 17, who kept everyone else awake at night?
(No one we knew, I am happy to say)

3. Where we had lunch at the old asylum (now being converted into any number of things) and discovered that the food wasn't any better now than it was when the hospital was in full swing.

4. Where in northern Michigan, the calendar said October, and the thermometer July.

5. Where our restaurant on Torch Lake couldn't serve us because they had a complete power failure, but we were served in the same owner's restaurant near Traverse City, which had the effect of saving us about 50 miles round trip.

6. Where my one friend gets up to go swimming every morning at 5:45, and another is an expert on wine, but never touches the stuff.

7. Where the Tapawingo restaurant was told that they could choose our pre-meal appetizers and decided on rabbit pate and fois gras.

Athol Fugard and Joseph Conrad (one cent)

2007-10-11T22:57:00.000-04:00

Not a likely combination, but having seen Fugard's riveting play "My Children, My Africa" last night at the Studio, I need to draw the comparison.

In "Under Western Eyes", we saw Mazurov, trying to remain an innocent, caught in a situation where the revolutionaries thought he was a revolutionary, and the conservatives thought him a conservative. And each had power to keep him in line. A dictatorial government and an increasingly monolithic revolutionary movement.

"My Children, My Africa" takes place in South Africa in the 1980s, when apartheid was still the law of the land, but where chinks in its armor began to appear on all sides. The blacks became more prone to dissent and rebellion, and some of the whites more open to reconciliation. It is in this situation that young, attractive, charismatic, intellectual Thami Mbikwana finds himself caught in the middle. A high schooler with academic skills who could easily be a bridge to an integrated society, who loves English poetry, who gets along with a white debate partner (an unusual circumstance to be sure) enters into a revolt against every thing white, and tear down the entire society that has affected his race so badly.

Does he want to? Or is community forcing him to? Does he have no choice? Or has he made a choice?

In many ways, the situations are not very different in that the central character is an individual whose freedom is circumscribed by circumstance.

Both the book and the play are quite heavy (the play is better written). Oh, for the days of Red Skelton's "Confederate Yankee", a delightful old comedy about a hapless individual who is recruited by both sides during the civil war and who, because of his general befuddlement, comes through unscathed.

Under Western Eyes (35 cents)

2007-10-09T21:03:00.000-04:00

It is St. Petersburg, 1911. You are living in the last decade of the Romanov dynasty. But of course you don't know that. You just know that the monarchy is in trouble, and the country is filled with revolutionary thought (and occasionally revolutionary activity). People are imprisoned for no reason whatsoever.

You are a young man, a student. You are very worried, because you do not know what the future will bring.

You are determined to ignore the political and social unrest. You study. You want to be an engineer. You go to class, you stay in your room. You have no friends.

A minister is killed in a well planned ambush. There is a knock on your door. A fellow student. He is sweating. He tells you he is the assassin. That a new Russia is just around the corner. You are panicked.

Why has he come to you? Because you are the last person the authorities would suspect.

What do you do? Do you help your fellow student? Do you turn him in?

Mazurov tries the former, and winds up doing the latter. That's when the trouble starts.

The assassin is captured and killed. Mazurov convinces the authorities that he has never been a rebel. But the revolutionaries learn that their cohort went to Mazurov for help and that therefore he must be one of them. And a very important one.

So the authorities decide that Mazurov is to be a spy. No choice. And they send him into the heart of the Russian revolutionary community in Switzerland, where he meets, among others, the mother and sister of the murdered murderer.

This is the basis of the plot of Under Western Eyes, by Joseph Conrad. A wordy book, sometimes hard to get through. But with an intriguing central character, who is caught in web after web, simply because he tried to stay neutral.

There is a lesson here. Maybe.

Yriarte's Venice (1 cent)

2007-10-02T22:14:00.000-04:00

Charles Yriarte was a 19th century French author, who devoted much of his life to travel and to writing of his travels. In the 1870s, he wrote a book on Venice, which was published in English just before the turn of the century. I found a beautiful copy and bought it and, much to my surprise, read it.

I learned quite a bit, although the book presupposed more knowledge of Venetian history than I had (my friends at Wikipedia helped me along). The book told of the origins of Venice (during the last days of the Roman empire, future Venetians escaped their pursuers and wound up on a series of islands off the Adriatic coast), how they built the city off-shore, of their need to defend themselves and consequently to develop ocean going expertise. The growth of trade. The independent kingdom. Its expansion on both sides of the Adriatic. Its assistance during the crusades; its rivalry with Constantinople. The effect of the fall of Constantinople to the Turks - a trading partner was gone. The end of independence with the coming of Napolean, the Austrian rule after the Napoleonic Wars, and finally the unity of Italy.

And the architecture (mixture of east and west), the churches (in what was not a very religious city), art, lace making, the publishing industry.

A very nice introduction (albeit too detailed for common man) to a unique place.

and don't forget morris louis

2007-09-30T16:24:00.000-04:00

The Photos to go with the weekly diary

2007-09-30T16:20:00.000-04:00

A Problem?

2007-09-30T16:18:00.000-04:00

When I started keeping my log for the week, I saved, but did not publish, and edited a number of times before publishing today. But then I found out that the publication date is not today's date, but is the date of my first entry. So you have to scroll down a couple of postings.

Also, I could not figure out to carefully put photos on this type of blog, so I gave up.

News You Can't Use

2007-09-30T09:22:00.000-04:00

From our July driving trip:

The seedless black raspberry jam from Das Jam Shoppe (talk about a weird name for a shoppe) in Fairview MO. is top quality, although I don't exactly know why as a company motto, they site Job 26:7 "He hangeth the world upon nothing."

On the other hand, the wild elderberry jelly from P.J. Enterprise of Batesville, Arkansas is too tart.

See Post Below on Michael Mukasey Before Reading This One. Then Proceed

2007-09-28T18:13:00.000-04:00

Ran into another friend today. He went to college with Justice Anthony Kennedy. Says no one remembers him either.

There is a pattern here.

No Dry Cleaner Left Behind, and Why I Go to Cosi

2007-09-28T13:53:00.000-04:00

So, I go into Zips this morning to pick up my dry cleaning and laundry. Zips charges $1.85 per item. But there is a poster on the wall saying that they will charge teachers only $1.50 per item. It's a special deal.

The Sign says "For Teacher's
$1.50 per item"

What is this country coming two?

So, I go into Naan and Beyond, our corner Indian carryout for lunch, and order a Caesar salad (I know, not very Indian) with tandoori lamb. The salad is acceptable. The lamb tastes like a fully grown sheep slaughtered about three years ago.

Want to exercise your jaw? Go to Naan and Beyond. Otherwise, stick with Cosi.

Istanbul Was Constantinople, Now It's Istanbul, Not Constantinople

2007-09-28T09:21:00.000-04:00

I have remarked before how the New York Times uses the terms Myanmar and Yangon, while the Washington Post uses the older terms Burma and Rangoon. Today's Washington Examiner (which uses Myanmar and Yangon) contains a box explaining when the country's name was changed, and how some people identify the name with the current regime and refuse to use it). Today's Post and Times both contain headlines on the first page, using Burma and Myanmar respectively, as you would expect.

But - can you believe this? - the Post's Express edition has a headline using Myanmar.

Huh?

Now do you understand how it all works? (2 cents)

2007-09-27T10:36:00.001-04:00

From today's Wall Street Journal:

"Syria indicated that it is willing to let the U.N. take custody of the Shebaa Farms area claimed by Lebanon, but under Israeli occupation, a Spanish diplomat said."

Our Attorney General Designate (3 cents)

2007-09-25T15:14:00.001-04:00

I went to law school with Michael Mukasey. I remember him. He seemed like a nice, bright fellow. I hardly (if at all) knew him. I don't know who did.

I got a call from a reporter on the Yale Daily News who was doing a story on Mukasey's background, and was looking for law school anecdotes. I had been referred to him by a classmate. I spoke to him. I told him that I remembered Mukasey, that he seemed like a nice, bright fellow, but that I hardly (if at all) knew him. And I had not seen him since law school.

He told me he had talked to 'about half a dozen' members of the class and everyone said the same thing.

I also talked to a friend who is one of the fund raisers for our 40th reunion, coming up next month. He said that he, and his two fellow co-chairs, could not even figure out who could call Mukasey to ask for money.

I have tried to figure it out. I read in a Washington Post article that Mukasey was and is an orthodox Jew, and went to an orthodox day school in New York, Ramaz. Maybe that was the clue. If he was orthodox (and not many were in those days), that would explain why he might have eaten no meals in the law school dining hall, rather than the 21 that most of us had paid for, and ate. And maybe he even went back to NYC on Friday nights (not far from New Haven) to return on Sunday, like a commuter almost. It is possible.

On the metro this morning, I ran into a friend, who had attended Ramaz, although some years after Mukasey. I told her this story. She thought it plausible.

But then she told me one of her own. She had gone to Harvard College, and lived in Leverett House. One of the other Leverett House residents at the time was now Chief Justice John Roberts. No one remembers him either.

This week

2007-09-24T23:17:00.000-04:00

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1. The Book. Some years ago I bought a book called "Whoredom in Kimmage" by a woman named Rosemary Mahoney. It was signed by Mahoney and I purchased it at the going out of business sale of the used book store on Wisconsin Avenue, near the Japanese restaurant. I don't think I ever opened the book and, to be frank, do not know what it is about.

Last week, I saw another book by Mahoney, signed by Mahoney, on the outside table at Second Story Books. It was called "A Likely Story: One Summer With Lillian Hellman", and was the retelling of the summer when high school student Rosemary Mahoney got a job as a housemaid for Lillian Hellman on Martha's Vinyard.

After finishing the book, I am not sure what would be worse. Spending the summer with Lillian Hellman, or having the 17 year old Mahoney living in my house.

It is probably a tie.

I know it is too late to spend time with Hellman, but if Mahoney ever suggests it, just so you know, I will run the other way. Far and fast.

Has my old friend Larry Gillis said in college as a group of us were telling a story going from person to person: "The mayonnaise factory blew up" "How was it?" "It was Hell, man".

So was the book.

2. The Baseball Games. You have to give to the Nats. After starting the year with expectations of 100+ losses, and losing 16 of their first 25 games, the Nats have, since then, played at a 50-50 level, and now have a record better than eight of the other teams in the 30 team major leagues.

Their schedule requires them to devote the last two weeks of the season to the two teams leading their division, the Mets and the Phillies. So far, they have beat the Mets 5 out of 6 games, and lost 3 out of four to the Phillies. They play the Phillies 3 times and the season is over. We shall see what happens. After sweeping the Mets, the Phillies are only one game out of first place in the division. So these games, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, will be very important.

Their relief pitching has been a strong point, but they need to rely on a closer with more consistency than Chad Cordero has had this year. I know he is only 24 or something like that, but how will he be when he is 29, and is he worth keeping around?

Next year, the hope is that Nick Johnson, Christian Guzman, Dmitri Young and Sean Hill will have their injuries behind them. Even with no changes in personnel, the team should be competitive.

3.
The concert. It had been a long time since I have gone to a Tuesday concert at Epiphany Church. I am not sure why. But I did go on Tuesday to see an interesting group called Ensemble Gaudior. Three members played at the church, baroque music on vintage instruments. Alexandra MacCracken's violin was made in 1665, and Lori Barnet's cello in 1755 (both have been restored), and Joseph Gascho's harpsichord was made in 1965 but based on a 1694 design. That is in and of itself quite interesting.

I never know quite how to rate a performance on vintage instruments, since the sound is invariably different. I enjoyed the concert, and had very different reactions to the four pieces played. MacCracken played a selection from a Bach partita, which she chose, I assume, because she liked it and could play it in a very spirited fashion. The other pieces were by composers who were apparently quite prominent in their time, but with whom I have no familiarity: Johann Heinrich Schmelzer, Johann Jakob Froberger, and Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber. I thought that the Schmelzer sonata prima was dull and flat and not particularly well played. I thought that the Froberger toccata and capriccio was snoozable. But I loved the Biber! It was his sonata terza from sonatae violino solo, but was an ensemble piece. It had extraordinarily modern harmonies and tonalities for a piece written in 1681. He lived in Salzburg and published a fair amount of music. I'd like to hear more.

MacCracken introduced the piece, and said there would be a suprise ending. There was. In the middle of a phrase on a hanging up-note, it just ended. I wonder. It was also 1:00 on the dot. Perhaps you can end the Biber anywhere you choose.

4. The Entertainer. I went to see Alan Alda, author of a new series of essays,"Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself" speak on Tuesday night at the 6th and I Street Synagogue. It was part of the Politics and Prose author series. It seemed like the building was over 90% full.

It is clear that everyone there loves Alan Alda. And admittedly, he is a very charming and engaging fellow. Most people know him from "Mash". In fact, when the moderator asked the audience, "How many people here have never watched an episode of Mash on television?", only one hand went up -- mine. I cannot quite understand how war and medicine together make for entertainment (especially for humorous entertainment), but I am really in the minority on this one.

Alda's speech was a rambling one, although it did not seem so because his delivery is so good. I have no idea what the books is about; it did not really come up. He basically told anecdotes about himself.

He talked about celebrity, the number of times people who when the meet him lose their motor skills, or become verbally dyslexic and say to him "You are my biggest fan". And he says this happens to all celebrities. And then he tells how tongue tied he got when he, years ago, met Liv Ullman for the first time.

He talks about people ask him to give speeches at odd places. Like the time he was asked to give the commencement address at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. He assumed that they had trained their students how to practice medicine, but needed him to show them how to act like a doctor. Or the time he was asked to speak about Thomas Jefferson at Monticello to a group of Jefferson scholars.

He talked about how people do him favors. Like when he visited the leaning tower in Pisa and was taken up some steps beyond a sign that said "absolutely no one allowed". He asked about the sign, and was told it was very dangerous there, and if there was any additional movement, anyone in there would be trapped. No one could enter, but for him, they said, "we will make an exception".

He seems like a genuine fellow, very talented, and dedicated to being meaningful. But would I go see him again if he were speaking in the office down the hall?

Nah.

5. The big speech. President Ahmadinejad speaks at Columbia University. I heard part of the speech and some of the questions asked by the students and the answers to those questions. It does not appear that the event added to, or further endangered, world peace.

My own impression was somewhat unexpected. I thought that, if I lived in the closed society which has been Iran for almost 30 years, and my news was controlled and managed, and I was not a particularly sophisticated or worldly person, I might have eaten up almost everything A. said. It was internally consistent, it bespoke of confidence and lack of ambiguity or equivocation.

It is only when you look at it through the perspective of a broader view of today's world that you realize it was almost all utter nonsense.

So, I can see the secret of his success.

Two ancillary questions:

first, was Columbia president Lee Bollinger's insultingly descriptive introduction (accurate or not) appropriate. I say 'no'. It reminded me of a DC Bar Association meeting thirty years ago when the invited guest was then Secretary of Defense Henry Kissinger and the U.S. had just sent troops into Cambodia chasing the Viet Cong. The then president of the DC bar in introducing Cambodia made it clear that neither he, nor the Bar Association, was endorsing such criminal action, then saying, "and I give you Mr. Kissinger...." Not appropriate.

second, what about Ahmadinejad's crazy remark about their being no homosexuals in Iran. Even for the isolated Iranian, this would have raised a question. As an old law school professor of mine once said: you can listen to a beautiful clock strike the hour, but if you count the strikes and they add up to thirteen, you doubt not only the last strike, but all that came before it. Maybe that was the reaction I would have had, were I in Iran listening to my president.

6. Another book. I am not sure how I pick them, but I read a book called "Bartholdi and the Statue of Liberty", written I think for teenagers by Willadene Price and published in 1959. I really enjoyed its simplistic writing style, recognizing that there were probably more generalities in the book than a full fledged biography would have contained.

But here was Frederic Bartholdi, of a wealthy Alsatian family, indifferent student, artist. Became a sculptor, and became enamored of the United States and of the French assistance to the American Revolution. And he decided that there should be a statue dedicated to Liberty. The biggest statue in the world.

The book tells of his political, social and artistic vision, his relationship with major French artistic and cultural figures, his mother and his wife (the model for the statue). But most interestingly, it tells how the statue was made, how it was financed, how it was displayed and how it was transported.

There is a lot of information, all of it (and I mean all of it) interesting in this little book.

7.The movie. "Into the Wild", directed by Sean Penn, starring Emile Hirsch, from the book by John Krakauer, based on a true story. A young college graduate from an abusive family (that, to the outside world looks perfect) decides to forsake society, and go out on his own. Changing his name to Alexander Supertramp, he is remarkably successful in his initial ventures in the west, ranging from the Dakotas to Baja California, meeting and charming some interesting people on the way, giving away his money, taking odd jobs now and then. But his real goal is to go to Alaska, to go out into the wild, and to live all by himself.

He finds an abandoned bus, which serves as his home and shelter (and where his body will eventually be found). He eats wild berries and shoots small game, and again does quite well. Until he decides it is time to leave, and discovers that he is trapped. The river he waded across months earlier is now a torrential stream, uncrossable. He was, I assume, by then out of ammunition, and he can no longer gather meat. He is left to foraging vegetation with the help of his book. He guesses wrong on one plant, and becomes violently ill. He then starves to death.

The movie is over 2 1/2 hours long. It is well acted, and photographed. But it is not uplifting, it did not touch me emotionally, and I would have been just as happy if I had never gone to see it.

8.
The exhibit. There is a Morris Louis retrospective at the Hirschhorn. Large, large abstractions. The Washington Color School. Twenty eight paintings on display. A personal connection, because Edie knows his widow (he died 45 years ago).

I found the work quite absorbing. Paintings you could look at for a long time. That surprised me.

The technique is also interesting. Although the work is done on canvas, these are not oil paintings, but more like batiks, where the thin paint is absorbed into and becomes part of the campus. It is an affecting technique, but it makes conservation that much more difficult, and there is one room devoted to conservation problems, also quite interesting.

My impression of Louis is that he was really a sorrowful character. He seems to have been singularly morose and uncommunicative. He was obsessive about his work, using his bedroom or dining room (depending on the house) as his studio. He rarely emerged. He died of lung cancer at the age of 49.

9. Next to the exhibit. The Hirschhorn, on the same floor, has a number of large installations from its own collection based on light. There is a very dark room, with a pale reddish orange light cast on a full wall. There is a clear acrylic bagel shaped prism (with a much larger hole)which spins on a string slowly (and randomly?) while a bright light shines through it, bringing shadows and forms and rainbow colors to the white wall beyond. There is an installation called 'Invisible', which looks just that unless you stand about three feet the from the beam of light cast from it, in which case the word 'visible' shows clearly on your body.

I thought these light based exhibits were worth the price of admission on their own.

10. The cafe. Yesterday, we stopped at a small cafe on maybe 9th and R (maybe), called Asia. Very modest, quite pleasant, quite busy, small menu. Not too far north of the convention center, but for the neighborhood. Shows what is happening in Shaw.

Medicare (12 cents)

2007-09-24T18:01:00.000-04:00

I was told that I should apply for Medicare, even though I am covered by a health plan at my work. So, I called up the number given to me at the Social Security Administration. An 800 number.

They told me (by recorded voice) that they could help me in many ways but first (they told me this in English) that if I wanted to continue in Spanish I had to push number 2. I did not do that.

Then they gave me some thoughts about why I might be calling and asked me which was closest. I said "enroll in Medicare" and they said that they could help me with my Medicare questions, and switched me to another computer.

This computer told me that they would talk to me, but first they had some things to tell me about Medicare. And they went on for several minutes telling me things that were of no relevance to me, and there seemed (seems) to be no way to cut them short. When that was over, they asked me exactly what I wanted and I told them, and they switched me to another computer.

This computer told me, with sorrow, that my wait would be about ten minutes and I could call back at another time, but they tended to be very busy, especially at the start of the month and the start of the week, and the start of the day. Because it was 5 p.m. on the 24th of the month, I thought I was OK, and decided to hang on.

The computer then asked me a number of questions: my social security number, my first name, my last name, my mother's maiden name, the state or location of my birth. Each one I answered. If the computer heard me correctly, it responded by repeating what I had said and then asking me if it had repeated what I had said.

But several times, it did not understand me sufficiently. In those instances, what did it do? Believe it or not, it said "OK, let's skip that and go on to the next question."

Within about ten minutes a real live person came on; she was very helpful. She told me that I should apply for Part A (Hospitalization only); there was no charge. I could apply for part B when my health insurance was going to end and, as long as I did not dilly dally and applied promptly at that time, I would not be penalized with higher Medicare premiums. All of that was good news.

I asked if I could apply on line, and she said yes, and I was fine with that, and we hung up.

And then I went on line, and after trying to figure out from both the Medicare and the Social Security sites how to apply (that took quite a while believe it or not), I filled in the page of information about my age, etc, and then pushed the continue button, and got a screen that said: "Due to the answers you gave on the last page, you cannot process this application electronically".

I tried 3 times and got the same answer, so I called back Social Security and went through the exact same process as before, only this time my wait was to be "more than ten minutes". I waited.

I got another very nice young woman (who sounded like the precise voice-twin of the first) who told me that she did not understand how the first voice told me to apply on line, because (this was in the tone of her voice, not in her words) everyone with half a brain (I thought that was me) knows that you cannot apply to Part A online without applying to Part B as well.

So, I said, being a cheery old person, OK, let's do it by phone and she said, "OK, let's set you up with an appointment".

I said "What?" And she repeated what she had said before, so I said OK, and she said that next appointment was on October 11, and that someone would call me at 1 p.m.

What do you think the odds are that that will happen?

Starting Next Week (4 cents)

2007-09-23T21:00:00.000-04:00

I am going to try something new. I am going to put together a weekly posting, to be published on Saturday or Sunday. I will write and edit it over the course of the week (editing will probably help, as everything you see now is first draft material). During the week, I will only put in short anecdotal pieces.

I have missed out listing or describing many things I have seen or done.

For example, what did I think about Amy Ziff's one-woman show, Accident, which is a Theater J "extra"? In many ways, I liked it, although I found that it too seemed too much a first draft, and thoughts that it needed a tighter weave. What did I like about it best? Probably, Ziff's memory of her father, who liked apple crisp, apple cake, apple pie, apple betty....anything with apples. I can identify with that.

How was dinner at Logan Tavern (as usual good, although my wine choice could have been better; I had a syrah along with my salmon)? How was dinner at Jaleo (quite good, and I especially recommend the Basque stew, for those whose diets permit it)? How was brunch at the Chevy Chase Bread and Chocolate (good eggs!)?

How about today's final baseball game at RFK? Nats beat the Phillies 5-3. They say the crowd was about 40,000 (Ha. Ha. Give or take 10,000). The day was beautiful. And I got to meet Chris and Joel (and German girl). And see Marsha and her daughter, whose name I have forgotten. (By the way, third baseball game in 8 days, a 2007 season record)

Speaking about forgetting names, when Rabbi Miller mentioned Tricia Nixon in her sermon, I began to think of the other Nixon daughter, the one who married David Eisenhower. I always liked her better. But I could not think of her name, so I sat during Yom Kippur services for about ten minutes running through every name I could think of before Julie popped into my head. This is a dangerous sign, isn't it? And what is Marsha's daughter's name?

I see that Franz Bader's book store (expensive art books) is going out of business in downtown DC, as well as Bonifant's Used Book Store in Wheaton. I didn't do anything to keep them alive, that's for sure. Also saw that Earl Allen's clothing store downtown is gone, and Continental Jewelers is on its way. What will replace them, and why can't strip retail last inside the city?

Did I say that I read Margot Livesey's "Criminals", a novel about one man who found a baby and one who lost the same baby? I think I might have.

I also read Lucille Eichengreen's very interesting book "Rumkowski and the Orphans of Lodz", a first hand account of the Lodz ghetto from 1939-1944. Very depressing obviously, but a fascinating picture of what life was like there and then. Rumkowski, you might remember from my review of the exhibit at the Holocaust museum on the Children of the Lodz ghetto was the orphanage director who was placed in charge of the ghetto by the Germans and who organized the ghetto for work, thinking that productivity was the way to the German hearts. Of course, he was wrong, as it turned out (and he and his family were sent to, and murdered in, Auschwitz), but he could have been correct, I guess. His administration was by and large a continuing series of 'Sophie's choices', decided who should live and who should die (sounds familiar on the day after Yom Kippur, huh?).

The twist in this book was portraying him as a child molester, amongst everything else (from first hand knowledge of the author, and of many she met during her years in captivity). I don't remember this being a focal point of the museum exhibit, and wonder why not.

And then there was the Smithsonian lecture on Timbuktu, by a man and woman who recently wrote the biography of the city. I wish that they had been better presenters or more sure of their topic. They clearly are not scholars, but there was a lot that I did not know that was fascinating.

Timbuktu, by the way, is in Mali. It has been around for perhaps 2000 years. It is on the Niger River and was once a great trading port, a center for the manufacture of iron goods and other weapons, surrounded on three sides by dense forests (now gone, all desert), and the intellectual capital of the Moslem world. It is a racially and ethnically diverse place, and always has been. It's oldest existing mosque was built about 1000, and is now being restored by the Aga Khan Foundation, it is very poor. There may be as many as 1,000,000 manuscripts in public and private collections there, most of which have never been translated or studied.

Did I talk about the Smithsonian's Portugal exhibit? Or the lecture that I attended on topics related to that exhibit? Or my disapppointing look at the Earl Cunningham exibit at the Museum of American Art?

So many things to mention. So little time.

Adventures with Amtrak ($1.27)

2007-09-18T20:36:00.000-04:00

I don't think of myself as a particularly lullable person, but yesterday morning, when my Amtrak train to New York left Union Station on time and arrived at Penn Station on time, I was lulled to believe that Amtrak would always be on time. I thought that my $76.50 was well spent, although I think that the price (for the regular train, with a senior discount) is a bit high.

I spent the majority of the day in meetings, I took a nice walk through mid-town on a beautiful day, I stopped at a small Thai restaurant on 8th Avenue near Penn Station for a delicious meal (green papaya salad, and chicken and vegetables in a ginger sauce), and got to Penn Station at about 6:30, in time for my 6:45 train.

I looked at the time board, which showed the usual 20 or so trains scheduled to be leaving, and noticed that all said "On Time", except for mine. Mine said "1 hour, 40 minute delay".

For some reason, I did not believe it. I thought I had misread the sign. I thought the sign maker had misspoke. I walked around to the other side, to see if it said something different. It did not. I was paralyzed. I was not sure what to do.

I walked around and looked at other people. That did not help.

I walked to my right, to my left, ahead. I turned around. I put my briefcase down. I picked it up. Penn Station does not have any seats to sit in, and I did not know how I was going to spend 1 hour and 40 minutes.

Then I remembered there was an information kiosk and I went there. I told the woman in the kiosk that I had a ticket on the 6:45. She said: "You have time, go to gate 13E and take the train to Harrisburg. It will stop in Philadelphia. You will be fine." I said: "What will I do when I get to Philadelphia?" She said: "isn't that where you are going?" "No", I said, "Washington". Her smile faded, she stared at me, she took a second or two, and then she said "I guess you are just out of luck".

"Do you think the time is firm?", I asked. "Yes", she said. "What was the problem?" "I think it is track repair work north of here." "Oh", I said.

And then came the clincher. She said: "I don't know why they don't build this into the schedule. This has been happening all week. Very regular." "When did they post the delay", I asked? "Quite some time ago."

I thanked her (it wasn't her fault, and at least she wanted to send me to Philadelphia) and walked away.

I looked at the board again, and saw that there was a 7 o'clock Acela, and a relatively short Acela line, so I went to stand in it. I did not know if I could make it, but thought I would give it a chance. Of course, an Acela is more expensive, and I figured it would cost me about an extra $75. Was that worth getting back into Washington at about 10 p.m., rather than 11:45? I debated. I got to the window (I had decided that if I got a ticket in time, I would take it, and if not, that God wanted me to wait until 8:25.) The woman took my credit card. I asked her how much extra the Acela was. She told me it would cost me an additional $96. I told her, even with the senior discount? She said that they had no senior discount (it is 15%) on the Acela.

I thought for a minute. They are 1 hour and 40 minutes late, and I am the one that pays an extra $96? That made no sense. I retrieved my credit card.

I looked at the board again, to see if the 1 hour, 40 minutes had changed. It had; now it was only 1 hour and 25 minutes. But then I saw something else; I saw that there was another regularly scheduled train at 7:35. And I saw that there was a fairly long, but not terribly long, ticket line, and once again I stood in it. This was successful, and I now had a ticket on a train leaving at 7:35, as opposed to my original train, now scheduled to leave at 8:10.

I would save 35 minutes, and I killed most of the delay.

But then I thought about my friend at the information kiosk. Why did she tell me I was out of luck? Why didn't she tell me about the 7:35 (which then would have bee n a 50 minute saving)? No answer for that one. At all.

I went back to the board. My 7:35 was now delayed. It would leave at 7:45. OK, I was still saving 25 minutes.

Then 7:45 came. And there was a public address system announcement that said that the train would leave at 7:45, but that the gate had not yet been assigned, and wouldn't be until the train came into Penn Station, which would be "momentarily". I looked at the schedule board. A new entry was placed next to my train number, where the gate reference should have been. It said: STAND BY.

A couple of hundred people were waiting for this train. We all stood by. And we stared at the screen. Not one person took one eye off it, for what seemed like decades. And more decades.

At about 7:50, the gate was announced, and we pulled out of the station at about 8. I was scared to death. By my measure the other train was only about ten minutes behind us. You can make up ten minutes very quickly. I was sure we would rear-ended, all the way home.

Happy New Year, 5768 (one cent)

2007-09-13T20:15:00.000-04:00

From this morning's Washington Post:

1. Raniyah, Iraq. "For four weeks now, Kurdish villagers in this far northeastern corner of Iraq have endured a punishing barrage of rockets and artillery shells from what they say are Iranian troops across the border. The seemingly indiscriminate shelling has burned acres of orchards and grassland, damaged homes, killed livestock and driven about 2,500 people to abandon about two dozen villages."

2. Big Creek, WV. "Police said six people, including three women, held a 20-year old woman captive for at least a week. During that time, the victim, who is black, was beaten, stabbed, raped and tortured, all the while being subject to racial slurs from her white tormentors, police said."

3. San Luis Obispo, CA. "But as Navarro hung on, tension mounted in the operating room...With time slipping away, one of the transplant surgeons ordered repeated doses of the narcotic morphine and the sedative Ativan, jokingly calling the drugs 'candy', according to police reports. Navarro eventually died, but too late for his organs to be transplanted."

4. Corsicana, TX. "A 6 year old girl was found hanged inside her family's garage and had been sexually assaulted before she died, police said."

5. American military dead in Iraq now stands at 3,765.

6. Padang, Indonesia. "On Wednesday, a strong earthquake shook Southeast Asia, collapsing buildings, killing at least five people and injuring dozens in Indonesia."

7. Baghdad. "Two sergeants who helped write a New York Times op-ed article sharply critical of the Pentagon's assessment of the Iraq war were killed in a Baghdad crash this week, and one grieving mother wants the army to explain their deaths."

8. Somalia. "Thousands of children face starvation as attacks continue around southern Somalia, the health minister and UNICEF said Wednesday."

9. Arlington, VA. "For nearly six hours, a senior FBI official terrorized his Arlington County girlfriend, at times holding her at knifepoint in her closet, dragging her around by her hair and forcing a gun into her mouth in a jealous, drunken rage, police allege in court documents."

10. Fairfax Co., VA. "Authorities arrested 17 people in Northern Virginia and Maryland yesterday on charges that included distributing metamphetamine and trafficking in firearms, prosecutors said."

11. Fairfax Co., VA. "Police shot King sometime after 3:30 a.m. in the Dulles Technology Center...where they were responding to a report of a one car accident. Police said King pointed a gun at them, prompting them to fire."

And of course, there are articles about war in Iraq, about Iranian intentions, about bombs in Syria, and you name it.

Can it ever end? Look on page A10, the article entitled "Climate Link to Neanderthal Demise Abates", where a representative from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution says (based on new studies of marine sediment sampling showing that there was no major climatic change at the time the Neanderthals died out) "They survived 20,000 years of very unstable climate. Then when you add humans to the mix, they are gone...." This was 30,000 years ago.

You answer the question.

Shanah tovah

My Four Questions for General Petraeus (14 cents)

2007-09-13T15:57:00.000-04:00

1. If the policy was to withdraw from Iraq as quickly as possible, how long would it take, and how would it be accomplished?

2. If this policy were implemented, what do you think would happen to Iraq?

3. If your current policy is followed, how long will there be U.S. troops in Iraq?

4. If your policy is followed, how many more American soldiers or civilians do you think would be killed or seriously wounded before withdrawal is complete?

Zips and Sips

2007-09-11T11:03:00.000-04:00

Dropping off my laundry this morning at Zips, I decided for the first time, to get a cup of coffee at Sips. A small cup of coffee costs $1.71. That is about what it costs to get an overcoat dry-cleaned! My last cup of Sips coffee.

I was surprised that all but one of the tables were filled (a la Politics and Prose) at about 10 a.m.

I am also trying to figure out the message on the Sips carry out coffee cup: "Caution, contents hot, and so are you!"

How do they even know?

Potpourri (78 cents)

2007-09-10T22:20:00.000-04:00

Carry out tonight from Dahlak, an Eritrean restaurant located at 18th and Florida. Took out their vegetable combinations. Quite good. Second time I have gone there. Each time, I seem to have been the only non-Eritrean in the place. And none of their customers are female. But they are quite friendly. Maybe they see a new market in white males? I'll do it again. (The picture, by the way, is from one of the Dahlak Islands, off the coast at Asmara)

Stopped in next door at my favorite wine store to tell them how well the Rudi Wiest Riesling went with our dinner, and asked them to recommend a second Spanish red to complement the Razon which we like so much. They suggested Vina Rey, a 100% tempranillo. About $10, like the Razon, so we shall see.

Finally got to the Portugal exhibit at the Sackler. As usual, we went the day before it closed. A great exhibit, with separate sections dealing with Portugal itself, and Portuguese colonization and commercial activity in China, Japan, India, Africa and Brazil.

I started Manju Kapur's "Difficult Daughters", but on the first ten pages, I came across the following words: shor-shaar, chauth, uthala, aalu ki sabzi, mithai, pice, angan, sandhya, bua, beti, dai, puja, hakim, and allopath. Can I get through this book? I see what's going on, but I must be missing something.

Speaking of white panel trucks, every time I see one, I am sure there is some sort of terrorist inside. You may remember when the Washington sniper w
as running around and no one knew when or where he would strike next. Witnesses had talked about white panel trucks being in the vicinity of the shootings, and anyone driving a white panel truck came under suspicion. Well, it turned out that the sniper was driving, I think, a red Chrysler. Or something like that. There never was any connection between a white panel truck and the crimes. But that is of no matter, because the connection had been established in my mind. If I, the least susceptible of people, can have my mind twisted by this unimportant, short-lived suspicion, is it any wonder that prejudices develop against Jews, blacks, Hispanics, Arabs, or whomever? How can one be expected to shake them off??

Then, there was the weird comment in yesterday's Washington Post by a staff writer comparing the presumed disagreement between high level members of the Bush administration on the proper course to take in Iraq to "family members squabbling at a funeral". Huh??

Finally, as we all know, Labor Day is always the time that Washington's heat and humidity breaks. But this year it did not happen. Today it was an ultra-humid 90 something. Global warming? Can you judge it based on one day and one week??

Over the Past Week (27 cents)

2007-09-08T10:51:00.000-04:00

Over the past week:

1. We ate at home every evening. That hardly ever happens. And the food was very good.

2.
I ate at Eli's Restaurant Tuesday for lunch. One of the two kosher restaurants within a walk of my office (the other being at the JCC), it is not bad. It is a meat restaurant, and while the food is sort of ordinary, the menu is expansive, and the service very friendly. And the atmosphere is comfortable. Sometimes it is difficult for a kosher restaurant to seem like an ordinary place, and they carry that off at Eli's. I just had a turkey sandwich, so nothing out of the ordinary. But I also had iced coffee. I had asked the waitress if she could give me iced coffee and she said she could, but with an explanation that all that meant was that they would pour the coffee in a glass with ice, that they had no special "iced coffee". I told her I understood, and the coffee came with enough ice, in a 20 oz. glass, and was one of the best glasses of iced coffee I have ever had. Whether that was by chance, I don't know.

3. So, I read one of the stranger books I have ever read - "Lying Together" by Jennifer Beth Cohen. I picked the book up because it purported to be the story of an American woman and her Russian fiance, and the complications that arose in their relationship. Well, it turned out that the Russian fiance was American and that they were both journalists working in/and interested in Russia.

They were college friends (at an unnamed university, which I will call "Tufts") who lost contact with each other for about seven years, as each went their own ways, both being somewhat successful professionally and less than successful romantically. They reconnected by internet, decided they were in love with each other, and that she would move to Russia to join him, where he had been working for years.

The initial glamor of the relationship wears off, he turns out to be an alcoholic and manic/depressive, and she turns out to be a pill pusher, and she tells the story of how she tried to save him but how, after he tried to commit suicide, it became too much, how the engagement was broken off, and how she came back to the US and lived happily ever after.

The names were changed to protect the guilty, she says, and she was not going to allow the book to be sold or reviewed in Russia (a trick which she couldn't accomplish).

Her fiance came off terribly, and she not much better in my opinion, although her description of the lives of American journalists in the Russia of the 1990s (the reason I was interested in the book) made for good reading.

I decided to look her up on the internet; she now being a producer for CBS news as I understand it.

The first thing I saw, on the website of an English language Russia based web magazine, was a rant from her boyfriend, who trashed the book, trashed Cohen, said that everyone in Russia knew who the book was about and that he was more than embarrassed and outraged, and then went on to tell his side of the story, which was quite different but still made both of them sound like just horrid people.

Then I saw a conversation with a Russian literary reviewer who wanted to review the book and asked the publisher for a copy. The publisher said, no, that copies were not available in Russia. The reviewer said, what?, I can buy it on the internet. The publisher agreed this was possible, but that he hoped he wouldn't. Apparently, all this became big news in Russia.

At any rate, someone is now making (or has made) a documentary movie about the book (I admit that I have not looked closely at this flashy website), Jennifer got married to a guy named Michael Oko, and they both talk about the book and how wonderful their life is together, and......yuck.

3. Now I am reading Margot Livesey's "Criminals", which is the story of a Scottish investment banker who finds a baby in the men's room at a train station on his way from his London home to console his sister in Perthshire, and how he brings the baby with him and his lonely sister promises to turn it over to the authorities. And how the baby's mother's boyfriend, angry at the mother, decides to put the baby on the men's room floor, and go outside and see the mother's reaction when he tells her the baby has disappeared (a joke, you see), and didn't expect an investment banker to pick up the baby and put it on a bus, but decides to follow the investment banker and get his address for reverse ransom purposes. I am half way through the book. I think it silly, but I will continue to read it.

I bought "Criminals" and "Lying Together" (the ex-boyfriend titles his story of the relationship "Cohen Lies Alone") along with two other books that I have pledged to try to read, Manju Kapur's "Difficult Daughters" and Maxine Clair's "Rattlebone".
Stay tuned.

Two Very Similar, Very Different Books (1 cent)

2007-09-03T20:59:00.001-04:00

One is Ben W. McClelland's "Soldier's Son" and the other Arnold Zable's "Jewels and Ashes". Each was written by a talented writer, who was tracing the history of his family. McClelland's father was killed in World War II when McClelland was barely out of infancy; Zable's parents both lived into old age, but they were just about the only survivors of their family, most of whom perished during World War II. McClelland grew up in southwest Pennsylvania, coal country; Zabel in Australia.

I would recommend McClelland's book because he is a very good writer (he is a professor of English and English composition at the University of Mississippi). His mother's struggle to raise a family without a father, and his grandparents and greatgrandparents trials and tribulations in changing America, are not without interest. Small town life in the 1950s and 1960s holds some fascination. But at the end, I had trouble. I couldn't remember one family member from the other, and I had little recollection of most of the stories McClelland told, although I enjoyed reading them very much. But I did not come out of the book very fond of McClelland, so I really didn't care about his stories. For his family members, the book is of course invaluable. For his students, it is proof that their prof can write. But for me and you, I am not so sure. Perhaps I am not being fair.

Zable's book, on the other hand, tells the story of life in Bialystok and surrounding shtetls from before World War I through the Holocaust, and tells the story of the survival of his parents, who were able to leave before the real bad times began. His technique is fascinating. Like Jonathan Safran Foer, he took a trip to recover his parents past. Unlike Foer, he did find traces of their past lives, and did not have to make anything up. And, his trip occurred about ten years prior to Jonathan's, so that he was able to meet more people (speaking in Yiddish and poor Polish) who were alive at the time, although he did not meet anyone who knew personally his parents (some did remember his grandfather, who hawked newspapers and magazines in the main square for decades).

So you follow Zable geographically, and within the geography you go back and forth in time. This works so well in this book. You don't have the same geographic references in "Soldier's Son", and the weaving from recent to deep past, and from realative to relative is more confusing.

And Zable was working with a much broader brush. He was able to put together a detailed history of the twentieth century Jewish experience in Bialystok, down to the last Aktion in 1943, and the "liberation" by the Russians in 1944. So it becomes a book of historical, and not just personal, importance.

I found the McClelland book (published in 2004) on the outside table at Second Story books. The provenance of the Zable book is more interesting; I picked it up at a used book store in Rolla, Missouri, where it was sitting (and it had been inscribed by Zable to 'Freda', apparently a distant relative).

I'm Sorry, But Tuesday Will Be Too Late (3 cents)

2007-09-02T21:57:00.000-04:00

The National Portrait Gallery of the UK had lent a large number of terrific portraits to the National Portrait Gallery of the US of A, and they are all going to be packed up on Tuesday. You will have missed a great exhibit of portraits of kings and mistresses, politicians and entertainers. I think I am going to get the catalog.

There are portraits of Henry VIII, Richard III, Queen Mary and Mary Queen of Scots, Victoria (in India looking quite rotund, working on her boxes), Elizabeth I (very big portrait, but not as big as the one of Judy Dench) and II, Churchill (understated), Blair (with very blue eyes), Thatcher (I am sure she likes this one), and more. Along with some pretty ladies (such as Lady Hamilton, Sam Taylor-Wood (yes, that's a lady) and _______, the most attractive of them all. There are several other ladies, reputed to be the prettiest of their time, who clearly were not.

Authors? Yes, including Oscar Wilde smirking, D.H. Lawrence sulking, T.S. Eliot (of course he was from St. Louis) in an abstract mode, Henry James looking very serious, Shakespeare (with an earing in his ear, but maybe it's not Shakespeare), Charles Dickens looking quite young and feminine, Charles Darwin looking very much the patriarch, and many others. Musicians? Yes. Actors? Of course.

A Commuter's Dream (one cent)

2007-08-31T08:44:00.000-04:00

If only every day could be the Friday before Labor Day. I drove through the park today. It was virtually empty. As was the office garage.

But enough of that.

Let's talk about breakfast.

As I was having a good bagel and a bad cup of coffee this morning, I wondered why Pumpernickel's couldn't serve the quality and variety of coffees served at Cafe de Francesco in Barcelona. Why is it that even coffee shops, like Starbucks or Caribou or whatever cannot match what the simplest shops sell to drink in Spain? Why do the exotic drinks here need to be so exotic? And so caloric? And so big?

Then, I realized that thinking along those lines would get me nowhere, so I reversed gears and wondered why Cafe de Francesco doesn't serve good (or any bagels)? What do you need for a bagel? You need flour (they have that), yeast (they have that), water (they have that) and toppings or flavorings (they have those). Then it occurred to me. The magic ingredient is butter. The bakers in Barcelona probably cannot conceive of baking without butter, just like the coffee brewers in the US cannot conceive of a drink that can't be sold in a 20 oz. cup.

What a Difference a Day Makes

2007-08-30T09:45:00.000-04:00

A few weeks ago, I picked up a paperback copy of a book I had never heard of, written by an author totally unknown to me. "Baghdad Express" by Joel Turnipseed. In the early 1990s, Turnipseed, a philosophy student at the University of Minnesota and a lance corporal in the U.S. Marine Reserves, was called up for duty in the first Gulf War. The book is, in effect, his diary.

When I first bought the book at Books for America, I took it next door to Soho's and looked through it while having a sandwich and Diet Coke. I found it appallingly bad. I thought it was poorly written, disrespectful of everything, profane, and not very illuminating. I put it aside and did not look at it again.

Until last night. For some reason, I decided to read "Baghdad Express". I think it was because I was tired and the book didn't weigh very much, it was only 200 pages long, and at least I knew what I would find and knew I wouldn't be challenged.

Last night (and still today), I thought the book was insightful, well written, and quite illuminating. I thought it formed a good complement to recently read "Homage to Catalonia" by George Orwell. I would recommend it.

What a difference a day makes.

There are interesting things happening today, but

2007-08-29T22:04:00.000-04:00

I don't seem to be able to find time to deal with them on the blog. So you'll have to come back another time.

Thoughts About Macao

2007-08-28T20:26:00.000-04:00

I followed a docent's tour yesterday on the portion of the Sackler Museum's extraordinary exhibit on Portugal's navigational exploits of the 15th and 16th centuries and their ongoing influence across the globe. Yesterday's tour concentrated on China.

In 1557, the Chinese granted the Portuguese the right to establish a community at Macao. This led to Portuguese rule of the Macao peninsula and nearby islands for 442 years, ending in 1999, when the territory was formally ceded to the Republic of China. The Sackler exhibit deals with trade, with religious missionary movements, and with the relationship between the Portuguese and the royal court in Beijing. Beautiful silks, extraordinary porcelains, maps and paintings populate the three exhibit rooms. A mixture of cultures, neither overtaking the other.

And, I recall Macao always being compared to Hong Kong, the British Chinese coastal colony, and always coming out second best (and nowhere near Hong Kong in glitz, prosperity, or in any other category).

Switch to 2007. Look at today's New York Times and the article entitled "High Rolling Right Past Las Vegas". Let me quote: "The $2.4 billion Venetian Macao Resort, scheduled to open here Tuesday, will give Sin City more than a run for its money. The Venetian has more floor space than four Empire State Buildings. The hotel's slot machines, baccarat tables, and other games of chance sprawl across a casino more than three times the size of the largest casino in Las Vegas. The 15,000 seat sports area nearly rivals Madison Square Garden, the convention center has a 6,000 seat banquet hall and the luxury shopping mall has three indoor canals with singing gondoliers; the Venetian in Las Vegas has just one.....But what is most surprising about the 3,000 suite project is that it is merely the first of 14 interconnected hotels being built here by the Las Vegas Sands Corporation....and the [overall] project is just the largest of a series of giant gambling complexes being constructed here in Macao, on the southwestern lip of the Pearl River."

So what happened here? What happened to the silk and porcelain? What happened to good old Catholicism's inroads on the Chinese religions?

And what's more, what does this say about the world? Think Darfur, think Iraq, think the entire Moslem world, think Cuba, think...... And, lest it be forgot, the country of which Macao has now been a territory since 1999 is Communist China!!

I cannot process this at all.

Random (3 cents)

2007-08-28T16:47:00.000-04:00

I was shocked a few months ago when I heard that David Halberstam had been killed in a random automobile accident. He had been invited to participate in a panel discussion at Stanford and was, I think, being driven from the campus either to his hotel or to the airport when his car (it was being driven by a graduate student, if I remember correctly) was hit by another. Random. Very sad. Very unexpected.

But it is not only Halberstam. I read in this morning's Examiner the following brief article: "An Arlington man was killed in a two car collision when a sport utility vehiclae ran a red light near the National Archives on Saturday night, according to D.C. police. Brian Ross Russell, 48, was a passenger in a taxi travelling on Constitution about 8 p.m. Saturday when a 2004 Toyota Four Runner traveling south on Ninth Street NW reportedly ran a red light and collided with the taxi....."

Random. It can happen to anyone, anytime, anywhere, anyway, I guess. But on Connecticut Avenue at 8 p.m. on a Saturday night in a taxi?

Sunday Morning

2007-08-26T16:56:00.001-04:00

Sunday morning cannot be better spent than eating a bagel, drinking coffee and reading through the latest issue of the Biblical Archaeological Review. The September/October issue has two fascinating articles on the second Jewish revolt (the "Bar Kochba Revolt"), talking about the historical and archaeological sources, the degree of seriousness with which the revolt was taken by the Romans, and the degree of destruction which resulted. Not much in the way of contemporaneous reporting (there was no Josephus), but more and more discoveries on the ground substantiating the basic information which had been provided by Roman historian Cassius Dio.

In the Meantime (3 cents)

2007-08-26T11:43:00.001-04:00

While procrastinating on detailed descriptions of some of the sights of Barcelona, I have not been wasting all of my time (or perhaps I have, depending on your point of view). Here is what has been going on since we returned from Spain ten days ago.

Books: First, I have read two books.

The one, not surprisingly, was George Orwell's "Homage to Catalonia", his description of his time in Barcelona and environs during the Spanish Civil War. Orwell went to Spain as a journalist, it would seem, in 1937, but quickly decided the owed it to the world to enter what he hoped would be the first successful defeat of fascism (Hitler and Mussolini facing no opposition). He joined an Anarchist militia and spent several months in the mountains of Catalonia, freezing, starving, observing, ruminating, and participating in several minor skirmishes to try to divert the Franco troops from the real battlegrounds, such as the city of Huerca. He was one of a number of English volunteers, and he was seriously wounded with a bullet that went through his neck, and was lucky to have survived. After spending time in various hospitals, he was sent back to Barcelona, arriving in time for the street fighting that occurred there, all between various of the non-fascist groups, the "democratic" government, the communists and the anarchists.

He concluded that war was unpleasant, that the Franco forces were going to lose (so he thought), but that the communists and the anarchists would also be on the losing side, with the government forces in control, leading to more of a plutocracy or oligarchy than a true democracy. He felt that the communists, afraid of the egalitarian philosophy of the anarchists, were a reactionary, rather than a revolutionary, force, siding with the government against fascism. He felt that both communism and fascism shared many qualities, including extreme class inequality (in spite of the communists stated) and total lack of tolerance. Orwell was of course quite right in much of his thinking.

"As for the newspaper talk about this being a war for democracy, it was plain eye-wash. No one in his senses supposed that there was any hope of democracy, even as we understand it in England and France, in a country so divided and exhausted as Spain would be when the war was over. It would have to be a dictatorship, and it was clear that the chance of a workingclass dictatorship had passed. That meant that the general movement would be in the direction of some kind of Fascism. Fascism called, no doubt, by some politer name, and - because this was Spain - more human and less efficient than the German or Italian varieties. The only alternatives were an infinitely worse dictatorship by Franco, or (always a possibility) that the war would end with Spain divided up, either by actual frontiers or into economic zones."

You can imagine what Orwell would be saying about Iraq.

He wrote this book, by the way, as a relatively young man, shortly after his return from the country. "Animal Farm" and "1984" were yet to come.

The second book I read was William Golding's "Pincher Martin", selected because I had read nothing by Golding and it was short. Man against nature: like "Robinson Crusoe" or "The Old Man and the Sea", but much more ambiguous than either. Martin is shipwrecked of a British warship during World War II and swept onto a remote Atlantic Island. The book is the story of Martin's battle against drowning, and his fight for survival without obvious sources of food and shelter. The prose is dense, but very well composed and very evocative.

But then something weird happens, that no one knows how to describe. Two new characters suddenly appear in the last chapter. Other members of the British navy exploring the island. They find Martin's body on the beach.

The trick is that Martin is wearing the boots that he had taken off while fighting the ocean to keep from drowning in the first chapter of the book.

What does this mean? Where is the reality? Was his survival a dream? A post-death dream?

Questions, questions, questions. And Golding was certainly not going to provide the answer.

Movies: I have seen three movies. Only one, "Once", was seen in regular theater; the other two were seen as part of the National Gallery of Art's free weekend cinema program.

"Once" is a very uplifting and enjoyable Irish movie. starring Glen Hansard and Marketa Iglova. Hansard, the leader of the Irish rock group 'The Frames' plays a young man who, when not helping his father in his vacuum cleaner repair shop, busks on the streets of downtown Dublin, playing popular songs during the daylight hours, and his own compositions at night. Iglova, who in real life sings with the Frames, plays a recent Czech emigrant who is intrigued by Hansard's music and by Hansard and who is excited to learn his day time job, because she has a vacuum in need of repair.

The chemistry between these two very likeable characters is highly charged, and together they work on his music (she is a musician as well, and helps him put together a makeshift band - the Frames, I suppose -) and produce a CD. They borrow money for the production, and the recording studio director thinks that this is a big waste of his time, until they start to play and sing.

You can imagine what will happen next as this couple draws closer and closer together. But it does not happen. Their relationship is an impossible one (she has a husband, still in the Czech Republic, and a daughter), and he still pines for his old girlfriend, now living in London.

Nevertheless, the movie has a happy ending (if indeed it is the ending), as they go forward on their separate life trajectories. The music is good. And, believe it or not, not only is there no overt sex in the movie, but there are no bad guys either.

Once has won a number of audience awards at recent festivals. It was released this year.

The second movie was "Maskerade", a 1934 Viennese movie, set around the turn of the century, and centered around the Viennese elite and their highly cultured high life. The most famous portrait painter of the time is rumored to have affairs with the women he paints; the wife of one of the city's top surgeons who is the brother of the musical conductor visits the painter hoping for more than a painting, and, although she is painted on wearing a mask and a chinchilla muff, she is disappointed to learned that the painter is a painter and not a serial lover. But her picture accidentally becomes public, and a scandal must be avoided. Of course, the painter falls in love with a woman of a lower social class, who is the only person in the movie with deep common sense and have furtive romantic interludes, all sorts of family intrigue and even an attempted murder (along with a Enrico Caruso performing in Rigoletto under the not quite cuckholded maestro) occur, but again all live happily every after (or, I guess, until World War I breaks out).

A very different movie was "Miss Universe 1929", a documentary about the first Miss University, Lisl Goldarbeiter of Vienna, half Jewish and very attractive, and her first cousin and second husband Marci Tanzer of Szeged, Hungary. Tanzer, a mechanical engineer by training and an amateur movie maker, filmed Goldarbeiter throughout her life, and it is these films that provide the basis for the movie. They were put together, with a little supportive dialog from a very old Tanzer (90+), awfully. An interesting story, with very interesting movie clips, could not have been turned into a documentary more sloppily.

Educational Forum: Only 27 people by my count attended a workshop presentation on Friday at the Holocaust Museum on the subject of Kristallnacht and the reaction of the American religious establishment (based on religious media, press and airwaves) to it. The nine presenters were finishing a two week workshop program sponsored by the Helena Rubenstein Foundation. They were all scholars, and representatives of various religious denominations. There was quite a bit of interest in this presentation (as a scholarly topic, this is apparently fairly virgin territory), as the reactions (and the intensity of pursuit of action based on the reactions) were quite varied, and often in surprising ways. But I came out of it thinking, in a sense, who cares? Clearly, nothing helped.

And the results of the chocolate poll are.......

2007-08-25T11:55:00.001-04:00

Totally inconclusive. Virtually a four way tie.

And the lesson is.......

Another Diversionary Posting (12 cents)

2007-08-23T17:41:00.000-04:00

I am walking by Dupont Circle. Drivers entering or leaving the circle at New Hampshire, 19th or Connecticut are always dangerously confused. I am standing waiting to cross New Hampshire. The light favors the cars entering the circle from New Hampshire. There are three people on my side of the street, and about ten on the other side waiting to cross. A car stops, although it has a green light (actually a flashing yellow arrow, which is part of the problem). The woman waiting on my left waves at the driver, motioning her to go forward. She does.

I almost talk to the woman. I want to tell her that what she did was very dangerous. Even though the driver had the right to go, and the woman was waiting patiently on the sidewalk. Others, particularly those on the other side, might have taken the driver at her word, and started to cross on foot. The driver, undoubtedly at least somewhat confused, might have seen the waving hand and, without looking carefully to her right, might have accelerated. It could have been bad.

But I didn't, and she and I went walking separately, but in the same direction, until we came to Connecticut Avenue. Now, there were just the two of us. Now I am on her left. There is no one on the other side waiting to cross towards us. The light favors the cars coming onto Connecticut from the circle. But a car hesitates and in fact, the driver waves at us to go forward.

What do I do? I shake my head 'no', and wave the driver on.

My walking companion (who I am happy to say did not walk in front of the car) says to me: "I am glad you did that. People get so confused here. I wish more people would do that."

I didn't say anything (except for a muffled 'yeah'). I was too embarrassed.

It's Not About Me, But......

2007-08-23T11:45:00.000-04:00

I talked to my cousin who told me that she and her husband had just come back from several days in Branson, MO (you might remember my earlier discussion of our drive-thru in Branson). The tourist center was closed, the man who owned the magic water fountain had died, the theater group they wanted to see was on vacation for a week, and the excursion train was not running. And she said that they had a good time. They did see Yuri Smirnoff (What a city!) and Chinese acrobats (the guys who spin plates??). And the temperature was in the upper 90s. Wish I were there.

The Spanish Chocolate Countdown (one cent)

2007-08-22T22:41:00.000-04:00

I brought four large bars of Spanish dark chocolate for my office. Two are Torres chocolates, and two are Valor Chocolates. Each are 70% cacao.

My experience with this type of chocolate (which I take for medical purposes only, along with my red wine) is that it is very bitter (this is what qualifies it as medicinal, I believe).

But, lo and behold, the Spanish chocolate doe not share this characteristic. It is not bitter at all.

The first chocolate, tried on Friday, was a plain Torres bar. It was very very well received. The second chocolate, sampled on Monday, was a Torres bar with filberts. You cannot believe how well it was received. The third chocolate, sampled today, was a Valor bar with pieces of orange rind. It was received well enough, but clearly appears to be in third place.

But why? Is it because Torres makes better chocolate bars than Valor? Or is it that the orange rind not only does not add to the chocolate's popularity, but actually detracts from it.

Tomorrow should tell the tale, when we sample Valor's dark chocolate with almonds.

I will report back.

Initial Thoughts on Barcelona Trip - Part 5 - The Sights (Survey Course)

2007-08-21T22:45:00.000-04:00

In nine days, I was able to do the following:

1. Take the Bus Touristic. THUMBS UP

2. Visit the Cathedral. NO THUMBS

3. Walk La Rambla. NO THUMBS

4. See the Columbus Monument. NO THUMBS

5. Visit the Museum of the City. THUMBS UP

6. Visit the Museum Frederic Mares. THUMBS UP

7. See Placa de Sant Jaume. NO THUMBS

8. See the Roman Wall. THUMBS UP

9. Visit the (possible) Sinagago Major. NO THUMBS

10. Go to the Contemporary Art Museum. THUMBS UP

11. Visit the Museum Picasso NO THUMBS

12. Vist the Textile Museum NO THUMBS

13. Visit the Aquarium THUMBS UP

14. Walk on the beach. NO THUMBS

15. Visit Gaudi's La Pedrera THUMBS UP

16. Visit Gaudi's La Sagrada Familia NO THUMBS

17. Explore Park Guell THUMBS UP

18. Visit the Fundacio Joan Miro THUMBS UP

19. Go to the National Museum of Arts of Catalonia THUMBS UP

20. Visit the Mies van der Rohe Pavilion NO THUMBS

21. Take a Side Trip to Gerona THUMBS UP

22. Take a Side Trip to Figueres, and see the Teatre-Museu Dali. MANY THUMBS UP

23. Go to the Saturday Flea Market. NO THUMBS

24. Go to the Sunday Used Book Market THUMBS UP

25. Take a Harbor Tour THUMBS UP

26. Do a Little Shopping

27. Wander Around

28. Visit the Diocese Museum

I did not get to do these things, which I wanted to do:

1. Go to the Geology Museum

2. Go to the Museum of the History of Catalonia

3. See the Gran Theatre del Liceu

4. Visit the Maritime Museum

5. Visit the Center of Catalonian Culture

6. Go to Palau Batllo

7. Go to the Palau de la Musica

8. Visit Fundacio Antoni Tapies

9. Visit the Monastery de Pedralbes

10. Visit the Royal Palace of Pedralbes

11. Go to the Caixa Forum

12. Explore the Castell de Montjuic

13. Go to the Archeology Museum

14. Go to the Ethnological Museum

I would also like to go to Montserrat (M and E went this time)

I don't care about the Wax Museum, the Chocolate Museum or the Museum of Erotica

Initial Thoughts on Barcelona Trip - Part 4: The Food (1 cent)

2007-08-19T11:22:00.000-04:00

The last time I was in Spain was in 1972. I remember the food as consistently the best I tasted anywhere, in quality, variety and quantity.

I did not have the same reaction this time in Barcelona. I thought we had good meals, but most were not spectacular. Of course, we did not search out spectacular restaurants, but I did not do that in 1972 either.

Here is a rundown of our meals. Restaurants are either rated with a "thumbs up" (which means I recommend it), "thumbs down" (the opposite), or "no thumbs" (eat there only if you're hungry).

Cafe de Francesca. Our breakfasts were similar to those I remember from that first trip. Coffee and pastries. As I earlier reported, we had breakfast virtually every morning at Cafe de Francesca, just down the street from the Hotel Majestic. This is part of a chain (I saw at least two others). It is more atmospheric than a Starbucks (and yes, Barcelona has Starbucks). It has two rows of outside tables on Passeig de Gracia under umbrellas, small tables inside in a front and a back room, menus of various sorts on the walls (all in Catalan), and a long bar with inviting stools on your right as you enter through two arched doorways. Hint: service is much quicker at the bar.

Because of language, it was hard to know all of the choices we had. The standard coffee was espresso, of course, and you could get all of the varieties you could expect. It was quite good. You could also get coffee americano, which appeared to be two shots of espresso diluted somewhat. It was also quite good, and stronger than typical American coffee. There was a large variety of teas. H. had jasmine oolong most mornings. There were also wall signs saying that Jamaican (Black Mountain) and Costa Rican coffee was available, but I didn't pursue and don't know how that would be served; I did see that there were separate coffee makers for each. There was fresh squeezed orange juice, processed with a large juicer (which seemed to be standard in a number of restaurants in the city; why don't we have those?).

The pastries were of high quality, as well. Croissants (chocolate and plain), palmiers, muffins (magdalenas) and others which were familiar. And some not so familiar, such as a tartaleta musico, which had nuts and dates and raisins, as well as a little custard in a pastry shell, the pastis de poma (sliced apple over custard in a square phylo-like dough pastry), and the canya crema (elongated cream filled pastry).

At night, the cafe turned into a bar, with among other things, a variety of grappa flavors and limoncello, a lemon liquor from Capri. We stopped in one evening before going back to the hotel. There was a torrential rain that night and we were trapped in the cafe for more than an hour, along with many others (including friends from DC. Grappa never tasted so good. THUMBS UP

Agua. Agua is a beautiful restaurant right on the Mediterranean. There is a broad boardwalk over looking the beach, well north of most of the beach front restaurants in the former Olympic Village area. Agua is actually located under the boardwalk. There is a small modern, glass enclosed entrance at the boardwalk level, perhaps measuring 8 feet square. Just big enough to enclose the stairway going down. The main dining room is spacious, divided into a bar area and an eating area, with glass windows overlooking the water. Outside is a terrace that is, in effect, right on the beach. The guidebooks all say that reservations are needed, but we were able to get a table at an early hour (for Spain that is, about 8:30 p.m.), "as long as you will be finished by ten". In fact, we were not quite finished, but no one seemed to care. Two of us ordered the tuna, and proclaimed it to be about the best ever had (but they had not yet been to Bar-Mut - read on), one of us had a monkfish brochette, and one had a codfish confit (simply cooked, served on a spinach base). We were all very satisfied. As for as starters, we had a very nice mixed vegetable medley, fried artichokes, a tomato/pepper salad, and a standard arugala salad with shaved parmesan cheese. We shared two desserts, a Greek yogurt with strawberries, and figs with marscapone. We also shared a very nice red wine, Belezos Acuarela 2005. All the Spanish reds we had were good; this was one of the best. It was a tempranillo, from Rioja. [www.aguadeltragaluz.com.] THUMBS UP

Agua was an expensive restaurant, as you might expect. About $40 per person.

El Puchero de Baralantra. We stumbled upon this restaurant early in the trip. It is located a few blocks from our hotel in the L'Eixample section of the city. We had tried to eat first at Cervesaria Catalunya, a restaurant perpetually crowded (it must be the Lauriol Plaza of Barcelona) and then at a nearby Italian restaurant, but both were overflowing with tapas minded twenty-somethings, so we found a nearby restaurant that only had a few other tables filled.

The service was very nice and, speaking about grappa, we each got a glass on the house (two kinds, killer and potable) after our meal. The food was adequate, but this is not a restaurant that one would rave about. El Puchero promotes itself as a restaurant serving traditional food, using natural produce, and not following the latest trends ("because some things never change").

We had two main courses, a tuna in a pepper sauce and an Andalusian baby squid, along with gazpacho, and several plates of tapas: olives, two kinds of omelettes, a cheese tapas, potatas bravas, and others. THUMBS DOWN

The cost was a little over $30 per person, including wine. www.elpurcherodebaralantra.com

Ugarit. Ugarit was a very pleasant surprise. It is a Syrian restaurant (I think there are three branches) located in the Gracia section of the city. I had passed it one afternoon about 4 p.m. and it was filled, so I thought it must be good. We had a little trepidation about going to a Syrian restaurant out of this country, it must be admitted. Our waiter spoke English pretty well amongst other languages. I told him that his English was much better than his Arabic. He laughed. I am not sure he knew a word of Arabic (he was from Bangladesh).

I wish I could tell you what we had, but the receipt is in Catalan-Arabic, and my memory is not helping me. The food included fattuch salad (with tomatoes, lettuce and bread), fried eggplant with tahini, and shwarma. Perhaps some of my dinner companions remember more.

This was an extremely crowded restaurant. The price was under $25 per person. THUMBS UP [www.restauranteugarik.restaurantesok.com]

Sedna. Sedna is a restaurant in the harbor area, but not right on the beach. It overlooks a marina in the enclosed harbor across the street in the area that is known as Porta Vell. It turned out to be our most expensive meal, and although it was very good, we probably did have better at some of our other choices. The main courses were turbot, salmon, duck and scallops. We had wine and sangria to drink. We had three desserts, two tarts (one apple, one apricot) and an Italian creme (tirimasu). The meal cost just over $50 per person. NO THUMBS [www.restaurantesedna.com]

Celler del Trabucaire. After visiting Gaudi's Church of the Holy Family, we had lunch at a small restaurant nearby. E. had anchovies on toast, H. had tuna on toast, and M. and I split a large assorted plate of hot tapas, which included baby octopus, sausages, olives, salads, mushrooms, patatas bravas, skewered chicken and more. About $20 a person. NO THUMBS

Can Majo.
The last time I was in Spain was in 1972. I remember the food as consistently the best I tasted anywhere, in quality, variety and quantity. Can Majo is an old, well reputed beach front restaurant, where we had dinner with our friends, the K's, who were also in Barcelona. Altogether there were 11 of us. The food was very good, the outside table with the strolling magicians very comfortable, and a good time was had by all. About $45 per person. I had hake or, as it is known in Spain, merluza. THUMBS UP

Wembly. Wembly is a neighborhood restaurant where M and I had lunch. The average age of the customers was about 80, it seemed (M asked me if we had wandered into the dining hall of an old age home). The food was not great, but for what it was, it was just fine, and the quantities were substantial. We had fixed price meals at $20 each. I had lamb, M. had cod. THUMBS DOWN

La Polpa. La Polpa was a find. E., M., and I went there on a Saturday night. It is a very trendy restaurant in L'Eixample. They have two courses - no tapas. The walls are filled with bottles of wine and chic chachkas. We had cod, dorado, and chicken brochettes for our main courses, a vegetable tart, a cheese salad, and a tri-color salad for our starters. We split one dessert, a date and nut bread/cake topped by unsweetened Greek yogurt. Doesn't sound that good? It was perfect. The very nice wine was the restaurant's private label. About $25 per person. THUMBS UP

Farga. Farga is a combination restaurant/tapas bar/geleteria located just off the Diagonal, near Passeig de Gracia. We had dinner sitting outside (where they add 20% to the price), and had merluza and salmon, ravioli with spinach and chopped meat, and duck with hundred-year old sauce, along with gazpacho, and pumpkin soup f0r a starter. The wine was Cresta Rosa, a rose. The dessert was an appealing selection of small cakes. It was about $35 per person. THUMBS UP.

Bar Mut. Bar Mut was our last restaurant. We stumbled on it, and went inside. It is really a wine bar with only about 8 or 10 tables, plus seats at the bar. And the tables are small. And there is no outside seating. But this was perhaps the trendiest place of them all. With no end of bottles of different wines climbing every wall. There was no menu, just blackboards with offerings and prices (of course not in English). The servings were a little larger than standard tapas size, but not full meal size. We over ordered. We had absolutely delicious tuna. We had a spinach salad, we had a delicious steak with foie gras, we had large prawns, we had chicken with pesto. And we have wine by the glass. This is a well known establishment, it turns out, and the reviews all say that same thing. Extraordinary food. But, oh, those prices. Our tapas-like meal cost us $45 per person. THUMBS UP

Restaurante Quixote. This is a typical restaurant about two blocks from the hotel. We ate here the first night. Again, the food was not bad, but there is no reason to go back. Actually, I don't remember what we ordered, except that E., who was tired from the trip, just had a saladTHUMBS DOWN.

El Zorzal. El Zorzal is an Argentinian restaurant, also known as Gaucho. There are a surprising number of Argentinian restaurants (and Argentinians) in Barcelona. We had lunch there, and discovered that they served fish as well as beef. The decor was very understated; it looked like a place for workers, not tourists. It was a nice place for lunch. NO THUMBS

La Marona. When we got to Barcelona, it was about noon, and we asked the concierge at the hotel (well, actually, one of the clerks; there is no official concierge) and he recommended an upscale seafood restaurant in the Gracia section. We took a cab, and upon arrival realized that it was too upscale for lunch for four tired travelers, and passed. We started walking back and found La Marona. I remember that I ordered as an appetizer a dish called judias verdes. I know this means green beans, but I think it may also mean green Jew. Is that possible? E. had gazpacho and large sardines, which I tasted and thought only so-so. NO THUMBS

Initial Thoughts on Barcelona Trip - Part 3: The Books (2 cents)

2007-08-18T15:36:00.000-04:00

Eventually, I will get to the sites themselves, don't worry. I am still hovering around the periphery.

As for the books, there are two categories, books read and books bought.

In keeping with my usual practice, I took with me several books that I found around the house that appeared to have the following qualities: they were paperback, they looked at least moderately interesting, I would never read them sitting around the house, and they weren't too long. I took three such books with me. It turned out to be a good selection and I read all three. None had anything to do with the trip.

First, I read a book that no one else reads (I am sure): "The Red Danube" by Bruce Marshall. This is a comic recounting of the British occupation of Vienna after WWII, centering on one somewhat hapless Colonel Nicobar, who is given the task of routing out hidden enemies, is housed in a convent, and wishes he were somewhere else. But who are the enemies? That is for him to find out. Are they Russians, or are the Russians (also victors, also occupiers of Vienna) allies? He does not know, and no one can tell him. And, when a famous Russian ballerina wants to defect to the west, and is hidden by the Mother Superior of the convent, what is he to do? (This was the going over book)

The second book was Berthold Brecht's "Three Penny Novel". Now, I knew of course Brecht's Three Penny Opera, a musical written with Kurt Weill. But I hadn't really known he had written a novel as well (the novel came last, not first), and did not know what to expect. It follows the complicated story of the Peachams and their business of selling supplies to beggars, of Coax who wants to defraud the government by selling it unseaworthy ships (at worthy ship prices with the help of his inside agent, Hale) to transport troops during the Boer War (and who convinces Peachem to invest), and of MacHeath, who supplies the "B Stores" with stolen goods and works to control not only all of the leading discount chains of London, but also the banks the fund them. And of course Polly Peachem ("The Peach") marries MacHeath (much to her father's displeasure, because he fears that MacHeath is, as rumor has it, the infamous Knife), and Peachem wants to annul the marriage so that she can marry Coax (who too late he discovers to be an out and out crook). Amidst it all, a clever critique of small scale capitalism, played out through the workings of extraordinarily clever and complex business deals by all three men. A lot of fun to read. (This was the Hotel Majestic rooftop deck book)

Finally, on the trip home, Thomas Mann's "Confessions of Felix Krull", a fictional memoir written by a clever and handsome young fellow who leaves his bankrupt family to make it first as a Paris hotel clerk taking advantage of its wealthy guests and then who trades places with a young nobleman to pretend he is the nobleman on a parent-sponsored world wide year long tour (so the man in question can remain in Paris with the girl of his dreams, the very girl his parents are providing the funds for him to escape from). But alas our hero only gets as far as Lisbon, where he too falls in love. (This was the flying home book)

And what did I buy? Well, in addition to a catalog of the collection of the Museum Mares (about more, later), I found and bought signed copies of books by people that few have heard of: Jose Luis de Villalonga, Rordigo Brunori, Enrique Nieto de Molina, and Yolanda Bedregat. Along with a signed copy of Andre Maurois' memoirs of the war years. None are in English. I will read none of them, but will feel fulfilled that I have them.

Initial Thoughts on Barcelona Trip - Part 2: The Hotel

2007-08-18T09:24:00.000-04:00

The Hotel Majestic has two important things going for it: its location and its rooftop pool and deck. And the beds were comfortable. Perhaps these even outweigh the negatives we encountered during our 9 night stay.

The Majestic is a 300 room hotel located at the corner of Passeig de Gracias and Valencia. Passeig de Gracias is the major artery leading through L'Eixample, the late 19th century upscale residential/commercial/tourist area that includes the majority of the Gaudi-designed buildings. It connects the medieval city and the port (to the east) with the trendy, more residential Gracias area to the west. Valencia is one of the major north-south streets running through L'Exaimple.

From the Majestic, you can walk (or take the Metro) to almost anywhere.

It is an old hotel, containing 300 rooms and apparently comprising three separate buildings, although they have been seamlessly connected (you can see the separation best when noticing that hotel hallways are sometimes surprisingly interrupted by short flights of steps, as the floor levels in the properties are not exactly at the same level).

It has been a hotel since the 1920s, and was refurbished in the 1990s.

We stayed at the Majestic because E. wanted a roof top pool. And, as I said, this is quite an asset. The tenth floor roof contains a small pool, both lounge and sitting chairs, umbrellas, and (at night) a bar. It offers very nice views of the city in three directions (every way but south). During the day, you can get cold drinks and sandwiches, and the fitness room is located off the deck. It is altogether pleasant, even if a Coke cost you 5 euros ($6.75), and a chicken sandwich (admittedly pretty good) cost 14 ($19.00). One evening, we each had a pre-dinner glass of Cava (this one, a dry sparkling wine, with a beautiful ruby red color). I shudder to think what that cost us.

Many of the rooms are small, as you would expect in an old hotel. Particularly those which face away from the street, on to a not-very attractive courtyard faced by all of the buildings on the block. And, because we were not paying top dollar for our rooms (2 rooms x 9 days x top dollar = unaffordable), this is where we were. That, however, was not a problem, because what we lost in views, we probably gained in quiet.

But there were several problems. For one, there was reconstruction underway on the lobby floor. We were told that it was not planned reconstruction but was the result of the massive power outage that had hit the city three weeks before our trip, causing damage to the electrical system in the hotel. Perhaps this was the case, but if so, the Majestic seemed to have been the only building so affected.

At any rate, the main lobby, directly on the corner, next to the ground floor Armani store, was blocked off and closed, and a side entrance on Valencia led to a small, makeshift lobby that clearly was overtaxed. The reception desk was to your left as you entered; it was big enough for perhaps three clerks, but there were usually about 6 there (I assume the main lobby is much larger), and they tended to fall over each other. At almost any hour, of the six clerks, five were male, all were perfectly dressed and coiffed, and their average age was about 60. They were rather formal, and lacked warmth. Their ability to speak English varied.

The hotel has two sets of elevators. The Valencia elevators, nearest the makeshift lobby, were very small, but convenient. But four days after our arrival, they were shut down to the lobby floor, and only the Passeig de Gracias elevators (around two corners, bordered by temporary walls cutting off the real lobby) were usable. This meant, for example, that we needed to climb two different flights of stairs on the fourth floor to get to our room. Not sure what the handicapped do.

The Majestic is clearly a very busy hotel. There are guests like us, who stay for a week or so. But the hotel also caters to cruise ships (Barcelona being a popular port for the start or end of Mediterranean cruises), and there were large parties of cruise ship customers (I am not sure what else to call them), who stay for a night or two, and who totally and completely overwhelm the temporary lobby, as they and their baggage are picked up by their buses in the morning. And there are other groups, such as the Vanderbilt University women's (girl's ?) basketball team, which arrived looking like they needed nothing more than fashion advice.

But this was not the biggest problem. We stayed in Barcelona for 9 days in part because we did not want to have to pack our bags and move around, as we usually do. But, it turned out that our plans did not work out. E. and I were put into a smoking room. We had requested a non-smoking room. They may have tried to cover up the fact that this was a smoking room; you could not smell the smoking because it was masked by a extraordinarily strong perfume smell from some sort of sickening air freshener. You could get rid of the smell by turning on the air conditioning fan at full blast, but because this was a small room, you were soon living in a meat freezer and, as soon as the fan was turned off, and because the perfume had been blown away, you felt like you were in an R. J. Reynolds factory. This was obviously not satisfactory, so on day #2, we had to pack our bags, and they moved us to a new, slightly better room, on a non-smoking floor.

M. and H. had it even tougher. Their room seemed fine, and so it was for the first few days, but then they got a message that they had to move because their room (on the first floor, right above the lobby floor) was being taken off-line because of the reconstruction work being done. Now, wouldn't you think that they would have known this before they put someone in it for 9 days? At any rate, they had to completely repack, and then they were moved to a room, which had only one bed. And they were told that, yes this was a mistake, but it could not be corrected until the next day.

I went down to the lobby and complained that the move itself was not justified, and that forcing them to stay in a one bed room, with a promise of a further change the next day (which may or may not be fulfilled) was not right, either. After much conversation among the six clerks, they found a room that was available with two beds, and agreed that they could be moved there immediately. And so they were, and it was an upgraded room, much bigger than the one that we had.

But the desk was rather ungraceful, and completely unapologetic, about the entire chain of events. The best that they could come up with was what they told me: "OK, we have taken care of your daughters. Of course someone is coming in this evening thinking that they will have that room. But you know how it is, whenever you solve one problem, you create another."

The Dolma restaurant (ten tables, world class chef, very, VERY expensive, is located on the ground floor of the Majestic). It was temporarily moved to somewhere on the first floor. The restaurant usually found on the first floor (elegant, and only VERY expensive, was moved to the basement level). We ate an neither. And don't know if anyone else did while we were there. Luckily, the Cafe de Francesca, just across the street, served good coffee and pastries, and we breakfasted there every morning. I bet they miss us now.

Initial Thoughts on Barcelona Trip - Part 1: The Flights

2007-08-17T08:51:00.000-04:00

We returned yesterday, leaving our hotel at about 7:30 a.m. CEST (Central European Summer Time, I think) and landing at Dulles about 3:30 p.m. Our trip across left Dulles at about 6 p.m. and we wound up in Barcelona about 11 a.m. the next morning. The debate was which is a better way to go, flying through the night, or over a full day. In either case, you land alive and a little loopy, but seem to manage. Perhaps it makes no great difference.

Iberia Airlines provided good, if not flashy, transportation. Everything came off on time, and the food was, for airline food, pretty good. Going across to Europe, the main course was beef goulash, spaetzele, Greek salad, a Wisconsin cheese triangle, and tiramasu. Welcome to Spain, I thought.

We transferred in Madrid both times. That is quite an experience. The Madrid airport is very large, it seems, and unique in the way incoming and outgoing flights are handled. When you leave the plane, you climb three long, long ramps. On one side, the large glass windows let you watch the runways and gates, on the other side, you see mysterious doors, this time clouded, leading to who knows where. The overall effect is very modern. At some point, a small arrow tells you to turn left through one of these doors, and another arrow tells you that connecting flights require you to proceed through still more doors. You then see screens that tell you what gate your flight leaves from. We were leaving yesterday from Gate U65. This means that first, you need to find U. You are helped along this task by going on interminable moving sidewalks that let you look out to the incoming ramps on your right, and into again who knows what on your left. Eventually, you see that you need to go through another set of doors (this time clear glass), because that is where R,S,T and U gates are. Then you go through security again. And then you go down an escalator and find yourself in the middle of a large shopping mall, with upscale designer outlets, duty free shops, places to eat and so forth. The various corridors go off from this area, including one that leads you down past several (I think it was) R gates, until you get to the U corridor, and of course, our plane was at the very end of this corridor. They tell you when you deplane at Madrid, that if you have to transfer planes, give yourself 30 minutes to get from one gate to another. This is not far off.

The Barcelona airport was very different. It is much less spiffy, and looks like it needs a major upgrade (in fact, construction is going on, but I could not tell whether it was for a replacement terminal, or a Terminal D to add to the existing three. Inside our terminal (B, which is dominated by Iberia), there were approximately fourteen billion people looking to check in their luggage. If you are going to any of the Americas (north or south, etc.), you needed to check into gates 24, 25 or 26. There were ten billion people in these lines. It took us about 45 minutes to check in. Then you need to walk to the opposite end of Terminal B (about the equivalent of one end of Dulles to the other), go up a relatively unmarked escalator, find yourself at security, go through security, also find yourself in a shopping mall, but have an easier time finding gate M5.

It all made Dulles seem so much easier. And, by the way, customs in all places worked very smoothly. Only when we came back to the US, and E. told the immigration lady (who asked whether we brought anything back with us) that our luggage was filled with anchovy stuffed olives that I felt we might be in deep trouble. M. disagreed: she said that our bags were about to be searched, but that we escaped this degrading step because no one wanted to put their hands into a vat of anchovy stuffed olives.

Cardinal Lustiger Dies

2007-08-06T10:47:00.000-04:00

And the obituary in the New York Times this morning by John Tagliabue is fascinating.

I knew that Lustiger was born Jewish. I had read before that his mother had died in Auschwitz and knew that he had been baptized when living with a Catholic family in hiding during WWII.

But the obituary shows to what extent, in his mind, he remained Jewish as he rose in the Catholic hierarchy. From the obituary:

"Cardinal Lustiger appeared to have undergone a spiritual crisis in the late 1970s, when he considered leaving France for Israel. "I had started to learn Hebrew by myself with cassettes," he told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in 1981. "Does that seem absurd, making your aliyah?", he said... I thought then that I had finished what I had to do here, that I was at a crossroads." Then in a surprise appointment, he was made bishop of Orleans....."

and

"In any early interview as archbishop, he said: "I was born Jewish, and so I remain, even if that is unacceptable for many. For me, the vocation of Israel is bringing light to the goyim. That is my hope, and I believe that Christianity is the means for achieving it.""

In response to criticism from Israel's Ashkenazic chief rabbi in 1995, he said: "To say that I am no longer a Jew is like denying my father and my mother, my grandfathers and grandmothers. I am as Jewish as all the other members of my family who were butchered in Auschwitz or in the other camps."

Nothing is simple, is it?

As We Get Ready to Depart for Spain

2007-08-05T20:44:00.000-04:00

I wonder why my blogging has slowed down. Why I haven't told you why reading Arye Lev Stollman's "The Far Euphrates" was not worth the time spent on it, or why Bill Gertz's "Betrayal" is excellent reading whether or not he is right on his facts or his opinions. I have not gone through all of the theater we saw last weekend, from Michelle's performance in "Oklahoma" in Rockville, to "Souvenir" at the Studio, to "Chasing Justice", "Noor", or David Hare's play about his trip to Israel. One day I will, but the blog will be shut down until at least the 17th, and then there might be major changes in store.

Filler (39 cents)

2007-08-03T22:55:00.000-04:00

1. We just came out of Joe and Tony's Seafood Restaurant in Georgetown. Our lunch was pretty bad. A couple is looking at the menu outside. The man asks how it was. I say "fair". He says "did you say great"? I say "no, just fair. You can do better." and I suggest Sequoia or Agraria, all in the same building. He is very, very grateful.

We walk up the way a bit. I turn and look back. They are going into Joe and Tony's.

2. ABC has a new show coming. A bunch of obese volunteers are going to take a 500 mile walk to lose wait. It is to be called "Fat March". According to the spot I saw this morning, Fat March will follow all new Wife Swaps.

ABC has outdone itself.

Potential Embarrassment (2 cents)

2007-07-29T14:29:00.000-04:00

One of the books I recently picked up is called "Politics". It is not about politics at all. It is a book of fiction written by a young English author and literary figure, Adam Thirlwell. And, I soon learned, it is about sex.

I wonder about books about sex. Where do authors get the nerve to write them? That is the source of my wonder.

The plot line is simple. A young half-Jewish Englishman (and struggling actor) is in love with a young six foot tall non-Jewish English architectural Ph.D. student, but their relationship gets complicated where, at his girlfriend's initiative, a young Anglo-Indian friend of his and struggling actress joins them to form a menage a trois. The book, narrated by a second young man, who seems to know these three, but who only appears as a voyeur (if that) talks of their physical and psychological relationships. The images are all x-rated, and the psychology more humorous than profound.

But interspersed with all of this in this relatively short book are illusions to various matters of European and American cultural interest. For example, the story of the relationship between Osip Mandelstam and the communist state, the plot of "Cabaret" and the goings-on in then contemporary Germany, the architecture of Rem Koolhass and particularly his view on Prada store design, a visit to Targu Jiu, Romania and the outdoor sculpture of Constatine Brancusi (and who knew that his name is pronounced Broncoosh?), the moral lessons of the movie Casablanca, the sexual habits of Mao Tse Tung as published by his physician after Mao's death, Bauhaus architecture and Mies van der Rohe, and the prison notebooks of Italian revolutionary Antonio Gramsci. As opposed to the philosophizing I got lost in when reading Michel Rio's Dreaming Jungles, and the fake intellectualizing of David Nokes' The Nightingale Papers, I found it all rather refreshing.

Then why the potential embarrassment? I took the book with me to the gym this morning. As the cover said "Politics" I was originally not worried, but what if someone had said, "what is that book on politics about?" and taken it from me? I would have had to find a new gym.

Akbar Ahmed (2 cents)

2007-07-28T08:32:00.000-04:00

Until recently, I had not heard of Professor Akbar Ahmed, who heads the Islamic Studies Department at American University. Ahmed, a Pakistani Muslim and former diplomat and part time academic, has been at AU for several years, where he has become perhaps the best known (but not to me) ecumenical voice of the American Moslem community. He has authored 30 books, and written numerous articles. See www.akbarahmed.org.

Now, he has written a play, "Noor" ("Light" in Arabic), which received its world premier staged reading at Theater J as part of its Voices from the New Middle East contribution to the Capital Fringe Festival. The reading was followed by an audience talk-back.

Being read on the set of Motti Lerner's "Pangs of the Messiah", with a large photo of the West Bank in the background, "Noor" tells the story of a family in an unnamed Islamic city in a country whose government is bureaucratic, arbitrary and cruel. Noor, the daughter and her older attorney brother are kidnapped from a public market. The brother is beaten, sodomized, and released. Noor is not returned and, when young women are taken in this manner, the expectation is that they will be forced into sexual relations with the country's political elite.

But what kind of government is this? We are not told. Is it a fundamentalist led government? Is it a simple dictatorship? Is it an American pawn? Does it make a difference?

Noor is eventually released, but not before you learn that each of her three brothers, her father and her aunt have very different reactions. Her father is a product of the old, more liberal society that preceded the current government. One brother, the lawyer, believes that the law will eventually work to bring justice. Another, the religious radical, thinks more radically, and plans vengeance, although it is unclear if his thinking is religious or tribal. The third, also religious, is a Sufi, a spiritual man, given to prayer and supplication. The aunt, a traditionalist, is convinced that, irrespective of what actually happened to Noor, her reputation has been ruined and she has become (and must become) an outcast.

Clearly, an unusual play to come from a prominent Muslim in 2007. But, a play in some ways identical to Lerner's play, where similar family differences appeared when a West Bank Jewish settler family is threatened by a peace treaty which will lead to the destruction of their home, and the redrawing of the borders of Israel.

On Ahmed's website, there are links to a number of articles he has written, including articles on potential Moslem dialogues with other religions. I wish I had time to read them; perhaps you will have the time that I don't. Clearly, Ahmed believes that it is possible for Islam to co-exist with other religions in a conflict-free manner. But, although he believes this, he is also deeply pessimistic, not only because of the attitude of so many Moslems to the outside world, but because of the attitude of so much of the outside world to Islam.

Once again, the questions have been framed, and there are no answers.

Today.

T-Shirts of the Day (one cent)

2007-07-26T16:55:00.000-04:00

People have a lot of choices in T-shirts. Two that I saw today say:

"I would really like to punch you in the face" and

"It's only funny until someone gets hurt.....Then, it's hilarious"

Huh? What am I missing?

Let's have a civility-in- shirts law. But whom do you punish? The wearer? The purchaser? The designer? The T-shirt printer? The manufacturer? The distributors or suppliers?

Everything is just so complicated.

Nobody Cares about the Nightingale Papers (11 cents)

2007-07-25T20:19:00.000-04:00

No one cares about David Nokes' book "The Nightingale Papers". Including me.

I picked up this recent novel by Kings College Professor Nokes, a prize winning biographer. Perhaps he should stick to biography.

But on the other hand, the book deals with matters that are quite foreign to me. English academia. Welsh poets. English humor.

It is a short novel, centered around a conference of experts in the poetry of a little known Welsh poet. Things happen in this book. There are academic jealousies. There are academic trysts. And there are surprises. And academic deaths.

Unfortunately, the minute I finished the book, I already had forgotten how it ended. Was it determined that the poet's works were really his wife's? Or were they written by one of the acamedicians? Or by the poet himself?

And how did McWhinnie die? And what was the gardener's problem?

I don't remember any of it, except that I do remember that I really don't care.

Is there any reason that there have been virtually no sales of this book the U.S. of A.?

What I have done (one cent)

2007-07-22T20:09:00.000-04:00

1. I finished two books. One, I enjoyed. One, I didn't.

I enjoyed David Horowitz's memoir, "Radical Son". Here goes: Horowitz has led a number of lives. First as a son of New York communists, raised in the 1940s and 1950s, he was a part of an interesting historical community. Second, as an intellectual prodigy and a would be philosopher, and published academic author. Third, as a husband and father of four. Fourth, as a California radical, involved with all the other California radicals, and especially with members of the Black Panthers. Fifth, as a left wing journalist. Sixth, with his partner Peter Collier, a mainstream biographer of the Rockefeller, Kennedy and Ford families. Seventh, as a victim of a mid-life crisis, leaving his wife and family and having a few affairs, and two more unsuccessful marriages. Finally, as a right wing author and pundit, from the time of the Reagan administration onward.

Horowitz needs ideology, it appears. He goes from Marxism to radical Conservatism with hardly a stop in between. He was equally devoted to both.

Horowitz also needs people, as he himself admits. His Marxist, his intellectual, his left-wing, his Black Panther, his biographical subject, and his right wing friends. All high powered. He was always right in the middle of everything.

None of this makes for deciding that Horowitz is an admirable character. But all of it makes for good reading. And especially interesting are the many pages devoted to the Black Panthers. For anyone interested in left wing California politics of the 1960s and 1970s, the book is essential.

The other book is a short novel called (in English) "Dreaming Jungles" by French author Michel Rio. It is just over 100 pages.

There is an article in this morning's newspaper that says that the French think too much. And that is the case with this short book (that seems like a long book). A story of two naturalists looking at chimpanzee society in Africa 100 years ago (one man, one woman; one English, one French) becomes a vehicle for discussing Darwin and natural selection, and religion and art, and science and philosophy and literature. The story line probably runs 25 of the 100 pages. The rest is all discussion.

Why is there so much of this sort of speculation in France? Is it the language, the red wine, or the cheese?

2. The new establishment. When Sirius Coffee Shop closed on Connecticut Avenue at the Van Ness Metro spot, I was concerned that it would be replaced by an establishment lacking in personality. I should not have worried. It is becoming a Starbucks. What a great thing. Now, residents of this area will not have to go four or five blocks distant to find a Starbucks. God works in wondrous ways. (Message to God: there are still three or four blocks in DC without a Starbucks. Please keep your omnipresent eyes open)

3. The plays. I saw two. First, at Forum yesterday, I saw Don DeLillo's "Valparaiso", about (apparently) a lonely, disconnected man who had to take a business trip to Valparaiso, Indiana, and concoted a story about going instead by accident to Valparaiso, Chile, so as to gether 24-7 media attention. Which he did. But which did not make him feel any more connected. An interesting premise, but I would like to see the playwright working a little harder to sharpen the play and its premise (but don't I always).

And today, I saw "Margherita" as part of the Capital Fringe festival, the story of Mussolini and his long time Jewish mistress, Margherita Sarfatti. This is a great (and important) story, but the playwright blew it by once again coming up with an unlikely situation (Mussolini paying visits to his now ex-mistress in order to retrieve fifteen years of love letters). The best part of the play was the acting of Marian Licha as the title character; the worst was Paul McLane who tried to pass muster as Benito Mussolini.

Pangs of the Messiah (26 cents)

2007-07-20T13:22:00.000-04:00

The play - "Pangs of the Messiah" by Motti Lerner, now in the middle of a very successful first-ever English language run at Theater J.

A "settler" family living in the Occupied Territories/West Bank in the year 2012. A final peace treaty leading to the creation of a Palestinian state is imminent. The family lives on territory that will become part of the new Palestine.

The father, a rabbi and leader of the settler bloc, very influential. The mother, follows the father and runs an elementary school. The older son, just returned from three years in New York, and his wife, originally from Tel Aviv and less committed to the settler movement. The younger son, mentally challenged, is building his own house down the street from his parents. The daughter, pregnant with her fourth child, helps her mother at the school. Her husband, more radical, served a prison term for the murder of a number of Arabs, and is either considered a crazy or a saint. This son's father, an old friend of the rabbi, who is also involved in the movement. And off stage, CNN, telecasting the latest news.

The family is united in opposition to the treaty. Their reasons are a combination of "this is our home" and "we are doing the work of God, to encourage the appearance of the Messiah". Their preferred methods of opposition, from not quite Gandhi to virtually Baruch Goldstein, vary.

The story builds to a personal, political, human, and spiritual climax. Everyone loves this play. I did not care for it. Not that it was bad, because it isn't. But I did not think it was at all that special.

Why?

There were several reasons. For one, I did not think that the characterizations were deep enough. Or subtle enough. They were each too predictable.

For another, I couldn't figure out the historical context, which is very important to this play.
In 2012, there had apparently been a series of moves which had already moved Israeli out of control over large parts of the West Bank. But there was no Palestinian state (leaving the question: what was there?). This piece meal evacuation over the next five years is unrealistic.

And now, it was time for the final pull out, with a treaty that would create a Palestinian state. The country and the world was for it, but this family and other members of the its community were against it. After all, it was their houses which would be affected. And they cannot find allies, anywhere within the Israeli community.

So, what is the play really about? They were protesting the destruction of their small community? Yes, there was some talk of God's plan in giving the land to the Jews, but a lot of the land had apparently already been given back, and this ideology did not seem central. There was certainly no concern as to the fate of the country (in spite of what happens at the end of the play); this is not a political play.

So, it wasn't quite religious ideology. It wasn't politics. It was basically about holding on to your own house. But this is not what the play was trying to say, was it? I don't know. Everything was too shallow.

And, because this was not political, there was no sense that giving back this land would hurt Israel the nation. There was no fear that Palestine would be ungovernable. There was no reference to Hamas, or any other issues concerning the new Palestinian state.

This is because the play was written twenty years ago, before Hamas, before the security wall, before a lot of things. And it might have made more sense then. The idea that today (or in 2012), the country would be indifferent to a peace treaty that would take an established settlement within the security wall and destroy it is very hard for me to grasp on any of the three levels: political, personal and religious.

So to me, the play failed to pass the reality test. And that was its biggest problem.

How Exciting

2007-07-18T21:32:00.000-04:00

Of the four semi-finalists we saw today at the piano competition (four of the nine of that category), three will be the finalists. Sara Daneshpour and Spencer Myer from the US and Sofya Gulyak of Russia.

Waiting for 7:45

2007-07-18T18:47:00.000-04:00

That's the time that the three finalists of the William Kapell piano competition will be announced on the University of Maryland website. We went this afternoon to see the final (of 3 days) of the semi-finals in the chamber music competition. My hope is that Sofya Gulyak, who played a Schumann trio with two U. Md. faculty members makes the finals. Having only heard four of the nine semi-finalists, I cannot say that she is the best pianist but I thought she was in the lead this afternoon.

And that is saying something because they are all excellent. The competition, now held every four years, had 27 invited entrants, ranging in age from 20 to 33, and from many countries. Their bios in the program show them all to be early prodigies, well schooled, and with quite a bit of performance experience of various types.

The requirements are to play solo, chamber music, concerto excerpts and, for the three finalists, a concerto with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra on Saturday night. More to report then.

And Speaking of the Future of Humanity......

2007-07-18T08:53:00.000-04:00

I went yesterday mid-day to the Holocaust Memorial Museum, because I wanted to see if their book store had a copy of the book containing the James McDonald diaries. They seem to have been sold out.

But I did look at two of the special exhibits at the museum, the one on the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion", and the one on the children of the Lodz ghetto.

I have to give credit to the Holocaust Museum. Their designers may be turning out the best-designed museum exhibits in the city, and perhaps consistently. Both of these exhibits are extremely well done.

I had wanted to see the Protocols exhibit. It consists of nothing more than about 20 versions of the Protocols, published in different languages at different times, and several refutation pieces, placed into window-like settings on a series of very busy temporary poster-walls, nicely arranged. The poster-walls contain, as background, photos and newspaper stories, and as insets, material to describe the history and uses of the Protocols

The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, which continue to get reproduced, distributed and sold today throughout the world (particularly in certain Arab countries) and on the Internet, are, as everyone really knows, fabricated fiction. I am sure that this is known to those to reproduce, translate, publish and distribute.

So, why does distribution continue? And why does fiction become, in some minds, fact?

All I can think of is that the Protocols pick up on something that many people generally believe and fear, that the Jews internationally conspire to control the world. If this is what the Jews do, this is one way that they might do it. And since there is no proof that they do it in any other way, this must be the way. Therefore, this fiction becomes historic fact. And, although the protocols are set in time-gone-by, not only historic fact, because the conspiracies of the Jews continue today, and will continue tomorrow.

In other words, the Protocols provide a basis for something that some people believe so strongly, that their rationally required condition of disbelief is suspended, and the false becomes the true.

But this does not normally happen in fiction, does it? People do not think that Harry Potter, or Hamlet, or even the Merchant of Vence is true.

Where is the precedent?

Aha. It is the bible. It is the Koran. It is that religious writing which is deemed true, irrespective of whether or not it is historically proven, or even historically possible.

The Protocols of the Elders of Zion are a religious text.

(As to the exhibit on the children of the Lodz ghetto, it proceeds chronologically through photos, writings, remembrances, documents, videos and memorabilia. It is an attractive exhibit, it is an educational exhibit, the exhibits are placed so you can see them, the writings are placed so you can read them, there is plenty of room, the are sufficient seats at the videos that groups can be accommodated.

The treatment of Mordecai Rumkowski, the Nazi's selected leader of the ghetto is very interesting. In fact, he is in some ways the focus of the exhibit. Good guy? Awful guy? The exhibit does not really take a position. What did the ghetto dwellers think of him? Remember, that the individual with a similar position in Vienna, Rabbi Mermelstein, was hated by the community; was he any different?)

Win some, lose some (one cent)

2007-07-17T22:26:00.000-04:00

I went to see "la Vie en Rose", the movie about Edith Piaf, this evening, with high hopes. A French movie, it has won a number of awards. But it was not to be. Edith Piaf's voice, as always, is remarkable, although the movie does not show it off to its best. But both her life, and this movie, were extraordinarily sad and depressing. But was her life always as depressing as the movie made it out to be?

But let's talk about reviews. I had previous said that I thought that there must be two movies named "A Mighty Heart", the one that I saw, and the one that my friends saw. Looking at several on-line reviews, I discover that I am correct. For example, Roger Ebert and other reviewers saw the precise movie that I saw, while still other reviews saw the precise movie my friends saw.

As to "La Vie en Rose", much the same. Several reviewers saw the overly depressing movie that I watched last night, while others saw one of the best biopics ever made.

How can this be? And what does it mean for the future of humanity?

"A Mighty Heart"

2007-07-17T09:27:00.000-04:00

We were with friends over the weekend who had seen "A Mighty Heart" and who were vocally critical of it as being nothing other than a virtuoso piece for Angelina Jolie, and telling nothing about why Daniel Pearl was kidnapped.

I saw the movie last night, and can only conclude that there are two separate movies being circulated, both called "A Mighty Heart", both ostensibly about the kidnapping and murder of Daniel Pearl, and both starring Angelina Jolie. But there the resemblance ends.

The "A Mighty Heart" I saw last night was absolutely riveting, one of the few movies that I have ever seen that kept me on the edge of my seat with continual anxiety throughout. I was surprised both because of my friends' weekend reviews, but also because I did not expect much from the story. A journalist in Pakistan goes on an interview that he perhaps should have known better than pursuing, is kidnapped and murdered by radical Islamists. Leaves behind a young, beautiful, French and pregnant journalist wife. Very sad, obviously. But it would not appear that this would be the makings of a great film or adventure story.

But that is what it is. Karachi comes alive, socially and visually. The life of a young western couple about to leave the country and have their first child, but living in the chaos of Pakistan becomes almost intelligible. The possibility of scoring a major interview with a radical sheik and the risks (and yes, the precautions) taken in getting the interview are easily understood.

And he does not come home. And his wife Marianne and her support from the Wall Street Journal community and, yes, from the Pakistanis with whom she is in contact, make perfect sense.

It is the effort put into the search by everyone, Pakistani officials, friends, informal contacts, American embassy and, yes, CIA workers, Wall Street Journal staffers. It is this, the effort, and the complexity of the search, that is truly remarkable.

The acting is extraordinary. Not only Jolie, but everyone. You are not watching actors playing Johnny and June Carter Cash. You are watching the real thing. You are there.

The direction, the seamless moving from scene to scene (with most scenes relatively short, and absolutely no wasted footage or dialogue), and the building crescendo from start to finish were nothing short of remarkable. And, presumably, true to the story and to the personalities involved.

I have a copy of Marianne Pearl's book. It never occurred to me that I wanted to read it. But now, I think I will.

One question remains. The title of the movie (and book), which may be a bit misleading. If it is Daniel Pearl's heart that is mighty, you could expect a little more information about Daniel Pearl. But the title should not be a criterion for judging the movie.

A Day in the Country (one cent)

2007-07-15T09:40:00.001-04:00

The 17th annual Contemporary American Theater Festival in Shepherdstown, WV. We have probably been there three or four other times, usually with an overnight stay, so that we can see all four performances. This time, we went down and back the same day, seeing two of the four. We had not been for a few years.

Thoughts:

1. The Drive. I-270 to Frederick, and I-70 west to ALT US 40, then through Middletown to Boonesboro, left on MD 34 through Sharpsburg and over the Potomac into Shepherdstown. It is just over 60 miles, and (once you get beyond Frederick), a very, very pretty drive. Beautiful hill and mountain scenery, attractive and historic towns, the Anteitam battlefields.

2. The Festival. More crowded, more professional in its staging, clearly spending a lot more on the technical aspects of the productions.

3. The Food. A disappointment. Lunch at Stone Soup, where it was hard to find the chicken curry in the chicken curry whole wheat wrap, was mediocre but comfortable. More disappointing was the Yellow Brick Bank, formerly a favorite of ours, but also disappointing at our last visit to Shepherdstown a year or so ago, when we had lunch at the restaurant. it is still a very attractive restaurant, but the food was minor league, while the prices remained in the majors. The salmon (and as I understand it the halibut) was extremely bland, and no one raved about what they had.

4. Play #1 - My Name is Rachel Corrie. Rachel Corrie is the 23 year old American killed by an IDF bulldozer in Gaza in 2003. The play is compiled from her diary and journals and emails. She is an idealistic young girl, not satisfied living her life out in Olympia WA, and who thinks that it is everyone's obligation to fix the world. Without knowing it (perhaps), the personification of tikkun olam. Somehow (not clear how), she joins a group dedicated to helping the Palestinians in Gaza, is trained in non-violence, and with others go to Gaza to work with the people. The Palestinians are very welcoming. Sh e is doing her thing, hoping (wondering) if it will help. She starts thinking, Ann Frank-style, that all people are really good, but at the end (and not surprisingly) begins to think that the Israelis must be a breed apart. This is not surprising, since she had spent several months in the line of fire. There is nothing in the play about politics, per se. Nothing about any political issue, just a social issue, the ranting against people being forced into the situation of the Gaza residents. Or about strategy. The play is about Rachel Corrie, and what goes on in her mind, as she (to her own surprise) does some very brave things.

The play has been very controversial, as being pro-Palestinian, and anti-Israel. I was very surprised at how inaccurate this interpretation was. With the exception of a line or two, the play is only about Corrie, and about the universal problem of suffering during times of trouble. Lisa Traiger in the review of the play in Jewish Week, said much the same thing. Her review was quite accurate. There is nothing for the Jewish world to be upset about here and if it is upset, it is not the problem of the play.

Rachel Corrie is a one woman, one act play. Anne Marie Nest is to be commended for her performance, and for learning all the lines. My question is whether her portrayal of Corrie mirrored Corrie's carriage and demeanor. Before I give my overall impression of her performance, I would like to know that. I know that Corrie's parents were in Shepherdstown to see an early performance; I would like to know what they thought of the production. I also wonder what Corrie herself would think about what is happening in Gaza today, where the Israelis are no longer the ones doing the shooting.

Following the play, there was a talk back with Yonatan Shapira, a former IDF fighter turned peace activist. In a tent on the grounds of the Shepherd U. campus, it drew a surprisingly big crowd. But it did not look like his presentation, nor the Q and A which was to follow, would be fun, and we left.

5. Play #2 - 1001. We were all looking forward to Jason Grote's play, a spoof on Sheherazade and her 1001 tales. It was a mainstage production and technically very complicated, and visually appealing for the most part. The acting was of high caliber. But the play, jumping forward from an old Persian kingdom to New York in 2001, was as cluttered as cluttered can be, none of the characters were at all sympathetic, and the cameo appearances (in the stories) of people like Gustav Flaubert, Jorge Luis Borges, Alan Dershowitz and a singing/dancing Osama bin Laden, were downright bizarre. Many groups (the Moslems, the Persians, the Arabs, the Jews, the Christians) were parodied without mercy. Some were undeserving; others deserve the criticism, but not in a comic fashion. I was in fact embarrassed for the playwright and the cast.

But the large audience seem to have loved it. So perhaps, I am being harsh. Maybe I was just expecting something different. I went with a very positive attitude. What turned me off? It was not the humor; I like humor. I think it was the insulting way that Grote (or the director) dealt with the portrayal of each ethnic/religious group. In part it seemed so mean spirited that it destroyed the humor for me even where I thought that the subject could be treated with humor, and by destroying the humor, it turned me so away from the performance that I could no longer look at it a manner that would enable me to enjoy those facets of it that I would otherwise have appreciated.

OK, it's late, but....

2007-07-11T23:16:00.000-04:00

When you start watching the PBS biography of guitarist Les Paul, you can't turn it off, even as it approaches 11:30. And it came after a delightful hour of Dan Abrams' news show on MSNBC.

We won't talk about ABC tonight. Although its American Idol-like show about celebrity look-a-likes was very entertaining, it was offset by the reality show on American inventors, which deserves immediate deep-sixing.

Back to Les Paul.

Interesting, if Wrong

2007-07-10T19:10:00.000-04:00

On my trip, I picked up and read "Betrayal at Pearl Harbor", written by two British (OK, one Australian) intelligence experts, one of whom was deeply involved in breaking Japanese codes in the Pacific during the second world war. Their premise is that not only did some Americans have knowledge of the Japanese strike on Pearl Harbor in time to minimize damage, but failed to recognize it, but that the British had broken the Japanese military codes (as opposed to the Japanese diplomatic codes, which had been broken by the Americans as well) but failed to tell the Americans. (This is a loose paraphrase; details may be not quite correct, but you get the gist)

The result was that the British could have told the Americans about the Japanese preparation for the attack.

OK, so the two countries did not work totally in concert (after all, the Americans were not in the war), and even within each country's multi-headed intelligence operations, cooperation was not always there (as it has not been in the US with respect to CIA, FBI, etc).

But the premise is that Churchill wanted Pearl Harbor to be attacked, because he knew that would bring America into a fight he would otherwise lose. This novel theory has, according to what I can see on the internet, not been accepted by others.

Sicko

2007-07-10T08:03:00.000-04:00

After having watched Good Morning America yesterday and having been impressed by the segment they devoted to Joel Siegel, I decided to give ABC a chance and watch the network last night. I did, through prime time, 8 to 11.

Wife Swap: here two women trade houses and families for two weeks. During the first week, the guest wife must go by the family's rules. During the second week, the guest wife sets the family's rules. Dumb, you say. OK, but maybe entertaining? Imagine this. Wife 1 is a fitness freak and perfectionist, who wins fitness titles, gets up at 3:30 a.m. to exercise and fix high protein breakfasts. Her kids are all super athletes. Her house is perfect. Everyone does their chores. Nothing is out of place. Wife 2 is a dwarf, or to be PC in the show, a "little person". So is her husband. They are not athletes, they are very laid back, they have never exercised in their lives, their house is a bit of a chaotic mess. 'Nuff said.

Extreme Makeover: OK, so my ability to concentrate and my interest began to lag. This appears to be a show about fat people, who are given an extreme makeover and turn into people like wife 1 in Wife Swap. There were a bunch of teenagers, but I didn't follow that plot line (by now the sound on the tv was off); there was a woman from Washington (maybe her name was Heidi), who had lost 100 pounds, but still had the old skin flab, was very depressed, and looked at the start of the show that she hadn't slept in a couple of years and must have been allergic to soap or make up. By the end of the show, she looked like a cover girl, had had surgery to get rid of the fat, ate salads, wore a bathing suit, wore makeup, and had long styled hair. And, of yes, a new nose (her nose was bandaged through most of the show).

Super Nanny (or something like that): now the sound was off, and I probably only glanced at the screen for or five times over the hour. I saw the parents (she was 35 and looked normal; he was 47, and had long blond hair) and the 3 year old (Nathan?), who was shown primarily terrorizing all of the other shoppers in a supermarket. He was clearly more than anyone could be expected to handle, except for SUPERNANNY, who came like Mary Poppins sans umbrella in a taxicab to the rescue. I assume that, over the course of the hour, Nathan turned into a model young gentleman and lived happily ever after, his father had time to go the barber, and Super Nanny went on to her next conquest.

Unbelievable. Sicko.

But Some Things Were Terre Haute

2007-07-09T21:32:00.000-04:00

1. Parts of Bristol, VA and the food at Jersey Lily's

2. Jackson and Lebanon, TN

3. Parts of Little Rock

4. The Mexican restaurant in Marshfield MO

5. All of the towns of western Indiana, and some of the towns in Pennsylvania

6. The traffic on I-68, where they narrowed the road (in two places) to one lane highways

7. Weavers Restaurant in Hancock MD.

8. Hancock MD.

Everthing was not Terre Haute

2007-07-09T21:24:00.001-04:00

Let's talk about the good things.

1. Winchester VA, a terrific place to spend a few days.

2. The drive generally through the Shenandoah.

3. Roanoke and particularly the new museum, and the bagel place where I had breakfast.

4. The tour of Nashville, including the downtown tourist area and the Parthenon.

5. Blue Fish, an extraordinary restaurant in Memphis

6. The exhibit in the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis that goes through not only the night of the murder of Martin Luther King, but the entire investigation and trial, and looming questions.

7. Seeing my Memphis cousins and meeting my two new cousins (both by marriage) and liking them.

8. The Flying Fish Restaurant in Little Rock (funky and good) for lunch

9. Visiting aunt and cousins in Hot Springs, and looking at the bathhouse which is open as a Park Service Museum.

10. Route 7 heading north from Hot Springs

11. Seeing Branson (ok, maybe this wasn't good, but it wasn't bad, either)

12. Seeing family in St. Louis for a one-night stand

13. Going through Richmond, Indiana and St. Clairville Ohio

14. Looking at the possibilities of somewhat decrepit, but very appealing, Wheeling WV

15. Driving Highway 40 through Pennslvania until is crosses Interstate 68

16. Interstate 68, but also High German Road.

17. Getting home, not the worse for wear.

Joel Siegel (2 cents)

2007-07-09T17:10:00.000-04:00

"Good Morning America" had a segment this morning honoring Joel Siegel, their movie critic who passed away recently after a long struggle with cancer. It was quite a nice tribute.

They talked a bit about Siegel's sense of fun, his ability to monitor young ABC staffers, and his general qualities as a human being.

He was a transplanted Californian, who loved NY, and thought that the only culture in LA could be found in its yogurt, and that the Berkeley football team would never win any games until they learned how to put cleats on sandals.

He loved movies and was a respected reviewer and critic, but he refused to review plays. Reviewing plays, he said, was too cruel. A bad review, and the actors are hurt, no one comes, the play closes, everyone is affected. A movie is different. Everyone (almost everyone) has already been paid, and the movie has already been made. Interesting, I thought.

Abu Ghraib, Step Aside

2007-07-07T22:30:00.000-04:00

It might be worse to be sentenced to time in Terra Haute IN.

We stopped at a restaurant which claimed to have been in existence forever, to serve excellent Italian food (meat, chicken, seafood and pasta) and to have introduced pizza to the city. There were several Harley's parked outside, weird people in the bar, and a couple sitting outside, who told us that they weren't sure if they had food or not at the restaurant. A waitress came out and told us that their kitchen was being renovated ( a likely story) and that they had pizza and, at night, a dinner special.

so much for that, so across the street to the Irish pub, where the Greek salad was hardly Greek and the turkey ruben took forever "because he had to carve the turkey" [loaf].

What a dead place Terra Haute seems to be, even though it is the home of Indiana State (send me anywhere but there, please).

But what a county court house.

And that is what Indiana seems to excel in. Late 19th century county courthouses.

So Who Would Have Guessed It?

2007-06-29T21:15:00.000-04:00

Roanoke is a treat. It is a very attractive city, with a most livable downtown - galleries, coffee shops, hippies, the same kind of street people you see in Seattle (looking like they've been at sea too long), etc. And they are building a new art museum that will look like a Frank Ghery creation (designed by a Los Angeles architect named Stout), and will become a tourist attraction. It is right downtown, next to the 365 day a year outside market. The museum is currently housed in a building which has a number of museums, as well as a theater (not a movie house), which is very nice in and of itself. I also went to the Virginia Transportation Museum, which has a lot of old N & W Railway cars, some automobiles (but not enough) and a great electric train setup. It is probably worth going for the electric trains, but not yet for anything else.

Driving south, the country is beautiful and the vibrancy of the towns continue to depend on the presence or absence of universities. But by and large, they are more pleasant than one would think. No reason that a week could not be spent in and around them, looking at history, architecture, scenery, and eating at a variety of restaurants.

In Bristol VA/TN tonight. Ate downtown at the very noisy State Street Bar and Grill. Considering my grouper, cole slaw and sweet potato fries cost $9.99, it was excellent. Not going to stick around Bristol tomorrow, too far to drive. But I was surprised to see that downtown is virtually all antique shops, and some very fancing ones at that.

Plaid Skirts and Topless Gowns

2007-06-29T21:12:00.000-04:00

In Winchester, they were celebrating the opening of bagpipe camp. About 50 young men (looked about bar mitzvah age) were getting together at Shenandoah U. One mother, staying at my hotel, wanted to make sure that I knew that her "son did not always dress like that".

And in Roanoke it was time for the Miss Virginia pageant. Either they are crowning them much younger than before or they also had a Miss Pre-Teen Virginia warm up, because the two girls with their mother whom I saw at the Holiday Inn Express were about the same age as the bagpipe boys.

No Oceans on Eleven

2007-06-29T08:05:00.000-04:00

The drive from Washington to Winchester on Route 50 is an attractive one, as you go through Middleburg (OK it was very hot, I had a small lunch and I did stop for a delicious strawberry ice cream cone), which has its own attractions and Upperville (now you see it, now you don't), and by an incredible number of large estates (and you know there are many more that you do not see).

For a city of about 25,000, Winchester offers a lot. I already posted about Little Me at Shenandoah University, where there is a lot of construction going on, including a new student center and a new business school. Historically, you can visit an office which George Washington, the surveyor, used, as well as headquarters of Generals Sheridan and Stonewall Jackson. There is a museum devoted to the Civil War in the 1840 court house (now replaced), perhaps the most attractive library I have seen (built in 1912 and restored most recently in 2000), and the Museum of the Shenandoah Valley, a new museum and landscaped grounds devoted to the history and culture of the region which apparently is well worth seeing. There are also a significant number of large, distinctive older houses, well maintained.

Driving south on Highway 11, the country is beautiful and you get near (not exactly to) Front Royal, where I had lunch, and which appears to have less interest to the traveler, although Shenandoah Caverns nearby must be worth exploring. Continuing the drive south on 11, you go through Woodstock, Mt. Jackson, Harrisonburg (home of James Madison U), Verona and Staunton (home of Woodrow Wilson, another town filled with historic interest). Then you pass close to Lynchburg (VMI and the Jerry Falwell world), and finally get to Roanoke, where I am now, a city of 250,000, where I have never been (and which I guess sitting here, I will never need to come again). I will use this morning to explore, before going about 150 more miles down the road to the Tennessee border.

Food in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia

2007-06-28T21:09:00.000-04:00

I take it that there is no Shenandoah cuisine. If there was, why would I have wound up at the Texas Grill last night, and at Jersey Lilly's tonight? These two restaurants (which may or may not be chains) are very, very similar. The interiors are dark, rough wood, and they are steakhouses. Each time I got fish. Last night, salmon. Tonight, flounder. Each was more than adequate. Both had good coffee.

Well, here is my question?

Why did I think Texas in Winchester was a good dining experience, and Jersey in Roanoke the opposite?

Joyce Carol Oates is/and Little Me

2007-06-28T08:12:00.003-04:00

Two things to report: listening to Joyce Carol Oates Tuesday night at Politics and Prose, and seeing Little Me on Wednesday on the campus of Shenandoah University in Winchester VA.

Oates has just published her 36th book, The Gravedigger's Daughter, a novel set in upstate New York and based (loosely) on the experience of her grandmother, whose German Jewish parents had come to this country in the 1890s. Oates knew her grandmother well, but until someone had decided to write a biography of Oates and discovered that her great grandparents were Jewish immigrants, Oates was totally unaware of this heritage.

Politics and Prose was very crowded for her appearance, and getting there twenty minutes early (unheard of for me) did not get me a seat. So I took a book and sat on the floor in a corner, where at least I could lean my back against something. I read about twenty pages, and could have kept going.

I listed to Oates' opening comments, but when she began to read, I went outside, coming back about twenty minutes later to hear the Q and A. I did not want to hear the excerpts Oates was reading. I wanted to be surprised.

How do you write? This is one of the questions that she was asked. She said that she knew that she wrote idiosyncratically. She does a lot of solitary walking and running, and while she is on the move, she is visualizing scenes. Not writing them, she says, visualizing them, almost like cinematography. When she gets back, she writes the scenes, as best as she can remember them, in longhand. Then she stores them and then, when she thinks she has enough scenes, she goes back to them, shuffles them around, and puts them together. She now types up a general plot outline composed of these scenes. Her writing embellishes this outline.

You published your first novel at 26? Yes, but I wrote my first novel at 6. Even before I could write. I just scribbled and scribbled.

Are you going to publish your memoirs? My memoirs? I am so uninteresting. I don't think I have led an interesting life. There really is nothing to read about. Even when I am being interviewed, I don't have much to say. I always wind up interviewing the interviewer. They have all led more interesting lives than I have.

What advice for a young writer who doesn't know how to start? First, talk to the older people in your family. The ones who came here, if they are still alive, or ones who knew them. That's the generation with the stories. And then, join a writers' group. That is the way you learn what part of your writing attracts others.

It was a very interesting hour.

Yesterday afternoon, I drove to Winchester on my way to Tennessee, and stayed at a Best Western (wi-fi in each room and free)across the street from Shenandoah University. They have a four play musical theater season each summer, with students from the conservatory program and what they call "guest artists", although these seem by and large to be faculty.

I saw that Little Me was playing and went across to the large theater's box office and bought a ticket. It was opening night.

I had never seen Little Me, and it was not high on my list of wants. But it is a lot of fun. As a play (Neil Simon)it is the ultimate in corn, and does not hang together particularly well. Based on a book by Patrick Dennis (he had something to do with Auntie Mame, too? Or am I mixing things up?), it tells a rags to riches story of Belle Schlumpfert (rhymes with comfort, in one of the songs), who is a combination Candide and Zelig. And Forest Gump. Always in the middle of things, always winding up worse for the wear, and in the end coming out ahead. Pure corn. A few songs you know ("I love you, as far as I am able" and "I've never been kissed, by a real live girl") and a bunch of novelty songs. The young Belle was excellent, and the male lead (who plays 5 different comic roles) was an absolute kick. (I was sitting next to a good friend of his, who was rolling on the floor)

You never know what you will find, I guess, in small town America.

Oh, yes, and "Little Me": could be the motto for Joyce Carol Oates, no?

If You Can't Stand the Heat (2 cents)

2007-06-26T22:23:00.000-04:00

I go into Jyati Indian restaurant in Adams Morgan to pick up my carryout dinner. It's a hot,muggy Washington evening. One of the regular waiters says to me: This heat is awful, just awful.

Where are you from, I ask? Bangladesh, he says.

Then aren't you used to this?

Why do you think I left Bangladesh?

Another Life (25 cents)

2007-06-23T15:37:00.000-04:00

I have just finished reading about another life. This one belongs (perhaps now it belonged, I am not sure) to Leo Saal, who wrote about himself in a very interesting book which no one has read called "Crossings". Published by a small Washington press in 1996, it tells the story of a young man, born in St. Petersburg in 1912, but whose mother was German and who was identified as German on his Russian internal passport, who was raised in middle class circumstances. His father was an officer in the Czar's army, but who preferred his side business of buying and restoring residential real estate in what became Leningrad.

After the revolution, which the family (and according to the book many middle class families) did not necessarily oppose, his father worked for the German Red Cross, which operated for several more years in the USSR. And during the 1920s, the time of Lenin's NEP (New Economic Policy), according to Saal, everything seemed pretty normal. The shops were open, the economy was strong, they even traveled to see his grandmother and other relatives in Germany. But in 1930, first his father and then Saal himself was arrested ("It was a high class crowd in this prison: intelligentsia, medium rank officials, and a few party members. Mostly 'fifty-eighters-, article 58 of the old criminal code with its fourteen paragraphs covered all political crimes"). And by the time the 1930s ended, Saal had been sent into the Gulag (for reasons unclear) working in various prison towns in Siberia, his father had died in prison, and his mother was exiled to a distant town ("In December 1934 Kirov was assassinated. He was Leningrad's popular Party Secretary and a potential rival to Stalin. As a reprisal, thousands of Leningrad residents were ordered to leave the city for faraway places in early 1935, among them were my mother and sister"). After his release from prison, when he was unable to live in Moscow or Leningrad (or several other cities), he led a hand-to-hand existence, marrying a Moscow medical student (with whom he spent surprisingly little time) and trying to keep in touch with his friends.

In 1939, after Germany's quick takeover of Poland, he was inducted into the army, his wife moved to Tblisi to escape potential fighting and, as he says, he did not see her again for 48 years. During the war, when it appeared that Germany was going to win, he switched sides (his first Crossing) and became a German (under German law he was automatically a German citizen) acting as an interpreter for the German army. When Germany lost the war, he remained a short time in West Germany (his mother was living there then as well), he married again (it was unclear that he was ever officially divorced), and eventually with his wife and children (probably sometime during the 1950s) came to the United States, where he finally wound up living in Chevy Chase. He was an artist; whether he did other work here, I do not know.

The book is interesting in so many ways. First, the issues of Jews and anti-Semitism play a small role in his memoirs. He knew that the Jews were discriminated against in Germany but, if you believe him, he knew nothing of the atrocities there or in Poland or the Ukraine when he was part of the German army. Second, he makes the NEP days in Russia look like capitalism without compromise ("In a short span of time, stores opened everywhere. On the Nevskiy Prospekt and Sadovaya Street the mile long arcades of Gostinyy and Apraksin Dvors again featured dozens of stores. Yeliseyev, the famous giant delicatessen store, offered an enless variety of foods; pyramids of Crimean fruit embellished many store windows. Lohr's bakeries and cafes sprangup everywhere."). Leningrad in 1930 was all culture ("Whenever there is a symphony concert and I am not at work, I got a ticket for Aleka and me. Bruno Walter, Klemperer, Zemlinsky, Knappertsbusch, Ansermet, Stiedry, Hindemith, Kuhlenkampf and others cam ein those years to conduct the Leningrad Symphony.") Third, his description of the Gulag and the various camps and work stations throughout Siberia ("Welcome to Bamlag!....the Baikal-Amur Correctional Labor Camp, situated between Lake Baikal and the Amur River, was organized in 1932 for the construction of a new railroad line to substitute for the Manchurian Railroad, now in the hands of the Japanese."), the type of work that was done, how much freedom one had, how sentences were arbitrarily extended or curtailed, etc. form a picture very different from what one might expect (I was not aware then of how lucky I was to have been arrested in 1933 and discharged in 1936. Had I been arrested after Kirov's murder, I would have served my full term until 1940 and most certainly would have received, without further trial, an extended term"). It reminded me a bit of the memoirs of Anna Lavrova, which I read earlier as it told the tale of her following her husband into the Gulag. And then of course, the ease with which he became Russian, German, American.

More than anything else, though, it tells the story of a life, very different from yours or mine, where somethings just seem very familiar. For example, his grandfather's nursery business in pre-war St. Petersburg ("He raised 50,000 roses. From Germany, Belgium, Holland and Japan he imported flowers in great numbers, including 70,000 hyacinths, 35,000 tulips, and 5,000 white lillies annually. At his peak, he employed a staff of 200"--how different from Russia under Communist rule). He visited friends of his wife ("Irina had arranged for us to stay with friends of her family, the Vereyskiys. ....He was a well known graphic artist and curator of prints at the Hermitage. His son Orest, also an artist, was a friend of Irina's. Orest's parents, although separated, maintained a common household which included their son and Mrs. Vereyskiy's new companion, a historian. Orest's mother was a well know writer of children's books.") It doesn't seem so different, does it? And I guess in some ways, it was not

Reality Check (12 cents)

2007-06-21T15:34:00.000-04:00

There were a number of items in yesterday's Washington Examiner that gave me pause. I am setting them down here because I have learned that no one but me reads the Examiner. It is my own private paper.

First, there was an ad for a "lifetime of home remodeling solutions". I cannot even conceive of what that could include.

Second, there was an article about Vice Admiral Eric Olson becoming head of the U.S. Special Operations Command, as if this were the most important job in the world. Perhaps it is, but truth be told, I never head of the Special Operations Command, and nothing in this article gave me a hint of what it does. Is it that secret?

Third, "The Phantom of the Opera" is opening, for the umphteenth time, at the Kennedy Center but this time apparently with a new twist. Now the pastry chef of the Roof Top Restaurant (I didn't even know that they had any kind of chef up there) is serving a Phantom Bar - "a chocolate buttermilk cake covered in chocolate sauce and served with a hand-rolled marzipan rose, a white chocolate Phantom mask and an almond tuile music note".

Fourth, secrecy abounds, and not only with regard to the Special Operations Command. the Metro pension plan is so secret that not even its participants are allowed to learn anything about it. The Old Naval Hospital (again something I never heard of) at 921 Penn. Ave SE (oh, I do know the building) is to be renovated for community use, but no one in the community is to be allowed to participate in discussions of what those uses should be.

Fifth, the mayor of Gaithersburg does not like the budget, so will not sign it, and the law does not appear to permit expenditures by the city outside of what is permitted by its adopted budget.

Sixth, zoo officials cannot tell if the giant panda is pregnant and may not learn until a day or two before she gives birth, if then.

Seventh, Madina Ashimova made her first Washington appearance as the Snow Queen (sponsored by that famous vodka from Kazakhstan, Snow Queen. Huh?) and her dress caught on fire.

Eighth, Tony Bennett got a humanitarian award from Aid Darfur.

Ninth, the new manager of Metro said casually that the system needs "a couple billion dollars" over the next few years to upgrade.

Tenth, and this is reassuring, the headline says: "Fenty has staff training for disaster".

Eleventh, if you want to replace your gutters, would you call www.guttercover.com and get $400 off from the Britt family, or would you call www.mdguttershutter.com and get $500 off with no payments until April 2008 (provided, of course, you make an immediate deposit), or would you be satisfied with $100 off from www.harryhelmet.com, because they bring you every other product so you can see how much better there's is? I know, you would go back to www.fosterremodeling.com, because they have a lifetime of ideas.

Twelfth, in the "World News Section", it is all good: if you were a deadly rebel in Somalia, you can now get amnesty; if you spend your time worrying about the health of your brother Fidel, like Raul Castro does, you might have overlooked the fact that your wife just died; third, if you lived in Baghdad, would you wonder whose side Allah was on, with 78 killed and more than 200 wounded at the Khillani (does khill have anything to do with kill?) mosque; if you were Gazan...., oy.

Thirteenth, on the editorial page they will publish letters with fewer than 150 words. How about words with fewer than 150 letters?

Fourteenth, a woman sued TJ Maxx $550,000 because she slipped on a hanger. In an understatement, her lawyer said "I don't sue for this kind of money for nothing."

Fifteenth, chef Alex Powell of 701 Restaurant, believes in "simple food". The recipe for veal chops include the following simple ingredients: sugar, garlic, chipotle chile, ancho chile, port wine, lime juice, lemon juice, orange juice, fish sauce, shallots, butter, sherry vineger, veal stock, black pepper, tarragon, white asparagus, green asparagus, bacon, puff pastry, olive oil, roasting potatoes, grapeseed oil, argula and, of course, veal chops. Simple.

Sixteenth, if you have surprise guests for dinner, why not give them Gorton's crunchy breaded premium tilapia fillets? This is one of today's "delectable finds for foodies". Along with Gorton's (ready for this?) Potato crunch fish sticks. "almost a cross between potato chips and fish sticks". (Bet they'd go swell with the tilapia.)

Seventeenth, and on the gossip page, the big questions are: Is Katie Holmes pregnant again? Why did Keri Russell name her son River Deary? Why didn't Ashton Kutcher have a date at Teddy's on Saturday night? What were Jay-Z and Beyonce cavorting about on that private yacht off St. Tropez? And did you know that Nicole Kidman is now 40?

Eighteenth, add to the cheery coffee news: "Coffee may protect against blinding eyelid disorder". (Also keeps elephants out of your front yard)

And all that before I even got to the sports page.

Pilgrim Among the Shadows by Boris Pahor

2007-06-19T21:40:00.000-04:00

An interesting memoir, written in the 1970s and translated from Slovenian into English in the 1990s, Pahor writes of his experience as a prisoner/medic in a series of concentration camps during World War II. A non-Jewish perspective. Very well written (a dense, poetic, meandering style), and as would be expected very depressing.

This is the only book by Pahor translated into English. On a website that I found, however, you were invited to read the plot outline of one of his Slovenian books (the plot outline being in English). That book was called Nekropola.

Well, Pilgrim Among the Shadows IS Nekropola. Weird.

A Little About Food

2007-06-19T21:23:00.000-04:00

First, about lunch. Having decided that I was in a lunch rut (always getting my lunch at the same few places, even though the quality was consistent and the prices right), I decided to branch out a bit. Based on yesterday and today, I think this was a mistake.

Yesterday, I went to a little sandwich shop on L Street called Kozey's and ordered a tuna melt on rye. Tuna melts can be excellent; they can be awful. This one was an typical tuna melt. And typical is closer to awful than to excellent.

Today, I went to Soho, a funky place on the corner of P and 22nd, filled with people whose shorts and shirts don't match and who are having lunch with their laptops. The blackboard called the chicken salad "the best". I asked the woman behind the counter if this was true, and she said it was and the she made it. So what could I do? I ordered it on whole grain bread, but unlike the crusty whole grain bread you find at Au Bon Pain, this bread was like whole-grain Wonder bread, if there is such a thing. And the chicken salad was more like chicken salad paste, than chicken salad. I have wanted to try to Soho, because it is around the corner from a book store I frequent, and I can sit there and look through a book (impervious to the electronics surrounding me). But I won't go there again very soon.

As to brunch, we went to Bistrot Au Coin, which is not on a corner and is on Connecticut Avenue near Dupont Circle. It should be terrific, but something is not quite right. It is not quite comfortable, although it looks like it would be. It looks like it could be a little cleaner (of course we walked out of Nathan's in Georgetown a few weeks ago, because it looked like it had not been dusted for a year or two). But the scrambled eggs were first class, the french fries very good, the small salad tasty, the baguettes fresh and crusty, and the expresso good. But there is something about the place not quite right.

As to fancy dinner, on the other hand, I think that Arcadiana (Massachusetts Ave) is one of the most comfortable restaurants imaginable. The food was also very good, although not cheap. Edie had a delicious trout, served on some sort of green vegetable, and I had red fish served on a jambalaya risotto. Both were excellent. Mine was interesting because the red fish by itself was good, and the risotto by itself was good, but when you put them together they excelled. Hannah had veal medallions, which she also said were excellent.

As to cheaper dinner, we went to Colonel Brooks, where Edie's Rockfish reuben, and my salmon caesar salad were first class. Our friend Ray had a too-spicy pasta dish. And the service was capital A abysmal.

And that's a little about food.

Latest news from Sprint (22 cents)

2007-06-19T14:24:00.000-04:00

The sign on the Sprint Cell Phone store says: "Sorry, no technical service today due to a systems failure".

Makes you think.

James Grover McDonald

2007-06-16T14:06:00.001-04:00

The book "Advocate for the Doomed" contains the diary of James Grover McDonald from the years 1932 to 1935. It is over 800 pages long. There will be several additional volumes published over the next several years. If I had all the time in the world, I would love to read through it. But I don't, and that is probably why this book will not be a best seller.

McDonald was the United States' first ambassador to Israel. Before that, he was the League of Nations Commissioner for Refugees. And before that he headed the Foreign Policy Association, advocating an active foreign policy in opposition to the American isolationists.

The book was just published. It contains McDonald's notes about meetings with Hitler, Roosevelt, the future Pius XII and many others. It contains new information, because McDonald believed, from 1933 on, that Hitler and the Nazis were out to destroy the Jews. Well before there were death camps. And (surprise!), no one would believe him. This too will pass, they seemed to think.

McDonald was a diarist, but not a writer. So he went to Thomas Sugrue, a writer but not a diarist, to ghost write his memoirs. Sugrue had already worked with McDonald on a book called Mission to Israel, which dealt with the first years of the Jewish state. So he was a natural. But the book was never written (for one thing, Sugrue died young), and Sugrue's daughter found amongst her father's things, in a box in her basement, fragments of the diary. They looked important to her and, not knowing what else to do with them, she took them to the Holocaust museum. The diary fragments, I believe, dealt with meetings with Cardinal Pacelli, the future pope. The historians at the museum wanted to find other fragments of the diary. They went to Columbia U., where the McDonald papers were kept. No luck. They then located McDonald's daughter, a lecturer at George Mason University in Fairfax, who had 10,000 diary pages at her house, and who had tried unsuccessfully earlier to get publishers interested in them.

Yesterday, at the Holocaust Museum, the editor of the publications, Prof. Richard Breitman of American University, Barbara McDonald Stewart, the daughter, and a museum archivist and a museum historian, all of whom had worked on the publication, discussed the book.

McDonald was prescient. He early saw Hitler's designs. He saw that Jewish emigration from Germany was not the goal. It would only be a step in an attempt to wipe the world clean of Jews, a most corrosive influence on society. The world would be in favor of this, was the feeling of Der Fuhrer. "We'll show the world how to get rid of the Jews", Hitler told McDonald in 1933. (McDonald's mother was German, he spoke German, had German friends, had written favorably about Germany in his younger years, and was generally viewed as pro-German in 1933). McDonald was aghast.

Like Kurt Gerstein, he wanted to get the church active in stopping the anti-Semitic movement throughout much of Europe. Cardinal Pacelli would hear nothing of it. He had just negotiated a Concordat between Berlin and Rome. In return for avoiding political activity, the church would be allowed to function and hold on to its assets. This was all important to the Vatican. And McDonald knew this in 1933.

He liked Roosevelt, and especially liked Eleanor Roosevelt. His relationship with FDR apparently soured as time went to (but in subsequent volumes, not here) as he felt Roosevelt was acting too often from political expediency, rather than a sense of moral duty or responsibility.

Again like Gerstein, McDonald was a failure. His warnings were not heeded. His position as Ambassador to Israel (by now he had become, it appears, a full fledged Zionist supporter) was the high point of his life. After he retired from that position, he spent years pushing the sale of Israel bonds.

Whether the future volumes will be as interesting as this one, I don't know. Should I have shelled out the $35? The book would have been signed by the four speakers/editors. Maybe. But I didn't.

Even Nazis Had Children (12 cents)

2007-06-16T13:53:00.000-04:00

Intuitively, I probably always knew this. It hit home, though, in 1962, when I visited my college roommate's high school exchange student's family in Bad Homburg Germany and saw the pictures of the relatives in SS uniforms on the wall. And, when I was still young, when I met other of my German contemporaries.

When I saw "Either/Or" at Theater J, I thought about the children of Kurt Gerstein, the Nazi hero/anti-hero of the play, and when I wrote a short play to be performed at the 5 x 5 after "Either/Or" closed, I chose to write about Gerstein's daughter, and about her schoolmates' reactions when she told them what her father had done during the war.

Coincidentally, at the McFriends store in Rockville, I saw a copy of a book called "Hitler's Children" by Gerald Posner, and brought it home. I finished it this morning.

The book was written in the mid-1980s, when the children ranged in age from mid-40s to mid-60s. Today, the children of Nazi leaders, to the extent they are still alive, would be 65+ for the most part.

Not surprisingly, the views of the children towards their parents varied greatly. And many such children refused to speak to the author. The book was interesting in that it showed how the children went on with their lives (generally relatively successfully), and how very few of those who spoke with the author seemed to harbor Nazi-like feelings, although many remained close with their parents (some of their parents had been hanged as war criminals after the war).

What was most interesting, though, were two things: one, that many of these children did have family members (generally older generation) who were still Nazis at heart, and two, that until the interviewees were in their teens, they had no idea about the Nazi atrocities, or about how the Jews were singled out and dealt with. To me this was a little surprising, since amongst the older generation ti was common knowledge, and there was no secrets from the children that there had been a war, and that Germany had lost and suffered great destruction.

Were the children kidding when they said that they did not know about the Jews until they were 13, or 15 or 18? Did the Germans of the previously generation lie when they said that they did not know the Jews were being killed. A lot of people quoted in this book found themselves surprised and revolted in the 1960s. For some, this knowledge cemented their negative feelings towards their parents. But are they being honest? Are they deluding us? Are they deluding themselves? Or is it easy not to see what is right before your eyes?

Our New Prius (3 cents)

2007-06-14T17:12:00.001-04:00

1. It is very comfortable.

2. On a trip to NYC, it got slightly over 50 miles per gallon.

3. It takes regular gas.

4. There appears to be more hidden trunk space than there appears to be.

5. It is easy to drive, and has a good feel.

6. It has bluetooth telephone capability giving hands free speaking and call reception.

7. It has a back up camera which is sort of cool.

8. It is keyless, which is sort of cool.

But

8. The radio controls (most of them) and the heat/airconditioning controls (all of them) are electronic on a screen and you can't see them both at one time. You have to flip screen to screen. What happens if your screen goes out?

9. The bluetooth connection has to be turned on each time you drive (if you want the phone to work)

10. There is no sky light

11. The seat adjustments are manual.

12. There is a weird split to the back window.

On a scale of 1 to 10, I would give it a 9. At least.

Where do squirrels sleep? (1 cent)

2007-06-12T08:43:00.001-04:00

and when??

Is there no news that's fit to print?

2007-06-10T10:47:00.001-04:00

Looking at today's New York Times front page, I find five features articles, and no news articles. The features articles are each of them interesting, but are they news, and particularly front page news?

1. "Grass Roots Roared, and an Immigration Bill Fell", featuring a story about conservative internet-savvy voters who lobbied against the immigration bill.

2. "Corporate Korea Corks the Bottle as Women Rise", featuring a story about the strains on after-work drinking parties in South Korea, becuase of the presence of more women in the workplace.

3. "Hispanic Voters Gain New Clout with Democrats", about Spanish language voting campaigns.

4. "Microsoft Finds Legal Defender in Justice Department", about how the Antitrust Division is no longer accusing Microsoft of violations, and is actually defending Microsoft against claims by others.

5. "Chinese Leave Guantanamo for Albanian Limbo" about how five Uighurs from China, whom China refuses to repatriate, are confined to a camp in Albania until they learn to speak Albanian.

Top left of the masthead: "All the News That's Fit to Print".

God Must Be Happy (1 cent)

2007-06-08T09:32:00.001-04:00

I spent yesterday afternoon at the Holocaust Memorial Museum attending a two hour session on the implications of the recent discovery in Vienna of 800 boxes of Jewish community records from the Nazi years. For many reasons, it was a fascinating afternoon.

After the session ended, I drove home and we decided to go out for dinner. We have a gift card from Filomena, a restaurant in Georgetown that we had never used, and where we had never been. So, very unusual for us, we drove to Georgetown for dinner. We got to Filomena at about 6:45 and were told that the next available table would be at about 8:30. We decided to go elsewhere.

Filmena is on Wisconsin Avenue, south of M Street. For no particular reason, we walked up to M Street and, again, for no reason turned left and walked west. We wandered a while (restaurants that used to be there are now mostly furniture stores) and saw hidden in a window that boarded a passageway that went to a set of steps that went down to a courtyard a small sign calling attention to a restaurant called "Leopold's", and another sign that said that it had won a Washingtonian Magazine award in 2006. We had never heard of Leopold's.

We walked down the steps, found ourselves in a spacious courtyard with outside tables, and saw Leopold's Kafe, a very contemporary looking place (much glass, much plastic, no wood) that looked exactly that it had stepped out of contemporary Vienna (having seen places last year that looked precisely like that). Then we looked at the menu, which included Austrian wines, schnitzels, and sausages, as well as more universally continental dishes.

Leopold is the name of one of Vienna's new museums in what is now known as the Museum Quarter, and there were Leopold posters on the interior walls.

So, what chance would there be to go from spending an afternoon dealing with Vienna to a restaurant that looked like it was Vienna? This is too much of a coincidence, so I conclude that it was at God's direction.

God must be happy. For once (and maybe only for once), his plan worked out just as he wanted it to. I am happy to have played a part.

Auf wiedersehen.

Presidential Courage

2007-06-07T10:36:00.001-04:00

So, Michael Beschloss' book on presidential courage seems to be getting panned all over. Based on what I have seen about the book, and on his presentation several weeks ago and Politics and Prose, that is not surprising.

He picked a number of examples of various presidential accomplishments, defined them as obvious examples of presidential courage (all were not) and stated them to be the best examples possible (they were not).

At any rate, in contemporary terms, look at George Bush (if you dare). You can't deny it: invading Iraq was an example of presidential courage. It might have also been an example of presidential stupidity or presidential deception, but clearly it involved courage.

So, we have a courageous president, right? Well, not so fast.

Our president does not appear to have the courage to pardon Scooter Libby, a man who clearly does not deserve to hang out and dry while his superiors go free.

For shame.

40th Anniversary

2007-06-06T22:30:00.001-04:00

Yesterday marked the 40th anniversary of Day 1 of the Six Day War. We went to a commemoration held at American University's Kay Spiritual Center, but not sponsored by the university. I am embarrassed to say that I don't know the names of all of the panelists, but of the four, two were Aaron David Miller and Yuval Rabin, Yitzhak's son. The other two were Arabs who live in the Washington area. All are involved in peace, bridge building activities. None are considered 'radical'.

I was surprised at the size of the audience. There must have been 200 people there. We only knew or recognized a handful. Many were activists with various peace organizations. There seemed to be many more Jews than Arabs (not surprisingly for any number of reasons).

The question is where to go from here. Or, putting it maybe a bit better, is there any where to from here. There was clearly a lot of sorrow and frustration expressed by the panelists, but each still had a smidgeon of optimism. None could understand where that remain optimism comes from. All agreed that on so many issues the sides were so very far apart.

The support was still for the two state solution. Which was deemed the right thing to support, but only because there was nothing else to support.

I return to my own thoughts. I do not think that the two state solution is possible. I think it is a chimera. You cannot name a state today that is divided in this manner; Pakistan failed and split, for example. And particulary you cannot think of a successful such state which would be separated by an 'enemy', and an enemy with much more power.

So, I repeat what I have said before.

Look at Jordan. A successful country to be sure, but a parliamentary monarchy under a Hashemite (ethnic Saudi) king, when the population itself is virtually all Palestinian or Bedouin (the majority being Palestinian). At some point, the kingdom will fail, and a form of democracy will take root, with Palestinian interests controlling the country. At that time, I believe that pressure would build for a merger of the West Bank into Jordan (where it was before 1967). I think that there are many reasons for this, and I think a viable country would remain.

As to Gaza, immediate viability is impossible, but long term viability, as a separate state unto itself, is quite possible. Look not only at what Singapore has done. Look closer to home (Gaza being home for this exercise). The emirate have done quite well for themselves.

Gaza has the port, it has the work force, and it has the beaches. Imagine goods coming from North African into Gaza, being transported across Israel into an augmented Jordan. The pieces are there for an economically interdependent region.

What about Hamas? As one of the Arab speakers said last evening, democracy is a great thing, but to implement it when Hamas is powerful would be a disaster. As we can see from the current Palestinian experience.

Perhaps this true, but perhaps Hamas would have bigger fish to fry if it had a country to develop than focusing on its enemy, Israel.

If the Arab focus could be on internal development. If the occupation could end. If the Israelis could stay together without a common enemy. If the Palestinians could do the same........

Both sides seem to need each other as focal points for internal feels of solidarity and community. That has to change. And a large number of West Bank settlers will have to be relocated, most likely. But the world is filled with people who move, and if it is done in the context of a mutually secured agreement for security, who knows what the limits might be.

In the meantime, I go back to what Tom Segev said when we heard him last month. He said that the citizens of the region seem to have give up today on large goals with prospects of immediacy, and instead being content to simply manage and control the conflict, so it does not break out too often.

My guess is that Segev is correct, but I think this time of controlled tension can be used to develop the possibility of two Palestinian states, not one, although this is clearly contrary to majoritarian thinking today.

A nice noon time concert (22 cents)

2007-06-05T22:44:00.000-04:00

sometimes, I am not certain about the accoustics at the Church of the Epiphany, and today was one of those times. Betsy Hinkle's violin did not sound quite rich enough. But her playing was otherwise impeccable and the accompaniment of Jad C. Bernardo was first class. The main item on the program was Cesar Frank's Sonata in A for Piano and Violin, which is one of my favorites, and I had not heard it for a long time. They ended with two selections from Porgy and Bess, much less demanding, and very enjoyable. About 75 people in attendance by my count. The weather was beautiful outside, so the dozen or so homeless men who usually sit in the back of the church were not there.

A few quick thoughts

2007-06-03T15:30:00.000-04:00

1. Neisha Thai Restaurant last night was very good.

2. Went to a lecture this morning on the role of women in Caesaria in the 4, 5, and 6th centuries. I found it a little disappointing because the lecturer, Kenneth Holsum, who has led a major dig in Caesaria and teaches at U. Md., is a very dry speaker, and he went on for over an hour although he did not have that much to say on the subject. He started by saying that nothing has been published on women in Byzantine Caesaria; by the time he was finished, I knew why. There is surprisingly little to say, particularly if you want to divide the roles played by Christian, Jewish and Samaritan women. Holsum would simply extrapolate and guess a little too much. Not that it was a waste of time, and not that nothing of interest was said, but for a lecture on this particular subject, I don't think he got very far.

3. Last month, as you may recall, I read Raphael Patai's "The Seed of Abraham". Why is it that, today, I could not tell you one thing in it?

4. How are they allowing the Nats/Padres game to continue through this rain? It wouldn't be such a bad call, if the Nats were winning, but they are not.

The Week that Was (16 cents)

2007-06-02T13:48:00.000-04:00

This was actually a fairly eventful week, but the lack of air conditioning in my home office has hampered by computer usage and blogging. Why the air conditioning went out, we don't know. Our regular air conditioning company came out and said that the air conditioner seemed OK, but that it was getting any electricity. We need an electrician. The electrician is coming on Tuesday, so here (on a Saturday) I am, without air conditioning in the room in which I do most of my homework.

Last Saturday, we picked up our new car, a silver Toyota Prius. Our first Toyota; our first hybrid. It is the 'greenest' car on the American roads, and according to this morning's paper, Toyota sold three times as many Priuses in May 07, as they did in May 06. It drives very comfortably and, in fact, is a relaxing car to drive. You don't have the sensation that you should be revving the engine up continually (in fact you can't), and you try (even subconsciously) to over accelerate. It is odd, in that the car has no key (you have a block shaped key-like thing that you can keep in your pocket), no starter (you push a button that says 'power'), and no gear shift (just a small vestigial toggle that protrudes about 2" from the dashboard). It also is low on trunk space (it is a hatchback), unless you pull down the back seat, but then your storage space, although more than ample, becomes visible.

We tried out the car on Saturday in Loudoun County at the Hunt and Stable Show, and then we drove it to New York, leaving our house Tuesday during rush hour and returning by about 11 p.m. Wednesday night. We went to see the Barcelona exhibit at the Met, closing this weekend), which proved very worthwhile, and a good primer for our August trip. We stayed on the way up at a more than satisfactory Best Western in Burlington NJ, and ate at a Ruby Tuesday's (or was it a Friday's or was it an Applebees?) across the parking lot, where the tilapia turned out to be better than the salmon.

We drove into the city (HollandTunnel was not fun) and followed the sign to the Met and the Met parking lot, where for only $26, we could park for five hours. The garage is under the museum, something that seems vaguely dangerous, although they do check your trunk (or what passed for our trunk) upon entry.

The Barcelona exhibit deals with the period from 1881 (when a newly textile-prosperous city decided to become a center of culture and art) until 1939 (when newly installed General Franco decided the opposite), and had sterling examples of art, jewelry, crafts, furniture, architectural models and more. We were lucky enough to catch a tour guided by one of the three curators of the show. We hope to see many of the exhibited items back in Spain in August.

Coming back (we left the museum about 4) and spent almost 2 hours trying to get through the Lincoln Tunnel, and onto the NJ Turnpike.
The drive back was quick, except that we had a two hour stop in Mt. Holly, an unknown (to us) old town, with buildings going back to the early 18th century. Everything was closed when we got there, and we ate at the Robin's Nest, an upscale restaurant where the highlight was the 3-soup appetizer: cold strawberry, cream of spinich and Md. crab.

The car did very well, and averaged the promised 50 miles per gallon (and it takes regular gas at that).

Since our return Wednesday night, I went to the National Museum for Women in the Arts to see the exhibit of paintings by women from the Italian renaissance, which was very enjoyable. Particularly the portraits (there were fewer still lifes, religious subjects, or historical subjects), some of which were up there with the best of the portraits of the time. I also saw Harry Benton's photographs at the National Portrait Gallery, which spanned a 50 year period of time from the 1950s until today. Benton is a Scottish photographer, who has worked for a number of periodicals and newspapers. While I do not think that all of the photos on display were of display quality, many clearlly were. Perhaps I will get time to talk about them later.

Finally, after a dinner at Bua Thai on Thursday, we saw again Either/Or at Theater J, which seems to have matured in the weeks it has been performed, and is now an excellent show, making it all the sadder that it has to close this weekend, and that the reviews were based on the first few performances. The show was good then (and the reviews positive), but seems to have improved dramatically (no pun intended). I guess this happens with some shows, particularly when they are premieres and were undergoing continual changes until just before opening night. The talkback with cast and director was also interesting.

What's in a Title?

2007-05-28T10:21:00.000-04:00

I just finished reading Shirley Christian's very interesting book, "Before Lewis and Clark". Its subtitle is "the Story of the Chouteaus, the French dynasty that ruled America's frontier". It is the story of the founding and first 75 years or so of St. Louis.

It was published in 2004 which was the 200th anniversary of the Louisiana Purchase (which brought St. Louis to the U.S.) and the start of the Lewis and Clark voyage to the northwest. Clearly, Farrar, Straus and Giroux thought they could capitalize on all of the interest in that expedition, by chosing a name for the book that would make you think that it was about the years before 1804.

Au contraire, as they used to say in French St. Louis. The subtitle is much more in keeping with the text. The Lewis and Clark expedition is discussed in the first third of the book.

Putting this mistitle aside, and not using this blog entry to retell the story of the founding of St. Louis, the following facets of the book were most interesting. First, the degree in which fur trapping was THE reason for the location of St. Louis, and the mainstay of its early economy. Second, how fur trapping worked, through bargaining with individual groups of Native Americans, and through sole trappers who roamed parts unknown. Third, the difficulties in getting the furs to market, and particularly the problems with transportation and the dangers of long distance travel. Fourth, the degree to which St. Louis really was a French city, with the senior Chouteaus, including those who lived well into the 1800s, never learning English. Fourth, the complex relationships between the trappers, the settlers and the Indians, and the problems between one Indian tribe and another, and how all of this impacted on, among other things, the economy of St. Louis. Fifth, the ease with which some of the Chouteaus got along with many of the Indians, including learning the languages. Sixth, the attitudes towards Indians of while St. Louisans, and their attitudes towards blacks and slavery. Seventh, not only the sexual alliances between Indians and whites, but the length and depths of some of these relationships. Seventh, the numbers of children born to each family, and the numbers of children who died, as well as the prevelance generally of what would today be considered very early death. Finally, how difficult travel was and how long it took to get from one place to another.

On this last point, in the early years going from St. Louis to, say, Washington, meant a boat down the Mississippi to New Orleans, and boat from New Orleans to Baltimore, and a coach from Baltimore to Washington.

Even as late as the 1850s, when I would have thought that transportation had been much improved, such a journey could prove an adventure. Although not taking as long as the route I just described, the five day trip from St. Louis to Washington went like this:

"Leaving St. Louis, he traveled up the Mississippi to Galena, then spent the night in a stage coach to arrive at Rockford the next day at 2 p.m. He got a train to Chicago, arriving safely despite the fact that the car jumped the tracks while taking a curve too fast. He took the night train to Detroit, the " the fast steamer May Flower for Buffalo......next morning we were in Buffalo and it was my [Henry A. Chouteau, age 20] intention to stop a day and go to the Falls, but as it was raining I went straight for the cars for Albany. This train goes at the rate of thirty miles an hour....."

After an overnight stop at a hotel in Albay, he took a steamer down the Hudson, getting to New York City at 5 the next afternoon..

Curses, foaled again

2007-05-26T19:14:00.000-04:00

So, today we saw three foals. One was born yesterday. All three nursing. We also saw a 20 year old arthritic horse (former race horse, Mountain John), swim three laps around a pool. And we saw a very large number of alpacas, ranging from black to white, with all shades of tan, brown and grays.

Where were we? In Upperville, of course, at the annual hunt show. We did not go to see the former Kentucky Derby winner, or Paul Mellon's barn, or the other stables that were open for inspection.

But it was all very interesting, and western Loudoun and eastern Fauquier Counties are quite beautiful.

Oh, yes, three cheers for the beef burritos with red sauce at Anita's in Chantilly. (actually, I didn't eat the burrito)

Why Am I Always Changing Light Bulbs? (one cent)

2007-05-26T08:30:00.000-04:00

Because I have 115 of them in my house. Homebuyers, beware.

Book of the Day (12 cents)

2007-05-25T14:29:00.001-04:00

Perhaps I should give you all an idea of the books that I buy for under $4 several times a week.

Today's is a coffee table sized book entitled "From Semaphore to Satellite", and it was published in 1965 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the International Telecommunications Union, in Geneva. It was signed by Gerald Gross, the Secretary-General of the Union, and inscribed to Francis de Wolf, whom Gross says is the guy who got him to Geneva in the first place. There is also a brief letter from Gross to de Wolf, or ITU stationery. On ABEbooks, there is one signed copy of this book for sale for about $70.

If you are interested in the history and international spread of the telegraph (first suggested by Robert Hooke in 1726), and want to see a lot of black and white historic photos, this may just be the book for you. Gross was the Secretary General from 1960 - 1965 and is the only American ever to hold this position.

The ITU is of course still going strong, having expanded its scope beyond the telegraph. It is now a part of the United Nations.

Initial Reactions (ten cents)

2007-05-23T08:22:00.000-04:00

Some time ago, I wrote a post about the decision of the Washington Post not to use the term "PG County" anymore, and always to refer to it by its full name. My posting was about the inconsistency in the use and acceptability of initials or abbreviations in place names (e.g., Phillly and Indy OK, Minnie or Millie not). Since that time, I have spoken to a number of residents of Prince George's County, most of whom call it PG, and think that the disputation played out in the Post was nonsense.

Now comes that terrific ad for St. Louis ribs that I see on television (actually, the ad could be better because I have no idea what brand or chain they are advertising, as I think about it), where the one young man says "These are just like they eat in St. Louie" and his companion says "People who live in St. Louis do not call it St. Louie", to which the other answers: "Yes, they doooooooo".

All of this came to mind again this morning as I was reading through the Washington Examiner which had a brief story about Deborah Palfrey, the now notorious and/or celebrated (take your pick) D.C. Madam. She says that she would rather be called the Washington Madam, and not the D.C. Madam. When asked why, she responded "it's a little classier". One more country heard from.

The best quote in the article came from her lawyer, the man with the name that sounds like a school for sick people: Montgomery Blair Sibley. When Palfrey announced that she was a supporter of Hillary Clinton, she added that she "hated" Bush. Sibley's reaction: "there goes your chance for a pardon".

Ciechanowski (11 cents)

2007-05-22T20:57:00.000-04:00

Jan ciechanowski was the Polish ambassador to the United States during World War II, and wrote a book published in 1947 called "Defeat in Victory". I did not read the entire book, but only the first and last few chapters. The implication was clear. At the start of the war, Roosevelt was very supportive of the Polish government in exile. At the end of the war, there was the Yalta conference where a very sick Roosevelt failed to stand up to Stalin with regard to elected governments in Eastern Europe. The Soviets appoint a government beholden to the USSR and no one kicks and screams. Defeat in victory.

I Wish I Liked It (11 cents)

2007-05-22T17:09:00.000-04:00

The concert at Epiphany Church today was by a soprano, a flute and a piano. Perhaps not my favorite combination, and there was nothing in the program that particularly attracted me. Ein Lied von Bach, and works of Philippe Gaubert, Roger Quilter, Edouard Lippe and Sir Henry R. Bishop (talk about names that didn't ring a bell). I debated whether I should just take advantage of the warm weather, but decided to enter the church, find a nice seat, and take out the book of short stories by Albert Moravia that I have been reading at the Tuesday concerts.

I thought that this was one of the weaker concerts. I was not attracted to the solists voice, I thought that the floutist was not up to professional standards. The piano was ok. On a number of flute/soprano pieces, I thought more practice might have helped. I had a hard time believing they were playing the same piece for the most part.

But....

no one left the concert, and

there was quite a bit of applause.

So I wish I liked it, because it looked like everyone else did.

Odd Exhibit at the Phillips Collection (24 cents)

2007-05-20T17:02:00.000-04:00

Called "Moving Pictures: American Art and Early Film", it contains numerous video screens showing short films from about 1895-1905, and next to them pieces of art which depict similar scenes. For example, an early movie taken showing Niagara Falls from up close (one of the better films, I thought), next to some paintings from about the same time of Niagara Falls. Most of the films were not that interesting. Yes, they were very early films, but....... And the art work got lost, I thought, because they were no more than there to support the video screens.

I did like the film of Niagara Falls (and it was up close), and a liked even more perhaps a short film of a storm at sea taken from the deck of a ship, with the waves looking very forboding. I also liked the New York street scenes. Even though you know it was so, it seems strange to see all of these large brick and concrete buildings, with no motor vehicles, only horse drawn buggies and carriages, and a lot of pedestrians. And, what was most noticeable about the overdressed pedestrians (all with hats of course)? They weren't fat. None of them.

Worth seeing? Well, anything is worth seeing, I guess. And it is interesting to see that some of the same things that the movie makers were focusing on (this is before films began to show stories and plot lines) were the same things that painters were painting. Worth seeing twice? Not at all.

The Trouble With Studying History (1 cent)

2007-05-19T21:43:00.000-04:00

From Lee Meriwether's "My Yesteryears", writing about the death of his ancestor, Meriwether Lewis. Lewis died in 1809, only a few years after the end of the Lewis and Clark exploration of the northwest. He writes:

"In October, 1809, Lewis died either by his own hand or by that of a murderer. The suicide theory rests upon a letter written by Jefferson, but facts discovered later point plainly to murder. Lewis was on his way with important papers for Jefferson. He planned to go by boat down the Mississippi to New Orleans an thence by sea to Baltimore, but at Memphis were alarming rumors of war with England. Actually war did not come until 1812, but even as early as 1809 impressment of Americans into the British navy made many men believe war was imminent.....Several days out from Memphis, Lewis and a friend named Neeley, and a Negro servant who accompanied him, plunged into the wilderness....The first cabin he found belonged to a man named Grinder. Lewis stopped there for the night, and next morning he was found dead in bed, a bullet hole through his head. Grinder was gone, and with him Lewis' watch, money and papers. Many months later Grinder was caught in North Carolina, brought back to Tennessee and tried for murder; he had Lewis' papers; he, formerly almost a pauper, had bought land and slaves. He could not explain his sudden riches; the circumstantial evidence that he had killed and robbed Lewis was strong. but no one had witnessed the deed, and Mrs. Grinder swore Lewis had killed himself. And so the jury's verdict was "Not Guilty".

"In those days, weeks, even months were required for news from the wilderness to reach Washington. Long before he knew, if he ever knew about Grinder's disapearing with Lewis' money and papers, Jefferson had received Mrs. Grinder's suicide story, and had written the letter which has come down to our own day, stating that Meriwether Lewis died a suicide. Had Jefferson known all the facts, he would not have written that letter."

This book was written in 1942.

From a book written over sixty years later, "Before Lewis and Clark" by Shirley Christian:

"A few days before Pierre started down the Mississippi, Meriwether Lewis had set out from St. Louis to go down the Mississippi and get a ship for Washington, intending to defend himself with regard to his use of government moneys......Shortly before his departure, Lewis spent a day with William Clark.....Clark wrote his brother Jonathan that......his friend was in a great deal of distress, 'ruined' by the government's decision to protest some of his expenditures....by the time Meriwether Lewis had sailed from St. Louis, he was in a deranged state, twice trying to kill himself, according to the boat crew. At Chickawaw Bluffs, the future Memphis, the fort commander, Captain Gilbert Russell, put him under a suicide watch.......But Lewis passed an anguished evening, and in the early morning hours of October 11 he took out his pistols and shot himself, first with one, then the other. When the owner of the house heard the shots, she summoned the two servants, but they arrived too late to save Lewis. Death came shortly after daybreak."

Nothing about Grinder, or a murder trial.

Which, if either, story is correct?

A Surprising Gap in my Education (29 cents)

2007-05-19T11:34:00.000-04:00

I went to a noontime slide lecture, held at the Renwick Museum, yesterday. The topic was the Bauhaus Workshops, and the presentation was given by by Ursula Ilse-Neuman. I am not sure who she is because I missed the introduction, but she is a curator somewhere, I believe, and a scholar. She speaks with a slight German accent, but with the speed of a French bullet train. If you blink, she has left you in the dust.

This made her a little hard to follow, as did the fact that she had a lot to say within her allotted 45 minutes of time. I believe that her speed exhausted many in the audience of about 100. There were zero questions at the end, perhaps because of a desire for a little space and some fresh air.

But the presentation was very informative and quite well organized.

Here is where my education failed me. I guess I knew nothing about Bauhaus. I knew it was a German movement, I knew it was a between the wars movement. I knew it involved Walter Gropius and Mies van der Rohe. I know a Bauhaus inspired building when I see it (usually). And I thought I knew that Bauhaus was a modernistic, but pared down industrial inspired architectual movmement.

I had no idea that the Bauhaus was a school that lasted for fourteen years (first in Weimar, then in Dessau and finally in Berlin), until Hitler shut it down (with great publiciity) in 1934, that it involved an extraordinary number of well known twentieth century artists (as teachers or instructors, as students, or as both), or that it was reconstituted in Chicago (where it was renamed and now forms part of the Illinois Institute of Techonology, and inspired Black Mountain College in the Piedmont region of North Carolina (also home to an array of famous twenty century artists) which closed in 1957, and also had influence over artistic teaching in Northern California.

I now know that, in addition to architecture (which hardly was mentioned yesterday), Bauhaus involved painting, fabrics and weaving, pottery, metal working and jewelry, furniture, and sculpture. That it was a holistic program, designed to blend the working of craftsmen with the working of artists, and on an equal footing (it was in a sense a socialist, or at least social democratic movement), and that the major item of contention within the movement itself was how much focus should be put on industrial design (i.e., items that can be manufactured), rather than on individualistic pieces of art. It spread in both directions. For example, in the U.S.A., Chicago was more industrially oriented (and techologically), while Black Mountain seemed to be more individualistic.

Josef and Anni Albers, Marcel Breuer, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Andreas Feininger all taught at Bauhaus. Josef Albers was a student, as was (at Black Mountain) both deKoonings, Cy Twombly, Robert Rauschenberg, Jacob Lawrence, Franz Kline and others.

Oh, yes, one more rather important point. The Bauhaus style inspired some extraordinary works in all of the categories mentioned above, much of which is now quite familiar. Only when you see it context with the Bauhaus philosophy, however, does it all (to my untrained) eye, all fit together in surprising ways.

A bit too early, perhaps, but funny

2007-05-16T11:23:00.000-04:00

The cartoon this morning in the Washington Examiner. Jerry Falwell, who died yesterday, is standing before (presumably) St. Peter, who says to him: Here we take people regardless of race, gender or sexual preference. Fallwell has a terrified look on his face and responds: oh my, do you mean I'm in hell?

One Movie, Three Plays and a Good Meal (5 cents)

2007-05-14T08:15:00.000-04:00

One of the weirdest movies I have seen is, in English, "One Hand Can't Clap", a Czech film shown at the Avalon. What is it about? Is it about the suave vegetarian Prague restaurater who, in the cellar of his restaurant has another, even fancier restaurant, where he serves exotic protected species? Or his wife, who is against anything having to do with eating or wearing animals, who insists that their house have neither TV nor computer, who homeschools their kids and obviously knows nothing about her husbands underground proclivities. Or the two children, one a pre-teen boy who dresses like a girl and the other a pre-teen girl, who attempts to murder her brother? Or the host of the TV show, which is a voyeur's version of Candid Camera, or his daughter who has been embarrassed on the show irretrievably. Or the fellow who goes to jail for transporting, without knowing it, endangered species for the restaurant, who gets out of prison and who, in spite of having a good heart, is befriended by a more mischievous ne'er-do-well, and who meets the daughter of the TV host, and who seeks to find out why these birds were coming into the country. Oh, yes, it is a comedy.

Much less weird are "Either/Or" and "Shylock" at Theater J. "Either/Or is of course Tom Keneally's story of Kurt Gerstein, the German Nazi who decides that his party is not always in the right, but who wants to be in the thick of things to act as a witness, but for whom the killing of Jews and others is too much. He becomes an unsuccessful whistle blower, but his papers are presented to the victorious English, although Gerstein is either murdered or commits suicide in prison before any trial can be held. Well acted, well written. But is it the best material for a play? Somehow, it would make a better movie, I think.

As to Arnold Wesker's "Shylock", a reworking of the story found in "Merchant of Venice", starring Theodore Bikel, in a modified stage reading formulation, it starts out very well, with a sympathetic Shylock, good friend to Antonio, and for whom the bond of a pound of flesh is meant to be a joke. But when Antonio's ships are lost at sea, even though all government parties are willing to forget the entire deal, Antonio and Shylock agree that the precedent would be potentially dangerous to the fragile Jewish community and insist on going through with the bargain. Of course, it does not happen because of the non-lawyer discovering the legal problems with the contract. The play deteriorates, I thought, in the second act. I don't think Wesker knew how to end it. I think he stuck too close the story line, something he did not need to do.

Before Shylock, we ate at Merkado. Very nice supper. Fish all around.

We also went to Theater J for the Friday afternoon reading of "The Milliner" by Susan Glass. An English playwright it is loosely (very loosely) the story of her grandfather, for whom English exile during the war did not end his love of Berlin, to which he returned. I think that he found out that while he remained a Berliner and always will, he was clearly no longer the German he thought he was.

Seemed like old times.

2007-05-14T08:11:00.000-04:00

A beautiful Sunday afternoon. The ballpark. Nobody in the stands. I thought I was back at Sportsman's Park watching the Browns.

But something's wrong. Something's different? What could it be?

Oh, now I see.

The home team won.

Abraham: father of us all?

2007-05-13T11:31:00.000-04:00

I had wanted to read Bruce Feiler's "Abraham" from the day it came out. Not that Feiler is a great scholar, or anything, but I had read "Walking the Bible", which I found to be an ingenious book. Not one that was profound, and in fact I thought that some of his statements and conclusions were wrong (or at least arguable), but the concept of exploring Israel and Sinai with the Torah text in mind, and doing so on three levels (the text itself, the condition of the biblical sites today, and using biblical historians and archeologists as guides) was very effective. I thought that it would be a very good introduction for those who had traveled to Israel, but not thought about things in these terms. [In fact, perhaps Moshe Pearlman's book, "Footsteps of Moses", wrtten 30 years ago, did much the same thing; I have the book, but have only looked at the pretty pictures].

When he put out "Abraham", which dealt not only with Judaism, but with Islam and Christianity, and which dealt with a broader geographic area, I had great hopes.

Unfortunately, the book is not very good. It (like the first book) does not go beneath the surface, his travels are much less extensive than in his earlier book, and his conclusions again seem not always right, and sometimes stretched to make the point.

For example, he says that the three religions all stem from Abraham, but from a different Abraham. The Jews get Abraham who made a covenant with God. The Christians get an Abraham for whom faith is all important. And the Moslems get an Abraham who always submits to God's will. Well, in fact, each of them have an Abraham whose qualities (good or bad) contain all three elements. Feiler's division is handy and seductive, but I do not think that it holds up.

I Missed Three (1 cent)

2007-05-11T09:51:00.000-04:00

I missed 3 newspaperboxes in front of Marvelous Market. Total = 955