terrible flooding in england

these are pictures of a place called tewkesbury in gloucestershire. i've heard that a month's worth of rain has fallen in a day in parts of england recently. it is the worst flooding in modern british history. the government says it is due to global warning. the grauniad says:

"... that the government was warned in two separate reports that the plans in place to tackle flood risks were "complex, confusing and distressing for the public". In July 2004 the government said it needed to improve co-ordination between water companies, councils and the Environment Agency; then in 2005, the government also agreed to "work towards giving" the agency "an overarching strategic overview across all flooding and coastal erosion risks"."


gotta quote wordsworth again:

"The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!"

most romantic film scene ever

deborah kerr and cary grant
the times newspaper officially announces (about a month ago but i seem to have missed it) that the most romantic scene in a movie ever is the denouement of 'an affair to remember'. it was voted for by readers, and of the choices available it was the one for which i voted. as long as you cut out the unbelievably awful last line ("o nicky - if you can paint, then i can walk!"), then huzzah!

shelley duncan

another yankees newbie starts out really rather well. shelley duncan (i thought shelley was a girl's name, but then who am i to talk!) has played twice and already got 3 home runs. ok the yanks were playing the devil rays, and in total over four games scored a gazillion runs (ok, 49 or so) but still it is a lovely way to begin your career.

ps shelley is the guy on the right

he's heeeeeeeeeeere!

beckham jr & suri cruise at the match
ok, so after perusing the pix available this morning, the one i finally decided best represents the debut of david beckham for the los angeles galaxy team against the scum yesterday is this celebrity shot.

doug (my classmate and yanks fan) invited me over to watch the game. we had the espn coverage on the tv, and the yankees game on his laptop on the coffee table. i wore a lovely qpr t-shirt, and he got his old inter shirt out for the occasion.

so why did i pick this particular photograph? because of the espn coverage of a football match. first of all, there was the "beckham cam", where we were forced to look at his feet and check whether or not they were in his shoes. then there were the 'celebrity' interviews - drew carey, governor schwarzenegger, etc - please tell me (or rather you'd better not) what on earth a pitch-side chat with jennifer love hewitt, 'star' of some tv series, was doing on-screen while the game was actually being played? that's just what every sports fan, every football fan is craving rather than watching abel xavier thwart another drogba attack on goal.

that is the way in the usa. i don't think, however, it is the way to turn people on to football. if they are watching for the cutaway shots of tv and sports stars, then maybe the e-entertainment channel is the place for television coverage of the los angeles galaxy. grumble grumble rant!

ilyena mironov and her ancestors

helen and kate mirren visit family graves in russia
ok so i was looking for what i thought would be the picture of the evening, i.e., david beckham tumbling over steve sidwell's trailing foot, which was how i ended up looking at the daily mail. there i found this story about genealogy that i enjoyed reading and thought other helen-appreciators may also enjoy.

"We drive to Kuryanovo, two hours from Moscow but two centuries back in time. "Oh my God, I just didn't think any of this would be here any more," Helen says, exploring the simple sand track that runs through the village where the serfs of her family's estate once lived, and where local peasants still pull water from the well. "I'm simply amazed," she adds. "I thought this would have been destroyed in Soviet times, ruined by the building of ugly factories. But it is exactly as I imagined it in my dreams. "It's so beautiful - small, brightly painted wooden houses with their vegetable gardens. It's very Russian, but looking like an English village might have done in Jane Austen's time. "To say I feel as if I've come home is not strictly true. I would find it difficult to live like this. But I do find it incredibly beautiful, perhaps because it's in my DNA. I feel very happy here. I know my father and grandfather would be utterly astounded if they could see us here, that we had managed to find it.""

i hope one day that i can travel to nowy sacz, the area where i think my hoschander relatives originated. i won't have the daily mail laying on translators, but i think i could live with that :-)

the nearly ridiculous and not quite sublime

a couple of stories i had wanted to blog but never got round to ...

lawn chair pilot flies with 105 balloons ok, it wasn't 99 red balloons, which would have been serendipitious, but still a lovely story about a guy in his garden in oregon trying to fly to idaho

a couple of weeks ago the news was that the pope had removed restrictions for celebrating an old form of the latin mass that included prayers calling for the conversion of the jews. the observer newspaper covered this story here. in a panic, i wrote a dear friend in virginia, that i got to know through the interfaith association there. she reassured me that first of all, many of the younger people do not even know that mass and secondly, she is pretty sure that if and when it is celebrated, it will be without the offensive prayers.

saturday sweetheart

eve myles
or would 'torchwood treasure' have been any better? each is as kitschy as the other. nevertheless, while waiting for that book to come out, i did watch a few more eps of 'torchwood' and even without any more scenes of her snogging sirens i still feel smitten by gwen cooper. as i may have reported previously, i will do anything if i am asked in a welsh accent. a real one, look you, not the transatlantic drawl that affects catherine zeta jones when she's on the left-hand side of the atlantic ocean.

let me just check the test match score and then maybe i can go to sleep for a while ...

and i've finished the book

... i've been reading for the last five hours, and have finished the last harry potter. cannot say more for a while just ... just in case any of you are yet to read it. i did have a good cry, though. thank you jkr. now for a nap!

the owl of reading

ravaj has her new harry potter
it's going to be a long night i think ... got my deathly hallows at midnight-oh-five and am now home. just have to get comfy on the bed: point the fan in my direction and remove all constricting items of clothing.

one guy found a couch by the entrance of the campus bookstore and already started reading. another one opened to the back page as he walked past the line where we were waiting. 'don't do it!' came the cry. 'wouldn't it be funny if someone read the end and shouted it out?' was the response. 'if he does that i will kill him,' muttered the guy next to me. cannot type any more. must read! see you later.

the homer abbas giant

local pagans are getting their knickers in a twist over the latest publicity stunt for the new simpsons movie. according to the picture, homer has been temporarily immortalised alongside the ancient cerne abbas giant. the full story is here, and most of the other current reports seem to be using the same press association source. the paint will disappear as soon as it rains, and is biodegradeable.

i have to say i am rather amused. while on the one hand the report notes that the chalk outline is rechalked every 25 years, and the grass is regularly trimmed, it was not always so. in my teens i had a summer of thomas hardy obsessive compulsive disorder and when on holiday in dorset insisted my hosts take me to every place that really existed that hardy mentioned about in his wessex. this included the church where i took a rubbing of tess durbeyfield's gravestone, a farmhouse that had the most delicious scrumpy cider and i don't remember the connection, as well as a sighting of the giant. in hardy's time, or was it the time about which he wrote, anyway the point is that the victorians used to let the grass grow over the giant because he was so rudely rampant. also, there is a river piddle that runs through part of dorset, but that name was considered quite impolite and so one gets villages called affpuddle and tolpuddle instead.

kieron st amie

i seem to have received quite a few hits regarding the qpr scorer vs celtic yesterday. i think and hope that this pic from the offish is of mr st amie, possibly even on the way to scoring his goal!

gotta get back to class now ...

we're back!

qpr 1 - 5 celtic
the first pre-season friendly for qpr saw us thrashed by the mighty bhoys from glasgow. there are no reports yet on the qpr list, so all i have to go on is the website which is shite as usual. i see that jake cole saved a penalty, so yah boo sucks to everyone saying he is no more than a reserve. he is all we have right now, folks! our goal was scored by another delightfully named player kieron st amie. but where was lee cook? probably packing his bags for fulham. ray jones was missing. stefan bloody moore started. right now i am listening to the sunday sport show on bbc london and qpr fans are calling and texting their disappointment and anticipation of relegation. hmmmmm ... it's only july, and we have already achieved the nadir of nay-saying :-(

ps apparently the r's player pictured here is chris barker

quatorze juillet chez friedlander

a ford cortina estate mkv
i think i posted about dear old odh197k a year ago or so. my favourite car *sigh*. she looked like the one in the picture, except that she was burgundy.

anyway, i was just remembering that bastille day is one of those days in our family when we know there is no point even trying to go anywhere in the car because something bad will happen. more than three times it has happened on family holidays either in france or on our way there or back. take, for example, one time in belgium. it is 14th july. we are in our car. we are having trouble with our car. everything is closed. few people are around. we finally find a person. this person does not understand my mother's french (which is quite good, actually). this person speaks walloon. my mother tries german (which she speaks extremely well). the person still harbours grudges with regard to world war two. the conversation does not go well.

that is all i remember, but i know we did get where we were going in the end. the main problem with a national holiday is that everything is closed so if you need help it is hard to find. i suspect it is not so problematic these days with the advent of cellphones.

the scariest problem we had was once in the '70's when trying to go from holland to germany or vice versa. it was just my mother and we two girls. we were in no man's land when they took away our passports. for second generation holocaust survivors this is particularly terrifying. we had to wait for hours. it turned out that my mother looked like one of the baader-meinhof terrorists, who were known to use children as a cover. after checking us out and finding us innocent (and handing back the passports), we were promptly informed that our tyres were illegal in some way and we would have to buy some new ones and, o so conveniently, there was a tyre place right there. after paying an exorbitant price for those tyres, we were finally allowed to cross the border.

i must try to remember these things and acknowledge how much better life is these days next time they take away my toothpaste and tweezers (i still dream of hijacking a plane with the immortal words "take me to cuba or i shall pluck your eyebrows!").

ps a note from my mother regarding this post: "There were two different trips. On the first we were constantly crossing the French-German border and were usually stopped for the reason you mentioned. On the second, we were crossing from Holland into Germany and stopped because of the tyres - the tread was below the legal minimum. It must have been 1968, because of my heightened awareness of the removal of the passport."

to quote the chicken lady from the kids in the hall: "memories, they keep coming back to me like ... memories."

english sweets aka candy bars

o my, there's a curly wurly!
today's ny times has two whole internet pages devoted to the best sweets in the world, i.e., english ones. it begins:

"A TELEVISION news producer from Atlanta recently made a deal with her boss, who was traveling in London. The producer promised she would submit her script for an investigative story ahead of deadline in exchange for two British Kit Kats and a Curly Wurly bar."

i understand this. i may be diabetic (type 2, for about 8 years) and thus must regard chocolate, especially an english cadbury's dairy milk or maltesers which are sold at stop'n'shop damn their eyes, must regard it as death-delivering poison. nevertheless, just a picture of a flake or a crunchie bar causes immediate salivation. the american cadburys do not taste the same. they are ersatz, and according to the article are actually made by hershey. sacrilege!

the whole article is here.

cagney and lacey on graham norton's show

remember these two?
hat-tipping to scribegrrrl she has a youtube video from part of the graham norton show on her site and i then downloaded the whole programme and have just finished watching it. i haven't laughed so hard in ages. gosh laughing is good medicine.


they may look very different now, but they still put on a great show. my favourite part is near the end, when six live callers from across the world, i.e., germany, holland, sweden, australia, the usa and somewhere i forgot, pay tribute to sharon gless and tyne daly by playing the theme song through their telephones on kazoos. hysterical!

barbara amiel black

so conrad black has been found guilty, and while his wife did not give evidence, the word is that it was only because he was trying to finance the extravagant tastes of his wife that black got into such trouble in the first place.

i don't really know very much about barbara amiel except that my father enjoyed talking to her. in reporting the verdict of the trial today, the telegraph had this to say:

"Lady Black, of course, won't be sharing in the next, less comfortable, stage of her husband's life if he goes to prison. But so far she has proved a staunch supporter during the bad times. Writing her off as the ultimate hard-nosed gold-digger, some had confidently intoned long before the trial that the marriage was already over. However, the sight of the Blacks turning up at court each day, often holding hands and frequently exchanging tender glances, suggested otherwise.

Lady Black contributed nothing to the trial apart from an unfortunate lapse at the start when - descending in the lift outside the court - she described journalists as "vermin" and denounced one television news producer as a "slut". Such language comes less from the Kensington salon and more perhaps from her proudly proclaimed roots as a north London girl who had to make her own way in life. "My husband is very rich, but I am not … I have been a bitch all my life and did not need the authority of money to be one," she once wrote. "I am a north London Jew who has read a bit of history. This means I know this: in a century that has seen the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian, British and Soviet empires, reversal of fortune is the rich bitch's reality. One might as well keep working and have the family's Vuitton suitcases packed."

And as Barbara Amiel, a writer whose combination of good looks and fiery Right-wing journalism proved decisive in attracting her current husband, she did indeed keep working, even during the trial."

so i read this and thought well yes a powerful woman must be a bitch mustn't she i mean if she is tough and can take care of herself then she is threatening so bring her down with insults, eh? then i read the profile below

here is a profile from 2004 in the grauniad

and she sounds like an incredible role model until i get to the bit that says:

"Like many of today's rightwing commentators, she ... promoted her belief that homosexuality is an abomination."

damn and blast it, i really wanted to root for her and now i don't want to any more. i wonder ... if this were not a personal issue, would i be more inclined to say well yes she has her flaws but basically i admire her? i do hope not!

discarded pants boosted literacy

ok, this has to be one of the more random stories of the day. the grauniad reports that underwear had a vital role to play in the making of cheap paper, and that allowed knowledge to come within reach of a much greater audience.

apparently the use of underwear increased in the 13th century as peasants became townspeople and found themselves in more business encounters with members of the opposite sex. this increased the supply of rags, which were used for the making of the cheap paper. before then, it was just hyper-expensive parchment, beyond the reach of the likes of you and me.

today is 12th july, not the first of april. i don't think they are joking. read about it right here.

see also this expanded version.

ps remember that 'pants' in england are 'underpants' in the usa

melanin may be more than benign

nice to mole you
at last something positive to having many moles (if you play join the dots on ravaj's back you get a wonderful map of the norwegian coastline). the telegraph reports:

"People who seem to stay younger for longer are also likely to have more moles, research released yesterday suggests. A study of twins found a striking correlation between high numbers of moles and a biological marker for slow ageing. As a result, people with a lot of moles might be expected to live longer than those who have very few, despite facing a greater risk of skin cancer."

here is the rest of the article, with some more technical explanation for those who are interested.

female circumcision in england

the metropolitan police in london are beginning a campaign tomorrow to make sure everyone knows that genital mutilation of women is a crime in britain.

"In Britain, the problem mostly involves first-generation immigrants from Africa and the Middle East. Police say they don't have comprehensive statistics about the number of victims. But midwife Comfort Momoh, who specializes in treating them at London hospitals and clinics and who works with police, told the news conference she treats 400 to 500 victims every year. Arranging or carrying out the procedure — in Britain or abroad — is a criminal offense punishable by up to 14 years in prison, but no one has been prosecuted since it was banned under British law in 2003 ... Police estimate up to 66,000 girls in Britain face the risk of genital mutilation."

yahoo carries the latest ap report here

so frida kahlo wasn't jewish?

appropos of another article i was just reading, i googled frida kahlo's jewish origins, and came up with the following article from the jerusalem post in april 2006:

"Frida Kahlo's father wasn't Jewish after all
By MEIR RONNEN

Fridas Vater: Der Fotograf Guillermo Kahlo
by Gaby Franger and Rainer Huhle
Schirmer/Mosel
248pp, EU49.80

For decades now, ever since an international revival of interest in the paintings and life of Mexico's Frida Kahlo, art historians and critics, including this writer, have been writing that Frida's photographer father was Jewish, possibly of Hungarian origin. A new book devoted to Guillermo Kahlo and his photography reveals that he had no Jewish genes and stemmed from a long line of German Protestants.

Frida herself was probably the source of the claims to her Jewish connection. But why?

My guess is that German connections during the Nazi era were an embarrassment to her. Communists in particular were strongly anti-Nazi and Diego Rivera, Frida's great love and sometime husband, was an active communist. So of course was the nominally Jewish founder of the Red Army, Leon Trotsky, who was Frida's lover in Mexico City before he was murdered with an ice pick, at Stalin's orders. In 1949 Frida actually wrote to her father inquiring about his origins. The letter survives.

Carl Wilhelm Kahlo was born in 1871 in Pforzheim, to Lutheran parents whose antecedents, craftsmen, soldiers, gingerbread bakers and sluice keepers, have been traced back by Gaby Franger and Rainer Huhle to the 16th century. Carl Wilhelm fell out with his family and at age 19 emigrated to Mexico, changed his name to Guillermo and began work as an accountant before discovering photography. Not all his negatives have been recovered, but he left behind a frank and unpretty record of life in Mexico at the turn of the century that is astonishingly modern in approach.

Guillermo ran a professional studio and married a woman of mixed Spanish-Indian origin, who gave her daughters an ethnic link to both the rich and poor of Mexico.

Frida and her taciturn, enigmatic father were famously concerned with themselves. Frida's favorite subject was herself (she made a trademark of her eyebrows). Guillermo's most riveting images are his self-portraits. Both father and daughter produced self-images that are silent witnesses to the tragedies of life."

we do like connecting brilliant, creative, famous people to our community, so i feel a wee bit sad when we lose one. it has, however, no effect on how much i love frida's work ... at least i think not ... :-)

wimbledon quote of the day

from the bbc live commentary on today's gentlemen's singles final:

"Players are knocking up and the atmosphere is crackling on Centre Court. Federer, as ever, looks the more relaxed of the two, as if he's having some hit and giggle at Centre Parcs. His girlfriend Mirka has plumped for the C3PO look today. That jacket's actually made of gold...apparently."

rabbi albert h. friedlander obe, phd z"l

today is the 3rd yahrzeit for my darling father.
more words from elie:

"albert and i were friends and allies, in many battles, always trying to remain faithful to one another, and together to one people - i shall remember him and his passion for study as well as his quest for peace"

the new 7 wonders of the world

chichen itza
in an online poll of 100 million people, the following wonders won a place in the top seven:

the great wall of china
the statue of christ the redeemer in rio de janeiro
petra in jordan
machu picchu in peru
the mayan ruins at chichen itza
the colosseum in rome
the taj mahal in india

i'm sure there will be lots of arguments and disappointments about this selection. for a start, the only one of the original wonders left in existence, the great pyramid of giza, didn't make it. also, several countries consciously marketed their own potential wonders to bump up the voting (and thence their tourist industry?).


i would have liked to see stonehenge in the list, but i didn't vote, so i cannot complain!

women's words?

a us survey recently analysed the commonly-held belief that women talk more than men do. while the results showed that is basically not true, the bbc has come up with a list of words that women were more likely to say than men. here is a selection from that list:

Book club: A female dominated affair, perhaps because women read more fiction, or perhaps because men aren't very good at talking about it

Accessorise: If men were ever to use this word it would only be in the context of cars

Body image

Empowering: Men never use this word, perhaps because for the 200,000 years humans have been on the planet, men have had all the power

Size zero

Home birth

Pilates: Men in the UK, particularly, seem to have no interest in building up their core strength

Pomegranate: Men seem ill-equipped to understand the significance and full range of superfoods

Cellulite

Conventionally attractive: Preceded by "well I suppose she is...", a phrase women often use to describe those who actually are

Footless tights: Strange idea, strangely popular

Breastfeeding

Emotional intelligence: Something that men usually do not possess, instead preferring the kind of intelligence that involves dates of battles

Kitten heels: Or indeed heels of any other kind

What are you thinking?: The classic female condition check

Feminism: If even veteran feminists can't agree on what this means then it's probably best avoided by men

Agony aunt:
When men seek answers to life-changing problems in magazines, it tends to be under the headline "plasma or LCD?"

Flexible working

Handbagging:
As in new Commons leader Harriet Harman's request to Theresa May not to savage her every Thursday

Beefeater: The first female one made her debut this year

Babies

Superwoman

Ms:
Extraordinarily, the battle continues for women to be allowed to avoid definition by their marital status

Concealer

Why: As in "why do you never call?"

the melting slopes of everest

i'm heading off to join my class for a shabbaton. something for me to think about this shabbat - what can i do for tikkun olam, to help heal the earth? this article in the independent was a response to a survey that revealed:

" ... most Britons remain unconvinced about the extent of climate change and that terrorism, crime, graffiti and even dog mess are more pressing issues for the UK."

the sons of the first men to reach the summit of mount everest tell us that:

"The base camp where Sir Edmund and Norgay began their ascent is 40 metres lower than it was in 1953. The glacier on which it stands, and those around it, are melting at such a rate that scientists believe the mountain, whose Nepalese name, Qomolangma, means Mother of the World, could be barren rock by 2050."

there is no question either that climate change is a problem, or that human beings have to do something about it, yesterday! listen and believe.

shabbat shalom!

ps happy birthday lis!!

and the new doctor who companion is ...

catherine tate
i am hoping this is the apex of my fan obsession with doctor who ... my compulsion demands that i blog the latest news which is that catherine tate (seen above in the last xmas ep) is joining the series full-time. this from the outpost gallifrey site:

"Catherine Tate is set to return to the TARDIS for the complete 13 week run of Series Four of Doctor Who. Award winning comedian Tate will reprise her role as Donna, the runaway bride from last year's Christmas special, despite turning down the Doctor's invitation to travel with him at the end of that adventure. When Catherine was asked if she would like to become The Doctor's new companion at the press screening of The Runaway Bride, she replied, "I would love to, but no one has asked!" Well, now they have. "Catherine was an absolute star in The Runaway Bride and we are delighted that one of Britain's greatest talents has agreed to join us for the fourth series," announced Doctor Who's executive producer and head writer, Russell T Davies. "Viewers can expect more ambitious storylines and a whole host of guest stars in 2008."

Catherine Tate : "I am delighted to be returning to Doctor Who. I had a blast last Christmas and look forward to travelling again through time and space with that nice man from Gallifrey.""

alan johnston is free!

from the bbc here

again in the midst of so much terror and destruction another positive piece of news. after 4 months of imprisonment at the hands of a militant group called the army of islam, bbc journalist alan johnston has been freed.

ny times report
grauniad
the times
the telegraph

news roundup

some of the stories that i kept meaning to blog recently but had to do my maths homework instead:

the rubber duck armada (the mail)

the sunshine and fruit juice diet guy (the mail)

freezing the eggs of girls with childhood cancers (the times)

wheelie bin travels from peterborough to bulgaria (the telegraph)

with regard to the medical procedure referred to above, my first response was how incredible and amazing it is. as someone who has struggled with issues of infertility for years, my instinct is to rejoice that other women may be spared that curse. i expect there are various ethical and/or politically correct issues that are evoked by this discovery. right now, though, i am just feeling pleased.

rocket's record

roger clemens pitching vs twins
yankees pitcher roger clemens becomes the first since warren spahn in 1963 to record 350 wins. at one point he retired 15 twins in a row. gosh darn it this is what we need from all our pitchers and not just to get in the record books. the game was on tv tonight and i duly did my part to help them win by falling asleep in the inning where the winning runs were scored :-)

we should be so lucky

guess who is the guest star of the doctor who xmas episode?! the bbc website reported today (after i'd read all the martha stuff):

"Kylie Minogue on board for Titanic festive special.

We're all feeling lucky, lucky, lucky that Kylie Minogue is to take a major lead role in the hour-long Doctor Who Christmas special, to be broadcast in December 2007. Especially for you, Kylie will be travelling light years to join David Tennant for the episode, Voyage Of The Damned, which starts filming in July in Cardiff. "We are delighted and excited to announce that Kylie Minogue will be joining the Doctor," revealed Executive Producer and lead writer Russell T Davies. "Doctor Who Xmas specials are always a joy and we feel very confident that this will be the most ambitious and best Christmas episode yet." "It is an incredible thrill to be joining David and the entire Doctor Who production for this year's Christmas special," added Kylie. "Doctor Who enjoys a unique history and it is going to be very exciting to be a part of that."

The production team has also confirmed that the story, written by Russell, will follow on directly from the ending of series three where viewers witnessed The Titanic crash through the Tardis walls."

the doctor is done (until xmas)

freema agyeman
*sob*
martha jones is staying on earth to take care of her family and the doctor is alone again

gosh darn it i was all ready to have a massive crush on martha, as were so many others. luckily for us the bbc has thrown out a bone or two, promising that freema agyeman will guest on torchwood and also reconnect with the doctor halfway through season four.

this past season has been so amazing that it even got my mother hooked. it helps that she sort of fancies david tennant :-)

*sigh* time to get ready for school ...

rabbi abraham j. klausner z"l

i did not realise he was still alive ... i'd always wanted to meet rabbi klausner. his obit in the ny times is here. when i was stuck looking for a subject for my rabbinic ma thesis, my father handed me a photocopied pamphlet of this haggadah:


i had never seen a text like this one, which ended with 'shefoch chamatcha' ('pour out thy wrath') - a prayer i also did not know since the reform text had omitted this first line. and so my thesis on the apologetic and polemic motifs in the passover haggadah was born :-)

may rabbi klausner's family and friends be consoled with the mourners of zion and jerusalem.

yanks in freefall

dj & andy stumped
what is there to say? it's not a good time to be a yankees fan. they couldn't score in a house of ill-repute. luckily for me, the qpr players have reported for pre-season training, including new signing previously with nott'm forest - john curtis. with any luck, i shall be too worn out from my work and study to get too upset about any of this.

*whoooooooosh* hmmmmm, was that a porcine creature i just saw up in the sky?

thinking of albert

i found these words today in a letter from elie wiesel:

"i see your father's face more often than when he was alive"

me too. i am talking about him so much during this first week of school. and, finally, some tears are beginning to fall out of my eyes.

you go mika!

msnbc newsreader Mika Brzezinski
the grauniad reports today about an incident on television last wednesday morning. mika brzezinski (daughter of former carter advisor zbigniew) refused to read a report on paris hilton's release from jail as the lead news item. she tried to burn the script and later, when it appeared again on her desk, she shredded it. the paper reports, however, that the moment may be a fake:

"... suspicions remain that Brzezinski's moment of madness was staged, although the worried reactions from her co-hosts when she attempted to set fire to the script on air suggests she wasn't acting."

o my goodness i do hope not. i saw the clip online and could not believe it was real in the sense that she would actually argue with the host and refuse to follow the director's orders. on the little island of my desk in a small room far away, a cheer went up for mika. ffs there is so much more important stuff that we need to be seeing. not to mention the behaviour of the men either side of her, who seemed to be auditioning for spike tv. go mika!

the zoo rabbi - natan slifkin

thanks to libby purves for pointing us to this article in the wall street journal.

here is the rabbi's website. the home page has a lovely video starting with him riding an elephant and both of them waving at us. he also gets nipped a little by an ostrich.

what's the big fuss? basically that as an orthodox rabbi, slifkin goes a bit too far with his acceptance of darwinian theories of evolution:

""Appreciating the role and rule of natural law is an essential prerequisite to appreciating the role and rule of the spiritual law of Torah," Rabbi Slifkin writes in "The Science of Torah.""

the site looks quite interesting to me - certainly worth remembering in times of procrastination.

ding dong farfour is dead

hamas' mickey mouse lookalike
yahoo reports that the mickey mouse character used to preach Hamas dogma on al aqsa tv has been killed off:

"GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - A Mickey Mouse lookalike who preached Islamic domination on a Hamas-affiliated children's television program was beaten to death in the show's final episode Friday. In the final skit, "Farfour" was killed by an actor posing as an Israeli official trying to buy Farfour's land. At one point, the mouse called the Israeli a "terrorist." "Farfour was martyred while defending his land," said Sara, the teen presenter. He was killed "by the killers of children," she added. The weekly show, featuring a giant black-and-white rodent with a high-pitched voice, had attracted worldwide attention because the character urged Palestinian children to fight Israel. It was broadcast on Hamas-affiliated Al Aqsa TV. Station officials said Friday that Farfour was taken off the air to make room for new programs. Station manager Mohammed Bilal said he did not know what would be shown instead.

Israeli officials have denounced the program, "Tomorrow's Pioneers," as incendiary and outrageous. The program was also opposed by the state-run Palestinian Broadcasting Corp., which is controlled by Fatah, Hamas' rival."

i can only echo rodgers & hammerstein:

You've got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You've got to be taught
From year to year,
It's got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade,
You've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You've got to be carefully taught

(YOU'VE GOT TO BE CAREFULLY TAUGHT - South Pacific )

she thinks it's all over ...

... she was wrong.

i saw michelle pfeiffer on youtube recently - a clip from an interview she did not so long ago. maybe it was on 'ellen' but i'm not sure. anyway, she came across as so terribly uninteresting, and i was sad to feel my ancient yen for her evaporate. however, just saw the above pic on a blog, and i realise that there are still embers of that fire smoldering within. i may be more ardent about ardant, but pfeiffer's publicist has certainly aged her well.

liz claiborne r.i.p.

god help me i am no fashion maven but there have been times such as job interviews and other occasions requiring clothing a bit dressier than my favourite jeans and hoodie when liz claiborne's designs have been a godsend. in sizes that fit and at prices i could afford rubenesque ravaj was able to dress appropriately thanks to her. may she rest in peace.

breaking news from the associated press as reported on yahoo.

the owl of learning (vi)

sowing in tears and reaping in joy comes to mind today. after much wailing and gnashing of teeth by ravaj on monday, conversations with teachers before the maths class led to an extremely unexpectedly enjoyable 3 hour lesson about bases. it's too boring to write about and i am too tired to try. suffice it to say that our teacher ended the session with a joke, and i got it. here it is for you:

there are 10 kinds of people in the world. those who understand binary systems, and those who do not.

what is wrong with this sentence?

from today's daily telegraph with regard to brits killed in the current flooding:

"The Queen and Tony Blair expressed their condolences to those who have lost their lives in the floods."

i am sure those people were honoured and comforted ?????

owl of learning (v)

the agony continues. tried to do my maths homework this evening. several fuses in my brain blew. let's put it this way. i decided i would rather walk in the drenching heat through unlit unknown boston streets in a new york yankees t-shirt than face the pages on my desk.

i guess i need to thank the yankee pitcher for walking home baltimore's winning run in the bottom of the ninth at camden yards. any red sock who saw me this evening would most likely either gloat or pity me, rather than bash me.

*sigh*

growing pain

my gorgeous adorable niece has started nursery school. she is only 15 months old, but the place was available and there she is. my mother tells me that the other kids are mostly bigger than she is, and recently one of them smacked her. she had never had that experience before in all of her 15 months, and was so startled, she did not know how to react. my first response upon hearing this was that i am going to get on a plane to berlin and find the child who did it and, well, you know ... of course my friends all pointed out that this is a first experience for her of how life is and can be. yes yes yes i know. but already? and how dare anyone touch my darling niece! and ... and ... and ... *sigh*

the joy of albert

my sister n. sent me this picture recently. on the 8th of july it will be 3 years already since our father died, and my thoughts are very much about him this week. i had never seen this picture before, and it makes me so happy and sad at the same time. i hope you enjoy it.

owl of learning (iv)

today was my first day of school. by the time i got home around 6:30 pm, i didn't know whether to cry, to go to bed for the night or to have a couple of margaritas. o dear! not that i am complaining - it was an experience - i just did not realise how difficult it was going to be :-)

ok - we began with a 3-hour mathematics lesson. since we will have to teach elementary maths, we have to learn it also. i was good at maths when i was at school. on the other hand, the last time i did maths in school was 27 years ago, before two-thirds of the class was born.

shouldn't be a problem. i am intelligent. i can be taught this. i can learn it. and then 15 minutes into the class i am looking at the teacher and she is speaking and i am sure she is speaking swahili and i do not speak swahili. i am ready to cry. i tell her that i think she is speaking swahili. she tries to explain again, and i am not brave enough to tell her i still do not understand. my brain shuts down, and i start building towers out of the little plastik blocks she has given us to help work out problems about eric the sheep.

ok so i am humbled because i can honestly say that i do not recall ever feeling so incompetent and incapable and frustrated and stupid and hopeless. also, i can now empathise with anyone who ever feels like that in a class i may be teaching. i told her i had never felt like this before, and she said then either i must be really brilliant or ... i hastened to make the case against being very brilliant and explained how i had always avoided anything i didn't like in school. i did not say that these were things like biology, swimming and italian. it did not seem relevant.

now i feel like i was hit by a brick. i do sudoku every night, and get quite a lot of the fiendish ones from the times she said plaintively. ah well, 'twas only the first day. i have tear stains on my shirt, but tomorrow i shall wear another shirt. and the introduction to reading torah in the afternoon was enjoyable and more in my comfort zone, so i had time to recover. a bit.

i may return to this subject. probably tomorrow evening in the middle of trying to do the maths homework!

not to mention dawn french

tracey ullman & dawn french
this pic is from the same series as the previous one, and reminded me how much i adore dawn french. i have adored her from the beginning, yet still get ticked off when people say to me, "o you must LOVE 'the vicar of dibley'!" my standard reply is something along the lines of "why on earth would i find any connection with a comedy about a rubenesque female clergyperson's adventures in a rural congregation?" of course i am no longer living in the shenandoah valley, so the response may have become a little more obscure. also, i do happen to love that programme :-) but that is not the point!

anyway, i consider ms french to be a genius of my generation. despite her zaftig physical presence, when she is acting, she becomes the character whether it is tall or short, thin or fat, male or female, black or white. brilliant. i believe that laughter is one of the greatest gifts, and i love her for making me laugh.

ok, am a bit dizzy from the adulating. time to go to bed perhaps ...

sandra bernhard made me laugh

just got "everything bad and beautiful" by sandra bernhard. some of it is a bit weird, and some nearly made me wee from laughing. my favourite line is about britney spears:

"britney, or as we affectionately call her, 'batya', is one of our foremost aramaic scholars."

i guess that one is weird and also wee-ful.

a little bit of a jerusalem pride report

see gay.com for full details. bits and bobs include:

"A 32-year-old ultra-Orthodox man carrying what police called "a homemade explosive device" was arrested before the parade's kickoff, and city officials forced the cancellation of a planned post-parade Pride rally, citing a slow-down strike by firefighters."

"Israel's Magen David Adom rescue service said in a statement it was preparing an "unprecedented operation," readying 200 medics, 45 ambulances, 11 mobile intensive care units and a field command center. Additional medics and ambulances were on standby, the statement said. THEY WERE NOT NEEDED (my capitalisation)."

"Noa Satat, chairwoman of parade organizers Jerusalem Open House, told Reuters: "We are thrilled to be here today, celebrating our freedom of speech in the center of Jerusalem.""

see also jewlicious
pix from the parade at critical-humanism
jerusalem pride photos on flickr

piglet gets around

piglet in newton
this is the house of our friend betsy. she goes by another name now, but when she came to london to stay with us when she was younger, that is how we knew her. the picture was taken when i came to boston and stayed with her when i was younger, well, about a month younger than i am now :-) i absolutely love her house.

the owl of learning (iii)

one of the things about starting in a new anything is the issue of coming out. again. today was the first classroom interaction for my cohort of fellows. we were to share our 'jewish journey'. we were to trace our paths to this day. i made a megilla (small scroll) of photographs. i lined up 18 pictures from various stages of my life so far. in the middle, i included a photo of dbl & myself with the caption 'first love'. i planned to preface the photograph with a bit of a warning, i.e., don't want to be in your face but this is part of it all. anyway, we got split into two groups, and i was in the group without the women i had identified as more traditional (wearing a sheitl was a bit of a clue). i presented my journey to my table, and i think the megilla went down well. i wish, however, that we had all been listening together. that way, if there is to be rejection, it would be less in my face. now i have, or not, to do this individually as the time passes by. *sigh* que sera sera, etc.

julie burchill to study theology

julie burchill is going for a degree in theology? cue goggling eyes bouncing out of sockets on springs. in my early teens, she was the coolest woman alive, writing for the nme about music, mostly punk i think. she's 3 or 4 years older than i am, and was always rather outspoken. that last statement by me might be said to be a massive understatement. under the title of 'queen of spleen: the acid tongue of julie burchill', the independent has a few quotes from her here. my favourite is:

"On those who read her columns: 'Readers are invited to come and spit at me. I will, of course, welcome the attention'."

of course i have nothing against studying theology. several members of my family have done this. it is just surprising that an iconoclast such as she is/was would take the time to do it. none of the articles i have read so far go into much detail with regard to explaining her motivation. the best i can find is in the grauniad, where she describes her conversion to xianity:

" 'One moment I was sitting there on my Bloomsbury sofa, flicking through Time Out, idly wondering whose life to ruin next, and the next moment it was as if a mighty hand had broken - painlessly, patiently, purposefully - a huge jar of ointment over my head' "

if you are interested in reading a more recent interview, this article may do it for you.

i guess one does get burned out being an iconoclast. most of the articles today quote burchill as saying that after 30 years it is time for a rest. she also has a gouty foot. so this may be a really good choice for her. i shall, however, miss her angry prose.

the owl of learning (ii)

a second foray onto campus today, to merge deeper within the system by getting a student id card; and to charm the nurse practitioner into writing out some prescriptions for me by revealing my innermost medical secrets (will anyone tell me how to fill the little plastic cup without making at least a bit of a mess?). since my visit to the health centre was to be a brief one, the policewoman on guard at the construction site allowed me to park behind the traffic cones. when i was done, i drove away, and was immediately flagged down. apparently my car had invited one of the cones to continue the journey with us. so embarrassing. is this a driving equivalent of leaving the bathroom with toilet tissue stuck to one's shoe?

cheesed off

a bit of a cheese war is looming in france sez the ny times.

on the one hand we have the french artisan: “Camembert that is not made with raw milk may be cheese, but it’s not real Camembert,” said Mr. Durand, who took over the family farm when he was only 19 and has run it for 26 years. “To not know a real raw milk Camembert — what a loss that would be. The variety, the diversity, the flavor of cheese — the very heritage of our country — will disappear.”"

on the other hand there is the american expert: "In New York, Steven Jenkins, a cheese expert and senior manager of the Fairway markets, praises the Lactalis Camembert made with treated milk, and sold at Fairway under the label Le Châtelain, as “something awfully darned good.”"

the thing is - the big dairy producers in france treat the milk, for health reasons they say. that is not the problem, though. the issue is that the big dairy producers want the rules to be changed so that their faux camembert may be certified as authentic.

the full story is here. this is a big deal in france. really it is. and my aunt lives in wisconsin, so naturally i was drawn to this story ...

my latest crush ...

fanny ardant
unlike ms snarker, i do not have the discipline to limit my crushes to the weekend. they come when they come. currently, i swoon at the sight of fanny ardant. most swoon-worthy, her rita hayworth/gilda dance in '8 women':

the owl of learning (i)

ollie the brandeis owl
while the brandeis (american) football team appears to be called 'the judges', i like the owl, named after oliver wendell holmes jr.. l & i went to the campus bookstore, to check out the prices of our textbooks vs the ones she had just ordered from amazon, and for me the aged freshman geek to buy t-shirts for all the family:


it was a fine and sunny day. we applied for parking permits, and checked in at the health centre, where i discovered that my port woebegone doctor had sent in a shoddy report. i was immediately scheduled for tetanus and hepatitis b shots, one in each arm for balance, and ordered to return after lunch to be jabbed.

duly jabbed, we headed for target, and plastic storage bins to deal with the lack of shelving in my room. this evening, the place is almost habitable. almost. not invite-somebody-over tidy. more kind of i-can-see-the-floor-and-sleep-on-the-bed tidy. this is a big change from yesterday. hurrah for plastic!

10 commandments for the road

the vatican office for migrants and itinerant people has issued a list of ten commandments for drivers. the list appears in a 36-page document called "guidelines for the pastoral care of the road." a report by nicole winfield of the associated press states:

"(the document) warned about the effects of road rage, saying driving can bring out "primitive" behavior in motorists, including "impoliteness, rude gestures, cursing, blasphemy, loss of sense of responsibility or deliberate infringement of the highway code." It urged motorists to obey traffic regulations, drive with a moral sense, and to pray when behind the wheel."

here are the commandments:

1. You shall not kill.
2. The road shall be for you a means of communion between people and not of mortal harm.
3. Courtesy, uprightness and prudence will help you deal with unforeseen events.
4. Be charitable and help your neighbor in need, especially victims of accidents.
5. Cars shall not be for you an expression of power and domination, and an occasion of sin.
6. Charitably convince the young and not so young not to drive when they are not in a fitting condition to do so.
7. Support the families of accident victims.
8. Bring guilty motorists and their victims together, at the appropriate time, so that they can undergo the liberating experience of forgiveness.
9. On the road, protect the more vulnerable party.
10. Feel responsible toward others.

as i've said before, i think cars induce the ultimate in egotistical behaviour. we sit in our own personal space, shut off from all around us. we control the air, the sound and the speed. we relate to other cars only insofar as they affect our own progress, i.e., get out of my way, you are going too slowly, how dare you cut in in front of me, etc.

the only quibble i have with this list is #9. who or what is the vulnerable party? the policeman in westchester told me that i must always hit the animal rather than swerve. last time i didn't, i ended up with my car stuck 4ft in the air in the branches of a tree. but the creature was alive, and so was i, and the car got mended. hmmmmm .....

ica piglet

piglet is such a culture vulture. no sooner do we land in the boston area than he must go visit the local repository for contemporary art. here he is observing ravaj enjoying the view.

boston, bourgeois and being there

"maman" by louise bourgeois
so i made it! exhaustion seems quite energetic compared to how d and i felt today. it took about 8 hours to load the truck in the end, mainly because i was still packing as we were loading. the traffic was terrible everywhere, and we reached waltham around 10 pm. we spent the night in the home of d & t, d being my d's ex. lesbians have interesting relationships y'know ...

i am now sitting in my new room surrounded by the corpses of unpacking - torn bin-liners* and half-empty boxes. much to do, but it cannot be done now since i just got online for the first time since thursday. but i am here, and my new life has begun. hurrah.

meanwhile, what's with the spider up top is that after d & i dropped my d off at the station to go back to nyc, we went to the ica. o dear - too many initials, especially without punctuation, are a sure path to reading-enteritis. sorry. there was an exhibition of louise bourgeois (a name new to me) that d wanted to see and so we went. one room was full with this gigantic spider. i thought it would be lovely to put a table underneath it and hold a dinner party there. it was my favourite sculpture, and when i googled the artist i found this link on the bbc.

and the yankees are beating the mets. a great first full day here at #72a.

* translation = garbage bags

thursday thirteen xix

Thirteen Things about Movers and Moving
today the movers came to take the stuff i am sending to live in some containers for a while. what is left behind must be crammed by me and d. into a van and my car so we can drive off tomorrow and say goodbye to port woebegone. here are some thoughts about this morning's experience.

1. the sound of the sofa being shrink-wrapped makes a peacock sound lyrical.
2. movers may look scrawny but they are bloody strong!
3. why did i not start packing earlier? i did?
4. there are enough tins of garbanzo beans in my cupboard to survive a (short) war.
5. movers get first dibs on your kerbside castaways.
6. why are all my dust bunnies purple?
7. i didn't realise that i had so many cd's/books/paperclips
8. ultra-sticky wrapping tape dances to the tune of the moving men
9. what do i do now there's nothing to sit on?
10. just found what used to be my favourite shirt!
11. by the end you chuck out anything that does not fit in a box. (the neighbour's cat is missing)
12. when the movers have gone, you find a whole lot of other stuff that should have gone with them.
13. it is only when the movers have gone that you realise your favourite sex toy was drying off right next to the sink where they washed their hands.

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circle line piglet

the other day, we were invited to join our friends from stuttgart on the famous boat trip around the island of manhattan. since it was *ahem* c. 30 years since ravaj had taken that trip (of course she was practically a foetus at that time!), we were delighted to go. the view of the skyline without the towers is still unfamiliar and feels unfinished. here piglet takes a moment to think and remember:


our friends had never been to the usa before, and it was fascinating to hear their takes on the scenes and the commentary of the guide. in a nutshell, they commented that, according to our guide, everything was the largest or the highest or the oldest or the best in the country, if not in the world. they felt that was neither interesting or useful information for a guide to share. we all felt he talked too much about baseball, although for me it was mainly because he kept talking about the pittsburgh pirates instead of my beloved yankees. when we first caught sight of the house that ruth built, a few of us cheered. quite loudly.

anyway, it was a beautiful afternoon for a boat ride, and when we were decanted back at the pier we went back to the east village for a lovely dinner. piglet had a good time also, for this was his first circle. here you see him with a friend he made on the boat:



o poo - can anyone tell me how to rotate this pic in blogger? my desktop won't let me save it rotated! sorry about this ... they look cuter together when you don't have to crick your neck to see them!

o the solutions that can be found!

an incredible story i read in the times today ... a five-year-old girl who was badly burned at 2 will soon have her bald patch fixed with the help of a balloon!

plastic surgeons implanted a balloon under a healthy bit of her scalp, and slowly filled it with gel over a period of months, so the skin - with healthy hair growing from it - will stretch and stretch. for now, the poor kid has to walk around looking like zaphod beeblebrox, but when there is enough extra skin, the surgeons will graft it onto the bald patch. brilliant!

"Her mother said: “We can’t wait to see the finished result. Hopefully she will have a lovely full head of hair. But whatever happens, we think she is very beautiful.”"

read the article here.