Readers’ Photos: Polaroid Gallery – Lens Blog – NYTimes.com

Readers’ Photos: Polaroid Gallery – Lens Blog – NYTimes.com

At first, we were merely amazed. Hundreds of readers answered our request on Tuesday for their Polaroid photographs, in response to an article in The Times about efforts afoot in the Netherlands to reinvent instant film. By the time we closed the submission gates on Thursday morning, 932 of your pictures had arrived.

A while back I bemoaned the loss of Polaroid film. Here’s a site with a great response.

Tags: culture, photography, Polaroid

 

Shameless Plug #11: Gallery installs Eunice Kennedy Shriver portrait

Gallery installs Eunice Kennedy Shriver portrait – BostonHerald.com

It’s a good painting – meticulousiy rendered but not overwrought. I love the fact that this is a portrait of a woman who doesn’t need to be flattered. Her face shows all the pain and joy of living 87 years. It’s wonderful to see a portrait reveal something about a person’s interests and achievements instead of just their appearance.

It’s now on view at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC (hence the shameless plug).

Tags: life, portrait, museum, NationalPortrait Gallery, painting, portraiture, culture, Washington

 

How Now, Wench? Talking Like Shakespeare : NPR

How Now, Wench? Talking Like Shakespeare : NPR

Chicago Mayor Richard Daley declared Thursday “Talk Like Shakespeare” day in honor of the 445th anniversary of William Shakespeare’s birth.

And folks in the Windy City, from fans at Wrigley Field to the aldermen on the City Council, are picking up the Shakespearean lingo.

Great idea! Listen to the podcast to hear Chicagoans brave the bard’s style.

At Wrigley Field, home of the storied baseball team the Chicago Cubs — and to many a Shakespearean-like tragedy, too — beer vender Vince Pavalonis tried a Shakespearean sales pitch.

“To drink or not to drink: That is the question,” yelled Pavalonis, as he sold the local favorite, Ye Olde Style beer.

Tags: culture, life, Shakespeare, fun

 

D.C. Radio’s Last Rock Overturned – washingtonpost.com

Legendary Classic Rock DJ Cerphe Signs Off as WTGB Switches Formats – washingtonpost.com

No more Zeppelin. No more Skynyrd or Tom Petty or Rolling Stones. And not a whole lot more Don Cerphe Colwell, either.

Classic rock and the DJ who brought that music to local radio audiences long before the rock was considered “classic” are both fading from the airwaves. Beginning Monday, Colwell’s station, WTGB (94.7 FM, “The Globe”), will switch to playing contemporary pop tunes. With the demise of the region’s only classic rock outlet, the music that helped transform FM radio into a cultural force in the 1970s will become just another baby boomer memory.

Just 2 years ago I blogged about the new format for 94.7 to “The Globe” featuring classic rock. Lots of goals for a greener more community based station. As I suspected, it didn’t last.

Radio in DC sucks.

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Tags: music, radio, Washington DC, rock, pop, culture, life

 

I want this kitty! Nora the piano playing cat

I love this kitty! You can see all of Nora’s video on YouTube or visit her site.

 

Shameless Plug #10: Obama portrait at the National Portrait Gallery

Outlaws at the Art Museum (and Not for a Heist) – NYTimes.com

I should have mentioned this one last week but I just forgot.

See the photograph above: The three gentlemen work for the registrar’s department at the National Portrait Gallery (left to right – Dale, Mark and Todd). Normally they don’t dress this well to install art but it was a special occasion. Besides, it’s nice to know they scrub up so well and are still able to lift large art with style. The title above the portrait and the hidden label to the left of the portrait were created and installed by me.

The portrait was recently given to the museum and installed the Saturday before the inaugural. It was a pain to do at the last minute but I really love this piece. It really outshines the Bush portraits.

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Tags: Art, Popculture, Culture, Life, portrait, NPG, Smithsonian

 

Say it isn’t so! “Obama quartet admits faking performance at inauguration”

Obama quartet admits faking performance at inauguration – Times Online

Deep down I suspected this was true because it just sounded too good to be a live performance in such cold weather. I don’t want to know it was a recording. I want to cling to the illusion.

I’ll get over it. Sigh.

Tags: music, inaugural, fake

 

Assessing the Bush years | The frat boy ships out | The Economist

Assessing the Bush years | The frat boy ships out | The Economist
I know I said I would try to be more positive in my entries but I just couldn’t help myself. On this day of the historic inauguration of Barack Obama, I find it strangely comforting that a publication as conservative as the The Economist is more than willing to comment on the deficiencies of “W” and his administration and legacy.

Mr Bush relied heavily on a small inner core of advisers. The most important of these was Dick Cheney, who quickly became the most powerful vice-president in American history. Mr Cheney used his mastery of bureaucracy to fill the administration with his protégés and to control the flow of information to the president. He pushed Mr Bush forcefully to the right on everything from global warming to the invasion of Iraq; he also fought ruthlessly to expand the power of the executive branch, which he thought had been dangerously restricted since Watergate.

The two other decisive figures were Karl Rove, Mr Bush’s longtime political guru, and Donald Rumsfeld, his defence secretary. Mr Rove was obsessed by pursuing his dream of a rolling Republican realignment, subordinating everything to party politics. Mr Rumsfeld regarded the Iraq war not, like his boss, as an exercise in democracy-building, but as an opportunity to test the model of an “agile military” that he was pioneering at the Pentagon.

The fruit of all this can be seen in the three most notable characteristics of the Bush presidency: partisanship, politicisation and incompetence. Mr Bush was the most partisan president in living memory. He was content to be president of half the country—a leader who fused his roles of head of state and leader of his party. He devoted his presidency to feeding the Republican coalition that elected him.

This is a great article and well worth the read. It’s refreshing to read a point of view from outside the states.

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Tags: politics, Bush, legacy, history, presidency, TheEconomist, publication

 

Bong! Big Ben still rings out 150 years on – Times Online

Bong! Big Ben still rings out 150 years on – Times Online
As we ring out the old year and ring in the new year here in DC, I remembered that it’s already next year somewhere else. I can’t imagine a better place to do that than in London to the chimes of Big Ben. I had no idea that the clock is still hand wound — take that digital technology! So it’s not the most precise instrument (head to Greenwich for truly precise time keeping). I’m chronically 5 minutes late in my life so I can forgive a clock a few minutes here or there.

2009 seems likely to be a strange year for me personally (I’ll be 50 in August) but I truly hope it will be better for everyone. Looking forward to a new (better?) president, some kind of better economic upturn, and a little more peace anywhere.

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Tags: life, time, NewYear, clocks, London, Big Ben

 

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Child star Grimes’ Wonderful Life

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | Child star Grimes’ Wonderful Life

Click the above link to a very interesting interview with Karolyn Grimes. She played Zuzu in the holiday classic film It’s a Wonderful Life.

Here’s a quote from the intro:

Grimes was Bailey’s six-year-old daughter Zuzu and uttered the now immortal closing line: “Teacher says every time a bell rings an angel gets his wings.”

Her Hollywood career was brought to an end in her early teens with the death of her parents, which led to her being sent away to live with her “mean” aunt.

She became a medical technician but experienced more tragedy with the death of several close family members, including the suicide of her son.

But since being “rediscovered” by a journalist in the 1980s, she has travelled the world as an unofficial ambassador for It’s A Wonderful Life – a film, she has since discovered, that has brought comfort to many a person, including herself.

I love this film and never tire of it. It’s one of the finest Christmas films but not because it takes place at Christmas. It’s about the good in everyone and the potential of every human life. However, it didn’t shy away from showing the meanness in people, too.

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Tags: Christmas, film, Capra, holidays, movies, It’sa Wonderful Life, interview, BBC