Concerning Issues: Gun Control, Social Security.

Two important issues are in the air now: gun control and Social Security - modification of the latter being a part of President Obama's budget proposals.

The President's original gun control proposals have already been diluted to eliminate any ban on sale of assault weapons. Now the concentration is on background checks. Even that proposal is causing consternation among certain strains of gun owners. Having read around to discover why, I found that the main objection is that they suspect that the registration of gun ownership, the holding of, and access to such registers by government would be unacceptable. It is surmised that, if ever a tyrannical government were to take over the nation, first thing they'd do would be to use any register of gun owners to rapidly confiscate all weapons. I'll try not to scoff, which was my immediate reaction. It could happen, though.... I guess. One day. Maybe. Couldn't it? The objection I see to the current proposal is that background checks are already part of the law - and that law is not being properly adhered to by all, including the authorities. Why would we expect that an encore would be treated any differently?

Is this really the best that can be done: the least we can do? If the NRA and its members are blocking every avenue, why not take an alternative route for now, consider that violence in general is being fueled by more than just the easy availability of guns? How about some restraints on depiction of violence in movies and video games? I know the arguments against this, but the fact remains that in this technological age more people do have far greater access to depictions of violence in fantasy situations than they've ever had before. Even when not seeking it we can all stumble upon heavy doses of violence in movies and TV drama. It draws the crowds, gets attention, encourages retailers to buy advertising time. Violence and sex, twin ensnarers of the human psyche, twin cash cows. Sex - well, okay that's a bit different, but treating violence as entertainment has to be wrong, measured by any yardstick.


Re: Social Security, and that peculiarly named "chained CPI" - sounds like something bikers might pin to their leather jackets. The President is allegedly trying to get Republicans to agree to fairly mild tax increases on the wealthy by offering up benefit reductions on incomes of senior citizens who, by the way, have contributed to their retirement benefit throughout their working lives. Nice, eh? If the Republicans go for it, which isn't at all certain (thank goodness) the measures won't affect seniors much immediately, but over time they would reduce Social Security retirement benefits by a significant sum, no longer linked as they'd be to cost of living increases (Consumer Price Index - CPI). It's the fact that Social Security should be "on the table" at all that's most concerning, and placed there by a "Democratic" President too! FDR must be rolling. If this measure is voted in, it'll be opening the door for further and deeper incursions in future years.

Words (again!) ~ "Illegal Immigrant"

The Associated Press revised its stylebook recently, deleted the term "illegal immigrant," reversing a decision from six months earlier. The AP did not offer an exact replacement, instead recommending that writers fully describe a person's immigration status. (See LA Times article)

Words again! Personally I don't see the term "illegal immigrant" as degrading, as long as used in full, but using "illegal" as a descriptive noun does tend that way: as in: "he's an illegal".

What replacement of the term illegal immigrant could possibly be any better? Non-visa immigrant? Ad lib immigrant? Elusive immigrant? Undocumented immigrant is used sometimes, I guess that'll be favourite among replacement possibilities.

I used to feel unhappy myself about being termed an "alien" during my early years here, so I can sympathise to some extent with the offended. I had covered all my bases though and was "legal" to the hilt. The USA's immigration laws do not make it easy to become "legal", believe me! You cannot simply apply for a visa because you feel it'd be nice to live in the US for a change, or to find work because your native land doesn't offer what you wish for. Visa's are strictly controlled, and available only under these headings:

Immediate Relative and Family Sponsored
Family Immigration
Marriage to a Foreign National
Spouse or Fiancé(e) of U.S. Citizen
Spouse of Lawful Permanent Resident (LPR) in U.S.
Adopting a Child
Employment-Based
Employment Visas - requires sponsorship
Investor Visas
Special Immigrants
Employment: Iraqi or Afghan Translators/Interpreters
Employment: Iraqis - Worked for/on behalf of U.S. Government
Employment: Afghans - Worked for/on behalf of U.S. Government
Employment: Religious Workers
Diversity Visa Program - Visas provided are drawn from countries with low rates of immigration to the U.S.

For more detail see HERE.

Even when a visa is obtained (can be a long-drawn out process - and expensive) that's not the end of the road, unless the visa-holder intended to return to their home country after a given length of time.

It's easy to see why so many immigrants, from Mexico in particular, are here without visas: few, if any of them, would ever have been given opportunity to obtain visas. Who knows how many of them had indeed tried?

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free...."

Kidding - weren't ya??

You think that I don't even mean
A single word I say
It's only words and words are all I have
To take your heart away. (Bee Gees)

THATCHER

 Margaret Thatcher has died at the age of 87.

That's for today - I said THIS in January 2012.

Jacques Brel and Jack L

Today, 8 April, would have been the birthday of Belgian-born singer-songwriter, actor/director Jacques Brel. He died in 1978 from lung cancer, aged 49.

French, or French language, vocalists tend to be an acquired taste for some of us - like anchovies. I'm not much of a Francophile myself, so I'm one who didn't acquire the taste, doesn't manage to access the right wavelength for Brel's own passionate, dark and rather ragged-sounding versions of his angry or sorrowful songs.....though I can understand what critics of English versions are getting at. If, as purists and snobs say, the songs lose something in translation, it doesn't matter, because in the hands of a gifted song translator they can, sung well, still shine in a different, more generally accessible way.

Mort Shuman and Eric Blau, two translators of Brel's work, were responsible for introducing Jacques Brel to audiences in the USA. They created a revue, Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris, comprising translations of his songs. It opened off-Broadway in January 1968. Poet Rod McKuen translated some of Brel's songs too. Artists too numerous to mention here have recorded English translations, most popular have been: Jacky, The Port of Amsterdam, If You Go Away, and Seasons in the Sun. English translation of the latter is particularly detested by Francophiles because it loses the original thrust of the song whose French title was Le Moribond.

A few vocalists seem to have felt special affinity to Brel, I've mentioned one of these in an archived post : Scott Walker (see HERE). Marc Almond discovered the Brel influence and recorded a full album of his songs. I came across another another Brel aficionado during my wander through YouTube: Irish vocalist Jack Lukeman also known as just "Jack L" (get it?) This was a new name to me, but he's a super vocalist - I'll be acquiring some of his CDs - he ought to be better known!

Jack L IS known to frequenters of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland, the Glastonbury Festival in England, and has performed in the Royal Albert Hall in London. He has sung with some big name stars from both sides of the Atlantic yet somehow has slipped through the music industry's cracks in the USA. He has an enthusiastic bevy of fans in his native Ireland, with several CD and DVD releases to his name. According to commenters at YouTube his stage performances are something to behold; he is, apparently a born showman as well as a superb and emotional vocalist. In 2003 Lukeman performed a record breaking run of 35 shows in Dublin with the songs of Jacques Brel, "Chez Jack L".




Of Brel himself it was said that: "...to see Jacques Brel perform live was an extraordinary experience....it was indescribable. ........... What was it exactly about Brel that could have this effect on audiences? Apparently, it didn't even matter whether you understood his French lyrics or not. The music cast its spell and the truth of his performance took you somewhere. Songs with themes of love, cities, streets, smells, drugs, war, loss, death, broken dreams . . . all with raw human emotion. Songs with stories, wit, pathos, tragedy – and always, the human condition . . . but never forgetting that life, with all its complexities, shows us much humor."
(See HERE)

By the way, she said donning her amateur astrologer's hat, Jack Lukeman has Sun in Aquarius with Sun in exact trine to Uranus (born 11 February 1973). Jacques Brel, with Sun in Aries had Mercury conjunct Uranus (Aquarius's ruling planet), so there's a clear astrological link - perhaps reflecting Jack L's feelings of affinity with Jacques Brel's music?

Possibly best known of all Brel songs was Ne me quitte pas (literally translated: "Don't Leave Me"). Rod McKuen's English translation, titled If You Go Away is less angst-ridden than the original, lending itself to a more melodic but still emotional rendition. Ne me quitte pas was written in 1959 allegedly after Brel's mistress "Zizou" left him. She was pregnant with his child, but he refused to acknowledge he was the father. Zizou had the child aborted. Brel said, in interview years later, that the song is not a love song, but is about the cowardice of men.

First, a version by the composer himself, then Jack L's interpretation, which I think is is one of the best, if not THE best (even including Sinatra's - and for me to say that is very unusual!)





Just as a passing thought, having listened to many other versions of that song via YouTube, I wondered why there's none with a jazzy leaning. I could easily imagine a gorgeous Miles Davis or Johnny Hodges-type solo, mid-track, the melody seems to cry out for something like that. I found Helen Merrill's very nice rendition of the song with a solo by Stan Getz at the beginning. Other than that, there's a version by Acker Bilk, but not on You Tube. It can be heard HERE - by clicking on "play".



Two good articles on Jacques Brel are:
HERE and
HERE.
Jack Lukeman's official website is HERE.

Unexpected Resemblances in a Movie I Didn't Want to See

Husband has been hankering after seeing one of the Pirates of the Caribbean set of movies ever since they first appeared, thinking they'd be of a similar genre to the Indiana Jones series. I've been less keen, especially to go see any of the Pirates tales on the big cinema screen. In a thrift shop recently, choosing five DVDs so's to take advantage of the "$1 each if you buy 5" offer, Husband spotted Pirates of the Caribbean - Dead Man's Chest; I couldn't wriggle out of including it! Back home, I'd kept slotting it back to the bottom of the pile of "to watch" materials, until this week. Husband got his wish, we watched it, but he was disappointed in the film. He found that it was certainly not in the same league as the Indiana Jones offerings. I watched out of curiosity. Johnny Depp is a fascinating character (see my archived post here). His highly camp portrayal of pirate captain Jack Sparrow wasn't at all what I was expecting, but then that's the Depp trademark: the unexpected.

Three things I kept noticing in the movie reminded me of other things:

#1 In a lot of the farcical action sequences the situations, reactions and and facial expressions of Depp and others kept bringing to mind those old Wile E. Coyote cartoons. I swear they must have studied those, or at least had them stashed away in their memory banks.



#2 I did admire the fantastic arty makeup/costumes of the crew of The Flying Dutchman who were half man/half sea creature. I can't find detailed photographs, but this, see left, will give some idea. I was immediately reminded of the art of Italian 16th century painter Giuseppe Arcimboldo. I wrote a post about him in 2010 - HERE. Some of his work:




WATER



FIRE


AIR




EARTH



#3 Reminding me of something else in a very different context from the film: in movie scenes on a fictional island called Pelegosto, inhabited by a tribe of cannibals, there were some huts, constructed in rather artistic forms, from wicker branches. Again, I can't find a photograph of the scene I'd like to show, but this will suffice:

 Husband and I both immediately said, "Bet those were inspired by erm....erm...whatsisname??" His name is Patrick Dougherty, we recalled later, a sculptor whose speciality is large works in wicker/willow - example above, 
more can be seen via Google Image.

North Korea - The Unknowns

Can I think of anything even edging on intelligent to say about current news on the North Korean situation? I doubt it. During the week I've brushed up on Korean history, reminded myself just how situations such as the present one have been spawned, but that still doesn't give much insight into the way the mind of North Korea's new young ruler Kim Jong-un works. Or, in fact, whether the way his mind works has much bearing on the situation. Would it be more useful to understand how his military leaders' minds work, to know how the new leader ranks in their estimation, and how much he allows their views to influence him? (Photo credit: Telegraph, UK.)

Even writers and commenters who have access to far more information than the average concerned reader don't seem overly confident about which way to slant their opinions, often aiming to cover all possible eventualities.

Backing up the weary "just another threat " point of view there's a slideshow of old headlines tracing North Korea's habit of issuing threats over the years:
The Complete History Of False Threats From North Korea.

Simon Jenkins in yesterday's Guardian wrote Where's the real threat here – Kim Jong-un or Trident?....."What we should be scared of is not the North Korean's bellicosity but how it's being used to subvert domestic politics in the west".

Hmmm.

To my mind independent blog Cannonfire's 4 April post looks at the situation with as clear an eye as anyone: Could North Korea's madness lead to a U.S.-China nuclear war?

Coming at it from another angle - would astrology, or psychic insight have anything helpful to offer to those who believe that "there are more things in heaven and earth (Horatio) than are dreamt of in your philosophy" ?

Let's see.

There's a good interpretation of Kim Jon-un's natal chart at Solaris Astrology. And more - on his Saturn Return and the situation in general at Neptune Cafe HERE. Psychic insights on the issue at Astrochicks HERE....

Me? I lean towards the "just another threat" view, but this time it comes with a definite extra edge, due to an unknown quantity: North Korea's new young leader, so far untested.

I wish someone else had said this, as I don't relish quoting former Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld's words at the time of the WMD (weapons of mass destruction) in Iraq debacle, but we're there again, Dude - sort of:
"There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know."

When Will We Challenge Them?

Vanilla Rose's comment to yesterday's post:

"Politicians pay lip service to the idea that everyone is "equal", but firmly believe that some people are much, much more deserving than others. And that they are in the very deserving category. The majority of the Cabinet (in the UK) are millionaires and yet food and alcohol at the House of Commons is subsidised. They have many perks and yet many still cheat on their expenses forms.

One Cabinet minister chose yesterday to answer the question, "Could YOU live on £53 a week?" with "Yes". I went into the supermarket this morning and the cashiers and other customers were all of the opinion that he couldn't. And said supermarket is not normally a hotbed of debate."

It arrived as I was reading an article by George Monbiot from the UK's Guardian newspaper: Communism, Welfare State – What's the Next Big Idea? Any attempt to challenge the elite needs courage, inspiration and a truly groundbreaking proposal....

As well as ideas to challenge Establishment's lopsided treatment of The People during austerity situations, or indeed, in just about any situation one could name, it'd help to understand just how we, The People of many countries, have come to find ourselves in such a dire situation.

A couple of clips from the piece:

........Thousands (in the UK) will be driven from their homes, and many more pushed towards destitution. Relief for the poor from council tax will be clipped; legal aid for civil cases cut off. Yet at the end of this week those making more than £150,000 a year will have their income tax cut. Two days later, benefit payments for the poorest will be cut in real terms. A week after that, thousands of families who live in towns and boroughs where property prices are high will be forced out of their homes by the total benefits cap. What we are witnessing is raw economic warfare by the rich against the poor.... .....So the age-old question comes knocking: why does the decent majority allow itself to be governed by a brutal, antisocial minority? Part of the reason is that the minority controls the story..............relentless propaganda..... Divide and rule is as potent as it has ever been.

Much the same thing can be said of US media, also long ago bought and controlled by corporations/the elite. They have power to "control the message", keep the country divided.

George Monbiot goes on

..............But I've come to believe that there's also something deeper at work: that most of the world's people live with the legacy of slavery. Even in a nominal democracy like the United Kingdom, most people were more or less in bondage until little more than a century ago: on near-starvation wages, fired at will, threatened with extreme punishment if they dissented, forbidden to vote. They lived in great and justified fear of authority, and the fear has persisted, passed down across the five or six generations that separate us and reinforced now by renewed insecurity, snowballing inequality, partisan policing.........

That last remark is important, it describes another facet of the reason we are where we are today. And yet, and yet, by those same people, whose ancestors were serfs, scarcely more than slaves, from time to time through the centuries, there has arisen a welling up of passionate and determined rebellion, attempts to bring about a better balance. It can happen!

For thousands of years, in almost every country of the world, a tiny minority of people have dominated and oppressed (to different extent and under different labels) the rest of the population. There has to be a better way. Many great brains have tried to solve the problem in the past. For instance, in the thread of comment following the article linked earlier in the post, a discussion emerged about Marxism. But Karl Marx was a man of his time, for him 21st century economies, policies and technologies were unknown factors. Things have changed beyond all imagination, and will continue to change at what to a 19th century mind would seem like breakneck speed. New political philosophies - completely new, not just re-hashed versions of the old stuff, are urgently needed. Isn't there someone with vision, someone somewhere, who could initiate another great welling up of determined rebellion by The People against the injustices of ruling elites and powerful corporations? The People, I'm confident, would re-discover their courage - it has been found before, it will be found again. Things change, The People do not.

Equal in Diversity

A linked article, Are We Equal, by Walter Williams also appeared in our local newspaper; my husband drew my attention to it, as a topic in which I'd be interested. I read it, re-read parts of it but remained puzzled about the point of it all. The topic seemed too clear to have required a professor of economics at George Mason University to explain it. Then, yesterday morning, I noticed a report that the US Supreme Court is this week deliberating on the issue of Affirmative Action. Aha! That could be why Prof. Walter Williams chose to write on that topic at this time?

Affirmative Action refers to policies taking factors including race, color, religion, sex, or national origin into consideration in order to benefit an underrepresented group in areas of employment, education, and business. It's a tool designed by Congress in the mid 1960s to ensure that positive steps were taken to advance qualified women and people of colour after decades of segregation and discriminatory practices.

In the 1960s, and for and a decade or so after, there was no doubt whatsoever that Affirmative Action was essential. The people of the USA, and especially those in Southern states had, for years seen African Americans as second-class citizens, treated them abominably through segregation - and worse. Women, unless of the wealthy privileged class, were still thought of as lesser than any male counterpart in matters of employment and education.

Those opposing Affirmative Action today bring arguments including the proposition that the need for this type of direct legislation has now passed. They propose that a new generation of women, and members of minority races, who have not been raised in, or with close memory of, segregation or ill-treatment, are no longer in need of the help afforded by Affirmative Action.

It will be interesting to find out what SCOTUS has to say on the matter. My view, for what it's worth, is that unless and until the day dawns when every last US citizen is free of every embedded, hidden unacknowledged racist or sexist feeling, there will never be equal opportunity and equal treatment for all. That point hasn't been reached in this country yet, far as I can tell. The next generation - another 20 or so years on - might see the dawn of such a day.

Back to Walter White's article. Surely, few people truly consider that we are all equal - on every level? Who has ever put forward that point of view? Is this what he had in mind? -

The opening of the United States Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson in 1776, states as follows: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

All people of the USA have equal rights to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness .......It doesn't say that all people are equal in talent, insight, vision, skill, physical strength, mental strength. We each have those attributes in differing proportion and mixtures, but none of us, however wonderfully gifted, however powerful, however wealthy, is entitled to be treated under the law with greater preference.

We could, if we as the human race would only allow ourselves to do so, complement each others' proportions and mixes of qualities and strengths. We're part of a whole, part of the same huge jigsaw-puzzle of life. A piece depicting sky and clouds cannot be placed in the midst of a brick wall and still make sense. We are entitled to the same equal treatment before the law and before education authorities and employers, each according to our inborn and/or developed abilities and qualities. All pieces of our human jigsaw are equal, but equal for different purposes.

Internet Trail: Norma Rae - Songs - Tears - Appoggiatura

"I like the trail that the Internet created. For example, I was watching one of those Douglas Sirk movies, and I noticed that Rock Hudson towered over everyone, and I typed in "How tall was" and I saw "How tall was Jesus," and I'm like, "Sure," and half an hour later you're somewhere you didn't expect to be. It doesn't work that same way in books, does it? Even if you have an encyclopedia, the trail isn't that crazy. I like that aspect of it."
(David Sedaris, Bohemian.com interview, June 2009.)

An internet trail, the other day, took an unexpected turn, and found what I hadn't been seeking, as well as my original goal. Initial intent was to read the lyrics of a background song from a film seen on Turner Classic Movie channel the previous evening: Norma Rae- excellent film, by the way. They should have cloned the woman upon whom Norma Rae's character was based and stored the clones - 'til now - the country could use a few enthusiastic, "won't take no for an answer" union organisers!

The song I was seeking, sung by Jennifer Warnes behind the movie credits, is It Goes Like it Goes, written by David Shire and Norman Gimbel. The only version by Jennifer Warnes at YouTube is this one, heard behind 1979 Oscar nominations; this song won Best Original Song that year.



Chorus:
So it goes like it goes
Like the river flows
And time it rolls right on
And maybe what's good gets a little bit better
And maybe what's bad gets gone.

That's something we can all hope for!

Anyway, having found that song I veered off for some reason I can't recall and came upon some blog posts/articles and conversations about a musical device known as "appoggiatura". (See one of them here.) The device is used by composers to elicit emotion in the listener. It is a type of ornamental note which clashes with the melody just enough to create a dissonant sound, and is thought to somehow generate tension within the listener. In other words, appoggiatura is what puts the tear in a tearjerker song. The song mainly being discussed in this case was Adele's Someone Like You. I didn't know the song - it's linked via its title here. Although I usually enjoy Adele's singing, her tearjerker factor, for my taste, is a little weak, in spite of any appoggiatura.

Music is therapeutic, most of us find it calming and comforting when feeling distressed or just plain old miserable. It would be no surprise to those who study ancient history and mythology that sound waves, and that's what music is after all, have a power all their own.Some claim that music has actual healing qualities. Ancient Greek god, Apollo, as well as having connection to light, the sun, truth and prophecy, also had within his portfolio healing, music and poetry - so there's an ancient connection between healing and music. Early tribes used the rhythm of a drumbeat or other instrument to bring about physical, or psychological, response. Sound waves, rhythms, wavelengths - entities only partially understood by our still puny intelligence. Timing and the cyclic rhythm of planetary cycles....there's that too, the "music of the spheres".

Tearjerkers which almost always work on me, appoggiatura or no appoggiatura, are many; the two below were first to pop into my mind. They're not heartbreaky-misery-crying-in-your-beer songs, though. There's something in Mark Knopfler's guitar and Jimmy Nail's voice that can flick the tear switch; maybe both have a naturally inbuilt appoggiatura ?

Big River - written and sung by Jimmy Nail, here accompanied by Mark Knopfler. It has me bawling every time, and I'm not even from Newcastle-on-Tyne, the city that's the subject of the song !



Speaking of Mark Knopfler - in an especially dramatic episode of The West Wing a piece from his Brothers In Arms was used in the background - that brought a tear or two to my eyes.



(Wipes eyes).

BELIEF AND BEYOND

Belief is the psychological state in which an individual holds a proposition or premise to be true.

Long and scholarly dissertations on the topic of belief can, and have been written by those far better equipped than I am to do so. The subject has come up in a couple of movies I've watched recently though. A blog post on that level might just be within my scope. Before I get to the two films, I coincidentally came across an article at Salon the other day about five religious leaders who have lost their belief and have become outspoken atheists. That article led me to recall reading of an astrologer who, when interviewed for Garry Phillipson's book Astrology in the Year Zero (2000) described his feelings when retreating from his professional capacity, due to loss of belief. (See HERE) It does appear, however, that much later on the astrologer in question, David Hamblin, did decide to give astrology another spin - see his website HERE. Another lapsed astrologer was mentioned in a post of mine in February 2011: Rudolf Smit.

It would seem that any belief, however strongly held, is capable of being reversed. Conversely any disbelief, however strong, is capable of being transformed into belief. That is at the the crux of the two movies I've mentioned: K-PAX (2001) and The Man from Earth (2007). K-PAX was adapted from a novel by Gene Brewer; The Man from Earth has a screenplay co-written by science fiction novelist Jerome Bixby (his last piece of writing before he died, in fact.)

In K-PAX a psychiatric patient, after claiming he is an extraterrestrial from the planet 'K-PAX', 1,000 light years away in the Lyra constellation. His name is prot (uncapitalized and rhyming with "goat"). He is committed to the Psychiatric Institute of Manhattan. There, psychiatrist Dr. Mark Powell attempts to cure him of his apparent delusions. However, prot shows himself able to provide cogent answers to questions about himself, K-PAX his home planet and its civilization. Dr. Powell introduces him to a group of astrophysicists, to whom prot displays a level of knowledge that leaves them aghast. Prot also exhibits easy influence over the other patients at the Institute. They each come to believe that he is indeed from K-PAX. Prot, who claims to have journeyed to Earth by means of "light-travel", explains that he can take one person with him when he instantaneously returns on a pre-selected date.

That brief synopsis based on Wiki's page is all I'll add, so as not to spoil the movie should anyone who reads this wish to see it. The film leaves one still wondering, should the characters have believed; would I, could I, have believed his amazing story?

The same question came up after watching The Man from Earth. This is a wordier, more deeply thought-provoking film than K-PAX, but in much the same "ballpark". Here a group of university academics gather in a country cabin to say farewell to a colleague (John Oldman) who has unexpectedly decided to up-sticks and move on. The cabin is the only setting we see, scenes moving only from a single room and fireside to just outside the door once or twice. The film was very quickly and cheaply made, but is certainly none the worse for that. It could quite easily be performed on stage, and has been.

Again, so as not to spoil things for others, only a brief synopsis: some lines from Wiki:

As John's colleagues continue to pressure him for the reason for his departure, John slowly, and somewhat reluctantly, reveals that he is a prehistoric "caveman" who has lived for more than 14 millennia and that he relocates every 10 years to keep others from realizing that he does not age. He begins his story under the guise of a possible science-fiction story, but he eventually stops speaking in hypotheticals and begins answering questions from a first-person perspective. His colleagues refuse to believe his story. John continues his tale, stating that he was once a Sumerian for 2000 years, then a Babylonian under Hammurabi, then a disciple of Gautama Buddha. He claims to have known Christopher Columbus, Van Gogh (he owns a painting which was a gift from the artist), and other famous historical figures. John's colleagues question his story according to their specialties: Harry, the biologist, discusses the possibility of a human living for so long. Art, the archaeologist, questions John about events in prehistory; he exclaims that John's answers, though correct, could have come from any textbook, to which John points out the nature of knowledge, as he can only put his memories together with modern science after he learnt the new ideas with the rest of humanity. When the discussion turns to the topic of religion, John mentions that he is not a follower of a particular religion; though he does not necessarily believe in an omnipotent God, he does not discount the possibility of such a being's existence................................

No more!

So, was K-PAX's prot really a delusional psychiatric patient with a savant-like level of knowledge, or.........? What about John Oldman? He, being a university professor had plenty of brain power, sufficient to answer all queries about a 14,000 year life span, and deflect any confrontational argument. He had a certain charisma too, gentle yet persuasive, never bombastic. What could his motive have been to so deceive his friends? Was he simply, what in today's parlance might be termed, "an attention whore"? He didn't come across that way - but do they ever?

I particularly enjoyed the part of the conversation relating to religion, but can say no more about that without revealing too much.

Though I could find myself wishing otherwise, it has to be kept in mind that this was all pure fiction. Both authors had nifty, if frustrating, endings up their sleeves too.

I'll say thank you, here, to commenter "DC" for recommending The Man from Earth to me in a comment a short time ago. I enjoyed the movie a lot, shall probably watch it again.

GOOD FRIDAY

Three views of Good Friday, from William Wyler via Lew Wallace; from English author G.K. Chesterton, sometimes called "the prince of paradox"; and from English painter L.S.Lowry.



Lew Wallace's novel Ben Hur, A Tale of the Christ (1880) was to become William Wyler's movie Ben Hur almost 80 years later, in 1959. The movie adaptation strayed from the novel in a few places, it was less "A Tale of the Christ" than "A Tale of the Adventures of Judah Ben Hur" - and, really, none the worse for that. In the movie the scene where Judah Ben Hur first encounters Jesus occurs when Ben Hur was being taken, with a band of other slaves, across the desert. He was desperately in need of water, cruel Roman guards cynically refused it to him. In a village the slaves pass by an onlooker, Jesus, who sees Ben Hur's distress and offers him some water. This scene links to another, later in the movie, when BenHur encounters Jesus and the two thieves hauling their crosses to the place where they are to be crucified. Jesus stumbles and falls, a bystander helps him and BenHur offers him a cup of water....reflecting a reversal of the earlier scene. The crucifixion scene follows later.

In G.K. Chesterton's The Everlasting Man (1925) the author had this to say about the events of the original Good Friday:

All the great groups that stood about the Cross represent in one way or another the great historical truth of the time; that the world could not save itself. Man could do no more. Rome and Jerusalem and Athens and everything else were going down like a sea turned into a slow cataract. Externally indeed the ancient world was still at its strongest; it is always at that moment that the inmost weakness begins. But in order to understand that weakness we must repeat what has been said more than once; that it was not the weakness of a thing originally weak. It was emphatically the strength of the world that was turned to weakness and the wisdom of the world that was turned to folly.

In this story of Good Friday it is the best things in the world that are at their worst. That is what really shows us the world at its worst. It was, for instance, the priests of a true monotheism and the soldiers of an international civilisation. Rome, the legend, founded upon fallen Troy and triumphant over fallen Carthage, had stood for a heroism which was the nearest that any pagan ever came to chivalry. Rome had defended the household gods and the human decencies against the ogres of Africa and the hermaphrodite monstrosities of Greece. But in the lightning flash of this incident, we see great Rome, the imperial republic, going downward under her Lucretian doom. Scepticism has eaten away even the confident sanity of the conquerors of the world. He who is enthroned to say what is justice can only ask:

‘What is truth?’ So in that drama which decided the whole fate of antiquity, one of the central figures is fixed in what seems the reverse of his true role. Rome was almost another name for responsibility. Yet he stands for ever as a sort of rocking statue of the irresponsible. Man could do no more. Even the practical had become the impracticable. Standing between the pillars of his own judgement-seat, a Roman had washed his hands of the world.

Lastly a northern English painter, L.S. Lowry, in 1946 painted a very different Good Friday scene: Good Friday, Daisy Nook. On 8th June 2007 it was sold for £3,772,000, the highest price paid for one of Lowry's paintings at auction.



Daisy Nook, near Oldham, in Lancashire, has hosted an annual Easter Fair since the 19th century - and possibly even earlier. Traditionally, Lancashire cotton mill workers of the region were confined to just two statutory days of holiday every year, Good Friday and Christmas Day. The fair attracted huge numbers of people. The painting depicts this annual fair in 1946, the year after the end of the hostilities of the Second World War. A local newspaper had reported at the time that there were "Record crowds at Daisy Nook", as people celebrated a return to the fair, which had not taken place for the duration of the war, and a return to normal life. The painting reflects post-war cheer and relief.
(See HERE)

Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s).

"I read the news today - oh boy!"

I read the news today oh, boy
Four thousand holes in Blackburn, Lancashire
And though the holes were rather small
They had to count them all
Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall

And now we'll soon know how many dollars it takes to acquire a signed album containing the song from which that quote comes.

A "pristine" copy of The Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” album, released in 1967, autographed by John, Paul, George and Ringo on the gatefold above their photographs is to be auctioned this Saturday, 30 March. Dallas (Texas) based Heritage Auctions have said that advance bidding for the album passed $110,000 some days ago, and could surpass $150,000 by the time bidding is closed.
(AP Photo/Heritage Auctions)

Am I the only one who sees this amount of money for such an item as kind of obscene? What would John Lennon think? I'd guess he'd be disgusted unless, of course, the money were going to some charitable cause.

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

Gay Marriage

The topic of gay marriage is in the news yet again with the Supreme Court's deliberations on the issue proceeding this week. Personally, I cannot see what people can find to complain about if two gay people wish to marry. It affects nobody but the two parties involved. Laws against smoking in public places, sale and use of alcohol and drugs, especially when driving, or texting when driving are different - those activities affect others detrimentally - sometimes fatally. Gay marriage doesn't affect others. So......?

I also agree though, from a slightly different perspective, with what Norman Pollack wrote yesterday at Counterpunch in a piece headed Gay Marriage: A Contrarian's View :

SNIP~~~

..........But let’s put the issue of gay marriage into context, i.e., prioritizing national goals. At this time, the issue is a diversion and trivialization, in the face of large-scale poverty, the vast gulf in wealth-and-power differentials, militarism run amuck, the nation in steep decline with respect to its social safety net, etc. Frankly, compared with the civil rights struggle, which NYT raises as analogous, and in which in the 1950s-60s I was active, I find proponents and affected parties of gay marriage self-indulgent and flaunting their preferences as though that form of discrimination raises to the plane of deprivation experienced by others in America’s long history of oppression and repression.........

There are far more urgent issues facing the country, and the planet - those mentioned above, and the old elephant in the room: climate change - but not many out there seem at all interested in seriously addressing them.

Talk of the Devil.......

In some recent "news" History Channel's current series "The Bible" has been criticised for their depiction of Satan. Apparently the actor involved has a passing resemblance to President Obama. Alright.....I'll stop myself from expanding upon that thought just now, and instead will wander along the secondary pathway it opened up: where did commonly held ideas of the physical appearance of Satan / the Devil originate?

An immediate thought shot me back to a novel I read last year: Arthur C. Clarke's Childhood's End. Oddly the part of the book which has most clearly remained in memory was the explanation of why humans have kept the commonly accepted picture of "the devil" or demons embedded in communal memory - the winged horned cleft-footed nasty - you know the one. Towards the closing chapters of Childhood's End it is explained by Rashaverak (one of the alien Overlords) to Jan, a character who has spend many years away from Earth and arrives back to find it much changed, and not much longer for the universe. The average Overlord, by the way, is much taller and more strongly built than a human, with large wings, horns on its head, and a barbed tail. Their appearance had, for many centuries, remained hidden from humans. Rashaverak revealed why the Overlords look so much like the Devil to the human eye. The reason is not, as many humans had guessed, that the Overlords had visited Earth in the past. Instead, it was a kind of collective precognition: the human race had a vague premonition, a foreshadowing, of its ultimate demise, and a creature looking like the Devil would be involved. That creature, it turned out, was Karellen, the Overlord.

The real explanation (or is it?) is that the horns and tail are derived from pagan lore which had, in turn, come about via Greek and Roman mythology: the Satyr, the god Pan provided horns, hooves and tail; the pitchfork he's often depicted carrying likely came from the two-pronged sceptre of Pluto, the King of Hell. Pagan gods were routinely demonised by the early Christian church in an effort to entice new converts, as well as restraining those already within "the flock" from falling back into the old ways.

Hat tip to Book Drum for the illustration.

Reverting to that mentioned in the first paragraph: this isn't the first time, actually it's probably one of many times, a President/Prime Minister has been linked to thoughts of Satan. In a rather different thought pattern Frankie Boyle, a Scottish comedian, once said of Britain's then Prime Minister: "For 3 million pounds you could give everyone in Scotland a shovel, and we could dig a hole so deep we could hand her over to Satan in person".

The Devil pulls the strings which make us dance;
We find delight in the most loathsome things;
Some furtherance of Hell each new day brings,
And yet we feel no horror in that rank advance.
~ Charles Baudelaire.

Spontaneously Speaking - on the Long View......

We enjoyed our long weekend in Texas; stayed in Longview in the East of the Lone Star state, a city of some 80,000+ souls, lots of traffic, lots (and I do mean lots) of churches, and lots of eating out. Restaurants in Longview were always jam-packed whatever the time of day. We asked the receptionist at our motel why this is. He said that it surprised him when he moved to Longview, it seems that everybody eats out all the time, for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Very odd! We picked around any antique stores there then drove out to Gladewater, 15 minutes away, known as "The Antique Capital of East Texas". Maybe so - but as the previous town was "The Pancake Capital of East Texas", one does wonder if there isn't a wee bit of hyperbole goin' on.

We were lucky enough to get a table one evening at The Genghis Grill Mongolian Stir Fry restaurant close to our motel. That was a first for us - the style of meal, I mean. Customers are given a stainless steel bowl in a little stand with a small bowl attached for sauce, then pointed in the direction of the raw buffet where all manner of raw meats, fish, and vegetables are displayed, along with a goodly array of spices and sauces. This being new to us we floundered around a bit deciding what to fill our bowls with. When filled the bowl is taken to a counter where several chefs are hard at work on a huge hotplate with special tools stir frying the customers' food before adding the choice of starches (3 kinds of rice, noodles or something I can't recall) customers can choose two from the list. It was a good meal - we'd have done a return visit but the place was packed next evening when we looked in, with a queue waiting.

This is how the concept is described in the "blurb"

It's actually not a cuisine, but an INTERACTIVE style of exhibition cooking modeled after a centuries-old legend.According to this legend, 12th century Mongol warriors, led by the mighty warrior,GENGHIS KHAN heated their shields over open fires to grill food in the fields of battle!

It was a good weekend, and Birthday Boy was happy with my planning.

My husband sometimes laughs at my predilection for planning. He believes in spontaneity. Well, Sun in Aries - he would, wouldn't he? I reckon it's a moot point in life as to whether spontaneity is preferable to planning. Does a spontaneous risk taker have a better time than a planner? Spontaneity sounds good, sounds cool and exciting: The

Why don't we do it in the road?
No one will be watching us
Why don't we do it in the road?
(Beatles)

kind of approach.

That'd be a wee bit too spontaneous for most, but over-planning, over-thinking and strictly structured living is definitely not a good thing.

Being spontaneous eliminates planning, unless one is planning to be spontaneous that is, for as Oscar Wilde said "Spontaneity is a meticulously prepared art".

Some people really do enjoy planning. I do. It's not always a matter of wanting to feel in control, it's simply a way of expanding the pleasure of... whatever, by adding anticipation to the mix. Speaking of mixes, the very best recipe is to have a mixture of planned and unplanned stuff in one's agenda, unless an agenda is to be outlawed as too control-freakish?

I find it exciting to plan, then to do something different, either from the start or during - at mid-plan stage. That way you get to enjoy both worlds! I never mind if a plan of mine goes wrong, because then the adventure begins.

In relationships of any kind control freak and spontaneous random risk-taker can be a viable combination - workable provided there is love and/or respect in the mix. One party will fill in blind spots for the other. The risk-taker will look askance at the planner from time to time, and the planner will have to get used to frequently rolling their eyes to heaven - but that's all in the game!

Long Weekend

It's my husband's birthday on Friday, hot on the heels of Spring Equinox. We shall celebrate with a long weekend away, a change of scene. Nothing exotic mind you, unless Texas counts as exotic!

Apt words of Bill Bryson - one of my favourite authors:

I mused for a few moments on the question of which was worse, to lead a life so boring that you are easily enchanted, or a life so full of stimulus that you are easily bored.
~ Lost Continent: Travels In Small-Town America

I am quite easily enchanted, as it happens, and I'm with Bill Bryson when he says:

I love everything about motels. I can't help myself. I still get excited every time I slip a key into a motel room door and fling it open.
~ I'm a Stranger Here Myself: Notes on Returning to America After 20 Years Away.

Back next week.

Movies and Messages ~ Million $ Baby, Crash, In the Valley of Elah

It was by chance rather than good management that we've watched three movies in the past couple of weeks in which Canadian director, producer and screenwriter, Paul Haggis had involvement. Two of the films were shown on HBO the other I'd picked up on DVD, in a junk store:
Million Dollar Baby,
Crash,
In the Valley of Elah.

Haggis was screenwriter and producer of two of the films which were also consecutive Best Picture award winners in 2004/5, Million Dollar Baby, and Crash, which he also directed. In the Valley of Elah (2007) had Paul Haggis as screenwriter (adaptation), director and producer.

I've nothing much to say about Million Dollar Baby, other than it was a well-acted, and an oddly engaging tale of a female who had the strange obsession to become a prize-winning boxer. I felt let down by the ending, but I guess it stands as a dire warning to those who might be nurturing similar obessions.

The other two movies had a lot more general relevance to life in the 21st century.


Crash, set in Los Angeles, puts the focus squarely on racism in the USA. The embedded message applies equally elsewhere, of course. Crash uses what I think of as "the tangled net" method of story-telling. A number of totally unconnected characters are introduced, and by the end of the movie we find they are linked in some way to at least one of the other characters, often to several. The Crash characters all have different ethnic backgrounds: African American, Middle-Eastern, Asian-American, Mexican, Caucasian, Latin-American (hope I didn't forget any). There is heavy stereotyping, and that is a drawback, but in this film it was necessary to get a point across in limited time. Each incident and reaction is drawn in extreme terms - cartoonish in fact. After I'd watched the film my first reaction was that it wasn't at all true to life, it was more like distilled version, keeping only the strongest flavours intact. It reminded me a bit of the way people sometimes train a puppy not to soil the living room carpet by rubbing its nose in the mess. Our noses were rubbed in the mess we sometimes make of relationships with others of different background from ourselves.

So as not to end on a completely negative note, Paul Haggis made sure that he did show that most characters though their bad traits were horrendous, had a decent, or even heroic, side too. Whether this was a cop out to stop audiences hating the movie I cannot say. I saw only one truly decent guy in the film - a Mexican locksmith.

I was glad to have seen the movie, but it left me part-irritated by the hyperbole, part glad that someone was at least attempting to point out how destructive racism can be.

In the Valley of Elah had a message too: war de-sensitises, war de-humanises.

The Last scene of In the Valley of Elah sees Tommy Lee Jones asking a guy to fly a worn and tattered Stars and Stripes in upside down position. His dead soldier son had sent him the flag. I had to look up the meaning of flying the US flag upside down; it means: "we are in distress".

We watched the movie on HBO, but had missed the first 15 minutes. I'd avoided this film when shown in the past, even though Tommy Lee Jones stars and is one of my favourite actors. I'd assumed it to be a war movie set in Iraq. We decided to give it a spin for half an hour or so to see whether it was as bad as I'd feared. It wasn't - and I'm very glad to have seen it at last. It's a story, based on real events, of a soldier's father seeking answers about his son's death, not in Iraq, but after his return to a military base in New Mexico.

Rather than recite the storyline here, Peter Bradshaw's 2008 review in The Guardian was a good one. My own takeaway from the movie was an underlining of something of which I was already aware: military action and war can brutalise and de-humanise even the best intentioned of humans. How many young soldiers come home alive but destroyed inside? How many commit suicide? How many come back with changed personalities - and not for the better?



Tommy Lee Jones' understated acting style, in the father's role was exactly right for an ex-Military Police officer with service in Vietnam, who has now lost the lives of his two sons to the army - one way or another. While watching the film I recalled another, from the past, in which Tommy Lee Jones played a character, a marine blighted by the war in Vietnam who, in the end, committed suicide: Heaven and Earth.



Crash and In the Valley of Elah are Two movies with messages that are important, very hard to miss and equally hard to disagree with. Paul Haggis did a good job!

Ashley Judd for The Senate?

Ashley Judd is considering running as Democratic candidate in Kentucky for a US Senate seat. This was a little surprising to me until I looked at her natal chart. (data from Astrodatabank). Her quadruple Aries (fearless pioneer), including Sun in that sign, and Moon in Aquarius (the socially aware, politically focused), with spotlight-loving Leo rising makes it almost a given that at some point Ms Judd would put herself into an even brighter glare of the spotlight than her successful acting career has afforded.

It does seem a huge first step though - from Hollywood to the Senate. There might need to be an intermediate step for Ms Judd - a mayoral appointment or governorship perhaps. Democratic party leaders, from what I've read, are unlikely to have enough confidence that she could beat Republican Senator Mitch McConnell. Given the low point of the Republican Party's reputation just now, I guess Democratic party leaders feel that the seat might be vulnerable - with the right Democratic candidate. Apart from being a huge first step into politics for Ms Judd, it's a step into politics in a strongly, one might even say rabidly, conservative state. Ashley Judd grew up in Kentucky though, she lives in Tennessee, works in California. Kentucky's political atmosphere isn't alien to her, she has to be well aware of what she'd be up against. Her family background and name recognition could be of some help. Her mother Naomi, and sister Wynonna are well-known country vocalists, country music goes down very well in Kentucky!

Ashley Judd is well-enough qualified academically for the job of Senator, it's experience she lacks. She has a Mid-career Masters in Public Administration degree from Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government, and a bachelor's degree in French from the University of Kentucky, with minors in cultural anthropology, art history, theater and women's studies. She has been an outspoken supporter of women's rights on many occasions.

Does astrology offer any indication of significant change for Ashley Judd in the near future? Well, yes it does. Uranus, planet of change, often unexpected change is currently transiting Aries, and is at around 7 degrees just now, heading towards her cluster of personal planets. Mars (energy, dynamism and ruler of Aries) is also transiting the sign, currently a few degrees behind Uranus. Astrology cannot tell us exactly what these transits will signify for Ashley Judd. Even if Democratic leaders do lack confidence in her at this point, and decline to give her the nomination, she has given them clear indication of her interest, and no doubt her future intention, to become involved in politics - if not in Kentucky, then elsewhere. She's a star already in one arena, I suspect that over the next few years we'll be watching her star rise in another.

New Pope and Two Pieces

I don't have anything nice to say about the new Pope.













The husband occasionally remarks to me "You're a piece of work, do you know that?" I'll respnd with "What does that mean?" All I get next is a wry grin. So I looked it up. Hmmm. Knowing him....knowing me....he's teasing - mainly - but it seems there's no cut and dried definition of the idiom. Some think it's another way of saying "You're an asshole", others think it just refers to a person who's being a little obtuse, obscure, obnoxious or difficult - I'll put my hand up to the first two ob...s, not the last two - as if!

"A piece of work", I was later able to enlighten Himself, comes originally from Will Shakespeare's Hamlet - Act 2:

Hamlet:
What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how
infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and
admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like
a god! the beauty of the world, the paragon of animals—and yet,
to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me—
nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so.

Rosencrantz:
My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts.

The Bard was putting a touch of irony into Hamlet's words I believe.






How about that second "piece" : a piece of cake? It's less ambiguous, easily interpreted. It refers to something that has proved, or is expected to prove, to be an easy task.

Origin of the phrase is less clear. Most sources quote a line from one of Ogden Nash's poems in a book, The Primrose Path, published in 1936. I haven't yet identified the exact poem, but the line goes: "Her picture's in the papers now, And life's a piece of cake." Did Nash invent the phrase himself, or was it culled from elsewhere? He was certainly no slouch when it came to inventing words! The phrase was rapidly picked up, or so it seemed, by British airmen in World War II. In 1943, author of Spitfires over Malta wrote: "The mass raids promised to be a 'piece of cake' and we expected to take a heavy toll." The phrase, possibly from that source, gained popular usage in Britain even faster than in the USA, but did the author of that book read Ogden Nash ?

Other possibilities for the origin of "a piece of cake", beyond Ogden Nash's use of it are: from ancient Greece, when a "cake" was a toasted cereal bound together with honey. It was given to the most vigilant man on night watch. Aristotle is quoted as having written in "The Knights": "if you surpass him in impudence, then we take the cake".

The idea of cake being "easy" seems to originate in the late 19th century. Cakes were given out as prizes for winning competitions. There was a tradition in the US South, the slavery states, where slaves would circle around a cake performing a kind of strutting dance step. The most outstanding pair would win the cake the in middle. The term "cake walk" came from this, also meaning that something was easy to accomplish....as in "it'll be a cake walk".

There is an equivalent French phrase for "piece of cake": c'est du gâteau; in Latin America also: "como un queque" meaning very easy - queque = cake. The first recorded use of "c'est du gâteau" was around 1952, according to Le Robert's Dictionnaire des expressions et locutions, so doesn't pre-date Ogden Nash's use of the phrase.

Although Ogden Nash's "piece of cake" is the first printed use of the phrase, it could well have been in oral use before that; or, Ogden Nash being Ogden Nash, a real piece of work one might say - he could have combined the traditions of Greece with traditions of the Southern States of his own land, and come up with the now common idiom. Piece of cake!

See also
HERE and HERE.

Arty Farty Friday 15 March

15 March 44 BC : Julius Caesar was murdered on the Ides of March.
Typogravure of a 19th century painting by Karl von Piloty:

Julius Caesar, the "dictator for life" of the Roman Empire, murdered by his own senators at a meeting in a hall next to Pompey's Theatre. The conspiracy against Caesar encompassed as many as sixty noblemen, including Caesar's own protege, Marcus Brutus. Caesar was scheduled to leave Rome to fight in a war on March 18 and had appointed loyal members of his army to rule the Empire in his absence. The Republican senators, already chafing at having to abide by Caesar's decrees, were particularly angry about the prospect of taking orders from Caesar's underlings. Cassius Longinus started the plot against the dictator, quickly getting his brother-in-law Marcus Brutus to join.

Caesar should have been well aware that many of the senators hated him, but he dismissed his security force not long before his assassination. Reportedly, Caesar was handed a warning note as he entered the senate meeting that day but did not read it. After he entered the hall, Caesar was surrounded by senators holding daggers. Servilius Casca struck the first blow, hitting Caesar in the neck and drawing blood. The other senators all joined in, stabbing him repeatedly about the head. Marcus Brutus wounded Caesar in the groin and Caesar is said to have remarked in Greek, "You, too, my child?

From This Day in History.






Nearer to our own time:

Janet Leach was born 15 March 1918 in Grand Saline, Texas, USA died 12 September 1997. She was a studio potter working in later life at St Ives, Cornwall in England. In 1956 she married Bernard Leach, a famous British studio potter. Janet was a potter in her own right before meeting Bernard and her independent spirit ensured that her work was quite different from much of her husband's in style. She never felt the need to pay reverence to her husband's work, was sometimes even critical of it. In return her own work was not always valued within the St Ives Studio, much of it remained hidden. David, Bernard Leach's son from one of his previous marriages, stated before his father's death: "Janet must be the one person who has worked closely with him for a number of years without being visibly influenced. She is so strong in herself that she has maintained more independence than anyone else who has been as close to that dangerous fire, my father!"

See more about Janet Leach HERE and HERE








Aldo Giorgini, artist and scientist, pioneer in computer graphics, was born in Voghera, Italy on 15 March 1934. He was one of the first computer artists to combine software writing with early printing technologies, leaving an aesthetic legacy in the field of the digital arts. He died in 1994.








Ruth Bader Ginsburg United States Supreme Court Justice was born on
15 March 1933, in Brooklyn, New York. Simmie Knox, under commission of the United States Supreme Court painted this portrait of her. She is the second female justice (after Sandra Day O'Connor) and the first Jewish female justice. She is generally viewed as belonging to the liberal wing of the Court. Before becoming a judge, Ginsburg spent a considerable portion of her legal career as an advocate for the advancement of women's rights as a constitutional principle. (Wikipedia)






Finally - another link to the date, and - stretching things a bit to achieve arty-fartyness - a famous ceiling painting by Caravaggio (the only ceiling painting by him).

The date:

Every 248 years Pluto moves inside Neptune's orbit for about 20 years. The period January 23, 1979 to March 15, 1999 was the last time Pluto's very eccentric orbit carried it inside the orbit of Neptune. During that time, Neptune became the outermost planet in the solar system.

For 35 interesting facts about Pluto, see Random Facts, HERE



The painting:

The fresco, features Jupiter, Pluto and Neptune as allegorical representations of alchemy. The artist used his own body and facial features as model for the figures. Jupiter stands for sulphur and air, Neptune for mercury and water, and Pluto for salt and earth. The fresco was commissioned by Cardinal Francesco Maria Del Monte for the ceiling of a small second-floor alchemy lab of his hunting lodge in 1597.

On his eagle, Jupiter swoops down towards Neptune and Pluto, who are standing at the opposite edge of the ceiling, as if he were making the sky light up with a crystal ball. Any interpretation of the gathering of the gods, seen, unusually, from below, must shift between mythology (the gods, identified by the animal associated with each: an eagle for Jupiter, a sea stallion for Neptune and the three-headed dog Cerberus for Pluto); astrology (zodiac signs can be seen on the globe), and alchemy.

Hat tip to Guia Bargigli at THIS BLOG for clear representations, information and interpretation of the painting.