A new list: My favorite Criterion movies.

These are my favorite (not the best. . .necessarily) movies from The Criterion Collection. Of course, they have hundreds of other great films too; I just haven't seen them (yet).

Grand Illusion - Jean Renoir (one of the great great movies...one notch under [or over] Citizen Kane)
Seven Samurai - Kurosawa (a three hour long epic film)
The 400 Blows - Francois Truffaut
This Is Spinal Tap - Rob Reiner (one of my top five knucklehead movies)
The Long Good Friday - John McKenzie
M - Fritz Lang - an awesome thriller
Nanook of the North - killer early documentary. Sorry, Frank Zappa didn't invent Nanook.
Time Bandits - Terry Gilliam (esp. if you're a Gilliam fan)
Henry V - Laurence Olivier (one of the best Shakespeare movies ever)
Fishing with John - John Lurie (a very funny and strange sort of travelogue, with Jim Jarmusch, Tom Waits, and Willem DaFoe)
Brazil - Terry Gilliam (This movie is one of a kind)
The Harder They Come - Perry Henzell (and dark, and very cool plunge into Shantytown, Reggae, and Rasta, with a great soundtrack)
The Blob - The classic spooky movie
Do the Right Thing - Spike Lee (his best movie, I think)
Playtime - Jacque Tati (I wonder if I would still like Tati movies?)
8 1/2 - Federico Fellini
Monterey Pop Festival (Hendrix, Joplin, Otis Redding and others broke out)
3 Women - Robert Altman
Slacker - Richard Linklater (an Austin movie--people seem to love it or hate it; the second time I saw it, everyone in the room fell asleep)
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou - Wes Anderson (my favorite Wes movie)
Murmur of the heart - Louis Malle
Dazes and Confused - Richard Linklater
Stranger than paradise - jim jarmusch
Traffic - Jacques Tati
The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie - Luis Buñuel
Spartacus- Stanley Kubrick
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[see, also, A List of Lists on All This Is That]

Video: Johnny Cash sings Nasty Dan to Oscar The Grouch on Sesame Street

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Teen shoots parents who confiscated his Halo 3 videogame

Prosecutors at the murder trial of 17-year-old Daniel Petric say the teen shot both his parents because they wouldn't let him play Halo 3.

Petric, 16 at the time of the shooting, was forbidden to buy Halo 3 by his parents, Mark and Susan Petric. The teen snuck out to purchase the game anyway. When his parents discovered the game, they locked it up in a gun safe, along with the father's semiautomatic handgun.

According to the dad's testimony, Daniel walked into the room and said "Would you guys close your eyes? I have a surprise for you."

Petric then shot both parents in the head. The mother died immediately, but the father survived. In court, Daniel said: "Dad, I'm so sorry for what I did to Mom, to you and to the family. I'm so glad you are alive." "You're my son," Mark Petric responded. "You're my boy."

Prosecutors have not said whether or not they would file charges against the surviving parent for child abuse.
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Amazing video and story-->> Iraqi newspaperman hucks his shoes at President Bush's head: "It is the farewell kiss, you dog!"

An Iraqi journalist hucked his shoes and hurled the truth lobbed a dog-bomb told The President what most people were actually thinking and insulted President Bush at a press conference in Baghdad yesterday.



As the two leaders met in Nuri al-Maliki's private office, a journalist sitting in the third row jumped up, shouting: "It is the farewell kiss, you dog," and threw his shoes one after the other towards Bush.

Maliki made a protective gesture towards the US president, who ducked and was not hit. We never get to see this in the States--the President ducking as foreign objects hurtle toward his head. [Ed's note: If you can throw two shoes at the President, surrounded by the best security force in the world, we hope Obama limits his public appearances].

Soles of shoes are considered the ultimate insult in Arab culture. In Moslem countries you do not face your shoe bottoms toward anyone.

The journalist, Muntazer al-Zaidi from the Al-Baghdadia channel in Cairo, was taken from the room by security forces.

The President later said "I don't know what the guy's cause is... I didn't feel the least bit threatened by it."
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Our Lady of Guadalupe: Stark Naked!--> Playboy gets Mother Mary to pose naked for their cover

A smoldering version of The Virgin of Guadalupe appears on the cover of the Mexican version of Playboy that hit the stands last Thursday. Playboy Mexico’s editor Gabriel Bauducco decided to put a nude Virgin Mary on its cover, and the Mexican newspaper El Diario reported that the magazine has already sold over 80 thousand copies.

The magazine features a model--Maria Florencia Onori--naked except for a white cloth over her head. A banner , “Te adoramos, Maria,” (We adore you, Mary) appears on the cover, as well.

In one of the pictures, the model seems to be posing next to a church. Playboy sources said that photographer David Eisenberg’s intentions were not to make the model look like Virgin Mary. Nyuk, nyuk. On the other hand, the magazine was purposely timed to be released before the Virgin of Guadalupe Day, a Mexican holiday based upon the Virgin's appearance before a Mexican child on December 12, 1951. ---o0o---

Poem: Defense

photo courtesy of freephoto.com
under a creative commons 3.0 license


Defense

You can't stop the rain.
All you can do

Is build a roof
You hope won't leak,

Or, at the very least,
Leak on you, and yours.
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Love Hurts: Never say "no" to sex in the morning

According to a Ouachita Parish Sheriff's Office report, early last Saturday morning, Brittany Phillips, a 19-year-old Louisiana woman, was ready for sex. But her BF, Todd Stewart, 35, was not supplying it. He tried to push Phillips off him in the bedroom of their West Monroe, Louisana home.


click to enlarge the complaint

Phillips claims that Stewart became violent after he shut her down (and the physical evidence does not disagree). Stewart told an investigator that he left the bedroom to sleep on a living room couch, but that Phillips "would not leave him alone." At some point, he added, things got physical and he was stabbed in the lower lip with "a long metal object which appeared to be a knife."


Todd Stewart: not ready to go that morning

The sexually frustrated Phillips acknowledged to Deputy Shane Smith that she struck Stewart, but said she did it "to protect herself." Phillips, pictured in the mug shot above, was charged with aggravated battery, and the battered Stewart, was charged with simple battery. Phillips was also booked on a pair of outstanding warrants, for more (!!) simple battery and damage to property.


click to enlarge
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An Incredible Globe

click to enlarge the stereographic projection

This Wikipedia "featured picture" is a 360-degree spherical panorama of a beach in Marigot, Saint Martin, using nine images in a stereographic projection to create a globe. The assemblage shows the "little planet" effect, where the area close to the point opposite to the center of projection becomes significantly enlarged. A detailed explanation of how it is done can be found here.

The original image resides here on Flickr and was created in 2007 by Alexandre Duret-Lutz.
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Another One Bites The Dust: Demo Governor Blagojevich of Illinois arrested for trying to sell Obama's Senate Seat

By Pablo Fanque,
National Affairs Editor, All This Is That

Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was arrested on corruption charges on Tuesday, including trying to sell the U.S. Senate seat vacated by fellow Democrat President-elect Barack Obama, federal prosecutors said.

While Obama has long distanced himself from the governor -- who has been under investigation on other issues for months -- many people are hoping he he has ALWAYS kept his distance.

The case reminds us once again of the political sewer from which Barack Obama emerged--Chicago machine politics--without necessarily being a part of those politics, but most likely, a reluctant observer and, at times, expedient friend.

"The corruption laid out in these charges is staggering," U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, the federal prosecutor, said in a statement. And that is an understatement. The amount of money Blagojevich (and his wife whom you hear so clearly giving instructions in audio tapes) were trying to shake down is stunning.

Possibly even spookier is his unmitigated audacity and the quite open demands he unapologetically imposes on supplicants. This makes the $90,000 found in fellow Democrat's Rep. William Jefferson's freezer last summer look like revenue from a Kool-Aid stand.

According to the complaint, Patricia Blagojevich was the voice in the background spewing an ugly suggestion to "just fire" some newspaper editors if the Tribune Co. hoped for state assistance to sell Wrigley Field, the storied home of the Chicago Cubs."

"Hold up that (expletive) Cubs (expletive)," she says as her husband is talking on the telephone. "(Expletive) them."

This shoddy episode has given great hope to right wing bloggers and talk show hosts, who seem convinced the Obama smoking gun tape will surface any day. And the story has struck fear in the hearts of more than a few leftists, all of whom are crossing their fingers.
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Sarah Palin's Christmas Card

Sarah Palin's Christmas Card from our friends at Weekly Wolrld News



click to enlarge
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The English Beat perform Best Friend (with lyrics)

The English Beat--who I am once again enthralled with (after just seeing them live again)--perform Best Friend. It's a great song, and the lyrics are worth checking out. Earlier, I always thought this was a love song; it's something entitely, and wryly different...and altogether roundabout love song. One of the things I've always liked about the tune is the chiming Danelectro guitar line...and it chimes here like the bells of heaven.



Best Friend
By Dave Wakeling


I just found out the name of your best friend,
you been talkin' about yourself again,
and no one seems to share your views.
why doesn't everybody listen to you kid?
how come you never really seem to get through, is it you?
talk about yourself again, you.
talk about yourself,
always you, you, you.
talk about yourself again.
she's on a holiday,
she's got her summer frock on.
suck on an ice cream,
it's meltin' in the hot sun.
first date's made you pray for more.
i wanted you, wanted.
everybody knows the score,
i wanted you, wanted.
what are we pretendin' for?
let's talk about ourselves on the floor.
let's talk about yourselves, nothing more i promise.
talk about ourselves again.
i just found out the name of your best friend.
talk, talk, talk about yourself again.
yes i just found out the name of your best friend.
i just found out the name of your best friend,
you been talkin' about yourself again,
and no one seems to share your views.
why doesn't anybody listen to you kid?
how come you never really seem to get through, is it you?
talk about yourself again, you.
talk about yourself,
always you, you, you.
talk about yourself again.
again, again, again, again.
i just found out the name of your best friend,
just found out the name of your best friend,
i just found out the name of your best friend,
i just found out the name of your best friend,
just found out the name of your best friend,
i just found out the name of your best friend,
just found out the name of your best friend,
i just found out the name of your best friend.
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Music That Matters

I have been jotting down notes on bands and singers, partly because I like lists, but also, in reaction to the list on the sidebar of Dean Ericksen's blog: "Music Worth Having Around."
A lot of people and bands I thought would be on this list didn't make it. Some bands I really like like Seattle's Band of Horses, The Raconteurs, or another Seattle band, The Fleet Foxes, haven't been around long enough to make the list. And there are literally hundreds of people and bands like Steely Dan, Yes, General Public, Leon Russell, Joe Jackson, Graham Parker, and others, that just don't hold up. In my booklet, anyhow. And yeah, I know I've missed dozens of people in all categories (let me know), and didn't even create one for classical/serious music...


Rock
The Beatles (all the way)
The Rolling Stones (up to Exile On Main Street)
John Lennon
The Kinks (up to, say, Schoolboys In Disgrace)
The Old 97's
Bob Dylan (up to Desire, and sporadically thereafter)
Rod Stewart (Faces and the early solo albums)
John Sebastian (the first solo record, and of course The Lovin' Spoonful, who had just enough hits to fill up a CD.
Paul Simon (the first couple of solo albums)
Rick Danko
Steve Miller (60's and early 70's SM, not "Fly Like An Eagle" and beyond)
Joni Mitchell
Chicago up through, say, VI
Bruce Springsteen
Elvis Costello
The Byrds
Split Enz/Crowded House/Finn Brothers
The Who
The Clash
The Pretenders
Talking Heads
Queen
Lou Reed
David Bowie
Cream
Velvet Underground
Derek and the Dominoes
Buffalo Springfield
The Grateful Dead
Los Lobos
The Posies (NW heroes)
Traveling Wilburys
Crosby Stills Nash/Crosby Stills Nash & Young
The Beach Boys
Brian Wilson (select, but not most, solo albums)
The Doors
The Sonics (NW heroes)
Nirvana (NW heroes)
Paul Revere and The Raiders (NW heroes)
Big Star (now 1/2 NW heroes)
Weezer
The Band
The English Beat
Frank Zappa/Mothers of Invention
The Ramones
Janis Joplin
Sly and the Family Stone
The Youngbloods
Fleetwood Mac
Cream
Jimi Hendrix
The Dukes of Stratosphear
The Carpenters
Simon and Garfunkel
Pink Floyd
Led Zeppelin (through Houses of the Holy)
Brian Eno
Nick Lowe/Rockpile
Buddy Holly
Chuck Berry
Derek and the Dominoes
The Allman Brothers

Country/Western/Bluegrass/folk (ish)
Woody Guthrie
Hank Williams (The King)
Bob Wills
Roy Orbison
George Jones
Willie Nelson
Chet Atkins
Merle Haggard
Emmylou Harris
Buddy & Julie Miller
Dolly Parton
Patsy Cline
Roy Rogers
Sons of The Pioneers
Gene Autry
Johnny Cash
The Carter Family
Earl Monroe
Old and In The Way
David Grisman
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
John Prine
Dwight Yoakum
Lucinda Williams
Lynette Anderson
Dale Watson
Bela Fleck

Jazz/swing/bebop/cool
Charflie Parker
Thelonius Monk
Art Tatum
Paul Winter
Charles Mingus
Duke Ellington
Lester Young
Benny Goodman
Glen Miller
Dizzy Gillespie
Bill Evans
Gerry Mulligan
Jacquo Pastorius
Miles Davis
Charles Lloyd
Jimmy Smith
Weather Report
Return To Forever
John McLaughlin
Count Basie
Chet Baker
Cab Calloway
Herbie Hancock
Bessie Smith
Nina Simone
Bud Powell
Stéphane Grappelli
Rahsaan Roland Kirk
Branford Marsalis
Wayne Shorter
Louis Armstrong (solo, and with The Hot Fives and Hot Sevens)
Billie Holiday
The Beau Hunks
Sun Ra
Bill Frisell
Jimmy Smith
Keith Jarrett

Blues/R & B/Soul/reggae
James Brown
Wlly Dixon
Muddy Waters
Al Green
Sleepy John Estes
Jimmy Reed
The Supremes
Lightnin' Hopkins
Otis Redding
The Blind Boys if Alabama
Rev. Blind Gary Davis
Stevie Wonder
Etta James
Smokey Robinson
The Temptations
The Miracles
The Four Tops
Leadbelly
Furry Lewis
Elmore Johnson
Skip James
Jimmy Cliff
Bob Marley
Billie Holiday
Marvin Gaye
Michael Jackson (first few albums)
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Barbra Streisand back in the day, 1977 that is

click Babs to enlarge

Here is the back cover of Barbra's 1977 album Superman. I worked at a music store in NYC that year (Carl Fischer Music Publisher) and the sheet music, with Barbra in her revealing outfit, flew off the shelves.

The cover, was probably the raciest thing she ever did. . .until perhaps Meet The Fokkers, where she plays the nearly deranged sex-therapist mom of Ben Stiller (Fokker)...
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"When Monkeys Fly Out My Butt": George W. Bush and Barbra Streisand Kiss - now that's one awkward smooch!

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Dave Wakeling and Nat Love perform Save It For Later on Luke Burbank's TBTL

It's kind of cool when your heroes meet.

While Dave Wakeling and the English Beat were in town for an awesome show at The Showbox, they dropped by Seattle's (and now, the world's) Luke Burbank's TBTL (Too Beautiful To Live - KIRO 97.3 FM and 710 AM). They play two songs, including one of their greatest, Save It For Later. I have seen The English Beat twice now, but have never seen Dave without his pink Danelectro. They're playing unplugged.

Check out this video on YouTube (or down below) and download the TBTL podcast with songs and interview at the TBTL website. or at the iTunes podast site.


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Portrait of Dean Ericksen

click to enlarge

Dean Ericksen can be found blogging here.

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Typeracer.com - a typing race game

As a four fingered typist, I knew I'd suck at this; still it's kind of fun. You race against other typists and your progress is measured by a car moving in a race with others. Of course, the people on the leaderboard/high score list all type around 150 words per minute. Check it out at http://play.typeracer.com/



As you can see, someone typed nearly 230 words per minute!
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Video: Seattle's Band of Horses play "No One's Gonna Love You"

Band of Horses are one of my favorite bands to emerge from Seattle recently, they're indy, hirsute, and have something of a pop sheen. I saw them in September at Bumbershoot and had a great time. They even managed to sound good in Memorial Stadium.



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painting: self-portrait (of Jack Brummet)

click to enlarge

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Only 44 days of Republican madness remain.

Only 44 days of Republican madness remain. It seems like the longest 44 days, ever.
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1,600 cops keep the peace between 700 Nazis and several hundred protesters in Berlin

German Youth give the finger to 700 Neo-Nazis

About 1,600 German cops, mostly in riot gear and helmets, were deployed in a Berlin suburb today to keep 700 Neo-Nazis and a few hundred protesters separated (roughly a 1:1 cops to citizens ratio). The police arrested more than 40 demonstrators trying to block the Nazi march Saturday.

The protesters chanted "Nazis out" and "Get Lost", and then tried to confront the 700 neo-Nazis, who carried black and red banners with the slogans "Young people need a future".

The far-right National Democratic Party (NPD) is described by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution as racist, anti-Semitic and revisionist (namely that they deny the holocaust).

Television pictures showed cops using water cannons to disperse the left-wingers who held banners saying "Berlin against Nazis". Wrecked cars could be seen in the streets of Berlin's Lichtenberg suburb, where the march and protest took place.

Dustups between the left and right are frequent in Germany, however, neo-Nazi demonstrations are often banned to avoid the violence.

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Painting: Bird

click to enlarge

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Oh Sister! Photograph: Nuns with guns

click the sisters to enlarge

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Concealed firearms okayed in national parks!

According to the Associated Press today, people will now be able to carry concealed firearms in national parks and wildlife refuges. "An Interior Department rule issued Friday allows an individual to carry a loaded weapon in a park or wildlife refuge..."

Now, when those guys drinking Old Crow and Seven-Up in the next campsite play Insane Clown Posse at maximum volume, you probably won't be quite so sanguine about moseying over and asked them to turn it down.

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Painting: King Lear and The Fool

click to enlarge Lear and The Fool
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Alien Lore No. 146 - The 2006 Australian UFO Wave

a still from the last clip in the film/video - click to enlarge

This is a great compilation of the "2006 Australian UFO Wave" -- a massive UFO hoax created by Christopher Kenworthy. Make sure to watch the entire video--the giveaway comes in the very last two videoclips. Thanks to Jeff Clinton, once again, for feeding into our Alien Lore series.

Kenworthy writes: "All the clips from my UFO hoax project, which have been viewed by over 8 million people." While the hoax project was underway many UFO researchers and others wrote to say they were convinced. Kenworthy says about the project: "Between June and mid-August 2006 thirty-one clips of UFOs were created. The UFO videos were distributed over the Internet via websites and video podcasts."

"The project was hugely successful, being viewed by many millions of people. Very few people suspected that the clips were manufactured. Gradually, the level of plausibility was reduced, but only when the last two clips were uploaded did a large number of people get suspicious. "

"It's also worth noting that two of the UFO clips we distributed were quite genuine - and no researcher was able to pick which two they were.I wanted to give people a taste of the drama and excitement of a UFO Close Encounter, creating a genuine sense of wonder." (See http://www.christopherkenworthy.com/ for further details on this fascinating project).


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Poem: Meaning

1
Some people say
Life would have no meaning

If we lived forever;
Others among us say

Life would have meaning
If we did.

2
The meaning of life
Is like the rings running circles

'Round a tree trunk.
If you remember back

On your last trip
To the natural history museum,

The best tree sections
Have pins on their rings:

Mayflower arrives in America;
Declaration of Independence;

Civil War ends;
Man walks on the moon.

3
Wouldn't it be something
To not konk out

And see rings tagged
Race wars end;

Israel and Palestine merge;
Poverty eliminated;

The return of Jesus;
And alien diplomats arrive?
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One of the best a capella songs ever: Thriller by François Macré - massively multitracked a capella

Nice! François Macré performs Jacko's thriller (written by Rod Templeton) using only his voice (with a little bit of digital chorus and reverb). He used 64 tracks to layer the sounds. I remember Brian Wilson's Imagination, where he also used a bazillion tracks. . .but he only did the voices, not the rhythm and melody tracks.

Here is Macré 's commentary from YouTube on the song:

Here is a remake of the "Thriller" song that I've entirely recorded with my own voice, using 64 A'cappella tracks. There is therefore no instrument, synthetizer, beatbox, or even to sampler, but only the sound of my voice livened up with Reverb and slight Chorus on certain tracks.

Regarding looping parts, I've simply used the "looping" technique. Moreover, in the whole piece (which contains several thousand notes), I transposed 8 notes, which were impossible for me to sing in high-pitched. Because of my tessiture, I also must have resigned myself to sing certain parts in head voice, more particularly on the track corresponding to Michael Jackson's solo vocal.

I've accomplished this non-commercial project at home, only with a mobile PC, microphone, headphones and webcam - in nearly 350 hours. It's just an artistic challenge, accomplished during my hours of free time, whose purpose is to make smile my close circle and net surfers. Nonetheless, I'll be happy to record in professional studio, original songs with this technique, if a label was interested to work with me on a SP or LP entirely based on this innovative concept of "Massively Multitracks A'cappella".I hope you'll have as much pleasure to hear and watch it as I had to accomplish. Don't hesitate to leave me your comments or, for labels and composers, to contact me through my MySpace profile : http://www.myspace.com/francoismacre

Northwest driving school: driving on ice

This video comes from Portland, Oregon--our neighbor to the south--during one of its famous winter ice storms. Thanks to Jason Larsen for pointing this one out...

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Painting: "Oh say can you see?"

click to enlarge

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The 100 most-often used verbs in English

I compiled this from several sources (most of which agreed). I Do believe, however, that among those 100 words should be several related to bodily and procreative functions that are not, as they say, "used in polite company."


accept
allow
ask
believe
borrow
break
bring
buy
can/be able
cancel
change
clean
comb
complain
cough
count
cut
dance
draw
drink
drive
eat
explain
fall
fill
find
finish
fit
fix
fly
forget
give
go
have
hear
hurt
know
learn
leave
listen
live
look
lose
make/do
need
open
close/shut
organise
pay
play
put
rain
read
reply
run
say
see
sell
send
sign
sing
sit
sleep
smoke
speak
spell
spend
stand
start/begin
study
succeed
swim
take
talk
teach
tell
think
translate
travel
try
turn off
turn on
type
understand
use
wait
wake up
want
watch
work
worry
write
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My favorite folk tale: Paul Bunyan (How Paul dug Puget Sound, and dozens of other tales)

click to enlarge - Jack inspects Babe The Blue Ox's testes in Klamath, California

Growing up in Kent, Washington, every week I trudged a few blocks up 4th Avenue to check out five or six books from the Public Library, . There were two books I checked out over and over through the years. I now own Paul Stevens' Paul Bunyan, (Alfred A. Knopf., NYC, 1925, 3rd edition...alas...but signed by the author, in great shape, with an intact dust jacket) and another, later book (collecting even more Paul Bunyan stories, Tall Timber Tales - More Paul Bunyan Stories by Dell J. McCormick (Caxton Printers/McCormick 1939 - I have the 16th printing in hardcover, from 1985 ).

I go back every couple of years and read the tall tales of Paul Bunyan and Babe, The Blue Ox. Paul Bunyan is a genuine American folk hero (right up there with Johnny Appleseed, John Henry, Pecos Bill, Koba, Atticus Finch [not a true folk hero, being from a novel], and Zorro), and a prototype of typical American tall tales you find gathered in folk tale anthologies. I was able to read all the stories I could get my hands on to my three children.

Something about Paul and Babe resonated with me. Partly it was the constellation of characters Paul assembled--people like Sourdough Sam; Cream Puff Fatty, and the other cooks; Johnny Inkslinger, the brilliant poet, accountant and all round deep thinker; Babe of course, with his Gargantuan feats of strength; Paul's foreman, the Swede Hel Helson; Brimstone Bill; Big Ole; Chris Crosshaul; and Sport ,the reversible dog.

The tales were about mosquitos the size of wild horses; logging problems and troubles moving the logs downriver; a winter so cold the flames froze, when all their cuss words froze and fell to the ground only to unthaw in a cacaphonous babble later that spring; Biblical rainstorms that lasted for months (welcome to Seattle); and natural obstructions like mountains ranges that Paul needed to level to make progress in his clearing of the land. Paul Bunyan was popularized by newspapers across the country in 1910 and has been a part of the American culture ever since. Unfortunately, Paul liked to cut down vast forests (he wasn't replanting seedlings or "reforesting" either...he was CLEARING land), and eat bacon and ducks; he is probably not Sierra Club, Greenpeace, Grist, or PETA-approved.


Delaney Brummet standing on Paul's logging boot in Klamath, Califorina.

Paul Bunyan was a hero of North America’s lumberjacks -- those sawyers and fellers, choke-setters, and woodsmen who cut down the trees impinging the road of progress, and, conversely, needed to build the foundations of the burgeoning West and Southwest. Paul was known for his strength, speed and his incredible skill with the crosscut saw, the maul, and the axe. Paul, Babe, and the crew leveled forests from Maine to Minnesota, all the way to right here in Seattle, alongside the Pacific Ocean , from which he would excavate a large swath to create Puget Sound (he threw the sand, rock, and mud he dug out over his shoulder, and created Mount Baker and the San Juan Islands). Paul Bunyan also dug the Mississippi river, built the Rocky mountains, and hollowed out the Grand Canyon,

Some people say Paul Bunyan comes from the middle western Great Lakes area of the United States. Other people say the stories about him originated in French Canada.

· Paul Bunyan was 63 ax handles tall.
· Babe, Paul's blue ox, was 42 ax handles wide from the tip of one horn to the tip of the other horn.
· Paul Bunyan had a frying pan that covered an area of one acre, which was used to make pancakes. The cooks greased the pan by ice skating across the griddle with sides of bacon strapped to their skates.
· Paul Bunyan and Babe created the 10,000 lakes of Minnesota. Their footsteps created impressions in the land that filled with rainwater, forming lakes throughout the state.
· Paul Bunyan once trained giant 2,000 pound ants. Each ant could each do the work of 50 men.
· Paul Bunyan herded whales in Lake Superior.
· Paul Bunyan created the Puget Sound in Washington by digging a hole along the west coast of the state, and simultaneously created Mt. Rainer and Mt. Baker, and as I mentioned, the San Juan Islands.
· Babe could eat 30 bales of hay, wires and all, in a day.
· It took a crow a day to fly from one Babe’s horn tips to the other.

The legends of Paul Bunyan incorporate dozens of points of interest in the United States, including: Maine, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Arizona, Washington State, The Grand Canyon, The Grand Tetons, Puget Sound, and The Great Lakes.

Paul Bunyan and Babe cleared the trees from the states of North Dakota and South Dakota to prepared the area for farming.

In the early days, whenever Paul Bunyan was broke between logging seasons, he traveled around like other lumberjacks doing any kind of pioneering work he could find. He showed up in Washington about the time The Puget Construction Co. was building Puget Sound and Billy Puget was making history by moving dirt with platoons of dirt-throwing badgers.

Paul and Billy Puget got into an argument over who had shoveled the most. Paul got mad and said he'd show Billy Puget a thing or two, and started to throw the dirt back. Before Billy stopped him Paul had piled up the San Juan Islands. [Jack note: another story about the Creation of Puget Sound says that Paul was actually digging a grave for his beloved Ox Babe and it became Puget Sound (which I can see from my front yard...and therefore always feel a little connection to Paul) when Babe miraculously recovered.

There are statues of Paul and Babe in Klamath, California [see the photos, above, of Jack and Del in Klamath), Brainerd, Minnesota; Hackensack, Minnesota; Westwood, California; Del Norte County, California; St. Ignace, Michigan, Ossineke, Michigan; and in Eau Claire, Wisconsin; Old Forge, New York; Akeley, Minnesota; Tucson, Arizona; Bangor, Maine; Minocqua, Wisconsin; Rumford, Maine; Oscoda, Michigan; Portland, Oregon; St. Maries, Idaho; Shelton, Washington; Lake Nebagamon, Wisconsin; Aline, Oklahoma; and also on top of a Vietnamese restaurant in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He is also depicted on the world's largest wood carving, at the entrance to Sequoia National Park in California. There is a group/fraternal order called the Mystic Knights of the Blue Ox in Bayfield, Wisconsin.

Paul Bunyan Land, an amusement park east of Brainerd, Minnesota, features a talking statue of Paul with a statue of Babe (its original Baxter location was cleared in 2003 to make room for new commercial development). There are two other (smaller, non-talking) statues located in Brainerd.

The Trees of Mystery, a roadside attraction in Klamath, California, features a 49 foot tall statue of Bunyan and a 35 ft (10m) tall statue of Babe. There are also carvings and characters from stories of Paul. See Babe and Paul photos above....

How Paul Bunyan created Puget Sound, by S. E. Schlosser - When Paul Bunyan was with the Puget Construction company and old man Elliott and Mr. Rainier on the contract to dig Puget Sound, the city council of Bellingham sent in to the company and asked them if they couldn't have Paul come up and make a bay for them so the ships from Alaska could get nearer land than they had before. They were willing to pay for it, and Paul went up with the blue ox to dig it for them. But when he got there he found that the land where he wanted to make the bay was held by an old homesteader by the name of Baker, who refused to give it up.

Paul offered to pay him three times as much as the farm was worth, but the old man was stubborn and would not give it up anyway. Well, Paul tried several times to argue with him and talked himself blue in the face nearly, and even hired a lawyer who could talk both backwards and forwards, but still the old man wouldn't give in. By that time Paul was getting pretty mad and he went down to see the old man again and they had a row that time.

When Paul dug out the bay he threw the dirt up into a big pile on the other side of the city. It didn't take him long to finish the job.

A couple of months later, after old man Baker had got out of the hospital, Paul met him on the street one day. "There's your farm," says Paul. "It's all there, I guess. You can name it for yourself if you want to." And that's how Mount Baker happens to be Mount Baker.

The Log Jam by S. E. Schlosser - One spring day, the loggers on the Wisconsin River discovered a huge log jam, the biggest they'd ever seen. The logs were piled about two hundred feet high and the jam went upriver for a mile or more. Those loggers chopped and hauled at the jam, but it wouldn't budge an inch. So they called for Paul Bunyan to give them a hand.

Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox sized up the log jam. Then Paul told the loggers to stand back. He put Babe in the river in front of the log jam and began shooting his rifle, peppering the Blue Ox with shot. Babe thought he was being bothered by a particularly nasty breed of fly, so he began swishing his tail back and forth.

Well, that stirred things up a bit in the river. It got so agitated that the water began to flow upstream, taking the logs with it. Bit by bit, the log jam broke apart. Finally, Paul pulled Babe out of the water, and the river and logs began to float downstream again the way they should.

Frozen Flames, by S. E. Schlosser - One winter, shortly after Paul Bunyan dug Lake Michigan as a drinking hole for his blue ox, Babe, he decided to camp out in the Upper Peninsula. It was so cold in that there logging camp, that one evening, the temperature dropped to 68 degrees below zero. Each degree in the camp thermometer measured sixteen inches long and the flames in the lanterns froze solid. No one, not even Paul Bunyan, could blow them out.

The lumberjacks didn't want the bunkhouse lit at night, because they wouldn't get any sleep. So they put the lanterns way outside of camp where they wouldn't disturb anyone. But they forgot about the lanterns, so that when thaw came in the the early spring, the lanterns flared up again and set all of northern Michigan on fire! They had to wake Paul Bunyan up so he could stamp out the fire with his boots.

Paul Bunyan's Kitchen, retold by S. E. Schlosser - One winter, Paul Bunyan came to log along the Little Gimlet in Oregon. Ask any old timer who was logging that winter, and they'll tell you I ain't lying when I say his kitchen covered about ten miles of territory.

That stove, now, she were a grand one. An acre long, taller than a scrub pine, and when she was warm, she melted the snow for about twenty miles around. The men logging in the vicinity never had to put on their jackets 'til about noon on a day when Paul Bunyan wanted flapjacks.

It was quite a site to see, that cook of Paul Bunyan's making flapjacks. Cookie would send four of the boys up with a side of hog tied to each of their snowshoes, and they'd skate around up there keeping the griddle greased while Cookie and seven other men flipped flapjacks for Paul Bunyan. Took them about an hour to make enough flapjacks to fill him up. The rest of us had to wait our turn.

The table we had set up for the camp was about ten miles long. We rigged elevators to the table to bring the vittles to each end, and some of the younger lads in the camp rode bicycles down the path at the center, carrying cakes and such wherever they were called for.

We had one mishap that winter. Babe the Blue Ox accidentally knocked a bag of dried peas off the countertop when he swished his tail. Well, them peas flew so far and so fast out of the kitchen that they knocked over a dozen loggers coming home for lunch, clipped the tops off of several pine trees, and landed in the hot spring. We had pea soup to eat for the rest of the season, which was okay by me, but them boys whose Mama's insisted they bathe more than once a year were pretty sore at losing their swimming hole.
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The Blogofractal, from XKCD

Click to enlarge

This illustration comes from XKCD, a web comic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language. ---o0o---

Rogues vs. Imbeciles

Rogues are preferable to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.

- Alexandre Dumas
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Pardon me! Who gets the golden ticket when Bush vacates the White House?

More than 2,000 people have so far asked President George W. Bush to pardon them or commute their prison sentences as a parting gift.

Junk-bond king Michael Milken, big media owner Conrad Black and the American-born Taliban soldier John Walker Lindh (good luck on that one John!) have asked the Justice Department for Presidential forgiveness.

Of course, some highly placed lawyers lobby the White House directly for pardons. This includes people who haven't even been charged with a crime yet, like the disgraced former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales or that hormone-gobbling baseball pitcher Roger Clemens.

"I would expect the president's conservative approach to executive pardons to continue through the remainder of his term," said Helgi C. Walker, a former Bush associate White House counsel. And, in fact, Bush so far has pardoned far fewer people than his predecessors. A President can pardon people at any time, but generally wait until the end of their administrations for the most sensitive ones, typically before Christmas and after New Year's. An exception was President Ford pardoning Nixon. Nixon was on the hot seat and without that pardon would have been hauled in and out of court endlessly over the next few years. Instead, he got to write books, and consult presidents on up through Bill Clinton.

Last week, The President issued 14 pardons and commuted two sentences--for small-time drug offenses, tax evasion and unauthorized use of food stamps. His eight-year total is 171 pardons and eight commutations--less than half what either Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton issued.

A pardon is a free pass that eliminates civil liabilities stemming from a criminal conviction. A commutation reduces or ends a criminal sentence. The president's constitutional power to issue pardons is absolute and cannot be overruled; can forgive anyone he wants, at any time. Thus there is always the possibility of surprises!

click to enlarge the Nixon-Ford pardon

Bush's father, President George H.W. Bush, pardoned Reagan-era Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, who was indicted in the Iran-Contra arms scandal. Weinberger's indictment by a special counsel days before the 1992 presidential election is believed to have contributed to Bush's defeat.

President Gerald Ford narrowly lost re-election in 1976 in no small part due to pardoning former President Dick Nixon in the Watergate scandal.

Bush earlier saved I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby from serving any time in the case of the 2003 leak of then-CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity. Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, was convicted of perjury and obstructing justice. He has not yet applied for a full pardon.

I believe President Bush could also pardon himself, as well as the vampire he selected as his Vice-President.

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The second biggest lie ever told

The second biggest lie ever told could be:

"Don't worry. I'm only changing one line of code."

[ Ed's note: see also: The biggest Lie ever told ]
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Alien Lore No. 145 - A landing party rehearses over Saskatoon

A fascinating light show played itself out in the skies of western Canada on Thanksgiving Eve. The light show certainly came from outer space. Some scientists say the lights and fireballs came from a meteor, or meteors. The light show was visible from Alberta to Manitoba, but appeared centered over Saskatchewan. Sure, it may have been a meteor, but we guess most readers of All This Is That will recognize it for what it actually was: an alien landing party in rehearsal maneuvers.

A dashboard chase camera in a police car caught the footage below:



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Thanksgiving with the Sanchez-Curran-Brummet-King-Ericksen-Stewart-Ford-Querfurth Clan from Boston, Canada, Texas, Ohio, California and Seattle

Click to enlarge. The Thanksgiving clan, missing Henry,
Bo, Rod, Mackenzie, and. . . Del, who snapped the photo

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Comments: Never go full retard

I love it when people comment here. I don't encourage it enough. Once BlogSpot got the comment spamming under control with the bitmap word challenges a couple years ago, things were great. The level of discourse here is almost always high (generally higher than whatever ramblings Jack or Pablo have posted on any particular day) and very intelligent. A lot of web sites and blogs mainly have people trying to outsnark each other. But, do you read the comments on the heavily-trafficked sites like, say The Huffington Post, or YouTube, or even Amazon.com? What are these people actually trying to prove? I was watching some YouTube vids of John Prine tonight (who seems like about the last person who would generate some sort of flame war in the comments). And this popped up in the comments on that great song Paradise:




click to enlarge


Which makes me flash back to this exchange in Tropic Thunder:



Kirk Lazarus: Everybody knows you never go full retard.

Tugg Speedman: What do you mean?


Kirk Lazarus: Check it out. Dustin Hoffman, 'Rain Man,' look retarded, act retarded, not retarded. Counted toothpicks, cheated cards. Autistic, sho'. Not retarded. You know Tom Hanks, 'Forrest Gump.' Slow, yes. Retarded, maybe. Braces on his legs. But he charmed the pants off Nixon and won a ping-pong competition. That ain't retarded. Peter Sellers, "Being There." Infantile, yes. Retarded, no. You went full retard, man. Never go full retard. You don't buy that? Ask Sean Penn, 2001, "I Am Sam." Remember? Went full retard, went home empty handed...
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Williams Words - another generator--Williams Words

I have been fascinated with these image and text generators lately. Here is one I just encountered--Williams Words (and no, I don't know why there is no apostrophe).

Williams Words takes a word(s) you type in and creates a "poem." They look cool, anyhow. Unfortunately, at the moment, it can only handle ten words. Here is the output for my last name.



brummet
ru e
ru t
b e
b u t
m et
rum
me
et
b et
b u m
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painting: Woman 33

Click to enlarge
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Russian analyst predicts the breakup of the United States

click to enlarge

The U.S. will collapse and break up into separate parts (ala The USSR, Russia, Ukraine, and the 'Stans) according to a highly regarded Russian political analyst.

Wait, won't the Red States have all the guns and the farms???

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Alien Lore No. 142 - The UFO sightings outside Istanbul, Turkey

Many people in the UFO community, and elsewhere believe this sighting, and video, to be "one of the most significant UFO videos of all time." The footage also shows two extraterrestrials on tape. The sighting/incident took place in a compound in Kumburgaz/Istanbul and was witnessed by nearly a dozen residents and filmed by a night guard (unfortunately I missed it, although I was in the vicinity last summer). The images captured are expected to have a tremendous impact throughout the world and be listed as the most important UFO/extraterrestrial images ever filmed.

As is often the case, thanks to Jeff Clinton for the tip...Jeff is often rumored to be the progeny of President William Jefferson Clinton. He is no blood relation to the soon-to-be Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. . .

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BFF: Best Friends Forever? Hillary and Barack start down the road of world affairs

By Pablo Fanque,
All This Is That National Affairs Correspondent

Painting by Jack Brummet


Click the BFFs to enlarge

Global warming definitely exists, at least in the relationship between the two former arch-rivals Ex-Senator Obama and Senator Clinton. They are now unquestionably the most powerful man and woman in the Democratic Party (and soon, arguably, the world).

After all the bitterness on the campaign trail, Hillary's masterful speech at the Dem's convention this summer sealed it. In fact, Obama's top aides jumped out of their seats backstage and gave her a standing ovation as she walked by.

Obama soon called to thank her. Fast forward to when--->>

Late last week future President Obama reassured Clinton she would have direct access to him and that she could select her own staff as secretary of state. And the deal was done.

Some people even think ('though most people doubt) that Obama and Clinton could become close friends. There is a lot of mutual respect and they are both extremely intelligent. As it turns out, Obama is much more a centrist that the rabid Obamanistas could have ever believed, which seems to be a page from the Bill Clinton playbook. Dean Acheson was no friend of President Harry Truman and Henry Kissinger, while in agreement with Dick Nixon intellectually, clearly was no personal friend. Rusk, McNamara, et al. were not JFK pals, and were, in fact, more conservative. It will be fascinating to watch the relationship unfold between Clinton and Obama. . .whether it becomes a train wreck, or whether they become close, or even BFFs, as they work the world.
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Sheer profundity from the poet E.A. Housman

This snippet is from a longer poem by the Victorian poet A.E. Housman, written in the 1890's. I've noticed this poem quoted a lot in various places in relation to our current economic woes.

The thoughts of others
Were light and fleeting,
Of lovers' meeting
Or luck or fame.
Mine were of trouble,
And mine were steady,
So I was ready
When trouble came.
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The Biggest Lie Ever Told

It has plenty of strong competition, but the biggest lie ever told is:

"There's no such thing as a stupid question."

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Painting: The Accident

click to enlarge

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Correction/not a retraction: The G20 video was real, but we did a poor job of contextualizing it.

By Jack Brummet and Pablo Fanque

A quick clarification on the story we ran yesterday on President Bush's reception at the G20 Summit, "Is President Bush Suffering From Leprosy?" We were troubled about this story from the get-go. Yes, the video was real. But even as we wrote and posted the story, we knew something wasn't quite right.

Let's face it, these people would shake hands with Papa Doc, Idi Amin, Sirhan Sirhan, Stalin, Carlos the Jackal, Herman Goering, or just about anyone in a position of power if it suited their purposes. Why would they shun W?

Daryle Conners confirmed reading about it later, and I independently realized late Friday night that we were probably seeing a clip of a "photo opportunity." President Bush, Merkel and the other leaders didn't shake hands because they all shalen hands a couple minutes previously. The handshakers were those not at the earlier photo-op. I'm not even going to look it up, because it is absolutely clear this is what happened! We got sucked into the blog/web hysteria on this one like everyone else. We should have known immediately what the context actually was. But it did give the Bush haters a chance to vent one more time (their time is running very short). You should have read the comments section on the HuffPo post on this!

Once in a while a story is just so tantalizing, you run with it (as we did in the summer over the Palin baby rumors that whipped around the internet like a tornado). And why not? After all, we're not some respectable blog with paying customers and advertisers.

When we print something scandalous, we want it to be completely true, or fictional from the ground up. Speaking of which. . .how was The President taken into custody last night when he was supposed to be at G20?
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Senator "Crazy" Joe Lieberman lives to see another day

Barack Obama wisely led his party to save Senator "Crazy" Joe Lieberman from complete ignominy earlier this week. As much as I dislike the sawed-off, ferrett-faced turncoat, keeping the independent Senator in the fold once again points out Obama's incredibly wise and pragmatic approach to governing. My inclination, like many, was to punish Lieb for his transgressions. But Obama sent out word and spoke kindly of Joe, and, in the end, he survived. . .and kept his Homeland Security chairmanship.

Lierberman embraced George Bush on Iraq, and supported McCain in many appearances and interviews. Most of us could forgive all that. What is much harder to swallow is his speech at the Republican Convention--a point-blank assault on Obama, and the rest of us. In the end, though, Lieberman is a true Democrat. He split with us on the war issue, but on virtually every other issue, he relentlessly votes the party line.

Majority Leaer Harry Reid said “Joe Lieberman votes with me a lot more than a lot of my senators. He didn’t support us on military stuff, and he didn’t support us on Iraq stuff. But you look at his record, it’s pretty good.” The Majority whip, Richard Durbin, also had nice things to say about Crazy Joe. So we do have him to kick around for a while longer. Like many of Barack Obama's other one-time enemies, I suspect he'll hop on the bandwagon and become a real team player. Who knows? He might even join the Democrats again.

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Poem: Narcissus [revision]

Ed note: We can't find out who created this cartoon.
If it was you, let us know! We like.


Narcissus

"They all sound the same," shouts someone in the audience. "It's all one song," replied Neil Young.

It's all about me;
Who do we spoof
When we pretend otherwise?

It's all one story,
It's all one poem,
It's all one song,

It's all one job,
It's all one painting,
It's all one game,

It's all one life,
It's all one wife,
Like it or not.
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