|
Post by millring on Sept 14, 2023 14:40:50 GMT -5
Amazing time to be alive. I went in to have my tooth looked at and perhaps schedule an appointment for a crown. Instead, here I sit two hours and two crowns later.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 14, 2023 14:13:49 GMT -5
I have flirted both intensely (banjo) and briefly (guitar) with frailing and it never sticks. It never becomes natural feeling and never becomes rhythmic (which is its most essential part).
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 14, 2023 10:11:04 GMT -5
A montage of edited youtube clips put together by people that hate the fellow show him to be a doddering Nobody ever watches video of any politician that isn't edited.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 14, 2023 7:38:26 GMT -5
I'll spend the day sticking my fingers in the dikes.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 14, 2023 6:30:23 GMT -5
There is video after video available for the youtubing if you were interested in seeing Biden's cognitive failures. His ramblings and pauses and moments of disconnecting are available to watch and they are every bit as dramatic as McConnell's pause. The adversarial press notes when McConnell has a moment. But the same press is supportive and protective of their president Biden.
But the reason this age thing has traction is because, again, nobody wants EITHER of them, and "the people" want to know why, in a country of 300 million people, we can't come up with candidates who aren't so obviously flawed. (And at least part of the answer is that national politics only draws from a pool of the flawed, the megalomaniacal, the narcissistic, the power hungry. Politics isn't the aspiration of the mentally healthy.)
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 13, 2023 6:21:55 GMT -5
I wonder what animals are included in the 2 billion number? I wish I could find the article, but I remember reading not that long ago that here in the US the threat to other animals by domestic cats is minimal .... and not much more than an internet hoax the like of microwave water killing plants.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 10, 2023 18:20:14 GMT -5
I don't think I was describing moral superiority. For sure, that wasn't what I had in mind. I'm more thinking that we graciously judge ourselves on a scale relative to the rest of humanity that allows us to escape uncomfortable moral judgement -- that judgement most likely from society, but for those who are religious, maybe from some god figure. We don't think we're better than everybody. We don't see ourselves as morally superior. It's more like the old joke: You don't have to be faster than the bear. You just have to be faster than the other campers.
And I think we're all good and I think we're all bad. But different measuring sticks often apply.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 10, 2023 7:33:17 GMT -5
fivethirtyeight.com/features/politicians-are-getting-older-and-voters-are-worried-but-not-that-worried/This is the scene everywhere Dar and I look. Every endeavor I've spent my life pursuing is completely dominated by old people. Dar's dog performance world has no visible competitors younger than 40 (and even that's charitable. Most are 55 and older). Every jam I play in, same thing. I look at the artists on my facebook page -- 55-80. I look at the guitar players here and on facebook, same thing. I think the linked to article may be right, but it doesn't identify the fact that old people are the only ones who still believe in a coherent society.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 10, 2023 7:24:06 GMT -5
Got Wordle in 2. I'm brilliant. Don't burst my bubble.
I'm off to the Amazon. I'm mere weeks away from becoming a regular. I'll make less money, but I might get some of my life back.
I've found a suitable way of playing "Come Monday" but I find that I sound silly singing "hush puppies". Music is full of landmines. I remember learning "Michelle" only to realize that I can't bring myself to sing the French part.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 10, 2023 6:51:01 GMT -5
I think I might have mentioned in my opening post that making the bad guys into good guys isn't a new thing....checking OP.......yup, I did.
It's just an interesting setup. In the case of Robin Hood it appeared to be very simple -- the government under John was corrupt and oppressive and Robin Hood was addressing the people's suffering the only way he could (because the very government that should have been addressing the suffering was the very entity that was causing it in the first place).
And if that's the model, then the viewer is left concluding that Suits is saying that our legal system is so corrupt that the means by which Mike and Harvey are addressing it and winning are justified by the fact that there are no legal means left.
Beyond that, Mike is a superman. He's the main fiction of the drama. He has a superhuman power and it's that power that comes in and saves the day time after time. It's not a reality based drama. It's a fantasy just like the Marvel/DC universe. (But then, ditto Robin Hood and his archery skills).
Butch and Sundance are winsome, handsome characters outsmarting and outshooting an ugly, stupid, brutal world. A different kind of superman.
Maybe sometimes the reason the theme of making bad guys the sympathetic protagonist is popular and revisited time and again in drama and literature is because we understand our own weaknesses -- that we all make bad and immoral decisions and like to believe in the hope of escaping their consequences. We rationalize why we made those decisions and comfort ourselves by rating our bad deeds on a scale of finding others who have done worse (So, Mike and Harvey are breaking the law.....but the reason they're doing it is because the bad guys are doing it worse).
I'm at season 6 now and I have to admit that there's a very good reason to admit that I'm completely wrong about all the above. It took several seasons to get there, but it's clear now that Mike and Harvey are not getting away with anything, and the theme of the whole series is addressing some pretty deep religious/philosophical issues of repentance, contrition, and living with the consequences of immoral decisions (all this while still dressing quite fashionably and driving great cars and viewing the NY skyline through the glass walls of the 32nd floor).
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 7, 2023 17:15:32 GMT -5
Dar and I have been watching Suits. It's a highly stylized courtroom/legal drama/soap.
What I have noticed -- and I understand that it's hardly the first time contemporary fiction has done this -- is that the entire central plot/theme is manipulating the viewer to root for the bad guy.
Oh, I suppose I could give them more credit than that. I suppose its overarching theme is to make the viewer more aware of how much of life lies in the morally squishy grey.
It also, I admit, should cause the thinking man to question how easily institutions are corrupted -- and that not by bad people with evil intent, but rather, by good people with good intentions.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 7, 2023 9:47:37 GMT -5
Home for the day. I'm going to see if I can get a line-of-travel for the Bourbon route so I can see what I'm up against every day (should I be lucky enough to get the route).
Beyond that, I'mma cut the grass and eat hotdogs all day, and dream of being in Vinton showing yous guys how to play the guitar.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 7, 2023 5:53:17 GMT -5
That's just beautiful. Thank God for for the ability to record.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 6, 2023 5:16:51 GMT -5
From the very outset I doubt the credibility of the polls he cites in the first paragraph.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 5, 2023 20:27:53 GMT -5
National get-wordle-in-three day.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 5, 2023 6:05:28 GMT -5
"Even though I perfectly well understood what the original words to the hymns meant -- no matter how archaic the language -- what I gained from the re-writes was a way of hearing the intent framed differently and divorced from something that had accidentally (via tradition) become something ... I don't know ... maybe sacred? The rewrites sometimes made the words less abstract and more real. All that, even though the meaning was never changed." Well, how's this for a digression. I recently read a new translation of the gospels by a woman named Sarah Ruden. She's a highly respected translator of ancient languages. Also a Quaker. She tried to be as faithful to the "original" Greek as she could be. Where there was humor, she showed that. Where slang was used--surprisingly often--she'd translate the passage into slang. In her introduction, she discusses how previous translations were often colored by the outlook of the dominant church at the time, as well as a couple of thousand years of accretions. She tried to avoid all that. I'm no Bible scholar but she made one interesting choice. When the words "believe" or "belief" appear in previous translations, she uses "trust." I'd previously read a book in which a Catholic scholar suggested the very same change on the basis that it was closer to the original meaning, and that "belief" has acquired so much baggage that it ought to be replaced. Reading multiple translations is somewhat akin to singing various versions of hymns. you might be interested in the coincidental content of the second episode of the podcast I linked to in my "good music story"thread.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 4, 2023 19:49:13 GMT -5
I've listened to this guy for years in a different context, but he's launched a new podcast (I haven't checked dates and such, so it might not be as new as is my discovery of it, prompted by an email exchange). Anyway, though the podcast content isn't going to be most -- if any of your -- cups of tea, the story in the pilot episode is nevertheless one of the most intriguing, well-told music-based stories I've heard in years. shanerose.substack.com/p/pilot-episode-of-the-humble-skeptic-a19#details
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 4, 2023 18:58:34 GMT -5
I thought these ladies did a terrific job. I very much enjoyed it. I love the harmony. I'm reminded of a debate we've had in church. Should the choir sing the psalm? They usually do. It's gorgeous. When they're through, though, I often have no idea what the psalm was about. When the psalm is read, I do. But then I miss the nonverbal plusses of the music. This thread prompted me to listen to Townes' version of I'll Be Here In the Morning. I noticed a couple of things in the lyrics I'd missed here. In the chorus, the narrator has his fingers crossed. Close your eyes I'll be here in the morning Close your eyes I'll be here for a while That "for a while" takes back what is otherwise implied. The narrator isn't professing undying love. And there's a great line in one of the verses. "I'd like to lean into the wind and tell myself I'm free." That line struck me when I heard Townes' simpler version. I didn't notice it in the ladies' version. I'm not saying one approach is better than the other. It depends on the song and the musician's goal. There's ample room for both approaches. Interesting take. I've had a similar discussion about hymns. 40-50 years ago it started to become rather commonplace to update the archaic language in hymns. I was among the resistant. But I finally had enough occasion to realize the same thing you did about Townes' own version -- that is, I noticed that different presentations make different things either more obvious or more obscured. Even though I perfectly well understood what the original words to the hymns meant -- no matter how archaic the language -- what I gained from the re-writes was a way of hearing the intent framed differently and divorced from something that had accidentally (via tradition) become something ... I don't know ... maybe sacred? The rewrites sometimes made the words less abstract and more real. All that, even though the meaning was never changed.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 4, 2023 7:43:36 GMT -5
Another day in the Amazon. Today I get paid twice, though. Since becoming PTF, my holidays are paid. So I'm getting 8 hours of regular pay and whatever else I get for the hours worked today.
That's a Labor Day I can get into.
|
|
|
Post by millring on Sept 4, 2023 7:42:04 GMT -5
Who's the artist, Howard? Is that a Depression Era painting or a modern recreation? Thomas Hart Benton
|
|