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Post by billhammond on Jul 16, 2024 18:06:30 GMT -5
Perfect summer day here -- sunny, 80 degrees, light breeze, low humidity. Makes a feller want to sit out on the deck at dusk and watch the sun set, until thousands of evil mosquitoes attack.
It was, however, a perfectly horrid workday, with fully half of my shift spent struggling to connect with the mother ship so that I could get some freaking work done. The weak link is still unclear, but somehow, we made features deadline.
I am obliged tomorrow to drive downtown, pay at least $20 for parking and enter Strib Towers for like half an hour to get an updated staff photo taken for our new hotsy-totsy website. Like our readership needs to know what an elderly copy editor looks like so they can better appreciate our exquisite prose.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 16, 2024 16:48:59 GMT -5
AP excerpt:
MILWAUKEE — A company is now selling $299 sneakers showing an image of Donald Trump with streaks of blood on his cheek and pumping his fist in the air after he was the target of an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania.
The white high tops are being sold as ''FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT High-Tops'' for $299 on a website that sells Trump-branded shoes that is run by CIC Ventures LLC, a company that Trump reported owning in his 2023 financial disclosure. The company says the new shoes are limited edition with only 5,000 pairs available and estimated to ship in September or October. It also said 10 pairs will be randomly autographed.
''These limited edition high-tops, featuring Trump's iconic image with his fist raised, honor his unwavering determination and bravery,'' it says. ''With only 5,000 pairs available, each one is a true collector's item. Show your support and patriotic pride with these exclusive sneakers, capturing a defining moment in history.''
CIC Ventures is the same company that debuted ''Never Surrender High-Tops," shiny gold sneakers with an American flag detail on the back, for $399.
The sale is another sign the former president's allies intend to capitalize on how Trump reacted after the shooting at a Saturday rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Trump got back to his feet and pumped his fist toward the crowd, mouthing ''fight, fight.''
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Post by billhammond on Jul 16, 2024 15:27:40 GMT -5
Speaking of storms, I just edited a review of "Twisters," the cleverly named sequel to "Twister." The film reviewer was quite impressed, giving it 3.5 stars out of 4, and calling it an "engaging, emotional summer blockbuster."
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Post by billhammond on Jul 16, 2024 14:40:14 GMT -5
AP excerpt
After a widely panned performance of the U.S. national anthem at the MLB Home Run Derby, country singer Ingrid Andress apologized Tuesday and said she was drunk.
''I'm checking myself into a facility today to get the help I need,'' she wrote in an Instagram post. ''That was not me last night. I apologize to MLB, all the fans, and this country I love so much for that rendition.''
The MLB is not commenting, spokesperson Matt Bourne said.
A representative for Andress said there will be no additional comment at this time.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 16, 2024 7:40:19 GMT -5
Wow, sounds like a massive system, or maybe multiple systems? Glad to hear all the SH'ers report being OK.
Mr. Hanesworth?
JohnB?
Todd?
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Post by billhammond on Jul 15, 2024 23:06:38 GMT -5
Right down there with Roseanne. I think she got the words right, at least.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 15, 2024 18:14:05 GMT -5
Excerpt from a Strib editorial today:
Perhaps the most discomforting detail about Vance is this: When asked by an interviewer in early February, "what he would have done if he had been vice president on Jan. 6, Vance said in no uncertain terms that he would have done what Trump had asked and demanded that contested states submit alternative slates of electors to the House of Representatives," Politico reported in March.
Vance should be pressed about this repeatedly in the upcoming campaign. In the Ohio senator, Trump appears to have found someone whose loyalties lie not with the nation, but with Trump himself. Vance's addition to the ticket inspires little confidence and further deepens concerns about our democracy's future.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 14, 2024 14:51:24 GMT -5
My old man photographed the rising real estate mogul
in the early 1980s, before all the brouhaha. Well, most of it, anyway. Library of Congress/Bernard Gotfryd Collection
Nothing phallic about that image. |
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Post by billhammond on Jul 14, 2024 14:41:14 GMT -5
Exactly the opposite of what he wanted to say:
Rep. Mark Green, a Tennessee Republican who chairs the House Committee on Homeland Security, sent a letter to U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas on Sunday raising questions about the shooting and demanding information about the former president's Secret Service protection.
''The seriousness of this security failure and chilling moment in our nation's history cannot be understated,'' Green wrote in the letter.
He meant "cannot be overstated."
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Post by billhammond on Jul 13, 2024 18:26:09 GMT -5
The blood on the ear is really chilling.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 13, 2024 17:12:20 GMT -5
Barb gets a weekly GK column, sent via email, and often forwards them to me. A recent one contained this limerick:
There was an attractive stockbroker
Who beat everybody at poker.
Her blouse was revealing
And also concealing
The Queen of Hearts and the Joker.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 13, 2024 13:50:40 GMT -5
Well, the guy who wrote that review is very picky about comedy, and was quite impressed with GK.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 13, 2024 13:28:23 GMT -5
Today I learned about this -- an excerpt from Strib colleague Evan Ramstad:
As a teenager in a small Iowa town in the 1980s, I would join dozens of kids around this time of summer on crews at a Cargill research plot where we helped scientists control pollination of corn hybrids under development.
We'd start work very early to finish before the heat of the day. By 8 a.m., we'd all be covered in dew, sweat, dirt and pollen.
The last summer I did it, we were only about halfway through the season when a big windstorm toppled the field and ended our work. We kids went back to school with a little less money than we expected and a lesson in the risks of farming.
For decades, crop scientists improved corn yields by making plants taller. Reaching 10 feet or more by harvest time, these plants produced bigger ears with more grain. Now, economics and harsh weather are steering farmers and seed companies in the other direction.
Shorter corn plants — topping out around 7 feet — are better able to withstand thunderstorms and windstorms.
After a derecho devastated Iowa in August 2020, photos of toppled silos, buildings and trees stunned most of us. But the photos that intrigued farmers and crop scientists showed fields of short-stature corn still standing after the storm packed winds of 120 mph and caused $11 billion in damage.
Shorter plants also make it easier for farmers to add fertilizer to fields late in the growing season. They can't navigate tractors and sprayers through taller plants after midsummer.
Scientists and farmers are finding the shorter plants are producing ears with nearly as much, and often the same, amount of corn as the tall plants do. And since it's possible to fit more of the shorter plants into a field, per-acreage yields actually rise.
"This is a Corn Belt-wide thing," said Jeff Coulter of the University of Minnesota Extension. "The major seed companies are working diligently on it."
For 12 years, Stine Seed, Iowa's independent seed giant, has been selling shorter-stature hybrids to farmers. They now account for half of the company's corn business by volume, Myron Stine, the company's president, told me last week.
This summer, Bayer — the multinational giant that owns Dekalb and Channel seeds, which has about 60 Minnesota farmers involved in its early commercialization effort — joined Stine. Other seed companies are following suit.
"If you think about all the innovations over the last three to five decades — switching from in-breds to hybrids, bringing in traits to protect against pests like rootworm, herbicide tolerance, breeding advances — farmers figured out the most they could get from them," said Denise Bouvrette, a scientist at Bayer Crop Science. "This is the next step-change."
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Post by billhammond on Jul 13, 2024 10:12:14 GMT -5
Excerpt from Star Tribune
Garrison Keillor is 81, the same age as President Joe Biden. But anyone who watched him steering the "50th Anniversary of Prairie Home Companion" Friday at the Fitzgerald Theater would be hard-pressed to question his vitality.
In the first of three shows at the former home in St. Paul for his radio program, Minnesota's most famous storyteller gave his signature red sneakers a young man's workout, delivering a nearly three-hour performance in which he rarely resigned himself to a stool.
During the intermission, he encouraged the sold-out crowd to mingle while he remained onstage to warble "The Owl and the Pussycat" and patriotic numbers. When harmonizing with guest vocalists Heather Masse and Christine DiGiallonardo, he looked as upbeat as a teenager who finally gets to hang with the cool kids. Even his suit looked less wrinkled than it usually does.
Yes, there were reminders that a half-century has passed since he launched "Prairie Home" at Macalester College. Keillor used teleprompters, even though he was nimble enough go off script at a moment's notice, especially if he thought he could trip up special-effects wizard Fred Newman.
Friday's show — his first at the Fitz since retiring from radio eight years ago — opened with Keillor entering from the back of the theater, serenading fans with a reworked version of Van Morrison's "These Are the Days" in which he thanked surgeries and blood thinners for keeping him around.
Later, he shared an age-appropriate update on Graham Nash's "Teach Your Children" that kicked off with lyrics, "You/who are on the road/are driving slow" and weaved its way toward a conclusion in which the main character is sent to an assisted living center.
There were plenty of familiar faces on hand, including longtime band leader Rich Dworsky and Grammy-winner Pat Donohue who led a number he wrote about St. Paul's Willie's American Guitars. When Newman and voice actors Sue Scott and Tim Russell made their first appearance, the crowd responded with one of the loudest ovations of the evening.
"Did someone famous come onstage?" Keillor said after the applause finally died down.
He paid tribute to the late Tom Keith, his original sound-effects artist. He shared anecdotes from his early days at the venue, back when it was called the World Theater. The song selection leaned heavily on classics from some of "Prairie Home's" best-known visitors, including Randy Newman, Mark Knopfler, Iris DeMent and Greg Brown.
The mere mention of the Ketchup Advisory Board drew the kind of reaction James Taylor gets whenever he starts playing "Fire and Rain."
It was a night of celebration triumphing over sentimentality. No pining for the days when he was one of the country's most beloved entertainers, no acknowledgment of the accusations of inappropriate workplace behavior that led to his bitter breakup with Minnesota Public Radio.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 13, 2024 9:59:31 GMT -5
Dr. Ruth Westheimer, the diminutive sex therapist who became a pop icon, media star and best-selling author through her frank talk about once-taboo bedroom topics, has died. She was 96.
(Cause of death was reportedly self-abuse.)
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Post by billhammond on Jul 12, 2024 21:50:06 GMT -5
That show represents one of the best years of my life. Only one? Which one? |
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Post by billhammond on Jul 12, 2024 19:20:04 GMT -5
Yep--had a good time there as well. Those shows have gotten so popular that there might be the beginnning of some pushback from the neighborhood, though up to now everybody has been pretty cool with it. Have you been to one? I have not, would like to. |
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Post by billhammond on Jul 12, 2024 19:16:50 GMT -5
From an Onion list of things Biden can do to reinvigorate his campaign:
End his campaign: This would provide him with such a huge surge in his approval rating that he would have no choice but to immediately restart his campaign.
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Post by billhammond on Jul 12, 2024 19:04:03 GMT -5
Mary's show--on a Tuesday rather than our usual Friday--sold quite well and (no surprise) was a delight. I also got to meet Mary's sister-in-law, who drove her up to St. Cloud. Nice person. The next night I went to the Midway Saloon for her gig with Pat and Dan Newton, which was, as I wrote above, mobbed. I have to say that our sound was better, though Bo's is probably an easier space to manage that way. I think Mary's experience was positive enough that we'll be able to tempt her back next time she comes through Minnesota. As I recall, Mary played one of those front-porch Lincoln Center of the Block shows in St. Paul -- did she mention that, perchance? |
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Post by billhammond on Jul 12, 2024 18:48:59 GMT -5
GK was supposed to be Pat Donohue's mystery guest at Pat's weekly session at the Midway Saloon. Haven't seen anything about it on FB, where Pat always posts show announcements. I wonder how it went. (Pat's third anniversary show a few weeks ago was completely, overflowingly full.) That reminds me, how was the Mary Flower show in your neck of the woods? |
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