I asked to take some photos when I stopped at the strawberry farm today, and immediately ran into this strawberry farmer with her colorful buckets.
Monday, May 24, 2010
5/24/20 Strawberry Farmrer
I asked to take some photos when I stopped at the strawberry farm today, and immediately ran into this strawberry farmer with her colorful buckets.
5/23/10 San Francisco City Hall
Julia's class was having their prom at San Francisco City Hall, where the Black and White Ball had taken place the night before!
Igor Stravinsky arrested in 1940 for an offence he committed in 1944?! Uhm, not really...
Yesterday, Boing Boing, which prides itself on accuracy, posted a mugshot of no less than Igor Stravinsky, under the title 'Igor Stravinsky, arrested for "tampering" with the Star Spangled Banner, 1940'. The post prompted the inevitable cascade of comments from readers whose sense of democracy had been (rightly) offended - a couple even observe (probably wrongly) signs of the venerated composer having been beaten up by the police.
Boing Boing is not the first blog to publish the photo (below) and the story (just Google it and you'll see). However. Take a careful look at the photo:
Now, check out your encyclopaedia, if you have one, or run a simple search for "Stravinsky" "Boston" "anthem". Here are a couple of results from what you'll probably agree are reliable sources:
'Stravinsky's unconventional major seventh chord in his arrangement of the Star-Spangled Banner led to an incident on January 15, 1944 with the Boston police, but "Boston Police Commissioner Thomas F. Sullivan said there would be no action" (Wikipedia).
'Igor Stravinsky was greeted with silence, in Boston in 1944, when he conducted a Boston Symphony Orchestra performance of his own orchestrated version of the anthem. The police showed up the next night to make sure he didn't play it again' (Boston.com, News).
'Other versions of the anthem left the words alone but altered the melody, in one case so drastically that it got the composer/conductor in trouble. When Igor Stravinsky raised his baton in Boston in 1944 you would have thought he was Roseanne Barr. [...] Boston authorities warned Stravinsky that he was afoul of a state law that forbade rearrangement of the anthem. Music critic Albert Goldberg noted Stravinsky's version was banned in Boston and booed in Baltimore, but he escaped sanctions' (George Mason's University History News Network).
(Source: Stephen Walsh, 2008, Stravinsky: The Second Exile: France and America, 1934-1971, p. 152).
The date on the mugshot is 1940. The "tampered" version of the Star Spangled Banner was performed in 1944. This means, rather obviously, that the photo was taken four years before the incident with Boston police. The only sources I have come across affirming that Stravinsky was actually arrested while in the US and linking the photo taken in 1940 with the 1944 incident happen to be blogs. Of which I run one, so clearly I've nothing against the medium. But I'm not a fan of sloppy journalism, to which this medium unfortunately lends itself, nor of passing off unverified rumours (as in the case of Stravinsky's alleged arrest) or fabricated stories as news and urban legends as facts.
So. Was Igor Stravinsky ever arrested for re-arranging the US national anthem? Well, I don't know, but I've yet to see any evidence that he was. Was he arrested for anything ever in the US? I don't know that either, but given that he moved to the US in late 1939 and married Vera de Bosset on 9 March 1940 in Massachusetts (capital: Boston) I can at least imagine that the mugshot, which is dated 15 April 1940, was probably taken for some unexciting bureaucratic reason that wouldn't make for eye-catching blog-headlines...
Boing Boing is not the first blog to publish the photo (below) and the story (just Google it and you'll see). However. Take a careful look at the photo:
Now, check out your encyclopaedia, if you have one, or run a simple search for "Stravinsky" "Boston" "anthem". Here are a couple of results from what you'll probably agree are reliable sources:
'Stravinsky's unconventional major seventh chord in his arrangement of the Star-Spangled Banner led to an incident on January 15, 1944 with the Boston police, but "Boston Police Commissioner Thomas F. Sullivan said there would be no action" (Wikipedia).
'Igor Stravinsky was greeted with silence, in Boston in 1944, when he conducted a Boston Symphony Orchestra performance of his own orchestrated version of the anthem. The police showed up the next night to make sure he didn't play it again' (Boston.com, News).
'Other versions of the anthem left the words alone but altered the melody, in one case so drastically that it got the composer/conductor in trouble. When Igor Stravinsky raised his baton in Boston in 1944 you would have thought he was Roseanne Barr. [...] Boston authorities warned Stravinsky that he was afoul of a state law that forbade rearrangement of the anthem. Music critic Albert Goldberg noted Stravinsky's version was banned in Boston and booed in Baltimore, but he escaped sanctions' (George Mason's University History News Network).
The date on the mugshot is 1940. The "tampered" version of the Star Spangled Banner was performed in 1944. This means, rather obviously, that the photo was taken four years before the incident with Boston police. The only sources I have come across affirming that Stravinsky was actually arrested while in the US and linking the photo taken in 1940 with the 1944 incident happen to be blogs. Of which I run one, so clearly I've nothing against the medium. But I'm not a fan of sloppy journalism, to which this medium unfortunately lends itself, nor of passing off unverified rumours (as in the case of Stravinsky's alleged arrest) or fabricated stories as news and urban legends as facts.
So. Was Igor Stravinsky ever arrested for re-arranging the US national anthem? Well, I don't know, but I've yet to see any evidence that he was. Was he arrested for anything ever in the US? I don't know that either, but given that he moved to the US in late 1939 and married Vera de Bosset on 9 March 1940 in Massachusetts (capital: Boston) I can at least imagine that the mugshot, which is dated 15 April 1940, was probably taken for some unexciting bureaucratic reason that wouldn't make for eye-catching blog-headlines...
Star nibbles on planet
Scientists have created the image of a start gobbling up a planet in the Auriga constellation, about 600 light years away, using data transmitted by the Hubble telescope. Although the star is too distant for Hubble to photograph, the data are detailed enough to allow Dr Carole Haswell (Open University, UK) and her team to translate them into the image below.
With surface temperatures over 1500°C, the unlucky planet's literally melting in its orbit tracks, as it circles the star. Actually, despite the dramatic image, the star is nibbling on, rather than gobbling up, the planet. According to Dr Haswell, the star will probably take the final bite in about 10 million years (image and article from the BBC).
With surface temperatures over 1500°C, the unlucky planet's literally melting in its orbit tracks, as it circles the star. Actually, despite the dramatic image, the star is nibbling on, rather than gobbling up, the planet. According to Dr Haswell, the star will probably take the final bite in about 10 million years (image and article from the BBC).
Sunday, May 23, 2010
UK's singles almost as many as the population of Australia
Another Saturday night home alone? Another non-starter? Yet another commitment-phobic, emotionally challenged Prince (or Princess, let's be fair) Uncharming? Chances are that if you're alone you're also lonely; that you feel somehow singled out from among your happily mated friends; that just about everyone else has been blessed with love while you are to bear the Curse of Eternal Singledom. However, no matter how lonely you may feel, you're certainly not alone.
'There are 21.5m single people over the age of 16 in Britain,' reports the Guardian. That's almost equal to the entire population of Australia. And the figures are for the UK alone. So, statistically speaking, he or she just has to be somewhere out there.
'There are 21.5m single people over the age of 16 in Britain,' reports the Guardian. That's almost equal to the entire population of Australia. And the figures are for the UK alone. So, statistically speaking, he or she just has to be somewhere out there.
Image source: Comically Vintage
Another thing: 'online dating is now worth more than one billion dollars a year, rivalling pornography as king of the net. Love is big business.' Isn't that funny. Love & sex competing as the most lucrative sources of e-income. Except that whereas the former is likely to include the latter in the package, it doesn't really work the other way around... (full article in the Guardian)
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