While sampling food at restaurants like the Bank (set in a gorgeous old bank lobby), the Cosmos and Craftsman, I was struck by how much pride the chefs had in sourcing local ingredients and how they celebrate the farms, dairies and waters of the upper Midwest. Walleye, paddlefish caviar, Minnesota duck, local dairy cheese and even house-made sauerkraut turned up on the menus. Who knew the Mini-Apple had so much going on?Maybe our time has finally come.
Happily I am not a coffee addict, but I do enjoy a cup of tea each morning. That goes too. Away with the exotic spices, salt and grains, none of which are grown in our area: no bread, pasta, oatmeal or granola.I knew about the coffee, tea, and spices, but I grew up in southern Minnesota, and for all my worldly travels, it had literally never occurred to me that I might be more than one hundred miles from a wheat field.
The article is great publicity for our show tomorrow night at the Ugly Mug in Soquel, opening for Jherek Bischoff's band Ribbons. I never knew Jherek was a name people had outside of Michael Moorcock novels. Actually I'm still not entirely convinced.Saturday originally conceived of the project as a solo endeavor. “I wanted to do a one-woman band thing, with me playing the marimbas and drums, and using my feet and various parts of my body,” she says.
Bassist Erik Ostrom chimes in: “Playing accordion with your head.”
“Yes,” Saturday adds. “Unfortunately, I don’t have a very dexterous nose, so they were very boring accordion parts.”
The important thing to remember is that toughness is a semiotic dumb show now. In that same debate in which Mike Huckabee flexed for the camera, John McCain pointed out that in his experience, which is considerable, torture doesn't work. On this, he was disputed by a former mayor of New York, who once was tortured by the thought that his second wife would not vacate the mayoral digs in favor of his second mistress, and the former governor of Massachusetts, who once was tortured by the fact that gay people were getting married. Toughness was now a performance skill in a cowardly country taught to fear the best things about itself.Wikipedia identifies Pierce as a sportswriter, which is puzzling to me because I know him primarily as a political writer and secondarily as a panelist on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. I guess Keith Olbermann is a sportscaster, too. Did you guys see his "go there and fight your war yourself" commentary?
A candidate's actual biography doesn't matter; George H. W. Bush flew fighter planes when he was a teenager, and he couldn't overcome the "wimp factor" against Ronald Reagan, whose primary combat experience was battling his way to the bar at the Brown Derby. In the three major national elections of his life, George W. Bush, who couldn't find Alabama while he was serving in the National Guard, defeated three men -- Al Gore, John McCain, and John Kerry -- who had volunteered to go to Vietnam, and he did so by out-butching them. Kerry's awkwardness in hunting clothes somehow trumped Bush's fear of horses.
In the midst of last evening's rush hour the bridge collapsed --and we don't know, and probably won't know for some time, the cause of the collapse. But I have been impressed by the citizen and government reaction to the collapse. People immediately came to the aid of the victims. Even some of the victims, instead of fleeing the scene, came to the aid of other people who were in the water, helping them to safety. Ambulances and other vehicles arrived almost immediately, and proceeded in an orderly manner to get the injured to hospitals. Government rescue boats arrived quickly. Divers at considerable risk went into the water searching for people who were trapped. Everything seemed very organized. This morning even the traffic was flowing remarkably smoothly. Overnight signs had been erected, replacing the bridge by changing a major street into a semi-freeway to connect the two major freeways in the city. In other words, although people died and we still have serious problems ahead, the response here was almost the antithesis of the response to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.Dad likes Minnesota a lot. Obviously, "bridge collapse" is nowhere near the scale of "levees fail," but it's nice to know the city's handling things. Reminds me of the Garrison Keillor book I'm reading... but maybe I'll get to that in another post.
Iran and the US are two of only eight countries that have not joined the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (Cedaw).The article goes on to explain that Iran's Guardian Council rejected the treaty because they regard it as un-Islamic, whereas the US... just hasn't gotten around to it, I guess.... (Carter actually signed it in 1980, but the Senate never ratified it. The Bush administration "has been reviewing the treaty for a couple of years but it is not high on the treaty ratification priority list to be sent to the Senate.")
Supporters call Cedaw an international "bill of rights" for women.
"This treaty deals with the most basic rights for women and girls, including access to basic medical care, legal redress against violence, and access to education," says Sarah Albert, co-chair of the Working Group for Ratification of Cedaw.
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dkw, it looks like I won't be needing your upright bass... although I bet that would've been fun.)greyaenigma's comment reminded me to mention where we're playing. The schedule's really filled in: This can't be a matter of political calculation any more. It simply can't. It's a fundamental question of what kind of government we want to have.
Mere days from assuming the presidency and closing the door on eight years of Bill Clinton, president-elect George W. Bush assured the nation in a televised address Tuesday that "our long national nightmare of peace and prosperity is finally over."
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timeasmymeasure
