Super Bowl Update

I don't get to listen to the news much in the morning, because I begin work around 7 a.m., and I'm not someone who can listen to Morning Edition and work productively at the same time. But luckily for me, my husband listens, and lets me know of anything he thinks might be blog-worthy.

Today Charlie came in (thankfully bearing the coffee pot) to let me know that Rupert Murdoch is, again, set to launch his iPad-only "thingy,"  The Daily. The original launch date for Murdoch's revolutionary (?) new news source was January 19th, and in anticipation of this Jeff Bercovici blogged for Forbes.com:

Mark your calendars, media nerds.

Wednesday, Jan. 19, 2011 is the day it all changes. 

Maybe.

 Maybe, indeed. In anticipation of the current launch date, Ian Paul  wrote on PCWorld :

News Corp.'s much-anticipated iPad-only newspaper The Daily will officially launch Wednesday, February 2, during a press event at the Guggenheim Museum in New York City. News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch will be on hand to announce his company's new venture along with Eddie Cue, Apple's vice president of Internet services.

It's not clear how much the tablet-based publication will cost, but it is expected The Daily will be offered at a subscription rate of $1 per week. The press event may also include an announcement about a rumored in-app subscription payment system for iOS devices.

Interesting choice of site for the announcement, don't you think? The old cutting edge in style hosts the new.

From the same PCWorld article:

The Daily will reportedly feature original content by journalists from The New Yorker, AOL, The Atlantic, and The New York Times.   The paper may also include work from News Corp.'s other properties such as Dow Jones, The New York Post, and The Wall Street Journal.

The Daily will reportedly include short, pithy articles similar to free commuter daily papers such as Metro and AM New York. So the big question is whether people will be willing to buy a . . . newspaper like The Daily when free competitors exist.

. . . But the iPad is not the Web. Users of Apple's tablet computer and other mobile devices have shown their willingness to pay for apps and content. Gartner recently predicted mobile app sales would top $15 billion in 2011, a 190 percent increase over 2010 numbers. But despite that rosy prediction for apps, some reports suggest iPad magazine sales have fallen in recent months by as much as 20 percent, according to WWD.

So it's not clear if The Daily will find an audience large enough among the world's nearly 15 million iPad owners to support News Corp's new venture. Then again at $1 a week, many people may sign up for the paper to give it a try for a limited time. It will then be up to The Daily to keep them coming back for more.

This is the first time in his long career that Rupert Murdoch will have built a news publication from scratch. All his other news sources have been bought in full flower. And interestingly, according to a November 28th article in New York magazine:

 In stark contrast to those of Murdoch’s existing American papers, The Daily’s politics will be centrist and pragmatic—Bloombergian, if you prefer—according to people close to the project. It’s a worldview embodied by its editor, Jesse Angelo, say people close to him. “He’s a freethinker, not locked in a dogma,” one source says. The opinion section will feature a range of both conservative and liberal pundits, and there are plans to wage “campaigns” on issues like immigration, education reform, and climate change.

So why do I think the journalistic paradigm just might be shifting because of this particular publication? It has to do with monetizing information e-delivery. No one's figured out how to do that. At least, no one's figured out how to do it very profitably.

That Rupert Murdoch is willing to build a publication which has no existence outside an iPad means to me that he's figured out something that may turn the old information delivery system we think of  as "the news" into a pretzel.

Your thoughts?

For the full Episode 1 Recap, Go Here.
For the full Episode 2 Recap, Go Here.
(That outfit would drive me crazy too, Brooke.)

Previously on FIFTEEN: The Most Amazing Show Ever: Matt and Ashley had the most hilarious fight ever, Billy dressed up just like Dylan and Matt laughed at both of them, Kelly spread rumors about Matt liking Brooke without Brooke's permission, Matt was sick and tired of being hassled about his DRINKING PROBLEM. Ashley believed Matt was turning to the dark side of the Booze Force. Oh and Courtney was a horrible friend to everyone. The previouslies don't mention it, but I guess it's because that never changes, and just assumed you'd know.

EPISODE 3 - THE DISLOCATED SWEDE (Yes, that's really what it's called.)

Opening Sequence. Matt Ender continues to rock my world.

Brooke's Gigantic Bedroom. Brooke is making her bed. They don't have servants to do that? Weird. Theresa is nagging Brooke about being home this afternoon at 4pm so that she can go to Crystal's birthday party. Brooke picks up on my logic that if the call is so important, why doesn't their mom just be there to TAKE THE CALL? Theresa's like "because that's not the situation the idiot writers gave us. It has to be one us here to take the call." Brooke's like "fine, I promise to forget and leave you stranded here." Theresa practically wets herself from fear of missing Crystal's birthday party. Have I mentioned to you that Theresa is wearing white overall shorts with green polka dots on them? With a green long-sleeve turtle neck? Because she is. Let me show you a picture of her shame:


Brooke walks to her bedroom door and shouts downstairs for Kelly to come up already instead of sitting on the stairs like a LOSER!! Her delivery there is kinda priceless. Theresa can't believe Brooke would talk that way about her best friend. Oh, Theresa. Get over it. Your sister's a bitch. Move on. Kelly comes in and Brooke and her frenemy hellos. They dismiss Theresa and after she leaves Kelly confirms with Brooke that whatever nefarious scheme they've cooked up to hurt Ashley is totally on.

Hillside - Main Hall. Matt is apologizing to Ashley about how he shouldn't have been rude to her and Jake at the Avalon even though he's just better than they are. Matt is wearing a cool aqua-colored button down shirt and Ashley is wearing something akin to gym clothes or sleepwear because it's 3 episodes in and she's already started not caring about herself. He brings up BEER and Ashley whispers about how nobody made it a big deal and then Matt's like "look. let's just drop it!" Dude, you brought it up. Then Matt finally notices that Ashley is upset about something. What could it be? The sucky way he just spoke to her? No... Ashley is worried about Brooke and Matt's feelings for her. Whaaaaat? says Matt. Ashley has been hearing RUMORS. Matt swears that there's nothing going on between him and Brooke. He doesn't even like her even though they used to go out together. Matt asks if Ashley trusts him and she's like "enhhhh.... MAYbe, sorta?" But somehow they both apologize for who knows what and they're okay again. Also within this conversation we learn that Matt and Ashley have been together for 5 months, and there's no WAY that's possible. Five weeks, tops. Five months is like 5 years in teen time and these two act like they barely know each other. Let's all operate under the assumption it's only been five weeks.

Brooke's Gigantic Bedroom. Kelly and Brooke's big plan is to each give Matt and Jake a fake note telling the other one they need to meet. Jake will be misdirected to the mall, Matt will be sent to the Avalon. They'll pass the notes right after school so Matt and Jake won't have a chance to talk to each other. This is how scheming was done in a pre-cell phone world. You really did go out of contact with people when you didn't see them. Notes were passed constantly! Matt will break his date with Ashley and Ashley will be pushed further to the emotional edge. (Why aren't Brooke and Kelly in school with everyone else? I have no idea.)

Hillside - Main Hall. Courtney and Ashley enter wearing ugly clothes. See for yourself:


Courtney is asking Ashley what she thinks about a poem she wrote. Ashley really likes it. Courtney wants more praise. Ashley thinks it's great. Courtney still wants more. Courtney, just die already. They go to their lockers, but I swear the one Courtney opens is the one that's usually Matt's locker. Saved By The Bell kept that shit consistent. Ashley opens hers (usually Jake's) and realizes she left her gym clothes at home and freaks out. Courtney doesn't see what the big deal is since this news has nothing to do with her. Ashley tries to explain how this is her third offense and the gym teacher is gonna murder her with push ups or something. It makes me think of the gym detention scene in Carrie which is AWESOME. Anyway, Ashley runs off in a panic and Courtney has the gall to sulk and be like "well, thanks for reading my poem..." Holy eff, Courtney.

Table in the middle of the main hallway. Matt is reading and Brooke slithers up next to him. Brooke's like "I won't bother you when you're reading" and then sits down net to him to bother him. She tries to figure out what his plans are for the evening. Matt and Ashley are going to the movies to see "that new one with Mel Gibson." Ahh, yes. He used to make movies. Brooke tries to make small talk but her tactics aren't working. Then Olaf enters. OLAF!! My favorite. Finally! So Olaf enters and Brooke switches her approach from "remind Matt how beautiful I am" to "remind Matt that we're both assholes." Brooke starts making fun of him on sight, even though Olaf looks no different than Brooke or Matt. This really turns Matt on and he starts mocking Olaf too. Man these two really do deserve each other. They're so nasty and egotistical. Anyway, Olaf comes over asking for directions and saying he dislocated himself. Oh, how these two a-holes laugh in his face!


Olaf tries to be self-deprecating about it, but they still act like he's subhuman. He's looking for a certain classroom, so Matt starts giving him obviously fake directions to the point where even Olaf can tell he's lying and then Cindy enters (Cindy!! You haven't met her yet but she's awesome.) and tells him where the room really is and then leads him there. Since Cindy acted with the slightest bit of human decency, Brooke declares that Cindy's almost as weird as Olaf - and she's not even foreign!! Finally Brooke gets up to leave telling Matt she'll see him next week... unless she see him sooner. Matt doesn't know what the hell she's talking about but it doesn't seem like a bad idea to him anymore either.

Avalon - Conspirator's Corner. Brooke is miffed because Kelly is 20 minutes late. Kelly begs forgiveness and as a make up gift tells Brooke that Ashley got detention for skipping gym class. Brooke loves it.

Avalon - Loser's Table. This scene is kinda awful. SO SLOW. I'll summarize quickly. Ashley comes in sits with her friends and at first she feels shame for cutting class but then she thinks it's awesome because now she has a Bad Girl reputation. Then she laughs and laughs like she's on drugs. Matt, Jake and Courtney all think she's nuts. Brooke is like "laugh it up now, bitch. Tonight we destroy your world!"


Stairs of Sadness. Jake rushes up to Courtney. He's so sorry he's late! He said he'd be there at 3:05 and it's 3:08. It's his stupid teacher's fault! Courtney is like "whatever, dude. It's only 3 minutes. Besides I wasn't that interested in seeing you anyway." Jake calms down and suggests they go get milkshakes instead of going to the library since it is Friday afternoon and all. Courtney is cool with that. Jake smiles because he thinks it's a date, even though it is not. They almost leave the stairs until Billy shows up wanting to know where they are going. Courtney says the library thinking it will deter him. Billy is so lonely though he still asks to tag along. Courtney still hedges making Billy feel like an ass and falsely leading Jake to believe they are actually going on a date. Billy takes the not so subtle hint and mopes away. Courtney's like "I should be a better sister, with our parents DIVORCE and all, but I don't want him around." Jake assures her he has his own friends, and Courtney's all, "No... not really. Oh well, can't do anything now! Let's get milkshakes!" Man... more bad stuff needs to happen to Courtney right away.


Olaf's Corner. Seriously, from the way they frame him, I have no idea where he's sitting. It looks like a completely new location, even though it's still the main hallway. There's a lot about the show that's lovably bad, but I give credit to the directors who constantly were shooting the same locations from different angles to keep it interesting. They could've made their lives a lot easier and always gone for the same shots, but it really is filmed better than it needs to be. So Olaf is sitting and reading and Cindy comes up and sits net to him. Thank god. Finally a conversation between two decent human beings. Cindy helps him out with the word ostracized and if that wasn't anvilicious enough, the book he's reading is Lord of the Flies. Cindy asks him how he's adjusting to Hillside. Olaf tries to find a nice way to put it and Cindy helps him out by telling him the whole school is filled with a bunch of useless shits. Olaf's like, "oh you noticed that too?" Cindy is blunt and she embraces it. Olaf thinks he can't help it if people want to think he's strange. Cindy thinks people think she's pretty strange too. Olaf thinks that's an important thing to have in common and with that the show's only real friendship is formed. Awesome!

Avalon - Juvenile Delinquent's Table. Bad Boy Dylan is talking to new Bad Girl Ashley. Ashley has now pretty much turned into Olivia Newton-John at the end of Grease. Matt walks in and Dylan bounces, but he hangs around just long enough to make Matt jealous. Ashley asks Matt about their movie plans that night and he lets her know he can't make it because he has already fallen for Brooke and Kelly's fake note scheme. Ashley is none too happy about her boyfriend canceling their plans. I sense a fight coming on!


Brooke's Gigantic Bedroom. Brooke is looking at new clothes she just bought when Theresa barges in, still wearing her horrible outfit from earlier. Apparently it's 6pm and Brooke's just getting home. Theresa freaks the eff out because she missed Crystal's birthday party. Brooke apologizes but she doesn't really care. Theresa is so angry!!! Brooke is confused and a little frightened at her sister's emotional state. She already fake said she was sorry. What more does Theresa want? There's nothing they can do about it now! Theresa storms out of the room and Brooke just keeps on keeping on.

Avalon - Pay Phone. Kelly calls us Ashley and asks her to hang out tonight. Kelly does a good job in her delivery, because we never get a split screen of Ashley, but still get a sense of what must be her total confusion on the other end since Kelly has never shown any interest in talking to her before. Ashley finally accepts and they agree to meet at the Avalon - where Matt has been fake sent to meet with Jake! Shit is about to go down, y'all. Kelly is so pleased with herself.


Dylan's Garage Band. Dylan strums a groovy tune. Billy comes in, and Dylan wonders what he's doing there. Billy thinks he's being told to leave and mopes away. Dylan tells him he can stay, since the kid obviously has no place to go and no friends. He offers Billy to play the drums, and Billy starts slamming away at them like a toddler would beat on pots with a spoon and Billy couldn't be happier.

Avalon - Pinball Wizard Room. Matt is once again playing pinball with zero interest. If he doesn't like the game at all he should not play it once an episode! Brooke slinks over to the side of the machine, decked out in the new clothes she bought at the mall. She inquires about Ashley's whereabouts but Matt tells her he's supposed to meet Jake. That's funny... Brooke doesn't see Jake anywhere! Brooke will keep him company until he never arrives. Brooke shoves her hand in Matt's face to show off a new ring she got. Matt has to grab her hand to keep from getting punched in the eye.


Kelly and Ashley enter the Avalon from the other entrance and Kelly says she's so happy Ashley agreed to hang out since THEY NEVER TALK EVER. Ashley is pleased too, because she's too dumb to see she's being set up. Ashley has her back to the Pinball area and when Kelly sees Matt and Brooke there together she gives an Academy Award-worthy performance of trying PLEADING for Ashley to go with her someplace else - ANYPLACE ELSE! - right away. Finally Ashley turns and sees her BF hold hands in close quarters with his ex-GF. She walks over there and Brooke acts like they got caught doing something BAD. Matt is confused. Ashley yells at him that she trusted him and he lied to her. Matt begs for a chance to explain. Ashley tells him not to bother talking to her - EVER. She runs out. Kelly and Brooke exchange job well done smiles for ruining things for Ashley so easily.

Next Time on Fifteen: Ashley tells Jake she's not talking to Matt and they are broken up! Courtney tries to get Billy to stop hanging out with Dylan because she thinks Dylan is wild... and wildly attractive. Matt tells Ashley he thinks he loves her. Brooke swears to Kelly they will have revenge on Ashley. Kelly, in turn, vows she will have revenge against Brooke. And you can take her word... on THAT! Damn...

I need to give mad props to my girl Joey Brenneman, whose new play opened last night at Center Stage, NY. Better Left Unsaid, which Joey wrote and directed, is a play that explores the relationships and secrets that exist between a group of people, whose lives start to connect in Central Park on a strangely warm, foggy day in November. The audience follows eight characters as their paths twist and turn and affect each other. Better Left Unsaid is a story about the information we withhold from the people we love in order to protect them, and to protect ourselves. I think it's a smart piece of writing, wonderfully acted and totally worth seeing.

"But Owen." you say. "It's January, and Snowpocalypse Season, and I refuse to leave my house for anything - even great theater." That's fine, my sweet homebodies! I feel you. But that's the best part. Better Left Unsaid is a first-of-its-kind live-streamed theater piece, so you don't have to go to the theater, you can watch anywhere you got a computer and and some internet access. The set-up they have down there is really incredible with 5 cameras shooting all the action. I saw some of the footage last night and it's great. I will be partaking in the live-stream experience myself this Sunday and I'm really excited for it. It allows for theater being produced in NYC to find an audience in a global community. The possibilities are endless, and it's starting now.

Innovative theater needs to be supported. So head down to Center Stage, NY this weekend or next (48 W. 21st St, 4th Floor, between 5th and 6th) to catch the show in person or wrap yourself in your snuggie or slanket and stream it live at http://betterleftunsaid.tv/ Don't miss it!

We are now four weeks into no cookies nor soda. Things are going okay. I feel like some of the excess side flab I have attributed to cookie and soda intake is beginning to recede and I'm looking more fit. This is a positive development. Although, strangely, I've started dreaming about soda. Monday night I dreamed I was in a movie theater, and I was eating popcorn and downing a delicious Extra Large cup of cherry coke. There was no lid on the cup and I was watching the ice slosh around in a sea of cola as I was drinking it. Gahhh! So refreshing! Suddenly, I realized I was not supposed to be drinking it. How could I have forgotten?? I actually said aloud in the dream "wow, I really thought I'd cave on cookies first!" Then I woke up and I couldn't remember if I really drank the soda sometime in the past week. I know, my life is boring.

So I thought this was a one-off dream, but I guess it's status has gone recurring, as I had a very similar dream on Wednesday night where I was walking around drinking a movie-style soda, straw pressed tightly between my lips, and then suddenly remembering I wasn't supposed to be drinking it. My subconscious has clearly turned against me. The soda dreams must stop.

Cookies did not present a big problem this week. Tony, who sits next to me at work tried to offer my some E.L. Fudges yesterday, but I resisted. I've been able to get my chocolate fix from my muscle milk protein supplement shake and the occasional mint hot cocoa.

Next week will push us into week 5 and across the month mark. I ordered girl scout cookies from my niece, but I've already decided I won't eat them. I will give them away to people I love or people I want to see get fat. Haven't completely decided yet which direction that's gonna go. If only thin mints kept you thin...

Monday was an exciting day in the office! It’s only January, and we’ve already been able to promote an assistant manager- talk about starting off the year right! Krystal was promoted after the morning meeting on Monday in front of the entire office. She gave a motivating speech that took up through her path from the time she began as an entry level in the office, to her promotion to assistant 19 months later. Krystal will continue to develop her leadership and managerial skills so she will be prepared to manage an office of her own later this year.

Congrats Krystal!

Trivia Night is BACK!!!!! Don't miss Trivia Night during the Spring 2011 semester!!!! Every Tuesday @ 9:30pm in Prof's Place!!!!! We are giving $50 is gift cards away EVERY WEEK!!!!! And there will be a GRAND PRIZE WINNER at the end of the semester!!!!! Don't miss out!!!! Here are the scores as of 1/25/2011! THE PLACENTAS are in the lead!!!! Team, Score The Placentas 18 Vick's Dawg Pound

Michele Bachmann, the founder of the House Tea Party Caucus, made a speech Tuesday night. Forty-eight hours later, it's hard to tell whether the bigger flurry of post-speech conversation was about the speech, itself, or about the fact that CNN decided to air it live.

Nevertheless, that speech is generating a lot of buzz. So, what did she say?

Representative Bachmann began by stating that, "The Tea Party is a dynamic force for good in our national conversation, and it's an honor for me to speak with you. " 


She went on to talk about what she sees as the evils of the current administration: exploding deficit, job loss, and "Obamacare:" 

Obamacare mandates and penalties may even force many job creators to just stop offering health insurance altogether, unless of course yours is one of the more-than-222 privileged companies or unions that has already received a government waiver under Obamacare. In the end, unless we fully repeal Obamacare, a nation that currently enjoys the world's finest health care might be forced to rely on government-run coverage.

She ended quite stirringly by stating that:

. . . thanks to you, there's reason for all of us to hope that real spending cuts are coming. Because last November you went to the polls and you voted out big-spending politicians and you put in their place great men and women with a commitment to follow our Constitution and cut the size of government.

I believe that we are in the early days of a history-making turn in America. Please know how important your calls, visits, and letters are to the maintenance of our liberties. Because of you, Congress is responding and we are just starting to undo the damage that's been done the last few years. Because we believe in lower taxes. We believe in a limited view of government, and exceptionalism in America. And I believe that America is the indispensable nation of the world. Just the creation of this nation itself was a miracle. Who's to say that we can't see a miracle again?

The perilous battle that was fought during World War II in the Pacific at Iwo Jima was a battle against all odds, and yet this picture immortalizes the victory of young GIs over the incursion against the Japanese. These six young men raising the flag came to symbolize all of America coming together to beat back a totalitarian aggressor.

Our current debt crisis we face today is different, but we still need all of us to pull together. But we can do this. That's our hope. We will push forward. We will proclaim liberty throughout the land. And we will do so because we the people will never give up on this great nation.

Whether or not you, personally, buy that the Tea Party Express is our country's best hope for addressing our current formidable problems, it's pretty obvious that a formidable number of people do. When I checked, the official Republican response to President Obama's speech, given by Congressman Paul Ryan, had drawn 10,825 hits on a randomly chosen YouTube posting; Michele Bachmann's maverick rejoinder had drawn 148,320-- on top of the hits on the speech's well-publicized presentation at the Tea Party Express website.


President Obama's speech probably resonated most strongly with those who think government should work for the common good in areas that aren't profitable enough to attract business investment. And to those who are fortunate enough to have jobs and reasonable mortgages. As Peggy Reskin wrote in San Francisco's examiner.com

Far from the cynicism of our times, the unproductive irrational criticism of what a man as President can do with the train wreck awarded to him when he took office, this Berkeley resident is very pleased and very proud of the President and our country.  It feels like we're going somewhere we want to go as a society with the "spirit of America" being our guide and our ethos.  God bless America as a verb.

But many less fortunate citizens grumbled that there was nothing specific in the President's speech about job creation. The comments of a man quoted in the Missourian seem pretty typical:

“There aren’t any jobs in Columbia, not for an engineer,” said Tim Bishop, 60, a mechanical engineer for BioMérieux in St. Louis.

Bishop often commutes to work in St. Louis and has to spend most nights there.

“I want Obama to talk about why he is still giving tax breaks to companies who send their business overseas,” he said. 

Michele Bachman is actively testing political waters for a 2012 presidential run.  Her message is easy to grasp and as old as the Reagan administration: The enemy of the little guy is big government. Ms. Bachman offers one solution to many problems.

People who are out of a job and threatened with losing their homes don't want philosophy; they want to work. The Tea Party Express tells them exactly whom to vote for in order to make that happen.


Remember those old Wendy's ads that asked, "Where's the beef?"

Michele Bachman's speech last Tuesday was one long simple-to-grasp answer to that very question: She and the Tea Party Express are just the beef struggling Americans need.

Those who don't like Ms. Bachman's message should perhaps come up with rhetorical beef that's equally appealing and accessible to financially troubled people. Dismissing the Tea Party Express is tantamount to dismissing its followers' very real concerns and worries. Those who don't like the rhetoric of Tea Party Express might still want to follow its lead when picking which questions and concerns to address directly.

Perhaps it's less important to pay attention to what Michelle Bachman is saying, than it is to pay attention  to what she's talking about.

Your thoughts?



I liked the industrial view from our table



• Nabisco Famous Chocolate Wafer Cookies

• Pink Marshmallows (regular sized)

• Large Chocolate Bar

• 1 chocolate square 
• 1 marshmallow and
• 2 cookies (actually, if you want you can wait to put your top cookie on after the heating process. It's up to you)

Place cookie sheet in a 300 degree oven for 5-8 minutes (bottom rack). The chocolate will melt and the marshmallow might slide off but don't panic. Re-stack and press the top cookie down to slightly flatten the marshmallow. 

Serve warm or let them cool to room temperature. They are really chocolaty, delicious and pink! 
Thanks for stopping by We Grow By Our Dreams Today. I will have lots more pink goodness to share with you in the next week. :)

Ay no. I woke up to sad Rafa news. What looked like it would be a routine match with the result of Rafa coasting into the semi-finals turned into extremely bad luck for Our Hero. He sustained a leg injury early in the first set and couldn't compete up to his usual level of play. Ferrer wound up winning in straight sets 6-4, 6-2, 6-3. So disappointing for Rafa! I mean, RAFA SLAM aside, there's no shame in losing a match to Ferrer who is playing extremely well. But to not be able to compete at his best, to have to deal with injury AGAIN, I just really feel for the guy.

At least he was able to play out the three sets. Last year, Rafa had to retire in the quarterfinals with injury. But then he went on to sweep the clay court Masters Series and win the next three Grand Slam tournaments, so there's no reason for extended lamentation on our part. Rafa can bounce back as he has many times before. Still, the conclusion of this year's Aussie Open will be missing a special something with Rafa not involved. The last bit of intrigue will be if Federer can make it past Djokovic, or if we'll see a Grand Slam final without either Fed or Rafa in like FOREVER. Rafa gave tons of credit to Ferrer's game for the match results and did not want to focus on his injury as the reason he didn't win. Rafa is very respectful in defeat just as he is in victory.

Steve Tignor over at tennis.com wrote a nice piece about Rafa this morning that I'm linking to here. Also Rafa gave a lovely quote from his post-match press conference that I'll be holding on to:

"In tennis, you have high moments and low moments. Almost all of my career I've had very, very happy moments. That's part of the sport. Last year I was very lucky. I was healthy most of the year. I was playing unbelievable. This year I did - I think - all the right things to start the season playing really well. But that's part of the sport. You have to accept it; keep working hard; I'll try my best in the next tournament. So this is one of the bad ones, one of the negative moments. I think I am a very, very lucky sportsman after all that's happened in my career. And I have to accept the fantastic moments that I've had during my career with the same [attitude] as when I have problems. And if I am ready to accept both things the same, I'm going to be able to come back and play my best tennis another time."

Oh, Rafa. You're my guy forever. Here's to a speedy recovery. Vamos!

February 28, 1994 cover of Time Magazine

"Only those who wish to be led to hell, or to their doom, will follow Malcolm. The die is set, and Malcolm shall not escape, especially after such evil, foolish talk about his benefactor; such a man is worthy of death and would have been met with death if it had not been for Muhammad's confidence in Allah for victory over his enemies." 

Malcolm X was shot dead ten weeks later. Farrakhan denied involvement in the assassination. Yet he did say in a 1994 60 Minutes interview with Mike Wallace and Malcolm X's widow, Shirley Shabaz, "I may have been complicit in words that I spoke leading up to February 21 [1965]. I acknowledge that and regret that any word that I have said caused the loss of life of a human being." 


Anyway, to me, Louis Farrakhan had always seemed militantly uninterested in any kind of social change that would unite his race with my race.


Let's move backwards to a couple of years  after Malcolm X's assassination.


I moved to Charlottesville in 1968 where I lived, off-and-on, for the next 22 years. When I got there, Mr. Jefferson's town was still pretty socially conservative.  I remember the native whites as not troubling much to hide their inherited racism. It was exactly the kind of place Louis Farrakhan might have been talking about when he said, as late as 2000: "White people are potential humans - they haven't evolved yet."  


Or maybe we have. At least, that's what I see as I keep hanging out, keep watching the world turn, and its events unfold.  I'll leave it to others to write about our first black President's second State of the Union Address, and what that says about the wheeling and turning of social history in the last 50 years.


What I want to write about now is last Saturday's 72-64 trouncing of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets by the Virginia Cavaliers at John Paul Jones Arena. Virginiasports.com crowed: 

Senior guard Mustapha Farrakhan scored a game-high 23 points. . .The 23 points are Farrakhan’s career high in an ACC game and he tied his overall career high with five assists.  

Mustapha Farrakhan slam dunks

I listened to the game (you can take a girl out of Charlottesville, but you can't take the Hoo out of an old Cavalier sports reporter) and noticed that every time Mustapha Farrakhan,  Louis Farrakhan's grandson, touched the ball, the crowd exploded with a loud chorus of  Muuuuuuuuuuuuuu.

I'm not an historical sentimentalist. I don't know Mustapha Farrakhan's politics, nor whether there were still old-timers in the JPJ arena who were made uncomfortable by his presence. But that doesn't negate the fact the grandson of as militant a black militant as I'm personally aware of, chose to go to the University of Virginia and has been embraced by its legion of basketball fans.

I love getting older. You live long enough and times change. And sometimes they almost seem to change for the better.

Hey everyone-  The next two weeks are Devour Downtown and I have had a lot of feedback already about where people are headed...I really want to know where you are going and what you think.  Who has the best deals, who has the best menu items?  What menus look the most appealing if you haven't been yet?

Everyone is asking...and I can't eat at all these places in the next two weeks, so let's hear it! Where have you been? And how was it? And where do you want to go?

I am making my list.....

image from Walmart Watch

It's not Confederate vs. Union, but historical preservationists vs. the worlds largest retailer. The question to be decided: Was the process granting Walmart permission to build a Supercenter at the intersection of Routes 3 and 20 in Orange County strictly on the legal up-and-up?

And why should I write a vivid, scene-setting opener for this post, when I can just cut and paste the opening of AP reporter Steve Szokotak's piece in Sunday's Westport (Connecticut) News?

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Nearly 150 years after Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant fought in northern Virginia, a conflict over the battlefield is taking shape in a courtroom.

The dispute involves whether a Walmart should be built near the Civil War site, and the case pits preservationists and some residents of a rural northern Virginia town against the world's largest retailer and local officials who approved the Walmart Supercenter.

Both sides are scheduled to make arguments before a judge Tuesday.

The proposed Walmart is located near the site of the Battle of the Wilderness, which is viewed by historians as a critical turning point in the war. An estimated 185,000 Union and Confederate troops fought over three days in 1864, and 30,000 were killed, injured or went missing. The war ended 11 months later.

The 143,000-square-foot space planned by the Bentonville, Ark., retailer would be outside the limits of the protected national park where the core battlefield is located. The company has stressed the store would be within an area already dotted with retail locations, and in an area zoned for commercial use.

So what, exactly, is being addressed this week in Judge Bouton's courtroom? According to the The Orange County Review: "In a suit that could dictate the county's economic development for decades,"

  ... Judge Daniel Bouton will determine whether the Orange County Board of Supervisors was right to approve a special use permit for a Walmart Supercenter at the intersection of Routes 3 and 20. The Friends of the Wilderness Battlefield and six local individuals claim the board did not properly weigh the historical significance of the land, which sits near the Wilderness Battlefield, when approving the Walmart. 

Dan Holmes of the Piedmont Environmental Council (who've joined the group opposing the Supercenter's construction), pointed out to me yesterday during a long phone conversation that there's also some question about the probity of the decision-making process used in granting the special use permit needed for such a Big Box of a store. For example, according to the PEC website, on Thursday, August 20, 2009:

 The [Orange County] Planning Commission held a Public Hearing on Wilderness Walmart at 7pm in the Orange County High School Auditorium. The Planning Commission voted 4-4 at this meeting [which was then formally adjourned].The Planning Commission convened a special meeting on Friday evening to deal with unresolved issues -- and to our dismay, they held a surprise vote on Wilderness Walmart. Only 6 out of 10 planning commissioners were able to attend this special meeting, and the vote to approve was 5-1

Pulitzer Prize Winning Historian James McPherson expressed his aesthetic opposition to the "Wilderness Wal-Mart"  in a  May 3, 2009 Washington Post Op-Ed. 

 . . . Preservationists are not opposed to Wal-Mart opening a superstore in the region. A coalition of national and local conservation groups has merely asked Wal-Mart to choose a different location. Together with more than 250 other historians, I signed a letter to the company in support of that idea. We wrote that "the Wilderness is an indelible part of our history, its very ground hallowed by the American blood spilled there, and it cannot be moved. Surely Wal-Mart can identify a site that would meet its needs without changing the very character of the battlefield."

"Wilderness Wal-Mart" supporters argue that because the proposed store site lies just beyond the park, it lacks historic significance, a profound misunderstanding of the nature of history. In the heat of battle, no unseen hand kept soldiers inside what would one day be a national park. Such boundaries are artificial, modern constructions shaped by external factors, and they have little bearing on what is or is not historic. To assume the park boundary at the Wilderness encompasses every acre of significant ground is to believe that the landscape beyond the borders of Yosemite National Park instantly ceases to be majestic.

With Civil War battlefields we have a true tool for determining historic value: the findings of the congressionally appointed Civil War Sites Advisory Commission. I was privileged to serve on this distinguished panel of historians and lawmakers, and I stand by our decision to include the area Wal-Mart is considering within the battlefield's historic boundary. . . .

part of projected Supercenter site(?)

County residents have mixed feelings about having that store in that particular location. Supporters site jobs, economic development, increased tax revenue, and a landowner's right to develop his land as he sees fit. Barbara Banner,  Executive Director of the Orange County Chamber of Commerce, frankly doesn't see what the fuss is about. She e-mailed me yesterday:

It’s sad that so much focus has been placed on a piece of property that no one was interested in for years – including the preservation organizations - and now it has attracted national attention. There is a great misunderstanding of this location in regards to the Wilderness Battlefield. Yes, it is part of a “greater” gateway but the real gateway is after you have turned up Rt. 20 & begin to approach the battlefield area. The area in question is already commercialized and will continue to be regardless of whether Wal-Mart builds here. Zoning has been in place for over 20 years with this as a designated commercial growth area. ”

Ms. Banner added, "this is really a simple matter of property rights that has been blown all out of proportion and; made to be very complex! It will be really interesting to see what happens this week."

Amen to that!

Today several applications will be made for summary judgment for the plaintiffs. If those fail, the Second Battle of the Wilderness will commence in earnest.

Got any opinion about whether or not the "Wilderness Walmart" Supercenter should be built?