Journal of Post-Ralphaelite Thought

Youngest son, Ed, has been successfully installed at George Mason University , in Fairfax, VA. I got back yesterday evening (only to be greeted by a work emergency at midnight). We flew down Wednesday, arriving in the afternoon. We managed to get everything in a large duffel bag and Ed's backpack (with a few things in my small suitcase. Travel hint : put clothing in freezer bags and squeeze the air out before packing. The decision to fly rather than drive meant getting quite a bit of stuff locally. Rather subjecting the high-priced Taylor guitar to the dangers of air travel and dorm life, I offered to get a dorm-worthy guitar in Fairfax. So first stop (after an early dinner at our favorite Indian Buffet) was the Guitar Center. After much debate, negotiation and testing, a suitable candidate - an Epiphone AJ200SR six string - was bought and paid for, along with a gig bag for it to live in. Next we hit Target and stocked up on bedding and toiletries. During all this dr...

Warning - geek alert: If you work with Windows and Linux/Unix, you need to rush out and get MobaXTerm , a free (but not open source) tool. It takes the GNU/Cygwin collection of command line Unix/Linux tools and puts them in a single Windows executable. Think of it as DOS on super steroids. Now obviously this isn't for everyone. Frankly, it's not for the many. But if you're one of the chosen few who have a feet in both the Microsoft and Linux world, you are going to love this. One of the best features of MobaXTerm is that it includes a built in Xserver, for connecting with a graphical interface to Unix/Linux environments. There are several ways of doing this. Though it requires a little setup on the front end, using Xdmcp is the easiest way to have a complete X remote session. To do this will require a preliminary bit of editing some text-based config files on the command line. It will also require you have root access through sudo. Don't worry, it's easy. H...

This will shock some of my friends, but there was a time when I had little use for Edward Kennedy. His flaws were many and it seemed readily apparent that initially he rode on the coattails of his older brothers. Mike Royko, the Chicago columnist (known generally as a liberal), regularly heaped abuse on Teddy, and (like some others) sneeringly suggested if his name had been Edward Slabotnik instead of Kennedy, he'd never been elected. There's no doubt the Chappaquiddick incident guaranteed that he'd never be president. His abortive run against the floundering Jimmy Carter in 1980 was the proof of that. Perhaps the knowledge eventually lifted a burden from him, because he ultimately became the third-longest-serving senator in U.S. History. His career had its ups and downs (some of these fueled by Kennedy's drinking habits). His marriage to his second wife is credited by many with turning his messy personal life around. He was not the smartest of the Kennedy brot...

I don't have time for a long post (trying to get out of town -- to Washington, ironically) when I learned that Edward Kennedy, a true lion of the Senate, passed away at the age of 77. Yahoo's Reuter feed has more , but I dare say you'll find tons of stories all over the 'net. I'll try to write more later.

I'll be out of pocket the next few days, journeying with Youngest Son to Fairfax, Virginia where he's about to become a freshman at George Mason University. We fly out tomorrow morning and Thursday at 8:30 AM he's scheduled to check into his dorm room. I'm not really sure how much use he'll have for me after that. We'll probably run out to K-Mart or Target and get stuff for his room, but other than that, what purpose do I serve? At least during this trip? Not that I mind being cast aside like that. He's got new roommates and friends to meet, a new life to reinvent. Still, it will be a little odd, and a little awkward, as I (representing his old self) slowly fade in the rear view mirror. But it's not a bad thing: you want your kids to be independent, free thinkers. And in this age of Instant Messaging, email, Skype, Facebook and cellphones, it's a lot easier to stay in touch, even without really thinking about it. Much more so than when I wa...

The New York MTA is now suing some blogger with an iPhone app, claiming railroad schedules are copyrighted. Uh-huh. MTA marketers and lawyers have demanded he sign a licensing agreement, claiming (among other things) without said agreement, the blogger, Chris Schoenfeld, might publish inaccurate information. This, of course, supposes the MTA is capable of publishing accurate information, something that is not immediately apparent. What is wrong with these people? Thanks to Slashdot .

A follow up to the previous post about the passing of Les Paul (June 9, 1915 – August 13, 2009), American guitar legend and recording innovator. Here's a clip of him playing one of his signature pieces, "How High the Moon." At about the 1:30 point he jams it into overdrive. My god, this brings tears to my eyes. And here's an archival clip of him and his then wife Mary Ford on Alistar Cook's Omnibus, telling how it's all done.

CNN is reporting that guitar legend Les Paul has died at age 94 . Screw the current crop of wannabees -- Les Paul was the real goods. In addition to being a phenomenal musician (he was playing into his 90's), he revolutionized recording studio technology with multi-track recording, tape-delay and other ground breaking tools. Perhaps the most visible monument to Paul's innovations was the guitar that bore his name. He developed the solid body (another Paul innovation) in 1939 to combat the problem of acoustic feedback that often occurred with amplified hollow body guitars. The "Log" as it was called, was little more than a chunk of 4 x 4 lumber with bridge, pickup, and guitar neck. The distinctive single cutaway Les Paul became one of the iconic symbols (along with the Fender Stratocaster) of the Rock generation. Paul's career as a performer spanned the 30's up to the present. He began playing with such names as Fred Waring, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra ...

A short history lesson, courtesy of Wikipedia. The Freikorps were nationalistic organizations primarily composed of disaffected, disenchanted and angry German combat veterans who believed that their government had betrayed Germany and sold them out... The Freikorps were in opposition to the new Weimar Republic. The SA [Stormtroopers/Brownshirts] evolved out of the remnants of the Freikorps movement. During the 1920s and 1930s, the SA functioned as a private militia that Hitler used to intimidate rivals and disrupt the meetings of competing political parties. Sound familiar?

Much has been made in wingnut circles about the supposed "beating" of Kenneth Gladney at a St. Louis town hall meeting. Mobs of union thugs beat him! He was hospitalized! Yeah, right. MediaMatters has a clip of the incident as well as a pretty damning analysis which puts the lie to the hordes of rightwing media and blogosphere all foaming at the mouth. To quote from MediaMatters : Go watch the YouTube video. (Or, the "shocking video," as Power Line hypes it.) The first thing you notice when the camera starts rolling is a union member already sprawled out on the ground with somebody standing over him. No explanation of how he got there (pushed, shoved, punched?) and Ham couldn't care less. Then yes, Gladney is pulled to the ground by somebody wearing a union shirt. (At the :06 mark.) But instead of Gladney being beaten and punched, as his attorney describes, and instead of union "thugs" standing over him and threatening him, Gladney bounce...

This just in, courtesy of Slashdot . Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary right here in Fort Worth, is offering courses in "Intelligent Design," which require, as part of the classwork, that students make 10 posts to "hostile" websites. Slashdot correctly characterizes this as " trolling ." The courses are taught by William Dembski , a "research professor in philosophy" at the Seminary. Read the Wikipedia article on Dembski -- it's quite revealing. Before joining SWBTS, Dembski suckled at the teat of the Discovery Institute , a well-known anti-evolution think tank. Can you even call a place like that a "think tank?" Mathematician David H. Wolpert has described Dembski's work as "written in jello." How do you research philosophy? This sure as hell isn't science. Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary , once a respected institution, furthers its journey to complete laughing stock and public embarra...

My overly rabid friends and occasional drinking buddies at the Whited Sepulchre are all aghast at what they are terming the "snuff film" of some Volvo being disabled for the Cash for Clunkers program (presumably so the car can't be resold by some shifty individual after the trade. According to US News and World Report ,  here are the top ten cluckers being ditched by their owners: 1998 Ford Explorer 1997 Ford Explorer 1996 Ford Explorer 1999 Ford Explorer Jeep Grand Cherokee Jeep Cherokee 1995 Ford Explorer 1994 Ford Explorer 1997 Ford Windstar 1999 Dodge Caravan Sorry, but you won't see me shedding any tears over this lot. Actually I'd like to see the Volvo procedure performed on some of the drivers of these beasts. I have to put up with this assholes on my work commute every day. Here's what the top ten replacement purchase are (again, curtesy of USNWR): Ford Focus Honda Civic Toyota Corolla Toyota Prius Ford Escape Toyota Camry Dodge...

Today is Barack Obama's 48th birthday!