philly

A Visit to the PMA

On Friday, I took off from work early. It was the day after Turkey Day and most of the office wasn't in to begin with. Lady and I went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art for some culture. I took some photos along the way.

Every time I go to the PMA, I'm always amazed to see what they have in their holdings. I remember the first time I went there I was amazed to see one of Van Gogh's "Sunflowers" and one of the famous Monet "Water Lily" panels. They also have tons of Pollack, Munch, O'Keefe and the amazing Rodin collection in the Rodin Museum. I still have yet to get over there though.

Our $75 Dual Membership has already paid for itself with two tickets to the Manet and the Sea which we saw in May and two tickets to the upcoming Dalí exhibit which we have members' preview tickets; we get to see it before the hoi polloi. The membership is up $10 for 2005, but at $85 for two people, I think that's well worth it.

So go out and support the arts! We know that this president doesn't give a shit and won't fund our museums, so it's up to us, the "have nots" as he calls us, to preserve what we have and fund what is to come.

Napalm in Fallujah

Remember in August of 2003 when the U.S. military admitted that they were using Napalm? Well, Randi Rhodes just said that they're using it again in Fallujah reports the Sunday Mirror.

Outraged critics have also demanded that Mr Blair threatens to withdraw British troops from Iraq unless the US abandons one of the world's most reviled weapons. Halifax Labour MP Alice Mahon said: "I am calling on Mr Blair to make an emergency statement to the Commons to explain why this is happening. It begs the question: 'Did we know about this hideous weapon's use in Iraq?'"

Napalm was banned in 1980 by a United Nations convention, but the U.S. did not sign the pact. Over a decade later, in 2001, the U.S. told the world that it destroyed the last of its Napalm arsenal. But it looks like they only got rid of Napalm-B.

What the military is now using is what they call: Mark-77 firebombs. According to this [Google cache here] Sydney Morning Herald article from August 8, 2003, the soldiers refer to the Mark-77 as Napalm because they are basically the same thing

Colonel Daily said that US stocks of Vietnam-era napalm had been phased out, but that the fuel-gel mixture in the Mark-77s had "similar destructive characteristics."

"Many folks (out of habit) refer to the Mark-77 as 'napalm' because its effect upon the target is remarkably similar," he said.

That's sort of like calling a tissue a Kleenex or a cotton swab a Q-Tip. They do the same thing.

I think we all know what Napalm does and I'd rather not post that image of the young Vietnamese girl running from her village as a result of a Napalm attack to reinforce how horrible this thing is. We are being forcefed lie after lie after lie.

The 2005 Spending Budget

The $388,000,000,000 [Billion] budget for the upcoming year is just amazing. The 1,000+ page, 14 lbs. pound piece of shit had 11,000 pieces of pork added to it. The pork added up to about $15.8B for special local projects that the creaters of the bill can take credit for back home. Things like:

• $4 million for an Alabama fertilizer development center
• $300,000 for a parking garage in Auburn, Maine
• $8 million to rehabilitate a "historic cafeteria building" in Oregon's Crater Lake National Park
• $1.1 million for research into the development of baby food and other products made from salmon
• $1 million for a Norwegian American Foundation in Seattle
• $1 million for a "Wild American Shrimp Initiative"
• $50,000 to control wild hogs in Missouri
• $350,000 for music education programs at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland
• $100,000 for a weather museum in Punxsutawney, PA
• $1 million for a world birding center, Texas
• $2 million for the government to buy back the presidential yacht USS Sequoia, sold in 1977 by President Jimmy Carter to demonstrate frugality

Sen. John McCain was quite pissed about all of the stupid pork. He took the floor of the Senate and asked

Why does the U.S. taxpayer need to fund this 'no shrimp left behind' act?

Nobody responded. And most likely, nobody ever will. Why? Because this kind of legislation is basically anonymous.

But surely someone or some group[s] must have lost out, right? For sure.

• The State Department
• Federal air traffic controllers
• The National Science Foundation
• Several environmental programs
• Several low-income education programs

Our tax dollars, hard at work.

The 1,000+ pages was delivered seven weeks late and left legislators with way too little time to peruse the bill, let alone a brief skim. It reminds me of a moment in Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 when Michigan House Representative John Conyers, a Democrat, said to Moore regarding the little provisions in the Homeland Security Act: "Sit down, my son. We don't read most of the bills." Crazy. Shouldn't these people have at least a week to read through the bills? It was already a week late, why not wait another week? That's what they're paid to do.

Tavis Smiley will Leave NPR

Tavis Smiley will sign off of National Public Radio on December 16th, reports AP. The Tavis Smiley Show is a daily one-hour program focusing on what's new in the news. I really liked his show on BET before he got unfairly canned. He's on political talk shows all the time so you can still catch him elsewhere.

I wonder if he'll join the Air America Radio team. I think that he'd be a great fit.

Christmas Presents... For Me!

Who wants to get me some nice Guinness glasses? For $20, you can make me a happier drinker!

Oooorrrr, you can take a look at my fairly comprehensive Amazon Wishlist and drop a pretty penny up in there. Heh.

Oooorrrr, forget all that and spend your money on our troops. Find a soldier here and let them forget, for a moment, that they're in the middle of a firezone.

Military Recruiters Barred from College Campuses

The NY Times reports that as a result of the decision mady by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, colleges may ban military recruiters from their campuses and not risk losing any of their federal funding monies. The three-judge panel in Philadelphia [yay!] voted 2-1 in favor of the consortium of schools including the University of Pennsylvania, New York University, George Washington University, Georgetown University, Stanford University and others, but will effect all schools in the U.S.

The 2-to-1 decision relied in large part on a decision in 2000 by the United States Supreme Court to allow the Boy Scouts to exclude gay scoutmasters. Just as the Scouts have a First Amendment right to bar gays, the appeals court said, law schools may prohibit groups that they consider discriminatory.

The Department of Justice can appeal to the full panel of the Third Circuit Court and to the U.S. Supreme Court, but they may fear defeat in those larger courts.

Return of the King: Extended Edition DVD

Peter Jackson and Co. have released a six minute trailer of the final installment of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Take a look here. The trailer includes some commentary from the cast and crew about the making of the final film and the trilogy as a whole.

This extended version will include the Saruman speech that was cut from the film. Along with many other snippets that will add depth to the characters and storylines. With 300+ new visual effects shots and 20+ hours of bonus footage, this will be a solid week of viewing pleasure.

Stem Cells Work

iFlipFlop pointed me to a poignant story about a South Korean woman who has been paralyzed for the past 20 years and just last week, she was able to walk again, with the aid of a walking frame, for the first time since an accident from when she was 17.

Last week her eyes glistened with tears as she walked again with the help of a walking frame at a press conference where South Korea researchers went public for the first time with the results of their stem-cell therapy.

They said it was the world's first published case in which a patient with spinal cord injuries had been successfully treated with stem cells from umbilical cord blood.

Though they cautioned that more research was needed and verification from international experts was required, the South Korean researchers said Hwang's case could signal a leap forward in the treatment of spinal cord injuries.

Stem cell research works. Why doesn't this nation provide federal funding to all forms of stem cell research to further the advancements in modern medicine?

The Science of Food

Harold McGee is not a trained scientist, but then again, you don't need to be, you can train yourself. So what's his specialty? Finding out why food behaves the way it does while cooking and tinkering with old recipies using science to his advantage.

The NY Times did a story on him just int time for Turkey Day showing that brining a turkey isn't the right way to get a turkey nice and juicy. The complexities of the Turkey Day feast with a huge bird, mashed potatoes, cranberries, gravy, green bean casseroles, pies among a myriad others is always quite the monumental task. Many people often take two full days to cook everything up [Lady and I took 1/2 a day] for the feast, but it doesn't necessarily have to be that way.

McGee's On Food and Cooking has sold over 100,000 copies in the decade it's been in print - pick your copy up at your local bookseller - and has helped people understand what is going on in their kitchen as they cook. And here's his thoughts on the brining craze:

... although brining the turkey is now part of the Thanksgiving ritual for many cooks, Mr. McGee does not do it. "The bird does become juicier, but it's just absorbing tap water, not the true juices that make a bird flavorful," he said. "And the drippings become so salty that you can't use them." He says that his own experiments with turkey, though far from complete, show that drying the bird out, rather than infusing it with water, is more likely to make it flavorful and juicy with crisp skin. He unwraps his turkey a day or two before cooking, letting it air-dry in the refrigerator, and then cooks it at high temperature.

Mmmmm, tap water juiciness. Not that sweet turkeyjuice you thought it was!

Photo Thor Swift/NYT

Holiday Work Party!

It's been a couple of years since I've been to an office holiday party. The last one was for Spring Street Networks and from what I hear and see on the internets, they're not going to be around for much longer. But now, at my new home at PW, our holiday party will be held at the new music venue World Café Live this Friday the 3rd.

I'll be bringing Lady to the hors d'oeuvres, dinner buffet, beverages, dessert and a concert. A pretty sweet deal indeed.