Random Access

Tuesday – 14 February 2012
Happy Valentine’s Day to all!

And here’s a little Valentine’s Day cuteness for you:

Vanessa (l) and Diana

Last night, my mother-in-law came over to help get the girls situated for bed while SaraRules! was at a Justice League meeting. Diana has recently started skipping her late-afternoon nap… so she was “a little” tired and cranky before bed. Nothing insurmountable, though.

After the girls were down, I started getting things ready for SaraRules!’ Valentine’s Day:

• I made chocolate and vanilla candy hearts.
• I made a CD for her morning commute.  (That’s right. CD. Old school.)
• And, I hid her gifts and cards, so that I could wrap them after she went to bed.

I managed to get everything but the wrapping taken care of before she got back home. Barely. But, I did. Making the candy became something of a race against time, as the meeting – which I expected to last until at least 9 PM – was over at 8:00. I was more than slightly anxious when SaraRules! called to say that she was on her way home. Fortunately, the Lords of Confection smiled upon me and allowed me to finish (and hide) the candy before she made it home.

Whew.

Chew on This: Food for Thought – Black History Month
Today’s person of note is: Jessye Norman, an American opera singer.

Jessye Mae Norman was born on September 15, 1945 in Augusta, Georgia to Silas Norman, an insurance salesman, and Janie King-Norman, a school teacher. She was one of five children in a family of amateur musicians; her mother and grandmother were both pianists, her father a singer in a local choir. Norman’s mother insisted that she start piano lessons at an early age.

At the age of nine, Norman heard opera for the first time on the radio and was immediately an opera fan. She started listening to recordings of Marian Anderson and Leontyne Price whom Norman credits as being inspiring figures in her career. At the age of 16, Norman entered the Marian Anderson Vocal Competition in Philadelphia which, although she did not win, led to an offer of a full scholarship at Howard University, in Washington, D.C. In 1966, she won the National Society of Arts and Letters singing competition. After graduating in 1967 with a degree in music, she began graduate-level studies at the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore and later at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan, from which she earned a Masters Degree in 1968.

After winning the Bavarian Radio Corp. International Music Competition in 1968, Norman made her operatic debut as Elisabeth in Richard Wagner’s Tannhuser in 1969 in Berlin. Norman also enjoyed success as a recitalist with her thorough scholarship and her ability to project drama through her voice. She toured throughout the 1970s, giving recitals of works by Franz Schubert, Gustav Mahler, Wagner, Johannes Brahms, Erik Satie, Olivier Messiaen, and several contemporary American composers. She made her American debut in 1982 as Jocasta in Oedipus Rex and her Metropolitan Opera debut the following year as Cassandra in Les Troyens. By the mid-1980s she was one of the most popular and highly regarded dramatic soprano singers in the world.

In 1990, Norman performed at Tchaikovsky’s 150th Birthday Gala in Leningrad and she made her Lyric Opera of Chicago début in the title role of Gluck’s Alceste. In 1994, Norman sang at the funeral of former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis. In September 1995, she was again the featured soloist with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra, this time under Kurt Masur’s direction, in a gala concert telecast live to the nation by PBS making the opening of the orchestra’s 153rd season.

On March 11, 2002, Norman performed “America the Beautiful” at a memorial service unveiling two monumental columns of light at the site of the former World Trade Center, as a memorial for the victims of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York City.

After more than thirty years on stage, Norman no longer performs ensemble opera, concentrating instead on recitals and concerts. In addition to her busy performance schedule, Jessye Norman serves on the Boards of Directors for Carnegie Hall, the New York Public Library, the New York Botanical Garden, City-Meals-on-Wheels in New York City, Dance Theatre of Harlem, National Music Foundation, and Elton John AIDS Foundation.

Stray Toasters

• I think that this is my second-favorite drawing that SaraRules! has ever made for me:
  This one, however, is  my absolute favorite.
• Scenes From a Marriage That Segregationists Tried to Break Up
• Despite how its title sounds, this is actually a lovely story: A Brother And Sister Get Married (And Later, Their Son Tweets It)
• Las Vegas Embraces Bad Guys of Its Past

• 
• What Happens When a 911 Emergency Call Goes Silent?
  
• How to avoid being tagged as a terrorist: Don’t pay cash for coffee
• Apple Asks Outside Group to Inspect Factories

Namaste.

Monday – 13 February 2012
Another new work week begins…

…and today is also my Sib-1’s (Rana) birthday:

This weekend was good… and somewhat productive, too. SaraRules! and I have changed the girls’ nighttime sleep and feeding schedule: Wake them up for a small feeding and diaper change just before we go to bed. It seems to be working pretty well. Saturday night (the first night we tried it), they managed to sleep for six straight hours. Unglaublich! And, after they woke up for their “wee hours of the morning” feeding, they slept in until 8:30. It was divine.

Diana (l) and Vanessa, before heading out for the day

We took the girls up to Red Butte Garden for a Saturday afternoon stroll. They seemed to enjoy it… almost as much as yesterday’s pilgrimage to The Garden of Sweden. Amen. Both girls stayed awake through IKEA trip, which became funny when we got into the warehouse area. As I’ve noted before, the girls are fascinated with moving things, especially ceiling fans. I had forgotten that IKEA has ceiling fans in the warehouse. However, this was not something that escaped Vanessa’s notice. Nor, a few seconds later, Diana’s notice. It was funny to look down into the stroller and see them both staring agog at the ceiling.

Chew on This: Food for Thought – Black History Month
It’s another post-weekend two-person post.

• John Mercer Langston (December 14, 1829 – November 15, 1897) was an American abolitionist, attorney, educator, and political activist.
  
  Langston was born free in 1829 in Louisa County, Virginia, the youngest of three sons and a daughter of Ralph Quarles, a white plantation owner of English descent and Lucy Jane Langston, a freedwoman of mixed African and Native American descent. After his parents both died when Langston was four, he and his brothers, Gideon Quarles and Charles Henry Langston, moved to Chillicothe, Ohio with their half-brother William Langston. John was taken to live with William Gooch and his family, friends of his father’s.In 1835 the older brothers Gideon and Charles started at the preparatory school at Oberlin College, where they were the first African-American students to be admitted. John Langston earned a bachelor’s degree in 1849 and a master’s degree in theology in 1852 from Oberlin. Denied admission to law schools in New York and Ohio because of his race, Langston then studied law (or “read law”, as was a practice then) under attorney and Republican congressman Philemon Bliss and was admitted to the Ohio bar in 1854. In 1855, he was one of the first African-American people in the United States elected to public office when elected as a town clerk in Ohio.

  Together with his older brothers Gideon and Charles, John Langston became active in the Abolitionist movement. He helped runaway slaves to escape to the North along the Ohio part of the Underground Railroad. In 1858 he and Charles partnered in leading the Ohio Anti-Slavery Society, with John acting as president and traveling to organize local units, and Charles’ managing as executive secretary in Cleveland.

  In 1864 he helped organize the National Equal Rights League, of which he was the first president. After the American Civil War Langston moved to Washington, D.C., practiced law, and was professor of law and the first dean of the law department (1869–77) and vice president (1872–76) of Howard University.

  He was U.S. minister to Haiti and chargé d’affaires to Santo Domingo (1877–85) and was elected president of the Virginia Normal and Collegiate Institute (1885).

  In 1888 he was a Republican candidate from Virginia for the U.S. House of Representatives, and, after a challenge of the election returns that took almost two years, he succeeded in unseating his Democratic opponent and served in Congress from Sept. 23, 1890, to March 3, 1891.

• Ferdinand Joseph LaMothe (October 20, 1885 – July 10, 1941), known professionally as Jelly Roll Morton, was an American ragtime and early jazz pianist, bandleader and composer.

  

  Morton was born in the Faubourg Marigny neighborhood of downtown New Orleans, Louisiana. A baptismal certificate issued in 1894 lists his date of birth as October 20, 1890; however Morton himself and his half-sisters claimed the September 20, 1885, date is correct.

  Morton learned the piano as a child and, at the age of fourteen, began working as a piano player in a brothel (or as it was referred to then, a sporting house.) In that atmosphere, he often sang smutty lyrics and it was at this time that he took the nickname “Jelly Roll”, which at the time was black slang for the female genitalia.

  Morton’s piano style was formed from early secondary ragtime and “shout”, which also evolved separately into the New York school of stride piano. Morton’s playing, however, was also close to barrelhouse, which produced boogie woogie. Morton often played the melody of a tune with his right thumb, while sounding a harmony above these notes with other fingers of the right hand. This added a rustic or “out-of-tune” sound (due to the playing of a diminished 5th above the melody). This may still be recognized as belonging to New Orleans. Morton also walked in major and minor sixths in the bass, instead of tenths or octaves. He played basic swing rhythms in both the left and right hand.

  Around 1904, Morton started wandering the American South, working with minstrel shows, gambling and composing. In 1912–1914, he toured with girlfriend Rosa Brown as a vaudeville act before settling in Chicago for three years. By 1914, he had started writing down his compositions, and in 1915 his “Jelly Roll Blues” was arguably the first jazz composition ever published, recording as sheet music the New Orleans traditions that had been jealously guarded by the musicians. In 1917, he followed bandleader William Manuel Johnson and Johnson’s sister Anita Gonzalez to California, where Morton’s tango “The Crave” made a sensation in Hollywood.
  

  He made his recording debut in 1923, and from 1926 to 1930 he made, with a group called Morton’s Red Hot Peppers, a series of recordings that gained him a national reputation. Morton’s music was more formal than the early Dixieland jazz, though his arrangements only sketched parts and allowed for improvisation.

  During the period when he was recording his interviews, Morton was seriously injured by knife wounds when a fight broke out at the Washington, D.C. establishment where he was playing. A nearby whites-only hospital refused to treat him, and he had to be transported to a lower-quality hospital further away. When he was in the hospital the doctors left ice on his wounds for several hours before attending to his eventually fatal injury. His recovery from his wounds was incomplete, and thereafter he was often ill and easily became short of breath. Morton made a new series of commercial recordings in New York, several recounting tunes from his early years that he had been talking about in his Library of Congress interviews.

  A worsening asthma affliction sent him to a New York hospital for three months at one point and when visiting Los Angeles with a series of manuscripts of new tunes and arrangements, planning to form a new band and restart his career, the ailment took its toll.

  Morton died on July 10, 1941 after an eleven-day stay in Los Angeles County General Hospital.

Stray Toasters

• It was a Foster The People kind of morning.

• The Style Report: The Best-Dressed Men at the Grammys
• Scale of the Universe 2
• While I’m not a huge fan of the new DC Entertainment logo, I find that it doesn’t annoy me as much as it originally did.
• 
• The Words She Really Wants to Hear
• Trophy heads of fanciful Seussian creatures

Namaste.

Friday – 10 February 2012
It’s my working Friday. As usual, it’s the “quiet” day in the office.

Last night, Melissa came over to help me square the girls away for the night, while SaraRules! attended a Justice League function. The girls were fine… until right before bedtime, when Diana decided she’d had “enough.” She was tired and thus whiny/crying. Amusingly, when it was time for sweet potatoes, she would cry, then eat a spoonful, wait a moment then… whimper/almost cry (or, her new favorite: grunt) before taking another spoonful. Not-so-miraculously, all problems were solved when she got her bottle. And, the girls were awake, post-feeding, just long enough for a bedtime story from Auntie M: Pajama Time! After the girls were down – which didn’t take long at all – Melissa ran over to Greek City Grill to get us dinner.

Chew on This: Food for Thought – Black History Month
You’re getting another two-for-one today:

• Jamaica Kincaid, is a Caribbean novelist, gardener, and gardening writer.
  
  Jamaica Kincaid was born on May 25, 1949, as Elaine Cynthia Potter Richardson in the city of St. John’s on the island of Antigua in the nation of Antigua and Barbuda. She immigrated to the United States at 16 and later became a U.S. citizen. Changing her name (1973), she became a New Yorkerstaff writer in 1976, working there until 1996.Kincaid first became known for her lush tales of Caribbean life—in her first short-story collection, At the Bottom of the River (1983), and in Annie John(1985), a semiautobiographical series of related stories that explore the complexity of mother-daughter connections. Her later fiction continues the style and themes of these works. Dark and personal, they often feature clear-eyed yet lyrical portraits of everyday reality in the post-colonial West Indies.Her novels are loosely autobiographical, though Kincaid has warned against interpreting their autobiographical elements too literally: “Everything I say is true, and everything I say is not true. You couldn’t admit any of it to a court of law. It would not be good evidence.” Her work often prioritizes “impressions and feelings over plot development” and often features conflict with both a strong maternal figure and colonial and neocolonial influences.

  Her novels include Lucy (1990), The Autobiography of My Mother (1996), and Mr. Potter (2002). Kincaid has also written nonfiction, notably A Small Place (1988), a long and angry essay on Antigua, and My Brother (1997), an incantatory memoir of her brother’s death from AIDS. An enthusiastic and knowledgeable gardener, she is also the author of many essays on the subject and of My Garden (Book)(1999).

  She lives with her family in North Bennington, Vermont, during the summers and teaches at Claremont McKenna College in Claremont, California, during the academic year.

• Eartha Kitt was an American singer, actress, and cabaret star.
  
  Eartha Mae Kitt (January 17, 1927 – December 25, 2008) was bornon a cotton plantation in North, a small town in Orangeburg County near Columbia, South Carolina. Kitt’s mother was of Cherokee and African-American descent and her father of German or Dutch descent.Kitt was raised by Anna Mae Riley, a woman whom she believed to be her mother. Upon Riley’s death, she was sent to live in New York City with Mamie Kitt, who she learned was her biological mother. She had no knowledge of her father, except that his surname was Kitt and that he was supposedly a son of the owner of the farm where she had been born.

  At 16 she joined Katherine Dunham‘s dance troupe, touring the United States, Mexico, South America, and Europe. When the Dunham company returned to the United States, the multilingual Kitt – she spoke four languages and sang in seven – stayed in Paris, where she won immediate popularity as a nightclub singer.

  In 1950, Orson Welles gave Kitt her first starring role, as Helen of Troy in his staging of Dr. Faustus. A few years later, she was cast in the revue New Faces of 1952, introducing “Monotonous” and “Bal, Petit Bal”, two songs with which she is still identified. Throughout the rest of the 1950s and early 1960s, Kitt recorded; worked in film, television, and nightclubs; and returned to the Broadway stage. In 1964, Kitt helped open the Circle Star Theater in San Carlos, California. In the late 1960s, the television series Batmanfeatured her as Catwoman after Julie Newmar left the role.

  After she publicly criticized the Vietnam War at a 1968 White House luncheon in the presence of the first lady, Lady Bird (Claudia) Johnson, Kitt’s career went into a severe decline; in the 1970s it began to recover after news surfaced that she had been subjected to U.S. Secret Service surveillance. She returned to New York in a triumphant turn in the Broadway spectacle Timbuktu! (a version of the perennial Kismetset in Africa) in 1978.n 1984, she returned to the music charts with a disco song, Where Is My Man, the first certified gold record of her career. “Where Is My Man” reached the Top 40 on the UK Singles Chart, where it peaked at #36; The song also made the Top 10 on the US Billboard dance chart, where it reached #7. Kitt found new audiences in nightclubs across the UK and the US, including a whole new generation of gay male fans, and she responded by frequently giving benefit performances in support of HIV/AIDS organizations.

  In 1991, Eartha returned to the screen. In the late 1990s, she appeared as the Wicked Witch of the West in the North American national touring company of The Wizard of Oz. In 2000, Kitt again returned to Broadway. Beginning in late 2000, she starred as the Fairy Godmother in the US national tour of Cinderella alongside Deborah Gibson and then Jamie-Lynn Sigler. One of her more unusual roles was as Kaa the python in a 1994 BBC Radio adaptation of The Jungle Book. Kitt lent her distinctive voice to the role of Yzma in Disney’s The Emperor’s New Groove, for which she won her first Annie Award, and returned to the role in the straight-to-video sequel Kronk’s New Groove and the spin-off TV series The Emperor’s New School, for which she won two Emmy Awards and two more Annie Awards (both in 2007–08) for Voice Acting in an Animated Television Production.

  Kitt was the spokesperson for MAC Cosmetics’ Smoke Signals collection in August 2007. She re-recorded Smoke Gets In Your Eyes for the occasion, was showcased on the MAC website, and the song was played at all MAC locations carrying the collection for the month.

  Kitt became a vocal advocate for homosexual rights and publicly supported same-sex marriage, which she believed to be a civil right. She had been quoted as saying, “I support it [gay marriage] because we’re asking for the same thing. If I have a partner and something happens to me, I want that partner to enjoy the benefits of what we have reaped together. It’s a civil-rights thing, isn’t it?”

  Kitt died from colon cancer on Christmas Day 2008 at her Weston, Connecticut, home.

Information courtesy of Biography.com, FactMonster.com, and Wikipedia.

Stray Toasters

• Utah Symphony: Falling in love with Beethoven’s Fourth
  I believe that tickets are still available for these performances.
• 20 Common Grammar Mistakes That (Almost) Every Makes
• Gunslingers Convene for Rootin’ Tootin’ Period Fun
• 
• Education Gap Grows Between Rich and Poor, Studies Say
• Surviving a Hack
• Agreed! Doubly so in our case!
  
• Serial killer John Wayne Gacy had accomplices, lawyers say
• How Your Cat Is Making You Crazy
• 
• Google’s First Employee Departs

Namaste.

Thursday – 09 February 2012
This NBN Thursday is a bit grey and hazy.  But, I started the morning with SaraRules! and the girls, so it was a good kick-off to the day.

Last night, we watched Killer Elite (not to be confused with the movie with almost the same title from 1975) for Movie Date Night. Robert DeNiro. Clive Owen. Jason Statham. All kicking ass and, in some cases, taking names. The premise was a little different than I expected, but not in a bad way. There were a couple of plot holes, but what movie doesn’t have those these days? In the end, it made for a decent night’s viewing.

Also, I tried out something different with my bike trainer: Disengaging the tension wheel, so that the back wheel spun freely. Works, but without any resistance, I was pedaling as easily in the higher gears (15 and up) as I was in the first three gears. Still, it’s an option.

Chew on This: Food for This – Black History Month
Today, you’re getting a double d0es of Black History Month goodness.

• The first person of note is James Weldon Johnson, author, politician, poet, songwriter, and educator, and early civil rights activist.James Weldon Johnson (June 17, 1871 – June 26, 1938)  was born in Jacksonville, Florida, the son of Helen Louise Dillet and James Johnson. His brother was the composer J. Rosamond Johnson. Johnson was first educated by his mother (the first female, black teacher in Florida at a grammar school) and then at Edwin M. Stanton School. At the age of 16 he enrolled at Atlanta University, from which he graduated in 1894. In addition to his bachelor’s degree, he also completed some graduate coursework there.

  After graduation he returned to Stanton, a school for African American students in Jacksonville, until 1906, where, at the young age of 23, he became principal. As principal Johnson found himself the head of the largest public school in Jacksonville regardless of race. Johnson improved education by adding the ninth and tenth grades. During his tenure at Stanton, Johnson wrote Lift Every Voice and Sing — often called “The Negro National Hymn”, “The Negro National Anthem”, “The Black National Anthem”, or “The African-American National Anthem” — set to music by his brother John Rosamond Johnson (1873–1954) in 1900.

  In 1897, Johnson was the first African American admitted to the Florida Bar Exam since Reconstruction. He was also the first black in Duval County to seek admission to the state bar. In order to receive entry, Johnson underwent a two-hour examination before three attorneys and a judge. He later recalled that one of the examiners, not wanting to see a black man admitted, left the room.

  In 1906 President Theodore Roosevelt appointed him U.S. consul to Puerto Cabello, Venezuela, and in 1909 he became consul in Corinto, Nicaragua, where he served until 1914. He later taught at Fisk University. Meanwhile, he began writing a novel, The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man (published anonymously, 1912), which attracted little attention until it was reissued under his own name in 1927.

  In 1920 Johnson was elected to manage the NAACP, the first African American to hold this position. While serving the NAACP from 1914 through 1930 Johnson started as an organizer and eventually became the first black male secretary in the organization’s history. In 1920, he was sent by the NAACP to investigate conditions in Haiti, which had been occupied by U.S. Marines since 1915. Johnson published a series of articles in The Nation, in which he described the American occupation as being brutal and offered suggestions for the economic and social development of Haiti. These articles were reprinted under the title Self-Determining Haiti. Throughout the 1920s he was one of the major inspirations and promoters of the Harlem Renaissance trying to refute condescending white criticism and helping young black authors to get published.

  Johnson died while vacationing in 1939, when the car he was driving was hit by a train.

• The second person of note is Mat Johnson (no relation), an American writer of literary fiction.Johnson (born August 19, 1970) grew up in “racially stratified” Philadelphia. His mother is African American; his father, Irish American. After his parents’ divorce, he was raised by his social worker mother in a largely black section of the city, Germantown, where he often felt like a standout. “When I was a little kid, I looked reallywhite—I was this little Irish boy in a dashiki.”In his teens, he transferred to a private school, Abingdon Friends, in a more affluent neighborhood. “It was the first time I was around a lot of white people. I suddenly realized I had an ethnic identity, and started to think about race.” He listened to Public Enemy and devoured The Autobiography of Malcolm X and books by W.E.B. DuBois and Toni Morrison. “African-American literature felt like an intellectual home, this place where I fit and belonged,” he says gratefully.

  Like the late playwright August Wilson, Johnson seems to identify almost exclusively with the African roots of his biracial family tree. “African-American is a Creole culture. It embraces the mix,” he asserts.

  Mat Johnson attended West Chester University, University of Wales-Swansea, and ultimately received his BA from Earlham College, and in 1993, he was awarded a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship. Johnson received his MFA from Columbia University School of the Arts in 1999. Johnson has taught at Rutgers University, Columbia University, Bard College, The Callaloo Journal Writers Retreat, and is now a permanent faculty member at The University of Houston Creative Writing Program.

  Mat Johnson’s first novel, Drop (Bloomsbury USA in 2000), was a coming of age novel about a self-hating Philadelphian who thinks he’s found his escape when he takes a job at a Brixton-based advertising agency in London, UK.  Drop was listed among Progressive Magazine’s “Best Novels of the Year.” In 2003, Johnson published Hunting in Harlem (Bloomsbury USA 2003), a satire about gentrification in Harlem and an exploration of belief versus fanaticism. Hunting in Harlem won the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Legacy Award for Novel of the Year.

  Johnson made his first move into the comics form with the publication of the five-issue limited series Hellblazer Special: Papa Midnite (Vertigo 2005), where he took an existing character of the Hellblazer franchise and created an origin story that strove to offer depth and dignity to a character that was arguably a racial stereotype of the noble savage. The work was set in 18th Century Manhattan, and was based around the research that Johnson was conducting for his first historical effort, The Great Negro Plot, a creative non-fiction that tells the story of the New York Slave Insurrection of 1741 and the resultant trial and hysteria.

  In February 2008, Vertigo Comics published Johnson’s graphic novel Incognegro, a noir mystery that deals with the issue of passing (racial identity) and the lynching past of the American south.

  He was named a 2007 USA James Baldwin Fellow and awarded a $50,000 grant by United States Artists, a public charity that supports and promotes the work of American artists. On September 21, 2011, Mat Johnson was awarded the Dos Passos Prize for Literature.

Information courtesy of Chronogram.com, DCComics.com, matjohnson.info and Wikipedia

Stray Toasters

• I’d like to add this to The Covet List.
• …and an order of these, too.
• Retro Fitted
• I drew some tweets, by The Oatmeal
• Try Medieval Hot Pants? Surely, You Joust
  Well, I don’t… but it is my home state’s official state sport.
• 
• States Negotiate $26 Billion Agreement for Homeowners
• I like this Project: Rooftop redesign of the X-Men’s White Queen’s outfit.
• Steampunk Magazine is back!
• China police chief may seek U.S. asylum
• MINE!
  
  I had to order this. Compelled to, I say! It’s the location of Beth Steel that my father used to work for.
• US Approves Two New Nuclear Reactors
• The science-fiction effect
• Tai Chi May Help Parkinson’s Patients Regain Balance

Namaste.

Wednesday – 08 February 2010
Vanessa turned 5-months-old today:

Last night, the girls took another foray into “New Food Adventures” with sweet potatoes. Their primary reflex is still to somewhat spit out whatever they’re fed, if it’s not in a bottle. This can be mitigated by simply re-spooning the food back in. After trying rice cereal last week, we were curious to see how they’d respond to a new food. We got our answer: They seemed to like it.  It was a messy – but successful – test.

As the night wore on, I finally decided to bring my bike in and set up the bike trainer that SaraRules! got me for Christmas. I got everything assembled and decided to try it out. It was a bit noisier than I expected, which may prevent me from using it after the girls go to bed at night… unless I move it into the unfinished part of the basement.

Chew on This: Food for Thought – Black History Month
Today’s person of note is: Elmer Samuel Imes, the second African-American to earn a Ph. D. in Physics and among the first African American scientists to make important contributions to Modern physics.

Elmer Samuel Imes (October 12, 1883 – September 11, 1941) was born in Memphis, Tennessee, attended grammar school in Oberlin, Ohio and completed his high school education at the Agricultural and Mechanical High School in Norman, Alabama. Imes graduated from Fisk University in 1903 with a degree in science.

Upon graduating from Fisk, Imes taught mathematics and physics at Georgia Normal and Agricultural Institute in Albany, Georgia (presently Albany State University) and the Emerson Institute in Mobile, Alabama. Imes returned to Fisk in 1913 as an instructor of science and mathematics. During his tenure there, Imes earned a Master’s degree in science from Fisk University.

In 1918, Imes earned a Ph. D. in Physics at the University of Michigan where he studied under Harrison McAllister Randall becoming the second African American to receive a Ph. D. in Physics since Edward Bouchet, did so from Yale University in 1876. Imes’ research and doctoral thesis led to the publication of Measurements on the Near-Infrared Absorption of Some Diamotic Gases in November 1919 in the Astrophysical Journal. This work was followed by a paper co-authored and presented jointly with Dr. Randall: The Fine Structure of the Near Infra-Red Absorption Bands of HCI,HBr, and HF at the American Physical Society and published in the Physical Review in 1920. His work demonstrated for the first time that Quantum Theory could be applied to radiation in all regions of the electromagnetic spectrum, to the rotational energy states of molecules as well as the vibration and electronic levels. His work provided an early verification of Quantum Theory.

Around 1919, Imes became married to Harlem Renaissance writer, Nella Larsen. The couple lived in Harlem becoming part of the Harlem intellectual society which included intellectuals such as Langston Hughes and W.E.B. Du Bois.

During the period Imes spent in the scientific and materials industry, his work resulted in four patents for instruments which were used for measuring magnetic and electric properties.

In 1939, he conducted research in magnetic materials at the Physics Department at New York University and continued as chair of the physics department at Fisk until his death in 1941.

Stray Toasters

• Court Strikes Down Ban on Gay Marriage in California
• 101 Valentine’s Gifts for Every Woman Imaginable
• Thom Zahler, the writer and artist of Love and Capes, is putting out an art book. Check out his Kickstarter page for more information.
• 
• The Miraculous NASA Breakthrough That Could Save Millions of Lives
• In Data Deluge, Multitaskers Go to Multiscreens
  Yep. I use two screens at home… and a total of five at work.
• The Well-Dressed Rebel
• MasterCard announces product future around EMV
• Sadly, this is what part of our conversation during last Friday night’s Star Trek Tactics game sounded like…
  
• 79 Things We Can All Agree On
• This is why an octopus is more awesome than your mom
• 8,000 Butterfingers dropped in Boston to jab at Pats’ receivers
• Could the Death Star destroy a planet?

Namaste.

Tuesday – 07 February 2012
Today, Diana turned 5-months-old:

Today also finds me in the south 40. So far, it hasn’t been too painful an experience. And, it’s even been somewhat productive. I consider that combination a good thing. (The doughnuts and the frozen mocha didn’t hurt things, either…)

Last night, and Mr. and Mrs. came over for a visit. As it was the first time any of them had met the girls, there was a bit of surprise of just how big they are — granted, it is kind of hard to tell from just pictures. There were also a few questions about parenthood and life changes, too.  I must admit that I was a little surprised – pleasantly so – at how well the girls took to hanging out with and at how comfortable he seemed with them.  (MENTAL NOTE: Keep this in mind for future babysitting needs!)

Chew on This: Food for Thought – Black History Month
Today’s person of note is Benjamin Hooks, an American civil rights leader, who also served as executive director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) from 1977 to 1992.

Benjamin Lawson Hooks (January 31, 1925 – April 15, 2010) was born in Memphis, Tennessee. He was the fifth of seven children of Robert B. Hooks and Bessie White Hooks. Young Benjamin’s paternal grandmother, Julia Britton Hooks (1852–1942), graduated from Berea College in Kentucky in 1874 and was only the second American black woman to graduate from college.

In his youth, he had felt called to the Christian ministry. His father, however, did not approve and discouraged Benjamin from such a calling. Hooks enrolled in LeMoyne-Owen College, in Memphis, Tennessee. There he undertook a pre-law course of study 1941–43. In his college years he became more acutely aware that he was one of a large number of Americans who were required to use segregated lunch counters, water fountains, and restrooms. After graduating in 1944 from Howard University, he joined the Army and had the job of guarding Italian prisoners of war. He found it humiliating that the prisoners were allowed to eat in restaurants from which he was barred. He was discharged from the Army after the end of the war with the rank of staff sergeant. After the war he enrolled at the DePaul University College of Law in Chicago to study law. No law school in his native Tennessee would admit him. He graduated from DePaul in 1948 with his Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree.

From 1949 until 1965 he practiced law in Memphis. He participated in restaurant sit-ins of the late 1950s and early ’60s and joined the Board of Directors of Martin Luther King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference, among many other civil-rights and public-service organizations. He was ordained as a Baptist minister in 1956 and began to preach regularly at the Greater Middle Baptist Church in Memphis, while continuing his busy law practice. He joined the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (then known as Southern Negro Leaders Conference on Transportation and Nonviolent Integration) along with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

In July 1972 Hooks was appointed to the U.S. Federal Communications Commission and became the first black FCC commissioner. As a member of the FCC, Hooks addressed the lack of minority ownership of television and radio stations, the minority employment statistics for the broadcasting industry, and the image of blacks in the mass media. Hooks completed his five-year term on the board of commissioners in 1978, but he continued to work for black involvement in the entertainment industry.

He resigned to become executive director of the NAACP on Aug. 1, 1977, succeeding Roy Wilkins. Hooks also served as the chairman of the board of directors of the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis and helped to found the Benjamin L. Hooks Institute for Social Change at the University of Memphis in 1996. Hooks stressed the need for affirmative action and pressed for increased minority voter registration.

Hooks received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George W. Bush in November 2007.

Information courtesy of biography.com, FactMonster.com and Wikipedia.

Stray Toasters

• Last World War I Veteran, Florence Green, Passes Away
• Rail’s handling of TSA should be a model
• 
• How Paranoid Should I Be About Trusting Companies With My Personal Data?

Wow… just ran into a wee bit of monkeydom. It’s lovely when the answers you get don’t quite fulfill the questions you ask.

Namaste.

Monday – 06 February 2012
Not only is today the start of a new work week, but – more importantly – it’s my niece, Grace’s, birthday:

This past weekend has been good. It has included, but not been limited to:

• Hanging out with the twins.
  

  Diana (l) and Vanessa

• Playing HeroClix: Star Trek Tactics with the guys.
• Judging a tournament for Dr. Volt’s Comic Connection.
• Tracking down (after THREE attempts!) and watching Contagion.
  
• Taking the girls to their third train show!
• Watching the Super Bowl.

Chew on This: Food for Thought – Black History Month
It’s catch-up time for our Black History Month items:

• Paul Laurence Dunbar (June 27, 1872 – February 9, 1906) was a poet, novelist, and playwright of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, born in Dayton, Ohio.
  
  Both of Dunbar’s parents were former slaves; his father escaped to freedom in Canada and then returned to the U.S. to fight in the Civil War. The young Dunbar was the only black student in his Dayton high school, where he was both the editor of the school newspaper and class president, as well as the president of the school literary society. Also of note: He was a classmate of aviation pioneer Orville Wright.Dunbar wrote a dozen books of poetry, four books of short stories, five novels, and a play. He also wrote lyrics for In Dahomey – the first musical written and performed entirely by African-Americans to appear on Broadway in 1903; the musical comedy successfully toured England and America over a period of four years – one of the more successful theatrical productions of its time.^[12] His essays and poems were published widely in the leading journals of the day. His work appeared in Harper’s Weekly, the Saturday Evening Post, the Denver Post, Current Literature and a number of other publications. During his life, considerable emphasis was laid on the fact that Dunbar was of pure black descent.

  Dunbar became the first African-American poet to earn nation-wide distinction and acceptance. The New York Times called him “a true singer of the people — white or black.” Much of Dunbar’s work was authored in conventional English, while some was rendered in African-American dialect. Dunbar remained always suspicious that there was something demeaning about the marketability of dialect poems. One interviewer reported that Dunbar told him, “I am tired, so tired of dialect”, though he is also quoted as saying, “my natural speech is dialect” and “my love is for the Negro pieces”.

  In 1900, he was diagnosed with tuberculosis and his doctors recommended drinking whisky to alleviate his symptoms. He moved to Colorado with his wife on the advice of his doctors. Dunbar and his wife separated in 1902, but they never divorced. Depression and declining health drove him to a dependence on alcohol, which further damaged his health. He moved back to Dayton to be with his mother in 1904. Dunbar died from tuberculosis on February 9, 1906, at age thirty-three.

• Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974), composer, pianist, and big band leader,  was born in Washington, D.C.
  
  Ellington grew up in a secure middle-class family in Washington, D.C. Daisy, his mother, surrounded her son with dignified women to reinforce his manners and teach him to live elegantly. Ellington’s childhood friends noticed that “his casual, offhand manner, his easy grace, and his dapper dress gave him the bearing of a young nobleman”, and began calling him “Duke.”His family encouraged his interests in the fine arts, and he began studying piano at age seven, but his first piano lessons came appeared not to have had that much lasting effect upon him. As Duke’s piano lessons faded into the past, Duke began to show a flare for the artistic. Duke attended Armstrong Manual Training School to study commercial art instead of going to an academics-oriented school.

  Duke began to seek out and listen to ragtime pianists in Washington and, during the summers, in Philadelphia or Atlantic City, where he and his mother vacationed. While vacationing in Asbury Park, Duke heard of a hot pianist named Harvey Brooks. At the end of his vacation, Duke sought Harvey out in Philadelphia where Harvey showed Duke some pianistic tricks and shortcuts. Duke later recounted that, “When I got home I had a real yearning to play. I hadn’t been able to get off the ground before, but after hearing him I said to myself, ‘Man you’re going to have to do it.’” Thus the music career of Duke Ellington was born. Duke was taken under the wings of Oliver “Doc” Perry and Louis Brown, who taught Duke how to read music and helped improve his overall piano playing skills. Duke found piano playing jobs at clubs and cafes throughout the Washington area. Three months shy of graduation, Duke dropped out of school and began his professional music career.

  Ellington made his first professional appearance as a jazz pianist in 1916. By 1918 he had formed a band, and after appearances in nightclubs in Harlem he became one of the most famous figures in American jazz. Ellington first played in New York City in 1923. Later that year he moved there and, in Broadway nightclubs, led a sextet that grew in time into a 10-piece ensemble. Extended residencies at the Cotton Club in Harlem (1927–32, 1937–38) stimulated Ellington to enlarge his band to 14 musicians and to expand his compositional scope. He selected his musicians for their expressive individuality, and several members of his ensemble were themselves important jazz artists. Ellington’s orchestra, playing his own and Billy Strayhorn’s compositions and arrangements, achieved a fine unity of style and made many innovations in the jazz idiom.

  He wrote nearly two thousand compositions before his death in 1974 – among his best-known short works are “Mood Indigo,” “Solitude,” and “Sophisticated Lady.” He also wrote jazz works of complex orchestration and ambitious scope for concert presentation, notably Creole Rhapsody (1932), Black, Brown and Beige (1943), Liberian Suite (1947), Harlem (1951), and Night Creatures (1955), and composed religious music, including three sacred concerts (1965, 1968, and 1973). Ellington made many tours of Europe, appeared in numerous jazz festivals and several films, and made hundreds of recordings. In 1969 he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

  Ellington died of lung cancer and pneumonia on May 24, 1974, a month after his 75th birthday

• James Leonard Farmer, Jr. (January 12, 1920 – July 9, 1999) was a civil rights activist and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement.
  
  Farmer was a child prodigy; at the age of 14, he enrolled at Wiley College, where he was the captain of the debate team. While there, a professor of English, Melvin Tolson, became his mentor. Farmer earned a Bachelor of Science at Wiley College in 1938, and a Bachelor of Divinity from Howard University School of Religion in 1941. Inspired by Howard Thurman, a professor of theology at Howard University, Farmer became interested in Gandhi-style pacifism. During the 1950s, Farmer served as national secretary of the Student League for Industrial Democracy (SLID), the youth branch of the socialist League for Industrial Democracy. SLID later became Students for a Democratic Society. Farmer talked to A. J. Muste, the executive director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation(FOR), about an idea to combat racial inequality. Muste found the idea promising but wanted to see it in writing. Farmer spent months writing the memorandum making sure it was perfect. A. J. Muste wrote him back asking him about money to fund it and how they would get members. Finally, Farmer was asked to propose his idea in front of the FOR National Council. In the end, FOR chose not to sponsor the group, but gave Farmer permission to start the group in Chicago. When Farmer got back to Chicago, the group began setting up the organization. The name decided upon was CORE, the Committee of Racial Equality. The name was changed about a year later to the Congress of Racial Equality.In 1961 Farmer, who was working for the NAACP, was reelected as the national director of CORE, at a time when the civil rights movement was gaining power. Despite the Irene Morgan Supreme Court decision and the Boynton decision, interstate buses were still segregated. Gordon Carey proposed the idea of a second Journey of Reconciliation. Farmer jumped at the idea. This time, however, the group planned to journey through the Deep South. Farmer coined a new name for the trip: the Freedom Ride. The plan was for a mixed race and gender group to test segregation on interstate buses. The group would spend time in Washington D.C. for intensive training. They would embark on May 4, 1961 half by Greyhound and half by Trailways. They would go through Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and finish in New Orleans on May 17. For overnight stops there were planned rallies and support from the black community. There were usually talks at local churches or colleges.

  Growing disenchanted with emerging militancy and black nationalist sentiments in CORE, Farmer resigned as director in 1966. He took a teaching position at Lincoln University, a historically black college (HBCU), and continued to lecture. In 1968 Farmer ran for U.S. Congress as a Liberal Party candidate backed by the Republican Party, but lost to Shirley Chisholm. His defeat was not total; in 1969 the newly elected President Richard Nixon offered him the position of Assistant Secretary of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (now Health and Human Services). The next year, frustrated by the Washington bureaucracy, Farmer resigned from the position.

  Farmer retired from politics in 1971 but remained active, lecturing and serving on various boards and committees. In 1975 he co-founded Fund for an Open Society. Its vision is a nation in which people live in stably integrated communities, where political and civic power is shared by people of different races and ethnicities. He led this organization until 1999. From 1984 through 1998, Farmer taught at Mary Washington College (now The University of Mary Washington) in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where a bust of him now stands on campus and the multicultural center is named after him. They also named a program after him that encouraged minority students to enroll and enter college. It is the James Farmer Scholars program.

  In 1998 President Bill Clinton awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

  Farmer died in 1999 in Fredericksburg, Virginia of complications from diabetes.

• Grambling State Universityis a historically black, public, coeducational university, located in Grambling, Louisiana, United States.
  Grambling State University opened on November 1, 1901 as the Colored Industrial and Agricultural School. It was founded by the North Louisiana Colored Agriculture Relief Association, organized in 1896 by a group of African-American farmers who wanted to organize and operate a school for African Americans in their region of the state.

  In response to the Association’s request for assistance, Tuskegee Institute’s Booker T. Washington sent Charles P. Adams to help the group organize an industrial school. Adams became its founding president.

  In 1905, the school moved to its present location and was renamed the North Louisiana Agricultural and Industrial School. By 1928, after becoming a state junior college and being renamed the Louisiana Negro Normal and Industrial Institute, the school began to award two-year professional certificates and diplomas. In 1936, and the curriculum emphasis shifted to rural teacher education; students were able to receive professional teaching certificates after completing a third academic year. The first baccalaureate degree was awarded in 1944, in elementary education.

  In 1946, the school became Grambling College, named after P.G. Grambling, the white sawmill owner who had donated the parcel of land where the school was constructed. In addition to elementary educators, Grambling prepared secondary teachers and added curricula in sciences, liberal arts and business, transforming the college from a single purpose institution of teacher education into a multipurpose college. In 1949, the college earned its first accreditation by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS).

  In 1974, the addition of graduate programs in early childhood and elementary education gave the school a new status and a new name – Grambling State University. The university expanded and prospered between 1977 and 2000. Several new academic programs were incorporated and new facilities were added to the 384-acre campus, including a business and computer science building, school of nursing, student services building, stadium, stadium support facility and an intramural sports center.

  Alumni of Grambling State include: Willie Brown (Green Bay Packers), eight-time Mr. Olympia winner Ronnie Coleman, Grammy-winner Erykah Badu (although she began concentrating on music full-time and left the university before graduating); former NFL quarterback and Super Bowl XXII MVP Doug Williams, who currently serves as the Tigers head football coach. Award winning and world renowned jazz artist Michael Thomas is a Grambling alumnus and he was a member of the Tiger Marching Band along with jazz artists Lovett Hines and Bob French. The writer Judi-Ann Mason was a double major graduate of Grambling.

Information courtesy of AllAboutJazz.com, Biography.com, FactMonster.com, the Grambling State University website (www.gram.edu), PBS.org and Wikipedia

Stray Toasters

• Brown student uncovers lost Malcolm X speech
• 100 Random Observations from Super Bowl XLVI
• Utah Symphony has announced their 2012-2013 season.
• Boundless information: Mining social networks
• Austrian Law Student Faces Down Facebook
• 
• Today’s out of context phrase that made me laugh: “orgy spork”
• FBI call gives clues into Anonymous, Lulzsec probes
• Top 10 list of ugly cars includes Ford Mustang, BMW
• 
• 17 and sudoku clues
• Art History Through Sci-Fi Colored Glasses

Namaste.

Thursday – 02 February 2012
It’s not just another NBN Thursday, it’s also Groundhog Day.

Yep. It’s just like that. And, apparently, the groundhog predicts six more weeks of winter. (Apparently, Utah never gets that memo.)

Last night was Movie Date Night around the household. The movie I chose was Drive, as SaraRules! and I both have an affinity for car chase movies. It was good… and far from what I expected, which was a pleasant surprise. I can’t really say “how” or “why”, but I will say this: The movie is not for the squeamish.

After the movie, I played a little CoD: Modern Warfare 3. There was one round that was horrid. Seriously abominable. The team we faced locked my team down on a map and just ate us up. We’d respawn. We’d die. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. Fortunately (or “mercifully”), the round was over fairly quickly.

Chew on This: Food for Thought – Black History Month
Today’s person of note is Benjamin Banneker.

Benjamin Banneker (November 9, 1731 – October 9, 1806) was a free African American astronomer, mathematician, surveyor, almanac author and farmer.

It is difficult to verify much of Benjamin Banneker’s family history. Some writers have stated that he was a grandson of a European American named Molly Welsh, who came to colonial America as an indentured servant.Researchers have questioned this, as Banneker described himself only as having an African ancestry. None of Banneker’s surviving papers describe a white ancestor or identify the name of his grandmother.

Born on November 9, 1731 near Elliott City, Maryland, Benjamin Banneker was educated by Quakers, however, most of his education was self-taught. He quickly revealed to the world his inventive nature and first achieved national acclaim for his scientific work in the 1791 survey of the Federal Territory (now Washington, D.C.).

Benjamin Banneker has been called the first African American intellectual; because of his dark skin and great intellect he was called the “sable genius.” Benjamin Banneker was a self-taught mathematician and astronomer. In 1753, after studying the inner workings of a friend’s watch, he made a wooden pocket watch – one of the first watches made in America – that accurately kept time for more than 40 years. Twenty years later, Banneker began making astronomical calculations that enabled him to successfully forecast a 1789 solar eclipse.

From 1791 to 1802, he published the Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia Almanac and Ephemeris, which contained tide tables, future eclipses, and medicinal formulas. It is believed to be the first scientific book published by an African American. Also a surveyor, Banneker was appointed by President George Washington to the District of Columbia Commission, which was responsible for the survey work that established the city’s original boundaries. When the chairman of the committee, Pierre Charles L’Enfant, suddenly resigned and left, taking the plans with him, Banneker reproduced the plans from memory, saving valuable time. A staunch opponent of slavery, Banneker sent a copy of his first almanac to then-Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson to counter Jefferson’s belief in the intellectual inferiority of blacks.

On August 19 1791, Banneker sent a copy of his first almanac to secretary of state Thomas Jefferson. In an enclosed letter, he questioned the slaveholder’s sincerity as a “friend to liberty.” He urged Jefferson to help get rid of “absurd and false ideas” that one race is superior to another. He wished Jefferson’s sentiments to be the same as his, that “one Universal Father . . . afforded us all the same sensations and endowed us all with the same faculties.” Jefferson responded with praise for Banneker’s accomplishments.

Banneker never married. Because of declining sales, his last almanac was published in 1797. After selling much of his farm to the Ellicotts and others, he died in his log cabin nine years later on October 9, 1806, exactly one month before his 75th birthday. A commemorative obelisk that the Maryland Bicentennial Commission and the State Commission on Afro American History and Culture erected in 1977 stands near his unmarked grave in an Oella, Maryland, churchyard.

Wednesday – 18 January 2012
Midweek is upon us once more. It seems as though Mother Nature has plans to introduce…

…into our weather pattern. Soon. We shall see how this plays out.

Last night was a long night for the girls. Vanessa seems to be on the downhill slope of her “cold-like thing.” She had a bit of a time falling asleep, but managed to meet Morpheus and wander through The Dreaming for a couple of good stretches. But, according to SaraRules!, Diana was up roughly every 45 minutes to an hour. Hopefully, she’ll get a better night’s sleep tonight.

Stray Toasters

• This Is What an Internet Protest Looks Like
• Protest on Web Uses Shutdown to Take on Two Piracy Bills
• 
• 3 New ‘Legend of Korra’ Videos Emerge for ‘Avatar: the Last Airbender’ Sequel
• Fashion Week: Best Looks, Fall/Winter 2012
• If I was a betting man, I’d have put money on Jeff Fisher going to Miami over St. Louis.
• Is Cooking Ever an Art?
• 10 Ways to Have a Productive Meeting
  I wish more of the meetings I attended adhered to these ideas…
• Few Cities Have Regained Jobs They Lost, Report Finds

Tonight is “Pasta and Movie Date Night.” I have a couple of tentative ideas for a movie, but nothing that jumps out at me. Hopefully, inspiration will hit before I get home.

Namaste.

Tuesday – 17 January 2012
It’s Day One of the work week for me. And, it’s my short week, to boot. AND, there’s a train show on Friday. Triple score!

Yesterday was Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

Like last year, I took the day off of work and volunteered at the Habitat for Humanity ReStore. And it was good. After that, I stopped at RubySnap and picked up a few cookies before stopping in to say “Hi” to SaraRules! at work and making a couple more stops before heading home. Yes, one of those stops was The Train Shoppe. No, I didn’t get anything. (Besides, I just ordered a new switching engine online a couple of days ago.)

The girls have been a little under the weather. According to the pediatrician, they don’t have colds, but a “respiratory illness” that has the earmarks of a cold, minus the runny noses. All I know is that they’re congested and a little irritable. Hopefully, they’ll be over it soon-ish.

Instant Replay: Football

Houston Texans at Baltimore Ravens
13 – 20
Sunday, the Ravens hosted the Ravens for the Divisional Playoffs… …and won. It wasn’t pretty. It wasn’t easy. But, it was a win. And, a little fun fact: Ravens Not Penalized For First Time Ever Next stop: Foxoboro, MA.

Stray Toasters

• Happy Birthday to The Greatest, Muhammad Ali Is 70 Today
  
• Black Voters Are Wary as Hopefuls Seek Kinship
• Predictions Of What 2011 Would Be Like From A 1911 Newspaper
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot…?!” file” Taco Bell’s Stupidly Exploitative MLK Day Tweet
• U.S. to Force Drug Makers to Report Money Paid to Doctors
• 
• More schools likely to lose accreditation, experts say
• Oversight of Cruise Lines at Issue After Disaster
• The Wreck of the Costa Concordia
• 
• Burger King tries home delivery
• Artist Builds a Six-Million Matchstick Monastery
• Zappos breach affects 24M, opens door for more attacks

Namaste.

Wednesday – 11 January 2012
Midweek. My day started with pre-work cuddles from both of the girls. AND there shall be new comics today. AND tonight is “Pasta and Movie Night.” I’d say that this is a Wednesday full of “Win.”

Last night was another baby bath night around the homestead. It was also a 180° change from Monday night’s pre-bedtime experience. The girls, while tired, were little troopers through their baths and bedtime preparations. We’ve also stopped double-swaddling the girls and just going with the single-blanket swaddle… and (so far) it hasn’t bitten us in the ass.

After the girls went to bed – and after we ate dinner – I decided to unwind by spending a little time playing DC Universe Online. After a fairly brief patch/update, I was back in Gotham City.

I finished out a mission that I started… probably back in November. I thought about doing the final mission in that arc, but realized that I was already up a bit later than I had planned to be. So, I called it a night.

Stray Toasters

• Doomsday clock moved closer to midnight
• A meeting that was almost scheduled for today has been pushed back to tomorrow. I’m fine with that.
• Stopped they must be; on this all depends — reddit goes dark in protest of SOPA
• 
• Simon & Schuster has posted an excerpt of Carrie Fisher’s new book, Shockaholic.
• Bacon: Good or Bad?
• Courtesy of Christopher M. and the “Some Peoples’ Children…” file: !@#&^%$!!!!!! (Cellphone halts Mahler’s Ninth mid-movement)
• Energy Department to analyze power grid cyber threats
• 
• We Can’t Get Enough of the Google Girls
• Independent DABC Committee Taps a Keg of Bar Owner Frustration
  And the “best” part: They scheduled this meeting yesterday, from 2:00-4:00 PM. You know… when most people (who might object to it) would be at work.
• After firing coach, Raiders GM promises title
• Fatal Stampede in South Africa Points Up University Crisis
• What We Expect to See at Fashion Week

Namaste.

Wednesday – 04 January 2012
Midweek is here already. Seems like the week just started. Oh, wait… it did.

Last night, I got home from work to discover that Vanessa had picked up a new trick from Diana: Blowing raspberries. Diana sussed out how to do it about a week ago — I first saw/heard her do it when getting ready to change her diaper.

If you’re not a parent, let me tell you that there’s almost nothing funnier than watching your infant daughters figure out “If I get lots of spit in my mouth and clench my lips and blow, it makes a funny sound!” I had a hard time changing the diaper because I was laughing so much. And the looks of concentration and determination on their faces when they are learning how to do this?  Priceless.

By now, Diana has raspberries down pat, so the “Okay, how do I do this again?” look has passed. Vanessa still makes the “thinking face,” though. SaraRules! has video of the girls doing this; I’ll see if I can get a copy posted in the next day or two.

Stray Toasters

• Wayne Brady (yes, that Wayne Brady) tweeted a link to a post on Dad or Alive. It’s a sad post, but a very good read.
• Terrell Suggs. T-Sizzle. Dean of Ball So Hard University. And, apparently not afraid to spar with ESPN’s Skip Bayless.
• Another parental truth:
  
• Survey: Developers still not doing enough to ensure security
• From the “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot…?!” file: Town Breathes Easier as Frozen Dead Guy and His Festival Stay Put
• 
• Teachers Resist High-Tech Push in Idaho Schools
• I had dropped the DCnU Green Arrow after Issue #1, but after reading this interview, I might consider picking it back up.

Namaste.

Sunday – 01 January 2012
Welcome to 2012 – The Year of the Dragon.

Today is also the seventh day of Kwanzaa; today ‘s principle is “Imani” or “faith”:

To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

Last night, SaraRules! and I had over for dinner and a movie.  SaraRules! fixed a Moroccan chicken dish over couscous that was quite good. While we ate, we watched The Horde, a French zombie movie.  It was… interesting. Not bad. Not awesome. Just different.

As this is our first new year as parents, we decided to forego watching the ball drop, so that we would be at least somewhat coherent if/when the girls wake up in the middle of the night. Besides, I’ve seen enough NYE shows to know how it goes, so I’m Ivory Soap sure that we didn’t miss anything… with the possible aside of seeing an even more haggard-looking Dick Clark than last year.

I hope that everyone has a safe, happy and prosperous 2012.

Be well and be good to one another.

Namaste.

Thursday – 29 December 2011
Another NBN Thursday is under way and I have already been to – and returned from – the airport. My uncle came to town Tuesday night for a post-Christmas visit and to meet the new additions to the family:

It was a short visit, but a very full one. The girls, who’ve been a bit fussy with new people lately, took to him fairly quickly; he took to them immediately. It was fun watching the three of them interact.

We also managed to squeeze in a trip to see the Lights on Temple Square last night. We bundled the girls into their bear suits and car seats and set off for downtown. We got there around the time that the girls are usually beginning to wind down before bed. But, with so many things to see – and all of the sounds – they were awake and staring at all the sights. About two-thirds of the way through our stroll, Diana started to fade; Vanessa was still going strong… until we got to the car. Then they traded: Diana woke up and Vanessa napped. We got home, changed and fed them and put them to bed. Diana faded out somewhat quickly; Vanessa, however, got a second wind and decided that bedtime was the perfect time to tell SaraRules! all about the adventures she had during the day. It took her almost an hour to wind down and fall asleep. On the “plus” side: They slept until almost 5 AM.

After the girls went to bed, my uncle and I went to Pawit’s to pick up dinner. He, SaraRules! and I ate and we introduced him to TopGear (UK). It was a good way to wind down the day and his visit.

Stray Toasters

• For SaraRules!: Not sure where this rates on your “uncanny valley” scale, but it has graffiti: Robot that paints random graffiti
• While I haven’t gotten in a lot of play time, I’ve been enjoying CoD: MW3
• I also realize that I still need to go back and finish three HALO games: 2, 3, and Reach.
• Young girl rages over pink toys and gendered play-choices
  This reminds me of of this post from my brother-in-law, about my niece, Grace:

  Yes lady, I’m aware that the “space explorer” pajamas were in the boys section. I’m also aware that my child is a girl. No, she wouldn’t rather have the pink princess ones. And yes, I can assure you that she picked them out on her own, so wipe the condescending look and eye roll off your face. My little girl can be a space explorer if she wants to, so suck it, wench.

  Amen.

• And, as a corollary to the above: Gamer Girl Manifesto
• A Brutal Chapter in North Carolina’s Eugenics Past
• Thanks to Keith for (re-)posting this picture:

  

• Disney Princesses as Street Fighter-style warriors
• Instead of Work, Younger Women Head to School
• Thanks to Corey for this: Photos of the Steam Festival at Golden Spike Historical Site
• Scheduling Partnership Links Pac-12 and Big Ten
• 
• Sears, Kmart to close up to 120 stores
• From the “What’s Wrong With This Picture…?” file: Police storm Church of the Nativity to break up brawling priests

I just put the girls down for a nap. Let’s see how this goes.

Namaste.

Tuesday – 27 December 2011
Our first Christmas as parents has come and gone. And it was a good one. We spent the holiday with Sara’s family and, as usual, it was a lot of fun. Added bonuses: I was able to video chat not only with my mom and uncle, but also with Rana, John and the girls, as well. Win-Win.

Because I didn’t consider what scheduling a post for midnight on Christmas might mean for “getting it lost on Facebook,” here’s this year’s Christmas card:

The picture was taken by Jenny Porter of Serendipity Photography.

And pictures of Christmas day can be found here.

Diana and Vanessa made out like little bandits. Lots of clothes, a few books, and even some toys. Granted, they’re not really “up” on the whole idea of Christmas, so it was just another day for them… aside from the fact that we hung out with their grandparents and aunts and uncles for the better part of the day.

I was able to surprise SaraRules! with a couple of gifts this year. (Go, me!) She had asked for one thing – which I got – but I had remembered that she had shown a particular interest in a letterpress kit we saw a few weeks ago. I found the kit and got it for her. What I didn’t know was that she had gone looking for that same kit elsewhere… just before Christmas. (That would have been awkward.) Fortunately for me, she didn’t find it. Again: Win.

I also was very fortunate in the gifts that I received. As I noted a couple of weeks ago, I got myself the 12-pack of Legion action figures for Christmas. It showed up on… Thursday, I think. I didn’t even bother wrapping the shipping box; I just wrapped a ribbon around it and called it good. SaraRules! got me a bike trainer, which is great — I’ll be able to actually get some cardio conditioning in while I’d otherwise be sitting on my butt, watching TV or playing video games.  (Oh, yeah, we bought a new 360 to replace “old and busted.” I didn’t realize how much smaller and more quiet the new models are.) Among the other things I got were:

• The MTH DCS Remote Set for my model train layout
• A couple of calendars — one Green Lantern calendar and one of train paintings
• The Anniversary Edition of Roots
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
• A nice cologne set
• A set of Lord of the Rings ‘Clix, and
• A GL action figure (Hal Jordan: Test Pilot)

Like I said: It was a good Christmas.

Another “gift” that SaraRules! and I got (from her sister and mom) was the ability to go out for a movie date on Saturday. We saw Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol. It was a good bit of fun. Lots of action. Decent enough plot. Although, we both agreed that the female lead seemed kind of “just there to be there.”  If there’s an M:I 5 and she’s in it, hopefully, she’ll be fleshed out a bit more.

We also finally got around to seeing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 last night. Long movie. But, it was good. Of course, knowing how it turns out didn’t hurt.

Sounds like little ones are safely abed, so I should head on to Guys’ Night Out!

I hope that everyone had a safe and merry Christmas.

Happy Kwanzaa for those who celebrate it.

Namaste.