Packing up TWO apartments for the move on Saturday to the new house; getting over pneumonia; planning the wedding for Saturday after the move; planning a week's visit with Q; trying to co-ordinate all the changing of address to various sources, changing of name, changing of the time for losing my mind....planning a menu (THANK YOU SHERRI!) finding a photographer, what will I wear?; handling my own fear of loss of movement and freedom while listening to J's concerns; and fighting off the migraine monster; finding a florist...
All is well. Nothing but wonderful things to bitch about - as for the world - OMGods! Nancy Pelosi imploding, the new justice to be named to the Supreme Court; the loss of the Swat Valley and the encroaching hoard of Taliban on Islamabad and it's stash of nuclear weapons; the hideous and obvious further harrowing of Suu Kyi; the increasing battle in Washington D.C. between parties while ignoring the danger hot spots around the globe and internally; the upcoming writer's conference in July and my DEADLINE! So yes I'm gobsmacked but blissful; and how's your day going?
Wednesday, 20 May 2009
Saturday, 9 May 2009
good advice
Summary Advice
1. Realize the value of the human body with which you have been endowed, for it is the result of many past good causes. Appreciate the fact that teachings are available and ready to be implemented.
2. Since this precious human life can be used in powerfully beneficial or destructive ways, and is itself most fragile, make good use of it now.
3. Physical happiness is just an occasional balance of elements in the body, not a deep harmony. Understand the temporary for what it is.
4. A tamed mind makes you peaceful, relaxed, and happy; whereas, if your mind is not peaceful and tamed, no matter how wonderful your external circumstances, you will be beset by frights and worries. Realize that the root of your own happiness and welfare rests with a peaceful and tamed mind. It is also a great benefit to those around you.
--from Mind of Clear Light: Advice on Living Well and Dying Consciously by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, translated and edited by Jeffrey Hopkins, Ph.D.
Wednesday, 6 May 2009
slow, painful, and frustrating
I have to tell you my recovery from "walking pneumonia" (why do they call it "walking" when they put you to bed?) is taking much longer than I would prefer and is not pleasant. I'm sore, short of breath, tired, and cranky - not my normal state. I promise to be back soon, and thank you for missing me. My friend sent me this photo and caption from her son today and I had to share - it had me laughing out loud.
Just click on the kitty.
Ciao
 |
| From New Album 5/6/09 4:30 PM |
Just click on the kitty.
Ciao
Thursday, 30 April 2009
help!!!!!
I'm being chased by a swine, no wait it's a bacteria! Walking pneumonia? Pardon me, as opossed to running or lying down pneumonia? Bugger what a pain - no really, a hacking, chest wrenching pain! Argh! I'm inhaling nebulizers and attacking with a full spread of antibiotics so I expect to be among the walking well soon.
MY doctor said to bed for eight days, I said two - we agreed on when the coughing up of lung tissue ceases. Yes well...
Ciao
MY doctor said to bed for eight days, I said two - we agreed on when the coughing up of lung tissue ceases. Yes well...
Ciao
Wednesday, 22 April 2009
nostalgia....sigh
It is nearing time for Q's birthday, and as I do every year (I know...) I'm getting nostalgic, looking back at photographs, and generally being so grateful to the Universe for allowing me to have her as my child. Here - share a grin and a sigh with me....her rescue of MC Solaar from the streets of Fez and a life of crime.
 |
| From The life of M.C. Solaar, so far.. 05/10/2007 19:26 |
Monday, 20 April 2009
not my doing...
I didn't write this one, but I wish I had. I love Maureen Dowd, I don't always agree with her but she is such a smart woman and excellent writer. I couldn't pass up the opportunity to pass on the opinion (and it's just an opinion people, and I realize NOT the only one) of George Lucas on Cheney - something I have said in the past and present.
As well, her review on the first gardener I found delightful - so enjoy.
April 19, 2009
OP-ED COLUMNIST
The Aura of Arugulance
By MAUREEN DOWD
BERKELEY, Calif.
The first thing I wanted to do in the Bay Area was go out to Skywalker Ranch and ask George Lucas about a disturbing conversation we’d had at an Obama inaugural party in Washington.
Lucas, the creator of “Star Wars,” had told me that I had gotten Dick Cheney completely wrong, that Cheney was no Darth Vader. I felt awful. Had I been too hard on Vice?
Lucas explained politely as I listened contritely. Anakin Skywalker is a promising young man who is turned to the dark side by an older politician and becomes Darth Vader. “George Bush is Darth Vader,” he said. “Cheney is the emperor.”
I was relieved. In “Star Wars” terms, Dick Cheney was more evil than Darth Vader. I hadn’t been hard enough on Vice!
Lucas was on his way to Europe and didn’t have time to elaborate in person. But he sent me this message confirming our conversation: “You know, Darth Vader is really a kid from the desert planet near Crawford, and the true evil of the universe is the emperor who pulls all the strings.”
Sated, I went over to talk to the other celestial celebrity in San Francisco who inspires cultlike devotion for what she does with green cooking rather than blue screens: Alice Waters, who has created her own mythical empire of healthy food with her cookbooks, edible gardens in public schools and renowned Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse.
Waters has been much in the news lately as the fairy godmother of the White House organic vegetable garden, an idea she has been pushing since 1993. Instead, Bill Clinton installed a seven-seat hot tub on the South Lawn. Though he loved to eat, Bill was more a consumer of fast food than slow food, as Waters calls her movement to persuade Americans to sup on simple, locally grown foods free of pesticides and herbicides.
The 64-year-old Waters, who got her taste for revolutions in the ‘60s in school at Berkeley with the antiwar and women’s movements, wears a gold peace sign on a necklace. But with her radiant skin and her mesmerizing, hesitating arias about the sensual pleasures of food, she seems more like a ‘30s movie actress than a graying hippie. (I’m not surprised to find out she loves Turner Classic Movies and Hollywood’s vintage hotel, Chateau Marmont, that she named her restaurant after a character in Marcel Pagnol’s 1930s trilogy of movies, and that she thinks of her restaurant as theater.)
She wasn’t invited to the opening of the White House garden, and she understands why the Obamas would want “to keep a kind of distance from me and from that whole celebrity chef” aura. Barack Obama got upset during the campaign that he was painted as a finicky elitist after he complained about the price of arugula at Whole Foods.
She’s well aware of the criticism leveled at her in blogs for condescension and food snobbery. In a post on Friday called “Alice in Wonderland,” National Review stirred the pot against her: “The truth is, organic food is an expensive luxury item, something bought by those who have the resources.”
She says wryly: “I’m just put into that arugulance place. I own a fancy restaurant. I own an expensive restaurant. I never thought of it as fancy. People don’t know we’re supporting 85 farms and ranches and all of that.
“And so my first thing I say, it’s going to cost more and I want to pay for my food. I go to the farmers’ market; it makes me feel like I’m making a donation.”
Since the Obamas haven’t taken her up on her offer of a “kitchen cabinet,” she wants to do her first TV show called “The Green Kitchen.” She can do a soliloquy on the “discernment” of choosing the most ambrosial orange. But she also says that a recession is a time when people need to learn the basics — “a kind of everyday cooking, in a really tasty way. We’re really trying to take the ‘ie’ out of foodie.”
She says she’s sick of hearing about diets and obesity in America, and believes neither would be so prevalent if her European-style “delicious revolution” succeeded.
Waters is a visionary. She imagines a “peace garden” on the Gaza Strip that would employ people “from all sides.” She imagines a high school where the kids could run the whole cafeteria themselves, learning math, nutrition, art and food. She imagines starting gardens at Monticello and Mount Vernon that would “become the source of all food in the White House.” She imagines food being covered on the front page and the business page — not the food page, or on TV by “lesser” reporters like “the weatherman.”
Her most ambitious vision involves President Obama, who didn’t want beets in his garden. “I would just like to serve him some golden beets sometime that were roasted in the oven, that were not overcooked, that were dressed with a lovely little vinaigrette, maybe even diced in a salad,” she says in her seductive way. “Squeeze ‘em with a little lime. It’s fantastically nutritious.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
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As well, her review on the first gardener I found delightful - so enjoy.
April 19, 2009
OP-ED COLUMNIST
The Aura of Arugulance
By MAUREEN DOWD
BERKELEY, Calif.
The first thing I wanted to do in the Bay Area was go out to Skywalker Ranch and ask George Lucas about a disturbing conversation we’d had at an Obama inaugural party in Washington.
Lucas, the creator of “Star Wars,” had told me that I had gotten Dick Cheney completely wrong, that Cheney was no Darth Vader. I felt awful. Had I been too hard on Vice?
Lucas explained politely as I listened contritely. Anakin Skywalker is a promising young man who is turned to the dark side by an older politician and becomes Darth Vader. “George Bush is Darth Vader,” he said. “Cheney is the emperor.”
I was relieved. In “Star Wars” terms, Dick Cheney was more evil than Darth Vader. I hadn’t been hard enough on Vice!
Lucas was on his way to Europe and didn’t have time to elaborate in person. But he sent me this message confirming our conversation: “You know, Darth Vader is really a kid from the desert planet near Crawford, and the true evil of the universe is the emperor who pulls all the strings.”
Sated, I went over to talk to the other celestial celebrity in San Francisco who inspires cultlike devotion for what she does with green cooking rather than blue screens: Alice Waters, who has created her own mythical empire of healthy food with her cookbooks, edible gardens in public schools and renowned Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse.
Waters has been much in the news lately as the fairy godmother of the White House organic vegetable garden, an idea she has been pushing since 1993. Instead, Bill Clinton installed a seven-seat hot tub on the South Lawn. Though he loved to eat, Bill was more a consumer of fast food than slow food, as Waters calls her movement to persuade Americans to sup on simple, locally grown foods free of pesticides and herbicides.
The 64-year-old Waters, who got her taste for revolutions in the ‘60s in school at Berkeley with the antiwar and women’s movements, wears a gold peace sign on a necklace. But with her radiant skin and her mesmerizing, hesitating arias about the sensual pleasures of food, she seems more like a ‘30s movie actress than a graying hippie. (I’m not surprised to find out she loves Turner Classic Movies and Hollywood’s vintage hotel, Chateau Marmont, that she named her restaurant after a character in Marcel Pagnol’s 1930s trilogy of movies, and that she thinks of her restaurant as theater.)
She wasn’t invited to the opening of the White House garden, and she understands why the Obamas would want “to keep a kind of distance from me and from that whole celebrity chef” aura. Barack Obama got upset during the campaign that he was painted as a finicky elitist after he complained about the price of arugula at Whole Foods.
She’s well aware of the criticism leveled at her in blogs for condescension and food snobbery. In a post on Friday called “Alice in Wonderland,” National Review stirred the pot against her: “The truth is, organic food is an expensive luxury item, something bought by those who have the resources.”
She says wryly: “I’m just put into that arugulance place. I own a fancy restaurant. I own an expensive restaurant. I never thought of it as fancy. People don’t know we’re supporting 85 farms and ranches and all of that.
“And so my first thing I say, it’s going to cost more and I want to pay for my food. I go to the farmers’ market; it makes me feel like I’m making a donation.”
Since the Obamas haven’t taken her up on her offer of a “kitchen cabinet,” she wants to do her first TV show called “The Green Kitchen.” She can do a soliloquy on the “discernment” of choosing the most ambrosial orange. But she also says that a recession is a time when people need to learn the basics — “a kind of everyday cooking, in a really tasty way. We’re really trying to take the ‘ie’ out of foodie.”
She says she’s sick of hearing about diets and obesity in America, and believes neither would be so prevalent if her European-style “delicious revolution” succeeded.
Waters is a visionary. She imagines a “peace garden” on the Gaza Strip that would employ people “from all sides.” She imagines a high school where the kids could run the whole cafeteria themselves, learning math, nutrition, art and food. She imagines starting gardens at Monticello and Mount Vernon that would “become the source of all food in the White House.” She imagines food being covered on the front page and the business page — not the food page, or on TV by “lesser” reporters like “the weatherman.”
Her most ambitious vision involves President Obama, who didn’t want beets in his garden. “I would just like to serve him some golden beets sometime that were roasted in the oven, that were not overcooked, that were dressed with a lovely little vinaigrette, maybe even diced in a salad,” she says in her seductive way. “Squeeze ‘em with a little lime. It’s fantastically nutritious.”
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
Privacy Policy Search Corrections RSS First Look Help Contact Us Work for Us Site Map
Wednesday, 15 April 2009
It’s just never that easy…
APRIL 14, 2009, 5:28 PM
Reconcile This
By SAM DAGHER
ABU SAIFEEN – On Saturday we got word from one of my Iraqi colleagues that Shiite-on-Shiite clashes had supposedly broken out between militiamen loyal to Moktada al-Sadr and members of an Awakening Council in Baghdad’s Abu Saifeen neighborhood.
My colleague said the militiamen were allegedly fighting over a base at a local husseiniya, or Shiite house of worship.
We thought it would be a good idea to see what was going on.
Everything looked normal as we entered Abu Saifeen. There was no sound of gunfire and all shops and teahouses were open. It was the usual hustle and bustle in this poor working class area that is adjacent to Baghdad’s central market.
After asking a few shopkeepers we were directed to a narrow and crooked alleyway, known as alleyway 127. We walked for a while skipping over a thin stream of waste water.
This is one of Baghdad’s historic neighborhoods with crumbling brick homes. Many had Shanashils, the projecting oriel windows enclosed within carved wood latticework located on the second floor of a building or higher, and found in many ancient Arab capitals.
In front of the husseiniya I met Salah Qassim, 50, a carpenter and Alaa al-Khattat, 45, a sign maker. Both moonlight as members of the Abu Saifeen Awakening. They recounted their version of what happened earlier on Saturday.
On Saturday morning the leaders of the Abu Saifeen Awakening reopened the husseiniya for a neighborhood reconciliation meeting called for by the government’s reconciliation council.
They were only expecting tribal elders. So they were taken aback when the 20 elders showed up with 30 militia members, including six who were accused by residents of having committed countless crimes in the area.
The mood quickly soured, especially when one militia leader invoked Mr. Sadr. Things went downhill from there when the tribal elders said the militiamen were “refugees who should be allowed to return to the neighborhood.”
Word quickly spread in the neighborhood that Abu Saifeen’s former Mahdi Army leader was going to mount an attack to retake the area. Angry residents who were wronged by the militiamen rushed to the husseiniya.
“If they come back we will kill them with our own hands,” said Ahmed Haider, an 18-year-old blacksmith’s apprentice, who said the Mahdi Army raided his house last year and shot his brother and sister-in-law in the legs.
Sensing that the charged situation had the potential to degenerate into an armed clash, the Awakening leaders told the sheiks and militiamen to leave.
Soon I was surrounded by dozens of residents with one claim or another against someone or another.
Walking away I pondered one particular word: reconciliation. American leaders keep exhorting the Shiite-led government in Baghdad to reconcile with Sunni Arabs, the “reconcilable” members of Saddam Hussein’s former Baath regime, etc. But much reconciliation remains to be done even among members of the same sect, in this case Shiite Muslims.
Six years into this war the sheer amount of reconciliation that has to take place is daunting. In addition to coming to grips with the past, almost every Iraqi family has been touched by what happened over the past few years. Many have lost loved ones in the sectarian bloodshed and many are not willing to forget or forgive.
Many still seek retribution either through the law or unilateral actions.
The Shiite Muslim’s, who are concentrated in Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon, clash with the Sunni has been at the heart of Islam since the groups first diverged after the Prophet Muhammad died in 632, and his followers could not agree on whether to choose bloodline successors or leaders most likely to follow the tenets of the faith.
The group now known as Sunnis chose Abu Bakr, the prophet’s adviser, to become the first successor, or caliph, to lead the Muslim state. Shiites favored Ali, Muhammad’s cousin and son-in-law. Ali and his successors are called imams, who not only lead the Shiites but also are considered to be descendants of Muhammad. After the 11th imam died in 874, and his young son was said to have disappeared from the funeral, Shiites in particular came to see the child as a Messiah who had been hidden from the public by God.
The largest sect of Shiites, known as “twelvers,” have been preparing for his return ever since.
Not "until the ascendancy of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1978" did they believe that they had once again begun to live under the authority of a legitimate religious figure. (and just how scary that was for the rest of the world and Iran we all know)
For Sunni Muslims, approximately 90 percent of the Muslim world, the loss of the caliphate after World War I was devastating in light of the hitherto continuous historic presence of the caliph, the guardian of Islamic law and the Islamic state. Sunni fundamentalist leaders thereafter emerged in nations such as Egypt and India, where contact with Western political structures provided them with a model awkwardly to imitate ... as they struggled after 1924 to provide a viable alternative to the caliphate.
What is important to remember, for this discussion, is that religions are run by men (for the most part Q, for the most part) and men can be avaricious, corrupt, victims to their own bullshit, and have a testosterone hunger for power and proving they are right. Having your hands on the joystick for any large organized religion makes it very tempting to remodel the world in the image you think fit – I give up Pope Benedict as example (just not so certain the holocaust happened. Excuse me?). Albeit he did retract - um yes...
Easy there boys this is not a rant against “men”, you well know you are my favourite people but rather organized religion (not spirituality, that can flourish in or out of organization) that forgets it is only divinely inspired – the chaps making the calls and writing the dogma are human and capable of grave error. As true for Christianity (the priest and the incidents of pedophilia) and the other major religions as it is for Islam.
As far as how this impacts the West politically – well that’s a long discussion eh? But we do need to stir the above thoughts into that pot. Nothing happens in a vacuum – not religion and not war. Sometimes you can not change people’s minds, and you then must get out of the way lest you, or someone’s else’s son or daughter, becomes a target. I''m just saying...
ciao
Reconcile This
By SAM DAGHER
ABU SAIFEEN – On Saturday we got word from one of my Iraqi colleagues that Shiite-on-Shiite clashes had supposedly broken out between militiamen loyal to Moktada al-Sadr and members of an Awakening Council in Baghdad’s Abu Saifeen neighborhood.
My colleague said the militiamen were allegedly fighting over a base at a local husseiniya, or Shiite house of worship.
We thought it would be a good idea to see what was going on.
Everything looked normal as we entered Abu Saifeen. There was no sound of gunfire and all shops and teahouses were open. It was the usual hustle and bustle in this poor working class area that is adjacent to Baghdad’s central market.
After asking a few shopkeepers we were directed to a narrow and crooked alleyway, known as alleyway 127. We walked for a while skipping over a thin stream of waste water.
This is one of Baghdad’s historic neighborhoods with crumbling brick homes. Many had Shanashils, the projecting oriel windows enclosed within carved wood latticework located on the second floor of a building or higher, and found in many ancient Arab capitals.
In front of the husseiniya I met Salah Qassim, 50, a carpenter and Alaa al-Khattat, 45, a sign maker. Both moonlight as members of the Abu Saifeen Awakening. They recounted their version of what happened earlier on Saturday.
On Saturday morning the leaders of the Abu Saifeen Awakening reopened the husseiniya for a neighborhood reconciliation meeting called for by the government’s reconciliation council.
They were only expecting tribal elders. So they were taken aback when the 20 elders showed up with 30 militia members, including six who were accused by residents of having committed countless crimes in the area.
The mood quickly soured, especially when one militia leader invoked Mr. Sadr. Things went downhill from there when the tribal elders said the militiamen were “refugees who should be allowed to return to the neighborhood.”
Word quickly spread in the neighborhood that Abu Saifeen’s former Mahdi Army leader was going to mount an attack to retake the area. Angry residents who were wronged by the militiamen rushed to the husseiniya.
“If they come back we will kill them with our own hands,” said Ahmed Haider, an 18-year-old blacksmith’s apprentice, who said the Mahdi Army raided his house last year and shot his brother and sister-in-law in the legs.
Sensing that the charged situation had the potential to degenerate into an armed clash, the Awakening leaders told the sheiks and militiamen to leave.
Soon I was surrounded by dozens of residents with one claim or another against someone or another.
Walking away I pondered one particular word: reconciliation. American leaders keep exhorting the Shiite-led government in Baghdad to reconcile with Sunni Arabs, the “reconcilable” members of Saddam Hussein’s former Baath regime, etc. But much reconciliation remains to be done even among members of the same sect, in this case Shiite Muslims.
Six years into this war the sheer amount of reconciliation that has to take place is daunting. In addition to coming to grips with the past, almost every Iraqi family has been touched by what happened over the past few years. Many have lost loved ones in the sectarian bloodshed and many are not willing to forget or forgive.
Many still seek retribution either through the law or unilateral actions.
The Shiite Muslim’s, who are concentrated in Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon, clash with the Sunni has been at the heart of Islam since the groups first diverged after the Prophet Muhammad died in 632, and his followers could not agree on whether to choose bloodline successors or leaders most likely to follow the tenets of the faith.
The group now known as Sunnis chose Abu Bakr, the prophet’s adviser, to become the first successor, or caliph, to lead the Muslim state. Shiites favored Ali, Muhammad’s cousin and son-in-law. Ali and his successors are called imams, who not only lead the Shiites but also are considered to be descendants of Muhammad. After the 11th imam died in 874, and his young son was said to have disappeared from the funeral, Shiites in particular came to see the child as a Messiah who had been hidden from the public by God.
The largest sect of Shiites, known as “twelvers,” have been preparing for his return ever since.
Not "until the ascendancy of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1978" did they believe that they had once again begun to live under the authority of a legitimate religious figure. (and just how scary that was for the rest of the world and Iran we all know)
For Sunni Muslims, approximately 90 percent of the Muslim world, the loss of the caliphate after World War I was devastating in light of the hitherto continuous historic presence of the caliph, the guardian of Islamic law and the Islamic state. Sunni fundamentalist leaders thereafter emerged in nations such as Egypt and India, where contact with Western political structures provided them with a model awkwardly to imitate ... as they struggled after 1924 to provide a viable alternative to the caliphate.
What is important to remember, for this discussion, is that religions are run by men (for the most part Q, for the most part) and men can be avaricious, corrupt, victims to their own bullshit, and have a testosterone hunger for power and proving they are right. Having your hands on the joystick for any large organized religion makes it very tempting to remodel the world in the image you think fit – I give up Pope Benedict as example (just not so certain the holocaust happened. Excuse me?). Albeit he did retract - um yes...
Easy there boys this is not a rant against “men”, you well know you are my favourite people but rather organized religion (not spirituality, that can flourish in or out of organization) that forgets it is only divinely inspired – the chaps making the calls and writing the dogma are human and capable of grave error. As true for Christianity (the priest and the incidents of pedophilia) and the other major religions as it is for Islam.
As far as how this impacts the West politically – well that’s a long discussion eh? But we do need to stir the above thoughts into that pot. Nothing happens in a vacuum – not religion and not war. Sometimes you can not change people’s minds, and you then must get out of the way lest you, or someone’s else’s son or daughter, becomes a target. I''m just saying...
ciao
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