On the Island of Emotion!

The Wikepedia entry on pain says
"This article is about physical pain. For pain in a broader sense, see Suffering." For some reason, this makes me laugh.


Sally Cruikshank animated this bit for Sesame Street--I love it!

Years ago, I noticed that when a big weather front came through, I'd stop sleeping. Later, I paid attention and recognized that when there was a dramatic change in the weather, such as the one we're having now--when the first wintery cold front and rain moves in-- I'd have an increase in fatigue, pain, and other fibromyalgia symptoms. Poking around, I've found that there is research that shows that many people with arthritic conditions, depression or migraine also feel these changes. It's not clear if it is a specific weather factor, such as the drop in barometric pressure, or the change itself, as some who study migraines believe, that triggers the increase in pain, but the correlations are unmistakable. Over the years, I've come to recognize those times of the year and weather conditions that trigger the worst flares, and the beginning of the heating season in MN, my body goes kablooie.

For the last several days, I've been a hurting individual: to the usual stiffness, joint aches, tight muscle bands, the flare has added stabbing pains: it feels as if someone stabbed me with an ice-pick behind my eye, another in front of my ear, and another at the base of my skull, burning pains down my back to under my shoulder-blade, to that the spot I named H.A.L.; throbbing pains --pressure behind my eye and ear on the right side. My right ear feels itchy and hot, there are knots of pain where my lymph nodes lie under my jaw. The back pain is almost unnoticeable through the intensity, the electric shooting pains in my hands and feet feel 'normal.'

Monday it got so I had to focus just to speak clearly. Grading papers, writing for a deadline, and peering at the computer all made it worse. I am so used to sucking it up that I plow on until I feel as if I'm going to collapse. I can do things like let the dishes pile up, stay in bed later or slow down at work (I even canceled classes one day) but when the weather is moving through, I just have to hunker down and wait it out.

Watching Roller Derby

Ellen Page and Drew Barrymore are in the new film Whip It (sort of like Bend It Like Beckham, but with hitting). I used to watch Roller Derby on TV back in high school when the Bay City Bombers were our home team. Charlie O'Connell and Joanie Weston were two of the star players at the time. Roller Derby back then wasn't cute, sexy or grrrl power; it was brutal and mesmerizing. This post by Pat Griffin reminds me of why I was fascinated by it; it was one of the few places you could see strong, tough women competing in sports on TV, back before Title IX.

Auto-tune not just for parody

I'm working too much to write at length these days, but I couldn't resist sharing this:

Public option?

Protect Insurance Companies PSA from Will Ferrell

Dr. Horrible Interrupts the Emmy Awards!

*buffering* LOL! or, why the internet will not replace your TV yet.

Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, which won an Emmy although it was produced for the internet and not broadcast TV, can be viewed on hulu.com or on the Tubes in three parts: part one, part two and part three.
The show was written by Joss Whedon and his brothers during the writers' strike (remember that?) and has won a ton of other awards already. Whedon and co. more or less gave it away online, but also released it in iTunes and for purchase as DVD with commentary extras; despite making it available worldwide for free, the project has managed to recoup the $200,000 cost and pay the cast and crew. A lovely example of working alongside the corporate media structure.

Mary Travers, my first love

Mary Travers' voice and spirit nourished me as a child. Oh, how I loved her then! Her voice singing "The Sparrow" enchanted me:


"The Rising of the Moon"

"The First Time" by Euan McColl

They sang with Martin Luther King, Jr, and against the Viet Nam War in 1971:

And they could be funny, too!

Health care bills making my head explode

So I will just not think about them today. Instead, for your amusement I offer you:

Kottke.org give us "Barack Obama, Jedi Knight"

Obama asked them to "cut the president some slack" but NO, his off-the-cuff comments about the VMA award show are all over.

Barely Political imagines the rest of "hot mic" conversation after Obama called Kanye a jackass.

Yet another "Downfall" parody with the Kanye meme.

Anna Marie Cox and Jason have fun annotating the White House Flickr feed.

But Ta-Nahesi Coates explains the difference between getting a laugh out of internet memes and the self-righteous huffing and puffing about civility that whitewashes (yes, meaning pretends to be blind to racism) our discourse on who gets to interrupt in public. I'm too lazy to do more than link and say "what he said!"

Pink and Muse perform at the MTV VMA award show

Don't get cable, so didn't see the MTV awards show last night, but the fuss blew up on Twitter about Kanye's hissy fit, overshadowing both the Michael Jackson tribute (with Janet Jackson dancing with the most amazing set of choreographer dancers EVER) and Lady Gaga's performance-art costumes and number (with Mark Kanemura!). Kanye needs to get to rehab.


(via Rickey.org) I love Pink!
They did not broadcast this clip, but Muse played their latest single at the VMA show as well.

Remember: 11 de septiembre de 1973 AND 9/11/2001

Chile: The Other 9/11 is the title of a program made by the BBC last year. But maybe it should be the other way around?

This short film by Ken Loach (made in 2002) is narrated by a Chilean refugee who addresses family members of those killed on 9/11/2001, on another Tuesday, Sept 11. Maybe you know that this date also has grim meaning for Chile and all of Latin America because it was Tuesday, Sept 11, 1973 that Gen Pinochet and the armed forces of Chile, with the active support of U.S. president Nixon, Sec. of State Henry Kissinger, and the CIA and the School of the Americas, seized power by bombing the presidential palace, assassinating the democratically elected head-of-state Salvador Allende, and rounding up and torturing, killing, and disappearing thousands of people, Chileans and others. At least 30,000 were killed by the regime-and many, many more were tortured, exiled, or lived in fear for decades. The fact that Pinochet is now dead has not ended the divisions in Chile.

The impact of this event on all of Latin America was as devastating as 9/11 has been to us in the U.S.A. and to the world. As Pres. Bush says in the film, "On September the 11th, enemies of freedom committed an act of war against our country, and night fell on a different world, a world in which freedom itself is under attack." Those words have a terrible resonance for those of us who remember the responsibility the U.S. had in supporting the dictatorships and savage repression in Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, and the countries of Central America in the 80s. So while I remember and mourn with everyone the events of 8 years ago in 2001, I cannot forget, I must not forget, the legacy of suffering of that first "martes 11 de septiembre."

11 de septiembre

Visual Inspriration: special effects in film

No, it can't be comprehensive, as the comments reveal, but it is intriguing and inspiring: a chronological compilation of special effects in film from early days of cinema through the 20th century.

This one is for Loren

How could we have missed this? The 4H Llama costume show at the MN State Fair is now 2 years old. What do you think?

SYTYCD season 5 Top 10 on Ellen

Ellen DeGeneres invited the SYTYCD Top 10 dancers to the premiere of her show. Watch Ellen dance with them! There's someone who loves her job!

Dance injury

see more Lolcats and funny pictures
I need to buy my daughter a trampoline. Or sign her up for dance classes. She likes to dance with her iPod in our tiny kitchen, but she keeps injuring herself. First a sprained ankle, now a toenail that has been semi-detached (OW! Ew! Ick!). she'll be OK, but I have prohibited kitchen dancing, and decreed that she must find a subsitute for getting her yayas out.

Doing the latest dance craze!

Do you love me/now that I can dance?

On America's Best Dance Crew (ABDC) the next challenge is to incorporate some of the latest urban dance crazes that are propagated by YouTube (AND use a trampoline, but that's another story) When I looked at the list, I realized I would need to do my research before Sunday nights show. Have you seen/heard of/danced any of these dances? Probably not.

"For their challenge this week, the crews will be incorporating the latest dance crazes (think updated Cabbage Patch) into their routines. And in addition to mastering their moves -- and giving 'em their own personal spin -- they'll also need to incorporate that big ol' trampoline ... without falling flat on their faces. Take a look at the songs and challenges assigned to each ABDCrew, and let us know which dance crazes are taking over your hometown!

AFROBORIKE "Swag Surfin'" Fast Life Yungstaz
MASSIVE MONKEES "Do The Ricky Bobby" B-Hamp
WE ARE HEROES "Stanky Legg" GS Boys
VOGUE EVOLUTION "Halle Berry" Hurricane Chris

RHYTHM CITY "The Jerk" New Boyz--this one is the most complicated!

A civil conversation about health care reform

Senator Franken talking to folks at the State Fair, in a calm and rational way, and people respond in a calm and rational way. Intense? yes. But this is a model of how we can do it right.

Pickpocket strikes in a cafe.

Today I went to the ATM, then went to the cafe to work on class prep. While I was engrossed with my work, a professional pickpocket lifted my wallet, with all those nice crispy 20s, out of the front pocket of my backpack which was sitting on the floor between us right next to my leg. I remember vaguely noticing a man sit down at the table next to me, but the next time I looked up it was because of the coughing of the woman another table down and he was gone.

When I went to leave, I discovered my wallet was missing. I searched desperately through my backpack, looked everywhere, asked the baristas, and flashed back to that odd feeling I'd had earlier. I realized what had happened, and then had to cancel checks, ATM card, credit cards, and make a police report in case I have to contest any charges or bad checks. Also lost my AAA card, my library card, and all those coffee discount cards. Oh, and my faculty ID, much good that will do anybody. I have a duplicate drivers license, but I will have to report that as well.

The thing is, when I lived in Berkeley, something like this happened to me because I had my purse sitting next to me on a bench at an outdoor cafe and someone reached over the back of the bench and lifted my wallet, so I am usually so super careful. I'm just dismayed that I was so oblivious. But this has happened to other people I know; pros are slick.

An hour later, after being all calm about it initially, I find myself shaking and anxious. No, it's not the end of the world; I don't think anyone can do anything bad to me, but I hate the idea that a thief now has my address, my child's pictures, my really nice wallet that I just bought two months ago and that was the perfect wallet. I hate feeling like a chump. Losing $200 is pretty crappy, too.

Urban gardening dreams

Sunday morning is for lazy reading and coffee, and adding ideas to the "Maybe/Someday" project list, like "start a vegetable garden....next year."

This morning I read all the posts in "The Starter Garden", a blog in the NYTimes Gardening section by Minnesota novice gardner (and professional writer whose work I've enjoyed in City Pages) Michael Tortorello, in which he has been chronicling his adventures this summer creating a vegetable garden in the city. I've always enjoyed his writing, and he started some great conversations among newbie and experienced gardeners all over the country with his posts about about how to get started, germinate seeds indoors, get rid of the lawn, use manure or not, deal with rabbits and deer, face the triumphs and disappointments of gardening. It looks as if there are many other stories in that section that I'll enjoy ("Peter Rabbit Must Die" sounds like the response of many a gardener who has discovered how fast rabbits can raze your garden to the ground.)

I had given some thought to doing something like that this summer, but remembered how back-breaking the work to start a garden is (I've done it with others twice; once in Berkeley and once in Minneapolis), and I ended up buying a share with a CSA instead for my veggies, and trying to grow some herbs on my back porch (with mixed success--I am a lousy gardener by myself, but an enthusiastic helper with others).

I'm going to take it in small steps. First step is to read other people's stories! I thoroughly enjoyed this book: Farm City: The Education of an Urban Farmer by Novella Carpenter. And she has a blog! and it's just as awesome as her book, which I loved, loved, loved and am willing to lend to anyone who promises to give it back eventually.

Mustard greens

In my CSA box from Featherstone Farms today, there were four kinds of tomatoes (little yellow ones shaped like pears, orange sweeties, a greenish-red heirloom, and several roma style cooking tomatoes), summer squash, bell peppers, basil, red onions, green beans, salad greens, cucumbers, and a bunch of mustard greens. I love my CSA deliveries! Opening the box is like opening a gift every week.
I often crave greens, any and all of them, especially bitter greens. I washed and ripped the leaves off the coarse stems, and cooked them down in the water left over from steaming the beans. I ate some with my salad, and put the rest in a container for later. There was almost a cup of broth left over, and I'm drinking it now. I like the flavor, and mustard greens have a huge amount of vitamins A and C, as well as other nutrients.
Nutrition has always fascinated me, and I just discovered asite called Nutrition Data, a good source of basic information presesented in the familiar USDA label format. An even better site is World's Healthiest Foods because it gives detailed explanations of the health benefits associated with the nutrients in specific foods. The entry on mustard greens explains why mustard greens might be particularly good for the lungs, the liver, and the joints, but not so great for people who have kidney or gall-bladder problems (because of the presence of oxalates). It reminds me of the kind of information that fascinated me when I started using Laurel's Kitchen to cook with, many years ago. The New Laurel's Kitchen is practically a textbook of nutrition as well as a cookbook.

Here is their list of the "worlds healthiest foods," (129) of them, according to these criteria: nutrient dense, whole foods, that are familiar, available, affordable and taste good.

Tutting (updated)

LOVE THESE GUYS!



Di Zhang (Moon), Phillip Chbeeb (Pacman) and Hokuto Konishi (Hok) here integrate waving and hand tutting into a dance they apparently created and filmed in just three days. Moon and Chbeeb teach and dance with a group called MarvelousMotion. Chbeeb was a very popular contestant on Season 5 of So You Think You Can Dance (sytycd), while Hok competed in Season 4 (and his crew auditioned together earlier). Hok and his buddies are now the Qwest Crew which won America's Best Dance Crew (abdc) last season.

Tutting (as in King Tut) is a type of hip-hop dance movement that emerged in the early days of hip hop dance, along with popping and locking. The group of dancers called The Electric Boogaloos had a huge influence on young kids who saw them on Soul Train (omg, awesome!).

Tut movements were inspired by Egyptian images and meant making right angles with the arms; these movements have been refined into various types, including hand tutting, which you can see here. Click on some of the links below for some more You Tube videos:

pacman chbeeb hok hokuto konishi di zhang moon tutting waving popping sytycd abdc
The masters break it down for us:

Grizzly Bear song, fan video by Gabe Askew

Two Weeks - Grizzly Bear from Gabe Askew on Vimeo.

Everyone's passing this around, for good reason. Charming and lovely!