Tuesday, December 18, 2012
Monday, December 17, 2012
Mourning Notes
This morning, my sister, an elementary school teacher in a Catholic school, texted me that the prayer chanted by Rabbi Praver at the memorial service last night moved her heart and soul.
There is something about Judaism and its liturgy-- some understanding of suffering, sorrow, nostalgia -- perhaps a desire to be reunited with the Almighty-- that never ceases to humble and amaze ..
I don't know if anyone will ever understand what motivates a person to kill the innocent.
Tragically, in many parts of the world violent deaths of children are just other versions of the same insanity that people live with all the time ..here in the US death happens to children in cities not on this scale but regularly where gun violence and mental illness by adults are visited upon children. When it is visited upon the enclaves of the comfortable then we really take notice.. Just don't know...
-Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn
There is something about Judaism and its liturgy-- some understanding of suffering, sorrow, nostalgia -- perhaps a desire to be reunited with the Almighty-- that never ceases to humble and amaze ..
I don't know if anyone will ever understand what motivates a person to kill the innocent.
Tragically, in many parts of the world violent deaths of children are just other versions of the same insanity that people live with all the time ..here in the US death happens to children in cities not on this scale but regularly where gun violence and mental illness by adults are visited upon children. When it is visited upon the enclaves of the comfortable then we really take notice.. Just don't know...
-Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn
"This dark, horrible world": A Mother's Grief in Connecticut
"It was early Sunday, the first time that Veronique Pozner had seen the boy’s body since he was shot to death in his first-grade classroom two days before. A sheet covered his body up to his neck, and a social worker had urged Ms. Pozner not to remove it. She obliged, but began to wail, alternately telling her son to leave this “dark, horrible world,” and beseeching him to come back.".....
More from Cara Buckley's moving article in the NY Times here: http://nyti.ms/UAX87B
More from Cara Buckley's moving article in the NY Times here: http://nyti.ms/UAX87B
Sunday, December 16, 2012
Why Mass Murder?
One theory here http://www.academia.edu/1199492/Hegemonic_Masculinity_and_Mass_Murderers_in_the_United_States
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Merry Quentin: Anticipating 'Django Unchained' for the Holidays
Happy Holidays...We at DITHOB have been drooling in anticipation for Mr. Tarantino's next flick for some time [see link here]. And now, as it nears release on Christmas Day --- Wow, what an exciting, glorious, funny, disturbing, and uber-Tarantino masterpiece 'Django Unchained" appears to be. A mess of current stars from in and out of the Tarantino multiverse (Jamie Foxx, Christoph Walz, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, et al) and stars from the 60s, 70s and 80s and beyond (Don Johnson! James Remar! Russ Tamblyn! Tom Stroud! Robert Carradine! Tom Wopat!) promise that this will be good for a hoot and a holler. While Drudge Report has been focusing on ol' QT's fondness for the N-word (a topic of films DITHOB has reviewed in other contexts - see link here), this promises to be an abolitionist's delight. After Inglorious Basterds, you can't deny that Mr. Tarantino is no revanchist, as far as continuing to see who the Good Guys and Bad Guys are throughout history. While diversity and immigration remains the bete noire (ahem) of the Tea Party and others cleving to rightward political extremes here in the US, just as anti-Semitism rears its head throughout the world, Tarantino takes a lot of joy in exacting further punishment and vengence -- total annihilation in fact -- on the Evil That Men Have Done --and Continue to Do. DJango Unchained, for this unabashed liberal, looks like a good one for sure...
See the Hollywood Reporter review, wrap up and extras here
-Anthony Napoli
See the Hollywood Reporter review, wrap up and extras here
-Anthony Napoli
Thursday, December 6, 2012
Dave Brubeck, 1920-2012
Dave Brubeck, jazz musician and composer, experimenter in time, died yesterday at his home in Connecticut. He would have been 92 today.
The NY Times obit by Ben Ratliffe here
http://nyti.ms/RC2yTY
The wiki bio here
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Brubeck
The NY Times obit by Ben Ratliffe here
http://nyti.ms/RC2yTY
The wiki bio here
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Brubeck
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Egypt Approaching Failed State Status? Mob Rule Threatens the Safety of Women
"It is not a country of law, not a state of law anymore. It has given men a chance to harass women without being accused," said Afaf Marie, director of the Egyptian Association for Community Participation and Enhancement, an NGO.
Some activists fear that women's rights will suffer under the rule of President Mohammed Morsi, who is an Islamist.
Government inaction has allowed the problem to spiral out of control, Heba Morayef, director of Human Rights Watch for the Middle East and North Africa, told NBC News. Police no longer inspire fear as they did before the revolution. In addition, locals say it appears there are fewer police on the increasingly lawless streets -- and often none in Tahrir Square.
"The state is failing to respond,” she said. "Men don’t have to worry about being caught.”
Full article here
Some activists fear that women's rights will suffer under the rule of President Mohammed Morsi, who is an Islamist.
Government inaction has allowed the problem to spiral out of control, Heba Morayef, director of Human Rights Watch for the Middle East and North Africa, told NBC News. Police no longer inspire fear as they did before the revolution. In addition, locals say it appears there are fewer police on the increasingly lawless streets -- and often none in Tahrir Square.
"The state is failing to respond,” she said. "Men don’t have to worry about being caught.”
Full article here
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
A Civil War Christmas at the NY Theater Workshop
Paula Vogel, Pulitzer Prize winner (How I Learned to Drive), has created a colorful, extremely earnest musical about the Civil War that strives to meld history, dramedy and historical and roots music into a sort of new holiday classic.
Despite its exceptionally talented and
equally earnest cast, the play, so hopeful and promising, fails its cast and its audience with what is essentially a dishwater weak pop treatment of a critical era in American history that deserves better- better writing, better story and simply more depth and drama. Yes, in the Obama era we have Spielberg's Close Encounters with Abe Lincoln, Abe Lincoln Vampire Hunter, but do we really need Abe Lincoln as Matthew Broderick mugging and singing about the End of the Civil War and the old south. There are some sincere and moving numbers. Sumaya Bouhbsl, K. Todd Freeman Chrus Henry, Rachel Spencer Hewitt, man tawny Hopper, Amber Iman, Jonathan-David, Karen Kandel, Sean Alan Krill, Alice Ripley and Bob Stilman give admirable and powerful performances on role and perhaps against all odds. Colorful and imaginative with bright staging, but the longed for drama, darkness and vision despite the performers best efforts seems wrestled to the ground by the play's uneven mix of real history and historical fiction. Never quite escaping the pull to Earth of the pedantic, A Civil War Christmas for this hopeful viewer never quite comes together and achieves escape velocity into a transporting theater experience.
-Anthony Napoli Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn
Despite its exceptionally talented and
equally earnest cast, the play, so hopeful and promising, fails its cast and its audience with what is essentially a dishwater weak pop treatment of a critical era in American history that deserves better- better writing, better story and simply more depth and drama. Yes, in the Obama era we have Spielberg's Close Encounters with Abe Lincoln, Abe Lincoln Vampire Hunter, but do we really need Abe Lincoln as Matthew Broderick mugging and singing about the End of the Civil War and the old south. There are some sincere and moving numbers. Sumaya Bouhbsl, K. Todd Freeman Chrus Henry, Rachel Spencer Hewitt, man tawny Hopper, Amber Iman, Jonathan-David, Karen Kandel, Sean Alan Krill, Alice Ripley and Bob Stilman give admirable and powerful performances on role and perhaps against all odds. Colorful and imaginative with bright staging, but the longed for drama, darkness and vision despite the performers best efforts seems wrestled to the ground by the play's uneven mix of real history and historical fiction. Never quite escaping the pull to Earth of the pedantic, A Civil War Christmas for this hopeful viewer never quite comes together and achieves escape velocity into a transporting theater experience.
-Anthony Napoli Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Where the Wild Things Are: Staten Island Edition
View more videos at: http://nbcnewyork.com.
A few years ago when I was working on Staten Island, my colleagues teased me about a deer running in the parking lot. By now, due to urban development and sprawl, deer on the Island are fairly common place. But wild horses and zebra? As Chuck Berry sang, it just goes to show, you never can tell.
-Tony, Deep in the Heart of Brooklyn
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Got Color-Glass Condensate?: Tales from the Large Hadron Collider
Is the Large Hadron Collider in CERN producing new types of matter, perhaps emerging from a post-Big Bang reminiscent Soup? Researchers speculate on ethereal, celestial technologies. Article from Physics.Org here
Thursday, November 22, 2012
Happy Thanksgiving -- and Peace!
It's a day for family and food, swing and standard tubes in the air, turkey of course,and Persian rice with truffles and piseli, quinoa with beans and onion, tempeh with mushrooms and okra and green beans, salad with autumnal roast veges, candied yams, roasted taters, corn bread, corn pudding , biscuits, broccoli soup with potatoes...
Hearing from our oldest daughter, potentially peaceful in Tel Aviv, rockets fall, turkey there among Espats and aliyot .. Wondering what tomorrow would bring...
Hearing from our oldest daughter, potentially peaceful in Tel Aviv, rockets fall, turkey there among Espats and aliyot .. Wondering what tomorrow would bring...
Wednesday, November 21, 2012
And For Now -- A Cessation in the Hostilities. How Long? Who Knows.
Washington Post Reports that the Egyptian government announced Wednesday night that Israel and Palestinian leaders in the Gaza strip have agreed to halt hostilities after eight days of Israeli bombardment of the enclave and hundreds of rocket strikes inside Israel. (However, the cease fire falls short of the long-term aggreement both sides were apparently hoping for.)
Standing alongside Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who engaged in intensive shuttle diplomacy aimed at ending the conflict, Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Amr told a news conference that the cease-fire would begin at 9 p.m. local time (2 p.m. in Washington).
Full story here
COLOR RED Phone App provides early warning on attacks by incoming rocket; details here
Twitter "Tweets" between Israeli Defense Forces and Hamas here
Standing alongside Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who engaged in intensive shuttle diplomacy aimed at ending the conflict, Egyptian Foreign Minister Mohamed Amr told a news conference that the cease-fire would begin at 9 p.m. local time (2 p.m. in Washington).
Full story here
COLOR RED Phone App provides early warning on attacks by incoming rocket; details here
Twitter "Tweets" between Israeli Defense Forces and Hamas here
A Pre-Thanksgiving Soliloquy
For Danielle and Rami in Tel Aviv Right Now
The Rolling Stones, 1969, on The David Frost Show, perform You Can't Always Get What You Want
The song was recorded at Olympic Studios in London on November 16 and 17, 1968.
Bon anniversaire also to Nanette Workman (aka Nanette Newman), one of the background singers on the track, a great Brooklyn-born, now Canada and formerly Mississippi based chanteuse who celebrated a birthday on November 20, who recently returned to rock with a powerful blues and roots album, Just Gettin' Started.
The Rolling Stones, 1969, on The David Frost Show, perform You Can't Always Get What You Want
The song was recorded at Olympic Studios in London on November 16 and 17, 1968.
Bon anniversaire also to Nanette Workman (aka Nanette Newman), one of the background singers on the track, a great Brooklyn-born, now Canada and formerly Mississippi based chanteuse who celebrated a birthday on November 20, who recently returned to rock with a powerful blues and roots album, Just Gettin' Started.
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
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