Riba Rambles:
Musings of a Mental Magpie

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:56 PM

One last post on The Making of the national poet: Shakespeare, adaptation and authorship, 1660-1769 before I put it away for the night and can safely return it to the library.

I described the book as funny, but neglected to provide examples because the review was getting a bit long.

So a few excerpts I enjoyed:

[Thomas Shadwell's] predominantly slapstick The Lancashire Witches in 1681 ... is in essence a kind of Restoration Ghostbusters.

Relatively concise and to the point.

In a very funny post, Lea thoroughly sporked Davenant and Dryden's This Enchanted Island (based upon The Tempest). Dobson spends a fair amount of time on this play, pointing out the philosophies underpinning the drastic modifications. But did you know that even contemporaries parodied it, such as Thomas Duffett's The Mock Tempest?

[I]n Duffett's play, Prospero, demoted from ducal status, is the keeper of the Bridewell prison for prostitutes, the state's official punisher of unruly women. The only important difference between the love plots of the original and their revision in the travesty ... Duffett's Miranda and Dorinda are ignorant not of men (far from it...) but simply of husbands...

DOR. Husband, what's that?
MIR. Why that's a thing like a man (for ought I know) with a great pair of Hornes upon his head, and my father said 'twas made for Women, look ye.
DOR. What, must we ride to water upon't Sister?
MIR. No, no, it must be our Slave, and give us Golden Cloaths Pray, that other men may lye with us in a Civil way, and then it must Father our Children and keep them.
DOR. And when we are so Old and Ugly, that no body else will lye with us, must it lye with us it self?
MIR. Ay that it must Sister.

Sometimes the humor is unintentional, such as this excerpt from David Garrick's Ode:

With no reproach, even now, thou view'st thy work,
To nature sacred as to truth,
Where no alluring mischiefs lurk,
To taint the mind of youth.

Right. I'd ask whose Shakespeare they were watching/reading, but thanks to the book I know it's not the same words I get off on.

And how about this wickedly catty putdown:

According to [Theophilius] Cibber, Garrick has adapted The Winter's Tale by throwing it to his cat (for whom he expects Garrick to arrange a benefit night accordingly)

Oh, and since I've long been curious about the underground Interregnum adaptations, reposting a footnote for my own reference:

The Merry conceited Humours of Bottom the Weaver (London, 1661), republished in Francis Kirkman, The Wits, or Sport upon Sport (2 parts; London, 1672-3). Two of this latter collection's other short interludes of the Commonwealth years derive from Shakespeare, 'The Bouncing Knight' (a 'Falstaff sketch', abbreviated from 1 Henry IV) and 'The Grave-makers' (from Hamlet)

PS: I feel somewhat sorry for our seatmate on the flight back from Florida.
I was reading Dobson; Ian was reading Bruce Schneier's Beyond Fear, and like good little adjunct brains, we'd read aloud the good bits to one another.

PPS: Tomorrow night and Monday, whether or not I finish The princess of Denmark, next book will be Oberammergau

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:11 PM

Isn't it wonderful when you discover that an author you like is about to release a book on a subject you're interested in?

In about two weeks, Steven Johnson (Interface Culture; blog)'s new book will hit store (and library) shelves:

It's called Ghost map: the story of London's deadliest epidemic -- and how it changed the way we think about disease, cities, science, and the modern world

Considering I've recently finished two books which touch briefly on Snow's diagnosis of cholera's waterborne transmission, this is wonderful timing...

As long as I'm compiling reading lists, related books I've found:

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:10 PM

Since I enjoyed Michael Dobson's The Making of the national poet: Shakespeare, adaptation and authorship, 1660-1769 so much, that got me looking for related books.

One of his other books goes onto my must-read list: England's Elizabeth: an afterlife in fame and fantasy, coauthored with Nicola J. Watson.

Searching the booklists (chaining from the LC subjects) turned up quite a few promising leads.

Subject-wise, next month's Marketing the bard: Shakespeare in performance and print, 1660-1740 by Don-John Dugas seems the most obvious successor in terms of scope and theme, but there are many other interesting books out there (sorted by publication date):

1. Modern Shakespeare offshoots by Ruby Cohn
2. His exits and entrances: the story of Shakespeare's reputation by Louis Marder
3. How Shakespeare won the West: players and performances in America's Gold Rush, 1849-1865 by Helene Wickham Koon
4. Shakespeare's America, America's Shakespeare by Michael D. Bristol
5. Shakespeare domesticated: the eighteenth-century editions by Colin Franklin
6. Shakespeare's other lives edited and introduced by Maurice J. O'Sullivan
7. Gender in play on the Shakespearean stage: boy heroines and female pages by Michael Shapiro
8. Shakespeare and the politics of culture in late Victorian England by Linda Rozmovits
9. The Romantic cult of Shakespeare: literary reception in anthropological perspective by Péter Dávidházi
10. Americans on Shakespeare, 1776-1914 edited by Peter Rawlings
11. Shakespeare and appropriation edited by Christy Desmet and Robert Sawyer
12. Heirs to Shakespeare: reinventing the Bard in young adult literature by Megan Lynn Isaac
13. Performing Shakespeare in the age of empire by Richard Foulkes
14. Not Shakespeare: bardolatry and burlesque in the nineteenth century by Richard W. Schoch
15. Novel Shakespeares: twentieth-century women novelists and appropriation by Julie Sanders
16. Shakespeare and modern popular culture by Douglas Lanier
17. Constructing a world: Shakespeare's England and the new historical fiction by Martha Tuck Rozett
18. Reimagining Shakespeare for children and young adults edited by Naomi J. Miller
19. The Taste of the town: Shakespearian comedy and the early eighteenth-century theater by Katherine West Scheil
20. Imagining Shakespeare: a history of texts and visions by Stephen Orgel
21. Shakespeare and the American nation by Kim C. Sturgess
22. Shakespeare, Marlowe, Jonson: new directions in biography edited by Takashi Kozuka and J.R. Mulryne
23. The Globe Theatre project: Shakespeare and authenticity by Rob Conkie
24. Collaborations with the past: reshaping Shakespeare across time and media by Diana E. Henderson
25. Hamlet's heirs: Shakespeare & the politics of a new millennium by Linda Charnes
26. Shakespeare and youth culture by Jennifer Hulbert, Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr., and Robert York
27. Shakespeare and the mismeasure of Renaissance man by Paula Blank
28. Shakespeare and Elizabethan popular culture by Stuart Gillespie
29. Shakespeare and technology: dramatizing early modern technological revolutions by Adam Max Cohen
30. Shakespeare and the American popular stage by Frances Teague

Richard Burt has written a lot of fascinating material around these topics:

• Enclosure acts: sexuality, property, and culture in early modern England
• Shakespeare, the movie: popularizing the plays on film, TV, and video
• Unspeakable ShaXXXspeares: queer theory and American kiddie culture
• Shakespeare after mass media
• Shakespeare, the movie II: popularizing the plays on film, tv, video, and DVD
• Shakespeares after Shakespeare: an encyclopedia of the Bard in mass media and popular culture

And while browsing Michael Dobson's other writings, I came across a review of Reforming Marlowe: the nineteenth-century canonization of a Renaissance dramatist by Thomas Dabbs. Sounds promising, but unfortunately Dobson summarizes it thus: “This is fascinating material, and there is undoubtedly a rich and important work of cultural history to be written around it, but Reforming Marlowe, sadly isn't it.”

I'm now regretting having missed this spring's exhibit at the Folger Shakespeare Library: Shakespeare for Children; Must try to get there for next year's exhibits: Shakespeare in American Life and Marketing Shakespeare 1789-1805.

On a related note, two recent biographies on the Tales from Shakespeare coauthor:

• The Devil kissed her: the story of Mary Lamb by Kathy Watson
• Mad Mary Lamb: lunacy and murder in literary London by Susan Tyler Hitchcock

My searches also turned up James Shapiro's Rival playwrights: Marlowe, Jonson, Shakespeare. While it seems like a more traditional biography, rather than the look into the afterlife like these other titles, this seems a likely pick. It's a bit outdated (1991) and I already know the more recent revelations about Will and Kit. However, I've liked everything I've read by Shapiro and have been wanting to learn more about Jonson.

OMG! I'm a groupie for certain academic authors!

And, yes, if I had the time and money, I'd love to travel from school to school to take classes with them. I'm not actually interested in pursuing a PhD, but just want the learning out of intellectual curiousity...

What was Henry Jenkins (blog) saying about fannish behavior towards high culture? [My reply] [Which reminds me, he recommended Highbrow/lowbrow: the emergence of cultural hierarchy in America; and yes, I could easily fangirl Jenkins (I already blogged a list of his and related works); at least I can follow along with MIT OpenCourseWare]

Sigh... such a geek...

[Obviously, there's no way I'll read these all. I have to pace myself and get a few from the library at a time. Further suggestions (for or against) always welcome. And I definitely invite contributions from ego-googling authors! Anybody got a pre-existing syllabus for a course of independent study?]

Posted by Lis Riba at 8:41 PM

The making of the national poet: Shakespeare, adaptation and authorship, 1660-1769 by Michael Dobson

OMG! I wish I had this back in college when I took that meta-Shakespeare class.

This book, like Gary Taylor's Reinventing Shakespeare, is about the transformation of Shakespeare's reputation from hack writer to THE BARD^TM, starting with the Restoration of Charles II and ending with the Stratford Jubilee thrown by David Garrick in 1769.

But Bardolatry arose during a period when Shakespeare was mostly performed in adaptations. And as mockable as those efforts seem now (King Lear with a happy ending!?), by showing the reasons behind such adaptations -- whether he was considered merely another anonymous source worth borrowing from, or if the adaptor is just refining a work flawed by a (now obsolete) need to pander to groundlings -- we can learn a lot about history.

For example, Restoration drama is often used as a general term for the whole of Charles' reign, but the period itself was hardly uniform. At first, adaptations were focused on stabilizing the new order: Macbeth becomes a morality play against usurping tyrants, or using Measure for Measure to condemn the Puritan government. When politics became more fraught in the 1680s, Shakespeare was adapted to focus more on intimate relationships, rather than matters of state. Tate added a love story to King Lear and made it more about the relations among a father and daughter, rather than kings' divine rights and the folly of trying to divide them.

I won't quote the whole book at you, but it is fascinating (am I overusing that word?) and often quite funny.

But as Shakespeare became ever more iconic, the less his writings mattered. As Dobson explains:

[H]is fame is so synonymous with the highest claims of contemporary nationalism that simply to be British is to inherit him, without needing to read or see his actual plays at all.

This culminates in the Stratford Jubilee, a celebration of Shakespeare in which not one of his plays was performed.

As much as I'd like to read further, by the end of the book, attitudes towards Shakespeare have already reached a "substantially recognizable form" to how he appeared when I grew up. Maybe times are changing; I'm certainly trying to do my part to restore his popularity.

From a description of the Stratford Jubilee:

Before the Ode began, an actor Garrick had planted in the audience, Thomas King, rose to his feet in order to complain, in the character of a languid aristocratic fop corrupted by the Grand Tour, that Shakespeare was a low and over-rated English provincial whose plays demanded levels of emotional and intellectual engagement incompatible with good breeding.

Garrick went on to rebut these slanders, but can I just state that he described exactly what I like about Shakespeare.

Finally, it appears that the most popular Shakespeare character for adaptation during this period was probably Shakespeare himself. Everything from speaking a few lines in the prologue to lend authority to an adaptation, or conversing with Garrick in an essay, or starring in the first novel to use him as a character.

Frankly, fannish vocabulary would be quite useful for much of what's being described. I recognized fanfic, RPF, fanon, AUs and Mary Sues, and a certain amount of shipping...

Won't it be nice when academics can use these terms directly, rather than talking obliquely around them.

Oh my... Well, that's unexpected!

Barely one chapter into Ed Marston's The princess of Denmark, two characters just went to the Dutch Church on Broad Street and found a nasty anti-immigrant screed posted to the wall.

Marston's stories usually avoid interacting with actual history, but a little research shows the few paragraphs are direct quotes from the Dutch Church libel.

For a long time I've been wondering how events in the story match the historical timeline. The first book takes place during the Armada year (1588), but since then I haven't seen any obvious indicators of the year. I've been wondering whether (or when) the book would carry forward into James's reign, and thinking that some of the apprentices might be getting a little long-in-the-tooth for girls' roles (to be fair, the company has hardly been static and some apprentices have outgrown their roles over the series)

Mind you, historically the libel was posted in on the night of Saturday May 5, while this part of the story appears to be set in late autumn. But this suggests we might be dealing with late 1592, putting all the adventures within about five years and giving Elizabeth another decade on the throne.

Oh dear. Nick is taking it on himself to find the culprits who posted the libel...

I wonder where this will lead? *?

Posted by Lis Riba at 8:39 PM

In the last week I've finished three books, and I thought I'd share my opinions:

Flushed: how the plumber saved civilization

W. Hodding Carter has long been fascinated by plumbing and plumbers, and in this book explores their history in a hands-on manner:

I spent three days in a row working with molten lead in an attempt to be a Roman plumbarius, and afterward I passed another three days staring, unable to do much, and feeling listless and unfocused -- pretty normal activities for me, really, except that I also felt weak and had an upset stomach...

Yes, the author experiments with making Roman water pipes, while describing waterworks from ancient to modern times: a social and technological history spanning the globe. He takes a visit to Bath, tours the London sewer system and Deer island, and meets an Indian innovator and advocate for the untouchables. And he sprinkles fascinating tidbits of trivia along his journeys. For example, did you know:

The sewage comes to Deer Island from forty-three communities in the Boston area via four aqueducts, divided into a north system flow and a south system. Once at Deer Island, the flows are treated separately, because it wa initially thought that the south-system poop would make better fertilizer since it comes from a less industrialized area, but this hasn't proven true.

At times, the author comes off as naïve -- his sudden realization that the term "plumbing" comes from lead is something both Ian and I knew since childhood. But the author does a good job of sharing his excitement and making the subject interesting.

The most significant problem is that this book needs illustrations. Particularly when discussing various innovations in toilets, it would be nice to see diagrams of the differences, rather than trying to rely upon purely written descriptions.

Still, all-in-all an entertaining read.

The book passes very quickly; I started and finished it on my 3-hour flight down to Florida with plenty of time for something else. Since I enjoyed the subject, I decided to stick with the aquatic theme and look at the other end of the system:

Wellsprings: a natural history of bottled spring waters

This is a much more technical work than Flushed, delving into business, chemistry, fashion, geology, history, law, manufacturing, medicine, microbiology, myths, personalities, politics, tectonics, and other issues that have played a role in how we obtain, use, and perceive bottled water. Sometimes the details can get a little too heavy for lay readers and (pardon the pun) sometimes gets rather dry. [I'm unsurprised to see that Francis H. Chapelle's other titles are more academic works on hydrology.] Still, each time I considered myself close to surrender, it pulled back into something more interesting.

It's full of fascinating trivia; explaining aspects of life that seem obvious upon thinking about them, but which I've never really considered.

For example, bottled water was a huge industry in the 19th century -- up until chlorination made tap water safe. At that point, bottled water became unfashionable until the last few decades. In the intervening years, the main customers of bottled waters were factories, shops and businesses that couldn't or wouldn't provide sufficient plumbing... Thus the tradition of workers gathering around the watercooler. Did you ever wonder why offices had watercoolers?

Likewise, healing springs weren't necessarily mere superstitions hokum. Soluble minerals were beneficial for certain conditions (iron-rich waters for folks suffering from anemia), and, given the usual poor quality of drinking water, a week flushing the system with water from a pure source can clear up all kinds of intestinal difficulties.

The book definitely has an Americentric focus (which isn't a bad thing - just something to know going in), using brief insights into Thai customs or European baths to shed light on the American market. For New Englanders, I'll point out a chapter on the history of Poland Springs, which even Ian (lifelong Bostonian) never knew.

Chapters are subject-based, and are somewhat independent of one another. This is useful if you can't always remember some of the technical details in previous chapters, but it also means there's a fair bit of repetition. For example this phrase quickly began to grate:

Page 20:

But by 1907, demand for curative bottled waters in the United States was waning. One reason was that medical science had actually advanced to the point where it could do more good than harm, and thus there was less need for medical miracles.

Page 25:

But for most of human history, with medical science likely to do more harm than good, healing wells were an important resource in the event of sickness or injury.

Page 46:

There is considerable debate among medical historians as to whether the doctors of the time did more harm than good.

I get the point, thanks!

Like I said, the book's not as casual an undertaking as Flushed, but if you're willing to put forth the effort, you will be rewarded.

Posted by Lis Riba at 6:15 PM

Seen on various blogs hither and yon:

UMM student newspaper headline, after a 67-0 win:

Jesus forsakes Trinity Bible College

Charlie Stross:

IBM has a secret island headquarters hideaway inside a computer game. Truth stranger than fiction? Must write faster, the clowns are gaining ...

Asylum Street Spankers:

Stick Magnetic Ribbons on your SUV

Jenk on Dot Cattiness:

When you said you were "the party of Lincoln", we didn't think you meant suspending habeas corpus.

Making the rounds:

The Republicans:
  They put an Arabian Horse Judge in charge of disaster management.
  They put oil company lobbyists in charge of our energy policy.
  They put Dubai in charge of our port security.
  And they put a child predator in charge of the Committee for Missing and Exploited Children.
Who will you put in charge in November?

A survivor of Idi Amin's Uganda (via Avedon Carol):

"What do you mean WILL happen? What hasn't happened yet? You torture in secret. You invade for what? The government reads your e-mail and listens to your telephone and makes you take off your shoes and pull out your computer. For what? Who do you need to protect yourself against? Is your computer going to attack you? Who should you be afraid of? Your government is more scary to most people than any terrorist. I feel for you really. Because I don't think you have any idea how far down the road you already are."

Before you get too depressed, blogger Bill Scher has written a new book, Wait! Don't move to Canada: A stay-and-fight strategy to win back America, that sounds like it might be an antidote to despair.

Update: On a more pessimistic note, a few other posts about the sad state of American government from the last week:

• Tristero:
  • Rogue Presidency
  • This Ain't Yer Grandpa's Democracy
  • Who Cares What The Supreme Court Says?
• Glenn Greenwald:
  • A pathological need to break the law

Posted by Lis Riba at 12:20 PM

From 1 - 5pm in Ipswich, The Ipswich Ale Harvest Fest at Mercury Brewing Company. Free admission and brewery tours, $3 beer, $1 sodas, lobster, chowder, and Sweet Loretta's Snake Oil Jug Band.

Then, from 3 - 7pm in Union Square Somerville, What the Fluff, celebrating the community's unique contribution to culinary history, including science experiments, bake sale, and "the reigning 'Kings of Irish-Jewish Folk-Punk' Los Diablos"!?

*Metaphorically speaking, at least.

Posted by Lis Riba at 12:01 PM

Anybody know how long WBUR's latest pledge drive will run?

I thought I remembered last week that they were saying that Friday morning they'd be holding a concentrated pledge drive on Friday morning only, but it's been going on for over a week now, and I've heard no sign of when it will end...

Posted by Lis Riba at 11:20 AM

So, I was killing time this morning following the links from When Fangirls Attack, catching up on what's new regarding the status of women in comics, much of it boiling down to evidence that (most) mainstream comics are clearly designed for the male gaze.

Then I thought about Heroes, the new NBC series I enjoyed so much.

Of the ensemble characters they've introduced so far, the featured women are (1) a high-school cheerleader (in uniform for most of her scenes), (2) a webcam porn star (who's also a single mother), and (3) a girlfriend who's also a concerned daughter.

Meanwhile, the men include: a nurse, a politician, a professor/taxi driver, an artist and an officeworker.

Notice any differences?

I can't believe I didn't notice this before.

Damn. I think this realization actually reduces my interest in the show.

Posted by Lis Riba at 8:15 PM

I'm still working on reviews for three nonfiction books I recently read.

But last night I also read three books about cats geared towards preschoolers. They're so short (I think I read all three in less than 10 minutes) I'm not even considering them for my book list (even as a group), but will mention them here.

1. Be gentle! by Virginia Miller

Bartholomew Bear is asked to look after a kitten, but instead drags the poor dear around on all kinds of escapades until it runs off.

I don't blame the kitten for fleeing, because for most of the story the boy seems utterly ignorant about cats. This is demonstrated in part by putting the kitten into exaggeratedly impossible situations (would any cat actually sit on a swingset?). The resolution seems somewhat random; and tells more than it shows. The bad behavior is much more vivid and prolonged and memorable than the proper conduct.

Maybe it works better in context with the rest of the Bartholomew Bear series, but read on its own, it's pretty thin.

And frankly, I don't think this book teaches any lessons Nate doesn't already know.

[I do see some recommendations for the sequel, Where is Little Black Kitten?, with lift-the-flap interactivity. Sounds like fun, but not enough to make the sale.]

2. Cats do, dogs don't written by Norma Simon; pictures by Dora Leder

I really liked the idea behind this one: describing the differences between dogs and cats.

Since my nephew grew up with two dogs, I thought this might be useful.

Unfortunately, it doesn't hold up in the execution. Too many of the points are phrased in absolutes -- and are therefore incorrect. Cats don't fetch? Only dogs will overeat if you give them too much food? I don't think so!

In short, it's a collection of your basic dog and cat stereotypes, and I was sadly disappointed.

I don't like spreading misinformation, no matter how well-intended, so the only way I'd give this as a gift was if I annotated the pages with corrections.

3. Grandma's cat written by Helen Ketteman; illustrated by Marsha Lynn Winborn

A short story about a girl who tries to play with her grandmother's cat only to get scratched for her efforts. After a quick cleanup and lecture she tries again, offering treats and eventually wins over the cat.

It's a similar story to Be Gentle! but the interactions feel more realistic and the means of befriending the cat more suited to emulation.

Considering the cat in question my nephew wants to befriend is at "grandma's house" (though it's more accurately my Dad's cat), this is on to something.

The art is rich and entertaining; on one page, Ian cracked up over the cat's facial expression.

I think we have a winner.

All three books are available at Wakefield Public Library, if anybody else wants to check them out.

Meanwhile, a few other purchases under consideration:

• The Best of The Electric Company: Nate may still be a little young for it, but if he already likes Spider-Man, here's his most kid-friendly version.
  • Hey, you guys! I guess the DVD must be selling like hotcakes, because I see they're releasing Volume 2! Mind you, we still haven't finished watching the first box set; there's only so much an unaccompanied adult can take at a time. :)
• Fraggle Rock: If Nate likes The Complete First Season, they've already released the complete second season, too.
• And for my brother and sister-in-law, Greasy grimy gopher guts: the subversive folklore of childhood by Josepha Sherman and T.K.F. Weisskopf

I'm not necessarily getting them all right away, but I have to keep fighting the urge to spoil this kid rotten!

Also, for my own nostalgia:

• Sesame Street Old School, Vol. 1 1969-1974. Until now, most Sesame Street DVD collections have been geared towards current viewers. Here's a look back into the archives for the nostalgia market.

Posted by Lis Riba at 7:25 PM

Following up on a conversation last weekend about Jewish superheroes, Wikipedia has 33 pages in category "Jewish comic book characters" and still more names in their List of fictitious Jews. However, I noticed both omitted Moshe Levy (Dust Devil) from DC's short-lived Blasters!. I may have to make some edits...

Ian, you're right -- Magneto is definitively Jewish (I thought Marvel was ambiguous whether he was Jewish or Roma). But someone's even written a Magneto is Jewish FAQ.

New book I want to read: Up, Up, And Oy Vey!: How Jewish History, Culture, And Values Shaped the Comic Book Superhero. You can get some of the flavor from a recent New York Times article on the book:

"This book came out of midnight conversations over wine and chicken soup around the Shabbos table," said Rabbi Weinstein, 30.

While I'm on the subject, a quip from our discussion I'm rather perversely proud of:

Title of this post comes from the old joke (highlight for the answers):

Q: Who are the three cowboys of Adon Olam?

A: Billy Raysheet, Billy Takhlit, and Kid Rukhi

Q: What did they say when they robbed the Lubavicher bank?

A: Gimme loot, Chassidim!

Q: What did they make off with?

A: Loot of the frum

Posted by Lis Riba at 6:40 PM

Wednesday I blogged about a Colbert Report segment offering a toll-free hotline for Jews to apologize during the Days of Awe.

Well, apparently he's been continuing the shtick on subsequent shows.

And it turns out the number is genuine!

Callers to 1-888-OOPS-JEW (1-888-667-7539) are greeted by Colbert's dulcet tones:

Shalom, and welcome to Stephen Colbert's atonement hotline.
At the beep, please be a mensch, and unburden your soul by stating how you've wronged me — Stephen Colbert.
Your call will not be returned but selected apologies may be broadcast on the air. You should be so lucky.

Via TV Squad

From another blogger, I found a flash-based Virtual Tashlich.
I'm a little uncomfortable that after the main animation is over, you can click on breadcrumbs and read what I presume are other people's submissions. They may be anonymous, but I would recommend against getting too personal with these. Also, given the URL, I suspect this may be a strictly seasonal page, so if you want to see it, do so soon.

Meanwhile, this seems an appropriate time to offer one last reminder about my Al Chet for electronic communications.

Posted by Lis Riba at 6:22 PM

Last night I parked my car curbside, since I knew I'd have to go out later to pick Ian up from a bartending gig.

But when I went back to my car, I discovered a lengthy scrape along the side and the left-rear hubcap on the ground. No note, or any sign of the perpetrator's identity. A totally random hit-and-run, while the car was parked in front of the house.

The only mercy is that they apparently pulled themselves away before reaching the front door, so our rear-view mirror is untouched...

Our car is getting on in years (has about 125,000 miles on it) , and I'm not sure it's worth fixing the cosmetic damage. [Given Massachusetts roads and drivers, a perfectly new mint-condition car seems like a license to worry.]

I think it's got another year or two left in it, and then I'm hoping my next car will be a hybrid...

Posted by Lis Riba at 10:25 PM

The Colbert Report makes it easy to apologize on the Days of Awe...

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:15 PM

My nephew/godson remains the most adorable kid in existence. He's two-and-a-half years old, remarkably articulate and opinionated, yet pretty well-behaved for his age.

Because his dad (my brother) is a cop, when I found this costume, I couldn't resist buying it for him. He hasn't seen it yet, as the holidays didn't seem quite the appropriate time, but his parents have and will give it to him when they're ready. [I made sure to point out the whistle, in case they wish to remove that from the costume before he gets it.]

Of course, every time I see Nate, I can't resist the desire to buy oodles of goodies for him.

My parents have a tortoiseshell cat named Freckles (photo below; isn't she beautiful?). The first thing Nate does upon arriving at my parents' is go "looking for 'reckles." The cat, no dummy, spends Nate's visits out-of-sight under the bed.

Saturday afternoon, he was carrying around a stuffed-animal cat that belongs to my mother, and played with it and the plaster cats on the coffee table.

Clearly, this boy needs a stuffed cat of his own.

Ty sells a Beanie Baby named "Chip" that seems like a likely candidate:

What do you think? Close enough for someone under three?

[Yes, I have noticed they're "retired," but I see enough for sale cheaply that I'm not overly concerned...]

And while I'm at it, since his parents don't have cats of their own, I'm thinking maybe a picture book on cat behavior, so Nate knows what to expect when Freck finally lets him close. He acts gentle enough, calling out in a quiet voice: 'Freckles, where are you? Don't be scared." And when playing with my parents' knickknacks, he used a very light touch when "petting" the plaster sculptures.

I've found a number of promising cat books for the toddler-set, but I want to check them out at the libraries first -- I don't think my brother would thank me for anything assuming the reader might be getting a cat, so I'm going to preview any purchases with library copies. I'll pick them up from the library tomorrow...

• Grandma's cat written by Helen Ketteman; illustrated by Marsha Lynn Winborn
• Be gentle! by Virginia Miller (may be overkill, based on the summary and given what I've seen of him)
• Cats do, dogs don't written by Norma Simon; pictures by Dora Leder (may be good since he's familiar with dog behavior being used for comparison)

Alternately, maybe just a picture-book with lots of cute cat photos would keep him entertained...

[For the record and for others in a similar situation, a few more titles that turned up in my searches (alphabetically by author): Cats by Julie Aigner-Clark (part of the Baby Einstein series), Why does the cat do that? by Susan Bonners, My kitten friends by Jane Burton, Cats know best by Colin Eisler, Cat's play by Lisa Campbell Ernst, Cat by Sara Bonnett Stein, and How big? how fast? how hungry? : a book about cats by Barney Waverly. Info about any of these and their appropriateness for the situation -- or other recommendations -- would be most appreciated.]

Posted by Lis Riba at 8:34 PM

Maybe next time we fly, we should write both the Fourth and First amendments on our luggage.

Via Boing Boing:

A flier in the Milwaukee airport wrote "[TSA secretary] Kip Hawley is an idiot" on the clear plastic bag that he was ordered to put his liquids into, and ran it through the x-ray machine. The TSA goon working the machine detained him for 25 minutes ... The TSA then confiscated the baggie and the traveller's liquids, took his picture, and "filed a report" on him.

Heaven forbid he wrote something unfavorable about the President -- he could've been bumped onto a one-way Gitmo express!

For the record, our bags weren't checked on the flight down to Florida.

Since we returned home with such additional items as a 15-year-old "portable" computer, a hotfix applicator wand, packets of lead crystals, two bottles of Wisconsin honey, and some other odd things I can't recall off the top of my head, Ian actually wrote a note to the TSA inside our suitcase explaining what they were. And several of our bags had the handy note from the TSA saying they were searched...

[The box for the applicator wand got a bit crunked because they didn't re-close the flap after opening it.]

“A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government on earth, general or particular, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inferences.” — Thomas Jefferson

“The Framers of the Bill of Rights did not purport to "create" rights. Rather, they designed the Bill of Rights to prohibit our Government from infringing rights and liberties presumed to be preexisting.” — Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, Jr.

The latter quote comes from Brennan's dissent in United States v. Verdugo-Urquidez, and the rest of the paragraph is also instructive:

[T]he Framers of the Bill of Rights did not purport to "create" rights. Rather, they designed the Bill of Rights to prohibit our Government from infringing rights and liberties presumed to be pre-existing. See e. g., U.S. Const., Amdt. 9 ("The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people"). The Fourth Amendment, for example, does not create a new right of security ag