AnimaMundi

"Carry Me Home"

Mark Folse kindly sent me an autographed copy of his book, "Carry Me Home" his journey back to New Orleans after the city was flooded due to the failure of the levees. The book consists of his blog entries from Wet Bank Guide that begin on September 1st, 2005. Mark writes with soul and wit. He is one of the best writers in southern Louisiana by far. Buy his book. You will come away different, if you have a soul.

I just read "The Last Mardi Gras" for the 3rd time and I got a lump in my throat for the 3rd time.

Freddie Hubbard RIP

I was lucky to win two free tickets to hear Freddie Hubbard in the early 80's in Albany on Central Avenue at a venue long gone. He blew my trumpet-playing cousin and me away. 

He blew hard and long.

 

 

NY Times Obit

Kodachrome

 

My friend Alfonso down in Dallas has put up some of his magic words and images on this digital wonderland. If you read his post you will learn that he grew up in a southern California resort where certain people frequented. He has never bragged about his meeting great and/or famous people during his lifetime. He doesn't need to. He is far too concerned with the authentic rather than the glitzy. This is one of his posts that sends me off on a nostalgic tangent. He has a penchant for that. Today we writes about perception and the camera. My father too was a photographer and home movie buff. He had higher artistic aspirations, but he was not bitter about not having attained them. He worked for two photographic studios and then for the Naval Underwater Sound Lab in Groton, CT. There he took pictures of old women breaking bottles of Champagne on the bows of nuclear submarines. After he died in 1979, I had a hell of a time getting his reels of 16mm film and my family photo albums back from his second wife. He married out of loneliness and loss rather than any love or affection. Another story that I might or not tell. The precious reels of film were stored in unkind places so much splicing was done before they were transferred to VHS tape. The reels contained footage of a very young Marco, an early 1950's Christmas, several weddings of my aunts and uncles, an aunt's high school graduation, a VJ Day parade and my parents' vacation to Rochester, NY, Niagara Falls (when The Maid of the Mist still went behind the falls). The first time that I watched the tape I noticed a highway sign at the start of the mash up of film reels. The VHS transfer was done randomly. I hit rewind to make sure of what I saw. The name on the highway sign read "Route 9W Delmar, NY" which is where we now live. A sign?

 

"If you took all the girls I knew when I was single
Brought 'em all together for one night
I know they'd never match my sweet imagination
Everything looks worse in black and white"

     

 

 

 

 

Eartha Kitt

Eartha Kitt had pipes. She was named well. I will always remember her growl. How could one forget it?

Friday Nights at The Knickerbocker Cafe

When the Knick opens, Friday nights are Mystic Horns nights.  

Winter Solstice

The winter solstice is approaching, "the windows are filled with frost. I tried to tell everybody, but I could not get across." The light dims, the arc is at its lowest and almost seems to vanish some days during deep dark December. It is an especially good time to meditate on darkness and those dusty niches. Or I could go shopping. Or put on some seasonal music. Or imagine depression morphing into melancholy, one of my favorite things. This failing of the light this year is further underscored or reflected by the current economics of loss, desperation and outright greed.

   "Brother Can You Spare A Dime?"  Ike Quebec

 

I can not offer any antidote to what is happening. I can only tell you where I am and what I feel amidst the turmoil, sort of. I'll try to be honest and not too heavy handed. I know that is hard for some of you to believe, but bear with me.

  "Tenderly"  Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong

Treasure friendship and love. They are eternal and fleeting. They are mysterious and tangible. They can make the world go away for a time. They can make the world precious and full of soul.

 

Seek out the authentic in people and experience. The quintessence of living beings and inanimate things. Cultivate this feeling. It is curled away within and without, like a smokey chimera.

Keep a twisted dark sense of humor. It comes in handy when the outrageously incomprehensible is staring you in the face each day. Take nothing too seriously. It's not worth it, seriously.

Laugh as much as you can. At yourself and the rest of the world. It's good for you and the soul of the world. Try to make others laugh, even if you fail miserably, as I often do. If they don't understand my humor, too bad. Some people have the sense of humor of a lug nut.

Love animals. Get a cat, dog, bird or howler monkey. Talk to them and hug them. Realize that they are living sensitive creatures with rights. In many cases, I prefer them to human beings.

"Slippery People"  The Staple Singers

Appreciate irony. It's all around you waiting to be discovered and gently folded into your being. Sometimes, not so gently.

Read books that do something for you or to you whatever that might be.

Sit down and listen to music for a spell.

Eat good well prepared food and drink good wines. Life is much too short to eat bland food lacking in soul and wines that are blase mass-produced specimens without character.  "Salt Song"  Stanley Turrentine

Give to the poor and unfortunate.

G. Franco Romagnoli, RIP

Franco Romagnoli and his wife had a show on local PBS TV in the 1970's. We looked forward to their show because it was so informal, entertaining and because it taught us about simple Italian cooking. Franco would sip wine as he cooked or helped his wife. It beats what's on Food TV now.

BUYDIG.COM---BEACH CAMERA

We just bought a 40" Samsung HDTV from Buydig.com. It arrived Monday. Before the delivery men left, I opened the box up and plugged the set in. The delivery men did not tell me to do this. There were instructions inside the box to examine the unit for damage or irregularities in the display. Everything appeared to be fine in the daylight.After the sun set, we turned the unit back on and noticed some distortion on the left edge of the screen plus a vertical line from the top to the bottom of the screen. From the web, I learned that this vertical line is know as dead pixels. They must have died enroute. When I called the vendor Buydig.com (pronounced "dige " as in digital), one rep told me to speak to the manager, one rep told me to contact Samsung and the other told me that Buydig.com will satisfy me with either a repaired set or a new unit if Samsung doesn't. As of now, they will not take the set back. If the screen had been cracked or I noticed the dead pixel line in the light of day, I could have refused delivery and Buydig.com would have taken the set back. As of now the jury is out. Samsung has not yet replied to my complaint. Buydig.com is waiting on Samsung. Buydig.com is in some unspecified way connected to Beach Camera, although the rep could not tell me exactly how. Their prices are some of the lowest on the web or brick and mortar. There is some discussion on web forums that they are gray market, although I received a warranty notice (not card) with my TV. I will post after this is resolved in one way or another.

Update: After calling Buydig.com numerous times, I was reassured that if Samsung did not repair or replace the unit, they would in fact replace the unit themselves. I found out through a request I made from Samsung on the web that a local repair person via Samsung is scheduled to come to our home on December 3rd to see if a repair or replacement is in order. So I am little more reassured. Buydig.com has been frustrating since they are mainly interested in selling massive amounts of TV's and other electronics at this time of year. Their customer service has to be tightened up some since I was getting conflicting information that did not provide any definitive answers.

Update 1: The local repair technician called tonight to determine what parts (the display/screen?) should be replaced after a call to Samsung central. Someone has taken notice. This is good so far.

Update 2: The designated repair facility has the parts on order and will phone when they arrive to arrange a service date.

Update 3: Repair person came and replaced all the boards in the unit and the dead pixel line did not budge. They ordered a new display and installed it today. Samsung stands behind their products and sub-contracts with people who know what they are doing.

You know it's Italian when you have been sitting at the table for an hour and a half already, you have eaten so much you can not move, you have drank so much you are slurring, the main course finally arrives and it is only lunch.

Alfonso while on the Italian Wine Trail in California asked a number of people to complete this sentence: "You know it's Italian when..." He got some very interesting, funny and quirky responses. After all, it is Italian. Oh, that's not me sleeping with the fish. Not yet.

"Sound Unbound"

I have only read a few of the 36 pieces about media in all forms in this enlightening take on the remix and sampling. Assembled by DJ Spooky, the contributors take vastly different angles on pop media culture as recombinant mixes of what nature and man have created out of chaos. I'll try to post about some of the pieces in the book. I recommend it to those interested in music, sampling, plagiarism, remixing culture, media etc. 

 "Sound Unbound"