Interviews

There’s this whole interview meme going around the blogs I visit. The blogger gets questions from someone else, posts the answers on their blog, and then opens it up to others to ask for questions. (The rules are posted at the bottom of the post.) I asked for questions from both Gothmog and Immunegirl. The first set are from Goth:

1. What theater production (that you were directly involved in) was the most enjoyable experience for you, and why?

I’d say it was playing Mr. Peachum in a production of Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera. Not because of the production as a whole. Oh no. On that production I first learned of Greenman’s “They Won’t Hate Me Theory”. Read the link for the whole thing, but in short the theory says that when the production is going poorly, you can either not care or try your hardest so that even if the audience hates everyone else, they won’t hate you. Perhaps you’ve never considered it before, perhaps you have and just didn’t do so consciously. But you can’t imagine how much audiences like having someone or something to like in a production that otherwise bites.

(This same production had one of the best review lines I’ve ever seen. The man who played the street singer was gay, flamboyantly gay. A reviewer said he was “Full of warm spunk.” Our reaction? “Well of course he is.”)

So no, not because of the greatest of the production. Because of the greatness of the part. Peachum is a truly villainous character who justifies his villainy as being the same thing the wealthy are doing. It’s a big, juicy part, full of great lines. He has four great songs – two solos, a duet, and a trio, as well as a key part in another ensemble. It was a great chance to show a lot of range, range people who didn’t see the production forget I have. I loved it, and would love to do it again.

And yes, they didn’t hate me.

2. You're ahead of your time in your belief that...

The gay rights battles in this country will eventually be looked at as much briefer, and much less bloody, than similar battles over racial and sexual equal rights. Indeed, I think by the time we hit 2020 the vast majority will have no objection to gay marriage, and that most people will look back and think “What? Were we high?”

3. What's your biggest regret from your youth?

That I chose the University of Iowa over New York University. Usually, it’s the small choices in life that have the biggest effect. You make a small decision here, a small decision there, and another and another and eventually you find yourself on a vastly different path. But that there was a huge decision. I can’t imagine what I would be if I had gone to NYU to study film instead of Iowa to study journalism.

4. Who had the most influence in the development of your sense of humor?

My father. As much as I might sometimes think it comes from other places, he had this semi-twisted totally off-kilter sense of humor that is the basis of mine. You can see the same sense of humor in my older and younger sisters.

5. Someone saw you on the street this morning and said "That was you?" What did you do to earn this response?

I would assume the Royal Flush Plumbing commercial where I play the father desperate to get into the bathroom his teenage daughter is using started airing again.

These are from Immunegirl:

1. What is the one thing you know the most about?

Me. I’ve been studying me for almost 45 years now. I’m probably the world’s expert.

2. Which is the one TV character that you would most like to be?

Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law.

3. If you had a million dollars to donate to charity(ies), where would it go?

Easy. $600,000 to the Iowa City Community Theatre, $300,000 to Dreamwell Theatre, and $100,000 to the scholarship fund in my father’s name at my high school.

4. What is the best advice you've ever received?

I keep coming back to my father, but there you have it. Just before I started college he took me aside and said to me:

“There’s a lot of temptations out there. The trick is to know which ones to give into and which ones to avoid. I think we’ve done a good enough job of raising you that you will do well at that.”

Note that it wasn’t “avoid this” or “avoid that”. It was “make wise choices” and then putting his faith in me that I could.

5. If you had an unlimited budget and could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go?

Well, I’ve never been to me.

Wait, that contradicts what I said above. So instead, I’d learn how to sail, buy a good, sturdy boat, and set sail around the world. No particular destinations, no particular agenda. Just sailing towards whatever I find. As an alternative, London.

And now the rules for those of you interested in being interviewed:

1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."

2. I will respond by asking you five questions of my choosing.

3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions. If you don't have a blog, you can post your responses in my comments section.

4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post, following the same rules.

Two Baseball Stories

Actually, the first is not a baseball story so much as a human interest story involving a major league baseball player. The story is about the player’s parents and it really wouldn’t be much of a story if it weren’t for the fact that his parents are a lesbian couple. (His father left prior to his birth.) The interesting thing about this is the amount of acceptance his parents have received from his friends throughout his baseball career, which, when you consider that he went to college in Alabama, is somewhat surprising. Ultimately, it is testimony to the fact that much of people’s fear of gays stems from lack of knowledge, and that almost always with acquaintance comes acceptance. Someday our current battles over equal rights for gays will be a relic of another day, and it will be in part because of stories like this.

The other baseball story is truly a baseball story. Former Braves pitcher (and former major league pitching coach) Tom House recently gave an interview where he claims that steroid use was widespread among players in the 60s and 70s when he played. Now, one of the things that causes the most hand-wringing among sports columnists when it comes to recent steroid use in baseball is “What shall we do about the records? We don’t know how many homers X would have hit if he hadn’t been on the juice! Course, we don’t know that he was on the juice, but still.” But if it is indeed the case that, as long as there have been being paid to play the game, there have been players looking for an extra edge, then it really doesn’t matter what you do about the records. You can assume that everyone in the past was clean, you can assume that everyone in the past was juiced, you can assume that some were clean and some were juiced. You can assume all sorts of things, but you can’t prove any of them about the past. So let all records stand as they currently are, no asterisks, and move forward from there.

Laughter

We had a good time playing cards Friday night. It was a small group that started the evening: Matt, greenman, Kris, and TanMan. Kris played two games and left. The rest of us played two more. I took a first, a second, and two fourths, though I was in strong position to win a second game and if I hadn’t made a stupid bluff, might have placed in another. So I was happy with the evening.

But that’s not why I’m writing. If I just wanted to write about poker, I would post on our poker blog. I want to write about humor. We said some very funny things Friday night. Indeed, I said something around 2:00 am, when there was just the four of us left, that had us all laughing hard. It was that intense kind of laughter that makes you stand up and walk around and bend over and you still are laughing and you can’t stop and you start to ache and tear up but you just can’t stop. And then, after we had all regained composure, TanMan riffed on what I said with something that made us laugh even harder.

But I can’t share it with you. For one thing, it would take way too long to set-up. What I said was based on something Kris had said five hours earlier. It played off of conversations we had in the intervening five hours. I don’t have the time to recreate five hours of conversation and you have neither the time nor the inclination to read them. For another, if you didn’t know the people involved in the joke (people we all know and have acted and worked backstage with) it wouldn’t be funny. It was genuinely funny to us, and not just in a 2:00 am sort of way. But it wouldn’t share very well. At least not in a manner that would be as intense for a reader of this as it was for us.

And ultimately, isn’t that the case with all humor? Isn’t it the case that the more people that can understand the joke, the less intense the resulting humor is? I’ve been to movies where I laughed very, very hard. But it never has approached the intensity of the laughter I experience in a situation with a small group of friends like what happened Friday night.

Late Links

Some more housekeeping stuff. Due to popular demand, I've changed my profile so that it is actually my profile. Not sure how the Arabic one got in there, but that wasn't me. Really. I've also added an email account. A brand-spanking new email account that will probably be filled with spam in under an hour. Oh, and two more links: one from Goth at Quips and Quibbles (should have been Quibbles and Bits), and one at Collecting Shards that I think I know who it is but am not saying cause it seems the author wishes to remain private.

And thanks for the comment deleting tips, Goth.

Poker Tonight

If you're on the poker club email list, you already know we are playing this evening around 8:00 at our place. Pop, chips, and some beer will be provided. With any luck, we'll actually have some posts on the poker blog after this game.

Friday Child Blogging

Ethan is just starting to be able to say his own name. That’s one thing you don’t take into account when you’re naming a baby – how difficult is it to say the name. At least we didn’t take it into account. He’s been saying his brother’s and his mother’s names for some time now, but he’s just now starting to say his. It comes out “E-ten”, but it’s really cute. You’ll hold a picture of him up to him and say “Who’s that?” and he’ll say “E-ten”. We’ll wait a bit to work on his middle name, Wesley.

I used to look longingly at people who were with their children, wanting the relationship they had. I still look at them, but now it’s because they always remind me of my boys. Being a father is one of the best things I’ve ever done. One of the hardest too, for that matter. But definitely one of the best.

My boys. At first, when we got the news that the child Lesa was carrying was going to be a boy, I was disappointed. I had wanted a daughter. I think mothers and sons have a stronger bond than fathers and sons, and fathers and daughters a stronger bond than mothers and daughters. But that disappointment quickly faded (it took all of about five minutes after the pronouncement), and now I’m glad I have sons. I still think mothers and sons have a stronger bond than fathers and sons, and I know that, if Ethan remains as stubborn and hardheaded as he is now, which, to be fair, is as stubborn and hardheaded as I can be, then the two of us will clash heads. A lot. But I think we will still have a good bond – Lesa always says he’s daddy’s boy, and he probably is. Which is nice.

Death And The Legislature

There has been a flurry of activity in the Iowa Legislature as a response to the Jetseta Gage tragedy. In brief, she was the young girl who was kidnapped, raped, and murdered by a convicted sex offender. Our legislators are trying to look tough by proposing new laws that will prevent this sort of thing from happening.

Now, it gets a little complicated. Roger Bentley, the man who committed the crime, was able to take her in part because her mother, Trena Gage, had invited him to the family home to work on her car. Trena met Roger through his brother, James. James was Trena’s ex-boyfriend. (And, if you dig far enough into the sordid history, a man that Trena once sued for child support as the father of her son. But DNA testing said he wasn’t.) James also was jailed last November for repeatedly raping Jetseta over a two-year period. Trena claimed she had no knowledge of this, but during the time she was dating James he was arrested for another incident involving inappropriate contact with a minor. I offer none of this as exculpation for Roger Bentley, just as proof of the fact that answers to these problems sometimes can’t be found in legislative action. By that I mean that the easiest way to have prevented Jetseta Gage from being kidnapped, raped, and murdered would have been for her mother to JUST NOT HANG OUT WITH CONVICTED SEX OFFENDERS IN THE FIRST PLACE! Sorry for the all-caps, but Trena’s actions in this case, indeed throughout the lives of her children, are inexcusable. Absolutely inexcusable.

But I digress.

As I mentioned, a lot of new legislation has been proposed. A group of Republicans are trying to start a debate on the death penalty, and are being blocked in the Iowa Senate by the Senate Democratic leader who refuses to let a bill out of committee if it contains the death penalty.

Time to digress again. The Iowa Senate is currently tied, 25 Democrats and 25 Republican. The Iowa House is slightly Republican. Prior to this, Republicans had control of both chambers for about 8 years. During that time, they never once brought a bill containing the death penalty to the floor for debate. There weren’t the votes for it to pass, the governor wouldn’t sign it, and a majority of Iowans opposed it. So they didn’t bother.

But now, now they do want it brought to the floor. One of the leaders in the movement is a Republican who, last fall when he was up for election, told voters he did not believe in the death penalty. But now he wants it, because of loopholes in the sex offender law.

Not sure why he doesn’t just want to fix those loopholes, but there you are.

Anyway, to make a long story longer, I am opposed to the death penalty. I won’t go into those reasons now – it’s not the purpose of this. I will say that the only reason that appears to be valid for having it is as a deterrent. And that’s one of the grounds supporters are giving for wanting it. To deter future crimes.

Doesn’t matter that all the statistical evidence shows that the death penalty doesn’t deter violent crime and that, indeed, states with the death penalty are the states with the highest rates of violent crime and, even further, that states that institute the death penalty see their violent crime rates go up. That should matter, but it doesn’t. And it doesn’t matter that a death penalty would not have prevented Roger Bentley from doing what he did. He wasn’t thinking about consequences, anymore than a cat thinks about consequences when it jumps a bird. He was thinking gratification of his immediate needs. He was as an animal, acting in accordance with the twisted way he was hard-wired. No, the death penalty would not have deterred him. That should matter, but it doesn’t.

(Although I will add one more complication to this, something I have wondered about. Did Roger Bentley do what he did in part to help his brother? His brother’s lawyer is saying that tapes made of Jetseta’s depositions should not be allowed in court during James’ trial because he will be unable to face his accuser. I’m not saying that went through Roger’s mind, but more of an instinctual “Hurt girl – help James” thing. We will never know unless Roger says something.)

The supporters are arguing that the death penalty would be a deterrent, and, as such, they want the death penalty for anyone that murders a child. They also want it for anyone who kidnaps a child with intent to do the child harm. And that’s what this long, rambling post is about. Because that sets off my“What? Are you high?” alarm. (Note: Sometimes the most appropriate response to a really insane idea is “What? Are you high?”)

Because it’s like this. If a person is rational enough that they are thinking about the consequences if they get caught, then why make the penalty for kidnapping the same as the penalty for murder? It’s much easier to get away with the kidnapping if you murder the victim. And if the penalty for the kidnapping is the same as the penalty for the murder, then why the hell would you let the victim live? (With the caveat that you are giving some thought to the consequences of being caught and, as such, are susceptible to being deterred, and if you aren’t giving thought to the consequences of being caught then it doesn’t really matter what the punishment is because it could be being drawn and quartered and it wouldn’t deter you) The answer? You wouldn’t. If you’re going to get punished the same for kidnapping you’ve just committed as you are for murdering the victim, you’d go ahead and murder the victim and take your chances that you wouldn’t get caught. In short, passing this law would incent criminals to commit murder.

And I don’t really think that’s a valid goal of our legislative body.

The New Glasses Are In! The New Glasses Are In!

And it is tough to adjust to - damn tough. I'm finding it particularly difficult at the computer so far because I can't just move it farther back or up and down. I keep putting my old pair on, but then I say to myself "I need to learn how to use the new ones" and switch, then switch again because it's tough to get anything done. So if posting is slight today, that's why.

Also, I find that I now have to look directly at someone speaking. So tomorrow night at poker, if you think I'm staring, I am. But not in a bad way.

Link Fest 2005

Bunch of new links, and some rearrangement. The sidebar is now on the left, the text space is wider, the previous posts is gone, and the archives are at the bottom. New links are from all the poker group that have blogs, including Danny, Teresa at Glorious Nonsense, Theresa at 2 Hot Chicks, and the Tanman. From OT come Buggy, Supes, Republican No More and, for a return engagement, Sasha.

And I've added some baseball blogs. Cardinals baseball. The only kind of baseball.

Bloggers Unite?* Bloggers UNITED!

Anyone know how to widen the text column? Thanks to Jo at Major Disaster for the tips on widening the text column.

*”Bloggers Unite!” is the battle cry of bloggers when they seek assistance from another blogger. Also acceptable are “Bloggers Assemble” and “By The Power Of The Blogosphere!” and “Advantage Blogosphere” and “It’s Bloggerin’ Time!”. And yes, there are actual bloggers who actually use one of those.

Savage Love

I love Dan Savage. For those not in the know, he is a nationally syndicated sex advice columnist. That doesn’t go far enough to describe – you just need to read him. His most recent column is dedicated to offering advice to horny 15 year old girls. The column was prompted by a letter from a horny fifteen year old girl who wrote after Savage wrote a column for of advice for a horny fifteen year old boy. Now before you climb on a high horse or get overly aroused (as the case may be), what Savage did was ask his female readers to send in advice they would give to their fifteen year old selves if they could. (This is the same thing he did with the earlier column – ask his male readers to send in advice they would give to their fifteen year old selves.) Which is an interesting idea by itself – what would you tell yourself at fifteen about relating to the opposite sex? Considering that in eight years or so I’ll be giving a fifteen year old boy advice on relating to the opposite sex, it is a relevant question for me. Maybe I’ll post more on that later.

But that’s not what prompted this post. What prompted this post was this list from a reader:

The 15 Things I Wish I Had Known When I Was 15:
1) Confidence is sexier than big boobs, a tiny waist, or long blond hair will ever be.
2) Medicated face wash will save your life.
3) 15-year-old guys are just as shy around girls as girls are around them. Beware the 15-year-old guys who can kick game.
4) Making the first move is no longer taboo.
5) Chances are, he is not picking up on the subtle "I like you" signals you're sending out. A smile here and a "Hi" there will not be enough for him to know you like him; you may have to tackle him in the hallway with a note that spells it all out, in no confusing terms.
6) At 15, three weeks constitutes a long-term relationship.
7) Rejection is not the end of the world, unless you make it that way.
8) You have the boobs; you make the rules.
9) That being said, having the power of the boobs is like having the force; be careful how and when you use it.
10) Not all guys are created equal.
11) Your mom is right; that outfit does make you look like a whore.
12) There will be rumors.
13) Being fun and funny will get you further than being catty and bitchy.
14) He's not as great as you think he is.
15) The most popular, pretty girl in school is just as awkward and confused as you are. —Adrienne H.

I can’t tell you how upset I am that this woman passed on numbers 8 and 9. That’s been the male secret for years! If women have this knowledge given to them, we’re hosed. Big time.

So if there are any fifteen year old girls reading this, or women in general, I want to say that 8 and 9 are a lie. A complete lie. We men have the you know what, we make the rules. And pay no attention to where my eyes are looking.

And yes, that outfit does make you look like a whore.

Englert and ICCT News

Those in Iowa City (or who just like to look at the Press Citizen online) may have seen this article announcing that a contract has been signed between ICCT and the Englert Civic Theatre. Our productions of Fiddler on the Roof and My Fair Lady will take place there next season. We’ll also have a fundraiser this summer. So that’s good news. The bad? The deal is just for one year at this point. The really bad? Our beloved president can’t (or won’t) do a good job of selling ICCT to the press. Check these graphs out:

Early on in the Englert renovation project, Buddin said community theater members were told that they would just have to pay a small fee for performances because of the group's large contribution of $50,000.

Some leaders in the initial grassroots effort to restore the Englert even told members that they would have partial ownership, she said.

There isn’t a true statement in either sentence. We weren’t told we would pay a small fee – in fact, the deal as negotiated is probably a lesser charge than what we had negotiated before. The key there is that a deal was negotiated before, and the current board wasn’t willing to honor it and we weren’t willing to do what we had to do to get them to honor it. And nothing was ever said about partial ownership. Nothing. Jeebus, I was there for almost every meeting for close to a year and a half. You think I would know if anyone would.

Mandate In Crawford

This? Is seriously funny.

(Link via Atrios)

Note To Self

The two-day-old microwave reheated Turkey Loaf is substantially worse than the freshly cooked Turkey Loaf which, truth be told, wasn’t that great to begin with when we had it Sunday night. Since I selected, and prepared, said Turkey Loaf, perhaps I need to look in a different direction for my future turkey needs.

World’s Most Dangerous Jobs (TV Division)

The Fictional Character Occupational Health and Safety Administration (FCOSHA) announced the results of it’s latest occupational hazard survey. The survey, conducted once every three years, reviews the data to determine which fictional occupations are the most hazardous. In a stunning turn of events, the post which has held the top spot since the survey was implemented in the 1960s, Star Trek Away Team Member, has dropped to the number two position. The top spot is now held by CTU Los Angeles Field Ops Team Member. While going out in large groups of CTU Los Angeles Field Ops Team Agents is generally fairly safe, going out in a party of one or two, especially in the company of a lead CTU Agent such as Jack Bauer or Tony Almeda (or even, as was shown last night, Chloe O’Brien) is likely to prove fatal. A spokesman for the agent’s union said “We all dread getting the call to go out with Jack. I mean, the guy hacked off his daughter’s boyfriend’s hand! Who wants to partner with a guy like that?” Agent Bauer was unavailable for comment.

Callings

Jo at Major Disaster asks why, if Cardinal Ratzinger didn't want to be Pope (see article here) didn't he (Cardinal Ratzinger) just say no. Well, when God calls, you can't say "No". I think the best you can manage is to say you aren't there or you're busy and you'll call back later, but if you do that, God eventually calls back and sooner or later you'll wind up talking to him. I mean, God can make any name show up on your caller ID, so you can't avoid him that way. The phone will ring, and the caller ID will show "Salma Hayek", and you'll answer the phone, and a voice sounding just like Salma's will ask for you by name, and you'll say "This is he" and then the voice will switch to God's and he'll say "Punk'd" and "I knew you were home" and "You guys playing cards tonight?" and "You want to be Pope?" and you'll end up inviting him over to play poker even though you don't want to and then he'll lecture you about your card play but lose and not think twice about the irony of that. So yeah, you might as well just answer God when he calls and agree to be Pope and let him play cards and hope he goes out early.

Fun With Keebler

Lesser-known animals* found in Ernie’s** Animal Round-Up, the hidden word puzzle on the back of my package of Keebler Frosted Animal Cookies:

Xurd
Fenoy
Bers
Robbletmar
Alice

*The clue says the only animals there are bear, gorilla, seal, sheep, hippopotamus, lion, horse, ram, elephant, buffalo, and rhinoceros. But the clue lies. Oh yes. The clue lies.

**What self-respecting Elf names their son “Ernie”?

In A Week Or So, I'll Be Bi

Focaled, that is. I went to the opthamaloogist, oppthemalogist, eye doctor yesterday and he said I need bifocals. They’ll be ready in about a week. I’m getting progressives, so no one can look at them and tell they are bifocals. Cool new frames, too, and a slight tint to the lenses. The whole thing is only costing me $100, thanks to the Vision Service Plan. Go VSP!

If It's Tuesday, There Must Be A New Pope

Because the new Pope gets a new name, were I to become Pope, I would thereafter be known as (wait for it)

Pope N'Fresh

More Theatre Thoughts

Kris had this post up awhile back regarding a PC article about theatre finances. I sent the following letter to the PC, but they didn’t publish it. I wonder why?

Thanks for the interesting article on the struggles of local theatres to survive. While the article mentions several things that have led to this struggle, I would like to comment on one thing that is not mentioned.

I am currently the Past President of the Iowa City Community Theatre (ICCT). For the four years prior to this, I served as President of ICCT. During that time I noted that there was a definite difference in attendance for productions that were well covered in the local papers and productions that received little or no coverage. Productions that received a nice article, with a picture or two, in the Go Section of the Press Citizen were always better attended than productions that received nothing. And productions that were reviewed almost always got an attendance boost from that review.

Unfortunately, during my time as President, the amount of coverage we received from the Press Citizen and other media outlets dropped. It’s been close to four years since the Press Citizen provided a review for an ICCT production. Were the Press-Citizen to devote a few more of its resources to covering local theatres and reviewing local theatres productions, there would, based on past experience, be greater attendance at those same productions. How much of an attendance boost would occur is open to debate. But I think it’s safe to say that for all our local theatres, at this time any attendance boost, no matter how small, would be a wonderful thing.

Think it hit too close to home?

A Lawn Again, Naturally

I’m one of those people who think a nicely mown lawn is a piece of art. I’m also one of those who like to do the mowing themselves. (I think a nicely shoveled driveway is also a piece of art, but I’d rather not be the one doing the shoveling. I figure that with Andrew hitting the age of ten in three years, and Ethan hitting it five years after that, I’ll have a good 13 year period where I don’t need to shovel snow.) I know that the first mowing of the year always looks a little rough, and you need a follow-up mowing shortly after (but not right away) to get it to look good. I know a lot about mowing. But what I didn’t know, what I found out after Lesa turned me on to the fact that I am actually a dog person, is that the freshly-mown lawn is the golden toilet of the canine world. Apparently, there is no better crapping in the world than crapping on a freshly-mown lawn. The dogs literally can’t wait until I get done mowing – there have been times where they are crapping on part of the lawn I just mowed even before I finish the entire thing. The bad thing about this is that I had to scoop crap before I mowed, and now there is more dog crap to scoop. The good thing is that it’s incredibly easy to find.

So how was your weekend?

Colonel? Dead. Perdue? Dead. Revolución!

A truck transporting chickens for slaughter “accidentally” crashed in Kentucky, freeing over 5,000 chickens. Accidentally. That’s just what the chickens want us to think. I? I suspect fowl play...

Englert Bookings

Doofus Doolittle, Branson’s Funniest Fiddler, is coming to the Englert. (Here’s how you need to say that name to get the full effect. Draw out the “Doofus Doolittle”, taking a full two seconds to get it out. Take the volume up a notch on the “Branson’s”, then spit out “Funniest Fiddler” as fast as you can. Like this. Doo-fus Doo-lit-tle, Branson’s FunniestFiddler.) Now, I imagine if you had told the community that one of the acts brought to town in the Englert’s first season would be Doo-fus Doo-lit-tle, Branson’s FunniestFiddler, I – well, I can’t imagine what the response would have been.

Fun Fact 1: Doo-fus Doo-lit-tle, Branson’s FunniestFiddler, is the great-grandson of Eliza Doolittle and the son of James Doolittle. According to his bio, exposure to the Fat Man (or was it Little Boy?) warped James Doolittle’s DNA, making Doofus a Doofus. And a funny fiddler. Fun Fact 2: None of that is true.

Not that I have anything against Branson. We spent a week in Branson last summer with my mom and my older sister’s family and my younger sister’s family, and we had a blast. Branson has some great theme parks, and I loves the theme parks. Seriously. I love theme parks. And there’s good boating, fishing, swimming, hiking, and lots of rural arts and crafts to be found. And some fine food. But the worst part of Branson are the stage acts – thankfully, Ethan wouldn’t sit still when we went to see Ray Stevens and Lesa and I were able to book out early. So although there are many good things about Branson, the stage shows aren’t one of them. You see all of them advertised as you drive up and down the main strip, big billboards and big theatres for all of Branson’s stars.

Although now that I mention it, I never saw one for Doo-fus Doo-lit-tle, Branson’s FunniestFiddler. So maybe he isn’t really Branson’s FunniestFiddler. Maybe he’s a fraud, and the reason he plays shows outside of Branson is because Branson’s real FunniestFiddler, whoever that might be, won’t let him show his lying doofus face around Branson. Something to think about.

In other Englert bookings, Steve Jepson performed there last weekend. Now the people who saw him probably thought of him as a decent baritone with many appearances in many operas around the world. But anyone who was in the Hawkeye Marching Band from 1978-1981 or so (like I was) know him as one of the most annoying human beings ever to grace the planet. They (like I), know him as an egotistical twit, the sort of guy who probably Googles his name once a day to see what people are saying about him. (Hi Steve!) Why the Englert booked him I’ll never know – probably just another sign that Kerchner had no clue what Iowa City was about. (And Steve, if you are reading this - all those times when the saxophone section would yell "Shut Up, Jepson"? That wasn't done in playful fun. We really wanted you to shut up. But you never did.) As for Doo-fus Doo-lit-tle, Branson’s FunniestFiddler – that was probably another of Kerchner’s little farewell presents to Iowa City.

In the interest of fairness, the Del McCoury Band is playing at the Englert this (Thursday, April 14th) evening. If you like bluegrass, and I’m probably the only one reading or writing here that does, and you don’t have family obligations preventing you from going to see a concert at the last minute, you should see Del McCoury. He’s great.

In Comic Strip News

This piece on the Press Citizen’s editorial page today mentions that some people felt that a BC comic strip that ran last week was offensive towards Native Americans. This naturally prompts the following thought: People still read BC? Seriously? That thing hasn’t been funny for the last 20 years. Judge Parker is more entertaining. What was once a snarky, sarcastic strip has become saccharine and maudlin since Hart was born again. Why the hell would anyone do more than glance at it as they are moving from Dilbert at the top of the comics page to Doonesbury at the bottom?

This Post Has No Title

I hate the Rod Stewart song Broken Arrow. I’ve never understood the line “Who else is going to bring you a broken arrow?” I mean, isn’t the correct answer to that one “Hopefully no one”. Who wants a broken arrow? But a thought occurred to me over the weekend. Perhaps the broken arrow isn’t really a broken arrow, but a metaphor for all those little things we like or dislike that nobody but the person closest to us knows about. Maybe the person being sung to really likes broken arrows for some reason, and the singer discovered that by chance, and so when he says “Who else is going to bring you a broken arrow?” what he’s really saying is “Who else is going to do the little things you love to have done that no one knows about?” That makes the song much deeper and much sadder, cause it seems like maybe the broken arrow recipient doesn’t appreciate the singer or is considering leaving the singer but in either event it seems that there is trouble in the relationship and the singer is trying to convey the message that he really does know the broken arrow recipient. But maybe he should just come out and say that instead of couching things in code terms like “broken arrow” or “a bottle of rain” that just make the broken arrow recipient go “WTF?” I think if the singer did that, these two crazy kids just might have a chance.

And don’t get me started on the relationship problems of the couple in the Pina Colada Song...

So. Where Were We?

Terri died. The Pope died. Frank Perdue had the bad sense of timing to die between the two of them, so the only people who know he died are obsessive news junkies, his family, illegal immigrants, and the world’s chicken population, the latter group throwing a party the likes of which hasn’t been seen since Colonel Sanders shuffled off this mortal coil. Saul Bellow and Prince Rainer died. True fact number one: I didn’t realize either were still alive. True fact number two: I had the biggest crush on Princess Caroline when I was in high school. She was slightly older, beautiful, had a hot body, rich, and a Princess. What’s not to crush on? Johnny Cochran died, prompting writer Peter David to comment on his blog “If Johnny don’t breathe, you must bequeath.” That one was for the lawyers, as is this, my favorite lawyer joke: Lawyer dies and goes to hell. Satan says “Wow, you lived to be 115!” Lawyer says “You must have me mistaken for someone else. I died at 73.” Satan replies “Not according to your billable hours.” None of these people who died were in my dead pool. Joe Namath, my out on the limb dead pool pick, went into rehab to get cleaned up. Bastard.

Speaking of the Pope, WTF? Flags are at half-mast for the Pope? The Pope? He’s still just a religious leader, right? And even though Catholicism is the world’s largest denomination, Protestants still outnumber Catholics in the world and the United States. So why flags at half mast? Why round the clock coverage? Why dominating the news cycle? And at some level, isn’t all this idolatry of the Pope somewhat unchristian? And am I the only one somewhat infuriated by the fact that every news story about the Pope’s death mentioned how good it was the he was able to die in the manner he chose while at the same time the Pope’s spokesmen (and it had to be them – he couldn’t carry on a conversation at that point) issued statements about how wrong it would be to pull the tube on Terri?

But enough about death. What about sports and entertainment? Let’s see. God has some beef with the PGA Tour. Baseball started, and the Cardinals are 1-1. The NBA is winding down, and the Lakers have missed the playoffs (for the first time in eleven years), which gives Kobe Bryant a lot more time for ass-fucking white chicks. I suck at poker. Scott Savol is apparently going to have to beat up some girl on stage to get voted out of American Idol. Sin City led the box office last week on the day the Pope died. (There’s an American Pie parody in there somewhere.) Lost rocks. So does 24. Did I mention I suck at poker? My friend Bob turned 50, which means I am only five years away from the same milestone. DC Comics have decided to remove every trace of humor from the DC universe, retconning out stories that didn’t take themselves seriously and replacing them with stories that take themselves very seriously. Very, very seriously. Very, very seriously, and very proud of their seriousness. Ponderously, over-pompously, seriously.

In the world of politics, the Republican Terri Schiavo Talking Points memo, which the asshats at Powerline, among others, claimed was a forgery done by Democrats, was proven to be real yesterday when Senator Mel Martinez (R–FLA) admitted the memo was created and distributed by a member of his staff. This after Senator Martinez had spent a couple of weeks denying that the memo was created and distributed by a member of his staff. Chances of Powerline et al ever admitting they were wrong? Normally I would say none, but Michelle Malkin of all people has come out and admitted she was fooled. And then there’s Tom Delay, who after forcing his face into prominence during the Terri affair, has found an almost constant stream of revelations of past misconduct working their way into the press. The Wall Street Journal editorial board, among others, have suggested that perhaps it’s time for Delay to step down. So has Senator Lindsay Graham (R-SC), although Delay has marshaled the Republican side of the House to stand by him. Democrats are torn – on the one hand, it would be nice for Delay to remain in power and as a prominent symbol of Republican greed and corruption. On the other hand… Wait. There is no other hand. You go Tom! Hang in there! Stick around until at least the fall of 2006! Oh, and in the Iowa Legislature Senators and Representatives are scrambling all over one another to overreact to a crime that would have been prevented if the mother of the victim just didn't hang out with sex offenders.

So that was the past 10 days or so. Whew! I guess there’s a reason why I need to post everyday.

On The Lighter, And Sicker, Side

Not going to add this to the links, cause who knows how long it will last. But if you need some funny, try this blog - Stuck In Rehab With Pat O’Brien.

Oh, and this is just wrong. Wrong I say!

Jetseta

I don’t mean the following as an exculpation for Mr. Bentley in any way, shape or form, or as a mitigation of the heinous nature of what he did or the need to ensure he is punished to the fullest extent of the law, but, at some point, isn’t one of your fundamental responsibilities as a parent to make sure that your daughter doesn’t come into contact with the registered sex offender, particularly when the registered sex offender is the brother of the guy who is already in jail for repeatedly abusing your daughter? I know the mother bears no legal responsibility for what happened, but doesn’t she on some level bear a moral responsibility? Can you construct any scenario where “leaving my previously abused daughter around the registered sex offender brother of the guy who abused her” moves out of the “Not A Chance In Hell” category into the “Maybe Just This Once” category? Shouldn’t this be grounds for at least a strong consideration of removing Jetseta’s younger brother from the home?

Schiavo Thought

I do eventually plan to write my feelings about Terri Schiavo, but work has been intense this week and I want to do it right when I do it. In the meantime, here’s a piece from
Light of Reason. Remember, this is the viewpoint of a hardcore libertarian. I’m excerpting part – you should read the rest.

This country was founded on the recognition of individual rights. The government properly exists solely to protect those rights. If you do not have the right to determine what happens to your own body, you have no rights at all. Let’s leave aside borderline questions here. These fundamental principles lead to the following results: they are why a military draft is absolutely wrong (if the government has the power to tell you how to spend one day of your life, let alone several years, and if you can’t control whether you live or die, you have no rights worth speaking of); they are the reason a woman has the right to abortion and has reproductive rights more generally (if she can’t determine whether to have a child or not, and whether close to 20 years of her life [at a minimum] will be largely devoted to caring for a child she may not want or be prepared to have, she has no other rights worth mentioning); and they are also the reason a person has the right to refuse any sort of medical treatment at all.

At this point, it is nothing but the most obvious of red herrings to argue that Terri Schiavo’s wishes cannot be determined. That is precisely the question that has been litigated, over and over and over again, for close to a decade in the Florida courts. Every conceivable factual dispute has been addressed. The courts made the best determination they could, on the basis of the available evidence. And they concluded that the husband properly has the right to terminate medical treatment.
And note this well. The primary and most important issue that the courts decided was this one: that, to the best of their ability to determine, Terri Schiavo herself would not have wanted treatment to continue. In other words, the courts have recognized that Terri Schiavo had the right to determine what happened to her own body.

If you can’t determine that, you have no other rights. And if Congress has the power (not the right, mind you—language is critical here) to tell even one individual that he or she must have treatment when the person does not want it, then we are all nothing more than slaves in principle.

And that is the totality of the argument. Argue about details all you want; it won’t change the fundamental principles involved.

More Fun With Signage

On the marquee at Perkins:

Wednesday Special – Buy One Muffin, Get Another One For Free

Strangely enough, they have the same thing on the marquee at Touch Of Mink massage.

Hedda Gabler at ICCT

One of the great things about participating in local theatre is that you meet, and become friends with, some really cool people. Our poker group is a theatre-oriented group, most of us having worked with each other at some point in the past few years.

There are some problems associated with this, however. Case in point? ICCT’s production of Hedda Gabler. I’ve worked, associated, and hung out with everyone but one person in the cast. Indeed, at one point the only people onstage were four members of our poker group. This can make for some awkward moments after the show, when people you like ask how you enjoyed the play. “You were great” you have to say sometimes. “That one part was interesting where you did that” you say.

Fortunately, this problem doesn’t arise with Hedda. Quite the opposite, actually. The production is great. The performances are great. I can’t recommend seeing the show highly enough.

Some highlights:

* There seems to have been a conscious choice not to attempt any dialects. Rather, a natural speaking style was utilized. This brought an immediacy to the show that made it far more compelling. Sure, the lines placed the show in the past. But the acting brought it into the present.

* The set. I’m not a big set person. I like minimalist productions. But I can appreciate a good set, and the show has a good set. Nice use of the play space, functional doors and windows, and appropriate furniture. But the best thing about it was the piano room off the main stage. This was an area viewable when the door was open and out of sight when the door was closed. Playing portions of some scenes there was a stroke of genius.

* The performances. The show was perfectly cast. Sometimes when you are watching your friends act, it’s tough to disassociate who they are as your friends. That is, they don’t truly become the character for you; rather, they are X being Y. Such was not the case here. Everyone became their characters, and there was no overlap between who they are as individuals to me and who they were as their characters (although, if you know Adam, there is something a little disconcerting about seeing him play a brilliant person undone by alcohol). Kris did a good job of bringing to life Hedda without making her a monster. Ditto Greenman as the judge. Brian played against type as the nebbishy, humorless Tesman. Adam was a great choice for Lovberg, and Annette, the only person onstage I’ve never worked with, was an appropriately sweet and determined Mrs. Whatshername. Madonna and Ellen rounded out the cast in small, but well-played, roles.

Sure, it wasn’t perfect. For one thing, Kris started out a little stilted before falling into a conversational speech pattern. But that seemed to be more nerves than anything else, and it is more a brief situation with that night’s production than an ongoing problem. Something that did seem to be an ongoing problem was one scene where the second room was used. Kris and Adam were onstage, Greenman and Tanman were in the second room. But rather than standing there talking, they were moving around in there, and it was somewhat distracting, particularly because they weren’t on the verge of being involved in the scene on the stage. But that’s it. All in all it’s a very good production, and I would urge anyone in the area to see it.

Oh, and I miss the fountain pop and the Hy-Vee cookies we used to sell at intermission as opposed to the pre-packaged stuff. But that has nothing to do with Hedda.

Linkage Changes

Okay, made some major changes to the links. First, I renamed the first two categories Highly Recommended and Recommended. Masters and Pros just seemed a little, I don’t know, juvenile. Second, I moved Daily Kos from the Highly Recommended to the Recommended. This is due primarily to Kos’ unrelenting criticism of the Iowa caucuses. I’m planning a post on this later, although it may end up in my Post Parts Word file with some other things I’ve planned in the past.

I’ve also taken out Pandragon and added Americablog, Steve Gilliard, and Arthur Silber. All three are good writers, though Americablog tends towards news and the other two towards commentary. Gilliard is on the left, Silber is a libertarian.

Finally, I’ve removed Pooh (cause she never posts) and added Wheezy. She nice, the Wheezy. I've also added Survivor Thoughts, another blog I am a co-author on.

The Kids Are Alright

I was going to blog about this last week, but Mr. Feels Sad resigned from the Englert and that took up most of my words. As regular readers are aware, I was directing a show for the Young Footliters. That show, David Mamet’s The Poet and the Rent, went up the first weekend of March. We had three performances: Friday, March 4; Saturday, March 5; and Sunday, March 6.

Now, if you had talked to me a week before the show (say at poker on Saturday, February 26) you would know that I was fed up. I was not liking the experience and was desperately wanting it to be over. The main problem was the lack of focus the kids had. We really could only rehearse for about an hour each night before they completely lost it and turned into a pack of wildings. My initial hope about the quality of the production was rapidly disappearing.

Then a funny thing happened. We built the set that Saturday, though we did not rehearse. We didn’t rehears again until Monday, when we were on set in costumes with full props. In a word? Magic.

I don’t know if it was getting into costumes, or getting on the set, or working the props. Doesn’t matter. What was a generally unruly pack of kids turned into focused actors and actresses working hard on their performances. Every night that week the show improved. It continued that way through the last performances. Oh sure, there were moments when things got out of hand. But they were few. By and large, the kids were great, and at the end I told Footliters I would gladly direct for them again.

One of the greatest pleasures was seeing how, when all was said and done, I actually seemed to have had an impact on some of their lives. Oh, nothing dramatic. (Heh. Dramatic.) But they seemed to enjoy working with me as much as I enjoyed working with them. I had several newcomers, all of whom came through and gave great first performances. I had a couple of regulars that I was able to work out some nice comedic bits with. And I had two kids, one who was the biggest troublemaker, one who was a consummate pro, give great performances.

It was a good show. I’m definitely proud of it, and I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to say that. I want to do it again, and I was sure I wasn’t going to say that.

I'm Aiming For The Dog Next!

Cat shoots owner. Film at eleven, story at Yahoo,

BATES TOWNSHIP, Mich. - A man cooking in his kitchen was shot after one of his cats knocked his 9mm handgun onto the floor, discharging the weapon, Michigan State Police said.

Yeah. An accident.

Michelle Sand, a spokeswoman at the Iron River hospital, said Stanton was treated there before being transferred to Marquette General Hospital for further treatment. But Marcie Miller, a representative of the Marquette facility, said there was no record of the hospital receiving a patient by that name.

Oh my God! The cats got to Marcie and are forcing her to lie!

A telephone message seeking comment was left Wednesday at Stanton's home.

Well duh, the cats aren’t likely to be answering the phone when one of them is a suspect in a shooting.

State police said he was cooking at his stove when the cat knocked the loaded gun off the kitchen counter behind him.

“I told you to scoop the litter!” the cat was heard to cry before firing.

How Can We Miss You When You Won't Go Away?

State 29 has this comment from the Gazette story about Eric Kerchner retiring.

Eric Kerchner, who was 33 when he was hired by Englert Civic Theatre Group on April 1, 2004, said his resignation is due to criticism from members of the community that has psychologically affected his well-being.

Okay, so maybe the horse's head WAS a bit too much...

Englert - More Thoughts

I wasn’t going to comment on this anymore, but today’s PC article about Kerchner’s resignation and comments I’ve heard on the radio have brought me back in. It isn’t enough for him to go away – he has to make self-serving, disruptive statements as he goes. Sadly, that appears to be par for the course for him. Here’s the first paragraph from the PC article.

After nearly one year as the Englert Theatre's executive director, Eric Kerchner has resigned, saying many in the organization and the community no longer shared his vision for the historic venue.

Give me a break. The community never shared your vision. Maybe some members of the board did, but many did not. And really, if you’re coming into a situation where there has been a community effort to purchase, renovate, and open a facility, shouldn’t you be trying to share the vision of the community that conducted that effort instead of the other way around?

"I wanted to make sure I could get the building open, then I had to assess whether everybody was on board," Kerchner said. "I just felt like everybody was not. I think the organization wanted to go in another direction, and I don't think I was the right person."

In other words, you took the job thinking you could sway the public from what they wanted, then decided to leave when you realized you couldn’t. Nice.

...

Kerchner's resignation comes at the height of the downtown theater's performance schedule, which includes renowned singers such as Leon Redbone and Greg Brown in April. Patrons are unlikely to notice any immediate change in the venue's operations, said Mike Partridge, president of the Englert's board, and the schedule is well set through fall.

I love Leon Redbone. Really, I do. I own Leon Redbone albums and cds. I was one of about, oh, fifty people who bought tickets to see him the last time he was in Iowa City in the late 70s. When he was popular. When people knew his name. When he was still releasing new albums. But renowned? Not so much.

...

"I am sure there will be quite a bit of people that will be happy to know I am leaving," Kerchner said.

Eric? Are you lurking here?

...

And from board member Matt Hayek: "Certain personnel matters just aren't appropriate for public discussion, I think that's fair to say. ... It was nothing short of a Herculean effort, but it was a stressful job. There's no doubt about that."

This doesn’t just fall into the “Things That Make You Go Hmm” category, it falls into the “Things That Make You Go HMMMMMM!” category. But while I am sure our next poker game will be filled with speculation as to what this quote is talking about, it would be wrong to talk about it here.

Really. It would be.

I’m not going to do it, no matter how tempting it would be. Move along.

Challenges in the past year included construction and finances, which resulted in considerable borrowing, as well accommodating national acts and local groups. Kerchner said outside criticism added to internal differences, making it harder for him to lead.

"I was feeling the negativity was coming from more directions than just one," he said, also pointing to the public and the press. "I was feeling that people were losing faith in me."

Yep. Tell people one thing, do another, and then blame everyone else for catching on to how you operate and not being happy about it. Again, nice.

Kerchner said he began sending out his résumé a few months ago, sensing there were people involved in the project that didn't want him around any longer. He has yet to land another job, however.

Now who thinks the horse’s head we left in his bed was a bad idea? Anyone? Anyone?

The rest of the article is fluff stuff – nothing particularly objectionable. Or more pertinently, mockable.

But wait! There is more from other sources. I was listening to KXIC this morning, as is my wont, and heard several news stories on this. In one Kerchner was quoted as saying that promises were made to ICCT before he came on board that were unrealistic, such as not having to pay for rehearsal space, and that ICCT members were upset when he wouldn’t honor them.

First, there weren’t promises. There was an agreement. A contract. Some of the terms of that contract have been honored by the Englert. Some haven’t. But if push came to shove, I am confident we could prove the existence of that contract in court. Second, there was a reason that the amount we offered per ticket worked out to be so much higher than the flat rental rate. That’s because that ticket price would have included funds for rehearsal time. Finally, we were upset not because he refused to honor the terms, but because by his words and deeds he showed that he didn’t think we were a particularly worthy organization for the facility and that he didn’t think community performers in general were appropriate.

I said this in an earlier post, I’ll say it again. If Eric had come out and said “In the first year or so we are open, we will need to rely more heavily on touring performers and higher ticket prices to ensure that we survive, but after we get our feet firmly planted we will start to open up the schedule to more local performers and open up the prices to more reasonably meet expectations” none of us would have questioned what happened. None of us. He said something similar to me on several occasions. That he wouldn’t say that to the community as a whole, particularly as the Englert started to draw some fire for the lack of local performers, is very telling. To me it says he didn’t want to say in public something that he eventually might be held accountable for saying.

I don’t know if anyone is reading these posts beyond my usual readers, anyone like someone from the Englert Board or from the local media, but just in case, it is important to state some things. First, we don’t want to see the Englert fail. Far from it. For one thing, the only hope ICCT has of getting any return on the investment we made in the Englert (and it was an investment – we gave the money with the hope that it would help us grow and ultimately survive) is for the Englert to be a success and for us to be doing shows there. That increases our audience base, which increases our volunteer base, which increases our funding base. We need a healthy, active Englert, and we need it bad. While other community arts groups haven’t tied their future success quite so closely to the facility as ICCT, the same general thought applies. We don’t want to see the Englert fail.

Second, we don’t think the Englert calendar should consist of nothing but community performers. The original Englert group, the original Board, the original volunteers made it clear that a mix of touring productions and community artists would be needed to make the facility viable. What we have been objecting to the past few months is the path the Englert appeared to have taken towards touring productions with local productions as an afterthought when they were thought of at all. It is becoming clear that the trip down this path was Eric’s idea, and that there was resistance within the Englert Board itself about this path. It’s a fine line, but a distinct line: You can be a community performance space that books touring productions in order to stay in business, or you can be a touring performance space that is willing to occasionally book community productions. It’s entirely about the focus. We wanted the former. He wanted the latter.

Finally, we are realists. We, the performing artists of the community, realize that the things that were talked about when the project first started have changed. We realize that goals change, that things that once seemed realistic might not now be realistic. We understand that fact. We are willing to adapt. What we want, though, is a fair and open discussion about these things, not handshakes and press statements designed to get people off the Englert director’s back. We want results, not glad handing.

We want the Englert to succeed, and we want to help it succeed. Let us. Don’t close us out, let us.

More Movies

Interesting news in the Press Citizen today. We’re getting more movie theatres.

Moviegoers looking to catch a flick on the big screen could have more films to choose from at two shopping centers later this year, theater and mall officials said Tuesday.

Tony Tillemans, vice president of St. Cloud, Minn.-based Cinema Entertainment Corp., said the plan is to add six screens to the Cinema 6 theater at Sycamore Mall and two at Coral Ridge Ten Theatres. CEC Theatres owns both complexes as well as Campus Theatres in Old Capitol Town Center.

So far so good. But six paragraphs later we get the real reason for the increase.

Tillemans said a goal is to play more popular movies at both theaters at the same time.

Okay. So instead of, oh, four screens of Star Wars Episode Three: We’re Out Of Good Titles, we’d get eight screens? Great.

But at least they said a goal, not the goal. So maybe we’ll get more first run lesser known films as well. That would be a good thing.

For everyone but the Bijou, that is…

Kerchner Resigns

Eric Kerchner, executive director of the Englert, resigned today. You can find the announcement from the Englert Board of Directors in the Press Citizen here. Here’s some excerpts:

Eric Kerchner, Executive Director of the Englert Civic Theatre, announced that he will resign his position effective April 1, 2005. Kerchner has been Executive Director since April 1 of 2004.

A year. He made it a year. A lot of us suspected that he was not in it for the long haul, but only a year? Sheesh.

"One thing Eric does not get enough credit for is the amount of community-based acts he has booked," said Partridge. A number have already appeared on Englert's stage, and upcoming performances include the Iowa City Community Band, New Horizons Band, Iowa City String Orchestra, City Circle Acting Company, Young Footliters, Old Capitol Chorus, Greg Brown and Dave Zollo. We also have commitments from the Jazz Festival, ArtsFest and Arts Iowa City. And of course we plan to play a large part in Iowa City Community Theatre's upcoming 50th anniversary season."

Now, I don’t mean to rain on anyone’s parade, but I’ve been involved with Footliters for the past six weeks, and closely involved (as in speaking with the President of Footliters every day among other things) for the past two weeks. The Englert was never mentioned except in regards to how expensive it would be to perform there. So I’m confident in saying that the Footliters will be surprised to know they are booked at the Englert. And I’m still a part of the ICCT Board, and while we hope to be able to do performances at the Englert as part of our 50th anniversary season, nothing is set in stone yet and a great many of us are pessimistic about the chances of doing any shows there next season.

Nonetheless, this is good news. I met with Kerchner several times while I was still ICCT President, and I don’t think I ever got the straight truth from him on an issue. He’s a master of telling people what they want to hear and then doing the opposite of what he told them. He was also very clearly opposed to community artists using the facility, no matter what Mike Partridge might say in the press release. So the fact that he is leaving alone is good news. That good news is compounded by that paragraph I cited. Even if it isn’t the most factually accurate piece of writing, the fact that the Englert Board felt they had to say it shows that they know they need to bring more community productions into the building.

So what’s next?

Well, any search for a replacement that doesn’t involve a call to Justine Zimmer to see what she’s doing and to see if she’s interested is going to be an incomplete search. There is no one more capable or appropriate for running the Englert than Justine. Forget her background. She knows the building, she knows the community – in short, she’s perfect.

But that’s for the Englert Board to do. The rest of us need to recognize that things aren’t going to change just because the main obstacle is gone. We need to keep up the pressure, although we probably don’t need to be as public about it. We need to let the Englert Board know that we are supportive of them and interested in using the facility. We need to remind them of the commitment they made to this community, and hold them to that commitment. Now is not the time to let up. Now is not the time to relax.

It is time to smile, though, and wave goodbye to Eric Kerchner. We’re sorry you ever came, we’re glad to see you go, and please, please Eric – do be a stranger.

Englert Again

Well, Matt at Thoughts From The Oasis (see link at right) weighed in on the Press Citizen editorial from last Saturday. At the risk of being me-tooistic (one of the worst traits of the blogging community, if you ask me), this paragraph that Matt points out isn’t getting enough attention.

That Wednesday's gala cost $60 for the performance and $100 for the performance and reception signals to many in the community that the Englert is now for the city's wealthy.

Now, I’ve got nothing against the wealthy. But anyone who was involved in this project in the early stages can confirm what I’m about to say. The city’s wealthy are not the reason why this project got to where it is today.

Not for a lack of trying on our part. We reached out to the city’s wealthy. We made efforts towards them to get them to donate money or time. We knew getting large donations from a few people would make our fundraising job so much easier. And some of the city’s wealthy did donate money and time. Not a whole lot, but some did. But this project was successful because of the many, many, many people who gave a little. People stretching their budgets to give $500 for a seat. Kids collecting cans to turn into change to donate. Elderly making $100 pledges over five years because $20 a year was really all they could afford. Those are the people who made this project a success. By and large (again, with a few notable exceptions), the city’s wealthy didn’t come on board until it looked like the project was going to be a success.

All in all, it’s a pretty good editorial. It could hit harder – it pulls it’s punches at times – but it’s a start. Nonetheless, there are some aggravating things.

Without question, the Englert Theatre refurbishment looks splendid, and its performances enhance downtown. The Englert, for many years to come, will stand as an icon of what can happen when a community comes together to save a be-loved building.

This would have been a perfect spot to hit the point that the community came together for a specific reason – the establishment of a community performance space.

But running through an overwhelming number of visions was a general sense it would be a community venue for community-based performers that would be accessible to by all community members. Right or wrong, some donors are unhappy that hasn't come to be, and this must be of concern to the wider community.

Right or wrong? RIGHT OR WRONG? You mean there is a possibility that it’s wrong to be unhappy that the thing you were promised when you donated your money and time isn’t what you’re getting in return?

To the theater's credit, there have been some local performances, especially during the holiday season.

Yep. Two events that were official Englert fundraising events had local performers.

You know, if the Englert hierarchy had come out and said “In the first year or so we are open, we will need to rely more heavily on touring performers and higher ticket prices to ensure that we survive, but after we get our feet firmly planted we will start to open up the schedule to more local performers and open up the prices to more reasonably meet expectations” none of us would be questioning what is happening. None of us. But they haven’t come out and said that, and it’s telling that they haven’t come out and said that.

But hey, the issue made the editorial page, and not as a letter to the editor. It’s a start, and we need to keep the pressure up.

Why Yes. These Grapes Are Sour.

Sometimes it’s about the greater good, and sometimes it’s personal. As many of you know, the Englert Gala Grand Opening was last week. Now, you would think that this might be a chance to bring together all the people who worked hard to purchase and open the facility. Like, oh, say the original board members. Or the original group of people who were involved before there was an original board. Like, oh, the original Secretary? But I know I didn’t get an invite, and I don’t know of any of the other originals who are no longer involved who did.

But maybe this isn’t just personal. Maybe this is just another example of how the current Englert hierarchy is trying to move away from any connection with the original people and purpose of the theatre. Oh well. At least the Press Citizen is finally on that case. See Kris at Random Mentality, or wait for a post from me tomorrow, for more about that.

I'm Back

A couple of days without Internet access at work, combined with a heavy workload, has kept me away. But I'm back now! Yes sir baby, I'm back!

Fun With Signage

From the marquee on the Canterbury Inn, advertising the House of Lords

“Enjoy a romantic evening in one of our private booths”

Strangely enough, the Pleasure Palace has the same thing on their marquee…

Koufax Awards

The Koufax award winners for liberal blogging have been announced. Many of the winners are people I link to at the right.

I'm posting this for the small subset of regular readers here who probably aren't regular readers of Pokerblogen. Although I don't know why you wouldn't want to be regular readers of that fine blog...

Linkage Time

I don’t like to do the linkage thing. I’ve got no problem with people who do (unless that’s all they do – does Instapundit ever actually, you know, write anything?), but this is supposed to be me, and I don’t know how much “me” you can put in when you are linking to things other people have written. Nonetheless, here’s some linkage for you:

I don’t know what it says about my politics, cause I don’t feel like a centrist, but it seems like I link to things Ed Kilgore posts at New Donkey more than anyone else. There are four great posts up right now that he put up Monday. One is on the ugly smear campaign that has started against AARP. (And pretty soon the folks behind the Swift Boat Veterans will be joining the battle!) The second is on the likely Republican presidential candidate in 2008. The third is on the recent poll that showed Republicans by a 3-1 margin believe George W. Bush is a better president than George Washington. The fourth is on Hunter S. Thompson.

You can see the ad here, along with a piece by Steve Gilliard that captures my thoughts on it.

What the cretins at USA Next don't get is that AARP isn't a campaign. They aren't an adhoc organization which comes together and falls apart in 18 months. They are here today, and will be here tomorrow, with a mailing list in the tens of millions. If this becomes about the survival of the organization, this fight could get much nastier than these folks can imagine. By suggesting that the organazation of widows and veterans can be slandered like a man, well, it's a campaign born of arrogance. They aren't called a powerhouse for no reason.

Ever seen an ad with a dead child and a smoking gun attacking the NRA? No? Not because people haven't been tempted, but because alienating millions of NRA members who aren't gun nuts was not just risky, but stupid. It would backfire, badly.

Well, calling AARP homoloving pacifists is not just insane, but stupid. Because AARP has several Congressmen by the balls and could turn a town meeting into a very nasty affair. Poltics is not for the gentle and easy going. The USA Next guys can pull that shit with politicians, who have limits on their behavior, but there is nothing to stop AARP from unleashing PI's, demanding their allies in Congress investigate them, and all kinds of shit which they cannot imagine. Notice how everyone treats the NRA gently. Well, AARP is spending $10m now, they can up that figure as needed without begging for a dime, and my bet is that they will, because they will see this as a threat to their organizational integrity. AARP has years of chits and favors saved up, and while the Bushies may act like that's no big deal, Congress members from states like Florida and Arizona don't have that luxury.

This is unfathomable to me. One of the key elements in Bush’s victory was the senior vote. It seemed like after years of hearing Democrats say “The Republicans are coming after your Social Security check” seniors said “We don’t believe you” and voted for Bush. So what’s the centerpiece of his domestic agenda? Coming after their Social Security check. But not just their Social Security check, their lobbying organization. And not just by arguing that they are wrong, but by arguing that they support gay marriage and are against the troops. C’mon! WTF!?!?! It’s as if the worst excesses of blogland are working their way up the food chain. No civilized debate, just yelling and screaming and trying to drown out any opposing voice.

Finally, there is this other piece by Steve Gilliard
on outlaw journalism and blogging. Yesterday on Daily Kos, Kos referred to Thompson as the world’s first blogger. I agreed then, and the Gilliard piece explains why:

Which is why Hunter Thompson was a hero. He was honest to a fault and mean to a fault. In a world where journalism has become about asking questions politely and fiction about settling grudges with parents and schoolmates, he was about something far more important.

Blogs follow in the tradition of outlaw journalism, but without the flourishes he liked. It's not about just being outrageous, most of the bloggers are little different than their peers in newspapers, clean living young men and women. They don't get drunk and naked for fun, they pay their bills, stay faithful and maybe have a beer too many. However, it is the spirit of what Thompson meant, to be outside the laws of journalism, not the rules, but the laws. The laws of not offending advertisers and friendly pols. The laws of family friendly copy. Those laws. Not the rules about honesty and decency.

…

Thompson understood the danger of objective journalism, which was a creature of the post-war period, Roosevelt would have laughed at the concept, battered by Father Coughlin and the Chicago Tribune, which is that the dishonest and the disingenious can have their way with the honest and decent. He called for subjective journalism long ago and our temporary experiment of objective journalism is ending, because it only serves the status quo, which is not most of us.

It's odd to think of the outsider Thompson having won the day about what we call journalism, but blogging allows for a world of outlaw journalists, working cheap and fast and supporting each other in ways he couldn't imagine. It's not a bad legacy.

Thompson taught that it was okay to put oneself into the story, that indeed, if you weren’t willing to put yourself into the work, and be honest in doing so, then it probably wasn’t worth doing the work to begin with.

Hunter S. Thompson, RIP

There was madness in any direction, at any hour. You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. And that, I think, was the handle. That sense of inevitable victory over the forces of old and evil. Not in any mean or military sense – we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave.

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look west, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high water mark – that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.

Been my writing idol since high school. First person I ever read who understood that there is a rhythm to words and writing and reading that is as important to the writing process as the rhythm in music. I don't try to write like him, but I do try to incorporate the lessons I learned from him in what I write.

On Gannon/Guckert

Perhaps it’s naïve, perhaps it’s overly optimistic, but I would hope that the background check that was run on anyone trying to obtain access to non-public areas of the White House would catch whether or not a person had ever worked as a male (or female) escort. I would hope that the check would also catch whether or not a person was working with an operating organization (Talon News, Gannon/Guckert’s “employer”, did not begin operations until almost two months after Gannon/Guckert’s first appearance at a White House press briefing.) I would hope that by the time someone was leaked an internal CIA document that a background check would have uncovered whether or not there was anything in the reporter’s background that would make the reporter a blackmail risk. I would hope that before a person received an invitation to an exclusive White House Christmas party two years in a row that that person had been vetted to the point that the vettors would know whether or not the person solicited themselves for $1,200 for a weekend (or $200 an hour, if you can’t afford the whole weekend) to men looking for a butch former military man to top them. I would hope that people would realize that this is an important story, that if this had happened in the Clinton White House the Republicans would already be talking about filing impeachment papers on it. (Side note - saw an interesting piece today where someone said that the biggest reason conservatives hated Clinton was that it was impossible to paint him as gay, the biggest smear they like to put on Democrats.) I would hope that people on all sides could see that, unlike the Jordan/CNN comments that were made offhand and immediately retracted, this is actually significant. But hey. That’s just me.

TV Shows I'd Like To See

Tony Almeida, Private Eye

I'm sure Matt's with me on that one, even if no one else knows what I'm talking about. Just like I'm with him on Joe Vs. The Volcano, even if no one else knows what he's talking about.

Kid Cuteness

So, Friday night we were trying to decide where to go out for dinner. Andrew suggested McDonalds or Burger King, but we said no. He then said Red Lobster. (He and Ethan both have a strong love of seafood that they seem to have been born with. It's understandable with Andrew because of all the time he spent in Alaska. But Ethan has been landlocked [except for trips] since birth.) When asked why he replied "Because it's my favorite restaurant that doesn't give out toys."

Know What Sucks?

What Sucks Is:

Breaking up with your significant other five days before Valentine’s Day.

What Really Sucks Is:

Breaking up with your significant other five days before Valentine’s Day on the ped mall in the area right outside the public library near the fancy-schmancy playground over the noon hour while tons of people are walking by including some on their work break going to Daydreams to pick up their weekly comic book pull list.

Now, I’m willing to believe that he cheated on her. I’m willing to believe he banged her roommate and several other girls on the dorm floor. (I almost replaced banged, the least offensive thing she yelled, with shtupped on the premise that shtupped was inoffensive and funnier. But as I thought about it, it is pretty funny to see a good-looking blonde scream “You banged my roommate” to her ex-boyfriend on the ped mall in the area right outside the public library near the fancy-schmancy playground over the noon hour while on your work break going to Daydreams to pick up their weekly comic book pull list. So I left it in.) I’m willing to believe he took money from her purse. I’m even willing to believe he did go to class that day and just didn’t want to give her his notes cause that’s just the way he is. But I’m not willing to believe he deserves to get yelled at on the ped mall in the area right outside the public library near the fancy-schmancy playground over the noon hour while tons of people are walking by including some on their work break going to Daydreams to pick up their weekly comic book pull list for his sins. He deserves to get yelled at, oh yes, he does, and he certainly doesn’t deserve a hot girlfriend. But he doesn’t deserve it happening in public.

On the other hand, it was a nice bit of street theatre for my lunch break.

Link Tweaks

I've tweaked them slightly, but I'm not going the Greenman/Matt/Kris route and linking to every Iowa blogger. Why? Cause I've decided that I'm not going to link to anyone that I don't visit everyday. (The only exceptions - the blogs for my niece and nephew and Will Kenyon's blog.) If I'm not a regular reader, I don't see the need to send you, my regular readers, there. I know, the linkage thing helps keep the Circle of Blog alive, but I'm still not doing it. Sometimes you just have to be contrary.

Speaking of which, one of these days I'll do a post explaining why I support the Iowa Rainforest project and why I think it will be a success.

Oh, and at somepoint I need to add the Survivor Thoughts link.

Musical Tag Part Whatever

Via Teresa, via Greenman, via Matt, I've been tasked with answering the following four questions about my musical taste.

1. Last CD you bought

Just bought a bunch last week – I got the soundtrack to the Buffy musical (I previously owned it, but it got lost and I needed to replace it), The Very Best of Tom Rush: No Regrets, Elliot Smith’s From A Basement On The Hill, and Dazed and Confused Volume Two – More Music From The Movie.

2. Last song listened to before this message

No Regrets by Tom Rush off the aforementioned The Very Best of Tom Rush: No Regrets. No Regrets is the song I bought the cd for – pure impulse buy on my part. I was walking to the register at Best Buy and it was just sitting on a DVD end cap – someone must have been walking around with it and then sat it down. So I picked it up. It’s an incredibly sad song about lost love, but an incredibly beautiful one as well.

3. 5 songs you listen to a lot or mean something to you.

This is a tough category. I’m sure if I answered this in a week, I’d have some different answers. No order to these, or no more order than just the order they come to me.

How Do You Like Me Now – Toby Keith

I found the lyrics on a break-up song site, but that’s not accurate. The man and woman in the song never dated, and what little relationship they had was over long ago. No. This is the single greatest F-U song of all time, passing the Tubes classic Talk To You Later for that distinction. Here’s the middle section:

When I took off to Tennessee
I heard that you made fun of me
Never imagined I'd make it this far
Then you married into money girl
Ain’t it a cruel and funny world?
He took your dreams and he tore them apart.

He never comes home
And you’re always alone
And your kids hear you cry down the hall
Alarm clock starts ringing
Who could that be singing
It’s me baby, with your wake up call!
How do you like me now?

How do you like me now,
Now that I'm on my way?
Do you still think I'm crazy
Standing here today?
I couldn’t make you love me
But I always dreamed about
Living in your radio
How do you like me now?

Tennessee Plates – John Hiatt

I’ve got to include some Hiatt. But what song? For now, this tale of two losers who decide to steal one of Elvis’ cars

She saw him singing once when she was seventeen
And ever since that day she's been living in between
I was never king of nothin' but this wild weekend
Anyway he wouldn't care, hell he gave them to his friends

Well this ain't no hotel I'm writin' you from
I’m in the Tennessee prison up at Brushy Mountain
Where yours sincerely's doin' five to eight
I’m just a Stampin' out my time makin' Tennessee plates

He Didn’t Have To Be - Brad Paisley

A song about being a stepfather:

I met the man I call my dad when I was five years old.
He took my mom out to the movie, and for once I got to go.
A few months later, I remember lying there in bed.
I overheard him pop the question,
And I prayed that she'd say yes

And then all of a sudden, oh it seemed so strange to me.
How we went from something’s missing to a family.
Looking back all I can say about all the things he did for me,
Is that I hope I'm at least half the dad he didn't have to be

I hope and pray someday Andrew feels this way about me.

Tough Little Boys - Gary Allen

And about being a father. Let’s see if I can make Matt cry!

Scared me to death when you took your first steps,
I'd fall every time you fell down.
Your first day of school,
I cried like a fool and I followed your school bus to town.

Well I didn't cry when old Yeller died
At least not in front of my friends.
But when tough little boys grow up to be
Dads they turn into big babies again.

Well I'm a grown man and as strong as I am
Sometimes it's hard to believe
How one little girl with little blonde curls
Can totally terrify me

Well I know one day I'll give you away
And I'm going to stand there and smile.
But when I get home and I'm all alone,
I'll sit in your room for awhile.
Cause when tough little boys grow up to be
Dads they turn into big babies again

Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic - Police

One for Lesa. My favorite love song of all time, and a song you absolutely MUST crank up as loud as possible when it comes on the radio.

I resolve to call her up a thousand times a day
And ask her if she'll marry me in some old fashioned way
But my silent fears have gripped me
Long before I reach the phone
Long before my tongue has tripped me
Must I always be alone?

Every little thing she does is magic
Everything she do just turns me on
Even though my life before was tragic
Now I know my love for her goes on

4. Who am I going to pass this stick to?

Uhm, since all my local blogging pals are taken, let’s pass this on to some OT friends

Jolene

Kimmah

And, uhm,

Pooh

All The Cool Kids Are Doing It

I too have added Haloscan comments to my blog.

I Am Misinformed Part Duex

So, apparently the PC has some length rule regarding letters. (Thanks Matt for pointing that out.) So here's the shortened version:

I don’t feel misinformed about the original intent of the Englert. After all, I was the first secretary of the Englert Board of Directors. But don’t take my word for it. Here’s the Englert’s mission statement:

The mission of the Englert Civic Theatre, Inc. is to own, maintain and operate the Englert Theatre as a community arts center and performance space, enhancing the vitality of Iowa City's historic downtown by preserving its last historic theater.

The Englert Civic Theatre, Inc. will provide diverse programming, educational opportunities, and exposure to the performing and visual arts. Our focus will be to highlight the talents of local performers, artists, and ensembles.

Mr. Kerchner’s statements indicate that his vision of the Englert is at odds with our original vision. Perhaps that original vision is no longer viable. Still, it would seem that the current Board would at least make an effort towards fulfilling that original vision before abandoning it for the vision of a Little Hancher. After all, abandoning that original vision means abandoning the people who shared that vision, and if the Englert chooses to abandon them, will it be any surprise if they in return choose to abandon the Englert?

David Pierce

Now With 50% More Card Throwing!

Much poker goodness to talk about at Pokerblogen. I'll post an update there today as well.

I? Apparently I Am Misinformed...

I see (via, oh, EVERYONE) that Eric Kerchner responded to my letter to the Englert. Here's the response I'm sending back.

Oooh. Electronic dueling! Isn't it fun?

To The Editor

I don’t care to get into a feud with Eric Kerchner on the letters page of the Press Citizen. Indeed, I wouldn’t be responding to Mr. Kerchner’s response to my letter if it weren’t for several factors. First, I find it interesting that Mr. Kerchner chose to say I was misinformed about the Englert. That’s interesting to me because I was part of the group of people working to buy and renovate the Englert before the theatre closed. It’s interesting to me because I was an original member of the Englert Board of Directors and also the first Secretary of the Englert Board of Directors. I venture that I’m in a far better position to speak to the original purpose of our efforts than Mr. Kerchner.

But don’t take my word for it. Here’s the mission statement from the Englert Web site:

The mission of the Englert Civic Theatre, Inc. is to own, maintain and operate the Englert Theatre as a community arts center and performance space, enhancing the vitality of Iowa City's historic downtown by preserving its last historic theater.

The Englert Civic Theatre, Inc. will provide diverse programming, educational opportunities, and exposure to the performing and visual arts. Our focus will be to highlight the talents of local performers, artists, and ensembles. (emphasis added)

Second, Mr. Kerchner has completely avoided the topic of my letter. I never said that I have any qualms with Leo Kottke (or any other touring artist) performing at the Englert. And I would have had no qualms with Mr. Kerchner stating that the Englert was the perfect venue for a performer like Mr. Kottke. My concerns lies with his statement that Mr. Kottke was the “perfect show” for the Englert. To me, that statement shows either a complete misunderstanding of the reasons we began the effort to save the Englert or a complete disregard for those reasons. Sadly, I think it’s more the latter than the former. It’s hard to tell, though, because Mr. Kerchner doesn’t address those concerns in his response.

Mr. Kerchner’s statements, and the events he has booked, indicate that his vision of what the Englert should be is completely at odds with the original vision of a community arts center and performance space. That may be all well and good – that original vision may not be a tenable foundation for a successful theatre. But his vision is also at odds with the vision we presented to the Iowa City City Council when we asked the council to purchase the facility. It’s at odds with the vision the Englert Board presented to the Internal Revenue Service to obtain non-profit status. It’s at odds with the vision we on the Englert Board presented to the state of Iowa to obtain the CAT grant. And it’s at odds to the vision we presented to the people of Iowa City to obtain their time and money. As such, it would seem that the current Englert Board of Directors would at least want to make an effort towards fulfilling that original vision before abandoning it for Mr. Kerchner’s vision of a “Little Hancher in Downtown Iowa City”. After all, abandoning that vision means abandoning the many people who shared that vision, and if the Englert chooses to abandon them, will it be any surprise if they in return choose to abandon the Englert?

David Pierce
Past President, Iowa City Community Theatre
Past Secretary, Englert Civic Theatre Board of Directors