I was fortunate enough to attend the US premiere of Joseph Marx’s Eine Herbstsymphonie (“Autumn Symphony”) in New York City on December 7, 2008, performed by the American Symphony Orchestra. The work is regarded as Marx’s masterpiece, but aside from a performance in Austria a couple of years ago, had languished forgotten since its last… Continue reading Joseph Marx – Eine Herbstsymphonie
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Alas, No More Excerpts From The Flashman Papers (?)
A continuous joy in my life since the early 1970s has been my anticipation of the next installment of the memoirs of that Victorian cad Harry Flashman, as related by George MacDonald Fraser. If you have read any of the Flashman books, you probably know exactly what I mean. If you haven’t read them, then… Continue reading Alas, No More Excerpts From The Flashman Papers (?)
Subliminal Message in McCain Response to Obama Infomercial
Didn’t anyone notice in McCain’s response ad to Obama’s infomercial last night that it contained what appears to be a nearly subliminal photo of Obama wearing a white Muslim-style hat? During the ad there are a number of still photos shown, separated by a loud old-fashioned flash camera sound. One of those photos, shown for… Continue reading Subliminal Message in McCain Response to Obama Infomercial
Visit to the Edgar Rice Burroughs Collection in Louisville
Since moving to Louisville, Kentucky I have always wanted to visit the Edgar Rice Burroughs collection at the Ekstrom LIbrary on the campus of the University of Louisville. As my daughter Allison is a student there, and as I had a week off, we went together a couple of weeks ago. The collection is maintained… Continue reading Visit to the Edgar Rice Burroughs Collection in Louisville
The Primary Season Was Too Long
I think one possible explanation for the “Palin Phenomenon” is that the whole primary process took much too long. This has been the longest election ever. You may recall it began just after the last midterm election, i.e. 2 years ago! I believe that such a long process sucked all the life out of the… Continue reading The Primary Season Was Too Long
VP Selection Process Is Flawed
It seems ridiculous that we put our presidential candidates through a 2 year vetting process, and then accept that the second in command can just appear out of nowhere, 2 months before the election. Sure, constitutionally the Veep has only 2 jobs, president of the Senate (which boils down to casting an occasional tie-breaking vote)… Continue reading VP Selection Process Is Flawed
No Religious Test
“…no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States…” US Constitution Article VI Section 3. So what was the Rick Warren thing last night with Obama and McCain? How far have we fallen. Not only is belief in imaginary beings a prerequisite to becoming… Continue reading No Religious Test
Can the Upper Common Pathway in AVNRT be Ablated?
I recently performed an ablation on a 67 y/o woman with AVNRT. She had inducible common variety (slow-fast) AVNRT on isoproterenol, and ablation was performed in the usual slow pathway location. Several burns were done, because no junctional rhythm was seen. Surprisingly, she had no inducible AVNRT on isoproterenol after the ablations, despite being easily… Continue reading Can the Upper Common Pathway in AVNRT be Ablated?
English-Only Fans Need To Learn English
Some of the people pushing English as the official language of the United States barely can speak it themselves. I am especially upset about the trend over about the last 10 years of what I call “pronoun confusion.” I refer to this kind of statement: “John drove Mary and I to the mall.” Argggggggh! Who… Continue reading English-Only Fans Need To Learn English
Configuring OpenSuse 10.3 Part 3
Setting up a Linux system always involves some customization, and so to avoid reinventing the wheel each time you do it, I urge you to keep an installation diary that records exactly the steps you took to achieve your perfect system. The previous 2 parts of this series of posts described setting up dual booting… Continue reading Configuring OpenSuse 10.3 Part 3