Baron Dave Romm
2009 Minnesota Fringe Festival
By Baron Dave Romm
Sorry, Bartcop Entertaiians, I'm still at the 2009 Minnesota Fringe Festival and have seen 40 shows in 10 days. I leave you with a picture to remember me by until next week:
Baron Dave Romm taking a picture of Dave Stagner
Bedlam Theatre, Fringe-For-All #1, 7/13/09
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Susan Estrich: Happy Endings (creators.com)
I know. The North Koreans are using President Bill Clinton's visit for all their own reasons. Attention world: Here we are, our leader is alive, Bill Clinton is paying his due.
Froma Harrop: Cash for Clunkers Means 'Ca-Ching' for Detroit (creators.com)
This is what I told my friend Frank: Under the "cash for clunkers" program, you could get more money for your '93 Mercury Grand Marquis than it was worth - up to $4,500 if you used it to buy a new vehicle with much better gas mileage.
"What would they do with the Merc?" Frank asked.
Scott Burns: Representation Without Taxation (assetbuilder.com)
"No taxation without representation!" That verbal tinder started the fires of our revolt against British rule more than 200 years ago. Today we are disastrously living with the opposite - representation without taxation.
Froma Harrop: No, Red States Are Not Better Than Blue States (creators.com)
In an entertaining but silly political game, partisans score points by comparing statistics of so-called red states and blue states. Conservative Ross Douthat does that in a recent column, "Blue-State Blues." Aroused, liberals came back with their own numbers, many of which did not prove much, either.
David Marburger and Dan Marburger: The free ride that's killing the news business (latimes.com)
Copyright law has to change to prevent Internet websites from undercutting newspapers by freely lifting stories that are gathered at a hefty cost.
Andrew Tobias: Check THIS Out (andrewtobias.com)
Listen. I know it's August, and I know there's always some controversy or other. But this health care fight is really important in almost the same way the Bush-Gore fight was important.
Arthur Delaney: Denied Claims Placed At Health Insurance CEO's Doorstep (huffingtonpost.com)
"They kept telling my local pharmacy...'Oh we're just waiting for one more letter, or we're just waiting for one more script, and then we'll start paying,'" Bailey said. "This went on for six months, and December 4th both the pharmacy and I received a letter from United Health Care saying they deemed it medically unnecessary and that they were not going to pay any of it. I tried to explain to them that if I do not have this, I will die. And the only response she gave me was, 'OK.'"
roger ebert's journal: The gathering Dark Age
As a remedy to pull us out of this nosedive into a gathering Dark Age, I have a simple proposal: Double teacher salaries and cut class enrollments in half.
"Some Things That Meant the World to Me" by Joshua Mohr: A review by Sheila Ashdown
Joshua Mohr's debut novel is that rare literary gem: the kind of story that envelops you so wholly, you forget that you're reading. The kind of book you want to lend to everyone you know -- except that you can't bear to part with it. I haven't felt this enamored of a book since I first encountered Denis Johnson's 'Jesus' Son' more than a decade ago, and that is one of my "desert island" books.
Geoff Brown: "Exclusive: when Alistair Cooke filmed Charlie Chaplin" (timesonline.co.uk)
It was the summer of 1933. Alistair Cooke - born in Salford, honed by Cambridge, Harvard and Yale - was a cocky 24-year-old planning a first trip to California. He told The Observer, and explained that he had arranged interviews with Hollywood's finest, though he'd done nothing of the sort. Would the paper like some articles from him? The Observer said yes; when approached, the interviewees said yes too.
Bill Gibron: "Don't You Forget About Me: John Hughes (1950 - 2009)" (popmatters.com)
Hughes melded the nostalgic feel good facets of life in high school with the real world traumas facing contemporary youth, combining comedy, sex, partying, parents, and suburban Chicago good times into the viable visual yearbook of our lives. And more times than not, he had a bitching soundtrack loaded with popular and unusual musical acts to accompany it.
David Bruce: The Most Interesting People Who Live Life, Volume 2 (lulu.com; $1.25 download)
This book contains 250 anecdotes, including this one: As a child, Abbe Lane often visited her paternal grand-mother for the weekend. Her grandmother was thrifty, and she found a subtle way of making young Abbe clean her plate-anything that Abbe didn't eat at breakfast appeared on her plate for lunch, anything that Abbe didn't eat at lunch appeared on her plate for dinner, and anything that Abbe didn't eat at dinner appeared on her plate for breakfast. Years after growing up, Ms. Lane says she orders small servings at restaurants out of a fear that if she doesn't clean her plate she will have to eat the leftovers at her next meal.
Hubert's Poetry Corner
Bill Clinton's Secret Gift for Kim Jung-il
Only the zEN mAN is rumored to have the provocative photos?
The Weekly Poll
Current Question
The "A little better all the time (It can't get no worse)" Edition
How would you rate the particulars of your personal financial/material situation compared to 6 months ago?
1.) Better
2.) Worse
3.) About the same
Feel free to comment along with yer answer
Send your response to
Results tomorrow.
wrote:
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and a bit cooler than seasonal.
Rapid Change In Late-Night Viewing
David Letterman
David Letterman is king of late-night television again.
You just won't hear him or CBS crowing about it anytime soon - not after NBC gave the crown to Conan O'Brien based on one week's ratings, much to their regret now. Letterman started his vacation last week with a four-week winning streak, the first since 1995.
It just all goes to show that late-night TV is experiencing remarkable changes in viewing habits, with more than Letterman and O'Brien in the mix. They're even competing with machines; DVR playbacks of prime-time shows is a growing habit.
The headline, though, is what is happening at the "Tonight" show.
With O'Brien, it has become a home for young viewers, and preciously few others. He's a particular hit among men up to age 34, and is winning among the 18-to-49-year-old demographic that NBC uses as the basis for its ad sales. Yet the show has lost 2 million viewers in a year: Jay Leno's "Tonight" averaged 4.6 million viewers each night during the last week of July 2008; a year later, O'Brien had 2.6 million.
David Letterman
Introduces 3D Film Award
Venice Film Festival
The storied Venice Film Festival is updating its awards lineup by offering a prize for the best 3D movie of the year.
Organizers said in a statement Saturday that nine films will compete for the new award at the festival's 66th edition on Sept. 2-12.
Organizers last week announced that 23 films would be vying for the festival's top award, the Golden Lion.
The entries are all world premieres and include Michael Moore's documentary on the financial crisis, called "Capitalism: A Love Story," and former Gucci designer Tom Ford's directorial debut, "A Single Man," starring Colin Firth and Julianne Moore.
Venice Film Festival
Horseback LA:
Griffith Park
For most tourists, visiting Los Angeles includes stopping in Hollywood and making a side trip to Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. Getting around means dealing with traffic and freeways.
But in historic Griffith Park, known for the famous Hollywood sign that overlooks the city, you can hop on a horse for a sunset ride and leave the clogged streets and smog behind. The ride includes a panoramic view of the San Fernando Valley and dinner at a Mexican restaurant with your horse hitched to a nearby post.
"It's like being out in the country in the city," Griffith Park Horse Rentals owner Julie Schad said. "It's a change of pace. A lot of people come from out of town and they want something different. It's a popular ride."
The horseback tour, led by a guide, starts with a 90-minute ride up one of the hills in Griffith Park, where you'll also find hiking trails and Griffith Observatory, which houses science exhibits and a planetarium. The observatory has been the setting for numerous movies, including the James Dean classic "Rebel Without a Cause," and a bust of the actor welcomes visitors.
Griffith Park
Baby News
Isaiah Timothy Hasselbeck
Elisabeth Hasselbeck of "The View" is the mother of a third child. Hasselbeck gave birth Sunday afternoon in a New York hospital to a boy, named Isaiah Timothy. She's married to former NFL player Tim Hasselbeck.
It's the couple's second son. Grace Elisabeth is 4, and Taylor Thomas is 20 months old.
Isaiah weighed in at 7 pounds, 7 ounces.
Isaiah Timothy Hasselbeck
Crashes Due To Overload
Panda Cam
The San Diego Zoo's pandas have become such cyber-stars that their Panda Cam got caught in a popularity crunch.
The zoo says the online camera feed, which monitors 300-pound mom Bai Yun and her 4-ounce, 1-day-old cub, crashed Thursday morning because of increased Internet traffic. The zoo's blogs went down about the same time.
Zoo spokeswoman Jenny Mehlow said the cam was down for about 30 minutes. The blogs were down until Friday evening.
Panda Cam
Tour Bus Abortion
MercyMe
The Christian rock band MercyMe cancelled a show Saturday in the St. Louis area after its tour bus collided with a car in northeastern Indiana, killing two passengers in the car and injuring the pregnant car driver, who had a miscarriage.
No one in the band was seriously injured, sustaining what they described as "minor bumps and bruises." A news story on the crash and a photo of the damaged front of the bus were posted on the band's Web site Saturday.
Fort Wayne police Officer Liza Thomas said witnesses told police the bus was going through a green light about 1:15 a.m. when the car made a left turn in front of it. The band from the Dallas area had been in Fort Wayne for a Friday night show at Parkview Field.
MercyMe
Black Hole Or Crucial Machine?
Large Hadron Collider
When launched to great fanfare nearly a year ago, some feared the Large Hadron Collider would create a black hole that would suck in the world. It turns out the Hadron may be the black hole.
The world's largest scientific machine has cost $10 billion, has worked only nine days and has yet to smash an atom. The unique equipment in a 17-mile (27-kilometer) circular tunnel with cathedral-sized detectors deep beneath the Swiss-French border has been assembled by specialists in many countries, with 8,970 physicists eagerly awaiting the startup.
But despite the expense, thousands of physicists around the world, many of whom hope to conduct experiments here, insist that it will work and that it is crucial to mankind's understanding of the universe.
The European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN, said Friday it would restart the collider in November at half power under pressure from scientists eager to conduct experiments to unlock secrets of the universe.
But spokesman James Gillies told The Associated Press they would have to shut down yet again next year to finish repairs so that the Large Hadron Collider can operate at full energy of 7 trillion electron volts - seven times higher than any other machine in the world.
Large Hadron Collider
Vast Expanses Melt
Arctic Ice
The Arctic Ocean has given up tens of thousands more square miles (square kilometers) of ice on Sunday in a relentless summer of melt, with scientists watching through satellite eyes for a possible record low polar ice cap.
From the barren Arctic shore of this village in Canada's far northwest, 1,500 miles (2,414 kilometers) north of Seattle, veteran observer Eddie Gruben has seen the summer ice retreating more each decade as the world has warmed. By this weekend the ice edge lay some 80 miles (128 kilometers) at sea.
"Forty years ago, it was 40 miles (64 kilometers) out," said Gruben, 89, patriarch of a local contracting business.
Global average temperatures rose 1 degree Fahrenheit (0.6 degree Celsius) in the past century, but Arctic temperatures rose twice as much or even faster, almost certainly in good part because of manmade greenhouse gases, researchers say.
Arctic Ice
Weekend Box Office
'G.I. Joe'
Inspired by the Hasbro action figure, Paramount's "G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra" took command of the weekend box office with a $56.2 million debut domestically, according to studio estimates Sunday. "G.I. Joe" also took in $44.3 million overseas for a worldwide total of $100.5 million.
Meryl Streep's Julia Child tale "Julie & Julia" opened a solid No. 2 as an alternative for adult crowds with $20.1 million. While "G.I. Joe" was the first choice for young males, women 35 and older were the main audience for "Julie & Julia."
Harsh reviews for "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" earlier this summer prompted Paramount to skip critic screenings for "G.I. Joe" and put the movie in theaters sight-unseen by most reviewers.
Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Final figures will be released Monday.
1. "G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra," $56.2 million.
2. "Julie & Julia," $20.1 million.
3. "G-Force," $9.8 million.
4. "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince," $8.9 million.
5. "Funny People," $7.9 million.
6. "The Ugly Truth," $7 million.
7. "A Perfect Getaway," $5.8 million.
8. "Aliens in the Attic," $4 million.
9. "Orphan," $3.73 million.
10. "500 Days of Summer," $3.7 million.
'G.I. Joe'
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