danajohnhill.org | Hard Times Come Again No More

Huzah! I just got finished watching John Kerry’s speech at the DNC, and it was a home run. If you watched that speech and still say, “I don’t know if he’s [whatever] enough to be president”, then you are either: a.) rich, b.) racist, c.) homophobic, d.) totally oblivious to what’s happening around you. And none of those are good things. Now, I suppose it is possible that you simply disagree with Democrats’ stance on abortion. I understand, and respect your views. But, be realistic. Is abortion really the most important issue right now? It’s time people think about the big picture. That picture looks a lot better with John Kerry. Huzzah!

Woo! Miriam and I went to Disney World on Friday, July 23. Her sister’s friend had an arrangement with a park employee to get us in for a reduced fee. It felt very much like an immigrant smuggling operation, but it worked. I would rather give $35 to a hard working employee making $10 an hour than give $50 to a huge corporation. It was hot and crowded, but very good overall. In fact, my only real complaints besides the heat were that I ate WAY too much for lunch at Pecos Bill’s and was in pain for hours afterward, and the wait for Space Mountain was an hour and twenty minutes for a two minute and fifty-four second ride. There was a family in line with a little kid named Kevin, who repeatedly bumped into me while twisting and twirling himself on the hand-rails. His parents knew he was doing it, and told him to stop, but they weren’t very sincere about it. Splash Mountain scared me the most with that big drop. I loved the carousel, Pirates of the Caribbean, the relaxing train ride with the steam locomotive and Big Thunder Mountain was good. The Jungle Cruise was weak. The brass band was great, the fireworks were nice after the excellent parade, and Snow White was so pretty.

Sandi’s visit concluded on Wednesday. It was nice having her again, and we did much good hang-outery. Her relocation to Jacksonville promises to increase fun.

Actually, no sooner had Sandi left, than Saturday came and she was back in town, this time with Jeff. Dan, whom I haven’t seen in months was also there at Steve’s new house. Dan brought his girlfriend, Michelle. Sure, she’s young. Sure, I was ten years old the year she was born. But she seemed very nice. Our game of Cranium will live on in our memories, as will the incredibly loud metal-rap at the Reitz Union Gameroom.

So did you think that that eBay auction for the Sibelius symphonies I posted last time was crazy? Well, look at the following recently-completed eBay auctions for Joshua Bell CDs: Presenting Joshua Bell apparently is his debut disc; the Saint-Saëns and Lalo concerti with the OSM is conducted by Charles Dutoit; and the Tchaikovsky and Wieniawski concerti feature Vladimir Ashkenazy and the Cleveland Orchestra. Obviously, these CDs have been out of print for some time. A less understandable sum was fetched for Bell’s recording of the Prokofiev concerti. These recordings, again with Dutoit directing the OSM, have been reissued on a Decca Trio coupled with Ashkenazy’s recordings of the Prokofiev piano concerti for around $20. Now, I know that Bell is popular, since I have been to one of his recitals, and I see how the fans go crazy for him. As I wrote in a previous post, he was very friendly and exceedingly generous with his time. His fans seem to be exceedingly generous with their money. The combined total selling price of the above three discs is over $250.

Filed under: Friends, Gainesville, Music, Politics, Rantings, Travel on July 31st, 2004 | No Comments »

I just added the new Links page. This is really more of a resource for me. I decided that I needed easy remote access to the websites I like. This way, if I am on a public computer, or one where I cannot save bookmarks, I can just go to my own links page, and visit sites I enjoy. You are welcome to use it if you’d like.

Sandi is in town now, and staying at our place. We all played a game called “Briscas” which uses a special deck of cards. It is apparently a very old game, dating from the fifteenth century. I don’t understand it very well, but managed to win for the first time, even though I have played Miriam many times before. We watched Wet, Hot American Summer later on. That movie’s great.

Whoa! Look at this eBay auction. This disc was part of a Decca cycle which Herbert Blomstedt recorded with the SFSO in the mid-1990s. Classical CDs are often taken out of print quickly, and many are not released in the USA at all. When that happens, these rare discs can become quite valuable in the used market. I don’t wish to disclose here how much I have spent for some hard-to-find CDs, but let’s just say it was nothing as high as $288. That is just over-the-top. Then again, if I had the money….

Update: I have to scale back on food, because these ice cream cones are making my clothes not fit. I just cannot help myself. They are so good. Last night I bought some mint flavored ice cream, so we’ll see how that is in a cone. I see Publix has also added a new line of super-premium ice cream. I’ll wait for a sale to try that. $3.99 for a quart is kind of steep.

We did go to St. Augustine Sunday, July 10. It was less than ideal, however, as it rained. Oh, and Anastasia State Park is a filthy hell hole. Clean up after yourselves, people!

Filed under: Food, Friends, Travel, Website on July 26th, 2004 | No Comments »

Ice Cream is a favorite treat of mine. In Europe people seem to eat ice cream all the time, and vendors sell it everywhere. I don’t know why, but I never really ate my ice cream in a cone when I was home.  Until now. Oh, man, Publix waffle cones are GREAT! I can’t stop eating them. In an related story, I weigh 300 pounds.

Independence Day weekend was fun and busy. Saturday afternoon flew by, and before I knew it it was time to see fireworks on campus. We took along some folding chairs and soft drinks and listened to some bad bands. I give them a great deal of credit for trying. They certainly gave it their all, and they were fun to watch. The things they can do with fireworks now are amazing. There was one that exploded into the shape of a heart with an arrow through it. The place was crowded, but other than the stupid lady by us that kept loudly complaining about the music playing through the fireworks, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

Sunday took us to St. Petersburg, where we visited briefly with my grandma before going to my aunt and uncle’s house for barbecue. A&W Cream soda is great, and even if swarms of flies laid their eggs on my hotdogs they were still good. I ate way too much. We played a fun game in the miserable heat, and relaxed later by feeding squirrels and blue jays. Julie’s back yard is like a nature preserve, it seems. Birds, lizards, and squirrels are everywhere. The squirrels ate from our hands. I have become increasingly fascinated by cardinals recently, so I was very happy to see that a mom and dad cardinal live in Julie’s back yard. Although the blue jays (which I also like) and the doves were interested in the peanuts we were giving out, the cardinal wouldn’t get too close. But he was ever so pretty.

We visited more with my grandma on Monday and listened to some music before the drive home. Eating lunch in Pasco County divided the trip in two and made it less awful, though my Pizza Hut Express meal didn’t meet expectations.

This week is going by quickly. Perhaps a trip to the beach this weekend is in order.

Filed under: Animals, Family, Food, Travel on July 10th, 2004 | No Comments »

Terrible news: my quiet and harmless neighbor, Goldie Weaver was savagely murdered June 28.  I left for work in the morning with her resting in her web, and when I returned in the evening her web was gone, and one of her legs was broken on the stairs.  I have no leads as to who may be responsible, but whoever might have done such a cruel thing surely has no heart.  What makes this brutal act all the more tragic is that I had been planning to re-locate Goldie to a pleasant woodland spot to avoid her running into trouble when pest-control came to spray the apartment.  I didn’t see any sign that pest-control was in the building, so I don’t consider them prime suspects.  But I feel quite bad that I didn’t act sooner.  Perhaps Goldie might still be alive.

I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 on June 26.  I bought my tickets way ahead of showtime to avoid the certain sell-out.  Arriving at the theater a half hour early, we still encountered a line that stretched all the way across the lobby.  Apparently Bush-haters are a punctual lot.  A well-mannered group as well, because there was none of the usual rudeness that typically enrages me and makes going to the movies an unpleasant experience.  There were, of course, frequent gasps of astonishment and horror during the film’s numerous shocking moments; A great deal of laughter accompanied the film’s highlighting of Bush’s many foibles.  It seems pointless to say that this movie “isn’t fair”.  If by “unfair” you mean that the conservatives weren’t given equal time in the film to make their points, then, no, the film isn’t fair, and wasn’t meant to be.  The fact of the matter is this: on almost every radio station and television channel in this country, the Bush Administration’s agenda has been discussed in terms bordering on unabashed praise.  While many experts disagreed with the Administration’s claims of alleged WMD and Iraq/Al Qaeda ties, and while millions of Americans–and tens of millions of people around the world–protested, the media in this country acted as though it was its patriotic duty to side with Bush during his march to war.  If people want to hear the Bush Administration’s point of view they need only turn on the television: it’s everywhere.  It’s finally getting to the point where there is open opposition, but during the period of “major combat operations” and in the run-up to the war in Iraq, anyone who second-guessed the Administration was shouted down and accused of lack or patriotism at the very least, and, on conservative talk radio, of treason.  So here we have a paradox, and that is that during the run-up to the war, if you were heard to voice opposition, you were ridiculed.  Consequently, many legislators went along with it.  Now, when the claims of the Administration all seem to be false (remember when Cheney repeatedly claimed that we knew with certainty exactly where the WMD were, and that we would be greeted as liberators?), and the predictions of the skeptics have all come to pass, legislators who now announce they were betrayed are reminded of how they once supported the war.  Of course they once supported the war!  Those who didn’t were subject to public humiliation.

I know that my statements appear biased against Bush.  But it isn’t me who is biased against Bush.  The facts are biased against Bush.  I know that the Bush Administration has made countless statements that are patently false about Iraq, and just about every other subject for that matter.  The media spends little time correcting these lies.  When an article or report is written which serves to illustrate the misinformation, space is also given–in an effort to prevent the conservatives from crying “liberal media”–to present the Administration’s point of view, which, again, they use to spread more lies.  That Bush’s approval ratings are at their lowest of his presidency is really no surprise considering the terrible events that are occurring because of his decisions.  What surprises me is how they are not even lower.  The reason they are not lower is because the Administration persists in deflecting responsibility, and continues to place blame on others.  But a hard rain’s gonna fall, and Bush will eventually pay.  They may never get what they deserve, but they won’t win in November.  Mark my words: barring some sort of election trickery or terrorist act that results in widespread fear-mongering on the part of the Administration, Bush will lose.  And it won’t be by the two- to three percent that some are predicting.  It will be by ten- to fifteen percent.

Filed under: Animals, Politics, Rantings on July 3rd, 2004 | No Comments »