tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4315050037751888231.post3068585310281345147..comments2023-11-03T02:26:21.279-07:00Comments on For Keats' Sake!: Someone is trying to make music somewhere with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum.Meredithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02275790985990503744noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4315050037751888231.post-11788328277229857792010-02-07T09:07:48.879-08:002010-02-07T09:07:48.879-08:00Nice post... Looks like flash memory is really sta...Nice post... Looks like flash memory is really starting to take off. Hopefully we'll start seeing decreasing solid state harddrive prices in the near future. 5 dollar 32 GB Micro SD Cards for your Nintendo DS flash card... imagine that!<br><br>(Posted on Nintendo DS running [url=http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474978023679]R4i[/url] NetPostv2)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4315050037751888231.post-46742806952768788082009-01-28T13:54:00.000-08:002009-01-28T13:54:00.000-08:00Espaillat would indeed have been a good choice. Ne...Espaillat would indeed have been a good choice. Never heard of Kelleher, though. <BR/><BR/>Last night I spoke with a cellist friend of mine about Yo-Yogate, and she said that her quartet has it in their contract that they won't play outside if it gets colder than 60 degrees F. So I guess we can give Ma & Co. a pass.<BR/><BR/>True that about "Culture." This is all an echo of Kennedy: first time tragedy, second time farce. Frost the Prophet to Alexander the Tenured. <BR/><BR/>Then again, say I, who would be lucky to get a tenured job in the next ten years, the way the market's going...<BR/><BR/>But not totally, actually: Unlike Kennedy, Obama actually wrote his books. Maybe he has better taste in writers than we know? He said he likes Roth -- or Bellow, one of the two.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4315050037751888231.post-44760428737801213422009-01-27T22:58:00.000-08:002009-01-27T22:58:00.000-08:00Sort of. Didn't you hear about how it was a pre-re...<EM>Sort of. Didn't you hear about how it was a pre-recorded performance and they were faking it?</EM><BR/><BR/>Yeah... after I wrote the post. I probably should have gone back and changed that judgment, but I'm too lazy. Still, at least the recording showed a performer's foresight on the part of Yo Yo Ma. I know how cranky a stringed instrument can get in freezing weather, and I can see why he wouldn't want to expose a good cello to that (it probably had fickle gut strings to boot).<BR/><BR/>I heard about the Jay-Z idea. I thought it would have been fun. There are also lots of slam poets out there who would probably have killed for the chance to do it. But the thing is, Obama chose this academic poet for a reason. His admin. is going to foster Culture. A rapper or a slam poet would have been declasse. <BR/><BR/>I think Billy Collins could have done a good job. But I would have picked... hmmm... maybe Rhina Espaillat. Or Rose Kelleher. They both write good metrical stuff. Espaillat is black, if that was an important factor. But like Obama, she doesn't have deep roots in the African-American community. She was born in the Dominican Republic and came to America in the 30's.<BR/><BR/>But mostly she's just a good poet who would have written something that the Average Joe would recognize as a poem.Meredithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02275790985990503744noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4315050037751888231.post-53142172216543816442009-01-27T06:17:00.000-08:002009-01-27T06:17:00.000-08:00And I'm not impressed by the pleas for lenience I'...<I>And I'm not impressed by the pleas for lenience I've been hearing. Aretha Franklin and Yo Yo Ma are artists, and they performed. They fulfilled expectations. </I><BR/><BR/>Sort of. Didn't you hear about how it was a pre-recorded performance and they were faking it?<BR/><BR/>I wake up to talk radio, and on the day after the inauguration, the talk radio host -- he's local, I don't know his name -- was making fun of Alexander by writing his own inaugural poems --one of them was about his lawnmower, if I remember correctly-- which he posted on the internet to rave reviews. And then he goes, "Why didn't Obama just have Jay Z go up there and read something?" And it's true. Jay Z and a lot of rappers --i.e., people who know how to rhyme-- were sitting in the front section. I seriously would pay money to know what Jay Z thought of Alexander's poem. Too bad no journalist was clever enough to ask.<BR/><BR/>Who else would you have picked, instead of Alexander? Christian Wiman? Billy Collins would at least have been funny.Santiagohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12210745471962977363noreply@blogger.com