Alison and I just checked into our accommodations at El Cosmico in Marfa, TX. We can’t wait for our first night in a tin can!
Apparently, Carol sweared that Grandma Hughes lived in a Kozy Coach just like this one…
Another of the trailers for rent by the night at El Cosmico (the cubic shapes next to both trailers are the outdoor! showers):
Beside the Rio Grande on March 19th, we picnicked on canned fish, tortillas, dried fruit, and cabbage salad with raisins.
Later we soaked in a natural hot spring next to the river, which was only about 15 feet wide at that point, and only knee deep.
View of Chisos mountains from our lodge at Big Bend National Park.
Apple Live Blog
Think how cool a trip to Kep, Cambodia could be for the Rector bucket lists. This NYTimes article will give you a flavor. Still unspoiled, with restored French villa hotels and open beaches. French, English, and Russian are fairly common, so between the sibs and sub-sibs, we’d easily get by.
Thoughts?
The latest batch of snaps from the newest resident hipster, Elias William Robb Rector of San Francisco, CA.
Chillaxin’…
I’m jonesin’ for a double-double…animal style, Pop.
So THIS is where you work, eh Dad?
What do you expect me to be able to see from down here, hipster?
Wendell and Carol of Windswept Lane hosting Alison and Eric of Windswept Farm.
After we left Wendell and Carol, Eric and Alison drove the length of SC from Greenville to Beaufort. Here’s a couple of photos of us on the beach at Fripp Island where Alison’s dad lives.
Chico & Rita
Thursday February 9th, 7:00pm Landmark’s Lumiere Theater
1572 California Street — San Francisco Film Society
Cuba, 1948. Chico is a young piano player with big dreams. Rita is a beautiful singer with an extraordinary voice. Music and desire unite them as they chase their dreams and each other from Havana to New York to Paris, Hollywood and Las Vegas. With an original soundtrack by legendary Cuban pianist and five-time Grammy®-winning composer Bebo Valdés, Chico & Rita captures a defining moment in the evolution of history and jazz, and features the music of (and animated cameos by) Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker, Cole Porter, Dizzy Gillespie, Woody Herman, Tito Puente, Chano Pozo, and others.
MY TAKE – Fabulous. The animation perfectly captures Havana of the late ‘40s, and ‘50s before Castro, the color, the street life, the clubs, the cars… just right. Later scenes in other cities are less successful, but plenty good. (How do you draw Las Vegas of the 50s???) And the jazz is plentiful and superb.
I’m in NYC for work and just took the 7 express train out to Flushing, New York’s vibrant new “Chinatown” where many of the newest immigrants have settled. It’s bright, loud, crowded, and has some of the best Chinese food in the City. I thought y’all might like to see what I got. Everything was fantastically good, and “buns” are actually Xiao Long Bao, or Shanghai style soup dumplings, and they were as good as I remember them from our visit to China. High praise.
Its said that Winston Churchill loved these phrases. They are technically figures of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected; frequently humorous.
For years I had noticed the mention of Rod Serling’s mid-50‘s video play and film “Patterns”. It is often suggested as an even darker, more realistic side of “Man in a Grey Flannel Suit” and stands in stark contrast to the current darling of the period, Mad Men.
As a fan of Twilight Zone, I could see Serling’s writing craft and character development clearly on display in this gritty film about big business, ambition, deferential power grabbing. Amazingly, though produced nearly 60 years ago, the human greed for power at the cost of humanity resinates today as the antithesis of the Occupy Wall Street ideals.
It tells the story of the fierce and corrosive competition that exists in the executive branch of Ramsey & Co., a New York industrial colossus headed by Walter Ramsey, its cold, designing and ruthless chief. It is the saga, too, of Bill Briggs, his longtime second in command, who is swayed by human values as well the industrial exceptionalism ideal. And, it is the case of the protagonist Fred Staples, a comparatively youthful industrial engineer brought in by Ramsey, ultimately to replace Briggs.
For its time period, the ending is very non-hollywood, as the thoroughly devastated Staples, intent on quitting, nevertheless takes on his late predecessor’s weighty responsibilities. (Spoiler alert!)In a compelling last sequence, Ramsey, unregenerate as ever, dares our hero to compete for control of the company, while allowing Staples to operate under is own rules of conduct, as long as the ultimate goal is the growth and expansion of Ramsey & Co. Staples’ defiant acceptance of this challenge is especially unusual for this time period, when the general view of business was as benign benefactors. But it is true to the film’s premise, and a more likely representation of what happens in the mahogany paneled executives suites. It makes for forceful drama, without a minimum of melodramatic overtones.
The cinematography and art direction for this film — while obviously produced on a limited budget — reflect taste, wealth and the tension of this frenetic world of business. But the difference between this and many other similar films of the time is present in Serling’s words and ideas, giving it power and distinction, and making “Patterns” a nuanced snapshot of big business.
Available on Netflix, and shown occasionally on TCM. See it.
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