Monthly Archives: February 2012

Cathy pulled in a miserable cold and cough, and she was in a sharing mood. Dang.

I mailed out 125 envelopes with info about our upcoming 50th high school reunion. Maybe after this mailing there will be light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe not. This was followed by 206 emails with the same information. That’s $92.70 the post office did not receive. This must be why they are closing post offices and laying off 27,000 employees.

Worse yet, I had one of the reunion committee members call for the best price to print 125 packets of information for the postal mailings. The cheapest bid was $285; the most expensive – $610. I printed all of that for a lot less than $50.

I feel terrible at the thought of people losing their jobs, but where is the money going to come from that keep them employed in non-competitive jobs?

I forwarded two videos today: the first was the animated film that won an Oscar last night – http://theguardiansbooks.com/FlyingBooks/?utm_source=Publishers+Weekly%27s+Children%27s+Bookshelf&utm_campaign=ef3ae25b53-Agency+-Campaign+Name+-YYYYMMDD&utm_medium=email ;

the second was a homework assignment from an art school in Jerusalem – http://vimeo.com/25149893 .

They each, in their way illustrate pieces of the disturbing puzzle pointed to by my reunion mailing dilemma and many of the discussions Jeron Lanier brings up in You Are Not a Gadget. Everything seems connected, but solutions are not easy or readily available. The best I seem to be able to do is observe.

That’s on the way to a solution, but not a solution.

Last week we drove to Denver to see the Lizards and Snakes Exhibit at the Museum of Natural History http://www.dmns.org/lizards-and-snakes/exhibition-features/species-on-display/

Meredith’s book, Slither and Crawl was prominently featured in the museum store and outside the exhibit. It’s a beauty!

We wanted to time things so that we also got to see an IMAX film on flying dinosaurs in 3D: http://www.dmns.org/imax/current-films/flying-monsters-3d

All of this had to be done before arriving at Chelsea and Neal’s house as they returned from work. The additional bit of good timing involved waving goodbye to the hoards of school buses as they left the parking lot and being able to slip into the featured Lizard/Snake exhibit before the VIP Members showing that afternoon.

Tighter than a bullfighter’s pants…but we did it!

Vivi had a bit of a cold, but with a little Tylenol and LOTS of strokes from her caring parents, the drama of sickness was dialed down to human levels. Oh, and the movie Finding Nemo helped a bit also.

We brought the leftover brisket from our meal with the neighbors, and really enjoyed our visit as usual.

I met with my drawing group, and this time we all explored different facets of a small illustration brought again by Judy Judy who is making a book on the subject. The illustration shows a woman in a 1960s red suit with a pill box hat looking back at a railroad station. She is carrying one suitcase and a shopping sack. Judy is fascinated by this work and has had all her friends write observations and stories about what they think is going on in the illustration.

We drew what we thought was going on. For instance, Ron Lupton sensed danger in the piece and had her fleeing the scene much like Eliza fled across the frozen Ohio river in Uncle Tom’s Cabin.

I broke the illustration down as if it was a design for stained glass (I’m still finishing the birds design for Laurie’s window to be made by Shannon).

Others did little painted sketches or pencil drawings. Judy will include these in her book.

Thursday night, Cath and I went to see In the Next Room (or the Vibrator Play) at the Fine Arts Center. http://www.broadway.com/shows/next-room-or-vibrator-play/

We thought it was pretty good – actually a pretty well-written play and only good performances from the actors. The set and the story really made the entertainment.

Christine and Doug Massey arrived from Kansas to look at houses in Colorado Springs. She has been assigned to Ft. Carson and both are excited about living in the Springs for several years and maybe retiring here. We went to La’aus for Mexican/Hawaiian tacos and then we headed off to the Philharmonic for a great night of Mozart, Prokofiev and Mendelssohn. Yum.

On the Jan. 30 post I mentioned we went to a mola exhibit and that Cathy was going to contact the curator of that show. Today we met Joyce Cheney at the Dogtooth Cafe for espresso and a chat about our mola.

I think she was fascinated about several things: 1. ours is old (early half of the 20th century), 2. it is large (must have been a very large woman to wear a blouse panel this big), and 3. has the first example of mola design of ric-rack on the dresses of the figures in the mola (difficult stitchery). Clearly ours was not made for the tourist trade. She pointed to several symbols which could either depict the spirit world or the mundane daily world of the Kuna or both depending on the thought of the woman who sewed it.

Molas are SO different from any craft or art I’ve experienced. We are going to order a book and dig even deeper.

I’ve been stretching the “toy” theme quit a bit. Can I get away with it one more time?

I blogged about Jaron Lanier sharing his perspective on the toys he created. Yesterday, we had a different kind of sharing going on at our house. After three days of preparation, Cathy hosted the Woman’s Literary Club. This is the oldest women’s organization in Colorado dating back to 1892 (Cath has been a member for a mere 15 years). So, how many layers are there to sharing exemplified by just this club?

On three year cycles, each member delivers a 40-minute paper on a shared theme for that year, the next year the member just attends and then must host the group on the next year. Hosting means getting out the best silver, lace, china, etc. Preparing the house, the food and the service in the almost Victorian sense, hence the three prior days of drill.

The ladies take their presence very seriously and assiduously call ahead if they will be unable to attend due to illness or travel. The numbers are counted, chairs placed so that all can hear and see the presenter as well as portions of two dessert items meticulously presented. One member is invited to pour the coffee or tea from a seated position at the head of the table as the members queue up to be served and then retire to socialize before the paper is delivered.

The socializing is all about sharing. These are some of the wealthiest women in the Old North End or the Broadmoor or wherever, but they are the least self-important collection of people I’ve ever met. However, mixed seamlessly with these most fortunate are women from lots of other circumstances, and I’m unable to distinguish by looking at them, talking to them, observing their interactions to which if any class of privilege they belong. It’s amazingly refreshing to my basically cynical nature to witness this.

The paper that was delivered was on the topic of “cracking” (not “fracking”) crude oil and how this process which creates gasoline was so important into changing the course of World War II. The theme this year is “Inventions Which Have Made a Difference”, and the paper today was delivered by a wonderful woman whose membership dates back to the early 1950s.

Cath has just completed negotiations with Colorado College to house all the papers going back to 1892 that she (Cathy) has cataloged.

This group would be such an easy target of derision if they were phony or pretentious or withdrew to cliques or engaged in gossip, but I’ve never witnessed any of that.

I wonder if the same could be said of their husbands…I sure hope so.

Here is a link to the whole lecture I told you about last week: http://radiocoloradocollege.org/2012/02/you-are-not-a-gadget-a-lecture-by-jaron-lanier/

Isn’t it wonderful when we can share things that are important to us? Technology makes some of that happen, but so does civilized women meeting in each others houses to research present, and discuss great events.

Last night TheaterWorks outdid themselves. They must have spent a ton of money on the play Joe Turner Has Come and Gone, but to the audience, it was surely worth every dollar.

We went with the Palsgroves and Gerry, all who agree it was top-notch theater. If you get a chance to see this play, don’t miss it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Turner%27s_Come and Gone and http://www.theatreworkscs.org/Special%20Event/Now%20Playing/JoeTurner.htm

My camera and I just spent an hour with Jason Linear at Colorado College.

My brain is full.

Who is Jason Lanier? Check him out starting at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaron_Lanier

Two things about him intrigue me. He was named one of 100 most influential people on the planet in 2010 by Time Magazine, and he coined the words “virtual reality”. To be sure, there are lots more kudos, awards and accomplishments, but this guy is dynamic.

He, maybe like most geniuses, is a study in contrast. Physically, he is HUGE with flowing dreadlocks down below his ample butt. Intellectually, he is HUGE with a grasp of history and an understanding – I think a REAL understanding – of what history indicates for the future. Yet his voice is soft, he spends most of his hours writing code and playing ancient or obscure musical instruments.

He has CREATED the future multiple times. First, VIRTUALLY like all science fiction thinkers, but then REALLY with his understanding of computers and mathematics and music and how the world works…or doesn’t

…and he came with a message, a message this college crowd didn’t particularly want to hear. He wasn’t preachy or screechy, but he didn’t back down on his central theme – that we have blown it with the Internet, with the creation of optimization for giants like Walmart, Facebook, Google, et al. That, as with other attempts to be cool, fit in, be accepted by the crowd, we’ve received a boatload of unexpected consequences AND we are not aware that the boat has sailed into OUR dock.

(You can see why I was eating up what this guy was serving)

We want cheaper goods. We want them quickly available in our town. We got… Walmart. What it really cost us was our jobs. Jobs manufacturing the products, jobs in the stores that used to compete with Walmart. If our grocery stores go the way of our lumber and hardware stores, we will be left with far fewer choices while seemingly having more for less.

Facebook? While networking with a larger group of friends online, our social interactions and real-time encounters have shrunken and become more difficult. Facebook attempts to optimize the life histories of us individuals, but at the cost of being truly individual lest people don’t “friend” you in large numbers.

BTW, Jaron is very clear that he has been and still is part of the problem. He helped develop the optimization that is at the root. He really IS at the top of the 1%!! However, he’s traveling the country and writing books about what’s REALLY going on, before history records our present civilization as boobs and rubes in the same way it has reported on so many others in the past.

I, also, need to be clear that with my lifestyle and choices, I too am very much part of the problem. Guys like this and writing this blog help me take a close and sometimes painful look at these issues.

Anyhow, I’m going to read Jaron’s new book, You Are Not a Gadget (http://www.jaronlanier.com/gadgetwebresources.html).

We got an invite to the next door neighbors Super Bowl Party complete with good wine, new friends, great food and our first ever football lottery! Needless-to-mention, we did not win the lottery, but were both fascinated about all the random squares and the fun they generated.

I’ve been working on multiple projects, as always. Tax time looms, and that is always a major hassle around here. It’s not like we have all that much money…it’s just that it’s squirreled away in so many pockets that the IRS insists on turning inside/out once a year. To complicate that just a bit more, I switched accounting programs midway into 2011 making double the work chasing squirrels.

I’ve continued working on my 50th high school reunion. I’ve had three new volunteers making 20+ calls each trying to track down current email addresses. They have been amazingly successful, and I must say this compiling of to where they have all scattered is…interesting. One of the more shocking facts is how a number of the classmates have held on to real (or imagined) slights from 50 years ago!!! Comments like, “I hated high school then and I never want to have anything to do with you or any memory of that time?” Haven’t we changed in 50 years? Haven’t you changed? “That doesn’t matter. Don’t ever attempt to contact me again!” Yikes!

The toy pictured above is a “ring light” mostly used for extremely close-up photography. A friend let me know they were on sale, so I pounced – normally $129, but on sale for $27 – I couldn’t resist. Another $7 purchased some close-up rings, and I’m now in business. Lots of fun, so expect to see a lot more like the top image.

One of Louis Cicotello's many resin-coated collages.

Back in March, I blogged about Louis Cicotello: http://skip2.me/SkipLog/SkipLog/Entries/2011/3/15_Another_Loss_Another_Gain.html and http://skip2.me/SkipLog/SkipLog/Entries/2011/3/19_Louis_Leaves.html

Last night, at a retrospective of his incredible art, we got to see him come alive again through 140 pieces of his very cerebral art. The Big Something did a nice narrated slide show yesterday, if you have the time and interest:  http://radiocoloradocollege.org/2012/02/25454/

Millie Yawn, his wife, and Sarah his daughter were there to announce an endowment through the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs to help students of art transition from school into the world. The Gallery of Contemporary Art was packed like in the old days, with people of all ages and persuasions. They wanted to be together with each other and with Louis and what he represented. Although the weather was deteriorating into an icy snowstorm outside, it was an incredible artful experience inside…and inside the gallery, too.

Wow, it’s February already! If you are looking for the previous posts, go to the Archives tab in the sidebar on the right and click on January 2012.

Regarding the previous post about cost and value of the stuff we buy, here is a more balanced view: http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-57367030-37/wont-buy-apple-products-anymore-then-dont-stop-there/?tag=txt;title

I didn’t have much luck pulling y’all into the discussion, so I will leave the dead horse by the side of the road and move on to other commerce.

I sold another Santa, am counting my nickels and starting to ready the income taxes – one of my great joys of the season.

My latest adventure was joining the Colorado Springs Chinese Cultural Institute as a result of the Year of the Dragon Festival they held at the City Auditorium. Who knows, you might get a future post from the Mundys-as-tourists on the Yangtze River.

The tribute site I (we) built to Gladys Hawley (Cathy’s Mom) is starting to shape up and new material is on the way. I am getting more used to this new software and sure appreciate the 24/7 support I’ve gotten from GoDaddy’s tech people.

Most of my ‘free’ time has been spent trying to organize our 50th high school reunion. We sure have been a mobile bunch, but search engines and skip-tracers seem to have been equally active. One of the committee members confirmed locations of over 300 classmates! Another has taken the laborious route of checking property records and city directories. (You can run, but you cannot hide…). However, even with fast computers, it’s slow business, and then you have to call them to confirm and try and get email addresses so we can save on postage. Often we get an earful as former classmates describe in detail how much they hated high school, hated us, and hate any form of reunion. Jeesshhh….lighten up….that was 50 YEARS AGO!!!