Amy Holmes interviews some folks at the Washington Atlas Shrugged premiere. I hadn’t realized that the actor who plays Rearden is British. We may go see it in Rolling Hills this weekend.
[Update a while later]
What if audiences shrug? An interview with the producer.
[Update late afternoon]
More interviews from Amy Holmes:
(Hot conservative women alert)
[Update Saturday morning]
Francis Porretto has some ruminations on the book, faith, charity and epistomology.
Griffith Observatory 7:30 – 9:00 PM
Tuesday, April 12th, 2011
Admission is free
Join us for a very special opportunity to join over 200 events around the world celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of humanity’s first step into the cosmos. Hear Griffith Observatory’s Astronomical Observer, Anthony Cook, describe Yuri Gagarin’s historic 108 minute orbit around the planet and how it still affects us today. Look forward to the future as Virgin Galactic CEO, George Whitesides, describes how space travel might change in the coming 50 years. Meet Yuri’s Night co-founders Loretta Hidalgo-Whitesides and George Whitesides, share your own “where were you?” stories, and take part in this historic, global celebration of people in space.
Wood and Vine 9:00pm – 11:30pm
6280 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA
[Via Robin Snelson]
…of wearing a baseball cap backwards. It’s still not quite as stupid as pants with the belt below your butt, though. Each of these fashion atrocities reduces my estimation of the IQ of the offender by twenty points or so.
…really misses the Bush administration. Because, you know, there’s not much to mock or make jokes about in this one.
And you know, Mika, somehow, I managed to watch that entire clip without even cracking a smile. In fact, it was effortless.
…and involuntary ant flights.
Bill Whittle says go see it.
[Note: this post will be at the top for a while, so keep scrolling for new crap]
Start your day off with a few jigs from the best trad Irish band ever (in my opinion). Dual fiddles lend them a unique sound.
The leader, Mairéad Ní Mhaonaigh (Mary Mahoney for Anglos, daughter of the famous fiddler Frank Mahoney from County Donegal) also has a beautiful, ethereal voice, particularly when she sings in Irish.
And yes, she sings in English, too. The Lass of Glenshee:
Finally, just to pick things up, a few reels.
[Update a while later]
Jim Bennett links in comments to an emigration song. Here’s another by Andy Irvine (one of the founders of Planxty):
It’s interesting to hear an Irish musician play an octave mandolin. He also plays bouzouki. He bummed around in southeastern Europe quite a bit in the seventies, and brought a lot of Romanian folk songs back with him, including houras, which have a very complicated rhythm.
You might note at the end that the tune starts to segue into another, which is the second in the trilogy from the album on emigration, but it doesn’t seem to be on Youtube. Nor is the third, Edward Connors. As you’ll note from the lyrics, the reality of the New World didn’t always live up to the hype. Thousands of them crossed the Atlantic to flee The Great Hunger to find but a grave.
Joe Morello has rolled his last drum.
This version of the piece is faster than the recorded one, but I love Desmond’s sax solo on it. This is one of the tunes used as an example in my brief tutorial on time signatures a few years ago.
A compilation of all of the racy scenes in ST:TNG.