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February 2004 Archive
29 February
Nice. Spotted just outside the Historic Cottage.
The captain of the Muranian Thunder Guard (Richard Talmadge) and High Chancellor Argo (Wheeler Oakman) conspire against Queen Tika, beautiful but cruel ruler of the Underground City of Murania.
The Phantom Empire (1935) may not be the greatest motion picture ever made, but from my point of view, it comes pretty close. It's one of those singing cowboy/science fiction flicks with trick riding, airplanes, robots, cliffhangers, cowboy songs, cheap gags, and lots of hats (cowboy, pith helmets, highly advanced futuristic hats, etc.) and it stars Gene Autry. Curiously, it has something in common with Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Kublai Khan, in that the screeenwriter, Wallace McDonald, was inspired to write it while stoned - on nitrous oxide at the dentist's, instead of laudanum. It's a twelve part Mascot Films serial, and I'm trying to ration myself to one (or at most two) episode an evening.
Here's some swell posters. And also a synopsis and some more stills.
27 February - Defenses of Washington, Continued
Little known in the annals of Washington at war is the story of the Monocacy Guard Force, organized in the Washington Grove area in the weeks following Pearl Harbor. Reports - probably false - of Japanese midget submarines operating in the Monocacy River caused panic in the county which was not altogether calmed by the formation of the MGF, one of the few mule-mounted volunteer forces of the Second World War. Troopers of the Monocacy Guard patrolled the banks of the river, ready to spread the alarm, Paul Revere-style, should the subs surface and threaten the nearby Buckeystown cement plant. However, the Japanese Navy never did appear in Maryland waters, and the Monocacy Guard Force was quietly disbanded in June, 1942.
24 February - Mardi Gras in DC
Happy crowds gather for the festivities near the Capitol.
The Washington version of Mardi Gras may not be as famous as New Orleans', and unfortunately there's no Krewe of Janus, as in Baton Rouge and Monroe, Louisiana. But we still know how to have fun in DC, as these snaps of a Washington Mardi Gras show.
23 February
Walking down Maryland Avenue in downtown DC this morning, I noticed a smallish police action - a block of 6th Street SW was blocked with a couple of cruisers and lavish use of DO NOT CROSS tape. I asked a security officer outside of one of the government offices what was going on, and he said "Somebody found a substance". But I heard no further reports, and everything was cleared up later in the day. A very unsubstantial substance, after all. Which is good.
I've received a letter from Emerson Chu of Hong Kong, our correspondent on Chinese airship affairs. Very thoughtful and philosophic - light on lighter-than-air, perhaps, but full of the Wisdom of the East. Some aphorisms from his letter:
No matter who eats first and who eat second our destinations are the same
We are all wild human animals living in the wide plains of Africa
The Chinese should look after themselves like in ages past stomach first
If and when I scattered my brain and become non focused I shall be dead
Except for consumer's enjoyment and cash happiness they [Americans] are actually lost
All the solid military museum hardwares or imaginary software will not make them [Americans] happy
Yet strangely faith can be picked up from a leaf in wild New England forest
Lingering walking during four seasons will engender pure wonders universe
Mountains of Fort Knox gold cannot assure us of glorious future in heavens
Unless we enjoyed trustworthiness no amounts of sweet and assuring tourguide talk will stick
Even our previous trusted friends will easily desert us in times of need.
22 February
Martyn Green as Ko-Ko
I watched the gloriously Technicolor 1939 version of The Mikado last night - remembered a lot of the songs, too, even though my own encounter with the play (high school, in the chorus, almost knocked cold by Snickersnee when I failed to duck) took place lo these many years ago. But aided by a liberal application of Gosling Black Seal Rum, the lyrics came back to me, and I confess that I sang along, though what I did to Three Little Maids was something chronic. Martyn Green is wonderful as Ko-Ko. Though how the responsible parties could have eliminated I've Got a Little List defies all reason.
One of my current reads is Donald Keene's Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852-1912, so I had a look in the index for references to The Mikado. There was only one, and it was pretty surprising - G&S used an actual Japanese song in the play. Miya Sama is sung during the entrance of the Mikado and Katisha. Now, I had been given to understand that it was only Gilbert's odd attempt at something sounding like Japanese; but composed by Shinagawa Yajiro as Tokoton'yare, it was sung by the Imperial troops on their march to Edo in 1868 to end the rule of the Shogunate:
Your Excellency, your Excellency, what is that fluttering before your horse?
That's the brocade pennant given me with the command, "Conquer the choteki!"
Don't you recognize it?
I haven't seen The Last Samurai, which takes place during this period - I wonder if the song is used in the film? An MP3 of the song may be heard here, sung, I think, by Gregory Smits.
21 February
One hopes that al-Qaida and the Taliban don't read the newspapers. Ssh... it's a secret.
Photograph by Sergey Grachev, St. Petersburg Times
The Museum Cat System has worked out very well for us here - Max and Maxine, our Museum Kittens, are valued members of the staff. So we were pleased to see this report in the St. Petersburg Times, and another report in ABC News Online on the use of Museum Cats at the Hermitage, the magnificent museum in St. Petersburg. About fifty cats live in the Hermitage, helping to keep down art-destroying rodents. The Museum Cats were introduced to the Hermitage in 1745 by the Empress Elizaveta Petrovna, who issued a decree to "find in Kazan better cats, the largest ones, able to catch mice, and to send them to Her Majesty's court, accompanied by a person who will look after their health." The children of museum workers hold a benefit art exhibit yearly, with proceeds going to the Museum Cat Fund. Via Mirabilis and Cronaca.
I'm sorry, though, that the Hermitage Cats didn't even have a walk-on in Russian Ark, the otherwise stunning single-shot movie that takes place throughout the Hermitage. A cast of thousands, and they couldn't let a single moggy on screen?
Maggots in the news, also via Mirabilis.
20 February
Another fine day for contrails; we like contrails. Here, a beautiful contraily dawn breaks over the famous CSX Intermodal Trash Train as it makes its way from the Shady Grove Waste Transfer Station in historic Derwood to the Dickerson Incinerator.
Contrails over the dome of the new National Museum of the American Indian, opening in September.
17 February
Defenses of Washington; the more modern variety. Retractable street barriers on Constitution Avenue at Capitol Hill - the entire Hill can be blocked off with these barriers.
16 February - Defenses of Washington
Artillerymen at Fort Washington, ambrotype (collodion positive on glass).
When I was but a lad, a popular destination in the Washington DC area for the Cub Scout Community was to one of the Nike antiaircraft missile sites that ringed the city. I don't recall that I ever got to see one of the missiles raised from its pit, as some other lucky scouts did, but I do remember the mess hall cake that was served out to us - surprisingly good. The bases are all closed, now:
Nike Missile Park, Gaithersburg, MD - site of Battery W-24's fire control unit.
... But missiles are back in DC. The Post recently showed a picture of a Stinger missile launcher being installed on top of the New Executive Office Building, near the White House. Other sites have been armed for over a year; I spotted an Avenger - a Humvee equipped with Stingers - on a hill overlooking the Anacostia River. During our most recent bout of Alert Level Orange, I noticed it was back, with a bit of shelter for its suffering crew:
The defenses of Washington have changed over the years. Fort Washington is a massive fort in the classic Vauban style on a Potomac bluff across from Mount Vernon. Up the river on the Virginia side is Fort Hunt, a more utilitarian design entirely. Maybe as the weather warms up, I'll visit some of the sites - there are all those Civil War defenses, like Fort Stevens, where Lincoln came under fire during Early's 1864 raid. Fascinating stuff, ain't it?
15 February
Old Tatar Songs, very jolly, via the always interesting Languagehat.
5 February
Gus, the Museum's maintenence man, got a new hat - he won't say where. He looks like a Chassidic cattle rustler in it. Gus likes hats.
1 February
What we're watching today, instead of the damn Super Bowl - The Brain that Wouldn't Die (1962). Handsome, arrogant Doctor Bill Cortner (Herb Evers, right) thinks he can transplant human limbs, organs, what have you. When Gus, the hospital's maintenence man (George Spelvin, center) is decapitated due to Dr. Cortner's handsome arrogance, he becomes the subject of a fiendishly arrogant experiment.
Kurt, Cortner's twisted assistant (Leslie Daniels) has one of the finest death scenes ever recorded in film. With his arm is torn off by a failed experimental monster, he flails about the lab, goes upstairs to the nicely appointed living quarters, flails about in the living room, bounces off the coffee table, sits down in a lovely upholstered armchair for a spell, gets up, flails some more, goes back downstairs to the lab - and yes, he flails about in the lab again. Finally, all flailed out after about ten minutes, he sits down, leans against the wall, and ... dies. Give that man an Oscar!
The biggest surprise for me was that the monster was played (and beautifully, too) by Eddie Carmel, better known as the subject of a famous Diane Arbus photograph, A Jewish giant at home with his parents in the Bronx, NY (1970). Listen to an interesting NPR story on Eddie Carmel.
Not quite so arrogant now, are we? Dr. Cortner and the monster have a falling out, and there are tears before bedtime. Don't you hate it when your fiendish experiments get all angry and stuff? Much better than football any day.
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