Grasses:

Well, not exactly a day in the county, but off the beaten path.

As part of this holiday weekend’s festivities (actually, the only festivity), we went to a garden center we had heard about outside of Benton Harbor, MI – Amber Waves Gardens.

Doesn’t seem that impressive, just a farm house surrounded by beds of grasses, but, wow, nice grasses.

And – at this time of the year, the seed heads of many of plants were out, which is a great sight.

The pictures – samples on the right, more in the gallery – really don’t do the plants justice. Part of this is the light at the time – not enough contrast, part was that the digital camera I had makes it hard to capture what you want (great little camera, however).

They’ll give you an idea of what they have.

I love ornamental grasses – easy to maintain, great summer, fall and winter interest (very unusual for most perennials).

I’ve a feeling the front yard is going to see less and less of fescue/rye grass and more oranamental grass.

Works for me…

For reasons that I can’t explain (uh, sure I can: “I’m an idiot!”), I haven’t been backing up all my scans and stuff like that in a regular manner.

I have a CD-RW disc that I’ve been copying the stuff to, oh, whenever I remember to do so (and feel like killing the hour or so doing so…).

Yep. Bad.

Backup shell script added. Following tests (running in background), will add to CRON.

200M of scans, backup up daily, keep at least five day’s worth of zips.

Done.

Well I feel better…

By ET, I mean us.

By that I mean, why the hell are we talking about sending humans to Mars?

Sure, President Bush is pushing for something like this, but that’s just election-year posturing for the most part. But I heard some guy on NPR yesterday – in town (Chicago) for some type of “Let’s get man to Mars” convention (I dunno what it was).

The guy was kind of a wing nut, but – still – there is an interest in putting people on Mars.

I just don’t get it.

Now, I’m probably more science oriented than the average person, and I strongly support the space program and all that. I fully understand that the benefits of a space program cannot really be seen in advance; you just have to do it because you’re curious and benefits sometimes appear.

For example, putting man on the moon was really an exercise in nationalism, kind of a key battle in the Cold War. Yet out of this came the integrated circuit, advances in computing, aerospace materials (composites, for example) and so on. But we didn’t go for that; the benefits were gravy.

All space exploration is like that. Will the current Saturn probe or the recently launched Mercury probe bring any benefits beyond more info about these far-flung bodies? Who knows? Who cares? The point is to understand more about these planets.

Again, everything else is gravy.

OK, what does this have to do with men on Mars, fer Christ’s sake?

Well, I look at it this way: Putting a man on Mars would cost (time and dollars) incredibly more than a unmanned mission. This can’t be disputed. I just don’t see the benefit – what we’ll gain – from sending one manned mission (for example) to Mars instead of numerous unmanned missions there.

Just getting a person there is a huge task; and – once there – that one mission will examine one area. Period. And roving is very limited due to the human factor. Need a certain amount of oxygen, protection against extreme cold, extreme warmth, cosmic rays and so on. And humans get tired, need sleep, need to dispose of waste and so on.

Unmanned probes are far less fussy. We could scatter roving probes all over the planet for far less than a single manned mission.

Sure, a human has better processing ability and can easily change the mission (not that rock, this rock is more interesting…), but the sheer volume of data points that can be gained by multiple missions – probably at a lower cost – make the whole manned mission to Mars talk silly to me.

To be fair, my argument is undercut by my own statement that one really can’t tell what benefits will accrue before it all happens. Yes, it’s possible the effort of putting a man on Mars – or what he finds there – will be so great that it will make all the cost/effort worth it.

Yet the same could be said about the unmanned missions. And – with more unmanned missions possible for same time/effort/cost – the odds of something good coming out of the unmanned missions seems higher.

WATCHING:
Fahrenheit 9/11
Michael Moore

Is this biased? Yes. Does it just portray one side of the story and attempt to belittle the other side(s) of the story? Sure. Does it dwell on just one part of a bigger story? Yep.

Is it exceptionally well done? Yes. Are the clips presented misrepresented? No.

Should this movie infuriate the World? Yes.

Yep, this it your standard Moore film, but an interesting examination of one facet of the war in Iran: His take on just why we invaded liberated Iraq.

Why?

It’s the OIL, stupid.

Agree or disagree, the movie raises a lot of points that are difficult to push aside, and – as I’ve mentioned – it’s done very well. Over the top at times, too maudlin at times, but that’s my bias.

Lot of facts that are hard to ignore behind the curtain of Moore’s ham-handed handling of some aspects of the film. Watch. Discuss. Be informed.

All movies

This is not an exhausive list, but just some things that have occurred to me recently.

I don’t care about:

The Olympics

While I’ve felt this way for some years, with the Olympics firing up again it just brought it to the forefront of my (little) mind.

Why the apathy? I don’t know exactly; it’s a number of factors:

• Since the whole pretense of the Olympics as venue of amatuer athletes has gone the way of all sponsorship, it’s hard to get excited about drama behind an individual getting there and all that. Sure, the Eastern Block countries went this way long ago – and the U.S. and others were fraudulent in their own ways – but now it’s just another Super Bowl. Super Bore is more like it.
• As I gotten older I follow sports less and less. So that’s an issue to deal with.
• I read a comment on a blog somewhere to the effect that the Olympics became less interesting with the end of the Cold War. I think that’s true, to a degree – the “us” vs. “them” competition added a charge to the the event, at least for the U.S. and Soviet countries. Remember the 1980 “miracle” hockey team?

Network TV – or much TV at all

It’s summer, and time for all the summer reruns, test programs, special programs (the Olympics and shows such as “America’s Funniest Game Show Bloopers” or what have you).

There isn’t much to watch, and – frankly – I don’t miss missing whatever I’m not seeing. Know what I mean?

Current Pop Music

Just haven’t been listening to the radio recently, and when I do – there’ s little to listen to.

How many more times do I have to hear “that” song by Nora Jones (i.e., any song; they all sound the same) before I slip into a permanent coma?

I’ve had the radio on for a couple of hours so far today; right now the first interesting song played is on right now: A Led Zepplin song from the 70s or so. (A nice song from Modest Mouse before that, however – I’ll give you that).

Or maybe I’m just grumpy…

Gallery Additions:

Yes, it’s the time of the year where you go, “Eep!, where did the summer go? I still need to do [list of chores].”

So I’ve been doing a lot of that.

Refinanced the house – finally!, got a quote on a new furnace (getting ready for when summer wanes), got the blade on the lawnmower sharpened, so it wasn’t just “gumming” the grass and so on.

Many little tasks, each taking little time, all adding up to large blocks of time.

Now if it would only rain so I could do the late-summer fertilizing, I’d be a happier camper…

It’s actually been a crappy summer weather-wise this year. Cold and rainy in the early part of the summer, and it never really got those nice sunny days that plants need to really get established.

Oh well, there’s always next year.

Beyond that, working hard and enjoying (? is that the right word?) all the frivolity that is surrounding the whole election process.

Unfortunately, it is sad that the process is so comical – because the results can be so devastating.

Still, how can you not crack a smile – or laugh because you’d otherwise cry – at the scripting, pandering politicos and their often frightenly rabid followers?

It’s just sad…

I guess it’s a wonderful thing that we’re trying to bring this brilliant form of government to Iraq. Yeah, that’ll work well. Look how well it’s worked thus far. Not a pretty sight from any point of view (Republican, Democrat, American/Anti-Amercian, Iraqi leadership, Iraqi warriors and so on).

It’ll be interesting to see how all of this plays out in an historical light, like going back and seeing the actions/re-actions that led to the carnage that was WWI.

On an unrelated note: Today’s spam percentage: hoving in the high 90s. Yes, spam filters catch virtually all of this, but…why? Tell me e-mail’s not broken is some fundamental way.

WATCHING:
Mystic River
Clint Eastwood, Director

Well, not the feel-good movie of the year, but a great story well told and with some great acting.

Sean Penn and Tim Robbins both grabbed Oscars for their (very different) portrayals of of individuals on the fringe and on the edge.

Between this movie and Good Will Hunting, I really don’t have a burning desire to move to Boston…

All movies

It’s frustrating, but reality.

There just isn’t enough time for the things worth doing. And – at the same time (pun intended) – I end up doing things that suck up time and don’t need doing (like writing this/other/all entries??? History will judge.)

A short list of what I haven’t had time for lately:

• Watching TV – This is a good thing, to me
• Read more fiction – I’ve been in a fiction slump over the last few years, and I miss it. But I like to read books in big chunks (100 or so pages at a sitting), and the large chunks ‘o time just are not there.
• Catching up on new trends – By this, I mean tech trends. I just can’t get up to speed on OO programming or XML/SOAP and so on. I’ve done brief bits of those (and a million others) over the last couple years, but I still want to immerse myself there. Not happening. Good example: I’ve been doing some data loads lately. I suck at dataloads. I chaff at doing them because I suck, but I enjoy doing them, because they are so necessary and the payoff is so great – press “enter” and suddenly files are downloaded, opened, parsed, passed into databases, files written. It’s a form of alchemy.
  
• Just enjoying the damn moment – Hard to do; easy to overlook; essential for sanity. But – hey – sanity’s overrated, right?
  

I don’t know if my musical taste has changed considerably over the last couple of years or if the music I normally listen to is – for lack of a better term – crap today, but the music I’ve been buying (new and old) and enjoying is a departure from my earlier tastes.

While my musical taste is somewhat eclectic – I like the Blues, classical, opera and other music – the music I listen to most of the time is (I guess) alternative rock, with a singer/songwriter bent. Think groups like U2 and REM, individuals like Bruce Springsteen, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan and Van (“the man”) Morrison.

In other words, not the stuff that wins Grammy awards, for the most part.

But I’m just not buying this stuff today, because “today’s” alternative rockers – Counting Crows, Googoo Dolls (spelling?), John Mayer and so on…they’re all going to be on MTV’s “Where are they today?” show in about five years.

Or singing in some shopping mall somewhere. (Sidebar: I actually saw Michael Lindsey – of Paul Revere and the Raiders and solo “Silverbird” and “Arizona” fame – perform in a shopping center in downtown Indianapolis sometime in the late ’80s. Sad.)

Anyway, what I have been buying – and enjoying immensely lately – are overwhlemingly women singers and a lot of CDs with a country flavor, and I’m not a country music fan.

Some recent purchases and impressions:

EmmyLou Harris, Red Dirt Girl

Hands down the finest CD I’ve purchased in the last couple of years. It came out in 2000, I believe – and I heard cuts from it and liked it, but never was motivated to purchase. I got it a week or two ago and I’ve probably listened to it two dozen times. Easily.

A remarkable album. Purchase. Immediately.

EmmyLou Harris, Stumble Into Grace

The follow-up to Red Dirt Girl is weak in comparison but still an enjoyable CD. The lead song – “Here I Am” is the disc’s strongest song. I saw her perform it on Letterman when the CD first came out; a powerful performance. She reminds me of Van Morrison, the soulful honesty.

Johnny Cash, The Essential Johnny Cash 1955-1983

Yes, I’ve known of – and heard this and that of – Johnny Cash for my entire life. How could anyone miss being exposed to him? Yet I never really “got into him” or whatever.

Yet this compilation (three discs) is unbelieveably listenable. Strong, honest songs. Cash is one of figures who will never fade away – again, he is a Van Morrison type singer/songwriter: Honest, humorous, brutal.

This collection has a lot going for it, but the one (delightful) surprise to me was Cash’s cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “Highway Patrolman.” Springsteen first offered this on his hugely-underrated, brilliant Nebraska album; Cash’s cover virtually makes the song his own. It’s a wicked little song if you pay attention to it.

Loretta Lynn, Van Lear Rose

Actually, this one was kind of a disappointment, as the two songs I purchased it for – the strong title track and the one-of-my-current-all-time-favorites “Portland, Oregon” – are the only songs I really enjoy.

The others are too “country” for me, even with my recent country leanings.

But “Portland, Oregon” – a collaborative effort with Jack White (of the White Stripes; how surreal is that?) – is brilliant. Let’s toast this song with a pitcher of Sloe Gin Fizz…

Beth Orton (various)

Beth Orton is someone who is never really on the radar. I know few people who know of her, yet her music is frequently used in soundtracks (I think that CBS show “Cold Case” used one of her songs for an episode). Like her music, Orton seems to keep a pretty low profile. Again, this is music that won’t win a Grammy (that does not mean it doesn’t deserve awards; more of a Grammy slam…).

If you don’t know Orton, she is cut from the same cloth as Joni Mitchell, Michelle Shocked and – especially – Sandy Denny. She has a great soothing voice and a casual but direct delivery. I’d love to see her live in a small club.

I don’t think she’ll ever make it big – her shtick (sp?) just isn’t that commercial, which seems fine to her – but I can’t imagine seeing her or buying a CD of hers and being disappointed.

Other women and/or country (flavored) types I currently like include Sheryl Crowe, Liz Phair (not her most recent; blech; bubblegum), Son Volt (led by Jay Farrar, formerly of Uncle Tupelo) and John Hiatt.

What does this all mean?

Who cares! Enjoy the music, regardless of it’s source, age or classification.

It’s like art: I can’t define it, but I know what I like when I see it. Ditto with aural art. Immerse yourself in it.

Hey, I didn’t even notice – this site, littleghost.com – turned seven years old yesterday.

Seven isn’t that old, but it’s pretty well-seasoned in Internet years. The Web itself is only about 11 years old, if I recall correctly.

Wow. Happy Birthday to (my Web site…)

Here I am on the anniversary of our nation’s birth (“…conceived in liberty…” – Abe Lincoln) working on a Web site.

And listing to Phil Ochs.

More than a quarter century after his death (suicide), Ochs’ music is still fresh and very applicable to the politics of today.

Don’t think so? How’s about a couple of his song titles:

“I Ain’t Marching Anymore”

“Cops of the World” (referring to U.S.)

“We Seek No Wider War”

These songs were written during the Vietnam Era, but ring true now, as well.

Happy 4th. Don’t blow off your fingers with firecrackers…