Whimsy Speaks Again

With the economy as bad as it is, and likely to get worse, we really need to think of some new ideas to raise some money for scholarships and grants.  Of course, there's trading cards, one each in every package of Poet's Bubble Gum.  The front might include the team the poet plays for ("The Modern Ellipticals"), and a variety of stats on the back ("shortlisted for the Bollingen, 4 times in BAP").  I could see this product in racks at the checkout of Borders and B&N, for example. 

For real money, though, we need to think bigger:  Product Placement.  Every author who agrees to appear in BAP or Norton's Anthology agrees to change exactly one word of his/her poem to a prearranged word:  Ford, McDonald's, Pampers, Exxon-Mobil.  To be fair, the poet should be given a list to choose from, of course, and all proceeds should be sent to some impartial institution to administer.

How about singing journals?  You could insert one of those inexpensive speaker things that one finds in noisy Hallmark cards just before the table of contents.  Air time would be auctioned off.

Of course, the next administration could just impose a tax on the speaking fees of major poets, to be used for grants and loans. 

~~~

I'll be driving this morning down to Santa Fe to meet up with my sister's large and growing (babies upon babies) family.  7 hours down and 7 hours back.  Wish Junie were with me.

Posted by jbahr at 07:11 AM | Permalink

This is what happens when governments try to ban guns.

~~~

This is what happens when you drink and drive.
~~~

This is what happens when you play in the street.

~~~

This is what happens when you mess with Lincoln's log cabin.
~~~

This is what happens when a car falls off a bridge.

~~~

This is what happens when you think you have a 10" springform pan in the house, and it turns out that you only have 9" and 8 1/2" springform pans, and you decide to go ahead and bake your hopefully delicious Passover orange-almond cake (to be drenched in an eye-poppingly intense mandarin-lime syrup) in the 9" pan.

~~~

This is what happens when a biologist learns to knit.

~~~

This is what happens when Courtney Love donates eggs.

~~~

This is what happens when you die, that is what happens when he dies, and that is what happens when they die. It's all very personal. And I'll tell you something; if I knew then what I know now, [shows her slit wrists]  I wouldn't have had my little accident.

--Beetlejuice

~~~

This is what happens when Ron mentions your blog.

Posted by jbahr at 04:24 PM | Permalink

Interesting observations by Josh on Gabe's desire to make poetry useful, instead of just beautiful (an attribute of Gudding's work that he may find unavoidable).  I had leaped to Cahiers de Corey from CDY's blog, where I had noted his abhorrence of institutional strategies for poetry (as he interpreted Seth's essay), and the latter's reluctance for "Art to be removed from aesthetics."  I had already read Seth's multi-part essay on CogPo and the uselessness of Quietude as a term (largely because it encompasses the work of too many poets to be of value) and the many fascinating comments (Bill Knott:  "But among the poets, those dismal defeated schlemiels and corner-biting cowards lured by vile Virgils into the abyss of verse, a fortunate few manage to inhabit the upper circles, its higher hellblocks").  The earlier discussion on relevance elicited the mildly angry response by Brent regarding the unfairness of the current situation:  "the way its basic presumption is already out there acting as the ideological justification for handing out economic and cultural capital to certain writers and students over others." 

There is a basic revulsion among many poets to categorizing anything in the poetry world.  My own interest in mapping the poetry world, I suspect, comes from origins similar to Seth's.  We both participated for years on a brutal poetry board, one in which Logan would have fit right in.  We both were civilians in the poetry wars and obtained our publications by putting stamps on envelopes and waiting.  We had (and still have, no doubt) a belief in poetry publication as the last bastion of meritocracy.  I realize this begs the question of what exactly is meritorious poetry, but I'll leave that question to wiser heads.  Personally, I tend to agree with CDY on the value of beauty in poetry (and my apologies if I'm misquoting).  I don't care a whit if a poem is useful or relevant or achieves political ends.  Now, beauty can be manifested in many ways.  I can imagine Seth's law background as influencing his aesthetics, as do mine in mathematics and computer science, or Simon's in physics.  These roots are unconventional, and I think they (and other examples of non-literary influence) tend to incense/frustrate/intimidate poets with more conventional life paths.

Anyway.  I'll go out on a limb and restate my amazement that poetry is the only literary enclave where the idea that we are striving to entertain is such blasphemy.

I know.  Clumsy sentence.

~~~

Jonathan's take:  "What if there is actually no relation between ethics and aethetics? Since aesthetics permeate human life, anthropologically speaking, it is found everywhere, so there really no point in associating it (them) either with the best or worst impulses of humanity."

~~~

Everyone complains about BAP, but nobody does anything about it (apologies to Clemens).  I'll do a little something:  tell you the poems I liked in BAP 2008.  Next year, of course, I may like others of the volume.  I've been buying two BAPs for years now, one to leave my notes in, and one to keep pristine.  I probably have more BAPs than anyone in the poetry world outside of Lehman.  I certainly have more than my local Borders.  But, I digress.

John Ashbery, "Pavane pour Helen Twelvetrees": "The clients are coming back.  Quick, the moustache cup."

Mary Karr, "Recuperation from the Dead Love through Christ and Isaac Babel":  "When the scabby man festooned with purple rags / shoulders an invisible rifle to shoot him, he pirouettes, / clutching his chest.  Light applause follows".

Alex Lemon, "From 'Hallelujah Blackout'":  "I am forever listening / To the sky breaking ribs // Until darkness falls    With fingers buried in light / Sockets   and holes".

Tim Ross, "then let fall your horrible pleasure":  "they sound like sculptors sanding away at the monolith".

Frederick Seidel, "Evening Man":  "Evening man sits signing bills in the Oval Office headless -- / Every poem I write starts or ends like this. / His hands have been chopped off.  He signs bills with the mess."

Chad Sweeney, "The Sentence":  The bones of Marcel Duchamp / laid end to end / reach all the way / to the bottom of this hill".

Dean Young, "No Forgiveness Ode":  "The heart hoards its thorns / just as the rose profligates. / Just because you've had enough / doesn't mean you wanted too much".

~~~

Someone should explain the Beckman poem to me.

~~~

I liked Jorie better when she was pithy.  Well, pithier.

~~~

Poets I'd like to see in BAP (or see them again):  Seth (natch), Gabe (natch), Mary Jo Bang (Elegy did win National Book Critics Circle Award this year), GC Waldrep (how did they miss him, he's everywhere?), Olena K. Davis (come to think of it, haven't heard much about her outside of Harriet), Jenny Boully, Kasey Mohammad, A. E. Stallings, Ange Mlinko, Joshua Clover, Natasha Tretheway, Jordan Davis, . . .   well, lots more if I think about it.

~~~

Zachary:  "The Canary is one of those mags where each issue could replace Best American Poetry. "

~~~

It's an old post, but you don't see a lot of trifle on the Internet (Lee Ann), and I do so love trifle.

~~~

TT by way of Thomas:  "Writers engrossed in any literary task which is not an assault on perfection are their own dupes and, unless these self-flatterers are content to dismiss such activity as their contribution to the war effort, they might as well be peeling potatoes."

~~~

32 Poems made it into BAP again.  Debra is an inspired Ubermistress and John Poch is a brilliant editor.  Go over and buy a subscription.  Please. 

~~~

Quick note to Junie:  travel safe, my love.



 

Posted by jbahr at 07:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Age and Gender

This year (and many years) the distribution of age and gender resembles the composition of the ruling heads of the Chinese Communist Party:  lots of old gentlemen at the top, few women:

As the table shows, there are 7 poets around 75 years of age, and in fact, almost all are 80 years old or more (one is a woman, Maxine Kumin).  Men outnumber women by more than a factor of two, which is quite high for modern BAPs (Ashbery chose 20 women in 1988), and particularly considering the composition of poets in today's MFA programs (both students and profs).

Poetic Persistence

As I mentioned yesterday, there is a remarkable persistence to BAP poets.  810 poets authored the 1575 poems in the past 21 issues.  But of those 810 poets, the top 160 poets account for over half of all the entries.  Perhaps even more remarkable is the number of poets in any issue that were in the original issue 21 years ago:

Number of Original 1988 BAP Poets in Each Issue

That's right.  Fully eleven poets of the current crop of 75 were in the the 1988 edition.  That's one reason that the median age of a BAP poet has been slowly increasing from the mid 40's in the early years to the mid-50's now (see yesterday's chart on Age Distribution).
 

BAP Facts

• There have been seven poets with a surname of Young over the past 21 years.  They were all male.
• Aldon Lynn Nielsen was chosen for inclusion in the 1988 edition.  He is listed as A. L. Nielson on the BAP website.
• Approximately 25 poets over the years have declined to state their birth year.  Over 20 were women.
• Journals appearing in BAP have included Shankpainter, Sal Mimeo, Deluxe Rubber Chicken, apex of M, Stud Duck and Heavy Daughter Blues.
• The longest dry spell award for a journal goes to Phoebe, which was included in 1993 and this year.
• The longest dry spell for a poet goes to Marvin Bell, who was included in 1990 and 2007.
• The New Yorker is the only magazine that has never missed a year in BAP.
• The "rules" state that a poet cannot appear more than 3 times in one issue, but only these poets have appeared twice in one issue:  Robert Pinsky, Linh Dinh, and Susan Parr.
• Only two guest editors have appeared in BAP less than 4 times:  Rita Dove and Lyn Hejinian

Complete Listings

A complete list of all poets for all years can be found here.

End Notes

I recently received an email asking why on earth I do all this.  Think of it as a variant of flarf.

Posted by jbahr at 06:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

An Imaginary Phone Conversation

DL:  "Hi, Chuck.  How's the poetry picking coming?"

CW:  "Pretty good, Dave.  I've got back issues of New Yorker, Poetry, Ploughshares and APR, so I think I'm set."

DL:  "Umm.  Don't you think you may want to branch out a bit, Chuck?"

CW:  "Well, actually, I wanted to talk to you about that, Dave.  I really wanted to include Ashbery, but I can't find him in the journals I have here".

DL:  "Have you looked in The New York Review of Books.  I think I spotted him there a while back."

CW:  "Hey, great idea.  While you're at it, can you hunt down any work by Jorie, Marvin, Galvin, and Louise?"

DL:  "Sure: London Review of Books,  Iowa Review, Verse, and The American Scholar."

CW:  "Wow, you're good.  I had no idea there were so many literary journals.  Know where we can find Kalamaras, Nurske and Tate?  Oh, and Padgett?"

DL:  "Let me look around and I'll get back to you with recommendations.  So how many are you up to?"

CW:  "I think about 3 dozen.  Is that enough?"

DL:  "Uh, no, Chuck.  You need 75.  We always have 75.  It's kind of like a rule."

CW:  "Yikes.  75?  OK, how about some of those young poets I've been hearing about:  Dean Young and Bob Hicok and Franz Wright?"

DL:  "Sure, that sounds fine, but you're only up to about 40 now."

CW:  "This is harder than I thought, Dave.  I don't know how I'm going to get anywhere near 75."

DL:  "Hey, Chuck, that's what we have interns for.  They'll find a few edgy poems and some journals that we've never included before and that will round things out nicely."

CW:  "Thanks, Dave.  That's a relief. 


Journal Distribution

I mistakenly wrote yesterday that New Yorker had ten inclusions in the 2008 BAP.  That was a clerical error that I've corrected.  The number is a record-setting 13.  Twelve journals account for 42 of the 75 poems this year:

Conspicuous by either their absence or single appearance are Paris Review (1 this year, 49 previous appearances), New American Writing (1 this year, 26 previous appearances), Kenyon Review (1 this year, 22 previous appearances).  Barrow Street (12 previous appearances) and Five Points (10 previous appearances) overperformed, as did Volt with only 2 prior appearances.

You can find a complete listing of all journals for all years here.

Age Distribution

In recent issues, the range and distribution of poet ages has stayed approximately the same.  This table demonstrates that:

The median age of Wright's selections is about par for the course for recent BAPs:  in the mid-50's.  Thus, Jimmy's question:

Posted by jbahr at 06:29 AM | Permalink

And what would BAP Season be without Jimmy's unique perspective?




~~~

This year there were six journals that made their first appearance in BAP: ABZ:A Poetry Magazine, Bird Dog, Rivendell, Runes, Sienese Shredder, and storySouth.  Is that a lot?  No, it's lower than the average for the last couple of years.   Lyn Hejinian picked 22 new litmags in 2004 and Paul Muldoon picked 20 in 2005.  John Ashbery holds the record for most new BAP litmag appearances, but then that's all he had to choose from, as it was the first issue in 1988.  Adrienne Rich chose 19 journals for the first time, and (surprisingly) Robert Bly chose 23.  In general, the BAPs that are more conservative tend to have fewer newly "discovered" journals and a much greater number of the old standbys (Poetry, New Yorker, APR). 

Another observation:  As the years go by individual journals are getting fewer multiple entries.  That is, there's a wider distribution of journals and more of them in each successive BAP.  That is reflected in the chart, as well – newly admitted journals track the overall diversity of BAP in terms of "total number of different litmags".

~~~

Well, I'm off to put on my red cowboy wedding shirt and a big red stocking cap and deliver presents to my children.  Happy holidays and see you tomorrow with more BAP analysis.

~~~

OK, I'm back. 

In the 21 years that BAP has been published there has appeared 1,575 poems, as every year exactly 75 poems are chosen.   A grand total of 809 poets are responsible for these poems, because some poets appear multiple times.  The vast majority of poets in BAP have only appeared once.  However, a couple of dozen poets have appeared more than 6 times:
 

Holding down the top position is John Ashbery, who has only missed 6 issues.  Next up is Donald Hall and Charles Simic, appearing 13 times.  Then James Tate with 12 appearances, Robert Pinsky with 11, Billy Collins and Richard Wilbur with 10.  There is, of course, a certain persistence in the poets list within any BAP.  If they've made an appearance more than twice before, there's a good chance they will be there again, barring some unfortunate circumstance.  This is mitigated somewhat by the choices made by the more daring of the BAP editors, in which group one would normally include Adrienne Rich, Robert Bly, Robert Creeley and Lyn Hejinian.  In fact, the number of poets in any group of 75 poets that had more than 4 appearances in any BAP looks like:

As you review the numbers year by year, you may conclude that Ashbery was prescient as nearly half of his chosen poets would show up again in BAP in the future.  As you review the middle years – with the notable exception of Rich – you see most poets making safe choices.  From this perspective, Wright seems to be about at the norm, loading up the issue with 27 frequently appearing poets. 

Still, I was struck by the number of known poets and the preponderance of mainstream journals in the mix.  In a way, it almost seemed like a tribute issue, which is why I think so many poems originated in publications like the New Yorker, which accounted for thirteen of the poems in this issue, a new record. 

Congratulations to all who made the cut, including of course, our mutual blogmate CDY.  He is among the four Youngs in this issue, including David Young, Dean Young and Kevin Young.  As there have been a grand total of seven total Youngs in the history of BAP, getting 4 in one issue is quite an interesting turn of events. 

 

Posted by jbahr at 07:15 AM | Permalink

Well, it's about time.  I don't think I've ever waited until the end of the year to give you all the rundown on BAP.

I'll have a lot more numbers, charts and graphs over the next few days, but first some impressions.  This seems like a very conservative BAP, one in which the Names were picked first and then a hunt was conducted for suitable poems from them.  Only 25 of the 75 poets are new to BAP, which may not be a record (haven't researched that yet), but is still a bit below the norm.  Charles Wright is the guest editor and he (with Lehman looking over his shoulder, perhaps) has selected the old standbys, almost to a man (and woman):  Armantrout, Ashbery, Bell, Bernstein, Galvin, Glück, Graham, Hass, Howard, Jarman, Kumin, Levine, Merwin, Muldoon, Simic, Tate, even Bly.  I didn't even know some of these people were still writing poetry.  And then, there's the new standbys:  Cronk, Hicok, (Dean) Young. 

The newbies range from 26 to 78 in age, but the median age is about 45.  Most of the names I wasn't familiar with, with the exception of Cornelius Eady and Garrett Hongo (who, curiously, was never in BAP before), and D.A. Powell (whom I read in Poetry from time to time), and Ciaran Berry (whom I met on a poetry board many moons ago).

More when I get the numbers crunched.

~~~

Have a Merry Christmas or Happy Hanukkah or a Krazy Kwanzaa or whatever holiday you may favor, or none at all for that matter.


 

Posted by jbahr at 04:54 PM | Permalink

The boys and Eileen (Ky's fiancée) decided they want curry for tomorrow night's supper.  I think that may become a Christmas pre-weekend tradition, considering how colorful it is and perfect for cold weather.  I have the dozen or so ingredients for the curry powder (see Whimsy's Curry from Scratch), but needed to stock up on the all-important condiments:  slivered blanched almonds, fresh raisins (Colorado's low humidity reduces raisins to titanium-hard rabbit pellets within days), organic bananas, celery, red and yellow peppers, mandarin oranges, scallions, a hot-house cucumber (I've got some shredded coconut in the freezer).  I might boil up a few eggs to add hard-boiled egg slices to the condiment tray.  I already had Major Grey's and Hot Mango chutney, but decided to add cranberry chutney to the mix for festive reasons.  Once I get the basic curry sauce made, I'll blanch some cauliflower and sauté some chicken strips.  Then, I can heat up the curry to a near-boil and have separate bowls of cauliflower, chicken and shrimp curry ready (you just pour it over freshly peeled shrimp, they cook in minutes just in the hot sauce).  I've also gotten some good beer for the occasion, and laid out the Christmas napkins that Sweet Junie got me.

This dinner started out as a clandestine exercise in finishing up the present for Cath and her guy Terry.  I can't tell you more on the off and highly unlikely chance that either of them visit Whimsyland.  I've already got stockings and small gifts for Der, Ky and Eileen on the mantle, but they're going to have to wait until Christmas morning to get them (they can, however, shake the boxes and squeeze the stockings).

It seems like I proofed the galley copies of poems for three journals months ago, but no word on release of the litmags.  Hmm, everybody must be timing things to coincide with AWP.  As it's in Chicago, I'd actually like to go, but they keep moving the damned thing up and I'm pretty sure I will be too busy in February, but who knows?  Sweet Junie is only 6 hours from Chicago so maybe we can make a date.  Der, of course, lives in Chicago so that would make it extra fun, but next year it's in Denver anyway, so maybe I could skip a year.  It's not as if I'm looking for a job.  On the other hand, there are hundreds of poets I'd like to meet in meatspace, as they say.  If it sounds like I'm dithering, you're right.

BTW, The 2012 AWP is in Chicago also.  Sounds like Blagojevich has been doing the negotiating.

It occurred to me today that Dima and I are surrounded by a ridiculous amount of technology.  Aside from the 30 terabytes of storage that is scattered around the servers and workstations (half of which is in disk drawers that can be inserted into test workstations), there are oscilloscopes and logic analyzers and USB bus thingies and USB to serial converters and flash programmers and FPGA downloaders and God know what else.  On the software side, there are a dozen different development IDE's and source code managers and three different source code control systems and backup systems.  And many specialized packages, like Sony Sound Forge and Adobe Photoshop.  We use these in the course of a year on an incredibly wide variety of projects that are spread across real-time operating systems, DSP-based systems, Windows development, Linux system programming, and applications in sound, video and whatnot.  I really can't imagine going into work and doing one thing day after day for years.  I could manage a dozen engineers that do that (and have), but I think I'm past the patience level for long-term projects.  Unless, of course, the 2009 economy hits the skids as badly as some predict, and then I may have to change my tune.

I received Architectural Digest today, so I must have ordered it.  Also Wine Spectator and Rolling Stone, so I must have ordered those too.  I already receive a daily newspaper, Harper's, Atlantic Monthly, Scientific American, Poets & Writers, APR, and a half-dozen journals.  I'm still trying to sort out how many mags I receive, but between the odd starving-student-at-the-door and converting airline miles, I think I'm good for the next year for reading material.

As I was on my treadmill this morning, it occurred to me that Madoff looks and sounds like a successful investment banker and Blagojevich looks and sounds like a complete sleazebag.  Not that it seems to bother him, his contributors, or even Obama who has spoken a number of times on his behalf in the past.  I find it hard to believe that anyone who has actually listened to this guy and read his body language would ever vote for him.  Maybe the competition was even worse.  Or maybe it's just Illinois politics as usual.  I still remember hearing how the copper foundry's owner (where I consulted for two years) regularly shipped car trunk's full of cash to Springfield to make sure he could continue to pollute most of the land around Alton.  In the end, the Feds shut the place down.  There were a dozen people indicted and sent to prison, including the plant manager, for secretly dumping heavy metals into the surrounding farmland for a decade.  The owner remained unscathed. 

Well, time to do prep on the curry sauce.  I may have to open a bottle of wine to assuage the tears associated with dicing onions.



 

Posted by jbahr at 05:35 PM | Permalink

It seems that everyone has that new blogroll thing.  I should have done some blogwalking before announcing that it was so novel and amazing.  Laura even has one that give you a multi-line intro to recently updated blogs.  Very cool.  I'll have to View Source and see how it's getting done.  Laura has a fascinating mix of blog links, including Bemsha Swings, Talking Points Memo, and The Wall Street Journal.

Derek has taken the next step toward interviewing for a Fairly Famous Rock Group.  He would be the new lead guitar and would take a leave of absence from his formal music education at Columbia, but it would be worth the experience.  I hope this blog entry doesn't jinx the deal.

Speaking for collaboration, Der and I collaborated on Beef Stew with Wine the other night.  Cath delegated dinner to him, so he called me from the supermarket and we went through menu options, and then jointly decided on ingredients.  This stew was similar to my standard Beef Stew recipe in Whimsy's Cookbook.  He must have done a bang-up job, because his dinner companions raved.

I'm looking forward to seeing Ky and his sweetie Eileen, plus Der, this weekend.  We're participating on a Secret Christmas Project, and I'll make Curry From Scratch to boot.

Yes, it's still cold, but bearable.  In the low single-digits in the morning and warming up to the high 30's in the afternoon, which seems positively Tahitian by the time it arrives. 

I finished up the code to do marquee scrolling on the next audio player for my favorite client.  We're switching to a new microprocessor in a month, so there's a lot of work ahead of us.  That's a good thing, of course, as it keeps us busy and paid during what could be an ugly 2009, economically.

Tonight will most likely be bowtie pasta with garlic, olive oil, shrimp, capers, scallions, artichoke hearts and red peppers.  Ms. Emily already petitioned for an early portion of shrimp.

All of a sudden, I'm reading a lot about Dark Energy and Dark Matter.  It seems like it was only yesterday that people were floating the idea of their existence.  More on that as I catch up on my Scientific Americans.

See you tomorrow.

Posted by jbahr at 05:59 PM | Permalink

Nada has this blogroll that adds a caption like "9 hours ago" whenever a blog is updated.  It also appears to keep the blogroll sorted by "most recently updated".  Very cool.

You're probably tired of hearing how stupid cold it is in Colorado, but not as tired as I am of enduring it.  Sweet Junie thinks I'm a weather wimp, as the Wisconsoners go through this every year like frosty clockwork.  Yesterday actually warmed up to the low 30's, which felt like a tropical day after recent freeze.  I could drive the little Honda and run over to Brewing Market for a latte and the roads were clear and life was good.

I've been giving as gifts to various family those digital frames that display photos.  The most beautiful display is (natch) on the Sony, but it's north of $250 and only has a 9" screen (diagonally).  The Kodak and Digital Spectrum are a bit less for 10" screens and (though their resolution is a bit less resolute), they have been the ones I've picked.  The frames can be loaded directly from a camera's storage device (SD, MMC, Compact Flash) or via a USB cable from your computer (which is what I usually do).  The higher-end ones have speakers and can play MP3 while the pictures roll by, and a couple have calendars and other interesting diversions.

Am I crazy or does Barack seem to be gutting the very Democratic majority we won in the Senate by appointing all these senators to Administration positions?  Speaking of which, the nearly hilarious Senate race between Coleman (boo!) and Franken (yea!) seems to drag on and on.  Some estimates have Franken ahead by a handful of votes after all the recounts and ballot restitutions are done.  A handful.  Like 5 votes out of over 2 million.  Amazing.

I finally finished The Dark Knight yesterday.  Ledger was brilliant.  I was either distracted (OK, I was wrapping presents through some of it) or the movie seemed a bit disorganized.  And what's up with The Joker kicking the living crap of our masked hero?  I prefer my heroes relatively invulnerable.

I should have read The Origin of Species well before now, but never got around to it (it's taken me about as long to getting around to reading it as it took Darwin to get around to writing it).  I'm surprised how relatively chatty it is, and how readable.  I've just finished Variation Under Domestication and am starting Variation Under Nature.  I'm looking forward to "On the Imperfection of the Geological Record", which should be interesting, given that it was written 150 years ago. 

I've also been enjoying the illustrated Weapons and Fighting Techniques of the Medieval Warrior.  From the tapestries and wood-cuts (many of which, are positively Boschian), it's hard to believe anyone survived the average Medieval battle (particularly considering the poor hygiene, rudimentary medical knowledge, and absence of antibiotics).  The book contains bird's-eye views of most of the major battles, showing with big red arrows how the ground forces moved and the cavalry swooped (cavalry does swoop, doesn't it?).  The illustration of the Battle of Hastings looks like that scene from Braveheart, where the Normans have the archers and cavalry, and the Saxons have a predominantly infantry force (and lost).  Some of the wood-cuts show knight training exercises, such as riding on a wooden pony pulled by squires and holding thrusting a wooden lance at a fixed target.  Another interesting aspect of the book is that fully half of the text and pictures involve the French and English carving each other up.

The most interesting thing we're doing around the shop is porting Android to an iMX37-based development board.  Android is the Google operating system for telephones and personal media players, and is an open-source effort in which hundreds (or perhaps thousands, at this point) developers are implementing it on various platforms.  Dima is doing the heavy lifting on this project, which involves porting Linux, writing/modifying device drivers (such as WiFi and LCD) and then getting the Android stack working.  Sales of T-Mobile's Android-powered G1 are going very well, which has prompted a dozen other large companies to join the bandwagon.

I need to write myself a note to lock down a dozen more pages on this blog.  I'm back up to getting a couple of hundred spam comments a day.

Obama is Time's Person of the Year.  Like anyone else had a chance.

Here's an amazing statistic that points out the collapse of international goods trade:  On June 5th, you could rent a dry-bulk ship to transport your goods at a cost of $233,988 a day.  As of the end of November, the cost dropped to $2,773 (it's since recovered to $8,261 a day).  Most of the recovery is the cessation of the commodity price freefall and the slow resumption of imports by China.

Posted by jbahr at 07:29 AM | Permalink

It was a balmy 3 degrees when I got up, which beats the weather where Sweet Junie lives (Eau Claire), where it was 7 below and God knows what with the wind chill.

I was volunteering for the Boulder County Arts Alliance the other afternoon, which entailed passing out coupons at Barnes and Nobles.  Said coupons, when presented at checkout, diverted some percentage of the sale to the BCAA.  I'm not anywhere as effective at accosting patrons as the other volunteers, so I just decided to buy some books myself and present the coupon.  This included a slew of big coffee table books on the discount aisle:  Medieval Warfare, A Concise Atlas of the World, and The Illustrated Origin of Species, to name a few.  Paging through the atlas, I was once again amazed at how you can think you know something and really know very little about it.  For example, when I lived in Iran as a kid, my parents drove us all up to the Caspian Sea.  I don't remember much about it, except we almost fell off a the mountains roads a couple of times.  Since then, I've heard about the Caspian as a major potential source of oil and a source of boundary squabble between Iran, Russia, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, and Azerbaijan.  What I didn't know is that it's the largest lake in the world, larger than all of our Great Lakes put together.  Lake Baikal, in Eastern Russia, is also immense and, unlike the Caspian, is all fresh water – in fact, it represents 20% of all the fresh water on Earth (not counting Antarctica, which stores 72% of the world's water as ice).   Other interesting facts:  Scientists argue over whether the Nile or the Amazon is the longest river, depending upon the definition of their respective sources.  The Yangtze and Mississippi are almost as long (over 6,000 miles).  Indonesia is the fourth most populous country in the world, and Bangladesh is seventh.  Asia has more land turning into desert more rapidly than Africa (mainly due to Chinese policies).  The longest bridge in the world is the Lake Ponchartrain Causeway.  The tallest man-made structure in the world is the KVLY TV tower in Fargo, North Dakota (2,063 feet).  The largest city in the world is Mumbai (18 million), but the largest metropolitan area is Tokyo (34 million).  The two largest lakes in South America are (I'm not making this up) Lake Titicaca and Lake Poopó.  The average life expectancy for a woman in Japan is 86, the highest in the world (the lowest is 33 years for a woman in Botswana).  The coldest known place on earth is the Vostok Station in Antarctica, where the record low is minus 128.6 degrees. Large areas of Antarctica are deserts, with less precipitation than the Sahara.  The most crowded place on earth is Monaco.  The richest country, as measured by per capita GDP, is Luxembourg, followed by Equatorial Guinea (!).  Norway is 4th and the U.S. is 6th.  Iceland has the lowest maternal mortality (the U.S. isn't even in the top 10). 

~~~

More after I get a little programming done.

Posted by jbahr at 08:16 AM | Permalink

I put on my jester ski cap and snow pants and ski gloves and two pairs of socks and boots and fired up my Dodge Dakota pickup with its new snow tires, 4WD and Kenwood deck playing James Taylor's new Christmas album.  I was all set to pick up Derek, who was flying in from Chicago for holiday break.  The snow wasn't too bad, but I got stuck behind a phalanx of snowplows on 287 and arrived just as Der was getting his baggage off the round-about.  We stopped at the airport gas station for hot chocolate and proceeded back to Broomfield on the E470, the handy toll highway.  The Dakota's windshield wipers were having a hard time with the gunk thrown up by idiots passing me at 70, so at every toll booth Der had to rub some greasy cold snow on the windshield while I ran the wipers on Full.  That would get us another 4 or 5 miles to the next toll booth, although the headlights were having trouble working through all the ice that built up on them. 

I figured it was cold, but I didn't realize just how cold, to wit:

RECORD EVENT REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE DENVER CO
1203 AM MST MON DEC 15 2008

...NEW RECORD LOW TEMPERATURE IN DENVER FOR DECEMBER 14TH AND 15TH...

THE TEMPERATURE AT DENVER INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT PLUNGED TO -15
DEGREES AT 552 PM ON THE 14TH BREAKING THE OLD RECORD OF -14 DEGREES
SET IN 1901. THE TEMPERATURE CONTINUED TO FALL AND BOTTOMED OUT AT
-18 DEGREES AT 635 PM.

THE 15TH STARTED WITH A NEW RECORD . AT 1200 AM THE TEMPERATURE WAS
-13 DEGREES SETTING A NEW RECORD LOW FOR THE DAY. THE OLD RECORD WAS
-6 SET IN 1951. A LATER STATEMENT WILL BE ISSUED IF THE TEMPERATURE
DROPS ANY FURTHER.

We made it to Cath's house without further incident and Der made coffee and got me some new socks.  He showed me his new jazz guitar, which had sat nestled in his arms for the entire drive from the airport.  The laptop, stereo gear and luggage had to brave the frigidity on the pickup's bed. 

Contrary to what you may think, it's not often that cold in Colorado, unless you're up in the mountains, and what do you expect at 10,000 feet?  It was, in fact 65 a couple of days ago and 55 on Thursday.  This morning, however, it's minus 18 in Denver (it's only minus 6 in Aspen, go figure). 

~~~

NPR had a segment on Cal and Elizabeth, prompted by the release of Words in Air:  The Complete Correspondence Between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell (reviewed here by Vendler).  I was surprised to find that the poetry selections read on the program were as bland and narrative as I remember when I first started reading poetry seriously.

~~~

Yes!  My shopping is complete.  Big boxes filled with cards and gifts been sent to Albuquerque, San Diego, Huntington Beach, and Tustin.  I could tell you what's in them, as my family never reads my blog (well, my kids and Sweet Junie do, of course).  I bought a lot of gag gifts from What On Earth, but the bulk of the presents were in the form of $50 Visa cards.  Some were deposited in those tin boxes they sell for the purpose, and some inside singing Christmas cards.  Next year, I might just send everyone a fruitcake.  Or a Christmas pudding.

Der and I will be driving down to Albuquerque to meet up with the Rawlings Clan on the 28th.  Roy and Lin (my sister) and their children and all the grand-babies will be there in what I expect to be a good time for all.  It's an 8-hour drive from Longmont to Alb, but pleasant enough if you don't get blowing snow on that long stretch from Denver to Trinidad.  With luck, we'll be able to stop in Walsenberg and have lunch with Ally and John, my poet buddy and her husband.  John is back to making chain mail.  A little Wikipedia info:
 

One Christmas, John gave my boys a battle ax that he had made.  They were duly impressed.

~~~

I just bought another 4 terabytes of disk storage.  These were 500MB 7200 RPM SATA drives from Seagate for $60 apiece.  I figure it's easier to just put one in every workstation and server and run constant backup with Memeo than to use external USB drives (which are really slow, compared to internal drives).  It's hard to believe that disk storage is approaching $100 a terabyte, but that's what I said about $100 a gigabyte ten years ago and $100 a megabyte 25 years ago.

~~~

Hey, here's some good news.  My buddy Seth won the The J. Howard and Barbara M. J. Wood Prize and Ange won the Editors Prize for Reviewing.

~~~

I have to go write up a budget proposal, but I'll be back. 
 

Posted by jbahr at 06:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)