Roger O Green

Author-Illustrator Day at Giffen

Wizard’s Wardrobe is “providing a free, after school tutoring program for elementary school students in the South End.”

My church has been involved with Giffen Memorial Elementary School in Albany for nearly a decade, primarily with tutoring. City School District of Albany families were invited to the fifth annual Author-Illustrator Day event at Giffen on Saturday, April 29 from 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., organized by the school and church. “In addition to presentations by authors and a free continental breakfast, Giffen musicians performed throughout the day,” and they were very good.

The authors and illustrators included:

Sharon Flake, award-winning author of books for children and young adults, including “The Broken Bike Boy and the Queen of 33rd Street” and “You Don’t Even Know Me: Short Stories and Poems About Boys.”

Jerdine Nolen, award-winning author of a dozen books including “Big Jabe,” “Thunder Rose” (a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor Book), and “Hewitt Anderson’s Great Big Life” (a Bank Street Best Book of the Year), all illustrated by Kadir Nelson.

James Preller, award-winning author of more than 80 children’s books, including the Jigsaw Jones Mystery series. His other titles include “Along Came Spider” and “Ghost Cat and Other Spooky Tales.”

Cheryl Willis Hudson, award-winning author of “AFRO-BETS ABC,” “AFRO-BETS 123,” “Hands Can,” “Good Morning” and several other books for children and young adults. She also is editorial director for Just Us Books, Inc., an independent publishing company whose books feature African-American characters.

Folks from the school and the church set up Friday evening. Then there was a reception, where I got to meet the authors. On Saturday morning, the Wife, the Daughter and I picked up the food supplies. I was supposed to help set up the books. Giffen kids got some for free, and others could buy them at a discounted rate. The Green family pile was very large.

My other specific job was as assistant to an author. I had done this in previous years with Joe Bruchac, and as one of the folks helping Lesa-Cline-Ransome and James Ransome; the Ransomes came to the Friday night reception. On Saturday morning, each author is on hand to sign his or her books, and the assistant’s job is to make sure that the the book to be signed was either purchased or given away, and then to print out the name of the persons who wants the book signed.

This year, I was assigned to James Preller, the only local creator, who had also been there three or four years earlier. He was very engaging with the children. He also kept all the names on the Post-It notes, promising to use some of them in future books.

A total of 23 Giffen and 38 First Pres people helped out. The cleanup was faster than ever before, a sign of the fact that we have done this before.

The driving forces behind this activity were Deb and Eric Fagans from my church, who had also created Wizard’s Wardrobe, “providing a free, after school tutoring program for elementary school students in the South End.” For that accomplishment, they received some award at a SUSU Women’s Club dinner that Saturday night, when I’m sure they were even more tired that we were.

Photos of the t-shirt, Sharon Flake, James Preller and Deb Fagens (center) from City School District of Albany

May rambling #1: Bringing the Invisible to Life

The Daredevils Without Landlines

And Jesus Said Unto Paul of Ryan … “Pious Paul interjected, ‘For the Samaritan’s work is unsustainable and sends the wrong message. It teaches travelers to take dangerous roads, knowing that others will rescue them from self-destructive behaviors.”

Strength Through Unity: How To Spot Fascism Before It’s Too Late

American Identity is Based on Alternate History

The Truest, Meanest Jokes that Bombed at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner

The absurd amount of entitlements that go to rich people and Why cutting rich people’s taxes doesn’t create jobs

Jimmy Kimmel’s Radically Simple ‘Jimmy Kimmel Test’

Torching the Modern-Day Library of Alexandria

Jodi Picoult: Are You Sure You’re Not Racist?

Someone wants to know why there was a Civil War and could Andrew Jackson have stopped it?

George Will: This president does not know what it is to know

Much Ado About Religious Liberty

Heineken ad

Is the special relationship ending? (Australia, New Zealand)

Vlogbrothers: Can You Trust Mainstream Media? and The Life Changing Magic of Thumbs Up

Younger Men, Older Women: A Pairing Becomes More Common

WebMD stands for medically deficient

There Is a Fake IDGod, and He Lives in China

The Daredevils Without Landlines — And Why Health Experts Are Tracking Them

Camsing Acquires Stan Lee’s POW! Entertainment

David Brickman review: Neil deGrasse Tyson at Proctors

Man forced to surrender his ‘offensive’ Star Trek license plate

Tony nominations (yes, I watch)

Now I Know: The Google Maps Invasion and Bringing the Invisible to Life and Lighting Up the Switchboards

Good luck (shhh!) and spam wedding

All of a sudden or all of the sudden

Please type your preferred plurals in the comments box: alumnus, apparatus, appendix, aquarium, cactus, crisis, criterion, focus, thesis, forum, fungus, hippopotamus, index, nucleus, octopus, phenomenon, referendum, radius, stadium, syllabus, prospectus, ellipsis, museum, factotum, status

Music

LISTEN TODAY! Bette Midler stars as Dolly Levi in the Tony Award-nominated revival of Hello, Dolly, before album is released May 12.

Saxa of the (English) Beat, R.I.P.

Princess Leia’s Stolen Death Star Plans, a Star Wars/Beatles fan tribute

TEN HOURS of the Cantina Band

Top 10 Songs About Elvis Presley, not including Elvis Presley Boulevard – Billy Joel, the only Joel single I own (B-side to Allentown)

Chuck Miller: Wake up, you sleeping lion!

Someday My Prince Will Come – Dave Brubeck Quartet

Photos show the world’s biggest rock stars as tourists in 1970s Japan

Forbes: How The Music Industry Is Putting Itself Out Of Business

The Eagles Sue an Actual Hotel California

R is for the Rheingold Beer Jingle (ABC W)

My beer is Rheingold the dry beer.
Think of Rheingold whenever you buy beer.

I was listening to our classical music station early one morning, and I hear the Rheingold beer jingle. OK, it wasn’t, really. But it certainly REMINDED me of it.

I discovered here that the melody I heard was in fact the Estudiantina Valse, Opus 191, No. 4 (The Students’ Waltz), a title I had never heard of.

“The tune was composed by a pair of obscure French composers, the tune itself by Paul Lacome (1838 – 1920); But ironically it is often incorrectly attributed to the man who arranged it in a rollicking Strauss-like arrangement for two pianos — named Emile (“Emil”) Waldteufel (1837 – 1915).

“Waldteufel included it in a set of tunes arranged for 2 pianos, published under his own Opus number, which blurred the issue of authorship right down to the present day.” In fact, I have found almost NO one to attribute this to Lacome, only to Waldteufel.

“The Beer jingle with a lyric by an unknown ad agent, used the melody of this famous light-classical waltz tune.”

The lyric was:
My beer is Rheingold the dry beer.
Think of Rheingold whenever you buy beer.
It’s not bitter, not sweet, it’s the extra dry treat
Won’t you try extra dry Rheingold beer?

I remember the third lyric as “it’s refreshing, not sweet…”, but there are a lot of variations.

“Ironic that this melody, which some may remember as the quintessential German Beer Hall tune (images of people with swaying cups all singing in unison) is actually of FRENCH, rather than German, origin.

The beer sponsored Rheingold Theater, a dramatic anthology series, on NBC Primetime in 1955 – 1956. Rheingold Beer, “despite its Wagnerian opera name, was brewed in a little brewery located in Brooklyn, NY; and which tried to use the early medium of TV to get a little respect — or “brand recognition” at least.

Still, Rheingold Beer, “introduced in 1883, is a New York beer that held 35 percent of the state’s beer market from 1950 to 1960. The company was sold by the founding German American Liebmann family in 1963… Rheingold shut down operations in 1976, when they were unable to compete with the large national breweries… The label was revived in 1998…” but it’s not the same, or so I am told.

WHY do I remember the lyrics to a song for a product I have NEVER consumed? Herwitz Associates suggests “a dozen principles for improving memory, but the concepts can just as easily be applied to making a message memorable.”

Listen to Estudiantina Valse here or here or here or here, featuring a 26-tone Violinopan (thanks, Jaquandor!)

Listen to the Rheingold beer jingle here or here or here or here (modern)

Co-opoly and other games people play

When we got to the dates category, I realized that not everyone knows them as well as I.

At the conference I attended in Syracuse at the end of April, we were encouraged to bring board games to play on that Tuesday evening. This was a new thing, and no one was sure if there would be any interest.

I brought backgammon, which I described here, and the word game Taboo, plus a couple decks of cards.

My group ended up playing three games. In Co-opoly. “players start a cooperative (a democratic business or organization). In order to survive as individuals and to strive for the success of their co-op, players make tough choices regarding big and small challenges while putting their teamwork to the test.”

It has elements of charades, Taboo, Monopoly, Life, and other games. Do we buy health insurance or risk going without? How about property insurance? The ending round is the most exciting. It did remind me once again that I CANNOT DRAW to save my life.

I had played Apples to Apples before, but never before was it such uproarious fun. “The object of the game is to win the most rounds by playing a ‘red apple’ card (which generally features a noun) from one’s hand to best ‘match’ that round’s communal ‘green apple’ card (which contains an adjective) as chosen by that round’s judging player.”

At one point there were nine of us, which was a great number for maximum fun. Here are some examples of how it plays out.

Balderdash was last. “One player reads out a question to the others. They each write down a made up, but believable answer and hand it to the person who read the question. This person then reads out the REAL answer and all the made up answers, in random order. The others must guess which is actually correct. You score moves on the board for each player who is conned into believing that your made up answer is the real one, as well as for choosing the real and often unbelievable answer.”

The person who has the REAL answer has to write that down too, and late at night, that sometimes didn’t happen. When we got to the dates category, I realized that not everyone knows them as well as I. For instance, someone read a date in 1946; one bluff was VJ Day, and a couple people were fooled. I had written down the Suez Canal crisis for a date in 1956, which I gather was too vague a reference. When I drew a card, it was for January 19, 1946, which I KNEW was Dolly Parton’s birthday.

Elsewhere, people were playing Cards Against Humanity, which, until it was floated on our listserv the week before, I was not familiar with and still have not played. On the other hand, no poker was played, in a break with tradition.

Life is a pre-existing condition

The bill that the House Republicans passed is the same sadistic bill they tried to pass weeks ago, and if anything more brutal.

Interestingly, I’m not especially worked up over the Republicans passing a bill, purportedly to “fix” health care, but in fact stripping the right away from millions of people in order to fund an enormous tax break for the rich.

Maybe it’s because everyone else is SO ticked. If those elephantine members of Congress took heat from their constituents around the time of the March non-vote, I can only imagine how angry those voters are now, well, except for the districts represented by those 20 Republicans who voted against the bill. The anti-GOP ads are already starting.

And target #1 in this area – not my district, but one adjacent – has to be former state legislator and now freshman Congressman John Faso. Endorsed by the local Hearst paper in 2016, and now blasted in same, I know a number of people who are already working for his defeat in 2018.

Some talking head – Dan Senor on CBS This Morning – recently suggested that November 2018 is a long time from now and that this vote won’t define any candidate. I TOTALLY disagree. It’s like what Nancy Pelosi said, their votes all but branded on their foreheads.

The bill that the House Republicans passed is the same sadistic bill they tried to pass weeks ago, and if anything more brutal — opening the door to discriminating against people with a pre-existing condition.

Before the vote, Jimmy Kimmel, FCOL, talked of how quick hospital-style attention saved the life of his infant son, and made the argument to protect those in situations like his child. Some trolls went after him, but the counter thrust was fierce.

Seth Meyers explained how Speaker Paul Ryan of 2017 TOTALLY contradicts Paul Ryan of 2009.

Oddly, the so-called prosperity gospel explains The American Health Care Act. I’m not sure I want to say Today, I Hope That There’s a Hell, but if there IS one, those grinning faces in the White House garden this past week would be heading there.

Stay angry, my friends. Your wrath comforts me. If YOU weren’t ticked, I’D have to be, and I’m TIRED of being enraged ALL of the time.

On the other hand, if you want help unelecting these SOBs, I’m in.