I post a weekly diary of the historical notes, arts & science items, foreign news (often receiving little notice in the US) and whimsical pieces from the outside world that I featured this past week in "Cheers & Jeers". For example .....
By Request SEPARATED at BIRTH from el vasco - seeking a doppelganger for the GOP pollster Frank Luntz ...
... well, how about Janet Napolitano - the Secretary of Homeland Security?
OK, you've been warned - here is this week's tomfoolery material that I posted.
ART NOTES - you may be familiar with the iconic Andrew Wyeth painting Christina's World from 1948....
.... now, the farmhouse in Cushing, Maine depicted has been declared a National Historic Landmark by the US Department of the Interior.
CHEERS to a wonderful family reunion this past weekend. But not the one I have with my cousins and surviving aunts - no, this one goes back to the family of my paternal grandmother and her parents who married in 1879 - and I had a wonderful time taking a bus tour of the family's homes in Greenwich Village and Harlem, a march into Central Park with a bagpiper leading us and recording oral histories. I'll have a photo diary in this coming Thursday's Top Comments diary.
WEDNESDAY's CHILD is De Vinci the Cat - a Georgia kitteh who claimed top feline honors at his first show, but for Celeste DeFreese (who's been showing her cats for 20 years) it's simply another first-place ribbon.
SPORTING NOTES - here is one of those sports stories that transcend sports: the day a kid named Jerry Joseph showed up in Odessa, Texas, ready to play basketball ... and how truth is stranger than fiction.
AGRICULTURE NOTES - the head of the International Food and Agricultural Organization believes that Africa can turn subsistence farming into profitable businesses while still remaining sustainable.
TRAVEL NOTES - a train station in the town of Zaltbommel is getting the Netherlands' first platform made of polystyrene - covered by concrete slabs - which (due to the lightweight materials) will be finished in a fraction of the normal time it takes to construct a new platform.
ART NOTES - an unusual paired exhibition of works by the French artist Nicolas Poussin and the US modernist painter Cy Twombly (who died this week) .....
... are at the Dulwich Picture Gallery in London, England to September 25th.
IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING whether the not-guilty verdict in the recent 24/7 cable-TV trial of the century decade month just might cause a brain explosion for TV host Nancy Grace - it turns out that the story she tells of the murder of her childhood sweetheart (which she cites as determining her life's mission) contains some .... notable inaccuracies it would seem.
IN WHAT MAY BE that nation's last judicial proceeding of this magnitude: the man second in seniority only to Pol Pot as a former leader of the Khmer Rouge is now on trial in Cambodia, with one prosecutor working for the UN-backed court calling it the most complex case since Nuremberg.
THURSDAY's CHILD was named Skipper the Cat after being rescued (quite oil-stained) from a NYC barge, capping a 2-day rescue by some animal lovers.
THE GOVERNMENT of conservative president Sebastian Piñera was boosted by the successful rescue of the trapped miners in Chile - but his government is rather unpopular today as the first anniversary of the August 5th collapse approaches, with survivor Jose Ojeda (who penned the famous note "All 33 of us are alright") frustrated with the government using the accident for publicity purposes.
TRAVEL NOTES - this week China opened a new, 820-mile Beijing-Shanghai high-speed rail line - with speeds of over 185 miles/hour, it cuts the travel time between China’s two most important cities by nearly half (to 4 hours, 48 minutes).
HAIL and FAREWELL to the late, great Dusty the Cat. Thanks to Debbie in ME for the 'Bonus Dusty' photos you posted over the years (even though he didn't like having his photo taken). She reports that Loki was looking for Dusty for a few days after the euthanization .. but she is glad that Dusty is no longer suffering from pain and is now at peace.
BRAIN TEASER - try this Weekly World News Quiz from the BBC.
CHEERS to yesterday's Cheers & Jeers northern New England meet-up in Maine. Someone asked about photos: oddly, I can't recall any that were taken; perhaps some will surface. But thanks to mayim for a fantastic day.
SEPARATED at BIRTH - actor Howard Smith, from the Twilight Zone episode A Stop at Willoughby - the boss who shouted "Push, push, push, Williams!" .....
... and North Carolina Senator Sam Ervin of Watergate fame.
......and finally, for a song of the week ............... being away for a long weekend, there was no time for a full musical profile. Here, then, is a quick story of an unusual musical pairing .. and a re-working of a classic tune.
In 1997, the hip-hop group Run–D.M.C were in their sixteenth year of existence and on a European tour. The band from Queens, New York would later be called the "Beatles of hip-hop" by fellow performer Chuck D, in his introduction of them as #48 in Rolling Stone's 100 Greatest Artists of All Time this past decade, and in 2009 they would be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
But bandmember Darryl McDaniels - the "D.M.C." in the band's name - was a most unhappy man back in 1997. Some reasons: he had grown weary of touring, was suffering from homesickness and substance abuse, feared his voice was wearing out (from his aggressive singing style) and that creative differences with his bandmates (as the band was in a lull) were damaging their future. In addition, he felt an inner loneliness for which he could not identify a reason. He began to consider suicide when he returned home, not wanting to leave his bandmates high and dry on the tour.
On his way home from the airport, he had a change of heart. The reason? He heard the new song Angel - about a drug-addict's struggles with the world - by someone whose background seemingly could not have been more different than Darryl McDaniels' life had been.
Sarah McLachlan is a singer-songwriter from Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada who has sold in excess of 40 million records world-wide. Long involved in charity work, she penned the song I Will Remember You for the film The Brothers McMullen in 1995 and was the chief organizer for the Lilith Fair music festivals featuring women artists. Not exactly urban, male hip-hop .... but it was a lifeline to Darryl McDaniels.
A year after he backed away from contemplating suicide, he saw Sarah McLachlan at a Grammy party and told her what her song "Angel" had done for him. "Thank you for telling me that Darryl - because that's what music is supposed to do" was her reply.
A few years later, Darryl McDaniels decided to write his memoirs and in the course of researching the book, called his parents for information on his birth, which they gave to him ... only to call back 15 minutes later to tell him that he had been adopted. This, he was convinced, was that missing piece of himself that he couldn't identify.
He devoted part of his life to working on behalf of adopted children and won a 2006 Congressional Angels in Adoption Award - and at nearly the 2:00 minute mark of this video, just look at who presents him with this award.
Darryl McDaniels and Sarah McLachlan - at ages 47 and 43, respectively - would appear to have many years of performing ahead of them, with McDaniels planning a new release The Origins of Block Music and Sarah McLachlan now on tour as well as releasing her first studio album last year after a seven-year hiatus.
In 2006, McDaniels planned a solo album and had an interesting idea for a song. He wanted to reprise the Harry Chapin classic Cat's in the Cradle - but with revised lyrics about being adopted (and this time, with a happy ending). Darryl picks up the story from there:
Then a light goes on in my head. I'mma get that lady. That lady whose record helped me, I'mma get her to help me make a record that's gonna help somebody else.
She agreed to sing the chorus for him, and once the record was finished: McLachlan told McDaniels .... that she, too was adopted. McDaniels was floored.
That's what music is supposed to do. I call up the lady that touched my life and then she tells me we had that in common. That's miraculous.
And below you can hear their collaboration entitled "Just Like Me".
It was nine whole months inside of the womb
Another long month in the hospital room
Facing doom in a tomb 'cause the kid is alone
But somebody came along and they took the kid home
He came into the world like we all do
But he never ever knew how he came through
Do the best you can do if this happens to you
And understand all the words that I'm rappin' to you
And the cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon
Little Boy Blue and the man in the moon
When you coming home?
I don't know when
But we'll get together then
You know we'll have a good time then