If you do, you can enter the competition, which begins soon: The Dept. of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) intends on issuing a solicitation in electronic format on or about March 6, 2017 for the design and build … Continue reading →
We call it “fashion.” But at this point it seems to have morphed into a competition to see who can come up with an outfit that is either strangest and most extreme, or most revealing. Preferably both at the same … Continue reading →
In my life, I’ve had some problems with February. Perhaps you have, too. It’s a short month, but it can be cold and gloomy. Its only holiday is Valentine’s Day, which can be a mixed bag. As a freshman in … Continue reading →
Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers generated more human happiness than many do-gooders. In the comments to the YouTube videos of their dance routines, you can find many people (some of them, I assume, young people) lamenting the death of this … Continue reading →
Wordsworth wrote: “Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting…” Now researchers indicate that sleep itself is a forgetting: In 2003, Giulio Tononi and Chiara Cirelli, biologists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, proposed that synapses grew so exuberantly during … Continue reading →
Yesterday I happened across a photo from the late-nineteenth century Klondike Gold rush of the part of the Chilkoot Pass that was known as the Golden Staircase. You can see why the photo caught my attention: Here’s one that’s more … Continue reading →
Mary Tyler Moore has died at 80. She had kept a very low profile in recent years. Diabetes (Moore was diagnosed at 33) can be a difficult taskmaster and exact a toll as time goes on. Anyone of a certain … Continue reading →
Boy, am I sick of this bigness-of-the-inaugural-crowd business. But commenter “Hangtown Bob” has called my attention to a photo I just can’t resist spotlighting. It’s interesting on many levels—not just because of how it impacts on the burning question of … Continue reading →
The press/Trump sniping made me think of the “Pick-a-Little” song from “The Music Man,” and so I thought you would enjoy seeing it. Hey, I was raised on those musicals, so that’s the way my mind sometimes works. There’s a … Continue reading →
Who was Astaire’s best partner? Fred Astaire himself was unique, and as a solo performer in his genre he was unsurpassed. Period. It wasn’t just that he could choreograph routine after routine and bring freshness to each one. It wasn’t … Continue reading →
Here’s a video featuring dancer Jean Veloz. I believe it was filmed back in the 1940s (with incredibly corny narration): Here’s Jean at 90: Jean Veloz is apparently still going strong now, at around 92. It’s hard to see any … Continue reading →
I’ve never been a big Donald O’Connor fan, but it’s about time I remedied that failing. This video (from the 1953 movie “Call Me Madam”) goes a long way towards converting me. It features Donald, supposedly drunk, making impossible moves … Continue reading →