Three more episodes of podcasts worth listening too:

• “Disgustingly Adorable” - Colonial Williamsburg: Past & Present covers the annual spring lambing, a big event for Phi Pi fans. Previous sheeplore: Fuzzy Pigs and Out Like a Lamb.
• “News from Lake Wobegon” - A Prairie Home Companion is a classic radio show, although it’s a bit tired these days. I’ve heard about all the Guy Noir and Ketchup ads I care to hear. Luckily there’s a podcast just for the best part, Garrison Keillor’s monologue. The one for May 3, 2008 is particularly good with a reflection on why Christianity is hard and the great line, “Gas costs more than beer. Don’t drive, drink.”
• “The Beauty and Challenge of Being Catholic: Hearing the Faithful” - An episode of APM: Speaking the Faith I learned about via Dirty Catholic. This a great selection of interviews from a cross-section of American Catholics. More interviews and transcripts at the website

Over the past decade or so, while the US economy has gone down the toilet, the dollar has crashed and burned, and xenophobia blossomed to the point of building fences on our borders, Ireland has become a prosperous nation built on new industries, the strength of the European Union, and the rising Euro. As a result, a centuries-long trend of Irish emigration has been reversed and now Ireland is a destination for the world’s poor and dispossessed looking to make a new life. One of Ireland’s premier contemporary writers Roddy Doyle takes on the challenges of the emerging multi-cultural society in his collection of short stories The Deportees and Other Stories (2008). The eight stories are built on the simple premise: “someone born in Ireland meets someone who has come to live there.”

Doyle is one of my favorite authors and I’ve enjoyed many of his novels including The Barrytown Trilogy: The Commitments, The Snapper, and The Van, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, The Woman Who Walked into Doors, and my favorite Doyle novel A Star Called Henry (sadly,a sequel to Henry called Oh, Play that Thing, was uneven to put it politely). Doyle may be the most appropriate author to write about this new Ireland. He has an eye for detail and ear for language, and his stories are comfortable in the space between poignant and laugh-out-loud funny. Doyle originally published these stories as part of a regular column (in 800 word increments) fo Ireland’s multicultural newspaper Metro Eireann.

My favorite stories include:

• The title story in which Jimmy Rabbite of The Commitments decides to put together a new band, this time with no native Irish musicians, to play the songs of Woody Guthrie. I’d pay money to see that band.
• “New Boy” in which a boy named Joseph who escaped political violence in his native Africa has to stand up to playground violence on his first day at an Irish school. This story hits the nail on the head in showing a child’s perspective on being the new kid in class.
• “Black Hoodie” in which an Irish boy in a hooded sweatshirt and his Nigerian maybe-girlfriend lead store security guards on while their friend in a wheelchair robs the store blind. Its all part of a business proposition to test stereotypes and collect consulting fees from the store managers. It’s almost too clever for its own good.

By the way, watching the video below will apparently play a part in determining how Irish you are:

New York: Viking Penguin, 2008.

Haley House is a great place in Boston where people create community around food. You can call it a soup kitchen, a bakery, and an organic farm, but it’s the people who count. Both poor and privileged come together to share their gifts and learn from one another.

Via Anna at Isak, I’ve learned that a Haley House documentary is in the works. It’s the work of Alexandra Pinschmidt who lives in the Haley House community. The trailer for the film is on YouTube and is quite stirring. Check it out.

I look forward to seeing the entire documentary.

The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation. Volume I: The Pox Party (2006) by M.T. Anderson begins like a science fiction story, reminiscent of The Baroque Cycle. Young Octavian lives with his mother Cassiopeia and a crowd of Natural Philosophers who go by numbers instead of names. Octavian and his mother are royalty, and although they are far from home, they live in luxury with fine foods and clothing, a classical education, and sophisticated society.

HONKING HUGE SPOILERS BEGIN HERE.

In time it is revealed that Octavian and his mother are slaves living in Boston in the 1760’s-70’s and while treated well materially, Octavian is also something of a lab rat, under constant observation by the scientists of the Novanglian College of Lucidity. This goes right down to Octavian having his excrement weighed after every bowel movement to study the efficiency of his digestive system. Over the course of the novel Octavian grows more aware of the uniqueness and injustice of his situation. Octavian’s coming-of-age is coupled with the College falling on hard times and the start of the Revolution. The central paradox of the novel is that the American’s who are fighting for freedom are doings so while defending their right to withhold freedom from others.

The title refers to an event in the central chapters where in Spring of 1775 the College scientists gather a party of 40 people, both blacks and whites, on a remote farm and inoculate them against smallpox. It is literally a party with dancing and entertainment until the guests begin to fall ill from the inoculation. As everything with the College of Lucidity it is also a scientific experiment to compare the effects of the pox on peoples of European and African descent, and becomes the subject of a scholarly paper. Finally, it is also an attempt by the slave masters to keep their servants indisposed and away from the cities as they fear the British will incite the slaves to fight against the colonists.

The majority of the book is written in first person as Octavian’s memoirs mixed with letters, diary entries, and newspaper clippings that offer other character’s perspectives. It’s classified as a Young Adult book, although I think the 18th-century style language would prove challenging for a teenage reader. I know I would have found this book difficult as a teen as I didn’t learn much of the history until I went to college and become acquainted with the language until I worked at Colonial Williamsburg. But perhaps I underestimate today’s young adults who can enjoy reading a gripping story and perhaps reread it later in life for other perspectives.

I enjoyed this book immensely and it is a front runner for my list of favorite books for 2008. I look forward to reading the second volume The Kingdom on the Waves set for release on October 14, 2008.

Favorite Passages

Music hath its land of origin; and yet it is also its own country, its own sovereign power, and all may take refuge there, and all once settled, may claim it as their own, and all may meet there in amity; and these instruments, as surely as instruments of torture, belong to all of us. — p. 156

‘Tis time to shake off the yoke of oppression. ‘Tis not enough for royal tyrants to reduce us to slavery — they raise up our slaves to lord it over us.

We shall break all their backs. We shall show them chaos and rebellion. There shall be retribution. [Clepp Asquith, Esq]. — p. 262

Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press, 2006.

Spring is sprung, so it is a good time to get out and take a walking tour of Boston where one can learn about history, architecture, art, nature, society, or just get some fresh air. Since I love walking tours, I decided to pull together a list of the various tours available in Boston and neighboring communities. The two organizations listed below have primacy because I am a volunteer guide for them (don’t let that scare you away, the other guides are great). The rest are listed in alphabetical order. While I’m a fan of walking tours, I don’t tend to have the time to take as many as I like so be aware I only have personal experience with a few of these organizations so don’t consider making the list an endorsement. If you know of any good walking tours in Boston not listed below, I’d love to add them to the list, so please post in the comments.

• Boston By Foot - Boston’s premier walking tours with 7 regular tours offered daily, tours of the month, and special holiday tours.
• Jamaica Plain Historical Society -Weekly tours on Saturday mornings of 6 areas in the Eden of America.

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• Appalachian Mountain Club - The Boston Chapter has a Local Walks Committee offering hikes to condition oneself for the mountains, nature walks, and social walks.
• Arnold Arboretum - Boston’s tree museum offers regular highlight tours and special theme tours. Come back again because the tour changes depending on the season.
• Black Heritage Trail - A tour of African-American history in Boston led by National Park Service guides, or you can take a self-guided tour.
• Evening Walkers - A Meetup.com group for people who like walking. No narration, just scenery and a chance to meet people.
• Friends of the Blue Hills - Group hikes and nature walks in the Blue Hills Reservation.
• Brookline Food Tour - The way to Brookline’s heart is through your stomach.
• Boston Athenæum - Art and architecture tours of this respected independent library. They also offer tours for members should you be so fortunate. [Suggested by Charles Swift in the comments below].
• Boston CityWalks - Four regularly scheduled walks and custom tours of Boston and Cambridge [Suggested by Alan in the comments below]
• Boston Harborfest - Walking tours are among the many events of Boston’s Independence Day celebration, including special Boston By Foot offerings.
• Boston Harborwalk - A self-guided walk along Boston’s waterfront.
• Boston Movie Tours - Tinseltown comes to the Hub in this tour of film locations.
• Boston National Historical Park - Tours of the Freedom Trail and Charlestown Navy Yard led by National Park Service Rangers.
• Boston Nature Center - Birding tours, nature walks, and hikes in the heart of the city.
• Boston Public Library - Regular art and architecture tours of the oldest municipal library in the US.
• The Boston Spirits Walking Tour - A spooky walking tour focusing on Boston’s ghost stories.
• Boston Town Crier - Freedom Trail tours led by character interpreters of James Otis and Benjamin Franklin.
• Boston Women’s Heritage Trail - Nine self-guided walks exploring women’s history in Boston.
• Boston Your Way - Hire a private guide for a customizable tour (I wonder if they’re hiring).
• Cambridge Historical Society - The CHS events calendar currently includes a garden tour and historic house tours.
• Discover Roxbury - Arrange a 90 minute tour for school, family, and adult groups of this historic and diverse neighborhood.
• Fenway Park - Go behind the scenes at the home of the Boston Red Sox, the oldest and smallest ballpark in Major League Baseball.
• Forest Hills Cemetery - Boston’s hidden gem is full of history, art, and architecture, all of which is illuminated by a good tour guide (read about a great tour we took last fall).
• Franklin Park Coalition - A self-guided tour, trails, and special events throughout the year in the “gem” of the Emerald Necklace.
• Freedom Trail Tours - You can follow the red line on your own or let a costumed guide show you the way with 3 different 90-minute tours provided by the Freedom Trail Foundation.
• Gibson House Museum - If you’re admiring the Victorian architecture of Back Bay and want to see a house interior, stop in here for a tour.
• Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway Society - Explore the new public space replacing the elevated Central Artery with special tours supported by Boston By Foot.
• Harvard Campus Tour - Free official tours of the Harvard University campus.
• Historic New England - The HNE calendar offers neighborhood and historic property tours in Boston and throughout New England.
• Irish Heritage Trail - A self-guided walk with guided tours in the works.
• Learn English in Boston - Art and architecture tours of Boston for ESL students.
• Mass Bay Railroad Enthusiasts - Quarry to wharf tours of the remains of the granite railway in Quincy and Milton (part van, part walking tour).
• MIT Campus Tour - Learn about the innovative architecture by world-renown architects that speckle the MIT campus.
• Middlesex Fells - Check the calendar for special hikes or join the regular Babes in the Woods walks for parents and children.
• Museum of Fine Arts - Regular free guided tours of the galleries (with museum admission) plus art & architecture tours outside of the museum.
• The Nichols House Museum - If you’re admiring the Federal architecture of Beacon Hill and want to see a house interior, stop in here for a tour.
• North End Secret Tour - Tours of Boston’s oldest neighborhood lead by a local resident.
• The Path to Independence - Character interpreters offer a first-person historical perspective of the Freedom Trail.
• Phantoms of Olde Cambridge -The ghosties of Harvard Square get their own tour.
• Photowalks - Walking tours combined with instruction in photography on four different routes.
• Paul Revere’s North End Walking Tour - An experienced guide from the Paul Revere House leads tours of the North End in early July.
• South End Historical Society - An Annual House Tour is offered in October.
• Unofficial Tours Present Harvard University - Fun tours of America’s first college.
• WalkBoston - Boston’s walking advocacy group offers regular walks around the city.
• Walking Tours of Historic Boston - Families and groups can book tours of Boston’s historic center lead by a children’s book author.
• Watson Adventures Scavenger Hunts - A unique spin on the walking tour where participants gather together in teams to solve questions and puzzles.
• Women Artists in the Back Bay - A self-guided walk created by created in partnership by the Boston Women’s Heritage Trail and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, with the support of the City of Boston, the Boston Women’s Commission, and the MFA Ladies Committee Associates.

Nobel Prize Laureate Heinrich Böll’s novel Billiards at Half-Past Nine represents Germany for Around the World for a Good Book. The story focuses on three generations of a family of architects set on one day in 1958, but encompassing flashbacks to life during two World Wars and living under Kaiser, Fuhrer, and Democracy. The three central characters are Richard Faehmel, his son Robert Faehmel, and grandson Joseph Faehmel. All three are tied to St. Anthony Abbey which is outside of the the city of Cologne where the family lives. Richard completed the Abbey in 1908, Robert as a demolition expert destroyed the abbey under orders in the waning days of the war, and Joseph contributed to its reconstruction in 1958. Through the novel each man’s relationship to the Abbey is revealed in ways that defy expectations - Richard is indifferent to the destruction of mere buildings, Robert more complicit in the Abbey’s destruction because he believed the monks collaborated with the Nazis, and Joseph horrified to learn that his father destroyed his grandfather’s work. The novel’s title refers to Roberts attempts to make order in his life with a rigid schedule that includes shooting billiards at the local hotel each morning from 9:30-11.

Billiards at Half-Past Nine is a complex novel with narration rotating from chapter to chapter offering perspectives of different family members, work colleagues and friends of the family. The time-scale and place are also affected by frequent flashbacks and memories to different places and times. All this is woven together well to show different perspectives on people and events in the novel.

Religious overtones are strong in this novel. The imagery of the lamb, referring to meek or sacrificial characters is used often. The lamb also comes up in allusion to Biblical passages such as “Feed my lambs” and “Lamb of God.” Meanwhile, those drawn to Nazism are described as taking the “Host of the Beast” and their actions are akin to Satan worship. Interestingly enough, while there presence is felt throughout the novel, the words “Nazi” and “Hitler” never appear in the text.

This is an excellent book, probably worth puzzling through again to get a better sense of the German zeitgeist in the aftermath of World War II. There are a lot of interesting details about place and time. I enjoyed reading about German school boys playing rounders (a game similar to baseball) in the 1930’s and one character’s ride on the Cologne streetcars whose routes and schedules haven’t changed over decades of turmoil.

I found these two discussion guides useful in sorting out the characters and chapters:

• Grinnell
• UCSB

Favorite Passage

“Politeness is really the most effective form of contempt,” he thought.

New York: McGraw Hill (1962)

]]> http://othemts.wordpress.com/2008/05/02/book-review-billiards-at-half-past-nine-by-heinrich-boll/feed/ othemts http://othemts.wordpress.com/2008/04/29/book-review-mets-by-the-numbers-by-jon-springer-and-matthew-silverman/ http://othemts.wordpress.com/2008/04/29/book-review-mets-by-the-numbers-by-jon-springer-and-matthew-silverman/#comments Tue, 29 Apr 2008 18:46:40 +0000 Liam http://othemts.wordpress.com/?p=782

Want to know the history of the Mets by uniform number from 1962-2007? Mets by the Numbers (2008) is the book for you!  The book is a collaboration between Jon Springer, mastermind behind the Mets by the Numbers website that’s graced the internet for the past decade, and Matt Silverman who’s worked on several books about the Mets.

The book is an odyssey through Mets history uniform numbers, focusing on the best players to wear each uniform and many of the worst.  Sidebars rank the best performances in various statistical categories and the idiosyncrasies of how players chose there numbers and sometimes how the numbers chose them.  This is quick, easy and fun read and also a good reference that should be on the shelf in every public library in the Tri-State area.  In Boston, not so much (I had to special order my copy through Brookline Booksmith).

Hailed as “the first magnum opus of the Palestinian saga,” Gate of the Sun (2006) by Elias Khoury is my (tardy) Around the World for a Good Book selection for March. This epic novel features the narrator, Dr. Khalil telling stories to the comatose Yunes, a veteran of the conflicts with Israel seen as a hero to his people. I didn’t catch on to this myself, but a review in the New York Times relates the telling of stories to keep someone alive to the classic Arabic tale “A Thousand and One Nights.”

This novel is challenging to read both because of it’s stream-of-consciousness narrative as well as the grim details of its subject matter. Khalil tells stories of his own life, stories about Yunes, stories of their families, and friends and villagers they know. The narrative stretches from the 1940’s to the 1990’s, punctuated by the historic conflicts with Israel. War, death, poverty, oppression, misery, and hopelessness flavor many of the tales. Their village is victim of massacres and their people commit their own atrocities. Not all of the novel is so dismal though, there are humorous stories, tales of love and love lost, and perseverance despite it all.

I have to confess that I know far too little of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and with more knowledge of that history I could appreciate this book better. On the other hand, this very personal tale is a good background for studying the history. Of all the Around the World for a Good Book novels I’ve read thus far, this one may be the closest to speaking for a people at the present time.

Favorite Passages

I won’t describe the darkness to you, because I hate describing things. Ever since I was in school I’ve hated describing things. The teacher would give us an essay to write: Describe a rainy day. And I wouldn’t know how, because I hate comparing things. Things can only be described in their own terms, and when we compare them, we forget them. A girl’s face is like a girl’s face and not like the moon. The whiteness and roundness of everything else are different. When we say that a girl’s face is like the moon, we forget the girl. We make the description so that we can forget, and I don’t like to to forget. Rain is like rain, isn’t that enough? Isn’t it enough that it should rain for us to smell the smell of winter? - p. 68

Got you! I’ve got you now, and it’s up to me to decipher what you said. Everything needs translating. Everything that’s said is a riddle or a euphemism that needs to be interpreted. Now I must reinterpret you from the beginning. I’ll take apart your disjointed phrases to see what’s inside them and will but you back together to get at your truth.

Can I get at your truth?

What does your truth mean?

I don’t know, but I’ll discover things that had never crossed my mind. - p. 398

Why are all your stories like that?

How could you stand this life?

These days we cans stand it because of video; Abu Kamal was right — we’ve become a video nation. Umm Hassan brought me a tape of al-Ghabsiyyeh, and some other woman brough a tape of another village — all people do is swap videotapes, and in these images we find the strength to continue. We sit in front of the small screen and see small spots, distorted pictures and close-ups, and from these we invent the country we desire. We invent our life through pictures. - p. 462

Here’s another edition of my irregular feature of spotlighting good podcasts I’ve listened to recently:

1. Writing the World is a recent episode of the Wisconsin Public Radio show To the Best of Our Knowledge. It features interviews with several prominent and award-winning authors about their craft. What struck me is that while we often talk about a writer having a voice, due to the nature of their medium we rarely hear their actual voices. Toni Morrison’s voice is beautiful while V.S. Naipaul sounds insufferably pompous. Amy Tan is heartbreaking when she impersonates her mother speaking to ghosts. Other writers interviewed include Sherman Alexie, Alice Walker, and Orhan Pamuk.
2. Pop Music- RadioLab is quickly becoming my favorite radio show podcast and this episode focuses on music getting stuck in our heads (WARNING: If you’re like me, listening to this podcast will leave “Downtown” stuck in your head for days!). Some people are unfortunate enough to get full-orchestrated and loud songs playing in their heads to their detriment (the work of Oliver Sacks is cited in this segment). Song writers on the other hand want to get music in their heads (and then into other people’s heads). While I’m unusual in my generation in that I am not exceedingly nostalgic for School House Rock (in fact I hated it when I was a kid), the interview with the songwriter who created them is pretty interesting. Finally, there’s the story of Ahmad Zahir, the “Afghan Elvis” who welded Western music to local tradition to become a pop sensation.
3. Can Science Save the Banana? - I love bananas. In fact, I read a book about bananas called Bananas: An American History by Virginia Scott Jenkins. From this Scientific American podcast, I learned that in our grandparents’ generation, people were able to eat a larger, more tasty type of banana which is now extinct due to a fungus. Worse, the banana we’re familiar with now, the Cavendish, is now also suffering from the blight and may be wiped out in the next decade. Genetic engineering and/or switching American tastes to the red banana may be our only options. I’ll have to keep up on the banana news from the Banana Book Blog (http://www.bananabook.org/) by Dan Koeppel.

Here’s a rare occassion in which I read a book in the year it’s published after reading this review of Timothy Brook’s Vermeer’s Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World (2008) in the Christian Science Monitor. This book is also my selection for April’s Book A Month Challenge on Beauty.

Brook uses eight works of art from the 17th-century (most of them by Johannes Vermeer) and uses them as doorways into the emerging global world. This book goes beyond simple art appreciation creating a James Burke’s Connections-style investigation of what is featured in the art and how it connects to the changing world of the time, especially in the Netherlands and China. It’s a fascinating and unique perspective and I recommend the book to anyone interested in art, history, and the human story.

The works of art are listed below with a synopsis of what Brook finds beyond each of these doors.

1. Johannes Vermeer, View of Delft (1660/61)

Vermeer’s accurate landscape of his hometown includes the prominent headquarters of the local chamber of the Dutch East India Company (Verenigde Oostindische Compangie, or VOC). This shows that Delft has become a part of the growing commercial empire trading with the East, redefining capitalism and nationalism in the process.

2. Johannes Vermeer, Officer and Laughing Girl (1658)

A familiar sight of a soldier flirting with a young woman focuses on the aspects that connect this domestic scene with foreign lands. The map on the wall shows the Netherlands as a growing maritime empire. The officer’s hat is connected to Samuel Champlain and his efforts by alliance and conquest to control the beaver pelt trade in the New World.

3. Johannes Vermeer, Young Woman Reading a Letter at an Open Window (1657)

A dish of fruit is prominent in the foreground and leads to a discussion of Chinese porcelain imported to Europe. The fine porcelain became a mark of taste and breeding in European homes. In China, the demand for porcelain created a export market for table ware used in ways different from the Chinese culture.

4.Johannes Vermeer, The Geographer (1669)

The studious geographer calmly studies the growing body of knowledge of the world. At the same time a cultural exchange in 17th-century occurs between the Chinese and European merchants, missionaries, and shipwrecked sailors.

5. A Plate from the Lambert van Meerten Museum of Delft (late seventeenth century)

Delft became a center of creating European versions of Chinese porcelain complete with Chinese-style images to enhance their exotic appeal. This plate in particular includes an image of a Chinese man smoking, an image that appeals to Europeans although for cultural reasons Chinese artists would never depict someone participating in such a new trend. This chapter follows the quick spread of tobacco use across Europe and Asia, and creation of cultural traditions for smoking.

6. Johannes Vermeer, Woman Holding a Balance (1664)

The woman is weighing silver which became prominent in trade in the 17th-century. Much of the silver was mined in the Spanish colony of Bolivia. Each year a large ship fulled of silver bullion sailed from South America to Manila where it was exchanged for silks with Chinese merchants. The growing community of Chinese traders in Manila leads to mistrust and massacres, yet the trade thrives all the same.

7. Hendrik van der Burch, The Card Players (1660)

This painting by Vermeer’s contemporary prominently features an African slave, something Vermeer never painted, but a growing reality in 17th-century Europe. This chapter focuses on journeys, ordinary people traveling to far-flung corners of the Earth, some of them to stay including Africans enslaved in the Netherlands and Dutch sailors settling in China and Korea. There’s also some good parts about pirates (or privateers depending on your perspective)!

8. Emperor Guan, the Chinese God of War, Depicted in Ivory from the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco

An image similar to one exhumed by a Chinese convert to Christianity and used as a standard for a Chinese insurgency against the Spanish in Manila.

I haven’t promoted it yet, but I added a new page to the links at the top of this blog called “PODCASTS.” It’s basically a list of all the podcasts I (try) to listen to sorted into a few broad categories. Some of the podcasts appear in multiple categories. I probably should also add a simple A-Z list as well as some synopses of each podcast. Anyhow, for now it’s what I listen too, and each is recommended for anyone interested in those topics.

I want to highlight three individual podcast episodes (all radio shows originally) that fall under the them of Old Sounds:

1. Ultima Thule is an Australian radio show that plays ambient and atmospheric music. A recent episode, UT 702 featured Christian religious music of the past including liturgical chants from the Coptic, Maronite, Melkite and Old Roman traditions. If you’re like me and are familiar with Gregorian Chant, but have not heard these other traditions, you will find it ear-opening. The history of sacred music is rich and diverse.
2. WNYC’s Radiolab recently did an episode about Orson Welle’s 1938 broadcast of “War of the Worlds“. They play segments from the actual broadcast, including the eerie moment where a report from the field goes silent. They also provide some historical context that helps explain the ensuing hysteria - the brewing war in Europe, radio coverage of the Hindenberg disaster, and the recent innovation of news bulletins interrupting radio programing. They also cover two other occasions in which radio performers perpetrated the same hoax with disastrous results.
3. Finally, for the oldest sounds of them all, recordings that precede Edison courtesy of the Antique Phonograph Music Program on WFMU. These recordings were made in 1860 not to be played back but as visual representations, however scientists were able to convert the images into sound! This is the earliest known recording of sound. The Antique Phonograph Music Program is always awesome as they play old records on their original equipment, but this episode goes above and beyond as they explain this great discovery.

Enjoy!

Yesterday, I watched Pope Benedict celebrate Mass with 48,000 people at Nationals Park in Washington. I wouldn’t usually do this because like fireworks, there’s something about Mass on tv that just isn’t the same. I’m also something of a “low church” kind of Catholic, to use an old fashioned term. But I was home from work and really curious. Since I’ve become active in liturgical ministry in recent years I wondered how they would share Eucharist among 48,000 people and whether people would kneel on the cold, beer-stained concrete of the grandstand during consecration. I also hoped I might see my friend Edward who was in attendance.

I didn’t find out the answers to these questions, but I’m really glad that I watched the Mass courtesy of live web streaming on USCCB’s Papal Visit Site. From all appearances, it looked like a joyous, hopeful, and prayerful celebration. I found it much more moving than I expected. I was especially moved by the liturgical music for the Mass which was a diverse mix of the standard contemporary Catholic songs, music of the many different cultural communities of the Washington archdiocese, and even a communion meditation by Placido Domingo! Pope Benedict is known for his fondness of music and I suspect he enjoyed the best that the American church offers in this joyous and prayerful liturgy. The diversity of the music also tied in well with what Benedict said in his homily:

“Two hundred years later, the Church in America can rightfully praise the accomplishment of past generations in bringing together widely differing immigrant groups within the unity of the Catholic faith and in a common commitment to the spread of the Gospel. At the same time, conscious of its rich diversity, the Catholic community in this country has come to appreciate ever more fully the importance of each individual and group offering its own particular gifts to the whole. The Church in the United States is now called to look to the future, firmly grounded in the faith passed on by previous generations, and ready to meet new challenges - challenges no less demanding than those faced by your forebears - with the hope born of God’s love, poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit (cf. Rom 5:5).”

I recognized one of the cantors, Stephen Bell, a deacon who will be ordained as a Paulist Father in June. I feel like I know him personally, but actually I just know him from when he participated in the BustedHalo Cast a couple of years back (apparently he does know a lot of people though). He has a rich and sonorous voice and it was lovely that he could share his gifts for leading the people in praising God.

The Pope’s homily was also moving with its message of hope. Like Dirty Catholic, I realized that I’d never heard the Pope’s voice before. It’s an obvious German accent, but softly spoken. My friend Edward put it best when he said you expect power from that accent so when you hear it gently spoken it’s “sort of like a powerful man tenderly holding an infant.” Like many Europeans he shames us monolingual Americans by being able to communicate fluently in multiple languages.

I’m particularly pleased that he was able to honestly and empathetically discuss the clerical sex abuse scandal in the homily. I’m even more happy that he met with some abuse survivors for an open conversation after the Mass. Hopefully this will be the beginning Church taking some responsibility for the wrongs of the past and working toward that hope for the future the Pope so eloquently foresees.

Hopefully, I’ll be able to tune into more of the events as the Pope visits New York (even though he’s going to the home of the Yankees, ick). The coverage provided by USCCB was excellent, albeit the screen for the the streaming video is tiny, but I read elsewhere that on tv news the reporters were chatting over the Mass and cutting to commercials so this was much better. Rocco Palmo as always deserves accolades for his Whispers in the Loggia where he’s publishing the text of all the Pope’s public comments as well as much more papal visit coverage.

I suppose this is the weekend where I write about TV. Ironic in the sense that I don’t actually own a tv, and haven’t had one in the home since 1999. I’m not an anti-tv elitist (although I do feel smug when I hear people have long conversations about reality show participants as if they were their friends), just sensible enough to know that I’m susceptible to being sucked into mindless channel flipping.

For not owning a television, I manage to watch a lot of it. Thanks to Comcast bundling prices, we even have a cable subscription hooked up to nothing so that our our internet service comes cheaper! Ah, the internet, which allows us to purchase tv shows from iTunes, watch live baseball games on MLB TV, and even stream free shows like the new season of Battlestar Galactica! Supplementing that, I’ve been getting lots of tv shows on DVD from the public library, which make for a great distraction during feeding times for the baby.

Anyhow, I’m unable to resist participating in memes when I come across them, so here’s the one about TV that I found on The Urban Pantheist:

1. Bold the shows of which you’ve watched every episode
2. Italic the shows of which you’ve seen at least one episode
2a. Star the shows you consider “the best”
3. Post your answers

50. Quantum Leap
49. Prison Break
48. Veronica Mars
47. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - probably the dullest of all the Star Treks
46. Sex & The City - saw a few episodes at a friends house and found it pretty trite

45. Farscape
44. Cracker
43. *Star Trek - I’m pretty sure I’ve only missed a few episodes, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen any. I should address that problem.
42. Only Fools and Horses - never heard of this
41. Band of Brothers - or this

40. Life on Mars - or this
39. *Monty Python’s Flying Circus - British television makes it so much easer to see every episode by having shorter seasons. Keeps the quality up too, I expect.
38. Curb Your Enthusiasm
37. *Star Trek: The Next Generation - my favorite Trek.
36. * Father Ted - watched the whole series back in December.

35. Alias
34. Frasier
33. CSI: Las Vegas
32. Babylon 5
31. Deadwood

30. Dexter
29. ER - I never watched this when it was new but we’ve been getting the DVDs for this lately from the library. A better show than I’d realized although it seems to decline in quality (and into soap opera-ness) with each season.
28. * Fawlty Towers - the first show I saw every episode of due to the fact that there are only 12.
27. Six Feet Under
26. * Red Dwarf - just watched the entire run over the past couple of months.

25. Futurama - I watched one episode of this show, and then watched it again about a year later and it was the exact same episode. I didn’t like it much either time.
24. Twin Peaks
23. The Office UK
22. The Shield
21. Angel - watched at friend’s house. They had to explain all the in-jokes.

20. Blackadder
19. Scrubs
18. Arrested Development
17. South Park - I watched from time to time over the first couple of seasons. It seemed to me that the writers went from “lets write something funny and outrageous” to “lets just try to be offensive and stir up controversy” much to the show’s detriment.
16. Doctor Who

15. Heroes
14. Firefly - far to sci-fi for my tastes.
13. * Battlestar Galactica - here is a great character drama that happens to be set in space. Best show on tv right now, imho.
12. Family Guy - I see references to this show everywhere on the ‘net and yet they don’t make me interested in ever watching this show.
11. Seinfeld - I never got the appeal of this show. Jerry Seinfeld is a funny guy, but the show always relied on cheap sex jokes, that annoying slap bass that I guess was supposed to enforce enthusiasm, and had the character of George Costanza who grated on my nerves.
10. Spaced
09. The X-Files
08. The Wire
07. Friends - the same-sex wedding episode was a big event in my apartment at the time. I never watched a full-episode otherwise.
06. 24 - This show appears to exist to justify the Bush administration’s torture policy. No thanks.

05. Lost - Susan, Craig & I watched an episode of this in a bar where we couldn’t hear the audio and we made up our own plot an dialog.
04. The West Wing - another show we’ve been getting from the library.
03. The Sopranos
02. Buffy the Vampire Slayer - saw this at the same time as Angel above.
01. * The Simpsons

I read this post called Forgotten Boston TV Commercials (via Universal Hub), and it stirred up nostalgia for some of the crazy local commercials of my youth.  Of course, since I grew up in Connecticut, my commercials are of a New York/Connecticut vintage.

Here’s what I found on youtube:

First, there’s the Mount Airy Lodge which defined the Poconos for me as a chain of mountains where hokiness prevails:

watch?v=3dOsgyw7yBw

Then there’s the Lulla-BUY of Broadway.  I always wondered why the Milford Plaza advertised so heavily in the New York market where their audience presumably already had a place to stay.

watch?v=UwlvkUMsDgI

This guy wasn’t Crazy Eddie but his incredibly annoying commercials probably didn’t make people miss the business when it went under.

watch?v=Yi5HfjEFrF4

Tom Carvel had a voice for telegraph.  Is it just me or does that ice cream squishing into the cake pan actually make it look really unappetizing.

watch?v=Cs1Vc_w9Nc8

French dancers go nuts for canned foods in this perrenial Shop-Rite ad.

watch?v=VdpYxZzhATQ

Sadly, I was not able to locate commercials for a New York radio station had claymation characters promise “love songs, nothing but love songs,” Gary Carter having the best shower ever for Ivory soap, and the classic low-budget ads for Mashuntucket Pequot Indian High Stakes Bingo (precursor to Foxwoods Casino).

Enjoy!

Time Begins on Opening Day is the title of a book by Thomas Boswell (see previous) and pretty much sums up my attitude toward baseball and life. There’s something comforting about the daily rhythm of baseball that is comforting. Even if I’m not watching a game on a particular day, I’ll pass a tv showing one in a pizza parlor, hear the radio broadcast from a passing car, and hear people discussing stats on the subway. If I want to divert myself with a couple of hours of baseball, I never have to wait a week or two to see a game during the baseball season. Those five months from November to March, of course, are nearly intolerable. So Opening Day is a joyous holiday for me in which life as it should be - for the most part - is restored.

Time began for me on March 31st when Johann Santana took the mound for the Mets in Florida, and lead the team to a 7-2 win. I started the season on the DL myself, laid up with a slipped disc and sciatica so I really haven’t been able to write about it until now. Of course, regular season baseball started even earlier with the Red Sox and A’s series in Japan. Such events are old hat to Mets fans who saw the first MLB game in Japan versus the Cubs in 2000. That Opening Day is memorable for the game winning homer by one of my all-time favorite Mets, Benny Agbayani. Incidentally, the Mets played the first MLB game in Mexico too versus the Padres and were the first opponent for Canada’s first MLB team the Expos in 1969.

My favorite Opening Day was April 9, 1985. That was the day I became a baseball fan. Previous to that date, I claimed to be a Mets fan and even avidly collected baseball cards, but I never really watched baseball. While they were able to play baseball in Queens, it was a rainy day in Connecticut so we had indoor recess. Some of the boys found a tv an tuned-in to the game, and for the first time I found myself watching, and asking questions about the game of the other boys. I was extremely unpopular so the fact that the other boys were even talking to me felt good, but better yet, I was enjoying an exciting game. After school, I rushed home and flipped on the tv and caught the finale. The Mets won on an extra-inning home run by their new catcher Gary Carter. I was so hooked I watched the replays and Kiner’s Korner, and pretty much every game for the rest of the season. I don’t think I’ve watched so many games since.

I heard this poem on Writer’s Almanac this morning and thought it appropos to this post:

Poem: “Assignment #1: Write a poem about Baseball and God” by Philip E. Burnham, Jr. from Housekeeping: Poems Out of the Ordinary.

Assignment #1: Write a poem about Baseball and God

And on the ninth day, God
In His infinite playfulness
Grass green grass, sky blue sky,
Separated the infield from the outfield,
Formed a skin of clay,
Assigned bases of safety
On cardinal points of the compass
Circling the mountain of deliverance,
Fashioned a wandering moon
From a horse, a string and a gum tree,
Tempered weapons of ash,
Made gloves from the golden skin of sacrificial bulls,
Set stars alight in the Milky Way,
Divided the descendants of Cain and Abel into contenders,
Declared time out, time in, stepped back,
And thundered over all of creation:
“Play ball!”

Here also are my Predictions for how I believe this Major League Baseball Season will finish. Don’t go to Vegas with these picks, I’m usually wrong.

NL EAST

New York
Philadelphia (WC)
Atlanta
Washington
Florida

NL CENTRAL

Milwaukee
Chicago
Cincinnati
Houston
St. Louis
Pittsburgh

NL WEST

Los Angeles
Arizona
Colorado
San Diego
San Francisco

AL EAST

Boston
Toronto
New York
Tampa Bay
Baltimore

AL CENTRAL

Detroit
Cleveland (WC)
Chicago
Minnesota
Kansas City

AL WEST

Los Angeles of Anaheim
Seattle
Oakland
Texas

DIVISIONAL SERIES

Philadelphia over Los Angeles
New York over Milwaukee
Boston over Cleveland
Detroit over Los Angeles

CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES

New York over Philadelphia
Detroit over Boston

WORLD SERIES

Detroit over New York

Our Boston Chapter of the William & Mary Alumni Society book club selected The Welsh Girl (2007) by Peter Ho Davies for our April reading. From the dust jacket summary, I gathered this was a romance between a German POW and a local girl and figured this was a remake of Summer of My German Soldier by Bette Greene, required reading in Junior High School.

Luckily, it’s a bit more complex than that.  The Welsh Girl basically intertwines the stories of three people in WWII Wales.  First, there’s Rotherham a refugee from Germany, not Jewish himself but with Jewish ancestry, who becomes an interogator for the British and comes to Wales to take a crack at Rudolf Hess.  Then, there’s Esther a teenage girl who lives on her fathers sheep farm and pulls pints at the local pub.  Finally, there’s Karsten, a handsome German soldier who to his shame is among the first to surrender on D-Day.  The three characters do not actually interact with one another for the majority of the book, so what we have three stories wound together around similar themes: a sense of belonging, identity (both personal and national), and feeling caged-in (both literally and metaphorically).

Unfortunately, The Welsh Girl is a rather dull book.  The Welsh scenery and cast of supporting characters lend a great texture to the story, but Davies appears to reserved to really let us into the minds of his characters.  Thus things just seem to turn out too pat and convenient for the plot.  The conclusion is particularly disappointing as it has Rotherham basically providing a distant epilogue for Esther and Kartsen.  A nice read for its place and time, but definitely a novel that could use some re-writing.

Beer: Wells Bombardier Bitter
Brewer: Wells and Young’s Brewing Company
Source: Draught
Rating: **** (8.7 of 10)

Comments: This is a tasty English-style ale. It’s a great looking beer with a thick head, and remains good looking as one drinks. The taste is fine too, bitter of course, but with a bit of sweetness. This beer really hit the spot with me.

From England to Ireland…

Beer: Wexford Irish Cream Ale
Brewer: Green King - Morland Brewery
Source: Draught
Rating: ** (6.9 of 10)
Comments: Nothing at all like Bailey’s Irish Cream. This is a beer that looks like a blond Guinness, thick with a creamy head. I found the scent a bit off-putting and the taste was rather bland, but it was a decent beer overall.

Here’s a bunch of short movie reviews, notes for my memory at least. I tend to watch movies in bunches and don’t want the anxiety of trying to write full reviews like I do for books anymore.

• Good By Lenin! (2003) - Set in East Berlin, this touching family comedy-drama tells the tale of Alex going to great lengths to care for his mother Christiane’s fragile health. She’s a true devotee to the socialist state who collapses and has a heart attack just prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall. When she awakes from her coma 8 months later Alex attempts to recreate the world of the GDR through increasingly elaborate stunts. Luckily the movie is not just a madcap comedy, but also delves into some introspective reflections on family. It’s also a time capsule of those heady days when the Wall fell and increasingly larger Coca-Cola trucks brought Western-style capitalism to the East (I can’t believe that was almost 20 years ago already!).

• The Iron Giant (1999) - In Cold War-era Maine, as Sputnik orbits overhead, a giant metal man crashes on the shore and goes on a rampage feeding on metal. An adventurous, somewhat obnoxious boy named Hogarth discovers the Iron Giant and befriends him. With the help of a beatnik scrap-metal yard owner and his mother they try to protect the Iron Giant from the government agent and military set to destroy him. The movie is predictable but charming and fun nonetheless. It’s a good combination of 50’s-style scifi with 80’s-style family drama

• The Clash: Westway to the World (2000) - For a revolutionary band, this is a surprisingly standard documentary. Basically archival concert films interspersed with talking head interviews by the band members and a few other folks affiliated with The Clash. I would have enjoyed more concert and less talking head interviews, but overall it is a nice peek into the life of The Only Band that Matters.

• Becket (1964) - Richard Burton is Thomas Becket the man of the world who finds meaning in defending the faith and the church when appointed Archbishop of Canterbury. His friend, King Henry II played by Peter O’Toole — who steals every scene he’s in with his slimy charm — appoints Becket thinking it’s a way out of church/state battles. But he doesn’t realize that his friend who’s been cleaning up after him is more honorable than he thinks. I understand that this film plays loosely with the facts of Becket’s life but it’s a classic tragedy all the same.

• Ma Vie En Rose (My Life in Pink) (1997) - Most definitely not the biopic of Edith Piaf. This is a Belgian comedy-drama about a 7-year old boy who wants to be a girl. Hollywood would play this for cheap laughs and then have a big lesson-learning moment. This European take shows the boy and his family meeting with prejudice, vandalism, job loss, abuse, a suicide attempt, and mobs of dead-eye suburbanites. It’s kind of comically depressing akin to a Funky Winkerbean storyline.

• Waydowntown (2000) - I was intrigued by the basic gist of this film in which a bunch of coworkers wager a month’s salary over who can stay inside the longest. This is made easier because their office building in Calgary, Alberta is connected to other buildings, including their apartments by shopping malls, food courts, and pedestrian walkways. Their adventures over one work day include a shoplifting CEO, a suicidal co-worker, cruel pranks, office romance, dead mice, and an ant farm. There’s also a moral lesson at the end but it’s kind of muddled. If you seek a move with a coherent storyline, this is not for you, but I enjoyed it due to its surreal black humor and ability to defy expectations. But I’m weird that way.

Beer: Tap Into the Art and Science of Brewing (1998) by Charles Bamforth is my selection for the March Book-A-Month Challenge: Craft. Creating beer is certainly a wonderful human craft and Charlie Bamforth examines it from historical, global, and scientific angles. In a sense this could be a textbook for a science course on brewing with much detail on the chemistry, physics, and biology involved in making a good brew. For all that it is quite readable, if you keep in mind that my brain skims over the more complex scientific parts.

Here are some facts about beer I learned from this book:

• Brewing beer is an ancient art going back to prehistoric times. From archaeological evidence at an Egyptian site, brewers Scottish and Newcastle were able to recreate an 3,000-year old recipe which they sold as Tutankhamun Ale. - p. 17
• Since the late 80’s Coors has shipped their beer from Colorado to the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia for packaging, bringing a little bit of the Rockies to the Appalachians. - p. 32
• Boiling, fermentation, and anaerobic packaging of beer are all inhospitable to microorganisms, so drinking beer is often safer than drinking water. Something to remember when traveling abroad. - p. 73
• Hops are unusual among agricultural products in that their solitary outlet is for brewing. “Although hopping acounts for much less than 1% of the price of a pint of beer, it has a disproportionate effect on product quality and, accordingly, much attention has been lavished on the hop and its chemistry.” - p. 102-103
• The major starch-degrading enzyme in fermentation is the same as that in human saliva. In some cultures brewers start fermentation with their own spit! - p. 120
• Brewing is a water-intensive process with as many as 20 liters of water used to create one liter of beer, although many brewers attempt to be much more efficient. - p. 123
• In medieval times, the strains of yeast used for brewing were known as goddisgoode. “Saccharomyces cerevisae, then, is a busy beast. Apart from being the workhorse of the brewery, it is responsible for the production of cider, wine, spirits, and some other alcoholic beverages. And as every cook knows, it is essential for production of life’s other staple food, bread.” - p. 137
• Beer is essentially the excretions of yeast. - p. 151-152
• Filtration is done with one of two filter-aids: kieselguhr which is the fossils of primitive organisms or perlite which is a volcanic glass. - p. 159
• Beers advertised as not being heat-treated are basically just marketing gimmicks since boiling beer does not significantly affect the flavor. - p. 164
• Army Air Corps General Curtis LeMay played a role in creating the keg when US airmen stationed in East Anglia during WWII did not take a liking to the traditional cask-conditioned ales of England. - p. 167
• Bamforth claims that being a quality assurance beer taster in a brewery is not as fun as it sounds, although I’d still love to find out for myself. - p. 183

So this is a great book, I’d reccomend to anyone who likes beer, brewing, and/or science.
Incidentally, while reading this book I came across this review of another book about beer, Fermenting Revolution: How To Drink Beer and Save the World by Christopher O’Brien, which may be next on my list when I want to read about beer.

I’m a fan of Mike Hayes from the BustedHaloCast so I read his book Googling God: The Religious Landscape of People in their 20s and 30s (2007). This thin volume is basically a guide for ministers to young adults in the Catholic Church, although I read it more as a young adult looking for ministry. Like libraries, the Church is good at ministering to children, teens, parents, and the elderly, but skip right over the (unmarried and childless) people in their 20’s and 30’s.

Hayes’ first lesson is the difference between people in their 20’s (the Millenials) and their 30’s (Generation X). Generation X tend to more progressive in their worship and seek community at their churches. The Millenials look more for contemplative worship and are more orthodox in their beliefs (or at least seek hard and fast answers to faith questions). Hayes conducts interviews with 6 people of each generation to learn about the typical faith stories of young adults today. I appreciate Hayes honesty when he disagrees with the opinions of the young adults he interviews, but finds value and importance in their beliefs all the same.

In the later chapters Hayes offers useful resources for ministering to Young Adults. This includes a critique of World Youth Day (the Pope’s biennial celebration with Catholic teens and young adults), a checklist for starting a young adult ministry at one’s church, and helpful tips for using technology and new media to attract and retain young adults. This is a very useful resources for those who want to learn about this important ministry written in a warm, readable style. Who knows? Maybe as I grow too old to be a young adult, I may be called to mentor the next generation.