Tag Archives: Events

Kings, Stings, Forgotten Stinks, Sungs and Stungs

Posted on September 1, 2012 by | 12 Comments

Thanks, Mr. President
For all the things you’ve done
The battles that you’ve won
The way you deal with U.S. Steel
And our problems by the ton
We thank you so much

Before they decompose in the grader ditch.

Honest! It just fell!

The ugly?

A touch of class

That gall bladder used to be right THERE.

Mexican Standoff in Chinese

Tanked in China

A sobering night for Ted Kennedy, but Mary Jo couldn’t swim. He bounced back, though not so high as previously expected. She didn’t.

Tanked in Martha’s Vineyard

The song has ended but the malady lingers on

Tanked elsewhere.

When Cuba still seemed nearby

The Last Roundup

Who ARE these guys?

Party animals

Hi! I’m king.

El Guapo meets Godzilla

Last one on’s a rotten egg

The Presidential War’s over!  This helicopter’s destination is Panama, Grenada, El Salvadore, Kuwait, Iraq, last stop in Afghanistan!  Show your tickets.

Old Jules

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Posted in 1950's, 1960's, 1970's, 1980's, 1990's, 2012, Adventure, History, Politics

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Hot Diggety Damn – Join Me for One of These Next Year! Let’s Party!

Posted on August 19, 2012 by | 5 Comments

2013 SANTA FE OPERA SEASON ANNOUNCED

WORLD PREMIERE OF OSCAR BY THEODORE MORRISON
Co-Commissioned and Co-Produced by The Santa Fe Opera and Opera Company of Philadelphia.
Featuring David Daniels in the title role.

 FIRST SANTA FE OPERA PERFORMANCES OF ROSSINI’S LA DONNA DEL LAGO
Featuring Joyce DiDonato in the title role.

 RETURN OF OFFENBACH’S THE GRAND DUCHESS OF GEROLSTEIN
First performances since 1979. New Production.
Featuring Susan Graham in the title role. 

TWO POPULAR REVIVALS
Mozart, The Marriage of Figaro from 2008. 
Verdi, La Traviata from 2009.
In honor of the 200th anniversary of the composer’s birth.

TWO SPECIAL CONCERTS

 SUNDAY, AUGUST 4, 4:00 PM
Venue to be Announced
In honor of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Richard Wagner
and the 100th anniversary of the birth of Benjamin Britten.
Richard Wagner, Wesendonck Lieder
Original version for voice and piano
Benjamin Britten, Cabaret Songs
Christine Brewer, Soprano
Frédéric Chaslin, Piano
Liszt, Wagner Transcriptions
Frédéric Chaslin, Piano

SUNDAY, AUGUST 18, 2013, 4:00 PM
STRAVINSKY COMMEMORATION
Basilica Cathedral of Saint Francis of Assisi
Stravinsky: Mass
Monteverdi: Vespers (selections)
A recreation of the concert Igor Stravinsky himself conducted on this date fifty years ago in his last appearance in Santa Fe.   That historic concert will be recreated by members of The Santa Fe Opera Apprentice Program and the Santa Fe Opera Orchestra led by Chief Conductor Frédéric Chaslin. 

THE GRAND DUCHESS OF GEROLSTEIN
Jacques Offenbach
Last performed by The Santa Fe Opera in 1979.  New Production.
Sung in French
With English Dialogue
June 28, July 3, 6, 12, 19, 30, August 7, 15, 21, 24

 

CONDUCTOR   Frédéric Chaslin
DIRECTOR     Lee Blakeley
SCENIC DESIGNER *Adrian Linford
COSTUME DESIGNER    *Jo van Schuppen
LIGHTING DESIGNER   Rick Fisher
CHOREOGRAPHER       Peggy Hickey
   
GRAND DUCHESS   Susan Graham
WANDA +*Anya Matanovič
FRITZ *Paul Appleby
BARON PUCK +Aaron Pegram
PRINCE PAUL  +Jonathan Michie
GENERAL BOUM  Kevin Burdette

 

Santa Fe Opera audiences in the 1970s loved this grande opera bouffe, and it was presented no less than four times in a decade.  Mr. MacKay decided it was time to bring it back.  The Grand Duchess, a young woman raised by tutors, is a tyrant, and the opera revolves around the complications of her love life.  Susan Graham, one of the world’s leading dramatic mezzo-sopranos, has a virtuoso comic side which will be remembered from the 2003 performance of another Offenbach gem, La Belle Hélène.  The object of her affections is a young officer, Fritz, sung by Paul Appleby in his debut.  Mr. Appleby was a national winner of the 2009 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, a career grantee from the Richard Tucker Foundation in 2011, and recently, the recipient of the 2012 Martin E. Segal Award. He performs extensively with pianist Steven Blier and the New York Festival of Song.  The object of Fritz’s affection, Wanda, is sung by Anya Matanovič, also making her debut. The cast also includes Kevin Burdette, remembered as Kitty’s father in the 2011 production of The Last Savage.  Making their debuts are scenic designer Adrian Linford and costume designer Jo van Schuppen.  Both have worked with director Lee Blakely, who is returning to Santa Fe for the 2012 production of The Pearl Fishers.  Chief Conductor Frédéric Chaslin will conduct.

 

THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Sung in Italian
Last performed by The Santa Fe Opera in 2008.  Revival.
June 29, July 5, 10, August 3, 8, 13, 20, 23

 

CONDUCTOR      John Nelson
DIRECTOR   Bruce Donnell
SCENIC & COSTUME DESIGNER  Paul Brown
LIGHTING DESIGNER     Duane Schuler
PRODUCTION Jonathan Kent
   
FIGARO   TBA
SUSANNA   *Lisette Oropesa
COUNTESS ALMAVIVA +Susanna Phillips
CHERUBINO       *+Emily Fons
MARCELLINA   Susanne Mentzer
BASILIO      +Keith Jameson
COUNT ALMAVIVA      Daniel Okulitch
DOCTOR BARTOLO  Dale Travis

 

The American soprano Lisette Oropesa will make her company debut as Susanna.  Ms. Oropesa, a former member of the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at the Metropolitan Opera, has appeared in a number of operas there including Das Rheingold and Siegfried.  Most recently she appeared in the Met’s production of The Enchanted Island.  The Countess and Count will be sung by Susanna Phillips and Daniel Okulitch, who was last seen in 2011 as the Last Savage in the opera of the same name.  Ms. Phillips has been singing leading roles both in this country and abroad, including the Metropolitan Opera.  Emily Fons, an apprentice in 2008 and 2009, is Cherubino.  The distinguished conductor John Nelson, who has appeared with orchestras and ensembles in this country and in Europe, led the Company’s 1997 production of Semele.  Director Bruce Donnell will recreate the original production by Jonathan Kent.  He has directed extensively at the Metropolitan Opera including a tour to Japan, and with opera companies in Europe, Canada and South America.  He has directed a number of productions for The Santa Fe Opera, most recently Salome in 2006.

LA DONNA DEL LAGO
Gioachino Rossini
First performances by The Santa Fe Opera.  New Production.
Sung in Italian
July 13, 17, 26, August 1, 6, 14

 

CONDUCTOR   Stephen Lord
DIRECTOR   Paul Curran
SCENIC & COSTUME DESIGNER  Kevin Knight
LIGHTING DESIGNER  Duane Schuler
   
ELENA  +Joyce DiDonato
MALCOLM GROEME     *Daniela Barcellona
UBERTO   *Lawrence Brownlee
RODRIGO DI DHU   *René Barbera
DOUGLAS D’ANGUS   Wayne Tigges

Rossini’s opera of 1819 is based on The Lady of the Lake by Sir Walter Scott in which a young woman, Elena, is pledged to marry one man, but loves another.  Joyce DiDonato, in the title role, performed the opera in 2010 at the Paris Opera and in 2011 at La Scala.  In La Donna del Lago, her true love, Malcolm, will be sung by mezzo- soprano Daniela Barcellona.  Born in Trieste, Ms. Barcellona is recognized as a superb interpreter of Rossini whose works she has sung throughout Europe.  She appeared with Ms. DiDonato in the Paris and La Scala productions.  The brilliant American tenor Lawrence Brownlee is Uberto, the disguised King James who also loves Elena.  He studied at Indiana University, making his Metropolitan Opera debut in 2000. Tenor René Barbera, a native of San Antonio, is Rodrigo.  In 2011 he received the top three prizes in Plácido Domingo’s Operalia Competition, the first singer to do so.   All three are making their company debuts in this new production.  Stephen Lord returns to conduct.  He led The Tales of Hoffmann in 2010.  Director Paul Curran and scenic and costume designer Kevin Knight most recently created Albert Herring in 2010.

LA TRAVIATA
Giuseppe Verdi
Sung in Italian
Last Performed by The Santa Fe Opera in 2009.  Revival.
July 20, 24, 29, August 2, 5, 10, 16, 22

 

CONDUCTOR      Frédéric Chaslin
DIRECTOR   Laurent Pelly
SCENIC DESIGNER  Chantal Thomas
COSTUME DESIGNER Laurent Pelly
LIGHTING DESIGNER    Duane Schuler
   
VIOLETTA  *Brenda Rae
ALFREDO    +*Michael Fabiano
GERMONT     *Roland Wood (American debut)
GASTONE    +Keith Jameson
DOUPHOL +* Jonathan Michie
DR. GRENVIL  Dale Travis

French director Laurent Pelly returns to Santa Fe to recreate his striking production of La Traviata with scenic designer Chantal Thomas.  Making her debut as Violetta is Brenda Rae.  The American soprano has been a member of the ensemble at Frankfurt Opera where she has sung major roles.  Her appearances in Europe include performances at National Opera of Bordeaux, Glyndebourne Festival, Bayerische Staatsoper, and Arena di Verona.  Alfredo will be sung by Michael Fabiano, a former apprentice who has been winning acclaim in this country and in Europe.  He was a grand prize winner at the 2007 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions and was featured in The Audition, the documentary about the competition.  He has made debuts at English National Opera, San Francisco Opera, Dresden Semperoper, Opera Cologne, Deutsche Oper Berlin, and others.  Baritone Roland Wood is a British native, having received his music education at Royal Northern College of Music and at the National Opera Studio and English National Opera where he has also performed.  He has sung with opera companies throughout Scotland, England and in Europe.  All three are making their first appearances in Santa Fe.  These performances also mark Mr. Wood’s American debut.

OSCAR
Theodore Morrison
Libretto by Theodore Morrison and John Cox
World Premiere
Commissioned and Produced by
The Santa Fe Opera and Opera Company of Philadelphia
Sung in English
July 27, 31, August 9, 12, 17

 

CONDUCTOR  Evan Rogister
DIRECTOR   Kevin Newbury
SCENIC DESIGNER   David Korins
COSTUME DESIGNER David Woolard
LIGHTING DESIGNER     Rick Fisher
CHOREOGRAPHER    Seán Curran
   
OSCAR WILDE   David Daniels
ADA LEVERSON  Heidi Stober
FRANK HARRIS  +William Burden
WALT WHITMAN  Dwayne Croft

                                                               

David Daniels is one of music’s leading countertenors whose career spans music of the Baroque era to the contemporary.  He appeared in the Company’s 2011 production of Vivaldi’s Griselda and recently in the title role of Handel’s Rinaldo at the Lyric Opera of Chicago.  He was the leading countertenor in the Metropolitan Opera’s Baroque pastiche, Enchanted Island, seen worldwide in theaters in HD.  Heidi Stober was Musetta in the 2011 revival of La Bohéme and prior, as Tigrane in Radamisto with Mr. Daniels in 2008.  She is singing the role of Zdenka in the 2012 production of Arabella.  Mr. Burden will be remembered for his sympathetic performance of Captain Vere in the 2008 production of Billy Budd.  He is appearing as the mysterious Shepherd in the 2012 production of King Roger.  Kevin Newbury last directed Life Is a Dream by Lewis Spratlan in 2010.  He will continue his collaboration with scenic designer David Korins. Evan Rogister, who has made his career primarily in Europe, is now in demand with opera companies in the U.S and returns to conduct King Roger in 2012.

http://www.santafeopera.org/thecompany/news/pressreleases/detail.aspx?id=6802

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Posted in Adventure, America, New Mexico, NM, Senior Citizens

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Book Review – Into the Rising Sun – Patrick K. O’Donnell

Posted on August 16, 2012 by | 4 Comments

 

Good morning readers.  Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.

This book ought to be required reading for all these namby-pamby ‘thank you for your service’ self-hugging smugness goodygoody submerged hypocrites, thinks I. 

These are the WWII experiences told by men who came back from WWII and didn’t talk about it.  Didn’t join the VFW, didn’t wave any flags, and grew old holding it inside their heads because what they saw and experienced as young men didn’t fit inside the picture the US Empire was drawing of itself and its conduct of WWII.

Eventually some decided it was time to tell it and O’Donnell was there to record what they said.  Into The Rising Sun was the result.  They told of being sent into places nobody needed to go, under-equipped with incompetent leadership, under-supplied, half-starved into malaria swamps against an enemy no better off than they were.

They told of the most significant experience of their lives.  A dismal experience perpetrated by negligence, mediocrity, politics, publicity and lies for the folks back home waving flags and beating drums.  Sending their own sons off to join them in jungles where getting captured meant becoming a meal for the enemy.  Where shooting all prisoners was the norm. 

Burma, the Solomons, the South Pacific they lived didn’t make its way into any Broadway musicals and the ‘thank you for your service’ expressions represented an irony too confusing to face.  Legions of men betrayed by their government for convenience, whims and indifference.  Betrayed by a failure of the military leadership to commit itself to the reality they were living and fulfill their own responsibilities, the only excuse for their existence.

The 20th Century is loaded with places a person wouldn’t care to have been.  What these men lived wasn’t unique.  Happened so many places to so many men of the 20th Century from all countries a book couldn’t list them all.

But this book probably represents as good a synopsis as anyone’s likely to produce.  It’s good the old men finally told it.

Old Jules

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Posted in 1940's, 2000's, 2012, Adventure, America, Book Reviews, Books, Government, History, Human Behavior, Military, Politics

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Texas Romance With Secession and Rope-Dancing

Posted on August 12, 2012 by | 11 Comments

Hi readers.

Probably a strong case can be made that the Texan love for the idea of secession is directly related to the long-term love affair so many Texans have with lynchings, beatings, bullyings, and executions.  Especially during the past 50-60 years the Federal Government’s been a terrible thorn in the side of folks who’d like to be able to drag accused offenders out of the jailhouse and hang them, as their ancestors were fond of doing.

The side of the Civil War in Texas a reader has to search deeply to find is the part involving Texas Homeland Security of the time.  Raping, burning, looting, confiscation of property, and indiscriminate lynching of anyone the forces of law decided might oppose secession or the Confederacy.

[Secession! Texas Makes Its Choice - Texas State Library and Archives Commission https://www.tsl.state.tx.us/exhibits/civilwar/secession.html]

According to the Texas Historical Commission, “Texas stands third among the states, after Mississippi and Georgia, in the total number of lynching victims. Of the 468 victims in Texas between 1885 and 1942, 339 were black, 77 white, 53 Hispanic, and 1 Indian. Half of the white victims died between 1885 and 1889, and 53 percent of the Hispanics died in the 1915 troubles. Between 1889 and 1942 charges of murder or attempted murder precipitated at least 40 percent of the mobs; rape or attempted rape accounted for 26 percent. Blacks were more likely to be lynched for rape than were members of other groups, although even among blacks murder-related charges accounted for 40 percent of the lynchings and rape for only 32 percent. All but 15 of the 322 lynching incidents that have a known locality occurred in the eastern half of the state. The heaviest concentration of mob activity was along the Brazos River from Waco to the Gulf of Mexico, where eleven counties accounted for 20 percent of all lynch mobs. Other concentrations were in Harrison and neighboring counties on the Louisiana border, adjacent to Caddo Parish, Louisiana, one of the most lynching-prone areas in the country, and in Lamar and surrounding counties in Northeast Texas.”

http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/jgl01

A couple of examples of Texas Cultural Lynchmen at work:

“Today in Texas History: Teenage boy lynched in Center

On this date in 1920, the body of Lige Daniels, an African-American teenager, hung in the main square of Center, a small town near the border between Texas and Louisiana.

Daniels was the victim of a lynching. In a 2001 story on Refdiff.com, columnist Dilip D’Souza described the scene: “Wearing a white shirt, torn pants and no shoes, his head tilted back sightlessly, this black teenager hung that day from the limb of a tree.”

D’Souza noted Daniels, imprisoned on allegations that he murdered a white woman, was taken from jail by a mob of nearly a thousand citizens, who carried him to the square where they hanged him.

D’Souza said the Daniels’ lynching garnered much attention but no local protests. Instead, there was so much fascination with the strung-up corpse that photographers turned the event into a postcard that was mailed to families and friends across the country. Daniels’ dead body became an article of trade.”

http://blog.chron.com/txpotomac/2010/08/today-in-texas-history-teenage-boy-lynched-in-center/

Or Jesse Washington, Waco.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching_in_the_United_States

Texans have a legitimate pride in their history and their heritage.  Their heroes of the Alamo, of San Jacinto, of the wars with the Comanche, the Apache, the Civil War are, to Texans, reflections of what they are, themselves.  Their aspirations, their salutes, their strutting pride in a history they yearn to be a part of.

And being a part of the United States with its obstructive Supreme Court decisions, its attempts to stand between Texans and the act of being themselves, needs mending.

Needs another secession to open the doors to opportunities lost.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2012, America, History, Human Behavior, Outdoors, Police, Politics, Texas

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Confederate Capital of Arizona Territory

Posted on August 12, 2012 by | 4 Comments

I probably should have added this to the last post, but somehow it seems to me to deserve a place of its own.

That building sitting on the corner of the plaza in Mesilla, New Mexico, was the self-same structure Col. Baylor of the Texas Baylor Baylors of Texas aristocracy chose as the capital building for the Confederate Territory of Arizona.

Baylor turned out to be a less-than-optimal governor to the Territory, brought himself up for all manner of criticism.  One of which being the source of an order to kill all the male Indians in the fledgling Territory, and make slaves of all the kids and surviving females.

News travelled slowly in those days, and this command reached Richmond, Virginia at a time to dovetail nicely with news of Sibley failures, chaotic retreat after Glorietta, and other matters not calculated to endear Baylor to the general Confederate command structure.

For instance, the retreating Texans left their severely injured in the hospital at Fort Davis as they passed through, hop-skip-and-jump ahead of pursuing Union Forces.  Obviously intending to defer medical treatment to the pursuers.

But Apache arrived at that hospital ahead of the Yankees.  Tortured, disembowelled, roasted those Texans at their leisure, finally killed them in time for the arrival of the rescuers.

Ultimately Baylor was reduced in rank to corporal and sentenced to spend the remainder of the war walking guard in Galveston, where he served honorably.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2012, Adventure, History, Military, New Mexico, NM, Texas

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Try, Try Again – Texas Secession, Invasion, Evasion and Forgetfulness

Posted on August 12, 2012 by | 4 Comments

Good morning readers.  Thanks for coming by  for a read this morning.  I promised a few days ago I wouldn’t tell you any Texas history anecdotes, but I’ve already got Old Sol’s sober promise to come up on schedule, the cats are fed, and I probably ought to write about something just to prove I can.

I mentioned Texas invaded New Mexico twice, once in 1841, then again during the early stages of the US War of Secession.  Both of those episodes were characterized by more human folly on both sides than anyone has a right to be part of, but one man, JS Sutton, was right up front for both of them.  First name on the monument. 

Captain in the 1841 Expedition, Lt. Colonel in the second.  Never got another shot at a third try because he was offed at Valverde.  But he must have been considered an expert on the second because the 1841 group surrendered without firing a shot and got frog-marched barefooted southward across the same route Sutton followed north to his death two decades later.

Sutton was a courageous, interesting man, lived a life I’d call worth living, but couldn’t seem to keep his eye on the dirt where he was standing, and it eventually got him killed.  As far as I’ve ever been able to establish, he was the only man involved in both expeditions.

However, there was a Lockridge [second name on the monument] involved in the 1841 debacle, shot himself while they were camped at Bird’s Battleground near Three Rivers.  Maybe this later Lockridge killed at Valverde was a brother, son, cousin.  Almost certainly kinfolk, in any case.

Some other similarities between the two expeditions involved both commanders spending a lot of their time drunk, generally being logistically ill prepared for the task, and plenty of poor command decisions to help it along.

That second expedition, however, came inches from being a success in the sense of achieving the main objective.  Driving the US Army out of Fort Union.  The secondary objective, Sherrod Hunter driving west, taking and holding Tucson, probably was doomed from the first.  Nobody could have anticipated the California Volunteers marching east with the equipment and numbers they managed.

Hunter’s force of 500 retreated from Tucson early in May, headed back to the Rio Grande with plenty of difficulties with Apache and desertion.  Only twelve of the force, including Hunter, arrived in Mesilla finally in August.

Which left them with one hell-of-a-long trek back to Texas and a long war to fight and lose when they got there.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2000's, Adventure, History, Human Behavior, Military, New Mexico, NM, Reading, Texas

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Philosophy by Limerick – We’re DIFFERENT Now!

Posted on August 10, 2012 by | 4 Comments

“A Marxist DICTATOR!” she cries
Buzz-wording with widening eyes.
Pretend OUR replacement
Will end the defacement;
OUR bail-outs efficient and wise.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2012, Government, limericks, Politics

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Crazy Anger

Posted on August 9, 2012 by | 13 Comments

Good morning readers.  Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.

I overslept, which almost never happens to me.  Thoroughly pissed-off the chickens [their protests finally woke me] and the felines.  Appropriate enough, I suppose, because I came out of sleep seething with anger.  An anger that’s been simmering inside me for a few days, but I somehow was ignoring.

One of my favorite authors, Sir Terence David John “Terry” Pratchett[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Pratchett], Jeanne told me, has himself a case of Alzheimer’s.  Hell, evidently he announced it to the public in 2007 and everyone in the world but my humble self knew it.  Not that my knowing of it would have made any difference, except maybe if I’d been digesting the fact I’d have reacted in a more rational way than I did having it come as a surprise.

Found, I did, that I’d almost been thinking of Pratchett almost as a family member or close friend gradually over the years, which also caught me by surprise.  The guy has a mind works so similarly to my own that when I read his books I sometimes found myself sort of juxtaposed, me creating his character, his dialogue, his plot, laughing as I did it.

So, time to go root hog or die back into my anger management rituals, I reckons.  Time to bring discipline and routine back into the gratitude and forgiveness affirmations.

Forgiving old Terry for maybe dying before I do.  Forgiving myself for being the flawed bastard I am, falling off the wagon, letting anger seep into my head.  Forgiving the Universe for tossing a challenge of the sort Alzheimer’s brings into our lives which seem plenty challenging enough already, everything else being equal.

I’m surely going to miss knowing Terry Pratchett’s out there doing what I ain’t doing better than I could have done it.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2012, Books, Creative Writing, Current Issues, Human Behavior, Relationships, Senior Citizens, Writing

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The Pulse of US Concern Over Kings and Wannabe Kings

Posted on August 2, 2012 by | 2 Comments

Hi readers.  Got a news flash here on the bumper-sticker issue that has all of you breathless and on the edge of your chairs.

Jeanne, the administrator for this blog, just returned to Kansas from a 10 day, 4300 mile motor trip to Washington and Oregon.  During the trip she was careful  to tally the political bumper stickers encountered on the highways both ways.  Finally finished tallying them up last night and faithfully reported the results to me:

The current King of the US:  3 each.  Two for this election, one for the last one.

The Wannabe King of the US:  1 each. 

Looks like a landslide victory for Long Live the King.  You can’t fight a popular movement.

Remember where you heard it first.

Welcome back, Jeanne.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2012, America, Current Issues, Government, Politics

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The National Synthetic Grief Olympics [NSGO] Deadline

Posted on July 29, 2012 by | 2 Comments

Hi readers.  Thanks for coming by for a read.

This is just a reminder.  If you, or your community, plan to enter the NSGO this year, time is running out.   For the orchestrated [team] events the competition is going to be stiff and the weather’s likely to be hot. 

Parades might be out of the question unless your community is prepared to haul off horseflesh collapsed on the streets and fried to the pavement.  Evening candlelight services conducted a few hours after sundown might be a better option.  That will allow the darkness to hide the furtive yawns while the names are being read from the podiums and so on.  It will also take a lot of the pressure off those who’d prefer to go home and watch television after they’ve carefully shown their faces and pronounced themselves present and grief-stricken. 

Slipping away to the car in darkness will maintain the illusion of mourners for the dedicated name-readers, and deniability later.  There’s even a next-day potential for smug, holier-than-thou denouncements of those who sneaked off without having to actually have stayed.

But the individual competitions will be tough this years, as well.  A lot of celebrities bit the dust this year, while a few big ones from the past are still lingering to be celebrated for the novelty.  Michael Jackson, JFK, Pearl Harbor, Elvis Presley and Rin Tin Tin come to mind.

If you’re only in this for a lot of public drama, pretense and shameless exploitation of the dead, you probably still have some time to prepare.  But if you’re in this to sell flags and bumper stickers, or create a commercial illusion of patriotic zeal for people to pretend to believe, you need to be out there now.

Old Jules

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Posted in 2000's, 2012, America, Communication, Government, Human Behavior, Politics

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