Sunday at the beach with Hi and Lois

In Hiandloisville, offshore drilling has begun.

What is happening to this comic strip?

[Hi and Lois, August 24, 2008.]

Related posts
Hi and Escher?
House?
House?
Returning from vacation with Hi and Lois
Vacationing with Hi and Lois

The Springfield Daily Gazette

7:30 a.m. Leave the house. Buy water, an extra umbrella, fruit and oatmeal bars.

8:00 a.m. Drive to Springfield. Get lost (briefly) — a back road is involved. There is no simple and direct route to Springfield.

10:00 a.m. Arrive in Springfield. An instant parking space in a downtown lot! It's open to the public today, courtesy of Horace Mann Insurance. Why are there easy-to-find spaces? Where are all the people?

10:05 a.m. An answer to the first question never materializes, but the people — many, many people — are already waiting in line, an astonishing line that already wraps around a city block and snakes back and down several other streets. (NPR later reports a crowd of 35,000.)

10:05 a.m.–11:00 a.m. Elaine and I stand in line. We talk with people around us, some from Chicago, some from Springfield. One of our cohort is a blues fan from way back. He and I begin to talk about Canned Heat and the Incident at Kickapoo Creek. The line is getting longer and longer. It moves a little now and then, into and away from shade. Vendors move past selling buttons, shirts, and towels (towels?) with Obama's likeness. None of these items are official campaign merchandise, which is available at a handful of white tents. (Hint: look for the union label.)

11:00 a.m.–12:00 p.m. Things move more quickly. We round two corners, cross a street, walk another block or so, and present ourselves for security checks. No bottles, umbrellas, or folding chairs. We are glad that we left our umbrellas in the car. We sip a little water before surrendering our bottles. Everything comes out of pockets for inspection. My compact Zebra pen arouses some interest. "It's a pen," I say, and demonstrate by uncapping it. It's okay.

[Things abandoned on the way to the security check. Why an Altoids tin? Click for a larger view, though doing so won't answer the question.]

12:00 p.m.–1:40 p.m. Waiting outside the Old State Capitol, in the street beyond the Capitol grounds. We talk to people around us, with pauses to endure the sun now and then. National Guardsman on rooftops watch the crowd through binoculars. A woman from St. Louis wonders whether Bruce Springsteen will be a surprise guest (he's playing in St. Louis tonight). We decide that his presence would add too great an entertainment element and undercut Joe Biden. A student who worked for Biden during the primaries is especially happy to be here. Elaine and I talk at length with a lovely couple from Bogotá, Colombia. They came to Springfield in the 1950s, planning to stay for a year, and never left. They offer remarkable stories about the city's history, its better days and worse.

The well-mannered crowd insists on manners. There are several outbreaks of polite chanting to get a news cameraman and several civilians to step down from the fence surrounding the Capitol grounds. These anti-social climbers are obscuring what would otherwise be splendid views of the podium. "PLEASE MOVE THE CAMERA!" And the cameraman moves on! "DOWN FROM THE FENCE — PLEASE!" This chant doesn't work so well. One guy remains on the fence for the entire time. I think his name must be Dick. Yes, he is a Dick.

It's hot, with occasional overcast skies and blessed breezes, and no sign of rain. "Is that rain? Oh — I think my body is making its own rain."

Behind us, a choreographed outburst for Candy Crowley of CNN, spotted on the press risers: "WE LOVE YOU, CANDY!" It occurs to me that I have never seen Candy Crowley in profile before this afternoon.

1:40 p.m. The event begins. The father of a serviceman killed in Iraq leads the Pledge of Allegiance. Springfield's mayor, two campaign volunteers, a minister speak. The minister's invocation reads like a lengthy to-do list for God. (Why not?)

2:00 p.m. Illinois' senior senator, Dick Durbin, introduces Barack Obama, right on schedule (I think). Obama speaks and introduces Joe Biden. Biden speaks and introduces Michelle Obama and Jill Biden. The crowd is fired up and ready to go, applauding and roaring, and cheerfully booing every reference to the worst president in history and his policies.

Not far in front of us, a young woman becomes unsteady while Joe Biden is speaking, and those around her help her sit down in the street. The call goes out in all directions for water. A bottle is passed back; a cup is passed forward. She drinks from the bottle; someone suggests pouring water on her feet; she's soon able to stand. There's a quiet round of applause.

It's odd: watching such an event on television, it's so easy to concentrate on what's being said. The speakers are in your face, so to speak. In person, it's different: there's more to pay attention to. It's like the difference between listening to a recording and attending a concert. Make that a concert at which you can only rarely see the musicians performing. So I'm looking forward to watching some of the endless replays of this afternoon's speeches on cable news. But I'm very happy to have come, and to be able to say that I was here.

[The people, yes. Click for a larger view.]

When the speeches were over (circa 3:00 p.m., I think) and the Obamas and Bidens began to greet people close to the speaking platform, Stevie Wonder's "Signed, Sealed, Delivered I'm Yours" came over the loudspeakers. Then some sort of rock and roll, and then the song I'd been waiting for, Jackie Wilson's "Higher and Higher." And then it was okay to leave.

[Barack and Michelle Obama and Joe and Jill Biden wave to the crowd. Click for a larger view.]

A related post
Great News from Springfield (from Elaine's blog)

Springfield!

In Google Maps, A not X marks the spot, the Old State Capitol.

(And we're off!)

Penguin's Great Ideas

From a review of Penguin's Great Ideas, third series:

These books are too beautiful. If I'm going to read a book, I want to be able to tote it around in a jacket pocket, to leave it in the bathroom to get warped by steam, or in the kitchen to get stained with ketchup.

Heinz, I hope.

Penguin's Great Ideas volumes are beautiful books indeed. You can see the covers from all three series (first, second, third) at designer David Pearson's website. No info available as to when these books will be available in the U.S. (I've asked.)

[Update, August 25, 2008: Penguin has no plans to publish the books in the United States. How to get them? More information in this post: Penguin's not so great idea.]

Proust in the New York Times crossword puzzle

[Welcome, syndicated-Times puzzlers!]

In today's puzzle, 36-Down, seven letters:

"Love is reciprocal       ": Marcel Proust

The answer is TORTURE (all caps, the crossword convention). The passage:

To be loved, one need not be sincere, nor even good at lying. By love, I mean here a kind of mutual torture.

The Prisoner, translated by Carol Clark (London: Penguin, 2003), 96

Yet another passage that won't soon appear on a Proust gift tag or note card.

My favorite clue in today's puzzle is 23-Across, "Field with bases" (four letters). Highlight the empty space between the colon and period if you want to see the answer: MATH.

Related reading
All Proust posts (Pinboard)

Review: Inara George and Van Dyke Parks

Inara George with Van Dyke Parks, An Invitation (Everloving, 2008)

Overture : Right as Wrong : Accidental : Bomb : Duet : Dirty White : Idaho : Rough Design : Tell Me That You Love Me : Don't Let It Get You : Oh My Love : Family Tree : Night Happens

Songs by Inara George ("Family Tree" written with Mike Andrews)
Arrangements by Van Dyke Parks

Playing time 38:46

An Invitation is a collaboration across generations and a recording to treasure. Inara George and Van Dyke Parks go back a long way — to 1974, when Inara (daughter of Little Feat's Lowell George) was born.

An Invitation is much like a theater-piece, complete with overture and a closing "Good night, good night to all of you." The songs are beautiful and spare; George sings them in a strong, cool, unstagey voice that makes the meaning of every word register. Her poignant and witty lyrics offer varied glimpses of someone in love, desirous, self-abasing, jubilant, ruefully self-aware, still hopeful:

Want to be a kite
And fly above your house
And then drop down into your room ("Right as Wrong")

I'm like a pet salamander
Just cut a few holes for some air
Carry me everywhere ("Tell Me That You Love Me")

I could be
Your century
I want to settle down
I could be
Your baby tree
I want to settle down ("Family Tree")

You're coming out
You bought the ticket
This is the greatest ("Don't Let It Get You")

I can break my heart
Before we start
Before we even start ("Duet")

A state of mind
To intertwine
Now love is blind
A rough design
But still sturdy ("Rough Design")

Parks' arrangements for small orchestra are elegant and endlessly supportive. There's a marked Gershwin influence (including a moment of An American in Paris) and some Argentine and French touches, especially when Parks plays accordion.

The throes of love? Accordion? I fear that this account might make An Invitation seem anything but inviting. But inviting it is. I've listened to this CD five times in two days, and will be listening again and again. It's contemporary music of the highest order. You are invited to try before you buy, at the Everloving website.

Other Van Dyke Parks posts
A new VDP interview
That (In)famous Line
VDP interviewed
VDP and the present tense
VDP on verb tenses
VDP speaks

Van Dyke Parks on verb tenses

From an interview with Inara George and Van Dyke Parks on the occasion of their collaboration An Invitation:

Interviewer: You said before you "stay out of the present tense." What's brought you back?

VDP: I meant in work — I don't mean psychologically. I'm in the prism of current understanding. I got the newspapers and I read them. But my reasons for that — "I stay out of the present tense." I think reverse is the most powerful gear. The torque! Things pass, and remembrance is the most instructive arena there is. It's wonderful because there’s nothing creative about it!

Related post
Van Dyke Parks and the present tense

Name brands and Brand X

In my supermarket life, I've been a sucker for name brands, having grown up in a family with a healthy respect for them. Our ice cream was Breyer's. Peas came from LeSueur. We shunned Brand X. This attitude was born not of affluence but of my parents' post-Depression intent to provide the best that it was within their means to provide.

Even as a frugal graduate student, I avoided Brand X. It never occurred to me to buy something other than, say, Skippy or Smucker's. Now things are different, and our kitchen is filled with store-brand items. But there are at least four name brands I can never forsake: Cheerios, Grape-Nuts, Gulden's, and Heinz.

As to the cereals: store brands don't compare. Oaty O's and their ilk are porous compared to Cheerios. Crunchy Nuggets and company lack Grape-Nuts', well, nuttiness.

And as to the condiments: Gulden's and Heinz are mustard and ketchup. I like Dijon too (store brand, way cheaper than Grey Poupon), but Gulden's is the Platonic ideal.

Reader, what name brands are you unwilling to forsake?

Hi and Escher?

I thought first of Lucy's psychiatry stand, but the real inspiration here might be M.C. Escher.

[Hi and Lois, August 19, 2008.]

Related posts
House?
House?
Returning from vacation with Hi and Lois
Sunday at the beach with Hi and Lois
Vacationing with Hi and Lois

NowDoThis

When keeping track of things to do, I prefer paper. But I still find NowDoThis an attractive and useful online tool. It has the virtue of extreme simplicity: a text area of unvarying size in which to enter and arrange an unlimited number of items (a scroll bar appears when needed). After you save a list, your items appear in large bold type, one at a time, waiting for you to click "done." No registration required.

NowDoThis might prove especially useful in managing time spent in front of the computer. I can imagine, for instance, making a list of everyday online reading —

NY Times obits
Arts and Letters Daily
Inside Higher Ed

and so on, so as to limit idle browsing. Putting such a list in the Firefox sidebar looks like an especially nifty way to stay on task. (Please be sure to include Orange Crate Art on said list.)

Related posts
Ta-da List
A timer to limit browsing