Ikiru v. Comedy of Power

Comedy of Power at the Museum last night was disappointing. Here's an excerpt from the blurb:

COMEDY OF POWER is inspired by the real-life story of examining magistrate Eva Joly, whose seven-year investigation into charges of fraud and bribery at the French oil company Elf Aquitaine was described by The Guardian as "the biggest and most scandalous fraud inquiry in Europe since the Second World War.

Tonight we went to the Bear Tooth and had no idea what we were going to see, only that it was Monday night Foreign/Art film night. After the first minute I realized we'd seen this 1952 Akira Kurosawa classic on DVD at home.

The black and white Ikiru showed us a bureaucrat who spent 30 years of his life stamping documents and as a cog in the system who maintains his job by doing nothing. When he learns he has up to six months to live, he realizes he hasn't lived, and with the help of a few strangers, figures out what he needs to do. In 2 1/2 hours we go through questions about the meaning of life, an analysis of the post War Japanese bureaucracy, come to understand this man who as his last act, fights the bureaucracy he's been part of to help some neighborhood women build a park.

Comedy of Power in contrast squandered its two hours leaving us wondering how did this investigator manage to pull off whatever it was she pulled off (it was never quite clear what got accomplished.) We really didn't learn much about any of the characters or what was going on. How could a one woman office with an assistant who we learn at the end was a spy do all the work needed to bring down giant corporate executives working closely with politicians - including her boss? After spending a week at the Anderson trial here, I know that just that relative small case took a lot of people to gather and organize all the data.


But Ikiru I highly recommend. Its story about human beings is timeless and one everyone should read now and then.

604

According to a very reliable source, Room 604 of the Baranof Hotel in Juneau will get a name change. When one of the hotel managers found out a group wanted to use the Veco corruption suite for a fund raiser a while back, he said no. The group was offered a different, more public room, but the infamous suite wasn't going to have 100 or more people squeezed in disturbing people on the floor at a time when the hotel was full. The hotel management doesn't want to promote the room's notoriety. There's no interest in cashing in on Alaska's most famous hotel room, in fact they are even planning on renumbering rooms soon.

Broadway Under the Stars Sun

The MacBook I got about three weeks ago has iMovie 6, which I spent most of today learning to put together this video of last night's outdoor concert. Christian Heppinstall and Theatre Artists United put on the show with help from various other folks. And now that I've got down the basics of iMovie 6, iMovie 7 came out this past week, and Ben from the Apple Store at CompUSA says it is completely different. Oh well, another obsolete skill.





I continue to be pleased with Viddler. The problems with the video can all be put on me. But considering this is all recorded with my digital camera, it's not too bad. Stabilizing would be helpful in a few places. A second camera would be really helpful. But it was a fun evening, with a big crowd out in the beautiful weather.

Blogger's New Browse Profile Feature

Wow! Quite some time back I had thought this was built in and so when I went to click on Alaska on my profile hoping to see all the other Alaska Bloggers, I was very disappointed you couldn't do this. But today you can. Now I've been gathering links for Alaska blogs hoping at some point to make a map of the types of blogs that are out there. The two blog rolls on the right side are part of that effort. I'd found about 250 Alaskan blogs. But when I clicked on Alaska in the Browse Profile feature, just now, it said there were over 6000! There's no way I'm going to map all those.

But then I went back to my profile and clicked on my first listing under favorite music, Keith Jarrett. Only 305. Out of all the millions of Blogspot bloggers, only 305 listed Keith Jarrett among their favorite musicians.

The first one I clicked on was Leighton. His banner is spectacular - at least to my taste. And the first post up was the YouTube of Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee which I immediately posted (below this one.) The photos on his site are also fine. And another video further down - the Secret - by Mark Day was also worth watching.

Obviously, there's something special about people who list Keith Jarrett in their favorite music. I make this claim based on a sample of one. Never mind that Leighton may find my site boring. For now, Keith Jarrett rocks. [I just picked the first Jarrett YouTube that came up. I'd never seen him perform before and I think perhaps the music is more enjoyable if you just listen. In any case the one I'd most recommend is the Koln [don't know how to do an umlaut here] concert CD.] I'll check out more of these Keith Jarrett fans later and give you a report. Meanwhile I'm going to try to put together a video/slideshow of last night's (now) "Broadway Under the Stars" at Town Square. Of course the sun doesn't go down til 10:30pm in early August, but there was a good crowd on this beautiful evening and the music was very good.

Not All Democratic Congresspeople Caved

Thank you Representative Lee for saying what needs to be said.

Short Hike Toward the BallField with Three Young Friends

We picked up S, M, and H, for a hike from the Glen Alps parking lot. We started at the steps to Flattop, but but took the upper trail towards Powerline Pass.

We stopped to play in the stunted forest. We're close to tree line here and the trees are kid sized.
























The kids decided on this warm day, they needed to rearrange the rocks in the creek under the bridge















Someone stole my camera while I was snoozing.
























M has a book on Alaska wildflowers and was excited to find the monkshood blooming everywhere she looked. But she told me the color was wrong in the book. It was blue, but these were more purple.




S decided to give H a piggy back ride.







They didn't get far.















Here we're getting back to the trail after the girls played in the tall grasses.
































We had to make another detour off the trail. This time to leave enough room for the moose and her calf. But she was taking the trail traffic in stride - and there was a lot of hikers and their dogs.















Finally back to the parking lot. As you can see it was full. At five bucks a car (free for those of us who buy annual day passes to the state park) it probably was a good idea just to maintain the parking lot and the trail heads. I wonder how many don't pay, and of that group, how many get fined, and how much of that is collected.

Anyway, it was a great day and the girls did a lot of walking and no complaining.

Fifth Day of 30 Day Sentence

Kona gets a visitor while in quarantine in Singapore. Can't tell who's happier to see whom.

What's Blooming?

I haven't been tending the garden nearly as well as I intended this summer, nor have I kept up with the pictures. Here are a few things that are blooming now.

Ligularia














Lily















Not sure the exact name, but this is a great dwarf delphinium.






















This fox glove came from deep in the woods, maybe ten years ago and is thriving.



The raspberries, always prolific, this year just have a pitiful crop. Not sure what happened but there are only a few stalks from last year that seemed to have survived. I'm hoping this year's new shoots will do better.







And a closeup of a naster[t]ium. [Someone googled 'nasterium' and got here. If I had spelled it right, the person wouldn't have gotten here. But it is 'nastertium."]
This close up shot makes it hard to reconize the Veronica.

Why Are Baseball Diamonds Different Sizes?

• Why are baseball diamonds different sizes when fields of other sports are very specific sizes?
• Why do three hour baseball games really take about the same time as an 'hour' football game?
• Why do baseball players always scratch their crotches?

Zack Hample, author of Watching Baseball Smarter: A Professional Fan's Guide for Beginners, Semi-Experts, and Deeply Serious Geeks, answers these and other questions on a fun interview on Fresh Air. Go there then click the listen icon. (If someone knows how to embed the links from NPR here, please let me know.)

Is This Really a Story of Importance?

Tribal Fires linked to this TPM Muckraker post that begins like this:

Recently, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) appeared in the news for purchasing property on the Kenai River at far below market value last year from Alaska businessman Bob Penney. It turns out, the plot is nearby one of her more notable earmarks: a three-mile stretch of road that abuts the property of about 50 residents, for which Murkowski has secured $6 million in federal funds since 2003.

If you read closely, you find out:

1. This was a project initiated by local home owners who didn't like the increase summer traffic going to a nearby federal wildlife refuge.
2. This probably wouldn't have affected commuting from LM's returned property or Penney's
3. Penney doesn't seem to be involved. The local advocates caught Murkowski's ear on a lucky plane trip.
4. It all began in 2002, well before, presumably, Penney offered the deal.

So, making a big deal of it - unless there's more to be uncovered - seems a like throwing meat to the lynch mob.

On the other hand, it sheds more light on the serendipitous way priorities are set and money is spent. A group of people living on a fairly remote road, though on or near the Kenai River, are upset about the dust and traffic on their road, that happens to end at a wildlife refuge and the Kenai River.

I can understand, especially in the age of Uncle Ted, their seeking federal money to help fix the road. But who sits down with the map of the whole state, its infrastructure, and the needs, and says, "These are the most critical roads, bridges, etc. that need money, that will give the most bang for the buck"? I know most federal and state agencies are asked to take that sort of approach in their budget planning. So it's the people whose project doesn't come in high on that list, who I suspect jump the queue and go directly to their legislators to get their projects funded. And with no one else to argue why the project isn't as important as those on the list, or should be funded some other way, the Senator can be persuaded and can also look responsive.

And those people are gonna vote for that sort of responsiveness.

One of the benefits of living in Alaska is that you can talk personally to your elective officials if you want. And when our Congressional delegation can slip in money that otherwise might have gone to Tennessee, well, then all the prioritized Alaska projects get funded, plus a few more. The voters of Tennessee should elect more capable Congressfolk. Or so goes the logic. I'd like to think about a legislator who asks, "So have you submitted this proposal to the DOT people who evaluate the state needs? If not, that wouldn't be fair to the people who have gone through the proper channels." That'll be the day.

But the facts presented in the story don't seem to have the taint that the headline and first paragraph suggest. Will this increase the value of Penney's property? Does the Alaska Fishing Classic use this road for their important guests? Maybe there is more here. But without that, no need for the teaser headline and opening paragraph.