reaching · for · the · stars · with · one · foot · in · the · gutter · . · . · .

but now I do. . .

Mark and I are going to Roma and Firenze (that's Rome and Florence) at the end of September! Two glorious weeks and two days! Gorgeous Italian men, women, shoes, food, wine, etc . . .. I'm already there! Losing 15 pounds of fat just so I can indulge in all of it! Heaven on earth - indeed!

Ciao baby!

Got Blood?: On October, Friday the 13th, The Tragedies Takes on the Original French Theater of Horror “Theatre du Grand Guignol”

The Tragedies mutate from a sketch comedy troupe into a monstrous theater company this Halloween season, premiering with Theatre du Grand Guignol, the original French theater of horror and comedy. Grand Guignol runs October 12th through the 28th at The Little Church, 5138 NE 23rd Avenue. Our opening Gala on Friday the 13th for $20 is not to be missed! Doors open at 7:30pm and show begins at 8pm. Tickets are $15 and available on the web at www.thetragedies.com/tickets.htm, at the door, or by calling (503) 367-2100.

What is Grand Guignol?

“The Grand Guignol (Grahn Geen-YOL) was a theatre (Le Théâtre du Grand-Guignol) in the Pigalle area of Paris (at 20 bis, rue Chaptal), which, from its opening in 1897 to its closing in 1962, specialized in the most naturalistic grisly horror shows and farcical comedies. The theater owed its name to Guignol, a traditional Lyon puppet character, joining political commentary with the style of Punch and Judy.” -Wikipedia.com

Grand Guignol’s formula of the horrific, the erotic and the comic, fulfills that primal human need to have the snot scared out of us and then laugh it off. The popularity of film classics like “Psycho” and modern shockers like “The Descent” attest to it’s commercial viability as well.

The Tragedies intend to present Grand Guignol as a faithful take on the original French theater with realistic special effects, stage trickery and sleight-of-hand in the intimate setting of a deconsecrated church in the Alberta District, while actors simultaneously juggle various acting styles.

The Tragedies’ Grand Guignol will feature the sharp, playful and mordant cabaret-style of piano genius Amoree Lovell and the mysterious, exotic and powerful vocal talents of the lovely Lisa Stringfield. Special effects make-up will be provided courtesy of the uber-talented Christina Walker of 13th Door and Haunting Productions! There is also a recurring theme of revenge in both the comedies and the scary plays, resonating with the bloody events of the world stage. Guignol is book ended by two high profile days, opening on Friday the 13th and closing dangerously close to Halloween night!

Proven popular by contemporary theater companies like San Francisco ’s Thrillpeddlers and New York ’s AboutFace, this will mark Portland ’s 1st Annual Grand Guignol production and the biggest, funniest, sexiest and boldest Tragedies show ever! The show begins before you enter the theater, setting a tone of unease, and it will haunt you long after you exit the church.

Oh, and there’s comedy, too!

Theatre du Grand Guignol runs Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, October 12th, 13th, 14th, 19th, 20th, 21th, 26th, 27th, and 28th at 8pm. Tickets are $15 and available on the web at www.thetragedies.com/tickets.htm, at the door, or by calling (503) 367-2100.

The Tragedies sketch comedy and theater troupe have been performing for and entertaining Portland audiences since 2003. Through several sold-out runs and special appearances, The Tragedies have maintained a clever and wry approach to their comedy. They often perform at charitable events for such organizations as The United Way, Mercy Corps, everyamericanvotes.com and Epilepsy Foundation Northwest. Portland, however, is not the only location that the Tragedies have an audience. Their successful podcast and website have been enjoyed by over 250,000 people from 93 countries. The Tragedies have released one CD to date, and are currently working on material for their next audio outing. They are also filming their latest show, "The Butler Did It" for television distribution and DVD. When The Tragedies are not starring in their own shows they are guesting with other comedy performers. To date they have performed with: Fort Hal, Extra Medium, Kick the Squirrel, Girls Girls Girls, and The Screaming Mee Mees. One member has even performed with Robert DiNero. The Tragedies plan on rounding out their 2006 season with three more original shows followed by sketch comedy circuit shows throughout the nation in 2007.

I just discovered an amazing singer from Iraq named Kazem Al Saher. I swear he's the George Michael of the Iraqi music scene - yes they have music in Iraq! Now, this damn war has to end so I can go there and see him in person! Allah be praised! I have to thank this site for exposing me to this 9th wonder of the world ... http://calabashmusic.com/.

Esther Williams . . .





Esther Jane Williams (born August 8, 1921) was a United States competitive swimmer and movie star, famous for her musical films that featured elaborate performances with swimming and diving.

Esther Williams
Born in Inglewood, California, Williams was enthusiastic about swimming in her youth. She qualified to be in the United States swim team in the 1940 Olympics, but the games were canceled due to World War II. Williams instead went to Hollywood, where she quickly became a popular star of the 1940s and 1950s. Her brother, Stanton Williams, also had a brief acting career during the 1920s before his death while still a teenager.
Many of her films, such as Million Dollar Mermaid and Jupiter's Darling, contained elaborately staged swimming scenes, obtained not without physical cost to the performer. She broke her neck filming a 50 ft (15 m) dive off a tower during a climactic musical number for the 1952 release Million Dollar Mermaid which landed her in a body cast for six months. She subsequently recovered, though she still suffers headaches as a result of the accident. Her many hours spent submerged resulted in her rupturing her eardrums numerous times. In her autobiography, Williams details several other occasions in which she nearly drowned shooting her oxygen-defying stunts, but she often used a stunt double.
Her love life was a source of media interest. She has been married four times. From 1945 to 1958, she was married to singer/actor Ben Gage, with whom she had three children. In her autobiography, she portrays him as an alcoholic parasite who squandered her earnings. She was romantically linked with Jeff Chandler. Her third husband was actor Fernando Lamas.
Esther Williams retired from acting in the early 1960s and lives with her current husband, Edward Bell, in Beverly Hills. She lends her name to a line of women's swimwear.

I can see this movie being a contender for the upcoming Oscars. Check it out and tell me what you think!

http://playlist.yahoo.com/makeplaylist.dll?id=1442737&sdm=web&qtw=480&qth=300

FSU Etruscan expert announces historic discovery at ancient site
by Barry Ray

Digging on a remote hilltop in Italy, a Florida State University classics professor and her students have unearthed artifacts that dramatically reshape our knowledge of the religious practices of an ancient people, the Etruscans.


Nancy de Grummond and Jim Harding, an FSU classics graduate student, lift a large Etruscan storage vessel from the sacrificial pit at Cetamura, and get their first view of the underside of the base of the vessel.
"We are excavating a monumental Etruscan building evidently dating to the final years of Etruscan civilization," said Nancy Thomson de Grummond, the M. Lynette Thompson Professor of Classics at FSU and director of the university's archaeology programs in Italy. Within the building, de Grummond's team located in early June what appears to be a sacrificial pit and a sanctuary—finds remarkable for the wealth of items they are yielding that appear to have been used in religious rituals.

Nearly every summer since 1983, de Grummond has taken groups of FSU students into Italy's Tuscany region to participate in archaeological digs at Cetamura del Chianti, a site once inhabited by the Etruscans and ancient Romans. In the final days of this year's program, de Grummond and her students unearthed what she calls "the most thrilling" find she has seen in 23 years at Cetamura.

She explained that the Etruscans, who once ruled most of the Italian peninsula, were conquered and absorbed by the Romans in the second and first centuries B.C.E. ("Before the Common Era"). Prior to that time, however, they were a highly advanced civilization that constructed roads, buildings and sewer systems and developed the first true cities in Europe. They also built large, complex religious sanctuaries—which may have been the purpose served, in part, by the Cetamura structure.

"The building has a highly irregular plan, with stone foundations 3 or 4 feet thick," she said. "One wing of the building is about 60 feet long, flanking a space that has walls running at right angles. Some walls run on a diagonal to the grid, or are curved. There are paved areas alternating with beaten earth floors and what I believe to be a large courtyard in the middle. Some of the foundations are so heavy and thick that they could easily have supported multistoried elements.

Within the building's courtyard, de Grummond said, is a freestanding sandstone platform that likely served as an altar. A few feet away, she and her students unearthed "the most fascinating find of all - a pit filled with burnt offerings for the gods.

"In all, the pit contained approximately 10 vessels, some miniature and thus clearly intended only as gifts for the gods," de Grummond said. "On the other hand, several of the vessels were quite large, including one storage vessel, probably for grain, and a huge pitcher, probably for wine. There also were little cups for drinking and a bowl for eating, as well as a small beaker of the type that holds oil or spices. All of these vessels were ceramic, some ritually broken and but with most or all of the fragments buried together in the pit. Further, most of the pots seem to be locally made rather than imported. They were offering to the gods their own special creations.

"We should be able to restore these vases and have quite a splendid array of Etruscan pottery dating from a single moment and a particular place in their history," de Grummond said.

Also of great interest to de Grummond was the discovery of some 10 iron nails deposited in the pit, all in an excellent state of preservation.

"These reflect what we know from ancient texts in Latin that note that the Etruscans treated nails as sacred, and regarded them as symbolizing inexorable fate," she said. "They had a ritual practice in regard to their deity Nurtia in which they would hammer a nail into the wall of the temple each year as a tribute to the goddess. We cannot yet be sure about the cultic significance of the nails of Cetamura, but they may well relate to the passage of time and thus to the sacred calendar of the Etruscans."

One of de Grummond's students also unearthed an Etruscan inscription on a shard of pottery that contained the name of a little-known Etruscan god, Lurs.

"Almost nothing is known about Lurs, but we may have at Cetamura some very rare evidence about his worship," she said.

De Grummond is a leading scholar on the religious practices of the Etruscans, a people whose culture profoundly influenced the ancient Romans and Greeks. "The Religion of the Etruscans," a book written and edited by de Grummond and Erika Simon, another expert in classical archaeology who served as the Langford Family Eminent Scholar in Classics at FSU in 1999, was published last spring. De Grummond soon will release another book, "Etruscan Myth, Sacred History and Legend."

De Grummond said she hopes to continue excavating the Cetamura sacred area, and building on nearly a quarter-century of knowledge that she has gathered there.

"It is a bit eerie to have excavated something so central to my own lifelong interest in the myth, religion and rituals of the Etruscans," she said. "Without a doubt, this is one of the most exciting of the discoveries I have experienced."

For previous news on Cetamura, see http://fsu.edu/news/2006/04/19/etruscan.secrets/

When I was 14 years old and living in Soesterberg, Holland, I used to kiss David Sylvian on the lips every night before going to bed. . . . Ahhhhh to be 14 again!!

Sold out crowd at the Crystal Ballroom this evening. Perfect view of the stage. Beauty and voice to still the heavens! PRICELESS!!!

I'm volunteering at the Dove Lewis Animal Clinic and I love it! I'm also involved with an AIDS orphanage called the Happy Children's Centre located in Kenya, Africa. We have an upcoming event in July to raise money and awareness. So mark your calendars for Saturday, July 22, 2006 (10 a.m. to 4 p.m.). The location is 6303 Corbett Avenue, Portland, OR. All proceeds to benefit the 359 orphans of the H.C.C.

Atlantic

I hope all my days
Will be lit by your face
I hope all the years
Will hold tight our promises

I don't wanna be old and sleep alone
An empty house is not a home
I don't wanna be old and feel afraid

I don't wanna be old and sleep alone
An empty house is not a home
I don't wanna be old and feel afraid

And if I need anything at all

I need a place
That's hidden in the deep
Where lonely angels sing you to your sleep
The modern world is broken

I need a place
Where I can make my bed
A lover's lap where I can lay my head
Cos now the room is spinning
The day's beginning

The treaty was negotiated in Kyoto, Japan in December 1997, opened for signature on March 16, 1998, and closed on March 15, 1999. The agreement came into force on February 16, 2005 following ratification by Russia on November 18, 2004. As of April 2006, a total of 163 countries have ratified the agreement (representing over 61.6% of emissions from Annex I countries) UNFCCC.int Duwe, Matthias. Notable exceptions include the United States and Australia. Other countries, like India and China, which have ratified the protocol, are not required to reduce carbon emissions under the present agreement.
According to terms of the protocol, it enters into force "on the ninetieth day after the date on which not less than 55 Parties to the Convention, incorporating Parties included in Annex I which accounted in total for at least 55 per cent of the total carbon dioxide emissions for 1990 of the Parties included in Annex I, have deposited their instruments of ratification, acceptance, approval or accession." Of the two conditions, the "55 parties" clause was reached on May 23, 2002 when Iceland ratified. The ratification by Russia on 18 November 2004 satisfied the "55 percent" clause and brought the treaty into force, effective February 16, 2005.

Actually, you'll see me giving water and doggie treats to the dogs participating in the annual "Run for the Love of Dove" event in NW Portland! I've been a volunteer for little over a month now (LOVE IT!) and this is my first event. The money raised is going to help support our wonderful non-profit critical care animal hospital.

So, if any of you that read this and are in the Portland area - COME ON DOWN! The cost for entering this event it $25. Lunch is provided and there will be a raffle drawing with fabulous prizes!

Here's the link to the Dove Lewis site - http://dovelewis.org/

See you there!
L

five years and counting - substitute the woman for man in the lyrics below! I LOOOOVE YOU!

Jerry Raferty - Right Down the Line

You know I need your love, You got that hold over me
Long as I got your love, You know that I'll never leave
When I wanted you to share my life, I had no doubt in my mind
And it's been you, woman, right down the line

I know how much I lean on you, Only you can see
Changes that I've been true, Have left there mark on me
You've been as constant as the northern star, The brightest light that shines
It's been you, woman, right down the line

I just wanna say this is my way
Of telling you everything, I could never say before
Yeah this is my way of telling you that everyday, I'm loving you so much more

Cause you believed in me through my darkest night
Put something better inside of me, You brought me into the light
Threw away all those crazy dreams, I put them all behind
And it was you, woman, right down the line

I just wanna say this is my way
Of telling you everything, I could never say before
Yeah this is my way of telling you that everyday, I'm loving you so much more

If I should doubt myself, If I'm losing ground
I wont turn to someone else, They'd only let me down
When I wanted you to share my life, I had no doubt in my mind
And it's been you, woman, right down the line

makes my soul rejoice!

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=61556895

Holy crap! How did 39 sneak up on my ass? Getting older is something my parents do . . . not me! Oh, well, here's to my birthday weekend! Yippee! Going to Lincoln City for a romantic overnight with my schweetie Mark. We are staying at a very retro motel - let me repeat - a very retro motel. Just walking in the room is bound to give me flash backs to when I was eight years old! See for yourself - http://www.oregon-coastdirectory.com/lodging/oregoncoast/central/lincolnc/hideaway/hideaway.htm. Thank you Lara for giving us the tip on this spot! Ahhh . . . the lovely "Sunset Suite" - complete with a real brick fireplace, wall to wall green shag-a-delic carpet and wood paneling. "Mom, Dad - what time does the "Brady Bunch" come on?" "Mark, did you bring the Jiffy PoP?

I can't think of a better place to remind me of being young again! Here's to another year of happiness!


Found this photo on-line this evening. The lovely Elisabeth Fraser.

I just received the latest issue of Archaeology and there it was on the very first page - the long awaited book by Nancy Thomson DeGrammond "Etruscan Myth, Sacred History & Legend". I'm calling the 1-800 number right now to have them ship me a copy ASAP!!! I'm soo excited to have something to read this Spring/Summer before I go to Orvieto, Cerveteri and possibly Veii this Fall!

Let's see, bought a book for Italy. Mark and I are going in the fall to Firenza e Roma. Friday afternoon, got rear ended on the Morrison Bridge by a girl who was chatting on her cell phone - I saw her in my rear-view mirror. Going to my docs tomorrow to get my back checked out - it hurts!!!! Did I mention that she was uninsured? She begged me not to call the police and report the accident . . . Sorry, if I have to pay car insurance and you don't - I have little sympathy. Hope her mom and dad can cover the damage to my "new" car (weep) and my medical expenses . . .

Oh, and I'm finally posting an old pic of Carmina Piranha. It's from our gig at the Red Eyed Fly - SXSW in Austin, Texas - 1998! Damn! That was ages ago . . . .
Back to bed, my back feels as if it's been run over by a truck . . . oh, more like hit by a car!! :-(