Buttermilk & Molasses

GET YOUR WAR OUT OF MY FUNNY BONE

I wish the Get Your War On strips would start being funny again, instead of funny and utterly painful. The latest batch is just so wrenchingly amusing -- the political fodder for the strip remains thick.

Office Worker 1: Why isn't Bush doing anything to de-escalate this shit in the Middle East? "Staring out the window with your thumb up your butt" shouldn't pass as diplomatic savvy.

Office Worker 2: Why the hell would you want Bush to get involved? What situation existing outside of his mind has he ever actually improved? I say we lock him in a room with an X-Box and a pile of biscuits, and leave the grown-up shit to grown-ups.

Office Worker 1: Come on, he improved the situation in Iraq -- Shiite death squad production is way up for the quarter.

MOTHERS OF THE WORLD, ROCK OUT

If you're expecting a baby, or currently tending to a tot under the age of two, click your mouse as fast as you can to The Washington Post article, "The Cradle Will Rock, to Metallica."

"Rockabye Baby! Lullaby Renditions of Metallica" isn't really a comedy recording. But the concept is pretty hilarious: Take 11 songs by a heavy-metal band whose rage-filled music has been a soundtrack for disaffected and alienated young people for nearly 25 years, and turn them into gentle, lulling instrumentals for babies.

Behold the dulcet tones of Metallica, my sweet little cherub-rockers!

Out are the roaring guitars, pummeling drums and howling lyrics such as "pounding out aggression / turns into obsession / cannot kill the battery / cannot kill the family." In: glockenspiel, Mellotron, vibraphone and chimes.

Then rush to the Baby Rock Records main site for lullaby samples from Metallica, Coldplay, Radiohead and more. (Coming soon: The Cure, Nirvana, The Pixies and Bjork.) Click on the album covers for audio samples.

REMEMBERING SEPTEMBER 11 IN PICTURES

Slate Magazine is presenting Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón's graphic adaptation of the 9/11 Report, chapter by chapter through September 11. It's a pretty powerful representation of the report, and has a whole different level of emotion behind it than the actual report. Well worth a read.

RUN FOR RUBY HARVEY

Ruby's Run, The Ruby Harvey Memorial Children's Run will be held on Saturday, November 4, on the Carillon grounds by Dogwood Dell. The run is open to kids ages four to 14, and proceeds will go to the Ruby Harvey Memorial Scholarship Fund at Ruby's preschool, Second Presbyterian Child Care Center in Richmond. In a message to kids interested in collecting pledges and running:

People's pledges and donations are where the money comes from to help pay for the scholarship.

Getting pledges is something adults do often when they want to raise money for something they care about in their community.

We think making things better is something kids care about and are VERY good at doing. You have energy, enthusiasm, and love to have fun. You can show everyone just how strong KID POWER is really is. Kids working together make good things happen!

The pictures and the dedication to Ruby on the site, which lets kids visiting the site know a little more about the little girl whose memory the race has been organized, is heart-wrenching:

Ruby was a native of Richmond, Virginia. She lived in the city with her parents, Bryan and Kathryn, and her big sister, Stella, who was 9 years old. Stella and Ruby were quite different from each other, but they were very close. Stella made sure Ruby was included whenever they did fun things with other kids...

...Ruby had a wonderful and colorful imagination. She liked to wear costumes and play make-believe, especially if it involved kitties. She loved listening to stories read aloud. She also loved going to the beach with her family and friends. Ruby delighted in running and playing outdoors.

RAINMAKER'S COMING

The 4th Rainmaker Festival will benefit the Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment, among other worthwhile organizations. The festival, organized in remembrance of Alvin Reynolds III, brings a raft of local bands to Legend Brewery on Sunday, September 10, for an afternoon and evening of music and fun. The line-up includes Bryan Harvey's old band, NRG Krysys, who are slated to play at 3:45 in the afternoon.

NRG Krysys was originally formed as a spoof of 70's funky dance music, to celebrate friend Chris Zechini's 40th birthday. But with the monster talents of the band members, including Bryan Harvey and Johnny Hott of House of Freaks, and Coby Batty of The Fugs, it was clear from the start that this was more than a joke.  In the wake of Bryan's tragic death, the band has chosen to remain together, persistently supporting The Harvey Family Memorial Endowment, and now includes the talented Stephen McCarthy of Gutterball and Long Ryders fame.

The Rainmaker website has all the details, including the line-up and schedule, ticket information and a dedication to the Harvey family:

Bryan, Kathryn, Stella Ann, and Ruby May Harvey, sadly in absentia,  are still our guests of honor at The Rainmaker Festival this year. Above the qualities so often used to describe them, such as creative, passionate, talented and good-humored, the Harvey family were loved by so many, and loved so many.

 

Upon getting to know their close friends, such as Chris Zechini and Coby Batty, it is so obvious: as true friends go, the Harveys were the real thing. If you're trying to grow a family complete with nurturance, fun, good parenting, and support for everyone's creative muses, they're the ones you want to copy. The multitude of good people who were close  to them, who continue to honor them in so many ways, are also a testament to their extraordinary  character, and hopefully to the healing power of good work in response to great tragedy. 

 

We at The Rainmaker Festival are honored to support The Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment, and its mission of affording musical opportunities for children in  need, and send continued prayers and wishes for comfort and healing to their loved ones.

CHOKE ON YOUR POLITICS

The new Campaign Network website by C-SPAN and Congressional Quarterly has enough political news, information and analysis to provide you with 34% of your daily fiber needs. It is dense with juicy political gumbo; in fact, it's almost too dense to chew.

LEONARDO DA F-ING VINCI

Let's start with a simple observation: Leonardo Da Vinci was a friggin' genius. No holds barred. Utterly, entirely, friggin' genius.

In concert with his observations of nature, this philosophy enabled da Vinci to make broad intellectual leaps that are refreshing to contemplate today. Having studied rivers and currents, for instance, he then applied that research to his study of how the blood flowed through the heart. He deduced that blood would flow through valves and create vortexes, which would then cause the valves to shut. The exhibit compares his drawings of the process with modern MRI scans—which confirmed that his age-old theory was correct.

If I had a plane (and a long runway), I'd be jetting toward London wirelessly posting a few paragraphs about how cool Da Vinci is. And never mind Dan Brown. He's a fop.

Instead, I'd be bracing myself for the four-stage exhibition at London's Victoria and Albert Museum. "Leonardo da Vinci: Experience, Experiment and Design" opens on September 14. (Which means I'd be two weeks early, so perhaps instead of flying I should take the newly refurbished Queen Elizabeth 2.) Newsweek International's Rethinking Leonardo Da Vinci provides a solid snapshot of the exhibition.

Through rarely seen manuscripts and drawings, large-scale models of his designs and computer animations, the exhibit illuminates da Vinci's bold, wide-ranging thought process. "Like Shakespeare or Newton, like all great figures, he remains perpetually surprising," says da Vinci scholar Martin Kemp, the exhibit's curator. "You look at those drawings in the original, and they are spine-tingling."

Split into four sections, the exhibit opens with "The Mind's Eye," an exploration of da Vinci's work on the connection between the eye and the brain, and his detailed studies of the proportional relationships between the parts of the face, torso and limbs...

...While the London show reveals much about da Vinci's beautiful mind, it certainly doesn't close the book on his story. A handful of other exhibits about the inspired Italian will do their best to continue the debate. "Leonardo: The Madonna With the Carnation," which opens in Munich on Sept. 14 as well, will focus on da Vinci's touching painting of the same name, in which he reinvented the traditional representation. A Milan exhibit opening in November, "The Treatise on Painting: Manuscripts and Editions Between the 16th and 19th Century," will highlight the influence of da Vinci's notes and art on later painters. Beginning last month in Oxford, the Museum of the History of Science, Christ Church Picture Gallery, the Ashmolean Museum, Magdalen College and the University Botanic Garden will each present separate exhibitions exploring different aspects of da Vinci's legacy, ranging from mathematics and botany to art.

"The good painter has to paint two principal things. Man and the intentionality of his mind," wrote Da Vinci in his "Treatise on Painting." "The first is easy and the second difficult." Judging by this latest round of insightful exhibits, even the latter may be getting easier for those curious about one of the Renaissance world's most fascinating figures.

THE WORLD AT YOUR FINGERTIPS

For a brief moment or three last year, soon after I stumbled upon the technological genius that is Google Earth, I pondered spending every waking hour for a month documenting every place I'd ever been in the City of Richmond and its environs. Then I got busy at work and came home and fell asleep; the dream was gone by the time I woke.

Never fear, says Michael Agger at Slate Magazine, there are other nuts with too much time on their hands out there. He's put together a nifty slideshow about Google Earth fanatics:

Cruising around Google Earth for the first time, what leapt out is how GE explorers are really, really into airplanes. It seemed as if every two-bit Cessna captured in flight by a passing satellite had been identified and tagged. Not only have Google Earthers found every Black Hawk; every stealth fighter; and every commercial, military, and private aircraft in the world, they've also tracked down most of the paragliders (a task that requires a scary tolerance for staring at a computer screen). Indeed, the message boards surrounding Google Earth are a romper-room for obsessive-compulsive behavior. People have found and tagged lighthouses, limousines, roller coasters, abandoned nuclear-missile silos, sports stadiums, nude beaches—one man cataloged each and every Starbucks outlet in the world.

HARVEY FAMILY MEMORIAL NEWS

The Community Foundation has posted some new details on the Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment.

 

Anonymous Donor Offers Matching OpportunityAn anonymous donor will match all new contributions to the Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment between August 15 and December 31, 2006 up to, but not exceeding, $12,500.  To learn how you can make a contribution, please click here. Harvey Memorial Endowment Announces First Grant Awards The advisory committee of the Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment is pleased to announce its first grant awards.  Grants of $4,000 each will be made to Art 180, Camp Comfort Zone and SPARC.  The awards fulfill the mission of the fund to provide arts enrichment through art, music and theatre for youth living in Richmond and Central Virginia. To learn more, please click here. Memorial Contributions Continue to Honor Harveys Members of the Granite Pool, where the Harvey family once enjoyed their summers, recently hosted a "Day of Mirth."  The event raised $5,500 to benefit the Bryan and Kathryn Harvey Family Memorial Endowment.  For more information about the fund, please click here.

ELEVEN BY NINE

The Times Dispatch reports that Plan 9 Music has doubled, purchasing five Record Exchange locations in Lynchburg, Roanoke, Charlotte, Winston-Salem and Raleigh; they will all carry the Plan 9 Music name.

[Owner Jim] Bland said he began negotiating with Record Exchange's owner in early July for the five best-performing locations.

"We saw this as an opportunity to expand into some markets that we feel are underserved," he said.

Record Exchange sold new and used CDs and DVDs in stores that are smaller than most Plan 9s.

Plan 9 has stores in Carytown, two in Charlottesville, one each in Williamsburg and Harrisonburg, and a Plan 9 Express shop inside the Virginia Commonwealth University e2 Bookstore.

Plan 9 either assumed the leases or signed new ones for the five Record Exchanges.

Bland said he is confident the stores will be successful even though his deal comes at a time when consumers are downloading music from the Internet or shopping at big-box retailers. Last week, for instance, the iconic Tower Records chain filed for bankruptcy protection for the second time in recent years.

"There is still a good deal of life left in music stores," Bland said. "People still like to buy, and there still is a profit to be made if you do it carefully."