2006 Derby winner euthanized today

Sad news today for fans of horse racing: Barbaro finally had to be euthanized this morning. See this NTRA article for more details.

2006 Year-In-Review

So my 2006 Year-In-Review post is long overdue, but hey, January 2007 has been a busy month.

2006: The Year In Brief
Biggest surprise: being sent to France for work

Biggest personal achievement: 4.5-day solo vacation in Paris
Biggest professional achievement: promotion to Academic Advisor/records supervisor
New interests: David Foster Wallace's writing, UIUC Music Library, tennis
Rediscovered interest: ballet lessons
Biggest regret: not attending one of Tom Waits' concerts. I've examined my main reasons for not going and they're all complete "it's complicated" crap. No more of that in future, I should hope.
Best new media release: Tom Waits' Orphans  album.

2006: Firsts
first...attendance at a tennis match (Illini Men's Tennis vs. Notre Dame) 2/7/06
first...solo plane trip (transatlantic, no less) 6/9/06
first...trip to France 6/9/06-6/25/06
first...appearance on the cover of a newspaper: 6/12/06 (in "La Dépêche du Midi: Albi," a regional paper in France)
first...visits to the following museums: Louvre (6/21/06), Musée d'Orsay (6/23/06), Field Museum (7/29/06)
first...solo apartment

A horse of a different color

Barbaro, 2006's Derby winner who was injured out of the gate at the 2006 Preakness had recently suffered a set-back in his recovery from his injuries, but here's the latest from NTRA.

For those Wlunchers out there, I misspoke. Here, a self-correction. Barbaro is categorized as having a bay coat, not a roan as I originally said. He's not even a chestnut, which I might have been inclined to use as my second guess. Oops. I was really off my A-game today. But anyway, some other coat colors and/or breeds mentioned at lunch:

Appaloosa

Palomino (related topics: Palomino restaurant, Mr. Ed)

IV

Save the date:
June 2007: production begins
May 2008: putative release date
Maybe they're serious this time about starting production on a fourth Indiana Jones film. They've been talking about it for, what, five years now? I'm always up for more Indy - Harrison Ford being yet another one of my favorite men over the age of 55. Although it does rather muck up the symmetry of the Star Wars trilogy/Indiana Jones trilogy what with this being the *fourth* Indiana Jones film and all. In case you're wondering, the preferred term for a four-parter is a "tetralogy." Avoids the awkward Greek/Latinate mash-up of "quadrilogy."

One is silver, the other gold

Hot topic: online media sources (not to mention user-generated news sources à la cell phone footage) relegating print media to the big permanent paper shredder in the sky. This debate sort of flared up on my radar screen a while ago with eBooks. Being an avid reader, I was mortified at people's suggestion that eBooks would eventually make printed books obsolete. Over my dead body, or at least not without a fight on my part. And by fight I mean "I think I'll go on a self-soothing spending spree at bookstores to increase revenue." Anyway, my point is this: I like having printed books around me. I like them because they can be beautiful objects in and of themselves and I like them because they are a tangible record of what I've read, what my interests are, and how I've become who I am. Perhaps in the future, if printed books do become extinct and young folks don't ever have the chance to turn a page while reading a newspaper or know that special hurt-so-good wrist strain of holding up a book in bed way past their bed time, they will not miss the lack. But since I grew up turning pages rather than scrolling with a mouse, I would miss the feeling if it leaves. Pun sort of intended.

All that aside, I've become quite enamored of the online print media lately and enjoy the wider accessibility to news that I might not normally be able to obtain in print here in the rather rural-though-college-town valley between three metropolitan peaks. So. Apply a little of that "make new friends/but keep the old" adage and be on your merry way.

Five articles of interest:
• Not so fast, harbingers of print media doom:
- "'Is Print Dead? Discuss!': Why magazines are in trouble, and the Internet won't be their savior"
- Gallup Finds 44% Still Read Newspapers Daily - As Web Reliance Cools
• "Seven rules for reading the paper" (Garrison Keillor, 01.10.07)
• "Media new and old merge at CBS" (reportage from CES 2007)
• an article about 'The Economist,' that periodical on the recommended reading lists of a US State Dept/Foreign Service recruiter and also of the Monterey Institute of International Studies' Grad School of Translation and Interpretation
• "Media Guy defines the terms you'll need in 2007"

A new word

I learned a new word today, and it's a catchy one.

snickersnee: a long kind of knife

Picked up that word from the 1962 TIME review of Pale Fire.

Smile

The girls at Biaggi's


New Year's Eve




(sorry guys, I had to)

What is that thing?

Saw this bird roaming on a roof while I was traveling down Route 1. Actually first spotted the bird while it was perched in a tree, which was an unexpectedly odd sight.

By the way, it's a turkey vulture (a.k.a turkey buzzard). For a kind of funny turkey vulture story, check out David Letterman's interview of Tom Waits.

Two of my favorite men over the age of 55

I ♥ these guys.

View David Letterman's interview of Tom Waits, 11/27/06
View Tom Waits' performance on the Late Show with David Letterman, 11/27/06

NPR's Song of the Day

Tom Waits is big in Japan... and in public radio apparently.

NPR's Song of the Day, 01.02.07: "Lie To Me," off of the new album, Orphans.

Listen to NPR's piece, "Tom Waits: The Whiskey Voice Returns" on All Things Considered, 11.21.06.
Listen to NPR's piece, "Tom Waits: Rock Classics, with a Gravelly Rasp" on World Cafe, 12.15.06.
Listen to NPR's piece, "Tom Waits Fights to Stay Out of Advertising" on All Things Considered, 05.06.05