‘Close Gitmo’

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Palo Alto Forward

I compared members of Palo Alto Forward to ring girls, but my comment was censored

I compared members of Palo Alto Forward to ring girls, but my comment was censored

I said, promptly deleted by Censor In Charged at Palo Alto Weekly:
Palo Alto Forward members are the policy equivalent to Ring Girls at a boxing match: they look good, their message is oversimplified, they take their orders from somebody else behind the scene and they are basically clueless.

Yet five of them are now part of leadership!

What about: rent control.

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Je suis Jim Yardley

Go , jim

Go , jim

I doubt we ran Jim Yardley’s first byline above the fold page one of the Oracle, at Henry M. Gunn High of Palo Alto — something about middle class students using public transportation to school, spring 1981 — but his latest, in Sunday’s The New York Times, co-authored with Callimachi Rukmini, about the timeline leading to the Paris Charlie Hebdo attacks, takes the bulk, I count 83 percent, of that sacred hallowed space.

edit to add:
I finally got the 30 minutes required to set down and read Jim’s report. One of the threads I want to follow up on is the guy from New Mexico working for the other side. I also read the bulk of Adam Gopnik’s account in The New Yorker. Here is link to The Times.

I am not buying that the attack on the kosher market is connected to the attack on the newspaper. Also, is the newspaper pronounced “Heeb” as in slang term or derogatory for “Jew” or “Hebrew” or “heb” rhymes with “web”? I get the Charlie Brown part. Gopnik says the name is part of a change necessitated by the forced shutdown of a previous publication. Also, I am thinking of the display recently at Stanford of vintage French political cartoons, walked thru quickly. Also, I posted earlier, borrowed or sweded in from Annette Gordon-Reed on Hemmings, Thomas Jefferson as a game-cock, similar concept. Gopnick had something about the blasphemy or liberal of depicting French royalty as a pear, and the defense was reportedly “but his head is pear-shaped?!”

Anyways, good luck Jim with your reporting. And your welcome, in terms of all the editorial guidance and encouragement I gave you. Also, your book was on end-cap or display, multiple copies, at new Mitchell Center library here:

And this is probably too big a leap – and I really should read further on this Charlie Hebdo and French dissent per se — but I added two stickers to the back of my 2012 Chevy Cruze: one, a tooth by sticker artist Mia and another by someone I met a whiles ago named Dog Byte, who has shown in galleries but the nature of his work requires him to keep his actual identity a secret. Which reminds, a further distance from Hebdo or Yardley that the Miles Davis stencil on Cali Ave has been painted over; well, the entire building save the wall with three murals has been disappeared, and making way — hey, great save, for Boulangerie the pseudo French bakery. Voila! If not Zola! But, yeah, we got a Zola here, overpriced. Snobby. Rude. Grill Yum! Not! (Am I the first person to sneak a restaurant review into a coverage of this tragedy?)

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More Blacks! More Poles! More Freaks!

IMG_20150119_172808476IMG_20150119_172832848IMG_20150119_172839108IMG_20150119_172818106

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Paul Cohen joins the set of immortals

Clegg and Pugh 2013

Clegg and Pugh 2013

Well, that plus the picture in the LBJ archive

Private collection that's me in the cornrt

Private collection that’s me in the cornrt

and 1, 3 days later:
Steve and Eric Cohen and I earned our MOCL degrees yesterday at Stanford, Masters of Creative Loafing. We went by Sloan the math building where Paul J. Cohen’s estate donated a piano to the fourth floor. Here Eric plays ragtime, I join in on GE WANG pseudo ocarina and Steve Cohen checks in with John Chu about getting some better like Vijay Iyer or Tom Lehrer to give that bad boy a little walk along the zeta landscape:

Seriously, I did ring Vijay Iyer's management office, in Asheville, NC -- Chu, working for Steve Cohen, a different Steve Cohen, or the same Steve Cohen but in a parallel universe, about whether the MacFound laureate musicians can tickle these keys at  a private function, maybe as soon as May, 2015

Seriously, I did ring Vijay Iyer’s management office, in Asheville, NC — Chu, working for Steve Cohen, a different Steve Cohen, or the same Steve Cohen but in a parallel universe, about whether the MacFound laureate musicians can tickle these keys at a private function, maybe as soon as May, 2015

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Selma and shema

Selma is a town in Alabama infamous for its role in the Civil Rights, while shema is a Hebrew word for HeAr or Listen and the name of an important morning prayer.

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Why aren’t the Windhovers signed?

By Nathan Oliveira

By Nathan Oliveira

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‘There is a king in every crowd, why not you, Russell?’

NFC championship game, at CoHo

NFC championship game, at CoHo

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Gunn-Paly shootout set for Feb. 7 at The Titensity Taj Maha, or The Paly Pit rather

When Gunn plays Paly they will seek to hold 21 below 21, points per game

When Gunn plays Paly they will seek to hold 21 below 21, points per game

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John Reid, who Hans outs as a former Awalt coach, lauds Kevin Mullin of the Vikes.

Should be an interesting match up Feb. 7 Saturday at Gunn’s new gym (new to me). That’s in three weeks.check that, the game is at Paly.

Hans, Me, Matt “Naps” Passell and Baird checked out the Titans rout of Lynbrook the other night.

Hans says that the Titans have a bunch of “long” guys who are quick which could cause some mismatches and upsets of supposedly stronger teams. The Longs are too quick for other Bigs and too tall for other ball-handlers. Hmm. If so, you read it here first.

Meanwhile, when we toured the new Mitchell Park center Hans agreed that there is something odd about the new court. One, he said, little dingleberries fall from the trees onto the court. Two, the concrete is too hard and too slippery when wet. Three, the windows are too close to the backcourt. I double-checked if indeed that was the court where Jeremy Lin famously sprained his ankle the day before a CCS championship and was told, no that was Ross Road YMCA.

Even so, maybe they should lower the rims to make it officially a midget league court. Or, next time we build a $45 Million community center and include a hoop, someone with a clue should oversee it, and not just be dazzle-eyed because they met Jeremy Lin.

edit to add: Gunn beat Lynbrook by about 30 and it was fun to watch, with the exception of the Lynbrook rooting section, a group of about 12 boys and 2 girls who were rather obnoxious and actually started making monkey noises when Gunn put in a black player, although they self-policed enough to cut it out after a few seconds. Wow, their #5 did a reverse pivot!!!!!! The cheerleaders were very sweet, however, and delivered hot dogs for $2 each back to our section, and I bought a round for Coach and Baird.

Off the top of my head, and I could cheat by referring to about 50 shots from 4 or 5 games stored in my cell, but for the Titans I like: Russell, from outside and occasionally bringing the ball up court, Lee, or Lee-H-somethings, two brothers, skinny but good passers; Gil, a relative of Javier Gil a footballer from my generation, tall and quirky and athletic and explosive at 6’3″ — fun to watch — Noah Riley off the bench and some type of bench leadership, coach Brandynn said he is the toughest guy on the team — especially since as the football QB he got knocked on his fanny probably 100 times in 11 games; Davis, I think, a point guard; Sun, I think, a point guard; #13 the other point guard, and one of two blacks on the team; Sharod Miller who looks thin as a receiver in football but huge in hoops, especially since so many of his teammate are downright bony; another big guy, Silverman or something, off the bench – -Gunn really has 9 or 10 players who can contribute during prime time — Lukas Dorward tall at 6′ 2 but can also handle the ball, he and Silverman actually had one pass too many in a fast break that worked Tuesday; meanwhile Passell was more articulate and observant but we both felt that the team could be a little more disciplined. I may have to scout Paly tonight against Los Altos early tip off 6:30 while Gunn is idle. gunnlynbrook15

MaxPreps meanwhile has Gunn at #23 in CCS and Paly at #5, behind 4 private schools. (edit to add: Monday before the Saturday, Gunn at 12-2 .857 winning percentage is #19 in CCS according to MaxPreps while Paly at 14-4 .778 winning percentage is #9. Gunn also has Lynbrook and #20 Pinewood this week).

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Charlie Musselwhite signed cd’s at Down Home in El Cerrito, while supplies last

Charlie was here

Charlie was here

I called up to Down Home to learn there are 8 or 9 signed copies of Charlie Musselwhile cd on sale for a reasonable price.

I might have to mosey up there to fetch me one. (And if Plastic Alto plug is enough to send others stronger, faster and more swiftly such that I am shut out, it’s all good).

Last I saw Charlie was backstage at Mystic Theatre and there was a teenager named Sweat Pea or something sitting in with the band.

I rode a bus with Charlie and a few others from San Diego to Orono, Maine in 2003 part of the Front Porch Blues tour. He asked if he could trail behind in his Harley, but was told the insurance wouldn’t front for that.

edit to add, a couple weeks later: I saw Mr. McCord the manager of the store at the Joe Ely show in Berkeley, from afar, which got me fixin’ to call them at 510 525 21 29 to see if any of these CDs are outstanding. Course, they’re not open until Thursday. I also noted I put them in the next town over, towards Berkeley, but fixed that. No offense to El Cerrito. The Gauchos.

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