The holidays are upon us and we decided it was worthy of our first joint posts, the MD  holiday gift guide 2009 parts I & II.  A selection of what we think would make fantastic gifts for that special guy in your life (or you know, us!). First up, Drew’s list:

1. Original rag socks $35 from Sundance. Classic, simple and totally holiday. I love my rag socks, they’re perfect in boots or just for lounging around the house.

2. The Amsterdam Moof Bicycle $795 from Sundance.  You might remember that I’ve posted about this bike before.  It is simply design at its best, and sure to be a classic.

3. The Stanley Flask $24 from Restoration Hardware. Just what you need to help carry that beverage of choice to keep you warm on those cold Christmas and New Years nights.

4. The Cabin Hat $39.50 from Martin & Osa.  This rag marl topper makes me think of Norman Rockwell New England winters.  It’s workwear without all the flannel and plaid.

5. PF Flyers Bob Cousy All American sneakers $60 from Piperlime.  PF Flyer need no explanation.  Get them.

6. Wool Hooded Plaid Zip-up Jacket $108 from Gap.  A great alternative to dropping some serious bills on a Woolrich Woolen Mills coat.  Enjoy American heritage workwear this winter.

7. Jack Spade Felt & Leather D.R. Tote $295 from Jack Spade.  By now you know that I have a Jack Spade obsession, and an ever growing collection of Jack bags. This is the perfect gift for those bag obsessed boys (or me!).

8. Sun-washed Flannel Shirt, $69.50 at J.Crew.  Ah, the “Crew”…we love J.Crew.  This will certainly keep that guy cozy and stylish.

9. Want Organic for J.Crew Da Vinci 72-hour Travel Bag $695.00 at J.Crew.  Speaking of bag obsessions, have you ever seen anything more perfect?  I thought not. Have I also  mentioned my J.Crew bag collection? I know, I have a problem…

10. Baracuta Jacket $275 at J.Crew. Continuing with J.Crew, a favorite from last winter this standby is a must have for those of us on the left coast enjoying warm winters.

11. Selvege Authentic Fit Jeans (dark rinse) $88 at Gap. Absolutely the best jeans I own.  A must.

12. Harris Tweed Laptop Case $98.50 from ACL & Co.  Michael Williams, the man behind the fantastic blog, A Continous Lean, is now offering some amazing items in partnership with designers like Billykirk, Cole, Rood & Haan, Co. and Mark McNairy.

Lil Wayne: The Carter

No disappointments here. About 3 weeks ago, when I first saw the trailer for The Carter, on Kanye West’s blog, I already knew this was going to be a must-see. I sat down last Friday, grabbed a 40 oz (Old English, of course), hit the play button, and prepared to enter a different world.

The Carter chronicles Lil Wayne’s life for a several month period centering on the release of his most commercially successful album, Tha Carter III. The music is less of a focus though, as anything else in the film takes a backseat to the actual character of Lil Wayne. After watching the 1 hour & 15 minute foray, I can honestly say that I don’t know anyone like Wayne, and unless I meet this dude, I probably never will.

He’s a weird guy. And not the bad weird, but like, honestly different. He carries a double-stacked Styrofoam cup full of syrup in one hand, and a blunt in the other, for almost the entire film. He doesn’t apologize for a single thing he’s done, and has absolutely zero concern for anyone else’s thoughts about him, especially if they relate to what he’s doing/”needs” to do. He’s an extremely hard worker, and everything in his life comes second to recording. And it’s not even a close second, because this man records like nothing I’m accustomed to knowing about.

There are several key moments in the film that I won’t give away, but suffice it to say that it’s good. (Oh man, when he kicks one clueless interviewer out of the room … you gotta see it to believe it — hilarious!)

Use your internet skills, and find this quickly, for your viewing experience. Even if don’t like rap, hip hop, or Lil Wayne, there are some strong themes in the movie that anyone can take something away from. Get on this!!!

“Repetition is the father of learning” — Albert Einstein… and Lil Wayne

_Reverend Zombie 12.14

Humanzee … is that you?

Dirt makes your food. Dirt makes your plants. Dirt changes your weather. People mine dirt to get metals that make your iPhone. Dirt is linked to war, drought and climate change. Without dirt there’d be no life as we know it. So watch the movie, Dirt! Dirt has already won 3 awards and was featured at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival so you can’t go wrong and you’ll learn plenty too.

Watch the video and full post at FoodCycles.org.

Isabella Rosselini’s recent series of shorts on insect sex for the Sundance Film Festival may have been entitled ‘Green Porno’ (an interview with her can be seen over at Matthias Merkel Hess’ Eco Art Blog), but the films, all of which star Rosselini, prove little more than Tim Burton-esque fairytale and could not in any sense be considered as of a piece with the very literal variety of ‘Eco-porn’ emergent in the wake of Web 2.0.

The term had always seemed sportive to my mind, a sardonic and thus more or less healthy response to the contemporary ‘Green wash’ phenomenon. Evoking an overly benign and grossly over-determined ‘nature’ (or Nature as subject), ‘Eco-Pornography’ suggested that which had come to appear captured by delimiting centre-spreads in lavishly produced (and often Photoshopped) pages of expensive wildlife magazines, or served up as soft-focus, reified consumables in television documentaries for ‘eco’-hungry consumer markets.

As the extremely literal act of ‘fucking for the forest’, however, Eco-Porn emerges as a somewhat ‘radical’ expression of Green ’sex activism’ (or ‘porn aid’). Taking its part in the necessary de-romanticisation of nature, the phenomenon might, then, be seen to summon forth the sort of ‘Dark Ecology’ prescribed by Morton and Žižek, albeit not unproblematically. Rather than supplying images or footage of their own production, however, the hosts of the Fuck For Forest website work to encourage active participation in their particularly ardent brand of eco-politics, intending FFF to facilitate as a non-profit node for those inspired by such activism, and who might wish to submit their own material in order to propagate further ‘environmental’ awareness. Holding submitted footage under consent, the website subsequently makes this available to subscribers who effectively donate towards sympathetic projects and actions.

“FFF is a non-profit erotic ecological project. FFF wishes to normalize sex and nudity to protect nature and liberate life. We collect money for ecology while exploring the power of sexuality.”

Despite how amusing initial contact with FFF might prove, the movement nevertheless poses broader challenges to what we take sexual politics to be; pornography, it seems, remains difficult to reclaim for social justice concerns, unless of course it is first sufficiently de- and re-territorialised. Take the post-feminist ‘art sleaze’ of Suicide Girls for example, an enterprise that would seem owned and operated for the most part by women who would deploy the site towards a creative celebration of female sexuality over and against the androcentric passifications of such male-oriented publications as Playboy or Hustler.

If pornography remains corrupting today, then it would seem to remain not so much morally (in any caricatural sense) as pragmatically in terms of the impact its endorsement might have upon such inviolable late capitalist institutions as the paranoically-maintained ’self’, which is to say, upon the personal image (or ‘avatar’) so essential to the furtherance of career and the maintenance of appropriate social standing. Unless mediated in some fashion, the consumption of pornography would appear to run wholly counter to the sort of ‘bookish’ middle-class social values that have come to seem so desirable (particularly in Britain, it seems) as guarantor against the ‘unrefined’ thrill-seeking of the (‘uneducated’) working-classes. Succinctly formulated by Alain de Botton in terms of ’status anxiety’, this symptom calls for the phantasmatic support of ‘clean lines’ (the ethico-aesthetic of anodynised living) and, to my mind at least, is suggestive of a number of diagnostic or symptomnal readings of the ethics of pornography, particularly where ‘clean’ living is (and was always) the moral expression of insustainable living.

If the FFF phenomenon appears an inevitable symptom of web-based media centralisation, of the inevitable (perhaps inadvertent) cut-up of eco-political material, high capitalist film-making and unavoidable sex ‘hook up’ sites, does this not itself warrant further investigation in terms of ‘eco-justice’? Whilst close-quarter shots of day-glo, dread-locked poster hippies indulging in oral and anal sex acts might prove little more than ‘entertaining’, what of the millions of web users who regularly use internet pornography as a masturbatory aid and ostensibly as part of a ‘normal’ late capitalist lifestyle? Consider, if you will, the ignominious fate of a billion Kleenex tissues sourced from the unchecked clear-cutting of arboreal Canadian forests.

From a transcendental empiricist perspective, however, several things appear to be happening in the FFF phenomenon. In Logique du Sens, the sexual surfaces of the libido are restricted, blocked, and reduced; such flows are repressed “in order to contain them in the narrow cells of the type ‘couple,’ ‘family,’ ‘person,’ ‘objects’”. In Proust, Deleuze discerns how “a molecular sexuality bubbles away beneath the surface of the integrated sexes”. The notion of sexuality, then, not so much as instinct but as creation, not so much as a transcendent mode of organization but as a revolutionary machine, becomes one that might be experimented with noologically; sexuality is linked closely to the possibility of immanence and thinking, to the all important event of thought, to the transformation of the dogmatic images that would constrain healthy experimentation. We might, then, consider how if true thought is possible only when liberated from the notion of castration as transcendent law, then castration needs to be thought of, instead, as a crack, a fracture that does not produce a lack but a surface of thought, “projecting the entire corporeal surface of sexuality over the metaphysical surface of thought.” If the transcendent law of castration results in a blockage of thought, it also results in the mastering and moulding of the sexual body into the molar notion of two sexes rather than the (pregenital) Harlequin’s cloak to which Deleuze compares it.

For ecological discussion, the sexual body might be seen to retain a revolutionary potential and sexuality a significant source of becoming; there is immense power in the ‘thousand tiny sexes’ of desiring-machines, in sexuality beyond the “all too human” idea of castration as absence, and in the multiplicity of surfaces that are opened up in its place. Striving to recognise the potential of sexuality when liberated from genitality as well as anthropomorphic presuppositions, recent Deleuzian scholarship has sought to explore sexuality and the machinic, sexuality and surfaces, and sexuality and animality (a forthcoming volume in the Edinburgh Deleuze Connections series promises useful material in this regard).

The FFF phenomenon might thus be conceived of after the ontology of sex and how we can begin to know of it when it is no longer captive to molar representations. Investigating the strengths and potentials but also the weaknesses and dangers that sexuality opens for thinking, bodies, and becomings, we open onto the ethico-aesthetic, the (eco)political, a noological force that enables change. Whilst the Fuck For Forest poster portrays heterosexual sex acts, the website itself contains images that run largely against hetero-normative practices, suggestive (albeit in something of a caricatural way) of activities that whilst crudely hitched to a ‘radical’ eco-politics, surely suggest ‘healthier’ alternatives to the sort of domesticated privations that remain enthralled to humdrum Oedipal coordinates.

After schizoanalysis, we might detect a purview that would usefully exceed not only the jejune institution of sex as a commodified aspect of ‘contemporary living’, but moreover, challenge new age Gaian-ism with its problematic Oedipalisation of indifferent, resolutely inhuman processes. Whilst the FFF website draws on a measure of ‘mother earth’ symbolism, surely the very concept of sex activism is one that suggests a wealth of post-Oedipal relations? The organisers of the FFF movement appear to uphold the orientation as a ‘healthy’ response (ostensibly for its ‘punk’ savvy) to the harrowing realities of internet pornography and the non-participatory ineffectualities of orthodox Green lobbying. By virtue of its unapologetically-explicit nature, or its de-romanticisations of both ‘loving’ sex and a neutered nature made safe for contemporary domestic needs, even the lingering ‘flower child’ sentiment appears displaced somewhat by the unsentimental emphasis on ‘fucking’, supplanting the image of the ‘tree-hugging’ flower-child with that of the ardent eco-nymph or satyr.

Of course, we remain entitled to think such sex activism ’silly’. But for those who (at the very least) have perhaps never had sex out of doors, or more significantly, have never considered their ‘private’ sexual practices as anything other than the carnal expression of ‘love’ for another human being, well, we might ask, is the home you love not also the extent of your desire?

"Precious" Movie Poster

All the stars were lined up against this one as far as your humble (or so I always say) reviewer was concerned. It’s the latest “indie sensation, ” a Sundance smash with all kinds of “buzz.”  It’s based on a novel written by a pseudonymous one-named author and purportedly features a powerhouse performance by an equally pseudonymous one-named painfully unfunny “iconic” comedienne. It features supporting performances from not one, but  two music industry heavyweights (and if there’s one thing I can’t abide the very existence of, my friends, it’s rock stars).    And to top it all off, it’s executive-produced by two of the most loathsome media moguls this side of Rupert Murdoch, namely Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry.

In short, I walked in expecting a tear-jerker with a tiresome “empowerment” theme heavy-handedly tacked on at the end given the “philosophical” predilections of the mega- powers that be behind this film. And then there’s the already- thoroughly-recounted backstory of the title character herself : Claireece “Precious” Jones is sixteen, morbidly obese,  functionally illiterate, pregnant for the second time by her father (her first child has Down’s Syndrome), and endures a nightmare existence in a Harlem shithole apartment with her physically, emotionally, and (at least hinted at) sexually abusive welfare cheat of a mom , who sounds for all intents and purposes like a ghetto version of Cinderella’s wicked stepmother on steroids, forcing her daughter to wait on her hand and foot in “exchange” for a constant stream of uber-degradation. All in all, it sounds like a laundry list of every single rotten-ass thing in the world dumped into one (admittedly very large) flesh-and-blood vessel.

Oh, how wrong I can be. I say that because “Precious” (or to refer to it accurately by its painfully verbose official title, “Precious : Based On The Novel ‘Push’ By Sapphire”) is quite probably the best goddamn movie you’ll see all year.

Gabourey Sidibe as Precious

First, let’s get the single-most distressing particular out of the way. Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry both signed on as absentee “executive producers” after the film was in the can and after it wowed audiences at Sundance to such an extent that they knew they’d have a hit on their hands if they could attach their names to it in order to help secure it widespread distribution, which they were quickly able to do through the auspices of Lionsgate. Their actual influence on the on-screen product itself, then, is completely nonexistent, apart from apparently (and quite wisely) nudging Daniels to change the name from “Push” in order to avoid confusion with the sci-fi flick of the same name that came out earlier this year (and speaking of titles, might I just say that Daniels’ decision to run the opening credits in the ummm — literally-challenged style in which his protagonist would transribe them herself is a brilliant tone-setter).  Anyway, you can breathe a sigh of relief now if, like me, you’re not a huge fan of Oprah’s new-age self-help sermonizing or Perry’s put-your-trust-in-God-style “solutions” for all of life’s problems. There’s no trace of either to be found here.

The main creative powers behind this unflinchingly honest slice of genuinely harrowing urban realism are director Lee Daniels (a former producer himself —  and no stranger to controversial material given that he was responsible for both “Monster’s Ball” and “The Woodsman” — who got into directing with the little-seen “The Shadowboxer” a few years back, making this his sophomore effort behind the camera), and screenwriter Geoffrey Fletcher, who have adapted the novel by Sapphire (a former Harlem-area teacher turned novelist and poet) with a refreshing directness that’s as admirable as it is unpretentious. Really, though, this is an actor’s film, and there isn’t one performance in here that’s anything less than spectacularly authentic. Daniels cast a wide net, from the aforementioned superstars of the music industry (namely Mariah Carey as the terrifically understated been-there-seen-all-that social worker, Ms. Weiss, and Lenny Kravitz as the sorta-hip-but-not-disarmingly-or-for-that-matter-distractingly-so Nurse John, who attends to Precious during her hospital stay after delivering her baby) to supporting-role veterans (the luminous Paula Patton as tough-but-kindly remedial school teacher Blu Rain — yes, really) to comedy stalwarts (Mo’Nique as the thoroughly wretched Mary, the previously-mentioned matriarch outta hell) to complete unknowns (right-off-the-streets newcomer Gabourey Sidibe as the titular protagonist herself, who skipped college for the day (she’s 26) to try out for the part on a whim and beat out 400 other contenders for the role,  finding herself cast literally less than an hour after her audition) and gave them all the trust and freedom to develop their characters  in whatever way felt right to them. The results are uniformly astounding without exception, and it’s no stretch at all to say that this is the best-acted film in recent memory.

Not to sound too gut-wrenchingly pretentious, but Sidibe as Precious is a straight-up revelation.  Painfully isolated within herself, her every movement an unconsciously-crafted defense mechanism designed to protect her very survival, she’s reflexively stoic and preternaturally cautious, yet still brightly inquisitive and not without some glimmer of realization that a better life is, somehow, possible even if she has no idea of how to get there. As apparently contradictory as this no doubt sounds, Sidibe is able to convey it all through her movements, demeanor, and overall affect to such a degree that you’d think she wasn’t even acting at all, so thoroughly complete is her realization of this multi-faceted character. Combined with Daniels’ (generally, although at times he does slide into different cinematic styles and visual themes, particularly during Precious’ numerous retreats into fantasy life, which she tends to project herself into when seriously awful shit — like her father raping her — is happening) naturalistic filming style, the overall effect is downright documentarian in its realism. She speaks very little on the whole (moreso as she opens up as the story progresses) but communicates volumes with every movement, gesture, even glance.  Hand her the Oscar now and get it over with.

And speaking of Oscars, the other ultra-noteworthy performance here is, of course, from Mo’Nique, who is at least as good as everyone has been saying, conveying with blunt honesty a sordid and soul-destroying inner rage that knows no outlet but formless and senseless violent physical and emotional outbursts directed at the easiest and most available target —  that being, of course, her daughter. She feels no sympathy for the incestuous abuse Precious has suffered, but rather blames her for “stealing her man, ” and is even — get this — jealous of the fact that this so-called “man” has fathered more children with their daughter than he did with her. She doesn’t want Precious to go to school and pull herself up out of her situation, she wants her to “go down to the welfare” and bring the check she’ll get there home to her. She has no grandmotherly love for Precious’ oldest, Down Syndrome-afflicted child and calls the baby a freak and an animal — yet a freak and an animal that she’s more than willing to coddle and pamper when her case worker from the welfare office is over on a home visit (then cruelly, and yes literally, toss aside the minute said case worker is out the door). And while all this does, indeed, make her a monster, she delivers an astonishingly raw, no-holds-barred,  bravura soliloquy towards the end at a meeting with Ms. Weiss (and Carey simply shines in this role, it must be said — she’s downright unrecognizable in her unglamorous earthiness, speaks as plainly as she looks, and is quite clearly both overwhelmed and used to being so — she can be officially forgiven for “Glitter” at this point, I would think. Oh, and watch for her absolutely golden nonchalance when Precious hits her with a question that Carey herself has endured countless times) that lays bare her own pain, confusion, and abject misery in a way that goes some way toward explaining why she is the way she is while in no way making her any more sympathetic. Quite the contrary, in fact — understanding her (partially, at least) only makes her cruelty all the more hideous. Never less than directly, forcefully, and consequentially immediate, Mo’Nique gives a performance for the ages.  Again, the Academy can just hand the little bald statuette over right now and be done with it.

Nope, I didn't recognize her either --- Mariah Carey as Ms. Weiss in "Precious"

Precious’s story is no doubt terrifying in the truest sense of the word, but it’s not without hope. When she’s expelled from school for being pregnant (did I mention this movie is set in 1987?) she is cajoled by her former principal into enrolling (against her mother’s wishes, of course) at one of those newfangled-at-the-time charter schools with a typically appropriate cheeseball name, “Each One, Teach One.” There she finds something of a support network for the first time in her life with a group of equally-illiterate “throwaway youth” students and a genuinely concerned teacher (Patton’s Blu Rain) who make the attempt to get through to her and she slowly, cautiously, stumblingly reciprocates their trust. Just as she’s  starting to come out of her shell, though, and safely delivers her baby, her mother hits her with the tirade to end all tirades when she gets home from the hospital, and she finds herself without a home when she needs one the most. The resolve Ms. Rain shows in getting her into some type of emergency housing  well past the eleventh hour is downright heroic, and soon Precious is back to slowly getting on her feet after arguably her biggest setback yet.

The worst, however, is to come, as some months after getting her into her halfway-house living situation, and progressing from a second grade to an eighth grade reading level at school, dastardly mother Mary shows up and delivers some news that provides the single-biggest cinematic gut punch of this young millennium. Without giving away what it is,  I’ll just say that it both underscores and overshadows all that remains in the film, and when Precious finally confronts her mother in the previously-mentioned scene in Ms. Weiss’s office, she does, yes, leave with some small sense of accomplishment and, dare I say it, “empowerment,” but even when she lets out a cautiously knowing  smile that comes from somewhere deep within while walking away with her two children at the very end in the closest thing she may ever know to triumph, the future is still uncertain, at best, for this extraordinarily resilient young lady. She’s gone some way towards turning her life around, but the future is unwritten and the darkest cloud of all (again, I absolutely won’t give away the details) still looms over her head. We’re not left with a strong sense tat it’s something she’ll be able to ultimately cope with, but at least we know she won’t be facing it, or any other tribulations to come, completely alone, and she’s also got a bit, just a bit mind you, more inner strength to see it through than she had before. It won’t be enough, but it’s a step in the right direction, and even though, in a voice-over segment early on Precious states “Ms. Rain says the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step — whatever the fuck that means,” we do hope she has indeed caught on to the import of that statement by the time the film is finished.

Daniels and Fletcher are  to be congratulated here. In lesser hands this would threaten to be Lifetime movie-of-the-week material, so endless is the litany of degradations suffered the title character and so simple would it be to twist the ending into something artificially uplifting. And the structure of the story is such that just when one heart-breaking situation is beginning to be partially dealt with, another pops up. It would be easy to turn this, therefore, into a pathos-laden guiltapalooza, designed to exploit the sensibilities of a largely liberal  and quite likely largely white audience through cheap and overstated emotional manipulation (truth be told, notorious contrarian Armond White has leveled something like that very charge at the film, but given that he’s tried to make hay out of the fact that all the characters who help Precious are lighter-skinned while all the characters who hurt her are darker-skinned — never noticing, apparently, the fact  that the lead character herself is quite dark, rather torpedoing his entire argument about the film’s supposed hidden racial subtext — and that he thought crap like “Transformers 2″ and “Norbit” were good movies, it’s pretty safe to say his views are based on nothing more than a reflection of his own rather desperate need to be noticed in today’s crowded market of cinematic opinion at any cost), but they have too much respect for their characters, their material, and their audience to go that easy route. Yes, you should probably bring some extra Kleenex with you to the theater, since there are a few moments where there wasn’t a dry eye in the house, my own included. But it’s in no way schmaltzy or overstated, a la Spielberg’s “The Color Purple.” The tears you shed here will be honest ones, that flow naturally based on the honest, no-frills presentation of dark, painful, and all-too-real subject matter. And there are quite a few lighter moments, as well, with some genuinely surprising humor and levity thrown into the mix at unlikely times, much as often happens in life itself.

In short, the story of Precious in not one of wildly exaggerated highs and lows, but of a real girl, living a real life, in a real world too many of us ignore all to often. There are a hell of a lot of Preciouses out there. This is the first time their story has been told in anything like a way that does them justice, not by painting them as hapless victims or as noble martyrs on the altar of the undeserved economic excesses that the rest of us enjoy (and, frankly, probably don’t deserve — I don’t know about you but in terms of sheer human value I think one Claireece “Precious” Jones is worth a hundred, or a thousand, or hell, a million corporate CEOs or Wall Street robber barns — if that makes me a bleeding-heart liberal pinko commie, so fucking be it), but by showing them to be exactly what they are — people, just like all of us, with the same fears, hopes, aspirations, and potential as any of us, but with a hell of a lot harder road to walk toward getting where they want to go.

A last nod to some of the criticism that’s been directed at this movie, this time from right-wing quarters — yes, it’s probably true that only an African American filmmaker could say some of the things this flick is saying and “get away with it.” It’s called cultural context, people. Precious dreams of having a light-skinned boyfriend and in one scene even fantasizes about being a blond white girl. This is not the same thing as saying she is ashamed of being black. It’s an acknowledgment that she wishes for a life, and an identity, completely different than the one she’s always known, and given her circumstances, who can blame her? Yes, her circumstances are, at their core, all about economics rather than race (and one hopes that, naturally bright as Precious is, she’ll eventually come to realize this — am I the only one who’d love to see a sequel where Precious really goes after those  most responsible for her victimization  and bombs a bank headquarters or a Wall Street investment firm? Okay, I guess I am.), but she’s a sixteen-year-old kid, and a poorly-educated one at that. It’s quite common for children in these types of circumstances to wish to have as dramatically different a life as possible, and that often extends to the most personal and central aspects of their very identity. But, yes, if a white filmmaker were to attempt to convey the exact same message, there would be an uncomfortable subtext of “lots of black people secretly wish they were white” attached to it. That’s just the way it goes, and that’s nothing to be exasperated about, so calm the fuck down my fellow white people. This bitching about how  “a white director would be called a racist if he made this movie” is nothing more than the cinematic equivalent of the tired and frankly stupid old argument around the use of  “the ‘N’ word” that essentially boils down to “if they can say it, why can’t we?” Frankly, those who engage in such useless “debates” do nothing more than sound like whining racists who still want to call black people n*****s and are upset that they can’t get away with it anymore. Shut up or grow up — or, better yet, both. Again, cultural context is all-important here, and we don’t all have the same life experiences.  If you can’t recognize that the message is not the same depending on who’s delivering it — and for what purpose — then you don’t have the intellectual maturity to recognize actual reality, and the fact that in  said actual reality the messenger to a great extent shapes and defines the message; the two are not inseperable.  Nor should they be.

“Precious” is not an easy film to watch by any means, whether you can directly relate to her story or not. It’s by turns heartbreaking, poignant, harrowing,  and even joyful. It’s not pessimistic, to be certain, yet it’s not forcedly optimistic, either. It’s just plain real. It asks all the right questions in just the right away and provides no easy answers.  From start to finish it’s true to itself, to its characters, and to their story. It’s vital and it’s  necessary. And it’s long overdue.

Something this powerfullly, unflinchingly honest only comes around once in a great while. This flick will rip your heart out and hand it back to you in pieces. Putting them together again is up to you. The hard work always is. Just ask Claireece “Precious” Jones — she knows all about that.

During the past week, I’ve come ‘cross a few videos that are … legit. Musical quality, artistic quality, and … female quality are present. Take your time … a few items of interest.

*******

Rihanna – Russian Roulette. Not a bad video at all. Rihanna embracing her “deeper, darker” side, for sure. I’m down with anything Rihanna produces, so this is cool with me. The sound quality on this vid is a bit freaky, so check this out for a more legit version … alreadyyy.

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Robin Thicke – Sex Therapy. This video is ON POINT. I haven’t heard anything from Robin Thicke in a while, and he came back with strength on this track. The melody is smooth, and the girls in the video are beautiful. Solid.

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Beyonce ft. Lady Gaga – Video Phone. ARGHH!! YouTube isn’t tryin to let this one happen, but this still needs to be seen. Beyonce is… wow, that’s all I can say about this video… indeed.

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Lil Wayne – The Carter (Documentary), first premiere. Even though Beyonce is looking like a caramel version of Aphrodite in her video, this one takes the cake for my favorite this week. In just the first 10 minutes of this film, it’s clear this is gonna be a good one. Lil Wayne is too unique of a character for this to not be interesting.

A good Wednesday! Until later…

_Reverend Zombie 12.03

Humanzee … is that you?

In cautarea de filme noi am dat si peste asta.

Lansat prin octombrie anul curent, cu un subiect nu foarte original (documentar despre iubire), filmul are totusi niste puncte tari.

In primul rand, am pornit de la ideea ca e film, deci fictiune, deci nume, actiune total imaginate (chiar daca ar porni de la a true story). Asa ca m-am mirat putin cand Seth Rogen era chiar Seth Rogen sau Michael Cera asemeni. Deci personajele din film sunt reale (in frunte cu actrita-realizatoarea documentarului Charlyne Yi).

Merita vazut si pentru unele scene din film (cand ia interviu copiilor din parc “True love is when you love somebody soooo much. Like us grils love Chris Brown, but you don’t know him.” sau excursia la Paris :X).

Totusi un “-” maaare este faptul ca ideea de documentar – oameni reali, interviuri reale care devine o poveste de iubire – cea dintre Charlyne si Michael Cera – este un fals. Adica este fictiune pentru film. Daca ar fi fost in realitate ar fi fost chiar un concept interesant pentru film in general.

Oricum, castigator la Sundance Festival, actori interesanti, “Paper Heart” merge vazut intr-o seara din timpul saptamanii.

Traileru’:

The new (biracial) guy on Grey’s Anatomy?  As soon as he first hit the screen I was like, “I think he’s one of us!”  But I wasn’t 100% sure until I saw Jesse Williams on the Bonnie Hunt Show.  He showed pictures of himself as a child with his (Black) dad.  So cute!  Then and now!!  My friend google led me to some more info about him….

Williams is the son of an African American father and a Swedish mother, and as a teenager, he moved from urban Chicago to ‘lily-white’ suburban Massachusetts.  His interest in acting was sparked, in part, when a film he was writing about this uneasy transition was chosen as a finalist in the Sundance Screenwriter’s Lab.  ”It was a big part of my life.  I really rejected that move.  It was a complete cultural shock.”  Williams recalls, “It wasn’t good.  My friends were sh***y, the people were sh***y, the parents were sh***y.  A lot of parents closed the door in my face, so I was like, I don’t need to be here.  I’m not going to try and change you, which, I guess I did try for a while.”- via

This is from an off-broadway play that Williams did last year.  So wish I had seen it.

Jesse Williams isn’t embarrassed to admit he wasn’t fully aware of who Edward Albee was when he auditioned for him to play the scantily-clad Angel of Death in the revival of The Sandbox that the 80-year-old playwright is now directing (in tandem with The American Dream) at The Cherry Lane. “Actually, I think it helped me, not being so intimidated,” says Williams. “He was so funny, cracking jokes with me even from the beginning. And I didn’t even fully process that he had offered me the job. But it’s all been an amazing experience, getting this immediate response from the audience, and working with this cast. And honestly, I don’t even really know what I look like on stage. I said I was going to go to the gym more often, but I end up just doing push-ups in the basement of the theater and trying to keep quiet.”

Williams’ enthusiasm is understandable, since he has only been acting professionally for a couple of years. While studying filmmaking at Philadelphia’s Temple University, he did some commercial and modeling work, with the occasional acting audition — even turning down a prime soap opera role. “I am a biracial man, and I was supposed to play this tragic mulatto character lusting after a white girl, and I didn’t want to leave school to do that kind of part.” Instead, after graduation, he took a job as a public school teacher in Philadelphia, and then a high-level law firm job in New York — “I was supervising 60 attorneys, even though I’m not a lawyer” — before deciding to focus on acting.- via

Oh, Jesse Williams.  I can’t wait to interview you!

Say what you will about The Maid, the one thing you can’t say is that it’s predictable. At times, it feels like a dark comedy, and at others, a social realist drama. It even veers close to horror as the protagonist’s behavior grows more erratic and unhinged. You also can’t say that it isn’t genuine. Director and co-writer, Sebastián Silva based the film on his childhood maid. He even shot it in his family home in Salvador, Chile. You just can’t fake that kind of detail.

The Maid opens with the upper-class Valdez family throwing a surprise birthday party for their live-in maid, Raquel.  It may be Raquel’s birthday but she’s not very happy. Turning 41, Raquel has dedicated over half her life in service to the Valdez family, and it has taken its toll. Everything about her seems to droop, from her hunched over shoulders to her sagging body to her unkempt curly hair. If not for her permanent frown, she would have no signs of life. Raquel is more concerned about her impending chores and protecting her territory – the kitchen. It doesn’t take long before one of the children clashes with her over access to the fridge, forcing the pushover Valdez matriarch to hire another maid to alleviate Raquel’s workload. Raquel perceives this act of generosity as a hostile threat to her position and wages a passive-aggressive war against the intruder. The young new maid is no match, and Raquel has her quitting in tears. A replacement maid arrives in the form of a hardened veteran who scolds Raquel for being too close to the “ingrates”. She doesn’t take Raquel’s psychological warfare lying down and physically attacks Raquel before she too leaves the house. Mission accomplished.

But eventually Raquel succumbs to her migraine headache attacks and after one particularly nasty fainting spell, awakens to find herself confined to her bed. The new maid, Lucy, a free spirit with a predilection for early morning jogs and nude sunbathing, assures Raquel that she has no long term plans to work at the house. Not satisfied, Raquel rushes to get back on her feet, only to discover that her mind games won’t work on the free-spirited Lucy who disarms her with an almost saintly empathy.

And this is when the story changes. We’re not only empathizing with Raquel, we’re rooting for her. That’s quite an impressive feat considering not long ago we cheered as Raquel took a beating from the other maid. Silva accomplishes this by shooting in an emotionally detached way.  Initially, we are drawn to Raquel solely out of fascination of her erratic behavior. Our empathy actually lies more with the Valdez family and Raquel’s victims. But little by little, Silva plants details about Raquel’s life of drudgery – how the family closes the door on her so they can eat in private, how she has nothing to do on her days off, how her only contact with her family is with her mother’s voice over the phone – setting up our eventual change of heart.

Because of The Maid’s dark comic moments that skewer bourgeoisie manners and hypocrisy, comparisons can be made to Luis Buñuel. However, Silva films in a gritty social realistic manner that undermines that tone. Much like the character, the film isn’t pretty. Although it was shot with HD cameras, it looks like it was shot with a consumer camcorder using available daylight. This accentuates the drabness of the characters, Raquel in particular, but never the gives a sense of the wealth of the Valdez family. Supposedly, the estate is so grand that it requires more than one maid to care for each floor, but it feels as claustrophobic as a one room apartment.

Thankfully, Silva eschews the didactic moralizing of films like Frozen River and Crash. Instead he focuses on the problems of a single maid and in doing so has a made a more powerful statement about the live-in maid phenomenon of Latin America. The film has stuck a chord in Chile even receiving a commendation from the president. The Maid works best as a character study owing largely to an excellent performance by Catalina Saavedre. The Chilean television veteran is bravely repellent and unattractive imbuing her character with a raw, unapologetic honesty. Her physical and emotional transformation from the beginning to the end of the film is absolutely amazing. It’s a performance that has not gone unnoticed garnering a special award from the World Cinema Jury at this year’s Sundance Film Festival  and a nomination for Breakthrough Actor for this year’s Gotham Independent Film Awards.

Catch the US premier of The Glass House tonight at 9:00 PM CST on the Sundance Channel! A documentary well worth seeing!

Love and Peace!

Sandy

Un docu sur Lil Wayne :

      A friend of mine has a special showing of a movie right near my mom’s house.

Jon Proudstar is my friend, and an actor in this independent film, entitled BARKING WATER.

It was at Sundance and is now touring the country.

One time showing at Crossroads Festival, Grant and Swan Tucson, Arizona

See reviews, trailer and more info: http://www.barkingwaterfilm.com/Post.aspx?id=16

http://www.barkingwaterfilm.com/Post.aspx?id=16

Hope to see you there,

Mark McMahon

Again, here are the vitals:

Special Showing of independent film:

BARKING WATER

Crossroads Festival Theater, Grant and Swan

Sunday Nov 15, 2009

2:00 PM
“When one man, for whatever reason, has the opportunity to lead an extraordinary life, he has no right to keep it to himself.”

Jacques Yves Cousteau

November 13, 2009

Ruskin Art Club

 Ensemble Green plays new music for ACF-LA, the winners of our first contest, the first of many, a full house, and it was amazing.   Confession time.  Yours truly does not completely understand new music.  I arrived early at the venerable Ruskin Art Club, just a few minutes younger than the Shakespeare Club in Pasadena.  My students arrived with the rest of the crowd at about 8 pm, and the music began.  Raucous, cacophonous, the music rioted around us.  I think about what Rite of Spring must have seemed like when Stravinsky first wrote it.  Not at all like the melody of the gods, more like the string section of a bunch of the devil’s dwarves.

 Before the music we had an ACF-LA Board meeting with sake and sushi.  It makes me laugh to think of it.  Of the five boards I am on, this is the only one where sake would be served at a Board meeting, and here’s what’s funny, despite some off color remarks, some sadly and possibly by yours truly (here is your turn to be shocked oh, blog reader, please!) the Board meeting with sake accomplished a great deal. I recommend sake to all my boards.  It’s a great nose dive into the purity of thought. 

 The music portion of the evening was a grand success.  The whole place was packed, and V, another V, I have 4 V’s in my life, some of the best women in my life are the L’s and V’s and G’s. but there are 4 V’s , so 2 of of the V’s are here tonight witnessing my usual Thursday night ohmygod, I made it, now, give me a drink, let me breathe, let me be asleep, let me be awake, let me go home, let there be music, let there be alcohol, let there be air, and Michael Roth is here, my future music partner, let there be dreams unfolding of rocks wild in air where there is sky music.  God, I have been drinking sake.  Veronika Krauses, who is the composer who wrote After the Opera, for which I wrote the libretto and Vicky Kirsch, the fabulist and imaginative pianist who performs poetry by the wonderful-well-you-you’ve-heard of-her, she made American poetry Emily Dickinson.

 Some students brought very small well behaved children. I looked at those kids and thought, they must be Catholic.  My kids at that age would make joyful noises.  That you might not want to hear.  Not at all.  Even now.  My neighbors, believe it or not do not appreciate it when my son has a live band in the back yard playing rock music.  Who would have guessed?  It’s a mystery. 

 Many of these pieces split the air apart in amazing ways; the small well behaved boy, who tells me that his name is Alejandro, kept watching the instruments exactly the way my kids would not have at his age.  I even met Alejandro’s father who seemed very quiet but may be amazingly famous.   He is the director of the film music program at the Sundance Film Institute.  I gave him my card and he nodded like he’d heard of Red Hen Press, and you know what, I nodded, because I’d heard of Sundance!  Just meeting this guy made me want to quickly become a musician, then a composer, then a film composer, then meet him again, then submit a film to Sundance, then have it nominated.  And then, it would all be gold dust, down hill from there.  Kidding.  It was just funny.  I saw his impressive card after Alejandro and I became friends and thought really, if I were a music person, I would want to know you.  Alejandro must go to a lot of music events, just like the poetry events I forced on my kids when they were small.  They used to roll their eyes and say, “Give me $10 and I’ll be quiet for the whole reading.”  Bribery!  So wrong!  They would have rolled their little eyes, begged for candy, anything.  It was a roll of strangeness, of craggy crackling music that seemed to break over rocks like ocean.  But Alejandro could take it, he could roll on the waves of new music which is like the center of the earth opening.  In there is where life starts happening, fire boiling, heat and the beginning of life.  A full house at the Ruskin, wine and whiskey and music, all good.

Just a quick update on The Glass House Dallas premier that happened this past weekend.  First, WOW!  It was a great time, great movies and lots of fun. Thanks to Bart and his staff for giving us a wonderful weekend of movies! Oh, and photos will be posted later this week, so be sure and check back.

The film (The Glass House) premiered on Sunday at 2:15.  My mom, Marie Hibbard, and sister Leisa Speegle drove in from Oklahoma City to be there and my cousins, Sherrie Williams,   Janice Wilbanks and Laura Terrell came in from several areas of the Metroplex to support Melissa and Hamid’s film.  My daughter Sarah Sellers and her hubby Matt were also there to see the film for the first time.  Obviously, we are proud of our family of filmakers!

I had tons of positive comments and some good questions from the audience about the documentary process.  The film and the stories of the girls had a very positive impact on all that saw it.

A special shout out to my friends and business associates who attended – Steve and Tony from Gold’s Gym and my dear friend Kadena Tate Simon and old pal Randy Jeter – thanks for “answering the call” and coming out for the day to support the film!  Love love to all!

The evening ended around ten after the Texas round of movies (so entertaining!) and the awards for the movies were announced.  I was proud to be able to accept for Melissa and Hamid the award for Best Documentary… I pretended I was at the Academy Awards, well…not really, but it did cross my mind!

Thanks again to everyone for coming out to support The Glass House.  Please pass the word that The Glass House will have it’s US Television premier on November 16 at 9:00 on the Sundance Channel.    Yea!

Love and Peace,

Sandy

Here is a trailer from the documentary, “The Carter”, that is said to be pretty decent.

Along the cliffs from Niagara Falls to the islands north of Tobermory there exists some of the world’s oldest cliff-dwelling trees. Some of those trees live within 60 miles of 7 million people in southern Ontario.

Hyperion, a redwood, is the tallest tree on Earth at 382 feet and growing. General Sherman, a Sequoia, is 277 feet tall with an astounding base of 103 feet. Not all ancient trees, however, are tall or big. Methuselah, a bristlecone pine, is the world’s oldest known living single-stemmed tree; he’s over 4,600 years old. He’s not tall or big; he’s weather beaten; he’s gnarly and near immortal.

The Niagara Escarpment is 420 miles long and made up of 400 million year old sedimentary rocks. For 130 million years the escarpment was under a Silurian Sea. Those rocks contain a rich mixture of tiny sea-dwelling animals without backbones known as invertebrates.

About 13,000 years ago the dolomitic caprock of the escarpment emerged from under the immense Wisconsinan Ice Sheet. For another 6,000 years it remained submerged under glacial Lake Algonquin. Lake levels fluctuated for thousands of years, but about 3,500 years ago the Niagara Escarpment resembled the landform seen today. 

The rock faces of the Niagara Escarpment are awesome. The maple and beech forests provide exquisite habitat for many critters. The escarpment is also a favourite destination for hikers and rock-climbers.

Until the late 1980s little was known about the eastern white cedars growing along the cliff faces.

University of Guelph botanist Professor Douglas Larson began to explore the trees growing out of shear rock faces and on ledges. What he quickly discovered was that these trees were old.

Eastern white cedars are amazing trees with a wide flexibility enabling them to live in swamps, on acidic thin soils and along cliffs. An average tree can produce in excess of 260,000 seeds in a life-time. And each tree has the ability to clone itself by rooting a branch that touches the ground. This trait protects swamp eastern white cedars when they tip-over. They don’t die easily.

As a matter of fact, Native North Americans steeped bark and needles from eastern white cedar, which provided vitamin C, and saved the French explorer Jacque Cartier and his men from survey in 1535-36. Cartier named this tree arbor vitae or the tree of life.

Native North Americans used eastern white cedars to build canoes and longhouses. The wood is highly rot resistant. They also derived many medicines from these trees. 

In 1989 Dr Larson and his newly formed Cliff Ecology Research group began to actively explore the cliff-dwelling eastern white cedars along escarpment. Led by ecologist and rock-climber Peter Kelly the group used ropes to repel cliff faces. They began to find thousand year old living, weather-beaten and in many cases upside down living eastern white cedars. 

With the assistance of Banff- and Los Angeles-based conservation institute Global Forest Science and others, Larson’s group began the formidable task of mapping the entire 700-kilometre length of cliff dwelling forests. What they discovered was extraordinary.

Along the Bruce Peninsula they found two exceptionally ancient dead trees. One tree had in tact 1,653 rings or years of growth. Some growth rings were worn away from the other tree. Kelly estimated its age to be 1,890 years.

That antiquitous eastern white cedar would easily have outpaced Canada’s oldest known living tree – a 1,693 old yellow cedar from coastal B.C.

Over the next decade Peter Kelly went on to discover the oldest living eastern white cedar on the Niagara Escarpment – he called it the Ancient One with 1,320 rings or years of growth. It was born at the time the first Buddhist temple was built.

He found other ancient upside down, twisted, deformed yet defiant survivors; he gave them names like: Octopus Tree, Water-Fall Tree and Flying Elephant Tree.

These ancient trees show no sign of ageing. They, like the near immortal bristlecones of the eastern central White Mountains of California out-grow the ground beneath them – the sedimentary rocks break down before the trees die. 

Erosion of sedimentary cliff faces and rock-falls along the Niagara Escarpment are what eventually kills the eastern white cedars. Similar to the britlecones, eastern white cedars are able to survive with as little as 10 percent living bark and thrive for centuries while hanging on literally by threads of life.

The key to long tree life is slow, at times almost imperceptible, growth. Our species has much to learn from this long-lived, persistent strategy of making haste slowly. 

The Last Stand – A Journey Through the Ancient Cliff-Face Forest of the Niagara Escarpment

Peter E.  Kelley and Douglas W. Larson

http://www.amazon.ca/Last-Stand-Journey-Cliff-Face-Escarpment/dp/1897045190

SAVE THE BEES http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6w-Z7XlnHI 

Dr Reese Halter is a public speaker, conservation biologist and founder of the international conservation institute Global Forest Science. His latest book is entitled The Incomparable Honey Bee  http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=The+Incomparable+HoneyBee+reese+halter&x=0&y=0  He can be contacted through www.DrReese.com

Thought I would share this little clip of my friend Jennifer Phang on Korean TV.  She was director and writer of “Half-Life”.  To learn more about the film, check out it’s Wikipedia Page, here’s an excerpt – “The film premiered in the 2008 Sundance Film Festival and has since been touring the American and international film festivals circuits. It premiered internationally in the Tokyo International Film Festival in competition, and then in Europe at the Mannheim-Heidelberg International Film Festival, also in competition. “Half-Life” was the opening night film for the International Women’s Film Festival in Seoul, Korea. The film will make a theatrical debut in December 1 2009 in selected cities.”

While in Seoul, Jen took part in a television interview, here’s the beginning clip of the interview.  My artwork can be seen between minute 1:06 – 1:16.  A whopping 10 seconds on Korean TV:

My father would be proud……ha.  Also in addition to being able to see the film in select theatres in December, you can also get the film through NetFlix.

I got to see the film when it showed at The Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, as part of the 27th San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival.  I had seen parts of the film before it was finished when I was working on the artwork, but it was so cool to be in a movie theatre and see my art projected up on the big screen.  In total, including the opening credits, my art is up there for about 2 minutes.  It was a cool experience to be a part of.  You can view some the artwork used in the film here.  I still need to upload the second round of paintings onto the site, but you can see the first round.

This looks genuinely interesting. A venture into the life of the self-proclaimed Martian. No one can say this man isn’t unique.

——-

Mareva Galanter

Mareva Galanter. Tahiti-born french actress and beauty queen. She’s currently a successful singer in the “yé-yé” genre — think American smooth, indie-jazz. Interesting, indeed. Take a look.

——-

Humanzee

New Humanzee shirts out this week! Continuing the bridge of art and fashion. Quite interesting.

A good week, indeed.

_Reverend Zombie 11.42

Humanzee … is that you?

Plants contend with snow and cold winter temperatures with a variety of different strategies. Unlike some animals of the west, they cannot migrate to warmer environs.

Many herbaceous plants do the next best thing to migrating: they shed all of their above ground parts and seek a safe place to spend winter beneath the soil. Aspens, maples, birches, alders and other deciduous trees protect themselves from winter temperatures by dropping their leaves. Native conifers, except for larches, are evergreen and so they have internal functions or physiological adaptations that help them get through the winter months ahead.

The two most common stresses among trees and shrubs of the north country are the ability to withstand low temperatures and drying-up or desiccation.

In order to prepare for winter, leaves of Northern Hemisphere plants begin to recognize the diminishing length of daylight in August. Certain plant hormones are released to slow and then eventually stop all growth. The first frost of the autumn prepares woody plants for the impending onslaught of winter. In addition, plants experience a water stress which further prepares them for the chilly months ahead.

Trees are now able to deal with freezing temperatures and the controlled formation of ice. The exact location of ice within the tree is very important. Most of the cells within trees are non-living, because their role is to conduct water during the growing season and provide mechanical support or stability. There are, however, living cells within the roots, branches, trunk and evergreen needles which are very important for storing food and kick-starting spring growth. It’s these cells where the exact formation of ice is a life or death matter.

The initial formation of ice occurs outside the living plant cell in a small space within the cell wall. All the water that isn’t bonded to other molecules inside the cell is exported to the space in the cell wall. When ice forms in the cell wall it attracts water to its crystals. The living part of the cell is protected by an elastic cell membrane and the remaining cell sap can withstand temperatures as low as minus 67 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 55 degrees Celsius). If, for any reason, the cell membrane becomes ruptured or if too much water is exported into the cell wall the cell sap will become toxic and the cell will die.

Exposed evergreen needles face the greatest water loss problems under bright sunshine and calm winter days. The needles are warmed to above-freezing temperatures and the air is dry, creating atmospheric suction or a call for water from its needles. The tree is faced with a problem: It’s loosing water in its winterized needles and must replace it.

The trunk being darker and warming above freezing like the needles is able to supply minimal amounts of stored water from the cell walls. This becomes a tricky balancing act. On a day such as this, trees prefer even the slightest of breeze, because that cools the leaf surface and prevents any moisture loss and subsequent demand for replacement water.

Heavy snow loads, particularly on the Coastal Pacific Northwest Mountains, can cause entire trees to bend. A 40-foot Pacific silver fir can accumulate a mass of snow and ice nearly 20 inches thick, weighing 6,600 pounds or more than 3 tons.

Exposed areas are subjected to blowing ice which can remove foliage or cause freezing injury and create deep pits eventually wearing away tree bark. Mountain winds, especially during the winter, shape trees and the treeline forests. Some high elevation trees actually resemble a broomstick with windswept branches and trunks with only a mop-head or cluster of foliage at their top.

Browsing activities of mammals create further winter-stress problems for plants.

Yet despite all the harsh winter environmental conditions, our coastal, subalpine, interior and northerly forests of Western North America are hardy and able to live for hundreds and sometimes thousands of years, toughly facing months of winter.

Save the Honeybees http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6w-Z7XlnHI

Dr Reese Halter is a public speaker, conservation biologist and founder of the international conservation institute Global Forest science. His most recent book is The Incomparable Honeybee and the Economics of Pollination http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=The+Incomparable+HoneyBee+reese+halter&x=0&y=0  Contact him through http://DrReese.com

Last weekend was about searching for horses, in particular Duke, Molly and Liberty, Poco and Roach and baby Hayden. I found Hayden and Poco and Roach.

The end of the third rifle season was Friday or Saturday, depending on which DOW schedule was right, and I mostly had the basin and the horses to myself – ah, peace. I haven’t seen the pintos since the start of hunting season, I think, probably because of pressure from the road, close to which is the only water source I know of for them.

One of the bands that has NOT been hard to see recently – Kreacher’s – was briefly sighted up by the northwest road, then not again. I did get lucky and saw most of the others both days I was out.

Grey/Traveler was babysitting his youngsters – safely tucked into the saltbush taking their afternoon naps – while mamas and Iya were out grazing. Chrome and his new family were nearby, baby Hayden also taking his nap.

It was pretty windy both days (very still and nice until Saturday mid-morning) but mostly sunny and perfect temperature. Still some shade in the very shadiest of the most-north-facing hills but otherwise totally dry – except “the squish” on the loop road down from the roller-coaster hill, but not a problem to drive through.

The first clutch came when I found Steeldust’s band near the north-south road north of the Flat Top pond (which continues to shrink). Hook was with the band, and Aspen, but Twister was not with Hook. Maintaining my practice of not letting ya’ll share (some of ) my worry, he’s with Cinch and Bruiser! Not too much of a surprise, given they were all out on the Round Top-Flat Top saddle the previous weekend. AND the very first time I ever saw Mister Twister, he was with Cinch and Corazon.

Comanche and Mouse were napping on the far side of the band, and only Aspen and Hook gave me the eyeball while I visited (I don’t think Mouse moved so much as a hoof). Steeldust was hanging out with Alpha on the other far side of the band, and he apparently was completely unconcerned that Aspen and Hook were closer to his ladies and babies (except Alpha and Storm) than he was. Is Alpha in heat? There was no activity to suggest that; they were very quiet, sharing each other’s company in the sunshine. I just like to speculate. Storm-chaser is holding onto baby-hood as long as he can.

Hook and Ember napping. They weren’t as close as they look in this photo. That’s Hollywood’s band way out in the distance on the east-west hill.

Sundance roused from his nap long enough to greet Aspen and Hook, and after a couple of squeals and sniffs, went right back to the band.

Is it just me, or is Mouse getting stocky as he grows up?

Handsome curious boys

Front: Mahogany and Sable. Back: Ember and Pinon.

Sleepy, sleepy babies: Ember, Pinon, Hannah and Luna

A little after the previous photo, Hannah laid down. In the “near” background is the east-west hill – that’s where Hollywood’s band was hanging out both days.

“Baby” Storm is still nursing. Mama Alpha still lets him. Steeldust was just to the right.

Comanche.

Whaddy’a think? They look sleepy … and they look fantastic, eh?

You all, of course, know the Twister “mystery,” but I didn’t yet at that point. This pic was taken from the west-side loop road looking back at the band. Those crazy ponies didn’t even move in the time it took me to drive around there – well, Storm walked over to the main group. Lower left: Steeldust and Alpha. Looming weirdly hugely in the background is Filly Peak.

Seven’s band was between the Round Top road and roller-coaster ridge pond, Bounce’s was between the pond and the ridge, and Cinch, Bruiser and Twister were out between Round Top and the weird guzzler. No Molly and/or Liberty to be seen. Bounce’s were right at the base of the ridge, so when I drove over, I decided to walk down and around them to get better light. But before I got “better” light, I got light that loved Alegre.

Love that rim lighting on her forelock and tail as she stands over her baby Whisper, who is growing up into a fine young boy.

Handsome handsome!

Just like daddy Bounce!

Sweetest bravest curious-est girl Gaia

She’s still baby-clacking.

While I was visiting with and photographing Bounce’s band, Seven was curiously and calmly watching. Then he walked down to get a drink from the pond, just a little bit in front of him, out of this frame.

I checked the hunter camp on the hilltop overlooking Wildcat Spring. Except for four ribcages, four mule deer heads (antlers cut out) and hides, two gut piles and three entrance routes to the hill from the main road, the only speck of trash I found was a bottle cap. I guess I get leaving the leftovers for the ravens (they didn’t seem to find the stuff till the next day, making me wonder how recently the hunters left) and coyotes, but did they have to dump it down the hill on the side of the spring/canyon?? And the three routes they drove in – I hope – illustrates the need to prohibit off-road travel in an area of limited forage. How long will it take for grass – or anything else – to grow back in that poor (poor as in not very fertile) soil the horses depend on?

The sun was close to the horizon (I always forget how early it comes when we turn back the clocks) by then, so I headed out, hoping to find Grey’s and Chrome’s still in the flats. Oh, lucky me … but the long shadows were growing longer by the second.

You can see that the shade has overtaken them by this point … See that white-ish blur at upper left? That’s Grey/Traveler. His band was out to the right.

Hayden looks back at me and Chrome takes the opportunity to investigate the little mister. That’s Grey’s butt between his ears; an unfortunate angle, but I didn’t want to move and lose the moment! Remember how I originally described Hayden’s star as diamond-shaped? What does it most resemble now?? Be still my so-lost heart.

This is how close they were … and how calm. Still in the sunshine, barely. Jif and Hayden were to the right; Grey/Traveler was over to the left as far back as his band. In the background, from left: Iya, Houdini, Terra and Cuatro. I think Two Boots was closer to Grey.

Lovely day and evening.

Recently, I had a chance to spend a couple days exploring Arizona’s Sonoran Desert. It’s truly amazing to see how all the different animals use the desert to make a living.

The Sonoran Desert is spread across 106,000 square miles with about 40 percent of it in the U.S. and 60 percent in Mexico. It ranges in elevation from near sea level to over 3,300 feet along the eastern edge of Arizona. In Arizona it receives both winter and summer precipitation with an annual average of about 13 inches.

It is the most biologically diverse of the four big North American deserts. In fact, there are more than 1,000 species of solitary and social bees in the Sonoran Desert – more than anywhere else on the globe.

Being trained as a tree root physiologist I’m always curious about what’s making a living on the ground. Digger bee holes are very evident with a quarter of an inch hooked-top chimneys dotting the earth. The hooked chimneys are believed to thwart the attempts of parasitic hoverflies, who are known to flip eggs into bee holes – their eggs attach themselves to the bee eggs, once hatched they devour bee eggs.

Digger bees are solitary and the female will lay one egg with a packet of honey and pollen in up to 18 cells in one below ground nest consisting of 7 feet of tunnels.

Nearby the digger bee holes, I noticed a circular hole about an inch and a half wide covered with silk; just outside the hole were some loose barbed, dark hairs – indicating a tarantula burrow.

Tarantulas are one of the most recognized residents of the southwest desert. These nocturnal hunters often wait at their entrance holes for beetles and grasshoppers that pass by. Upon entering their hole after a night of hunting they weave silk at the den entrance. The silk has at least two purposes: It keeps the burrow dry by holding humidity and it carries vibrations down to the spider allowing it to know what’s occurring above the ground.

Tarantulas defend themselves from foxes, coyotes, raccoons and skunks by rubbing their legs against the abdomen to loosen their barbed hairs, which are designed to severely irritate the eyes or nasal cavities of predators.

White-nosed coatis, a much larger relative of the mink and closely related to raccoons, are known to grab tarantulas, roll them vigorously on the ground, dislodge their barbed hairs and then feast upon them.

In a sparse clump of grass about a miles away from the tarantula den I spotted a hole in the ground about an inch and a quarter wide, sitting nearby I waited for its occupant to surface. Soon a fierce little predator – a grasshopper mouse appeared. These diminutive yet tough critters hunt lizards, grasshoppers, beetles, scorpions and even other mice.

Grasshopper mice cooperate by raising their young and teaching them to hunt. Young mice learn how to bite the stingers off scorpions before eating them; and how to disable stink beetles – inch-long bugs that defend themselves by performing a headstand and spraying a fetid smell from their posterior.

One of the more eerie desert sounds at night is the high-pitched howl of grasshopper mice. If cornered by a predator this miniature beast will drop a runny, very smell bowel movement in a last ditch attempt to escape – an uncommon trait for a mouse.

One of the most fascinating and easily my favorite animals of the Sonoran Desert are the Couch’s Spadefoot toads. They are the largest native toads in the U.S. measuring a whopping 7 inches in length.

These incredible animals sleep for almost one year in the earth. The vibrations of the first summer thunderstorm awaken them and they burrow their way to the surface where then congregate in temporary rain pools and puddles in desert washes, irrigation canals or ponds.

Because water is so scarce in the desert they breed immediately and females lay eggs within 24 hours. Tadpoles must race to become toadlets before the ephemeral pools dry-up – from egg to toadlet in less than 14 days.

Adult Spadefoot’s are insectivores with termites being their preferred prey. An adult requires just two meals on termites, then with their hard keratinous spade-like pad on their hind legs they bury themselves in the ground. This exceptional desert dweller can live for over 10 years.

Burrowing owls are the only owl or raptor (bird of prey) to den and nest in underground digs. Excellent eyesight helps them spot predators. They prey on rodents, beetles, moths, scorpions, grasshoppers, prairie dog pups, toads, young snakes and other reptiles.

Snakes, badgers and coyotes preyed upon burrowing owls. Mature burrowing owls have developed an intriguing defense mechanism – they imitate the sound of a rattlesnake, which often frightens predators away.

Arizona’s Gila monster is one of the most unusual reptiles in the world and one of only two venomous lizards (the other is the Mexican beaded lizard) known on the globe.

Gila monsters spend 90 percent of their lives in natural crevices under boulders or rocks. 

This beauty of a beast can eat 35 percent of its body weight in one meal and store excess as fat in its tail. You can’t miss its bright black and pink coloring and beaded skin.

These shy animals release their venom by biting down on the victim with needle-sharp teeth hidden by the gums when not in use.

Gila monster venom may very well become the next blockbuster drug; currently it’s being studied by pharmaceuticals for treatment of high blood pressure that afflicts over 73 million Americans.

 Save the Honeybees http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6w-Z7XlnHI

Dr Reese Halter is a public speaker, conservation biologist and founder of the international conservation institute Global Forest Science. His most recent book is The Incomparable Honeybee and the Economics of Pollination http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=The+Incomparable+HoneyBee+reese+halter&x=0&y=0  Contact him through http://DrReese.com

The indigenous Douglas and pine tree squirrels are incredible and an integral part of the web of life within coastal and interior forests of British Columbia.

Douglas squirrels are only found on the south-coast whereas pine squirrels live throughout the rest of the province. They are easily recognizable compared to the introduced eastern gray squirrels or black fox squirrels. Native British Columbia squirrels have deep reddish or chestnut coloration with white-eye rings. They are considerably smaller in size than the introduced squirrels and so the indigenous squirrels have lost some of their habitat.

Tree squirrels, as their name implies, spend a good deal of time in forest treetops. They have powerful limbs, elongated digits and sharp recurved claws. They also have flexible ankles with hind-feet that are able to rotate 180 degrees enabling them to scamper down trees head first. Ever growing front teeth, molars and powerful jaws are critical assets since their main food source is the seeds inside conifer cones.

The most distinguishing feature of a tree squirrel is its tail, which accounts for about 40 per cent of body length. Not only does the tail aid in balance when performing spectacular acrobatics, but it also assists in regulating heat loss or gain (thermoregulation). Bundles of blood vessels at the base of the tail help retain heat in the body core or dissipate it more readily.  In addition, the tail is used for communicating; its orientation and movement convey information to other squirrels and predators. It also acts as the perfect parasol protecting against sun or rain.

Male and female tree squirrels are indistinguishable from a distance. They are the same size and their thick fur is light colored on the underside and relatively dark on the upper side. The dark color provides excellent camouflage from predators above while their pale underside enables them to blend against the light colored sky.

Tree squirrels are daytime (or diurnal) creatures with magnificent eyes that are able to differentiate certain colors like reds and greens. Their black whiskers are important tactile sensory organs and their superior intelligence is ascribed to their relatively large brain.

They rely heavily, but not exclusively, on tree seed as food.  In certain years, conifers produce an abundance of cones, tree scientists call this a mast crop. Unfortunately for tree squirrels, mast crops do not occur every year, hence it’s either feast or famine and population numbers fluctuate wildly according to availability of food. This presents an energy problem for an active critter whose heart beats between 150 and 450 beats per minute and does not hibernate during the winter.

So how do tree squirrels survive winter? They are prodigious workers and hoarders of food. They harvest whole conifer cones and store them in caches (called middens) that are underground, in hollow stumps or hollowed fallen logs. They must keep the cones moist to prevent them from drying out and shedding seeds. The squirrels have even been known to store cones in streams or springs where seed remains fresh for a year or more.

After awakening from hibernation both black and grizzly bears can often be seen raiding middens in search of any remaining protein-rich tree seeds.

Not all the seeds in caches are eaten. Some germinate and eventually become mature trees.

During the spring and summer, tree squirrels will eat a variety of foods from truffles to tree bark, tree buds, sap, insects, eggs and even mice.  Goshawks, owls, martens, fishers and bobcats prey on tree squirrels.

Perhaps most significant, the presence of native tree squirrels is a barometer of a forested ecosystem’s health, especially after a disturbance such as fire, insects or logging.

Save the Honeybees http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6w-Z7XlnHI

Dr Reese Halter is a public speaker, conservation biologist and founder of the international conservation institute Global Forest Science. His most recent book is The Incomparable Honeybee and the Economics of Pollination http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=The+Incomparable+HoneyBee+reese+halter&x=0&y=0 Contact him through http://DrReese.com