French
Au clair de la lune, mon ami Pierrot
Prête-moi ta lume,* pour écrire un mot.
Ma chandelle est morte, je n'ai plus de feu.
Ouvre-moi ta porte, pour l'amour de Dieu.

Au clair de la lune, Pierrot répondit
Je n'ai pas de lume, je suis dans mon lit.
Va chez la voisine, je crois qu'elle y est
Car dans sa cuisine, on bat le briquet.

Au clair de la lune, l'aimable Lubin
Frappe chez la brune, elle répond soudain
"Qui frappe de la sorte ? ", il dit à son tour
"Ouvrez votre porte pour le Dieu d'Amour"

Au clair de la lune, on n'y voit qu'un peu
On chercha la lume, on chercha du feu
En cherchant d'la sorte je n'sais c'qu'on trouva
Mais je sais qu'la porte sur eux se ferma.

English
Under the moonlight, my friend Pierrot,
Lend me your light, so I could write a word.
My candle is out, I've no more light.
Open your door for me, for the love of God.

Under the moonlight, Pierrot replied,
I've no light; I'm in my bed.
Go next door, I believe that she is in,
For in the kitchen, someone lit a match.

Under the moonlight, friendly Lubin
Knocks at the brunette's door, she suddenly replies
"Who's knocking this way", he says in his turn
"Open your door, for the god of love."

Under the moonlight, little can be seen
The light was looked for, fire was looked for
Searching this way, I don't know what was found
But I do know that the door, on them was shut.

*In modern versions, this word is "plume", meaning pen. "Lume" is derived from "lumière", meaning "light".
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Au_clair_de_la_lune

Through a link from cynodd's mother, I found this photo exhibition in Time Magazine Online entitled "Detroit's Beautiful, Horrible Decline." It's from a series by 2 French photographers, Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre, entitled The Ruins of Detroit (click on the arrow to the bottom left to scroll through the pictures on their site).

It's hard for people outside of Detroit to imagine how many abandoned buildings there really are in this city, but Marchand and Meffre have photos of 14 of those that used to be important and/or beautiful. These photos are really worth a look for the beauty of the photos themselves and for the lost potential revealed in them.

This should be the last post about my recent trip to London. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I visited Westminster Abbey. Photographs were not allowed inside and I'd previously taken some photos of the outside on another trip, so I only took one on my visit there this time. It would probably be better to post this on Monday or to have posted it on Thursday, but this photo is a portion of the wall above the main door at Westminster Abbey displaying the statues of 9 "martyrs," according to the tour guide. I've captured 3 of them here, the one in the middle being Martin Luther King, Jr.:

( Cut for photo )

I think I mentioned in my last post, too, that I'd gone to the Novello Theatre Saturday night, which was the closing night, to see whether I could get a return ticket for Hamlet, but there were none to be had by the time I arrived. So, I wandered around central London fairly aimlessly on Saturday night (coffee shop, bookstore, etc), but returned to the Novello Theatre, which really was on my way back to the hotel anyway, at the time the play was due to be over.

( Read more about chasing David Tennant )

If there is anyone reading this who might like to see Hamlet on DVD, please sign this petition. (For those on Facebook, joining the group on Facebook isn't the same as signing the petition. I think the Facebook group is mainly for updates. According to the latest update there, though, Michael Boyd, the artistic director for the Royal Shakespeare Company, has been in contact with the petition's author and is reading the petition with interest.)

Sunday, which was my last full day in London, I went to see Twelfth Night. This is the story of a twin brother and sister who are shipwrecked and find themselves in an unfamiliar land, each thinking the other is dead. The sister, Viola, passes herself off as a boy to work for the local duke, Orsino, and is sent on his behalf to court Olivia. Unfortunately, Olivia falls in love with Viola (as the boy, Cesario) while Viola falls in love with Orsino. There are several other characters in the households of Orsino and Cesario involved in side storylines, one of which involves making Olivia's steward, Malvolio, believe that Olivia is actually in love with him. (A mean trick, I thought, but I guess it would have played well to people who were victims of a class system.) It turned out that my ticket for Twelfth Night was very good, row K in the stalls, and I really enjoyed it.

( Read more about Twelfth Night )

Overall, the Shakespeare audience seems tougher than the musical theatre audience. Neither of the 2 Shakespearean plays got a full standing ovation, but Oliver! did.

Sunday evening, I was sent to a French restaurant at the Covent Garden Market for dinner by the hotel's concierge, who was French. As I was looking around the Market area for the restaurant, I came across a sextet who were performing in an open area of the Market near a pub. (Some of the pub's patrons were actually eating and drinking outside, despite the cold.) I sat and watched them for a few pieces (something by Mozart, "The Can-can", and the opening of Carmen) and gave them a couple of pounds. I also took a picture:

( Cut for photos )

Hamlet closed with its last performance last night. I thought I'd try to see whether I could get a return ticket because...why not? However, I later heard that people had lined up for return tickets beginning the night before, so it's not surprising that I didn't get one when I went to the theatre only 45 minutes before the show was due to start.

When I met Peter De Jersey from Hamlet the other night, I asked whether he'd miss it when it was done. He said that he wouldn't because he was bound to work with everyone from the production again at some point or another and he was excited to be moving on. Not being very gifted at small talk, at the time it didn't occur to me to ask what he would be doing next. Instead, I asked whether that indicated that the community of actors here was small. He responded that he didn't think so, but that there were a lot of projects over the course of time. Now, I'm wondering how true that is...

As I mentioned previously, after meeting Julian Bleach and having him tell me that he was playing Mr. Sowerberry, the undertaker, in Oliver!, I had the tune for "That's Your Funeral" running through my head all day Friday, though I couldn't remember most of the words. So, I figured I'd try to go see it. Why not, eh? I was able to get a ticket to the matinee performance yesterday. It turns out that it was starring Rowan Atkinson, whom some may know as Blackadder or Mr. Bean, as Fagin. It also starred Burn Gorman, whom I know as Owen Harper from Torchwood and jaderabbit knows as Mr. Guppy from Bleak House, as Bill Sikes. (I have yet to see that version of Bleak House, but intend to watch it sometime.) Although neither Blackadder nor Mr. Bean fit my sense of humor exactly, Atkinson was quite funny as Fagin. I really enjoyed his rendition of "Reviewing the Situation" and there was a new twist to Fagin being concerned about Oliver seeing his stash of jewels. He seemed to be enjoying wearing the jewels, including a tiara, quite a lot, so when he discovered Oliver awake, it seemed as if he was as concerned about Oliver having seen him try on the jewels as he was over whether Oliver had seen where he kept them. *lol* Bill Sikes as a character is harder to judge because there's nothing humorous or subtle about him. I will say, though, that I thought Gorman had the presence to pull it off, which surprised me. The woman playing Nancy, Jodie Prenger, had been chosen for the part in a competition similar to "American Idol." She had a good voice and wasn't inappropriately bright or cheerful as Nancy, unlike what cynodd and I noted in our old high school's production of Oliver! this past spring. (To be fair, I'm not certain that any average high school aged girl would really understand Nancy's situation. I certainly didn't when I participated in Oliver! many years ago.) At the production I saw, Oliver was played by Harry Stott and the Artful Dodger was played by Ross McCormack (based on their photos in the program). I thought that the boy playing the Artful Dodger was particularly talented and fun to watch.

But, back to Julian Bleach...it turns out that he played both Mr. Sowerberry, the undertaker, and Dr. Grimwig, the doctor (obviously). I was sitting as far back as row S in the stalls, but I'd never have known him to be the same person I met the other night, if he hadn't told me. Knowing it was him, as I did, I could say that his nose was the same. Otherwise, he looked very cadaveric (which fits an undertaker, I suppose) and moved as a nimble charicature of an illustration in a version of Dickens's book. He was very funny, too, as Mr. Sowerberry. When I got back to the hotel, I decided to look him up on the internet to remind myself what he really looked like. Here is a photo of him from the Royal Shakespeare Company's production of The Tempest a few years ago. As I was looking for a photo, though, I came across his "filmography" and discovered that I'd seen him before on television: he portrayed Davros in the finale of Doctor Who, series 4, and the "ghostmaker" in a series 2 episode of Torchwood, "From Out of the Rain" (the evil circus episode). It's a shame I didn't know that at the time I met him or I'd have told him how creepy I found him in Torchwood. Hopefully, he'd have taken that as a compliment. ;-)

So, given the number of overlapping actors in just these few shows, it's hard for me to believe that the theatre community is really that large...

ETA: I said there was nothing humorous about Bill Sikes, but that's not entirely true. The way he pulled his loot out of various hiding places on his person to give it to Fagin was done in a very amusing way... Also, Gorman received quite a few boos from the audience during the closing bows. However, he smiled at it, so hopefully that was a good thing...traditional or something.

As I'm spending this evening in a hotel room, I thought I'd take some time to write about my trip to London, so far. I'm here to see Hamlet and Twelfth Night. On arriving Wednesday morning, my main goal was to make sure I was rested enough to enjoy the performance of Hamlet last night. Fortunately, even though I arrived at the hotel hours before their normal check-in time, they had a room for me and I was able to take a nap. I have to say that I didn't do much else on Wednesday - just wandered around central London on foot (everything is so close that I wouldn't have bothered with the Tube in the past had I known), had dinner, and stopped in at a Waterstone's Book Shop to get a copy of Twelfth Night. I had plans to read it before I saw the performance, as it's been more than 15 years since I read it. (Although the Royal Shakespeare Company's Manifesto on learning Shakespeare emphasizes active involvement in the plays, either acting or watching, which I don't dispute is a good thing, I personally learn better by reading than I do by hearing. Given the rapidity of speech from good actors, the accents, and the difficulty of this older version of English, I'd like to make sure I understand it.) However, I haven't yet started reading it...I felt too tired for Shakespeare Wednesday night, so I just read a bit further in A Game of Thrones by George RR Martin, which jaderabbit and her husband gave me to borrow when I visited them in November. (I'd have gotten to it sooner, but I was reading The Enchantress of Florence by Salman Rushdie and was very busy with the holidays. So, I'm about 150 pages into it and was interested to see that lunas_ceiling just posted her thoughts on it. I don't want to read what she wrote until I'm finished with it, though. Unlike cynodd, I never skip to the end! *lol*)

( Read more... )

This is my tree, showing all the ornaments.  I finally got all the gifts wrapped and put under the tree this afternoon.  You can also see part of the lighted garland I have running up the stair banister.  Like lunas_ceiling , I thought I'd show some of the other decorations in my house, too.

Never visit Zingerman's Bakehouse when you're hungry. I went there on my way home today to find a cake for a Christmas dessert (I settled on a Buche de Noel) and also ended up buying a pan of cinnamon rolls, an over-the-moon pie (sort-of an expensive Ding Dong - $4 each), and a tin of their "Fancy Schmancy" cookies for my Grandmother. Unfortunately, I'd missed lunch because, by the end of the morning, I was 2 hours behind in clinic and used the lunch hour to become only 1 hour behind. (Usually, I'm about 1 hour behind and use the lunch hour to mostly catch up, so I have time to eat a few bites between patients...but, not today. *sigh* I did eat 2 cookies from a tray that someone brought to the staff room, though.) After finishing clinic, I decided I'd rather just go home than eat hospital cafeteria food. And, again unfortunately, it was a mess on the roads with all the snow. It took me 3 hours to get home.

( Cut for more unfortunate events... )

ETA: And, things must be looking up because I see that 2 of the discharge summaries in my inbox have been done... That greatly increases the chance that they will all be done by tomorrow and I can have my day off. :)

This is for anyone who thought this was one of the most awesome videos ever back in the 80's.

Take On Me: Literal Video Version



Thanks to son_of_darkness for originally linking to this. :)

As I was driving home today, I heard a story on NPR about how Coldplay is being sued by guitarist Joe Satriani for copying their Viva La Vida from his If I Could Fly. They said there was a YouTube video demonstrating the similarities between Coldplay's Viva La Vida and Satriani's If I Could Fly, which is purely instrumental. Actually, I found 2 videos, the second of which seems to be Satriani's music with someone singing the Coldplay lyrics along with it?

( Cut for videos )

According to NPR and all the news stories I saw on this, Coldplay is being sued for plagiarism...but, I thought that plagiarism was purely an academic term and one could only be sued for copyright infringement? Is it different with music than it is with the written word?

Also, here is a new trailer for the Doctor Who Christmas special:



It seems not particularly informative or exciting, though the sound quality is better than the previous trailer that I'd seen. (ETA: I still can't quite understand what the older man is saying at the end, though. Monstrous...something? The woman responds, "Merry Christmas to you, too.") I remain most intrigued by the opening 2 minutes of the show (broadcast to raise money for the BBC's Children In Need), which makes it look very interesting, amusing, and fun. :)

( Behind the cut for anyone who missed it before...*cough*cynodd*cough* )

Unfortunately, I've been out of touch with my LJ recently. (I was sick at a time when work was extremely busy, but am better now.) So, I missed last week's excellent news that The Lexicon: An Unauthorized Guide to Harry Potter Fiction will be published next month. It seems that with a lot of hard work and determination, Steve Vander Ark has revised his manuscript to make it compliant with the September 2008 court decision, which confirmed that unofficial guides to literary works should not be prohibited as long as they don't use too much text from the original work.

Congratulations, Steve!

It'll be exciting to see it in bookstores finally! :)

Also, I updated my "home theater" with a new plasma HDTV - it's a thing of beauty, all sleek and black and the perfect size for my room. The picture on the TV is great, too! *lol* I also got the Blu-Ray DVD player to go along with it. I don't have any Blu-Ray DVDs, yet, but it plays regular DVDs, too, which is convenient. I'd previously been under the impression that Blu-Ray players wouldn't play regular DVDs and that everything I own would need to be replaced, if I ever got one.

The Blu-Ray player "up-converts" the old DVDs quite well, so they're very clear - I can now see all the appalling skin flaws of my favorite actors and actresses! :-D (No one should be worried about that, since it just makes them seem more like real people, rather than divine beings to be placed upon pedestals.) Actually, the thing I notice the most, strangely enough, is the fabrics used for costumes. For example, it was only after watching the Doctor Who series 4 DVD set that my parents got me for my birthday on this new set-up that I realized the Doctor's blue suit isn't solid blue - it has reddish-orange pinstripes in it! *geekily excited by being able to see this*

When I was little, I was more afraid of vampires than practically any other type of scary creature. It's interesting that they've become more nuanced, transitioning from evil monster to antihero in recent years. We've seen this in the vampires of Anne Rice, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Twilight. When I was visiting jaderabbit and her family, we began watching Ultraviolet, which I understand is another story in this line. I'll have to get the DVD set and finish watching it - we only watched the first episode, so I don't know where it will lead yet, but it was interesting enough to wonder about. :)

Yesterday, the Red-headed Girl mentioned a series on HBO called True Blood, which is also about vampires. I hadn't previously heard of it, but checked and found it was "On Demand" through HBO. (Yes, I subscribe to HBO.) It also seems quite good, though I'm writing this after only having seen the first episode.

It takes place in modern Louisiana 2 years after vampires have begun coming "out of the coffin" to claim their place in modern society. This was made possible by the advent of a synthetic blood product called "Tru Blood." Some people think that vampires should be treated like humans and given all the same rights in society. Bill Maher is shown on a TV interviewing a vampire advocate for vampire rights early on in the episode. Some people think that vampires are not to be trusted. One un-trusting character makes his point by asking the human protagonist, Sookie, whether she would give up all the foods she loves to drink Slim-Fast for the rest of eternity. I admit this isn't very appetizing...

Another problem for the society of the True Blood world is that vampire blood has street value. Apparently, drinking it makes humans feel more alive and it acts like an aphrodisiac. Vampires are captured by the human criminal element and drained of blood which is to be sold like heroin. It's been implied in this first episode that draining a vampire completely will actually kill it, unlike in usual vampire lore. This is what almost happens to Bill, the vampire who plans to make his home in the small Louisiana town where Sookie is a waitress.

( Read more... )

Interesting stuff! :-D

ETA: I've just started watching the second episode and saw a tabloid lying on a table with the headline "Angelina Adopts Vampire Baby". *rotfl*

In case anyone missed it, Twilight, based on the book by Stephanie Meyers, opened in theaters today. Since the worst part about the book was the writing, I was curious about whether the movie could be better and checked out some of the reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. Interestingly, the top critics seemed to have liked it better, generally speaking, than the lesser-known critics; though, it earned a tomato splat from both groups. Of the 28 top critics, 15 gave it "fresh" reviews and 13 gave it "rotten" reviews. Of the 122 lesser known critics, 52 thought it was fresh and 70 thought it was rotten. So, since I didn't really like the book all that much, I'll probably wait to see this until I happen to run across it on TV someday...

Yesterday, someone on another blog's comments posted a link to this interview with the actor who plays Edward in Twilight, Robert Pattinson, who a lot of my f-list know as Cedric Diggory:

( Cut for video )

The interesting part comes when the interviewer asks about why he thinks the books are so popular and he speaks about his experience reading them. (It must have been torture for him - it's hard to imagine any guy having the fortitude to take more than a few pages of Bella's thoughts. Actually, Bella is lucky that Edward can't read her mind...) He says [edited for pauses & filler words for easier reading]:

"There's a thing about the books where, when I was reading them, I didn't know how to read it from a teenaged girl's or any kind of woman's perspective, I guess. I don't really know why they like it. But, what I thought was weird about it...the reaction I had with it was...when I read it, it seemed like...I was convinced that Stephanie was convinced she was Bella and it was...it was like a book that wasn't supposed to be published and you're reading her sort of sexual fantasy about some...and, especially when she says it was based on a dream, and it's like, "Oh, I have had this dream about some really sexy guy," and she just writes this book about it. And, some things about Edward are so specific...things like...I was just convinced that this woman is mad. She's completely mad and she's in love with her own fictional creation. And sometimes you'd feel uncomfortable reading this thing. And I think a lot of people feel the same way - it's voyeuristic and it creates this kind of sick pleasure in a lot of ways."

Although, I have to say that he seemed very uncomfortable with the idea, not as if he'd enjoyed the books as some sort of voyeuristic pleasure.

Prior to the passage of Michigan's Proposal 1 to legalize medical marijuana, I told those who asked me what I thought that I was against it. But, unfortunately it passed and now I'm going to have to deal with it.

Today, I received an e-mail from our hospital's chief medical officer (CMO) to address the issue, since patients are already asking for it; although, the state has several months yet before the program must be implemented in order to develop and set up the program. The CMO also attached a document on FAQ for Proposal 1. It's not clear to me where this document originated, with the hospital or the state, but it unhelpfully states that the Michigan Department of Community Health cannot provide any advice on how patients should grow marijuana plants (for those without a green thumb) nor how patients can legally obtain marijuana. Apparently, patients are only legally allowed to have it once they own it, but there is no one who is legally allowed to supply it to them. Yes, this was well thought out. *rolls eyes*

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Last night, I was over at my parents' house to watch Doctor Who with my Dad, since they were showing last year's Christmas special, "Voyage of the Damned", on BBC America. He'd missed that episode on the Sci Fi Channel. Unfortunately, BBC America cut it down to 1 hour with commercials, so it wasn't very good. It seemed very disjointed and half the characters didn't have any introduction - they were just suddenly there in the thick of the action. Since BBC America shows the same programming over and over, I don't see why they can't cut out some of the repeats to show the episode properly. :-/

We didn't watch the following episode, "Partners in Crime", which was shown immediately after because my Mom always watches Suze Orman at the time it was on. My Dad, who had the remote control, actually left it on Doctor Who for the first 10-minutes of "Partners in Crime" until, after a couple of comments like, "God, this is so stupid," my Mom reminded him that Suze Orman was on. I liked "Partners in Crime", though. I thought it was cute and funny! :)

After getting home, I was able to track down the video for the first 2-minutes of the 2008 Doctor Who Christmas Special that was recently broadcast to raise money for Children in Need. ( It looks like it will be fun! )

cjmr and cynodd posted this meme, so I thought I'd try it:

clair de la lune's Dewey Decimal Section:

045 [Unassigned]

clair de la lune = 3219845212145 = 321+984+521+214+5 = 2045


Class:
000 Computer Science, Information & General Works


Contains:
Encyclopedias, magazines, journals and books with quotations.



What it says about you:
You are very informative and up to date. You're working on living in the here and now, not the past. You go through a lot of changes. When you make a decision you can be very sure of yourself, maybe even stubborn, but your friends appreciate your honesty and resolve.

Find your Dewey Decimal Section at Spacefem.com

It's a little odd because the quiz says that it will give you results 3 different ways (based on name, favorite number, and birthdate) and you may choose the one that you feel best suits you. Well, that part's not odd. The part that's odd is that, although I got different Dewey Decimal numbers each time, I was always in the same part of the library:

( See other results. )

So, I guess it must be the real me! *lol*

If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.

It's the answer told by .... Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of individuals or a collection of red states and blue states.

We are, and always will be, the United States of America.
- President-Elect Barack Obama, November 5, 2008

In the spirit of the US being united states, as opposed to a collection of individual red and blue states, I made this map of the US showing how red & blue each state really is:



My paint program uses red, blue, and green for all colors. If Obama won a state 57% to 41% (as he did Michigan), that state's color is 57% blue and 41% red with green (representing 3rd parties) making up the rest to 100%.

The commentators have noticed how there seemed to be a "Civil War split" in terms of how the Southern states went for McCain and the Northern states went for Obama (see red/blue map), which is sadly divisive. I think my map tells a different story. :)

cynodd showed me this yesterday and I thought it was hilarious. If you love Les Miz and favor Barack Obama, this video is for you:


Starring Obama campaign office workers as Jean Valjean, Marius, Cosette, Eponine, Enjolras & Company. Starring "John McCain" as Javert and "Sarah Palin" as Mme Thénardier.

After the book, The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, was mentioned here in relation to the Doctor Who episodes, "Silence in the Library" and "Forest of the Dead", I knew I had to read it. So, now I have. :)

I was surprised to find this book in the literature section of Borders instead of the sci-fi section, but on reading it, that really makes sense. It's about time travel, but not about the mechanics of time travel. It's about the effect on a man, Henry, who spontaneously time travels, controlling neither when it happens nor when/where he ends up, and on his relationship with his wife, Clare. It's a fantastic love story.

(Not that there isn't any science in it - there's a very small amount. I was skeptical about the idea of time travel being controlled by a person's genes, but this was more than compensated by my amusement at the idea of making transgenic time traveling mice to study the time travel genes. *lol*)

When Clare first meets Henry, she's 6 and he's 36. By that time, Henry has known Clare for 8 years and been married to her for 6 years. When Henry first meets Clare, he's 28 and she's 20. By that time, Clare has known Henry for 14 years, but they won't marry for another 2 years. (Older!Henry has been very careful to tell young!Clare nothing of his everyday life, so it may be complete coincidence when he meets her; though, in general, the story seems strongly to support predestination.) I really liked Henry's response to his first meeting with her at the beginning of the book:

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So, overall, I really loved this book. It often read like a bunch of short stories, but isn't that what our lives are made of? A series of events, like short stories? And, the individual events all fit together perfectly to make the lives of Henry and Clare complete.

Oh, and a bonus for me is that Clare is from Michigan with much of the story taking place there. :)

Has anyone else read it? I would very much like to discuss it.

On a related topic, I saw this news story tonight about David Tennant having announced...( Read more... )

Someone sent this to me via e-mail today, so I thought I'd post it here:

I found this amusing, but I thought that rattlesnakeroot, especially, would get a kick out of it:

See more Ron Howard videos at Funny or Die

A friend directed me to this news article. Apparently, a woman in Japan was playing a game online in which she had a virtual husband, who was a man she didn't otherwise know living in a city 620 miles away. Her virtual husband suddenly divorced her virtual self with no explanation and she got angry - so angry that she logged onto the computer as her virtual husband (with a username & password he'd shared with her) and killed his character in the game. Now she's in real jail charged with some crime related to manipulating electronic data and faces a up to 5 years in prison, if convicted. How crazy is that? Was the man actually irreversibly harmed? What kind of person reports the death of an online character to the actual police?