Sleeping Muse and Falling Rocket

I just read in someone's blog that "O. Henry kept his real identity a secret until his death." I wonder what William Sydney Porter would have said about that? It would have been a good question to ask him in the N.Y. Times interview in which he discussed why he chose the pen name O. Henry!

The red-head at the lower right is sleeping on a copy of A Hole Is To Dig, by Ruth Krauss. It helped launch Maurice Sendak's career.

I fell asleep on the couch. When I woke at 2 am, everyone had gone to bed. My first thought, of course, was "Musetta's Waltz! I need to listen to Musetta's Waltz!" I didn't check the volume. Fortunately, Puccini and Alcindoro were a step ahead of me. The first thing I hear is the exhortation: "Piano! Piano!" Thank you. I turned it down.

Emily Hornor Ma, the  daughter  of  Yo-Yo Ma, was married on 2014, but asked her father not to play at the wedding. That meant no cello arrangements of the Wagner's  Bridal Chorus  as she walked down the aisle and no Piazzolla tango transcriptions during the reception dances. Horner Ma, who married investment banker John Mistovich in front of 300 guests, told the  New York Post  that she didn’t want her father to perform, but "just be a dad that night." Instead, the newlyweds danced their first dance to the "Blue Danube Waltz," accompanied by the Alex Donner Orchestra – followed by a father and bride dance to "My Girl."

The double shoot-outs that open Silverado. Scott Glenn, asleep in a shack. Bad guy shadows surround it. Glenn shoots them all dead through the walls and ceiling. "I had to get up anyway." Kevin Kline in a Union suit, recognizing his stolen horse. Buying a broken six shooter and some bullets. Standing in the middle of the street, loading as the thief rides straight at him, shooting. "Can't you see this horse loves me?" One bullet in. One bullet out. One bad guy dead. Kasdan can write a script.

Very excited to see that "Star" was showing on TV tonight! Turns out it is a contemporary musical series set in Atlanta and featuring Queen Latifah. All well and good I'm sure, but I tuned in to watch Julie Andrews as Gertrude Lawrence and Daniel Massey as Noel Coward. Oh well. (Hey! Queen Latifah as Gertrude Lawrence! I like it!)

Just took an online art history quiz that claimed that this sculpture, Christ the Redeemer, was by a sculptor named "Cristo Redentor." What a coincidence!

Hadji Murad.  The 19th Century Avar warrior.  The fighter against Russian domination.  The inspiration for Tolstoy's novella that bears his name.  The novella that Wittgenstein carried in his pocket throughout WWI.   The novella that Harold Bloom called  “my personal touchstone for the sublime of prose fiction, to me the best story in the world, or at least the best I have ever read.”   This legendary figure and the equally legendary Tolstoy work was adapted to the screen in 1959. Anthony Quinn? Anthony Quayle? Olivier? Brando? Burton? Christopher Lee?  Nope. Steve Reeves. Steve Reeves.

The real reason I watch movies: Watching Limitless with Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro. Hanging on the wall in De Niro's office? Untitled No. 12 by Mark Rothko.

   Tom Hollander's Cyrano, at Cambridge, also featured Nick Clegg.

Mariska Hargitay, then three and a half, was asleep in the back seat of the car when the accident occurred that killed her mother Jayne Mansfield.