Daily Entries for the week of
Sunday, February 21, 2021
through
Saturday, February 27, 2021
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It’s Saturday, February 27, 2021
Welcome to the 1036th consecutive post to the blog,
existentialautotrip.com
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1.0 Lead Picture
ABT: Liz Cheney
116th Congress official portrait
US House Office of Photography - https://www.facebook.com/replizcheney/photos/a.1800762520249606/2293745477617972/
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2.0 Commentary
ABT.
You heard it here first: ABT.
Yes.
Anyone but the most popular Republican.
Donald Trump has wreaked enough damage on our country.
This week: Liz Cheney.
Re: Sacco and Vanzetti.
During this day we discussed a number of items, one of them the electronic copy of our proposed installation.
But mostly the conversation turned to the conversation,
the point being that all four of us worked in peace and harmony.
We talk things out.
We’ve banished voting from our conversation,
replacing wars for votes with understanding, compromise, and unanimity.
My personal feeling is that Trump is peaking too early.
In advance of his opening salvo when he speaks on Sunday to the CPAC, I predict his words will already sound tired, stale, boring.
Boring.
True he is the by-far front-runner.
But he is riding waves of sympathy; of anger; of hope of revolution and change; of finding a fall guy; of the bloodthirst for French Revolution-style public guillotines.
Do Trump advisers really believe they can provide enough fuel to keep these fires burning for near four years?
If they do, they are wrong.
If Trump does become their candidate, look for Biden to win in one of the biggest landslides in American history.
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4.0 Chuckles and Thoughts
“Frisbeetarianism is the belief that
when you die, your soul goes up on the roof and
gets stuck.”
~George Carlin
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5.0 Mail and other Conversation
We love getting mail, email, or texts.
Send comments to domcapossela@hotmail.com
or text to 617.852.7192
This from Colleen G, well-known for her Blog: Room to Write (www.theroomtowrite.org)
Hi Dom,
I'm still behind, so am looking forward to looking at your reimagined opening soon. Sorry for the delay. Still trying to fit more into the same 24 hours.
I have to say I am really enjoying the bits from George Carlin. He is hilarious:)
Also, I thought you'd appreciate that my husband and son--on their own accord--decided to make me and my daughters dinner on Valentine's Day: Bolognese Sauce with homemade pasta. They even made us a Red Velvet cake from scratch. They were in the kitchen all day while we had a DYI spa day upstairs. :) Thought you'd appreciate that on many levels. Then we all watched The Kid with Bruce Willis. It's a movie I never saw before, but it really was a good one! Tears and all:) If you haven't seen it I think you'd like it.
See---I'm still catching up from Feb 14th. I cannot be trusted with time-sensitive materials. Slowly but surely I'll get there.
I took my mom for her second vaccine yesterday. She was just really tired yesterday. Happy to hear you have had yours. It is exciting to get together the other end of whatever this is. Having seen what this end looks like--the other end can't be worse.
Universe, don't take that as a challenge:)
Enjoy the sunshine!
Cheers,
Colleen:)
Blog meister responds: You’re a joy, my dear.
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6.0 Dinner/Food/Recipes
Last night I hosted my first social dinner in several weeks – with architect Jack Hagan.
We are both twice-vaccinated.
The visit doubled as a business dinner as we reviewed his first version of the site we think appropriate for The Sacco and Vanzetti memorial we are working on.
We had a couple of disagreements that needed resolution.
A lovely night, we finished dinner and, rendering in hand, walked over to the site.
We reviewed site on location and were both mollified.
The result, a course-correction, exactly why we set up he dinner in the first place.
Returned home happy.
next appointment: three weeks
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11.0 Thumbnail
ABT Hopeful
Elizabeth Lynne Cheney, born July 28, 1966, is an American attorney and politician serving as the U.S. Representative for Wyoming's at-large congressional district since 2017. Cheney is the House Republican Conference Chair, the third-highest position in the House Republican leadership.
She is the third woman elected to that position after Deborah Pryce and Cathy McMorris Rodgers.
Cheney is the elder daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney and Lynne Cheney. She held several positions in the U.S. State Department during the George W. Bush administration, notably as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs and Coordinator for Broader Middle East and North Africa Initiatives. She promoted regime change in Iran while chairing the Iran Syria Policy and Operations Group with Elliott Abrams. Cheney co-founded of Keep America Safe, a nonprofit organization concerned with national security issues. She was a candidate for the 2014 election to the United States Senate in Wyoming, challenging three-term incumbent Mike Enzi, before withdrawing from the race. In the House of Representatives, she holds the seat her father held from 1979 to 1989.
Regarded as a leading ideological conservative in the Bush–Cheney-era tradition and a representative of the Republican establishment, Cheney is known for her focus on national security, support for the U.S. military, pro-business stance and hawkish and neoconservative foreign policy views, and for being fiscally and socially conservative.
Cheney is considered one of the leaders of the neoconservative wing of the Republican Party and was critical of the foreign policy of the Donald Trump administration.
She supported the second impeachment of President Trump.
A February 2021 attempt by pro-Trump Freedom Caucus members of the House Republican Conference to remove her from her leadership position failed by a vote of 145–61.
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It’s Friday, February 26, 2021
Welcome to the 1035th consecutive post to the blog,
existentialautotrip.com
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1.0 Lead Picture
Ferlinghetti
in 1965
Elsa Dorfman - Own work
At the Grolier Bookshop in Harvard Square in the 1960s,
with Gordon Cairnie, the owner at the time.
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2.0 Commentary
Recurring headaches through Wednesday a nuisance.
Last Thursday got second vaccination.
A low-grade headache was only negative after-symptom.
First vaccination also led to headaches>
Seven days worth.
Hopefully, this is last one this time, too.
Dodging bullets.
Rarely I strain a muscle lifting weights.
Monday proved an exception, pulling a lower back muscle doing some back extensions.
The pain caused me to walk a little differently, i.e.,
not raising my feet as high as I normally do.
That and a sewer cover raised several inches from the sidewalk
led me to a fall.
Fortunately, slamming my knee.to a bruise, but no more.
Out of next ten days, only two in the thirties.
Seven in the forties.
And one day at 54*!
Yayy!
Wednesday and Thursday nights I am preparing dinners for two friends, one on each night.
This is my first foray into socialization since I got my second shot.
Am not at all worried.
Have taken all recommended precautions.
By now, we all know what they are.
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3.1 Sacco and Vanzetti
A lot of work today on the mailing list for our Sacco and Vanzetti Zoom meeting on Friday.
Please send your email and I will send you the link.
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4.0 Chuckles and Thoughts
“Tell people there’s an invisible man in the sky
who created the universe, and
the vast majority will believe you.
Tell them the paint is wet, and they have to touch it to be sure.”
~George Carlin
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5.0 Mail and other Conversation
We love getting mail, email, or texts.
Send comments to domcapossela@hotmail.com
or text to 617.852.7192
This from Victor B:
Dom,
It is my recollection that in the version of cacio e pepe served in Rome, toasted peppercorns, not simply black pepper, are called for. I had cacio e pepe (as a test) in a North End restaurant where black pepper was used, and it was extremely disappointing.
Victor
Blog meister responds: got this blurb from wikipedia. however, watching s tucci on sunday night: he talked about the three pastas and rome and in a famous roman restaurant we watched them make the dish with no mention of peppercorns.
do you remember liking the dish? biting into the peppercorns?
And Victor answered:
Dom,
The peppercorns were very tiny. I don't recall the sensation of biting into them. I only recall that the result was more flavor than what was produced by the small amount of black pepper in the recent North End version that I had. It seems to me that the dish, which uses so few ingredients, is made something special by the use of toasted peppercorns. I can even tell you, after making a survey, the restaurant in Rome which produced what I thought was the best. I can't wait to get back and update the survey.
Blog meister responds: I’m hard on your heels, my friend.
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6.0 Dinner/Food/Recipes
Dinner Tuesday night at Ma Maison.
I knew exactly how I wanted that night to be.
Steak and Frites.
A large glass of red wine.
And time to stare out into space.
I got exactly what I hoped for plus
an excellent Bearnaise Sauce. Superior.
A great value at $50.00.
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11.0 Thumbnail
If you would be a poet, create works capable of answering the challenge of
apocalyptic times, even if this meaning sounds apocalyptic.
You are Whitman, you are Poe, you are Mark Twain, you are Emily Dickinson and Edna St. Vincent Millay,
you are Neruda and Mayakovsky and Pasolini,
you are an American or a non-American,
you can conquer the conquerors with words. ...
— Lawrence Ferlinghetti. From Poetry as Insurgent Art [I am signaling you through the flames].
Lawrence Monsanto Ferlinghetti (March 24, 1919 – February 22, 2021) was an American poet, painter, social activist, and the co-founder of City Lights Booksellers & Publishers.
He was the author of poetry, translations, fiction, theatre, art criticism, and film narration.
Ferlinghetti was best known for his first collection of poems, A Coney Island of the Mind (1958), which has been translated into nine languages, with sales of more than one million copies.
When Ferlinghetti turned 100 in March 2019, the city of San Francisco proclaimed his birthday, March 24, "Lawrence Ferlinghetti Day".
Shortly before Lawrence's birth, his father, Carlo, a native of Brescia, died of a heart attack.
His mother, Clemence Albertine (née Mendes-Monsanto), of Sephardic Jewish descent, was committed to a mental hospital shortly afterward.
He was raised by an aunt, and later by foster parents.
He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he earned a B.A. in journalism in 1941.
He began his career in journalism by writing sports for The Daily Tar Heel,
and he published his first short stories in Carolina Magazine,
for which Thomas Wolfe had written.
Following service in the U.S. Navy throughout World War II, Ferlinghetti earned a master's degree in English literature from Columbia University in 1947 with a thesis on John Ruskin and the British painter J. M. W. Turner.
From Columbia, he went to Paris to continue his studies and earned a doctoral degree in comparative literature with a dissertation on the city as a symbol in modern poetry.
Ferlinghetti met his future wife, Selden Kirby-Smith, granddaughter of Edmund Kirby-Smith, in 1946 aboard a ship en route to France. They both were heading to Paris to study at the Sorbonne. Kirby-Smith went by the name Kirby.
He moved to San Francisco in 1951 and founded City Lights in 1953, in partnership with Peter D. Martin, a student at San Francisco State University. They both put up $500 dollars.
As the owner of the City Lights bookstore, Ferlinghetti was arrested for publishing Allen Ginsberg's Howl, which resulted in a lengthy First Amendment trial.
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It’s Thursday, February 25, 2021
Welcome to the 1034th consecutive post to the blog,
existentialautotrip.com
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1.0 Lead Picture
Pecorino Romano.
Copied from Image:Pecorino Romano on board.jpg, and
cropped and converted to PNG with Microsoft Paint.
Deanna from Chicago 'burbs - Part of For Sue
CC BY-SA 2.0
File: Pecorino romano on board cropped. PNG
Created: September 21, 2006
About this interface | Discussion | Help, 20
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2.0 Commentary
Weather getting warmer.
In the next week, one 36* day and the rest are in the forties and fifties.
Like it.
Quo Vadis, Mitch McConnell?
Is Mitch the man to stand up to the fringe right?
The man around whom conservative Republicans will circle the wagons in the Republican internecine war against the crazies?
Here’s the deal.
MM is a crafty, knowledgeable, political animal.
Do we believe that his lambasting of Trump during the insurrection was a one-off?
A spontaneous, idealistic spouting?
Or rather the first salvo in a well-planned attack on the Trump-Republicans,
more in the keeping of what we know of Mitch McConnell?
We certainly hope it’s the latter or
this country is heading for threatening times.
In 11.0 Thumbnail below are three classic Roman pasta dishes.
These are very simple sauces.
Go on the internet and pull down some basic interpretations and learn to make them.
They will provide simple but delicious dinners or lunches to come.
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3.1 Sacco and Vanzetti
We’ve gone back and forth on the Mission Statement for the Memorial to Sacco and Vanzetti.
We’ve settled on this:
Boston’s historic North End is a neighborhood synonymous with Italian immigration and imbued with Italian-American culture. Sacco and Vanzetti, two such immigrants, suffered one of the most publicized, egregiously unjust criminal trials in American history. Fittingly, after their execution, the bodies of Sacco and Vanzetti were laid out in the North End.
We are the committee for a Memorial to Sacco and Vanzetti, Inc. remembering these men in the spirit of reconciliation, rather than casting them as a source of separation.
We propose to install in a public space in, at, or near the North End, a bronze sculpture of Sacco and Vanzetti to memorialize our Italian heritage and to promote equal treatment before the law.
For anyone wanting to participate, email me: domcapossela@hotmail.com
I’ll send you the zoom link to our Friday meeting.
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4.0 Chuckles and Thoughts
“Some national parks have long waiting lists for camping reservations.
When you have to wait a year to sleep next to a tree, something is wrong.”
~George Carlin
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5.0 Mail and other Conversation
We love getting mail, email, or texts.
Send comments to domcapossela@hotmail.com
or text to 617.852.7192
Lots of people are getting vaccinated.
Some have had symptoms.
Some not.
But all are relieved to be vaccinated.
Blog meister responds: Welcome to the fully-vaccinated club. We’re a fast-growing community.
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6.0 Dinner/Food/Recipes
Hash for dinner.
It was good, not brilliant.
I did use up pieces of leftover steak and roast pork.
Had a drink with it: a martini, no vermouth.
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11.0 Thumbnail
Pecorino Romano (Italian pronunciation: is a hard, salty Italian cheese, often used for grating, made with sheep's milk.
The name "pecorino" simply means "sheep" or "of sheep" in Italian; the name of the cheese, although protected, is a simple description rather than a brand: "[cheese] pecorino romano" is simply "sheep's [cheese] of Rome".
Even though this variety of cheese originated in Lazio,as the name also indicates, most of its actual production has moved to the island of Sardinia.
"Pecorino romano" is an Italian product with name recognized and protected by the laws of the European Community.
Pecorino Romano was a staple in the diet for the legionaries of ancient Rome. Today, it is still made according to the original recipe and is one of Italy's oldest cheeses.
On the first of May, Roman families traditionally eat pecorino with fresh fava beans during a daily excursion in the Roman Campaign. It is mostly used in Central and Southern Italy.
The sharpness of the cheese depends on the period of maturation, which varies from five months for a table cheese to eight months or longer for a grating cheese. Most pecorino cheeses are classified as grana and are granular, hard and sharply flavored.
Pecorino Romano is often used on pasta dishes, like the better-known Parmigiano Reggiano. Its distinctive aromatic and pleasantly sharp, very salty flavor led to it being preferred for some Italian pasta dishes with highly flavored sauces, especially those of Roman origin, such as the three most popular dishes.
Sugo all'amatriciana
is a traditional Italian pasta sauce based on guanciale (cured pork cheek), pecorino cheese from Amatrice, tomato, and, in some variations, onion. Originating from the town of Amatrice (in the mountainous Province of Rieti of Lazio region), the Amatriciana is one of the best known pasta sauces in present-day Roman and Italian cuisine. The Italian government has named it a traditional agro-alimentary product of Lazio.
A serving of bucatini all'amatriciana, a pasta recipe from Latium.
Popo le Chien - Own work
CC0
File: Bucatini allamatriciana.jpg
Created: 29 April 2018
Location: 46° 31′ 1.51″ N, 6° 37′ 59.64″ E
Spaghetti alla carbonara
Carbonara is an Italian pasta dish from Rome made with egg, hard cheese, cured pork, and black pepper. The dish arrived at its modern form, with its current name, in the middle of the 20th century
The cheese is usually Pecorino Romano, Parmigiano-Reggiano, or a combination of the two.
Spaghetti is the most common pasta, but fettuccine, rigatoni, linguine, or bucatini are also used.
Normally guanciale or pancetta are used for the meat component, but lardons of smoked bacon are a common substitute outside Italy.
Plato de espaguetis con la salsa carbonara tradicional,
hecha a base de huevo, guanciale de cerdo y queso pecorino romano.
Javier Somoza
Spaghetti cacio e pepe
Cacio e pepe is a pasta dish from modern Roman cuisine.
Cacio e pepe means "cheese and pepper" in several central Italian dialects.
As the name suggests, the ingredients of the dish are: black pepper, grated Pecorino Romano cheese, and spaghetti, or traditionally tonnarelli.
All the ingredients keep well for a long time, which made the dish practical for shepherds without fixed abode.
Rough-surfaced pasta is recommended, to make the sauce adhere well.
The pasta is prepared in boiling salted water as usual; it is then poured into the grated pecorino mixed with black pepper, with a little of the hot, starchy, cooking water. The heat melts the cheese, and the starches in the water help bind the pepper and cheese to the pasta.
While not traditional to cacio e pepe, seafood or bacon may be added, and other shapes of pasta such as rigatoni, always made with a rough surface, may be used.
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It’s Wednesday, February 24, 2021
Welcome to the 1033rd consecutive post to the blog,
existentialautotrip.com
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1.0 Lead Picture
Arturo Di Modica, Charging Bull, c. 1990
Artislife1406 - Own work
Arturo Di Modica & Charging Bull (c.1990)
an Italian-born, American sculptor,
widely known for his Charging Bull sculpture
which he dropped outside of the New York Stock Exchange on December 15, 1989,
as his gift to the United States.
My point was to show people that if you want to do something in a moment things are very bad, you can do it. You can do it by yourself. My point was that you must be strong.
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2.0 Commentary
As the winter winds down we can look ahead with confidence.
Many economists are predicting dramatic upticks in the economy.
And we can use dramatic upticks.
We are too far down to be cautious.
It is now so certain that we have turned the tide of the covid-19 attack that
we are arguing about the end date and what victory will look like.
Sweet.
Donald Trump’s fringe-right has launched an all-out attack
on conservative Republicans.
If conservatives don’t respond with a ferocious and brave defense
they will lose this battle.
It will take ten years and a great many Republican election losses for conservatives to recover.
We need a chorus of red badges of courage to stand up and
loudly resist the destructive, scorched-earth policies of Donald Trump that include
the recent party losses of the White House and the Senate,
losses that can be traced directly to Trump’s bizarre behavior,
the grave dangers to democracy the cult of the individual poses,
and the continuing threat to democracy posed by automatons directed by a man with no values but self-aggrandizement and self-glorification,
a man for whom truth is plastic to be twisted and molded to suit.
Please, God, give our Republican brothers the strength and courage to defeat this band of crazies.
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3.1 Sacco and Vanzetti
We spent much of the day agonizing over the mission statement and settled on this:
Boston’s historic North End is a neighborhood synonymous with Italian immigration and imbued with Italian-American culture. Sacco and Vanzetti, two such immigrants, suffered one of the most publicized, egregiously unjust criminal trials in American history. Fittingly, after their execution, the bodies of Sacco and Vanzetti were laid out in the North End.
We are the committee for a Memorial to Sacco and Vanzetti, Inc. remembering these men in the spirit of reconciliation, rather than casting them as a source of separation.
We propose to install in a public space in, at, or near the North End, a bronze sculpture of Sacco and Vanzetti to memorialize our Italian heritage and to promote equal treatment before the law.
We also did work on the bronze art for the memorial.
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4.0 Chuckles and Thoughts
You show me a lazy punk
who’s lying in bed all day,
watching TV,
only occasionally getting up to pee, and
I’ll show you a guy who’s not causing any trouble.
~George Carlin
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5.0 Mail and other Conversation
We love getting mail, email, or texts.
Send comments to domcapossela@hotmail.com
or text to 617.852.7192
The emails flew around the Board of Directors but I won’t reprint any here.
Bear in mind we do not vote.
Voting too aggressive.
We belabor issues until fatigue and blurriness make any complete sentence sound like a Shakespearean sonnet.
Blog meister responds: It sounds very good to me!
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6.0 Dinner/Food/Recipes
Sunday evening I enjoyed a slow-roasted double-thick, bone-in pork chop.
As always, it was delicious.
I finished off a handful of spinach-with a teaspoon of garlic-oil.
And I drank much of the remains of a Uruguay Cabernet Sauvignon from the Pisano vineyards.
The wine was under $20.00 and I found it very attractive.
Exhibiting intense fruit and ripe tannins, this wine is brilliant red in color with a round, exquisite nose of dark fruits, vanilla and green pepper aromas.
The feel of the wine is smooth, generous, with soft tannins and a structured ending.
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11.0 Thumbnail
Arturo Di Modica (January 26, 1941 – February 19, 2021) was an Italian-born, American sculptor, widely known for his Charging Bull sculpture which he dropped outside of the New York Stock Exchange on December 15, 1989, as his gift to the United States.
Di Modica was born in Vittoria, Sicily to Angela and Giuseppe Di Modica shortly before Allied forces invaded during World War II. His father owned a grocery store and his mother was a homemaker. He was inspired by the ancient Greek and Roman artifacts of his childhood home. When his father did not want him to become an artist, he ran away at age 18, taking a steam train to Florence to pursue a career in sculpting.
Upon arrival in Florence, Di Modica took menial jobs to survive, he also studied at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze. Unable to afford to use the local foundries he built his own forging and metalworking tools. He had his first major show at Villa Medici in 1968, primarily featuring rough abstract bronze castings.
By the late 1960s, Di Modica began working with marble in the Italian Carrara studios which is where he met English sculptor Henry Moore. Moore would subsequently nickname him 'the young Michelangelo'. Moore had a strong influence on Di Modica, who subsequently developed a new style. By 1970, Di Modica had grown frustrated with the limitations of Florence for his career and moved to New York City.
On arrival in New York in 1970, penniless, Di Modica set up his first studio on Grand Street in Soho. This was the time that the neighborhood was famous for its Bohemian arts. Here, he became known for leaving large scale marble works on the street outside his studio. It was also here that Di Modica discovered a young graffiti artist, Jean-Michel Basquiat (also known as SAMO), spray-painting his studio door. The two would later both move onto Crosby Street also in Soho in the early 1980s, as Basquiat experienced his rise to fame.
In 1977, Di Modica held a major exhibition at Battery Park, telephoning to invite art critic Hilton Kramer to the show. Uninterested, Kramer hung up on Di Modica — which inspired Di Modica to illegally drop off eight monumental abstract marble sculptures at Rockefeller Center, blocking 5th Avenue and drawing the attention of police. Ultimately, Mayor Abe Beame arrived, interested to meet the artist. After receiving a $25 fine, Di Modica received permission to temporarily leave the sculptures on exhibit. This stunt made the front page of the New York Post the next day and became a valuable learning experience for the artist.
Charging Bull (1987–1989)
On October 19, 1987, Black Monday hit U.S. financial markets and the country entered a very difficult period.
Di Modica recounted that he felt indebted to the United States of America for welcoming him and enabling his success.
Wanting to give something back, he conceived the Charging Bull sculpture.
Di Modica spent the next two years creating the 16-foot bronze, financing the $350,000 cost, himself.
The sculpture was created in his Crosby Street studio and then cast using a local foundry.
Once complete, Di Modica spent the next few nights watching the police patrols on Wall Street trying to find a window of opportunity. After establishing exactly where he wanted to place the bull, outside the New York Stock Exchange Building, he went home to rest. On December 15, Di Modica returned with a group of friends and Charging Bull on the back of a truck. However upon his arrival, during the day time a 40-foot Christmas tree had been installed exactly where he wanted to place the sculpture. With only four minutes between the police patrols, he announced "drop the bull under the tree – it's my gift."
Di Modica stayed by the bull to greet the morning commuters as they came to discover the sculpture. However, while he was away for lunch, the New York Stock Exchange arranged for the sculpture to be collected by a local firm. The late night event went on to make news all around the world, including the front page of the New York Post.
Due to the public demand for the bull's return, Parks Commissioner Henry Stern arranged for the sculpture's installation at Bowling Green on December 20, where it can be found to this day.
Di Modica's original concept was to inspire each person who came into contact with the sculpture to carry on fighting with "strength and determination" through the hard times for the future. Di Modica later was quoted while in conversation with the art scribe Anthony Haden-Guest:
My point was to show people that if you want to do something in a moment things are very bad, you can do it. You can do it by yourself. My point was that you must be strong.
Di Modica received the Ellis Island Medal of Honor in 1999. He was represented by art dealer Jacob Harmer.
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It’s Tuesday, February 23, 2021
Welcome to the 1032nd consecutive post to the blog,
existentialautotrip.com
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1.0 Lead Picture
Claudette Colvin
Colvin in 1954
Born September 5, 1939 (age 81)
Montgomery, Alabama, U.S.
Occupation Civil rights activist, nurse aide
Years active 1969–2004 (as nurse aide)
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2.0 Commentary
Good news.
Massachusetts is down to a 2.02% positivity rate.
One more drop and we’ll be in the 1s.
That’s sweet now with better thins to come.
For me, after my first shot I got low-grade headaches for seven days running.
Two aspirin were effective.
After my 2nd shot, last Thursday, those headaches returned.
I anticipate the headaches continuing until Wednesday.
If they go beyond, I will monitor them more closely.
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3.1 Sacco and Vanzetti
Today we discussed the wording of the invitation to join in on Friday’s All-In Zoom Meeting @ 8.00am.
The invites will go out on Tuesday.
Here’s what it looks like:
Please mark your calendar.
This Friday @ 8.00am.
Tune in to our Zoom meeting
for an update on the progress we’ve made on our mission statement.
MISSION STATEMENT
Boston’s historic North End is a neighborhood synonymous with Italian immigration and steeply imbued with Italian-American culture. Sacco and Vanzetti, two such immigrants, suffered one of the most publicized, egregiously unjust criminal trials in American history. Fittingly, after their execution, their bodies were laid out in the Langone North End Funeral Home on Hanover Street in the North End.
We are the committee for a Memorial to Sacco and Vanzetti, Inc.
We propose to install in a public space in, at or near the North End, a bronze memorial celebrating both the America’s system of justice which learns from its mistakes; and Italian immigration which, despite outrageous prejudice, emerged from its struggles to assimilate into mainstream America without anger or rancor; without calls for retribution or restitution.
This memorial is intended to bring all segments of American society closer together.
If you would like to help on this effort, tune in and learn the positions available for you to serve.
Any questions? email
domcapossela@hotmail.com
Thanks
the committee for a Memorial to Sacco and Vanzetti, Inc.
a non-profit Massachusetts corporation
BTW: anyone reading this is invited to join.
I’ll share the link when I get it on tuesday.
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4.0 Chuckles and Thoughts
Trying to be happy by accumulating possessions is like
trying to satisfy hunger by taping sandwiches all over your body.
~George Carlin
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5.0 Mail and other Conversation
We love getting mail, email, or texts.
Send comments to domcapossela@hotmail.com
or text to 617.852.7192
This week’s most significant email for the Sacco and Vanzetti effort reads like so:
Engineering Services - 3D Scanning Single day on Location - Capture customer components utilizing industrial structured light or Red/Blue Laser in high resolution. Service includes all treatment materials, markers, cleaning and post processing of the scanned model and production of the final .STL file. 1 1,750.00 1,750.00 Travel Travel Expense - 2.5hr 127.9 mi
Blog meister responds: We’re investigating creating a mold from an existing sculpture without endangering the original sculpture. I hope this is the way we go. I’d love to watch this happen.
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6.0 Dinner/Food/Recipes
After a poor meal on Friday night I fell back to an oft repeated slow-roast bone-in rib eye steak.
On Saturday dinner was delicious.
W Foods didn’t have dry-aged beef, they do about 25% of the time, so I settled.
The steak was delicious anyway.
Served it with spinach with a teaspoon of olive oil and garlic.
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11.0 Thumbnail
Claudette Colvin (born Claudette Austin, September 5, 1939) is a pioneer of the 1950s civil rights movement and retired nurse aide.
On March 2, 1955, she was arrested at the age of 15 in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a crowded, segregated bus.
This occurred nine months before the more widely known incident in which Rosa Parks, secretary of the local chapter of the NAACP, helped spark the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott.
Colvin was one of five plaintiffs in the first federal court case filed by civil rights attorney Fred Gray on February 1, 1956, as Browder v. Gayle, to challenge bus segregation in the city.
In a United States district court, she testified before the three-judge panel that heard the case.
On June 13, 1956, the judges determined that the state and local laws requiring bus segregation in Alabama were unconstitutional.
The case went to the United States Supreme Court on appeal by the state, and it upheld the district court's ruling on November 13, 1956.
One month later, the Supreme Court affirmed the order to Montgomery and the state of Alabama to end bus segregation.
The Montgomery bus boycott was then called off.
For many years, Montgomery's black leaders did not publicize Colvin's pioneering effort.
She was an unmarried teenager at the time, and was reportedly impregnated by a married man.
Colvin has said, "Young people think Rosa Parks just sat down on a bus and ended segregation, but that wasn't the case at all."
It is widely accepted that Colvin was not accredited by the civil rights campaigners at the time due to her pregnancy shortly after the incident, with even Rosa Parks saying "If the white press got ahold of that information, they would have [had] a field day.
They'd call her a bad girl, and her case wouldn't have a chance."
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It’s Monday, February 22, 2021
Welcome to the 1031st consecutive post to the blog,
existentialautotrip.com
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1.0 Lead Picture
Ansel Adams
A photo of a bearded Ansel Adams with a camera on a tripod and a light meter in his hand. Adams is wearing a dark jacket and a white shirt, and the open shirt collar is spread over the lapel of his jacket. He is holding a cable release for the camera, and there is a rocky hillside behind him. The photo was taken by J. Malcolm Greany and first appeared in the 1950 Yosemite Field School Yearbook.
J. Malcolm Greany - Unknown source
Photographic portrait of nature photographer Ansel Adams — which first appeared in the 1950 Yosemite Field School yearbook. The camera is probably a Zeiss Ikon Universal Juwel.
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2.0 Commentary
One of the changes that the vaccination is making in my life is the onset of dinner parties.
Not full houses.
Discreet events.
This week, I am hosting a guest on Wednesday and a guest on Thursday.
It’s been a while.
On Tuesday, funeral services will be held in Rhode Island for a co-worker from days past.
I’m sure they will follow health standards.
I will travel there with a sweet friend and participate.
Dinner out in Providence is likely.
Being vaccinated, I’m comfortable with the activities.
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3.1 Sacco and Vanzetti
After working on our Mission Statement, we produced a sheet of alternative Endorsements that we will solicit from pertinent groups.
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4.0 Chuckles and Thoughts
We have multiplied our possessions but reduced our values.
We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often.
We’ve learned how to make a living but not a life.
We’ve added years to life, not life to years.”
~George Carlin
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5.0 Mail and other Conversation
We love getting mail, email, or texts.
Send comments to domcapossela@hotmail.com
or text to 617.852.7192
Lots of mail from people sharing their reactions to the second shot, like this one:
Glad you took well to the vaccine. …had a reaction after the second one chills, fever, blah etc.
Or the one whose reaction was a terrible rash on his non-needled arm that resulted in severely wrinkled skin that only several days later is beginning to abate.
Blog meister responds: Pretty amazing, the variation in reactions to the second shot. Mine was the Pfizer.
Another letter says that Moderna vaccine cause more numerous reactions.
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6.0 Dinner/Food/Recipes
Friday night’s dinner was the poorest I’ve had in a long time.
The leftovers from Kowloon just didn’t work.
I really don’t want to remember it.
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11.0 Thumbnail
Ansel Easton Adams (February 20, 1902 – April 22, 1984) was an American landscape photographer and environmentalist known for his black-and-white images of the American West.
He helped found Group f/64, an association of photographers advocating "pure" photography which favored sharp focus and the use of the full tonal range of a photograph.
He and Fred Archer developed an exacting system of image-making called the Zone System, a method of achieving a desired final print through a deeply technical understanding of how tonal range is recorded and developed in exposure, negative development, and printing.
The resulting clarity and depth of such images characterized his photography.
Adams was a life-long advocate for environmental conservation, and his photographic practice was deeply entwined with this advocacy.
At age 12, he was given his first camera during his first visit to Yosemite National Park.
He developed his early photographic work as a member of the Sierra Club.
He was later contracted with the United States Department of the Interior to make photographs of national parks.
For his work and his persistent advocacy, which helped expand the National Park system, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1980.
Adams was a key advisor in establishing the photography department at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, an important landmark in securing photography's institutional legitimacy.
He helped to stage that department's first photography exhibition, helped found the photography magazine Aperture, and co-founded the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona.
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It’s Sunday, February 21, 2021
Welcome to the 1030th consecutive post to the blog,
existentialautotrip.com
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1.0 Lead Picture
Anarchist trial defendants
Bartolomeo Vanzetti (left) and Nicola Sacco (right)
Ben Shahn
Unknown author - Boston Public Library
Dedham, Massachusetts Superior Court, 1923.
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2.0 Commentary
With a sense of personal relief I report that after receiving my second shot, I showed no symptoms other than a low-grade headache easily cured with two aspirin.
With my first shot, I also showed no symptoms and also got a low-grade headache.
That headache reappeared for the first seven days after my shot, each time fading after I took two aspirin.
I can handle that.
Friday morning, after our Zoom Board of Directors’ meeting, I met with a possible collaborator for my book, Conflicted. I think we’re a great match and am hoping he comes aboard.
At our Sacco and Vanzetti Board of Directors’ meeting we developed this:
MISSION STATEMENT
Boston’s historic North End is a neighborhood synonymous with Italian immigration and steeply imbued with Italian-American culture. Sacco and Vanzetti, two such immigrants, suffered one of the most publicized, egregiously unjust criminal trials in American history. Fittingly, after their execution, the bodies of Sacco and Vanzetti were laid out in the North End.
We are the committee for a Memorial to Sacco and Vanzetti, Inc.
We propose to install in a public space in, at, or near the North End, a bronze memorial celebrating both America’s system of justice which learns from our mistakes, and Italian immigration which, despite outrageous prejudice, emerged from its struggle to assimilate into mainstream America without anger or rancor; without calls for retribution or restitution.
This memorial is intended to bring the segments of our society closer together.
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3.1 Sacco and Vanzetti
Had a Zoom board meeting today at 8.00am.
We got a lot done and rehearsed next week’s All-in meeting.
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4.0 Chuckles/Thoughts
Some people see things that are and ask, Why?
Some people dream of things that never were and ask, Why not?
Some people have to go to work and don't have time for all that.
~George Carlin
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5.0 Mail
We love getting mail.
Send comments to domcapossela@hotmail.com
Got a couple of emails re: covid vaccination symptoms.
One got chills and sweats.
The other symptom free.
Blog Meister responds: So many variables it’s difficult to figure who and why.
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6.0 Dinner/Food/Recipes
On Thursday, after I got my shot, cousin Lauren and I went to Kowloon’s not thinking to call about changes.
We had a great time despite not being able to get any sushi, available after 2pm, nor any curry, available after 3pm, nor any lobsters at all.
We didn’t let that bother ous.
We ordered from the lunch menu instead and saved a fortune.
The food was good, so were my two martinis.
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11.0 Thumbnails
Nicola Sacco (April 22, 1891 – August 23, 1927) and Bartolomeo Vanzetti ( June 11, 1888 – August 23, 1927) were Italian immigrant anarchists who were controversially convicted of murdering a guard and a paymaster during the April 15, 1920, armed robbery of the Slater and Morrill Shoe Company in Braintree, Massachusetts, United States. Seven years later, they were electrocuted in the electric chair at Charlestown State Prison.
After a few hours' deliberation on July 14, 1921, the jury convicted Sacco and Vanzetti of first-degree murder and they were sentenced to death by the trial judge. Anti-Italianism, anti-immigrant, and anti-Anarchist bias were suspected as having heavily influenced the verdict. A series of appeals followed, funded largely by the private Sacco and Vanzetti Defense Committee. The appeals were based on recanted testimony, conflicting ballistics evidence, a prejudicial pretrial statement by the jury foreman, and a confession by an alleged participant in the robbery. All appeals were denied by trial judge Webster Thayer and also later denied by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. By 1926, the case had drawn worldwide attention. As details of the trial and the men's suspected innocence became known, Sacco and Vanzetti became the center of one of the largest causes célèbres in modern history. In 1927, protests on their behalf were held in every major city in North America and Europe, as well as in Tokyo, Sydney, Melbourne, São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, Dubai, Montevideo, Johannesburg, and Auckland.
Celebrated writers, artists, and academics pleaded for their pardon or for a new trial. Harvard law professor and future Supreme Court justice Felix Frankfurter argued for their innocence in a widely read Atlantic Monthly article that was later published in book form. The two were scheduled to die in April 1927, accelerating the outcry. Responding to a massive influx of telegrams urging their pardon, Massachusetts governor Alvan T. Fuller appointed a three-man commission to investigate the case. After weeks of secret deliberation that included interviews with the judge, lawyers, and several witnesses, the commission upheld the verdict. Sacco and Vanzetti were executed in the electric chair just after midnight on August 23, 1927.[3] Subsequent riots destroyed property in Paris, London, and other cities.
Investigations in the aftermath of the executions continued throughout the 1930s and 1940s. The publication of the men's letters, containing eloquent professions of innocence, intensified belief in their wrongful execution. Additional ballistics tests and incriminating statements by the men's acquaintances have clouded the case. On August 23, 1977—the 50th anniversary of the executions—Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis issued a proclamation that Sacco and Vanzetti had been unfairly tried and convicted and that "any disgrace should be forever removed from their names". Later analyses have also added doubt to their culpability in the crimes for which they were convicted.
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