Unca Darrell

MAY 2 / Double take

CHECK OUT www.take2videos.org for an interesting Good Work worth a look-see. Talented writer and photographer Karin Muller shoots high-definition video in a world hotspot -- recently Darfur and Gaza -- then turns the raw footage over to participating high schools and colleges. Students are then challenged to cut the tape into useful news or documentary reports. If you like what you see, consider donating.  

MARCH 24 / Nice personal site by friends

 

 

THE DEMOCRATIZATION of publishing through blogs has inspired many to report on their lives. Here's Viajando05, a personal blog by friends Kathy and David Altaras. It recounts their travels, photography, reading, and other activities. 

MARCH 13 / Lovely movie

  GOLDEN DOOR is a slow-paced, elegaic account of a poor Sicilian family's migration to America in the early 1900s. Worth seeing for the story, the characters, and the scenes of rural Sicily, steerage, and Ellis Island. 

It's a reminder of the millions of similar deeply human stories that have gone into (and are still going into) the making of America.

SEPTEMBER 30 / Dancing at the Cajun museum

   

 

THE PRAIRIE Cajun Cultural Center in Eunice, Louisiana, not only exhibits Cajun stuff, but it also shows off Cajun life. On this Saturday afternoon, three musicians provided the music. The audience provided les danseurs.

The performers: Bubba Frey on fiddle, Albert Rozas on accordian, and Claudia Wood (a National Park Ranger) on guitar. Click below for more shots of the event.

After the show, Mr. Frey gave a lecture on how to make hog's head cheese. (Don't ask.)

SEPTEMBER 25 / Waltzing back to Eunice

It's been a while since we last traveled together, so let's return to Savoy Music Center on State 190 just east of Eunice, Louisiana.

ANOTHER view of the famous Saturday morning cajun jam at Savoy's.

To see earlier posts about Savoy's (including a group shot in which this multi-talented man is playing an accordian), go here, here, and here.

SEPTEMBER 12 / Stay moored

During the hurricane, think peaceful thoughts.

This peaceful image fromes from Roundstone Harbor, Ireland, June 2005.

AUGUST 20 / Saturday morning jam

HERE'S WHAT the Saturday morning Cajun music jam at Savoy Music Center looks like.

 

AUGUST 15 / Marc Savoy

Cajun musician, accordian-builder, and entrepreneur Marc Savoy welcomes visitors to his Saturday morning jam sessions

WHILE LOCAL fiddlers, accordionists, guitarists, vocalists, and triangle players laissons les bontemps rouler against a side wall each Saturday morning, Marc Savoy ("American by birth; Cajun by the grace of God") tends to business at the counter of Savoy Music Center on Louisiana 190 just east of Euncie. Click "Jam Sessions" at this Web site for details.

Mr. Savoy will patiently answer all questions. To save time, however, you can read his self-conducted interview under "Writings" on the Savoy Web site.

Want some real old-time Cajun music? Just ask. He has CDs aplenty. Also more modern stuff. You'll definitely want to pick up a couple of his albums.

If your sales resistance is too low, you may even leave with a handmade Cajun accordian. Click "Accordians" on the Web site.

By the way, if you bring your triangle to join the jam, please respect the house rule: one triangle player at a time. Also, no Stratocasters or other instruments with electrical plugs.

AUGUST 13 / The eloquence of open contempt

ALL YOU NEED to know about trusting Russia:

GORI, Georgia -- Just hours after Russia agreed to a French-brokered cease-fire, Russian troops followed by irregular Ossetian militias pushed deep into Georgia, seizing the strategic city of Gori and deploying and deploying armored vehicles on the nation's main highway that leads to the capital city of Tbilisi.

Yaroslav Trofimov, "Russian Troops Push Deeper Into Georgia," The Wall Street Journal, August 13, 2008, 10:58 a.m. EDT

Meanwhile one of our major political parties is set to nominate for president an young man with no accomplishments other than two autobiographies and no skills other than writing books, delivering written speeches, and campaigning for public office, who thinks honeyed words might lure the bear from the throat of its enemies.

And that same party embraces an energy policy that, by depriving America of potential reserves of domestic oil, would strengthen the thugs in Moscow who will use oil as a weapon against the West.

AUGUST 13 / Tbilisi, Georgia

IN AUGUST 1995, I spent a couple of weeks in Tbilisi, Georgia, on a bidness project. These images of the city are bad scans from one roll of 15 distressed medium-format negatives, but they give the flavor of the place.