Tinfoil + Raccoon

Historic Steamboat Photos

Anita Doering, Manager of Archives at La Crosse Public, just sent a link to the now-live collection of steamboat pictures that marks the launch of the UW La Crosse Historic Steamboat Photographs collection. It's part of the University of Wisconsin Digital Collections Center. Anita says that the project was launched with about 500 photos, but that there are a few more to go. Pretty nifty. More about the project.

The UW-La Crosse Historic Steamboat Photograph collection consists of over 40,000 black and white photographic images of steamboats on the inland waterways of the United States, primarily the Mississippi, Ohio and Missouri rivers and their tributaries. The photos depict steamboats in every phase of their life span — from construction to destruction — and every aspect of their daily operations from the 1850s to the present.

No terrorists...just Methodists

Found this email when I got in to work this morning and nearly had coffee come out my nose:

There's a funeral happening across the street at the Methodist Church at 11:00 am.  Afterwards, around 11:40 - 11:45, there will be a three gun military salute in the church parking lot.  So, if you hear shooting, please know that it is not a terrorist attack, just some Methodists.

It's okay for me to laugh at this.  I was a devout Methodist until 8th or 9th grade when me and churchiness parted ways. Mostly what I remember were lots of highly perfumed and powdered church matrons with warbly voices. Oh, and the year we had a Harper Valley PTA poster-mom as a Sunday School teacher. She had early-70s era Dolly Parton hair, was a smoker AND a divorcee, and wore miniskirts. Scandalous!

I also got two memorable pen pals out of the Methodist youth publication that was distributed to us: a college student rock critic who wowed me with her brushes with fame (Warren Zevon, Kim Fowley...) and fabulous letters. She was the first real writer I ever connected with.  She blew off a spot in a master's program for English and moved to NYC to become a writer for the soap opera Ryan's Hope.  The one year she wrote for them, the team won an Emmy.  I believe she is now in Idaho, happily writing Buffy fanfic and copy for Coldwater Creek. 

The other was a guy in a juvenile detention facility in Indiana who my mom was none too happy about. Even if it was church-related.

 

Flaming Elmo: Why I Unsubscribed to Boing Boing

Boing Boing: A Directory of Wonderful Things is like digital meth.  There are numerous postings every day, most of which make go, "Oh my gawd!  You have to see this!"  I hadn't been there in months and had almost forgotten about it, but, dang that Emily at Posey Galore, she posted a Google video of Tickle Me Elmo going up in flames.  Disturbing, yet compelling. 

Here's a direct link to the Boing Boing post, Immolate Me Elmo.

Poetlawyer.com

I have a few lawyer friends. One is a runner. One is blind. Two are musicians. (One is blind and a musician).  But my favorite "lawyer/_______ " combination is the Poet/Lawyer, exemplified by my friend Carl Reisman who sent me a link to his new online shingle, poetlawyer.com today.  I especially like that "poet" comes first.  Carl is also listed on the website "Strangers to Us All," a clearinghouse of all things poetlawyerly. From the website:

Perhaps we misunderstand our poets, in the way we do lawyers, because we know so little of their practices, their language, and their contribution to a literate society.

And, from Carl:

After the Hurricane

A levee gives.
It does not apologize.
New Orleans dissolves
like sugar in tea.          

For this disaster, God omits rainbows.

The Army Corps scouts for a giant sandbag,
an even bigger claw,
and a helicopter to drop it in place.
But the helicopters are in the lower
Ninth Ward pulling
people from roofs.
The water keeps rising
as officials look for answers
cribbed on a drowned
man's hand.

The truth is
that there's little
we can manage
and less we can grasp.

KABOOM! It's Elvis Explosion 2006!!

Man, oh, man do I wish I had first-hand Elvis Explosion stories or pix to share.  What is Elvis Explosion, you ask?  It's an extravaganza of Elvisism in the extreme, a competition of more than 30 Elvis impersonators--right here in La Crosse.  There are approximately 12 Elvis Explosions every year, produced by Elvis impersonator Ronnie Craig, who also serves as the emcee for the shows.  La Crosse, WI vies with Lake George, NY for highest attendance.

I was so tickled to hear that my town hosted such a gloriously ridiculous event (stay tuned for Oktoberfest), and hoped to have had numerous Encounters of the Elvis Kind, but no luck so far.  An official encounter is pretty expensive, with tickets going for $20-$40.  Still, I was hoping to see roving Elvi this weekend and have had my camera with me at all times. I asked at the Co-op this morning if they'd seen any contestants, but the gal at the counter said no, explaining that they didn't typically carry fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches.

As fun as it would be, I still dream of covering the Abe Explosion some year.  Okay, it's not really called the Abe Explosion, but there is an annual convention of Abraham Lincoln impersonators--only they call themselves "presenters." 

I wonder which group of presenters has more groupies?

Penny Postcards from Orleans Parish

Reader MK sent me this sweet link to images of penny postcards of New Orleans, knowing that I'll be making my way to ALA Annual there in less than two weeks.  Perennial conference roomie KR and I will be staying at the Monteleone, a grand old place suffused with the drunken, brilliant essences of Hemingway, Faulkner and Williams. Perhaps I will absorb some of that energy, but it'll likely be whatever I soak up in the Carousel Bar.  I also understand that the Monteleone management really stepped up to help out employees during and after the hurricane.

I stayed at the Monteleone the last time I was in New Orleans, and unfortunately, my overarching memory is of arriving around 9 pm with one of the worst migraines of my life, and being placed in a room that had just been sprinked with CarpetFresh.  Plus, I had a special room located street-level on Bourbon Street, close to all the action.  I hadn't packed any medicine and just rode it out for about three hours, with pillows over my head, too sick to request another room or go get Dramamine.  Thankfully, I was able to order room service around midnight, got some decent sleep, was ready to roll the next day for the beginning of an especially awesome visit. New Orleanian Andrei C, who will not be around to buy me a drink, reports that "the town feels good." 

She's gone to pieces

  She's gone to pieces 
  Originally uploaded by rochelle, et. al..

I was driving Claudia and her friend, Anya, to school, when I saw mannequin parts on the curb side. That made the girls giggle, but they really thought it was funny when I stopped the car in the middle of the street and started throwing the body parts in the back of the car.

Kelly is Cool! Just Like Reference!

Charlotte-Mecklenberg Public Library's newest Young Adult Librarian, Kelly Czarnecki, does some book truck surfing to demostrate for Salem Press that Reference is, indeed, Cool!

New on April 1: Google Romance!

"Post multiple profiles with a bulk upload file you sleaze."

Who knows, though?  Google posted their Gmail announcement on April 1, 2004, and I sure got fooled.

Mother Blogga

I bow down at the feet of Brian for making me laugh and snort in a most unprofessional manner this morning.  Check out his Blogga Song (requires Flash).  Chances are you've been bloggaed, too!