Betsy Devine: Funny ha-ha and/or funny peculiar

…because I’m off to a few days of no web access.

I’ll miss you, all my internet companions! Keep on blogging and Twittering and Wikipedianizing on my behalf until I get back.

xxxx to all of you guys,
Betsy

"Wait–I see a square foot of empty space in the corner!"

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

…who are all these folks in my living room?

These two questions are strangely connected because our living room is getting each moment more crowded by crew members from the PBS TV show Closer to Truth, visible online via The Research Channel.

Having now Flickred some photos of them, I’m headed back downstairs to enjoy all the chaos, including free brownies!

Bad news about the Smithsonian’s path under now-ex-director Lawrence Small has been leaking out for years–as early as 2001, scientists started raising red flags about his leadership. In 2005, Congressional audit deplored the “underfinancing” of museum upkeep. In 2006, a sweet but secret 30-year pact signed with Showtime. But the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents, which doesn’t seem to read the New York Times, had no clue that their oversight of Lawrence Small should include some actual–what’s that thing called again?–oversight.

Which brings us to this morning’s NY Times story and the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents “taking responsibility” for failing to keep on eye on Lawrence Small. The Board’s response is such a gem of PR-speak it bears reprinting:

“It’s never easy to do this kind of self examination, and we wish we’d been doing it on an ongoing basis.”

Step one: We are already suffering, please don’t be mean to us.

“But it is what it is,” she added. “Certainly the importance of assuring the public trust — and the Congressional trust — is why we moved at such a pace. We met every week since Larry’s resignation to try to make sure we brought forward this set of recommendations so that we can turn the page.”

Step two: Talk about what we did right–even if what we did right was mainly cooperating when forced to take a look at what we did wrong. Step three: Describe future goals with metaphors that imply your forgetting our misdeeds is a necessary prelude to making things better.

Ms. Stonesifer said the governance committee’s report was aimed at ensuring accountability. “There is a need for ethics and transparency in everything we do,” she said.

Step four: Talk about “accountability” as something that will happen in the future and to people other than the current wrongdoers. Step five: Give lip-service to ethics and transparency and any other virtues that sound good.

“Yes, we had a problem,” she added. “The Regents accept responsibility, and we’re ready to move forward.”

They accept responsibility! Not guilty, your Honor! Let’s give that brave, honest, already-suffering Smithsonian Board of Regents a hearty handclasp of thanks and “move forward” and “turn a page.”

Time for all us taxpayers to stop being mean to these so-sorry millionaires and reach deep into our pockets for some tax money to start repairing seven years worth of misgovernance of the Smithsonian, which is or was and hopefully will be again a proud national treasure.

Rob at West Side Lounge, Cambridge, MA

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

Because Suw’s blog is “Chocolate and Vodka“, I wanted to introduce her to Cambridge’s reputedly best bartender–Rob of the West Side Lounge, also home to Cambridge’s best chef.

(In fact Rob is most famous for his mojitos, including (his own recipe) Mexican mojito, but that’s a different story.)

Consider this blogpost just a bit of local knowledge offered up to Google and you concerning a very good place to eat and drink in Cambridge, MA–well, at least a place I like a lot, and so now does Suw!

Suw Charman in photo destined for many Flickr notes

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

Suw is in Cambridge, bringing joy and also swag from ORG.

Geeks love free stickers and stuff aka swag. This photo contains many examples, including a Tucows cow we got from Joey DeVilla, Mr. AccordionGuy.

In honor of Fathers’ Day…

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

…here’s my dad, Murray Devine, who was far too rarely the subject of photos. Most often, he was the one holding a camera, trying to get all the people and places and things he loved to hold still so that he could preserve us forever.

This early Polaroid shot was so overexposed that my dad’s face is almost eclipsed by a pale, pale blur.

So thank you to Photoshop for bring my dad’s face back to me, many years later. I still miss him so much.


Oh–and here’s a shout-out to so many other dads I love and admire–Frank A and Frank J and Kevin and Bill spring to mind. You are the Babe Ruths and Mickey Mantles of Dad-hood. You stepped up to the plate and took your best swing–not just once but again and again. Sometimes you hit home runs–other times tried just as hard but your luck was against you. Thank you for your love and your courage and your perseverance. Those of us with dads like you are lucky indeed.

English breakfast as served at Oxford’s New College

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

…the breakfast toast-destroyer known as a toast rack.

In my NH growing-up family, we liked our toast hot–fresh out of the toaster and quickly slathered with butter. So your first bite of toast would be hot with a dab of still-cool butter on top, while your last bite would be warm, all the non-crust somewhat sodden with melted butter.

My first encounter with an English toast rack left me incredulous–was this a machine for cooling off hot toast and creating cold dry bread slices?

Now years later, I think I understand. It’s not a machine to make the toast lose heat, it’s a machine to keep toast from getting soggy. The English prize crisp toast that crunches. My family didn’t mind soggy if it came with buttery. The English way is healthier–but of course I like my way.

Suw Pre-event

Originally uploaded by betsythedevine

Or should that be, guess whuw is coming tuw Boston?

Suw Charman! The always charming Chairman of Britain’s Open Rights Group. (Does this make her an ORG-head?)

I’ll show you my wedding dress, Suw, if you’ll show me your tiaras!

Just finished writing a (rave) review on Amazon–thought this bit on its author might have general interest:

.. June Howard can discuss race, gender, and class while assuming a reader’s intelligent, sensible interest. Far too many academic authors treat these issues as if they were glowing chunks of kryptonite that might damage the morals of ignorant readers everywhere unless placated by an Author’s whimpering and trembling on our behalf.

The book is Publishing the Family by June Howard. To summarize my review: if you liked Louis Menand’s The Metaphysical Club, you will enjoy reading Publishing the Family.

rex

Originally uploaded by simbi0tic star bubbles

In 1903, Mark Twain was already poking fun at his era’s version of Intelligent Design. For example…

According to Kelvin’s figures it took 99,968,000 years to prepare the world for man, impatient as the Creator doubtless was to see him and admire him. But a large enterprise like this has to be conducted warily, painstakingly, logically. It was foreseen that man would have to have the oyster. Therefore the first preparation was made for the oyster.

Very well, you cannot make an oyster out of whole cloth, you must make the oyster’s ancestor first. This is not done in a day. You must make a vast variety of invertebrates, to start with — belemnites, trilobites, jebusites, amalekites, and that sort of fry, and put them to soak in a primary sea, and wait and see what will happen. Some will be a disappointments – the belemnites, the ammonites and such; they will be failures, they will die out and become extinct, in the course of the 19,000,000 years covered by the experiment, but all is not lost, .. and at last the first grand stage in the preparation of the world for man stands completed, the Oyster is done.

An oyster has hardly any more reasoning power than a scientist has; and so it is reason ably certain that this one jumped to the conclusion that the nineteen-million years was a preparation for him…

Thanks for sharing to Tingilinde, where you can read the rest of Twain’s inspired nonsense.