Once-proud HP reduced to shamelessly peddling Apple MacBook knockoffs

120130 hp macbook knockoff

Once-proud HP reduced to shamelessly peddling Apple MacBook knockoffs – MacDailyNews – Welcome Home: ““It’s painfully obvious where HP drew its inspiration for its newest Envy laptops,” Dana Wollman reports for Engadget. “It’s not because of any single design choice, like the aluminum unibody chassis, island-style keys, glowing logo or giant clickpad; it’s all of the above!” Wollman reports. “HP’s latest 15-incher is the most flagrant Mac imitation we’ve seen in some time, and the resemblance is close enough that you could, at first glance, mistake the interior for an MBP. “

Wollman reports, “Of course, HP threw in some flourishes that keep it from being a total facsimile: the lid and underside are black, not silver, the keyboard area has a thin red ring around it and there are Beats-branded volume controls on the laptop’s right side.””

 

Company developing drug from raw marijuana for U.S. – USATODAY.com

Images

Company developing drug from raw marijuana for U.S. – USATODAY.com: “A British company, GW Pharma, is in advanced clinical trials for the world’s first pharmaceutical developed from raw marijuana instead of synthetic equivalents — a mouth spray it hopes to market in the U.S. as a treatment for cancer pain. And it hopes to see FDA approval by the end of 2013. “

(Via .)

Aural-Innovations Blog » Vas Deferens Organization & Perihelion – “The Science Of The Impossible” (Pure Pop For Now People 2011, Pure 07, LP)

Vdo perehelion

Aural-Innovations Blog » Vas Deferens Organization & Perihelion – “The Science Of The Impossible” (Pure Pop For Now People 2011, Pure 07, LP): “Here we’ve got another archival recording from those menaces to the mainstream and mediocrity – Vas Deferens Organization (VDO). Recorded in 1997, The Science Of The Impossible was a one-off collaboration between VDO (Matt Castille and Eric Lumbleau) and a studio-only duo named Perihelion, which was keyboardist David Price and the late synthesist Tim Boone.

Gilded Portals Through Abandoned Temples / Shrouded Processions Through Forgotten Empires opens side 1. This is classic Kosmiche but in a carnival mood and reminds me of VDO’s Zyzzybaloubab album which was released the same year these recordings were made. We’ve got multiple keyboards and synths, all playing distinct roles, both melodic and atmospheric, and all grooving along to a playful rhythmic pulse. Around the 7 minute mark things get briefly loud and noisy, before settling into an eerie but playful vibe that’s like a blend of the early German cosmic pioneers and the Residents. Elegant Eskimos In Arctic Ballrooms is next and starts off with a blend of trippy cosmic mood-scapes, bleepy blurpy effects, and freakout guitar bits. It goes quiet after a couple minutes, the cauldron bubbling ominously, with strange sounds and light melodies rising gently from the pot.

Side 2 kicks off with The Illusion Of Equilibrium. Slow moving and sparse, it begins with a simple Casio-like rhythmic pattern, over which a parade of electronic sounds and textures pass by, some spaced out and some on the found-sound/experimental side. About halfway through all the sounds abruptly gel, working together to concoct an avant-Kosmiche stew. There’s still a big glom of different sounds, though the fun of it all is hearing how they contrast and cooperate. The Perils Of Gravity is next, at first sounding like mid-70s Tangerine Dream, but these guys waste no time warping the analogies by tossing in a non-stop barrage of sounds and clatter. LOTS happening here, making for an intense ride that’s an intriguing blend of classic Kosmiche and avant-garde fun.

Wow, lots of activity from the VDO camp in the past year, with both new and archival releases, and The Science Of The Impossible is another welcome addition to the VDO cannon.

The Science Of The Impossible was pressed in a limited edition of 200 LPs and is available directly from the Pure Pop For Now People label at http://www.ppfnp.com (Vinyl junkies should closely inspect their web site as they have released many treasures)

Email them at purepop@buissnet.com

Visit the Vas Deferens Organization web site at http://vasdeferensorganization.com

The latest and greatest VDO information is always posted at the Mutant Sounds web site at: http://mutant-sounds.blogspot.com

Reviewed by Jerry Kranitz”

(Via .)

Czech Republic Moves To Legalize Medical Marijuana – Toke of the Town

Czechmedicalmarijuana thumb 325x325

Czech Republic Moves To Legalize Medical Marijuana – Toke of the Town: “The Czech Ministry of Health has said it will take marijuana off the list of banned substances and for the first time allow it to be prescribed as medicine by doctors.

“By the end of this year we will submit to Parliament an amended law on addictive substances which will move marihuana from the list of banned substances to the list of those which can be prescribed,” Deputy Health Minister Martin Plíšek said, reports Chris Johnstone at CzechPosition.com.”

(Via .)

The Allied Victory Sidecar Motorcycle – Hammacher Schlemmer

Screen Shot 2012 01 17 at 10 09 57 PM

The Allied Victory Sidecar Motorcycle – Hammacher Schlemmer: “The Allied Victory Sidecar Motorcycle.
Description
This is the Ural-T sidecar motorcycle credited with helping the Russian army to achieve victory on the East Front during World War II. Regarded as a reliable workhorse by reconnaissance troops for tackling Russia’s unforgiving terrain and climate, it is now considered by enthusiasts to be the historical apex of the classic sidecar motorcycle. Still produced east of the Ural Mountains in Russia, it is updated with modern components for roadworthy cruising. Its electric starter (or kick starter for purists) starts its air-cooled, flat-twin 749cc engine, producing 40 hp for comfortable cruising along scenic routes up to 65 mph; its 5-gallon tank provides up to a 165-mile range. Its five-speed transmission (four forward and one reverse), adjustable twin hydraulic spring shock rear suspension, and front disc and rear drum brakes provide easy foot shifting, smooth rides, and confident stops. The single-wheel, all-steel detachable sidecar ensconces passengers in comfort with a padded vinyl seat and chassis-mounted shock absorbers; its trunk provides 3′ cu. of storage. Supports up to 580 lbs. of total payload. Black with maroon pinstripe. Special conditions and guarantee limitations apply. Please call 1-800-227-3528 for details. 8 1/2′ L x 5 1/2′ W x 43 1/4″ H. (705 lbs.)

Price:
$10,000”

U.S. attorney threatens to seize 23 Colorado marijuana dispensaries | The Raw Story

Medicalmarijuana LaurieAvocado

U.S. attorney threatens to seize 23 Colorado marijuana dispensaries | The Raw Story: “U.S. Attorney John Walsh sent letters to 23 medical marijuana dispensaries in Colorado on Thursday, warning them that they faced legal repercussions if they did not close down within 45 days.

“This letter constitutes formal notification that a marijuana dispensary is operating on the above described property in violation of federal law,” the letter states. “You are further advised that the real property is subject to forfeiture, and any money you receive, or have received, from the dispensary owner may also be subject to seizure and forfeiture.””

(Via .)

David Bowie’s 65 birthday: 65 crazy facts and bizarre myths – mirror.co.uk

Image 1 for david bowie at 65 gallery 183860335

David Bowie’s 65 birthday: 65 crazy facts and bizarre myths – mirror.co.uk: “David Bowie’s 65 birthday: 65 crazy facts and bizarre myths
By Paul Cockerton 8/01/2012
Decrease font size Increase font size
Image 1 for ‘David Bowie at 65’ gallery

Image 1 for ‘David Bowie at 65’ gallery

Click here for ‘David Bowie 65th birthday: 65 iconic images of the ever-changing star’
Advertisement >>

1 First things first – how do you pronounce David Bowie’s name? It is ‘Bowie’ to rhyme with ‘Joey’, rather than as if it were similar to the acronym for The Only Way is Essex, TOWIE.

2 Did Bowie help start the credit crunch? BBC journalist Evan Davis suggests he may have had a role. In 1997, Bowie sold bonds on his future back catalogue royalties, an idea which was copied by the banks who sold on mortgage income. This ‘securitisation’ was partly responsible for the problems banks developed in the late Noughties.

3 Bowie says he was moonwalking years before Michael Jackson wowed the world in 1983’s Billie Jean. He wrote on his official website that choreographer Toni Basil taught him a type of moonwalk for his 1974 Diamond Dogs tour.

4 Bowie was interviewed on a BBC programme as the founder of The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Long-haired Men at the age of 17. He complained: “It’s not nice when people call you darling and that”.

5 Bowie shares his birthday with Elvis Presley, who was exactly 12 years older. In her book, Stardust, Angie Bowie writes David Bowie could do a “devastating” impersonation of Elvis Presley. And Elvis once considered recording a cover version of Bowie’s 1976 hit, Golden Years.

6 Bowie’s first ever release was Liza Jane/Louie Louie Go Home in June 1964, under the name of Davie Jones with The King-Bees.

7 Born David Robert Jones in Brixton, London in 1947, he changed his name to avoid the similarity with Davy Jones from The Monkees. Due to the similar-sounding name, a popular misconception is that Bowie was actually in The Monkees.

8 Bowie got just one O Level – in art. He still draws, paints and sculpts with his favourite artists listed as Picasso, Michael Ray Charles, Tintoretto and Erich Heckel.

9 Many young boys in the 1970s and 1980s grew up wanting to be Bowie – and so did girls. Queen of Shops Mary Portas said Bowie was her hero as a child and she dressed up as Ziggy Stardust aged 12.

10 Blue-eyed boy Bowie’s left pupil is permanently dilated thanks to a punch thrown by friend George Underwood at school over a girl. His thumbnail dug into Bowie’s eye, which now appears either brown or blue depending on the light.

11 The fictional Major Tom has appeared in three of Bowie’s hits: ‘Space Oddity’ in 1969, ‘Ashes To Ashes’ in 1980 and ‘Hallo Spaceboy’ in 1996.

12 Rock guitarist Peter Frampton was Bowie’s friend at school and he has played guitar with Bowie many times during his career.

13 Bowie released his debut album, called ‘David Bowie’, in 1967 after playing in pub and club bands.

14 The Laughing Gnome – regarded by many as Bowie’s worst song – was the most requested track by fans when invited to make phone votes to select songs for him to perform on the 1990 world tour – although he didn’t play it.

15 His first hit in the UK was ‘Space Oddity’ in 1969 and – aptly enough – was used by the BBC for the coverage of the moon landing.

16 Nicolas Roeg cast Bowie in his first lead role in 1976, as a stranded alien, in The Man Who Fell to Earth.

17 His first number one in the United States was Fame, in 1975. Co-written by John Lennon, it features the late Beatle on backing vocals.

18 Bowie wrote the soundtrack for the BBC dramatisation of Hanish Kureishi’s novel, ‘Buddha Of Suburbia’.

19 On album ‘Diamond Dogs’, Bowie plays pretty much every instrument, including the guitar riff on ‘Rebel Rebel’.

20 Bowie was ahead of the pack when the internet started to take off. In 1997 Bowie made single ‘Telling Lies’ available for release only on the internet. He launched Bowienet, his own ISP, a year later.

21 Bowie made a special guest appearance on the SpongeBob SquarePants episode Atlantis SquarePantis as the Lord Royal Highness in Atlantis SquarePantis on November 12, 2007.

22 Bowie formed his own mime troupe in 1969 called Turquoise, later to change their name to Feathers.

23 Bowie appeared as Pontius Pilate in Martin Scorsese’s The Last Temptation of Christ.

24 In contrast, in the 1986 movie Labyrinth, Bowie plays Jareth The Goblin King.

25 Bowie married supermodel Iman in 1992. In fact they married twice – at a registry office

26 Bowie’s hit ‘Ziggy Stardust’ is about Vince Taylor, proto-punk and frontman for The Playboys.

27 A version of ‘Space Oddity’ was recorded in Italian titled ‘Ragazzo Solo, Ragazza Solo’ which translated means ‘Lonely Boy, Lonely Girl’.

28 Chart rivals Roxy Music were miffed when Bowie copied their catsuit look on stage – so they ‘stole’ his trusty lighting engineer.

29 Bowie’s duet with Bing Crosby of ‘The Little Drummer Boy’, recorded for Christmas 1977 and a hit five years later, was Crosby’s last ever single.

30 A letter that Bowie sent to Young American Sandra Adams in 1967, thanking her for sending his first fanmail from across the Atlantic, was unearthed in 2010.

31 It’s nothing new for bands to be pelted by missiles during gigs, but the projectile usually takes the form of a beer cup of water bottle. Not so during a gig by Bowie in Norway in 2004 when he was hit in the eye by a lollipop while onstage. The gig was stopped while Bowie received medical attention.

32 Actor and musician Scarlett Johansson said: “I learned I was a sexual being through David Bowie’s songs.”
David Bowie performing The Jean Genie on Top of the Pops in 1973

33 Lost Top of the Pops footage of The Jean Genie from 1973, regarded as the ‘holy grail’ by Starman’s fans, was found in a dusty box by a former cameraman on the show last year. It had been wiped by the BBC and assumed to be gone forever.

34 ‘The Man Who Sold The World’ has been covered by Nirvana and Lulu.

35 Bowie proposed to Iman in Paris while on a boat cruise on the Seine while it was passing under the Pont Neuf.

36 His favourite aftershaves are Minotaure by Paloma Picasso and anything by Guerlain.

37 David Bowie has been immortalised in stone to celebrate turning 65. Artist Ed Chapman, 40, created this tile mosaic of the Starman in time for his milestone birthday. Ed, who lives in Manchester, has previously made of a portrait of Lord Sugar out of sugarcubes and Jimi Hendrix from 5,000 plectrums.
Bowie pin-up

38 Bowie declined the CBE in 2000 and a knighthood in 2003. He said: “I would never have any intention of accepting anything like that. I seriously don’t know what it’s for. It’s not what I spent my life working for.”

39 He was the star of an episode in the second series of Ricky Gervais, where he makes up a song ridiculing Gervais’ character Andy Millman.

40 Bowie grew up in Bromley, London, but his family hail from Doncaster in South Yorkshire and Tunbridge Wells, Kent.

41 Rumour has it that Bing Crosby did not know who Bowie was before they recorded their Little Drummer Boy duet, but Bing’s son recommended him.

42 29-year-old Bowie was arrested for cannabis possession in Rochester, New York in 1976.

43 Wife Iman has a Bowie knife tattooed on her ankle as well as the name ‘David’ in Arabic writing.

44 Estimates of Bowie’s wealth range from £100m to £500m.

45 Other pseudonyms Bowie has used over the years include Aladdin Sane, the Thin White Duke, Tao Jones, Halloween Jack and John Merrick.

46 His Glastonbury performance in 2000 is regarded by fans as one of the greatest Glasto shows of all time. And in a poll of who festival fans want to headline Glastonbury when it returns next year, Bowie was number one choice.

47 A new spider species discovered in Malaysia in 2009 was called Heteropoda Davidbowie.

48 Guitarist Mick Ronson’s work with David Bowie is sometimes credited as being the ‘birthpoint of heavy metal’.

49 The video for Ashes to Ashes was voted the 27th greatest music video of all time in a poll by Channel 4.

50 When recording the Magic Dance song for the Labyrinth soundtrack, the baby wouldn’t provide the necessary coos and giggles so David Bowie did it himself.

51 His mum Peggy was a waitress and his dad John worked for Barnardo’s.

52 A pupil at Stockwell Infants School in south London, he had a reputation for ‘defiance and brawling’.

53 Bowie began playing the piano at the age of ten and played the ukelele and tea-chest bass in skiffle seesions with mates.

54 He met first wife Angela Barnett in 1969 – they married within a year.

55 The song ‘Kooks’ on 1971 album ‘Hunky Dory’ was written for his son Zowie.

56 Now know better as Duncan Jones, he is an award-winning director responsible for science fiction-techno-thriller 2011 flick Source Code.

57 ‘Diamond DOgs’ was planned to be a musical version of George orwell’s 1984.

58 In 1980, Bowie did a three-month run on Broadway in The Elephant Man.

59 He turned down the chance to play baddie Max Zorin in James Bond film ‘A View To A Kill’ – a role that was performed by Christopher Walken.

60 In 1992, he played FBI agent Phillip Jeffries in ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me’.

61 He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996.

62 He and Iman appeared as characters in 1999 game Omikron – for which he provided the soundtrack.

63 Bowie suffered an acutely blocked artery that required emergency heart surgery in 2004 and went into semi-retirement.

64 Rolling Stone magazine declared him 39th on the list of the 100 Greatest Artists Of All Time.

65 Bowie was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006.”

(Via .)

Primate Watching (junky plaza) | Inside Mundoblaineo

One way ticket to hell by stamatisgr

Primate Watching (junky plaza) | Inside Mundoblaineo: “Yesterday I had to go over to the post office on Ebay business. The local post office around here is at the Platia Dimarchios, city hall plaza. For some reason, local junkies and other permanently bewildered types have taken up a sort of residence there. There seems to be only minimal dealing going on, furtive ingestion, not much else except for a sort of Brownian motion and social interaction. I told Maria it was like going to the monkey house to watch our distant cousins. Big time voyeur action. I watched a strange menage a trois as one belle of the balle, her left eye blackened and swollen, squeezed into jeans and boots, decorated with chains flirted openly with another candidate as her bearded oblivious companion phased in and out of existence off to one side. He lifted her up from behind, stretching her back while beardo, resplendent in plaid shirt and baseball cap had image iteration and rendering problems. Then the police came by and no one altered their behavior in any way.

 

Sirota: Legalizing marijuana is now a ‘mainstream’ position | The Raw Story

Picture 32 610x345

Sirota: Legalizing marijuana is now a ‘mainstream’ position | The Raw Story: “The slow drumbeat to legalizing marijuana in America continued Friday evening when Salon.com columnist David Sirota appeared on Current TV’s The Young Turks.

Sirota mentioned a recent Gallup poll in which half of Americans support legalizing marijuana, with 77 percent also backing medical marijuana. With those figures, Sirota and host Cenk Uygur slammed White House and Washington figures still viewing marijuana legalization as a radical idea.

“I think if you look at those numbers like that, what you see is the mainstream, centrist position, is to support legalizing marijuana,” he said. “And the extremists are those who continue to fight the drug war.””

 

Marijuana: Fight Back With The Facts – Toke of the Town

Creme marijuana is medicine women design thumb 280x280

Marijuana: Fight Back With The Facts – Toke of the Town: “The prohibitionists try to tell us that marijuana is not medicine. The scientific research tells us that cannabis can be a useful medical treatment for a wide range of diseases, and there are literally hundreds of scientific studies to back this up. For a 420-page listing of studies showing the effectiveness of medical marijuana, check out Granny Storm Crow’s list.
Marijuana is medically good for you. Fight back with the facts.

The prohibitionists tell us that smoking marijuana makes us stupid and lazy and unmotivated. But the scientific research tells us that cannabis smokers work harder and smarter than their non-toking brethren. The Rubin Study in Jamaica, published in the 1970s by Dr. Vera Rubin (look it up if you don’t believe me), shows that the hardest workers are the highest workers.
Marijuana is good for your motivation. Fight back with the facts.

The prohibitionists tell us that marijuana is a gateway drug. The scientific research tells us that not only is cannabis not a gateway drug, but is in fact an exit drug from hard drug use, which has shown to be invaluable in helping addicts of meth, cocaine and heroin, along with alcoholics, maintain abstinence from harmful substances.
Marijuana is good for stopping drug abuse. Fight back with the facts.

illigaldrugs-pq22376254 flip.jpg
Photo: American Pregnancy
?The prohibitionists tell us that the smoking of marijuana by pregnant women results in lower birth weights and less intelligent babies. The scientific research tells us that toking mothers have babies that are just as healthy, with birth weights just as normal, as babies born of non-toking mothers. And you know what else the research showed? That the babies of pot smoking mothers scored better on laboratory tests of cognition than babies of non-smoking mothers. Another independent scientific study showed that babies of marijuana-using mothers have a lower mortality rate than babies of mothers who didn’t use any drugs at all! The baby mortality rate among non-using mothers was 13.7 per 1,000 live births, while babies of toking mothers had a rate of only 8.9 deaths per 1000 births.”

(Via .)

News from the Edge | Mayans Ended up in Georgia | unknowncountry

Mayanpyramid

News from the Edge | Mayans Ended up in Georgia | unknowncountry: “How did corn, beans and tobacco come to the Indians of the US? We used to think they came from Native Americans who brought them back from their trips across the border into Mexico, but they may have come from Mayans who moved north and eventually settled in the state of Georgia.

For a long time, US archaeologists said there were no Mayan ruins here, but that was probably because they weren’t familiar with the buildings of the descendants of the Southeastern mound-builder tribes: The Creeks, Alabamas, Natchez, Chitimachas and Choctaws. Despite their insistence that all Indians arrived in North America by walking across the land bridge that once stretched from Siberia, these tribes have always claimed that their ancestors came up from the south, and recent DNA evidence shows proof that they were right. “

(Via .)

Jim Sherwood obituary | Music | The Guardian

Jim Sherwood 007

Jim Sherwood obituary | Music | The Guardian: “Jim Sherwood on tour in Germany with the Mothers of Invention in 1967. His principal contributions came on baritone and/or tenor saxophone, though he could also be heard on percussion and vocals. Photograph: Petra Niemeier/K&K/Redferns
Jim “Motorhead” Sherwood, who has died aged 69, was a member of Frank Zappa’s original Mothers of Invention. He appeared on all the group’s early albums, up to and including Weasels Ripped My Flesh (1970), as well as on Zappa’s solo disc Lumpy Gravy. He later performed with the Grandmothers, a group of musicians who had accompanied Zappa during different phases of his career.

Born in Arkansas City, Kansas, Sherwood first met Zappa in 1956 when both of them were attending Antelope Valley high school in California. Sherwood was in the same class as Frank’s brother: “Bobby found out that I collected blues records and he introduced me to Frank, and Frank and I sort of got together and swapped records.”

At the time, Zappa was already in a band called the Blackouts, but this soon disintegrated. Then the brothers moved to Ontario, California, and started a new band, the Omens, which also included Sherwood. He would regularly jam with Zappa in a string of different groups, and eventually, in 1964, the Mothers. The following year, the band signed a recording contract with MGM records, and set about the lengthy process of recording their first album, Freak Out!, with producer Tom Wilson. At the time, Sherwood was not a fully fledged member of the band, which changed its name to the Mothers of Invention. He described his role on Freak Out! as “just making sound effects on some of the songs”.

After the album’s release in June 1966 on MGM’s Verve label, the band went on tour, then in November that year took up a six-month residency at the Garrick theatre in New York, during which they played 14 shows a week. Sherwood was working for the band as equipment manager and roadie, and sometimes operated the lighting during the Garrick shows. These were a bizarre mix of music and performance art, featuring puppet shows and interludes when the band would pelt the audience with fruit.

It was when the Mothers made their first trip to England, in mid-1967, that Sherwood was finally hired as a full-time musician. It was the band’s vocalist and percussionist Ray Collins who gave Sherwood the nickname “Motorhead”, through his love of working on cars and trucks and motorcycles: “He said ‘it sounds like you’ve got a little motor in your head’, so they just called me Motorhead and that seemed to stick.”

Sherwood contributed on baritone and/or tenor saxophone, and sometimes percussion and vocals, to Absolutely Free, We’re Only in It for the Money, and the doo-wop album Cruising with Ruben & the Jets, taking in the Zappa solo album Lumpy Gravy en route. Zappa disbanded the original Mothers of Invention in 1969 for financial reasons and what he perceived as public apathy, but Sherwood appears on the albums Uncle Meat, Burnt Weeny Sandwich and Weasels Ripped My Flesh, recorded before the split but released subsequently.

Sherwood makes an appearance in Zappa’s bizarre and confusing 1971 movie 200 Motels (“Frank wanted me to play a newt rancher and I was supposed to be in love with a vacuum cleaner,” as he put it). In 1973, he played baritone sax on the album For Real!, by Ruben & the Jets. This was a band formed by Ruben Guevara, inspired by Zappa’s album Cruising with Ruben & the Jets, and Zappa played some guitar on their debut album as well as producing it.

Sherwood appeared on the further Zappa releases You Are What You Is (1981), Civilization Phaze III in 1993, the year of Zappa’s death, and the Läther box set, released three years later.

In the 1980s, Sherwood performed with the Grandmothers, and played on a couple of albums with them. During the 1990s, he joined forces with Billy James and his Ant-Bee project.

James, a graduate of Berklee College of Music, Boston, wanted to express his fascination with psychedelic and experimental music from the 1960s, for which he assembled musicians from the Mothers of Invention and Captain Beefheart’s band. Sherwood appears on three Ant-Bee albums, though by this time he had given up playing the saxophone and his contributions are limited to “snorks”, in which you “snort through your nose, sucking air in through your nose”. He added further snorks to Sandro Oliva’s album Who the Fuck Is Sandro Oliva?!? (1995).

“I just feel honoured to have spent time with [Frank Zappa] and the other guys in the early group,” said Sherwood. “[He was] an incredible person, and his music is just something I enjoy listening to all the time.”

• Euclid James Sherwood, musician, born 8 May 1942; died 25 December 2011″

(Via .)

Christopher Hitchens and the protocol for public figure deaths – Salon.com

AP050914039305 460x307
One of the most intensely propagandistic weeks in the last several decades began on June 5, 2004, the day Ronald Reagan died at the age of 93 in Bel Air, California. For the next six days, his body was transported to, and his casket displayed in, multiple venues around the nation — first to a funeral home in Santa Monica; then to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, where it remained for two full days as over 100,000 people paid their respects; then onto the U.S. Capitol, where his casket was taken by horse-drawn caisson along Constitution Avenue, and then lay in state under the dome for the next day-and-a-half; then to a state funeral at Washington’s National Cathedral presided over by President Bush and attended by dozens of past and present world leaders; and then back to the Presidential Library in California, where another service was held and his body finally interred. Few U.S. Presidents in history, if any, have received anything comparable upon their death; as CNN anchor Judy Woodruff observed the day Reagan’s body arrived in the capital: “Washington has not seen the likes of this for more than 30 years.