1879: Legendary Nobel Prize winning physicist, Albert Einstein was born in Worttemberg, Germany

1794: Eli Whitney patents the Cotton Gin.

1920: Cartoonist and Dennis The Menace creator, Hank Ketcham was born in Seattle, Washington.

© 2008 Larry Curtis Spurlock. All Rights Reserved

Down At The Home

Writing Tickets

Roy: Hey, boyees .. t’other day I was in da Feed Stor’ for about haf ‘our. When I comes out, thars a Copper writing a Parkn’ Ticket.

Clyde: Wha’ happen’d ?

Roy: I, I, I gots mad and called him a Pig !

Claude: Oh boy – what’d that thar Copper do then ?

Roy: Damn, damn ! He wrote another Ticket for da tars not havin’ enuf tread on ‘em and stuk it on da windershied, too !

Clyde: Boy, I bet you got madder’n heck .. huh Roy ?

Roy: I shor did. Thens I called his mammy a snotty beetch !

Claude: Utt ohh, that wasn’t smart. I bet that Copper really got mad !

Roy: Yea’ he went an’ spit on da groun’ an’ wrote another Ticket an’ slapped in on da windershield, too !

Clyde: Oh shee-uut ! Then wha’ ?

Roy: I looked at him all squinttee eye’d .. and started laughing. Then I walked away.

Claude: WHY ?

Roy: Cause it twernt my car. I’ze parked aroun’ da corner.

By Clyde, Claude and Roy

A satire or lampoon, especially one that ridicules a specific person, traditionally written and posted in a public place.

Synonyms: parody, spoof, charade, lampoon

© 2008 Larry Curtis Spurlock. All Rights Reserved

Dawn Wells Busted for Marijuana

Mary Ann on Mary Jane ?

Dawn Wells – ‘girl next door’, Mary Ann from Gilligan’s Island is serving six months probation for allegedly possessing marijuana. Ms. Wells failed a sobriety test after being stopped by Cops in Idaho. The 69 year old Wells was driving back from a surprise Birthday Party in her honor. Her attorney reports that a previous passenger in her car testified that the half smoked joint was his and that he left it there without her knowledge.

We might have expected this from Ginger but sweet little Mary Ann …

© 2008 Larry Curtis Spurlock. All Rights Reserved

1847: Johnny Appleseed Day.

1903: Musician, Accordian player and Bandleader, Lawrence Welk born in Strasburg, North Dakota.

1985: Mikhail Gorbachev succeeds Chernenko as Leader of the Soviet Union.

© 2008 Larry Curtis Spurlock. All Rights Reserved

A grasping structure on the limb of a crustacean.

Synonyms: claw, nipper, chela

© 2008 Larry Curtis Spurlock. All Rights Reserved

James Joseph McGuinn III was born July 13, 1942 in Chicago. He was impressed greatly by Elvis Presley after hearing “Hearbreak Hotel”. He was also influenced by Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Gene Vincent and The Everly Brothers.

In 1957, he enrolled as a student at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music, where he mastered the five-string banjo and continued to hone his guitar skills.

After graduation he worked the folk music circuit and various coffeehouses and was hired by The Limeliters and The Chad Mitchell Trio. He also sang backup and played guitar for Bobby Darin.

In 1963 he was a studio musician in New York City, recording with Judy Collins and the Paul Simon-Art Garfunkel duo.

At the same time he was influenced heavily by the Beatles. He eventually turned his attention to another folkie who was also a Beatle fan, Gene Clark, to join forces with McGuinn in The Byrds, in July of 1964. Conga player Michael Clarke was recruited because he looked like two of the Rolling Stones. Mandolin player Chris Hillman was asked to join the group and learn to play the bass guitar. During a Thanksgiving dinner the band settled on the name “Byrds,” and success was just around the corner.

In 1965, McGuinn joined the Subud spiritual association and practiced the latihan, an exercise in which he opened himself up to receiving spiritual guidance through the quieting of his mind.

McGuinn changed his name in 1967 after Subud’s founder Bapak told him it would better “vibrate with the universe.” Bapak sent Jim the letter “R” and asked him to send back ten names starting with that letter. Owing to a fascination with airplanes, gadgets and science fiction, he sent names like “Rocket,” “Retro,” “Ramjet,” and “Roger,” the latter a term used in signalling protocol over two-way radios, military and civil aviation. Roger was the only “real” name in the bunch and Bapak picked it. While using the name Roger professionally from that time on, McGuinn only officially changed his middle name from Joseph to Roger.

While with the Byrds he developed two innovative and highly influential styles of electric guitar playing: “jingle-jangle”–generating ringing arpeggios based on banjo finger picking styles he learned while at the Old Town School–and, secondly, a merging of saxophonist John Coltrane’s free-jazz atonalities which hinted at the droning of the sitar, a style of playing first heard on the Byrds’ 1966 single “Eight Miles High.”

A sound that McGuinn developed is made by playing a seven string guitar, featuring a doubled G-string (with the second string tuned an octave higher). The C. F. Martin guitar company has even released a special edition called the HD7 Roger McGuinn Signature Edition, that claims to capture McGuinn’s signature “jingle-jangle” tone which he created with 12 string guitars, while maintaining the ease of playing a 6-string.

Notable Byrds’ members included David Crosby, Gene Clark, Hillman, Michael Clarke and Gram Parsons, all of whom went on to form successful groups. n 1968, he helped create the groundbreaking Byrds album Sweetheart of the Rodeo, to which many attribute the rise in popularity of country rock. They disbanded in 1973.

After the break-up of the Byrds, McGuinn released several solo albums, and later toured with Bob Dylan during his 1975 and 1976 “Rolling Thunder Revue”.

In 1977 in an acting class, McGuinn met the woman who would soon become Camilla McGuinn. Over the years she would become his musical partner as well, co-writing songs and helping manage his career. McGuinn became a born-again Christian, after giving up cocaine due to the death of Elvis Presley. In 1978, McGuinn joined fellow ex-Byrds Gene Clark and Chris Hillman to form “McGuinn, Clark and Hillman,” and the band released its debut album with Capitol Records in 1979.

Roger opened for Dylan and Tom Petty in 1987. He also appeared at the 30th anniversary for Bob Dylan at Madison Square Garden in 1993.

In November 1995, McGuinn began recording and uploading to the Internet a series of traditional folk songs to his web site. The recordings are available for free download here. To read more about Roger visit his blog.

Roger was inducted into the Rock’n'Roll Hall of Fame in 1991. See him on the Today Show

To this day, McGuinn remains a quietly devoted Christian.

© 2008 Clifton Eastham. All Rights Reserved

Using hip hop to teach High Schoolers

Not a good idea says Sterling, VA Supervisor Delgaudio

Yo, Cliff – .. still living it up, down here in Key West.

I hope nobody (read: my family members) is trying to get me fired, this week ! basturds

Regardless, I continue to keep up with life in my home area by reading the Online local newspapers. One of which is the Loudoun Easterner.

There was a particularly interesting Letter To The Editor, in the March 5, 2008 edition. I’d like to reprint, here, if I may.

Also, I would encourage Comments as this is the High School that my Daughter attended …

*********************************************************

Letters to the Editor

( Loudoun Easterener )

Delgaudio re: hip-hop

By: Eugene Delgaudio

A lot of my Sterling neighbors aren’t happy with the decision of Park View High

School to use hip-hop rap lyrics to teach kids poetry, but if you want talk to some

people who are really upset over those who legitimize hip-hop culture, I suggest

you talk to leaders in the black community.

In fact, an Associated Press poll of black Americans taken last year found 50
percent thought hip-hop was a negative influence on society. And who are these people?

They’re leaders like Salome Thomas-El, principal of John Reynolds Elementary in inner city Philadelphia, who debated rapper Cam’ron and rap producer Damon Dash on the influence their music has on children, glamorizing a lifestyle of crime,violence and womanizing with no future. If the principal of an inner city Philadelphia school won’t tolerate it, why is Park View?

They’re strong black women like the late black activist C. Delores Tucker, who
battled the rap and hip-hop culture for years for the way their lyrics demean and degrade women, author Bakari Kitwana, who wrote “Does Hip-Hop Hate Women?” and professor Tracy Denean Sharpley Whiting, author of “Pimps Up, Ho’s Down: Hip-Hop’s Hold On Young Black Women.”

All of these activists, scholars, teachers and authors oppose glamorizing hip-hop for the same reason I do – it’s a corrosive and destructive force in the lives of our children, who need positive role models and lifestyle choices.

If these black activists and strong black women are dedicating their lives to speaking out against the racist, sexist and violent lifestyle promoted by hip-hop, why is Park View High School spending our money to teach our children that gangshootings, drug dealing and womanizing are a legitimate art form and fun lifestyle?

Quite frankly, assuming the only way to teach minorities is by using gangland examples and ebonics is in itself somewhat racist. What’s next, having kids sell drugs to teach them the metric system?

Eugene Delgaudio
Sterling District Supervisor

© 2008 Larry Curtis Spurlock. All Rights Reserved

“You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.”