Friday, February 26, 2010

Using Evernote to Catalog Audio Books

I use Evernote (https://www.evernote.com) to keep an inventory of audio books.

To facilitate quick searches, I created a number of filters to identify the audio books inventoried as mp3, mb4, or both.

Here are some screen captures on how I use Evernote to manage my aubio books library.

1-Examples of How I Set Up the Audio Book Library

2-An Audio Book Record Content

3-An Audio Book Search Filter

4-Audio Book Formats

Eureka!

Every time I saw Bogart and Hepburn in the movie, "The African Queen", James Agee came to mind; he wrote the screen play for this adaptation of C.S. Forester novel. I already have this Forester book, and I wanted to read the Agee work, "A Death in the Family".

I have this e-book, but I put it away somewhere. Every now and then I would search for it about the house. This has been going on for years. Finally, at the wee hours of this morning I found it. It was too securely stashed away at the bottom drawer of a desk along with all my HP manuals and calculators. Go figure.

Now James Agee is on my iPod 3G bookshelf. It's good to go.

Thursday, February 25, 2010

George Duning

George Duning
American-born film music composer
(25 February, 1908 – 27 February, 2000)

The MP3 below expired on 02-25-2010.
Click here for current selection.


Morris Stoloff and the Columbia Pictures Orchestra (1956)
Moonglow and the Theme from 'Picnic'(Duning)

I sang to you and the moon
But only the moon remembers.
I sang
O reckless free-hearted
    free-throated rythms,
Even the moon remembers them
   And is kind to me.

-- Carl Sandburg (1878–1967)

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Récit de Cassard

Michel Legrand
le compositeur et le pianiste français
24 février, 1932 -

The MP3 below expired on 02-25-2010.
Click here for current selection.


Michel Legrand, jazz piano et orchestre (2002)
Récit de Cassard (Watch What Happens)
(from 'The Umbrellas of Cherbourg')


On a related note (pun), I created a short storyboard video of the title song, "I Will Wait for You", taken from scenes of Legrand's "Les parapluies de Cherbourg".

"I Will Wait for You"
Click here to view this L'Envoi YouTube.

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Leo Delibes Birthday Anniversary

Leo Delibes
French composer of ballets and operas
(21 February 1836 – 16 January 1891)


The MP3 below expired on 02-23-2010.
Click here for current selection.


Maurice Abravanel conducts
the Vienna State Opera Orchestra (1970)
Coppelia Valse
(from Delibes' ballet Coppelia)

Friday, February 19, 2010

Haydn's Wife

He was nicknamed by his contemporaries as "Haydn's wife." Because Boccherini's compositions modeled after that of Franz Joseph Haydn. Afterall, Haydn was the father of the string quartet and the symphony. And, Boccherini's critics thought he would always be the "second fiddle or cello" to Haydn. As for me, Boccherini was a composer and cellist of the first order.

Luigi Rodolfo Boccherini
Italian classical composer and cellist
(19 February, 1743 - 28 May, 1805)

The MP3 below expired on 02-21-2010.
Click here for current selection.


Alexander Schneider Chamber Ensemble (1997)
Minuet in A
(from String Quartet in E, Op. 11, No. 5, 3rd Movement)

Thursday, February 18, 2010

Books Galore

I have a number of books I am reading. Here are some of them:

* E-book:

- The Jackdaw...I have been reading this one for years on my PDA.

- Gone with the Wind ...ditto.

- Out of Africa...ditto.

- Room with a View...ditto.

* Paperbacks:

- The Lymond Chronicles...I am now reading book 2 of 6.

* Audio Books:

- Genghis...am listening to book 3 of 3

* On hold at the city library:

- The Brenner Assignment

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Peach Blossoms

Peach Blossoms, 17 February, 2010
Sunny, 73°F/23°C

去年今日此門中
人面桃花相映紅
人面不知何處去
桃花依舊笑春風

唐•崔護 《題都城南庄》

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Sleepless?

Bert Kalmar
American-born lyricist
(16 February, 1884 - 18 September, 1947)


The MP3 below expired on 02-19-2010.
Click here for current selection.


Hugo Winterhalter Orchestra, Johnny Parker, vocal (1952)
A Kiss to Build a Dream On (Ruby & Kalmar)

Sleep on, and dream of heaven awhile
Tho' shut so close thy laughing eyes
Thy rosy lips still wear a smile
And move, and breathe delicious sighs
-- Samuel Rogers (1763—1855)


You probably had seen a movie where Louis Armstrong was featured in a recording of this tune. Can you name the movie?

Monday, February 15, 2010

RIP Dick Francis

One of my favorite British mystery writers died on Sunday at the age of 89. His horseplaying around earned him a CBE from the Order of the British Empire. That he did.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Born on Valentine's Day

Irving Gordon
American-born composer and lyricist
(14 February, 1915 - 1 December, 1996)


The MP3 below expired on 02-16-2010.
Click here for current selection.


Lorie Line, jazz piano (2004)
Unforgettable (Gordon)

"Love is enough: though the world be awaning"
-- William Morris (1834-1896)

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Happy Valentine's Day, 2010

L'amour inventa l'art de plaire,
Celui de peindre et de chanter.
Daphnis, auprès de sa bergère,
Chanta le premier l'art d'aimer.
Homère, après lui dans la Grèce
Chantant ses vers harmonieux...

-- Le chanteur parisien
Recueil des chansons de L.A. Pitou


I had an attack of a creative impulse. A rare occurrence, nonetheless scary. Thank goodness it's behind me now.

Anyway, click on the following YouTube link to view the video (at your own risk):

A Valentine's Day Greeting 2010
Click here to view this L'Envoi YouTube.

Saturday, February 06, 2010

The Gipper's Birthday Anniversary

President Ronald Wilson Reagan
(6 February, 1911 – 5 June, 2004)

Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

-- Ronald Reagan

Thursday, February 04, 2010

The Final Solution for Stopping Global Warming

I did some simple math and arrived at a solution for ending global warming.

Methodology:

Parameters (Al Gore, Barack Obama, and the Babel Tower of U.N. et al, are welcome to plug in their own numbers here):

≈1 gram exhaled CO2 per breath

≈14,440 breaths per person per day, or 31.84 lbs. CO2 exhaled per person per day

1 short ton = 2,000 lbs. (pounds)

As of February 4, 2010:
U.S. Population: 308,611,000 (4.5% of world population)
China Population: 1,335,640,000 (19.6% of world population)
India Population: 1,176,622,000 (17.2% of world population)

Calculation:

Comparison of Carbon Dioxide (CO2) Exhaled by the Populations in These Three Countries on Just One Day - February 4, 2010:

U.S.=308,611,000 pop. x 31.84 lbs. exhaled CO2/day = 9,826,174,240 lbs. CO2 per day, or   4,913,087   short tons of CO2 exhaled in the United States on February 4, 2010.

China=1,335,640,000 pop. x 31.84 lbs. exhaled CO2/day = 42,526,777,600 lbs. exhaled CO2/day, or   21,263,389   short tons of CO2 exhaled in China on February 4, 2010.

India=1,176,622,000 pop. x 31.84 lbs. exhaled CO2/day = 37,463,644,480 lbs. exhaled CO2/per day, or   18,731,824   short tons of CO2 exhaled in India on February 4, 2010.

Discussion:

Before I give you my solution to "global warming", I have five questions for the
two brilliant American Nobel Peace prize winners and the Babel Tower of U.N. climate experts:

1. Excluding and ignoring all ecosystems and cultural and infrastructural generated CO2, which of these countries exhales the least CO2 per day, and therefore, the least of the "offenders" for "killing" our planet with said gas?

2. Would not the Plant Kingdom benefit from the alleged excessive greenhouse effect CO2, thus producing more Oxygen? How would this Oxygen Effect alter the global warming equation (if there is one)?

3. Using my or your CO2 exhaled per person per day parameters, do you think by legislating the U.S. and EU to go "green" would stop global warming (if it is true)?

4. If the two Nobel laureates and their junk science colleagues are prophetic in describing the global warming doomsday scenario (maybe pathetic is the better word), why aren't China and India buying in to the Kyoto or the Copenhagen accord?

5. Without China and India (37% of the world's population) in the accord, do you think the U.S. and EU can stop global warming however the methods (if it is true)?

The Final Solution:

Okay. So my unlearned astro-turf questions are beneath you people who are above me. Obviously. Just the same, here is my proposed solution to solving YOUR global warming problem.

There are two options to this solution.

Option 1: Nuke (neutron bomb) every country in the world, except China and India. That is, by killing every global warming doomsayer countries, the issue will go away.

Grüßen Sie zur neuen Weltordnung (and click your heels)!

Option 2: Nuke (neutron bomb) China and India. A very significant number of the CO2 exhalers and polluters will be eliminated, and therefore, global warming will be averted and earth will be saved.

Grüßen Sie zur neuen Weltordnung (and click your heels)!

Al Gore and Barack Obama each should receive his second Nobel Peace prize for just being who they are, and "Being There" (as in the 1979 flick starring Peter Sellers). The award ceremony would be held at an Option 1 or Option 2 country, accordingly.

Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Jazz Me Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn
German-born Romantic composer, conductor, and pianist
(3 February, 1809 – 4 November, 1847)


The MP3 below expired on 02-13-2010.
Click here for current selection.


Rudi Moosmeier, jazz piano (2006)
Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in E Minor
Op.64, 1st Movement

Tuesday, February 02, 2010

The Cat Who Looks Like A Pirate

I have not written a book review in years. Below is my review on J.A. Jance's "Edge of Evil", submitted to Amazon today.

The review is titled: "The Cat Who Looks like a Pirate."
My nom de plume is: Gussie Fink-Nottle.

Click this link to see the review at Amazon:

The Cat Who Looks Like a Pirate

If you like, you may comment here on this blog or at the Amazon site.

"la vie ressemble plus souvent à un roman
qu'un roman ne ressemble à la vie"*

-- George Sand (1833)

A far cry from the societal and family norms once treasured and embodied in Wilder's Our Town, the stage atmosphere of the Edge of Evil is the social fabric of today's America. The life mobile once reverently held and symmetrically balanced with the three strands of daily living, love-marriage, and death-eternity, are slowly being severed. Our lopsided national character is now steeped in anxieties and breakups. The ties holding normalcy together are fraying and weakening. It is in this backdrop we find Ali Reynolds' life center teeters on the verge of collapsing.

Already feeling raw from a wrongful termination as a Los Angeles television news personality, Ali Reynolds receives nary a solaced embrace nor soothing lips from network executive and husband. Wilting under his accusing and narcissistic rants, emptiness drowns her. When hearing her long time friend is missing, it's the clarion call for Ali to return to the succor of her childhood home for a respite, and learn the where about of Reenee Bernard. So the forty-something Reynolds and her heart, accompanying by college senior son, jettisons the hubris of a cast television persona and leaves southern California behind.

Sedona, Arizona, named after the wife of settler and postmaster Carl Schnebly. The hub of the Red Rock Country, Sedona radiates majestic red buttes, lush greenery, and wilderness expanse. Fused in with purported healing cosmic vortices, the intrinsic enticement of this landscape is certified. The aura of these natural phenomena propagates along the rugged serpentine Schnebly Hill Road as well.

Liken to the horizontal stroke of the letter "H", Schnebly Hill Road had once been a vital road for ferrying goods between Sedona on the west, and Flagstaff east. This eleven-mile stretch of road hugs and slithers out the Mogollon Rim above Sedona; it is an old, rugged, and narrow cattle trail which accommodates all mortal motives with marked indifference. Whether it is he who wants to channel the healing energy vortex whirling at the Bear Wallow Canyon, or that she intends on doing a dead-on Thelma and Louise stunt six thousand feet above the town, the road asks no questions and gives no answers. It is what it is.

Upon the searchers finding Renee's mangled body down in a canyon below Schnebly Hill Road, on this deed of dreadful note, the tale begins. Ali Reynolds, the now ex-investigative reporter, sets about to learn the reasons to the "it is what it is" cause of death to her friend: suicide.

Although this novel is tagged as a Mystery-Thriller, the whodunit theme elicits a far more stronger and deeper antiphonal pathos than other works in the genre. We attribute this verisimilar characterization to the author's own life journey. In her formative years as a writer, Ms. Jance was subjected to much academic chastisements and life's vicissitudes. These rebukes later served to discipline and anchor her resolve to become the author she is today; in her works, we find the quality of mercy is not strained. We see, for example, the tender pity Jance ascribes to Sam and her humans.

Samantha the cat could never be considered as the feline partner to Qwilleran in a Lilian Jackson Braun's caper. A cat with a ragged torn ear and a missing eye, at best, might be thought of as a veteran of some territorial altercation. Or she could be the recipient of the affliction owing to someone's cruel pleasure. Whatever the history behind Sam's disfigurement, she now has a home. The deceased's surviving children love her, and she them. A mutual solace. A testimony to resiliency and hopes rekindled. This tabby would later become a new strand in Ali Reynold's yet to be reconstituted mobile, the healing vortices notwithstanding.

To find answers to her life's persistent questions à la devise de Guy Noir, Ali forays into the Internet. It is here in this vast digital-age nebula, we see the transforming of an aloof, coiffured hair, and manicured reporter, into a softer heart and more susceptible spirit. Yet paradoxically, she is holding on to what is becoming an anachronism. Handwritten letters. She doubts the veracity of Reenee's typewritten suicide note. To Ali, it counters the victim's penchant for pen and ink.

By cleverly juxtaposing the two art forms of the printed word, the former English teacher Ms. Jance conveys a subtext within the story. That is, writing, however rendered, is an intrinsic and indispensable portion of being human. We all subscribe to the philosopher-dustman Alfred P. Doolittle's uttering, 'I'm willing to tell you. I'm wanting to tell you. I'm waiting to tell you.' Except in writing, once the 'Moving Finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.'

One final thought. I have a question to which Guy Noir might not have an answer. Perhaps Ms. Jance would tell us. Why would anyone wants to drive a Lexus on Schnebly Hill Road, and on a blistery snowy day?

*"life resembles more often to a novel than a novel is to life"