May Ramblin'

I was listening to one of the few podcasts I follow regularly, Coverville; highly recommended, BTW. Anyway, there is sometimes a segment at the end called Musically Challenged, in which a listener provides a quiz for Coverville host Brian Ibbott, and usually for Brian's wife Tina. Lo and behold, the quiz for episode 574 was provided by Tosy and Cosh. Tosy was the one who turned me onto Coverville.

I had requested of Brian that he play a Pete Seeger cover in honor of Pete's 90th birthday a couple weeks ago. Well, Brian didn't play any Pete covers on May 3, but instead dedicated the whole next show to Seeger. My request for one song became the inspiration for the entire episode. I am pleased.
***
A (weird) random conversation starter from Jaquandor.
***
On June 6, 2009, in honor of the quadricentennial of Henry Hudson's trip up the river that now bears his name, a musician will be playing the Mid-Hudson Bridge, the bridge that connects Poughkeepsie and Highland, near my college town of New Paltz. Not just playing ON the bridge, but actually playing the bridge as an instrument.
***
1981 Video Predicts The Death Of Print Newspapers.
***
Mr. Frog reviews the warts-and-all complete history of Sesame Street. It includes discussion of this scene which always chokes me up:

***
How to test your copyright knowledge.
***
A couple television programs you should watch. They've already aired, but thanks to the Internet, they are easily retrievable.

One is Bill Moyers Journal of April 17. Bill interviews the executive producer of HBO's critically-acclaimed show THE WIRE, David Simon who "talks...about inner-city crime and politics, storytelling and the future of journalism today." I've never seen The Wire, but now I must watch it on DVD. But you don't have to have watched that vaunted program to appreciate his insights.

The other is a two-part 60 Minutes report narrated by Lesley Stahl. In Part 1 she "reports on flaws in eyewitness testimony that are at the heart of the DNA exonerations of falsely convicted people like Ronald Cotton, who has now forgiven his accuser, Jennifer Thompson." In Part 2, she "explores the task of an eyewitness to choose a criminal out of line up through memory. Jennifer Thompson falsely selected Ronald Cotton as her rapist." Thompson and Cotton are now friends, and have co-written a book, Picking Cotton.
***
Dom Deluise as role model for Mark Evanier, of a sort.
ROG