Mother Ginger

Clara's dream in the Nutcracker is full of a child's Christmas fantasy - Sugar Plum Fairies, a Mouse King, a Nutcraker Prince. A ginger bread house comes to life.

In his 1816 book The Nutcracker and the Mouse King, E.T.A. Hoffman provided the stuff of dreams and inspiration of the Nutcracker Ballet that is performed around the world.

Urbi et Orbi

The child of Bethlehem directs our gaze towards all children, particularly those who suffer and are abused in the world, the born and the unborn.
-Pope Benedict XVI Christmas sermon 2006

May peace come to children of all the world.

» PermaLink

Quiet landscape outside Albuquerque before the big snow storm.

» PermaLink

Dresden Dolls at Zero

Since listening to a cassette demo years ago, we've had nothing but admiration for the talent and tenacity of singer, songwriter and performance artist Amanda Palmer. Talent because she writes hard hitting songs busting with emotion. Tenacity because she can do it all by herself with a little help from her friends and record label. Not odd, then, to hear Robert Woodruff, Artistic Director at the American Repertory Theatre was inspired enough to invite Amanda and her Dresden Doll cohort Brian Viglione to create a theater piece for the A.R.T.'s new black box space near Harvard Square.

Only days before the recent opening of the Dresden Dolls-A.R.T. collaboration The Onion Cellar, Amanda's interviews with the Boston press and her blog signalled that her experience in what Woodruff terms the "relationship of music and text" was not what she planned.

Inside the theater lobby, a merchandise table sells drink tickets and Dresden Doll ties, t-shirts, souvenir books and $10 posters that read "Lungs Locked, Lips Locked - Join the Rennaissance" and "You Can Stop The Truth From Leaking."

» PermaLink

Since finding volunteers to help at a .org tradeshow booth some years ago in San Francisco, we've always found craigslist to be very helpful. The plain vanilla community oriented website has grown to be the envy of many a newspaper classified ad sales department. So, it is with great amusement that we read founder Craig Newmark and his Chief Executive Officer Jim Buckmaster not only think outside the box, but show no apparent interest in stepping inside one.

» PermaLink

J.B. Zimmerman revisits the battle in Massachusetts over the state government's initiative to adopt open standards for software, specifically the OpenDocument (ODF) format.

With a new executive government taking the reins at the State House in January, how Massachusetts officials proceed with information technology remains to be seen.

A Technology Advisory Group is advising Governor-elect Patrick. Absent from its list of members that includes a Microsoft employee are any open source community or vendor representatives. Admirably, one IT executive whose company has an existing state contract, reclused himself from the transition working group.

» PermaLink