Salaam, Mira Nair.

Can't wait for Friday! That's when one of my favorite books comes to the big screen.



Mira Nair is responsible for the film adaptation of the brilliant novel The Namesake, by Jhumpa Lahiri.



I really love the work of South Asian (Deshi) writers, and this one is among my favorites. It tells the story of a Bengali immigrant couple and their struggle to adapt to Western life. Their first child is born in Massachusetts, and they name him Gogol, after the Russian writer.

The Namesake was a resounding success for Jhumpa Lahiri, but she didn’t let that go to her head. Get an insight into this down-to-earth writer in her interview with the Washington Post in 2003.

Now combine her craft with that of the brilliant Mira Nair.

Salaam Bombay, Monsoon Wedding, Mississippi Masala and Vanity Fair (ironically, I just wrote about it in my March 1st post on the Bollywood craze among young white Brits.) Watch those films, and I need say no more.

I wonder how much the film will depart from the novel, though. According to IMDb, the film is a comedy/drama. The novel really didn't strike me as comedic, so - must wait and see.

Nair gave a very nice interview on Fresh Air with Terry Gross on Tuesday. You can listen to it here.

Finally, the face behind the voice!!

This is the voice of Eliza Dolittle in "My Fair Lady." This is who you heard in "West Side Story" as Maria. And she is also the voice behind Anna in "The King and I."

She is Marni Nixon, the woman whose voice supported Audrey, Natalie and Deborah in the musical film roles. I've only seen Marni in a little (singing) role as one of the nuns in The Sound of Music, complaining about the problem (like Maria.)

Now 77, Mrs. Nixon is in the New York Philharmonic’s concert-style revival of "My Fair Lady" at Lincoln Center this week.

Here's the story.

30 minutes? Try a dish in 30 SECONDS.

On Saturday morning, I caught an episode of Jacques Pepin’s public television show, Fast Food My Way, and felt a renewed appreciation for the skill, mastery and frugality of this elegant chef’s creations.

He opens each show with a simple dish whipped out in about 30 seconds!

There’s a cold black bean soup, which begins with a can of black beans pureed in a food processor with garlic, olive oil and hot sauce, then garnished with a little bit of sour cream, cilantro, sliced banana and crushed tortillas.

In the episode I watched, he tossed canned sliced beets with salt, pepper and sour cream, and set them on a bed of endive leaves. Took him about 15 very calm seconds, delivered in his reassuring voice.

I had the great pleasure of meeting and chatting with him (“please call me Jacques!”) last November at a private gathering and demonstration the night before his Yakima Town Hall lecture. We talked a little bit about his show, about Singapore food (it’s impossible to talk about Singapore without the subject of food coming up fairly quickly), and ingredients: we both agreed that the egg is completely underrated in American cooking. Apart from breakfast dishes, how often do you see eggs as the star of an entrée? He told me about a couple of simple sauces that elevate the humble egg. I told him about the days when I raised chickens on a mix of free range, vegetable scraps and grain, and was totally spoiled by having an unlimited access to fresh eggs with yolks so orange my cakes almost looked like they had food coloring added. It was something to which Jacques could relate from his boyhood in France.

Throughout the evening, Jacques showed a frugal sensibility, which also comes across on the show. He peppered his demonstration mentioning how much one could save by using one ingredient instead of another with no sacrifice in taste. Or, as he took the wings off a whole chicken and turned them inside out to form a “lollipop,” quickly calculated it would cost $6.50 as an appetizer in a restaurant. THAT, my friends, is a real chef – one who keeps a constant eye on the bottom line.

So I share now Jacques’ tips on the economical use of mushrooms.

The simple button mushroom, he said, has at least as much flavor as the more expensive varieties.



We’ve heard that the way to pick mushrooms in the store is to look for those with tight caps, with no separation from the stem. Yet Jacques said he often looks for the mushrooms in the bargain bin, a little past display prime, but with even more flavor with their age. And they're very cheap, to boot!

I can support the bit about flavor. There was once when I left a paper bag of these mushrooms on my counter before leaving on a vacation. When I came back, the caps had shriveled, but hadn’t gone bad. I tossed them into a pot of water with other vegetables and ended up with the richest vegetable broth I have ever made. Following that discovery, in the summer I sometimes dry mushrooms exactly like that, in a paper bag. They make particularly rich sauces and stews. (None of the local supermarkets has a bargain bin that I know of; but there is one in the food co-op - I should start paying more attention to what it has to offer.)

Jacques’ other fungus tip: - it’s okay to wash the little guys. Merci beaucoup!!! Wiping mushrooms with a damp cloth – it’s just too Martha for me. And if you’ve ever examined the amount of gunk that washes off those caps, you’d get rid of them damp cloth and dunk the ‘shrooms in a bowl of water too. But Jacques did say it’s key to wash them only immediately before use.

I’ll write more about my meeting with Jacques Pepin in future posts. Meantime, if you haven’t watched his show or read any of his books, I highly recommend them. He’s the real deal, trained in the old school where chefs had to start at the very bottom of the brutal kitchen hierarchy and work their way up by grueling labor and mastery of technique. He was a chef before it was a fashionable and lucrative career. In this day of celebrity chefs, it’s so refreshing to see a modest yet utterly charming gentleman go about his work without bluster. May the culinary world raise more of his ilk.

Teens Accused of Making Ostrich Impotent

This Associated Press story comes from Germany, where three teenagers could face a hefty fine if a court finds their firecrackers scared the libido right out of an ostrich named Gustav.

The bird’s owner claims that fireworks set off by the boys made the previously lustful Gustav both apathetic and depressed, and thus unable to perform for a half-a-year with his two female breeding partners.

The farmer estimates he lost out on 14 ostrich offspring -- worth $460 apiece.

Here’s the full story.

No word if manufacturers of ED drugs are interested in helping Gustav.

Last post on "literally." I promise.

I found some information on how the poor word came to its current state of abuse, and apparently it goes back a very long way!! Check out these articles:

Robert Fulford's column

Jesse Scheidlower: The Word We Love to Hate. Literally.

Abusers include Louisa May Alcott, Mark Twain, and F. Scott Fitzgerald! I had no idea. Never really noticed it until the last couple of years, frankly. Wonder if the misuse has just accelerated dramatically.

Like, literally.

It just occured to me (duh!) that like is often used where the speaker means something occurred literally , e.g.:

"The icicles were, like, falling off the roof."

Often people say literally in situations where something is like another thing, e.g.:

"My hands and feet were literally burning." ("My hands and feet felt like they were burning.") Or: "She was literally a father and mother to him." (Only one case where this could apply, that I know of - Cartman!!)

Another example of a constantly changing language: last week on Fresh Air I heard Maureen Corrigan's review of Ben Yagoda's When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It. She mentioned Pimp My Ride, where the first word has morphed from noun to verb, and the last word from verb to noun.

My faith restored! Literally.

For the last couple of days, Morning Edition has carried stories that somehow related to my posts written the day before. Funny how that happens.

Today, it's a big hurrah for NPR's Renee Montagne for correct usage of literal! She introduced a story was about a material that allows light to pass through as easily as it goes through air; that is to say, with no glare. Renee Montagne correctly used literally:

“The following story is no reflection on you. Literally, in this case. Scientists in New York have used nanotechnology to create an optical coating that virtually eliminates the reflection when you shine a light on it.”

The first time I’ve heard it used correctly in a long time.

Read or listen to the story, New Material Makes the Most of Light.

And to further my hope for a better future for the word literal, Northwest Public Radio's Robin Rilette just asked me if she could get on the studio computer to check something, saying "it will literally take me one minute."

I'm going to have a nice Friday.

Illiterate about "literal."

What has happened to the word literal?

For one thing, it’s become very popular. While flipping channels over a ten-minute period one afternoon, I heard it at least 6 times, incorrectly, in every instance. Literally! One example:

“My brain was literally on fire.”

I get irony, really. But it seems to me that more often than not, the word literal is used by people who think it means the exact opposite.

From the web site Common Errors in English by WSU's Paul Brians: “literally has been so overused as a sort of vague intensifier that it is in danger of losing its literal meaning. It should be used to distinguish between a figurative and a literal meaning of a phrase."

How did this happen, I wonder?

Something similar happened with déjà vu. It was funny when Yogi Berra used redundancy: “it was déjà vu all over again.” It caught on, but eventually most people who used that phrase had no clue of the joke - or if they did, gave no indication they were in on the irony. For years now, that phrase has irked me. It’s just not funny anymore.

So, back to literal.

“I was, like, literally heartbroken!” (The dead continue to speak!)

“My head like, literally exploded.” (And the mouth still can’t, like, shut up?)

“My skin was literally crawling.” (Where to? The flayed look is so last millennium.)

Oh, for goodness’ sake. Like and literal are not synonyms, not by a long shot! Using them together in sentences annoys me greatly! LITERALLY!!!!!! It grates on my nerves. Figuratively.

I have to wonder: is there a link between like and literal?

Given the gross overuse of like, in cases where one might have heard such as, compared to, as in, et cetera….can we detect a growing inability to use language accurately? Or perhaps, people speak with exaggeration and hyperbole as a matter of course, so much so they've found they need a way to say when they really mean something?

I still would love to know how this misuse began, so if anyone has answers, share and enlighten, please!

You know what prompted me to write this tirade?

Yesterday afternoon on the program The World,” the guest host said of the son of a late musician from Mali: “He’s literally following in his father’s footsteps.” (Read or listen to it here.) I waited to hear where exactly the son was trekking, retracing his father’s footsteps. I was disappointed. Of course, the son was following in the father’s figurative career footsteps.

And this on PUBLIC RADIO!! That, for me, was the last straw. (The last straw that literally broke the camel's back? I'm KNOW I read or heard that somewhere lately!)

Ye gods.

I really don’t know how literal came to be so abused. But apparently, I am far from alone in my irritation. After I started writing this, I Googled misuse word literal – and lo and behold, 380,000 results!

This one is fun: an “English language grammar blog tracking abuse of the word literally”: Literally, A Web Log. Some hysterical examples collected on this site, such as she literally jumped out of her skin. Worth a few good laughs!

A brief digression to the word like. I tried my best to reduce its egregious use by my children, a couple of summers ago. Each time they used the word meaninglessly, as a filler, the offending party would be fined a nickel. If I did it, the fine was a quarter. (We used the money for ice cream at the end of the summer.) The exercise didn't obliterate the word from our home, but my sons, at least, don't pepper their speech liberally with the word. With my daughter, corrections are still required on occasion.

Maybe my next goal should be to discourage the misuse of literal and literally. I want to encourage the use of the following in its place: practically, virtually, actually, really. Or use nothing at all, in sentences such as I [literally] couldn't wait for the show to start.

Rant over. I feel much better! Literally!

Happy birthday, Cat in the Hat!

Dr. Seuss created the character 50 years ago today.

I swear, I didn't know that when I wrote the titles to the last two posts!

Morning Edition investigated the genesis of The Cat this morning.

Happy Birthday, Cat in the Hat!

Jolly Good, Bollywood!

Fish and chips have been supplanted by chicken tikka masala as Britain's favorite dish. And now comes the news that the country's South Asian wave has hit the theater and popular culture. The BBC reports Bollywood dancing has really caught on in Yorkshire.

White English youths are crazy about it in this northern county. We're talking about James Herriot territory, here! The land of Siegfried, James and Tristan!

Young Yorshire folk love Bollywood dancing, described as "a fusion of Indian classical dancing with Western dance moves".

"It's exciting, its physically testing, it's graceful and above all it's fun," says one teenager, auditioning to dance in a play called Bollywood Jane.

Alastair Lawson writes, "It seems as if the people of Yorkshire have embraced Bollywood with the same kind of enthusiasm that many cricket fans in India have for the batsman Geoffrey Boycott. The mention of his name in India still prompts the refrain of "eh up Geoffrey".

Relations between the two cultures have not always been cordial. I was reminded of this recently when I watched David Lean's A Passage to India, and re-read E.M. Forster's novel of the same title. Another recent movie night, I discovered Lagaan, a good example of the ambigious relationship between the Indians and their colonizers. Still, the cultural flow of ideas between the two peoples has been rich, with examples ranging from mundane to profound. Did you know it was the British who are responsible for the word curry? Hard to imagine curry coming from anyone but Asians, isn't it?

Indian song and dance seem an excellent addition to Britain's culture.

One of my favorite movies, Gurinder Chadha's Bride and Prejudice, successfully translated a beloved English novel into the Bollywood idiom. Director Mira Nair brought some Indian elements into her film of Thackeray's Vanity Fair. That may have betrayed authenticity, but the result was visually very appealing.

Very much my cuppa chai.

How Now Low Dow?

Wow!

Ow.

Wish I could take credit for the great headline, but it's by Slate's Daniel Gross.

The piece is about Tuesday's sharp plunge in the markets.

Read the article here.

Could this gain the same notoriety of the Variety headline in 1935, Sticks Nix Hick Pix?

Viva assonance!

Not my cup of tea, but...

I would never dream of going to a place like Robert's Steak House on West 45th Street in Manhattan, for any number of reasons. But I always enjoy good, funny writing. Frank Bruni's review carries the wonderful heading, "Where Only the Salad is Properly Dressed."

Havens for Italy's Abandoned Babies Go Hi-Tech

Every now and then we get a news story about live babies found abandoned, sometimes in disgusting places - dumpsters, public bathrooms. What’s most surprising is when these cases take place in states such as Washington, where there is a “safe haven” law.

This law permits a person -- usually a parent -- to abandon a newborn baby at certain places, such as hospitals, police stations or firehouses. The first state to enact the law was Texas, in 1999. As of 2006, all but 4 states had similar laws, bearing names such as Safe Place, Baby Moses Law, Safe Arms for Newborns, Safe Delivery, Safe Surrender.

In Washington state, the law states a baby up to 3 days old may be abandoned without penalty if given to an employee or volunteer at a fire station or hospital. With such a shield, it's hard to know why people continue to dump their infants anywhere other than the places specified. Ignorance? Sheer callousness? Who's to know.

This sort of thing goes back to Biblical times, when Pharoah ordered the drowning of every newborn Hebrew boy. The mother of Moses put him in a basket, nestled it in the reeds in the Nile. He was found and adopted, by no less than Pharoah's daughter.

The Middle Ages devised the “foundling wheel” which allowed women to deposit their offspring without being seen.

And now technology has transformed the foundling wheel in Italy. It's a sophisticated system to provide for the safety of abandoned newborns. In today’s New York Times, Elisabetta Povoledo writes:

“Now a Rome hospital, the Casilino Polyclinic, has introduced a technologically advanced version of the foundling wheel — not at all a wheel but very much like an A.T.M. booth. For the first time a new mother left her baby there on Saturday night, and on Monday the child, a boy about 3 months old, was doing well.”

"The baby was deposited in a small structure equipped with a heated cradle and lifesaving instruments, including a respirator.

"As in bygone days, it is possible for a woman to leave a baby without being seen, but the moment the child is abandoned an alarm goes off in the hospital’s emergency room, ensuring that the baby receives immediate first aid from a team of specialists."

Here’s the whole article: Updating an Old Way to Leave the Baby on the Doorstep.

I found this interesting: Povoledo says, "many common family names in Italy can be traced to a foundling past: Esposito (because children were sometimes “exposed” on the steps of a convent), Proietti (from the Latin proicio, to throw away) or Innocenti (as in innocent of their father’s sin)."

And back to Washington state: just last month, a baby was abandoned on the steps of a Mount Vernon church. Here’s the Seattle Post Intelligencer’s report.

Here are some links:

Safe Place for Newborns

religioustolerance.org
(Their page on this topic has information on the history, enactment and effectiveness of safe haven laws.)

Great concert, Wenatchee!

What a pleasure to host another concert of the Wenatchee Valley Symphony. Maestro Marty Zyskowski conducted a great program. It opened with Sousa's Liberty Bell March, which was used as the opening them of Monty Python's Flying Circus. As I told the audience, that piece was written with the title of The Devil's Deputy. It didn't sit well with Sousa's band manager. The name change was a good idea!

After the opening, the Wenatchee High School Percussion section, clad in their purle and yellow uniforms, came onstage with their director Jim Kovach, to join in John Williams's music for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. The scoring also called for a celeste and piano. This was the only piece keyboardist Jill had to be perform that night.

The orchestra made us feel nostalgic with The Sound of Music by Rodgers and Hammerstein, and Mancini Memories with selections from Breakfast at Tiffany's and Hatari.

In researching Offenbach's Orpheus in the Underworld I discovered that the operetta was even funnier than I remembered - in fact, it's a complete send-up of the Greek legend. In this version, Eurydice is not in love with Orpheus. So much so she’s having an affair with someone else! She moans and complains and tries to get out of her relationship, which is fine with Orpheus, who's much more in love with his fiddle....but a character named Public Opinion will not stand for it. So Orpheus is forced to get rid of his wife's lover. But in the madcap attempt, Eurydice dies as an unintended event. Orpheus is quite all right with it, but Public Opinion is decidely not. Now Orpheus he has to go into Hades and get Eurydice back.

It's truly a madcap romp from Mount Olympus to Hades and back, and the operetta gave us lots of catchy melodies. Who among us isn't tempted to hum along to the Can-Can?

After intermission, the WVS gave an excellent performance of Dvorak's 9th Symphony, better known as the New World Symphony. As I told the audience, it was written in the late 1800s, when there wasn't a distinctly American form of classical music. New Yorker Jeanette Thurber did some pretty clever fundraising to start the National Conservatory to pursue this. Ironically, they hired a Czech to create this American sound! But what a sound. People who heard the spiritual "Going Home" would say, "oh, that's where Dvorak got that lovely theme." Fact is, the melody was written by Dvorak, and borrowed to create the spiritual! What a gorgeous melody. No wonder this is One Of The Most Beloved Symphonies Ever Written.

A lively encore of Sousa's Stars and Stripes Forever closed another great concert.

Then, it was time for coffee and dessert.



And time to visit with listeners.




Above: That's our station manager Roger Johnson in the black suit, with listeners taking a look at our display with pictures of radio personalities, both national hosts and those at Northwest Public Radio.



Above: I spoke to longtime NWPR supporters and classical music fans Larry and Penny Tobiska.

We couldnt' have put on the reception without the help of volunteers. Thanks, guys!

Here are some of those terrific volunteers, with our Woman in Wenatchee, Rita Brown (with the name tag.)



For all the exuberant performances and humor in the music, though, there was a tinge of sadness around the edges of this evening. The concert was dedicated to a member of the symphony, violinist Angela Schuster Svendsen. The former Young Artist winner was killed in a car accident this month. Angela was 31.

I was also very sad to hear that conductor Marty Zyskowski's wife Char is struggling with cancer. I met Char last year and enjoyed chatting with her. She's a cheerful, sunny woman. This illness is very hard on her as well as for Marty. You are both in my thoughts and prayers.

Prayers and good thoughts also to my Northwest Public Radio colleague in Wenatchee, sales executive Kathy Allen, undergoing treatment for brain cancer. Kathy was previously with the Wenatchee Downtown Association before joining us in October last year, and is a well-known person in Wenatchee. She's mother of a toddler, and sister-in-law to a former NWPR employee, Kelly Allen (you may remember her show, Saturday Jazz.) An account has been set up for Kathy at People's Bank. If you'd like to make a donation, you can do so at any branch. It's really been heartbreaking to all of us at NWPR; needless to say, we're all rooting for you, Kathy.

And looking ahead now to the final concert of the Wenatchee Valley Symphony's 60th year: that will be on April 15th, with pianist Dr. Jody Graves. The birthday celebration begins with a silent auction at 6PM, and of course, there'll be cake! So, good folks of Wenatchee, turn out and help your great orchestra have a successful fundraiser. They get better every time I hear them, and with your support, they can continue to bloom and grow, bloom and grow, for-e........ver...... (Well, they were playing Edelweiss tonight! I get my inspiration where I can.)

News Bits and Pieces.

A headline in South Korea: Olympic skier Toby Dawson, adopted by an American couple at an orphanage in Seoul when he was three years old, has been reunited with his biological father. Dawson's adoption story received international attention when he won the bronze in Moguls At the Turin Olympics in 2006. That's when dozens of South Koreans came forward, claiming to be his biological parents (Don't they know about DNA testing?) The BBC reports Dawson has "mixed feelings" about meeting the bus driver who says Toby was stolen from him at a street fair.

Costco is tightening its money-back return policy on electronics, because the wholesaler (based in Issaquah, WA) was losing "tens of millions of dollars" in returns. Read the full story in the Seattle P-I.

Krispy Kreme is now making WHOLE WHEAT doughnuts! No word on what the glaze will contain. I saw this Associated Press story on the Washington Post.

Pizza burger, burger pizza. Pizza taco, taco pizza. More and more, restaurant chains are offering mashups of unhealthy food options, making them even unhealthier in the process. Health and nutrition advocates call these creations hybrid horribles. Here's the Los Angeles Times report.

Truly Regal.

I missed the Oscar show last night, while having a great time with the Wenatchee Valley Symphony (more on that coming, soon as I get a hold of some pictures from the evening.) Caught some news clips on TV this morning, and was happy to see a royal pair of wins, so to speak: Forest Whitaker for "The Last King of Scotland, and Helen Mirren for The Queen.

As stars go, Dame Helen is in a constellation all her own, as far as I'm concerned. It's somewhat strange that for her supreme acting, she hasn't been awarded an Oscar till now. I was absorbed in her brilliant, multi-dimensional performances, among them as Detective Chief Inspector Jane Tennison in the Prime Suspect series, as Ayn Rand in The Passion of Ayn Rand, and in Gosford Park, Calendar Girls, and lately, as queens Elizabeth I and Elizabeth II.

But there's so much to enjoy about Helen Mirren apart from her supreme craft. There's always a cheeky sense about her, of which I caught a glimpse on Oprah's day-after-the-Oscars show.



(image from from oprah.com)

See her black T-shirt in this photo? I couldn't make out everything on it, but did decipher these words in a close-up shot:

lah dee dah

As Meryl Streep sang out upon meeting Helen Mirren recently, "There's Nothing Like a Dame!"

On the Road Again!

I'm off to Wenatchee tomorrow to emcee a concert of the Wenatchee Valley Symphony tomorrow. While the Oscars are being presented, Marty Zyskowski conducts a program of "Classics, Movies and More!" John Williams, Henry Mancini, Rodgers and Hammerstein - along with Dvorak's New World Symphony and the overture to Offenbach's "Orpheus in the Underworld."

It's a four-hour drive to Wenatchee, but I always look forward to getting out into our listener communities.

Northwest Public Radio is treating concert-goers to post-symphony dessert and coffee, so if you're able to join us at the Wenatchee High School auditorium starting at 7PM (Sunday), please stop by and say hello.

Sorority Fights Stereotypes, Boots Out Non-Conformists

The New York Times reports in Sunday's edition that the Delta Zeta sorority was so concerned about what DePauw students perceived about that house on the Indiana campus, it was moved to action.

Sam Dillon writes:

"Worried that a negative stereotype of the sorority was contributing to a decline in membership that had left its Greek-columned house here half empty, Delta Zeta’s national officers interviewed 35 DePauw members in November, quizzing them about their dedication to recruitment. They judged 23 of the women insufficiently committed and later told them to vacate the sorority house.

"The 23 members included every woman who was overweight. They also included the only black, Korean and Vietnamese members. The dozen students allowed to stay were slender and popular with fraternity men — conventionally pretty women the sorority hoped could attract new recruits. Six of the 12 were so infuriated they quit.

“Virtually everyone who didn’t fit a certain sorority member archetype was told to leave,” said Kate Holloway, a senior who withdrew from the chapter during its reorganization."

What on earth were they thinking, that being overweight or a racial minority amounts to a negative image?

Dillon writes:

"Asked for clarification, the sorority’s public relations representative e-mailed a statement saying its actions were aimed at the “enrichment of student life at DePauw.”

Well, can't wait to see how they explain that one.

Now that Delta Zeta's actions have caught national attention, that ought to take care of any "negative stereotype", then, eh?

Here's a link to the whole article.

Weather we should depend on the meteorologist.

All it takes a few warm, sunny February days, and people start thinking of spring. You see them buying seed packets and little potting trays.

Ah, the folly. Every year the false promise of spring dupes many of us into putting away the parka and snow shovel a few weeks too early.

Yesterday the Inland Northwest saw a resurgence of winter weather, with snow and rain across the region. Still, residents of the Palouse were not quite prepared for heavy snow that blanketed the area rapidly in the afternoon. I was sitting in a doctor’s office with my son between 3 and 4, when big snowflakes began swirling. By the time we were done with the appointment, my car was covered with nearly an inch of the stuff!

Last night, I received an e-mail on the subject, from a listener who works on the Washington State University campus in Pullman. It reads, in part:

“…I realize that we have listeners all over the area but I assume it originates here & we like to know what weather to expect. Like today, we received no warning of this, pardon the pun, ‘coldsnow’.”

This, in part, was my reply:

“...to your complaint that I did not give any warning of snow in the afternoon, let me show you the 4AM National Weather Service forecast for the Palouse, which I used to prepare my announcement:

IDZ003-WAZ033-222300-
IDAHO PALOUSE-WASHINGTON PALOUSE-INCLUDING THE CITIES OF...MOSCOW...PULLMAN
402 AM PST THU FEB 22 2007

TODAY: SNOW IN THE MORNING...THEN RAIN OR SNOW BY MIDDAY.
SNOW ACCUMULATION OF 1 TO 2 INCHES ABOVE 2500 FEET THIS MORNING. (emphasis mine.) HIGHS IN THE LOWER 40S. SOUTHEAST WIND 10 TO 15 MPH IN THE MORNING SHIFTING TO THE WEST IN THE AFTERNOON. CHANCE OF PRECIPITATION 90 PERCENT.

As you can see, there was no indication that the area would be hit hardest with snow in the afternoon. In fact, I was out with my young child when the snow began coming down hard, caught unawares as many other people were.”

I forgot to tell the listener that the updated forecast issued at 6:30AM showed no change to the forecast; that only came at 3:30PM:

IDZ003-WAZ033-231145-
IDAHO PALOUSE-WASHINGTON PALOUSE-INCLUDING THE CITIES OF...MOSCOW...PULLMAN
332 PM PST THU FEB 22 2007

TONIGHT: MOSTLY CLOUDY WITH NUMEROUS SNOW SHOWERS THROUGH EARLY EVENING...THEN SCATTERED SNOW SHOWERS. SNOW ACCUMULATION NEAR AN INCH MAINLY ABOVE 2000 FEET. LOWS IN THE MID 20S. WEST WIND 10 TO 15 MPH. CHANCE OF PRECIPITATION 70 PERCENT.

But get this: a snow advisory for the Palouse, sent at – 7PM!!!

IDZ003-004-WAZ033-230600-
/O.CON.KOTX.SN.Y.0011.000000T0000Z-070223T0600Z/
IDAHO PALOUSE-CENTRAL PANHANDLE MOUNTAINS-WASHINGTON PALOUSE-INCLUDING THE CITIES OF...MOSCOW...ST. MARIES...KELLOGG ...PINEHURST...OSBURN...WALLACE...MULLAN...PULLMAN
658 PM PST THU FEB 22 2007

...SNOW ADVISORY REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 10 PM PST THIS EVENING ABOVE 2500 FEET...

At my house just east of Moscow, the snow was pretty much done by the time that advisory was issued. Then again, I don't know what conditions were in the areas to the north of the Palouse named in the advisory, and they may well have had to deal with snowfall until 10PM. More on my reply to the Pullman listener:

“Had the weather service revised its forecast at any point during my shift (which ends at 9AM), the information would most certainly have been announced. I take this responsibility seriously, but the reality is, I am not a meteorologist; I depend on forecasts from the National Weather Service for information to relay to listeners.”

I’ve worked at Northwest Public Radio for 14 years now, and the subject of HOW to deliver weather forecasts has been a big debate the whole time. Just take a look at the size of our coverage area, and that explains part of the problem. If we had unlimited time to discuss the weather vagaries from Puget Sound to the Blue Mountains, from British Columbia to the Camas Prairie of Idaho, that would be one thing: but in radio, we have so much to say and so little time in which to do it. Live and die by the clock!

That said, many's the afternoon I've taken my dogs on a long walk, following a whole morning announcing a forecast of partly sunny skies. I've ended those afternoons drenched, shivering...and absolutely mortified.

So, the meteorologists have some ways to go toward accuracy, though I'll say they do a good job most of the time. With all their fancy satellite images and moving maps, it's hard to remember they don't control the speed and direction of a jet stream!

That being said, I am always open to comments and suggestions. REALLY.

Meantime, you can follow this link to the latest weather forecast for your area on the Northwest Public Radio website.

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Turning a La Scala Tradition on its Ear.

As I prepped for my shift this morning with the BBC World Service in the background, my ears perked up at the mention of La Scala. The host was saying the world's premiere opera house has all sorts of rules, such as: you can’t wear purple there (I wish he said why!), and no encores, except on special days.

Bear in mind, an encore in an Italian opera house is not the same as an encore in most places – that is, at the very end of the concert. Rather, their version of an encore (a French word) is called bis (the Italian word for again, as in biscotti, the twice-baked cookie.) The bis is done in the manner of an instant replay. The audience doesn’t want to wait for the very end of the opera (or even an act of the opera). So with prolonged applause, cheering and calls of “bis! bis!” the conductor picks up the aria again, and the singer pipes up - this time usually out of character. I’ve read that the bis has been requested at the end of a death scene, which entails the now-dead character resurrecting temporarily to appease audience demand, then reassuming the death pose when the opera action resumes. As I’ve noted in previous posts, ludicrousness is just one of the things that make me love opera so! But Toscanini hated the way these encores broke the flow of an opera and put a ban on the practice.

Anyway, back to this week’s breach of the 74-year old bis ban.

On Tuesday night’s performance of La Fille du Regiment by Donizetti, rising Peruvian tenor Juan Diego Florez stirred the La Scala crowd in the aria Ah mes amis that has NINE high C’s! Count them! The applause went on for four, five minutes. The conductor caved. Picked up the baton, Juan let ‘er rip – and Toscanini rolled in his grave.

The BBC talked to opera critic Michael White about the incident this morning. He’s always very entertaining. He said Juan Diego Florez has immense appeal. “He looks like Errol Flynn,” said White.



As a point of comparison, White mentioned another top-notch young tenor, the Mexican Rolando Villazon, every bit as accomplished as Diego Florez. But, White said, he's not likely to cause the same stir, because "he looks like Mr. Bean!”



You decide.


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