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Bozo the Clown Dead....

Bozo the Clown is dead; Long Live Bozos!
Larry Harmon, who purchased the rights to Bozo from Capitol Records, is dead at 83. Harmon's franchise spawned a worldwide spewing of Bozos only recently diminished by the decline in such TV franchises. Despite Harmon's attempt to corner the Bozo market the name has entered the lexicon and "bozo" has come to mean " a man who is a stupid incompetent fool" or "an informal term for a youth or man; 'a nice guy'".

(MP3 "Down With the Clown" attached below)




Tags:clowns,bozo the clown,bozo,bozos,larry harmon

Dugout Paddlers Off For Florida...

Middletown Press reports today:

MIDDLETOWN — With a grey-clouded sky over the river five brave boaters set out for Key West in dugout canoes Thursday.

Setting forth in two handcrafted dugouts, Captain George Frick and four crew members headed down the Connecticut River towards Saybrook and the open water beyond. They are then to head down Long Island Sound to New York and then traverse the Inland (IntraCoastal) Waterway to Florida, a journey that will take about 6 weeks. We reported earlier on the making of the canoes and on an earlier trip down river to Greenport, Long Island. The photo at top is from an earlier excursion on the river and the one below is a view of two incomplete dugouts taken in Harbor Park, Middletown last year. A full account of the earlier trip can be read here and here (PDF). The top photo is from that site.

Here is an excerpt from a web site documenting the building of the canoes:

THE PROJECT
Getting the tree
An Eastern cottonwood tree -- 60 feet in length and 12 feet in circumference -- had been
identified on Wilcox Island under the Arrigoni Bridge. Ron Klattenberg, Middletown City
Council member and project organizer, observed that there were several auspicious signs
for this project. The first was the weather. The massive tree identified to be cut down for the
project fell during a storm; then subsequent days of rain helped wash the tree trunk down
parallel to the river for launching.
The cottonwood was floated downriver to Harbor Park in Middletown. Clients went
upriver to watch the process. Not only were the clients watching, so were police, fire and
Coast Guard boats. Everyone marveled at how George Frick, president of Friends of the
Connecticut River, was able to manage to straddle the tree without falling off, then to bring
it to shore.
Crafting the canoe: Trial and error
Now it was time for the AIC clients to begin the arduous and grueling process of chopping,
burning, and carving the tree into a canoe. Under the guidance of George Frick and Ron
Klattenberg, the young men set to work hollowing and carving out the dugout canoe. For
a month they burned the wood to make it soft, then dug out the tree, all the while using
primitive tools. Each day they carved, cooked lunch over the burning embers, then carved
some more. While there are no historical records as to how the Indians in fact crafted these
boats, Frick had some knowledge of the methods and type of shape that would be necessary
to make this journey successful.

Tags: dugout canoes,paddling to florida,connecticut river,middletown ct,george frick

Bird Mites and Human Infestation....

News articles today(here and video here) about a Long Island woman, infested with bird mites, who was taken from her home in a HazMat suit and put in quarantine isolation gave me quite a jolt. The woman was most likely infested by mites from an abandoned bird nest in her bathroom vent.

While I don't have any of the horrific symptoms of this type of bird mite infestation I live in close proximity to birds and regularly feed them. Birds, mainly sparrows and starlings, nest in the eaves, gutters and crannies of my house and I have several feeders on my porch. Doctors are quoted in the stories saying that, although the bird mites can cause extreme discomfort to humans they don't feed on humans, only attacking them when their bird host dies or leaves the nest.

Several websites (here and here) dealing with these pests strongly disagree with that assessment saying there are numerous instances of people driven to the brink of suicide by total household and personal infestation depriving them of sleep, causing constant torment. One man bought a parakeet in the hope that the mites would attack the bird and leave him alone. They got the poor bird alright, attacking it so hard that it had to be put down, but the pests remained in the home. Below is a photograph of a Northern fowl mite, one of several type of bird mites.



The Long Island woman, Nina Bradica, gave this account of her ordeal:

"My whole shower was covered with them," said Bradica, 45. "I didn't even know they were there at first, I was drying myself with my towel in the bathroom. That's how they got on me."

One of Bradica's doctors told CBS 2 HD bird mites can be a very severe problem.

"They can be a nuisance and some people have been infected for years with these bird mites and have had difficulty eradicating them," said Dr. Kenneth Steier.
Added Dr. Shadab Ahmed of Nassau Medical Center, "They can stick to the body. They are extremely tiny. I just sent three to be tested to the parasitology lab for identification."

Doctors say there is absolutely no public health hazard. Mites can't feed off human skin and will eventually drop off, but until then …
Bradica tried to describe her discomfort.

"They do go inside you. They go in your nose. They go in your ears. They go in your mouth."
she is covered with welts and red bumps and wonders if her home will ever be livable again.

Tags: bird mites,human bird mite infestation,birds,bird feeders,bird nest in home,household pests

Barack Obama at Wesleyan Commencement....

This will be a blog posting on the fly today. First a photo essay (a beautiful day for photography by the way) from Obama's appearance at Wesleyan University in Middletown to give the 176th annual commencement address in place of the ailing Ted Kennedy. Following the photos there will be an 8 minute video of the event and later I will add some comments about the address and also about remarks by President Michael Roth.

Funny, Obama thought he was at Wellesley; listen at around 6:10 in the video. (Omitted from the Obama campaign official You Tube video posted on Wesleying blog) And the Courant's blogger Melissa Pionzio thought she was at Palmer Field instead of Andrus Field ("Well, I'm here sitting under the trees on the side of Palmer field where the Wesleyan Commencement ceremonies will begin in about 45 minutes.") She also seems alarmed by the obvious presence of heavily armed security agents:

"There appears to be sharp shooters of some kind atop the glass connection between the campus chapel and I think Judd Hall (home of the psychology dept.) They are in black, with their arms folded - looks like there are about four of them. A woman with binoculars behind me confirmed that they have rifles up there, yikes!!

The following video runs a little over 8 minutes:

Tags: barack obama at wesleyan,barack obama,ted kennedy,wesleyan university,middletown ct,wesleyan commencement,global warming,climate change,progressive politics,michael roth,wesleying,

All Quiet Now on Wesleyan Campus....

In the few days following the tumultuous events of last week (the police student confrontation*), peace has returned to the campus just in time for next weekend's reunion and commencement celebrations. Following is a portion of the university's announcement about the 176th Commencement. Senator Ted Kennedy was scheduled to be the speaker but his appearance remains doubtful because of recent health issues.

The 176th Commencement Ceremony (11 AM May 25)
The Commencement Ceremony will be available live by Webcast. Please go to http://wescast.wesleyan.edu for details about how you can view the ceremony.
A live broadcast of the Commencement ceremony will be available in the Memorial Chapel, Patricelli '92 Theater, Crowell Concert Hall, and Tishler Lecture Hall (Room 150), Exley Sciene Center, rain or shine. The ceremony may also be viewed online. Please check this site for details the week of May 18, 2008.
In case of inclement weather, you may also call the main University number at 860/685-2000 to determine whether or not the University will institute the rain plan for the Commencement Ceremony.

*The student-police clash created great controversy and charges and counter charges are in the air and on the blogosphere. We reported on it on Right of Middle; Wesleying blog has been all over it; Ed McKeon at Cauterwaled weighed in; the student run Wesleyan Argus published a special edition, also see Hartford Courant and Middletown Press.

On April 6 last we reported on an incident involving several students and one Middletown police officer.

Finally, an historical note regarding Wesleyan town/gown, police/student relations: On May Day 1954 following a veterans parade on Washington Street there occurred a near riot on campus. Right of Middle reported (April 30, 2007):

....events of the previous Sunday (Loyalty Day) when some Wesleyan students clashed with police and VFW members during a parade through town and onto the campus. The disturbance garnered nationwide attention, with charges of subversion on campus....An informal band of students with musical instruments began to perform in front of the Delta Kappa Epsilon house. Other students with their instruments joined the band and they all marched on High St to Washington St where they turned around only to find themselves leading the VFW parade which had just come up Washington and turned onto High.....From this point forward confusion reigned. Police, in attempting to clear the streets for the marchers, were accused of undue roughness although it was evident that a number of students provoked the officers. At least one student, Terry Hatter, was taken into custody; other students refused to doff their hats when the flag passed and were rebuked by police.

The commotion continued onto Andrus Field, The Argus reported::

The police then began to disperse the students. the marchers who had been standing on the other side of the stret started to cross the steet, saying something about “un-peace” apparently in reference to the sign. By the time they had reached the other side the students had been herded into the house by the police. The bulk of the paraders had reached Andrus field by this time and were awaiting the start of the speeches. Several inquisitive students had gathered behind Denison Terrace to view the proceedings. It was this time that the German Swastika flag, a trophy brought to Wesleyan by a veteran paratrooper after the war, was seen hanging from a dormitory window. The flag had been brought to the dormitory from the Alpha Delta Phi house, where it had been hanging for about twenty minutes. The Alpha Delta had gotten the flag from students who had been dissuaded from hanging it at the Beta Theta Pi house. (The Argus from the period-pdf)

Ahh youth....Happy Spring and Best Wishes to all new grads,,,We return to serenity below....



Steadyjohn photos
Tags: wesleyan u,mddletown ct,police student clash,students riot,police brutality

Connecticut's Largest Tree....

Although the world's largest living organism is a fungus in Oregon it, sadly for observers, is almost entirely underground. Not so the Pinchot Sycamore on the east bank of the Farmington River in Weataug (Simsbury). Standing tall at nearly 100 feet and with a circumference of over 28 feet this sycamore is the largest tree in Connecticut and the largest sycamore in New England. In the aerial view below the full canopy of the tree can be seen next the open area immediately to the right of the bridge at the road side.



In April 2000 the Hartford Courant described the tree and its surroundings:

Nobody knows exactly how old it is, but it is almost certainly two centuries old, and it may be three centuries old. It is named for Gifford Pinchot, a Simsbury native who became the first head of the U.S. Forest Service, a governor of Pennsylvania and co-founder of what today is the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies.....It is the state's largest tree of any kind, it is the largest sycamore in New England and, latest information suggests, it may be tied with a tree in Bath, Va., for honors as the largest sycamore in the United States. It appears to be healthy.

Tags: largest tree ct,farmington river,gifford pinchot,pinchot sycamore,simsbury ct