Dmitry

https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/musicians-irvin-mayfield-ronald-markham-plead-guilty-fraud-case

"I spent a lot of my money on alcohol, women and fast cars. As for the rest..., I just wasted it." George Best

Kevin, I loved reading your motorcycle resumé! I just now remembered how I drove a car-full of you guys from downtown Manhattan to Columbia University in my then brand new BMW 3 series through the NYC traffic. If I remember it right, we met Tom Evered in a cafe above FEZ on Lafayette. You guys had some uneven experiences on that ride. Was that in 1999 or 2000? Jackie McLean headlined that gig. That was our only time meeting each other.

You are lucky to be alive. This was a life-transforming experience...

I had to look it up. That is a huge motorcycle. It's 4x bigger engine, and weighs 2.5 as much as the one I practiced on. Kudos to you! I must say that one of the people who took the class with me was a young woman who never rode a motorcycle, but already bought a ~900cc HD cruiser. She was not a natural...I hope she does well with her machine. Others also had motorcycles prior to taking the course. I must've been one of the very small group that were complete newbies.

Last summer we spent 3 days in Nantucket, and rented a scooter for one of those days, which both my wife and me enjoyed. It was much more convenient than driving around the island. It was a Chinese 49 cc. plastic job, but it got us going at the top speed of 25 mph, which was good fun. Scooters have become rather popular; these days I see them more and more, not like in Europe, but more so than a a few year ago, for sure. I, too, decided to get a scooter, like a Vespa, to ride around our town, to the beach, to the supermarket, etc. Turned out, I needed to get a motorcycle license to ride anything over 50 cc. No problem, I'll get a license... Never been on a motorcycle before...ever. To get a permit, had to take a 2-day, 10 hour MSF hands-on riding course at the community college. First day was no fun, it was 35F, windy and pouring rain. That first session I really sucked, I didn't dump my bike, but it wasn't easy to keep up with the group, many of whom already had motorcycles, just needed to get licensed. They supplied us with 250cc Honda Rebels and 300cc dirt bikes in various states of cosmetic and mechanical repair. The one I picked had a small gas leak, the neutral was to be found only by luck, and it seemed kinda small for my 6ft frame. I barely finished the first day of exercises, and wasn't sure I'd pass the test. Second morning was a lot more pleasant, and that made a significant difference for me. Somewhere mid-way I knew that I will pass this damn test, calmed down, and started to ride much better. One of the instructors that second day paid much closer attention to how we were riding, and gave us pointers and suggestions on how to do things. which really helped me. He tried to get me to ride the taller dirt bike, but even though the Rebel was definitely on a smaller side for my comfort, I'd already gotten used to it, so I declined. The final riding test went smoothly for me, and the instructor told me I had one of the lowest scores, which is good, because they add points for infractions. I got my motorcycle permit, which honestly made me way more proud than getting some of the professional diplomas I've got on my office wall. Here's the odd part of it - with that permit I can ride for a month under the supervision of a 18 y.o. or older licensed motorcycle rider. After 30 days I can get a motorcycle license from the DMV. I expressed my amazement at the fact they were giving us these permits to ride on the thoroughfares , even though we only practiced in the community college parking lot. The instructor was on board with my apprehension, and informed me that in some states even that wasn't required, and Rhode Island was one of the tougher ones. So now that I've ridden a motorcycle, I'm kind of considering buying one, not a huge road machine, but a smaller, 250cc or a little bigger. Are any of you guys riders? What do you think about various manufacturers, which ones to get, which ones to be wary of? There are many great restored vintage bikes for sale around here. I'm still very unsure of my road-riding abilities, and would possibly go for the scooter first still...but I've got the Easy Rider bug now, for sure. Wife is not on board with it...

Barry Miles - Sky Train

He was awesome! An alpha male if there ever was one.

I've seen him live twice or three times over these 20 years; last time being in Smoke about 8 months ago with the Washingtons rhythm section. By no means can I call myself a keyboard authority, yet to these ears his playing is unimaginative, and predictably-boring. His "interpretations" of the American Songbook are automaton-like, and whatever compositions by or associated with Bill Evans that he lays his hands on just suck any kind of life out them. Every time I hear a molasses consistency standard on my Pandora Bill Evans station, I know it's him.

One of the big problems is that the curriculum is not set up for them to read books, and to discuss books in class, but rather to teach them how to pass the exams. I'm sure things have changed since your children were in school, but that's how it is now. Same goes for the foreign language part of the middle and high school curriculum. It's set up for students to not be actually able to speak a foreign language or at least to comprehend after several semesters, but instead, to pass the tests. Same daughter has an A- in Spanish, but couldn't compose a sentence when were in Spain. No learning disabilities there, they test kids for that up to wazoo. Just an average teenager with an iPhone.

You are one of the lucky ones. My daughter[18] just realized that her lack of interest in the written word is costing her big time - her practice SAT scores were significantly weighed down by the low Reading and Writing parts of the test. We are waiting on the results of the real SAT that she took 2 weeks ago. I'm not optimistic. I took a couple of these practice tests , just to see for myself, and they are not written for literacy-challenged.

Me and the missus just watched it yesterday. I had a sad vision as the documentary unraveled...perhaps unintentionally, but the film-maker exposed the doom awaiting the book trade. In my opinion, the real disaster will come in the next decade or two, when the generation of current schoolchildren grows up, and has nothing to offer to their own children. Сhildren and young people don't read books anymore. My own biggest failure is not being able to induce and interest my children in reading. No matter how much i've tried, they are not reading anything other than what's prescribed by their shitty school reading lists, which are fucking atrocious. I am afraid that I will have nothing to talk about with them when I will be old, not so long from now.

I didn't mean to turn this into a political discussion. It was more of a lament for yet another NYC icon to go into history, while the City is being sanitized and neutered. Hell, I had no idea who the owner of the Strand was until you guys told me. This Strand story now stinks reasonably badly for me - https://thebaffler.com/capital-offenses/hanging-by-a-strand-oconnor Also, in case you, like me, buy books from abebooks.com , they are an Amazon company. I just found that out recently. At least they give an opportunity for independent booksellers to advertise their stocks....

I did not know that. The building is worth tens of millions. East 12th Street and Broadway...can't get more"choice" than this location in all of the sub-Times Square NYC. The building is huge, probably 9 or ten stories. This puts somewhat of a different angle on this story for me. From the same article: A financial disclosure report from 2015 showed that Senator Wyden and his wife earned at least $2.5 million last year, and that did not include Wyden’s Senate salary of $174,000. The lion’s share of the income went to Nancy Bass Wyden. She is also the one who owned most of the assets listed in the report, which are worth at least $8.5 million. The disclosure report covering 2011 said she had assets worth between $12 million and $56 million from the Strand-related businesses. Nancy Wyden reported earning more than $1 million in 2014 from the bookstore operations and more than $1 million from a related real estate arm. I think this situation requires a further explanation for mere mortals, like myself. It used to be 7 MILES OF BOOKS thirty years back.

This is hitting much closer to home for me - the Strand is on the ropes, and might close. https://www.foxbusiness.com/lifestyle/famed-strand-bookstore-warns-it-may-close-due-to-covid-19 I cannot blame myself, as I have been a customer for thirty years. I don’t remember the first book I bought there, but I am sure I was poor. I am not poor now, and I still shop there for my books. Wish the store all the luck. It will hurt if they close.

Lev Yashn, when asked about his opinion regarding the first manned space flight of Yury Gagarin: "I feel proud, but not as great as after a good penalty save".

Looks like he sobered up and picked up his life by the end of it.

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/exclusive-sammy-hagar-recalls-20-years-of-madness-with-van-halen-11942/no-title-311-26241/ God damn....I had no idea. That's why I don't like reading biographies of famous crazy, drunk, and drugged out artists [yes, Miles]. It absolutely puts a big negative perspective on my consequent appreciation of their oeuvre.

The a/d/a transfers almost swayed me. I'm happy that these are new transfers, and they sound excellent. Did you compare them to the classic TOCJ and McMaster discs from the glory days, Lon?

I decided not to pull the trigger at the last instant. I have most of these on LP or CD, and it just doesn't make economical sense. Now, if I were in the market for some 1960s Mobley, it would've been a no-brainer purchase. It's not like you can drive or peddle to your local Tower Records, make a few turns to get to the M isle, shuffle a few steps towards the Mobley section, pick out what your fancy directs you to do, and make another step to the left, towards the Morgan section. Let's see if a new JRVG release is there. Fat chance...

This is what an enforced veganism is - being forced not to eat meat or dairy...due to lack of it.

We also don’t have to drink a plethora of lab-cooked chemicals labeled with funky trade names, yet you are very enthusiastic about some new Coke concoction.

NEWPORT, R. I., July 4—The remaining two days of the Newport Jazz Festival were canceled today after thousands of young people last night tore down sev eral 60‐foot lengths of chain link fence surrounding the field, battered their way through a second wooden fence and in vaded Festival Field. Read both articles, would love to see the news reels. I doubt you'd see anything like what's described these days. Certainly thousands of young people doing anything together en masse sounds like a dream of some weird sort,...aside from maybe a climate protest. This is the 1960 Muddy Waters footage, according to the title. Doesn't appear that all shit was breaking loose outside.

I don't mind grocery shopping. I like to pick the better head of lettuce or eggplants, I like to choose which bunch of basil I want to cook with. I want to look at the grandmother's rolls, before I put them in the basket. I don't want to sit at the computer or stick my face in the phone to order produce. Like Matthew, I also see the absence of certain produce at our town supermarket, which is kind on a ritzy and expensive side. They didn't have the eggplant when I was there a couple of days ago. Certain peppers were not in stock. Still no all-purpose flour. Yeast returned, and was scooped up fast. Wife got a jar! I've seen the article titles on the upcoming meat shortages, and that is somewhat worrying, so we'll be stocking up on some beef and lamb. I don't like pork (aside from some good bacon), we usually don't cook it. I'd imagine there should be plenty of that, as pork is so popular in the USA. The garlic my m-i-l has planted is coming along tremendously well. I'll share the photos. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the padron peppers I've planted: would love to see these babies grow! Tomato seeds I've saved from the previous harvest have been disappointingly-cachectic, and probably won't bring fruit. The Spring has sucked so far...rainy and not inviting.