Archive: Arts & Entertainment

Aurora, New York - The Wells College Performing Arts program is pleased to present "Balancing Acts," a concert of original choreography by faculty and students. The annual performance will take place on Friday, October 31 and Saturday, November 1 at 7:30 pm in Phipps Auditorium, Macmillan Hall, on the Wells College campus.

"Balancing Acts," an exploration of texture, asymmetry, flow, falling and rebounding, features senior student thesis choreography by performing arts majors Iivy Murphy '09 of Brooklyn, NY and Tiffany Orellana '09 of West Islip, NY, as well as new and repertory work by faculty members Jeanne Goddard and Elizabeth Wilmot Bishop. Responding to themes suggested by Ms. Murphy and Ms. Orellana, all of the dances on the program explore in some way the maintaining, losing, and regaining of balance, from the delicate poise of the dancer en pointe, to the physical risk of dancing on ramps and pedestals, to the asymmetry of choreographic and scenic design.

Smart TalkSMART TALK
by Dr. Viva Palaver

LAG BEHIND:  Actually, all you're doing is lagging.  After all, as we tell our patients, you can't lag ahead.

You can lag behind the main group, but if you have no object for the preposition ("behind"), you have no need for a behind, either.  In that sentence.

As staff psychologist at the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired, I ask patients who lag behind whether they remember getting left by the big kids.  From that pain may come a compulsion to say left behind, left remaining, last of all, and last remnant.

Imagine the depth of the hurt that could cause such linguistic impairment.

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Lansing High School explores the nature of theater in two comedies that turn drama inside out tonight and tomorrow night.  'The Actor's Nightmare' is Christopher Durang's deranged fantasy in which an actor -- or is he -- finds himself in a play that he hasn't rehearsed for.  Tom Stoppard's The 'Real Inspector Hound' twists the lives of two critics with the fantasies they review.  Are they reviewing the drama or are they in it?

The stylish production melds the two on a set framed by opera boxes where audience members are painted in place for 'Nightmare,' replaced by the critics in 'Hound.'   Stylish costumes help define the characters played by Maxwell T. MacKensie, Jes, Uhroveik, Kate Schuttenberg, Susan Lin, Benjamin Veaner, Aaron Eddy, Allison Veaner, Brendon Hammond, Gregory Wasenko, Bethany Sharpless, Alyssa Wasenko, and Everett Brown.  The play is directed by Karen Veaner.

The Opera Cowpokes are riding the airwaves into town with that special blend of horseplay, vengeance, lost (and found) love. The world premiere telecast of Opera Cowpokes Alive! is scheduled on WSKG  Public Television, Thursday, October 23 at 10 pm.. This professionally filmed video features stars from Tri-Cities Opera,  a hot western swing band and a  cast of cowgirl dancers, with a special appearance by Binghamton's globetrotting dance troupe, Galumpha.

Filmed on an organic vegetable farm overlooking Cayuga Lake, Opera Cowpokes Alive! features opera stars performing western and country/western songs ,  traditional folk tunes and operatic favorites.  Producers baritone Steven Stull and choreographer Jeanne Goddard break down the barriers between "classical" and "popular" music and bring together an impressive collection of performers from both worlds. They have also crafted new cowboy and cowgirl song lyrics, a series of mythical letters between cowpokes and their gals, and a new form of sometimes outrageous cowboy poetry - the "Opera Cowpoke Haiku".

ITHACA—The Tompkins County Public Library and Ithaca Made Movies will host a discussion and signing by New Jersey writer Richard Koszarski, author of Hollywood on the Hudson, Sunday, October 26, 2008 at 2:00 PM in the Borg Warner Community Meeting Room.

Hollywood on the Hudson is a beautifully illustrated testament to the role the East Coast played in the early film industry.

During the Sciencenter’s 6th annual community event,  Spooky Science, visitors will meet live leeches and other creepy creatures, learn about the inner workings of a pig heart, and watch a Jack-o’-Lantern carve itself during the grand finale.

On Friday, October 24, from 6 to 8 p.m., everyone is invited to visit the museum in costume and experience science that is both thrilling and playful. Spooky Science is made possible with the generous support of Kionix, Inc. and is free and open to the public.

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You need Java enabled to view the crossword applet. If you do not have Java installed you can obtain it from java.com. If do have Java you may need to check your security settings to make sure that applets are enabled, especially if you are viewing the puzzle from your hard disk. In Windows XP you may be able to enable the applet by clicking on the yellow bar at the top of the window and selecting "Allow blocked content".

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You need Java enabled to view the crossword applet. If you do not have Java installed you can obtain it from java.com. If do have Java you may need to check your security settings to make sure that applets are enabled, especially if you are viewing the puzzle from your hard disk. In Windows XP you may be able to enable the applet by clicking on the yellow bar at the top of the window and selecting "Allow blocked content".

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SMART TALK
by Dr. Verbos Metikulos

MIC:  Somebody has to take a stand, and the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired is taking it.  It may cost us some financial support from a few of our regular donors, but we hope others will feel vindicated at last and step up to join our cause.  We are unanimous:

The word mic has no place in intelligent English usage.

The microphone has been in use in various forms since before most of us were born.  True to our habit of abbreviating long words and expressions for casual useage - as when one of Vice President (under Truman) Alban Barkley's grandchildren suggested "veep" instead of his four-syllable title - folks in show "biz" referred to a microphone as a mike, and, sensibly, spelled it that way.

Mike it remained for decades, as in open mike night and step up to the mike.

But then, not long before the Internet, we had quaint machines called tape recorders.  They and amplifiers, which we still use, often had a place to plug in a microphone.  The manufacturers, to save space and limit control labels to three letters, abbreviated microphone, reasonable enough, as mic.

Linguistic corrosion ensued.  Many linguistically impaired users of sound equipment thought mic was the standard short form instead of mike.  They even thought mic was pronounced mike.  Like an electorate following the lead of neocons, too few asked questions.

At roughly the same time, digital clocks were leading unquestioning users astray as well.  For centuries, anyone who could tell time knew enough to read a clock as saying 10:00 A.M., 11:00 A.M., and 12:00 A.M. (noon), followed by 12:01 P.M.  No problem at night, either: 11:00 P.M., 12:00 P.M. (midnight), then 12:01 A.M.

But the designers of digital clocks apparently couldn't program them to change from A.M. to P.M. and back at one minute after the hour, so as with mic, people let machines tell them how to talk and even think about time.

Perhaps that's a reason so many think the 21^st Century began in 2000.

Until now, we've seen only the brilliant staff of American Science and Surplus, a catalog company in Chicago, insist upon correct form and always use mike.  We've always supported them, but now AS&S can point to the authority of the Institute for the Linguistically Impaired.  That should silence any know-nothing critics.

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You need Java enabled to view the crossword applet. If you do not have Java installed you can obtain it from java.com. If do have Java you may need to check your security settings to make sure that applets are enabled, especially if you are viewing the puzzle from your hard disk. In Windows XP you may be able to enable the applet by clicking on the yellow bar at the top of the window and selecting "Allow blocked content".

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