On this day long ago, a child was born who, by age 30, would transform the world. Happy Birthday Isaac Newton b. Dec 25, 1642
— Neil deGrasse Tyson (@neiltyson) December 25, 2014
… for jokers. And also comedians, bless their hearts. From the NYTimes:
SAN FRANCISCO — The comedian Margaret Cho has been busking around her hometown, singing, plinking on her guitar and nearly stripping to raise money for the homeless. San Francisco has pop-up restaurants, art galleries and shops, but Ms. Cho’s may be the first pop-up charity.
Through social media, she has notified fans, who brought coats, pants, shirts, shoes, blankets and lots of socks as well as cash, which she gave away at each event. Her ninth and final performance was on Tuesday.
The inspiration, Ms. Cho said, was her friend Robin Williams, who committed suicide in August at age 63. When she could not shake her sadness, another comedian friend said, “Don’t mourn Robin — be Robin.” Mr. Williams, who lived in the Bay Area, raised millions for the homeless. So Ms. Cho began what she calls “my mini-baby-weirdo version” of Mr. Williams’s charity routines.
She also did it because, she said pointedly, this city has become Dickensian, with the rich getting richer as they till the digital fields of Google and Facebook and the poor getting poorer and priced out of their apartments. Ms. Cho knows that she cannot change the economy, but she can lift spirits by doing what she knows best.
“San Francisco used to be a city of street performers,” Ms. Cho said at her final event. “Robin was a street performer — this is part of bringing that back.”…
During her monthlong string of pop-ups, she took her act to a youth shelter and to neighborhoods where homeless people congregate. Ms. Cho said she had raised about $2,000 at most of the shows. She finished with an evening performance at SF Eagle, a gay bar with synthetic snowflakes and a mirrored ball twinkling from the ceiling.
Outside, drivers pulled up with armfuls of new sweaters, vests, jackets, pants, dental floss, soap and socks, stacking the donations on tables on the sidewalk. Homeless men and women, often unnoticed during the day, walked or biked to the tables and chose what they liked. Late into the night, the hills of clothing were replenished and the homeless kept coming….
Happy Boxing Day, Ms. Cho, and many more of them.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
I have to say, I’m not a fan of Cho’s, but this was a pretty spectacularly nice thing to do, and it sounds like people pitched in very generously. Good for her.
I’m planning a pajama day for tomorrow (in my Batgirl pajamas, natch). I haven’t had one in a while and I’m really feeling the need to be slothful for one day before I fill up the rest of my vacation days between now and New Year’s.
lamh36
I worked the majority of the day today, but afterwards, I brought Maddie her present I got here, then I took Maddie and her crew (my lil girl cousins) to see Annie. They all said they liked it. Maddie gave Annie an A+. I liked it but other than Jamie Foxx, nobody really sounded good. Me and my cousin, both agreed they should have just dubbed the voices. Still I liked it and the actors other than Cameron Diaz were good. And honestly, I could have taken the movie even with Cameron Diaz, but the sing really wasn’t up to what you’d expect from the Annie musical.
Still, the appropriate age group loved it, singing or not!
https://twitter.com/psddluva4evah/status/548317908892647425
Suzanne
Well, it was a lovely Christmas. One of the best, I think. Church last night was lovely, we ate great food all day, took naps, everyone loved their gifts, great relaxing. Tomorrow we go see Mr. Suzanne’s family for a week. Should be a good time. I just want to get my house clean before we leave, because I hate coming home to a messy house.
Ruckus
Don’t mourn Robin, be Robin.
I like that.
Remember the good, don’t let your pain gloss over the person.
I once sat in a friends room, after his funeral, crying that he died at the young age of 21. His sister told me to stop and remember his life and his great personality. He was at peace with the dangerous sport that cost him his life and he took the risks with an open mind. She was right and she gave me a gift. I’d seen plenty of death before then but what I was missing was a realistic perspective about life and death. As painful as it was it was a great gift I got that day.
NotMax
@Mnemosyne
But – but – that means Yvonne Craig will be naked!
(Not that there’s anything wrong with that.)
Major Major Major Major
Cheap burger at a 24-hour diner for me. SF hasn’t ruined the Castro and environs quite yet.
I really don’t get all the hate for techies. I get the concerns about gentrification, but maybe you should have built housing to keep up with demand any time in the last, I don’t know, four decades, Bay Area. The politicos and nimby’s here own this crisis and we *still* can’t get enough dense housing approved to fix it and stave off future ones.
I also found a new Minecraft server today that’s going to consume my weekend. I’m sure my to-be hubby will be pleased.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@lamh36:
You can sometimes work around someone who’s a good actor but not a good singer (like Rex Harrison in “My Fair Lady” or Richard Harris in “Camelot”), but you can’t do a musical with an entire cast who can’t sing, and you really can’t autotune your way through “Tomorrow.” It’s too bad, because I thought an update of that musical was a good idea, but whoever cast it seems to have forgotten they needed actors who could also sing!
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@NotMax:
Yvonne Craig can find her own pajamas.
(And, yes, a comic book version of Craig’s Batgirl is what’s on the pajamas.)
NotMax
@Mnemosyne
Unless it’s Peter O’Toole.
see: Goodbye, Mr. Chips, Man of La Mancha
Keith P
Bleh, just got back from a midnight trip to the ER (for an abscess in my armpit). Amazing, but it was less than 2 minutes from the time I signed in until they saw me, and it took them about 15 minutes to cut and drain (which was disgusting…the thing was the size of a golf ball). All told, I was out of the house for only an hour and a half.
buster
I just finished a marathon viewing session of “Mozart in the Jungle” a new series on Amazon Prime.
It’s pretty fucking great, to quote one of the characters on the show.
edit:And a hell of a lot better than going to the ER!
Debbie(aussie)
Am about to get some shut eye. Have had two wonderful days. Yesterday with my family, parents, brother and adult children, we also included my d-I-l’s Mom on Skype. Today with hubby’s family (5 of 8 brothers/sisters & various adult children and younger 3rd gen). Great time was had by all.
SiubhanDuinne
No comments in the past 2h40m?
::tap:: ::tap::
Is this thing on?
BillinGlendaleCA
@SiubhanDuinne: Looks like everyone had a bit too much eggnog for Christmas and now they’ve all passed out.
ThresherK
@Mnemosyne (iPad Mini): That’s a pissah. I was looking forward to this for a bunch of reasons, including how ill-made the 1982 movie was.
Not to mention that Hollywood moviemaking in the 1930s had a lot to say about both the reflection on, and fantasy avoidance of, poverty, and I want to see more of that from mainstream Hollywood today. “Let’s Go To The Movies” is fun number for me, yet a transcendent scene for a wretched orphan 80 years ago.
OzarkHillbilly
Detente with US has Cubans worried about special immigration privileges Heh. Ya think?
OzarkHillbilly
Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet, our good friends in the House of Saud are prosecuting 2 women for the heinous crime of Driving while Female… in a special terrorism court. Oooopps, my bad, not for DWF, but for tweeting about it.
But by all means, let us not normalize relations with Cuba.
OzarkHillbilly
@OzarkHillbilly: Ooopps, link: Two women referred to ‘terror’ court for driving in Saudi Arabia
JPL
Good Morning. I’m still in a food coma.
Ole Phat Stu
Newton was born on Dec 25th alright, but NOT on the Gregorian calender.
So NdeGT is 11 days off with his birthday joke :-(
Tommy
My favorite gift this holiday season, the blue-ray version of Cosmos. You go Neil. Come to think of it I don’t really have anything to do until Monday, DVD inserted. Think I will just binge watch some Cosmos.
DivF
Up with my nightly bout of insomnia. Back to the gym tomorrow (later today). Plus going out and buying a new dishwasher, and picking up 20 lbs of pork neck bones to make ragu bolognese.
Tommy
@OzarkHillbilly: I’ve said this a few times in the last few days. One of my best clients is a Cuban American. His parents came here on a boat and literally swam to shore. His parents are not fans of our trying to “normalize” relations with Cuba. He is giddy about it.
I recall being a little worried three years ago about bring up the topic to a Cuban American living in Miami, well what did he think. But I am curious so I did. He went on a rant for like 30 minutes about how the embargo made no sense. This and that. I might have said a few times “you go boy, get it off your chest.”
I called him minutes after Obama made his announcement and he just reinforced what I already knew. Nobody he knows under 50 or 60, like his parents, think the embargo is a good idea. Everybody near his age, and he is in his late 30s, or younger could not be happier.
I can’t get all the talking heads on TV. This dude is (1) Cuba American and (2) Lives in a mostly Cuban area of Miami. Think he might have his finger on the pulse of things.
satby
Hope everyone had a great Christmas, and for those who stretch the holiday to see lots of relatives, continued joy!
I had a nice day, some short visits to drop off goodies at the neighbors, see my decorator friend’s 5(!) Christmas trees at his house, and then a visit with the oldest son unit at my (soon to be his) house in Chicago. All finished in time for me to be back in Michigan for sunset! And a short binge of Foyle’s War on Roku. A lovely day!
OzarkHillbilly
@Tommy: The thing that gets me is the absolute hypocrisy of justifying one’s anti-normalization stance on the basis of human rights or “theft” of property. There may well be good reasons articulated but I have yet to hear one.
Tommy
@OzarkHillbilly: Yeah. The thing that gets me is I grew up as a kid when the Soviet Union was still around. I was taught them listening to our music, wanting soda, Levi’s, that was how we’d “turn” them. What is different with Cuba?
I heard an interview on NPR of this guy that runs a Cuban policy research group at Harvard. He flew in the day after Obama’s announcement. The first thing the cab driver said to him at the airport when he found the guy was American was “when can I buy a Ford van? I can make more money if I had a van.”
I don’t have to tell people here this, but ponder that for a few seconds. The person’s first thought was he wanted to buy something from us. How is that not a good thing for all involved?
Hunter
Yesterday turned out to be “None of the Above” Day — I didn’t do anything I had planned on doing because the sun came out so I went to the park and discovered that the Zoo is now open on Christmas Day, which it didn’t used to be, so I watched the ducks and counted the dwarf crocodiles, which I always do (there are five).
And cheers for Margaret Cho. Was almost there myself a few years ago; my year-end giving, such as it is, goes to Ali Forney Center and our local food bank. Because that was almost me. (Yeah, I know I should be doing that even it if wasn’t almost me, but going through times like that plops it right down on your doorstep.)
About holidays in the ER: last time that happened, it was 4 am on July 4th and I couldn’t breathe — acute bronchitis, a week after I’d gotten out of the hospital with pneumonia. Some days it just doesn’t pay to breathe.
Robert Sneddon
I was working on Christmas Day, appearing on people’s new toys^W Kindle tablets as a disembodied Scottish head when they accidentally tapped the Mayday tile while they tried to figure out how it worked.
It’s a living.
My Xmas present to myself was a 4k monitor for my computer, a 32″ Dell. I have no peripheral vision left.
Citizen_X
Ah, NdGT has become a most excellent troll. I will remember this next year, because if your holiday season has involved any driving, flying, phoning, delivering, or using the internet, then Newton is truly the reason for the season.
Or, if you prefer riding on a donkey and sleeping in a barn, go with that.
Good on Margaret Cho, too.
ruemara
Love Margaret Cho. If I could find a cheap place to stay, I’d have repatriated to the Bay years ago. Since my mitzvah was done, I’m mostly burning through the 8 additional work hours I negotiated for the holidays. We’re out for nearly 10 days, but we don’t get paid vacation. Today, I push through the last 4 & try to do.mockups of the website for the content management vendor. I’d rather do it myself but, my former boss just believed in the vendor solution mode of business, so she got hosed on prices. But, I shall be wearing my house dress all day until I change and head to the gym. I could work from home all the time. And I do.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Hunter:
I’ve mentioned before that my family has a tradition of someone always being sick on Christmas Day, but the only one that involved a trip to the ER was when my mom had an allergic reaction to a new laundry detergent and had to spend Christmas morning in the ER getting an IV drop of Benadryl. Good times, good times.
JustRuss
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): A few Xmases ago my daughter ended up in the ER, she was recovering from an embolism and had some complications. They gave her some great meds, I’ve never seen her so loopy. then my brother tripped over a barrier in the hospital parking lot and sprained his ankle. Good times indeed.
This year we stayed in our pajamas and never left the house, it seemed safest for everyone.