Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Dusting plane hedge-hopping after spraying swath on beanfield. These planes can spray 100 acres an hour, can usually fly one or two hours unless it rains or storms in an average day. The usual traveling "dusting circus" has at least three or four planes, its own pilots, mechanics and elementary repair shop. Seabrook Farms, between Bridgeton and Vineland, New Jersey. Edwin Rosskam, 1938.

Annals of semi-apologies

I suppose Dharun Ravi's semi-apology is better than the all-too-common non-apology (... mistakes were made... if my words offended anyone, I sincerely regret it... etc.). But I agree with TNC: "the wrong choices and decisions" sounds a little too much like "I should have gone for the salad instead of the soup."

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Sharecropper boy. Chesnee, South Carolina. Dorothea Lange, 1937.

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Shasta dam under construction, California. Russell Lee, 1942

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Lathe operator machining parts for transport planes at the Consolidated Aircraft Corporation plant, Fort Worth, Texas. Howard R. Hollem, 1942.

Clintonia andrewsiana...

... occurs in abundance along one short stretch of the Lost Trail in Windy Hill OSP. It's a California native in the lily family and always a delight to come upon as you round the bend in the trail, aglow against the ferns and horsetails in the deep shade of the redwoods.

From Windy Hill, May 25, 2012 From Windy Hill, May 25, 2012

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Child of strawberry picker, Hammond, Louisiana. Ben Shahn, 1935.

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Good citizenship and plain common sense. This man is performing a duty every car owner owes to himself and to our fighting men. In having his car adjusted to prevent excessive tire wear--and in observing the simple rules that make tires last longer--he is making a valuable contribution to our war effort. The man who wastes rubber is a poor citizen and blind even to his own personal interests. Martha McMillan, Howard R. Hollem, Albert Freeman, or Howard Liberman, 1942.

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Saturday afternoon in London, Ohio, "the other side of the tracks". Ben Shahn, 1938.

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

At the Greene County fair, Greensboro, Georgia. White schoolchildren were admitted free one day, Negro schoolchildren the next. Jack Delano, 1941.

Four things I liked about the Avengers movie

1. Thor.
2. During one of the few passages in which nothing is blowing up, a string quartet plays Schubert's "Rosamunde," which I heard my son perform last summer. Lovely!
3. The giant armored monsters from outer space swim through the city like an airborn version of a pliosaur.
4. Gwyneth Paltrow's feet.
Not necessarily in that order. Don't ask me to come up with a fifth.

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Son of a woodcutter, Eden Mills, Vermont. Carl Mydans, 1935.

Robin Gibb, RIP

What can I say, I'm not proud, I like the Bee Gees. Robin was perhaps not the mastermind, but the whole package was damn-near irresistible. So many songs that put a smile on your face. So much falsetto. So much hair.

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Taking Burley tobacco in from the fields, after it has been cut, to dry and cure in the barn, Russell Spears' farm, vicinity of Lexington, Ky. Marion Post Wolcott, 1940.

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Privy along front street, Hamilton County Ohio. Carl Mydans, 1935

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

A fisherman's work is hard and many times they fall exhausted on the decks to sleep for hours at a time. Gloucester, Massachusetts. Gordon Parks, 1943.

Ignorance is bliss

"Whites Account for Under Half of Births in U.S."
"Annual Census at Risk in House Budget Bill"
Ah, the workings of the Republican mind... If we don't know they are there, maybe they aren't really there...!

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Bank that failed, Kansas. Arthur Rothstein, 1936.

Your FSA/OWI photo of the day

Mrs. Norris with homegrown cabbage, one of the many vegetables which the homesteaders grow in abundance, Pie Town, New Mexico. By Russell Lee, 1940

Good for you, Barack

And shame on you, North Carolina. History is on the president's side. Along with doing what's right.

Warmest 12 months on record

Well, we Californians can be grateful for lovely moderate temperatures in April, while much of the rest of the country cooked. If I were a religious man I would say that God is rewarding us for being Democrats and having enacted AB 32. But I suppose our droughts and fires are yet to come, nevermind the earthquakes.

I have maintained some hope that once the global economy recovers, the forces of demand and supply will drive oil and gasoline prices through the roof, and even Americans will voluntarily go all-electric. Certainly we cannot rely on our political system to do anything. And alas, we will still have coal and fracking. OK, I'm not hopeful, I'm just delusional.

Reasons to love New York

In his NYT obit for Adam Yauch, Jon Pareles writes, "The Beastie Boys became an institution — one that could have arisen only amid the artistic, social and accidental connections of New York City." From everything I know about U.S. culture, this rings true to me. We have few truly essential cities in this country, and New York tops the list. Well, after Palo Alto, of course.

MCA, RIP

Only 47. Here's my favorite Beasties song among many great ones...

The Good Minus

I've tried to like The Bad Plus, I really have. There's no questioning the virtuosity and the smarts, but to what end? The music just makes me snooze. Except their cover of Aphex Twin, which sounds almost as good as the original... but not quite as good...

So much money, so little taste...

Aaaaaaah!

Can Music Be Perfect? Vol. 15

I suppose this is the best political pop song ever recorded. Can you think of a better one?