A rainbow without rain

Posted on September 20, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

Today was a sunny, breezy day in Milwaukee.  But the sky looked so strange! 

Mostly this was due to many different types of clouds coexisting oddly in the same space.  Puffy, flat-bottomed cumulus clouds sailed like a scattered armada across the bright blue portions of the sky, but their peaceful progress was randomly punctuated with stuttered white skid marks.  To the west, thin wisps like veils draped alongside wavy-patterned cirrus clouds that recalled women’s marcelled “bob” hairstyles from the 1920s.  To the east the clouds were broad streaks; some resembled a watercolor wash, while others were opaque smears, like a thick coat of gesso applied with a palette knife.

And then, directly overhead, was this weird phenomenon: a large grayish cloud slightly blocking the sun and ringed by a rainbow “halo.”  I’d never seen anything like it before, so of course I had to whip out my trusty iPod Touch to snap some photos. 

Can you see the “rainbow”?  (Please excuse my fingers in the first picture 🙂 )

All I can figure is there must have been enough water in that one particular cloud to make the light refract.  Very strange, but then again, today’s sky was chock full of strange clouds.

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George Martin: the man behind the Beatles’ sound

Posted on September 11, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

Today’s Wall Street Journal has a fascinating story on / interview with George Martin, the man who produced all of the Beatles’ music except the Let It Be album.  A BBC documentary titled Produced by George Martin is being released today on DVD.

According to the article, Martin, a self-taught pianist who could play by ear, was responsible for many of the catchy hooks that opened Beatles’ songs.  He also introduced strings to their music, first with a Baroque quartet on “Yesterday” and later with the driving rhythm heard in “Eleanor Rigby” – a new kind of sound inspired by the fierce, urgent strings of Bernard Hermann’s famous Psycho score (warning: the Psycho audio/video link contains black and white stills from the film – with one rather cheesy 1960 horror movie effect, but still . . .)

One heartbreaking piece of information in the Wall Street Journal article: after years of 14-hour days in the studio, Martin is now unable to hear music and must read lips and use hearing aids to carry on a conversation.  It reminds me of Beethoven, who was completely deaf by the time he composed and conducted his Ninth Symphony  – a portion of which, in one of those beautiful, circular twists of fate, puts in an appearance near the end of the Beatles’ second movie, Help!

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Double helix – fire escape and shadow

Posted on September 10, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

I hope you’re not tired of photos.  Because here’s another one I took this morning of the fire escape winding down the side of Milwaukee’s City Hall.  The only camera I had with me (again) was my iPod Touch, so I hope you can see what I saw – specifically, the way the fire escape intertwines with its own shadow all the way down, creating a lacy, spiraled pattern that resembles the DNA double helix.

DNA structure and bases – from the National Genome Research Institute genome.gov (National Institutes of Health). Via Wikipedia

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The Accidental Photograph

Posted on September 6, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

I took this photo on the walk to Starbucks this morning.  I liked the contrast between these two buildings’ actual and reflected windows.  Windows upon windows. 

Because the idea of taking a picture hadn’t crossed my mind until the minute I looked up and saw this, I had to use my iPod Touch, which was the only “camera” I had with me.  Too bad.  My photo didn’t turn out nearly as well as it would have with my real camera and a longer lens.  I could “see” the photo I wanted in my mind’s eye, but using the iTouch meant standing in the middle of a (not too busy) downtown street in order to approximate the way a better lens could have captured the image from the sidewalk. 

When oncoming traffic sent me scurrying to the opposite curb, I unintentionally took the picture below when my thumb brushed across the virtual shutter release by mistake. 

Ironically, I like this accidental photograph even more than the picture I took on purpose.  There’s something appealing about all those lines and planes at odds with each other.  What do you think?

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Red sky at morning

Posted on September 1, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

 . . . Sailor take warning.

I’m not sure whether Milwaukee will be feeling the effects of Hurricane Isaac’s weather system soon or not.  But sunrise this morning was VERY red.  The sky looked almost like the glow of a wildfire out West, except there is nothing to our east but Lake Michigan.  So if a storm arrives within the next day or so, I guess it won’t be a complete surprise.

A few minutes later the red glow had faded to a strange light pink.  Normally sunrise is tinged the yellow-orange color seen at the lower left corner of the sky in the photo below.

After taking the photo above, I faced north and slightly east to take another, just for fun, so I could get the contrast between the pinkish sky and swooping, criss-crossed black power lines.

Have a great Labor Day weekend!

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“May” versus “Might”

Posted on August 31, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

There is a difference between “may” and “might.”  I don’t think the distinction is taught in school, and because neither is the kind of word that would call attention to itself when used incorrectly in conversation, it’s not usually a recognizable grammar deficiency.  However, I see the two confused in newspaper articles all the time.  Because even most journalists don’t know the difference (see this New York Times “After Deadline” blog/column on the topic by Philip B. Corbett, the deputy news editor in charge of the newspaper’s style manual), perhaps “may”/“might” is a helpful topic to blog about today.         

“May” and “might” are a special type of helping verb called a “modal.”  “May” goes with present-tense verbs; “might” goes with past tense.  Similar examples of past/present modal pairs include will/would, can/could, and shall/should.

If I read a newspaper article with a sentence like, “The toddler may have drowned,” I assume we don’t know yet if that’s what actually happened.  The toddler is missing and was last seen near a body of water, so it’s possible he may have drowned.  But if the story ends with a photo of the smiling toddler in his mother’s arms, I’m confused to discover not only that he is alive but also that everyone has known it all along. 

The reporter should have written, “The toddler might have drowned, but an alert teenager saved him.”  (Thank goodness! 🙂 ) 

Here’s a sentence with another scenario: “Rescue workers say the toddler, who slipped into the drainage ditch during yesterday’s storm, may still be alive if the sewer grate at Smith Road was intact.”  The situation sounds hopeful.  We need to check the status of that sewer grate.  If it was intact at the time the child was swept away, then he may have survived and we’ll find him wandering nearby, frightened but okay.

But suppose the story does not have a happy ending?  Suppose the child has already been found dead in a creek fed by that drainage ditch, and the missing sewer grate has been identified as contributing to the tragedy.  In this case, using “may” instead of “might” not only conveys the wrong impression but, worse, also raises false hopes. 

One word can make all the difference between accurate and inaccurate reporting.

Posted in Grammar, punctuation, usage, mechanics | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments

Where a lone dinosaur roams

Posted on August 28, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

I have intended to photograph this dinosaur for years.  A couple of decades, actually.

The colorful, scaly reptile is a denizen of a long-closed amusement park on the northwest side of Milwaukee – once a roadside attraction featuring miniature golf, possibly go karts, and a giant wave slide of the sort ubiquitous in the early 1970s.  I have vague, distant memories of driving past at night and seeing the darkness brightly lit, which means it must still have been in business as late as the early 1980s, when I moved to the city.

In searching for more information online, I came across this photo on Flickr that shows the orange dinosaur in its original setting.  And here’s another Flickr photo showing the dino from the opposite angle, a rear view pointing out toward the street, with the original (but by then greatly deteriorated) “Johnson’s Park” sign beyond. 

The park remained intact for many years after it shut down, but eventually the slide disappeared and slowly the rest of its installations were also dismantled, until all that was left behind were some dinosaurs and other remnants of the miniature golf course hidden in the encroaching brush.

Demolition of the property started in earnest maybe a year ago.  Bulldozers and heavy equipment moved in, and soon it appeared nothing remained.  I had waited too long to take my photo.  With all traces of this kitschy park erased, there would be no tangible reminder of Milwaukeeans’ cheesy entertainment of an era past.

Then my daughter recently spotted this guy lurking in the bushes.  He’s nearly invisible to motorists driving north on 76th Street because of the overgrowth.  Because I needed to be on the northwest side of the city today anyway, I took along my camera – finally!

The site of this former amusement park exists in a swath of empty history: abandoned auto dealerships and weedy parking lots along N. 76th Street in Milwaukee.  Half a century ago this area was freshly built, the newest construction on the outer edges of the city abutting the countryside.  Now it has lapsed into ruin.

Whatever shape this property assumes in its next phase of life, wouldn’t it be wonderful if somehow the dinosaur could be incorporated into its design as a physical link connecting us to who we used to be?

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El Greco sky

Posted on August 24, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

The sky this afternoon was a giant mass of clouds, with just one hole where the sun burned through.  Doesn’t it remind you a little of El Greco’s View of Toledo?

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Recording Academy pushes for digital songwriter credits

Posted on August 23, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

A couple weeks ago I wrote a post about how I’d noticed that iTunes doesn’t give credit to songwriters. 

It looks like I’m not the only person who wishes things were different.  According to an AP story by Mesfin Fekadu this morning, today the Recording Academy has announced a campaign, called “Give Fans the Credit,” to include “liner notes” and songwriter credits with digital music. 

To me, this seems like a no-brainer. 

Surely the people who were smart enough to develop the amazing technology that makes digital music possible, surely they can figure out a way to attach a little extra information to each song floating around out there in the cloud. 

It’s the right thing to do.  We need to recognize the artists who create the music we love.  I also posted a couple of weeks ago about how in the afterlife of Greek mythology, poets got to hang for eternity with the gods and warriors in the Elysian Fields.  Greeks clearly venerated their creative workers, and a culture that values its creative workers endures.

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E-books versus print – a false dichotomy?

Posted on August 21, 2012 by Katherine Wikoff

I’ve seen some really interesting articles in the last few days appearing to indicate that, regardless of the zeitgeist’s general consensus, print is NOT dead. 

Here are links to three articles – two from Publishers Weekly and one from The Telegraph – that seem to offer a vision of the future contrary to the usual predictions of a paperless, print-is-doomed, brickless/mortarless publishing industry.  I think the links below will remain live, but in case they don’t, I’m also providing enough info that you should be able to find them with an online search.

1. “BISG Report Finds More E-book Buyers Buying Print Books,” Publishers Weekly, August 2, 2012. 

2. “Bookstore Sales up in First Half of 2012,” Publishers Weekly, August 20, 2012.

3. “Amazon to deliver parcels to UK cornerships,” The Telegraph, August 17, 2012.  (I can’t get this direct link to The Telegraph to stick, so I’m sending you to a Publishers Weekly roundup page, where this article is the second link from the top on the list of stories.)

The future of publishing suggested by these articles is fascinating: a hybrid that blurs the lines between e-books and traditional bookselling, combining the best features of each.  This month is the first time in years that I’ve noticed so many hints of good news regarding the future of books (print), bookstores, and non-virtual storefronts in general. 

I love Amazon, and if I’m looking for a specific title, it’s my go-to place.  Why waste time wandering around a bookstore looking for a book when I can complete that transaction instantly online?  Nor do I like to waste gas driving to a bookstore only to discover that the book I want is currently out of stock.

On the other hand, Amazon comes nowhere close to matching the tactile experience of a bricks-and-mortar bookstore.  It’s not that I never discover new titles on Amazon, because I do, but an entirely different type of serendipty arises from browsing the stacks.  You pick up books, feel their weight, and page through them – an experience bearing little resemblance to Amazon’s “Click to LOOK INSIDE!” feature (which remains nonetheless a great way for online shoppers get to acquainted with a book).  Unless I am zeroing in on one particular book, I greatly prefer just wandering though my local bookstore to clicking through images on a screen.

Besides, I can also sip a Starbucks latte if I’m shopping at a Barnes & Noble bookstore 🙂

In the end, all the forecasts about changing technologies and new modes of delivery tend to obscure this most important fact:  We just want good things to read.  Content is everything.  The format we select doesn’t matter beyond the context in which it is used.  In some cases we want a print edition of a text, and in others, we want the audio or electronic version. 

Wouldn’t it be nice if purchasing a print copy of a book included the option of getting the electronic version for free?  That way you could have the actual book as your primary reading experience, but you could also have the portability and searchability of the e-book.  Or maybe you could have the audio version to listen to in the car or during your workout.  I hope in the end we’ll continue to have many choices among formats instead of getting stuck with whatever technology “wins” and subsequently dominates the marketplace.  

Technology should not shape the way we read.  The way we read should shape the technology.  (Actually, each greatly influences the other, but you know what I mean 🙂 )

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