Archive for August, 2009

Trip report: Circus Bella (free) at Fort Mason

Sunday, August 30th, 2009

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The thing that strikes you first, probably because the performers are not yet performing yet, about Circus Bella is its ringmaster, a tall guy dressed in a bright blue bunny suit. My daughter, the circus aficionado, took one look at him and groaned, "It’s aiming too young."

But then she was handed a programme and noticed that one of the guys who works on trapeze with her was in the show. And he started to kind of dance/juggle his suspenders and — she knew everything was going to be happy.

First of all, the price was cheap. Well, free, actually. And then there was the fact that we were sitting outside in the shade but could have chosen to sit in the sun, on a beautiful SF day.

Plus, Circus Bella arrives with its own band. (The accordion player is killer.)

The acts did not reflect the dumbness of the blue bunny. Although there were some missed juggles, the ambition of some of the mix-ups was impressive.

And then there was the lone juggler/percussion band. He placed a mic near a box and then bounced the balls he was juggling off the box, all the while making a wall of other interesting sounds in various other ways. Brilliant. We could have listened forever.

We also LOVED the slack rope walker and rolla-bolla rider.

The bandstand opposite the circus stage is made of car hoods. and lined with computer parts. Pendant-like flags flutter cheerfully all around you.

The sailboats in the dock and on the water were almost as scenic as the adorable babies and dogs.

Lovely lovely.

The Mexican food sold by a group amusingly entitled "Chaac-mool" (we are pretty sure that’s the platform on which the Mayans placed the still-beating hearts of their blood sacrifices…) was very inexpensive and tasted great. (A chicken tamale for $2, for example.)

After the circus, we visited the Italian Museum and then wandered around, taking in the fantastic and scenic Exploratorium fluid-dynamics installations.

There’s also a book store that accepts book donations daily. Fort Mason. Our kinda place.

Photos here

Book review: Dancing to the Precipice: The Life of Lucie de la Tour du Pin, Eyewitness to an Era

Friday, August 28th, 2009

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Author:Caroline Moorehead
Reading Level (Conceptual):Sophisticated readers
Reading Level (Vocabulary):Sophisticated readers
Genre:non-fiction, history
Year of publication:2009

Lucie de la Tour du Pin was born into an aristocratic family, served as lady-in-waiting to Marie Antoinette in her early adulthood, then went on to marry for love (not common in those days), birth and lose many children, and survive the treacherous political turmoils that began with the French Revolution.

After reading this book, I was not certain I understood much more than I did before about the French Revolution, but I did empathize a great deal more than I had before with the French aristocracy of that time. For example, Moorehead continually implies that Talleyrand was evil (and was he so terrible compared to the many other participants of the Terror??!!!) but never quite tells us what awful things he did.


Starting in mid-life, Lucie began a memoir, not published until long after she died, and I assume that Moorehead used this document as the basis for much of her narrative.

Which probably explains why the author flits between levels of detail; there are weeks of Lucie's life described down to the taste of the food she ate but then whole years pass without much information. I came away convinced not that history is written by the victors (a quote attributed, but not definitively assigned to Winston Churchill), but instead that history is written by those who write things down.

Not a book for the sensitive reader, but a fascinating description of an "ordinary", if upperclass, women who played a small part in history and lived to tell us about it.
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Movie review: The Thin Man

Sunday, August 9th, 2009

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Recommended for ages 12 and up

Released in 1934, this was the first in the series of Thin Man movies.

We watched this as a family. Perhaps it is less confusing on the big screen. I am not terribly good at mysteries and I am also not a very keen observer of film, but for the first hour of this film, neither my cinematically literate husband nor daughter could differentiate between the women in the movie nor could they follow the action or dialog. I ended up having to explain everything to them and since I guessed most of the plot within the first 10 minutes, I accidentally ended up telling them what happened early on too.

So, anyway, your standard oblivious, not-kind-to-others genius disappears, and a couple of rich dilettantes who are much smarter than the bungling detective assigned to the case help find out what happened, even though they drink pretty much constantly, and what’s in those glasses is not water.

The women’s dresses/gowns are astonishing (think all-Bjork-all-the-time). The dog is adorable. The bad guys are ugly. There’s no food at any party, just liquids (not water). The dialog is fast-paced, delivered in varying degrees of New-York-ese, and old-fashioned.

Challenging to follow, maybe not a bad thing in a film. But really — a mystery that I solved within minutes? I who never predict plot twists in film unless they are blasted out to me? Maybe I saw this film before in a previous life….

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Book review: Is God a Mathematician?

Sunday, August 9th, 2009

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Author:Mario Livio
Reading Level (Conceptual):Sophisticated readers
Reading Level (Vocabulary):Children 12 and up
Genre:Non-fiction, biography
Year of publication:2009

I never thought I'd get my fill of non-fiction books about mathematicians. And this is not really a bad one. Maybe it was the silly title and the author's transition from that religious question to the more chicken-and-egg question: Do humans invent mathematics or do they discover mathematical principles?

Guess my question is, "Why do I care?"

Anyway, I found Livio's discussion of the achievements and ideas of the Greeks, including Pythagoras, very interesting.

-- Emily
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If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Is God a Mathematician?

Book review: Poison: A Novel

Monday, August 3rd, 2009

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Author:Susan Fromberg Schaeffer
Reading Level (Conceptual):For grown-ups
Reading Level (Vocabulary):For grown-ups
Genre:fiction
Year of publication:2007

Grown-up fairy tale about how the grown children and former lovers of a philandering novelist unite to defeat his widow, the children's evil stepmother, and secure his money and his legacy.

I guess that the point of the book, which is truly unpleasant to read, is that even folks who are not gifted can destroy lives, unless they are stopped. And that stopping them can take time and strategizing, even for gifted and deserving and creative people.

Or maybe, the book makes another point, which is that tremendously gifted people can so desperately hurt their less gifted spouses that they are driven to terrible evil.

-- Emily Berk

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Movie review: Hobson’s Choice

Saturday, August 1st, 2009

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Recommended for ages 12 and up
Cerebral — not action-packed; one short scene hints at the delights of the marriage bed, but these are not shown in any way.

Touching working class (reverse) fairy tale in which the OLDest daughter identifies and helps her “prince charming” (in this case a talented shoemaker) to notice and marry her and create his own kingdom (a shoe shop).

Hobson, played by Charles Laughton, is a widower, drunkard, and the owner of a shoe store whose success is pretty much entirely owing to the talents of his eldest daughter, Maggie, and one of his shoemakers (Willie). Hobson prevents his daughters from marrying, and thereby escaping from his household, by refusing to grant them dowries.

Beautifully filmed in black and white, directed by David Lean. As we watched Maggie, and then Willie, slowly manipulate Hobson into giving them exactly what they need (and, in the process, getting him to give up the alcohol that is killing him), my daughter would start by saying, “WHY are they telling him that?” And then, each time they had progressed in positive direction, she’d say “Ohhh, I get it.”

A great period piece. Nice to feel as if we were seeing how people lived in the late 19th century in a fairly small British town.

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