Published by admin on 16 Nov 2009
“Chuppie gave us a scare this week. He disappeared for a couple of days and reappeared much the worse for wear. More on Chup in a bit, but that’s what got me thinking about our pets.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 09 Nov 2009
“…thinking about luck, fate, fortune, karma, what-have-you. Thinking of those who, like me, seem to have been blessed with good luck, and those who suffer one calamity after another, those who seem to have been cursed with bad luck.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 30 Oct 2009
“If you tramp the gloomy and spectral byways of Greek lore, sooner or later you will run across the tale of Erysichthon, a tale which goes back to a time when Time itself was but a swaddled suckling.” & “As a sort of revenge, [Mark Twain] enjoyed having sport with the reporters the local paper would send out.”A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 26 Oct 2009
“In the pages of tabloids you can find everything to feed your head, albeit a crude diet.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 19 Oct 2009
“So there I was in the checkout the other day and a cover story and headline assailed my eye. The picture was of our new First Couple (dancing, I think). The President’s back is to us and the First Lady is looking over his shoulder with an ominous scowl. The headline? “MICHELLE TO OPRAH: BACK OFF! HE’S MINE!’”” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 12 Oct 2009
“I have found William Topaz McGonagall’s soulmate! (Surely you remember McGonagall, ‘World’s Worst Poet’?) I sing of Julia Ann Moore, aka ‘The Sweet Singer of Michigan,’ and I take special pride in that she was from our own American heartland.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 05 Oct 2009
“She was born Zoila Augusta Emperatriz Chavarri del Castillo in a remote village in Peru. Her father was part Spanish and her mother a full-blooded Incan (in fact, the Peruvian government supported her claim to be descended from the last Incan emperor, Atahualpa)… Everything about Sumac—her repertoire, her stage presence, her costumes, her heritage, her stories—was exotic, and she relished it.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 29 Sep 2009
“So I have been wallowing in Saki the last few days and thought I would share him with you. And since I find Saki, his pen name, to be an irritating affectation, from here on out he will be Hector Hugh Munro, the name he was born with.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 02 Jul 2009
“Grab your toothbrush—we’re hitting the road again. Unlike Belize, you won’t need your swim trunks, because this time we are going ‘North to Alaska.’ Specifically, we are going to Sitka, one of my favorite places in all the world.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus, from the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 26 Jun 2009
“We may never get there in the flesh—I’m told that the airfare, for one thing, has gone through the roof—but whenever I am closeted in the loo I can pretend, in short increments, that I am there.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, Dec. 14, 2008.
Published by admin on 19 Jun 2009
A tribute to J. Lawrence Shea, 1907-1966. Video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com.
Published by admin on 15 Jun 2009
“Who or what are the Sons of Ditches? Harvey Buchalter and I are the co-founders of this esteemed running club, so-called. Why Sons of Ditches? Because that is where we usually run, on the horse trails or levees in the bosque along the Rio Grande—his piece of it in southwest Albuquerque or my piece in northwest Albuquerque—or along the miles and miles of irrigation ditches that our city is blessed with.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, Jan. 24, 2009.
Published by admin on 08 Jun 2009
“The actors in this drama are a thirty-something man and his wife who had moved here from Southern California a few years back, so we’ll call them the Socals; a freshman at a charter high school downtown, whom we’ll call Ms. Charter; and a fellow sitting beside me whom I choose to call the Jerk.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, Nov. 23, 2008.
Published by admin on 01 Jun 2009
“Sex, a friend once observed, is really just a sublimation of a man’s most basic desire: to browse forever in a good hardware store.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, Dec. 7, 2008.
Published by admin on 26 May 2009
“I think the pundits are right, for once, when they tell us that this presidential election is the most important in decades.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, June 8, 2008.
Published by admin on 18 May 2009
“Rain in Albuquerque—and I mean a whole rainy day, not the brief evening showers that we get in July, our “monsoon season”—is a big, big, deal… We often go for months with unrelenting sunshine, day after day after day.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, June 1, 2008.
Published by admin on 11 May 2009
“As I watched los matachines make their stately way down Camino del Pueblo in Bernalillo twenty some years ago, it was, as Yogi Berra would say, ‘déjà vu all over again.’ But it did not take me long to make the connection: the Mummers, back in Philadelphia! I was raised just north of the City of Brotherly Love, where the New Years Day Mummers Parade is a big deal—a very big deal.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, Nov. 9, 2008.
Published by admin on 04 May 2009
“I wonder how many of my readers outside the American Southwest have any idea what “los Matachines” (ma-ta-CHEE-nez) refers to. It’s a strange name for a strange dance drama or religious ritual or mummery or costume play or…something.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, Nov. 2, 2008.
Published by admin on 27 Apr 2009
“What started me on this color business (see “Colors”) was the generally bad reputation that yellow struggles under. Never mind that yellow can be associated with gold and sunshine and buttercups and ribbons ‘round the old oak tree. Never mind that it has become a very popular color for sporty cars lately—my late, lamented Metro convertible was a brilliant yellow. On balance, yellow has suffered a bad rep, or rap, through the centuries.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, Sept. 15, 2008.
Published by admin on 20 Apr 2009
“This will not be a wonk on the optics of color, why red is red, and so forth. I am not even sure I know the primary colors (red, yellow, and blue, aren’t they?). More in my line is the fact that colors imbue our speech and thinking as much as they do our world. For millennia, colors have been metaphorical as well as physical.” A video blog by Jerry Shea, UNM professor emeritus. From the original blog at MacInstruct.com, Sept. 3, 2008.
