Category Archives: Indiana University

11/25/2011
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Alex Straiker, Bloomington Storytelling Project, Cats and Machines, Indiana University, Joy Shayne Laughter, Laura Grover, Mary Okie, Ryan Lee Dawes, The Bishop

The Pencil Today:

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BUT ENOUGH ABOUT ME — WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT ME?

Gulp!

Today’s post is not about what Big Mike thinks, feels, or has an itch for. Nope. It’s about other people.

Yeesh.

Hi! It’s Me! Don’t Forget Me!

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Yeah, the focus today is on The Electron Pencil’s contributors. See, I told you we would feature the best writing and visual art in Bloomington. We’re building our roster of contributors slowly but surely. And we’ll always be indebted to that fabulously fedora-ed author chick, Joy Shayne Laughter, for being the first contributor to take a chance on us. Read her short story, “Armistice Day.”

So, today we’re posting work from Ryan Lee Dawes who previews the Mary Okie show at The Bishop Saturday night. Here’s Ryan on his unorthodox preview style: “This is a strange style of concert preview that, to my knowledge, no one else is doing. It’s meant to be slightly comical and very expressive and descriptive.” Go see for yourself.

Ryan Lee Dawes

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We also have the new comix series “Cats and Machines” from Grover & Sloan. You may know Laura Grover from the Bloomington Storytelling Project. You probably don’t know Sloan because he’s too busy working on his PhD.

Laura Grover

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And for the final piece of our debut triptych today, we introduce Dr. Alex Straiker, research scientist at Indiana University’s Department of Psychological & Brain Sciences. He’s an artist as well as a cerebrum on legs. We’re featuring some of his images of neuromicroscopy.

The Brain Of Alex Straiker (Body Attached)

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If none of this interests you, well then, there’s no hope for you. Go watch TV.

Here’s how you check out new works by our contributors every day: Simply click on either the Salon button or the Gallery & Studio button (located at the top of this page).

Salon offers fiction, poetry, reviews, previews, essays, and any other sort of word output I can get my hands on (oh yeah, and is of the highest quality).

Gallery & Studio has pictures and videos and other two-dimensional (Duh! — WordPress doesn’t offer hologram capability yet) visual art.

Each of these pages will display a table of contents. Simply scroll down and pick what you want to see, click on the link and voila!

Go there now. Read. Stare. Like. Share.

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11/22/2011
3 Comments
9/11, Business, Che Guevara, Class Warfare, Economics, Fidel Castro, French Revolution, Indiana University, Irrational Exuberance, John F. Kennedy, One-Percent, Soma Coffee

The Pencil Today

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CLASS WARFARE: THE BATTLE OF SOMA

The first shot was fired last week, according to an anecdote I overheard at the venerable Bloomington caffeine-jones institution.

Liberté!

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One participant was scarred, possibly permanently, suffering a coffee-stained suit. The attack was  dastardly, sudden. The victim is bravely attempting to carry on.

Here’s the tale from a completely impeachable source — although I verified the incident with the victim.

The dean of a certain high profile Indiana University school was picking up his usual morning life-giving substance at Soma. As he approached the front door to leave, another customer was about to enter.

This second customer pushed open the front door with asymmetric shock, as — oh, say — an economist might describe it.

Greenspan: “Hey, Watch How You Throw That Door Open.”

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Sadly, due to the door-opener’s irrational exuberance, the door swung into the dean and caused him to spill coffee over his business suit.

The dean in question, by the way, is a nice guy, a gentleman, and well-respected even outside his discipline. On the other hand, his discipline is not universally cherished by some angry citizens these days. (As opposed to, say, the 1980s and 90s.)

Gekko: “Throw That Door Open And Damn Everyone Who’s In Your Way!”

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Anyway, the dean jumped back and looked plaintively at the young man who threw the door open.

The young man eyed the dean, whose suit befitted a man who earns some $350,000 per annum (HT to the H-T annual listing of salaries.) The door opener apparently lumped the dean in with the justifiably-villified uber-rich hyenas whom the Republican Party, the Koch-fueled Me Party-ists, and the Ayn Rand fetishists doggedly feel deserve their billions and billions and billions and….

The young man said, coldly, “Hey, you’re part of the one-percent; just go buy yourself a new suit.”

With that, the young man strode toward the counter and ordered his drink. The dean remained in place for a beat, his mouth agape.

Che & Fidel: Noted Spillers Of Coffee On College Deans

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The aggrieved dean seems to be recovering. He told me, “I’ll be alright. I’ve been called worse things.”

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A GRAY NOVEMBER FRIDAY AFTERNOON NEARLY A HALF CENTURY AGO

November 22nd dawned chilly and overcast in Chicago some 48 years ago today.

It was, on the other hand, a warm day bathed in brilliant sunshine in Dallas.

The nuns at St. Giles sent us all home early that afternoon. The principal, Sister James Mary, made the announcement over the PA. We were shocked as we listened to her. Her voice seemed to be cracking with emotion.

We second graders had never before imagined nuns to be capable of feeling any emotion other than rage.

When I got home, my mother was vacuuming. I watched her for a few moments. She seemed to be rolling the vacuum over the same spot, obsessively. She was crying.

I’d never seen Ma cry before.

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If you weren’t alive and aware on that long ago Friday, the only analogy I can make to convey the life-changing nature of that day is to cite September 11, 2001.

The hell of it is, now I’ve personally lived through two such days. I have absolutely no interest in living through another.

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BLOOMINGTON’S TALENT COMING TO THESE PAGES!

We’ve already got crackerjack author Joy Shayne Laughter here. And the latest opus from those cinematic geniuses Chris Rall and Tony Brewer is here too.

Over the next couple of days, we’ll be presenting work by music aficionado Ryan Lee Dawes and we’ll begin running a brand new comix series by Grover & Sloan.

Here’s a sneak preview of G&S’s “Cats and Machines” series:

Cats And Machines

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Oh hey, did I mention that research scientist Dr. Alex Straiker of the IU Department of Psychology and Brain Sciences will grace these pages with his vivid images of neuron microscopy? He mixes science with art as well as any creative alchemist ever has.

Stayed tuned or it’ll be your loss. So there!

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11/13/2011
1 Comment
Baron Hill, Boy Who Came Back from Heaven, Burt Reynolds, Colton Burpo, Cooperative Threat Reduction, Donald Trump, Elizabeth Taylor, Elvis Presley, Erik Estrada, Gary Busey, Going Rogue, Heaven Is For Real, Indiana University, Jerry Sandusky, Joe Paterno, Larry Hagman, Lynn Vincent, Michael A. McRobbie, New York Times Review of Books, Ozzy Osbourne, Penn State University, Republican Party, Richard Lugar, Sam Allison, Sam Nunn, Sarah Palin, Sharon Stone, Soviet Union, Tea Party, Todd Burpo

Today: Sunday, November 13, 2011

POETIC JUSTICE

Penn State lost. Good. May they never win another game again.

Joe Pa’s Statue Being Molested By Penn State Fanatic

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PONY UP

Indiana University employees are raising a stink about having to pay a larger share of their health insurance premiums, according The Herald Times (log-in required).

Some 800 IU wage slaves have signed an online petition asking for more time to mull the huge increase. IU honchos say the increase is set in stone, so tough luck, kiddies.

The hike will hit IU workers who make about $10 an hour hardest. The university did agree to a slim wage increase for this school year ($1.5-3 percent) but additional expenses like the health insurance premium pretty much offset it.

I hate to be a nudge (well, alright, I love to be a nudge) but I just want to remind the world that Big Chief Michael A. McRobbie is enjoying his hefty pay raise this year. The school’s pres is making $533,120 in 2011-12, an increase of 12 percent over lost year’s paltry sum.

Higher Premium? No Prob.

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Jes sayin’.

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LOOSE NUKES SINK WORLDS

Yeah, yeah, I know I’m supposed to villify Senator Richard Lugar  but I can’t help but thinking he isn’t all bad.

You know, we progressives are mandated by blood oath to abhor all Republicans. They are, after all, the spawn of Adolf and Eva, but — silly me — I’m just a contrarian.

Commentator Mike Leonard in today’s H-T heaps kudos on the 79-year-old running for his sixth term in the Senate for a piece of legislation Lugar co-sponsored 20 years ago. Lugar and Georgia Senator Sam Nunn, a Democrat, successfully pushed through the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program Act in 1992.

The bill authorized this holy land to spend tons of dough to help the nations of the former Soviet Union find and destroy nuclear weapons that had been positioned within their borders. The Soviet Union, natch, wasn’t the most open of hegemonists when it planted the big bangers within such wild spots as Azerbaijan, Belarus, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan.

The Act led to the destruction of at least 7500 nukes as well as thousands of delivery systems and tons of fissionable materials.

Here Is Soviet Gift To You, Mr. and Mrs. America

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For you younger readers, the Act was the result of something we used to refer to as “bipartisan cooperation,” a quaint concept that means Democrats and Republicans working together.

I know, weird, huh?

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LOVE TRUMPS POLITICS

Sam Allison is quitting his job as Monroe County Board member.

I met Sam on election night, 2010, when his fellow Dems across the nation were dropping like flies under the onslaught of the Me Party-ists. Even Bloomington congressman Baron Hill got fired by the voters that sad night.

Not Slick, Just Decent

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Allison had been the County Recorder and was running for the first time for County Council. He and his lovely bride hung around the Democratic campaign headquarters on 3rd Street. Gloom descended upon the place as results came in. The figures showed Allison winning early in the night, though. Too bad his moment of triumph came in what was essentially a funeral parlor.

Sam Allison seemed a decent and humble man. Those qualities, apparently, didn’t hinder his political career. Now his lovely bride has scored a big new gig in Missouri so Sam, faithful mate that he is, is following her.

Good luck.

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I’M COMIN’, ELIZABETH!

“Heaven Is For Real” is still the number one paperback bestseller in this holy land, according to the New York Times Review of Books.  Next week will mark a full year since it hit the list. That ain’t all: Somehow, the hardcover version is still among the top movers in that category, sitting at number 26 this week.

It’s The Big One!

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“Heaven…” recounts young Colton Burpo’s trip to paradise after his appendix burst when he was three years old. The book was written by his father, Todd Burpo, an evangelical pastor from Nebraska. Old man Burpo’s co-writer was the controversial Lynn Vincent who co-penned another other work of bizarre fantasy, “Going Rogue,” with Sarah Palin.

The book is joined on the coffee tables of the willfully credulous by “The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven” at number 17. This one is the tale of a six year old kid who falls into a two-month coma after a car accident. The kid, of course, comes as close as can be to joining the putative creator of the universe in his palatial digs but somehow finds the strength to come back to Earth because, you know, any place with the Taliban and Donald Trump in it has to be preferable to eternal paradise.

Screw Heaven; I’d Rather Be Around This Guy!

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Anyway, this whole I’m-precious-enough-to-be-brought-to-the-doorstep-of-god thing got me to searching the interwebs for other fascinating folks who’ve seen the bright light. Sure enough, Hollywood is filled with ’em!

One website that finds the whole phenomenon credible lists the following souls as having entered the tunnel and coming back:

● Liz Taylor

● Sharon Stone

● Gary Busey

● Larry Hagman

● Erik Estrada

● Burt Reynolds

● Ozzy Osbourne

● and the King himself, Elvis Presley

So, you tell me, who ya gonna believe, a bunch of dumb scientists or Erik Estrada?

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