Mullings by Rich Galen | Secret Decoder Ring for November 19, 1999

Norman Rockwell, It's Not Friday, November 19, 1999

Title: "Norman Rockwell, It's Not" Norman Rockwell (1894-1978) was the famous American illustrator best known for his more than 40 years of presenting America at its best to Americans at their best in his long series of covers for the magazine, "The Saturday Evening Post." This, as contrasted with the next item.

"… pose for an updated Edvard Munch painting …" Edvard Munch (1863-1949) was a Norwegian artist of the Surrealist school. One of his most famous paintings is "The Scream" which is one of a series of mood paintings including "Despair", "Jealousy", "Melancholy", "Anxiety", and "Love."

"...why this 'Geschrei' mentality ..." is the name of "The Scream" in German

He said of "The Scream": 'I was walking along the road with two friends - watching the sunset - the sky suddenly turned red as blood - I stopped, leant against the fence, deadly tired - above the blue-black fjord and the town lay blood and tongues of fire - my friends walked on and I was left, trembling with fire - and I could feel an infinite scream passing through the landscape.'

That Ed. What a card.

"The real loser in this whole Nang Yai play …" is a traditional form of entertainment in Thailand in which back-lit puppets perform on a small stage. It is often translated to "Shadow Play," which is the form used here.

"It's the old saw …" Saw used here, is an obsolete form meaning "saying" or "expression."

"Golden Arches of politics…" In Taos, NM, for example the McDonald's sign has the Golden Arches with just the word "Taos" beneath. I have driven passed a McDonald's sign in Tennessee along the interstate where there was no word beneath the Arches at all.

"… reprehensible …" Gephardt's use of that word in a speech, I believe, at Harvard was softened over the next few days but the damage had been done.

"…twist slowly, slowly in the political wind …" a play on the phrase made famous by Richard Nixon insider John Erlichman during Watergate to describe what they should do to a political opponent: "Well, I think we ought to let him hang there. Let him twist slowly, slowly in the wind."

That John. What a card.

"…penultimate …" next-to-last.

"The Leonid meteor shower …" This, from NASA: In mid November, there is an annual meteor shower called the Leonid Meteor Shower, or simply, The Leonids. The Leonid shower gets its name because the meteors appear to be coming from the constellation Leo. The comet responsible for the Leonid meteor shower is the comet Temple-Tuttle, which passed close by the Earth in 1998.

Temple-Tuttle travels in a highly elongated ellipse around the Sun with a period of 33 years. As the comet gets close to the Sun, ice is boiled off, leaving dust and bits of rock along its path. This debris continues to follow the same orbital path as the comet, and eventually spreads out over the entire orbit.

Every year in November the Earth passes near the comet's orbit and encounters the ice and the rock. This gives rise to the Leonid shower. Naturally, this debris is most plentiful close to, and behind the comet. For one or two years after perihelion, the point where the comet is closest to the Sun, the showers are especially strong. Exceptionally strong showers are called "storms." The strength of the meteor shower or storm is indicated by the rate that particles are observed in the sky.

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