TAPS-Melvin Benson Haynes, Jr.

Melvin Benson Haynes, Jr., 59, passed away on April 24, 2007 at the University Of Maryland Hospital in Baltimore, Md., of natural causes. He was born on February 7, 1948 in Baltimore, Md. to Belle and Melvin, Sr., completing the family that included sisters Anne and Bonnie. From the age of 7, Melvin enjoyed a life long passion for fishing.
Melvin graduated from Overlea High School in Rosedale, Md in 1965.
He served proudly in the US Army in Vietnam and Germany.
On August 1, 1968, he married K. Carol Sites producing 2 children, Teresa Lynn and David Brian. This marriage ended in divorce; however they decided to try again and were remarried on August 1, 1985. Sadly, this marriage ended in divorce.
After completing his service to his country, he joined the Pipe/Sprinkler Fitters, UA local 536 in Baltimore. He was a pipe fitter for over 30 years. In 1990, he married Sherry Elaine Garrett producing Christopher Michael and Nicholas Ryan. The family relocated to Minnesota for 12 years at the request of the Union.
In 2004, the family relocated back to Baltimore area and Melvin retired from work due to health reasons. Melvin Haynes is preceded in death by his father, Melvin, Sr., his mother, Belle and sister, Anne. He was a life member of the Charles Evering VFW post # 6506 in Baltimore, MD. He is survived by his wife Sherry, and his children; Teresa, David, Christopher, and Nicholas. Melvin will be remember by his friends and family members for his delicious crab cakes, sharing his catch of freshly caught fish and his skills at playing pool, along with many other wonderful memories.

Interment will be at the Gardens of Faith in Rosedale, MD. Memorials may be made in his name to the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.

Plum Street Block Sale

05/05/07

PLUM STREET BLOCK SALE

Lancaster, PA

500 block starting @ 7am

Rain date 05/19/07

The Blog | Laurie David and Sheryl Crow: Karl Rove Gets Thrown Under the Stop Global Warming Bus | The Huffington Post

The Blog Laurie David and Sheryl Crow: Karl Rove Gets Thrown Under the Stop Global Warming Bus The Huffington Post

[ we are the infantree ]

[ we are the infantree ]

Spring Art Walk=Lancaster PA

This year is the 23rd anniversary of the Lancaster Spring ArtWalk. This fabulous celebration of the arts will be taking place the 21st to 22nd of April, 2007. Lancaster Spring ArtWalk 2007 will encompass a wide variety of arts including: art exhibits/demonstrations, children's and student's art, some musical performances and returning this year, a Kid's ArtWalk. During ArtWalk, artists open their studios and galleries for the weekend and invite the public to stroll around downtown Lancaster and visit with the artists. Area restaurants and shops will also open their doors with special exhibits.
Kids ArtWalk is a hands on art experience at participating locations during ArtWalk. Kids are given the opportunity to express their creativity in a variety of interactive projects free of charge.

Also new this year is our interactive map. You can search out locations, information and get directions from it.

Check out: www.spacelancaster.org and

http://www.lancasterartwalk.com/artmap.html

The Ambitions

Check out the Ambitions!! The Ambitions are a Washington, D.C. based soul band. Their music is an inspired mixture of 60's soul, garage, and mod culture with a twist all their own. Their lively stage performance gets crowds on their feet and dancing. Even the non-dancers are hypnotized by the band's energy on stage leaving them wanting more.
The band has gained a large following from the local DC, Baltimore, and VA club circuit and features musicians from touring acts such as The Checkered Cabs, Villa Rosie, Victor Rice Octet, New York Ska-Jazz Ensemble, Eastern Standard Time, and more.

"The Ambitions' fusion of garage-pop with uplifting soul-style vocals has the edge...."The Washington Post Express

A southern soul-influenced band from Washington, DC worthy of your attention. The Ambitions take the stage, and I remember why I bothered to come out: they're ridiculously good."
Singer Caz Gardiner is as much a sight to behold as a joy to hear. By the time their set is finished, half the crowd is shaking a** in one way or another. The Ambitions transcend the space; anywhere they play there will be dancing and smiles."
-Goucher College Newspaper (Arts & Entertainment) 03/01/06

I wanna be able to DANCE like Caz! The entire band rocks and really puts on a great show. Hopefully they will be playing around Lancaster, PA soon!! Check out their websites:

http://www.myspace.com/ambitionsdc

http://www.kellyannmarshall.com/Ambitions/

Local Half Nelson

Local Police log from Sunday April 15, 2007: A School District of Lancaster, guidance counselor was arrested and charged with possession of drug paraphernalia, city police said. Steven Timothy Dinnocenti, 46, of W. Chestnut Street, Lancaster, was observed lighting a glass crack pipe at about 6:55pm, Saturday in the 500 block of West Orange Street, police said. A summons was to be sent. I believe in innocence till proven guilty and I wonder if he has seen the movie?

Thank You Nike ?

Thank you, ignorance.
Thank you for starting the conversation.
Thank you for making the entire nation listen to the Rutger's team story. And for making us wonder what other great stories we've missed.
Thank you for reminding us to think before we speak.
Thank you for showing us how strong and poised 18-20-year-old women can be.
Thank you for reminding us that another basketball tournament goes on in March.
Thank you for showing us that sport includes more than the time spent on the court.
Thank you fo unintentionally moving women's sport forward.
And thank you for making all of us realize that we still have a long way to go.

Next season starts 11.16.07

This is a copy of a full page ad that appeared in the NYT Sunday edition Sports section by 'the swoosh' on 4.15.07

Jackie Robinson's Day

He was a Soldier,

A Writer,

An Activist,

A Politician,

A Voice,

A Leader,

A Father,

A Husband and a Friend. Being a Hall of Fame second baseman was the easy part. Celebrate the 60th anniversary of Jackie Robinson's first Major League Baseball game today and watch the national ceremony live from Dodger stadium on espn at 8pm ET.

This is a photo I took in Pasadena, CA of a sculpture in tribute to Jackie and his brother Mack, who was an Olympic silver medalist.

Brick Artist

The Lancaster Museum of Art is hosting one of the most intriguing, family-friendly exhibits of the year. The Art of the Brick is scheduled to be at the Museum from April 7-May 20 and features the work of Nathan Sawaya, a professional LEGO® artist and former LEGO® Master Model Builder with a gifted skill set that he’s been honing since the age of five.His work is obsessively and painstakingly crafted and is both beautiful and playful. Sawaya’s ability to transform LEGO® bricks into something new, his devotion to scale and color perfection, the way he conceptualizes the action of the subject matter, enables him to elevate an ordinary toy to the status of art.http://www.lmapa.org/exh.html

Don't forget to check out Nathan's web site also:

http://www.brickartist.com/

So it goes

Thursday, April 12, 2007, brought the news that Kurt Vonnegut had passed. His book "A Man without a Country" lies on my night stand. The titled for the book comes from a quote concerning his favorite magazine; In these Times. A magazine he was a frequent contributor to: http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3124/thank_you_mr_vonnegut/

The following is part of the memorial from In these Times by it's editor, Joel Bleifus: There were two folks Kurt was wont to quote: Jesus and Eugene V. Debs.
In the May 10, 2004 issue, in an article titled “Cold Turkey”—the most popular of his essays that we published—he wrote, “For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that’s Moses, not Jesus. I haven’t heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere. ‘Blessed are the merciful’ in a courtroom? ‘Blessed are the peacemakers’ in the Pentagon? Give me a break!”
In that essay he also invoked Debs, who like him was both a socialist and a Hoosier: “Eugene Debs, who died back in 1926, when I was only 4, ran five times as the Socialist Party candidate for president, winning 900,000 votes, 6 percent of the popular vote, in 1912, if you can imagine such a ballot. He had this to say while campaigning: ‘As long as there is a lower class, I am in it. As long as there is a criminal element, I’m of it. As long as there is a soul in prison, I am not free.’ Doesn’t anything socialistic make you want to throw up? Like great public schools or health insurance for all?”
Skeptical of the promises of technical salvation, Kurt was a self-proclaimed Luddite. Though he used a fax machine, he heartily scorned computers: “Bill Gates says, ‘Wait till you can see what your computer can become.’ But it’s you who should be doing the becoming, not the damn fool computer. What you can become is the miracle you were born to be through the work that you do.”
It was In These Times’ pleasure and privilege to publish the work of Kurt Vonnegut. We applauded his humanist ethics, his one-off sense of humor and his in-your-face contempt for Beltway venality. We felt In These Times and he were a perfect fit, and he seemed to agree. One of the nicest faxes we received from Kurt read, “If it weren’t for In These Times, I’d be a man without a country.”
We have lost a citizen who spoke for us all. So it goes.

Lancaster PA Pride 07

Friends and Families: join us for the Lancaster Pride Arts and Entertainment Festival, Saturday, June 23, 2007 at Binn's Park, Lancaster, PA. To contact an event coordinator, call 717-380-1071 and check out the web site!

http://www.lancastergaypride.com/

VICTORY OVER PROHIBITION DAY

Don't forget to celebrate: APRIL 6 (Prohibition ended at the stroke of midnight April 6, 1933) !!
WHY: To celebrate the end of Prohibition and the return to sanity for our great nation. On this date we thank those who helped change policy to allow for the return of our favorite beverage, BEER!

"With preachers announcing that the millennium lay at hand, men and women began to swear off hard spirits; the yearning for perfection drew them until they were pledging total abstinence. Prohibition offered them [fundamentalists] their one link to national authority, the one public commitment to resisting moral decay."- James Morone ( Hellfire Nation: The Politics of Sin in American History)

Missing the L word ?

Just as I was missing the L word, The New York Times runs an article on Daughters of Dinah, Unbound by Melena Ryzik, on their cover of Sunday Styles section ...www.nytimes.com/2007/04/01/fashion/01golf.html

The article talks about the parties and promotions surrounding a golf classic that turn Palm Springs into ‘L’ World Inc.

I Heart City Life

This is not the first car to be hit in front of our house. It seems that the parking spaces in front of our house is a sort of magnet. This car was hit on Tuesday night, 4/3/07, around 10:30pm . After the driver hit this car he proceeded to hit other cars across the street and he was stink'in drunk after drinkin' @ the Fulton bar, as street rumor has it.

April

"It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen..."...is one of my favorite lines in all of English Lit. from Orwell's 1984 along with "APRIL is the cruelest month" by T.S. Eliot as the opening line to The Wasteland. So lets take a look at April's calendar, it's not gonna be cruel at all!!

April 6th=1st Friday in Lancaster but heading out of town to Balto to see a friends band (Kelly)

http://www.kellyannmarshall.com/Ambitions/

April 14th=FanFest Lancaster Barnstormers and Stepitup07=Action against global warming.

April 20th=Natalie Zuckerman and Sam Saber play Steel City Coffeehouse in Phoenixville

April 21/22=Lancaster Artwalk

April 28=PA College of Art and Design Senior Show