Fine Arts & Crafts in Bethel, Sat after Thanksgiving

Fast talking, always smiling, Bohemian wildman artist Mike Seri sent me this poster. He curated the first Pop Up Bethel show and i have to tell you it was wonderful. So why not do your Xmas and Kwanza gifting right here and support the arts. So check this out:

Robin's Rant: Words like pebbles

I liked this new blog post from a blog called Robin's Rant! Robin's Rant: Words like pebbles:

"I don't let go easily. I save words like pretty stones. I turn them over and over, feel their heft. Smooth or rough, they are all beautiful."    - Robin Sampson

Art and Frame Photo Show in Danbury

Art and Frame's Photo show has some interesting works. Take a pass through and check them out. This gallery and frame shop is located near Chamomile on Route 6 in Danbury. Check their Facebook page and click on events for show openings.  Besides the artwork, their show openings usually feature great local music and a nice spread of noshable items. On this particular evening I was too early and missed the music however.

Threads - a seasonal weave

I haven't written a post in quite a while, so I thought I would start with a picture. This fluffy bit is all digital,   a digital doodle.

Helen of Troy, a treat at WCSU

Classic Greek drama visited Danbury Monday night. It questioned the efficacy of violence and the benevolence of the fickle "gods."  The play was Helen of Troy by Euripides. The performers were a professional touring troupe under the direction of Eftychia Loizides.

The play provides an alternate view of Helen. In this version she'd been whisked to Eqypt by Hermes and never taken by the warrior Paris, who instead, stole a phantom of smoke, whipped up a goddess bent on mischief. Yet as we find out - this means all the blood shed, lives lost, agonies endured for the sake of Helen during the ten-year Trojan war, had been offered up in vain....

Literature Professor Donald P. Gagnon, PhD  set the play among Euripedes other works, before the curtain went up on this performance, noting that it was banned for a time some 2400 years after it was first produced, because it was considered too powerful for the situation then.

It took me a while to get used to the stage voices, but after a while I was immersed.  It was tastefully done with a minimal set and some beautiful (haunting) singing.

The production stared Leslie Fray as the beautiful clever Helen, Brian Scannell as craftly but noble Menelaus, the delightfully villainous Chuk Obasi as Theoclymenus, and an equally strong cast of other players including Aaron Barcelo, Nora Aislinn, Katia Haeuser, Stevan Szczytko and Sandra Maren Schneider. (Leonidas Eftychia Liozides Theatre Group)

The production of Helen of Troy was sponsored jointly by Western Connecticut State University and The Deno and Marie Macricostas Family Foundation.

A reception with delicious food, coffee and Baklava afforded an opportunity to chat about the play, with the actors and the sponsors immediately afterwards.  A delightful event, entirely free to the public. Thank you. This low budget person says, Thank you very much.

See also www.loizidis.com and http://helen-oftroy.blogspot.com

File under: Healthcare-miscellaneous discontent

Today I read an opinion piece in the Danbury News Times by Dr. Kenneth Pellegrino, a family doctor in Brookfield. It's one of the best assessments of the current system I have ever seen in such a short space. The title is "The guarded state of American health care: A doctor's diagnosis. Bravo Dr. Pellegrino!!! I read it in the paper paper rather than online.

I borrowed the book  How Doctors Think, by Jerome Groopman, MD from the local library. It reveals an amazing view of what influences a doctor's thought processes, and what reasoning a doctor may use when putting you into a pigeonhole of care -- or instead, actually seeing and speaking with you as a living being..... Eureka!

 I recenty learned there are apparently online "health record vaults" where health records can (supposedly)be shared with insurers or various doctors you might have. Not that you actually would be able to convince anyone to look into it, and it looks like it might be a fulltime job just to get the info up there. And by then I'll be 90.... or not. Sigh.

Women's Voices at the Bank Street Coffeehouse

Four differing voices made an interesting evening for poetry in New Milford last night. The reading, called "Women's Voices" was organized by reporter and poet Susan Tuz, who made the poster on the right.  I snapped the picture as it hung in the coffeehouse window and you can see a faint reflection of the buildings on Bank Street.

The four poets were Susan Tuz, Joan Kantor, Robin Sampon & me. (Mad Mar Walker - no pic of me):