And I Will Read "War And Peace" Before Christmas

The Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle was tricky this week. I know because I went to the post office today.

"Ice Cream Social: The Struggle For The Soul of Ben & Jerry's", New Book by Brad Edmondson

Ben & Jerry's ice cream was always an Ithaca kind of company: deliciously radical, with a Peace Pop and "Cherry Garcia," and a scoop shop operated by youths as a social project in the heart of our downtown.

Then, in 2000, the company was bought by Unilever, one of the world's largest food corporations. What happened to Small Is Beautiful?

Brad Edmondson, a local author, tells the tale in his new book, "Ice Cream Social: The Struggle For the Soul of Ben & Jerry's."

The book originally started as a collaboration between Edmondson and Jeff Furman, who lives in Ithaca and helped write Ben & Jerry's first business plan in 1977. Jeff has been called "the '&' in Ben & Jerry's." He still serves on the independent board that monitors Unilever's operation of Ben & Jerry's.

After some months of work, Edmondson and Furman decided the story was too big to be too much Jeff's. He supplies the epilogue and serves as a source. The book has a list of over 40 "Main Characters" (an actual list, in front of the book).

Edmondson said that despite the scope of the story, he wanted to write "a book that could be read in one sitting." We are reviewing the book for the Ithaca Times and told him that's exactly what we did, and that it reads at times like a soap opera. He said, "Really? That makes me happy.

"It's not a normal business book," he said. "It can serve as a reference book for certain business practices, and it tells a business story, but unlike many business books, it doesn't pretend to be a road map. It's a story. A story people can learn lessons from, I hope, but I don't tell you what the lessons are. I put the story between the covers and the lessons are for you to determine."

The book's release is imminent and there will be an event at Buffalo Street Books. The tentative date is 13 December. Please look for our full review in the Ithaca Times of Wednesday 11 December.

Celery And Things Such As Celery

Three days before Thanksgiving, our favorite holiday. What's not to like about a holiday where celery is so central? Even if you don't like celery? We do, but we especially like the idea of simple pleasures, like those stalks (salted, standing together in a glass of water), cider, pie, and time with people you love, whom you see all too seldom.

We wish you a happy Thanksgiving with, as a wise and happy friend of ours says, whomever your "we" are.

A Good Clout

Neither of my parents were hitters, though they often were forced to threaten it.

My father, like many fathers of the time, I guess, had the role of punisher when he came home from work, and heard all the bad things we did that day.

If hitting was warranted, he would discuss it first, in a way that was so rote, and comical to me, the hardest thing was trying not to laugh.

"I'm gonna take off my belt," he would say, "and...I'll hit ya; and you'll cry..." and his voice would trail off in the sad inevitability of it all.

So I would say I was sorry, maybe crying a little for authenticity, thus avoiding any smacking, and then I would rush off and imitate the ritual for my siblings. It got us every time.

My mother also would allow us the chance of an out through words. Caught at something, or simply annoying her, she would turn and say, eerily deadpan, "Do you want a good clout?" - our introduction to the rhetorical question.

Once and only once she ever hit me. There was no question first. It was when President Kennedy died.

He was shot and killed on a Friday. I was in first grade. They didn't tell us at school. I remember getting off the school bus, and all the mothers were there. That was unusual, as they usually took turns meeting us.

They took our hands, which was also strange.

I remember coming home, and the news on TV - all day, and into the night.

When I woke on Saturday, my mother was up, standing in front of the TV.

I stood next to her. She wasn't speaking and might have been crying.

Personally, I was wondering what was happening with cartoons. I was a big fan of a new show, Tennessee Tuxedo and His Tales.

"Is this going to be on all day?," I asked.

"Of course," my mother said, and not kindly. "The president is shot dead."

It sank in. I shook my head - at the thought of the morning ruined; and said, as I gazed at the TV:

"Why did stupid President Kennedy have to get shot on a Friday?"

Wham, came the answer, a swing of my mother's arm, with the back of her hand to my face. She was crying now, and I sure knew why.

I found my footing, and looked up at her with tears in my eyes. She looked shocked, and sad, but she didn't say she was sorry.

The Thematic "Joe Show," Tuesdays on WRFI

Our pal Joe Romano does a show called The Joe Show on WRFI radio, Tuesday nights from 7 -9 p.m. It's the only radio show we know that has its own original theme song: a rocking little number called "Get A Cup Of Joe." It was written for Joe by big-time author and part-time musician, Ithaca resident J. Robert Lennon. It probably did not take long to write, but it is rollicking and fun, which describes the show, too.

We recommend the show highly. Joe does a theme each week. Sometimes it is jokey ("Infinity") and sometimes it is serious ("Crime"). Always it is interesting and captivating.

Sometimes, unavoidably, we tune in late, but then we have fun trying to guess the theme by the songs. But we recommend tuning in on time, at least the first time, to hear the theme song.

Sometime soon, probably tomorrow, we will publish some excerpts of an interview we recently did with Joe.

WRFI just ended a fundraising marathon to support the community-owned station. If you missed it, you can still donate. Check wrfi.org for details.

Tompkins County Passes On Gambling (But Loses)

New Yorkers voted overwhelmingly last Tuesday to expand casino gambling in the state. Tompkins County provided a notable exception, with the largest number of "no" votes of any county. (A few western New York counties had slightly higher percentages of "no" votes, but among much smaller populations.)

Tompkins County seems to have taken a long view towards the proposal, that while casinos will provide jobs, they are not stable. Casinos in Atlantic City have lost almost half their revenue in recent years, and when casinos fail, there is blight.

Sullivan County, in the Catskills, had the highest percentage of votes in favor. At least one major casino will be built there, a place of desperate unemployment. Tompkins County, conversely, has the lowest unemployment rate in the state year after year.

That's because we have colleges. Colleges are a little like casinos, in that people come from away to leave a lot of money there, and drink too much. That's the end of the flippant comparison, except to note that colleges rarely fail as businesses, create good jobs, and provide something of value. We suppose that's what Tompkins County voters were trying to advocate, in rejecting gambling as an economic path.

Fundraising Drive On WRFI: Pledge Online, On Phone, On Foot

WRFI, 88.1 on the FM dial, is Ithaca's community radio station. It started a decade ago as a rebroadcast station. In 2012, with full licensing, it began airing local programming along with choice syndicated shows such as "Democracy Now!" with Amy Goodman.

WRFI's local programming began with Jim Murphy's "Morning Show." Today WRFI airs over 40 original shows.

It takes more than commitment, time and talent. It also takes money. WRFI built a studio last year in the Clinton House on the corner of Cayuga and Seneca Streets. There is rent to pay, and equipment to buy and maintain. WRFI sells no advertising and gets no money from sources such as the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. All its revenue comes from listeners.

The station is doing its second annual pledge drive this week. You can make a pledge online, at wrfi.org, on the phone, at 319-5445, or on foot, by visiting their third-floor studio. A $10 pledge gets you a bumper sticker. With a pledge of $60 or more you also get a station t-shirt, and a chance at one of many prizes donated by local businesses.

We've written a longer piece about the drive for this week's Ithaca Times. See it in this Wednesday's issue.

Ithaca Blog Resting Before Moving

Close and frequent readers of Ithaca Blog have noticed it's not easy to be a frequent reader anymore, as our posts have dropped from a few a week to a few a month.

We're not sick, or tired, it's just that we have been writing for the Ithaca Times lately, and readying a book ("Brooklyn 3, New York") for publication, so time's issuance is an issue.

Also, maybe the main thing, is that there are plans for Ithaca Blog to become a feature on the Ithaca Times website. This is also taking a little planning and time.

We will come back resuscitated and, of course, more frequent. Meanwhile, we will post here every once in a while, when we think there's something you must hear or not miss. Such as, right now, the fundraising marathon for community radio WRFI, 88.1 in Ithaca. We are planning to have a brief blurb on RFI here soon, and a longer article in the Ithaca Times this week, both online and in the Wednesday print edition.

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Author Lydia Davis At Ithaca College

Damon Runyon, author of the taut "Guys And Dolls" tales of old Broadway, used to say, "No one can tell me anything about keeping 'em short." Well, Lydia Davis can. Some of her stories are mere pages, some a few paragraphs, some just a few sentences.

Of course, Runyon wrote for manna, while Davis writes for mind. Her work has been cited for its psychological and philosophical weight. Some critics call it more poetry than prose. Some say she has invented a new form altogether.

Ms. Davis won the Man Booker International Prize (a new challenger to the Nobel Prize) this year for her body of work. In 2003 she won a MacArthur Fellowship (the so-called "genius" award).

Ms. Davis will speak at Ithaca College for its Distinguished Visiting Writers Series on Thursday 19 September at 6 pm at Handwerker Gallery.

We wrote back and forth with Ms. Davis this week for an interview for the Ithaca Times. We can report that she is a friendly and generous correspondent. The interview will appear this Wednesday in the Times' print version, and at ithacatimes.com.

Mortification In Print

We write book reviews occasionally for the local weekly paper. It pays almost as much as minimum wage, if you sell your free copy of the book (we haven't yet), but gratification is supposed to be the real remuneration.

It is, sometimes, but sometimes it's mortification, when editing errors turn your perfectly serviceable copy into something a conscientious eighth-grader wouldn't sign. That happened to us this week in the Ithaca Times.

We know a lot of people in town and like to be thought of as normal in intelligence, rather than a moose-head moron, so here is our actual lead for a review of "Among The Bloodpeople" by Thomas Glave.

"Thomas Glave mixes intellect, passion, and daring in his new collection of essays, 'Among The Bloodpeople.'

"Mr. Glave has been a Visiting Professor at MIT and a Visiting Fellow at the University of Cambridge. This is his fourth book. He will give a reading at Buffalo Street Books at 6 pm on Wednesday, September 25."

Not so complicated, right?

Ricky Jay At Cornell Cinema, 24 September

Ricky Jay is the greatest playing card magician in the world, probably in history, and he will appear at Cornell Cinema on Tuesday 24 September for the showing of a movie about him, "Deceptive Practices."

Mr. Jay lived in this area in the 1960's, rumor has it, and spent hours practicing shuffles at the bar at the Rongonvian Embassy, although in following his career over many decades, we have never heard him talk about this chapter of his life. We are a little surprised he is scheduled to be here.

We are also surprised the show is not already sold out (we got our tickets), and will be shocked if it is not sold out at least somewhat in advance. Every few years, Jay performs a limited run show in a small theater on Broadway, and tickets are impossible to get for anyone less illustrious than, say, Jay-Z. Of course, the appearance at Cornell is not a show, and might be no more than a few spoken words, but Mr. Jay is a great story-teller and historian of both show business and the con. Chances are, brief appearance or not, at some point Mr. Jay, showman that he is, will produce a deck of cards and ask someone to pick one, any one.

What's In A Fast Food Name (And Bucket)

Dunkin' Donuts runs commercials on Met games on TV (yes, Met games, it ain't over till it's over), and I notice it isn't "Dunkin' Donuts" anymore, it's just "Dunkin'." I guess donuts are a little declasse, and reminiscent of Homer Simpson, and the company wants to focus on the other, more expensive foods they now sell.

It reminds me of when Kentucky Fried Chicken changed their name to KFC years ago. You probably think it was to get the word "Fried" out of the picture. Maybe, but there's another possibility.

At the time the Colonel made the change, I was a few years out of college, and worked with a younger guy named Johnny who ate KFC for lunch a couple of times a week. As he indulged one day, I mentioned the name change, and how they don't want you to think about the unhealthy fried aspect of their food.

"No," he said patiently, between bites. "It's not about the 'F'. It's about the 'C'."

"About the C?," I said.

"Uh huh," he said, pointing at the bucket. "It's not necessarily chicken."

A Quick One For The Baseball Fans

We're trying to substantiate a rumor we're trying to start, that Al Rodriguez of the NY Yankees baseball club paid that guy to hit him with that pitch in Boston. It turned him from pariah to pet among his teammates and was the best thing to happen to Rodriguez in his career since he started making choices.

Curtains

The Inquiring Photographer feature in the Ithaca Times this week asked, "What's Something You Want To Do Before The Students Return?" We won't ask, but tell you, something you should do.

Buy a new shower curtain. They'll be a scarce commodity soon.

Types Of Talk: NYC And Ithaca

There's a joke among us staff at GreenStar Coop, or a half-joke really, that the store should have red flags to unfurl on shopping carts and baskets for shoppers who want to signal that they are in a hurry and don't want to talk. Most of the time we're glad that people are so extravagantly friendly, but sometimes we see (and sometimes feel) that it can be a problem, too.

The problem is magnified, maybe, for ex-NYC people, such as myself. City people like to talk, but not as a way to pass time; more as a way to show how funny and smart they are. (And, of course, they are. Everyone in New York City thinks they are funnier and smarter than everyone else, and are eager to prove it.)

Thus, talk takes on a different tone. Exhibiting your cleverness takes brevity. Long-windedness is for the dull. So is lack of focus. You want to make your waggish point and walk. So does your interlocutor (at least you hope they do).

It is an art form, and a way of being, and one I haven't been able to shake, in all my years away from the city. It's one of the reasons I love the place so much. You know - I love Grand Central Station, but just partly for the architecture; more for the talk I will hear when I'm there. And for the fact that the funny person talking to me will stop before I want them to, and go.

"Belly": Filling Tall Orders At Lot 10

We had a staycation here in Ithaca this week and it turns out a big highlight was a trip last night to the "Belly" food enterprise which inhabits Lot 10 bar on S. Cayuga Street every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

Belly is a food truck type enterprise, sans the truck, using Lot 10 as a three-night-weekly outpost. Unfortunately for us, we work those three nights, so when we had a chance to hit it this week, we did.

We wish we could tell you about everything on the menu, because that would mean we had eaten everything on the menu, but we only had one offering, the schnitzel and spaetzle. It was so good that we didn't want anything more. Well, we did, especially when we saw the other choices coming out of the kitchen, but we left great enough alone.

The menu changes weekly, depending on what's good at the market, and the creative impulses of the chef. It is a simple but splendid formula.

Our pal Manny Flores is part of the operation. He is from Queens and has worked at some of the best restaurants in Manhattan, but also has a feel for the fast-moving and hip, the ethnic, funky, and real. This is what Queens is, after all, and Manny represents. He takes your order dressed in crisp clothes, with a quick smile and a gift of gab. You are in the hands of a pro, here, who will make sure you're not only well-fed, but laughing and relaxed, and happy to be there. It's a tall order, maybe, but Belly fills it.

It's a great place to be. Maybe we will take next Friday off, too.

Seward Historian At Cornell Tonight

Last autumn, we reviewed in the Ithaca Times Walter Stahr's biography of William Seward, whom you might know as the perpetrator of "Seward's Folly," the purchase of Alaska for the U.S., or for his supporting role in the hit movie "Lincoln." Tonight, Mr. Stahr comes to Cornell to discuss his book.

Seward was from Auburn, New York. You will see many momentos of his life if you visit Auburn, and also of Harriet Tubman, with whom Seward worked on the Underground Railroad, bringing fugitive slaves from the south. Seward rented a house to Tubman and both their houses were used to harbor fugitives, in violation of federal law.

Walter Stahr discussed "Seward: Lincoln's Indispensible Man" tonight at 7:30 in Statler Auditorium. The event is free and open to the public.

We published an interview with Mr. Stahr in this week's Ithaca Times. It is viewable at wwwithacatimes.com.

GrassRoots Parking Tip

If you're doing a same-day round-trip to GrassRoots, here's a tip: pass up the free parking at Agard Road and pay for parking on Route 96, near the fairgrounds.

The parking lot was fine yesterday (we used it), before a lot of people had arrived. Thursday is usually a slow day. So there were no lines to board the shuttle bus (also free), in either direction.

But tonight, and tomorrow, there will be a lot more people, and tonight a lot of them will be leaving at the same time: when Emmylou Harris stops singing, about 11 o'clock. That could mean long lines to board the bus to go home.

Across from the fairgrounds on Rt. 96, the various car dealerships, markets, etc. sell parking spaces for $10 a day. That means at the end of your night you can walk to your car and be home in Ithaca in half an hour (assuming you don't get stopped on Rt. 96 for squealing your tires, which happens a lot this weekend each year, when state troopers on 96 develop very sensitive hearing).

$10 can't do anything about the cops, we don't think, but for parking, it can be a very wise investment. By Sunday, the crowds have thinned enough to go back to free parking and the bus.

Beating The Heat (Again)

Almost exactly two years ago, Ithaca had record heat, and we posted here on IBlog an entry about hot beverages as a palliative for over-heatedness: method, or madness? It's too hot to retype or recap it here, so we simply refer you back to the posting, from 7/11/11. There's a search field on the blog pages that will find it for you if you enter "hot beverages."

Meanwhile, we got the idea of sticking our shirt into the freezer for a while before donning. We haven't done it, and are sure it is stupid enough not to mention again, but if we do it and it's cool, so to speak, we will, don't worry.

We will also report what we find when we log onto Amazon and Etsy and look up "ice-pack hats."

4th of July On July 1

In Ithaca, we call it the Community Fireworks Celebration, because it's not on July Fourth, but on a cheaper day less in demand - this year, Monday 1 July.

This is the second year the event is at Stewart Park, a fine venue, with room to spread out, and for vendors with food and drink.

Transportation is always a problem for a fireworks show, because unlike a festival, everyone leaves at the same time. TCAT has free buses between the park and the library, but by far the best option is biking. If I lived in Enfield, I would bring a bike in back of the car, drive in and park at Wegman's, and bike across town. Bikes are not affected by congestion, and there was plenty at show's end last year, even to board the buses, and for them to exit.

Our favorite question about the fireworks show is, what time does it start?, because you don't have to answer that question.