Death in a Prairie House

In August of 1914, as the first shots of WWI echoed across Europe, the family and staff of architect Frank Lloyd Wright sat down for lunch in his Wisconsin home. The servant calmly and expertly served the soup - and then pulled out a hatchet. Without warning he killed Wright's lover and her children before setting fire to the building and hacking away at the staff as they tried to flee.

Seven people would die that day, making it the bloodiest mass murder in Wisconsin history before 2005.

Wright was in Chicago that day, but the loss of his lover and the partial destruction of Taliesin, his Prairie House masterpiece, would shape his life and the history of architecture. Death in a Prairie House by William R. Drennan, tells the untold story of those murders.

For many years my wife and I lived two blocks from three examples of Wright's work, and as a Wisconsin native and resident he lives on as a hero in the state. That wasn't always the case.

A few years before the attack Wright abruptly left his wife and children to take a married mother of two as his lover. In defiance of convention, he flaunted this affair and eventually took up residence with her at Taliesin. That is questionable behavior now, much less in 1914, and all of it neatly justified by a hodge-podge of collected aphorisms.

In return, many people in America looked upon him with scorn and distrust.

Did that play a role in inspiring the killer? No one ever discovered the true motive behind the attacks - the African-American assailant starved himself to death in jail before the trial, having attempted suicide upon capture - and everything from religious indignation, racial tension, and a grand conspiracy was offered up for approval.

The book does a fine job of exploring the early life of Wright and piecing together the attack and its aftermath. There are a few notable little errors - one on the first page (!) - but in each case they are almost certainly insignificant details (but ones that should be corrected in future editions). As far at the writing goes it is smooth and polished and shows an expert hand.

Highly entertaining, highly recommended.

The international Date Line always confuses me - is it April 1st in Oslo?

I'm tinkering with announcing an 'intermission' here at Slapinions as I tangle with real-world issues, but I had to sally forth for this obligatory subject . . .
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My reaction when Lisa told me Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize: "For what?!" That's a point of view shared by many Americans, even those in his corner.

[The best snarky reaction I've read? "Where's Kanye West when you need him?"]

Keep in mind that the nominations for the Prize closed on February 1st, which meant that Obama's administration was all of 12 days old when the committee felt The One was worthy of the honor. 288 hours, with at least the first 24 devoted to dinner and dancing.

Ah, but Oslo didn't award the Prize based on accomplishments, saying "Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world's attention and given its people hope for a better future."

In other words, it's just a high profile political endorsement.

After the first wave of genuine shock, and no doubt a glance at the calendar to see if it was April 1st, there were hesitant predictions from the Left that the Nobel win could help Obama push through health care and aid in ending the war in Afghanistan. Apparently, the idea is the award will legitimize his efforts and give heft to his arguements.

Yeaaaah.

It makes more sense to say it'll be more difficult for him to do what needs doing - how can you win the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday and send in 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan the next day?

In reality, it'll probably do nothing to aid or hurt him, other than costing him a small share of voters made uneasy by the Cult of Personality. Oh, and of course, it furthers the decay of the awards legitimacy, but if Norway doesn't care, why should we?

Kudos, btw, for the hyperbole from DNC Communications Director Brad Woodhouse: “The Republican Party has thrown in its lot with the terrorists – the Taliban and Hamas this morning – in criticizing the President for receiving the Nobel Peace prize."

Remember kiddies, criticism is only patriotic when its directed at a Republican!



[Note: For his part, the President said "I am both surprised and deeply humbled [by winning the Prize]." Hmmm. I'll give him the former, but call b.s. on the humble bit. That man's ego isn't capable of recording a hit.]

Just a routine 3 a.m. update

Howdy. I wouldn't be up at all at this late hour if it wasn't for a toothache that seems to come roaring to life only when my head hits the pillow. I'm groggy as heck, but as I wait for the Advil to kick in, let's type.

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The van is still down, although estimates have dropped the bill to $1550. Whoo-hoo. Since we won't have that money for a long time, we've been walking quite a bit, juggling rides, and leaning heavily on the (fingers crossed/knock on wood) Escort.

I actually got pulled over in the Escort last week while running to the store to buy Smiley an apple for school. The exhaust system is ghetto-rifficly loud until it's warmed up, but the officer let me off with a warning. Unfortunately, I don't really have the money to replace that system right now either. Later that same day I took Smiley for a "man day", spending time at the DMV, getting the van towed home, and grabbing a quick bite to eat.

Oh, speaking of that exhaust the girls are horribly embarrassed and so, when I drop them off/pick them up from school, I park a half block away and walk them to the door. Fun.

All that is reinforcing an inferiority complex Lisa and I have. We never had the money of the other parents, but quite apart from that I don't have the time or energy to devote to all the petty little things that seem to consume a "quality" parent there. It doesn't help when on a day like today, when I was running late, I brought Smiley along wearing a mismatched outfit with chocolate smeared across his brow.

Screw it. As I told Lisa tonight "We're good parents. Not Cosby Show good, but right up there with Roseanne."

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I took the girls to the eye doctor for checkups. I warned YaYa, in the Dr.'s presence, that she better not think of tanking the test just to earn a new set of glasses. Lo and behold she did fake the results, and the doc called her on it. No matter. On the redo her eyes did come up as worse than before, and her prescription was strengthened. LuLu on the other hand, came out A-1. She recited the letters machine-gun style. :)

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I watched the Twins and Tigers battle for the AL Central crown in the do-or-die one game playoff today. It wasn't a flawless game, but when it comes to drama it was damn near perfection. For me it ranks right up there with the '91 and '01 Series, the Rockies-Padres playoff a few years ago, and the 2003 ALCS.

Congrats to the Twins - and I hope you're swept by my Yanks.

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Speaking of Minnesota: what a crappy football game Monday, at least for Packer fans. You can't give up 8 sacks and win, you just can't. You can point fingers every which way, and bow down to Favre if you like, but again - you don't give up 8 sacks and walk away with a W.

Oh, btw I notched my third consecutive loss in fantasy football. I adjusted my roster for bye weeks and racked up a respectable point total, but my opponents defence went nuts for something like 35 fantasy points, and I lost by ten. Sigh.

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Congrats to the Badgers for their 5-0 start!

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Back to baseball. A St. Louis blogger made a boast last week. He bragged about how his Cardinals would beat down the Brewers for their "arrogance" when they went to Missouri to finish the season. Hmm. I'm all for partisanship, no problem there, but since his team was going to the postseason and mine sucked I reckoned his commentary was pretty assholish and unnecessary.

Naturally, in the first game of the series Milwaukee came back from a 6-1 deficit to win, and then swept the rest of the set. Ha-ha.

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Team victories are what matters, not individual numbers, but I have to congratulate both Ryan Braun and Prince Fielder.

Braun finished at .320/32/114 with 20 SB, 39 doubles and 203 hits - only the seventh time in Brewers history a player has cracked the two-century mark.

Prince finished at a staggering .299, with a .412 OBP, 35 doubles, 3(!) triples, 46 home runs. While starting every game of the season he also set a new Brewers single season mark with a whopping 141 RBI's, tying him for first in the NL.

Well done. I'm truly proud of you both.

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I'm also damn happy with Alex Rodriguez, my favorite player in the game. He entered the final game of the season needing two home runs to reach 30 on the year, and seven RBI's to reach 100.A long shot of course, but he reached both goals IN A SINGLE INNNING, setting a new record in the process.

That marks the 12th year in a row he's gone 30/100, tying him all-time with Jimmie Foxx. Keep in mind, he sat out an entire month this year and still reached those goals.

Arod, you are the man.

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My MLB predictions

AL: Yanks over Twins, Angels over Red Sox. Yanks over Angels.

The National League is much more complicated. I'd like to see the Dodgers move on to face New York, but I'm not feeling it. Hmmm.

NL: Phillies over Colorado, Dodgers over the Cardinals (but my gut says St. Louis). Dodgers/Cards over Phillies.

WS: Yanks over Dodgers/Cards

A Stir of Echoes

For all the fuss over Sixth Sense, I felt Stir of Echoes was a better movie, far more intense and involving and just downright scarier. As a matter of fact, Stir of Echoes might just crack my personal 'Ten Favorite Movies'.

Because of that, and a recent Richard Matheson kick, I was eager to read the original novel that inspired the movie.

You can tell it formed the bones of the film. Tom Wallace is hypnotized at a party and develops psychic gifts that lead him to suspect foul play took place in his rented home.

Beyond that the movie veers sharply off the written page, and for good reason. The book reads like a claustrophobic example of '50's Suburbia. A good handful of people shoved into their perfect little world, everyone civil and sweet on the surface and chafing at the bit inside. Ugh. That's no way to live.

Aside from that, I think Matheson made a mistake writing in the first person. I think it weakens the story in this case, divorcing the reader from much of the suspense.

A good book, but I doubt it will be remembered in a a century's time.

My Political Views, according to Facebook

There are a ton of useless, mindless quizzes on Facebook. I have no desire to know what '80's hair band best reflects my personality, or what Nordic god I'd be (Odin - duh). I do admit to a sophomoric desire to take a score of the girly quizzes, just to find out what Disney Princess I'd be and freak out the in-laws.

Anywho, I did enjoy a quiz that tried to pigeonhole where you stand on the political spectrum. It was pretty detailed, and while I have no idea if it was scientifically accurate or not, I was impressed.


My Political Views
I am a right social moderate
Right: 5.08, Libertarian: 0.15

Political Spectrum Quiz


My Foreign Policy Views
Score: 6.43

Political Spectrum Quiz


My Culture War Stance
Score: 5.66

Political Spectrum Quiz


The Political Spectrum Quiz
Daniel is a right social moderate. He is also a neo-con and culturally conservative. Daniel's scores (from 0 to 10):

Economic issues: +5.08 right
Social issues: +0.15 libertarian
Foreign policy: +6.43 neo-con
Cultural identification: +5.66 conservative
Category: political quizzes

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No surprises on the foreign policy front, since I've always been a bit of a hawk. Still, in this day and age 'neo-con' just means not agreeing to take one up the ass every time another country might have its feelings hurt.

My, that did sound neo-con, didn't it? :)

I was a little thrown off by not being judged as more libertarian. But, after reviewing the test, I do favor government intervention in some cases, and my pro-life views don't jibe with the standard Libertarian platform.

All those results, and a pretty little graph too. What more can you ask for in a free Facebook quiz?

And now the content universally despised among blog readers: pictures of the writer's cats

Angelcakes, who sleeps with YaYa most nights.



And Billy, aka William Sonoma, a mainstay of our lives since 1997.

More TV

At the moment I'm quite depressed, and rather bitter with the course of my rotten life. So let's take the focus off the real world and discuss the magic box in the living room again, shall we?

I did forget a few shows when I did my last write-up. My DVR scooped up the The Office unexpectedly, as I thought I'd cancelled that slot. It was funny, but not as strong as the premiere. For the record, I thought the co-manager gig was ridiculous. Forget the 'value' of Jim. Michael has somehow (voodoo?) managed to run one of the most productive branches in the company, and they're going to F with that? And in a recession, with the business downsizing? Nuh-uh.

Lame.

For a few weeks I was hooked on SyFy's Eureka, which follows an everyday sheriff in a town full of government super-geniuses. Cute show, cute premise, but I soon tired of the formula.

Basically, the genius of the week will invent something magical that winds up posing a threat to the town. The crisis will be diverted not by luck or science, but by a seemingly random observation by the sheriff, something that could only be spotted by an Average Joe.

I'll still watch, but I don't count myself as a big fan.



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On frequent rotation in my house: Doctor Who (aka the greatest sci-fi show ever).

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Here's an odd glitch in my makeup. I can watch a game between two teams I've never seen before, sometimes playing a SPORT I've never seen before, and in minutes develop a vocal and partisan loyalty to one team.

Case in point: the championship game for Australian Rules Football, a mix of rugby and soccer I'd never knew existed. Last week I found myself watching it in the middle of the night when I was saddled with a toothache. Ten minutes in the rules of the game began to saturate my brain, and by the end of the match I was screaming when Geelong scored the go-ahead goal to finish off St Kilda.

Well played boys!

New AIC

Listening to Alice In Chain's new album, Black Gives Way to Blue, in stores today!

Fantasy Football Wk 3

Some more good news tonight. After a vigorous contest that saw my team post 104.16 points - good enough to beat all but two teams in my league - I lost the game by a tenth of a point. A tenth of a bleepin' point.

That's right. I lost 104.26 to 104.16.

Bright side: the point total should move me up the standings among the 1-2 losers. Downside: I'm 1-2. Duh.

Everything you wanted to know about Canada but were afraid to ask!

While its intent was to get a laugh, this Rick Mercer clip from Feb 3rd (2009) taught me a lot about the convoluted workings of the Canadian government. From an outsiders perspective, I have to comment on what a whacky system they've put in place. It's worked for them so far, of course, but look at it from a distance and just try to justify it by saying "That's the right and proper way to go about it!".

On a less serious note, if you can ignore the canned laugh track, there are some funny lines, such as describing the Queen as "an elderly lady of German descent who lives in a castle across the ocean."



H/T Canadian Perspective