Two Birthdays and Tons of Interviews

It's birthday time.

Happy Birthday Trey! It's something when you're little brothers start turning 40. Ok, it's not quite 40 yet for Trey, but well, getting close. Here is a picture of my middle brother, Trey, in the command center of his house which he designed and built, along with his wife Amy. I still have a tour to give to you all. Coming soon.

Happy Birthday Aidan! Eight is great!!!!! Shhhhhhhhhhh, want to hear a secret? Bob and I got him this cute kid set of golf clubs. Guess who is most excited? (Answer: Bob) He'll get them tomorrow with Spiderman cupcakes. But don't say anything, and whatever you do, do NOT tell Amanda who can't keep a secret for nothing.

Finally, I would say, if you could only have one, just one source of information, I would say your best bet would be the Fresh Air radio interview show. The host, Terry Gross, is the most amazing interveiwer ever. She can get anyone to say anything. And she does it because she is able to honor the interviewee by understanding his/her material, nomatter if she may agree or not, which you can never tell anyway. Her interests are far and wide -- from pop culture, to politics, to I don't know, pop corn. For example, she's done several good pieces on the Sopranos.

Although, of course, you should never ever have just one source of information (you know, propaganda and spin). BUT if and only if you could have only one -- say you're really busy -- it should be the Fresh Air show. The podcasts are great for on the bus or walking.

Anyway, today I heard parts of these interviews:

Sekou Sundiata
A spoken word poet who died last Friday and I never even heard of him until this interview, and he is amazing. He told the story of how four friends came forward with matching kidneys to donate to him, when he needed a transplant. FOUR! They had dinners together to discuss who would be the actual donor, and then all agreed to be back up donors for eachother, should something go wrong. He spoke a poem about his kidney transplant recovery that I tried to google, but with no luck.

Victor Bout
I never heard of this guy either until today. A Russian arms dealer who arms every one, every faction, every government -- including the U.S. Dept. of Defense. Including Islamic extremists. Including all sides of almost every conflict I've ever heard of: the Congo, Angola, Bosnia, Colombia. And then his planes are used to airlift aid missions following the conflict. (Don't worry, not LWR, we usually never airlift stuff.) He is the most wanted man in the world, next to Al Kaida leaders so of course the interview was not with him actually, but with two journalists who just wrote a book about him.

Birthday pictures coming tomorrow. Cheers!

With love, T